Post-lift pre-dig

Summerford:

And so it came to pass.

On the first day, the house was lifted. That would be Monday, June 9, for anyone who hasn't been paying attention.

We got up early. John around 7. Me around 7:30. I was coherent by 7:45, sort of. Didn't really matter. What mattered was that I could heft and carry, shove and pull. Choked down some cold cereal with an apple on top. Had to get some carbs because it would be a long day.

We had a few things to do before the lifters arrived.
1. We had to take the top off the living room chimney. (Yes, I know I said in the previous entry that we were going to postpone any action on the LR chimney until later, but the lift man said that the top had to come off now to prevent damage to the roof during the lift. John also had had to separate this chimney from the floors during the previous day or two. I forgot to mention this. He had the pleasure of working in the attic where there hasn't been any fresh air in 100 years and where it is still the temperature of the earth when it emerged from the primordial ooze.
He could not proceed with this work though until the furnace man gave him the go ahead in case he (the furnace man who was due to arrive at 8a.m.) needed to run the furnace before dismantling it.)

2. The furnace had to be dismantled - or at least some of the ducts had to be removed because they would be in the way of the lifters. The furnace man would do all this, freeing up John's time, and also bearing the responsibility for any problems occurring with the furnace when we hooked it back up again. That part is worth whatever we paid him, which was very reasonable.

3. The sewage pipe had to be severed because it is not of the stretchy variety. and would not survive the lift - or the septic tank might be lifted from its resting place.

4. The water inlet pipe had to be severed so it would not get damaged.

As for me, I was tasked with getting us packed up and ready to leave. Clothing. Food. Stuff in general that we couldn't live without. You'd be amazed what's in that list.

By the time John got the chimney taken down to below the roofline, the furnace man was pretty well done with the furnace. John, bless his heart, left the sewage pipe until the very last minute. It's not wise to have a middle-age woman in a house without a functioning toilet for any more than 20 minutes.

The lifters arrived pretty much on schedule. Robert Coates from Glenwood and his crew of four men, two of whom were his sons.

Within the hour, they had cribs (crisscrossed square posts; see top left pic below) started under the house which would support the rails they were inserting from front to back of the house, as well as a place for the jacks which would raise the house, inch by inch.

Within a few minutes of starting to jack it up, the boss realized there was a problem. The floor in the living room was not lifting. Turned out that the living room chimney had been mortared to the sill plate. There was no choice. The chimney had to come down. So the strong fellows bunged a hole in the base of the thing (see top right pic below). John went up to the attic and started bunging the bricks down through and they took them out at the bottom. It was down in less than an hour. And the lift could continue.

By 3pm, with lunch and two coffee breaks, the house was up as far as it needed to go. It is 38" higher in the back than it was before we started. They took a while to get it all level, tweaking this jack or that one to get it just right.

And so it was done. As predicted, my stress level came down as the house went up, although I confess I spent most of the day at a friend's drinking tea and worrying.

We were informed that we were responsible for finding a digger to dig the trenches for the foundation footings. Huh? So why weren't we told this beforehand. We could have had someone lined up to come the very next day. No that would be doing things the easy way. Let's do it the Newfoundland way.

Luckily we had hired a fellow from Lewisporte last year to dig the hole for our septic tank. So we put in a call to him, telling him to call the lifter and arrange a date. We would have see how long this wait might be.

Banging down the LR chimney

In all her glory

 

 

Filling in the blanks

Hillgrade:

I should have made a post between the last one and the one before to show just what we did to get ready for The Lift.

The biggest job was the chimney in the kitchen. It used to be hooked to the wood range but it had to come down since it was leaning dangerously and would have prevented the house from lifting.

It didn't take us long, John and I, to make short work of it last week. John started on the roof and really only had to push it with his little finger to make it come tumbling down. He got it down to below the roof line and then patched the roof with some pink bubble wrap that we had tied around the stuff in our trailer last year when we came down.

Then we got to work on the portion that ran through the Chimney Room (hence the name of the room)[see leftmost picture]. John had a 4-pound sledge hammer (I grew up calling them mauls) for knocking the bricks. The bricks didn't take much coaxing to come loose. We opened the window in the room and threw the bricks out into the backyard.

Pretty soon we could see down into the kitchen, so we cleaned up the Chimney Room and took ourselves downstairs. We had a cup of tea and a little snack before continuing.

It pretty soon became clear that we would need masks for the remainder of the work. The chimney, just below where the stove pipe joined it, was pretty much FULL. Of what we were/are not sure. It was like gravel, but damp and dark [see below]. Probably a mixture of creosote, soot, dust and precipitation that fell through the chimney over the years. It stank. Acrid is a mild word for it.

We needed a tiny shovel to get this stuff out of the chimney before taking the bricks away. John remembered finding a wee shovel in the shed but it was falling apart. However, with a strategically positioned nail, bent at just the right angle, we managed to get a workable shovel.

We were unable to open the window near the kitchen chimney without totally destroying it. So the bricks had to be walked out the door to the yard, two by two.

When we were finished, we were left with a concrete chimney block [at left]. This top of this block would originally have been at floor level, or perhaps just above. Proof of just how badly this house needs to be leveled.

The living room chimney services the furnace. It was originally the chimney for the parlour wood stove. In fact, the furnace pipe comes up through the floor and enters the chimney in the same spot that the stove used [see right]. This whole thing had been boxed in to hide it all, with shelves built around in an attempt to make it somewhat useful. But it took up a lot of space in the Living Room (parlor?) and I was all for getting rid of it.

Except. The chimney was rather nice seen from outside. Gave the house character. Completed the roof line. But not practical inside. What to do? What to do?

We debated long and hard about it. John did a lot of online research to see if our furnace could work with one of those metal chimneys attached to the outside of the house.

It seems that it would, but we decided to postpone this decision until later. Maybe next year. (Update 2023: Little did we know.)

And so. With the kitchen chimney down, we were truly ready for the lift. Bring it on.

D-Day approacheth

And so it has finally arrived. Okay, almost arrived. The big day. Tomorrow they will lift this house. And I won't be anywhere around. It would be like being awake when they cut you open. Who could watch that?


In the morning John will be in a scramble. He has to take down the living-room chimney to below the roof line and then cover the hole with plastic. He then has to put the furnace to bed (in cooperation with the furnace man who arrives around 8, we hope. Finally, he will cut the sewer line to the septic tank. And thus providing another excuse for me not to stick around. Women of my age have to be near a bathroom.

The house is almost naked tonight. The skirting has been removed from around the crawlspace, revealing the innards of the place. The furnace is sitting on concrete blocks, the sewer and water pipes are all exposed. The crumbling wooden shores are there for all to mock in their last moments of utility. Tomorrow they will mere firewood.

This afternoon I set out a row of onions. Kept some back for setting next week or the week after. Don't want a bunch of onions all coming mature at the same time. As it is we'll be eating a whole mess of onion soup towards the end of summer.

I also rescued some boulders that were dug up last fall when we trenched around the house. Rocks big enough to just get your arms around, some of them. Some not quite so big. All of them heavy as lead. I needed to make sure that they don't get covered with dirt or otherwise buried in the goings-on of the next week or two. I want them to put in the garden I'm going to build behind and to the side of the house when this is all over.

It's apparently 42 degrees on the humidex back home tonight. And here I was complaining about the cold breeze that's blowing up through the cold-air return duct from under the house now that it's open to all the ocean breezes.

So. Here's hoping the relation between my stress level and the house level is an inverse proportion: as it goes up, my stress level comes down.

Back at ya tomorrow night. I hope. Keep yer fingers crossed.

From our ASHES TO someone else's ASHES

Yesterday Bev and Ivan did us a big favour. They took away the wood stove that had been in the kitchen of this place longer than anyone we know can remember. While we had it, it was the backup stove, in case electricity failed. It was also a source of heat when we didn't want to turn on the furnace.

It was probably what excited us the first time we saw the house. Owing our very own old wood stove. Just like the one my parents had when I was a child. Like my grandmother had. It was solid, dependable and beautiful. It had served many people for a very long time.

But it had seen better days. The firebox was starting to cave in, not leaving much room for birch chunks. We couldn't leave the kitchen when it was going because it threw flankers out the side. Heaven knows what it was throwing out the chimney.

It was a very large presence in the kitchen. When we want to seat more than two people at the kitchen table, we pull the table to the middle of the room. But with the stove being as big and as far from the wall as it was, it didn't leave much room for chairs and table or walking around.

With energy prices being what they are and our pocketbooks being strained in every direction, we needed to find a stove that would give a lot more heat more efficiently. It was time to part with the showpiece and get on with being practical.

When we left here last fall, I polished it up to look like it was when we got it. People here polish their iron stove tops to prevent rusting. Vaseline was the polish of choice. Had to borrow a crock from a neighbour. I mean, who has Vaseline anymore. [Aside: My mother asked me on the night before my wedding if I had any. That was the extent of the marital advice. Oh, yes, and a box of tissues, she said.] While I had the crock, I also wiped some over the shovel and axe and spade and whatever other tools we had in the shed. They look like new this year.

Anyway, the stove is now gone. In its place we had a large rusty rectangle on the canvas floor. I spent a while with some Comet and a scrubber and most of it came away. The chimney behind the stove will soon be gone too. We worked on it today to remove the wooden cladding that hid the bricks. Tomorrow we (I mean John) will go up on the roof to knock over the part that protrudes through the shingles. Then we'll take a sledge hammer to the parts that are in the house. We meant to buy some plastic to cordon off the area where the chimney is, to minimize the amount of soot that goes where it shouldn't. But we forgot to buy the plastic today. We were too excited to get fresh broccoli and sardines and other foodies.

My good friend Joanne gave us a spritzer bottle. The man who used to live in this house conveyed the message to us (via his daughter, our across-the-street neighbour) that we should spray the inside of the chimney with water to keep the soot from flying too much. I don't think we'll need much spritzing. The weather has been mauzy since we got here. I don't think the soot will be flying much.

But I could be wrong.

Four days on the road

When we left home on Wednesday 28th a.m., the plan was to be in Newfoundland by Friday 30th, approx. 2 p.m.

Day 1 - drive through Montreal, past Quebec City and on to Grand Falls, N.B. for the night. This part of the trip went according to plan. We even got the same room at the Hill Top Inn as we had last year. Alas, the bottle of make-up I left in the bathroom last September was there no longer.

Day 2 - drive to North Sydney, N.S. in time for the 11p.m. ferry to Port-aux-Basques. Like clockwork. A bonus of a double rainbow in Cape Breton. Needless to say, I got all excited and snapped a load of pictures through a rainy windshield. A guaranteed way to fill up the trash bucket. ***** Alas, even a double rainbow didn't spare us the news we got at the ferry terminal. The MV Joseph and Clara Smallwood was out of commission and the replacement (MV Lief Eriksen) would not sail until the following morning. Once again, proof everything is random.

A night at a motel in North Sydney (which shall remain nameless because a place such as that doesn't deserve free publicity) on our own dime didn't make us any less grumpy about having to get up early to be at the ferry by 8am to get a good place in line. Marine Atlantic gave us meal vouchers, one each for a breakfast, dinner and supper. We used only the lunch voucher and have a year to use the others. Uh huh.

We landed in Port-aux-Basques at nearly 6pm, way too late (because of the danger of moose-car encounters) to be heading across the island. So I phoned my dear uncle Ben and aunt Mary in Corner Brook and begged their hospitality in putting us up for the night. Of course, they said, come on and we made record time over the road, driving up to their door by 8:20.

A grand night, by any standards. We sat around the kitchen table and caught up on all the family news. Aunt Mary had a meal of cod au gratin waiting for us and a real cup of tea - our first since leaving home on Wednesday. Uncle Ben was hoping we'd be staying for a few days but we had to break the news that we'd be off again in the morning, making tracks for Hillgrade.

And so, by 10 am on Saturday, we were off again, passing Deer Lake, the long drive to Springdale and Grand Falls and then off at Notre Dame Junction to Lewisporte and up the shore to New World Island and our Newfoundland home.

We saw a moose between Deer Lake and Hampton. A female, grazing at the side of the road. Never even looked up as we passed. Good thing she didn't decide to cross because we didn't see her until it would have been too late to avoid her.

A couple of Tim Horton's coffees later, we pulled up in Friday's Bay cove. Cora was planting carrots at the side of her squid-drying shed with her granddaughter Jenna. Big waves and hellos. Eileen and Gord came out of the lobster pool down by the wharf and waved wildly, called out Hello, Good to have you back. And it was good to be back.

John went under the house immediately to hook up the plumbing junctions. Inside an hour we had running hot water and electricity. Smooth operation. We were so pleased with ourselves that we had things under control so quickly that we decided to set up the computers. Bad idea. At 5:30, we realized that we had forgotten to go to the grocery store and so had absolutely no food in the house except what we had brought with us (organic honey, organic peanut butter and whole wheat pasta).

Our long-planned meal with Joanne and Simon, previously scheduled for Friday, took place on Saturday night. It was grand to see them again and we only scratched the surface as far as catching up goes. When we were leaving, Joanne handed me a bag containing the lasagna left over from supper. She pressed on us as well a bag of frozen fishcakes she had bought at a recent bake sale, as well as a loaf of bread. What a good friend she is. When we were unloading at home, we found also a large sack of homemade ginger snaps. Wow.

And so we're off to a good start. Food and friends. Don't need anything else.

Just a bit of snow

We got snowed on last night. Actually all day yesterday and last night, too. I haven't heard the latest tally but somewhere around 50cm has fallen on the city, adding to the 385+cm which we already had.

My husband said, "Now that was a wicked storm!" Pshaw. That wasn't even a storm, never mind wicked. It was just a rather large-sized snowfall. A storm howls and this one didn't even whimper. It just dumped, very slowly and very attractively, too, I might add.

Here are some pictures taken after we had shovelled ourselves out today. Daughter just came and asked to borrow the car. Teehee. She wouldn't have even contemplated going out if she'd been out shovelling this morning. Youth!




(Above) Our front walk is like a cavern. I have a pic somewhere of me showing just how high these banks are but I'm not posting that. Ha.

(Right) Taken in front of our house showing the unplowed road.

(Bottom) A neighbour shovelling his (or maybe it's her) walk from driveway to front door. You can just see their head above the snow bank.

The Blogger uploader is complaining. Won't upload. More later.

The Quilting Plan - more or less

I'm hoping to start quilting this week. I've been saying that for a while now. But this week is looking like it might be the time. I've got the stuff done that I had to get done for my MIL, it's not tax time yet and the weather is turning nasty again. All good reasons to get my wee stash out. I gave myself an early birthday present tonight and bought me a cutting mat. Wow. That's a few years worth of birthday presents right there. But, I had to have it if I'm going to get started so. . . . I got my rotary cutter as part of my Christmas gift from Secret Santa. Alas, I just noticed that it's not the Olfa one that I had my eye on, but here's hoping that it works as well.

So. What is my first quilt going to be? I borrowed some books from the library a while back and photographed anything that caught my eye. I did the same with some books my friend Jo loaned me last summer so I have lots to inspire me. The photo at left shows the one that I'm going to attempt, or some version of it.

My stash is still very small and was purchased with a completely different quilt in mind. I've decided that one is far too ambitious for a beginner and will postpone it. Meanwhile, I think I can use what I have in the new project. Will have to add to it, of course. And I think I'll have to do that soon because I will need to get a picture of the whole quilt before I can start any of it.

I have fat quarters (mostly) of four hues - oranges/reds, yellows, greens, blues/purples. I think I can make what I want with those colours. I'm thinking starting at top left with yellows, melding into oranges then into reds, then purples, then blues, then greens and finally, perhaps, ending up at the bottom right with yellows again. Not sure about that last bit. It might make it too balanced. But I like balance in most everything else so why not in a quilt. The individual blocks will be unbalanced with the various angles of the strips, so with the overall balance of the blocks themselves and the colour sweep, it might just work.

Once I have purchased all my fabrics, I have to figure out the most economical way - both in terms of time and materials - to proceed. I was thinking of sewing a bunch of fabrics (say the reds) into large (perhaps 12"x12") blocks, and then cutting the 12x12 into 4x4 or whatever size I've determined the individual blocks should be.

I want this to be a double bed-sized quilt, so what does that mean for quilt dimension? Double beds are 54 x 75. A quilt needs to hang down at least 1 foot per side so that would mean quilt has to be 75x85, at the very least. Will have to ask about this. The final dimensions will determine how large I make the individual blocks.

I'm getting excited about this and am looking forward to starting. Hmm. Wonder how much more fabric I will need. I definitely need more darker and warmer golds since my yellows are all rather monochrome right now. I love my greens and blues. Need more reds.

The quilt as it is shown in the pic seems to not use patterned fabrics, or if they are, the patterns are very subtle. Shall see.

Anyway, if you have any suggestions, I'm all ears.

Make me one with everything

Heard this one today. Buddhist goes up to a hot dog vendor and says 'Make me one with everything.'

I'm betting that Buddhist didn't have my garage to come home to. Here are pictures to show you what I mean. And I haven't even mentioned the basement or John's office. No wonder I feel claustrophobic. And panicky at the thought of moving.

The last minute gang

I can't believe it. Here we are. Three days away from crossing over on the ferry and my husband is up to his neck in a trench that stretches all the way around the back of our house. It was put there this morning by a lovely young fellow from Lewisporte who owns a small bobcat -- a mini-backhoe, for those who are not up on their machinery -- whom my husband previously hired to dig the hole for our new septic tank.

Today's trench is an effort to ascertain as best we can whether the sill plate of the house, along with the studs and the wall boards are in any shape to undergo the process of 'jacking' which we had hoped to have done either this fall or early next spring.

I didn't bother going outside. I could hear everything that was going on through the walls which are now full of holes where hubby has been tearing off tar paper to look at the boards beneath. He's tapping and banging right now as I speak.

The back end of the house -- a kitchen extension, in local parlance -- is now sitting with its ass all exposed. This same ass, for want of a better metaphor, was previously buried by dirt and grass and goutweed, all of which did nothing at all for the well-being of the ass. All it did was hide the rot that was taking place below soil level, although, I suppose, it was keeping the wind from whistling around in the underparts.

A fellow is supposed to arrive this afternoon to survey the situation and give us his opinion on whether the house can be safely jacked. I suppose it would be more correct to say that he will say it can be safely jacked, but for a much higher price than he originally hinted at.

Neighbours came to watch the bobcat. Of course, neighbours are always interested when a hole appears in their cove. They bobbed their heads up and down, with their lips tightly pressed together, and then allowed as how it might be best to just tear the sucker off and start over. Build a new kitchen extension.

When I finally managed to get outside -- had to jump the trench no matter which door I used -- I was dismayed. There is a lot of rot. There was even a fly that was landing on the trench, on the house, in the trench, back on the house that sounded like a bee when it flew, but like a giant mosquito hen it was landed. For a few minutes it had us worried -- like there was air escaping from somewhere, not a good sign when you've just exposed the innards of your house, plumbing, water supply line, and the like.

So. We wait. Like we waited all this week for this day to come. Wait for the fellow from Twillingate to show up with his crew. Wait for him to pronounce whether we will have to pay a lot to 'jack 'er up', pay a lot more to replace 'er, or pay nothing and just abandon 'er.

And I've made plans to spend the afternoon in Twillingate with a friend -- ladies' day off -- and I may have to go before I find out anything.

I hate waiting. I've never been good at waiting. Really, I suppose, it's not the waiting that is tough. It's not having information that I need to make a decision. And I like to make decisions when I have to make them. That's it. I hate having to wait before I can make a decision.

And all this with only three days to go before we pack the car and leave. Hubby is talking about moving the boat reservation. That might mean I have to go get groceries because we have barely enough in the house to get us through until Sunday.

Sigh. If only we'd dealt with the sloping floors problem when we first arrived. But it was like the elephant in the room. We completely ignored it, hoping, I guess, it would go away. So now we're doing it all at the last minute.

Talk about getting hi-jacked. What's that? I hear a vehicle. Maybe the fellow has arrived.

The price of going home

A friend asked me yesterday if we were likely to live in Newfoundland year round anytime soon. This came on the tails of a conversation in which I inquired about tips on closing up a house for the winter, since that is what we will be doing in a little over a month.

My emotional answer is that I'd love to live in Newfoundland year round. Nothing I'd like more. Just the thought of going back to the big city is giving me nightmares. Back to house alarms, pass codes, pool closing, multi-bathroom cleaning, etc. Not something I look forward to.

So what's the problem, you ask? The problem, she answered, is heat. This old house is 120 or more years old. It was built before furnaces and insulation and R-factors and climate change. I've been told that retrofitting a house like this to bring it up to 21st century building code is well nigh impossible since it appears that the structure of the house can't take it and it will rot from the inside out. It has to breathe, summer and winter.

We've had a few cold days and nights so far and I have to say, the house is less than cozy when the wind is blowing or the rain is pelting. The crawl space is quite wet and the dampness moves up through the floors, keeping everything humid (nice in hot dry weather, but not on a cold day). We don't yet know what's in the exterior walls, if anything. We understand it's probably sawdust. There is nothing in the attic except very warm air. We do have a furnace which is bolted to the underside of the living room floor. It does provide a great deal of hot air most of which I fear seeps outside long before we can benefit from it.

And that brings me to my point - can I live with myself if I'm burning barrels of heating oil just to keep the house at a livable temperature? Surely this is not in keeping with how I live my life otherwise - to make the smallest footprint possible.

Saying this here though is not going to win me any friends. Most people here live in old, very drafty homes and crank up the furnace to keep them warm. They can spent more than $2500 a year on heating oil. Surely some of this, spent to upgrade the homes, would be a better investment and a kindness to the planet.

So. Am I staying here this winter? No. Even if the above problems didn't exist, we haven't made plans for it. Much preparation needed if we are to become resident Newfoundlanders again.

Next winter? Not likely, although one of the reasons for my reluctance to live here seems to be falling by the wayside. A comparison of health care experiences is showing the big city to be falling short of what is available here. If what I've learned is true, I would have been better served to have been diagnosed in Newfoundland than in Ontario. Would have gotten attention faster, by far.

Maybe it's time to just start researching what can be done with century old salt box houses. Can they be retrofitted to be energy efficient? I would love that to be the case. Our only problem then would be to find something for John to do as a photojournalist here that would interest the rest of the world. So far, we've not had a not of interest from other parts of Canada in what's happening in Newfoundland. It has been ever thus.

Getting resettled

We saw a house today with a sign in front that said: "Resettled Bushies". Obviously a family -- with the same last name as the current US president -- which had been away from Newfoundland and has returned to stay. Also a reference to the forced resettlement of many Newfoundlanders in the 1960's at the whim of the government of the day.

Returning to one's roots is thrilling. I am still pinching myself when I regard the exquisite vistas along the road as we drive from place to place. Returning home is easy, for the most part. It just takes some readjustment.

For instance, yesterday while chatting with our neighbour, we discussed a tree in our back yard She called it something that sounded like Haps. Puzzled, I asked her to spell it.

It was her turn to look puzzled. "It spells the way I'm saying it," she said. Spelling is probably not her forte.

Haps? Hasp? Ah. Light bulb. Like many here, she adds "h" to words that begin with a vowel. "Aspen?" I asked. The transposition¹ of the last two consonants did not register with me until tonight.

"Yes," she said. "Haspen."

I have just looked it up. Aps is a good Newfoundland word for the aspen tree. It is a variant of Aspe² which is itself a good English word for the same tree. I feel I should apologize to my neighbour for having inadvertently corrected her. Many words here have remained unchanged from Old and Middle English. I should have known better.

From the Dictionary of Newfoundland English:
aps n also hapse, (h)apsen [phonetics unavailable]. EDD ~ sb s w cties. Trembling aspen (Populus tremuloides); also attrib.
1842 JUKES i, 160 The wood ... they here called the 'aps.' 1907 MILLAIS 86 On each side was dense forest of good-sized birch, white pine, 'haps' [etc]. T 50/2-64 You chop up bark off o' the trees—white spruce or apse; apse was good bark. An' you dry that on a flake or a wharf. T 203/5-65 An' then you'd get those apses; you'd cut two an' you wire 'em together an' the dead stick in the centre. That's what you'd tie your trap to. 1966 FARIS 240 Apsen (aspen) ... [used for] planking for boats. C 70-21 Christ's cross was made from an aspen (hapse) and that's why the leaves always tremble. P 148-72 No woman wants it for firewood because 'aps wood is full of water.'

I've been away too long.

Tonight someone mentioned his cousin's name. "Bice," he said.

"Bice?" I replied, looking puzzled, and able to think only of Bo Bice who competed on American Idol this past winter.

"Bice," he repeated. It didn't help that there was a downpour hitting the metal roof of the lobster pool shed, making conversation of any kind difficult.

"Bice." I said again, more to myself than to him. "Bice. Sorry, I'm not familiar with that name."

"B-o-y-c-e," he explained, spelling it rather quickly.

"Ah, Boyce", I said, feeling both relieved and foolish.

"Yes, Bice." He smiled.

And so it goes.

¹Reminds me of the way the word "ask" is pronounced in some places, Barbados among them. "Aks" is the common prononciation, rhyming with "axe". Can throw you for a loop at first, especially if someone says "let me aks you."

² Thus Gerard says of it:--"In English Aspe and Aspen-tree, and may also be called Tremble, after the French name, considering it is the matter whereof women's tongues were made.... (http://www.2020site.org/trees/aspen.html)

Bliss on a Rock

Bliss on a Rock. Sounds like a drink. Isn't. It's just me being happy in Newfoundland.

We're still pinching ourselves that we're lucky enough to be living here, albeit for only a few months. But then, maybe that's why we're so lucky. We get to enjoy Newfoundland at its finest (in summer) and retreat to our cave in Ontario while everyone here does battle with winter. Some might say that you can't fully appreciate summer unless you've endured the winter. Perhaps. But if I appreciated it any more than I do right now, my face would split from grinning.

I had hoped to write while I was here. However, I doubt if the current novel will get finished or any new novel will be conceived. I'm just too excited to sit still to write anything of any length. Heck, just hanging clothes on the line keeps me blissed out for hours. And I'm dying to go blueberry picking in August.

Blogging will have to suffice. So watch this space.

Tears for Sears

I just got off the phone yelling at some poor woman who works for Sears. I don't usually do that, but today I received a statement from Sears telling me that the credit I had on account of overpaying a while back is now being raked back to the tune of $25.00 for what they term a "credit balance admin fee". Say what?

When I explained that such a fee was unknown to me when I signed up for a Sears card, the lady on the other end of the line insisted that it was contained in a little booklet which I would have received once I got my card. I still have that little booklet (I bet most people throw them out and she was counting on that) and was able to go through it, page by page, showing that there was nothing in it about a credit balance admin fee. Then phone-lady says the information was contained in a "flying page" that came with the booklet. I assured her that nothing I received from Sears had wings, and the only insert I got was about the use of my personal information.

Her reaction when I asked to speak to her supervisor was to raise her voice to the point where I had to ask her to please not shout at me. I was already holding the phone a foot from my ear. However, it seems that raising the voice must be significant to reaching a deal, because when I raised my voice back, she said she was putting me on hold and would be back in a jiffy. While I hummed and waited and hummed, I looked at the sheaf of papers in my Sears file folder and noticed that I had been through this exact same discussion with Sears a few years ago on a previous account that I held with them. I didn't win that time, it appears and I cancelled my account without getting my $25 back. Hmm. Should I tell her about that time? Naw. Funny how a thing like that would slip my mind. I must be getting older faster than I feared.

When she returned, her voice had returned to mellow tones and she informed me that they would credit the $25 back to my account but that I would have to use the credit (all of $26.41) withint 12 months or the Credit Balance Admin Fee would reappear.

I assured her I would use it. (Maybe even tonight.) I also suggested that she tell her superiors that it would be a good idea to put a notice on people's bills that they are running out of time to use a credit, and that $25 of it will go poof in the next month's bill. Seems like a neighbourly thing to do.

What I didn't tell her was that the minute I use up the credit, I'm cancelling this account. You know what they say, Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on you again. Fool me three times? Not going to happen.

It could be worse

I have been looking forward to this weekend for weeks, nay months. It's Ryder Cup weekend and I deliberately planned to have nothing at all to do from 8am to 6pm every day from Friday to Sunday.

So this morning, I got up at 7:30, got my breakkie, a cup of organic mint/green tea, today's paper, and in my bathrobe went back to bed to enjoy a day of golf. (I hate playing golf but I love watching Tiger.)

Tiger and Jim Furyk had just gone 3 Up when the screen went blank. Every darn channel was nothing but grey dots and static. Say what? Okay, probably just a temporary outage. Time to take my shower. 10 minutes later after an unusually leisurely shower (for me), I turn on the TV again to find the same #($*. Okay, now I'm getting upset.

I phone the cable company. From my number, they are able to tell where I'm phoning from and the recorded male voice says, "I see we are experiencing difficulty in your area. We are currently working on the problem and expect to have it corrected by ... [inserted female voice] 3 P.M."

I can't believe it. My day is in shambles. There is absolutely nothing else I want do. I made sure that everything else that needed doing this weekend has been done. Even stayed up late last night making some window panels (long story) that had been on my list for a few days.

Sigh. Double sigh. I just know it's some old lady that's bunged herself and her car up against a telephone pole. There's been a rash of senior driver accidents here lately. Just two days ago an old lady killed a man who was crossing a driveway in a motorized scooter. A few weeks ago, an old man who must have been blind as well as stupid, drove his car into a plate glass window of a house. It seems that he also accelerated as he did it. But I digress. That's a whole 'nuther rant.

I thought I'd content myself with at least keeping up with the score on the Internet. but alas, there's a time lag. The scores they are posting are for the afternoon matches, and I haven't even seen the complete morning match yet. I don't want to look at the score for the morning match in case TV comes back on again and I'll have spoiled all the fun.

Okay. Time to regroup. Take a deep breath. It could be worse. I could always be a Taliban wife.

Fog for the Blog

John has gone off to cover the Terry Fox Run this morning so I was all alone when I woke up the second time. Came into the living room to find that there was a wall of fog surrounding the building. The railing on the balcony resembled the railing on a ship fog-bound outside of Port-aux-Basques. A familiar sight. A little startling not to see anything -- anything at all. This is the third time I've seen fog here. Must be the lake effect. Reminds me so much of Newfoundland which, by the way, we will be returning to sometime around Oct. 16 to spend our first nights in the new homestead. Doris and Tom will likely meet us at the airport and accompany us since they probably won't be building anymore that time of year.

John has recovered from his food allergy. We are now looking around to find a place where he can get some testing done to find out just what it was that did it to him. Since it was a fairly extensive anaphylactic shock, we have to arm ourselves with some knowledge so that it doesn't happen again. Poor fellow is afraid to eat anything now, although he has agreed to foods that he has had many times before, despite the fact that everything we ate last Sunday night was also very familiar to him.

I went home this past week to attend a Lymphedema workshop. Found out that I can get it, even though I now have no symptoms, just about anytime. Even thirty years from now should I be lucky enough to live so long.

Very sad this week to hear of the death of Oriana Fallaci. I did not even know she had breast cancer and I feel a kinship with her after the fact. I am going to check out her latest books from the library this week and see what everyone's been talking about. I do not believe that she went off the deep end in her old age, or that she mouthed off just because she knew she wouldn't be around much longer. I do believe that everything she said, she truly believed. And given that she was right about so much else in her life and work, she might well be right in these books too. I'll read and report.

What a weekend brings

Some of the things I've learned this weekend:
1. Not everything at the Dollar Store is a bargain.
2. Shorts and t-shirts on other people are not an indicator that the weather is warm enough for you to do the same thing.
3. If you think things are going well, wait a few minutes.

Yesterday John and I went to the 7th annual Music on the Mountain festival. This is an fundraiser for spinal cord research with free music by talented and some very well known musicians, yummy food, silent auction and general outdoor enjoyment. John was assigned to cover it for The Pioneer and although he could have shown up, taken a few pictures and done an interview with the organizer, Chris MacKay (a young man with a personal stake in the outcome of spinal cord research), we stayed all afternoon. The MacKay family was grateful and might, in future, have nicer things to say about journalists.

John and I took our living room chairs to sit on. It was a people-watching paradise. I think some of these folks have been growing their hair since 1960, on their heads and/or on their chins falling to their navels. White and bushy.

We got home around seven o'clock and made the quickest dinner we could, including a green salad with toasted almonds and sesame seed dressing. John called his kids and his mother, I called my son and we then both settled down for an evening of this and that - John was going to edit his afternoon's pictures and I was going to fire up the computer and get myself ready for writing this week.

Around 9:45, John said he felt itchy and was scratching himself in some very odd places. I didn't pay much attention. At 9:55 he asked me to come to the bathroom where the light is good and check out something. He said, Is my bottom lip swollen? I said, Well, stop sticking it out and I'll let you know. He said, I'm not sticking it out. Whoa! And he had spots everywhere.

Maxi story, mini version: he ended up at the hospital today for nearly five hours and came home with prescriptions for Benadryl, raniditine (which I could have given him because it's what I take), antiobiotics (God knows why) and an epi-pen. The first and the last I figure he needs. The rest - well, it's money out of our pockets which are already rather empty.

So... now we go on a hunt to find out what it was he ate that caused all this. Almonds or poppy seeds are the most likely culprits. But he's food-shy now for sure and doesn't want to eat anything. Could be a long autumn.

Meanwhile we have to get him well enough to get back on the job. He's exhausted and wants to sleep non-stop. Still itching. Still some facial swelling. The managing editor was appalled today that he couldn't make it in (although sympathetic). Will he make it tomorrow? Watch this space.

Is this how birds feel?

We've made the move and are now living in an apartment for eight months while John goes to school. I have to admit to a sense of freedom like I haven't had in a very long time. When I was unpacking the bags and boxes I'd brought with me, putting stuff away in the bathroom or bedroom or kitchen or wherever it belonged, I felt so light, that I thought I would float around the apartment. It was as if I'd had sacks of rocks removed from my shoulders that I didn't even know were there.

The view from the balcony is in itself freeing. The tops of houses, even the tops of some apartment buidings are visible. Lake Ontario is off to the right with the semi-islands of Prince Edward County providing a lush backdrop for the sailboats that race in and out of the yacht club on the waterfront. Since we are on the top floor, birds seem to fly right at us, then deke up at the last minute to clear our rooftop. You can hear the flutter of their wings against the air. No wonder I feel free.

Perhaps - actually, no perhaps to it, I'm sure this is the real reason - it is the lack of possessions that makes me feel free. We have very little - just the essentials like computers and desks for each of us (Ha!); folding lawn chairs in the living room for watching the one channel we get on TV (one my mother-in-law discarded when she got a new one, along with her old DVD and VCR players); a small round table in the dining room that was second-hand twenty years ago. Oak chairs in the dining room came with a house bought in 1972. I stripped them about 10 years ago and this summer I gave the two that had not come unglued a coat or two of varathane and they look pretty good. Not the most comfortable of all chairs, but servicable.

The bed we started out with was an inflatable one that we bought a few years ago for guests. Figured it would do us just fine while we're here. Not. John spent Monday and Tuesday on it and, by the time I got here on Wednesday, was determined that we needed an actual bed. I slept on it Wednesday night and after a completely sleepness night, on Thursday we went out and bought a real bed. The cheapest new bed we could find (about $300) and we're sleeping like kings now. What a treat. And that's the extent of what we possess. Our bedspread is one that I bought when I got married the first time 36 years ago. It has a tear in it now but it keeps us warm and it covers the queensized bed for which I have no other blankets that fit. It is snuggy and warm. We have four knives, four forks, four soup spoons and four teaspoons. The dishes we are using are the ones that John had when he was in University 26 years ago. The newspaper they were wrapped in was dated 1981. A few kitchen gadgets - like a can opener and a vegetable peeler and we' re good to go. I'm very happy.

Have been here nearly three days now and apartment living agrees with me. Housework consists only of sweeping the bathroom, vacuuming the living room and bedroom and wiping down the counters and sinks. The neighbours are quiet and must not cook much because there are no food smells in the hallway. They may not like us when I get started using the bottle of fish sauce I bought yesterday (found a store that sells Chinese groceries, and Caribbean, African, Indian and much more). I've heard "Hello" and "Good Day" from neighbours here more often than I've heard in eight years in Ottawa. Everyone is cheerful, polite and outgoing. They hold doors for you, let you in if you're fumbling for your front door key simply because they recognize you from seeing you in the elevator or at the mailboxes.

I don't have to worry about whether there's a groundhog building a condominium in our backyard or whether sumac is pushing its way up through the deck. If something breaks, I can just call the super rather than worrying about how to go about repairing it myself. I have to clean up only after myself and, if I tidy as I go, which I do, I minimize even that. Can't say the same for John but I'm cutting him some slack because he's so busy with his class assignments.

We went to a country fair last night in Picton. John is assigned to cover it and a music festival tomorrow. I'm looking forward to the latter. The fair was interesting from a sociological point of view but even that gets stale when one's feet are searing from all the walking and the bathrooms are nowhere in sight. I attended my first tractor pull and I have a feeling it will be my last. Luckily we were on the right side of the venue when the black smoke was pouring out of the exhaust as the tractors strained against The Terminator. I learned that there is an whole industry in building tractors especially designed to compete at these rodeos. The drivers even wear asbestos suits and full helmets. There were firemen on the scene. When I asked about that, John said it's probably because they're burning nitro. Sounds dangerous. Would the firemen save the onlookers or the tractors? The amount of fuel that is burned at these events is astounding. Let's see. Each tractor probably burns every ounce in its tanks trying to pull the weight. The weight machine itself has an engine for driving about. A front-end loader idles constantly at the side of the track to smooth the dirt back into position after each pull. Several generators rumble away, each powering four high-energy lights to illuminate the scene. What waste! What pollution! What obscenity! There oughta be a law. Maybe I should be grateful. At least they weren't using horses.

John has gone back to the fair this afternoon for the mutt (you heard right) competition and for the demolition derby later on this evening. A journalist has to be inpartial, so it wouldn't help him for me to be there muttering about the pollution and wastefulness of it all. I stayed home and will get myself in gear to start some writing this afternoon ... perhaps.

I just called all the Subways in town and none of them sell Garden burger subs. They didn't even know what I was talking about. The last lady said, when I explained what they were and that they were available in Ottawa, that they hadn't reached here yet. That's how it used to be in Newfoundland years ago. We will survive without Gardenburgers. Certainly we'll save money by not eating there. Too bad, though, because I love Gardenburgers. Maybe I'll write to Subway and complain.

More to come.

Blame it on the Walkman

We're a nation of music-addicted zombies. Mp3's. iPods. Even our telephones play music.

The first Cassette Walkman appeared in 1979. Kids begged. Santa caved. CD Walkman showed up. Santa bought the bill of goods again.

We've created a generation of people that eat/drink/sleep music. They can't walk down the street without earphones. They study with earphones. They ride the bus with earphones, usually also with eyes closed, zoned out. They don't see the frail passenger who might need their seat. The cries of anyone needing help are drowned out by the boom-boom hiss-hiss in their ears. They are the most unapproachable, unfriendly creatures ever to walk our streets. Unfortunately for them, they are also being involved in accidents at an alarming rate when they fail to hear approaching traffic over the roar in their ears.

Other cultures encourage dialogue. People gather in coffee shops, doorways, street corners; slap each other on the back, ask about each other's families, pass the time of day finding out about each other, testing the temperature of the community to make sure all is well.

Not here. We not only prefer the privacy of our homes but we carry that privacy around with us in the form of earphones. Like tortoises we have our shells at the ready should we need to retreat. What better protection from the homeless man with his hand out. If we can't hear him, then we don't know that he's asking for something. Can't be expected to know what's going on if we have earphones on, now can we? Great way to stay uninvolved, not responsible, and answerable only to ourselves. It's hard to care about or even be aware of anyone or anything when music is tickling your insides, revving your feel-good metre, recharging your batteries, soothing your nerves, massaging your brain, eating away your eardrums.

If I was a conspiracy theorist, I'd be checking to see who's investing in this technology. Who has a stake in making sure we don't talk to each other? People who talk often discover that things are not as they should be. People who talk a lot often stage such anti-establishment activities as boycotts, rallies, protest marches. They refuse to serve in armies. They cast votes for people other than the reigning elite. They even help get the other guys elected. Can't have that. Keep them busy with heavy beat, empty lyrics. It's hard for them to organize if they don't talk to one another.

Should we blame it on the Walkman?

[The above was sent to the Ottawa Citizen as a letter to the editor, July 2, 2006.]

Where was France?

And where was France this morning? From where I stood, I couldn't see all the dignitaries but I was standing point blank in front of a speaker and didn't hear anyone say that so-and-so of the French Embassy was present.

And when the wreaths were all laid, there was a wreath from France, but it was among the smallest. Why wasn't it the biggest? Why didn't someone from France stand up and say, Merci à tous vous Terre-neuviens. Merci de nous avoir sauvé. Merci d'avoir donné votre vie pour la notre. Merci toujours et rien que merci.

Where was France this morning?

We Will Remember Them

I just got home from downtown where Canada Day festivities are in full swing. We normally don't join the masses until about now but today was special. The government of Canada had a service at the war memorial (in the middle of downtown) to commemorate the soldiers who died at the Battle of the Somme and Beaumont-Hamel in 1916.

In Newfoundland, July 1 was always Memorial Day. We wore artificial forget-me-nots in our lapels and went to the cenotaph for a service. I remember somber music on the radio and there was never much reason for gaiety. Once Newfoundland joined Canada (in 1949) it also became Dominion Day¹ for that was the day that the Articles of Confederation were signed in Charlottetown, P.E.I. in 1867 forming the original nation of Canada.

And so for us, July 1 had a dual purpose. Remember the dead. Celebrate with the living. Not a problem for most Newfoundlanders. We never forget when someone does something for us and we're up to celebrate most anything.

Today marks the first time that the valour of our Royal Newfoundland Regiment has been commemorated anywhere else in Canada besides Newfoundland. It is the first time that anyone but Newfoundlanders have publicly remembered that on this same day in 1916, only 69 of 801 soldiers answered roll call when the battle was over.

It felt good, so very good to stand there and sing the Ode to Newfoundland on Ottawa soil. I feel like finally we're part of the Canadian fabric in a way that we have never been before. Needless to say, I was a blubbering mess long before a young soldier read the Act of Remembrance.

They shall grow not old,
as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them,
nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun
and in the morning
We will remember them.

RESPONSE: We will remember them

Newfoundlanders in the crowd were visible by the Newfoundland flags they carried, the Newfoundland tartan ties around their necks, or simply by the radiance of their teary smiles.

I met my babysitter. She used to wheel me in my baby carriage around the harbour of Brigus when she was about 9, as near as we can figure. She told me she'd have recognized me anywhere.

What a morning! What a glorious day.
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¹Dominion Day was officially renamed "Canada Day" by an Act of Parliament on October 27, 1982 after the BNA Act (Canada's Constitution)was repatriated by Pierre Trudeau.

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