Big dog, litte lady; tiny dog, big man

The moment I saw this couple out walking their dogs, I knew I had a picture. The lady is walking the big dog while the man is walking the tiny dog. Seeing this I smiled and I haven't smiled a lot lately.

Seeing Ukraine colours everywhere

 London city hall was illuminated the other night in the country colours of Ukraine: blue and bright yellow. A dessert emporium downtown is selling cupcakes and other confections decorated with blue and bright yellow icing. The money raised is going to a Ukraine relief fund. 

I find I am seeing the blue and yellow colours that say Ukraine everywhere. Parking my car I noticed blue and yellow fabric hanging on the garage wall; it was a kite. Tomorrow that kite will be moved. At present, those colours bring tears to my eyes and sorrow to my heart.

Memories of snowfolk past

This winter has not been a great one for snowfolk. There has been adequate snow but it has not been packing snow. It has been too cold.

I'm disappointed. If given a chance, people can get oh-so-imaginative when making a snowperson. I saw this snow creation a few years ago. I thought it was quite memorable.

Solitude No. Two

The theme yesterday was solitude. In looking through my files, I was surprised at how many images could be interpreted as illustrating solitude. This lady sitting on the park bench seems to be enjoying being alone--at least as far as being with other people is concerned. 

Maybe she is not interacting with other people but she is interacting with a flock of geese. And the birds she is feeding are not the more common Canada geese. This hungry pair resemble a Eurasian species.

Solitude: the theme of the day for March

It is known as the North Shore. Tourists seeking solitude need look no further. This shot shows a woman gazing over the waters of the North Channel above Manitoulin Island and Lake Huron.

It is not the Rideau Canal

 

Ottawa has the best skating venue in Ontario and possibly in Canada: the Rideau Canal. People travel hundreds of miles to skate with their families on the frozen canal.

But London, Ontario, may have potentially the second best place to take a family skating. The city constructed a 250-metre, 10,000 sq. ft. skating trail loop in Storybook Gardens inside Springbank Park.

It may be big but it is no Rideau Canal. It's small size and COVID-19 restrictions have made reservations necessary. Cost is another downside to the London trail. While the canal is free, it can cost a small family $20 or more to skate on the London trail. (File images)

Brilliant, imaginative and functional

 

To successfully beat the COVID-19 pandemic it is being fought on many fronts. One front, and an unlikely one, is the boot rental area at the local ski hill. Only a few skiers at a time are allowed entry, they are given a pair of boots and then their regular footwear is taken and stored in the numbered compartment which had held the ski boots they are now wearing. 

The storage area for all the footwear left by the renters is now closed. Signs saying "Please do not use!!!", block the footwear storage compartments.

To return the boots, the skier goes to a table outside the rental building, the number on their rental boots is noted and their regular footwear is brought to them. The skiers change into their street wear outside in a sheltered area and then leave the rental boots for the staff.

This COVID-19 fighting method encourages social distancing, minimizes indoor contact between skiers and staff, and is actually more efficient than the method used in the past.

Turn off the news of adults and destruction, to focus on a child building stuff

Now and then over the past few months, I've toured Ukraine using Google Street Views. My memories of what I found haunt me as the Russians mount an offensive with the apparent aim of taking over the whole country and leaving untold destruction in their wake.

Needing to turn from the televised images of needless, uncalled for destruction, I went in search of my youngest granddaughter. She was busy making an elephant, a frog, a gramophone and more using the Lego brought by Santa. 

It was a beautiful sight.

Ice on overhead wires

 

One would think ice-coated overhead wires gleaming brightly in the sunshine would make an easy picture. Althought it looked spectacular viewed from a passing car, it lost its dramatic visual punch when viewed safely from the sidewalk. Shooting from the middle of the road was the best vantage point but the passing drivers clearly disagreed. Damn, those horns were loud. Oh well, what did they know.

Freezing and Thawing Is Hard on Pavement

 

Winters in southwestern Ontario are cold but interspersed with the freezing cold days are the occasional thaws when it climbs above freezing. It may even rain. The other day it did both. The result? The pavement in London began breaking apart and deep holes appeared, pitting the roadways. 

Today city crews were out spreading asphalt cold patch. This is a mixture of aggregate and bitumen which is more durable than one might think. The repairs last indefinitely.

Play Mancala with an expert

 

I believe I have mentioned Mancala in the past. Mancala is one of the oldest games still played today. Its roots possibly go back as far as 700 B.C. The game clearly has staying power. If you would like to sample the game, read on and please click the link in the 3rd paragraph. You will not be disappointed.

I play Mancala with my little granddaughter. She beats me. The last time we played she told me to find a partner and improve my game. My wife bowed out. I turned to the computer and found a fine opponent. The computer not only beat me but did it with poetry. The way it ends the game is absolutely beautiful.

I introduced the online mancala game to my granddaughter. The computer and Isla were soon playing. The computer won. She agreed it was beautiful to watch the computer moves. We agreed that now we both knew how a knowledgeable desert nomad might play. 

I researched the strategy of the game and I played and played and played. I got better with time. And then it happened, I beat the computer. It was gracious in defeat.

Mask use is fading outdoor

 

Wearing a mask never seemed necessary when walking in the park but still masks were often sported by those using the biggest park in London. With so much room, social distancing in Springbank Park was never a problem. Yet, as recently as last month, a walk in the park without a mask could earn one a lot of nasty stares.

Now, in late February the mood has changed. Masks seem to be out. I spotted a mask on only one park visitor. The province is easing the restrictions applying to theatres, restaurants and more and clearly people are ready. Soon we may all know just what endemic entails when applied to COVID-19.

Icy wires only sign of winter storm

 

Driving home from the grocery store, I noticed the wires along the road were sparkling thanks to a thick coating of ice, the last remaining sign of the severe winter storm than had moved through southwestern Ontario just a few hours before.

Skiing is not the only way down a snowy slope

It's cold and windy today and stopping a car to take a picture puts one in danger and others as well. And so, today, I'm running a picture from the past.

Helping shovel snow: a Canadian tradition

Last night the biggest snow storm of the year hit. When I was boy, we'd have put on our winter duds and headed off to school. School was just a short walk away. Today, with school bus trips taking over an hour each way for some kids, school was cancelled.

This little eight-year-old took this as an opportunity to help Gug, her grandfather, shovel the front sidewalk and drive. She was not alone. A walk through the neighbourhood found lots of kids out helping parents and grandparents clear away the snow. It is a Canadian tradition.

As a boy, I never saw a school bus

School buses are everywhere today. When I was a boy, schools were smaller, more numerous and located in the students' neighbourhood.

We walked to school. We did not take the bus. We didn't need to. I left for school at 8:45 a.m. School was but a fifteen minute walk away.

Two of my granddaughters must take a school bus. One granddaughter is up each morning at 5 a.m. to catch her bus. She rides the yellow bus for hours and hours everyday to and from school. That just seems so wrong.

A simple story in the snow is a good story

Tracks in the snow tell a story. Usually the story is a simple one documenting the passing of a rabbit or sometimes a field mouse. City wildlife has it easy but if the little critters let their guard down, a good neighbourhood can quickly turn bad. There are dangers lurking in the suburban backyards.

Packs of coyotes roam suburban backyards when night falls. During the day cruising hawks and even the occasional bald eagle.pose a threat from above. Even family pets, dogs and cats, present a danger. Some days the story written in the snow documents the life and death struggle little critters confront every day and every night. These stories don't always end well.

Really? A robotic vaccum!

 

The iRobot Roomba is readily available in Canada: Costco, Canadian Tire, Best Buy, Bed Bath and Beyond and the list goes on. A friend's parents have the top-of-the-line model and a home with a floor which is mostly open. There are not a lot of places to trap a Roomba. They love it. I maps out the floor plan and saves the info in memory, it tracks straight and then, like a lawn mower, it rotates around and makes its second pass beside the first with just the right amount of overlap. When it is done, it parks itself and is automatically recharged and emptied of dust.

Our kids and their partners, knowing how well the iRobot Roomba is working our for our friend, bought us one for Christmas. (I knew there was a reason I hated Christmas gifts.)

First, it is not the top-of-the-line model. You turn it on and it wanders about the floor somewhat randomly. At times it seems to shows flashes of brilliance but generally this is an intelligence challenged robot. It will run until its battery get low and then it will head back to its recharging station. That is kinda neat, I must admit. The unit is not emptied automatically but that is no big deal. It is easy to empty.

Still, I would not give our iRobot a pat on its robotic head and tell it that it did a great job. I will admit our home is the problem. One of our beds is too low to the floor, the iRobot gets jammed under the bed. One of our dining room cabinets has a maze of wooden legs and the iRobot manages to get lost in a 2X4 spot and cannot find its way out. When we use it to vaccum the kitchen floor, we must first remove all the chairs and stools from the room. I could pass a manual vaccum over the floor in the time spent moving furniture.

Robotic vaccum cleaners are kinda cool but they need to be fitted into an environment designed with their needs in mind.

Am I happy with ours. Surprise, surprise, we are delighted with it. It was a gift; a gift from our family. Its whirring hum as it skoots about cleaning the floor says, "Love."

Ski poles double as rapiers

 

Young and too tired to ski, the two kids on the left found their ski poles made excellent rapiers in-spite of the baskets. Rapiers, a type of sword, are thin, light and sharp-pointed. When one thinks about it, rapiers do seem similar in appearance to ski poles. It's too bad Errol Flynn didn't make a ski movie. He could have shown these kids a cool move or two.

Beating challenges with help from my friends

It is not uncommon to see young people, and older folk as well, beating their own personal challenges with the kind assistance of the trained staff at Boler Mountain. 

Folk who, for a number of reasons, are unable to ski unassisted, are often sighted on the slopes.

This young person has been strapped into a specially designed seat with two pair of skis.

With the assistance of the gentleman holding the two ropes who is following behind, the young person is able to gain the control necessary to ski down the slope.

Accessibility has also been considered when it comes to the new lodge. The ski club received a $45,000 grant to fund the installation of an elevator to provide access to the second floor by those with personal challenges.

A picture moment interrupts jogging

My  youngest nephew likes to stay active, even in the winter. When he heads out to jog, he always takes his camera. This beautiful, snow covered, wide/wild leek, Allium tricoccum, I hope I have identified this correctly, stopped him in his tracks. He shared the image on his Facebook page.

Art brings smiles even during COVID

 

The art gallery in London once had an excellent art shop run by a group of volunteers. The women in the group, it seemed to be composed of mostly women, were smart both at finding art for their shop and at running a successful and very profitable business. But the ladies and the gallery had a falling out and the in art shop in now only memory.

Our home, like many in London, has a lot of art purchased from those ladies. During the COVID-19 pandemic, that art has brought a lot of folk a lot of happiness. With lock-downs and lock-ins, with closed schools and off-limit restaurants, life can seem a wee bit on the bleak side. Art seems to lighten the atmosphere in the home and that lightening has never been more important than now. Today one spends an inordinate amount of time within those walls.

This closely cropped image of a glass on glass plate creation is a favourite of our granddaughters and my wife and me. It brings a little, much needed, whimsy into our home.

Trade between cities

 In history class I remember learning how cities have talents. Or at least the folks living in the various cities have talents. One city might be famous for its tile and pottery creations, like Nabeul, Tunisia. Another city might be well known for its glass, like Murano, Italy. Or it might be the creative innovation of its residents and the multitude of imaginative stuff pouring out of the place which put it on the map, like Palo Alto, California.

When I picked up my first Klutz Press book, I was not surprised to see that it came from Palo Alto. The Klutz credo was: "Create wonderful things, be good, have fun." Klutz books encourage kids to not just read but to do. The book on knots includes the necessary rope. The book on making paper airplanes comes with  40 sheets of flight-tested, ready-to-fold paper, printed on both sides in a variety of colourful patterns.

And possibly my favourite Klutz Press book is The Book of Classic Board Games. I believe it may be out of print but if you can find one, even used, buy it. Kids of all ages love it. Somewhere in there one will find a game one likes:

• Backgammon
• Checkers
• Go
• Nine Men's Morris
• Cats and Dogs (aka Blue & Gray)
• Solitaire
• Roundabouts (aka Surakarta)
• Brax
• Mancala (aka Kalah)
• Hasami Shogi
• Hoppers (like 2-player Halma)
• Dalmatian Pirates and Volga Bulgars (aka Fox & Geese)
• Hex
• 3-D Tic Tac Toe (aka Qubic)
• Fandango (aka Fanorona)

This skier almost skied out of my shot

 

This is my last post from the race day at Boler Mountain in London. I could not resist posting this image. I rather like the oddly weighted composition. I must confess, this skier approached so fast and I was so slow to react that this skier almost skied right out of my shot.

Saturday was a true race day at Byron

 

One always sees skiers blasting down a small, but on the steep-side, hill at Boler Mountain, scooting through gates, flashing down the slope. But Saturday was different, at least for me. Saturday the skiers were not practising but competing. And the skiers were looking good. 

This old geezer wishes he could have joined them. I'd have done my best Jean Claude Killy imitation, with the accent (French accent?) on imitation. I was Jean Claude Killy only in my mind, only in my imagination.

Living with the COVID-19 virus

 

We are now in the living-with-COVID part of the pandemic. Skiers on Boler Mountain Saturday were wearing COVID masks rather than balaclavas. Although, I wore both, with my balaclava over my mask. The dining area in the ski lodge at Boler Mountain was open but the seating number, thanks to social distancing, was halved. Maybe, just maybe, we are seeing the easing of this all-too-long pandemic.

Boring but functional fencing

 

A few days ago, I post some common fencing I found in the Ukraine. It was unique. Some folk found it a little busy, others tacky but others quite liked it. Whatever, it was completely different from anything I have ever seen in North America.

I decided to post an image of two types of fencing commonly found in London. The old wooden fence was popular about thirty years ago. The newer, plastic fencing on the left, is going up all over the city on both private and public land.

We replaces the aging, wooden fencing with the newer plastic stuff. As it is made to resemble stone, I think I am safe in saying it is, at its core, it is somewhat tacky. Imitations always are.

Not a lot of snow in London

With snow storms hitting the U.S. east coast and traffic in some locations along the seaboard coming almost to a standstill, snow, at least a heavy snowfall, seems to have eluded the southwest Ontario Great Lakes region. London has not had a prolonged storm, with heavy snowfall and high winds, move in from Lake Huron this year. One has hardly had to even get out the snowblower. A snow shovel had done just fine.

Another young skier at the neighbourhood hill

The number of kids who are able to complete a decent jump seems almost limitless. Take a picture of one and the next kid may take it up a notch. Even my youngest granddaughter has given  one of the smaller jumps her best shot. She got airborne but her landing let her down -- pun intended.

Kharkiv has 3.5 times London's population

I don't understand war. Attacking and invading a neighbouring county makes absolutely no sense to me. None. Here, in North America, I don't think most folk have a good handle on just what a fine country the Ukraine is. And Russia is can be a damn fine place to live as well. And yet, an invasion may not be on the table, as they say, but it is a possibility. Why?

I decided to check out the Ukraine and I chose the city of Kharkiv in which to do some sightseeing thanks to Google Street Views. Why Kharkiv? I caught a journalist, who was working in Kharkiv, being interviewed on CNN. I thought it must be a rather important city if a foreign journalist was stationed there.

Kharkiv has a large, popular, city park. London has a city-block sized park, too. I checked out the Ukrainian park. Wow! The Kharkiv park is absolutely amazing. 

There was a time London's park had a fountain but no more.  It was removed and discarded some years ago.

The heritage section of Kharkiv is not as intact as one might like but it does boast the presence of a large number of fine, old structures. London does not have a heritage district. The vast majority are gone and the one's remaining are sprinkled about here and there. The last intact block of heritage structures was torn down in order to build a massive downtown mall and then the mall was never built. Today a hockey arena occupies the land.

Kharkiv is a larger city than London. It has about 3.5 times the population of London. In 1975, the Ukrainian city started to build a subway. Today there are some 30 metro stations. In 1975, London politicians were discussing how to build an improved transit system. Today the London politicians are still discussing how best to build a rapid transit system. Nothing has been done but at least London is now considering a rapid transit system. For the moment, London will continue to use simple buses. Come back in 40 years and see what has changed.

Covid is not stopping the fun

It is not just COVID that introduces risk and danger to kid's lives. Spent a few minutes watching young people taking flight as they hit the jumps at Boler Mountain, in London, and if you have a child out there on the slopes, you cannot help but have some concern.

That said, I watched a lot of skiers crank up the speed and fly off the edge of a jump and although some fell, I didn't see one jumper show any signs of injury. It may be safer than it looks. It has to be. I don't think Boler could afford the insurance if it weren't.

Convoy of truckers made headlines across Canada

 

A convoy of truckers opposed to the cross-border, truck driver vaccine mandate made newspaper headlines right across Canada. First Canada barred unvaccinated American drivers from entering Canada, then the U.S. moved to mirror Canada's border restrictions by banning unvaccinated Canadian truck drivers from crossing into the States.

It is believed that a vast majority of the drivers affected by the mandate are vaccinated. Yet, the small percentage of unvaccinated drivers are attracting attention out of proportion to their numbers. As the day wore on, the convoy protest seemed to morph into a protest against all COVID vaccines and COVID-related shutdowns.

Many participating in the convoy and many of their supporters lining the route said they were not convinced of the need even to vaccinate against COVID-19. 

How does the Canadian Trucking Alliance feel about the convoy? It strongly disapproves.

The Heron Says, This is Our Home

Condo developments more often than not are composed of row upon row of identical housing units on nondescript private streets. Move in and until one has lived there for awhile, it can be tough telling your unit from all the others. 

One solution: a metal heron. Only one home has a metal heron standing guard at the front. The heron says to the owners, this is our home.

Baby It's Cold Outside

Days like this make me recall Canadian singer Michael Bublé singing a duet of "Baby It's Cold Outside" with Idina Menzel.

Once there were seals

At one time London's Springbank Park had a small zoo with a number of exotic animals. The most popular exhibit was the seal pool. At one point a seal named Slippery escaped from the enclosure, made it to the nearby Thames River and travelled down the river to the Great Lakes. It was captured near Cleveland and returned to its London home. The now famous seal attracted thousands of folk to the small zoo over the following years.

But zoos are no longer the attraction they once were. In fact, today many people take offence at seeing wild animals held in small enclosure and locked in cages. The London zoo was shutdown and the animals sent to other facilities to live out the remainder of their days. 

Unfortunately for the seals, most died in transit. The London seals were true zoo animals, born and raised in captivity. They did not handle being forcibly removed from their London home and placed in small tanks in the backs of large trucks. 

Possibly the trucks were too hot, or the the tanks too small, but whatever the cause, most of the seals died in the backs of those trucks. Very sad. The seals are still missed today.

London photographer shoots "Liquid Mountains"

A London photographer specializes in capturing the wild fury of the Great Lakes. An Australian friend, on seeing some of his images, told Dave Sandford that Sandford was shooting images of "liquid mountains."

The local paper, The London Free Press, did a story on Sandford and his passion. The reporter was impressed by both Sandford and his photos. Check out Sandford's photos for yourself. I'm sure you will be, forgive me, blown away: see The Great Lakes collection.

The world is not all the same

 I have, at times, heard people say that the world is all the same today. A city in Canada is in many ways the same as a city elsewhere in the world. I have to concede that in some cases, they are right. Modern glass buildings, whether apartment blocks or commercial districts, can often look very similar no matter where these structures have been built.

But then there are things like fences. These two fences, which I found in the eastern Ukraine using Google Street Views, are unlike anything I have ever encountered anywhere in North America. I wonder how old these fences are and whether or not this style of fencing is still be installed in the East European country. And is it common elsewhere in Europe?

Racing at Boler

 

Watching this racer Saturday at Boler Mountain made me think of two of my granddaughters. They have both been taking skiing lessons at Boler Mountain in London for a few years. The oldest is outgrowing the classes and looking for someway to extend herself. The eight week junior ski program at the local ski hill is looking more and more attractive.

$1.449/litre is $4.36 U.S. for a U.S. gal.

 

Gas is getting expensive in Canada. Although a bunch of green onions has been hit harder by inflation than gasoline. One bunch of green onions can run a careful shopper almost $2. Unbelievable. The price of gasoline is still worth a mention.

Gas is sold by the litre in Canada. Friday it was hitting nearly $1.50 per litre at some name brand stations. Although not quite as bad, it was still $1.449 at off brand gas bars. That converts to $6.59 for an imperial gallon of fuel or $5.49 for a American gallon. Why the difference? The U.S. gallon is much smaller than the traditional Canadian or Imperial gallon.

As the Canadian dollar is not worth as much as the U.S. dollar. The price drops to $4.36 per gallon when paid for in U.S. funds. Yanks think they have it tough with gas running around $2.40 a gallon in the States. Americans would be so surprised to know how much stuff costs outside the U.S.

A reverse after school pick-up

 

Usually when the parents arrive at the school at the end of the day it is to pick up the kids. This time was different, dad was dropping off something: sleds and snow saucers. There's are small hills in the park beside the school that are excellent for sledding. The slopes are long but not too long and steep enough for fun but safe play. And so dad made a drop-off instead of a pick-up. If the winter is long with lots of snow, more than one parent will be doing this reverse after school pick-up.

A very complex story with a sad ending for many

 

Champion road graders have quite a history. The first Champion road graders were horse-drawn. When it became possible to make self propelled road graders, Champion made the first ones. When hydraulics came onto the scene, Champion was the first to improve their machines with the new technology. With operations in both Canada and the United States, Champion was a solid company shipping graders all over the world to almost a hundred countries.

Then it was sold to Volvo Construction Group in 1997. Although the promise was "No jobs will be lost," the Goderich plant was closed by the end of 2009. I believe the original operations in the States have also been lost.

Then in 2014, in a move to cut costs, the Volvo Group discontinued production of motor graders as well as backhoes at its Shippensburg facility. Production of both lines was transferred to Volvo Construction Equipment’s Chinese subsidiary. The Shippensburg facility produced its first motor grader only about four years ago earlier when the motor grader line was moved to Pennsylavania from Ontario.

The end result of all the opening and closing of plants was the loss of about 1,000 jobs in four countries, Poland, the US, Brazil and Canada.

Not-for-profit, a win for the community

 

Boler Mountain is a not-for-profit that has been adding to the richness of the living-in-London experience for more than seven decades. Boler opened originally as a small ski hill with very little going for it other than location. For London area skiers, Boler was close and that was its major drawing point.

A trip to Blue Mountain near Collingwood on Georgian Bay takes a full three hours. When the day is done there is another three hour drive to be tackled before one is finally back home. A day trip to one of the ski hills near Pontiac, in Michigan, demands more than another hour behind the wheel. The distant hills may be bigger and the runs longer but the time spent on the road drains a lot of fun from the day.

Five years ago, Boler expanded its existing forty-year-old chalet and that is using the word chalet rather generously. The resort likes to brag that the new chalet has a large modern kitchen. The young skiers could care less. Steaming hot chocolate, crispy French fries plus hamburgers, cheese burgers and hot dogs keep the kids happy. 

And if one prefers bringing their own hot chocolate and brown bagging it to keep skiing cost down, Boler mountain allows that too. But, when one comes in off the hill, a serving of the traditional French Canadian ski hill standby, poutine, is awfully hard to resist. 

Poutine, for those who are unfamiliar with the term, is a serving of French fries sprinkled with fresh, cheese curds and then smothered with hot gravy. The cheese curds immediately start melting and the poutine is ready to eat. Oodles of calories but skiers can handle it.

Boler Mountain has a reputation for snowmaking

 

Ski Area Management, covering the ski resort industry in North America, has short-listed Boler Mountain for the honour of being declared to have the best snowmaking crew on the continent. Boler Mountain is up against such big names as Sugarloaf in Maine and Vail Mountain in Colorado.

Considering how little snow there is to be found on the ground surrounding the small ski hill located in the middle of a London, Ontario, suburb, the snowmaking experts at Boler have earned their place in the annual competition.

And that snow is not cheap. The little hill gets no break from the city but pays the full industrial rate for the water supplied by the City of London PUC.

A ski hill and tubing runs right in the suburbs

 

There are three tubing runs at Boler Mountain. The runs are about ten stories high and tubes have been clocked going as fast as 70 km/h. I find that amazing but even more amazing is the fact that the tubing runs are almost in the backyards of some of the most expensive new homes in London. I expected the NIMBY, not in my backyard, movement to try to shut down the suburban winter sport resort but so far so good.

Maybe its age is providing the facility with some protection. It is decades old and its roots extend deep into the last century. Maybe the fact that the resort is mainly known for its skiing, a winter sport with some panache, also helps to keep the critics at bay.

Come to think of it, I have noted downhill ski tracks appearing at the backyard gate behind some of the homes. My guess it that the homeowners have a family membership and to go skiing they simply put on their gear and slip out their back door. In some cases, there may be a high-speed quad chairlift immediately behind the home.

A chairlift and ski slope may be fine behind a home but I must admit I would find the noise of the snow making machines a bit hard to live with.

Parking Lot Snow Piles Attract Kids

 

It's winter. There's no school, at least not until Monday. There's very little snow. And even if there was, playing with friends is difficult with COVID-19 raging. But there are still great mounds of snow scraped off the parking lot at the local strip mall. To kids desperate for something to do, these piles of snow spell F-U-N. One can climb 'em, slide down 'em and, when tuckered, one can just relax and chat with a friend on 'em.