Zip It Up

You know Spring has sprung when you see the coltsfoot blooming.  Coltsfoot is a perennial plant that looks similar to a dandelion when it blooms in spring. This wild edible plant is unusual in that the flowers bloom and die before the appearance of any leaves, which earned coltsfoot the name of "son before the father" in earlier times.   A decoction is made of 1 oz. of leaves, in 1 quart of water boiled down to a pint, sweetened with honey or liquorice, and taken in teacupful doses frequently. This is good for both colds and asthma.  Coltsfoot tea is also made for the same purpose.

Colts Foot

    

Barry and Larry                              
were walkin’ down the street.
Barry say, “Larry——--
Look at the dead bird.”
       Larry looks up—                                                              “Where?”
                                                                                    "Larry Sez (...again)" by Glotheri

It was a sunny, but cold Cape Breton day. Not unusual for these here parts. Maritime Mac is getting dressed to go to the grocery store. See Maritime Mac put on his nifty black pants. His cool, brand new, Walmart tee shirt. His hiking boots with two differently coloured laces.

See Buster, Maritime Mac’s pet dog, dance. See him jump. He wants to go with Maritime Mac. So bad!! So friggen bad!!

Maritime snaps on Buster’s fashionable red leash and off they go to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Lake O’Law.  Actually, there is no wizard in Lake O’Law, but I couldn’t resist the flow of words.

See the truck bounce through the pot holes and over the bumps. See Buster, Mac’s favourite dog and confidant, enjoying the exciting adventure. Go Bear, Go.

Bear is the name of Maritime Mac’s truck. Bear’s front licence plate has a picture of a polar bear.

Maritime Mac parks Bear next to the pole he usually parks next too. He jumps out of the truck. Tells Buster he’ll be right back.

Maritime Mac marches proudly across the paved parking lot. Smells the Cape Breton Mountain and salty ocean air as he parades forth in his snazzy black attire. Whistles a merry tune as he walks through the automatic doors, grabs a small cart and begins his shopping.  A bag of apples, loaf of bread, a pound of butter, shower gel, soup, two big dog bones for Buster Boy and of course Maritime’s two cans of Bud Light.

Last Year's Apple

But, oh my, he can’t get into the cooler. A woman who works in the store, is leaning on her cart, blocking Maritime’s access to the magic cans. She’s gossiping with another employee.

Maritime Mac sniffs. Coughs. Clears his throat. The woman finally spots him. Maritime Mac is surprised at the colour of her face. Maybe she’d visited the tropics or has high blood pressure. Her face is really quite red.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she says, as she backs up, so Maritime can get into the cooler.

“That’s quite all right, ma'am”, Maritime says. He feels that his clothing decor is best accented by his super polite response to this red-faced woman.

See Maritime Mac put the beer cans into the cart. See him wheel the cart to the check-out counter where he enters the line-up, and then is happily surprised to hear another check-out lady say, “I can help you over here, sir.”

Maritime Mac pushes his cart to the other cashier.

“Thank-you very much, my dear,” he says. Words to go with his spiffy clothes.

This woman’s face is also extremely red.

“Maybe they all went on a group tour to the tropics,” Maritime thinks.  “Maybe the lighting has been changed in here and that’s why their faces look all rouged up,” he also thinks.

Maritime Mac raises his head and looks up at the ceiling. The lights are a yellowish-white colour. No red luminescence shines down from on high.

Maritime Mac pays with cash. The cashier bags his supplies.  He thanks her in as dignified a way as he can.

Maritime Mac walks proudly across the parking lot, bags of groceries in hand. The highlands are still as misty and beautiful as ever as Maritime Mac marches towards a patiently waiting Buster.

Maritime wonders why the breeze feels so cold, so intimate and personal as he saunters across the concrete parking lot. Is curious why the wind feels like it’s blowing down his legs. Inside his pants. To the very tips of his toes. To provinces best left unspoken.

See Maritime Mac look down. See the uncool, not spiffy nor fashionable shock of brilliant red, light up his face as he spots the gaping hole, outlined by the gleaming zipper, shining forth from his cold crotch. Oh, god! All that time in a public space and he’s been flying half-mast to a cold north wind.

Why the hell didn’t some kind, compassionate and empathetic soul not do what they used to do when Maritime Mac was a kid? You ask a person, who is sucking wind in all the wrong places, this important question: “What do airplanes do?”

The answer, which every kid knew, was to say, “They fly.”  Then you tell the poor chap, that his fly was down. Yuk, yuk, yuk.

See Maritime Mac zip up and then run like an embarrassed dingo. See him fling his groceries into the back of the truck. See him start his truck and drive hell-bent for home. See Buster’s tail waving wildly in the wind. See his treat treasure wiggling and waggling out of his mouth like an unlit cigar.

Maritime is not happy that he solved the red-faces-in-the-grocery-store puzzle.

Not only that, but Maritime Mac later learned that his careless firing of the groceries into the back of Bear, in his effort to escape to a place where he could erase the red from his face, had broken one of the cans of beer.

See Maritime Mac, wiping the beer off Bear’s floor. Poor, spiffy dressed, embarrassed, Maritime Mac.

“Woof, woof,” Buster says. Which, translated from Canine, means, “Thank-you, thank-you, oh great red-faced master.”

***

Speaking of a dog named Buster, we also have a dog named Buster. What a coincidence, eh?

Anyway, last week we took Buster to the vet to get his ears treated and his buster shots. I’m sorry, I mean booster shots.

Buster has learned a few lessons since the last time he was at the vet's. He now wants out of the waiting room and not into the waiting room. That is a big change.

Anyway, they weighed Buster and the huge scales showed he’d gained a few pounds. Hard to see why unless he is getting too many treats. Very possible.

You see, Buster has a recurring yeast infection in his ears. Sue can relate very well to Buster’s problem, so she is quite keen to get Buster to the vet when he has this ailment.

The situation is this. Buster hates us touching his ears. He hates anybody touching his ears. So, he bites and he bites mighty hard. He also chomps mighty enthusiastically when somebody fools around with his arse end or tries to clip his nails. Buster has a very solid set of personal boundaries that you cross at your peril.

So, we waited for the vet in a tiny room with a shiny table. We waited about ten minute. All this time, Buster, poor Buster, was shaking.

Then the vet walked in, wearing his long white coat. I picked Buster up and plopped him down on the table.

After we all gave our polite salutations, which is what most people do, the vet looked at Buster and said, and I quote, “I remember you.”

Now we have Buster shaking and the vet shaking.

Well, I won’t go into much more detail but for two points.

Point one: We were quite nervous about having to treat Buster for the yeast infection because it meant we were going to have to daily try to apply the prescribed drops to Buster’s ears. Why, the very thought was enough to send us into involuntary jitterbugging spasms.

However, the vet had some really, really super great news. He informed us that they now have a new medication which only involves two treatments, a week apart.  And the vet does the treatments! This is really, really joyous news. Because we don’t have to try to treat Buster’s ears any more.  Just two trips to the vet and that will be it.

And point two: When I held Buster down so the vet could look into his ears, we all learned together that Buster doesn’t necessarily growl before he attacks. It was a Buster surgical biting blitzkrieg and he did manage to get a microscopic piece of the vet's finger.  A wee treat, so to speak.

In summary, Buster was muzzled, and he got his ears de-yeasted, his three booster pokes and another appointment for next Wednesday.  

I might phone in sick from a yeast infection.

Interesting Fungus on One of our Trees