The road to success is always under construction

The house is creeping closer to being done.  Upstairs is pretty much there with all but carpet complete.  Downstairs, this wknd we were insulating and vapour barriering (yup that's a verb) the last two rooms.  For those who have not had the dubious pleasure of experiencing vapour barrier, think about wrapping a giant, house-sized present, from the inside.  It even gets all taped up in fancy red tape.  And not red-tape of the paperwork style, but more of the "tie with a pretty bow" style.  Somewhat frustrating at times for those of us (ie me) not tall enough to reach the ceiling.  Had quite the dance going with the ladder, trying to relocate it while still holding a staple gun and trying to hold a giant sheet of plastic to the ceiling.  The fact that there are still giant holes in the floor just added a level of challenge. Like picking "expert" on DDR.  Except sadly, I am nobody's definition of an expert.  And then once it's all, successfully I might add, stapled up comes the tape...  ah the tape.  The tape that sticks to *everything*.  Think of what you'd get if you applied a thin coating of crazy glue to the back of a sheet of saran wrap.  It's a fun game, let me tell you.

That, however, at least I can manage.  It may not always be graceful, but I can get the job done.  The drywall otoh...  Oh dear.  Especially given the level of tired of my poor muscles by the time we got to this.  My whole job became "hold this" ;)   And sometimes in a creative fashion as we were trying to put it on the ceiling which, we've already discovered, I cannot, in fact, reach.  Blah.  Fortunately I can climb and Chris knows what he's doing so I didn't have to hold way too heavy things over my head for too long.   One of the things I miss most about the barn is how fit I was!  Could really use hay-throwing muscles now!

The rest of the house stuff though was outside and let me enjoy the amazing weather while Chris did useful things like hook up plumbing (I definitely have a new respect for simple things like heat and running water :). I tackled the mowing -- which on flat surfaces is fine, but turns out the lawn mower does not, in fact, have either four-wheel drive or roll-over stability ;)   Thus hills should be tackled at 90 degrees...   But not all our hills are accessible at 90 degrees...   There might or might not have been a few dodgy moments *sigh*.   But hey, at least the weather was good ;)   

Also tackled the garden, which was more enjoyable than I'd expected.  Would help a whole lot though if I had any knowledge whatsoever about local plant life ;)   Ie what is, or is not, a weed *g*  hahahha  Ah well -- maybe when we have a place I can make a little garden where anything I didn't plant is fair game ;-P

And, I am more excited than I should be about the brick wall I built.  It stands an impressive two bricks tall and could easily be demolished by Sasha chasing a ball, but it still makes me smile.  I can't even lay full claim to it, as it was half-way built already, but half the bricks were upside down which just wasn't acceptable (seriously -- not only did it look bad, but the little divots filled with pine needles.  Way too much unnecessary sweeping involved).  And the rest of the wall had to be built as we didn't have enough bricks the first time around (the "new" ones came from the chimney we tore down a while back).

The huge wall of Horsfall's Half Acre

And now I'm writing this while waiting for the mountain of laundry to complete.  The only thing that makes this, and every weekend like it, survivable is that it brings me one week closer to actually being able to live with my husband.  My friends who've been married forever think this is a fairly ideal situation, but for me, Sunday nights are always too sad.  But hopefully it shouldn't be too much longer!

Oh -- and I got my job :)  Yup, my year-long trial ended with being hired full time about 6 mths ahead of schedule.  Pretty stoked about that!  So yeah, that also made it a good weekend :)

There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.

So last weekend C and I went to the Stratford Festival.  Haven't been since high school and had every intention of going early, wandering around town for a bit, and getting some dinner.  But life being the way it is, none of this happened and we got there about 15 min before the show started.  Just enough time, it turns out, to visit the gift shop.

This is where I learned what a geek I really am.  Not in the hacking, super-hero watching kind of geek, but an academic geek.  Cause I could easily have spent entirely too much money in there without even trying.  hahaha oh dear.  Amused me though :)

The show itself was Hamlet.  I quite enjoyed most of the casting -- Hamlet pulled off the angst ridden young adult remarkably well.  Ophelia was just the right degree of crazy.  Rosencrantz and Guildenstern had the interchangeable prep-school yes-men thing down pat.  Wasn't a huge fan of the queen, although couldn't pin-point why precisely.

As for the interpretation itself, the only thing I didn't care for was that it was chronologically challenged.  Various pieces came from various time periods.  And while part of my brain pipes up with "it goes to show the timeless nature of..." the greater part, the one trying to be lost in the story, didn't appreciate it at all as it continually jolted me back to "well that's not right".   I was impressed with the ending though -- that was quite well done.

No photo or video allowed, so instead, here's the Reduced Shakespeare Company's version.  Enjoy.

Regardless though, it was a fun night and a nice change from endless renovations.  And did you catch the part where I mentioned my husband went to watch Shakespeare with me???  hahaha yup, I picked well ;)

It's amazing the peace horse time can bring to your soul.

I was on my way home from dinner and it was a reasonably nice night out and I didn't entirely want to go home, so I figured I'd go out to the barn and see my pony -- she's due to be wormed anyways and if I stretch my imagination a bit, it's on the way.

But then I actually got in my car and decided I was really tired.  Maybe I should just go home.   I was in an area I don't know all that well, so I decided if I found the hwy that goes to the barn, I'd go there.  Otherwise I'd go home.  All good.  Except I couldn't find the hwy for the barn and was so incredibly disappointed, I realized how much I really wanted to go to the barn.   Hmmmm that, in itself, is a good thing.

So I got myself turned around, found the right hwy, and headed up to the barn.   Sunset over the pond...  Cherry trees in full blossom...  Only person there...  Pretty much heaven :)

Now Lexi had been kicked a little over a week ago and needed stitches.  She was on stall rest till Monday.  Yeah, you can imagine how that went ;)  On Monday night I let her trot a bit, just to see how she was doing, and she was remarkably close to sound.  Cool.

So tonight I decided to lunge her a bit.  And by lunge, I mean "trot around in circles" -- halter and lungeline style.  Not working proper training lunging by any stretch of the imagination.  Alex would not be impressed ;-P  

She was *wired*.  hahaha the most beautiful lengthened trot, and balanced uphill canter.  Admittedly also some moderately excessive airs above the ground, but we don't need to mention those *g*.   She's a rather impressive horse when she wants to be.

After we finished playing in circles, I took her for a walk around the track.  It was a power walk -- the kind I wish I could get in dressage! -- but she was remarkably good about it.  Her Royal Greyness' brain is, maybe?, finally catching up with her age ;)    I suspect there would've been more drama if I'd been mounted, but I was still impressed.  Did a couple laps, let her munch some clover and dandelions, and went back in.

The first time I ever tried to deworm Lex, she threw me across the stall.  I worked *really* hard with her to get her over that and it's never been a serious issue since.  It's never been easy either though.  But this time?  It was actually possibly the easiest worming I've ever done.  On any horse.  Ever.  She took it very much as she would a carrot.  It's distinctly possible she, in fact, believed it was a carrot ;)  hahaha but I'll take it.  And it was promptly followed by an actual carrot.

So then spent a long while grooming and just enjoying peaceful pony time.  Left feeling happy and relaxed and super glad I chose to detour.  And that, is why I pay her bills :)

So this is Nick rather than Lexi,
but it's about how I was feeling tonight and the only pic I have like it

A train leaves station A at...

This morning I was running late.  I take the train to work so a couple minutes can make a big difference in arrival time.  Leaving Oakville, the trains are every 10 minutes.  They alternate express and local trains.  I like the 7:15 which is express to Union (the other express trains stop at Clarkson).  If I miss that train, I need to hang out for 20 minutes.  This is because the 7:35 express will actually get to Union before the 7:25 local.

Starting to feel like you're back in a junior high math problem?  Welcome to my life.

Anyways - I was running late so, figuring I had 20 mins to the next train, I puttered and took my time.  But when I got to the station I could see by the number of people on the platform that it hadn't come yet.   I could've made it w just a little effort.  Blah.

So I was pretty unimpressed w that, and sure enough the train pulled up as I was leaving my car.  I park in the garage so it's a long hike to the train.  If it's on the platform, I won't make it.  But then I got downstairs, waved my pass at the machine, and the train was still there!  Sweet.  Booked it up the stairs and jumped on just as last call was happening.

And then promptly jumped back off.  It was *packed*.  It's often standing room only, but this was sardine style packed.  Ummm no thanks, I'll wait.

Was going to wait for the 7:35 but there were still a ton of people on the platform, leading me to believe the next express would be packed too.  So I got on the 7:25 (which starts at Oakville so hangs out there for about 10 mins).

Before it left however, another train pulled in on the express track.  Hmmmm interesting.  The one I was sitting on called last call for the doors so I jumped off and hopped on the one on the express track.  So random.  No idea what train it was, but it was pointing the right direction ;)

And better yet, it was deserted.  I ended up avoiding the sardine train, getting an entire block of seats to myself, express to Union.  Pretty good start to the day ;).  Admittedly we had to stop a couple times due to train traffic, but still pretty happy.

That being said, I'm not actually at work yet.  We shall see ;-P