Category Archives: My failing sanity

More magical journeys

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Strange things are happening in the neighbourhood. There was a Home Depot cart in my back alley. It’s not uncommon to see carts from Walmart and Co-Op, both of which are within walking distance, but the nearest Home Depot is at least five kilometers away. Did someone take a cart and walk all the way to my back alley with it, before abandoning it to its fate? How else would it have gotten here? What was its journey, what was it carrying? These are questions that I am seriously wondering.

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Note the Budweiser can at its wheel. I suspect there are more cans in its basket, but I didn’t actually get out of the car to investigate.

The cart was there for a few days, then it moved to someone’s front lawn. Currently it’s residing on a nearby boulevard. Just across from its original position, a different cart appeared. I think it’s from Canadian Tire. The carts are multiplying.

Maybe I find myself somewhat obsessed with the journey of these carts because of my own irritation about people not returning carts to the proper corral. Obviously these carts were used for different purposes, and that’s fine. But as we all know, the people who leave their carts in random parking spaces, or worse, mere feet away from the corral, are the worst people in the world. Okay, maybe not the worst. Maybe lazy is a better word. Or inconsiderate of other people. Or making the store employees’ lives that much worse, when the corral is RIGHT THERE JUST PUT IT AWAY FOR THE LOVE OF GOD. Tomato, to-mah-to.

Anyway, enough about the fascinating journey of the Home Depot cart and its new friend or possibly rival, the Canadian Tire cart.

I just thought of something. Maybe the Home Depot cart moved because of a turf war. Maybe this is a Sharks/ Jets kind of thing. Like this, but with carts.

Speaking of journeys, I have great news for those of you following along with my Kondo journey. The charity that was supposed to pick up my donations but didn’t called back and rescheduled. Hooray! Mark and my husband lugged all the bags back out onto the step early Friday morning, to the interest of a new addition to the neighbourhood: a skunk. Eeek! Fortunately the skunk scurried down the street and – possibly unfortunately – hid underneath a neighbour’s van. This neighbour has two noisy dogs, and I imagined the worst, but so far things have been non-stinky. Possibly Pepe le Pew found his way to an uninhabited-by-pets yard to stay in.

My life lately has been yoga, yoga, yoga, which is wonderful. Things are busy and hectic in the best way possible. We went to an information and Meet the Teacher night at the junior high, and the principal mentioned the active Parent Association, and the desperate need for a Treasurer, and my husband gave me a look that needed no verbal interpretation. I did NOT attend the subsequent meeting because we all know how that would have ended, and I really just can’t anymore.

We are having a real Calgary fall, which means that yesterday the dog park looked like this:

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Whereas today is freezing cold and rainy. I have brought out my warm, lined fall coat and I dub today’s Clothing Theme to be Sith.

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Come to the Dark Side! We have cookies.

New (School) Year, New Me

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I have that autumnal Back To School Energy right now, that feeling that it’s A New Year, And A New You, and I’m brimming with goals and things to do and filling my days up with Productive Activities And Work-Related Things. Either it’s a coping mechanism for the house being dead quiet all day and my birds flying the nest, or it’s just a natural part of my yearly cycle; whichever it is, it’s a good feeling to Cross Things Off The Lists.

I am almost done Kondo-ing the entire house! I only have the kids’ schoolwork and artwork bins to take care of – things that probably should wait until AFTER the first week of school, because EMOTIONS – and I probably should take care of the storage room filled with old paint cans and, apparently, shoe boxes. Well, the paint cans can go to the firehall, and I think we can all agree that this will be a very pleasant task indeed, although not as pleasant as when the kids were small and the firefighters would kindly let them sit in the truck and give them fire safety colouring books. There’s a big, big difference in being an early-thirties mom with two adorable little boys, and being a forty-one year old woman lugging paint cans by herself. I mean, they probably aren’t going to give me the tour or let me sit in the truck.

That reminds me, I really should clean out the schoolwork bins sooner rather than later, because when Jake was in preschool I chaperoned the field trip to the firehall. I rarely volunteered for field trips, and so that probably indicates my feelings about the firehall. Anyway, the firefighters challenged two of the parents to a race, to see who could put on the firefighter’s outfit the fastest. Is it called an outfit? I don’t know. You know what I mean – the boots, overall pants, coat, helmet and everything. I was chosen to be one of those parents. Somewhere in one of those bins is a photo the preschool teacher sent me, of me in the firefighter outfit with Jake.

I should probably mention that I won the race. It was against the lone father who decided to chaperone. IN YOUR FACE, STEVE.

(His name may or may not have been Steve. It’s actually killing me that I can’t remember his name.)

My husband has been pretty busy these days, lots of regular stuff plus doing little things around the house like repainting the bathroom after filling giant holes in the wall. The contractors installed towel racks but didn’t use wall studs, and after four years one finally gave way, leaving gaping holes in the drywall. Luckily my husband is a handy kind of guy, but it still took a lot of work and a couple of trips to Rona and Home Depot to get new towel hooks. All of which is to say, I decided that I would take the car in to get an oil change, which is something – BLUE JOB – that he would normally do.

I know, I know, it’s totally retro of me to refer to vehicle maintenance as a Blue Job, but that’s the way it is in this house. I am totally cool with it.

Some of you may remember what happened the last time I took the car for an oil change, but this time, I thought, would be different. For one thing, there’s no nail bar at this dealership. For another, this dealership doesn’t require appointments but instead prides itself on quick oil changes. Or, express lubes.

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It sounds so dirty!

Anyway, my husband had informed me that there would be no charge, something about included with extended warranty, blah blah blah car stuff blah blah. When I got there, I confirmed this with the fellow who checked me in, and after Looking It Up In The System, he said that indeed, there would be no charge. Yay! I went to the waiting room to stare at the tropical fish tank, read Do Your OM Thing, and admire the chutzpah of a woman wearing the absolutely most colourful floor-length caftan I had ever seen.

You can probably guess the punchline here. When the lady at the service desk called me over, she charged me, and informed me that our two remaining free oil changes would not be free after all, for reasons which remain mysterious. I never know what to do in situations like this. I should probably be more assertive, and squeaky-wheel-ish, but I guess I’m not. When it comes to vehicle maintenance, I have absolutely no confidence in my ability to deal with things. I would have called my husband at work, but I knew he was on a conference call. So I paid it, went home, and texted my husband.

A livid phone call to the service manager, which I was not party to, has resulted in the admittance that the woman at the counter had made a mistake, a credit at the dealership, and much annoyance on my part. Why. WHY does dealing with vehicle stuff have to be so fraught for me? Why do I have no confidence in myself when it comes to cars? When am I going to figure out how to open the hood of my minivan? These are all very good questions and perhaps, in my quest for Kondo-ing everything, New Year, New Me, and reorganizing my life, I should work on this. Personal growth, the automobile edition.

All I do is win, win, win, no matter what.

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The sun has come out! The sun has come out! It was a wee bit too late to save our Sunday afternoon barbeque for fourteen people, but better late than never. On Sunday my husband and I looked at the sky with nervous hope; about twenty minutes before our guests arrived, the sky turned black, the wind turned icy, and the rain started pouring and didn’t stop. That was a bit disappointing but I shall repeat: the sun has come out!

The boys are at karate camp this week, so I’m extra glad for the sunny weather. I can’t imagine how miserable the camp would be if the weather had been what it was like last week. Mind you, last year there was one day that was twelve degrees and raining and they still went swimming at the heated outdoor pool so I guess the show must go on. Swimming isn’t happening this year, though, as was evident when we pulled into the parking lot and saw a giant digger and dump truck, and where the pool had been previously was merely a pile of rubble. There’s always next year! In any case, if yesterday is any indication, they will be having an EPIC week full of karate and water fights and obstacle courses.

I am austerely taking this opportunity to get a lot of work done. It’s amazing how much one can get done without having near-constant conversations about The Simpsons, Overwatch, and – alarmingly – Grand Theft Auto. Mom, there’s a guy on GTA who does yoga! Ah, yes, thanks for letting me know about the criminals and how they spend their time when they are not stealing cars or shooting people.

Grand Theft Auto is just one in a string of examples of things I never thought I would allow, but here we are. Although “allow” is probably the wrong word for it; it’s more like I was railroaded into this “decision.”

The other day I bought a pair of athletic socks, and this is actually a much bigger deal than it appears. I hate, hate, hate spending money on socks, for some reason, but I especially hate spending money on athletic socks. I don’t know why. I don’t know what my issue is but it probably would take a team of therapists to get things straight. In any case, I realized that the two pairs of athletic socks that I own are on their last legs (feet?). One pair I purchased for spin class, last attended in 2001, and the other pair I purchased for golf. My last golf game was somewhere in the first half of 2003.

I probably needed a new pair of socks, is what I’m trying to get at.

We all know my love of all things lululemon, and so I purchased a pair of socks from there. They are pink, to match my trainers, and they have all kinds of claims like “micro-cushioning” and “sweat-wicking” and plus did I mention they are pink? Anyway, they were a bit pricey but I figured that by the time I bought a new pair, somewhere in the vicinity of 2030, I would have gotten my money’s worth from them. Per-unit usage and cost-benefit analysis and all that. “Micro-cushioning” isn’t cheap, you know.

Anyway, I took the socks from the packaging and I was faced with one of lululemon’s signature inspirational sayings. Except that it was less inspirational, and more depressing. It said that women, on average, walk five kilometers more than men. FIVE KILOMETERS. I thought of all the women in the world, walking for hours to find clean water and whatnot, and I thought that was probably the least inspirational thing I could have read on my sock packaging. Because honestly? I’m not sure that Fitbit-wearing women in North America are walking five kilometers more than their male counterparts. I mean, I haven’t seen the data or anything, but that doesn’t seem credible, which makes the “on average” thing that much more depressing.

This is why I don’t have a Fitbit. Well, not exactly, it’s not because I would become depressed thinking about the plight of women in disadvantaged situations, although every time I think about it I do. The real reason I don’t have a Fitbit is because I would turn into David Sedaris. I have somewhat of a highly competitive nature and would probably spend my days trying to kill it on the Fitbit. All work, childcare, and sanity would go out the window as I would spend my days walking briskly to get more steps. This is the reason that my husband will no longer play Monopoly with me, and also the reason I secretly fumed at my sister-in-law’s brother for winning Shopkins Bingo at my niece’s birthday party. It’s bad enough that I have a step counter on my phone; if I had a Fitbit I’d probably railroad my husband into getting one too, and then see if I could walk five kilometers more than him on a daily basis. Actually, I’d probably make it six for good measure and to get back at him for the Grand Theft Auto thing.

Well, it’s better for my marriage, sanity, and everything else to not have a Fitbit, and meanwhile, I am enjoying my new socks very much. If I was walking an extra five (or six) kilometers a day, I’d probably have to spring for another pair, and that is just a bridge too far.

The Miracle of Flight

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I’m on the internet a fair amount, mostly because of work and writing related obligations, but also for the social aspect. I love all the photos of kids, puppies, vacations, food, and silly things, I love funny memes, I love updates about people’s lives. But with the internet comes a flip side, and although I should be deadened to it by now, I am not.

Yesterday I was flipping through Facebook and I noticed an article that had been shared a few times. I noticed, in particular, on one friend’s page that the aforementioned article had over thirty comments on it and – cue the ominous, Jaws-theme-song-type-music – I clicked on it.

I know what you’re thinking. Nicole! What’s wrong with you? Have you never been on the internet before? DON’T READ THE COMMENTS. I know. I know. I’m disappointed in myself as well.

The article in question was this one, that listed all the reasons people shouldn’t recline their seats on airplanes. The comments were mixed between I am going to recline my seat whether you like it or not, you whiny baby, deal with it and Everyone who reclines their seat is an inconsiderate asshole, every single one of them, reclining seats should be BANNED. There was really no middle ground; after all, this is an internet argument, and there is no room for middle ground here. Pick a side, people, there is no room on the fence.

This is where I out myself as the Switzerland in this airplane-reclining-seat-mortal-combat. I fly fairly often, and I don’t recline my seat, unless I am on a red eye, and then I definitely do, because I’ve taken Gravol within an inch of my life and will sleep and drool all over myself for the duration and I like to be reclined for that. Generally speaking, though, I sit up straight and I use the flight time the way God intended: to read, watch a crappy movie, or to stare blankly at the seat back for hours like David Putty on Seinfeld. I will also eat lots of free cookies and pretzels, but that’s about it.

Nor do I care if the seat in front of me is reclined. I’m fairly tall but I’m not a big person, and a reclined seat in front of me does not affect my airline experience in any major way. Sure, there might be slightly less room for my free cookies and pretzels on my tray, but I don’t really care. This is not the era of The Glory Days Of Airline Travel. We are not on the set of Mad Men. No one is sitting in cushy comfort with free cocktails and bathroom booty calls. We are all just crammed in and hoping for the best. I think we can all agree that airline travel these days is uncomfortable no matter what the situation, and for me, someone reclining their seat is not going to negatively affect my trip.

To be honest, I was kind of aghast that Reclining Seats Versus Not-Reclining Seats was such a vitriol-filled issue, and YES, I know, have I ever been on the internet before? No topic is too small or ridiculous to warrant heated discussion and name-calling. No topic is too minor to cause people to take sides and friendships to break up. This is the era of The Glory Days Of The Internet, and everyone gets to Air Their Grievances, just like it is Festivus somewhere, every day.

I like to think of myself as a positive person, as a mix between Sally Allbright and Maria von Trapp, going around singing lame songs all the time as I alphabetize my spice cabinet, but things like this make me gravely disappointed in all of humanity. I mean, for all I know the Asshole Who Reclines Their Seat has a bad back that makes it impossible to sit straight for five hours, and for all I know the Whiny Baby Complaining About Reclining is six foot six and the circulation below their knees is being cut off.

Whatever happened to Communicating Needs and Common Decency/ Respect for Fellow People? I don’t know how you would react, but if someone behind me asked me nicely not to recline my seat because it was bothering them, I would not recline my seat. I wouldn’t go off the deep end about My Rights As A Passenger To Recline My Seat. And similarly, if someone reclined their seat and for some reason it was bothering me, I feel that it would be okay to talk to that person and not assume that he or she was The Worst Person On The Face Of The Planet and start mentally plotting their demise.

Let’s all agree that a) airplane travel will always be a bit uncomfortable but it’s worth it to experience the Miracle of Flight rather than spend three weeks driving/ sailing somewhere, b) if we have an issue with something we will look at it at an individual level, rather than Painting Everyone With The Same Bitter Brush, and c) it’s impossible to choose between cookies and pretzels, instead ask for both.

PMS or Dreadful New Personality?

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One of the interesting things about being in my forties and starting the slow boat to periomenopause is that I have only the vaguest idea of when my Ladies’ Holiday will land, which means that I have the alarming experience of not knowing if My Mood is the result of the upcoming aforementioned Holiday, or if I have this whole new awful personality.

Now, before I get to what I am going to call The Coleslaw Incident, I feel that I need to digress a moment. Because of the vast amount of time I spend in the kitchen, both because a) I enjoy it and b) I am a food blogger, my family has become terribly spoiled, like one of those wretched turn-of-the-21st-century Park Avenue children, but with food. Examples: a) my children are surprised that you can purchase items like Caesar salad dressing and spaghetti sauce already made, b) there are no fewer than five homemade ice cream flavours in the freezer at any given time, c) they think store-bought ice cream is a depressing imitation of homemade, and d) when we are out of homemade jam, Jake refuses to eat any at all, preferring plain peanut butter toast to the apparent atrocity that is a spoonful of Smucker’s. But for every rule there is an exception, and in this case, it is coleslaw.

Coleslaw is something I do not eat. I don’t like it, I don’t like the texture, I don’t like the taste. My husband and kids, however, love it but have had problems trying to land on the perfect recipe. They’ve tried cookbooks, the internet, and my mother-in-law, but have been unable to get the perfect coleslaw dressing. That is, until we were at a barbeque at a friend’s house. My husband asked the hostess how to make the dressing on her coleslaw, and her response was, “Are you serious? It’s PC brand from Superstore.”

So here we were coming up to Father’s Day weekend, and my husband decided on Thursday that he wanted to spend his Father’s Day cooking a brisket for eight hours on the charcoal grill, and he would also make a coleslaw to go with it. I’m not sure why he wanted to spend all day grilling but hey, it’s his day. I eat neither of those things, but it’s not my special day, so whatever floats the boat. The kids were thrilled with the prospect of grilled meat and coleslaw.

Thursday night I came home from my yoga teacher training, and my husband asked if I had happened to pick up a bottle of coleslaw dressing. Now, in my defense, I had no notice that this was needed and also, it was almost 9:30 on a Thursday. Those who know me well know that it isn’t well advised to talk to me after nine o’clock on any day. I’m basically in a coma by then, or extremely put out that I am still vertical. Since I had just gotten home, it was the latter.

My husband suggested that I could maybe pick up a bottle, since no other kind would do. Normally, I would say okay, and pop out to the store as soon as it was convenient. But as I said, I was exhausted, it’s nearing the end of June, there are teacher gifts and end-of-school celebrations, I am busy with teacher training and staining the deck every spare moment, and as always, there is much to do keeping up with the one million things that come up in a household and when working from home. Going to Superstore to get coleslaw dressing seemed to be a bridge too far. And for some reason, in my sleep-deprived mind, this seemed less like a request than an Accusation That I Am Not Properly Running The Household Because We Are Out Of Coleslaw Dressing And All Is Ashes. As I melted down a little, my husband suggested that I must be kind of tired, and maybe should go to bed.

The next day, I was cognizant of my over-the-top irritation but that didn’t stop me from being irritable. My husband suggested that perhaps my Ladies’ Holidays were due, which led, as you can imagine, to MORE irritation. Sadly, in retrospect, he was wrong. It is just my horrible new personality.

But I carved out a few extra minutes in my Friday, and decided to run over to Superstore for the dressing. After all, I thought, with just one item I could pop in and pop out, and in total, including driving time, it would be thirty minutes out of my day. I could spend thirty minutes to make three people in the house very happy, especially with it being Father’s Day and all. So I drove over, ran in, grabbed a bottle of dressing and four pounds of strawberries – I am not made of stone, who among us can go into Superstore and get only one thing – and then hopped over to the 12 Items or Less line. There were only three people in front of me and not one had more than four things, so it seemed to be the place to be.

In retrospect, I should have been suspicious that people were avoiding that line.

It turns out the fellow at the front of the line had been there a while. By the time I had set down my items, he was in the midst of debating credit card usage, wondering why they didn’t take Visa, contemplating an application for a PC Mastercard, asking about PC Points, and thinking seriously about The Deal of the Day. Finally he finished buying his Romaine lettuce and box of crackers, asked for cash back, and slowly made his way out of there. The woman in front of me looked at me, rolled her eyes, and sighed loudly, which summarized the scenario quite nicely. The next guy? I knew we were in trouble when he brought out a flyer and started pointing to specific pictures and loudly asking questions.

I like to think of myself as a fairly patient person. If I am behind an elderly person who is fumbling with getting the exact change and who takes 20 minutes to buy a carton of eggs, I have all the time in the world; after all, we may all be that person one day if we are lucky. If I have a mother with small screaming children behind me in line I will always give up my spot for her because I was that person not so terribly long ago. But when I pop in to get one (okay, two) things at Superstore and someone is taking that much time in the express line because they are unaware of and are debating the store policy on credit cards, well.

I am happy to report that I did make it out alive, but not without doing some ujjayi breathing and thinking there will be a time after Superstore. And even more happy to report that my efforts were not in vain; the coleslaw was enjoyed by all. I also managed to catch up on sleep on the weekend and so was Much Less Irritable. Maybe I don’t have a terrible new personality after all.

“Look out, world. I have a giant cart.”

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Maybe it’s a function of age, maybe I’m just busy, but lately it seems like the days are speeding by, like one of those cartoons where each daily calendar page is flying off in super fast-motion. Yesterday I noticed a work deadline of April 29. April 29, no problem! That’s tons of time, I thought, until I looked at the actual calendar and realized that April 29 is Friday. Where did April go? I don’t know. I just don’t know.

So work is busy and classes are busy and everyday life is busy but everything is good, good, good. Yesterday was another PD day and, in contrast to Friday’s zoo day, I took the boys to the optometrist. One child had been complaining that he was unable to see the Smart Board at school, and the other boy was on the “watch list” in terms of his vision, and to make a long story short, I bought two pair of glasses yesterday. One child is thrilled with this, and the other is not, so it’s a bit of a roller coaster around here.

I will say this, though: children’s glasses and glasses in general are much, much more attractive than they used to be. When I was in grade six I got my first pair of glasses, and let me tell you, they were as ugly as fuck. Or, ugly AF, as the kids say. The frames were pale pink and were gigantic, and a few years later they were replaced by burgundy frames similar to those worn by every teen girl’s idol, TV host Sally Jesse Raphael. What thirteen year old girl doesn’t want to look like the fifty-something host of a tabloid talk show?

Our friend and optometrist said that it seemed like in the Eighties, people really wanted you to KNOW they were wearing glasses. It wasn’t enough to have glasses, they had to take up half your face in a statement that said “Look out, world. I have glasses.” Sort of like how we all teased our bangs so the tips of them were several inches off of our foreheads. “Look out, world. I have bangs.”

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All I’m saying is that kids these days do not know how lucky they have it.

My other exciting PD day activity was a giant Costco trip. I had a thought when I was leaving the store, as my entire upper body was practically vertical pushing the cart, and it was taking every ounce of effort in my body to control that cart and not accidentally run into anyone, that an interesting concept that Costco should adopt would be a cart weigh scale, similar to those that they have for large transportation vehicles. Wouldn’t it be interesting to see how much your giant Costco cart actually weighs? I mean, it’s not like it would change anything, but it would give me empirical data for when I tell my husband about my day. My husband is a wonderful man, but he does not view Costco trips in the same light that I do. For example, he thinks they are “fun.” I think they are “a chore.” I go to Costco approximately every three weeks with the hypothesis that more frequent trips mean lighter trips, and for the most part this is correct. Every so often, however, I find myself inexplicably out of all the heaviest/ most expensive things at once, and then my Costco trip takes on the properties of an epic journey, or a Sisyphean task.

If there were weigh scales, I could quantify the effort that is put into the actual Costco shopping trip. Because it’s not just about the time in the store, is it? I don’t know if I’ve ever spent more than about forty-five minutes actually in the store. I’m pretty efficient at filling my cart and then getting the fuck out of there. The actual effort involved is a) pushing the cart through the parking lot and silently cursing the people who leave their carts everywhere but in the cart corral, b) loading the groceries in the car, c) unloading the groceries from the car and bringing them into the house, d) putting all the groceries away, and, finally, e) separating out all the items from the gargantuan value packs for individual freezing, washing grapes, slicing strawberries, etc., etc. I mean, you can’t just put a giant pack of chicken breasts in the freezer as-is. I can’t just put the grapes in the fridge unwashed because that defeats the purpose of having a quick and easy healthy snack for the children on hand. Also, I’ve seen those videos where strange insects/ arachnids are hiding in the grape bunches and I would like to avoid that if possible. Strawberries will disappear quickly if they are washed and sliced but a clamshell of strawberries is doomed to either go bad or I am doomed to be asked at very inconvenient times if I would help with the washing and slicing of said strawberries.

Very very long and fairly dull story short, it is always better to deal with all those little things at once than to let them go, which means that a large Costco trip takes hours to complete. Again, a weigh scale would be nice, so I could tell my husband/ write in my fitness journal that I carried however many pounds down the stairs. It’s all about celebrating your accomplishments, isn’t it? And yesterday I accomplished both a Costco trip AND the selection of glasses for two boys, so I feel that I deserve some praise and adulation indeed. Or maybe a Costco-sized treat, at the very least.

When I am 41, I shall wear purple.

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Here’s a PSA for you: the Alberta government no longer sends out renewal notices for car registration or driver’s license updates. Now, this is a bit of a moot point for me since I haven’t received a renewal notice for YEARS. Each time I go to the registry office, they tell me it was returned because of “address unknown,” and yet, my address is correct in the system and always has been. This is a mystery that has never been solved. Address correct. Postal code correct. Renewal notice received? No. At one point I had the hypothesis that perhaps it was delivered to the wrong address, and the recipient decided not to drop it at my house but instead marked it “Return To Sender.” However, this has happened too many years in a row, for that and only that document, and so I think that hypothesis is incorrect. But what is the answer? No one seems to know.

In any case, it doesn’t matter now. A friend emailed our circle to remind us that renewal notices are no longer mailed out, which was a timely reminder for me. Both my license and registration were about to expire, and so today I popped over to the registry office – where the lady helpfully mentioned that my renewal notice was returned as “undeliverable” – and took care of business. Mercy, I forgot how awful it is to get a driver’s license photo. Passport photos are worse, to be sure, but my new driver’s license photo makes me look like a cross between the crypt keeper and Lizzy Borden.

I’ve been a bit tired this week, which is hell on my undereye circles. In retrospect it would have been better to get a photograph done after a great night’s sleep, but what can you do. Fortunately it’s in black and white, so my grey roots will not be as obvious.

Speaking of grey roots and undereye circles, my birthday is coming up! Last weekend we went to my parents’ house to celebrate, and my mom took me shopping as a birthday gift. Among other things, she purchased me a flowy, long, beautiful, PURPLE wrap. It’s very pretty, and did I mention it’s purple? I know. I KNOW. I wore it yesterday on a field trip, and I had a few girls tell me that “my purple cape was very pretty.” Aw! My boys, as well, had nothing but compliments for it, and they are not the kind of kids who notice what I’m wearing at any given time. I’m trying to wear colour slightly more often, even if I do feel like a bit of a peacock when I wear something other than black or grey. I did wear a black top underneath the wrap, in an attempt at normalcy.

And yes! That’s two field trips in five days, which includes the weekend. The field trip was the same as the one last week – the Police Interpretive Centre – so at least it was interesting and engaging. It was almost exactly the same in content, but this class forewent the “Bullying” module in favour of the “Drugs” one. I worried that it might be a bit old for the class, but it turns out it wasn’t at all. It was “scare them off of drugs” without being nightmare-inducing.

The field trips are done for the year now, which means I did it! Some of you may recall that this was my goal for the school year; since giving up my responsibilities as School Council/ Parent Association chair, I had decided I would volunteer more in the classroom and on field trips. Every opportunity that arose I took it, and I’m so glad I did. I’ve realized that Grades Five and Six are actually fun to go on field trips with: they mostly stay on task, they stay together, and they are fairly responsible. No one tries to run away or get separated from the group, everyone makes an attempt to complete the assignment at hand. And I even get my ego stroked with compliments on my outfit! It doesn’t get much better than that. Mental note: for next year’s field trips, wear purple wrap.