We Have To Remember Where We Live, For Daisy's Sake

                        So I took Daisy out for a walk around 8:30 tonight like I do every evening.
                    I like taking her down the  new greenway that use to be the railway connecting 
                        Kelowna to Vernon because I can take her off the leash and let her run.
                                                                   She likes it too.

                              I decided to put her back on her leash when I spotted this coyote 
                                            about 150 feet in front of us on the path.

                                    I tried yelling as I walked towards if but he stood his ground. 
                                   I decided it was easier just to turn around and go the other way.

                          This reminded me of a few years back when my piano tuning friend Steve 
                 was sitting on a bench in a place similar to this when a coyote came out of the bushes 
                                     and killed his little dog that about the same size as Daisy. 
               I guess this is one more thing to be conscious of while living out here in Lake Country.

Ruth Says"I've Bought The Farm".

Actually, we've both bought the farm. It closed yesterday.

 We now have our work cut out for us. 

We have to figure out how to redo the entrance so it is less steep , 

Remove the tenant living in the mobile home , redo the floors in the log house . demolish
the mobile home and all of the derilect out buildings. 

This will keep us busy for a while. 

The upside is that it is a great piece of property. 
That railway track has been removed and a new hiking trail from Kelowna to Vernon is
being built on the old rail bed. Nice.

One other downside is that I am putting off my annual fishing trip with Ron until early August.
I've been going back to Ontario for 20 years now for this .
Oh Well , At least I'm still going.

I'M BACK

So life has been a little boring lately so I haven't had a lot to write about.

We did make a couple of new friends last week. 

John and Cheryl are from Winnipeg. Easy to be with.

John is restoring a Jaguar XK140 and has been working on it for over 30 years.

What a beautiful car.

So he is doing everything in the most impressive way.

The wooden dash is being being built with book match woods.

After he builds the new parts he painstakingly varnishes them so well 

I thought they were from a plastic hold of some sort.

I had such a nice time with him over dinner (They were both wonderful hosts) that I asked if he wanted to go to the car show in the park with me.

 We had a lot of fun there. I love car shows.

I haven't seen one of these cars for decades.

This is an Austin Healey Sprite.

I had four of them all together in my late teens.

They called them bug eyed sprites.

I can't believe I even fit into one of these.

I should have had my picture taken beside it.

There were two Bug Eyes at this show.

Cute cars.

This brought back a lot of memories.

My last bug eye had a Volvo P1800 drive train in it and I use to Ice Race it thru the 

Winnipeg Sports Car Club in Winnipeg area. Those were fun days.

This made me laugh.

These were called "little car hot rods" but the guys in the booth were all extra large.

My friend Bruce who I am going to visit next month in lake of the woods has a 32 like this.

It's almost built and he was saying to me last month that we might work on it together 

this summer and finish it. That would be fun.

So this piece of art lives in the same building that Ruth and I live in.

The owner told me that he has so much money into it that he will never be able to sell it.

It is truly a work of art. 

It's perfect and beautiful even upon close inspection.

This is a Funny Jack Story

So in the last week Carrie has been really busy. 

She welded and built a new carrier for her little boat so that she could launch it thru the yard into the lake that their house is on without having to do the trailer up to her car and drive for 2 miles to the boat launch.

Then a couple of days ago I helped her hang the doors on a new tool cabinet

 she has built in her back yard under the garage eve.

It turned out quite nice. 

Very functional.
She's definitely a get it done girl.

On Wednesday morning I wandered over to her place for my usual morning coffee with her.

Jack was home from school with the sniffles and I offered to make him 

an egg on toast if he was interested. He was so I did.

As I was cooking the eggs he brought in a lego toy he had just built.

It took him 3 straight days to complete. 

He's very focused and hardly stopped for food on those 3 days.

There was over 200 pages of instructions to follow and I noticed on the box 

it said it was for 14 year olds. He's 7 going on 8.

The funny thing.

As we sat eating Carrie told me that jack had bought the Lego with the $150. gift money

 he received from all the kids who came to his early birthday party.

For his party Carrie had said on the invite not to bring presents, Just $5.00 for a gift.

That makes it so much easier for the parents.

Jack said he preferred money over small birthday gifts. That way he could buy what he wanted.

Carrie then said that the Lego was a good thing to buy

 but not something she would have bought with that money.

Jack looked at Carrie and with a smile said ,

"What would you buy Mom? Something like a new oven."

HAHAHA.

She just stared at him.

HAHAHA.

Later she said if he wasn't a little 7 year old boy she would have lit in .

He thought it was just an innocent thing to say.

He is a very sweet little boy.
How do they develop these stereo type thoughts.
Certainly not from what he sees at home.

I Had A Jack Day On Saturday

Jack had promised to take me out for lunch on my birthday but we had to put it off until yesterday.

But first , I wanted to give him the bike that Ruth and I were giving to him for his birthday.

Carrie had picked it up for us and left it in the shed at one of her rental houses.

I told him there was something in the shed that didn't belong and I needed his help.

He looked around but said he didn't see anything out of place.

I said that there was a bike in there that looked like he should be riding.

He gave me the most beautiful smile when he figured it out.

Next we headed over to the Grand Buffet.

Jack's favorite eatery.

The dessert table is his favourite place.

After lunch the rain stopped and we got in a ride.

He's one happy boy.

Another Busy Week

Carrie came over to the new condo and helped me put up a new light fixture.

The original one was a plastic chandelier .

The last owners must have thought it was cool. NOT.

I happened to drop into Carries place before bed time and caught her 

just as she was starting to morph into her real self.

Ellie loves Nona's home made noodles.

She's so proud of the fact she can eat a meal without utensils.

So I do love living in Lake country. I also love living this close to my kid.

That building in the background is our condo building. 

This is Carrie starting to build and weld a hand cart style trailer for their small boat in her back yard.

We can walk over here in less than 2 minutes.

So she cut up Jacks bike to get wheels and a superstructure for her trailer.

I thought that was funny until Ruth told me we had to buy Jack a bike. Haha.

The trailer actually turned out good.

It was such a hassle for them to take the boat out before

 because they had to hook up to the truck and drag it about one mile to launch. 

Now they can just drag it on this trailer by hand across their front yard and launch it off their beach.

She was so proud of how it turned out.

The balance was perfect.

So perfect even a girl could lift it. Haha.

She's going to kill me for that statement. Hahaha.
Now for my own protection I should say that I do love her a lot.

Dana and I Did the Chinese Ovens

So it was too hot to be going for a hike into Scenic Canyon but we went anyways.

It's beautiful once you get to the bottom of the canyon.

Dana had never been here before.

I think he liked the hike. I know Mr. B did.

This rock face is most unusual. Water carved it out in ancient days.

Very beautiful.

I suggested he not stand under the rock face because of all the rocks and boulders that were on the ground

 (obviously fallen from over head) but he wanted a picture taken with him and Mr.B in front of this Chinese Oven.

A weekend On The Island

So we are having a family thing on the island at Sharon's camp. 

She is running a woman's retreat over the weekend.

 This is the 6th year she has done this.