Record-breaking times: temperature, elections and the defeat of the dean of demonization
Remembering
By the tyme this week’s T-Star hits the newsstands I expect November 11th will have come and gone. But as I write this (last Sat ayem), here’s some “F/N” thoughts on how the 2020 version of Remembrance Day might unfold at various armories, cenotaphs, cemeteries and churches across the Dominion, including Ottawa’s Tomb Of The Unknown Soldier, according to info from the RCL (Royal Canadian Legion) as well as other media releases. In a word….’Virtual’….and the first thing that popped into Rotzy’s pumpkin was ”what about in Nakina”? I mean, November 11th is BIG up there!….THE biggest annual event, and almost the entire town turns out….kids, parents, grandparents, you-name-it….for the 3 block ‘march’ from the school to RCL William Grant Branch #116, the playing of The Last Post, the laying of about 30 wreaths, then inside for lunch!….provided by Legion members, including Dennis’s (not his real name) soup and platters of sandwiches, cheese, pickles, etc. and hot dogs for the kids. Catch up visits with folks (some of whom you hadn’t seen since last year), purchase new Legion memberships and have a pop or two. I have no idea how they will accomplish that in a ‘virtual’ mode?! All announcements indicate you’re supposed to ”stay at home”….and I guess ‘do your own thing’. ‘Virtually’ of course. Whatever. Y’all know how Rotzy feels about anything ‘Virtual’, right? Well, (don’t tell anybody, but) yours truly will make the 8-minute drive from 555 Harris Place down to Mt Hope Cemetery, then after a stop to say ‘Hi’ to my Mom and Dad, make my way over to the section where the identical, upright tombstones identify the Dead from The Great War and WW II….still amazed at (most of) them and their terribly YOUNG ages. Then I’ll have my own ‘two minutes silence’….or more….and read/re-read some of the hundreds of tombstones. (“We are the Dead. Short days ago we lived, felt dawn, saw sunset’s glow….loved and were loved”. (John McCrae/M/D Cdn Army/April 1915/Ypres, Belgium)
EST vs EDST
The Yays and Nays over Daylight Saving Time seem to be gaining interest/nomentum every tyme we have to change our clocks, and here in Ontario last week it was one more tyme to ‘Fall Back’. I don’t know that Miz. Jo and/or Rotzy feel all that strongly about it one way or t’other, but it is VERY clear that the Nays are making their point(s) VERY clear. And the one in the forefront is that Saskatchewan dropped Daylight Savings years ago….so ask somebody from Regina or Saskatoon! Anyway, all of that has little (or nothing) to do with an email I got last week from a “F/N” reader….(other than to ‘set this item up’) and I nearly ‘soiled myself’ when I read it!! Check it out….it goes like this. *”Turning back the clocks and ADDING an hour to 2020 is like getting a ‘bonus track’ on a Yoko Ono album”!! (Too funny! LM#AO!!)
Miz. Jo/Tilley (*see below) and Me….
….can usually be seen all/most afternoons walking on one of many paved trails starting/ending at Jaycee Park over on the other side of the WGP (Wayne Gretzky Parkway) and just getting there is kinda hair raising…..largely because we hadn’t seen/had to deal with lights and intersections in Nakina for almost 20 years!! We gotta get across FOUR lanes of traffic, so yours truly pushes the pedestrian button, the ‘marching man’ light comes ON, and we’re OFF. Well, the best we can do is half way across before the Red Hand comes ON!! So….SO….Rotzy is thinking we gotta work on SPEED rather than ENDURANCE! By the bye, Tilley (*see above) is Jo Ann’s walker…a deluxe Trillium*tm model with lotsa ‘extras’ and 8-inch NASCAR-style wheels/tires and when she gets her RPM’s up, she is a veritable ‘blue blur’!! I sometymes gotta ‘cheat a tad’ and take a short-cut to catch up. Most days on our ‘hike’ we cover 1.5 to 3.5 k/m…..not bad for a couple oldsters, eh?
The Q.O.T.W.
Hands down winner for this week’s ‘Quote Of The Week’! Blunt and to the point. Words all ‘run together’ and said in a very sarcastic tone. Check it out:
“COVID/COVID/covid/covid/COVID/COVID/covid/COVID/COvid/coVID/COVID”
Yup….offered by Donald Trump to one of his last gatherings….an arena full of 20,000 + Trumpians, yet only 120-odd of whom were wearing a masque.(*this item was written Sat 10:30 AM….before the final result*)
Records And Stuff
*While we’re busy these days here in Southern Ontario re-writing the record book for warm temperatures….today (Sun 8th) looks like another 20C day….(it got up to 23C and 13C in Nakina!!) *Uncle Sam absolutely ‘shot out the lights’ for ‘the number of ballot-casters in a presidential election’! And as to either/both of these records being broken again….with Global Warming looming I suppose a temperature of 20C could be surpassed. But as to a bigger number of voters turning up to choose a president….in 2016….or beyond that….forget it! Not gonna happen!! Why?/Why not? Plain and simple, because Trump won’t be in it. Regardless of what he might say (or not say) in these post 2020 election days, up to and including Biden’s inauguration. And no, there is NOT a ‘Trump-like’ person/politician ‘waiting in the wings’ to take the baton from Don and keep on going after President Joe. Of course there isn’t! C’mon man, there isn’t another ‘Trump-like person/politician’ ANYWHERE!!! (*this next couple/few weeks is gonna be a real Gong Show!!!)
What If? And Other Questions.
It’s Sunday 9:35 AM….approaching 24 hours since Joe Biden became ‘US President Elect’. ‘What if’ Donald had won? Would he still have gone ahead with his 18 holes of golf? (*hey, when you own the golf course you call the shots….and the tee-off tyme) Where in hell has he had Milania hidden from one and all for a month or more? Even the paparazzi. And why? Have you ever seen a happier bunch of smiling faces….some even choking back tears of joy….than Wolf Blitzer, John King, Anderson Cooper and the entire team at CNN??!! Four years of agony….GONE! ”Oh Happy Day!!!
*Thought Of The Day…CORONA isn’t Trump’s fault. EBOLA wasn’t Obama’s. SARS wasn’t Bush’s, and only a handful of cases of herpes was Clinton’s.
