Tricia's Musings

Random Thoughts about life in general, living in the big city of Toronto



You are here: Home / Archives for Home and Lifestyle / Family

Strange – our visitors are missing

by

I’m having a strange week. My husband and I both have relatives in town from Vancouver. that’s odd to begin with that we’d both have relatives from the west coast in town at the same time, but there’s an even stranger thing going on … they seem to have disappeared!

Yep …

Chris saw his cousin that was visiting Toronto on Saturday at his parents house. On Tuesday his cousin and her husband came to Toronto on business and they were supposed to be in town for a few days. My husband made plans to get together with them, but we still haven’t heard from them!

Then .. on Wednesday afternoon I got an email from my brother saying that he was at the Vancouver waiting for his plane to Toronto. He was coming into the city for business and he’s supposed to leave sometime on Friday.

I guess he’s here … but I still haven’t heard from him. Usually we talk on the phone, or meet for dinner or heck – he ends up staying at our house. This time … not even a phone call or an email.

It’s strange! I sent him an email but I still haven’t heard from him. I know he usually had back to back to back meetings when he comes to Toronto, but we usually get at least a phone call or something. Really odd.

Now if only one of our friends would disappear for a while! LOL My friend broke up with her boyfriend and I guess I’m her go to person. She calls me and emails me several times a day. I love her but it’s too much. Oh and lately her emails ask about Weight loss pills that work fast and how else to lose weight quickly. You see she’s ready to get herself back on the market.

So have you ever had someone tell you they were coming to visit and then you didn’t hear from them?





A belated birthday wish

by

One of my brothers did something kind of funny the other day.

My birthday was at the beginning of the month and he was away on a vacation with his wife. He’d gone to Peru and all through the trip he sent an email (pretty much every day) telling us what areas of the country they were visiting and sending a few photos of the wildlife or of the meals they were eating. One picture was of deep fried guinea pig! Not my kind of meal, but apparently it tasted ok.

Anyway .. he’s usually pretty good about remembering my birthday, but I guess with traveling and then getting back to work shortly after their return home he forgot that my birthday had come and gone. So on the 20th I get this call from him and, since he doesn’t call all that often, I though maybe something was wrong, but it was just a belated birthday phone call.

Wasn’t that nice?

While we were on the phone we talked a little more about his trip, a few other things and joked around. Then only a few minutes after we’d hung up I got an email and he’d sent me a birthday picture. It was composed of three pictures of me as a child – one of me as a baby walking through the Tulips at the Experimental Farm in Ottawa, another of me sitting on his lap when I was about 3 or 4 years old and then the last picture was an old school picture – probably of me when I was about 9 years old. It was really cute.

I don’t know if he already had the birthday picture made up before our phone call or if he made it very quickly but it was a great idea. I’m going to have to remember to try to do something like that for him or maybe one of my other brothers or sister for their birthday. I think they’d like it too.

Speaking of my family … I haven’t heard from my brother out in Vancouver for a while. Last I heard he was just about to close a multimillion dollar deal for his business. I think it had something to do with getting investments from asset based lenders. I wonder if that went through or not. If it did, the business he’s been working on for the last year should be off to a good start.

Anyway … I’m sure I’m not the only one with family that sometimes forgets their birthdays. I usually don’t forget my families birthdays, but I’ll get distracted on the day of their birthday and then end up wishing them a belated happy birthday … kind of like my brother just did for me. Does that happen to you too?

We had a fantastic long weekend

by

You know what? I had a really good weekend!

I had sort of been dreading the long weekend because I’d started a new medication for my migraines about three weeks ago and it’s making me feel really odd (spacey, forgetful, mixing up words, tingling hands and feet etc) and on top of that my nephew and niece (and her fiance) were coming in from Chicago for the weekend, and my in-laws were coming in to town for a day or two to see all of us.

When I’m not feeling all that well I don’t really like having other people around or worse, I don’t like having plans to go out, especially when I’m not sure if I’m going to be feeling up to going out.

Luckily everything turned out ok.

My husband picked up our niece and nephew t the airport and took them to our family friends house where they were going to stay for the weekend. Oh and on the way there they stopped off at a restaurant bar and my husband bought my nephew his first legal drink. He’s 19 and thus it was legal for him to drink in Ontario. Our nephew was thrilled … oh and he’s the one who asked Chris to buy him his first legal drink. LOL

The next day my husband went over to the house with our dog to see the kids and to drive them to where ever they wanted to go in the city. He did that every morning – Saturday, Sunday and Monday so he got to spend a bit more time with them and they got a lift to where ever they wanted to start there day.

Surprisingly – for a 19 year old and two 23 year olds they didn’t spend a lot of time going out and partying. They did hit a few bars, especially on Saturday, but they didn’t go out clubbing like we thought they would. Instead they did things like taking a tour of the Rogers center, walking around the CNE (Canadian National Exhibition), touring a micro-brewery (SteamWhistle) and tasting their beers, going to the CN Tower, shopping, and going to the Hockey Hall of Fame.

I stayed home on the Saturday and just rested up.

On Sunday my in-laws came into town and we got together in the late afternoon with them and the kids at an Irish restaurant called Murphy’s Law and had dinner. My father in law usually doesn’t drink, but when he does he normally only has one drink. That night he had 4 double Bailey’s! It was interesting!

After dinner the in-laws went back to their hotel. Usually they stay at our house, but we’d warned them that with this medication that I’m on I’m feeling really off and that maybe staying over wouldn’t be so great. Usually they come in threes – Chris’ mom and dad and his aunt (although this time Chris’ aunt didn’t come) … so that’s a lot of people to land on someones doorstep when you’re not feeling so hot.

I wasn’t feeling too bad after dinner – a little wonky … I’ve found if I don’t drink enough water on this new medication (Topamax) I kind of feel drunk (and no I didn’t have any drinks with dinner) so we drove the kids back to the house and sat with them on the back patio for an hour or so talking. They were kind of tired. The day before they had walked everywhere they went .. we worked it out and we figured that they walked over 15 miles!

The next day, yesterday, was Labour Day Monday – my Birthday. So we all met up at Cora’s downtown for brunch. Well … ok breakfast … but it was 1 pm. I haven’t been to a Cora’s for a long long time and man – it’s delicious! I had French toast Brioche covered in a mound of assorted fruit, and a sunny side up egg and a few slices of bacon. I think it’s called “1990’s Harvest” on the menu. Delicious!

Shortly after we finished our meal at Cora’s it was time to take the kids to the Island Airport for their flight to Chicago. However, since there was a little bit of time before they had to board the Ferry to the island we walked over to an Irish Memorial.

I have to admit that I only glanced at the huge black stones at the Irish memorial at the port because just as we reached the memorial area jets flew overhead and I realized that the airshow was starting.

I’ve never been to an airshow! So while most of our relatives looked at the Irish memorial my husband and I stood by the waters edge and gazed up at the sky as jets and the famous Canadian Snowbirds did amazing areal feats overhead. I never thought I’d enjoy an airshow that much, but I loved it.

As we walked back to the Ferry area and airport check-in the airshow was still going on, so I was a little distracted in those last few minutes with our nephew, niece and her fiance. I actually almost tripped as I was walking along. Someone had stopped right in front of us to watch the jets do a fly by and I just missed tripping on the wheels of one of the most unusual baby strollers I’ve ever seen. I stopped long enough to ask the lady what it was and she said it was called a phil and teds explorer. I couldn’t help laughing at the name – do you remember the movie – Phil and Ted’s excellent Adventures?

Anyway … The weekend that I thought I’d struggle through because of in-laws and relatives being around turned out to be quite nice. I had two fantastic birthday celebration meals and seeing the airshow just topped off my birthday. I loved it.

How was your long weekend?

Heat wave ends as the long weekend arrives

by

It seems that we’re just at the end of a very hot week here in Toronto. It’s cooler today, but still quite humid.

I guess it’s only fitting the end of the heat wave was marked with a huge storm. At about 1 pm I was upstairs and I hear a rumbling sound. At first I thought it was an airplane going over the house, but then I realized it was thunder.

Shortly after I heard the sky rumble a major downpour started. Normally I can’t even hear the rain hitting the roof of the house, but this time I could. Oh and it was loud! It was really raining hard!

When I went downstairs to our main floor I looked out in our backyard and our patio was flooded with water. Hmmm all I need is one of those spa covers and a pool heater and I’d have a redneck hot tub. LOL

I think it rained hard for about half an hour and then it died down. Now it’s just humid out – but overall cooler than it has been most of the week. I’m glad it’s cooler … I mean, with humidity, it’s been getting into the 42 and 43 Celsius (109 F) range. I’m glad we have air conditioning!

This weekend is going to be a lot cooler. Autumn temperatures – 20 to 23 C (68 to 73 F) – not too cool, but a huge difference from earlier in the week.

Oh and Monday is my birthday! It’s my true birthday day too. I’m a Labour Day baby – so whenever my birthday actually falls on Labour Day Monday it feel like it’s my true birthday. Perhaps others who were also born on holidays feel the same way?

We don’t have anything special planned for my birthday yet. All I usually want is a nice dinner and this birthday will probably be the same too.

I know we’re going out for lunch or dinner with my husbands parents, his aunt and his nephew, niece and her new fiance who are flying in from Chicago this evening for a weekend in Toronto (the niece and nephew I mean). The outing on Sunday will probably turn into an engagement party for the niece though rather than a birthday celebration or even a combination event.

What are your plans for the long weekend? Are you going away to cottage or doing anything special? Hopefully your weather will be better than ours.

Our old car broke down – now we have a new one

by

Another busy day .. or rather another busy week!

Last week, Chris was on his last week of holidays and I spent part of the week at home on my own because Chris was off camping with his brother, and the rest of the week was spent traveling out of the city to Brantford twice and going to some friends of ours for a BBQ.

The main reason we went out of town twice was because our car broke down in Brantford. GRRRR … I wish our in-laws had told us that it had broken down, but they didn’t tell us until five days after it had happened. again – Grrrr! Once we tried to get the car fixed we found out that the transmission was shot. It’s apparently pitted and therefore it leaks.

So … rather than putting $3000 into a 14 year old car (it had worked well until this happened) we decided to buy a newer used car. That accounted for our second trip to Brantford as there was a good deal at the used car dealership that’s attached the garage where our old car was being “not” fixed.

Last Friday night we took a few cars for a test drive and decided that a 2006 Pontiac Pursuit would be fine for us. Unfortunately we couldn’t finalize the deal until Monday so Chris had to go back on Sunday night so he could get the ball rolling on Monday morning … then he drove home with the new car on Monday afternoon.

While he was in and out of the house over the last week – or week and a half I noticed how much cleaner the house was without him around … especially the bathroom! I think I finally figured out why we have this odd white spot on the front of the Hansgrohe faucet … it seems he leans over to take a sip of water when he’s brushing his teeth and of course this leaves some toothpaste foam on the edge of the tap. Guys!?!

Anyway … we’ve got our new car now. It was a little more than we can afford … especially since we weren’t expecting to have our other car breakdown like that. Although, given that our old car was 14 years old we had been thinking that we’d need a new car sometime soon. Just not this soon.

Unfortunately we’ve found something wrong with the new car. When Chris came home from work this evening we decided to get the dog and take a drive along the lake. It’s a hot day but we didn’t turn the cars air conditioning on (yes it works). We opened the windows and the back drivers side window wouldn’t open. It had been working when we test drove the car – but now it’s not .. so I guess it must have a loose wire or something.

I guess we’ll have to call the used car dealership tomorrow and see if they’ll fix the back drivers side window. The sales bill says all sales final so I don’t know if they will fix it free of charge or not – but I hope they will as we really can’t afford another expense … plus it’s only right – we find something wrong just 24 hours after buying the car? Yeah they’d better fix it. Hopefully we can get it fixed here rather than driving back to Brantford yet again.

Meta

Search this site

Tags

blog blogs camera Canada Chris computer crohns dinner dog Family flower flowers Food friends funny garden Gardening Green Thumb Sunday Health and Fitness Health Fitness and Beauty holiday home Home and Lifestyle house husband IBD Inflammatory bowel disease Internet Music neighbors pain photo photos plants puppy Shopping sick sleep spring Toronto TV Video visit website Wordless Wednesday