Last time I was away and came home from a trip, the entire inside of the fridge was coated with the contents of an exploded Orange Crush can.  Yesterday when I returned home from Hawaii, the inside of the fridge looked fine.  However, the rest of the house is absolutely filthy.

Nicky proudly told me that he and Denis partied like wild hyenas all weekend.  Apparently Luke decided to come home for the weekend from Calgary, and brought Dan (The Boarder) with him.  So I guess the four of them were just having a testosterone ball, as I see every scrap of frozen food was eaten.

I was going to return to the gym today, but instead must wield a vacuum and then a mop to get this place into shape.  Mostly it’s the several pounds of pet hair that need to be removed from the wood floors.  For those of you about to call the health department, please be assured that my commercial kitchen is hermetically sealed in the basement.

I’m proud to say that Marilyn and I ate like monks while in Hawaii, so I lost a few pounds and gained a tan.  We tried to walk a lot, and found that on Kauai the beaches go on for miles and miles.  We saw several seals sunning themselves on the sand during our walks.

Kauai turns out to be quite an interesting little island.  It’s the oldest of the chain of Hawaiian islands, and as it’s quite tiny, is easy to navigate.  One hears Hawaiian spoken there quite a lot.  The island is dotted with tiny towns, though there are two larger centres.

We went to an outdoor market at Kapa’a and I bought a Polynesian flower themed apron.  I thought that would both be useful as well as a nice memento.  Next winter when I put it on while baking fruitcakes I’ll feel nostalgic for sun and sand!

I tried to snorkel in front of our resort at Poipu Beach, but the current was really strong.  At one point I had one hand on an outcropping of lava, and the other was holding my underwater camera.  As I tried to take pictures of the fish my body was horizontal, just like in the cartoons.  I knew if I let go I’d be swept away.

Much tamer pursuits involved lying by the pool, barbecuing insanely thick steaks, and browsing through stores.  I felt extremely moderate in my purchases as I only got two dresses, one T shirt, a pair of sandals, a pair of earrings and one pair of shorts.

Now it’s back to the old routine.  I have my creative writing class at UBC-O today, and am looking forward to being back.  Country Woman has notified me that they will be featuring my business in their December issue!  So even though the house resembles an abandoned lean-to, there’s always good news to counter the bad.

Just so you know, I’m leaving for Hawaii on Wednesday, so this same stinking blog will be sitting here until I return on February 9th.  In preparation I’m having a fit about the weather, nervously and compulsively checking the Kelowna Airport departures every few hours.  This has been going on for weeks, so by now my nerves are totally gone.

Maybe that explains my latest bout with stupid behaviour.  Last Thursday I did the usual, parked in the big lot at UBC, and then put a nice note on the dash.  The note is always the same, “Sorry, I forgot to bring change.”  Prominent signs are displayed around the lot advising that a ticket needs to be purchased from the dispenser.  Failure to do so can result in a ticket or being towed.

After class I headed straight to where I’d parked the van, but when I arrived, it was gone!  I felt sick as I realized my “sorry, no change” gag had finally failed.  However, I also felt that I deserved to be towed, as here I was, flouting the parking laws of UBC.

I trudged up the hill and went into the security office.  Unfortunately, on my way I passed my creative writing prof and said to her, “I’ve been towed!”  She reacted with disgust at the strict punishment meted out for parking infractions.

As soon as I told the people in security that my van must’ve been towed, both nice guards shook their heads and said they hadn’t towed anyone that day.  One of them phoned down to a colleague and read my license number to him.  I waited nervously, though with some joy as I thought of never seeing the van again, and making the claim for theft.

Sure enough, the guard phoned back that indeed, my van was there!  I said, “Oh my God, I feel so stupid!” and was given a ride to the lot in a golf cart.  I then had to e mail my prof and tell her how incredibly stupid I am.  What a day!

It’s funny because I’m always so sure that I’m right.  I was sure I knew where I’d parked, but it turned out I was at the opposite end of the row.  And because I felt so sure that I was guilty of an offense, I didn’t even bother to search the lot.

At the gym we hand over our car keys in exchange for a locker key.  Last fall the receptionist handed me my key, and I said with utter conviction, “that’s not my key.”  She replied calmly, “it’s the one you gave me.”

I shrugged and took it, knowing she was nuts.  I went out, and sure enough, the key started my van.  Hmmmmmm.

So it appears that a nice holiday somewhere warm is probably going to be a very good thing.  Please think of me now and again as you are freezing.  Aloha!

I followed up with some of my stores to see how sales had gone.  Dufflet Pastries in Toronto reported selling three quarters of what they’d ordered, so that wasn’t bad for the first time out.  I’ve realized that it’s one of those things where once people know it they but it.  At first, though, it’s like, “Fruitcake?? No thanks!”

But don’t ask me how many fruitcakes I’ve sold, as people like to do.  They think I’m being coy, but I’m serious when I say, “I don’t know.”  The spiral bound notebook in which I record sent and received invoices only works for the stores.  For other orders, I put credit card receipts in an envelope for my poor accountant.

In March or April, she will hand me a tidy bunch of neatly typed stuff, and only then will I actually know the number of fruitcakes sold in 2008.  When I was interviewed for the Vernon Morningstar newspaper last month, the reporter asked me how many pounds of fruit I go through. I said, “Hmmmm, I’m not sure….”

Actually, I would have to say that I’m very much of an instinctual entrepreneur, and not your normal school-trained variety.  I just do things because something in my gut says to do it.  Later I find out I was just having heartburn, but by then it’s too late.

On Tuesday after the weight-training class I went up to the instructor and told her that I won’t be there next week.  I said I had to watch the inauguration on TV.  Actually, I mentioned it to lots of women at the club, and not one of them went, “me too!”  Maybe I am some kind of a nut??

My dear friend Alison is right there in D.C. in the thick of things, as her apartment is just three or four blocks from the Mall where it’s all happening.  She’s going to actually be standing there watching the whole thing, so I feel mighty jealous.  To placate me she’s bought me a deck of Obama playing cards in which Cheney and Bush are the jokers.

I had lunch with my old pal Ralph from teacher training days at UBC.  We always like to reminisce about the time the prof told us to lie on the floor and feel a dot moving through our bodies.  On another occasion he made us chant vegetable names in the dark.

At one point as our practicums loomed someone nervously asked the prof what to do about discipline problems, and he said, “Be creative, and you’ll never have a discipline problem.”

Needless to say the grade sevens I had for my first practicum made mincemeat out of me.  Ralph and I still laugh ourselves stupid about all of that, even though it happened over 33 years ago!

Oprah has become the world’s guru, so I think it’s great she did a whole confessional show on getting fat.  She has everything anyone could want, but still gets bummed out and eats herself into oblivion.  Therefore can anyone blame those of us with no fame or fortune for eating like horses?  If she has to eat to feel better, then the rest of us should have custom-made feedbags slung around our muzzles all the time.

Mine would contain the items that I consumed at 8:00 last night: shortbread, chocolate and Miss Vicky’s jalapeno chips.  The year is off to a bumpy start where the diet is concerned.  On top of the nighttime shenanigans I’ve been meeting friends for lunch and happily consuming fries and lettuce drenched with full-fat Caesar dressings.

I find it inspirational that Oprah and I are both having serious issues around food at the very same time.  The unfairness of it all, though, is that Oprah has a doctor, a trainer, a spiritualist, and many other professionals around her.  I have a surly husband, a hungry teenager, a blind diabetic dog, two feeble-minded dachshunds and two disinterested cats on my team.  I wonder which of the two of us is going to beat this weight thing?

Oh well, you know what I always say.  When in doubt, go shopping.  You cannot believe the sales at this moment.  At the Bay they have those fab racks where it says, “50% off.” Under this sign it says, “Take an additional 40% off.”  I found a great housecoat, regular $58 for $12, and the most darling Ralph Lauren two-piece pajama for $24 (regular around $90).  My God, that was a great afternoon!

On Wednesday Nicky’s girlfriend, Taya, came over to take a bunch of photos for Country Woman Magazine.  They’d sent a list of suggested shots, so I baked a batch of fruitcakes and Taya took photos of the process from start to end.  She’ll edit them and put them on a CD as the magazine said they want them early in the New Year.  It’d be great if they decide to run them and do the accompanying story.

I’m enjoying the second half of first-year creative writing immensely.  We’re learning interesting things, and are given exercises in order to practice them.  The worst part of the course for me is my own idiocy regarding the use of the computer to post and read my and other people’s stuff.

When the prof explained it, I was like, Huh??  “You have to go on-line, blah blah blah.” By this point I was too frightened to listen, and was wondering if I had passed a chocolate bar vending machine on my way up the stairs.

Fortunately on the way out I was able to visualize my thighs at a normal size and passed the chocolate bars without a hitch.  I drove home, feeling triumphant, and quickly mixed up tuna canned in water with low-fat mayo and threw that onto a large bed of lettuce.  I wolfed it down, wondering how Oprah and I were going to manage the next couple of dark months of winter.

I have inspirational messages sent to me daily from a place called tut.com.  Today’s said, “The power is within you.”   I dearly hope that it is because one thing I’d really like to do this year is to write another book.  As you know, I wrote a 100 page romance novel which was soundly rejected by the Harlequin critique people.

This time I’d like to write more within my own interests, which is memoir and non-fiction.  Mom wants her life story recorded, so I’ll start there.  I’ve also started a book about my journey as a fruitcake entrepreneur.  I find it kind of laughable, though, as I can barely write a one-page weekly blog and now I want to write one or possibly two books.  Mad!  Dream big or go home, I guess, is my motto for 2009.

To help with the writing I’m returning to UBC-Okanagan to take the second half of first-year creative writing.  It starts tomorrow and ends in April.  With that behind me, I can apparently take a second-year creative writing course in the fall in non-fiction.  It appears that the insanely strong desire to write has finally reached the breaking point.

Besides writing, I have two trips planned for this year.  The first one occurs in three weeks when Marilyn and I will wing our way to Hawaii.  The second will occur in late April when Nicky and I will go to Germany to visit our relatives.  I’m looking forward to both, but after seeing the nightmare of Christmas airline travel I have to admit that I’m quaking a bit at the thought of any delays.

A goal for the fruitcake business is to get into both Country Woman and Chatelaine’s December issues.  I also need to find other magazines which might be interested, and get really focused with marketing.

A constant irritant is my inability to get into more local winery shops with the Okanagan Harvest Cake.  These places have shortbread from England and poached pears from California, but they balk at a locally-made product.  Why??

I made the mistake of reading Marly and Me, and sobbed my heart out over the ending.  Though I knew the old dog would die, I perversely continued reading.  The next day I showed up at the gym with one eye big and one eye small.  I just said to the women, “Look, I read Marly and Me, so this is my own fault.”

Arnie is now in his 14th year, and is totally dependant on me, as was Marly on his owner.  I’ve had that dog since he was six weeks old, and we’ve been inseparable for his entire life.  Needless to say, I over-identified with Marly’s owner!

So who knows what joys and sorrows 2009 will bring?  But no matter what, as usual, I am pretty well ga ga with excitement about the whole thing.

Do you find it challenging to be funny while seething with anger?  Such is the case for me, thanks to the illustrious workers at Canada Post.  As you may recall, I had the great compliment of having Eric Akis write in glowing terms about my fruitcake in the Victoria Times Colonist.  This caused panic buying at Peppers Foods, so the nice manager re-ordered.

As the last weekend before Christmas was approaching, he asked that the fruitcakes be sent overnight, but not at an insane cost.  I checked around and decided that Canada Post’s Priority Courier service would be the best option.  I packaged up four cases (96 fruitcakes) and mailed them at noon on the 18th with a guarantee that they’d arrive at noon on the 19th.

I spent the last weekend before Christmas feeling smug about all of the successful transactions that had occurred.  Humming away, I answered the phone on Monday the 22nd to this unbelievable question: “Where are the fruitcakes I ordered?”  I felt like I’d been punched in the gut, and raced to the Internet to track the packages.

Sure enough, I saw that they were sitting in Richmond at 10:00 PM on the 19th and no further information was provided.  I phoned the number shown on their site for assistance, and then spent the next hour in a loop which ended nowhere.  Finally, I drove to the post office from where I’d mailed them, and they informed me that the tracking branch of Canada Post, the inside workers, were on strike!

The nice clerk at the post office said, “Once the strike is over they’ll refund you the courier fee.”  To which I replied that I didn’t care about the refunded fee, but was very concerned that a seasonal product had not been delivered on time to the store.  She explained that there was nothing that anyone could do.  I drove home feeling completely defeated.

The fruitcakes finally arrived on the 23rd, but as the manager said, so many people had left mad that he was worried he’d have trouble selling them at this point.  I just have to think positively, as who wouldn’t want a fruitcake to ring in the New Year?  I just read that in Scotland a fruitcake is eaten on New Year’s Day for good luck.

By the 24th I had largely gotten over the upset, as it was time to get ready for our traditional Christmas Eve.  Mom and Gerry arrived with Schwartzie, and the four of us plus them made for a happy evening of carols, gifts, food and wine.  I successfully made a Jewish dish, knishes and brisket, which Gerry loved.

Vast amounts of food were also consumed on Christmas Day as I made the ubiquitous turkey dinner with all the trimmings.  Luke has the appetite of a super model after the last runway show of the season, so has practically eaten us out of house and home.  Oh well.  That’s what the holidays are for.

What a fantastic surprise the manager of Peppers Foods in Victoria and I received on Sunday.  Eric Akis, food writer and cookbook author, wrote a column for the Victoria Times Colonist in which he listed locally produced delicacies for Christmas and where one could find them.  He ended the column with the heading Fabulous Fruitcake, and extolled mine by saying, “It’s not often you can use ‘fruitcake’ and ‘fabulous’ in the same sentence, but I do when describing the cakes produced by the Kelowna company Nuttier than a Fruitcake.”

This of course brought a flood of people to Peppers, and so I hurriedly shipped six cases to the store.  As well, I was very fortunate that Phil Johnson, the host of Kelowna’s AM 1150 morning show called me again.  He did a brief interview, and then on Monday he’s going to do a give-away of a couple of my fruitcakes, so that will also drive people to the stores.

This has all been very good, but it’s been a tough week standing in the various Quality Greens stores.  Due to the blizzard on Thursday I had to cancel my gig in Penticton, but as my route would have taken me through Westbank, which received 46 centimetres of snow, I felt that risking my life for fruitcake wasn’t worth it.

I was frozen solid upon leaving the Westbank Quality Greens demo, and learned that more layers are good.  So yesterday in Vernon I was dressed a bit more warmly, yet still froze!  With the doors opening and closing every few minutes, it’s hard to keep warm.  The staff told me they wear several layers, plus hats and boots and are barely able to survive.

While in Vernon I was interviewed by the business editor of the Vernon Morningstar newspaper.  She also took a photo, but this unfortunately won’t appear in the paper until next Sunday.  However, some people eat fruitcake between Christmas and New Year’s, so it will still help with sales.

My friend and baking assistant, Marilyn, happened to be listening to a new FM station in town, and the host, a 20-something, said some disparaging things about fruitcake.  She promptly phoned in and set him straight, and then phoned me.  So the next day I took him a fruitcake and told him to try it.  I said if he thought it was really terrible he could continue to disparage fruitcake.

I had the station on, so had the great pleasure of hearing him say, “Okay, here I go.  Mmmmph (chomping sounds).  Mmmm.  Hey, this is actually good!”  Even after a break he returned to the topic of how Nuttier than a Fruitcake makes a really good product.  I was really happy about that, as another convert puts me that much closer to fruitcake heaven, doesn’t it?

I suppose instead of whining about how tired I am, I should be thanking the Gods of Christmas Merriment that I’m not hung over to boot.  Last night Denis and I were invited to our friends Bob and Jerralynn’s for a Christmas party.  After the pino gris and gewurtztraminer, one of my last acts of the night was to send a glass of wine flying off the counter where it then shattered on the floor.  Oopsies!

So today I’ve spend my time quietly baking cookies, as I’ve been doing for the past week.  I always make my granny’s cookies, the spitzbubchen, but this year I decided to make zimmtsterne (cinnamon stars) as well.  Both of these recipes must be well over 120 years old, as my granny, born in 1899, learned them from her mother.

I’ve been making batches of these cookies to give away to various (very select) people.  However, there’s a nasty downside to the cookie production.  Invariably, six or eight cookies will not fit into the tin, so I put them ‘aside.’  I then decide that I can certainly eat ONE cookie, and not wreck all of my hard work on Weight Watchers.  Soon I have finished the sixth or eighth cookie and feel really annoyed.

Perhaps I’ll lose weight from the upcoming Week from Hell.  Quality Greens is my largest customer, so when they ask me for a favour, I do it.  They’re going to run their usual ad in the newspaper, but in it they will be featuring my product.  The ad will run the week prior to Christmas, so they asked me if I’d be willing to do demos in each of their four stores during that time.  I said sure, and am now wondering how I’ll survive it.

We’ve just had quite a big snowfall, and are sitting at minus 10, and I’ll be demo’ing fruitcake in Penticton, Kelowna, Vernon and Westbank.  I should probably take my space heater and an extension cord as the demos will be three hours in length.  The things I have to do to flog this product!

Last week we went to a tree farm and picked out a tree that was cut on the spot and has filled the house with an insanely strong scent of pine. For years I’ve been buying the cultured Douglas firs, as they’re easy to decorate.  All of the decorations can go on the ends, but with this pine and its leggy branches, it takes a lot more decorations.

What a wonderful opportunity to demonstrate my committment to Canada! As I said to the women at the gym, it is our patriotic duty to shop.  When one of them asked, “How so?” I explained that in recessionary times we are to spend, spend, spend.  It’s wrong and unpatriotic not to do so.  Not willing to be branded a traitor, I went out and bought tons of the most adorable Christmas decorations, and now our tree is absolutely resplendent.

I have to say that a large part of my business’ success has been due to the help I’ve received from others.  It would be great to say that meant people like my husband, but I’m talking about real help from strangers.  For example, though I always have CBC Radio on, due to the crisis in Ottawa, I happened instead to be watching TV on Tuesday afternoon.

The phone rang, and a woman said, “Phone in to CBC Radio right away.  They’re trying to find fruitcake makers in BC.”  I quickly put on the radio and heard Mark Forsythe talking about Christmas foods.  As I was desperately looking on-line for the call-in number, the phone rang again and the same nice woman gave me the number!

I dialed, and the screener asked me what my call was about.  I told her I’d heard they were searching for purveyors of fruitcake, and that actually, I was Canada’s Fruitcake Queen!  She put me on hold for about 30 seconds, and suddenly I was on Almanac, talking to Mark Forsythe, whose show I’ve always adored.

He asked me what my secret was, and I told him about the chunks of chocolate as well as the booze-soaking after they’re baked.  Then he asked me how people can reach me, and I told all of the listeners my website’s address.  As soon as I hung up, one customer phoned to order five, and when I went on-line, a dozen orders were waiting for me!  Once again, don’t ya just love CBC?

Later that afternoon, the kind customer who’d phoned me to let me know about the show called back.  It turns out that her name is Colleen, and she lives in Quesnel.  She’d ordered some fruitcakes in the summer, and liked them a lot.  She placed another order, and I stuck a fruitcake in there as thanks.  Very meager, I know, for all that she’s done for me.

As I write this I hear Denis in the bedroom next door.  He’s snoring, and the sound of his exhalations reminds me of the far-off lowing of a cow.  He’ll get up groggily in an hour or two, eat breakfast, drink a litre of coffee, and settle himself in front of the computer.  Then he’ll proceed to play World War 2 on-line for the next several hours.

My Sunday will unfold somewhat differently.  After making the bed and cleaning up the kitchen, I plan to do some Christmas baking and continue packaging my orders.  I’ll vacuum, clean the upstairs and downstairs bathrooms, and then make my weekly call to my mom.  For fun, sometimes I like to sum up my list of things done at the end of the day to Denis, who very kindly replies, “Good work, dear!”

Where is a camera when you need one?  A couple of nights ago Mango brought in a really big mouse and let it go.  I was watching TV and knew that Mojo would eventually get the mouse so didn’t bother to move.  The mouse ran into the kitchen, where Denis was standing.  He saw the mouse, and immediately called for Mojo, the Mouse Slayer.  I said, “She’s downstairs watching Nicky eat.”

However, Ricky, the dwarf dachshund heard Denis’ call and ran into the kitchen.  He and the mouse made eye contact, and the mouse stood up on its hind legs. Ricky put his nose to the mouse who gave him a right left right left with its paws.  I heard Ricky scream, and he ran from the room.  He had been beaten up by a mouse!

Within minutes Mojo was back upstairs, and we soon found the mouse’s hiding place.  Mango was in my bedroom, lying in front of a trunk, and watching it with the odd twitch of his tail tip.  I moved the trunk, the mouse ran out, and crack! Mojo had its skull fractured within a second.  I then advised her that she’d have to put a paper bag over her head due to the shame brought on the family by Ricky.

I’ve always been mad for marzipan, so I decided I’m going to make it myself.  I found a great recipe, now I just need to purchase a candy thermometer.  I’m crazy with excitement about it, and told Denis I was going to make marzipan, and added, “Isn’t that fab?”  To which he rudely replied, “Are you supposed to be eating that?”  Can you imagine the nerve of that man?

No, of course I shouldn’t be eating marzipan, but I’m talking about the thrill of making it, for God’s sake.  We had wonderful neighbours in Osoyoos, the Sziegauds, and Margot used to make marzipan every Christmas.  I still think about it, and last ate it about 40 years ago, so it must have made quite an impression on me.  You can dye it and shape it into cute stuff, so it’s a very creative pursuit.

Okanagan College has a business program, and I was contacted by one of their e commerce students.  She said that they had received a grant from the government, and were offering local businesses with websites a free critique of their site.  I said I would be happy to participate, so a nice young woman came over with a comprehensive report.

And wouldn’t you know it, that little genius, Steve, my web designer, rated five stars (out of five stars) in almost every category.  The student had a couple of things that she was able to point out that will help me, but other than that, she really felt that my site is doing a good job.  So even though the small dog is a great disappointment, the web designer is a point of pride.