Tuesday, February 06, 2018

Productive & Fun Weekend In the Books

Happy Tuesday, friends!

My first weekend in February was a good one.  I got a lot of stuff checked off the "To Do List" and had some fun, too!

Friday was a quiet day at home.  I had woken up with a headache (those always aggravate me), so I just lay low for most of the day.  I worked on a puzzle, continued reading "The Nightingale", watched a whole bunch of episodes of House of Cards, and napped.  Oh, and I also downloaded the new Justin Timberlake album on Friday morning, and listened to it A LOT over the weekend.  I absolutely LOVE it!!!

In the evening, Lindsay picked me up and we headed out to our first book club meeting of 2018.  This month's book was "The Handmaid's Tale" by Margaret Atwood.  I was the leader on this discussion, and honestly, I don't even think we needed a leader or questions.  This book generated BIG discussion and analysis all on its own.  It was nice to hang with the ladies, eat yummy snacks, and enjoy their company and conversation.  It's the time of year when cabin fever is starting to seep in a bit (despite my absolute love of hibernation), so it was nice to get out and have some girl talk.

Saturday morning, I again woke up with a headache, but it eased off fairly quickly, thank goodness.  I enjoyed a lazy morning, thew my bedding into the laundry, made pancakes, and cozied up with an extra cup of coffee.  I didn't get my butt moving until mid-morning, and just as I was finishing making the bed, my mom called to see if I'd watch my niece while she ran my sister up to the hospital.  After being sick and missing work most of last week, they had decided she'd better get checked out just in case, but was too weak to drive herself up there, and Chris & Caden were going to a hockey tournament.  So Mom went to get her, and I offered to keep Dan for the night.  After being cooped up with a sick mommy for a week I figured she'd need a fun girls night with Auntie.  And that's what we did!  We watched old movies from when I was a kid (Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead, Girls Just Want to Have Fun, and The Cutting Edge), she coloured while I worked on my crocheting (I got the start of a beanie made!  Ran out of my practice yarn, but it was nice to see something actually taking shape and looking like it was supposed to look!), we ate pizza and cheesies and just hunkered right down.  It was fun!  (And for the record - sister was sent home with diagnosis of a bad virus, so nothing too serious!)

Sunday was church, and then out for brunch before heading to Mom's to spend the rest of the day.  We watched the Sens game, I finished "The Nightingale" (woo hoo!  all of my half-finished books are now finished!!), and then got ready for our "Superbowl Party".  Which is our silly reason for having "snacks for supper", just the two of us.  Mom had zero interest in watching the game, so we just munched on pumpernickel & spinach dip, nachos, mini pizzas, and Sun Chips for supper.  Then I went home and turned the game on.  Was I actually into the game?  No, not really, other than I had decided I wanted the Eagles to win. (Brady's hot, but he's won enough.  Someone else's turn.)  I was really just waiting for the Halftime Show. And it did not disappoint!!  JT was SO good!!  I loved it, probably my favourite Superbowl Halftime Show ever!!!

Once the JT concert was over, I fell asleep on the couch, and while I had my PVR set and ready to go, I was so glad I woke up in time for This Is Us.  The big "What Really Happened to Jack" episode was on right after the Superbowl, and it was one for the books.  Many of my friends say they watch the show and cry every episode, but I seem to be an exception to that rule.  I have had tears a few times, but I don't sit and bawl through every episode.  I love the show, I think it is done amazingly well, and I usually come out of each episode feeling a connection to one or more of the characters.  And my gosh, who doesn't love Jack Pearson?  But I don't cry all the time.  Sunday night's episode was definitely a tear-jerker though.  It got me good.  I think it has a wide reach, because it speaks to different people on different levels.  While Jack Pearson's death was vastly different from my own father's, I could still relate to those kids trying to deal with that loss, that grief.  It was profound.  And yes, I cried.  A lot.  Pretty much from start to finish.

So, like many of my friends, I awoke Monday morning with a This Is Us hangover.  Puffy eyes and a slightly achy head.  But I had things to do, and no time to wallow in post-Jack grief!  I got my laundry started and then tackled the next items on Jill's Crappy Winter Jobs List: cleaning out the fridge and kitchen food cupboards.  I like to think of myself as a clean person, but man oh man, my fridge was disgusting.  Much like the front hall closet, I'm not entirely sure the fridge was properly cleaned before we started loading it up with our food.  I took literally every single item out of it, the shelves, the drawers, and scoured it from top to bottom.  It was awful.  But boy, does it sparkle now.  It felt good to throw out all the expired salad dressings and condiments and jams, etc. that lingered in the back, taking up space and long forgotten.  I didn't have any containers of mouldy old leftovers or anything like that, thank God, but a lot of bottles and jars with expiry dates past their prime.  Good-bye, old crap!  The cupboards weren't so bad, as they got well cleaned back when my kitchen was painted a few years ago, but it was nice to toss old boxes of crackers and rice and stuff like that.  Once they were cleaned and re-organized, I was able to clean off my cluttered little table and store a lot of that in the cleared space in the cupboards.  So I got my table set up with the little coffee and tea tray that I had mentioned in the Hygge post.  Justin carried me through all of this cleaning and re-organizing, as I had the Man Of the Woods album on repeat.  Have I mentioned lately that I might be in love with Justin Timberlake?  'Cause I'm totally in love with Justin Timberlake.

The rest of the day was spent chilling.  I shoveled and went for a walk,  continued reading our next book club book "They Called Me Number One" by Bev Sellars, caught up on the PVR and watched more House of Cards on Netflix, cooked a spaghetti squash that had been rolling around in the fridge for a few weeks and made a cheesy spaghetti squash casserole.  I konked out early on the couch... that was a pretty busy Monday for little ol' me!

How was your weekend?

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