Carrick to Calgary

P here on a weather and Christmas update...


Well... its currently colder than most domestic freezers... quarter past four in the afternoon on new year's eve 2004, and here is what the in-out thermo clock is telling us...



Yes - you did read right - inside its a very comfortable +20.5 degrees C, while outside is currently a very uncomfortable minus 24 degrees C, forecast to drop to minus 29 degrees C this evening, with the windchill making it feel like minus 41 degrees C (according to the very hyponotic weather channel) - eeek!

The guys on the radio yesterday were saying that minus 18 degrees C is the critical point - below that, skin which is exposed to the elements begins to freeze within minutes, and if left long enough, can result in frostbite. They've told me at work that people just don't go out when its like this. They get in their cars (many of which have remote starters so that they get warm before you get in), drive to work or the mall, dash from the carpark into their destination building, do their business, dash back to the car and go home again. If you do feel the need to be outside for any length of time, you simply have to dress appropriately.

In my case, appropriate dress goes something like this:
regular underwear
thermal vest
M&S opaque tights
thermal longjohns (and fleecy trousers if intending on being out for more than 15 mins)
thick socks
trousers
long sleeved teeshirt
woolly jumper
Columbia jacket (consisting of heavy duty fleece zipped into windproof outer with hood)
thick mittens (much much warmer than Northern Irish gloves)
fleece hat with ear flaps (lifesaver as far as ears are concerned)
scarf (to wrap around chin, mouth and nose)
fur lined zip up leather boots (or Baffin snow boots if not going to work!)

For the uninitiated, this is the concept of dressing in layers, and its definitely required at the moment.

J has just come in from shovelling the drive and the sidewalk, and thankfully, even he has realised the error of not getting very wrapped up to venture out the door. You just can't get away with a short sleeved shirt at the moment!!

You know, when we got here, we were told that Calgary doesn't get much snow. Well, I suppose they don't - but this is only relative to places like Halifax in Atlantic Canada which got 50 centimetres on Boxing Day. We just seem to get little dribbles of snow on a fairly constant basis. Mind you, even these little dribbles can look like a lot when piled up in the supermarket carpark...




And even on the sides of the drive (and yes, there is grass under there somewhere - hard to believe at the moment)...




You know when people from 'away' (Canadian for 'not from here') come to Ireland, and rave about how green it is... I think I now know what they're getting at. There are days here when I look out of my office window, and it just looks like the whole landscape has been bleached. There's nothing green - everything is white, grey or some sort of shade of brown. Its particularly drab when the sky is overcast. The only saving grace is that often we get the most brilliant blue skies, and sometimes we get sun dogs. I haven't got a picture of sun dogs yet, but they are coloured, luminous spots caused by the refraction of light by six-sided ice crystals in the atmosphere. They look like bright spots on either side of the sun, at the same elevation as the sun. All very strange!



Anyway, now we're all up to date on the current weather conditions, it seems like a good time to tell you a little bit about Christmas. Luckily enough the weather was pretty good coming up to Christmas (great for all those Calgarians who have to drive for 7 hours to visit relatives in Saskatoon), and we were able to get out for a few walks around the neighbourhood. Some of the people in our neighbourhood went a little overboard on the outdoor Christmas light and decoration thing:








But the same evening, the sunset outdid everything that people had managed to do to their houses. How about these for amazing skies...








So... on to Christmas Day itself. Thank you again to everyone who sent presents and cards - all were very much appreciated, both in the wrapped...



and in the unwrapped forms...



We loved everything we received (especially the M&S pants!! - I do miss M&S!!)...

For the first time in a long time, we were due at someone else's house for dinner on Christmas Day (thereby breaking our usual anti-social habit of staying home). Richard and Emma had invited us to their house, and we were due to go about 1.30pm (a very early time to be up, washed and out on Christmas Day!). Emma came to collect us (and the turkey, carrots&sprouts, gravy, stuffed bacon rolls and wine), and we headed up the road to find Richard ready to make 'special Christmas cocktails'...hhmmmm...




J tried a 'Balalaika' - a vodka & lemon based thing, which unfortunately tasted like cold lemsip (possibly owing to the use of plastic jif lemon, rather than an actual fruit!), while I had something Cuban (rum, and stuff). J's cocktail was only saved by the liberal application of Sprite (although I think I might just have chucked it down the sink...). We then moved on to banana daiquiris (minimal alcohol and loads of cream and mushed up banana in place of banana liqueur) which were a vast improvement. While the turkey cooked in the afternoon, we spent the time eating cheese, dips, crackers, crudites, nuts, and playing games like Scattergories (write down 12 categories - e.g. boy's name, body of water, capital city etc, then pick a letter, and in two minutes, come up with something beginning with that letter for each of the categories), and that age old favourite, Consequences.

Here are a few pics of the day... (note Mr White's nice new Christmas shirt)...

Boys relaxing on the sofa




Christmas dinner table



Hannah wearing her granny's Christmas present





We had a little bit of a problem with a smoking oven setting off the very persistent smoke detectors (hard wired into the house so no batteries to remove...)

Richard trying to waft away the smoke...



And Emma's cousin, Lisa, trying to protect Benjamin's sensitive ears...




But eventually the turkey and the stuffed bacon rolls got cooked...






And Richard did his bit by trying to set the Christmas pud on fire




It was all rather nice, but we simply ate far too much... for people who don't usually have a starter to the Christmas dinner, and certainly never have Christmas pud and brandy butter, we did ourselves proud, but instead of walking home that night, we could have rolled home. Mind you (watch out - back to weather again - who says I'm obsessed?), we needed the insulation for walking home. Having started out as a beautiful day, we ended up walking home in a snow storm - our first white Christmas in a long time...

Having said that, even Rhanbuoy Close in Northern Ireland had a bit of a white Christmas this year. The following pics come courtesy of Denise and Roy (who were sensible and cooked only a bit of their turkey!)...

Snow in Rhanbuoy Close back garden...



with Her Majesty on the telly (didn't see it here in HM Commonwealth's Canada)



while the lady of the house displays the lovely turkey





All just lovely!!


A couple of days later, we headed off to walk in a local park (which to our shame, we have only just discovered...). Its down by the river, and has good walks, and also skating (for those who are interested in that sort of thing!). It was a beautiful day - a bit of ice on the edges of the river,,,



and some very mini ice-bergs in the river (honest!)






Yours truly ...



- it was a relatively warm day, so no earflap hat... (but about 4 layers of clothing all the same!)


Of course, Mr White, once he had seen all the other people skating on the frozen lagoon in the park,



decided he would have to give it a go too. You can rent skates for the princely sum of $5 for as long as you want them, so off he went...



Unfortunately, the lagoon being natural ice, rather than a nicely groomed rink, was a little bumpy in places, causing a little bit of staggering about (and one or two falls)..




but he got the hang of it eventually...




So there you go...all updated on the recent activities...

We're being very boring this New Year's eve (no change there then!), and have turned down an invitation from our Swiss-German friends to go to a theme evening in a restaurant tonight ($160 dollars EACH and fancy dress for the 1930's theme night vs staying in, cooking a nice dinner, and not freezing to death - no competition!!)...

Back soon

P