Last day!

It's finally here, my last day at work! Hooray!

2008: Week 32

Another week, another box. Well, that's how life feels right now. We have just one week left at work, then another two weeks before we leave Calgary for good. Work is the final rush of getting as much done as possible, and making sure someone else can finish off what I can't. Home is all about posting furniture on Craigslist and Freecycle, emptying out cupboards, and trying to work out how to fit in all those Calgary things I kept putting off (zoo, art gallery, science centre, various restaurants).

I'm also spending quite some time thinking about how to maintain my online life while we are in Europe. Dragging the computer around is a real pain, although I have to confess that the prospect of several months without my baby causes me quite some angst. Internet cafes are fine, but require a chunk of time to be worthwhile. I'm considering an iPod touch as a compromise - they have wifi capability, and enough applications for most of what I need. Any opinions out there? Of course I may just be looking for an excuse to buy a new toy....

Best of the week
- A warm clear evening on Friday for our farewell to Calgary party.
- Matt's birthday.
- Lots of cooking to clear out the pantry.
Worst of the week
- Our drawn out packing - the price of organisation is weeks of empty shelves and boxes.
- Being ruthless with my kitchen gear. I'd love to keep it all, but it's just not practical :(

Gone fishing

Well, not literally. But it is about time I wrote about some big changes that are just around the corner.

It's time to move on again. Matt and I have resigned from our jobs and in just a few weeks will be leaving Calgary to spend some time travelling. The exact details are still to be finalised, but our basic plan is to drive back across Canada, leave the car (and our stuff) with Matt's parents, then head to Europe for several months. We plan to be back in Australia for Christmas, and after that I suppose we will have to give up the good life and head back to work. However it's still unclear exactly where that will be. Or for me, what it will be. As I've posted previously, I'm feeling pretty burned out in my current job. I'm hoping that the time away will give me some space to think about what's next career wise. The suggestions so far involve cupcakes, coffee, and shoe shopping. I like what I hear :)

You know you live in Canada when...

...you get the following email from campus security.

Moose tranquilized and safely removed from campus

Alberta Fish and Wildlife Officers successfully tranquilized and removed a young moose from campus this morning.

The moose wandered onto campus at about 8:20 a.m. and broke through a window in the link between Reeve Theatre and Craigie Hall. Fish and Wildlife Officers had been in the area and were able to tranquilize the moose shortly after 8:30 a.m.

Alberta Fish and Wildlife Officers were to monitor and then release the moose.

2008: Week 29

Why do the weeks pass so slowly and the weekends so fast? This week has been one of frustration, trying to track down some documents I signed when I first started my job. Unlike Cornell where I used to work, the U of C do not treat post-docs as regular staff members. Instead, we are trust employees, contracted privately to the Professor who recruited us. We have University email accounts and library access, but we don't qualify for things like retirement plans. We do get extended health benefits (a bit like private health insurance in Australia), but it is administered by an external company. So I spent quite some time this week calling and emailing my way through the maze of uninformed helpfulness - "You're a trust employee? I'm sorry, I don't know who you need to contact, but try calling X (then Y, then Z etc.) and they should know". Aaaggghhhhh!!!!!

Outside of work, a large amount of my time has been devoted to cleaning. The time has finally come to leave our house, and I'm trying to be as organised as possible and move only the things I really need. The piles for recycling and Vinnies grow daily, and I'm constantly amazed at how much I've accumulated in the last few years, and how many of the things I "needed" at the time were just a waste of cash. Hopefully this exercise will not only lead to an efficient move, but also to some better purchasing decisions in the future.

Best of the week
- Being offered a hard-boiled organic egg (he had 2 to spare) by a guy I'm pretty sure was homeless. He spent the next 5 minutes telling me about his philosophy of passing gifts along and generally being generous with whatever he has. Amazing!
- Warm sunny weather, flowers, dragonflies everywhere (lots of black and blue ones this year).
- Confirmation that a few decisions I've made concerning work were right (more to come later).
- The arrival of some cool stuff from MOO - check them out if you need custom postcards, business cards etc.

Worst of the week
- Dealing with the bureaucratic black hole that is the institution where I work.
- A flooded basement due to a defective hot water tank. Fortunately the only lasting damage is to the landlord's pocket (well, not so fortunate for him, especially since he soon wants to knock down the house and build his dream home).

2008: Week 24

June is a busy month for me this year. With our trip east for Elysa and Patrick's wedding, and an upcoming trip to the south, I only have 9 days at work in the whole month. I had hoped they would be 9 productive days, but it's not really working out that way.

On the good side, I finally received the reviewers comments for a paper I submitted in April, and the manuscript has been accepted subject to some changes. I'm reasonably confident that I can make most of the changes, and argue articulately why we don't need to do the rest, so hopefully I will be able to cross it off my to do list in the near future. On the less good side, my cold continued to linger, and I ended up going to see my Dr who was very sympathetic and prescribed some medication which seems to be helping. After 5 days, I still have a blocked ear, but I have enough energy to do more than lie on the couch watching daytime TV. Of course it's hard to get lab work done while moping at home in your pyjamas, but at least the things I'm working on right now can be put in the fridge and finished later.

Best of the week
- Finding time and motivation for some gardening - hanging flower baskets for the front and side patios, basil, tarragon, sage, and strawberries for my kitchen garden, and flower pots for the upstairs patio.
- Studying for my French exam (tomorrow!), and feeling pretty confident that it will go well.
- Having my sister in the same country :)

Worst of the week
- Still sick. The cold turned into sinusitis - hopefully the antibiotics will work fast.
- Missing half the work week because I was sick (or is that a good thing?). Cancelling our planned camping weekend because I was sick.

2008: Week 18

The snow has cleared for now, and after several rakings (one for snow, one for leaves) the backyard is ready for some sporting action. Bocce is the game of the moment, although the badminton net (still up from last year) adds some interest! We now have a house rule to cover what happens when the bocce ball hits the badminton net and rebounds back toward the players.

Today I spent a little time clearing weeds from our small garden, and trying to remove the dead stems from last year without damaging the new shoots. I spotted a tiny tulip flower forming on one of our plants, and there are pink buds on one of the backyard bushes - next week I may actually be able to write about flowers!

Best of the week
- Snaring the last 2 loaves of apple and flax sourdough at Urban Baker.
- A boring visit to the radiologist - so nice to be told "nothing to see here, you can go home".
- Victory over the boys in our backyard bocce game.

Worst of the week
- The Canadian tax deadline - my tax return seems to get more complicated every year :(
- I love my job...really...

2008: Week 17

This had been a particularly uneventful week. After working several weekends in a row I've finally managed to get my experimental work under control. By under control I mean that I've collected so many samples for analysis that I can't start anything new. That means I don't need to keep cells growing, so I have much more control over my time. It's also the end of the academic year, so many of my regular meetings are coming to an end. Hooray!

This week I will be working on my program for Operation Minerva, a job shadowing day for girls in Grade 9. I have 3 girls coming to spend the day with me on May 8th. I'm also preparing a talk for a conference on May 14-15, and I have to work through lots of frozen samples, so it will be a busy few weeks ahead.

Best of the week
- A sunny weekend without snow (or work)!
- Thai dinner on Wednesday.
- Finally submitting a long-overdue paper.

Worst of the week
- The looming deadline for filing my Canadian tax.
- Feeling that I'm working and living in a holding pattern.

Calgary or Narnia?

Always winter and never Christmas...or so it seems.

2008: Week 16

OK, so we were a little premature putting the patio furniture outside last weekend :) There were a few calls to try bocce in the snow, but no one was really that keen. Matt and I did brave the cold and wind today and went for a short walk. The wind had made some really interesting patterns and textures in the snow, very similar to patterns I've seen in sand at the beach. Most surprising was a patch of very smooth, flat snow which proved to have a hard outer surface over soft snow. Something I've often seen on the beach, but never before in the snow.

Best of the week
- John Butler Trio on Tuesday night.
- An email from a former adviser saying "no more changes, submit the paper"!
- A new session at French, already improved from last time.

Worst of the week
- Feeling tired and unwell.
- Finding the last few details so I can submit that paper.

Spring, come quickly

Another foot or so of snow on the ground this morning, and more to come. Those poor plants who thought is was Spring, they must be cold today!

Winter vs/ Spring

The first photo was taken April 10th, the second taken April 17th. Sadly we're back to the snow this weekend...

2008: Week 15

Change is in the air here in Calgary. Spring is asserting itself, and winter retreats, although with great reluctance. This week I saw my first crocus and hyacinth for the season, and noticed tulip shoots reaching for the light. Then on Thursday morning we had a foot of snow fall in just 4 hours, the largest snowfall by far this year. The weekend was glorious, with temperatures as high as 20C; we had our first BBQ on the patio tonight. The coming week will be cooler, with temperatures predicted to resemble the mild winters of my hometown.

My jonquils are flowering, the freesia bulbs I bought are in pots, and the steel bucket I found at an estate sale a few weeks ago now holds the herbs we will enjoy all summer. But for the time being, the heat which feeds these plants comes from a sunny spot in front of the fireplace. It will be several weeks before they can be confidently moved to the light and warmth of the outside world.

Best of the week
- Wading through fresh snow on the way to work, barely resisting the temptation to make snow angels.
- Venturing outside in a T-shirt, skirt, and bare legs.
- Finally taking the plunge and upgrading to Leopard.

Worst of the week
- Working several weekends in a row, and remembering how easy it is to stray into workaholic territory.
- Golf on TV. I'm way too hyperactive to want a day on the couch doing nothing.

April showers?

This is what I woke up to today!

2008: Week 14

This week seemed long. The weather has turned a little colder again, and despite the appearance of tulip shoots in many of the gardens I pass each day, it feels that spring will never arrive. Don't be fooled by the photos though, they were taken at the Sunshine ski resort, high in the Rockies. The ski season will continue until the end of May - hopefully Calgary will be green again by then!

I have been enjoying two books this week - A Lineage of Grace and Christ the Lord: The Road to Cana. The first was a Birthday gift from a very dear friend - well chosen and well timed once again - and I'm enjoying it very much. The second is Anne Rice's follow up to a novel she wrote after her returning to the Christian faith of her youth. I admire her integrity in writing about what is significant to her, even though it is a quite a change from her earlier work! She spends some time exploring what it meant in a practical sense for Jesus to find places of solitude - very relevant given my never-quiet household.

Best of the week
- A new recipe for Cranberry and Zucchini muffins - I'll take a picture next time and post the recipe on eatdrinkcook.
- A lovely day skiing at Sunshine.
- Ottawa [just] scraped in to the NHL playoffs.

Worst of the week
- Lab work on Saturday and Sunday because my cells decided that Friday was the perfect day to be ready for an experiment.
- More strange interactions at work - do I somehow attract weird behaviour?

Me, skiing at Sunshine

2008: Week 13

We're now a quarter of the way through 2008! A quiet week here, with few interesting events. Monday was a normal work day, although I discovered the hard way that it's not a normal work day for the post office :( Calgary has very few real post offices - they are mostly outlets inside Shoppers Drug Mart, a chain of stores somewhat similar to Priceline in Australia. The stores are often open 24 hours, although the post office counter has more limited hours.

Our weekend adventures involved trawling garage sales and a visit to a different supermarket. The garage sales were pretty poor overall, although I managed to pick up a retro metal bucket I will use to grow herbs on the balcony when it finally warms up. The supermarket exploration was a revelation. Since moving away from Ithaca I have really missed Wegmans, the greatest supermarket ever. The new downtown Coop in Calgary is not as good, but it does stock a better range than our local store, and has a good selection of prepared salads for lazy days.

Oh, and did I mention we had 10cm of snow last night?

Best of the week
- Watching the French film Angel A.
- A longer than usual conversation with my parents.
- Finally finding a French exercise book with answers!

Worst of the week
- Waiting for Spring.
- Feeling restless.

2008: Week 12

In the lead up to Easter, I've really enjoyed reading Fiona's posts anticipating Good Friday and Easter Sunday. I've often found Easter to be a strange time of year - we celebrate one of the key aspects of our faith, yet without external cues like we see at Christmas, the lead up seems almost non-existent. At least that's my experience. Today we celebrated with hot cross buns, chocolate eggs from my family, and roast lamb.

There were a few notable events this week. Things have been quite odd work-wise, with some unexpected politics, and an even less expected breach of confidence. I'm working through some old issues, and thinking quite hard about how my professional future might look. On the home front, one of my house mates moved out this weekend, so we are now a household of 4. Not a bad thing, but I expect the dynamic of the house will change, for better or worse.

Best of the week
- Hot cross buns with no peel (and no icing)
- Chocolate, delivered (thanks Mum, Dad, Michael, Lynda)
- Access to a much-needed machine at work, and success in using it

Worst of the week
- People playing games, and wondering if I'm the pawn
- Aftermath of the farewell party...

2008: Week 11

Another week has flown by! I was quite busy, with an extra French class scheduled and lots of things to get done at work. Then my work computer started doing strange things, which prompted a complete backup and upgrade of the operating system. Add to that a half day on Friday and the week gets a little crazy.

Friday was a half day because I volunteered as a judge at the Science Fair. My team of 4 people had 5 projects to evaluate, all done by 5th and 6th graders. We interviewed each child by ourselves, then decided together on a final mark to determine if they made the second round of judging. The projects were really impressive! Most of the kids had a really good understanding of the question they were trying to answer, what they had learned from their experiments, and what they might do better next time. I might be out of a job in a few years!

Best of the week
- Ethiopian lunch with work friends
- cool science projects from primary age kids at the Calgary Youth Science Fair
- home made ravioli that did not explode

Worst of the week
- french class 3 nights in a row (OK, so we skipped the 3rd one)
- snow again - at least it melts fast in March.

2008: Week 10

A quiet week at last! French was cancelled on Tuesday, so we had an unexpected night off (although we will make it up this week with 3 nights in a row!). On Thursday night we went out for Indian after our class, and that is really the majority of the week. Some unexpected developments at work, but it remains to be seen if there will be any long term effects.

The weekend was warm and sunny, so I went for a walk on Saturday. Despite a week of above-zero temperatures the river is still half frozen, with the ice extending quite a bit above and below the surface. The seasons are turning though; the birds are coming back, and people are out and about once again. Sadly we will probably wait another month or two for the plants to declare that Spring is really here.

Best of the week
- Visiting a different Calgary market and finding cheap (good) cheese.
- An extra hour of daylight in the evening.
- Successful brioche baking experiment.

Worst of the week
- Losing an hour for daylight saving.
- 3 dead mice in our kitchen (although that may be a good thing in the long run).

2008: Week 9

Another busy week, this time juggling spending time with Lynda and putting in an appearance at work. Lyn and I managed to do quite a few fun things, and I even made some progress at work, so not a bad week overall.

Wednesday I took the day off to take Lyn skiing/boarding at Sunshine. It wasn't the perfect day weather-wise, but it was reasonably warm, and by staying on the lower slopes we avoided the worst of the visibility problems. Lyn has picked up snowboarding really fast, and even took on the challenge of the ski out at the end of the day - not intrinsically difficult, but an ~6km run on tired legs with lots of people can be hard.

On Thursday we had breakfast at Diner Deluxe, after a walk in the freshly fallen snow. Yum! Then on Friday it was a visit to the Farmers Market, some last minute shopping, and an Alberta beef dinner before Lyn's Saturday morning flight to NZ. On Saturday afternoon Matt and I spent several hours indulging his new collecting hobby, and on Sunday I was up early for a pasta making class. Monday might even be relaxing in comparison!

Best of the week
- skiing with my baby sister
- making explosion-proof ravioli
- lots of birthday treats

Worst of the week
- putting Lyn on the plane back to NZ/Aus
- juggling work with the fun stuff

2008: Week 7

Sorry for the late post - it's a long weekend here and my days are a little messed up. We had a good weekend - we spent 2 days doing chores and relaxing, and today we skied at Sunshine. It was the perfect day; warm, calm, and sunny. I'm aching now, and rushing to get ready for tomorrow, but it was worth it.

And what's happening tomorrow you ask? I'm off to New York and North Carolina to hang out with family for the rest of the week. So there won't be (m)any posts this week, but I'll be back next week with all the stories.

Best of the week
- Perfect skiing weather
- Unexpected chocolates :)
- Finishing the French session with good results in written comprehension and writing (my listening skills still need lots of improvement)

Worst of the week
- Work dramas ... again
- Forgetting the camera on a perfect ski day and having to use my camera phone

Evening

Morning

2008: Week 6

Matt was given some tickets to see a few Davis Cup matches this weekend, so on Friday afternoon we met at his office and made the chilly 10 minute walk to the venue. We watched 2 singles matches in the Canada vs/ Mexico men's series - both won by Canada in straight sets. The result is a little misleading, as both matches were pretty close. The whole experience was rather odd - I tend to associate tennis with warm weather, so it was strange to be watching in the middle of winter.

Saturday was "Hockey Day in Canada". Last year our household spent the day watching hockey on TV and playing hockey on the rink across the street. It was much colder this year, so there was less playing, and perhaps less watching too. I did watch the Ottawa game - after a few recent losses they gave Montreal a 6-1 pounding. Just as it should be :)

Best of the week
- Going out for dinner after French - it's lovely not having to run home and cook.
- Locally made lavender and mint bath soak - heavenly!
- A new tradition at work - afternoon tea, every day at 4pm, with biscuits!

Worst of the week
- Exhaustion, knowing it probably means I'm getting sick, wondering when the cold symptoms will start.
- Discovering that you shouldn't buy flowers when you have to walk 20min in the cold - the cut ends were almost solid when I arrived home!

Mountains

I managed to capture a photographic glimpse of the mountain view I enjoy on the way to work most days (click on the picture for a bigger version). Calgary is around 100km from the base of the Rockies, which should give you some perspective on how large they actually are.

[relatively] warm

The temperature in Calgary had crept up to a balmy -15C. And I do mean balmy - after a few days at -30C it feels quite warm. I'm still surprised how quickly I adapt each year. I remember wearing a floor length wool coat in Sydney on days where the temperature was probably never below 5C, and feeling cold. Now I wear a shorter coat and less layers on much colder days (although I've resigned myself to beanies and gloves which I NEVER would have worn in Australia).

At home we've been battling some randomly frozen pipes. The hot water is fine, but we currently have no cold water feeding the shower (the bath is OK again after hot-water-only evening when I waited over an hour for the bath to cool enough to get in). It's all a bit of a mystery; we can see the pipes in the basement, 9 of them running in a bundle. Somewhere as they run through the house (maybe through the unheated garage?) some of them have frozen while the adjacent pipes are fine. Go figure.

Talking about the weather is such a cliché that I feel a little bad having mentioned it so often lately. Sorry for the string of monotonous posts...

2008: Week 4

It turns out that the chilly weather I wrote about last week was just the beginning of the cold - tonight as I write the temperature is -27.3C with the wind chill bringing us down to -43C. To give you some idea of the sudden temperature changes in Calgary, yesterday we had a high of 3.9C.

This week has been a strange mix of quiet and noisy. Matt spent most of the week in Toronto, so I had lots of time to myself (which I spent going to French classes, cleaning, and reading). However our house has been even crazier than normal. Our household of 5 swelled to 7 as we had two friends staying while looking for places to live in Calgary. Even after more than a year it's quite a shock to go from living alone to living here.

Best of the week

- Making progress on a book I've been reading for months.
- The satisfaction of completing tasks that I've been putting off for a while (vacuuming, writing).
- Long phone calls to Australia.

Worst of the week

- Listening to a lecture in French, and being reminded how far there is to go before I understand everything.
- Facing the prospect of heading to work when the thermometer is reading -32.2C.

Winter Mornings

In response to a request for some snow pictures, here are a few shots taken this morning on my way to the train station. A light dusting of snow overnight, a cold morning (-14C at 8.30am), and the rising sun combined to make the trees across the street particularly pretty.

As I turned the corner to walk down the hill the trees were white, the moon was setting, and the mountains were clear in the distance. I still haven't worked out how to take good shots of the mountains - they are clearly visible by eye, but in the photo you can barely make them out in the haze on the middle-left side.

A pox on sensible shoes

There are many reasons to wear sensible (read boring and ugly) shoes during a Calgary winter. Snow, mud, freezing cold - none of these are really compatible with cute shoes. But some days, you just have to ditch the sensible shoes and wear the silly ones anyway - today I put on my Fluevogs and tried them out in an inch of fresh powder.

It was a surprisingly successful experiment! The shoes have excellent soles, and the only time I was in any danger of slipping was walking down a steep path with a layer of ice under the snow. In fact it was no worse than sneakers over the same area. A little more snow and I'd have wet feet, but overall these shoes are surprisingly functional, even in winter. Oh happy day!

Stupid Alert

This may become a new feature - the top 3 stupid things of the week;

In 3rd place - the guy on the train this morning with his bike wedged sideways across a whole door. Obnoxious of course, and pretty stupid given that train doors open inwards! Fool!

In 2nd place - the City of Calgary, for completely blocking pedestrian access over the trans-Canada highway so that I had to walk along the middle of the road to get to the bar. Of course I could have just gone with the (probably safer) drink and drive option. Also for blocking the exits from a series of pedestrian pathways I use every day, but failing to put up detour signs. Halfwits!

In 1st place - the person who, upon being told I was almost finished reading the new Harry Potter book, proceeded to tell me the biggest spoiler of them all (ie/ Harry's ultimate fate). Aaaggghhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sunny summer days

Flowers150707, originally uploaded by thegreendragonfly.

For a while I thought there wouldn't be any Calgary summer posts, but at last we are getting a few days of real summer. It's been in the high 20s to low 30s since Friday, and while the Canadians are fearful of melting, I'm happy as the proverbial pig in mud. As are the flowers on our balcony! They have a new friend today - I found a small pot of gardenias in the supermarket, and couldn't resist the reminder of Christmas in Australia. Any of you who have been at my family home at that time of year should understand why.

Escape the city

Southern Alberta has finally defrosted enough to contemplate leaving the city limits and exploring the surrounding areas. On Sunday we drove roughly 200km SW through Okotoks and the Turner valley, down the Cowboy Trail, and through Crowsnest Pass into the neighbouring province British Columbia (photos are here). A beautiful area - the contrast between the prairie landscape and the Rocky Mountains is amazing! And being Spring, there were lots of baby animals around - horses, cows, and deer. Crowsnest Pass has many relics of unsuccessful coal mining operations in the area, including the Frank Slide, a disturbing mass of boulders that slid off the face of Turtle Mountain in 1903. The "rock avalanche" extends at least a mile from the base of the mountain . It wiped out part of the town of Frank and a large stretch of railway in its 100 second journey.

Heading back into Calgary we decided to drive along Macleod Trail instead of taking the highway. Close to 100 blocks of strip malls, an unpleasant contrast to the prairie wilderness just a few kilometres away.

Snow pictures

Beautiful snow

Calgary is the white city today. It's the third day of fairly consistent snow, so everything is covered! Quite beautiful, but getting around on the roads is an adventure. As for shovelling the footpath - it's a necessary but somewhat futile effort. It's always a little discouraging when your freshly shovelled path is immediately covered in snow again. Not as discouraging as trying to walk through snow 20cm deep (and rising) to get out of the house!

Cupcakes!

It seems that the cupcake craze is everywhere, including Calgary. I walked to nearby Kensington on the weekend to try out Crave Cookies and Cupcakes. Not bad, although still prefer Magnolia. I tried 3 flavours of cupcake - The Princess (vanilla cake with strawberry icing), Crave-O-Licious (chocolate cake with blue butter cream icing), and Lemon-Lime Twist (lemon cake with lime icing).
The Lemon-Lime Twist is my pick of the three, the lemon cake keeps the icing from being overpowering. The cake texture is a little odd though, somewhat like angel food cake. The Princess was pretty good too, although I think I might prefer the version with chocolate cake. Crave-O-Licious was a disappointment, the chocolate cake really didn't compare to the Magnolia version.

Crave wins on the packaging front - you can see from the picture how well the cupcakes survived the 20min walk home, compared to cupcakes from Magnolia carried uptown on the subway.

Cupcakes from Crave:

Cupcakes from Magnolia:

Calgary update

Time for an update on life in Calgary. Life in our little house is good - I'm getting used to all the testosterone (3 men plus their friends), and I think they're getting used to having a girl in the house. Actually, they might be having more influence on me than the reverse - tonight I have the place to myself and I'm sitting watching the hockey in HD! Calgary are 2-1 against Chicago as I type.

The weather has been all over the place, over 10C during the weekend, but down below -10C today. The predicted high for Friday is a chilly -13C! Yesterday I bought myself a new tuque and mittens, so I'm ready for anything.

The coffee scene is pretty dismal compared to Ithaca. Tim Hortons provide staple fresh coffee, but it's nothing compared to a good latte from Gimme! A little easier on the wallet though. On Saturday I visited Bumpy's for a real coffee - textured milk, none of that awful Starbucksesque foam, and a rosetta. Bliss, but unfortunately too far away to make a daily ritual.

Work is work, but unlike Ithaca I'm working pretty normal hours. It's quite a treat to be home by 6pm each night! The University HR department is pretty "relaxed", so I still don't have an ID card for after hours access to the building. I'm not in any hurry, although an email address might come in handy.

That's about all the news for now. Less than four weeks before Matt and I hit the heat shock of our Christmas holiday. Can't wait!

Snow in October...

Hello from sunny Calgary! Sunny, but COLD. And there is snow on the ground! The last few days have been fun - lots of unpacking of course, and the usual running around. I now have a bank account and I should have a new cell phone by the weekend. All I need is to start work so I can put money in the account and pay for the phone.

Banff, Stampede, and Home

Getting a little out of date here. Sorry.

Thursday Matt and I drove out to Banff National Park, a little over an hour outside of Calgary. I had really hoped to see an elk, but it wasn't to be. Still, there was no shortage of impressive sights - Lake Louise gleaming turquoise against the craggy mountains and distant glacier, Moraine Lake more blue than I thought possible, the Crowfoot glacier (one of the toes has receded since it was named), and Peyto Lake and its source glacier viewed from the highest pass in the park.

Friday we joined the cowboys and girls at the Stampede for mini donuts (think of a bigger version of the Berry Donut Van serving bags of miniature hot fresh cinnamon donuts - yum!) and chuckwagon races. Alas, I couldn't find a cowboy hat I liked enough to fork out $30. The races were followed by a kitschy patriotic show featuring the "Young Canadians of the Calgary Stampede". It was pretty cool, although a little bizarre to hear Canadians being so overtly patriotic. They usually tend towards more subtle maple leaves on their backpacks or hockey jerseys. The bars afterwards were crazy, but we finally managed to find a beer at the Unicorn Pub. It's still a mystery how a pub founded in 1979 could be Calgary's original pub. It's a young city, but really...

Saturday was a sleep in followed by some pretty good Mexican for lunch, then off to the airport. Quite some tears later I was on the WestJet plane (kind of the Canadian version of Virgin, lots of fun) back to Ottawa. It's a little strange to think that the three and a half day drive could be reversed with a three and a half hour plane ride. Matt's lovely parents picked me up, fed me coffee and alcohol, then let me sleep in on Sunday AND fed me bacon and eggs for breakfast! What legends!

Of course all good things eventually end, and after breakfast I headed back to Ithaca. A very uneventful drive, which may or may not have been punctuated by a trip to the Carousel Mall in Syracuse. And finally I arrived back to Ithaca, to a steamy 30C apartment, some very wilted plants, and the fun of unpacking. Oh, and work tomorrow. Hooray....

Calgary

Yes, we finally made it to Calgary. The last day of driving was pretty slow, because we stopped to see a few touristy things along the way. First the Brooks Aqueduct which was built in the early 20th century to irrigate the fields in Southern Alberta. Then on to the Bassano Dam, also part of the irrigation system. We also stopped for the first McDonald's of the trip - not a good move. It always tastes even worse than I remember. But after multiple stops at Tim Horton's it was time for a change.

This morning we went to a Stampede Breakfast - free pancakes, sausage and eggs - all part of the Calgary Stampede. This is ranch country, the Canadian wild west, and the Stampede is a massive yearly rodeo. People on the streets are actully wearing cowboy outfits! I'm hoping to pick up a cowgirl hat myself.