Happy birthday to my brother!

For my brothers birthday I got myself a present. Not on purpose but because my phone expired, I had to get a new one. And by expired I mean that the network no longer works, the phone is fine.
This is the old and the new:

More expensive but a good upgrade. It has unlimited talk and text so I will be working on phasing out the home phone as soon as the contract with Bell is done.

As my brothers birthday meal I made guacamole turkey burgers.

 I had never HAD guacamole let alone made it before but my mother said that avocados were pretty unoffensive and so I tried. She was right.

 Salsa

 The salsa mixed in with the salad. Limes are great!

 Turkey burger

 With guacamole

 With leafy greens

 And salsa

 Finished product on a pretzel bun. Healthy meal!

catch up

This week was very full.

There was the award ceremony and Char's funeral on Wed.

Then my mother took the bus back on Thurs and I went back to work to try to catch up on taking the day off. Did not succeed!

Friday I worked again playing catch up during the day. Then in the evening went to Kim's Church for their 20th anniversary celebration.

James had a game today. I ran some errands in the morning and went in to work in the aft to prepare for a big meeting on Monday. I still have to get some documents together but am in much better shape to make it through Monday!

Inmate escapes and Oma arrives

An inmate escaped nearby a few days ago. There were many police cars around yesterday but today with the weather and the fact that they didn't find him yesterday I haven't seen anything going on. Likely he had a plan since they didn't find him quickly.

Oma arrived at 10pm and was immediately put to work helping with the English project that has been going on for days. So thankful she is here!

Inauguration

My dream last night was all about trying to organize presentations but nothing went right and it was all chaos.

This week I got a jalepeno burn while cooking. Not on the pasta dish. I love their pasta dishes.

 Enchilada skillet was very good.

 Filling

 Enchilada sauce

 Tortilla

 Filling

 Cheese

 Tortilla

 Enchilada sauce

 Cheese

 With a dollop of greek yogurt mixed with lime.

Rolling in

Apparently a biker gang has rolled into the neighbourhood: http://www.ckwstv.com/2017/01/17/biker-gang-rolls-into-town-outlaws-open-clubhouse-on-princess-st/ Work is very busy as it is still week 2. I did make it through my email. The next few days I am working on communication workshops and sorting all enrollments out by Friday. Also lots of meetings! I am behind on my dinner posting. Here are the ones from last week:
Applewood smoked steak. Very good but for the steak recipes I need to remember to double the cook time for them.






Butter Chicken Lasagna was very good. I always love their pasta recipes.The butter chicken was a nice twist.

Stories

This morning at Rustle some people told a bit about their stories, which is always interesting to hear. I had some really good talks as well. After Rustle I ran some errands. I got home and had lots to do. I was trying to avoid my work email but some things had to be taken care of so I did a bit of work. I have a late training session tomorrow so I'll be heading in to work a bit late. After the training session I have a board meeting. Another story:

An even 200

When I left work yesterday my email had crept up to 200 in my inbox. It was a very busy week. After work, I went to the Krock to help run a 50/50 draw to raise money for minor hockey. James didn't get back from Whitby until 2am. I went out to Rustle in the morning to sell a washer, got a haircut and ran a lot of errands. Now it is 2pm and I just had lunch. For the rest of the day I have a lot of work to do around the house, some Kijiji posting and try to tackle my personal email. My work email will have to wait until Monday.

windy night

"Even from a dark night songs of beauty can be born" Mary Anne Radmacher

blizzard of uncertain precipitation

Last night James checked the snow day predictor and it was only 5%. But when we woke up in the morning, the buses were cancelled in anticipation of the storm. So James had a snow day. And by the afternoon it was blizzardy. I was running all day. I had a late training session so I didn't leave the office until 7pm. By then things had quieted down weather wise. I'm not sure what the precipitate was when I was walking home- a somewhat spiky rain.

Plans

My plan on Monday was to clean the bathrooms but I discovered the Bachelor was starting so I watched it instead. On Tuesday I worked all day so by the time I got through dinner and cleanup I did not have any time for bathrooms. On Wednesday I had the day off but was running errands during the day so again by the time dinner and cleanup was done I did not have time for bathrooms. On Thursday I but the day odd but prepared for the finance committee, updated the course website for my other job, ran some errand. Then in the evening had a finance committee meeting so didn't get them done either. This morning, James and I spent working on his homework for To Kill a Mockingbird which were thoughtful questions, but as he has not experienced much of what they were talking about in his life, he had a hard time giving thoughtful responses. I probably need to go out and run more errands today- we'll see if the bathrooms get accomplished later!

Char

Char passed away on Monday. He had a hard couple of years. I went in to work yesterday and had a lot to do despite all my preparations. I am taking the rest of this week off though. Though I started today with a work phone call, then went to Food basics. I picked up a pork tenderloin for $7.00 intending to make a recipe similar to a chef's plate one that I had done and liked. When I went to make it up, I found that there were 2 pork tenderloins for the $7, so there is dinner for tomorrow as well! In the afternoon, I went to Loblaws- they had clothing for half price so I checked it out and got some shirts for James.

First day of the year

Today at Rustle we had a most wonderful service- it was run by the Butlers and we sang Christmas carols. There was no sermon but there was a list of questions (31) that we answered one of. There were only 20 people there so it was a small homey group (there was even 1 new visitor) In the afternoon, I did some cleaning and watched a Dateline documentary mystery called "murder by the sea" Set in Nicaragua, an American is charged and convicted of a murder that he could not have possibly committed as there was plenty of proof of where he was and what he was doing but these things were discounted by the judge. In the face of facts and truth, the judge just decided that the person who was a known liar was telling the truth (and the "liar" was the one originally charged with the crime, but got out of it by claiming the American had done it) Later I watched the morning service at Kim's Church online- it is the service that they normally do on New Year's Eve. It was about 3 hours. James has a friend over right now. I expect to go to bed early as I'll be working tomorrow. I need to make some lists for the year.

Happy new year!

In a change of routine this year, Kim's church did not have a new years watch service, so I did not have a service to go to. To make up for it I was watching the one thing conference livestream. However, I just realized that they are an hour behind so it is not the new year for them. I am not sure I can stay up another hour! I went to Loblaws before it closed today. Then walked to Rustle. I saw the 24 hour donut store closing up. The snowplows heading back to the yard. The sidewalks were kind of mushy at that point. When I went out a few hours later they were pretty icy. Welcome 2017!