It was 38 degrees Celsius here on Wednesday. It was about 32 today, and about the same on Monday and Tuesday. I like warm weather, but “warm” to me is 25 degrees.
We’d probably have central air conditioning in our house if this kind of weather was common. Instead, we make do. Our house has “top opening” windows, so in-window air conditioning isn’t an option for us either. I bought a portable AC unit a couple of years ago, the type with the big hoses you are supposed to route through the window…but guess what? There isn’t any real way to mount the hoses / vents in top opening windows either. I can jury rig something with tin foil and cardboard (I’m serious), but it is generally more hassle than it’s worth.
I’ve been working a lot lately, scrambling to catch up with some application programming work. Part of this is a result of being behind the technological curve in terms of the particular programming environment I’m working in (J2EE/WebSphere/Hibernate/Spring). Suffice it to say I’ve been working some overtime.
My back problems flared up today big time. I have some hinky stuff going on with my C4/C5 vertebrae- arthritic growths/bony spurs, microfractures, and stuff like that. Once in a while something happens and the bones pinch the nerves that run through/near them, or at least that’s how it was explained to me.
Earlier this week I was relaxing in the back yard reading a book. It was about 6:00 PM, and was starting to cool down after reaching 25 degrees Celsius or thereabouts. I heard a rustling sound in the vines and some odd “chuff” noises from the corner of our gazebo. I looked in the direction of the sound, and saw Mama Raccoon hanging upside down and peering at me.
Earlier today, my wife and her parents noticed a raccoon walking through our back yard. Later, the ‘coon came back, this time poking around under our deck. This time, I got a look at her (I’ll explain the gender assumption in a moment): she is huge, easily twice the size of our largest cat. I’d speculate that she’s 30 pounds, give or take. And she seemed to have absolutely no fear: I stepped out into the back yard, and she turned around as she walked towards our gate and looked at me before walking off. Our cat Rommel was out in the cat run, and fluffed up/hissed at the raccoon at this point, who completely ignored him.
“Happy Easter” seems like a strange thing to say given the religious meaning of the holiday, but I’m not religious in any way so I’ll say it and not feel guilty. For me, Easter is sort of like Thanksgiving: a time to give thanks for all the good things in life and to spend some time with family over a meal.
Today was a good day. Irene and I met my Mom and sister Judy at the Casino for a bit- that’s always fun. We don’t really gamble much- it’s basically more of a chance to sit down and have a coffee with just the four of us. I put $5 in a slot machine, and came home empty handed: perfectly normal 🙂
Janet and Gord, friends of Irene and myself from Edmonton (they actually introduced us) came out here last week. Unlike ordinary houseguests, though, they came to look after us: they fed us, cleaned up, and kept Irene entertained.
We had a bit of an adventure last night, or more accurately very early this morning. At around 1:00 am, Irene went to get up and her surgical wound started to drain…a lot. It took half a dozen large paper towels and a big (2′ x 1′) surgical gauze mat to sort of stem the tide of mostly-clear blood tinged fluid, during which time I called the district health nurse. Irene started shaking and feeling faint, which isn’t too terribly surprising under the circumstances.
