The Very Long Weekend Part Two

We were out at a special event last night, with plans for dinner afterwards, and arrived at 7:00 p.m. After a bit we were able to get a couple of glasses of wine and settled into talking to other guests when we saw our old friends, the poisoners.

These were the couple who, as I said in the last post, “Friends insisted we join them for dinner on Wednesday evening before we left.  Although we were busy we agreed, as it was going to be fun. There would be six of us for a barbeque. One person was unable to attend, so five of us had dinner and the hostess failed to mention her illness of a few days before, as she was over the sickness and was capable of doing dinner. Had we known we may have made another decision.”

We were greeted warmly and joked around a bit when the hor d’œuvres  were passed around and I was told to try these great things. I did, and he explained that they had made all of them.

I froze!

 

I was “forced” to try another and stopped after that one.

 

Was I walking into the shadow of death once again?

Would I end up in the morning once again throwing up in the sink?

My wife had the look of horror on her face as she looked in my direction.

Luckily the speeches started and the eating stopped for a while, and for us, it stopped forever. We left a bit after an hour of speeches and we escaped to dinner.

I was fine this morning, and hopefully the entire incident is behind us……

 

The Very Long Weekend

We planned on a long weekend vacation, a little after Labour Day, after the kids were back in Toronto.

Discussing the possibilities, we settled on Prince Edward County Ontario, a place we could get to by car in less than three hours, that had beautiful beaches and interesting galleries, shops and wineries. It was all set for a great weekend away for just the two of us, something we seldom do. We found a small resort hotel with a pool and a beach, the pool right off of our room, and looked forward to a quiet, fun filled romantic weekend.

Friends insisted we join them for dinner on Wednesday evening before we left.  Although we were busy we agreed, as it was going to be fun. There would be six of us for a barbeque. One person was unable to attend, so five of us had dinner and the hostess failed to mention her illness of a few days before, as she was over the sickness and was capable of doing dinner. Had we known we may have made another decision.

Our vacation started on Thursday with a carefree drive past Toronto out to the country, and a nice ride to our hotel. We relaxed, and went to the hotel pub and sat on the patio and watched the sun go down on the water, sipping great wine and dining on Caesar Salad, mussels and garlic bread. It was fun and even though it became a bit chilly, we enjoyed the view and the food.

At 6:00 a.m. I awoke, ran to the sink across the room, and began to throw up!

The rest of the weekend was filled with four major activities; projectile vomiting, diarrhea, flatulence and extreme gas pains for both of us. We had breaks of course, and we slept often. We were able to go out shopping so I could buy new underwear (I can leave that to the imagination!).

We texted the one other guest attending the dinner to see if he was ill, or if it was the mussels that was killing us. His wife texted back to us to let us know he had been throwing up since 5:00 a.m. We knew who the culprits were!

We did get to go out to a late breakfast; at least some tea and cakes, and my wife had to excuse herself to go throw up in the bathroom of the lovely little tea shop. We also went to the beach, and my wife threw up on her feet and used the lake to rinse them off.  

We did get to a few wineries and taste and purchase wine, as I was able to use the bathroom in each winery

We continued to laugh thank God, as it could not have been funnier. We planned so hard to make it all be so perfect, and it could hardly have been worse. On top of it all, we were committed to the reservation so it was an expensive rest home as well. Being Canada, the hospital would have been free!

We are on the mend. We will be much more careful about where we eat from now on. I believe we have ended pot luck dinners as part of our lifestyle.

I will go back to work today, staying away an extra day so as not to infect our staff.

 

Moving On....

Yesterday we were in a sweaty operation, moving our second daughter to Toronto, into a three bedroom condo she is renting with friends.

Our U-Haul truck was full as was my car, and we had rented the freight elevator for two hours to get all the stuff moved in. I had moved a full shopping cart into the elevator at ground level; and was waiting for my wife and daughter who were carrying a desk from the truck down the street.

I heard a loud conversation going on and it was my wife and someone else. I had no idea who it was but they were both clearly struggling with the desk but moving forward. It was a man’s voice, and when they came into view I laughed, as my wife was on one end and Mike, a local character it seems, rounded the bend. What Mike lacked in teeth he made up for in enthusiasm.

What he said was priceless, “I wouldn’t have offered to help if I weren’t half in the bag!”  He smiled, waved and moved on into the sunset…..

Pretzel Surprise...

It was in the late 50’s and a group of us were sitting around a friends kitchen. We were all over at a girl’s house and I can’t remember how many of us were there or what the circumstances were, just that we were there and it seems to me it was in the daytime.

There definitely was a group of teenaged boys and girls sitting in the kitchen doing nothing.

My friend Edgar was sitting up on the side of sink and next to him was a box of pretzels. He absentmindedly put his hand into the box and pulled out a pretzel and ate it. He reached in and pulled out another and continued to eat. The third time he reached in he pulled out a piece of salami!

It seems, as he looked hurriedly inside, with all of us watching his look of horror, that the mother of the house had been using the pretzel box next to the sink as a “green bin” (not a term of the 50’s, but a gross garbage container none the less).

Our friend Edgar had been snacking on the garbage!

Paranormal Blank Wall

In a lot of horror movies and paranormal TV shows, children and dogs seem to sense spirits and demons when no one else can see them or know about their presence. I can speculate as to why these simple creatures are psychic, and my guess would be that they are presumed innocent and without baggage.

In any case, I have been noticing that Max, our dog, is sometimes, not too often, found sitting in the dining room staring at the wall.

He is looking at a space between the bar and the wall, just a blank wall. He seems interested and is staying in place. My wife has noticed this as well. I’m not saying he’s seeing things but, he is looking at things I do not see.

In looking to debunk this problem, I did notice the wall has an air intake for the furnace, so it is possible that voices of my children travel through the ductwork, even though I can’t here them, but dogs hear very well. This is at least an explanation. I haven’t tested the theory as I haven’t been paying attention to his actions too often.

 

My hope is that it’s just a fluke, or a little bit of sound traveling through the house. In a few weeks when my daughters move back to Toronto, I will see if he stays in place. At that point I think I need a ghost hunter.

 

 

 

 

 

Teacher!!

It was a required course for all Education Graduate students, and the only choice you had was when you were taking it. It was Developmental Psychology, and I was not eager,  but of the academic subjects required in my Art Education program, this was the one I was looking forward to.

The funny thing was that in the years yet to come at the time, I would end up teaching all of the courses at the graduate level that I didn’t want to take, and tried to do a much better job than had been done for me.

The course was taught by a young PhD who had recently completed her degree and had just obtained this part time teaching position. It was probably her first class. She had come from New York as I remember, and I kind of liked her. She was interesting and of course I enjoyed the subject.

There were about 20 or so students in the class from all different education programs, but clearly, all of us were classroom teachers. This program existed, as it was offered part-time, for working teachers at Towson University in Baltimore.

Somewhere during the mid-point in the term the teacher told the class that she was unhappy that several of the students had reported her to the Dean for not doing her job. I was shocked as I enjoyed the class and could not imagine what was wrong.

Being young and naive at that time I didn’t see it coming.

She had not listed the dates for a mid-term and a final, as well, she had not given out the term paper assignments the disturbed students were waiting for. I cringed! I was so happy not to have to do a term paper I was floating on a cloud. But the disturbed ones needed structure to exist!

I could have guessed who had done it, but they managed to let us know who they were as they were proud that they had forced the teacher to comply with the rules! They didn’t need to learn Developmental Psychology; they were the embodiment of some form of psychosis that we all now understood!

We had our tests and our paper, albeit a bit nicer done as I remember than a formal process envisioned by our tattle-tales (whistle blowers they surely thought).

I learned about Developmental Psychology and never did see the teacher again but she tried to do a good job and almost succeeded.

If memory serves me I did write the Dean (in the teacher evaluation form) to say what a good teacher she had been and how unfairly a few had high jacked the direction of the class.

 

Disaster narrowly averted!

It wasn’t late, just after 8:00 p.m. and I was on the computer when the phone rang. “Arthur, I think I forgot to unplug a glue gun when I left the studio today!”

OK, what was I to do? The only close persons with a key and the ability to circumvent the security systems were out of the country. The two women who might help were one, not home, and the other, without a visible phone number. I had no car as our cars were commandeered by a daughter and a wife.

The instructor picked me up at home in about 10 minutes and off we went, on the wild goose chase. To do nothing risked a phone call from the fire department at midnight and a guilt filled sleep. To act only meant taking a ride to school and trying to see if she had unplugged the glue gun.

We determined it was not sitting on a hot pad or trivet, but placed on a piece of paper on a table. This was an accident waiting to happen.

We arrived in a few minutes with no smoke in sight and opened the doors, switched off the alarms and found that someone, either an assistant or the cleaner or the teacher herself had in fact unplugged the glue gun!

Disaster narrowly averted!