New Snow Fall in Toronto
Sunday, December 21, 2008 at 5:23PM 
Last Monday, our friend Holly flew from Florida to pick up her pup, Blazin.
It was 8 Celsius (46 Fahrenheit for our American friends) that day. All the snow had melted and it wasn’t half bad.
The very next morning it was -8C (17F).
Holly thankfully handed me off Blazin to take outside for his morning pee and ran away from the open door.
She thought she was going to freeze to death momentarily.
Meanwhile I was wearing jeans and a t-shirt under my ski jacket, bare feet slipped into clogs. There was no snow.
On Friday we drove to our Vet located an hour and change east of Toronto. We got caught in a major snow storm and ended up spending a few hours visiting with Yvonne and Alex before heading back so that the snow plows had a chance to clear the road, a sometime reality of our Canadian lifestyle.
As always my largest issue driving back was all those drivers on the road that don’t have a clue that snow covered roads and lousy visibility calls for a different mode of driving. Not everyone was clueless but there were a few complete nutcases that made up for it.
One 18 wheeler comes to mind. I fully expected to see him overturned before we got back to town. He certainly wasn’t allowing for any margin of error in a vehicle that could not stop on a dime in any conditions let alone those.
Between Friday’s snow storm and today’s snow fall our yard is no longer snow free. Snow banks are probably two feet high and I’ve taken turns with one of my sons shoveling out paths for the dogs in the backyard. The dogs love it. They go racing round and round the paths and every now and then sheer exuberance with life sends them flying over the top of the banks right into the piles of powdered snow.
Watching their wonderful antics compensates for the pain in my arms, shoulders and back from all that shoveling. I get absolutely no sympathy though. The kids think I’m still 30 and if I didn’t go out and shovel Darlah would and then I’d never hear the end of it.
When outside in winter always watch your dogs for signs of stress, cold affecting their pads and such. They do not have the body weight and metabolism of the larger dogs and cannot stay outside in extreme temperatures for any extended period of time.
The other night it was -20C (-4F) when I took the dogs for a walk. Actually with the wind chill factored in supposedly it felt like -30C (-22F). I can tell you without a doubt that it was very cold. That’s not the words I would normally use to describe the weather but I’m trying to keep this to a family rating. I only went once around our own block and in two cases I had to pick up a dog because their pads got to cold.
Even though we have a large selection of sweaters, jackets, even snow suits, in such cold weather never spend too much time outside with your Havanese.
I have a few pictures to share with you. As you can see, they love running in the snow. Their joy of life is a constant inspiration. I hope you enjoy them and remember, comments are always welcome. Darlah and I love interacting with any of you interested in interacting with us.
I’m off to walk a few dogs.
Nathan
