In Ottawa, the nation's capital, the second coldest, snowiest in the world after Mongolia's Ulan Bator, it's never over until it's over. Winter, that is. And winter, notoriously, is reluctant to have its reign for any given year, be 'over'. Nothing benevolent about its grumpiness, unready to allow spring to have its all-too-brief stay. We're accustomed to it, but we've never become used to it; a distinction that may seem elusive to a logical mind, but is not when you experience it.

Even though the arrival of the Spring Equinox is but days away, it could be a month down the atmospheric road. It's still mid-March, and March gives this region 20 percent of its winter snowfall. We've had substantial snowstorms in April on occasion, and even in early May. It's why the gardening season doesn't officially begin until May 24th.

Nature chose the Ides of March to invite her stormy adjutants to strategize a gift that left havoc in its wake. Of course it wasn't just Ottawa. Close to Montreal, in Quebec 300 motorists were left stranded overnight on a regional highway, two of whom died, because rescuers were unable to reach them.

Elsewhere, to our south, our neighbours in the United States were forced to cope with really unexpected weather conditions, and they're not accustomed to such fierce winter storms when spring is imminent; a spring that had already introduced itself to the very areas freshly inundated with snow. The cherry blossoms were well o their way to brightening the environment in Washington when they were hit with icy temperatures and lingering snow.

When we went out for our ravine walk yesterday we were somewhat surprised to see that the trails in the forest were in really fine shape after receiving 25 cm of fresh snow. The depth of the snowpack is another thing altogether since we need a spate of mild, sunny weather to reduce it and this added dump only increased it. Our little puppies didn't mind; they were in fact, overjoyed to be out, wading into the fresh snow, curious as usual about everything in the landscape.