This morning I went downstairs and was greeted by a scene from the movie The Hangover.  Thankfully, all of Nicky’s friends were gone, but their detritus told a sad tale.  I could see from the pulled-out hide-a-bed that someone had the brief idea of sleeping it off, but then they must’ve changed their minds.

Every frozen Costco hors d’oeuvres was eaten.  This included boxes of shrimp nests, calamari, Mexican, Indian and Chinese foods, as well as a Delissio pizza.  Every cup and glass in the house was downstairs, as were two of the kitchen chairs.  It must’ve been quite a crowd down there at one time.

Of course I was in bed, fast asleep.  The dogs and I keep opposite hours to the children, and it’s a system that works well for us.  I go to bed at 9:00 and get up at 5:00.  The kids go to bed at 3:00 and get up at 1:00, so it means the core overlap is kept to just a few hours, and that way familiarity doesn’t breed contempt.

A few days before Christmas Luke and Nicky both had friends over, and it was a cookie fest.  I was pretty upset by that one, as they got into my sister-in-law Wendy’s shortbread and cheese cookies.  I’d had one of each, and the rest were devoured by the locusts in the basement.

I have no-one to blame but myself, as I’ve always been overindulgent with the kids.  Just before Christmas I was in the licquor store line-up, when I said to people in line, “Oh darn it, I forgot to get stocking stuffers for the children” and left the line.

I started to browse through those tiny bottles of hard licquor they keep near the till.  The customer who’d been ahead of me said, “You buy stocking stuffers for your children in the licquor store??” and I explained that the ‘children’ were actually 21 and 24 years of age.  That kind of eased the concerns of the cashier and customer, who were both laughing at my choice of gifts.

The good news from all of the children’s consumption is the amount of cash I stand to gain at the licquor store from their empties.  They’re far too flush with money and too pressed for time to take in their empties, but I have neither of those concerns.

I have a filled stamp book from Value Village, meaning I have 30% off on my next purchase.  With the $12 or $15 from the empties, plus the discount, I figure I’ll likely be coming home with either a designer coat or shoes.  What a great day I have ahead of me!

I don’t think I can say the same for Nicky, though, judging from the package of Gravol I found on the table downstairs.  If you don’t know, it’s an excellent way to stave off certain death if you’ve over-indulged.  Trust me, I know.

I’ve already made myself sick from bingeing on a box of Lowney’s maraschino cherry-filled chocolates.  Last night I ate quite a few cookies, and today I’m wondering why I gave away all of my comfy clothes.  I put on my jeans and they were a bit snug, so I can see two weeks of this is going to lead to no good.

Luke’s home from the oil rigs, so I invited Denis over for dinner last night.  The four of us enjoyed a beautiful dinner of chicken souvlaki, roasted potatoes and Greek salad.  This was accompanied by pita bread and homemade hummus and tsaziki.  For dessert I made a lovely baked cheesecake.

I have to say it’s so great to be able to remain such good friends with Denis.  It could’ve gone either way, but after 25 years it’d be a shame to be hostile.  Yet we all know people who divorce and the entire situation is really ugly.  I feel blessed that we can have evenings like we did last night, as the kids really enjoyed it.

Today Luke and Nicky drove to Osoyoos to visit their dear gramma.  I put Christmas music on as soon as they drove off, and started baking cookies.  I’ve made several batches already, but now I’m baking just for us.  Every year the list of people demanding the Spitzbuebchen gets longer. 

I did a demo at Quality Greens in Kelowna yesterday.  There was a funny old gentleman there doing a demo of some jellies, cream cheese and crackers.  He asked how long I’d be there and I told him about two hours.  He was shocked.  “Two hours?  You only stay two hours?  Why?”  He told me his stint was five hours long.

I said, “Because I don’t like to do this at all, so two hours is the most I can do.”  In between customers he told me he lived alone, so said these food-tasting gigs were a way for him to get out and be among people.  He begged me to stay on, but after two hours hours I said I was sorry, and that he was on his own with the public.

I told him I had a cheesecake cooling, chicken to debone and dips to make.  He asked if I had a large family, and I said, “No, I just enjoy the domestic arts.”  I could see he was mulling that over, and I said, “Look, I’m sorry, but I’m the world’s laziest entrepreneur” and with that I left and drove home.

And I’m afraid that’s just the way it is when you’re Martha Stewart the Second and Christmas looms.  I found two new German cookie recipes that I want to try, and I’m busy planning the accompaniments to our Christmas Eve and Day dinners.

Last night I sent Denis home with a batch of shortbread cookies made with really fresh unsalted, cultured butter and the taste of them is to die for.  Thankfully the kids at the rest of those last night as I’m not sure what happens nightly at about 7:00 PM.  However at that hour I begin to shovel snacks so the less there are, the better.

It’s quite ironic that after all the times I found Mojo in the garbage, I almost killed the dog by my own hand.  Last Thursday I made the molasses, honey and Dijon mustard-glazed pork roast that Nicky and I like.  There were a couple of large bones left, so I gave them to the dogs, as I often do.

I know not to give chicken or other sharp bones to them, but I honestly thought a heavy bone like that would be fine.  The next morning Mojo ate her breakfast, then threw up.  The vomiting continued for hours, as did alarming bouts of diarrhea.  By 2:00 PM I said to Nicky I had to take Mojo in to the vet.

By the time I got the listless mutt to the vet it turned out she was massively dehydrated, near death, and had to be put on intravenous immediately.  They said they’d have to X ray her stomach to see if there was a blockage from the pork bone.  I felt absolutely horrible as I drove home.

I prayed to God to save the dog, and said, “I don’t care how much it costs, just don’t let the dog die.”  Fortunately, God answered my prayers in both ways.  The dog survived, and I received a massive bill!  Can you believe that moment of stupidity cost me $900?

Oh well, that’s what money’s for, eh?  Now I know never to give a bone of any kind to any dog, ever, so that’s worth something.  I’ve already told a couple of dog owners about it, and they thanked me, as they were also in the ‘who knew?’ category of giving bones to dogs.  It seems so wolf-like, but I guess not.

Luke arrived home without any prior announcement, and it was great to see him.  However, I’d already booked a demo at the Quality Greens in Vernon so just said hi and bye and drove off in a fury.  I could only do two hours there because by then my feet were absolutely frozen solid.  I don’t know how the cashiers stand it.

Today Luke has big plans for the two of us to go to Costco and shop like we’re Conrad and Barbara Black.  I’ve already bought boxes of Indian and Mexican frozen appetizers, but he wants lashings more of everything.  As he’s found his fame and fortune as a directional drill technician in the oil fields, he’s offered to pay for it all, and I’m going to allow him to do so.

The nice food writer, Eric Akis, e mailed me with a question about fruitcake which was sent to him from one of his readers.  He said if I helped him with the answer he’d mention my fruitcakes in his column so I hope he does.  I actually had to Google the question as it concerned the safety of eating a 25-year-old frozen fruitcake.  The general consensus is that it is still edible!

So what a week it’s been, filled with expensive, yet important new bits of knowledge.  Dogs can die quite easily, but fruitcakes appear to be immortal.  They’ll go on and on and on, until some archaeologist finds them down the road and wonders.

 It’s heart-breaking being a fruitcake monger, as everyone likes to get in on the defaming action.  Even The Bay, for God’s sake!  For example, in this weekend’s flyer, they have these “cute” holiday factoids.  One of them says “Holidata #12: The Fate of Fruitcake” which depicts a pie chart.

The witty ad writers have delineated a slice of about 1/8 of the pie as “door stopper.”  The next slice of about the same size says “pet rock”, and a smaller sliver says “eaten.”  Three quarters of the pie, ie 75%, is shown as “re-gifted next year.”  Isn’t that funny? Not!

Stereotypes like that sure make it hard to sell this product.  But for some reason, I’m not the only certifiable lunatic out there trying to sell this vile food.  In the Globe and Mail’s Life section they had pages of gift suggestions, and one page was entitled For the Epicure.  What should I find there, but another soul’s fruitcake!

This fruitcake is sold at some chi chi bakery in Montreal, and costs $50.00!!  I’m obviously approaching this entirely incorrectly.  Instead of charging a paltry $14.00 for mine, I should triple the price, and say as they do on that site, “limited quantities” and create a Tickle-Me Elmo-like riot.

Here’s another way:  I’m about this far from President Obama eating my fruitcakes!  My sister-in-law and close friend Margaret is dating a man in D.C. whose brother works for the President.  I’m going to mail a fruitcake to the boyfriend and encourage him to share it with his brother and the Prez!

Then on my site it’ll say: Eat the fruitcake adored by President and Mrs. Obama! Clever advertising, eh?  I’ll definitely keep you posted on that project.

The marketing continues at a heady pace, as I’m contacting newspapers and will phone Phil Johnson, the local AM radio morning show host.  He’s one of those people who loves talking about sites where they use a trebuchet to catapult innocent fruitcakes into kingdom come.

When he interviewed me last December, he began with a long preamble about the vile nature of fruitcakes.  When I came on air, I began with, “Do you bait all of your guests before you interview them?”  I think it must happen only to the person daring enough to create the excrement called fruitcake.

Oh well.  As I said, I could easily have started a company selling cookies, but where in the world is the challenge in that?  That’s pretty much a no-brainer if you ask me.  Which reminds me, it’s time to start making the two most delicious German cookies in the world, Spitzbuebchen and Zimmtsterne.  Just saying them makes a person hungry, non?

I adore Sundays because it’s the only day of the week I don’t go to fitness.  Don’t get me wrong, I really love fitness classes, but sometimes it’s wonderful not to be tortured like that.

Picture this: sometimes we have to do what are called burpees.  You crouch, then fling your legs out behind you until you’re in a full push-up position.  Then you jump your feet back in to where you started, and then you stand up. Repeat about 15 times.  I think you can see why a day off is so appealing.

However, I have fitness to thank for my ability to shovel our entire driveway without keeling over. It snowed like nobody’s business on Wednesday night and Thursday, so I spent an hour shoveling in the morning, and then an hour in the afternoon.  I slept like a log on Thursday night from all the fresh air!

On Friday morning on CBC Radio I heard Jian Ghomechi interview a woman who’d invented a cereal called Holy Crap.  Apprently she’d been on Dragon’s Den with her product and the dragons had just loved it.  I felt a mixture of jealousy and fear when I heard her talk about the people they’ve had to hire due to the rapid expansion.

That’s always the tension in small business.  If you go mad with advertising you have to be ready with product.  But if you don’t advertise, then you have yourself a hobby, and not a business, as you likely don’t have enough sales to make any money.

But when free advertising comes, I always take it.  As I wrote earlier, I was mentioned in the business column of our local Capital News last Wednesday and was in the Novemeber/December EAT Magazine.  Now I’ll be in Wine Trails Magazine’s December issue with a proper article accompanied by a photo!

After that, Jennifer Schell’s going to write about me in her food column in the Capital News, and the Osoyoos Times has kindly said they’ll run a photo and story.  So I feel very privileged to have so many nice journalists willing to help with the word of mouth.

Another interesting contact I had was from a woman named Alix Cameron who’s a co-founder of the site called Eat Drink Be Local.  She said they’re going to be recommending 12 must-have local gifts, and my fruitcakes will be one of them!

I’ll be at the Wine Museum’s Neighbourhood Nosh on Thursday.  It’s a once-monthly event wherein people can sample local foods and wines.  I’ve been there before and it moves a lot of fruitcakes as people love to sample, then buy.

I’ve decided my reward for all this is going to start on December 19th and hopefully end January 1st.  Those are the two weeks in which I’m going to allow heady indulgence.  And then of course I’ll be thanking God for the burpees as I slap myself back into shape for the New Year.

When I left Untouchable, the salon I go to inside Orchard Park Mall, I noticed a young boy in a booth.  The sign on it said, “Hurricane Simulator”, and the mom was standing outside the glass door waiting for the kid.  A dial showed the strength of the wind being simulated, and I could see the kid was pretty amused at the  experience he was having.

What kind of a brilliant mind thought of this little money trap?  It’s made me think of other simulations one could try in a booth, such as Trapped in a Mine.  The entire booth would become pitch black, humid and very hot.  Or, a Frustration Simulator, in which you’d be re-routed dozens of times while trying to make a call to a business using their automated phone system.

I’m currently in my own Anxiety Simulator, though it’s more real than simulated at this point.  Orders are coming in at a rate much greater than in the past, and so perhaps this tiny business is finally going to turn a corner.  It’s wonderful, really, and that’s why I’m trying to get a grip on the negative aspects of it.

Yesterday I delivered four cases of fruitcakes to the Osoyoos Buy-Low Foods and two cases to the Bench Market in Penticton.  If all current customers re-order, I am dead.  I’ll actually have to haul my lazy carcass downstairs and start baking again. This will be fun, because I’ll also be packaging and shipping at the same time!

And speaking of fun, I finally did something that I’ve heard of, but never thought I would do: on-line dating.  It’s true. I signed up for two sites, and now I’m getting profiles of men, and wondering what to do.  As usual, technology has me completely buffaloed, but I’m going to soldier on.

Here are some hints to those of you who may be thinking of doing this.  When writing your profile, don’t write, “I don’t have a lot of time for a relationship,” as we question why you bothered to spend an hour to fill out their questionnaire.  Or, “I am a veracious (sic) reader.”   You obviously don’t read with a lot of absorption.

At dinner the other night when I was describing some of the profiles on the site, Nicky asked if I’d written in mine that I can cook.  I said I had.  He said, “Good, that’ll help because cooking’s a big plus.”  Even Nicky’s not above brain-storming ways to get his mom’s profile noticed.

Never mind on-line dating, but on-line shopping’s become my new friend.  I’ve just ordered more detritus from Future Shop and am thinking it beats the hell out of skulking up and down the aisles, trying to find an available clerk.  And if it’s not something I need to examine in the flesh, then why not just order it on-line?

Too bad the mate-matching isn’t as easy, as one does have to interview these prospects face to face.  Perhaps a big seller for singles would be the Dating Simulator, wherein you’re trapped in a booth with a bore for 60 minutes.

We’ve all heard of the show, $h*! My Dad Says, and lately I’ve thought I could have one of my own, called $h*! My Kid Eats and feature Nicky’s food intake.  The other day I made a red curry paste and coconut milk chicken recipe for the first time.  It was so successful that Nicky ate two chicken breasts worth of meat bathed in sauce and accompanied by a cup of heavily buttered rice.

After a gigantic dinner he’ll often have a salad bowl filled with Froot Loops and topped with a litre of milk or cream.  And instead of being annoyed, we should all feel awed by the power of exercise.  It appears that if you work out like a son of a gun with heavy weights every day, you will develop quite the eating ability.

I’ve been quite organized lately, and it’s bothering me because I don’t understand it.  I think a lot of it has to do with my ability to force myself to get unpleasant things done even if I don’t want to do them.  Yesterday, for example, I made myself bake four dozen Okanagan Fruit and Rum bars, and I vacuum-sealed them this morning.

Ordinarily the fruitcakes would sit in their Tupperware container for days, waiting to be vacuum-sealed.  Meanwhile, I would be upstairs fretting about them, but refusing to do anything about it.  The tension would mount until I had orders to fill and then would have to work for hours, weeping.  Maybe I just grew tired of the drama of all that.

I was very fortunate to be mentioned in the November/December issue of EAT Magazine.  You can read the article on-line, page 37.  Next Wednesday I’ve been promised a mention in Maxine Dehart’s column in the Kelowna Capital News.  All of this helps tremendously.

I’ve now got orders coming in daily, either via my website from individuals, or by phone from the stores.  On Wednesday evening I’m going to attend a tiny, free craft fair at the Catholic elementary school which I’ve been told is well-attended.  As you know, I loathe these types of events, but one must do what one must do.

But then again, I say I loathe these events, and yet something good almost always comes of them.  Either I meet a really nice fellow vendor, or else someone I haven’t seen in years shows up.  Sometimes sales are actually good, and so it’s always an adventure no matter what.

Kind of like the awe-inspiring sage of the Kid that Ate Everything. Yesterday Nicky ate 10 or 12 pieces of bacon with four eggs scrambled with cream and four pieces of toast.  A while later I went downstairs.  I saw him lying on the floor and asked him if he was sick from too much bacon.

He said no, and that he was just stretching, but added the amount of food was “borderline too much.”  I’m kind of fascinated at seeing what the limit’s going to be. 

I went to the South Okanagan on the weekend, both to deliver fruitcakes and also to visit mom and Gerry.  I dropped off at Terwilligers Gifts in Penticton, and thought one day when I have time I simply must shop at that store.  They have absolutely to-die-for pottery and they wrap everything very beautifully.

After that I went to Handworks Gallery on Main Street in Oliver, owned by a wonderful woman named Esther.  It’s the kind of place where you can find locally-made arts and crafts and learn something about each artist from her.  Plus, I like her style: she keeps coffee brewing and has my fruitcake ready to serve with it, so her sales of my product are brisk.

Finally I dropped an order at Tin Horn Creek Winery in Oliver, which is situated like a castle on the top of a hill.  I adore the steep driveway, which they keep in indigenous plantings on either side.  Once at the top the view of the valley is one of the nicest, even though there’s nary a body of water in sight.

It was a sunny day, and because it’s been so warm all of the coloured leaves have remained on the trees.  Below Tin Horn Creek it’s solid orchards, and the leaves of the cherry trees were a gorgeous gold on the bottom, with the topmost branches a fiery red.  On days like that I’m knocked out by the beauty of the Okanagan Valley.

Mom had a few people over for dinner on Saturday evening and she made a moist and delicious pot roast.  She’d bought the most decadent coconut cream pie from the bakery at Prince’s in Oroville, WA and I had an enormous piece.  Then at midnight, after everyone had left, I had to have some more.  Mmmmm.

I got home on Sunday exhausted, as usual, because as you know by now, mom loves to stay up late.  She made me sit there and visit with her until 1:00 AM, then she looked at her watch and said with surprise, “it’s 1:00 AM we should go to bed!”  By then I was like, “just shoot me” because I’m usually fast asleep by 9:00 PM.

After cleaning up some of Nicky’s detritus, it was mercifully 4:30 PM, which is the hour at which I put a margarita into the freezer so that it’s ready at precisely 5:00 o’clock.  Imagine my horror upon finding most of the tequila gone!  I have to say that thanks to people like Eckhart Tolle, most of the time I seem able to keep a grip on how much adrenalin I allow to flow through my body.

However, my world is the size of a pea.  Hence small pleasures, such as my drink at 5:00, are very large and important.  So I indignantly marched downstairs and tore a strip off Nicky, who admitted he and Jordan had drank it the night before.

Just as I was planning a murderous revenge, there was Nicky, home with a bottle of tequila for his mentally deranged parent.  He hugged me, and said, “sorry, mom.”  So what can I say?  I probably need to read a bit more Eckhart Tolle.

I walked Arnie every single day for five years.  Somehow by year six or so, with Mojo along, it dawned on me that I shouldn’t be the only family member walking the dogs.  Sporadic attempts were made by Denis here and there, but they petered out, and soon dog-walking was a thing of the past.

However, Nicky’s a big fan of Caesar Milan, and is also a psychology major, so he very successfully put those two factors together.  He told me stories day after day about how important it is for dogs to be walked.  To his credit, over the past several months he’s also made some sporadic efforts to walk the mutts.

I finally caved and took Mojo and Ricky for a walk around the neighbourhood on Friday.  Then, much to my surprise, I took them again yesterday and today.  I’m very hopeful this is a sign of renewed adherence to daily dog-walking.  I realized how much I missed the neighbourhood, and have already enjoyed two great conversations with neighbours I haven’t spoken to in years.

A couple of days ago as I walked by one neighbour who was out raking his lawn, he said, “I hear you’re on your own.”  I explained that technically I wasn’t, given the fact Nicky lives here, but that yes, Denis had moved out.  As I continued on my walk I thought, I simply love this area because I feel people know me, and care about me.

It’s such a great neighbourhood in that it’s a lot like the small town of Osoyoos where I grew up.  In Osoyoos there are one or two key people to whom you tell a story, knowing by the next day the majority of townsfolk will know it.  It just seems an expedient way to spread news.

I was quite delighted to see that it works just like that in the Hall Road neighbourhood.  Of course there’s my blog, which I know some devoted fans read who happen to be neighbours.  Then there’s a lovely woman who goes to my gym, and who lives here, and who may also have told a person or two.  In any case, I think it’s rare to live in a neighbourhood where people still know each other.

I think another reason for the dog-walking is the great fall we’ve had.  The weather’s been so mild.  In the 20 years I’ve lived here I don’t recall snipping dahlias on October 31st.  We’ve always had frost by now in past years.

Yesterday I cut down as many spices as I could stand, as some of them, like the sage, are just plain huge.  I’m now drying it, along with rosemary, parsley and tarragon.  My plan is to grind them when they’re all nice and dry and then fill cute containers with them and give them to people as gifts.

Tonight it’s Halloween and we usually get about 5 – 10 kids.  This makes the recent purchase of the box of 125 assorted tiny chocolate bars kind of odd, doesn’t it?  I think Nicky and I are going to be feeling quite dizzy by tomorrow morning.

As you know, shopping is my hobby, so it may come as a suprise that I’ve actually just placed an on-line order for some Christmas gifts.  I’ve never done this before, as I adore wandering the aisles of stores, peering at items, and wondering if anyone really wants this piece of junk to put on a shelf.

However, as that pesky little thing called time seems to be in short supply right now, I have no time for speculative tours through stores.  As much as I’d like to touch items before buying, the items I ordered are largely electronic in nature.  Hence I actually don’t need to, nor do I even want to.  It’s all strange stuff for the kids, so who would know what it is, even if held and examined.

Now that’s saved me a bunch of time, though of course it’s warmed up the credit card for the season.  Although sometimes when one is weighing sanity against a few dollars, sanity, or vanity will quite often win.  Though I’m broke, I’ve booked a Botox treatment for my forehead because I simply can’t take it any longer.

The lack of time issue is my own fault because I’m such a poor manager of time due to being a very impulsive person.  The other day while driving I was making mental lists of all the errands and things I had to do, when the Art Knapps sign caught my eye: It’s Time to Plant Spring Bulbs!

I thought to myself, they’re absolutely right, pulled into the parking lot and went into the store.  My goodness there are a lot of early, mid and late spring tulip bulbs from which to choose these days!  I loaded up on lots of each, and then headed home to start the driveway garden preparation.

I felt kind of bad, thinking about all of the work I had told myself I’d do, but then I thought what the hey.  It was a sunny and lovely day, and I enjoyed the project immensely.  Once I’d dug out the too-large heliopsis (false sunflower), I added peat moss and Ogo Grow to the soil, then put in the bulbs.  Now I can’t wait until spring to see the show of tulips I only envision in my mind’s eye.

Flowers make me so much happier than some people do.  I don’t want to speak negatively of people, but my God I’ve been tested recently.  You’ll recall I’ve been trying to get the Lions Club to try my product.  Their newsletter-writer put an article about my products in their monthly bulletin and e mailed it to all the clubs. 

I phoned one of the members and asked if they now wanted to test my product, in light of the newsletter’s article.  He was like, “Newsletter? Article?”  and I realized I have a tough demographic to work with here.  However, equally as tough is trying to pin the stores down on when they wish to order.  It’s kind of embarrassing as customers e mail and phone me asking, “When will your fruitcakes be in the stores?” and I’m like, “I don’t know.”

But like some kind of lunatic, I just keep baking away, praying for the God of Fruitcake Sales to help me.  One of these days, my big break’s gonna come, and then you’ll all be like, “I knew her when.”