Stopping power

We spent the last few nights in Darrel Ozmun’s shop east of Nipawin.  That’s where we go for annual maintenance on the frenchy-bus.  Last year I left a pallet of brake parts in storage because we didn’t really need them.  When we got the safety done in BC the goofball who did it claimed that my rear brakes were pretty well worn out across the board. Fortunately I didn’t let him do any further work on the bus.  But based on his claim, before we showed up at Ozmun’s last summer, I ordered enough parts to rebuild both the tag and drive axles completely.  And by completely I mean completely.  If it unbolted or unpinned from the axle I ordered it. 

When we got to Nipawin last summer Darrel’s head mechanic Bob did a DOT inspection on the brakes and his determination was that the tag axles could possibly be worked on although they were still well within spec. Remember that was a full year and several thousand miles after the clown in BC told me they were marginal.  The drive axle on the other hand, according to Bob had minimal wear.  Can you say “lying BC SOB trying to pad his work order?”  So we changed all the parts on the tag axle and left the drive axle parts on the pallet in Darrel’s store room. 

I didn’t want to leave the parts in storage forever so when we got a chance to go back to Nipawin we headed there to hang my last year’s parts.  Of course we arrived in Nipawin in the middle of a record setting heat wave so it was way past unpleasant pulling off tires and lifting brake drums.  Even with the incredible complement of tools in Darrel’s shop it’s still just bloody hard work at times.

Last night we got all wrapped up and rolled out of the shop right around 5:00.  I checked the brakes one last time and then took the bus to an approach so I could tip it each way.  That’s important to do after you have had the hubs off so that some oil can run from the pumpkin into the now dry hubs.  Then we moved out to Grace & Al’s for a night of eating and drinking.  Which was followed by a morning of more drinking (only coffee this time) and more eating. 

Tonight we’re on the street in Muenster, SK which to the extent that it is famous is famous for being the home of St. Peter’s Abbey.  Tomorrow I have a quick meeting with one of Assiniboia’s tenants and then we’ll head back to Buchanan to see if our Ukrainian painter got the hovel painted.  Sometime in the near future we plan to head way south, possibly into Texas for some Growsafe projects – I sure hope it rains and cools off down there before we get that far south.

Back at Waskesiu

All the years we were rained out at Candle Lake we always wished we had stayed at Waskesiu.  Last summer stopped in at Candle Lake for a visit, had a rainout and came over here.  This year we bypassed the rainout and came straight to Waskesiu.  In fairness we would have gone to Candle Lake but Doug and Jo were out fishing when we phoned so we came here instead.  It feels weird being here without the boat but its pretty nice to be back even if we are boatless.

I guess some genius in Parks Canada decided that “The Trailer Park” was too descriptive a name so we are now in “Red Deer”, whatever the hell that’s supposed to mean.  Monday morning the place cleared out as the holiday weekend crew left and then a few newcomers arrived but its still pretty empty.  We had planned to move to Nipawin on Tuesday but the day dawned so nice that we decided to stay an extra night. 

We’ve got a lot of happy memories of summers at Waskesiu.  When the kids were young we spent a lot of summer time either at Waskesiu or at Mara Lake.  When we were here with the kids we always stayed in Beaver Glen because we could have fires over there but that campground is really better suited to tents or at least much smaller rigs than what we have now.  We used to shoehorn the fifth wheel into the sites over there and then the kids would pack fresh water in pails to keep the tank full but we really prefer the open tree cover in the trailer park  Red Deer.  From here we can walk into the village for tea in front of the store.  Our rule has always been that we will sit and sip our tea until somebody we know comes along for a visit.  Occasionally we get skunked but usually somebody comes along and so far on this trip we have been able to visit with somebody each time we have gone for tea.  Marilyn still has some high school friends up here so she has been reconnecting with them too.

 

We’ll see ………….

I love the story of Charlie Wilson’s war.  Those of you who haven’t heard/read the story should at least see the movie and if you want the whole story then you need to read the book.  There’s a wonderful story buried in the movie about the boy and the zen master.  I’ll paraphrase it here:

A young boy in the community goes out for a walk and a pony follows him home.  The boy tames the pony and raises it.  The whole village says “What wonderful luck and good fortune this boy possesses!” The zen master says “We’ll see”.

After a while the boy starts to ride the pony and one day while he is out riding the pony falls on the boy, breaking his leg and hip in several places.  The whole village bemoans his fate saying “What terrible fortune has befallen this boy!” but the zen master says “We’ll see”.

Shortly after the accident the village declares war on the neighbouring village and all the young men go off to fight but the boy with the pony is still recovering from his fall so he stays home.  The whole village says “What wonderful luck for you” but the zen master says …………

So when I hear what glorious things are happening in Libya and how the good times are about to roll for Libyans all I can think is “we’ll see ………….”

International bacon day and other assorted weirdness

Apparently today – Saturday – is International Bacon Day.  As a long time fan of bacon consumption I am strongly supportive of the concept.  I try to eat bacon for breakfast at least 5 times a week.  Some fools might tell you that is an unhealthy choice given our family history of high blood pressure and heart disease but ……………

Last week I went to see Dr. Dan to get my prescriptions renewed.  I take something called Vaseretic which is supposed to lower my blood pressure and Lipitor which is supposed to lower my cholesterol level.  Many years ago Dr. Steve told me my cholesterol levels were “slightly elevated”.  He followed that up by saying that I shouldn’t worry because “we can control that with diet.”  “Like hell we can” sez I cuz I knew damn sure he wouldn’t be anywhere to be seen at breakfast time.  “Bring on the drugs”.  So he did and we did and here we are many years later with me visiting Dr. Dan to replenish my drug supply.  I like to carry at least 6 months supply so I never have to be in a panic to get a prescription filled so there was no big urgency but we were in Saskatoon and had some time so I went to see the Dr. 

He checked my blood pressure and it came out something like 100 over 65 which is really good.  When we got all done he told me he was cutting my meds in half which seemed like a good outcome.  I like to think of it as me getting healthier and it definitely is not the result of cutting back my meat intake.  I’m at the top of the food chain and damn proud of it.  And of all the meats bacon is likely my fav.  So I’m a big fan of International Bacon day, even though I never heard of it until about 10 minutes ago.

Continuing our walk on the weird side, how about that Lonechild guy?  For those of you who don’t follow Saskatchewan Indian politics closely (or at all) first off, my hat’s off to you but to quickly bring you up to speed Guy Lonechild is the (former) chief of the FSIN (Federation of Sask Indian Nations).  He got to be former chief when his board unceremoniously and illegally dumped him.  We know it was illegal because he took them to court and the judge said it was illegal.  The day the judgement came down he showed up at the FSIN office only to discover that his key didn’t work.  Apparently he made a lot of Indian enemies by insisting on things like due process in FSIN business deals and by appointing people with educational experience to the board of the First Nations University.  Associations that run on business procedures and universities that are run by educators – OMIGOD no wonder he got canned. 

Most of the other chiefs evidently prefer the old arrangement where they get paid non-stop mileage charges for driving those bright red Dodge pickups we keep buying for them and get paid per diems to sit on boards that they are unqualified for.  For one whole day the media was filled with praise for Lonechild’s brave stand against generations of corrupt Indian governance.

Fortunately the story had a happy ending.  It turns out that the price of Lonechild’s principles was exactly $250,000.  Everybody is buddy-buddy again, the FSIN bank account is $250k lighter and Lonechild has enough money to buy 5 new pickups.  Life is good with the small niggling concern that the Province of Saskatchewan would like some assurance that the million dollars they just recently gave FSIN didn’t help buy off Lonechild.

The past couple of weeks we have been on the move regularly.  We’ll slow down a bit for a few days now.  We spent most of this week in Regina so we were able to have several good visits with father.  His brain continues to wander but his body is in really good condition.  Physically he is probably in better condition than he was when he went into the black hole called Dove House.  He seems to have finally lost the urge to walk so he is no longer covered with bruises from crawling out of bed.  That has to be a huge relief for the Wascana staff – it certainly is for us.

My ain’t that purty?

We’re settling into site 43 in Dogpatch section of Sask. Landing Provincial park.  I don’t think it’s actually called Dogpatch section but it’s some other stupid name like that.  It was a little challenging getting into the site but we made it and we got Clifford’s awning rolled out so I can sit under it with a cold beer.  SWMBO is doing her favorite camping thing – making a great big fire. 

It’s hard to believe that this campground is pretty well smack dab in the middle of the famous Palliser Triangle.  Somebody planted a lot of PFRA trees down here in the river bottom many years ago.  You can see the bald prairie hills around the edge of the campground but it’s pretty pleasant in the shelter of the trees.  I guess the “lake” outside the campground is what’s left of the south Saskatchewan river backed up behind Gardiner Dam which is probably 90 miles away from here. 

We left Buchanan about a week ago, stopped close to Weldon for a few nights, moved out west of Saskatoon for a couple more nights and spent the last two nights south of Biggar.  I’m on my annual Saskatchewan circuit looking at farmland and interviewing tenants for Assiniboia Capital/Palliser Farmland.  They’re an investment group that buys farmland and packages it for investors who don’t want to mess with the dirty business of holding the physical farmland.  Along the way we’ve been mooching parking spaces from friends with large yards, always being careful to move on before they ask us to so that we can come back next year.

We’ll likely spend at least another week on my round the province road trip and then end up in Nipawin.  I’ve got a few thousand dollars worth of brake parts stored in Ozmun’s shop.  I asked him today if he had sold them yet but apparently he hasn’t had any takers so I’ll likely get to hang them on the bus after all.  I bought them last year thinking that I would need to redo the brakes on the drive axle when we did the brakes on the tags but it turned out that the drives were actually still in really good shape.  Darrel said he could store the parts for as long as I wanted so we ground another year’s wear out of the drive brakes and now we’ll have new brakes pretty well all around.  The fronts were in like new condition last year.  My rebuild on the tag axle is still hanging in there but I’m paranoid about it so we stop way too often to check it. 

Harvest is just getting rolling in Saskatchewan.  Marlan and Michael crossed back into Canada earlier this week so that must mean that things are ready to roll in southern Alberta too.  RJ has already posted harvest pictures on his Facebook page so they have started.  There’s not a lot of combines rolling  yet in eastern or northern Sask. but there’s lots of swathing going on and it’s not unusual to see a combine going either.  All that means that fall isn’t far away – we haven’t seen any flocks of geese yet but I suppose it won’t be long before we do.

Saint Jack & Romanow Road

It’s not nice to speak ill of the dead so I’ll be careful but I’m more than a little tired of the platitudes that are raining down on Jack’s corpse.  Just in case you didn’t realize it, the man could NOT actually walk on water.  As far as his spectacular electoral prowess is concerned it seemed to me that on election night he failed miserably outside Quebec and rode a wave of separatist disconnect in that peculiar jurisdiction.  Here in Saskatchewan, supposedly the socialist heartland, he was shut out completely.  And that’s all I’m going to say about that except to note that it was a pretty class act on Harper’s part to offer up a state funeral.

Now back to Saskatchewan where we are reminded about our years of NDP mismanagement every time we drive anywhere.  Which is why I am proposing that we start naming stretches of provincial “highways” for those shining stars out of NDP history who are directly responsible for the catastrophic state of our provincial highway system.  How about “Blakeney Boulevard” for #25 highway between Birch Hills and St. Louis?  Its not that long since this highway was decent pavement but you’d never know it now – its barely up to main farm access standard gravel.  I’m thinking it wouldn’t be hard to come up with a Romanow Road, Calvert Crescent and Lingenfelter Lane to commemorate those other provincial socialists who put safe injection sites for crack whore mothers ahead of maintaining the provincial infrastructure.

What a difference a year makes

Back to Buchanan.  Last Friday I tracked down John-the-welder and got him to cut off the remains of the dead bearing on the tag axle.  John’s eyesight is not so good anymore – I’m pretty sure I could have done a better job cutting the bearing and I KNOW I’m no damn good.  But it was his torch and I didn’t have a whole lot of options so I kept my mouth shut.  He blew away most of the spacer behind the bearing and nicked the axle in a couple of places but I think everything is still usable.  I should have ordered the spacer along with the rest of the parts anyway so its really my own fault that I was stuck for a few more days waiting for that to arrive.

Even after John had cut through the bearing in three places it was still about a 4 hour job to get the 3 pieces beat off the axle.  Actually I damn near gave up and gave the whole mess to Lecuyers in Nipawin.  I had visions of them having to cut off the spindle, build a new one and weld it back on.  I saw them build a new stub for the end of the axle on one of our floaters one night so I know they could have done it.  In that case we lost a bearing and the weight of the unit ground the axle completely away on one side.  Kevin showed up at the shop with a micrometer, measured the axle on the good side and headed back to their shop.  We got busy and pulled the axle out from under the truck overnight and delivered it to Lecuyers’ shop in the morning.  By then they had built a new stub about 18” long.  I still don’t know how they kept it straight while they welded it back on but they had the axle assembly back to us by mid-morning and we had the truck back together and in the field that same afternoon.  In that case it was the drive axle so the piece they added had to be hollow.  So I’m certain that sticking one little solid spindle back onto my tag axle would have been child’s play. 

Marilyn has been busy painting the hovel.  Just having the primer coat on it has made a huge difference in it’s appearance.  Its still a miserable little hovel but at least it is no longer a bohunk yellow hovel. 

We’ve been hooked up to town water since we bought the place but all we had was a connection for the bus.  While I was waiting for the axle spacer to arrive I got us cold water hooked up in the house so we can use the bathroom there now.  That’s no great advantage except for Marilyn’s cleanup while she is painting.  Now the paint mess doesn’t have to come into the bus. 

We figure we’ll probably hire a pro to put the top coat on the hovel.  Not because we think it needs such a level of expertise – we just won’t be here to get it done.  That won’t be as easy as it sounds though.  Yesterday I had a long phone conversation with a Ukrainian fool (is “ukrainian” redundant in that situation?).  Getting a painter lined up may take longer than actually doing the work ourselves.  Marilyn talked to someone with a functioning brain last night so perhaps we have that problem solved.