I joined Major Gym Chain last summer and bought a 12 pack of trainer sessions at that time. I joined at the East Side location, used 6 sessions and then transferred my membership and my son’s daycare membership over to your North Side location (I think that was October). I still have 6 trainer sessions owed to me and called eleventy times (not really) to inquire but was told each time that East Side had yet to transfer my trainer sessions over to your North Side location.
My kids then both got the flu or SARS or Mad Cow Disease or something, and then Christmas took over and since Santa isn’t real I had to do EVERYTHING so I forgot all about you and the size of my gigantic hips (blah blah blah excuses blah) but now that the holidays are finally over, I’d really like to get going on my last 6 trainer sessions.
Hopefully by now East Side has sent my file over (I’m pretty sure mail by donkey would be faster) and I can get started again after Jan 1st because we are having a party for New Years and there’s no way I’m committing to you when there is baked brie and red wine to be had.
Please call me to schedule because the sweet baby Jesus and my mirror both know that I my ass is STILL fat and I need you to kick it! (Also? I’m sick and tired of my husband saying “When is the last time you went to the gym?”)
Thanks,
Karen Sugarpants
Phone: xxx-xxx-xxxx
p.s. Hopefully I didn’t ruin Santa for anyone over there. If so, my apologies.
Dylan came home from the neighbour’s house last week and proclaimed that High School Musical SUCKS.
“Why? What’s wrong with it?” I asked. (I actually wanted to see it because there’s been so much hype about it, although Danny’s infatuation with Vanessa Hudgens makes me laugh queasy.)
“They SING THROUGH THE WHOLE THING MOM!”
“Imagine that Dylan. It’s a MUSICAL.”
“Yeah but MOOOOM…they SING EVERY TWO MINUTES!” This kid deserves an Academy Award for the drama in his contempt for the movie.
“Heh. Hence the name HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL?” (mimicking him at this point - hee hee)
“Yeah but Mom. You’re not getting it. They sing through the WHOLE ENTIRE movie. It’s ANNOYING.”
“Dylan, it’s a MUSICAL. Like the Sound of Music.”
“The Sound of WHAT?”
“The Sound of Music. You know, ‘Doe, a deer, a female deer…Ray…a drop of golden sun…” singing…
“Mom. Mom. MOM!”
“What?”
“That’s gotta be from the olden days. Clearly nobody does musicals anymore.”
Ouch.
“Sure they do. Moulin Rouge? Mommy owns that.”
“Yeah but you’re a Mom. Musicals are obviously for old…for parents.”
“You were going to say old people!” I laughed.
“Well it just seems that musicals are from the olden days, that’s all I’m saying.”
“Well than colour me old, because I happen to love musicals.”
He was deathly ill Christmas Eve, but still helped me entertain his family here at home.
He was closer to death Christmas morning, but managed to help build toys, play the Wii, and get through Christmas dinner at his Aunt’s without actually dying.
Encroaching on death Boxing Day, he got up early with me, drove me to the airport to get the rental car, reloaded the kids and our gifts and suitcases into the rental (a PT Cruiser!), picked up my brother and his girlfriend in our car, and drove 4 hours to my Granny and Papa’s.
He survived a very loud and very chaotic Christmas dinner with my very loud and very chaotic (and very insane) family.
Throughout said dinner, he tried (unsuccessfully) to get my Granny to SIT DOWN ALREADY AND LET THE YOUNG’UNS CLEAN UP.
Gave me his strep throat/fever/death sentence without even kissing me. Talent!
He spent half of December 27th driving all over Eastern Ontario to find the only walk-in clinic for miles for both of us. There were 30 people ahead of us, so we hit the local pharmacy and bought Buckley’s. If you’re not familiar with Buckley’s, it tastes like melted down Balsam pine needles. Imagine sucking on your Christmas tree. Gross.
Did shots of the nastiness that is Buckley’s with me for the last 3 days. True love.
Put up with my constant whining about how sore my throat is, how much my head hurts, how much my body aches and WHY WHY WHY do I have to menstruate anymore since my uterus is no longer a baby factory?
Mix all of the above together with electric beater.
Pour into Bundt Pan.
Bake 1 hour @ 325 degrees.
Let stand in pan for 1 hour.
In a small pot, boil 1/2 cup butter, 1/2 cup sugar 1/2 cup coffee on medium heat for about 8 minutes. Remove from heat. Add 1/4 cup Kaluha. Pour over cake and let stand in pan another hour.
This is a family recipe we inherited from really good friends. I will be making it December 24th so when I do, I’ll take a picture and post it here. I do not own a Bundt Pan, so I’m going to bake a square cake and reduce the bake time.
Dylan’s 9th Birthday was yesterday. Every year I marvel at the fact that he grew yet again, and think back to the days when he was a mere football in Daddy’s arms, fragile with heart problems and a sweet, happy baby.
I’m not complaining for us — Daren and I have the means to make an annual trip to Children’s in Toronto for Dylan’s workup. What bothers me is the children who need these doctors more frequently than us - some of which are in the intensive care units with Kawasaki’s or something equally scary, or awaiting operations, or whatever.
What bothers me is that there are parents who can’t afford to travel to and stay in Toronto for care. The one day I went to visit my cousin Jessica in the Toronto Children’s Hospital after her last surgery, it cost me around $50, between parking and gas (it was only a day trip). $50 bucks I can afford. But to families that need care for their babies and kids, $50 wouldn’t even begin to cover the expenditures of having a child in a hospital 2 hours away, not to mention the toll it would take on a family with other children, or in home where the parents aren’t together, or any number of things.
London is not a small town. There are 350,000 people in this city, and the hospitals here help people for miles around, so I’m sure if you added it all up, the staff at London’s hospitals care for a lot more than 350K. I know this is a financially driven decision - that health care is a business. But, A contingency plan will be put in place if they don’t hire new doctors in time they say? NOT. GOOD. ENOUGH.
I could talk about the health care system up here and brag and say that most of the time, it’s really good. To be honest, in the entire world, there really is no place I’d rather be.
BUT.
Canadians boast about their “free” health care but we need to own it — we pay taxes that pay for health care and ought to be our own best advocates for it. Getting brushed off by the doctor is unacceptable. Waiting weeks or months for specialists is horrible. We pay for these services and I’m sick and tired of hearing that we ‘can’t switch family doctors because there aren’t any.’ The government needs to put some real money into the system!
Our health care system is fair, most of the time - I’ve had good care over the course of my life. But I’ve never had a major problem — the biggest things were the births of the kids (both smooth and fine) and Dylan’s Kawasaki’s Disease almost 9 years ago. For us, it’s been okay.
Having said that, I waited 8 months to get a therapist. There’s a lot that could have happened in 8 months. I could have gone a completely different way and destroyed myself, my kids, my marriage, taken my life, any number of things. Thankfully I leaned on the husband and he helped me to get through this time. Heck, he still is helping.
My family and I are extremely healthy, with the exception of Dylan’s heart. I’m grateful to be in the situations we are in, in terms of money, health and opportunities. Unfortunately, it isn’t like that for many people. These aren’t the first doctors we’ve lost here. I’m sure they won’t be the last.
It just makes me so very sad to know there are families here that need these guys.
Dr. Buffo & Dr. Pepelassis? We will miss you — both of you have been so kind to Dylan. Winnipeg is very lucky. And Dr. P? Dylan says hi to your son — the boys played video games together last year while Dylan was confined to a bed awaiting tests after a chest pain scare. Best of luck to you and your families.
**********
Also, I designed some buttons for a very worthy cause. Friday December 21st, 2007 is officially Frozen Pea Friday at Photrade and for every Pea photo you upload, we’ll donate $1.00 to the Frozen Pea Fund created for Susan Reynolds.(I have 3 more invites!) will donate to The Frozen Pea Fund - more info if you click the button:
Where the hell has Sugarpants been? Well, I’ll tell ya but it’s going to be brief because it’s agony talking about stupid things which really, are all that have been happening to me lately.
First, living in Canada in the winter can suck sometimes. It’s downright dangerous. Pair massive snowfall with Momvans chock full of stressed-out Moms that are looking to fulfill all their spawn’s holiday wishes and not get shit for spending too much. Hello hubby? 1950 called, it wants you back in the year of the obedient wife.
My kids?
ONE. GIFT.
ONE.
I am better at this than Madonna, who allows three gifts.
I shopped non-stop for said gift that rhymes with Pee and is unavailable everywhere. I hired a sitter on a Friday morning so I could stand in line for 90 minutes only to be sent away because the courier hadn’t delivered them. I hired the same sitter Monday morning to repeat the stupidity. That is when I was 9th in line and got one of 63 units at a normal price. Kijiji.ca and Ebay.ca are a flurry with people charging more than twice as much as retail for their Pee. Redonkulous.
Quite frankly, I’m afraid to buy toys due to lead, recalls and you know, the old date-rape drug when you get your toys wet. Who the hell makes this absolute crap and HOW does it get past our government who is supposed to protect us?
I’ll be buying books, and I need ideas for stocking stuffers for 9 and 3 year old boys that isn’t glucose-fructose or the like.
I’d love to say we had three funerals behind The House That Will Never Sell, but no.
Daren gave the furnace mouth-to-mouth and revived it. He swore a lot so I don’t know how much oxygen the poor thing actually got. But hey! Thomas learned a new word! (grumble grumble)
Yesterday, I arrived home from a meal-planned shop to find the fridge dead, splayed across the kitchen, too much makeup on and giant cougar-fridge tongue hanging loosely out of it’s mouth. After hauling 3 coolers and a laundry basket of condiments and beer to the back deck (this is where snow is GOOD), my back decided to give me the finger and quit also.
Daren gave the fridge mouth-to-mouth but the fridge being 30, which in fridge years is 4,513, it decided it was just too tired to go on. This morning I bought a refurb and had them deliver it immediately so I could put all the condiments and beer back in their heavenly place. (cue angels singing)
Which brings me to the stupidest of all stupidity. These phones. We have had these phones for maybe 2 years. Being nickel-cadmium, the batteries don’t hold a charge for as long as I need them anymore and so I went to buy new batteries and alas! They are $27 EACH. So for $52 bucks I can get my phones working? Might as well buy new phones! So I did. The fun part is, they have to charge for 16 hours. I can’t talk on the phone until 10 a.m. tomorrow.
The stupidity of all of this is that in 48 hours I’ve managed to fill landfills that much more. It bothers me a lot. Our world of stuff needs to change. If you watch the video as a Canadian, it’s so obvious that eventually the United States will invade Canada to get at our natural resources. Hopefully not in our lifetime, and hopefully not while our defense system consists of 3 canoes and a killer beaver or two.
Speaking of beaver, I need ideas for stocking stuffers don’t forget. Huh? Please help me, I can’t remember my name at this point. I was thinking a trip to the massive drug store would cover anything you throw at me because I am NOT going within 5 miles of a Wal-Mart. I would rather teach birth control to the Spears’ family than set foot in that chaos, y’all.
I told Sarah last week on the phone that I was trying ‘learn football.’ See, Daren is a big Dallas Cowboys fan, and I would love nothing more than to throw back a coupla wobbly pops with my man and enjoy a football game without having to be all girly and questiony. Further to that, I would really like to enjoy it, you know?
Now while this lovely lady surely makes her mother proud with her Dallas Cowboy Body Paint, if I did something like that for Daren it would come off like I was going for the Smurfette look or trying to join Blue Man Group.
A couple of weeks ago I surprised Daren by offering to make sure dinner was done and over with so “we” could watch the New England game. He was surprised I knew this information, but I couldn’t resist making him think aliens had abducted me and planted a football chip.
“Well they’re playing the Baltimore Ravens,” I began, “and seeing as the Pats are 11 and OH, and the Ravens are 4 and 7, I don’t think the Ravens stand a chance!”
The look on his face was priceless.
“WHO ARE YOU?”
I giggled. (I only had memorized stats, and really didn’t have a clue what the hell I was talking about.)
He loved the fact that I was trying to learn something that he loved, but I have to admit my interest has since wavered completely. Except on the weekend I noticed the Pats were still undefeated and I was quite impressed.
I even surprised myself tonight when I looked up the Pats to see that they are now 14 and OH. That is cool! (Think he’d be upset if I liked the Pats more than the Cowboys?)
And here I thought my interest in Cowboys would be limited to this little piece of hot, sweet, sugar:
And who has the longest streak of being undefeated in the NFL?The longest winning streak in NFL history is 21 games by the New England Patriots. The streak started October 5, 2003 … ran through the playoffs and the 2004 Super Bowl that the Patriots won … and ended on October 31, 2004.
The 1972 Miami Dolphins (Daren’s best friends’ favorite team - ha!) are the only team in NFL history to go through a single season undefeated. However, they lost their second game of the 1973 regular season and wound up with a winning streak of 18 games.
For the last week or so, Thomas has been pretending my kid brother has been at our house (he’s 30, but still my kid brother). Every lunchtime, I’ve had to make an extra sandwich for Uncle Joel, making sure to cut it into triangles. Hey freeloader, you owe me $4 worth of peanut butter and grape jelly.
“Uncle Joel” has been here all week despite holding down a full time job & taking care of his girlfriend Mel, and their fur-babies. Thomas has been running all over the house, yelling, “Come on Uncle Joel! Take off your sweater Uncle Joel. Oh, I like your shirt Uncle Joel! Do you like my shirt Uncle Joel? Let’s play swords/cars/Lego Uncle Joel. YOU CAN BE THE BAD GUY.” Heh.
Thomas woke up from a rare nap this afternoon, crawled out of his tent (which he has been sleeping in for 3 weeks) and announced, “UNCLE JOEL FARTED IN MY TENT AND WOKE ME UP!”
“Oh no,” I said, “What are you going to do about that stinky Uncle Joel?”
“Throw him in the snow!” he exclaimed.
“That’s not very nice,” I offered. “Who will you play with if you throw Uncle Joel in the snow?”
“Auntie Mel,” Thomas said. “She smells good. Like chocolate pudding.”
Up here in Canada, at the Loblaws stores, we have a line of products that are store brand called President’s Choice. The PC Products are usually damn good, especially the appetizer-type stuff from a box that gets thrown in the oven, like mini-quiches and some other stuff wrapped in filo pastry that tastes like heaven just because it’s wrapped in filo which is made by angels. Anyway, this line of foods extends through breakfast cereals, ice cream, anything.
You name it, President’s Choice makes it — and PC products are taking over. Ask any Canadian at their next Christmas party and they’ll be all:
“Yeah, meatballs, BBQ sauce and grape jelly, in the crock pot, on low all day? All President’s Choice eh? Yeah eh, they have the best products eh? And you can’t beat the price eh? Oh yeah man, I picked up that table and recliner over there at the Loblaws too. Yup, that snowman as well. He was on sale eh? Can’t beat that President’s Choice!“
Seriously, we talk like that eh?
Part of the President’s Choice line up is a series of sauces and marinades called “Memories Of…(insert someplace here). Like there’s the Memories of Singapore Marinade that is a fruity passion fruit chicken marinade that I personally will never buy again because it was too strong but definitely has it’s place in the line up if they ever start target marketing bees. I’m pretty sure that sauce could fill a greenhouse of honeycombs or whatever bees do with pollen besides make people bitch about spring and their noses and complain complain COMPLAIN — why don’t you just go be on Grey’s Anatomy? God I hate that whiny show.
So the sauces - there’s Memories of Mom’s Kitchen and my favorite: Memories of Szechwan Spicy Peanut Satay Sauce. YUM. Tons more too eh? You ought to come up here and buy some since your dollar isn’t worth much anymore. The sauces sell 2 for $5 a lot of the time and that’s when everyone tries new ones. The funny thing is, every time they go on sale like that, I think, “I swear those things are normally $2.49,” and then I chuck 4 in my cart — 3 of them being that peanut sauce.
On a whim, I thought that I should play a little in Corel Paint Shop Pro (yeah, the President’s Choice version of Photoshop, lemme tell ya) and give you President’s Choice Memories of Life sauces:
Memories of Infancy: nothing like the taste of breast milk and saliva covered fingers to bring back those memories. Fill your pants and you’ll be basking in the glory that was infancy. Course you’ll also be basking in a pant load of shit, but really? That’s your problem. President’s Choice also makes detergent but you’re own your own, shitpants.
Memories of Preschool: Ahhh the sweet smell of PlayDoh and finger paint. Remember the days before nut allergies and lead? Remember a time when you could hug your teacher without getting suspended? Remember lifting your jumper so little Billy and Steven could see your ‘kiki’ and then they showed you their weiners?
Never mind that last part — I blame my parents for all my problems. Hold me.
Memories of Grade Two: Billy and Steven got transferred and you’re all about girl jeans now anyway. Skirts are for babies, and this lovely aroma of library carpet and erasers is enough to set you back 2232 42 years to Grade Two (not 2nd grade, Americanos!) where girls have cooties and boys are stupid.
Memories of College: Sure, high school was a pot-filled blur of skipping class to head to the mall and bum smokes, and getting drunk and high behind the church. That’s why we didn’t make a sauce for that: BORING!
In college, we felt ALIVE! We owned a bong or five! Binge drinking, random sex and toga parties made us feel spicy and wrong but oh. so. right. Enjoy this puke and beer sauce at your next kegger or on your microwaved Kraft Dinner in college residence after the bars close.
Memories of Parenting: More sophisticated and spicy than our College sauce, and again with the puke and beer — but the puke is straight from the mouths of babes you can’t afford and the beer is so you can sleep at night rather than lying awake, drowning in your sea of guilt for how much you are screwing up your kids. And you ARE screwing up your kids, trust me.
President’s Choice really is in every household.
What sauces would you add?
*If you are here from the lovely President’s Choice company, I love you and want to have saucy little babies with you. Don’t sue me, eh?
