On The Road Again or Close To It

On The Road Again or Close To It

Life was fairly hectic for a few days but I am glad to say it has calmed down somewhat now. The day of the auction sale dawned bright, sunny and hot. It was a very long day, the auctioneers arrived at around 9 am and the sale began at 10:30 am. It finally finished just after 8 pm and everyone (other than the relatives) had left by 9:30 pm. We had a lot of company over the last week and we are tired; but ready to leave. I am in town to finish up the last few things, then on to the next town over to meet with the auctioneer, do the banking, etc.. After all that we are off to Mexico.

It has been a long, busy 3 months and we are glad that everything is done and we can relax. We don't intend to rush the trip back down, after all we have all the time in the world and no responsibilities.

We will probably hit some libraries for computer time on the road to keep in touch.

Server Problems

Server Problems

We have been having problems with our internet service provider (Telus) since we returned to Alberta. Yesterday, after trying to get to talk to someone who understood that the problem was not with my computer, when I didn't have a dial tone on my phone line, I finally gave up. They were going to send a technician out "possibly" on Wednesday. As we are leaving next Tuesday and will be quite busy with the sale and cleaning and packing to leave, I told them to forget it. I shut off the phone and the internet completely. I have never seen a company give such poor line service and/or customer service as they do. We have had problems with them several times before. It took over 3 months and lots of phone calls to get our money back from them when we returned a modem, and the list goes on. It is frustrating to be told you have a problem with your computer and you need to get it repaired when you are calling because you don't have dial tone on the phone line. Yesterday when I asked that it be cut off completely the person said, you realise then that this call could get cut off. I replied, I AM NOT ON MY LANDLINE, IT HAS NO DIAL TONE, IT DOES NOT WORK. UGH!!!!! After that the day got better, how could it not have?

Anyway from now until we go I will be using the computer at the library in town.

Raining again last night; but forecast is for sun on Saturday, the day of the sale.

Wildlife- (The 4 Legged Type)

Wildlife-(The 4 Legged Type)

We had been assuming that our lady deer had a fawn somewhere in the bushes nearby, as she has been staying closeby the last while. Yesterday she finally brought the little one out into the pasture, between the height of the grass and his short stature, we couldn't see him too well. He did look cute doing his jump/bounce to keep up to his mama. We watched them until they returned to the bushes on the edge of the pasture.

In the evening I was sitting by the window chatting on the phone with my sister and a bunny decided to check out the backyard. He slowly munched his way around for about 1/2 hour while I watched him, he is much braver now, with no dogs in the yard.

It poured rain again yesterday evening and is wet, cloudy and windy this morning. Yuck.

I did a little more packing; but we are at the point where we cannot do much more until it is time for the sale. We are down to about 12 days before we leave.

Last Things

Last Things

As the days pass slowly, or so it seems; we are getting some things done, even if it refuses to stop raining. I had made several long lists of things that had to be done before we left and there are very few things on them undone. Progress. We both had our last doctors appointments the other day. Son in law came and picked up the rest of the equipment that went with the tractor. I rototilled the flowerbeds for the last time yesterday, the lawn will need one more time before the sale on the 24th and then my big gardening days will be over. The auctioneer and his wife came over today and brought one trailer that we will be putting some things on for the sale. We visited for awhile and whined about the weather.

A few weeks ago I had scanned my recipes into the computer and put them on a disc, today I did the same to our address books, the less paper to take with us the better! I did some cleaning, some packing, some business and some more visiting so all in all it was a busy day. Tomorrow I will start undoing some of the machines: fax, answering machine, VCR, DVD, one printer, things that we can do without. The house is beginning to look barren; blank walls, empty cupboards and shelves, a strange sight. We will be getting some company next week also, so along with setting up for the sale it should be a busy week.

Our deer herd of 5 that regularly visited seems to be down to one female. She comes through the front yard and continues on into the pasture every morning and evening. As she passes through the front yard she always stops to have a few dainty nibbles off of the rose bushes. I laugh because she always looks at the window as if she knows she shouldn't be doing this. It reminds me of catching a child with it's hand in the cookie jar. Her route is usually the same, so I think she may have a fawn in the bushes close by. We will miss watching her everyday.

We are back in our countdown mode, it seems like we were just doing this not long ago; although this time is different as it is on a more permanent basis. We should be ready to be on the road by the 28th if all goes as planned, so we have less than 2 weeks to go. It will be a very busy 2 weeks.

The Papers Are Signed

The Papers Are Signed

I am so sick of the weather! We are still having rain almost everyday and it is chilly. I think that there has been about 3 nice days since we arrived back here in April, probably an exaggeration but that's what it feels like. The yard is becoming overgrown, the flowerbeds full of weeds, etc. as the 1 decent day we had lately was spent mowing lawn. Well, there was one other day but that was spent running around to banks and doing other business type activities. On the plus side, everything is very lush and green looking and the flowering shrubs were beautiful this year. Part of last weekend was spent sitting at one of my sister in laws yard sale, I got to see a lot of people and do some visiting that I wouldn't have done otherwise, so that was nice.

We had a nice visit on Wednesday with Roys daughter and grand-daughter. We hadn't seen his daughter since our short visit on the way back in April, his grand-daughter was away that day so we hadn't seen her since before we left in the fall. It was good to see them and hard to believe how grown up his grand-daughter is getting to be, she is a lovely young lady.

I went to the lawyer yesterday to sign the final papers for the house sale and came away wondering just who they were representing, me or the real estate. There were a couple of errors on the papers, of course not in my favor, that needed to be fixed before I would sign. At one point I was told, just sign and we'll fix it up after, HUH. I just looked at her and asked innocently, if I sign doesn't that mean that I am agreeing to everything on the papers. She was quiet for a bit and then said, yes, it would mean that. I asked her to fix up the papers and then I would sign. After she had made 3 trips to the outer office to fix things up, I finally signed and as I walked out the door I wondered what else was in the papers that I had missed. Remember, I paid for these people (lawyer) to represent me. HMMM....corruption in Mexico??

We then returned to our own little town for a little more punishment. Roy needed to renew his drivers license and the car registration and change addresses on them both, and also to close out a bank account that we won't be using. While he was doing this I decided to go and have coffee with my mother in law and do a little venting. Roy returned and was just about to sit down and have a coffee. I asked how it all went and he was telling me what he had paid to get things done. It didn't seem like enough money had been forfeited, so I began to look at all the paperwork. They had only charged for changing the address on the car registration ($9.00) and had not renewed it. So, off he went back to the office, returning in a couple of minutes, the lady was on lunch and no one else in the office could do it. We sat and visited with my mother in law and an hour later he returned to the office, again. It was all accomplished this time in a couple of minutes; but of course the original $9.00 error couldn't be reversed as it had already gone through the computer, Yah right. So now we are both frustrated!! Meanwhile it is still chilly and raining and this is the day that we had told the gas company to turn off our gas--which translates to heat. Home we go-cold house, well at least this is one company today that did what it was supposed to! Lit the fire for awhile and had a nap.

It appears that we have everything in order, so have decided to leave here a few days after the auction sale which is on the 24 th. We can't see staying in an empty house until the 7th of July, we will have no equipment or anything to maintain the yard or house with, so might as well get on our way. We weren't sure if everything would be finalised with the house by then; but as it now is we will be free to go. We need to stay here until we get the money from the auction sale and until people have had a few days to pick things up. The auctioneer has to have the cheque ready for us on the 26 th, as they will be leaving to go to a family reunion in, guess where, Chihuahua, Mexico. We will give people until the evening of the 27 th to pick up their stuff and hopefully leave the morning of the 28 th of June. We will be able to do the last "shutting down" of things in those few days, so should be free and clear. Looking out the window at the rain this morning and feeling chilly and achy, I can't wait.

Blog Renovations

Blog Renovations

I spent some time this morning renovating the blog. I realised, (after receiving an email from a fellow who sent me some links that he reads) and I started to send him some that I read, that it would be much easier to take the time and put them on the blog. I had been thinking of it for awhile; but had been too lazy. I hadn't really thought about just how many sites I visit regularily, until I started to put them in an email. UGH!!

I added better links to our online photo albums, added more blogs to the blog list (although this is not finished), and also added some other interesting and informative sites. This is still a work in progress; but I have run out of "fooling around time" this morning.

We managed to get a lot of yard work done yesterday. Today one of my sister in laws is having a garage sale, so I will be taking some things in to that and sitting there for awhile before heading off to the bank, again. I have been trying to get somewhere with my company pension since we returned in April and finally got the package in the mail yesterday. I won't even mention how many phone calls this took. So now I am off to the bank again to figure out what to do with it. Wish me luck.

As Time Goes By

As Time Goes By

Slowly but surely the days pass, one running into the other as the sand in our hourglass runs out on our time in Canada. As I look around I wonder about what I will miss about my life here. I have lived on the acreage here for 11 years now. The first time I came here it felt like home and it has never ceased to have that feeling. In a year when we have rain, which it seems is this year, we have a beautiful green vista (bella vista) of rolling hills covered with green grass, aspen and spruce trees, and a small lake in the distance that you can just barely see through the trees. Right in the yard it is also green and lush, shrubs and trees blooming, grass needing to be mowed, birds chirping, and all of the accompanying fresh, wet rain smells.

Am I in such a rush now to complete things here that I am missing out on enjoying the beauty surrounding me and will I regret this rush later? I don't think so; but who knows. I will miss the fresh smell of the rain, as it rarely rains in our new home, it is also much greener here (in a good year); but in the city where we will reside it is also green. In our new home will we have blossoming trees at all times of the year, not just for a couple of months, very few people there have actual grass lawns and in the ones that do the grass is different. It seems to be of a coarser variety with larger leaf blades than ours. This surprised me, as usually the larger the leaf the greater the evaporation, so to me it would follow that grass there would have really narrow blades. I am rambling.

A couple of days ago, we were getting cabin fever so decided to go and walk the beach at a nearby lake. We have been really missing the water. Less than a mile from home we encountered a black bear on the road, probably a 2 year old kicked out by mama. These are apparently the ones you have to keep an eye on, as they are mischievous and troublesome. We have never had any problems with them; but in springtime when the cows are calving a bear will sometimes take a calf. A short while later there were a couple of deer off to the side of the road. We regularly have about 5 deer that feed in our pasture right by the house, deer are a common sight here. We got to the lake and walked for a short time on the beach before another rain shower soaked us as we hurried back to the car. In the car again, the shower passed and the sun returned so we decided to head to the river (North Saskatchewan) to see how low/high it was. The mountain melt has not affected the level of the river yet and it is quite low. Which is not a surprise, the surprise is that it has any water in it at all, as all the towns/cities along it continue to use and abuse it. There seems to be no plan to conserve it (well, lots of plans and all in the planning stage), I guess they will wait until it goes dry before doing anything. The consumption of water by our neighborhood in Guaymas amazed me. There doesn't seem to be any thought of conserving it. Everyone waters their plants everyday with a little sprinkling, rather than a deep soaking every couple of days (perhaps this is how it needs to be done). They also wet down and wash their yards out every day. I had assumed that being in a dessert meant strict water conservation, I am much more careful with my water consumption here than they are there. I asked our landlord where the water for Guaymas comes from and was told that it is piped there from the city of Obregon 120 Kms. or so away. The average water bill there is around $6.00 a month. They do not seem to worry about the availability of it. Anyway, after checking the river level we returned to the car just in time to avoid getting drenched again. We did manage to get the lawns mowed yesterday in between little showers. Today I need to start dismantling parts of the yard, bundling up lights and other decorations. 37 days to go.