A Typical Day in the Life

7:00 AM : Beep Beep Beep Beep...Wife's cellphone doesn't actually function as a communication device anymore, but it does make a reliable alarm clock. Regular plugged-in clocks lose around a minute of time every couple days, in our house anyway.

Roll off bed, stumble around blindly searching for yesterday's dirty clothes. Cats heard alarm and are now yowling noisily on other side of door. Socks? Check. Pants? Check. Yowl, yowl yowl...Throw heavy things at door. Wear clothes. Leave room and check house temperature...says its 21C, feels like 18. Bleh. Change to 22. For wife.

Feed cats.

7:05 AM : Call dogs. We're borrowing an extra dog for a few weeks, if you don't know. Open front door. Eight inches of snow on porch this morning, and its still snowing and a bit blustery. Bleh. Snow is too frozen and heavy to sweep with a broom today. Instruct dogs that they need to do their business with calmness, dignity and restraint while I try to clean out some of the snow; quietly pray they don't cause havoc whilst unattended.

7:06 AM : Yell at dogs for causing havoc.

7:15 AM : Door frame is more or less cleared up. Stairway was a deathtrap and water services were blocked...cleaned that up a tiny bit, but I'm horribly lazy and still coughing from a cold. Also bored. Go inside. Give treats to dogs for being bad. Make sure wife awake. Start breakfast and tea.

7:20 AM : Eating oatmeal this morning, and watching news. I watch CBC in the mornings. Today its stuff about Libya mostly, and New Zealand. Still no frontpage news about Baker Lake; not entirely shocked. Relax watching TV for a while, drinking decaf tea.

7:45 AM : Now more or less awake. Shower. Take it easy on the water since water delivery can sometimes be sketchy during snowstorms/blizzards. Don't shave since its not a Monday and I'm usually too lazy to shave more than once a week.

7:55 AM : Dry up and wear clothes. Wife has kindly picked out stuff that doesn't horribly clash for me this morning (since when do brown and blue clash? They both even start with the same letter...) and left it on the bed. Awwww.

8:15 AM : Gear up to go outside. Its a mild snowstorm outside still (blizzard watches for the last couple of days but no real blizzard materialized).

8:20 AM : Work starts in 10 minutes. It takes me well under a minute to walk to work, and the wife needs around 5-8 minutes to walk up the hill, depending on weather and the route she takes. We have a vehicle today, parked at my office two doors down, and she'll be using that.

Outer door from house doesn't close properly due to snow and ice accumulation. Sigh. We'll probably chip out the ice at lunch.

8:22 AM : Vehicle miraculously unburied by snow. Door to IT office on the other hand half-blocked but I'm able to climb in fairly easily. Watch from safety of doorway while wife stands in snowstorm and clears ice from windshield wipers. Get bored; go inside.

8:25 AM : Call Arctic Fuel (local company) for snow removal at IT office and our house since our utilities are still mostly blocked.

8:26 AM : Working away. I'm all alone in my "office" which is actually a house we've converted to that use since there's not enough room up at the main office.

9:30 AM : Look out window; looks like they're already clearing out some snow nearby. Huzzah!

10:30 AM : I think I can hear them shovelling out the doorway. Good. The last two times I climbed out over the snow I managed to crack my head on the door frame. Not today! *Fingers crossed*

12:02 PM : Good work morning; its quiet and lonely here sometimes but fewer distractions can be nice. I wait a couple minutes to give wife a few minutes to walk home, hoping to intercept her on the way. Make sure my worklog is up to date and saved. Gear up to go outside.

Yay, doorway is definitely cleared out. No headaches for me.

12:03 PM : Forgot wife had a vehicle today; she has already gotten home and released the hounds. Dog A sees me, sits nicely so I'll approach. Dog B charges me.

12:04 PM : Wife is clearing out some remaining snow. Utilities were cleared out while we were at work, but the stairway is still near suicide. I get the ice chipper and help.

12:08 PM : Bored of clearing snow. Dogs are biting each other and finding and eating rabbit poo. Dog B ran to neighbour's house to bark at the poor guy trying to shovel out his own snow. Bleh.

Go inside.

12:09 PM : Wife remembered to chisel ice out of doorframe on the way in. Door manages to latch again. For now.

12:10 PM : Give dogs treats for being bad. Make lunch. Mmm. Breakfast for lunch usually. One fried egg and some toast. Mmmm. Watch more news, natter with wife about finances, work drama, dinner plans.

12:15 PM : Wife is doing bills and transfering money to the savings accounts. Yay! Saving money = good. I continue to watch TV. More news, although I can't get CBC at the moment. Probably need to tweak the alignment of the dish again.

Brief interruption to go clean cat litter box before Dog B tries to eat it again.

12:50 PM : Gear up and go outside again. Wife left car running most of lunch. This is actually pretty normal up here. I try not to think about the waste.

12:55 PM : Work work work. Trying to release an interesting project, but need a bit more testing and some sign-offs. Work on upcoming priority projects while I wait for sign-offs.

4:00 PM : 4 already? The days seem to be like normal length to me now, so its still bright and sunny outside. No more tip-offs about the end of day coming just because its dark outside.
Decide to write a blog today. Maybe an amusing timeline of a typical day's events? Jot down some notes. Google the term self-referential allusion. Chuckle at my own wit. Get back to work.

4:40 PM : Wife calls to confirm dinner plans: Guesthouse burgers! Guesthouse is a sort of restaurant. Sortof. Decent burgers. If you know Mr. Burger in the 'Shwa, kinda like those, but without the thick-cut fries. We're getting takeout so we don't leave the dogs home too long.
Hungry now.

5:00 PM : Gear up to go outside. Not waiting an extra 2 minutes this time since wife has vehicle and I actually remember it. Will try to release hounds before she has to.

5:02 PM : Home at last. Wife not here yet. What a commute! The traffic today was brutal, blah blah blah. Chuckle at my own wit.

Let dogs out. Briefly consider instructing them to conduct themselves with calmness, dignity, etc, but they've already left. Sigh and follow dogs.

5:05 PM : Dogs are chasing each other around in the back field. Occassionally they'll stop and eat rabbit poop (which to be fair looks almost identical to dog kibble. Can't comment on the taste).

5:10 PM : Bored of watching dogs run around and eat rabbit stuff. Go inside. Hungry.

5:11 PM : Give the dogs treats for being bad. Look for something to have for dinner. Yowl yowl yowl. Oh right, forgot to feed the cats at lunch. I need to feed them smaller meals now, three or four times a day instead of just two, while I keep an eye on them, because each have their own kind of food and they each prefer the other's. Yowl yowl yowl. What do you think I'm doing? I have both of your bowls on the table AND my hand in the food bag.

5:12 PM : Remember that wife is picking up dinner. Decide to find out if we get tonight's Leafs game. Usually don't. Usually just as well.

5:13 PM : Leafs game blacked out. Bleh. Why'd we move here again? Cats switched bowls when I wasn't looking. Mutter. Confiscate catfood.

5:15 PM : Wife is home with food. Huzzah! Smells like happiness.

5:25 PM : Ate too fast. Watch some TV. Mostly Poker on the sports channels. Dunno how we got into this, but now it seems terribly interesting. I can't believe he folded pocket kings!

5:50 PM : Back in Toronto, this is about the time I'd usually leave work.

6:00 PM : Wife remembers we need the extension cord to plug in the vehicle. Its back at my office, so we'll need to go all the way back there and get it. Oh no!

6:10 PM : We're back from my office. Man, what a commute, etc etc. Vehicle is plugged in and should now hopefully start gracefully in the morning.

Settle into a typical night of favourite TV shows, favourite computer games, playing with the animals.

7:00 PM : Wife calls neice on her birthday. Happy birthday, Leigha! After a moderately long interchange it becomes apparent that she has a Dora on her cake.

7:50 PM : Back in Toronto, this is about the time we'd usually get home from work. Instead, I'm slaughtering the French and Austrians in Napoleon: Total War. Take that, frenchies.

9:00 PM : We're in the middle of an epic 24 marathon, so we decide to watch another episode tonight. Its season four. I bet this is the episode where Jack Bauer flaunts the rules and is completely right about his gut instincts.

10:15 PM : Let dogs out into back field. Instruct them to cause havoc; nobody's out here anyway. Eventually take them back inside.

10:30 PM : Bedtime. Read for a while, then zzzzzzz.

Holy Zero Visibility Batman!

You know its bad when you choose a route home so you can see the buildings as you are walking.

And you know it's *really* bad, when you have to follow the hydro poles.

But, the new measure for *really* *really* bad is when you are following the hydro lines to find your way home, and you loose them once or twice!!

Yikes! I had a few panic moments, hoping I wasn't wandering off into the wild white tundra!

Time to hibernate with the dogs until this blizzard passes, supposedly tomorrow. Until then, Season 3 of 24, here we come!!

No Vacancies...

... at the hotel for dogs. For the last week we've had two extra varmints at our place. Knowing how difficult it can be to find someone who wants to watch your pooch when you fly out, we always try to accommodate our friends.


So Harley's taken up residence on Squire's bed (not that she uses it that often, since she prefers to sleep at the foot of our bed.) If he isn't to be found on the bed, you'll find him lounging in the 'house' (aka crate). Harley's stay is short-term, as he heads home tonite.

Chester, on the other hand, is a bit of a going concern. He's just over a year old, and is a furry bundle of energy. He would like it if the cats were more inclined to play with him and hasn't gotten the clue from all the hissing and swipes of claws across the nose that he just isn't welcome as far as they're concerned. While he's content being relegated to the house (especially while unsupervised) he prefers to cuddle with us, on the couch or our bed or even on our pillow. Chester is staying a bit longer, almost til the end of the month, as his dad heads to Mexico for some sun and sand.


With all the chaos inside, Page has focused her attentions outside. One lunch hour was spent eyeing up 'dinner' sitting on the hydro lines outside the window. Little does she know that the ravens up here probably weigh at least twice what she does; I've seen them routinely take caribou meat from the dogs that live outside up here.

Squire is handling all the upheaval really well. It helps that Harley is so laid-back and chill and she really only has to deal with Chester wanting to play and cuddle with her. It's been fun to watch all the animal antics, but it'll be nice when things quiet down and we get back to our normal routine.