Category: Dog days

Saturn in Opposition

This is about as close as we’ll get to Saturn this year, as Earth moves between the Sun and Saturn. It’s a great time to have a look at it through a telescope.

I took this picture from the west side of Lake Windermere. I’ve labelled the stars that form the Great Square of Pegasus, along with the Andromeda Galaxy, about 2.5 million light-years away and the most distant object we can see with the naked eye.

Toast is still too small to join me on these walks under the stars. There are too many coyotes and other critters wandering around in the dark. By the end of winter she’ll still be small, but I expect she’ll be out there with me, giving Orion’s dog, Sirius, a bark.

Early October

It has been nice for Lisa and me to be enjoying the October air with a little dog cutting this way and that while she learns the smells and sights of the bush.

The garden is pretty much in, except for some beets and a heap of carrots. I am going to pull the carrots, trim and bag them up so Lisa can put up a notice on Facebook announcing free carrots. We have done this before with extra vegetables, and they go fast. We keep them out at the road for people to pick up.

The carrots are Royal Chantenay, short and fat, and look nothing like the carrots you buy in the store. This is why I trim, wash and bag them, so people will take a chance on them. It is surprising how some people will not take fresh garden veggies because they don’t look store bought. Once they taste the Royal Chantenay, they will be hooked. I don’t want a little dirt on them being the deciding factor in whether they are tried.

Only a few frosts in the valley bottom so far. I had a couple of tomato plants that were killed. It seems long overdue. It has been a long while since we have had a killer frost at the end of August.

Blue Skies

Toast gets a run in.

September is a good month. Still no frost in the valley bottom. Soon though, and I’m looking forward to it. Most of the tomatoes and the last of the cucumbers have been picked.

Toast and I piled wood this afternoon. I split a few so she gets used to the sound of the axe hitting a block. She will also have to get used to the sound of the chainsaw. So far nothing seems to scare her. She is a little reluctant with new people, but I don’t mind that.

These days the skies are blue. The tourists have receded somewhat. However, as I write this I can hear vehicles doing burnouts. There is a classic car rally in the valley that brings participants from far and wide. They can’t help it.

I expect the next month or so to be busy as people start realizing they have to get things done before the snow flies.

The trip to Quebec has renewed my interest in Canadian history and I have been reading some old journals and books in the public domain. I’m also rereading The Orenda by Joseph Boyden. Boyden was cancelled in the Canadian literary scene, maybe rightly so, however he sure can write. His books, based on historical events, are from the individuals perspective. That’s what I find interesting. I know dates and how it all panned out, I am interested in what people where thinking and how the world was changing in their eyes.

Boyden did this well in Three Mile Road about a man coming home from the First World War. Some of the stories within the book were similiar to the ones my father and grandfather told. There is an authenticity to his stories. So it is quite ironic that Boyden was cancelled due to his own lack of authenticity. Things change, soon people will be judged by their work or art. That’s not now however.

The moon is growing. I point it out to Toast. She gnaws on a piece of bark and doesn’t look up. I know she feels it though.

Off the ridge.

Cloud and Smoke

Tamaracks

A few drops of rain this morning. They were welcome, as they helped clear some of the smoke. Unfortunately, the Perseids will likely be hidden tonight by smoke and clouds. It’s disappointing, as it seems to be becoming a regular thing to have them obscured by smoke.

This year they fall during a new moon, so under good conditions they would be quite a sight in a dark sky. That’s the way it goes sometimes. Will keep a look out regardless. A hole in the din may develop.

Here are a few pictures of wildflowers from the other day. The names I use may not be proper. Just like creeks and mountains I tend to call them by the names I learned long ago.

Rocky Mountain Heather

Umbrella Plant

Fireweed

Pasque Flower

Smokey Tarn

Red snow algae.

Alpine Forget Me Not

Indian Paint Brush

Arnica

Late July

After a day of smoke, tourists and work, it’s good to find a quiet backroad. The huckleberries may be scarce this year, but the stars are as plentiful as ever.

Been spending some time driving the backroads, looking for a little peace and checking the higher elevations to see how the huckleberries are doing.

It doesn’t look like they’ll be nearly as plentiful as they were last year. We just haven’t had the same amount of moisture. I’ll be lucky to gather enough for a few batches of jam.

The valley has settled into summer. There’s smoke in the air, plenty of tourists, and it seems there are more every year. A few fires are burning nearby. We’ve certainly seen much worse.

The garden, on the other hand, is thriving. Squash, peas, beans, lettuce, and potatoes are producing faster than we can keep up with. The tomatoes are just beginning to ripen, and the garlic is ready to come out of the ground. Time to construct a drying rack. Today I pickled a batch of beans, trying to find ways to preserve some of the bounty before it all disappears at once.

It’ll be a busy weekend. I’ll be working, right in the middle of it all.

Old Friends

The old frame with a repurposed matt and rhubarb leaf print done on Environment 110 lb card with printers ink.

I don’t see many people at work anymore. That’s by choice.

My jobs come to me through an app the night before or first thing in the morning, and away I go. With a little planning, it’s easy to schedule jobs for times when people are less likely to be around.

My phone is set to accept calls only from work or immediate family. My bosses contact me through the app. Everything else is screened by AI.

It’s a survival tactic after years of being available at a moment’s notice to everyone, business and personal. This is where I am right now, and it’s working. It means less money, but more peace of mind.

The other day, though, I had two unexpected encounters with old friends.

While pulling into the gas station to refill a propane tank, I noticed a man standing beside a beat-up truck with a jerry can. He was holding a sign asking for gas money. He looked like someone I hadn’t seen in years. As I was leaving, I pulled up behind him. Not completely sure, I walked over and said his name.

He looked at me and replied, “Rob.”

Not many people ever called me Rob. He always had, ever since we met in grade school.

I hadn’t seen him since high school. He was a year ahead of me. He grew up in a small house close to the school with a short fence around it, kept in immaculate condition by his parents, who were wonderful people. He had several siblings.

We talked for a while. He introduced me to his wife, who was sitting in the truck. They were living out in the bush and invited me to stop by if I was ever in the area. I knew exactly where they had set up.

Living in the bush is something more and more people are doing these days. Of course, no one really wants to. The cost of living, especially housing is simply beyond the reach of many people in the valley.

Lisa and I were fortunate to buy our house almost forty years ago, when our money had much more buying power and owning a home was still within reach.

It was good to see him again and to meet his wife. I helped them out with some gas money, or whatever they felt they needed most. Lisa was saddened to hear about their circumstances. We’ll keep an eye out for them through the summer.

It seems that whenever I run into longtime locals, their circumstances are rarely good. Progress and unchecked growth, instead of delivering on their promises, have too often displaced the very people who built this valley.

The second encounter happened only about an hour later.

I pulled into a parking lot beside a Hummer covered in a realtor’s logos. I know the realtor. As far as realtors go, he’s one of the better ones. I saw him walking toward me and thought, Oh shit… I’m going to have to talk to him.

Just then a little beater car came flying into the lot, slammed on the brakes, kicked up a cloud of dust, and blocked both me and the Hummer in.

It was B. I hadn’t seen him in quite a while. He was another I went to school with. We’d also worked together years ago, and I never tired of his sense of humour. He delivered everything, good news or bad, with the same grin. He could get away with saying things no one else could.

The realtor looked more than a little surprised as B threw the car into reverse and cleared a path for the Hummer.

Then we stood there laughing and catching up.

B is on disability now with a bad back. His father had recently died just shy of a hundred years old, and B told me he’d taken to riding his mobility scooter down to the beach.

“Jesus, B,” I said. “You can walk.”

“Sure,” he said. “But this way I’ve always got a chair to sit on.”

That somehow led us onto another cheerful topic – dying.

B told me that years ago his ex-wife had suffered a series of heart attacks and was lying in the hospital on life support. When he went to visit, the staff assumed he was her current husband.

“They asked me what I thought,” he said. “I told them, ‘Pull the tubes. Unplug her. No one should have to live like that.'”

While the staff went to get the doctor, her actual husband arrived.

“He told them not to unplug her,” B said. “‘She’s the only thing I’ve got.'”

B looked at him and said, “That’s bullshit. She’s just another welfare cheque to you.”

I stared at him.

“Holy shit,” I said. “What happened to your ex-wife?”

“Oh, she’s fine.”

“She recovered?”

“Oh yeah. This was years ago.”

“Damn, B,” I laughed. “You almost killed her.”

“Yup,” he said with that same big grin.

Then he peeled away, kicking up the dust that had finally settled since the beginning of our conversation.

I’m still laughing.

It’s good to only see the people you want to.

Mid June

A Highland Cow enjoying the abundant grass.

The garden is on the verge of catching hold. The cucumbers have not enjoyed the rain but are still hanging on as are the tomatoes. Not exactly flourishing though.

A few things came up very spotty. Beets and lettuce for instance, strange as they usually come up like gangbusters. I did use old seed, perhaps that made a difference.

The starlings have vacated the hole in the top of our tree. With the foliage out in full force one could hardly see the hole. The young ones have learned to fly and flown the coop.

My trips in the bush have not been as frequent. Still missing Willow. Lisa has been trying to track down another Wire-Haired Standard Dachshund but they are hard to come by. They are much more popular in Europe. I have joked that I’m going to go to Poland to get a hound. Our Wire-Haired before Willow, Slinky was from Poland. She was also a fantastic dog.

Here are a few pics from June.

A Roundleaf Orchid. I returned to this orchid recently to get a picture of the flowers open and it had been munched off. Flowers are a favourite of bears. There was plenty of sign to confirm this suspicion.

Lola helping me find Orchids along the game trails.

Coral Orchid. These were everywhere and reminded me of Asparagus.

Following a game trail. I often followed game trails when I was young, hunting, but often, just trying to learn from the animals. Where they were going, what routes they chose, where they would dip down for water or rise onto the mountain side, the tracks they left and which animals shared the route. My young self figured they knew the bush better than us, so why not learn from them. Older now I have trouble managing the deadfalls.

Bog Orchid.

An Oldtimer harvesting pine pollen. This was taken on a walk with Lisa, Cooper and Scarlett. The kids asked what pine pollen is good for. I told them it was good for the immune system and can even be used as an aphrodisiac. Cooper wanted to know what an aphrodisiac was, Lisa said it can give a man an erection. Cooper’s response was, “Why would somebody want more of those.”

Storm Clouds

The two starlings are quiet while they tend to their young in the nest. They are busy going back and forth. Starlings are almost never quiet, usually kicking up a fuss, but they are not taking any chances giving themselves away. The hole at the top of the tree is mostly covered now too, with the leaves fully out.

Lisa says she can hear the young ones, but I can’t. My ears have been plugged from a head cold. This morning I drove out of the mountains and the change in altitude really plugged them up. I stopped at a gas station and when I went in to pay, a woman started talking to me and I couldn’t hear a word she said. I just nodded along with, “Ya,” “Ah-huh,” “Oh ya,” “Ya.” She could have been telling me my fly was undone, or that I’d just won a prize. To top it off, I’d forgotten to put in my front teeth. Deaf without any bite. Oh well.

Up the pass the creeks were flowing muddy from the recent rains. Lola again was on loan. We found some yellow orchids, though they were not blooming yet. The Venus orchids were out in large patches and were even starting to die back.

I was very happy with the photo I snapped that leads this post. To think that this delicate plant lives all year beneath the moss and bark that make up the forest floor, then picks just the right time to bloom in such a magnificent show that only lasts a short while before disappearing almost undetectably for another year. They are sometimes called fairy orchids as they flutter just above the forest floor. It would be a shame not to celebrate them while we are here.

***

A month or so ago I was doing some work at a set of fancy condos overlooking the lake. I saw a guy walking by from the lakeshore, stopping here and there to look around. I thought he was lucky to be out for a walk, unhurried, with time to take in the sights looking back toward the lake.

Not long after he had passed, I felt eyes on me. Busy working, I looked over my shoulder and there was the same guy hiding behind a partition, videoing me.

Once spotted, he tried to hide better. I said, “Hold on, you look like you have some questions.”

He told me he was on the strata board and that he saw me putting hot tub water on the grass. I told him he didn’t see that because I wasn’t, not that it would have mattered much if I had — it probably would have done the grass good. I also told him it wasn’t a very good idea sneaking up on people. All in all, it was an okay but strange interaction.

A week ago I was back at the same condo complex. This time I heard a yell that made me jump.

“I told you not to put hot tub water on the grass!”

Again, I wasn’t. But this time I couldn’t see the guy. I knew it was the sneak from last time. He was somewhere above me on one of the balconies.

I said, “Come on down here.”

And he did.

I had been nice the first time. This time I wasn’t.

***

It sure is good riding the backroads. Here is a picture from coming off the mountain toward the storm clouds down in the valley bottom.

Searching

Everywhere we looked, animals were ducking for cover, which was essentially what we were doing. We got higher than we’d been since November. The clouds quickened. A rabbit jumped off the trail. Squirrels had left their cones shredded on the deadfalls. A small falcon tested the wind, curious enough to hang around and get a good look at us. Several light-coloured swifts flew like bullets through the timber. They must have an amazing navigation system. Thrushes, robins, and juncos scattered, disturbed by the two of us early on the trail.

And the quiet was wonderful, exactly what the ears needed.

We stopped below a rock bluff with a view north. The valley bottom was long gone. We could see storms forming above Baldy, sheets of misty rain rolling closer while the clouds directly overhead kept flowing north. A great collision, perhaps. Would the rain get through?

We spotted a large black bear below, near where we had come from. It was accompanied by a few crows and several grey jays perched on the top spikes of spruce and pine. We kept our eyes on them as they turned back down the mountain. We wished them peace, and for them to stay hidden, the same wish for ourselves.

The northern clouds won. Hail and snow started to fall. It wouldn’t last; it was spring after all, and blue sky was already showing through.

***

The other day I was cut off by a tourist in a shiny little sports car with all its windows tinted black. All the stuff I had on my seats ended up on the floor when I slammed on the brakes. If Willow had of been there she would have crashed into the dashboard, which she has done before on similar occasions.

I cursed, not at the driver, who had long sped off, but at this reminder that we are again on the verge of another busy tourist season.

Orchids

A couple of days ago, Lisa mentioned that the Calypso orchids should be blooming. I’m usually on top of these things, but I don’t get out into the bush as much anymore without Willow spurring me on.

Today I left the gardening behind and headed out to see how spring in the mountains was progressing. To make things even better, the kids lent me Lola to tag along.

Lola is a wonderful dog — well behaved, sweet, and kind. She’s recovering from an injury, so I have to keep her close, which is no problem at all. Although she’s a big dog and can look a little menacing, she is anything but.

This is how a conversation with Lola goes:

Chipmunk chirps somewhere off in the distance.

Lola: “Did you hear that?”

Me: “Yep.”

Lola: “What was it?”

Me: “Sounds like a chipmunk.”

Lola: (worried look) “Do you think it’s friendly?”

And this is how a conversation with little Willow went:

Willow: “Bark, growl, bark, growl, bark, bark, bark!”

Bear runs and climbs tree.

Willow: “Did you see that?”

Me: “Yes. You scared the bear up a tree.”

Willow: “It’s lucky I can’t climb trees, or I’d go up there and kick its ass.”

Then she’d scrape her paws on the ground like a bull getting ready to charge and puff out her chest like she ruled the mountains.

Lola and I did find some orchids growing on the soft, mossy forest floor. We even sat together and watched the sun rise above the mountains and warm our faces.

Two years ago, on May 10 and 11, we experienced an incredible solar storm. Lisa and I spent the night outside, and neither of us had ever seen anything like it. Auroras pulsed and waved in every direction and continued throughout the entire night.

This photo is from that unforgettable evening