No Do Days

A friend had a stepfather she didn't particularly like very much. I think her feelings were fairly conflicted on that matter as he was very good to her mother. He'd been a lifelong bachelor and only married her mother when he was in his mid-sixties after his own mother died. He was handsome but fairly boring and came from an old Toronto family and still had the airs and graces (but alas no wealth) which went a long way to attracting her mother.

The marriage lasted over thirty years and ended upon his death in his mid-nineties. He never had any of the worldly worries that beset most of us. His mother took care of him. She died. Then his newfound wife took over. Hardly a wrinkle on him, full head of white hair. Tall.

Anyway the point of all this backstory is to bring the title of this post into play. This man never worked up a sweat over anything. He often took to sulking in his car when his wife wanted to visit her adult children.

BUT, a couple of times a week he would declare "A No Do Day" and we would have a bit of a hoot about this as he never lifted a finger on any day. No Do Days were days spent in his pyjamas and sleeping a lot to recover from, well, what he viewed as stress. We could never figure out what stress. It's all subjective I suppose. He would work himself up into a lather now and again if it came to even making a decision about getting a new vacuum cleaner. Or car. Or phone. Or selling his bit of stock. He would take to his bed and No Do for a a whole day. No Do meant no thinking also.

Maybe that's why he lived to 95 with no wrinkles and a full head of hair and lovely erect posture. No Do Days.

So I declared one today. It's a gorgeous day out there. And I haven't been outside. And my lovely comfy pyjamas are still on me. And I asked the dog to run around the meadow in lieu of. And she did. I've bored you all with her brilliance. She just takes care of herself when I ask her to. And now she's lying on the deck slobbering over a big bone given to her by one of her adoring aunties.

And what DID I do? Well, nothing. I didn't even cook but reheated leftovers. And watched Sons of Anarchy Season 2 recommended by a good friend who, like me, loved The Wire and The Sopranos. Not for the faint of heart but appealing to those of us with a good slice of darkness in our souls.

No Do.

Try it.

No Do Day

I kind of fell into today. I've been working like the hammers of hell (tax deadline for self-employed persons in Canada is June 15th each year) and sorting out some unexpected tax tangles of friends of friends along with undoing the near tragedies of 'false filings' which happens a lot to people. They think tax returns are: like, man it's so easy, technology just completes your return. AUTOMATICALLY.

I hate puncturing that balloon for them when they come to me, proudly, telling me they don't need no accountant for they have their own computer like, which does it all for them.

*Did you claim that new truck?
Well duh!
*Did you claim just the capital cost allowance on it or the full value?
Wha'?
*How did you calculate your home office space?
Wha'?

You get the picture. It costs far more for them to get me to recalculate and file adjusted tax returns than it would have to get me to do it all from the get go. I should add: I don't mind. More money for my trip to Chile.

I was at cards last night when I had this thought seep into my head:
"Have a No Do Day tomorrow."
It sounded like anarchy to me. No Do? Moi?
Well here I am. No Doing.
Stan at Sentence First would have a ball with that word.
I got up late. I cooked home-made home fries with eggs and home-made bread toast. I had 3 cups of dark Italian roast. And savoured the newspaper all the way down to the Jumble.
I played Lexulous with four dear Lexy-buddies, two of whom are beating me.
I drifted onto FaceBook.
It is now 1.30pm and the whole FREE day yawns ahead of me. A friend dropped off 5 movies. I have knitting. I have a pile of luscious unread books. I have a fire going. What can I say? Summer in Newfoundland this year.
And absolutely no one is making demands on my time.
How perfect is this life?
Well, if it were any better there would be two of me to handle it (my beloved Granny would say that!).
No Do. Try it.