A nice repeat customer who has some marketing experience gave me a good tip.  She pointed out when she went to my site she had no idea whether or not fruitcake is available outside the normal fruitcake season.  So I’ve asked my web designer to place a statement to that effect right on my main page, and will henceforth incorporate it into every newsletter as well.

I always assume people know fruitcake is available year-round, but we all know how stupid it is to make assumptions.  For example, I assume because Nicky’s 23 years old, when he leaves the house he’ll turn off the TV and lights.  Wrong!

Yesterday, Sunday, all I heard coming from the basement was the constant drone of race cars going around a track.  I presume the kid’s found another video game with which to kill days of time.

For a bit of adventure, I made Kathy, David and Petra accompany me to a talk by Justin Trudeau out at the UBC Okanagan campus last week.  It was great fun, and we were smart to arrive early because we got the last four chairs.  Everyone coming after us had to sit on the floor or stand.

Though not Pierre, the kid has solid Liberal roots and appears honest and patriotic.  We all enjoyed it, and then headed to the ORA restaurant in the Best Western for dinner.  I had my usual Manhattan there, and then as Petra had had a Cosmopolitan, I decided to give that a whirl, too.

That was a mistake, as I had to race out the next day and purchase a bottle of vodka and some cranberry juice.  Now every afternoon at 4:30 I toast my gramma with a beautiful Cosmopolitan.  They’re gorgeous as they’re pink, my favourite colour!

On Saturday I thought oh what the heck, and went to the thrift stores for a bit of R and R.  A week earlier I was talking to Alison and I told her I’m not shopping as I really don’t need a single thing.  She said, “That’ll last six weeks.”  Wrong.  It lasted about seven days.

But imagine my joy at finding the hardcover Antiques Roadshow Primer for $4 at the Mennonite thrift store.  I raced home and started to look at my stuff and went through the book in a day.  I had no idea some of my furniture was that old, but according to the photos of the leg styles and pulls, it is.

You may know mom’s partner Gerry is an artist, and he had several old water colours lying around unframed, which he kindly gave me.  To save money, I decided I’d frame them myself.

Yesterday I overcame my fear of taking apart a framed print to insert my own art.  You know how on the back, there are brackets and screws in the corners?  I carefully disassembled it and removed the hideous art.  Then I took one of Gerry’s lovely water colours and put it into the frame.  Not bad.

I told mom another thing I learned from my Antiques Roadshow book is that Gerry’s style of folk art is valuable.  I can’t believe the amount of stuff I learned from a $4 purchase!

Luke left for the oil patch, so it’s back to just Nicky and me batchin’ together on Hall Road.  Luke’s an eating machine, so it’ll be kind of nice not to have to be at the store every other day.  Though as you know, I love to have a reason to cook and bake, so it’s my own fault.

Liz’ memorial was held on Saturday and I brought the baked goods for the event.  I had so much fun making all of the stuff.  I made white fudge with pistachios and dark fudge with marshmallows.  Liz’ favourite meringues, some chocolate chunk cookies and shortbread cut into cute shapes and topped with colourful sprinkles.

Afterward mom and I drove to Osoyoos together, and I spent the night.  Gerry remains an inspiration.  He’ll be 98 in March but there he was, downing a double Scotch before dinner, like always.  We had a pleasant evening, and then I drove home on Sunday.

Luke had left that morning, so I didn’t see him, but did see either his or Nicky’s handiwork when I opened the lower cupboard door in the kitchen. Someone had broken the top shelf of the lazy Susan.  That kind of thing puts me into a murderous rage.

When Nicky came upstairs I told him about my discovery, and he did the old, “I noticed that.”  Do you know at 23 and 26 years of age, nothing has changed with those kids?  I said,”well if you didn’t break it, then Luke must’ve.”  I’ll have to e mail Luke and ask him, and he’ll reply, “yeah, I noticed that.”

My goal for the next while is to study my portfolio and try to learn about stocks and investing.  This is going to be one of my greatest challenges, as I’m starting from zero.  I have adorable Joe Miller helping me and if I don’t learn, I’ll let him down, and I can’t do that.

If you’re reading this and still have mutual funds, transfer them immediately into a self-directed portfolio.  Think of the amount you pay for commission for the hands-off help you’re getting for that.  We pay more attention to celebrity gossip or sports scores than we do to the most important thing for most people, our financial well-being.

But to get to the financial well-being, I’ve had to institute a strict savings program, so I’m not shopping.  This leads to hours of spare time, as you can imagine.  It came in handy this past week as I had to gather all of my paperwork for the accountant.  I’ve also finished a couple of books.

I’m now reading the memoir Pinboy, by George Bowering, who attended the same high school my mother, brother and I did.  It gives me tremendous joy to read the names of old principals and teachers I used to know.  It sure makes me want to write memoirs of my life in the South Okanagan, too.

But of course I won’t, being the World’s Greatest Procrastinator.  Instead, I’ll decide a closet needs to be cleaned out, or I’ll have to re-arrange the art in a room.  Perhaps I’ll have the strength to actually paint a room or two.  I doubt it.

Instead, I’ll probably just daydream about spring as I walk my tiny dog around the block.

Remember how having one adult male to take care of bothered me?  Surprise!  Now I have two of them, and there’s no end in sight.  When Luke came home on December 31st he said he would be called to work any day.  I said well get down to Osoyoos ASAP to visit gramma in case you get called this week.

He raced down to spend the day with gramma and Gerry on January 1st, then got sick with a cold, so I could certainly understand not being able to go to the rigs.  But now we’ve all recovered from the cold, and I’m saying to him daily, “When are you leaving?”

We’re now two weeks into it, and I’m sorry to say my patience is wearing out.  Yesterday their pals Taylor and Chris spent the day gaming in the basement with Nicky and Luke.  At dinnertime I said to them, “I thought it was horrible having one adult male in the basement, and now I have two.”  They laughed.

But I have to say I love January and so I’m enjoying myself in spite of having Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee under my nose.  As the yard’s covered in snow and ice, I can’t do a thing in the garden, so that’s good.  There’s not a lot to be done with the fruitcake business, so that’s very relaxing, too.

Marian, my dear accountant of 21 years, invited me out for coffee lat week and told me she’s retiring. She’s found a nice person to take over her clients, so will help this new man learn all about Nuttier than a Fruitcake so that he can take over.  So I do have to get my receipts and invoices in order for them, and Marian said to do it now before busy tax season.

That’s the type of thing I hate to do, and so I procrastinate, as I’m always sure it’ll be too hard.  I’m still trying to get a handle on this time management problem, and have noticed I avoid tasks that I think will be hard.  However I also find the trick is just to start, no matter how incompetently, and it does seem to lead to the job getting done.

I read that about writing, and it’s true.  Just start writing, and then edit and read afterward.  Sitting there trying to compose the perfect sentence in order to start usually doesn’t work, so just start writing anything and that can get the ball rolling.

And of course you’ll laugh, as I list the types of meals and baked goods I’ve made for the kids.  Then I complain these fat, lazy males won’t leave.  Brownies, anyone?  But you know how I love to cook and bake, and now with one extra person here, it seems to have motivated me to be more Martha Stewart than ever.

I discovered that easy-to-make fudge, where you melt chocolate and add sweetened, condensed milk.  I tried a recipe for chow mein drop ‘cookies.’ These are odd, but Luke loved them.  I’ve made Eggs Benedict, spaghetti and meaballs, chicken chow mein, brisket, and so many other things I should have my head examined.

I offered to make the baked goods for Liz’ memorial tea next Saturday, so that’ll give me something to do, other than lure kids like the witch from Hansel and Gretel.  She had a good motive, but I don’t, hence the need for psychiatric intervention.

Last Friday I sneezed a whole bunch of times in a row, then again on Saturday, and I wondered what the heck was going on.  By Sunday morning I knew, as I woke up feeling horrible with some kind of a cold or the flu.  God only knows what it was, but it’s left me feeling like lead.

You know how I like to run around gloating that I never get sick, so it’s a lesson never to brag, isn’t it?  The last time I had a cold was in the spring of 2009 , so I guess it was time for my body to demand a break, which it did.

Luke arrived home from Thailand on the afternoon of December 31st and when he phoned from the airport I told him Nicky and I were both deathly ill.  He said he didn’t want to catch it, so would just come in and say hi, then go to Denis’ to spend the night.

Luke came in for an hour and left.  The next day he became horribly sick, too!  I said I don’t believe it’s possible to catch a germ in an hour where nothing communal was touched, but he blamed us for it.

So the week was spent with Luke, Nicky and me in the house, all sick.  There really wasn’t anything to do but get busy and eat all of the Christmas baking and chocolate, and I think we’re finally rid of it.  Monday my diet begins.

I’ve made two resolutions, one for myself, and one for the business.  For me, I want to use my time better and stop wasting it.  When I sat down and figured out how much time I have outside of the normal things we have to do it in a day, it was a lot.  I can’t figure out why I can’t get more done, other than I procrastinate horribly.

For the business, I want to sell 1,000 fruitcakes from my site per year.  That means I need to drive people to my site, but I believe this is a conversation we’ve had a time or ten in the past.  But step 1 of that is I need help with my e mail, and especially my newsletter list.  There are over 500 people on it, but the way it’s organized means I can’t find anything.

Other than that, I’m just going to wing it, having learned it’s pointless to over-plan.  At this time last year I had no idea of the changes to come, and for all of us the same thing applies for 2013.  Surprises are good.

I’m reading Buddhism for Dummies and finding it helpful.  I was explaining some of it to Luke, as Jan is a devout Buddhist so we want to learn about it.  For now, all I know is we have to try to do good things and think good thoughts, so I focus on that.

And speaking of raising one’s spirits, today I bought a bottle of Malibu (a rum and coconut liqueur), and a bottle of Canadian Club whiskey.  I have plans to slowly build a complete bar, and then each night I can order something different.  Tonight a pina colada, tomorrow a Manhattan.  Cheers!