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The
Squamidian Report – Feb. 8 / 25
Online
Versions
Of This And Past Issues Issue
#1185 Russ Nova Scotia Sus Doug
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The Ontarion
Greg’s wife Carole has informed me that Greg is back in the hospital after suffering another major heart attack. He is on pain killers as they attempt to keep him comfortable. I know we all wish him and them the best.
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From Russ
Laughter Last week I wrote about tickling which brought on 'laughter', that's for kids, we older adults find laughter in humor. There's humor all around us - we just have to be "tuned-in" for it! Pity those who are not tuned-in. The word humour , (the way we spell it in Canada) is derived from a Latin word meaning to be in good health, and if we are in good health we are quick to laugh, and "laughter is the best medicine" as we stated last week. Recently, I came across an article written by Jennifer O'Reilly which appeared in Grey-Bruce boomers magazine and found it to be "Bang-on" with my Squamidian story. (Will be making references from time-to-time). Jennifer is now a 'stand-up comic' she says, "....laughter makes challenges seem less threatening and helps us cope better. It also takes our focus away from guilt, anger and negative emotions", she goes on, "and tends to put us in a positive frame of mind". She should know, too. Jennifer has always been funny. Growing up, she was the family jokester, and a bit of a class clown, entertaining relatives and classmates with personal anecdotes, one-liners and wisecracks. That all stopped on her first day of Grade 12 when her father died by suicide! "My world shattered" she said. "And not just my world. Our whole family was torn apart" Jennifer's grief was unimaginable. First she was in a state of "denial" bottled-up - when she finally broke down, the tears wouldn't stop. She cried for four months......finally requiring Professional help. Now, we've been saying there is humor in everything......bur Jennifer said, ".....losing my father that way was not a laughing matter.. But the therapist told me that's where I was wrong --- that humor is a coping mechanism. I have since learned that he was right -----humor is the ability to find joy in the face of adversity" And here, Jennifer is like our Carol - - 'gutsy', she (Jennifer) wanted to spend her life making people laugh. She took a course at a Community College called "Comedy writing & Performance" and graduated! She's proud to say, "Through comedy and improvisation, I try to teach people about the physical, mental and social benefits of laughter, and how to incorporate it into their daily lives" And as you and I are getting 'riper', Jennifer put it this way, "Getting older is not for the faint of heart - more than ever as we age, we need humor in our lives. If we don't laugh, we may just cry" * I don't know if you've noticed, but I try to bring humour into my weekly articles in the Squamidian - life is too serious to be taken seriously.
Russ😂 ****
From Nova Scotia Sus
Here in Nova Scotia we are experiencing extra cold temps. This morning a minus 20 brilliant sunshine and a decent depth of snow. We really can't complain so far. Although it's a constant effort to keep the chickens water from freezing even with a hot lamp hovering above their water container. I take warm water to them about 5 times a day.They are big drinkers! Over their outside doors we hang old blankets and comforters to keep the cold out. They can take quite a bit of cold but there is a point of too much. Sus ****
From Doug
How’s it going…..eh? For the first time this winter, we have had some actual, good old fashion winter. It started last weekend with a good old fashion storm crashing into the west coast. It brought snow to the whole lower mainland area. Up our way it brought lots of snow. It started on Saturday with about a foot of snow, then on Sunday another foot came down, and then over Sunday night another foot decorated our trees and yards and streets. As always happens, the highway became a big mess and was more like a parking lot than a highway. We knew better than to try to go anywhere because you couldn’t get to anywhere. Our usual Sunday morning get-together at Horseshoe Bay was cancelled as none of the group who life in the city could go anywhere either. We’ve done a lot of shoveling and the old snow blower has had several good workouts. Even our temperatures are acting like they should in winter with below freezing readings all week. I kinda’ like it. I even pulled out my old ‘Ontario’ parka, a down-filled garment that I’ve had for 35 years or so. It hardly ever gets used here because it hardly ever gets cold enough to use it. * I haven’t talked much about my flight simulator lately because I haven’t been able to spend much time flying. Too much going on that has taken my attention. However, every once in a while I do manage to sneak in a little flying fun. One such recent adventure required total disregard for any and all flight regulations and rules and laws. But you can do that in a sim and get away with it. So, here’s what I did….. I figured it might be fun to fly UNDER the Lions Gate bridge, the bridge that spans from Stanley Park across the first narrows of Burrard Inlet to West Van. My starting airport would be Vancouver Int (YVR) which is the first air regulation violation. There is no way in heck that a small Cessna would EVER be permitted to land or take off from YVR in real life without declaring an emergency. I didn’t even bother to take off from a runway as the taxiways there are more than long enough for my digital Cessna to take off from. Next, I held an altitude of just 100 ft. Again, a violation of the air regs but who’s going to stop me! The real Lions Gate bridge deck is well over 200 ft above the water but the X-Plane simulator program does not do a very good job with bridge layout as most of its info comes from satellite photos. I held that 100 ft and slowed to 80 knots and aimed for the space between 2 of the piers. Bang, I had hit the bridge deck and went down in a ball of flames. Embarrassing and funny. The sim program them ‘put me back in one piece’ at YVR. I took off again from YVR and headed out over the Straight on my way to the bridge. As I flew away from the airport I noticed an aircraft carrier out in the middle of the Str of Georgia. (The sim has carriers etc because some of the available aircraft are military). I couldn’t resist that, I’ve had 4 successful landings on carries so far so why not another one. The carries deck sits at 100 ft above the water so I climbed up to 500’ for my approach. A moving carrier with its runway at an angle to the ships direction is very tricky to land on but again, I did manage it. (I say that proudly) Then in order to take off from the deck I taxied right to the very rear of the deck for starting my takeoff roll because a Cessna is at it’s limit taking off from a carrier deck, and needs every inch of the deck length to get air born. This is all of course totally NOT legal and in real life the carrier would have probably shot me down. That takeoff was successful and I set my heading for the bridge again. This time in anticipation of the bridge deck being way lower than in real life, I held just 20 ft above the water. That is hard to do, and a few feet of deviation could put me in the drink. Holding that silly low level of flight I approached the bridge, slowed again to 80 and aimed for between the piers. This time I was successful. Cool. Quite a thrill even if it is just digital. Then another totally illegal idea crept into my head. Why not continue on over Burrard Inlet and fly under the Second Narrows bridge. It sits much lower than the Lions Gate but what the heck. So, I did, and held that tricky to do and rather low 20 ft and 80 knots. Just as I went under the bridge I realized that there is an even lower railway bridge ahead of me, too low to go under, so I hit full throttle and pulled sharply up, and, survived. I had made it. Wow. All totally against any and every air regulation but fun and challenging. Please don’t turn me in. :) I ended my flight by heading east to Pit Meadows and doing a standard, legal type proper approach and landing. I took a screen shot of my approach to the Lions Gate while at 100 ft. After this the approach became too busy to be able to take a closer shot. That is West Van on the left and Stanley Park on the right with English Bay below m. I’m still too far out for the bridge to be very visible.
Doug ****
Have
a
Good One ****
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