This took far too long

List 30 things that make you happy.

Graham
Hubby and Boo
Going out with friends
Power wheelchair that folds like a lawn chair and fits in the trunk of the car
Hubby’s smile
Family
The books of Christopher Moore
People who choose joy
Nostalgia and generosity
Graham in a box
Supportive parents like
Jimbo’s mom
People achieving unlikely dreams, like Naomi Smalls, became a model for Vogue
A great meal for my birthday
Trust from a wild animal
The comfort of my new lift chair
Graham waiting for breakfast
Creativity
Women who have triumphed over adversity
British humor
Living in Canada 🇨🇦
Canadian humor
Space exploration and technology
The music of the Rolling Stones
Mick Jagger
The way Neal Degrasse Tyson explains things
Free Canadian Healthcare
The knowledge that my rights and freedoms won’t be taken from me
The ballet
The fact that I’m still here and healthy, aside from the permanent paralysis of course

And another thing about Barbie

I still have yet to see the movie, but while watching a video from Drag Queen and Barbie collector Trixie Mattel ,I had an idea. I wondered if I could find a Barbie doll from 1965,the year of my birth. And because it’s no longer 1965,I have access to a computer and it took mere minutes to find out that while the original was not available, in 2009 Mattel reissued several older dolls under the title My favorite Barbie. The doll wasn’t as inexpensive as it was in 2009 at a whopping 200 Canadian dollars, but it was worth it to me .

And then, because I’m overly generous, I immediately set out to find Barbies from 1990 and 2013 for my stepdaughter and my niece, respectively, because every girl should have a Barbie from the year she was born.

All 3 dolls are new in box and will be good investment and display pieces

The difference between Trump and Trudeau on display

I’m not sure if you’ve heard about the legal trouble that Trump has gotten himself into but, yesterday he received his 3rd indictment. This one was over Trump’s ACTIONS on and around January 6th, 2021. I will let prosecutor Jack Smith tell you about it below.

Meanwhile, in Canada, Justin Trudeau has announced his own legal trouble, and he and his wife of 18 years, Sophie, have legally separated. Here’s the story from the CBC https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-gregoire-separation-1.6925254?__vfz=medium%3Dsharebar

Yes, even our PMs’ legal issues are boring as compared with his peers down south. Having spent years living in both countries, I must say I prefer my politics boring and my entertainment exciting.

My Barbie experience and then some

Im pretty sure that I got my first Barbie doll in 1971, I was only 6 years old and it was the Malibu Barbie . She was very tanned and blonde, my exact opposite.

My second Barbie doll was the Sweet 16 Barbie, and I had been begging my parents to buy it for me for Christmas of 1972. Then, just a few days before Christmas, we made a stop at a store, and I saw my mother purchasing the doll through the window of the store . Unusually for me, I kept my mouth shut about what I’d seen until I opened the gift-wrapped package and noticed it was signed from Santa 🎅. Not wanting to out Santa Claus as fake to my brother, who was 4 years younger, it wasn’t until years later that I let my parents know how I’d figured out that Santa was fictional.

The doll that told me there’s no Santa Claus

I’m not sure what year it was when my parents built me a house for my Barbies, but it looked just like our house as they used bits of our wallpaper and shag carpet from the house. Barbie dream homes were just too expensive, and the personalization made my doll house special 💕

Just one more Barbie story to tell. This is the story of my Barbie heartbreak at the hands of my aforementioned younger brother and his friend, who was the lucky recipient of the entire collection .

This is the story of the crowned jewel of my Barbie collection, my Miss America Barbie doll. Technically, she was a Stacy, Barbie’s brunette friend, and I wanted her BADLY!

Miss America Stacy. I screamed so loud with excitement when I got her.

I think this happened when I was 10. I came home from school to find out that my brother and his friend, Claudine, from 2 houses down the street, were playing with my easy bake oven and my Barbies. I wondered why the whole house smelled like burning tires,only to be told the most heartbreaking news of my little life. All of my Barbie heads had been melted. Mom tried her best to open the easy bake oven, but the damned thing was on a timed lock, and there was no rescue for any of them . And yes, was the response to my only question, “What about Miss America?

The very next year, I sold the entire collection, house, and all to Claudine’s mom for Claudine and her little sister for 200 dollars that served me well during our European vacation.

So,will I see the Barbie movie?

HELL YES! It’s like it came out just for me!

Had such a great birthday dinner

Apologies for the less than sharp photos 📸.

Yesterday’s festivities began for me around 330pm when I was finished applying my face and my fragrance and was ready for my mom and husband to each put in my earrings simultaneously. It was a big laugh, and this was taken just after, hence the largesse of the smile.

Ready for my reservation

We had a 5pm reservation at my favorite Italian restaurant and had to pick up mom from her place before dinner. I never thought that I’d miss something about being shut down for covid, but I do miss being able to order delivery from this place. Now that everything is back to normal, it’s special occasion food again. Because this little restaurant got very popular. In no small part due to the dish that I had last night.

From left to right birthdays 07/07,0709,0716. Our favorite waiter is a fellow cancer ♋️

They do a canneloni stuffed with fresh crab and lobster in a rose cream sauce that if push came to shove,I would fight for. And I consider myself a passivist. It’s my favorite meal in town. I’d eat it daily if I could. And I’m about to thoroughly enjoy the second half shortly. But not before mentioning the tiramisu cups that came for dessert gratis, and thank you very much for that ,so light and creamy. It was the perfect way to end the meal 😋. Had a tad too much of my summer cherry aperitif, so was in bed early,where I promptly passed out in the middle of the bed,forcing the hubby to sleep in the second bedroom. All in all, a perfect day.

I’m a cancer ♋️ ,I grow on you

It’s smack dab in the middle of my birth month! As a matter of fact,it’s officially the day before my birthday, or as we call it Birthday Eve. Hubby had his birthday 8 days ago, and Mom has hers just 7 days later , so July is a big month for celebration around here, beginning on July 1st for Canada day 🇨🇦, and ending a tad early on the 26th for my yearly toast to Mick Jagger for his big day.

So it was very unfortunate and unwelcome to have had the back go out and even more unfortunate that it caused problems with my bowel. My back was so bad that I was unable to have a movement for 2 weeks and I finally called an ambulance to take me to emergency where I was promptly given an enema and a lecture about never waiting for more than 4 days to 💩. Not a fun or celebratory event, by any means, but it was a relief. When my back finally felt better, I realized that it wasn’t just the bowel that took a hit, so I’ve finished my first day of antibiotics for a UTI.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME! I hope 58 brings better health for longer and some travel, even if it’s local travel, and some gawddamn fun! Because I deserve it 😌

Ups and downs

So, my back is 95% better, my energy is up, and I’m almost ready to add exercise back into the mix and have apologized to Boo for the last post where I let slip her weight. She has yet to forgive me.

Unfortunately, my husband’s knee has gone all catywompus. He played 18 holes yesterday on his already questionable knee, and it decided that it was enough. Now it’s on strike.

Just heard cnn say North Korea launched a long-range missile, so gonna cut this short to find out more.

This is Boo

5 pounds, going blind,but beautiful enough to steal my husband

She’s a tortoise shell cat who weighs in at all of 5 pounds and who can’t lift that up from the floor to the bathroom sink…?

Me,130 pounds, poor eyesight and Kermit the frog’s arms

Perhaps I should start at the beginning of our time together. From day one, Boo has made it known that she ONLY drinks water from the bathroom tap. This really only became an issue when she recently started going blind. The hubby noticed it first, and then I saw her walking into the wall occasionally. Most recently, she waits to be airlifted onto the counter ,which hubby does with a smile.

A day before yesterday, I was wheeling to the bathroom, and there’s Boo I thought, she’s only 5 pounds, it’ll be easy. Then, I bent down and lifted her about three quarters of the way to the counter, when I felt the muscles pop off from 4 lumbar vertebrae, I was barely able to set Boo back on the floor and I’ve been bound to my lift chair ever since.

I’ve never put my back out like this before, and I’m trying very hard to allow as much healing time as possible, but can I just say that if you’re a wheelchair user DO NOT risk the injury. In my case, it’s a right side injury, as opposed to my already paralyzed left side. I can’t transfer to my wheelchair due to the pain ,which means that I must have help with getting to the toilet, where to my and hubby’s horror I couldn’t wipe the rear.

Even some of the able bodied, might have pulled something. But please never forget that you are not able-bodied, and any injury will take you away from the progress you are making. And time away will set you back farther from your ultimate goal. So if you take anything away from this post, it should be even when something seems like it should be easy, if you’ve not done it recently, DON’T ASSUME IT’S EASY, ASSUME IT’S NOT, AND ASK FOR HELP. Unless you want to end up like this for days.

Taken well before the injured back.