Enamel Dental Care Teeth Cleaning Blues: Tuesday, February 16th!

Politics, as a practice, whatever its professions, has always been the systematic organization of hatreds. -Henry Adams, historian and teacher (16 Feb 1838-1918

With photos of this quality it is now time to change the resolution setting on your camera ... Just do it! Cheerios, Aarturo the humble Dutchman

Dearest Neanderthaler, and Bridge Afficianados! It was with great pleasure that I learned you enjoyed the snapolas and "reportage", as per your messages of February 15th and 16th. Particularly since I was not aware that many of you Summerland cave-dwellers could even read! On the other hand, I must chastise you for your misuse of the adjective, "humble", certainly you meant "haughty", as in Imperious Dutchman! Mary Lee can caress your shoulders but keep your hairy mitts off my camera settings!

Now that you have been suitably reprimanded, please ask my Darling Josinta which evening or afternoon, over the next little while, might suit her, (and her cultured companions, of course), to play some bridge with Spumoni and Guillermo, the latter as a UN Bridge Observer, only. Naturally, you are most welcome to join the gathering, muttering grimly, in the shadows, whining about being constantly misunderstood. You can always help with the construction, (Work started yesterday morning at 7:00 am much to Lady Darjeeling's discomfit!), next door, lending your powerful, long legs, strong back and weak mind, should you find our assembled company, and the "chess" of card games, boring! Three No Trump and Cheers, Patrizzio, Official OF Grammarian, Arbiter of Good Taste and Proper Etiquette! Pic: Humble back-hoe!

Up at just before 8:00 am as I thought that I needed to take my antibiotic pills two hours before my dental appointment. However, prescription calls for the taking thereof only an hour beforehand. Hadn't set my alarm as Lady Dar was sure the work next door would commence at 7:00 am. In fact, although the lads were on the lot when I looked over the fence, they were preparing the forms for the footings so not much noise at all. What a grand day, but a few small clouds, otherwise the sky was blue, blue, blue!

Mme Coriandre had a few errands as well as an appointment at Bugsy's to have her hair coiffed so she dropped me off at the dentist's office at 10:00 am. The dental hygienist, Elizabeth, is a lovely woman, originally from Sweden, so it was fun to chat with her over the course of the cleaning, about Sweden, but also about her relatively new farm, near Rock Creek, where she and her husband have a small herd of beef cattle. I continue to be impressed with the high, high level of professional attention one receives at Enamel Dental Care. Very latest in technology extends to teeth cleaning and one feature I had not encountered before was the "painting" of one's teeth with a flouride of some sort instead of having an upper and lower mouth guard, of sorts, filled with watermelon flavoured gunk, for five minutes or more, in one's mouth. Apparently the former process if far more effective as the substance bonds with the teeth, immediatley, providing better, longer-lasting protection. Furthermore, one can eat or drink right away although one is not supposed to brush or floss for at least twelve hours.

Thanking Elizabeth and paying my bill, I strolled home, along Main Street, stopping in at The Lloyd Gallery to say hello to Nel, the owner. She was on the phone to Holland so I just mimed Happy New Year and continued on my way. Couldn't believe how warm it was. I had brought along some gloves but didn't need them and was actually almost over-heating by the time I reached our house. Knew I was going to go for a ride, given the weather, so once I'd had a delish plate of Dad's Delight, (Coined by Ayn when she and Chloë were kids, an admixture of anything I could find in the fridge that needed using, fried up with lots of onions!), I gave my bike chain a quick cleaning, (I'd cleaned and washed the bike once we were back from India/Vancouver in December.), but I knew it would probably need some oil as well. 

Suited up, quite warmly, as although it was still wonderfully warm, I knew, from past experience, that the wind off the lake can be quite cool and once sun dips, temperature in the deep shadows can be uncomfortable if one is not prepared. had thought that I might take a run to Naramata but by the time I had done one loop of the Penticton Tennis Club/Lakeshore/Riverside Drives, I decided I'd stick to the flats for my first outing. I'm planning my first attempt at snow-shoeing, this coming Thursday, and don't want to have sore or tired leg  muscles. I've not ridden since mid-December and other than hiking each Monday, since the start of the year, I've not had any real vigorous, extended exercise.

Must say that it felt simply wonderful to be back in the saddle again. Was a tad concerned that the street shoulders would be covered in gravel/grit, laid down by the City after the various snow falls but on my "route regulare", I'm pleased to report, that this really wasn't an issue. May well be on Eastside Rd, to OK Falls, and perhaps on Naramata Road. If all goes well, I hope to ride one of those routes tomorrow so I'll know more afterwards. at any rate, I wasn't the only one taking advantage of the glorious day as there were scads of dog walkers and joggers along the boardwalk on Lakeshore Drive, as well as quite a few cyclists, a number braver than I, wearing shorts!

Didn't really push myself. I was just happy to be riding and stretching my legs but must admit that the AVG was a pretty dismal, 17.8 kph. Still, I relished my first ride of 2016 and have high hopes that this will be the start, or close to it, of the riding season. Plan to take my Brodie in to Freedom to replace my commuter hybrid tires with larger mountain bike tires. I'm looking forward to exploring the KVR with a number of friends from the hiking group and I know I'll need wider tires than the current ones. I've already determined that the forks can accept the tires in question. They should provide the traction I will need so all I must do now it to convince Lady Darjeeling to lend me the cash! Maybe if I start out asking for a new road bike I'll be able to persuade her to go for the cheaper alternative! Stats for ride:

https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1053268791#.VsPJKsDl-xU.email

Christina Tassell Makes my 10k today look pathetic Patrick James Dunn

Hi Raymond! Glad Sylvia passed along your new account! Please say hello to Jim when next you chat. Lady Darjeeling's ankle seems to be mending nicely. She bought an ankle support today and will try it tomorrow, walking to her dental appointment. She is going to wait until next week to return to Flatlanders walking group, wisely as she certainly doesn't need risking re-injuring it. Fire place seems to be burning nicely. Haven't had it on for last two days as weather has been so mild. Just started it before dinner, this evening, as we decided to eat at the large island in the kitchen. We often dine in the Rumpus Room as the screen is larger there. Just watching a Wallender, the Swedish series, and like it very much. 

Cora Lee is on the phone to Catherine at the moment, (They are off to Bhutan on Monday, for about a month!) so I thought I'd dash this off.

Sorry to hear about the delay in Sylvia's flight. We've been through much the same, of late, with Chloë coming from Vancouver, and Ayn not being able to come at all! Do you know where you are sitting, for the Sevens, relative to the seats Mick obtained for us? Looking forward to seeing Ricardo and Sir Andrew as I've not bumped into either since well before we moved here.

Must away, as Lady Mary is yowling now that she is off the phone, wanting to finish Wallender! Regards to Sylvia. Cheers, Patrizzio!

Pics: Construction next door. Today's sky and hills without much snow. Some of the wood I've split. Will stack it more efficiently once I've cut up some of the long lengths to make room. More shots of construction in progress.

Hi Bed & Breakfast, Grandparent, Hockey Sibling, Gourmond and Guilt Tripper!
First, let me say how adorable Kian is! You must be pinching yourselves with love and delight. My sympathy is for Picasso as pets usually take second place to new human arrivals! Tell Warren to come on over when in Summerland as I have a number of interesting bottles of rum, one I brought back from India, Old Monk! Cheers, Patrizzio!

Good Morning Burn’s St. Boot campers! Please no apologies for lack of emails as we are equally if not more remiss!. You are correct that there has been a lot of crap being dealt with down here and as a matter of fact I had to check my Mom back into Mount St. Josephs yesterday afternoon due to an acute onset of psychosis..part and parcel of her Wernicke's Korsakoff syndrome. 

[Hanging out on Deer island]

She was in quite a state and was seeing multiple people in her apartment and had not slept a wink the night before. I suggested that maybe I should take her to the hospital and she said she did not want to so I got her settled and tried to get her to have a nap. Then when I was halfway home she called me and said that yes she did want to go get checked out...but just a short stay to try and get some rest etc. I took her over there and on the way she was incredibly happy , even giddy which shows just how much she had been in fear of the prospect of spending another minute alone in her place. 

[with Heather and Alexis and gorging on 6 kilos of fresh shrimp from a fishing boat we traded 8 cervecas for!!]

After I checked her in  I tagged teamed with my sister and the nurses tried to tell her there didn’t seem to be anything physically wrong with her and they would probably just have to send her home. Les just lost it on the nurse who was trying to make light of the situation thinking this was just another dotty old lady but in fact my Mom cannot do the simplest things now and this has gotten rapidly worse in recent weeks such as the inability to work her door lock, operate the remote for her t.v. and can barely operate the phone and when she does calls people up to eight times a day among other issues.
 

[Adventurous Iguana]

We have been working with the social workers, psychiatrists etc. trying to get extra help to deal with it but until now was deemed well enough to be on her own with some outside help with bathing etc. which my sister has been doing instead as my mom doesn’t want any stranger to do it. the situation is beyond our means now in more ways than one, seeing as my Mom blew all her money there is nothing left beyond her life pension that my Dan in his incredible foresight chose to leave. Between that and a few other small government pensions she gets about $3300.00 a month which is not enough for the kind of care she needs so we are pushing for her to be assessed for subsidized assisted living or long term care. 

[floats from Mazatlantida themed carnaval]  Unfortunately we do not have the means to provide enough to look after her outside of the government supplied system and frankly even if I could based on our history of my Mom and her financial fiascos it would surely be the end of my marriage.  

Ok, well having said all that Colleen and I did manage to escape down to Mazatlan Mexico for a week and had an amazing time!!. We met up with some friends we have down there and have probably mentioned before. Alexis is a native Mazatlanian and his wife Heather is a Vancouverite born and raised. They have three kids and we met them through Jake`s soccer as their oldest is the same as Jake. We have been down a couple times now and as he is a professional Musician we get to go hear him play at various venues while there.

They moved back down about 5 years ago as he wanted to pursue his music career and his family is there still. After doing that however they have decided to move back here to have a better future for their kids among other things. I had said to Colleen that maybe we should ask you guys if you wanted to go but knew you had a full house with Clara and Dusty. Very sorry to hers about the travel woes of Ayn and Chloe and hope Ayn can get up soon.

[watching the parade with our friend Romi and her man Miguel.]

Other than all that stuff, i worked on the latest planet of the apes movie for three weeks before heading down south and am now going to try to get a few personal projects out of the way before starting on the next fifty shades of grey movies part time over the next few months.

Love the hiking pictures and the wordy emails to keep up with you guys ...almost feels like I`m there!!. Love the idea of you having your own booth at the farmers market as well!. Great news about Carolina and company moving out west again and hopefully we can coordinate a visit to the valley enroute where we can reunite.  Take care for now and we`ll talk to you soon! Fondesto`s , Al and Colleen
 

[This parrot is in fact a female model who posed for Johannes Stötter, a fine art body painter. Using breathable paint, he spent hours painstakingly turning this woman into the image of a parrot, brushstroke by brushstroke. The model's arm forms the parrot's head and beak, and her legs form the wing and tail feathers.]

(Hello The Sisterhood! For the two Picassos! Brenda Louise has an African Grey named Picasso and this is one of Dusty's nicknames! Cheers, Patrizzio!)
 
Hi Iguana Folk! First, let me say how much I enjoyed the snaps of Mexico! Really pleased that you two were able to get away for a much needed break. I did know you were there as Lady Dar had seen some of Marilyn's postings.

On the other hand, our hearts go out to you over the terribly, terribly difficult situation you are dealing with, or trying to deal with, with respect to your Mother, Al. I was so very fortunate with Annie, in terms of temperament when she began to deteriorate mentally, as well as her finances, with respect to being virtually self-sufficient within the confines of subsidized care. My advice is to press for your Mom to be admitted to such a facility as soon as possible. I'm sure I'm not telling you anything you don't know or wish to happen. Buona Fortuna indeed!!!!

Yes, it is exciting that Choocheranian and Brunello will be moving back to the Coast. Do hope we can all connect, one way, someplace or another. More closer to possible dates, of course. Glad you have enjoyed accounts and pictures of hikes. Perhaps you can join us if you are ever able to be here during the summer, per esempio, on one of the days we trek. Regards to Marilyn. Fondestos and Cheers, Patrizzio! Hi again, Kids! This past Monday's hike! Cheers, Patrizzio!

Greetings Lord Dunn of the Dunces, Happy Chinese New Year to you and Corinne (moreso to her than you)! Now, with the niceties out of the way...finally, we hear from you, I was worried for one that you might have done us all a favor and decided to fall off the face of the earth and leave your whole scotch collection to yours truly! speaking of bad whisky, managed to get a hand on the over-hyped Crown Royal Northern Harvest, which I tried and still taste like regular Crown Royal to me more or less, but if sipped it is not bad, either way it falls within my price range (chain cleaner/porch climber level).

Actually, I also picked up a bottle of Lot 40 which was voted the best for 2015 at the recent Canadian Whisky Awards, beating out Northern Harvest, and in my own opinion it is better than the Crown Royal, as well it is 100% rye and single-pot, as opposed to Northern Harvest which is a blend. I know you are more scotch than a rye person, but I definitely recommend the Lot 40, same price as the Northern Harvest too. Did you try to get your hands on the Northern Harvest out of curiosity? and if so, what's your opinion of it? I can't believe how nuts ppl are going over it, the power of hype (and who is this Jum Murray fellow??? I need him to do my pr work if he can make a $35 bottle of cheap whisky seem like holy water)...

Please, even though Vancouverites are celebrating the fact that we have managed to finally rid ourselves of your odious and noxious presence, I would love to see you and Corinne in March when you come down here, I will be around and will bring you some of the LDB's finest chain cleaner/porch climber, of course.

I will make sure to say hi to Liisa, she is in good spirits as she is seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, this being her last year before riding off into the sunset and maragaritaville. I forgot if I told you, but in place of the annual Dunne and Durston xxxmas free for all, I went to Liisa's to freeload. She was kind enough to invite me and my new girlfriend (not Juniper anymore, if you remember her), although, as Liisa told me, it was mainly to make sure that I was not a complete nut job before I started my practicum with her, since she hadn't seen me since the xmas party - and probably wanted to also make sure I hadn't gotten a face tattoo or something like that.

I would love for you and Corinne to meet my new girlfriend, Jessica, whom I met at SLAIS and is also doing the dual program, although she is more on the Archives side as Records Management is her passion. I'm leaning more towards the library side, just applied for a VPL shelving job, as they put out a posting looking for shelvers, crossing fingers that goes ok.

Speaking of young ladies celebrating their birthdays, will be making a trip to Toronto next weekend to celebrate my grandma (on my dad's side) 80th birthday. Hopefully she will look as good as the Riveter when she hits 91

Great to hear from you and even better to hear you are all having a good time, miss you both (Corinne and your whisky collection to be more precise when I say "both"). Please let me know when you are free when you get to Vancouver in March Take care, VL 

Hello Alphabet Lover, (aka Fop of Fools), and Jo Nesbø's personal chef! First, let me say how much I enjoyed your lengthy, witty epistle, Vittorio! Must be your stint at SLAIS that is improving your communication skills. Thank you, as well, for the Chinese New Year's wishes. We were in India when I heard about  Northern Harvest but I'm not really interested in such award winners. I do appreciate your recommendation of Lot 40 as it seems far more interesting for all the reasons you state.

I was sorry to miss Liisa's Christmas bash as I went a year ago and it was wonderful! Glad you are keeping up the Freeloading! Do give her our regards, as well as sending greetings to Jessica. Be delighted to meet her. Buona Fortuna with shelving at VPL. Not a bad idea to become known in any system as who know what might happen. Cora Lee did a summer project at Hastings, back in the mid-70's, Books Behind Bars, a program to deliver paperbacks to prisoners, and the Branch Head there remembered her from that project when she applied for the Children's position there, a few years later! Her fist job with VPL!

Travel safely to Toronto and trust you will have a wonderful time. Regards to Jessica Jones! Will be in touch about meeting in Vancouver closer to the date. Cheers, Patrizzio! 

Tummler's Reach Hope-Princeton Tandem Ride! Tummler, we look forward to driving to the Reach in tandem - and to catching up with you both. We hope Corinne is on the mend. Fond regards to all, G & J

Hi Island/Coastal Folk! First, let me say how much we look forward to your visit. Just curious, but are you continuing on to Rossland after your sojourn here? Makes sense. As well, will we be celebrating Calamity's birthday. I have plenty of rusty tools I'd like to re-gift!

Not sure if you've tried to contact Robo Man of late. I did and messages bounced. Finally asked Sylvia if he had a new address. He did! Here it is. Must away, as Lady Mary is yowling now that she is off the phone, wanting me to heat her bean bags! Regards to you both from Her Imperiousness! Fondestos and Cheers, Patrizzio! Pics: Shots of construction in progress next door. Do these conjure up images of your Ten Year Plan?

  Anya Gusakova