I was both shocked and elated to find out the Hall Road area has been designated a “no-growth” zone by the City. Right beside me a developer had wanted to put in a subdivision with 16 homes, but with this designation, he can’t. My view is saved, along with the coyote dens that are on that land.

Then today I was shocked and maddened to hear from my pal Lorraine who lives on Manhattan Drive that the City is trying to buy up all of those homes, level them, and turn that into a park. As they had just built this house a few years ago, Lorraine said she doesn’t want to move, plus who would buy the house knowing the City will eventually get you out anyway?

I just find the City’s decisions to be quite fascinating. The old heritage area downtown has been designated for densification. Of all areas in Kelowna, this is filled with lovely old homes on large, landscaped lots. Now they’ll have to put up with carriage houses and perhaps the destruction of some single-family homes for small apartment buildings.

As there’s not one single thing anyone can do about these things, I keep my mind on the things I might be able to control. These appear to be few and far between as well, given on the latest “treasure hunt” with Elsa I came home with yet another oil painting.

Another thing out of my control is poor old mom and her declining health. The other day the care aide found her on the ground and had to call the paramedics to help get her up. Luke and Jan are also available at times, though both work, and so I’ve decided to come weekly now as mom’s in such bad shape. However, she’ll likely keep on ticking, knowing mom.

Do you recall how I used to like saying Stephen Colbert’s band leader Jon Batiste was my boyfriend? He’s moved on, as have I. I’m now madly in love with Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen. I have never in my life experienced such heady potty mouth as Michael’s. When I met Denis on a blind date, and I realized he swore with every other word, I knew this was the guy for me. We married soon after.

When Michael calls someone a “f.ing putz” I swoon. I notice when I go on tirades people blanche a bit, and I think it’s because I look so f. ing innocent. Ha ha. They’re not used to hearing such colourful descriptions coming from such a sweet old lady. Though at the Puerto Vallarta airport I met the loveliest young woman of English descent who had no problems with the term I used to describe a person who irritated me.

I believe I can trace it back to my gramma. She suffered from potty mouth, though it was all in German. I learned absolutely hilarious Schwabian expressions as a child and just thought that was a normal way of speaking. I sure miss my gramma.

One thing I’m surprised and happy to be able to report that I was able to control, was my food intake. I’ve now lost ten pounds since January, and I did it largely by following the Weight Watchers diet though I didn’t join as so much of it is available on-line. I couldn’t control my cocktail intake, though, and still lost weight, so I say, “bottoms up.”

I’ve written about my bouts of euphoria in the past, and said when I googled it, I learned it could be the sign of a terminal disease. Twenty years later, and nada, so I figure it’s just plain old euphoria over being alive and especially living in Canada. Our main worries seem to revolve around how to utilize the 1.8 litre Hellman’s mayo we stupidly bought at Costco. In other words, nothing.

Of course, with cat ownership one is often brought down to Earth by their habits. Yesterday I noticed a mouse head, well not really the head but the snout and whiskers, lying on some dried blood. I thought I have to get a paper towel to clean that but having a hummingbird’s ability to be distracted, I forgot. Then this morning after walking down the hall I realized I’d kicked the mouse head without noticing, as now it’s dry and light as a fluff ball.

Margaret was here over the long weekend which was tremendous fun as always. We went to thrift on Saturday where she found a new pair of Ecco pink leather runners for $15.00 and an Old Navy brown trench for $4. We love stuff like that. I screamed for joy when I found a 6-cup plastic filter cone as I’ve been looking for months. I need to be able to make vats of coffee at once for the German visitors and I only have the silly 2-cup cone.

Denis and his long-time pal Ralph came to visit us on Sunday. They scared Frieda so badly with the sound of their motorcycles she had a diarrhea attack in the kitchen. Fun. We had a lot of good laughs, mostly over the offspring, so that was great. Only parents can really get into the crux of what makes their children insane.

I’ve found a new mania in the yard, the lawn. For 20 years I’d watch Denis aerating and fertilizing and ignored it, wondering what it all meant. So, for the past 14 years I’ve done nothing except water, and over time I noticed the moss and creeping buttercup, but thought hey, it’s green isn’t it? However now there’s very little grass left so in a total fit I ordered aerating, moss-killing, and thatching, and now I’m out on my hands and needs pulling out tufts of moss.

It’ll likely never return to being a proper lawn, but at least I have a new obsession, right? The old ones, such as dahlia collection have also kept me busy as I planted the bulbs I’d stored over the winter, and 22 of them turned into plants again, so that’s an awful lot of planting to do. I did half a week or so ago, and today the dogs and I’ll go out and get mighty dirty and love it.

As I’ve said we have Amazon deliveries almost daily thanks to Calvin, the Gen Zer, and the other day the old Purolator driver came, and we chatted a bit. He looked at my Ponderosa pines and cedar hedges and said well I guess if there’s a fire, there’s not a lot you can do here. I agreed and said I’m sure not logging off 30 mature trees just in case there’s a fire one day, then went inside and packed a Tupperware of precious stuff to take to Osoyoos, just in case.

I really hate people who worry all the time because what does it do? Ruins your present moment and sure as hell doesn’t stop that thing from happening or not happening. I refuse to do that to myself because I have too much to do in a day as it is. Imagine wasting my precious time on that.

We’ve been warned of impending drought this summer, and along with that the concomitant wildfires, yet so many people leave dead cedar bushes ringing their homes. We were wrong to buy them when we did, and I’d never do it again as they need so much water. But if you have them, you do have to water, or else they die and then if you leave them and one cigarette butt is thrown, look out.

34 years ago when we moved into this house we noticed many yards were ringed with cedar bushes and when we went to the nurseries they had tons of them, so we naturally thought this is the plant to buy. However it’s not a desert plant, and so can imagine the amount of water these hedges require?

And then add to that the thick pine needle drop in Sutherland Hills Park and you can just sense another disaster of fire waiting to happen. My Ponderosa pines are part of that forest, as we live in a beautiful heavily wooded area. We all love trees until they burn down our homes, but I can’t worry about it. I can only hope the City recognizes needle drop in a public park and dead cedars around homes are hazards.

Social media sure works, as I posted on the Osoyoos Connect Facebook page that mom’s phone wasn’t working thanks to being switched over to some high falutin’ cellular network. Over 100 people commented, and over 60 emojis were posted, most of them angry, and the nice Telus person who was working on mom’s house said he got several calls from concerned citizens.

Just a suggestion, but if you really want to get something done, post on social media. The downside, as we all know, are trolls making rude or stupid comments, but I didn’t actually get any of those on this post about mom’s phone. Though when I posted about the thick pine needle drop on the Hall Road Facebook page, I got some ignorant results.

And while we’re onto suggestions, if you have stuff you really don’t know what to do with, put it into a box and drop it at Value Village. They’ll sort and recycle. Where else can you drop half a can of old paint, a broken fan, old photo albums or ancient books with that tiny print? Exactly. Instead of putting them into the landfill, let Value Village decide what’s garbage and what isn’t.

And who among us thrift store shoppers hasn’t bought an item that seemed wonderful only to discover it’s got issues. I bought a great hard-sided carry-on suitcase at the Salvation Army for around $10 and was smug all the way home. Then after trying to lift and release the handle a few times and realizing it was super sticky, I went oh that’s why it’d been dropped to thrift. Tit for tat, right?

I’m quite sure this is going to lead to a disaster, however Romany Runnalls, the nice volunteer president of the Okanagan Humane Society, said they’re always looking for host foster families as they don’t have a facility and count on volunteers. I said I doubt I’d qualify as my pets aren’t vaccinated, plus I already have two dogs and two cats so could become a hoarder quite easily.

However Romany replied that’s not a problem, thanks a lot, we always need volunteers, you’ll be doing such a good thing….. so just make a note of this date so that when I hit the papers, you’ll know why.

I sometimes imagine myself in a condo, no yard, just hours and hours of free time to fritter away. But then I go out and start shoveling, then get the wheelbarrow and load it up with pulled weeds and soon I start to imagine what it’s going to look like in summer. Due to the minus 27 in January, I see my blanket flowers (gaillardia), heliotrope and penstemon all died. Wimps, I guess.

Also gone are the two bunches of arrowleaf balsamroot flowers that were here when we arrived 34 years ago. That makes me particularly sad because my dad used to pick a huge bouquet of them in the hills above Osoyoos and bring them to my mom each spring. I’m grateful a third bunch is alive right at the top of the driveway, but now I wonder if it’ll disappear too. I can’t imagine it was the winter, but it could be the ton of pine needle debris under which they tried to live.

The area to the left of my driveway, which is covered in pines and where the indigenous flowers lived, was given to the City by the O’Reilly’s in exchange for their permission to develop the subdivision. Mrs. O’Reilly visited a couple of decades ago and said she and her husband gave a lot of extraneous small pieces of land to the City, which was super nice, but kind of unnecessary in my mind. I mean, the City??

Another sad thing I noticed is no more hooey hoo hoo hoo from the mourning doves. There are now ring-necked doves that are invasive and seem to have overpowered my birds. I grew up with that sound. Have I mentioned how much I fear and loathe change?

And finally, I used to see the last stars when I sat on my couch in the early morning, but now, nope. Thank you to everyone who thinks it’s very important to keep an outside light on so that no other person needs to be bothered by pesky twinkling stars.

I went to Osoyoos last week and came to the realization that Luke isn’t a gardener. It’s not his thing, and I’m not there often or long enough to work in the garden, so we had to get some help. The hint it wasn’t working was the five-foot-long, two-foot-wide, one-foot-deep gouge he’d “trimmed” into the side of the hedge. All I said was “don’t ever do that again.”

My nice new neighbours, Sylvie and Jim, who live beside my vegetable garden, were admiring the bamboo I planted in the corner many years ago. It’s incredible as you can see its progress day to day. It must grow at least six inches daily. How or why it would do this in a temperate climate, and especially given all that was killed during the sudden cold snap, is the question. It’s quite the champion.

Because having 22 dahlias in pots, ready to plant into the garden aren’t enough, Sylvie and I went to Costco today and visited their nursery. The other day I noticed fruit trees were around $125 at Art Knapps, but here they were $55 so I bought a plum. The soil was $17 instead of $45, so as sorry as I feel for the nurseries, Costco sure can compete.

But now I have to find a spot, then dig a nice big hole for that plum. It’s odd that I’d buy another fruit tree, given I’ve had maybe three cherries in total from the tree I planted about five years ago. I don’t think the twelve-year-old apricot’s had a lot of fruit for the past couple of years so why do I think this plum tree is different? Hope springs eternal.

My kitchen sink’s been draining very slowly over the past while, so I finally called in a plumber to snake out the drain. I still have the old, galvanized pipes in some areas, and this is one of them, so they’re very rough and easily clogged with gunk. He’s currently in the kitchen working away while I hide back here, praying for him to hurry up and get out. No reason really as he’s quite pleasant, however I like being alone in the house.

Turns out the plumber also has a dachshund, a mini named Lucy so we bonded immediately over that. He and his wife also have five cats, so what’s not to love about someone like that? Now it remains to be seen if the sink snake-out actually did its job. As we know, no German relative may visit and see a sink that drains like that.

The ten-day stint of minus 27 in January seems to have taken out quite a few of my garden plants as well as the Valley’s grapes. So off to The Greenery I went to shop like a wild hyena for all manner of lovely perennials, then yesterday Petra and I went to Vernon to two nurseries there, and I hauled home more flowers. Now to wait for a sunny day to plant them all.

I can only do about two hours a day in the yard and then the body starts to say no. I have a handy low stool which helps with weeding, but even with that, the old carcass starts to balk at odd postures. And then I like to do things like dig out deep-rooted plants with a hand shovel so that it also feels completely trashed.

So I intersperse thrift store treasure-hunting with garden work and that seems to help though lately it’s been pricey as I can’t stop buying things I don’t need because they’re $5.00. However, five dollars times God knows how many items equals a lot of wasted dough. And then we can’t try on in some of these stores so when I get them home and realize they don’t fit they’re donated back. Let’s face it, Elsa and I are heroes for all we give to charity.

Mom’s been battling with her body for 99 years and it appears she’s losing the battle. She’s very tippy and has no balance so is nervous to move. Then she’s also got awful spells of dizziness and has terrible back pain from compression fractures of the spine. In other words, aging is the pits and she’s not enjoying it. Her only comfort is the four litres of wine she drinks in a week and the couple of pounds of chocolate to go with it.

I’m losing the fight when it comes to YouTube as channels like The Bulwark, The Meidas Touch and Brian Tyler Cohen have me glued to them. I tell myself it’s not necessary to check these channels throughout the day, but I continue to fall for the algorithm’s sensationalistic captions, like “Trump goes into panic mode with DESPERATE stunt.” How can I resist that?

I also enjoy River, or River Royal as she dishes the dirt on Harry and Meghan, my dear, with the loveliest English accent. She also enjoys shopping at thrift and is a fan of J.K. Rowling. Again, what’s not to love here?

Something I do find detestable is my neighbour who insists on having a bright LED outdoor light on all night long. Why? I just heard an article on CBC Radio about the dangers of LED lighting to all living things. If only I had a YouTube channel, where I could, my dear, talk about all manner of miscreants.

Of the seven deadly sins, gluttony is the one that nearly did me in. On Sunday late afternoon I was ravenous with hunger and had made myself a lovely chicken curry. As I was sitting down, I was already starting to shovel food in with my left hand, but somehow my right hand, which was holding a knife, decided to poke me very hard in the eye.

I had to eat my way through the pain, then down a couple of cocktails as well, and managed to sleep okay. Monday first thing I phoned the optometrist, and the first opening was today (Wednesday) at 9:00. I kept looking at my eye and since no blood was pouring out, and my vision seemed okay, I figured there’s no point in going to emergency.

When the doctor had a look she said, “Oh wow, you really did a number on your eye!” She said I’d managed to take a gouge out of it, and prescribed antibiotic ointment. Of course her first question had been to ask how it had occurred, and when I told her she chuckled and said food really does shape how we behave, especially when hungry.

I was in Osoyoos for two nights last weekend as Gerry’s son David and his wife Hang (she’s Vietnamese) came to visit from Virginia. I made fudge with melted chocolate, peanut butter and fruit-flavoured mini marshmallows. As predicted everyone ate it with glee and said it was magnificent. It sounds odd but tastes so evilly good. Luke said to Hang “You should get the recipe” and she replied that was the last thing she’d ever want to know how to make.

The other week I looked at my living room and decided I hated the rattan couch and chairs and began hunting around online. As I wanted to know what the new couch would look like, I re-arranged the furniture, as per the suggestions of my pal Alison, whose taste can be trusted. I liked it a lot, but still felt piqued by the couch.

Then a few days later my friend Patricia came for lunch. She was the director of a museum and is an expert in textiles. I asked her what to do, and she declared the rattan as perfect, but said the white couch needed a fabric on it. As a classic thrift store shopper I got out a pile of tablecloths I’ve made over the years from beautiful designer fabrics. She draped them and chose one and voila, I now love the living room!

I saved a couple of thousand dollars in that venture so that was another wonderful bonus of keeping everything, just switching it around. I needed four blue pillows and was able to shop in my own home for those. I tell ya, there are a lot of benefits to hoarding thrift store items.

And as a homeowner I need to save wherever possible, given I just had a guy come and put disinfectant on the moss on my roof and clean out the gutters. He’ll return to wash the windows, and will pressure wash some hideous areas that I’ve looked at for years. As I said to him, “German relatives are coming!” I want this house all shiny and nice for them. He’s of Belgian descent so could totally relate.

Now I just have to try to keep sharp objects out of my eyes as I begin the long slog out in the yard. God knows I have enough opportunities to injure myself out there.

There’s nothing that’ll put the fear of God into you like the knowledge German relatives are coming. I look at the house and think this place is a dump. What to do other than scurry about phoning a roof cleaner, a handyman to do the deck, and the garden helper to prune and haul away pine needles. My French doors lost their seal and will be replaced next month. I need to arrange for window cleaning.

I’ve hated the chest of drawers in the guest room since I bought it 20 years ago, so finally made a serious search, putting out positive vibes, and found a nice replacement on Facebook Marketplace. Bit by bit I’m going to slap this house into shape so that it no longer resembles the old shack it really is. But you know how I love this place, crappy or not.

Thinking about summer I decided it’d be nicer for the public not to have to deal with my large stomach so went online and checked out Weight Watchers recipes and generally thought I was on a diet. How wrong a person can be. I haven’t lost one single ounce in three weeks of trying to eat like a normal person. I feel like I may as well go back to the gargantuan amounts I like to power back as it appears to make no difference.

Trevor, a young man who I’ve known since he was about 15 as he’s a friend of Luke’s, is going to illustrate my Kindle Direct Publishing book, the one which is a compilation of newsletter articles. I said to him since the book is supposed to be funny, and as dachshunds are known as the comedians of the dog world, perhaps we could scatter cartoon wiener dogs here and there. He sent me a couple of drawings before we began to have a look at what he could do, and I loved them instantly as he has that ability to put soul into their eyes.

Here’s one of the awful things I have to do before I die: I have to figure out what to do with my grandfather’s old stamp collection. I met with a nice man who’s in the stamp club here and he’s taking some samples to a convention in Vernon where collectors from up and down the Okanagan Valley will be meeting. As you can imagine, I dream about having that one special stamp, but I’ve already Googled quite a few and have gone drat.

A wonderful thing I discovered are two young gals who were able to clean the dogs’ teeth without anaesthesia. I drove Louie and Frieda over to the place and the dogs went in all confused, and the girl said the dogs behave a lot better without their owners there, so shooed me out, and said they’d call. I said as stubbornness is a trait of dachshunds, I wasn’t holding out a lot of hope.

I drove home, and as one hour passed, I knew one dog had been done and then when the second hour came and went I thought yahoo! Both dogs have had their teeth cleaned, and Louie’s were really dirty and his breath stunk. I was so enthralled by their ability I took a dozen butterscotch chip cookies as a tip for a job well done.

It’s sunny and nice and supposed to go all the way to 18 C on the weekend, so I’ll have to haul my carcass out to rake and start to do some preliminary work in the yard. March is an exceptionally ugly month in the Okanagan as everything is grey, but today the sky’s blue so all’s well.

A couple of weeks ago I was proud of my tulips as they were already poking up a good three or four inches. Now imagine my dismay at seeing those stalks completely frozen as last night it was minus 10. For me it’s an aesthetics problem but for farmers climate change is a disaster we can now witness in real time in the Okanagan.

Because it was so balmy all fall the trees and grapevines were humming along, no thought of preparing for winter. Then in January within a day or two it was minus 30 degrees which has reportedly killed almost every grape, cherry and peach in the Valley.

And now with the low snowpack we’re told to expect a major drought, and then add a possible heat dome in summer and we’ll have ravenous forest fires coming toward us again.

So as usual I’m happy I save that paper towel that I used for drying lettuce to reuse it for something else, and proud to see used plastic wrap sitting in the drawer waiting to wrap a leftover. Then I read about the billions of tons of waste in the oceans thanks to cruise ships, or the mountains of discarded unsold fast fashions in the landfills, and wonder if my efforts might be in vain.

Never mind. We all have to do whatever we can, wherever we can. And speaking of which, Elsa and I are going to hunt for treasures tomorrow, followed by lunch at Chutney on Pandosy Street. Though God knows all of the lunches I’ve eaten of late have decided to remain on my stomach so that I perpetually appear to be seven months pregnant.

I don’t need to be out eating and wasting time given the enormous amount of projects I have before me. I know you’ll find this hard to believe, but I’ve compiled favourite newsletter articles into a book, and have named it Okay, I’ll Bite. Now I need to find a genius to format it and probably an artist for the cover and some cartoons, then off to Kindle Direct Publishing. If I sell two or three copies, I’m fine with that.

I’m writing a second eBook on starting a home-based baking business based on the Nuttier than a Fruitcake experience. To prepare I’m reading old emails I sent to mom and they’re quite hilarious because they’re not only updates on the business, but stories about life with adult children in the home. I’m glad I blocked some of that out.

Not content with the world of e publishing, I decided to get rid of stuff I no longer need, and if it’s of value, to try and sell it. I started with the old Brio wooden train tracks which I set up with a few trains and photographed, then will put it on Facebook Marketplace. I have a garbage bag filled with Lego that I plan to get rid of the same way. I do give a lot to thrift, but these items might bring in a bit of dough, and that’s always good.

I had a very nice lunch with Denis last Friday. He came from Midway arriving at noon and stayed until 2:30 which was rare but turned out to be a very good visit. He loved the chicken souvlaki, roasted potato, tzatziki and Greek salad I’d made us. It’s good to have a decent relationship with an ex when there are kids involved as let’s face it only the other partner who knows exactly what’s up with a kid.

This cold snap isn’t just bothering fruit it’s also making the hens mad as we haven’t had one single egg for at least six weeks. Everything’s angry at this strange weather.

Was the person who wrote Groundhog Day retired, because that’s pretty much the way my life is. There’s a definite sameness to my days, and I think back on my gramma when she was my age, and think our lives are not all that dissimilar.  She’d make breakfast, do dishes, make beds, vacuum, make lunch, do the dishes again, then was quite happy to sit in the living room smoking her Matinees while watching her soaps for the rest of the afternoon.

In my case you can substitute YouTube for T.V. and the result is pretty much the same.  I like to fool myself into thinking I’m learning something, and at times there’s a documentary that does teach me a fact or two, but the majority of it, according to my algorithm, is true crime and what kind of crap Trump is up to.

Then there are the on-going lunches which I love to do. My friend Lona who used to work at Rucastle and Schiller was here on Tuesday, and as she has four books on Amazon, I needed her valuable advice on my vanity project. It appears I’ll have to shell out several hundred dollars for the formatting as my book has a lot of pictures and needs someone who knows what they’re doing. As you know, this isn’t me.

Yesterday Elsa and I went to thrift, then returned for lunch and had leftover spinach quiche. I bought a painting, then didn’t like where we’d hung it, and today managed to redecorate my bedroom. I hung the new painting over my bed, then realized the bedspread was all wrong so returned to my old green leaf theme. Now I walk into my room every few minutes just to admire my own genius.

Marie’s a stalwart when it comes to lunch. A couple of weeks ago I thawed and heated up a soup I’d made after Christmas with the turkey carcass. To jazz it up I added some really freaky looking purple Japanese yams. Anyway, suffice to say we choked it down and Marie was brave enough to eat all of it with just a hint of surprise at the inferior lunch being presented. 

And then I’ve walked Mission Creek with Sharon, and had coffee with John Patterson, so my life ticks along in a comfortable groove. Sharon and I meet at the same place and do the same walk each time. John and I always go to Specialty Bakery, and we get a deep-fried donut of some kind (he goes for the apple fritters) and we have coffee. I’m a creature of habit so all of this is good.

To say mom’s a handful is like saying a rabid dog loose in a daycare would be a problem. But even here we have predictability. In my daily call to mom she informs me the women who come daily at 9:00 are really not needed. Mom said she explained to one of them the other day they don’t really do a lot for the money she’s paying. I said how did Karen take that then? Mom said oh she totally agreed with me.

They’re good, eh? A company with workers trained to work with the elderly. It’s a help to me as mom lives to talk. I’m like my dad, I’m good with silence. So even if these women come for one hour a day and do nothing but talk, it’s worth it to me. And of course no matter what mom says I know they make the bed, dress her, do the dishes, make her coffee, etc. in that hour. Saves my mental health quite cheaply.