From the back garden, chez Pipers!
It actually smells like spring out there.
Spring skiing sounds like a bust! 
I trust you didn’t find 3 dead friends in your backyard, then?
1 dead squirrel, 1 dead mouse; no Chiefs fans.
It’s interesting tracking the differences between our climates. I envy the real winters youse guys get – wait, let me rephrase that: I envy the beautiful snowy winters youse guys get, but definitely not the subzero temperatures which – I need not go into this again – almost killed me when I visited Saskatoon one winter in a light overcoat. But the clean, crisp snow of the prairies is truly beautiful. We just don’t get much of it here any more. The change in just the past 10 to 15 years has been really remarkable.
But when it’s time for the last of winter to go, I’m glad we get it sooner. The birds are back and have been furiously chirping here for over a month. My friend’s place a little further south where I went to view the eclipse has red cardinals flitting about all over the place (the birds, not the officials of the Catholic Church). The enterprising kid who runs a lawn mowing business has already arranged his “contract” for this summer and indeed will need to start work soon.
Easy enough to get by in a Saskatoon winter with a light overcoat, just need 3-4 good insulating layers underneath it.
All the ice is gone,
And the yard is grey,
It’ll green up soon,
If we get a rainy day.
The weather’s nice and warm,
As we get closer to May,
Saskatchewan dreamin’,
On such a springtime day …
Yeah, it’s starting to melt. We have huge piles of snow still.
The ice at the end of the driveway seems to be going away. Perhaps we can get a propane delivery. Ran out last week. It’s getting a bit chilly, but we deal with it by pointing a space heater at us.
We really mis our propane stove though. It’s our primary source of heat, and we like the ambiance.
“Spring on the Prairies
Comes like a surprise
One minute there’s snow on the ground
The next, there’s Sun in your eyes!”
George Harrison has a rather nice song about this… 
Boy, I like this.
What you call the Mamas and Papas, in Saskatoon?
We just got a rainstorm reminiscent of the middle of winter here in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Suddenly, I am hungry for Weetabix and don’t know why.