The First Snow Arrives

Although the Solstice has yet to arrive, the first snow has, but unlike my unfortunate sisters in the UK, and parts west of here in the US, and of course my lovely Canuck sisters north of the border (All of you, poor sweet dears!), this time it was just a light coating. Sorry if it sounds like I'm rubbing it in. I certainly don't mean to, but this is my kind of snow! Here today, gone tomorrow! A pretty white sugary sprinkling, as if sugarplum fairies had just dusted everything down overnight. Nothing at all like the horrid + one foot dumpings of heavy wet snow that we had three times last winter, toppling trees and knocking out power, so that I had to hunker down next to a kerosene heater to stay warm, while listening to a battery powered radio, and eating soup cooked on a camp stove. I'll have none of that this winter, thank you very much! At least not if my luck holds out, (knock on wood!).

They say a new broom sweeps clean, and that's exactly what my new broom did this week, as I swept the last of the fallen leaves and acorns off of the deck. Fortunately a broom will be all that is needed to sweep the night's snow off the deck and steps tomorrow. I'm glad I got all of the fallen leaves off of the deck before the first snow, otherwise I would be shoveling the deck off tomorrow.

I received the most wonderful news today! My friend Brittany Lynn Roche (A Day In The Life Of A Texas Transsexual) is now situated in a residence house in Montreal, awaiting GRS by Dr. Pierre Brassard next Tuesday! It seems like only yesterday that I got to know her, as she detailed her torturous sessions at Electrology 3000 in Dallas, Texas, where they would inject her face with 36 lidocaine shots, and proceed to remove all of her facial hair in one sitting! Her poor face was so swollen afterward, that she woud have to sleep upright for the next several days! She would go back for this same grueling torture, at least another dozen times before her face was devoid of hair. But it was worth it, because today, she looks perfectly lovely! All the best to her, as she undergoes and recovers from her surgery. If you would like to send her an email, her address is located in her blog profile at the link I highlighted above. I'm sure she would love to hear from you.

It's hard to believe that Christmas is only 20 days away. It always amazes me the way the holidays sneak up on you after the Autumnal Equinox. First comes Halloween, then Thanksgiving, and before you know it, Christmas and New Years Day are here! It all happens way too fast for me. This is especially true since I have become older. Time passes by so much more quickly! When I was a child, school would start in the fall, and it seemed like forever until Christmas arrived. Not so today!

My mother will turn 90 a week after Christmas, and my sister and niece had a notion of throwing a big catered party for her, but last week she said she did not want a big party, so I suggested we just take her out for dinner, and she seemed to like that idea much more. Frankly I do too. Special times like that, are better spent with those closest to you, than a wider circle of acquaintances, who are just there for the party. Now the question is, where do we take her? Her usually choice is Red Lobster, or Red Slobster as my sister, the comedian likes to say. I must confess that I agree with her, since nearly everything on the menu is dripping in melted butter and way over salted. I'm more incline to taking her to a local privately owned restaurant, where the food is cooked from fresh ingredients, instead of a franchise, where microwaving pre-packed, overly salted frozen crap is the norm. The thing is Mom seems to love those kinds of restaurants, but then again she takes an abundance of meds to counteract all the bad stuff they serve. Yes, Mom is a finely tuned chemical experiment

I can't embed the following video, but you can still watch it on Youtube at this addresshttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrwtSrdFTyY. Of course it's one of my favorites by Gustaf Mahler, but forget about the music this time, and just watch the lovely people playing the instruments that they love so much, and doing it so wonderfully.

Melissa XX