Oct 31 - back to normal ?

What is normal ? If normal lasts less than 24 hours is it normal ? In this context, I'm referring to normal as just Sandy, me & Abby. I guess that I take that back -- normal is having other people around and just having the three of us is unusual. Alex will arrive sometime this afternoon and will be here until next weekend. We'll be deer hunting, duck hunting, fishing, playing pool ... depending on the weather and our luck.

I guess that the other thing that's normal is that I'm writing this blog in the early morning. I may be less regular with Alex here ... we'll see ... just a warning.

Sandy got back from Toronto around 8pm last night loaded down with groceries, as usual. Included in her haul were 10 boxes of Suzies Flatbreads -- a favorite of ours that Costco used to carry but now apparently does not ... seems that price negotiations fell down, according to what she has been told. Anyway, by phoning around and checking stock she found a Costco in the Toronto area that had some in stock and we now have 10 boxes. They'll last us a long time and they keep well, especially over the winter when the air is less humid. We'll take some to Florida with us too. Why are these such a deal ? Well, a small box of similar or the same flatbread costs $2-$3 and these large boxes from Costco contain perhaps 10x the volume for $8.

While Sandy was driving around Toronto I was driving around this area. I went to Sudbury, hitting Home Depot (self tapping screws for the X5 wheel well, screw eyes to hang tarp around the gazebo), Canadian Tire (windshield washer anti-freeze, more screws for the wheel well, some fishing gear), Future Shop (looked at a firewire cable, way overpriced at $23) and Costco (feta stuffed jalapenos for Florida, raisin bran, canned mushrooms, cheese). I'd decided to get my Sudbury errands over with and go to Mass in Britt on Sunday morning.

Abby and I were back home around lunch time and then went off to Loring, picking up the three m's -- mail, milk and minnows -- ha !! Whoops, I forgot that I also picked up the Toronto Star -- doesn't start with M. The bait guy carries shiners and dace. He was out of shiners so I got dace -- which, by the look of them, are the same minnows that I've been using that I got from Bob Simms.

Speaking of Bob Simms and other up-north neighbors, I heard from Bonnie that his wife had a heard attack and small stroke a couple of days ago. I don't know any more at this point. She also told me that they had heard from Jack and Dolores Robinson that they had arrived safely in Vancouver Island. That's good news.

Back to the dace -- I'd never heard of them before but according to Wikipedia the name dace refers to any of a number of small fish in some latin-named family. As minnows they are very active and long lived when on the hook. I prefer them to shiners but then again, I don't know which minnows the fish prefer ! I did go fishing last night and although I was getting many bites, nothing would stay on the hook. That told me that the fish biting were probably not "keepers" anyway, too small to take the entire minnow and hook.

It was quite warm last night, having reached about 14C/ 57F during the day. I did get cool sitting out there as the sun went down -- silly me I forgot to bring a hat. It was almost flat calm and quite pleasant. I'm also planning on going out this morning. Perhaps there will be some pike around. It's colder this morning -- -3C the last time that I looked -- but it will warm up again once the sun is up.

The other thing that I did yesterday was repair that wheel well. In the garage, with the car on the trolley jack, I removed the drivers-side wheel to better get at the area. I then used a combination of the self-tapping screws from HD and clips and screws from CT to firmly afix both that corner of the bumper and the wheel well cover. For the missing 4" square access panel I cut a piece of plastic out of an ice-cream container and screwed it to the wheel well cover. My temporary repair using duct tape was holding well ... but wouldn't have lasted. Covering that hole stops crap from spraying through to the metal parts behind -- not so much a short term issue but in another month on the trip north with snow and salt on the roads, a major issue.

My initial inclination had been to procrastinate on the car repairs but I decided to take advantage of the warm afternoon. The temporary work that I'd done a couple of days ago was in sub-freezing temperatures, in the closed garage, with the 4800 watt heater blasting at me as I worked on the concrete floor. Yesterday the car was dry, the air was warm, there were no bugs -- how could I resist -- undoubtedly had I waited one or more of these favorable variables would go the other way.

So ... should I be starting out these entries as "dear blog" as in "dear diary" ??I guess that the difference between a diary and a blog is that you don't expect anyone else to read your diary whereas the blog is in the public domain, visible to billions of people should they care to read it ...

Ok, obviously I've run out of things to say, looking at the previous paragraph. It's time for breakfast for me and Abby ... we're back to the "normal" routine.