The other day at the gym I was reading a woman’s T shirt, and it said Do One Thing a Day that Scares You.  So the other day I finally decided to try and figure out why my camera battery won’t charge.  I’ve been looking at the camera for months, but was too frightened to deal with it.

However I was forced into it, which is one of the lovely aspects of life.  I went to switch my house insurance, and the agent asked for photos.  I had barely enough juice to take 4 pictures before the camera died, then I took it and the charger to London Drugs.

A poor person there had to help me, and he discovered the problem was the charger.  I got a new one, which I discovered I can’t use, and I was helped with ordering the photos, which was successful.

I returned the next day where a heavy-set woman tried to help me, and didn’t as it turns out, so I have to return again today to see if someone can show me how the charger works.  If they can’t, then I’ll have to go elsewhere.

However, despite the poor customer service, I’m returning to London Drugs for a two-hour workshop on how to make a photo album.

Isn’t that strange?  I hate technology, but signed up for a workshop!  I left feeling particularly proud of myself as it all scares the bejesus out of me.  I have to download their software, put the file of photos I want to work with on my desk top, and arrive on May 26th at 2:00 PM laptop in hand.

But it’s good to learn new things, and I seem to be learning a lot through Neflix documentaries too.  I watched the series, The Inexplicable Universe, which was really interesting.  Some of it’s much too hard for my small head, of course.

And then I watched The Secret, and it made sense following the universe documentary.  It’s based on the best-selling book, and is a workshop about how it all works.  Id’ been practicing the Law of Attraction after reading an excellent book called Excuse Me, Your Life is Waiting, but somehow forgot about it.  Funny how you can forget something so important!

So between quantum physics, the Law of Attraction, and Buddhism, I seem to have calmed down quite a bit.  I think an understanding of all of that helps one know it’s never worth it to sweat the small stuff.  Or the big stuff either.

I have two food events on the horizon.  Tomorrow I’m making dinner at mom’s for a group of people, including the Osoyoos museum director and wife, mom’s lawyer and Jerralynn.

I thought for the six of us I’d start with baguettes toasted and topped with bruschetta, followed by seafood casserole, beet salad, asparagus and rice.  Then end it all with lovely strawberry Pavlovas.

Sunday’s Mother’s Day lunch’ll be fun as Liz’ brother James, his wife Julie and her son will be coming to mom’s.  For that, we’ll start with cheese terrine slices on crackers and sweet potato soup.  The main course is chicken strips, potatoes with Dijon mustard sauce and curried carrots.  For dessert I’ll make chocolate mousse.  My idea of total fun!!

I was feeling pretty swish the other week.  Hair combed, makeup applied, dressed decently.  I went to Value Village and was browsing around in the shoe section when a young woman came by with her two-year-old daughter in the cart.  I smiled at the cute little girl, she smiled back, and then she said “gramma?”

I notice when I say something about visiting my mom to a twenty year old they have a really confused look on their face.  They’re trying to add two or three decades onto someone who resembles Methuselah and are feeling a bit scared.  Having been raised on vapire stories, they’re sure my mom and I must be the un-dead to still be walking around.

However as we know, the alternative to not growing old is the pits, so I don’t complain.  Better to just resemble the walking dead than to actually be dead.

Have you ever thought of trying to start a little home-based business, but felt too nervous about how to do it?  On Sunday Nicky said he was going to put an ad on Castanet for computer repair services, and on Monday he had his first customer.  That’s how you start a small home-based business when you’re young.

 Nicky said he was able to fix the woman’s printer problem very easily.  He then took her hard drive home to load something onto it for her, returned it promptly the next day, and got paid.  Now he needs to keep jazzing up his ad in order to get more calls.

I received an order for a wedding in Ontario, so I hand made some fruitcakes and they’re beyond reproach in every way.  I think since I’m off selling to stores I’ll continue making them individually like that as they’re really beautiful. I could win a prize with these.

Have you ever tried heaping scorn and abuse onto companies by using Facebook?  I discovered once again how it brings almost instant results.  The other day my landline didn’t work, so I phoned Shaw and the customer service rep said they’d have a technician out here the next day between 10:00 and noon.

I said to her, but this is my business phone, and actually the only phone I have!  I was lucky Nicky was back from Thailand so I used his cell to call them.  After I hung up I thought what if mom tries to call me in an emergency?

So I posted on my Facebook, then Shaw’s Facebook pages, then sent an e mail to the company.  Soon after my phone starting working (likely a random event) but get this, I received a very apologetic call from some senior person and a long e mail from another person!  Make sure you try it if you want action.  I kind of like social media now.

You know how I love buying stuff at thrift as I hate contributing to the moutains of waste in the world.  But this past weekend I went nuts over new cushions from Canadian Tire.  After 14 years I felt it was okay to throw out the cushions that go on the outdoor furniture.  So I started by getting four new pillows for the chairs, then I thought how nice if the sunroom cushions all matched, too.

I needed a total of six more, and a new bench cushion so really overdid the retail shopping with 11 cushions.  But now everything’s lovely so it’s all good.

Mom came to Kelowna for Easter and we had a lot of fun.  She arrived at noon on Easter Sunday and we had a lovely spa-like lunch of chopped apple topped with sunflower seeds, almonds and yogurt.  I said we have to eat like this as we have three boxes of chocolate to eat later.

We then headed out to Value Village for a bit of fun, and mom found some pants to try on.  The cubicles at Value Village are large enough for a very small woman or child to turn around in, and that’s all.  However as mom’s 89 and slightly decrepit, she said “You have to come in here and help me get these pants off and on.”

So I crammed into the changing room with mom, but of course right as I got one pair of pants off the cubicle door opened.  There were some people standing there looking at us and she and I laughed so hard we almost wept.  I don’t know why, but the thought of the people, the sight, their faces, etc.

One pair of pants fit, and she found a couple of jackets she liked, so we headed home.  I made salmon and onions in a cream sauce and put that into vol au vent shells for dinner.  Mom loves Netflix so we settled in to watch a couple of movies.

The next day we headed off to the Mennonite Thrift Store, where mom immediately pounced on some knick knacks, and then we started to look at clothes.  Suddenly mom said she felt dizzy and had to sit down.  Then she said she felt quite sick and wanted to go home and lie down.

We drove home and mom spent the afternoon on the couch with an afghan and watched some more movies.  I puttered around outside in the yard, checking in now and again.  At one point she’d had an upset stomach and then later developed a headache.

We had soup for dinner to settle her stomach a bit, then drove to the airport to pick Nicky up as his plane was landing at 7:00 PM.  He arrived right on time and said it was a pleasant surprise to see his gramma standing there as well as his mom.  He showed us an angry insect bite on his ankle, but otherwise seemed fine.

Most of Nicky’s trip seemed to involve vast amounts of alcohol and a lot of vomiting, so I said I guess it’s time to dry out a bit back at home.  He went to the clinic and was put on antibiotics for the infected insect bite of unknown origin.  That’s Thailand for you.

The next day mom got up and felt fine so she drove back to Osoyoos.  I was thinking about her symptoms, the nausea and headache, and thought I wonder if it’s due to being 89 and drinking almost an entire bottle of wine the night before?  In our family, from kid to grandparent, alcohol likes to wreak havoc.

After 36 years of constant alcohol intake, I’ve finally come to understand how much my body will take, and I now adhere to that limit due to the pain caused whenever I throw caution to the wind.  My weakened old self is a panty waist when it comes to how much I can safely consume.  Sad!

It was 7 degrees C this morning, and I’m still frozen solid with the furnace on.  But then for fun I checked Toronto’s weather and it was minus 2 so I should stop complaining.  I like to pretend it’s tens of thousands of years ago when the Earth was chilly all the time.  That way, if it ever turns warm, it’ll be a pleasant surprise.

I imagine the bamboo I planted, given its origins are in the depths of the jungle, isn’t all that happy right now.  I got a piece of root from Petra and planted it in the lower yard where I hope to have a screen of greenery to block out people walking by on the road.  Petra said the bamboo grows like mad and has giant leaves, so it should be perfect.

However the very next day when I checked on it some filthy pest had bitten into a bud.  So I got some pesticides and sprayed the hell out of the area, and can see it’s going to be one of those long struggles to have some something like bamboo in my tundra.

Never mind, a gardener’s optimistic if nothing else.  I also planted a gooseberry and a red currant, plus I got a whole bunch of strawberry plants from Petra.  If things work out I’ll have all manner of berries down there as well as my apricot tree.

But wouldn’t you know it, though I see apricot trees covered in blooms all over the neighbourhood, my little tree has maybe ten blossoms!  I shoved some fertilizer spikes into the ground around it, as per the Art Knapp’s staff’s instructions, so we’ll see what happens.

This is one of those situations where you can choose either to laugh or to cry.  You know, like in Breaking Bad where Walter starts crying when he realizes Skyler gave all of their money to the man with whom she’d had an affair.  However when the absurdity hits Walter he starts to laugh hysterically instead.

The other month I’d said to the web designer please remove the Closed sign from my order page.  Time went on, and I thought damn it, I’ve never been this slow in the fruitcake business in the whole ten years.  I went back to my site, and sure enough, it still said closed!

So I e mailed the web designer, and said Um, can you please remove this, as my business has no customers whatsoever.  I felt like crying, but then thought why?  It’s much better to laugh about it, and let’s face it, it’s been a great holiday from baking.

I’m not sure if it’s because I’m turning 60, became a Buddhist, or because I’m reading Scientific American magazine, but I’ve noticed I’m pretty “meh” about almost every formerly upsetting situation.

I said to mom I read over two million galaxies have been discovered, of which the Milky Way is just one.  Then when you think of the number of solar systems in each, you can decide either we’re such miniscule specks we’re nothing, or we have to live to our potential, let our lights shine, and be everything.

As I said to mom, who’s coming here for Easter, we’re damn well eating chocolates because we’re all headed to the same place and should try to enjoy today. 

On Saturday I went to a nice man named Sal Caruso’s house to see his garden and purchase some of his advertised plants.  With a name like that, you just know this guy’s gonna be a successful gardener.  And sure enough, when I arrived to his half-acre property I could see he has a mini Garden of Eden there.

He has two giant fig trees which he over-winters by putting a heavy canvas tarp over one, and he has them tucked right against the house and workshop.  I said that might be a project for me down the road, but for now I need something a bit simpler.

Sal has a grove of kiwis, and they’re all lovely and thick, twined up and around a pagoda.  He said they’re relatively easy to grow, as they don’t need any protection over the winter, so I said I’d take two, a male and a female.

I also bought a thornless raspberry and then oregano, arugula and garlic chives, all of which should be in my garden forever.  For now, I see nothing from the arugula, and the oregano looks completely dead, so not sure if they’ll amount to anything at all.

For more challenges, I signed up for a macaron-making workshop at Sandrine Pastry, but they were full until July 26th, so I have to wait until then.  I think that should be tremendous fun, as if I can master them I’ll always have a lovely gift to give to people.  You simply can’t buy them as they’re $1.75 each teensy weensy cookie.

As you know, I’m having the house painted and new railing put around the deck.  A company was in the neighbourhood doing driveways and a guy came to my door trying to sell me a driveway sealing job.  I said no thanks, but pointed out an area where the Ponderesa pines have caused tall heaves in the driveway.

He sent over a special asphalt repair person, and as he was going to e mail me the quote, I gave him my e mail and added, “But I’m not crazy, I just have a fruitcake business.”  I’ve noticed whenever I say to someone I’m not crazy, I usually end up acting it.

Once he sent me the quote of $5,000 I thought I don’t even want more asphalt in my yard, so replied “no thanks, I think I want rocks there and not more pavement.” I guess he wondered why I’d invited him over to give me a quote for new asphalt, but never mind.

The house is definitely a pinking mauve-ish beige, and I’m going to have the front door painted a dark gray/blue for dramatic effect.  Then all the planters will be filled with pink and mauve themed flowers so when people drive up they’ll think they’ve arrived at a little Barbie’s Dream House.

And because I simply can’t keep up to this one-acre property, I bit the bullet and asked a landscape company to give me $200 worth of work per month to help me with overall maintenance.  Otherwise the cute house and yard are all wasted if overgrown like Sleeping Beauty’s castle.

On the local website Castanet I found an ad for blueberry bushes for sale.  They were just $6.50 each and it said they were 3 -4 year old plants.  I sent an e mail and said I’d like to come by and purchase some.  Mindy the owner phoned and said they had to be dug out of the ground and were about 3 feet tall.  I said I had a Honda Civic and she said she thought they’d fit into the car, lying down.

I arrived on a farm near a nursery in the Glenmore Valley and was met outside by Mindy.  We went out to their blueberry and raspberry fields and she explained they were downsizing so were selling off almost all of the blueberry bushes.

Mindy’s a slight woman of East Indian descent but she wielded the shovel like a construction labourer.  It took two of us to get the root balls out as they were 30 or more pounds each.  Once out of the ground, each plant with its branches and root ball was massive.

We managed to get the four plants out of the ground and onto a tarp, then dragged them to the Civic, one by one.  Two were hoised onto the back seat, and the hardest part was lifting the other two into the trunk.  Somehow Mindy got the trunk lid shut.

We were both sweating and I handed her $26.00 and drove off wondering that would happen when I got home.  It’s funny but I’ve always pretty much lived in a fantsy world where I imagine something magical is going to happen.  It rarely does.

When I got home there were no elves waiting to help me unload, so I got a tarp and the wheelbarrow and began with the two behemoths on the back seat.  Somehow I got them out, and was amazed at the amount of soil left behind.  I’d brought a roll of plastic garbage bags but even with that there was dirt everywhere.

Lifting the huge root balls out of the trunk nearly killed me, but I did it.  Then I put them on a tarp, and one by one, dragged them down to the lower yard where the next day I dug four holes and planted them.  I doubt they’ll amount to much given the shovel went ka-wang! many times on rocks after about 18 inches of depth.  I think that’s the sum total of soil I put into the beds, and under that it’s solid bedrock.

At the gym today one of the instructors asked me what I did on the weekend and I said you don’t wanna know because my life is filled with mad eccentricities, and told her about the blueberry caper.  Most people just go to Art Knapps and buy a quart-sized container of plants.

I purchased a soil-testing kid and peat moss as Minday said blueberries like soil with a PH of 5 IE very acidic.  This afternoon I hoed around each plant and dug in as much peat moss as I could.  Then I put the sprinkler on  them as she said they like a fair bit of water.

From the past three days of working with the blueberries, I find I’m a complete physical wreck.  My hands are a mess and my body’s in a lot of pain.  But if I can whip up a nice blueberry fool in the summer it’ll all be worth it.

Now I’m ready to phone a guy named Sal, who advertises cuttings from exotic stuff he grows here in Kelowna like paw paw, persimmons, pistachios and more.  Fun!

Mom wanted me to move my income tax paperwork to her accountant in Osoyoos, which I did.  So far, it’s been nothing but a positive experience.  First of all, the bill was half of what I paid last year here in Kelowna.

Then I learned I’m officially poor, given my income from last year, so will get GST rebates and lowered medical premiums.  On top of this, I’ll be turning 60 so as a bonus I get 30% at Value Village on Tuesdays!

So not only am I poor but old too, which is really such good news when you think of it.  And imagine, on this paltry income I’ve just ordered $250 worth of bulls’ penises for my puppy.  We all have our priorities.

Pat, a really nice woman at the gym’s turning 80 at the end of this month, and she cycles there and back for the one hour cardio or weight training classes.  I said to her last week, “Pat, while you’re here, I have to be here, too.”  She’s a great inspiration as I age.

Last week I had two lovely lunches at the same restaurant with old pals.  The first was on Wednesday when I went to the Cactus Club and met Marie, a sign language interpreter I met over 20 years ago.

The second lunch was on Friday, and was with my old pal Ralph from university days.  He and I enjoy reminiscing about our year of teacher training.  We still speak fondly of Venn diagrams and re-tell stories we like, even though we know them so well.

Ralph asked about the fruitcake business and I told him last year was the last time I’d be selling to stores and henceforth all sales would be through my website.  When he asked why, I thought for a moment and said, “Make yer own damn fruitcakes, how about that for a reason?”

I told him I’m getting too old to be making 4000 fruitcakes to sell to stores, and after 10 years, I don’t want to.  He said his wife had recently given up her home daycare (raise yer own damn kids) and teaching yoga (learn yer own damn poses).

We agreed getting old meant setting very definite limits on what we would and wouldn’t do.  He’s like me and not motivated by money which usually confounds the hell out of people.  He pointed at his shirt and said “$3.00” as he also shops at thrift stores, and I pointed at mine and said, “$3.00 and it’s Sigrid Olsen.”

But even though my bills are low, my children like to live as though they’re millionaires, and do it in my house.  Luke currently has a Litecoin mining device running 24/7 in the basement, which generated a huge electrical bill which he tried to argue his way out of .

I held true to the peculiar oldster I’ve become, and managed to browbeat the money out of him.  And why not, as he and Nicky are currently la dee dahing it in Thailand?

On Saturday morning I went to the gym and then the Superstore as I usually do, and arrived home to be told by Nicky Luke was arriving later that day.  This always puts me into a bit of a tizzy as Luke’s got the appetite of a right whale and I need to know before I go shopping, not after, that he’s coming.

In any case, he arrived mid-afternoon and said he wanted to leave for Thailand within the next two or three days.  Another tizzy.  I raced to the thrift stores and looked for suitcases, as Nicky’s going with him and I’m loading them each with 80 pounds of gifts.

I know that sounds like a lot, but when you get a bed full of boxes of chocolate, toys, clothes and soaps, you soon realize you need a lot of luggage for all of this stuff.  I got a dozen boxes of Belgian chocolates at Costco as they’re wrapped so adorably and of course the price is right.

Nicky’s staying in Thailand for one month, and Luke’ll get a visa at that point to extend his stay, probably for another month and so he’ll be back mid-May.  Then he has some hare-brained scheme of renting my gramma’s old house in mom’s orchard in Osoyoos as his home base when he’s off from the oil rigs.

When you’re in Thailand for two months of the year, and at the oil rigs in Saskatchewan for ten, I fail to see how you need to rent a house in Osoyoos year-round.  There go mom and her handyman Alan’s dreams of renting the place by the week to tourists.

But apparently there are currently 70 homes listed as vacation rentals in Osoyoos, so maybe there wouldn’t have been a run on the little place anyway.  I’m staying out of it, but have the feeling somehow I’ll be dragged into the midst of this arrangement.

It’s kind of interesting when you’re given a square half the size of a bandaid and you choose your exterior house colour from this.  Then when the hapless painter begins painting, you realize your house is going to be mauve.  I was pretty sure I was choosing a pale cafe au lait colour, but apparently not.

Perhaps when all of the coats are on, and it’s completely dry, there’ll be less of a pinkish mauve tint to the house.  If not, I’m going to tell everyone I chose a pinkish mauve because that’s my favourite colour, and as you know, being different is what life’s all about.

The rather interesting handyman who came to look at the deck project and give me a quote has disappeared.  Normally that wouldn’t bother me, but he drove off with one of the screens for my sunroom and never returned it!

I noticed when he was here his hands trembled and when I googled him I read an article that said he was a formerly homeless person who turned himself around.  He may have, but I sure wish he’d answer my e mails and bring back my screen.  Sadly, I don’t think he’s the right man for my deck reno and other odd jobs, do you?

However Mitch, a retired carpenter, is going to build the railing for me.  Then Mike will paint all of it mauvish pink and the place will gleam like an opalescent pearl.

Now that spring appears imminent, I can see I have an awful lot of garden work to do.  I was out there this morning with the dog and cats, and everything’s so heavily overgrown and rotten.  The Jupiter’s beard’s a messy perennial once the growing season’s over and is a pile of brown stems with noodle-like consistency.

I heard birds chirping this morning and see the sun so that’s why I think I’m so hopeful about spring.  Yet the plants don’t seem dismayed at all as I see sprouts of bleeding hearts and sedum coming out of the ground.

I went out for wings with a few pals on Wednesday evening then was deathly ill on Thursday.  I think I must have an allergy to alcohol, which is why I think it’s particularly brave of me to continue in the face of such adversity.

And once feeling sick, there’s no way I can do anything hard so I just got right into the car and drove to the Salvation Army thrift store.  I bought a couple of things for around $10 then hit the Mennonite’s and the hospital auxiliary.  Finally I ended up at Value Village, where I again spent some money on a few things.

For around $50 I managed to spend a good three hours getting outside of my mind and body so who can complain about that?  When I got into the car and drove off I thought, wow, I haven’t thought about feeling sick at all, and compared to Advil and Gravol, which are so hard on the liver, this seems to so much better.

I see I’ve bought a lovely top which doesn’t got with anything, so now I have to do a good bout of pants shopping.  What can occur there is I’ll end up with pants that don’t go with anything and need to return for some serious top shopping.  You can see how this can go on forever.

As it was the one-year anniversary of Jerry’s death, his sons David and Jerry Jr. decided to come to Osoyoos to hang around with mom which was awfully nice of them.  I had to get Jerry at the Kelowna airport on Friday afternoon, and then he, Louie and I drove down to Osoyoos.

Jerry and David grew up with a standard red dachshund called Crackers, who they called Crackie, so they both love dachshunds.  And Louie loves everybody anyway, so it was a good time for the dog.  Jerry photographed him from all angles so I hope to have nice shots to share on Facebook soon.

You may recall I was in a fight to the death with Moneris Solutions over closing my account with them, and I can report that it all ended up in my favour!  I received a nice call from a senior customer service rep who assured me all charges would be reversed.  So if you ever feel unjustly treated, for God’s sake do something about it.

Today I’m going to try a new cake recipe and I hope it’s good because I’m taking it to Kathy’s tomorrow for Petra’s birthday dinner.  It’s an orange cake, and has orange mousse between the layers and then butter cream icing over all.  Orange zest goes into the cake, mousse and icing so it should be flavourful.  Perhaps I picked orange as it’s spring-like?

In 2007 I thought I should get credit card capability on my website.  Somehow I heard about Moneris Solutions and applied to them, and have been able to process Visa and Mastercard payments ever since for a usorious fee.

There’s the percentage charged per transaction, of course, but then there are also “service fees” and surprise! there is no actual service.  I recently decided to inquire further about these fees a couple of months ago, and called Moneris.

The customer service agent I spoke with said I could get a lower rate if I entered the card numbers on-line, rather than on the phone as I do now.  He said they’d send me a secret password to get started.  Nothing arrived for over a month, then two days ago a terminal and a bunch of wires arrived by courier.

Seeing this just confirmed to me I had to get away from Moneris, as this customer service rep had lead me to believe I was entering in my computer, and made no mention of a terminal and pin pad!  Also, I really don’t want to pay their fees any longer, and probably don’t need credit card capability for my customers anyway. I notice many people prefer to pay by cheque or with bank transfers, which are so easy and free.

So two days ago I phoned to cancel my contract with Moneris and that’s when all Hell broke loose.  I told my story and was transferred three times, and put on hold for several minutes each time, which was really helpful in making me feel absolutely sure getting away from Moneris was the right thing to do.

I spoke with a gal named Amanda, and for some reason I brought up the terminal which I’d just received.  She stated, “I don’t have any record of you having a terminal” to which I replied, “Well of course you wouldn’t, because your customer service is so poor.”  She said until the terminal was picked up and returned to them, they couldn’t close my account, so she said she would make sure that happened.

I said great, and then she added there’s also a $300 cancellation fee!  I asked why, and she explained my contract had automatically been renewed last year and it’s in “the terms and conditions” of the contract. To say I was mad is like saying Kim Jong Un isn’t very nice.

Today I noticed more “service fees” from Moneris out of my account, and so this time I spoke with Diane.  I asked why, when I had been assured the account would be closed, more fees had come out.  She said it takes 5 – 7 days.  Then she phoned back and said she saw I had a terminal, and guess what, no arrangements had been made by our little Amanda for it to be picked up!

Had I not called today, Moneris would merrily be dinging me with “service fees” and I would be assuming they’d snatched the $300 from my account as per the “contract” and it was closed.   Then in a couple of weeks I would see even more service fees, have to phone again, reach yet another agent, who’d go, “Oh I see Diane didn’t put that request through……”

Someday however, I’ll be seeing the back of Moneris amd then I can laugh about the whole situation, much like you do after a really bad hemorrhoid has gone away.  What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.  I also decided besides putting up with that, it’s good to make a Better Business Bureau complaint, which I did, and I’m sending a letter to their head office as well.  May as well spread the misery around.