Bob And Susan

This is a test to put a picture on here by me. Lindsay has always done it in the past.

It snowed at least a foot last night!  It is still coming down strong with no end in sight.  Poor Bailey gets through the snow like a dolphin gets through water.  We were going to go to Castlegar for lunch today but I think not now – the roads will be very scary.  There is a great deal of shovelling to be done as well as plowing.  So I best get my snow gear on and get at it.  Luckily for me I made an appointment at the chiropractor for Monday the 29th – I am sure that I will need it!

There is a cluster of crows out front – 8 or more – all hanging around the old cherry tree.  I don’t think that it is cherries that they are after – I think that maybe one of them has some kind of an animal up there that they are all enjoying. 

What a gorgeous day it is.  The sun is shining very brightly making the fresh fallen snow sparkle in this balmy -3C temperature.  I just came back from a snow shoe with Bailey.  Let me tell you the snow is deep – up past the top of my kamik boots – it was a good workout even creating a sweat.  Bailey was romping through the snow like a dolphin through water.

The turkey carcass is in the pot with the other necessities to making a fine turkey stock.  I am using the frozen turkey stock from the Thanksgiving Turkey that was in the freezer for a more intense stock flavour.  Since I am recovering form a nasty cold, I need to make a cold battling broth.  So I am going to take the amount of stock I need to make an oriental style soup with lots of garlic and ginger and parsley and other veggies.  I will freeze the rest of the stock for other soups to come – I expect I will get at least 12 cups of condensed turkey stock.  Looking forward to this!

After Susan got on Facebook, and a recent Woburn reunion, I have had the good fortune to be contacted from old friends from my high school days. I’m writing this blog to explain a bit of my history for those who have contacted me to read this blog instead of writing it individually. I hope it’s not taken as being lazy or pompous. I work all day on a computer, and am reluctant to get on it when I get home. I don’t even have a home email address anymore,but people can contact me through Susan’s.

OK, here we go.  This is not as easy as you think. I’ll miss more stuff than I’ll mention. After high school I worked in the recording industry in sales and promotion. I met stars, went to the Juno Awards, and travelled a lot. Too many lonely hotel rooms later  I quit as I wasn’t enjoying being a rat in the race. I grew my hair to my waist, got a backpack and travelled a lot. I’ve been across Canada several times, and been in all the US states except for 3. Back in 1979 living in a 1 room schoolhouse near Port Perry with a girl named Jackie Rae, we moved out to B.C. I had been here through my travels and a company was hiring people when in Ontario the economy was very slow. Go west young man, go west. The marriage to Jackie brought my two lovely daughters into the world. After out divorce I was able to be a constant parent, not just a weekend parent which I an forever grateful for as “The girls” remain my good friends still today. My wife Susan came into my life after both of us had divorced . Susan,  (ne. Susan Butt) and I have been friends since we were teenagers. We were even friends during our first marriages. When Susan moved back to Toronto from where she lived in Calgary we hooked up and the friendship turned into love. 20 years later we are still very much in love and I am very grateful as she is not only my best friend but……you get the picture. I have  a great deal of respect for her as being a step parent isn’t easy as many people know. Susan has been a wonderful parent and friend to the girls. When they phone I talk with them for 5 minutes, Susan, 20. Susan currently manages the cafeteria in Nelson’s college. She is an incredible chef!  We live on 12 acres of land near Nelson B.C. A day doesn’t go by that mother nature isn’t a part of our lives. We see dear, elk, and bears constantly. We’ve had to learn to live with them and that’s why our organic gardens are protected with a battery powered solar electric fence. When you wake up to 45 elk surronding your house, you realize a barking dog just won’t work so you learn how to live with them. We never take for granted the beauty of where we live, our property has a small forest out front with a field (4 acres) that I’m working on killing organically behind the house, that means driving around on my tractor which isn’t really so bad, no cell phone or computer on the tractor. There’s a few more acres past that which is forest at the bottom of a mountain with 3 creeks, one of which we get out water from (a spring). We love our home and are very fortunate. We will stay here until I retire ( 4 years) and will try and farm the field up until it’s a pain at which time we’ll move to Nelson and travel more with the good fortunes selling this property will bring. Susan and I love to travel. We sold a bit of land a few years ago and had the good fortune to take what could be considered a trip of a lifetime spending a month going from Rome, to Florence, to Venice then Pairs and London. Seeing the works of Michalangelo was a dream of mine, and it came true. We’ve had good fun in Orlando, Mexico, all over B.C. and Alberta, just did the Oregon coast, and I took the kids to Disneyland to name a few. I have been back to Toronto where my family is but it seems I’m there less often as the years pass. You have to understand that when you sit on your deck watching a bear and her cubs, that getting on to the 401 can be difficult. I have phoned home to my Mom & Dad every Saturday for 30 years.

“The girls”, Lindsay now 29, as a matter of fact, today Christmas eve is her birthday as I write this is my oldest and Rheanna (26) is the baby. I am so blessed to have these two friends. They are both living in Calgary which I’m happy about as they got out of the forest and are now city wise. They grew up on glacier fed rivers learning to swim out of the currents so I have no concerns when Rheanna says she was out tubing on the Bow river. Lindsay married a wonderful man last year named Jeff and they are both happy and also love to travel. It was a lovely wedding in Calgary and I was happy to have my sister, my parents and Susan’s parents all come out for it. I could go on a lot about my daughters but won’t because if they read this I’ll get an ear full from them. I hope my love for them was well noted as was my love for Susan.

So what else? I coached football for over 20 years. Ran a men’s flag league as well as a kids tackle league. I’ve coached, refereed, and been an executive volunteer and found it to be very rewarding. Now at age 54 I find chasing teenagers down the field for 3 games on a Sunday as a ref became a bit much so I’ve retired. Couldn’t walk properly until Wed. of the next week.  

I work as an expediter at Cominco in Trail. I throw money at problems and do paperwork for shipping dangerous goods around the world. It’s a good job and done us well. We live 8 hours drive from both Calgary and Vancouver. It makes travelling a chore though we are only 3 hours from Spokane Washington which get us to the States easily. I have a goal to get to every football stadium in north america and am doing pretty good so far, having been to many Canadian stadiums, including 6 Grey Cups, as well as NFL games in Seattle. Denver, Oakland, and San Fransisco. Next year we’re off to Chicago and after that to Green Bay in 2010. I usually go with the boys but Susan comes sometimes as well. I’m getting tired of typing so I want to wrap this up. Did I mention Joe Connelly ? My friend of 48 years, lives 10 minutes away. My friend Talis passed away. I stay in touch with my old friend Bob Black and his wife Jean who we went to Vegas and the grand canyon with us couple years ago. I hope this answers a bit of who I became. I will hopefully get back for a highschool reunion someday to see many who have contacted me. I hope this blog let’s you know that I’m very happy and very fortunate to have a wonderful family and friends.  Love Bob

So I got to the store to get ink for our Epson printer and she rings it in at $90.00. As I groan I happen to look over and see that there is a HP printer with ink on sale for $19.00. so I bought the printer and will now recycle the old one. Every once in a while I see things that make me think the world’s gone nuts.

Here is my year 2008 in review very condensed.  I am going to start with the garden.  I love gardening and already have lots of plans for garden(s) 2009.  I went on two garden tours this past summer with my dear friend, Sheryl and we saw so many amazing ideas – it truly was mind blowing.  I learned so much that will grow here just fine.

Bob put up the big wooden posts so that the eletric fence is permanent (or at least as long as we are here).  Now in the spring he just has to wire it up to the solar panel and it is done.  The electric fence seemed to work quite well this year.  I did see where the dear or elk would stretch their head the get at some pole beans or a sunflowers or roses or corn or squash – well you get the drift but for the most part I got the bigger bounty this year!!!

We had a great deal of fresh veggies and herbs and a fresh bouquet when ever I felt like it.  When my parents were out here this past Thanksgiving, I loved asking them what veggie they wanted to have with their meal and go and get it.  My garden is organic. 

I do have a crop I try to focus on – garlic.  I have been told many times over that my garlic is fabulous – thank you – I think so too!  Sadly this year my garlic crop got a disease so now I have to start over.  I know what I did wrong and pretty much what happened so I am quite confident about this new crop that I planted in October.  As I said, I am very much anticipating the 2009 garden(s).

Family in 2009.  My parents came out for Thanksgiving this past year.  I just loved having them.  My Dad is in his late 70′s and my Mom is in her early/middle 70′s.  Both are in good health, spirit and mind – I am fortunate for this as a lot of people my age don’t have this fortune.  We had a fine time together.  We all love to eat and cook for each other and play Euchre.  Yes there was a lot of Euchre playing for the week that they were here – Bob and my Dad are the champs (but only by the skin of their teeth).

Bob and I flew into Calgary this past Easter to see Lindsay & Jeff and Rheanna.  It was a lovely visit.  Bob and I use to drive to Calgary but we would get there stressed out and tired and even a little miserable from a 8 – 9 hour drive with some it of being in the city (Neither Bob or I are at all use to big city driving anymore – who needs it). It was great getting picked up at the Calgary airport all refreshed with two smiling faces waiting to take us to their lovely home in the northwest of Calgary.  Rheanna caught up with us the next day for dinner.  She brought over that “Band” thing that you put on you TV.  What a hoot we had playing that!  I think that Lindsay and Jeff have some photos of that on their website thesills.net .

 About other family members that speak a little differently.  A coyote came and snatched our lovely Mable one night in the fall of 2007.  That broke our hearts as Mable was such a great cat.  Ironically enough I had just said to Bob that very day that it was getting close to keeping Mable back in the house. 

As is already posted on this blog, we said good-bye to Beasley.  Beasley was the sweetess dog ever – she was kind, gentle, had very good manners and was quite considerate.  She still comes to visit me in my dreams and give her a big hug and remember her soft fur and her silly smile. 

I think that Bailey is sometimes lonely for Beasley.  Bailey and I spend a great deal of good quality time together; we go hiking and snow shoeing together a lot.  Bailey is also such a lovely dog – my fellow hikers tell me quite often how well behaved she is. As I said to Sheryl, when to day comes that I have to say good-bye to Bailey, it will indeed be a sad one.  Sheryl summed it up perfectly – One very sad day for a whole bunch of happy ones is a pretty good deal.

I joined a hiking group last spring.  We go out every Saturday morning at 9 sharp  We go to many different trails withing a 20 minute drive of our meeting place.  I enjoy that a lot and so does Bailey ( I swear she knows when it is Saturday morning because she is like a sugared out kid just before we get in the car to leave).  I had made a couple of good friends with in this group too – a bonus.  The extra bonus is that this group turns into a snow shoeing group when the snow comes  – snow shoeing is my favourite winter outdoor activity.  I was able to rack up double kilometers in the “Cross the Nation” Wellness Challenge with all the snow shoeing that I do.

Bob and I went on three vacations this year.  Two small and one two weeks.  I already told you about the first one to Calgary last Easter.  This past summer we went to the Oregon Coast – it was fabulous!!  I did a great deal of research before we went so we weren’t driving around aimlessly at any time.  If you have never seen the Oregon Coast you should put it on your must do list and email all the tourist info places to learn about it before you go.  I was sent about 6 inches worth of valuable information that made our holiday just terrific.  We did go to Seattle first for a couple of days and saw the sites and even took in a real Baseball game.  There I was sitting in the Baseball arena eating Sushi and enjoying a glass of Chardonnay (whatever happened to ballpark dogs and beer – who cares?)  We spent our last night in Seattle as well just to see a real football game.  It was fun and a great new experience for me but I understand baseball better and the food was better at the baseball arena.  A great holiday that one was!  The other small vacation was taking a week off to spend time with my parents when they were here – nice and relaxing.

I believe in clean slates and I am optimstic person.  So I welcome 2009 and all the challenges it brings.

 Happy New Year All!!