So, it's Thanksgiving weekend here in what used to be called the Dominion of Canada, and Chateau Ricardipus has been the site of the usual melange of relatives, turkey, sweet potatoes and general holiday festiveness that is usual on this occasion. Even the almighty Google™ sat up and took notice, although since the Blogger picture upload tool is currently broken, evidence is lacking.
[
Use your imagination to insert Thanksgiving-ified Google logo here.]
Our neighbours to the south of the 49th parallel celebrate much later on, in November. If we did that, significant portions of our country would be eyeball deep in snow, which makes finding the turkeys difficult, to say the least.
Actually, this argument hardly makes sense, especially when you consider that where I'm sitting and typing this is actually
south of much of the U.S. of A., including:
- all of North Dakota;
- what looks like all of Washington state;
- most of Montana, Minnesota, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine;
- bits of Idaho, Wisconsin, Michigan and New York state;
- parts of South Dakota and Oregon (I think); and
- maybe even part of Wyoming.
Of course, the above might be biased by the
crappy web-map I'm looking at, because I'm too lazy to haul the Atlas down off the top shelf in the basement. But you get the idea.
Otherwise, the weekend has been spent doing the traditional things: eating, cooking and housecleaning. Especially housecleaning, 'cos that's what we do around here on weekends, and most especially on holiday weekends. When relatives are coming to visit.
And what else? Well, the Juniors are not attending karate classes as they're not scheduled (due to the aforementioned holiday), and I've been able to sneak in a good solid chunk of research for the report that I mentioned in passing
here; in true twenty-first century style I have done some research, written an outline, downloaded and printed some materials (blowing out the ink cartridge in the process, darn it) and emailed my co-author who
doesn't even live in this city. I'm easily impressed by this technology stuff, you'll gather.
Turns out Capital City-Based Partner in Crime is also working at home, on the assumption that going to the office on a holiday would result in Domestic Violence With Extreme Prejudice. Which would probably be the case here, too, come to think of it.
Now, if only I could bring myself to spend a few bucks, I could get me some wireless set up in the Chateau, and do this stuff on the laptop, in bed, while watching racing on TV. Well, I do that anyway, but without the internet, which as we all know is roughly equivalent to playing ice hockey without a puck. Or skates. Or ice.
Yeah, I know, laptop in bed, it's
hardly an original idea, but cut me some slack, I'm well behind the technology curve here.
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In other news:
1. Lots of birds this weekend. After weeks of house sparrows, starlings, doves, more sparrows, the occasional goldfinch, and a bunch of bloody sparrows, we've finally been joined by some other friends. Not uncommon by any means, but haven't been around recently:
- Dark-eyed Junco,
Junco hyemalis- Red-winged Blackbird,
Agelaius phoeniceus- House Finch,
Carpodacus mexicanus- a pair of Blue Jays,
Cyanocitta cristata- Song Sparrow,
Melospiza melodia.
Plus, of course, the usual skeins of Canada Geese randomly flying North, South, East and West for the winter.
2. It seems that the summer is not quite dead and gone, as Expensive Sports Cars That Should Be Stored Out Of The Snow Season™ is, apparently, not yet over. On Saturday I was passed by a bright yellow Lamborghini Gallardo (again), and at a local coffee shop I parked next to a rather spiffy silver-grey Aston Martin DB9. Makes a change from all the Ferraris, anyway.
Picture, if you will, about fifteen people goggling (not 'Googling', for a change, but 'goggling') out the window at the snow, as if we'd never seen it before. Well, that might actually be true for the bioinformatics guy from India - but he didn't seem any less enthusiastic than the rest of us. To tell the truth, the home-grown Canadians were a bit gigglier than everyone else. Talk of skiing was rampant.