$4.00 worth of seeds

My garden.

A bought a couple of $2 seed packages and put them in the center of the garden. Where could you get that much beauty for your dollar.

My dad was a great gardener and I am sure I he would love this. I often think of him when I am out in the flowers.My dad also had a big heart and would always take the side of the underdog. He used to make us feel sorry for the Christmas tree as we had it had given up it's life for our holiday pleasure. The sunflower is a volunteer that is growing in the middle of the cucumbers as I couldn't bring myself to pull it out. I guess I get my soft spot from him.

Robin

Kamloops

We (Lois and I) spent the Holiday weekend in Kamloops. My sister Ann came up from Castlegar and Don (Alanna's boy friend) came down from Quesnel.

The city of Kamloops put on a first rate day in the park. There were lots of crafts like pottery, paintings and cut glass windows. There was good ethnic food (Lois and I ate Korean) from lots of places including native cooking (banak etc). I entered some contests on enviromental trivia (I won a tee shirt and a key ring). There were also music and dancing of course (I watched the belly dancing and the can can girls it's about as close to a mid life crisis that I can get).



The highlight of our visit was a train ride. It was about a one hour affair and cost us $16 dollars apiece. It came complete with a train robbery by Bill Miner and the boys. It was a great ride and I would recommend that you give it a go if you find yourself in Kamloops.

Robin

Cold

What is up with the weather? It's cold here with a high today of only 15. It's only suppose to get to 19 tomorrow. Depending on who you like to believe only about 16 (according to the Weather Network) or 20 (according to Environment Canada) on Tuesday.

My plants have gone on strike. The cucumbers, tomatoes, and peppers will hardly talk to me. I feel like I have let them down. Even the weeds seem to be in slow motion . At least the lawn likes it, as besides being cold we get lots of rain.

The solstice has come and gone and I want summer!

Robin

Home Alone

Well actually at work but I will be alone when I get home as Lois has gone down to Kamloops to see Alanna. They are doing some sewing as Alanna needs cloths to wear for her practicum like a white blouse and black slacks. She only has about one month left in Kamloops and I think that she is looking forward to coming home. Both the practical parts of her course are here in Quesnel.



I agreed to work a shift tonight (Saturday) as it pays well. I really don't like shift work as it leaves me tiered and it can be really boring. I haven't had any calls yet and I still have six hours to go. I suppose that I could work on this all night but I really don't have all that much to say.


For those of you who know Rev Rob Pollock ( a distant cousin of mine) he now has a blog @ http://www.rob-pollock.blogspot.com/ if you want to check it out.

Robin

Birthday

Last weekend was Alanna's birthday. I had some time off so I went over to Kamloops to get her. We had a get together at 10Mile Lake which is always a favorite. The Peeke-Vouts, the McRaes and Cheryl and Kendal Sheldon were there and a good time was had by all. I had big plans to take some pictures and see if I could add them here but the camera's battery was dead. Don (Alanna's boyfriend) was good enough to send me some.





In other news the garden is slowly coming along. I have potatoes, peas, beans, spinach, onions, beets, and carrots all showing signs of life. I had to put up a bit of a fence yesterday as the neighbour's new puppy likes to dig up my potatoes. I still need to think of some way to put up for a gate as Lois will have trouble stepping over the top.





Lois and Pat Peeke-Vout have been very busy putting together sailor costumes for the big 40's musical that they are putting on this year. The group has been working really hard on the show with rehearsals almost everyday for the last couple of months. I am looking forward to it and will keep you posted on how it goes.

Well that's about it from here.

Shift Work

Not much of a title but I have been spending a lot of my life at the mill lately. Sixty hour last week alone all on shift. It isn't my favourite activity but it pays well and if nothing breaks it's pretty easy.


My garden is way behind partly because I am spending so much time at the mill and partly because it has been cold here in the Caribou. I have peas, lettuce, onions, and beets up but no sign of the potatoes as I didn't get them in till late. I thought about planting the tomatoes yesterday but it is only going up to 16 today so they would not do much I am afraid.

In other news we had a visitor from Rupert. Kim stopped by on her way home from Kelowna where she was visiting her new grandson. We had a good visit and we were glad to see her.

I am off on Thursday to Kamloops to bring Alanna home for her birthday so that should be fun.

Podcasts

Lister Sinclair (long time host of Ideas on CBC radio) when asked how he wanted to be remember said I would like people to say "that he died learning". I guess this is true of me to, for as long as I can remember I have wanted to know. The subject doesn't matter all that much I just like to know things.

I have lost hope in educational TV. The learning channel is now more concerned with trading spaces and what not to wear than the are in good documetries. The Discovery channel seems to going a similar route. The History channel spend a lot of time showing old movies or war stuff which is OK but not all there is of History. Once in a while you get something on TVO or SCN but that is about it.

But now I have discovered podcasts and I am in educational Media heaven. I started with the CBC at http://www.cbc.ca/podcasting with shows like ideas and the current. Then I moved on to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation http://www.abc.net.au/services/podcasting/ which I have listened to on CBC overnight. I then went out looking since I am hooked and found this science program from the UK http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/podcasts/. National Public Radio out of the United States has lots of stuff although it is usually not as good but still worthwhile http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast/podcast_directory.php?type=topic&value=1007#podcast1007 . I am sure I could go on for a long time but you get the idea.

Anyway I hope you can find something of interest for your mp3 player.

Happy Listening

Robin

Visits

Hi

Well I had company on Thursday night as Lorne and Jean Clerihue dropped in on their way to Kamloops. We had a nice visit even if it was short and I really enjoyed it. I sometimes worry that people think that they are imposing when they stop in or don't stop as they think they might be a problem. Nothing could be further from the truth. If your near Quesnel please stop we love company.

Lois and our friends Cheryl and Pat all went to visit Alanna in Kamloops. I think they went on a bit of a shopping spree so we may be a bit poor for the next little while. Anyway I am sure Alanna was glad to see them (she probably helped with the shopping spree) and I hope they had fun.

The Language

Well it seems that my family gets great entertainment out of what I do the the English language. It's true I have very poor spelling and can't decide there from their and to from too etc. I also don't use enough commas (they seem a bit of a mystery (why isn't it mistere like it sounds) to me). Check out appleseeds.org/Eng-lang-difficulty.htm for just a few examples of how confusing the language really is.

Spelling is my biggest problem and so I have joined the simplified spelling society spellingsociety.org. . They make some pretty good arguments for changing the spelling so it reflects the way we speak. The Germans did there language a number of years ago and I think we should do the same. I know that I am out in left field on this because I mentioned it to a couple of people and got a pretty poor response (people who can spell don't understand the problem). Anyway as my father always use to say everyone swings their little axe (I seem to have quite a few axes).

Anyway that is my rant for today.

Robin

Spring

Yes it's finally here. A little slow in coming and still a bit cool but here all the same

We went for our first wiener roast at 10 mile lake. The lake was still very frozen and you had to walk around a lot of snow but we went anyway. What a great thing to do. Alanna was home and our friend the Peek-Vouts and the McRae's joined us for lots of stories and laughs. It was fun, no cell phones, no recorded music not even a tell-a marketer just a bunch of us roasting wieners and marsh mellows around a fire. We did this a number of times last year and are hoping to do it lots this year to. If you haven't been on a wiener roast in a while might I suggest you give it a go.

Robin

The Linux Question

A Pitch for Linux,

I am a really and I mean really big fan of Linux. In my whole life I don't think I have ever really convinced anyone to try it but what the heck here is the pitch.

As you may already know Linux is an open source software operating system (like windows without Microsoft (sounds good already don't you think)). The code that it's written in, is not hidden in a vale of secrecy (of course it doesn't matter to me I can't program anyway). What this really means is that all kinds of people can, and always seem to be working on it. Yes lots of this worlds geeks are doing something good.

It is free (now I know that most people think if your not sending money to Mr Gates the computer will fall off it's mounts), or you get what you pay for and if you don't pay it won't work. Trust me it works fine (and to my mind better than Microsoft windows). Try this web sight for more good reasons to give it a try http://www.whylinuxisbetter.net/.

My flavour or distro if you like of Linux is Ubuntu. Now if your a computer nut and understand all things computerish this distro is probably not for you. If you are like me and can't understand the finer points of Microsoft XP then this is the program for you. Installing it does have some complicated questions I suppose like what country do you live in, what time is it that sort of thing. Anyway go to http://www.ubuntu.com/ if you want to give it a try and see what you think. You can also run it from a disk without changing over, but it is kind of slow and there is only a limited amount of software available.

I run Linux on an older computer that I had kicking around and it runs fine (it actually likes old equipment as someone has figured out the hardware). So if your not ready to give up your Microsoft machine that is always an option. Although if my wife was willing to change on our newer computer it would be there to.

Well that is about it for this week. Thanks for all the comments.

Robin

Climate Change

It’s my blog and I can get on my soap box if I like and this will probably become my topic.

This is a subject that I lay awake at night and worry about. It’s so big and no one seems to have the political will to do much about it (unless your convinced that $2000 off on a fuel efficient car is going to fix it). All the politicians want someone else to fix it, or they don’t mind doing something as long as it doesn’t upset the economy (like we will have much economy if the worst predictions come to pass). Perhaps it's such a big problem they don't know where to start.

So what to do, that is the question and I am looking for your response. Am I crazy and nothing will happen, will B.C. become a tropical paradise and the heck with the rest of the world, will the planet turn into an uninhabitable waste land because we can’t beat or addiction to fossil fuels. Anyway the list goes on and on.

Thanks for all the response to my blog it’s great to hear from all my friends and to know what is going on in your lives. The big play in Rupert sounds like fun and I am really sorry that I can’t get there to see it.

Well until next week.

Robin

Well I use to write monthly emails but I seem to be behind on that, and I use to write once a week to my children but I am falling behind on that to. So what the heck I will try blogging. Maybe add a few pictures maybe get on a soap box, maybe hear from my friends (that would be nice). I hope to post once a week so that will keep me thinking of something to say. Anyway we will see how it goes.

Not much new here in Quesnel. Alanna is off to a course to become a Pharmacy Technican at a college in Kamloops. Jennifer is working at the Old Spagetti factory in Edmonton (enjoying being on her own I think).

I expect that the only people who will read my friends so with that in mind feel free to reply as I would love to know how everyone is doing.

Well till next time.

Robin