MIDWAY THROUGH FEBRUARY

Made it half way through February. The weather has been extremely weird this year. Mostly very cold with a few days of a melt-down with rain, then it all froze over. Locals were actually skating on the sidewalks and roads all over town. Luckily we had some more snow on top of that so we could get some traction. When I first moved here in 1977, I couldn't understand why the weather was the number topic of conversation, now I understand. In the winter it really dictates what you can do and when it's not winter everyone is so damned happy about it they talk about it with glee! Sun is up around 7:30 a.m. now and is giving us a whole day until about 6:00. The daylight increases about two hours each month until June 21 when the sun is up about 4:15 and sets about 11:00 p.m. - love those long days.
I took a one year break from this climate during the school year 81-82 and taught some classes at Louisiana State University in the Speech department. Then in June of '82 I returned to Manitoba. Have been here ever since. I travel often to the South to visit relatives in Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida. I retired in Jan. 2005 and walked away from the profession (Speech/Language Pathology). I haven't missed it one bit.
I have been using the internet to search for former classmates and colleagues and have located a good many of them. As a military brat, I have searched for people is the U.S. and overseas. Still looking for many of them. I had hoped posting a blog might draw out some of them if they remember my name - this blog is in my maiden name.
My son and his family, wife and three kids, live just north of Jacksonville, Fla. actually in Georgia. My other relatives are in Louisiana and Mississippi. My mom and my sisters are gearing up for Mardis Gras next week - the parties and parades have already been in full swing. My parents took my sister and me to our first Mardis Gras parade when I was three years old, so we had a long history of visiting or living in and around Louisiana over the years.
I'll log onto one of the many web sites in New Orleans and watch the festivities.
Here's hoping for an early meltdown this year.

JANUARY ACTIVITIES

Click on the picture so you can see that I have a cord plugged into the block heater of the car so it will start in the cold weather. This is my backyard in the winter.

We had the coldest January on record this year - many days below -40F. Even so I have been busy. Had a once week call to spare for the bowing league, was asked to play drums for a musician's group and met friends a few times for social gatherings. I did find something that was fascinating to me - the street view segments on Google Maps. Since I was a military Brat and moved about 30 times before I graduated from high school I spent some of my hibernating days finding the houses we lived in and the schools I attended. Couldn't access all of them as the streets in England and Germany had not been filmed, yet. I did find the Paris hotel we stayed in the summer of 1959 ($5 a night) which was two blocks from the L'arc de Triumph. Not all of the streets I was searching for in the U.S. had been filmed but I was able to take a "drive" up every little road along the Gulf Coast that had been affected by hurricane Katrina - of interest to me since that is my family's home and all of my relatives live on the coast between New Orleans and Jacksonville, Florida. I didn't have addresses for all of the places and my Mom is trying to remember some of them. I had report cards from Kindergarten so I was able to find the school sites. I was flabergasted at the memories that popped into my head as a result of seeing these places. It was truly just likely driving by them in a car.
I shall have to put this activity aside for a while as I could spend countless hours "driving" to the cities I have either lived in or visited. I have lived in this house since the Fall of 1999 and never thought it possible to be in one spot for this log - a record for me. I guess you would have to be a military Brat to fully understand all of this sillyness.