Thursday, June 28, 2007

Hairy Scary

So here we are again, facing another long weekend and our usual trip to the hairdressers. Sabrina had her hair layered just a bit more than usual, while I insisted they fix their mistakes from the last trip in.




I find it really annoying they will dye my hair, then streak the hell out of it, then only cut bits and pieces out, followed by an hour of flat ironing, or blow drying. I keep telling them, "I won't be doing this, why are you...can I do this at home?"

They tell me it has to be dried anyways, part of the price I pay. So I'm still a Canadian schmuck and politely agree.

I sit in my uncomfortable, leather chair that has white cotton bleeding out of it. The woman has her crotch pressed against my knee as she leverages herself to tame my hair. And, you know, I'm thinking, oh fuck! not again, but if she starts moaning I'm outta here! This hair style will last until my next shower, which is probably going to be tonight.

Reason: we still seem to have a lice problem.

It's getting on my nerves. Because I own a daycare I am basically informed about lice issues, often sent home notices from the kid's school of outbreaks, yet I feel oddly disgusted that me or my family could get it. We should be immuned by them, shouldn't we? We live in a upper-class sort of area in an executive home, have four bathrooms that cleanse us and keep us pure of trailer trash filth.

Fact is, kids are kids, teenagers have sleepovers, at home or at camp, they style each other's hair and some of Sabrina's friends have questionable hygenic routines. So I buy the lice shampoo stuff that costs about the same price as a case of dry cider, or a 6-pack of Heinekens.

Hubby is extremely embarrassed. L-l-l-l-iiii....bugs.

I've had to buy the stuff a few times now, particularly after one of my previous daycare kids seem to be the carrier, all the time. I remember exactly my first encounter with the buggers. 3-year old was standing at the window, looking out towards a promising afternoon play in the yard, as the sun nestled down upon his brow, it struck me eerily how his crew cut seemed to be moving.

I look closer and discover little critters running here, there and I was so disgusted and freaked out by it. I checked the internet first to confirm what lice look like. I had no idea. Seems there's a lot of lice and shapes and breeds and sticky eggs and, just really gross up close pictures.

I managed to pick one off his head and put it in a sandwich baggy and passed it off to another customer to form her analysis. She happened to be a Vancouver Police Officer, who had no experience with lice, but extremely knowledgeable about scabies. Oh, fuck! What in the hell are scabies? I'll tell you what it is, it's another goggle search of gross pictures.

Anyways, I don't feel all that disgusted by lice anymore. It seems to be a natural thing that occurs at daycares, at school, amongst teenagers. So hubby and I go to Safeway to buy "the shampoo". Hubby won't even say the word.

I'm standing at the pharmacy counter because the lice shampoo is hidden behind bars, away from five-finger Mary. I think people won't take care of the problem because they're too embarrassed to ask for the LICE SHAMPOOOOOOO.

Hubby is standing nearby, pretending to buy condoms or some manly thing and I suddenly find myself in a long, winded detail of our current situation with the pharmacist, who's of asian descent and needs several translations of my english.

Weeee....Need...to buy.....shampooooo....FOR LICE...

You have the lice?

No, I lie. My daughter does.

And possibly my son....maybe my husband.

In my best apologetic voice of explaining, which instinctively makes my voice rise a few decibels and in one heaving breath, "We have THE LICE, we just bought this stuff a few weeks ago, why isn't it working? I think I might be doing it wrong. Is my daughter's hair too thick, too long...we do a lot of camping, you know."

Pharmacist: Did you perform a second treatment after 7 days.

7 Days!!! Isn't that, like, The Ring, the movie. I will kill you after 7 days. Look, I'm about to kill someone myself. I'm tired of these critters invading my life. But more annoyed that hubby is hiding behind Depends napkins and Polygrip.

Yes, Mr. Pharmacist, I ....would....like...to buy....some LICE SHAMPOO....the real good stuff.....the...one...with...the nice....LICE COMB THING....that will go through....my daughter's hair easily......

AND BETTER MAKE THAT.....TWO BOTTLES.....WE'VE GOT A HELL OF AN INFESTATION AT MY HOUSE....

Oh, hey....there's my husband over there...come on over honey, look see what I'm buying....

Picky Parents and the Child Nose Pickers

This morning, after her comment, I felt my blood heat up my face. Count to 10, Colleen, count to 10. But I knew my eyes were already in a defensive, glassy stare, as she kept explaining her reasons as to why I need to feed her son 5,000 times a day.

He's a vegetarian, they need to graze all day long with a multitude of offerings, fruits and vegetables and grains, "he's a vegetarian, you know".

Son is 22 months old and similar in age with the other kids here, which is to say, the other kids don't bring pork chops and veal cutlets for snack time either.

Son's lunch box is a large pail full of fruit, vegetables, big bags of cookies, cereal, granola bars, cheese sandwiches, juice, snack after snack that require preparation time. Not like the other kid's lunchboxes with snack and lunch meals pre-cut, pre-contained, ready to go.

I find myself trying to slice up an avocado, or a pear, determining how many mini crisps I should take from big bag.
And now I'm just plain annoyed. Son seems to be losing weight and she's concerned. Guess what, son is growing up and is getting taller, not to mention he shits 5 times a day.

Yesterday she asked that I spend more one-on-one time with son because she's been neglecting him lately by going out, and by going out I mean by "going to work". I'll just ignore the other five kids for a bit because apparently their parents are out carousing.

Count to 10, Colleen, count to 10. I blurt out, "okay", because in the back of my mind I see a brand new travel trailer payment coming up soon. And, yes, I'll make sure he doesn't get hurt by the other kids, even though your kid is the biggest bully, hair-pulling, face scratching, toy snatching kid here.

She's not as bad as one customer I use to have. Their son was 2 years old, still needed to have his milk bottled WARMED UP. As well as his water sippy-cup WARMED UP. They phoned the daycare about 3-4 times a day, usually during nap time, which woke son up, as well as the other kids.

During winter, with the drive and walk-way covered in snow and ice, father tip-toed, inch by inch, baby steps, carrying son to safety, despite drive and walk-way lathered in melt-away and salts.

They phoned once to ask if son had his snack, which I replied "no, he wasn't hungry". Then panic on the other side of the phone, "is he alright, is he fainting, is he breathing??!!!" Utter panic.
From then on I told them he ate like a pig.

Handwriting Pesonality Quiz


The results of your analysis say:

You plan ahead, and are interested in beauty, design, outward appearance, and symmetry.
You are a shy, idealistic person who does not find it easy to have relationships, especially intimate ones.
You are diplomatic, objective, and live in the present.
You are not very reserved, impatient, self-confident and fond of action.
You enjoy life in your own way and do not depend on the opinions of others.

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Monday, June 25, 2007

Secret Garden

I have noticed when I post pictures of my backyard that I have been neglecting to show you my "secret garden". This is the garden I keep behind a fence, mostly because I operate a daycare at home and cannot have children running here, there, and everywhere....by law, it needs a fence.
So I've taken some pictures of my other backyard, which is just as nice as my main backyard, but louder.
The swimming pool needs a pump to circulate the water and chemicals all day long, which are directly below nutcase neighbour's bedroom window.
In the past we agreed to shut the pump off at 8:00pm, but then she came over to demand "you turn it off at 6:00pm, or I get legal". Imagine a fuck-head Romanian, and their fuck-head Romanian accents, okay....then picture her squished in face, the communist look that all communists seem to have, a hard, dull, dictated face, and pointing a finger within inches of my breast bone.
But I won't get into that right now, read "the Romanian Bitch" which is archived earlier in my blog.
I watch from my window at night, all my wonderful solar lights sketching my property boundaries, and a special floating ball in the pool. It smells chemicals and chlorine and the pump is truly loud.

Daniel and I lay awake at night, with smiles on our faces.
























Nutcase cunt thinks her yard is the best, simply because it's larger, and sits along a salmon spawning creek. Yet, nutcase planted trees to keep "people away" and blocked the creek view...and she has several "private property" signs. Her yard isn't that great....shit, we built a semi-inground pool, with a hundred evergreen trees, and banana plants, and tropical essence....

Romanians think they are better than everybody. Can't even look beyond themselves to recognize other people have gardens and architecture and vision.

We are awaiting the complaints....I think my usual "fuck you immigrant" response will suffice.

Someone Missed Me

There's a House in my Driveway

You can actually see my house now, without all the boy toys in the drive. We've now got the trailer, the boat, and the van at the campground. Right now our van has been called to service as a shed, storing the kid's electric scooters and Daniel's precious "Hummer" barbecue.
Now all we've got to worry about is how to transport the three ATV's up the lake, where there is a special course available to knock the wind out of you.

And in case you're not paying attention....and just like clockwork, the sun appears just as soon as we arrive home!





When we first come home from camping I am amazed at how everything has grown and got greener, and more colourful. Even though this seems to be the crappiest spring/summer to date, with all the frickin' rain, I have had only to water my lawn twice.













Buoys and Boys


There are several buoys already positioned in the lake. You have to make your own if you want to buoy your boat up on water, instead of taking it out the lake and parking it.
And, of course, of all the buoys this guy tied his boat up onto ours. Even though it is marked "private - SpongeBob", we will now be adding our site number to it.
Daniel made two industrial sized buckets of cement, and the chains dried inside the cement. They were really heavy and a pain to get to the lake.

It rained now and then, but mostly rained. The kids had to bundle up. Luckily, our beds are heated...very, very nice.

The sun came out just long enough to sit at the beach and have a beer.

Cultus Lake Seasonal Site S218

Our new site S218 already had gravel on the ground, which made it much cleaner for us because it rained again. We will be buying a tent thing to place in the middle of the site, to allow for more sitting arrangements.












We bought solar lights and the site looks excellent at night time, but the damned camera didn't work again. We are on a corner lot, so not too many neighbours to bother when we play our music.
















Here's a view from our site, although not very clear picture, you can see how close we are to the lake.













Here's at the foot of the little street our site is on.

Thursday, June 21, 2007

Killing Lice


Tonight Pink Floyd is in town. It's a concert hubby would have killed for,



Except we needed to ready ourselves for camp trip...especially to set up our new "seasonal spot", which was announced to purchase last Sunday at $1,600 for the balance of the year. Yes, we took the spot immediately...it's a lake view spot for Pete's sake....and it will be ours forever and ever, should we opt out on our continued yearly agreement.

We finally got our camera out of warranty repair...I took tons of pictures of my night solar lights, not one picture turned out.

What 42 Loonies Can Buy You

It was my dad's birthday a few days ago. I'm not suppose to say how old he is because my mom doesn't want people to know she's married to an old man. He's not that old, but I can understand the logic, since I don't tell people my real age anymore either.



Here's what she said about the birthday lobster:

It was flown in from the Atlantic and cooked alive. It started off seeming like it was going to be too much work to be worthwhile but once i got started it was excellent except the dumbo waitress didnt know enough to give me another plate or garbage pail or something to put my shells in. My plate was huge but had a mountain of shells on it before i was even half finished. I had to move my potato to my little bun plate and ended up eating it off that which was awkward as hell, especially since said dumbo took my dinner knife and i had to use the huge lobster knife.
Could have used more sour cream or the whipped butter that was provided with the buns but dumbo had already taken it away. I was guarding my fork with my life.



Dad got the steak and lobster...but only the lobster tail, and it cost 38 loonies...I probably would have gone for the full lobster.

Thursday, June 14, 2007

Ode to Pacific Winds

I met my husband on a weekend trip to Tofino on Vancouver Island. It's circa 1980 and the night was sultry. Just kidding, a spoof from the movie "Throw Momma off the Train" . It's a tiny village on the northern west tip and boasts scenic shorelines and tranquility. My girlfriend and I rented a chalet on the beach and spent two days admiring waves bursting to shore, as we don't usually see angry waters on the mainland. The waves were, ironically, like the panic attacks I began to suffer at 19 years old. One minute I'm feeling calm and tranquil, the next I feel complete panic. I suddenly cannot breathe, there are no more waves of breath.

But the waves keep crashing, the winds force them from the ocean, deep from the Pacific waters, and sometimes we found partial remnants of Japanese buoys or garbage. We pretended they floated to us all the way from Japan, but we really knew their fishing vessels were nearby in International waters, netting whale and sea lions or other innocent sea creatures that got caught in their nets, depleting the First Nations of their rightful heritage to kill whales with respect, with guns and spears. The Japanese ships will keep the bountiful salmon and tuna and return to their homeland, only to mass fish again on the outskirts of Canadian waters and Canadian sovereignty.

The winds are strong and forceful, more so than we're accustomed on the mainland coast. There are no wind breakers until Vancouver Island and the trees that align the edge of the beach are repeatedly blown backwards, now sculptured at a 45 degree angle. It's odd to see trees not standing straight. They remind me of a Queen's beheading, a graceful death.

There is a constant mist around us, ocean spittle, and down the road there is an ancient forest, where the spit has been soaked up to be recycled again. It's green, several hues of green, so thick of moss and vines and earth, even the rain is green. I close my eyes and it smells like rotten salt, then I panic, again. I suck up rotten salty air into my lungs, over and over, until a brown paper bag provides me with calm.

My husband blew in from the east coast, straight from the thick of Quebecois separatism and the smoking man. He came "west young man" to find a job gooey-duck diving and worked off a fishing vessel with 20 other non-English speaking nationals from around the world.

I first saw him standing beside a black corvette. I wanted to meet someone who had a nicer car than mine; a gorgeous 1980 Firebird, with corvette rally rims and Michelin 50's. God, my car was hot.

Turns out he was just standing beside it, admiring my car, but by then it was too late. He found a place in my heart right then and there and we have never been apart, except for the occasional trips back East to Frenchland, but at least he keeps one of the kidlens with me.

He's a motherfucker, dip-shit french fucker frog, pisses me off all the time, we argue over everything, but I know there is no problem, because I usually win these battles, since it's coming up to our 27th anniversary of togetherness and celebrates our first meeting at the Pacific's crest.

He was wearing tight jeans and I was wearing a brown paper bag. And not much has changed since then.

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Pictures of our new Travel Trailer




...on the other side of the fence...

Here are some pictures of my front and back yard, taken June 10/07