All good things end

Calgary often has a long wonderful autumn season, and this year was no exception. Except it just started raining, and the weather people tell us it will turn to snow. Later this week it will be nice again. Edit update, I started writing this about noon. Shortly after that the light rain has turned to light snow. By 1pm it's fat and fluffy flakes. It begins...

In the meantime, Linda has just left for a walk. She will come back soaked in sweat and snow.

In the other meantime, Calgary drivers will have forgotten everything about driving in the snow, and will still be in just as much of a bullying hurry as ever, so there will be carnage on the Deerfoot, especially in the several construction zones. Just like nearly every snowstorm, every year. But this blog, for today anyways, isn't about idiot drivers.

Yesterday was a busy day putting the back yard to bed for the winter. Linda got a good deal on bulbs, and bought many. Lots of many. Bazillions. She's been working steadily over the past couple weeks planting them, a few hundred a day at least. I don't know where she found space for them all. Let's all hope the squirrels and voles don't eat them.

We had our usual 3 rain barrels set out, plus using the black and green carts and some 20 L pails to capture rainfall during the drought and water main repairs. Except we can't leave them that way over winter. Linda has been drawing them down and soaking in the garden beds.

My task is to empty them out completely, swoosh them with a hose to get the worst of the gunge out, then turn them upside down and cover them with one of those big bags soil gets delivered in. Plus I like to extend the drain pipe out into the lawn, trying to keep the patio from turning into an ice rink during winter if I should want to use the barbecue. As a bonus, I scrambled up a ladder and hosed out the west eaves trough, getting soaked to the ass in the process.

Here's what it looks like just before the rain then snow started. The camera insists on punching up the colour and brightening the scene. It's actually more dreary than this.

1. The patio table ready for the snow. I like watching the snow buildup patterns, looking a little like a waffle. I'm thinking this year I might try to get some abstract black and white photos of it.

2.

3. The big barcelona barrel is under the yellow bag.

4. The two wood deck chairs are tucked under this bag.

5.

6. 

7. There's a few flowers still hanging in. That won't last long.

8. The two white water barrels are under the yellow bag.

9. That big brown plant actually stood out, kind of glowing a bit against the background. 

10. The side lawn. The brown eyed susans have finally packed it in and drooped over.

The most sheltered plants in the front vases are still hanging in, just barely. There's some fall sprouting crocus plants that optimistic about putting up shoots, but we'll see what happens.

Of the Day

Driftwood (NZ)

Driftwood (NL)

Film HP5, looking for textures for the darkroom class.

Linda

Of course we had to stop to take this photo. It was one of the planned side trips, and harder than you'd think, since there is no place to park. This made it into the book.

Newfoundland

A really wide panorama from the highest point in Terra Nova park. Yes, we drove to the nearby parking lot, and it's a short hike to this viewpoint. 

Why ever didn't I publish this, and maybe I did

More of this kind of weather is coming soon.