Colder than Siberia
4 November 2003Random notes from a very cold place (i.e. repurposed emails from the past few days)
It's snowing again, minus thirteen, and temperatures won't rise above zero for the duration of the five-day forecast. This is the real thing, not just a preview. I really hope it's snowing in the mountains... I hope it warms up before I go sliding skeletons next weekend.
It is currently five degrees warmer in Novosibirsk. I know, I check hourly.
The other morning I saw a dreadful kids' TV show that I thought was Irish, on account of all the characters having Irish accents and being barnyard animals on some idyllic, it-never-rains Irish farm. But I quickly realized it was American because (i) none of the names in the production credits were the least bit Irish; (ii) there were no scences involving sadistic nuns and pederast Christian Brothers at the village school; (iii) one of the characters actually said "Begorrah!"
For some peculiar reason probably related to its history as a largely rural, agricultural society, Alberta only requires one license plate, on the rear of the vehicle. (This history may also explain the abysmal quality of urban driving skills in the province.) Consequently if you've ever lived in Europe you can bring back your far cooler license plate and mount it on the front to show off. I see that quite a bit here, particularly on German cars. You just know I'll be doing the same the first time we have a car in Berlin (next sabattical even).
For some peculiar reason probably related to our having auto industry clients and the general car-centredness of Calgary, many people in my office have little toy cars on top of their monitors. (We haven't moved to flat-screens yet, obviously.) In silent protest I have placed a little toy Berlin streetcar upon mine. A tram. A Straßenbahn. Go public transit! (A small gargoyle perches atop my high cabinet thing.)
I rode in to work again today, which really wasn't too bad. I'm certainly warm enough - ski goggles over balaclava, gore-tex cycling jacket, huge antarctic-rated mittens I bought at MEC, the fleece winter cycling tights I've had since Chicago, and instead of cycling shoes, my enormous great snow boots on big open pedals. Works fine. I don't have too many grip problems with knobbies, though there is a lot of ice on certain sections of the path. If it gets worse I may spring those steel-studded Finnish ice tires, while I still have a discount at the bike shop (they sent me a cheque for my vacation pay that I'm obliged to go spend there, as I did with all my regular pay).
Apropos traction, we bought winter tires for the van on the weekend. Last year I wasn't terribly impressed by the way the new all-season tires worked on icy parking lots, and Annette had a couple of skids coming to and from work. (I suspect that big cumbersome vans are less forgiving than smaller cars in this respect.) This year we'll be skiing and perhaps won't be as lucky with the roads driving home at Christmas. I looked at new tires and wasn't thrilled with the prices but checked the online buy & sell and hit paydirt, a set of good Michelin Alpins, already mounted on rims, used one winter for 5 to 10k out in the middle of nowhere where the roads probably don't get plowed too often so there's almost no tread wear, for just over half what they would cost new. I'll have them swapped over as soon as we can find a garage that isn't booked solid doing the same for everyone else, and then we'll finally have that tough-ass black-steel-wheel look just like every one else.
Annette was marking midterms this weekend so it was my job to mind Maddy. We hit the park both days so that she could roll around in the snow - that's what snowsuits are for. But mostly I got her out of the house by devising errands (i.e. spending money) and paying social calls.
That's all I do on the weekends, it seems, unload what I earned the week previously. To that end I also bought ski boots yesterday, another closeout from last year. I won't say how much, but they're bloody nice. They fit. The local shop has some two-year-old Völkl all-mountain skis (slightly wider midsection for soft snow but still tons of sidecut) at half-price that I suspect we'll each end up buying, so as not to have to cope with rentals all season. I got paid last week and we had a budget summit and decided this was entirely reasonable. I'll just work full-time one month longer.
As mentioned, I was on my own with Mads for much of the weekend (save for forty minutes on the rollers yesterday morning, for most of which she sat on the stairs asking me why I was riding my bike and not going anywhere; and skating last night for which I dumped her at Trish's). Mads was a bit, well, bitchy. I think she knows that I can't get rid of her when Annette is busy working, so she can therefore piss me off with impunity. She wasn't bad all the time, but whenever something went the slightest bit wrong, or a whim was politely denied, she would whine, howl, provoke and outrage. Thank god she was a model child at Trish's. By ten o'clock last night I was worn pretty thin; luckily she went right to sleep, otherwise there might have been a smothering.
Hallowe'en was a bit of a bust. At school on Friday the kids went to visit a retirement home, where they were fed cake with inch-thick frosting and consequently did not nap in the afternoon. After dinner Mads wisely opted for a warm bath instead of sub-zero trick-or-treating, then moaned about being tired, staggered to her bedroom at seven and fell instantly asleep. Oops. We hauled her off to the planned gathering, where she woke up, recovered, partied until eleven, then crashed on the sofa until we were ready to leave. So it all worked out, despite some early glitches.
Talking to Mads:
"I want a little office, like Mom's."
"You want a little office with a desk, and books and everything?"
"Yes, and a little computer. And little students."
My new long-track boots (ice speedskates) should arrive this week. I am eager to try them. I've finally sorted out the racing schedule, not much will happen before January, but in late February there's a crazy week in which we'll have a 10km race on a 1km natural ice loop in a park in Edmonton, then two days later the "world marathon championships" on the Oval in Calgary, then two and three days after that 50km and 200km races on a 15km loop on around a frozen lake in the mountains. Given that only the Dutch practice mass-start marathon ice speedskating with any enthusiasm (every year they hold their national championships in Austria or Finland, since the canals only freeze once per decade it seems) I assume they're flying in a bunch of Dutch professionals who will completely destroy everyone else. (The whole thing is being organized by Dutch expats.) Weird though it may sound, having all that racing will be pretty cool. I need to get some laps in though.