Listen !

Can you hear that ? The ever so slow grinding, grating, erosion of my middle age.  Huh... today is one of those days where I am unwillingly forced to view my somewhat static life through the eyes of a younger, more energetic, hell or high water person in my life. Mainly my hair stylist.

I know what you're thinking... she goes to a stylist....for that hair do....hahahahha  Yes I do, but I pretty much hold her at gun point to not do any of the cutting edge stuff she likes and just give me a basic utilitarian hair cut...after all, where do I go that I need to look cutting edge.   There are some days when I even forget to run a brush through my hair until bed time...yikes !!!!

Today Amy, my stylist, was chattering away about her family moving to the big house on their dairy farm since she and her hubby and small children are out growing the small bungalow they currently live in, her in-laws will be placing a new modular home on a different parcel of land. So she is filled with the designing bug, and she has quite a flare for it....her little hair studio is fixed up so nice, kind of a down home cottage feel with hand made quilts, that she made with her mom, and folk art and such about the place. very cosey...we were talking about base boards today...how much she dislikes store bought trim boards...and wanted to salvage old barn board for trim wood....but I pointed out the draw backs to that...the rough wood being hard to clean...with kids especially... so I suggested a 1 x 6 inch spruce board...with a piece of 1/4 round on top giving the base board a nice rounded top....very victorian...with deep baseboards...  she loved the idea...and wrote it down...but it was while she was telling me all the different things she wants to do to the place that I was struck by how stagnant my life has become. WHAT WAS I LOOKING FORWARD TO.  not much, sadly.   Oh well there is one thing I am looking forward to....snow...yes that's right...snow...because once it snows I don't have to do any more field work, gardening or lawn care....That makes me sound so lazy.... and I suppose in a way I have become lazy.  If lazy means that working so hard makes me hurt in places I didn't know I could hurt. I ache from head to toe...and in some spots it feels like I was hit by a truck...a big truck.

The new diabetic med I am on is expensive but seems to be working. That's good. I feel better about the numbers now...before it seemed like I was trying so hard to eat all the right things only to have the numbers be out of whack..now they are where I would expect them to be...so bravo Dr. Jamal.

We had a short but very nice visit with Sue last week, she brought a box of peaches....hmmmmmm they were delicious... I canned some and we are still enjoying one on our cereal each morning.  I can only eat a half a one though since it sends my sugar level through the roof.  I must say that Sue looked fabulous.... and she seems really happy, so I am very glad... I am mentally making plans to visit her and enjoy the resort like atmosphere of her new digs.

We finally got our new satellite receiver hooked up and not a moment too soon...both Robert and I were having withdrawal from TV.  There is only one glitch...the new receiver will not send the signal to the other TV's in the house like the old one did....so Robert can't watch News in bed at night... I rather like that...but him, not so much....hahahaa so we will be buying an RF modulator so that the other TV's will get a signal as well.  Seems like Shaw wants you to have a different receiver for each TV at $6.00 per receiver per month...plus the main one...

Yesterday I helped Robert bring three calves home from pasture that were missed the day before when we weaned...then made lunch, picked a 2 gallon pail of green beans, and Ice cream pail of peas, a pail of carrots and a 3 gallon pail of ripe tomatoes...as well as dug one hill of potatoes for supper..then I snapped the beans and shelled the peas...blanched and froze them...I skinned and froze the tomatoes...and canned the box of peaches Sue had brought. I then made egg salad for todays lunch and collapsed on the couch at 10 pm to watch a bit of news before bed. Today already I have been for a hair cut, and we are going to wean a small group of cows with heifer calves. 25 calves to bring home along with one bull.  We weaned on Sunday the bigger bunch of calves...boy was it hot out that day...we hauled 7  loads home in the stock trailer and then had lunch and went back out to run them all over the scale for a weaning weight. I also want to mow my lawn today but it looks like it wants to rain so I may not get around to that. 

I have an appointment in the city on thursday for an eye test...one of the drugs I am taking can build up in the layers of the retina and cause you to go blind...so they check every six months for signs of that happening...so far I have been lucky...

Well I should go and fire up the barbecue, I guess I will throw a couple of hot dogs on and give Robert one of his favorite lunches...hot dogs with grilled onions... and beans on toast...it must be a british thing...

Yikes

Holy shit, on Saturday night just after we got home from the field and a day of baling hay, a storm rolled in, we had just gotten into bed and were watching the news when the lightening started...we shut off the TV and Satelite.  When bam, a blue flash and boom right outside our bedroom window....one of the 40 ft pine and tamarak trees along the east side of our house was struck by lightening....there were more than a 8 strikes very very close to our house....it shook the house so much that the next morning I had to go around and straighten all the pictures hanging on the walls. They were all really out of kilter. No damage to the house, thank god...but the tree lost a lot of bark...it was shredded right off one side of the tree, into thin little strips like spaghetti...and scattered far and wide over the yard. I found some of it as far away as a hundred feet, Robert thinks most of the debris is still on the roof of the house or in the rain gutter.  We think the strike just grazed the tree on its way downward to the ground....time will tell whether the tree suffered enough damage to die...lightening is wierd, in that it can appear to have suffered little damage but then next year, will not be alive...  this row of trees is exactly 12 feet from the house. 





sizzled right down the side



shredded bark

The power was off for most of the night...and we sustained a little damage due to hail all from the same storm.  Lucky us...no really, that same storm, by the time it travelled 30 miles...dumped more than two inches of rain and very bad hail on the town of Barrhead....businesses downtown were flooded from the deluge...and some guys crops were totally wiped out...

Besides the damage to the tree we lost our satelite receiver....they are super sensitive to lightening and I guess this strike was just too close...so we are waiting for Shaw to send us a new one....which means a whole week with out any TV....and no highspeed internet to watch our shows on....whaaaaaaaa

I rely very heavily on TV for entertainment and company....it's gonna be a long week.....day one seems to be dragging on forever....and of course we are not working due to the rain...so I have bags of time to kill.....Romance novels here I come.  Yipee....

Holey Moley

We are getting about three good days in a row and then more rain, lucky us...Robert is starting to pull, his already sparse hair, out.
But we are slowly whittling away at the work. If the weather holds its current pattern we could be done baling by late Sunday. That would be bloody awesome.

Yesterday, the John Deere dealer brought a potential buyer out to our farm to view the borrowed tractor...the one they lent us until our new one comes. I have fallen in equipment love with this loaner tractor.  It is ten years old and I adore it....so much so, that I was embarrassingly petulant yesterday....I wanted  to pull a rabbit out of a hat and have some miracle  happen that would enable us to purchase it too, along with the new one...but I am fresh out of Rabbits at this time, so sad.  It looks like the guy really liked the tractor...and if he buys it, John Deere will have to bring us a second loaner until ours is here.

I picked a ton of veggies from the garden yesterday...new potatoes, carrots, beans, a basket of tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce and 2 gallons of peas...we ate a bit of spaghetti and a load of veggies for dinner...

I cannot not believe how late in the season it is already. it seems like summer just got here but already the leaves are turning and I see autumn plants blooming along the road.  sigh......    soon the snow will be back...less work mind you but we are stuck at home looking after cattle then...Oh well, the price i pay for marrying another farmer...

My latest painting is nearly finished.. I think it turned out awesome, keep your eyes peeled for a photo soon. I just need two more good days to work on it and voila` .

No Surprise

It is no Surprise to me that the novelty of the new equipment has wore off and I am tired of cutting and baling hay.  I have noticed a direct correlation with the purchase of this new, ridiculously expensive equipment and the hours of labour I am required to do. 

Now, I am not a lazy person, anyone who knows me and has seen my yard and house knows that I do not shirk work...but a certain someone in my life seems to have decided that since the Doctors have not labeled my illness with a specific name, that I am not that sick...so I can pull my weight again...

Robert greasing the machine I will be running that day.

On any given day, I can be required to run four or five different pieces of equipment, a typical day can encompass 8 -10 hrs of driving tractor, broken only by the time it takes me to run to the house and make lunch and supper and take it back to the field.

I feel guilty if I complain...but by the end of this last week I was so exhausted I felt like crying...it got to the point where I was praying it would storm so that I could have a day off.  I am determined not to whine to him about it...he must be aware of how much he is requiring of me...and doesn't care...I mean what else can I think.... two years ago he wouldn't let me do a damned thing but read and paint pictures... Now I have no time for either...it's like I was never sick...I only wish my body felt the same way.

small but perfectly formed

Last week we finally took the plunge and bought our first barbecue...we have been tire kicking for a few years...and finally found just what we were looking for....it took me 3 hours to put it together but we ate the best hot dogs ever that night off the barbie....

My garden is producing ripe tomatoes now like crazy and I am picking a head of cabbage this morning for cole slaw.  We ate new potatoes yesterday for the first time...hmmmmmmmm were they good along with oven baked chicken breast and a little dish I like to call my fresh corn hash, which is just fresh stir fried zucchini, onion and baby carrots with kerneled corn and fresh tomatoes, it is very very good.

I finished painting my fake windows, and now am just waiting for a bit of spare time so that Robert can help me mount them on the garage wall. I think they are going to look pretty good. At least them leaning on the wall and my viewing them from the end of the drive way, makes me think they will.



poor kitty, his leg all chewed up

 Our little cat "TROUBLE" is being bullied by a black female barn cat.  His legs are all chewed up from her biting him and Robert has hinted that perhaps she needs to be reminded of her near death experience of last month...in which I came this close to shooting her for killing the kittens of another barn cat. Honestly I do not know what is the matter with her...but all the progeny from that old black and white tom cat are unnaturally mean and cruel to other cats. She is the last one remaining...but if Rob has anything to say about it, not for long.

Big Doctors appointment tomorrow...Rheumatologist in the city.

I am excitedly waiting for a visit from my sister this month...it will be so lovely to see her.  And happy to report that Jen is well, after her surgery.

I can't end this with out telling you that I finally heard from my son...for those of you who are out of the loop, I hadn't heard from his since last November when he came to borrow $400. for a job safety course... and then a few days later came by to get a box of Beef from us. Both visits I told him about his cousin Jen coming to visit and her sister Kim from Jasper coming for one day and that I was making a big dinner and wanted him to come so he could see his cousins, whom he hadn't seen for 13 years. He said sure he would come...but on the day...he never showed up, I must have phoned 20 times but he never returned my calls....ever...for nine whole months...and then last week he calls...to tell me that he was going to the hospital for a laproscopy for a suspected stomach ulcer and had had to take so much time off work being sick that he didn't know how he was going to pay his  mortgage payment this month.

To say I was disappointed would be an understatement, but no really, because I am beyond that at this point where he is concerned...sadly it no more than what I expected.  The only time he ever contacts me is when his life is in crisis.  this time he didn't come right out and ask for me to make his payment, but it was more than hinted at.  I even had Robert listen to the message in case I was being paranoid...but no, it was definitely a holding his hand out, message.

I called back, had to leave a voice mail of course, that is what I always have to do....99% of the time he never returns my calls...and then out of the blue, he wants money... so I left a message, saying I was sorry he hadn't been feeling well, and of course I was concerned as to what the doctors would find..could he please keep me informed...and then hung up....I chose to not mention the mortgage payment dilemma...

He called back a couple of days later while I was outside, Robert talked with him on the phone...but we had discussed the mortgage payment thing and decided we were going to ignore the hint. So that is what we did...and since then we have not heard a word from him.... I have left messages asking him about what the doctors said..but he hasn't answered back, of course.

Oh Please !

I mean really people...what are  you thinking...

How many of you really think the USA is going to default on their loans.  Oh right...... they are just being diva's.... make the world remember just how important our little old country is....(said with a southern drawl)  But I predict the writing is on the wall for Barack Obama....sadly...I don't think he will get a second term as president...and God knows I hope I am wrong...because I think he is terrific...and given a presidency without a total market crash and wars to hell will have it...I think  he would have done a fantastic job for the country.  But much to every ones chagrin, he is not a miracle worker.

On the subject of Norway, well what can one say....there should be a special law, internationally, for the perpetrators of mass murder ...instant death penalty...by the most heinous, painful, humiliating method...no pleading insanity, only the most rudimentary judicial course and then bam....so it's that or a life imprisonment in solitaire in a Turkish prison where the accommodations are less than rustic...no Tv, no prisoner rights, nothing but basic food, a pail to crap in and four gray walls, with the occasional gang rape thrown in for good behavior....  Sounds pretty blood thirsty, but Christ I don't know about the rest of you but I am tired of hearing about shit like that happening...

Take for instance the young Burnaby woman viciously attacked by her axe yielding husband...God damn it but shit like that makes me furious....certain cultures that move to Canada to have  a better life and get away, supposedly, from all the violence and blood shed in their native countries and what do they do, but bring all the same shit and horror here... WE USED TO HAVE A FAIRLY PEACEFUL, UNEVENTFUL Country, until about 20 years ago...and it just kind of snuck up on us this violence, gang killings, honour killings and shit....bombings, violent protests, and mob mentality, where the hell did that come from....

We all know where it comes from, but it wouldn't be Politically correct to say it... I sometimes am driven to wishing that they would all go back where they come from and take the crime with them. THERE, I SAID IT OUT LOUD. so sue me...

Well, in a complete turnabout, summer is in full swing...haying is progressing as best it can between rain showers... I feel like I have spent a lifetime in the cab of this new tractor...since it is easier to drive, Robert feels I can put in a lot more time now.....

I am working on a lovely painting of a photo a friend of Jens took of a Blue Heron on a beaver house....and Robert is saying it is my best yet....we'll see, there's still time for me to fuck it up...hahahaha  But it amazes me how the time flies when I start painting...I get into the zone, my mind goes blank of all worries and I am not kidding but my blood sugar goes way down....I love to paint and could do it all day, everyday...too bad I can't make a living at it...I would have an argument for not farming any more...hahahahaha

Well gotta go, I'm making a pot of brown rice in my new rice cooker and a chicken zucchini stir fry...zucchini, baby carrots, onion, snap peas, and corn stir fried with chicken breast and a light sesame sauce hmmmmm just made myself hungry...  Have a great day all.

Oh ya, had this storm go over yesterday with the most vivid rainbow afterwards showing so many violets bands...

Blah, Blah, Blah

Sunday today and I am feeling pretty lazy.  I spent the whole of yesterday, pouring rain outside, baking up a storm while the weather was cool. Managed to bake three different cakes x 2 of each...a sourcream walnut coffee cake, a really nice pumpkin bar with cream cheese icing and a to die for scrumpscous upside down apricot cake , all from the splenda cook book. after they were all on the counter cooling I put together two big pots of Beef and black bean soup....one of our all time fav's.... with homegrown tomatoes, celery, onion and four kinds of beans, black beans, kidney beans, lima beans and white beans. This soup is full of fibre and yummy goodness. I freeze all the cakes and the soup so that we have quick good food when we come in from the field.  Besides the cake and the gallons of soup, I made baked spaghetti with meat sauce for supper and there was enough left over for three more meals for us both...so we froze that as well...

Today I made a roast chicken with sausage stuffing, mashed potatoes and broccoli, baked apple yams  and beets.  We will eat that again tomorrow and then I make up a few TV dinners for the freezer and turn the rest into thick hearty chicken soup.....hmmmmmmm

I got my hair cut on thursday...quite short...and for now I am wearing it all spikey looking...it is a nice change from the past few years hair cut I have been sporting...I liked that one very much but felt I needed a small change for the hot summer...hahahahaha  My friends looked at me on friday like I had lost my mind....but hey, it's just hair..it grows back...

the weather today is fairly warm at 24 and windy...if it holds in this pattern we will be baling more hay in the next couple of days. grrrrr

I got the tin on my little shed project with R's help and I t hink  it looks great. now I just need to install my wooden dowel rods and I can hang up all my garden hoses and such....no more having to lug them all the way back to the far garden shed...no small feat with my gimpy ankle. My fake windows are the last project to tackle and I will get to them in a day or so...it has been so humid that I wasn't able to paint the final coat...

I just ordered three kick ass beach towels from general mills cereal offer....last month the offer on the box of cereal was a free frozen yogurt or ice cream worth $5.00... so we tried some great walnut caramel brownie frozen yogurt...hmmmmm it was delicious, so we redeemed the rest of our coupons and now have a years supply of frozen yogurt...which is half the fat of ice cream..I love freebies...and it's healthy...gotta love that.

Thoughts go out to Jen, surgery tomorrow and I will be thinking of her all day.

Gotta go warm up some soup for supper..maybe homemade biscuits  with cheddar cheese in them....hmmmm   i'm all about food the past few days.

Too bad about amy winehouse. 

new Photos



me, of course



my favorite planter



my favorite man



my new shed



A cool perspective



Ruby King (hen and chicks)