Good one

Mildred, the church gossip, and self-appointed monitor of the church's morals, kept sticking her nose in to other people's business. Several members did not approve of her extra curricular activities, but feared her enough to maintain their silence.
She made a mistake, however, when she accused George, a new member, of being an alcoholic after she saw his old pickup parked in front of the town's only bar one afternoon. She emphatically told George and several others that everyone seeing it there would know what he was doing.
George, a man of few words, stared at her for a moment and just turned and walked away. He didn't explain, defend, or deny. He said nothing.
Later that evening, George quietly parked his pickup in front of Mildred's house ..walked home....and left it there all night.
You gotta love George.

Emma report by John

I sent out an Emma Report tonight:

It's been a while since the last Emma Report. Emma's reaction to interferon has not changed, and the last two Tuesdays have been rather rough days after her Monday night injection. Her short term disability from work runs out just before Christmas, so she is now applying for Long Term disability. She has done some work remotely from home, but finds concentrating rather difficult, and two hours is about the best she can manage.

Now settled into

We have now settled into our new home. The last of the boxes are just waiting to be unpacked, and I think we are finally here!

We had been contemplating moving from the big city of Calgary (who would have thought it would now be home to almost a million people). Raymond and I had been escaping from the city every other weekend, packing the trailer and the dogs and traveling to the nearest campground. I retired last April and Raymond decided to retire in October if we could find somewhere to move to. Low and behold Stephen called one day and said to look at a cute little place at Red Lodge Estates. We called this place, but it was already conditionally sold, so Raymond entered Red Lodge Estates in the computer and came up with a 1.2 acre lot with a little house that certainly needed some tender loving care. We made an offer and we are now living in our ‘altered’ dream home.

One of the biggest perks to living in the country is the amount of wildlife that wanders onto your property. A LARGE moose wandered through last week and today we had a squirrel and two blue birds (we haven’t found our book on Alberta birds to confirm what these birds are, but they look like blue birds or blue cardinals, if there is such a thing) fighting over the seeds we had put in the bird feeder. A woodpecker was also seen flying in our back yard.

Raymond has been very busy fixing and organizing all our stuff. It is amazing how just a few finishing touches will make a home look better. We plan to build a garage next spring and then put an extension onto the front of the house.

The mail boxes are about 2 and a half miles away, so twice a week Raymond drops Zack and me there when he gets the mail and we walk back. It takes Zack and me 40 minutes to walk home, but it is good exercise for both of us.
Raymond bought a new toy this week – a chain saw – and he spent yesterday in the back woods cutting down dead trees. He has a roaring fire going in the front room which will keep us cozy and warm. With the snow that is predicted, it is starting to feel a lot like Christmas

The lonely Frog

A lonely frog telephoned the Psychic Hotline and asked what his future holds.
His Personal Psychic Advisor tells him: "You are going to meet a beautiful young girl who will want to know everything about you.
"The frog is thrilled, "This is great! Will I meet her at a party?" he croaks.
"No," says the psychic, "in biology class."

Hi! Guess what we had wandering through our yard this afternoon. A moose, a BIG moose! It didn't seem to be bothered by our neighbours dogs, just had a nibble of grass on the neighbours lawn and carried on with its wandering. Boy, the things you see in the country.
We have settled in, have lots to do yet, but it is getting to look like home.
The dogs have gotten used to the place and even Molly was running around outside today - something she hasn't been doing.

We have wildlife in our front yard

 

We are back

Hi All, We are back on the Internet (Dialup)

We got moved OK with the great help from Caroline, Stephen,Susan, Ron and Kids.
The bedroom set would not fit up the stairs and we had to remove the upstairs deck
railing, with all the help pulling with ropes and pushing from below we got them up.

Today I replaced the kitchen taps and built a shed on the back deck for a place to do some
wood working until we build a garage in the spring.

Still Moving

Friday 11 is the last move, dishs, food, TV, .table, chairs and the master bedroom set all are going
tomorrow.
No more liveing in Calgary for us.
The phone is now working and I have put up the TV dish.

Emma and John

Were back from the dog show. The dogs showed well but not points were won. I was very happy with the way Piper worked with me. We beat her sister Kitty, but failed to beat our friends new dog Lulu. Oh well there is still tomorrow.
Our friend Pat gave Emma a framed copy of the following. Very nice words, and very touching of Pat to give these words to Emma. Now to find a fitting place in the house to hang them.

Moving

Kevin and I look a truck/trailer load to the acreage today, Kevin cleaned the floors and I unpacked some boxes and checked on what repairs need to be done to the house.
Cathy was sick and stayed in Calgary.
Emma and John called in on the way home for a dog show in Red Deer. It was great to see them and the dogs had a run around.

Update by Emma

Had an appointment with my oncologist this morning.
Very hard to get up at 6:30am to make it to the hospital in time.They started with some blood work. They are happy with the results. My white blood cell counts are low but apparently not too bad (Carol - 2.7 on the whites and 1.6 on the babies).
They are going to keep me on the same dose of interferon as I was previously on as they feel I am tolerating itwell.They then gave me the results of the ultrasounds I had a couple of weeks ago. Not bad news but not exactly positive either. Of my lymph nodes, they could find 6 and one of them was enlarged. They classified it as "reactive"meaning it is responding to something but being a lymph node, it could be anything. They couldn't detect a mass inside it so I guess that is good.
They are going to re-ultrasound in a couple of months to follow it.The other ultrasound of my abdomen did not get a clear read on my liver.There may be a mass on it but they aren't sure as the scan didn't work too well. I think I saw in the report that there is something like a 50% chance of it being a mass. Originally they weren't going to followup on it as my CT scan in August showed my liver as being normal but by the time I got home from lunch with Mum, they had left a message saying they had talked it over and decided to do a CT or PET scan (not sure which). So now I have to wait for that appointment which may be a few weeks. Well, that is about all there is to report.
Emma
PS - not related to the cancer but I also sprained my ankle on Tuesday.Sigh.

Wayne helping with the move

Helping

moving

Today I picked up a Uhaul (6X12 enclosed) trailer, load up the truck with
most of my woodworking tools and the trailer with boxes of books, hand tools
and wood I got to take.
Wayne a guy I have worked with, help today and is coming to help unload tomorrow.

Moving

We went to our new home (acreage) today and got the keys to the house.
Parked the TT and unloaded the truck, planted 4 plant Cathy had to move
with us, read the power and gas meters.
We cheeked the house and turned up the heat.
Started to load the truck for Thursday.