Waiting to see how bad it will be, so far nothing special.
Hurricane Irene that is.
Although really, we won't know till tomorrow how bad it will be.
A friend is coming to visit for a week, she was scheduled to fly in this afternoon but last night I sent her an email suggesting that Sunday afternoon would be right in the middle of the hurricane and if it was bad it would be very bad. It's a good hour's drive to the airport, another back and they were forecasting 40-60 kph winds and heavy rain, increasing to up to 100 kph in the evening. So if her flight was delayed, well, I just didn't feel safe on the highway in that kind of weather.
So, she cancelled her flight in favour of coming Monday afternoon. The airlines are being forgiving about people cancelling flights in hurricanes.
Now it turns out that Sunday afternoon was a bit gusty but nothing really bad, and the major winds will come tonight and tomorrow. Great. I am not telling her to cancel again, I'll just suck it up. Maybe the airline will cancel, or maybe it'll be fine.
My neatly stacked firewood will probably get blown over during the night. The smaller stack behind the shed has already tipped over, I don't know how long the bigger stack will last. It is broadside to the wind direction. I've got it stacked in hopes of drying out a bit before I stick it into the shed, where there is very little air circulation. Somehow I don't think I'm going to get much traction on this.
Sam invited some friends over and we spent the afternoon eating junk food and playing Settlers of Catan: Knights and Cities. By 5.30pm two of the friends had to leave so we counted our points and declared two winners; one of them declared the other one the King since he held the capital city.
A couple of weeks ago Sam and I had supper at Rosie's restaurant, I had a Spicy Bean Wrap which was really good. The beans were mixed with mashed potato and coated with sour cream. I have become quite addicted to that odd mix: potatoes and beans. I had a potato and bean burrito last night and I think I will have another one tonight. Really must get a little variety into my diet!
Two of Sam's friends are new to the province having moved here at the beginning of the summer from the Okanagan in BC, and they played tourist for the first month that they were here. I got some advice from them as to tourist-y things I might do with my visiting friend. They recommended a couple of wineries to visit and a zoo.
There are a lot of wineries around here, one could spend a whole week just doing the wine tour and still not hitting them all. Good to have recommendations for particularly interesting ones. One that was recommended by another friend they panned, said it was not bad for scenery and tasting but so new that there were no actual vines to see. They thought that one ought to be able to see the vines as well as taste the wines.
One of them grew up in Florida and Maryland, had a bit of experience of hurricanes. He said the word from New York and Philadelphia was that this one was a dud. He didn't expect much here. The other one grew up in the Okanagan and all her family are there; she is getting frantic calls from parents worried about her in a hurricane. They don't get hurricanes there.
Yes and this isn't really a hurricane, by the time it passed through New York state it was a tropical storm and is soon to be downgraded to a post-tropical storm. Whatever that means.
A hurricane (or whatever) headed for Nova Scotia or thereabouts is always a crapshoot, you never know what you're going to get until it arrives.
Well, we'll see what tomorrow brings...
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Oh Jack
It was shocking to hear that Jack Layton died yesterday. He was younger than me.
Jack really turned the NDP around and had a real shot at the top, being taken out by cancer like that seems so unfair. He fought the last election hard and the party won big thanks to him, but he had to have been battling his own illness at the same time and he couldn't do both.
I hope the NDP is able to build on what Jack did, I hope that his efforts were not in vain.
"My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic.
And we'll change the world.
All my very best,
Jack Layton"
Jack really turned the NDP around and had a real shot at the top, being taken out by cancer like that seems so unfair. He fought the last election hard and the party won big thanks to him, but he had to have been battling his own illness at the same time and he couldn't do both.
I hope the NDP is able to build on what Jack did, I hope that his efforts were not in vain.
"My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic.
And we'll change the world.
All my very best,
Jack Layton"
Sunday, August 21, 2011
Cottages
Just back from a day and a night at a lakeside cottage, before that two nights at a seaside cottage.
The seaside cottage was the more primitive, but quite comfy and in a lovely setting. Its only downside was the terrible infestation of mosquitoes.
During the daytime with sun and a brisk breeze it was OK, but as soon as the sun dipped and the wind died, the bugs rose. We stayed indoors in the evenings, but there was no escape, they plastered themselves to every screen and when anyone went in or out, they scooted right in.
The owner of the cottage--Jean--is immune to mosquitoes, their bites cause no discomfort to her. She is mildly irritated by their buzzing around her, but that's it. Her sons seem to have inherited her immunity, but the rest of us suffered.
Anyway, it was a good time. We swam and paddled and sailed, and sat around gazing out to sea in the sun. In the evening we ate and drank ourselves silly.
Jean is 80 and still paddles her kayak regularly. She used to go to the cottage for 5-6 months every year, but now she is down to 3 months, the cold weather bothers her more. She has a paddling buddy and they regularly paddle back and forth between their cottages on opposite sides of the island. Her cottage is on a small island linked to the mainland by a causeway.
The outing to the lakeside cottage was a get-together of seven women, and the 13-year-old daughter of one of them and her friend, for nine in total. But the cottage was large and spacious with beds for all.
We noticed that all of our vehicles were red.
The lake was blessedly free of biting insects. Not entirely but a great deal better than the seaside location. There was a thunderstorm in the middle of the afternoon that we watched from indoors, but it passed and the sun came out again.
More paddling and more swimming. I love swimming in a lake. Nova Scotia lakes are very tannic which makes the water very dark. You can't see a thing when you go underwater.
I wanted to get the kayak into the lake to wash off the salt from the ocean. Three women paddled one canoe, and the two girls took the other canoe. We went down to the end of the lake and back, not very far.
We had a potluck supper the evening of the day we all arrived, and seven women can produce enough food to feed an army.
Our host was in a mood for mixed drinks, so we sampled her pina coladas, crantinis and watermelon-vodka slushes. Drums appeared and several women drummed away for an hour or so. I am not a huge fan of drums but whatever, to each his own.
There were loons calling in the evening.
Breakfast was interesting. Our host provided little 4-inch pastry shells and bowls. We each got two eggs and there were trays of chopped veggies and bacon. You mixed up your eggs and whichever chopped veggies you wanted, added a little cream and then poured it into your pastry shell. The little pies were collected on baking sheets and baked in the oven to produce individual breakfast quiches. With unlimited coffee and jugs of fruit juice, we ate our quiches and sliced cantaloupe on the screened deck.
As the sun warmed up we washed our dishes and moved to beach chairs by the lake. Chatted and swam and took group photos.
Eventually we all tore ourselves away to return to civilization. We were only a half hour drive out of town.
Isn't summer grand?
The seaside cottage was the more primitive, but quite comfy and in a lovely setting. Its only downside was the terrible infestation of mosquitoes.
During the daytime with sun and a brisk breeze it was OK, but as soon as the sun dipped and the wind died, the bugs rose. We stayed indoors in the evenings, but there was no escape, they plastered themselves to every screen and when anyone went in or out, they scooted right in.
The owner of the cottage--Jean--is immune to mosquitoes, their bites cause no discomfort to her. She is mildly irritated by their buzzing around her, but that's it. Her sons seem to have inherited her immunity, but the rest of us suffered.
Anyway, it was a good time. We swam and paddled and sailed, and sat around gazing out to sea in the sun. In the evening we ate and drank ourselves silly.
Jean is 80 and still paddles her kayak regularly. She used to go to the cottage for 5-6 months every year, but now she is down to 3 months, the cold weather bothers her more. She has a paddling buddy and they regularly paddle back and forth between their cottages on opposite sides of the island. Her cottage is on a small island linked to the mainland by a causeway.
The outing to the lakeside cottage was a get-together of seven women, and the 13-year-old daughter of one of them and her friend, for nine in total. But the cottage was large and spacious with beds for all.
We noticed that all of our vehicles were red.
The lake was blessedly free of biting insects. Not entirely but a great deal better than the seaside location. There was a thunderstorm in the middle of the afternoon that we watched from indoors, but it passed and the sun came out again.
More paddling and more swimming. I love swimming in a lake. Nova Scotia lakes are very tannic which makes the water very dark. You can't see a thing when you go underwater.
I wanted to get the kayak into the lake to wash off the salt from the ocean. Three women paddled one canoe, and the two girls took the other canoe. We went down to the end of the lake and back, not very far.
We had a potluck supper the evening of the day we all arrived, and seven women can produce enough food to feed an army.
Our host was in a mood for mixed drinks, so we sampled her pina coladas, crantinis and watermelon-vodka slushes. Drums appeared and several women drummed away for an hour or so. I am not a huge fan of drums but whatever, to each his own.
There were loons calling in the evening.
Breakfast was interesting. Our host provided little 4-inch pastry shells and bowls. We each got two eggs and there were trays of chopped veggies and bacon. You mixed up your eggs and whichever chopped veggies you wanted, added a little cream and then poured it into your pastry shell. The little pies were collected on baking sheets and baked in the oven to produce individual breakfast quiches. With unlimited coffee and jugs of fruit juice, we ate our quiches and sliced cantaloupe on the screened deck.
As the sun warmed up we washed our dishes and moved to beach chairs by the lake. Chatted and swam and took group photos.
Eventually we all tore ourselves away to return to civilization. We were only a half hour drive out of town.
Isn't summer grand?
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Free trip to wherever
[Dobby and the grandsons on a beach in PEI, last month]
The next best thing---or maybe even a better thing---to owning a summer cottage is having friends and family who invite you to theirs. I am off to a friend's cottage today and another friend's cottage in a few days. One on the ocean and t'other on a lake.
Having grown up with a cottage on a lake I prefer a lake for swimming in, but oceans have their special charms too. And invites to summer cottages are like winning a free trip to wherever. Yay!
Sunglasses, swimsuit, booze, hamburgler buns... check!
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