Issue #918
Including:

From Wayne
From Russ
From Lorne
The Ontarion

Hi All,

Well now, I guess thats pretty well it for another year. Everyone is older, a few are perhaps wiser, we’re all a bit slower. That’s how it goes. Since this time last years we’ve made a full orbit around our Sun, traveling about a thousand miles per hour. Didn’t require any effort on our part. We simply went along for the ride. That’s not the only ride we are on. As our planet orbits our star, our star is in turn orbiting our galaxy. Or to be precise, our galaxy is rotating and our sun is going along for the ride. A full rotation, or orbit, takes about 230 MILLION years, with a speed of about 828,000 km/hr. All that with no effort at all on our part as well. The night sky we see now was not what was seen even just a few thousand years ago. Certainly not what was seen a few million years ago, because while the basic structure of the observable sky is moving right along with us, everything is moving on slightly different projectorys. And as our planet’s tilt oscillates it creates apparent changes in the sky, from our perspective. So, since this time last year we’ve traveled 940 million Km in our solar orbit. Our distance traveled in our galactic orbit is just too mind boggling to comprehend, yet its just a tiny fraction of a light year.

Did you know that if our Sun was depicted as a tiny grain of sand, that our nearest galactic neighbor would be another grain of sand 5 kilometers away. Thats how far apart things are in galaxy's. For all those billions of stars that make up the Milky Way, galaxy's are in fact mostly just empty space. Ours and the Andromeda galaxy are on a collision course that you don’t need to loose any sleep over because the actual collision won’t happen for at least a billion years. When they do finally collide, the statistical chances of any stars actually colliding are almost none existent. You have a higher chance of winning every lottery there is, for the rest of your life, than any given star has of hitting or being hit by another star during the collision. An observer would see more Milky Way-ish type bands in the night sky but thats about it. Gravity perturbations would jostle things around a bit but to any observer it will be a bit of a let down, excitement wise. And, it would be in very slow motion from a human life perspective due to distances being traveled and distances of separation.

What doesn’t move slow at all on a human perspective scale is the growth of nasal hair. Good greef, that stuff just doesn’t quit. You can pluck it, cut it, do whatever is needed to get rid of it and almost instantly its back, like a full bush, making your nose itchy again. The hair that grows straight our of ears is bad enough but the curse of us old guys is those pesky nose hairs. They don’t give up, they won’t give up. Its like some cruel joke, especially for anyone who is losing or has lost the stuff on the top of their head. And now you know how my brain moves from one irrelevant topic to the next.

And moving on, it was great having some guest columnists in last week’s Christmas addition, and we thank each of you. So, EVERYONE, give some thought to contribution more often as we move forward. There are several reader who look forward to this letter each week and it would mean a lot to them and to everyone if more readers would be more involved. Its not hard, everyone’s life is different so everyone has something of interest to say. And lastly, Happy New Years.

doug

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From Wayne

Hi Everyone:

I met with the surgeon on Friday. My surgery will be Jan. 9 and I will be in the hospital for about a week. Mobility is not expected to be a problem once the healing is underweigh.

He is satisfied with my physical strength and that I will survive the 5 - 6 hour operation. The CT scan and MRI confirmed that there has been no further spreading of the cancer but what parts will be missing after the surgery is unknown and will be decided during the surgery. I expect that I would be a disappointing cell partner if I were to turn to a life of crime and go to prison.

At this point I don't know which category of public washroom I will be using in the future.

After about a month I will start 3 months of intense Chemo but no radiation and then I should be clear of the disease.

Wayne

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From Russ

My column this week is also about something BIG !

If you walk down to the shore of Lake Huron and look North-East you will see a huge structure purposely built right on the shore of this huge body of cold, clean water. This man-made ‘monster’ sucks in cold water and spews out hot water 24/7. The Bruce Power Nuclear site is the largest in the World, and keeps 4000 professionals with fat wallets! It generates roughly one-third of Ontario’s power and leaves no carbon footprint!

I had the privilege of touring the site a while back, and was amazed at the high levels of security. We were bused from place-to-place, and at each stop a uniformed security person boarded our bus – armed to the teeth like part of a SWAT team! In fact, the security people are trained as military personnel, with small tanks and armoured vehicles.

It’s with some pride that I live ‘cozily’ to The Bruce, but I sometimes worry about being so close if something destructive should happen.

Terrorists? Nuclear melt-down? Crazy Donald?

Your old Uncle Russ.

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From Lorne

Last week I misspelled 'meccano' and now it's still wrong. My spell check doesn't know it's wrong from it's right. Glad to know brother Wayne's surgery is booked and although there will be very tough times ahead, it sounds like he has the strength to handle it. I have a bone scan next Monday and a doctor's appointment Tues. Bother Russel wondered why I have a crawler in my yard. Well, doesn't just about everyone have those crawly things?

Lorne

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THE ONTARION REPORT

Hello everyone!

Well, Christmas is over and the mad rush of Boxing Day or shall we say week has begun! People are out trying to obtain the best of the best of that week’s amazing bargains. The traffic is crazy and so are the crowds of people hitting the malls etc. It’s just pure bedlam out there and the stores are raking in millions and millions of post Christmas dollars in the week that follows the big day. I guess there are buys to be had but all in all it’s a big cash grab. I always think “If these stores can price their goods this low for the period called Boxing Day or Week, why can’t they keep these prices all year long?” I guess for the rest of the year it just boils down to pure greed on the part of the business of doing business! Everything revolves around making money these days and I guess it’ll never stop until the economy collapses.

Everything was quiet around our household during this festive season now past. It was nice and relaxing not having the usual anticipation of hoards of company showing up on various evenings or days to disrupt the serenity of our home routine. We just enjoyed the quiet of sitting in front of the TV watching old Christmas movies or whatever we felt like watching and eating a selection of various foods that Carole had put out on a large tray in a casual selection for our eating and picking pleasure. The movie was good and so was the company. We’ve cut back on the amount of money and number of gifts to each other since there is just the three of us and we’ve pretty much got everything we need in our lives. There are always a few items that we pick up for each other but for the most part we manage to obtain whatever we want or need for ourselves all year long as the need arises. So, there really isn’t much to request from “Santa” when Christmas rolls around. It’s still a fun Christmas Day as we emerge from our cozy beds about ten am and sit down to a lovely mid morning breakfast provided by Carole. Then, we move to the living room and take a couple of hours to enjoy a cup of tea and good conversation while presenting each other with a few gifts. It’s still fun after all these years for the three of us to enjoy the routine of opening gifts on Christmas morning as if Santa has gone to a lot of trouble to choose and deliver a selection of items for each of us! We all have several gifts to open but Adam and I had picked up my main gift from Carole and Adam two days before the big day. It was an amazing new recliner chair that the two of them purchased for me for the occasion. It’s a gorgeous chair constructed of lovely wide oak arms and side rails with dark brown leather on the seat and back. It’s totally different from the usual soft plushy huge fabric kind of recliner that you see in most homes and furniture stores. When I get a moment I’ll include a picture of this beautiful piece of furniture and post it along with a few words about it’s comfort and features in one of my upcoming Ontarions! I haven’t seen a piece of furniture like this since I was a kid of around 5 years of age and was staying with my mothers parents for a couple of weeks. They lived directly behind KCI on Glasgow St and looked after me while I was recuperating from a broken heal. My parents both worked full time so grandma and grandpa Hoy elected to watch me for a few weeks until my heel healed! It was great fun since the loved to spoil me as their youngest grandchild! They had an old house with an enclosed porch on the front that had two huge leather chairs for their sitting pleasure on warm evenings. The chairs had leather seats and backs with large wide oak armrests on them and slatted wooden sides, just like my new Christmas present of this year. It sure brought back memories when Carole and Adam presented me with my new chair! I’m getting to enjoy the feeling of having my own special place to sit every day or evening and know that it’s comfortable and relaxing to sit in with no squirming to find a comfy position for the evening. The seat and backrest are thick and soft and warm and the armrests are at exactly the perfect width apart to comfortably rest both arms on. Also the footrest is a perfect length to support my legs that must be raised while sitting to keep them from swelling according to the doctor’s instructions. Most of the chairs we looked at while shopping for the right one had too short a leg rest and the edge of the rest seemed to hit me right in the middle of my calves and that made it uncomfortable for sure. This one is just perfect and I’m sure I’ll enjoy it for many years to come. It’ll indeed become an iconic piece of furniture in our home no matter where we live should we ever change residences again. I must sincerely thank both Carole and Adam for the very thoughtful gift of the chair and of course I think of them both every time I sit in my new chair! It’s wonderful!

When we’ve been so lucky as to have pretty much whatever we want at any time, we must put a lot of thought into whatever we purchase for each other at Christmas. It’d be a shame to give or get a gift that would sit or stand in the corner of a room not to be used after someone was kind enough to give it to you! We try each year to give useful presents to each other so as to avoid this problem. It’s always a challenge to come up with a thoughtful gift for each other each year and it’s becoming more difficult each year!

I guess I’d better get making a list of ideas for both Carole and Adam’s gifts for next Christmas already. It’s getting harder and harder to find ideas each year so consequently I need to start shopping well in advance each time! I’m sure we’ll all do well in the shopping department again next year but it’ll take some tricky thinking for sure! Wish me luck!

Well, that’s about all I have to say this week folks!

Take care and thanks for tuning in!

I’ll look forward to talking to you all again next week in The Ontarion Report.

Bye for now …. Greg

Something to Think About>

Your shopping list for next Christmas of course!

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