As it has been many many months since my hair was cut, I booked an appointment for Saturday morning at 8:30, and an appointment for the boy at his ‘haircut store’ (his term, not mine) for an hour later. My stylist moved salons, so this was my first trip to the new location. It’s closer, it’s more posh.. and also more expensive. Still, I’ll pay it gladly to keep working with a stylist who doesn’t condescend to me and who actually does what I ask her to do. My hair is now even shorter than it was at its shortest last year. Heh.

There was a Tim Horton’s two doors down from the new salon, so the boy and HRH headed there for a treat while I got my hair cut, then we moved on to the boy’s appointment about five minutes away. The boy loves getting his hair cut, so that wasn’t a problem, either. Then we wandered to the bookstore, where the boy found a Transformers collector’s guide that we told him to save up for, because it was fifteen dollars and he had already chosen an early reader book to buy. He kept insisting that he had the money, and we kept telling him that he didn’t, and that lots of coins in his money box did not necessarily translate to a large total sum of money, especially when they were mostly nickels and pennies. He was not pleased with this, to put it mildly, which necessitated his removal to the sidewalk outside the store while I paid for our books. I was apologized to when I emerged from the shop. We then stopped at our local Best Buy to pick up a birthday gift certificate for HRH’s dad, where the boy found a Wii terminal that was demoing the swordplay game from the Wii Sports Resort kit and proceeded to do a creditable job for a four year old player while giggling madly. While he did I checked out the webcams (no luck), and the cases for iPod Touch (finally, win!). We coaxed the boy away from the Wii and took a quick turn through the two video game shops for a secondhand copy of Sports Resort, but again, no luck. We’ll put it on the list of things to surprise him with at Yule.

Sunday morning we joined Ceri, Scott, and Ceri’s parents for brunch. We haven’t seen Aubrey and Carmel in eight years (almost exactly, as it was for Ceri and Scott’s wedding!). It was lovely to spend time with them again. The boy thought them very fine as well, and gave them huge hugs and kisses when we left. He spent lots of time digging through an old box of Lego and action figures that Scott had unearthed, and playing on the play structure in the backyard. Brunch was delicious. After the boy’s nap we headed to the south shore for HRH’s dad’s birthday dinner, which was also wonderful. We had a lovely time relaxing in the backyard, and then indulging in a huge pile of barbecued ribs. There was no traffic on the bridge, which was surprising because there had been several warnings about closures, which didn’t seem to be closed after all either there or back. And then when we turned onto the street before ours we saw emergency vehicles, and as we turned onto our own street we saw that one of the duplexes in the building across and one over from ours had burned out during the three hours we were gone. HRH and I were a bit freaked out for the next couple of hours. The shock of coming home and seeing it so drastically changed was bad, but being here while it was happening would have been worse. Our next-door neighbour told us that there was so much smoke it was like night-time. Somewhat reassuringly, the flat above the one that burnt and the ones beside it were relatively undamaged, if one discounts the hole the firefighters had to punch in the floor and roof of the flat above to vent the smoke. Good construction.

Monday we’d left blissfully unscheduled and open. Good thing, too, because my back was so bad by that point that I was pretty much bed-bound. We went out late morning to the pharmacy to buy tiger balm (ours has gone AWOL) and lotion and such things, and we discovered that tiger balm now comes in a lotion form dispensed from a pump. It’s heavenly. I spent much of the day reading or asleep thanks to the muscle relaxants I was taking. I was able to get up and do a third round of tomato canning mid-afternoon, and then made a really nice spaghetti sauce for dinner.

Over the weekend I also managed to reknit all the stuff I’d frogged on my short-sleeved sweater, which makes me very happy. The boy asked if he could help me last night and was upset when I asked him not to, so I got out the size 11 needles and a ball of rainbow yarn, and cast ten stitches on for him to knit. At the moment we’re at the ‘Mama holds her hands over his hands’ stage, but he is very enthusiastic about wrapping the yarn over the RH needle to make the new stitch. He has decided that he is knitting a scarf for his teacher (first it was a hat “because hers is getting very old”, but I suggested the easier scarf instead and he took the suggestion readily). I also managed to read three books over the long weekend. Amazing what being stuck in one place can do for sedentary pastimes. The weather over the weekend was lovely, too; clear, not too hot, nice and cool in the mornings.

Today I’ve been very, very careful. Sudden movement is bad, as is twisty side-to-side motion. If I sit down and stand up very slowly and remember not to turn while I’m doing it, I can get around. I proofed, polished, and handed in the freelance project I’d pretty much completed on Friday this morning.

And… I just got a call to tell me that orchestra is beginning tomorrow night! Which means I have to scramble for my augmented dues, about which I’d entirely forgotten. There’s a silver lining to my spinning wheel being delayed; I have extra money in the bank.