Grits

Good day. For me and hopefully for you. That is.... if there IS anybody out there. Some people dressed up for Halloween today at school; I wore my black cat costume. We had our last season game yesterday. We played the best team in the city and we kept them to four points in the 3rd quarter! Sure... they beat us by twenty, but it's really good for us to be not that far behind them! They usually win by a lot more, and we were missing some of our players. I would looove to beat them in the finals. I think we can do it. We can do it if we play like we did in that 3rd quarter. Our practice after school today was really great. We did lots of "fun drills" and everyone played really well in the scrimmage. We have our first play-off game on Tuesday. It should be easy.
Tonight for supper we had some kind of rice casserole with bacon, egg, peppers, and other miscellanious (sp?) foods, and also beef with a really good sauce. I don't know what grits are, but these chunks of beef/pork reminded me of the word. I think I heard about the word grits in a book one time.... I dont know. All I know is that next time the word comes up I will correlate it with this dish.

Wanted: Black Ears and Tail

Today consisted of eating a blueberry muffin (which for some reason was without blueberries)and later going to church. After church we went to Timmies where my mom and I tried their french onion soup. It was really good = and definitely recommend it. The we went to go drop of my rotary application (will explain later) to someone's house, and then went in search of cat accessories. I went to three different stores.... WalMart, which sold out, Zellers- sold out, and my last try, Dollar4Dollar, was closed. So no luck in the cat department today. When we got home I took the dogs for a walk. It's funny: I think I actually like better walking this time of year, when it's a little cold, better than in the summer. Even though the sky is gray and the air crispy, it's nonetheless pleasant. It seems the dogs like it better too. In the warm weather Cleo especially requires walks that include a water break. Or sometimes a "let's sit down and not move" break. And she knows that whatever she does the rest of have to do too, mostly becasue of her over-powering size =P When she decides to sit down, there's no use in trying to move her. If she knows you want her to do something she will intentionally do the opposite. Sounds like a bad babysitting job. But whatever.... Cleo's a good dog.
So here I am eating chili and pumpkin cake. I don't think it could get much better than this. After the dog walk I was outside for a bit, and by then I was ready for a good hot meal. My ma made chili and it was a "help yourself when you're hungry" meal.We usually all eat at the table together, but my mom left to take Olivia to dancing and Brad is sick. So he's downstairs sleeping and I'm here: eating chili and pumpkin cake. The cake is delicious... I'm pretty sure I ate more than half of the pan! My dad is out of town, so that's one less person to eat the massive thing, and I don't think my siblings like it a whole lot. And mom doesn't eat more than one piece a day, so that just leaves me to finish the entire thing :D But I'm not complaining... it has the greatest cream cheese icing and the pumpkin makes it a really moist cake.

Black Cat

I was so proud of myself this morning.... I woke up at 0945 and right away started cleaning my room :0 (this is strange for me, no matter what time of day it is). I folded clothes for about half and hour before starting to do some of my wash. The thing about any season but summer is: where do you hang your wet clothes? In the summer I string them on the line to dry but in the colder seasons I usually end up hanging them on random furniture around the house. This usually results in me not remembering where I put half of my clothes ;P I probably have about three loads (BIG loads) of laundry to do this morning, and I just put the first one in a couple of minutes ago. My room still isnt very clean after all that folding, but you really need to to see a "before" picture to appreciate how it is now. No word of a lie- I actually couldnt see my floor due to all the clothes. I really need to go through them ALL and make a pile for the Salvation Army. Maybe I'll do that today too. I also want to take the dogs for a walk and possibly think about my hallowe'en costume. I went to Value Village a couple of days ago in search of a costume, and I found everything BUT a costume. Although I did find a pair of gray sweats, a dark purple sweater and an olive green coffee mug, I couldnt find anything for a cat get-up. I do love Value Village. When I was younger I always wanted to be a black cat, but my mom thought "it probably isnt a good idea". We couldnt be anything that is scary. Here's the thing though: I didnt WANT to be scary, I just really liked cats that were black! hahaha. So I figured that since this is probably my last year dressing up (finally), I should be the cat. I should just BE the black cat. And obviously my mom doesnt care now whether Im a black cat or a green duck, so it's all good =P

Anybody Out There?

Wowie wow wow.... this is the third time in two days that Ive blogged, which Im pretty sure is as close to a record as Im gonna get :) I was just thinking: I wonder if anyone reads these posts.... I dont have any blog "followers" mostly because most of my friends dont blog. But I guess that's beside the point. I didnt actually realize how easy it is to FIND someone's blog; all you need to do is google their name! I discovered this by googling my own. Ive been told that when applying for jobs etc you should search your name, so that if your potential empolyer does some kind of follow up, you know they wont find any weird online things. Not that I have anything to hide, hahah. Buuuuut you never know what comes up under your name. Im actually glad that I discovered how easy it is for someone to access my blog, because I was just starting to think how great it would be to write everything and anything I felt I needed to say. You know.... to use it like a vent. But no longer, internet!
So let's talk about dog food. We just started our St Bernard/Newfie on a diet of raw meat. She has a form of mange (you know, like a "mayn-gee mutt?") and the vet says its becasue of her low immune system. My dad was looking at stuff online and he decided that instead of keeping her on meds, we would go for a more natural route. He found a site that takes in sick and abused dogs and they have this system of curing them naturally (it's where he got the idear from). Cleo lost all the fur on one side of her face and its really raw and swollen. The meds were causing her vision to be impaired and shes falling a lot. The person/people running this animal shelter claimed that often they get dogs that are completely hairless becasue of mange. Instead of using medication they take them for long walks, feed them a diet of raw meat (cheap scraps) and give them loads of love. Of course it doesnt always work, but its just as likely that the meds will. So my dad came home today with a cardboard box of chicken necks and backs. I didnt even know poultry HAD backs. I thought they were just a corpse, two little skrawny legs and a head? Anyways I guess we'll see how this remedy works. I'll keep you posted, that is if there is anybody out there.

“Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass. It’s about learning to dance in the rain”
Anonymous

One Sixty Five Hemlock Place

I’m trying to recall the days of dress-up and homemade salsa. The days where we would swim in a well-maintained pool for hours on end, and re-emerge only when convinced our fingers couldn’t look any more like dried prunes. This pool was situated in my grandparents’ backyard; it was a place that my dad’s whole side of the family could take refuge, and be comfortable in calling “home”. It didn’t matter where my extended family was currently living... they came from all over Chicago, Australia, Ottawa, Toronto, New Zealand, and Alberta. Yet they would all agree that they felt most at home on 165 Hemlock Place.
It was a scene of cousin sleepovers, which included popped corn, ripple chips, and banana sundaes. We went to the park, watched movies, and talked well into the night. The cousins would fall asleep between ten at night and two in the morning – all depending on what time zone we were coming from. In the morning some of us would pick fresh raspberries to add to our porridge. My grandpa was head chef when it came to making breakfast. He was also the one that was forever cleaning the pool, fixing scooters, and teaching his grandchildren how to skate. Grandpa was probably the handiest man to have around.

165 Hemlock was also a place of celebration. There was never any question as to where the family would eat Easter dinner or celebrate New Years. The most vivid memory or these occasions is Christmas. My grandma made a wicked Caesar salad; you could smell the garlic as you pulled in the driveway. After a fabulous supper of turkey, dressing, cabbage rolls, garlic mashed potatoes, and cranberry juice, we would all gather in the living room. There was hardly enough in the way of seating! Sitting on the lap of a favourite aunt, the entire family would sing the classic carols until there were none left to sing.
This was Santa’s cue. My grandpa would come in through the front door wearing a big red suit and an elastic beard. He would reach into his big black bag, pull out a gift, and call the lucky contestant onto his lap. After Santa left, and Grandpa magically reappeared, we would open the rest of the presents. The night would end with everyone moving furniture to accommodate the family for our annual photo.
Salsa and tea parties will always live in the grandchildren who were victims of this experience. And we will probably miss it forever.