Tutshi Lake, BC

Another painting . . . completed today.  Tutshi Lake is a lake between Skagway, Alaska and Carcross, Yukon. While picking blueberries on a nice summer day, I stumbled upon this scene. I knew I had to paint it.

 

Beginning of Gallery 2

It’s amazing how short the days are becoming now. Painting time under natural light is markedly reduced and it is getting shorter.

Gallery 2, on my website is now populated with a recent painting. Others will follow as I complete my work in progress, and finish other artwork not yet started. The new addition is a painting of a scene along the Dempster Highway in the Yukon.

Blue-gray Clothes

Today was water day. I picked up and delivered 600 gallons of water to the house in two trips. Each trip involved travelling 12 km for a total of 24 kilometers. Both of my water tanks are now full with a total of 1100 gallons. I use about 35 gallons per day. It takes an average of 1 hour for each load, for pick up and delivery to the house water tanks, using a 300 gallon hauling tank and a two inch hose. It’s not too bad a task now but when it gets cold outside this winter, it won’t be fun. I could get it delivered but the cost would be about $140 per month for that.

As long as I was getting water I thought I would do my washing as well. The first load went well . . . nice and clean and bright. The second load however included some blue trousers that I thought wouldn’t run. You guessed it. I now have some blue-gray T-shirts and blue-gray towels. Uuuugggggly! The T-shirts have now become my painting T-shirts and the towels have become my painting towels.

Spyware

The best of plans don’t always go smoothly. My plan for today was to paint . . . all day. I thought I would check my email and other things on the computer first.

Slow! Too slow! I ran one of my spyware detection programs . . . it found “dollarrevenue”. Every time it was removed, it returned within a short time. I spent far too much time trying to get rid of it for good. Finally I purchased another spyware detection program and ran that. It promised to get rid of “dollarrevenue”.

46 problems were detected with the new software. A little less than one dollar per problem to have them fixed. Sometimes I wonder if the people that sell the spyware programs also infect computers. Anyway it all looks okay now and the speed has returned. But it’s too late to paint today. I no longer want to do that today. Sometimes it’s best not to turn your computer on.

While I was at it I decided to install a hardware firewall. It won’t stop spyware since that is usually picked up while visiting an internet site, but it will stop other computers from accessing my IP address.

No such luck. It wouldn’t install properly.  I called the router’s support line. From the accents and the difficulty understanding each other, the support obviously seemed to be located in a foreign country. After three attempts at resolving the problem, with three different “experts”, I gave up. I removed the router and put it back on the shelf where it came from. I will not purchase ”*-****” hardware of any type again.

New Note Cards Available

Two new note cards have been made available. You can  see them here. One is of a painting I did at the end of the Ingraham Trail near Yellowknife and the other is a sunrise last March in Inuvik NWT.

Don’t Put Bales of Straw in a Suburban

I had a doctor’s appointment in Carcross today in order to review my routine blood test taken last week. Everything looked great but even though my cholesterol is near the high end of normal limits the doctor wants to bring the level even lower because of having type 2 diabetes.  Thus a prescription for a low dose (10 mg/day) of a “statin” (Crestor).

As part of this vist and because I’m a type 2 diabetic the Carcross nurses take special care to keep extra check on their regular patients. Thus I was given the “little container” to make a liquid deposit. Well, I had very recently got rid of any spare liquid I had and because I never yet had breakfast, there was no new liquid forthcoming; at least not soon. Being resourceful, as all Yukoners are, it was suggested that I take the “container” with me . . . I was going to Whitehorse anyway, and make the deposit at the Whitehorse hospital lab. I was given the completed form necessary to give to the lab in Whitehorse to accompany what then would be a container with the rquired “liquid” to test for protein levels. Okay, on to Whitehorse.

I quickly completed my grocery shopping, filled my prescription for Crestor and left my last pickup of a bale of straw, for a friend in Tagish, for her to cover her plants and protect them for winter kill. Good idea . . . both for protecting the plants and for leaving the pickup for last. The suburban now had the odour very reminiscent of a barn. Opening the windows didn’t help because then the tiny pieces of straw were kind of flying around inside the suburban. Okay, close the windows. Now don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad smell. I kind of like it. But in my suburban? I wonder how long it will be there. It might be normal to have a suburban in southern Alberta smell like a barn, but maybe not even in Alberta. I think they have pickup trucks there.

Now, on to the hospital to make my deposit of liquid gold. Or is that gold liquid? I followed the sign in the hospital that said “Laboratory”, then entered a door with a sign that said “specimen delivery”. This shouldn’t take long at all.

I entered and said to the worker in that office, “Hi, where can I fill my container to give you my specimen? I have the form already filled out by the nurse in the Carcross Nursing Station.”

The reply was something like “Oh, you have to go to the admitting office and have them  give you a form. Then you will have to wait until your turn. There are about ten people waiting there ahead of you.”

“But I have the form already filled out. All that’s lacking is to fill this little  container.”

“Your still have to go through the admitting office.”

I left the room and went to the admitting office, just inside the front entrance . . . and kept going out the door to the suburban, throwing the form in the garbage along the way. I kept the container . . . it might come in handy, and it was still empty.

Election Day in the Yukon

Today is election day in the Yukon. There are three candidates running in Tagish Southern Lakes District; for the Yukon Party, the NDP (New Democaratic Party) and the Liberal Party. I did my part this morning by volunteering as scrutineer at the Tagish Polling Station for the Yukon Party from 8 am until 12 noon, when I was relieved by another scrutineer. And yes, I voted also.

Thanksgiving Day

Today is Thanksgiving Day in Canada. Yesterday evening myself and others were invited to “Sandi’s” place for supper. Wow. . . what a great supper! Sandi took much care to ensure that every part of the meal was perfect. And it was. I enjoyed it immensely. Thank you Sandi. And the Spruce Tip Jelly went great with the lamb.

What Does It Cost Me to Live in the Yukon?

What does it cost me to live in the  Yukon? In particular, to live in a 4 bedroom-plus house located on a little over 2 acres in Tagish, Yukon. Here is a chart showing my expenses for the first 9 months of 2006. If this were related to my actual dollar income you would see that there is very little left for discretionary spending. In actual fact the expenditures have exceeded my income by over 28 percent. This means of course that some changes will have to occur soon in order to remedy this. I am still learning to live within my new, low, retirement income. Life is interesting, isn’t it?

“Good” Followed by “Not Good”

Sirius satellite radio is starting up a new radio channel called “The Catholic Channel”. It isn’t up and running as planned as yet and the channel on Sunday and Monday was playing continuous religious choral music. So all day and evening on Sunday I listened to that wonderful music, which included many classical choral Masses . . . and I painted all day and evening on Sunday and all day on Monday. That’s good. What a wonderful two days.

Today (Tuesday) I had an appointment at the Carcross Nursing Station to have some blood work done to check my cholesterol, blood sugar, kidneys, and whatever else they do when they do “bloodwork”. I fasted from 6 PM on Monday.

Three dry holes! The fourth try, with a different nurse, produced enough blood to take the sample. The first nurse didn’t feel comfortable trying a fourth time. I wasn’t complaining though . . . I felt sorry for her.

For band aids in four places. And they didn’t have any “snoopy” or “mickey mouse” band aids. What kind of a day is this going to be? What a start. Not good.

Then on to the city of Whitehorse to do some stuff that was put off to enable hitting Carcross and Whitehorse on the same day.

First stop, Walmart, to return a defective DVD that I purchased the last visit there.

No they can’t refund my money . . . policy you know . . . but they will give me credit towards another DVD.

“But I’m pressed for time, just give me a refund”.

“No, can’t do that”. 

Onward to the DVD section. I’ll go and get another one the same and return to the customer service counter. So I go to the DVD section and look and look and look for the same title. Can’t find it. Too long. Can’t find another DVD the same. It’s already cost me more in time than the DVD is worth. It’s from the bargain bin. $6.88. So I finally in frustration grab they first one I find that might be okay and return to customer service. And I wait in line. I’m ready to leave without my DVD, but then it’s my turn.

They need my credit card because I purchased the defective DVD with a credit card. But I have a different credit card this time. And I’m not going to run out to the parking lot to my vehicle to get “the” credit card. Okay. They did something instead, and gave me my new DVD. Good.

Now I can eat . . . I had to fast for the bloodwork and I was hungry. The quickest way to do that was to go to the Walmart McDonalds. It was 10:45 AM. I look at the menu . . . it’s all breakfast. I don’t want breakfast. It’s almost noon.

“You can’t get anything else until 11 AM”, I’m told politely.

 ”But that’s only 15 minutes from now. Give me something else please, I don’t want breakfast and I don’t want to wait”.

 ”No I can’t do that”, was the reply.

I was still hungry as I went to my next stop, the glass place, to get some picture glass for some of my print frames.

“We’re too busy today with windshields”.

“Okay, I need 5 pieces of glass, 16 inches by 18 inches, I’ll check with you later and if they aren’t done I’ll be back in about a week and  pick them up then.”

“Okay.”

Next stop . . . the Department of Motor Vehicles to get my vehicle registrations changed to my name only since my wife died last December. This is my third visit there to try to get this done. A different person each time and different rules each time. But this time I’m ready. I have a copy of the death certificate which I didn’t have the last visit.

“I can’t change the registration without a . . .  ” I wasn’t listening any more. I’m pretty sure I was getting red, but there was no mirror around to confirm that feeling and I don’t know what I said next but she said she would go “to the back” and talk to somebody else. I waited, and waited and waited. She came back.

“Okay I’ll make the change but my boss isn’t here right now and he might not like what I’m doing”. She made the change and gave me new registration forms.

Good. Progress. I might get back home today.

Next stop, Social Services. That’s where you go to apply for the Pioneer Utility Grant that the Yukon Government gives to seniors that live in their own home. Amost $900 this year. I think I was in their office less than 5 minutes. Now that’s efficiency! And a government department too! Good.

Next stop . . . groceries. I don’t need many, but I do need some. First however, Cisco, my Papillon dog probably has his legs crossed. I drive to the corner of the “Superstore” and take the dog out on his leash. No bag. Is he going to poop? There’s a bag in the bushes . . . good, now he can poop. But he doesn’t. He just wants to walk around and pee on everything. Okay, back into the Suburban. The grocery shopping goes okay. I get everything I need. Good.

On the way to the Suburban with my cart full of groceries I’m followed by a “street person” eyeing my shopping cart, hoping I’ll give it to him to return to the “shopping cart place” and thus retrieve the dollar that it cost me to get the cart. The young man said he was living at the Salvation Army Homeless Shelter. I let him have the cart. He took it to the “shopping cart place”, which was about 15 feet away and retrieved my dollar. I didn’t mind.

Next stop, the bank. I have to deposit a cheque. I’ll use the machine in the lobby, there’s no line there and it’s faster than standing in a teller line. I put my card in, punch in my secret numbers, select “deposit” and the machine starts beeping. I read the instructions. “Put deposit in envelope”. Where? Where is the envelope? The machine keeps beeping, I think louder but it’s really not louder, just loud. I find the envelope, I put the cheque in. “Seal the envelope” the instructions read. The machine keeps beeping. I lick the envelope but the flap doesn’t stick. The machine keeps beeping. “Put the envelope in the deposit slot” is the next instruction. The machine keeps beeping. Where? Where is the deposit slot? There’s slots all over the front of the machine. The machine keeps beeping. I find the proper slot. I put the unsealed envelope into the slot. The machine keeps beeping. It grabs the envelope and slips it somewhere inside. The machine stopped beeping. I press the “NO” button to answer the next request and grab my card and receipt. Whew! I’m done. Good. On the way back to the Suburban a couple asked for money. They didn’t seem to be sober and I politely refused and didn’t wait for further response from them. Why are there so many pan handlers around? There are jobs available all over the place. Businesses are so short of staff they are hurting.

I’m still hungry. Next, back to McDonalds. I order a Crispy Chicken Dinner with a medium Coffee. The coffee was good but as I finished my meal I easily recalled why I don’t usually eat at McDonalds. It doesn’t really matter what I order it all tastes the same . . . I should have ordered breakfast.

I wonder if the glass is ready. Back to the glass shop. Surprise . . . it’s ready. Good.

Cisco needs his food supply also. I don’t feed him human food. Next stop, “Duffy’s Pets and Tanzilla Harness Supply”. Yes that’s really the name. They have Cisco’s food. Good.

I drive by a service station. Hey, I need gas. Look it’s only 103.5 per liter. I better fill up now. It might go up later today. I’m not down to half a tank yet, but it still cost me almost $100.

I’m done. Yippee! Now I can go back home.

At home I check my email and see one from my good friend Sheila in New Brunswick. Her sister Miki, also a good friend living in Inuvik, NWT, was visiting New Brunswick to celebrate their mother’s 93rd birthday. Their mother died last Sunday. She died three days before her 93rd birthday. The funeral is tomorrow. Her birthday.

I read the email, and the attached obituary. I cried and cried and cried. Cisco came to me, close to me, when I cried. I feel so sad. I’m so sorry for Sheila and Miki. I’m crying while I’m writing this post and Cisco is here again. I remember Sunday . . . I was painting and listening to choral Masses and Requiem Masses; all day. I thought it was a good day.