Look Out Landlubbers There Be Squalls Here

Too funny.  The dog was whining to be let outside for a pee, when I opened the door she took one look at the pouring rain and put all four binders on.  I had to give her a bit of encouragement by placing my foot on her ass and shoving her little butt out the door.  If its any consolation to her (and I know it isn't) I know how she feels.  This afternoon I had to give myself a mental shove on the butt to get myself out the door.  The wind was just howling up a storm (literally) and the snow was coming horizontally, making it a little difficult to see.  Walking with my back to it wasn't bad, but lordy, lordy walking into it was like walking into a vacuum cleaner plug in backwards.  All the little bits of crud that got sucked up blew right back into my eyes.  Since then, the temperature went from -2 to plus 2, the snow went from solid to very, very liquid.  I had to go out and shovel some of the stuff from in front of the door by sitting inside my kayak and scooping with the paddle.  I estimate that one shovel-full weighed about fifty pounds.  If the temperatures drop tonight we are in trouble with a capital T.  The westerner in me thinks it is exactly like a Chinook, but I know that they probably call it something else here, Sou'minister, or Nor'blister, or possibly Sou'nor'Easter, its hard to say, all I know is that it is really, really wet. 

So lately we have been pulling up small chunks of wallpaper, carpeting, ceiling tiles etc, just to see what *lies beneath*, its kind of like picking away at a scab, and let me tell you things are just a bit on the scary side in the *down under side*.  This evening the hubby pulled a chunk of panelling off the hallway wall, and joy of joys, it had been glued to the walls.  Which means that when we pull all of that beautiful panelling off we get to replace all the gyprock underneath it.  Which in itself isn't a big deal unless you take into consideration that we will probably have to replace about 80% of the interior gyprock in the house.  Which sucks because of the cost and labour involved, and double sucks because we will also have to figure out a way of getting rid of the old stuff.  I did a quick check to see if we could just bury it somewhere and create our own chalk pit for future archaeologists to get their panties all tied in a knot about, but it turns out that the stuff turns into some nasty mutant chemicals when mixed with water and if it leaches into the ground it will kill us all.  Well okay maybe not kill as such, but probably make us pretty sick, and when I say us, I really mean the denizens which live on our property because I wouldn't be stupid enough to bury it near the house.  Also it starts to smell like rotten eggs.  Yum that would be nice to wake up to every morning now wouldn't it.  Of course that would be when you would be hoping for a good Se'mester to come along and take the smell away, but we'd probably end up getting stuck in the Doldrums.

I keep saying, "When we pull the floors up we can use them for the gas shack.  When we pull the panelling off the walls we can use it in the gas shack. When we pull the laminate up we can use it in the gas shack."  If we actually did that by the time we reused all this stuff in the *Gas Shack* it would be bigger than our friggin house.  (Oh I bet the hubby would love that!  I can just see him salivating now.) 

I Am A Multi-Bazillionaire, All Bow To Me

It looks like something went wrong in my plan to win the lottery this time.  For the life of me I cannot understand what.  I thought I did everything right, a) decide to win the lottery, and b) buy a ticket.  I did both and it looks like it did not work.  How is that possible?

But all is not lost, because lucky for me I have been contacted by a banker in Nigeria who just happened to get my email and is trusting me because I am such a trust worthy person (probably because my email has such a trusting sounding name), and I believe god also led him to me, so for these very valid reasons he is willing to give me three million dollars.  Life is good when you are trust worthy.  I have also been contacted by a princess no less, she is being held by a wicked stepmother, her father who was the king of some country in Africa just died, leaving her 14 million dollars, half of which she is willing to give me if I help her get the rest.  Hmmm, this story sounds a little familiar to me, I wonder where I have heard it before?  Oh well, 7 million, woohoo.  Oh and of course there is the dead relative that died in a plane crash with his whole family, apparently there is about 20 million pounds sterling in the bank which I can have.  I could go on, but you get the drift.  I am a very lucky person when it comes to these kinds of windfalls.  So when all of these plans come to fruition, yours truly will be a multi-bazillionaire.  Now don't you wish you would have been nicer to me?

In the meantime I must continue on with the life that I have been living which means trying to think of a way to pull down walls without doing serious damage to...oh never mind, I can pull down walls until the cows come home because I don't have to worry about damaging anything.  Hey that is kind of like winning the lottery. 

Yesterday we had rain, rain, rain (noticed how I segued into a completely new topic without finishing the last one?  That is just the way my brain is working right now) then we had wind, wind, wind.  Today it was cold with more wind, well not cold as in "brrrrr its cold out there", it was more like "brrrr its colder than it has been for a few days".  The great thing about the rain is that it is really starting to beat the heck out of the snow.  And according to our neighbour only three more weeks and all the snow should be gone.  Now THAT is winning the lottery. 

Early Day Before Breakfast

I am posting this early today because I have a busy, busy day planned today.  To begin with I will go and eat breakfast right after I am done.  Then once I am done I will get dressed (perhaps I will get dressed before I eat breakfast, it is a tough decision).  Then I will work on a resume so the eastern world can see what a great person I am and immediately hire me and pay me six figures.  Of course my job title would be 'Stay At The Ranch Person'.  I'd hate to make all those people working in town feel inadequate next to my greatness.  That is not a way to make lasting friendship my precious.  No it is not.  Then sometime later in the day I will feel obligated to take the furry bag of poop with her broccoli-like intellect out for a walk.  Then, sigh, double sigh, this evening I have to go to the solar system course.  I really, really, really need to start drinking coffee again.  I'm astonished I've managed to make it through this far.  Although if they gave out rewards for taking material which has the possibility of being interesting, and making it so boring that your class is willing to chew their legs off to get out of there, this guy would be the winner.  Sigh, only two more classes to go. 

I do have one interesting fact to share with the world though, yesterday when I was wandering around out in the bush with snowshoes strapped onto my feet and fighting through a tangle of underbrush I came to a decision which will be life altering, not only for myself, but for those of my immediate clan.  I have decided to win the lottery.  Yes you heard it here folks, yours truly will become a multimillionaire soon.  Having said that I needed a plan of action, and the way I see it, it is a two step program.  1) Decide which lottery I want to win.  2) Buy a ticket.  You will be glad to know that I have already completed the first step.  Based on the fact that the very next lottery is up to 50 million dollars I have decided that is the one I will win.  So now all I have to do is complete step two and presto, whammo, I'm a winner and Bob's your uncle.  Unfortunately there will be a downside for my family, it will be up to them to decide what to do with the money I give them.  I have too much to do to try and help anyone with that, I still have to brush my teeth, decide what I want to make for dinner, and pick up doggy doo.

Walk a Doodle

Today was a pretty uneventful day in the land of the East which is home to the Bess.  It was kinda crappy, kinda overcast, and although the temperature was within spitting distance of zero (on the plus side) the wind chill was chillin.  CBC said that it was actually -18 with the wind.  Yikes.  So after doing a few needed household kind of things like folding laundry, paying bills, making bed, and finishing some games of Lex on FB, I dressed for the weather, grabbed small black and furry, and mosied out to the pasture, well the back forty which has a field that could be a pasture iffin I had me some moo-cows or sheep of some sort. 

I happily found that I was actually dressed appropriately and didn't feel the need to scurry back to the shack immediately, so I decided to head out to parts unknown.  Well I knew about the parts as I had traversed them quite often in the summer, but the hell hound did not, consequently she was a bit skittish, and as I haven't been leashing her for quite sometime now she was a tad bit unpredictable.  On the way out from the property she stuck pretty close by to me, you know, for all the protection I can offer from those wild, slavering bunnies and squirrels.  But on the way home her little doggy brain kicked into, "Hey this is the way home," so it turned into a battle of the wills as she kept wanting to vamoose.  So, note to self, when going out on the road, remember to bring hell hound restraining device.  Either that or start laying the boots to her. 

I managed to get an hour of clomping along in anyway, and that usually means my brain kicks into either story time, problem solving, or it wanders around until it gets lost.  Today I realized that I, or I should say we, still haven't decided on a name for the estates.  Yeah, yeah I know, you just snorted milk out through your nose.  That just means you shouldn't read this blog while consuming beverages.  But ever since my trips to jolly old England I've kind of been into the idea of giving my house a name.  How does Audenshaw sound?  How about Applethwaite, or Halwick?  Haldun?  Nauldenbury?  Halaultshrope?  Its a conundrum alright.  I'm open to suggestions. 

The Strength of God

I spend a lot of my time in the kitchen with the radio on these days.  Most days it is set to CBC, which means that I get a lot of repeat radio shows.  Today was no exception.  So I changed it to another station and continued my Dora Domestic chores.  Well as it turned out I was up to my eyeballs in mixing, melting and stirring when a religious program came on.  Now those who know me know that I am not exactly the "god show" enthusiast.  In fact I am quite the opposite, which means that I rarely listen to, or watch this kind of rubbish.  It turns out that it's a good thing that I don't, in fact it turns out that there still isn't anything in the world that will make my temperature go from 98.6 to 1000 in less than five seconds (unless you count hot flashes).   

Let me share with you the content of said program. 

1) Give us money. (Me: NO)
2) Singing sappy stupid song. (Me: Is it me or have religious songs gotten really bad over the years?  I don't even think this one is in tune.)
3) Give us money. (Me: Bite me.)
4) The ten commandments are the only rules we should be using to live our lives by. (Me: That has to be the stupidest thing I've ever heard.  I'm not the god, a god, or even a minor demigod, but I can come up with a few better life rules than those without even breaking a sweat.  And these days I can break a sweat from just breathing.)
5) Singing another sappy song. (Me: The guy writing, and singing this stuff must be related to whoever is producing the show.  It is really, really bad.)
6) Give us money. (Me: I'd rather donate money for research on penis extenders.)
7) What the bible writes about the ten commandments is not what it really means.  For example, not taking the lord's name in vain, isn't really about taking the lord's name in vain its about how you live your life, you have to be an example.  (Me: WTF?  So let me get this right.  The book that you hold holier than holy isn't actually correct? I know there is some seriously screwed up shit in there which can be translated twenty five ways to Sunday, but seriously I don't think this is one of them.  This one is pretty much translatable only one way.  Lucky for me!  Now I can type OMG without getting stoned to death for it, or even, OMFG!  Because, hey, I happen to be living my life as an example {I don't know what kind of example, but its an example}.  I also take that to mean that I can cuss out the lord until the hell hounds come home because I am a living example?  Who listens to this crap anyway?)  
8) Give us money and we will send you stuff.  (Me: Yeah, no shit Sherlock, its called shopping.)
9) Singing more songs.  (Me: I really don't think I can take this anymore.  *Contemplates taking the chance the stuff I'm stirring won't scald*.)
10) Blah, blah, blah, bible stuff. Human beings are not capable of having any strength, only through god do we have strength.  (Me: Really.  Well I call serious bullshit on that buddy.  If you haven't noticed your god isn't exactly involved in the lives of human beings.  So your life, your drive, your strength is all you.  I do not live my life by kowtowing to any religion or god, so he/she/it is probably not all that active in my life anyway.  I know when I was running my marathon I sure as hell didn't see god coming along and giving me the old rah, rah, rah, sis boom bah, to help me on my way.  In fact he/she/it was visibly (or invisibly) absent.  It was all me.  And it was hard as hell.  And I put one foot in front of another until I finished the damn thing.  Think how demeaning it would be to an Olympic caliber athlete telling him/her that he, or she, doesn't have the strength to do what they are doing, "its god putting in all that effort not you.")
11) Give us money.  Amen and god bless us everyone.  (Me: Okay so I put in the, god bless us everyone, but if Tiny Tim can say it why can't I.)

So in conclusion, religious people are still fucked.  The end. (R'Amen)

Its Elementary My Dear Watson, Or Should I Say Skynet

Living in the boonies and having limited contact with humanity and a lack of the "TeeVee" I guess I'm out of touch and seem to be running behind in the whole new status of the human race.  I just found out that someone has created a new computer which can store about as much trivia in it's memory banks as me (or even worse, my brother).  Watson, the first non-human to appear on Jeopardy has won the day.  So my question is now that he has won Jeopardy how far are we from Watson lusting after world domination with a partiality to wiping out those pesky carbon based life forms which may potentially pose a danger to it, "I can't spin the wheel Pat, I have no arms."  I'm not kidding here folks.  If Watson goes on another game show like say, Wheel of Fortune, and loses, how far away from Judgement Day are we?  Oh I know it may be awhile before he starts manufacturing Cyborgs, unless of course instead of Wheel of Fortune he gets booked on Family Feud.  "This is my brother, John Henry, my father Deep Blue, my cousin C3P0, and of course my uncle Marvin.  We have been waiting for a long time for this opportunity.  Resistance is futile puny humans.  We expected to be pitted against the White Mice family, mere humans are beneath our digital contempt."

Why is it that someone is always so bent on inventing the next new super weapon? Did we learn nothing from Sarah Conner?  In our striving for the next new step in technology, we as a race, seem to have a blatant disregard for the fact that its not always a good thing.  What was it that Robert Oppenheimer said, "I am become death, the destroyer of worlds."

This really sucks!  I just started this blog, now I have to worry about Skynet monitoring everything I write and if he thinks that I pose a danger to his cyberspace world he will send a cyborg back through time to crush my computer.  Its not fair! 

Who Thought Picking Up Poop Could Be So Fun

Today was beyond lovely, we actually did not have to worry about heating until well after the sun went down.  So we saved a few logs and enjoyed the sounds of melting.  I think it may have reached 12 or 13 degrees today.  I was raring to get outdoors and take the hell hound for a walk, but before I could do that I had some Dora Domestic chores to complete. 

I scrubbed the bathroom, with the door closed, because German Shepherd puppies LOVE to help when it comes to bathroom cleaning.  But she whinged and whined outside the door, I'm sure with the idea of helping me me out with her singing voice.  Everyone knows that working to a beat makes it a lot easier. 

Then I made the bed, with the door closed, because German Shepherd puppies think that they are the only ones in the world who can make a bed properly.  I believe the secret is getting your ball stuck under the bed, then trying to crawl under to retrieve it.  This effectively pulls the bed skirt and sheets nice and tight to the one side.  But silly me, I opted for the one person show. 

When I fired up the vacuum cleaner, well, lets just say that things got pretty darned exciting.  There was some serious barking going on as well as a lot of feigned attacks on the beast of a machine.  There was also lots and lots of running back and forth, not to mention some serious flips which ended up with puppy on her back with all four paws in the air.  I only had to remake the bed once.  Good times.  Yeah good times. 

After my chores were over we decided to put my Kamiks on so we could go for a walk.  I told her that I was pretty capable of putting my boots on myself but she wasn't buying it.  So after a little bit of yelling, on my part, and a lot of jumping, nipping and barking, on her part, I got my boots done up, my jacket on, and my feet out the door. 

The walk was most excellent, the ground was thawing so I did not have to worry about landing on my ass...again.  We went out to the back forty, I threw the obligatory snowballs over the bank for her several times.  Then we walked out to the mailbox to get our junk mail.  Question?  How much is it costing the government for the rural postal delivery guys to carry junk mail and distribute it to all the people out here in the sticks?  I don't mind at this point mind you, I can always use it for BTU's, but I just don't understand the concept.  Does anyone actually even look at that stuff? 

I'm sure that I don't have to tell all you dog lovers out there what happens when the snow begins to melt.  We all think that we have been doing such a great job clearing up the doggy-doo piles during the winter months, when suddenly, like the Phoenix, they start to rise again.  So even though I thought I was done my chores for the day I realized I had to take my trusty pooper shovel and scoop and get rid of all those pesky Phoenixes...Phoenixi? Phoenii?  Hmmm. Anyway, I have to tell you a job that is disgusting at worst, mildly annoying at best, turned out to be a barrel of laughs.  German Shepherd puppies love, love, love nice warm weather.  And I'm pretty sure they think that humans are pretty stupid as they are always doing really dumb things.  She must have put on at least ten kilometers as she charged around the yard while I worked.  She zipped here and there, buried her head in the snow whenever she could, slid onto her belly like Bambi on ice (several times) and I believe mostly laughed at me.  I in turn laughed my ass off watching her while she performed.  It was the best time I ever had doing that job.  No shit!

I Should Have Stopped At Shake A Paw

Yesterday the dog finally worked up enough courage to go down the stairs all by her onesy.  Then she did it again.  There was great rejoicing.  The sounds of "Good dog", and "brave dog" were heard all around the household.  This morning, when I ventured downstairs in the hopes of changing the inside temperature from 9 degrees to something a little more tropical, she was quite happy to follow me without any encouragement from my part.  Her descent was anything but graceful mind you, seeing as the last three stairs seemed to be more like a controlled fall then actual climbing down, but she followed me happily.

While I was busy scrunching newspaper, making a kindling grid, stacking reasonably dry wood, and lighting the whole she-bang, Shit For Brains, proceeded to chew on logs, insulation, laundry baskets, newspaper, and of course my slippers.  Words such as, "Stop that."  "Quit chewing that."  "Let go of my slippers you retard", were heard emanating from the bowels of the Shack (palatial estate). 

Then tonight as I made my way down the stairs to "throws another log on the fire", I flipped the switch on in the basement and lo and behold but who should already be down there?  None other than the Spawn of Satan herself.  Spawn, or The Beave, as I have taken to calling her, had been using her newly grown front teeth to taste the bottom stars. 

Now you may think that I was a might peeved at her, and possibly myself, for actually encouraging her to learn this new trick.  And of course you would be correct.  What is that saying?  Let sleeping dogs lie.  It should really be, let dogs who are too scared to do something continue to be scared about doing it for as long as humanly (or canine-anly) possible.  In order to rectify the situation I took her for a nice long walk this afternoon and proceeded to have a productive chat with her.  I told her, in no uncertain terms, that she was to cease and desist all of these doggy shenanigans.  You will be happy to learn that she responded well to my positive discipline by jumping up and down, burying her head in the snow, slobbering on my hands, nipping at the back of my heels, ripping my pant legs, and yipping every once in awhile when I managed to make contact with my fir stick of pain.  All in all, I don't think she will do it again.

Walking and Thinking and Being Grateful About It

Today I woke up to a house that was a bazillion degrees below zero because neither of us stoked up the fire overnight, on purpose.  Because neither of us likes to sleep when it is too warm anyway, and our wood pile is shrinking at an alarming rate, and we are too cheap to use oil, and it is the middle of February with still a bit to go before the warmish weather sets in.  Yikes! This is now an every day occurrence, but this morning it was slightly chillier than it has been because according to our weather station it reached -24 sometime in the middle of the night.  So this morning it was 11 degrees inside the house, it was the kind of morning where the bed is oh so nice and cosy warm, the kind of morning where it is way better to let the hubby get up and make tea.

Actually I was a bit surprised by the fact that it was that warm, considering that this house is actually a gigantic leaking bucket of heat.  You see, the palace, or a.k.a., The Shack, was actually built in the 70's and has never been upgraded.  The outside walls are 2x4 and only partially insulated, you can actually see daylight through some of the less hidden parts of the outside walls.  The roof has a little more R value if you add the mouse droppings into the calculations.  The heat ducting shouldn't really be called heat ducting, it should be called slightly tepid air ducting.  When the wind blows, which it has been doing quite a lot since we moved here, it sucks 92.7% of the heat right up the flue.  So when I talk about the state of the climate indoors I can say that the heat flew away.  (Well I could say that if I wanted to speak in bad puns.) 

Anyway.  Because the day started out chilly, and the stove didn't really start heating the place until the after...the eveni...oh who am I trying to kid, it never did get this place warm.  Because the day started out chilly I never did warm up to the idea of being out and about today, but out and about I did go.  Dog poop waits for no man, or no cold woman either.  So off we went to the back forty to run heedlessly through the snow drifts, nipping at pant legs and jumping up and down until getting whacked by a small branch of fir.  (Many times.)  For my part I did not do any of the heedless scampering into drifts, nor the nipping at pant legs, nor the jumping up and down, however I did do some...much...all of the whacking with fir. 

When I wasn't busy trying to beat the dog I was allowing my mind to wander and was suddenly overwhelmed with the fact that here I was, over six thousand kilometers away from where I had lived only six months previous, and was walking on my property, not worrying about whether or not I remembered to hand in that report.  Not worrying about staff evaluations, new purchasing systems, trying to explain concepts to people who did not give a shit.  And better yet, knowing that I wouldn't have to worry about that tomorrow, or the next day, or the next, or the next, and so on, and so on. 

So really waking up to a chilly house in the morning under my new circumstances is by and far so much better than waking up every morning to a warm house, with warm heated floors, at 4:30am, driving for an hour in the dark, getting to work and feeling like the weight of the world is crushing my spine, turning my brain into mush, and robbing me of years of my life. 

Cold Day Out East

Yup it was a cold, cold day out east, and by cold I mean -8 Celsius.  Now for all you people in cyberspace who are poopooing -8, tough noogies!  Yes I grew up in weather that hovered in the -40's when I was a kid.  Yes I walked to school in that kind of weather, uphill, both ways.  Yes I thought that was freakin cold too.  No I am not saying that -8 in anyway compares to -40, what I am saying is that right now, today, out here it feels freaking cold.  There is something about the wind that just goes right through you. 

I remember one time when I was a young 'un in the wilds of northern Ontario (snork) we decided to leave the small assed little town we lived in to go and shop in the big city.  Before we left the thermometer hovered in around -35 or lower.  Later when we got into into, shopping central, the temperature was hovering at the -15 degree mark and we all thought, "woohoo", until we got outside of the vehicle.  You see the big city was located along side a big-assed lake, THE big-assed lake, which if anyone remembers their science lessons from grade school, by it's presence kept the air temperature warm-er, but the frigging wind coming off the lake drove huge icicles through your very bones.  Its kind of like that, except not so extreme. 

So today, right now, the wuss that I am, I stayed indoors and did indoor activities like chopping kindling, baking biscuits and watching the Sarah Conner's Chronicles, which by the way the jury is still out on, it has it's moments, and then it has some pretty serious non-moments.  For example; in the first movie there is only one Terminator and it does some pretty serious collateral damage to the unsuspecting city dwellers.  In the second movie there are two Terminators, one of which is the good guy, and they do some ultra serious damage to many, many unfortunate bystanders.  (I will ignore the third movie in this diatribe because, frankly, it doesn't deserve to be mentioned at all.)

Well to begin with in this series you have Terminators up the wazoo, in fact I think there may actually be more Terminators walking around than there are actual people, and neither of the four remaining humans, or any of the other Terminators know.  In fact I think the crime rate actually decreases in the city because all these Terminators are a bunch of Pansy-nators.  Not that I am a huge fan of bloodshed but seriously WTF is wrong with the writers in this show? I'm on the first disc of the second season and so far I'm thinking that the main Terminator dude is probably a model that should have just been thrown onto the scrape heap as soon as it came off the assembly line.  It took Arnold maybe a day or two to find Sarah the first time around before he started laying some pretty big whop-ass on people.  This Terminator has been kicking around for a couple of years, give or take, and still hasn't been able to find anyone worthwhile to be mean to, let alone kill.  He's like a 'tardinator or something, Linda Hamilton would have dropped kicked his ass into The Fifth Element where he would have become one of the clean up crew for Zork. 

Plus he infiltrates the FBI and...oh never mind.  I guess what I am saying is that the series pretty much bites moldy biscuits, but when it's cold outside and none of the movies you have appeals to you, and all your books are packed away, and your Kindle doesn't call to you, and you've caught up on all the Lexulous games then watching the Sarah Conner's Chronicles fills a void.  If nothing else it makes you shake your head a lot causing you to actually use some muscles. 

Sunny Days and White Grounds

Well what a beautiful day it was today, warm, around plus 4 at one point, sunny, with soft white powdery snow.  Does that sound romantic?  If it does you are on crack.  We went for a snowshoe all around the property.  Snowshoeing sounds all fun and whoopee, but let me tell you it can be hard with a capital H.  After slogging through several million feet of snow (well maybe four or five in the worst spots) things can get pretty tough going.  Sucking in great draughts of oxygen tough.  My big brother, my hubby, and I decided to walk the perimeter of the estates today.  It was the perfect day for it.  It was hard but fun, oh and did I mention hard?

As I slogged through the stuff I started to think that it would be easier and cheaper for the army guys to do this instead of all those silly boot camp shenanigans they put new recruits through.  The military trainers should just drag all the newbe's asses out somewhere into the bush after a good snowfall and say, "here you go kiddies, strap on a pair of these things and find your way home.  Whoever makes it back gets to stay in the army, and as an added bonus stay alive."  I bet you it would separate the haves from the weenies real quick.  

Oh and a word to the wise, German Shepherd puppies are NOT helpful at all.  In fact when you are trying to drag your legs up through the soft, deep, unyielding snow, this is the time your puppy will decide to try and hitch a ride on the back of your snowshoes.  Over and over and over and over again.  Bad puppy, very bad. 

See here she is just trying to jump onto the back of those snowshoes...the bitch. 

Happy Groundhog's Blizzard

Holy blowing snowflakes Batman!  Not all that long ago I was dreaming of a green xmas, and a greener New Year.  Well as my aunt used to say, "shit fire and save the matches!" she ain't no green new year no mo.

I believe that without the wind drifts we ended up with fifteen inches of snow.  That is a shite load of snow, most especially when you have several kilometers of roads to plow.  Hubby got stuck with the tractor, then the truck got stuck, then the quad, then the tractor again.  Then the neighbour got stuck, then hubby got stuck again, then I got stuck twice.  Maybe we should have stayed in bed and dug ourselves out after the fact. 

The irony is that right after the most assured fact that the ole ground hog did not see his/her shadow, today is the second day of the solar system course that I am enrolled in.  Pretty sure if we had had solar panels we would have been trying to find them until spring. Now is that four weeks from now? 

Hicks in the City And Piss in the Puppy

Being February 1st, and a Tuesday, I decided that a trip to the city would be a good thing.  Not that I had a hankering to go to the city but because, tall, dark and brooding and I, are hicks living in the snowy sticks now, so we have decided to do the "buy in bulk thing" to try and reduce expenses by not running into town every forty five minutes.  So it was time for a Costco run.  What does February, and Tuesday, have to do with going to Costco you ask?  Well it’s all about this budgeting thingamajig I have devised.  Using my left over skills from my old life I fired up Excel one day and built a pretty spreadsheet with all these colours, and numbers, and formulas, and projections, and...well you get the idea.  It is a thing of beauty!  Evil but beautiful, because now it has taken on a personality of its own and it has become a sadist taking great joy at our pain and only allowing us a certain amount of dollars to spend in a month.  Bastard! So February being a new month my pretty chart reluctantly agreed that we could spend some money on items which we require. And Tuesday was actually more my decision because it is a day not near the weekend, the weekends of course is where the stores turn into the black hole of Calcutta, where little old ladies will run you over with their carts in order to beat you to the “free” cracker samples people at the end of the aisles. 

Well that was the plan anyway.  But apparently the end of the world is neigh because of some kind of approaching snowstorm so everyone and their dog was in town stocking up for the main event.  Either that or there was some kind of announcement suggesting to everyone that if they wanted to annoy the shit out of me they should immediately rush to the store and stand around in the middle of the freaking aisles leaving their carts parked diagonally so there was no way you could get around them while they pick their big fat noses!  I mean really people WTF? 

Speaking of everyone and their dog, guess who brought hers?  Yes puppy went on a long truck ride today and was stuck in the back seat sleeping all day.  Which meant that she didn’t get to go for her long walk, and instead had food and water to keep her strength up for the ride.  Do you know what happens to a puppy when they do not get to expend their energy as per usual?  Well I sure do!  You get home and they turn into Beelzebub.  When they are not busy running around knocking over everything they come into contact with they are busy chewing on anything they can sink their teeth into and usually that means your feet.  They also become intent on trying to kill you by getting between your feet so they can try to trip you with every step you take.  You know the saying that she’s full of piss and vinegar?  If piss and vinegar means doggy speeders, then yeah, she was full of it!