Musings of Musang: Belated Hippy Newt's Ears!

Sunday, 9 March 2014

Belated Hippy Newt's Ears!

Apologies for the new year silence, I have not been too well, healthwise, for a few weeks.

Lots of writing and catching up to do! And how time flies! By the time I felt ready to write again, 2.3 months have passed.

I did take a whole bunch of photos, of some of the activities I've done in the few days when my body responds to medication. Carpe diem, as the Romans would say. On bad days, I just refer to them as Crappy Diem, take a slightly higher dose of painkillers than the maintenance dose, lie down, stay warm and hydrated and read.

And boy, did I read! 15 books were devoured in the "in between states" of pleasant, stupored, medicated, grogginess. Not quite as prodigious as my pre-illness reading habits (I usually go through about 3-4 books a week, prior to health problems) but it is a huge improvement. Onwards and upwards.

Books devoured, so far, in 2014

Here's some stuff that I've been up to, since the New Year. Went out snowshoeing twice (very short distances, 50 to 100m), which was very fun, despite having to take the rest of the week off to rest. Recovering from serious infections, and dealing with chronic pain makes the Great Outdoors somewhat a rare treat for me. But that's what makes it even more precious.

Fire Monkey has Fire!

Personally, I find the time to enjoy the smaller, easily overlooked things in life, a much missed past time.Walking s-l-o-w-l-y with snowshoes, and just looking around gives me a sense of calm that most meditation practitioners keeps telling you about. Being somewhat a hyperactive, ADHD-like fox, I usually attain the "meditative calm" when I go on long hikes, a physically intensive activity or when I go for a run (it uses up the excessive adrenaline, you see). 50-100m snowshoeing is a good start, though.

As good ole Plato once said in his work Phaedo:

“Never discourage anyone...who continually makes progress, no matter how slow.”

And the Great Spaghetti Monster knows I'm my very worst critic. LOL

Random Inukshuk like sculptures (no, I didn't build them)

My camera does not capture the colour hues correctly, so I did tweak the
saturation of the photos afterwards. Retina trumps CCD every time.

Watching the wind blowing the snow into dune-like formations is a pretty relaxing.
If you're dressed up warm

That's my other 2/3 snowshoeing way ahead of me. This was on Vee Lake.

Yes, there are wild Red Foxes here.

This is the closest I'll ever be to living on Planet Mars.

Other than snowshoeing, I did go for a couple of Snowmobiling (hanging on for dear life, really) with my other 2/3. There's an Island on Great Slave Lake that has a Bald Eagle's nest, that we came across while fishing in the summer. The birds weren't too thrilled to have us near .... so we couldn't get any good photos of the nest.

In the winter, on the other hand, is perfect to come close to the nest. They share the island with a family of Magpies. I hope they come back in the spring thaw. Might leave a couple of game cameras, and see if we can get some good videos of Eagle chicks and fledglings.