We
miss Richard Elliott
by
Robert LaFrance
Taking my daily constitutional walk
this morning, I came across a total of 21 returnable items (Bud Lite is quite
popular these days) in the ditches. This was during a walk of less that two
kilometres.
It goes to show us just how much
alcohol beverages people imbibe and it goes to show how often people throw the
empty vessels in the ditch as they head along home. All to the good though;
usually when I’m out walking I carry a plastic grocery bag and eventually the
money from those returnables ends up at the food bank to help pay their hydro
bill.
I also pick up empty coffee cups
whose rims have been rolled up to no avail. No money from those, but a bit of
knowledge thanks to a young woman from the Arthurette area. She said one day
that she could tell how long it takes the average person to drink a cup of java
by the number of those paper cups collected in one area just above Red Rapids.
Taking that a step further, I estimate that one swallow of coffee lasts 1.32
kilometres.
I think it’s now time to pause and
say a sincere thank-you to the late Richard Elliott of Lower Kintore. He used
to get up as early as 5:00 am, in any and all weather, and take his collection
bag for many a long walk to collect bottles and cans. He died last fall and I
will tell you that a lot of people miss him. He always had a good word to say
and he was an amazing friend of the environment.
**********************
This part of my column is an apology
to all those acquaintances who think I am a stuck-up, self-important oaf.
I blame auto makers. Practically
every vehicle on the road comes equipped with tinted windows and windshield.
They all look as if Aunt Ruby were driving. She was about four-foot-ten. I try
and see who’s driving a certain car or truck so I can wave to them but it could
be David Suzuki and Donald Trump in there. Imagine that.
When I stopped by the Scotch Colony
Club last evening, it was almost as if people were lined up to insult me, and I
get enough of that at home. Picked on or what?
“Well, there’s Mister Rich and
Famous!” sneered Edgar Reinhold. “Couldn’t bring yourself to wave back when I
waved to you uptown.”
“I didn’t see you,” I sputtered. “I
can’t tell who anyone is behind those tinted windows.”
To make this sad story somewhat
shorter, let me say that I endured even more of that abuse until, four hours
later, I left in a huff. Actually it was a 2009 Toyota Yaris but I wasn’t
driving. My wife had arrived to pick me up, although the club is only half a
kilometre from my front porch, where I slept that night.
***********************
One of these days I’m going to write
another book (My “Fishladder Gazette” is still enjoying good sales) but this
one will be a self-help volume. Common sense solutions to everyday problems.
Here’s one that we have all
experienced. You lose something – say a flashlight, a watch or an umbrella –
and after days of scanning the world you give up. “It’ll turn up,” people will
say. “Stop thinking about it and you will remember where you hid it so it
wouldn’t get lost.”
This happened with me. I lost a
digital voice recorder somewhere in my orchard, I thought, and mounted a
massive search effort, as they say on TV. I retraced my steps back to June 2002;
that yielded nothing but blackfly bites and a bear scare. I turned over every
item of anything inside the house and garage – no luck.
Finally, ten days after I lost the
DVR, I bought another one - $68 including tax. I told the clerk I had lost mine
and she sneered: “It’ll be there waiting for you when you get home.”
“Not a chance,” I retorted, stung by
her tone. “It may as well be in Kabul or Ernfold, Saskatchewan. It ain’t gonna
turn up.”
At this point the reader is saying
to himself or herself: “I can see what’s coming; he’s going to arrive home and
find that recorder in some obvious place.”
Wrong. I walked outside to my car
and noticed something shiny sticking out behind my driver’s seat. The word
‘Olympus’ was soon visible. My first instinct was to go back into that smug
store and demand my money back, but I have too much character for that. (Not
necessarily GOOD character.)And now I say goodbye to my faithful Victoria Star readers after 16 years of this column and faithful work for the Victoria County Record and later Victoria Star newspapers. I have been informed that my column is no longer needed, but don't despair because it will now appear in the Blackfly Gazette of Perth-Andover and this blog will continue.
-end-
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