The Squamidian Report – July 21 / 18
Issue #843
Including:
From Russ
The Ontarion
Hi All,
Were any of you fortunate enough to watch Venus and the Moon on Sunday
evening? From the time it was starting to get dark until they both sank
below the western horizon they put on a nice show. It started with
Venus just left of the moon and as the evening wore on she slid down
and closer. Of course its all from our perspective. They are no where
near each other at any time but visually they appeared to come very
close. Venus obviously orbits the Sun and the Moon obviously orbits the
earth (sort of) and the Earth orbits the sun. Most of the apparent
motion is the optical result of the earth's rotation from west to east.
From our view point Venus is practically standing still and the moon is
tagging along with us. The reason I said 'sort of' is that the moon
doesn't actually orbit the earth, rather, the moon and earth orbit a
common center of gravity point which just happens to fall just a bit
inside the earth. Anyway, they made a great spectacle for the naked eye
and through binoculars they were pretty hard to beat.
As well, Jupiter and her moons kept watch from just west of south. Her
4 visible moons were visible through scopes and good binoculars
although one of those moons was just at the edge of the big planet
making it a bit hard to see without a stable scope mount. And Saturn is
visible at the same time, lower in the south east. She's a bit harder
to get a clear view of as the viewing angle is low and therefor through
a lot more atmosphere. Her rings never the less were visible and thats
always nice. Then, if one were still up a bit past midnight, or
had gotten up for some reason, Mars was there, in the south east. By
this time Saturn has moved to a point west of south. Mars is closer to
us right now than she has been in a while as both our orbits have us
lined up together on the same side of the Sun. She is spectacularly
bright, very reddish and well worth the effort to see. Mars will be at
her closest on July 27, at the same time that the moon is full. Over
the next couple of weeks the moon will grow from a crescent through
half up to full. Any moon phase past the early stage crescents can and
do affect star gazing as the brighter the moon gets, the more she
washed out the night sky. Oh well. However, Mars is and will be bright
enough as to be remain very visible and easy to view.
Oh, almost forgot, when I was up to checking out Mars I turned my
binoculars toward where Andromeda should be and there she was. I had as
good a view of her as I've ever had and I hadn't even bother to set my
scope up again, just used those trusty old binoculars. Its always
interesting and fascinating that when looking at Andromeda, we are
seeing her where and how she was 2.2 million years ago as she is 2.2
million light years away. We have no way of knowing what she looks like
now because light can only travel at the speed of light. Also
interesting, we are on a collision course, our Milky Way galaxy and
Andromeda. Don't worry about it though, it will be many millions of
years before the 2 galaxies start to collide and even then, the chances
of any 2 stars actually bumping into each other are very low and just
like solar systems, galaxies with all their billions of stars, are
mostly what we'd call 'empty space' from the point of view of physical
matter. A collisions between galaxies is a collision of gravities, with
stars, cluster, and chunks, being sent in all sorts of directions. It
would be pretty cool to be there and watch but any sign we ever even
existed will be long gone before it happens, and even as it happens, it
will happen at a galactic pace meaning even if we were there we
wouldn't really see it as it would simply be 'the way things are' in
the universe. Sure would be nice to hang around for a few billion more
years to see it though. Night time star gazing would at times be pretty
nice.
*
One
of the reasons I've been writing about memories of the old farm is that
there really isn't all that much going on around here these day and I
need something to write about. Interestingly, there has actually been a
bit of interest expressed in the topic, so, I'll do a bit more.
Borrowing from Uncle Russ's wonderfully creative style of writing, I'll
give this installment a name, hence......
Memories of noon radio on the farm.
These particular memories are based in that time frame from before they
had electricity, which they finally got when I was about 13.
Contact with the outside world was sparse at best, no phones, no TV, no
nothing so to speak. In order to attempt to be aware of things like the
news and more importantly, the stock yard reports, they had a battery
operated radio. The radio was tuned in to CKNX in Wingham. The
'men-folk' would come in from the fields or the barn in time to catch
the 12 noon new which was brought to you by Blue Sunoco (“I'll custom
blend a Blue Sunoco, just for you”) and your local Sure Gain dealer.
The news was read by John Strong. Then there would be some country
music. I can still hear Johnny Cash singing 'Ring of Fire'. Being very
young and rather unaware of anything, I couldn't figure out why anyone
would want to fall into a 'ring of fire'. I had yet to understand that
song lyrics were not to be taken all that literally. Then, the stock
yard reports, the prices for pigs, cows etc would be read by a woman
with a funny accent named Jean Keen. Interestingly, I would run in to
her years later as it turned out her and her husband were friends of my
in-laws. At some point the weather would be given and of course we all
had to be very quiet so the adults could hear every word. I never
really understood that either because my grandfather could take one
look at the sky and tell you what was going to happen a whole lot more
accurately than the weather man on the radio could. In between each
information section would be more country music. By 1pm lunch was over
as the radio was turned off, and left off, until the next day's noon
hour.
Occasionally there would be the interrupting sound of a distant vehicle
bumping its way down their usually very dusty rural back-road and my
grandmother would hush everyone in order to lessen better. (We were
already 'hushed' so they could hear the old radio). Then, if the
vehicle was getting closer, she would run out into the yard in hopes of
recognizing or identifying the vehicle and therefor the occupants. If
they did figure out who was driving by (it was a good distance out the
lane to the road, and assuming you could even see the vehicle through
all the dust it kicked up) they would spend a fair amount of time
discussing where they might be going and why they would want to or need
to be going anywhere. Those were very different times and they lived a
very isolated life.
And thats enough from me for now.
doug
****
From Russ
Do you like chocolate? I LOVE chocolate! As you know by now I’m a
“chocoholic”. I credit my “sin” to a couple of uncles who gave freely
of the stuff during my “informative years”(age 16 to 25). Some of you
may recall that Uncle Harry Elsley worked at Smiles & Chuckles,
Weber Street, East (when I was about 16). We used to visit him when he
was doing maintenance on the chocolate-making machinery when the plant
was shut down on weekends. The factory smelled so strongly of
chocolate, I nearly had an orgasm. Unc. Harry was doing electrical work
on some machine that was coated with chocolate which needed to be
scraped off before it was fully operational. He let me have the
scrapings...which would otherwise be scrapped. That did it! From then
on, I couldn’t resist the stuff!
When I became a cop, (age about 25) I used to visit another uncle who
worked for Raymond’s Nuts. I remember during warm days on the beat, I
walked into the loading door at the rear of the factory to “visit”
Uncle Elton Wismer. He was Ruthie Keith’s dad, such a kind old
gentleman. After we talked for a while, he’d always send me off with a
small bagful of assorted nuts and chocolates. I became a “
beat-pounding” chocolate addict.
And you may recall the Laura Secord caper, when I was doing foot-patrol
on the night-shift, and during a “Police escort”, I filled a large
bagful of assorted chocolates to be shared with “my wife and family”. I
made the mistake of sampling “just one piece” and ended up eating the
whole 2 pound bag!! The chocolates were always given freely by the
gentleman doing the deliveries, but I’m ashamed to admit to my
gluttonry.
Even though I was puking-sick and couldn’t look at food for 24 hours I
wouldn’t turn down a piece of chocolate if you offered it today!
*
Do
you remember when most cities had water fountains (bubblers) on their
main streets? We cops appreciated them on hot Summer days. Pounding a
beat is “thirsty” work! There’s another addiction....can’t pass a
bubbler without taking a gulp or two. Back then, I probably had an
insatiable thirst from “too much the night before”.....but now I can
blame diabetes.
Next week we’ll talk about ‘Precinct #2’
Your old Uncle Russ Cst. #20
****
THE ONTARION REPORT
Hello everyone!
Well, it finally happened! I got a call on Thursday from the body shop
working on the MG. The owner Matt Cochrane phoned to say that the MG
was finally done and was ready for pick up anytime Thursday afternoon.
Carole and I drove down to Blair to the shop at around 3pm and the
little beauty was sitting outside glistening in the afternoon sunshine.
I was thrilled to see it back in complete condition and painted a
lovely dark green original colour. The paint colour is called
Brooklands Green and it matched the inside of the original trunk and
also the colour undr the hood! Or should I say in the boot and under
the bonnet? LOL! While standing beside the car with the body shop
owner, Carole pointed out the there were still many spots that hadn't
been properly cleaned of paint dust and overspray. When she pointed
this out to Matt the owner of the business, he called a 13 year old kid
that he had given the cleaning task to and told him to finish cleaning
the rest of the car properly. The young guy went to work and cleaned
most of the outstanding spots. When I went inside to pay the bill,
Carole asked the kid to clean some green paint off the bumpers. He
tried but was not successful. I reluctantly said that I’d take care of
the few spots once I got it home. By rights, I should have either
refused to pay the bill or told Matt to keep the car for another day
until these spots were properly cleaned but, I was anxious to get the
MG home again after all these weeks of waiting. So, I paid the bill and
agreed to bring the MG back in a few weeks to have him put the Whiskers
in place on the doors. He had the parts but hadn’t gotten time to
install these.
He asked if I’d mind bringing the car back in a month or so and he’d
install these parts. Whiskers are actually rubber seals that are
mounted on the top of the doors and slide along the glass of the
windows as you open or close them. They prevent water and other debris
from dropping down inside the doors through the opening where the glass
slides up and down. The original whiskers or rubber seals are of course
old and cracked with age. So, I agreed to bring the car back in a few
weeks or more and allow him to have it for another day to finish the
job! I spent most of the day in my garage cleaning up the MG and I also
changed the oil and filter on the car. I usually change the oil and
filter once a year since we don’t put many Kilometers on the car each
Spring, Summer and Fall season. In fact, we have only put about 25,000
km on the MG since I rebuilt the engine completely back in the year
2000. There were years when I didn’t have the MG on the road at all and
of course an oil change wasn’t necessary until I did put her on the
road!
Today while working on the cleanup, I tried the signals and they failed
to work. I removed the glove box to enable my access to the signal
flasher. I bought a new flasher unit and it failed to rectify the
problem. When I activated the 4-way flashers switch on the dash, the
signals began to work. So in testing the new to the old flasher to see
which one would do the job, I flipped the 4-way switch again and it
literally shattered in my hand.
Old age I guess! So it means another trip to Hwy 5 south of Cambridge
to the British Auto Parts dealer to acquire a new switch and while I’m
at it I might as well purchase a new “flasher” unit just to be sure
things work properly once they are all back together. The Brits were
not very skillful in the early days of car building at making things
easily accessible when it came to replacing dash components. The switch
took me a good half hour to remove what was left of it and once I got
it out of the dash, the wiring plugs that plug onto the prongs of the
back of the switch came free from the old switch but the wires are so
short that I can’t even pull them out of the dash enough to be able to
plug them onto the new switch once I get it! So, another challenge will
confront me once I bring that switch home. Thankfully parts aren’t very
costly for these old British Cars and they are still easily located! I
hope to have the dash all together by the weekend and I also want to
install the trunk/boot liner carpet and also the new vinyl roof. Once
these three tasks are completed, the MG will be worth her weight in
replacement value for sure. With the recent $6,000.00 that went into
the body and paint repair the MG will be a much better investment for
sure! It’s only taken us 29 years to complete the restoration and now
she looks like a million bucks! She’s finally gleaming in the sun and
all one colour! LOL! As I had mentioned before there had been who knows
how many previous owners of this LBC (Little British Car) and it
appeared that at least one of them had done body and paint work on the
MG during their ownership. It’s always bugged me that there were a few
different shades of green on the entire car and now it’s finally like I
say, all one lovely dark green gleaming paint colour! I haven’t taken
any final pictures of the MG since getting it home. I want to wait
until I have the cleanup and refit completed before taking pictures of
it and sharing them with other people. I’ll have it all completed next
week for sure and then I’ll happily share the photos of her in all her
glory!
That’s about all I have to tell you 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>
To understand the heart and mind of a person, look not at what he has already achieved, but at what he aspires.
PPS: I can hardly wait to see what Idiot Trump will do next!
****
Have a good one..
the doug
The Fine Print!
The articles in these issues are the sole property of the persons writing them and should be respected as such.
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