scotchneat.ca

Went to a cousin’s wedding this weekend in the true north. When you’ve got “dozens of cousins”, as the bride likes to say, never mind dozens of aunts and uncles, there’s only one way to do it:

• Dress-up optional at the ceremony and dress-down mandatory at the reception.
• Have the “I Do” part take 10 minutes and the eat and celebrate part take 12 hours.
• BYOB and pot luck. There was enough food to feed dozens for days, and no one could complain that there weren’t enough options. At what other wedding could one get swedish meatballs, butterscotch squares, homemade chili and watermelon?
• Have the great aunt do shots from a used bagpipe bladder then set her loose on the dance floor.
• Play Johnny Cash, immediately followed by Biggie.
• Bring the wedding party to the reception area via a pontoon boat on the river. Make them scurry to the back of the boat so as not to ground it on the shore.
• Have the wedding part do boat races for halftime entertainment (the drinking kind, not the boating kind).
• Have people bring tents that are pitched about 40 feet from the party tent. Easy lurching distance.
• Have no bears attend the reception, or the pot luck table.

My family was renovating my sister’s house which wasn’t my sister’s real life house, and the not real life house had a dirt floor basement that seemed more like a catacomb with many rooms and kind of drippy walls. Anyway, my father broke through a rubble wall and a series of ghosts started coming out, kind of like in Scooby Doo when the kids find the secret door in the haunted mansion.

But these weren’t just any ghosts – I distinctly remember Abraham Lincoln, Christa McAuliffe and Bette Davis.

We weren’t exactly afraid of them, but to ensure that they travelled only on approved pathways, we put up police tape around hazards and unexcavated areas.  They were very respectful of the boundaries. No one knows where they went upon exiting the premises.

Due to logistics, we had the family Thanksgiving this weekend instead of last weekend. It was great to see everyone, and the youngest nephew has gone from crawling to walking just in time for his first birthday. Oldest nephew and I bonded over Maru, and niece was ecstatic to get a new DS.

While we were gorging on turkey and multiple desserts, my sister popped in a DVD of old family movies. There we were at different ages. The divas would completely recognize me beside my cousins, building a kickass fire on one of our camping trips.  And there’s evidence about just how happy I was to receive my Shaun Cassidy album back in the day (link to geocities – natch!).

But what’s with me, in my underwear, doing cartwheels in the living room?

I guess some things never change.

Attended the family reunion on the weekend. When your mother’s family is 13 kids, your father’s is 7 and they all grew up together, only thing that’s for sure is that you don’t know what will happen.

This year was at my mother’s house in Muskoka. It’s unusual to get all the kids, and even more unusual to get all the cousins and the grandkids, but there was a respectable showing (I’m gonna guess around 60).

There was a zip line between 2 trees for the kids – basically a disk on a string and you sit on the disk. Once the first kid tried it, then they were all willing to give it a go. But by about 5pm or so, once the beer coolers had started to reach the half-empty stage, the average age of the zip-liners started to go up. We’re like “Oh wait, was that Uncle G??”

Some water balloons also came into play later in the afternoon, and the fortuitous proximity of the chalet deck to the driveway below (where many were congregated) made for a new game called, “How fast can Uncle B jump?” Then there was a counter-attack with some water hoses from the 20-somethings, which ended in some soggy Aunts and an enforced truce.

My father and I tried to get a fire going but the wood was young and wet, so it devolved into a smoker (to keep away the mosquitos) and/or interesting place to try burning various bits of foliage that we found in the bush.

Speaking of which, walking a Great Dane in the bush? Interesting. Gilbert is usually a pretty sedate guy, but once he was out in the wilderness, he definitely “took the lead”, and at well over 100 pounds, I couldn’t really argue that much. I just kept giggling at the juxtaposition of this honking-sized dog trying to prance daintily over the bushes to get to the next smell.

The party later migrated to my brother’s house where there was a proper fire and more beer, and scotch! My brother had a new set of scotch glasses he was wanting to christen, and I was happy to oblige. We also learned a very useful hex for smoke in your eyes from my cousin’s fiance, named (obviously) the “FU, white rabbit!” hex. It’s a native Canadian tradition of long standing, or so I’m told ;)

In and amongst the catching up and the laughing at dogs and people and chats, I did get to spend some time with my new nephew who’s almost 9 months old now. He’s at that great age when he still likes to cuddle but he’s got enough mischief to keep life interesting.

My family: good value for your entertainment dollars.

It was time for another Dad visit, and the theme this time was “the great outdoors”! Well, at least the big gaping hole in my front yard.

When I had the driveway redone, I had them remove a “sidewalk” between my front walk and the driveway that, for some reason, had been done in asphalt instead of pavers or something. Also, it ran right against the flower bed at a weird angle that went toward the garage instead of out to the driveway where it’s most likely that a visitor would park.

Anyway, since the removal, I’ve had a gaping hole there (about a foot deep) and it was just lucky that Melle or the Sheriff didn’t fall into it during our Scotch & Cigars soiree the other night.  Speaking of which, we had a smashing time with some Montecristos, some Highland Park and some Macallan. Topics ranged from the profane (work) to the sacred (junk food) and off into the wilderness (grilled cheese). Next time there will be Doritos!

Back to the hole. The plan was decided that we would remove the “sod” from a strip closer to the street and on a straight line between the driveway and the front walk, and then put that sod in the hole with some filler to make the green space up to the flower beds. You can tell that my lawn has been around for 60 years or so–the root system is about 6 inches deep.

It was a workout just to get the pieces out, never mind the 4 wheelbarrows of fill we had to shovel and tote to fill in the hole. Then, of course, also the pavers were a bit of a workout (about 80 lbs each).

However, the results are smashing. I have sidewalk, some grass (which I have to water every day for a while), plus no hole.

Job # 48 done.

Jean Luc is 17 today, which means he should be wearing pants around his ass and drinking gin through a straw.

According to sources, that’s 84 in cat years. So maybe he should be wearing pants around his nipples and drinking tuna juice through a straw.

It’s been a tough year for him: there was a round of daily throw-ups, followed by a hospital stay, a change in his insulin, a needle to the jugular, the introduction of heart medication, and a hypoglycemic incident that left him covered in honey and urine (resulting in a bath, which can also be added to his catalogue of horrors). We like to say he’s a bit like Mr Burns–everything’s wrong with him, but somehow it all balances out.

JL in his natural habitat

He’s so excited about the big day that he’s decided to find a whole new place to take a nap.

Had the family Easter get-together at my mother’s house in the Muskokas. The Easter Bunny left a whole bunch of eggs and a couple of baskets with toys and stuffed monkeys in trees around the property and the whole fam dam had to trudget through up to a foot of snow to retrieve the loot.

My niece and nephew enjoyed the challenge and we were relieved that no wildlife made off with the shiny chocolate before we got to it. The path also led us past the bear den that is within 40 feet of the house – one that was occupied until just a few weeks ago. Wisely, my step-father has removed the suet from the bird feeder on the front porch. Last year he had to throw a lawn chair from the upper deck at an orsine visitor who was enjoying a quick meal by the patio door.

My newest nephew is significantly more engaging at 6 months. I discovered he likes to tango, hates being on his tummy, and thinks that his own stinky feet are the funniest thing evar. He also seems to be sporting some reddish hair–shaping up to be an excellent Scotsman.

My father and uncle went at the bathroom again this weekend. The good news is that there are now walls. However, my shower area is currently encased in 6 mil plastic and I have to turn on the shower by reaching behind it. It’ll be a little like taking a shower in a rather large prophylatic for the next few weeks.

The new vent/light is pretty awesome. Very classy and far less noisy than the old vent.

I still don’t have a sink. Some day. Some day.

For a few weeks, JL has been having episodes of breathing heavy, and not while performing his best imitation of Darth Vader or anything. I took him to the vet’s on Wednesday for an x-ray and his heart looked a bit large for his new svelte self and his lungs were a bit opaque on the film. Classic symptoms of degenerative heart disease.

She booked an ultrasound for this afternoon but I had to drop him off first thing this morning because I had meetings all day. He was suspicious of my movements while I was getting ready for work. Primarily, I’m sure, because the cat carrier was sitting out in the middle of the living room floor instead of being returned to that weird place under the stairs where the cat carrier and possibly millipedes live.

He seemed quite pleased when I finally grabbed my stuff and went out the front door. Little did he know that I was merely warming up the car for his royal highness and cleaning off the snow. When I came back in, he was all, “um, what are you doing here?” His cockiness was his undoing though, since I managed to get him into the carrier before he head a chance to bolt into the closet and hide under the re-usable grocery bags.

The ultrasound shows early-stage heart disease as we expected. He gets to go on a beta-blocker as of next week, and I’m not supposed to STRESS HIM OUT. Yes, because this cat, who basically lounges around the house where he wants and when he wants, and has no siblings nor even anyone to vye for my attentions, and who gets his food and his insulin on a schedule so regulated that the OCD Association of Canada would be proud, this cat needs a lot of stress relief in his life.

I’m of a mind to hide in the front closet and jump out at him as he’s sauntering to his food dish. Arsehole. And a mostly healthy arsehole at that.

JL seems to be doing well on the new insulin, and since he hasn’t been throwing up (knock on wood), he’s found a new pastime–namely, leaving little poop nuggets strewn about the house like the magical droppings of the Great Bunneh. I can’t figure if it’s senility or a genuine need to debase me some way that means picking up bodily expulsions.

My shoulder is still out-of-joint so I tried to do some home PT last night which involved hanging by one arm on my gravity bench and then doing some tricep pulls using a full paint can. I’m pretty sure that P-90 doesn’t go for such hardass training. Up next, I’ll have to ask someone big and burley to pull my arm though I’m not sure they’ll like the popping noise I expect might happen.

I didn’t get around to blogging about last week’s BSG, and the next ep is imminent. I’m still disgruntled. I let out a squee when Starbuck came out and shot the buggers who were after Lee, but then it seemed to fall back into weird editing and I still think Gaeta is just not believable as the head of the insurrection – he always looks like he’s constipated. And there’s no way that Starbuck and Lee would leave Adama and Tigh to fight “bad guys” on their own. I can only hope that they were climbing onto a catwalk for a better shot when the doors are breached.

Read this awful article from Rolling Stone on Joss & Dollhouse. Unfortunately, if the words be true, Mr Joss is not coming back to tv if this gig fails. It makes me want to throw a shoe at the Fox execs all over again. I, like everyone else in the Jossverse, will be watching next week and praying like hell to the Nelson gods that it is good, and that enough of the people like it.

Apparently, my uncle of the “work overalls” fame wants to make a return trip in a few weeks to meet my Dad here. I have no idea what they will get up to, but I’m sure it involves dust, dangerous tools and some personal injury. If I get a fully working bathroom out of the deal, I’ll be happy.