Category: Life

A package arrived today from my friends in Sydney, Australia. Two surprises were inside for me. I was thrilled because I didn’t expect this. After all, I have never personally met Bernie & Louise, but we have become friends by sharing our lives on our blogs.

It’s a strange thing, isn’t it, how close you can become to people that you have never met, but read over time.

I started thinking about this as the day went on. You see, as we write our blogs, and share our lives, our sadness’s and our happiness’s, we do develop friendships that are not stifled by the miles that separate us.

What a wonderful thing that is.

You learn so much about about other countries, traditions, cultures and see the most beautiful pictures too! But best of all, you begin to understand that as different as we all are, we share some very basic things.

The love of our families and friends. The enjoyment of the world around us, and the beauty of the nature where we live. By sharing these things we see just how much we are alike.

So if you are a stranger reading me for the first time, welcome!!! I hope you will take some time, read more and check back.

And for those of you who already know me, thanks for being such good and faithful readers.

There are no strangers here, just new friends!

While we were on our cruise we had a cabin steward named, Dennis. Each day Dennis came and cleaned our cabin, made the bed, tidied up, and emptied our trash. In the evenings he came and turned the beds down and put chocolate on our pillows.

All I can say after 5 days back in the real world is: I should have left my laundry on the ship and packed Dennis in my suitcase and brought him home!

Today I started the long process of going through our stuff and getting things back in order.

Now I wasn’t really into doing that, in fact the first hour or so of the morning I sat drinking coffee, watching the snow fall,

and viewing “What Not To Wear” on TLC-TV. Then guilt began to plague me and I got dressed and actually started to put things away.

Do you know how many catalogs came in the mail at the end of November? I had 15 catalogs that came while we were gone, plus all of the magazines that we subscribe to.

After a while I decided that I wanted to make soup with the turkey broth that I’d made yesterday. I thought long and hard about making a healthy soup, so this eventually led me to go out to the grocery store to pick up some fresh carrots and escarole.

While I was out running errands it continued to snow. When I got home, I enjoyed the first of the season snowfall which had collected on our patio table.

The soup began simmering on the stove when my cell phone rang. It was my cousin telling me that my Uncle is not well and will be in the hospital longer then we had first thought. I am so worried about him!

Then the phone rang again and it was Hubby telling me that his skiing partner had fallen and injured his shoulder. (He did, in fact, break his upper arm!)

By the end of the day the temperatures had dipped and black ice is on our driveway. No worries. We have no where to go, and are safe and snug for the night.

Tonight I plan to do nothing more than veg out watching the TV and perhaps read some more of my book.

And if Hubby is very lucky I may turn down the bed and put chocolate on his pillow!

It was back to reality today here in New Hampshire. While Hubby was up early to go and tackle a mountain skiing, I stayed home with the dogs, doing laundry, putting things away and trying to keep Arnie and Greta apart.

I finally decided to put Arnie in his crate at the other end of the house and close the door, so I could have some peace. At noon I put Greta in the guest room and let him out for a few hours then switched them again in the late afternoon. Currently Arnie is out again, but shortly he will be put to bed for the night and Greta will come back out.

We’ve had heavy rain here at the house, while in the mountains where Hubby was skiing they had several inches of snow. He came home shortly after noon with sore legs, and a big smile on his face!

I’m having the hardest time getting back into this whole cooking routine. Last night the pork chops were tough as shoe leather. Tonight, the rice wasn’t quite done. Maybe by Thursday, which is our Thanksgiving, I can pull it all together and make a really good meal.

Wednesday morning is my day of reckoning! I return to Weight Watchers. I’m nervous and worried, but I tell myself that I should just not become too upset. After all, I had a wonderful time and since I have returned home I have been very careful what I have been eating. It will come off, just like it did before.

Still……

Hubby and I were up at 6:30 this morning, dressed and with coffee in hand made our way down town to the polling station to vote. When we arrived there was already a line of people standing outside waiting to get in.

Promptly at 7 AM they opened the doors and things went very quickly after that. I voted and so did Hubby and then we placed our ballots in the ballot box and came back home for breakfast.

I raced out at 8:45 for Bible Study and then was back home by 10:30 with the mail in hand.

Hubby was still working on screening the porch windows, painting and also re-screening the door to the green house. This occupied almost his entire day. He did manage to get my garden soil turned for next year with fresh fertilizer.

Meanwhile I decided to wash down all my counter tops with bleach. This took me from just after lunch until dinner. I have a lot of counter tops in this house and they all needed to be cleared and washed and reorganized!

Kimmy and Sarah came over after school and I shared a cup of tea with them until it started getting late and then sent them on their way.

I made dinner, fed the dogs and now at nearly 7 PM I am ready to just put on my pajamas and slippers and read.

I’m tired of all the political speculation and all the “spin talk”. I just want it to be over, so I sure am looking forward to tomorrow morning.

I also have Weight Watchers to go to and I’m hoping that I once again have done well. I sure have been working hard on that.

Thursday was one of those days where we took care of all the essentials. You know, we shopped for groceries, picked up some hardware at a Home Depot, and after making lunch Hubby and I settled in to do our various chores.

He’s working on the screens for our porch, sanding, priming, painting, and re-screening.

Meanwhile, I paid bills, walked the dogs, put the groceries away, made some doctor’s appointments for me and for Anneliese and then later in the day prepared our dinner.

Now I had thought that dinner would be something usual like chicken, until we got to our grocery store and found an in store special for Lobster. Beautiful yummy Maine Lobster for $3.99 a pound!

Now after the last Lobster meal, I wasn’t all that sure I wanted to chance it, but how often have I had a bad Lobster in my life? Once. So I sidled up to the fish counter and ordered two – one and a half pound Lobsters.

I am happy to report that the Lobsters were excellent!

I also worked on sorting through my closet deciding what to take on our cruise. After all its just 23 days and counting….

I didn’t think it was possible. You go to the store, you find just the right lobsters and immediately your mind kicks in and you begin dreaming of the sweet lobster, dripping in butter (or in my case fat free, cholesterol free margarine) as it just melts away in your mouth.

Heaven!!!

Yes, when I saw Hubby coming toward me today with a bag containing two twitching lobsters, my heart skipped a beat.

Aside from dark chocolate, my favorite food is lobster. Since lobster is point friendly, I can enjoy that where I can’t enjoy dark chocolate. You see eating dark chocolate brings about more guilt to me, than a Catholic school girl getting caught smoking by the nuns at lunchtime, could possibly feel!

And I’m not even Catholic!!!

Anyway, I cooked the two lobsters up and we sat down. Hubby started to eat his and we found that his was a hard shell lobster that had somehow forgotten to shed it’s shell last summer, so all the meat was jammed in there and had gotten dry, tough and woody! Hubby tried to eat it, but it was just plain distasteful!

Bad lobster!

Since I love Hubby more than anything, I shared my perfect lobster with him. He enjoyed a claw and leg, and half of the tail, but basically, the dinner was a bust!

So what did we do with the woody tail that Hubby simply couldn’t eat?

Well we discovered that Fritz loves lobster.

Who’d a thought!

I dutifully went to Weight Watchers today, but I knew before I even went, that it was not going to be a good week, and it wasn’t. I didn’t gain weight. I just didn’t lose anything. So close to my goal…..and yet…..so far!

Totally unfair!!!

After class I trekked over to my General Practitioner’s Office to get the lab slips for my blood work tomorrow. I arrived and found that they’d moved. No one told me. I read the directions on the door and off I went. It didn’t take me long and before long I’d found the new office.

Truly amazing since my sense of direction is not always the best!

As I drove home along the back roads of New Hampshire I appreciated the colorful trees and clear air. The humidity is down and the visibility is wonderful. I could see the mountains so well with all their painted brightness.

It was really splendid!

Since I was full of Autumn wonder, I arrived home in a fairly good mood, despite the fact that I was a bit depressed about Weight Watchers, and decided to wash floors. With 4 dogs and a summer of nothing but terrible wet weather, I would wash the floor and it would immediately get dirty. I am thinking that I may actually keep that wonderful lemon scent on the floors for a few days, as we have no rain forecast!

I love clean floors!

My sister and her husband are coming up in a week for a visit and to celebrate my birthday with me just a little early. That will be so nice. We’re not sure yet if we will do a ride on the Hobo Railroad or the Mount Washington Cruise ship, but I’m thinking a train ride would be fun!

It’ll be so nice to spend time with Mel & Ron!