For the birds

It ain't summer till you have a lime slurpee.

That's what I think.

Hot day = need for lime and ice. Only place in town I know to get 'em is 7-11 in Bridgeland, but they run out fast. The guy who works there only on Saturdays is the only guy (he says) to order it in.

Memories of Stampede

Being a true-born Calgarian, Stampede is sort of a season for me. Kind of like Christmas. You prepare for it, you survive it, you move on, knowing it's coming next year. Hard to get whipped into the frenzy - I don't even go to the Parade (shocked gasps from the audience, I know). It gets in my way of going downtown. Tourists slow me down.

And yet, this year, I found myself more drawn in than usual. I entered some knitting in the "exhibition" portion of the Calgary Exhibition & Stampede (and got a 3rd-place rosette for my entrelac hat!). I volunteered to show people how to spin sheep fleece to yarn in the Barns with the Rare Breeds association, and in the Cabin near the Exhibition section, with my guild, the Sheep Creek Weavers. Riel was in town, doing her fighter-pilot thing with a static display of an F-18 jet (well, part of it, anyway) along with the other parts of our military. (She was in the parade, too! I even caught that bit on streaming real-time online coverage from the air-conditioned spacious comfort of my office but don't tell anyone). And Aurora had managed to fanagle a delay for her annual Montreal trek to be in town long enough to partake of the festivities.

Me, I went for the mini-donuts (gotta watch those suckers go down the river of oil). But then Riel got me in to the Chuckwagon races - for the first time ever, I got close enough to them to get mud on my hat...something you can't understand until you've felt the wind from a horse & rider barrelling by and the thunk! of a chunk of mud smacking your head. And because she's who she is, I got to go to the Chuck barns and see horses and muckety-mucks and drink Calgary Stampede-emblazoned Budweiser beer. Cool.

But I did get to take the kid, too. I brought her with me late on the last Saturday, and we did a kid's ride, and she finally got her greatest wish: to see the ShamWOW! presentation up close & personal, and own a set of her very own. Plus we ate things on a stick (a Tornado Potato). And she did a kid's ride that looked pretty cool - some kind of controlled reverse bungee jump. And then we watched the Grandstand Show...I have to admit, it was some good entertainment. Lucky kid, the next day, her Uncle Mik, AND Auntie Riel took her on the mean rides and behind-the-scenes experiences few Calgarians - and tourists - get at the Greatest Show on Earth. Great initiation.

But, me, my feet got really tired. Perhaps it's because wasn't wearing cowboy boots. Good thing two bits'll get you a short but sweet massage.

Picnic at Grampa's

It's just not a meal at the Kendall's without awesome food, home-grown beef, and some kind of kerfuffle involving an animal. Sometimes it's a cow, or a coyote (getting shot during dinner whilst prowling the cattle for an unattended calf), or a mule, or a dog.

Given that the cattle are gone, our choices were limited.

The Southern Kendalls - that is, Uncle David & Auntie Marion (Arizona) plus Cousin Rebecca (California) were in town, and most of us locals showed up. Auntie Olwyn & Uncle Monte brought a cooler full of yumminess, and my newly pregnant cousin Lindsay (and Juan) made munchies (and tasted them while at it - after all, they are eating for two) to tide us over. Auntie Laura was buzzing the kitchen with David & Marion shucking corn, when Grampa came busting in, badly needing a bucket of water for Chester.

This was new. Nobody worries about Chester. In fact, we all are often very busy getting him to go away. Chester is the Chesapeake Chocolate Lab Grampa adopted a few years ago, and he's a bundle of energy and is more than a little OCD about his "stick". A stick to Chester is anything he can coerce someone to toss for him more than once - so he can go get it, again & again. Today it was a partially rotted log. Last time I visited, it was a huge rubber shingle Grampa had dropped from his roofing project. Another time it was a broken bicycle tire.

Suddenly everyone was on the porch, bent over....Chester. The silly pooch had convinced the two visiting kids - second cousins, I guess, being progeny of Donnamom's Cousin Paul - to throw and throw and throw his "stick" for him for probably more than an hour. In summer. Nobody was keeping track because, well, the kids were busy and Chester wasn't bugging anyone. So, Chester stopped, finally, when he passed out, collapsing near the porch.

Poor Grampa. He was worried. And everyone worries when Grampa worries.

So we got cold packs and buckets of water and more water, and poured them on Chester, and coaxed him back to the land of the living.

And when that dratted dog could barely prop himself up again, on his two very wobbly front legs (ignoring the fact that his back end was not moving from the "passed out" position), the first thing he did was lean over to wrap his mouth around his stick...and promptly fell on his face.

Ever practical, Rebecca finally had the sense to hide his stick.

And then Shaun & Kristy showed up...with a puppy. Who proceeded to find Chester's stick, steal it, and make Chester follow him around.

So we decided to eat dinner.