Little Campsite on the Prairie
I spent the September long weekend (what the Canadians call the Labour Day holiday) camping at Blue Lakes with C, J, B, L, and the kids (6 of ’em in all!). It had it’s ups and downs, but overall I had a great time.
We got off to a slightly late start on Friday afternoon after having to run a few errands in town. The campsite is about 100km north of Dauphin or about an hour’s drive. We were camping on Manitoba’s only mountain that I saw in the distance on my train ride up. Part of the drive up involves a dirt road! I was once again fascinated watching the scenery out the window. The prairies that just never end and the endless blue sky.
B, L, and their kids had an adjoining campsite to ours, so we set up to cook and eat at our site. Unfortunately, the campsite had rules about the number of adults allowed to sleep on a site, so we couldn’t all sleep on one site. I borrowed a small tent from C, and with her help, put it up, and then we even managed to put up the large tent for C, J, and Baby C (J wasn’t joining us until later, as he had to work). L lent me an air mattress so I didn’t have to sleep directly on the ground, for which I was quite grateful. We finally got everything set up and got a campfire going for dinner.
We really were roughing it – Latreens for bathroom facilities, no showers (there were facilities, but it was a loonie for 5 minutes), and cooking over an open flame.
Friday night I noticed a lot of stars when I looked up….more than I’ve ever seen before. C suggested I walk out away from the campfire to see more, and K2 (B & L’s second oldest) came with me. We sat on a picnic table at an unused site and just looked up at the sky. We saw the milky way and all sorts of constellations I had only seen in books before. K1 and K2 (and B!) tried to convince me there were aliens and spaceships and when there was a moving star would say “hey look! aliens!”, but I’m not sure I buy that. I also saw several shooting stars that first night. Friday overnight was really cold and it rained. Unfortunately, I had to leave the warmth of my tent to find my way to the bathrooms around three in the morning.
Saturday morning was chilly, but fortunately it warmed up enough for us to go to the lake in the afternoon and go swimming. I had fun in the water with K1 & K2, playing catch and swimming. The kids discovered “sink sand” spots on the beach, and had fun getting sucked in up to their ankles in the sand before hopping out and then running into the lake to rinse off the sand.
Saturday overnight was chilly again. I was rolled in two blankets and I still was cold. Fortunately, I managed to get to the bathroom between rainstorms so I avoided getting wet.
Sunday, B & J took the kids fishing, so L, C, and I played Yahtzee and had a late lunch of blueberry pancakes. The kids came back in the afternoon because they got cold, and then in the late afternoon I learned how to play Canasta. I was partnered with B, and I didn’t know he was a card hoarder and we wound up losing because I went out while he was holding high cards! Whoops. Shortly after dinner, the downpour started. C, L, the babies, and I hightailed it into C & J’s tent where we all piled onto the bed and got under blankets to stay warm. I went and retrieved most of my belongings out of my tent in case it leaked, and for a while we thought I might have to sleep in their tent. The rain finally let up around 10:30, so I headed into my own tent and read by flashlight until I was tired enough to sleep.
Monday was miserable. It was pouring, and we had to do tear down! Of course, since most of us fled the screen tents the night before, everything had been left out overnight so we had to first clean up Sunday’s dinner. Taking down tents in the rain is no fun. Several times I got hit with water that had pooled on the top of one of the tents or tarps. We were all so cold and miserable, but we had to pack up! We finally had everything in the car and headed back to Dauphin.
I had to do four loads of laundry last night when I got home because I had to wash everything I had taken with me including my backpack and other bags because everything smelled like campfire. Then, I needed to wash the towel I used when I took my after-camp shower because it was gross and I added in some of the kitchen towels and the bathmats to make it a full load. Then, I was getting ready to re-make the bed and I discovered one of the cats had gotten sick all over one of the pillows and the sheets, so I had to wash the sheets AND a pillow.
I took a bath when I got home, figuring it was the best way to warm my body up and the best way to make sure I was clean. The bathwater was grey when I got out! EW! I made some soup for dinner, and then got into bed.
This morning I woke up with a sore throat and a stuffed nose, and now I have a headache. 🙁 But more soup, some zicam, some tylenol and a nap and I’ll be good as new.
Camping was fun, minus the rain. I think I’d probably be willing to go camping again…but only if we knew it wasn’t going to rain, and maybe with someone to share a tent with for warmth at night!
Photos:
My home for the weekend!
Blue Lake
Wildflowers. I love the purple centered daisies!
To see the rest of my photos from camping, check out my gallery:http://photos.beccajanestclair.com/winnipeg-manitoba-august-2008/camping-at-blue-lakes
And in other great news, my birthday package from my mom arrived and in it was my Nokia N810! She needs a name other than N810, so leave your comments with suggestions. It’s worth noting that my laptop is named Gwen, my external Owen, and my iPod is Tosh. I’m considering renaming the iPod Ianto though so I can name the N810 Tosh ;). This time, the package was never even opened by customs, so I have no idea why it took so long to get here.
Happy Birthday to Me!
Yesterday was my birthday. This wasn’t the first time I’ve not been home on my birthday (I wasn’t while I was in college or the year I turned 27), but this was the first year I wouldn’t have at least been with close friends or a boyfriend for it. Mom was sneaky – She e-mailed Sarah and asked her about getting a cake delivered, and Sarah suggested she contact C (and this was before C and I met). Mom and C conspired for me to have a birthday celebration at C’s house. Mom also contacted a lot of people I know (family, friends, past co-workers) and asked them to send me e-mail for my birthday, so I had e-mails coming in all day from people I haven’t spoken to in a while. My friends on facebook sent me a lot of messages, and several message boards I frequent had threads wishing me a happy birthday!
So far I’ve received cards from my aunt and Tim, though Tim’s package hasn’t arrived, and I know I at least have a few more cards that haven’t yet come through.
The nicest surprise yesterday was a flower delivery from the cats I’m catsitting with a note that they “promise not to try to eat the flowers and then puke”. hehe. Of course, as soon as I put them down they started munching, so I put the flowers in the shower (it has a door) for the weekend.
Over at C’s, she made me my favourite meal – Spaghetti. We even fed some (pureed) to Baby C. C also made a Cheesecake Pie, and B & L came over with their kids and the kids sang for me.
UPS package is “in transit”. The website says rescheduled for 2 September, but the woman I talked to on the phone seems to think it will be delivered today. I won’t be here though, so J is going to stop by and check for a package since he’s not joining us at the campsite until tonight.
Flowers from the cats (Sarah)
The “what did I just eat” look on Baby C.
Okay, we’re off to Blue Lake for some camping! I’ll be back on Monday, hopefully with lots of stories and pictures! I haven’t been camping in years, so this ought to be fun! (and if I get cold, L told me she’d have one of her kids come sleep with me in my tent. hehe)
UPS is Teasing Me…
We used UPS again for my birthday package since we can track it every step of the way.
I just checked, and here’s the stats on my birthday package:
In Transit – On Time
Scheduled Delivery: 29/08/2008
Shipped To: DAUPHIN, MB, CA
Shipped/Billed On: 25/08/2008
Service: STANDARD
Weight: 1.90 Lbs
So….not only is it scheduled to arrive the day *after* my birthday, it’s scheduled to arrive the day we leave for camping….which means I won’t actually be able to get it/open it until Monday….which also means it might sit outside with no one around…I *really* don’t like that. Does anyone know if I can call UPS and tell them to hold it until Tuesday, when I know for sure I’ll be home?
Good Food, New Friends, Lots of Fun
Yesterday I attended a Barbecue over at C and J’s. They also invited their friends L and B and their children, who I’ll just refer to as K1-K4. K1 is 7, K4 is 6 weeks old. Later on in the day, R and his wife (another)C showed up. J set up the kiddie pool for the bigger kids (as compared to the babies) to play in and C, L, and I made two fantastic hot dips and a cucumber salad. I don’t know what all goes in the Spinach and Artichoke dip, but I do remember what went into the broccoli dip, since I made part of it-
Ingredients:
1 packaged thawed chopped broccoli (we used fresh though)
1/2 cup roasted red peppers (we used fresh red pepper)
1 cup miracle whip
1/2 cup parmesean cheese
1 cup shredded mozzarella
mix it all together and put it in the oven at 350°F until bubbly and melted (15 minutes or so).
So yummy with some whole grain Tostidos. I made some Freezer pickles a few days before with part of the mountain of cucumbers C gave me. I couldn’t remember mom’s recipe, and she wasn’t online for me to ask her, so I looked it up online and sort of combined two recipes into one.
Ingredients
Thinly sliced cucumbers
Salt
1 cup sugar (I omitted this and used a few packets of splenda….should have used more!)
1 cup cider vinegar or white vinegar (I used white, and way more than a cup)
Diced onion (I used a leftover red onion Sarah and Joe left)
Dill or celery seed.
Put the cucumbers and onion in a bowl. Add a few tablespoons of water and some salt. Let sit for 2 hours. Drain, but don’t rinse. boil sugar and vinegar until the sugar has dissolved. Add dill (until it tastes the way you want it to) Combine it all into a freezer safe container. Freeze. In two days, you have pickles, or you can keep them in longer and get it out when you’re ready for them!
By omitting the sugar I made *really* tart pickles though, so I don’t really recommend doing that, or if you are going to do that, use more Splenda than just three packets!
We started being attacked by wasps, so we went indoors and the three older boys were watching DVDs. They picked “Enchanted”, which I hadn’t seen yet, so they invited me to watch it with them. I liked it, and the boys were cute in “spoiling me” (the plot was pretty predictable, so I had fun gasping at the appropriate places)
So, here’s some photos from yesterday…or not, because WordPress seems to not want to add photos today. *sigh* Photos later, then.
Okay, photos working now.
Baby C pets the kitten
K4 is only six weeks old. L calls this “burrito baby”.
K1 & K2 were “dissecting” a dead wasp.
C and Baby C
C’s cat, Luka, sitting in the grocery sacks
Hobbes, licking his lips after licking the dill off a chip…he kept begging for one, and Sarah told me if he kept it up to give him one to see what he would do…he just licked off the dill and left the chip on the floor!
Vegetarians on the Go
It’s hard finding food to eat while traveling. A simple road trip with friends can turn disastrous if you can’t find food for the vegetarian. I’ve made a few discoveries along the way that might make it easier for other vegetarians who travel:
- Turnpike Rest Areas – the PA, DE, MD, and NJ Turnpikes (and probably others too) all have Roy Rogers in most of their rest areas. Roy Rogers will sell vegetarians (or anyone else, really) a bun with cheese. Sometimes you need to call it a grilled cheese for them to realize what you’re asking for, but most of the time you can get this, and then load up on the veggies at the fixin’s bar (lettuce, tomato, pickle, and onions). Depending on the cashier, I’ve been charged for either a kid’s meal ($1.99) or a biscuit ($0.60) with cheese ($0.10).
- Burger King BK Veggie – in 2002, Burger King introduced the BK Veggie. When it was first introduced, it was cooked on the same grill as the meat burgers, but in 2004 Burger King changed their policies (and their burger) to microwaving the Veggie burger so it would not be cooked near meat. Because of their “have it your way” campaign, you can ask them to put lettuce, tomato, pickle, and onion on it as well.
- KFC Vegan Chicken – As of June 2008, KFC Canada is now offering vegan chicken. I haven’t yet tried this, but it’s apparently being offered at 300 of their 400 stores across Canada so far. I’m hoping I can try this before I leave, but I’m betting the Dauphin KFC doesn’t have it!
- A&W Root Beer Veggie Swiss Burger – What inspired this post was a trip today over to the mall. I needed milk, and I decided to stop in at the A&W for a root beer float. I was perusing the menu while I waited for my float, and I discovered they offer a Veggie Swiss burger on their menu. The combo meal is over CDN$7, the same price as a triple burger, but it also comes with a side salad, so you might even get to make two meals (or a meal and a half?) out of it. The Veggie Swiss is a veggie patty with Swiss Cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, and pickle.
- Subway Veggie Sub – I can’t forget this staple of my travel (and local!) diet. Subway will put whatever you want on the sub (provided they have it…for a while they didn’t have spinach, and then some shops took out tomatoes for a while) and you can even get it toasted. A 12-inch veggie sub is only $3.99, and you can always bring a cooler along and save half for later!
There’s plenty of other options too – Pizza, ordering breakfast at a diner (minus the bacon/sausage), or ordering a side salad, too. Unfortunately, there’s very little healthy choices for vegetarians at McDonald’s, Wendy’s, or Arby’s. McDonald’s sometimes has yogurt parfaits, but more often then not the store is out of them. At Wendy’s, the options are the taco salad (without the chili – give it to a meat eating friend), fries, or a frosty. And at Arby’s – well, they offer apple turnovers, mozzarella sticks, and curly fries. I have had luck with ordering a market fresh sandwich without the meat at some locations, but others have no idea what you are talking about.
I always make the mistake of not planning ahead for trips, but I’m getting better. On my flight up to Canada I packed myself a boxed lunch (I’m not sure I can call it a bento), and I plan on doing the same for the trip home as well as for my flight over to the UK. I haven’t started planning for the UK yet in terms of food, but Tim and I will manage. If we wind up eating pizza a lot, so be it. I could probably live off pizza anyway!
Johnny Appleseed
J IMed me this afternoon and asked me if I wanted to help C pick apples at her grandmother’s. Apparently C went over to pick apples while her grandmother is out of town and there was a whole bunch as well as loads of string beans and cucumbers, so she wanted some help. I agreed, so she came and picked me up.
Her grandmother’s apple tree is HUGE and a ton of apples had already fallen to the ground from the windy storm we had on Friday, but there were still so many left to pick that when we got back to C’s house to cut them up, we filled 2 gallon sized ziplock bags and one quart sized bag before we gave up for the night…and we still had a huge bagful of apples we didn’t cut, AND there was probably the same amount of apples that we picked on the ground around the tree!
The apple tree
Not pictured: a giant tubfull of cucumbers and a quart sized bag of string beans.
Our hands are stained brown from all the apple cutting we did tonight, too.
Tomorrow is a BBQ over at C and J’s…should be loads of fun! 😀
*edit* I was telling my mom about how chilly it’s been and how all the cats keep sleeping on the bed in such a way that I can’t get in with them, and she asked for a picture:
And last night, Hobbes decided getting stuck ontop of the fridge was a good idea:
Farmer’s Market? Sure, if you’re rich
This afternoon, C and I went to the “Farmer’s Market”. The first weird thing about this market is that it’s only open from 5PM to 8PM on Friday’s, and it’s in the Rotary Club building. But…okay. I figured it was later in the evening so more people could get to it. This is a small town, and probably most people work 9-5, so having market in the evening made sense.
Market, if you could call it that, was a joke. I think there were maybe 8 stands total, and at least three of those had or were baked goods stands, one was crafts, and one was used books (where, ironically, I spotted two Karen Kingsbury books!). The first stand had “Peaches and Cream” (white and yellow kernel) corn…$6/dozen. At home? I think the last time we were at market it was 12/$2.25. So right away, I knew this wasn’t going to be the type of market where I go with $10 and bring back a week’s worth of veggies. C and I did manage to get a bag of tomatoes for $5 that had about 20 small-to-medium tomatoes in it, and I bought some raisin bread and some cheese buns.
The best buy, though, was a Saskatoon Berry pie. C insisted that I had to try saskatoon berries since they are a local berry, so she bought a pie for us to have for dessert tonight. So good! Saskatoon berries sort of taste like a cross between a blueberry and a cranberry…actually, it reminded me a lot of the lingonberry. Apparently there’s a saskatoon berry farm near Dauphin, so C is going to check and see if it’s still saskatoon season and if we can go to get some fresh saskatoons. I’m just sad I won’t be able to bring any home to share with mom, but fruit can’t be taken into the Us :(.
I’m glad the raisin bread was only $2. There’s hardly *any* raisins in the bread at all, so really I might as well have purchased a loaf of white bread. The cheese buns are good though. I had to sample one tonight when I got home along with a slice of tomato on it. The tomatoes are alright, but not as tomatoey as local tomatoes. Being away for the summer, I missed out on my aunt’s “tomato man” (her neighbour) giving her tomatoes that she always passed on to us.
C had never been to market before, either, so we both came away disappointed, but glad we had checked it out.
14 and Raining (or 57 and Raining)
It’s a chilly, raining day today. Which is a nice change from the overly hot made-me-feel-like-I-was-down-South weather we had been having here. I was planning on walking down to the library, but not with this weather! Fortunately, I received my care package from my mom yesterday, so on this chilly day I can have Ramen soup mixed with some veggies and a nice cup of Swiss Miss.
Inspected by customs
My loot – iced tea bags, lemonade mix, ramen noodles, coffee singles, the Sunday paper, and two bottles of bodywash (not pictured)
The only thing missing today is my big U-M sweatshirt to snuggle up in, but since I didn’t pack it, I’m sort of out of luck with that.
Oh, and because this was cute:
Quincy, stretched out on the newspaper, with Lolly to the side.
he pulled Lolly over across him, though i did reposition her so she was face side up!
This afternoon I’m headed to the farmer’s market with C, so expect lots of photos later!
Why I Dislike UPS Right Now
My mom put together a package for me with some US-based food items I couldn’t find up here that I wanted – pizza dough, some powdered drink mixes, my favourite brand of iced tea, etc. I suggested she use UPS because I thought it might be cheaper since international postage seems to be skyrocketing lately (seriously, I sent a light manilla envelope to Tim before I left and it cost $14!).
She sent the package on the 15th, and was told I’d get it on Wednesday (today). My package made it all the way to Winnipeg by the 16th according to the online tracking, and I was sort of puzzled about that because if it was in Winnipeg….why was it going to take it four more days to get to me? I checked online a few days later, and the package was no longer in Winnipeg…it was in Minneapolis. Yep. Somehow, my package went to Canada then back to the US. Yesterday, it said the package was scheduled for being “on time”, but then a few hours later,it was listed as being in Winnipeg with an “exception”. UPS customer service have no idea what they are talking about and the person I spoke with had no explanation for me. Finally, the exception changed to “Pending clearing house”. Okay, that’s customs. Then, it was “Expired: Unable to resolve exception”. Again, I called UPS and the girl I spoke with didn’t know what that meant. I told her it looked like I might not be getting my package if “Exception” was going through customs and the package couldn’t make it through customs. Someone from UPS was supposed to call me back yesterday (they didn’t). This morning, I fired up tracking to discover my package was “on time” and said it’d be delivered today….but usually on the UPS site it says “out for delivery” on the day it’s getting delivered, but I thought maybe UPS in Canada was different, so I ignored it. A few minutes ago, I loaded the tracking again to see what it said, and it once again says “exception” and “SHIPMENT PENDING RELEASE FROM CLEARANCE AGENCY / RELEASED BY CLEARING AGENCY. NOW IN-TRANSIT FOR DELIVERY”….and still in Winnipeg. Winnipeg is 200 miles away from here. So….my package is going to get here today, but at 2PM it was just leaving Winnipeg? Something doesn’t add up here. Even better? Now when I check tracking it completely took away half of what I had tracked the past few days and now it only shows the package as going from East Petersburg, PA to Minneapolis to Winnipeg….and none of the other crap is listed in the tracking.
The person I spoke with over the phone even verified the address the package was going to….so I have no freaking clue what’s going on with this package, but it’s frustrating me because I want to go out and walk around or go to the library, but I feel like I can’t leave the house just in case the package shows up!
I think I’m going to advise my mom if she’s sending another package to me here to send it via USPS….unless the package does miraculously show up today and all this “exception” stuff doesn’t mean anything.
A Question to the RSS Readers
If you’re reading this via a RSS reader/LJ RSS feed, would you rather I change the RSS settings to show the whole post at once? Though then if you want to leave a comment, you’d have to come over to the page anyway, so I’m not sure which is the better option. You decide.
City Girl* on the Prairie
I spent this evening outside with the killer mosquitoes, assisting my new friend C with her vegetable garden. I braved the prickly raspberry bushes and picked a pretty decent bowlful of raspberries while she picked carrots, pea pods, and purple string beans. Then, I helped to shell peas. I really don’t think I’ve ever done something like that before, unless it was when I was really small. I had a good time, and I told C i’d help her out more if she wanted. She said she had weeding that needed to be done, and I told her that probably wouldn’t be a good idea, as I might not know what was plant and what was weed!
I came away with some fresh raspberries, cucumbers, apples, and carrots. And I really think the raspberries taste better than even the raspberries I bought at the farmer’s stand…..of course, this may have more to do with the fact that I picked them over anything else.
Oh, and purple string beans? Taste just like green ones. C told me they turn green when you cook them, and I was a little disappointed to find that out. I mean, how cool would it be to serve up a dish of purple beans at your next dinner party?
*I’m not really a city girl. But where I grew up, there wasn’t really room to have a garden. I think my mom had a rose bush for a while, but that’s about it. Oh, and my dad and I planted wildflowers when I was 8 or so. Now that mom and I live in a place where we have our own yard to grow stuff in, neither one of us really knows what to do to start a garden.
Mosquitos that Eat You Alive!
I joined Facebook yesterday morning, because a lot of people I knew were posting their photos on it and I couldn’t see them since I wasn’t a facebook user. Facebook can take your gmail address book and find your friends, so I had it do that, and it added J, Sarah and Joe’s friend who I met the other day. About 15 minutes later, I got a friend request from C, J’s wife. She suggested we get together, and I agreed. She asked me if I brought my bathing suit with me, which I hadn’t, but we decided to go to Wal-Mart to get one for me and then head to the lake with her son, who’s name also starts with a C, so I’ll call him Baby C.
Shopping for a bathing suit in the clearance section was fun. Loads of suits that were 2XL and 3XL and then suits that were size small. Yeah. Not too good for either of us, but in the end after many suits being tried on, we both wound up with the same top! One of the tops I tried on was so low cut, the center of it was below my chest!
By the time we picked out our suits, Baby C was ready for a nap, so we went back to their house to get ready to go out to Dauphin Lake. It was beautiful. C tells me the lake isn’t the cleanest, but compared to some bodies of water I’ve seen, this seemed tame. The lake also had sandbars in the middle of it and so we were able to walk out really far with the water only ever getting up to my hips, then lowering down to my lower legs. After we got out of the lake, Baby C attracted the attention of two ladies who were also at the lake, so we hung around for a little while while they fawned over Baby C (and he really is that cute!).
We returned to their house for dinner, and then some Olympic watching with J, and wine drinking outside.
While we were at the lake, C advised me to coat myself in bug spray. While she was telling me this, a mosquito around an eighth of an inch long landed on her leg and started biting! Those things are vicious! I didn’t spray the back fo my neck, so of course I have a bite where I can’t reach it to scratch. I also got bit right below the edge of my bathing suit. Other than that, no other bites.
C invited me to go camping next weekend. I haven’t been camping in years, and that’s only if sleeping in my friend’s aunt’s pop up tent trailer counts, but I might do it anyway. We had a lot of fun, and I’d really like to experience more of the things to do around here.
The sky is streaking pink with the sunrise. I was going to go outside and take photos of it, but it’s chilly out there, and I discovered how far I’d need to walk to get photos and decided it wasn’t worth it. Maybe if I go camping, I’ll get some pretty photos. I’m not sure why I couldn’t sleep tonight…I was tired enough from being out in the sun, but for some reason I started tossing and turning around 4am and finally gave up around 530. Maybe now that I’ve done something I’ll be able to go back to sleep. I also forgot to shower last night to wash off the bug spray and sunblock, so I feel a little itchy from that, too.
For a few more photos of yesterday, check my gallery:
http://photos.beccajanestclair.com/winnipeg-manitoba-august-2008/lake-dauphin/
Logic? I don’t have it.
[talking to Tim on the phone]
Me: I can’t figure out how to take the VIA Rail train out of Dauphin when I go home. There’s no platform on the other side.
Tim: [explains how they probably run both sides from the one track that has the platform]
Me: okay. But I’m confused. The timetable says the train only runs on Friday and Sunday, but the website says I can take it on Monday.
[Cue different ways of trying to figure out what’s going on]
Tim: Where is the train coming from?
Me: Thompson.
Tim: look at the train times and go backwards from Dauphin
Me: [reciting times]…0117…..0012….2327….oh.
Tim: Daft woman.
Me: *facepalm*
….The train leaves Thompson on Friday and Sunday, but gets to Dauphin on Saturday and Monday.
The Sun isn’t as Damaging Here?
Yesterday I was out from around noon until 4PM in the sun walking around into town and around town and then back. And I was *hot*. I drained my water bottle well before I even got back near the house, and my pedometer says I walked 5.25 miles. I neglected sunblock so I was sort of expecting to look in the mirror this morning and see sunburn on my forehead, but would you believe there’s nothing? Usually if I’m out in the sun for even a half hour without sunblock I start to get a little crispy. I’m sure the scientific reason is that I’m farther away from the equator, but I always thought sunlight was sunlight? Then again, when I was in the Caribbean, we were warned about the sun being hotter, so I suppose it makes sense the farther north you go, the less hot the sun is?
My latitude here is 51 degrees…am I really as close to the Arctic Circle as I think I am?
I’m using the latitude/longitude calculator here: http://www.satsig.net/maps/lat-long-finder.htm, and apparently when I’m in the UK, I’ll be at the 0 meridian…so I get to go from the hundredth meridian to the zero…and I realize I am probably a huge geek for pointing this out. (Latitude of where I’ll be in the UK is 53)
The Perils of Living Out of a Suitcase…
…Or at least, one dresser drawer, as Sarah emptied a drawer for me to unpack into is that you wind up wanting something you don’t have, or forgetting you’re out of clothing until it’s the following morning and you go to get clothes to wear!
This morning I wasn’t feeling well. I woke up with a small cold, so all I wanted to do was to take a hot shower, change into my fleece pajamas, and go back to bed. Unfortunately, my fleece pajamas are back in PA, but I did have a pair of UM sweatpants….but they were in the laundry basket, since I wore them two days ago. I also discovered I only had one clean T-shirt in the drawer, and it was a slightly ratty one I packed for sleeping in. So, I wound up needing to do laundry this morning while I wasn’t feeling well just so I’d have something clean and comfortable to wear!
Packing to come here was hard. I didn’t want to over pack and need two suitcases, especially since I’d have access to a washer/dryer. I also had to consider the season change, and I still worry that with not packing a sweatshirt I’m going to get chilly in late September. Since I’m spending most of my day indoors, I wanted to pack plenty of comfortable/lounge clothes, also known as pajamas…but now that I’m here, I don’t think I packed enough!
I was so worried about getting here and not needing things I packed that I failed to think of the flip side — wanting something you forgot to pack. I really should have packed a second pair of shoes – all I have with me are my Crocs and a pair of slippers for around the house. Yesterday while walking outside I slipped and turned my ankle funny. Usually when I do that I want to wear a different pair of shoes…but I can’t here, unless I want to *buy* a pair over at Wal-Mart. I probably could have asked my mom to throw in my sneakers into the package she’s sending me, but she’s sending so much already, I really didn’t want to make it any heavier!
For my next trip, I’m going to have to really think about what I’m packing. I’ll be gone during the late fall/early winter, which means while I won’t need my winter coat when I leave, I’ll certainly need it when I come home! I still only want to pack into one suitcase, so it’s going to be interesting to see how I’m going to fit bulkier winter clothing into the same suitcase I just had all this stuff in. I also wanted to try to pack my bathrobe in case Tim’s house is drafty. I used to take my robe with me when I went to Ann Arbor to visit, but I also usually had the entire trunk of my car available for packing space! The airline I’m using for the UK trip (Air India) doesn’t seem to have any baggage limits, but I have to get myself all the way up to JFK on public transportation, and I really don’t want to be dealing with loads of bags on New Jersey Transit!
Anyway, my point is that I really wished I had given a bit more thought to packing before I came up here. I probably would have squeezed in at least one more pair of lounge pants/pajama pants and probably my sneakers as well. Too late now, just information to file away, and information that maybe will help someone in the future!
Prarie Storm
It’s starting to storm out there, and despite the fact that thunder makes me jump and I don’t really like looking at lightning, I’m finding the storm pretty. It’s different than a storm would be at home…at home there just isn’t as much sky. I know, that sounds weird, but with the wide open prairies it just makes the sky look bigger for some reason.
Check the gallery for more photos:
http://photos.beccajanestclair.com/winnipeg-manitoba-august-2008/storm-in-dauphin/
Oh, and because I think this photo I took of Hobbes is adorable:
Going Green
I didn’t leave the house yesterday,and I probably won’t today…I’m currently glued to the Olympics. Weather also says it’s supposed to storm, and I don’t want to get caught out in that, since I forgot to pack my umbrella.
I’m still not sleeping well. I’ve been here for a week, and I keep wanting to go to bed around 11PM CST, and then I’ll wake up around 130, 3, 5, and then 7. Usually I’ll wind up giving up on sleeping somewhere between 8 and 9AM CST. Sometimes I fall back asleep quickly, sometimes it takes me a while to get back to sleep. The sleep timer on the television has been a big help. Every time I wake up, Casper thinks it’s time to play, and he’ll jump up on the bed and get right up in my face. This morning he accidentally swiped my nose with his claw.
I also wanted to pass along a link to a website I was given: http://www.reusablebagsgiveaway.com/. For the cost of shipping ($5.99 in the US) you can get two free LARGE reusable grocery bags. The more reusable bags we use, the less plastic, and this means there will still be a world to travel on. Several countries have banned free plastic bags, charging a tax if you require one, and many US cities are giving it consideration, too. I’m all for it. We leave the reusable bags in the trunk of the car, so we always have them when we go shopping. Up here, I’ve been taking my backpack with me to the grocery store along with an insulated bag ($2 at Weis markets), and between the two, I manage pretty well. Most grocery stores sell reusable bags for about a dollar these days. Even Wal-Mart gets into the act. Wal-Mart in the US had been selling black reusable bags for $0.50, Wal-Mart here sells large plastic reusable bags for CDN$0.97, made from recycled plastic bottles. Some stores even offer credit for bringing in bags to reuse. Weis Markets gives a three cent credit per bag you bring in (when they remember). Use a bag 33 times and it’s paid for itself!
Sarah and Joe have done a lot to their house so things are more environmentally friendly. From special windows, to cork floors, to a special toilet that uses less water. You can read all about the changes on their blog. The post is about a year ago when they were still in the process of moving, but it explains things far better than I possibly could!
Oh, and because I thought this photo was cute, here’s naptime for the cats:
(click for bigger)
You Can Take the Girl out of Lancaster County…
…but you can’t take Lancaster County out of the girl!
I wanted snack food. For the past few days I’d be watching TV or something around 10PM and just wish I had a handful of pretzels or chips to munch on, so today I decided to go get something to munch on in the evenings. There’s no Gibbles, no Utz, no Hanover….not even Snyder! The only pretzels I could find looked…not very good, so I settled for some salt and vinegar chips…and I bought the brand closest-sounding to home:
Old Dutch.
Oh, and how cool is it that the potato chips are in a box?
Rude Canadians?
Wow, I really bought into the old stereotype of “All Canadians are nice and polite” until today. I finally had my experience with a rude Canadian.
Last night, I really wanted a milkshake. I couldn’t remember which A&W Sarah told me was okay to go to, so today I decided to just walk down to the McDonald’s and get a milkshake. There was a family ahead of me – two kids, and two adults, and a teenager, who I wasn’t sure if she was with the family or on her own, since she was significantly older than the other two children. The counter person called “next”, and I hesitated for a minute to try to get the teenager’s attention to see if she was next or part of the family, when the man behind me not only barreled in front of me, but banged into me and practically sent me to the floor in his rush to get to the counter! Wow. I mean, if he had really wanted his Lunch that badly, I might have been nice and let him ahead, but I see no reason to push forward.
My second incident of rude – In order to get to the grocery store from Sarah and Joe’s, you have to cross the “highway” – it’s 4 lanes, but there *is* a crosswalk, and I was told that usually people will stop if they see someone waiting to cross, otherwise, you wait for it to be clear and then walk across like a normal crosswalk. I approached the crosswalk, and the cars on the opposite side of the street both stopped, and the car in the left lane on the side I was on stopped. There was a car coming in the right, but I figured as long as the other cars were stopped, it would stop too, so I started across. That jerk sped up! I had to RUN across the right lane so I could finish crossing. Seriously, what? If all the other cars are stopped for the pedestrian….shouldn’t you?
On the flip side….I talked to the man at the small vegetable stand outside the safeway,and he told me how to find the farmer’s market for next Friday (I’m too pooped right now!) and he sold me a cucumber for CDN$0.25, when he was selling them as “nine for $5”!
Oh, and while we’re on the subject of McDonald’s, I noticed what we would refer to as the “dollar menu” is called the “value menu” and most of the items are CDN$1.39, which when you do the conversion, is US$1.30. So even the fast food is more expensive here! But, they do have a CDN$0.99 Mini Milkshake – it’s the size of the happy meal drink and perfect when you just wanted a little bit of milkshake!
