Each of my first three days off I went out for an hour or more. The first day, coming off my night shift, was with little energy, and I had to be careful with each step on the way home… as if trudging through a desert after days with no water.
The other two days went well. And yesterday was turkey day! Saw around ten of them, crossing my path and rushing to safety through the woods.
Side note, in light, fluffy snow, turkey tracks look like they were left by miniature cross country skiers.
Last night there was a combination of snow and freezing rain. This morning, I tackled my driveway… and my energy got zapped.
So I look out my window thinking it would be nice to get out there. Wishing the search out the turkeys once again or size up tracks of a fox. But if I feel tired and listless now, I’m not sure how it’ll feel a half hour in to a snowshoe. Let alone the half hour back.
I never do much of any hiking or snowshoeing during my four days of work, so I know if I don’t go today, I’m not going again before Monday. But after three straight snowshoes and an hour at the driveway, I’m thinking the old body could use the rest.
Speaking of the driveway, I’m pretty much at my limit with clearing that without help from the city in plowing the road. I think they’ve plowed once this entire winter. Maybe a second time while I was home for the holidays. But in all that time, snow mounds gradually edge out from driveways into the streets. I’d think, at this point in time, there is 3 to 5 feet of lost road.
So where, early on, I could throw excess snow out at the edge of the driveway, I’d literally be throwing it into the street now. A narrow, snow covered street. And with the freezing rain creating a crust on my already five foot mound where my lawn once lay, any snow thrown up there would simply slide straight back down from whence it came.
So really, I’m stuck. Anymore snow without prior melting or street widening will leave me with no real options beyond packing it down and driving over it.
Five weeks to Florida… can’t come soon enough.
Speaking of Florida, before now, I’ve never thought about having issues at the border. Before moving to Ottawa, all my border crossings occurred in the pre September 11th world. And since my move, I’ve always figured that a white guy who works with the RCMP would have very little issues at the border. And that has been true. And, I guess likely will remain true. But still, I now think about the scenarios at the airport.
I heard some talk of the US making all foreign visitors supply websites they visit as well as all of their cell phone contacts. I have nothing to hide on any of those fronts but I think it would be completely ridiculous to be asked to supply any of it. Not without good reason. And I can’t think what I’d do to cause that good reason to occur.
If Trump’s vision for America comes to be, I think the rest of the world can stop calling that country the Land of the Free. Trump’s America would become the Land of the Paranoid. Perhaps it will increase safety from terrorist threats. I’m not convinced it would but perhaps an argument could be made it will. But his vision promotes walls and a viewing of everyone around you with complete suspicion. In Trump’s America, freedom is a fantasy. It’s little more than an empty slogan.
Watched a bunch of movies on TV this week. One thing that becomes more and more solidified in my mind… Mad Max: Fury Road is indeed the greatest action movie of all time. I must have watched it at least seven or eight times at home. It’s become one of those movies where, when checking the guide, if you see it there, you can’t help but flip over. I think my favourite part of the spectacle is the vehicle that carries the beat of the bad guys. That is to say, for whatever reason, they have one vehicle in the entourage that seems to create the rhythm of the chase. Six big Japanese like drums on the back… one guy with a flame shooting electric guitar on the front… and a wall of speakers separating the two. It’s like the modern day version of the drummer on the back of Viking ships as the villains give chance across the desert.
Also, having rewatched Fargo… again… that’s for sure one of my top five movies. The characters and cinematography are both just incredible in that one.
And there isn’t much more to share this week. The length of this ramble, coupled with my general level of tiredness, doesn’t have me very creative either. So I’ll leave it with a picture of the turkey cross country trails.
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