Yesterday I noticed I was in a vile mood, and wonder if it’s just the January doldrums.  I think that’s why a lot of lucky Canadians who can afford it go someplace hot and sunny for a week or two.  Not that it’s cold here, but it’s just so damned boring.

I’m now working my way through the old series Nip/Tuck on Netflix, and I’m happy to see there are 100 episodes so that should keep me going for a while.  I’m shocked that Downton Abbey is comprised of maybe 12 episodes for two seasons.  What’s up with that?

A bit of fun was had in Osoyoos last week as mom had a dinner party for Jerralynn’s birthday.  Of course Louie accompanied me because everyone’s crazy over that little dog.  Or else they should be if they’re not as he’s very, very cute.

Sadly mom’s poodle Schwarzie has diabetes so only weighs a pound or two and one of Louie’s favourite things to do is to bowl the dog over.  He’s not trying to be mean, but he gets all excited and happy and decides knocking down a one-pound dog is fun.

So perhaps even he’s suffering from the January doldrums, so maybe if I see a thin person I’ll have to run over to them and knock them down.  Not sure how well that’ll go over, or if it’ll relieve boredom.

In a couple of weeks school tours start again at the art gallery, and thankfully there’s a new exhibit.  As I mentioned before, I simply couldn’t understand the one we toured the kids through in the fall.  I just hate that kind of stuff, you know, a pile of sand with shards of glass in it.  This is art?

I’ve been indulging in a bit of my favourite thrift store browsing, but I have to stop buying lamps.  I don’t know why I do it, but when I see a nice lamp, even though I do not need any lamps, I buy it.  Again last week at Value Village there was a cute lamp for $6 which I bought.

That engenders hours of re-arranging because how to incorporate something like that into a fully decorated house?  First there’s just walking around, holding the lamp, then finally an object is removed, and the lamp has a new home.

Then the object that was removed has to be carried around, and when it’s placed into a new spot, the object it replaced has to be carried about for hours.  This domino effect goes on for a long time, and finally something makes its way to the storage room downstairs.

Today it was 11 degrees and windy, so besides being unseasonably warm which melted all the snow and ice, the yard’s a debris field of pine needles.  With 50 Ponderosa pines one gets an awful lot of needles in a windstorm.  This usually occurs in the spring, not January, so I’ll have to get Nicky out there with a leaf blower before the next snowfall.

He drove to Osoyoos on Sunday to spend the day with his gramma, so he’s also in need of a bit of external stimulation.  Maybe something of great importance and excitement will occur.  If so I’ll let you know the moment it does.

You may recall somewhere around 2010 or 2011 I got a parking ticket in Penticton, paid the $10 fine, but my cheque arrived one day late, so the City of Penticton put me over to a collection agency for the $25 they alleged was owing.

I refused to pay, so had dozens, if not a hundred calls, from a company named Wiggins Adjustments.  Whenever the phone rings, I look at it, and if it says Wiggins Adjustments, I don’t answer it.  I notice they’ve stopped, so maybe that’s that for them and the illustrious City of Penticton.

Then in October I parked a bit outside the lines in an Impark lot across from the art gallery during the docent training.  I had bought a ticket and put it on my dash, but they didn’t care, sending me a bill for $62 for being an ‘obstruction’ in an almost-empty lot!

In the letter it said I was being put over to a collection agency, and I wrote them back and said I didn’t even know the money was owing as nothing was on my car when I left the gallery to drive home.  Obviously, they don’t care, and now I’ll have two or three years of staring at the phone and seeing a new collection agency’s name.

I wonder how collection companies manage to collect anything with call display.  Who’d answer their calls?  As well, I don’t even have to listen to the message as I just hit erase instantly.  I notice in the letter it says civil action may be taken, which I welcome, as I want to tell my story to a judge.

I suppose I’m lucky to have these types of things, as we know adrenalin’s a good boost to the nervous system.  If my life was without conflict it’d be quite boring.

The new gym opened, and I went on Saturday and today.  It’s quite a noisy place with open warehouse-like ceilings, so I’d never be able to spend more than my hour working out there.  I mentioned this in the change room and one of the women said she just loves din, and I said I meditate and want silence.  To each his own.

I bought a little hyacinth today and am hoping for spring already.  Not that I want all the gardening work that goes with it, but I love seeing spring flowers in the stores in January.  I’m off to Osoyoos this afternoon for a dinner party at mom’s for Jerralynn’s birthday, so will give her the plant as part of her gift.

Luke’s working in minus 44 degrees temperature in southern Saskatchewan but as he works inside he’ll be cozy and warm in his trailer.  I happened to be speaking to a young man the other day who works as a roughneck on the rigs, and when I told him about Luke’s job he said he’s so lucky to be working inside.

Are you ga ga with excitement about 2014?  I am.  Not sure why, but I think a lot of good changes and things are coming my way.  If nothing else, I have my big 60th birthday reunion with the women I went to elementary school with in May in Palm Springs.

Until then I have to remain focused on some goals, one of which is to have the house exterior re-painted and also to get bees again, both of which will occur in the spring.  And as well, there’ll be the many phone calls from some hapless collection agency to ignore.

Another gargantuan Christmas train’s gone through the house, and I’m very glad to be waving bye bye to the caboose.  From the vast amounts of presents under and around the tree for the six of us, to the jumbo helpings of food and booze, it’s already time to start thinking of a health regime.

The Woman’s Place Gym has moved locations, so we’ve been without any exercise since December 22nd and they’ll re-open with a big splash on January 4th.  Secretly of course I’m enjoying not being able to move this carcass other than to walk the dog.

Margaret and Brendan arrived right on time, early on the 24th and the dog and I picked them up from the airport.  I continued my cleaning routine while Luke went to Osoyoos to pick up mom and Schwarzie.  Everyone was assembled by late afternoon.

As we like to do, we dressed in decent duds and then convenened around the piano and sang while I banged out a bit of Jingle Bells, Deck the Halls, Joy to the World and other old favourites.  We then began opening gifts but it was such an exhaustive act we had to break for a huge dinner to fortify ourselves before being able to continue.

The over seven pounds of brisket, which looked like an awful lot of meat, was easily consumed by this pack of savages.  A tiny bit was leftover for lunch the next day.  Once we’d eaten our lashings of meat and roasted potatoes, we resumed the present-opening.

I was very thrilled to get a Breville juicer from Luke, and Chanel perfume from Nicky, both as requested.  Margaret gave me her old Flip camera which looks like tremendous fun for making videos, and she also gave me the cutest tray and apron, both with the theme of pink roses, which you know I adore.

There was a bit of excitement on Christmas Day, as I asked Luke to affix a hook to the back of the bathroom door.  I got out my power drill and he easily did the job.  I don’t know exactly what happened next, but I think he became over-stimulated by the power tool and said he was going to remove my old range hood.

This was a job I had mentioned and wondered about, but as he’d acted as if he may or may not do it, I’d kind of forgotten about it.  However, here is was, noon on Christmas Day and he wanted to do it.  The old hood was taken off, and the new one was grabbed and installed.

When the power was turned back on, wham, a piece of metal and a puff of smoke flew from the hood, and I said this doesn’t look good.  It had to be taken off and re-done, so I said I was going to walk the dog because my nerves were going.  I mentioned I’d have to have all of that working very soon because I needed to start the stuffing.

When I returned, everything was working, and the turkey dinner was a great success.  Denis spent the day hanging out, and we all ate and drank as much as we humanly could.

Louie’s been a remarkably good dog, given his curiosity about everything.  He hasn’t opened any presents, nor peed onto the tree skirt, so he’s doing really well for a young pup experiencing his first visit from Santa.  I gave him a bath before mom’s party so he’s ready for the season.

He and I went to Osoyoos on Tuesday, and initially Luke thought he’d attend, but then changed his mind.  He said after driving from Saskatchewan to BC he didn’t want to drive for a while.  However the dog and I enjoyed mom’s party, and everyone enjoyed him, especially when he devoured a mini quiche and grabbed a beef bun right out of a guest’s hand.

I used to get mad at kids who visited when Luke and Nicky were small if they complained Arnie or Mojo had stolen something out of their hands.  I’d remind them they’d been warned many times never to hold any food at waist height or lower as the dachshund always lurks, ready to spring.

For the first time in ten years, I planned the fruitcake inventory better, and instead of having any left over I ran out just a few days ago.  A few people tried to order, and if they were local I sent them to Discover Wines who have the bulk of them.  However yesterday I got a phone call that pushed me right over the edge of reason.

You know how I love to bake Christmas cookies, and I generally have a DVD of old Christmas tunes on so I can sing along.  Nothing cheers the soul more than “Mele Kalikimaka is Hawaii’s way to say Merry Christmas to you.”  I also love to have the tunes on while I’m decorating and wrapping, which I was also doing.

So in the midst of this, some man phoned and wondered if I could get two fruitcakes to Regina by Tuesday!  At first I actually tried.  I phoned Purolator but it was busy, so I went on-line and tried to find the shipping rate and time.

It seemed possible, so I phoned him back, and said I would ship via Purolator.  Then went back on-line and tried to arrange for pick up, but after half an hour of opening an account, then typing in my address it said pick up isn’t available at this location!  I realized I’d have to stand in line for hours on the Saturday before Christmas to ship two fruitcakes for someone who waited until now to order.

I picked up the phone, called him back and told him if he insisted I would do it, but would have to charge for my time.  Silence.  I then added perhaps he’d wanted to cancel this order and think about ordering in a more timely fashion next year, which he quickly said he would, and then we hung up.

Now I hope to have peace and quiet from the business so I cam complete the last of the preparations.  I found the cutest set of cloth antlers with bells I must’ve bought for Arnie or Mojo years ago which will look adorable on Louie.

He just loves company so is enjoying Luke’s visit, especially the amount of food debris in a wide swatch all around the kid.  Louie’s going to love Christmas, too with everyone here including mom, Margaret, Brendan and Denis.  Merry Christmas to all of you, too!

You know how people tell you how busy they are at Christmas, with the shopping for gifts and groceries, card-writing, parcel-sending and all?  I just stand there listening to that, and then say to the person, “Yes, and now add replying to orders, packaging fruitcakes, driving to the post office, and making local deliveries daily to that list.”

In other words, YOU aren’t busy; I’m the person who’s losing their mind.  Because as you well know, I love to hand-write Christmas letters, send cards, shop like a lunatic for gifts, wrap them like an artisan, bake cookies and plan meals.  So the month of December has now become truly unmanageable.

I remember how I’d put down the Martha Stewart Living magazine, and then get busy reproducing some of her lovely ideas in the house or yard.  After near nervous breakdowns, Denis would remind me that Martha has an entire staff to do all of that, and I would go, “Oh yeah, right.”  But at least I had the time to give it a good try.

And so, after days of thought, meditation and prayer, I’ve come to the decision I have to stop selling my fruitcakes wholesale to stores.  I mean really, I’m not Mrs. Weston, so why try to make volume, earn 2 cents a cake, and hate what you’re doing?

As you know, I stopped selling to all stores outside of Kelowna, as I thought if I keep the product in stores in town, I can avoid people driving to my house to buy them.  However, people have become so used to the fruitcakes in these stores that the orders locally are large.

So now I’m thinking next year all of these local people will still want my fruitcakes, so will have to come here and pay me the full price for them.  I can adopt a better attitude about people coming to the house, and really, with my on-line repeat customers I can now have a solely home-based business.  Then next year we’ll see if I’m in a similar vile mood.

 I’ve been feeling somewhat better after making the decision that all sales will be retail, hence via me, but I’m quite nervous to tell the stores as it’s going to be horrible for them.  I had a similar experience the other day when I went into Illichmann’s for a large loaf of marzipan.  They now only carry the small, so I felt murderous toward the poor clerk.  Same thing next year with the fruitcakes.

On Thursday night I had a small Christmas dinner party and invited Petra, Larry, Kathy and David, and everyone enjoyed Louie’s antics, especially the way he plays with the cats.  I thought the food was horrible but they had to act like it was okay.

I made boeuf Bourgignone, but by the time we ate it, the meat was desiccated as it’d been in the oven that long!  I said to them, imagine this one hour ago, chunks of stew meat in a lovely red wine gravy.  Most of the time I’m in shock by what’s happened in the kitchen while I’ve been visiting with guests.

Luke’ll be home next week, and he said he could hardly sleep last night with excitement thinking about it.  Mom’s having a gala Christmas party next week that we’ll attend, so that should be great fun.  These things help to minimize the crankiness, though we now know there’s only one real cure: buh bye stores.

The nice president of the local pro-choice society, of which I’m a member, asked if I’d take a turn at a Salvation Army kettle.  I said sure, and was given an envelope with signage, the secret word to receive the kettle, and a list of time slots with names in them.

Yesterday at 10:00 AM I arrived at the customer service desk of Extra Foods in Capri Mall and announced I was there to man the kettle.  I said the secret password, “turkey.”  The nice woman went into the back to get it, and then came out empty-handed.

She said, “That’s not the password.”  I opened the brown envelope and showed her the slip of paper with the word typed on it, and she pointed to the top of the sheet and said, “It says December 14th, not December 4th.”

I then showed her the other sheet, with the time slots and names filled in, and it was headed up December 4th.  She didn’t care, and said my password for the 4th was not correct, so away with me.  Of course I was thrilled at not having to do that for two hours.

When I came home I e mailed the president, who’s on holidays in San Diego, and she replied she was sure she’d booked it for the 4th.  Maybe, but not a soul was there when I arrived at 10:00, so obviously the 8:00 – 10:00 shift had been shooed away too.

I had a delivery to make to Sunshine Market, which I’d done on my way home from the debacle.  I then spent two hours packaging an order of 48 fruitcakes for Discover Wines.

As you know I sent a fruitcake to the food writer at the Kamloops News, and he went nuts, so there’ll be an article appearing any day complete with photo.  That’ll drive people into the Kamloops Discover Wines store, so the owner decided to be prepared and stock up.

I think I may have a total of 100 Decadents and maybe 50 Okanagan Harvests on hand, and for once, people will be learning a lesson.  When I say one small woman can only bake so much, please order early, next year they’ll know I’m not kidding.

I finally broke down and decided to try some on-line gift ordering.  At first it appeared to be another nightmare, such as when one tries to do a simple bank transaction on line.  However, after an hour or two, I seemed to get the hang of it.  I was finally able to order, and then wham! two days later the packaged arrived.  Delivery was free!

I then wondered why anyone would browse a store if you know exactly what you’re ordering.  For specifics like games, books and toys you can easily order on-line.  However, I find I still need to walk up and down aisles to gather inspiration for some people.

And then you’d never get the stuff I find at the thrift stores on-line anyway.  On Tuesday after my regular gig at the art gallery I stopped in at the Helping Hands Thrift Store.  I got a lot of adorable Christmas things, and the total was $7.23.  Hard to do that on-line as everything is 50% off at that great store on Tuesdays for those of us lucky enough to be over 55.

Orders are coming by phone and e mail, so it’s a busy time of year for the fruitcake monger.  I’ve also done some marketing, so hope something will come of it.  For instance, the other day our local CBC radio morning show hosts mentioned fruitcake.  Alia, the co-host said, “It looks so good, and then you try it and then you go, oh yeah, that’s why I don’t like it.”

I couldn’t let those words go unchallenged, so yesterday I drove a fruitcake and note down to them at CBC and said try this.  Then I mailed a fruitcake to a food writer at a Kamloops newspaper, as Discover Wines, my first customer here in Kelowna, expanded and they now have a store there, too.

Finally, I mailed a fruitcake to Jian Gomechi at CBC Radio and reminded him in last year’s panel on fruitcakes they did the usual fruitcake-trashing, and I asked him to sample mine and see if it’s even possible to disparage it.

In the midst of marketing, packaging, delivering and mailing, imagine my joy to open an envelope and find a bill from Impark for $62.00!  Apparently, on October 10th I was causing an “obstruction” in the Prospera Arena parking lot.

I recall being in a hurry to get to my last day of docent training at the art gallery, and as I parked I noticed I wasn’t within the lines.  However, as I’d paid for the ticket, was in a hurry, and because 95% of the spaces were empty and I was far from anyone else, I just left the car and ran.

Now I got a letter saying this is the final notice before being put over to collections.  I wrote them a nice letter saying please give me a break as this is ridiculous, and why put me over to collections when I had no clue this evil thing was in the works?

I look forward to their reply, as I’m certainly not mailing them $62.00 for being outside the parking lines by a few inches.  Remember Wiggins Adjustments who phoned me for three years to collect $25.00 on a parking fine in Penticton?  I have a feeling this is going to end badly for Impark.

That sort of thing is healthy as it raises adrenalin levels mightily and forges action.  The same thing happened when I heard our illustrious mayor and council approved a piece of land owned by the powerful Bennet family coming out of the Agricultural Land Reserve.  Same thing: huge spike in adrenalin.

Besides writing a letter to the editor, I made an appointment to meet with our MLA to discuss his government’s position on the Agricultural Land Commission.  Steve Thompson assured me they have no intention of messing with it, and I did that two fingers to my eyes then pointing them at him, De Niro style, and said, “I’ll be watching your voting record on that.”

Hence you can see the life of the fruitcake monger isn’t without its challenges.  Now that I started markegting, I’m doing that horrible second-guessing wondering if I made enough fruitcakes.  Either I’m crying because the sales are too low or too high, but that seems to be the way it is every year.

Today I remembered by blog was due, and it was a horrible shock to realize I’d completely forgotten about it.  I was thinking how in control I was of the week, and suddenly it hit me.  It must be due to all the memory required for daily posts on my Nuttier than a Fruitcake Facebook page.

Who would’ve thought social media could do anything for a business?  But since I started posting easy-to-make recipes people forward them to friends, and so I’ve had a large increase in people who are now exposed to my fruitcakes.  I’m receiving on-line orders daily.

And what would the business be without my dear, faithful, repeat customers?  I had my yearly order from a nice man in Halifax who’s 94 years old, and who’s been ordering for at least the past 8 years.  When he first ordered he wrote, “In all my years I’ve never tasted a fruitcake as good as yours.”  Needless to say, I love him.

There are so many nice customers I realize I can’t leave the business as I can’t say good bye to them.  And then there’s the weekly blog and monthly newsletter and now Facebook, so I get to keep my writing skills honed.  Without the fruitcakes, why would I write any of that?

I guess because this fall is my 10th season that my mind sometimes wanders into retirement territory.  But really, what would I do each fall if not bake until I’m exhausted?

Do you know five weeks from now the season’ll be totally over for me?  So I need to get a grip and keep going.  I plan on sending a fruitcake to Gian Gomechi at CBC Radio because last December he had a small panel on to discuss fruitcakes.  I thought I’d send him one and say, “Disparage this.”

Maxine Dehart’s going to write about my fruitcakes in her weekly column in the Capital News this week, so that’ll get a flurry of people racing to the stores.  From December 1 – 14  I’ll have fruitcakes in the display case at the Woman’s Place Gym so that’ll be good sales, too.

We were hoping Luke’s wife Jan might be able to be here on a visitor visa for Christmas, but it’s not to be.  Their application was denied, so now they have to do the permanent resident application and wait 12 – 14 months.  It’s so annoying as she’s coming no matter what obstacles the government throws before us.

 But Luke plans to be here, and of course Nicky lives here so that’s a given.  Margaret and Brendan are coming, as is my mom, so I’m already excited about it, though it’s a whole five weeks away.  I love Christmas, especially the baking.

Which is how all of this began.  I received a fruitcake as a gift from our accountant, asked for the recipe and made it for gifts.  People swooned and alleged if I ever made it for sale they’d buy it.  Challenge met.

So throwing obstacles in front of people with this type of attitude is complete folly in my mind, and the reason I’ve asked our MP for a meeting to explain immigration policy to me.

The season’s sales are well on their way, as I delivered 60 fruitcakes to Quality Greens, 48 to Discover Wines, 18 to Tin Horn Creek Winery and mailed 24 to Sea Cider in Victoria.  As it’s just mid-November, I expect this to continue right up until Christmas so I feel smug about the heavy baking I did in September.

Because of my profound laziness, I’ve jettisoned the Okanagan Fruit and Rum bars along with the chocolate bark.  I hate making anything small, so decided to stick with the original two fruitcakes and try to make each and every one of them a prize-winner.

Margaret’s helping me with my Nuttier than a Fruitcake page, and it’s a lot of fun.  I honest to God didn’t know what to do, and said to her what simple things can a Luddite possibly do?  She replied: Post one thing every day, and make sure you always include a photo.

Every day I dutifully post a recipe and sometimes the odd tip for something else, and I’ve increased my reach by a couple of hundred per cent.  Margaret suggested I might do a special Christmas cookie recipe exchange, and I’ve started that.  If only I could do those damned videos I’ve been talking about for a year or more.

My wonderful little pup got neutered on Wednesday, and at noon on Friday when the vet’s office assistant phoned to see how he was, I said,  “Not well.”  Louie was completely depressed from the experience and not himself at all.

I didn’t know what to do to cheer him up, so I went into Buckerfield’s to peruse the dog chews to see if I could find something he might like.  After some thought, I ended up with a bull’s penis, and for good measure I threw in a pig’s ear.

When I got home I placed both items on the floor, he sniffed the ear, and then sniffed the penis, and started chewing on it.  He kept at it for about four hours and I was worried he might be injuring his jaws from over-exercise.  It sure took his mind off his surgery.

Then this weekend Louie and I went to Osoyoos to visit mom and her poodle Schwarzie.  Louie had about 1/3 of the bull penis left, so I took it with us.  Once we got into the house Schwarzie smelled the penis and grabbed it, and wouldn’t let Louie near it again.

Even though she is a walking skeleton due to advanced diabetes, that little dog laid there and chewed on the penis for at least three hours, and I said to mom I’m scared all this chewing energy’s going to finish off the dog.  But she was fine.

One of the books I bought for $1 at the annual library book sale is by Cesar Millan, the Dog Whisperer.  He says chewing for dogs is like reading a good book.  So in both cases, the bull penis took the dogs’ minds off their troubles.

Perhaps one should always have a bull penis in the home for stress relief?  I sat beside the dog when he was chewing on it and at times the odd whiff I got made me feel pretty sure only a dog would covet them.  However you know you love your dog when you get to the till and hand over $12 for a damned penis.

When Jerralynn was here a couple of weeks ago she said she felt something on my dog’s throat and said it felt like a pimple.  When we tried to find it later we couldn’t, and thought it had fallen off.

Then on Saturday Nicky said the night before the dog had been downstairs while I was sleeping.  He said a friend of his noticed something on Louie’s throat too, and when they examined it they found it was a tick.  He said they got pliers and pulled out the tick, but the head broke off in the dog.

I went on-line and it didn’t seem to be an emergency that a tick’s head was in the dog.  But I e mailed a friend who owns dogs, and also told the women at the gym, and oh no, I had to go straight to the vet’s with the dog because “ticks carry viruses.”

I understand that, because a friend of mine caught Lyme disease from one, but as the tick was living in the dog for at least two weeks and he had no symptoms, I didn’t think this particular tick was a problem.  Sure enough, the vet said if Louie was going to get sick, he would’ve done so long ago.

So it was as I thought, absolutely nothing, yet out of fear something terrible might happen down the road, I had gone.  God forbid people could say, “if only she’d dealt with that tick head imbedded in the dog none of this would’ve happened.”

I know I love to go on about things likes this, but again last week I had the best time at Value Village.  I was looking for comfortable navy shoes, and there was a pair of Rockport loafers in mint condition for $10 in the perfect colour.  I looked heavenward and thanked my gramma for her help.

But that wasn’t all, because in the housewares section I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw a turkey-themed tray exactly like the one my mother-in-law had and which was hauled out every Thanksgiving and Christmas.  It’s in excellent shape, and as five bucks.

I shouldn’t be hanging around thrift stores at all, because fruitcake orders have already come in.  The nice people at Discover Wines have ordered and they’ve expanded into a second store in Kamloops so want twice a many.

As you may or may not have noticed, I’m posting recipes and other tips on my Nuttier than a Fruitcake Facebook page daily, so if you’re reading this, but aren’t my friend on that site, please ask for an invitation.

With seven weeks left, I know I can do it, which as I’ve always said, is the beauty of having a seasonal business.  It’s focused and then over before you know it.  Hopefully kind of like the dog will find his neutering appointment this Wednesday.