Polar Bear Trip - October 2007

Last Christmas our family went in together to buy my Dad a trip to Churchill. Since he was born in Winnipeg, we decided to plan an extra few days of vacation to see Winnipeg and visit relatives.

On our arrival, we booked into this bed and breakfast, the Beechmount.









We spent a few days in Winnipeg, exploring The Forks, the museum, visiting relatives, and shopping. On Oct. 25, David, Dad and I met with our Frontiers North tourmates at 6:15am at the airport. I don't know why we had to meet so early as we then had to stand around for a good hour before a bus came and picked us up to take us to a smaller airport North of the International terminal. We were thenshuffled into a 44 seat propellor plane and began our Northern adventure!



Upon our arrival in Churchill, we were met by +1 degree temperatures, wet snow, and rain. We were shuffled into another bus, driven by Simon the smiling Brit. He gave us an interpretive tour of the town and surrounding areas, including a bear jail and some bear traps.

The first day of our Tundra Buggy tour, we woke up to -7 temperatures with freezing rain and wind. Not great bear watching weather, but our guide was upbeat. We lucked out and got Glenn Hopfner as our guide, a real polar bear Rockstar (and I'm not kidding). We had tundra buggies pulling up beside us all day to get Glenn to sign his book for their passengers. Glenn has been touring with Tundra Buggy for 14 years.

The first bears we saw were a mother with her one or two cubs. We could only see one cub, but it is likely that there was another one snuggled underneath. These bears did not want to move, and stayed hunkered down on the snow as we stopped to view them. We saw a few more bears along the way, and then were treated to a show at the lunch break spot where a resident bear wandered between the buggies sniffing and poking around.

On our second tundra buggy day, we woke up to -10 weather, but it was clear and not snowing. It was actually a very nice day for viewing but we didn't see any bears until lunch time. We did a tour of the Hudson's Bay area, and stopped to look at a tanker wreck slowly disintegrating on the shore. At lunch time, we saw a large number of bears, including a monster male who will reach 1200 lbs once he fills up on ring seals over the winter.

Following the buggy tour, we were shuttled back to the airplane for our ride home. It was 9 at night as we came into Winnipeg, and the lights from the city were gorgeous. Another day and a half in Winnipeg saw us shopping and visiting with family. We attended a potluck supper at our cousin Carol's place, and disgusted the men by gathering all the women at 8pm to watch desperate Housewives in the den.

Our final vacation day was spent at the Assiniboine Zoo. Mom and Dad had an earlier flight, so David and I bussed it to Assiniboine park. It was a neat trip as we were 2 of about 8 people in the zoo. I got a few pictures of one animal I had been really wanting to see, the Artic Fox.

Birthday and Housewarming Party - 80's Style

Too much fun! My birthday and housewarming party was just a blast. We played Trivia Pursuit 80's edition, drank orange sherbet punch and ate all kinds of cool snacks (including nerds and chocolate whoppers). Midge sported a glow in the dark collar and Sony was long gone as he was afraid of all our laughing. Goonies and Say Anything were playing on the TV and 80's music came out of the speakers. Maria brought along a burned CD and we rocked out to Dexy's Midnight Runners and 99 Luftballons.

My late Grandmothers

This summer we lost my Dad's mother, Muriel Johnsen. She was to turn 84 this year, but was diagnosed with cancer in June, passing away August 4th. Her hospital confinement was a time for all of our family to gather, and in spite of the loss it was nice to see so much family all in one place. Being with her brought back all kinds of memories of family visits to Chilliwack during my childhood. Primary among these were our trips to the nearby cemetary where both my grandmother and grandfather are now buried. As children, we used to take the dogs to the cemetary and run and play between the headstones. A favourite game was to have one person hold the dog while the other ran and hid. The dog was then let go, and always went crazy trying to find us.

I'll miss my Grandmother.



Upon coming back to work after the funeral, I found on my desk the following newsclipping:











It brought back all kinds of memories. Jessie Mack was my nunnie grannie - Great Grandmother - on my mother's side. I remember mostly only her, having been 8 years old when my Great Grandfather died. She was a stern woman, not given to a lot of affection, but I held her in the highest regard. After her funeral, there was quite a flurry of activity regarding her propoerty, but I ended up receiving a set of red wine glasses with gold rims. They are gaudy and not something I'd use everyday, but they are safely packed away in a box, ready to be displayed when I have a safe place.

New house for Kelly

I decided to sell my house around May of this year. After looking at a large number of houses in my price range, I settled on one that was still 'older' but newer, more finished, and in a better area than the one I had been in since 1999. After a few false starts in selling my old house, I managed to sell it for about a $50,000 profit.

The move was stressful, and I need to thank my family for showing up to help. I paid some movers to do the heavy stuff, and was shocked at the cost.

Now I am in the new place, trying to decide on good places to put things and deciding on paint schemes. The new house has an unfinished basement which is just incredible for storage of all my random stuff.

Midge can Fly!

I caught this photo at the top of the Coquihalla, as we stopped to let the dogs out for a run.

Camping and Dogs on the Beach

A few weeks ago, our family tried to take a camping trip to White Lake near Sorrento, BC. We only stayed two days before we had to head back to Chilliwack for a family emergency, but the couple of nights there were pretty cool.

Kirsten and I drove together, and stopped a few times to take pictures

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Worms in Space - More info

http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=f0c04bed-69ed-4c4f-8424-07cfe501a20c&k=63148

From the Vancouver Sun:

Tiny space worms coming home to B.C. next week

Glenn Bohn, Vancouver SunPublished: Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Hundreds of thousands of little worms that have been flying around in space reproducing might help pave the way for humans in a similar endeavour -- the flying part, at least.

For six months the worms -- each about one millimetre long -- have been among the live cargo at the International Space Station, successfully reproducing for about 25 generations while being subjected to radiation from outer space.

My Uncle Sent Worms to Space!

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=pubmed&cmd=retrieve&dopt=abstract&list_uids=16038089

My uncle, Dr. Robert Johnsen is headed to Cape Canaveral to pick up some worms he and his colleagues sent into space. Bob is a genetic biologist at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, BC. They are studying generational effects of space radiation, and since the worms multiply so quickly, they can easily study the 28th generation of the original worms sent to space months ago.

Houses, houses, houses

I have lived in the house I bought in 1999 for seven years. It's a cool house with character, but it is not well set-up for dogs. It's quite large, with the bedrooms upstairs and living area downstairs. There is no mud-room and the laundry-room is cramped. My dogs would have to come straight from outdoors into the dining room, muddly paws and everything. I am hoping to move from into a smaller, better laid out house.

Luckily, my parents are good at seeing potential and they urged me to look at this particular house. Since it was so crazy cheap. I can probably make around 100% profit on selling it.

Here is my old house:

And here is the one I have an offer on right now:

Body sock

Body sock
Originally uploaded by junomidge.

Midge was spayed last Wednesday, but she decided the stitches needed to come out a bit earlier than they should. So I had to get one stitch replaced on Saturday and then they fitted her with this cone. She was still trying to chew, so I then made her a body sock to ensure the wound is covered. Needless to say she hates life right now.

Chloe is a swimmer

trailer 038
Originally uploaded by junomidge.

Took Chloe and the pup to the trout farm this weekend. Chloe has decided she would like to be a black lab instead of a Shepherd.

Day at Macoah

Juno surveying his domain:

Asha looking at the dogs down below:

We'd like to come in now:

Live at ACME Foods

Saturday I went with Leann and Kelley to see our old singing friend, Lindsey Martell. He did an acoustic set at ACME foods in Nanaimo. It was really nice, with some other nice scenery as well!

After the sets at ACME foods, we zipped back to the Rod and Gun to catch the last set of Hummer - a pop rock band that is doing quite well for themselves. Things have changed quite a bit in the Nanaimo scene. Kelley and I used to spend a lot of time at the Queens, but the crowd has changed a lot, and the bouncers (gasp!) don't know us anymore.

Yeah, I'm getting old.

Dog days outside, nice weather finally

Took Asha for a picnic:



Then we tried out the lake. Mom went in, so Asha figured heck, it's easy:

Until she hit the drop-off:

Wet ears make them droopy:

Quadra Trip Pictures

Quadra Island, here I come!

So, work is sending me to Quadra Island for four days. How nice is that?! I will be staying at a lodge on the beach, and attending a cultural safety in nursing conference. I am not sure if I will take my dog, but it would be nice I guess to take her for walks on the beach.

Other than that things have been pretty normal at home. I have had some ups and downs with the pups. I found homes for all but two, but had to put one to sleep on Friday. She had some birth defects that the vet and I finally decided were extensive enough to warrant this route. It was one of the hardest things I have had to do, and I have not been sleeping well since.

I have been working on the house and yard as much as possible in the awful weather we have been having. And I came home yesterday to find a brand new section of fence where the trees destroyed it last Fall. I guess the neighbour pushed up the start date of May that she had discussed with me. It is so nice to let the dogs out without wondering if they will stay in the yard or force through the flimsy chicken wire I had strung.

This is a view of the pups and fence yesterday:

My cat loves my dog

They can walk! Sort of.....

Chloe woke me up this morning at 7am, by letting me know that she REALLY needed to go outside. I got up to let her out, and noticed that the pups were really motivated and moving around. Grabbing the camera, I managed to catch a shot of a couple of them walking. They are so uncoordinated, but they are trying so hard!

It was actually nice to be up early, so I made an effort with my outfit, and let the truck warm up and de-ice while I got stuff ready. I even had enough time to drop by Tim Hortons for coffee and a bagel on the way to work. Of course, I went to bed at 8:30 last night and read til 9:45. That's a lot better than staying up til midnight and taking a Neo-citran to make me crash out. I haven't been feeling so great the last few days, so I hope this early night will help.

My aunt called me last night to ask about a game I play online, World of Warcraft. It would be funny if she started to play, as both my Dad and my brother play the game with me. I also managed to get the floor cleaned and as Molly Moppins advised, mopped with a terry cloth towel. It looks really nice.

Happy New Year!

Hello from the land of the eternally tired. Even after two weeks of Chloe looking after her pups, I still awake at the smallest squeak from downstairs. Yesterday I was headed to bed when one pup started screaming. I went to check and she was laying on it with her elbow fully across it's poor little stomach. I had to manually lift her up to get it out! I swear she'd leave her baby on the bus if she were a human.

They are doing great, roly-poly and attempting to stand on their back legs. They use their back paws to scratch themselves in a very clumsy and uncoordinated way. If you scratch under their collars, they wave their back legs in the air. Their eyes are opening, but it's a slow process.

I'm back to work after two weeks off and there are lots of emails to catch up on. I have conference calls booked, and lunch meetings to organize, catering and all.

We seem to be in the middle of yet another storm. I lost a good portion of my back fence when my neighbours two trees fell, one on her house and porch. I feel really bad for her, but it makes things really difficult to have a roaming dog with three yards to explore. I never know if she has found an open gate.

Boxing Day Excitement

Boxing Day came around with visits from all sorts of folks. First came my aunt Kathy, Holly and Abigail, then came my parents oldest friends, Charlotte and Ted. Chloe became quite agitated around 2pm, and we figured she was going into labour. By 8pm, no pups and she was grunting with contractions. I called the vet office and was advised to give it one more hour. At 9, no sign of pups and the vet asked me to bring her in. After 2 hours of waiting at the vet office, we decided to do a caesarean section at 11:30pm. By midnight there were 9 squirmy, screamy pups.

Chloe had a hard time with the anaesthetic, and was groggy and spastic for a few hours. I put the pups on her to nurse as often as possible, but as she regained consciousness I realized she wasn't going to accept the pups. By 5:45am, I was a complete mess and I called Holly to get some advice. She told me to have someone hold Chloe's head while I put the pups on her. They needed Mom's milk. I had to run the pups tummies to get them to pee. Kirsten and Shane woke up and helped me, and we rotated on puppy patrol for the rest of the day. By 7pm at night I was dead tired so Shane told me to go sleep and he and Kirsten would watch the pups. About 1/2 hour later he came up to tell me that Chloe was licking the pups. At nine when I came back downstairs, Chloe was being a good Mom, cleaning the pups and allowing them to nurse. She has gradually grown to be quite responsible with them, although she does get a bit sketchy when something startles her.

Today, a bit over a week later, I am still a bit tired because I get up in the night if one starts yowling. Sometimes they get onto the wrong side of her and can't figure out how to go around.