This week we put off our usual Tuesday shopping for Wednesday instead of Tuesday, figuring that with the long weekend and fairly widespread loss of hydro in Saturday's storm that brought down hydro towers and poles, we'd do well to skip a day. We knew that many businesses were affected by the power outage but we were beyond surprised to hear that it was only yesterday that the supermarket we frequent was returned to power.

All of the freezer lockers were empty. Power had been off long enough to produce a situation where it was not safe to eat frozen food whose optimum freezing temperature had dropped over the past few days. So that was a massive loss of food. And then we came along to the dairy refrigerated counters and all dairy products were missing from the shelves. There was milk available, but no coffee cream, no yogurt, no cream cheese, very little cheese blocks or eggs

 

On the good news side there was plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables just brought in. The meat counter looked as though a giant hand had scooped up most of the offerings. Canned food was undisturbed. Fortunately for us it was fresh perishable food we were after, so we weren't much affected by this severely limited stock. Along one aisle of frozen food cases the products hadn't yet been cleared off their shelves. There were shopping carts lined up alongside the aisle which was closed off to the public, bursting with once-frozen food destined for destruction.

 

If that isn't a sobering sight and a more sobering reality of the effect of the violent storm on the city's electrical grid, it's hard to say what is, aside from the devastation in the forest. Although the municipality has asked people to stay off the roads to give emergency and clean-up crews clear passage to do their jobs, clearing roadways of the debris of fallen trees, no one seemed to have paid much attention. The traffic we encountered on our way to do the food shopping was dense.

It's not hard to imagine how low-income people are feeling at this point. Food prices are skyrocketing, and any food they might have had in refrigerators and freezer if they're among the tens of thousands without power, would be ready for the garbage. Little wonder people were desperate to find ice to enable them to keep food frozen. Our power was restored a day after the storm. Our daughter's yesterday afternoon. But there are households and businesses on the fifth day following the storm being told, sorry, you'll have to wait another two to three days. Beyond dismal.

Later in the afternoon when we moseyed over to the ravine with Jackie and Jillie we discovered ourselves to be the only ones coursing through the trails. It was still and tranquil in the ravine, and now we've grown accustomed to the painful sight of the  wreckage of tall old trees. We came across one really huge old poplar that had produced an enormous amount of seeds; it was all you could see, entirely covering the downed tree's leaf mass. A testament to the poplars' survival instinct to cling to life. We've seen poplars that fell in the fall, completely severed from the base of the trunk, but when spring arrived, there was the fallen poplar, putting out new foliage.

On the forest floor we're on the hunt for the presence of Jack-in-the-Pulpits but this year is shaping up to be a tough one for the Jacks. We've only seen a few small specimens, which left us wondering why. On the other hand, there were also fewer trilliums than usual in May. So something is off with the vegetation. We soon picked up the presence of Engleman's ivy returned again to life. Where the clumps tend to emerge there's no nearby trees for them to clamber upward on, a strange set of circumstances for a creeping vine.

A little more work in the garden, planting portulaca in a bright, sunny spot, and more begonias; just cannot get enough of the begonias with their bight and beautiful, everblooming flowers. We're discussing between us, Irving and me, what to do about the suddenly-released garden space with the absence of the yew and the holly that he took down yesterday. We're agreed; a host of  hostas. I have the option of separating some of our existing hostas or to go out and look about at a place nearby that specializes in cultivating endless types of hostas...