Month: January 2023

Rain, in January? Freezing rain at that. Again. What a weird winter this is shaking out to be. Take care out there all you long distance commuters, it could potentially get ugly. Take your time, and be safe.

Not much to report here today, beyond the aforementioned strange weather we’re having in Southern Ontario. Work has remained fairly constant this week. I have a new large project coming my way, probably for next week, possibly in a day or so. Lots of 3D renders to produce. New sell sheets, and a couple of coupons to make too. Gotta love it. Never know how long it will all last. Ciao Bella.

Wouldn’t be Wednesday unless it was also hump day too. First real week back for 2023 and it’s shaping up to be a doozy. Lots of new paid work, returning clients, and cold, cold, bitterly cold breezes blowing around the streets. Not so hard that the lamp posts are touching the ground, but icy enough to let you know if there’s any room left in your abdomen for a couple of cold danglers, hint hint, wink wink, nudge nudge. Brrr.

So due to the current temperatures of minus sixteen (as of 8:00am) this morning, no outdoor work in the shop is slated for today. I have some fine tuning of my cleaning to do out there at some point. Big boxes, and garbage items to get tossed.

I’d like to throw a bunch of broken random stuff away this spring, but that may require a trip to the dump, as I don’t think I can get it all to the curb for the weeks we have garbage pick up. My modest post holidays clean up has not yielded the amount of waste I thought it would. But I was trying to be kinder, and attempt sorting & storage over a straight up purge. Plus I didn’t empty all the cabinets like I did last year. Not that I believe there to be anywhere near the same accumulation of junk that there was prior to both kids starting school. I had been so pressed for time I just lodged junk out of sight, to be dealt with later. And, that later came and it was all dealt with. Something along the lines of four or five garbage bags worth, plus another five or six recycling bins of paper and cardboard we’d been holding on to for one reason or another. Pack rats. Sometimes I feel like we are hoarders with all the cardboard and plastic bits we manage to keep lying around. I’m still getting rid of birthday & Christmas present debris. Will probably still be doing so when Valentines day comes, that and then Easter too! Can’t escape it!

Not to mention my front porch is littered with “cool” looking sticks, and rocks, and other such items my children pocket when out and about to bring home and fawn over. Smaller rocks I don’t mind, we can look at and categorize shiny rocks, but sticks and grasses or leaves I could do without an additional stockpile of.

If I recall we are about a week away from the Big 400 Day benchmark. Four hundred seems like a lot. Being a week out, it doesn’t seem so big, but to start again, from zero that would be a challenge. I guess now that I’m in the thick of it, I’ll keep going until I miss a day. Not sure what else to do. Part of me would like to substitute the writing for working out. But I’m absolutely certain I would not achieve a daily workout of any sort for more than just a few days at a stretch. If we ever win any money, I’d like to invest in a home gym with free weights, and bench/squat rack. To be able to squeeze in a meaningful work out in the comfort of your own home must be a real thrill. Stinky, but thrilling nonetheless.

Duty calls. Gotta return some e-mails. Ciao Bella.

And I’m not about to start now. Most likely why I find I absolutely have to get eight hours of sleep or else I will have to drag myself around in an army crawl in the mornings. Not a fan of tea either, nor iced coffee, nor cappuccino, nor espresso for that matter. On a cold day I can partake of a hot chocolate provided it wasn’t made using water – blegh! Yuck. Although the powdered Icetea from Nestea is a bit of alright in my book, if made correctly for my tastes. I don’t care much for wine, of any sort. But! But, I will say this, the Yellow Tail “Bubbles” product, in the white wine or the rose are pretty great. But I dilute that with No Pulp orange juice, so… take that however you want. I don’t have a sophisticated palette you might say.

A long island ice tea however, is fantastic. Same with various Twisted Tea products, good stuff that is. Gets sweeter the more bottles you consume. Dangerous stuff!

I need to work on some 3D renders, so I’ll sign off now, and will leave this conversation alone for a bit. Ciao Bella!

Can’t believe there are 50 more of these things to go this year! Mondays that is. Chock full of things to do. Gas runs, milk runs, school drop offs (no tears today! Check mark in the win column, thank you very much), sorting laundry, hanging clean laundry, the dishes, and a general first round tidy up. That and I’m back on my bullshit. Yeah-buddy!?! But seriously. This week the extra curriculars kick in again, with new destinations to remember. Same bat time, new bat channel. POW! PIFF! POFF!

Paid work is back (thankfully) and so is my Domestic Duties Monday/Tuesday schedule. Cleaning and grocery runs are all a go. Green light! Gett’r done!

Soon I’ll need to put my quiet time to productive use and get my taxes sorted out before I take it to the accountants office. Lots of receipts to sort through & catalogue. Bill’s to dig up, billing histories to download. It’s a whole thing.

For those playing the home game, this weeks magic puzzle word is “Pilfer”. The losing team Gomes home with a thousand bucks, and the winner gets to eat a wheel of cheese. Fun times. Today’s game is called “The First Monday Back After Winter Break“, and it is most notable for a full e-mail inbox, an over flowing voicemail box, and more meetings than work hours, and having to say ‘Happy New Year‘ to everyone you meet for the next three weeks. Oh, isn’t life grand. Also we’re pushing up the time line for your projects, and you need to sit in on some calls/meetings about new big idea projects whose budgets we’ll never approve, but want you to look into anyway! Ta! Have a fantastic day.

The holidays went over well. We traveled to see some close family. Isolated at the cottage before & after until we had the all clear, and binged some shows, got out doors to snowboard, snowmobile, and walk around to find deer antlers. It was at once a busy & slow 15 days off. Food was great. People were great. Kids were lovely (mostly). The get older real fast though. Vroom. And they’re teenagers off to work, and out with friends. We did get hampered by freezing rain, but it was all good. One extra night with family went over smoothly with the kids. So all good.

Looking forward to what’s instore for 2023. Happy and hopeful! Ciao Bella.

Four months later and a squirrel/chipmunk or large black bird has recovered my 1/4 inch socket and deposited it on top of the leaves & dirt a foot from the garage door. Now my set is whole once more! I did have to buy a $4 replacement, and an extra deep version too, but the point is, I have found it months after giving up hope and forgetting about it. On top of all the downtrodden leaves. Imagine that. I forsure thought that was gone, lost to the ages. I’m so happy. Stupid think caused me a lot of grief. Searching here and back between the yard and garage. Sweeping on my hands and knees. But I have it back in my possession. Hurray!

Back at home, just in time to sort things out for the week ahead. School is back on, so are extra curriculars, and work responsibilities; like after school staff meetings. Going to be atleast two weeks of transitioning with my kindergartener if history is any indication of what is to come. Crying and histrionics in the mornings, and falling asleep before the bedtime story is half way through at night, for two weeks until the new schedule settles in. I hold out hope that it won’t be that way, but deep down I know that it will. I just need to remain calm, and try not to escalate because I’m tired, or hot, or out of sorts myself. If I’m clear headed enough I can catch myself before i make things worse. It’s a process.

Best guess is today is Sunday. At least I hope it is. I can’t recall if I wrote anything yesterday or not so perhaps my streak heading to 400 days is over, and I don’t know it yet. Oh well. Back to the drawing board if so. If not, Party-On!

My next model kit project has arrived in the mail. It is the correct model, but the incorrect build up, if that makes any sense. It has only just dawned on me that the best build up version of the Valkyrie was purchased directly from Japan via HLJ. It had the multi colour injection moulded parts. Whereas the kit I just bought is all white. I’m going to paint it, but I thought I was getting one kit, and got another. No matter. Not going to swap them out now. First thing to do is open the sprues, and wash the parts in soapy water. Remove the mould release so that the paint & primer adheres without cracks and ripples. Also, this time around I’m going to build, and paint in smaller sections before I fully assemble. The markings on the cockpit are far easier to add when it’s not attached the rest of the fuselage. I have a set of all new USAF colours, mainly greys, for this build, so I hope to make it look a bit more custom than the last two of these I have made. One straight out of the box, the second I attempted to paint, and then weathered it to fix my many errors.

This next one I hope to remove mould and seam lines, and to make it look as clean as possible before I add some lived in weathering details. Not as much as before, but enough to make it look like a working military machine. Could be cool. I need to write out my plan of action first, otherwise I will definitely miss something vital. Like the cockpit interior panels, or lights on the wing tips. Tiny little parts that are easy to overlook until you review it at the end and go whoops! Missed those minor details. Damn.

So… a new year ahead. The weather is a tad strange. There must be some more snow and cold on the way. I can’t imagine going all winter with green grass showing through every where. It got down to minus fifteen last night, so winter is still very much here. Just not the snow – as of yet. At least if the temperatures are below or at zero the snow hills can produce snow for the slopes. I’d like to venture out myself to hit the slopes for a refresher. It has to be at least twenty four years since I’ve gone downhill skiing. Luckily around here, we’re dealing with hills, and not mountains. So I can bone up on my skills without too much going wrong, I hope. But don’t mind me. I wanted to hit the links, or even the driving range while my kids were at school, and wound up being too busy to do either. So skiing may be a far off dream as well. At least while I have a warm office to putter around in, and an unfinished model kit at my disposal. No sun/wind burns to contend with, or expensive rentals and lift tickets to purchase. We will have to see how things play out.

Fifteen times the charm I suppose. Oh I hate to see what a mess the next two years are going to be with the US Congress. What a mess. Why hold out for fourteen votes just to go ahead on the fifteenth, five days later. Looks like showboating, and attention seeking. But I’m no scholar in American politics, so that’s just my opinion from the outside looking in. No different than any other fundraising politician anywhere. Being a household name by any means necessary is good for raising money. Not sure why, but it seems to work. Oh well. Now we can see the dysfunction spill over into every other aspect of Congress being run. I expect committee members to be dropped (Democrats that is) and the one man vote to remove the speaker going ahead on the daily, as revenge. What a mess.

Only a few days left of this wandering fog called a winter break and reality will come rapidly back into sharp relief. That and all of our usual responsibilities, like knowing what time of day it is, what day of the week it is, and where we are in the month. That and driving, shopping, school runs, lunches and every day regular life. Oh, oh and waking up at a reasonable hour and going to bed well before midnight. That is something I look forward to. Regular sleep patterns and my own bed. Amazing what passes for good news as you get older. Ha.

One last leg of our drive and we’ll be officially home, and then I can begin to resettle for school and work obligations. I’m sure I have a mountain of laundry to process. The dishwasher will have sat idle for the week, so those dishes will be stinky, and may need a second run through if we had any really sealed in goo on the bowls. Gotta sort out the presents to locate school back packs, books and such. It’s going to be a whole thing this weekend getting prepared to return to regular days. I have a pile of masks to wash, and N95’s to find out of storage. The new extra curricular schedule to put in my phone, and attempt to remember to use a 3 and not a 2 on any dates I write down.

I intend to undertake a good broken toy / garbage purge in the coming week(s). Depending on how long it takes to make the interior look livable, and less cluttered. I foresee a lot of sorting this time around, and not as much throwing things away. Finding all of the LOL Doll accessories and putting them in an accessible, but tidy spot to be played with, without winding up all over the family room floor. Sorting out Trolls, and Peppa Pig from Harry Potter, from all of the LOL Doll figures and accessories is going to take a very long time. My main goal is to remove as much cardboard/kleenex/napkin shards that accumulate around the house while the kids modify their toys and build cloaks, coats, sleeping bags, and back packs for their various toys. I don’t mind the crafting and modifications, but I detest them leaving the aftermath scattered over the floor. Paint streaks on the hardwood floors, globs of glue on the edge of the coffee table, pieces of paper confetti against every available surface. Ugh.

Don’t get me started on the actual crafts, fancy paper and glitter bombs I find behind the couches, or hidden corners of the house. Bits of decorative string, cord, or frayed rope lengths just lying every where. Sand and glitter all over the table cloth in the dining room. Buttons, jewels and baubles that get thrown about the room, ready to pinch your foot should you step on them. Maddening! Madness! Mayhem I say. So I need to re-sort all that stuff, and probably get rid of things that never get used, like colouring books, and dried out markers, and smashed crayon bits, and dried up glue sticks. That’s at least a full weeks worth of home house keeping to undertake. I do have some down time coming, so I’ll definitely find the time. Wee!

Come Monday we are all back to regular life. It may not be normal as of yet (Thanks COVID-19 : XBB15 point something or other). Maybe in another year or two if we miraculously decide to try something other than mostly nothing. Maybe this new year will bring us all some clearer insights and inspiration. Who knows! Ciao Bella

Had to put off some travel due to inclement weather yesterday. But now the road, it calls to us. Beckoning us to drive in all the grey coloured clouds. The salters have been out and about for hours already, and in a few more the sun should peek through, and we’ll have an ever so slightly safer trek. Pays to wait out most of the bad weather.

Vacation week with the kids is drawing to a close, as we now need to get prepped for a return to school & work. I have some lined up all ready, with more to come. Will check back in later. Ciao Bella.