Stuck In Canada!

My friend Les from San Miguel de Allende Mexico is arriving tomorrow to do four days of hiking in Strathcona Park. I washed the bedding and got the motorhome ready for him to stay in so he will be no trouble at all! He came to Canada for a short visit early this year and got trapped here by the COVID-19 virus. He is going to abandon his new car in Canada and fly home soon.

Tonight I am watching the Canucks play Las Vegas in game 3!

Well That Was Interesting!

I just received an email from Canada's INTERAC E-Transfer telling me there was a $20 deposit awaiting me from a $49.8 million class action lawsuit against the Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) industry for price fixing. Somewhere in the back of my mind I remembered signing onto this lawsuit but it was many years ago. Is this email legit or is it a scam? I Googled it and found several references saying people had accepted it and it is legit! I clicked through everything and there it was in my bank! It was not a scam and I am $20 richer! :)

Never A Dull Moment

Things are busy around the homestead! They have been working on a highway improvement for over a year and it will go on for maybe another year. I am reminded of it every morning at 6:30 or 7:00 when the equipment gets started up and moved into position. The house shakes so badly it is impossible to keep pictures hanging straight and the dust is ridiculous! Norma would be crapping herself but luckily my standards are not so high!

Part of the project was to re-run all utilities, water, sewer, power, cable, telephone and a new storm sewer. I put a lot of water into the storm sewer from the two year round streams coming down the bank behind the house. These streams used to go into a pipe, under the highway and into the ocean. That is no longer considered politically correct so hence the new storm sewer which will probably collect runoff from all the properties and THEN dump it into the ocean.

The other day they were going to connect my bank drain pipe to the storm sewer when I got a knock on the door. A worker in a white hardhat asked me to walk down to the highway with him. He told me they had trouble locating my pipe and finally found it but it is buried under my neighbours property by a few inches and not mine! Well, if it is it is not my problem as I didn't do it and they have assured everyone many times that the project will not cost any homeowner anything. They talked to the City Manager and the Legal Department and concluded they couldn't connect me to the storm drain as long as I was trespassing on the neighbour's property. I told them to just leave me draining into the ocean, I was happy with that. Well, they finally decided they were going to give me a whole new pipe buried under my 100 foot driveway and connect to the pipe where it actually is on my property. Again he told me there would be no cost, don't worry. They found the old drain pipe under the top corner of my driveway and started digging. They removed all of the 40 or 50 year old pavement off the 100 by 16 foot driveway. dug a trench, placed and connected the new pipe. It works! The nice, clean, fresh stream water no longer goes into the ocean.

The white hat then told me that they were filling in the trench but were holding off on resurfacing the driveway for two weeks to a month until the power, cable and telephone lines were buried. No problem with me as long as it eventually gets done. He said if it rains and becomes muddy and unusable to let them know and they will spread a load of crush on it. Then he asked me exactly where my property line was and I told him, "Down at the highway, I own the driveway". He gave me a shocked look and said his drawings showed the driveway as belonging to the city. Well, my drawings and property survey show it belonging to me and I have the drawings from when we purchased the house in 1989. He told me he had to make another call and never came back so I trust it is resolved because I want the driveway paved and restored to the condition it was in when they started messing with it and I want them to honour their promise that it would cost me nothing.

Visitors

My 20 year old Granddaughter, Sierrah came up for a short two day visit from Victoria with her other Grandmother, Caroline. It was a fun couple of days catching up, I have not seen Sierrah for about a year and she leads an active life so there is always lots to catch up on. I was going to take us all out for dinner but all the restaurants we wanted to go to were COVID closed and doing take out only. Instead we stopped at the grocery store to buy supplies and Sierrah made veggie burgers for us. I always let her do the shopping when she is here as she is a Vegan and this requires ingredient lists to be very carefully studied.
Dinner was delicious and Caroline and I cleaned up while Sierrah retired to the porch to return a couple of calls before rejoining us. Sierrah eventually took her dog and her phone out to the motorhome, leaving Caroline the guest room. Caroline and I have always gotten along well and found lots to talk about and before we knew it, it was almost 1:00 AM! Well, that was it for the night.
I was up first to make a late breakfast and not too long after 3:00 they headed home, remembering the dog! One lucky thing that happened was the women discovered Norma's Janome sewing machine in the guest room and asked what I was going to do with it. I "sort of" knew it was there but certainly had no plans for it. Norma bought it back in 2004 and had never used it (the receipt was in it). It was brand new! Well, it turns out Sierrah sews! It was a productive visit for her because she scored Grandma's "new" sewing machine! No more having to use someone else's.
It was a great visit, it has been a long time since I had family around for that long even though it was only a couple of days.
We were so busy, I forgot to take pictures!

Big Finance Day!

In Canada starting at age 71 we must start drawing down the money we have squirreled away in Registered Retirement Savings Plans (RRSP). These funds must be converted to Registered Retirement Income Funds (RRIF) and depending on your age, you are required to withdraw a minimum amount every year. At my age (75) I had to take out approximately 6% (still substantially less than the fund earned last year) which becomes taxable income. This year because of COVID we were allowed to take a reduced amount which I took advantage of and my investment company allowed me to delay my withdrawal from my agreed upon date of April to August which I also chose to do. A wise decision it turns out because my fund has now recovered everything it lost during the initial COVID financial pandemic meltdown. For once I did the right thing. My RRIF payment was deposited in my Credit Union this morning!

I also delayed the payment of my Income Tax and my Property Taxes, both delays were allowed penalty free again due to the COVID-19 situation. Today I paid both and discovered I still had +/- $1500 left over! Oh what to do with it? Save it for airfare to visit my friends in Mexico when the pandemic is over! YES! Monterrey and Merida are in my future!

"Anonymous" Commertors

Anonymous comments will be deleted. If you have no Google account then all you have to do is add your real name to the bottom of your comment and you will be welcomed here. The person who has been making off topic comments recently is simply hiding his face and yelling at me two things I don't take kindly to. You don't have to agree with my politics nor I with yours, we can have an intelligent conversation even without agreeing but it's my Blog, not yours and I want to know who I am talking to. Hiding in the weeds and calling me a Communist only brings a chuckle to my lips and don't think for an instant that you are dictating or even influencing the content of my Blog. Take the bag off your head, introduce yourself and lets see if we can have a discussion.

George's Drive In

George's Food Bar

There is a tiny hole in the wall Chinese take out "order at the window" restaurant in Courtenay, BC called George's. Norma and I stopped there every time we passed it. Norma was an extremely light eater and never emptied her plate except when it came to George's! She LOVED their hamburgers, would eat every bit and then lick her fingers clean. They were that good! I am not a burger guy but his fish and chips were equally as good! A little on the greasy side maybe but crisp and delicious! We stopped every time.

Two or three years ago George died and his son tried to take over the business. Things did not go well for him and he was not open very often, I think he had another job. In fact his openings were very unpredictable and he was never open when we drove by.

Well, today I was at my eye doctors and passed by George's on the way home and IT WAS OPEN! The son was there and it looked like his mother was helping out as well. Sadly though, he was out of fish so I had to leave! I do not yet know if the son's fish and chips are as good as his dad's.

My Cataract!

Today was the day for my conference with the surgeon! I showed up a half hour early but was sent back to my car to wait until precisely 1:20. No problem, every business has their own way to deal with COVID.  I went back in at precisely 1:20 and was sent into a technician's office where she did my eyeball pressure test for glaucoma and pronounced me to have perfect eye pressure. More on this later!

I reminded her that I was here to see the surgeon and she assured me that I would be seeing him. She then embarrassed me again by having me read the eye chart. I could see there was an eye chart but that is about all. I could read three of the four largest letters. She then sent me in to see the big shot himself!

He started off as usual, reading charts and reports and then pulling the microscope over. He studied my eye for quite some time changing lenses or attachments and then went to his desk to write notes. "Not this time" I thought, knowing his next move has always been to send me out the door. I started talking and he immediately shushed me and asked, "May I say a couple of things first?" Well yes, please do!

He told me that some cataract patients develop a membrane in their eye post surgery and I had this membrane. Laser surgery is required to get rid of it. Relief! I had something to hang my hat on! PLUS, he said... Your puff of air tests for glaucoma have always looked good and everyone presumed it was under control with the eye drops I have been taking for years. However after my complaints he has taken another look at it and it is worse than they thought. He has referred me to a glaucoma specialist and when I pressed he told me it might require stronger drugs or even surgery. He will make me an appointment.

So there you have it, I had more than one problem. Now we know the whole story and now to get the problems dealt with!

My Ongoing Cataract Story

My left eye is no better. It has been over two weeks and it is exactly the same as it was pre-op. I have an appointment with my surgeon tomorrow and hope to get some answers. Stay tuned!

Eye Surgery Ten Days Later

Well, the short story is my eyesight has not improved! My left eye vision is exactly as it was before the surgery. When I look through my left eye in looks (and this is the best way I can describe it) like I am watching a TV with the contrast turned up way too high. Things in my vision are either too bright or too dark and I can barely read the biggest line on an eye chart.

The surgery was done last Tuesday, July 28 and I went for my first post surgery exam the next day. A technician gave the the puff of air test and I passed that. I tried to tell her there was no improvement to my vision but she assured me it was way too early to tell and gave me an appointment at the surgeon's office in Courtenay for August 4. I drove down there and saw another technician who gave me another puff of air test, which I passed. I explained my problem and she had me read her eye chart which I failed miserably. I did not see the surgeon as he was not in the office that day. She told me it could take up to a month before I notice ant change but I have little confidence in this.

I will call the surgeon's office on Monday and schedule an appointment with him and find out what is going on. I am starting to think I had more than one problem to start with and he addressed one problem (cataract) but not the second. I want to start getting some answers and not just get shuffled from one technician to another.