A Mighty Wind

     Okay, “Mighty” was probably an exaggeration, but it was windy yesterday and there must have been some fairy strong gusts, because in the afternoon when I went out to the garden, I saw some big pieces of Coroplast (sheets of plastic made like cardboard) scattered in my garden.  I then looking over at my greenhouse I saw that sections of the Coroplast I had used on the top row of the roof of my greenhouse had blown off.

    Two years ago I lost some glass on the greenhouse roof, and had replaced the broken glass with coroplast.  Sheets of Coroplast has a bit of flexibility to it, but I found the blown off pieces extremely brittle.  They had been facing direct sunlight for two years and I suspect that strong sunlight had caused the Coroplast to decompose.  I had previously used some Coroplast on the back side roof of the greenhouse, which doesn’t get direct sunshine, and it has been there about five years and it is still good.

    Now I have to figure out what to do.  Obviously Coroplast doesn’t last very long in direct sunlight.  It would be a waste to use it again, if it doesn’t hold up and will need replacing again in two years.

    Note:  “A Mighty Wind” is also the title of one of my favorite movies.  It is a very funny and touching “mockumentary” about aging folk singers putting on a reunion concert for their fans.  The “Folk Music Revival” of the 1960 was an influential part of my life and the movie really captured the musical groups and singers of the time in a very humorous way.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Panic, Upon Returning Home From A Vacation

         In March of 1995 we planned to visit my brother in Las Angeles for Spring Break.  That meant finding friends to take care of our animals while we were away.  Brian, a co-worker at Forestry, volunteered to take care of my fifteen Angora goats.   He assumed the responsibility of letting them out of the barn and feeding them in the morning, and putting them back in the barn and giving them some oats in the evening.

        Returning home from an international trip is always an ordeal for us.  Not only do we have to make the flights from wherever we were, to Vancouver, we then must catch another flight to Prince George.  After all that, we have to drive two and a half hours, home to McBride. 

        When we finally got home from our Las Angeles trip, it was dark and we were tired. When we pulled into the driveway, I was surprised to see that the light in the barn was on and I assumed that Brian had just forgotten to turn it off when he put the goats in for the night.

        After getting out of the car and unloading our suitcases, I walked up to the barn to check on the goats and turn out the light.  When I got to the barn, I noticed that there was a note on the door.  It said, 

“Call me about the goats,”  followed by a phone number.

Then when I opened the door and went into the barn to check on the goats, and got a terrible shock—there were no goats. The barn was empty.

I rushed back to the house and told my wife in desperation, “All of the goats are gone!”

I was in panic mode, I remembered the note on the door, and figured that calling the number on the note would give me some explanation as to the disappearance of the goats.  I dialed the phone number, but the voice at the other end of the line, didn’t know anything about the missing goats, they had just noticed the goats one day when they had driven by the house, and wondered what kind of animals they were.

Still in a panic about what happened to all of my goats, I grabbed a flashlight and rushed back outside into the dark, hoping I could spot them somewhere.  I soon did:   They were all just standing in the barnyard.  They stood perfectly still and silently in the dark barnyard, wondering why they they were not in the barn eating their oats.

        Much relieved, I opened the barn door and let them in to fed them.  All of that fear and distress vanished, as I watched them eat, but I still wondered why Brian had not put them in the barn earlier.  

An hour later Brian called me with an explanation:  That afternoon his mother-in-law had fallen and had broken her leg.  They at the hospital, and hadn’t had time to put the goats in the barn for the night.  

        Suddenly all of the mystery that had arisen when we had gotten home had been explained, and I was able to settle in for a peaceful night of sleep in my own bed, after a long stressful day.              

         

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

I Was Screened

     Last evening I was going out to the deck.  As I approached the door, I wondered why my wife had left it open, but I didn’t really give it a second thought.  I was just walking through the doorway when, 

“SCHWACK,” I ran into something; it was our screen door.  

    Many years ago we had purchased this fancy unusual screen door.  The screen is hidden on the vertical side of the door frame in a roller.  To use the screen, you pull it out from the side, across the door opening, and a powerful magnet holds the screen it place.  It is kind of neat.

    While it is nice to have what looks like an open door, when the screen is across it, the screen door has one big disadvantage;  when you have the screen across the door, you can’t see it, and last night was just another episode of accidentally running into the screen.  Both of us have done it, as well as our pets.  It is just really hard to see the screen when it is across the doorway.  (The screen is across the doorway in the photo above.)

    I did a bit of damage to the screen door last night when I ran into it, but I was able to pretty much restore it to its original state.

    I think I will have to put a small smear of paint on the screen so we will see it before I walk into it again.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Coronation Year by Jennifer Robson

         This month’s book club’s theme was “Anything You Want to Read”.  After striking out twice choosing novels that turned out to be duds, I didn’t want to waste any more time, so I thought I’d try a novel from an author that I had previously enjoyed.  I liked the two other novels that Jennifer Robson had written, so when I saw Coronation Year her latest novel on the shelf, I decided to give it a try.  I am certainly not a Monarchist, and I was a little scared given the title, but once I started reading, I enjoyed the story.

    The novel is not about the Coronation of young Queen Elizabeth itself, but certainly her coronation plays a big part in the storyline.  The novel is set in London in the first five months of 1953, and the countdown to the Coronation, and centers around the Blue Lion Hotel, its staff, and boarders, as they anticipate the big event.  

            The Blue Lion Hotel was built in the 1500’s and had been run by the Howard family from the beginning, however, the novel finds the Blue Lion hotel in financial decline.  Edie Howard, the present owner is last descendant of the Howard line and the first female to run the hotel.  Edie had inherited the hotel from her father, who had left it in a bad financial state.

    Edie had grown up in the hotel and she now dedicated her life to managing it and bringing it back financially.  She had sacrificed most of her own time and money to keep the hotel going.  She was kind and generous to her staff and to the handful of longtime borders in the hotel, some of which were more of a deficit than a credit, but to Edie, they are all like family.

    Edie was banking on The Coronation of Queen Elizabeth a major big event, to hopefully generate enough money to change the direction of the hotel’s finances.  Luckily for the hotel, the Coronation Parade was set to run down the street in right front of the Blue Lion, and Edie hoped that an influx of wealthy guests paying higher prices for the rooms with windows overlooking the Queen’s route, would save the hotel financially.

    Two of the hotel’s newest boarders play an important role in the novel’s plot.  One of the new guests is Jamie, an East Indian war hero who had worked in dangerous field of bomb disposal.  Since the War, Jamie had become a gifted painter, who had been given a commission to paint a picture of the Queen’s carriage as it proceeds in front of the Journeyman’s building.  Jamie took a room at the Blue Lion month’s before the event, because the Journeyman’s building sits right across the street, and he needed to do preparation drawings of the building for the painting, before the Queen’s Parade.

    The other important new guest is Stella, a young Jewish concentration camp survivor from Italy.  Stella is a talented photographer, who had recently managed to procure a position at a British photo-based news magazine.  Her parents, who had been killed in the concentration camps, had run an Italian Tourist Guide before the War and they had known Edie and the Blue Lion Hotel during their work for their tourist guide publication.  When Stella got the job and moved to London, she took a room at the hotel, because she knew no one else and had a connection with the hotel through her parent’s.

    Queen Elizabeth’s Coronation is of course the major driver in the plot, but as its date approaches, a mystery arises that threatens the hotel’s future.  It seems that someone is trying to sabotage the hotel before the coronation, and the excitement builds in the novel as the Queen’s Coronation approaches, and the plot to sabotage the hotel start to converge.

    Again with Coronation Year, the author Jennifer Robson didn’t let me down.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

But You Don't Understand, McBride Is A Tiny Place

         Because the Village of McBride is such a small place, when we have to deal with businesses or organizations from urban areas, they often just don’t realize that things are different here, and we know how things work in our tiny village.  We are often asked for a lot of information that is irrelevant and often leads to frustration when they don’t believe what we are trying to explain.

    When we order something that will be shipped to us, they insist that we give them our home address for shipping.  They will not accept our mailing Box Number, even though a lot of the things we order will not be delivered to our home, but will instead be put in our Post Office Box.  In our little community, if those orders are not put in our PO Box, they will be dropped off somewhere in town, and we will have to drive into McBride to pick them up.

    We get the message that “Your order has been delivered” but we are never told where it has been delivered to.  It wasn’t delivered to our house, so that leaves a couple of other possibilities as to where it might be.  It might be at the Post Office, or maybe it is at Uncle Mark’s Store.

        I once got a bit fed up with an emergency call I had to make to 911, because they kept wasting time asking me needless questions,  because they didn’t know what a small place McBride was.  Here is what happened:

    In the 1990’s it had become our habit among some of us who worked at the Forest Service to walk down to the post office during our lunch hour to pick up our mail.  One day in February of 1995 as we were approaching the Post Office, we saw an elderly woman, who was walking to her car, miss her step off of the curb of the sidewalk.  She fell forward, hitting a parked car, then landing on the street.

    Several people rushed over to help her, and I immediately went into our small post office to tell them to call an ambulance.  The McBride Hospital is about two blocks away from the Post Office.

            The Post Office worker hesitated and didn’t want to make the call, then she told me I should do it, which I did.

    The 911 operator who sat in Kamloops, 400 kms (250 miles) away, began to ask me questions:  “What city?”

    I answered, “McBride”

    Then she asked, “Where in McBride?”

    I replied, “At the Post Office”

    “On what street is the Post Office”  and I told her, “Main Street”

    I was then asked, “On what block of Main Street?”  At which point I became frustrated.

        I realized that was probably a relevant question to ask for some big city, but I was calling from the tiny McBride, with only one Post Office.  Everyone that lives in or around McBride knows where the Post Office is, so I told her, “The ambulance people will know where the Post Office is.” 

        Fortunately, the 911 Operator was satisfied with that information, so didn’t waste any more time asking me any other questions about the location.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Geez, I Hope I Don't Have Flesh-Eating Disease

          People always start imaging they have the disease or condition that they start hearing about.  That happened to me in 1995.  Here is the story: 

          During the last half of 1994 there had been a lot of buzz on the news about a terrifying infection called Necrotizing fasciitis, which was more commonly known as “flesh-eating disease”.

Lucien Bouchard, the well known Quebec separatist Member Parliament, had gotten it and almost died.  He ended up having to have his left leg amputated as a result of the infection.  That horrific scenario began to start playing out in my mind in January of 1995, when I noticed a painful spot on my leg that was becoming increasingly swollen with a red splotch surrounding it.  My leg muscle was also starting to become hard and tight.  

    I was consumed with fear, thinking that I had flesh-eating disease, so I didn’t procrastinate; I went to see Dr. Cowburn our local doctor.   After he examined it, he confirmed that it was an infection but it looked like a bite, probably from a spider.  He wrote me a prescription for antibiotics, and told me I should be seeing results very soon, and to come back on Saturday it hadn’t gotten better. 

    That was on a Thursday, and I immediately began taking the antibiotics, and much to my relief, by Friday I could see that the swelling had begun to go down, but there still remained a big red blotch surrounding the central point where an ugly-looking scab had formed.  Needless to say, I was much relieved as the area on my leg continued to heal due to the antibiotics.

    It was such a relief knowing that I didn’t have the flesh-eating disease that I had been imagining and fearing.  I was also happy that I had quickly decided to go see the doctor before that spider bite had gotten worse.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Aw, Not Now, I'm Tired

     Yesterday was a busy one.  After doing the blog, I spent most of the morning hanging up the garlic I had harvested, to dry.  It did not require much physical energy, but I was on my feet the whole time.  

    After lunch I went to the “Celebration of Life” for one of my friends and long time Forestry co-workers who had recently died.  Again, it didn’t require much exertion, but a lot of sitting, and socializing.  By the time it was over, my energy level was drained.

    Once back home and feeling worn out, I did some reading, and while I sat on the lanai, I actually became aware of how tired my legs were, despite the fact that I really hadn’t exerted them very much all day.

    It was then that my wife informed me that the water pressure in our house was almost nil.  That news filled me with horror, because if the water stopped, it meant a hike up to Sunbeam Falls to see what had happened to our water system.  I did hold up a slight hope that maybe it was just our water filter under the house that was clogged. 

    I went to the hydrant by the barn to see if the main waterline was running.  I pulled up the handle, and got nothing.  Our waterline was empty, and it meant a hike up to Sunbeam Falls to fix it.  That was not a welcome prospect for my tired legs and low energy level, but when we lose water, we have to get on it, and fix the problem quickly.

    I called Nick my neighbor, who would also be out of water, to see if he had time to go up to the falls with me to help fix the situation.  Nick, who was then in town, answered the phone and said, “Give me seven minutes to get home.”

    The two of us then started climbing the hill up to our water intake culvert.   I figured that the problem was either our water intake pipe screen was clogged with debris, or else a lot of rocks and debris had built up on the heavy screen at the top of our culvert, blocking water from going into the culvert.  

    When we got to the culvert I saw that I had overlooked a third possibility:  There was just not enough water coming down the falls to fill up our culvert.  The amount of water in our culvert had fallen so low that it was no longer going into our waterline intake pipe.

    There were three stream of water coming down the falls, the central and main one channeled into our culvert, but there were streams of water on each side of it that went around, and missed our culvert.  To fill our culvert, we had to divert those outside streams of water and channel them into our culvert.  It meant climbing up on the slippery rocks above our culvert and moving big rocks and small boulders into place so that the water was re-directed toward our culvert.

    Although I had been tired before the waterline problem, being in the cold water coming down the falls was bracing.  It quickly woke me up, refreshed me, and energized me.  

    Once we had re-channeled the water on the falls, our culvert began to fill up and overflow, so Nick and I headed back down the trail and home.

    Having a low flow on Sunbeam Creek is a worrying situation, and something that never used to happen.  I sure hope the flow doesn’t get any lower, because that would create some real problems.

    Thus is life in rural BC.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

The Local News Grapevine

     I have often referred to the Village of McBride as being isolated and remote.  We sometimes feel cut off from the “outside world”.   Because of our remoteness, during my early years living here, we depended upon CBC radio and TV to give us the news about what was happening out there beyond our mountains.  Because those news sources originated provincially or nationally, rarely did they cover any of the events that had happened in the Robson Valley.

       We did have a weekly newspaper that gave us news of some of the things that happened locally, but because the newspaper only came out once every week, the “news” it reported on, was already “old news” by the time the paper came out.

    All of the current local news we got, came from word of mouth.  During the 1980’s to the 2000’s most of that up to date local news came to me during the coffee breaks at work in our Forest Service office.  I was reminded of that fact yesterday while going through my 1995 diary, when I came upon these two unfortunate local events that happened in February of 1995:

The Aubreys of Crescent Spur had been successfully running a lodge and heli-skiing operation for a handful of years.  (Heli-skiing is flying skiers in a helicopter up to the alpine, so they can ski in the deep powder) Tragically, one of Aubrey’s helicopter skiing clients was killed on a run during one of their ski trips.  An avalanche was triggered which buried the skier under four meters (23 feet) of snow.  The Aubreys, who run the heli-skiing business were devastated by the accident.

        There are several small cabins located up in a few local alpine areas for people to use for overnight hiking or skiing trips.  One of those cabins is located up in the remote Eagle Valley alpine.  Those cabins were inaccessible to any kind of communication.  

        In a coffee break a couple of days after hearing about the heli-skiing death, I heard that there was a local guy who was staying up at the Eagle Valley cabin on a cross-country skiing trip.   He couldn’t be reached so he couldn’t be told that while he was up there skiing, his house in Dunster had been destroyed by a fire.

        Another vital source we have to get local news is Pam, the cashier at the grocery store.  She always knows what is happening around here, both past and present.

        Of course most of the local new stories we hear are not that dramatic as those two examples, but our local news grapevine does serve the important purpose of communicating to the community what is happening in our isolated valley.  

        The photo shows part of the Eagle Valley.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Meeting Robert Bateman

     Above you see my painting “Fence Line” which depicts the sun setting through the trees one May evening.  I have the painting hanging in my bedroom and quite often when I notice it, I think about the day I happen to meet Robert Bateman.  

    Robert Bateman is a well-known Canadian painter, who paints extremely striking images of wildlife.  Unfortunately the artsy-fartsy elite art establishment, always looks down on wildlife art for some reason, but they can have their splattered blobs of paint on canvas, to me Robert Bateman is among the apex of talented artists, and fortunately among Canadians, he is probably the best known contemporary artist.

    One day in 2008, we drove up to Prince George for supplies.  I took the “Fence Line” painting I had just completed along with me, so I could get it framed.  We went into the store where I got my framing done and while there, the store owner introduced me to Robert Bateman, who happened to also in the store on business.  The store carried prints of Bateman’s work.  

    A friendly Robert Bateman came over and ask to see what I had painted.  I had done the picture using acrylics on paper, and when I unrolled it and spread it on the table, Bateman complimented me on the image I had captured.  That was certainly a generous boost to my ego.

    Even before my short meeting with Robert Bateman, I was a huge fans.  Not only did I love his paintings, but I loved his dedication toward the natural world and his public efforts toward protecting it.  Meeting him in person enhanced my respect I already had for him.

 You can view some of Bateman’s amazing paintings at:

     http://www.robertbateman.ca

Our Driveway

     I don’t think most people spend much time thinking about their driveways.  All those urban-living people don’t even have a driveway, but up here in rural BC, we have to think about our driveways a lot, especially during the winter.  

    Our driveway is 70 m. (235 ft.) long and is gently sloped down to our house and turn-around spot.  Although the slope isn’t that steep, during the winter if the drive becomes icy, which it usually does a couple of times a year, it can cause problems if one doesn’t have a four-wheel drive vehicle.  We have always had four-wheel drive vehicles. 

    During winter I spend a lot of time making sure our driveway is clear of snow, but there is always an inch or so of snow left on the drive, after I shovel or snowblower it, and that inch stays there and slowly builds up during each snowfall.  As we drive over that leftover snow, it compacts and hardens, and if we experience a warm spell its surface melts and then re-freezes, making the driveway glare ice.  In that state, it is even dangerous to walk across it.

    Every summer I collect a couple of 5-gallon buckets of sandy-gravel to spread on the icy driveway so tires have a bit of traction going up or down it.  

    Here is an example from my diary of a day our driveway caused me trouble during winter of 1995:

During the coffee break I mentioned that last night I had recorded a TV show on the Knowledge Network that had a segment featuring our ex-District Manager.  This generated a lot of interest with my co-workers at Forestry, so I volunteered to drive home during my lunch hour, get the video tape, and bring it back so the staff could watch it during the afternoon coffee break. 

         However, I made a big mistake:  I chose the 2-wheel drive warehouse truck to make the pickup.

        When I got to my driveway, it was so icy that I decided that I shouldn’t drive down it, so I parked the truck partially on the road, at the top of our drive.  Unfortunately, then a car came down the road so thought I’d better pull off the road more, and I inched the truck down into the driveway a little bit more.  The front end of the truck was then slanted downhill, and when I tried to back the truck up, the back wheels just kept spinning on my icy driveway.  

        I didn’t know what else to do, so I decided to drive the truck forward down the driveway,  just to the level area between the shop and the barn.  There I thought I might be able to get enough of a run on the driveway to back out.

        It didn’t work, so I decided I would just continue to drive forward on down the driveway, all the way to our carport.  Once I got into the dry carport I was able to get enough inertia to back all the way to the level turnaround spot.  There I was able to get the truck maneuvered into the right direction which would allow me to drive up the driveway.  Unfortunately, just being aimed in the right direction, didn’t really give me enough traction to get up the icy drive.  I was stuck there.

        Running out of other ideas, I finally decided to fire up my old green 4-wheel drive truck, which was parked on the side of the turnaround space, I hoped I could tow the 2-wheel drive Forestry truck up the hill.  I positioned my old green truck in front of the Forestry truck, I hooked a tow rope between the two, got into my old truck, and slowly pulled the Forestry pickup back up to the level area between the shop and the barn.

        I unhooked my old 4WD and drove it up the driveway and parked it up on the side of the road.  I then skated carefully back down to the Forestry truck, got in, and tried to drive it up to the road.  After three unsuccessful attempts, I was finally able to get it up to the road, where I left it. 

         I drove my old 4WD back down the driveway and parked it.  I carefully walked back up the icy driveway, got into the Forestry truck and drove, with the VCR tape, back to the office.  It was a lunch hour to remember.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Showers and Rain, Rain and Showers

     Well, at least my fear of forest fires have been abated, because we have been experiencing quite a parade of rain and showers lately.  As you can see from the photo I just shot from the balcony, it is looking pretty gloomy and wet outside right now, but starting tomorrow, a clearing and sunny weather system awaits us.

    Last night was our jam night.  As the decision maker for the group, it was up to me to decide whether we would play outside on the train station porch or inside in the lobby.  There were dark clouds starting to accumulate and build over the mountains and the wind was slowly increasing, but I couldn’t see any rain falling on the peaks so I decided we would do our playing outside, and began to set up.

    We got through about five songs, but then the increasing wind began to make thunder-sounding roars through the microphones, and we could tell it wouldn’t be long before rain began, so everyone, both the band members and the audience, quickly scrambled, picking up instruments, music stands, and the other equipment, and carrying it all into the lobby. 

     We played the rest of the music for the night in there.  As were playing, it got pretty warm inside, since everyone had dressed for being outside.  When we were done and started packing up the equipment to carry outside,  it was refreshing to experience the cooler air.  Everything outside was wet; evidence of the rain that had fallen while we were playing.

    One of our regular musicians wasn’t there last night because she had gone on a camping trip, way back in the mountains.  I wondered what kind of experience she was having with all of the rain and showers.  Camping can be pretty miserable in the rain.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Hay Bales and Troubled Skies

     Here are a couple of photos of round bales of hay sitting in the fields between the many rain showers we have been getting.  Because we live in the Valley, we first see the rain as it falls on the mountain slopes.  It’s a good thing the farmers were able to get their hay baled during the window of dry weather that we got, because if they had cut the hay and were unable to get it baled, all of the showers would have caused it to mold.  Baling it dry protects it from molding when it rains.

You can take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

Weather in the Mountains

     Yesterday our showery weather continued.   I needed to pull the garlic that I had growing in a friend’s garden, and took a gamble that could drive out there and get the job done before the next rain shower came blowing in.  As I drove through the main valley to get to their house, I couldn’t help but notice the dramatic-looking weather developing back in the Raush Valley, so pulled over and took the photo above.

    On my way home after harvesting my garlic, the rain up the Raush had begun and was beginning to obscure the mountains so I had to stop to take the photo below.

View my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca

Light on the Mountains

     One of the things I enjoy about living in the Robson Valley is watching the ever changing light falling on the mountains.  The sunlight breaking through the clouds project shadows across the slopes, and during the sunrises and sunsets the mountains pick up the color of the low sun giving the mountains hues of alpenglow.

    I took the photos you are seeing today this morning on my first outing of the day.

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca

McBride's Train Mural To Be Destroyed

     I was both shocked and outraged yesterday to learn that the hand-painted mural painted by Glen Frear of an old CN train that adorned the side of the former Scotia Bank building, is scheduled to be destroyed Monday.  It seems that in a secretive deal the building was sold to the McBride Community Forest, and they have arranged for a daycare to rent/lease (who knows?) part of the building, and so windows will be cut through the walls on the side of the the building, destroying one of McBride’s landmark historical murals.

    The McBride Community Forest Corp supposedly operates under the auspices of McBride Village Council, but as far as I know, even some of the Village Council members didn’t know about the sale or the destruction of the mural.  I am very surprised about the Community Forest being able to take over the building.  Where did they get that much money?  To my mind, owning buildings doesn’t seem to be part of the Community Forest mandate.  I sure don’t like all of the secretive deals that go on in our little village’s government.

    At any rate, it seems that this artistic mural which is featured in McBride’s tourism Information is doomed to disappear without people even knowing about it.  Too Bad.

You can view my paintings at:  davidmarchant2.ca