We're Still Here

   Yes. We're. Still. Here. In the Great White North. And it is. No, Donald, we're not on our way to becoming your 51st state. We don't have to be Great again as we've always been Great. Weather-wise, it has been White and North with lots of cold and snow this week. It's nice for a week but we're ready to leave this for warmer climes. Anyway, it's been almost a month since my last ramblings so it's time I brought you all, faithful readers, up to date.

  As you'll remember, I was busy with son David's basement. We broke things, built things and almost finished things. And then James' house happened so the focus shifted to a mad dash to get that house finished so he, Jen and the boys could get in there by Christmas.

  We broke what was already mostly broken, built a lot of new and, amazingly, have mostly finished. Three weeks from start to finish and almost all the upstairs areas are complete and we're down to paint and trim for most of the basement. I'm checking with the Guinness folk for world records on the renovation front.

  Part of the deal with their house is there's a large crawlspace just perfect for storage. Guess what? We have things to store. Remember this?

  Well, Jen, James, David and I spent a -20C day Sunday moving it all to their basement. Without frostbitten extremities we've accomplished almost Herculean tasks during December. Tired? You bet, but there will be plenty of time to sleep in January.

  We've been managing all this while house sitting in Toronto's east end... still. Yes, our seven weeks are almost up and I'm looking forward to ending the almost daily commute to Bradford. It's been a trial, not to mention a lot of gas, dragging my sorry butt 60 km through this city's ridiculous traffic each morning and evening. No more house sits in the city, he said, hopefully.

  This assignment has been comfortable and in a nice neighbourhood so no complaints. Except for Charlie, our furry charge. You see, as I noted earlier, Charlie is "food aggressive". The trouble is, he has a very broad understanding of "food". Penny made the mistake of reaching for a tissue that had fallen on the floor in front of him and he bit her. She insists it wasn't as bad as it looks but it should never have happened.

  We reported it to the owners and they were appropriately shocked. Based on the tone of their messages we were concerned they were going to put Charlie down when they returned, which would have been a massive overreaction. They have a grandchild on the way in the next few weeks and are very worried there could be another incident, more serious than this. Fortunately, cooler heads have prevailed and they have scheduled him for behavioural modification with a specialist in January. And Penny's hand has mostly healed so no lasting harm done.

  This is the first time we've had such an incident. None of the animals we've sat for has come close to attacking either of us, even the huge dog that almost pulled me over back in September. Hopefully this will be the only such incident.

  So, as I said, we're done here in a few days and then our great friends, Bryan and Sheila, arrive from Yellowknife on a stopover before yet another cruise to some exotic destination. While they're here we'll polish off a case of wine and share lots of laughs and some good food... in one night. Looking forward to it. This will be a new experience, having a hangover the morning of Dec. 31 rather than Jan. 1.

  We'll have a few days to recover before hitting the road on the 5th. Our first stop will be a spot on Florida's Gulf Coast for most of January. We'll be close to the beach with only cats to look after. I see sun, sand and margaritas in our future. It looks like we'll switch to the Atlantic coast after that for another ten days with a little Havanese like the one we sat for in Florida a year ago.

  We'll still have a two week gap to fill before heading up to North Carolina where we'll have a dog in a hundred acre forest for two weeks. Finally, the last two weeks of March will take us to Washington, DC, where we'll have more cats while we check out the cherry blossoms and government chaos up close. Sounds like lots of laughs, or maybe civil war. Who knows? At least it will be interesting.

  We have another grandchild on the way in April so we'll make sure to stick close by and, in May, we've been invited for a return engagement in Minnesota. This time I get to drive the tractor! And, we'll finally get to meet these people who we're starting to think of as friends even though we've never met. Life is truly full of wonder. We may also be sitting for them again in September so our 2025 calendar is already filling up.

  This year has been a bit of a trial. House sitting, for us, was supposed to entail spur of the moment travel to exotic destinations. Instead, we've struggled to find housing reasonably close to the kids so we could help them with their houses as much as possible. It's been fun and it reminds me of when they used to work for me when I was contracting. The house sitting, on the other hand, hasn't been much fun, especially for Penny, who's been saddled with watching over dogs while I swing hammers. Good and bad.

  With that, I'll close this episode with warm wishes to all of you and your families during this holiday season. Wherever we travel this will always be home. May the New Year bring you all good health and warm hearts.

Cheers.