WWC # 27

Weekly Word Challenge is hosted by the very funny Tink over at Pickled Beef - check out her site for photos and details on how to join in the fun. This weeks challenge words are Domestic & Foreign, I had loads of fun gathering these photos.


My Mom was a rather talented artist and so, I chose one of her paintings for domestic. Sadly she was called away to paint sunsets in 1993.



My parents were fortunate enough to be able to do a fair amount of traveling in their lives. This next piece is artwork from Russia from before the Iron Curtain rusted. The photo following is the back label of this work. Too bad it didn't come out very well, it is inlaid woods and really very intricate.





This covers both categories, it is my domestic (at least I think so) table, sporting a runner that the folks picked up in Sweden. As a bonus, it shows my lack of domestic skills!


Foreign


Domestic


These next shots, I, um, ahem... "borrowed".

Domestic


We can't give her away!


Foreign & Domestic



I think I might be getting better with this camera phone! I think my next challenge is to see if I can't get them into a slide show like some of the other bloggers use. I will update later on next weeks words.

Goodnight.

P.S. Just had a look and I think I spoke to soon, they are still kind of blurry. More practice I guess.

So close, then this!

As I was headed out to catch the bus on Wednesday, I noticed how much snow had gone, so thought I would snap a picture. This is one of the South facing yards in the complex, starting to show grass. What a sight for snow blind eyes!




Then I noticed the forlorn remains of this snowman.


I was out today after three days of snow and grey, ucky weather. It was -17c with a windchill of -25c (-15f windchill). I was almost immediately blinded by the sun reflecting off of the snow, but thought I had to take a comparison shot. This is the same lawn area as the first shot.



And I found some other snowmen that had fared a bit better.



I thought the shadows looked kind of pretty.


These last three were taken without the benefit of actually seeing the screen on my phone, it was that bright. I think they turned out alright.

It will be just above freezing for the rest of the week, then calling for more snow on the weekend again - sigh! It will be warm thought so it won't stick around. I really shouldn't complain, at least I am not in the East with Hilary of The Smitten Image! She gets much better pictures though.


Goodnight all.

WWC #26

Finally, I am getting around to putting up my poor examples of Paper and Ceramic for this weeks WWC. This is hosted by Tink of Pickled Beef, so you should drop by and have a look at much better photos than I can get. Next weeks words are Domestic & Foreign, so that could prove interesting.


Here we have two papier-mache Christmas ornaments (no, I didn't make them - no talent that way)


A paper angel (again, no)




My baby book from the Uni Hospital. Sister just sent it to me & now I finally know what time of day I was born!



Very old papers - Dad's service papers from WWII


Ceramic statue made in Dartmouth, N.S. to commemorate the Volunteers that served in Canada's Navy during WW's I & II



Ceramic Jewelery


That is it. Whew, I didn't think I would make it this week, it has been a bit hectic, what with falling and filling in for the boss.

You would think I would learn!

There are four buildings in the apartment complex where I live (and work part time) and I walk between the buildings on a regular basis. Working at the office part time gives me access to all the buildings and round about June last year, I tripped on the speed bump between two of the buildings. I tripped lengthwise to the speed bump, so landed straddling it and smacked myself in the face. I dented my forehead, skewed my glasses and had wonderful bruises all over and tore the glove that I wear on my right hand because of the lymphoedema.

The boss is off enjoying her head cold in the Baja (which she passed on before she left) and as a result I am left in charge which means I am working full time hours. Well on Sunday, I was taking a prospective tenant to view a suite and damned if I didn't do it again, crosswise. This time it was a different bump, one that I have to walk over to go to the bus, the office, um, pretty much anywhere AND I WALK OVER IT EVERY DAY! Oh and I have lived here for four or so years!

The direction we were headed was also slightly uphill, so I had no hope in hell of not falling. I carry most of my weight in my belly, so am front heavy anyway. I can't even blame it on snow as it has mostly melted on the roadways, in fact the bump is dry, of course, I landed in the melt coming off of the grass. Drove gravel and tiny bits of glass into one hand and skinned the elbow and baby finger on the arm that I am not supposed to get a needle stick in, or a hang nail because of the potential for infection. Not to mention knocked a few vertebra out of place.

The poor girls I was taking to show the suite to. They were all "OMG, is there someone we can call?" "Are you going to be alright?" and so on. They were very kind not to laugh and I am sure it was funny as hell to watch. Once I got my breath back, I told them I was fine, just a fat klutz and then we went and looked at the suite.

That night, I decided that I had better do at least one set of the exercises I had been doing and see if I could do some stretching for my back. This went well, I actually felt pretty good by the time I went to bed and much better when I got up. Well, as yesterday progressed and I started to cough, all of the muscles I have been working in my belly decided that coughing on top of the abuse they had gotten Sunday was just too much. By the time I went to bed last night, if I didn't know better, I would have said that I had dislocated my uterus! OMG I was sore. All I can think of is that all of my fat being thrown forward against muscles that really haven't had a lot asked of them in such a long time was just too much. They were just getting accustomed to me trying to suck them back in where they belong and here I go throwing all this weight at them from the other side.

I discovered today though, that I can still walk, smoke, read and suck on a throat lozenge all at the same time - I just can't walk and talk! Hmm, seems to me that is what I was doing the first time too.

Can anyone walk & talk?

Pregnancy Hormones

I was just speaking with a friend and she told me of a woman that she knows that is on a diet using pregnancy hormones. WTF? Well, apparently she injects herself daily for three weeks and eats a 500 calorie/day diet. Then for three weeks she eats a normal diet, then goes back to the 500 calorie pregnancy hormone routine for another three weeks.

So far she has lost 25 pounds in just the first three week cycle. It is supposed to reset your metabolism. The hormones have to be imported from India and men can do this as well although 1 in 20 could develop breasts.

Does this strike anyone else as a bit nuts? Injecting yourself with someone else's pregnancy hormones? 500 calories a day?

This woman is not overweight by more than 10 or 15 pounds and plays squash on a regular basis. She is also a NURSE.

Well, now I have to see if I can find any information on-line, 'cause this is too weird, the number of bad things that could happen from this. Just the gross factor itself, how well screened is this, what about hormone positive cancers, if you are not menopausal, what does it do to your cycle, if you are what does it do to that? I could go on, but I am pretty sure you can all come up with your own questions.

I googled "pregnancy hormone diet" and was led to this page.

It seems this Dr. Simeons discovered that "a very tiny amount of the human pregnancy hormone hCG 'disconnects' the mobile fat and assists to burning it and discharging it through the kidneys." The 'mobile' fat is the stuff that keeps us from starving when food runs out. It goes on to say "the placenta-hormone hCG Human Chorionic Gonadotropin should act through the hypothalamus on mobile fat stored as spare fuel in still active adipose-cells under the skin."

In a nutshell then, you tell your body it is preggers and you are living through a famine. It opens the fat vaults so you can produce a child and not starve. The website does admit that this method failed double blind studies, but they have continued to do it anyway, they started in the 50's or so. They also claim that you must be supervised by trained personnel and the diet is very specific. Very long FAQ page on the site which I was glad to see. Still, not something I am going to run off to have done to me though. Just because a Dr discovered this doesn't make it a good idea. Although it sounds better than what I was imagining from what I was told by my friend.


While searching though, I did find here that there might be hope for MS sufferers by using pregnancy hormones. If I had to give money to one or the other, my money would be on improving quality of life rather than losing weight.


Thoughts anyone? Am I out to lunch or is losing weight really worth all that?

Good night.

Seat belts & slow chases

I just did a quick calculation in my head and damn I'm old! However, that was not the calculation that I was performing. It seems that the wearing of seat belts has been a law in AB for about 25 years now. No I didn't look it up, I was working for the RCMP when it became law and I think it was in the second year that I was stationed in Peace River. Therefore about 25 years - hence, OMG I'm old!

The reason I bring this up is there is a funny story related to the enforcement of this law. Now, the members all had to radio in from their cars when they were pulling over a vehicle for any reason and give me license tags and vehicle description as well as where they were located. So, I am dutifully writing all of this down as the female Constable relates it to me when I suddenly hear this gagging noise over the radio, then silence. She comes back on a couple of seconds later and finishes telling me where she is, but I can hear her laughing.

She does her check, I do my computer check, she lets me know she is clear and proceeding in whatever direction. An hour or so later she saunters into the comcentre where I am working away (or reading a book) and tells me that she was pulling this vehicle over for not wearing a seat belt, but she forgot to take hers off when she was getting out of the car. She damned near hung herself and had a very interesting bruise for a few days. The fellow she had pulled over, did very well in not laughing at her, so she let him go with a warning, she was laughing too hard to write a ticket anyway.

******************

One of the things I had to do in that job was to monitor high speed chases. I had to keep the radio repeaters open, tell the detachments that they were heading to that a chase was coming their way and write down everything that was said. This could be almost impossible depending on the circumstances of the chase and the number of vehicles involved.

I had one chase however that I couldn't help but keep up with. First a bit of geography, Peace River is located at the joining of two major rivers and the town is down in the valley. It gets pea soup fog on a regular basis there. Winter fog is especially heavy.

Some silly woman had gassed up her van, then leaving her kid in the baby seat and the vehicle running, had gone in to pay for the gas. This was in the '80's and we didn't have the remotes to lock and unlock doors like we do now, so she had left it unlocked, after all she was only going to be a minute. Well, a minute is all it takes.

I get the phone call and before I can make a radio call, I get a radio call, one of the members had pulled in to gas up so he also got the complaint. The van was heading up the south hill out of town, in pea soup fog, dispatch one of the other cars and he will stay with the mother to keep her apprised. Two cars see the van, pull in behind him and turn on their lights. No response, this guy isn't stopping for anyone.

Most of my transcript from the night was: Yes, we are still behind him, we are doing about 45 kph (28 mph for those readers from the USA), oh now, we are up to 50 kph. He just won't pull over! I can't see to get in front of him. Control, radio McLennan and have them start towards us. Tell them to be careful the hwy is covered in black ice. So I did, then I had to keep track of McLennan detachment too. About 30 minutes into this, I hear: McLennan is that you coming towards us? Yes, I think so. Turn on your over head lights. They are on! Well, I guess that's not you then. About 5 minutes or so after this, the same thing: Is that you? I can see three cars heading toward me. Yes, we see your lights now. So, McLennan pulled in front of the van forcing him to stop and they arrested the guy. The kid? Well, he slept through the whole thing.

Of course after all this time, I can't remember the call numbers of the cars that were involved, but that wouldn't make the tale any better.

For those that have never experienced it, black ice is not visible on the hwys, it just looks like a wet spot so takes you unawares. Here is the wiki description. It is very treacherous.

Weekly Word Challenge #25

I thought it only fitting, after my last post, to try my hand at the WWC that Tink at Pickled Beef hosts. After all, if I intend someday to fork over money for a digital camera, I had better get back into the practice of taking pictures. So with out further ado, I give you this weeks photos. The words were Stone & Glass.



Stone:
Amethyst

Sorry, colour needs work as does getting close ups. The top right is a Tanzenite and the bottom right is a Sapphire, can't remember the other two, I think they are both Pink Tourmaline.


Jade, Labradorite and Fire Opals


Glass:


This is a very cool glass paperweight that was gifted to me by one of my brothers. It is Kosta Boda and has the artists name etched on the bottom.


These too are Kosta Boda, hand made glass eggs that Mom & Dad picked up in Sweden.

These are three of the remaining seven (Sis at Bag Lady's Blather has the other four) salt bowls that belonged to our paternal grandmother. It is a mystery what happened to the eighth. I didn't put the other spoons in as they are silver and very tarnished.

This last is '70's (maybe '60's) and looks like carnival glass, but I am not sure. I don't know enough about glass to say and there are no markings on the bottom.
I really like the way the light and shadows picked up on this shot though. I had to smudge out the base of my monitor though.


So, there you have it, my very first entry into WWC. I hope they shots are not too disappointing.