Victoria, B.C.

Victoria, British Columbia, Canada

Inner Harbour  from the window of the Delta Victoria Ocean Pointe Resort and Spa

At Night                                                                     

 

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Harbour in the morning sun

In the Morning

 

The Empress Hotel  

 

 

 

Butchart Sunken Garden

 





Victoria shares it's heritage with native Canadians and their well known totem poles



 

Sorry folks, I don't know how to get this picture smaller.....it has a mind of it's own!

 

 



 

Now don't for one minute think I know all the flower varieties  

          

 MY FAVORITE OF ALL Honey bees hard at work

Flowers too numerous too mention

 

 

 

 

 

 

These are begonias

 A fabulous walkway

A unique way to showcase all types of ivy

 A type of hydrangea

 

Found in the Italian Garden

The little Tugboat

 Then my iPhone ran out of batteries....

 

 

 

Fall Sights and Sounds in Saskatchewan

It's Fall in Saskatchewan and what we fondly call "Indian Summer".  The weather is glorious with warm temperatures in the daytime from a brilliantly shining sun, even though it's started to dip to below freezing at night.  I have picked the cucumbers and tomatoes and will bring the onions in soon.  Farmers have the harvesting of their grain crops well underway and probably most are done in southern areas.  In Saskatchewan, some of the crops I can think of are wheat, rye, barley (the head has a beard), flax (look for the blue field), oats, canola (yellow field), canary seed, peas (they dessicate these and then they look awful), lentils,  grasses for hay crops, and alfalfa.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not a farmer, just a farmer's daughter.  :-)


Even living in the city, we know harvest is on because of the look of the dusty, hazy air.  At night, there's no mistaking a harvest moon.   Somehow the combine dust particles do something to change the look of the sky and you just know what time of year it is.  The air is becoming crisp and soon it will be Hallowe'en.











My back yard looked to be in a real mess this weekend, so Saturday morning was the day to get to work.  I have a huge maple tree that although lovely, tends to shed small dried branches whenever there's a wind.  It's been pretty windy lately, so the lawn had to be raked before mowing.   The outer edge of my backyard has shrubs, flowering plants and grasses.  I have an assortment of cedars, hostas, rose bushes, chives, strawberries, raspberries, lilly of the valley, peonies etc.  In my tiny garden in the corner, I planted a very limited taster's garden only of cucumbers, green and yellow beans and swiss chard.  One lonely swiss chard plant has thrived against all odds, I guess because  I deliberately left it untouched all summer. It has the deepest green leaves and the brightest red stock and stands up as straight as anything I have ever seen...especially for a swiss chard.  It looks more like a rhubarb than anything, but it isn't (at least I don't think it is.....) It began as a bedding plant, started by some local greenhouse and I haven't had the heart to disturb it and neither have any of the other little creatures who live around there, including the woodpecker.  He's been hanging around two of my trees and he makes an awful racket.  He's white with black markings and has a red cap on a distinctly Woody Woodpecker shaped head.

My deck is not as exciting and is beginning to rot in spots.  Looks like the odd board will soon need to be replaced...maybe next year.  I swept off all the leaves and branches and gave it a good hosing down.  I put things away like lawn chairs and small tables, readying the place for the inevitable snowfall.  I have a shed of sorts under the deck where I store a few things, but now I kind of hesitate to go under there....so left everything sitting outside, or maybe it'll wind up in the garage.

The reason?  Mrs. Mega Spider.

 

See the back of the chair in the reflection of the kitchen window?  See the size of the spider?  She  escaped from me and went down into my under-deck shed about a week ago and I was not impressed.  I swept away her food trap, the big web on the window and even used the little bit of RAID I had left, but I doubt it fazed her.  (I've since gone to the store and bought the really nasty stuff in the black can this time RAID MAX). She had built another big web on a pair of my outside shoes which I'd kicked off and left there one muddy day....(imagine stepping on her?) and another on a basement window.  She's a master at spinning webs, so I think I'm probably fighting a losing battle.  I expect she's a mother and has had a nice, big family this summer with a multitude of babies who will grow even bigger than her.. like most kids do...      I'm asking that her and her offspring please stay out of my house if the universe has anything to say about it.  Incidentally, I found two smaller spiders in the basement sink the other day and immediately drowned them both.  You know the story about the water spout.

As I worked outside, I could hear flock upon flock of Canda Geese flying overhead.  As you know, at this time of year, they're flying south for the winter.  Many Canadians do the same thing.  I wish I was one of them!  The geese somehow know exactly the right time to leave for a warmer climate and I wonder how.  My folks used to make a break for warmer climes on occasion, only to get caught in a snowstorm by about Salt Lake City, Utah.   I guess if you're outside 24 hours a day, you'd soon get out of a place that freezes your beak and the webs between your toes too!  The photo below is of a small grouping, but generally, there are thousands flying together and much higher in the sky.  They talk all the way there and back because if you're outside, you can hear them honking from very far off when they leave in the Fall and again when they return in the Spring.  I know some people like that.   I went to Arizona one winter and found that the Americans don't call these same birds Canada Geese at all, they call them "honkers".  They think we're crazy because we think they're OUR geese.  They do have a point.  I never realized the Americans think they're THEIR geese just as much as we do!



I watched families of geese up close at the lake for a few summers and found that the male doesn't leave the female once the baby goslings are born.  One or the other of the adult geese takes turn standing guard at all times.  They are exceptionaly family oriented and appear more monogamous than some humans I know.

Once on my way to Edmonton, I saw a family of geese standing on the side of the highway.  One of the adults had been hit and killed.  The other adult and the babies stood alongside the lifeless body, stock still, waiting and waiting.  The cars whizzed by, but none of them moved and it was such a tragic and sad little sight.

Geese are not like ducks, where the male is long gone and the female is left with the troupe of seven to ten or more ducklings to care for on her own. They are so cute and can those little gaffers ever swim fast. I followed eensey weensey ducklings in a kayak once and they would only be a day or two old! They kept ahead of me as I paddled along for quite some time, until their mama shooed them off to the shoreline.

 If you don't think there's anything beautiful about Saskatchewan in the Fall, you need to get off the beaten path and find out for yourself!

This is canola being swathed with a self-propelled swather vs. a pull-type.  It looks like a bumper crop!

\
Our forests are many and gorgeous

 Go for a ride on a combine...Go with a wife and mother and take meals to the field....Or ride with the mother who's driving the combine, the swather or taking the grain back to the bin in the big truck.

  

Ride a ferry across the Saskatchewan River...

 

You can't beat Saskatchewan all year round, but especially in the Fall, it's great!

 

Kids and Summer Jobs

Summer jobs for young folks I think can be a good idea.  It gives them an opportunity to develop a sense of accomplishment and to interact with other adults besides their parents and teachers.  A job lets them make a little money, gain some skills and self confidence, and generally keeps them out of the mischief that a long, hot summer can bring.

In 1968, I was fourteen years old and left the farm temporarily to stay with my aunt and uncle in Yorkton for most of July and August.  They had bought a corner store with a residence attached to the back.  It had been owned by a Chinese man by the name of Skinny and that's what the townspeople called it... "Skinny's".  My aunt and uncle had four kids, two elementary school-aged ones and two little ones.  I was hired to give my aunt a break from the store, help out with the kids and the household, and really just give me a chance to get off the farm.  It was time to get out into the world and to make a little bit of spending money.  I had saved enough money by the end of that first summer to buy myself a beautiful camel-coloured, maxi length winter coat, with a fur-lined hood.  I was very proud of myself.  As a matter of fact, I returned to that job every summer until I was sixteen.

I loved bagging the groceries and incidentally, it was all brown paper bags or cardboard boxes in those days, tied up with a string around the flaps at the top. We weren't to the stage of asking about "paper or plastic" and the question fell by the wayside too, if you haven't noticed.   It's not very often you see paper bags these days.  There was no such thing as the scanning of bar codes.  Self check-outs were unheard of and would probably only mean you were shoplifting if you even thought to mention it.  A chip on a credit card meant nothing either, other than you probably had run it through the chick chick machine a few too many times.  There were bar codes on some of the grocery items like canned goods, but most people didn't know what they were there for.  I'm serious.  Prices were written or stamped on little sticky price tags and they sometimes fell off.  There was no overhead loudspeaker to say, "price check on aisle 12".  If there was no price on an item, the clerk in a corner store would have to run down the aisle, find the item, and then run back to the till to finish ringing through the order.  You really had to trust people and not everyone was trustworthy even back in the golden age of the sixties.

If memory serves me, the cash register was like one you'd see in an antique shop...old and metal, but highly functional and exceptionally sturdy.  You could throw it off a cliff and probably not find a dent.  It seems like they made most stuff like that to start with...I'm thinking of safes and cash boxes.  Not the plastic stuff that came after.  The drawer rang when it opened.  One thing that survived all these years was giving the customer their cash register tape.  Back then, older customers tended to pour over the numbers in case you, as a teenager, had made an error.   They didn't care if their actions embarrassed you or that your face was red as a beet and you felt like a real tool.   Money was not something to be loose with.  A fool and his money are easily parted and all that stuff.  I am happy to say that although sometimes they found discrepancies, it wasn't very often.  Running that cash register was where I learned to place all the dollar bill denominations in the same direction in the drawer.  I also learned how to count money back.  I learned what to do if somebody gave me more than the exact amount asked for.  Like....a different amount in an attempt to get back even change.  For instance, if it was $7.50 and they gave me a $10 bill and two quarters, I soon learned that I owed them three dollars in some combination of one or two dollar bills. Back in those days, we did not have looneys or toonies.  We had one dollar bills that I think were green and two dollar bills that I think were a kind of salmon colour.  Those have gone by the wayside now too.   My transactions did not always balance by the end of the day, but my aunt and uncle never once scolded me or made me feel like I had done anything wrong.

Behind the counter was a small workspace, more like a narrow galley, so there wasn't room for a whole lot of workers.  The customer would stand on the grocery side of the counter in front of you and you would stand behind  the counter with the cash register at your back.  I seem to recall there being something like a rear view mirror so you could still see the person while you turned your back to make change.  There were no debit cards or pay pal, so cheques and cash worked even then.  Some people had a charge account, which is pretty much unheard of today, so if they wanted to charge it, the information, (especially the total and their name) had to be recorded in an accounts receivable book.  By the way, if we're talking about things that have prevailed over the years and things that have changed. .. Corner stores in and of themselves are almost non-existent any more.  They really were gems in any neighbourhood...

Somewhere behind the counter sat a big, shiny, sharp, ice cold, metal meat slicer.  It would glint in the sun every day through the window and seemed to invite people to come in and ask to have sliced any one of several varieties of cold meat.  Did I say it was sharp?  You could lop off a finger like nothing if you weren't careful.  In fact, I was exceptionally leery of that thing but am happy to report I still have all my digits intact to this day...touch wood.   I would slice the meat, weigh it on the scale and wrap it up in brown kraft paper and tie it with string.  Thickness of the slice was according to personal preference.  Some wanted it shaved, others wanted it thicker for sandwiches.  I don't remember smoked turkey being the hit it became this past few decades, but I do remember pastrami, mac 'n cheese loaf, bbq meat loaf, roast beef, chicken, turkey, rings of ham and garlic sausage, and almost anything a palate could desire and a tummy could digest.   The meat was on display in a big cooler which made up part of the counter.  Other favorites were the poppyseed roll, along with fresh bread and buns, all imported from the Canora Bakery (a few miles down the highway to the Northeast).

I usually indulged in a treat about mid-afternoon every single day...free, I might add.  (Back home, I might have had this treat once or twice a month...).  I enjoyed either a bottle of NuGrape or an Orange Crush pop.  You could get orange Fanta, but I didn't like it as much.  Mountain Dew was my other favorite.  I'm pretty sure Diet Pepsi and Diet Coke were around, but I wouldn't have touched either with a ten foot pole.  I didn't like anything that caused bubbles to fizz up inside my nose.  The pop was in glass bottles with caps you had to use a bottle opener on.  Seriously, there were bottle openers affixed to walls at the weirdest spots and actually used.  There were open coolers of cold water in restaurants that held all the pop when I was a kid.  There were no cans with tabs and no plastic bottles with screw off caps.  I don't even remember there being pop machines, but maybe there were.  We weren't really into recycling per se, but you certainly could go picking bottles in the ditches, (still can) wash them in an outdoor tub, and take them some place for a refund of money.  You couldn't expect to get rich, but you did get a few cents for every bottle.  You used to see grown men on bicycles with sacks on their backs collecting bottles. Not so much any more, but they're still around.  Some were wealthy and either misers or had nothing else to do. I also loved different kinds of chocolate bars and potato chips.  It's amazing I didn't gain weight, but I guess my metabolism was fast enough so everything evened out.  When we first moved to Hudson Bay as a kid, we stopped at a grocery store downtown and dad bought everyone in the car a chocolate bar.  I probably already told you this...I know, it's a bad sign when you start repeating yourself, but some things you can't remove from your memory.  He always bought himself a Cuban Lunch, but this time when he opened it....the things was full of little, white worms.  You can imagine the scene that followed....  Cuban Lunches I seldom chose.

Back to the corner store in Yorkton....In those days vanilla, hair spray, perfume and lysol disinfectant were favorites among certain folks.  They were cheap and gave a pretty good kick I guess.  The ones who abused these products got to coming into the store quite often.  They inevitably would wander in and sheepishly ask for "wanella".  I can remember pretending I couldn't understand what they were saying.  I'd make them say it several times over.  No mistaking it....they couldn't say their vee's.  Yes, I can be a real jack ass at times.  Ironically, I got so I never knew whether the strong-smelling Sweet Pea perfume or Gillette shaving cream, would be used for the person's body or drank down their gullet.  It didn't take me long to figure it out though, believe me.  Apparently, they mixed the shaving cream in with their beer, if they had enough money for both.   I never could figure out the whole drinking lysol thing, and it became common to hear of this person or that who had died from an overdose.  I'd say one swallow would do it.  Today, you almost never hear of anybody dying from drinking lysol, lye, or battery acid.  Usually, if the person was super inebriated, my uncle would magically appear and I would be off the hook.  Sometimes if it was a big transaction, I was happier to be nowhere around anyhow.  I guess it was just as easy to sell a case of vanilla as it was to sell one bottle.  The cases usually went to someone sober in a last ditch attempt, I guessed,  to prevent even worse destruction by their friends and relatives.  It sounds bad, but was really a very noble thing to do.  Almost as if doling it out in smaller quantities more often was medicinal and would help the person not get so wasted at any one sitting.    It was either that or they were planning on going on a pretty good party.....Might as well come in when sober and be clear-headed for the transaction.  By the hushed voices in the back aisle, I guess it equated to bootlegging.

I had many customers who came in and asked for "Old Port Cigarellos - tipped please".  That request was said to me over and over until I began to think there must be something special about these mini cigars.  After all, they were long and thin and looked pretty elegant when being smoked.  My favorite customer was a cool biker who was tall, dark and handsome.  He came in often and I had a big crush on him, but he didn't give me a second glance.  I was smoking cigarettes myself in those days, so decided to try one of these wine-tipped cigarellos.  It wasn't half bad, but boy did I feel sick afterwards.  I gave up that habit toute de suite!  Do you realize that a package of cigarettes in those days was about 50 cents.  A carton was about $3.50.  Not sure what they are worth today, but I thank God that I quite smoking in about 1985 (27 years as a non-smoker!).  I remember when a package of cigarettes was 25 cents, my dad made a proclamation that if they ever actually hit 50 cents, he would absolutely and definitely QUIT smoking.  That price came and went and he only stopped smoking for a few months during the days of his open heart surgery.   He used to say he quit smoking every day...

Sometimes, things were slow in the store and to break the monotony, I stocked shelves, cleaned, swept and dusted.  Back in the house, I ironed, cooked, looked after kids and generally enjoyed myself.  My Mom had taught me well.  There was no room for a dishwasher, so all dishes were done by hand in the kitchen sink.  My aunt was floored that anybody would even remotely like ironing, but I loved it and still do. I remember my Mom and Grandma letting me iron pillow cases and tea towels for years.   I was told the men's white shirts were probably not for me because you know, I might miss a sleeve or something.....The looking after of kids might mean I had to take them to J.C. Beach, but that was certainly no hardship for me.  I loved to swim and suntan and play in the water myself.  A girl I met in the neighbourhood came with us to the beach one time and offered to watch our stuff on the towel.  I had inherited my grandmother's wedding ring (on my dad's side) and amazingly enough, it went missing during her watch....Hmmm....she strongly denied having any idea where it went...Hmmm...As I got older, if I was lucky my aunt would let me drive her green and white Rambler around town or to do an errand for her.  (That girl asked me to watch her dog while they went on holidays and I wouldn't).  She was a real brat it turned out.  Sometimes my aunt  and I would go play Bingo or go to the A&W drive-inn for a frosted mug of root beer and a teen burger.  Life was grand on those gorgeous summer evenings.  As I got older, sometimes my guy friends from HBay would show up and we'd go driving or to the show.  I was always glad to see them, but one night came home to find all the doors locked, so had to crawl in through a window!

At the time, Yorkton was a largely Ukrainian community, so I learned a few words in that language.  It wasn't too much of a stretch because Hudson Bay, was also comprised of many Ukrainian friends, neighbours, and school-mates.  In fact, my uncle coached me on what to say if people came into the store and started speaking to me in their native tongue.  All I had to do was say this one phrase that sounded like "yen es ni you"...It was supposed to mean "I don't understand".  He was a big b.s.'er, so I was suspicious that the phrase might mean something else and said as much, vowing never to use it.  As well, the kids at school back in HBay had taught me to say "shot the robbish and che kai che kai whoa" all with a Ukrainian accent.  :-)  Or so I thought.  I had no idea what that really meant either.  So one day this lady who was in the store was mad as a hatter about something and was complaining loudly  to me in Ukrainian.  I could only imagine it was something to do with a bad dose of  what?  sour cream?  Ex Lax?  Finally in desperation, I said the "yen es ni you" phrase out loud to her.  She just kept talking and looking at me like I was a real idiot.  I said it again, and then tried the other phrase...with the "whoa" at the end,  it was like putting a torch to dynamite.  Whatever I said, set her off like a rocket.  She was throwing her arms all over the place, jumping up and down, and shaking her finger at me.  Finally, she gave up, turned on her heel and walked out.  I have no idea why she got so upset, but after that, I never attempted to speak Ukrainian to a Ukrainian again.  On reflection, and given my record with not balancing at day's end, maybe I had gypped her of money at one time?  It was hard to know and I doubt if I ever will.

One summer, my uncle had spent time sewing a big, heavy-canvas tent.  They were planning a much deserved holiday/fishing trip.  For some reason, he thought he could attach the tent, fully erect to the back of their vehicle and drive down the highway.   My aunt knew this would never work, but let him have his fun.  After all, he was getting a chance to play. When it came time for them to leave, my other uncle was driving over from Melville, about a half hour away.  He would be bringing my cousin to stay with me for a few days.  She is four years younger than me, but even so, we were always good friends while growing up.  The two of us were going to be fully responsible for the store for a few days.  My aunt and uncle and the kids had left on their trip and it would be an hour or so until my cousin and her dad arrived.  I was doing fine with customers coming and going, but it was getting close to 6:00 p.m. and there was a lull. 

I was hoping the handsome biker would show up, but instead, all of a sudden the regular delivery man was there instead. Every week, all summer he had brought boxes of supplies from the wholesaler and unloaded them from his big truck through the side door.  Every time, any of the family, including me would help him cart the boxes down the stairs to the store room.  He was an unattractive, middle-aged man with a brush cut and bad teeth and skin.  He showed up out of the blue that night and totally unnecessarily from what I could tell.  I had always been pleasant to him, so I thought maybe he felt sorry for me being all alone in the store.  Then again, maybe he needed cigarettes. 

What he did though, was come through the front door and walk right around behind the counter where I was.  There wasn't another living soul around within hearing distance.  Where was the Ukrainian lady?  Where was the biker?  Where was the old guy who smelled like sour honey and where was the drunks looking for vanilla and lysol when I needed them?  The delivery man grabbed my arm and I really felt  threatened, in fact, I was instantly afraid for my life. He was so close, I could smell his breath and it wasn't good, but it didn't even smell of liquor.  He was just plain crazy.  The only thing I could think was that he was about to do something awful to me.  He had me backed right up against the furthest corner by the meat slicer and I have to say I felt real terror.  He knew darned well I was there by myself because he had been by at noon, unloading boxes, all the while watching the family packing up to leave.  Of course my aunt and uncle had been explaining that they were going away and that I would be in charge of the store...little did they know what this bugger was all about!  Your basic pervert.  To my great relief, at that moment, in walked Uncle Warner and my cousin, Susan through the side door.  I never saw anybody take off as fast as that delivery man. What a jerk!   I could have kissed them both and remember being scared to have my uncle leave again.  In the commotion of it all, at some point Uncle Lionel and Auntie Dianne returned.  For some reason, the tent creation had blown right off the vehicle and into the ditch...go figure??  They were quite a long ways down the road too!  There were repairs that had to be made to the tent as it turned out.  It was funny, but no one dared laugh.  I complained about the delivery guy and nobody seemed to take it too seriously.  Strangely enough, I never saw him delivering there again.  Maybe he quit, but then again, maybe he got fired.

And that my friends is how kids get indoctrinated into the cold, cruel world.  Like flying an airplane, there's hours and hours of sheer boredom, interspersed with moments of exhilaration countered by seconds of stark terror!

Auntie Dianne's Bear Story

Should I write about bears before I go to sleep?  Oh what the heck, why not you say?  Well, if ever I have a nightmare, it's usually about bears.  Awhile ago, I practiced a sort of self-taught therapy where you face your fears in your dreams.  I somehow overpowered a bear in my dream and thereafter I was okay for the longest time.  I have to remember that I am strong and powerful and after all, it's only a dream, right?

Okay, here is one of my bear stories, as written by my dearly departed Auntie Dianne.  Here's what she wrote as part of my 'celebrating 50 years' birthday tribute, put on by my family, but especially my party organizer extraordinaire daughter.  If you knew my Auntie Dianne, you will recognize her by the way she speaks, so here is her story.

     "Dear Carmen,   Here is a little story about your Mom that you may not have heard! 

     Long ago when Jean was a little girl she lived on a farm in Hudson Bay.  This area  was  considered  to be almost a frontier, wild and untamed.  Jean at this time was approximately  eight years old.

     One Friday night after work I drove to Hudson Bay to pick up Jean's Uncle Jerry and take him      back to Melfort.  Upon arriving at the Busby Farm and going into the house, it was very plain to see there was great excitement happening.  The table was set, the food was on the table and everyone's plate was piled high with food.  However, the only people sitting at the table were Jean, her Mom and her Grandma Busby.  A bear had been spotted and the hunters had lit out on its trail.  The hunters' of course being Jean's Dad Glen, Uncle Jerry, her Little Brother Doug and the hired man Bobby.

     Now having been raised on a farm and not being smart enough to be afraid Jean and I decided that we should join the hunt.  So we jumped in Uncle Jerry's new car and away we went out into the   middle of a field and parked the car in solid sand.  We very quietly got out of the car and started to    walk over to where the men were hunting.  I remember that Uncle Jerry was hiding behind a     disker, but I truly have no idea where the rest of the men were hiding.  We could see the wounded      bear up a tree and this was very exciting.  Just as Jean and I started to get close to where all the      action was happening Jerry yelled "the damn bear has come down out of the tree, and he is headed     this way.  Run Girls Run the bear is coming after you."  At this point I grabbed Jean by the hand      and we started to run back to the car.  Our adrenaline was pumping so hard that I was dragging      Jean behind me because I was older and had to save her from the bear.  Then I tripped in the      tangled grass, fell flat on my face and Jean still holding my hand kept right on running over top of      me, stepped on my head pushing my face down into the stinking grass.  Now you must realize that    I had a death grip on Jean because I had to save her from the bear!  As Jean helped me up we took      off running and finally reached the car with those words still ringing in our ears, as Glen yelled      "my God the bear is going to catch you Run Girls Run!"  We jumped into the car rolled up the      windows, locked the doors ...there was no way that bear was going to crawl in the window or open the door and get Jean.  I quickly started Jerry's car, threw it into reverse and floored it, promptly  burying the back wheels right up to the axles, all the while continuing to floor the car.  I bet we      were doing a hundred miles an hour and man was I driving.  However, we never moved.  The men
had to come and pull us out of the sand.  How Embarrassing!

     Needless to say as the years have passed, the story has been told, embellished and told again.  It is  wonderful to have such a hilarious memory of Jean and to be able to share it with her on her 50th    birthday!  Love, Auntie Dianne"


That's my Auntie Dianne alright.  It's true.  I really did step on her head as I ran over top of her to get away from the bear.  Can you imagine?  We were in an old farm yard on the south side of the Ridge Road.  There was this old abandoned hip-roofed barn sitting there without a speck of paint left on it and I think the big door was gone.  Whoever owned the place had those white, stacked honey bee boxes up against the bush.  A real attaction for a bear.  The bear in the tree, as it turned out was a baby.  Have you ever heard a bear cry?  It wails loudly and sounds almost exactly like a human baby.  I'll never forget that sound.  I can still hear him.  That poor little guy just cried and cried and cried.  I wonder where his mother was, but not far away I would suspect. 

Uncle Jerry really was hiding behind the disker and clutching his 22 rifle for all he was worth.  His eyes were like saucers, he was white as a ghost  and was shaking like a leaf.  He could barely talk. (He too passed away at a young age..59 to be exact.)  I can still see the look of disbelief on his face when he saw us two girls show up!  As you can imagine, he couldn't get us out of there fast enough.  Somehow though, I have a sneaking suspicion that my Dad was having a good laugh because I'm pretty sure if the bear was up in the tree and wounded, he sure wasn't going to chase after us.  Auntie Dianne says the bear had come down from the tree.   Maybe....but, I know my dad.  I know when he's laughing and teasing.  I knew darn well there was no bear coming, just by the sound of my Dad's voice... but just the look on Uncle Jerry's face was the part that scared me more than anything.  He really was scared, no doubt about it....but then again, so were we and I could run really fast given half a chance.  I remember her falling, me running over top of her and then realizing I couldn't just leave her there for the bear to get.  I remember helping her up and seeing that disgusted look on her face and then both of us laughing like crazy.

I do remember hardly being able to get into the car fast enough.  I remember her shaking fingers trying to get the key into the ignition and then once connected, her gunning the motor, sand flying everywhere, but still not moving an inch.  We were stuck and there was no moving, even if the bear did decide to come our way....which he didn't I might add.   I remember the men finding their way over to us shortly after and laughing like crazy about how dumb we must have looked.  I listened to Auntie Dianne tell them what happened and me feeling kind of bad, but not really.  Everybody was in such a frenzy about the bear that we became the biggest joke going.  I think it was to take the heat off of any of them and their fear.  After all, none of them were too expert at hunting bears.  Funny how we got sent home right away too...we were shooed off as fast as they could get us out of there, so that at least I for one never really knew what happened to the little bear in the tree.  I can only use my imagination and feel bad for the wee little fellow at what his future would hold.  After all, I was only a kid.

Like Auntie Dianne said, in the early sixties, to outsiders, Hudson Bay was still a pretty wild and woolly place.  I can remember visiting a family on the Ridge Road that had baby bears and fawns (baby deer) penned up in the living room.  My grandma, Auntie Hazel, Auntie Dianne, Mom and us kids and cousins stopped in to see these animals.  I guess it was kind of a big deal....a bit of an attraction, after all, how often do you find that today? Like never. 

Another time, our neighbour was trying to invite us for a meal of bear meat, but my Mom adamantly refused.  Thank goodness.  They say it is sweet, I hope I never have to find out.  Things were different back in those days.  I doubt I will ever have another opportunity to try bear meat again.  Somehow, I don't really feel that bad about it!
 

Bits and Pieces

     I just checked and saw that this week somebody from Serbia was reading my blog.  Once again I'm blown away by this and amazed at how small the world is getting.  Ain't technology wonderful?  To me, it wasn't that long ago that computers made their first debut.  In the grand scheme of things, three or four decades is a mere drop in the bucket.   I can remember a time when nobody had ever heard of such a thing.  In fact, I don't think we owned a computer until the late 1970's or early 1980's.  Just think, all the generations before us survived without wireless and 4G networks somehow.

     I was thoroughly entertained and impressed last night by watching a cross Canada travel show hosted by Scotsman Billy Connelly..Not sure if that's the right spelling, but I enjoyed his show.  He's hitting the high spots from coast to coast and started at Halifax - Pier 21 and  the Titanic burial grounds for instance.  He stopped at Cape Breton and visited a place where a man makes life-sized scarecrows.  There were at least 40 and many of famous people.   Billy noted all along how the cod are almost non-existent these days due to over-fishing, as you likely know.  He also talked about early explorers like John Cabot and Christopher Columbus who reported the cod as so plentiful, that a net wasn't even required.  All they had to do was to dip a basket overboard and it would instantly be full of fish. 

     Connelly went to the northern most point of Newfoundland and found people there who no longer fish for a living but who have turned to tourism.  They're claim to fame is the Viking.  They have what looks like a bomb shelter in the wall of a hill that is really a restaurant of sorts.  They dress up like Vikings and provide a truly unique experience to their visitors.  I believe it was some sort of bed and breakfast.  He stopped at Gander, NFLD, where their hospitality precedes them.  During 911, they had 39 jumbo jets re-routed and land there all at the same time.  The whole community lent a hand to feed and host the hundreds of stranded travellers for several days.

     David Suzuki is also a man I admire.  He has a show on T.V. that now includes his grown daughter.  She is every bit as passionate about the environment as her father and their travels around the world make for exceptional adventure.  A few years ago (quite a few), one of my university classes was about critical issues in Canadian society.  The prof was someone I never met, but most impressive.  Brian Puk.  (I've since read the odd letter to the editor he writes in the local newspaper).  The course was by distance and we had all these readings to do.  The ones that had the most impact on me were excerpts from Dr. David Suzuki.  He talked about things I'd never heard of.  Things like 'ghost nets' in the oceans that are simply nets cut away from boats and left to drift aimlessly in the water.  What they do is catch sea creatures, like dolphins, who can't get away and eventually die, trapped for eternity like that.  He talked about Victoria's dirty little secret - how the city of Victoria dumps their raw sewage directly into the Pacific Ocean.  (I think at one time so did Saskatoon and Edmonton, right into the good old Saskatchewan River).  I hope things have changed on that front!  It was the first time I'd heard how mother's breast milk was more contaminated in the Arctic that anywhere else, even Mexico City, which was really bad at one time.  He reported finding seals that have blisters all over their noses from the contaminants that find their way to the poles.

     It's never too late to learn...in fact being a life-long learner is what we all have to be so we don't stagnate.  I love history and loved writing papers about what I learned.  The whole voyages of discovery were fascinating to me.  I found out that the reason travel occurred to India in the first place was for the spices...not to mention the gold.  There were only ice boxes back then, and spices were used to cover up the taste of rancid meat.  I'm so glad somebody invented the fridge.  Way to go inventors!  Where was Dragon's Den back then?  Actually, these explorers were trying to get to China, but they couldn't go over land because of encountering what they called the 'dreaded infidels'.  That's why they travelled by ship down the coast of Europe and beyond.

     You have to marvel at all the discoveries, brilliance, futuristic thinking and planning that occurred over the centuries.  Even though they found things out the hard way, I think they may have been just as tough, if not tougher and more enterprizingm than any of us today. Back in the days of the plague, sanitation was not exactly a high priority.  In fact, in those days, people didn't seem to make the connection between filth and ill health.  They didn't know that it was the flea on the rat that was the carrier of the plague.  They didn't realize until it was too late that their sewage and drinking water should not be mixed, i.e. seep into each other.  Hospitals were horrific with the saying that you were better off recovering under a hedge than lying three to a bed in a louse-filled, hot and dirty room.  Public health was at an all time low.

     After the onslaught of the Bubonic Plague, it didn't take long for them to start putting two and two together.  They were sick and tired of living in the black darkness. The fever ships moored in the harbors during the Irish Famine were a real attempt to segregate the sick from the healthy. That Irish Famine was the catalyst for many of our Irish ancestors, who had no choice, but to leave their native land and sail to North America, or starve.  Florence Nightingale advocated for so many things, but the biggest impact in my mind was her cry for "fresh air" and clean drinking water.  She realized as far back as the days of the Crimean War that fresh air was necessary for good health and survival and not something to take for granted or avoid.  You can imagine what it was like riding on a ship across the ocean, many ill, with little food or water.  It's interesting that many of these early immigrants landed at Pier 21 in Halifax.  :-)

     You can't beat the stories of the early explorers who made their way across the ocean.  One had visited the 'natives' on the North American shores several times.  On his last visit, he sat helplessly in his ship a safe distance away and watched in horror while the initial boat loads of crew who had gone ashore first were killed and eaten by cannibals. This same group of natives had welcomed them with open arms on earlier visits.  In between times, however, other explorers had raped and pillaged their villages, and that served to change their whole point of view about these strange travellers who had entered their midst.  Another explorer and his crew travelled North and met with what are today called the Inuit.  In those days, as you know, they were called Eskimos.  (If you're writing a paper, you will get marks taken off if you don't use 'Inuit'...also you must say humankind instead of mankind....just a few little tips..)  The explorers were treated royally to begin with, but eventually, the bad habits and behavior of the visitors were thought to have contributed to their never being heard from again...probably turned out onto an ice flo to fend for themselves.

     I found out that Hitler, as a youth, was a runner of messages in World Ward 1.  He would physically run up and down the trenches, behind the front lines amongst soldiers dead and alive holding guns and bayonettes.  He delivered word and directives to the officers and men. Perhaps this ultimately dangerous work contributed to his hatred for others and love of power as the years wore on.

     I also discovered that the high towers in the ancient castles of Europe were built like that more than just for aesthetics.  If you've never noticed, the tall tower has a window that allowed boiling water or oil to be poured down upon the heads of marauding invaders.         Brutal, yet effective.  Not just for Rapunzel to let down her long hair..

     The stories of royalty are equally intriguing. Of course, royal bloodlines predominated as a prerequisite to sitting on the throne (irregardless of whether the person was mentally sound or even of age).  Murders by various means such as poisoning and beheadings were common.  Adultery and being locked in dungeons and wasting away from starvation in chains, occurred more often than not. Methods of torture and execution were barbaric.  People would have all their limbs tied and then be  stretched until they were torn apart.  I think they called it the "rack".

     If you're looking for some astounding reading, or if you want to understand why they say history repeats itself, just pick up a history book and start reading.  Pre or post rennaisance...it doesn't matter, but keeping track of what was happening with art and sculpture after the rennaisance alone is enough to give you a full-time career if you take the time and choose to be interested.  Did you know that at one point, all the art and sculptures were of men?  To begin with, when women were eventually included, their bodies were designed and crafted just like a man's, complete with muscled arms, legs, chest etc.  I expect the reason was because really, who would be allowed to be the model in those ultra conservative time periods?  As you know, things did change and there are spectacular paintings and statues all over the world that tell a different tale from every age and culture.

    So many great authors, artists and painters emerged, such as  Leonardo da Vinci whose works are well known, because his paintings have become part of our world's heritage.  He too was an inventor, inventing things like scissors and flying machines.  His work in the Cistene Chapel occurred on his back over several years.  His Mona Lisa smile has intrigued multitudes all these centuries.  Anyone who has seen the  daVinci Code will have had their memories refreshed about him and his work.  Today we have rap and grafitti...Some day in the future, they may be mavelling at how brilliant these works are.  We just scratch our heads.

     In fact, architectural designs over the centuries and across continents are fascinating and worth studying.   If you can afford to travel, paying attention to the uniqueness of our world is a large part of understanding how humankind has evolved in every corner.  By paying attention to history and our neighbours in our own country, we learn to understand more fully where we are going in life.  Like John Edwards showed me today, we are the You in You-niverse!


    
 

I can see peeling paint when I close my eyes

Believe it or not..  I've had over 1,200 people looking at my blog from all around the world.  It makes me really happy every time I check who my audience is.  This week I have three new people reading from the United Kingdom!  Thrilling! 

So it was back to work for me today and for the next six weeks at least, I'll be covering two portfolios.   Everybody was in a great mood and happy to be back after a long, relaxing summer.  I guess you could say that technically I've been on holidays because I did take a few days and go to the lake at the end of July, and I also sort of had another few days off last week.  In between times, I took a summer job working as a nurse for home care.  Oh those patients, they are the best.  Nice to make new friends and learn more about this beautiful city.  I had three weeks of full-time orientation in July, learned scads of stuff, and then worked three shifts a week for most of August.

In between times, there was a flood at my regular office and I had a big project to keep me out of mischief at home.  I wanted to repaint my garage door.  A simple thing.  The paint was peeling when I bought the place two years ago, and it hasn't improved.  It had some kind of really heavy duty, oil-based paint on it (epoxy?) and I wanted to change the new finish to a water-based stain.  Why (everybody asks)?  Because stain doesn't crack and peel in the hot sun like oil-based paint...at least I don't think it does.  My vision is that when I eventually have to re-stain, then that's all I'll have to do....not all this scraping/sand-o-rama rigamarole that I did this year.  (Incidentally, I do have experience in this, because I re-did my back deck last summer).  I think I must have some sort of affliction that drives to do these ignorant jobs....  :-( 

Keep in mind to get to the goal isn't exactly easy because you can't put latex over oil.  So readying the surface means scraping and sanding ad nauseum, then repeat.  All the old coats have to go.  The first step of paint loosening, chipping away paint, scraping, wire brushing, rasping and you-name-it  took me weeks.  The sanding was about a day, while the staining happened over a couple of days. In the end, I had nearly worn out my hands, wrists and forearms and had to apply ice paks for several hours on the final day. It was worth it.

I had to smile and eventually learn to hold my tongue at all the passersby who watched me working away during those hot summer days.  They most often had a word of wisdom or two or a tiny suggestion here and there.  Over time, it was obvious some were frustrated with my slow progress and concerned that I was overdoing it.  "Don't work too hard" was pretty common, and mostly everyone said what a big job it was.  No kidding.  Some shook their heads, others clucked their tongues.  Others came right out and told me that I was doing it all the hard way.   A common thread was that I could blast the paint off with a pressure washer instead..  What they didn't know was that I had already applied two coats of paint remover gel which has to stay wet as much as possible.  Every time I used the garden hose to wet things down, the water ran into the garage into a low spot on one side.  That side just happened to be where my two electric deep freezes sit.  Somehow, the pressure washer was a little over the top. 

I didn't plan very well with the first coat of gel, because in the midst of scraping the now loosened, long rolling curly Q's of paint off , I had to go out somewhere in my vehicle and that meant opening the garage door.  All those wet chips and pieces of sticky paint and crudded up paint remover gel went flying and dripping down everywhere as I opened the overhead door (onto my red vehicle specifically) which was parked in it's place (inside the garage)...Since I didn't have the foresight to hose it down right away, it dried and stuck there. I had been preoccupied with trying to suck up the unwanted water with the shop vac prior to leaving and ignored the fact that all that muck had dropped onto me and stuck too.  Since I didn't have time to rush in and sponge myself off, no wonder I was getting funny looks.

I had tried a test section using oven cleaner as a paint remover last year and found it really does work, but is even messier and probably more toxic than the commercial paint removal concoctions.  I had researched paint removers on the internet and got so excited when I read about oven cleaner that I rushed out and bought six cans.  When it came time, I was all gung ho, but a male friend urged me not use it.  He didn't really have a good reason, but I tend to defer to others more knowledgeable and in the end, spent $69 for a half gallon pail of something less caustic.  I noticed there were really no bugs bothering me, so they must not have liked it.  I did end up with a sore throat every day while using it, but that doesn't count I guess.  Incidentally, I have a lawn with weeds, but my neighbour who is a scientist forbids me to use chemical weed killer because like he says, they cause cancer in the weed, so what do you think they'll do to you?  Him, I believe.  Incidentally, I've cleaned three ovens this summer, and am getting pretty good at it.

A male friend helped stave off the chance of electrocution by flood waters in the garage by raising the deep freeze closest to the door up onto two - two by four's, so at least it wasn't sitting directly in the newly created puddles on the cement floor.  It took me awhile, but eventually (another day) I realized I could set up a barricade made of plastic and boards, so it wasn't so easy for the water to pool into that corner.   The resulting garbage bags didn't look too professional, but served the purpose.  At that point, I almost tried the pressure washer, but the paint was so unbelievably stuck on, I seriously doubt it would have worked.

Another fellow came along one day and offered to lend me both of his sanders.  As it turns out, I have my own.  I have an old rectangular sander which I used as well as another pretty professional-looking belt sander.  I realized that the sanders wouldn't be of much value until I got rid of the big pieces and chunks of paint.  I just had to get rid of the majority of the old paint first and leave the sanding as a final step before staining.  I used coarse sandpaper and a wire screen type of material on the rectangular sander.   When I finally did use the belt sander, I was at the bitter end of scraping and had to wear goggles and a face mask.  I hadn't done so and realized I needed to because of the fine sawdust collecting in my eyes...but man, it was 29 and 30 degrees celsius temperatures, and awfully suffocating work. 

A most extraordinary thing happened when I pulled out the power tools.  The collective neighbourhood sigh of relief was almost palpable...especially from the men.  They had been forced to sit back and watch me for days, as I was reduced to struggling with anything that remotely worked as a scraper.  My best tool was a type of razor blade (thanks Home Depot) and several  different-sized putty knives.  I used a butter knife from the kitchen drawer for all of the rounded moulding edges.  But, I guess the manual scraping was taking it's toll on everybody, not just me.   A fellow showed up one day and brought me his heat gun, almost begging me to use it....something I still have to return.  Unfortunately, it didn't work, probably because the door was wet.  It was a small version of a hair dryer from what I could tell.  Supposedly, you just have to heat up the paint and it peels off like nobody's business.  Great for furniture I guess. 

A tidbit about what works for furniture stripping came to me long ago from a lady in Hudson Bay.  She used to douse furniture with lye soap out on the lawn in a tub of water.  She recommended wearing rubber gloves, ha ha....

When I finally got to the staining, I realized I had to put the first coat on with a paint brush, because of all the nooks and crannies.  The garage door is white with brown trim.  I gave it two coats of white and then thought one coat of brown would do.  Not quite.  Every brush stroke showed.  In the meantime a man called out that I was really doing it the hard way.  The hairs on the back of my neck stood up and I answered, "Believe me, if I knew what the easy way was, I would be doing it."  I waited for him to share his much revered secret, but he just laughed and strode off.  Now I was getting ticked.  A lady slowed as she drove by and rolled her window down.  She asked if I was almost done and then smirked about how much scraping I'd put into it....I'm not sure what look I gave her, because she quickly back peddled with, "you've done an awful lot of work, and it's looking great"....After that, I couldn't wait to be done.  I was getting embarrassed...  I immediately retired the paint brush and broke out a tiny roller for the fastest final coat of brown paint on record.  My hands never hurt so much as after using that piece of crap....but I was done at 10:45 a.m. on August 19...a Sunday no less. 

What really made it all worthwhile was an  elderly gentleman and his wife who were visiting in the area.  They were loading their car to leave as I was putting the final touches on.  As they went to leave, he hollered across the street to tell me what a beautiful job I had done.  Awhhh...My whole mood lifted.  My spirit soared.  No longer was I feeling bad.  Suddenly I was elevated to project completion...because I knew I had done a great job!  I backed up and took a long hard look.  He was right, it was beautiful.  Yes, I guess I am meticulous and a slow worker, and maybe I do things the hard way, but darn it, why not... because it sure feels good when it's all over. 

Simple Things

It's the simple things in life that truly make me happy, not the convoluted and complicated ones.  I had almost forgotten the simple joy of riding in a vehicle with the windows rolled down.  The situation came about yesterday, because of some funky smell in my SUV.  It was evening and I started out by driving down Spadina Crescent, along the river bank.  I powered every window down, even opened the sun roof.  The sun, wind and humidity were just right and the air was oh, so fresh!  I hardly ever do this, but was quite thrilled at how exhilarating it felt.  I got to wondering why I don't do it more often.
I vaguely recalled what led to my overlooking and almost discarding this lovely way of driving.

Bugs are one.  Getting hit on the cheek or eye or mouth by a wayward insect makes you want to go for the window roller upper pretty quick.  I was scraping paint off the outside of my house yesterday and a mammoth dragonfly flew into the garage door and then did the most startling things...it was a form of the "chicken" really.  The buzzing noise he made was frightening, and he flew all over the place, in a confused thrashing way, poor thing.  I was ducking and getting out of his road at every turn.  The fluttering and grinding of his anntennae, legs and big wings is something I never want to come in contact with.  In my books, I want to avoid insect fluttering anywhere near me especially that of moths, who tend to shed a grey powder.   So, bugs should be avoided when possible, whether on horseback, riding a bike or whatever, you can easily be "taken out" by an insect, and... when you least expect it!  I got hit hard on the cheek by a massive bumble bee one afternoon, on a Honda 50 when I was about 16...we were only half way home.  Now that hurt!

If you slow down with your windows open, especially on a cloudy, muggy day (but any day really),  black flies, mosquitoes, horseflies, no see um's, etc. usually sense the opportunity for fair game and go for it.  These creatures dive bomb and bite and leave you itching or bleeding or both. Some you feel in the moment and can swat, but mostly you find out because you start to scratch some time later.  You know, it's those pesky females that do it, because apparently, the males are more docile, or just not built that way (at least for the mosquitoes)..

Wasps, hornets, and spiders are others who seem to find their way inside your car by accident and might have to sting you while trying to find their way back out.  The result isn't the innocent mosquito bite, it's more like an injection of painful venom that may or may not cause you to have a severe reaction.  You will definitely feel it exactly when it happens...no doubt.  Most people can count on one hand how many bee stings they've ever had in their life. They can vividly recount exactly what they were doing at the time.  When my son was about four, we were in the straweberry patch on our acreage.  His little blue jeans had a gap at the waistband at the back.  He was down on his hands and knees playing and a monolith bumble bee started to crawl down the gaping area.  His dad saw this and whacked our little boy hard on the backside in order to kill the bee.  Oh dear, it was a bee sting and a hit all at the same time....Yes, there was loud wailing involved, but there was no loss of limb and he has grown up to be a fine man.... In fact, you may not know you have an allergy to bee stings until it happens and then know that the plan will include a quick trip to the nearest emergency department for a shot of adrenalin! 

Not only that, but all the swatting and enticing of the biting insect, (i.e. bee) out of the cab of the vehicle may cause you, the driver, to swerve all over the road. Not pretty...This erratic driving, to the surrounding drivers, could look like drunk driving, and there's a number to report that.  You could find yourself up in front of a magistrate, explaining yourself faster than a cat on a hot tin roof (or a dragonfly, temporarily head-injured from hitting the garage door)!  Driving with the windows rolled up in the first place might have been smarter in the long run.


Another excuse to keep the windows up on a summer's day is rain.  No point in getting wet or God forbid splashed by a semi on the highway or a speeding demon on some city street.   The chance of having lightning come in through the car window or sun roof is also not pretty, so better play it safe.  On the other hand, especially in cities, sometimes during a downpour, the water can't get away fast enough through the street drains and flooding occurs.  In low-lying areas, like underpasses, the water can get too deep within minutes.  In the past, as some of you may remember, this has caused serious consequences, including loss of life.  Maybe when approaching a situation like this, having even one window down would serve to be an escape route, if worse came to worse.  That's only my opinion though, just a thought that crossed my mind.  Why I got to always riding with the windows rolled up tightly, even when it's not raining, is mainly habit though, because as you know, it doesn't rain every day.

As you may have guessed, I am nothing if not practical and safety-conscious. My kids as they got older used to tease me when I reminded them about taking their raincoats, etc.  They used to say things to the effect that I wanted them to wear their space outfits and boots wherever they went, just as a cautionary measure....We would laugh together....To my mind, that was a perfectly normal request!  I think most mothers and fathers would agree.   :-)

In my defense though there are other valid reasons.  Obviously, the freezing cold of winter is a deterrant to rolled down windows.  Who wants to freeze their noses, ears or digits off just to get some fresh air...enough to last you all day at work in an office where there are no windows?  I guess not me.    But....there are days, even in winter when the temperature soars and the sun shines brightly....so why not roll down the windows and open the sun roof?  My excuse?   It never crossed my mind.  Don't get me wrong, I have been known to open the windows a crack in the dead of winter.


So now, it's been summer officially for a couple months, but in reality only for the last couple of weeks.   Why not roll the windows down and ride like the wind or even while parked?  Well.....what about vandals?  What about thieves?  What about blowing dirt and big dogs running loose?  I recently listened to directives for work that say you need to keep everything of any value out of sight in your vehicle.  Even loose change!  They said your garage door opener is an appealing target, because thieves steal it along with your car registration (from the glove box) and then go break into your house.  But let's be realistic.  There is NOT a boogey man under every bed!  In reality, 80% of people are wonderful and 20% are something else.  The odds of you getting affected by crime or randomness is pretty minimal, don't you think?....But then again, Karma can be fairly nasty.   Oh joy!  On the occasions when I have had the opportunity (basically out of necessity) to eat lunch in my car in an unsavoury neighbourhood,  I have tended to throw caution to the wind and roll down the windows anyway...especially if there's no one around.   Oh, and by the way....keep your heads up.  I'ts important to keep track of what's happening around you at all times.  Just a little more fodder :-)

What of these 20%?  Well....What about when you get to a stop sign or red light?  The other day I sat at a red light beside a carload (I mean, six or eight people in an old model, run down something).  They were enjoying their music blaring with all the windows rolled down :-)...  They were obviously "on" something and some had the typical facial features of fetal alcohol syndrome (poor souls).  They were happy as anything, and waving at me and giving me the thumbs up.  They obviously thought everyone would love their music as much as they did.   I smiled back and returned the thumbs up, all the while quaking in my boots with my foot itching to jump off the brake and floor the gas pedal!  I thought about it later....maybe I would benefit from being "on" something, but at the time, I was happy as anything to have my automatic door locks on, my windows rolled up and sun roof firmly secured.  There.