Hats off to me

I am not what you call, a hat person.  Being someone who looks mostly ridiculous in any kind of headwear, I live in fear that I may be called upon to show up at a Garden Party with the Royal Family and give thanks that no Prince has ever come calling.

When I left the house yesterday morning to go to work, it was minus 7 degrees outside and knowing there would be considerable walking in my future both before and after Skytrain, I reluctantly donned my warmest hat to date. 

Ken bought me a fake fur number for Christmas.  Think something a hunter would wear in the woods, complete with earflaps.  Now imagine it covered in fake brown fur.  I looked like I mugged a wolf.

However, because all other commuters were too busy wearing their own silly hats and shivering from the cold, happily, no one even gave me a second look.  Either that or I couldn’t see them with all that fur in my eyes.  Apparently, I was the only person on the Skytrain who thought I looked odd. 

It took me a while to figure out what I looked like with my fur hat, red jacket, black pants and boots.  Hell, give me a Muscat and a box to stand on and I could have been a guard at Buckingham Palace!

The goods news is that the hat conquered even the coldest of winter days and that was the only reason to wear it.  No matter that the fur kept falling down my face obscuring my vision.  No matter that if I tried to look either left or right, I ended up looking into the inside of my hat.  I was warm…toasty even.  And for that, I was thankful.

Now let’s hope that warm spell comes back today as scheduled so I can put my Busby back in the closet where it belongs.

As they say in Poltergeist….I’m BACK!

I took the longest vacation that I’ve had in years and decided it would be as good a time as any to totally check out.  No emails, no texting, no social media…no blog. Only the odd old fashioned face to face conversation. Rest is a beautiful thing, and its impact cannot be underestimated.

My brain has definitely been recharged, if not entirely reset.  In fact, it’s taking a bit of effort to get it going again.  I hate to think what would happen with a year on a deserted island.

Ken and I went on our first cruise ever through the Caribbean.  My favourite moment of the entire trip came when at the spa on the ship, about to have a massage and a facial, they asked me to rate my stress level from one to ten with ten being the highest.  I wrote down a one, only because I had to stand upright to do it.

You have to know that this is an unusual report when even the spa lady seems surprised to see that number!  I think after the hour-long treatment, that number was probably .5 seeing that I still had a pulse.

During the daytime, I found the concept of being at sea quite relaxing.  Smelling the fresh ocean air and watching the water going by induced a kind of brainwave that frankly had me nodding off quite often.  But at night, when you couldn’t see more than 10 feet from the deck, it was a little different.  Although seeing the amazing array of stars was quite a treat and the amount of light cast by even a crescent moon was impressive.

I also witnessed more sunrises in that week than I probably will all year.  I have no idea why I was up at that time of day so often, but I’m very that I was as they were spectacular.

I’m not sure if it was the romance of the seas, but throughout the voyage I found myself wondering what it’s like to sail around the world and thought about all those brave souls who do it solo.  It would definitely be an interesting experience…until a storm hits and then I’d be totally out.

Our time on the Love Boat was good.  We met lots of nice people from all parts of the Globe.  We drank champagne, we laughed, we danced and we saw some new places.  We tripped the light fantastic and ate like Kings.  But mostly, we relaxed and recharged and I can’t wait to do it all again.