It's 9:06 p.m. and I'm sitting in our little backyard in the wooden Muskoka chair that came with the house. It's quite bright out and will continue to be so for some time. This is far north, folks. I should mention that being out here, I'm now unable to use the little mouse pad on my laptop though I can still write like this...

Another interesting fact is that it's really chilly out here and I'm actually wearing a light winter coat--even though it was warm enough today to not need a jacket at one point. This is why people up here own FIRE PITS. (See that: I ordinarily would have italicized those last two words but can't because of the aforementioned mouse problem. Probably too far away from the mother ship computer or something?) There: I got it figured out now. (I walked towards the back door and found the little cursor moving again. (Blah blah blah.)

Okay now it's the next evening, also around 9 p.m., and I'm writing this indoors. A moment ago I stepped onto our back "deck" (such as it is) and breathed deeply the very cool, clear Calgary air. I heard a squawk from a distant house and saw that it was a crow, on the peak. These are the birds we see most often it seems: crows and their magpie cousins. Big, tough birds that don't mind the sometimes hard climate. Ya know what I'm sayin'?

So I'll go ahead and post this now, brush and floss, then climb into bed with my P.D. James...Sleep tight and good night.