Sunday, February 06, 2005
Back to the Snow
Welcome to February on Carrick to Calgary, the world's premier blog on moving from South-East Antrim to North-West Calgary. It's been a busy old week, what with one thing and another. The weather has changed again: the last couple of weeks of January were unusually warm, with temps up to zero and then a nice long Chinook period that took us up to nearly +20, which is well above average (normally -4!). This is all very nice for us, but the mild snap made all the snow and ice melt, which has put the ski resorts in a bit of a spot. Fernie in B.C. is badly hit, with brown slopes, and they've had to bus people across the border to Lake Louise to get them any skiing at all.
But it's been back to Business as Usual since Friday, with fresh snow all weekend and temps down to -17, -25 with the windchill. Not a lot of snow here (maybe 2-3 inches) but it's just coming down steadily, day and night. There's more in the mountains, so the ski people should be OK. We wish the weather would make up it's mind and maybe stick at a single figure temperature. You know - cold enough to keep the snow around, so we can go for our ski-ing lessons, but not so cold that your skin freezes and you have to wrap up like the Michelin man to go for a walk. We'll see what develops...
Anyway, we've been busy, with a trip out to Canmore at the weekend. We just wanted to see that the Rockies were like at this time of the year, and the answer is cold, brown and yellow. The plains between here and the mountains are a beautiful, barren yellow/brown colour and there's no green to be seen. And the sky is amazingly empty and blue...
The Rockies from the Road
The Jeep was running well with it's new battery, and we ended up stopping in Canmore for lunch at the Grizzly Paw micro-brewery and going for a walk around town. Canmore is right beside the Three Sisters mountains and the Rockies are right in your face no matter where you go in town. We took home a couple of six-packs of the local brews, Rutting Stag Red and Grumpy Bear, which we can recommend!
Got my beer!
Mountains in Canmore
We also took a swing by the Canmore Nordic Centre which is the best place to start cross-country skiing, we're told.
The working week has also been busy for me, as my Cancer Biology classes are in full swing and I have lots of preparation and reading to do for them, plus lots of operating, and I also gave a 'Big Talk' this week to the Grand Oncology Rounds at the Tom Baker Cancer Centre. This is a bit of a big deal, as the whole staff turns up to listen, and this week it was my turn, talking about how rectal cancer is treated here in Alberta. Luckily it went very well and my talk was well-received with a lot of good questions and some robust debate. I also talked about N.I. a bit and showed some nice pictures of home, so it was a bit of a laugh too.
My title
Cartoon from the talk
We've also been having some amazing sunrises this week:
and here's one from home (Milebush Park)
We've also been sent a few note-worthy images and links in the last few weeks which deserve a mention:
One of Rod Charlesworth's new paintings, called Look Out Below. Do we know anyone who skis like this?...
Tarantula Nebula from the Hubble Telescope
Name That Baby
The line between Day and Night (from the Columbia Space Shuttle)
New Recliner, Madam?
And finally a couple of surreptitious webcam snaps:
Obtained by pressing Apple-Shift-3 to take a screenshot at the right moment. We do have other ones of the local Northern Ireland supporters club (you know who you are, with your green wigs), and we'll destroy the image files for the right amount of money..!
And finally, for lovers of our Norn Iron language links, take a wee gleek at this...
Love
J&P
But it's been back to Business as Usual since Friday, with fresh snow all weekend and temps down to -17, -25 with the windchill. Not a lot of snow here (maybe 2-3 inches) but it's just coming down steadily, day and night. There's more in the mountains, so the ski people should be OK. We wish the weather would make up it's mind and maybe stick at a single figure temperature. You know - cold enough to keep the snow around, so we can go for our ski-ing lessons, but not so cold that your skin freezes and you have to wrap up like the Michelin man to go for a walk. We'll see what develops...
Anyway, we've been busy, with a trip out to Canmore at the weekend. We just wanted to see that the Rockies were like at this time of the year, and the answer is cold, brown and yellow. The plains between here and the mountains are a beautiful, barren yellow/brown colour and there's no green to be seen. And the sky is amazingly empty and blue...
The Rockies from the Road
The Jeep was running well with it's new battery, and we ended up stopping in Canmore for lunch at the Grizzly Paw micro-brewery and going for a walk around town. Canmore is right beside the Three Sisters mountains and the Rockies are right in your face no matter where you go in town. We took home a couple of six-packs of the local brews, Rutting Stag Red and Grumpy Bear, which we can recommend!
Got my beer!
Mountains in Canmore
We also took a swing by the Canmore Nordic Centre which is the best place to start cross-country skiing, we're told.
The working week has also been busy for me, as my Cancer Biology classes are in full swing and I have lots of preparation and reading to do for them, plus lots of operating, and I also gave a 'Big Talk' this week to the Grand Oncology Rounds at the Tom Baker Cancer Centre. This is a bit of a big deal, as the whole staff turns up to listen, and this week it was my turn, talking about how rectal cancer is treated here in Alberta. Luckily it went very well and my talk was well-received with a lot of good questions and some robust debate. I also talked about N.I. a bit and showed some nice pictures of home, so it was a bit of a laugh too.
My title
Cartoon from the talk
We've also been having some amazing sunrises this week:
and here's one from home (Milebush Park)
We've also been sent a few note-worthy images and links in the last few weeks which deserve a mention:
One of Rod Charlesworth's new paintings, called Look Out Below. Do we know anyone who skis like this?...
Tarantula Nebula from the Hubble Telescope
Name That Baby
The line between Day and Night (from the Columbia Space Shuttle)
New Recliner, Madam?
And finally a couple of surreptitious webcam snaps:
Obtained by pressing Apple-Shift-3 to take a screenshot at the right moment. We do have other ones of the local Northern Ireland supporters club (you know who you are, with your green wigs), and we'll destroy the image files for the right amount of money..!
And finally, for lovers of our Norn Iron language links, take a wee gleek at this...
Love
J&P
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