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Both kids have been asking for a Nintendo Switch for quite some time so I found one on sale on Amazon that had a game, a one year subscription, tv dock, joy controllers, and a grip controller attachment. Then I spent a relatively long time setting up my two kids accounts, plus one for myself, and then three hours to download the game from the estore. It was a tense exchange while my kids waited for it to become available to play on. Then once it was they were too afraid to try it, so I blasted out a grand prize first place finish on a 50cc race as Yoshi, and then they were cool with it. I did tell them that we weren’t going to buy any games for it until AFTER we see what their aunt & uncle had bought for them in relation to the Switch (if anything at all). I know my youngest wants Smash Bros for $80, but I don’t know what game(s) the older one wants to get/play. She finds too much choice hard to parse and freezes up. Does it all the time. Whether it’s in the candy aisle, toy store, movie choices, you name it. More than two or three options and it’s game over. Might as well pack up, head home, and embrace the ensuing tantrum over a failure to choose anything at all. But I digress.

I have been impressed with Mario Kart 8, I really like it. The gravity defying element is pretty awesome. I like that the music, and general feel are still so similar to the N64 version. And very close to the SNES version at that! Very nostalgic. I need to figure out how to skid into corners again as my lap times weren’t as sharp as they should be. No matter. All this means is that we have an entirely new category of games to look at now too. So much for working without distractions! Ha.

I also somehow managed to get Fortnight up and running on the Xbox for my youngest, as she had been asking about that for a really long time now. I blocked a great many options because she is so little. I have to approve things as they come up, and I limited, to the point of choking out, the chat options. No chat, no third party website visits. I can tighten down controls even more if I feel I need to do so later on.

The next thing they’ll be wanting is a VR headset, so we’ll have to brace ourselves for that. Though with the presence of the brand new switch that might be delayed for a while as they game on the newest console in our home. One would hope.

Christmas was otherwise very pleasant. My oldest woke up with a fever, so we stayed home and did our own thing for the entire day. It was really nice. I made a hot breakfast of beans, bacon, toast, while my wife made the pancakes. It was really nice. I finished off the day with a Rye & Coke while watching the new Nate Bargatze special on Netflix. Hell, we even saw two NFL games on tv yesterday, so that was awesome. My wife got dug in on her new 1,000 piece puzzle. So I know she was having fun. I cleaned up wrapping paper, and the recycling so I was pretty happy about that.

The new puppy hot more gifts than my wife & I combined, so he’s a spoiled little brat. Chewed the legs off of his new squeaky chicken almost immediately. He was a little perplexed by the wrapping paper, and cheers of joy from the kids, but he didn’t attack any gifts, or mangle any toys (yet). Still early days.

I hope that you and yours are all well taken care of. Ciao Bella!

Making a hot breakfast, and opening gifts from Santa Claus, plus our stockings while we wait for the grandparents to arrive to finish the rest of the gifts. I came from a free for all present opening family, while my wife came from a watch everybody open each gift one by one in turn. It’s a nightmare of boredom, and frustration. I personally hate it. Makes it feel more performative for the gift sender than the gift opener. No-no you can’t enjoy it unless I watch you, is a weird power struggle vibe. Not a fan. But onwards and upwards!

Had a fair old snowfall last night. I had even gotten out to shovel earlier yesterday to try and mitigate the amount I would have to deal with today. But with the temperature rising, and the amount of snow which fell, I felt it was a smart choice to enlist the help of both of my children. I did however manage to clear the front walk, and 80% of the driveway myself before I gave in and asked for help. Which they freely gave, so that is appreciated. If we have too much more I’m not going to have much room to put it anywhere!

If we could cap the snowfall at two or three inches per event then I would likely never need any help, but seeing as we got six to eight inches pretty consistently across the property I was going to require assistance. If it were still the soft powder from last night, no problems, just puff heavily and that stuff will go away. But the temperature rose significantly, and the bottom portion was a warm sticky mess. Adding several pounds to each shovel full. Makes pushing the snow around a real chore too. Not to mention you either have to move heavy shovel fulls, or twice as many half full shovel loads. Not cool.

I was sweating like a pig by the time I was done, and downed a pint of water immediately upon coming inside.  From what I can see of the forecast ahead we will get a little bit more snow, and then rain, rain, rain. The temperature will go up above zero, and the rain is to stick around for two, twonand a half days possibly. Yuck. I hate rain in winter. Ice dams flood things terribly when we have these conditions. I could do without.

I forgot to inspect their work before heading inside, so now I see a patch at the very bottom of the driveway that they gave up on, which I’ll need to sort out. But otherwise they were very helpful. It went much quicker with all three of us throwing snow, instead of it just being me. My back, shoulders, and arms all thank them profusely!

It is a pretty quiet Christmas Eve, so I don’t think we’ve got much going on today. Happy holidays.

Good news, the dogs play well together off leash. They ran for the full hour, and should now collapse in a heap and sleep for a good portion of the day. That’s my good deed done for the day. Ha! Happy monday.

Had a blast at the family Christmas party. Not going to lie, I got into my cups just a touch for the first time in about eighteen months and made my wife drive us all home. The beverages went down so smooth. I indulged a bit more than I usually would. I had three, which for me is a lot. I know I used to work for several breweries, and had tonnes of fun doing so, but I’m not much of a drinker. Except on occasion when I can partake, and not suffer for it. Luckily I ate like a king, and stretched those drinks over four hours and this morning, I am none the worse for wear. Beauty! I’m more sore from the rock climbing, and the tug of wR session from the night before. It was the tug of war that pulled my big toenail off from my toe whilst battling at the Taekwondo dojo. Fun time otherwise.

The kids had a lot of fun doing crafts, running around with one another, and watching Christmas cartoons. I’m sure they dipped into the candies a fair bit too while the adults attentions were turned towards conversation. It was really nice to see just about everyone. There were a few notable absences, but schedules cam be so hard to coordinate, especially when folks tend to move around the province so much.

Today is going to be pretty chill, while we prep for tomorrow’s play dates, and farm walk with the dog(s). I hope all those invited still manage to come along. I hope the dogs play well together, but also tire each other out some too. The kids won’t be much of a problem, as they are all good kids… mostly. Ha.

Happy sunday to you all. Ciao Bella.

It’s a sad day when the things that used to spark an inordinate amount of joy in you seem to fizzle away, and now leave you feeling nothing. Not like a complete nothing, but just a passing “meh”. Like, now I know that I am well outside of the demographic for the things I really used to enjoy. I find spectacle to be empty. I want character development, not sky lasers, and roiling cloud monsters. I nolonger want to see every single character known to be thrown together, I want a tight ensemble of no more than five doing, saying, being something meaningful. Not just the loud mouth key guy who is there to open a door and then die. That feels lazy to me. It also sparks no joy.

What I’m saying is, is that I’ve grown less fascinated by movies as of late. I’m more interested in how they were made, and created than I am about what’s on screen most of the time now. I was always a BTS on the expanded Bluray type of guy. Show me how the sausage was made, because now I find the dynamics behind the scenes more relatable than whatever is going on in picture. Guess I’m just starting to show my age. I do not believe it to be a sign of depression, because, and here’s why. I am still able to feel joy and excitement. They are just induced by different things now. I can still enjoy a great twist of events in a book. I still enjoy Diablo four. I still enjoy wood working and doing minor handy man tasks about the house. I still love the holiday season and visiting friends. I am sure that I just don’t see the appeal to CGI leaden movies that are heavy on phony looking effects, and thin on plot & story. The characters are all terribly thin. Not just nutritionally, but academically as well. Dialogue is horrendous lately. Exposition a bore. Don’t get me started on the sound design, and mumble core acting delivery we are getting. Can the grimdark universe’s please enunciate and move their clenched jaws when they speak. Can we get some volume on the spoken words, and less red lining on the explosions please!?! Maddening.

But I digress. Happy first official day of winter. The cold certainly settled into Who-ville these last few days. A bit nippy out there if you forget your hat, gloves, boots or a decent jacket. Stay safe! Happy holidays to you all. Ciao Bella.

My youngest has been in the process of shedding her two front top teeth for a few months now, and the loosest one was a real snaggle tooth looking mother father. It was being pushed upwards, and outwards at the same time, while the adult tooth poked through in behind. But after all the swinging, dangling, turning, and pushing it was still held in place by two points on a very healthy gumline. It was interfering with how she eats, and was making her feel uncomfortable when she smiled, so I said “That’s it! This tooth has got to go”. And she fled from her bedroom out into the hall in a panic, where her mother caught her and pulled out the tooth. And it bled. Oh boy did it bleed. Wow. That’s ah, that there is a whole lot of blood. But, it’s out now, the tooth fairy came, and already she was eating this morning with a lot less pain. She didn’t have to try to eat around it. As sad as it was that it hurt to come out that last little bit, she is all the better for it.

So now the other front tooth that was wiggly has room to manoeuvre, and will hopefully come out even quicker, and with less fuss. I don’t think both will be out by Christmas day, or even by the start of the new year, but we’re 50% done as of today. Nice!

By the time she woke up this morning all the bleeding and pain was gone. We went through a number of paper towels, toilet paper sheets, and a few loogies in the sink to get to that point. My eldest hates the sight of blood and was getting queasy at the presence of it all. For a kid whom does full contact combat sports she’ll need to work on that. But, no matter. Tooth was extracted, crisis averted. Yeah! For Christmas miracles.

The kids had their winter pageant at school yesterday afternoon, and both kids were in it. The older one did two different band segments (one on the saxophone, the other on percussion) and then three songs with the Newsies cast. While my youngest did a class poem about what snowmen do at night. It was a fun time. Glad I went.

So now it is the Friday before the start of winter break and Christmas is right around the corner. I’m excited to see if the kids actually like the gifts we got them this year. I scaled back on small junk filler gifts, and went for fewer, but higher quality items. Not to mention my wife bought multiple sets of Ĺeafs tickets that we will start to use in early January. That’s for my oldest daughter and myself. That covers her birthday, and Christmas, as well as my Christmas and up coming birthday too. All told we are supposed to go 4 more times in total against an assortment of teams. No repeats! I’m pumped. Though we are high up, the view is unobstructed, and I’ve got ample leg room! Score.

We have a pottery experience factored in to Christmas for my youngest daughter because she wanted to try throwing a bowl, or cup, or vase of her own. Sounds like fun. Plus our go to theme for this year was less stuff/things, and more going out to have experiences to make memories. I’m all for it! Sign us all up.

In other news I have no idea what else to do with this damnable Elf from the Shelf. I have it stuck in the blinds right now. It was in the cutlery drawer yesterday (my wife’s idea) along with a poem about spoons. I am still none to keen on the Elf, but as the interest in it among my kids wears off, we could probably park it, and forget about it for days on end next year. I’d rather we spent more time reading Christmas themed books, or watching holiday movies to get into the spirit of the season, than pranking the kids with a surveillance Elf. But that’s just me.

I’ll be thinking of you all while I rinse the blood out of the bathroom sink, and mop it up off the floor. Take care out there. Ciao Bella!

It has been a few years since the Jericho blew through the farm leaving a bunch of detritus in its wake. And now that uncle Fred has been dead for the better part of a year the salvage job has finally started to clean up the grounds a bit. The busted trees were taken care of the fall immediately after the wind storm, but it has taken some doing to sort out jurisdictions, insurance, and under whose purview this salvage job is to be. My father in law got all the ducks in a row and now they’ve begun to remove the old busted grain silos, tin roof, and mangled equipment that was left to moulder in the bushes. Plus some old vehicles are being extracted from the tree lines, and inner fields by the work shop. I’m sure you could keep a flat bed truck, and several bins busy for 7-10 days clearing out all of those old cars, trucks, vans, tractors, and farm equipment that has been left on the farm to die. I imagine the use of a chainsaw is required to get much of the oldest items to pull free of their parking spots, especially if in the tree lines between fields. Freddy wasn’t too keen on taking stuff to the scrap yard. He used stuff til it was dead then dragged it to the trees and forgot about it.

If it were me I’d want to start in one area and clean it up entirely, but I don’t know what sort of items the salvage guys are looking for, or are interested in. I’m sure they grab things they can turn a profit on first, then collect the waste items afterwards. I haven’t seen any of it in action, I just notice the tracks, and bins later on, and try to guess/recall what was taken away. A fair few trees and limbs have come down, that much I can tell you for certain.

Funny to see just how deep a truck will settle into the earth when left alone for a decade or more. Some of those tire holes are a full foot deep if not more. We are going to need to get a burn pit permit to dispose of all the rotting wood that a bunch of this old farm junk was sat on. Old pallets, fencing, planks and such. That would be real handy to have a burn pit. I could then take my wood shop cut offs there instead of waiting for a cottage run every few months.

The farm grounds will change a whole lot if they are able to clear out most, if not all of the junk. Why you could even rebuild some smaller outbuildings on the reclaimed foundations of buildings long left to ruin, and overgrowth. Like a whole new farm down there these days.

It’s Thursday, so I’m still on the clock for some paid work. I best get moving!

I do not intend to do any traveling this Christmas holiday slash winter break, so I feel confident in pre planning some outings for my kids, and their little friends. It will begin at the farm so that my puppy, and our friends dogs can run wild and blow off some steam. The kids can explore outdoors for a while before they break off into separate groups and spend the rest of their time together on devices. This way I can tire out my dog, and know my kids will have spent at least one full hour out doors running around, so that they could be ever so slightly less full on during the remainder of their respective play dates. A little mud and fresh air will do them all some good. I’m really excited to see if the dogs can/will tire themselves out at all. That’s my main goal. That and occupy the kids for a bit when we are so close to Christmas that you can taste it.

In other news Christmas is one week today. My how time flies. I think I am finally finished shopping and wrapping for the season! Joy to me! I’ll need to start wrapping up my projects for the year soon.

Oddly enough I have received two new projects already this week, with several more on the way I’m sure. Which by all measures is a good thing. Means I’ll have work in the new year! Score. That’s terrific news if you ask me. I’m always happy when I know I have work coming in the near future. Takes a lot of the anxiety out of freelancing when you’ve got pre planned paid work on the books. Typically December through March are really empty, and kind of dead. Which really sucks because it’s far too cold to go in my shop and build furniture, and I can only do so much cleaning, purging, and organizing inside the house. Things usually even out in the end though, so it’s all good.

Sitting and waiting for a chop to open 8n order to grab one more item for my youngest child. I was under the impression it had been ordered already, and we were waiting on shipping, but that isn’t the case, so here I am. Luckily things open a bit later around here so I was able to take the fog on a lengthy walk first. I also hope to be able to find what I’m looking for fairly quickly. That would be nice touch too. But I’ll just be pleasantly surprised if they have it in stock here at the bricks & mortar physical store. I had visions of getting lunch or making a day of this sort of thing, but it’s not as much fun by myself, and I have paid work to finish up later this morning. Onwards, and upwards as they say.