A Winter’s Tale, NOT

Juno, 2022, Kamloops BC

Six year old Labradoodle, Juno, lives with her humans in Summerland in the BC Okanagan. This year they have had almost no winter at all. She is not impressed. See below.

I am disappointed, downhearted, and furious that winter has skipped us this year in the South Okanagan. There was only one week in November when we had a bit of snow. PaPaw had to scrape the sidewalk twice — and that’s all folks for winter this year. Not impressed.

I love winter, not so much that I might move to say, Saskatchewan, Southern Ontario, or Northern BC. You see, I enjoy all four seasons including the white one throughout an annual cycle. We visited Nelson BC over Christmas where we should have enjoyed a white Christmas. Sadly, virtually no snow throughout our short visit. Just a bit of slippery ice.

I know of other dogs, a couple in Ontario and one in Saskatoon for instance, who continue to enjoy winter games, just like the Olympics. In both places, their humans would say this year has been a little too cold for their tastes and comforts. Their dogs, however, while chilly, have not complained.

Meet Bunter (Bertie Wooster’s man) and Watson (Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street), two border collies who enjoy a good life on a permaculture farm two hours north of Toronto. Their MaPaw, Sylvia, suggested they develop a set of winter Olympics for the farm — specifically, Front Crawl Shoveling, Dog Destruction, Snowy Gate Hurdles, Alpine Breakfast, Porch Vault, Doghouse Curling, Two Person Relay and the Ariel Sweep. These sound like such fun, but one needs snow and temperatures below -10 C for courses to be constructed. Not going to happen here anytime soon.

Closer to home, but in Saskatoon, our friend Lorne constructs agility courses worthy of any Olympic racer. His dog, Jake, loves to run through tunnels and jump up on knolls; depending on the temperature (recently below -30 C he could well spend the morning on the track.

Sigh; and here I am, basking in a rusky, green +/- 2 C weathered blah. Boring, boring, boring. I can but dream of a competitive snow Olympics. All I can do now is wait for Blue Jays training camp to begin. No snow in Dunedin, Florida I know. But what a great team will soon assemble to commence another run towards a World Series victory.

Great to be back online. Woof.

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