The Squamidian Report – April 19 / 14
Issue #621
Including:
The Ontarion
Hi All,
Now that the riding season is well underway, there is a fare amount of
work to do getting the members of my riding club chapter back up to
speed, so to speak. Several riders rode all winter, others, like me,
parked our bikes for the winter. Either way, we are all a bit rusty at
doing the tight group riding and other necessary skills needed for safe
riding. We have several training events lined up for the near future
including some slow-speed skill training and practice, group riding and
parking practice and so on. However, there is more to riding than just
riding. There are the group riding rules and procedures that all
participants must know and in order for them to know the information,
it must be taught to them, and refreshed for any who supposedly already
know the stuff. So, to that end I lead a group ride from our meeting
place in Horseshoe Bay up to my place here where we could use the quiet
sunny deck to put on our group riding seminar. We simply sit around a
table and I run everyone through the rules, and the procedures, and the
'why' for the procedures. We discuss emergency procedures, how to deal
with various situation and so on. The ride up was great, a bit on the
cool side because its basically shady all the way due to the high
mountains along the Sound. We stopped at Porteau Cove where one of our
riders had camped for the weekend. She is a Harley riding kindergarten
teacher who loves motorcycle camping and never misses a chance to do so.
We rode in to Squamish, grabbed a bite of lunch and then climbed up to
my place where we parked the row of bikes out on the street. Funny how
everyone stops what they are doing and looks when a row of bikes come
riding up to here. It attracts all the people who wish they had
bikes, be they kids or adults.
We did our seminar and discussed any peripheral topics and then mounted
up and headed back to the city. I rode half way back with the group but
turned around at the 'overpass to now where' (pre-arranged) simply
because there was no point in riding to the city again and then having
to brave the Sunday afternoon traffic all the way back to Squamish. But
it was good. By then we has all shed a few layers of insulation and
were enjoying riding in the warm sunshine. We still have a lot of
training and practicing to do. Our road captains still need to
re-qualify, which is my rule, not a club rule. Like I said, we all get
rusty including me. Re-qualifying is easy, we simply get a minimum of 3
riders and choose a route that includes intersections, traffic, highway
on and off ramps and so on. Each road captain must prove their
proficiency at both the front (lead road captain) and rear (tail
gunner). I still have to do the rear road captain position before I can
declare myself proficient. Actually, although I have the authority, it
is my other R/C's that must re-certify me. Its all good, and keeps us
out of mischief. And face it, if you are not continually trying to
improve, you are going backward.
Now a different topic, don't read this part unless you don't mind icky
stuff... for decades now I've looked like I've been colonized by weird
space aliens. Thats why you will never see me with my shirt off, its
just too gross. Even my forehead seems to be over-run by these
invaders. All of our generation that spent too much time in the sun
over the years has been advised to keep an eye on our unwanted lumps,
bumps and markings and watch for anything 'out of the ordinary'. I had
one such small patch that seemed somehow different from the rest so I
had the doctor check it out. He referred to it using a long name that I
could not possibly remember and then proceeded to tell me that he had
just had his numerous spots, warts and moles treated and that he does
his parents every 6 months. He left the room for a minute and came back
with a pressurized container of liquid nitrogen that squirts out a very
fine focussed spray. I'd had liquid nitrogen applied to a few spots
years ago using a big q-tip type swab but this thing was more accurate
and faster. He treated almost every spot, patch and weird thing on my
upper body and head. It stung as he was doing it and as I drove home
the stinging all over was quite distracting but within an hour or so it
went away. He had showed me the welts under his collar and had told me
that I'd look like I'd fallen onto the BBQ for a few days. For the
first hour I had felt like I was still on the BBQ but like I said, the
stinging went away. Now I just have the big welts which I assume will
disappear. Whether any of my ugly unwanted carbuncles were or could
have become an issue I will never know and thats a good thing. The
doctor has advised that I have this done every 6 months now and that
seems like a good idea going forward. Some of these things have been
with me all of my adult life and yet I don't feel any compassion or
affection for them what-so-ever. No nostalgic parting of the way. No
reminiscing about old times, just goodby and good riddance.
doug
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THE ONTARION REPORT
Hello everyone!
Whew, let’s hope that my speaking of spring finally being here doesn’t
jinx us into another few of those quickie snowstorms! What a shocker
the other day to wake up to another 2” of that white crap! Oh well,
stuff happens when you live in the Great White North! The last of that
accumulation melted on Thursday and now it’s onward and upward for our
temps in the future, I’m sure this time! LOL! However, if I’m proven
wrong in the near future, I won’t be as surprised as I was this past
week!
I gotta tell you all about our dog Bailey’s disappearing act the other
night. He had been licking the inside of his left back leg for most of
the day and it was getting quite sore and raw. I decided to sleep with
him in the spare bedroom so I could watch that he didn’t start gnawing
at it during the night. I took him in on the bed around midnight and I
climbed under the blankets for the night. About two hours after we hit
the hay, I felt him move for the first time. The bed shook a little and
I looked down towards the spot that he had been sleeping on. To my
surprise, Bailey had disappeared! I called to him thinking he might
have fallen off the bed. I got no answer and didn’t even hear him
whimpering. Thinking that he had fallen off the bed I got up and turned
the light on. I searched the entire bedroom, under the bed etc. Then I
figured he’d found his way out of the room into one of the other three
bedrooms on the floor. I checked all the rooms while calling his name
franticly! I was beginning to think that maybe he’d fallen between the
rungs of the banister and down to the main floor of the house. I
quickly woke Carole up and asked her to help me search for the dog! She
checked the upstairs once again and I went down to the main floor to
look for his broken little body! To my relief, he was nowhere to be
found on the main floor either. I called up to Carole and asked if
she’d found him yet and she said “no, where the heck could he be?” I
ran back up stairs to take another look and once again I entered the
front bedroom where we had been sleeping for one more look, maybe under
the covers of the bed! I glanced once more at the headboard of the bed,
which is an arched white pipe with vertical smaller pipes supporting it
like a “half moon” and “There He Was!” He had wandered up over the
pillow on that side of the bed and stepped through a pair of the
vertical rungs and was sandwiched between the headboard rungs and the
wall! LOL! I screeched, “I found him Carole!!!!” She came bounding into
the bedroom and was as shocked as I was to see the little fellow
suspended between the headboard and the wall just looking at us in
bewilderment!
I went to the side that Bailey was on and Carole took the other side of
the bed and we gently pulled the bed away from the wall. I had my hand
under his chest but he slipped out of my grasp and down onto the floor.
He just sat there looking at Carole as if to say, “What the heck was
that all about?” LOL! I picked him up off the floor and cuddled him to
make sure he was ok and of course he was just fine. I think he was just
in a little bit of shock. He’s blind; as you all know, so the whole
episode must have been really strange to him! I doubt it was any more
strange to him than it was to us but all he had to do was hang there
and wait to be found however he must have really been wondering why it
took us five minutes to find the little guy! Oh well, after making sure
he was ok, we were able to laugh about it and of course it’s given me
another story for this edition of The Ontarion Report. I’m sure if
Bailey were still able to see, he’d have gotten a big laugh out of
watching me crawl around the bed on the floor naked calling his name!
Maybe he was afraid to say anything in reply to my calling his name
because he wasn’t sure he wanted to be scooped up by a half crazy naked
old man at 2am! LOL! I know if it were me, I’d have kept my mouth shut
too in hopes that the nice lady in the nightgown would be the one to
find and help me first! Hahahaha…! Sheesh, I sure am glad that Bailey
didn’t have his cell phone camera with him or I’d likely be famous on
U-tube right now! Can you imagine?????
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>
Did you hear about the cross-eyed teacher who lost her job because she couldn’t control her pupils?
PPS: Just want to wish all of our Squamidian members a very Happy Easter.
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Have a good one..
the doug
The Fine Print!
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