MUNGO EATS Latin America

We have been back in Calgary for almost a month, and embarrassingly, for the first time since we returned, we went out to the mountains.  I know, I know, I wrote many, many times about how I love the mountains, how I missed “my mountains”, and it still took us a WHOLE month, to find the time to visit them. 

I am not sure what I can say in my defence.  There always seemed to be something else we needed to do, or the weather was not good.  Finally, all the stars were aligned just perfectly, the sun was shining, we didn’t have any pressing business, so we were off.

I love the Rockies, but when I speak of “my mountains”, what I really mean are the mountains of the Ghost River valley, north west of Cochrane, up the forestry trunk road.  Kevin and I have been visiting this valley for the past 20 years, and I can say, without a shadow of a doubt, that this is my favourite place on earth!!!  No other place makes me quite as happy as this area.  Let me explain, that the river, although beautiful, is likely not the MOST beautiful waterway on earth.  Because the river is routed towards Lake Minnewanka for the production of hydroelectricity, there are a lot of gravel berms, and such.  But, what the river lacks, the mountains more than make up for. 

The mountains in this area rise up from nowhere.  These are the front ranges, and their beauty affects me every time that I see them.  I have to tell you that today, I was nearly moved to tears….I really missed this place.  Unfortunately, I forgot my camera.  I am not sure how.  It was all loaded up with fresh batteries and empty memory cards, and then it was forgotten on the kitchen counter.  I therefore have no pictures from today’s excursion.  However, I have many, many photos from the Ghost, and so I am going to dip into the archives to show you this incredible place.  You will see the kids looking a little young, and Mungo might look “de-aged”, but try to look past this to the beauty of the area. 

Mungo was beside himself today.  He got to run, off-leash, in a wonderful forest for hours and hours.  Tonight he is curled up on the couch, threatening to sleep for the next three days.

One of the most wonderful things about the Ghost area, are the sheer cliff that top nearly all the peaks.

Between peaks, in nearly every drainage, lurks a hidden waterfall.  All you have to do is pick a drainage, and you are sure to be rewarded every time.  We hadn’t been up the drainage we visited today for quite a while, and I had sort of forgotten what the fall was like.  I was surprised to find not only one fall, but two!  Amazing!!

This truly must be heaven on earth!

Ever get the feeling that your dog is nuts?  That there is a screw loose, the elevator stops short of the top floor, he’s not the sharpest tool in the shed, he’s not the brightest bulb…..?

Now you have heard me complain about the hound before, but most times he is actually too smart and this gets him into trouble.  There is one thing that he does that does NOT put him in the “too smart” category. 

Occasionally, Mungo tries to “hide” something.  Usually it is something that he REALLY likes, but he just can’t consume it at the moment.  So he tries to hide rawhide strips and occasionally a really good toy.  Today, the item to hide was a stuffed toy.  It is actually a bear made out of alpaca fur (sorry Giulliana!)  Things with REAL fur make Mungo crazy.  So he will walk around for hours carrying the toy, and then eventually he gets tired of this carrying.  Instead of carrying it, he decided he should hide it or bury it, to prevent us from taking it.  I am not sure why we would like a slobbery, half eaten alpaca skin bear, but that is not the point. 

First he has to find the perfect place.  I am not sure what makes a place perfect, and once you watch the video, you will understand my confusion.  Something in his head tells him that a place is PERFECT and then it is time to start hiding!

As you can see, the toy is now perfectly hidden…you can’t even see it, right?  How about here, can you spot the toy now?!!

One day he decided to bury a rawhide right in the middle of my bed, not hiding under the covers or anything, just smack in the middle of the comforter.  The thing is once he figures it is hidden, he watches us.  If we look toward the toy or the rawhide, then he knows you can see it, he starts the hiding process all over again.  The day he “hid” the rawhide on the bed, the kids were under STRICT instructions to “not see the rawhide”, and thus it stayed “hidden” there for several hours.

Yup, that’s my dog…not the sharpest knife in the drawer, or the brightest tack in the box.  Phew…a night of “hiding” can tire a hound out!

We have a small gym in the basement.  It consists of a weight machine (a Bow Flex) and a treadmill and a stretching mat.  I know, not much of a gym yet, but we are working on it, and at least we can get a little work out, hopefully staying fit. 

AND…we have the added bonus of a hound dog for a personal trainer!  Whenever we head down to the “gym”, Mungo follows along to make sure that we are doing our exercises just perfectly. 

Make sure you squeeze your shoulder blades together during this row!

A little extra resistance will make those crunches much more productive!!

He calls this  yoga move “downward laying dog!”, which is sometimes followed by “downward laying dog, chewing a rope!”

Ah yes, with Mungo’s help, we will be back in our pre-trip shape in no time!!

I have been home just under a month and…I’m bored. I can still find enough to fill my day, but I feel like I need something more.

I have not started working yet, and maybe that is the problem. I will start at my “one day a week job” at the beginning of August, but somehow, I don’t think one day a week will be enough to fill the void.

My options therefore are as follows:
1. Find another job, one that I go to more than once a week.
2. Find another part time job to add to the one day a week job.
3. Start my own clinic.

I can’t even believe that I put that out there for everyone to see, but there, now it’s out, there is no turning back. I have always resisted the urge to open my own clinic. I am not sure why, didn’t want to take responsibility for all the headaches, I think. Yet, here I am, contemplating just that move. Maybe I have finally grown up. Maybe I just want to do things my way, for once. Maybe I am too lazy to look for a REAL job.

Whatever the reason, I am currently talking to bankers and checking out locations. Sounds kind of serious. So all you Calgary pet owners, start thinking about visiting Dr. McLean in the hopefully near future. Most likely, I will be very happy for your business!!!

Ah, Calgary…never a dull moment.  There is a saying in Calgary, “If you don’t like the weather, wait 5 minutes!”, and it is the truth.  It is possible for the weather to change several degrees in the matter of hours, and summer storms blow in without warning.  Thunderstorms are common in the summer, in the afternoons, and hail sometimes accompanies these storms. 

In minutes hail can cover the visible ground, so you think you are in the middle of winter.  Alternately, the hailstorms can be very large and often property, like vehicles and homes can be damaged by the falling projectiles. 

Since I have lived here all my life, hailstorms are nothing new, and the only thing that bothers me is that sometimes my plants get a bit beaten up by the nasty ice shards.  Hail, however, is not normal in other parts of the world, and I remember a Peruvian friend calling on the phone once, to exclaim, with great PANIC, that there was “ice falling from the SKY!!!”

Today’s storm was a doozy!!!  I was indoors and could not see the hail, but the sound inside the building was deafening.  When I got home, I found that there was still evidence of the hail.  Sara had run out immediately after the storm, to gather hailstones.  I got home almost an hour after the storm, and still found Sara’s stones looking like THIS!

Crazy Hail!!