Bigger conglomerates building crappier stuff...

That pretty much sums up the arc of progress, doesn't it?

Time was, manufacturers took pride in building durable, reliable, and quality products. In case you haven't noticed, those days are largely behind us.

Nowadays, one conglomerate with manufacturing facilities in China will push out hundreds of thousands of you-name-its, whether they be washing machines or lawn tractors, under half a dozen different brand names, all of which are fully expected to be replaced within five years or less. The idea that you should take pride in building a quality product that can last a lifetime is so ancient...

Speaking of lifetimes, the Farm Manager and I attended a birthday bash today for a family friend who was celebrating his 94th. Took along the 89 year old Bubbinator. Their paths used to cross all the time thanks to the Owen Sound Little Theatre. Earl was a patron and his late wife an occasional actor, while Bubby was for decades the beating heart of that outfit.

Also present at the party was a Syrian gentleman of my recent acquaintance. Nash is in his 80's and he's not a newcomer. I think he's been in this country longer than I have. The reason the dude fascinates me is that he's a genuine cannabis whisperer. He was keen on hearing how my crop (two plants) was faring this year.

Fifty-fifty, I said. Half my crop unexpectedly turned male when it was about three feet high. The other half is promising a very decent yield. Think "elephant sticks." If you weren't a pot aficionado fifty years ago that reference might be meaningless to you, but it's a good thing.

Nash gave me some hints on how I could improve the odds for my cuttings. He's a seriously smart guy who is in demand as a consultant for some of those Bay Street wankers who ended up owning Canada's legal weed market, thanks to PM Fluffy.

As you recall, Fluffy was elected in no small part due to his promise to legalize pot. What he neglected to mention on the campaign trail was that his legalization gambit was premised entirely on making sure the corporate sector was handed the market, instead of legitimizing the mom-and-pop growers who have kept weed science alive for the last hundred years.

That was merely one of Justin's bait-and-switch shenanigans. He got a lot of votes from folks who still harboured happy thoughts about the reign of his dear daddy. Pierre was his opposite, a Canadian nationalist who pulled no punches when it came to our relationship with the elephant next door. Pierre was all in for an independent foreign policy. Justin is all in for making sure we don't offend the Trump-Bolton-Pompeo axis of virtue.

That's why we're discussing the 19 billion dollar purchase of fighter planes and a 60 billion dollar warship building program... in a country that can't afford to ensure our Indian Reservations have drinkable water.  After all, ensuring "interoperability" with the armed forces of "our allies," meaning Uncle Sam, is going to be way more important than clean water once the Ruskies snowshoe over the North Pole to invade us.

To say nothing of the Yellow Peril...


The day began with a bit of a scare. My dear Hanna was up for a brief visit. She's been in Toronto for the last seven or eight years, collecting various university degrees that have thus far failed to improve on the income she makes from that Iranian food-truck operator. I think she's finally on a good track; starts an MSW degree at U of T next week. Hopefully that will get her out of Hoonan's food trucks once and for all.

So Hanna has her turn in the shower, and whoopsie... there's no more water!

I panicked. Last time this happened it took multiple trips to Home Hardware and a couple of YouTube videos to sort things out. Ya, I know; I'm one of those geezers who still wants to fix everything himself.

I had a party to go to, and no time for Home Hardware or YouTube. I was just pissed off that I was denied a shower.

Long story short, when someone, anyone, (I'm not mentioning any names) has a 45 minute shower, both the hot water tank and the pressure tank will run dry. By the time we got back from the birthday bash everything was functioning normally again.


What a relief!

Family picnics and a note to Bibi

Drove down to Waterloo yesterday for the annual family picnic. They used to have it in Bellwood but the Waterloo contingent considered that too far a drive, so for the last few years it's been held at the Laurel Creek Park in Waterloo.

That shortens their drive down to about ten minutes, but adds another 45 to mine, and I was having the longest drive anyway, absent any outliers from Montreal or New Jersey.

But these family picnics are a get-together I hate to miss.

What's way cool is how the next couple of generations are faring out. The third generation offspring of a bunch of DPs who got off the boat with nothing in their pockets are generally busy with masters or doctorate studies. It's the classic immigrant tale; the first generation digs ditches, the second generation manages the ditch-diggers, and the third generation, the Ph. D. crowd, produces studies that prove ditch-diggers are no longer required.

And while those master's and Doctor Phil kids have my utmost respect, I have to say there were a couple of kids there who I give even more. Nephew Sam found himself some kind of college course where he get's qualified to be a fishing and hunting guide.

Say what?

You can go to college for that?

Apparently you can.

Sam's got a gig at a hunting lodge in the North West Territories for three months, then he's got a fishing guide gig lined up in Algonquin Park, and after that he's eyeing some opportunities in New Zealand.

And nephew Isaac just got his Red Seal as a truck and coach mechanic. Isaac went the apprentice route instead of signing up for gigantic student loans. No student loans and making fifty thou a year doesn't sound too bad to me.

Especially when you compare him to all those schmucks with MA degrees in English Lit trying to pay their rent, not to mention their student loans, by driving for Uber.

But the family picnic is a tradition that goes waaay back. I think it had it's origins in the late 50's when they'd all decamp to Sauble Beach for a day in the summer. Then we moved it to the Elora Gorge Park for a few years, and then it went to Bellwood, and every year you'd see the same folks being just the same but a year older.

After fifty or sixty years, you can imagine they look quite a bit older...

Me included.

So the family shindig was six hours of driving for a three hour visit with the extended family, and today I drove half way back to Waterloo to have breakfast with my old pal Kipling at the Teviotdale Truck Stop.

Kipling is a larger than life character, and for reasons of national security I can't really tell the whole story till he kicks the bucket, and since he's looking hale and hearty I imagine that'll be a few years yet. Suffice it to say he's made his living in the transport business most of his life.

Kipling's got a bee in his bonnet about self-driving vehicles. Seems Freightliner or somebody recently ran a driverless truck all the way from California to Detroit without an accident.

Great!

Kipling points out that about 20% of the workforce is engaged in transporting goods from point A to point B.

He further points out that once you disemploy that 20% of the working population, there'll be 20% less people able to buy the shit those trucks are carrying.

I guess the AI robots who are taking over the driver's seat and a lot of other jobs in what's left of our manufacturing sector are gonna have to pick up the slack.

Not sure how that'll work out.


While I'm out breakfasting with Kipling, the Farm Manager is on the horn with the Bubbinator, and somehow, in their weekly exchange on all matters political, they get on the topic of dehumanizing the "other" and how that leads to genocide.

Canada as a British Colony dehumanized the native Canadians.

Germany under Hitler dehumanized Jews.

Israel today is dehumanizing the Palestinians. That's why it's A-OK for Israeli snipers to shoot unarmed Gaza protesters in the back.

To my surprise, Bubby agreed with this line of reasoning.

I was surprised because, as long as I've known her, she's been a staunch supporter of Israel, no matter what. This is a departure.


Note to Bibi; when you're losing the Bubbies of the Diaspora, you'd best have a long think about where you're heading.