Category: Trailer

Shackwacky - Chapter and Verse

31/3/2015

I’ve just finished reading a science fiction detective novel by Sherry D. Ramsey. That’s a lot to say in one breath. The book is called ‘The Murder Prophet’. Now, it was a novel that made me look forward to going to bed. Because that’s when I read novels. The book, in a few sentences, is about Kit, the main character, who’s trying to solve a mystery before a millionaire named Aleshu Coro is murdered. The threat was made by the mysterious Murder Prophet.

Many of the characters in this book, including the animals, have super powers. Power to tell whether somebody is lying. Power to tell if somebody is using their powers. Power to change a person from one thing to another, including themselves. Anyway, lots of different powers. I particularly enjoyed a delightful side character, a goose by the name of Trip, who had a very special power. The goose liked to practice killer ninja moves, could talk and was active throughout the novel.

Anyway, I enjoyed the book. It was a good read and can be ordered through Amazon.ca as a Kindle or paperback edition at http://www.amazon.ca/The-Murder-Prophet-Sherry-Ramsey/dp/0993897304/ref=tmm_pap_title_0

***

My god, but haven’t we had enough snow? For what we are once again about to receive we are truly thankful, amen. NOW GO AWAY! Enough is enough, and as I’m writing this blog, in the living room, with Buster lying on my foot, and at the end of March, I’ve just heard that we are to receive another ten to fifteen cm today. Hallelujah!

                “One must have the mind of winter
                              To regard the frost and the boughs
                              Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

                              And have been cold a long time
                              To behold the junipers shagged with ice,
                              The spruces rough in the distant glitter”
                      Wallace Stevens, The Snowman

Our Trail to Road

***

WARNING!! THIS PART OF THE BLESSED BLOG WAS INSPIRED BY A SEVERE CASE OF ACUTE SHACK-WACKINESS!
And I did go to bed one night. And I had a dream. I dreamed that I bought a )(*&^ snow blower. And thus I woke up and declared, “Lo and behold, I’ve just had another friggen nightmare.”

But I did go out and purchase a snow blower, anyway. Although my mind was shouting at the top of its voice, “Larry, Larry, my son, verily, verily, you will be verily, verily sorry and will surely repent of your stupid deed in buying a cursed snow blower when you were warned against such a stupid action. Thou faithless servant.”

And verily, and thus and therefore, I discovereth, over a short time, that my dream was true. Because verily one friggen wintry morning, I couldn’t get the friggen snow blower to move. I did pull and push all the sacred buttons and levers, but it would not budge. The wheels desisted and resisted and so I had to pull the son of a blower through the deep snow, to the fair entrance to our driveway, where I left it for the snow blower purveyor to pick up and take to his holy little motor workshop.

And lo and behold and verily, thus and therefore, he phoned me and told me that my snow blower, Grinder, had frozen his bolts off and that’s why Grinder wouldn’t move. So, they got him all nicely warmed up around their pellet stove and gave him a cup of hot W30 oil and cinnamon. Then they delivered him back to our abode.

And lo and behold and verily, thus and therefore, the snow blower did blow snow for a few very brief occasions, until the snow got too heavy or icy or wet or white or some damn snowy issue, when lo and behold, hark the herald snow blower angel asked me, “Did you know that your snow blower has stopped blowing?” And how would I not? And I said to god, “Why, god?” And I asked the same question of the snow blower man, “Why, snow blower man?” and he said, “Hark, I think you probably broke a belt.”

So, verily and thus and therefore, he came to our snow-stuffed lane and picked up Grinder and did take him away, while I stood in six feet of snow and waved my frozen glove and fingers bye-bye at my disappearing snow blower. Then did I thus whisper under my breath, “And don’t come back, you unreliable son of a beech.”

But verily and thus and therefore, they couldn’t find a replacement belt. Not until the snow was ice and too much for poor Grinder to remove. So, verily, thus and thou and hark, when they finally did find a belt, verily many weeks later, and they put the belt in and delivered it to me, the snow was unmanageable and so verily, I did dig out our little, blessed, metal toolshed and put the snow blower in said toolshed so it could hibernate in the summer. And I told the snow blower not to move a bolt, nut or screw or it would be turned into a pillar of salt.

The next winter, I verily, thus and therefore, took the snow blower out to prepare him for some certain upcoming manly snow blowing. But verily, I smelled the odour of gasoline and the snow blower would not verily start.

So, verily, thus and thou, I picked up my feet and took up my phone. Phoned the snow blower purveyor. And lo and behold he came and he picked Grinder up and then verily in not a verily long time he told me that some cursed mice had built a forty-room condo in Grinder. They had built a restraining wall against the gas line and thus it had broken asunder. And lo and behold, thus and thou, I ordered him to hand them their notices and then fix the gas line.

Oh snow blower, you break my heart. How many ways do you verily have thus? And the tiny little snow flakes fell, each one a different shape from its brethren, and I got out my snow blower and did blow and blow for about an hour when suddenly the snow blower wouldn’t move forward on command. So I verily, thus and therefore investigated and behold! I found out I had broken a breach pin. Which meant that only half the sacred augers were going round and round. So that was why I was rolling up a gigantic snowball on one side of the snow blower while the other side was not valiantly blowing away. So, I went again to the snow blower man and I bought another breach pin and installeth it myself.

The snows continued to fall and the world grew all white and my eyes began to see strange colours from the all white, everywhere, top and bottom and side by side and the ice came and the ice left and Grinder and I did manage to make it through the rest of the winter. Hallelujah!

And verily, thou and thus came the winter of 2014-2015 did arrive. And the snow felleth and felleth and felleth and felleth and felleth and felleth and it did raineth too and raineth more and more and the ice got thicker and the snow higher and verily I got to use the snow blower twice before it stopped.

I verily, thou and thus, decided to check it out myself. I very carefully read the manual. I worked on the snow blower only long enough to feel I had accomplished something or learned something and then I would verily quit before I went into a crying tantrum. Because verily, verily, I have little patience with disobedient servants.

And, after cautiously working on the said Grinder, I managed to find the problem. The belt was rent asunder. And I verily spotted little mice feet and mice faces and mice other parts sticking out of the holy inner sanctum where the belts do their business. And I, by myself, did replace the belt.

Path from Woodshed to Trailer

Then more snow did fall. Then some of it melted and froze and melted and froze and I got, maybe, three snow blows out of my snow blower and my new belt that I put in all by myself. Although, Sue did hold the snow blower and did use a tiny pair of pliers to pick out the tiny pieces of mice I missed and some of their bits and pieces of nesting material.

Then, one fine morning, I went to the woodshed and tried to start Grinder. But he wouldn’t start and lo, I pulled and pulled and pulled until my puller was exhausted.

Lo, I took a rest and then returneth and pulleth some more. And suddenly the engine did start in a violent rush of engine power. And then all was silent.

It was then that I witnessed, in a vision, a burning snow blower. And I took off my tuque and came forth and lost the race. (Probably heard that one somewhere, right?)

And verily, thou, thus and disgustingly, the engine man phoned me and told me that my engine was as dead as a frozen parrot. He said, “You must have got some ice or snow in the engine that melted and then froze.”

“But it’s a snow blower! Isn’t it supposed to get snow and ice on it and in it, fgs? My truck and Sue’s car get ice and snow on them and they don’t blow up their engines. My lawn mower doesn’t desist because it gets grass in it. So, what the hell are you saying?”

“Well, let me put it this way. There were a lot of parts that wanted out.”

He then explained that when or if I get a new motor, I should probably keep it covered or inside. And maybe brush the snow off, because it can melt and run down into the engine and then freeze. Then you get the results I got.

I’d like to put it this way, if I verily may, “What the hell is the use of a snow blower if you have to keep snow off it after you finish with it, set mousetraps inside, lay moth balls around all its internal and external organs, place a hot water bottle on it before you go to bed, make sure it’s tucked in on a bed that can pass military inspection, don’t push it too fast if the snow is thick, and make sure you don’t snow blow slush because it can freeze the wheels and the inner sanctums? That’s what I have Buster for.”

AMEN

We now use shovels and snowshoes and to hell with the snow blower.

Lots of Shovelling

***

“The light made the snowballs look yellow. Or at least I hoped that was the cause.”
Gary D. Schmidt, The Wednesday Wars

Buster on Watch Duty

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The Path in the Sky

30/8/2014

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I’m back and hoping that you’ve all had a great last few weeks and are getting pumped up for the fall. Which you know as well as I do, is the precursor to winter.

I’ve just finished reading a wonderful poetry book written by David Woods. He’s a black author and the book is titled “Native Song”. This was his first collection of poetry.   It is an intense and passionate collection that reveals his determined and unrelenting fervour to right the wrongs that were done to the Blacks.

David Woods has also written plays and is an accomplished artist. Here are a few samples of his poems.

“It is never good to agree
to hands choking you to death.”

        David Woods, ARTIFACT (For Rose)

“Each fragment lying outside
The structure of love
Turns to monster in the late night,

Each society that discards people
Sharpens hands for killing.”

      David Woods, MACHUKIO (The Terror)

***

A few months ago I was asked to be one of the judges for a writing competition. And whew, the more I thought about this judging task, the more serious I felt about the whole venture. Me, having the audacity to tell people that their stories are better or worse than somebody else's!

You see, I’ve submitted a few short stories to a competition or two. And, I’m proud to say, I’ve never won any. Yeah, blow the horns and bang the drums.

However, I’ve come close. One story got an honourable mention and one made it to the long list on a CBC short story competition.

The thing is, I labour over the stories I submit. Rewrite and rewrite. Change the plot. Discard the plot. Start a new story. Totally change that plot. Get out my notes and check the story against lists of short story musts and maybes. On and on and on and then one day I mail the story out. Usually on the deadline day.

Once it’s in the mailbox I try to forget about it. Put it out of my mind, but still, there’s always a tiny flitting bug memory that buzzes around in the back of my consciousness. Which periodically bites me on the brain stem and makes me think, “I wonder how I’ll do in the competition?” “When will I hear from those short story writing gods?”

I also wonder who is judging my story. Is the judge a woman or a man? How old is the judge? Are they watching television and eating a peanut butter sandwich while they are reading my precious baby? Are they drinking? Oh god, no. While they were looking at my story? My story!!

Is he or she in a bad mood? What kind of life philosophy do they have? Will my story yank their chain the wrong way? Are they sophisticated, snobby readers?

So, when I was reading the stories that I was supposed to judge, I kept all those thoughts in my head. I really, really tried to read the stories carefully. And I didn’t eat anything while I was carefully reading them. Although, I did drink a cup of hot tea. And I only had quiet music on while I sat in my office with my door shut as tight as a honey jar.

Not only that, but Sue also had a read of the stories and made her own notes. Oh yes, we made notes, but I didn’t read her notes until I finished reading the stories. I didn’t want to be pre-prejudiced. (Is that a word?) Neither did she read mine.

She was as serious about the job as I was and then afterwards we sat over a cup of tea and talked about the stories and argued a bit and then came to a conclusion.

Of course, it was a subjective exercise and in the overall picture that is probably a good thing. Because writing and art are subjective by nature. As are so many of the dictates we are exposed to which tell us how to behave or not to behave, eat or talk. Much subjectivity must rule if our lives are to expand, and if we and our race are to venture out into the creative unknowns.

Writing Tips I've Gleaned over the Years

Here are a few points to remember if you are writing a short story for a contest.

1: Begin with a bang.

2: Try to introduce an element of uncertainty or suspense at the beginning.

3: Make your characters alive and real.

4: Make your story different.

5: If you have no length restrictions then try to keep your story reasonably short. Say between 1,500 and 3,000 words.

6: Have an ending that is positive, meaning one with a different turn to it. It doesn’t have to be a happy ending. It can be sad, but it should say something important.

7: Make sure you have one clear central theme or plot running through the story.

8: Try for a story that goes against the grain. Don’t always stick to the politically correct issues of the day.

9: Follow the contest rules.

10: Watch out for errors in grammar, spelling, punctuation, etc. No matter how many times you reread your work, you will miss some errors. Most writers ask at least one other person to proofread their stories.

***

I’m going to try to tie a thin thread between our time at the cottage and my thoughts on subjectivity, rules, freedom and creativity. Here goes.

We recently spent a week at a cottage. It was a large cottage. It had to be because ten of us were going to be rattling around inside its walls. And it was a beautiful cottage. Alas, it did have some problems.

For example, the well went dry. Which meant the toilets didn’t work for a time. Therefore a gigantic truck had to squeeze down the cottage road and pump thirty thousand litres of water into the parched well.

However, we still didn’t have the downstairs toilet or washing machine operating because there was a pain-in-the-ass leak down there. So the plumber had to shut the water off to the downstairs washroom until it was fixed.

This problem affected the family members who had to sleep in the basement or, to use a more genteel label, the downstairs. The downstairs was damp and probably not so comfortable for those family members and some nights the pump was running almost continuously.

There were other problems too. One family had a sick cat which had to go to the hospital and another family had a child who was bitten by a tick and she had to go to the hospital.

So you might think that I would think the week at the cottage was near to being a disaster. But in my mind it wasn’t even close. And it also proved that having lived a life that was a bit or a lot off the grid can be an advantage.

You see, even though there wasn’t plumbing for a day, there was an outhouse. And that’s what I used anyway. Even before the plumbing went up shit creek. Because I was used to using a shit-house or, if you want to be more genteel about describing it, a privy.

I remember when Sue and I moved to our trailer with the indoor toilet that we missed the outhouse. Missed sitting inside, with the door open, looking at the ants, listening to the wind, watching the clouds, smelling the flowers, feeling the snowflakes tickle our face, listening to the ice on the lake speak. Those kinds of natural earth- bound events.

So, when the two dumpers shut down, it was no big deal for us. And when the plastic toilet bowl pail in the outhouse was full, again there was no big problem. Sue and I simply went outside and dumped it in the designated place so the various family members would have a tidy place to attend to their personal needs and requirements. And she and her daughter hauled buckets of water from the ocean for washing purposes.

The privy had a Dutch door so we could sit in there, secure from onlookers, while admiring the ocean and watching the blue heron who spent time on the beach.

Antigonish Harbour

What were the other positives? The beautiful ocean. The trip to PEI. The chance for the family to better understand each other and to spend undistracted time together. Time to read and drink beer or wine or rum and coke or ginger ale or cola, etc. And the weather was good for the most part, so we all played in various ways outside. The meals created by Sue’s son and son-in-law were wonderful. We got to meet an interesting fella who helped us all realize that the world doesn’t whirl the same way for everyone. Or maybe I should say, revealed to us that the sun shines on everybody. Subjectivity. Subjectivity.

I found a hiking trail; we played games with each other; I met up with a dog named “Luka” who was kind enough to jump up on me and show me his teeth.

Luka

My new camera captured some beautiful pictures; I kayaked for the first and second time. Oh, I could go on and I’m sure that everybody else has lots of good memories too.

Of course, we all went into the cottage with a bunch of expectations. And, the cottage was reasonably expensive, so of course we wanted everything to work out. But instead there were the problems. Things broke, didn’t work the way we wanted them to and it rained one day, just like life. Lots and lots of things happen in life. And, in my mind, it’s the things in life that surprise us and disrupt our plans, or don’t follow the rules as laid down by those who have the power to lay them down, that play a large part in what moves the human world forward in a creative Wabi Sabi way. (Wabi Sabi is the Japanese art of appreciating the beauty in the naturally imperfect world.)

View of Antigonish Harbour from Cottage

***

By the way, I painted our trailer a different shade of green. We like it better.

One interesting thing, though. If you look at the picture it looks like one section had one less coat of paint applied to it. However, it didn’t. They all received the same amount. Maybe it was the rain that caused one section to look more faded. Maybe I mixed one batch better than another. Who knows, but DOESN'T IT LOOK CREATIVE?

Our newly painted home

***

             “For every evil under the sun
              There is a remedy, or there’s none;
          If there is one, try and find it;
          If there is none, never mind it.”
                               A Proverb

          “The woods were dark, and the night was black,
          And only an owl could see the track;
          But the cheery driver made his way
          Through the great pine woods as if it were day.

          I asked him, ‘How do you manage to see?
          The road and the forest are one to me.’
          ‘To me as well,’ he replied, ‘And I
          Can only drive by the path in the sky.’

                                                  Amos R. Wells, The Path in the Sky

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"Guess What I Found?"

7/8/2014

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This is blog number twenty-five and I’m still trucking along. Even though I was warned by a friend to be careful that I don’t write myself out and have nothing to contribute to my other writing tasks. Maybe that’s why I only write a blog approximately every two weeks.

However, this blog might be a little early. Maybe. Because we are going to a cottage on Antigonish Bay for a week and I might not get to do any blogging there.

Anyway, I have a little story for you. If I were going to give it a title I’d call it, ‘GETTING A NEW STOVE’. And I’ll juice up the story by adding this little tantalizer: Boy, oh boy, was Sue ever glad to be getting rid of our old stove. Which only had two working burners. Because I had removed two fuses. Because we couldn’t turn one burner off. And when we removed that burner's fuse, we found out that the other burner had suddenly decided to jump ship and be a copycat. So, out came two fuses.

Country life includes a variety of wildlife!

I’ll start by saying we always have mice to contend with. There are lots of mouse stories, like this one from a few nights ago. That particular night I went to bed. Which I do pretty well every night except long ago when I was younger.

I opened the closet door to put away an item of clothing. I’d tell you what the item was but I don’t remember. However, on this night, I was greeted by a foul odour. A something-decomposing odour. And this jarred my memory.

“Yes, now I remember, at some point in time, I had placed a loaded mouse trap in the closet. Because one night we had heard plenty of activity going on in there.”
So, I rummaged through the shoes and whatnots and there was the trap and the mouse.

Yeck. I picked the trap up and carried it outside. Where I dumped the mouse. Which I knew would be a healthy breakfast for our young crow family. Then I sprayed a nice-smelling spray into the closet.

A few days later we went to North Sydney and bought a cooking stove. It was to be delivered the next day.

The next day, while we were waiting for the new stove, while I was outside painting the trailer, and Sue was preparing the old stove for removal, I heard Sue shout, “Guess what I found?”

God, I hate it when I hear Sue shout, “GUESS WHAT I FOUND?”

Guess what Sue had found? She had found, with her little eyes, a well-roasted mouse in the oven. How long had it been there? Had we, when we chowed down on the last roast chicken, actually been consuming roast chicken à la smoked mouse?

And that’s why Sue was never so glad in her whole life to get rid of a stove and the memories that went with it.

***

Well, I now have my new K50 Pentax camera. So, for the rest of this blog I will just post some pictures I took with the camera. I hope you’ll enjoy this pictorial journey around parts of Cape Breton.