The Squamidian Report – Dec. 24 / 16
Issue #761
Including:
From Russ
Greetings From Lorne
The Ontarion
Hi All,
It is now officially winter and we've just had our shortest day of the
year. That shortest day meant the least amount of daylight. Daylight
means light and light means photons, those tiny little particles (or
waves) that we all like, want and look forward to when they are absent.
So, here's a little bit of trivial about photons...
At the most simplistic, anything that converts one kind of energy into
something else tends to create photons if enough heat is a byproduct,
aka light. Now, light travels at well, the speed of light. So photons
radiating from a source do so at the speed of themselves, at the speed
of light. As we all know, the faster something travels, the slower time
moves for said object (relativity) and as something gets closer to the
speed of light, time moves ever more slowly. At the speed of light time
is completely stopped. For a photon traveling at the speed of itself,
time does not pass, does not happen. Therefore no matter how far a
photon travels, no time will pass for it. Photons that were created at
the beginning of the universe may have been traveling for 16 billion of
our years and yet have not had any time pass for them. They have only
existed for an 'instant'. Interestingly, photons radiating out
from stars may will have experienced vast amounts of time because if
they have been created in the core of the star, they get slowed down by
the incredible pressures, gravity and temperatures. It takes then 150
thousand years to make it out to the surface of our sun. From there
they are immediately at the speed of light and radiate away, with no
more passage of time at all. Funny how that works.
Every Christmas for the last 3 years, if you include this one, we have
a tradition of making peanut brittle and fudge to hand out to the
employees of the gondola. (I should point out that 'The Wife' does
99.9999% of the work). So, this being the 3rd year of the gondola
existing, this is the 3rd year we have done that. Several days ahead
'The Wife' starts to make the treats. We then package them in small
portions so they can be handed out and then we do just that, take them
with us and hand them out to all the people working there we run in to.
Some of the people are new employees who don't know us and are a bit
confused by whats going on. Most have gotten in on this before and are
quite delighted. Funny how a small homemade token can mean a lot to
people who are not expecting it but it seems to. Funny how some prefer
fudge, others the peanut brittle. Many of the people working there have
become somewhat like family to us and vice versa. Our Ontario Christmas
traditions were by necessity left behind years ago. We are making new
ones.
A big thanks to Russ for sending is his great story, and thanks to
Lorne for sending in his Christmas greeting. So, to you guys and yes,
to the rest of you too, have a Merry Christmas.
doug
****
From Russ
I’ve got a new tricycle.....well, not “new” new, but newer than my 43
year old one. I’ve been riding that old 3-wheeler around Point Clark
for the past 6 years, and I think the neighbours refer to me as, “The
old guy you see riding his bike every day, rain, snow, sleet, or
shine.....probably senile”
Around here, you wave at everybody, and mostly everybody waves
back...those who don’t are either “week-enders” or even
worse.....”strangers”
No, I didn’t receive the new bike as a gift, but where the “gift” comes
in is where my “gifted” son transplanted the old “saddle-type” seat
from my old bike onto my new one. It took imagination, mechanical
skill, and good luck to accomplish this “miracle”. Why go to all
this trouble for an old man? You ask. Answer; love and respect.
The seat which was on the new bike, was about as comfortable as sitting
on a split-rail fence! One thing I learned about getting old......I
traded my “butt” for an “exclamation mark” ! (no muscle...no kidding!)
Now, I can ride in comfort, and greet the dogs I’ve gotten to know
along my route. When my dog, Donny was still with us, we got to know
the dog’s names before their “human’s” names:
Macey (Donny’s former girlfriend) is a chocolate-brown, mid-size
Poodle. She likes to wipe her muddy/snowy/wet feet on me while licking
my lips.(How sexy is that?). Macey takes her mother, Mary to a
Retirement home regularly, where Macey brings joy, love and laughter to
some very sad old people.
Willow is a small, blonde, female (Poodle/Panda mix...I think) who owns
two small, grey-haired British parents. Willow is timid like her Mom
and Dad, also old, and not very active. Sniffing and peeing are
her only tricks.(Willow, that is, not Mom).
Bo is a tiny, white, Toy Poodle(I think), who looks like a “wind-up
toy”....his wee feet are invisible as he “vibrates” along the road. Bo
owns a Chinese lady who speaks only two English words.....Bo, and
Hieeeee. I don’t know her name, although she’s been my neighbour
for the past six years. But she has tiny feet...Size Two, and swings
her arms while marching like a soldier. She always picks Bo up in
her arms when a car goes by(sometimes I can count 2 or 3 in a
day....it’s Winter up here you know!) They tell me Bo’s parents are
breaking up, and Bo needs a new home. NO! Not mine!.
The other dogs I see, own parents who warn their children “not to speak
to strangers”, so they just “eye me with suspicion” as they (dogs and
parents) glide silently by. But, how is this a Christmas story? Think
about it....there is
A Miracle,
Love,
A Gift,
And Animals.
A Merry Christmas to you ALL!
Russ.
****
Greetings From Lorne
Merry Christmas and happy New Year to all the weekly followers of The Squamidian. Looking forward to Report #761
Lorne
****
THE ONTARION REPORT
WOW, it’s Christmas Eve already!
Hello and Merry Christmas to all of our Squamidian Friends and family!
I guess all your wrapping is over and done by this time and I hope for
sure you’re finished with your shopping! If you’ve forgotten anything,
the Mac’s Milk on the corner might just have a pack of gum left!!!!
Hurry! Hurry!
Don’t forget to pick up your scratch tickets for stocking stuffers; you
can still buy those right up until the last minute for sure. I had the
majority of my Christmas shopping done a few weeks ago so the only
thing I had yet to do was pick up a few “stocking stuffers” this past
week. Like most years in the past 25 or so, Carole and I have both said
that we pretty much have everything we ever wanted so when asked what
we’d like from Santa, we would just reply that “Anything at all will do
and please don’t overdo the spending on each other!” and like always
we’d overspend on each other and Adam as well but, that’s life isn’t it?
At least this year we’ve got a lovely looking white Christmas and so I
can’t say I had my picture taken on a green front lawn in my summer
shorts December 25th! LOL! It’s happened before but not very often!
After all, we are still living in Canada, which translates into “COLD”
most years! I guess if we didn’t like the cold we could always spend
winters in Florida like some friends of ours do but then we’d miss the
beauty of a “White Christmas”. You can’t have both!
Back in the early 80’s we went to Punta Gorda Florida with another
couple and their little girl. There were 6 of us in a huge “Woody”
Buick station wagon and it was a diesel as well. It belonged to the
couple that we went south with and it was a real stinker of a car! It
was fine while we were driving but when you stopped all we could smell
were fumes accompanied by black smoke! It’s all right, it got us there
and back in one piece and we had a ball! We were in Florida over
Christmas and thought we’d enjoy the warmth of the south for a change
but as luck would have it, Florida experienced the coldest Christmas it
had had in 50 some odd years! We went to Disney World on Christmas Day
and we had to wear the winter coats we had taken along for the trip
down from Canada. Disney World was almost deserted and we had most of
the rides to ourselves. The crowd that usually gathers on Main Street
for the Christmas parade was non-existent and it was like Disney World
was throwing this special parade just for us! When you think about it,
I guess they were since there were about 20 other people standing and
shivering while watching the parade! The sun was shining bright and
there was no cold wind blowing but the temperature was well below
freezing. They have a huge 50 foot Christmas Tree in the middle of the
“Town Square” that is made out of circular wooden shelves one on top of
the other with a center pole. They stack poinsettia plants on each
shelf and the result is a beautiful red and green Christmas tree with
twinkling lights on the edges of the shelves. It’s quite a beautiful
sight! However, this particular year, the cold snap of weather had
caused the poinsettia plants to die on the “tree” and all of the red
pedals of the plants were drooping like red icicles from their
planters. It was a sad but interesting sight to behold. We made the
best of the trip to Disney by enjoying having the amazing place to
ourselves. We had arrived at Disney around 9am that day and by noon the
sun had warmed it up enough that we could take our coats off and the
park seemed to come alive with more people as the day went on. We got
to see Disney World as most people will never see it so I guess it was
a bonus after all! The drive from the home we were staying in at Punta
Gorda was about an hour drive from Disney World and it was fascinating
to see the orange groves along the way all frozen with most of the
oranges covered by a coat of ice. The growers tried their best to keep
the oranges from freezing but it was so cold the efforts they made were
futile indeed! They had what they call “smudge pots” placed about every
20 to 25 feet apart throughout the rows of trees in the groves. These
“pots” were filled with a liquid of some sort that once lit would
create clouds of hot black smoke that was supposed to prevent the
oranges from freezing on the trees. I guess it’s a tried and true
method of combating the cold weather but according to the news reports
the losses to the growers were in the millions of dollars due to the
frozen damage to the oranges and grapefruits that year.
We enjoyed our two weeks in Florida and of course had an experience to
talk about after the trip. The two days of ice cold weather didn’t
spoil the rest of the trip as the weather was back to normal after
Christmas Day. When all was said and done, we enjoyed the sunshine of
the south for a change but we all agreed that we did miss the
atmosphere of the snow that Canada offers at Christmas time and learned
to appreciate what we have here in the Great White North! After that
year, we decided that if we were ever to go south for the winter in the
future, it would be a trip we’d make AFTER Christmas had passed! We’ve
done it a few times since and spending Christmas at home is definitely
the way to go!
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! Until then, have a VERY MERRY
CHRISTMAS and I’ll look forward to hearing a few reports from as many
of our fellow Squamidian readers as have the time to write in the
coming issues! Please give it a try! Drop Doug a note and tell us about
your Christmas this year!
Bye for now and Ho Ho Ho to you all!
Talk next week … Greg
PS: Something To Think About>
“Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply. Speak kindly and Leave the rest to God!”
****
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.
|