Hey, good morning! It’s very nice to see you. I hope you had a great week.
Erin and I stayed up a little later last evening watching a movie, so we’ve bypassed our usual pot of tea this morning for something a little more industrial. The coffee should be ready by the time you grab us a couple of clean mugs from the cupboard.
Let’s catch up.
The grocery store in August
They say the population of PEI doubles in the summer with tourists. And while I’ve always found that an exaggeration, there are some days in the grocery store where it sure feels like it.
I try to avoid getting groceries on a Friday after work, but I found myself at Sobeys on Friday. Fridays at the grocery stores are typically the domain of middle-aged dudes who didn’t plan ahead. There are a million of these dudes on any given Friday, but the bright side is, they’re usually only buying ingredients for a single meal, so the lines move fairly quickly.
On this particular Friday evening, the dudes were there in force, but they were accompanied by families of tourist. The tourist families have each made the individual decision that grocery shopping on holidays is a group activity.
You can see the family dynamic decay from the produce section at the beginning of the trip to the freezer case at the end. At first, it’s a fun outing. People are dashing around. Kids are sent on missions to find individual items or are given a chance to push the cart—something they’d never be allowed to do back home. People are laughing. It’s an adventure! It’s delightful.
By the yogurt section, they’ve lost all steam. The kids are grumpy and walk sullenly beside or behind the cart. Mum and Dad are snapping at each other as they try to make sense of these weird Canadian brands.
“Just pick one! You’re the yogurt-eater!”
The sting. The venom.
Anywho. I needed the ingredients for a single meal, so I moved through the line fairly quickly.
All my childhood dogs
It was the darndest thing.
Erin and I were out for a walk last evening. As we strolled down Brighton towards Victoria Park, we passed a house with three untethered (and yet, well-behaved) dogs playing on a front porch. I’m almost positive they were the ghosts of all the English setter dogs I grew up with on the farm.
Most English setters are white with patches and dapples of sooty grey. Ours had lovely spots of a reddish brown: a fairly rare colouration, I’ve come to learn. Which is why I’m quite sure these were my phantom dogs, back to give me some floppy-eared feelings on a Saturday evening stroll.
Good dogs.
Don’t jinx ‘em
It’s been a funny growing season on the Island. The spring was so cold and wet, a lot of things started late or are slow to start. I don’t think I’ve seen a sunflower yet that’s higher than my kneecap.
The tomatoes went into the ground a little later than we would have liked (see my careful use of passive language there? Almost makes it seem like it was the tomatoes’ fault they didn’t get planted earlier. Luckily, tomato vines can’t talk, so you’ll never know the truth).
For all that, they are looking terrific. Every time I walk out the front door, I do a turn around the garden to pluck a raspberry or take a peek at the tomatoes.
I’ve pruned the plants back fairly heartily, and the fruit seem to appreciate it. I may cut back some encroaching cosmo flowers, to keep the air flowing around one of our bigger plants.
I hesitate to tell you any of this, because we’ve lost so many tomatoes to blight over the years. We’ve gotten some pretty nice-looking tomatoes almost all the way to the ripeness finish line before the telltale signs appear. Fingers crossed.
Bring bring
I’ve been riding my bike a lot more this summer, and I absolutely love it. It’s perfect for quick outings in the summer. One morning this week, Jane texted from work to say she accidentally brought the wrong lunch container from the fridge, and I nearly whooped at the chance to hop on my bike to make the exchange downtown.
Sometime in the last few weeks, my bell broke. It was a bit of a relief, really, as I’ve had a hard time with that bell.
The modern bicycle bell is a tiny thing with little clanger activated by the flick of a thumb. It gives a cheery ding! when engaged.
Erin gives a single ding! when she arrives home from any trip. She rings her bell the moment she passes under the kitchen window, and I always shout “yay!” in response. It’s a fun little ritual.
I’ve had a couple issues with my own bell. First, the placement. My bike was gifted to me as a hand-me-down from a colleague over ten years ago. It’s a creature of the late 90s or early 2000s, and its gear shifters on the handlebars take up a fair amount of space. As such, my bell has had to live near the middle of my handlebars—well out of reach of my thumb, so any time I've needed to use it, I’ve had to let go of one handle and give it an awkward flick.
Most times I need to use my bell, I need both hands on my handles. It’s not all that often everything is going super smooth and AOK when I have an urgent need to announce my presence. It’s been inconvenient to say the least.
I also have a bit of an issue with the one-note tone of the ding! It’s such a cheery ding!, which is usually fine, but sometimes you want the tone to convey a bit of swearing to someone who deserves swearing at.
The clanger on my bell broke a few weeks back, which was a relief. A few days later,I remembered we had an old-fashioned mechanical bell sitting around. I’m not sure where it came from, but it spent the winter on the back deck frozen under a pile of ice and snow, and it still came out the other side in fairly shape. I fashioned it to my handle the other day and was delighted to find the thin metal strapping allowed me to slide it under my shifters so it’s well within reach of my thumb.
I gave the internal mechanism a quick spray with WD-40, and it rings like a charm. It’s also capable of conveying the entire range of human emotion, from the cheerful bring-bring! to a friendly short brng! to a full-throated, righteous BRING!
Anyway. I love it. May it bring for all times.
Old kitty under the camper
Old Lolo still likes to go outside, but she doesn’t venture terribly far away. I was a little worried one rainy day this week that I hadn’t seen her in many hours. I found her happily curled up under the camper watching the rain. Such a nice little spot.
That’s all she wrote for this week, boice. Thanks for dropping by.
If you’ve a moment to pop by Dunnock Bay later this morning, they’ve got a special event going on at the library. I won’t be clicking the “publish” button for another hour or so, but I promise it’ll be worth the visit.
I hope you have a great week.