TWO BLOG READER SURPRISES TODAY THAT COINCIDENTALLY INVOLED THE SAME PLACE IN ZURICH ONTARIO

 A COLD AND STORMY LAKE HURON WEDNESDAY MORNING

Walking down our darkened hallway last night around 11 something in the sunroom caught my eye.  It was a large rectangular patch of light on the sunroom floor.  I knew instantly that our night sky had cleared because that could only be the big old Moon shining down through our sunroom's skylight.  It was a hopeful sign for a sunny morning and I right away thought to myself, 'Oh my how I sure could use some good old sunshine right about now'.  And, so it came to be today.  With a clear night sky overhead I knew it was going to be a bitterly cold morning and it was as our thermometer dipped to 14F.  Luckily, we did not have a blustery cold wind to drive those low temperatures even lower.  Knowing the day would be sunny, I had written out a list in my little book of things to do this morning and waited until nearly 10 a.m. when I knew a couple of stops along the way would be open.

 FROST CREEPING UP OUR WINDOW PANE THIS MORNING

With Pheebs in the passenger seat, we headed into Bayfield shortly after 10 a.m. with our first stop being at the Bayfield Garage for a gas fill-up.  Across the road, we went from there to pick up some cold and sinus pills for this head and chest cold of mine at Michaels Pharmasave.  I also stopped at the Bayfield Library because I had a few questions to ask of the Librarian.  More about that in a later post.  Our next stop was Bayfield's Tim Hortons for a decaf coffee to go.  

HEADING INTO BAYFIELD EARLIER TODAY AND HEY, HOW ABOUT THOSE SUN SPLASHES ON THE ROAD EH

FROSTY FISHERMEN ON BAYFIELD'S ICY SOUTH PIER

 THE BAYFIELD RIVER IS IN THE PROCESS OF FREEZING OVER AGAIN

 LAST WEEK A HEAVY SNOW LOAD COLLAPSED PART OF BAYFIELD'S CLASSIC ALBION HOTEL ROOF BUT THE HOTEL IS GOING TO BE THANKFULLY RESTORED TO ITS FORMER GLORY AND BEYOND

Before leaving Bayfield we stopped at the Porters Hill Wild Bird Seed Company and loaded up four twenty-pound bags of birdseed.  Steve, the always friendly owner had built himself a new squirrel feeder and asked me if I wanted his old one and I said sure.  It's kind of a twirlygig thing that has a corn cob on one end.  Wishing me 'Merry Christmas' he generously tossed in a big bag of corn cobs as well.  I will mount that squirrely twirler on one of our pine trees.

 A TAD HARD TO IMAGINE BUT THINK OF IT AS AN AIRPLANE PROPELLOR THAT SPINS AROUND AS THE SQUIRREL TRIES TO HANG ON WHILE TRYING TO GET AT THE CORN COB

I POSITIONED THIS ON A PINE TREE I CAN SEE FROM MY LIVING ROOM RECLINER

 AND THIS IS THE BAG OF CORN COBS THAT STEVE THREW IN WITH A HEARTY 'MERRY CHRISTMAS'

From there, Pheebs and headed down the Bronson Line to Zurich.  Nice to be out in the countryside again with large patches of blue sky overhead.  Zurich is the home of Jerry Raders Homestyle Market which I often mention. A few days ago our phone rang and when I looked at the answering machine it said the call was coming from Jerry Raders in Zurich.  What!!  Oh my, I thought, did I forget to pay for something the last time I was there, were they upset I asked for second piece of 'free pie' the last time I was there on a Saturday morning.  I knew I hadn't done that but maybe somebody that looked like me did.  Anyway, off to Jerry Raders we nervously went.  It's not very big inside and anything over half a dozen people constitutes a crowd.  Because of the 'free piece' of pie on Saturday mornings, I think there was about a hundred and ten people in there!!  I managed to track down a frenzied employee, told her my name, and said they had called.  With a Christmas smile spreading across her face she slipped around behind the counter and retrieved a small white envelope with my name on it.  Hmmmmm, I thought as I carefully opened it.  Inside was a gift certificate for........'WOW'  When the staff peeled me off the floor and stood me back up and dusted me off I stood looking at the gift certificate thinking, OMG I'm going to have to buy a freezer on the way home to accommodate all this food because I knew I didn't have enough room in my little fridge freezer to hold 350 butter tarts.  Okay, okay, so I didn't really think about butter tarts...but I could have.  A nice lady explained to me that I didn't have to use the whole amount on the card all at once.  She said just take home what you want today and we'll deduct it from the card and when you are ready for more just come back again.  So, with two chicken pot pies, two cream of chicken soups, 25 butter tarts, a turkey salad sandwich, and a free piece of chocolate pie I precariously balanced everything and headed out to the car.  Okay, okay, so I didn't get the 25 butter tarts.....but I thought about it.  In the car, I shared the turkey salad sandwich with Pheebs but I didn't tell her about the free piece of plastic wrapped chocolate pie I had stuffed into my shirt pocket.  Sooooooo, where did this Jerry Rader gift certificate come from.  I suspected a blog reader and because of a 'quirk' as it turns out, I was right.  Not only was it a blog reader but it turned out to be an old close friend of mine who I knew very well back in the mid-eighties and someone I had not seen since that time way back then although we have been in contact on Facebook.  This person's caring, concern, and generosity, know no bounds............. But then, just a couple hours after getting home, Jerry Rader entered my life once again.  The phone rang (no it was not Jerry Radar's place phoning again) and it was our good neighbor Monica from across the road.  Her daughter Brenda was visiting her and Monica said Brenda had something to bring over.  Minutes later, Brenda walked up the driveway with a box in her hands and I recognized the contents of that box to be from Jerry Raders.  Coincidentally as it turns out, both Brenda and I had been at Jerry Raders this afternoon at the same time.  She said she thought she might have have recognized me getting into a white car.  Brenda had never been to Jerry Raders before but she knew of it from the many times I've mentioned it in my blog.  All of Monica's grown-up kids are long-time blog readers.  So anyway, in the box Brenda was carrying were two Jerry Rader chicken pot pies, a larger beef lasagna, and a larger chicken pie, and by golly, there was another Jerry Rader gift card in the box too.  Holy Smokes I thought....more butter tarts:))  Also, in the box was a Tim Hortons coffee shop card, a sympathy card, and a warm knitted Mennonite-made prayer shawl that Monica had got for Kelly but Kelly was gone before Monica had a chance to give it to her.  Needless to say, I have a well-stocked fridge freezer now but the only way I could get everything in was to eat what was left of a tub of Kelly's chocolate ice cream.  I am one of those people who cannot throw out perfectly good food. 

 PHEEBS AND I SHARING A TURKEY SALAD SANDWICH IN JERRY RADERS PARKING LOT

THE FIRST OF TWO JERRY RADER GIFT CERTIFICATES I RECEIVED TODAY

Al's Music Box:)) Beautiful is a song by Canadian singer-songwriter Gordon Lightfoot. This song, which is in the key of B major, first appeared on Lightfoot's 1972 LP Don Quixote album and was the first of two singles released. The album's title track appeared on the B-side. It reached number 13 in Canada. It peaked at #58 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 and #67 on the Cash Box Top 100 in July 1972.  The song also hit number one on the Canadian Adult Contemporary chart, his second of seven to do so, and number 30 on the U.S. Easy Listening chart.

GROANER'S CORNER:(( A sweet grandmother telephoned St. Joseph 's Hospital. She timidly asked,'Is it possible to speak to someone who can tell me how a  patient is doing?'  The operator said, 'I'll be glad to help, dear. What's the name and room number?'  The grandmother, in her weak tremulous voice said, ''Norma Findlay, Room 302.'  The operator replied, 'Let me place you on hold while I check with her nurse.'  After a few minutes the operator returned to the phone and said, 'Oh, I have good news. Her nurse told me that Norma is doing very well.. Her blood pressure is fine; her blood work is normal and her physician, Dr. Cohen, has scheduled her to be discharged on Tuesday.'  The grandmother said, 'Thank you. That's wonderful! I was so worried! God bless you for the good news.'  The operator replied, 'You're more than welcome. Is Norma your daughter?'  The grandmother said, 'No, I'm Norma Findlay in 302. No one tells me squat!!

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An English fisherman goes to the river to check an illegal fish trap that he owns. He looks around to make sure there are no Fishing Inspectors about and proceeds to pull the fish trap out to check it.  An Inspector steps out of the bushes, “Ahha!” he said and the fisherman spun around and yelled “Oh Crap”. The Inspector, who wasn't expecting such a response said “Settle down, I'm only the Fishing Inspector”. “Thank God for that” said the fisherman, “I thought you were the Sot who owned this fish trap”.

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A father spoke to his son, "It's time we had a little talk, my son. Soon, you will have urges and feelings you've never had before. Your heart will pound & your hands will sweat. You'll be preoccupied and won't be able to think of anything else."  He added, "But don't worry, it's perfectly normal... it's called golf."

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One day, a man was dragged to the cinema by his wife who wanted to watch a romantic comedy.  Half an hour into the film, the man felt a nudge in his elbow. "What an outrage," his wife murmured to him.  "The person sitting in front of us is sleeping!" the woman said, clearly offended.  Her husband was fairly annoyed.  He replied: "You woke me up to tell me that?"

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