November 18, 2023
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Is the end near for the beer store?

If you are not from these parts – Ontario to be specific – you may be thinking, what the heck is a beer store and why should one exist? We have them. We really do. These stores are owned by a group of big brewers and for many years they had a lock on beer sales in Ontario. I heard on the radio the other day that the Province is not likely to renew its agreement with the beer store and has given them the required couple years notice. These things take time, and so it may actually be a few years before this dinosaur disappears.

I buy beer, but my idea of a major beer purchase is 4 or 5 cans, which I buy from the giant walk-in fridge in my local liquor store, a place which features a crazy selection of craft beer brands. I can’t help but notice, though, that more and more hyper-expensive beers are appearing there, many at over 5 bucks for a can. The other day I suggested to the cashier that I wanted to make a citizen’s arrest about the $5 beer. She suggested that perhaps that would be over-kill.

When I was a kid, there was a beer store plopped down beside a liquor store, not far from my dad’s little window factory. Across the street was a KFC, that seemed to pump out the fried chicken smell to entice shoppers from the beer store and the liquor store to cross the street for some greasy poultry.

The beer store and the liquor store were designed to be as unfriendly as possible. In the liquor store, you couldn’t actually see the booze, which was tucked away in the back. You had to fill out a slip with a little golf pencil and hand it to a sour looking little man who would go in the back and bring you out your bottle, sheathed in a paper bag. The Beer Store featured two lines, one for recycling and the other for buying, with a long conveyor on each side of the store. I haven’t ventured into a beer store in years but I doubt they have changed with the times.

I suspect the one thing that has allowed The Beer Store to continue it’s grip on the suds market as long as it has has everything to do with recycling. Not only do you have to bring your beer bottles and cans back there for get your deposit back, wine bottles have to go back there as well. When the beer store is dead, how will the province handle bottle and can recycling? They will have to figure out an alternative. Can grocery stores handle it? Would they want to. I don’t have the answer.

November 13, 2023
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Garlic

When the leaves on the Shishishagira Japanese Maple out front turn orange then red – usually the last tree around to change colour – I know it’s time to plant garlic for harvest next July. Yesterday I selected some of the best garlic bulbs from this year’s batch and separated the cloves, enough for over 40 new bulbs next year. In some past years, I planted garlic in a haphazard way, planting some in any disused areas of the garden. Last year I established a dedicated patch for the garlic and I used that area again, plus took over some other areas for garlic near the tomato garden.

Garlic is super-easy to grow. The only thing to remember is to cut off the scapes when they appear in June. After harvest in July, the garlic has to be cured for a couple weeks. I do this by tying it together in a bundle and hanging it outside under a canopy. I used to plant my garlic at the end of September. My brother suggested that was too early because if we get a period of nice weather, the garlic could send out shoots before it gets freezing cold. I took his advice so these days I plant it in November before the ground freezes.

This means winter is almost here. Time to bring in a little wood for the woodstove. Time to get the snow tires on. Last week I cleaned out the bird houses and did maintenance where needed. I like to do this before winter, so in spring, the bird houses are ready for new inhabitants. With several trees around our home, we see a good variety of birds. Last year house sparrows, chickadees and grackles used the bird houses plus there were robins and cardinals nesting way up in the spruces.

October 8, 2023
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Morning Coyotes

The other morning, Bonnie was playing with her buddies in the sandy area of Jack Darling Park, when we heard some constant fairly high-pitched barking and yipping. There were two coyotes out beside the tennis court, just outside of the dog park, looking at the dogs and the people in the sand pit, and making quite a racket. It seemed as if they were calling for a third coyote who was in the dog park, though we didn’t see any others.

The dogs playing in the park ignored the coyotes completely, and just carried on running and chasing and wrestling, as if there was nothing different about this particular morning.

September 30, 2023
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Buried Treasure

We’ve been going through book shelves in an effort to reduce the crazy number of books we’ve accumulated over the years, and then we’re painting the shelves. I shouldn’t have been surprised to find some buried treasure in amongst the books.

Uncle Harold was a pianist and composer and a French trained chef, among other things, which included being a spy, but that’s another story. We unearthed a copy of Harold’s symphony score, given to my parents in 1961. Inside, was yet another treasure, an 11 page typewritten essay by Harold Knapik, called: NOSTALGIC REMINISCENCES – – SHOPPING IN PARIS – – 1948 TO 1960. It is a lovely essay about markets near the place where Harold and his wife Virginia lived in Paris for years. I scanned it, and I’m publishing it here so everyone can enjoy it.

September 28, 2023
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Wanted

Retired guy who thought it would be a fine idea to start getting serious about the fiddle during the pandemic seeks guitar picker who thinks Canadian Old Time as well as American Mid-western fiddle music is the cat’s meow. Object: regular jamming for now, busking later. I’ve been playing music with a good guitar player, but he much prefers it when I play banjo (which to be fair I’m still lots better at). I’m learning fast on fiddle these days and would love to work up some tunes.

The ideal person would be an intermediate guitar player with serious taste for gobbling up fiddle tunes. I live in Long Branch, South Etobicoke but I can travel around the City some if necessary. I’m flexible on times, and I’m thinking meeting up once or twice each week would be boatloads of fun.

Let’s work up a bunch of tunes, have a blast and go busking. Wheeeee!

September 25, 2023
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Foggy

Have you ever had an experience in which your body has warded off an illness until you do something you have to do? This happened to me on Saturday evening. Earlier in the day, I played music with the Jack Antler Old Time band at Neilson Creative Centre during the John and Bruce Parsons art exhibition. I felt fine during the performance, but on the way home, I was clobbered with flu-like symptoms. When I say clobbered, I mean full on fever and chills, achy everything, vomiting – the works – which gradually morphed into common cold type symptoms. I feel as if I’ve been in a fog since Saturday evening. I was able to eat a little last night and this morning, and, in spite of my nose running like a tap, and a bit of a cough, I feel much better this morning.