Vitamin D and Oxygen poisoning

The Geek and I and about 10,000 other 'sneaky jerks' were out on the river trail today. The sun was shining and the temperature was lovely. Considering we have all been trapped inside by the cold weather of late, it felt great. The Geek did the whole circuit there and back but I only back and forth from the Forks to Omand's Creek.
Below is an exerpt from today's Free Press.

"So now we've gone from dweebs in snowsuits to sneaky jerks, eh? On the very day Winnipeg laid claim to having the world's longest skating rink, the cold war brewing between our city and Ottawa escalated. Janine Flood, out for a skate Saturday on Ottawa's Rideau Canal Skateway, called Winnipeggers "sneaky jerks" for trying to usurp the Rideau Canal's Guinness World Record for having the world's longest rink.
Saturday, Winnipeg's skating trail measured 8.54 kilometres. Ottawa's Rideau Canal skating trail measures 7.8 kms -- if it ever manages to fully open.
"We did it," said Paul Jordan, The Forks chief operating officer. "We beat Ottawa by three-quarters of a kilometre."
But Flood was not impressed.
"Does Winnipeg have a Winterlude?" asked the former Winnipegger who should know better. "We have a national event that takes place on our canal. I guess it's OK to be factually correct if they have the longer rink, but are people going to travel there just to say they skated on it?"
Flood also said Ottawa should warn people there have been floods in Winnipeg's past. "One minute you're on the ice, the next you're in the water," she said with a chuckle.
Jordan said he stopped clearing Winnipeg's trail when he did because "we just wanted to beat Ottawa. With more money we could keep on going."
An Ottawa Citizen columnist had called Jordan a "dweeb in a snowsuit," in a friendly dissing match between the two cities. That just made Jordan more determined to dethrone Canada's capital city.
The skating trail extends as far west on the Assiniboine River as Omand's Creek. On the Red River, it runs from Whittier Park in St. Boniface to the Norwood Bridge.
"We could go all the way to Portage la Prairie. We could go wherever we want," Jordan said, if Ottawa tries to retake the mantle as longest skate trail."
Sounds to me like some people in Ottawa have a bad case of sour grapes!

Renovation Tip #3

When working near doors and windows, measure the width of the trim before installing the switch boxes.

Renovation Tip #2

When you remove the baseboards and trim prior to any renovation work, be sure to clearly identify from whence the pieces came. Otherwise, you will have little odds and ends of wood left over and no clear idea where to re-install them.

This little piece of baseboard has been puzzling me for awhile. So I set it against the chimney to take a picture to demonstrate my point. I figured the contrast would produce a lovely photograh.
Do you see where I am going with this? (I certainly had never noticed before now.)



I thought you would. Mystery solved!! (Tho' perhaps it was never a mystery to The Geek. I didn't ask.)

For those of you that don't know, we tore off the plaster that covered the chimney. We like the colour of the brick and the visual appeal it provided to the room. Funny thing; the first fellow we had in to give an estimate for drywall taping offered to cover it up for us. Considering I spent a whole day with an air chisel stripping off the plaster, we politely declined.

The Truth is out

The real reason we are renovating the bathroom is not because there are holes in the plaster, or that the floor is 'crunchy' or that it is ch-ch-ch-chilly in there with no insulation in the walls. No sir-ee. We are renovating the bathroom because there are only two light bulbs above the mirror that still work and we won't be able to replace them once they are no longer functioning.

And now you know!

When it is a dry cold...

I could see why there would be static like this but today it reached +3C and at one point the humidity was 94%.

Maybe the stuff just really likes The Geek.

Who knows....

Recipe #2 Spiced Lentils and Quinoa

Spiced Lentils and Quinoa

1 tbsp olive oil
2 onions, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 tsp grounc cumin
1 tsp curry paste
1/2 tsp each cinnamon and salt
4 carrots, sliced
1 cup quinoa (pronounced kee nwa) or rice
2 cups vegetable stock
1 can (19 oz) lentils, drained and rinsed
1 apple, unpeeled and diced
4 green onions, sliced
1/2 cup low fat plain yogurt
Heat oil over medium heat. Cook onions, garlic, cumin, curry paste, cinnamon and salt stirring often for about 5 minutes our until softenend. Stir in carrots and quinoa-cook, stirring occasionally for about 1 minute. Pour in stock and bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer for about 20 minutes until quinoa is tender and most of the liquid is aborbed. Stir in lentils, apple and green onions. Cook for about 5 minutes or until lentils are heated through.
Serve with a dollop of yogurt.

If I haaaaave to...

For the last six days I have had a song stuck in my head. And if I haaaaave to have a song stuck there, at least this is a good amusing one. Now, let's see if it is contagious:
Do your ears hang low
do they dangle to and fro'
can you tie them in a knot
can you tie them in a bow
can you throw them over your shoulder
like a continental soldier
do your
ears
hang
low!
:-)

Two very GOOD stretches

These two muscle fascia stretches as taught to me by my athletic therapist, Dea, who fixed my knees and all the other stuff that has slid out of place lately.

With the first, you lay on the floor and raise yourself up into a shoulder stand.
Then pull your feet over your head keeping your knees straight. Hold for 10 - 15 seconds. This one especially unkinks my neck and loosens all those muscles between your shoulder blades that really don't like sitting at at computer. (The Geek and I have decided that we would never make professional model/photographer-there is too much giggling).

The second one you can do anywhere.

Tuck your chin against your chest

and bend down slowly, vertebra by vertebra until you touch your toes. Hold there for 10-15 seconds.

Slowly uncurl, again vertebra by vertebra, arching backwards and spreading your arms apart and pushing the stretch out through your middle fingers. (The first time I did this I felt a real zing, like an electic current seemingly shoot out the ends of both middle digits.)

Repeat as required. For a deeper stretch, place your feet on or against and object so the bottom plane of your feet are at about a 45 degree angle to the floor. This really gets the back of your legs happy.

Now THAT's blue!

I have had a fascination with the blue skies in this place ever since I first came here. Today is one of those big sky days - I find you can never quite catch the colour in a picture, but this one is not too bad.

It seems the colour is just meant to go with oak bark and Manitoba limestone. The only sample of that around my place is the foundation of the house, and I was not about to lie in the snow to figure out an angle that shows it all. This is probably more than I of all people should say about esthetics anyway. :-)

Happy New Year to you all!