the hunt for the bear-a-sauras goes on

I am faced with what i think any amateur faces when blogging... there’s way too much to write about when you don’t keep up to date and i often procrastinate. To keep things simple i’ve decided to make use of my favourite skill...organization. brace yourself.

The River Breaks:

When the ice on the Mackenzie River cracks the ice shifts and the chunks of ice move on top of one another or push each other together to form mini icebergs. This is possibly the coolest thing I have seen since I first saw the mountains out West. The ice is still so thick and is frozen in a chandelier type formation. Okay this is really tricky to explain but let’s just say it would make a sweet postcard. There are so many of these icebergs that are slowly being pushed out of the way so that the water can move through. The Titanic surely would have no hope at this time of year.

May Queen:

It’s a tradition in Norman Wells that every year in May the firefighter’s association holds an event called May Queen in which all the new men in town have to dress up as women and compete in a little competition to see who is the best woman.  I have to say it was almost as fun getting the new guys ready then it was watching them perform. Ben let me paint his nails and some went as far as shaving (obviously they didn’t think about how unfortunate it’s going to be when their hair grows back worse than ever) There must have been 50 men in the sassiest outfits I have ever seen, it was absolutely wild. I couldn’t help thinking about how this would NEVER happen in Toronto, cross dressing yes, but not like this.

Epic Hikes:

We have so far been on three epic hikes. The first Ben and I went on alone and involved a romantic date in the dump as well as a failed attempt to make it to the lake due to mass amounts of snow. Then the snow melted and we went up to jackfish lake and went on the second hike along the edge of this crazy cliff, gorgeous. It made me want to pack a bag of necessities and run away into the wilderness and live off the land, then i got hungry and quickly changed my mind, apparently living off the land doesn’t include macaroni. The third hike involved mass amounts of bear poop and so much swamp water it flowed over my rubber boots so that i was literally walking knee deep in swamp, delicious. I believe if i keep hiking i’ll either find gold which will commence the second gold rush or i’ll end up face to face with a bear, please note that i would prefer the gold rush.

Along with all this I’ve been working at the daycare which has been wild. Nothing like bugger filled adorable babies to set a smile on your face. It’s this fad for babies to wear intense sun blocking sun glasses up here as the sun is super strong but every time i put them on their faces i can’t help but laugh. I call my group “the cool dudes” i’m sure they’d appreciate the nickname if they could talk, i'll have to take the burps and dirty diapers as a sign of affection instead. Also it is bear season and I’m trying to decide which to purchase, bear mace or a shot gun, please provide your opinion as this is a difficult decision. On the one hand, police hold mace so that might be kind of cool, plus there’s less chance i’ll accidently injure someone. On the other hand a shot gun definitely looks more intense but i don’t know how to use one and so the chance that someone else would accidently end up in an insane amount of pain is probably rather high. Yours to contemplate while i continue my days polar bear-less.