I simply can’t believe my luck.  First of all, mom’s partner Gerry’s son and family are coming to Osoyoos for Christmas for the first time.  They’re coming all the way from Virginia, so mom wants to buy some decent things for them for Christmas.  So she handed me a cheque and basically said, “Get at it.”

Then Luke e mailed me and said, “Look, I hate Christmas shopping, so can you please buy the gifts for Margaret and Brendan for me?”  I e mailed back, “Thank you!”  On my way south to Osoyoos the other day I immediately got an adorable thing at that cute antique shop in Okanagan Falls for Margaret.

And then, joy of joys, mom advised me to do the same for myself as I did last year.  She told me to buy a bunch of stuff that I want, and then say it’s from her.  Last year I wrapped my gifts beautifully, and chose lovely to/from cards.  I plan to do the same again this year and am basically breathless with anticipation of how I’m going to surprise myself.

I’m just not sure how to fit all of that in, as I now seem to be baking daily.  Of course I have to do it, but I’ve noticed I put the dough into the pans with less and less enthusiasm as the days go by.  But I suppose that’s the lure of a seasonal business.  The moment you think you simply can’t make another fruitcake, it’s over and Christmas has arrived.

Yet anything you do over and over again is bound to get monotonous.  The other day one of the nice women at the gym said she feels bored with the gym routine and often has to force herself to come.  I said I feel the same way occasionally, but as a true hypochondriac, there’s no way I could stop going.

Although I have to admit that sometimes when I’m in the class, lifting the weights over my head dozens of times, doing a hundred dead lifts, a myriad of squats and countless stomach crunches, I do feel a bit cranky about it.

Chytra Brown of Savour Magazine asked me for the list of stores which carry my fruitcakes, so I imagine that’ll boost sales when it comes out on December 1st.  Jennifer Schell, the editor of Wine Trails and writer for EAT Magazine and The Capital News also said she’d mention me in her Christmas columns.

Today I was called and interviewed by Kevin Parnell, the business writer for the Kelowna Capital News.  It was a half-hour interview, in which I wildly expounded upon many fanciful things, so I’m somewhat hesitant to read the interview.  Sometimes in the heat of an interview I can say the darndest things.

I’m often working until late afternoon, and sometimes find myself in a less than favourable mood for making an elaborate dinner.  Fortunately Nicky’s been able to keep himself fed with meals like the one he had around 3:00 PM; five scrambled eggs on two pieces of toast, which he spread with a mixture of mayo and a hot sauce called Spiracha hot chili sauce.

I’ve decided that the gym and sleep are the only really necessary things I have to do , and outside of that, I have to concentrate on just two things: shopping and baking.

I always love Daylight Savings Time.  Today I have an extra hour, and what better way to use a gift like that than to shop.  In the spring, we lose an hour, and since the day’s shot anyway, is there any better time than that for a shopping excursion?

Although due to not having baked ahead, I have an awful lot of catching up to do, and therefore have precious little time for joyous shopping.  Yesterday I made 84 fruitcakes, and hope to do the same again today.  It sounds like a lot, but those sell very quickly when stores like Quality Greens order 8 cases (192 fruitcakes).

As well, I get asked to make adorable little gift baskets, and that can be time-consuming. You know the nice woman from the gym who ordered bark for her business’ conventions?  She wanted to see a little gift ensemble for their managers for Christmas.

I recalled the half fruitcakes I made for the huge Nokia cell phone company order I received in 2007.  I still had some fo the cute cube-shaped boxes left, so cut one of each fruitcake in half, vacuum-sealed them, and put them in the little boxes.  Then I put half a pound of bark in one of the larger fruitcake boxes.

All three labels, the Okanagan Harvest, Totally Decadent and Okanagan Chocolate Bark, have the same orchard and sun-rise theme, so they look absolutely fab together in the box.  I wrapped the bark box in a thin green fabric ribbon, and placed all three items onto a pillow of white tissue.  Voila!

It’s a really nice-looking gift.  I put a note into it for Joanne saying, “I scare myself sometimes.” She loved it, and said they want a minimum of 12, but maybe more.  That’s the kind of thing I love fooling around with so much.

I guess that’s why an article about macarons caught my eye.  I’ve heard of macaroons, of course, but never macarons.  It turns out they’re also a meringue confection, but made with almond paste and filled with butter cream.

There’s a new chi chi French patisserie here in Kelowna, called Sandrine, and I see they make macarons.  I plan to go in there and buy some, so I know what the finished product should be like.  Then I can start to experiment.

And wouldn’t you know Alison, whose mother was a home ec teacher, and who can’t stop emulating her mother’s penchant for hunting down new recipes, said she has a recipe for macarons which she’ll send.  There’s even one in the older edition of The Joy of Cooking, even though I’ve never heard of these little delights until now.

I’m telling you, the old home ec teachers from Osoyoos Elementary Junior Secondary School would be amazed.  My best pal Liz was called a “lazy pudding” by one of them, and I only survived because my mom would sew my projects for me.

But here I am, all Martha Stewart-like, with tons of ideas, and no time.

As I type this I can hear the raucous hoot hooting of the great horned owls who love the tall Ponderosa pines around here.  Of course as a cat and small dog owner I’m not all that thrilled by their penchant for small pets as food, but as long as they’re just eating rabbits and other mammals, then okay.

I know I’ve told you this before, but I believe this time it’s really going to happen.  Chytra Brown, associate publisher of Niche Media, who produce Savour Magazine, contacted me last week.  She said they’re doing a section on gifts for the December issue, and wondered if I could send photos and short descriptions of my products.

I did so immediately, and haven’t heard back, but am hoping and praying that I do indeed get into that spread.  She e mailed that my bark “is to die for” so I have a feeling a strong emphasis will be on the chocolate bark.  This is rather scary in some ways, as I kind of know what numbers of fruitcakes to bake based on past sales, but this is my first year carrying bark.

But that’s the fun of entrepreneurship.  You’re constantly getting surprised by things, and on top of it, cheques arrive in the mail.  It’s really quite wonderful.  Though on a day like today, when I plan to bake 84 fruitcakes, by the end of it I’ll be somewhat less enamoured by the thrill of being an entrepreneur.

I’ve had to cut my gym attendance from five to four times per week due to time constraints.  I still walk the dogs daily, though, as now that it’s a habit they actually get all antsy and demand their walk.  At first they hid under the bed, but now they realuzie it’s fun so they look forward to it.

Yesterday Ricky thought a garbage can was some type of prey to be pursued, so we ran the length of Wildwood Street toward it.  He didn’t seem the least bit embarrassed when he realized it was a garbage can, but then that dog’s no Einstein.

The other day the phone rang at 5:30 PM and it was someone from the Kelowna Wine Museum calling.  The woman said, “We’ll take four cases of fruitcakes.”  I said, “You want 96 fruitcakes?” And she said she did, as they were down to just six fruitcakes in their store, and people were beginning to ask about them.

So I didn’t waste time and spent the next couple of hours packaging their order.  I’ve learned that you never put off until tomorrow what you can do today, because of all the surprises in small business.

Now the cat’s jumped up beside me and is looking out the window, growling at the deer that likes to graze on the neighbour’s knoll.  Why one would have to growl at an innocent deer is beyond me, but you know how crabby cats are.

But in spite of these days, fraught with orders and the unknown, I take great comfort and enjoyment from the owls, deer, dogs and cats around me.  Even if I do have to push a hind paw off my keyboard every time I need the letters on the left.

One thing I really like about my business is the surprising inquiries I get.  The other day I came home to a message from a man in Brooklyn who owns a bakery.  I called him back, and he said he wanted to order my fruitcakes for his store.  I told him I don’t have an export license, but he said he wanted to try them anyway, so ordered one of each for his own consumption.

I googled Jude Nwabuoku and saw a photo of him and his bakery, and it looks fabulous.  I mailed the fruitcakes, and hope he likes them, though I can’t see shipping from Kelowna to Brooklyn.  I suspect there’s someone within a thousand mile radius of Brooklyn who makes fruitcake, so perhaps they could supply him?

A month ago I was watching the news and they were talking about the cranberry harvest in the Fraser Valley.  Huge tanker trucks pull up, and the cranberries get poured in through the top, just like water.  Then they’re all delivered to Ocean Spray, who buy the bulk of the harvest.

At Thanksgiving when I bought a bag of Ocean Spray cranberries, I wanted to see where they’re located.  I turned the bag and it said Massachusetts on the back.  So the cranberries went from Langley to Massachusetts and then back to Kelowna where I bought them.

You see the moral dilemma we should all have around this sort of thing?  While I loathe fanaticism of any kind, I do think the general principles around the 100 Mile Diet are sound.

We’re all forced to lose our eyesight with these new light bulbs in order to save the planet, but if we just stopped buying ridiculous items like well-travelled cranberries we could probably still have the bulbs that illuminate a room.

I’m also going to re-think some of the things I try to grow in my little garden.  After God knows how much watering, I have one pumpkin.  It just seems too expensive for the Earth to provide me with one of those.  I think a solid crop of tomatoes is probably the wisest, as I freeze them and eat them in stews and sauces all winter.

And the bees?  They’re all going to die, as confirmed by an old beekeeper named Bob Chisholm.  He came to inspect my lone hive, and said, “Foul brood.”  I said, “What?” I wondered what my children could possibly have to do with the bees.

He said it has nothing to do with one’s offpsring and explained it’s a term describing a blight that kills bees and is very contagious.  I’ll have to burn the frames and start over with new bees, though the boxes are salvageable.

But you know what?  Next year I’m getting all new supplies from Bob, and then I’ll be making my own honey before you know it.  I’ll no longer have to go to Costco to buy honey that’s come all the way from China.

I think you’ll be really proud of me.  I’ve now donned my bee suit, and stood inside a swarm of bees, and didn’t scream, flap my arms or run.  Because of my desire to save my poor bees from certain death, I made an appointment with a beekeeper who has 250 hives.  I figured he could probably help me.

I went over to his house on Friday afternoon, and he showed me how to build a smoky fire in the smoker.  Then we put on our bee gear and marched over to the vast area of hives.  He opened the top of one, took out the screen, and then smoked the bees a bit.  After that he started to pry the frames apart in preparation to put in a feeder frame.

Soon enough he was making me pry them apart, so there I was in the midst of hundreds of thousands of annoyed bees.  I pretended I wasn’t scared spitless, as I’ve read that bees can sense fear pheromones and will sting en masse.  So I used every bit of my mental powers to remain calm.

Then I was sent home with a feeder tray and a pail of syrup and told to do the same at my own home.  Luckily Bev came to Kelowna for the weekend, and I asked her to take bunch of photos of me to update my website.  When I told her about the bee assignment, she coerced me into getting at it so she could document it in photos.

I suited up  and started the fire in my smoker, and we went down to my hive.  I couldn’t believe it, but I had the nerve to open the top, pop out a frame, put in a new one and close the top.  I felt triumphant.

We spent the rest of the weekend doing our favourite thing, which is thrift store and garage sale shopping.  There was a large garage sale at the college parking lot, so we started there.  A woman was selling some willow China that said Japan on the bottom of it, so I bought it immediately for $6.00!

I got a lovely storage cabinet made of maple, and miscellaneous adorable items like a CD of Marilyn Monroe singing songs like Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend.  Bev got a cute wicker plant stand, and some kind of a Gucci knock-off purse.  We made two trips in and out of the sale, we had so much stuff.

Last weekend I was in Osoyoos for Thanksgiving, and so were a couple of good friends, Jim and Bernard.  We stuffed a turkey and thew it into the oven, and then didn’t look at it for another five hours.  We learned that unless you cover or baste a bird, you’re going to end up with something resembling Maria Shriver.

This weekend with Bev here, the food was more successful.  I made Jerralynn’s salmon, which is baked with butter and brown sugar.  Then on Saturday night I made Thai chicken in coconut milk and red curry paste.  I gave Bev some of the bark to try, which she then termed “evil” and immediately bought a pound to take with her.

Now giddy with the new beekeeping knowledge and satisfied with a great weekend of shopping, I’m celebrating with a glass of very cheap white wine.  Cheers!

I don’t know if this is wise, but I’m trying a new experiment this fall.  Instead of having dozens of cases of fruitcake pre-made, I’m waiting to see how orders go, and then baking as required.  I figure it worked for me when essays were due in university, and perhaps this method of working with a tight deadline will be good here, too.

But besides a tight deadline, I really think I need a new chin-line.  The web designer said, “How about some new photos of you for the site?”  I said, “I’m now too hideous to be photographed for the site.”  Nothing makes one think facelift like looking at photos and going, “Yikes.”

But then I guess that’s why Photoshop was invented, eh?  I’ll just get some photos taken, then send them to Steve, and ask him to work some magic with them.  And then ta da, there’ll be some ‘updated’ photos of me!  How else to explain whenever I look at photos of Martha Stewart she does not age?

This week I received repeat orders from Stong’s Market and Edible Canada in Vancouver, and Sunshine Market here in Kelowna.  I shipped them immediately because I want to stay on top of my dwindling stock.  Isn’t this going to be fun?

Actually, I already have experienced baking for an order, as part of Edible Canada’s order was for 24 Okanagan Fruit and Rum bars.  I had none on hand, so had to bake those on Monday to ship them on Tuesday so they’d arrive in time for the Thanksgiving weekend.

It happened again during the week as a nice friend phoned to order a bunch of bark.  She said, “I’ll take a pound of white chocolate and cherries, a pound of half and half, and two pounds of dark.  Do you have all of that on-hand?”  I didn’t, but of course I said “No problem!” and two days later delivered the order.

And then all of this interferes horribly with my home cooking projects.  Kathy loves spicy foods, and I mean hot.  So I told her I’d make her a screaming hot salsa, but to date, I can’t get it hot enough!  I also have Concord grapes ripening and I want to make jelly as I read it can be used as a barbecue sauce ingredient.

During the week I baked blondies and chocolate almond squares for Steve, the web designer, as he loves sweets.  Unfortunately, two of the squares didn’t fit into the tin so I had to eat them.  Needless to say, the diet isn’t going all that well.

And that’s all about to get much, much worse.  I invited Denis to join Nicky and me for turkey dinner tonight, and he was happy to accept.  Then tomorrow I’m off to Osoyoos for another turkey dinner at mom’s.  I’ll arrive home on Monday to leftovers of turkey.  That should just about do my yen for it.

Naturally there are lashings of pumpkin pie and whipped cream involved in all of it.  I’m off to the gym, as it’s about all I can do right now to hold the line.  I suppose I could leave the girth to Photoshop, too, but it just doesn’t seem healthy.

When I paid a visit to my pal Liz and her mom Liza in Penticton at the end of May, I received a parking ticket.  I was about eight minutes over the time allotted, and the ticket was for $35, but $10 if you paid within seven days.

A few days later, I wrote a cheque for $10 and mailed it to Penticton.  I mailed it on a Tuesday, and it was due on Thursday.  I gave it no further thought.

The mail strike ensued, and during the month of July I received a notice from a collection agency.  I thought, what the heck, and saw that I was “overdue” with a payment of $25 to the City of Penticton.

I phoned them, and a nice girl explained that my cheque was due on the Thursday, but they didn’t receive it until Friday.  Hence, it was late, and an additional $25 was owed.  I explained I mailed the letter in time to for it to arrive, and besides, had no idea it arrived late and wondered why I had to be put over to a collection agency.

The nice girl explained that they had sent me a second letter, which I said I didn’t receive, as it must’ve been mixed up in the mail strike.  She said that was too bad, but I owed $25 and that was that.

So now every few days I get a recorded message from Wiggins Adjustments, based in Langley, asking me to call them.  I won’t, though, as I enjoy it.  I want the City of Penticton to pay far more than $25 to this company to try and beat the money out of me for being one day late.

Imagine trying to pay a parking ticket, payment arrives one day late, and having a collection agency sicked onto you!  In the words of the immortal Bugs Bunny, “I hope you know, dis means war.”  And since I’m the sort of person who enjoys this type of thing, this may go on for years.

It adds excitement to my trips to Penticton.  I was there on Tuesday, and made lunch for Liz and Liza.  We started with Liz’ favourite carrot soup, then I’d made shrimp jambalaya and rice, and another one of Liz’ favourites, meringues with whipped cream.

I parked in a free space in front of their building, and thought, “Come and get me, City of Penticton.  Here I am.”  Of course, as I was legally parked nothing happened.  Then I further taunted the gestapo by parking in the Safeway lot, and then on a residential street.

And there’s even more excitement in my life, as I’ve started to contact stores, and once again, they’re ordering.  I have a repeat order for Urban Fare in Yaletown, so feel really happy about that.  If you’re going to make artisan food, you do want it in the highest-end places around.

This weekend I plan to prep the dried fruit for the Okanagan Harvest Cakes, and then bake a bit.  I have to get moving because God knows how long I’ll remain free. Conrad Black wrote a book while in jail, so at least I have something to aspire to once the dangerous Wiggins Adjustments Collection Agency gets a hold of me.

When I told mom I was getting the bee hive, she said with some concern, “You know, beekeepers are all really kind of odd people.”  I thought she was perhaps overstating the case, but since last weekend, I do think she might be right.

A week ago the woman who sold me the bees, named Lorraine, came to my property to have a look at my hive.  She said, “Unfortunately, your bees didn’t make enough honey and will die over the winter.”  I felt terrible about it, and decided to do some research.

I went on-line to the BC Beekeepers Association, and e mailed whoever had an e mail listed on the site.  I said I had a bee hive, had been told the bees would starve, and wondered if there was anything to be done about it.  Well!  Beekeepers began phoning and e mailing me, just like an actual swarm.

As it turns out, the bees need something like 60 pounds of syrup, fed over the fall and winter, to help them survive.  Who knew?  One man I spoke to nearly wept.  He said, “How many supers to you have?”  I went, “Um, supers?”  He almost went insane, saying how anyone can get a bee hive, and not know anything about beekeeping was beyond him.

Now I’m resigned.  I have to get on my bee suit, learn how to put fuel into the smoker, go to the hive, open it, and generally commune with the bees.  The particularly upset man had also asked if the bees were still carrying in pollen.

I asked how I would know that.  He said, “You’d see it on their hind legs.”  I said, “Oh, I guess I have to start watching them.”  I believe it was at this point in the conversation where, even through the phone line, I could feel his adrenalin stores building dangerously.

My overall to-do list, posted on the fridge, says 1) do yoga 2) walk the dogs and 3) take pictures (ie learn how to use the new camera).  Now I have to add 4) hang around with the bees.

Instead of naming the bees, and trying to be their friend, I’ve been trying to keep up with the tomato harvest.  One year I’d like to actually keep the little tags that come with them, so that I can only buy the ones that I like. I have some that are absolutely huge, and very tasty as well.

Nicky announced proudly that he had an idea.  “It’s genius, mom.” His idea was for me to make homemade salsa with all the tomatoes.  He’s crazy for tortilla chips and salsa, so I thought it was a pretty good idea.  I’ve made one batch, and I just love it, so will put the recipe in next months’ newsletter.

I wonder if becoming a proper beekeeper will place me into the realm of kooky.  One of our neighbours in Osoyoos, my dad’s pal Johnny Rist, kept bees, and he was a Rosicrucianist.  If these weekly blogs get nuttier and nuttier, then you’ll know that mom was indeed correct.

If you have any experience with Millenials, you know the highest compliment you or something can receive is “dope!”  As in “I bought you some frozen Aunt Jemima pancakes.”  Nicky: “Dope!”  I tried it out at the gym in response to someone’s comment about something or other, but it didn’t go over well.

After procrastinating longer than ever, I baked on Sunday.  And of course it was much easier and more pleasant than I’d expected it to be.  I made 42 Okanagan Harvest Cakes, and now still have to vacuum seal them.  However, I felt very self-satisfied, and hope to continue.

You know I started selling fruitcakes in the fall of 2004, not knowing what it’d all mean.  At first I was renting the kitchen at the United Church, lugging stuff back and forth, and then had the commercial kitchen built downstairs.  For a few years I marketed hard to stores, and was hoping to grow to several thousand sales.

Then one day this spring I went, wait a minute.  This is an artisan product, and if I think I’m going to compete against Mrs. Willman’s mass-produced dreck, then I’ll kill myself.  After a full day of standing my knees are not really all that happy.  And this is followed by days where I don’t stand, and can recuperate.

Hence I’ve decided to keep the numbers much more reasonable, and to make retail sales my goal.  I’ve always dreamt of having a solely mail-order business, and I simply have to work on getting more people to my site to order.  So that’s my new goal: sell the product directly, make smaller numbers, and make the same amount of money.

Right now I’m making 300 pieces of chocolate bark for Source Furniture’s convention in Toronto in October.  My nerves are completely shot, as I still have to make some of the bark, never mind get the ribbon and package it all.  You may recall they ordered in the spring, and people loved it, so I’m thrilled to have them as a customer.

On Wednesday Kathy, her boyfriend David and I went to Osoyoos.  He’s just moved here from the prairies, and had never been to the South Okanagan.  He just loved it, and thankfully the weather was hot and beautiful.

We had lunch at mom’s, and then went to Oroville because Kathy insisted she wanted to buy cheap groceries.  When we crossed the border and the guard asked what we were planning to buy, I said, “Diet food.”

He said, “You’re coming HERE for diet food??” and I explained that the US always has way more variety in strange foods.  I then scoured Princes, but barely found anything vaguely interesting.  I got some frozen bars, sugar-free wafers, and some pudding which is largely inedible.

Today I have to produce my monthly newsletter, but first a trip to the gym is in order for a bit of detoxification. God knows I need it after the amount of Aspartame I’ve consumed since arriving home with the diet food.

 I was really proud of myself on Labour Day weekend, as I painted my bedroom, and it looks great.  The more projects I do, the more I improve with difficult implements such as screwdrivers and paint rollers.

There I was, removing switch plates, taping, painting and generally feeling like a tradesperson.  Unfortunately, I more closely resemble a bull in a China shop than an actual handyman.  I did things like whack my baby toe into the wall while moving too quickly, slamming my shins while climbing onto and off of the chair I used to reach high places, and so on.

But doing that must’ve improved the overall Feng Shui of the place, as things seem to be picking up a bit for the businesss.  Tin Horn Creek just placed a largish order for fruitcake, and Discover Wines re-ordered chocolate bark.  Even that did little to spur me on to start baking, though I forced myself to take inventory, and today I bought what I need to get started.

I haven’t heard boo from Choices Markets or Art Knapps, so am guessing they’re going to pass on my fruitcake.  What can one do?  The stores that now carry it every year are very glad they do, as by Thanksgiving people are asking for the fruitcake in the little white box.

I heard an interesting interview on CBC Radio the other day, something like How to Work with Millenials.  You know, our own brats.  I feel so sorry for business owners these days who have to hire these kids.  The interviewer was saying there’s a dearth of workers in the North, because the Millenials are like, “No thanks.”

And why should they do it, with mom and dad driving them to university, making their lunches, purchasing their clothes and dutifully returning the rejects?  Apparently, in order to get these zombies to work you have to entice them with incentives like free time, allow them to game on their phones, and insane stuff like that.

I would add that you have to ask them nicely, never chastise them, and then praise them soundly when the task is done, however poorly.  Hence it takes a human being with the patience of Job to hire and train these apathetic slobs.

It’ll be up to me to produce my fruitcakes this season, as I’m not hiring anyone, and am going to slug it out alone.  As upsetting as it’ll be, Nickly’ll have to help me label boxes, carry in product, and so forth.  But I think with the TV and radio as companions I should be able to copy with doing it on my own very nicely.

And God knows I have to start selling, as yesterday I went berserk and shopped in the mall prior to my hair appointment.  The bill for the hair itself is a nightmare amount due to the Herculean task before the hairdresser.  Hence my prayer: dear God, please let me remain true to my Type A Boomer self and not sink to the level of the lackadaisical Millenials.