Snow

Ahhh!! It is working!! For the past few weeks, I have been unable to write anything on blogspot! Tonight it works.

It's snowing in the Arctic. Let me clarify: I am not talking about "scattered flurries". Not "light snow". It is full on heavy snowfall. The last time that I have saw snow at this magnitude was back in the day of good old White Juan, when the snow in Mom and Dad's driveway higher than my waist. Sigh.

It just keeps falling. In the Okanagan we would have flurries. Scattered flurries. I grew up with snow in NS. I grew up with cold in NS. However, after two glorious years sans neige et sans froideur, I feel incredulous at the amount of white stuff coating everything and the dry, bitter cold seeping into my bones. Last night Elliott went out shovelling and was up to his knees in snow on our back patio. He was wearing snow pants and his Canada Goose and was so hot from his gear, steam was coming off his head when he stopped for a break. (Will post photos soon! Waiting for the new laptop to arrive before I upload new photos.)

Life in Yellowknife continues. The roads are ridiculously snow and ice covered. There are already mammoth snowbanks growing on the sides of the road and in parking lots. People are zipping around towns on their skidoos, or sleds as they are called in YK. (Wanna go sledding?! Has a totally different meaning north of 60 than at home!)

Tonight was grocery night, a night I a beginning to dread. A LOT. Walmart in town is tiny and very gloomy feeling inside the store. It is like a mini warehouse with Walmart crap plunked down inside. It is a common sight to walk down an aisle and see the majority of the shelves empty. However success was had tonight when I found a new shower curtain!!! Yippeee!! For all of you "Southerners" (This is what you are called by the population of us crazy north of 60ers) finding a shower curtain at Walmart may not be a "BIG DEAL". In the Knife, we have maybe 3 stores that would even sell them, selection is paltry to pathetic on a good day, so I almost leapt out of my skin with JOY! when I found my treasure.

Then we slipped and slided over to Extra Foods. A lovely store for this town with the same phenomena occurring, where half the shelves are empty at times... For the most part, I love this store. It carries an amazing selection of items for this tiny, isolated town in the middle of nowhere. For that I am thankful, believe that. HOWEVER. The checkout system at this store is enough to make my worn, fragile nerves dissolve into thin air.

Picture this: Elliott and Natalie, cart full, overflowing even, heading to the checkout. Normally there is a line up of fellow townsfolk about ten people deep. Of the 12 or so checkouts, two, MAYBE three will be open. Everyone stares at the closed checkouts praying and plotting on how to overtake the crowd, incase a new one opens up. (Ok, maybe that is just me. ) The cashiers are all young, teenyboppers possessing zero experience in the cashiering world. Ok. Just breathe. So, Natalie starts to unload the groceries from the cart onto the conveyor belt. Teenybopper is deeply engrossed in a conversation with "SHUT UP!!!" "No WAY!!!" "OH MY GAWWWD!!" being exclaimed numerous times throughout her important, work related conversation with her colleague and customer. Natalie then discovers the cap to her Organic Milk (Which she was so DARN happy to find... seriously, organic milk tastes soooooo much better than the regular) So the cap is half off, and the contents of the container are half leaked all over her massive cartload of groceries and there is now a big blob of organic milk spreading along the conveyor belt. Danggggggg y'all, that sucks. So, very politely, professionally even, Natalie interrupted this worldly and highly important conversation. Teenybopper glances at Nat and continues chattering away. Natalie stays calm as that is one of her finer qualities in life and repeats, "Excuse me, do you have a cloth or something, so I can wipe up all this spilled milk that is everywhere." Teenybopper is then able to acknowledge this ridiculous request from this clearly crazed and unreasonable customer. "No." Natalie maintains her cool and requests if maybe she could find something as there is milk covering her groceries and now the conveyor belt. Crying over spilled milk would of course, be silly. Teenyboppers starts shouting out..." Umm, Nicoleeeee, do you like have any paper towel or something. Yeah. I need some. No. Ok. Marrrrrrrrrrrrrrrk. Um, do yooooou have any paper towel or something? Yeah, there's milk spilled. Oh you do? I don't have any. Can I like, borrow your roll? Yeah, Thanks!!"

Natalie cleans milk like a trooper. Elliott has gone off in search of a non faulty topped milk. Groceries are being scanned. We had many, many groceries. (I only grocery shop once every two weeks as I cannot handle the continuous bizzare behaviour of the staff of the Extra Foods... I digress. ) Sigh, back to the Great Grocery Escapade... Once I get all the groceries loaded onto the conveyor belt, I realize that the scanned groceries have ended on the other conveyor belt, *surprise* there is no one bagging them. Elliott has at this point just returned with the wondrous Organic Milk. (SERIOUSLY... it will be worth the hassle.)

Now the process of bagging one zillion groceries with no help begins... fine, I am not physically handicapped in any way that would prevent me from doing this, but after spending $350 at Extra Foods, wouldn't it be nice to have a littllllllle help? Am I out of line on this one... clearly I am. I'm such a dang southerner. So, the grocery order has been paid for and Elliott and I are madly trying to bag and load up the cart. Teenybopper, starts ringing in the next customer. Before we realize, their groceries are piling up next to our groceries... it was a madhouse. (Where did Third Person Go? I was enjoying it... )

Then I realize that my orange juice carton has also been half ripped open and is leaking everywhere.

BIG SIGH.

I alert Teen. to this fact and request she call someone to get me a new one. Teeny2 comes along, repeats "Tropicana" and is on his merry way to find me a replacement. By the time we finished, Teeny2 was not to be found. I had to set off to find him. He was just stopping to chat to his coworker, then couldn't remember what oj he was searching. Not kidding.

Should this be highly complicated procedure of buying groceries? Nope. Is it every time I go? Yep. (Coop, the "other" grocery store in town has much higher prices than EF. So I shop at EF.) Intentions people, it is all about intentions...

Snow... crazy grocery shopping... waiting for new laptop so I can upload photos... that basically sums up my life to date.

Till the next time,
xoxo