Thank you SO MUCH to Paul for accompanying me to see Lois and Bob. We had a wonderful time.
One of our adventures was pretty adventury and I won’t talk about it because no matter how I tried I’d just sound petty, but one of the days I was gone we went to Dinosaur Provincial Park, a world heritage site, and it was stupendous, spectacular, amazing. We went to the Centrosaurus Bone Bed and Bone Bed Number 50 and saw an owl nest (no baby wols, although they had been spotted) and did NOT see a rattlesnake, phew, and walked where every honey coloured rock was a dinosaur bone.
We also went to Lake Newell where I got into a big argument with a Ring Billed Gull (it was very funny, it kept flying back and squawking at me in an attempt to get the last squawk) and mostly we hung with dogs (Harley is a black lab and I LOVES HIM, I brushed him repeatedly and he loved on me right back…. and Lazzy is well, a terrier, and I watched the two of them play keepaway with a stick and I laughed until I HURT MY RIBS and the last day I was there Lazzy presented his belly for my approval and strokes) and people, and Bob cooked me an organic local beefsteak that brings tears to my eyes as I recollect it and we had Cambodian style food in Brooks and I admired how enormous the trees are that they planted 30 years back and enjoyed the comfy bed and quiet at night (except when somebody started spraying Roundup at dusk Thursday night, snarl) and really enjoyed the Nissan Maxima I rented and exclusively drove thanks for asking and OMG JULY 1ST.
We drove into Rosemary at dusk July 1st and set up chairs and blankies and watched a small town fireworks display. It was neither cheesy nor short; it was one of the best fireworks displays I’ve ever seen and I got to be really close to it. It was a really sincerely trulio Canadian experience and it made me happy. A local country cover band was playing as we pulled up and they were good
Apart from how very hot I was for the second field trip at DPP (I got very tired of the field interpreter and spent a lot of time sitting in the bus) and the mosquitoes as we walked up to the Centrosaurus bone bed (black, ferocious, completely painless as they bit, and perfectly able to handle 30 degree C weather and 40 kph breezes) I enjoyed the entire trip. Paul as always managed the travelling portion perfectly and all the getting thither and in and out of Calgary was slick.
I brought neither my computer nor my instruments and I brought no cameras. I wanted memories, happy ones, and I am topped up currently.
It was SO GOOD TO SEE THEM. I miss my inlaw rellies and I am glad to have sat in their kitchen and caught up with them.