Foggy, But a Beautiful Winter's Day

Already February 1st!

Where has the time gone since we closed September 15th!?!?

I don't know who sent them (telus? hydro?) but a crew arrived the other day to prune and chip branches that threatened their wires at the driveway.  A job's always made faster with the right equipment and these Asplundh Tree maintenance people certainly had that.

Thank you, folks!

We're as surprised as can be that this COVID-19 winter is passing quite quickly, despite missing all our usual distractions such as going out to a pub for dinner, especially with friends (most of whom we haven't seen at all).

Husband and I have read books, watched a lot of TV documentaries, cursed Bell ExpressVu--our satellite provider when our favourite British dramas like Endeavour and Lewis, and Silent Witness disappear from programming.  Husband had a Zoom meeting with his colleagues, and says he's "done with that".  And we don't Skype.  Such is life for those of us unaccustomed to learning anything about personal video recorders, WI-FI add-ons etc., let alone streaming.

Now the highlight of any day is picking up a Tim Hortons coffee at their drive-through on our way to fuel the vehicle and pick up our six-year-old Grandson after school twice a week!

Even the monthly trip to the Birnie Road garbage dump is now anticipated (albeit not eagerly) as an outing!  The worst part of that is turning left to get back on Hwy 97 to head home...far too dangerous to pull out when traffic from both directions is generally speeding and coming uphill.  So I routinely turn right onto 97 and turn left onto the old Vernon "highway" at the bottom of the hill.

Today, despite the fog and spitting rain, it was still a beautiful day at a balmy +3C.  And despite the generally poor photos that cellphones produce, I pulled over to enjoy the view.

Looking NE towards Middleton Mountain

 

 

And there's a house being constructed over there:

Looking North, the highly-fractured rocks adjacent to the road are beautiful in their own right.

Yes, the glaciers did an amazing job in this area! 

So...if this is winter, we're happy with it.

Especially since there's going to be sufficient snow for water users in 2021.  In early January the North Okanagan was reported to be 94% snowpack, with some areas (that appear to include the North) in the Central Okanagan at 132%.  

Until then, many more Scrabble games are on the schedule here. 😆

Infinitely better than cleaning out closets...