Frozen lake? No, just a stubblefield covered with snow, whipped up by the wind, and hardened into waves.

•

The snow is melting though. The middle of the grid road is muddy, and there is hard slush along the sides.

I took a long walk yesterday afternoon and was tickled to see the dog stand straight up on her hind legs, then dive straight down, head first into the snow banked in the ditch, so that all I could see of her was her ass end. She came up with one unlucky mouse. I doubt she meant to kill it, as her tail was wagging the whole time. She probably meant to play with it.

Later, she heard something under the snow and, staring fixedly at it, bounced her front legs off the ground about four times. Boing boing boing.

Dogs. Hours of entertainment.

*

Good news: that our hostages in Iraq have been freed and will be coming home safely. It is only too bad this rescue didn't take place a few weeks ago, before the murderers ended Mr. Fox's life.

Migraine day. It's 5 o'clock and I'm still in my housecoat; just starting to feel normal now. If the trend continues, I'll be working at the computer tonight. Cross your fingers for me.

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The wind over the past week has hardened the snow above so that it can be walked on. This photo was taken a little distance behind our house, where there is a "deer highway."

You can see tracks of all sizes. I'm not sure how many animals there are in the herd, but they pass by here every day; I'm guessing it's at dusk, since that's when the dog goes crazy, barking in that direction.

Sonia, a Brazilian writer, updated her online journal with a photo of, among other things, her bookshelf. After I finished drooling, I thought I’d take a picture of my sadass bookshelf so y’all could feel sorry for me.

I mean, is this not cruel and unusual punishment for a booklover such as myself? My librarian would surely agree.

•

It’s sunny and the thermometer claims the temperature is above freezing, but the wind is still blowing and when I was out on the deck getting almonds from the freezer for the granola I’m making, it felt pretty damn chilly. The dog was in her cardboard house instead of out running around. That surely means something.

I’ll get out there. Meanwhile, I have a card reading to do for someone who sent a cheque about six months ago and has waited patiently all this time. I haven’t cashed the cheque, but I still feel a little guilty. Tsk! Where does the time go?

•

Sadly, the list of most and least carcinogenic (i.e. pesticide-contaminated) fruits and vegetables includes the ones my children eat the most of. This is downright scary. It takes two hours of highway driving to get somewhere that sells organic produce, so I often purchase what is available locally. I’m going to have to make better arrangements.

Not that I haven't asked the Co-op store to get organic produce in. I have, and they thought they would. But I'm not seeing it very often. There is not enough demand for it. Grrrrrr. I thought I was demanding enough!! Just ask Scott.

Here are the most contaminated:

Apples

Celery

Cherries

Grapes

Grapefruit

Lettuce (leaf)

Lettuce (head)

Nectarines

Oranges

Peaches

Pears

Potatoes

Snow peas

Spinach

Strawberries

I found this list by following links at this Marketplace webpage.

I long ago stopped buying strawberries and grapes off the Co-op’s shelves, and Scott grows our potatoes in the summer. But most of the others are staples in our kitchen.

Not good.

This picture? Taken early in the week, before we had another six inches of the fluffy white dumped on us.

People's vehicles have been stuck on roads all over the area, as the municipal graders are not able to keep up with the snowfall combined with high winds.

My trip to Grandma's today, where Everett was going to spend the night, was kiboshed in favour of staying warm and cosy. The idea of shovelling out a snowbank in the middle of a gravel road somewhere between there and here was not too appealing.

Thursday night we came home from Everett's piano lesson and had to park on the road and shovel 50 feet of driveway in order to get the van up to the house. Fortunately the snow was, though deep, light and powdery, and Everett thought shovelling was fun.

•
•

Let's see, what's new:

1) new mattress and boxspring this week -- gotta like that; a little more padding and my hipbones aren't grinding into the thing, so it seems a luxury fit for a queen.

2) a girlhood friend's mom's funeral in town yesterday; sad occasion, particularly since the cause of death is not known and, although she'd been ailing for several months, her illness was not expected to kill her. So on top of shock and grief, her children and family have this mystery (as the pastor called it) to cope with. One asks enough Whys when the reasons are known; this must be even more difficult.

3) after the funeral, a good visit with my friend Clever and her family, with whom I spent quite a bit of time as a teenager. Her mom still calls me a "brat."

Was watching Prairie Giant, the Tommy Douglas Story on TV this week. Near the beginning there was a clip of the early settlers coming to Saskatchewan, or maybe this country in general, and someone read a proclamation that all those who would clear and live on the land would become its rightful owners. It occurred to me how much this opportunity must have meant to people, to leave a homeland that they loved and much of their extended families behind in order to do this, knowing they’d quite likely never see them again, and make this very long and tortuous journey to get here, not knowing exactly what they would find.

Were these incredibly forward-thinking people, very aware of the possibility of making a better lives for their descendants, or were the conditions back home that bad? Of course in many cases they were -- there was religious persection and poverty, and no end to them in sight; and often there was no hope of owning one's own land.

I attended the same high school as the producer of this program. I’m tempted to write him a note in appreciation.

•
•

Everett was telling me about a girl at school who gave a beating (he exaggerated quite a bit, I discovered when he was pressed) to a kid who was always saying rude things to her. Finally, she’d just had more than she could take.

“She’s like you, Mom,” he said.

“Eh? You think I’d lay a licking on someone for saying things I didn’t like?”

“Well, no,” he said, “but you don’t allow anyone to speak to you like that, and neither does she.”

In some ways I wish I was as tough a nut as he believes.

Do those two dead trees not look like a courting pair?

•
•

I live in a forest oasis of scrubby poplars, willows and maple trees, caraganas and wild roses, raspberry and saskatoon bushes, and the odd tall, dark evergreen.

Twice when I was out walking on the road, I looked in every direction around me and the dog was nowhere to be seen. The first time, she appeared out of the blue right beside me and I was flabbergasted. It is not a heavily wooded area, and I’d been standing in the middle of the gravel road. There was no place to hide.

The second time, she disappeared into the horse pasture and I got all the way home alone before my curiosity got the best of me and I went back onto the road and called her. After three calls and a weak whistle, I was about to give up when she came running onto the road from the haybale stack with something dark grey, furry, and thankfully dead, in her jaws.

So, Sara is not only an Australian cattle dog. She’s a ratter, too.

“Ugh!” I said, as she threw it up in the air, picked it up and shook it mercilessly, then dropped it on the snow and rolled on it. I mean, “Good dog! Now, don’t bring it into the yard.”

< <> >

I've been mostly sleeping, or trying to sleep, since the wee hours of Sunday morning. Have been popping a lot of pills to assuage migraine symptoms, and am not sure I'm out of the woods yet. But I see that the thermometer on the little shed outside is registering 10 degrees Celsius, and the dog is running around the yard, playing with a plastic pail. I think I need a walk.

This is a needlepoint that was done by a lady in New Zealand. I believe it is a copy of one of Joni Mitchell's self-portrait paintings. Here is a snippet of one of her songs:

We all come and go unknown
Each so deep and superficial
Between the forceps and the stone
Well I looked at the granite markers
Those tributes to finality - to eternity
And then I looked at myself here
Chicken scratching for my immortality

On the last day of February, my friend Joe passed away after a short illness. He and his wife Helen were our neighbours when we lived in Legal, Alberta. We'd only been there a couple days when they came strolling down the alley behind our back yard, greeted us warmly, and a friendship was begun.

I'll be writing more about that later. But right now, I am just angry about the high incidence of cancer. Just ... angry. One out of every two people now get cancer, apparently. That's too damn high.

On CBC television's excellent consumer awareness program, Marketplace, airing this Sunday night at 7:00, the journalist Wendy Mesley is looking for some answers. She's just had a bout with breast cancer herself and survived.

More information about the show, here.