Home
August 3, 2026
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Blog
- Hits: 11
The Long Weekend finally over, the longest weekend of the year (in the Hospitality Industry at least), after this things will/should start to quiet down. Baker Street filled with people walking, drinking coffee, eating ice-cream, shopping, standing in line, talking to people with the same-state license plates; shopping some more, a long-long weekend if only there were something to do, anything to do, other than the Baker Street Promenade...
Only the smoke arrived 2 weeks early this year, mid July, and has been heinous, foul as of the past few days, my throat - a smoker's - has been dry and hoarse with it all; what the mudbloods are feeling I can only imagine. This seems to affect business less than you'd expect - the numbers, always down, the global economies have been crashing for years. The weather only accentuates that. But - for our Southern Neighbours, well, it's no weather to be travelling in, but staying home or put isn't much to be envied either. The world is generally on fire, wherever you go, so get out while you can.
There's a few of the strays from Shambala as well, I've kept low, out of sight the past week, couldn't stand the preposterousness of the ravers again (and - maybe it's just jealousy but mostly I'm getting old...), the few strays, they stick out, rave dress and unfamiliar faces, the lost looking to be found and relocate, the newly arrived homeless staking out their corners on Baker St...good luck.
In news, from the building and the internet, Cathy, neighbour from downstairs, my own age (apparently and confirmed) - died of a sudden heart attack. Unexpected, while on a road trip, many in the building are shocked, me; not so much. She was never the picture of good health, seemed - as far as you would get from speaking with her - pretty much ready to go any day now. I wasn't surprised, some of the neighbours were. Notably the one upstairs, who'd had words with her, fought with her, been friends with her, sold her cheap cigarettes, they are of the same vices and the same age. I am the same but I generally keep to myself. The neighbour upstairs isn't taking it well.
In other news I was tracking missing people, the case of the missing nonverbal child Parker in Calgary - and the predictable but tragic outcome, the missing hiker in his rental Nissan, found after 3 1/2 weeks, same outcome, (what was odd about that was his missing vehicle), the missing 81 year old hiker in Waterton (nothing surprising) the missing girl from Shambala (Found safe and nothing surprising, all outcomes were possible). The news provides you the hooks, and you're in until the outcome, seldom good but - lesson - give up the news.
To the locker, 5 more boxes, a dozen or 20 left. Many are the kids toys, someone else's keepsakes, not my shit, not my decision. I sort as I advance, there's a lot of sorting left to be done and big pieces of furniture to be worked around.
Of 5 boxes 4 are books, one is cameras, mostly Pentax, 35MM Film, and lenses. Yeah. Take pictures, start listing on Facebook Marketplace. The antique shop is bored with these finds. As well other treasures found and laid aside, I've been taking a bath with the antique shop (actually, the fairest deal around at 50%, estate buyers gives you maybe 10%).
The books, take them to the bookstore. I have over $1000 credit so far. I bring 40 books, am offered cash/or credit. I take the cash. I have bills, prescriptions that need filling, groceries, more bills than revenue at the moment so take the cash. I'm short.
My apartment is filled up with books, those 40 books today generated 20$ cash - I found a book I wanted to read - (Haskins’ “Voodoo and Hoodoo”) - so my cash on 40 books given the exchange (50% cash, 50% credit) was 13$. All books are better on exchange, actually just better to burn for warmth, this $20 - a pile of campfire logs, same price, 3000 years learning, a dozen civilizations, 2 score men and women that thought enough to write out their lives - it's the same no matter whenever I go - whatever the books - "Shakepeare's First Folio, signed..."..."A Newly Discovered Testament written by Jesus in his own hand..." all bring roughly the same price as "Eat, Pray, Love..." - always $20.
Still, it's the only bookstore (used) in town, and if you want it to remain you'd better support it...
I'm getting at best 1/10 what they sell them for - but I failed a few months ago, should have opened my own shop, sold my own books, antiques, jewelry, candlesticks, neckties and knick-knacks and various other absurdities and curiosities at my own price, always cheaper than everybody else...the most interesting shop in the world at the best prices guaranteed!!!
My own bookshelf, now condensed to a few shelves on a Mission Styled Oak desk, 4 shelves, 3 feet wide, 14” high, that’s it; constantly removing and adding to the shelf; books vs Art supplies, decisions, books I love, will pass on, read again, books I have yet to read, next; paper, mixed media, dozens of boxes that have been laid up for further discovery, I take none of these, there is no room for them now, when the locker is emptied it will be still filled enough with my unrealized ambitions...
I need to live to be 100 to use it all. And - that’s if I get efficient. I am not efficient.
Drugstore, open, surprised on a long weekend. I pick up my next month's prescription. Only 1 pill, I'll have to double check that - From 7 pills to 1 in the span of a month. Hmm.
And I talked to work, tell them I'm available whenever, I am, but they know I’m not coming back, I'm too much a liability now, I've run out my Medical EI but the stress is still there, it would do it. The job is 90% no stress but when it is it will kill me. They don't want that. I don't either. But this still leaves some cash-flow problems, the exigencies of life...at the moment, Pharma, Hydro, Credit Card, Insurance, Donations, Subscriptions, Groceries, Vices, Etc. And soon enough rent (again).
***
The crows have missed me, I've been avoiding them, out of peanuts. They've been cool with it, hanging out just to chill, after the expectation of food, as if to reassure me that's not all we have in common. The pigeons aren't so bright, but I have some leftover food for them.
Pigeons, there's one, newly fledged, obviously tiny, smaller than the rest by a third, and when I scatter the millet he's bullied away, grabbed roughly by the neck and escorted from the food by a fat well fed ****. So - feeding him now I ensure he gets fed first. At first he's the only one, then his friends grow wise....
They show up, but I'm feeding their scrawny, undeveloped child or neighbour. And they don't care, they bully in and try and push him off the patch of feed. I chase them away with my hand. They come back. This repeats. I don't chase the child, who's still skittish no matter what the interaction but he seems to be figuring it out...
And he's getting comfortable with this...now, when the "adults" step in he runs them off, chases and pecks at them, he's arrogant beyond his size and counting on my backup (and the adult's are not so happy with this) - but - watching them fight it out, the little guy against the fat, complacent adults, and the little guy now winning, just because he thought to fight back...
Well, I'm loving it. It's "Rocky" rendered in Pigeon-speak. And maybe now I'll start stocking a little more pigeon food...
Yukon Gold: High Hopes and Dashed Dreams - James/Susan Preyde
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Blog
- Hits: 94
A slim volume, perfect, a summary of everything else more interesting I've read on the Klondike. Perfectly unnecessary, but I found it in a free pile.
It did inspire though some thoughts of fevered digging - I mean, reports of panning out $5,000 a day (with a pan!!) - and gold at a mere $15.00 an ounce. But I don't really need any more inspiration, I need wheels...
The Best Laid Plans...
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Blog
- Hits: 105
...I was never one to make.
Thursday, Doctor.
After Doctor - head out. My destination, the north-easterly arm of Kinbasket Lake. I've a pin there to check, a source for large gemmy garnets, staurolites. I've got the pin on my map, read the old geology reports, I'm ready-freddy. And 3 days with a loaned car.
It's a long drive. Listen to the radio. Days 8, 9, 10 in the heartbreaking search for Parker, a nonverbal autistic child who wandered off from a day home and hasn't been seen since. A couple grainy surveillance photos that place him in the NE of Calgary.
As of this writing he still hasn't been found.
As well there's the case of Jeremy Lalande, who over 2 weeks ago set out in a rented 2026 Nissan to go hiking from Calgary. A day trip. No sign of the car or it's driver since.
Then the CBC, guests arguing the decline of reading; theorizing it's related to cell-phones, computers...
The radio, it's in and out here in the mountains and I'm glad when it cuts off, these subjects are inane beyond consideration...
But I'll come back to this in a separate post.
...
The drive, to Kamloops long and uneventful, I spot a couple places to get out and look at the roadcuts, but I'll do that on the way back. I'm on a mission. From Kamloops I head up the valley past Clearwater and on toward Valemount - a beautiful drive, with lots of scenery, and again prospects, but I really need to find places closer to home...
Smoky, like end of summer smokey with the stare-straight-at setting red sun, the thick haze, beautiful, but...
And the lake - this end, I've never been. I hike to the pin on the map. The lake is high, as high as it can get, and the place I wanted to explore - exposed schist-beach, well, it's under 25-50 meters of water. A thought I never considered, this dam is at high water, and everything I wanted to look at won't be available until early, early spring.
I find signs, small garnets in schist, other rocks of interest, but - well, the rocks I came here for, they're completely inaccessible.
***
A lot of gas and not enough planning. I mean, never in my life have I had to consider dam height in my adventures, but apparently it's time I do. But from this little misadventure I can perhaps find clues so when next I'm this way I can find even more...The plan refines itself. And I need a boat...
From the beach I gather a few mudstone concretions fallen from the sand cliffs, and bits of specifically shaped driftwood. "Mixed Media".
***
Hiking through the forest, an abundance of mushrooms, common, a few turning orange. I take a picture and Google lens assures me their on their way to becoming Lobster Mushrooms. Which I kind of guessed, but you don't fuck around with mushrooms unless you're certain, and they're not yet ready.
***
A long and disappointing trip home. The places I'd laid aside for the return trip, the light has changed and it's pouring rain. I can't spot them again.
***
Home, survey the mess I left behind me - a big mess. A stack of boxes from the locker to be gone through. Make some dinner, a home-cooked meal is just what I've been missing - "road food" gets old in a hurry; meet neighbour who tells me about another neighbour - part of the "Meet outside we're all smokers" network, Cathy, has had a heart attack and is on Life Support in Calgary.
She never looked well, never, always coughing, claimed to be my age but could pass easily for 20 years older.
***
Unpacking boxes. In the locker, maybe 2 dozen boxes left. A box of books, water damaged, some are salvageable, others not so - a shame, one was an antique historical/literary map of the world, the cartology of mind; the other an old leatherbound copy of Speke's "Journal of the Discovery of the Source of the Nile". You can read it online here: https://archive.org/details/journalofdiscove00spek. These two break my heart.
Another box, filled with: more cufflinks, my silver antique cigarette case (thought lost, and so finding it was a joy), a Navaho silver inlay bracelet - this I check, maker mark, worth some $$$ but will I get that here? Some old watch boxes - Rolex, Tudor, Bulova, Longines, themselves now collectable but not here, I’ll have to get those to Vernon, use in trade with the antique watch guy, they'll fetch a much better price or value in exchange.
***
SO, now at the library and time to get home, gather up the cufflinks and bracelet and see if I can find a home for them, get a few groceries, then maybe back to the library to work on a few other projects. And time to get back to work - the job, the Doc gave me the all clear but that job - it's stress, nonstop, and I'm thinking I need a desk job, clerical, boring, this "yes-sir-no-sir-three-bags-full-sir" sort of occupation has grown a little - a lot - old, as it always does and it's long overdue time to try something else...
Gerry Anderson
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: People
- Hits: 52
And my social media as of late filling up with the Bigfoot Autopsy by internet genius and creator Peter Caine there's some other, equally interesting new arrivals.
Like "Thunderbirds" and "Stingray" - old puppet shows from the 60's, of which I've seen some episodes, but not as a child. A shame, I would have loved these things as a kid. As an adult they merely carry a rather retro nostalgia for a series I never watched.
But imagine when I start getting clips for "Space: 1999" - a series I did watch, and discover that the same genius was behind them all.
If you have a taste for the old-timey media he's worth checking into. And while the clips reveal most of his shows were pretty cheesy, formulaic nonsense I might just have to relive a bit of my childhood...
Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerry_Anderson
Page 1 of 1115