2012 - year of major changes

It's hard not to look back at this year as one of the most difficult we've had to deal with. We finally decided that with both our jobs being secure, we could invest in some of the more expensive home repairs that we'd been putting off. The first was the kitchen. In addition to installing a storm door to give us more lighting and ventilation off the deck, everything inside the kitchen was white! The counters were deteriorating so we priced it out and decided to get new laminate counters and a new black granite sink, brushed nickel faucets then add in a new island for more work space and storage. We put a 50% down payment on the kitchen reno and the new door.

So we went from this....

To this... A dramatic and spectacular change! Absolutely love it!

However, between putting the money down on the new kitchen and the installation, Brendon (and 53 others at NRC, part of wide-spread layoffs in the federal gov't, especially in sciences. 20 more Winnipeg NRC'ers have been laid off since the first round of cuts.) We were not expecting this at all and there wasn't even the slightest inkling that NRC would close and sell the building?! Since we'd already paid for half of the kitchen, you may as well pay for the other half and plow through the rough parts in the budget. Brendon's termination came as a shock but he had a few weeks to get his resume in order and start looking for work. He was immediately offered a position at Boeing at $10/hour with a raise to $12/hour after he'd completed a few months of training. Neither of us was happy with that offer! Fortunately, a job opened up at HSC in Adaptive Technologies (building custom electronics for people in wheelchairs) and I happened upon it the day before the deadline to apply. He had most of the necessary skills, a polished resume, and a great dossier of previous work from NRC. It took less than 4 hours for him to be interviewed and be offered the job. He now works across the street from me, so all things considered, it's an incredibly positive change for us. Brendon has a difficult but fulfilling job giving people independence and improved quality of life. Every day is a challenge for him to come up with new ideas and adapt mp3 players, cars and Kindles to each person's abilities. The downside is the new hours - we have to drive during rush hour so it can take up to an hour and a half to get home some days, mostly due to construction and traffic volume on Nairn. The worst thing is the amount of time we waste motionless in traffic 5 days a week. Brendon used part of his severance package to buy a new car so at least we're idling in style! ;-)

The next major change was the crushing disappointment to find out that we won't be having biological children of our own. We have had a difficult time moving past this but working with Adoption Options to open our file and create our family with them has been great. We get a lot of support from friends and family, and the AO staff are wonderful to work with. Brendon and I have had a lot deep conversations about what it means to be parents, the way we'll raise our child, and our shared values. It's a discussion that few people have before they become pregnant but as difficult, emotional and uncomfortable as the discussions are, it really helps our relationship and hopefully, will make us great parents. We're at the stage where social workers will be visiting our house so we're about 3 months away from "getting in the box", which means our file can be shown to pregnant women choosing to place a child in a family. We try to remain strong for each other and hope that someday, we'll be picked as parents. In the meantime, we just try to stay positive and optimistic.



Finally, we said good-bye to Kitty on September 12. Our beloved 18 year old, deaf, toothless, clawless cat finally succumb to her kidney disease. She had stayed with us for almost 2-1/2 years longer than cats normally live with kidney disease. She was quite sick in the end and despite our best efforts, we had to make the decision to put her down. The vet came by and quietly put Kitty to sleep and days later, her ashes came home forever. It's still difficult seeing photos of her and we miss her terribly. The grief of losing her is still very real.

After 2 months without Kitty and still deeply depressed, we discussed whether or not we should get a new cat. We drove across the city to D'arcy's Arc to look at some of the rescues but were told that we'd have to come by every day to spend time with a particular cat, but could only spend time with her in a room with 20 other cats. With both of us having terrible cat allergies, we'd never know if we were allergic to that cat or one of the other 19. The first cat we played with was a deaf older pure white cat with a temper. It was too much like Kitty and too soon after saying good-bye to her to replace her like that. We drove home quite dejected and decided to swing by PetSmart to see if they had any cats from the Humane Society. They had two and we spent time alone with both Sabrina (4 month old callico) and Tommy (8 month old mixed short hair). After nearly 2 hours and very little sneezing, we picked Tommy. He's a rambunctious, hyper-active, highly destructive, very much clawed and toothed cat! He's the type of kitten who'll chase lasers and spiders and shoestrings for hours, tearing around the house at top speed crashing into walls and bouncing off furniture. He's always underfoot and we're constantly stepping over him, but to have him purring on your lap will compensate for any of the million hilarious and annoying things he does each day. He's the opposite of Kitty and a happy addition to our family. We're both allergic to him like crazy but he's so much a part of our lives now that we'll just invest in anti-histamines and Kleenex instead of returning him to the Humane Society.

And finally, leaving NRC was equally difficult for me because I won't do lab work anymore. I write grants and have had to accept that I'm not a tech, but the day after my birthday, I received a phone call from a teacher in a small town who wanted to apply to send samples to the International Space Station next year. My officemate and I worked for months on the application and it was accepted two weeks ago, so on April 5, 2013, our project (to which we are technically the scientific consultants for, but we're going to take whole credit for the work) will blast off from Dragon X launch site and go to the International Space Station for a month. We are testing whether green tea prevents DNA damage due to cosmic radiation. It's incredible to be part of science again, especially in such a huge manner.

I wonder what 2013 has in store for us.....

So how long do you have to wait?

We decided to open a file with Adoption Option and every person we've told asks us the same question "So, how long do you have to wait?" It's a question that's so common that even we asked it when we started this process. I'm not an expert on adoptions but I want to answer the most common questions we get so far.

1) How long is the waiting list?
There isn't one. Adoptions are now based on a double-match system. The biological mother fills out a form telling what traits she wants in the adoptive parents to have. She can decide based on anything, from the ethnicity, religion, financials, pets, number of other kids, geography etc. As prospective adoptive parents, we provide all this information to the adoption agency. We also fill out a list of the features we want from the mom (drug/alcohol use, ethnicity etc). The adoption agency tries to match the lists. So there is no "waiting list". It's not a matter of being patient until everyone else has a kid before you. It can be a matter of months, to a matter of years, to never. It all depends on the double-match system.

2) Where do you adopt from?
There are two agencies in Winnipeg that you can adopt locally - Adoption Options (private) and Child and Family Services (public). AO also handles some international adoptions. You can open a file with both AO and CFS simultaneously.
For international adoptions, there aren't many countries that are allowing international adoptions. Some, like Ethopia and Haiti are under political upheaval so they closed their borders until the political situation returns to normal. Other countries just closed their doors without warning. And China keeps changing their rules all the time, so for example, there's a BMI requirement now that wasn't there a few years ago. And you can only adopt kids with medical problems (heart defect, HIV, club foot, cleft palette etc). So yeah, we want local because the rules are more consistent.

3) How much is the cost?
About $12,000 all in with AO. CFS might be different because they don't have to pay for staff.
Opening the file is $550.
Weekend 2-day seminar $1100
Homestudy with the social worker $2100
Pre-placement $400
Placement $900
Review of medical history $500
Counselling for the biological mother $900
Documentation $1400
Openness agreement $200
Lawyer fees $3000-$4000
Medical history (depends on your doctor) $20-$50/person
Criminal records $80/person

4) Can you choose the baby's ethnicity?
Yes and no. We fill in an "Application II" form that lists our criteria for the biological mom. We can choose the mom's ethnicity, the amount of drugs/alcohol use during pregnancy, the age range of the baby/child we're willing to adopt, the gender, number of kids we're willing to adopt (eg. twins, siblings, singletons) etc. This is the list that helps in the double-match I explained before.

5) How much is the biological mom involved in the kid's life?
Yes and no. That's call "openness". We (biological and adoptive parents) decide and sign an Openness Agreement with the biological mom/parents detailing how often the we meet with the biological parent(s). Usually, it's 2-3x per year, around holidays and birthdays. What we've been told is that during the first year or two, there is more involvement and it typically wanes over time as the biological mom/parents move on. It's not, let me make this really clear, a joint custody agreement. We're not sharing a child and there aren't weekend visitations. Oh yeah, and the biological mom usually decides the middle name of the child.

6) How many kids are placed each year?
That depends on the year. In 2011, it was 9. In 2009, it was 27. The number of kids placed depends on the number of biological moms that complete the process. For every 100 moms that contact AO for information, only 50 will decide to come in for a meeting, 25 will complete the process to place the child with a forever family, and 2-3 will change their mind and request their child back.

7) Whoa, wait. WTF?
Aye, there's the rub. The biological mother (or father, but usually the mother) has 21 days after placing the child up for adoption to change her mind and can take their child back. On day 22, the child is yours and then you can change the baby's last name to yours and get the birth certificate changed.

8) How many parents are on the waiting list?
Again... there's no list. But what we've been told, it's about 100.

9) How long are *you* going to wait?
About 3 years.

Next steps

I read an article about allowing yourself to grieve over your infertility. The part that made me laugh (dark humour) was that infertile couples will often seek out hobbies like gardening, crafts, or exercise to get their minds off their infertility. I have an AMAZING garden full of tomatoes, peppers, and jalapenos this year. I  took up crocheting again after a 20 year hiatus and made an afghan, a sweater, and a touque. And I can run 2.5 miles now!

We met with our doctor at the Heartland Fertility Clinic about a month ago. The results normal again. So the  suspicion is that the embryo can't implant or if it does, it's rejected by my body. His recommendation was for ICSI, intra-cellular sperm injection, along with IVF. It's a more complicated and more expensive procedure than standard IVF, but if the embryo is rejected if it does implant, then we pay $12,000 for a miscarriage? Thanks but no. He tried to convince us to sign up for the procedure but it wasn't much of a sales pitch. "Well, you can. If you want. You can try. I mean, you're both still young and healthy. It might work. It could, you know.... uhh...."
Both of us got the feeling that he was eyeing our Mastercard and figuring out how many payments on his Lexus he could make from us.

We were supposed to register for counselling at the front desk (huh?), but since he'd made us wait an hour past our appointment time and the secretary had left for lunch, we left too and had lunch at Tony Roma's. The only time we go to Tony Roma's is after an appointment and disappointment at Heartland Clinic.

Knowing that pregnancy isn't in our future, we went to an information night at Adoption Options and are scheduled to have a meeting with their staff next month, followed by a 3-day information session in November. Adoption is a very complicated process and there are two "divisions": Division 1 is with provincial Child and Family Services, Division 2 is with Adoption Options. We're going to start a Division 2 file first, and if the process isn't too horrific, we might consider opening a Division 1 file later. Of course, the paperwork for both Divisions can't be shared so  we have to do things (and pay for it) twice. At any rate, the next few months will be spent putting together our file, medical checks, credit reports, background checks, criminal records checks, home visits and a lot of waiting.... waiting...waiting....

Of Porcupines and Swamp Water

The Letrozole (aka Femera) that I was taking is supposedly most effective in the second and third month. It's now the fifth month. Although it's not working (obviously), I can happily say I also don't have the horrific side effects I read about on TheBump.com. The hot flashes, night terrors, vomiting, body aches that I read about were just that... their stories. I've been fortunate that I don't get sick every month from taking those pills, but unfortunate that it didn't do anything to help get me pregnant.

I've read about acupuncture and decided after the 2nd month of Letrozole not working, to augment my hormone treatments with 3 times a week acupuncture. I found one place that came recommended from a friend with MS who swears by Dr Liu at Eastern Healing Centre. My friend doesn`t suffer fools gladly and has a BS meter much stronger than I do, so I trust her judgement. Dr Liu is a very compassionate TCM doctor and diagnosed my liver as too hot, my uterus as too cold and my spleen as lacking nourishment. Also, I have a weak pulse and my tongue "film" is sparse. Huh....

Okay, so I have to suspend all my medical education, all my beliefs in conventional medicine, all my pre-conceived notions about what is or might be our fertility problems, and put some trust in Dr Liu's techniques. For placebo effect to kick in, you have to commit mentally that *this will work*. Blue pills are more effective than red ones. Or at least, I had to convince myself (and B) "what's the worst that could happen?" That's why it's called "alternative medicine", but with 1 billion people in China and reproductive restrictions, maybe they're onto something? Besides, if it doesn't work, we're in the same child-less state that we're in now so I didn't see it as potentially harmful....

Three times a week for two and a half months, I paid Dr Liu $45 to look like this....

The living porcupine

On the upside, I did get a lot of reading done. After getting poked in 13 different locations (the qi spots for my ovaries and anxiety spots couldn't be photographed easily), I would read my Kindle for a half hour as the acupuncture "worked it's magic". Nothing more relaxing that reading a good zombie book while my toes twitched sporadically.

And then there's the pills. Little, stinky, brown mystery pills. 104 pills a day, every day for 21 days. I haven't got the foggiest clue what any of them are or what they do. Unlike the Letrozole, which gave me zero side effects, the combination of these pills left me so depressed and anxious that I spent a lot of time trying not to cry or have panic attacks or go completely bat-shit crazy on poor Brendon. They made me want to crawl in our spare room and curl up into a ball, jam my fingers in my ears and scream. And yeah, there's some irony that I was more anxious and depressed while taking herbal anti-anxiety pills. 

40 pills per envelope, 2 envelopes per day

8 pills twice daily

8 pills three times daily

Plus the tea. The stinking, rotten concoction that makes the Red River look pristine and potable. "Just" for the days leading up to and including ovulation. It's a mysterious steaming swamp water from 12 different packages of herbs and roots and probably some ground melamine and panda penis for good order. I had to mix it and drink it after breakfast each day. It made me wretch and gag each time I had to take ingest it. My office stunk so badly during those days. The instructions that came with it recommended adding as little or as much boiling water as you can chug in three gulps (because your body will fight you if you attempt a 4th gulp) and that adding honey or sugar won't help it taste any better. It burned all the way through me, and just added to the miserable feeling this whole ordeal was causing. 

But with Brendon's recent 'Work Force Adjustment' into the world of the unemployed and my Blue Cross only covering the equivalent to 9 treatments, we don't have the money to continue the acupuncture. It worked out to over $1000 a month when you factor in the cost of herbs. I told Dr Liu how the herbs were affecting me but she just said it's my body normalizing. If this is what "normal" people feel like, I think I'll stick with my abnormal self. I may be weird, but I'm happy and embrace my weirdness.

I took another month's worth of Letrozole but I'll probably stop that as well. It's a bad time for me to get pregnant, if indeed it were possible, since we don't know how long Brendon will be job hunting. And even if he finds something right away, he won't be able to take extended paternity leave and we need my full salary to keep the house. We have an appointment with Heartland Fertility Clinic in June but we're guessing the recommendation will be to move onto IVF, but at $12,000 a month, we don't have the money to even attempt 1 round. Adoption is $10,000 or more so that option is off the table as well.

Thus ends our attempt at becoming parents. Not with a baby, but with a whimper. And if I thought I felt depressed while I was on the herbs, the realization that we can't afford to do anything more that'll make us parents is even worse. 

So Long 2011!!

2011 was supposed to be the 'and baby makes 3' year. Just like in science, theory and reality don't often meet. We found out in March, after my exploratory surgery, that we're part of the rare 5% of infertile couples that have 'infertility of unknown etiology', which is the I-paid-a-lot-to-go-to-med-school way giving us a big ol' shrug o'dumb
and sending us on our merry, albeit childless, way with a referal to Heartland Clinic. We're starting the first type of fertility treatments (Letrozol, for those in the same situation) in January. *fingers crossed* *pray for us* *burn incense and chicken bones and chant to a fertility goddess for us*

Since our world wasn't being shaken up by a stork, NRC decided on a restructuring plan that saw me leave my job of 12 years as a tech at IBD and start fresh at CancerCare. When I saw who else was being "work force adjusted" into unemployment, I got the feeling that I'd be next. A feeling that was confirmed at my exit interview when the DG said "your unique skill set (government-ese for "we're not sure what you do here so therefore, you're uniquely skilled to do that thing you've been doing for a long long time") wouldn't be needed here much longer." When a position at CancerCare opened up, I applied, had a good interview, and left IBD. That was a really tough decision because B still works there, my friends are still there, I was really comfortable with my job and knew how to run magnets, my boss was AWESOME, I knew where things are and who to talk to about them - to go into a lab that doesn't have a single magnet in sight, doing weird blots and spinning disk microscopy, having to understand new acronyms (CCMB, PTMs, HER2s, BNIP, etc).... It's been 6 months of feeling completely overwhelmed and really dumb, but I'm settling in. I'm still overwhelmed and feel dumb, but at least I know where the copier paper is stored!

It wasn't even just leaving IBD that was hard, it was leaving the lab that was the hardest. Watching everyone else pipette and dilute and section, stuff I LOVED to do, and instead, going to endless meetings to discuss leverage potentials, trying to find someone competant at CIHR (a work in progress), or fighting with ResearchNet to *not* crash on the day a grant is due... Well, it's tough but it's also different, the people are great, and I really hope to be there for a long long time.

We'll see what happens in 2012! Hoping you guys have a Happy New Year's!!

Memories of 9/11...

I can't believe it's been 10 years since 9/11. I hate to sound cliched, but it really does seem like yesterday. Perhaps it's because footage of the towers collapsing, soldiers in beige being deployed, and constant reminders of "Muslim terrorists" (because no one remembers or admits that there are Christian terrorists) and ever increasing, less effective airport security. And with this weekend being the 10 year anniversary, I thought it'd be interesting to find out what people remember from *That Day*.
As remember that morning, I was eating my usual bowl of Cheerios while watching Breakfast Television on A-Channel with Jon Ljungberg broadcasting from the Pancake House at the Forks. He and the guest chef were making waffles with cinnamon apple sauce and whipped cream. I looked at my pathetic bowl of Cheerios with utter disdain. Watching Jon ruin waffles but covering his mistakes in heaps of gooey steaming apple cinnamon and whipped cream, mmmmm. I shut off the tv and ran down the 7 flights of stairs to Kathy's apartment so we could, as we always did, walk to work together... laughing and joking about wanting waffles now. We got to work, she headed upstairs to her top floor corner office, I headed to the new computer lab. My "To Do" list was to uninstall Windows XP and reinstall Windows 2000 because NRC hadn't cleared XP to be rolled out to all NRC computers yet. Once the new-old operating system was installed, I got to test out a demo of Office 2000 on these new computers!!

*As a complete aside and unrelated to 9/11, that year, my boss had come back from a conference with a 128kb mem stick. It was the size of a iPod is now and cost nearly $200USD. That's neither here nor there, but after having a high school student working with me all summer, I'm starting to realize I'm old and technology hasn't changed A LOT in 10 years. Anyways, back to my story...*

Shortly after formatting the 500Mb hard drive that cost me nearly half my annual IT budget to buy them, our Facilities Manager with the Napoleonic complex came over the PA system and said, "We are streaming the news in the Herzberg room if you would like to watch. Understandably, network access is slow."

I email Kathy with a descriptive "WTF?" email so we agree to meet downstairs. We arrived at the Herzberg room moments before the second tower was hit. It was an unreal experience to stand there, hot chocolate in hand, giggling and laughing as we always do when we're together to turn and see the tower get hit. I remember going cold instantly and just saying, "Guess that means America's at war now."
Kathy answers "Yeah, but with who?"
I recall her saying "This seems like one of those times that Bruce Willis is going to pop out any minute and save the day."
Yeah!? Where was Jeremy Irons with a German accent as authentic as Mel Gibson's brogue in "Braveheart"?
It really did seem like this was some unbelievable Hollywood movie, that people weren't really being burned alive or jumping from windows, two more planes weren't getting hijacked, the Pentagon lost a wall. (.... or did it... conspiracy theorists have loads of ideas to the contrary about the Pentagon crashes)

We just stood there for over an hour watching the news feed until the first tower fell. I couldn't handle much more so I went back to my computers, numb and cold and feeling sick. Maybe watching the progression bar of Windows installer made my world seem normal. Maybe being in a silent, windowless room by myself would make the events go away, or stop, or even realize that it's a big hoax.

As often as I could, I would try to get online for updates or go to the Herzberg room to see the latest news. I would spend the next 2 days completely obsessed with anything relating to the events of that day; staying up late, getting up early, just to find out any updates.

What about you? What are your memories?

Thoughts from our side of the city - redux

Six months ago, I blogged about my first impressions on living in Transcona. I think it's time to re-address some of the issues. Yes people still don't know where it is, no there aren't any pink flamingos, however there are some changes in this part of the city that I see as a step in the right direction.
1) Lack of coffee shops.
As previously mentioned, there aren't any coffee shops in T-cona unless you count the lone Starbucks on Regent Ave. That in itself is weird, having only 1 Starbucks store in a 10 km radius but I've also discovered that down the street from me is going to be a "gourmet coffee and tea shop" opening soon at the corner of Plessis and Grassie. The location is terrible but I'm looking forward to having somewhere to go for coffee if/when my "other side of the city" friends grace me with their presence.
2) "Downtown" Transcona.
Again, I wrote about how weird it is to hear people refer to "going downtown" meaning that they're driving 5 minutes east on Regent Ave. But our city councillor and the local Transcona Biz are trying to revive The Downtown to make it more attractive for pedestrians and patios. If Corydon is Little Italy, this would be what, little Ukraine?? Perogies instead of gelatti? Anyways, they tore down a dilapidated building before the firebugs could get to it, and are creating a green space called the "Centennial Square". Okay, so it's actually a circle, but it's such a rarity to have a green space these days that I'll skip the semantics / geometry debate. Also opening in The Downtown, a COFFEE SHOP!! This one is being run by L'Arche, a local organization that helps special needs adults find meaningful employment, so in addition to being a coffee shop, it helps people too!! Double karma points.
3) Speaking of green spaces, the new Transcona Trails.
I'm not giving any credit to Harper or Katz, but the city managed to get infrastructure money out of the feds and paved 5km of trails running the entire length of T-cona and connected it to existing trails that starts near our house. I think it's brilliant! Every time we use it or drive past it on the way to/from work, there's always people blading or biking past. It's not often that the city does something right AND promotes a healthy lifestyle but this is one of those rare examples.
4) Community Centres.
I think there are more community centres per capita in Transcona than any other part of the city. But they were all built at the same time, so they're all about 40 years old and falling apart. However, they're renovating the one nearest to us to become a Wellness Institute and are proposing to tear down an old community centre to make it into a huge YMCA. As expected, there's a small but vocal group opposing any changes to "their" centre, insisting that some paint is enough of an improvement. *sigh*

Ch-ch-ch-changes...

Apparently, I've been negligent in keeping my blog posts up to date and there are some readers that rely on it for entertainment over their lunch break. Ooooh, the pressure!! And given how many things have happened last month, maybe it's time to put it online for your amusement.

There's a new president of the NRC and his entire role, best as I can figure, is to eliminate and destroy 100+ years of Canadian scientific accomplishment in the name of progress and competitiveness. Yes, I'm choosing my words carefully, for good reason, but I give the NRC 5 years (coinciding with the end of this president's term) before it's gone and the thousands of technicians and scientists are left unemployed and taking their skills elsewhere (re:out of Canada). Because that'll make Canada more competitive in science. *snort*

Anyways, off my soap box. After losing 10% of IBD's staff in the first round of cuts, I saw the writing on the wall. A position opened up at CancerCare Manitoba and I took the opportunity and decided to leave before I could get cut. In my exit interviews, I was told that it's good I'm leaving because my "unique skill set" (re: whatever it is that you do, besides look after the coffee machine) wouldn't be needed much longer. And for an institute that millions in the hole, me quitting is a heckuva lot cheaper than firing me.

I had 4 days between jobs and, as Brendon well knows, leaving me alone in the house for more than a day guarantees that something is going to be painted. And if there's something that needed painting, it's our bedroom. As Oprah hath bequeathed, so therefore it hath be true, a bedroom should be sanctuary and should only be used for two things. And one of those is sleeping ;-) The bedroom was a horrible yellow colour. It's more yellow than margarine but not really lemon yellow. It's like a faded Post-It note. Sanctuary? Nope, it's like old office supplies! *That* does not inspire that other use of a bedroom (the not sleeping one) if you're remind of being at work. Brendon started by repainting the back wall before we moved in last year. Leaving us with this.

Meh. Well, it left me unsatisfied. Nothing worse than an unsatisfied wife in the bedroom right right?? LOL! Still bland and still "faded Post-it note" yellow, but without the sponged back wall. Worse yet, the yellow wasn't evenly painted, so you could still see the roller marks and dry wall tape in some spots?! With Brendon at work, I got out my ipod, my brushes, and my painter's tape and got started.... :)

Ta DAHHHHH!!

Okay, so it's beige. Again. Like 95% of the rest of the house, it's a combination of beige and brown. Technically, it's Behr "Castle path", and that's in the grey/red category but it's a variation of beige. But it's not yellow!! So that's the bedroom finished. Well, for now... until I insist we replace the carpets, heh heh.

Meanwhile, I still had 2 more days to myself and I was out of paint. To make a long story short, this 3 yards of soil...

became this... (Brendon and I had built the flower beds and 2 boxes ahead of time)



which has grown into this...



60 square feet of boxes is now growing 2 types of tomatoes, green peppers, zucchini, beans, peas, garlic, onions, lettuce, potatoes and carrots. The flower beds are a mix of annuals (sunflowers, zinnias and celosia) and perinneals (digitalis, daisies, echinacea and a few others I can't recall their names but the red ones in the front of the picture).


Oh yeah, and I got a new car. Sexy sexy!!

En suite is finally done!

I've already posted about how much I hated the en suite and how everything in it was white: floors, walls, cabinets, fixtures etc. Here's the pic from the Kijiji ad when we first looked at the house.
So in August, I painted the cabinets. In October, it was the walls.
Last step was the flooring and thanks to my fantastic incredible father-in-law, my ultrafantastic truly amazing husband and 6 hours of a Saturday we'll never get back, here's the final result!!
*BLISS*!!!!
We used Allure tiles from Home Depot. It's a floating floor so there's no adhesive, just two sides that stick together using contact cement. Isn't it beautiful??? *sigh* I'm going to go admire our work again... happy happy!!!

Thoughts from our side of the city

It's been a year since we sold our West End house so I thought, given my 11 months of being in Transcona, that I'd share what my impression is.

1) No one knows where Transcona is.
Tell someone that you live in Transcona and watch their eyes glaze over. And it's not just Winnipeggers who think T-cona is that uncharted part of the map described in latin as "Here there be dragons", our utility companies think the same way. Case in point: MTS called us (at the old house) to tell us that they offer HD and PVR in the West End now. I said "Great, but we're moving to Transcona. Is it there?" Lonnnnnng pause, he comes back "No, we don't offer service outside of the city." What? After moving here and dealing with the mind-boggling ineptitude that is MTS, we discovered that we don't have call display or answering machine on our land line anymore. I call MTS to find out what happened and she said (and I quote) "Different parts of the province have access to different features. If you lived in Winnipeg, you could get call display." I called back the next day (once my jaw had been picked up off the floor) and got everything fixed by someone who knows geography better.

2) Regent Ave traffic is as busy as St James, but without the suicide lanes.
Driving in the area of Regent and Lagmodiere on the weekend is akin to Route 90 or St James. But, someone with a background in traffic flow patterns realized that left turn lights are a good thing and used them A LOT on Regent. Too bad the city can't rehire that company and fix the train wreck that is St James and Route 90. Instead, they're putting in *more* shopping in that end. Can't wait to see the parking lot on Sterling Lyon when Ikea final plunks down here.

3) Transcona is it's own city
Okay, this is the weirdest part of living here. Transcona has it's own downtown, complete with decorative arch! So when I tell someone I'm going "downtown", I have to specify if I mean "Downtown Winnipeg" (ie far away) or "downtown Transcona". I had lunch last week with a group of Transcona residents (transconians? transconites?) who admitted to me that they haven't left Transcona in months. She said "Anything past Nairn is too far away. Besides what do you need to see that you can't get here?" We have 3 chinese restaurants and a thai restaurant withint 1 block of each other. Does that qualify as our "chinatown"?

4) Transcona is a small town.
And just like Pinawa, everyone here knows each other. Or tries to find out if they know each other somehow.
Case in point: The woman and her daughter that deliver the weekly flyers were stuck in their dead car outside our house on a really cold day in December. We invited them inside to warm up while they waited for a tow truck and when they found out that Brendon and his brothers all went to TCI, they spent time trying to figure out if she (as TCI grad in the early 90s) went to school with anyone of Brendon's brothers. When her husband came to get them, turns out he (like most people in Transcona, including my mother-in-law) works at the Freshwater fish processing plant (did you know Winnipeg has a fish processing plant?? I sure didn't...), then we started the whole conversation over again trying to figure out if the husband remembers my mother-in-law. Thank goodness the daughter doesn't work at New Flyer or else we'd have to link her to our friends.

At the same lunch last week, a woman admitted to me that she's lived in Transcona and gone to the same T-cona church for 32 years but is still referred to as "new to the area", but her kids are "neighbours" because they're born/raised here, and yes, came back to raise their families. Yup, it's more like Pinawa than I'd like to admit.

5) Coffee shops.
We don't have one. Seriously. There's neighbourhoods elsewhere in the city that have 2 or 3 on a single corner but the closest Starbucks is Regent and Lag. Depending on how you draw the boundaries, it means Transcona doesn't have a Starbucks. And Timmy's? Only 2. There's a Timmy's inside the Safeway on Kildare (Transcon Proper) but no stand alone Tim's until you go down Regent, past the casino, where you find 2 within a block of each other.

6) Pink flamingos?
I don't know where this notion that T-cona is filled with tropical plastic birds but I've never seen one.

7) Jacked up chromed out trucks with swamp tires and growling engines?
Sadly, yes. We've got that in spades. I'm sure Princess Auto can't keep the "Calvin peeing on the Ford logo" sticker in stock because they're everywhere here! In T-cona's defense, there was a truck down the street in West End that was covered in chrome diamond plate so there are men with Freudian complexes throughout the city.

Holidays!!

Normally, while you're on holidays, in the back of your mind is always the thought "what's going on at the house", especially in this province where November can be either freezing cold and rupturing pipes, or a freak storm creates a random flood that can destroy a basement. We've always had wonderful friends and family coming to our house to look after our Kitty and this time, Brendon's parents will be coming by each day to give Kitty her special pills and her special food (low protein so her kidney failure doesn't progress faster). The pills have to be wrapped in a chewy treat so they don't have to wrestle her to the ground and ram it into her throat; she may be old, skinny, toothless, and clawless but she can be extra nasty to strangers. But this trip, we have added security from our neighbour. Oh yeah, one of the neighbour's house has an extensive camera system that monitors his house 24/7, with a live feed on a password protected website, and is backed up daily onto DVDs. Yup, we live next to Fort para-Knox. He has, the last time I counted on the way to the mail box, 7 cameras that covers 3/4 the radius of his house; 2 are night vision, 1 has a microphone, there's even 1 on the door bell. If anything were to happen to our house, as he told Brendon one day, he's got it on disc. He said that he can't "see into your house or anyting". This is supposed to make us feel welcome to the neighbourhood?! It's creepy creepy creepy. But being thousands of miles away and knowing that he's "covering" our house, is pretty reassuring. Just wonder if insurance can give us a discount for his paranoia?
I wonder if he's reading this...
I wonder if he's reading this as I type it next to the window near one of the night vision cameras....

Second Honeymoon!

In a few weeks, we're going on our second honeymoon! Feel free to start hating us. Hard to believe it's been a year since we were on our first honeymoon in the Dominican! We've been saving up our Air Miles for years and years until we'd have enough for a decent trip. Last year, we were *close* to having enough, so a year later, and many many trips to Rona, the Liquor Mart (yeah, that was a lot of work and arm twisting...) and Safeway for bonus miles, between the two of us we managed to collect about 8500 Air Miles. It is enough that the trip costs us 1/3 the normal price. The trip, for both of us, for a week, all-inclusive, is only costing us $900 instead of $2600. Did I mention that you can feel free to start hating us? Yeah, well, when you're only saddled with a ridiculous mortgage and a cat with kidney failure that requires pills, shots and special expensive food, you may as well blow all your Air Miles and nearly a grand on a trip. You'd be stupid not to!! We just loved the Gran Ventana and the Dominican Republic so much that we talk about going back all the time. I was looking at other all-inclusive resorts in the same area (Jamaica was top of my list, as was Costa Rica) but we just kept coming back to how much we loved the Gran Ventana. So, we're going back.

And yes, I know what you're all thinking so I'll beat you too it. No, this trip is not about making a baby. It's because we want to, can afford to, and will go to a fantastic resort, drink rum, and soak in Dominican sun for a week for $900. Nyah nyah nyah! :-P I know... I'm ridiculously mature for my age. But I get enough flack from my seriously-overly-concerned-about-my-reproductive-status co-workers with their constant opinions about why I'm not pregnant yet, that we need a week off in the 200% humidity, melanoma-inducing sun to get away from their daily advice about what worked for them, or recommendations from their friend of a friend of a niece of a neighbour. I'd like to pretend that I'm exaggerating about their daily comments, but I'm really not. I put on a little weight, they comment that I'm "starting to show" and rub my belly. Oh yes, that actually happened, (hence the new treadmill which I am using regularly). I complain that I'm not feeling well, eyebrows shoot up and a big grin spreads across their face with a "knowing" smile. Since when did sinus headache qualify as a symptom of pregnancy?! *sigh*

(follow-up... Just checked on WestJet Vacations and the trip we're taking is on sale for $750 per person, nearly $530 per person less than we're paying for the same dates. Dammit!!!)

The En Suite

The one room I whined and nagged Brendon the most about changing ever since we moved in, is our en suite. Actually, I whine and nag Brendon in every room, but the one I complain about the most is the en suite. It's white. It's really white. I'm talking "Blinded by the white" white. It's retina-searing, "okay, I'm awake now and seeing spots if you turn on the lights in the middle of the night to go pee" white. White linoleum (except where it's yellow from the previous owner's bath mat), white counters, white sink, white toilet, white vanity, white blinds and the inexplicable green "accent piece" behind the diagonal toilet and the window sill. Yeah, I don't get it either, but it's what was here when we moved in.
So I started my en suite transformation with baby steps and bought a new mirror. Then I bought melamine paint and did the vanity. We'd looked into getting a new vanity but because, for whatever reason, there's no shut-off valves on our plumbing, so we'd have to get someone in to do that first and melamine paint is $40, plumbers are $200. That just seemed like a lot more work than just painting it. Then I bought the new flooring, but that's currently under the bed, awaiting inspiration.

But after much nagging, Brendon finally relented (like he had a choice?) and said we can paint it this weekend so I rushed over to Home Depot before he changed his mind. I tsp'd the walls and we taped off all the baseboards and framing before painting. It's a small bathroom and he was done with the roller work in an hour while I finished the edges and trim. Here's the 75% completed en suite now. *sigh* Bliss.... :-)

AWESOME!!! The wall colour is C-I-L Tomorrow's Taupe with Cocoa Mousse on the cabinets. I prefer Behr paints but it didn't come in this colour, which is supposed to match the faux grout lines on the new flooring which hasn't been installed yet because it's going to be very difficult and we'll probably need some help with it. What you can't see in the photo is the diamond-shaped shower on the left that'll be one of the problems of putting in the new floor with the toilet being the other half of the problem. We can't do much about the shower, but the toilet? Looks like it'll be easier if we just lift it out and put the flooring around it instead of doing ten million cuts.

And in about a month from now, the view from our window will be this...

if Brendon's lucky! We're heading back to the Dominican for a second honeymoon!! We had enough Air Miles that we can go for a week for $900 for both of us. Normally, it's $1200 per person! Can't wait. If you ever get the chance to go to D.R., I highly recommend the Gran Ventana. It's a spectacular resort!!

New Clothes Dryer!!!!

Sooooooo excited!! I've heard that air drying your clothes is better for the environment and for your clothes, so we invested in a new $1400 dryer for the basement. It's even got mp3 capabilities!!

Ha ha ha. We upgraded from our stationary bike to a treadmill. I've wanted one for a while but the floor at the old house was tipsier than I was in my first year at university so we bought a bike instead. With the new house and LEVEL floors in the basement (shocking change!!) we decided to invest.

The upstairs bathroom is a work in progress. I finished the cabinets and we'd do the floors this weekend but I have a performance at the Prairie Theatre Exchange. Will post photos of the new bathroom later, but if you want to see pics of me dancing, go here.

All done

I hate saying these words, but I'll have to eat crow and utter those little words that Brendon has never heard from my lips.... "I was wrong."
*shudder* I was wrong when I said that I could find a dry waller for less than $1000. It's possible, but very difficult. I called one guy in Lac Du Bonnet three times without answer. Turns out, there's so much business in and around LDB that he can't come into the city for extra work. I called around to a number of places in the city. Those that did answer their phones said that they wouldn't come for anything less than a grand. Apparently, Naomi Campbell's attitude is infectious to the construction industry (though she will get out of bed for blood diamonds...). I did find one company that's too busy but knew someone that'll do it for cash. After a few phone calls, he said that'd come and install our 1 lousy piece of drywall for $400. Seriously. 1 piece of dry wall 8' long and 4' high! It took him four trips to the house over a weekend and a grand total of 47 minutes of work which works out to an incredible $8.51/MINUTE!! It's not bad enough that after all our collective years of post-secondary education that we never learned to shower, but to know that someone working under the table makes 25x what I make just blows my mind. However... to defend the construction industry... my university classes had dozens and dozens of MSc's and PhD's all studying med mic without any jobs to go into. I'm sure his class had maybe ten or twenty people in it, all whom had jobs lined up on the second day they showed up at school.

He wasn't out of the house 15 minutes before I was upstairs with the paint roller and a glint in my eyes!! Once the paint was dry, I tacked down the carpet and put in the baseboards. We're back to where we were 4 months ago, but here's the end result!!


Still a work in progress because we still haven't put up the photos and stuff on the wall, and I want a new computer desk instead of a kitchen table.

My next project, the en suite... or as Brendon calls it "The bathroom that no one else sees so why should we waste time and money decorating it???? Please please please don't make me paint anything else!" Or, as I call it, "The gawd aweful room with the white floors, white walls, white counter, white cupboards, white white white." First step is to paint the melamine cupboard a walnut brown, the same colour as the vase in the corner.



The rest will be a "mushroom" colour and I really like the fake tile floors at Home Depot. My "honey do" list is growing again.... someone warn Brendon!

Plumbing update...

The stain that started it all....
So in my last post, the contractor was going to remove the wall. Here's what it looks like now.


With it open, our contractor was able to investigate all of the water damage. As you can see, there's virtually no damage to the dry wall anywhere. There's a tiny little bit around the tub and there's visible water damage to the subflooring underneath the tub but that's about it. (Yes, that's our snoopy Kitty in the room as I'm taking the photos). Brendon got the fun job of staying home the day they removed the wall and didn't find any damage. The contractor then went into the bathroom and said to Brendon that it must be our "showering practices" that caused the damage; that we use the shower head wrong and as we use the bathroom, we're hosing down the walls and floors, causing enough water to accumulate on the floors that it seeps into the adjecent room and soaks the carpets. Oh, and we don't use a shower curtain because we're complete dolts and haven't learned how to shower. He said this as he was sitting on the shower curtain. Cue the irony....
Given that Brendon's bald, it's hard to understand this guy's story... that we're too dumb to shower properly and we're in the shower for so long, splashing around like a bunch of little kids at a water park, making a huge mess, when we lather rinse and repeat?? Uh-huh, and I've got a bridge in San Fran....
Anyways, the contractor left and Brendon was still pretty gobsmacked with the baloney that they were feeding us that the Manitoba school system neglected us by not offering a "how to shower class" in school. Guess all my years in school, I opted out of the useful classes, like showering and basket weaving. The contractor recommended getting a plumber to fix the leak that was coming from the faucet. See, the thing is that the faucet that sticks out of the wall to fill the tub... when you start the water to have a bath, the water comes out the faucet and sprays against the wall. Brendon demonstrated this to the contractor, even showing how when you pull the lever to make the shower work, that the spray is even stronger ... that maybe *this* might be the problem?? No no no, couldn't be a leaking faucet causing the water in the other room!! It must be our showering practices. *argh*

We called a plumber and had him come in to remove the faucet and replace it. And since the wall was already open, we had him change the taps from a hot/cold 2-tap system to a 1-dial system that we liked better. Here's the bit of piping that the plumber removed and said "Well, here's your problem!!" (ala Mythbusters...)


I may be just a doctor that doesn't know how to shower properly, but I'm pretty sure that ain`t right. After removing the faulty section and replacing everything, we have our shower back and we're using the bathroom for nearly 3 weeks without a drop of water in the spare bedroom.

I had to email the contractor and our insurance adjustor twice a week for four weeks to get an estimate from him for how much the rest of the work that 'needs to be done' will cost. He wanted, get this, $1000 to put the drywall back up, $75 to remove the toilet, $100 to remove the flooring and $500 to put new flooring down and put the toilet back. There's some other stupid fees that he's charging but to fix everything, but suffice to say, it'd be $3000, minus our $500 deductible. We decided that we don't want insurance to pay for it and that we don't want to deal with him anymore and his accusations of incompetance on our part for not following shower directions to the letter.

Now we have to get the drywall back up to make the bedroom useable. We can maybe probably find someone in the city that's able to put up 1 sheet of 4'x8' drywall for under a thousand dollars. I know that trades and skilled labour is in high demand but I seriously doubt they're charging $1000/hr now!!

Home ownership is fun!

One step at a time...

We called our insurance company about the water damage in the spare room and within days, we had a contractor (Rick) and an insurance adjustor at the house to inspect it. Rick brought out a hydrometer, which measures water content in materials and found that there's water in the subflooring underneath the vinyl floor of the bathroom. Most of the bathroom subfloor is damp. There isn't much moisture left in the subfloor of the bedroom so the mould that's growing there has been cut off from its food supply. So, the issue now isn't the mould in the bedroom, now it's the mould growing under the vinyl in the bathroom.
Our next step is to remove the wall between the bathroom and the bedroom to expose the plumbing, hire a plumber to locate and repair the leak. After that, Rick comes back to remov everything in the bedroom and bathroom, clean up the mould, and repair the damage. Best case scenerio, there isn't a lot of mould in the subfloor of the bathroom so it just needs to be dried, cleaned up and sealed before everything that was damaged gets replaced. Worst case scenerio, the entire bathroom is gutted right down to the joists and we get a new bathroom. We'll find out Monday just how bad it's going to be, and whether insurance will cover it.
*fingers crossed*

Dead ant, dead ant, d'd ant, d'd ant....

Speaking only for myself and not for Brendon, I'm not going to say that I regret buying the new house, just that there have been significantly more problems that need immediate repairs than we'd ever had in 5 years at the old house. We've just discovered we now have an ant infestation. We killed 10 last night and 3 more this morning. Two in the basement, most on the main floor and 2 in the upstairs. Big, nasty, ugly, black ants. We found four (killed three) as they were coming in under the baseboards next to the fridge so we used black pepper (non-toxic to Kitty) along the baseboards as a deterant but we're off to Rona again today to get ant traps.

Our biggest problem began about a month and a half ago when we thought Kitty was sick and had peed on the carpets. The stain never really vanished from the (sorta) white carpets despite my best efforts. A few weeks later, after we were recovering from the worst flu either of us had ever experienced (I threw up every 20 minutes for 8 hours, he had a 102.5°F fever), we noticed that the stain was 3x the size and had spread from the original spot by the door and was now about 2/3 the way along the carpet against the wall that divides the main bathroom from the computer room. We moved the furniture that was against the wall and found the carpets absolutely soaked. After cleaning it up (again), we tried to locate the source of the water: either from the roof or from the bathroom. Both times that we noticed the stain on the carpets was after long days of rain, which would lead me to suspect it's a roof issue. But the fixtures in the bathroom are loose and leak, so Brendon and his friends worked on the fixtures to try and seal the leaks. We won't know if the problem is fixed until we get another few days of downpour. Fortunately, we have an en suite so we don't have to use the main bathroom. If there is water in the carpets after it rains again, then we know it's a roof problem. And before you ask, no, we can't access the attic to inspect the roof because the only attic hatch is outside, above the 2nd floor and we don't have a ladder tall enough, or nerves strong enough, to climb up and inspect the roof from the inside.
Now that the carpets have been peeled back, we can see the water damage to the underpadding and subflooring. No matter what we have to fix, whether it's the bathroom or the roof, we also need to replace the floors before the mould gets worse and aggrevates our allergies.
List of things wrong with this house that need repairs:

• dining room window seal is broken and moist is between 2 panes of glass so it's foggy
• deck is unlevel (Brendon has pretty well fixed this using shims and a car jack to level it as best as he can)
• stairs from the deck to the backyard are rotten and falling apart
• ants
• furnace that can't heat the upstairs and
• a/c that can't cool the upstairs
• damaged carpets from previous owners dog
• damaged carpets from water leak
• questionable wiring in the garage that has blown out two light bulbs already

*sigh* I really liked this house.

1 month in!

We've nearly unpacked all the boxes. We're still missing a 4L bottle of canola oil and the little plastic circle that makes the glass plate in the microwave spin around. Admittedly, the weirdest two things to lose during the move! We can't really microwave anything that isn't perfectly balanced!! The oil can be re-bought but the plastic ring really is microwave-specific? Sucks that we may have to buy a new microwave just for a $1 piece of circular plastic!!

As the boxes are starting to disappear, our house is starting to feel like our *home*. We've started decorating and putting up pictures in all the rooms so it's nice to see our stuff again. Brendon doesn't really like "messy" everywhere, but I like having rooms full of photos. I'm trying to find a balance between tidy and cluttered. We splurged on new furniture for the living room with navy leather reclining sofa and love seat, a "server" (topless hutch) in the dining room and a new bed, all from Paliser, plus a new bbq for the deck. Woo hoo bring on summer!!

We've been in contact with the previous owners of our new house and had them over just recently to pick up some of their mail and some of their gardening stuff that only recently thawed out. Surprisingly, we haven't heard from the people that bought our house. I sure hope the people that bought our old house aren't disappointed in their purchase. We went back a few weeks ago to clean it out, and I left in tears. So many good memories at the old place!!

New home sweet home

Moving day is never easy. Moving day with a 14 year old cat that's not good with change (not that I'm any better) is even worse. We spent since mid-December packing so by the week of the move, nearly every room was floor-to-ceiling with boxes. Kitty thought we were making forts for her to explore so she was jumping like a kitten from box to box. We'd been training her to get into her travel crate with less stress than 3 years ago when she nearly killed Brendon trying to escape from his clutches for the move to the old house. I took her, her stuff, and our frozen food and headed to our new Transcona house while Brendon waited for his best friend and his older brother and the moving company we'd hired to show up. I locked Kitty in the en suite while I unpacked and cleaned other stuff then let her go into the master bedroom while I read a magazine and sat on the floor listening to the radio. Brendon kept me in the loop through text messages and let me know when they were on the way so I could return Kitty to the en suite.
The movers really motored and unpacked with both engines on full. We stayed inside with clean(-ish) feet and hauled boxes from the front door to the right rooms while the movers ran back and forth to the truck and the front door. They packed the old house, drove across the city, and unloaded in under 5 hours. We're paying them $110/hour so the faster they worked, the better for us. And because we were running the boxes around the house, the mud and grit from their shoes wasn't being tracked too much on to the carpets that I'd spent 3 hours shampooing last week!
I started getting the kitchen set up while Brendon set up the basement. Took me about 5 hours (until ~9pm) to get the kitchen unpacked and useable. We actually have fewer cupboards and less counter space than our old house, but the square footage is larger. It's just really big and open, without much room to prep anything. Neither of us like the counters (or the cupboards for that matter) so we're pricing out new counters. Depending on the price, maybe new cupboards too???

But, all in all, the move went spectacularly amazingly well. The house is beautiful and we've got most of the rooms (except for the guest room) setup and almost 100% the way we want them. There's still lots more to do, but it's starting to feel like home pretty quickly!!.nce everything's done, I'll post photos.