Oh, Christmas Tree!

Every Christmas needs a tree. This year, with the rest of the family heading west to Rossland, we were determined to get a tree for the house. The local hardware store was selling trees, and we watched the supply dwindle until there were none left and we were left with no choice but to go hunting for a tree ourselves. Naturally, this happened under the cover of darkness three days before Christmas


I found a saw in the basement, and we all headed out in Roxanne's '88 Celica to find us a little piece of Christmas. Here is the photo play-by-play of our late night adventure:

Hip-deep snow is ideal for tree hunting!

This tree is just a little too Charlie-Brown-Christmas. Let's keep hunting!

This tree should do!

To infinity, and beyond!

The face of a lumberjack.

Roxanne lifts a branch. Garth lifts a tree. Well done, team!

I can lift a whole tree! While wearing insulated coveralls! Awesome.

The Selkirk sisters: Keeping Christmas sexy.

It fits!

I'm really excited to be sharing the back seat with our tree!

Chris's knee prevented him from coming on the hunt, so he does his part by figuring out the intricacies of the  tree stand.

Icicles! From Wooco! There is a good chance these are older than I am.

The finished product! Sure it's a little bald on top, but it's really the adventure that counts!

My favourite Christmas ornament!

The Christmas tree star...A Selkirk family tradition for 50 years! We inherited the star to replace the impish angel that tried to light the tree on fire on Christmas.

Found! A Little Piece of the Ottawa Valley

For those of you who don't already know, Roxanne and I (and our baby brother) spent a number of our formative years living in luxury in the heart of the Ottawa Valley. Amongst the locals of a town called Deep River, our luxury was the great outdoors: a massive forest in the backyard (climbing trees with a skipping rope as a "harness"), patches of wild blueberries (painstakingly picked for Mom's baking), and sandy beaches (oh, the beaches!)...

The Ottawa Valley. Gorgeous, oui?

Pine Point Beach in Deep River. Beautiful sand. Unfortunately, I assumed every city was accompanied by a riverside beach.

More of the Valley. Stunning in the autumn. Beautiful red maples. Medicine Hat turns yellow for autumn. Okay, enough of the Valley pics. I'm aching with nostalgia!

Before I get too carried away droning on about my childhood, I'll refocus by mentioning another great feature of the Ottawa Valley: chip wagons, aka chip trucks.

What is a chip wagon? Simply put, it's a truck that sells chips (fries). The fries are fresh cut, deep-fried to a crispy deliciousness, and covered with a plentiful assortment of vinegars, salts, spices, and/or ketchup. The trucks don't sell much else, although you might find cans of pop, pogos, or poutine.

The ubiquitous chip wagon.

This is probably Jake, and he certainly looks like he loves his job! Note the limited menu. Yes, people make a living selling nothing but sliced potatoes.

Of course, knowing nothing else, I assumed every town was thoughtfully dotted with chip trucks, a conception that was abruptly shattered with the family move to Medicine Hat, Alberta in 1997. The experience was a culture shock in many other ways (no trees, no blueberries, no beach), and the closest I've come to a chip wagon since is the annual family discussion of how nice it would be to open one some time.

For the past thirteen years, my memories of street-side deep-fried potatoes have been fading, while the nostalgia for many things Ottawa Valley related grows. Then last Saturday, everything changed.

It all started when our posse made a trip down to Trail with a stop at Canadian Tire. In the corner of the parking lot was a trailer selling food: advertised $1 coffee and all-day breakfast! On the drive out of the parking lot, I asked Roxanne to glance over and see exactly what kind of all-day breakfast could be sold out of truck.

Answer: "Fresh cut fries!"

Jim's Joint: $1 Coffee! All day breakfast!

To be fair, fries are not the all-day breakfast offered at Jim's Joint. Roxanne, a fellow potato enthusiast, honed in on the best part of menu and shouted with glee, completely abandoning my original inquiry. Before Garth knew what was going on, I pulled over and Roxanne and I were up ordering a fresh batch!

Looks like not being situation in the Ottawa Valley requires a more extensive menu of offereings to make a living.

How fresh are the fresh-cut fries? The chip vendor was peeling them right there! In the truck! A quick slice through the chipper and then into the soothing warmth of hot oil, the fries simmered and steamed until crisped to perfection. 

A bucket of potato peels! And these aren't just for show! I saw him (Jim?) peel the potatoes on site!

Action shot! If you look closely, you can see the steam from our simmering potatoes.

After being tossed lovingly into their respective boxes, Roxanne and I slathered them generously with vinegar and happily marched back to the Jetta for the ride home. You can be certain we'll be back! 

Small and medium fry boxes. Carbs. Grease. Perfection. We barely made a dent in these...so many fries!

Golden crisp on the outside, fluffy on the inside. Exactly the way a fry should be.

An Assortment of Events and Observations

Unlike the last few posts, this one isn't going to have cohesive theme or a well-told story. It's simply a collection of stuff that I've been saving up until now.

Isn't this gorgeous? I don't know how anyone can hate snow!

Lovely :)

Local folks lined up at the thrift store. I really wasn't kidding! 

Like every ski hill thrift stone, this one has a corner of crutches. If you have relatives visiting you for a ski trip, you should probably make this bin your first stop.

The sexy fire of our basement wood stove.

Bagels. My latest baking adventure. It was challenge to find a recipe that didn't demand the use of a food processor or standing mixer. You would think bagels didn't exist before the invention of either of those culinary machines! I don't have a Kitchenaid standing mixer yet, which is mostly because I can't decided on a colour, and partially because they're $300-$500. If you, dear reader, are feeling generous this holiday season you should know that I'm leaning towards orange.

We left the house for beer night at 9pm, when we came back around midnight, there were signs in the snowbanks warning of snow removal. We thought it best to wait until the morning (and sobriety) to move our cars. At 8am, we were being warned they would be towed. Rossland is serious about snow removal!

This picture doesn't look like much, but that's because it isn't anymore. This is the front street post-snow removal. Prior to this, we had to parallel park our way into two spots wedged between giant mounds of snow. Even the snow we had piled close to the road from shoveling the sidewalk was scraped off!

The first sunny day in Rossland (Dec 4) since we moved here on October 25!

The parking meters in Trail. I don't think the prices have been raised in 30 years. Twelve minutes for 10 cents! You can pay for parking just by digging under your couch cushions or peeking in the washing machine...

Glorious Times at the Local Legion

Several weeks ago, our posse of three made our inaugural visit to the town's only pub on a Saturday night. We drank a little beforehand while playing a newly invented game of "Spiderdrunk"...a game involving that week's thrift store find of Spiderman Yahtzee Junior (no reading required!) and some inventive new rules. This pre-drink however, was not enough to soften the blow of finding out drinks at the pub cost $6! Each! After one drink (all that was in the ski bum budget), we trotted down the hill to our cozy home with the resolve to obtain personal flasks to make it through the winter.

Life was looking grim for a couple of days, until a suggestion came from our landlord: The Legion. As luck would have it, there are two really great reasons to drink at the Legion: one is $3 highballs and the other is $2.25 beer. And those aren't specials, folks - those are the regular prices!

It turns out that on Fridays, the Legion is the place to be. If you show up after 10pm, you won't be the youngest by 30 years, either! No one seems to mind paying the modest $3 cover (it is jam night, after all) for a plentiful supply of cheap booze backed by locals strumming out classic tunes. I'm told that if I frequent the Legion enough, pretty soon I will know what time it is just by the song that the band is playing! 

The Legion Band

The Legion is barely a block away from our house. I took this picture below to illustrate the proximity.

The Legion - Just a short stumble

Like every other Legion, this one has the world-famous meat draws. Every Friday and Saturday and 4:30, tickets are purchased and numbers are drawn to win packs of raw meat! Roxanne and I finally made it over there this week. We walked the half-block to the Legion at 4:20, hoping to get in, win meat, and continue with our Friday night plans.The Legion meat draw proceeds in the following way:

1. Four tickets for $1
2. A ticket is drawn, and the winner goes to the fridge to take their pick of available meats (whole chicken? ribs? pork roast? So many choices!)
3. Twenty minutes later, another ticket is drawn and a choice is made between the remaining meats. This continues until all meat is claimed.

The meat fridge. A treasure trove of delicious prizes!

Roxanne and I thought we would be in and out in 15 minutes. I don't know how long the meat draw lasts, because we didn't wait around to find out. After an hour, they had only drawn twice, and with places to be we had to head out. The bartender said she would keep our tickets and let us know if we won when we came back later that night. I'm sad to report we did not win, which is such a shame, because the better part of that hour was spent discussing elaborate plans for the whole chicken.

It's now obvious that the meat draw is a lengthy event to encourage the purchase and consumption of cocktails and beer. This would be fine if it didn't start are 4:30. Who wants to start drinking at 4:30? I may be a ski bum, but even I like to wait until after dinner. Most of the time.

The Quest for the Holy Ski Bum Grail: Part-time Employment

Going against what some consider true ski bum style, we've all been trying to acquire jobs for the winter. Job hunting in Rossland isn't cheap...photocopies are 25 cents each and drinks at the pub are six bucks! The job market in Rossland (as much as there can be one) is so different from the job market in a regular city that I've had a tough time sorting it out. 

Not much use checking the paper for jobs here...most are obtained by knowing the right person!

Here's summary of the experience so far:


1. Evening and weekend jobs are the cream of the crop. Not so very long ago, I was searching for a job in Edmonton and whining about only finding opportunities to work evenings and weekends, and mostly part time. Now I'm whining about day jobs and full time work. And I'm not alone in my rant, is the universal rant of the partially-employed ski bum: "Who the hell wants to work full time? Forty hours a week! I'd never get any skiing done! Isn't there work to be done somewhere after the lifts stop running?!" Oh, the distress of it all. 

Not my to-do list, but not that far off...

A friend of ours that we met in town has struggled with finding a job. She managed to find an opportunity working for lodging on the hill, and although it comes with a free ski pass, she will be required to work a minimum of forty hours a week. A terrible deal if skiing for the season is your goal! Only two days a week to ski, and that's providing you don't need to clean your house, buy groceries, or sleep in.


2. Ski bums are notoriously slackers. Many of the places I've inquired about work mention how they don't want people calling in on a powder day. There are many people in the town who work all summer and enjoy not working at all during the winter. When talking to other ski bums about employment, they've often said "You don't have to work, do you? Which is generally followed by a look of pity followed by wistful looks of disgust as they remember their most recent bout with employment.

Habit 1: Smoke pot. Frequently.

3. If getting a job, the first place a ski bum looks is the ski hill itself. Ski hills around the country prey on the desperation of visiting Aussies and destitute ski bums. Here are some horror stories from hills that are not Red Mountain:

• Waitressing at a pub for the season where they withhold your tips every night until the end of the season. If you quit before the end of the season, you don't get your tips.
• Sending you home unpaid for the day for showing up ten minutes late, and then also revoking your pass for the day so you can't ski.
• Revoking your pass on your days off for incidents like writing found on a locker, or cleaning that needs to be done before you're allowed to ski. 
• Management getting bonuses for saving money, which results in cutting back staff hours as much as possible. Not enjoyable when you've budgeted for x hours/week for the season.
• Starting work less than a full month before Christmas to ensure you don't get paid extra for working Christmas/Boxing Day
• Offer bonuses for staying the whole season but strategically firing most of the employees before the season ends. I'm told that most hills don't offer bonuses anymore.

Although some of those experiences may be the fault of the employee, it's still an uncomfortable situation when your employer has that much control over your free time and days off. It's obvious why some are very weary of working for the hill.

4. You have a degree? Higher education? No one cares. What they really want to know is if you have experience serving coffee. Or cleaning. Or selling stuff. Traits and qualities which can only be gained in a previous life, so forget learning on the job. For the first time in my life I am beginning to wish I spent less time studying and more time being a barista/bartender/server. Even for something like being a lifty (a job which is infamously done mostly by stoners) I was lacking the experience to even land an interview. I feel both over and under qualified at the same time!

Do you know that minimum wage in BC is eight dollars an hour? Do you know that it's the lowest minimum wage in Canada? Do you know why I know this? Because I can now count myself amongst the proud ranks of Canada's lowest legally paid workers!


That's right, friends. I have renounced my hippie ways and become a productive member of society! Cleaning condos for a lodging company on the hill! I get up in the morning, scrape off the car, drive up to the hill, clean for four hours, come back and dig out my curb-side parking spot, and enjoy the rest of my afternoon knowing I made 32 pre-tax dollars. Ah, the good life! No free ski pass, but I only have to work three days a week. I'm sure this will all make sense once I start "shredding pow" down the glorious peaks...or at least will hold me over until I find a better job.

McDonald's: An Exposé

For the second time this month, I'm presenting to you, dear readers, a piece of investigative journalism. Last week you learned the horrors of modern-day air poppers, and this week my subject revolves around McDonald's. There is no shortage of investigative topics surrounding the infamous golden arches. I'm not here to debunk the myth of whether the "beef" is really beef, nor am I going to try to explain why Canadian prices are 30%-40% higher than American ones even while our dollar is close to par. I'm not even going to explain the current tragedy of Canadians not having widespread access to the boneless-pork-patty-shaped-like-a-rib. What I'm really here to talk about is...cheeseburgers.

There are no greasy fast food outlets in Rossland. The closest thing is a Subway, and without a deep fryer, it fails to meet my greasy needs. Whenever we venture off to Trail for a cheap grocery shop, our primary destination is Wal-Mart, which like every other Wal-Mart has an in-store McDonald's.

McDonald's isn't my favourite fast food outlet, but their version of a cheeseburger hits the spot and their salt sticks are delicious. On a side note, I love to get my cheeseburgers with mac sauce, and sometimes lettuce. It's like a mini Big Mac. And it doesn't cost anything extra! Anyway...

The Cheeseburger. Classic. Delicious. Improved upon only by the addition of mac sauce.

After closely examining their menu and placing my order, the :


Cheeseburger: $1.69
Bacon Cheeseburger: $1.39

The Bacon Cheeseburger...like a cheeseburger, but with bacon. Also note that it's not nearly as good-looking as it's previously pictured cousin.

I know math wasn't my strongest subject, and I never did take economics, but I am unable to figure out how adding two strips of a secondary animal to my sandwich costs less than making it an all-beef affair. McDonald's is tricky with their pricing. The cheeseburger price is not posted, but the bacon cheeseburger is brightly displayed on the $1.39 menu board! I'm sure most people assume there is no way a cheeseburger could cost more than a bacon cheeseburger. Fools!

Cheeseburger: $1.69. I'm not lovin' it..

The solution to this whole problem is obvious: I just need to order a bacon cheeseburger without bacon. So during the next Wal-Mart adventure, I did.

Approximate transcript:

Rachel: Hello, I would like a bacon cheeseburger without bacon, please.
McDonald's: Uh...so we can just make you a cheeseburger?
R: Well, the cheeseburger costs 30 cents more than a bacon cheeseburger, so I would like a bacon cheeseburger without bacon.
M: Really? They aren't the same price? So...it's just the price then?
R: Yes.
M: Okay...a bacon cheeseburger without bacon...
R: And add mac sauce, please.

Later that day, I went home and called McDonald's to see if one of their employees could explain to me why it costs 22% more not to eat bacon. The closest thing to an explanation I could get was a "The bacon cheeseburger is a feature of our value menu and is priced lower than a cheeseburger even though, with two strips of bacon, it would seem to offer more value."

Proof that actually did order a bacon cheeseburger without bacon. Unfortunately, this receipt doesn't have the price breakdown.

Truthfully, I felt like an idiot. It's only 30 cents, right? But, like most great battles, it's not about the money, it's about principle. I prefer my cheeseburgers (mini macs!) without bacon...perhaps next time I will order the bacon on the side, and although it will seem unnecessarily pretentious, I think it will be easier for the employees to comprehend.

It's Always Movember in Rossland

We've been living in Rossland for four weeks now, and the town continues to grow on me. It's been snowing for the past few days, and was actually enough snow to require a shovel! The familiar stomp-stomp-stomp of everyone banging the snow off their footwear is back, and I'm happily annoyed with the fact my socks are pulled off every time I take off my boots.

This sexy Jetta hasn't moved since it started snowing. I figure it's the next-best-thing to  a snow gauge.

Mmm...icicles...

It's a little strange to be in a town where everyone loves the snow. I hear and read about my city friends dreading the snowfall, and here everyone remarks "5cm today! I hear there's a 64cm base on the mountain! Supposed to snow all week!"...everyone is just thrilled about it. It feels like we're all on the same team.

We met someone while out yesterday who is going to drive to a near by hill and hike to the top in order to ski down. That's how hardcore some of the locals are...willing to walk an hour uphill (with gear!) just to ski down it again.

First snow angel of the season! Why, yes! I am wearing a fabulous pair of insulated coveralls. They will surely make an appearance on the hill at least once this winter...

Not bad!

Here are some other Rossland observations:

Facial Hair: Facial hair (awesome moustache or full beard) is always in style. Even in October, hairy faces were abundant - and not just on the women! Beards are proudly displayed about town, but not in a pretentious hipster way...and never in a well trimmed/stylishly maintained way.

Dress Code: Along with abundant facial hair, Rossland has a distinctive retro-ski vibe dress code. Nordic sweaters (hopefully adorned with wildlife), toques with pompoms, thrift store jackets and classic Sorel's are part of the daily uniform. Plaid is always in style, and hopefully it's paired with a beard or 'stache. I'm looking forward to seeing what appears on the hill this winter! 

Social Clubs: The thrift store continues to be a main event on Wednesdays and Fridays. People are still eagerly lining up...only now while they wait, they're kicking their feet against posts to get snow off their boots. Last week I overheard someone remark that it's more than a thrift store - it's a social club. Even if he doesn't need anything, he still comes buy just to run into everyone he knows. Going to the grocery store at 4 or 5pm has the same effect. Of the few people that we do know in town, we run into them constantly. Some people hate this about small towns, but for now I'm really enjoying it.