oceansedge, posts by tag: ponderage - LiveJournal

I've been overweight most of my life.... I think I was probably 8 yrs old the first time someone mentioned it. My mother blamed it on my father.

My eldest son was 8 when he first started getting a bit 'thick', the same with my second son, and my daughter. I was all blamed on me. Despite the fact that my feeding habits with the children never changed between 7 and 9 yrs of age.... or that the eldest's weight issues never changed after he went into care at age 9. Still. ALL. MY. FAULT.

I can tell you categorically there is probably no other single element of human science, or medicine more filled with woo and quakery and charlatans and scams than the weight loss industry. I can tell you that because I have struggled with, lost and gained weight, read the science, read the nutrition, read the papers, seen the books, followed whatever the fad diet today is. Heck at one time in my life my mother would kindly send me whatever new weight loss book was the day's favourite for my birthday or Christmas, figuring it would be interesting to me. 40+ years on .... I can pretty much assure you that no one is really entirely sure what they're talking about.

20 years ago, I pretty much decided I am who I am, my self worth is not a number on a scale, and obsessing about it, and / or living with other people who obsess about it, was simply no more healthy for me than the weight was. I would eat well, I would eat what I liked, I would cook and I would live. Chasing numbers is for suckers.

Now a Type 2 Diabetes diagnosis throws me right back into the hairy world of "miracle diet cures", and the "SCIENCE shows!!" crowds. The really occasionally frustrating part of this is that there IS news in the world of dietary science, there is valid argument that the popular science thinking of the day has for decades been wrong and skewed and pushed by vested interests.

More and more good science seems to be indicative that 'dietary fats' aren't the great enemy they've been projected as for the past 50-60 years. Largely sugars have been getting something of a pass (although not entirely), and the real culprits have been carbohydrates.

In other words.... Atkins might have been on to something.

And of course carbohydrates is exactly the place where the diet industry and the diabetes communities cross over. Especially for Type 2 diabetics, minding, watching, limiting and controlling the consumption of carbohydrates, is in a nutshell the only way to bring down blood glucose numbers - with or without the aid of medications. That much is true. However, within the diabetes community (and outside it as well) you'll find (as one so often does) zealots. ALL carbs are bad, they obsess about the numbers, they keep scorecards.... "how low can you go?!" I've seen people bragging that they haven't had a carb in years, or giddy they're seeing BGL numbers in the 3.5mmol/l range (for those not familiar with the science or range, anything below 4 is a pretty serious hypoglycemic). On certain diabetic forums, a lot of them actually, you'll find some people pushing LCHF (low carb high fat), and of Keto diets pretty heavily, and a lot of gluten-free woo thrown in for fun and flavour.

Now I'm not about to say these people are wrong. I've always kinda had a live and let live attitude towards other people's dietary habits except as it comes into promoting bad, debunked, mythological science (a la the anti-GMO crowds, or the aspartame is poison nonsense). Really they aren't entirely wrong, limiting carbs will reduce once's blood sugar, the more you reduce the carbs the more you reduce your blood sugars - easy. A pretty strict very low carb regiment was how I initially got my BGL under control. And in conversational chats with dietitian friends - they agree - it's a good kick start to getting your numbers down. However, I also firmly believe that *any* extremism isn't likely a good thing and keto, paleo, atkins, advocates promising that a diet of just protein will cure everything from cancer to the common cold .... well it irks me.

It also irks me that it's become almost impossible to separate the wheat from the chaff on this. I've seen so many people trying to flog another diet book that even good science gets read with an extremely skeptical eye.

For instance... this video was really interesting, and the science is solid and born out from another of other researchers.


As is this commentary added:
https://proteinpower.com/drmike/20…

But then both of these gentlemen Dr Ludwig and Dr Eades are flogging their current diet / weight loss / miracle cure book. Skeptical.

More established sources of information? Like for instance The Canadian Diabetes Association and a lot of the 'accepted' medical literature and nutritionist information... is still pushing the whole food triangle argument of 'balanced nutrition' and the old notions of fat=evil. It doesn't take into account more recent science findings, or even that dietary recommendations for Type 2's who are using diet and medication to control their blood glucose, and for Type 1's who are using diet to medicate - are really subtly but substantially different or at least they should be.

Fats
Proteins
Simple Carbohydrates
Complex Carbohydrates
Glycemic Indexes
Slow Absorption
Fast Absorption
Keto
Paleo
Atkins
LCHF

I really don't think that anyone has 'THE' answer yet.

So yes, looking for data, information, science, a simple answer, a simple eating plan, I can trust, it didn't really exist. Because there are no simple answers, and the science is continually evolving and especially for Type 2s my insulin resilience isn't going to be like your insulin resilience which isn't like their insulin resilience.

After all is said and done. I've taken a very middle of the road, no extremes, tack. I used self testing, medication and a low carb regiment to get my BGL under control, continued to use testing to slowly see what carbs I could and could not tolerate. Slowly added a bit more carbs back in (because - yes I *do* like a muffin or a piece of pie on occasion). I do eat some carbs, chose the complex, low glycemic index, high vitamin ones as often as possible, try to limit the processed simple carbs, and keep my 'treats' to within reason (as determined by self testing). This works for me, I'm happy with my numbers, so far my doctor seems happy with my numbers - I do have an appointment in June to get my April (1 yr anniversary) blood test results. Will this work for you? Maybe. Maybe not. Your body and endocrine system is yours, not mine. Do what works for you.

I'll leave you with these two links - to a two part Ideas episode from CBC radio on fats and sugars that is worth a listen to.

FATS

and

SUGARS

Originally posted to: The Plan® comment there or here

Sooooooooo the last you heard from me I was planning a series of baking attempts and posts as I was working for an application to the Great Canadian Baking Show....

Then I worked 21 days straight, and even after that the combination of the two jobs and trying to squeeze in a bit of baking and bookkeeping in between has left little time for blogging.

I think we can probably safely say, that as filming was planned to happen May-June, that I didn't get a spot this year, I am thinking I still, at this juncture, want to continue to work towards a placement next year.

Of course if they actually viewed this blog as part of the selection criteria, well I haven't exactly been keeping it up, and certainly the only post that I put up regarding the competition was a failure. I never did get posted the "laminated pastry in 3 hours" post... which was a win. Or the Potato Bread one. Or even Black Forest Cake for Mother's Day post. Ah well I can only keep doing what I do.... and given the choice of baking or writing about baking, the baking will always win.

In other depressing news, the wee inexpensive building next to the national park, that would have been perfect for my Big Black Dog Cafe, (which was all part of the 'must win Baking Competition' obsession) has been bought. It's a sadness, but honestly without a competition win, or a lottery win, it wasn't going to happen this year anyway.

The combination of the two has left me floundering a bit .... I don't enjoy the work I'm doing, but the income is necessary, but it's not leaving a lot of room emotionally, physically, temporally, or financially, for stuff I *want* to be doing. Building the house, sending the Feychild to school in England, my cafe, or even gardening, knitting, reading,..... *anything*. So I'm feeling a bit trapped in a black hole. But James and I are in this together and we keep on slogging, and maybe, just maybe .... eventually we'll figure our way out of it. I just kinda hope it happens before we're too old and weak and addle minded to enjoy it. In the meantime, I'm looking for a new idea, Plan, obsession, to hang my hope on.

-----------------------------------------

Oh and as you know.... there's been changes to LiveJournal's TOS, that has a lot of people leaving. Honestly, I haven`t been reading at LJ regularly for a couple years now - much as I hate FB it really has become my point of contact with a lot of people. As for posting that comes too from my own blog space, and dreamwidth and they`re all crossposted to each other. If I can eventually manage to figure out new image hosting (I have been continuing to use scrapbook for all my image hosting) ... I may end my LJ account for these privacy reasons. But migrating all my photos is gonna take a looong time, so that may not happen any time soon. It will be sad if it does.... 15 years I`ve been there, 15 years since a certain person I will never speak to again convinced me to try this idea that sounded hideous to me (yeah really I am NOT a big fan of change....) 10 years at least since I made that account permanent..... OK enough being maudlin.... I haven`t decided, and it`ll be a lot of work before its ready to happen if I do and besides it`s not like I`m leaving cyberspace..... LOL

Originally posted to: The Plan® comment there or here

Depressing thought for this morning...... the attacks in Paris, even amongst moderates I know who are wise and circumspect and know "not all Muslims" see this event as affirmation that we need to keep up the pressure on Syria and for Canada to not remove our fighter jets and to keep bombing the country and keep taking in refugees (which we have hand in creating - maybe not directly, but certainly indirectly) ..........

*cry*
9/11 was 14 yrs ago, when we ramped up the 'War on Terror", although lord knows it existed long before that..... and frankly - bombing the hell out of em hasn't worked - the War on Terror has been as effective as the War on Drugs.

Without opening large cans of worms and being in my usual way broadly over simplistic. Even at the worst times of The Troubles and the IRA Britain never bombed the hell out of Ireland (although I can't be sure there wasn't talk of it). We have lots of home grown terrorists (although we like to put the misnomer of 'eco-terrorist' on them ..... like somehow that makes their violence more palatable) but no one is calling on bombing Vancouver or Northern California....

This isn't our parents war, or our grandparents war. This isn't one country and tanks and u-boats and armies marching across Europe, this isn't a formal declaration of war and send in the bombers and the tanks till they cry "uncle' and sign an amnesty, this isn't an easy enemy to see or defeat. Because the enemy is hate. This is a new war and a new warfare for the new millennium - welcome to the technological revolution - old strategies and tactics aren't going to work..... they haven't for 14 yrs, or 24 yrs or 54 yrs .....

I'm just a silly old woman who's tired of the answer being 'bomb the hell out of them', I don't know what the answers are - but I know that I'm proud of Canada's and Lester B Pearson's role in developing the concept of Peacekeeping missions - I think that it plays a role in our identity as Canadians (or is the result of our identity as Canadians or both) .... and maybe Peacekeeping (as it exists now) isn't the answer any more than 'bomb the hell out of them is', BUT maybe that thinking - maybe that mindset - maybe that Canadianism can help find answers for a new millennium and a new war. Maybe our new millennium Prime Minister can help find that, maybe I hope too much. I suspect that in the global reality - Canada is small potatoes, Justin is young and only a month in office and will he, can he, have the ear of the world ... can hope and optimism that's been so infectious here infect the world?

Yeah I know - I'm asking too much.

#thewaronhate

Originally posted to: The Plan® comment there or here

Yes, it's been two weeks since I sat down and put words into some kind of a cohesive order here.

I have about a half a dozen notes here on my desktop about 'blog posts I should be writing', or just plain things I'd like to share with you, and other rambling thoughts. So, the chances are very good that you're going to get all, or most, of them in one long in-cohesive post.

---

Michael Ruhlman wrote a very interesting article a little while back about bringing chefs into hospices, to create meals for the clients. I was deeply moved by and taken with the idea. As Ruhlman says, "because meals are about family as much as they are about food, and last meals are important." However, reading the article what i don't get a sense of is how often this is done. Are these event meals? Once a week special nights? Or have the created a system where every evening meal is this sort of family meal? What I think I'd like to see, what ought to be done (if it isn't what they're doing now) is bringing the chefs in to help create menus and planning and teaching cooking staff the techniques so that every evening meal in hospice care can be this kind of family moment. Sitting down for a meal as a family shouldn't have to be an occasion or event for those in hospice, but something that's just there, a quiet background thing that removes one more stress from the family, removes one more barrier from that feeling of 'home'.

I hope that's what they're doing.

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Poverty. Kathleen Kerridge writes this article on the face of poverty today. And this follow up article about all the stupid things that get said when you start talking about poverty. While Kathleen is based in Britain these are still valuable and enlightening reads, the numbers and systems may differ some between our countries, but the truths don't. They're eye-opening if poverty isn't something you know; understand or have experienced. If poverty is something you have an intimate relationship with it's good to hear you're not alone.

For me, personally, aside from a period of about two years of my life, 'working poor' was the correct demographic description, but what it boiled down to was we were and are now, poor. We were and are exceptionally fortunate that James family was able and willing to help us out (albeit with a scolding), and that within a week of being turned down for social assistance I found part time work. Oddly enough we were denied assistance because I'd cashed in what meager retirement savings I had, and in playing shell games with credit accounts to stretch things out as best we could - we couldn't adequately explain later where/how that money was spent. The thing of it is, I read Kathleen's article I find myself more sympathetic to her poverty as "no fault of her own", after all she didn't choose to be ill. I'm less forgiving of myself and am inclined still to be embarrassed by and apologetic for our poverty, which can be directly attributed to certain choices I've / we've made over the years. My children grew up in poverty because I *chose* to leave my first marriage, oh I had hopes and dreams and potentials when I left, but the 'poor' came ultimately because of that choice, and choices I made later. Later on, our current situation is a direct result of my *choice* to leave my employer on March 3rd 2010 and thus effectively committed professional suicide. I didn't think it would turn out that way, however, it did, and it was a direct result of my choices. In the end the relationships I ended that landed us in this mess were abusive ones, but that doesn't make my abusers responsible for my choices. The thing of it is, I don't want it to sound all noble "I'm poor because I chose a higher moral ground', but nor do I want it to be "it's all your own damn fault!". In the end I did what I had to do for me, I didn't want it to turn out this way and we work daily to move forward from here, but it's neither to be commended or condemned - it simply is. I need to learn to be more forgiving of myself.

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Writing. I've been thinking a lot of late of favourite phrases. I've long had a fairly short list of favourite words; turtle is one, I love the bumpy chewy texture of it in my mouth; but the list of favourite phrases is longer yet I haven't really written about that. Sometimes they're catchy and people (myself included) will use them as tag lines, but more often than not they just simply illustrate a point - succinctly or amusingly or with a particular panache. As a writer a well crafted phrase, an elegant painting of words, is a beautiful thing and I tend to collect them. I'll often laugh out loud a little in delight upon discovering them, some of them I've written, some I've collected elsewhere. So in no particular order:

He couldn't manage his way out of a paper bag without a lamp and a Labrador (mine)

She ain't pretty she just looks that way.(Northern Pikes)

A plethora of famished cliches. (Jack)

Quasi-superfluously noncommital. (Ken)

Sooooooooooo really not so very rambly.... there was a looooooooooooooong interesting bit that's been rambling around in my head for a while on art, artisans, arts and crafts, Ayn Rand, Pierre Berton and The Plan®........ but after 2 days of writing on it - the computer ATE that part. I know I know *sigh*, 'save your work, save your work often.'

Anyway, it eventually grew to a point where it really deserves a post of it's own, so I'll have to try and recapture the spirit of the thing again tomorrow :)

Til then.....

Originally posted to: The Plan® comment there or here

I know I know.. I already did a 'Polar Bear Season' post, and a 'New Year's' post another navel gazing post is just too much!

Too bad.

Gonna do it anyway.

I was trying to explain to someone recently how 'The Plan®' evolves. In the process scared her silly when I said, "James and I decided to take a bit of a break over the holidays" and she thought that was a polite euphemism for, "the relationship is on the rocks and we're having a trial separation". While we do have our moments, mostly related to stress and my depression, we are, fear not intrepid fellow traveller, still deeply in love. What I meant was "we are taking a little break from life and outside commitments and giving ourselves a couple days off - which I admit might be hard to follow when - we're 'retired' already.

However, that really is part of the process of how 'The Plan®' evolves. There is rarely that moment of epiphany when you suddenly wake up and decide to do something completely different. Rather it's more of an ongoing inner process of little things and little influences and subtle tweaks, over a period of time that ends in something that might seem surprising to those outside your own head. Yeah I know, I'm still explaining it badly.

There were a lot of influences that went into the whole decision four and a half years ago that we would up-stakes and move to Nova Scotia. We had a 5 year plan, but then we've always had a plan, we've always had 'The Plan®', and that came out of talking about the things we love, the things we wanted, how we saw our lives, but as they say, 'Life is what happens when you're busy making plans'. The place in our lives we're at now isn't where we envisioned five years ago, it isn't where we envisioned when we made that left hand turn decision in the summer of 2010. Recently a combination of subtle things, the sense of a possible turn in fortunes (alluded to in my previous post), the happenstance of a couple new diy documentary serieses from Britain (the £100,000 House and it's sequel "Tricks of the Trade' and it's prequel Restoration Home) and just taking a bit of time to relax and reconnect over the holidays. Even when you're retired and share each others' company 24/7 you can find yourself getting caught up in the mundanities of life.... meals and pets and cleaning and bills and chores. With the struggles of the past two years here, especially financially, we got bogged down in getting by. Life became about surviving, not building. So it is that this little combination of events didn't really change 'The Plan®', but rather brought us back to it. Reminded us what we set out to do in the first place, what it was we were dreaming of out of our new life in Nova Scotia, and rediscovered that what we want out of our lives together, here, hasn't really changed, it just got back burnered for a while. So, no, no great epiphany moments, but yes, a bit of an 'ah ha!', a feeling and moment of clarity of purpose.

We still want our little farm by the sea (and a lack of swamps would be really good), I still want my dog aquatic centre, we still want our workshops, we still want to be doing and learning and teaching and sharing. Taking all those eclectic things we love, from the art of food, to the art of technology, to the art of writing, to the art of painting, to the art of photography, to the art of music, to the art of building, to the art of teaching, to the art of hospitality. In short we want to be creating. That is what inspires us, but we also want to be sharing that creating, with like minded folks. The goal is a retreat and learning centre. A place of workshops and learning and creative spaces. To invite the friends and people we know and admire to teach the things that they do so well, and that we want to learn, and to make new friends and family along the way sharing the things we do and know. He is in his core a teacher, I am in my core a planner and organizer. I am the artist with the soul of a scientist, he's the scientist with the soul of an artist. It's a vision that FITS us, and we want to take our friends and community along for the ride.

It's a grand dream, honestly I don't know if we'll ever get there, but that's where we decided we were headed back in July 2010, that's where we confirmed we were still headed in January 2015, maybe we'll be a bit closer there in 2020, or maybe 'The Plan®' will evolve, morph, and become something different again.

Originally posted to: The Plan® comment there or here

... And a bright and shiny new year full of promise and possibility awakens, (complete with the first proper big fluffy flakes winter wonderland snowfall of the season). Seems like every year we seem all too glad to kick the old year out the door and welcome the new one. I don't think it was really 2014's fault it was a bit of a dud.... I think maybe we just wore it out, and by Dec 31st it's looking tired and shabby and 2015 feels much brighter.

It's true - 2014 was NOT the bright year we'd hoped for back on Jan 1st. If 2013 had been tough, 2014 was a slow descent from 'this doesn't look good, into some kind of scary places'. That said I can't completely knock '14, we have a roof over our heads - which while it is kinda scary the maintenance it needs that it isn't getting, it isn't falling in on our heads yet, and while tight finances and stress as a whole take their toll, we still have our health for the most part, and we have each other, and while we may have been a bit distant at times lost in our individual thoughts and worries, we've never wavered in our love and faith in each other.

We hit our deepest low in November when we were turned down for social assistance. However, The Feychild's application was approved (hers being separate as she's an adult now, and technically qualifies for Room and Board), and then shortly thereafter I found part time work. The business at the Market wasn't quite as grand for the holiday season as we'd hoped, but it was steady and it was growing, even if not in leaps and bounds, and there are still a few pieces on the table for January so we're hoping it continues to progress. All that and another helping hand from the parents (hopefully for the last time) and we had a more comfortable holiday than we thought we would, and we start 2015 feeling a bit like we've turned a corner and it may just get better from here.

Cautiously optimistic.

A friend recently said, her only New Year's Resolution in 2014 was to finish the year healthier than when it started, and would be putting the same Resolution forward for 2015. That seems right to me ... that all I really want out of 2015 is to end it in a better place then we're starting it.

Ain't no miracle bein' born
People doin' it everyday
Ain't no miracle growin' old
People just roll that way

So it goes like it goes and the river flows
And time it rolls right on
And maybe what's good gets a little bit better
And maybe what's bad gets gone

Bless the child of the workin' man
She knows too soon who she is
And bless the hands of a workin' man
He knows his soul is his

So it goes like it goes and the river flows
And time it rolls right on
And maybe what's good gets a little bit better
And maybe what's bad gets gone

Yeh it goes like it goes like the river flows
And time keeps rollin' on
And maybe what's good gets a little bit better
And maybe what's bad gets gone

David L. Shire / Norman Gimbel

Originally posted to: The Plan® comment there or here

heheh.... I *love* this...
The David Bowie Paper Doll

If that doesn't float your boat, try a little Freddie Mercury in a Habs Hat

But in other news.... I feel old.
Looked this morning at the full line up for the Halifax Pop Explosion: "The biggest music event east of Montreal kicks off next week, and features a solid mixture of big-name international touring acts, beloved Canadian staples and interesting up-and-comers."

And I don't recognize a single name on the list.

<--------- old phart

Originally posted to: The Plan® comment there or here

I think the interview this morning went well ... but then I'm never *sure* about these things.

Despite the familiarity with the questions, I did struggle with at least one key point "Can you give an example of a time when you exceeded expectations?" "Umm no, I have exceptionally high expectations of myself, I set the bar pretty high, I achieve what I expect of myself. I'm pretty sure those achievements exceed other people's expectations, but since those are rarely spelled out - I'm sure I exceeded them, but I'm not sure what their expectations were since I know mine are different that that." I definitely struggled trying to find the words for that one... same as "Can you name a time when you set a goal for yourself, and how you went about meeting that goal?" Well bugga. What I said was, "I'm always constantly setting challenges and goals for myself - every day strive towards things, it's what I do.... this week I decided I was going to learn to hand code drop down menus - not a big thing, sure I could have downloaded a widget or.... cut and pasted a bit of code from someone else, but I set out to learn it, and in 24 hours I had that puppy working." What I should have said was, "17 yrs ago I decided I needed a future, a career, not just a job ... I set out to learn to fly and become a professional pilot - that never happened, but along the way I learned a great deal more and it led me into a challenging and fruitful career I am really good at" It's hard to give those sorts of examples because I just don't think of it in those terms.

There were 12 questions, in total, I think I did OK on most of them, it's a scored system (60% is a pass - I'd find it hard to believe I didn't at least do that well, but then again I wouldn't find it hard to believe that one of the other 3 candidates did better either.... or at least 'smoother' answers.

But I enjoyed meeting them all, and the HR person was quite personable and chatty and asked a lot of interesting 'aside' questions about airline dispatch and what the heck I was doing in Corberrie NS.

Hope springs eternal.

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Spent the rest of the day futzing with malwarebytes support - still trying to figure out what went wrong with the latest update install......

Originally posted to: The Plan® comment there or here

Well life continues on here.... fall has arrived, as usual I'm moody and melancholy, but not in a bad way, just in a grey fall being reflective way. Yep, it's Polar Bear Season again.

Usually major life changes, switches in direction, begin formulating in September and fruition happens the first week of October. Of course there's no hard fast rule about that. For which I'm very glad. I got the call yesterday for an interview for the job I mentioned a couple weeks back. I know I'm qualified, I know I'd be good at it, I know my experience in airline dispatch isn't all that far a throw away from "Dept of Transportation and Infrastructure Base Person I" - snow plow dispatch. Despite my glowing resumé and experience and excellent references - well there's a lot of very qualified people, with experience and references around these days. I just hope for the best. With any luck at least one of the interviewers will be one of the same people from the 3 person panel in Shelburne last November and they'll remember me fondly - that interview went well as well.

A friend turned me on to a possible copy writing gig, sent off an email regarding that late last Friday - that too would be a great thing if it pans out. Lots of crossed fingers.

Spent the morning dealing with complaining......
Complaining to Malwarebytes that the latest updated version is broken, that was a handful of hoops to jump through.
Complaining to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada that the information they gave me over the phone yesterday regarding my dilemma with Facebook doesn't entirely apply. I suspect I'm spending a lot of effort making myself unpopular with 'Barry' and I won't get anywhere, but I am trying. There are a few people on Facebook I deeply miss, had a quick chat with one of them last night via James's account, and then emailed her this morning, there's also one of my sisters, as much as Facebook was pretty much my only contact with her, she didn't post often, and its limited in it's information. I tried emailing her, but she's had some issues of her own and her mailbox is full and emails are bouncing. I hope she's ok. What does come through from her - James will let me know.

I missed making an appointment with the provincial social services office today - admittedly this is something I've been putting off, avoiding, generally burying my head in the sand about for a while now. But we cannot continue to avoid it. Even if the job interview goes well tomorrow, it'll still be weeks before we see any money from it, and frankly I can live without the phone, and the credit card bills are what they are, the market is providing us with sufficient to eat - not well, but every day, so we've avoided it, but I'm starting to fear we may lose the power - and that'd be a huge problem. Technically The Feychild should be getting a disability payment at the very least anyway. Still I keep putting it off one more day.

The stress has had it moments of taking it's toll on James and I, but in the end, ultimately I think, I hope, it might all be good for us ... it's certainly poked us both in some very tender places, and we are trying to pull together more than pull apart so I think we'll survive this.

A little change in luck, a sold snow blower, the wood stove selling, the property in Newfoundland finally finding a buyer...... it won't take much to turn things around. We're starting to make orders at the market, and *do* live in hope of one day seeing those 100-150 orders a year... maybe more. If we can do that, and I can be working again, we'll find our way through to the other side of this. After all .. it's only money and I've been broke before. What it won't break is our love and commitment to each other.

We did get a marvellous Thanksgiving dinner - thanks to a little help from James' parents, and the market, and a good week on the tables. And left over turkey is holding us over this week well. They're still irate with us, but we're doing all we can, can't do any more than that.

I'll make some soup for tonight - The Feychild's request, there's fresh bread to go with it. I may be tired of complaining and tired of struggling, but we're battening down the hatches and holding on, it may be a long hard winter, or maybe we'll catch a break, but whatever happens we have each other, and we have you gentle reader. So nothing is really all that awful.

Here ... have a puppy.


Originally posted to: The Plan® comment there or here

I suspect someone's internet prank has gotten a little out of hand?

At least that's what it smells like to me.

Amaruk Wilderness: Questions raised about company at centre of anti-Christian attack

Originally posted to: The Plan® comment there or here