Grey Cup Madness & Breathless Buddies Game On!

21Nov - Wednesday

Grey Cup celebrations are breaking out all over the city in anticipation of the big game on Sunday. There has been much discussion as to whether or not the traditional horse thru the hotel lobby will happen here in Toronto. Time will tell...

Dundas Square is a happening place, with preparatory events going all week. I grabbed this shot on my way by this morning. I had come downtown to meet Chaitra for coffee before she went to work at the Eaton Centre. 

After coffee, I walked Chaitra to work and then stopped at the GNC store to pick up some NAC for Carman - and scored a big sale, so bought extra!On the way up Yonge St. I stopped at a little “we have everything for next to nothing” store and picked up a storage foot stool for Carman. It’s not heavy on its own, but when the gentleman boxed it for me, I added a couple of 6 packs of Ensure to it - the rest of the 6 packs are in a bag on my back for ballast as I make the trek home. As I reach each intersection and wait for the walk light to change in my favour, I’m grateful for the fire hydrants and bicycle racks on which I can rest the box and give my arms a stretch. I’m home in time to unpack and put everything away before Carman is up. He notices the foot stool right away, so sits in his chair to make sure it fits. It’s perfect, we can now put the chair he was using, back at the table in the dining area and he has the perfect spot in which to hide the weights he never uses!

Tonight is the night for our monthly Breathless Buddies Game On event. Ruth & Gary had surprise visitors from NB, so won’t be able to attend tonight. Jess is busy fighting an infection in the hospital, Retta is working on settling her new lungs and getting them fully functional and Ruth & Don have gone west to their home near Sarnia, ON. We’ll be a much smaller group and have decided to order pizza for supper and start our games earlier than usual. It always seems that we run out of time before we run out of fun!

Carla & Carman

We’ve invited Jess’ Mom, Carla to join us along with our friends from Casselman, ON - Marie-Ève and her Mom, Gisele. Marie-Ève has great sympathy for Jess, having already had a turn fighting infection in hospital since joining the transplant program only a few weeks ago. We’re glad to have them with us and are looking forward to teaching them to play Dominoes.

Kristy has brought her new set, which came with a fancy raised platform station piece and lots of train engines to go around. The station piece has a button on the side, and of course, Carman gives it a press to find out what it does. Suddenly the room is filled with a cacophony of train whistles, the chugging of steam engines and the clacking of wheels on tracks! What a noise! This must be the button to push when you have to put your engine up (indicating that you can’t place any dominoes). Yes, well, this idea lasted until the 3rd train engine was put up, then all hands were banned from the button!! 

Kristy, mid-game

Carman - mid munch

Kristy & Marie-Ève, mid-pose

 Jess was excited that Carla was coming without her and gave her specific instructions to protect the Carver name. Carla came thru in spades for Jess, cleaning up at the table with the lowest score, making her the big Winner of the night!  Well done Carla - Numero Uno! And thanks to Carman for doing station clean-up!

Carla, Pamela, Kristy, Jim, Carman Marie-Ève, Sue, Gisele