Scenes from St. Catharines! A Four Part Story - February 9, 2019
Over the past week in St. Cats - where we tried to get seven days worth of visiting and errands and appointments booked into four - there were some funny moments. Here are just a few of them.
Scene One: Monday morning
The morning went well – dropped the van off for the E Test and nearly walked away with the keys. Got to the gym - I had let our gym membership had run out but the gal at the front desk knows us so let us in.
Got in an exercise class and a swim – and one of us had forgotten his swim suit and goggles. No worries, gym shorts work and he borrowed some “found” goggles at the front desk. And then the real silliness started. Says Laur, “Where did I park the car…” Of course, it was at the mechanic’s – just a block away.
Scene Two: Monday afternoon
Laur had to drive me to get my hair coloured and cut – I had let my driver’s licence run out. He tried to take my computer to our fix it guy – but our lad, who doesn’t start work until after 10 am, was out for lunch from 1:00 to 2:30 pm. It took Laur a few trips to track him down. We adore him. His store hours are a little unusual, but he speaks “old” and “economical.”
Laur had a fun time gassing up our car. The machine wanted him to pay at the pump instead of the lad inside the store, but kept rejecting his Mastercard. Laur got so flummoxed, he drove home with the gas cap in his pocket. (I can’t say a thing – I’ve driven off with the gas cap on the roof… Never to be seen again.)
And then to Service Ontario. The line was snaked out to the door – as usual. I had let my health card run out – there is a bit of a theme here – and I needed to renew it so I could see our doc on Tuesday morning. And I had to get my driving license renewed so Laur didn’t have to chauffeur me anymore.
Laur joined me to get the E Test submitted but also got it in his mind that he had to have his driving license and health card renewed too. Since we do everything together… Apparently, not so when it comes to the province of Ontario. His wasn’t due for another year or two. The clerk managed to keep a straight face – paired with a sense of humour. You’d have to, to work in a thankless job like that. But we now had the sticker for our license that gives us permission to drive our van.
We’ve decided on Monday that it would be best if we ordered out for Chinese food for supper. Heaven knows - perhaps I had let our electricity fees at our Life Lease run out.
Scene Three: Tuesday morning
We fly South West regularly and to get a good seat – since they don’t assign seats – you have to go online 24 hours ahead of time to get your place in the queue. Normally, this isn’t a big deal – Laur goes on line and prints the tickets.
But his computer in our St. Cats apartment is linked to the printer by internet – and we had cancelled our internet. And Laur is of the understanding that you have to print your tickets the minute you get your number from South West. Since I ask him to do this, I cannot say a thing. Yes, I know, you can just have it on your phone. This is far beyond our level of competence.
Anna and Neal – our daughter and son-in-law - said Laur could go over to their place on Tuesday morning. Anna made sure he could hook up to their internet and Neal gave Laur a key to the side door since he had to get on line before 5:50 am. When we got home, Laur realized he didn’t actually have to get on line until 6:50 – which he told me and I quickly forgot.
So woke him up at 5 am on Tuesday morning (vs 6 am) – nearly giving him a heart attack. Off he went to the Glausers – Neal and Emma (granddaughter) were up – Anna had a day off so was enjoying some extra sleep. Laur booked our tickets and went to print them – and nothing happened. The printer said is was out of ink…
So, Neal woke up Anna who immediately went on line and found a site for a “work around” so that the printer would print – even with low ink. By this time Laur had tried to print a number of times, and so the printer printed out – full colour on glossy paper – numerous copies of our boarding passes. If the printer wasn’t out of ink initially, it certainly was by the time Laur was done!
Scene Four: Tuesday afternoon
Went to visit my niece Tia (not her real name.) Her boys are now in school but her little girl is still home. A very sweet family. Anyways, the other day, Tia was on the phone with her pal Ava (not her real name) – talking about how Ava’s birthday is coming up. Tia’s little boy N heard the word “birthday” and he was there in a flash. Tia said to N, “Aunty Ava’s birthday is coming up. What shall we get her for her birthday?”
Three year old N says, “Pot!” Tia just about dropped the phone! Where did he hear about marijuana? Ava on the other end was chuckling about how she was not into that stuff. So Tia pointed to a cooking pot and said to N – “You mean a cooking pot?” N shook his head and pulled his mom to the fridge … and pointed at a bottle of Pepsi. “Pot!”
“Oh honey,” laughed T, “You mean PoP!”
You can see how rumors get started.
*****
All in all, things went really well – the planes didn’t crash, we got to see our Southern Ontario kids and their kids, we got to go to church and coffee hour with our Grace “framily,” and while we weren’t able to go visit my mom – Granny Marj – we were able to chat by phone.
In theory we could have rebooked our flight and added on Wednesday and Thursday so we could drive over to Belleville. In practice, it’s good that we didn’t. Wednesday and Thursday, southern Ontario closed down with freezing rain. And I have just come down with a flu bug back here in Arizona.
I’m very fond of quoting my cousin Jack who is a pastor, “We don’t know what we’ve been spared.” This time, I think Mom and I do! 😊
Scene One: Monday morning
The morning went well – dropped the van off for the E Test and nearly walked away with the keys. Got to the gym - I had let our gym membership had run out but the gal at the front desk knows us so let us in.
Got in an exercise class and a swim – and one of us had forgotten his swim suit and goggles. No worries, gym shorts work and he borrowed some “found” goggles at the front desk. And then the real silliness started. Says Laur, “Where did I park the car…” Of course, it was at the mechanic’s – just a block away.
Scene Two: Monday afternoon
Laur had to drive me to get my hair coloured and cut – I had let my driver’s licence run out. He tried to take my computer to our fix it guy – but our lad, who doesn’t start work until after 10 am, was out for lunch from 1:00 to 2:30 pm. It took Laur a few trips to track him down. We adore him. His store hours are a little unusual, but he speaks “old” and “economical.”
Laur had a fun time gassing up our car. The machine wanted him to pay at the pump instead of the lad inside the store, but kept rejecting his Mastercard. Laur got so flummoxed, he drove home with the gas cap in his pocket. (I can’t say a thing – I’ve driven off with the gas cap on the roof… Never to be seen again.)
And then to Service Ontario. The line was snaked out to the door – as usual. I had let my health card run out – there is a bit of a theme here – and I needed to renew it so I could see our doc on Tuesday morning. And I had to get my driving license renewed so Laur didn’t have to chauffeur me anymore.
Laur joined me to get the E Test submitted but also got it in his mind that he had to have his driving license and health card renewed too. Since we do everything together… Apparently, not so when it comes to the province of Ontario. His wasn’t due for another year or two. The clerk managed to keep a straight face – paired with a sense of humour. You’d have to, to work in a thankless job like that. But we now had the sticker for our license that gives us permission to drive our van.
We’ve decided on Monday that it would be best if we ordered out for Chinese food for supper. Heaven knows - perhaps I had let our electricity fees at our Life Lease run out.
Scene Three: Tuesday morning
We fly South West regularly and to get a good seat – since they don’t assign seats – you have to go online 24 hours ahead of time to get your place in the queue. Normally, this isn’t a big deal – Laur goes on line and prints the tickets.
But his computer in our St. Cats apartment is linked to the printer by internet – and we had cancelled our internet. And Laur is of the understanding that you have to print your tickets the minute you get your number from South West. Since I ask him to do this, I cannot say a thing. Yes, I know, you can just have it on your phone. This is far beyond our level of competence.
Anna and Neal – our daughter and son-in-law - said Laur could go over to their place on Tuesday morning. Anna made sure he could hook up to their internet and Neal gave Laur a key to the side door since he had to get on line before 5:50 am. When we got home, Laur realized he didn’t actually have to get on line until 6:50 – which he told me and I quickly forgot.
So woke him up at 5 am on Tuesday morning (vs 6 am) – nearly giving him a heart attack. Off he went to the Glausers – Neal and Emma (granddaughter) were up – Anna had a day off so was enjoying some extra sleep. Laur booked our tickets and went to print them – and nothing happened. The printer said is was out of ink…
So, Neal woke up Anna who immediately went on line and found a site for a “work around” so that the printer would print – even with low ink. By this time Laur had tried to print a number of times, and so the printer printed out – full colour on glossy paper – numerous copies of our boarding passes. If the printer wasn’t out of ink initially, it certainly was by the time Laur was done!
Scene Four: Tuesday afternoon
Went to visit my niece Tia (not her real name.) Her boys are now in school but her little girl is still home. A very sweet family. Anyways, the other day, Tia was on the phone with her pal Ava (not her real name) – talking about how Ava’s birthday is coming up. Tia’s little boy N heard the word “birthday” and he was there in a flash. Tia said to N, “Aunty Ava’s birthday is coming up. What shall we get her for her birthday?”
Three year old N says, “Pot!” Tia just about dropped the phone! Where did he hear about marijuana? Ava on the other end was chuckling about how she was not into that stuff. So Tia pointed to a cooking pot and said to N – “You mean a cooking pot?” N shook his head and pulled his mom to the fridge … and pointed at a bottle of Pepsi. “Pot!”
“Oh honey,” laughed T, “You mean PoP!”
You can see how rumors get started.
*****
All in all, things went really well – the planes didn’t crash, we got to see our Southern Ontario kids and their kids, we got to go to church and coffee hour with our Grace “framily,” and while we weren’t able to go visit my mom – Granny Marj – we were able to chat by phone.
In theory we could have rebooked our flight and added on Wednesday and Thursday so we could drive over to Belleville. In practice, it’s good that we didn’t. Wednesday and Thursday, southern Ontario closed down with freezing rain. And I have just come down with a flu bug back here in Arizona.
I’m very fond of quoting my cousin Jack who is a pastor, “We don’t know what we’ve been spared.” This time, I think Mom and I do! 😊