Season's Greetings from our table to yours!
And what a busy season it has been...for some of us, at any rate. In between 'decluttering' the house and getting organized for Christmas, there hasn't been a day to just relax and reload.
We finished off November with Marilyn helping out with the dinner theatre, just taking tickets and cleaning up after the performance. With just getting home two weeks before the big show, she knew she wouldn't be able to offer any support during the preparation. Al got back into the swing of all things hockey...and football...he started going to the Terrier games and was pleased they were starting to pick things up a little. He is no longer on the executive...reasons cited were missing too many meetings and...ahem...being to outspoken about the running of the team...and we will leave it at that. He is actually quite happy about that because now he can just go and enjoy watching the games...and he can speak as freely as he likes.
We had our Association of Canadian Custom Harvesters annual convention the first week of December in Saskatoon, SK...bitterly cold, but we didn't venture out of the hotel for the four days we were there. It's always a great time to see all our fellow harvesters in one place, listen to the latest and greatest from the dealers, drink a few beverages and just put the cap on another year of harvesting. Marilyn is back on as Sec. Treas. for another year...not a big job as most of the heavy lifting is done by Lynn, the Executive Assistant. We don't have a huge membership...contrary to what some of the US harvesters have been told...with 42 active members and only 16 working south of the border, we really are a small group.
We had some great entertainment both nights...Double Vision, twin magicians that strolled about and picked audience members at "random" to take part in their show. Marilyn doesn't believe it was very "random" since she was sitting at the very back of the conference room and was "picked" to participate...oh, little did they know what they were getting into...AND they were silly enough to give her a mic to make sure the audience heard her. It was entertaining to say the least. We also had a sound effect comedian the second night who had everyone howling in laughter...just the thing to cap off a great convention.
We left the convention Friday morning after saying our goodbyes until the spring and Marilyn took the scenic route back to Yorkton...after all, who loves driving more that we do? Al had a toy show to attend in Weyburn so we met up with Jeff, his brother, on the highway to Weyburn and after Al loaded his bags and various toys into the other truck, Marilyn headed back to Yorkton. The toy show went as well as they figured it would and after picking up Senior(the 'old' Dodge) at Jeff's farm where he had left it, Al got back to Yorkton in time to take part in the Staple's Christmas party that Marilyn was at.
This year they had projectors and big screen stations with Guitar Hero, Scene It and of course...the Wii Fit. There was quite a lot of action and some pretty wild stuff going on as everyone took turns boxing, hula hooping, ski jumping, among other sports...and no booze to use as an excuse for the craziness. The "old folks" outlasted all the school kids that work at the store and it was 2am before we finally got home.
After another work week Marilyn was off to Regina to help out with Theatre Saskatchewan's annual dinner theatre. She is a member at large on the executive committee for the provincial community theatre group who cook and serve the meal for their annual fundraiser. Once again it was -40°...Farenheit or Celcius, it's all the same...damn cold...and let's add a bit of wind to drop it even lower. You just can't beat winter in Saskatchewan...those 100+ degree days from the summer don't look too bad at this time of year.
More work for Marilyn with the crazy's out shopping at this time of year...no signs of recession here...maybe until the credit card statements arrive in January. The weather certainly doesn't keep people at home, they just bundle up more and leave the vehicles running in the parking lot, which is a lot less painful now that the fuel prices have dropped to .75/litre or about $2.40/USgal...a far cry from this summer.
Al got busy and actually put together the Christmas newsletter...well, he wrote it up and Marilyn added the pictures and had it printed up at Staples. We always do one up for anyone who doesn't have the chance to follow the blog for whatever reason and Al has had to look after that for the past few years. Once we had them all done, Al took a road trip to Kenmare, ND to mail the US ones so they would be delivered before Christmas...oh, and to pick up some toys that he had bought.
We hosted an early family Christmas for Al's family on Dec. 21. The three brothers and their step-dad take turns every year and it had finally rolled around to ours. Marilyn slaved all day over the hot stoves while Al made sure she kept updated with the scores from all the NFL games, but he did take over after the gifts were opened and the fireworks came out. It is interesting how different they sound when it is -35° and the snow is on the ground...lighting them was another challenge. The barbeque lighter wouldn't work in the cold and when Jeff tried to use a small propane torch it sprung a leak around the collar and made it's own fireworks. Still, a wonderful family get together for the holidays.
With "Junior" (the new Dodge) being Marilyn's main ride into work...at least when Al doesn't drive her in...being able to use command start is a must in this cold weather. Marilyn decided to find out about getting it installed and halfway through the phone call was told by Al that she had just ruined her Christmas present...he had booked the truck in to get it installed on Dec. 23...and Marilyn has not stopped hearing about how she just had to tear open the paper on the gift to see what she was getting. It works great, except it likes to randomly lock the doors when it is running...needs a bit of tweaking, or at the very least a hidden key for the door so Al doesn't have to drive into town to open the doors.
Christmas day was spent quietly at home until we went to our next door neighbors, Murray and Darlene's for turkey supper and a long visit. Darlene has been trying to talk Marilyn into joining the United Church choir...yes, you read right...and with their daughter Kristen playing the piano, she had Marilyn "audition" with an old fashioned sing-along....not bad enough apparently to sway Darlene from her mission. We'll see what January brings...
Marilyn worked on Boxing Day...Dec. 26, consider a shopping day in Canada...and a few other countries. People will line up outside stores waiting for the opening to take advantage of all the great bargains that are available only on this day. Marilyn had to go to work at 7am to help set up for the day and although she now works in the furniture department, she was drafted back into the computer department for the day. People started lining up at 7:30am for the 9am opening...the staff could hardly get through the waiting customers to get to the doors, fortunately it had warmed up to -20° so the wait was bearable...it was a crazy day and 3:30pm did not come soon enough.
Clutter's Last Stand took over again as Marilyn decided to do a major overhaul and chuck a ton of stuff and give another couple of tons to Salvation Army...they are really getting to know Al well what with all the stuff he has been taking in to them. Marilyn was a bit upset when she went to get some boxes to put the donations in and...Al had thrown them ALL away in his cleaning frenzy in the garage. Fortunately, Staples came through and after fishing a few good size boxes out of the cardboard baler, she was back in business.
And now, here we are about to ring in another new year, waiting for the ball to drop before calling it a year. The "weakly" update didn't happen as planned, but maybe next year...
Here's hoping that 2009 brings you all you wish for...
