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A  Colourful Story

17/8/2017

1 Comment

 
Picture
Wild Roses Near Port Hood Trail
You all remember Maritime Mac’s second cousin, Wilbur Mackenzie. He’s the fella who drove to Sydney to pick up a bicycle and returned home empty-handed, but with both he and his dog, Bradley having learned an important lesson about likes and dislikes.

Anyway, Wilbur, besides owning a 2010 red Accent, also owns a large, dark red pick-up truck. He uses it to plough his neighbours’ roads in the Cape Breton snow belt, truck fire-wood to folks and occasionally haul his sometimes sorry ass to this place and that. Once in a while, he even likes to sit in his truck, listen to the radio and occasionally rev up the engine. He loves his hemi.
Picture
Church on Mountain
On one particular Sunday, Wilbur, Bradley and his nephew, Tyrell jumped into the pick-up and drove to Wilbur’s friend’s small trailer. The friend’s trailer was stuffed with Wilbur’s friends and folks and the day was very, very hot.

How hot was it?

It was so hot that the cold beer became warm beer practically before it hit their lips. So, there were Wilbur and his significant others imbibing at high speed to beat the heat. Even Bradley was turbo-licking the beer out of a black, cast iron frying pan.

There was no air conditioner, so it got very stuffy, even with the tiny fan blowing to beat the band, bless its little fanny.

Wilbur was majorly sweating and it was supposed to continue to be hot for another few days. When he looked out the window, he could see the heat rising off the hood of his dark red truck. Wave after wave of hot air floating up, up and away.


And speaking of hot air, Wilbur let the laughter and much of the conversation zing over his head, out the patio door and up to the top of some mountain. Wilbur wasn’t much of a conversationalist.
Picture
Bald Mountain Summit
And Wilbur couldn’t help but notice that wee Timmy’s father, who was Wilbur’s cousin, could sure swear up a storm. He could roughly expound on any topic and therefore, wee Timmy, who was only seven years old, could already talk like an irate mechanic who’d just spent two hours throwing things at a rusty bolt.

“You want to go fishing with us?” Wilbur’s cousin asked.

Wilbur didn’t want to go fishing, because he can’t deal with wire or string or rope. It tangles up on him and drives him just a short distance from stir-crazy.

However, Tyrol was keen to go fishing and was one of the first ones in the motor boat.


“If you’re not going, would you mind looking after little Timmy then?” Wilbur’s cousin asked. “He gets boat-sick and we spend more time cleaning up his %^&$%^& puke than we do fishing.”

Wilbur said he wouldn’t mind, so very soon Wilbur, wee Timmy and Bradley were listening to the sound of the motor boat pushing its way through the heat. 

They’d only been gone about five minutes, when Wilbur realized he had to use the little boys’ room because of all the beer he’d downloaded.  However, little Timmy who’d been downloading his share of hot dogs and pop, had already bee-lined his way to the one small washroom, and the way he’d comported himself to the tiny water closet, it looked like he was possibly in for a number one and number two combo.  So Wilbur, whose kidneys were becoming more then a little insistent, went outside. Once there, he walked to the back of his steaming hot truck, unzipped and began to merrily stress the innocent grass.

Suddenly, he heard one heck of a scary boom. An explosion, which sounded like a stick or two of dynamite had blown up practically inside his head. Why, the ground even shook and Wilbur later told Maritime Mac that he had, for a brief instant, seen the big, fat, white light.

And then, who should come running out of the trailer, but wee Timmy! He burst through the trailer door, his pants falling down around his knees, trailing a stream of toilet paper and looking like a scared white-tailed deer. And my gosh, but he was cursing like a scared trooper.

“What the F$%^&* $^&$ $)(*% was that?”

Wilbur was still in shock and had no answer.

And we can’t forget poor Bradley. He’d been in mid-dump himself when the explosion occurred.
Picture
Bradley
What the heck had happened anyway? Well, I’ll tell you.    The truck had got so hot that one of its very large tires had blown to smithereens.

What happened after that, you may ask? Well, to put it bluntly, Wilbur wet himself. The little fella messed himself and Bradley got backed up until a week next Sunday.   And when the folks came home with their load of rainbow trout, did wee Timmy ever have a colourful story for them!
Picture
Deer on Trail Near Port Hood
1 Comment

Universal  Love

29/9/2015

1 Comment

 
Last week we made an unplanned trip to Ontario to visit my critically ill mother.

Picture
Arriving at the PeachTree Inn in Kingston, ON
While there, I went shopping in a discount food store. In the lineup, just ahead of me, was a tall black fella. He may have known the check-out person, I’m not sure but when she asked him how he was doing he said, “I am a handsome, smart man, so I am doing just fine.”

A woman on the other side of me said, “You’re not a humble man, either.”

To which the man replied, “You have to love others to love yourself and I love almost everybody.”


On Sunday I was sitting a little way up a mountain trying to decide what I would write for our mother’s tribute. She’d passed away on Friday at the age of 95 and we’ll all miss her terribly.

Although I didn’t include this conversation in the tribute, I did think about this grocery store conversation and how it applied to my mother, who had lived a fruitful and good life.

I thought about my mother because of the fact that she’d shown so much love towards so many people. Especially to her children.  I know for sure she’d had a strong love for God and her faith, but she must also have loved herself. A love that benefited us all.


“Love is like a beautiful flower, which I may not touch, but whose fragrance makes the garden a place of delight just the same.”
                                                                                Helen Keller

“Love seeketh not Itself to please,
Nor for itself hath any care,
But for another gives its ease,
And builds a Heaven in Hell’s despair.”
                                                            William Blake, The Clod & The Pebble

Larry and Mom
Mom with Me at a Family Wedding
***
The woman who so kindly took the time to tell me that she was enjoying my blogs and then requested another blog which included Buster, (which I did provide in blog number 43), sent me some links that gave me some information about invasive plants. I thought my blog readers might be interested in the information.

Here are the links:
https://www.facebook.com/invasiveplantscapebreton?ref=hl A Facebook site for on-going discussion

http://invasiveplantscapebreton.blogspot.ca/ Some general information

https://www.pinterest.com/marianwhit/invasive-plants-of-cape-breton/ Links to information on the plants and eradication methodologies.

***
earwig
A few weeks ago, I was depositing some of my investments into a see-through garbage bag which is located in a rusty old drum. The deposits were empty beer cans, soft drink cans, orange juice containers and other whatnots.

These deposits make me more money than my official, government-insured GIC’s. Which are deposited in a bank and not in a see-through garbage bag in an old rusty drum.

Why, last week, I verily took my big bag of deposits to the local dump bank and made twenty plus dollars. Meanwhile, according to the official bank statements I receive in the mail from time to time that inform me how much interest I’ve made on my GICs, no word of a lie, if I’ve made five dollars interest I’m damn lucky.

So, you see what I mean. Plus, there are bonus perks, because I have usually enjoyed every last drop from the investments that I deposit in the see-through garbage bag which is in my big rusty drum account.

However, this is only a lead-up to my wee fable.

While I was removing the big board and rock which secure the see-through garbage bag in the rusty old drum bank vault where I keep my stash, I happened to look down. On the piece of splintering plywood I saw an ugly bug creature. Are any of God’s creature’s really ugly? Yes. To my little eyes this bug was ugly. It had a pair of pincers on its ass-end and I think the insect is called an ‘earwig’.


Anyway, this bug was dragging a poor defenseless ant across the top of the board, I assumed to its stash. Now, I happen to like ants, so I felt sorry for this little fella. Therefore, I showed no mercy. I snuffed the mean ugly bug. Just like that. I’m not proud of it, but I did do it, just like that, and that was the end of the cold-blooded killer.

Except, to my surprise, the squashed bug kept moving. And it became obvious I hadn’t been very observant. The bug was still moving in the same direction it had been moving before I poofed it into another dimension. It was moving in the direction of the ant. Which was also moving and using all its muscle power to drag the now dead, squashed ugly bug to its stash. The ant had been the aggressor.

Now, I am mildly dyslexic. Left is right and right is left.

What the heck had I done? I’d blamed the innocent instead of the guilty. The non-perpetrator instead of the perpetrator. I think there is a lesson here.

***
Years ago, I was in Halifax. I was carrying a knapsack. I was there to look for a job.

Anyway, I went into this plaza. I won’t name it. It’s in a very tall building. I was tired and sat on a bench to rest. A well dressed guard approached me. Asked me to leave. I guess I looked like riffraff. I do, from time to time.        
    
A few weeks ago, we visited the same plaza. Sue wanted to visit a bookstore. This time a very large guard approached us. He told us we had to leave. Because Buster was with us. He must have looked like riffraff. He does, from time to time.

I have to admit, that secretly, I was kind of proud that I had been kicked out of this plaza twice. And I was proud of Buster for taking the fall.
 
Because, when I look at the way our world is going, and I look at these nice buildings stuffed with fairly well dressed people, then I’m rather proud that I can say I have been kicked out of this plaza twice. Or maybe I should say, in a genteel way, that I have been escorted to the door.

And when we left the building, feeling like three refugees, I, strangely enough, began to think about the talking political heads who must spend hours at home soaking their tongues in lubricant so they can untie the knots they tied their flappers into. I swear some of their tongues must look like an earwig’s hind end.

And I think that many of the so called riffraff that get  kicked out of nice plazas, malls, restaurants, etc. probably have real stories. Stories they could tell, if people would listen. Stories that don’t knot up your tongue. And I’m also pretty damn sure they’re not all aspiring to join the magical middle class.

That’s my two cents worth and a pox on the security guards’ houses. Not the guards, just their houses, because I’m dyslexic, so I can’t be sure whether I’m talking from the right wing or the left.

***
"I done got so famous I can’t even grocery shop."

                                                                                      Riff Raff

Port Hood
Port Hood
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