Saturday, 4 February 2017

The Beginning of New Year 2017 (2) - by Anne Shier

(At Brent's Home in Janetville, Ontario)

DAY 2 – Monday January 2, 2017:

Today, Brent went to work for a 9:00 am start, which is later than his usual 7:00 am start.  Meanwhile, James and I slept in until about 10:00 am and then I made him a breakfast of toaster waffles with butter and syrup.  I made myself my usual coffee and some toast with jam.  After breakfast, I took a quick shower and got dressed.  I knew I had to call Katina today at Travel Plus to tell her that Brent and James both need travel health insurance, which I had neglected to get when I booked this trip in November.  Katina wasn’t in the office since her office was closed today, but I was still able to call her cell phone.  She promised me that she would do this task for me first thing tomorrow morning.  She knows how imperative it is for travelers to have health coverage while out of the country.

James had his assigned tasks to do at the same time.  He had to read his book, at least a third of it this morning.  It was homework assigned by his teacher and his dad wanted him to do it today.  Brent also wanted him to take out the recyclables from the bin in the kitchen and bring them all outside, sort them, and put them into the correct bins by the lane behind the house.  On Wednesdays, the garbage and the recyclables are collected from the main road for the neighbourhood, so they bring theirs to the main road then for collection.

Later on, in the early afternoon, I made a grilled cheese sandwich for James and gave him some orange juice to drink with it.  I ate some yogurt and, for dessert, we each had a Passion-Flakey pastry.  We were thinking of going for a walk across the now-frozen lake later on after James played some of his video games, but I had started reading my book and fell asleep upstairs on my bed.  I don’t usually sleep well at night, so napping during the day has become important to me lately.

This week, I would like to apply online to the Toronto District School Board’s web site for supply teaching on the Secondary Panel.  The TDSB head office had told me to apply in January 2017.  If I do enough supply teaching this year, a maximum of fifty days usually, then I can make about ten thousand dollars extra without impacting my pension payments.  That’s money I could use for travelling in the future and for using to publish a new book or publicize my existing two books.  Everything costs money, as we all know, so I always want to make sure I’m not spending money I don’t have and that I always a reserve stored in TFSA Mutual Funds for the things I’m planning on doing.  That’s tax-free money that can grow and keep me going during rough times should there be any in the future.

I guess the only concern I have about working in 2017 is getting enough sleep the night before a supply teaching job.  It’s been a struggle for me lately to get the sleep I need, mostly due to arthritic pain.  However, I do try daily to get my self-assigned tasks done in the afternoons so that I can relax in the mornings and the evenings while at home.

I’ve decided to write about my Christmas holidays that I spent up here at Brent’s place as well as about this week’s activities while I’m babysitting James.  So, I spent some time this morning and afternoon writing in my daily journal.

Brent called me this afternoon to see how we were and everything’s fine.  I asked him what I should make for dinner for James and me since he is working late tonight, so he suggested making soup and/or toasted tomato and bacon sandwiches.  It’s not that he doesn’t have enough food here; he just has to go grocery shopping to get refills of certain things, like milk and English muffins, for example.  Anyway, Brent’s got the day off tomorrow (because he’s working late tonight) and he decided to get ready for our trip next week by getting a necessary letter of permission from Tori to take James down to the Dominican Republic for the week of January 13 to 20, 2017.  This is imperative so that, at the Canadian border, the officers don’t think that James is being kidnapped by Brent.  (Don’t laugh – this kind of activity sometimes happens between divorced / separated parents who share children).  A letter of permission would ensure that there would be no hassle at the border when Brent took James out of Canada for our vacation with Dave and me.


In fact, Tori had to do the same thing recently when she and Jeff took James and a family friend down to Darien Lake, a resort in Ohio, USA.  As long as there was letter of permission from Brent and a current passport for James, no problem.  We all need passports these days, even if we’re only going to the USA.  Although it wasn’t always like that, it’s been that way since the events of 9/11 and that’s to assure the US government that they are not letting in criminals or terrorists into their country and I can’t say I blame them.

copyright 2017 - Anne Shier

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