Wizard Card

Facial hair so much lighter now.

Another week has passed on the shore of Lake Superior in my hometown. The weather continues its slow descent toward winter. Most nights see freezing temperatures and daytime highs struggle to reach double digits. There is still no snow here, but we did have a big dump (88mm, about 3.5") of rain on Tuesday. Otherwise, the days have been pleasant and we've been able to get out for walks with Kali. She is gradually building up her comfortable walking range; those 10cm legs take a lot of steps to get anywhere!

Happy Birthday, Rauni!

Wendy took Kali to visit Rauni for her 93rd birthday. She was delighted by the visit and to get acquainted with Kali. We both continue to be busy with music as we have choral presentations coming up in December. Yesterday, our routines were interrupted by a plumbing emergency. The shower control had failed. I discovered a replacement cartridge among my plumbing supplies, so the shut down was not lengthy. When I reported to Home Depot, they informed me that these cartridges were a free replacement, so I gathered that they have been seeing lots of such failures! The chaos of Trump is already being felt in the USA, despite that he won't take office until January 20th. He has been making wild picks for his various government officials—an accused rapist and sexual predator for Attorney General?! Fortunately, the Senate played the Wizard card and over-trumped that one, but dangerous candidates remain! The markets have been a bit wild, but remain buoyant and we continue to test record highs. This is producing another good month of gains—thanks, Uncle Joe. The world of sports is rolling out plenty of surprises, not as I expect and hope. The Oilers, Pens and Leafs which I follow in the NHL are performing well below expectations. The Grey Cup was won by Toronto in a pleasing upset of Winnipeg. At least Jayhawks keep winning, and retain their #1 ranking. Today, #3-Texas and my unranked Sooners played. Texas had an easy time of it against unranked Kentucky, while OU was up against perennial powerhouse #7-Alabama. Surprisingly, the Sooners put up a great fight and won that game—they are now qualified for a bowl game!

Erica writes, "The snow has arrived and our carport is still in its box, not doing its job of keeping the snow off our car! Our neighbour helped us out by shovelling our driveway and walk—good neighbours! Mystery Train (the girl band I’m in) played at a few care homes these past two weeks. Today, we played at a seniors' condo. There was a lot of dancing and singing along. At one point, we said we were going to do a more modern song—from the 1970s! Maybe not so modern after all. It has been fun and I’ve learned some more keyboard parts to play as well. Eric has brought up the Christmas Tree box and cleared a space, so I guess we will be putting that up this weekend. I got a call for carpal surgery on December 5 so this week included appointments with the surgeon and a pre-op with my doctor. The procedure is about 10 minutes and done with local anesthetic so nothing to worry about (mom!). No news from the rest of the clan."

Not much news out of Regina, except that the snow has arrived with a vengeance, and more is coming this weekend. No developments on Kristian's potential employment, but he did some fancy electrical work this week to repair an LED pot light downstairs, and he's thinking about taking more training. Erin is doing a bit of posting work from home this weekend, but unfortunately she's getting some help from Elly—LOL. 

Big help from Elly

Travis and Joanna are very (make that extremely) busy as the postal strike has them reconsidering shipping options. Some orders had already been sent, and now may need to be redone completely. We did have them stop by for soup one evening, but no time for games. They also came by today, but that was mainly to visit Kali! Travis and I also take some time to commiserate over our NHL teams as he also follows the Pens, Leafs and Oilers. 

And that's about it for this week.