I’d hate to see what I’d be like flying 15,000 km away from home to live in a new climate and culture, yet Jan’s doing amazingly well. I bought her a lightweight zipperless hooded grey sweat shirt which she wears non stop over her T shirts, but I said to her you’re going to have to buy warm things. Can you imagine coming from 35 degrees C to here in March?

Jan’s very open to learning how things are done, and I always start etiquette lessons with, “Here in Canada we…..” and then explain the custom. She always replies emphatically with, “Okay mom!” and I must say once she’s been told something she does it that way each and every time thereafter.

Just now mom phoned to say she’d taken Jan shopping at Sonia’s, a nice boutique in Osoyoos. Mom said she’d bought Jan a lovely long dress for the party next Saturday, so that’ll be great as with her figure she’ll look adorable dressed up like that. Just like a living doll.

Kathy had a lovely birthday dinner party for Petra last week, and their friend Bev brought along her friend Ken, so there were seven of us. As always, Kathy had the table set so beautifully. I should buy more accoutrements for the dinner table as it sure makes every dinner an event.

Once we got into the evening Ken told us about something magical and wonderful that we simply had to check out on line. We all said what’s it all about, and he said he couldn’t say, but we needed to look at it. He said it’s called Zeitgeist, and asked if we’d heard of it.

The next day I Googled it and went Oh my God, as Zeitgeist is some nutty conspiracy theory site, filled with insane rants and bizarre theories. I e mailed and Kathy and said “Um, Ken’s a conspiracy theorist, did you know that?”

While God knows we all have a right to our own opinions, some are just too off the wall to be taken seriously. And as you know, I’m good with strange ideas and odd people, so it’s not like I’m closed to stuff, but the conspiracy theorists are just nuts in my opinion.

And speaking of whacky, the other day I went to a few thrift stores after the gym, and then came home and tried to exit my car, and couldn’t. I had to crawl out the passenger side, and no matter what I or Nicky did, the door wouldn’t open.

I dropped it at a shop where it took them hours to figure out what was wrong, and they eventually had to order a part which had to be couriered. I was therefore without a car for four days, but it turned out to be fine, except for the bill of over $600.

On Saturday I drove Nicky’s hot rod to the gym and grocery store, Sunday and Monday I practised what wearing an electronic monitoring bracelet would be like and loved it, and on Tuesday Kathy picked me up and took me to the gym and drove me back home.

By Wednesday I was mobile again, ready to shop myself rotten for Luke and Jan’s impending party.