The
Squamidian Report – May 15 / 10
Issue # 416
Including:
Lorne replies to last week’s article!
The Ontarion
Hi All,
Oh the misery of it… ‘they’ are putting in two roundabouts to replace two stop signed intersections on the Boulevard up here in the Highlands. Roundabouts are annoying enough as it is but these ones are so small and tight that your average mini-van will have trouble getting around the circle. I have no idea how a delivery truck or service vehicle will do it. The idea behind these villainous entities is to expedite the movement of traffic and supposedly make it smoother with fewer disruptions to flow. Bull!! All a roundabout does is remove any liability of intersection design from the municipality and place it all on the individual driver.
And of course because the Boulevard is the only way in and out of the top end of the Highlands we are forced to pass through the dusty bumpy and poorly laid out construction zone. It is not fun, the traffic control people are the grumpiest and most inept persons you could meet. Most of the time they do not even bother to pay attention to what is happening around them. I know most of the traffic control people around here and these are the bottom of the barrel. Oh well, I guess its someone’s idea of progress.
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I rode up to Whistler the other morning with Ryan. The ride up was nice, a bit on the cool side but that’s how it is these days. They ride back was spectacular. I have never seen the Tantalus Range look so incredible in all the years we’ve been here. The air was absolutely clear, the sky was that blue that can only happen when the air is that clear. The sun was bright. The more than ample snow cover in the high country and up on the slopes glowed under the ample sunshine. The crisp white of the ridges and peaks contrasted so sharply with the deep blue of the shy behind that it almost sent shivers up my spine. The only reason that any and all tourists on the highway didn’t drive right off the road was because they had all pulled over to take pictures.
You don’t see the Tantalus as you drive north toward Whistler because you come out from under it as you climb toward Warren’s turnoff and then from there on it is behind you. You do see it in its entire splendor as you drive back down. The first views start on that twisty section just south of Function Junction and then keep reappearing whenever you come out of the areas that are hemmed in by thick trees. By the time you are climbing up out of the Canyon, the Tantalus is a wall of steep brilliant white filling your western view. No wonder that the Swift Creek lookout is always full of people taking pictures, and who can blame them. I’ve taken a few there myself over the years.
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Now this is kind of funny, in a weird sort of way. At least to me it is. Warren probably wouldn’t think so because he seemed to enjoy the piece of the cake that he had gotten. But now that cake is no more. It had been a rhubarb cake that ‘the wife’ had made from scratch and had included some fresh rhubarb from the back yard. We had all enjoyed the fresh rhubarb flavor with a cup of coffee last Sunday evening during a nice relaxed jam session. However, on Monday during the morning some time ‘the wife’ was working in the back yard and the dog from next door came over for a visit. This is not unusual at all as many of the local dogs drop by for a visit and this particular one likes to hang out in our back yard with us. What we didn’t realize was that the door that leads from the deck into the kitchen area of the house was partly open. The dog figured it out pretty quickly and disappeared for a while. We didn’t suspect anything until later in the day when ‘the wife’ noticed that the plate that had held the remaining half of the cake as it sat on the dinning room table was now empty. The chairs had been moved slightly and there was not a crumb to be found. That same dog keeps indicating that it would like to go back into the house but we are onto it and have no intention of letting her in. And as a final note, I do hope she farted rhubarb all that evening over in her own house.
doug
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Lorne replies to last week’s article!
Everything you describe in last weeks issue, with the exception of humans, has disappeared. The hill, the trees, the rope and the recklessness. In their place, development [?] houses, streets, lawns, underground stuff and a whole lot more humans. And traffic.
I tend to forget about those long-ago times, so its good to be reminded. Makes me think back to unmentionable juvenile things that I conducted. Every generation has its time of exploration and adventure, but governed by a changing world.
A sad change is the passing of aunt Edna.
This too brings many memories.
Lorne
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THE ONTARION REPORT
Hello everyone!
We’re looking forward to a couple of weeks of sunshine and warmer temps around here according to Dave MacDonald. I hope he’s on the mark with his prediction this time.
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Summer weather always brings back memories of when we were kids. I guess it’s because this weather allowed us to be free spirits for a few months. Especially during July and August when there was no school. The old Floyd St gang used to have a lot of fun back then. Especially since right at the end of our street was Breithaupt Park. Back then it was nothing but a large open multi level field with knee length grass and weeds to romp in. We spent many a day flying our kites and playing ball and soccer in those fields and it was like being in another world. No school playground rules to worry about and no traffic problems like when we played road hockey. Attached to the fields of course was Breithaupt’s bush and we had loads of adventures playing in the bush as well. We had forts built in the heavy underbrush that filled in beneath the trees. The bush was only about 10 acres in size but to us it was wilderness that stretched for miles and miles. There were so many climbable trees that made it even more fun. I remember my friend Dave Bernhardt and I had a special tree that we claimed for our own. We called it “The Tarzan Tree”. It was easy to climb and was on the edge of the bush between two of the playing fields. We would spend hours up in The Tarzan Tree just talking and day dreaming and watching the people pass below. Most times, they didn’t even know we were up there as long as we kept quiet.
We had another place that was a lot of fun to go as well. We discovered a pond that was in another section of bush across Bridgeport Rd where the expressway now passes over it. Back then the expressway didn’t exist and Bridgeport Rd was the northern most boundary of the bush. Once you crossed it you were really a long way from civilization. Anyway, there was an old house at that point and behind the house about a ¼ mile was the pond I mentioned. It had a lot of tall trees around it and on one side of the pond the trees were covered with huge vines. We managed to free up a couple of the vines so we could use them to swing out over the pond. I remember wanting to take our clothes off and cool off in the pond but we found out it was full of Snapping Turtles and was also very muddy! One summer day we were playing around the pond and trying to build a raft out of old logs we found there. One of the guys had a fishing pole along and tossed his line in just to see if he could catch anything. He finally managed to hook onto what he thought was a log on the bottom of the pond. He didn’t give up and kept pulling his line in slowly. After about 10 minutes of pulling just hard enough not to break his line he managed to get his prize catch up on shore. Lo and behold, he had hooked into the rear end of the shell of a HUGE Snapper! We were all shocked to see such a large turtle. He decided he wanted to keep it as a pet. Luckily one of the guys had brought his wagon along that day. It was one of those with the removable side racks on it so it was nice and deep, deep enough to keep the snapper from climbing out. After a couple of us managed to get up enough nerve to pick this monster up we finally got it lifted into the wagon and headed for home. It took us about an hour to get back through the bush to Floyd St where we then had to figure out what to do with this prehistoric creature.
Volker Hasselman was “The German Kid” that lived across the street from me and he was the only guy whose mother had a galvanized tin washtub large enough to house the turtle. He brought it out onto his front lawn and we slugged the turtle into the tub. Volker got his finger in the way and the turtle bit a good sized chunk out of it. I ran across the street and got a bandaid out of my mums first aid cupboard and managed to stop the bleeding by wrapping his finger good and tight with it. He actually should probably have had stitches to close the hole in his finger but who thought of things like that back in the late 50’s? Volker was more worried about getting heck from his dad for even bringing the turtle home in the first place. We got a pail and ferried water from the side tap to the tub until the turtle was covered. He was really huge by turtle standards. We were used to bringing home the little 4” painted turtles from the Grand River so this guy was a real prize!
It was a Saturday and when the parents noticed all the commotion on Volker’s front lawn they decided to come over to find out what was going on. Mr Hasselman and my dad came out to see what was up and were totally shocked when they discovered what we had. I guess this Snapper was some sort of a record for size. Another neighbour that lived beside the Hasselmans phoned the RECORD newspaper and they sent a reporter up to interview Volker and take a picture of his giant Snapping Turtle. Of course he named it “Snappy” and he made the first page of the “Local” section of the Record on the following Monday. I think the headline read something like this “Local Lads Land Prehistoric Creature in Neighbourhood Pond” and there were a couple of paragraphs to the story of how, where and when we managed to bag this monster. With no decent place to keep the turtle, Volker’s dad and mine loaded the turtle into Mr Hasselman’s station wagon and also loaded all the guys into Volk’s dad’s car and my dad’s as well and we all made the trip by car to take “Snappy” back to his native stomping, or should I say “Snapping” gounds. Mr Hasselman took pictures of all of us standing on the edge of the pond with Snappy before he slipped back into the water and disappeared in the muddy quagmire.
That was the last we saw of Snappy but I’m sure he lived a good long time after that summer. According to one of the dads in the neighbourhood who knew a bit about turtles, he was a pretty old creature already. The back of his shell measured almost twenty inches from front to back over the hump and not quite fourteen inches from side to side again over the hump. He was also about six inches thick in the middle. His head was huge, about the size of a grown man’s hand. I’m sure he could have bitten half a grownup’s hand off in one bite! We were amazed that Snappy could almost reach the middle of his back by bending his neck back over his body. It was a real chore to keep him from bighting you when you were handling him. He also had huge claws as well and scratched a few of us pretty good when we were getting him into the wagon and the washtub too. It was one of those summer adventures a kid never forgets!
That’s it for this week folks!
Thanks for tuning in and I look forward to talking to you all again next time in The Ontarion Report!
Bye for now…. Greg.
PS: Something To Think About>
It’s ok to get angry with God he can take it! In fact, that’s part of his program, handling our frustrations!
PPS: I wonder if Snappy is still alive?
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Have a good one..
the doug
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