Ya, I know. 12 days of Christmas and all that. Too bad. I’ll take down the tree when I want to take down the tree.

Pater with Daracha - 5 January

 

Actually, I took down the tree when I had time…which was over a course of about two weeks.

 

Nostalgic for summer.

 

 

What We’ve Been Up To…

I think that I get so wrapped up in my day-to-day life that I forget that this blog is to update my family and friends on my day-to-day life.   There’s facebook, of course, and I keep in touch using that medium, but not everyone uses Facebook (and good for them for not getting sucked in), and, let’s be honest, we all know I’m a passive, not an active, user.  Same with the whole email thing.  So here’s the latest update:

Work…is work.   I’m in the same position, but will be in a slightly new role by the time you read this.   Hopefully, I’ll be a bit more in the background and less in the front-line, but still doing things that are necessary and have needed done for a long time.  We’re still short-staffed, but here’s hoping this slightly new set-up works…or I’m out of there.  Life’s too short for work to be this stressful, especially with the house-building and the infertility.  Which leads me to the next update…

Infertility.  A word that is beginning to bug me.  I’m fertile, dammit.  It’s just that the egg and the sperm can’t reach each other because of some sassin-frassin scar tissue.  Totally pisses me off.   We’re paying for the next round of IVF.  I’ll keep you updated.

House.  We’ve come to an impasse with the current design our architect has presented.  Over the Christmas holidays, while we were in our fancy-schmancy hotel, I designed a house I could happily live in for the next 20 years.    At the time of writing this, I still needed to pass it by our architect to see whether she is willing to work on it with me.   I don’t know how to address this with her and I don’t know how she is going to react.  Pleasant and professional would be my guess, as that is how she’s been with us from day one.  Still, what words do I use?  How do I introduce the subject and phrase this?  I simply have no idea. [Update: have spoken to the architect and forwarded the plans to her.  She was pleasant and professional and made me feel fine about dropping this bombshell on her.  She's to get back to me after she's had time to look at the drawings.]

Flat.  Our goal was to complete it as best we could over the Christmas holidays, seeing as we were both off until the 5th of January.   Then we caught the flu.  I mean we really caught the flu.  I don’t remember the last time I was that bone-achingly ill.  Now I understand why elderly people with low reserves don’t recover from something like that.  Next year I’m wussing-out and getting my flu shot.  No way am I going through that again.

Mobile Home/Static Caravan/Trailer home. We’ve been idiots.  There was a very small leak in the central heating system that we just. could. not. find.   We had to drain the radiators, etc, earlier in the year to fix a separate problem and didn’t want to fill the system with anti-freeze until we could find the leak.  And then it got cold, and I mean very cold.  -20C cold, one night.  Which was fine because we kept the central heating on a continuous low when we weren’t in the trailer so that it and the plumbing wouldn’t freeze up.   And then we went away for 36 hours, and instead of turning the central heating down, my traitorous wrist turned it OFF!!  Not realising I’d made this mistake, we had a great 36 hours…until we returned to the caravan to find everything — and I do mean everything — frozen.  Then, when things thawed , we found that something in the boiler had cracked.  Thankfully, we had spares from the first boiler we bust and my wonderful, handy husband was able to replace the broken piece.   Then the temperature dropped and everything froze again.  When things thawed, we found that the copper pipes inside the trailer had cracked.   With the use of much solder and flux, hubby thought he had them fixed…maybe…but everything had frozen, again, for the third time so we couldn’t turn on the water to check.  This drama began a little over five weeks ago.  It’s not over.  So we’ve been camped at the flat, where it’s noisy, but there’s running water and functioning central heating.  Oh, and we also have mice in the trailer.  Five caught in traps, so far; probably more of them around — I know this because one of them had been decapitated by the trap…and we never found the head!!  It’s been hauled away somewhere by its mates and probably eaten by them.  Blech.  (Do they call it headcheese in their mouse-language?) [Update: found where the mice are getting in.  Arms are too short to reach the hole and stuff it with steel wool, so went to B&Q hardware store to buy expanding foam to fill the hole.  B&Q had ONE canister, but sans nozzle.  ONE.  needless to say our zombie mice are still getting into the trailer.   Yes, zombie mice.  Eating brains of your own kind means you're a zombie.  I watch TV, I know these things.]

And that’s it for now.

 

Water in the well – updated

In the past 24 hours, we have lost 1 1/2 feet of snow from the ground through warm (5-7C) temperatures and sublimation (the wind really is quite strong). Our pipes are no longer frozen, but one of the copper pipes has burst, so we are still drawing water from the well. Yesterday, the water level was at its normal 2 1/2 meters below ground level. Today, I had to lower the bucket only one (ONE!) meter. Crazy.

Update: the pipe has not burst. (Yay!) However, the solder seal no longer seals. Fantastic hubby has looked at it and replaced bits and bought a blow-torch and solder and other accoutrements, and has replaced and soldered, and he thinks it hasn’t worked. To be checked tomorrow. Watch this space.

Update: It didn’t work.  One week later and we’re still sans water and sans plumber.  Plumbers are being run off their feet, and, now that the world is a snow globe again, there’s little chance they’ll take the driving risk to come out to ours.  *sigh*

 

This Morning

Winter has most definitely arrived.

Yay!

 

More covers

Ahhh…winter.  You are a many-faceted beast.

And I’m thankful you’ve hit the United States and Canada, coz it means I get to buy lots and lots of fabric.  So, thank you.  You may stay.

Sincerely,

Hot Water Bottle Cover Maker Extraodinaire.

 

Anatomy of a Northern Ontario Roadtrip (Summer)

Start: Lake A.  Your own after a morning swim.  Stupid o’clock in the morning — unless drinking with buddies the night before.

…

…

…

On the Road.  Trans-Canada Highway.  10 a.m.  (because was drinking with buddies the night before)

Cruising speed: 105km/hr

Speed limit: 90 km/hr

Speed at which the cops will pull you over: 106 km/hr

…

…

Coffee break, pee break, and toasted everything-bagel with herb cream cheese

 

Timmy’s parking lot (summer)

…

…

…

End: Lake B. Your friend’s.  11:30 a.m.

…

…

…

22:00.  Reverse order.

(P.S.  That last picture is supposed to say large fluffy clouds, but I’ve already flattened it and I can’t be bothered starting over again.  I’m sure you understand.)

 

Snapshots of an afternoon at camp on Big Basswood Lake

 

Allen Family Camp - Definition

Camp (noun):

• a hot day’s retreat on the lake; archaic: a hot day’s retreat on the lake after the day’s haying;
• Includes: canoes, inner-tubes from old tractor tires, spare bathing suits from the ’70s “just in case”, small children who are adamantly not cold, four decks of playing cards — none of which are complete, two decks of Uno, bucket of water outside the cabin door for dipping sandy feet into; one outhouse with spiders (toilet paper with mouse nest optional), mosquitoes, pic mosquito coils, adults telling children to stop sniffing the mosquito coil smoke; a fire pit (outside); oil lamps (inside), friends and family;
• Cuisine: potato salad and/or pasta salad, hot dogs, Delmar chicken with JoJo’s and DJ sauce (large), Thelma’s [raspberry/blueberry/strawberry/peach/insert name of fruit] pie, Terry’s and/or Lynn’s butter tarts; [note: used cutlery to be scoured with sand in between swigs of beverage of choice];
• Beverage: pop, beer, wine, coolers — all of which have been placed in the lake to maintain optimal temperature.
• Synonym: the good life

P.S.  Forewarned is forearmed.  For all you people out there with slow broad-band (or no broad-band), the next post contains 11 pictures.

 

Where I’ll be in exactly 21 days

smug mode:

activated