It's Time!

Another week has passed on the shore of Lake Superior in my hometown. The cold weather has broken, and we're enjoying sunny days. They're predicting temperatures near zero next week, but also suggesting that we'll get some snow. We'll see how that plays out! I am scheduled for spinal surgery on Monday, so I won't have to worry about snow clearing for a while! We've had a cold week here in Thunder Bay, but not the wild weather experienced east of here, nor the deep freeze enjoyed in the west. We've had a quiet, mostly indoors week. Wendy had her choir practice on Monday evening, and went for a fresh haircut on yesterday. I had my pre-admission conference on Wednesday. The markets have been struggling with fears that the FED will maintain its high interest rates for longer than hoped since the USA economy continues to perform so strongly. However, as jobless data was much better than expected, and consumer confidence data also was a beat, the investors finally decided that companies pretty much had to make money in this environment so, we closed the week with some nice gains. In the world of sports curling has been a highlight. Last week concluded with Koe winning in Lloydminster. This week, it's the Canadian Open in Red Deer. Koe lost in the tie-breaker this morning. It will be a Canada/Scotland final on the men's side tomorrow, featuring Bottcher vs Mouat. On the women's side, it'll be Switzerland/Canada with the Tirinzoni vs Homan matchup. In hockey, my Oilers ran off another big win streak (now at 13 games) to move into a playoff position. Leafs are having a bad spell of blowing leads and losing games; they're barely hanging on to what used to be a solid playoff position. Penguins are playing better and have moved within two points of the playoffs. They all played today, but only Oilers managed a win. #3-Jayhawks have continued their sloppy ways in college basketball, and have not been achieving the easy wins that I expect! Today, they dropped a road game that they should have won easily! Rock Chalk boys! Stadium stairs, boys!! I expect this will show up in a drop in the rankings!

Erica writes, "Eric and I honoured our grandfathers on Friday by attending an NDP fundraiser in PA. We dragged along a few conservatives as well. Ha! It was a fun evening with music bingo, silent auctions and air banjo. On Saturday, we went to listen to Amy Bishop at the EA Rawlinson in PA. I also had an appointment in Saskatoon to get my hand electrocuted. Turns out, I have carpal tunnel. I also had some testing for arthritis, but I don’t have that yet! So that’s good. I have to wear a brace for four months and if that doesn’t fix it, we may do a procedure. The boys all seem well. We’ve had a few chats here and there and they are doing okay."

Kristian won his curling game last week, but this week's schedule was postponed. We expect they will catch up on that one later. Then, they'll be into the playoffs. Erin had a small disaster with her RAV4 as the battery failed. Modern vehicles rely heavily on the computerized aspects. We experienced a similar issue earlier this winter as the battery weakened, and the computer said, "So sorry, can't run on that!" It wouldn't start, it wouldn't even lock the doors, we couldn't even get it out of gear for towing—it was dead! Her situation was similar and in the very cold weather, she had to get it towed to work and a new battery installed.

Ah, the life!

Travis and Joanna are enjoying life in Punta Cana where tropical beaches beckon! They laugh at we poor folk suffering in the cold! Seriously, we are glad to see them taking a break from the work and the weather. We are taking care of Minnie, and that's going fine.

And that's about enough for this week!