So sore, a good sore I think, turkey is here, gum drop squares are in the oven

OK, Quick updates on this Tuesday night (I could have sworn it was Wednesday already),

• I’m making gum drop squares for our Christmas luncheon at work tomorrow. My mom’s gum drop squares were always one of my most favourite parts of Christmas. I’d take gum drop squares over anything on a sweet tray. My FAV! Unfortunately there are no little sized gum drops in the stores here for baking so I have to buy the big tubs of the big jujubes at Walmart and then cut each gumdrop into at least 8 little pieces. This is not easy. This is not fun. This takes a really long time. Finding out the pan I used was too big and I had to start all over again, remaking the recipe I had already doubled just to fill the pan wasn’t fun either. (I’m pretty sure I did the same thing last year. Maybe I should be smart enough to write it on the recipe card this time.)
• Gumdrop squares are in the oven right now.
• I’m incredibly sore. This is week #3 of my standing desk experiment. My feet are doing better, but my neck and shoulders and collar bones are so stiff and sore. I know that sitting in a chair for 10 years straight has given me horrific posture. Standing fixes this posture. But my body is very sore as it realigns itself. Sitting isn’t a relief, it actually hurts more.
• I find I’m doing stretches, squats, and dance moves most of the day while I work.
• At end of the day I feel alive. I worked some wickedly difficult physical labour jobs back in the 90’s (tree planting, brush saw operator, hole digger for Hydro, tree chipper, etc. etc.) and the best part of those jobs is I would feel like I did something by the end of the day. I felt alive. I felt sore, and tired, and dirty, and I loved it. I have no sense of satisfaction with a desk job. But just the difference of standing all day makes me feel like I did something because my body is so tired at the end of the day. Amazing how a simple change can affect the rest of my life.
• Using all these muscles now, especially in my mid-section, has made a noticeable difference. I am rediscovering my lost figure. OK it is way deep in there, but my muscles are coming back to life and I feel like I did a set of my old curl-ups (remember back in ’92 when I used to do 800 crunches a night? I can’t do 8 now. haha!) But I’m loosing some pudge and I’ve done nothing different but stand instead of sit at my desk.
• We went across the lake to pick up our Christmas turkey tonight. Our neighbours across the lake, who we recently met, raised eastern wild turkeys in their turkey yard this year. We got a freshly plucked 11 pounder. They said they heard the turkey is best to sit in the fridge for 24 hours to sit before it is frozen (like how you hang a deer? Dunno?) so Mr. Turkey is chilling in our Frigidaire.
• Oh the turkey raisers also said that wild turkeys tend to be drier meat, so they cook it with strips of bacon below and above the turkey. Yum! Sounds like half the ingredients to a good club sandwich
• Our Christmas gifts went in the mail to our families back in Ontario too. The shipping cost almost as much as the presents. Where on earth is all this money going that Canada Post collects for shipping?
• Our tree is up. Earliest I’ve ever had a Christmas tree up. But so far we haven’t fully decorated it yet. The lights are on it and the string of tinsel garland, and the angel, and now Jeff thinks he likes it perfectly fine as it is. It’ll get decorated soon though. As soon as I find the box of decorations. They aren’t in the big rubbermaid container with all of our other Christmas decorations.
• Gumdrop squares are done now. I covered the hot tray of squares with a cooling rack so I hope the cats don’t get hungry or that will be a real disaster. Time to unplug all the Christmas lights and head to bed. By the way, we got to see our Christmas lights tonight from across the lake in our neighbour’s house. They can see our LED’s across the lake! What a sense of pride. It brings out the Griswold in me I think 🙂 If only we had a bucket truck for roof and dormer lights!