Beginning to move away from summer

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It is Labour Day and that signals the start of the Fall routines. Let me take a moment to wrap up my Summer for you.

Such a busy summer it seems to have been. Michelle and Florian were here for over a week again. It was a nice time. I have sure eaten a lot of food. We had parties and I did a baron of beef on the rotisserie. This was interesting. Patti went to Queensdale Market and checked out the beef. On the day of the BBQ, she sent me to get it. The butcher was one of the umpires from some of Malcolm’s baseball games. I explained that my wife had talked to someone about a baron of beef and that it would cost about $30. He went into the cooler and came out with a huge hunk of meat. I was a bit shocked at the size. As we talked about baseball, he carved away and then handed me the most perfect chunk of beef for $31. Wow, did that cook nice. What a great dinner.

Days before that, my sister had a party for all the August birthdays. I think there was eight of us. That was a pretty good party.

We made a trip to the US and Michelle and Florian wanted to go all the way to Alderwood Mall, almost to Seattle. I vowed never to do that sort of long trip and shopping in one day again, and that was last year. On the way down, we were in a modest lineup and then got hauled over. It turned out that Florian, being German, is required to file an I-96 form every 90 days. So, there we were for the first time held up in the customs office. Once done, we headed to all the usual shopping spots, including Alderwood and the Olive Garden for the Endless Pasta Bowl special. While we waited for the kids to shop, Patti went into Macys and found a $400, 20 piece, bed set for $65. How could we resist such a deal and chance for Patti (and I) to have a wonderful bed set. It even includes curtains.

Yesterday, we ventured back to the US for my Uncle Gordon’s 90th birthday party at Cousin Don’s at Birch Bay. On the way, we shopped more and ended up with a car full of pillows. When we got to the party many relatives I have not seen for years were there. There was so much food and I had a really great time. It was a long tough wait at the border to get back. Everybody was jumping lanes and making new lanes. Not great. Then we found out that Malcolm, who was looking after Paula’s dogs, was not given a ride home when they got home from the party at Don’s. Malcolm had been there for 16 hours and we had to go get him late at night.

I wanted to go to the PNE today, however, we all wanted to sleep in and spend the day with Malcolm, who did not want to go to the PNE. So strange, I always wanted to go to the PNE when I was young So, we went on a tough bike ride up to the Demonstration Forest. Malcolm, of course, was able to out ride us, but, we still managed to get plenty of kilometers in, some of it was up hill too.

When we got home, we had a feast of crab given to us last night at the party. Such a treat. As I write here, Malcolm and Patti are making cookies. Tomorrow, we start getting back to the routines that happen after summer.

I have not been making much bread over the summer, except when Michelle and Florian were here I made a raisin bread with molassas. We were short of raisins, so we substituted some chocolate chips. It is pretty good and I gave the kids one of the loaves.

I have had a curious thought on my mind the last few days. It started with my feelings around the time of the start of Summer. I had a routine and was sort of used to getting up earlier and taking Malcolm to school, then heading to work. I knew that an adjustment to life was coming as school was ending and thoughts of hot days entered my mind. The thing is, I am uncomfortable in hot weather. I feel best when the temperature is in the low 20s C and the nights get cool. As things turned out, the first half of the summer was not hot and August has been my temperature. For many folks, is has been less than Summer like, yet, I have been busy and not too hot. I am used to this routine now and just as I have reached this point, I am faced with changing again. What sort of winter is in store for us this year? Have I really made good attempts to enjoy the Summer days and make the most of them? Part of me is happy with this late Summer routine and part of me is looking forward to getting back to other routines. Curling is starting soon. I may be able to get more blogging done and even photography. May favourite seasons are Spring and Fall. Photography is better then too. I think I am experiencing perfect weather, plenty of interesting things going on, lots of work and it seems hard to leave all that behind or, in some way begin to move away to find a different balance to life. Late Summer has been pretty good and that has brought happiness. Perhaps the months to come may balance out in some way as Summer has. At least I have some good memories and perhaps that is what counts.

Poodle doodles

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As you can see my blogging efforts dropped off a bit. Is this due to the winter doldrums of no holiday break? After all, this is the longest stretch of the year without a holiday. There are efforts at hand to add a family day, but, that is met with resistance from the business community. I’m not going to let this blog entry get carried off on the topic of adding a new holiday. Daylight Savings Time started last weekend and this weekend holds the first day of Spring, thus, it seem the stretch is over. My sister, however, finds that she gets SAD in the winter, that is ‘seasonal affect disorder’ and any disorder deserves special attention in search for a cure. So it is, that we have not had Christmas together for a few years as they are always vacationing in Hawaii. In the old days, Christmas morning often included a long distance telephone call, these days, it is Skype. Now, I am getting closer to the topic of this blog entry.

It seems that Hawaii at Christmas is not enough, now they are looking for property in Palm Springs and with just over a week away on the search, I was offered the doggie sitting chore. I guess this passes through a few candidates and my turn came up. “You can stay at the house and I will stock the fridge.” My wife agreed for me to take the job, even though it would mean the longest time we have been apart in our nearly 20-year marriage.

Whew, I finally got through the preliminaries for this blog, the balance is taken from my responses to my sister’s message ‘…checking in…’:

Check out the toe nails – pretty Tessie

HI Bob,

Hope all is well and Gryphie and Tessie weren’t too much trouble this weekend Everything okay? Are you finding what you need?

Let me know if you have any mysteries or dilemmas to be solved, otherwise, hope you have fun and give them a hug for us!

Paula
🙂
PS – Very sunny here, half of Vancouver is here!

I ended up getting sick again, not as bad as before, but enough to slow me down a bit Saturday night and all of yesterday. I’m not sure yet about today. I watched curling and movies and Le Mis 25th.

The first couple of days were a bit confusing as I figured out where everything was. I had to get out to work, so I was in a rush. Tessie piddled a couple of times, once at her food dish and the next day in the upper hall. Now there is a stain, because I could not find what to use to clean it up, so I did the best I could with soap and water. If you have something, I could try to get more of the stain out. Often it is hard to get Tessie up from sleeping, so on that day, I was rushing to go to work and I woke her up, but, she just rolled around rubbing her face, so I went to get the food ready. When I went back a few minutes later, she was standing in the hall with her mess. I took them to daycare, because I was going to be gone all day. On Saturday, I watched about half an hour of one of Malcolm’s soccer games at Ambleside and then took the doggies to run in the park. Gryph got a bit muddy, so I used a towel in the garage to wipe his feet.

Patti and Malcolm came for dinner on Friday and Saturday nights, so I have been making it through quite a bit of the food you left, but, will have to buy a few things like veggies, etc. today.

Thus, things seem to be in some sort of order, or whatever. At least we are all carrying on.

B

Just out for a trot at Ambleside

Hi

Don’t worry too much about the carpet… I will get the cleaners in when I get home… (the pet stain remover is in the closet in John’s bathroom, on the floor, across from the sink)…

For future reference… Tessie needs to go out as soon as you are going to leave the room I always carry her from the bed to the front door and make sure she has a pee before she comes in for breakfast… (remember she is OLD….)

Give Gryph and Tessie lots of hugs…..

Glad you had fun with Patti and Malcolm

Made it to the dog park at Ambleside and are now back getting ready to start dinner. Tessie is snoring somewhere across the room and Gryph is sprawled out at the bottom of the stairs.

When we went out, all the neighborhood poop was collected and deposited on newspaper at the foot of the driveway. Surely I did not miss that much poop. I don’t know who it was, but, I hope they are not angry.

I guess it’s more pasta tonight, so, I should start thinking about getting that ready. A feast is a brewin’ in my mind, I think.

That is upsetting, particularly because all our immediate neighbours are away – so don’t know who it might have been, can you be extra vigilant and not let them out on their own…

Enjoy pasta! Thanks for the update….

Tessie likes the beach

Hi,

Hope everything is okay?

Just wanted to remind you to check out the contents of the Freezer in the garage and also the freezer compartment in the fridge (their are some individually wrapped cheesecakes!)

Hope the puppies are curled up next to you… don’t forget to pet and talk to them!!!

These are lazy doggies! I have had Tessie out three time this morning and I think she has yet to do her morning little business. At least she can really eat, sometimes she goes for Gryph’s food when he is not interested. She eats all the soft food she can get. I guess it gives her energy for those occasional times she gets perky and darts off down the street. Yesterday, she stood in the the garden down the street, tilted her head a bit and looked at me as if to say, “come and get me, I dare ya,” or, “you can’t get me in here now, can ya?” I’m never really sure what is going on in her head.

We made it to Ambleside again the other day and to Lighthouse Park yesterday. Got back into the car just as the rain started. We were sure glad about that. When we were at Ambleside, we stopped to visit and the next thing I knew Tessie was high tailin’ it down the sea wall, back in the direction we had just come, trotting along side another fellow with exactly the same orange jacket as mine. What are the chances of that, only Tessie could find such an opportunity to get confused. I thought she would never stop and they were long gone so fast, I could hardly believe it! Gryphon goes to get muddy, Tessie just does her own thing, whatever that is and wherever she is. What a scallywag.

What time are you back on Saturday?

Oh well, it’s a dog’s life.

Gryphon likes the beach too!

Ha ha!
Sounds like you are learning all of Helen Keller’s tricks… She really can’t see or hear, but if she wanders off, try sending Gryphon to go get her you have to make it sound like a fun game)

Back late Friday night, I will email you the exact time

Thanks for update and have fun!

Tessie enjoys the scenery

I don’t completely buy what she is selling, I think she is more with it than she leads us to think. She just likes to be a rascal, a real handful at times. Sleeps all morning, won’t go out, makes me nervous that she might have another accident (see she sensitized me with fear by having two piddles already), gets out finally, then follows me around until we go out to the car for a walk, takes off down the street to poop in someone’s garden, gets back in the house, because I left the door open so I could get my stuff and set the alarm, won’t come back out, wants to play chase, I have to get the leash, finally we get to Ambleside and she runs everywhere, before pooping more and then deciding to settle down. Gryphon gets fed up with all the miss focused attention and decides to try an escape over the bank into the neighbor’s yard.

OLD, my foot, she still has lots of puppy in her and plenty of tricks up her paw sleeve.

Oh ya, I forgot, Gryphon is acting up too. On the way back to the car at Ambleside, I had them go by way of the beach, so that running on sand and gravel might clean some of the mud off his feet. He gets wrapped up with a gang of dogs on the beach, wades in the water (OK that helped wash his feet) and tried to drink the ocean. Then he saw a lady with one of those flinger thingies, throwing a ball for another dog, yup, Gryph stole the ball, found that it was squeaky, decided to keep it and take it back home in the car. The other dogs just looked wondering, ‘who is this snob stealing our ball?’ Everyone tried to get it from him and, of course, this was just more fun than he could think of by himself, then I got stern with him, he stopped, I grabbed him by the collar and another lady got the ball from him. Humf, no manners! The both of them!

Now give back that ball!

Ha ha ha Rodney Fangerfeild, you have to make them respect you!

 

 

 

A bit more…

 

 

Well! I decided that we really needed to get to the Capilano River Regional Park where I used to walk Kyla. I was able to park in the first small parking lot, where I always used to park. I hoped the doggies would be alright with the short walk along the path next to the road, there is a concrete barrier. Gryph seemed to know exactly where to go and jumped over the log into my favorite part of the park. I assisted Tessie and then we were there. What a place!! I sure have missed it. A few deep breaths and we were all invigorated.

So, we followed some paths on a slow stroll so as to let the pooches explore everything they could. So relaxing.

Then, it happened. I heard a voice asking me where the path leads. This lady had two black Irish-doodles (Irish Setter Poodle mix). Well, you never saw such fun. Gryphon ran and chased, and just played, jumping over logs and everything in the rainforest–a pretty rugged place. Tessie watched to make sure the games were safe, ref-ing as best she could. Gryph sure got tuckered. I promised we would go back tomorrow and both agreed it would be a great idea.