“If you don’t like the weather, wait a minute”
by Robert LaFrance
Some
people actually like winter, and those people should be deported to Nunavut or
the farthest reaches of the Northwest Territories. Perhaps Mars.
As
for me, my mind goes all kablooey when the snow and blustery weather starts,
like yesterday. I got up about 8:00 am and went downstairs to find that the
wind had blown open the door between the kitchen and the shed and it was about
ninety below in there. It was a Monday of course.
Then
there was the matter of opening the can of dogfood. The dog Minnie’s food comes
in one of those no-name ones, the paper on the can coloured yellow, and right
beside it in the cupboard was a can the same size and colour - Pineapple
tidbits.
Do
I need to say any more? I blame it on the impending winter. My brain had
already started to shrink.
It
is said about the Maritimes, if you don’t like the weather, wait a
minute. Forget that old saying. Winter is here, and waiting a minute ain’t
going to help.
*********************
I
thought I had heard every story there was having to do with Hallowe’en night
but there was one I missed.
The stories
I was involved in usually had to do with throwing rotten tomatoes at my
cousin’s car as he passed by our house on his way to church or somewhere
equally GOOD, or maybe watching one of my criminal pals calling the
police with a complaint about noise being made by some 89-year-old lady
somewhere.
The story I
am about to tell you about occurred in the mid-1960s but I just heard it last
week. A young chap (my age then but somehow younger now) from Aroostook was
telling me about The Great Hallowe’en Egg Caper. The story goes to show just
what kind of preparations some people were willing to make just for a prank.
There are lots
of stories about young scamps, so to speak, climbing up on top of the bridge
from Perth to Andover (It became Perth-Andover in November 1966) and tossing
eggs down onto the windshields of passing cars whose drivers and passengers
were not pleased at the job they had to do when they got home. I never heard of
one of these high-level hoodlums being caught, but if I had been in an egged
car I would not have chased the egg pitchers around the scaffolding of that
bridge. Concrete is hard on the head come October 31.
To get to
the story I just heard, my friend Steve (or so we’ll call him) said that he and
his pal Owney (ditto) would go to Perth after dark three or four times in the
days just before Hallowe’en, borrow a ladder from Charley Willett’s ESSO station
next to the Bank of Montreal, and take up three or four dozen eggs each time to
the roof of the bank, now called BMO.
“We had a
great time,” recalled Steve last week, “and we never did get caught. We egged a
thousand cars in those three years or so. We egged police cars, threw eggs at
dogs and cats who were so stupid they stopped to lick up the eggs, and we egged
Father Ronny’s Jeep. He stopped right there – not a good move – and started
swearing but he didn’t know who to swear at. So Heaven rained down a few more
eggs on him. See you later.”
That’s not
the end of the story. A few minutes later retired police officer George
Pattersine came out of the library. “I see you were talking to Steve and he was
pointing to the roof of the bank. I’ll bet he was talking about throwing eggs
from up there onto cars, people and animals.” I didn’t say anything. Discretion
is my middle name, which sometimes confuses my relatives.
“He thought
we didn’t know anything about him and young Owney doing that,” George continued,
“but we knew exactly who it was. Not at first, but the last time they did it.
My constable, who later became a judge, figured it out that time and
sneaked out and hid their ladder. It was cold that night too. They didn’t get
down until Charlie Willett came to work the next morning.”
*********************************
Moving away
from the subject of Hallowe’en for another year, several people have commented
on my new hunter’s orange coat with the reflective white tape. I am not sure
why they felt the need to comment on my personal attire, but there it is.
A few days
after my new coat arrived I was talking to my wife’s friend Mona who commented
that, at last, someone could truthfully say that I am bright. I appreciated the
thought that went into that remark.
Another
comment I appreciated was from a (former) friend of mine, who said I must have
the only coat visible from the moon. One of the few man-or-woman-made objects
like that, along with the Great Wall of China and Donald Trump’s mouth.-end-
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