I have done Iqaluit. And survived. Passed the course I was taking, and am now even more qualified to run police computer systems. Cool stuff.

Went hiking at the Sylvia Grinnell River, with some other visitors to the region and a local lady. It was raining like hell, but we were all pretending that it was just lovely. My feet got soaked really quickly, after a misstep into a boggy bit, and after that it was just a question of getting through it.

Next morning, when I'm being driven to the airport, the radio is talking about the polar bear that was seen the previous evening. Down by the Sylvia Grinnell River. Just out of town. I said to the cab driver, "Hey, I was there last night." He was an Eastern European fellow, and he started saying to me, "Well, you know, you never hear that the polar bears eat people."

Anywhere you want to go in Iqaluit is five dollars, in a cab. Per person. And if you're taking a cab, it will keep stopping for more passengers. To fill the car. So you could be stuffed in with random drunken strangers.

But, to my mind, the coolest bit of the trip was getting to fly back in the copilot seat of the Pilatus, and the weather was clear so the pilot was pointing out settlements and landmarks to me. And he gave me a headset, so I could hear all the air traffic chatter all over the Arctic. He said that the commercial airline flights go from Europe to North America in the morning, and then fly back later in the day. So in the morning all the traffic's going in one direction. There's miles and miles and miles of ice and rock out there.

It was good to get back home. Funny that I've started to think of this place as home...

Got home Friday at lunchtime, and went back to work. Then after work I went to proctor drivers' examinations. After excavating the kitchen enough to make dinner for kids and feeding them, I got everything squared away and went to bed at 10. At 11:30, they called from work -- they had people in cells and couldn't find a guard. So I went and worked the midnight shift. Yesterday turned into a bit of a write-off, I got some cleaning done but also napped a lot.

Today Patty called (she's got five kids) and we all went out to the beach. (No. We did not swim. There's still ice in the bay.) We made a fire and sat round it in our coats and toques, but we were at the beach dammit. Kids flew kites. Miguel's in Iqaluit now, I left on Friday morning and he got there on Friday afternoon.