Today was Camp Day at my former place of work. Our location invited local VIPs and groups to participate behind the counter. I had planned to volunteer on behalf of the MFRC, but apparently I was the only one who was able to go. Instead, I joined my current coworkers as they did a shift. I started out on the front counter, doing coffee, but I got shifted over to Soup and Sandwich. The staffer there pretty much treated me like I'd never left, she did the stuff like getting bagels and buns ready to bake, and let me do the sandwiches, "Call me if you need me". It was funny to talk to some of my former coworkers who think I'm crazy to like my new job.

I rode my bike home from work today, for the first time. I've had the bike for 16 years, and it still had the original tires on it. Mark put new ones on for me over the weekend. It still needs to have the brakes and gears fixed, but at least it's rideable now.
I actually drove the car in to work because of the Camp Day thing, then Mark rode my bike into town, left it at the Library, then walked over to get the car so he could use it.
I caught my pant leg in the gears, and tore them, and my bag was too heavy, but all in all the ride was fine. I've used Mark's bike a couple times in the past month, but my bike is way more comfortable.

Squid's youth group had a year-end barbeque out at the lake. Mark was supposed to work late, so I figured I'd grab a picnic for Hamster and me, and we'd hang out at the beach, too. I dropped off the boys and was on my way to get our picnic when Mark called. He was home from work and wanted me to pick him up. So back home I went, got some food, then back to the park. The boys splashed around in the water, but it was too cold to swim. I saw a grouse with a bunch of chicks, a pair of geese with 4 or 5 goslings, a muskrat, a beaver, and oodles of ducks.

Even more books

What Your Clothes Say About You, Trinny Woodall & Susannah Constantine
What Not to Wear For Every Occasion, Trinny Woodall & Susannah Constantine
Kidnapped, Jan Burke
The Night Lawyer, Michelle Spring
The Journal of Mortifying Moments, Robyn Harding
Gallows Thief, Bernard Cornwell
The Cat’s Meow, Emily Carmichael
Chasing Rainbow, Sue Civil-Brown
Amazing Gracie, A Dog’s Tale, Dan Dye & Mark Beckloff
Paid In Blood, Mel Odom
The Perfect Fake, Barbara Parker

I don't read all the time...

but close:
Dating Can Be Murder, Jennifer Apodaca
Batteries Required, Jennifer Apodaca
Dying to Meet You, Jennifer Apodaca
Laced, Carol Higgins Clark
Design on a Crime, Ginny Aiken
Decorating Schemes, Ginny Aiken
Interior Motives, Ginny Aiken
Pen Pals, Olivia Goldsmith
Twelve Sharp, Janet Evanovich
Naked, David Sedaris
The Fourth Bear, Jasper Fford

In other news, Squid's camp this weekend at Ft. Edmonton was cut short due to Snow! and High Winds! that wrecked one of the tents!
Mr. Freeze and I are going to a party with his ski patrol buddies and their SOs tonight, but I expect a call from Squid at some point asking for a ride home.

And more books.

I've really tried to not bring home every interesting looking book that crosses my path. I have to keep telling myself that the books will still be there tomorrow, next week, etc. Anyway, here's a few more I've read recently:

1. Dublin 4 Maeve Binchy
2. Ninja Soccer Moms Jennifer Apodaca,
3. Size 12 is not fat Meg Cabot,
4. Size 14 is not fat either Meg Cabot,
5. The Trouble With Tulip Mindy Starns Clark,
6. Inside Job Connie Willis,

More Books

1. Lord Harry Catherine Coulter
2. grave surprise Charlaine Harris
3. The Birth of Venus Sarah Dunant
4. The Hidden Diary of Marie Antoinette: A Novel Carolly Erickson
5. Breathing Room Susan Elizabeth Phillips
6. When She Was Bad... Louise Bagshawe
7. Long Time Coming Sandra Brown
8. Abundance, a Novel of Marie Antoinette Sena Jeter Naslund

Books I've read recently

1. Weep No More, My Lady Mary Higgins Clark
2. Eleven on Top Janet Evanovich
3. The Carriage House Carla Neggers
4. The Woman in White Wilkie Collins
5. Stonebrook Cottage Carla Neggers
6. Holmes on the Range Steve Hockensmith
7. Last Voyage of the Valentina Santa Montefiore
8. The Final Confession Of Mabel Stark Robert Hough

Actually, the list should be longer, but I can't remember the titles of the rest of the books. Guess they were that memorable!

A little advice

Never start a new job the same week that you are planning a convention and teaching classes at that convention, especially if there is a music festival going on that your child is playing in!

First the new job. On Wednesday, I started working at my new job. There's a lot to learn, but as long as I stay calm, it seems to be going well. Everyone is great to work with, and how can you hate a job that had birthday cake the first day, a surprise birthday lunch the second, and a catered grand opening party the third.

I've always thought that this would be my dream job, and so far, so good even with the steep learning curve.

A few months ago, I was approached to be on the planning committee for a scrapbooking convention, the first of it's kind to be held here. We had modest goals, and surpassed almost all of them. Along the way we learned a lot, and I made two new friends. This past weekend, we had the conference, over 70 scrapbookers attended, along with 10 vendors, 20 or so just taking classes and a bunch of people who just came to shop at the vendor show. Overall the reviews have been great. We had people who drove 6 hours to come!

I taught a couple classes, one on scrapbooking for beginners, and the second on cardmaking. Both were well received, and I had a lot of fun teaching them. It's neat to see other people's creativity get sparked.

The music festival is always a busy couple weeks. This year Hamster was performing in the piano and speech categories and Squid was in the instrumental and speech categories. Hamster had bigtime stage fright at the first speech event, and ended up not being ajudicated, although he did manage to recite his poem after the other participants were ajudicated. An hour later, he got up and performed his piano piece quite well, without any stage fright. He got a decent mark, better than I expected. The next day, both boys performed poetry, and Hamster got up on stage and recited his poem almost perfectly. Squid did fine on his poem, too and he ended up getting a medal for Canadian Poetry Solo. The next week, it was Squid's turn to play. He did two pieces, and did very well on both. He was awarded the woodwind certificate of excellence and was asked to play one piece in the showcase concert! Unfortunately, I couldn't go to the concert, because the band I play in had a gig. A gig on the first night of the scrapbooking conference!

Games Night

I grew up in a family that played games. We played cribbage, Scrabble, Monopoly, Aggrivation, Balderdash and Trivial Pursuit, as well as all kinds of card games. I now own a lot of board games, but I don't get to play them that often. Mr. Freeze doesn't like to play any kind of game, board or card, the boys are too young and I'm a bit shy to ask my friends if they'd like to come over to play in case they think I'm even more nerdier than they already know I am.

A few days ago, of my band friends mentioned that she likes playing board games and that she and a couple other women in the band had been talking about getting together for a night of game fun. We decided that we'd get together Sunday and after emails and phone calls, I ended up hosting. (Damn cat allergies! ;-))

There ended up being 5 of us and we all had at least 2 games to contribute. We had Apples to Apples, Pictionary, Balderdash, Taboo, Cranium, Scrabble and two editions of Trivial Pursuit. there was one other game but I can't remember what it is called.

We started off with Balderdash. That game went pretty fast. I loved it when I was younger, but now, not so much. Most of us were able to pick out the right definition, and more than once, one of us gave a definition that was pretty close to the right one.

Then we switched to Taboo. But first we ate. Someone brought a cake, someone else brought chips and salsa, and I had a crab dip I'd bought plus I made my famous bean dip. We also finished the first bottle of wine and started the second. Weirdest wine name prize goes to "Cat Piss on a Gooseberry Bush".

Taboo was the most fun. We know each other well enough that we could often use our shared experiences to get around the taboo words. We'll play Taboo again.

Then we played Trivial Pursuit. We threw out the rules after a couple rounds. We gave hints and if someone else knew the answer, they could steal the pie, except it's not stealing when the rest of the players insist you take it.

We ended off the evening with Scrabble. Scrabble champs we are not! I got stuck with the Q. I think the highest word scored was worth 28 points, and that used a double word score, as well as forming a word across and down.

By that time it was pretty late (for us) so Mr. Freeze drove everyone home, so nobody drank and drove. I hope this becomes a semi-regular event!

Ski Bums

We went skiing again today. I can see a big improvement in Hamster’s self-confidence, just compared to last week. Last week he really didn’t want to ride the chair lift. I went up with him every time and had to hold his hand when we got off. One time it stopped for about 5 minutes and as it bounced and swayed, he sat there saying "It’s okay, it’s okay, we won’t be stuck up here, it’s okay." We took Slow and Easy down the hill each time and the one time we thought we’d take Lift Line he decided it was too steep.

This time was a different story. He rode up with me a couple times, once more under duress because he really wanted to go up with his dad, then it happened. He didn’t wait for me at the bottom and got on a chair by himself. I could see him trying to put the bar down but his arm was just a little too short. I was scared for him, but the lifty couldn’t do anything. I got on a couple chairs later and yelled to him to scoot over and lower the bar from the side. The people in front of me yelled back that the bar was down. He’d figured it out for himself!

It was the same with the skiing itself. He wanted to ski with me for the first couple runs, then he was off with his brother. Down the Lift Line. The next run I did the Lift Line with him but I couldn’t keep up. I decided to let him go it alone the last time, I stayed on Slow and Easy, he did Lift Line.

It’s been a different story for Squid. He loves to ski and has from the first time he tried it. He got boots for Christmas and a friend loaned him skis, so he doesn’t have to wait for us to get our rentals. By the time we got our skis on, he’d already gone up the chair lift and was back down. He probably did twice as much skiing as I did today.

Confessions of a muffle-something band geek

This one time, on a band trip, I walked into a Sony store with a couple of my fellow band members. There were a bunch of big screen TVs playing Lord of the Rings, and a couple playing some movie with a marching band scene. Guess which one we all focused on.

This past weekend I went on a band trip. We'd been asked to be the house band for a veteran's group convention. We did 4 gigs in three days, but still managed to have a lot of fun. Not that playing isn't fun, but unload the bus, set up the gear, play, pack up the gear, load up the bus, gets old fast. Especially the unload and load part. We did a concert at a legion, a military style parade (no clowns or floats), and a dinner/dance. We played a bunch of 40's type music for the dance and it was cool to have people actually get up and dance. It's the trips like these that help us all get to be better friends, even though what happens on band trips stays on band trips.

Wow, me with a blog!

Yes, I've taken the plunge and started my own blog. I'm not sure what you'll find here, 'cause I'm not sure yet.