Put down that fire extinguisher!
by Robert LaFrance
As a
journalist for about 35 years, I know what a slow news day is. You look
desperately for a story, and in the end can only find one about a family of
groundhogs who built a nest in an abandoned tractor tire.
No wars to
speak of, no mass killings in Texas, no big tax announcements, no huge scandals
– just that pitiful group of rodents huddling in their frozen tire.
That’s
about what it’s like today and has been for the past week. Only in this case
the groundhogs are people named Harry, Meghan and Archie – ordinary enough
names for ordinary people who have decided they might want to move from England
to Canada.
I never
figured out, in my 71.5 years, what the word ‘Royal’ means and probably never will,
but I suppose it mostly means ‘rich’ and living on money doled out by
governments. In years past this family, based in Britain not far from the
biggest welfare office in the country, the family members attend opening
ceremonies of hospitals and bowling alleys and are fawned over as if they had
recently accomplished something. Then the crowds disperse and everyone goes
home.
So the Duke
and Duchess of Sussex want to bring little Archie to Canada because the British
tabloid newspapers (they never have a slow news day because they simply
make it up) have been picking on the duchess, whose former identity was actress
Meghan Markle.
What did
they expect?
The
television and radio news networks interviewed people who worked for the
Canadian immigration departments and they said that Harry and Meghan had to go
through the same channels as every other immigrants. Nobody popped up to tell
the story about Goldilocks and the Three Bears. The mayor of Sussex, NB, showed
up to welcome them to his town, because of its name. Imagine, the Duke and
Duchess of Sussex occupying a farm only a few kilometres from downtown. Not to
mention Archie.
Best of
luck to the family; I am happy for them, that they’re not trying to enter the
U.S.A. via the southern border. Trump would be calling them rapists and
murderers, or worse, in his “mind” – Democrats. God, he’s an odious man, as are
the Republicans supporting him.
********************
This coming
weekend will be Robbie Burns Night in Kincardine and, once again, I will not be
wearing a kilt. Every year I feel I should warn people.
However, I
will be singing with various groups during the program although I have no idea
what ‘Auld Lang Syne’ means. Something to do with Scotland no doubt.
You have
been warned.
Moving on,
my neighbour Edd Sprang stopped by to visit last evening and I could hear his
cursing from the time he emerged from his 1976 Gremlin at the end of our
driveway.
“Edd,” I
said, “I have never heard you swear like that since your favourite cow got her
udder caught in your ringer washing machine. What’s the problem?”
“Christians,”
he roared and quaffed the beer I gave him within half a minute. “Today they
cost me almost $700. I was driving my decrepit 1976 GMC pickup home from Riley
Brook when it caught fire around Two Brooks. The smoke was rolling out from
under the hood and also from my left rear tire. I was laughing like a hyena as
I came to a stop and just before an idiot appeared on the road behind me.
“Obviously
he was a Christian because he wanted to help. He had a fire extinguisher in his
cab and I will be damned if he didn’t haul it out with the idea of putting out
the fires. I grabbed it out of his hand and threw it in the ditch, but he told
me I was in shock and out of my head and got it back from the ditch.
“I grabbed
it from him one more time and threw it once more in the ditch, then tramped it
into the little stream. He got it out again and damned if he didn’t put out
those fires.”
I was
baffled of course, but then I often am when dealing with Edd. “Why didn’t you
want him to put out the fire?”
“Remember I
said it was a 1976 GMC pickup? Resale value in the vicinity of zero and nil. My
insurance would have come good for about $2500, and I would have got rid of
that piece of-”.
I
interrupted: “But Edd, you would have gotten some money from your
insurance. Wouldn’t you?”
“I got my
pickup towed to Plaster Rock where the garage replaced the burned out wires and
the tire. The towing came to $80, the garage work came to $587 for a grand –
not so grand – total of $667. The deductible on my insurance was $500. I didn’t
apply to my insurance company because, according to my neighbour Blurb McGann,
they would have put up my payments another $25 a month for five years.”
********************
Changing
the subject, I have recently completed a task I have been working on for what
seems like years. I changed all my computer, banking and other passwords. For
months, even years, I have been warned every hour it seems to change my
passwords every month or so. The last time I changed mine was October 1994.
Following
instructions, I saved a different password for each of the 15 programs I use.
The next day I was informed that I had been SPAMed, PHISHED, etc in 11 of those
programs. Remind me to never listen to anyone again.-end-
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