A Promise Mostly Kept

I wrote this time last year:

This time, though, I actually think that the dream is going to realise itself. I firmly intend at this time in a year to be wending my way through northern British Columbia, testing the weather, and plotting my route across the Yukon border. I am making a promise to myself to celebrate Litha next year right at the arctic circle, pulling off from the Dempster to to celebrate a sunny Esbat.

I celebrated Litha this year 300km shy of the Arctic Circle, at the southern limit of the tundra.

Modern Furniture

The more I settle in Miranda, the more I itch to redecorate her according to my tastes. I won't be using Go Modern for inspiration, that's for sure!

My tastes run to non-cluttered 'cottagey shabby chic French provençal' and I have a serious disdain for contemporary furniture. I like wicker and antiques!

If you like black furniture, a site like that might be useful to you. I prefer cream. In fact, I'm actually dabbling with the idea of one day painting Miranda's oak cabinets cream!

They also promote glass tables. I can just imagine the paw prints on one of those (plus the breakage factor in an RV!).

But if your tastes favour sleek lines and stark minimalism, I'm sure you'll find something to fall in love with at Go Modern.

Mailboxes

In the market for a commercial mailbox? Mailboxixchange offers some very nice ones, as well as mailboxes for residential use and other related products.

Since I'm someone who feels that everything she touches should be both useful and beautiful, if I were ever to start a business, such as a rental property, I would probably start with them in my search for a commercial mailbox with an 'antiquey' feel to it.

In addition to commercial mailboxes, they sell house numbers, curbside decor items, and assorted sundries, for a total of about 2,500 different products for both commercial and residential use. They also have an affiliate program.

Starbucks Redux

This morning, I got a late start and grabbed my Thermos as I headed out the door, planning to fill it at Starbucks on the way to work. I can get about 2.5 cups of coffee in it. I figured that Starbucks would charge me for a 'Venti', their largest size.

So imagine my shock, and joy, when I was charged 1.63$! This comes out to 65.2 cents per 'tall size' coffee.

Needless to say, I'm not even going to bother having my first cup at home anymore.

I was very impressed that the cashier rinsed out my very cold Thermos with hot water before adding the coffee. The contents were still hot an hour later.

Assumptions

I started a new (temporary) job last week and made the decision very quickly that I was going to allow myself one store bought coffee per day for two reasons:

1) I need to be at the office for 8:30, but do not have keys. My colleagues are not always punctual. Rather than get annoyed, I give them till 8:40 then I go down to the Starbucks two blocks away. My Starbucks cup serves as evidence, when I waltz in the door after them, that I was in at 8:30;

but more commonly

2) The office is tiny and does not have any lounge space. If I want a break, I need to leave the office. The only obvious place in the immediate vicinity to sit down and read the paper for fifteen minutes is the Starbucks.

Where do assumptions come in?

There is a convenience store in our building that sells coffee and the next nearest place is the Starbucks. My colleagues always go to the convenience store and gasp when they see my Starbucks cup. My boss finally commented on the fact saying "The coffee downstairs is okay and a lot cheaper than Starbucks." She was surprised by my answer. A cup of truly disgusting coffee from that convenience store in a size equivalent to a 'tall' size of Starbucks brewed coffee is 1.79. That tall size of Starbucks brewed coffee will set you back... 1.72$. Go for a 'short' and you're at 1.52$.

Starbucks gets a bad rap for having expensive drinks. Yes, the fancy drinks are very expensive (I once paid 6$ for most 2nd most amazing latté of my life (my mother makes the best!)!), but the price of brewed coffee is extremely comparable to what you'd get at a coffee bar in a convenience store and Tim Hortons... and tastes MUCH better. Amusingly enough, I remember the days when I couldn't appreciate Starbucks coffee, finding it too strong for my taste. Then, I started to drink it with two inches of milk in it and four packets of sugar. Now, I don't put sugar in my coffee ever (something that shocks me!) and I never ask Starbucks to leave me a couple of inches of space for milk, ergo practically drinking their coffee black. And I now get their dark roast.

I'll be working at this new job about 75 days which comes out to 130$ for coffee, which was earned my first day on the job. So, to those who make snarky comments about the kerchief sporting gal's ridiculous 'latté factor', check your assumptions. :)

Value Village Deals

Wow, that job at the nursery wound up costing me a bundle! I lost so much weight there that all the 'work appropriate' attire I've been lugging for four months no longer fits!

Thankfully, the work culture here is fairly casual, so I know that just a few pieces will help me stretch my casual wardrobe. I went to Value Village with a list of several things and, to my surprise, I found all of it! This never happens when I go shopping! I should go buy a lottery ticket!

On my list were:

-A black kerchief in a dressy material. I found a black and white satin one that's perfect!

-A pair of medium-weight black slacks. First pair I put my hands on was perfect!

-A few blouses. Found three that weren't too... huge. *laughs* I can't believe that I can wear blouses now!

-Several pairs of jeans (for off work hours). After all my hard work looking for jeans at the end of the summer, all that was needed was losing a few inches of fat around the middle. I found three comfy and nice pairs of jeans today... and only tried on four!

I added two books to my pile and the amount for everything was 77$. The lady at the cash told me that I could buy a 3$ Value Village calendar which has coupons for every month and which would give me a rebate on my purchase today. How much of a rebate, I wondered. A whole 25$!!! So, my 75$ total came to 55$ after buying the calendar and getting the rebate!

I've complained before that VV isn't always a good bargain, but today I totally scored!

The Move is Now Official!

Well, the worst of the blog move is over, so I've decided that I will no longer be updating travelswithmiranda.blogspot.com. All future updates will be at travelswithmiranda.uskeba.ca. I'll leave the Blogger version up for now, but everything on it is available at the WordPress site, including comments.

What is left for me to do is finish uploading all my photo albums. You might therefore encounter broken links within old posts. Please take a moment to leave a comment if you encounter such a link.

I'm very, very excited about this move. While WordPress has tested my patience (and will continue to do so), I am happy to be moving to the freedom of hosting my blog at my own domain and having full control over the design. I hope that this blog/website hybrid will be both useful and entertaining.

Miranda and I hit the road again in just a little over a week!

For those reading about my travels on OIT's tale, I'm afraid you will need to go to the TWM blog to continue reading up on my adventures. I am considering moving OIT to WordPress also, but it will probably remain here with its infrequent updates. I am trying to turn TWM into a business and I need to focus my energies on it for the time being.

If Not the Weather, the... Cats

I had water at 6:30 this morning, but not at 8:30. I got the heat gun, set it up, opened the tap in the bathroom sink, and went out to open the guest facilities. I wound up getting tied up there and didn't get back home for twenty minutes.

That was just long enough for:

-the heat gun to work its magic;
-water to start gushing out of the bathroom tap;
-one of the cats (probably Neelix) to leap up onto the counter to get at all that fresh, yummy water, and;
-knock a washcloth into the basin where it stopped the drain.

*sighs*

I suppose that's one way to wash the floors. I used a heater to dry out everything and the room looks okay. I hope that the water didn't have time to infiltrate.

In other dismal news, I believe that my overhead cab is now leaking. I've got a nice chunk of ice in one corner. Inside. I'm going to get the heater up there next, but I'm sure the damage is done. Caulking will have to wait until the weather warms up.

In happier news, it was SUNNY today!!! I went out to do the cleaning this afternoon and switched to a light sweater and a kerchief, instead of the sweater, coat, and tuque I've been living in. Sure, it was a tad 'brisk' (-11) walking around the park like that, but it felt sooooo nice to be unencumbered by a million layers of clothing. Of course, the sun is already setting (can't believe it's four, where does the day go?!), but I definitely got my vitamin D quota for the day.

This afternoon, I managed to run my errands in preparation for Thursday's dinner with the guests. My contribution is mashed turnip (rutabaga for you purists) with brown sugar, which I will have the pleasure of serving in a bowl that belonged to my dad. I couldn't tell you the number of times I served mashed root vegetables in that bowl over the past twenty years and I am very happy to bring a piece of my father with me to this traditional Christmas meal he would have enjoyed so much.

Introductions

If you like Travels With Miranda, then I'd like to invite you to check out the brand new blog by my new friend Donna (aka 'Gypsy'), Life On Our Ark! Donna and her husband are, like me, complete RVing (and full-timing!) newbies, as well as Canadians. Donna's just getting started, but her first few posts will have you in stitches as she recounts her own experiences with our current climate crisis. Welcome to the RVing cyber family Donna! I look forward to following your adventures when we part ways!

Such Naïveté

Gee, Rae thinks, it's pretty warm out there (minus six). The tanks need dumping! Why don't I just thaw out the dump valves. There! All thawed! Waitaminute, nothing's coming out!

Yes, my full black tank is actually a solid block of ice. As a friend would write--:headdesk:

Goings On Behind the Scenes

I am in the process of moving Travels With Miranda to not only WordPress, but also my own site. In doing so, I will gain greater control over the format of the blog and will be able to integrate both the blog and the website into a seamless whole (at least, I hope so). I have therefore removed the website, so you may encounter broken links within blog posts. All of this will be fixed in good time. This is a major endeavour on my part as I need to learn new types of coding languages and how WordPress works (or, rather, doesn't). It is a fine adventure and has been, and will be, keeping me busy for months.

For a sneak peek, you can check out the new blog at travelswithmiranda.uskeba.ca. I will make an announcement when the new blog becomes the official Travels With Miranda. This won't be for quite some time as there is much for me to do with the new blog:

-cleaning up all the posts by fixing links, reuploading pictures, categorizing, and tagging;

-tweaking the design;

-uploading all my travel pics and doing all the coding for the pages;

-transferring information from TWM:TW to the new WordPress site.

Thank you to all my readers; you make me feel that this effort on my part is worth my time!

Solstice

I don't normally make it a point of standing on rooftops and shouting that it's such and such a Sabbat, but being here, surrounded by fanatical, Bible-thumping Christians, I feel a need to assert myself and proclaim that it is Yule. A minor Sabbat, Yule celebrates the return of the sun. The unhappy fall I had combined with my imminent departure make Yule's symbolism particularly literal for me.

I'd also like to remind Christians that while the son was actually born in summer, it is the sun whose birth is celebrated at this time of year, misappropriations of rituals not withstanding.

Trying to Lull Us Again...

At 7PM last night, it was minus twenty-one. My water froze again in a matter of minutes and it took forever to get it going. I was chilled to the bone and miserable; I hadn't felt my feet in two days and the night promised to be brutal. When I got the water running again and was able to take a very long and extremely hot shower, I felt better. By the time I went to bed at 10:30, it was minus seventeen. Yes, the temperature was going up...

I had a fantastic night. When I woke up around 5:30, my first thought was that the bedroom was very cozy!

I rose to minus sixteen and about six inches of snow, which I just spent two hours moving out of the way in areas where people walk. Apparently, a snow plow is on its way.

It's supposedly cold out there, but a dry minus sixteen with no wind is perfectly bearable.

The Fighting Resumes

Yesterday evening, I suddenly found myself without water once again. It's presently -16 and we're looking at another long stretch of deep freeze. The forecast continues to change and while we're looking once again at a long period of sub-zero weather, they are no longer announcing nights at twenty below. Small blessings, I suppose.

I'm trying to figure out where the water is frozen. My compartment is well heated and my heat tape is working. All I can fathom is that the problem is once again in the pedestal, but that was insulated. So, perhaps the problem is underground...

At times like these, I start to dream of Las Vegas, but Las Vegas got more snow than we did this week, so I am starting to wonder if there are any warm havens left!

A Really False Sense of Security

My toilet has decided to start working again.

Lulling Us Into a False Sense of Security...

This morning was, again, my favourite kind of day--bright, warm(ish), and snowy. I spent over an hour digging myself and my neighbour out from our two day snowstorm and it was perfect shoveling weather; I soon removed my winter coat and laboured away in just a sweater, gloves, and tuque (and jeans and boots and socks!). But it wasn't long before the sun vanished and the cold began to seep in again as the wind picked up. We went from a minus six without windchill to a minus seven that feels like minus fourteen. At least, the forecast continues to be more and more optimistic; we're supposed to hit zero on the 25th!

A glimpse of our snowy world:

Red Herrings

As it turns out, my plumbing problem with the shower wasn't a plumbing problem after all, but an electrical one.

I've made a mental note to check on the basement heater twice a day from now on... to make sure that the breaker hasn't tripped.

*bangs head on desk*

Reprieve, But at a Cost

The long term forecast is improving... so much so that we're now in the middle of a snowstorm. As fellow winterites know, it can't snow when it's bitter cold out. So, snow is good in terms of temperatures. We're supposed to hit a high of minus four today, which would be awesome!

That said, the forecast still doesn't think we're going to go above freezing until about the 27th or 28th and... my shower drain is frozen.

A Single Battle Won, If Not the War

Last night was much better than the previous one.

I concluded that sleeping in the study would bring about the same issues as doing so in the upstairs bedroom because of how COLD it is by the big picture window. Since the bedroom is a much smaller space, I figured that it would be easier to insulate. I grabbed whatever I had; leftover pieces of styrofoam insulation, towels, extra bedding, and suitcases to create as much of a barrier as possible between the windows and myself. Also, before going to bed I set a cookie sheet on the mattress to create a flat and fireproof surface and then stuck the heater up there for about forty minutes. Finally, I didn't skimp on clothes, doubling up on all layers. I was still feeling pretty cozy when I got up at 6:30 to open the park gates, but when I went back to bed after, cold had seeped in.

Another thing I did overnight was leave the water running in the bathroom sink. I hate doing this as it is so wasteful, but environmentalists have obviously never fought this climate. Leaving the tap on meant that I had water this morning and no burst pipes.

When I showered just before bed at eleven last night, the pipes were just starting to freeze. I had water, but the temperature and pressure were uneven. I had to let the shower run for about five minutes before I could even think of getting into it, but the water finally reached optimum pressure and temperature.

This morning, it is -12C (10F), but it feels like -20C (-4F) with the windchill. And what a wind it is. Miranda is thankfully buffered between a house and a huge class A, but she is still being tossed about 35kph (22mph) winds.

Getting up this morning to face the weather wasn't as tough as some people might think. I'm used to this weather, grew up in it, worked in it, camped in it, lived in it. Which all means that I've earned the right to be sick of it.

That said, if it wasn't windy, these would be the best kinds of days. Bracing, sunny, with an air so fresh and crisp that it wipes the soul clean; the kind of day that beats a 'feels like 40 with humidity' summer day.

I suppose I have a love/hate relationship with winter.

Don't Forget About Starting Batteries in Cold Weather

My house batteries have been handling this cold snap without blinking (knocks on wood), but my coach battery went from 100% charge to 60% overnight. 60%, I discovered, isn't enough to crank the engine. For the first time, I pulled out my trusty charger and used it to trickle charge (at 2A) the starting battery. This took less than 10 minutes. I'll do this once a day until the cold snap passes. I nice it was to have the tool to do this! My neighbours have been boosting their trucks to get them going each day and I know this is not good for a battery.

The car started fine this morning and I have the option of trickle charging it, too, should I have an issue with it at some point.

The charger has a 100A 'jump start' mode for boosting using the charger rather than another vehicle, but I can't use it for obvious reasons! In a pinch, I could use the 15A 'fast charge' mode, but trickle charging is definitely the better battery maintenance option.

There is so much to think about!