Just don’t ask me to bring hors d’oeuvres

Lynda Davis
March 12, 2018
2 Comments

You're having a pot luck? Great. What can I bring? Dessert? Salad? Veg? NOOOOO! Not an hors d'oeuvre! That's the one thing I hate to do most in the world—right up there with washing the inside of my kitchen cupboards. Even worse, because it requires planning, specialty shopping, fiddling and figuring out how to keep everything fresh/crisp/moist/whatever. And my creations are never as fresh/crisp/moist or as visually appealing as what everyone else in the world can do so much better. It's like the time my coworker tore apart and rewrapped…

Goat yoga? Save your money

Lynda Davis
March 8, 2018
2 Comments

You may or may not have heard of goat yoga. There are actual people paying real money to have a live goat walk on their backs. I'm not making this up. Advocates of this new form of therapy go to a farm or designated facility equipped with layers of straw or similar material on the floor (for obvious reasons) and play barnyard for an hour or two. Pictures of this latest exercise craze are popping up on television, in the newspapers and on internet news streams. It's called goat yoga…

Have I lost my decorating mojo?

Lynda Davis
March 5, 2018
7 Comments

After decades of subscribing to various (OK, too many) home decorating magazines (a.k.a. house porn), I'm seriously considering cancelling at least one if not more of my subscriptions. The reason? I'm finding I like the "Before" pictures better than the "After". Yikes! I've outlived the decorating fashion cycle. Without naming names, I noticed that one of my favourite Canadian decorating mags recently featured makeovers that reinterpreted the apartment from my first marriage in the seventies. It was all geometric wallpapers in headache-inducing colours, hard surfaces and, oh lordy lordy, an…

Hair today; gone tomorrow

Lynda Davis
March 1, 2018
2 Comments

The other day I read an interesting blog posting on a beauty and lifestyle site for mature women. It outlined different strategies for coping with thinning hair as we age. Many women our age have the added challenge of hair regrowth following chemotherapy when new hair is often quite different from its pre-chemo state. Our once glorious manes are no more and we're constantly on the lookout for ways to enhance thickness, texture, shine and body. Rogaine is one option for thinning hair, although it's expensive and with limited effectiveness…

The Hudson’s Bay Company welcomes new CEO and this shopper couldn’t be happier

Lynda Davis
February 18, 2018
1 Comment

Canada's venerable 350-year-old Hudson's Bay Company (for non-Canadian readers it's comparable to Macy's in the U.S.) is getting a new C.E.O. Her name is Helena Foulkes and she comes from CVS, a health-care company with about 9,700 pharmacies in the United States. Since January 2014, Foulkes was the company's executive vice-president and president of subsidiary CVS Pharmacy. As a shopper, loyal Canadian and feminist I'm thrilled with the news and thought I'd take the initiative on behalf of all baby boomer women and make her feel welcome: Dear Helena: Welcome…

Sleeping on Jupiter is a clash of dreams and reality

Lynda Davis
February 5, 2018
0 Comments

This book first came to my attention when I heard the author of Sleeping on Jupiter, Anuradha Roy being interviewed on CBC Radio. Listening to the background story of a young girl from India being told in the author's lyrical accent prompted me to immediately put it on my 'To Read' list. The characters' stories are linked by their common voyage to the seaside temple city of Jarmuli. It's beautifully written with many sensory touch-points that take the reader deeper into the scents, sounds and texture of India. Two story…