Brrrr

I woke up to 5C and rain this morning.
Perfect running weather! I haven't been
for a run in ages but I did ok. I'm hoping
to get another one in on Friday. I know
you'll all hate me for saying this BUT
I'm looking forward to cooler weather!

I have another stray. This time it's a brown
tabby. He's been abandoned by his owners
(they moved) and was supposed to be taken
care of by their mother(who also lives on my
street) but he never leaves his old 'hood for
food. She lives at the other end of the street
and he never comes up! I've been feeding him
for about a week now and he's only come up to
me on his own once. So he must be getting food
somewhere right??? Surely he's not that dumb?
I think he's waiting for his family:(
I think the woman who agreed to feed him has
given up on him and has left him to his own devices.
He's so skinny:(

I'm not comfy with the thought of four cats but I will
keep feeding him from my porch and when the weather
gets too cold,I'll bring him in. I've already had him in twice.
My cats(well the younger two) follow him around like idiots
and there is some hissing and swats but no major dust ups.
He's not all that keen on being inside. I'm not sure if
it's because of my cats,lol,or if it's just him. I don't
think he was ever a house cat at his old home. I wonder
if the best thing for him would be to take him to the
pound? At least then he'd have a chance to get a new
family...I always worry though that they'll put him to
sleep because they're full..may be I'll put an ad in the
paper..ok just thinking out loud now! Jig is going to
ask the woman who's supposed to be feeding him what
the deal is and then we'll know what to do from there.
I'm hoping to embarrass her into taken some action.
And who knows,may be she is taking care of him...
Yes,I do realize I spend way to much time worrying
about animals that don't belong to me. LOL,why
change now?!

My last week of freedom

before school starts has begun.
It's funny,most parents are celebrating the
opposite!

Do I still have homeschooler readers?? Kamrin?
Are you out there??? You need to start a blog again:)
I know Faye knows what I'm talking about when
I talk school. She homeschooled her boys:)

I think I scare most homeschoolers away with
my posts about kissing girls and such;p I was
looking through some of the other blogs here
with homeschooling as their thing and am still
surprised that most of them are god-fearing folk.
What's with that?? I thought the times they were
a changin'...It gives people the wrong impression
of ME,lol and I always feel sorry for them when
they discover this blog. I mean I'm not some hard
core freaky person,I share a lot of the same values
with Christians and the like BUT I'm waaay more
liberal and open minded about stuff. You would
not believe the people who think I'm"bad" or "evil"
because of that. It used to make me mad but now
it makes me laugh because I've seen the light (ha!)
and now know not every person who believes in God
is like that.Hallaulah! I have a lot of awesome friends
who prove that:) I still feel like I need to put up a
disclaimer though which is funny considering how
MILD and boring I am.

ANYways: I am almost all prepared to teach C grade
five. I'm just waiting on a few more books. One being
a book I need by Tuesday of course. Hurry up book!
What are we using this year you ask?

Math U See. This is a neat program that comes with
everything you need to teach math,including a dvd
that shows the lesson/skill with base blocks. (I think
I haven't watched it yet;p)

Sing Spell Read Write (or something like that!)a language
arts program,that comes with a cassette player and tapes,
exercise books and a teacher's guide. It looks pretty good.

We're doing a Pioneer Story for Socials for the first term.
I've got the first book(see above) and then a Pioneer Thanks
giving and A Pioneer Christmas,as well as a craft book.

Science is just the ministry approved textbook,Science
Probe 5. It looks boring. We'll probably just skim past
the dull parts,cause we can.

Then we're learning to play guitar,sew,swim,doing gymnastics,
I have a fine arts book..hmmm what else?? We have to do daily
PE,which will be swimming or walking or something like that.
We're doing keyboarding with a neat program called All the
Right Type(Watch out Bernie,I'm learning to type the proper
way!)Oooh and I think I have to teach some sort of career
prep/lifestyle health course thingy.

This will be the first year Jig has ALL of my attention school
wise,as Devon is going to public school. I think it'll go well
here. We're with a program and have a wonderful teacher
to inspire, encourage and motivate us. The rest is up to us.
Ha,she's screwed;p

Yesterday

was my 14th wedding anniversary. Go me!
We didn't do anything exciting,but did exchange
cards and small trinkets. OH we also had a flan.
Yep,I'm all about the food! I thought it'd be fun
to show you some wedding photos from the dorkiest
wedding ever,ha. Ok,it wasn't that bad but looking back
now I find I laugh and laugh and laugh at these pictures.
We were in our Country stage. Luckily THAT didn't last
too long,heh.

Me with food on my shirt as usual!

All ready to go. Look,wood panelling. Funny thing,I still

live in a house with wood panelling.

These are out of order but you get the gist. That's my sister

and Durell's brother. During the ceremony a big gust of wind kicked up and

Devon said "Uh OH!" It was funny cause everyone kinda

took it as an omen,lol

kissy kissy My friend and my BOOBS,hehehehehe

Dur's dad. Look how WEE Devon was! Durell's drinking beer,I'm drinking grapefruit juice.

Me and Dur's mum.
Dur,Dev and his Momma.

Ta da

Pressies. We opened them at the wedding because let's face it,

it wasn't exactly formal. Just the way I like it! Notice the smoke

in my hand??lol I made that toppper myself,lol,out of silk flowers. I glued them

onto a styrofoam cup that I'd stolen from my work,lol love hahahah Our wedding cake? A DQ ice cream cake,lol. I love the beer

can in the background!

The end:)

A better Monday post

I actually got some sleep last night!
(see post below) I fell asleep around
three and woke up at 9. I feel strangely
refreshed.

I almost cut the end of my finger off this
morning.(HA,perhaps I'm not as refreshed
as I thought.) Lucky for me my finger nail
caught the brunt of it. I hadn't showered
or dressed yet so it would have been a
looooong time before I got to the ED.
Yes,I'm one of those freaks who needs to
be squeaky clean before presenting myself
well anywhere. When I had those heart pains
and rapid heartbeat a few years ago,I showered
first too!

It's garbage day. Lucky me,my garbage men
are HOT! (hee,I had typed licky me before I
realized my mistake) They always stare in at
me. That's kind of creepy isn't it? I'm not sure
what they're hoping to find. There's just some
fat chick in a ratty nightgown here. This time
I stared back aaand they kept looking,even as
they drove off and went to the next few houses.
It was weird BUT it gave me a better, longer view
of them,heh. I think I'm turning into a cougar.

Devon is going to a job interview today. At Save
On Foods.The position is cashier. Not bad for a
15 year old. Of course they might offer him some
thing else. I guess we shall see.

We went swimming yesterday. It was kinda
cloudy when we went but warm. Then the storm
clouds rolled in but they quickly passed and before
we knew it,the sun was shining again. There's
nothing like swimming in a storm,lol. Nobody left
the beach! We're a tough bunch here in The Cariboo.

I totally jinxed my husband. For the past couple of
months he's had a pretty regular shift. He loads in
the mill at 10:30am and is usually home by 10:30 or
11pm every night. It's great! We get up,laze around.
The do the reverse at night and go to bed at our
normal time. I commented on this of course and
guess what happened??? Yep,dispatch changed it!
This week it's the opposite. I shoulda kept my mouth
shut!

Ok,that's all the ramblings I have today. Cheerio.

Since I'm up anyways

at 2am,I may as well make good use of my time.
I can't sleep. I'm hot(and whiny) and the damn
cat keeps trilling and staring at me. May be if
I stay up for a bit I'll feel sleepy again.
I don't really have anything to say. lol
My other jerkass cat just hung herself from the
blinds and wrecked them. I think I'm going to
switch over to dogs exclusively from now on.
These cats(with the exception of Miles) do
nothing but wreck stuff and tick me off.
Fish. What about fish? They're pretty easy,right?
OK,whatever this isn't working. I'm going to
go bash my head against a brick wall,may be
that will make me sleepy.

Our Day At The Garlic Festival

First things First:
At the above mentioned festival I met an internet person
in REAL life! I did! We met the one and only Bernie !
Some history:
Devon had met him first through a trucking forum and then
I met him after through his blog. He lives just down the
road from us (in Cariboo miles) and has become a fixture
in our family in that weird internet way. We talk about
him like he's an extension of our family,lol. Why? Well
because he's funny and clever and smart. He's kind,
especially to animals and he's taught me lots of things.
Through conversations with Bernie,I've come to terms
with the whole saving every animal thing I have going on.
NO small feat that;) Bernie also has an interesting persective
on...well everything! I love a person that makes me look at
things another way. It's funny,we grew up in the same area
and went to the same school albiet at a different time!
Bernie is straight forward and honest, will kick your ass at
word games,typing tests and has a fun playful nature.
He's good people:)
ANYWAYS,now that I've completely embarrassed the man
(naaaa,he loves this stuff;p) let me tell you that in person
Bernie is gracious and easy going. He made me feel welcome
right away and I felt completely comfortable chatting with
a man I technically didn't know because he's exactly who he
is on his blog,only even better:)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I swear I have to beg for decent photos of this kid!


And then I have this one who'll pose as soon as she sees the camera. Squinty eyes or not!
The first thing we did when we walked into the GORGEOUS
park,in 100Mile House was seek out food(well I went pee,but
didn't take a picture. You're welcome)

Mmmmm,this smokie was SO good! I'm tempted to make my man
drive an hour both ways to get me 10 more.

We sat under a tree and ate,then let the girl child play at
the playground where I took this photo.

And then after meeting Bernie, we let the kids
go play in the creek. I know I said it before,
I'm saying it again. This park was a jewel.
You'd never know how wonderful it was until
you get right into it and then you're completely
enchanted. I think I need to move to 100Mile.

Kids in the creek.

I took my shoes off and walked through too.
It was fun,I felt like a kid! The rocks were
slimy,there were little fishies swimming
everywhere,there were sticks with sharp edges
and mud that could have hid leeches BUT that
was part of the whole experience,hee hee.

We told Ciar "You may only get the bottom hem
of your skirt wet" yeah..she got wet right up
to her waist.But we knew that would happen.

So we walked around for a bit more,Durell bought a cool
shirt,the kids literally dragged me off to buy them candy
and then we left to go home for dinner.

The Festival

Pretty Creek

But first we needed to make a few stops. One for water:

I had it gone in a couple of gulps. It was a HOT day...

and the other stop was to DQ where I got a
Peanut Buster Parfait.

I wasn't able to finish it (I KNOW! I disapoint myself!)
and stuck it in the fridge for later. When I came back
it was still firm. What the hell??
While we were at the DQ waiting for our stuff,a co-worker
of Dur's saw us and came over to chat. We mentioned we
were at the park and then he said "Did you go to the falls?"
Falls? Apparently,there are also water falls in the park!
That place just gets better and better! He was all upset that
we didn't get to experience them,lol. Ciari kept begging us
to take a walk up this hill but because it was so hot we
said no. Well,it seems we should have,lol. Sometimes parents,
you really need to listen to your children;p

Our evening ended with organic watermelon. You know,
you don't really know how much your food has changed
until you have a locally grown,organic watermelon. It
had seeds(which I spat out onto my floor and will be
vacuuming up later,heh)and tasted a ZILLION times
better than what the grocery stores are selling.

Today we're heading out to Chimney Lake for the day.
I've got to get rid of this farmer tan!
Ciao!

Bye Bye Doggie.

Chase is gone to live on the farm.
His owners took him today. I'm
sad for them but VERY happy
for him. This is exactly what he
needs.

OH! We may have figured out why
he took that snap at Ciari. Her hat!
He may have been trying to grab her
hat. It always struck me as odd for him
to try and bite her -it was SO out of
character for him-and I felt like I was
missing something. That may have been
it. At any rate,he's gone to live a new
happy life doing what he was meant to
do,herd.

Life's Ambition

When I was in my twenties I made up a
Life List" of stuff I wanted to do before
I died.(NO! NOT a bucket list. A Life's List.
Bucket List sounds and IS so STUPID!Dumb
Ass Hollywood people,screwing things up)
ANYways,it was filled with all sort of fun
and wonderful things I wanted to accomplish.
Lately I've been mowing through items on my
list. Of course it's became necessary to get my
list out and start crossing the things I'd done,
off. BUT when I went to dig out my list...I'd
discovered I'd LOST it! The symbolism behind
that scares me,heh. ANYWAYS: I was sooo
disapointed but decided I'd just write another.
I can remember pretty much everything on my
list and I definately remember the stuff I've
accomplished so here goes. A more permanent
record of:
Lael's Life List

Hike to the top of a mountain.
(did it! Ok,so I took a tram most of the
way up BUT I still hiked a distance to
the top of a mountain so there;p)

Do the Grouse Grind

Visit Bella Coola

Visit Barkerville.
Done this many times!
Going back this month some time.

Live in The Cariboo.
Doing this at the moment.

Live somewhere(ANYWHERE,lol) on
Vancouver Island.

Visit New Zealand for at least a month.

Speaking of New Zealand go Zorbing!
(Think human sized hamster ball)

Hike The West Coast Trail

Go on a Grand Tour of the North.

Volunteer as a Hospice worker.

Become independant of energy companies via solar and
wind power.

Grow and raise my own food as much as possible.
If unable to do so totally only eat food from
local organic sources.
Partially doing this already. We buy our meat
from a local Ranch

Work in a trusted field that makes a difference.

Ride a horse.
Did it! It got spooked and tried to throw
me but I got him under control. Not bad
for my first time.
I'd like to do this more often...

Homeschool my kids.
Doing it!

Rescue animals.
Done it and doing it.

Go on the road with my husband for an extended
period of time. He's not into this AT ALL but
I think I can convince him.I have too,I can't
drive a car never mind a big truck. (You'd think
as a trucker's wife,I'd use proper terms for
the unit he drives instead of talking like a five
year old)

Learn to knit.
Did it.

Sew a decent outfit.

Quilt a decent quilt.

Paint a picture.

Do beadwork.

Own a Genuine
Cowichan Sweater

Build a straw bale structure.
This used to be build a straw bale house BUT as
I don't plan to live in this cold dry climate for
the rest of my life(where such houses are better
suited) I've changed this to straw bale structure.
May be I'll build a small shed or something.

Visit Quesnel Forks.

Visit Bralorne,and Bradian and Gold Bridge.

Explore all of BC.
Doing it!

Sail a boat along the Coast exploring all the
nooks and crannies.

Surf!

Buy an Airstream and spend the summer moving from
campsite to campsite.

Restore my Great Grandmother's damn chair!
I've been meaning to do this for 16 years.
May be if I put it on this list,it'll get done!

Fly or ride in a Glider.

That's it for now. You can see that some of my
stuff is silly and some of it is serious. That's
pretty much me in a nutshell.
I've left off items from my previous list that
I'm not interested in anymore.
Such as become a crazy cat lady. I have three
cats now and they drive me INSANE! I can't
imagine having more than that. HEY! I wonder...
are you a crazy cat lady because you COLLECT
cats OR are you a crazy cat lady because your
cats drive you to it???
I'm not much into sky diving anymore and I
don't give a crap if I ever learn to drive.
I may or may not,it just isn't important enough
to make my list. A lot of the jobs I wanted
to do are gone too. I've kind of narrowed it
down to what I really want(but that's a secret
for now,ha)

So how about you? Do you have a list?
Tell me what's on yours!

I know,I know. I'm a bit late. I've been so lazy
lately. I haven't been near the computer in days.
Odd,non? I think the days of rain played a part
but it's sunny and nice now,so who cares. What
rain????

I took Chase for his last walk this morning.
Jig walked past him as we were coming back and
he lept up and took a big snap at her face. Think
crocodile! She kneed his ass down and I made him
lie down while I glowered over top of him. He was
not at all contrite. If that were not bad enough,he
did it again! On the same walk. This time he tried
to bite her arm.You could see him think it through
and seek her out soooo fuck that shit. I'm done!
I think his un-channelled innapropriate herding
aggression has turned into plain old aggression.
Both bite attempts were unprovoked and out of
the blue. I have a feeling this is the end of the
road for our friend Chase.
Edited @ 6:30pm to add: The snap was the last
straw for Chasey's owners. His owners had been
speaking to somebody about giving him away
a few days ago but told him they weren't ready.
Well they are ready now and Mr. Chase is going
to a working farm to be a working dog! How is
that for an awesome outcome???

ANYways here is a slide show thingy of some
photos from our trip to Alberta. Mackey,I'm
bummed too that we couldn't hang out:(
We were only in town for a short while cause
of work BS,but I hope to catch you guys next time!

Yesterday was my first day back
from a whirlwind road trip into
the province to my right,Alberta.
We were supposed to go for a week
but work stuff occured so we left
early and stayed for a shorter period
of time. I have lots of cool pictures
which I will share tomorrow. Today,
I'd like to make a few observations:

Wildlife!
Deer are the rats of the Cariboo. Rach?
Can you ask Dave to come hunt here
the next time he goes??? Pleeeease??
I hate them! All along highway 24,
(coming and going)the deer were out
and they weren't just grazing nicely
along the road. No,no they were ON
the road,or about to cross the road.
We'd come around a corner and one
would be just standing there like
"Oh, do you want me to move??"
Mamas were leading their babies
across,young adults were racing the
car(!) cutting across at the last minute.
I'm surprised(and thankful) that we
didn't hit one. My heart raced the entire
way down.

In Jasper National Park the only wild
life we saw was a mountain goat and
her baby. I was expecting(and had been
told) we'd see everything else"Ohh,
they are right THERE,you'll see tons of
animals!" Nope. Just the mama goat and
her baby. I felt bad for her because she
was up on a ridge and 9billion people
were parked and watching her.We came
to a rolling stop I snapped the photo,
then left.That's still not ideal but better
than the people who were actually walk
ing up towards her. You could tell she
was stressed. I hope she knocked their
asses off the ledge,ha. I suspect the above
scene plays out like that often and the
other animals got smart and headed out
of town.

We saw a baby coyote outside of Edmonton.
He was cute. I like coyotes:)

We saw a two bears in BC. Well,I saw one.
Everybody else saw two. I was looking away
when we passed the first one. Both were
brown black bears. The one I saw was not
to far from my house. It was a teenager
and he was up to no good! You could just
tell. He had long funny looking legs and
a goofy face. I wanted to hug him.(but I
didn't)

Food:
Restaurant food is a rip off.It's mostly
over priced and tasteless. We had two
good meals while we were out. One was
at a Mexican place(it was excellent,huge
portions,flavourful,awesome waitress.
When I gave her the money with her tip,
she thanked me with such enthusiasum
you'd think she'd won the lottery,lol.
How nice is that!? Usually they act like
it's owed to them instead of optional.)
and the other was a picnic lunch we
made on our laps in the car with groceries
from a store in Jasper.

People:
Albertans are not much different from my
neighbors here in the Cariboo. We were
treated kindly by everyone we met.

The Cities:
Jasper(both the town and the park) are
incredibley beautiful. I'd like to go back
and explore the area further.

Edmonton is HUGE but doesn't feel over
crowded or crazy.(Of course I still
experienced system over load,lol.)It was
interesting to explore the city.It has
great character and everything a person
could ever want.

Hinton(where we stayed) was kind of blah.

Edson looked neat.Lots of cute houses.

The towns between Little Fort and Mt.
Robson (in BC) were not that interesting.
They all have neat names and I really
thought they'd be cool places but nope!

Cool Sights:
I saw a funnel cloud! We were driving to
Hinton from Edmonton,and the sky was
doing it's stormy thing,when all of a sudden
the cloud formed right in front of us. It
didn't touch down but it was so neat to see
it form and then drift off as the storm
moved on. It was very distinct for a while
there.
THEN after that,a perfect rainbow formed
behind us. It was a complete one,we could
see it's begining and end and, it was so
brilliantly coloured. OF course I didn't have
my camera with me,lol.

Funny Things:
There is this one section of Edmonton
where (and I swear this is not an
exaggeration) there is a liquor store on
every block. One right after the other. It
was hilarious! We also saw a hotel with
rooms for 10 bucks an hour! Woohoo!! lol
We got a huge kick out of that.
Never seen that before. Not even in
Vancouver and I KNOW they exist there!
Guess you just have to look harder. It's
way better if they're advertised;p

I was all discombobulated by the lack
of BC license plates. It was WEIRD!
I never realized how much of a comfort
they were to me until I went to another
province,lol. I am a dork.

ANYways,it was an awesome trip! It's nice
to be home now and I'm busy dreaming
about my next trip to..who knows where!

I still haven't fully recovered

from the subject of yesterday's post.
Most of us go through life convienently
iggnoring the fact that we're not going
to live forever. Yesterday's content
smacked me in the face. We could die
anytime,anywhere,any way. I'd better
get to steppin'! I've got tons of stuff
to do;)

On a lighter subject, Devon sent me something
funny. Enjoy!
Geo metro
Reply to: Date: 2008-01-21, 12:58AM 1994
Geo metro - Windshield cracked. Door hinges
missing on drivers side - door falls off when
handle pulled and must be "placed" back on to
close. Passenger side door will not open at all,
probably for humanitarian reasons. Muffler fell
off, now in back seat but you wont notice the
noise because the shame will be deafening. Car
would overheat if engine would stay running long
enough but mercifully, it will not. Steering wheel
loose and missing mounting nut. Front right
brake rotor damaged when wheel fell off while
driving. Many dents(several from my foot), scrapes,
rust and holes here and there. Radio has "William
Shatner Christmas carols" cassette tape stuck in
deck, enjoy. Radio catches on fire at random. Minor
smoke damage from radio and other misc. electrical
fires though not on headliner as it caught fire as well
and was thrown from vehicle. Front bumper fell off
(I left it). Brakes squeak,wheels squeak, wipers
squeak, everything squeaks and/or is broken. Headlights
blink on and off, turn signals do not. Drivers seat
mounting rails broken off in back, brick under seat.
"New car smell" has given way to "old rat decomp".
Stains on upholstery are primarily not urine related.
Engine has original horsepower (both) and few of the
critical parts have fallen totally off. Rust holes in
floorboards covered with tattered garbage bags and
duck tape scoop up exhaust fumes from missing muffler.
Car will not make it, must tow (preferably on a trailer
with a solid deck and sides to avoid leaving a trail of parts
behind as they fall off during your trip). thanks-Jumpinjoe
This item has been posted by-owner.
Location: Foodmaxx 459- Clovis
it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests
Original URL: http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/fre/546194826.html