Dec 26 - boxing day

There were no boxing day sales at the lake. I doubt if there were boxing day sales in Loring either. I guess that there were boxing day sales at lots of .ca websites had I cared to access them, but did not.

I did a little more snow shoveling here, spending an hour taking more snow off the front deck that had come down from the roof, but the most snow that I moved was actually at Jim's sugar shack. Jim and Bonnie came back from Pam's in Barrie and he realized that the 3 feet of snow would probably take down his shack if he waited until after the predicted rainfall. He gave me a call and we set off in his car, snow rake, shovel and snow shoes. I had only tried my snow shoes once, but did I ever need them yesterday.

His place is a short ride down the East Road, by the microwave tower. He owns 100 acres of bush ... mostly Maple ... and used to make a lot of syrup but has not in the last couple of years. When you drive to Loring along 522 there is an intersection at Loring and a stop sign. To the left is the North Road. Straight ahead is the East Road. To the right is the continuation of 522. I guess in that parlance we've been on the "west road" and are turning onto the "south road" ... hmmm.

Anyway, I've never done any exploring along the East Road or North Road. Perhaps I should some day ! Yesterday, however, was not a day for exploring. We put on our snow shoes and went to his sugar shack which was visible from the road and had not fallen down from the snow load. Its roof is fairly flat and yes, there was three feet of snow. I used the snow rake, pulling snow down while Jim climbed up and shoveled. At one point the snow rake gave way suddenly and I fell backwards into the deep snow and actually had a hard time getting up again. It's hard to get up when you cannot push with your arm against anything solid. What made it even harder was that I was on the downslope from the shack, so at that point my head was lower than my feet as I was partially buried in the snow.

It did not take very long, perhaps 1/2 hour, but we were both pretty near exhausted by the effort. It's good that Jim asked me to help because he would have been at it until after dark ... and it's not the sort of thing that an almost-70-year-old should be doing by himself anyway. As we were getting back to the car Al Nichols came along in his truck, back from plowing some driveways, and we chatted for a bit. Al does our driveway when we're not here. He also does Jim's when they are away.

As we were riding out to the shack Jim noted that various driveways had been plowed -- Troup's, the Finn's, Maurice's ... that had not been plowed when they got home from Barrie. Although they both said "thanks" to me for clearing their driveway I can imagine the relief that they must have felt on the way in, having driven along the road noting that driveways had not been cleared by Al yet and then getting to theirs and finding it cleared. They'd have parked on the road (the snowplow bank was 2 feet high) and Bonnie would have had to wait for Jim to get the snowblower to clear a path -- or Jim would have brought the snowmobile up and taken her down. It's not that it would have been that difficult to walk down the driveway with six inches of snow, but with Bonnie's knee still healing from the operation, clambering over a snowbank and walking down a slippery hill is not something that she would risk.

I mentioned to Jim that my blower had a hard time on his hill. His actually has tracks -- like a bulldozer -- and cuts a 36 inch swath. It takes him two passes to do the entire driveway, up and down. His blower cost $3200; mine cost $500 ... you certainly get what you pay for ! Perhaps I should check on deals at end-of-season one of these years ... we're in this for the long haul (I hope!) and my little snowblower was not designed to handle these kinds of winters. I bought it for Philadelphia ... it would probably work in Oakville !

Today ... we are getting light rain now but the heavy rainfall prediction has been lifted somewhat. It is still supposed to get warm -- +10C / +50F -- by end of day but the original rainfall prediction of 40-50mm has been reduced to 15mm. That's good ... it's also supposed to be light rain, not heavy. The bad part is that heavy rain would have washed some of the snow off the roof, now it will simply make it heavier. The bedroom wing is already cleared but there is heavy snow at the edges of the kitchen post-and-beam and a lot of ice build-up. I kept Jim's snow rake to pull some of that snow down and will also go over to Jason's and Don's. Jason doesn't have much snow -- less than a foot -- but I'll check the edges. If there is any shoveling to be done David can help me tomorrow morning. Don's is also pretty good except at the one valley where it could use some clearing.

The fish were really biting yesterday. I let one little pike go and kept another that was dinner-size. I lost a couple of minnows -- they are biting and stealing the shiners, which must be pickerel. Pike simply swim along and take the entire minnow and hook. Even if they are not hooked, they hold onto the bait and I've pulled them right out of the water with their refusal to let go. Pickerel nibble, take the bait into their mouth and readily let go if not hooked. When still fishing you often have to jerk the rod to "set the took".

I think that I'll let Sandy go alone to Toronto today to pickup David and do some grocery shopping. I've got a couple of shopping items that I'll give her. By the sounds of things Kylie will be coming back with her as well, and perhaps Lauren. It would be a over-full car with me, Sandy, David, Kylie, Lauren, Abby & luggage. More than that though I want to be here if we get heavy rain to see and deal with the effect, and get snow off my kitchen roof.

That's it.