The Squamidian Report – Dec. 7 / 13
 
Issue #602

Including:
The Ontarion

Hi All,

The world is full of people. So, you know that the world is full of stupid stuff because people are carriers and they tend to spread 'stupid' around like any other communicable disease. Here's a couple of cases in point that we are still stuck with after the '10 olympics. In order to look 'green' to the rest of the world, the west coast politicians (and face it, politicians lead the pack when it comes to stupid) decided it would be a feather in their collective egotistic caps if there was one of those big tall wind towers siting high up on Grouse Mountain, visible to most of the GVA as a display of how forward looking and progressive the area is, or was, or whatever. So, at great expense the tower was built, ready to turn free wind energy into usable, green, electrical energy. Being a typical political idea, it was never really thought out very well. First off, it wasn't ready in time. Then, it turned out there was no one in BC qualified to inspect and pass the installation, or to issue the permit that would let it be hooked up to the power grid. It still isn't. So, on the very few times the thing is even turned on, all it is doing is spinning enough so people think its generating power, and, once in a while, to be fair, it is powering a few lights or other things that are not connected to the grid. Gotta love those politicians.

Then, equally stupid and wasteful, presumably the same 'important people', carriers and spreaders of 'stupid', got the idea that our showcase to the world should include nice new 'green', hydrogen powered busses in Whistler to move all those world leaders and athletes around. So, at double the cost of normal busses, a whole fleet of hydrogen powered busses were purchased. Gotta show the world how green and forward thinking we are. Most of them barely made it to Whistler on time and the ones that did didn't work very well. They kept breaking down. Normal diesel busses had to be brought in to cover for them. It slowly leaked out that the fuel for these green busses was being trucked in from Quebec at about 4 times the cost of normal fuel. So, almost 4 years later, these busses that have cost a fortune and hardly ever run because they are always broken and when they do, require fuel that must be trucked right across the country, are finally under consideration to be scrapped. But its the tax payer who want them scrapped, not the politicians.

Then there was the blizzard on the parries this week. There was some TV news footage of  local Calgary residents trying to dig though the snowdrifts that were clogging their streets. No politicians necessary here. The diggers were shoveling away like crazy, but they were trying to throw the snow INTO the howling wind. The wind, not being at all stupid, just threw it right back at them. Had they thrown the snow WITH the wind, it would have kept on going and ended up somewhere in central Saskatchewan.

Here's something thats both silly and stupid: ABS brakes are dangerous when they don't work right. They are supposed to make braking on slippery surfaces safer for the average driver and generally they do. However, when they malfunction they are not at all nice. The ABS system on my little 10-yr old Ford Ranger malfunctioned. So, instead of kicking in under slippery conditions where one or more wheel slipped while braking, they started kicking in during slow speed stops on perfectly dry, none-slip surfaces. We haven't even had any slippery driving conditions yet this year. The ABS pump would come on and the confused system would shunt all the braking power to the front right wheel causing a sharp and sudden pull to the right. Not at all a good thing.

I took the truck in to have the ABS system looked at because it didn't seem to want to 'repair' itself. There could have been any number of things wrong from a computer module to a failed sensor to who knows what. Most likely thing was a failed wheel sensor. Turned out it was a sensor in one of the front wheels but the problem was just that it was rusty. It and the wheel hub simply needed to be cleaned up. So, for now at least, the brakes are working the way they should again. One contributing factor is the fact that the truck sits unused pretty well all spring, summer and fall during riding season. Any and every kind of machinery tends to deteriorate faster when its not being used than when it is being constantly used. But its fixed now and that is a good thing.

And as I type this, the windchill factor is -20 here on the balmy west coast. Crystal clear but very, very cold.

doug
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THE ONTARION REPORT

Hello everyone!

A couple of weeks ago while we were putting up our outdoor Christmas Decorations we were in shirt sleeves and light clothing. We were both making light of the fact that our temperature was hovering around the +15c mark and the city of London Ontario was being bashed by a lake effect snow storm to the tune of up to 70cm of the white stuff. That was the weekend I got my Toro snow blower back from the dealer in Waterloo after a total tune up. I was glad that we hadn’t gotten any of what London was getting!

Then, Wednesday of this week I had to go to London to visit the eye surgeon Dr Lee Siebert who saved my sight 15 years ago and checks my retinal scars once a year to make sure his surgical procedure is still holding. While I was sitting in his exam room and he was busy blinding me with that incredibly strong light he has he made a comment about it taking him four hours to clear his driveway two weeks ago even with the use of his Sears snow blower! I began to tell him about buying my Toro Blower after doing lots of research on the most highly recommended make of blower five years ago. He said he’s going to take my advice and buy himself a new Toro blower this year. He said his eight-horse power blower from Sears gets plugged all the time and he’s fed up with having to stop to clear the chute every 20’ of blowing. I then told him about working in +15c weather while he was in London blowing two feet of snow in a blizzard the same day! We had a chuckle about that and he then told me that that same day he had a few patients from the KW area that told him they hoped they’d be able to get out of London alright with all that snow because they wanted to get back to Kitchener while it was still light out so they could rake their leaves! LOL! We were both laughing about the contrast in weather when our cities are only 90km apart! It’s hard to believe there’s such a difference! Of course London has always been in that heavy Snow Belt that bashes them off Lake Huron! When I was a kid in Kitchener we used to get tons of snow but it seems to have lessened some every year until we are getting quite a bit less snow each winter. Watch, now that I’ve said that, we’ll wind up with 5 feet of the stuff this year! LOL! Oh well, I’ll need a good reason to have spent all that “tune up” money on my Toro anyway so…. “Let ‘er snow!”

We’re well into December already so it’s about time we got some of the white stuff anyway! From what the long term forecast says, we’re in for more sunshine than snow over the next couple of weeks at least so we’ll just have to be patient with winter after all. I still have to remember to fill my snow blower gas can with five gallons of High Test before I can do any snow blowing anyway! So, old man winter can hold off a bit longer after all!
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That’s about it for this week folks!
Thanks for tuning in and I’ll look forward to talking to you all again next week in The Ontarion Report!

Bye for now … Greg


PS:  Something To Think About>
There may be winter in our hair but there’s summer in our hearts!

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Have a good one..
the doug
http://www.thedougsite.net
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