the berry and the squirrel

In the mornings, I let Fergus outside to play (read "stalk bugs and eat grass) outside. Lately, he's found a new "friend" to play with. For the past 4 mornings, Fergus and this little squirrel have been chasing each other up and down our big maple. They'll take breaks to natter at one another and then the chase is on again. I wonder what Fergus will do if he catches the squirrel?

Before supper, he was such a whiny cat, we put him in the spare room. Here he is trying to make his escape.

Today, I went out to my a farm near my parents and picked saskatoon berries with Karri and Mom. We picked like fiends. I have over 24 cups! On top of the rhubarb Karri gave me last week (21 cups), I'll be busy baking sweet treats for a while. Rhubarb and saskatoons... definately some of my favorite things about living on the prairies.

Confessions...

Things I've learned about myself in the dog days of summer.

1. Since coming home from Germany, I lack motivation. Motivation for doing my class, motivation for re-doing our siding, motivation for doing my hair, motivation for most things except reading like a fiend.

2. I have a serious guilt complex so, the lack of motivation isn't helping. (The most pressing guilt I'm currently feeling is the amount of crazy weeds in my back alley...)

3. I LOVE grocery shopping. I love pushing the cart through the aisles and reading labels and price checking and looking at all the produce and imagining what great things I could cook if I'd only get motivated.

4. My cat is a wee beastie. I think he scared our house-sitter with his demanding cat-ttitude. What will we do when we go away at Christmas?

5. I dread the fall. I love my job but, I love sitting on my butt more. How do I get paid for that?

Any confessions you'd like to make?

humdrum

Returning to the routine of things has been a little bit of a comforting struggle. My body is still having its ups and downs recovering(?) from this flu bug that seems to be attacking my sweet husband again (poor man... should have thrown up when he could instead of endure the crampy ravages of this beasty of a bug).
I'm trying to find a routine.
"Ah, you teachers... what do you do all summer?"
I power walk and garden and try to get into discipline to take my correspondence class (blech). I lounge in my mother's pool and haul my cat out of trees. I try not to read all day (but I would if I could). I plan the garage sale (that I'm afraid I'll never have) to try and get rid of all the junk in the basement. I watch the days tick by on the calendar and wish we could have July forever.
It's a busy, difficult life. It's one of the perks to my career that I wouldn't trade for the world!

2 1/2 weeks of travel bliss

We're back!
We had an amazing trip. I loved traveling with my sweet husband!
We arrived in Hamburg at 9:30 am after flying all night and made ourselves stay up all day to ward off jet lag. We hung out in an awesome park, ate hamburgers, went on a canal tour (in German - not really too sure what we saw) and went to bed early!
After another day in Hamburg, we spent 3 glorious days on the island of Rugen in the sea-side town of Binz. We played in the Baltic Sea, took a boat out to visit the famed White Cliffs and generally had a mini-beach holiday.
Next stop was Berlin. This was my second time in Berlin and I still feel like I need to go back to see it all. We had 3 crazy, crammed days. Highlights included the Sony Center, the Reichstag, Schloss Sophie-Charlotta and piles of history. Of course, the biggest highlight was the Radiohead concert. Amazing! I don't even really like Radiohead (Trevor's favorite band) but, it was still the best concert of my life.
The morning after the concert, we bordered a train and left Germany for the Czech Republic to visit Prague. We toured Prague Castle and enjoyed the city. We made sure to eat goulash but, passed on the pig knuckle.
Our next stop was Nuremberg where the Old City is still walled in. Although it rained a lot, we were still able to relax and see quite a bit. This was our favorite hostel. We were given the "Honeymoon Suite" and we spent our evenings hanging out with other backpackers.
Lastly, we ended up in Munich where we power-shopped for souvenirs and endured the rain. Fortunately, on our anniversary, the sun came out and we headed to off to see Newschwanstein with Mike's Bike Tours. In the morning, we biked to an lake and rode and alpine slide. In the afternoon, we toured the castle itself. Amazing!
We're kind of sad to be back and done our European adventures. However, it's also nice to have our home and our own bed and food in the fridge. It was also good to see our parents and Fergus.
Unfortunately, we have the flu. I yakked up my Mom's welcome home supper while trying to show my parents pictures and I'm still a little leery of food today. Trevor's currently napping through a pretty bad stomach ache. Not the best kind of feeling to combine with jet lag. Ah well...