The Imperceptible Immigrant

In between

April 9, 2023 in Life in BC | Permalink

“Reality is not always dark or positive. It is somewhere in-between”.

Antara Mali

It is Easter weekend and here on the west coast of Canada we are once again caught in between. Winter has tarried over-long and though we have had occasional glimpses of spring it has to be said that we have not yet truly broken though thereto. Even the garden seems unsure as to whether or not to really ‘go for it’ – or to wait for things to warm up a bit. Most of our daffodils took one look at the weather and decided not to bother with flowers this year. The tulips boldly unfurled themselves but are now looking as though they wished that they had not bothered. I have mowed the lawns a couple of times but even the grass seems to be in two minds as to where we are in the seasons’ cycle.

A quarter of the year has gone. The clocks are wondering if they made a mistake with ‘summer’ time, but the planetary movements are relentless and we are already more than half way to the longest day. Hardly seems possible, does it?

Our exciting trip to Africa looms ever closer but the whole thing still seems more like make-belief than reality. It will be real enough, soon enough! We (in truth, mostly The Girl) have focused our minds on the expedition to come by carefully equipping ourselves for the sort of adventure that I don’t believe either of us has encountered before (well – I certainly haven’t). Will it be a life changing experience? Time will tell (and so, of course, will I)!

I am just finishing a fairly tough term at the College, during which I have been teaching not one class but two. I feel sure that the mental exercise of maintaining overlapping schedules has been doing wonders for keeping my ageing brain sparking; a sort of fitness class for the intellect. I have certainly detected a fair bit of grumbling from that quarter – the which is pretty much how I am when it comes to physical exercise also. Ah well – at least the remuneration goes some way towards paying for our sojourn south of the equator.

Well – let us hope that things change for the better and that the year begins to feel as though it has truly sparked into life.

Tags: Africa, college, Spring, Travel, Weather, work

Today’s forecast…

December 23, 2022 in Life in BC, Photos | Permalink

…Holy Moley – I can’t feel my face degrees!

The winter weather is doing its bit to make the run in to Christmas something of a challenge! Notice that I didn’t qualify that with: “Here on the west coast of Canada“. I am well aware that we are not alone in experiencing exceptional climatic conditions. We have had quite a lot to do of late (as of course have many people at this time of year) and needing to keep a constant eye on the weather only makes things more exacting.

Here are some ‘highlights’ – complete with pictures:

Last weekend we made a overnight trip up island to Nanaimo – for a Christmas visit with The Girl’s mum – stopping on the way back on the Sunday for lunch with a dear friend in Duncan. As ever we took the Mill Bay ferry to avoid traversing the Malahat (always a good idea when there is snow in the air).

We figured that the snow would start to fall at some point during this trip and sure enough it did – whilst we were in Nanaimo. We stayed overnight in the Coast Bastion hotel overlooking Nanaimo harbour – with which we are very familiar from previous visits.

We had a lovely visit with both family and friends – dined splendidly at the Nanaimo Golf Club, the Minnoz restaurant at the Coast Bastion – and, of course, with our lovely friend in Duncan. Happy Christmas to you all.

Once back in Victoria the winter storm really swept in and soon everything disappeared under about a foot of snow. This was the view from my studio window by Tuesday.

The Girl had taken most of the week off as well-earned pre-Christmas break, but the weather put paid to any notions of a relaxing run in to the festival itself. The Volunteer Agency of which The Girl is one of the mainstays delivers meals to elderly folk every week – with teams of volunteers driving routes around Greater Victoria to make deliveries to more than seventy locations. Given the weather it would have been totally unreasonable to expect these excellent volunteers – many of them elderly themselves – to be out on the roads in such treacherous conditions. It fell to a number of us folk with 4x4s equipped with snow tyres to get the food parcels out to the elderly in time for Christmas. This is – of course – is just the sort of thing at which Lorelei excels and she did not let us down. Here we are en route…

I guess the big question now is – will we get a white Christmas? Today is the 23rd and temperatures are starting to rise – though to this point they have only reached the ‘freezing rain on top of compacted snow‘ phase – so today we are going nowhere! We will see how things pan out tomorrow.

Tags: Christmas, Lexus, Photo, Snow, Weather, work

Random images…

November 19, 2022 in Life in BC, Photos | Permalink

…from a lost season (see previous post).

Whatever I personally feel about this time of year (and of the month of November in particular) there is no denying that there are some pretty images to be captured. Being a sharing kind of guy I always like to pass such things on to the gentle reader (or viewer!).

These are quite seasonal:

…and that mountain is still visible (though by no means so every day!)…

There is good, if somewhat nippy, walking to be done – in Centennial Park for instance:

“Two of us wearing raincoats
Standing solo in the sun
You and me chasing paper
Getting nowhere
On our way back home”

Lennon/MacCartney
The other day I was in Sidney, engaged upon the purchase of some comestibles. On returning to the Lexus – the which I had parked under a small tree at the far extent of the car park – I observed that a murder was in progress. A murder of crows, that is…

No sooner than I had mounted the vehicle and fired up the big V8 than one of their number flapped lazily down and took up residence on the bonnet (hood!). He looked me in the eye as a sort of challenge and let it be known that he felt disinclined to move even when I revved the engine a little. Had I not started to reverse gently out of the parking bay I think he might well just have stayed there.

Cheeky bu**er!

Tags: Autumn, Fall, nature, Photo, Walk

Season of… er…!

November 11, 2022 in Life in BC | Permalink

It is a pretty extraordinary thing – particularly here on the west coast of Canada – but we do seem to have skipped a season this year.

Completely…!

I know…! With climate change so much of the world’s weather seems to have lost track of what were once familiar patterns. It has become the norm to read of unprecedented weather cycles or events. The ‘new normal’ is clearly that there is now nothing normal about anything.

What a strange and unsettling time to be alive.

Regular readers of this journal will already have picked up references throughout this particular year of weather patterns not occurring as expected. The spring here on Vancouver Island was wet and cold and dank – and seemed to be stuck in that state for ever, instead of flowering into spring and early summer as is usual.

It wasn’t until we packed our bags and set off to Europe in July that the weather here in BC really picked up. One result of this was that exposure to the heatwaves that afflicted Europe throughout the middle of the year came as a considerable shock to the system for travelers like us.

When we returned to Canada summer seemed finally to have arrived. At the southern tip of Vancouver Island the season is usually warm and dry – with little or no rainfall for the three summer months. It was good, finally, to be able to get out into the garden to do some barbecuing and entertaining.

Come the dog days, however, when the temperatures usually fall away and the summer drought is broken by the first welcome showers of the advancing fall, the temperatures remained stubbornly in the mid twenties Celsius and there was no rain in sight. Serious concerns about the lack of rainfall were voiced and gardens and agricultural lands alike began to shows signs of stress. An Indian Summer can be a wonderful surprise at the end of a disappointing season, but when one follows an already extensive dry period farmers and gardeners start to worry.

Naturally, when the weather finally broke in late-October it did so in true ‘wet’ coast style – with yet another Atmospheric River providing us with many days rainfall in a few hours, accompanied closely by the autumn’s first wind storm.

Then, as we crossed into November, the temperatures dropped abruptly – as did the first snowfall of winter. I know that some gentle readers will still – even after all this time – cling to the notion that the whole of Canada is a snowy wasteland for much of the year. There are indeed some good reasons for so doing. Here on the west coast, however, that is not the norm; winters in Victoria are not unlike those in the south east of the UK for most years.

So – we seem to have skipped autumn (fall) this year and gone directly from late-summer to winter. I’m not sure what Mother Nature will make of all this, but I have a feeling she will adapt to it with rather more sang-froid than do we.

Brrrrr!

Tags: British Columbia, climate change, Fall, Snow, Weather, winter

A mixed bag

October 7, 2022 in Life in BC | Permalink

…random ramblings on a recent rag-bag of topics from the Pacific northwest…

First things first… ‘Tis once again the time of year to wish The Girl a very happy – if slightly belated (in real world, if not in blog-world terms) birthday! Yay! Happy B-day!

Life here on the west coast of Canada trundles along in its usual way. We are both busy and things are returning to some semblance of order now that the western world has decided that COVID is over and done with (even if it isn’t!). Secure in the knowledge that our multiple vaccine boosters and immunity from having had a dose of the lurgy make us a little more protected than we were before, we have on occasion stepped out to eat and to attend other public social events.

We even decided that it was safe enough to go back to the theatre – a least for a few months until the ‘immunity’ wears off. We had tickets for a play at The Belfry for The Girl’s birthday but the performance was cancelled at the last minute due to ‘illness’ (now, what could that be?). Our tickets have been rescheduled for this coming weekend, so let’s see how that goes.

Following the grim (as in cold and wet) spring and early summer, concerning which I posted at length earlier this year, the weather finally got its act together and we are enjoying a most pleasant Indian Summer. Temperatures remain in the 20s C and we have had no rain to speak of for several months. The garden could really do with some to be honest, but I guess it will come soon enough.

Apropos of very little, I feel that I should extend my commiserations to those who yet reside in the UK. Though I try not to comment on politics in these dark days it would not be – I believe – controversial to describe the UK political establishment since 2016 a a complete sh*tshow. However, even by such measures the new incumbents of 10 Downing Street might just prove be the worst and most dangerous yet.

Why do I care? Well – last week’s shenanigans wiped a considerable chunk off my monthly pension income as the chancellor carelessly crashed sterling and sent exchange rates plummeting (or soaring! – depends which end of the chain one is at). The subsequent recovery has been encouraging, but the knowledge that this ruling cabal’s dangerous ideology might well cause permanent damage is chilling to those of us who have no say in the matter.

In a strange Hitchcock-ian coda: yesterday I was out in the garden, underneath our deck (the which forms a sort of veranda across the whole width of the back of the house). It was impossible to miss the fact that – out in the stand of trees that border our property to the east – a huge and raucous convocation of birds had gathered. I could not actually see most of them, as the trees are tall and there is plenty of foliage. They were making sufficient noise, however, that it was impossible to ignore them. Quite startlingly so, in fact.

I took one step out from the cover of the deck and immediately the whole gathering took off. There must have been thousands of them (clearly of more than one species). Their parting darkened the skies for a moment or two and then they were gone – and a sudden and total silence descended.

Now – I wonder what this portends?

Tags: Autumn, COVID-19, Politics, The Belfry, The Girl, Theatre, Weather

Welcome back my friends…

August 20, 2022 in Life as we know it, Life in BC | Permalink

“…to the show that never ends”

Emerson, Lake and Palmer

Though it did look for a while there as though the show might end after all…

Welcome back indeed to the Brentwood Bay summer season of Music in the Park. This year – for the first time since the COVID pandemic struck in 2020 – we have again been able to indulge ourselves with the weekly free concerts that have for such a long time been such a splendid feature of life on the Saanich peninsula. I have no doubt at all that similar stories can be told for other al fresco summer music seasons on the island – but the Brentwood Bay events are local to us and much beloved by all of the communities in these parts.

Now, you might – with good reason – cavil that there is little point in my writing about this splendid seasonal entertainment… when the concert series has just finished!

Good point – well made!

The thing is, of course, that we were out of the country for the first part of the season and sufficiently badly stricken with the hideous lurgy that we were unable to attend the first couple of events subsequent to our return. We did, however, get to enjoy the final two weeks of the program and I did not want to miss the opportunity to raise a cheer to mark the occasion.

We are particularly grateful for the return of this relatively safe form of entertainment. The Victoria Fringe – in a somewhat truncated and localised form – is also upon us, but frankly we are very unlikely to partake of any of the offerings. One weighs in the balance the risks of sitting in a small, crowded venue with others who may have contracted the virus against the desirability of the fare on offer. Frankly, nothing in this year’s festival moves us sufficiently that we are prepared to take that sort of risk.

The same is true of the local music scene (when not in the parks!). Local venues such as the Mary Winspear in Sidney have started booking acts again, but one really has to want to see something to overcome the reluctance to expose oneself to another dose…

I guess such things will improve slowly over time and, though we do somewhat resent the way that a huge chunk of experience has been denied us, we also acknowledge that these are our choices.

I guess that life was ever just such an ongoing battle of risk versus reward.

Tags: Brentwood Bay, COVID-19, Fringe, Music, Theatre

Canada and stuff

July 3, 2022 in Life in BC, Photos | Permalink

“The cool thing about being famous is traveling. I have always wanted to travel across seas, like to Canada and stuff”.

Britney Spears

Last Friday was Canada Day.

I have mentioned this event several times in these meanderings since first I visited these shores. It is perhaps little surprise – given recent (and more distant) history – that the reaction to the celebrations has become considerably more equivocal over the years. As an outsider (and in particularly one with the background that is my inheritance) I hope that I can empathise appropriately with all (or most!) parties. There is much that is good here – and that should be celebrated. There is also much that is bad – and that needs to be repaired.

There are also fireworks – the which we get to see from our deck. Here be some pictures thereof:

Tags: Canada, Celebration, Fireworks, Photo

A promissory note

June 27, 2022 in Life in BC | Permalink

“Summer is a promissory note signed in June, its long days spent and gone before you know it, and due to be repaid next January”.

Hal Borland

As gleefully explained in my last post – some form of summer appears at long last to have arrived on the west coast of Canada. It may not last long, but it is most welcome whilst it is here.

That aforementioned post also referred to the Summer Solstice – the longest day and, of course, the shortest night! At the southern end of Vancouver Island that looks like this:

10:00 in the evening. Not fully dark yet:

4:00 in the morning (us older folk often have to get up in the middle of the night):Of course – if it is summer then it must be time to entertain folk in our garden. We duly did so over the weekend – with an impromptu invitation to dearest friends to come over an to cook their dinner on our BBQ. ‘Twas really most pleasant to be able again to sit out of an evening enjoying the balmy BC climate with good friends – even if it meant something of a canter down the home straight of making the garden look presentable – the which it finally very nearly does.

On the Sunday we bobbed across the Saanich inlet on the Mill Bay ferry and once again headed up island to have lunch with The Girl’s mum and another long-standing friend. These summer pursuits are most pleasant, though there is a slight feeling of squeezing things in over this next short period, before we set off on our travels.

I took these shots as we bobbed our way back over to Brentwood Bay at the end of the day:

Tags: Brentwood Bay, food and drink, Friends, Lunch, Summer, Vancouver Island

Oh – come on!

May 18, 2022 in Life in BC | Permalink

I wrote recently in rather gloomy terms on the subject of the less than stellar performance thus far this year of the weather gods… at least where this corner of Vancouver Island is concerned. Spring and/or summer (assuming that they eventually do turn out to be distinct seasons) have yet to put in an appearance. Temperatures in this usually clement corner of the world continue to lurk some five to six degrees Celsius below the usual average for the time of year and the endless rainfall does seem actually to have… no… end!

…and that really sucks!

Sadly, that isn’t the end of the bad weather news.

A quick search for ‘storms‘ in the archives for this blog will reveal that during the fall and winter seasons here on the island such phenomena are regular occurrences. They cause a certain amount of mild havoc – power outages – branches falling from trees – bins overturned… that sort of thing… but beyond that they are pretty much accepted as just part of the rich tapestry that is living in a country that is yet largely wilderness. Such events, however, are considerably less well tolerated in the supposedly balmy springtime and summer seasons (not that we have seen either yet!).

Today we had an extensive and unseasonal wind storm that included gusts of up to 90Kph. We had a three hour power outage – branches fell from the trees into our newly coiffured garden – our bins were blown over!

Bah!

I was in the studio working on some music. No power = no studio, however, so that was the end of that!

The other thing that I should be doing is working in the garden; amongst other things on planting out the recently purchased replacements (more on that later) for the various flora that we lost during the unpleasantly lingering harsh winter. I do draw the line, however, at venturing forth when repeated squally showers soak one to the skin and tempest-like gusts of wind threaten to bring large branches down upon one’s tender head.

It does look as though we might get a few sunny days now, but in gardening terms it will take me all that time just to get us back to where we were before the storm. At this rate the garden will be just about ready in time for this year’s fall storm season!

I’m afraid that it didn’t take me long to get back onto the subject of the weather… did it?

Sorry!

Tags: garden, Spring, Vancouver Island, Weather

May Day

May 1, 2022 in Life in BC | Permalink

Today is the 1st of May.

By rights we should be well into spring by now and heading rapidly towards to the balmy, bosky days of summer.

Here at the southern end of Vancouver Island the weather gods clearly did not get the memo. For the last however many weeks (endlessly, or so it feels) it has been, it is only fair to say, markedly chilly… not to mention damp to boot.

Now – if I were to be strictly fair there have been some quite sunny days and even on (rare!) occasions it has felt just the slightest touch on the warm(ish) side. Such days, however, have simply rendered the disappointment of subsequent, less passable days all the more bitter.

The garden – meantime – has blithely got on and done what gardens do at this time of year – ie. grow prodigiously, regardless of what is happening climate-wise. This is in marked contrast to its response during the winter when parts of it reacted quite negatively to what I thought was not really that bad a fall of snow. Clearly my understanding was based on some of the less appropriate of the fifty words that the Inuits apparently do not have for snow – and this was really quite, quite bad snow. That is certainly the impression given by the number of plants that turned up their toes (interesting metaphor there) and gave up the ghost (alright – stop this now!)…

Anyway – I really should be cutting the grass now instead of writing this…

…well – that’s done – and it didn’t actually rain – though it did think seriously about it!

Where was I?

Ah yes… The winter term at College has finished (there is a theme here!) and the summer term (during which for this year I will not be teaching) does not start for a few days yet. I am off duty until September, so my mind should now be turning to all manner of summer activities… which it sort of is – though a bit of a warm spell would really help things along the way.

Now – I think I have laboured the point quite enough to be getting on with and I do promise that my next post will contain no mention of the weather at all!

What weather?!

Tags: garden, Lawn, Spring, Vancouver Island, Weather, work

Life in BC

In between

Today’s forecast…

Random images…

Season of… er…!

A mixed bag

Welcome back my friends…

Canada and stuff

A promissory note

Oh – come on!

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