Friday, May 06, 2011

Update to the Neighbours **UPDATED**

After I had written the last post about our new neighbours - some things happened.

That evening, the neighbour (whom I know)from the other side of the new people's unit came to my house to talk about the noise and to decide what to do.

In the last post when I mentioned on Tuesday night about the car door locking at 11:00pm and the smoke in our room at 3:30am - apparently at 1:00am there was some drum playing that woke up the neighbour on the other side. I did not hear that.

The dog was standing in the window barking as we were talking. Looks like a pit bull to me - or something similar.

He and I talked and he decided he was going to call the condo corporation and the property manager would then speak to the owner of the house - the people living there are tenants.

Today in my mailbox I received a hand written letter. It really smells of smoke - that was my first impression. It reads as follows:

To our new neighbours,

It was brought to my attention from my landlord that there has been noise complaints caused by our dog since our arrival.

First I'd like to apologize.

My landlord told me that it is either us or the dog.

This is new behaviour for our dog and I'd like (with your permission) to try to solve this problem before I have to put him down.

Please give me the chance to either find him a new loving home or fix the problem.

My phone is ####

Please call me if you are willing to talk about this problem.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Again I am sorry for the noise.

Thank you.


WOW! I was surprised by the letter and impressed with their initiative. I didn't make any calls to complain, but from this I would assume the neighbour on the other side did. I will be talking the him first to see if he got a similar note before I respond to her.

I must say that yesterday and today I haven't heard anything from their unit. I don't know if that is because someone is home and the dog doesn't bark when his owners are home or if he was just doing all the barking and the whining because of his new locations.

I will update when something happens.

I will have to catch my other neighbour and figure out our next step.

***UPDATE*** The reason I have not heard anything from their unit was because when her landlord called her, she sent her dog to a friends. The other neighbour did talk to her and things are good. Never for one minute did anyone suggest putting the dog down. She is new in the neighbourhood and nipping things in the bud is the best way to handle this. She has never lived in a townhouse before and didn't know that noise could travel. Us and the the neighbour on the other side have both lived here for a long time and never heard any noise from the unit between us. Apparently the dog and woman came from a large house full of people and the dog is lonely now living and spending most of his time alone. The neighbour also informed me that the dog is a pitbull/lab cross. I still don't know who the woman is, I still have not seen her but I will talk to her over the weekend either in person or on the phone.

Wednesday, May 04, 2011

The New Neighbours

UGH! They only moved in on Sunday and already I have had enough of them! I have never even seen them!

Sunday afternoon a truck pulled up and they unloading began. To say that I hadn’t seen them might be wrong. There were six guys unloading the truck so one of them might be living there.

I went out and when I returned they were still unloading and that is when I saw them unloading a drum set, guitar and amp…sigh. Later that evening we were getting ready for bed and they were in their backyard clanging beer bottles. There were lots of beer bottles and lots of clanging. As I crawled into bed, I had to get up and close the window as I didn’t know how much longer that was going to go on for.

On Monday when I got home from work, their car was not there but I found out that apparently they have a dog. I know this because the dog barked continually for 2 ½ hours until they came home. By continually, I mean continually. After the owners came home, again I didn’t see them, but their car was there, and the barking stopped.

Tuesday I came home to a whining dog. Non stop whining dog. The dog continued to whine all evening and into the night. At 10:00 when I went to bed, the dog was still whining. I couldn’t relax. I had trouble falling asleep. The poor dog had been there all night whining and nobody had been there for it.

The owners did arrive home about 11:00. How do I know this if I was sleeping?? Well they felt the need to ensure their car was locked by pressing the ‘lock’ button multiple times so that with each press came a piercing beep.

There were at least two people in the car because they were loudly talking and laughing as they walked from the car to the house.

Finally I fell back to sleep – no easy feat for me.

At 3:30am, my nose was assaulted by the strong smell of smoke. They were outside their unit smoking and the smoke was coming directly into our room. Out of bed to close the window – none to quietly!

Again trouble getting back to sleep.

Lets see what today brings...

Friday, April 15, 2011

First Timer!

Wednesday, for the first time ever, I donated blood!!

Let me back up and explain why it too so long for me to do it.

When I was a child, I had hepatitis. I was sick and I honestly don't even remember having it as I was that ill. If someone hadn't told me that I had had it, I wouldn't even know.

As far as I understood, I was sick enough for my brain to block it all out. To this day I don't remember the 'bad' parts. I do remember when I was on the mend and I was allowed to go outside for the first time in FOREVER. I went over to the neighbours house and she and another neighbour friend were making a snowman. I went over to play and join them.

They yelled that I had cooties and ran away and wouldn't play with me. It was traumatic. THAT is my memory of having hepatitis.

But I digress...

I was always led to believe that I couldn't donate blood. I never really investigated it. A few years ago I made a call to Canadian B1ood Services and asked a few questions and they said that no I couldn't donate. However, if I wanted to go through a battery of test and documents and paperwork then they would investigate it for me. I left it at that.

However, on Wednesday our work had it's quarterly blood donor drive and I went up to talk to a nurse. She pulled out this HUGE book and looked through it and informed me that if I had had hepatitis before I was 11 then I eligible to donate!

YAY!! I was in grade 4 when I was sick and was about 8 or 9 - certainly not 11.

I filled out all the paperwork required and took the plunge! Really how can you not when you can do it during you work day and all I had to do was walk up a flight of stairs!

I felt so good and lucky that I was healthy enough to donate to someone who was in need.

What a great day! I even got a sticker, cookies and juice!!

Wednesday, April 06, 2011

Counting

Well I did it. I knew I should not have done it, but I did.

Today we have been waiting for 52 months for Pumpkin.

WOW - I shouldn't have counted...

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Wednesday

So what is happening in my life...LOTS! I am not prepared to talk about some of it just yet, but safe to say it is exciting!

I am VERY much liking the evenings and the brightness. I can't wait for the mornings to get bright. I start work at 6:30am and it is still dark then.

My work hours are going to change in July and I am NOT happy about it. However, it is not an option.

I don't know that we will ever go to China for Pumpkin. I don't even have a clue as to how many months it has been. Since Dolores stopped counting, I don't get a reminder any more!

BBQ season is in full swing - well, lets be honest, I BBQ all winter. Tonight's BBQ dinner was YUMMY!

I am still unsure about energy saving bulbs - they take so long to get bright.

I could probably live on popcorn.

My sister is doing the Ride to Conquer Cancer - you can sponsor her here if you are so inclined.

I like the colour blue.

My dry skinned hands are looking forward to the warmer weather.

Is there going to be any more snow??

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Awkward

The other night, Husband and I went to the mall after work. We had a couple of birthdays coming up and we needed to shop.

We were standing in line to pay for our purchases and there was a lady behind us with two young boys. I would say they were 3 and 5 – maybe 4 and 6. The area to line up was narrow and we were single file. Husband was in front of me and behind me was the little boy, his mother and then the other little boy.

As I was standing there, I felt someone touching my bum. It seemed like it was accidental…at first. It happened a few times and I casually glanced behind me and realized it was the 3 or 4 year old boy. The accidental “touching” turned into a full on RUB!!! This child was RUBBING my butt!!

My head is now swirling. I am not sure what to do. I am not sure how to handle this. Do I say something? Do I ignore? AAGGHH!

I glanced behind me again and the mother was looking the other way – actually her back was totally to the boy.

At that point in time I decided to ignore. Maybe he would stop. Maybe the slowest cashier in the WORLD would speed up.

The child finally stopped rubbing my butt – for a second – and I felt instant relief. I didn’t have to deal with this after all! PHEW!!

Well the relief was short lived. The child then decided to start HITTING me with the toy that he had in his hand!!

It was at that point that I decided to take some action – right or wrong, this is what I did. I turned to the boy behind me – his mom still had her back to him and didn’t witness any of this – I said to the boy in a stern, but not raised voice “That is not very nice”. The child’s eyes popped open and he took two steps back and just stared at me.

The mother never even turned around.

Wednesday, March 09, 2011

I WON!!





A couple of weeks ago I entered a contest to win a necklace. I WON!!!

The contest was being run by Dolores to promote her new NEW ETSY SHOP
.

The contest required you to, on her Facebook page, to leave a comment on what you think 'family' means.

From all the entries I was randomly chosen to receive the necklace. It came yesterday and it is beautiful. THANK YOU!!!

Now please visit Las Palomas Facebook page or her NEW ETSY SHOP. Even better if you make a purchase!

Monday, February 21, 2011

YUMMY!

I find it hard sometimes to come up with something new and exciting to make and eat. Dinners are difficult getting home from work and preparing and cooking and sitting down at a reasonable time to eat.

I am not a big recipe person. There always seems to be far too many ingredients in each recipe and inevitably, you are missing one or two items.

We make a weekly meal plan - while making the weekly plan I make the grocery shopping list. I was never a fan of this much planning, but let me tell you, it certainly makes a difference in reducing the stress I feel during the day trying to figure out what to eat. Stopping at the grocery store on the way home from work and, many times, not having everything I need - or too much. I was continually asking my work mates what they were having for dinner to get ideas.

The amount of food that we throw out or waste now is almost nothing. I cannot say how much of difference it has made.

Anyway, Sunday morning we were sitting down to make the menu/list as usual and I just couldn't come up with something for dinner on Monday (today). Since we were home today - Family Day - I wanted to make a more elaborate meal as I would be home and have the time to prepare.

I sat down at the computer and went to Kraft Canada and went to the dinner recipes and it popped up on the screen. It looked good and didn't have too many ingredients and I declared that to be dinner on Monday night.

Well let me tell you - it was FANTASTIC!!!

The ingredients:
pork, vegetables, broccoli slaw, garlic powder, soy sauce & Asian salad dressing



Another angle:


Meat cooking (I don't know why the upload changes the direction of the photo):



Adding the vegetables:



Adding the sauce:



Adding the broccoli slaw:




The finished product:


We chose to serve it on rice and let me tell you - VERY ENJOYABLE!

The 'real' recipe can be found here

Let me know if you try it and what you thought - I would definitely recommend it!

Tuesday, February 01, 2011

Today

I am a busy woman. I am generally on time. I have little patience for showing up for a professional appointment and having to wait. I have things to do, places to go and people to see too.

Today I had a dentist appointment. I received an e-mail reminder last week telling me that my appointment was at 2:50. Well my little ‘tooth’ card said 2:30. So I responded to the e-mail saying that I was told that my appointment was 2:30 and would they please clarify because I didn’t want to be sitting in their waiting room waiting.

Someone responded and said that yes it was 2:30 and I was to have x-rays and I would see the hygienist at 2:50.

I then confirmed that I would be there for 2:30.

So I made arrangements at work to leave early for my appointment. I showed up there at 2:20 for my appointment. My first clue should have been when the receptionist said “Wow – you are early”. I said not really. She said o.k.

So I sat in the waiting room and at 2:45 they came to get me to do the x-rays. They were complete about 2:55. The x-ray lady told me to go back in the waiting room and it would be 5 or 10 minutes until I see the hygienist. I said PARDON? My appointment was 5 minutes ago. She said no. You were early for your x-rays so we took you early.

I went to the waiting room and was seething. She came out to tell me that my x-rays were scheduled for 2:50 and my appointment with the hygienist at 3:10. I just about lost it!!!

I said that I was a busy woman and I was told that my appointment was at 2:50 with the hygienist. She kept saying NO. I also told her that had an appointment and other things to do and I expected to be seen on time. She apologized and retreated. I could hear her talking to another lady in the back about me.

I pulled out my phone, and searched for the e-mail. I found the e-mail just about the time that the hygienist came to get me at 3:15!!! I and showed her. She just looked at it stunned and apologized profusely. I then said that I have another engagement and I have to be out of here at 4:00. Not out of the chair but out of the building paid and next appointment made. She would have to alter whatever she was going to do to ensure that that was the case.

I was almost in tears at this time. My voice was cracking and I was ‘this close’ to just turning around and walking out. Then I was mad at myself for letting this get to me, but if I didn’t leave on time, I would have been late for my next appointment and I had already established that I don’t like to be late.

If someone else is late, their appointment should be shortened - I shouldn't be made to wait.

I should mention that I have had issues before with the dentist running behind and appointment times getting screwed up.

So I pretty much had the shortest hygienist visit ever. There was just a very basic cleaning done and my next appointment was made while I was still in the chair and my invoice was printed and waiting for me when I got to the front to pay. I was out the door at 4:03. However, I assured them that next time I wouldn’t be waiting and I would be walking.

Sigh…

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Stuff

I am in a blogging rut. Not just posting but with reading also.

Most of the blogs that I read are Chinese adoption blogs and frankly, they are generally a bit stale these days. There is not much happening in the program. No one is getting excited about their referrals - there are no referrals coming.

What blogs do you read - even if they are adoption blogs I am thinking that I want to expand my repertoire.

Today the weather warmed up to -1C. What a nice break from yesterday's start of -29C.

We are having friends over on Saturday. This makes me happy.

The days are SLOWLY getting longer. Again, this makes me happy.

Dinner was really good tonight. I even have leftovers for lunch at work tomorrow.

I wish I was more creative.

I have a girls lunch on Sunday - looking forward to that.

Will the groundhog see his shadow? How much longer will winter be?

My bamboo plant never seems to change. Doesn't grow, doesn't die. Odd

I am really liking the new show OFF THE MAP.

I have a spot on my back that gets itchy all the time. It is the same spot.

That's about it for me right now.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

SEVEN YEARS!!!



Seven years ago today I said I DO to the most fantastic man in the world from there I became the luckiest woman in the world!!

We were married on a beach in Cuba and it was perfect. Today we celebrate our 7th anniversary and I don't even feel a little bit itchy...

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY H!! You have made me one LUCKY and HAPPY woman!!

I LOVE YOU!!

Monday, January 17, 2011

Winter

HAPPY NEW YEAR READERS!!

I don't think I was ever a fan of winter - even as a child. You would think that all kids would like to play in the snow and build forts and snowmen. I can really say that I was never a fan.

What I do remember about snow and being outside when I was little was freezing cold feet. Freezing cold fingers. Nose hairs stuck together because of the cold OR a constant drip of the nose that usually ended up in your mouth.

I also remember the lung shrinking that you felt when you breathed in the cold air. I remember the moisture of the mitten and on your face when you would put your mitten up to your face to warm the air.

I tried skiing - I thought, if I enjoyed a winter sport, maybe I would enjoy winter more. That wasn't too successful either. I kept getting cramps in my feet and when you have those ski boots on, getting them off to deal with the foot cramps was just not going to happen.

I constantly wondered how I could make the spring come sooner. What could I do to make the snow go away to make way for the better weather. I thought if there was no snow, then there was no winter.

My solution - as a child - was to take all the snow around my house and lay it out on the road, on the side walk anywhere I could smooth it out. After the smoothing process, I would stomp it, breathe on it, spread it out more. When it turned to water, I would get more snow from pile and do my best to melt it.

I REALLY thought that if I could melt all the snow, then spring would come.

These days I am an adult and I still have the same distaste for winter and snow. However, now, instead of laying the snow out and trying to melt it, I drive through as much as I can on the edges of the road to spread it out and hope that the smaller piles melt faster and spring will be on it's way.