Being Annoyed

I subscribe to a wonderful e-newsletter called the 77% Weekly - Religion Outside the Box, with Rabbi Brian. He has a nice way of making religion not about church and sermons and what you should or shouldn't believe in, but taking our many little character flaws and uncharitable behaviors, and trying to get us all to be aware of them, learn from them and break bad habits, while having faith in the God of our understanding to help us get through tough times. Brian is a smart guy who has a way with words... on Monday he asked his followers to record the time during the day each time we felt annoyed. Here's an email he sent this morning:

A reflection on annoyances...

I am doing the exercise that I sent out on Monday -- Managing Annoyances -- and have two observations that I wanted to share with you.

(No, I'm not going to tell you the number of times that I get annoyed a day as that might lead to competition.)

Here are two things that I've found:

1.      I want to record WHY I am annoyed every time that I get annoyed.  I really want to be able to justify my irk.  

2.    The simple act of taking out my note-pad to record my annoyances short-circuits my usually path of making a snarky comment.  As Victor Frankl said: Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom. 

I hope you are trying this exercise and learning about you -- after all, what is more important to learn?

Rb

Hahaha… I’ve learned two things too! Either it’s a good week (no annoyances on Monday and only 2 yesterday, and I can't remember what the second one was for!) or I am not easily annoyed. 

And I also wanted to write down why I was annoyed. It wasn’t just me throwing a pout… it was my stupid laptop jamming AGAIN and taking over an hour to turn on yesterday morning… while I was supposed to be working! That’s worth it, right? It’s not a character flaw when there’s such a good reason to be annoyed!

On the other hand… I do get annoyed by the actions of others and I know that's something that I need to work on. I can't project my way of thinking onto someone else, and I have no idea why it is they do what they do. For example, say a neighbour burns garbage. That's a bad thing on a couple of levels... first, it really STINKS. Second, it's not good for the environment. Okay, so I get annoyed. It happens for about 1/2 hour a week, it's someone who grew up in an era when everyone did it and didn't realize that it was bad for the environment, and I really adore the person who does it, so wouldn't want to hurt their feelings or strain the relationship by saying anything (although I did write a Fish Heads in our online paper 'the Express' about it... anonymously trying to get the word out without implicating myself). I can't seem to just accept that this happens and not react. I don't know why, and I don't know how to fix it, but trying to figure that out and work on it is a good way to become a better person, I think. Thanks Rabbi Brian!

Scottish Oat Cakes

When Norm and I were in Nova Scotia this summer, we stopped at a pub for supper one evening. The server offered us one of her homemade oat cakes and we both loved them. For some reason, that memory came back to me last night so found a recipe and decided to try it this morning.


The recipe called for buttermilk, which I don't have, but I knew there's a substitute so I looked it up online. One tablespoon of vinegar in the measuring cup and then top it up to one cup with milk. So I did... forgetting for the moment that the recipe only called for 1/4 cup of buttermilk.


Well, obviously it was a sloppy, mushy "dough" so I had to quadruple the rest of the ingredients in order to make it right.


Scottish Oat Cake anyone?

Time to Write

I was woken up this morning at 6:30 by the ferry's fog horn. The only positive is that the MV Balfour is running this week. The Osprey's horn is WAY LOUD and jolts me into a sitting position, eyes wide open, heart pounding... the Balfour is softer, like an iPhone reminder, hahahaha.

It's kinda cool to wake up in the middle of a fog bank. Everything is silent and white. And fog feels different than cloud. You expect it to burn off and leave a sunny day, where the cloud is darker and weighs down on you and hunkers in for the day... or the winter. Oh man... it's only October and I'm already freaking at the imminence of winter.

Just Another Manic Monday...

 I had a busy weekend. Saturday I did a seminar in Trail, Sunday Norm and I spent all day processing apples and pears (and I mean ALL DAY), and today I worked in Nelson. I'm tired and have pain in my neck. I think I need a massage. But things are finally settling. I just need to fix the financials for our new Chapter Treasurer, and prepare our Gaming grant application and then I think I'll take some time off... it'll be December by then and quieter at work. Norm wants to go south, but I'm not sure I do. I hate to leave the chickens to someone else... they are harder to look after in the winter because they need to be shoveled out...

These photos are of me and Norm doing our apple juice. Check out Norm's outfit!

 His yoga pants and a sweatshirt with wool socks!! hahahaha, my Fashionista!

Telus and Modems and Wireless = ARRRGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!

Telus had 25 minute wait times when I called for assistance this afternoon. That's not good. Didn't they get into trouble from the CRTC a few years ago for their crappy service? I left a call-back request and they called back just as we sat down to supper. An hour and 15 minutes later, we thought the problem was solved and I said good-bye to Melissa, connection specialist and pug owner. Then I discovered that, even though mine, Jane's and the iPhone connect, Norm's computer can't. So I tried moving the modem into his office and connecting him with the ethernet cable. Then my wireless stopped working, so I had to bring the modem back (it is for work after all...). Norm's computer is 7 years old and stuffed too full of information to run efficiently, but it should still connect. I'm so exhausted I can't think straight and I hate to leave him without his computer tonight, but I'm not sure I can work through this without some sleep, and tomorrow is such a busy day I will have to get up earlier than usual to fix it before I go to work. Sigh...

Beecause it Had to Bee Done

Today we had to go into the beehive to remove four strips with medicine on them. They protect the bees against some moth or fungus or something. Poor bees. They had their hive all nice and weather-proofed (they put their honeycomb in the cracks to seal it off) and we went in there, let in all the cold air, and ripped apart all their hard work to take these strips out. This is me and Norm in our glamorous bee suits!

This is what's left of some licorice Allsorts that Norm gave the bees. they'll take sugar out of anything, apparently!

The Good, the Bad and the UGLY!!!!

This photo has it all... the sunshine is good, the clouds are bad and the SNOW is UGLY! I'm not ready for snow (whimper, whine). I find that the older I get, the less I can handle winter. I hate to drive (to the point where Norm is going to be taking me to choir practice all winter!) and I hate to shovel and I hate that I have to park at the bottom of our yard and come in and out through the basement. It really isn't pleasant and it's hard to invite people over because there's no parking and they have to come in through the basement and risk getting a ton of snow sliding off the roof just as they arrive. It's hard to get to the chicken coop and our little road is the last to be plowed so sometimes it's even hard to get out of our yard at all...

On the other hand, I love the wood fires that Norm keeps burning all winter, it's really beautiful (especially if the sun is shining, though that's rare) and it gives me an excuse to hang out in my kitchen. I cook soup and sweets and special dinners and I love it.

I took that picture with my iPhone, and for some reason it came out sideways and I had to go back to my photo album and save the pic sideways so that it would be upright here. Weird. I have figured out how to get email and half of my iPod songs are downloaded and I'm figuring out how to surf the web, but I still need to get my old cell phone contacts transferred over.

My New iPhone!!!!

I bought an iPhone today. Now all I have to do is learn how to use it! I did take some pics, and made some notes, and called someone, but I want to get my email set up and my contacts all entered, and take off that stupid autocomplete thing that has NO IDEA what I'm trying to say... I took pictures of the mice in my coop tonight but I haven't figured out how to get them off the phone just yet, so I'll add them later. (and I did... here is some of the mice "hiding" in the chickens' feeding station, and all of a sudden the flash went off!).

 

Norm and I did "Date Day" in town. We had supper at the Outer Clove (garlic-based food) and then I sang at choir practice. Poor group... not only was it oozing off my breath, but I kept burping it up too. And then at one point my boob started singing really loud head banger music. I keep my cell phone there and I guess I somehow not only managed to turn on the internet, but I opened something called Death Note... hahahaha. 

Of Mice and My Leg

This morning I went down to the chicken coop, like I do every day. The first thing that was out of the ordinary was the two dead mice in their yard. Probably Sammy the cat was toying with them till they died and just left them. Then I went into the coop and a whole passel of mice were scurrying around in terror. I never see mice in the coop when it's light, as the chickens will kill and eat them (ewwww). But there they were. Then one went up my pant leg. I've been practicing calm restraint all summer with the bees (don't freak out if one lands on you, or flies near you, or stings you, Norm says... just be calm). So I managed to get the mouse out of my pants without too much panic (although, when I got back in the house I did drop my pants and shake them out, just to be sure!) and then I found another dead mouse, in the chickens' water bucket. Weird. Poor mice. I'm feeding the chickens much less now, and daily instead of once a week, so that the mice won't have a lovely buffet every night. And Norm really needs to fix the hole in the door where they're coming in. In the meantime, this fashion statement means no more mice up my pants.

Weigh Day and some of my Favorite Pictures

Due to a slow collapsing of my resolve this week, the two pounds that I'd lost were back on by this morning - weigh day. Sigh. I had relatives visiting from Calgary and had a big family dinner on Friday, with baked ham, pasta alla carbonara (bacon and eggs with spaghettini), asparagus, salad and tomato/basil bruschetta. (My spell check isn't liking all these Italian words!) We were all so full we never even had the pie I baked.

Saturday my cousin wanted to toast with champagne to our restaurant being back in business and the lawsuit with Nick being over, so we toasted. Then we went to the pub across the road for appies... chicken wings, nachos, dry garlic ribs, cheese poppers and panko shrimp. Plus wine. Then back to Mom and Dad's for more champagne and more wine. I woke up in the night with the taste of vomit in my throat (sorry... too graphic?) and needing Tums. It's been a while since I've suffered from gastric reflux.

Yesterday was turkey dinner at Mom's for Thanksgiving. It was delish and I ate too much. More Tums... So that's why I failed on weigh day. I did however follow through on my promise to walk at least 5 days last week and drink 2 litres of water a day, so I wasn't totally bad. But it's time to get back on the horse. In the meantime, I'd like to share some of my favorite photos...

This is my niece, Lauren. I don't know what the story is or who took the photo (I saved it when I saw it on FB), but I always laugh when I look at it, so it's one of my faves for that reason alone!

Another pic that makes me smile. Remember the Bea I was talking about in my chicken story, the crusty old lady we named a chicken after? Well, this is her after she found an eyebrow pencil among her belongings and decided to doll herself up a bit!

This was taken by a woman in Nelson, whose name escapes me now, but when I remember I'll give her credit... one of the cutest pics I have ever seen! The little girl on the left is my teenager friend Madison.

Is this adorable, or what?! Look at his big, beautiful eyes, the huckleberry juice around his mouth... the daisy in the bucket. I love this pic. This is Noah, my great-nephew.

This is another pic that makes me laugh every time I look at it. Momo, just hangin' around, "hands" behind his back, surveying his kingdom from his little front porch...

Momo and the girls...

This is the best dragonfly picture I've ever taken...  and I've taken lots.

See?

Another photo that always makes me laugh. My sister's husband looking grumpy (although I don't think he was... I just caught him in "a look") and my husband in the background looking goofy happy!

Is this an amazing picture of a calliope hummingbird, or what?!

My neighbour's dog doesn't like to be cold, so she made him some earmuffs to match his coat!!

My niece, Allison, has decided "enough pictures!"

 There's a bee in my orzo!! Well, a B anyhow.

Sophie smiling... the end. For now!

My Cousin LOVED my SOUP

My cousin Kevin and Jen, his fiancee, are visiting for the weekend. Today I made cream of broccoli soup for lunch, not knowing that Kev isn't a vegetable fan. After he went back for seconds, and then thirds, I wrote out the recipe to pass on to Jen if she wants to try and up his dark green leafy vegetable intake!

Chop up an onion, about the same amount of celery and 3 stocks of broccoli (cut off the tough outer part of the stems and chop up the tender insides for the soup too)… fry in a bit of vegetable oil till onions are soft and broccoli is bright green. Add a chopped up clove of garlic or two and sauté for another minute or so.

Add enough water to cover the broccoli and a couple of chicken bouillon cubes. Cook till broccoli is tender. Cool and puree in the blender. Add a couple tablespoons of oil to the empty pot and - when it’s hot - stir in about 2 tablespoons of flour. Stir till it’s well blended and then put the soup back in the pot and add about ¾ cup of grated cheddar cheese and some salt and pepper. I also threw in some cooked rice that I had left over, but it’s not necessary. 

How to Bake a Pie

I totally hate cutting out the circle of foil to put around the pie to keep the edges of the crust from burning (it's close to fingernails on the blackboard, or rubbing styrofoam together... makes my teeth hurt!) and today I figured out an easy multipurpose way to do it!! I didn't want to get apple pie overflow all over my new oven, so I put the pie on a cookie sheet. Then I realized that I also didn't want apple pie overflow all over my cookie sheet either, so I got a piece of tin foil out to go over the cookie sheet and under the pie. Then I folded it up over the edges!

After baking it for 40 minutes, I folded it down to continue protecting my cookie sheet and allow the edges to brown. Unfortunately, that was the end of my brilliance. After the allotted time, my pie was still pale and raw looking and hadn't bubbled up at all, so I figured the foil and cookie sheet were blocking the heat. I removed them and cranked up the heat for an additional 10 minutes of cooking. It overflowed all over my oven. Sigh. But it's pretty!

 So I got to clean my oven for the first time... another not so brilliant move. I'm having a dinner party tonight for 6 and needed to slow cook the ham. Once the oven is locked, it's not opening till IT says it is. Good thing I made an appetizer, as we're not eating before 7 (which is fine by me, and probably my cousin and his fiancee from Calgary, but my poor parents like to eat early). 


I had to buy another meat thermometer the other day as I left my old one in the last roast I cooked. I forgot it was an instant read thermometer and leaving it in the oven caused the plastic cover to melt off the face. I probably won't forget that again, but you'd think they'd have a big reminder right on the thermometer, wouldn't you?

McQ's

Dad took us out for dinner tonight, to McQ's. Man, what a lovely dinner we had. I had too many glasses of wine, which lead to too many pieces of excellent bread and butter... but I controlled myself with my dinner - Mom's Mushroom Salad. DELISH!!! Norm had a burger with avocado and crab in it. Mom had some kind of kissed chicken, and Dad had seafood pasta. Everyone liked what they ate. That Trevor is an amazing cook. And Reg is highly entertaining.

 Then I got home and ate another piece of bread (ciabatta from Save On) with salami. Breakfast was a spoonful of peanut butter and an apple. Lunch was a salad with tuna in it and a smoothie. Coffee with whipping cream x 2 today. I want another piece of ciabatta with salami... SAVE ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (I did it... I had a 2nd piece, with mortadella... tomorrow is another day. I'll eat better then).

I made a unique soup today. Roasted yam and garlic with tomato and fresh sage. It smells good, but I haven't had a bowl yet. Tomorrow I'm making french onion soup. I had to buy a hunk of Gruyere from McQ's tonight as I forgot to buy some yesterday and I need it for my french onion soup.

Balfour is one weird little town. If a person has an idea and another person doesn't like it, then they both hate each other. Are all little towns like this?

Date Day

I just got home from choir practice... we have started our Christmas songs. If it didn't feel so much like winter out there it would be less depressing, but we ended up laughing our heads off at some of the caterwauling that happened tonight, so I'm feeling fine!

I told Norm I didn't want to keep singing because I hate driving in the winter, so he said he'd drive me! We now call Wednesday our date day. We go to town when I'm finished work (3:30, unless I have work related stuff to do in town, then we leave Balfour earlier) and do our banking, grocery shopping, appointments, window shopping, visiting with friends, etc. Then we go for dinner, then choir practice, and home at 9:30. Much better to spend 6 hours in town than 12.5...
I had a hard-boiled egg and rye crisp with my coffee and whipping cream for breakfast.
Homemade roasted cauliflower soup and a smoothie for lunch (freezing the bananas makes for an amazingly creamy and thick smoothie!)
Supper was at a restaurant, so probably not perfect, but it was stir-fry chicken with veggies in a black bean sauce. Very salty. And now I'm having a glass of wine before bed.

The gloomy, cool, rainy night is reminding me that winter is approaching, and something I learned a couple of years ago when suffering with SAD (seasonal affective disorder) was that having lights on in the house all day all winter really helped. Soon we're going to have to fire up the old wood stove. Sigh...

My New Kitchen

Because I can't bore the world (my four fab followers - hahahah, actually only 3 because I followed me too!) with diet talk ALL the time, I decided today I would talk about my new kitchen. First let me say that I've never had anything really brand new before. Big things, that is... of course I have new clothes and shoes (although for the past couple of years I've even been buying those at thrift stores...), but I've never had a new home or car or appliances... till this summer!

My kitchen is the place where I spend the most time, and my kitchen was inconvenient. It was okay... it had everything I needed, but the bottom cupboards had top shelves that were only half as wide as the bottom, and I had to walk all the way around my U-shaped cupboards to open the sliding doors to our porch, and the dishwasher didn't clean the items on the top shelf very well so I always had to rewash them, and we removed most of the upper cupboards when we moved into the house as they blocked the light and view so most of my kitchen was stored in the basement...

So this was the year we hired a local cabinet maker (Jack Zeeman, All-Star Woodworking) to build us what WE wanted... and he did. And it was good. Then we went to Sears in Nelson and Barry helped us choose our appliances. And he did. And it was a bit of a hit and miss with a few things, but eventually we got it all worked out and it was good. (The stove he told me to buy wasn't what I wanted and he found the one stove on Earth that had all the features I'd requested and managed to get it for me, even though it wasn't available through Sears Canada). The delivery was made on the day that we'd asked them to, and except for a broken piece on the fridge, everything was perfect. Getting the dishwasher to work was trial and error, with 3 visits from the technician, but it's good now and we're happy.

This is my old kitchen... nice, bright and really not too bad.

An eerily empty space...

And this is my new kitchen!!! I LOVE MY NEW KITCHEN!!!!!
The opening where there used to be counter is one of my favorite features. It really brightens up the room and makes it seem bigger. Also, because we moved the dishwasher to next to the sink, we weren't able to install a double sink, so we got a single with a drain board. I wish I'd been able to find an old porcelain one, but oh well... stainless steel is fine, and if I do find an old one I'll just buy it!  On the island we installed a tiny vegetable sink and have had some issues finding a faucet that fits it without spraying out onto the counter. We eventually just drilled a hole in the counter top and moved the faucet back a few inches.

 Note that GORGEOUS stove!!!  It's a Whirlpool and had the very specific features I wanted - two ovens, both self-clean, convection in the bottom oven, a warming zone, black top (instead of grey, speckled, or white) and only 4 knobs... the rest is push button and smooth for easier wiping. There is one silly feature - if I want to set the time I have to hold the up or down arrow key as the numbers go by... it takes a while if I have to change several hours, and our power goes off pretty regularly around here, so I have to do it a lot. I also haven't figured out the benefit of the convection. Maybe it's not working right, but it doesn't speed up the cooking process at all.

You can see in the  photo below that my ceiling needs painting. A winter project. It will get done. Also, where there used to be cupboards, there's now a wonderful florescent light bar that totally brightens up my work space, and we raised the back of the counter so you can't see a mess when you sit down to supper!

So, the fridge is a  30" GE Profile french door with the bottom pull-out freezer. I love everything about it - especially how quiet it is compared to my 10 or 20 year old fridges that I've owned before. There's not as much space in the freezer as was in my old top door freezer, but it was always a mess and I tend to keep most of my stuff in the basement now. The only thing I use every day is frozen fruit for my smoothies, so they have to be up here. Then I also have things like ice cubes, a chunk of ginger, an opened can of orange juice concentrate and some food processed basil with oil that I made the other day.

We had some troubles getting the dishwasher to work, but it does now and I love it! We use it almost every day.

And because I promised myself I would track my food every day, here goes:
Breakfast - coffee with whipping cream, small yogurt
Lunch - homemade cream of celery soup, fruit smoothie
Snack - small handful of seeds, nuts and raisins
Supper - pork stir fry and salad (too big a portion, but everything except the white rice was healthy and within my diet limits)
TONS of water today, and a walk through the woods and back along the beach with Jane after work. I might have a little glass of wine tonight, but no snack.

Day 2

Today I started off with a healthy breakfast (and an invite to a Zumba class, which I declined... I really do dislike exercising, but thanks for the offer "Fat Girl in a Skinny World"!). I had a free range, homegrown hard-boiled egg and a rye crisp (carbs and protein... yay me!). But really quite gross... I'm NOT a breakfast person. I do like my morning coffee with whipped cream in it though.

Lunch was thrown together because I had a conference call and then had to catch a bus to work in town. I threw 2 more rye crisps (I suppose they're only healthy in moderation, huh?), a cucumber and a small container of full-fat, full-sugar Activia yogurt... mmmmm!!!!!

I'm dealing with having to use the toilet an awful lot, but I'm getting at least 2 litres of water a day, as per my personal goal. I also walked to the bus stop and back today, so I got my 20 measly minutes of exercise in. It's a start! It's kind of pathetic, but my first exercise of the day is to try and touch my toes. I'm about 6 inches away. I used to be able to lay the palms of my hands flat on the floor... not that long ago. I guess my work is cut out for me.

Supper was one of my old favorite lunches from when I used to do the Curves diet. A big bowl of lettuce, some red onion, a can of tuna and oil/vinegar/salt/pepper dressing. It's just as good as I remembered, especially when I'm starving!!

Snack tonight will be a small piece of cheddar, a small glass of red wine and a small handful of nuts. mmmmm!!!!

My Lifestyle Change... again.

I need to get it into my head that I can't "diet" and then "go off my diet" over and over again. My poor body has been flung back and forth from fat to average 5 times in the past 8 years. I was 220 in 2003, then I lost 60 lbs, then I gained forty, then I lost forty, and now I've gained 40... obviously I like being around 200 lbs... sigh.

SO! This time it has to be different. Not a project that I take on till I get to a certain weight and then go back to my old habits. This time it has to be for life. I do know that I can change my habits and eventually I will get to a healthy weight and activity level, but I'm also realistic. I'm thinking that the best way to do this is to stick to a fairly strict diet for a few weeks, and during that time slowly increase my exercising, then I can lose a bunch right off the bat. After the "diet" part of this plan, I'll work into a comfortable pace to continue losing gradually.

Me in 2002 (and Norm of course):

Me after going to Curves and doing their diet for six months in 2003-2004 (this portrait shot was taken by Glamour Eyes Photography and I scanned it... that's why the coloring is off):

By Christmas 2006 I was back to my 200 lb self...

I promised Norm I would get back to 160 lbs if he shaved off his moustache (and he did),  and eventually I lost the weight:

A bare 8 months after that photo was taken, I was already back to an unhealthy weight, and this morning I was 203.4 on my scales. The pic below was taken on our Maritimes holiday in August.  Sigh...

So, to add insult to injury (self-inflicted, I admit) I have started menopause. Harder to lose weight, grumpier... poor Norm! But I will not cave! Starting today I'm eating smaller portions, no junk food, 2 litres of water a day, more activity (20 minutes/day to start) and I'm going to track my progress. Feel free to join me for the ride!

Today - no breakfast, I know. Bad, bad, bad!
Morning snack - two or three bites of an apple before I dropped it accidentally in the chicken coop and it became their treat.
Lunch - homemade (always) cream of celery soup and a smoothie... I'm a little torn about how to make the smoothies from here on in. I got away from using yogurt but I bought some for a lunch I did for guests and it's really, really good. It's also high milkfat and sugar, so that's what makes it so good. If I bought 1% and unsweetened, I am sure I wouldn't even bother.
Supper - tuna steaks marinated in soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic, ginger and lime juice, and then seared. Also spaghetti squash and salad with toasted nuts and seeds.
Evening snack - a small glass of red wine, a rye crisp cracker and a small piece of brie. mmmmmm!!!! The most decadent thing I've eaten all day!!!!!