Wrapping Up

It’s hard to believe, but our sojourn here in Inuvik is already drawing to a close. It’s gone by incredibly quickly, and has been quite fun. Last weekend was especially action packed. Friday night we were invited out for some more curling, and afterwards, our team had a little house party at the skip’s house. There were a few Scottish people in attendance, who brought with them many a moment of side-splitting hilarity.

On Saturday morning, we got up early to rent a car. Actually, we rented a Yukon, in which 5 of us drove on the ice road to Tuktoyaktuk. We cruised way up past the tree line and walked out onto the Arctic Ocean. Despite being dressed very warmly, it was farkin’ cold, and the wind was so biting that, after a couple of minutes, I felt like I was standing out there buck naked. We took pictures at the end of the TransCanada Trail. It took us a while to figure out what the sign was commemorating because the thing was pretty much covered in ice.

After driving around for about 5 minutes, we had a pretty good handle on Tuk. They have an interesting thing up there, actually. I figure it’s the equivalent of a community garden “down south” (meaning like Edmonton, or Ottawa, or something). Instead, they have a community deep freeze. They’ve dug these caves down into the permafrost and in the summer they keep their meat down there. Pretty neat eh? I guess they’ve been doing it that way for hundreds of years.

Aside from the Beaufort Sea and the above mentioned highlights, there is very little to do in Tuk. There’s one restaurant in town which serves contaminated food on the rare occasion that it is actually open. It was not open during our visit, unfortunately. There are two other small stores. The Northmart, and Stanton’s. After a brief dip into the Northmart, we stopped by the health centre, which is staffed by two nurses. We were just stopping in to say hi and maybe hoping to use their bathroom. Instead we had a super freaky experience involving a rapid cycling bipolar nurse, some scrambled eggs, and canned fruit. I won’t elaborate further.

We got back later than we thought on Saturday, and were treated to just a tiny taste of Aurora B. on the trip back. We also got to see the work crews out flooding the ice road, which is pretty interesting, especially when the auger breaks through the ice and water shoots up.

Driving on the Mackenzie River is kind of cool, very curvy. Our vehicle happened to have Onstar, and we heard someone’s funny story about breaking down on the ice road and hitting the Onstar button. Apparently, a frantic voice immediately flooded the car yelling “Get out of the car. You are over water. Get out of the car.” It’s probably folklore, but it’s a funny story nonetheless.

So Saturday night we went to another dinner party and were pretty exhausted when we finally fell into bed. On Sunday we went dogsleding. It was extremely fun. But like the perpetual 2 year old that I am, I could not resist the urge to give my dogs a great big snuggle after our run. Those bitches ran their assess off after all. I paid the ultimate price since I am totally allergic to dogs, and my eyes frequently swell shut when I play with them. You may recall an incident which occurred in Calgary last September. Also, at Christmas, my eyes were swollen shut for 2 days.

Anyway, I broke out in the itchiest hives in the world, all over my face and hands, and ended up having to take 50mg of Benedryl, which pretty much knocked me out cold. I was in bed by 8:30pm. I can, however, report that I am now hive-free and, all in all, it was a very fun weekend.

Yesterday I was on call for 24-hours. I spent over 2 hours doing an admission in the middle of the night, which my staff sauntered in and signed (took him 4 minutes). This morning, he said to me “what a great night last night eh?” I almost barfed in his face. Then I witnessed an act of professional bullshit wherein 2 physicians volleyed an elderly Inuvialuit man back and forth for a couple of hours, neither wanting to have him as their patient. When one of them instructed me to tell the other that he should take the patient, I finally put my foot down and said that she should tell him herself, and that it was well outside of my comfort zone to be acting as a mediator between 2 physicians. They sorted their shit out. The patient is as cute as a button.

Bobcat is on call tonight, and is currently dealing with a patient who took a bottle of iron pills and tried to hang himself. There are hoards of psych problems up here. Ironically, I personally have seen very few psych patients. I have never been coughed on so much in my life though. Kids and babies have no manners. I exact my revenge by making them gag with a wooden tongue depressor.

So tonight I am making lists of things that need to happen before we leave here on Friday morning. It feels like we’ve just arrived. We will spend a day in Edmonton with Mandykins and Mattcat on Saturday and get home Sunday, just in time to begin my travel marathon in Montreal on Monday. I just want it all to be over. Plus, I think I’m gonna need to buy a girdle in order to fit into my suit. The median BMI up here is about 33, and I have been heading in that direction myself.

I can’t wait to be done interviews and at home for weeks on end. I plan to yogafy and run, and feel joy. The bed here has probably permanent damaged my back (either that or I have Fibromyalgia) and the puffy rubber pillows leave a lot to be desired. They are like sleeping on an inflated balloon.

Okay, I hope everyone is excelling in their chosen fields. I miss you all.

Love
Tabs