Today

height, width, depth, planes, monochrome...

Here’s a reflection of my state of mind lately. Think a blend of constraint, anxiety, confusion with a dash of blah. Although it’s officially spring – and we did have all our snow gone – winter decided to remind us that ‘tah-dah! this is still Canada in March’ and whacked us the last couple of days with a few more inches of the blessed white stuff. Jeez – I surrender; gimme a break.

I’m off this afternoon to the funeral for a friend and former coworker at ‘the house’. Trish was the chief cook and we worked a great many shifts together. Saw one another around the rooms of A.A. a good deal and actually she preceded me as Chair at the executive table during the term prior to mine. Physically she was tiny but she had an enormous spirit and I’ll miss her wise counsel.

Otherwise life trucks along. I’m looking forward to some one-on-one time with Lynda this weekend as we’ve had company during the last few. Hunker down and talk, talk, talk.

Later…….

Hectic

I’m done with apologizing when I don’t get much of a chance to post here. Life keeps perking right along with lots of dips & dives, which is to be expected I suppose. Needless to say there is lots going on that prevents me from spending time plunking away at the computer.

A couple of weeks ago my work schedule was changed suddenly – little notice – so my hours have changed; shift rotation, too; and place of work. I’m hoping this will be another longish-term post. I was also studying for and wrote an exam to re-certify for my licence to work in this (#!&*%%#$) field. Got a 77% which I was quite happy with considering the gawdawful quality of the exam. Truly had no idea how I might have done.

The kitchen was coming along quite quickly but there have been some hang ups because a couple of the appliances were damaged in shipping…. the plumbers discovered the damage when they went to install them. Lots of back and forth regarding that. The cabinets are all in and the granite countertop is a thing of beauty – predominantly dark grey; lots of solid black offset with swirls of quartz and highlights of various minerals. Love it. Pics to follow, promise. Oh, okay…. maybe one.

Granite

We’ve settled on handles for the cabinets but they haven’t been put on yet. Still trying to nail down final decision on backsplash but that should be figured out tomorrow. Then a bit of final trim & we’re finally done. PTL.

I mentioned on Facebook that I had gotten my shortest haircut in 40+ years primarily because it’s thinning so much; mostly in back. Check this out…

Yikes - whole lotta scalp!

Last week I saw a couple of dogwalkers out in the greenbelt checking somethings out on the ground & yelled to them asking what it was. ‘A hawk’, says he. And it clicked, we’d heard a bunch of crows – probably 30 of them – raising a ruckus about an hour before. We have such a thing about birds of prey that I couldn’t let it lie out there and be picked apart by other birds, or cats, dogs or coyotes. Out I go with plastic garbage bag and work gloves and collect the poor thing. It had it’s wings scrunched up as if protecting it’s head but had no obvious signs of injury. Beautiful even in death…. and surprisingly light. WARNING – picture below.

Red-Tail Hawk

I sent this and other photos yesterday to a woman who writes a nature column for the local paper. She said in a prior email that she hadn’t seen this happen before – that usually the hawk can make it’s getaway. I think it was overwhelmed my sheer numbers and had a heart attack through panic and exertion. With the constant dive bombing the hawk isn’t able to gain enough altitude to soar and outpace the crows.

What else? Mom is good – got together with she and my older brother on the weekend. My sister Linda got engaged to a great guy last weekend – they were celebrating going out together for a year and he popped the question. Leafing through the calendar the other day and realized my daughter Sarah will be 30 this May. 30!!!!! Holy carumba!

That’s it for today. Time to get cleaned up for work and make something tasty for my lunch(es). I’ll do another ‘books’ post but thought I’d mention I’m reading Sara Gruen’s ‘Ape House’; which is great and got wonderful reviews.