Thursday August 17, 2006 6:20 am Regina Saskatchewan Sunrise 5:50 Sunset 8:15 Hours of daylight: 14:25 Day 2 of our trip to Virginia

A. Morning Musings

6:20 am It is partly cloudy at the moment and + 11 C, with a forecast high of + 21 C. The hours of daylight are virtually the same as in Lethbridge, which makes sense as we are on about the same latitude. But Regina is about 30 minutes in front of us which surprised me as they are not on Daylight Saving time. I thought they would be about an hour in front of us. A quick check shows that Winnipeg is very close to an hour in front of us. So Winnipeg is genuinely about an hour earlier than us whereas Regina is actually only half an hour different even though they are nominally an hour different because of the different time zones. Lovely. I continue to learn. I did a google of Canadian time zones and realized that Regina is about half way between Lethbridge and Winnipeg and that Winnipeg is near the center of the Central time zone. Of course. This all makes sense. Time is continuous.

Gordon & Hanna will pick us up at 11 this morning. That gives us about 4 hours to get cleaned up, have breakfast, and perhaps do a little reading.

B. Plan

Visit Moose Jaw.

C. Actual/Notes

8:30 am The free breakfast in the small room adjoining the lobby was fine. Coffee, fresh fruit and a small cinnamon roll hit the spot. Not too much - a good start to the day and a cost saving over having breakfast in a restaurant. I am not sure how many Holiday Inns provide this, but I think we will take advantage of it when we can. Today will be a holiday within a holiday as we are going sightseeing in Moose Jaw and will not be doing any real travelling nor genealogy. An easy restful beginning to our trip.

9:30 am I have just finished the second short story, "Green Grow the Grasses O" from "All the Men Are Sleeping". Impressive. One of the best short stories I have read in a very long time. It seems to me that he captures the story of a possible affair perfectly. Everything is understated yet the overall effect is the exact opposite. His description of the land and the remains of previous lives is poignant and reminds us of the transitory nature of life and its events. Even a solid rock house can decay and fall down, yet embedded in the cement the tracks of a small bird remain. Here is one sentence that caught my eye, " 'Marijauna.' But the word came out of her mouth erotically rounded somehow, lush and foreign." This is a story I will read again. I am grateful for the time to have read the story slowly and to have thoroughly immersed myself in both the story and its telling. I closed the book slowly and then my eyes as I relived it again. Even writing this brief summary has been slow as I admire MacDonald's gift of prose. If all his stories are this good, it is going to take me a long time to read this book.

One of Moose Jaw's many murals	Cabbage butterflies on truck grill
Regina Legislative building	Regina sunset

D. Reflection