sleep?????

Well camp is great but I certainly am, reminded why I do not normally work in the mornings. They suck!

NEW FABULOUS TRAVEL SHOES....

Okay world...here I come...in these shoes....

and they don't smell like cat pee....and well, don''t tell D as he left the shoes in pee's way, but these are waaaaaay more comfy and I feel like I could climb a mountain in them.

cat pee and cork....

Yuch......

No one should have to start their day by putting their foot in a shoe full of cat pee.

Yes, that happened and I am just now recovering.

And not any shoes mind you, noooooooo......... they are my new and expensive, going travelling and needed to break in, shoes.

 Sigh..I blame D...he knows this one spot in the house is a cat magnet and if the litter box is notto  the Duchess's liking she will look elsewhere. To D's credit , he has soaked and cleaned and we are hopeful the shoes can be salvaged..but...cork and leather.......I don't know.

it would not be fun to be on a train in Romania, sharing a berth with strangers and stinking of cat pee.....really...just not cool!

Sage gets thumbs up at vet...

Just home from show and D tells me that nothing worrying showed up on xray.....thyroid is fine..a titch low normal but nothing that needs medicine, we wiil watch....
My vet I believe, thinks the other dude seriously overeacted..can't believe they took 4 biopsies for an obvious staph infection and said if her 14 year old is in as good as sage as sage when he is 15, she will be happy.

D and Sage came home happy, went for a nice walk to the field with Niko...no issue with where she whacked herself and sage is just right as 15 year old rain.

We are breathing A lot easier.....Dr. P I think, was quite pissed at other yahoo vet she was polite but daiv said you copuld read between her lines,...lupus upset,ulcer orries, bladder stone upset etc..... she feels the inflamation and irritation sage occasionaly gets around her vagina could more than explain the red blood cells in the urine and even if it doesn't she sees nothing that is alarming and if anything looks worse we will go from there.

Ofcourse, she recognizes there may be things we can't see...but she does not see the need for any further testing..she trusts our knowing how sage is doing and will be available for us to come in the future as we need her. No indication of lumps....she had a very good feel and ran quite a few xrays ( at no cost to us) I know she feels crappy we spent so much on dioagnostics only to spin in wrong directions.

Yayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayayy! antijinx!

Sage is getting spoiled tonight.

Sage...dear old girl...

Poor old Sage gave herself a good whack yesterday.

Got out of bed too fast and banged her back end on the bed rail ( sage is our 15 year old Husky/chow cross)

She seems to be fine today but we thought she may have had a stroke or something at the time.

Sigh....she is getting older......she is slowing down.....she is still motoring about on her own 4 legs, and she is still telling everyone she is boss dog. 

For now I am going to simply enjoy every single day and not look at it as a long goodbye, but rather a gift of learning to live in the moment together.

whew..and a week goes by...

I am constantly amazed at how much talent these kids I get to work with truly have.

In a mere 4 days, they have, researched, improvised,written and story boarded and created a theatre piece about the history of the Hudson Bay Company they are performing tomorrow. 

They have also constructed all the shadow puppets, set pieces and accessories necessary for their performance.

I am in awe of the energy and focus.

I am also exhausted by it. The harder they work, the more they need from myself and my directing partner B.

They are fearless in their work and exploration and I love watching them grow as actors every day.

It isn't quite as much fun to watch them getting taller than me though....I hate being short!

They are trying to Kill Me!...

but it is a good kind of death.

Camp is going fantastic. these kids are outrageously talented and require so much of my team and I's brains that I come home more than a little fried...however what they are creating with all that....magic.

Sigh...I heart Tumbleweeds Theatre!

Summer camp ...

and so begins another year of theatre camp.

Car is loaded to the max full of fun things and supplies and puppets...lesson plans have been carefully prepared and I am singing the summer camp anthem...

"Are you ready for the summer..? Are you ready for the good times?

Why.,.....oh why has that song not left my head for 20 years?

Damn you Bill Murray!

Sunday sunshine and furries...

It is a gorgeous day here and I am making preparations for my theatre camp to start tomorrow.

The week settled into a lovely pace of friends and furries and time at home with D.

We picked up a funky mahogany sideboard for the kitchen which then involved changing the whole kitchen around, putting up some funky shelving cleaning like crazy.

No quick way to do that. it all looks great but now the need to pain the walls is strong and I must put off the feeling. It looks good though don't ya think?

I know the continuing New York saga awaits and I will keep posting that this evening.

for the moment,  Sage seems her usual Sagey self and even has some fur growing back on her shaved spots, Niko insists that every day should be Niko day...Flame squeaks for more food please A LOT, Abby is finding sunbeam upon sunbeam to nap in and Nesa has taken roost under the mallow bush, unless it is dinner time and then the furry train lines up in the hallway in order of noisiest ( that would be Flame).

I am off to pick up supplies for camp and enjoy some gardening time.....laters

have phrase book, will travel...

I just picked up my Western European phrase book, Paris ideas and Greek phrase book.

My European travels are now 6 weeks away.

I can't believe how quickly it is coming...Yay!!!!!!!!

I am a little trepidous but mostly ridiculously excited and it is all still a little surreal.

The plan is...2 months...

*Fly into Norwich, England and stay with S and her furries, and do much traversing, giggling and enjoying, then travel to the north of  Spain to see my friend K and her family.

* I head off to Santorini where S & S will join me along with P and we spend a week on the island before heading to Crete.

*I will say farewell to my travel buddies and strike out alone back up through the Greek Islands and the Pelloponese, to find my way to a train with my Eurorail pass and head across Europe, through Romania, Prague and back to Norwich.

*Paris, London and Amsterdam are in the works with A, who is living in Paris through the wind.

We will have cafe au laits and talk art and literature and giggle in Paris together.

I know this note is a bit of a list but, now you can see the adventures laid out here, that I will be writing about as I go. 

I am soooooo grateful to the hearts of my friends abroad who are opening their doors to me allowing me not only a place to stay, but the confidence to go it alone, knowing that I have friendly faces whenever I need them.

this story will be continued..today I am very excited.

cheesesteak anyone?

Well, after a busy and crazy beginning of the week, I am finally taking a deep breath and continuing with my tale of Philly and New York.

First, car is home and well, Sage continues to gain strength from her infection and Grandma is dancing in her wheelchair ( seriously she was dancing when I went to see her yesterday) so officially relaxing.

Now....Philly, I left off with D and I and the family RAV and a GPS device called Garmin.

We drove fairly uneventfully to Philly for the day on Saturday June 21st.

We arrived in the beautiful historic district, parked and immediately went to Betsy Ross's house.

What an amazing tale she has, a feminist before her time, working in a basement on a flag that if caught, could have seen her condemned for treason and keeping a business running on her own, with or without a husband. Very cool woman.

We then decided the historic district and alllllll the people could wait, and went to Little Italy for a Philly Cheeseteak. MMMMMMMMMMMMMM. 

It was a little like ordering soup from Seinfelds "the soup nazi" episode...but the guy screaming from behind the chrome covered corner shop, winked at me and let know he was doing it all for show. D stood in the spot the Rocky had ordered his cheesesteak in the first Rocky movie..lolololol.

A quick stop in a bar....( I needed a  bathroom and there nothing around ) saw a couple of old withered and leather skinned men slapping each other......lol.....it was pretty funny but we opted to not have a beer there.

We then head to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, at least we would have had D listened to me and NOT the Garmin for directions, once we arrived at the parking lot. 

Instead he drove in a circle, away from parking, and ended up in a detour that took us 90 minutes and several worried moments, through the really low rent districts of Philly, complete with visable guns, bullet holed, burned out cars and wow....if I hadn't been so mad at D for not listening to me, I may have been scared.

We did eventually find our way back to the Museum and the parking lot we had almost entered originally and spent a fantastic 4 hours with Degas, Renoir, etc...etc...etc...

Absolutely phenomenal. I can't tell you what it was like to see the brushstrokes, the textures, the energy, the colours, the everything about these works I had seen only on slides or in books.

There were these wonderfully knowledgable security guards who helped us to find our faves and there was one man who looked like he had lived his whole life inside the museum. He had a little leather bound black book full of noted about the art, the artists and the people who honor them. Very cool guy. I asked him to direct me to Cezanne, and without missing a beat, knew exactly where the painting I was looking for and led me there.

Awe struck and emotional we leave the museum and head back into town for dinner.

Night looked a lot different downtown and we opted to park H and E's car in a secured parking lot before finding a wicked retro diner "The Continental" The best lobster risotto ever....EVER!

The adventures seem to be done for the dat and we head for home trusting the voive of Garmin to lead us there......after "recalculating" a few times and getting us onto a freeway she promptly ran out of juice leaving us without directions home......UH OH!

We did manage to get there eventually, but first found ourselves in some crazy wooded areas of the Pennsylvania subarbs and a lot of gas stations who had neither a bathroom or an English speaking attendant who could help us... OI!

Much after dark, we finally made it home and shared our tales with the family.

Sunday June 22nd and D wants to go back to the Outlet mall for more shopping. I tell ya, he can shop better than I can. and we have a nice end to our time in Philly.

One more sleep will see us driving into NY and the smells, sights, sounds, sweat, splendour of the city.

More to come.....

good morning sunshine!

I hope you are now singing that song...loving that song...singing a song..... hee hee hee.

It is time for some serious work stuff today. I am building a show based on a historical building here in town and have to get serious about some of the planning and such.

Meeting with my pop today who will be involved in the design..pop ...hmmmm..now he is a long story to share, not today perhaps.

Last night saw a good friend of ours come by for BbQ.

We played music and ate good food and indulged in party favours and had a great evening.

What is it that enables old friends to come together after time apart and pick right back up where you left off?

There is something wonderfully comforting in recognizing that, and simply enjoying the moment when you reconnect.

Breakfast calls........ciao.

A brand new day!

Well today shines a little brighter all around....hoping that it shapes up to everything and everyone being given clean bills of health and that the sun washes away yesterdays woes!

We are getting a new/old piece of furniture for our kitchen.

A really nice mahogany sideboard that we are putting in instead of new wall cupboards.

Much more personality.

Now if I could just get D put the lids on things after he uses them, perhaps the kitchen would stay a little tidier?

Well hope springs eternal.

whew...

That was a big crazy day, but grandma seems to be okay, bruised but not broken...

sage (my dog) does not have bladder stones..yay...and my car is in the shop...

sigh....I am exhausted.

laters...

crap!

Well one year after the great grandma debaucle, it looks like we are at it again.

she seems to make a habit of having terrible thing befall her while my mother is out of town and i am in charge.

Last year while still in independant living, she fell resulting in needing a new home, adn ER/hosptial stay and a lot of advocating for, while my mom was in Australia for a month.

She ended up settling into a great place, but it took a horrificly large mountain to move to make that happen and most of 8 months to see to fruition.

Now mom's been gone 4 days, and grandma has had another fall.....she seems to be fine but I can feel the stressing rising like the sun right now.

My mom simply is not allowed to go away in July anymore.

I am going to go and see grandma today and see that she is fine for myslef.

Ugh....poor grandma.

New York New York....and all things NY

Okay so I am recently back from my first adventure of the summer to New York City and Philadelphia.

I wanted to write it all down in one place as it was such a big adventure but you will have to bare with me, I am going to do it in sort of a reverse diary...going back in time and starting with day 1...

day 1 June 19th, 2008

Leave victoria at 4:00am..ugh, no sleep following a show going up that I directed on the 18th...a busy time.

We fly into Philadelphia on one of those little airbuses that gets you there but offers very little for amenities, including two working toilets....ugh....one broke down and we had line ups up the aisle for the only other remaining toilet for 6 hours.

Arrive in Philly...yay safely, and transfer bodies and luggage to our rental van. D and I are travelling with my Mom and R, her husband, and he is treating us to this vacation.

Drive mostly uneventfully to step sis and her hubby E and their 2 children's place in the area of Richboro PA, about an hour NE of Philly and visit and catch up on sleep.

impressions...a lot of driving to get anywhere...wow!

It is beautiful though and a lot...A LOT  of flags and bunting.

Friday June 20th....drive my mom and D and I to outlet mall for shopping. Really what else do you do????

D, being a better shopper than my mom and I, purchases a whole new wardrobe from perry ellis and ralph lauren for what some might spend on a pair of jeans...nice sales! Considering he packed 1 pair of pants, 1 tee shirt, 1 pair of boxers and socks, and 1 suit jacket for 12 days ( really Kimmee it's all I'll need)........it was good we shopped...MEN! he also needed to purchase a new duffel bag as the SMALL knapsack he brought was not big enough to get said purchases to NY.

Myself I opt for looky-looing and cotton bras.  let's hear it for Lane Bryant!

Not exciting but soooooo comfy in the heat.

OI the heat, have I mentioned that yet?

94 degrees and 74% humidity...OI the heat.

really diving from one air conditioned environment to another is the only way to be.

We borrowed H ( step sis's) car and the family GPS device, Garmin.....

what a trip...I got used to hearing " recalculating" a lot.....and found our way there and back with minimal effort.

Oh forgot...We had a great lunch first. H took us out to local vegan restaurant...yummmm and aside from a delightful, puking 18  month old ( my nephew) it was a good meal. The D and Mom and I took off to outlet mall.

The day went on without incident and had yummy BBQ and video night.

Day 3, June 21st

D and I drive, alone, into Philly for day........just me and daiv the borrowed car and the Garmin...can you gues how many times we heard 're calculating" from it over the day?

to be cont....

morning has broken....

or some such other cheesy thing...lollollo..

I am off to spend a sunny day poolside with my friend S, she and I are practising tanning 101 for our upcoming trip to Greece...I expect we will get an A.

While thinking about this blog thing last night I was trying to think why this is so popular and then I realized how very differently one types if they think someone may read it, so therefore the attraction I do believe.

D's  ( my partner ) coffee machine has finished its magic so I am off.....

til next we meet.

and so it begins....

Yes, I have started a blog, I have joined this web of words that is tripping out of so many of us and decided to jump onto the word wagon.

This is my testing ground where all things bloggy will be stored and shared and thought through. Adventures to be journalled, ideas corralled and mayhem exhibited.

This blog, I hope, will be a place where reflection takes place and is really a love letter to and for myself.

I read that and think, wow doesn't she sound pretentious, and sure that may be true, but, really...isn't that what this whole sharing our realities is all about? I mean who are we that we think anything we are sharing will be valued by anyone else...it is my journey, my reflection and it is my gift to me.

So I go forward...... to be continued...