I’m fortunate to be surrounded by people who inspire me.  When Alison was here early this month I invited mom and Gerry to come up for lunch.  For something different, I made a pitcher of Tom Collins’.  Actually, Vodka Collins’.  There were six of us for lunch, so I used 12 ounces of vodka.

To this one adds lemon juice, a bit of sugar and club soda, plus ice.  After Gerry had downed the last of his, he turned to mom and asked, “Was there alcohol in here?”  As you may recall, he’s 96 years old, and so I hope to God when I’m 96 I’ll be asking that very same question of someone.  Isn’t that inspirational?  To down a two-ounce highball, and then go, “What?”

Another insanely inspirational person is a woman named Pat from the gym.  She’s 77 years old, and is stepping and lifting weights with a vigor that stuns new members.  I love it when new young gals prance in, look at us fat/old babes, and think to themselves, “Watch this.”

Yeah, we watch them alright.  Too bad after a few minutes their fire hydrant red faces give them away as perhaps not quite as fit as they thought they were.  Even for us regulars it’s hard to compete with someone like Pat, as she even bikes to the freaking gym, for God’s sake.  Can you believe it?

For what I like to call United Church food, there’s no greater inspiration than Alison.  I mentioned in an earlier blog that she suggested pasta salad while here.  I’ve made it twice since, and Nicky and I just love it.  Not sure what it actually has to do with the United Church, but I kind of put foods like Jello and pasta salads in that category.  Blandness, maybe?

Now if I could just find some type of baking/marketing inspiration from someone.  It makes me sick the way I purposely hide from the business.  But honestly, I’m just too busy with all of my projects.  For example, on Saturday mom gave me half a dozen of Gerry’s water colours.

They were all unframed, so on Sunday I went to Value Village to look for ugly prints in nice matted frames that could work for my new art.  Then as I was at Value Village anyway, I decided to look at every other department, eventually leaving with three frames, ten dinner plates, three decorative pillows and eight place mats.

Today I had to invest time in searching for a new recipe for ground beef.  Nicky and I are getting kind of tired of the same old stuff.  Now I have a lovely Texas-style meatloaf in the oven, and if it’s any good, I’ll put the recipe in a newsletter.

Then believe it or not, I’m still on the hunt for the right shade of pink for my bedroom.  However, today I believe I may have found it, so will now be filling all of the holes, taping, etc. in preparation for painting on the weekend.

Hence, no time for fruitcake, but easily finding the motivation to garden, cook, decorate and shop.  What is up with that?