Some good news and some bad news in the media lately. Two vaccines, one by German/US firm Pfizer and BioNtech and the other by US firm Moderna showed to be 90 and 95 percent effective respectively in late stage trials. There has also been significant developments in vaccine trials in China and Russia. But those are two countries you shouldn't trust what they say, especially China. Not surprisingly the effectiveness of China's vaccine has not been released. So hopefully a vaccine will be available to the wider population soon.

The bad news is that we are well into the second stage of the pandemic, with large numbers of active cases in Alberta and Ontario especially. Nunavut which had no cases suddenly has 60 centered around the community of Arviat. Even more worrisome there is the cases of covid 19 is through community spread and they haven't been able to trace the source.

 Really nice day for a change. Took the kids down to the big marsh to go skating this afternoon. It was the first time I was pond skating since I was a teenager I think. There were 50 plus people showed up.

 Man it never stops blowing. The weather has stabilised somewhat but not the winds. Looks like I won't be getting out for a hunt to get a winters supply of ducks. Not many complaints about the ferry service this year compared to last year with the exception of the Black Tickle run, namely being she didn't get in one time early on this fall when she could have.

The kids went down to Goose Bay with Mom and Dad for a night. The kids were glad to see their mother.

Me and my boy.

Remembrance Day was different this year due to the pandemic, as was many other things. There was no ceremony or parade.

Trump lost the election but still has not conceded defeat. He has launched numerous lawsuits to get votes tossed out in several states with no evidence to support electoral fraud, despite it being the most secure election in U.S. history.

Bonfire Night aka Guy Fawkes Night

Bonfire Night was a day later for us this year because of high winds. The next night was good, not very cold and hardly any wind. For anyone that don't know Bonfire Night started after the Gun Powder Plot to blow up the House of Lords  in 1605 England. Ever since then people have had bonfires to commemorate the event and it is common to burn an effigy of Guy Fawkes in the fire. I'm not sure if it is common in the U.S. but it is in Canada and the UK.

 We had some really high winds night before last. Could even feel the house shake and that rarely happens.

Had a busy day today. Cleaned the chimney out and cut some trees down on the end of the house so Dwight could dig a ditch for me with his excavator. I was cooking supper at the same time, and almost ruined it in the process. Then this evening I had a council meeting.

Something woke me up last night. After I got up I learned there was an earthquake up near Makkovik. It could be felt in Rigolet. Maybe that's what woke me up.

 The weather is up and down again from one extreme to another. The planet is warming but that doesn't mean the warming is evenly spread. What you're actually seeing is areas such as the North warming much more than everywhere else. And one of the biggest impacts of climate change is more extreme weather events; more storms and hurricanes, more wildfires, El Nino and La Nina becoming more pronounced and lasting longer. Where I live the ice forms later and is not as reliable as it used to be. Happening right now as I write, it is raining and forecast to get up to 10 degrees and high winds when it should be 0 degrees down to about -5 degrees. Tomorrow the temperature will drop to -5 degrees in the afternoon. That's typical. This summer I think it was twice we had high temperatures for a week or more that were higher than normal. I was on patrol with Canadian Rangers in August in Goose Bay and it was HOT. One winter, I think around 10 years ago, we didn't have a proper winter, it was more like Spring all winter. We had a very warm winter that year, a lot of wet weather and flooding of rivers and lakes made it very difficult, even hazardous, travelling by snowmobile. Snowmobiles are very important for travel in the winter around here, Cartwright.

So overall, climate change isn't just a global rise in temperatures. It is more extremes, extremes in temperatures, extreme weather events and more inconsistent weather patterns.

Another Halloween over with. Cold one as usual. There was a lot of kids at some places. Good to see lots of kids out. I wasn't too impressed with the construction going on into dark on the other side of the harbour. They should have stopped with all the kids getting around.

Time went back an hour again last night. I wish they would stop with that. It's been over a century now, since World War I that they started changing the clocks twice a year. There are no tangible benefits, more harm than good really.