The
dread disease called Bluetooth
by
Robert LaFrance
Some people were pleased to see all
that snow as it crashed to the ground on Nov. 30 and Dec. 1, but I wasn’t. I
loathe winter anyway, and the idea of scooping all that wet heavy snow annoyed
me to no end. It must be communism, or something.
We have three snow scoops here, as
the Three Bears might have, going from the largest (that’s me, Papa Bear), to
Mama Bear’s scoop, and then to Baby Bear’s, bought when he was about twelve.
Always the optimist, I started with
the largest scoop and it wasn’t long before I re-thought that decision.
However, Mama Bear’s scoop was also too much to push, so I went to the
smallest. That was all right for five minutes, but then I went up and went
into the kitchen where the real Mama
was making some kind of soufflée or baked beans, something like that. “What do
you want?” she snarled.
“Let me have the egg spatula,” I
said. Maybe I could push that.
*************************
I love some of those great old words
now mostly lost to the good old days. Yesterday my neighbour on the southwest
side, Wormley, stopped by and was telling me about ‘swamping’ his pickup truck
on Highway 109 near Quaker Brook. “I knew I was going too fast,” he said, “when
I found myself out in the pucker-brush.”
The other day I drove past the
former Tobique Truck Stop restaurant site in Perth-Andover and wondered, not
for the first time, why it had to close last year with the loss of 25 or 30
jobs. Correct me if I am wrong, but when Ultramar bought that building, they
decided immediately to close the restaurant. Somebody in Montreal or Taiwan or
Ohio took a look and said: “close it!” The same thing with the former Foodland
grocery store on Fred Tribe Road.
Here’s my suggestion: When a company in Toronto (for
example) decides to rip 30 jobs out of
New Brunswick, then 30 people from head office should lose theirs. Names drawn
from a hat, etc. That would include everyone from President on down.
One gets to thinking that rich and
successful people are all a bunch of jerks, but now I am sure that several are
not. Last week I listened to a radio interview with country music superstar
Garth Brooks, who has won every award in the world except Dart Champion of Belgium.
It was quite a pleasure to hear him speak clearly – he even used the word
‘whom’ several times – and to demonstrate that he was a guy who thought about
other people once in a while. I may even buy his new album – ‘Gunslinger’ –
although I am not sure how one goes about slinging a gun.
We have all figured this out: We
live in an age when our phones are smarter than we are. My grandfather, Muff
LaFrance (1881-1976), would be appalled at the way people of all ages go to
their phones whenever they want to know something. Even I shun Encyclopedia
Britannica now and prefer to seek knowledge from Samsung and Motorola. What can
be done? Nothing by me. I’m much too lazy to go to my office and lift a heavy
book when I can merely consult Mr. Google.
Sort of along the same line of
‘thought’, in these days that include Donald Trump, I am never sure I am
getting real news or fake news, but this story sounds weird enough to be true.
In the west Africa country of Ghana, located between Togo and Ivory Coast,
organized criminals set up a fake U.S. embassy in the city of Accra and sold
REAL visas to the U.S.A. for $6000-$10,000 each. I could see such a thing
happening for a short time, but ten years?
More on technology, my friend Flug
(real name Richard LaFrance, no relation) is not exactly a high-tech guy and
once in a while he makes a boo-boo when referring to the online world or just
about any technological occurrence – setting his car clock for example.
Yesterday - or was it day before yesterday - he came running over from his
driveway and said: “We gotta do something for Lennie Brann! He’s got some
dental problem that sounds bad!”
Once he calmed down he said he had
been lounging (chilling) in his living room when Lennie had called. “I’m
driving home from Edmundston,” he told Flug, “but it’s all right. I’ve got
Bluetooth.”
Just then my phone rang. It was Lennie asking what
had happened to Flug, whom he calls Richie, who had hung up on him. I couldn’t
speak with all that laughter filling my mouth.
-end-
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