Category Archives: Romance

Nicole’s Favourite Things: Holiday Edition Part 1

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Yes, you read that title correctly.  There will be a part two. 

Despite its darkness, and despite the fact that a) it was minus 12 this morning, b) my hands are constantly purple, and c) traffic and the streets are mayhem, I love December.  It is one of my favourite months; the approaching holidays and associated festivity just make me smile.

And hence a two-part post of my favourite things!  The first post shall be about gift ideas; the second post shall be random things I love about the holidays.

Related: every single time I think of the term “the holidays”, I think of NYPD Blue.  This may seem counterintuitive but if you – like me – are a fan of NYPD Blue, you may remember the famous Andy Sipowicz line, when he is threatening to put “a pole” up “the ass” of some internal agent who is up to “louse up” Lt. Fancy’s career.  “Let’s not quarrel, eh?  It’s the holidays.”  Word.

As always with my favourite things, I am not sponsored by any of the companies I talk about; I received nothing for free.  I just love these things and maybe you will too!

Nicole’s Favourite Things – Holiday Gift Edition

Wine

Nothing says “I love you” or “It looks like you could use a drink” or “How else do you get through family get-togethers?” like a bottle of wine, am I right?  Wine is a very simple and greatly appreciated gift for anyone, other than maybe teetotallers and recovering alcoholics.  I always love receiving wine, and I give bottles to people I don’t know very well but still want to give gifts to; for example, our school’s long-suffering secretary.  All you really need to know is if the recipient prefers red or white, but even then, it’s hard to go wrong.  I buy my wine in bulk from the Superstore liquor store; a $12 bottle of wine has a lot of gift bang-for-the-buck.

Chocolate

Not everybody loves chocolate, but the vast majority of people do.  ‘Tis the season for chocolatey goodness.  My personal favourite is mint chocolate, and number one on my list is a good old fashioned box of After Eights.  My children have inherited this from me; my husband came home with a box on Saturday, as a festive treat and MAYBE to get lucky, and 3/4 of that box is now gone.  I had ONE.  This is why I’m hiding the dark chocolate peppermint Godivas from the children.

I’m also hoping to get some in my stocking (some chocolate, not something something some, if you know what I mean and I think you do).  I haven’t seen any peppermint Lindors yet this year, but maybe Santa will come through for me.  Santa baby, just slip some mint chocolate under the tree, for me.  Been an awful good girl.

Sweaters

Cozy sweaters are a fabulous gift idea, and are simple for the giver: sizing is generally small/medium/large, so it’s forgiving if you don’t know someone’s exact dimensions.  I love a nice cozy (black) sweater, and Jacob has a wide selection.  Ever since I embraced the skinny jeans trend I have also embraced the big flowy sweater.  They are so snuggly and if you happen to have a muffin top peeking over those skinny jeans, they conceal it nicely.  I think this one is super cute:

However, I am probably not getting one for Christmas since I have several drawers that are stuffed full of black sweaters and my husband seems to think that is plenty in the black sweater department.

Sweaters are a nice gift for the man in your life, as well.   

Ha!  I kid.  If I gave this to my husband, there might be a divorce, or at the very least, no one would be getting a “present from Santa” if you know what I mean.  And I think you do.

Lotions, potions, and beauty products

One of my favourite gifts to receive is a bottle of scented body lotion.  Calgary is a very dry climate, add that to going back and forth from dry indoor heat to the dry frigid outdoors, and the semi-obsessive handwashing that accompanies cold and flu season, and I go through a lot of lotion.  I don’t wear perfume, so I like to have nice girly scented lotions; my favourites are from Bath and Body Works, which frequently has a buy three/ get three sale.  My wintry favourites are Twilight Woods, Moonlight Path, and Secret Wonderland, but there are just so many to choose from. 

My views on “natural” deodorants are generally that such products are aimed at smelly hippies, who remain smelly hippies even when using said products.  I dislike the chemicals in regular antiperspirants but have always been a skeptic about natural deodorants.  However, my friend makes these products and now I’m a believer.  One of our mutual friends – who is very athletic – told me that they really do work, and so I was persuaded to try it.  I sweat a lot during yoga, and the deodorant still held up.  In fact, I asked a friend – who is an ANGEL and a very, very good person – to smell me after a sweaty Sunday morning Primary Series, and she said not only did I not stink like a hippie, but I actually SMELLED GOOD.  That should be endorsement enough, I think.

It makes a great stocking stuffer, although it might seem strange to give someone deodorant as a gift – if you don’t know the recipient well it might seem like you are trying to tell them something – but the jar is so pretty!  And the scents come with fun names like Sweet Jane, Sexy Sadie, and Lucy in the Sky.  There is even a men’s scent called – get this – Johnny’s Cash.  Cute!  If you can talk the man in your life into trying a natural deodorant, which is no small feat if you have a non-hippie husband.

Pajamas

There is something so luxurious about a new pair of jammies.  I eschew anything remotely sexy when it comes to sleepwear.  I’m all about fuzzy flannel bottoms and tops that are emblazoned with Snoopy or Hello Kitty.  Part of this is because I just like cozy pj’s, dammit, and part of this is because I like to have my children choose them for me.  It’s amazing I don’t have Star Wars or Angry Birds on my pajamas. 

Jewelry

Is there any woman alive who doesn’t like a nice piece of jewelry?  I have been wearing silver hoop earrings since I was thirteen years old, this year I told my mother I’m hoping for silver stud earrings and I think she fell over.  She kept repeating “You don’t want HOOP earrings?  Silver hoops?”  I’m all unpredictable now, yo.  Last year I had a Pandora bracelet on my wish list and my over-indulgent husband actually gave me two:



The greatest thing about the charm bracelet is that it’s a gift that keeps on giving!  New charms are always a lovely gift idea, for any occasion.

*****************************************************************************

Looking for more gift ideas than these Nicole-centric ones?  Look no further: my friend Beck put together a list of non-Oprah-like gift ideas last year (full disclosure: I was one of her writers, and you MAY see a few similarities between last year’s list and this one), and for the Trekkie in your life visit my friend Nan’s site. 

Men of Years Past, or Childhood Memories

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It’s the most wonderful time…of the year.  Not only is it the holiday season (well, almost the holiday season, I was singing Santa Baby in a slutty voice to myself this morning, so it totally counts) but it is also the Sexiest Man Alive season, as I alluded to in my last post.  Mark Wahlberg with no shirt on?  Hello nurse. 

I love the SMA awards (like the AMA awards, but sexier) not just because it is a thrill to see Patrick Duffy and Tom Brokaw make the list, against all odds I would think, but also because there is something about a magazine devoted to so many “hunks” (remember when people actually used the word “hunk”?  Actually I think my mom still does; “That Sam Elliott is a hunk.”) that gets my friends’ creative juices flowing.  Maybe that’s not the only kind of juices that are flowing.  Eeee.  I just squeamed myself out.  Sorry, everyone. 

In any case, for amusing commentary on the state of manly sex appeal, visit Hannah, Nan, and Beck.  Last year I wrote a list of the ten sexiest men, not including my husband, of course.  He would be top of the list, but you know what they say about writers who boast about their hunka-hunka-burning-loves, they are lame and boring.  Once I was having a purely theoretical discussion with some male co-workers about their “lists” – and in the context of this post I need not describe what such a list entails, readers will have to come to their own conclusions – and one co-worked informed us all rather righteously that there was one person on his list and that was his wife.  It kind of killed the mood, to be honest.  And so I will say right now for good form that my husband obviously on the top of my list, he’s super sexy and awesome and he looks like a cross between Jim Cuddy and Kyle McLaughlin, but in a good way, and he wears the hell out of a business suit.  Blah blah blah back to my SMA list.

I like my men dark, with strong jawlines, and a certain air of success and confidence about them.  But it wasn’t always that way.

Nicole’s List of Men Whom She Used To Crush On

1982 – Almanzo Wilder

I developed a huge crush on Almanzo as I spent my free time curled up with the Little House books, probably with my “Bookworm!” or my “I Heart Books!” bookmark by my side.  Oh!  How apt it was that his nickname was Manly, as he courageously battled minus forty temperatures and rising blizzards to save the entire town of DeSmet from starvation!  Oh, how my seven-year-old heart beat when Almanzo touched Laura’s mitten tip on the way home from church (when he was 25 and she was 15…but whatevs…).  Oh, the thrill when they exchanged name cards and went for buggy rides.  Remember when he surprised her by visiting on Christmas Eve, bearing gifts of a breastpin and oranges, and he asked, huskily, “Can’t you thank a fellow better than that.”  THEN THEY KISSED.  Old-timey romance; I’d rather not think about how after they got married they got diptheria, had crop failures and crippling debt, AND their house burned down.  Just look at this for photographic proof of pioneer sexiness.  Just don’t think about the one-bath-a-week thing.


1984 – Corey Hart

I was in the Corey Hart fan club.  I had posters and records that I would play over and over.  You can never surrender!  I’m pretty sure I have a xeroxed letter from him somewhere in my possession.  Sorry, younger self, I don’t really see the appeal here.

1985 – Gilbert Blythe

I know, he was on the list last year.  Every year at Christmas time I wish I had a VCR and the old cassette that I had recorded the CBC version of Anne of Green Gables on.  I wish I could still see those old Canadian Tire commercials.  I loved the books, and I just loved Gilbert.  I do still see the appeal, for a ten-year-old bookworm girl.

 
 
1986 – Judd Nelson
 
I watched The Breakfast Club a few years after it was released, and developed an enormous crush on Judd Nelson.  Bender!  This was the start to a long, unfortunate period in which I was very attracted to the Bad Boy.  No good can come of this, younger Nicole!  These are the guys that will end up dead or incarcerated!  Or at very best will be employed in dead-end jobs, still smoking dope at age 40.  Yet, it still is very cute when Molly Ringwald gives him her diamond earring.  EXCEPT NOW YOUR EARRINGS DON’T MATCH, DUMBASS.
 
 
 
1987 – Lou Diamond Phillips
 
Remember La Bamba?  And the Young Guns movies?  Yeah. 
 
 
 

1988 – John Cusack

Good taste, younger Nicole!  He’s still on the list!  “I’m an athlete so I rarely drink…what I’m saying is that you can trust your daughter with me for the next six to eight hours.”  God, I love that movie still.  And who can resist this?  Even my mom, when she watched this with me in the mid-nineties, got all uppity that Lloyd stood there with his boombox, unanswered.  “Go to him!  Doesn’t she go to him?”  Word, Mom.  What’s up with the sweatpants, though?  Oh, right.  Athlete.



1989 – Tom Hooper

If you are not a Canadian girl in her late-thirties to early forties, then you may not remember The Grapes of Wrath – the band from Kelowna, not the book.  Oooh, how I longed to run my hands through his curls.  Where is he now?  I have no idea.

1990 – Jim Morrison

I almost stopped the list at 1989 because of my deep shame and embarrassment at admitting that I had an enormous crush on a dead guy.  Not only that, but a dead guy who was crazy, wore leather pants, and drank himself to death at age 27.  But in the interest of veracity and full disclosure, I will close with the Lizard King himself.

And now that I have divulged my deep, dark, secret (or not so secret, really) crushes of my formative years, it’s your turn, dear reader.  Who did you crush on, back in the day when it was still all about VCR’s and records and writing notes in class?  Tell Nicole everything.  xoxo

A touch of the mitten-tip

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I have been reading the Little House series to the boys for a while now, and we are now almost finished that epistle of madcap gaiety, Little Town on the Prairie.  As opposed to the very depressing previous book, The Long Winter – everyone is going to die! – this book is full of exciting good times like the Friday night Literaries and the weeklong discussions following the Friday night Literaries and the anticipation of the Friday night Literaries, and also a New England Supper.  I’m not entirely sure what makes it New England, as opposed to South Dakota, but maybe it’s the baked beans and pumpkin pie?  I don’t know. 

The Friday night Literaries start out with a spelling bee, which puts the whole town into a competitive tizzy.  Pa wins the bee, naturally, since Pa can do no wrong, except for the whole moving his family into more and more isolated and dangerous places.  The spelling bee was pretty exciting, though, and I’m not just saying this because I myself was on the television show Spelling Bee, hosted by former Stampede Wrestling host and Calgary celebrity Ed Whalen.  I was quite the spelling star back in the day!  It made up for my complete inability to do anything well in Phys Ed.  Or, at least, I think it did.  Spelling’s more important than being able to do a chin-up, right?

Anyway, it’s been fun reading this book to the boys, what with all the wholesome – and also offensive – entertainments.  Minstrel show, I’m looking at you.  But this is also the book where the romance between Laura and Almanzo begins!  They exchange name cards, and Laura also accepts a ride to school from him, that hussy, and when she gets out of the buggy, they touch mitten-tips.  IT BEGINS.

My husband and I were talking about what it would be like to have an old-timey romance.  I use the term “romance” loosely since it seems like if you were of a certain age, and there was a man there also of a certain age, and neither of you had anything seriously wrong with you like a missing leg, then you would probably get married.  This seems to be the case with Laura and Almanzo – I mean, Laura was 15 and Almanzo was 25, which is a bit squicky, but likely there were no eligible females over the age 15 and he was tired of the bachelor life.  Think of all the marriages which would have started for similar reasons!  Romance would boil down to a buggy ride, and maybe a heart-pounding touch of the mitten-tips.

But real life romance is very different from movie romance anyway, isn’t it?  Real life romance isn’t all about rose petals on the bed or bubble baths for two with champagne.  It isn’t about getting it on while lying on a beach with ocean waves lapping at your feet.  Sand, ouch.  It isn’t even about him standing outside your window with a boom box lifted above his head, playing In Your Eyes, although that would be awesome.  Real life romance, in my mind, is personified by my husband checking restaurant menus to see if there are any good vegetarian options, even though he’s planning on having steak, or by my husband recording a late-night talk show just because the guest was Hugh Jackman.  Real life romance is my husband becoming worried about my bone density and ordering calcium supplements for women 50+, even though I’m not really close to 50+.  It’s sweet – he cares about my bone density!

What do you think?  What’s the most real-life romantic thing that you or your spouse has done for each other lately?

Padme and Anakin and the Five Languages of Love

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Getting right into the year 2005, I watched Revenge of the Sith on the weekend.  Here’s a little piece of advice: do not watch the violent end of a movie minutes before leaving the house to attend a led primary practice.  You will feel all shaky and NAMASTE, BITCH.  Related: it’s very, very awkward when, at the end of a led practice, you turn to your neighbour to say “Namaste” and that neighbour is looking the other direction.  So, you turn to your other neighbour, who is also looking the other way, but you feel that the first neighbour is now looking at you so you turn your head quickly, only to see that they have already bowed their head to their mat.  Awkward. 
Anyway, Revenge of the Sith!  I loved it more than all the other Star Wars movies combined, which isn’t saying much, really, since I have seen The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones a number of times and yet I cannot remember what happens because I either fall asleep or become completely bored and zone out every single time.  But I really, really liked Revenge of the Sith; it was interesting and fast-paced and compelling.  I have only a few problems with it, and although this makes me feel a bit like those nerds that created “Jar Jar Binks Must Die” webpages immediately following the first midnight viewing of The Phantom Menace, I will nonetheless detail them here.

First, near the end of the movie, the conversation between Anakin and Obi-Wan goes as follows:

Obi-Wan: Anakin, the Sith are evil!

Anakin: From my point of view, the Jedi are evil!

FROM MY POINT OF VIEW?  What kind of writing is that?  George Lucas may have well have had them having a twitter conversation:

@ObiWan IMO Jedi = Jerks #haters #SithRule #CheatDeath

Although, it would have been tremendously cool if Obi-Wan had said “Have you tried Hare Krishna?” after saying “Then you are lost.”

My second issue is about Padme’s death.  All this time, I had thought that Padme died a grisly death in childbirth, which, quite frankly, would have been pretty realistic.  But yet, she died of a broken heart!  She lost the will to live!  Padme, you just had two babies – LIVE FOR THEM.  You’re not the only woman who got knocked up by a guy who turned out to be a dick.  I mean, we all make mistakes.  Padme’s was having unprotected sex with a Jedi.  Get over it and mother your children.  Jesus.

Maybe Padme and Anakin should have discussed the Five Languages of Love.  My friend and I were talking about these love languages yesterday, which are Words of Affirmation, Quality Time, Gifts, Acts of Service, and Physical Touch.  We are now, as I told a young friend of mine who is in the stage of life when all her friends are getting married, in the stage where marital issues are starting to rear their ugly heads.  My friend was telling me about a book detailing five different love languages, and how sometimes it seems like your partner is being a jerk, but maybe he’s showing his love in other ways.  For example, maybe sometimes you want your shmoopie to give you some PDA, but he never does.  Instead, he shows his love by always unloading the dishwasher (note: this does not happen in my house.  If my husband unloaded the dishwasher, I would be so excited I would rip off my clothes and have sex with him right on the countertop).  But anyway, our conversation centred around understanding how someone says I Love You.  It was interesting, and it made me think that maybe Anakin was showing his love through Acts of Service (turning to the Dark Side so Padme wouldn’t die, ostensibly), but Padme really wanted some Quality Time.  I don’t know.  Things could have been resolved so differently.

Our discussion around the love languages got me thinking – what love language do I speak?  How do I show my love?  My husband would probably say that I need to work on my Quality Time.  For example, the other night I was immersed in a book and he was talking to me.  Instead of looking up from my book and listening, I had a “mmm, really?” kind of response.  He totally busted me for not listening.  Oops!  But I will tell you about something really nice that HE did that is totally sweet and romantic.  I was talking about how I wanted to go visit my grandma, but I didn’t want to take the whole family.  The next thing I knew, he had booked me a flight and a rental car, and had figured out child care.  If it was up to me, a year later I would still be saying “I want to go visit Grandma…”  Hooray for decisiveness!

In other words, people, I am going on a solo trip!  To Saskatchewan!  I haven’t traveled by myself since 2003, I’m the teensiest bit nervous.  So, I should say, is everyone around me.  I have to drive two hours after flying to Regina, and, given my ability to get hopelessly lost in the city I’ve lived my whole life in, there is some concern that I will end up in Nunavut or, alternatively, South Dakota.  My husband has been busy googling maps and reminding me to take the Garmin, my mother keeps asking nervously if I know how to get to the highway, and my dad is probably hand drawing me maps of the various streets around the airport as we speak.  It’ll be FINE.  How lost can I get?  (Don’t answer that).

So anyway, I’m so in love with my husband, I get to go see my grandma, and I am going to be away from the kids for longer than I’ve ever been, which is causing me a little bit of angst.  I’m pretty excited though – it helps that my kids are going to the lake with my parents, which they have told me is WAY more fun than when I come.  What?  Clearly, their love language is NOT Words of Affirmation.

69 Days of Summer Vacation; Mark and Jake Are Going To Do It All!

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I was going to do a “Wordless Wednesday” and just post this picture of my kids on their last day of Grade One and Two:
But there is a reason I don’t do Wordless Wednesdays, and that is because I am much, much too wordy.  I want to tell you all about the last day of school and how I held my friend’s four week old baby boy today, and he was all curled up like a little bean on my shoulder and he fell asleep, and now my boys are all huge (see above picture for relative hugeness) and pretending to be hip-hop artists, apparently, and how sad I am that their favourite teacher is leaving the school and so Jake won’t be in her class next year, and how she whispered “I love you, Jake” when we were leaving, and how she described Jake as blossoming from a shy little boy in September to one of the leaders and role models of the class, and how happy she was to have Mark in her class for two years, and how she described Mark as having a huge love of learning, and how I came home and while thinking about fleeting time I missed a step going up the stairs and slammed my bare foot on the edge of the step and now it’s all swollen and bruised and how I’ve been home for two hours and still haven’t accomplished any of the tasks I set out to do, and how I’m wondering if a beer would solve these problems.
It might.
So I’m not going to think about my empty nest eleven years hence, but instead I am going to relate snippets of life around me over the past couple of weeks.
Overheard at the mall:
Girl #1: I think I’m going to stop dyeing my hair.  The roots are coming in too light.
Girl #2: What’s your natural colour, anyway?
Girl #1: Like, ash blonde?
Girl #2: WHAT DID YOU SAY?
Girl #1: Ash blonde?
Girl #2: Oh my god.  Ash blonde?  Your natural colour is ASH BLONDE?  Why in the world would you EVER colour ASH BLONDE?
Girl #1: I didn’t think it was that exciting.
Seen while driving: a billboard proclaiming “Look your Stampede best!  With BOTOX.”

Conversation between the kids, after watching Empire Strikes Back:
Mark: Mom, I thought you said that Princess Leia and Han Solo were in love.
Me: Yes.
Mark: They totally do not seem like they are in love.  They just bug each other all the time.
Jake: Mark!  That means they are going to get married.  Sometimes your wife is just a pain in the butt all the time!
Me: Jake!  Why would you say that.
Jake: No, Mom, it’s true!  That’s what being married IS. 
Me: I’m not a pain in the butt to your dad.
Jake: I didn’t mean you, Mom.  Sometimes it’s Dad who is the pain in the butt.
Conversation at my dinner table:
Husband: You look really nice today.
Me: Thanks.
Husband: No, I mean it.  You look great.  That shirt is great.  You should wear it more often.
Me: Thanks!
Husband: It’s so nice to see you in something colourful.
Me: This shirt is navy.
Husband: Yes, but it’s not black.

A few of HIS least favourite things.

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My kitchen is done!  My kitchen is done!  I was feeling a bit concerned yesterday, and the day before, when a somewhat comical series of events took place that made the flooring installation take a full day longer than anticipated (“Hm.  Well.  This is going to complicate things.” the flooring guy said more times than I am comfortable with.)  I am extremely happy with the final product and I will post before and after pictures very soon, but today is Friday and I’m feeling a bit silly – giddy, even – and I have beer! because it’s a sunny day! and it’s a Friday! and the before pictures are on my other computer and I am just too silly, giddy, lazy, and beer-y to retrieve them.

The other day my husband and I were watching Modern Family and I pointed out the owl shaped cookie jar in their kitchen.  I had seen the same one on the anthropologie website, and I thought it was cute – outrageously overpriced, but cute.

“Please tell me you didn’t buy that.” my husband said.  Now.  I had no intentions of buying it – I don’t use cookie jars, and that particular cookie jar is $98, plus shipping and duties, and I think we can all agree that is an excessive price to pay for a cookie jar, when a Tupperware container does a much better job at keeping cookies fresh.  However, I thought – and still think – it’s adorable, but the vigor with which my husband opposed my way of thinking made me realize that, sometimes, we really are from different planets.
Mars and Venus, if you will.
I never actually read any of those books, for the record.  But I was inspired to make a list of things I love that my husband hates.  Hey, we could make a meme out of it!  Anyone want in?  Anyone?  Anyone? 
Things I Love That My Husband Hates
1. Kale chips.  I know!  How is that possible?  But, upon gamely trying some, he has said, and this is a direct quote, “GAH.  That is the worst thing I have ever eaten.” 
2. My favourite retro radio station that caters to old people.  What can I say, he is not a fan of 70s ballads.  He is also not a fan of listening to me sing along to 70s ballads in the car.  Baby I’m a want you.  
3. Speaking of retro, he’s not a fan of anything that could be described as retro, vintage-look, or antique.  He doesn’t like old things.  “But I like you, and you’re old!” I say to him, which is nearly always answered with a look only.  He also dislikes anything that can be described as kitchy.  In other words, he hates my new tea towel:


 
It says “Just Married”!  Sweet, right?  Following is the conversation we had about this tea towel.
Me: It’s so cute!  Just Married!
Husband: Why would you get something that says Just Married? 
Me: Don’t you think it’s cute?
Husband: But we’ve been married for ten years.
Me: But we’re in love just like we were just married!
Husband: *nonplussed silence*
4. This outfit:
This super comfortable outfit, he hates.  It’s not the little sweater.  It’s not the cropped leggings.  It’s this shirt:
“It looks like a maternity shirt!” he tells me, which is almost enough to dissuade me from wearing it.  And yet, I wear it still.  That shit is comfortable.  Someone mentioned that men universally dislike the empire waistline, from a “Is she knocked up?” point of view, which may be accurate.  I know that when I was pregnant, I mostly waddled around enjoying all the attention I received, in addition to eating eleven meals a day, while my husband worried about me.  So he may have a bit of PTSD from those days.  Still, I think the top is cute.  By the way, that’s the new flooring in the background.  Squee!
5. The people who do the weather and traffic reports on the morning news.  Okay, I don’t LOVE them, but I don’t actively hate them, either.  Given the chance I think that my husband would set them on fire. 
So, do you want to join in my Friday night meme?  Things you love but your significant other does not?  Good times, people, good times. 

When I say "kind of a dick" I mean in a good way.

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Here’s proof that I have a very confident husband: he was completely unfazed by my shameless male objectification as I ranked the cast members on last night’s Grey’s Anatomy, based on hotness.  For anyone interested, here are my top two:

And here is who I rank at the bottom:
“Too young for you?” my husband asked.  Exactly.  Call me in 20 years, Dr. Avery.  Well, actually, in 20 years I will be almost sixty, so probably my tastes will have altered somewhat.  But theoretically call me in 20 years.
A while back, I heard someone say that if there was a Hooters for women, it would just be men in business suits walking around holding up their impeccable credit scores, and I have to say, that really spoke to me.  If I was to say I had a “type”, it would be an older, salt-and-pepper haired man in a business suit who is kind of a dick, but yet inwardly romantic.  Fortunately my husband fits into this genre.  It would be a bit strange if he didn’t, just as it would be strange if he suddenly announced that he prefers petite blonde women with big breasts, rather than crazy artificial redheads who really like to make lists and drink wine.  Come to think of it, I’m not sure that there are too many other crazy list-making wine-tippling artificial redheads that he is particularly enamoured with, but still.
Last night we watched Grey’s Anatomy and I engaged in sexist behaviour while the snow came down, giant fluffy flakes.  It turns out we had a record snowfall!  Today the snow is melting and the grass is looking much less brown.  Springtime in Calgary!  The wet snow is making the grass greener!  Hooray for giant wet snowfalls!
Another sign that it is springtime, other than the festive April snowshowers, is that my dog is behaving like an imbecile.  I’m guessing this is spring-related, anyway.  Yesterday before the snow I went with some friends and their dogs to the off-leash park.  We walked and chatted, and as we were almost finished our walk, I noticed my dog way behind us, sniffing and happy and rolling enthusiastically in the grass.  When he caught up to us it became evident that not only was he enthusiastically rolling in the grass, he was enthusiastically rolling in some other dog’s poop.  I’m not going to lie to you, people.  I pretty much hated my dog at that moment and in the moments that followed.  I especially hated him as we had driven to the dog park, and the ride home, though brief, was without a doubt the worst olfactory experience I have ever had.  My very good friend who was with me not only rode home in my rancid-o-mobile, but she gave me some no-rinse foamy dog shampoo when I dropped her off.  I can never repay her for this kindness.  I need to buy a case of this no-rinse foamy dog shampoo, to have on hand just in case such a horror ever occurs again.  Did I mention my dog is very fluffy?  Three applications later and he was back to his normal, non-smelly self.  However, it has taken me until now to fully forgive him for being so disgusting. 

It’s a good thing he’s so cute.