Blame Canada

My grandad died last Tuesday. I never saw him as much as I should have done, but whenever I did see him he was always kind and made me laugh. I'll miss him.

Canadians are always going on about 'wind chill'. "It's minus 10 outside, but minus 20 with the wind chill." In other words, the wind makes the weather colder than the thermometer says it is. I always thought this was melodramatic guff (how could the weather be colder than it really is?) and a way of weather forecasters making headlines, and this article says I'm right:

http://www.slate.com/id/2159370/?GT1=9129

As well as scrapping the wind chill, we should also lose the 'humidex'. This is the opposite of wind chill, saying the weather is hotter than it really is because of the humidity. More lame hysteria from a country that thinks it's living in the Arctic/Sahara (depending on the season) but is actually more like Maine. And while we're at it, let's get rid of the constant storm warnings! So there's going to be lots of snow - big deal! This is Canada! If you want less dramatic weather, move to England and live in perpetual drizzle.

I never thought I'd say this, but - yay, it's stopped snowing!! We've just spent an hour shovelling our driveway so we can go out to dinner tonight. Here's some more photos:



The guy across the road using his fancy snowblower to clear his driveway - skiver : ) Unfortunately, the storm's still going, blowing all the snow back across the driveway again - slightly pointless really.



The cliff of snow around my car. Joe and I have just finished shovelling all that away. My arms hurt. A lot.



My romantic cutesy side coming through : )











And of course, I couldn't let the day go by without building a snowman - or two. Well, it is Valentine's Day : ) That white thing on Mrs Snowman's head, by the way, is supposed to be a veil. Her lipstick is a nice shade of ketchup.

My car is snowed in...



...and so are we (this is our back door - you can just see the top of our recycling bin, which is about 2 and a half feet high)















And here's our basement window - at ground level!!

In case any of you wanted to find out about my recent travels, take a look at the website I've set up:
http://www.activedisassembly.com/suziechiodo/final_assignment/travel_frameset.html

Highlights of my trip included:

- Being snowed on in 3 countries and 2 continents
- Skiing in the Pyrenees
- Seeing my family in Bristol (below) and helping out at my grandad's senior citizen's party
- Seeing my work on the website of a British national newspaper
- Being nursed back to health by my honorary Turkish family after a nasty bout of stomach flu
- Watching the Northern Lights from our plane on the way back to Canada