Winter. Winter Never Changes.
Today we had to take Jazzy to the vet for her eye removal surgery. We had to be there around 8 AM.
And in true 2020 fashion, on the one day we had to leave the house, the weather did this:
That’s about nine (edit: 10.6) inches of snow in the non-drifts. But we had to get to the vet because the next open appointment for the surgery wasn’t until January 5th and her pain and light sensitivity have been getting worse by the day it seems.
So we braved the snow. Nate had to practically shovel us out of the parking lot and the roads were kind of iffy to get to the vet, but we made it. Then we got stuck in the vet parking lot. Then some guy helped push us free and we just parked on the street while I took Jazzy to the drop-off area. Then we had to make it back home. But rather than try to get back into our parking lot, Nate decided to park over at the hospital. This ended up being a good plan because he could get 24-hour parking for about $15, so we just left the car there, hiked back home (only about a half a mile, but through a lot of snow and wind), and waited for the vet to call to give us an update.
Jazzy’s surgery went very well. She did fine under the anesthesia and there were no complications. So around 4:00 PM we hiked back over to the hospital (after helping push a guy out of our parking lot, haha), drove back down to the vet, and picked up our girl.
She had a cone on to help prevent her from scratching at the stitches in her eye and she managed to get the cone off within three minutes of us leaving the vet (she wedged it on the circular indent in the top of the cat carrier and jerked her head forward to pop the clips open), so I had to watch her to make sure she didn’t start scratching on the way home.
We had to park back at the hospital because our lot wasn’t shoveled yet, so we had to carry her as gently as possible through the snow to get her home.
But once we got her home and out of the carrier, she immediately started purring and flopping…until we put the cone back on her. Then she was very disoriented and upset and started panicking every time she ran into something with the cone. Luckily they gave us some pain meds that are quite sedating, so we gave her one and she zonked out after a while. She actually seems okay about missing her eye, but she hates that cone. She’s got to wear it for two weeks, though, so that will be fun.
Edit: Nate trimmed the cone the next morning and it fits her much better. She can move around a lot more easily now and can get to her food and water. I don’t want to post a picture of her because the eye area still looks a little rough, but maybe once it starts healing I’ll give a visual update.
Poor girl.
GAS GAS GAS
So today was the warmest day in like a week and a half and I was SO SICK OF BEING INSIDE that I decided to try running in the snow.
By “snow” I mean the compact snow on the river trail. I’d walked on it yesterday once things warmed up a bit and I felt like it was something I could run on, so I got on my winter running clothes and went to try it out.
It sucked.
I have no idea how people can run on compact snow, because I certainly can’t. I don’t know if I push off harder with the balls of my feet than most people, but it was definitely very slippery and hard to get a good footing. So super frustrating.
Once I got to the first point in the trail where I could get back off (which was like 0.2 miles, haha), I crossed the street and went back to the other side of the road where there was just a sidewalk. This looked relatively clear, so rather than give up on running today entirely, I decided I’d go a few miles on the sidewalk to see if that was better.
And it was.
There were a few snowy/icy places where fartbags hadn’t shoveled, but it was much clearer than the path. So I ended up weaving up and down a bunch of the side roads and going back and forth on the main road until I got to my standard 14 miles. It wasn’t the most enjoyable of walks because of the ice/snow, but the temperature was actually a nice one for running and it definitely beat running on the treadmill.
Plus, it’s only supposed to get warmer this week, so hopefully the sidewalks (if not the trail) will be clearer by the time I run again on Thursday or Friday.
YAY!
Edit: I have about six blisters on my toes and my quads hurt like hell. I definitely have a different stride and toe grip on the snow/ice than on regular pavement. Which is to be expected, I guess, but still. Ouch.
Winter Walking: September Edition
It’s FREAKING SNOWING RIGHT NOW and I am NOT READY FOR THIS WEATHER.
It’s supposed to get worse over the weekend, too, so that’s great.
So in the spirit of “I need to pretend to look on the bright side of things unless I want to shoot myself in the face,” let’s list all the pros of winter walking.
- I use my on-ear headphones as a way to keep my ears warm, which means I get to listen to music when I walk (I don’t walk to music in the summer).
- I have to wear a coat, which helps hide my ugly body from the world.
- I don’t have to wear sunscreen (and thus don’t have to hose off in the bathroom once I get to campus).
- There are fewer people out on the sidewalks/river path due to coldness/bad weather.
- You burn slightly more calories in the cold than you do in other temperatures.
…I think that’s it.
So yeah. Things are supposed to improve by the end of the coming week, but it’s hard to see beyond the FREAKING SEPTEMBER SNOWSTORM right now.
Happy December 2nd!
Oh wait, it’s October 2nd?
YOU COULD’VE FOOLED ME
(and this was taken this morning, before another eight or so inches of snow fell)
Edit: holy hell, it’s a snowy death trap out there.
Edit 2: apparently this is the snowiest October day since like 1957. Also, this September was the coldest September ever recorded in Calgary. I can believe it.
I still prefer this kind of weather to the rainy hell that was Vancouver, though.
Edit 3: hahaha:
Dear Calgary:
It’s fUCKING SEPTEMBER, WHAT IN THE HELL IS THIS WEATHER?
I am not mentally ready for snow. I’m just not. Winter ended in mid-April.
Whyyyyyyyyyyyyy
SNOW WAY
Sung to the tune of Frère Jacques:
It is April, it is April
What is this? What is this?
Winter can go die now, winter can go die now
I am pissed, I am pissed
Arctic Trekkin’
You know what weather is surprisingly enjoyable to walk in?
Heavily falling snow. Especially if it’s just a little below freezing.
I left to go walking this morning and it had just started snowing very lightly. But the further I went, the heavier the snow got. By the time I was in my last 3 miles of the walk, it was some serious snow action going on. It looked like a blizzard without the super heavy winds.
It was very fun.
Walking gives me a lot of time to think/zone off, and when the weather’s extreme like that, I like to just pretend that I’m an Antarctic explorer making my way through adverse conditions to get to my eventual destination.
That probably makes me sound like I’m in elementary school, but I don’t care. Pretending is fun.
So is snow.
I’m pretty sure Canada’s motto is “hieme perpetua”
What the hell is all this, now? IT’S FREAKING APRIL, CALGARY, WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS
It’s not even regular snow. It’s rain secretly disguised as giant-ass snowflakes that turn into rain as soon as they touch anything. Which means I had to look like a doofus with an umbrella in the snow while I did my walk this morning. It also meant that—ONCE AGAIN—the sidewalks were covered in slushy crap the entire morning/afternoon.
Not enjoyable at all.
And considering that walking is currently the only thing keeping me from having a complete mental breakdown as of late, that’s not a good thing.
BLAH.
WELL I GUESS IT’S WINTER
Brr.
IT’S ONLY OCTOBER, CALGARY, WHAT THE HELL.
I think it’s supposed to be a rough winter.
Albrrrrrta
Welcome to April in Alberta!
To be fair, this was just south of Calgary; the city itself was cloudy but snow-free. We were down in Crowsnest Pass for the weekend and there was quite a bit of snow going on today in that area. Still better than that September storm, though, haha.
Is it December?
JUST A LITTLE BIT OF SNOW:
Holy hell, I stood out at that bus stop for an HOUR this morning. Why? Because right before my bus stop is the super busy intersection of 4th street and 16th avenue. The snow storm had knocked out the power to the lights and so it was being treated like a four-way stop.
During morning rush-hour.
It’s a damn good thing I like to get to campus early, ‘cause if I’d been waiting for the next #19 bus I wouldn’t have made it in time.
I would have just freaking walked to campus, but I don’t know how to walk there yet. It’s not a straight shot and you have to go some weird way to get there.
Edit:
Holy crap, so the snow has pretty much decimated all of Calgary’s trees, or their branches at the very least. There is debris EVERYWHERE. They’re saying it’ll take at least two weeks to clean everything up.
Alive Beyond Reason
Well, today was interesting.
1) Snow! Snow makes everyone freak out up here.
2) The bus Twilight Zone. I got on the 8 bus and it went completely not where it was supposed to go. We were all yelling, the driver just kept driving, it was really quite freaky. Then I got on the 10 bus and it did the same freaking thing. What.
3) This afternoon involved a good fifteen minutes of duck-and-cover cautionary behavior due to a psychotic gentleman who had a knife and was hell bent on finding someone and “motherfucking MURDERING” them. Quite frightening indeed. No, this wasn’t on campus.
And now I’m watching Team America: World Police and remembering how hilarious their portrayal of Kim Jong Il was. “Hans Brix! OH NO!”
And puppet sex. So much puppet sex.
Sorry these blogs suck as of late; it’s been a rough start to the year for reasons I’m not going to go into right now.
Okay? Okay.
SO MUCH SNOW
WHY AM I THE ONLY ONE WHO SHOVELS ON THIS ENTIRE DAMN STREET?!
Bless the Gods of Academia!
If, that is, there are such gods to be blessed.
Either way, I’m very happy that we got a snow day today. Why, you ask? Statistics homework. I’d done it all, of course, but I felt the need to redo it all again in preparation for the test on Monday.
I’m just that obsessive.
And I spent the whole day listening to disco music. Thank you, iTunes radio.
Good, productive day. Couldn’t ask for more.
Oh wait, except for this:
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Claudia — |
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[noun]: A master blogger |
Eigenblogger 