July 8th - life

Yesterday, the husband and I went "down to the city" because we needed to renew our membership to Costco. We haven't been members for perhaps a couple of years and we want to order a solar blanket for the pool through Costco's online orders. Our old solar blanket was done for, depositing little blue circles in the water on a pretty regular basis.

Unfortunately, our timing was a bit bad because their machine that takes the photos and produces the cards was not working, so we got a membership on paper, but in order to receive our cards, we will have to go to a Costco again.

Now, I realize many people shop at Costco once a week, which is mind boggling to me. I don't know how they control themselves. They must have closets filled with multiple bottles of sauces and giant boxes of cereal and a couple of extra televisions or solar lights. We managed to control ourselves (mostly due to the fact that we had a small car and could only purchase what would fit in the trunk).

While in the city, we ate at an Indian restaurant which is something we enjoy doing. We have no ethnic restaurants around where we live, apart from the obligatory Chinese food restaurants found in most towns. I had the butter chicken (I know, not very adventuresome, but very good) and husband had curried goat. We each tried the other's and liked both, especially with naan bread.

We were travelling home around dusk and the day had been warm so I knew we would likely see many animals out and about. Certain parts of our route are on what I would describe as back roads, bordered by bush land and fields. First, a small raccoon ran across the road and husband was able to stop in time, only to have to stop again quickly because another raccoon (little brother?) ran after the first one. On the same road, we encountered another raccoon, bigger than the first two, and it crossed the road unscathed. Still on the same road, I could see something ahead of us, and it was a deer. We were able to stop in time and the deer took a few moments to decide which way it wanted to go.

I always worry about my own kids who sometimes have to drive at night. I'm not really ever concerned about their driving abilities, but I do worry about other drivers they may encounter, or animals that dart out in front of them. We witnessed two separate idiot drivers who passed on a hill yesterday. They blindly pull out and, I guess, hope nobody is coming over the hill on the opposite side. Not only are they putting their lives in danger, but lives of those in oncoming cars and other drivers on the road in the general vicinity.

Today, I went around and watered all planted pots, urns, window boxes, and hanging flowers. I finished more weeding in my small vegetable garden and realized that with all of our heavy rains, the ground dried hard like concrete. The water would now have a bit of difficulty soaking in, so I tried to chop up the ground as I was weeding. All I've had from the garden so far has been lettuce, but it is still early days.

I spent a bit of time reading on the porch. I got the most recent Janet Evanovich book called Turbo Twenty-three. Her books are purely fun and I love the whole series. They are a quick read and I enjoy all the different characters who are part of each one of her books. Anyone else out there a fan?

As I am typing this, husband is watching a programme on tv about Bruce Lee's life and career. He has seen every Bruce Lee movie and has watched many other programmes about him. I've never really been the type to have a "hero" or absolute favourite actor / athlete / musician etc. I think I'm too varied. But husband has loved Bruce Lee and his discipline and philosophy since he was young.

As I think about it, even as a child, I never had a favourite toy or doll or blanket. I know children tend to have their one toy they take to bed with them or they can't sleep without a certain blanket. That was never me. In fact, weird little kid that I was, I remember trying to play equally with many toys, so as to be fair and not show favouritism (good lord, did I need therapy?).

Favourite books? How could I possible choose? Favourite movie? Maybe if it was narrowed down by category, but even then... Favourite colour? It's not about the colour, it's the combination of certain colours. Favourite food? C'mon!! Maybe I just have trouble making decisions or choices. Or maybe it's not a big deal and it's fine to have lots of things that I like.

Anyway, to continue with my stream of consciousness here, now that I am on my holidays, I find I have a never ending list of things that need doing: hair appointment, dentist appointments (for all of us!), renew all of our passports, house cleaning duties, organizational duties, yard work. All I really want to do is read a little, relax a little, realize that I have time off - and make sure I don't spend it substituting one kind of work for another.

To go back to a previous thought in a previous post, I still find I am contented. I am contented to look at my flowers, and see the many chipmunks on the property, and enjoy the warmth of the sun on me when I'm in the garden, and knowing my family is safe and sound. I am contented to know I have food in the pantry and the freezer. I am contented living in my small rural spot, especially after being slowed down to almost no movement on the 401 yesterday, even if we don't have the choices in shopping. I am contented to have my time in the morning when I have a cup of coffee sitting on the right hand side of the computer desk, reading through "my blogs" where I get to laugh, enjoy, commiserate, and share. It is a little ritual that I enjoy most mornings, but now I have even more time. Enjoy the rest of your weekend, all.