Bellini-induced Brain Freeze

We're still in this pandemic, everyone. Let's not kid ourselves. Last week my travel agency closed it's doors permanently. Oof. It was poorly orchestrated and it was not headed by the best people for the task. If anything it was a clear indication of how much my dear agency was the black sheep of the corporate family. We really got a sense of who genuinely cared about us and who were "just doing (their) job." They tasked my colleague with a long laundry list of things that had to get squared away...all because she was the only one who had been recalled to the office to do work. The rest of us were only asked to gather our belongings and leave. But after 10 years together I could not leave my team stranded and fend for themselves. I left my new job a few hours early one day and hustled hard with my colleagues trying to empty the office of as many brochures and as much garbage as we could. My regional manager, who is still furloughed, actually texted us t...

My grandma had her 96th birthday this past Monday. 96th! And there was nothing we could do to celebrate it alongside her. Luckily I was able to arrange a FaceTime with her recreation staff -- I have not been able to FaceTime with her since the 2nd, more than 3 weeks ago. it's tough because the staff are only able to coordinate FaceTime with the residents during weekdays 9 to 5...and guess when my shifts are?! (Thankfully a new schedule season is starting up soon and I have arranged for compressed workweeks so I should be able to see her at least every other week.) I told her it's her birthday, but I don't think she really registered that that's a thing, or maybe she just figured we'll celebrate it together when we have a free moment. Embarrassingly she had to tell me not to cry; I don't want her to worry but I miss seeing her in person and I always fear she'll think she has been abandoned. She coughed a couple of times which of course caused a bit of c...

This weekend has been a lot of late nights just like old times, but only because we keep on watching stuff on TV until we're too tired to watch anymore. Woke up fairly late and so we made brunch late...which made me show up late for the twins' birthday on zoom. But it was great to see everyone's faces. Mom and baby sis did not make it into the chat. Later, S posted some video and photos of their birthday...there was even a community parade of strangers who decorated their cars and drove around to wish all the neighboring kids a happy birthday. Great timing! Since it was Easter I could finally have Starbucks so I ordered for drive thru and dropped off some decaf mochas for mom and baby sis in exchange for some pulled pork. :P Later on Weird Kid and his girlfriend (let's call her T, now) popped by my house with a Pizza Hut pizza and brownies for Easter. I'm glad I was able to see most of my family in person today, even if for just a minute. The only one missi...

Today I went to Superstore and picked up some groceries for Butch and I as well as for mom and baby sis. The store was not as regimented as it was when I went there last, which was actually kind of disappointing. A lot more people were not respecting the social distancing concept. So strange that they would be more lax when last week Wal-Mart was ramping up their social distancing measures. I wish they would all enforce the same protocols at the same time. I tried calling the credit card company again to dispute that odd charge on my account. While I sat on hold getting drowsy Butch pulled up a way to dispute the charge online, but through the normal website and not on the app. Phew, so much better than sitting on hold. Here's hoping they can shed some light on the mystery. Tomorrow is Easter and it's going to be so weird to attend Easter Mass online and be apart from the family. Mom was making some pulled pork for tomorrow and she offered some if I wanted to come pic...

Another fun night zooming with my friends. Not without technical difficulties, though. :( We thought we'd try Google Hangouts and then Google Meet because of the security concerns with Zoom. But sadly I kept freezing or lagging with the Google apps. I still kind of froze at times with Zoom tonight for some reason. But the big annoyance with me about keeping on meeting through Zoom was the 40 minute limit. So they got me; I subscribed tonight because I figured 20 dollars a month is a small price to pay to be able to stay connected all night without having to add a new meeting code every 40 minutes. We also played more Cards Against Humanity together. I was on a roll! Also was super happy when Golf Girl and R messaged me asking if we were still chatting tonight. They were looking forward to it! Turns out they didn't get the Google Hangout invite somehow. I learned that R enjoys The Circle so we had a great chat about that. We also talked a little bit about Love Is B...

So today was my last day at work for the week but they just put out an offer for more overtime next week. I offered another 3 hours a day for Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. I don't want to miss my Friday Zoom with my friends. I noticed a strange charge on my Visa the other night, but when I tried to call the card company to dispute it they were closed for the evening. Hopefully they're open tomorrow even though it's Good Friday. Or I can try on Saturday. I've never had a weird charge on a credit card before! Butch's office is closed for another two weeks so I have my office mate for a little while longer :P Although we don't get to have a long lunch together or anything. It's just nice to have someone else in the house with me. Other than that nothing much to report today. Oh boy, this self-isolation stuff makes for pretty blah days.

Daisy sent me a gif today wishing me a happy Rex Manning Day. I totally did not realize it was an actual date on the calendar. That movie is still a good one to rewatch over and over. I always seem to start my lunch later than scheduled. Today Butch surprised me with some Burger King he ordered -- the crispy chicken sandwich meal was on special. Never had BK chicken before but it was definitely crispy as advertised. Good flavor, too. New show to binge on Netflix: The Circle. The premise looked kind of cheesy and it just seemed like a Big Brother knockoff from what I saw in the trailer. But after getting hooked on Love is Blind I figured I'd give The Circle a shot. Well as it turns out it is my kind of show. :P All about chatting and social media messaging (although kind of emoji heavy) and games you can play with others in an online setting! It has Leah written all over it. The people do seem kind of overly stereotypical at times. I mean, like Joey, he is a straight ...

Tuesday morning I woke up realizing I had not finished off some accounting on a clients' destination wedding; but with me working overtime with the other job when in the world was I going to make it to the travel office to get it done! Especially with us (temporarily) closing the doors after Wednesday. As I ate my breakfast to prepare to start my shift I decided I would boot it to the travel office and get it done during my lunch break. Mission accomplished. I did not have much time to eat -- thank goodness for leftover pizza -- but I was relieved I was able to finish the ONE thing I could not do from home. Phew. The other job was still more of the same. Lots of helping, lots of thankful callers, everyone doing their part to take care of one another. Baby sis messaged me and told me that her and our mom wandered to the Italian Centre to grab some food and go for a walk. I understand they are going a little stir-crazy but I was kind of annoyed that mom would wander out and ...

On Monday I prepared myself for what I expected would be a crazy hectic day for us and for fellow Canadians as we worked hard to make sure we helped as many people as possible get the assistance they needed to get through the next 4 weeks. Despite long waits people were still quite pleasant and appreciative that we were on the job helping them out. I really do love how helpful this position makes me feel; it is so satisfying. It was also my first day working overtime. I chose to just tack on an additional 3 hours at the end of my shift -- they said they would be ok/could approve me working an additional 6 rather than 3, but I still wanted to be able to enjoy a (late) dinner with Butch and have some time to wind down and relax before heading to bed to rest for the next day. It went pretty well considering. And since I have to work late Butch has been preparing our dinners. Monday night we had pizza because he had a craving. He decided to try Fast Lane Pizza which is pretty close...

The world is adapting as best it can. Life has become absolutely bizarre. Today is Palm Sunday for us Catholics...and instead of worshiping together in our churches we have to watch YouTube videos or live streams of the mass. We cannot receive communion but instead say a prayer of spiritual communion. My church offered blessed palms for anyone who wanted to come by and pick it up, but maximum 2 palms per car. Drive around the back, drop what you wish into the collection basket they would bring to your window, continue on and someone else would place the palms in your passenger seat. I got lucky and received 4 palms but honestly I think they were just getting too cold to stand outside for much longer so they were doing their best to finish their supply. Everyone was wearing a mask. 2020 church procedures, everyone. Then mom wanted some fish and iceberg lettuce. Weird Kid had already gone grocery shopping and I agreed he should not have to go out again (a bit of lecturing from ...

Yesterday was my last day at the travel office for who knows how long. I did my best to make sure the consultants looking after my files will know what is left to do for my clients or what my clients are looking for moving forward. I then filed my folders away and locked it all up securely. I sent out emails telling my clients what was happening and then a letter to my mailing list letting them know as well. Then I set up my "out of office" and that was that. Well, not quite. I still had not edited my office's "see you soon" video but it was something I could do from home so that's what I opted to do instead of staying at the office even later. I was already 2 hours past closing. Phones are such powerful little computers now. I was able to put together the video, upload to our YouTube channel and then schedule it to post to our social media accounts at closing time when we shutter the door. Not even a full day away from the job and I could not he...

We had another zoom get together with five of us; myself, Daisy, M, Rainbow Girl, and VW Golf Girl. Again, multiple zoom sessions as we always got timed out. This time we tried playing Cards Against Humanity at the same time using http://playingcards.io Butch suggested Google Hangouts because there is no 40 minute time limit and lately zoom has been getting some bad press regarding privacy breaches. We couldn't be bothered to figure it out at the last minute so we just kept getting a new zoom meeting session. But I think we'll be ready for next week. I Googled how to set up a Hangout meeting and I have already scheduled it (I think) and invited all the girls that were at my surprise zoom party plus Bizkette all the way in BC. Also, I hope with the Hangout that it will give everyone the freedom to drop in and walk out as they need. It's so strange all these new "normals" we are having to get accustomed now...and how quickly it seems to have all come to pass...

Thanks to the kind young lady in charge of recreation at my grandma's nursing home I was able to FaceTime with grandma after I finished work. Unfortunately my shift usually prevents me from being available to FaceTime with her but since I had a doctor's appointment today -- which turned into a phone consult -- I got to see my grandma and chat with her for 15 minutes. She looked to be in better spirits and she wasn't in bed so I think (hope) she wasn't woken from her afternoon nap to talk to me, and I think when she was told she had a FaceTime date she got excited. She did tear up a bit still but I held it together for the most part until the end when we had to say "bye." She asked how dad is doing twice during our short conversation -- we had somehow managed to avoid that last time. I hope everyone at the facility is still helping us keep up the ruse I can't bear to think of her dealing with the news all alone. Plus after visiting dad and seeing the...

The house is a little more furnished right now as we have inherited some stuff from Butch's brother. We now have some super sturdy bar stools, two leather recliners, and a foosball table so that his nieces did not have to say "goodbye" to it forever. The tv room is looking a tad more full and a LOT more "Joey and Chandler's apartment." I'm so tempted to put a Magnadoodle on the wall (since the room does not have a door) It's pretty cozy but my puzzle still has its spot on the coffee table until I complete it. Definitely no room to do any WiiFit or Fitness Marshall videos so excuses are stronger than ever. :P I do have to get back on the wagon at some point, though. We have been ordering in a lot of dinners and I just had my phone consult with the doctor observing my liver. While he said that the levels (of what, I'm not sure...I'm terrible at asking questions) were coming down to normal levels I still have to work on losing weight. Bu...

The other day I watched a video put together by many of our sales representatives in the travel industry wishing us travel consultants well and sharing encouraging words and thanks for hanging in there. It gave me the idea for a video of my colleagues and I thanking our clients for trusting us and essentially a "this is not a good bye, it is a 'see you soon'" to share with our clients the day we have to close up (temporarily.) So I sent an email to my coworkers and they thought it was a good idea. So we'll be getting together after close on Friday to get it all filmed and I will work on it on Saturday to be ready to post on the 9th. Thank goodness I figured out Hootsuite on my phone. It will help me keep up our office's online presence while we are away. I may only get to spend very few hours in our physical office but I still enjoy posting social media content for us. Posie mentioned that she is taking on a new role at her workplace where she is going ...

But whoever is running the game, could you please stop? The infected numbers and the deaths from COVID-19 keep climbing...the latest at the Mckenzie Towne Continuing Care Facility is 65 confirmed cases with 4 deaths. I have been following this particular case closely because I am so worried about my grandma's facility getting infected and suffering a similar scenario. I showed my mom a graphic of how deep the swab for a COVID test actually goes. I asked my brother's girlfriend if it seemed accurate (she had to get tested) and she said it sure felt like they were swabbing her brain. Call it kind of a scare tactic, I guess. Tough love? Not really, I suppose. I know I'm going to go visit mom and baby sis...but I should put my foot down on taking them to any stores. I will have to insist on a shopping list and I will go pick it up for them. If they need to go out then we'll go for a walk or something.

Mom and baby sister are pretty much going stir-crazy and I'm being too lenient of a "parent" and not enforcing the social distancing measures enough. Sunday morning I grabbed some coffee for the three of us and a bagel for my breakfast (I miss my lazy Sunday brunches with Butch so much) and got to the house in time for the 10am livestream of our Bishop celebrating mass downtown...only the livestream did not seem to be working. So we watched a YouTube video of mass from Toronto and ordered our lunch for delivery from Big T's BBQ for 1:30. I then brought them to Superstore to do their grocery shopping. Weird Kid and I have been trying to get mom to give us her shopping list but she purposefully withholds the info because she needs it as a reason to get out of the house. Superstore was pretty good at keeping things clean -- I have not seen these types of measures at Walmart. As soon as we came in with a shopping cart from the parking lot they came and sprayed the h...

I'm still a whole post behind my Lenten commitment. I need to blog earlier in the evening so I can actually get it done before bed. Yesterday was my second-to-last shift at the travel office. Not a single phone call but I did have a few emails to action. A couple asking what their options are for changing the dates on their summer honeymoon; with everything going on right now they're not sure if their wedding date is going to remain the same. And then also wedding related I had a room/family cancel out of a destination wedding group. Neither client purchased travel insurance and also their travel dates are outside of the flexibility policy in place with the travel suppliers right now. I handled everything as business as usual which felt very strange given I do not like handing off my clients/work to someone else to handle...but I will be forced to do that after next Saturday. Pairing that with me loading up three bags of my personal belongings at the end of my shift and ...

Yesterday started like pretty much all the other days this week. Woke up, breakfast, set up the basement for my work-mode and got to it, and the bird on the roof continued on with his "construction" activities. Before my first break of the day my watch went nuts letting me know I was getting a call on my cell. It was not a name I recognized it so I easily ignored it, besides I was on a call. And then the same number called again. Still on a call so again, dismiss. The person left a voicemail so, fine, I made note to check it once I was on break. But then my doorbell rang over and over again. At this point I got really nervous because it reminded me much to vividly of how Weird Kid tried to wake me up on the day that dad passed away. I started thinking worrisome thoughts but I was still on a call so I couldn't answer the door. After I got off my call I set my status to away and ran to my phone to see what in the world was going on. The person at the door was th...

20 minutes left in my birthday. I survived. I worked the early shift today and yeah, the early start made it a little brutal to get out of bed. The bonus of telecommuting at least is that it buys me an extra hour of sleep. Some of my calls were pretty long but it was satisfying to be able to help them all. One lady actually had the same birthday as me! I wished her a happy birthday but she said after you hit (a certain age past mine) it just becomes another day. Maybe this is the start of that sort of feeling for me? Thankfully I was able to make it to my parents house so that my baby sister, mom, and I could all get in on the FaceTime date with my grandma. I did not factor in her routine when I made the appointment and so she actually spoke with us while she was in bed as they woke her from her nap. XP The smile on her face when she us though...I'm sure she thought it was worth the wakeup call. Mercifully she did not ask when we were going to see her again, and even tho...

So the travel office had a conference call with the rest of the corporate offices this morning -- of course I was not able to attend because I was busy doing my work with the call centre but I had a feeling I knew what was about to go down. Sure enough, when I checked my travel email during my lunch break an email advising me of my "temporary layoff" was waiting for me. I figured it was an easy decision for them to make since I am only there for a handful of hours each week, with little sales to show for it at this time. If my layoff meant that the office would have an easier time staying afloat then I was fine with that. To be honest, if it was a permanent layoff, although it would have been very sad, it might have been just the kick I needed to move on 100%. What I had not expected, though, was that they were effectively "temporarily" closing all of our offices down. Here in Calgary there will only be three senior consultants maintaining all of our current c...

The bird on our roof definitely has a project he's working on. Jackhammers on our roof every day now. The lady who runs recreation at my Grandma's nursing home was great and reached out to me almost exactly when I started my lunch break. Unfortunately, they can only arrange FaceTime during regular business hours. So I made an appointment to visit with her on Thursday after my shift. Butch suggested I see if my team leader will let me leave my shift early so I can try and make it to the parents house and have grandma FaceTime with all of us at the same time. Hopefully, I can encourage mom and baby sister to make more FaceTime appointments since they are the ones who have the time when this opportunity is available. Also, our city's health department announced that Calgary has suffered its first fatality due to COVID-19 and it was a vulnerable 80 year old lady living in an assisted living facility. This fills me with so much fear and sadness. It validates all my conc...

A full day solo. So. Weird. The crazy bird on our roof made sure I wasn't completely alone, though. :P Instead of making my lunch last night I left it till my actual lunch break to put it together. Unfortunately I missed grandma's nursing home returning my call. Hopefully I'll reach them tomorrow during my lunch. My day went pretty quickly with only a few hiccups when the system would disconnect me. It's definitely strange working all alone in the basement, very lonesome. I still feel like I covered as many calls as I usually do at the call centre. After I signed off for the day I took a walk to the mailbox. I got a birthday card from Daisy and her family. She has always been a fan of regular mail and I think right now with COVID-19 keeping us all in our respective homes her card was a very nice touch...even with phone calls and FaceTime and texts at our disposal it's still all so quiet and lonely. I tried facetiming with my sister but mom bogarted her ...

Butch left this morning for his work up on site. It's going to be so weird in the house without him all week. So much last minute modifications up until even half an hour before he left. I sincerely hope the trip up there isn't a waste and they get the job done so he does not have to go back up there. I also hope they stay safe and warm. I was going to head over to my parents house soon after he left but I ended up putzing around a little while. This morning there was a bird on our rooftop that was hammering on our vent pipe quite rhythmically, almost like someone with a little jackhammer was knocking on our roof. Butch threw a pine cone at it to make it go away but the little guy was oblivious and persistent. :P But soon after Butch left the bird stopped pecking away. He might have come back while I was out of the house but I did not hear much for the extra hour or so I was here at home. Unfortunately we never did get to have FaceTime with grandma. And with the wa...

After working at the travel office I set out to grab the rest of what I needed (wanted?) for my work setup. Luckily I scoped out some websites for a corded phone that would meet my requirements. Almost of them were only available online; London Drugs had one available at my nearby store so I promptly purchased it for in-store pickup. And then over to the ReStore to hopefully find a decent deal on an office chair. $30 -- and it has some of those adjusting levers so it makes it more "ergonomic." Thank goodness it fit in my car. :P Even though I was fine with the price of the phone I just couldn't rest until I absolutely knew I exhausted all options. I took a look at the Buy & Sell and shockingly they had no phones. The WIN thrift store had one but it had a built-in answering machine and I could not be sure that it would not complicate the whole system so I passed and stuck with my initial purchase. Then I impulse bought the puzzle pieces tray set I saw at the ...

Quite a few people were super cranky today -- I wonder if all the self-isolating is making everyone a little nutty. I spent a few hours at the travel office sorting out my clients some more and my colleague was over hearing about anything COVID-19. A stark contrast to Wednesday when I popped by and they were listening to the press conferences non-stop live-streaming it into the office. After I got my client's ticket reissued I went over to the parents' house to have fish and chips with the family and to get mom and baby sis' cable subscription renewed and repriced. Somehow while I was sitting in the living room after lunch mom and Weird Kid had a conversation between the two of them that he did not want to hear of any more. So he quickly departed, but he also had to go back to working from home. Then when I finished sorting out the cable (after a half hour nap waiting for a call back and then an additional 2.5 hour hold!) and mom checked their voicemail. She did not ...

You deserve a cookie if you know where that line is from. Life is definitely imitating a (poorly scripted) sci-fi movie. COVID-19 policies everywhere keep changing. Kinjo Sushi on Tuesday announced that, as per AHS recommendations, they were going to cut the customer capacity by 50% or 50 guests, whichever is less. The next day they sent out another announcement that the dining rooms were now closed and only takeout and delivery options remained. This morning my teammates and I came into work to do our thing; our team leader came in when he was scheduled off (is that a problem given the 50% on 50% off rotational work schedule?) because he knew we had lots of questions and just to put us more at ease. Before he left early that afternoon he let us know that tomorrow we were scheduled off again...if he didn't call us over the weekend then we could expect to be at the office on Monday. Maybe an hour later his leader-partner was coming over to all of us asking if we had landlin...

So last night while we were having dad's birthday dinner my team leader called my cell to let me know that they were going to do a rotational schedule: 50% on 50% off. Today was my turn to be out of the office...and if I did not hear from him tonight that I should report to work tomorrow. So I guess I'm on tomorrow! Instead of staying at home, though, I decided to pop into my travel office and try to get my client's ticket sorted instead of waiting till I was in on Saturday. Saturday is two days away from their scheduled departure and obviously the world has been flipped upside down so that is not happening. Self-isolation is also a thing at the travel office; they have recently started locking the door. No walk-ins unless we have set an appointment with them and EVERYTHING is Lysoled after they leave. The crazy thing is I spent almost the whole day with the girls in the office and I STILL did not get through the wholesaler to sort my client's ticket out. I ev...

"It means nobody gets left behind or forgotten." So yeah, today had more than its fair share of sadness. At least the whole family got to visit dad, we did not get to visit him all together but we all got out there. As I was pulling up to the grave site a Beatles song started up on my phone...Martha Dear. It's not one I'm very familiar with but my phone is full of songs I just load up without remembering much about it. So I sat in my car for a bit before walking out to dad's plot and just took in the whole song. The lyrics had some important lines but overall I don't think it was a "sign" by any means. And as planned we picked up some bbq and had our little nuclear get together to celebrate his birthday. Good food and good company. Butch streamed Beatles music on his phone as dinner tunes when the Google mini (cuz we don't have a Spotify Premium account) could not deliver only Beatles songs. But one living family member was still missin...

Tomorrow is going to be really tough. I've already teared up several times tonight just thinking about it. So hopefully I can just immerse myself in work until I'm off...but then I'll be heading off to the cemetery to have a visit (and to see if the groundskeepers were able to install the wreath mom ordered on Sunday. Sadly because of all the covid-19 updates that are swiftly changing EVERYTHING around us we had to decide to cancel our get together with the uncles and aunts in dad's honor and we'll just have a small little dinner just the family and our partners. That is upsetting as well -- the people we can reach out to for more "dad comfort" and we can't even surround ourselves with them on this day. Grandma's all by herself...I really hope to reach her on the phone tomorrow. The orchids are looking fantastic. Butch said he aimed to have it in full bloom this week and I think he full-on delivered. It's wonderful. We had intended to...

Self-isolation is becoming more of a serious thing at an UBER rapid pace. This morning I went to drive mom and baby sis to church but I was running late so as a fix we watched mass online. Little did we know that by the end of the day the province would be including religious gatherings as part of the public events that would be shut down. While we were at the house we discussed Tuesday's plans and mom admitted she would be more comfortable if we hosted the dinner at home rather than at the brewery. So I called and asked to order food for take out and cancel our reservation. I also reached out to the rest of the family and luckily everyone is still available to attend and meeting at the house is perfectly fine with them all. The hostess on the phone made a it very clear that they thanked us for supporting their business at this time. I'm sure they are not having it very easy right now. After that we went to the nursing home to spend some time with Grandma. I figured it...

After a long week it was finally my turn to come into the travel office after my colleagues had spent the previous five days quashing all the cancellations and re-protections coming in from all angles at a furious pace. The lucky thing for me was that my clients have lessened dramatically since I cut down my hours at the office. I have one client and her boyfriend pondering their alternate dates for a trip that was scheduled to happen in less than two weeks. I have a couple of guests from a destination wedding getting a bit nervous about the trip to Mexico, but unfortunately their departure date is outside of the dates the tour operators are concerned with at this time. I have another couple who are wondering what to do with their trip to Vegas, but again their departure date is just outside of the dates covered by the flexibility policy right now. And I had one couple who arrived back home that day...their return flight got rescheduled because Cathay Pacific cancelled their orig...

I'm typing from a laptop! I owe three posts to catch up with Lent! Let's do this! On Friday I worked the super early shift, and 15 minutes into the day I was scheduled to attend the first Q&A seminar regarding covid-19. We did not have much to discuss other than collecting questions for management to bring forward to the higher ups and labor relations. By then there were already some companies who shut down their downtown offices. Butch sent me a text saying he was working from home because a coworker's kid was possibly in contact with someone who tested positive for the virus. Weird Kid's girlfriend had a patient test positive for the virus as well so he decided to work from home that day. An employee at my workplace asked during the Q&A what she was supposed to do since her husband's downtown office was closed (he wasn't at risk, his office just closed to be cautious) Nobody knew how to answer that, but I have a feeling she just wanted to stay...

It’s a sign of Spring, perhaps? It’s a miracle of love? Everyone knows I have a horrible green thumb, but I can’t help but take flowers/plants/herbs home just to slowly watch them deteriorate under my incompetent care. But wouldn’t you know the orchid I bought at IKEA last year is starting to bloom again?! With a lot of loving help from Butch, mind you. Seeing the two buds start to open up makes me happy-cry though. Dad’s birthday is in a few days and he has always been the orchid-whisperer in the family. My corsages for my debut and my high school graduation came from daddy’s plants. The current timing could not be more serendipitous. Sitting beside the orchid pot is an aloe vera plant from Daisy‘s dad; another parent we lost last year. The aloe vera is growing pretty wild, too.  It’s kind of poetic having the two “dad plants” side by side in my dining room. I get comfort glancing over to them at breakfast and dinner.

So all of Italy has decided to stay home; they’re not coming over to play. The USA is not letting anyone from Europe come over nor are they going to be visiting there anytime soon. Canada has advised against cruise travel — but that’s alright because you won’t be able to take a Viking river or ocean cruise until May.  The NBA has cancelled games for the foreseeable future. It’s as if we’ re all grounded and no one can come out to play. But just like I was saying the other day I really think if we just kept to ourselves and laid low for the next little while the coronavirus would flitter away and we’d all live happily ever after.

Today, the encouragement continued at work. Several clients expressed a lot of appreciation for my service; not a single impatient or irate customer! At one point I almost felt like perhaps I was being “secret shopped” because it is so rare to interact with such thankful people. It makes my role feel very meaningful and worthwhile.  I love the new challenges and experiences I get to have in my new position. I sincerely hope it lasts (my role and my enthusiasm) for a long time.

I finished episode 9 of Love Is Blind and Jessica is as annoying as ever. Barnett is a more mature and decent guy than I was expecting, and Amber is just a big mooch. And I really hope Cameron and Lauren get married but Lauren is making me really nervous. Today at work I got an email saying I’ve cleared the review phase for using one of our software programs.  Amazing! I’m actually pretty proud because it’s the software I was most nervous about. I hope I can clear review for the other programs soon. Today was a big confidence booster for me. I also finally got around to dyeing my hair tonight. Hopefully it won’t be super staticky.

We had a super indulgent date night thanks to Butch‘s boss. We had lower bowl seats (4th row!) and I had my usual like my malt and pocket dawg. Then after the game we went to Vintage Chophouse and had an amazing dinner. We had mojitos and beef tartare to start and then some luscious prime rib. I added bone marrow butter to mine and had potato confit as my side. He had a bigger cut with bacon scalloped potatoes as his side. We finished with key lime pie and peanut butter mocha ice cream pie respectively. I could not finish my confit potato or my ice cream pie. But at least I could take my potato home. There were a lot of Las Vegas knights fans in our midst and unfortunately their team won.  But they weren’t obnoxious about it. There were two blondes who kept posting instagrams. One had a sparkly ladies jersey named “Khloe” and we had to wonder if that was really her name out if she’s obsessed with the Kardashians. I was entertained by watching them almost as much as watching the act...

After work today I spent a brief moment with Butch shopping at Walmart and then I dropped him off back home and went to the parents house to have dinner with the family. Poor Butch was still tired so he stayed home to rest. Tonight seemed to be a comedy of errors. The brother practically took the back gate of off its hinges when he was taking dad’s car out to be assessed. So add another thing to fix on the house. Then mom’s new washing machine arrived but it’s leaking everywhere (bear in mind this is already a replacement unit because the first delivery was dented.) our Skip the dishes order was missing an item. But it turns out I reported the wrong item missing...I said we didn’t get our beef korma but in fact we were missing the butter chicken. And when I tried to set up the new printer for mom and it turns out her iPad cannot update to a compatible iOS now. *sigh* what a time. But it was great to spend time with the family all together at the house and with my brother’s girlfriend....

Butch’s nephew, little K, asked if he could come over and have a sleepover tonight so here we are watching the classic Lady and the Tramp. He really loves the song La La Lu. I forgot how adorable this movie is.  For dinner I made Butch and I some salmon stroganoff. It’s my second time making it. I put a tablespoon too much lime juice so it was a bit too tart for my liking but otherwise the salmon wasn’t overcooked and the egg noodles were delicious. Little K had Kraft Dinner. Excellent dinner company. :) Daisy messaged me to see how I am doing. We shared thoughts on our dads.  She pointed out it’s almost been a year now since her father passed away. As she described it, she’ll “never be the same.” In a little over a week it will be dad’s 70th birthday so we’ll get together with family and have some yummy BBQ in his honour. It’s not lechon but I think he’d still love it.

Today was my first ever experience with strike training. Actually this is my first time ever working for a union. I consider my opinions to be pretty socialist. I love how we have universal health care here in Canada and how so long as everyone participates our contributes their share then everyone is taken care of. It’s also why despite the relative poverty of Cuba I respect how all of the citizens have free post secondary education and how the whole nation is essentially content because there is no “keeping up with the Jones’” mentality.  Alright back to strike training; I already sympathize with what they’re trying to achieve for all of us but I wasn’t really digging all the propaganda speak and spin. I should really read what both sides are saying — as I should always do — so I understand fully what I’m standing for.

On Sunday I wasn’t feeling all the best and it got worse as the day went on. I ended up cutting family time early and went home to rest. Little did I know that Butch has a rough day as well. Both of us were feeling achy like a flu... but Butch was alternating between chills and sweating like crazy all night long. Monday I still wasn’t  super but other than mild aches my biggest issue was more of a sinus headache. When I got home from work Butch was waiting for me to see if I could take him to a walk-in clinic. That’s when you know it’s bad. So it turns out he got a serious infection during his work trip. Really bad. The poor guy stayed home for two days. He’s still not 100% but he’s got deadlines. I’m feeling much better today; but just like what I mentioned in my previous post I figured I should self-isolate to make sure I don’t make my family sick.

Now that I’m trying to reconnect with my blogging hobby I tried to look for a Blogger app for the phone. Too bad it does not exist anymore. So now I’m trying this app called Blogtouch. I think blogging on this phone is still kind of limiting but it’s so much more convenient than firing up the home PC.  I do find that it’s somehow more difficult to piece together my thoughts on this tiny screen and i text on the phone at a much slower pace than touch typing. So far, this app is a lot easier to edit as I go compared to using the Blogger site using Chrome.  People are commenting in the App Store that it is inconvenient that you cannot publish from the app but I’m fine with the workaround writing on the app and then signing into the site to hit “publish.” But I still think my posts would have more substance if I actually sat down at my computer.

A lot of friends in the travel business are sharing their thoughts on the coronavirus situation and how the media is blowing it out of proportion. I get it; I had one family cancel their spring break trip to visit family because their destination was/is quarantining arrivals for two weeks — the exact length of their stay making the long journey pointless. I also had another couple nervous about their once in a lifetime river journey in Asia. There were a lot of nervous consultations every Saturday but in the end they are in destination and hopefully enjoying their trip without much (more) worry. Personally I think it warrants the media’s attention and concern. Sure, the flu is killing more people than the coronavirus but at least with the flu we know how to fight it. We understand “that” enemy. The coronavirus is an unknown. We should treat it much like the flu to protect those with compromised immune systems and everyone around us. So, sure, self-isolating is good. Limiting migration...

I think March is going to be a really rough month. Late last night I put a photo of me and my dad as the banner photo in my Facebook seeing as it’s our birthday month. So many friends have been “liking” it which keeps me checking on the site to see who likes what and who commented. It just ends up making me tear up seeing the photo over and over again. Every Sunday I get a little weepy as I say my prayer for dad or even just think of him. I mean it’s where I last got to look at his face before we closed the casket. Today there were so many Volkswagen cars around me it was quite comforting. It’s like he knew I was having a very emotional day. We are starting to plan a get together with family and friends on what would have been his seventh birthday. On my visit with grandma she asked me twice about dad’s welfare (we still do not have the strength to tell her the truth. Honestly I’m very scared she will pass from heartbreak when she finds out) I thought the days were getting a littl...

So after hearing so much about it I finally started watching Love Is Blind. I have finished two episodes so far. Barnett is a joke. Mark should find someone better. Jessica is too easily wooed. That’s my opinion so far. Amazingly I believe Cameron and Lauren are really in it — although I’d Lauren share her thoughts first for once and not just parrot back whatever Cameron says. When Diamond talked about her dad and how there was a ladybug on the mirror the day Carlton proposed had me weeping. And now I’m on the fifth episode. Jessica is still hung up on Barnett. I knew that would happen. Totally not worth it. Her still talking about what he tolls her in the pods is so clingy. Barnett always looking to the skies anytime he talks about marriage and long commitments just makes him seem extremely fake. But I bet Amber would cut any girl who comes close to her fiancé

So I had some time between work and when I had to pick up Butch from the airport so I decided to finally check out New Horizon mall. Now that it’s almost 50% (so they say) occupied. Or maybe they mean 50% spoken for, which isn’t really 50% functional. I feel really bad for the shops and services that are currently trying to run their business. I’m certain a lot of shops are “undiscovered” by the rare shoppers/adventurers — I know I didn’t do my usual methodical up-and-down-every-aisle. A young guy who was obviously told by his parents to go out and try to drum up business. “Hey have you checked out the perfume shop yet? I can show you where it is.” The food court is miserable w with only three food vendors two of which were closed today and two lonely bubble tea shops. After 45 minutes I’d had enough of the nothingness and went to spend the last half hour at cross iron mills.

I need to make time to blog from an actual computer because typing this out on a phone is time consuming and madness. Butch is away on his second overnight trip this month. This one was several nights. I can’t wait for him to come home; the poor guy works so hard and for so long. With my working 6 days and trying to accommodate my grandma, my mom and my siblings, and his time-consuming demands at work it feels like we barely have any together time. The weeknights seem so short because we need to sleep early enough to function the next day. There’s always something keeping us busy and when we do have time together we usually end up just sitting in the living room playing games on our phone with the tv on...like some kind of old couple :p (ooh, with emojis I don’t think anyone really types out emoticons anymore. I’m so geriatric, haha) But it’s not just him. I feel like I don’t have much time with him and at the same time I don’t have enough time spent with my family and this we...

It’s been a very long while since I last posted; but today is the start of a new Lenten season so I thought I’d try to make this 40 days of self-reflection and getting into the habit of writing thoughts down once again. Other ideas of what I’m going to try and do for the next month and change: 1. No buying Starbucks of any sort (exception of course on my birthday) 2. Reflecting on the Rosary daily 3. Clean something every day. Anyway, here’s my first blog of the season...but of course I should be sleeping. I have been at my new job for a little over two months now. There’s still that very real fear of doing something wrong but it’s also getting easier every day to complete a case more efficiently and smoothly. The commute isn’t as bad as I dreaded it would be but it’s also long enough that I still get choked up at least once each day. Some days it’s just a tear, some days the tears will flow down my cheeks...luckily it’s never a full out sob that would put me at risk on the road...