Can You Plug In My Truck?

So today I had the task to plug in the new truck. It was a lovely -36 morning, and when I tried to start my deer hunter she won't go for me! Two vehicles to plug in today. So here is how the morning went:

Step one: unlock vehicles, easy!

Step two: brush 3 weeks of snow off tall truck. Not so easy! Needed to pop the hood!! It went as well as I had hoped.

Step three: Pop hood! Very simple.

Step four: Grab block heater cord and plug in. Easy enough in theory. Upon opening the hood I am daunted with the task of actually finding the block heater. I have no idea what a block heater even looks like. My dad usually has the cord out for me and I just plug in. So I start looking for a cord that has the pronged ended (with a cover on it), and well I went from side to side, looking all around and nothing!

Step five: Call Dad! Have him give me the side to which I should be looking for the block heater. He also tells me it is flat and should be near the something? I don't think I was listening very well.

Step six: Go back to the -33 weather and look under the hood again. Still nothing.

Step seven: Refer to own vehicle to see exactly what I'm looking for. Pop my hood, see that my cord is nicely out in the open from last winter season, take note that it is a cord that is wrapped in black ribbed plastic, check. Plug in my vehicle.

Step eight: Back to truck hood, look for black plastic wrapped wire. Looking and see that all the wires are in fact wrapped with this black plastic. Back to drawing board.

Step nine: Call J and tell him I can't find the cord!! He says he will google it and see if anyone else can tell him where the cord should be located.

Step ten: Have some breakfast, warm up and wait to go back our for round four.

Step eleven: Look online at the pictures of other trucks and in most of them I can't even see the cord. Not looking hopeful for me actually finding cord.

Step twelve: Return to truck and look all around, including getting on the ground and looking up! Still nothing, where can this cord seriously be hiding out!!

Step thirteen: Lovely neighbour sees that I am looking under the hood, asks "she won't start", I say "I'm not sure, just looking for the block heater cord actually". He then begins the search I've been at all morning and is successful in finding the black plastic wrapped cord with a RED plug!! If someone had told me to look for something RED I'm sure I could have found it! So cord and plug now found!

Step fourteen: Plug in the truck and go back inside and be warm!

What I have learned from this: Sometimes you need a new eye to find what you are looking for! -36 my vehicle doesn't like to start, unless plugged in! I do not know what a block heater looks like!

It will be nice to have J back tomorrow, so that he can deal with the cold weather and well he owes me for finally plugging in his truck.

Pulling an "Irene"

So way back when, while I was in my first year of grad school bliss, living with Whoolie and Megubber in our sweet townhouse with Pumpkin Jack and Lucile the bunny.... My parents came to visit us, I forget the occasion, it may have been for my birthday or just because they love me. Anyways, we always got spoiled, we would get to go out to Red Lobster for dinner and then they would always make us a super good meal. So our special meal was roast beef with all the fixings including Yorkshire pudding!! My mom started the Yorkshire pudding early, she thought that if it was pulsed by the blender every 30 minutes they would turn out just perfect! So W and M were on strict orders while we went out shopping to pulse the Yorkshire pudding every thirty minutes. I think this was what we were looking forward to most, fluffy Yorkshire pudding, filled with gravy! When it finally came to be the Yorkshire puddings time in the oven, we all watched with anticipation as she got the pan ready with hot oil and did one final pulse of the blender and well all she had to do was take the blender pitcher and pour the flour, egg and milk goodness and 15 minutes later it would have been perfect!! Well as one may expect with my mom, it doesn't always go as planned. Now I'm fairly certain that I have seen her use the blender many times while growing up but never had I actually seen what was about to happen ever happen, nor do I think M or W!! I do not know exactly how she managed to do this but instead of giving a little twist and removing the pitcher off the base, she somehow managed to actually pull the pitcher apart (like one would do to clean it AFTER one is done with the blender!) and well all the hard work of pulsing every thirty minutes was all over the blender base, the counter top, running down the cupboards onto the floor!! We all just sort of sat there like "no that did not just happen!" I don't think there were any words for the incident, other than to start laughing, it was truly a funny moment, one that I doubt we will ever forget.

So now each time I make Yorkshire pudding i think of the time my mom managed to make one huge mess!!

What I would like to call "pulling an Irene".

So the other week I was making some Christmas inspired cupcakes, one giant cupcake and some mini ones and 6 regular sized cupcakes. All was going as planned, I didn't make these ones from scratch like I would normally, so I bought two cake mix boxes to ensure I would have enough batter to fill my giant cupcake pan. I had way more than enough, so i made the little ones and still had more to make 6 regular sized ones. I dyed the batter red, which turned out to be more pink but still sort of red, then I dyed my icing green, the colours of Christmas! All went well, giant one came out beautiful, the mini's were doing good too, and then when it was finally time to get my regular sized ones in the hot oven, in there nice little cupcake liners, looking yummy.... I open the oven and with my other hand I had the raw cupcakes and I'm leaning into the oven to put them on the rack and then something horrible happens. I am not even sure how I managed to do this, I guess I am my mothers daughter, but somehow I managed to dump the cupcakes and the liners into the oven. So now I'm standing with the oven open, my cupcakes tin is now empty and my batter is now on the door, sliding into the drawer and on the floor of the 350 degree oven! Pretty much dumbstruck, what am I to do? How do you wipe down a hot oven and get my cupcakes back? I ended up using my oven mitts and whatever cloths I had close by and get most of the batter out, and managed not burn the dogs that were now coming over to see what the commotion was all about. It was a mess I was not expecting that is for sure, and ended up having to vacuum out the oven to get all the burnt cupcake out. I had just pulled an Irene, lucky for me though the only witnesses were Lily and Dexter!

What do you want for Christmas?

I used to always ask for a BMW and a black lab puppy for Christmas. Now that we had a BMW I no longer feel the need for one and we have two dogs now, so I think a third would just be too much! So now I need a new wish list of things that I probably won't actually get this year but maybe next year....

1. A big shiny diamond
2. Trip to Ireland
3. A weekly house cleaner!
4. Steamed buns (i know a little strange)