Aug 29/30 - friends

We had a great visit with Hamid and Shab, not tied to a bike ride this time ... well, at least separated by a few days :).

I got the Bayliner into the water and we had a ride on a glorious day to Lost Channel, doing a little exploring and around Whip-poor-will.  I gave Shab a ride on the 4-wheeler and then later Hamid took it out -- first time for him -- while I drove the 3-wheeler.  Both are running nicely. 

They enjoyed the lamb for dinner (so did we !) and ate some more seedy bread.  I made a loaf of Easter Bread and they had some slices for breakfast and then I ran off to Port Loring.  They headed out shortly afterwards, with Yonge & Steeles as their destination in Toronto (Hamid's uncle). 

In town Daryl waved me onto the hoist and we looked at the suspension together.  It seems pretty clear that replacing the ball joints at the back -- I've got the parts -- will help the camber.  It's not a five minute exercise though and I'll get it done in New Smyrna, assuming that the car is still rolling.  I always have to add that proviso and have been doing so for the last 70,000 miles !  Anyway, I have new tires on the back now.

I was a long time in Loring.  Daryl is a chatter; careful and precise as he works.  The phone rings, people stop by -- this is a small town.  Thankfully there were no towing calls or the car would still be there !  I was asking him about the average number of calls per week and, as expected, there is no average.  He said that on Monday he did five calls and couldn't handle a sixth.  He does towing calls from a wide area -- North Bay, Sudbury, Parry Sound and has towed many to Toronto, eg. a BMW that needs to go to a dealship.

From there I went to the Post Office.  I must have been there for 45 minutes.  Doug put the first parcel on the scale and the PC died.  It took almost 15 minutes to re-boot as it needs to use dial-up to connect to the post office. It then took a long time to weigh and stamp each package.  I have a bill that's 4 feet long !

I asked the girl who took over the work from Doug (don't know her name; she's always working there) why she was using stamps instead of metered postage and she said that they like to use up inventory so that the Post Office doesn't yell at Doug.  Interesting -- I don't really think of the Post Office as a business that way and the stamps are basically worth nothing, but I guess that they have to be tracked as inventory. 

Back home it was quiet.  Rain was on the way so I decided to get something done in advance and started up the splitter and dealt with the birch and the few pieces of hemlock.  The maple awaits David and I for later today.  I'll get up there shortly and do some piling.

Dinner -- port chops, potatoes and carrots, the latter two were from the garden.  Lorraine came over afterwards; she and Sandy were looking at what Sandy has rented for us in Florida while the work is continuing on the house. 

Time is running out.  I've got a lot to do to pack up this place.

-- finish splitting and piling wood
-- wrap gazebo, hang lights
-- put away Bayliner, organize barn
-- deck chairs and table away
-- Muskoka chairs away
-- oil change for X5
-- all my bike stuff ... still not sorted after the Granite Anvil
-- all the Granite Anvil stuff for the meeting in September and just finishing up the financials

That's only a part of the list.  I spent a couple of hours yesterday reconciling all the financials, ensuring that all my charges had been accounted for.  We did make money on the event, over 3k.  I spent 21k.  I've got many reimbursements to do.

Onward !