Her First Parade

Good morning and good grief, for I have had this post sitting in my queue for a whole year. Last December I scanned some old negatives, including the ones below, of Shauna's first Santa Claus parade in 1973. I had other restorations to publish at the time, so when I couldn't get this posted before Christmas 2024, I put it aside for this year. With Christmas looming, I could easily have missed posting this year too.

These photos are of Shauna's first Christmas parade in Sarnia in 1973. A year or three later, we, somehow, managed to take her all of the way to the really big parade in Toronto.

We seemed to be early for this parade in Sarnia in the first photo, and we must have thought better of our location because we had changed position in the other pictures.

Sue's leather coat was tres magnfique! and Shauna was well bundled
against the cold, but if memory serves it was not a terribly cold day
 — milder Sarnia weather, not Ottawa winter weather.

Some folks think we take too many pictures, but looking back on them is a treat, and we enjoyed the slideshow on Shauna's birthday. I am not sure what the grandkids thought of it, but we who were present both then and now really appreciated the stroll along memory lane.

Happy Solstice

You've seen this photo here before but without the words. I think the low, weak sun with snow below is very suitable for a solstice card.

I haven't flooded you with photos from Sha's birthday, But I'll post a few now. I really like this candid of Dani, not so much of her although she is fine, but I find both the light and bokeh to be quite appealing.

Just a few other photos from the evening. You've already seen Shauna, but we'll include JJ and Sue too now.

53

We knew that Shauna would be perplexed when she opened her card. Wouldn't you be?

front
The figures at the side are from me cutting and pasting from the images below and others

inside
note: Sue and I did sign on the left

What happened is that Sue found a whole, forgotten booklet of verse and paintings made by her mother with graphical help by Sue's sister, Heather, who was a teen that the time. Yes, Grandma Pearl really created a whole book for Shauna's first birthday. Here are a few sample pages out of the (I think) 20 that she created. What an odd delight that I don't think I had seen for 52 years.

Cover Page

We had Chinese takeout for dinner. There were the usual five of us, but then Shauna's friend, Krista, who had been visiting family in Ottawa, surprised her. Danica's friend, Matt, also joined us at the last minute. 

A few pictures, but not many.

I was right about Shauna being very puzzled by the strange card that she opened.

Oddly enough, however, she remembered the book. Neither Sue not I had. Some of it was pretty funny in retrospect, 50 years after grandma put it together with love in her heart.

As is traditional, cake was served.

I nabbed a pretty awful group photo before the gathering broke up. I am holding my arm oddly because I had triggered the phone form my watch. I did have 3 seconds to lower my arm, but it didn't cross my mind.

Sue, Danica, Matt, Shauna, Krista, Jonathan, AC

Shauna Pics from Long Ago

Our baby completes her 53rd year tomorrow, but we'll be having a family dinner tonight because — kids and their work schedules and their whatnots. I will likely have some photos to post tomorrow, but for today, I will take you back — way back. I did scan many old slides this year, so I don't think I have posted any of these previously: perhaps one. They are more or less in chronological order.

Sue and Sha by the Christmas tree which the cats brought low,
many times, that year while Sue and Sha were in the hospital.

She liked her carriage, often sleeping outside in it, even in winter.

She enjoyed telling my mother and father about the fish that got away. It was THIS big.

Standing with dad's help.

Posing with Grandma, Mother and Aunt before they
went out for the evening.

A shower of leaves provided by Mom outside our first house.

By the Christmas tree in our second house.

A snuggle in my den. The pictures to the left and right on the bookshelf behind me there
 are also behind me in my present den more than 4 decades later.

The Juxtaposition of Good and Evil

I wasn’t going to post of this incident, for it might smack of me being highly self-congratulatory. In fact, I wasn’t planning to post at all today, thinking that you might need a break from me. And maybe you do. :)

But when I clicked onto Sandra’s blog and listened to a very distraught lady’s very emotional response to dear leader here, I changed my mind. 

In her short, emotional interview, in addition to being angry and distraught, she talked of the juxtaposition of good and evil in human behaviour.

It made me think of yesterday, when I believe that I did a good thing but did it in the midst of a kind of evil. Perhaps that is the wrong word because evil tends to denote purposeful malevolence, so let me just call it sadly unfortunate.

We don’t see too many down-and-outers (I assume homeless) in our town, so when I do, I am moved. Yesterday, we passed a man standing with a huge cart piled high with garbage bags containing, I presume, all of his worldly belongings. Because such sights are few and far between here, encountering people who need assistance, is somewhat emotional for me. And because I am not required to reach into my pocket often, I was able to offer him something.

He wasn’t begging and wasn’t even looking in my direction when I passed by, so that is what I did — passed by. I wanted to offer him something, but I didn’t want to make a show of it. Once past, I fumbled for my wallet and pulled out a twenty. Then, I turned back to him, tapped him on the shoulder and asked, “Would this help you?”

He said that indeed it would. I simply patted him on the shoulder and kept on walking. 

So, I guess that was a kind thing to do and was all that I could reasonably do. But I should not have had to do it. Society should be able to better help those who need help in this life, for my belief is that people cannot help what they are. If someone can’t fit into society in the normal way, that someone is still a someone and, as such, is deserving of a decent existence. 

I had a grand uncle whom I never met. He was a brother of my grandfather. He was a paraplegic, I think born that way. I have seen pictures, in which he appeared decently dressed and cared for. He was lucky in that way at least. Some people aren’t lucky, partly because the world has changed and the support of villages and of extended families has been lost for the most part. 

So that is what the lady in the interview was talking about, or at least how I related it to my own experience, the juxtaposition of good and evil that lies within humanity. I think it is a good thing to reach out a helping hand if and when we are able, but the reality that we allow great needs to endure is a rather evil thing.

(I hesitated to post these rudimentary thoughts as perhaps being too maudlin or self-aggrandizing, but, as is plain to see and for better or worse, I did come back and hit that Publish button.)

Never Again . . . probably.

Remind me never to do it again.

For a long time, I have played Sudoku twice in the morning, once for the daily challenge and once for an extreme level game, which they rate 2 notches higher than expert. Sometimes, I also play at night before trying to go to sleep. I do it to try to shut my mind down without listening to a podcast, for when I play a podcast, I will likely nod off, catch myself snoring*, and, therefore, will interfere with my attempts to fall asleep properly. (* I only snore when I am on my back in a listening sort of pose. I do not snore otherwise. Verified by Sue.)

What I do not do in the Sudoku game is play their contests and challenges. When I have entered the contests, I have found that some people play so often that they are hundreds of thousands of points in the lead. So, I just stick with my two games in the morning and maybe a few at night.

But I lost my mind and started the Winter Magic challenge. It was just a challenge and not a contest, so I decided to play it. The task was to decorate an alpine sort of scene. Each level always consisted of completing two games. First, a few decorations were added to the tree and then more and more. Houses appeared that weren't there before — the decorated ones near the centre — but they had to be decorated too. The stand to the right popped into existence, and then I had to decorate it: the same with the snowman and Santa's sleigh too. The final touch was the aurora borealis, which came  naturally decorated.

Days and days after beginning (I think 10 days), and being required to play multiple games per day, the picture was finally done. It came with words and scores and dates and things on the screen, which I eliminated in Photoshop. I might even add a Merry Christmas and use it as a Christmas card, so you just might see it again.

BUT! I hereby declare that I will never do that again, unless, perhaps, in a very weak and forgetful moment, I become seduced by the promise of another pretty picture next Christmas.

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Speaking of games, I liked the congratulatory message after a good result on OneWordSearch (link to game here, for the browser version). OneWordSearch is also offered as part of the Waffle game page (link here) that everyone should play.

I thought the message most appropriate for a Canadian who had recently posted a photo of a puck going into the net. I scored a 4 out of a possible 5, which is the best that I can do, for I will never find 10 words in a changing puzzle within a minute. I minute and 11 seconds was my best, but as you see above, I almost used up 2 minutes on that one. I would have then been down to 3 stars. If you play and can get 5 stars, please do not let me know.

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When I check on my loved ones on Find Friends, and they are home, I note that they are 7 minutes away. Twenty years ago, we lived 7 hours away. We undertook a very expensive move to a higher cost of living region in addition to paying the moving company a small fortune. We paid the price to live 7 minutes from Shauna instead of 7 hours. Despite the financial drain, it was already a good move, and then the grandchildren came along to make it even better.

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I did my grocery shopping early today (actually yesterday when I post this) and brought back Tims coffee. We brew Tims at home too, but the coffee that we bring home is so much better than the ones we brew ourselves. Maybe we should K-cups to eliminate the guesswork. We use a single-serve brewer now in which everyday becomes a guessing game about how much coffee and water to use. 

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Unforeseen — Poor Guy. 

Ladies Win at Winners

To the great delight of the ladies, Winners has come to town. Since it opened in late September, there have always been cars in the parking lot, and when one goes inside, one sees almost only ladies. The occasional blokes that I do see look as stunned as I feel. 

Added Note: Apparently, Winners is a Canadian discount chain, but I would have to say that it is an upscale discount chain.

The ladies, however, are as pleased as punch, including the beloved one.

There is a fairly substantial men section where the occasional woman might purchase a piece of clothing for her significant other. I said, “Might,” for I haven’t encountered too many shoppers of any sort of gender in there. 

It’s a surprisingly large store. Sometimes, a smaller town like ours will get an outlet that is smaller than a city store of the same ilk. Our WM, for example, is not tiny, but neither is it as large as the one at Centrum. It’s the same with our Marks franchise.

Back outside, there is a puzzling thing in the parking lot.

It’s the Accessible parking spaces so far from the door. While there are 4 accessible spaces near the door, people do find the location of this secondary site a little puzzling.

However you get there and wherever you park, it seems to qualify as a wonderful place for women. While the occasional man, comme moi, will enter, I don’t think that I ever seen one who is unchaperoned.