Yes, I have an agenda now, to schedule things in and remind myself to get things done. It doesn't help if I don't write everything I need to do in there. Like keep up with this blog. I am making a note of my next scheduled post date right now. Honestly!
Two months ago, I was starting out my grandly-titled (in my mind, anyway) "Year End Reading Project". A Song of Ice and Fire (Books 1-4) had been languishing on my TBR (to-be-read) shelf for more than a year since my birthday of 2012, and I decided it was time to give them a go. Or, I should say, another go. I started reading A Game of Thrones in October 2012, but quit within the first hundred pages. I simply couldn't get into the book, and the author's use of character names instead of chapter numbers almost guaranteed I would end up confused and lost about who was whom, much as I was the first time I read The Lord of the Rings.
However, I decided that four months left in the year and four books in my boxed set was serendipitous, so I embarked (again) on the journey into the fantasy of George R. R. Martin. I resolved to read the books on my lunch break at work, and read something else on the weekends. I bought myself a book to use as a book journal, so that I could keep people straight, then discovered that the books had appendices naming the major, and not a few of the minor, characters.
Fast forward two months, and instead of being halfway through, I am very nearly done with all four books. I have been sucked into the Westerosi universe, and leave only reluctantly. As a consequence, I read the second book over the space of 4 days, and the third and fourth in about two weeks each. I only managed to stay true to my original calendar with the first book. The fifth is now on its way, ordered via Amazon.ca, thank goodness.
Since I took over the organization of our home finances, things have been somewhat more orderly. After a mis-communication that saw us over-paying the hydro and under-paying the gas bills, G and I have worked out a system whereby he opens and sorts the mail, hands off all the bills to me, I input them into the spreadsheet I use for tracking, and all bills are sorted into 3 neatly labeled caddies (one for unpaid, two for paid). At any point in time, I can hand him all outstanding bills if needed, or confirm all paid bills. Although I pay everything online, I print the payment confirmations. Computer systems do fail, occasionally.
Another recent contribution of mine to our "home economics", is the use of a menu plan for weeknight meals and grocery shopping. For some many months, one of my main bones of contention with G has been how late we eat on weeknights. Often it is not until he collects me after work that he turns his mind to what we will eat for dinner, and that usually means some amount of waiting for food to be prepared. Jamaicans do not eat dinner at 9:30 p.m. very often, at least not the ones I know. However, that was becoming a normal practice for us, and it began to annoy me to no end. Two weeks ago, I decided to end this practice by using one of the dozen or more cookbooks we have as a basis for menu-planning. Specifically, Betty Crocker's Big Book of Weeknight Dinners.
The results have been encouraging so far. Rather than going to the supermarket every couple weeks and spending $300-400 to buy random items we might like to eat, and still complaining that there's nothing available to make dinner (or lunch for work), we select recipes for each night, plan our shopping list accordingly, and I make weeknight dinners now, with help from G where needed. Leftovers become lunch the following day, and usually there are leftovers. So far we have not spent more than $140 on each week, and it has not been necessary for me to purchase lunch (usually between $5 and $10 per day), or any items specifically for lunch (such as prepared salads). Saturdays and Sundays, meals remain G's sole responsibility.
As of this week, and for the foreseeable future, I will not need a lunch anymore. My hours have been cut at work, the usual "budget cutback" cry has become fashionable in my workplace. It came as a blow, but with many of the major bills out of the way for this year, such as the property tax, I won't complain. For the rest of the year, or until my hours go up again, we will just have to tighten the belt a little further. As a Jamaican, this is nothing new to me. I am new to being a part-time employee, having been employed full-time in salaried positions since I started working at 20, but with a new life comes new things.
Something new is up next tonight: With the end of the Showtime series Dexter, it became necessary for G and I to find a favourite series to spend some of our "couple time" watching. After seeing my enthusiasm over the Game of Thrones book, he agreed to give the HBO series based on the books a try. We are halfway through the first of three seasons, but I can confidently say we have a new favourite series!
Showing posts with label catching up. Show all posts
Showing posts with label catching up. Show all posts
Monday, November 4, 2013
Sunday, September 1, 2013
2013 So much, so little..
My last post focused on fall and the beginning of winter 2012/13, and I expected to update this blog sooner rather than later.
This year did not start well. It started with a call from my mother in tears, and for a moment my heart stopped as I thought something had happened to my much-loved younger brother. However, it was not my younger brother affected, it was hers. My uncle, my mother's younger brother, one of four of my Grandmother's children, died 1 January 2013 of a massive coronary. I left Canada for the first time since arriving in June 2012, not for Jamaica, but for New York State, where my uncle's life would be commemorated, celebrated and mourned.
I flew from Sudbury to Toronto, cleared US Customs in Toronto with minimal trouble (I forgot to fill in my I-94 immigration form, but the officer was gentle, I think he clearly saw my grief when he asked me my purpose of travel), and flew to JFK where I was collected by my cousin. It had been more than a decade since I was in that airport last, nothing seemed the least familiar. Even Yonkers was strangely unfamiliar, as we never went to any of the areas near downtown I had been used to from my time there, we spent all our time in the residential area my uncle now lived in.
Throughout the various events, I stayed well out of the way, did what I could to be helpful, and refused to spend any time in the viewing room of the funeral home. Since childhood I have been afflicted with the inability to remember someone in life once seen in death, and I was determined to cling to the memories of my uncle as I had last seen him, happy and alive on the beach in Negril, Jamaica, offering me a freshly-caught lobster and a slice of lime. I wanted no part of seeing him in the stillness of death, and it was my other uncle who understood that more than anyone else.
I returned to Canada two days after I left it. Clearing Immigration and Customs was much less dramatic than my landing. It was explained to me, although I already knew this, that these two days would be added back to my residency obligation as I had left the country alone. I was still floating in that odd surreal fog that seems to surround a person when their life takes a sudden turn, and felt no particular need to say I was already aware of this.
I went back to work and life has continued in its usual fashion since then. The winter was a long one. As February and March slipped by, I began to feel a restlessness and urgent need for warmer days. I had hopes that April would bring warmer days, and the start of Daylight Saving Time made me feel even more keenly that it had to get warmer, as I lost an hour of sleep in the name of more daylight hours. Still, it did not get warmer, and G and I seemed to argue more often about my need to raise the temperature in the house until I felt more comfortable.
When it snowed on the 12th of May, Mother's Day, I almost broke down in tears. It was quite more than enough, I was feeling a great deal of unhappiness. Everything bothered me, and it seemed as though I had no filters and couldn't keep it from spilling over into my relationship with G. Arguments over little things became even more frequent, and even our impending third anniversary couldn't bring us closer.
Finally, towards the end of May, the temperatures began to rise, and with them my spirits. The snow finally all melted away, the city began cleaning the streets of the rock salt and sand, grass began appearing and trees began filling out with leaves. The family tree in our backyard bloomed, and our anniversary approached.
We celebrated our third anniversary by staying the weekend at a bed and breakfast resort some way up Highway 17, heading west towards Sault Ste Marie. I spent time on a lake in a canoe for the first time in my life, and did not freak out too much. G was quite at home on the water, I saw a new side of him, and though we still had many rocky moments during that week, we came back together in celebration of our love.
The next event of significance was my 37th birthday, and I was treated to dinner by G this year in celebration. I was happy that we could just spend time together, and at work some effort was made to make it a nice day, which I appreciated.
In the beginning of August, I accomplished a goal I set myself as part of my timeline for my first couple of years in Canada: I earned my driver's license. Quite frankly terrified, I went to Thessalon, rather than take the test here in E.L. My driving instructor felt that I would find it less intimidating to do the test where I was unknown and had less chance of feeling like I was making a fool of myself. I made at least major blunder, but only one, as the examiner passed me. I was still in shock on the way home, even as I held the paper in my hands.
I have been growing and progressing in my job. With just under a year in, I have been trained to act in place of the head of my section, and been taken on as a permanent employee with benefits, although still part-time and not full-time/salaried. I think that has been a goodly amount of progress for a year, I have put myself out to learn all I can and gain as much experience as possible, and can see myself continuing to grow. It's not what I did before, but it can form a foundation, I think.
Over the summer we have done some entertaining, so far as we are able. We have had friends to visit for Canada Day weekend in July, and this Labour Day weekend as well. With only 3 weeks to the beginning of the fall, there is almost a sense of mourning in comments I have heard recently, as everyone turns their minds to the upcoming fall and winter. As the trees are already changing colours, and have been since I went to take my drive test (when temperatures plunged in that week to such frankly unseasonable lows that I had to wear a sweater at least once!), many are the comments that winter 2013/14 promises to be a long, cold one.
This time around, I have resigned my mind to the need to wear warmer clothes, even at home, rather than adjusting the temperature in the house. Quite frankly, after seeing our gas bills for the end of the fiscal year (August), I can now understand G's consternation every time I fiddled with the temperature gauge! Now that I am taking a more active role in managing our finances, I find myself constantly on the lookout for various ways to save on our bills.
There are a great many more bills to be concerned with here than I ever had in Jamaica, or know of anyone having. Where before there used to be just light, water, rent/mortgage, cable, telephone, internet and the odd credit card, here you have to add municipal taxes, natural gas and water heater rental. I have actually created a spreadsheet to keep track, and bought myself an agenda, which I used to have but didn't get this year as it seemed unnecessary. No longer do I deem this unnecessary, I need the sense of control being able to track everything daily gives me. I feel more useful to G this way.
Tomorrow is Labour Day, and I will spend the day in my time-honoured fashion: doing nothing much. I laboured long and hard today, as I usually do on Sundays, to make the house ship-shape and presentable. Tomorrow, I hope to start a reading project that should take me the rest of the year. I have been getting back into my reading, and taking time to focus on my need for solitude and reflection, respecting my introvert tendencies.
From here on out, I should be scheduling posts on a weekly basis. Agenda in hand, I shall have the entry looking back at me, waiting to be ticked off as "done", and that should hold me more accountable. With four months left in the first half of my second year in Canada, I hope to be better at recording the events I experience.
This year did not start well. It started with a call from my mother in tears, and for a moment my heart stopped as I thought something had happened to my much-loved younger brother. However, it was not my younger brother affected, it was hers. My uncle, my mother's younger brother, one of four of my Grandmother's children, died 1 January 2013 of a massive coronary. I left Canada for the first time since arriving in June 2012, not for Jamaica, but for New York State, where my uncle's life would be commemorated, celebrated and mourned.
I flew from Sudbury to Toronto, cleared US Customs in Toronto with minimal trouble (I forgot to fill in my I-94 immigration form, but the officer was gentle, I think he clearly saw my grief when he asked me my purpose of travel), and flew to JFK where I was collected by my cousin. It had been more than a decade since I was in that airport last, nothing seemed the least familiar. Even Yonkers was strangely unfamiliar, as we never went to any of the areas near downtown I had been used to from my time there, we spent all our time in the residential area my uncle now lived in.
Throughout the various events, I stayed well out of the way, did what I could to be helpful, and refused to spend any time in the viewing room of the funeral home. Since childhood I have been afflicted with the inability to remember someone in life once seen in death, and I was determined to cling to the memories of my uncle as I had last seen him, happy and alive on the beach in Negril, Jamaica, offering me a freshly-caught lobster and a slice of lime. I wanted no part of seeing him in the stillness of death, and it was my other uncle who understood that more than anyone else.
I returned to Canada two days after I left it. Clearing Immigration and Customs was much less dramatic than my landing. It was explained to me, although I already knew this, that these two days would be added back to my residency obligation as I had left the country alone. I was still floating in that odd surreal fog that seems to surround a person when their life takes a sudden turn, and felt no particular need to say I was already aware of this.
I went back to work and life has continued in its usual fashion since then. The winter was a long one. As February and March slipped by, I began to feel a restlessness and urgent need for warmer days. I had hopes that April would bring warmer days, and the start of Daylight Saving Time made me feel even more keenly that it had to get warmer, as I lost an hour of sleep in the name of more daylight hours. Still, it did not get warmer, and G and I seemed to argue more often about my need to raise the temperature in the house until I felt more comfortable.
When it snowed on the 12th of May, Mother's Day, I almost broke down in tears. It was quite more than enough, I was feeling a great deal of unhappiness. Everything bothered me, and it seemed as though I had no filters and couldn't keep it from spilling over into my relationship with G. Arguments over little things became even more frequent, and even our impending third anniversary couldn't bring us closer.
Finally, towards the end of May, the temperatures began to rise, and with them my spirits. The snow finally all melted away, the city began cleaning the streets of the rock salt and sand, grass began appearing and trees began filling out with leaves. The family tree in our backyard bloomed, and our anniversary approached.
We celebrated our third anniversary by staying the weekend at a bed and breakfast resort some way up Highway 17, heading west towards Sault Ste Marie. I spent time on a lake in a canoe for the first time in my life, and did not freak out too much. G was quite at home on the water, I saw a new side of him, and though we still had many rocky moments during that week, we came back together in celebration of our love.
The next event of significance was my 37th birthday, and I was treated to dinner by G this year in celebration. I was happy that we could just spend time together, and at work some effort was made to make it a nice day, which I appreciated.
In the beginning of August, I accomplished a goal I set myself as part of my timeline for my first couple of years in Canada: I earned my driver's license. Quite frankly terrified, I went to Thessalon, rather than take the test here in E.L. My driving instructor felt that I would find it less intimidating to do the test where I was unknown and had less chance of feeling like I was making a fool of myself. I made at least major blunder, but only one, as the examiner passed me. I was still in shock on the way home, even as I held the paper in my hands.
I have been growing and progressing in my job. With just under a year in, I have been trained to act in place of the head of my section, and been taken on as a permanent employee with benefits, although still part-time and not full-time/salaried. I think that has been a goodly amount of progress for a year, I have put myself out to learn all I can and gain as much experience as possible, and can see myself continuing to grow. It's not what I did before, but it can form a foundation, I think.
Over the summer we have done some entertaining, so far as we are able. We have had friends to visit for Canada Day weekend in July, and this Labour Day weekend as well. With only 3 weeks to the beginning of the fall, there is almost a sense of mourning in comments I have heard recently, as everyone turns their minds to the upcoming fall and winter. As the trees are already changing colours, and have been since I went to take my drive test (when temperatures plunged in that week to such frankly unseasonable lows that I had to wear a sweater at least once!), many are the comments that winter 2013/14 promises to be a long, cold one.
This time around, I have resigned my mind to the need to wear warmer clothes, even at home, rather than adjusting the temperature in the house. Quite frankly, after seeing our gas bills for the end of the fiscal year (August), I can now understand G's consternation every time I fiddled with the temperature gauge! Now that I am taking a more active role in managing our finances, I find myself constantly on the lookout for various ways to save on our bills.
There are a great many more bills to be concerned with here than I ever had in Jamaica, or know of anyone having. Where before there used to be just light, water, rent/mortgage, cable, telephone, internet and the odd credit card, here you have to add municipal taxes, natural gas and water heater rental. I have actually created a spreadsheet to keep track, and bought myself an agenda, which I used to have but didn't get this year as it seemed unnecessary. No longer do I deem this unnecessary, I need the sense of control being able to track everything daily gives me. I feel more useful to G this way.
Tomorrow is Labour Day, and I will spend the day in my time-honoured fashion: doing nothing much. I laboured long and hard today, as I usually do on Sundays, to make the house ship-shape and presentable. Tomorrow, I hope to start a reading project that should take me the rest of the year. I have been getting back into my reading, and taking time to focus on my need for solitude and reflection, respecting my introvert tendencies.
From here on out, I should be scheduling posts on a weekly basis. Agenda in hand, I shall have the entry looking back at me, waiting to be ticked off as "done", and that should hold me more accountable. With four months left in the first half of my second year in Canada, I hope to be better at recording the events I experience.
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