June 1 - 14 Project list from Bonnyville to PGR

June 1
Back to Dave writing again. Thanks Leslie for keeping us going and hey, we're in the same month now!!

We're staying at the house for another week so Leslie can work some shifts and I'll keep ticking projects off the list here at the house. My leg is feeling better so after I had a decent breakfast I geared up for a run. Great way to start the day! I want to try a longer distance now that we're close to the 10K race on June 9. I managed to get 8k or 5mi so I'm happy with that. The rest of the day was the usual stuff. Leslie is organizing the stuff left in the house to see what we keep or get rid of and she breaks it up with work on the flower beds etc. I just keep finding more stuff to fix or more yard work to do. Not very blog worthy.
June 2 
We did our usual project stuff and then in the afternoon we decided to take Margaret for a walk. We headed down the main road and as we were walking we decided to see if our friends Andre and Shannon were home. They bought a beautiful home overlooking Moose Lake not far from us and we haven't even stopped by to say hi yet. What's up with that? We walked up their driveway and could tell right away they were there with all the evidence of work happening at the edge of the road. Looks like a major landscaping redo happening. We found them out back on their huge deck with some other friends that had stopped by. Of course we were welcomed in with big hugs and handshakes for a frosty beverage on the deck. Did we time this visit right or what?? Can you believe that we didn't take one picture of their beauty new place? Well we didn't, so sorry guys. We were given the grand tour of their house and trust me it is grand! They bought a great place and are putting their touches on it to make it even better. I did notice there is lots of room to park an RV on their paved driveway.....keep that in mind for future reference lol.
Their other friends had to leave but we stayed for a second round of drinks (maybe 3!) and enjoyed visiting and catching up a little. A really fantastic couple of hours just relaxing and catching up and then we walked back to our house for supper and the usual TV and bedtime. Very nice place you have Andre and Shannon and it was really nice to get to spend some time together.
June 3
Leslie is working at 8am today and our plumber is coming first thing to install the new water heater. Sure enough, Mark from Trademark Plumbing arrived just after 8:00 with another fellow and they started straight away on the install. Of course the fittings are a little different from our old one so he has to solder in some copper to get it done. They hoisted up the new one and the other plumber left with the old one. There might be some good parts on the old one but it's junk to me and it's heavy so they can take it. Mark finished up and cleaned up by lunch time and we have hot water as promised. Of course there is a pretty good bill with it but these guys are quality plumbers and I have a saying I like; "Quality is not expensive, it's priceless". I have known the owners of Trademark for many years and I did get a really good deal. Thanks guys!

We used this pic before, all new and shiny!

Leslie has an appointment with a chiropractor after work to see if he can help with the pain in her back. He gave her a couple new exercises to try and then she got the usual twist and crack treatment. Time will tell. Hopefully she finds some relief. It's the weirdest thing but if she keeps moving like walking or even dancing around the room she feels better. If she sits too long or bends over to pick something up then it just spasms. We'll keep trying different things and hopefully land on a good fix.

After Leslie got home I of course showed her the new water heater and then we had a beverage before supper. I happened to look out the kitchen window to the west and could see a huge column of smoke in the air. It's dry as toast around here with no rain in weeks and none in the forecast. Sure enough a post pops up on Leslie's Facebook that there is a forest fire across the lake from us. 

The start of the Moose Lake fire.

Within the hour we watched as rapid response water bombers flew over the house and did many circuits filling up with water from the lake. We learned that they had 5 rapid response planes, 2 helicopters and a larger water bomber in play that evening. By the next morning that included 110 fire fighters from all around the area. Hit er' big and hard was the plan. Only a few homes had to be evacuated and nobody was injured so that's great. The fire consumed about 120 hectares of boreal forest.

It took a few days of 24/7 work by all those awesome folks but they stomped that fire out and then mother nature capped it with a couple heavy rains. 

On the news afterwards.... the cause of the fire was human and it started at the edge of a rural road in the ditch. Likely someone tossed a cigarette out their window in tinder dry conditions. The investigation is ongoing. So stupid and completely avoidable.

June 4

I have an appointment in St Paul at the Dodge dealer for my truck. We have had a slow speed clunk in the rear diff for a year now and nobody can find the source. Last year a dealer in Stony Plain replaced a carrier in the diff but the noise returned within a day or two so I decided in frustration to just keep driving until something breaks. We towed our railer all through the winter and nothing has broken but the clunk is worse, that is until I try to show the mechanic in St Paul. Not a sound out of it while I had him in the truck. By my description he suspects my emergency brakes are sticking and causing the noise so that's what they are checking today. He found that the hub seals are weeping and there is a ton of brake dust packed in there so, on warranty, they are replacing the seals and cleaning the brake dust out. Bonus. I also got a recall repair done at the same time. They gave me a loaner for the day as we thought it would be an hour or 2 and it was closer to 5 hours on the hoist. Didn't make the noise in the parking lot, yayy! (Made the same noise the next day at home, frick sakes!)

Leslie had to get everything ready for our dinner with Kyle, Lisa and Calvin for tonight because it took me longer than expected to be done. Of course she did a great job with all the prep and we had a really nice visit with them to catch up on all the news on both sides. We haven't seen Lisa and family since last September!! Way too long. Unfortunately we again did not take one picture! Man we have to get better at this. Anyway it was a great evening and around 9 pm we said so long with hugs and handshakes.

June 5

Another work day for Leslie and I have two projects I want to get done. The new part is here for the dishwasher door fix and my new motorcycle front tire got mounted on the rim last night so I can pick that up and put it back on the bike. I've had the dishwasher out often enough now that I had that fixed quickly and the door works like new again! After a quick trip to town for my wheel and a couple other items I drove home and installed the front wheel. My other tire was 10 years old and it made me leery about riding the Harley. Now I can ride again without thinking about a blowout.

All shiny and new! Thanks T&T Power Sports.

The rest of the day was just the usual stuff.

June 6

Time to pack everything back up because tomorrow we will drive back to PGR. I have an appointment in town so while I am there Leslie is busy packing the truck and spreading a few more bags of cedar mulch on the trees and flower beds. We loaded up our rototiller in the truck and drove it over to Paul & Di's. Turns out neither of them were home so we just left it in the shed and drove home. I took the bike out for a ride just because. It was nice to get out on it for a bit. That was our day pretty much. Happy hour, supper and relax with Derek's Netflix. Thanks pal.

June 7

It's raining today and pretty cool actually. The big fire is mostly out except for hotspots and this rain should take care of that. We're not in a big hurry but we are off to PGR today in separate vehicles. Leslie left before me and she is going to stop at a store in north Edmonton to return an item for Rachelle. Our timing was right to save her a trip. Perfect. Rachelle has done so many favours for us that it's nice to be able to help her out every now and then. It rained almost all the way except for one spot where it turned to slush on the windshield!! The temp got down to 2C/34F for a while. This is June right?

Shot from my truck dash.

After we got to PGR and unloaded we got pictures from Bonnyville and there was a layer of snow on the grass. Unreal! Definitely will help squash the forest fire hotspots. Time to fire up the furnace and the fireplace in the rig and relax for the evening with our 5 antenna TV channels.

June 8

We're up fairly early and got breakfast in because we want to get into Edmonton to meet up with our crazy runner friends Barry & Ailsa. Ailsa has a long (110 km/ 68.5 mile) ultra trail marathon coming up in 3 weeks and she wants to run some long distances plus get in some speed work plus get in some trail work. She has a big weekend in store. She signed up for a charity event at a track in Sherwood Park called Survivorfest 24. It benefits a sexual assault center in the local area. Great cause. You can run for either 6,12 or 24 hours and get as many laps as you can in your chosen time. Ailsa chose 6 hours and she completed an impressive 172 laps of the 400 meter track! That works out to about 72km or 45'ish miles. This is the first event of the weekend!

Round and round she goes.....

Crew pics, nice calf stretch Barry lol.

We drove to their house and had a beer while Ailsa showered up. Then we all went out for a fantastic carb loading supper at Sorrentino's Italian Restaurant. Sorrentino's is well known here in the Edmonton area and the place was packed when we arrived but we soon got a table and some drinks. Big smiles!

All smiles. Great dinner at Sorrentinos!

Dinner was incredibly good and we even had a little left over for tomorrow. Ailsa had a beer for the carbs and then split a bottle of wine with Leslie just because she can and still run like the wind tomorrow. It's kind of funny to watch her eat and drink and then just smash out the miles. Something in her DNA??

After dinner we went back to their house and relaxed with water and some TV. I'm running a 10k tomorrow with my nephews wife Brittany and Ailsa is running a half marathon in the morning. Thanks guys for letting us have a sleepover!

June 9

We were up and got some breakfast into us and then off to the race venue, Foote Field, which is connected with University of Alberta here in Edmonton. It's an MEC race (same company as REI in the states for our U.S. friends) they are great races and are run really well. You can race for $20 and  "all the bananas you can eat" is their slogan. Ailsa was first up for the half marathon at 9am. Brittany, her friend Ally and me will leave at 9:20 for the 10k. My goal today is to try to get under 1 hour for 10k. 59:59 will work!

We knew about a hill that was on the course and worried that it will hurt our chances to get under an hour. Of course it did! There was actually switchbacks on the hill and no way I could run the whole thing. Going down was not as bad as turning around and coming back up! I was able to see Brittany for most of the race and we were still close coming back to the finish but she definitely finished ahead of me. Of course, just to add to my exhaustion, at about 100 yards from the finish line my buddy Ailsa comes up beside me and says "c'mon buddy let's finish strong" or something like that. I can't hear as good when I'm sucking for wind lol. I honestly tried to run with her but within steps I knew she is way too fast for me. I told her to finish fast and I'll watch haha. She took off and passed Brittany too and beat us both to the line. 

That's what an elite athlete runs like.

This is what an old man looks like after 10k.

She left at 9:00 am for a half marathon (21.1 mi/42.2k) and we left at 9:20 for 10k/ 6mi and she beat me back!! That's why they call her "elite runner".

Britt was next across the line 1:03:35 and then me with a time of 1:04:37. Definitely not under an hour but that hill was a beast. We finished and we feel great with big smiles all around. I got to run with Ailsa MacDonald, the Canadian Female Ultra Champion!! Sure it was for maybe 10 or 15 yards but I ran with her hahaha. 

And thanks to Brittany as a great pacer! If I can keep trying to stay with her I'll be doing great but she's getting way faster now too. Good times. I also ate TWO bananas :)

I don't finish first but I'm taller!  Ailsa, me and Brittany.

Me, Britt and Ally after the race.

Thanks to Leslie and Barry too for hanging out and carrying our stuff while we run. At least it was a nice sunny day to enjoy while we were out there.

We drove back to St Albert and with hugs and handshakes we said so long to Barry and Ailsa. They go back to work soon in camp up north. Ailsa did another 12 km trail run, for fun, that afternoon too. She turned back because of a storm or she would have done more! 

Leslie and I drove back to PGR so I can shower and have a little rest. It's looking like a quiet afternoon indoors anyway with the black clouds that are swirling around us.

Our drive home. That looks like rain ;)

June 10

We made today our chore day. Leslie is cleaning the rig and doing laundry while I am cutting the grass here with the weed whipper. Les also made a batch of food for Margaret and came out and pulled weeds in what she is making into flower beds. She's a whirlwind once she gets going. Just stay outta the way! My legs are a little stiff for sure so my pace was far less strenuous.

Needed to burn some sticks from the yard :)

Later that night we hooked the laptop to the personal hotspot and watched the Toronto Raptors get closer to the NBA championship. We're not huge basketball fans, that's the 2nd game we watched this season, but it was fun to watch the game.  Yay Raptors!

June 11

Leslie is doing a shopping day in Spruce Grove and as we have mentioned before it's best if I don't go with her on those days. She's looking for plants to put in the flower beds and pots that we brought from Bonnyville and that will take some time to choose. Yeah it's best I stay home. She hit Walmart, Home Depot and the liquor store. Yay, I get beer! She was home early in the afternoon and got going on her planting.

Leslie's Chinese pots that she got in the '80's, freakishly heavy.

The "smaller" one. Half full of rocks so nobody will take it.

Makes the front yard a little nicer.

While Les was gone I got going on a couple projects. I fixed a squeaky board under our mattress that has been making us crazy and then went out to the garage to build a workbench in the corner. The top and shelf were already there so all I had to do was get the legs at the right height and screw it all together. I like my bench height a little higher than most so my finished top is at 42 inches off the floor. Perfect!

A good working surface plus storage.

The rest of the day was just usual stuff. Leslie did buy some dark beers for me. She's awesome.

June 12

Today is a rare day for Leslie. She is driving to Sherwood Park to meet up with Sam and Ashtyn and she is doing a spa day. I don't even remember the last time that ever happened. Good for her. Her chiropractor recommended a massage and Ashtyn is a massage therapist so that's the first order of business. She stopped first at Verve, where Ashtyn works, to get a massage from Ashtyn. Of course if you are in the Sherwood Park area Leslie recommends booking a massage with Ashtyn. (I have been getting massages for decades and I can honestly say that Ashtyn is an amazing massage therapist. If you ever get the chance, book in with her. I slept like a baby for the next week and my back was way less painful.- Les)

The spa where Ashtyn works in Sherwood Park.

Next up Ashtyn and Leslie met Sam for lunch at La Petrona, a really good Mexican restaurant that apparently started as a food truck but now have their own building, nice!

After a nice lunch and a Margarita :) they went to Sam's workplace, HQ, for a pedicure.

Ashtyn was supposed to be working so she didn't book a pedi. Ripped off :)

Happy ladies.

Pretty good day so far. Next up is a haircut. Leslie has been threatening to cut her hair super short for ease of care and just something new. If she cuts out all the previously dyed parts then it will be pretty short and her hair will be "au natural" color for the first time in a while. A bold move baby lol. 

With Sam there and the stylist advice they cut lots off and this is Leslie's new hairstyle.

Much shorter and no blonde highlights! Looks great!

You too Sam lol.

After she styled it herself! Gorgeous :)

Sam and Leslie went for a glass of wine after their stressful haircut moment and then Leslie made the trip back to PGR. "Pretty great day" were her words! I thought she looked fantastic when she got home. So relaxed and a big smile on her face. Awesome.

My day was a little more labour intensive than Leslie's. After she left I put Margaret in the truck with the windows down, her favourite place, and got my gear together to give the trailer a good wash from the roof down. The excavator for my power line is supposed to be here around 1 o'clock so I have a few hours to get some washing done. It's a fantastic view from up on the roof on a beautiful day.

Looking west up the 8th hole here at PGR.

Looking east, over our neighbours house, at Wabuman Lake. 

I got the roof done and then got going on the body right away. It's a big rig doing this alone. Wonder how Les is doing....

I completed the back and 2 sides before my trencher showed up early  just after noon. I shook hands with Tom, from Tom's Skidsteer Services, as he was offloading his mini excavator.

Getting ready to go.

Tom is a local contractor but travels all over northern Alberta working for Telus, our phone supplier, installing fiber optic cable. He is doing some local work right now and was able to fit in this quick job. I need to dig 36 inches deep for 23 feet from our power pedestal to the garage wall. Then I'll call Devan from Just Wired Electric and get it all hooked up. The electrical inspector from Parkland County will be here tomorrow and we can backfill and that's it for my power to the garage. 

First off Tom used his line locator so we know where the existing power lines run underground. We have a decently clear path to the garage away from the other power lines. 

Easy digging for this machine.

Tom was done in about 1 1/2 hours from start to finish. Could you imagine trying to dig this by hand? Not this ol' boy. He packed up and I paid him and away he went to his next job. Great guy if ever someone needs a hoe in this area. 

That was my day. My arms are sore from washing and I had to do a little hand digging by the pedestal and garage so I'm done. Did I mention Leslie had bought me dark beers before??

She made me a great supper and we just relaxed for the evening.

June 13

First thing today is a trip to Stony Plain to buy the electrical wire for the trench. I found a good deal at Bartle & Gibson for $4.70/ foot for 10/3  water resistant cable so with our coffee in hand that's our first stop. Leslie's comment on the way in to town, "isn't that the company that makes ciders?" Sorry baby that's Bartle & James but it's close haha.

We picked up the wire and a length of conduit for the garage wall into the ground and started back towards home. I have had this incredibly annoying clunking sound in the rear diff of this truck for over a year now and this morning it is the worst I have heard. I tried to show a mechanic in St Paul a week ago and of course it wouldn't make the noise but it is really happening now. I'm going to Stony Plain Chrysler to show them. They replaced a rear carrier last year under warranty and this is the same noise again. Thankfully it made the noise with the shop foreman in the truck and we have an appointment for Monday morning at 8:00 to check it out again. Hopefully it makes the noise Monday.

So because we hired Devan to do our wiring and the electrical inspector trusts his work we are allowed to continue with the power hookup as long as we take pictures to prove the depth, the material around the wire and that we have caution ribbon 14 inches above the wire in the back fill. Parkland County codes and electrical codes being followed.

I had many pics but this shows we're to code.

Les and I had backfilled, by hand, to that depth but I'm going to see if I can borrow the Pineridge Kubota tractor to backfill the rest. Devan showed up in the afternoon and completed the hook up of the wires and we now have power in our garage!! Yay, that's it. We're done. We have the final building inspection already and will get our final electrical tomorrow now and that's it for this year. Well maybe I'll do a little more..... nope that's it for this year, it's a storage garage!

We had a beer with Devan and thanked him for his work on this project. He's a really good guy and has been great about helping us out.

We made some supper and then hooked up the laptop to watch the Toronto Raptors win the NBA Championship Trophy!!! First time a Canadian team has ever done that and they pulled it out. Cool!

June 14

I messaged Jeff, the property owner here, to see if I could borrow his tractor. It's almost identical to the one we had so I'm pretty confident on it. He said I could use it but that he would need a favour too. Fair deal. I will be hauling a couple buckets full of pea gravel to another lot in our section along the way. No problem there. We backfilled our trench much quicker than if by hand and it probably took me an extra 30 minutes to run back and forth with the pea gravel. Great deal.

We covered the dirt so the rain wouldn't turn the clay to muck.

Need a little extra material but not bad.

Wheel packed it with the truck.

Around 2ish in the afternoon the inspector from the County showed up for a look. He knows Devan did the work but he looked everything over and put a tester on the outlets to check for bad ground etc. He also checked the pedestal and the panel connections and after all our hard work and a few dollars we got a 2 cent green sticker! Just like when you got a gold star in elementary school. Do they still do stars? No idea but we get a green sticker today!

We're good to go.

We cleaned up the yard and the tarps after the inspector left and thankfully we are done! That my friends is a great feeling, to be done. Well for now at least.

Speaking of done, this is a lengthy post as well so we'll call it quits. Trying hard to get caught up. Hope it doesn't get too long winded for ya. Cheers everybody.