Out Like a Lion

The old saying is not accurate this year.  I don't think it was accurate last year either.  Maybe its just a Nordegg thing...?  If March comes in like a Lion, its supposed to go out like a Lamb.  This year it was in and out like a Lion.  We had some cold weather and snow at the beginning of March, and now at the end we had a storm roll through on March 30 and dump about 3/4 of an inch of fresh snow.  Before that there was no snow, and we had been experiencing some really mild temperatures.
Leonard was back out on March 30th and it only took him and his helper about half a day to finish up the rough in.  They ran all the furnace ducts and got everything with the heating system roughed in and ready to be energized.  They also finished up the plumbing rough in, including a couple of outside water taps.
Margarit came out in the morning and joined Helena and I.  We had a nice dinner together in the evening and spent a cozy evening in the cottage, listening to the wind howl and watching the snow fall.  The next morning dawned clear and sunny... but cold.  We shall see what April Fool's Day brings...

Plumbing Rough In

On March 29th my mechanical contractor... Leonards Plumbing, based out of Leslieville, came out to Nordegg.  I've known Leonard for a few years as he is very close friends with my cousin Vic.  He also did the mechanical work on our other cottage.

Leonard and his helper showed up around 10:00 and worked until mid-afternoon.  They roughed in all the water supply lines, both hot and cold, as well as most of the drains.  We positioned the shower base, and connected the drain.  I had to cut out one stud and install two new ones to replace it, in order to have adequate space for the shower valve.  After they left I continued working on a few other little odd jobs around the cottage.  I applied lacquer to most of the aspen paneling that I brought out, and installed the exterior light fixture above the door.

They also brought out the new forced air electric furnace and confirmed a bunch of dimensions necessary to prepare all the duct work.  They also marked out and cut in all the openings for heat registers.  They plan on coming back out on March 30th to carry on......

Feeling Better

I felt a lot better by Monday morning and went through the day without taking any additional meds, with the exception of one Ibuprofen in the morning.  My phone indicated that I walked over 5500 steps during the day, equivalent to almost 2-1/2 miles.  My knee still felt a little swollen, but most of the pain is gone.  Perhaps the cherry juice I started drinking is also helping.

I re-organized all the materials in the cottage and then stacked all the scaffold parts outside, and covered them with a tarp.  Then I unloaded the 40 aspen boards that I brought out.  These are mostly 12 feet long, so although the quantity is down from previous loads, the area it will cover is more than it seems.  Previous batches were mostly 8 and 10 foot boards.  I set up and put the first couple of coats of lacquer on about a quarter of them.

It was cool during the day and only got up to a degree or two above freezing.  And it snowed lightly in the afternoon... getting heavier towards evening.  But the ground is now quite warm and the snow was mostly melting as it came down.  Seems spring is just around the corner, and I even saw the chipmunks... now out of hibernation.  The deer were hanging around right outside our window... looking for handouts as usual.

It is much easier to work over in the guest cottage now...!  The days are much longer and the light lasts until well into the evening.  And, I now have power in the building and some of the lights are connected, so I can work after dark if I want to.  Now that spring is just around the corner its not as cold and its much more comfortable to work inside, even without the fire going.

A Tough Week

I'm finally beginning to feel a little better after a rather difficult week.  It kind of appears like I may continue to experience Covid-Like symptoms, despite the negative tests.

My knee became really inflamed and sore on Tuesday evening.  It got significantly worse on Wednesday and Thursday, to the point that I could not play in the first two playoff hockey games for the Renegades.

I'm not aware of anything that I did that could have injured my knee and have come to believe that it is probably gout.  The pain is in my knee cap, not the joint.  I experience gout from time to time and have a prescription for some anti-inflammatory medication.  In the past it has always occurred in my feet, and this is the first time my knee has been affected.

On Friday Margarit and I attended another performance at the New Moon Folk Club.  It was supposed to be a blues singer named Kat Danser, but her band came down with Covid and she had to cancel at the last minute.  The club was able to book local performer Martin Kerr as a last minute fill in.  He was fantastic and performed despite recently breaking his femur.

During that performance a dull headache that had been lingering with me for the previous day became a full blown migraine.  That was accompanied by an upset stomach.  I'm not really sure if this is ongoing cold/Covid symptoms, or a reaction to the meds I have been taking.

I spent most of Saturday in bed before my headache finally let up in the late afternoon.  This delayed my plans to travel to Nordegg.  On Sunday I loaded up some aspen panelling, picked up some groceries and headed out to Nordegg with my youngest daughter Helena.  The girls are off from school this week for Spring Break.

I still didn't feel great on Sunday evening.  By Monday morning my knee was beginning to feel a little better, and so was the rest of me.  Hopefully this is now behind me and I can look forward to enjoying the week out at the cottage.

Wildlife

I finally got around to downloading a bunch of photographs from my digital camera.  I have a rather expensive Nikon D810, which I really don't use much any more.  All of my "real" photography is done with film.  And... I take quite a few snapshots with my phone.  

I did take a whole bunch of pictures of the interior of the guest cottage when all the wiring rough in was done, and before the insulation was put in.  This can be used for future reference to see where studs are and how the wires were routed.  I did this in the first cottage and found it useful on more than one occasion.

I also found two pretty good wildlife shots.  Both were taken just outside the window.  In the mornings and evenings I always sit at the stool by the lunch counter.  I enjoy my morning coffee, check e-mails on my laptop, and watch the birds and wildlife out in the yard.

In late September I got a good shot of one of the White Tail Deer that come around all the time.  And then, more recently, in early March, I got another good shot of our resident Red Fox.

Covid Negative

Last week I was out at a local pub with a half dozen other members of the Monochrome Guild.  This was one of our first meetings since the Covid restrictions were lifted in Alberta.  A couple of days later I found out that one of my friends tested positive for Covid.  Exactly five days after that pub night,  the evening that I returned home from Nordegg, I came down with some mild cold symptoms.  The timing suggested that I also had caught the virus.  This was rather unfortunate as shortly before I learned the news of my exposure, I attended a meeting with my brothers, my Mom and a home care worker.

So I gave myself a rapid Covid test... and it yielded a negative result.  Suspicious of the timing of everything, and the accuracy of rapid tests, I gave myself another test earlier today.  That one was also negative, and my cold symptoms seem to be easing off a little.  I guess it is just a cold after all...

Out Shooting

On Monday morning I did a few chores in the morning.  I organized some of my construction materials, tidied up the cottage, did the dishes and brought in some firewood.  Then I took a small load of garbage to the dump.  It was about lunchtime when I left the cottage and hit the road for home.

For the past three or four months I have been religiously hauling my view camera back and forth to the cottage, but never actually did anything with it.  The last time I shot any film was in very early December.  I was determined that on this trip out to Nordegg I would take my first photographs of 2022. 

I stopped along Shunda Creek and walked around for a bit.  It was partly sunny and a little breezy, but quite warm.  The snow was melting and it is obvious that winter is in the rear view mirror.  As I walked along the road I found what I think were Lynx tracks in the snow.  The tracks were a day old... from the fresh snow of the day before, and with the warm temperature they were significantly melted.  But I'm fairly certain of my identification.  

I set up the camera twice over by the creek and exposed five sheets of film.  My first shots of the year... and it felt really good...!  Hopefully this kick starts me to get back to shooting.  I'll make excuses and say that it was mostly too cold this winter, or I was too busy working... but mostly I was not motivated and was pre-occupied.  I'm hoping now that will change.

Here are a couple of phone snap shots from my brief outing...

Worked Like a Dog

It snowed over night out at Nordegg on Saturday March 19th.  When I got up on Sunday morning there was about half an inch of fresh snow on the ground.  First day of Spring I believe... go figure...!  It was dead calm, but overcast and dull.  I decided it wasn't a good day for photography, so I went to work instead.

It was not very cold, so I didn't even have to light a fire in either cottage.  I put down some more subfloor in the east bedroom.  Just a four foot section against the north wall so that the register can be cut in.  I changed over an electrical box to a deeper one, to allow me to properly hook up that new receptacle in the small loft.  By late morning the sun came out and it warmed up nicely.  Rather than try to do any photography at this point, I just decided to keep working.

I cut an opening through the siding for an intake vent.  This will supply fresh air to the woodstove.  I realized that I need to look after getting eavestroughs put on the cottage as I got a shower from the melting snow as I worked on the vent.  Since it was warm, and I had a caulking gun out, I sealed up the penetrations from the ground cable conduit and the electrical supply.  It was too cold to seal these previously when I cut them in before.  I am just about the world's worst caulking applicator.  I always make a mess of it, and get as much on myself as I do where it belongs.  Today was no exception.  With the intake cut in I decided to finish it and ran the insulated duct over to the woodstove.  I had previously put an elbow down through the floor when I installed the stone and mortar beneath the stove.

After that I put up some more panelling on the ceiling of the west bedroom.  It takes a nine foot length of material to do the ceiling, and I don't want any joints up there.  I had a few boards set aside for this purpose and installed them.  This took me past the smoke detector so I installed that too.  Soon I will have to bring out more aspen panelling and trim and get back to work applying the lacquer finish.  It will be much easier now that it is so much warmer. 

When I was out last time I temporarily installed the yard light, with the electrical box just mounted on the surface of the siding.  It was time to do this properly so I put up the ladder and cut the box into the siding and re-mounted the light.  I will have to wander over after dark and make sure that the motion sensor is working correctly.  With that done I unpacked the shower that I brought out and carried all the parts over from the back of my truck, and stored them in the new cottage.  By this point I was running out of gas...  

I put out the last of my oats for the deer.  With the bears soon coming out of hibernation I will no longer keep feeding the deer.  With spring upon us they will have no problem fending for themselves.  In fact by late afternoon, almost all of the fresh snow had already melted.  

For some reason I felt the need to torture my body just a little more, so I went for a walk around the subdivision.  By the time I returned to the cottage I was done for the day...  I went inside and had a couple of beers.   Then I got some enchiladas going for supper, and started a fire to take the chill out of the cottage.

Time to Unwind....

After a really busy week I headed back out to Nordegg on the afternoon of Friday March 18th.  I didn't get away until about 5:30 in the afternoon.  But, now that the days are much longer, and Daylight Savings Time has kicked in, the evenings are much lighter.  Although the sun had set, there was still some light in the sky when I rolled into Nordegg around 8:15PM.

Last Monday I just ran a few errands... picking up some construction supplies for the cottage.  Then on Tuesday I played hockey twice... once in the morning and once in the evening.  The morning was a ball hockey game with my brother-in-law Shawn.  I've gone out to this three times now, and enjoy the slower pace as compared to ice hockey.  But in the evening the Renegades played a late game at 10:45 up at KofC Arena.  We lost to the Showboats by a score of 6-3.

On Wednesday I slept in a bit and then took it easy through the day.  In the evening I got together at the pub with six other members of the Monochrome Guild.  On Thursday I spent the day helping Shawn move.  And then on Friday I was in a meeting with my Mom and my brothers discussing home care.  We all had a nice lunch together after that meeting, and then I hit the road in the evening.  None of the girls wanted to come out to the cottage this weekend so I headed out on my own.  I have two things on my agenda... to get a little work done in the cottage, and to get out for an afternoon with my camera.  Here we are in the latter part of March and I have not exposed a single sheet of film yet in 2022...!!

I slept in on Saturday morning and didn't really get outside and active until around noon.  I worked in the guest cottage for most of the day.  But I was lacking motivation, and not working particularly quickly.  I decided to put an electrical outlet up on the small loft, so I ran a cable up for that.  It was relatively easy now, as the vapor barrier was not on yet.  I put in the electrical box and installed the receptacle.  Then I put the vapor barrier up on the two outside walls in the bathroom.  Once this was done I could start putting down the subfloor.  I got enough of it installed in the bathroom and now the plumbing rough in can proceed.  I installed the toilet flange and with the subfloor in, the shower base can now be installed as well.  I also put subfloor down along the south wall in the kitchen.  This will permit plumbing rough in, and allow the heat register to be cut in.

In the afternoon I took a spin into town to check out the rink.  It has been really warm all week.  I was hopeful that with the overcast skies on Saturday, that the ice wouldn't have melted too much.  But by afternoon the temperature got up to +8c.  The ice on the rink had melted back from the boards on one side, exposing the concrete.  What was left of the ice was very wet and slushy.  It seems doubtful there will be any more outside hockey this year.

Front Row Seats

I shot this one back in April of 2021.  I was out on a day trip with my friend Arturo and we came across this abandoned community hall late in the day.  This one was taken with my 8x10 view camera on Bergger Pancro 400 developed in Perceptol Developer.  I have been having much better luck with Perceptol since I started processing with it on my Jobo processor.  The continuous agitation of the motorized processor has eliminated the previous issues I had with the anti-halation dye not properly washing out of the film.

Service Station

I originally tried to shoot this abandoned service station on 4x5 film.  But I somehow messed up the exposure, and the resulting negative was almost blank.  I could faintly see the outline of the building, but that was it.  So, I returned in May of 2021 and reshot it, this time with my 8x10 camera.  I shot this on Bergger Pancro 400 film, processed in Perceptol Developer.

Slocan Ramblers at New Moon Folk Club

Margarit and I recently bought annual memberships to the New Moon Folk Club.  This club hosts live music performances at the St. Basil's Cultural Center.  The Club has been shut down for two years due to the Covid Pandemic, but recently started up again.

We attended their first show on Friday March 11th.  This was the reason that I was anxious to leave Nordegg by noon, so that I could get back to the city in time for the show.

The first show was The Slocan Ramblers, a bluegrass band out of Toronto.  There was also a warm up act, a 19 year old vocalist named Mary Stinchcomb.  It was great to see live music after being away from it for so long.  The Ramblers were really good and Margarit and I both enjoyed the show.

The Club took some precautions in hosting the event.  Proof of vaccination was required to enter, even though the province dropped almost all regulations a couple of weeks ago.  Masks were also required except when eating and drinking, though this was only loosely enforced.  The venue was only filled to 2/3 capacity, and patrons were only allowed to enter a few at a time.

St. Basils Ukrainian Orthodox Church ran the kitchen and was serving plates of food.  The perogies and cabbage rolls were really good...!  We thought the atmosphere was much like the Springfest down in East Coulee, with a small intimate crowd and a comfortable venue.  We are thrilled with our decision to join the club and look forward to the next show, in a couple weeks.

The Slocan Ramblers were selling advance copies of their new CD, which will not be officially released until June.  I picked up a copy to support them, and it was only $15.

Alberta Coal

In early March the Alberta Government released their long awaited response to the Committee Report that they initiated on Coal Mining in the Eastern Slopes.  It seems they have caved in to public pressure, and mining activity will be stopped.   

No one really trusts them though... particularly in light of all the issues they have had on a range of topics.  Though the decision is good, it could easily be overturned in the future.  As things stand now, all new mining activity has been halted.  There are only four projects, that were in the midst of the review process, when the recent pause was undertaken.  These are allowed to move through the approval process and may or may not proceed.  Two are down in Crowsnest Pass...  Grassy Mountain and Tent Mountain.  These are proposals to re-open mines that previously operated.  The Grassy Mountain project put in a new haul road and invested a bunch of money, only to have the Federal Government refuse to approve it on environmental grounds.  Their appeal of that decision was also denied.  It seems unlikely this one will proceed.  

The Vista Mine near Hinton is exporting Thermal Coal to Asia.  This seems stupid given the fact that most countries are moving away from coal fired power generation.  That mine was in financial difficulty in recent months, but is still looking to expand.  Although it is an operating mine, it is my understanding that the expansion of the existing operation is not yet approved.  The fourth project is up in Grande Cache area.  It was originally to be an underground mine, but I'm really not certain that status of that one.

There were a couple of projects in my neck of the woods... not far from Nordegg.  They started doing some test drilling, put in some roads, and cleared off a bunch of forest.  These will not be permitted to proceed, at least in the foreseeable future.  I wonder how much compensation the taxpayer might be on the hook for...?  And, unfortunately some damage has already been done.

Here is a link to an article prepared by the Narwhal...

https://thenarwhal.ca/alberta-coal-mining-report/

Fall Photo Weekend 2018

Every fall, for over twenty years, the members of the Monochrome Guild have traveled on a weekend outing together.  Usually it was in late October or early November, when things were quieter, and the hotel accommodations were more affordable.  Most years we headed to Jasper, but sometimes we also visited Banff, Kananaskis Country and the Badlands.

In 2019 we had our last weekend outing before Covid, and that one was to Jasper.  In 2020 and 2021 we were not able to make our annual pilgrimage, though it is hoped we can start up again in 2022.  I recently completed the development of all of the negatives that I shot in 2018.  This includes the ones from our Fall Photo Weekend trip that year.

It seems so long ago now, and I can't even remember for sure how many of the Guild members were on this one.  I know that there were at least four or five of us.  We stayed at my shop in East Coulee and spent three days visually exploring the Badlands of the Red Deer River Valley and the immediate area.  The weather conditions on the first day were pretty good but after that it got quite a bit cooler, overcast, and windy.  This was on October 26, 27 and 28 of 2018.

Over those three days I set up my view camera twenty times.  For the most part I exposed two or three sheets of film at each set up.  The one time that I only exposed a single sheet was a detail shot of a dead cottonwood tree.  That image was lost... not sure if it was a processing or exposure error.  Even with my years of experience with the big camera and in the darkroom it is not all that uncommon that I sometimes mess something up.  This is one of the reasons that I generally expose more than one sheet of film.  The other reason is that I like to try different film and developer combinations and see how they respond to different lighting conditions and subject matter.

The nineteen scans that I have included below are all of the shots that I took over this three day weekend [with the exception of the one that I lost].  I tried to select the best of the multiple images from each set up.  Not all of these are "keepers" and worth printing in the darkroom.  There are a couple in here that I may take a stab at printing, while the rest will only be shared online.

I recently shared these with the other Guild members.  I hope that it stimulates some discussion about photography and perhaps motivates us to get out shooting again this spring.  Hopefully we are able to organize a group outing this fall, and maybe one in the spring as well.  I'm also hopeful that some of the others that were on this outing, share their photos.  I'm interested to see how they might have interpreted the same subject matter.  Surprisingly, even though we are often shooting the same subject, at the same time, under the same conditions, the compositions are often very different.  Individual personalities result in a very different way of seeing things, and I find that fascinating.

Final Morning

I hung around out at Nordegg until Friday the 11th of March.  I had ordered a partial lift of 5/16" particle board underlay from the Co-op Home Center in Rocky Mountain House.  They had promised to deliver it to me before noon on Friday.  The shipment showed up at about 10:00AM.    The driver was super nice and really helpful.  He used the Moffett forklift on his delivery truck to drive the load of material up the driveway, and around the cottage, right to the door.  Then he lifted it up to door level, and was willing to wait for 20 minutes while I pulled it all off the forks and stacked it in the cottage.  This sure made my job a lot easier and was very much appreciated on my part.  I really like to deal with small town operations like the Co-op was they are so down to earth and really understand customer service.

Once that task was behind me I quickly packed things up and shut down the cottage.  I was able to hit the road back to Edmonton by about noon.  I'm not sure when I'll get back out to Nordegg again, but when I do I will start to install this material.  It will be glued and screwed down to the plywood subfloor to provide a smooth surface for the installation of vinyl tile.  I won't install it to the entire cottage right away, as I have a bunch of work remaining with aspen panelling and cabinet construction.  But, I will install it in select areas, so that other work can progress.  This includes the bathroom, so that plumbing can be roughed in for the toilet and the shower base.  I will also have to install some in other locations so that I can rough in kitchen plumbing, and cut in the heat registers.  The bulk of it will wait until a little later though.....

The Scaffold is Down...!!

My muscles were pretty tired from all the skating at the outside rink... but I slept pretty well.  It didn't get as cold over night this time, and was only about -8 when I got up at 8:30.

I got busy next door in the guest cottage and before I knew it, the day was done.  But I got quite a bit accomplished.  

While the scaffold was still in place I finished up a little more of the trim on the south gable, around the plumbing vent.  The really high part is now done, and I can finish the rest lower down, from a ladder.  I can't really do that part right now, until the aspen paneling is installed on the lower wall.  I also made some adjustments to the three pendant lights on the high ceiling.  The ones the lighting store sold me are not really suited to a sloped ceiling.  I had to make a proper hanger out of a chain link and an eyelet.  That all worked OK, but the ceiling canopy and the lock fitting that hold it up, didn't really allow the downrod to hang straight.  I ended up screwing the canopies to the ceiling, and hopefully once the glass globes get installed there will be enough weight for the lights to hang straight.

Once this was all done I dismantled the scaffold and took everything down.  I stored the planks in my crawl space and the frames outside for now.  I returned the wheels and one extra plank to my neighbor Dan, who had loaned them to me.  With the scaffold out of the way I tidied up in the cottage and made some working space for the next steps.  I have a load of particle board subfloor material being delivered and will need to store this inside when it arrives.

It sure feels good to get rid of that scaffold...!!  If I never have to climb it again it will be too soon.  I think I must have been up and down that thing a couple of hundred times between electrical rough in, insulation, vapor barrier, aspen paneling and light fixtures.  The new step ladder that I bought should be adequate for any future access.