May 01, 2011 by Gildas Paradis

It is unreal, the worst snow storm we've had all winter, came at the end of April. It started 2 days ago and has really socked in. I don't know how many inches, has to be over a foot, but with the high winds up to 80 kms, there are drifts higher than 6 ft. I had big plans for this weekend as it was beutiful weather until Friday, then winter hell broke loose. This is quite a set back for everyone as it was totally unexpected. Oh well, looks like i get to work in a mucky mess up at Riverside the next 2 weeks. That is disapointing since it was starting to dry up nicely. The next concern is flooding again after this amount of rain and snow, on the heels of the spring water runoff. Good thing our sandbags are still in place at Valley Riverside! I tried to get there and check on things but the highways are closed and i probably couldn't get out of the driveway if i tried. Snow banks galore and all the snowmachines are put away for summer. I was going to take a picture of the snow but who wants to see that,not me! Old Mother nature can be a real grouch. We call her Mother Nature and it seems to make us think of "her" as a pleasant being, as helpful and caring as a mother as we know it. When in actuallity "she" is the cruelest, meanest, heartless force on the planet. In her deffence her job is to take care of the planet which is basically herself. (So she is very selfish too!) But i can tell you that the weather is my biggest challenge on a daily basis. It affects our everyday in more ways than any other type of business. Weather can hurt farming operations and even cripple businesses finacially. But in our business and area of operation, old Mother nature can kill us if we are not careful. This is on our minds everyday, and we watch the weather forecast closely (for what it's worth) to plan our every move. I write this as the sound of the winds blowing past our house making more and more drifts to deal with. It is a game (life) of survival lately, hope it gets better instead of worse.