Tonight is our Christmas party. I just got out of the shower, am about to go dry my hair, paint my nails, put on makeup, slip on the fabulous new dress, check hair again, and emerge stunningly gorgeous for Husbandly One.
Wish me luck and many dropped jaws!
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Just sedate me
We leave on our trip to Florida in five days. I have been planning, dreaming about, and looking forward to this trip for eight months. But today it hit me: WE LEAVE IN FIVE DAYS.
Ever the procrastinator, up until today it felt like I had loads of time to prepare. Then this morning, I woke up at 3:30 am, and all was not cool in my world. Reality came crashing down and I immediately got up and made thre lists: Things To Do (such as photocopy documents, get a haircut, pay bills), Things to Buy (kitty litter, one last Christmas gift, food for the next four days) and Things to Pack (well....I never got around to packing today, but I DID make a list of things I commonly forget). Between the three lists, there are over seventy items for me to accomplish.
I left the house at 9am this morning, and only got back here at 6 pm. I therefore had the right to relax with a beer for an hour before I got back in to stuff around the house. Well, it is now almost 9pm, I am about to get in to the bathtub, and only eight of te seventy items have been crossed off my lists. Not good.
Tomorrow is Sunday. Husbandly One needs to go in to work to prepare for our staff party, so I will have the better part of the business day uninterrupted to do things around the house before I begin getting ready for the party. But seriously, I want to be gorgeous tomorrow, my party preparations may take a while. So over-all housecleaning and what have you will clearly suffer. PLUS, we are expecting 30 cms of snow tomorrow. Which I will have to shovel, seeing how Husbandly One won't be here. So, between shovelling and showering, looks like tomorrow is going to be a write off.
And then I go back to work the next day. And I work straight until the morning we leave.
I am sooooooo screwed.
Ever the procrastinator, up until today it felt like I had loads of time to prepare. Then this morning, I woke up at 3:30 am, and all was not cool in my world. Reality came crashing down and I immediately got up and made thre lists: Things To Do (such as photocopy documents, get a haircut, pay bills), Things to Buy (kitty litter, one last Christmas gift, food for the next four days) and Things to Pack (well....I never got around to packing today, but I DID make a list of things I commonly forget). Between the three lists, there are over seventy items for me to accomplish.
I left the house at 9am this morning, and only got back here at 6 pm. I therefore had the right to relax with a beer for an hour before I got back in to stuff around the house. Well, it is now almost 9pm, I am about to get in to the bathtub, and only eight of te seventy items have been crossed off my lists. Not good.
Tomorrow is Sunday. Husbandly One needs to go in to work to prepare for our staff party, so I will have the better part of the business day uninterrupted to do things around the house before I begin getting ready for the party. But seriously, I want to be gorgeous tomorrow, my party preparations may take a while. So over-all housecleaning and what have you will clearly suffer. PLUS, we are expecting 30 cms of snow tomorrow. Which I will have to shovel, seeing how Husbandly One won't be here. So, between shovelling and showering, looks like tomorrow is going to be a write off.
And then I go back to work the next day. And I work straight until the morning we leave.
I am sooooooo screwed.
Saturday, December 8, 2007
More advice
If, hypothetically, you have spent approximately a million dollars on lobster for dinner to surprise your Husbandly One... and if, hypothetically, you decide a half hour before dinner to clean your bathroom.... and if, hypothetically, you are using a bathroom cleaner which contains bleach.... do NOT decide that you don't need to use rubber gloves and go in bare-handed.
I have washed my hands three times and the smell of bleach is still so strong that I'm nauseous. Can't WAIT to dig in to the most expensive dinner of the year with my bare hands. Yumm...bleachy goodness....
I have washed my hands three times and the smell of bleach is still so strong that I'm nauseous. Can't WAIT to dig in to the most expensive dinner of the year with my bare hands. Yumm...bleachy goodness....
Thursday, December 6, 2007
Power outtages and you
I have a lot of respect for the chefs I work with. Over the years, they have given me tons of advice about food in general, and tonight, I am going to share with you the simplest, easiest trick in the world. Seriously, your jaw is about to fall open and hit the floor. And then you are going to call all your firends and share this with them, it's that good.
Are you ready?
Okay, then.
We have all experienced power outtages. Sometimes it's for an hour or two, but sometimes it's for a day or more.I think most of us who have lived through extended outtages have then turned to our significant other and said, "Shit, what about the stuff in the freezer?" Or, as once happened to me, I returned home after a weekend away and discovered that, at some point, the power had been off. WHen? For how long? And what about my freezer??
So here's what you do (but you have to do it now). Throw a few ice cubes in a tupperware container and put it in the freezer. After your next power outtage, check the ice. If it still looks like cubes, your food is still safe. If it has melted into anything other than pristine cubes, you have a problem.
See? How mind blowingly easy is THAT?
Are you ready?
Okay, then.
We have all experienced power outtages. Sometimes it's for an hour or two, but sometimes it's for a day or more.I think most of us who have lived through extended outtages have then turned to our significant other and said, "Shit, what about the stuff in the freezer?" Or, as once happened to me, I returned home after a weekend away and discovered that, at some point, the power had been off. WHen? For how long? And what about my freezer??
So here's what you do (but you have to do it now). Throw a few ice cubes in a tupperware container and put it in the freezer. After your next power outtage, check the ice. If it still looks like cubes, your food is still safe. If it has melted into anything other than pristine cubes, you have a problem.
See? How mind blowingly easy is THAT?
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
There's a reason why he usually cooks
For dinner, Husbandly One had taken a roast out of the freezer. "But," I protested, "I have shrimp in the fridge that I need to use before it goes bad. I'll mkae some shrimp pasta tonight."
When we got home, I realized that I had grossly overestimated the contents of my pantry, and I essentailly served him fishy noodle water.
God bless his soul, he had a large portion and praised my efforts. I, on the other hand, just kinda stirred the mess around on my plate, and when a decent interval had elapsed, got myself a bowl of potato chips.
When we got home, I realized that I had grossly overestimated the contents of my pantry, and I essentailly served him fishy noodle water.
God bless his soul, he had a large portion and praised my efforts. I, on the other hand, just kinda stirred the mess around on my plate, and when a decent interval had elapsed, got myself a bowl of potato chips.
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
40 centimetres of snow, and counting
Stupid, stupid WINTER.
Major storm began blowing in last night when I went to bed. This morning, I stumbled out of my room at the regular time (big mistake), looked out the living room window, and hightailed it back to the bedroom to wake Husbandly One, who was actually off today. "Hon, you gotta get up. There is a ton of snow, we need to shovel, and I can't be late for work today, I have a meeting at 8:30."
Him, all snuggly warm and not quite awake, "Yeah....I'll get up in a minute...."
"DUDE, you have no idea what the end of our driveway looks like. I'm scared."
That got his attention, and he got up immediately to see what I was talking about. In retrospect, I wish I had had a camera in my hands, because the sight of my buck naked man standing in front of the picture window saying, "Fuuuuuuuuuuck" was priceless.
I finally made it to work, a half hour late...no one had showed up for my 8:30 meeting, anyway, so that was one less thing to worry about. I had a TON of work I needed to get done, so I thought that, seeing how most of Atlantic Canada was cancelled today, I could get some serious office time.
HA! There are nine of us in Sales...today, only two of us made it in, me and the catering coordinator. And the phone rang off the HOOK, and she only had one person to forward the calls to. It was pure chaos, and while part of me was cursing my co-workers, the other part of me was cackling in glee: today alone I met my bedroom sales quota for the month, simply because I had to deal with everything, whether the booking in question was traditionally my market or not.
Still, at 3pm, our general manager decided that the weather was getting too out of control, and shut down the administration offices (not that there were many of us around.... there are normally 20 people on our floor, today we were 7, including the two of us in Sales). Whatever, I was totally surprised to be sent home, that has never happened to me during my 20 years in the hotel industry. I said, "ummm....don't you want me to go bus tables in the restaurant? Or clean rooms in Housekeeping? Or wash pots in the kitchen? Or stay over night in case people can't get in tomorrow?"
It was just so far out of my realm, this idea that non-essential personnel were actually, gasp, being told to go home to their families while it was still safe to travel. But I was very, very glad to get home.
It is 9:45pm, and still snowing. Looks like tomorrow will be another morning of shovelling. But at least I'm home.
Major storm began blowing in last night when I went to bed. This morning, I stumbled out of my room at the regular time (big mistake), looked out the living room window, and hightailed it back to the bedroom to wake Husbandly One, who was actually off today. "Hon, you gotta get up. There is a ton of snow, we need to shovel, and I can't be late for work today, I have a meeting at 8:30."
Him, all snuggly warm and not quite awake, "Yeah....I'll get up in a minute...."
"DUDE, you have no idea what the end of our driveway looks like. I'm scared."
That got his attention, and he got up immediately to see what I was talking about. In retrospect, I wish I had had a camera in my hands, because the sight of my buck naked man standing in front of the picture window saying, "Fuuuuuuuuuuck" was priceless.
I finally made it to work, a half hour late...no one had showed up for my 8:30 meeting, anyway, so that was one less thing to worry about. I had a TON of work I needed to get done, so I thought that, seeing how most of Atlantic Canada was cancelled today, I could get some serious office time.
HA! There are nine of us in Sales...today, only two of us made it in, me and the catering coordinator. And the phone rang off the HOOK, and she only had one person to forward the calls to. It was pure chaos, and while part of me was cursing my co-workers, the other part of me was cackling in glee: today alone I met my bedroom sales quota for the month, simply because I had to deal with everything, whether the booking in question was traditionally my market or not.
Still, at 3pm, our general manager decided that the weather was getting too out of control, and shut down the administration offices (not that there were many of us around.... there are normally 20 people on our floor, today we were 7, including the two of us in Sales). Whatever, I was totally surprised to be sent home, that has never happened to me during my 20 years in the hotel industry. I said, "ummm....don't you want me to go bus tables in the restaurant? Or clean rooms in Housekeeping? Or wash pots in the kitchen? Or stay over night in case people can't get in tomorrow?"
It was just so far out of my realm, this idea that non-essential personnel were actually, gasp, being told to go home to their families while it was still safe to travel. But I was very, very glad to get home.
It is 9:45pm, and still snowing. Looks like tomorrow will be another morning of shovelling. But at least I'm home.
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