Winnipeg is the Bangladesh of Canada.
June 7th, 2006
So I’m back from my weekend trip to Winnipeg where I saw my mom and spent some time with my friends Ian and Greg — and dodged kamikaze cankerworms that were divebombing the citizenry from the trees. Yum.
Winnipeg is the Bangladesh of Canada. (Winnipeggers don’t like me to say this, but they know it’s true.) There is now not one week of the year that is not beset with one apocalyptic plague or another. Now that the worms are gone, the mosquitos will come. After the mosquitos, watch out for the flies, and then after the flies come the wasps.
Extreme heat, extreme cold, spring floods, summer drought, Winnipeg has it all. If you’re a masochist–or a meteorologist.
Winnipeg also has several fine yarn stores, including the Good Wool Shop (which sells more than just good wool), The Sheep Boutique, Camille’s Elegant Yarns and my personal favourite, Ram Wools.
Ram Wools has a terrific online yarn store, but there’s really nothing like shopping there in person and playing touchy-feely with their huge and wonderfully varied stock. Plus they are having their semi-annual sale this month–20% off everything in the store, and that includes discontinued Rowan yarns (Ann and Kay, I thought of you instantly), Debbie Bliss, Jo Sharp, Koigu, Noro–you name it.
This is also one of those rare old-school yarn stores where everyone is friendly and helpful and interested in who you are and where you’re from and what you’re working on. Getting there by Winnipeg Transit is somewhat obnoxious (getting anywhere by Winnipeg Transit is somewhat obnoxious) but it’s well worth the struggle. And if you have a car, you’re laughing.
I also, despite the apprehension of alleged terrorists on the day of my flight, had no trouble bringing my knitting needles through security and onto the airplane. And this means I got hours of work in on my seasilk moebius scarf. Photo next time for sure.
(Mama-E, I haven’t forgotten you. But I have forgotten shipping stuff–several times now. I’ll have your treat in the mail by the end of the week, I swear!)
3 Comments Add your own
1. Ann | June 12th, 2006 at 10:06 pm
Deeply moved to think that you were gazing upon a pile of discontinued All Seasons Cotton and casting a thought our way.
LOL!
2. D D Dawson | June 13th, 2006 at 3:36 pm
Winnipeg is the Bangladesh of Canada! LMAO!
I suppose it’s true: my friend, Jenn, left Winnpeg in March to do volunteer work in BANGLADESH, and she LOVES it there!
Originally from Southwestern Ontario, and having lived in a number of far-flung places, I lived in The Peg from 1997 [the year of One of the Big Floods] -2003. From there I went to back to Japan and vowed never to live through a Winnipeg winter again. Still, in that perverted Canadian way we have, half-bragged to everyone who asked how tough we Prairie People are for playing outdoors in -30C weather, but had to concede my coworker from Regina had it even tougher.
Truth be told, though, I hate the cankerworm-dropping-from-the trees season more than the winter, despite the weather being more tolerable than the suffocating heat during hte mosquito-feeding-frenzy period which follows.
And the final irony: I am now planning on moving to Wisconsin! As if THAT’S a step up. I was surprised to find Milwaukee is very much like Winnipeg.
Anyway, I was happy to find your knitblog. Thanks for sharing your stories and photos.
DD
3. david_demchuk | June 13th, 2006 at 3:55 pm
Ann: I held that All-Seasons Cotton (and I think some Wool Cotton and a few balls of Rowanspun something-or-other) in my hand and instantly regretted bringing only a stuffed-full backpack for my little trip, instead of an empty steamer trunk. Oh, and thought of you and Kay. Really I did. I was going to ship it all off to the two of you…wasn’t I?
And DD: I’m so glad to hear that you and your friends are actually travelling around the world trying to find worse places to live than Winnipeg! I salute you! As a well-known and widely known Winnipeg Survivor, I’m the first to say that it is a city that builds character, endurance and sheer intestinal fortitude like no other. The only thing it doesn’t have is giant mechanical spiders you have to electrocute with jumper cables. But I bet they’re working on that as we speak.
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