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Thanksgiving, a beautiful fall day, off and exploring.
Mushrooms, everywhere, and I'm taking pictures and googling them because I know nothing about foraging and while they all look tasty I'm pretty sure I could come to some bad end as a result of faulty guesswork.
When I get back into cell range I search them. A couple are "agarics", not a good thing, others inedible or unknown, one apparently a variety of Oyster Mushroom...
IN any event while there's a wide variety most are inedible.
***
Then to the mines:
Enticing, top left note the mass of quartz crystals. Dirty, white, not what I'm after.
A lots of quartz, the blue beneath I suspect is fluorite.
And the big blocky grey stones - perfectly formed Galena (Silver/Lead ore) - large crystals, a huge seam right in the ceiling...The gold reflections are pyrites,
Another view of some great Galena Crystals, which, cleaned up, just might be saleable. Note the quartz crystals upper left.
Center top, big vug filled with dirty quartz.
left, gold-ish patch of arsenio-pyrites, other minerals.
The Galena here is the real treasure, and the great crystal shape might just make it collector quality....
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The long dreaded dental appointment.
Monday the drive, Tuesday morning - a few thrift shops. I'm replenishing my wardrobe for fall, some good finds, scarves, vests, dress shirts, pants.
Then the dentist.
Now I've been holding a back tooth in with my tongue these last few days, a sore spot where I took to overbrushing to no avail, and the tooth eventually had enough and just plumb fell out. And so I optimistically popped it back in and held it there with my tongue the next few days.
To no avail. The cleaning progresses, an hour and a half of misery, less misery than I'm used to, true, but misery nonetheless. Measurements are taken, there's some progress, the gum therapy has shown some success, overall, next appointment in a few months.
Free, and more than a little miserable, tooth in my pocket I'm off.
Furniture, furniture aplenty. Loveseats, chairs, sofa tables, everywhere I check. The re-store, Kelowna Share, treasures abound. And no real way of strapping them to my vehicle and so that's that.
It's a bit annoying this, nothing to be found in Nelson by ways of livable furniture, but if I had a half-ton I'd be done furnishing my place in an hour, and for well under $200.
Back to Nelson, my apartment still needs an abundance of sorting out, things to be sorted and moved into the closet, clothing closet to be organized and sorted, I've got a few hours of work ahead but I'm a championship avoider and so it will be time to gather my resources and get onto it - before my son arrives with my furniture to begin filling it up.
On that note, no sooner than I arrive back in Nelson, 5:25, pop into Share and I discover a fine armchair. Good enough, comfy (enough), and so I now have 2 chairs for family to sit upon during visits. Still in need of a Sofa Table and Loveseat...
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2 dreams, over 2 nights, that I'd made my deal with the devil and was now discharged of all obligations. I woke meaning to write down the particulars, didn't, they still elude me, unimportant, I understood it well enough.
**
Now, free, the past few days, not so busy, the Mother in Law brought in as my replacement, the mornings before work combing the beach, finding small scrapers, flints, micro-blades, another arrowhead. No Jade Adze as of yet, but going further up the beach than normal I am still finding flakes, watching the stones tumble in the waves as the Ferry comes in, there will be more finds.
(worked bits of flint, scrapers, arrowhead far right next to quarter)
The days, unseasonably cool and rainy, Fall has come early.
Friday night is slow, a regular, in by himself, the last table leaves at 7:00, he's oblivious, hangs out until 9:00, "lost track of the time". He'd been in for lunch, with a fellow church member, a long conversation and a napkin left behind gave me some inkling as to his beliefs.
I find the whole idea of "Hell" quaint and charming. There is a certain "WTF" direction as to his reasoning, though...
Saturday, briefly busy when I start, and then that's it, the slow miserable trickle of customers and the day ends. It's anticlimactic, a few customers come in to see me off, most I haven't told. The Mother in Law, she does nothing to assist in the close, she's depressed, why is she here? Why does everyone hate her in-laws? And she understands, knows, so it's a moot point, and I make what little peace I can, I'm not ungrateful, merely it's time, overdue, that I get back to my life, too much has been postponed for too long and my spiritual, physical, creative well being is not going to die in this boneyard.
The end draws near, finish the sweep, the bar, sit down with Mister Tickles and her for a final drink, and then I'm off...
***
Finish the evening at Mike's, Seafood Fettucine, glass of wine, home to bed.
***
This morning, Sunday, October 1st, up too early, I have no coffee, Oso, John Ward closed, find then Empire, Open, and here I'm recombobulating from the longest summer on record.
Lists of what I have to do to be compiled, projects, always more and always uncompleted, back to the Gym, some sort of Cardio routine, stretch, meditate, Wim-Hoff, begin the uncompleted grist of creative projects, cooking, seafood Jambalaya, Gumbo, Gazpachio, Borscht, Manhatten Clam Chowder, first though, to wake up, shake the stupor I've laboured under, clean the apartment - at most, maybe 2, 3 hours work, simply organize everything into it's place, sit down, clear my head, breathe, do the dishes, read a book, listen to the radio, the world - briefly, is my oyster and to make the most of it...
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Yesterday I give my notice. I'm on another 12 hour double as JR has a job interview. Day is slow, night is busy, a "late busy", the kind that pisses you off when you're getting ready to go home and tables start arriving, the piss-off of a late close.
Tickles, of course, is crashing, and SR and his wife are in the kitchen helping, SR washing dishes, his wife cooking, Tickles on cold side making salads.
It passes and Tickles is left to clean up.
The shift, probably the biggest single ring out of the summer, yet it ran smoother than any of the shifts where I rang out half as much with the "help" that I was given.
They ask no questions about my resignation. It was expected, overdue, they don't want the answers they know will come. Like "Am I a fucking Donkey?" and "How did you think this was sustainable" and "WTF???". They're strangely, solemnly quiet.
Out loud they voiced a plan to work towards closing, then, my departure is the nail in the coffin.
It isn't, there are servers that would happily work in reasonable circumstance, reasonable hours, but these are things they can't provide. They need donkeys, a whole new team, they've killed the old team...
Today, up early, another day in fucking hell. Drive out, because I don't fucking know my schedule, it's perpetually being upended by JR's antics, find JR mopping, he arrived late last night, no, I'm on the split today...
Sure. 2 weeks 2 more days of this.
SO now, on the Balfour Beach, bottle of tequila in one hand, laptop in the other, a scour of the beach found me a well-worked flint with all of the divots from pressure flaking, but no good shape, a scraper, or discard. A beautiful day made lousy by the prospect of work, but 12 shifts left and I'm free, and there's no telling that I won't be free before then...
***
I start at 12:30, JR retires, his day is done. He's upstairs pouting. He told me they'd be closing on October 9th, I held firm on my departure Sept 30th. The opportunity to negotiate a graceful exit is long past.
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The last week, a largely somber mood at work. Friday, slow, Saturday, busy.
There was a vintage car show in Nelson, all the streets and side streets filled with hot rods and roadsters, vintage cars, while some of them are nice the streets are too busy for my taste, and so get out of town. Pass the homeless - all on the move, 10 shopping carts filled with possessions, displaced because the town didn't want the black eye of homeless encampments to tarnish the auto show.
We're beginning to look a bit like Spokane. And not in a good way.
To work early, SR is showing the property, this fatality, it's spurred them to want to get out of there even more, if possible. The basement, he's explaining, is off limits, he can't explain why, sealed off by the Coroner until the next of kin are notified, can claim his possessions.
JR, doing as little as possible, busy with the winter ferry schedule, unprepared travelers, and people coming and going from the car show in town.
Crows gather in front of the basement door. They're drawn in by the smell, hopping up to the stairs in the shadows, the bodies gone but they don't know that,...
You can tell the motor enthusiasts, they're trying to order the fancy cocktails, margaritas, martinis...
Sunday, JR is trying to get out, circumstances don't permit. It's half busy, busier than one waiter, not busy enough for two, and he's annoyed every time he has to pick up a table.
Then, in the kitchen, Mister Tickles, on his own, crashes and burns. Soon everyone is in there helping him, SR, JR, his mother.
A customer, older fellow, pays, tips well, and tips me again: "Pay for a haircut...I'm a barber!!!".
I didn't think I was fooling anyone, but I have to laugh at his frankness...
***
Monday, Thursday, I'm on my own. Doubles, open, close, this is to be my schedule for the foreseeable future. Having burned C**** and killed S*** it's me and Mister Tickles, 50, 60 hours a week. No fucking way. No fucking way. An hour commute to the restaurant, with construction, half an hour back.
They've moved the goal posts, removed the carrot from the stick, and this Donkey will be giving his notice. I need a goal, I need my own life back, these people, they are demons....
Monday - slow and steady all day. $3,000 at the end of it, never too busy, just a slow steady stream of customers. The easiest shift of the summer, made so largely by the absence of "help". Meaning T*** and L**** and JR.
Mister Tickles is crashing and burning in the kitchen the entire time. He's hysterical, he can't keep up, can't do it, he's in tears, yelling, all the customers can hear, I just smile and pretend nothing's going on. Mister Tickles, he's not used to doing this on his own, he's not S***, hasn't the skills. I stagger my orders, wait until he's cooked an order for two before I put the next order for two in, but he's not managing, not even fucking coping. He won't survive the next week or two, my notice will be a formality; there's no way they can stay open with Tickles in the kitchen on his own, it will kill him...
September 30th and I'm out. I can already hear the mock distress, appeals to my loyalty, the "we didn't know you wanted a life" and "I told you every time you asked me...", the "Why", the slow, careful explanation that I'm not a donkey, that I can talk and walk on two legs and dress in clothes should have been a clue, that it's September and I should be relaxing, business drops off, and instead they keep piling on the hay, there was no straw that broke this donkey's back, rather a dozen bales thrown carelessly on...
September, I've brought my own goalposts and let that fucking shithole crash and burn. Their problems are their problems, I have plenty enough on my own...