Munchkins on the mountain

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Although we are getting awfully used to the life of luxury – indeed, roughing it again after a week of comfy beds, home-cooked meals and hot thermal pools in a wintry Banff wonderland could be construed as madness, really - we say farewell to our family and point Fugly in the direction of Jasper. So here we are on the Columbia Icefields road, on a mid-September Alberta afternoon, and we’re wondering: What the hell does it look like out here in winter?!

Snowed-in in September

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The dude can really shovel

Despite all good intentions to get back to the tent, Mother Nature has conspired against us, dropping almost a foot of snow overnight and putting the road to Jasper pretty much beyond the reach of a small, bald-tired Fugly. Doog takes to the shovel with great relish and I realize with some amusement that he never actually wants to leave. Hmmm, let’s see now… Who can blame him? The sauna, the roaring fire, the endless supply of wood, the comfy beds, the stocked fridge … What’s not to love?
So we sit tight, and play our zillionth game of UNO with my best girls.
Man, I dig being a travellin mama.

Wives are from Venus, husbands are from ... elsewhere

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Here's my favourite new phrase, and one best repeated in my inside voice only: My husband is so annoying. My husband is so annoying. My husband is so annoying.

Out here on the prairies where it’s hot and dusty and there’s not much to do but drive and think, I find myself prone to introspection. Tend to romanticize things. Ponder our great good fortune. Wonder about the big picture, think about politics. My head is swimming in Tragically Hip lyrics – I’ve swapped Ontario’s Bobcageon-style anthems for the David Milgaard story and sundown in the Paris of the prairies – and I can’t help but wonder: would I go insane out here in the middle of February? I start musing aloud, hoping for a little husband-and-wife conversational to-ing and fro-ing while the kids saw logs in the back. Instead, Doog nips that in the bud with a running commentary on … roadworks and earth-moving machines.

“Honey, did you see that? Over there? I used to drive one of those in Perth. My God, they’re AGGRESSIVE machines! Look at that – there must be 100 guys working out here. Holy shit! Bloody amazing. Hey, pull over here and we’ll cook up some beans.’’

Not for the first time do I ponder how two such very different people can co-exist, for the most part, so very happily....