Toronto,
stick strictly to Chevrolets
by
Robert LaFrance
One subject we do not need to talk
about is the predicament of Torontonians and their mayor (Rob Ford). Even saying that
little bit was too much on that subject.
I know I rail on about the weather,
but who was in charge on the weekend of November 9th and 10th? On
the 10th my bride and I had a supper invitation in Bath, normally a
20-minute drive away, and it took us twice that long as we battled the snow and
slush. I backed the Toyota out of the garage and started spinning, then started
down off this mountain and those things called brakes were only a vague
concept.
The road had gone from bare to
deadly in about forty-five minutes. I did manage to get the car stopped down at
the church, then turned around to come home and get the 14-year-old Intrepid
that had studded winter tires. The Toyota’s summer tires were, I suppose,
better suited to summer.
We did manage to spin our way back
up the hill and into the garage, where we changed to the Intrepid. As we drove
by the garage, did I only imagine it, but did that big ancient car give a sort
of sneer and Quebec raspberry to the Toyota? Thumbez le nez as it were?
Spoiled. That’s the word that occurs
to me when I want to describe us humans and how we are doing. I can’t imagine
watching TV if I had to actually stand up and walk over to the television to
change the channel every hour or two. Brutal. I would probably not even bother
to watch it at all.
It was probably five years ago when
I heard a gent define the term ‘roughing it’ as “watching black-and-white TV”.
He was serious. That’s why I think we should do away with winter tires and TV
remote controls altogether. Once we walk to where we’re going a few dozen
times, it might serve to tell us that we aren’t spoiled at all. We are
UBER-spoiled.
*****************************
People are always telling me stuff.
Someone else was telling me recently that he and his wife often leave the house
while the automatic washing machine is running, or the dryer, or some other
kind of device whose entire function in life is to disappoint its owners.
That’s just plain crazy.
Every time I hear a word whose first
two syllables are ‘auto’ I cringe, because it gives me a flashback to the day I
was certain was my last.
You know about aircrafts’ autopilots
of course. I would rather not think about it any more, but this was in 1976
when I was working in a Lockheed L188 turboprop aircraft. Doing an ice survey
for shipping, we had flown over Hudson Bay for six hours at an altitude of
about one hundred feet, and then as dusk arrived we headed home for Montreal.
A fellow ice observer, Ben Baker of
Amherst, NS, and I were sitting across a table and playing some cards – whist
no doubt – when all of a sudden the plane started dropping like a stone. It
dropped and dropped and dropped some more until it looked as if we would soon
be part of the landscape, seascape, or bayscape, whatever fits. Ben looked as
green as Robin Hood’s tunic and I was probably even more terrified if possible,
but we said not a word as we waited for our particular Godot.
I know we didn’t have any more than
five thousand feet of air beneath our wings when at last I could hear the
engines roar and slow down our descent. We soon levelled out and started
climbing again. “Ahem,” said the pilot. “We had a little problem (a little
problem?) there with the autopilot which decided we should be flying at 2800
feet instead of 28,000,” the pilot – or some other madman – said over the intercom.
“Don’t worry. All is under control.” All except our bodily functions that is.
An hour later, coming into Montreal,
we entered a thick, thick fog. That same pilot said: “We’ll be landing on
instruments. They’ve been working great for over twenty years, so don’t worry.”
At that moment I was reading my Mad Magazine whose main character, Alfred E.
Neuman, always said: “What, me worry?” as a tree fell on him.
When we had landed and were walking
down to that blessed tarmac, I couldn’t see either wingtip. The pilot was
pointing somewhere. “The bar is right over there.” Talk about the walking
wounded. However, before we landed, the pilot had showed his real worth. He radio-ed ahead for the bar to get extra
rations of lemonade.
Next morning we were off to Hudson’s
Bay again. I can’t say we were bright AND early, but this time we insisted that
the pilot fly his own damn plane.
-END-
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