Wednesday, Oct. 24, 2012

Everybody should order ‘chicken chests’        

                                                            by Robert LaFrance

 

            That first snow. What a thrill!

            I am writing this on a Sunday morning, a few hours after I awoke to see the ground covered in white stuff that was neither baking soda nor flour. Those reading the words ‘What a thrill!’ will recognize sarcasm, irony, and all that good stuff.

Why me? Why does winter have to happen to me of all people? I’ve tried to be a good person. I give to the food bank (food, returnables, donations) and I don’t beat my dog unless he deserves it.

On to other things: I was thrilled recently when I read the newspaper headline “Scottish to vote for independence in 2014”. As one who has seen (and heard) a certain amount of Scottish culture and one who has often heard the opinion that Scotland is the finest place in Earth, I was surprised to learn it wasn’t already independent.

After all this time, none of the people in this household who claim Scottish ancestry (not me) have ever mentioned the fact that Scotland is part of Great – or formerly great – Britain. I think they have believed all these years that Scotland was a country anyway, and the Scots the greatest race. The kiltophiles of this world must think the 2014 vote is quite irrelevant.

One of these days, I warn you, I am going to do a pun column. It will consist of a mealtime condiment and gushing praise (a salt and flattery) and things like that. I will look at every little crook and nanny for inspiration. Anyway, perhaps I’ll do that later. I like to sit and think about puns in my lonely cabin, but I can’t do that any more because the cabin has a lean on it, according to the bank, (and how would they know?) and I might fall out.

Occasionally, against my better judgment, I read a book set in Victorian England, meaning the latter half of the nineteenth century when the ever-smiling Queen Victoria was on the throne. “We are not amused,” was her favourite phrase. The reason I don’t often like to read about this period of history is that it is so silly – unlike our age of endless serious discussion. Nobody in those days acknowledged any parts of their bodies; their legs were referred to as ‘limbs’ as if they themselves were a tree. After I read the book I refer to I went out for a restaurant meal and ordered ‘chicken chests, please’.

As if I hadn’t been depressed enough about the fall’s first snow, Flug came over to visit this morning. He went to the fridge first thing and took out a lemonade. “Late night,” he explained, before he drank it all in one visit to the bottle, then grabbed another. “Isn’t it great about the snow?” he asked, and grabbed another lemonade before I kicked him halfway to my cabin with a lean on it. If there’s anything I can’t stand, it’s people who are cheerful in the morning or make welcoming comments in the direction of winter.

Have you been watching the news coverage of the Charbonneau hearings in Montreal? Quite fascinating - owners of construction companies being called before the hearings and testifying that they had to pay the Mafia and politicians three or four percent of any government contract. It was right on film, these guys handing out envelopes of cash to organized crime folks. Four envelopes stuffed with cash, one for the Mafia, and three for the politicians. One news reporter was saying tonight that Quebec was ‘corrupt’. No kidding. However, one good thing did come out of all this - one tired old phrase will now have to go in the waste-basket: “Under the table payments”. The video clearly showed that the payments were right on top of the table.

I wanted to contact the Guinness Book of World Records 2014. As of last evening at 6:37, I had been called 329 times in two days by telemarketers, most of them being “Megan, with Cardholder Services”. Another one I’ve gotten a few thousand times before is the one with the ship’s whistle at the beginning. The idea is that I have just won a Caribbean cruise and I should send money to secure my stateroom.

I said I ‘wanted’ to call the Guinness people, but I have changed my mind. Megan is just so cheerful and happy sounding and just wants to help me out with my credit card problems, even though I don’t have any that I know of. Unless…what aren’t they telling me? Maybe the next time Megan calls I had better find out. 

                                                    -end-         

It was a very good year for whining

Emerging from the whine cellar        

 

                                                            by Robert LaFrance

 

            Time to quit whining about winter coming. Let’s get on with complaining about other things!

            It was interesting to hear Environment and Local Government Minister Bruce Fitch say, after he’d made his government’s long-delayed relocation announcement, that the people of Perth-Andover are ‘partially to blame’ for the fact that only some of the flooded houses will be moved this fall. He said there should have been a lot more than twenty lots ready.

            I could be wrong (I often am) but I’m quite sure that everybody in and around the village and others who were listening to and watching the news realized that there wasn’t much point getting lots ready if the government decided to do everything BUT move houses. If I were a land developer in Perth-Andover, would I really want to spend many tens of thousands of dollars to develop lots only to find that the government had decided to put all their money on ‘mitigation’?

            It was his own government that caused the problem, but then, isn’t it always?

I found it odd that in neither government announcement was the flooding of Muniac Road mentioned. During the flood, most of those on the Perth side of the river could leave the village via Jawbone Mountain, but in order to get to Waterville hospital, they had to go up to Arthurette, over to the St. John River, cross Brooks Bridge (if possible) or go up to Grand Falls and downriver on the Trans Canada Highway. If they could have gone via Muniac it was just a matter of driving down through Bath etc. and crossing the river at Hartland. Too simple?

            Well! That was a good start on the complaining, wasn’t it?

            On to sibling matters, I see that it’s time to start hating my sister again. It won’t be long – a month or two -  before the snowy swirling winds of Kincardine are all around me and she sends an email letter from Florida: “It’s 82 degrees here today with a nice breeze. We took a walk around the lake…” You want to know the definition of hate? Call me on that day. I will not only define the word, but will add some adjectives, free of charge.

            While I’m in the whine cellar, I should mention one of the most annoying things about working with a computer. I have a feature on my computer’s operating system that tells me when I plug in earphones. This fabulously helpful sign pops up and says: “You have just plugged a device into your audio jack.”

            Really?

            It’s nice to be informed about this sort of thing. Just think, if a burglar or my Aunt Marion somehow sneaked up to my office while I was typing and they plugged in my earphones, I would know immediately and could call the police during one of their frequent patrols through the Scotch Colony. I daresay that Stephen Harper’s Omnibus Crime Bill (Safe Streets and Communities Act), passed in March, has something to say about these hoodlums plugging ‘devices’ into the audio jack of my computer.

            Those who read this column but don’t use a computer don’t have any idea what I’m talking about, but here’s a comparison: You are sitting in your living room and a dump truck backs onto the lawn just outside, then dumps a load of topsoil there. This is a load that you have ordered. The driver comes in and says: “I just dumped a load of topsoil onto your lawn.” Oh, really?

            I sure got reaction to last week’s column that listed many (about .0004%) of the things I hate. People phoned and emailed in defence of wind chimes, and even though I didn’t mention cats, they defended them too. I will not despair though; of the 261 letters I received, almost one percent agreed with me on at least one of the points. That’s progress. In 2007 I wrote an anti-cat column and received 1,432 letters, all against. It’s probably time to write a pro-cat column, and I will. As soon as I find something good to say about cats.

 

            Going back to the second paragraph of this column, I should say that the citizens of Perth-Andover, especially flood victims of course, are happy that the government has finally made the relocation announcement. It was a long time coming, as I mentioned, but the point is, the relocations can now get started. When I and a few thousand others complained that it took too long – much too long – to get the thing going, I thought about a sentence that the French writer and philosopher Voltaire attributed to King Louis XIV. Like the NB government, when he did something good he was still criticized: "Every time I fill a vacant place I make a hundred malcontents and one ingrate."
                                                -end-

Hating on Oct. 10, 2012

All the things I love to hate      

                                                            by Robert LaFrance

 

            Wind chimes. Squirrels (rats with good PR). Painting anything. Tail-gaters, especially on 4-lane highways. Insects in my apples. Flat tires. U.S. election campaigns. Microsoft. Cell phone companies. Any figure of authority. George W. Bush. The very indecisive Reversing Falls. Procrastinating. The use of the words ‘bacteria’, ‘media’ and ‘data’ as singular. Bureaucrap. Diets. Careless parking which can lead to car-less parking. And I ain’t fond of bad grammar.

            Designer beards. A few years ago they would have simply been called ‘unkempt’. How about ‘concurrent jail sentences’? Ever heard of anything so dumb?

            I can’t think of any people I hate, but I sure hate a lot of THINGS. And the number seems to be increasing every day. I don’t hate Facebook, but it is a bad thing sometimes, such as when a young friend of mine learned of her best friend’s death on Facebook, only an hour after at happened.

            I think I hate some of the oxymorons – as well as the morons – of everyday life. How about ‘common sense’? Did you ever hear of anything that fit the description of oxymoron any better? I can only assume that the phrase was invented before the age of television, when several people did have some sense. I don’t have that problem myself.

            Back to things I hate, I hate to see a new car scratched – mine or someone else’s – especially when it’s just through stupidity. About five years ago a certain RCMP officer parked what was clearly a brand new cruiser at the post office parking lot in Perth, and somebody in an old beater drove in and parked about a foot away, swung open the door and laid open a big gash in the cruiser’s door. The officer came out just then, saw what had happened, and charged the guy right then and there. I would have helped set up a gallows on the spot and offered to find the lumber, but she said no, ‘due process’ would have to suffice.

            Just about a week after we bought our 2009 Corolla, I parked it in a grocery store parking lot. It was a BIG parking lot in Fredericton, and I parked in the back corner of it, as far from the other cars as I could get. I was in the store no more than six and a half minutes, but when I came out, there was a pickup truck on one side of my car, and a van on the other. They were close, and there wasn’t another vehicle within fifty feet. Lots of room, but the drivers felt they needed the companionship I guess. It was a miracle though; there wasn’t a scratch on my Toyota. However, as I was driving home, a truck threw back a rock and smashed out a headlight. Murphy lived, then as now.

            I can’t say as I hate them, but it quite annoying at times when organizations don’t take down their signs after advertising an event. When I am in stunned mode (often) I am just as likely to make plans for overeating at a potluck supper that took place the week before. Don’t laugh; it’s more sad than funny. Last year, thinking a bean and salad supper was scheduled for a certain afternoon, I drove 20 km only to find it was the previous Sunday.

            Billionaires and mere millionaires who, in truth, are not as financially solvent as I am: Suppose, for argument’s sake, I owe $71,325.23 to my credit card company, I am still better off ‘on the bottom line’ than someone like Donald Trump who, it is said, has assets of $145 billion and debts of $195 billion. So how come he’s driving a Rolls Royce, or being chauffeured in one, and I have a slightly less expensive Japanese sedan? Why does he eat caviar and I am overjoyed to have brook trout?

            Bottled water. It’s been proven over and over again that bottled water has just as many bacteria (that’s more than one bacterium) and minerals as the water coming out of taps, but people spend hundreds of dollars a year and waste a lot of plastic in buying bottled water. The companies who sell it have persuaded people that their product is ‘safe as houses’ as they say in Britain of all places, and all they needed was a group of 100 million people or so who bought that guff. I once paid $1.73 for a half-litre bottle of water and proceeded to give my head a shake. Dangerous, but effective.

 

               But most of all, I think I hate to have people be sceptical when I tell them something. I never lie as you know. Even when I found a wonderful money-making opportunity over the Internet, people just laughed when I told them. I am going to be a wealthy man. You see, there’s this company in Nigeria which has its funds frozen in a bank there, and all they needed was $20,000 to pay off government officials. I sent them that money and sometime in the next few weeks I am going to receive $457,000 (U.S) in cash. After that people won’t scoff at Bob LaFrance. I’ll be a somebody.
                                    -end-

Cutting stovewood is so much fun - not!

The hunters rend the woods asunder  

 

                                                            by Robert LaFrance

 

            And so they go into the woods – grim-faced men intent on the hunt. They return a few hours later by the same route, but this time their trailer is full of stovewood cut in 16-inch sticks. When they get home, they will rent a wood-splitter and reduce the sizes until the ‘better half’ can lift the blocks into the wood heater while the male of the species sits back, reads the paper, and sips on a lemonade.

            I mentioned that their trailers are full of stovewood, but you will note that I mentioned nothing about the box of their pickup truck. No, no, NO! The wood might scratch the paint.

            You know you’re getting absolutely ancient when you can remember the time that ‘half-tons’ or pickup trucks were actually used to carry heavy loads. My last pickup truck (unless I win a lottery) was a 1974 GMC that I bought from Jim Dixon. Although it was six years old at the time and only cost me $1500 or so, I received a good warranty: “It’s a 30-30 warranty, Bob. Thirty minutes or thirty feet.”

            In fact that truck lasted me five or six years with little trouble, except for the time it caught fire up around Two Brooks or Blue Mountain Bend and I got out, all set to let it burn and collect the insurance, but a truck driver stopped and brought out his fire extinguisher. I told him to let it burn, but he said his religious beliefs wouldn’t allow that. Instead of getting $1500+ in insurance payment (that was when insurance companies actually paid legitimate claims without argument) I ended up with a $496 bill for replacing all the wiring, plus the towing bill. I hadn’t set the fire and felt properly aggrieved, but now I would look at it differently of course.

            Back to the subject of how pickup trucks have changed over the years: I mentioned that I had bought mine for $1500, but today that MIGHT buy the ashtray in a new Dodge Ram. I say again that another big difference is that back then we actually put things on the backs of pickups. Mine would hold half a cord of stovewood. Seen any new trucks these days with stovewood on the back? If it were ever to happen, the owner of that $45,000 heavy-duty limousine would have to buy a $2000 velvet cushion to protect the paint.

            Another thing about that 1974 GMC I used to own: It was the last vehicle I ever owned that I was able to repair. The alternator ‘went’ on it, and I actually took wrenches that I kept in a container called ‘a tool box’ and took off the alternator. A friend drove me to Walter Hurley’s garage in Andover where I got new brushes and had it rewound, whatever that might mean. I took it back to Birch Ridge where I was living at the time and put it back on the truck, tightening both the belts. It started right off.

            Picture doing that today to your 2011 Altima or Toyota. You would need three electronic technicians and a canary to help you do the job, as well as ‘an automotive technician’ and seven or eight psychologists to deal with all the emotional stress involved in replacing every sensor on Plant Earth. Contrast that with the way I took off the alternator on that 1974 GMC halfton. I reached in the old toolbox, picked out a half-inch open-ended wrench, unscrewed two bolts so I could loosen the belts, then I took out the alternator. Pretty complicated.

            The worst thing – or, as they say in Germany, the wurst thing – is that, when I was halfway through this column, a  fellow from Sisson Ridge came by and he was driving a pickup truck. It wasn’t one of those $45,000 vehicles that won’t hold ten sticks of wood, but one quite similar to my old GMC. The box on the back would hold sheets of 4’x8’ plywood, or half a cord of wood. I said to myself: “There goes my credibility!” I didn’t think there were any of those left. So, pretending I was trying to get rid of an annoying squirrel, I shot the driver of the pickup and parked the truck in the woods out back of Moose Mountain. I hope no one finds out.

            I suppose my point, if I have a point, is that people are paying an awful amount of money for vehicles that are of little use other than for going from Point A to Point B. I stood along the sidewalk in Perth-Andover one day last week and talked to a chap from Plaster rock. As we talked – and it wasn’t any more than seven or eight minutes – I estimated that the purchase prices of the vehicles, not counting tractor-trailers, that passed by would have exceeded half a million dollars. Enough to move five or six Perth-Andover houses to higher ground.

                                  -end-