Snowstorm

Big snowstorm overnight Sunday into Monday, about 47 cm (16") on the ground by the end. High winds blew it into thick drifts. One of the students next door helped me shovel out my car and then my snow plough guy came and cleared out the rest of the driveway. In the process he took out half a dozen bricks I was using as a border between the garden and the driveway, and dumped them somewhere. I found one in a big pile of snow on my front lawn and two more across the street, but couldn't find the rest. The ones across the street would have been in the path of the sidewalk plough which came by later, so who knows where the rest of them are.

I think almost everybody was busy clearing snow on Monday. The student who helped me borrowed my shovels (I have 4! They all do different things!) to do her driveway, and then later a student across the street borrowed one. I told a friend about it and mentioned that the student across the street liked to throw loud parties; the next time he does that I am going to remind him ("Remember me? The Shovel Lady?"). My friend said I should take the shovel with me to his next party. Just as a reminder.

Today we went to the Reservoir for a walk, the snow was deep but the snowshoers had cleared some trails. It was blindingly beautiful: sun, blue sky, white snow, black trees. We met up with some other dogs and owners and all walked together, single file in the narrow snowshoe trails. One dog, a young tan-and-white Springer Spaniel named Jerry (Jerry Springer) was enjoying dashing through the snow, while Hapi and her buddy Owen (a Bernese Mountain Dog) plodded along behind the humans, because the trail is so much better after a few humans have stamped it down.

Unfortunately it was hard work for Hapi and her left rear leg is not great, she kept slipping off the trail into the deeper snow. At one point she gave up and just lay down in the trail. After a minute or so of rest she was able to get back up, but at that point we decided to head straight back to the car, enough was enough. I kept her in front of me so I could catch her if she fell again. Jerry the spaniel bumped her a few times racing to get by her so she switched to a parallel trail. Then we met up with a young husky who romped with Jerry. Huskies are hard to control and usually kept on leash but this one had a radio-controlled collar so the owner could let it run. Turns out the husky's name was Winter.

Newfoundland is having a Covid outbreak. First New Brunswick and now Newfoundland, it feels like the walls are closing in. Scary.