As a driver and owner of vehicles living in the Ottawa area where winters can be pretty brutal, you've got to err on the side of caution, anticipating ferocious winter storms and driving in less than optimal road conditions, and commit to equipping your vehicle with winter-road-worthy tires to maximize your changes of surviving those driving threats that winter can pose.

My husband always used to change the oil in his vehicles, and I hated him doing that. I kept urging him to take the car to a garage and let them do it since they're professionally equipped to do all these things. Years ago, a co-worker of mine was changing his vehicle's motor oil in his garage when the vehicle slipped off the mounts he had it on, and crushed him to death against the garage door.

My husband was always careful, always mindful of taking precautions but that gave me little relief from my concerns. Eventually, the cars he bought became more and more difficult to work on, and he also became older and older. Now that he's in his 80s, I breathed a sigh of relief that he finally agreed not to do those strenuous things any longer.

Until several days ago when he went looking on line and accessed a seller (would you believe, called Jack and Jill Tire?) to order a mechanical tire lift to simplify changing tires. For the last year since he turned 82, my husband had taken his car and truck to our local Canadian Tire to have them change from all-weather tires to ice tires and then back again, spring to winter, winter to spring. A time-consuming, physically difficult job he'd always done himself.

He'd drive to the shop, leave the vehicle, walk the 20 minutes it took to get back home, then walk back when the vehicles were finished, to retrieve them. But, he ordered the device designed to carry the tires and to lift them to the desired height of the wheel to make it simpler to change those tires. It arrived yesterday, and he studied the schematic to put it together.

Yesterday was a decent enough day, with sun for the most part, little wind and a high temperature of a balmy 6C. Saturdays are shopping days for many people, both those in the workforce and by force of habit, those no longer employed, enjoying their retirement years. Often we can go through a long walk on the forest trails in a wide circuit through the ravine without coming across anyone else.

Yesterday wasn't one of those days. First we came across a tiny figure of a woman whom we've seen on several other occasions, walking her shaggy giant of a dog, a Bernese Mountain Dog. While we stood briefly talking to her, a small black Lab we know well dashed downhill to reach where we stood and happily ran circles around us while her person waited for her to return at the top of the hill. Jackie and Jillie didn't respond to her invitation to play, but the Bernese did, clumsily attempting to cavort with the much smaller Lab.

Later, as we went on much further on our walk there was an English Lab we'd also met before, the little Schnauzer always trailing a long rope, and a mahogany-burnish-coated Rhodesian Ridgeback, with all five interacting very sociably. The Ridgeback was particularly interested in the little Lab whose lovely coat was the very same shade as its. The Ridgeback seemed intent on forging an emotional bond with the Lab, but the little Lab was uneasy and appeared somewhat fearful, while strangely enough, Jackie and Jillie seemed perfectly comfortable in the Ridgeback's easy presence, while the Schnauzer was disinterested in the presence of all other four dogs.

Observing them all responding to one another is a fairly interesting pastime; somewhat like perceiving the interactions between people with their various impressions of one another.