A VERY busy weekend…

Posted on September 10, 2019 by kdarcy21

Saturday was one of the busiest and longest days that I think I’ve ever had in my 48+ years.

I decided that I wanted a trailer to be able to do some camping with the dogs.  I was also planning on using the trailer should I have had to move back to Ontario for a new job.  Seeing as I didn’t get the job, I won’t be using it for that, but that’s OK.

I searched the net and found what I was looking for, a Teardrop trailer.  They are small, lightweight (weight under 1000 lbs) and can be towed by pretty much anything.  I found a great small manufacturer in Spruce Grove, Alberta, just West of Edmonton and I arranged to pick up the trailer this past Saturday.

I left Coleman at 4:40AM for the 6-hour drive north.  I passed through Calgary and stopped to have breakfast with a friend.  We ate at a place on McLeod Trail, 99th Avenue Cafe.  Amazing breakfast, I had what was likely the best breakfast sandwich ever.  It was a triple-decker with bacon, lettuce, tomato, cheese, ham and a fried egg, it came along with home fries that were also great and they filled my coffee to-go mug as well.  I headed back onto the road a little later than I wanted to, around 8:15AM.

The trip north was uneventful, traffic was very light.  Either my GPS failed me or the map link that the seller sent me was wrong (it was Apple Maps so I blame that) but I did not end up where I wanted to be.  I was able to text him my position and he came to meet me, I was only a few kilometers off, so it wasn’t too bad.  I took a look at the trailer I was buying and it met my needs.

We zipped to the bank and then I had to get to my appointment at uHaul to have a trailer hitch installed.  If you are ever in the market for a trailer hitch, don’t even bother going anywhere else.  They were over $100 cheaper than the next lowest quote and they do quality work.  The hitch was installed in under 2 hours.

In the meantime, my brother met me at the uHaul and we headed to South Edmonton to go to Little India for lunch.  Amazing food there.  We were a bit rushed though since I had to get a plate for the trailer and they were closing at 3PM.  So, back to the uHaul dealer, pick up the trailer and get the plates.  I also picked up a bike rack at the uHaul, that will come in handy.

Back at the trailer shop, I was shown all of the cool features and we hooked up to my car.  I drive a 2015 Ford Escape, my first Ford and I love it.  It pulled the trailer with ease, the trailer is only 8 feet long, and just slightly taller than my car so it did cause some drag on the highway.

I headed to my niece’s place, I had not yet met her son, my great-nephew, he’s going to be 4 in November.  I was planning on only staying for 30 minutes or so, that turned into 2 hours but it was a great visit.  I was planning on stopping at Crossiron Mills on the way home but I knew I wasn’t going to make it before they closed.

Instead, I stopped off in Olds, Alberta and met up with an old friend.  We did a bit of shopping, how exciting, at Canadian Tire and Walmart and then went to Dairy Queen for a bite to eat.  The chicken strips at DQ are out of this world good.  If you ever order them, forget the dipping sauce and order a side of gravy.  Amazing stuff, better than any chicken strips you will get in a pub.  I guarantee it.

I left there around 11pm, maybe a bit later and headed for the last leg to home.  I had about 3.5 hours to get home at this point.

I bought gas and 2 x 5-Hour Energy drinks and although I drank them both along with a large coffee and a vanilla latte, I was falling asleep along Highway 22.  Luckily, I had a trailer attached to my car and I pulled off at a road-side stop and slept for a bit over 4 hours.  A passing transport truck shook the trailer enough to wake me, it was shortly after 5AM.

I continued home and made it back by 7 in the morning, so, 26 hours after I had left.  My dogs were attended to on Saturday by Crowsnest Pet Care, they were visited 4 times in total, fed and let out and played with, but they were very happy to see me.  I had never left them all night before, but they were fine, of course, it was just me that felt guilty about it.

I slept until 11AM or so, I wanted to get up and watch the Bills game.  It took me some time to actually get out of bed and turn on the game.  I caused them to make an amazing come-back and win their season opener against the rival Jets.

I went to bed shortly after 8:30PM and slept through until my “normal” wake-up time of 4AM.  I needed the sleep.

All in all, a good but VERY busy weekend.  I am definitely getting too old to pull off all-nighters.  Speaking of all-nighters, I have another one coming up in October when I take the red-eye to Toronto.  I am sure I will have stories to tell then as well.

Posted in My Dogs, Personal, Vehicles | Leave a comment

A Thursday not to be believed…

Posted on September 9, 2019 by kdarcy21

I am going to tell you how my Thursday went.  I assure you, everything that I will write is bang-on accurate, but you may not believe it all.

Thursday, was, to be sure, an interesting day.

Going back to when I moved into the house in Sentinel, Alberta, I had to have internet access, obviously.  I had arranged for a local company, Tough Country Communications to come and install their direct line of sight service.  They came out the second day I was in the house, early in the morning.  It’s a direct line of sight service though and, unfortunately, there was a mountain in the way.  I guess that happens when you live in the mountains.  Going a bit out of order here, I also tried ExploreNet and their satellite internet service.  It worked great, although the lag time was a bit much.  The only issue is that it worked great when the skies were clear.  When it was heavily clouded, it didn’t work at all.  I contacted them and canceled before my trial month was up and I got a full refund.

I needed internet service though and I contacted Rogers as they had a Rogers Hub that would work.  Telus actually had a much better priced Hub of their own, but since I ended my association with them on bad terms, shall we say, they would not give me service.  Fair enough.

So, the Rogers Hub was $65 for 5GB of service and each additional GB was $2, or $20 for 10GB actually, I am not sure if you used 12GB if you were charged $22 or $30, anyway, it was a bit pricy.  I had some issues early on and my September 2018 internet bill was over $600, let me tell you, that was a shock to see.

Getting back to the story on hand here…  After Tough Country tried and failed to give me internet access, I called Rogers.  They could ship me a device but it would take a few days to arrive. Nope, that won’t work, I need it setup and working before I left for Missouri and the World Series, I had a friend looking after the dogs and there was no TV so I had to at least give him internet access.  They asked what the closest center was, that would be Lethbridge.  Sorry, they are out of stock…  OK, Cranbrook, BC?  Sure, they have one – we will have them hold it for you.  Awesome.

So, off to Cranbrook, we go.  It was a good drive through the mountains.  We waited for what seemed like forever in the store (it was well over an hour).  I picked up the device and decided to pay for it outright since I didn’t want to be locked in a contract.  I was also asked to pay a $300 security deposit which I thought was a bit odd seeing as I just paid for the device, but, whatever.  So I paid my security deposit.

Fast forward a year and I was moving out of the house in Sentinal (propane was WAY too expensive and I was quite tired of having to completely limit my internet access as $600 bills were a bit much).  I called Rogers to cancel the service, they of course offered to suspend the service, I declined – I will have no need.  OK, so they canceled it effective the end of June 2019.  No issues there.  I did ask about my security deposit and was told it would be credited to my account and a cheque would be issued.  Awesome.

Fast forward again to the end of August 2019.  I have now not had the Rogers Hub for 2 months and yet, no security deposit.  I call Rogers.

The level 1 support person I talk to is helpful, but he can’t even see that I have paid a deposit, they have no record of it and he suggests that I am out of luck.  I lose it on this poor, misinformed gent and ask for his Manager.  She also cannot see a security deposit, but she assures me that she will look into it.

A few days later, I get a call from her.  She’s looked into it, sure enough, they trace it back to the store, the store has record of it but for some reason, it never made it onto my account.  One has to wonder how they balanced their books?  Anyway, I was told that Rogers could not help me with my refund, I have to go to the store.  I ask her if she’s aware of the geography here, Cranbrook is over 400km round-trip.  Oh, yes, that is a lot to ask of you, she says.  She will escalate to the Office of the President, I think I am supposed to be in awe of this, I am not.

I do get a call back from a nice guy name David.  He apologizes, but he is also unable to issue a refund and wants me to go to the store.  He at least has some sort of an idea about geography and at least offers to credit my Hub bill of the amount I owe (under $100) for compensation for the gas I will use to Cranbrook and back.  I accept this and on Thursday, I load up and head West.

I get to the store and figure I will be there for 20 minutes or so.  The dude in the store tries to help, but he has no idea how to issue this refund.  He calls his Manager, she doesn’t know, she calls the District Manager, they don’t know either, in fact, they state that they cannot do it and that Rogers has to issue me a cheque.  Have we heard this before?  David, remember him?  He’s from the Presidents Office, well, he gave me his number and assured me that he would be in until 7PM Eastern time.  The dude in the local store and I both leave messages at 4:50PM (Mountain Time, which, if you’re not familiar with time zones in Canada, is 6:50PM Eastern Time), no answer.  We both leave messages.

So, after being on hold forever with Rogers support, some lady IS FINALLY able to see the deposit and says that she will issue a refund cheque – it will take 6-8 weeks to arrive.  I thank her and I assure her that it will arrive sooner.

The next day (Friday), I call David back and leave another message.  He does return my call that afternoon and assured me a cheque would go out today, Monday and that I should have it by this coming Friday.  I am not holding my breath, but I am hopeful.

Now, in the meantime, with all this going on, a friend back in the Pass posts something on Facebook that if anyone is heading to Cranbrook in the near future to let him know.  I replied and he asked if I could pick up some ATV tires for him.  Sure, no issue.  His friend who is selling them asks if I can do him a favour.  Well, even though I don’t know you, people down here are pretty friendly and helpful, so sure, what is it I ask…  He wants me to follow him to Kimberly BC with his second truck, it needs to get to Kimberly.  No problem.  That adds about 1.5 hours onto my trip home and it will be full-on dark by the time I get back.  I had Crowsnest Pet Care let the dogs out and feed them around 5pm, I also asked them to go back and let them out around 10pm – they are absolute life-savers.

I heard via various means that the route back to Alberta (Highway 3) was blocked just outside of Fernie, BC (about 45 minutes from home) and that the accident should be cleared by 10pm.  I am thinking I am lucky, as I will be getting to Fernie by about then.

Just outside of Fernie, the traffic is completely stopped.  I fall into a long line of cars, trucks and various other vehicles.  We did move, about 200m at one point, but otherwise, we just sat.  10pm arrived and went, no movement.  The update on the road’s website said midnight for clearing the accident.  Take note that the accident happened around 3:30pm so we are talking that the major (and only) route in southern BC to southern Alberta has been closed for nearly 9 hours.  Midnight comes and goes and we are updated that it should be 1am for opening. Well, I’ve heard this before and frankly, I don’t believe you.  Sure enough, 1am comes and goes and nothing.  By 1:05am, the Westbound traffic is moving and by 1:10am, Eastbound traffic is also moving.  I am finally home by 2:10am and I collapse in bed, dead to the world.

It was an interesting Thursday, and Friday morning, to be sure.  Now, I just wait for the cheque from Rogers.  I am sort of hoping I get this one on Friday and the one that was promised in 6-8 weeks as well – I will cash them both for my trouble.

Posted in Personal, Rant and Rave, Technology Amazes Us, Vehicles | Leave a comment

It’s finally decided, I am NOT moving back…

Posted on September 7, 2019 by kdarcy21

I received a phone call yesterday at work.  It was news that I sort of expected, but I was still surprised.  I was not offered the Managers position, so, once and for all, I now know that I will not be moving back to Ontario.

It’s a mixed blessing really.  On one hand, I would have enjoyed the challenges of the new job and the responsibilities that would have come with it.  On the other hand, I would not have enjoyed having to move across the country, find a house to live in, move into the house and setup, commute 1-1.5 hours each way to work, fight crowds in downtown Toronto and work back in an office again.

Instead of that, I get to stay in the mountains of Crowsnest Pass, Alberta, where I have made it my home for a little over a year.  I get to stay working from home which means my commute is measured in seconds as opposed to hours.  I don’t have to totally uproot my life and the dogs lives.  I like that.  I am not actually disappointed at all.

I am glad the waiting is over though, that was tough.  Although I only interviewed two weeks ago, it seemed that I was waiting for a decision a lot longer than that.

I learned something about one of the people who interviewed me as well and learned that he’s not necessarily to be trusted, this is good to know and good information to have.

So, I will continue down in Coleman Alberta and I am happy about that.

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No word as yet…

Posted on September 5, 2019 by kdarcy21

I have still not heard about my possible promotion.  I am told that I should be patient.  Well, I am not the worlds most patient person, but, under the circumstances, I suppose I have to be, don’t I?

I have been looking at the housing market in Southern Ontario.  I am specifically looking in areas from Burlington through to Grimsby, with the exception of Hamilton.  I would live in West Hamilton or Hamilton Mountain but not lower Hamilton.

I would like to keep the commute to around an hour and no more than 1.5 hours each way.  I think that should be possible.  I plan on taking the Go Train into downtown Toronto, I am not crazy enough to drive.  I can’t believe the number of people who do drive, I will not be one of them.  Well, not on a regular basis anyway.

I suppose I am going to have to visit offices in the GTA and in Southern Ontario from time to time.  This will mean I will need to drive, but the occasional trip will be fine.  A daily commute via car would likely drive me insane.

So, for now, I am in a holding pattern.  I am still planning to be on vacation the week before our IT Conference, I have made plans with many friends for the week.  The only difference now is that I might already be in Ontario, and by the 3rd week of October, I certainly hope I will be in my new house.

I hope to hear something, positive or negative by Friday, Monday at the latest.  It’s really a win-win situation.  If I get the promotion, that will be an interesting turn in my career.  If I don’t, I get to stay here, living in the beautiful mountains of South-West Alberta and working from home.  I really can’t lose.

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Labour Day trip to Montana

Posted on September 2, 2019 by kdarcy21

I have been planning a day trip to Montana ever since I moved to Crowsnest Pass a little over a year ago.  In the grand scheme of things, I want to visit the continental 49 states, a bucket list item.  Hawaii, perhaps, who knows…

Anyway, I figured since I may not be in Alberta much longer, today was a great day for a road trip.  Shortly before 9am, I canceled the dogs pack hike, well, actually rescheduled it for tomorrow morning and loaded the dogs into the car and headed for Kalispell, Montana.  That was the final destination and Chick-fil-A was the goal.

It was a bit over 2.5 hours to get there, great drive, nice scenery.  It looked pretty much like Alberta to tell the truth.

Chick-fil-A was super busy.  There were likely 50 people in line ahead of me, the line stretched out the front door.  They had all the registers going though and made it through pretty quickly.

The food was as excellent as when I had it for the first time last summer when I was umpiring in Missouri.  Good stuff for sure.  Some people protest because the owner has strong religious views.  I couldn’t care less about his views, the food is amazing.

We stopped at a dog park and the dogs had 20 minutes of fun and then headed home.  All in all, I spent about $70 including gas, so not too bad at all.

We left just before 9 and got home after 5:30, so it was a long day of driving.  The dogs are tired, so am I.  Well, should I move, we will have about 3 days of that, so get used to it pups.

I hope you had a good Labour Day Weekend, or, for any American readers, a good Labor Day Weekend.

Posted in Blondie, Hera & Twix, My Dogs, Personal, Vehicles | Leave a comment

OK, yes, so what? I changed my mind…

Posted on September 1, 2019 by kdarcy21

Last Monday, I decided that I would withdraw from the application process for the Managers position at BDO.  The Director and CIO asked me my reasoning and they gave me their full support.

Starting sometime on Tuesday, I had a feeling in the pit of my stomach and I interpreted that as I had possibly made an incorrect decision.  I wasn’t sure though.

I have been waking up earlier lately, was 5am, then 4:30am and now, it’s around 4am.  Last week was worse, between 2:30 and 3:30 and on Friday, wide awake at 1:50am.  That’s not a lot of sleep when you go to bed at 10:30 or 11.

I was speaking with one of the Management team at National office on Friday morning and once the business side of the conversation was concluded, he asked how my interview went.  I told him quite well, I thought, but that I had decided to withdraw from consideration on Monday.  He expressed his disappointment and added that he thought I would be perfect for the job, which I took as quite a compliment.  He also said that he had given me a very strong reference when he was asked about me.

With that, my “gut” feelings and some conversations I had during the week, I decided that I had to enquire as to whether or not I could change my mind about the job and withdraw my withdrawal.

So, I contacted the two top people in IT and after they confirmed that I was sure, the unanimous answer was that yes, I could.  So, just like that, I was back in the running.

There was an HR task that I had to complete and submit this morning, which I did.  I think I did a good job on it.

I am currently sort of in a holding pattern now, likely until Tuesday or Wednesday since Monday is a holiday.  I am hoping that I will be offered the position and if I am, unless something really “weird” occurs, I will accept and I will put a moving plan into place.

I am thinking, should everything fall into place, I will head across the country, for the second time in my life, somewhere around September 10/11 and take a few days (at least) to arrive.

It will be a massive change from where I am now, that’s for sure.  Coleman, Alberta is a small town of about 1400 people in a slightly larger municipality of Crowsnest Pass which has about 5000 people (give or take).  I may settle in the Burlington area, I am unsure.  I can’t afford Toronto, that’s for sure.  I just need a nice place for the dogs and I, fenced-in backyard, definitely a place with AC and preferably, a bungalow.  Not too much of a demand list.  The rental prices here are nuts from when I last lived here, but not much I can do about that.

It will be an exciting adventure, that’s for sure.  🙂

Posted in My Dogs, Personal, Work | Leave a comment

A trip to the homeland…

Posted on August 29, 2019 by kdarcy21

I have booked my trip to Ontario.  The primary purpose of the trip is our IT Conference for work that we have every 3 years.  This year, we are in Niagara-on-the-Lake at the Pillar and Post and Prince of Wales hotels.  They conferences are always a good time.

When I was booking time off for the conference, I was going to take the Thursday and Friday before the conference off and have a long weekend in Niagara before-hand.  When I looked at the calendar, I saw that we had Monday off that week due to it being Thanksgiving so I figured I would book Tuesday and Wednesday off as well and take an entire week, plus the weekend before so a total of 10 days in Ontario before our conference started.

It’s going to be a busy week as it turns out.  I arrive on Saturday, October 12, coming in on the red-eye.  I like those over-night flights as you don’t really lose any time for adventure since you’re traveling at night.  The flights are pretty quiet since a lot of people tend to sleep.  I don’t sleep on planes, so I will watch a movie or read a book.  Anyway, after I land and collect my luggage, I’ve arranged for a car for the trip, 10 day car rental only cost be about $370 which is pretty decent, worked out to just over $37 a day.

I will be heading to Peterborough to have lunch with a friend from Ottawa.  We used to do this once a year back before I moved West, but we haven’t seen one another since 2011 so it will be great to catch up.  We are going to what I would very likely describe as my favourite restaurant on the planet – Hot Belly Mommas.  It’s a Louisiana style Cajun place, amazing food and great atmosphere.  The first time I was there would have been in the early 2000’s sometime.  The waitress recommended we start with the corn chowder soup – we weren’t very interested…  She guaranteed that we would like it, or she would pay for it.  Ten minutes later, we were wiping up the remaining soup with the corn bread, it was amazing.  All of the food is and I have tried many things on the menu.  I am really looking forward to that.

I will be spending Thanksgiving with my brother-in-law, my Aunt and cousin are joining us from Toronto for the day.  I have not had a full turkey dinner since I headed West so that will be great.  I am spending a couple of days back in Toronto, seeing friends, current and past co-workers and hitting up some restaurants.  If you think my trips revolve around food, you’d be correct in thinking that.

I will be back in Niagara for a few days, likely hit up Duff’s for pizza and wings, going to breakfast with a friend on the Saturday, dinner the same night with a former co-worker at the Keg (in Hamilton) and then on Sunday, my brother-in-law and I are heading to Orchard Park New York and taking in the Dolphins @ the Bills.  I used to go to one or two Bills games a year and haven’t been since 2010, so that will be awesome.

The conference starts on Monday and ends Thursday.  I will head back to Alberta and then have Friday off.  Should be a great two weeks back.  I am looking forward to it all.

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The house that could have been…

Posted on August 28, 2019 by kdarcy21

Well, I did not get my mortgage for the house that I offered on and was accepted for.  I had planned on getting pre-approved, which is the correct route to go, but this happened pretty quickly.  I did have some credit issues shortly after I moved to Calgary which, although they are cleared up, there are some lingering issues with my credit report and my score just isn’t quite up to snuff.  I sort of expected that and I am not disappointed.

That is one of the bonuses of being a pessimist.  I don’t expect things to go well and when they don’t, it is what I expected so I am not disappointed.  If it goes well then it is a pleasant surprise.  Plus, I am living in a great little house that I am happy in.  In all honesty, I didn’t really want to move anyway.  I had strongly considered renting out the place had I gotten financing and living here.  I could have made a couple of hundred bucks a month which would have been awesome.

So, I am going to work with the mortgage broker and see what I can do in the next 6 months to a year to improve my situation and then perhaps look into something again.

On a side note – the first person I dealt with at CIBC was great, until she discovered that I didn’t have a perfect credit rating and then her service and interest went considerably downhill.  She wasn’t really willing to offer any help or advice.  So, I told her I was not interested in dealing with her nor CIBC.  Big banks suck, big time.  Stick with a mortgage broker, you’ll probably save yourself some money too.  As for CIBC, go to hell.

Anyway, we will see where I stand a year from now.  Six months from now it will be deep winter, and no one wants to move then, so, let’s wait a year.  🙂

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Staying right where I am…

Posted on August 27, 2019 by kdarcy21

So, as I’ve written, I had an interview for the Managers job where I work.  It would have been a big step up and it would be a challenging position for sure.  The only real issue was that the job is based in Ontario and worse (possibly) yet, in Toronto.

I applied for it, although when I applied, I was not sure if I wanted to move back to Ontario or not.  I figured the experience of the job interview process would be a good one.  I had the interview this past Thursday and it went well.

Over the weekend, I looked at all of the pros and cons regarding moving back to Ontario.  The pros list wasn’t very long and some of them were pretty lame, I didn’t want the list to be so dang short.  The cons list was hefty, to say the least.  On Friday, I was in the mind-set that I planned on moving back to Ontario.  I contacted a real estate friend of mine in Toronto and he sent some listings for rentals.  I was shocked at the prices.

As any reader of my blog knows, I have three dogs so I wasn’t looking for a one-bedroom apartment.  I wanted a house, within 30 minute transit ride of the downtown office.  There were lots available.  One was very promising, it was about a 7 minute walk to the office.  The catch?  It was $3750 a month.  Wow…  The most I have ever spent on rent is $1600 and that was for a townhouse in Calgary and it was likely over-priced.  I crunched some numbers and based on what I believe I would have started at with the new job, I could have afforded it, barely, but it would have left me with almost nothing at the end of the month.  I quickly decided that living in downtown Toronto was not going to happen.

I expanded my search to Oakville and Burlington and the rental prices were much more acceptable.  I found a good 3-bedroom house, right on Lake Ontario and it was going for $2200 a month, much more reasonable, although still very pricy.  I was a little shocked at the prices of rentals and how much they’ve gone up since I last lived in Ontario.

I wasn’t overly excited about commuting to work again.  Right now, I have it pretty good, my commute, from the couch, is about 20 feet.  If I was to live in Burlington, I would be looking at an hour, at least, one-way door to door.  That’s not really that bad, in the grand scheme of things but still, that’s an extra two hours a day that I am not home.  The dogs would be on their own from somewhere around 7am until likely 6pm, a long haul for a dog.  I could have installed a doggie-door and trained them on how to use it, or paid for someone to come over and take them for walks, I likely could have made it work.

I also thought about other issues, or differences in Ontario when compared to Alberta.  The summers are long and hot and humid – I don’t particularly care for hot and humid and Hera (my Shepherd) would have hated the summers, she hates it when it’s 22C and there isn’t any humidity in Alberta.  Twix would have been happy with the temperatures, she loves to be warm and I am sure saying goodbye to Alberta winters would have been number one on her list.  Blondie started her life out in Ontario and I am sure would have adjusted to it quickly enough.

I would have paid more for rent, electricity, natural gas, gas for the car, insurance and then you add on 8% PST to everything else you buy, it was looking less and less favourable.

I thought about all of this over the weekend and talked to a number of people to see what they thought as well, I wanted to get different opinions.  Well, turns out, I didn’t get many different opinions, it was pretty much unanimous that I should stay in Alberta and that would mean turning down this job, should it be offered to me.

By Sunday night, I had pretty much decided that I would not be returning to Ontario.  On Monday morning, I talked to the two most senior people in IT to let them know that I had decided to withdraw my name from contention for the new job.  I was told, and I sort of wish that I hadn’t been, that I was going to be offered the job as they liked that I had the BDO advantage and could hit the ground running.  I felt pretty good that they were willing to place their faith in me and I did feel a little bad for possibly letting them down, but, I am still in a good job and still able to help the company out.

So, I will not be returning, not now anyway, other than a planned two week (nearly) trip in October for our IT Conference.  I am looking forward to that trip for sure.  And to whoever is hired into the position, I wish you the best of luck.  I will be seeing if I could have done a better job.

Posted in Blondie, Hera & Twix, My Dogs, Personal, Work | Leave a comment

Three day weekend…

Posted on August 25, 2019 by kdarcy21

This is day three of a three day weekend.  In fact, because next weekend is Labour Day, it will be back-to-back three day weekends, I like that.

It has absolutely zipped by, as most weekends do.  I had a bunch of zipping around to do on Friday and I also took the dogs down to the lake for an hour or so.  There were some other large dogs there that they played with and swam with.  There was a lab mix that the owner was throwing the frisbee into the lake and her Lab and Twix would swim out and try to get it.  Believe it or not, Twix (who is a Pitbull / Border Collie mix) outswam a 2-year-old Lab mix.  She LOVES the water.  Meanwhile, Blondie and Hera are just splashing about ensuring they don’t get any deeper than the chest.  I am not sure that Hera’s back has ever been wet from lake water.

That completely tired them out.  So tired in fact, that I had a bit of a panic on Saturday morning.  I woke up early, as I have been doing lately (4am) and Hera came in to give me my morning kiss, every morning, as soon as I wake up – what a sweet dog.  I said good morning to Blondie who was all smiling and tail wagging.  Twix didn’t respond, which is odd, she at least normally wags her tail.  Twix, is not what I would call a morning dog.

Anyway, I called her again, nothing.  I shook her, nothing.  At this point, I am thinking something is wrong and I recall reading about dogs who go into the water and ingest too much water and they die.  I pop up on the bed and shake her pretty good – nothing.

I am not in a mini-panic mode thinking my dog is dead.  I am right out of bed now and I violently shake her.  She lifts her head up and looks at me like “Can I not sleep in one day a week?”…  Now, that I know she’s alive, she gets a bear hug from me, likely further adding to her confusion of being woken so rudely.  Jeez Twix, you scared me.

We had a low-key type of day yesterday.  Coffee with the neighbour, a little TV, a short nap, an Indiana Jones Marathon in the evening.  Life is pretty good.

 

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