Staying Pretty Isolated

    Daughter and oldest grandson came by today, ostensibly so he could clear my driveway of snow. I could have done it myself as it wasn't a big snowfall this time, but left it for him to do.

   They are my first visitors of the year (except for the appliance repair man) and I'm not expecting anyone else any time soon. I will be at their house in March for grandson's birthday and they will come here on Easter for our traditional leg of lamb meal. I see that isn't until April so maybe I will have someone else drop by before then. Meanwhile I am quite happy with my own company and will be even happier once the weather allows me to get out more,

   I did forget daughter came by in January with dinner for Robbie Burns birthday so this is actually my second visit in 2022. She didn't stay long as she was on her way home from work but we had time for a brief chat over coffee.

   So, at the moment, it is quite a solitary life chez moi. I'm hoping the fitness classes at the Senior's Centre will start up again in March and the number of infections and hospitalizations are going down. Dare I say "The end is in sight"? This feels like tempting providence - I read that Covid is rampant in deer populations, so who knows if another mutated version of Covid is lurking somewhere! 

Here We Go Again!

    This is what greeted me when I opened the front door this morning!

   Seemingly we got about 20 cms.  of snow. First I cleared the drive with the snowblower, then I shoveled the pathways. It was pretty cold to begin with (-12C) but I warmed up as I worked. The sun helped too and melted some icy spots. It got up to -3C later in the day so I went back out and tidied some parts I'd missed. All in all an energetic day!

From my kitchen window - the snow has pretty much dropped off the branches by now.

The pool is under there somewhere. The cover is really sagging with the weight of the snow. I hope it survives until the Spring melt!

Cleanliness is next to Godliness

  .....which is why I clean the bathrooms on a Sunday! This was a famous motto of my mother. Although I believe in adhering to Christian values, I am not even slightly religious so a Sunday doing cleaning chores suits me fine. While putting away the cleaning supplies I noticed that the laundry room floor was a bit grubby so that got done as well. All in all, pretty pleased with my progress with the big Spring cleanup.

    It was too cold and icy underfoot for a walk today. I almost fell taking the garbage out as the rain last week on top of snow followed by a snap freeze created an ice rink of the paths I dug earlier. I did walk yesterday but had to keep my eyes down to make sure I avoided the icy patches on the sidewalks.

   Right now I am watching tennis - a tournament in Rotterdam with a Canadian, Felix A-A, in the final. So far he is doing well, up a break, but it is early days. Then more Olympics later on. I am really enjoying the speed skating, the ski and snowboard events, and any other sport that has a Canadian presence. Not a big fan of curling or ice hockey, though! I will skip those.

Dance Scottish

    I know I promised not to bore my followers with any more dance videos, but we learned an interesting one last night which I thought you might enjoy hearing about.

   The dance is called "The Royal Deeside Railway" and it was part of a program designed by Nigel, our teacher, celebrating Queen Elizabeth's 70th Ascension Day. All the dances we did had something to do with the Royal Family as the Queen is the patron of RSCDS (hence the Royal in the organizations name). Seemingly there would often be ceilidhs at Balmoral while the Queen was in residence.

    The Deeside railway line was inaugurated in Queen Victoria's time and the dance dates from then. The railway wasn't used as much by subsequent monarchs and was finally decommissioned in the 1960's. In the video see if you can identify the connection to a train - the wheels of the locomotive, the engine being followed by the carriage, for instance.

   Hope you enjoyed this. We certainly enjoyed learning and dancing it!