Musings on a Small Life

It's been an exceptionally long week, or so it's seemed. Probably because today is our once-a-month payday and it has seemed like forever since the last one. Still busy at the office with various projects, and with our move (upstairs) slated for the week of October 12th, right after the holiday Thanksgiving Monday (the 11th). Everyone's looking forward to that, as it means offices for the analysts at long last. I'll still be in a cube, so it won't make as much difference to me. Except I won't have to sit next to my surly co-worker; he'll be tucked away in his own space with walls and a door. Hallelujah! Mom and Harry are settling in to a routine of sorts, still lots of stress there, of course. More so for Mom, obviously. But she has her respite now, Mondays and Fridays, and has a girls' day scheduled for tomorrow. Dad and some friends are camping this week in Kelowna, BC. Biking along mountain trails. He sent me a link to some pics he took yesterda...

It was a short jaunt this morning, not quite three hours, just a ramble down to the Cataraqui Cemetery and then home. The colours are just starting on some of the trees, particularly the maples. The colours usually peak over Thanksgiving weekend (which will be October 11 this year). It always amazes me how it feels like summer one day, then fall the next. I used to think that it was the frost that turned the trees, but a co-worker told me, a few years ago, that it's the decreasing daylight hours that starts the change. Which makes sense, since we've not had any frost yet. Walking down to the Cemetery.  Notice the insect? I have no idea what it is. I snapped a pic of the swamp, just because the water table has been high like this for most of the summer. We've had a lot of rain in a number of storm bursts.  This morning glory was growing at the end of someone's driveway.  In the Cemetery. Cute little chipmunk. There were quite a few around, but this was the only one...

Gaaahhhh, my back space is filled with spiders right now, but this one is the largest. *Shudder* I can handle snakes, mice, moles, squirrels and chipmunks, but not-- not --spiders. They make my skin crawl and if the cats manage to somehow bring one of these creatures into the house, god/dess forbid, the entire city will hear me screaming at the top of my lungs. Because there's no way I can touch anything that looks like this, not even with my vacuum cleaner. This is one of the things about fall I cheerfully could do without! Happy Friday and I wish everyone a spider-free weekend! LOL!

Today's our first full day of Autumn, so I guess there's no escaping the turning of the seasons. Every year I try to work up enthusiasm for the impending winter's cold and ice and snow by telling myself I'll do fun outdoor things, but the truth is I just prefer to hibernate. Oh, to be a bear! LOL. Other than last evening's snake adventure, recounted on the Fuzzy Tales blog , the week has been relatively uneventful. Still buried under mounds of paper, still juggling 5 projects, still so tired I'm almost falling asleep over my keyboard by mid-afternoon. No (non-cat) pics since the weekend (except for the snake!), just a header change to herald the season. (That snapshot was taken last October, walking down the street from the bus stop to the conservation area.) I've chatted to Mom a few times and Harry's doing very well, all things considered.I think her respite kicks in next week (9am to 2pm Mondays and Fridays), so I'm sure she's looking fo...

Autumn starts on the 23rd, so this is summer's last hurrah for another year. Yesterday was my usual laundry, house cleaning and errand day, picking up necessities as well as some things I had ordered from Sears. Including long johns. :-) Today, though, I bused down to Portsmouth Olympic Harbour again, and walked along the waterfront park to Lake Ontario Park, where there's a dog agility competition taking place this weekend. I was too early for any events, but did see quite a few well-trained dogs, in a variety of breeds. If you saw most of the dogs in my immediate neighbourhood, you'd understand why it was a treat to see well-behaved ones. Then I walked down the road to the beginning--or the end, depending upon your point of view--of the Rideau Trail. It runs between Kingston and Ottawa and parts of it pass through the city. I hadn't been on this part of the trail in over a year, possibly two. It's not that scenic, really, though it is a lovely walk all th...

"Wasting away again in Margaritaville, "Searching for my lost shaker of salt...." Did you know a margarita has about 580 calories? I just thought I'd throw that out for a bit of trivia. Go with a Caesar instead. At least you get your veggies. Nope, I haven't had a margarita, but I've had about 3 shots of rye right now, and that was before food. I can barely see the keyboard. I so seldom drink that I have very little tolerance to alcohol. But the week deserved it. Explain to me how it is that I can spend weeks on end mindless with boredom at the office, then be swamped by half a dozen "must do immediately" projects? Including that web project. Which would be easier if the University's web template actually allowed one to do what one wanted in the first place. I had visions of going "postal" this morning, left the office and ran an errand downtown instead. Explain to me why I live in public transit hell and why it takes 1.5 to...