TubaOrNotTuba

Housework is a drudge, right? What if you have motivation? In today’s case, we have a visitor. Total stranger, spending the night. The obligation, then, is to quickly clean up. Pretend to be socially civilized. Even go with the idea that we keep the place this neat and tidy, all the time. I know, a myth in the making. But, we did our best, and when the supper table was set, we seemed like normal folk. I think.

Some of the tiny pleasures of summer are still around. Out there. Tonight, we have noted an upsurge in the numbers (volume?) of mosquitos. That last stretch of rain must have resuscitated a hatch that should have been gone for the year. And we’re paying the price, in blood. There is a new gadget here, still in its box. Thermocell.  No, I don’t want to go out on the deck and test its efficiency. Next year will be soon enough. For tonight, we’re going old school, with arm flailing and a swatter.

Outside my kitchen window, within a stone’s throw, there is a pin. Not something insignificant; this is one of those pins that surveyors like to leave behind. In fact, according to some legal papers, I own four of them. Corner pins, on my trapezoid. And invisible, for what they’re worth.

Some things qualify as poorly kept secrets. Today, when CBC announced that the swimming area of my LOCAL BEACH was temporarily closed, due to a shark sighting… that qualified as real. I mean, I’ve known about the risk of sharks for most of my adult life. The local dive shop sold “bang sticks” which seemed like over reaction, but there you have it. I’d seen photos of fish that had been hauled aboard. I cannot claim to have ever been theoretical prey, but I’m going to be better informed in future. Perhaps our dog not wanting to swim has nothing to do with fear of getting his fur wet.

I am so easily distracted. Music history. In particular, when it covers a period that I actually survived. Watching a compilation of Canadian bands from the ‘70s and ‘80s; singing along and trying to recall if I actually saw them perform. I grew up in a small market, and all the good bands had to play somewhere. If it happened to be my high school gym, or the barn that served as a concert venue in university… I might have been there.

On social media, someone posted that the had forgotten how to pack for travel. I hear you. Something that I rarely did lapsed into  “pretty much not at all”, and now I’d be left behind the rushing crowd if I needed to prep a suitcase.

The outcome came as no surprise: after a short visit with the new G-G, the Canadian Parliament was dissolved. The writ was dropped, as CBC says. And in three dozen days, we should have a new government.

Our supper was either “take out “ or “carry in”. Or a combination… suffice to accept that it did require a short trip by car to get from there to here. And I didn’t have to prepare anything, beyond my reheat on a BBQ pork chop. The decision to leave the lobster to another was made by mutual choice. And just because, there was an oversize portion of potato salad, along with some wonderful seafood chowder. I’ll eat my blueberry whatever later. Fundraisers locally tend to overfeeding,

We may have a lot of rain, but we don’t have wildfires. That should be a motto, given that missing a beach day is better than missing your home. On the West Coast, it’s not going well.  And we still have weeks to go before snow.

While going over some travel notes, I realized how quickly time passes. Our last road trip was back in the fall of ’19, before the cart went sideways and left us all fond of our home life. Now, this is the point where I claim that things are back to normal, and that we intend to hit the road, soon. Not exactly. We’re still living in “interesting times”, and so I have decided to proceed with caution. In fact, the last while has been vicarious: that’s where I try to imagine ourselves in other places, and spend my time assuring that our comforts will be met.