I generally have found a lack of interest to share anywhere lately. The whole world seems to be about sharing every little thing these days… and I haven’t been dying to be a part of that. What I had for supper? Who cares? A selfie while stopped at an intersection? Really? And I have no kids to boast about after they’ve lost a tooth or finished in fifth place in a race, but at least had fun doing it.
And the world of politics? Oh goodness no. There is simply no agreement in that world anymore. You’re either conservative and think all liberal minded people are “snowflakes” who live in a dream world. Or you’re a liberal who thinks all conservatives are the devil. Donald Trump and his lackies go off on Trudeau and there are people on twitter blaming Trudeau for provoking Donald, followed by a horrifying “I wish he was my leader.”
So I’ve been living the quiet life. Mom and dad are back in Newfoundland and I’m left back doing my own thing in Ottawa. I do love having no plans during my four days off. In fact, I love it so much that, back in June, I took a block off work and had twelve days of no plans. It is the heights of relaxation. To get up when you see fit. Go for a 45 minute to 1 hour long walk. Take a drive to the grocery store. Go to a movie. And go on to bed whenever you feel like it, at the end of the day.
Oddly, I guess I blame it on aging, these days now have me getting up and going to bed earlier. Extended vacation used to mean staying up until 2:00 or 3:00 AM and waking up around 10:00 the next morning. But I’m not more likely to be in bed around or before midnight. And up somewhere around 7:00 in the mornings.
Another thing I’ve been doing quite of a bit of during my time away from the blog. Gardening. My parents have a garden plot at the condo common space. And, with them away, it’s for me to tend to.
I generally haven’t minded it. It’s become part of my days off routine. Walk over with a couple of grocery bags… check their mail on the way there… pull weeds and deposit them into one of the bags… tear off some pieces of lettuce for the other bag… check on the condo… water the garden… and head home again to deposit the weeds in my green bin and clean the lettuce for my salads. Lots of salads this summer. There’s a constant supply of lettuce and the little roadside market supplies all the rest of the ingredients. It’s been a nice enough thing to do that I may set up a bit of a garden in my yard too, next year… though with mom and dad in Newfoundland during the growing season, I don’t know what I’d do with more lettuce.
I’m booked for a trip home. I’ll be there for a few weeks from the end of August to the middle of September. It’ll be my first time home in a year. One of the downsides of parents spending half the year in Ottawa… less reason to head home for a visit. On the positive side, it has probably saved me between $1000 and $1200 this year. With mom and dad in Newfoundland year round, I was heading home three times a year, instead of the one.
I enjoy being home in September. The tourist season is pretty much over and trips to Fogo Island and surrounding areas are usually fairly quiet as compared to heading there in July or August. It seems, though, that the second part of my traditional September trip home is becoming a trip of a less enjoyable kind… a trip to the attic. Last September mom drove me up there. “Size up what’s still up there? And maybe we can clean it up!” Twenty minutes brought buckets of sweat and aches in my feed and legs as I balanced my way upon the narrow beams, careful not to fall through the ceilings below, and in a constant hunch in an attempt to avoid clocking my head off the boards above. Well, this year, mom seems to want what’s up there gone. Which probably means any of my St. John’s friends would be wise to avoid picking up the phone or responding to my texts during the September days… I may be looking to put you to work.
After a pretty crumby spring, this summer has been fairly dry and hot. Canada Day’s humidex hit 48. The hottest ever measured in Ottawa. We had a full week of humidex readings in the 40s. And even though that is now broken, most days remain sunny and into the high 20s or low 30s. There’s been so little rain through all this that lawns all over are becoming vast stretches of low lying hay. Daily watering keeps my back yard green and my front yard greenish. There is so little shade in the front that I think I’d need to water twice daily in order to keep all the brown at bay.
So that’s about it, for now. A general look at what I’ve been up to since last posting. I’ll try to post more regularly again now but I still think I’ll keep most of my posts off of Facebook. Every time I use facebook I feel a little dirty for doing it. And I don’t want to be promoting myself to the Russian bots. They may steal one of my pictures of a beaver or turtle and use it to reelect Trump somehow.
