February 15th - A special day in our history

Today is the 50th anniversary of the day Canada's national flag was first raised on Parliament Hill.

It has served us well these 50 years, and will continue to do so for many more, I'm sure, given the international respect it garners.

For many years Canadians tried to convince the federal government to declare February 15th a national holiday, to mark that momentous day in our history.  But the feds just won't budge on that.

Several provinces have since acknowledged that the day is worthy of recognition and have their own version of holiday to commemorate the event.  In Ontario, we have "Family Day" -- the Monday nearest February 15th -- a day for families to spend together.  It's the best they could come up with.  So those who work for provincially-regulated employers have the day off to spend with their families.  Those who are employed in federally-regulated workplaces must take a vacation day to do the same.  Keep in mind, day care providers and teachers all have the day off, being provincially employed.  So all the children are home that day, many of whose parents are employed in the federal government.

But I digress.

Back in 1965, when that flag was first raised, my best friend sister was celebrating her 16th birthday. We decided then and there that the day should be an annual national holiday.  After all, if the country could party this hardy on her 16th, why not every year?

Wendy and Bonnie 1951

(with their Mother)

Wendy and Bonnie, Aug 1999

For the record, we still think February 15th should be a national holiday.

Happy 66th Wendy, with love from Canada!

It's February 14th!

Fun with my FitBit

Santa brought me a FitBit for Christmas.

I love it!

I'm having so much fun with it.

One thing it's doing for me is making me ever so conscious of my steps, and the effect that those steps have on my body.

For instance, I actually managed -- one Sunday -- to get up to 10,000 steps in.  And the next day my muscles were taking me nowhere!

Scratch that idea.  When you have fibro, you have to pace yourself and 10,000 steps in a day is way too much.  I don't care what the experts say!

I've since learned that if I limit my steps to between 5,000 - 6,000 steps a day, I'm OK -- for the most part.

Anything over 6,000 steps in one day and I have terrible leg cramps during the night.  I've seen the pattern.  

So now I try to make at minimum 5,000 steps each day.  Anything over that is a bonus.

The price I pay for going over that 6,000 step threshold in a day?  Besides the leg cramps that night, I can't make even 2,500 steps the next day.  Simply not worth it in my books.

But the feature I most enjoy with this FitBit is the sleep monitoring report.

I indicate when I'm going to sleep and when I wake up.  And it monitors me while I'm "asleep."

I've learned that on average it takes me six minutes to actually fall asleep.  (I've always felt that it took me "forever."  Apparently, that's not true.)

I've also learned that when I'm "sick" (which I have been for most of the month of January), I waken anywhere from 11 to 17 times a night.  Not a very restful sleep.  But when I've not been sick, I waken perhaps two times.  A much more normal pattern, methinks.

Sleep data has always been of interest to me and I love getting this information every morning.  I know it's not the most accurate of data in a scientific sense, but it is reporting something.  And I'm enjoying it.

Oh, I also like learning that during my sleeping period, I'm taking steps too.  Yep.  Some nights I'm walking nine to twelve steps at a time, without getting out of bed.  Neat trick that, don't you think?

Have I mentioned that I'm having fun with my FitBit?