Sunday, February 26, 2006
Weekend to End Breast Cancer
Just a short post - Paula has done a mad thing and signed up to take part in a big sponsored walk called 'The Weekend to End Breast Cancer'. This 60km (yes, you did read right!) will take place in Calgary on the last weekend in July, and all of the proceeds from the Calgary walk will benefit the Alberta Cancer Foundation. The Foundation is a charity that supports research, and many different facets of cancer care and treatment. They don't only fund breast cancer stuff, but the money that they raise from the Weekend to End Breast Cancer walk allows the Foundation to free up funds to support work in other cancers. In Alberta, they support research projects, fund a palliative care programme, provide financial assistance to families that are in trouble because their main breadwinner is sick, are involved in screening programmes and help support psycho-social care programmes.
So after several weeks of dithering around, a work colleague and I decided to sign up. I have made a commitment to raise $2000, and those of you who know me well, will know that I'm not too good at asking people for money. However, I believe that this is a worthwhile cause, and I'm looking for sponsors!
If you're interested in supporting the cause (and interested in seeing whether I can manage to walk 60km over two days), please click on Weekend to End Breast Cancer, then click on sponsor a participant, put in my name (and visit my lovely homepage), and click in the box entitled 'Donate here'. Any amount will be very gratefully received!
P
(1) comments
So after several weeks of dithering around, a work colleague and I decided to sign up. I have made a commitment to raise $2000, and those of you who know me well, will know that I'm not too good at asking people for money. However, I believe that this is a worthwhile cause, and I'm looking for sponsors!
If you're interested in supporting the cause (and interested in seeing whether I can manage to walk 60km over two days), please click on Weekend to End Breast Cancer, then click on sponsor a participant, put in my name (and visit my lovely homepage), and click in the box entitled 'Donate here'. Any amount will be very gratefully received!
P
Wednesday, February 22, 2006
Snow Day
Hello and here is today's weather report from Tuscarora Weather Station #48:
As you know, we've been having an unseasonably warm winter and it only finally got really cold (-40) for a couple of days last week. This week has been warm (0 to -10) and clear until this morning... The weather forecast on the tea-time news said "a few mild flurries overnight", but when the snow came it turned out to be a wee bit more than that:
Our garage door has been malfunctioning, and as we were getting it fixed today (it needed a new big spring), the Jeep was on the outside when the snow came:
There was traffic chaos all over the city, with radio warnings of a "Heavy Snowfall Warning" and reports of accidents all over. Locals were on CBC radio saying they hadn't seen snow like this in February in living memory! The traffic was awful - people were taking 2 hours to make journeys which would normally take 20 minutes! There was a "tow-ban" on the Transcanada highway - i.e. the RCMP weren't letting tow-trucks go and pull cars out of the ditch in case the tow-trucks ended up in the ditch too! So they were telling people to stay with their cars and be patient! Calgary is well known among Canadian cities for not bothering with silly things like snowploughs or gritters - in Edmonton, they say that the offical policy of the Calgary Roads Service when it snows is to put the kettle on and wait for the next Chinook!
We weren't too bad, as we had nowhere vital to be for the start of the morning, so we decided to wait a wee while until the worst was over. P was initially considering going on public transport, but she came back again after waiting for 20 minutes in the snow with no sign of the bus! We ended up having breakfast at home and then she braved the roads in the Honda and made it to work for about 10 o'clock. I was doing Masters work at home and was waiting in for the Garage Door Doctor, so I was at home when it really started to snow...
I brought the Jeep back indoors after trying to get some of the snow off it, with limited success:
I did manage to get a lot of the snow off, but a lot of it did seem to end up on me!
I did take a trot across the road to the postbox when the snow was coming down at its heaviest, and I found couldn't see the house from 30 feet away! And when I got back to the house, I couldn't see the end of the street anymore - you can see how people can lose their bearings in a blizzard!
A lot of the cars in the street were more or less buried in the snow:
You can see how much was coming down by looking at how much snow ended up on our deck rail:
In all, we got somewhere between 10 and 15cm of snow today. This morning they were estimating 2-4cm, but we think they looked out the window and revised the forecast accordingly! I ended up shovelling the drive and the street twice - the first time it was easy, just a light dusting of our usual 'icing sugar' snow, and I cleared the drive and also the sidewalk all the way up to the end of the street (up to the bus stop, if you know where that is!). Then it just kept on snowing and all my good work was undone, and I had to shovel again. This time there was much more snow and it was a good bit heavier, so I just did the drive and our own sidewalk before I got a hernia!
We went for a walk later just to see how deep the snow was:
Up to my knees in a snowdrift (I have snow-boots on, but you can't see them!)
P also took some nice pics of snowy trees:
The weather forecast is for more snow tomorrow and Friday, and more freezing temps at the weekend. Looks like we're going to get some "cold + snow" for a few more days. It's like Canada is trying to show us what it's really going to be like if we do decide to stay on!
Love from the snowy North
J&P
(0) comments
As you know, we've been having an unseasonably warm winter and it only finally got really cold (-40) for a couple of days last week. This week has been warm (0 to -10) and clear until this morning... The weather forecast on the tea-time news said "a few mild flurries overnight", but when the snow came it turned out to be a wee bit more than that:
Our garage door has been malfunctioning, and as we were getting it fixed today (it needed a new big spring), the Jeep was on the outside when the snow came:
There was traffic chaos all over the city, with radio warnings of a "Heavy Snowfall Warning" and reports of accidents all over. Locals were on CBC radio saying they hadn't seen snow like this in February in living memory! The traffic was awful - people were taking 2 hours to make journeys which would normally take 20 minutes! There was a "tow-ban" on the Transcanada highway - i.e. the RCMP weren't letting tow-trucks go and pull cars out of the ditch in case the tow-trucks ended up in the ditch too! So they were telling people to stay with their cars and be patient! Calgary is well known among Canadian cities for not bothering with silly things like snowploughs or gritters - in Edmonton, they say that the offical policy of the Calgary Roads Service when it snows is to put the kettle on and wait for the next Chinook!
We weren't too bad, as we had nowhere vital to be for the start of the morning, so we decided to wait a wee while until the worst was over. P was initially considering going on public transport, but she came back again after waiting for 20 minutes in the snow with no sign of the bus! We ended up having breakfast at home and then she braved the roads in the Honda and made it to work for about 10 o'clock. I was doing Masters work at home and was waiting in for the Garage Door Doctor, so I was at home when it really started to snow...
I brought the Jeep back indoors after trying to get some of the snow off it, with limited success:
I did manage to get a lot of the snow off, but a lot of it did seem to end up on me!
I did take a trot across the road to the postbox when the snow was coming down at its heaviest, and I found couldn't see the house from 30 feet away! And when I got back to the house, I couldn't see the end of the street anymore - you can see how people can lose their bearings in a blizzard!
A lot of the cars in the street were more or less buried in the snow:
You can see how much was coming down by looking at how much snow ended up on our deck rail:
In all, we got somewhere between 10 and 15cm of snow today. This morning they were estimating 2-4cm, but we think they looked out the window and revised the forecast accordingly! I ended up shovelling the drive and the street twice - the first time it was easy, just a light dusting of our usual 'icing sugar' snow, and I cleared the drive and also the sidewalk all the way up to the end of the street (up to the bus stop, if you know where that is!). Then it just kept on snowing and all my good work was undone, and I had to shovel again. This time there was much more snow and it was a good bit heavier, so I just did the drive and our own sidewalk before I got a hernia!
We went for a walk later just to see how deep the snow was:
Up to my knees in a snowdrift (I have snow-boots on, but you can't see them!)
P also took some nice pics of snowy trees:
The weather forecast is for more snow tomorrow and Friday, and more freezing temps at the weekend. Looks like we're going to get some "cold + snow" for a few more days. It's like Canada is trying to show us what it's really going to be like if we do decide to stay on!
Love from the snowy North
J&P
Monday, February 20, 2006
where did February go?
Well, here we on on 20th February 2005 - Family Day in the province of Alberta, Canada. We're having a quiet(ish) weekend after our trip to the provincial capital last weekend. P had a meeting to attend in Edmonton on Friday morning (10th February), and we decided that it was as good an opportunity as any to go and have a look at the property market. Of course, we're still not certain where we will be in July, but the Edmonton opportunity is starting to look more and more concrete (unlike the shambles that seems to be unfolding in the good old NHS). So, given that the weather can be slightly dodgy between here and Edmonton at this time of year, we decided to fly up and rent a car, rather than drive the 6 hour return trip. Of course, the weekend weather was absolutely lovely - warm, no snow, no black ice, no white-out conditions on Highway 2 between Calgary and Edmonton, so it would have been perfectly safe to drive, but you just never know... Sometimes, conditions in Calgary and Edmonton can be great, but there can be black ice around Red Deer, the first thing you know about it is large trucks lying in the ditch, having slid off the road...eeekk!
Anyway, up we flew and rented a car - the only thing they had left in the class we wanted was an electric blue PT Cruiser. Perfectly okay car, but in our minds it will forever be known as the "PT crap car", thanks to a conversation overheard in the SuperValue supermarket in Victoria, Carrickfergus a few years ago. We stayed in the Varscona Hotel in Old Strathcona - great wee hotel with complementary breakfast in the morning, complementary wine and cheese tasting in the evening, complementary newspapers and free high speed internet access in the room. They probably build it all into the price, but at $125 a night for a good room, in a hotel on a street with good restaurants, shops, cafes etc, it seems like good value to me.
This is the inukshuk outside the hotel...
The house viewing took place on Friday evening and most of Saturday, and I have to say, with a couple of half reasonable exceptions, we couldn't see ourselves actually living in most of the houses that they showed us. We thought we knew what we wanted, but having toured many small, badly renovated 1950s bungalows that were on the market for large sums of money in so-called desirable areas, we think that the criteria will have to be revised! In the past, it was deemed reasonable to buy a crappy house in a good area, and then do a full 'reno' (or knock it down and rebuild). Basically, these houses could have been bought for 'lot value' (i.e. the cost of the ground they were sitting on), and builders could have been hired within a reasonable amount of time to put up a modern house. Unfortunately, these days, builders are few and far between in Alberta, and taking this route could mean that you would have to live in a crappy house for a very long time. We did see a 'period house' (built 1916), which apparently had retained many of its period features (i.e. squeaky wooden floor, very dodgy wooden window frames with original glass, storm windows (the fore-runner of double glazing)), but all that did was to reaffirm that we want a modern house, with modern conveniences and something that is ready to walk into (how shallow!!). However, the modern houses that they showed us were about 40 minutes' drive from the hospital - not so good if you have to be on call for trauma ... Another strange thing is that houses built in the last year or so seem to be lacking a door between the master bedroom and the ensuite bathroom - brings a whole new meaning to a steamy bedroom!! Also, some of these doorless ensuites had a large doorless walk-in closet leading directly off the bathroom - wouldn't all the clothes get damp?? Didn't quite undertand that feature..... So, back to the drawing board ...
By the way, Orange-ism appears to be alive in Edmonton
Mind you, J was a bit perturbed...
We're not sure that good old Northern Ireland Orange-ism would be up for these kinds of activities...maybe it would help the political process if sashes and bowler hats were traded for roses between the teeth or yoga mats??
Doesn't that conjure up some wonderful images?
So, back in Calgary, our little warm spell got blasted out of the way with an Arctic outflow that brought a little bit of snow (only enough to be irritating), and absolutely baltic temperatures
Along with ice on the inside of the double glazed windows in the bedroom (reminds me of growing up in Greenisland - except that those windows weren't quite double-glazed).
The Honda had to stay outside because the garage door decided that it would only lift off the ground for 6 inches before stopping and refusing to go up any further. Our maintenance contact at the letting agency tried to tell us that the door was probably malfunctioning because of the cold, but funnily enough, it has warmed up again and it still doesn't work properly. Currently, it can only be opened and closed fully by disengaging the chain lifting mechanism and lifting the door manually. The door is really heavy, and unfortunately, if you lift it manually, it doesn't lock into position when its up - meaning that there is great potential for decapitation (or making a huge dent in the roof of the car). Hopefully they will send someone round on Tuesday to fix it. Actually I'm not surprised that it has ceased to function, as it is supposed to be serviced annually. If the other things in this house are anything to go by, it probably hasn't been serviced since it was installed, and I think that this house is getting to the stage where things are starting to wear out.
We have a new purchase - Mr White spent his 'Ralph bucks' on a remote control vacuum cleaner (honest!).
Our Ralph Bucks ($400 x 2)
This thing is about the diameter of a very large pizza and is just slightly thicker than a pizza box. When you turn it on, it can be programmed to trundle around the floor doing hoovering. We don't have video footage, but here are a few pictures of the i-Robot Roomba doing its thing...
Spot cleaning (note the concentric rings)...
On the move from carpet to the lovely lino...
Programme finished or battery going low - then head home to charge up again...
Safely home, charging up...
All we need now is something to mop and dust!
Love to our Families on Family Day,
P&J
(0) comments
Anyway, up we flew and rented a car - the only thing they had left in the class we wanted was an electric blue PT Cruiser. Perfectly okay car, but in our minds it will forever be known as the "PT crap car", thanks to a conversation overheard in the SuperValue supermarket in Victoria, Carrickfergus a few years ago. We stayed in the Varscona Hotel in Old Strathcona - great wee hotel with complementary breakfast in the morning, complementary wine and cheese tasting in the evening, complementary newspapers and free high speed internet access in the room. They probably build it all into the price, but at $125 a night for a good room, in a hotel on a street with good restaurants, shops, cafes etc, it seems like good value to me.
This is the inukshuk outside the hotel...
The house viewing took place on Friday evening and most of Saturday, and I have to say, with a couple of half reasonable exceptions, we couldn't see ourselves actually living in most of the houses that they showed us. We thought we knew what we wanted, but having toured many small, badly renovated 1950s bungalows that were on the market for large sums of money in so-called desirable areas, we think that the criteria will have to be revised! In the past, it was deemed reasonable to buy a crappy house in a good area, and then do a full 'reno' (or knock it down and rebuild). Basically, these houses could have been bought for 'lot value' (i.e. the cost of the ground they were sitting on), and builders could have been hired within a reasonable amount of time to put up a modern house. Unfortunately, these days, builders are few and far between in Alberta, and taking this route could mean that you would have to live in a crappy house for a very long time. We did see a 'period house' (built 1916), which apparently had retained many of its period features (i.e. squeaky wooden floor, very dodgy wooden window frames with original glass, storm windows (the fore-runner of double glazing)), but all that did was to reaffirm that we want a modern house, with modern conveniences and something that is ready to walk into (how shallow!!). However, the modern houses that they showed us were about 40 minutes' drive from the hospital - not so good if you have to be on call for trauma ... Another strange thing is that houses built in the last year or so seem to be lacking a door between the master bedroom and the ensuite bathroom - brings a whole new meaning to a steamy bedroom!! Also, some of these doorless ensuites had a large doorless walk-in closet leading directly off the bathroom - wouldn't all the clothes get damp?? Didn't quite undertand that feature..... So, back to the drawing board ...
By the way, Orange-ism appears to be alive in Edmonton
Mind you, J was a bit perturbed...
We're not sure that good old Northern Ireland Orange-ism would be up for these kinds of activities...maybe it would help the political process if sashes and bowler hats were traded for roses between the teeth or yoga mats??
Doesn't that conjure up some wonderful images?
So, back in Calgary, our little warm spell got blasted out of the way with an Arctic outflow that brought a little bit of snow (only enough to be irritating), and absolutely baltic temperatures
Along with ice on the inside of the double glazed windows in the bedroom (reminds me of growing up in Greenisland - except that those windows weren't quite double-glazed).
The Honda had to stay outside because the garage door decided that it would only lift off the ground for 6 inches before stopping and refusing to go up any further. Our maintenance contact at the letting agency tried to tell us that the door was probably malfunctioning because of the cold, but funnily enough, it has warmed up again and it still doesn't work properly. Currently, it can only be opened and closed fully by disengaging the chain lifting mechanism and lifting the door manually. The door is really heavy, and unfortunately, if you lift it manually, it doesn't lock into position when its up - meaning that there is great potential for decapitation (or making a huge dent in the roof of the car). Hopefully they will send someone round on Tuesday to fix it. Actually I'm not surprised that it has ceased to function, as it is supposed to be serviced annually. If the other things in this house are anything to go by, it probably hasn't been serviced since it was installed, and I think that this house is getting to the stage where things are starting to wear out.
We have a new purchase - Mr White spent his 'Ralph bucks' on a remote control vacuum cleaner (honest!).
Our Ralph Bucks ($400 x 2)
This thing is about the diameter of a very large pizza and is just slightly thicker than a pizza box. When you turn it on, it can be programmed to trundle around the floor doing hoovering. We don't have video footage, but here are a few pictures of the i-Robot Roomba doing its thing...
Spot cleaning (note the concentric rings)...
On the move from carpet to the lovely lino...
Programme finished or battery going low - then head home to charge up again...
Safely home, charging up...
All we need now is something to mop and dust!
Love to our Families on Family Day,
P&J
