What's the buzz?

I had a chat with Jenn this week and she says she is feeling fine and doing well. My spies tell me she has been walking outside in the yard without her cane. Ahh, yes, my fave daughter has an independent streak a mile wide. When I say walking in the yard, you have to remember Jenn lives in the country and her yard is about the size of a football field. If this keeps up, I will have to buy her a skateboard! This has been a fun week in other ways as well. I zoomed over to Foleyet Thursday to have a quick visit with Tyler, Nathan and Victoria, who are three of the greatest kids in the world. Of course it was also nice to see Denise and Don there too, and just as nice, got to see Aunt Line and Uncle Moe. The whole gang was at the Red Pine Lodge. I was pleased to leave a chocolate cake for the kids. Ty said he was going to have it for breakfast.
The drive back to Timmins was great. The highway is remote enough there was very little traffic so I opened the windows and enjoyed the amazingly fresh clean northern air. That's when I noticed how much fireweed was in bloom everywhere. There are huge patches of it. It's always nice to see to break up the endless rolling landscape of lakes, rocks and trees. It's called fireweed because it's usually one of the first plants to come back in the boreal forest after a forest fire has occurred. So I snapped a couple of photos and got a bit of action as busy little bee, on the right, went from blossom to blossom. (click the pic to see it close-up) So that was nice.

This morning, I covered a little news event that really got to me. A local police inspector has retired and there was a little ceremony at police headquarters. Holy sugar, I thought, I remembered when this guy joined the police force and now he is retiring! I started wondering when I am going to retire. I can't imagine that right now. I get bored too quickly. And I am wayyyyy too nosey. I think I am blessed to be doing something I enjoy. I scoot around town all week snapping photos of people winning awards, or doing things they like, and most people are happy to see me ... unless you're the guy coming out of the courthouse with the handcuffs on.
I booked my hotel rooms this week for my stay in Victoria in September. It will be nice to take a few days off I suppose. Seeing Neil again will be nice. And my niece Melissa lives in Victoria. She's a hoot so I am sure we will all be having fun. Well it's Friday afternoon and there's a cold glass of wine waiting somewhere. Keep smiling.

TV or Internet

I called the cable company this week. I was going to order digital cable. But at the last minute I backed out. I did however decide to order up the new and improved ultra-fast Internet service. I find I am just too busy to watch TV and I am at the stage now that when I do watch, I feel guilty that I should be doing something more productive. And I sure don't need TV for the news anymore. As funny as it sounds, TV news is too slow. If you want fast up-to-date news, check your newspaper website. (CBC Radio is pretty good too.) The internet thing will also let me buy TV programs I truly want to see and download them. So we'll see how that goes. When hockey season comes back, well who knows what will happen. Apparently my new TV allows me to play television programs right from my laptop. (I just haven't figured out how that works.) I am also looking into downloading books from the net -- Just to see how that goes. I think the folks over at the Third Avenue bookstore will be worried. LOL

Good news ...

Good news 1 - Jenn remembered the chocolate cake that was in the back seat of the car and she says the kids tore through it very quickly. I talked to Jenn this morning. "That cake is history," she laughed.
Good news 2 - It's a bit political I know, but Canada has just placed an order for 65 brand new F35 aircraft. I think this is amazing. I am an aircraft nut of course. This is no ordinary fighter jet. It is a stealth aircraft. It is also has Joint Stand Off Weapons, which means it can launch deadly accurate cruise missiles from hundreds of miles away from the target thus not putting the pilot in danger. The cockpit also has voice recognition to allow the pilot to fly and operate aircraft functions by voice command. I can't wait to get the video game version of this plane.
Photo Credit:U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Julius Delos Reyes

Jenn, cake is in the back seat in a box ...

Thursday morning P.S. I am hoping Jennifer remembers I put a frozen chocolate cake (for the kids of course) in the back seat of her car just before she drove away Tuesday!

Winding down ...

It’s Wednesday (or early Thursday morning) and I am winding down. What a great week. Jennifer arrived last Thursday and we sure enjoyed each other’s company for a few days. She went back home Tuesday. We spent five days together and went out to restaurants for five days. It was fun. It was like a vacation for me. We had dinner at home though on Thursday. I was pleased to treat Jenn to a nice steak that we bought at Pick of the Crop. I was worried that I wouldn’t cook it right, but it turned out just fine. It was also time to use the good dinnerware. I always use the same two plates myself. But with Jenn’s visit, we brought out the Royal Doulton so that was nice too. (It was the first time I ever used it!) I forgot to unpack the crystal wine glasses, but we still managed to put away a few bottles of wine. I think the best part was seeing Jenn up and about puttering around my kitchen and doing dishes. Life is good eh.

Jennifer had a nice time too especially because she got to see some of her favourite aunties who were all in town for the weekend. (Front row from left) Lorraine, Suzanne, Lorraine, Helen, (back row from left) Linda and Lilliane sure seemed to be enjoying themselves when we dropped by Moe's place for a backyard fire.

Enjoying the weekend

I have been enjoying a great weekend with Jennifer as she came home to Timmins to relax for a few days. One of the things we did was visit her old elementary school where she reminded me that there was a line on the wall of the school that could be seen by every kid in the schoolyard. Boys were allowed to play on one side of the line in the schoolyard and girls were allowed to play on the other side. Hmmmm…I found that a bit unusual. Oh well. Jenn sure turned out okay! It has been nice to spend a few days with Jennifer, but celebrating with family members all over Timmins is more fun than we imagined. Tiring too. But it's always nice to enjoy great people with the amazing summer weather we have been enjoying so far in July. I shot a fresh photo of Jenn with her new hair style. She missed her long hair, but everyone agrees that she is still a cutie with short hair too.

Happy Saturday.

A fine hot Saturday morning in Timmins. I am enjoying a cup of coffee and munching on chocolate cookies. I have company this weekend. Jennifer is here and it's very nice. The best part was Thursday afternoon when we went out for a walk downtown, in and out of the stores, shopping. Yup, Jenn can walk just fine. She has a cane now and she is determined as ever. I haven't shot a fresh photo of her, because I can barely keep up to her, but I will get a few. Jennifer's hair is slowly growing back and all the aunt's and cousins are telling her how beautiful she looks. Down in Sudbury, Scott and the boys are enjoying a 'boys only' weekend, while up at camp, Denise and her sisters are having a girls weekend. Soon I will be enjoying more of the homemade jams Denise sent up, strawberry and rhubarb. Wow. Yesterday it was nice when some of the Maltais women arrived in town for a visit. Lorraine, Lilliane and Helen Richer showed up. The kitchen table party at Aunt Sue's place went on till two oclock this morning. Helen and Tasha are on their way in from Red Lake. If anyone has ever wondered how big Northern Ontario is, it is taking them two days to make the drive from Red Lake to Timmins. It will be nice to see them. I slept in this morning to eight oclock. Time for another hot cup of coffee.

Grreat Canada Day and wonderful fireworks!

Canada Day was wonderful in Timmins. I was so busy but it was nice to bump into so many smiling faces and the weather was perfect! I think the best part was the amazing fireworks put on by Goldcorp to celebrate Canada Day and the 100th anniversay of gold mining in Timmins.