Remember back to the halcyon days of January, when the winter carnival happened?
That mid-winter celebration of winter activity hit some icy patches after a period of warm weather mostly melted the sledding hill, turning it into a giant ice block.
Despite Dave Thompson from the Wolverine Nordic and Mountain Society going out and trying to use the trail groomer to de-ice the hill (no, there wasn’t a bunch of American Immigration officials hiding in the bushes and he wasn’t following them), it proved to be too melted. As a result, the annually scheduled Tobox’n races were cancelled, and instead, locals were invited to a show and shine-style event, where the best designs were crowned.
But, while the races were officially cancelled, that didn’t stop a few (read: nearly all) of the enterprising constructors to run their creations down the hill in unsanctioned, un-timed, and ultimately lots of fun head to head races that saw nobody crowned victor, merely a good time.
Ad administrative error meant that the names of the entrants and their creations were not linked, meaning we have no idea who the winners were. We do, however, know what the winning designs were. Congratulations to the creators of Chip (the teacup from Beauty and the Beast), Shark, Planet, Magic School Bus, the Penguin and the Train.
As part of the Tobox’n Races, the Tumbler Ridge Outdoor Recreation Society groomed a trail for people to try out skiing and snowshoeing, ran a number of other events, and gave away a pizza party prize, which was won by Crystal Boisclair.
Over in the library, Wall Scrabble went on all week. Penelope Trudeau and Roland Greenwell won in the child category, while Nora McKenzie took home the youth prize and Kathy Light got the highest scoring word in the Adult category.
Cleaning up in the Edible creation category was mother-son team Braxton Kirby and Natasha Dougherty, who won the individual prizes for the child and adult categories individually, as well as the family category. Tasty!
Braxton Kirby also made the best Card Creation in the 9-13 year old category while Wall Scrabble winner Penelope Trudeau took home the prize in the 5-8 year old category. Sister Mya Trudeau won in the 14+ category, and Natasha Dougherty won the adult category. She and Braxton tied with the Mannions in the family category.
Speaking of Mannions, Freddy Mannion took home the prize for best Lego Creation by a child under 5. In the ages 6-9 category, siblings Luardt and Zihan Steyn took the prize, while Channah Ciobon won the prize for best build for ages 10-12.
Finally, a special note that team Protomolecule won the Library’s trivia night contest. Originally from the Expanse book series, the protomolecule is an “infectious agent of extrasolar origin first discovered on Saturn’s moon Phoebe. It has the ability to radically alter infected life forms and utilize their biomass in various ways. Not a life-form in itself, the protomolecule as a set of free-floating instructions designed to adapt to and guide other replicating systems.”
Team protomolecule, on the other hand, is made up of the Hofman adults, Ron and Darra, as well as Sarah Bear (you know, I’ve never bothered to find out if that’s officially her last name or more of a description, like TR Cougar) and the Ernsts, Colette and yours truly.
Yes, I’ve gone from ruling the Wall Scrabble Category to my true calling: knowing trivial information.
Trent is the publisher of Tumbler RidgeLines.
