On with the season!

A few days ago mother nature so gently nudged me into realizing it was in fact November in Edmonton, random snow falls and all:

At first I was down. And cold.

Then I remembered three things ... namely Puff:

Skipper:

and Rose:

About three Christmases ago I was downtown for an office Christmas dinner, but my fear of arriving late when I do not know how long it will take me to get someplace new left me with many minutes to spare before I was to run into anyone else. So I decided to engage in some window shopping. I had only enough money in my pocket for my meal that eve, so no treasures were to be coming home with me at all.

Then I sensed someone staring out from a shelving unit cluttered with some of most ghastly and tacky Christmas decorations imaginable. Six coal briquette eyes burrowing holes in me, begging me to release them from their low-rent neighbours:

The best I can do, I promised as I cuddled them in my arms before placing them carefully back in their unfortunate circumstance, is come back later in the week to set them free.

All the way back to the restaurant, Puff's pleading (yes, I had already named him by then) resonated in my head. Back on the restaurant's doorstep, my watch revealed 20 minutes remained before I was expected to appear at dinner. I knew it was a sign. That eve, dinner would be put on my credit card and I would be undertaking a festive rescue.

Welcome back out, my cheerily rotund friends. I just wish it was holiday season year-round.

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A Picture Puzzler

A friend sent me another picture from the wrap party. As I looked at it, and recalled the good times, I was struck by something really unusual. See if you can spot it: I'll give you all some time to guess...

And they called me mad when I bought the bunker in the woods!

I had heard that one way of thwarting telemarketers was to make them think the number they have dialed is in fact a fax machine. I've tried different tones on my cordless phone, all to no avail. Then I had an epiphany: When I turned sixteen, my sister bought me a new-fangled telephone. It had push buttons, but it was still just a rotary phone - when you pressed each button to dial, you still heard the rotary "tat-a-tat-tat-tat" with every number. I had held onto this phone ever since. It's cute. It works. There was no reason to get rid of it. I was willing to bet that, in this day and age of advanced technology rendering yesterday's device obsolete on a daily basis, a telemarketer - who is likely going to be decades younger than my phone - would be unable to even identify a rotary phone by sight much less by sound. And voila! Answering the phone with my rotary phone, and constantly pressing the buttons, the telemarketer kept repeating "Hello?

Batten down the hatches -- we're in it for the long haul!

Given that the weather reports for Edmonton this weekend are grim grim grim (lows of minus 33, highs of minus 25 -- with wind chills of around minus 35 to 40), I woke up early this morning to get all errands for the weekend out of the way in one fell swoop. I barely needed a coat this morning as I headed out to my car to embark on my mission. With each passing hour, the thermometer dipped a degree or twelve. By time I was done driving around (and paused to catch a movie at the neighbourhood googolplex), it was chill-lay outside. I am now snuggly boarded up in my apartment, with no plans to so much as peek my nose out my window until Tuesday (when the temps shall return to a balmy minus 15). Groceries? Check. Toiletries? Check. Magazines to curl up with? Check. Christmas Presents? Check. Lessee, I got my father what he's been asking for since I was old enough for him to give me his Christmas wish list: And I think my mother will enjoy her bungalow by the stream: For my sister and he

A Skewed View

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