Ah...Cape Breton Island

Cape Smokey from our cabin's yard...

two crows joy

For those of you from afar - Cape Breton Island is part of Nova Scotia - it is an island but it is joined to the mainland with a causeway. Sometimes Capers revolt and shout "Down with the causeway" but mostly they seem happy to see us mainlanders storm their shores in search of fantastic music (Rita McNeil, The Rankins, Men of the Deep, and on and on...), their amazing land and seascapes, their world renown hospitality and their ability to create fun out of not much! That last ability is one that they share with the company I have with two of my best friends - Catchword Productions. We create mysterious events and this weekend was the best! We had 100 guests in the most fabulous location - The Keltic Lodge - in gorgeous Ingonish Beach. I could go on and on about the glorious views - I could hardly eat my breakfast for looking out the windows - every one framing yet another view of shore and sea that took my breath away. And I like my breakfast! The food was spectacular, the accommodations completely wonderful, the staff superb BUT best of all were the guests. We've been doing this for over 24 years and we have a lot of regular followers but this was for the most part a completely new crew. And they were absolutely keen to have fun. They took notes and asked questions and followed us and ate up every fight, every conversation, every moment as if they truly had become entranced.

Today I am basking in the glow of the whole event and doing my wash (always need a little grounding activity). I'm a bit fluish so I'm taking it easy. My best pal came down with the dreaded lurgy on the weekend so I think I'm about four days behind her. Luckily I can arrange my week so as not in infect anyone! I hope.

In minutes I will be off to Liscombe Lodge. I'll pickup my best pal and we'll head down the road. We'll stop for groceries somewhere - I need to find some kind of snack I am allowed cuz these are BIG snacking weekends and I need to be fortified against temptation. We have the scripts, the players, the blood, the gun. Ah, what a job! I like this script - I think it is funny and look forward to seeing what all the actors make of it. I like my part - Ninette Beazley - Nose of the North. She is kind of a eccentric journalist. I've played her before. I dare say she is one of my alter egos. She's sort of asexual and a bit like Jane Hathaway - sensible, acerbic. Wait a minute! You don't know who Jane Hathaway is. Why she's the indomitable assistant to Drysdale down at the bank that my friends the Clampets use. She's a bit mad for Jethro and loves bird watching. I adore her. They're both pretty smart Ninette and Jane. Ninette is the ninth of twelve kids her parents had. Uno, Duxie, Treise, Quatro, Fiva, Six (!), Septimus, Octavia, Ninette, Dixie, Onzie and Fred. (Her mum put her foot down at the end.) Well gotta fly. Let you know how it all unfurls - a nosey journalist, an aging child star, a lonesome cowboy, an aussie bounty hunter, a biker chick, a hard nosed business woman and a patsy!

Swimming to Tancook - not

quite honestly, dear readers, I haven't been working on Swimming to Tancook (working title). I have been working on feeling better with this diet and today, I do feel some equanimity with it. I didn't realize how much my life is focussed around food. I love cooking, I always have and my SP loves cooking and so does my step-dot. Our big night out is always some nice restaurant or a long yummy dinner with friends. I read cook books and visit cooking sites daily. A lot of that is pretty good food but not neccesarily what I can eat on this diet. Also, I love not so good food. I love chocolate bars and fish and chips and potato chips eaten with my pal Marion. I even like a nice cold coke from time to time and I certainly like a g&t in the summer and a scotch in the winter and wine all year round. So I'm recalibrating my entire system, both body and mind. The last few days I haven't felt aggrieved though. I've felt....hmmm...clean! Like what I'm putting in my body is really good - full of chi. This morning I had kamut cakes (like rice cakes only not allowed rice) with cashew butter I made from organic unprocessed cashews with slices of an apple on it. It was incrediably tasty. I just need to not eat twelve of them! Last night I had quinoi (sp) with steamed cauliflower and brocoli and lightly sauteed green onion, garlic and ginger root. Very good. I know! I'm a hippy again!I've lost about seven pounds so far which is pretty radical. I'll be able to fit into my old bell bottom jeans and tie dye shirt. And I feel my energy returning slowly. Tomorrow or the next day I am supposed to get what feels like the flu as the yeast dies off. I don't want it but I do so that I know something is happening. It is EASY to accidentally eat the wrong thing on this diet unknowingly so ...
Today I am working on the script for our upcoming murder mystery - The Sad Sad Story of Angel Pye. That will be fun actually. The mystery is a week from today so I best get at it!