Penguins, Pot & Other Stuff

Yes, not much happening that would warrant blog mentioning.  Played poker with the boys (minus Dickhead) a while back.  Lost $30.  Went fishing with Brother Mike over a week ago out at Binbrook.  He caught a couple, one of which was really nice: a bass that weighed at least 2.5 pounds.  We will probably be going out again Thursday of this week.

 

Football (both real & fantasy) is going somewhat better.  I have restructured my fantasy football team which has led to a slow but steady rise in the standings.  All the way up to 8th place for now and that will get me into the playoffs (as long as I don’t slip again).  Actually won $50 on Pro Line last week and that’s the first win this year.  Even the Tiger Cats are doing better.  If they keep winning, the playoffs are guaranteed and there will be a game in Hamilton.  Oskee Wee Wee!

 

Noticed the other day that David Wilcox is playing at the Hamilton Convention Center on November 27.  I’ve always wanted to see him in concert.  I’ll probably be going.  Is anyone else interested in attending?

Summer has faded away and with that, much of our nice fishing weather is going with it.  Still though, a couple of days ago it was nice enough for Brother Mike & I to head out to Binbrook once again.  There was absolutely no wind and the temperature was around 15°C so it was quite enjoyable.  To top it off, I caught my first real fish while on the pontoon.  A nice little bass which was close to a pound.  Actually broke water when it got near the boat!

 

Don’t know how many more (if any) trips we will be able to make this year.  I’m hoping we can get at least one more in there.  Then it will be time to get the boat ready for winter storage.  It’s going to be a long long wait for next year’s fishing fun. Patience Patience Patience!

Now, for some reason that I just can’t figure out, people often put the tag of "cheap" on yours truly.  Oh, the injustice of life!  But, had a very interesting conversation with a friend of mine who tends to be what I consider an overzealous tipper.  15% she says, that’s what it’s supposed to be!  I was at a meal with her (Trish darling, it was delicious) and a friend of hers.  Her friend decided to take care of the tip.  The meal was $68.  The tip: $30!  Trish could see by the look on my face that I was stunned.  "That’s because you are so cheap" she responded.

So I ask you, and please be honest.  Let’s say you were at a nice restaurant with a friend and paying for the meal.  The bill came to $100.  What kind of tip would you leave?  I told Trish I would put down $10 and feel quite comfortable with that. She just laughed & rolled her eyes.  So again, I ask: what kind of tip would you have left?

Things have slowed down a bit in the fishing department.  Brother Mike has been busy putting down some new flooring in his home.  Have to keep the little lady happy!  He warned me he would be tied up for a couple of days.  Hopefully though, we’ll be able to get back out on the water within the next couple of days.  The weather has been so nice!

 

We did get out Friday of last week.  Headed to what is becoming our favorite spot; Binbrook Conservation Area.  Must have been there for 5 hours.  Had some luck but nothing big.  For those of you who are into fishing, Brother Mike caught a catfish while trolling!  Never heard of that before.

 

Check out the Picture

I could tell there was something in the air.  Paulo started howling at the moon.  Trish started growing hair where people don’t grow hair.  Michael Jackson & Warren Zevon started to sing.  Lon Chaney Jr. made an appearance.  Where the hell is my silver bullet? 

 

Check out the Picture

Headed out fishing today with Brother Mike & Herb.  Went to Waterford for a few hours.  This time we spent our fishing in relative luxury.  Brother Mike brought a propane barbecue and actually cooked up some hot dogs for lunch! Right on the boat! Yes, it’s true.  Everyone thought we were going to catch a few fish because we were in a huge pond with all kinds of weed/waterlily cover.  The weather was great and the water was calm.  After 4 hours of fishing-not one fish!

 

Even with that though we had a great time.  Herb offered a few suggestions, based on his vast boating knowledge & experience, on what I could do to improve the pontoon boat.  Guess what?  They actually made sense!  While out there on the water, we were able to use both the gas motor & the electric trolling motor.  Actually killed the battery on the electric.  She’s charging up right now on the $10 battery charger I bought on Kijiji.  We’ll see how that goes!

 

After 4 hours of fishing in luxury, it was time to head back.  After all, I had a very important event to get back for.  You’ll read all about it in my next thread.

 

Check out the Pictures

I find them very annoying.  They take away from one’s privacy & quiet time.  They always seem to interfere at the worst possible times.  Cell phones!  Said I would never buy one.  I did-this week.  Figured that after running out of gas while bringing the pontoon boat back home, it would be a good idea.  To be honest, it was on my list of things to do.  Now it’s done.

 

Let’s see how long I can hold out with the new promise I have made to myself.  I’ll be using the cell phone Strictly for Emergencies.  Won’t be calling for any old reason.  The plan I have gives me 50 anytime minutes.  It might be anytime for Virgin Mobile but it will be emergency time for me!

Yes, much nicer!  I’ve talked with Owen a couple of times since his unfortunate incident.  He’s doing quite well.  The pain is not bad at all and he is learning the art of using a sling.  Glory tells me he seems to be handling things very well.  Once Owen is healed up, I will hook him up with an occupational therapist to see what we can do to help him get back on playing that piano.  It’s so important for him!

 

Now, about the pontoon.  Brother Mike & I headed out to Binbrook Conservation Area yesterday for a couple of hours of fishing.  Things went much smoother this time.  Because we were in a conservation area, the electric motor I purchased got a good workout.  Everything went great.  The motor had no problem pushing my boat so we did some heavy-duty trolling.  It took a while but Brother Mike finally landed a monster fish.  The battle that it gave him!  Brother Mike now can wear the honors of being the first one to catch a fish from my boat.

 

Check out the Pictures!

Okay, he technically turned 7 on August 20.  This past Saturday though was when Kaleb’s birthday party took place over at Papa Paulo’s apartment building.  Paulo & Jeannine booked the building’s party room because they were expecting a big crowd.  Sure enough, 28 people showed up.  Kaleb’s cousins, people from his soccer team and other riffraff (including yours truly).  Even a Dickhead made an appearance!

 

All kinds of food: delicious Portuguese potatoes & chicken, various salads, buns & munchies.  Simply delicious!  Kaleb’s Great Aunt Kelly made the birthday cake which had a soccer theme.  The lucky birthday boy received so many gifts: MP3 player, money, clothes, gift certificate, a Power Ranger-the list goes on!  Such a lucky boy.

 

I took the opportunity to combine partying with catching up on my sleep.  Didn’t get much the night before because the boys were over to play poker (I actually won $140).  Wasn’t in bed until around 4 a.m. and was up very early.  Needed that nap to retain my naturally beautiful appearance.  When I woke up, it was almost 6 PM!

 

A fun afternoon: Check out the Pictures!

On Thursday, Brother Mike & I headed to Clinton to pick up my pontoon boat.  After a nice easy drive, we pulled in and there she was.  Simply beautiful!  Sitting on her trailer, gleaming & ready to go.  Well, Trevor & Terry (the father & son builders of my pontoon) had to finish off about 45 minutes worth of work.  So, Brother Mike & I headed into Clinton to get some lunch & a license plate for the trailer.  When we got back, things were complete.  We hooked the boat up to my van and started our drive back to Hamilton.

 

The plan was to get back to Hamilton around 4:30 PM and then head down to Hamilton Harbor to try the boat out.  While we were driving, it didn’t take long to see that by pulling the pontoon boat we were using an awful lot of gas.  Kept asking Brother Mike: do you think we have enough gas?  From his previous experience in driving my van (and that represents a lot of experience), Brother Mike figured we had just enough to make it to the first gas station.  Wouldn’t you know it!?!  We were coming down the QEW from Bradford way and were about 3 km from the cut off for the Linc when we ran out of gas!  Don’t know how he did it but Brother Mike was able to get us off to the side.  What to do now?  Both of us live somewhat in the Stone Age and there wasn’t a cell phone between us.  With that, Brother Mike started walking down one of the exit ramps to look for a telephone.

 

About one hour later, Brother Mike & Cousin Jan showed up in Cousin Jan’s truck.  My good old cousin was a little ticked off because we had interrupted his preparation of dinner for the family.  However, he did bring a gas can and threw enough gas in my van to get me and Mike to a gas station.  Unfortunately though, there wasn’t enough time left to launch the boat.  Brother Mike said he would just drop me off and take the boat home so he could pick me up early the next morning and we could try the boat out.

 

Sure enough, Brother Mike & Brother Joe (a helping hand) & I were at Pier 4 by 9 a.m..  After a few rookie mistakes, we managed to get the boat into the water.  Getting on for me was easy because of the excellent docks at Pier 4.  We headed out into the bay and chugged around for maybe 20 minutes.  Brother Joe is not much for the water and there were some waves out there.  I must admit, my wheelchair did tip a little bit once or twice so I was in total agreement with him!  We headed back, loaded the boat onto the trailer and headed our separate ways.  Brother Mike & I stopped at a local automotive supply place (Princess Auto) that sells an amazing number of things.  Picked up what we needed and headed up to Owen & Glory to store the boat.  Loyal blog readers know that Owen & Glory are the couple renting my house.  I had asked them weeks ago if it would be okay to store the pontoon boat on the driveway there because there is so much room.  No problem!

 

Brother Mike got the boat parked in almost his first try.  He’s really very good at handling the boat/trailer with my van.  After she was parked, Brother Mike wanted to set up a tarp we had bought to cover the boat.  Owen offered to help.  Now, try to picture this pontoon boat sitting on its trailer.  When you are up in the boat, you are a good 4 feet and a bit off the ground.  To get in, you step on one of the pontoons, grab hold of the guard rail and pull yourself in.  To get down its like climbing a ladder: you grab the guard rails, step on the pontoon with 1 foot and bring your other foot down to step on the ground.  It’s no problem for Brother Mike; he’s fairly tall.  Owen isn’t.  When he went to step down, well-it wasn’t pretty.  He grabbed onto the guard rail, stepped onto the pontoon with 1 foot but couldn’t reach the ground with the other foot.  So, Owen decided to jump.  That’s when all hell broke loose.

 

Somehow, his finger got caught in the guard rail as he jumped.  As soon as he landed, which was an awkward landing to begin with, he started jumping around and holding his hand.  I thought he was joking a bit but it didn’t take long to realize it was no joke.  I heard Owens say "I pulled my finger off".  I told him to stop joking around but he repeated this statement only this time quite more emphatically.  Sure enough, I heard Brother Mike say from the pontoon boat "yes, here it is!".  It still didn’t sink in with me because there was no blood that I could see.  But sure enough, Owen had managed to pull off the pinky finger on his left hand.

 

Of course, Glory could see that something was wrong.  Brother Mike showed just how well he can handle this type of situation.  He ran into the house with Glory and spent the next five minutes settling her down.  She needed this because she was starting to hyperventilate.  While he was getting her to calm down, he got hold of some ice, a container and some towels.  I went inside with Glory to try to keep her calm while Mike loaded up Owen & his finger and ice for a run to St. Joe’s emergency.  Glory had called their two kids who went down to the hospital to be with Owen.  Shit, I felt so bad while all of this was going on.  Owen is such a nice guy and to have him do something like this while helping around my pontoon boat was hard to take.

 

Brother Mike showed up after the two kids made it to St. Joe’s.  We had a tea with Glory to calm her down some more and then headed home.  Glory promised to call once she knew what was going on with Owen.  I hadn’t heard anything after four hours so I called her.  She had spoken with Owen after they had taken x-rays of his finger.  Wasn’t a long conversation because while she was talking to him, hospital staff showed up to take Owen away.  Eventually, a couple of hours later, Owen phoned me himself from home.  Unfortunately, they were not able to save his finger.  Too much damage had been done in the accident.  Owen sounded OK on the telephone and was full of pain killers so he wasn’t hurting-yet!  The sad thing is Owen loves playing the piano-he has one in the house.  I asked him about piano playing and he said he is going to have to "learn how to play an octave higher".  Shit, I hope he can do it!

 

I hardly slept once I got into bed last night (which was late because of a poker game with the boys).  Don’t think I slept more than 20 minutes.  Couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened and I just can’t shake this shitty feeling I have.  I only wish for all the best for Owen and his recovery.  You just never know when something like this is going to happen-damn!

 

About the boat, Check out the Picture.  Don’t worry, it is a picture of the boat!