It's my habit when we return from a ravine walk in the afternoon with Jackie and Jillie, to download photographs from my little camera to my computer. I did that yesterday, and automatically deleted all the photos from the camera. Then I went looking for them on my picture files, and there weren't any to be found. Dismaying. I knew I had selected the right file I wanted to download to, but no photos, the file was empty. So I looked into adjoining files. Nothing. I kept looking here and there, but no luck. They went traipsing into the ether never to be seen again.

As an experiment I took a few pictures then went through the download routine again. No problem, there were the photos I experimented with, but who needed them? I advised myself not to be in such a hurry to delete them from the camera's storage henceforth until I was certain they had downloaded properly to my picture files. No problem downloading today's photo. Just one of those irritating little things that happen.

 

Spring hasn't yet arrived but we're expecting it. Winter decided to dash our expectations. Mind, it's a mild temperature day, albeit heavily overcast. The temperature rose to 2C by afternoon, and the reason it's so heavily overcast with dense, dark clouds is because it has been snowing all day. At that temperature the snow just melts where it falls. Of course it's falling on the snowpack that has become dense over time and thumbs its collective 'nose' at us, that it has no intention of melting.

Winter equals comfort foods, so as long as winter sticks around, we're eating those meals that provide us with an inner sense of well-being. Last night's pea-bean-vegetable soup with freshly baked miniature egg-loaves was perfect. Pate for Irving on his challah, avocado for mine. I had saved some leftover rice and decided this morning that we'd have another kind of comfort food, rice pudding. The rice simmered in milk, added cinnamon, brown sugar and raisins, and the result was perfect for a snowy day.

 

It seemed somehow fitting that the day was so overcast, the house shrouded in soft grey, since today is my house-cleaning day. Of course I was an hour 'behind' all day, thanks to the time-change of Sunday. I believe most people agree that 'Daylight Saving' time is one great big spoof. Aside from which there's no end of research that concludes it's very bad for our health. A rising incidence of stroke, heart attacks, traffic accidents, general bad humour, long-lasting trauma, neurological problems and even types of cancer attributable to the time-change, the loss of an hour upsetting our biological clock. Hard to believe, actually, other than that it's a nuisance.

 

 

Little Jackie began having one of his discomfort episodes that arise periodically. He doesn't feel well, and looks for sympathy. His appetite, always robust, disappears and he skips breakfast, even his most favourite part of it, scrambled eggs. He doesn't exactly mope about, but he indulges in more sleeping than usual, and wants to be fussed over. Both he and his sister communicated their interest in heading out for an afternoon walk, so that's just what we did, later than usual.

I wanted to put on a pot roast for dinner before we left for our hike in the forest, after the cleaning was done with the washing of floors, the last thing to complete the cleaning ritual. When we returned from our foray into the ravine, the fragrance of dinner simmering on the stove was very welcome.

 

We'd put waterproof jackets on the pups, but their usual ones would have done. Even though it was mild, it kept snowing. We knew we hadn't seen the last of the snow for this winter season. And there will be plenty yet to come before it's all over. It is beautiful to look at, and there's no complaints from this source. We had an altogether pleasant hike with the puppies. Jackie was a little subdued and asked to be picked up -- more for comfort than anything else, when we exited the ravine and were walking down the street toward home.