Month: November 2011

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Starting to Feel Like a Routine

This was my fifth weekend in a row of powering away at a transcription project. It was also another weekend of breaking the tedium on Saturday by going to dinner at Jody and Gary’s. I decided after taking just a single bit of The Most Amazing Club Sandwich I Have Ever Eaten that they are going to have to follow me around so Gary can cook for me every night. 🙂 His shrimp minestrone was also delicious, and the leftovers much appreciated for lunch today!

(Are there any single RVing guys out there who cook? I’m available! 😀 )

I like that I’ve had the discipline every weekend to get the work done by Sunday dinner, so I have time to make a nice meal or go out for one, and then spend the evening unwinding to give me a semblance of a break before starting all over on Monday.

Tonight, I’m making something I haven’t had since Dawson (!!!), pasta with vegetarian ground. The sauce is ready but the water stubbornly refuses to boil. I can’t believe how long I put up with an electric stove in my housebound life! I have timed things and discovered that I can boil water and cook the pasta on my propane stove in the time it takes to just boil the water on the electric stove!

So, not much to report, again, but I’ve learned that if I don’t post regularly I get an ‘are you alive?’ email from my mother. 😀

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Visits From the Mountain Folks and the Muffin Faery

I read an article today that claims that seeing friends regularly boosts your immune system, so it’s important to not get caught up with work and brush off social engagements.

That was interesting timing since Donna and Ken were blowing through town today and wanted to meet for lunch and Jody had plans to pop in with muffins for a quick visit.

Needless to say, I gave both visits all the time I could! Spending time with loved one makes it much easier to get that headset back on and those fingers typing!

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Slightly Busy This Week

With the U.S. Thanksgiving this weekend, I knew I would either have little to no transcription to do this week or be swamped. I was right. A request landed in my inbox on Monday evening asking if I could take a week-long (due Sunday evening) project. Estimated completion time: 32 hours.

I’ve been plugging away at it and am well on my way to having a reasonable amount of work to do both Saturday and Sunday, but there’s no getting way from needing to do five hours of transcription per day this week, every day excluding Monday (when the lateness of the hour in which I got the files means I only did about three hours). So that will be five weekends in a row of work.

I am most certainly not complaining. In fact, I relish this. Yes, there are other things I would like to do with my life, but I pretty much had from September to the end of June to do that! My work schedule is full right now, but I am enjoying what I am doing. During the day I have a variety of tasks that challenge me in ways that are allowing me to discover I have strengths I was sure escaped me. Mornings and evenings, I get work for myself in my PJs if I so choose, proud in the knowledge that I have finally built a viable business for myself in the field I discovered is best suited to my lifestyle and abilities. Besides exhaustion, I currently feel an overwhelming sense of pride and accomplishment.

Let me share, once again, this wonderful quote that beautifully illustrates my philosophy:

The universe puts us into places where we can learn. They are never easy places, but they are right. Wherever we are is the right place and the right time. The pain that sometimes comes is part of the process of constantly being born.

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My First Chinook!

Growing up out east, I was fascinated by the idea of a chinook, a warm wind blowing in from the ocean that would significantly raise temperatures in a very short period of time. I always associated them with Calgary, but it turns out they are more prevalent in Lethbridge!

The temperature started to rise yesterday and the wind to pick up. I was standing outside enjoying the sun when a tenant came up and explained to me that a chinook was rolling in! Today is incredibly windy and the snow is melting very quickly. My tenant says that if I am fortunate I will experience a much more dramatic chinook this winter, with temperatures going from, say, minus 15 in the morning to plus 15 in the afternoon, but even I don’t I can cross ‘experience a chinook’ off my bucket list!

Fun fact: chinook is pronounced ‘shi-nook’. The reason for this (and why it’s Shi-ca-go, not Tchi-ca-go) is the influence of the French-Canadian explorers. We (because I am a French-Canadian explorer) pronounce ‘ch’ the way ‘sh’ is pronounced in English.

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I Have to Admit I Kind of Miss This Weather…

By early afternoon, I was halfway through the work I had to do today and my chores were just about caught up. The sky was that crystal blue shade that screams “It’s bloody cold out here!” But it was so sunny that Outside called me, whispering my name enticingly. I decided I’d earned a long lunch break, so I bundled up and headed out into that bracing air.

Aaaaaaaaah. There is nothing like a dry cold with the snow crunching underfoot and a blinding sun overhead. I set off at a fast gait, planning to hit Value Village, a dollar store, and Subway where I would grab lunch.

My cheeks must have been rosy red when I got to my first destination! I then rediscovered the joy (not) of shopping after going for a long walk in cold weather; let’s just say you start peeling off the layers one by one! I found what I came for (a neutral-coloured wool blend cardigan) and what I’ve been looking for for ages (a light green pashmina shawl), both at bargain prices. Woohoo! The dollar store had a good brand of shoe polish on sale for $1 each and I’ve been needing some brown polish, so that was my next stop. I paid $5 for the same brand of polish in black at Walmart in the U.S. a few months ago! Then came a yummy Subway lunch. I just love their sandwiches.

I got in around 2:15, spun a load of laundry and hung it, got the last load (including my new purchases) soaking, and sat back down at the computer. I alternated transcribing, finishing laundry, and preparing dinner, and finally finished my day around 7:30, a small price to pay for getting some fresh air and exercise this afternoon!

This cold weather isn’t going to last. We’ve already started to climb back up, will hit plus three tomorrow, and are racing towards a high of plus ten midweek.

I’m curious about the week ahead. I’m either going to have very little work because of the U.S. Thanksgiving or I’m going to be swamped because I’m the only Canadian on the team…