Wondering? Don’t. I am childfree by choice, and love it!

Saw this, and while I don’t normally share things on my personal page that make it really clear that I am childfree by choice, I couldn’t resist! I shared it, and the response has been fantastic. This is by CBC’s comedy page, and I LOVED it.

I am who I am, and my choice does not mean you made the wrong choice. Everyone’s decisions are personal to them, and choosing something different isn’t a judgement on your decision! Why can’t people live and let live? Jesus. OH and for reference, I had a pretty serious family rift this year when my parents decided that ‘I’ owe them grandchildren. Wrong wrong wrong wrong WRONG. We are currently  not speaking, by my choice. Maybe in a year, we can reconnect and laugh about it?! 🙂 But there are none so blind as those who will not see.

Free to be me!

I had my dressage lesson on Tuesday and my legs were still kind of killing me (see Halloween half-marathon and my apparent lack of fitness…). I was SO tempted to cancel the lesson, just take it easy again.

Mr. Handsome- photo credit to Hannah R.

Did I? Nope! I am proud of myself for committing, even when I was tired, my legs still hurt, I was having a lot of trouble with stairs- going down them was not easy until yesterday- but I did it. Oh and it was absolutely pouring cats and dogs. Yeeeesh.

It was a good, thorough and challenging lesson.

Things Oats is allowed to do now: Express himself appropriately. His major hissy-fits of yesteryear are no longer, apparently, and now he is okay to say ‘THIS IS HARD!!’ and then…move on and accept it.

Phew!!

We worked on lateral work at the trot, and he had a few ‘moments’ but funny enough Karen really liked when he was haughty with a little more attitude, because his trot suddenly became very ‘prancy’ and bouncy, instead of flat and draggy like usual. So, we could use it! Ha, take that, pony 🙂

After some fairly extensive lateral work, we brought in transitions- walk/trot in shoulder-in, and haunches in. This was tough, I’m not going to say it was easy. But, it was good work, and I was very pleased with the solid effort-not without minor drama- from Oats.

Then we moved on to holding a nice mid-level neck with a lot of bend inwards, from a slow trot to a canter, holding the bend. Easier said than done…We struggled with that more. I had a hard time keeping the bend, not letting Oats throw his head up and out, and keeping the canter with the bend. Ah, things…

We finished the lesson by working on ‘spins’ sort of. Getting Oats to disengage his hindquarters and let me ‘spin’ him, instead of bracing against me. It wasn’t 100% successful, but I could feel a real change from the left spin to the right. A very interesting technique, and not something I am used to doing.

Bonus- all that work let me forget how tired and achy my legs were!

A good pony.

 

An evening with David Sedaris

I was lucky enough to have my husband buy us some tickets to go see David Sedaris do a reading the other day and I LOVED it.

His insights (crass, gross, gentle, loving, heartfelt, funny~) really spoke to me. I heard the most bizarre stories I have ever heard, and probably will ever hear in my lifetime. I also had the opportunity to share some pretty dirty jokes with coworkers the next day (shhhh!).

He’s so funny, but plays it off in a well-intentioned ‘aw shucks’ kind of way. Like he says, when he’s asked why he has an obsession with picking up trash outside his home in the UK- “People think I’m crazy for doing it, and it’s true it has become my hobby. But this hobby is taking me to Buckingham Palace to meet the Queen!” (He also had a garbage truck named after him, for his service in cleaning up the area).

Fabulous night, and having him read those stories, and some new ones, was a great time. I could NOT believe the story about his fatty tumor  a ‘lipoma’ as he calls it. He wanted to get it removed, and then wanted the tumor, once excised- so he could feed it to his favourite snapping turtle in South Carolina.

The doctor, humorlessly  said anything removed from Sedaris’ body was kept by the facility and would not be given to Sedaris.

So, David Sedaris left, tumor intact, and shared that story at a reading. A tiny lady came up to him after the reading and said she could remove the tumor and he could have it afterward. She did add that she was a doctor, of course.

He took her up on the offer.

They went under cover of darkness to a medical clinic across the border to Mexico, and the procedure was done. David was accompanied to her sister’s house, where he got some pain meds, and then at 4am, was on his way to another reading via airplane. His tumor was frozen, and shipped to his South Carolina house, where it could stay frozen ready in time for a Thanksgiving day feast for the snapping turtle.

Sadly, when he went to feed the frozen tumor to the turtle, there were only the smaller ‘slider’ turtles left. The snapping turtles were likely hibernating until spring. It didn’t quite ruin Thanksgiving, but it did leave it feeling rather anticlimactic.

I believe he said he was going to wait until summer, to feed the tumor.

OMG!

Weirdest story ever. Woah.

The Big Finale Perogy: A Wedding Story, Part 6

The wedding proceeded as all weddings do…with some embarrassing dancing.

But first, some standout moments:  the bride was presented with a giant perogy courtesy of her grandmother I believe. I don’t know if she ate the perogy, but it did sit on the table for some time on display.

Yes let’s take a moment to digest this- a giant perogy sat on a table at a wedding.

To make the evening even more fun fun and get people involved, along with the perogy presentation and a few lame games, a new rule was instated. Instead of the traditional clinking of glasses, everyone who wanted to the happy couple to kiss had to sing a song.

Yugh.

Um NO THANKS I’m a terrible singer and don’t enjoy that–did NOT participate.

But several people were good sports and drunk, and did. They also started nominating other couples to kiss instead of the newlyweds, which again, some people did good naturedly, or if you were the bride’s parents, refused to kiss and looked stony-faced and simmering.

The wedding wound down and navy-overalls/running shoes girl was the only one left on the dance floor…We took that as a good cue to leave and headed back to my SO’s parents place.

I brought with me a few of the centerpieces, they were cute flowers in little pots, one of which the friend of my SO promptly broke the stem on. 

I guess that’s the way the giant perogy crumbles…

Meet the creatures: A Wedding story, part 5

Young guests, dressed like a night on the town for a stagette party and we have our wedding, folks!

Emily Post (or whoever the reigning etiquette queen was) would turn in her grave. I have never seen so much denim on men in one venue (and I live in Calgary! Home of the Stampede!) and so many skin baring ‘party’ dresses and excessive makeup on women.

A standout, however, deserves a prize for her ‘costume’, I’m not even sure you can call that clothing. If I have one regret from attending this affair, it is that I didn’t take a photo with this individual. She was wearing navy blue bellbottom overalls that ended just above her ankles that appeared to be made of a tight, stretchy material (lycra? Polyester blend? Both?). On her upper half, aside from the overall straps, she was wearing a crop top/bandeau style top that I think was light blue. Gaudy running shoes completed the outfit, and she was obviously off to the races! I still talk about this spectacle– a visual masterpiece.

The bride’s parents were both incredibly tiny people, like Lilliputian small, as was the bride’s brother who probably topped out at an impressive 4’9 BUT DID YOU SEE HIS TRUCK! I, for one, was more impressed that he hadn’t broken a bone at some point ascending and descending from the behemoth vehicle via the stairs that folded out when the door was opened, maybe he has at some point?

You know what they say ‘bout men compensating for size via giant trucks though…

Anyways, the bride’s parents seemed a little tense and awkward. Overboard on the rude speeches?

 But they did make an announcement via the cougar MC, that the bar is now an open bar. COURTESY OF THE BRIDE’S PARENTS AND ONLY THE BRIDES PARENTS, SO GET THAT STRAIGHT.

Boom. Mic drops.

Dinners, drinks and screams- A Wedding story, part 4

Or is it dinner, drinks and screeches?

Anyways, the happy couple and bridal party comes in –their entrance also carefully choreographed to a song, can’t remember which one, probably Bruno mars…yeah, I’ll leave that one there– and take their seats.

 I’d also have to say that it felt early on like the wedding was not a wedding to unite the happy couple, but rather the bride’s wedding, birthday, Christmas and what the heck, maybe even her graduation rolled into one event. Anyways! The drinks start and it’s only the finest for this young couple- plastic cups for every drink, and served by the teenager out of the Simpsons.

Hey, booze is booze though. If you ask nicely, you get wine on your table.

Buffet- snooze. Pierogies for all.

Now for the speeches. Endless, bottomless (like I wish my drinks were!), forever, speeches.

It felt like everyone and their dog got up there to say something (mostly about the bride, because BRIDE IS PRINCESS).

Some speeches were boring, some funny, and some very embarrassing.  Note to all: bodily fluids jokes and or tales are NOT acceptable at mine, yours, or anyone’s wedding. At all.

Thanks.

Even if the bride or groom wants a joke or two, they don’t want to be embarrassed at their own wedding.

Other people at the wedding? Well, roast away!

Speaking of which…the Emcee at the wedding  was related to the bride (aunt or something?) AND she vaguely knew my SO.

How did she know my SO? Well, she tried to take him home from a bar some months before he and I met. This same MC gave a very long- drawn out speech about the bride, blah blah and then about herself: HOW HAPPILY MARRIED SHE IS LOOK AT HER BEAUTIFUL DAUGHTER SO HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY.

Interesting.

She apparently was also heard whispering comments about how ‘cute’ my SO looked. 

Yeah, on MY arm, cougar-town! 

The guests were the best part of this wedding though, and you’ll never believe…