Another drizzly day. A good excuse to stay inside, drink coffee, read a fat book, and eat peanut M&M’s by the fistful.

1:57/6C (but a balmy 19C inside)

The pools are open!

Heh…

It’s 5C and drizzly this Victoria Day long weekend. I don’t think anyone is going swimming.

I took a circuitous path into the river valley because I had to stop by work. Today is the first day of my two week vacation, and I was at work. Work! But just for a few minutes. I forgot to enable my out of office thingy on Friday. Obviously, the excitement of not being at work for 14 days overwhelmed my deep-fried brain. However, if I didn’t have that errand to run, I might not have tagged a walk to the end of it. It’s been raining off and on today. I had my hood on, then off, my umbrella up, then down. The last 20 minutes of the walk was sunny. Even though I was repeatedly teased by the capriciousness of the weather, it was lovely.

I know I’ve said this before, but really, the smell of wet spring foliage is just ridiculously beautiful. And yes, I’ve said this before too, but the city is green, green, green. It’s like the Maritimes, or the English countryside. Even the North Saskatchewan is much higher than it was. That island where the seagulls screech at one another is almost entirely submerged. This is good.

Today is Hip Hop in the Park, which takes place at Louise McKinney Park. I walked by it, but the crowds were sparse. Too early, I suppose, but the music was thumping and the rappers were rapping. I remember wandering by the same event last year and hearing one of the performers shout motherfu#!%$ over and over again. The reverberation throughout the river valley was kind of thrilling. I mean, who hasn’t had that fantasy of standing in the middle of the river valley  and shouting motherfu#!% at the top of your lungs?  I know I have.

Today, in fact.

1:30 PM/5C

Rain. OK. Wind. OK. Rain and wind? No walkies. Instead, please enjoy some beavers.

5:13 PM/4C

It’s poooouuuurrrrrinnnggg! I love it. I love listening to rain as I read, or write, or draw, or rearrange my collection of  hand-painted Royal Doulton porcelain clowns. It’s the perfect soundtrack for quiet activity. Or no activity at all. After a week of really hot weather, I’m once again in my hoody, drinking a hot beverage, and appreciating the heck out of this  big ol’ drink of water falling on our droughty city.

I kept my walk fairly short today, only about 45 minutes. The skies were rather moody. But…didn’t get rained on, and I’m happy to report I stole my first bouquet of lilacs today. It’s kinda, sorta a public area, but what’s a girl to do? I don’t have a lilac bush…or is that a tree? Not sure. I don’t have  a green thing that sprouts purple things in the spring, therefore I have no choice but to steal other people’s purple things.

And now, the thunder.

Could it get any better?

Hmmm…no chocolate. That’s a problem, but I’ll take the storm.

The city is no longer flirting with spring. It’s now full-on late spring. It’s lush. It’s dripping with green. And beginning to drip with other things. I saw my first worm hanging from a tree, (but we won’t talk about that. Yet.)

This particular route follows the south side of the river all the way from the University to Skunk Hollow, otherwise known as Lavigne Road. It’s a steep drop from Saskatchewan Drive, and it’s lined by three-story houses and …uh…public lilac bushes (or trees.) When I first started walking more than a decade ago, I relied on this route to get me home. It links to downtown and many other paths, and it’s quite lovely. Almost every time I walk this path I see Dennis Hopper circa Easy Rider, biking through the woods. Except it’s not Dennis Hopper, it’s some middle-aged guy in a fringed jacket and leather hat riding his tricked-out mustang bicycle. Born to be Wild in south Edmonton.

I rarely take the Skunk Hollow route now, simply because I’ve discovered other, longer paths, but the thought crossed my mind today that if the area south of Louise McKinney Park becomes inaccessible due to that fu%$#! LRT extension, I will be taking this path more often. Way more often. As far as my weekday excursions into the river valley are concerned, the proposed LRT construction is going to be the equivalent of an axe.

At least I have my hand-painted Royal Doulton porcelain clowns, and the rain. And the contraband lilacs.

7:18 PM/14C

I suppose I should be angry, and perhaps that will come, but all I feel is sadness. Just attended the workshop for the Southeast LRT extension at the Old Timer’s Cabin. The meeting tonight was for the Downtown to Strathearn route. I was going to say ‘proposed’ route, but in spite of the the presenters pallid efforts to assure us that the routes are not yet ‘set in stone’, it’s clear that the public consultation portion of the planning process is a joke. There was less than 40 people at the meeting, but the folks who did attend were well-informed, if not somewhat resigned.

We were divided into three tables, each table representing the area of most concern to us. I was at the Downtown to Muttart table, with four other people and a ‘facilitator.’ The first sign that things were looking grim was the huge map spread out on the table. It named all the roads and neighbourhoods in the vicinity, including Cloverdale, Riverdale, and various other points of interest, but in the area of Louise McKinney Park, nothing. Just a big, green space with a fat line running through the eastern edge, the fat line being the LRT of course, punching through the hill. The facilitator had a easel with a large pad of paper (no doubt headed for a large shredder)  for our suggestions and concerns, and my first one was that they at least mention Louise McKinney on the damn map. Also, Henrietta Muir Park on the other side of the river. Both parks, and the park area around the Muttart will be greatly impacted by the LRT, and not for the better.

And speaking of the bridge, the current plan is to build an elevated track on top of the existing Cloverdale pedestrian bridge, closing off the open roof, and changing it to the point where it is an entirely different kind of bridge. An LRT bridge. Yes, people will be able to cross it, eventually, and how well it will be integrated into the river valley is up to debate. Not a real debate, of course. And anyway, how well can you integrate a giant metal pig screeching through parkland? You can’t.

The Cloverdale is not the only bridge in the way of the LRT. The bridge over 98th is gone, and so is the one that connects Muttart to Millcreek (crossing over Connor’s Hill.)  New bridges will be built, once again to accommodate the needs of the LRT. However, because construction is likely to be concurrent rather than sequential, accessibility to the river valley trails in this area for at least a couple of years is not guaranteed, and judging by the expression on the facilitator’s face, not something that has even been considered.

It seems that the river valley, and those who use it, are just not relevant concerns for City Council or the LRT extension planning team. The bid for Expo 2017, to quote a like-minded attendee at the workshop, is what’s driving the LRT extension, the specific routes chosen (regardless of viable alternatives), and the speed with which the plan is being executed.

Disgusting.

This is not the last blog on the subject.

On a more positive note, when I exited the Old Timer’s Cabin at around 9:00, it had just rained, and the air was cool and head-swimmingly fragrant. The sky was still dark, and with the sun setting behind us, the trees in the river valley were luminously green. After all the hot air today, it was a simply gorgeous end.

30C today, but currently 18C/11:05PM

It’s not ‘honey, get the Fargo DVD‘ hot…yet...but it’s close. Tomorrow. That’ll be the scorcher. Today was manageable, even pleasant, but two or three degrees too hot for me. Not crazy about sweating. I prefer my ‘glow’ to come from within. However, even though it’s only been a few days since I walked my usual paths, the change in foliage is dramatic. It’s getting thick. And pink. And green. I love the shininess of recently unfurled poplar leaves, and the aromatic presence of apple, mayday, and Russian olive blossoms wafting through the air.

Glad I took the Rossdale path. I was going to take the downtown route but the MacDonald Hotel stairs have crime-scene tape blocking them off, due to a dead guy found on the middle deck last night. Can’t say I’m surprised. There are often no-goodniks loitering about on the stairs, and the bus stop at the top of the hill is a nightmare. But…the stairs are a great workout, even if they make me walk funny the next day.

OK, that’s it. I’m too hot. I’ll save Fargo for tomorrow, but tonight  I think a chilly, rainy X-files episode will be a most welcome distraction from the heat.

6:03PM/26C