Usually I take The Bright and Cheery Path, where I see wild strawberries and purple lupine...the sun shines and the birds are singing...but then...sometimes...the path leads into the dark and flowers change and things are strange....

The Dark and Gloomy Path beyond which are strange pieces of wood, and flowers like no other!!! The yellow ones I call "Crazy-Daisies" There are thousands of them, but never do you see one with it's head up and all it's petals...they look like they have been through some sort of woodland war.

Look at this piece of old, burned tree...shaped like a cross. The "crosspiece" is all a part of the wood, untouched by man. Past this is the dark and gloomy path that leads to odd and unusal flowers...see the three below. I felt like I was in Dr Suess land...or Bizarro World.

For Pauline

Pauline, you can see from this angle, what that beam that you thought was a doorframe really is. The carport used to go out that far, but Steven decided to "inset" the garage a little so as to lessen problems from rain and snow and drips off the roof. You can see him on the ladder, putting up the tin underneath...he was hoping that I'd be on the other ladder, alas, it was not to be.

The windows have arrived! Three in each door, and they don't just "pop the panels out" at all. They actually saw them out and then seal the window in. Either way...we are pleased. The brick for the bottom part has also arrived, so "we" (read: Steven and company) will be doing that this week, and then the siding.

Oilaphobic

Oilaphobic. Fear of people thinking you have oil stains on your driveway.

Steven just saw the picture below and was horrified that people might think those marks on the driveway are oil stains. They are, in fact, water spots from the truck that he just moved that had water on the running boards from yesterdays rain.

For those of you who do not know...he has a fear of marks on the driveway...one might say it's a "problem"...ask anyone who has ever parked in our driveway and left a drip or drop of oil. It's a sad thing to see a grown man rubbing the driveway frantically with a cloth soaked in gas...or maybe it's just funny!

Coral knows...now that she drives a Toyota 4Runner she has been formally invited to park in the driveway....prior to that she was banished to the far curb. It's an exclusive club....

Doors!

We have doors! The poor door installer had to put them in yesterday during rain, hail, wind and SNOW! Yes, we had little bits of snow at our house yesterday...sleet, actually. But today is sunny and supposed to go to 18 or so. Such are the trials of a door installer.

But back to the doors! I spent a wonderous 15 minutes playing with all the electronic thingies...from the keypad outside to open them, to the door opener gadget that goes on my sunvisor, to the funny switches on the inside to open it if you are trapped, to breaking the electric beam that stops the door from squishing me if I forget to move away from a downcoming door.

The windows for the doors come later, they weren't available just yet. Who knew that you just "pop" whatever panels out that need windows and then you insert "window panels" Hmmm....so how secure IS a door? Well, he said they don't really just "pop" out, you need some sort of special tool. Anyhow, in either case, we will have 3 nice little windows in each door sometime next week. And I think the siding comes today.

I have never heard such thunder as I did this morning while walking. It was sunny in one direction, but when you turned around, the sky was dark gray and getting grayer by the moment. I could hear the thunder rolling in the distance and it got louder and louder and then there was a huge "CRACK" that made me cringe for a second. Suddenly there was dead silence...even the birds were quiet, and then the sound of the wind came towards me, I could hear the leaves of the trees rustling as the wind got closer and closer and then it swept over me in a warm rush...it was almost as if I was in the path of the aftermath of an atomic bomb. The warmth swept on by and I could see the grasses and trees wave. ("Who has seen the wind? Neither you 'nor I. But when the trees bow down...the wind is passing by) Another moment of silence and then came the tapping of the raindrops as they hit the leaves and the ground. It was a dreamlike moment...almost like something from that other world was trying to tear through that thin film that separates this world from theirs.

Hail Stones!

Gypsy and I were out for an early morning walk today, the weather was "iffy" and thunderstorm warnings were on the radio. We got caught in a bit of rain on the way home, but luckily the hail arrived after we were safe and cozy indoors. Look at the size of some of these stones...that one in the center probably would have knocked the poor dog out cold if it had hit her on her hard little noggin.

Hail Storm!

Our new play thing

We went out today and came home with a motorhome. It's not brand new, which is a good thing. I am most assuredly not a "brand new" person. I'm either afraid to use a brand new thing in case I spill/break/stain/lose or ruin it...or, I do use it and am so nervous that it's no fun. Our trailer that we had last year was that way...full of stained glass and oak and frilly things and velvet stuff...I was afraid to cook in it. (yeah, yeah, I know...when you're camping you're supposed to cook outside and usually I do, but sometimes it's rainy or cold or I might simply be anti-social and want to stay in) Anyhow, we ended up hardly ever using it so we decided to sell it and look for something more our style. This one has linoleum instead of carpet (yes! The other one had RUGS!) and just regular curtains that you can wash, if need be and no fancy doo-dads. It has a large bed with room to almost sit up (so none of that claustrophobic thing goin' on) , a bathroom with a nice shower and cute little built in microwave...just in case.(the microwave isn't in the bathroom you understand) It's perfect for us, just the right size so now I am anxious to get out into the bush...should the sun ever shine...you can see how grey and glooomy it is today. I started to walk the dog and got caught in a downpour.

Do you feel sorry for me yet?

We were going out to visit friends last night, and Gypsy seemed to think she was coming along. When I told her: "No, go lie down...watch the house." she gave me "a look" and went down the hallway. When I tip-toed after her to see where she was, this is where I found her, in the 2nd spare room. She hardly ever goes in here so I have no idea what she was planning.

My Tree

The beautiful tamarack tree beside our garage. A tamarack is one of the only needle trees that loses it's needles in the fall, unlike pine, spruce etc that keep their needles and thus end up as Christmas trees. A tamarack turns a vivid yellow, really bright, and then drops its needles in a matter of days. My neighbour was quite hoping we would remove it (*gasp*) when we started the garage as it does make a mess...it's a huge tree.Look how high it towers over the roof. But, you know? When those flat needles all fall they make a carpet of yellow and then they turn a rusty orange and I think it's quite spectacular. It's a good thing we like our neighbour and we can joke about it...these are the sorts of problems that you see on those day time TV Court shows. There are many, tons, of these trees around town and in the bush and they are usually skinny, sparse and barren looking. I think mine is beautiful because it knows I love it. And besides...what did we all learn in school? "I think that I shall never see,
A poem as lovely as a tree..."

Staring up through the branches of my tamarack tree

Steven's freshly painted pride and joy...those of you who know him, know how he babies his Cruiser. I think, really, that's why he built the garage...so it could have it's very own home. For those of you who care, it's a 1981 Diesel Landcruiser with original tires and rims (apparently that is important stuff) It just came out of the bodyshop today, and it smells brand new again.

We have windows!

Pretty nice teeth for an 11 year old! Look at the shine on those back ones!

*Whew* Thanks for the walk!

Tired!!

Gazing sadly at the deluge of rain and hail....ruining an otherwise perfectly good "walk day"

Once the windows and the back door are in, they will purchase and start the siding so that it will look like the garage has always been there!

Today is window and door day. Not the big garage doors, those will be installed by the official garage door people, (in other words, professionals.)in a few days. But today Steven and Paul will put in the 3 windows and the back door that will lead into the backyard.

I blog, therefore I am.

I blog...therefore I am...really, it's an odd sort of legacy in a way. I get e-mails from people that I don't know who read this, (although the past little while has been rather dry, I just have blank spots in my brain). But it made me think about what unusual times we live in, and how correspondence is not what it used to be.

Long, long ago my children, there was no internet and we had to use regular mail. Stamps were cheap, but the mail was slow. There was the telephone (attatched to the wall, none of this portable kind of thing) but it was pricey. No one made long distance calls just to chat, not even "the Joneses". Now we can talk to our friends on the other side of the world for free and we can see pictures the second they are taken. It's pretty amazing really.

Now we can leave our mark this way and you never know who will stumble on it accidentally, the input of a search word and the hit of a key and you might make a new friend who you would otherwise never know. What would Jane Austen and Mark Twain think? What would the apostles do? Would "the Good Word" be the same if it had a website? I wonder who would have sponsered it? Click on our sponser: "The Money Changers of Jerusalem" or "Sore feet? Travelling for the Census Count? Call Rent-a-Donkey NOW!!" It would be a whole different world I'm sure.

Garage.

Now we have the frames in for the 2 doors. Pauline, in the other pictures I was standing sort of where that little white ladder is, so it just looked like a big room.