See you in September

See you in September



Enjoy the Dispute full Moon as seen from my front lawn

I always let blogging get away from me and then instead of anything interesting, it’s just updates from my life. Don’t get me wrong – I have a wonderful life and I enjoy writing about it – but it should be more than one giant post every few months. I should try and plan to just post wee updates when the fancy takes me instead of thinking I should wait for more interesting things to happen. A more clever human would plan out times to write but it kinda defeats the point of being retired to only put myself back on a schedule again. Then again, I have schedules for all kinds of things, why not something I want to be better at? The inner debate rages on.



Check out this majestic heron who allowed us to get close in our dragon boat one evening

At some point in August I realized that I was spending way too much time on facebook mainlining flood-related information and it was just a> making me more upset; b> making me more anxious; c> preventing me from moving on with my life. Insurance was going to take the time it was going to take, and unlike most folks in my neighbourhood, my adjuster was incredibly responsive and helpful. In the end, she cut us a cheque for the contents and now the rebuild is going to happen around November 16th. We are just waiting for an additional quote to install a backwater valve and/or a sump pump system as well as install a powder room in the basement. I’d love a full bathroom down there but it isn’t feasible. But this way I can host movie nights and not have to trudge up the stairs to go to the toilet, which would be amazing. That is supposed to come in today and we are hoping we can make it happen. It makes more sense to just get it all done together rather than try and get quotes for later since they’re already here.



While the adults fretted, both of our children worked full time for the city this summer

Mr. Tucker and I shook off the dread and then started spending a lot of time exploring the Multi-Use Paths (MUPs) around the city. We live right on the TransCanada Trail so it was great to shake off the drama of natural disasters by getting out into nature. I bought an electric trike from Teslica in the spring and had such a great experience that Mr. Tucker went back and bought himself an e-bike as well. He was using his regular bike to get around but the pedal assist is super helpful to go long distances (especially for me, who gets neurologically exhausted very quickly). Mr. Tucker found himself going to Muay Thai downtown and hitting the grocery store right off the MUP on his ebike, so it worked out. MUPs have a maximum speed of 20kph and this is something I never need to worry about because even with the pedal assist I mosey along around 18kph at my speediest (I did get to 22kph on a hill once but it wasn’t on the MUP and it felt dangerously unsafe on a trike which has a very different centre of gravity than an actual bicycle).



We managed to make a wee holder for my crutch as well, which means I can take it conveniently with us



We sat here for a few hours one day



Sneaky cobra chickens



It’s really lovely to live in a city with so much greenspace



We stopped off at a local coffee shop that had this collection of rocks on the counter. I’d like to know what the bad thing is!

Dragon boat season was lovely as usual but I missed too much due to the flood drama. Still, I did get out on the water enough and of course I am always grateful for another year of being able to paddle with my friends. We did an exploration of some nooks and crannies on our last night out. We usually do a theme and our captain does a series of games while we eat chocolate. This year it was “pirates.” I still have a cheeky eye-patch from a children’s party supply store hanging on my wall.



Enjoying a leisurely paddle of no drills or races

The Eldest – now 18 – discovered BINGO! We took our kids and our friends took their kids to enjoy a few evenings at The Legion. There are some intense folks at BINGO! But overall we had a good time even though none of us won anything. You basically go to get a night’s entertainment along with a burger and fries for $100 for 3 people. I didn’t realize that they can’t legally serve alcohol during BINGO! so we were sadly disappointed when we were told that there would be no bar. Chins up though! Trivia nights have alcohol and we did a couple of those this summer with friends.



Figuring out the different games was challenging at first

Other friend events have included the Tuesday Night Movie Club (which is now the Thursday night MC but also is sometimes the Wednesday night MC? IDK, maybe we should rename the group chat just MOVIE CLUB). To be honest, I have watched more movies this summer than I have in years probably just because I go to hang out with my friends, eat dinner and then watch a movie. Some notable ones were watching 9-to-5 after Dolly died (RIP you absolute gem of a human) and watching O Brother Where Art Thou after everyone had seen The Odyssey in the theatres.



Shawarma is a movie night staple

Oh yes, Mr. Tucker and I also went to see The Odyssey in the theatre together!



Of course we went on cheap day…



…and of course I spent more money on snacks than I did on the tickets!

We also had our annual Park Drinks event where everyone brings their own dinner and their own drinks and we set up for an evening in a public park. I don’t think people know what to do with a gang of middle-aged women who’ve set up a party in the local greenspace. If we were teenagers they’d call the police (or at the very least make a very “concerned” facebook post in the local community group!) but when older ladies do it, I guess it’s fine. After spending many young years getting chased out of parks, I guess it’s kinda nice to just be allowed to set up shop and only get curious stares from the passersby? I could still shenanigan if I want to! I choose to just not engage in shenanigans! Also, ow my back.



Twilight…on many fronts

Have I mentioned that The Eldest needs $20000 of braces and jaw surgery? Laissez les bon temps rouler, I guess! It’s not really les bon temps for either of us – the one getting the work done or the ones paying for the work to get done! She had her wisdom teeth removed last month, the braces go on at the end of October and then next year is major jaw surgery.

I did enjoy this poster in the surgeon’s office. The Eldest explained that this was actually “a TikTok thing” where people are spreading the misinformation that if you drink pineapple juice before dental surgery that it will prevent you from having any pain. You know what also helps? Not aspirating under sedation and then just taking the prescribed opiates after the surgery. I swear to #DIETY that folks will believe anything they see online even in 2026. God, remember the cinnamon challenge? La plus ça change…



I mean…really? REALLY?

The Eldest was also off to University this year, and she moved into residence in September. She is roommates with one of her best friends and so far it is going well. I cried like an absolute baby when we moved her in but I did manage to keep it together for the family lunch in the cafeteria! So go me! She is actually really enjoying university and I was worried she wouldn’t. But she managed to take some interesting enough electives to keep her mind going and I love hearing about what she’s learning. I reminded her that life has lots of do-overs and if she doesn’t love her major, she can always change. She still comes home to do her laundry and hang out periodically so that’s also lovely. She likes hanging out with us and I am grateful for that!






She needed stuff from IKEA for Uni and that means IKEA BREAKFAST DATE!

September was also preserve season around these parts. I am only doing quick pickles this year because they last forever in the fridge and take care of the insane amount of cucumbers we get in our CSA box. Our primary veggie lover is The Eldest and so with her off to Uni, we find ourselves either freezing or processing a lot more stuff than usual. I made and froze a ton of pesto this year because the basil was out of control. We brought some of the more prolific plants inside for winter but we still got a LOT of pesto.

Corn season is just ending now and we are freezing the rest of it today because I cannot look at another cob! Corn season comes around and I get so excited and then by the end I am whispering to myself as I fill ziploc bags, “Sorry guys, you’re February’s chilli now.”

We also buy 15lbs of local garlic every year and this year I made the decision to whazz it all up in the food processor and freeze cubes of it. I also did larger blobs of garlic + ginger. So far I am so pleased with myself for being such a clever girl! It’s so easy to just pop a cube into a stirfry or toss it in with butter for garlic bread. It is definitely worth doing the work once instead of peeling and mincing these things regularly.



Yes. That is also a mojito poking out from behind. It’s all of the flavours of summer!



I canned a pile of sauce and also roasted & froze some tomatoes for salsa this winter



Mr. Tucker is the undefeated king of passata canning



Gonna try my hand at hot sauce this year. Wish me luck!



When cases of peppers go on sale, I process & freeze them. We use them in so many things!



NGL: it was an insane amount of basil. I’m not mad, either!

Here are a bunch of one-off photos from the rest of the summer and early fall!



Sara diving into the pool on a family hangout night



Montreal bagels and coffee on Judy’s porch. She got her health card last month! And a doctor! YAY!



Longtime readers will remember Copain, the Therapy Dog from the ALS clinic. He’s still doing great and so am I! August is ALS clinic month where they assess me and then I hang out with my fellow PLS ladies and have coffee and catch up. I find it adorable that they have Therapy Dog trading cards.



For years we have joked that every time Judy gets a bonus, she owes me a dinner. This year she got a bonus and took me to Union 613 for dinner. Because she lives in Canada now! YAY! It was lovely, they are lovely, we had a great time.



Here is Cooper looking very cozy (he likes soft chairs and cool AC)



Here is Connell looking very cozy (he prefers hard surfaces & unbelievably hot weather)

This pretty much brings us to ROCKTOBER and with it, the most wonderful time of the year: SPOOKY SEASON! …and also Thanksgiving.

This year was Judy’s first Canadian Thanksgiving so it is weird because it’s a> in October; b> doesn’t happen right after an election; c> it isn’t followed by a weekend of collective shopping. But like, there is still turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy so that’s similar. We ate dinner with friends and then played a rousing game of TABOO before moving on to pie and other desserts. We split the cooking which actually worked out and we ended up hosting at the last minute because The Lytles have things going on over at their place. So The Lytles did the turkey and we did the sides and we all ate, drank and were merry and no one fought and it was absolutely lovely and low-key.

On the day we had planned Thanksgiving though, I (thankfully?) asked Mr. Tucker to bring up some breakfast stuff from the downstairs freezer. That’s when he discovered that the freezer had died. Cue chaos as Mr. Tucker ran around the city the Sunday of a holiday weekend trying to get a new one. Of course, we had justjust done our monthly Costco run and set up a ton of food for the winter so it was necessary to get this figured out. After much drama (we couldn’t get an upright freezer because they can’t be transported laying down and no delivery services were working) Mr. Tucker found a solution in the form of not one, but TWO 7 cubic foot chest freezers to replace our one large upright one. It was easier for him to carry them, they were cheaper, and could be transported in the back of our SUV. Crisis averted!

While he was out navigating that drama, the kids and I cleaned the house and prepared the side dishes. My kids are so amazing. They know how to take control and help out where needed and I am so grateful for them. Things seemed to be looking up and so I started prepping our dining room for crafts with The Lytles before dinner. As I was laying down newspaper, I rounded the corner and caught my foot on the dining table. I ended up falling super hard on one of the chairs that overturned as I went down. I smashed up my leg, hip, arm …and like…just a lot of me. The worst seems to be that I gave myself whiplash and because I was wearing a claw clip, it smashed under my head and left a huge bump. it’s been 5 days now and my neck is still sore! I don’t fall a lot but when I do, it’s a doozy. Still, the show must go on and we did manage to do crafts, have dinner & drinks and play a game so overall, I am calling Thanksgiving a success.



I made a bunch of fall-themed sketches



Mr. Tucker taking inspiration from some of his notebooks



Sara making a postcard



My first linocut!



Let’s play a game called, “Who went to art school?”

The kids and I have also been doing some handbuilding clay classes at a local studio! The Youngest and I did a pumpkin lantern (or jar!) workshop together. The Youngest did a jar to hold the RPG dice collection and I decided on a lantern for mine. I kinda love how squishy it turned out!



The process!



The end result!



The process!



The end result!



I would also love to take some of these longer classes

The Eldest and I also took a clay class together – a cauldron mug! Ours aren’t finished yet but when we got there the pumpkins from the previous class were done and it was a convenient time to pick them up.



You can see the example mug & glaze colours in the foreground



My finished (but not yet glazed or fired) mug

We are waiting to get the finished products back but we did the gingerbread house workshop last Yuletide and that was great. I found that one to be the most difficult out of all of the ones we’ve done so far, however. So we probably shouldn’t have started with that. Oh well, too late now!

The Eldest came home for a 4-day weekend over Thanksgiving which meant hangouts of having drinks, snacks and playing cards. We also carved the pumpkins that The Youngest and Mr. Tucker picked up from a local farm. They are HUGE! We also watched the first Practical Magic movie before heading out on cheap night at the theatre to watch Practical Magic 2 (I did not get snacks!). We still need to take our Halloween decorations out of the storage container and see what survived but that is a Sunday problem.



Digging out the guts



Pensive about design choice



Coyote! (also, Coyote v. Acme was a great movie. We saw it…you guessed it …on cheap night!)



A more traditional offering

A few one-off photos from October:



We (I) have sadly broken all of our wine glasses. So I’ve taken to using the chalices we bought at Medieval Times a few years ago. If I start saying “MILADY” and tipping my fedora, please take me out back like a lame horse



I question Dollarama’s dedication to anatomy and osteology



I feel like IKEA’s theme for their VINTER collection this year is: buttstuff

That is pretty much everything happening right now. I have also mostly finished my Christmas shopping (I know! I know!) because I like post-Halloween to be dedicated to the lead up to the season in a less-shopping, more-hangouts-with-friends kind of way. I want to plan a more structured Winter Solstice this year and I think I will probably nail that all out before the beginning of December. I am also hopeful that the basement work will all be done by Christmas. That may be naive of me, but I really want The Eldest to have her room back for the winter holiday. She has been so gracious about living in the office but I know she really wants her own space back.

I hope your autumn has been amazing and that you are enjoying the season.

On Tim Curry & disability

On Tim Curry & disability

“I don’t know if it was Parkinson’s that he had or a different neurological condition […] and I was really delighted to see […] some of the interviews with him and coverage of him in the last couple of years, while, you know, people have realized that he was perhaps at the end of his life.

The way that his career had been reassessed while he was still alive, and that he’d received that praise and that adoration, and also had got to show that that really acerbic wit still remained. And, you know, of course, I think probably everyone listening to this knows that we don’t portray disabled and chronically ill people in a particularly interesting light in general.

We tend to belittle and patronize them and see them as diminished in every way. And I thought it was glorious that Tim Curry shed any shame that he might have felt about being in a very different condition to the way that he was at his heyday, the way that we were perhaps used to seeing him, and was, and felt able to show up anyway and still make everybody laugh, and just enthrall us with his anecdotes and his kind of slightly catty comments…”

-Katherine May, from The Clearing podcast

RIP Gloria

RIP Gloria

“I didn’t save money until I was past 50. I was sure that I’d end up as a bag lady, like women I saw sleeping in subway stations. I used to handle that fear by thinking: It’s a life like any other. I’ll organise the other bag ladies.”
– Gloria Steinem, An Unexpected Life

Après le déluge, moi

Après le déluge, moi


Ominous area downtown where the fireworks were slated to be from a pic a friend sent me

Pre-amble
When I was a child, my uncle told me the story about asking grand-mère Corinne what the biggest technological advancement was that she had experienced in her lifetime. Her answer? Indoor plumbing. Although we are only about 100 years out from the advent of indoor plumbing and sewage systems it was by all measures, a miracle. When she was a child you carried water from a communal well, had an outhouse in your backyard that was cleaned out by a service and basically life in basse-ville was very difficult and very smelly. That story always stuck with me and I have always truly believed that these things were veritable miracles.

The Sitch
Every year we host a drop-in Canada Day party for friends. It is very low-key: bring a snack to share, something if you want to BBQ and come hang out and swim in the pool and chill with friends. Most folks end up hitting the fireworks downtown afterwards and for the most part, it wraps up early. Most years, it also rains. Historically, we generally get an hour’s worth of rain during the afternoon and then the sun comes out and the party goes on. So when it started raining on July 1st, we huddled under the canopy and waited for the rain to stop.


Twas just a sprinkle

We waited. And waited. And waited.

Eventually we all just made the decision to head inside the house because it was raining much harder than it had been in previous years so we figured we’d wait it out in cooler climes. So we took the party inside and I didn’t think much of it until a neighbour knocked on the door and asked, “Are you getting water in your basement?” No. It was all good on our end. The neighbour left, more friends came and we sat around snacking, drinking and chatting in our living room until The Eldest walked by the staircase and said, “Uh Dad, there is water in the basement!”

My friend Uncle Justin and Mr. Tucker headed down to try and locate the entrance of the water as it started to climb rapidly. At that point friends realized that the rain was not subsiding and graciously took their exit. Uncle Justin and Kym ran home to get a pump we could use and then they left to check on his mother. I hopped on facebook to figure out what was happening (spoiler alert: the entire neighbourhood was flooding). When they came back it was then that reports were coming in that the highway and other main arteries were getting flooded with some roads becoming impassable. At this point we had 9.5” of water that reached the top of the stairs as the kids rushed to bring up the harp, the computer and anything of value they could grab while simultaneously piling all of the stuff on the bed from the floor and lower shelves of the book cases. It was wild.

At this point my stepson showed up with his girlfriend and while they were here, his mom called: they had just moved into their new house just days before and ALL of their boxes were piled in the basement. The live in a community adjacent to ours but a lot of the west end of the city appeared to get a lot of flooding. Around that time, the manager of the closest Canadian Tire decided to open on the holiday to allow folks to buy pumps, fans and dehumidifiers. I ordered one for pick up and told my stepson to get his stepdad to rush over and buy one as well.

Mr. Tucker hopped in the car and rushed over to the store and in automatic mode, he took the back roads he usually takes to get there. Unfortunately, they were flooded out so as he drove through, the car died as water entered the engine. So he had to abandon the car and walk the rest of the way to Canadian Tire. There he ran into his son’s stepdad who kindly gave him a ride home[1].

Thus began the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad flood of 2026.

Without going into exhausting detail, it was an AWFUL month. All plans to chill out and enjoy the summer were thwarted and instead it was full of insurance claims, removing our soaked belongings from the basement and then tearing out all of the finished basement. The Eldest is taking it in stride but she is essentially living on a couch in the office until she moves into residence in September. The remediation company luckily came straight away and brought with them a bunch of dehumidifiers. Unfortunately, they discovered tiles under the subfloor (SURPRISE: it’s asbestos!) which they had to remediate as well [2].

In the end, almost 6000 homes logged flooding events with the city. We were lucky: I logged an insurance claim that day and then the next morning I hopped onto the chat and got someone to call me back with info on our adjuster and the name of the remediation company. While I didn’t hear from the adjuster for a few days, the company came within the week and the HVAC shortly after that (our furnace and our hot water tank were both pooched). By the end of the month the asbestos remediation had been done and now we are waiting on a path forward for the rebuild.

We rented a car and had our car towed to the mechanic the next morning. Shockingly, after a week of drying it out and replacing a bunch of parts, it started! I told myself I wouldn’t make an insurance claim unless the cost for the rental and the fix was under $3000 and it was…$2900. In a way, I am grateful because a> I only have $20000 in the car replacement fund; b> I worried that our insurance company would drop us like a hot potato if we claimed both.

TMIL (this month I learned)

A disaster that affects a lot of people is informative: I have always had a good experience making claims with our insurance company and that still stands (so far). During the past month, I have watched people have a variety of experiences with various companies from really great to downright negligent. Many other people had horrific experiences with their insurance companies and so I now know who to avoid. Insurance seems to be one of those things where you can be penny wise and pound foolish. I am not saying you should go with the most expensive option but there are certainly signs that an insurance company isn’t going to make it easy on you. It appears that folks should choose a large company whose sole focus is insurance and if the name is something like “Cheapie Insurance” you may want to avoid it.

If you have a finished basement, get the flooding insurance: My flooding rider was only $56 a year for 1.85M coverage because I live in an area that has a 1/250 year chance of flooding. A woman in my neighbourhood didn’t get the flooding insurance because it was $600 a year due to her proximity to a creek. I ran the numbers and even if it does cost me that much, I would still pay it. Why? Because I suspect the full remediation and rebuild for my basement will be around $100000. If you do the math, if I live in this house for 40 more years it will only cost me $24000 total to have that flooding insurance but I wouldn’t want to risk not having it because…

The bigger the disaster, the fewer contractors there will be: who knew that there would be a run on dumpsters? Not me. Sadly, some folks who had to do the tear out themselves discovered that the insurance companies swooped in and offered most remediation, plumbing, HVAC, dumpster and rebuild construction companies guaranteed work for the next 6 months or so. If you didn’t have flood insurance, you are now at the mercy of who you can find to do the work and there certainly aren’t any deals. Of course, there has been an uptick in scams as well both online and at people’s doors.

Make sure you have as much insurance to pay for the entire rebuild: a lot of folks discovered they only had $5000-$75000 worth of insurance for flooding disasters. If you are an insurance company and you are looking to deploy resources, where are you going to go first? Will you choose the home that maxes out at $50000 or will you choose the home that maxes out at $1M? The answer of course is that $50000 is the top end you will pay in scenario number one and the homeowner is on the hook for the rest, so of course you won’t prioritize it. In our situation where the heat (it was 34C many days in July) and wet causes massive amounts of mould that needs to be remediated, you are going to prioritize the house that can cost you the most to your bottom line. I have no proof that this is the thought process but it seems to me that people online who didn’t have a ton of coverage seemed to be de-prioritized.

Not everything is a conspiracy: I was heartily reminded as to why I stayed off of social media for so long. People are bonkers! Despite the fact that folks were affected in a variety of different neighbourhoods, it didn’t stop folks for blaming extremely niche situations for the flooding. One person even went so far as to suggest that the government was actively pumping water into our neighbourhood to save the highway (what?!). Everyone will blame everything rather than accept the fact that sometimes disasters just happen (also see: climate change! It is happening whether or not you believe in it).

Taxes pay for things: our mayor ran on low taxes. He won. During his tenure he decimated the reserve fund for the city and we are starting to see some deficits. What kills me is that the very same people who voted for him expect white glove service from the city in regards to their flooding. I’ve watched our councillors and MPP desperately trying to get information out as much as possible but in the early days after the event they were still struggling to deploy resources. Instead of thanks for their hard work I have seen relentless whining from folks who somehow expect that a full review of the disaster be undertaken by experts and delivered in under a month. They expect that garbage runs should be 24-7 at their convenience and that complaining on facebook replaces an email to a councillor or logging a ticket with 311. I have seen people do the absolute bare minimum to help themselves while posting daily about how useless all levels of government are. This is not to say that there aren’t valid criticisms to make about all levels of government but the expectations are ridiculous. I am in absolute awe of folks who will post to facebook instead of hitting up the councillor or the city’s website and using the search button – and then complain that “the communication from the city is just awful!”

Miracles become entitlements

Like my great-grand-mère Corinne, I see so much of modern life as pure miracles.

Clean water right from my tap? Miracle!

Electricity to my house? Miracle!

A fridge? A freezer? Miracles!

Heating and air conditioning? Miracles!

A hot shower? …you guessed it! A GD MIRACLE!

But if the power goes out for 5 minutes, people get hysterical and it just boggles my mind. A power station had filled with water and it took a day to drain and people were positively apoplectic about it. No concern for the workers who had to go into the flooded area (because water + electricity is a winning combo), just whining about how inconvenienced they were because they couldn’t watch tv. It was weird watching some of the most privileged people in the world show their entitled asses to the internet. It was – quite frankly – embarrassing (that whinging is for your friends and family, not the whole world!).

Mr. Tucker and I discuss a lot how we are “glass half full” people. Things happen and they suck but we try to appreciate that we have food on the table, a roof over our heads, and even in the event of a disaster such as a flash flood, things are moving along. This isn’t to say I haven’t spent most of the last month teetering on the brink of a breakdown (I have!) but living in a small space when all of the contents of your basement are stacked into boxes in your living room will make anyone squirrely and claustrophobic [3].

But throughout all of this, we managed to go on with life. The kids are both working full time jobs this summer, we are still doing a good job eating our CSA basket every week and not eating out, and The Eldest has been an absolute champ about having to live in the office. I know not having your own space isn’t easy but she has been so gracious about the upheaval. We still need to wait to hear back about the rebuild but until then life is indeed going on.

[1] It’s not weird, we all get along really well.

[2] Yes, I know that if you just leave asbestos and build over it, it’s not dangerous but the water had soaked them and the glue holding them which was starting to flake and so it did need to be removed.

[3] We eventually rented a POD for our driveway and we moved all of the boxes out there. What a mental game changer!

April & Maycember: an insane spring

April & Maycember: an insane spring



Where is the lie?

Poisson d’Avril

From Easter weekend onward, our life has been absolute chaos. On of my best friends moved from California to Ontario and settling her in and getting her set up has been a priority. We picked her up from the airport and the next day we hosted Easter with our friends the Lytles and our friend Kri joined for a bit of Pysanky as well before running off to her own dinner party.

I had a bunch of health things happening all at once, which led us to a variety of medical appointments at a variety of diagnostic clinics and specialty doctors. I also had signed up to take part in a study for PLS patients so that was…a lot of clinicians.

We headed to Toronto for a weekend for a friend’s 50th birthday, leaving our kids alone for the first time (they were fine). We rented a car so that we could leave them our car and took off first thing Friday morning. I was able to use points to book the hotel, which was nice because we basically spent no time in our room at all. On Friday night we headed off to a friend’s new home in Clarendon, which is the most charming old farmhouse upgraded in all of the right ways. They are on a nice piece of land with gardens and a small forested area behind them and it was lovely to see them and their new home. We ended up having dinner at Slabtown Cider, which was in the middle of nowhere but yet, still packed solid? It was amazing.

Saturday morning was Dim Sum in Toronto with our friends Cory and Laura (and their incredibly charming children!). Mr. Tucker tried – and enjoyed – chicken feet for the first time. After it was back to the hotel for a quick nap before heading to our friend Susan’s birthday party.

The party was super fun, we met some great folks and played a game called Salad Bowl which I highly recommend because it basically requires pens, paper, a timer and a bowl. Like our own parties, this one had adults and kids of all ages and everyone was so kind and lovely. I laughed a lot and had some great conversations and we stayed later than we normally would have until we drove Susan back to her condo. Her husband had purchased a bunch of Châteauneuf-du-Pape for the party and I didn’t realize that the reason it was so smooth was because it was at a price point that is beyond my social class. It was lovely though and I didn’t go overboard so I feel less badly about being an absolute unrefined toad.

After the trip we settled into our “normal” busy schedule except this year The Eldest was chosen to do All-Star Band! It’s basically a super group of band kids chosen from every school in the city for their ability to play. She had to practice every Thursday night for 6 weeks (on top of her two mornings of band practice with the school band) that culminated into one incredible concert evening. It was amazing how 6 weeks of the top performers from across the city is on such a different level from the regular school band.

Oh, and of course we had our regularly scheduled events such as hockey games, Roller Derby for The Youngest, Muay Thai 2x a week for Mr. Tucker and jamming with his band every second week on top of Trivia Nights and dinners with friends and…it got worse.

May showers and flowers

We planted a bunch of lovely tulips in the fall so it was nice to see all of that hard work pop out in a splash of colour in May! It’s good because we had to walk by the front garden a lot as we went back-and-forth from the car to event to home to back into the car…ad infinitum.

Maycember is no joke but here it lasts until…well…this week.

We had tickets to our friend’s band’s 20th anniversary party but then the Ottawa Charge made the playoffs and our entire plan went off of the rails. We even spent The Youngest’s birthday at a playoff game – which was fun – but super chaotic as we had to wrap up cake with the family quickly before scurrying off to Kanata. I had also planned to host Judy’s 50th birthday here as a pool party and…you guessed it: playoff game. We bailed on our guests after a few hours and told her to lock up when she left (we discussed it beforehand! I didn’t just announce it and leave!).

We did have a sweet 16 party for The Youngest though, and we had a bunch of friends over and they played games, ate mounds of pizza and cake. Sadly, she had a major dental surgery that week so it was a lot for her.

We did manage to win 2nd place at a charity trivia night where we scored $500 for the Ottawa Food Bank, so that was a great night!

Dragon boat started up in the middle of the month as well and while I loved being back on the water with my amazing friends, it felt like there was very little room on our dance cards for any other things.

On top of all of this, my Stepson was in the process of opening a new restaurant and was working insane hours, moving into a new apartment and so he would pop in for coffee early in the morning before he shuffled off to his 17-hour days. We have seen him more in the past 4 months than we have in the past 6 years and it’s been great!

The Youngest interviewed – and was hired – at a city theatre camp this summer and it looks like she will be working as a hostess at the Stepson’s new restaurant when school ends as well. The Eldest got hired as a supervisor at her wading pool so increased pay for her as well. It also meant many evenings and weekends of job-related training on top of school and her extracurriculars as well.

June: the end is…nigh?

I feel like we may be seeing a light at the end of the tunnel now?

We managed to eat twice at Stepson’s new restaurant and it was incredible each time. He takes such pride in what he does as a chef and it shows. I am glad to see that the reviews are amazing and that people are really enjoying it.

It’s the end-of-the-year stuff for the kids as well. The Eldest passed her DELF and The Youngest passed the OSSLT (not that there was any danger of either of them failing). The Eldest had her Spring Band Concert as well, her very last one. I am a bit choked up about that – after four years in band, it’s the last one.

Speaking of – The Eldest graduated high school! Last Thursday we watched our grown, adult child accept her diploma and came off of the stage to join her friends for photos. She is off to university in the fall and will be staying in residence so it is our last summer together before she starts her life as an adult. On one hand I am glad and so happy for her. On the other, it is the end of an era and I certainly feel a ways about that. Next week is prom and her and her friends have rented a hotel room and have tickets to both prom and after prom. The dress is bought, the heels are borrowed and she got a beautiful necklace as a graduation gift so she is well prepared.

Next week dragon boat goes back to only one night a week, the kids will finish exams and start working and the summer will officially begin. I often forget how chaotic this spring season is and I am glad we are facing a more calm, poolside-oriented summer.

I have missed a lot here and I know it’s a relatively boring update that is me just listing the busy-ness of our lives but that is just the way it’s been. I think there is a lesson here about how people always say that you “have to retire to something,” but honestly, I have such a full life that I’ve never found it difficult to fill my days with stuff. I’ve paddled, I’ve gone on trike rides, I’ve swam in The Puddle, I’ve hung out with friends, I’ve parented, and I have read HELLA books.

As usual, there are things I want to expand on, stuff I have missed mentioning and a few things I am still working out how to write about. But I am good, the family is good, and life is great. Nothing more to say except I need more naps.

Work til you drop

Work til you drop

Unfettered capitalism wrote an article about how you should slave away at an unfulfilling job for more years.

Honestly, the first comment nails it: as long as you are getting out and being social, have interesting things to do with your brain (hobbies and interests), eat well and get a reasonable amount of exercise, I don’t see this being a problem. I think we need to explore more the deepening loneliness of our current culture and why this seems to affect men more acutely. The solution shouldn’t be: work more! The solution should be: how do we build community and maintain ourselves mentally and physically into our old age?