Title says it all! I got into Winnipeg at 10:30pm on Wednesday and was welcomed by lots of snow. Good thing Leah and my mom brought my boots! 

The first thing I did upon clearing customs in Vancouver was get Tim Hortons- as any self respecting Canadian would. I’ve had Tim’s almost every day since- due to trips to Winkler to get my phone and computer sorted. Phone is unfixable, so guess where my first pay cheque is going! Computer (the one with all my pictures) needs a new harddrive. We’re hoping my pictures can be salvaged- or at least that’s what the tech told me. He might just not have wanted to see me burst into tears. Either way- nobody gets to see my pictures for a little while longer, including me!

The thing I’ve found the weirdest since being back is not the snow, or seeing everybody again, it’s the driving. I didn’t realize how used to the left I got until we were driving out of the airport parking lot. Seriously throws me for a loop. Hence why I’ve been banned from driving for a little while. Other then that, absolutely nothing is different. That I’ve found yet anyway. I guess I expected that though, I mean, Carman isn’t a very exciting place on the best of days. My friend Katie probably has the best quote on how exciting it is here.. She came to see me on Thursday evening and after a good 5 minutes trying to come up with something new to tell me, this is what she said..”There was no dog sledding at blizzard fest this year.. cause there was no snow.”. Whoa. I know. 

My horse is quite pudgy, and fuzzy. I haven’t seen him with this much hair.. ever. As usually he’s blanketed in the winter and by this time of year clipped for fair. He has quite a lot of muscle to gain back, and I’m pretty ready to get back on him and get going. Unfortunately, I don’t know if I can for a while- at least until we know when I have surgery. I’m feeling great right now, and I’m sure I could do some riding- and if the put me on a big waiting list, it’s going to be very hard to stop me. I saw a local doctor yesterday, who has referred me to a surgeon who is to call me early next week to set up an appointment, then I might find out how long I’ll have to wait for a surgery date. This is going to drive me nuts! 

I don’t really have any other interesting news at the moment. So I’ll stop here until I have either some pictures to post, or something riveting for you to read. 

Cheers!

Ookay, so long time no post- but I’m sure you’re used to that by now. I at least have something interesting to post this time, no pictures..thankfully.

I don’t think I mentioned this in my previous post, but I guess about on Monday this week I started getting really bad pain in my tailbone area. I hadn’t done anything traumatic- so I was a bit confused as to why this was occurring. At this point I was in Queenstown staying in a dingy hostel. I figured it must just be from spending hours and hours on buses (which I’m sure didn’t help anyway). I would rate this pain at about an 8 or 9 out of 10. Definitely the worst pain I’ve ever had- and if you know me, you know I’m decently accustomed to pain. Anyway, although I was a little concerned- I wasn’t about to not go out to Milford Sounds (10 hrs on a bus sucked), and hoped it was just bruising and would subside in a few days. Well, a few days passed- which brings my location to Alexandra at the lovely Marie and Ken’s place. By Wednesday, since I don’t usually carry painkillers with me, I had bought some nurofen (ibuprofen). This had little to no effect. By Friday nothing had improved, at all, so I finally decided to find a doctor. I was getting concerned because not only had the pain maintained for a week- it was constant pain. Usually if it’s a muscle thing, certain movements will make it worse, etc. But this was constant. Didn’t matter what I as doing, it was excruciating. So, went to Dr. Norman at the local family clinic. He did a quick look and decided it was a pilonidal cyst, and gave me some antibiotics and stronger pain medication. So off I trotted with my prescription. I started the antibodies as soon as I got home to Marie’s. Really not feeling too hot. So I spent the evening curled up on the couch. Later on, about 9, I got up to get another antibody pill from my room. I made it to my room, got the pill, but noticed as I went to leave my room I was feeling a little faint. Then my vision went. Then my ears started ringing. Then I was kneeling. Me, being me, figured I just needed a glass of water. So I got myself up and went to the kitchen. Where I completely failed at getting water. By this point I remember thinking, okay, this isn’t good, go get someone. So I started walking towards the living area. Still having no vision, or balance, I promptly walked into a wall, and proceeded to pass out. This got Ken’s attention- who quickly jumped up and exclaimed some words not appropriate for wordpress, and put a pillow under my head and got me back to reality. He got me up and almost as soon as I was up again, the whole thing started over. So we sat me down and called the doctor I’d seen earlier. Thank goodness for small towns! We met him back at the clinic where he reassessed me and decided that I might be a little septic, hence the fainting. Thus began my first night in hospital. Dunstan hospital took very good care of me, and it being a small hospital I got my own room too! After being assessed by another doc, having a line put in my arm (in the stupidest place, the only vein he could find was in my elbow), having that arm splinted so I couldn’t bend it, having IV antibiotics, and given some very strong painmeds, I was down for the night. I can’t say I slept great, because I hate painmeds. I can feel the exact moment they kick in, and wear off. So that caused a lot of me being wide awake.

The next day I was seen by yet another doctor, who found that the cyst had begun leaking a little bit-not a lot- as the hole was very small. Here came the decision (not really a decision, more like “you’re going, now”) to move me to Dunedin hospital. Marie and her sister Bern were more than happy to transport me themselves, and set up the car like a mini ambulance, as I couldn’t sit. So I had the seat reclined and full of pillows. I was pretty dopy the whole ride- but my pain at this point was down to 3 or 4 as some of the pressure had been relieved. Upon arriving at Dunedin, I was assessed again by a surgeon, Dr. Rennie.

To be continued…….

Phew. Got most of my organizing and booking done today- up to next tuesday that is where my planning has stopped for the moment.

As mentioned before, I went out to Waimate for a few days to meet and stay with Esme Elliot. She gave me a tour of the town (complete with showing me where everyone of importance lived), which is a bit smaller than Carman, took me out to the old Elliot farmstead, and kept me entertained by taking me to her Woman’s Society meeting, and on visiting rounds with other long lost family members. I drank lots of tea, and made lots of small talk- but it was great to meet more rellys.

I spent this past weekend working at a horse show for Tessa Williams (pictures will be up shortly). She and her mom were very pleasant, and it was very nice grooming for people who appreciated your help. She had 4 horses, two in the 7 yr old division, one grand prix horse, and another who didn’t end up competing that much as the first day he gave himself a pretty nasty puncture wound from overreaching. Never seen an overreach that bad. It was quite deep. I slept in my little one person (see picture in next post) tent beside the horse truck and stables, so the melody of horses kicking walls, and NZ’s bird chorus sang me to sleep and woke me up each morning. My tent is so tiny that I can’t really lay straight in it. I always have to be curled up at an odd angle in order to fit. Plus, all the pegs have been bent out of shape by the previous owner- so pegging it down is near impossible. Thankfully there were no strong winds, and the rain held off until the last day. My days were much the same, I fed the horses at 6:30am and then mucked out, watered, walked, and put studs in, and plaited if needed- usually around 8am Tess was either up or texting me with further instructions. On Sunday I let myself sleep in until 7am, as we didn’t have any classes until later in the day. Once competition commenced, I basically spent the rest of the day tacking up, walking to the ring, holding, watching, holding, bringing horses back, getting another horse, and repeat. Pretty relaxed compared to the crazy days we had working at shows for LC when there were 10 horses on the go each day. For three days of work, I got $200. Not bad! That plus the $600 I got from Airhill have pretty much been used up on this week travels. But boy have I got some awesome things planned! Here’s what I’ve got!

Tuesday (Feb 21) I take the train from Christchurch to Greymouth. Said to be one of the worlds greatest train rides- it travels through some gorgeous scenery. That experience (one way) costs me $110. Sure I could take the bus and cut that cost by about thirty bucks, but I’m going to be doing the bus thing for the rest of my trip- so I think I’ll avoid the squished seats, blurry finger/head printed windows, chatty asian tourists,  and the awkward guy who headbangs and sings along to his death metal.

I’ll spend two nights in Greymouth ($48 in Noah’s Arc Backpackers). There are rumoured to be some very nice walks and hikes in that area- plus it’s right along the coast. Plus the hostel I’m staying at provides free bikes to use while staying, bonus! I’d love to get up to Punakaiki park, where the “Pancake” rocks are. It’s about 40 minutes up the coast, but unless I can find some cheap transport I might have to skip that (save it for next time:))

On Thursday (Feb 23) I bus to Franz Josef ($40). On the Friday I’m doing something awesome. I’ve booked a full day Franz Josef Glacier guided trek. A must see of NZ. We spend the day hiking up to the glacier, and then climbing up and through the glacier before returning to have a dip in the hot glacier pools. Everyone I’ve told about this has told me “not to fall down any cracks”. Clearly they know me well. I’ll stay in Franz Josef at the Chateau Franz for 3 nights ($72). One night longer then I’d likd, but the bus service doesn’t run on Saturdays for some odd reason and to use the other bus service was going to cost me an extra $50. NO thank you. My hostel comes with a free spa pool and free soup and popcorn so I’m sure it won’t be too hard to stay an extra day. Normally I wouldn’t be this excited about free soup and popcorn (okay maybe I would) but when travelling on my budget, any extra food is absolutely a god send.

On Sunday (Feb 26) I bus to Queenstown ($33), where I’ll stay for 2 nights ($44). On Monday I’m partaking in a scenic day trip out to Milford Sounds ($121) – which includes a 2hr cruise around the sounds. After Queenstown I’ll bus to Alexandra ($15), on Tuesday (Feb 28) where I’ll meet up once again with Marie and Ken, do some laundry, and enjoy a unshared room. This is where I’ve stopped planning. I haven’t quite decided if I’ll go down to Invercargill. I very much want to, but it’s going to cost me $80 in bus tickets so I’ll have to decide if it’s worth it. I also need to decide if I want to go up to the top of the South island to Nelson area. Oh well, one day at a time. At the rate I’m going my bank account might make that decision for me!