I scheduled a half day off for myself on Friday May 8th. I intended to book out of work at noon, and head out to the cottage in Nordegg. My oldest daughter Hailey, and youngest daughter Helena were already out there... as they journeyed out from the city on Thursday.
The noon departure didn't happen, but I signed off my time sheet at 1:00 and tried to head out the door. That got interupted as I got called upon to deal with a few last minute things. I signed out again at 2:00 and tried to head out the door, but once again I was interrupted as more duties called, I finally managed to get out of the office shortly before 2:30PM. Not exactly a half day off as I worked through my lunch break, like usual, and only put in a work day that was an hour-and-a-half short of a full eight hour day.
When I got back to the house I loaded up a few materials and supplies, made a quick stop at the gas station and hit the road around 4:30PM. Traffic was light and I made good time, arriving at the cottage shortly after 7:00PM.
I unpacked a few things on my arrival, including three rustic barstools that I had purchased on line. They had been delivered to the house about a week prior, but this was my first look at them out of the boxes. When I unpacked the first two, I found loose ball bearings from the swivels rolling around in the boxes. Needless to say, the seats were rather rickety and precarious. The third one seemed solid and OK, but when I tried it out and sat on it a little later that evening, the wood base of the seat split and broke. I know that makes it sound like I have a weight problem, but at 57 years of age, I am still basically the same weight that I was 20 years ago. I am 72 inches tall and maintain a reasonably healthy weight between 190 and 195 Lbs. I reported the problems with the stools to the website I bought them from and was assured that they will be replaced under warranty.
I also brought out the cupboard doors for the lower kitchen cabinets. I completed these some time ago but in recent weeks have been fitting some decorative tree branches onto them. The lower ones are all done now, and look pretty good... if I do say so myself. Now I just have to cut and dry some more branches to finish up the four doors on the upper cabinets.
On Saturday afternoon the girls and I took a drive to the west up to Abraham Lake. We made a stop at Windy Point. It seems that a lot of people that have been isolating and social distancing due to the Corona Virus Pandemic had similar thoughts. It was cool but unusually calm and quiet there, and a number of other people were out wandering around. I took a couple of shots with my view camera and Hailey rattled off a couple with the Hasselblad. We continued further up the valley and made a couple of other brief stops. Saw some Bighorn Sheep and an Osprey sitting on a nest. By late afternoon the clouds started to settle in and the weather deteriorated. We made our way back to the cottage and had an evening BBQ. It was beginning to rain and turning to snow as the steaks and baked potatoes cooked on the grill.
It continued to snow overnight and into Sunday morning and things were pretty white by the time we had brunch together. Despite that fact that it is almost the May long weekend, it looked rather "festive" and Christmas like. By Sunday afternoon it warmed to just a little above freezing and most of the snow disappeared. I wrapped up a few chores around the cottage before reluctantly making the drive back home to the city.
No comments:
Post a Comment