Deep Freeze

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Well I was away all weekend for the department ski trip, and returned home to find Edmonton in a serious deep freeze. The temperatures here have dropped to what I consider to be entirely too cold, and the city has found itself in a mayhem situation traffic-wise. As we drove back from Jasper, I started to wonder what people's problems were. I was driving along the yellowhead highway on my way back to Edmonton and the roads were not in great shape. There was some places that were pretty clear, but for every kilometer we traveled on clear roads, there was at least 4 or 5 kilometers of icy road with blowing snow across it.

So as I'm driving a good 20km/h below the speed limit of 110km/h, I see a large number of vehicles speeding by me on these dangerous roads. As they do so I start to feel more and more nervous that one of these vehicles is going to lose control and cause us to get in an accident. It sure kept the heart pumping as I continued down the road.

Particular frightful situations occurred when larger vehicles would pass by going the speed limit or more. They'd churn up a large amount of the blowing snow and present it to me a few meters in front of my car enabling me to see even less than I could before. Every time this happened I was forced to slow right down just to be safe if someone was stalled/stopped in my lane for any reason, or some poor wildlife was on the road -- because if I continued to go 90 down the highway with zero visibility ... well that's just an accident waiting to happen.

I don't understand how people think that hurrying down the highway will help them out in any way. The chances of them getting in an accident don't seem to be worth getting home half an hour earlier to me. When conditions are like they are right now ... you SLOW THE HELL DOWN!

Speaking of highway issues - has anyone noticed that a large portion of the cars on the road have no idea how to properly pass someone on the highway? I'm not talking about a simple undivided highway where there is just one lane of traffic going each way (I must admit I'm not all that experienced at passing vehicles in this situation). I'm talking about driving on a divided highway with at least 2 lanes of traffic going in the same direction. I can't tell you how many cars sped by in the left hand lane and cut in front of me way too early. Why the hell is that a good idea? You're just pissing me off! By cutting in front of me so fast, you greatly increase the probability you're going to pick up a stone and hurl it at my poor windshield. Since you're passing me, why don't you take a few more seconds to continue on in the left lane until there's suitable distance in front of me for you to get in front of me without causing me undue stress.

Ugh. I don't know where people learned to drive, but they really should learn something about how they're driving their vehicles.

Heraldk

A Weekend of Fun

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This was a pretty packed weekend. On Friday, a group of us went over to Mike's parent's place which Mike is house-sitting at. We played some games and pool and stayed out pretty late. On Saturday, my family got all dressed up to go do a portrait photo which my mom won at a fashion show she went to in St Albert. We were *going* to buy prints for us and my grandparents and our other relatives. However, we were shocked to see that the price was $80 for a single 5x7 print?!!!! That's highway robbery! Diane and I had thought we would try and get some photos with just the two of us, but the prices were simply not reasonable enough for us to try that. We'll have to find somewhere else to go for that. So we went and got our one free 5x7 print and we'll have to look at other options for portraits. *sigh*. On Sunday was Nolan's 1/4 century Birthday party. It was a pretty good party and I got a tad liquored up. We had fun! Today, Diane and I joined her family for an afternoon picnic at Emily Murphy Park near the university. Afterwards, Diane and I took a leisurely stroll down the river valley and across the bridge walking eventually to Corona station where we took the train back to my place to watch the season finale of Heroes.

*whew*. Busy weekend huh?

Heraldk

A couple of Amazing Photos

I haven't posted in awhile, but I plan to get to a longer post with stuff I've been up to in a bit (hopefully tonight). But first, here's a couple of pretty cool photos that have been pointed to all over the internet today. First, there's a picture of a mirage that appeared just off of East China and lasted for an astounding 4 hours. I was not aware that such detailed mirages that can be seen by everyone (and a camera) could exist. I've always been aware of mirages like water appearing on a highway really far away on a warm day. So that was a neat picture to see.

The other picture I saw was a picture of a set of twin children. The startling thing is that one is black and the other white! Apparently such a thing is possible, but I have no clue how it happens. It makes a cool picture though and the kids are really cute!

Heraldk