Author: The Widow Badass

As the Year Ends…

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Christmas Decorations finally hung on Dec 25th. (Yes, those are leftover Halloween decorations you see in the background. I just put away an Easter thingie too, to make room for Christmas. Sigh. I’d like to say its because we celebrate those holidays every day of the year but I think we all know what the truth is!)

…I get reflective at this time of year. Also at the change of seasons, and especially as September draws closer (like an old firehorse who still charges at the sound of the firebell, I get an itch to start school or something…anything…every September).

OK, so I am naturally introspective and reflective….navel gazing, I think it’s called at its most negative.

One of my cousins just started reading this blog and her comments about my…ahem…adventures caused me to go through some of my postings to find out what the heck she was talking about. Um, oh yeah….I did do or say those things…

Anyway, what I learned from my review is that I am a helluva starter of things but not so great at finishing (see Photo of the Day, Getting in Shape etc.). (I take some small comfort in the realization that I am not alone in this.)

Christmas Tree – assembled on the 25th, now destined to stay up till Valentine’s Day

However, hope springs eternal (for me anyways) and I am ready to start 2011 afresh and with a new strategy.

I even have a mantra for this year and it is:

Peace & Strength

Peace – to ensure I do the things that bring me peace of mind and body, things that I love, that put me in the Zen Zone and make me feel in control of my life (in no particular order of importance):

  1. Exercise – yes, I am one of the strange and few that actually enjoy exercise.

  2. Cooking – I love to cook healthy foods.

  3. Doing good work – at work or at home, I love the satisfaction it brings to me.

  4. Spending time with family and friends.

Strength – taking care to build and maintain physical and mental strength to get me through the challenges and demands of my life in the year ahead AND to help me attain my goals for this year:

Short Term:

  1. Start Graduate School, specifically an MBA program. Which means I have to prepare for, write and get a score of at least 550 on the GMAT exam. And assemble an application! Deadline: May 1, 2011 for a September start.
  2. Move house! JD and I would like to be moved over by late spring/early summer 2011. This means decluttering, organizing, packing.

Long Term:

  1. Only 1 goal but it’s a biggie. LIFESTYLE CHANGE. For the betterment of my health (mental, physical and emotional) and energy levels, I will be focusing on building muscle and stamina through pumping iron and cardio activities. Hopefully, significant weight loss will be a side effect.

Let’s see where all this takes me.

Peace and strength to you all in 2011!

Now It’s My Turn!

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Three noon hour walks accomplished!

I can walk down to the Big Grocery Store way down the street, shop a bit, and get back to work in just about an hour, if I walk with real purpose. Adds about 7000 steps to my pedometer, which means I have reached over 12,000 steps on each of my walking days – WOO HOO!!!!

Today I bought some ingredients for making a cauliflower and potato soup this weekend in my slow cooker. Two big and beautiful heads. Also bought some celery, carrots, a kabocha squash, brown arborio type rice, kefir (more about that later)…somehow it escaped my mind that I would have to haul this all on my shoulder on my way back to work. Funny how my selections did not seem very heavy individually when I placed them in my buggy….but man did they add up. I almost bought a 2 kg bag of dried black beans too. For some reason, THAT I could figure out would be too heavy to carry, with all the rest of my loot.

I did manage to bring my haul to my office, though, with only one casualty (besides cutting off the blood supply to my arms). My kefir popped!

Introducing my new addiction:

Kefir is a fermented milk product that is kind of like drinking bubbly yogurt. I love it poured over cereal. Yum Yum.

When you buy kefir the inner seal on the container should be bulging. This is the sign of good kefir. A bad sign for all other foods…but GOOD for kefir. Trust me!

But because of the buildup of gases causing the bulging aluminum inner seal, the container is under pressure. Expecting kefir to duke it out with a bunch of heavy fall veggies in a bag and emerge unscathed is asking for it, I found out. Luckily I only lost a little of the kefir and the bag didn’t get soiled, just the packaging on some of the veggies, so all was still good!

And I didn’t get any kefir on my new source of inspiration, Tosca Reno – the lovely lady telling me that it’s NOW MY TURN on the cover of the magazine. Which is apropos, because I only got turned on to kefir from reading Tosca’s book: The Eat Clean Diet Recharged!

Tosca is Canadian, my age (and a fitness model/cover girl!), and just flat out gorgeous and gorgeously healthy and strong-looking. She is also of Dutch background, like me, and has the same educational background: a B. Sc. and a B. Ed.! When I look at her, I see the Me I could be.

I’ve never bought Oxygen Magazine before, but I have 3 of Tosca’s books and am really feeling inspired to Eat Clean and dust off my dumbbells! Sometimes everything just clicks and the next thing you know, you are on a whole new path. I feel that is happening to me now.

When I saw the lovely Tosca beaming and pointing at me at the checkout magazine rack, I knew I had to bring her home for even more inspiration. I think I will make me a new vision board with Ms. Reno front and centre….

Who Needs the Gym….

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…When you have a house and yard to look after? See above for this year’s mountain range of leaves, raked the curb for the annual pickup by the City. See also bags of cut up branches peeking out from behind the light pole. Just a few this round, adding to the total of about a dozen so far this fall….

However, I do not have leaves to rake and shrubberies (is that a word? Sounds vaguely Monty Python-ish somehow) to cut up every day. Which is too bad really, because I find yard work strangely soothing. Years ago, a good friend gave me a decorative plaque that reads “Find peace in the garden”, and I do!

Now that the wedding is behind me, and we are not quite ready to move over to JD’s place, I am thinking of taking one another project, specifically Project Me, and about time too! My goal is to be in ready shape, by Spring 2011, to start seriously training for another half-marathon. Which means it’s time to get more active and lose me some poundage. Yeah, the poundage I was supposed to lose for the wedding….yep, those pounds are still hanging around and they found a couple of friends too since then….fast food, eating late, and being inactive have taken their inevitable toll on me.

I was eyeing up the gym next door to my work last week as I was percolating the whole Project Me thing, thinking I should rejoin. My husband (I still thrill to use that word!) suggested I start out more simply, by taking walks at lunch. A cheaper option, needs no special equipment, gets me into the fresh air, will clear my mind etc etc. All good things. So I will start there and see where it takes me.

My goal for this week is to get out for a noon hour walk at least 3 times this week. I’m strappin’ on the pedometer once again and will aim for 10K steps on those days.

I can still be a PITA; I still have work to do…

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Sometimes I congratulate myself on being older, wiser, more compassionate, less rebellious etc. etc., than in my youth. Thinking happily that my days as a smart-a** and a sh*t-disturber are far behind me.

And THEN…

…Along comes someone and all my so-called higher self-development melts like sugar left out in the rain.

Sunday night I climbed into the hot tub at the local hotel where we have a pool membership. Another couple of members were already there and the woman, who was monopolizing the conversation much to her companion’s dismay (the glazed over look and half-hearted uh-huhs gave it away), was holding forth on the proposed half-way house for drug addicts soon to happen in her neighbourhood. This was in the local paper, and all the NIMBYs (Not In My Backyarders) were in full umbrage about this.

This woman couldn’t believe that the City would allow this to happen on a street that had 5 schools on or near it.

Hmmmmm. I really don’t understand how a bunch of ex-junkies could pose a threat to schoolchildren so I said with great enthusiasm:

“I agree – what are people thinking? Those poor half-way house people are in way too-close proximity to drugs, what with 5 schools in the neighbourhood!!”

This brought about a guffaw from Mr. Glazed-Over but Ms. Nimby was not impressed, nor did she stop her tirade against the half-way house.

So I asked her to explain. “What is the issue here? I don’t understand. These are not sex offenders, they are drug addicts. How are they are threat to schoolchildren?”

I honestly wanted to know if I was missing something. I was not trying to be a PITA (pain in the butt) by asking.

No response. Just a glare that spoke volumes. Volumes as in: if I have to explain this to you, you are way too stupid for me to waste my breath on. Then she continued to speak about another proposed half-way house, but one in which the inhabitants had to pay $2-3K a week for the privilege of being there. She appeared to think 2 things about this:

1 – these people were “serious” about recovery because they were paying so much for it.

2 – they were “better” people to begin with because they could afford to pay so much.

Then she questioned why people had to go to half way houses in the first place, when they should just go home to their families after rehab. I explained to her that to my knowledge, rehab is just the beginning, and that half way homes are important so that the newly sober have a safe abode in which to relearn how to live in the real world again, without drugs.

I could have also mentioned that the families often contribute (unknowingly or otherwise) to the addiction in the first place and need counselling as well but I could see she wasn’t at all interested in anything other than her own point of view so I just shut up.

I also kept my mouth shut when she then opined on how sneaky the social service agency was to try to get this house set up with as little publicity as possible. “If it’s such a great thing, why wait till the last minute to tell us this house is coming to the neighbourhood?”

BECAUSE OF PIN-HEADED NIMBY’S LIKE YOURSELF WHO WILL MARSHALL FORCES TO DERAIL THE PROJECT, I wanted to shout at her, but didn’t. Ah, self-control at last……

Then she started some evil gossip about the woman heading up this project (who actually lives in the same neighbourhood as this woman and the proposed half-way house)…blah blah blah. Yuck.
At this point I turned my attention to the other gentleman in the tub and switched the conversation to a seemingly safe topic: golf.

However, also in the local paper, was an article about the 18 hole golf course (also close to this woman’s home), that is suffering financially and is cutting back to one 9 hole course with the intention of putting other sports-related facilities (golf academy etc.) in the remainder of its grounds.

Again, umbrage from Mrs. Nimby – what about the poor folks who paid a premium to have their homes back onto a golf course, and now this happens!! Someone needs to reimburse them; if not the golf course, then the City!!!! Because they are “allowing” it to happen.

“Look,” I said, “This stuff happens. There are no guarantees in life. You buy your dream home and 5 years later the gov’t appropriates the land next to you and puts through an expressway. It’s bad luck but what can you do? This is a business decision, to save the business.”

Again, no direct response, just more illogical spewing of outrage. I left the hot tub at this point.

I am sorry I let this woman get to me. It scares me to think how many people there are out there who think just like her. It saddens me to think of the suffering this woman inflicts upon herself, let alone others, by her attitude.

Offering my opinions was just a waste of air. It did no good. It probably fueled the fire. She couldn’t enlighten me on her point of view. My verbal volleys back at her did not change her mind. As Dr. Phil would say, how’s that workin’ for ya?

Didn’t work at all.

Since that exchange, I keep asking myself WWDLD (what would the Dalai Lama do?) in the face of such close-mindedness. When I know the answer, then I’ll be the Grasshopper, snatching the pebble from the master’s hand, or I’ll know what the sound is, of one hand clapping…or some such other Zen mystery!

Until then, I still have lots of work to do.

Switched Gears

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For the past coupla years, whenever I had some down time (or was ill, a favourite time to…ahem…sprout my couch potato inclinations), I inevitably gravitated towards one of those Life Channel or TLC Wedding shows. I just couldn’t get enough of Rich Bride, Poor Bride, Wedding SOS, Bulging Brides or Say Yes to the Dress. I’d grab my knitting, or my dog, or both and settle in, eyes glued to the 13 inch screen of the only TV in the house.

I tried to do this a few days back and somehow it just wasn’t the same. The shows that absolutely held me rapt in August now made me yawn and channel surf. The wedding has passed and with it, the TV wedding show mania.

Now I find my focus being directed towards home renovation/design shows and the Cooking Channel (Alton Brown, where have you been all my life?). I believe this is called “nesting” and quite understandable for a young bride to be interested in. But me? I’ve been creating my own nest for about 30 years now. It’s not exactly new to me.

Yet, when I have a moment and sit down, I surf my way over to HGTV these days, or Food, or the design shows on W.

Hmmmm….to be continued….

Wedding & Honeymoon Wrap Up

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Married 3 weeks already….wedding flowers not all dead yet, amazingly so….honeymoon spirit still intact!

Here are some of my favourite shots from the wedding day:

The joy of the day for us was very evident!

All of our honoured guests!


A creative pose, suggested by our wonderful photographer, Jillian Bolender of Focused Photography:

Here’s more inspired shots:






The wedding flowers were so beautiful…..


The honeymoon was supposed to be only for a couple of days, but we found ourselves having so much fun, we extended it for 10…..

Our first night was at the Village hotel where we had our dinner and reception:


Then we went to the Little Inn, in Bayfield:

Home of the best sunsets in the world, according to National Geographic:

After that, we stayed in Elora a couple of nights, at the Elora Mill Inn:

Then we were off to Niagara on the Lake, to stay at one of the top 500 hotels in the world, right in our backyard (so to speak). Who knew?

When we saw the dragonfly lamp in the corner, we knew we were going to take the room, no matter what the cost (and it was pricey, but worth it!):

Even the pool was opulent:

We had our first B&B experience, in Maryhill (definitely not the last!):

Yummy yogurt parfaits, followed by caramelized french toast…..

We went back down Niagara way again….this time to the Falls themselves (view from our room at Embassy Suites):

We did the typical tourist things….the Maid of the Mist boat ride never gets old:

After coming back home for a week, we were off to Dubuque, Iowa for a work trip (we called it part of the endless honeymoon…). With an unexpected quick tour of Chicago when we missed the flight to Dubuque (thanks to American Airlines) and had to rent a car to actually get there in time for my meeting…..
We definitely want to get back to Chicago for a visit!

Dubuque (below) is a beautiful town on the Mississippi River….worth a visit if you are in the area. The trouble with work trips is that there is very little time for exploring wherever you are, usually. Dubuque has many beautiful buildings, a rich history, and the National Museum of the Mississippi, not much of which we got to see….wah!

And now to start married life….for real! (And to FINALLY open our wedding gifts…I can’t believe we haven’t even had time to do so yet…..)

We interrupt this honeymoon to bring you the following….

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Just a quick post with a few pics snapped by the hubby of my MOH while the official photographer was posing us and snapping her shots….
The wedding day itself was absolutely wonderful. Everything we wanted.
The weater surprised us by changing so dramatically. The day started out very gloomy – heavy rain and thunderstorms. But by the time of the ceremony it was sunny and dry, with a light breeze and no humidity – perfect wedding weather!!!

Our soloist surprised us by bringing along 2 friends, to play guitar and bass. The music (what I was able to hear of it) was incredible. He did such a beautiful rendition of Bob Dylan’s “To Make You Feel My Love” (my processional song), I burst into tears before I had to go down the aisle.
Our minister surprised us by forgetting the marriage license…..seriously, he did. When he called my cell from the chapel before the ceremony to ask me who had it (uh, YOU do) I was sure he was punking me, but NO. I think he was more shook up about it than I was. So we faked it at the chapel, and did the official signing later, in the hotel lobby.

The photographer surprised us by making us stand in a soybean field and against a split rail fence for some shots. (She was inspired by these locations on the drive out to the chapel.) But they really are going to be nice, if they are anything like the ones Adrien took.


More to come later. Now back to our previously scheduled honeymoon……

It’s All Small Stuff

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As the wedding day countdown is heading into single digit territory, things are getting a little busy, as you might suspect. And, I am ashamed to admit, I am feeling a bit panicky at times. Thinking I might forget something that could potentially “ruin” the day.

Thank goddess for the Knot email newsletter I received in my Inbox this week. This week’s lead article was something to the effect of “10 Reception Disasters and How to Avoid Them”.

O.M.G.!!!!!

DISASTERS?!?! This is something I really need to read, I thought! Well, read it I did, and it helped me out so much, and not the way the writer of the article intended.

Disaster 1: Little kids invited to the reception act up – run around the room and yell a lot.

(You gotta be kidding me – this is ranked as a DISASTER?)

Disaster 2: Your flowers start wilting.

(Unbelievable. My flowers are wilting… shoot me now.)

Disaster 3: The sun is too bright in the reception hall.

(Ummm….WHAT?)

And so on.

I was expecting topics like: one of your guests drops dead on the dance floor; food poisoning sends your guests to the hospital; the hotel has a fire…etc. etc. Not the insignificant crap they called disasters in the article.

I can only recall one wedding in my past that could be called somewhat disastrous, and even though a terrible thing happened (the groom’s hospitalized mom died during emergency surgery literally an hour before the ceremony), the hundred-mile-away wedding AND reception still took place and the couple are still married to this day.

So, life goes on and people deal with it. The Knot, please give your head a shake. (And thanks for inadvertantly putting things into perspective for me, OK?)

Out of Sorts

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Feeling like life is getting away from me. Like I’m on this roaring freight train called Our Wedding, and hanging on for dear life, determined to get to the final destination but not enjoying the ride very much.

My discomfort is because we have too many loose ends at this point of time for me to feel good, to feel relaxed. I’m a GET IT DONE ASAP person, and JD is a TAKE IT EASY, THERE’S STILL TIME person.

I like to get to appointments early, so I can relax and take it easy and know I am not holding anyone up. I am where I am supposed to be at the right time.

He likes to roar in at the last minute, so he doesn’t “waste” any time sitting around waiting for someone else to be at the right place at the right time.

Of course, this means we are sometimes late as JD doesn’t always consider building in time for the unforeseen e.g. traffic. I have learned that being late will not kill me. Age me…but not kill me. JD is learning to heed my advice on adding extra time as being late doesn’t age him, but sooner or later if this keeps up, I may have to kill him. Ahem. Kidding!

I like to decide fairly quickly and move on to the next project – I get tremendous satisfaction from crossing things off of a list. I can’t relax until a decision has been made and the ball is in someone else’s court, the paperwork is on someone else’s desk.

He likes to wait until it absolutely has to be decided – he feels rushed and fenced in, by having to decide before he needs to. Some pertinent piece of information that will affect his decision could be revealed just before the deadline, doncha know? He can’t relax if the decision is made “too soon”.

There is no right or wrong “way” to do these things; there are just different approaches. Sometimes his approach works out to be the best one for a particular situation. Sometimes mine does…of course I firmly believe that more often than not mine is the better approach (for my sanity if nothing else). Hehehe….

I have decided I need to chill. Everything is going to come together and work out just fine, and if it doesn’t, OH WELL. People will get over it. We will get over it. Now, if only the crazy anxiety dreams would stop.

I’ve heard of Baby Brain, but Bridal Brain too????

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Oh my…things are getting busy at Chez Impending Nuptials, with less than a month to go.

JD and I just returned from a 10 day trip down to Texas, to pick up a used scientific instrument for my work. We also made a bit of a scenic roadtrip out of it – using the opportunity to visit/drive through Indianapolis, St. Louis, New Orleans, Galveston, Houston, Dallas, a bit of Oklahoma, Hot Springs and Little Rock – travelling throughout the hiways and scenic byways of the American South and MidWest. Saw bayous and mountains (Ozarks), the Gulf of Mexico, rivers and plains….and many many interesting vistas and people. More about that, and pictures, later on.

I’m glad we did it, though it was a LOTTA driving and felt mostly like one of those “see 10 countries in 7 days” type of tours (except we did all the work).

I’m very upset (since last night) at my brain. I am even more forgetful than usual these days, which means things are getting quite bad. I attribute this and my mental fogginess to “Bridal Brain”. Not sure if anyone has come up with this term before, but let me tell you brothers and sisters, it is REAL, as real as Baby Brain.

Here’s what happened. Way back…just before our trip, I made a trip to our jewellery store to finalize my wedding ring purchase (JD’s was bought last year but we were hemming and hawing on what mine should look like), and I managed to do this without JD in tow, so a perfect opportunity (so I thought) to pick him up a little wedding day surprise from me to him. Said Surprise was tucked into the car in a big ol’ Rubbermaid container we keep in the back of Edward the Sparkly Prius to house groceries and other items we want to hide from view. My plan was to drive to work and then remove Said Surprise to my office, to hand off to the Best Man at some future convenient juncture, to give to JD on the Day Of.

But of course, you must know what happened, right? Bridal Brain kicked in and I forgot about it. In my defence, I didn’t have an opportunity to sneak it into my office before our big trip and then, well, the trip happened (Edward stayed home ‘cos work rented a van for us) and we came back and had to resume our normal (??) lives again, in full-on overdrive and catch-up mode.

Then last night, we were packing Edward with groceries at the store and JD lifts the lid off of the container and says “There’s a Birks bag in here?!?”. He took one look at my stricken face and says “I didn’t see anything”, and promptly moves back to the task at hand. Gotta love the man for that, amongst other things! But I was quite crushed, at yet further evidence of my declining mental abilities. Sigh. I guess as long as I still recognize JD at the altar, it can’t be that bad….yet.

The Said Surprise is now firmly ensconced in my office and I’m saying a little prayer to please help me remember to pass it on to Michael before September 3rd.