Fall has arrived and with it fall weather – which is awesome (with the exception of leaves – which aren’t so awesome when you’re highly allergic to leaf mold like I am). Cooler days and cool nights mean I’m sleeping better and can actually walk the dog in the middle of the day when he prefers it without melting into a blob on the sidewalk. I quite enjoy fall. It’s not too hot, not generally too cool, there’s football to watch, playoff baseball in Toronto, and Thanksgiving at the family cottage to look forward to.
Word Wednesday – Fortune’s Favour
I’ve been AWOL of late – and for that I apologize. Depression and grief took hold for a while, and then things got really busy for a while, and then I felt so guilty about not writing that I couldn’t write. It’s a vicious circle. I decided today, though, that I should write something and put it out there. So here goes.
Word Wednesday – In search of the ghost of Tom Thompson
It’s been a busy week around here. I spent most of the day Thursday and all day Friday and Saturday getting ready for Dad’s 60th birthday party at the cottage. Thursday I put in a full 8 hours of work writing for clients, packed the car for dad and the dog to leave for the cottage right after dinner, and then went into town to get some supplies for the party (and a card for dad since I’d forgotten to get one when I got part of his present). Somehow, I managed to volunteer for a couple of hours AND get the errands done but it meant I was out until 10:45 pm which was longer than planned. Friday, I got up early, loaded the van with all the last-minute things like gas cans for the boat that can’t go in the night before, packed the cooler, went to the vet to pick up Monty’s special cookies, dropped a bag at home, picked up the ice pack I’d forgotten, and drove to the cottage stopping at Costco and for Gas and other party supplies on the way. I had lists on top of lists on top of lists, with photographs of said lists on my BlackBerry in case I misplaced one. It was supposed to be a quick in and out mission at Costco. Of course, if you’ve ever been to a Costco en route to cottage country on a Friday during the summer, you’ll realize the folly of my plan.
Swimming with beavers
This post got eaten. I’m going to blame the beaver at the cottage. Maybe he’s shy and didn’t want the notoriety that being on my blog would bring. I’m not sure why it got deleted but I’m trying to recreate it from memory.
I was at the cottage last weekend for my dad’s birthday weekend. It rained most of the weekend. On Sunday evening, during a break between rain storms I glanced out of a window at the lake and saw what I thought at first was a log floating in the lake. Upon closer inspection, however, the log moved! It was a beaver, swimming about 5′ out from shore! The beaver in question didn’t seem to care that there were people in the cottage, he swam around the bay and returned about 25 minutes later. (this time both Mum and Dad saw it – at first they thought i had just seen a log or something in the water). We tried to take some pictures which really do look like a log in the water due to the fact that beavers swim mostly underwater with just their nose sticking out at the front. It was a cool piece of Canadiana but I put it out of my head as one of those one-off things you see at the cottage.
Monday, Dad left early so he could make it to work relatively on time, leaving Mum and I to stay and clean up the cottage. Tidying the cottage is hot and sweaty work, mum can’t get down to the lake anymore, so she got the shower and I went for a swim. The air was cool and the lake was warmer than the air – which made it a very refreshing swim. I had been swimming for about 10 minutes, had taken a few dives off the raft and was swimming between the raft and the shore when I heard a noise that gave me pause. I looked towards the shore and there was the beaver again. They look a LOT bigger up close and personal! This thing was at least 2 feet long (not including the tail which looked huge!) and about 30 lbs. It raised its head out of the water a bit and wow are the beaver’s teeth prominent. It didn’t seem to care that I was in the water and kept on swimming. I, however, wasn’t taking any chances. I swam over to the dock (the beaver was swimming away from the dock) and got out of the lake as fast as I could. The fact that I got out on the dock demonstrates how nervous I was about the beaver – I never get out there – I use the beach because the dock has dock spiders and I really hate dock spiders! I have since read that beavers don’t attack humans, at least not in the water, but there’s a first time for everything right?