Road
trip! Happy Tourist Trails to You
by
Robert LaFrance
When I was a youngster, about a
century ago, I and other hoodlums from Tilley used to go once in a while to the
Capitol Theatre in Andover to see the Saturday afternoon matinee, which word is
a misnomer at best since ‘matin’ means ‘morning’. At least that’s what Grampy
told me, and he grew up speaking French.
Our favourite movies were those
starring Roy Rogers (real name: Leonard Slye) who would gallop – or rather his
horse Trigger would gallop – across the screen in search of rustlers, who were
always found at ‘the old line shack’.
Still on the same subject, believe
it or not, I recently took a road trip to Plaster Rock on my side of the
Tobique River and then came back the other side. I drove from our estate in
Kincardine, along Kintore Road to Highway 109 along the Tobique, then Highway
390 from Arthurette to Plaster Rock, then Enterprise Road – all beautiful
areas. On the return it was down the river on #109, then on McLaughlin Road,
Bedford Cross Road, Anderson Road, Currie Road, and Churchland Road to Highway
105 in Tilley.
The reason I mention all those roads
is that most of them are what some in government call ‘tertiary’ ones, meaning
that, theoretically, they’re not as important as Highway 105, which is a
secondary road. EVERY ROAD I mentioned was better than Highway 105.
Kintore Road, which probably gets 10% of the traffic
that #105 does, is in far better shape. Roy Rogers and his wife Dale Evans used
to sing a tune called ‘Happy Trails to You’ and I will guarantee Roy Rogers
would never have tried to ride Trigger on Highway 105 of New Brunswick. Cruelty
to animals. This road is amusingly called, by the province at least, ‘a scenic
route’. I wonder if any tourist who unwittingly found himself on that road
would use the word ‘scenic’? Perhaps, but I do know some other words he would
use.
I know I rail and rant a lot about
potholes, but Highway 105, at least in southern Victoria and northern Carleton
Counties, takes the definition of the word ‘pothole’ to a whole new universe.
I mentioned my grandfather earlier;
I doubt very much if he, like Roy Rogers,
would take a horse that he liked onto Highway 105, especially that part
of it between the Victoria-Carleton County border and the village of Bath.
However, I can be certain of one thing he WOULD say: “Whoever is in charge of
that stretch of highway should be horsewhipped.”
*****************************
As to events going on around here,
Flug’s nephew Dill, only 38 years of age, got bifocals. He went to the
optimist, er, optometrist, and he, she, or it (to preserve anonymity) said that
if he, Dill, didn’t want to keep changing his glasses every time he wanted to
read ‘War and Peace’ he should get bifocals.
Dill, whose library consists of the
current and back issues of ‘TV Guide’, decided to make the change so he could
easily see when ‘Murdoch’s Mysteries’ came on. Unfortunately, he saw a flight
of stairs (that wasn’t there) as he was leaving the optometrist’s office and
went flying onto his face. Luckily nothing important, or even worthwhile, was
injured, but Dill considered a lawsuit. He was going to cite physical damage
and embarrassment because, just at the moment that Dill fell on his face, well
known anti-alcohol terrorist Maud Stravinsky happened to be arriving for an
appointment. Of course she assumed that he had been ‘over-served’ in the
lemonade department and laid a lecture on him. The fact that her optometrist
appointment was long overdue meant she was lecturing the door hinges was the
only saving grace in the whole scene. I couldn’t help but laugh, although I’m
not usually a cruel man.
The bottom line, as they say, is
that Dill went to another optimist who dinged him $414 for non-bifocals, but a tool and his money are soon parted,
according to the Perfessor.
*****************************
Speaking of that learned and worthy
gent, the Perfessor, he was saying the other evening how important a thing it
is to be perfectly literate and clear every time we utter a sentence. He went
on and on and ON until, as Beatrix Potter used to say, I felt I would go
distracted.
As picky as I am about clear speech
(I wish!) I must say that I don’t know the difference between a gerund, a conjunction
and a cherub; I just know I ain’t none of them
three stooges.
-end-
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