A stormy summer

This weekend feels like I'm in the eye of a big storm. Not necessarily a bad storm, but one that keep you on your toes. Last couple of weeks have been very busy with work and my free weekend was taken up with a two-day prenatal course. Although interesting and worth while, it was also quite tiring and let's not even start talking about the chairs we were sitting on!
This past weekend was Civic Holiday in Ontario, which means we all had the Monday off. It's become a bit of a tradition that I work that weekend at the PRF. And this year was no difference. Luckily it was pretty quiet without any crazy accidents like washed-out roads or extreme dry spells. The highlight of the weekend was probably the sighting of three river otters in one of the small lakes. Really cool! Unfortunately I did not have a camera so I didn't take any pictures.
I spent the second half of the week at the PRF as well, to host the CIF's Teacher's tour (which included some talks) and the next day a presentation for the sustainable communities with CFB Petawawa.
In the meantime Nolan lived the bachelor life while maintaining a smooth household :)
Luckily I was able to work one day at home in between as well to catch my breath, since I sometimes have a hard time realizing that I can't go the same speed anymore as I used to. I am 30 weeks pregnant now, and for the first time I actually feel pregnant. As in, I can really notice my belly and my decreased stamina. Not that I'm complaining, it's been a pretty smooth ride so far, but I guess it's starting to get real now!

This coming week is going to be just as crazy. I'll be spending a good chunk of the week at the PRF again, while we're hosting the Eastern Research Forest Managers Meeting. Since we're hosting it this year, we are responsible for everything from catering to agenda and speakers. Fun! But also challenging. I only have to present at one site, so it's not too bad. And hopefully I can sneak a nap in during some of the indoor sessions at the hotel so I can keep my energy level up!
But if all goes well, this should be the last busy week that involves travelling, and from then on it will be mostly Ottawa based work. And I'll be off work in less than two months :)

This crazy summer work schedule matches some of the crazy summer weather we've had. Lots of thunderstorms, microbursts, downpours, and even tornados (in other parts of Ontario). The town of Petawawa got hit pretty hard a couple of weeks ago with lots of damage to trees and even houses. The PRF had quite a few trees down as well, but not to the same extent as Petawawa itself. And that was the third storm in just as many weeks. The new normal?

Nolan is doing well. He just finished a Java course (computer course, not the coffee!), and is now back into running. He signed up for a half marathon in September, so the pressure is on!
The animals are also doing really well. Zora is still full of energy but a lot of fun to have around and super playful (especially with Murphy).  The cats are really enjoying the outdoors (the backyard is now completely fenced off so they're safe there), and although we have to put Fertile outside, once she's there she loves it.

So all in all things are going really well. Sometimes it's hard to imagine that things will change a lot in a couple of months, and we're really excited about it, but I also feel that there is more to me than 'just' being pregnant.

My first week of being 33...

Was spent in the bush! But first, of course, my birthday :) It was somewhat low-key, but really what I wanted. We went to see the musical Wicked, which was indeed wicked good. Very well done, and very professional cast. Before the show (it was a matinee), we went out for lunch with Perry, the lady that sits besides us when we go to musicals, which was really nice, although the food and service was disappointing... But it didn't ruin our day! Sunday morning we celebrated by going out for breakfast with our running group (almost complete!), which was also nice.
Nolan got me some really nice earrings. I guess my small studs (I have studs and small hoops) were starting to drive him nuts, so he decided to upgrade to some nice real diamonds. Don't they say diamonds are a girl's best friend? Not sure I agree, but those earrings are darn pretty! He also got me some beautiful roses. Looking familiar?

As I mentioned before, it's been very dry, and any rain we've had so far has always been accompanied by lots of lightning. And lightning is a number one cause of forest fires. The Thursday before my birthday, the students up in the fire towers at the PRF spotted a large fire on CFB Petawawa. By Friday, it had grown to over 100 ha, en Sunday it was up to 200 ha, and the east entrance of Algonquin Park was closed. The fire was close to the main entrance road, but also close to the PRF. Staff at the PRF was starting to burn out after many days spent in the towers or patrolling the forest for fires, so they asked me if I could help out. And why would I say no to a week in the field?! Indeed, no reason to say no! They also asked me to come out since I have a reputation of bringing lots of water. Remember from last year? Read here...  Well it worked, within an hour of arriving at the PRF, the sky opened up, and we got a short downpour. Which resulted in 4 mm of rain. And lots of lightning... So not a good scenario. A couple of days later several fires had started in Algonquin Park, but luckily nothing too major. I actually spent half a day up in the tower the day with most fire activity in the Park, and it was actually really cool to watch the fire bombers dumping the water on the fires. I was glued to my binoculars!
Below are some photos of the view of the tower, as well as some photos to show how dry it really is...

Pretty bad... Luckily we didn't have any fires at the PRF itself, but if something was to break out, it could spread very quickly, and that's why we're so alert.
After a week at the PRF, I went back home on Sunday and started my intensive French training right away: every morning for 4 weeks, after which I'm supposed to do oral exam. It's tough, but it's also going quite well. My French did not get as rusty as I thought it would be. This week it's actually only four mornings, since I'm back at the PRF, working another weekend (and a long one this time, Civic Holiday!).  Luckily Nolan is coming up for a few days as well, so at least he's not a bachelor again this weekend. We did get some rain on Tuesday (and lightning), but the fire index is back up, so the students are back up in the towers as well. They are calling for some rain this weekend, but also lots of lightning. Hopefully we'll get some real rain in the near future. And not just for us, also for the farmers and others in the region that need this rain so badly. Let's all do a rain dance!!

Home away from home

A quick update between all my travels. And again another update written on my BlackBerry while on the bus on my way home. I'm getting pretty good at this!
First of though, Fertile. After an improvement Monday morning, she seemed to be worse when we came home from work. She was still not good Tuesday, so we decided to take her to the vet. They ran a bunch of tests and checked everything out. Also to be sure, they gave her some fluids. The tests all came back negative, but she still didn't really seem to get better. Until Wednesday morning, when Nolan reported that she was pretty much back to normal. She even fought with Murphy again. So we won't know what happened, but maybe the fluids did help.

After I got back from the vet, I headed to Petawawa where I would spend the next few days. AGM of the Friends of the PRF Tuesday evening, and then we hosted a 'take your kid to work day' on Wednesday. With 5 kids and 12 adults it made us wonder if some of the adults also wanted to check out the PRF and maybe just spend the day in the bush.  But it was fun to tour some of the Ottawa folks around as well. The weather was absolutely amazing, and who doesn't like to spend a day in the bush when it's so nice, right?
One of my Ottawa co-workers said: so this is where you spend so much time. Nice!
Nice indeed :)

After I got back to the hotel, I decided to go for a run, since it was so beautiful outside. There is a nice trail system in Petawawa, but as usual, I was paying more attention to the surroundings, and not so much to the trail, which resulted in a flat-forward-saved-by-my-hands fall. I didn't really hurt myself, but my right shoulder is a bit sore today.
After my run, I met up with Krista, which was really nice. It had been a while since I'd seen her. It also made me realize that I sometimes do miss the valley. However, I am also very happy with our place in Kanata, and this way I have the best of both worlds!

This morning we toured the Base Commander of CFB Petawawa around, which went very well. If only we'd had more time! Unfortunately the nice weather we had yesterday left us today, and we made due with grey and rainy weather. But still nice to be outside.

Tomorrow I'm heading to Port Hope and then Granaraska for the OWA chapter summit until Sunday. So Nolan is having a lot of alone-time, but I think he is somewhat enjoying that as well. Of course, I will leave him a honey-do list :)
And how could I forget, Monday was Halloween! We had a total of 158 kids, and then had to turn the lights of, because we ran out of candy! I have never seen so many kids on the street. Good thing we ran out of candy: I really had my fair share..

A typical weekend

Remember last weekend I worked at the PRF? Roads washed out and we had to close the gates due to safety reasons. You can read about it here.
This weekend I am up at the PRF again, but it looks like this might be a more typical weekend. Yesterday was pretty quiet, and the fire index was low enough so I didn't have to send the student up the fire tower. This morning it was still pretty low, but when we checked at 1 pm, it had climbed enough that I decided to send a student up, just to make sure everything is ok.

Now I can hear you thinking, what is the fire index? The fire index is the Fire Weather Index, developed based on fire research done at the PRF. It takes several components into account, such as rainfall, temperature, wind speed and humidity, and based on those number calculates the FWI.  At the PRF we rely on it when deciding on whether to man the fire towers or not. Normally you man one fire tower when the index goes up to around 4, and two towers when you get close to 7. We normally check the index at 9 am, and again at 1 pm. In the afternoon, it also provides you with an 'predicted FWI', which we use in our decision to send someone up. There are two weather stations, so we receive two different FWI's. Since rainfall can be very local around here, the numbers can vary quit a bit. The weather stations closest to the office gave us a number of 3.2, and a prediction of 9.2. The station further away had a current FWI of 2.1, and a predicted FWI of 6.9. The station further away received more rain, and has therefore a lower number. Pretty cool, eh? So to be on the safe side, I sent one student up to the tower nearest by. Normally you would send someone to the further tower, and then if smoke is detected, someone else can quickly go to the nearest tower to get the second bearing. However, the far end of the property is still pretty wet, and there is no activity on the base, so the chances of seeing anything on that side are pretty low (knock on wood!). Hopefully there is no smoke detection today!

Another task is to make sure the roads are in good shape, no washouts or fallen trees, etc. It's one of the perks of working weekends, I get to see stuff like this:

Not bad, eh?
But I also get a lot of work done on the weekends, since there is minimal interruption from email or phone. The only thing that is hard: to be inside on a gorgeous day like today when the woods are calling...

Parents - Update

It's been a week now since my parents arrived, and it seems like time is just flying by! But by the same token, I can barely remember what we did do yesterday. I'll try to give a bit of a recount...
I had to go to the PRF last week for a tour of our HQ group out of Ottawa. I wasn't feeling great, but decided to make the trip anyway. I was supposed to spend the afternoon there for meetings, but decided to go home since I just wasn't feeling great. My parents spent the night in Kingston after visiting with the Belleville gang, and would visit with Nolan's parents on Thursday. I love the fact that they are here, but it was also nice that since I wasn't feeling well, I could just go home and crash on the couch without being social!
The next day the cold really hit me, and I actually called in sick. I think it's the first time ever that Nolan has seen me sick! Needless to say we took it easy Thursday and Friday, which we both had off, and just did some work around the house.
On Saturday we went to the Museum of Nature which was quite impressive. The best part? The bug department!! We saw grasshoppers mating and laying eggs, and we say really cool bugs emerging from the soil! Nolan and I were both mesmerized, and had to be removed by staff when we were hanging around for too long...
Sunday we went running with Ann, and were actually able to do 16 km! Quite the achievement (if I may say so), since we hadn't run an awful lot in the past week, and the mercury was started to climb as well. But we took our time, and ended up having a great run! We had some conversations that I would love to post here, but I was sworn to secrecy...
Nolan's parents showed up for lunch, and the parents took over the house. We really had nothing to control anymore! But it was great to see how well along they all get.
It had been a hot and muggy day, and by the end of the day, a sudden storm rolled in. We watched it come in, but it still hit us quite unexpectedly. Strong winds, heavy downpours and lots of lightning made for a very impressive storm.
Luckily we didn't have any damage, but some people were not so lucky. The main stage at Ottawa's Bluesfest collapsed (maybe two storms in just over a week was too much??). Luckily there were only two injuries and nothing more major. It could have been so much worse.

I worked Monday morning, but in the afternoon my mom and I went for a great walk in the Greenbelt. We say a buck with a huge rack and some other small animals. It was just nice to be out in the woods, with great company. We stopped at Don Cherry's (!!) for a beer, before making the track home. Well deserved, right?!  We also went for Indian food for dinner. Of course we ate too much, but it was worth it!
On Tuesday I had to head back to the PRF to host the Meet and Greet for the judges of the Canadian Forces Sustainable Communities, but the storm knocked down a tree on the Visitor's Centre, and it damaged the displays and the building, so that option was out. A new venue was quickly found, and the Ottawa Valley Waste Recovery Centre offered to host the judges. I was still allowed to present on the PRF (and the judges were quite interested, just like rest of the group), but on top of that got a tour of the centre, which was very interesting!!
My folks in the meantime decided to spend the day in Mont Tremblant, and ended up liking it so much that they decided to spend the night there as well.  They are expected to come home tonight, and then we'll make some plans for the next few days. Nolan and I have time off until they go back home Monday night, so time to do stuff.
However, we are experiencing a heat wave, which can make it a bit harder to do a lot of stuff outside. They are forecasting 35 degrees for tomorrow, but also a humidex of 47... In other words, a sauna!
We're now trying to find something to do for tomorrow, which is a very special day since it's my birthday! So to be continued...

Water

I recently finished Angels and Demons by Dan Brown, and if you are familiar with that book, you know that the four elements (water, fire, air and earth) play an important role. In my last post, I wrote about the fire. This time, it's time for water...

This weekend it was my turn to supervise the fire crew at the PRF. On a normal summer weekend, that would mean that two students would be in, manning the two fire towers for fire detecting. However, with all the rain we have had in the last few days, there would be no need to have the students come in, and I would mainly be working in the office, open and close the gates (the PRF is open to the public in the summer, mainly for fishing), and keep an eye on the place. Nothing too crazy, you'd say. It was looking like it would be quiet and I was actually looking forward to catching up to some of my work and get things done. Well, it was not to be...

Take a look at this and try to find the differences:

The photos are taken from a slightly different angle, but they were taken at the same place, about 2 hours apart... If you click on the top photo, you can see a beaver dam in the distance (where the green ends, and the darker colour starts, is where the dam is), and the water is obviously lower on this side of the dam. The second picture shows the water to the road, and the dam in the distance. The water is just simply flowing over the dam. There is a serious threat the road here can break, if the culvert can't handle all the water.

Now look at these:

Yep, same place again and about 3 hours apart as well. So a complete wash out. We had opened the gates this morning, but luckily nobody got stuck on the other side of this wash out, and we were able to have everybody out by 3 pm. I decided to lock the gates for the rest of the day, seeing that this could be a potential hazard... Once I found this wash out, I decided to follow the water to see if this wave had taken out more culverts. Well, unfortunately it did, and a I came upon a smaller one at the far end of the PRF. Some other crossings are not very stable either, and all the crossings have humongous water levels. Definitely something to keep an eye on.

In the midst of this all, a lady came to the office, obviously upset, telling me that her husband had left to go home, and was supposed to be home two hours ago... Luckily that ended well, and I think he probably just lost track of time.

At least I will have some help tomorrow, so we can check out all the crossings and culverts and make sure they are either well marked, or cleared from any debris. So much for trying to do office work. But it sure makes for a fun and interesting day!

Fire

Last night, around 9 pm, we heard the sound of a fire truck. We didn't think much of it, since you hear them more often, although this one did sound a bitter closer than normal. Nolan looked outside, and he could see the reflection of fire in the windows of houses across the street! That made us realize it was a bit closer than usual. We ran outside, and first thought it was one of the houses on our street, but quickly we noticed the huge flames and large amounts of smokes coming from a house at the end of our street, across the road. I have never seen a fire like that; the house was complete engulfed in flames and you could see and hear several small explosions. Fire trucks kept arriving, and it was quite amazing to see how quickly and efficiently they went to work. When the fire spread to the other house, you could hear a common awe among the dozens of people watching the fire. The fire fighters were able to knock the fire down in about 45 minutes, and were able to save most of the second house. Watching last night, we really thought they would knock the first house down; it sure didn't look like any of that would survive. Luckily nobody got hurt, and everybody was able to get out on time. Nevertheless, two families were displaced and lost so much.

The Ottawa Sun newspaper has a story and some dramatic photos, which shows quite well the intensity o the fire.  The Ottawa Citizen article gave it some attention as well, and it was on several newscasts. Which in return turned our street into a huge parking lot for media vehicles.
I just walked by it from my way from work and took this picture with my BlackBerry:

All in all a pretty scary situation, and you realize how quickly things can take a turn, and change your life forever. One our to-do list this weekend: make sure we have a decent inventory of our house... They have not figured out yet what caused the fire.

On a more personal level, Nolan will be a bachelor again this weekend. I have fire duty (how peculiar...) at the PRF this weekend. Luckily we've had quite a bit of rain this weekend, so I won't have to worry too much about actual forest fires, but I will be there to keep an eye on the place, and it's also a great time to catch up on a lot of work without too much interruption. Who else works on the weekend??

Busy Expo, heat wave and my life in general...

Expo 150 turned out to be a bit more attractive to people than first anticipated. The last estimations say that about 40,000 (!) people visited the site! No wonder if felt somewhat crowded on Saturday... But all in all it has been a huge success, for the organizers, but also for the PRF. We drew a lot of attention to our booth, which was exactly what we were there for! But by the time I came home on Sunday, I was pretty zonked. At least I had about 5 hours of weekend left!

The last few days have been nice and warm, although not as warm as the one day crazy-warm-humid-hazy-sticky-42 degree day we had last week. The interesting thing was that after this crazy hot day on Thursday, the temperature on Thursday never made it above the 20 degree mark. Funny how climate and weather do their own thing. I like it! Although I do prefer the warm weather over the I-wish-I-had-a-sweater-day. The last few days have been nice and warm as well (30 or so), and the weekend looks awesome. Mid-twenties and lots of sunshine. We could use a little bit of rain though, especially since our grass is starting to turn yellow. We also haven't cut it in over two weeks. It just doesn't grow. Somewhat opposite to earlier this spring, when everything was way, way too wet! The bush is still pretty moist, with lots of mosquito-producing puddles...
A recent study confirmed that Canadians like talking about the weather. I bet you that study only focused on Canadians, because I think everyone likes to talk about the weather! At least the Dutch :) Makes you wonder how will fund a study like that. Couldn't they do something a bit more useful?

After twelve days of work, I'm happy it's Friday.  It's been a good, but long two weeks, and I'm ready for some down-time. And perhaps trying to get a run in? It's been a week now since I went out for a run, so hopefully I am able to get out tonight. But sometimes life gets in the way. Or OCTranspo, our city bus company... Last Wednesday it took me exactly two (!!!!) hours to get home. Isn't that ridiculous! It normally doesn't take much more than an hour, which is enough as is. But this time the first bus got cancelled, the second was full, after which I got frustrated and took another bus, which meant I had toured our neighbourhood... At least the bus driver was nice!
On a said note, remember the two baby raccoons we took to the vet a couple of weeks ago? The vet decided to put them down. I know it was the right decision, but it still sucks...
Fertile was at the vet yesterday for some teeth cleaning, and apparently she made a tonne of friends among the clinic staff. Everybody loved her! No wonder, when we picked her up she had those big eyes which looked even bigger on her already tiny head. Just really cute.

Raccoons...

This afternoon when I came home from work, I decided to water the plants outside, so I opened the garage. In the garage, I heard this fairly loud noise, almost like a bird. It came from the side of the house, but when I checked it out, it turned out it was not a bird. There were two baby raccoons and one of them was making a lot of noise. The other one was too weak to really move or produce any noise. It really was a heartbreaking sight. I called several organizations, the city, the humane society and wild life sanctuaries, but nobody was willing, or able, to help. It was obvious they were suffering, dehydrated and desperately looking for their mother. We don't know what happened to the mother. Maybe she got killed, or perhaps she decided to abandon the young.  Whatever happened, it was clear she was not nearby and I felt we had to do something for them. You can't just leave them there!
In a last resort, we called our vet, and asked them if we could bring them there, and take them out of their misery. They were very helpful and accepted them without any trouble. We left them there, and they told us that they would assess them, and decide then whether they would try to keep them alive, or do the humane thing and euthanize them.  They said they would let us know what they decided, so I'll keep you posted.
Raccoons can be a nuisance, but seeing two small babies is absolutely heartbreaking. They are very, very cute but also very helpless. And yes, I know I have a huge soft spot for animals in need. Nothing wrong with that!

As for a follow up on last week, especially with regards to our presentation: it got cancelled... The ADM received last-minute notice that he needed to be somewhere else, so unfortunately, we will have to postpone. I was quite disappointed, but there is nothing we can do, and we'll try to get him out there later this summer. And we didn't waste our time too much; we will be using an adapted version of the presentation for our neighbouring base commander next week. Can't hurt to recycle presentations :)
Work has been good, but it is also busy. The good thing, however, is that it is very diverse and exciting, and also rewarding. So all in all, I can only say that I love my job!

Friday came, and went...

Friday came much quicker than I had expected, and the week ended on a very good note. Why? Even though I came home late on Thursday, and managed to get about 6 hours of sleep, Friday turned into an extremely productive, successful and rewarding day. Time flies when there are lots of things to do with a tight deadline, and I love it!
The next few weeks will also be chaotically busy. I'll be at the PRF quite a bit; on average 2-3 days a week for the next few weeks, plus a tonne of meetings for the OWA. Both provincial, our chapter, and for the business development committee I lead. So no reason to sit still for too long!
In the meantime, we're also trying to get our garden in order, continue the fight against dandelions, and also enjoy it. The rainy weather has returned, but hopefully spring will return shortly. It was too nice to let go of already!
Besides our busy lives (Nolan is slightly less busy, but also has no problems keeping himself busy with work and the house), we also take time to do other things. We went to the NAC yesterday to say 'i think i can'. A dance performance by the Toronto Theatre for Young People. Very impressive! We also watched a movie last night, Zodiac. I hear you think: big deal. Well, actually it was. We realized it was the very first time we actually watched a movie since moving into this house... We normally watch shorter shows; especially I have a really hard time staying focused (or awake...) during movies. But this was an evening well spent!
In other news, we might be going to Salt Lake City this summer!! Well, it depends on whether Nolan gets approval to attend a conference. But if he does, our summer vacation destination has been decided!

Training and the return of winter...

This past week I was lucky enough to take a three day training session on Learning Organization Community of Practice (LOCoP) for advanced practitioners, focusing on strategic planning. The session was facilitated and led by Sylvie Lapointe, who is an absolutely fabulous teacher. She started her own company, L2Emerge, a few years ago but used to work for CFS. If you ever need a facilitator, I highly recommend her!
The days were intensive, but very productive. The funny thing is that we never thought that we would actually talk about strategic planning, vision, etc. Beforehand I thought the session would more focus on the preparation before you facilitate a session, which we talked about as well, but it was so much more! And on top of it all, it fit in perfectly with our National Research Forests session that we planned for Monday and Tuesday.  We received some great guidelines for a 'Taking Stock' exercise. Guess what was on our agenda for Tuesday morning? Indeed: Taking Stock. We thought we would just talk about it for a bit, and move on, but now we actually have the tools to make it successful. Same for a mission statement we're trying to come up with; we now know how to tackle this effectively without it being too dry, and making sure everybody is involved and have their say!
This training also fits in very nicely with the SRI International training I took in the fall. The approaches are slightly different, but they both offer very valuable points and advice, and we'll be using both strategies next week. It is just really nice that an investment in training is actually useful.

I was supposed to leave for Petawawa this morning to guide a group of university students around the PRF, but woke up to a crazy blizzard! It was a bit unexpectedly, especially since we received 30mm of rain yesterday, and were maybe secretly hoping that winter would come to an end. No such luck! So I decided to cancel my trip, and now I'll go up tomorrow morning instead. Missed my coffee date with Krista though :(
We almost went running as well, but decided last minute that it would probably be a disaster and went snowshoeing instead. Never knew that snowshoeing in wet, fresh snow could prove to be such a great workout! We were both sweaty and had our heart rates racing! We put them on about 5 minutes from our house, and just snowshoed down the streets. There was more than enough snow, and now plough in sight! Until this afternoon of course, when we could go out and shovel the end of our driveway again. I guess being on a corner lot does have one disadvantage: we seem to be getting an awful lot of snow dumped on our driveway. And consequently, our snowbank is the highest in the street!

Petawawa

I think I can say that Tuesday was the highlight of my week: I actually got to spend a day in the field! Together with some of my colleagues, we looked at a long-term research site, as well as several new research sites for a potential biomass trial. The weather was fantastic, the company was great, and the fresh air was, well, refreshing! The timing was great, since it poured all day on Wednesday, which was when we were stuck inside all day for meetings. Tiring, but still fruitful. Today will be my last day in Petawawa and at the PRF, and we'll host the Management Advisory Committee, for a meeting to update them on the progress on our strategic and management plans. I'll be presenting a part as well, so we'll see how that goes!

Tonight I'll be sleeping in my own bed, and then tomorrow a day in the office to do some last minute preparations for our upcoming forum next week. I just checked the weather forecast and it looks like it might be a good idea to dig out my long john's, especially for the field day on Tuesday. Snow and -15. Great!

Renfrew County Outdoor Woodlot Conference

Yesterday was the annual Renfrew County Outdoor Woodlot Conference, organized in partnership with the Ontario Woodlot Association, of which I am a (board) member. And on top of that, the location of this year's conference was the Petawawa Research Forest. Needless to say that I spent all day at the PRF yesterday! The weather was frisk but beautiful and the colours are starting to come out, in other words, perfect conditions! Darwin and I showed the participants the world class Meridian Road study, that looks at white pine regeneration, Craig and Ian talked about red pine management, and Suzanne and Ian explained biomass harvesting. After lunch, the participants were introduced to sugar bush management and how to successfully manage your woodlot to produce maple syrup. Overall, it was a very successful day, and a great way to show everybody that the PRF is still alive and kicking!

Afterwards the Algonquin Section of the CIF had organized a little event to honour some long-time members and researchers, including Ben Wang and Kit Yeatman. 

After a long day, I was really hoping to finally sleep in on Sunday... However, Nolan had other plans :-) He had told Ann that we would meet her downtown for a run. Oh well, it was nice to stretch the legs a bit, even though I ran alone since Ann and Nolan decided to go for a walk (Nolan still was not feeling a 100%, and Ann is slightly injured). The colours are so nice, that I decided to go through the Arboretum. It turned out to be a nice run, until I was getting close to the end of my run. A squirrel ran out in front of me, and a car just came down the road, and hit the squirrel. The squirrel got hit, and was killed instantly. It might have been a good thing that I was pushing myself a little bit at that point, so hopefully most of the blood in my body was used for running, and not for my brains and conscience... Still, it was quite upsetting to see this black squirrel get hit in front of me. You always see so many dead squirrels on the road and every time it breaks my heart. I know, I'm probably a softy, but it does make you realize that life can be over in a heartbeat.  So, enjoy life as much as you can. It's worth it!