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	<title>RAMBLINGS Archives - Before My Clutch Slips</title>
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	<title>RAMBLINGS Archives - Before My Clutch Slips</title>
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		<title>A TERROR ATTACK IN MY BARBECUE &#8211; TEXAS 2002</title>
		<link>https://jimbored.com/a-terror-attack-in-my-barbecue-texas-2002/</link>
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		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jimbo Red]]></dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Fri, 06 May 2022 00:25:10 +0000</pubDate>
				<category><![CDATA[RAMBLINGS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TEXAS - all]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://jimbored.com/?p=9802</guid>

					<description><![CDATA[<p>For this next piece, I will just free my mind and ramble around a bit in the cavern of my memory. The setting will be the Woodlands, Texas, after our transfer there in 2002. Our time in Texas was one of our best times ever. After, swimming upstream for many years, and never quite seeming to get ahead, things were now changing. We now started to put money into a savings account. My words of 20 years previous, now became real. I had always told Deysi, that we would save for our retirement, at the time when they paid me more than her and the girls could spend. Life was good. My job was still stressful. However, now there were fewer people who could crap down, on me, from above. This post will just be some random snippets of our early life in Houston. One of the strangest things happened, that had ever happened, in my strange life. It occurred one hot summer afternoon, shortly after our settling into our new house. I was out in the backyard, minding my own business and puttering around by the pool. It was silent, no wind, no clouds and no one was telling me what to do. I was bent over checking the filter basket on the pool pump suction. All of a sudden, BLAAAMMM! A LOUD EXPLOSION! Remember, I had been in Kuwait after the war, so I did recognize an artillery shell explosion. This one, apparently right beside me! My heart stopped! My bowels didn&#8217;t! I heard someone let out a high pitched scream. Geezus, was that me? I was frozen, possibly curled up into a fetal position, whimpering slightly. That is, until Deysi came out and said, something like, &#8220;what did you do now?&#8221; And, &#8220;get up from there, why are you all curled up like that?&#8221; She then added, &#8220;why is your face so white, what&#8217;s that smell?&#8221; I get up and look around, but can not, immediately see where the shell had hit. There was no crater, no smoke, no smell of cordite. Nothing! I see no damage. Then out of the corner of my eye, I spot our barbecue, tilted on an angle leaning against the garage. I know, I did not leave it like that. On further inspection, I could see it was full of, what looked like, tiny shards of glass. Not one sliver bigger than a 1/4 of an inch long. Millions of them. There was about three inches of this glass covering the inside of the BBQ. Deysi is peering at it, trying to figure out what I had done, this time. I&#8217;m thinking, who in hell would want too go Al-Qaeda on my BBQ? Just when she puffs up a bit, I preempt her by saying, &#8220;I did not touch it, nor look at it, or do anything to that BBQ!&#8221; &#8220;Well&#8221;, she says, &#8220;it certainly didn&#8217;t do it by itself.&#8221; &#8220;Now you fix this mess, and clean it up!&#8221; &#8220;You&#8217;re not getting another one, you hear?&#8221; I look around for a shell hole, but don&#8217;t see any other damage. So, contrary to what Deysi thinks, this BBQ did explode into pieces, ALL BY ITSELF! To this day, I do not know why, or how, but I do know, that this BBQ, sitting all by itself, basically self destructed. None of the millions or billions of shards of glass exploded outward. They were all still inside the BBQ. It&#8217;s just that the BBQ no longer had a big glass panel covering the front. I guess you might say it imploded. In any event it was finished, dead, or toast. I was a little afraid to touch it, after all, who knew what other evil spirits might have been dwelling inside my barbecue, waiting to unleash their fury. I can only think that maybe the glass was weakened by the salt water, it was soaked in, when coming from the UK. (read my story about the tsunami in our driveway). Maybe in a weakened state, maybe when the salt dried, it formed an airtight seal around the edges of the cover. And maybe combined with the heat, of the sun, it created a vacuum and imploded. Whatever, it scared the hell outta me! I always stepped a little more carefully around that part of the garage from then on. To this day, I still puzzle over the time when terrorists attacked my barbecue in Texas. Another very memorable time for me in Texas, was when when I took on a new hobby. I decided to become an astronomer or stargazer. After studying, a bit, about it, and with Deysi and Ange along, we headed for the telescope store. At that time, I might have known, marginally, more about astronomy than Deysi, Ange, or their cat. Although, Deysi would never admit that. What we finally settled on was a 6 inch, Meade, computer driven, self tracking, all singing and dancing scope. It was by no means the Hubble space scope. However, the sales guy did say, I could, probably, see as many aliens with it as anyone else, had seen. This work of high technology cost about $2000, once the price of the fine lenses were added. We are off, I can&#8217;t wait to get home and, look back to the beginning of our universe. On arriving home, the first order of business was to sit down and read the instructions. I was an avid reader, at this point, so did not mind reading thru a manual of about 100 pages. I came very quickly to another revelation. Within a few pages, I realized, that, I did not understand much of what they had written. After the thousands of books I had read. And, add to that, the hundreds of technical documents I had read at work. I now found out, just how many words there were, in the English language, that, I did not understand. I may as well have been reading Mongol! Luckily though, there were pictures on almost every page, illustrating what it was they were talking about. I worked at this hobby diligently for the next few weeks. That meant every spare minute and weekends. Was I obsessive/compulsive? You think? After a while, I got to a point where I could locate an object, like a planet, centre it, put the scope on auto-tracking and follow it for hours thru the night sky. Of course one of the first night sky targets was the moon. Once I had got it set up and inserted the correct lens, it became a thing of beauty. My god, I could actually see craters! I mean, lots of them. Of course, neither Deysi or Ange had any particular interest in my discoveries. So, I was kinda by myself, congratulating my own brilliance. Just to sidetrack a bit. The difference between my amateur telescope and one of the big ones was significant. For instance, once I could clearly see the moon and it&#8217;s craters, I truly thought I was seeing everything there was. However, the smallest crater my scope would pick up, was between 3 and 5 kilometres across. Now, that&#8217;s one big hole in the ground. Obviously what I could see was a very small percent of the craters on the moon. The Hubble Space telescope, for instance, could see a &#8220;lit candle&#8221; on the moon&#8217;s surface. In between a lit candle and a three kilometre crater, were all the things I was missing. However, it was, still, more than Galileo had, when discovering the planets and star patterns hundreds of years before. A few months into my hobby, I am becoming pretty competent at locating, planets and well known stars. I had even found a few nebulas, galaxies and some star clusters. Nobody cared. And then Ron came home for a visit. I could not wait to show her my hobby. I just knew she was going to be impressed. One bright, clear starlit evening, I take all of my equipment outside. After some major messing around, I had managed to get Saturn, right square in the middle of my lens. I change lens, to find the absolute perfect resolution. I got the auto-tracking to follow its path. It was amazing. You could clearly see Saturn, resplendent with rings, in full view, in the middle of my lens. My heart was racing! I call for Ron. After a few calls, I see her, reluctantly appearing out the patio door. She is not looking happy. She says, &#8220;Dad what do you want&#8221;. I explain to her about my telescope and how it works, computer driven, night sky GPS, auto tracking and all the good stuff. I know she was impressed, but hid it well. Finally I explain to her that I have Saturn and it&#8217;s ring for her to look at. She leans over, gazes into the eye piece, hesitates for a second and then straightens up. She looks at me, like I am a dork, and says, &#8220;Dad, that is a movie you are running in there&#8221;. I start to protest, but I can only, now, see her back, as she flounces away. She crosses the patio, opens the door, and with a SLAM, disappears inside. I have just taken another kick, square in the huevos. Deysi could always make me laugh. She had a way of saying things that went right to the heart of a matter. One of these times happened in Texas. We were on a road trip with two friends from Canada, R&#38;D. We were west of Houston, somewhere between home and San Antonio. Mostly we drove thru Texas ranch lands. We stopped every once in a while to take photos. It was idyllic. It was now sometime in mid afternoon. We had been driving for a few hours, exchanging comments on the scenes. We passed herds of Texas Longhorn cows, Brahma bulls and miles of pasture land. Then Deysi sees something. &#8220;Stop&#8221;, she says. I pull over in front of a &#8220;For Sale&#8221; sign on the edge of the road. It appears to be a small plot of pasture land, with a tiny, weather beaten, dilapidated shack standing on it. The roof was sagging, the walls were bare, exposed wood, and it lurched on a 40 degree angle to the side. There was nothing salvageable there. It might have been 400 square feet of trouble. Deysi looks at it, and very seriously, in her best &#8220;realtor&#8221; voice, pronounces, &#8220;Yup folks, another little fixer upper&#8221;. I howled! I could just picture, one of the &#8220;many&#8221; realtors we had dealt with in the past, saying these exact words, with straight faces. Trying to paint a positive picture, of the piece of crap, that, they were now pushing you to buy. It was hilarious. Maybe it was the long drive, the hot sun, but in my mind it was one of her best &#8220;one liners&#8221; ever. R, a former realtor, himself, howled along with me. He could see himself in Deysi&#8217;s biting commentary. I am sure he had come up with the same description for pieces of crap that he had sold in the past. This one comment made our whole day. Every time I thought of her deathly serious face and deadpan delivery, I broke out again. It is funny how some, seemingly innocent events, can stay so long in your mind. These ones from Texas have done just that. Everyone probably thinks they are silly, however, that is all my fading memory, spit out, this time. Stay tuned for more adventures from Texas.</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://jimbored.com/a-terror-attack-in-my-barbecue-texas-2002/">A TERROR ATTACK IN MY BARBECUE &#8211; TEXAS 2002</a> appeared first on <a href="https://jimbored.com">Before My Clutch Slips</a>.</p>
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		<post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">9802</post-id>	</item>
		<item>
		<title>BEWARE NORSEMEN HERE COMES JIMBO RED &#8211; YEAR 2000</title>
		<link>https://jimbored.com/beware-norsemen-here-comes-jimbo-red-year-2000/</link>
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		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jimbo Red]]></dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Mon, 07 Mar 2022 04:37:28 +0000</pubDate>
				<category><![CDATA[RAMBLINGS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[NORWAY - all]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[SCOTLAND - all]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://jimbored.com/?p=8807</guid>

					<description><![CDATA[<p>After a brief foray, in my mind, to Mexico, I am back to my memories of our time in Scotland. As you are aware, I had broken my (more or less chronological) stream of writing, about adventures in and around Scotland. I did that, in order, to fill in memories, that flit past, from time to time. As elusive as fireflies, I must grab them as they appear, and smash them down onto paper, before they are gone forever. My ability, to instantly, recall visions from the past, is no longer dependable. I find more and more, a confusion over dates, places and happenings, in my memories. It could be that the &#8220;clutch IS finally slipping&#8221;, however I&#8217;ll forge on, as if it isn&#8217;t This next piece is a collection of ramblings around Norway, while we were still based in Scotland. I must say, that when they asked me to go there, I was pumped. Visions of big ol&#8217; Vikings, plundering and pillaging, danced thru my mind. I could not wait to see what this land was all about. My client&#8217;s had a facility there, in a place called Farsund. It was down on the southwest coast of Norway. They needed some help, and figured that I was just the guy too sacrifice, to the Norsemen. I will not try to put these ramblings in any order, but just write them as they appear in my mind. Over the years, I made many trips to Norway. A few things stick in my mind. Perhaps, not so interesting; but here goes. The first and most vivid image is of reopening the coating plant. It had been dormant for a period of time (3-5 years I believe). However, with a new contract from Statoil (the Norwegian government oil and gas company), we were, once again, ready to rock and roll. The task was to restart the facility, secure labor, equipment and materials, and get ready for production. The largest problem we were now faced with, seemed to be a labour force. Farsund was not a large town and after a few years, we worried that the labour pool had dispersed, for &#8220;greener&#8221; pastures. What we experienced, was a thing of legend. Before I go on, the politics of Norway must be understood. There were vast oil and gas resources in the North Sea, along the coast of Norway. It was all owned by the State. No foreign ownership of these reserves was allowed. The usual players, such as Shell, Chevron, Exxon, etc., had no ownership of natural resources. Therefore, their usual plundering of this country&#8217;s resources did not take place. Much like they would have, in any other &#8220;capitalist&#8221; society. The Norwegian government was 100% Socialist. They owned everything! And very much, controlled the will of the people. Unlike almost every other socialist state, they were very successful. Everyone, that knows me, knows well of my &#8220;conservative&#8221;, &#8220;capitalist&#8221; leanings. The very thought of a socialist state, had the hackles on my neck standing up. It was my belief, that socialism of a society, was one small step away, from the dreaded communist hoard, taking over. I must also say that 99% of the time, I was 100% correct. Many places, such as Cuba, Venezuela, Laos, North Korea, North Vietnam, Russia and others, had tried socialism, and had failed miserably, just prior to the communist party, taking over. I believe that the socialist ideals, faded once all the government resources were used and the particular country fell into poverty. Norway was a grand exception, due to the large petro based economy. The point is that, when we returned to Farsund, those many years later, almost all of our workforce was still available to come back to work. They were all still in the area. Out of 175 people, 170 were sitting around waiting for us, or someone else, to re-open the plant. During this period of unemployment, they were being paid, about 75% of their previous wages, by the Norwegian Government. If I remember correctly, they were given 75% for the first 5 years, then 60% for a few years, then 50% forever. It did not foster the need, to go find work, once you were laid off. Rather, it encouraged you to just go fishing, while you waited for someone to bring you a job. In any event, finding labour was the least of our problems. I must say, their system of government was very successful, and remains so, to this day. My nature, is to criticize any form of government that does fit with my vision democracy. I would add, that the Norsemen, I encountered, no longer had an adventurous nature. They were not loading up their boats, to go plunder the world. Rather, it seemed, like their spirit was gone. Myself, I was always more of a &#8220;plunderer&#8221;, than a &#8220;sitter&#8221;. However, I cannot argue with the success of this system. As long as you have one of the major oil and gas reserves in the world, then maybe it is right, too spent it on the people. Hmmmm, perhaps, I am, a closet Liberal, after all. So with the basis for restarting our business, intact. We set about gathering the equipment and major materials, required for our operations. It was then that I experienced the magnitude of my client&#8217;s operations. It seems, that they were to take 30&#8243; diameter, 40&#8242; long pieces of steel pipe, wrap cement and iron ore around them, and then send them offshore, to be welded together, then sunk in the ocean, to create an oil or gas transmission pipeline. My immediate reaction was, &#8220;bullshit&#8221;. These were huge, heavy pieces of pipe and, &#8220;you are going to wrap cement around them and then move them around&#8221;? &#8220;Yeah right, sure you are!&#8221; Not only that, the cement/iron ore mix, they were going to apply, was 4 inches thick! The principle being, to add enough &#8220;weight&#8221; to the pipeline to keep it in place at the bottom of the ocean. If I remember, a single 40 foot long piece of pipe, once coated, weighed almost 30 tonnes. Geezus. The secret was, that they would mix iron ore &#8220;fines&#8221; (or ground up grains of ore), with the cement, into a very dry mixture (by adding only a small amount of water) and wrap it, over a rebar cage, and around the pipe. This mix, seemed to stick, to the pipe, like &#8220;gum in your hair&#8221;. All the while, that we were getting ready, my mouth was saying, &#8220;OK, I buy that&#8221;, but my brain was saying, &#8220;there is NO way!&#8221; I thought they were just pranking me, because I was new to the business. One day, while deeply involved in some form of major panic. I look out the office window. And there before me, is the largest ship, I had ever seen in my life. It made, those that we had used in Japan, those many before, appear as toy ships. It was huge. Along it&#8217;s length, every 30 feet, it had overhead cranes, mounted on the deck. There must have been, at least, a dozen of them. I asked, one of the guys, working nearby, &#8220;what the hell is that ship carrying?&#8221; His reply was &#8220;iron ore&#8221;. I could not believe it, and still thought, it was some elaborate joke, that they were playing on me. Soon enough, the ship&#8217;s crew, used their deck cranes, to lift the covers off a couple of the holds. It was then that trouble started. The iron ore, had to be unloaded, by use of the deck cranes, from the ship&#8217;s holds, and over the side, onto trucks. The point was, that our Norwegian Labour Union decided that, they, and only they, could operate the cranes on Norwegian soil. The ship&#8217;s captain is not having, anyone, other than his own people, operate anything, on his ship. So we are now at a &#8220;standoff&#8221;. Neither side is budging. Meanwhile, the clock is ticking. We are given, about 72 hours of &#8220;free unloading&#8221; by the ship&#8217;s owner. After that, &#8220;demurrage&#8221; (or penalties) set in, for each hour of delay. Demurrage, is a huge number and escalates, on a sliding scale, as unloading time passes. This sets our management into a frenzy. The, problem must be solved, the penalties were huge. This panic then flows down to me in the form of abuse. Once again, I was personally responsible for hiring this ship and putting the future success of our business, in jeopardy. Geezus! The Norsemen, were really not bothered, by our problem. For them, right was right, no matter the cost. They felt no sense of urgency. On the other side, the ship&#8217;s captain, is exercising his authority, and is planted, firmly, in the path of progress. Finally, after some frenzied, negotiations, with the ship&#8217;s owner, it was agreed, that a &#8220;joint&#8221; team of our guys and the ship&#8217;s crew, be formed to unload. Basically it meant, one person, from each team sitting together, operating the same crane. It seemed kind of childish, however it was not the first time I had run into labour-union problems in my career. Like new found lovers, the little dears, sat together and shared the controls for the cranes. All I could come up with was, ”why me lord”? Unloading starts, one small bucket load at a time. It was lifted over the side of the vessel and piled into a heap on the dock side. From there it was picked up and loaded into dump trucks to be moved to the storage area. This operation, once started, ran for 24 hours per day, until every last ounce of ore was unloaded from the ship. it was an intense time. One breakdown of equipment, labour or transport, meant potential disaster to the process. Little by little, this huge &#8220;bulk carrier&#8221; was unloaded and the ore moved to the storage area. Up too this point, I had no idea, of just how much cargo, one of these bulk carriers could handle. It was, to say the least, impressive. Little, by little a mountain of ore was piled up in the storage area. My last memory of this iron ore unloading process was of the effort made to empty every last grain of ore from the ship. It must be remembered that these bulk carriers, hauled many different types of cargo. From, wood pulp, to grain, to iron ore, gravel, or coconuts. This meant that every last grain of ore had to be unloaded from the ships holds. Once the crews had unloaded as much as possible, with the crane buckets, they lifted a &#8220;bobcat&#8221; frontend loader into the hold. Along with a crew and their shovels, they cleaned each hold until, you could eat out of it. Well maybe NOT, but they were very clean and ready for the next cargo. Once unloading was complete, they close all of the hatches. And with an &#8220;adios amigo&#8221;, this big ass ship, disappeared into the ocean. They wasted no time, they were enroute to their next cargo. My last thought of this time, was the huge iron ore mountain, that came from the bowels of this ship. To this day, I am amazed with the thought, that, it was possible to stick four inches of cement, mixed with iron ore, a bit of sand and a &#8220;tablespoon&#8221; of water, onto a huge piece of pipe. Then lift it up, move it around and sink it into the ocean. Somehow, it just doesn&#8217;t seem right. So ends this post, of my first memories of Norway and the Norsemen. I will follow this with some more reflections, of my time there, in the next few days.</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://jimbored.com/beware-norsemen-here-comes-jimbo-red-year-2000/">BEWARE NORSEMEN HERE COMES JIMBO RED &#8211; YEAR 2000</a> appeared first on <a href="https://jimbored.com">Before My Clutch Slips</a>.</p>
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		<post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">8807</post-id>	</item>
		<item>
		<title>A QUEST FOR THE HEALD TARTAN &#8211; SCOTLAND 1998</title>
		<link>https://jimbored.com/a-quest-for-the-heald-tartan-scotland-1998/</link>
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		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jimbo Red]]></dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Tue, 25 May 2021 18:22:52 +0000</pubDate>
				<category><![CDATA[RAMBLINGS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[SCOTLAND - all]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://jimbored.com/?p=6929</guid>

					<description><![CDATA[<p>I will now leave, the memories of our brief sojourn in Canada behind, and move on to our time in Scotland. We had been lucky enough to return to Canada in the mid &#8217;90&#8217;s, to provide our girls some grounding in their Canadian heritage. It was a great chance to allow them to meet and bond with their myriad aunts, uncles and cousins that had popped up while we travelled overseas. As for myself, being back in Canada was little different than being overseas. I spent 90% of the time overseas anyway, only without having Deysi at my side. There came an opportunity to join a group, in Scotland, and once again travel as a family. We thought long and hard, but the chance to travel together, was over-powering. And soon we were packed and off to Scotland. Before I get too involved in our adventures in Scotland, I would like to recount one rambling memory, from our time there. This memory pretty much demonstrates the attitude in the British Isles between the English, Scottish, Irish and Welsh. Each group had their own cultural identity, and submitted reluctantly to British rule. It was obvious that each one of the smaller groups, would fight the English, once again, if they perceived any chance of victory. To say an uneasy peace existed, was an understatement. The tension could be felt in the air. The title for the cover photo, comes from a visit by my niece Michy and husband Jonny, with us in Edinburgh. Jonny had definite Scottish roots. We therefore spent a great deal of time trying to find what estate, his family had come from. Michy patiently accompanied him on this quest that, ultimately, covered a lot of Northern Scotland. The closest we got to establishing his roots, was in tracking down his &#8220;family&#8221; name in Edinburgh. The root we found was to a &#8220;milk delivery driver&#8221; from the early 1900&#8217;s. Not to be upstaged, after we had made this remarkable finding, Michy entered the most famous tartan shop in Edinburgh. It was now her turn to discover her roots, and gain a little glory. She wandered around and snooped for a while, before planting herself in front of a fully &#8220;kilted&#8221;, very Scottish, salesperson. She looked him in the eye and demanded to see the &#8220;Heald&#8221; Tartan. He hesitated for a second, puffed up his chest, crossed his eyes, tilted his head and sniffed out&#8230;.. &#8220;HEALD is an English name is it not?&#8221; With that he turned and flounced off, leaving Michy to shrug her shoulders and give him a &#8220;WTF is his problem&#8221; look. What, an Englishman in a Scot&#8217;s tartan store! I coulda peed myself. Another rambling memory is of Ange and our ride to her school, one rainy winter morn. She was enrolled in St. G&#8217;s private school for girls. She wore full uniform to school and looked so cute. I drove her most mornings, as her school was on my way to work. We would talk about all sorts of things. It was my opportunity to fill her head with family standards, thoughts and morals, while she was my captive. I took every chance I got. I was slowly turning her into a hard ass &#8220;righty&#8221;. However one day I undid all of my gains with one mis-statement. It happened like this. Each day we passed a field, smack in the middle of the city, that was always full of sheep. She would look out the window and make cooing sounds at the pretty little woolies. One day she asked&#8230;&#8230;&#8230;. &#8220;Dad why do some of the little lambs have blue spots on them and some have pink?&#8221; I did not have an idea, but never wanting to be caught without an answer. I let out a large belching sound, smacked my lips and pronounced, &#8220;the colors are to tell them, which ones, go to which school, for lunch each day, yyuummm!&#8221; She said, &#8220;no dad!&#8221;, then thought for a minute and said, &#8220;you&#8217;re not serious? Are you?&#8221; I belched loudly once more, smacked my chops and said, &#8220;yep, the blue ones are for your school. Yum lamb stew today, methinks&#8221;! She looked at me aghast and a loud mournful sob escaped her mouth. The tears were flowing. Ol&#8217; Bubbaloo, called me &#8220;an insensitive pig&#8221;. Now I was in serious shit. I tried to take it back, but she was forever traumatized. Some days we would pass the field and it would be empty. I would just have to say to Ange, &#8220;see what&#8217;d I tell ya. They&#8217;re all gone. Musta come and cleaned it out yesterday&#8221;! That would set off a new round of tears! It also transpired, at this same time, in the UK, there was a bad spate of Mad Cow Disease. Although not whipped to the level of the Covid pandemic, it did have its moments. It affected this story because, coincidently, the Mad Cow Disease prevented beef from being served for school lunches. Only, bbbaaaahhhh bah, (little lambs) could be served for school lunches. Of course my little insight into the pretty little painted lambs, put Ange OFF all lamb, sheep and mutton lunch options, FOREVER. Another rambling memory of our early days in Scotland was shortly after the arrival of Ron, to join us. Deysi had by now, bribed, bullied and coerced her into coming to Edinburgh to complete her university. We all missed her deeply, however no one, more so, than her mom. My end of the deal, to entice her into this move, was to promise to buy her a car when she arrived. So, true to my word, we went car shopping. Geezus what a surprise. The exchange rate between Scotland and Canada was 2.5:1. That meant 10,000 Pound Sterling was $25,000 Canadian. The prices were in the same numbers, as in Canada, however, now conversion made the prices 2-1/2 times greater. What I had planned to spend, would buy &#8220;nada&#8221; in Edinburgh. Well I had promised; and a promise is a promise. During our shopping trips, I came to realize that Ron and I were far apart when it came to the type of car to suit her. Her tastes ran to high end, sporty, flashy convertible speedsters; while mine trended towards the Datsun sedan. We looked at quite a few cars, and more and more I understood that, even, $25,000 Canadian would get us little. Finally Ron found her car. it was a ten year old convertible sports car, with 150,000 miles, that had never been driven under the speed limit. She fell in love. My heart sank. I knew this car was trouble! It just sat there, begging me to buy it. For once I stood up and said, &#8220;we are not buying that money pit&#8221;. Her mom backed me. Ron was pissed. I tried to show her lots of other options, but now she was &#8220;dug in&#8221; and resisting all of my efforts at conciliation. Finally we found a beautiful Toyota Corolla, four door sedan, with less than 100,000 miles and less than $25,000. We proudly took her to see it and this is where I learned another lesson about our girl. This one was about the depth of her resolve and about the standards she now had set for herself. She took one look at my treasure, looked at me like I was losing it, and proclaimed, &#8220;I&#8217;d rather walk than drive that&#8221;! I was gob smacked! Her mom said, &#8220;just give her a few days, she&#8217;ll come around&#8221;. Not our Ron, from that day on she walked everyplace she went as long as we stayed there. Now that is what I call resolve. She was hilarious!</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://jimbored.com/a-quest-for-the-heald-tartan-scotland-1998/">A QUEST FOR THE HEALD TARTAN &#8211; SCOTLAND 1998</a> appeared first on <a href="https://jimbored.com">Before My Clutch Slips</a>.</p>
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		<post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">6929</post-id>	</item>
		<item>
		<title>ROPING IN MEMORIES OF MY PAST AS THEY STAMPEDE THRU MY MIND</title>
		<link>https://jimbored.com/roping-in-memories-of-my-past-as-they-stampede-thru-my-mind/</link>
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		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jimbo Red]]></dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Fri, 23 Apr 2021 17:36:15 +0000</pubDate>
				<category><![CDATA[RAMBLINGS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[EARLY YEARS - all]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://jimbored.com/?p=6856</guid>

					<description><![CDATA[<p>This next post, will break away from of our time in Calgary, and drift back to visions, of earlier times. Because of the fragile state of my mind, I must grasp and write down memories as they thunder past me. Otherwise, they will be gone forever. The timing for these short clips is during the Early Years, which is everything pre-&#8217;70&#8217;s. They are in no particular time frame, but basically recounted in the order they enter my mind. I am sure that most of my memories, of the past, have little interest to anyone on this earth. Please humour an old man, I will move on to more contemporary times soon. The first one, is of my grandmother, on my father&#8217;s side. She lived alone in the small village of Rosalind, deep in the Alberta, prairies. After our departure from Rosalind, &#8220;remember the great inferno&#8221;, where dad&#8217;s welding shop burned to the ground, we would visit gramma as often as dad could load us all in his car. The timing was probably in the late 1950&#8217;s, but the same incident took place many times. It helped to shape my obsessive compulsive personality. This time it was a lesson about compromise, priorities and portion control. It went something like this. One of my gramma&#8217;s favorite indulgences was peanut butter. She absolutely loved it and ate copious amounts. I believe she bought it in truckload lots. We were allowed to eat her hoard of peanut butter, with thick toast, at breakfast everyday. However, there were rules attached and this is where my visions of self control and compromise come from. Gramma would set us all around her table, cook toast on her wood burning stove top and bring out a big barrel of peanut butter. You could have your toast, one of two ways. Either with butter and a thin layer of peanut butter, or, no butter and a 1/2&#8243; thick layer of peanut butter, on the bare toast. You could not have butter and thick peanut butter. A choice must be made, either both in moderation, or a compromise foregoing butter for unlimited peanut butter. Believe me, if you chose to forego the butter, then there was no limit to the amount of thick, cloying peanut butter you could eat. Our gramma understood that butter along with peanut butter, could not be good for you on a daily basis. She therefore, practised self control by limiting her butter intake, and then going crazy on the other topping. Somehow, to a young mind it kinda made sense. I have used her method to balance things out, often in life. For instance, at times when I eat two or three burgers, I might well cut the intake of French fries. Sometimes when drinking copious amounts of beer, I would refrain from eating, to balance the calories. My standards, now, have a lot to do with, how gramma saw life. I bellied up and ate my share of 1/2&#8243; thick peanut butter alongside her. I was her favorite. Because the previous memory was a little long, and perhaps boring, I will keep the next one short. This event happened in the mid &#8217;60&#8217;s. It consisted of a horrible trick, played on me by my mom and evil sister Murt. You remember her, the one of the &#8220;peeing under the swing&#8221; fame. At this point in time I was about 15 and living alone in my basement lair. My evil older brother, L, had left for university in Montreal. By this time in my life, I was quite full of myself and had decided that I was fully mature enough to start smoking. Money was not easy to come by, so each and every package, I managed to purchase, was special to me. I used to enjoy one before school, sneak off the property for one at lunch, and have one or two on the way home, after school. I was real proud of myself, felt grown, powerful and manly. My self image, was that the girls saw me as the &#8220;Marlboro man&#8221;! Geezus how our classroom must have smelled. It was not only me sneaking the odd puff, but me and everyone of my friends. We never smelled the odor and thought we were very clever hiding the evidence of our sins. At home, I would hurry directly downstairs and hide my precious smokes in my bed. Oh, I thought I was so clever. Everybody except dad and I smelled my smoke. At the time dad was furiously &#8220;pulling&#8221; on his pipe every chance he had. He could smell, nothing! This went on for a while, me enjoying my new found manhood, and my mom and sisters hating the smell, as well as, my new found manhood. One day my mom and the evil Murt, get a brilliant idea. While I was otherwise occupied, they snuck into my room, found my stash and had their way with them. I can hear them now; my mom saying, &#8220;this will fix the little buggar&#8221;, and my sister cackling her shrill witch&#8217;s cackle. Oh how funny they were! They took each and every one of my smokes out of it&#8217;s precious box. They then proceeded to poke fifty holes in each one with a tiny needle. Pretty funny, eh? After completing their evil task, they replaced my precious sticks of pleasure, in the box and returned it to its hiding place. I&#8217;m sure I can still hear them cackling. My little sis S, was not brought into the scheme, as she would not have been able to keep the secret. She would have spilled her guts before they had made it back upstairs. The next day dawns, and off to school I go. I must say, that during this period of my young life, I was never so happy too leave for school each day. No one had to push me out the door, I was never too &#8220;sick&#8221; to get up and head out each day. Outside and on my way to school, I pull out my little treasure and fire one up. I huffed and I puffed, but could not get that satisfying lung full of tobacco smoke. At first I thought that I must have a hole in my lungs. Usually, one puff would fill me with smoke and start me coughing. Searching for an answer, I went through different scenarios. I had been sold defective smokes, nah; maybe I needed a stronger brand, nah. What could be wrong? I took out a fresh piece and looked at it quizzically, only to discover tiny holes in it. Immediately, defective smokes came to mind. No wonder I couldn&#8217;t get a satisfying pull on it. Then realization floods me and I see my evil sister&#8217;s satisfied smirk at me, as I left for school that morning. &#8220;The witch&#8221;, I screamed out. &#8220;What am I to do&#8221;? One of my friends offered a solution. It seems like, if you use some scotch tape, you could tape over enough of the holes to achieve some sort of satisfaction. So that is how I smoked for the next few days. Two lessons I learned from this, were; too better hide my smokes and that, if I confronted big sis, I was going to be in so much trouble for smoking, with my dad. I seethed inside but stayed silent, while she tortured me for weeks, mimicking me smoking, and gasping for breath once her &#8220;holes&#8221; kicked in. It was a long time before I forgave her for this.</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://jimbored.com/roping-in-memories-of-my-past-as-they-stampede-thru-my-mind/">ROPING IN MEMORIES OF MY PAST AS THEY STAMPEDE THRU MY MIND</a> appeared first on <a href="https://jimbored.com">Before My Clutch Slips</a>.</p>
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		<post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">6856</post-id>	</item>
		<item>
		<title>THIS BLOG IS ONE YEAR OLD! AMAZING, IMPOSSIBLE, YOU GOTTA BE KIDDING ME</title>
		<link>https://jimbored.com/this-blog-is-one-year-old-amazing-impossible-you-gotta-be-kidding-me/</link>
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		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jimbo Red]]></dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Mon, 05 Apr 2021 15:54:40 +0000</pubDate>
				<category><![CDATA[RAMBLINGS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[CANADA-all]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://jimbored.com/?p=6751</guid>

					<description><![CDATA[<p>HAHAHAHAHAHA, I bet you didn&#8217;t think I&#8217;d be here a year, from when I started this blog. I am though! Beginning Last April, I was quarantined in our house by ol’ Bubbaloo, Ange, Ron, JMW, and D2. Basically they ganged up on me and overwhelmed my resistance to “state” mandated control. They wouldn’t have beaten me down in my prime, but here in my looming senility, I was no match for their combined efforts. I allowed them to imprison my body, but they couldn’t cage my mind. Hell, even I have no idea of where my mind is going, from minute to minute. It was like trying to cage an insane dervish. Thus my blog was born, as a means to allow my mind to travel to places where my body was forbidden to go. The original idea was to attempt to write down some thoughts of my life, before everything is deleted from my memory card. I did not even know if I could set up a blog, let alone write something, that anyone would read. Geezus, I didn&#8217;t even know what a &#8220;blog&#8221; was! Bubbaloo humoured me, hoping I would find something to do, other than irritate her, incessantly. Ange said, “hell yes dad you can do it!” Condescending? Maybe! The final push came when Ron decided to call my bluff and buy me a course on Website development. I donned my school clothes. Well ok, Bubbaloo dressed me in my new clothes and off to school I went. I cannot remember being so excited, since the time, “when the pigs ate my little sister”. Just kidding, don’t get all upset. School taxed my old brain severely, but I persevered and graduated. I had learned how to create a &#8220;blog&#8221; and what you see in front of you is the result. From that starting point, I have created 279 drops of genius, which detail some of our life as travellers. During my confinement, I was allowed outside, only to do battle with the &#8220;Amazon Jungle&#8221;, that lives in our yard. Bubbaloo decided that the risk of my catching the dreaded disease from a tree was well worth the opportunity for exercise. This lasted 4 months. I began writing like a man obsessed. Finally, I was released from improisonment. I could, now, go out for limited periods. Not to go golfing or fishing, but I was allowed to go shopping, and for cardio walks with ol&#8217; Bubbaloo. My summer passed like this. At this point in time, 250,000 pearls of memory have been put on paper. Bubbaloo has read each and every one of them. She has, for the most part, been supportive of my writing. I have only felt her wrath a few times, where I wrote, something that I might have been better off, forgetting. Ange has been a great help. She is brimming with praise, filled with constructive criticism. Sometimes she states the obvious, with things like, &#8220;Dad you are really long winded&#8221;, &#8220;Maybe you need some help with punctuation&#8221;, or &#8220;How about a few paragraph breaks, so I&#8217;m not faced with a wall of text, each time I open your Blog&#8221;. I try to be welcoming of her criticism, but invariably, I am thrown into a sulk. Ron, is mostly a silent reader, but I can feel her, &#8220;you are so full of shit&#8221; attitude. D2, JMW, A and T are faithful readers. D2 and JMW have heard me tell many of my stories, during times when they could not get away from me. I think they are happy to read of my exploits, rather than being cornered and &#8220;force fed&#8221; them. Readers, like A and T are loyal, and who knows what motivates them to read my drivel. I know some of you would like to tell them, &#8220;Geezus, get a life, will ya&#8221;. In the course of writing my blog, nearly 600 people have visited it from time to time. These visits resulted in nearly 8000 views of individual articles. One thousand times, someone has &#8220;liked&#8221; an article or comment. I find this amazing! I am also sure that many of my readers, use my writing, as a sure cure for insomnia. There are also many other, loyal readers, mostly from Bubbaloo&#8217;s family. It is now April 2021, and I am celebrating ONE YEAR of retrieving memories and stories from my fading mind. Once in a while, I have exploded into a &#8220;rant&#8221; or tantrum, when something upsets my usual calm demeanour. I have also quit writing for brief periods, especially when Ange or Bubbaloo are critical of what I produce. My skin is not so thick as many of you think. I also can be sent into fits of crying, pouting and sulking, when my literary skills are questioned. The next year will see me continue my efforts at dredging up memories of the past. It&#8217;s getting harder now as the girls get older (in the stories) and remember much of what I am writing about. It is more difficult to be creative with the truth. I am &#8220;called out&#8221; more often. However, I will persevere and continue prying out memories and writing them down as I see them. Please enjoy what you can, ignore what you can&#8217;t, agree or disagree with my opinion pieces and help an old man dream his way through the later years. We will, hopefully speak again in another year. That is, if I don&#8217;t have a major fit and quit writing, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO JIMBO RED! ALWAYS REMEMBER, THAT &#8220;A SLIPPING CLUTCH&#8221; IS A BEAUTIFUL THING! Thank you one and all.</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://jimbored.com/this-blog-is-one-year-old-amazing-impossible-you-gotta-be-kidding-me/">THIS BLOG IS ONE YEAR OLD! AMAZING, IMPOSSIBLE, YOU GOTTA BE KIDDING ME</a> appeared first on <a href="https://jimbored.com">Before My Clutch Slips</a>.</p>
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		<post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">6751</post-id>	</item>
		<item>
		<title>OH YES I STILL REMEMBER OUTDOOR PLUMBING &#8211; THE EARLY YEARS 1950’s.</title>
		<link>https://jimbored.com/oh-yes-i-still-remember-outdoor-plumbing-the-early-years-1950s/</link>
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		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jimbo Red]]></dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Sun, 28 Feb 2021 23:18:58 +0000</pubDate>
				<category><![CDATA[RAMBLINGS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[EARLY YEARS - all]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://jimbored.com/?p=6394</guid>

					<description><![CDATA[<p>Once again, my mind drifts off to the early years of my life and too things that left an indelible image in my mind. Unlike most of the days gone past, memories of which have been scrubbed from my mind as clean as an erased blackboard, some small and insignificant flashes of my early life remain. It is these I cling to while rambling thru these posts. I vaguely remember our early years in Red Deer after leaving the prairie hamlet of Rosalind in the early 50&#8217;s. Shortly after my Dad&#8217;s business had burned, to a crisp, in the Great Inferno. In the first couple of years in our new home, we suffered the experience of no indoor plumbing. It was to arrive by the late 1950&#8217;s in our part of town. I know all of you younger than 30 or so, are shrinking back in horror and disbelief wondering, &#8220;where did you go for relief&#8221;? Having been told, they might say &#8220;NEVER&#8221;, but I say &#8220;give them about one week and they would joyously embrace their outhouse and the Simpson Sears catalog found inside&#8221;. Our place of relief was called the Outdoor Toilet. It was an imposing building, to a young child and harboured many of my personal fears or dislikes. Every household had one of these structures, made of unpainted wood that stood about 7 feet tall and was about 5&#8242; long on each side. It had a door and a latch, so someone had to be inside to lock it. Inside this menacing looking structure was a bench seat with &#8220;one&#8221; hole about the size of a butt, cut into the seat (unless you had the deluxe version which had two holes, a spot for males and one for females). Whatever the type was, it was perched over an eight foot deep hole dug into the ground. Once that hole was filled, another could be dug and the outhouse moved. These outhouses, were perched at the back of each lot and ran all the way down each side of the alleyway. Everyone had to have one, and these were the great equalizers of society. No matter how rich, smart, beautiful, snobby or high society you were, at some point you were going to have to visit the outdoor crapper in the same manner as the most common and humble of the rest of us peasants. There were no decorations or vanity mirrors inside, only the bench, the hole, a paper role and (someone&#8217;s) Dad&#8217;s old newspaper. This, seemingly, humble structure had a part in shaping many of my early habits. For, instance I remember being terribly afraid of what lurked in the dark, so unless I was in danger of unleashing the worst flood or a major crap storm, I never went outside for relief after dark, and you sure didn&#8217;t want to be accompanied by my brother, who would stand outside, slinging insults at me. Also, because there was no heating inside, I don&#8217;t ever remember going during the winter days. I heard rumours, probably from classmates, of little kids, their butts frozen to the seat and unable to free themselves, discovered only upon being missed, a couple of hours later. I&#8217;m not sure how, but I have no memory of a visit to the crapper in the cold. I guess I just waited for school in the morning, which might account for half of the days in my youth. One vivid memory is of a Halloween when I was 9 or 10 and my dad came up with a nefarious plan to catch the &#8220;little buggars&#8221; that spent their Halloweens going up and down the alleys, pushing over outhouses as a &#8216;trick&#8221;. They would push them onto their sides and then move on. My Dad hated righting the toilet in the dark late at night and could usually be heard cussing in the back, on discovery of his outhouse laying on it&#8217;s side. So he came up with a plan. The way he described it was that because it was so dark out there, he would merely push or slide his outhouse about two feet forward onto our property from the alley. This would leave a gaping hole of about two feet between the alley and the back of the toilet building. What was down this two feet opening was a thing of nightmares and didn&#8217;t smell real good. His theory was that in the pitch dark, when they snuck up to the outhouse to do their evil deed, they would not see the yawning chasm behind the outhouse and would then fall into the hole and be irrevocably caught. Mom was telling him, &#8220;Slim I don&#8217;t think that&#8217;s a good idea&#8221;! Mom could be the master of understatement. In any event another halloween passed, and thank god my dad didn&#8217;t catch a &#8220;little buggar&#8221; in his crap trap. That memory stuck with me, and whenever I approached that outhouse from the alleyway, I gave it a wide berth and walked past it on tiptoes. Just in case dad had moved it away from the hole again for one reason or another. I would have rather been hit by a bus, than fall into that open cesspool. One last little outhouse story I am reminded of, is of a cabin, by a lake north of Edmonton, owned by Uncle Cleeef and Lalita. This had to do with our weekend visits, there, in the early days. The girls (Deysi and Lalita) refused to use it. They would &#8220;hold it&#8221; all weekend and get meaner and meaner as time went on. Sunday afternoon when we would leave the cabin, we had to make a mad dash for the nearest town, about 10 miles away. We would fly into the parking lot of the local service station, come to a full screeching, sliding ,4 wheel stop at the store or gas station. The doors would fly open and the two of them would pile out and scramble for the restroom. Lord, if it was ever occupied, we would have been at risk of a major flooding. Once they had visited the public facility they were a lot nicer for the remainder of the trip. Talk about just in time delivery!</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://jimbored.com/oh-yes-i-still-remember-outdoor-plumbing-the-early-years-1950s/">OH YES I STILL REMEMBER OUTDOOR PLUMBING &#8211; THE EARLY YEARS 1950’s.</a> appeared first on <a href="https://jimbored.com">Before My Clutch Slips</a>.</p>
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		<post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">6394</post-id>	</item>
		<item>
		<title>AAAHHH, HOME AT LAST, NOW TO SINK SOME ROOTS</title>
		<link>https://jimbored.com/aaahhh-home-at-last-now-to-sink-some-roots/</link>
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		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jimbo Red]]></dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Thu, 28 Jan 2021 05:21:01 +0000</pubDate>
				<category><![CDATA[RAMBLINGS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[CANADA-all]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://jimbored.com/?p=5974</guid>

					<description><![CDATA[<p>In the last post, I jumped ahead of myself a wee bit, in order to get down on paper, a few memories of the girls in their new environment, while those memories yet remained with me. Ron was still not quite sure that she hadn&#8217;t been kidnapped from her home in the USA and then brought to Canada illegally. Remember her famous words when we told her about moving back to Canada, &#8220;not me Dad, I&#8217;m an American girl. Just leave me here&#8221;. Ange on the other hand was &#8220;hahaha, lalalala whatever&#8221;. She enjoyed the closeness and attention of gramma&#8217;s, grandpa&#8217;s, aunts, uncles, and, by now, a growing list of cousins, as Ol&#8217; Bubbaloo&#8217;s siblings grew and started to propagate, procreate and pollinate. We had arrived, found housing, office space, set up a business, found a client and got busy with our new life. All in a very short period of time. In this post I will ramble a bit. And try to paint a portrait of the chaos that seemed to follow us around, and a bit of how we dealt with it. First of all, let&#8217;s just say that while the girls were sinking roots deep into the Alberta soil. The roots that I sunk were very stunted and never did quite catch hold. It seemed that my destiny was not to remain in the land of my parents, for very long. Almost immediately, upon throwing myself into this whirlwind of activity that surrounded our arrival back. I found my butt back on an airplane seat and off once again. Let me say, that in a couple of short months after arrival back to Alberta, our life was once again in turmoil. I had started an Engineering, Construction and Procurement company and almost immediately became very busy. Along with that my older brother &#8220;L&#8221;, brother in law &#8220;B&#8221;, Bubbaloo&#8217;s brother in law &#8220;J&#8221;, my friend R we were involved in trading a property, for a building in downtown Calgary. We were now, just getting into a complete renovation of this building. I was up to my neck in this work also. And then at the same time, my nephew &#8220;Huck&#8221; had come up with an invention for an inflatable, back-packable watercraft. So now a new company took shape called Little Beaver Watercrafts. Same partners, plus Huck, and we now set off on a plan to manufacture these inflatables. I got busy with drawings, ordering materials, and trying to manufacture in our spare time. Everyone had jobs already so anything we did for this company was always after hours or on weekends. Huck, so named because he was the ultimate adventurer (of Mexico in an old school bus and Thailand on $2.50 a day fame.) Was to handle marketing to all of the sporting stores, I would handle drawings, advertising, materials, supplies and equipment and everyone else would pitch in with the manufacturing. So you can see that very quickly after arrival, I was very, very busy. I had not even sat down at this point to see if I was even making any money yet. And then in the midst of this organized crap storm, I was hit by a thunderbolt! My best, only, most loyal and singular &#8220;paying&#8221; client at this time had hired me to help them establish an overseas business in Thailand. Something they had absolutely no experience doing. And something that I could, maybe, have been considered an authority on, by this time in my life. I was to show them the ropes of International business. Then to teach their management how to proceed into these dangerous waters. I was cool with that. There were only two significant problems that I could see. First of all, the ego at the management level in this organization was huge. There was not space in it to allow these people to realize just how much they did not know about doing business overseas. Second the top executive (the guy that paid my invoices) had decided that if I was truly needed. Then my worth would be overseas where they were starting up; not sitting on my ass in Calgary entertaining his top brass with travel stories. Oh great! Now some of you, especially Ol Bubbaloo will remember me harping on about never, not ever, travelling without my family in tow. I had just left a fairly high paying job, with good benefits, when we couldn&#8217;t find a proper married status job that attracted us. We had a fit and moved back to Alberta, rather than travelling separately. Geezus, I am barely three months into the freedom of running my own business and being my own boss. I am suddenly, confronted with exactly the same situation I had avoided through all of those years with my previous employer. &#8220;Overseas alone! Out of the question! Who do they think they are! Don&#8217;t they know you are a powerful company? They can&#8217;t push us around? You promised, you remember?&#8221; All of these things came from Bubbaloo&#8217;s mouth when I presented the dilemma to her. She was absolutely right, but it seemed like we had no choice. Here we were a short time into our new business, and we are at the brink of telling our first customer to &#8220;shove it&#8221;. We just couldn&#8217;t do it. Even though, the top man from the company, assured me that it would only be a &#8220;few weeks&#8221;. Bubbaloo and I both knew that &#8220;a few weeks&#8221; was the only thing it wasn&#8217;t going to be. Either I would be fired shortly after arrival, if I couldn&#8217;t help out; or if I could make a difference, I knew I was there for the long haul. So leaving Ol&#8217; Bubbaloo in charge of my business, the building renovations, finding clients for our new building, raising the girls, looking after everything, I boarded yet another jet and flew off into the sunset. It was early summer and I promised to return by fall, latest. Yet another in the life-long series of &#8220;famous last words&#8221; that passed thru my lips. As it turned out it took 18 months over three trips to finish a near to impossible task (story later). In total I spent about 6 months of the first two years outside of Canada, and it wasn&#8217;t over yet.</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://jimbored.com/aaahhh-home-at-last-now-to-sink-some-roots/">AAAHHH, HOME AT LAST, NOW TO SINK SOME ROOTS</a> appeared first on <a href="https://jimbored.com">Before My Clutch Slips</a>.</p>
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		<post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">5974</post-id>	</item>
		<item>
		<title>YEAR END MESSAGE 2020 &#8211; I&#8217;M STILL IN THE HUNT</title>
		<link>https://jimbored.com/year-end-message-2020-im-still-in-the-hunt/</link>
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		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jimbo Red]]></dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Sat, 26 Dec 2020 18:32:19 +0000</pubDate>
				<category><![CDATA[RAMBLINGS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[CONTEMPORARY-all]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://jimbored.com/?p=5581</guid>

					<description><![CDATA[<p>Another eventful year passes and I am still kicking. It seemed that the last twelve months took a long time. One sure-fire way of slowing the acceleration of time, in your old age, is to go into isolation for a few months. And ol&#8217; Bubbaloo and I did just that. From mid March thru mid July we kept to ourselves, avoided any suspicious looking Covid carriers and followed the rules. My what fun we had. After an early January golf breakaway to Mexico with a couple of buddies, the excitement fell off sharply. By mid march we had a supply of toilet paper layed up, enough food for a couple of years and six cans of beer, in case I wanted to get a little crazy. To supplement our supplies and make sure we always had two years of stockpile in front of us, D2 paid a twice monthly visit to check us out and replenish anything we might have consumed. My plan during this time was to lose a few pounds, unfortunately we had so much food that it went the other direction. I hoarded my six beer, even fighting off an offer from Bubbaloo to sit and have a boys night with me and polish off my supply. As much fun as she is, I can guarantee you she is no fun to drink with! She sees nothing redeeming in getting legless, telling tall tales, bragging about conquests, throwing up and them going to bed. Absolutely nothing. Instead, to help combat boredom, Bubbaloo kicked my ass out into the yard to fight the cursed Amazon Jungle. She was unrelenting in her dedication to ensure that I had no time to grow bored. Out I went each day, the door was slammed behind me and I was told that she would let me know when I had, had enough fun for the day. More than once I contemplated hanging myself up in one of those cursed trees. Once my bushwhacking was done and I cooked lunch and washed up, I was then taken for a &#8220;slow&#8221; walk, following in the trail of her walking group, the “roadrunners”. Ange encouraged me to do something creative, hence this blog, and Ron enrolled me in “website building for the feeble of mind” school. Bubbaloo promised to read whatever came from my brain and ended up on paper; that is if it didn’t offend her stand on the inherent evil of men, and the righteousness of women. So to say I had no censorship or filter on my drivel, is not necessarily true. Summer came and another of my happy times followed. Ange, Ron and Jered came home. We all met at D2&#8217;s for one of his epic feasts. This time it was the medieval dinner, in the middle of the table eaten in medieval fashion. What a pig-out it was. It was great to be around A and the grandkids. After recovering from D2&#8217;s blowout we headed to Quatsino, to visit Ron&#8217;s and JMW&#8217;s property. It was spectacular. We rented a house there and lived, isolated, in the community at the far end of Vancouver Island. Very remote but mystical. JMW and I were pumped for fishing and crabbing. However, it appeared that the government notice, that self quarantine had been lifted, did not make it out to the &#8220;sound&#8221;. Therefore it appeared that all the seafood was still self isolating and avoiding any contact with us, whatsoever. Other than a measly rock cod and a humble crab, we did not catch anything. Geezus! All too soon this idyllic time was over and everyone returned to their lives, with promises to return for a blowout Christmas. Fall soon arrived and, just as Deysi was planning a birthday visit to Alberta, the government issued another travel advisory and pandemic warning. This effectively killed her plans, dead in their tracks. I must say Deysi had a very good attitude about it and just sucked up her disappointment and got right back into her routine. Had it been me, on the other hand, I would have pouted and sulked for a couple of weeks. After 6 months of isolating myself from the golf course, we decided that I must join for the fall and winter in order to rescue any remaining sanity that I possessed, after months in quarantine. The only sad part was that after 6 months off, I had to start golf all over as a beginner and learn again. Also after 6 months of nurturing from Deysi, I had virtually forgotten how to throw a fit and curse. After a few short sessions as a beginner golfer, it all quickly came back and soon I had my full repertoire of bad words and self abasement back. It was as if I had never left. As everyone who lives in this side of Canada knows, late fall brought a new round of isolation rules and regulations into effect. so back inside I went, where I remain to this day, other than twice weekly rounds of &#8220;socially distanced&#8221; golf. Our big plans for a &#8220;full on&#8221; family Christmas disintegrated, one group at a time. Down to only Ange with us for Christmas. As the gathering got smaller so did my Christmas spirit. I had a major fit, decorating the tree, but was bullied into it, anyway. Once Ange arrived my spirits returned. She is the essence of Christmas and still pretty much a full on participant in the seasonal festivities. Together we made our Christmas dinner, baked cookies, and chocolates, exchanged stockings and watched &#8220;Home Alone&#8221; for our hundredth time. Deysi kept the festivities flowing and everything fun. I basically did as I was told and was really the voice of moderation and conciliation in all things. Christmas Day we planned to go to Mount Washington and meet D2, A, M and Benhameen for a socially distanced hike. We thought it would be a wonderful way to get together, yet obey all the rules about &#8220;not really&#8221; being &#8220;together&#8221;. The drive up was really, really pretty. Seeing the snow on Christmas was so enchanting. We arrived, donned what remains of our winter gear and went for a short walk to meet D2 and family. Geezus was it cold. I walked about 100 yards and it all came flooding back. I remembered why I hated the beautiful, peaceful snowy scenery so much! I almost froze, Deysi was freezing up fast and had slowed her walk to the pace of an Arctic Explorer pulling a full dog sled! Ange didn&#8217;t appear to mind so much, but might have been faking it. D2 and family soon arrive. The only one dressed for the climate was A, she had full on winter regalia. M, now an adult for 3 days, was dressed in a sweater, fashion scarf and booties, while Benhameen sported tight blue jeans and a light jacket. The temperature was 0, there was a light sleet coming in on the horizontal, everything was covered in snow, breath came out as vapour, and voices were loud pitched. There was a fog so we could not even see the skiers plying their trade a few meters from us. We exchanged baking packets, helped push a skier out of the snow where he had parked his car, told everyone how nice it was to see them and then all piled back into are cars for the descent into the golf zone. That my friends is a recap of year 2020 to date. If it sounds a little boring and uninteresting it is only because, it was. However we made it, Deysi has not yet taken me out while I sleep and Ange is committed to visiting with us &#8220;until we piss her off&#8221;, and she leaves for home. Well we still have 6 days left of this year for something big to break. Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://jimbored.com/year-end-message-2020-im-still-in-the-hunt/">YEAR END MESSAGE 2020 &#8211; I&#8217;M STILL IN THE HUNT</a> appeared first on <a href="https://jimbored.com">Before My Clutch Slips</a>.</p>
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		<post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">5581</post-id>	</item>
		<item>
		<title>THE GREAT INFERNO AS REMEMBERED FROM A FOUR YEAR OLD&#8217;s MIND &#8211; 1950&#8217;s</title>
		<link>https://jimbored.com/the-great-inferno-as-remembered-by-a-four-year-olds-mind-1950s/</link>
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		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jimbo Red]]></dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Sun, 13 Dec 2020 21:45:27 +0000</pubDate>
				<category><![CDATA[RAMBLINGS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[EARLY YEARS - all]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://jimbored.com/?p=5515</guid>

					<description><![CDATA[<p>As I lay here flipping thru the worn and wrinkled pages of my mind, I am struck by the fact that I can still pull out memories that are now reaching 67 years old. When I say that out loud, it seems surreal. In some ways, there are memories of events that happened back then, which are more clear than things that only took place one or two years ago. Although I do not remember seeing my Dad ride a bucking bronc, I remember my mom calling him an &#8220;old fool&#8221; for doing so. He must have been all the way into his thirties by then. I remember riding with him on the school bus as he picked up a load of the kids from the school and delivered them to their homes in the surrounding countryside. These were some of the best times of my life. Sitting up front in that bus and watching the &#8220;big&#8221; kids pile on, laughing and talking, full of excitement and loud banter, was a proud moment for me. I felt like a big shot. My Dad was driving! To me it was as if he was flying an airplane. The bus seemed so huge and he was in complete command of it. Or, images, of my Mom sitting with me reading a book and pointing out each word, often stopping to tell me the sound each letter made. Books were a magic kingdom to me. I believe it was at this time where I developed, a lifelong love of the magic of the printed word and of stories. My favorite were of adventure and mystery. I was probably 4 or so but a rousing session of &#8220;Cock Robin&#8221; had the juices flowing. The picture of that hated &#8220;sparrow&#8221; with his little bow and arrow, was enough to put me in a melancholy mood. My favorite version was when they hung the little devil. My Mom was a pacifist and could not abide the thought of capital punishment even for the sparrow, so I did not get this version often. I couldn&#8217;t read, so she may have been making up her own ending where there was no punishment, mentioned, for Cock Robin&#8217;s passing. It was one of my &#8220;go to&#8221; stories. Mom sat with each one of us kids individually, each day. She also started us on a gaming path, and had games with us each and every day. Another event sticks clearly in my mind. It was of the night that my Dad&#8217;s welding shop caught fire and burned to the ground. In our town, all of the businesses were located on one street, in basically, a one block area. Our village had one store, and a magnificent place it was. You could get anything a young person would ever dream of, including a haircut from the owner Dick Benz. I sat in that huge haircutting chair, holding on for dear life, as he spun me around as if on a merry-go-round. How that name, and that chair, stick in my mind as clear as if it was just yesterday, is beyond me? I suspect it was because, he was the dispenser of all things magic for a young boy. He had the best &#8220;jawbreakers&#8221;, ice cream in a cone, jellybeans and liquorice in the world. I remember him giving me a bag loaded with my favourites, in return for one small coin, that my Mom gave me (might have been a &#8220;nickel&#8221;). You could also buy a set of cowboy guns if you had unlimited resources. I used to go in and look at that set of toy guns and dream. His was a place that held the answer to all of my dreams. Dad&#8217;s welding shop was two doors down from the general store. It was also straight up the alley from our house, about 6 lots away. In there he hammered, banged, sawed and otherwise imposed his will on huge pieces of iron and steel. Almost everything he did was for the surrounding farming community. Occasionally a trucker, or some other type of customer came by. Whatever the farmers could not do with their own equipment, at home, they brought into Dad or had Dad go out to their place. He was moderately busy and along with the school bus gig, seemed to be making a go. However, what would I know, I was barely out of the wet diaper stage and would have cared less about things like that. In the middle of one summer&#8217;s night, our world came crashing down. After a loud pounding on our door and lots of loud voices, I became aware that something was happening at Dad&#8217;s shop. Mom immediately swung into action, corralling us and helping dad get out the door. What I remember, dimly was my older brother and sister talking about a &#8220;fire&#8221;. Mom was soon making food and coffee and ferrying it up the alley to the fire with my big brother. I still didn&#8217;t have an awareness of what was going on, but remember the sense of &#8220;excitement&#8221; in the air. As it turned out Dad&#8217;s shop burned to the ground but they managed to contain it to his shop only. This pretty much finished our time in the little town of Rosalind, Alberta, population (now 6 less)at 150 persons. Dad&#8217;s tools, equipment, shop and supplies were gone. Sadness permeated our home, but with it came an undercurrent of excitement. Soon, at least that&#8217;s how my memory worked, we were packed up and off to live in the big city. Dad had accepted work in the metropolis. It wasn&#8217;t the Big Apple, it just seemed like it to us. Red Deer, Alberta at that time had 10,000 people and at my age, could have been 10,000,000. We were about to start some new adventures.</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://jimbored.com/the-great-inferno-as-remembered-by-a-four-year-olds-mind-1950s/">THE GREAT INFERNO AS REMEMBERED FROM A FOUR YEAR OLD&#8217;s MIND &#8211; 1950&#8217;s</a> appeared first on <a href="https://jimbored.com">Before My Clutch Slips</a>.</p>
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		<post-id xmlns="com-wordpress:feed-additions:1">5515</post-id>	</item>
		<item>
		<title>RAMBLINGS OF THE MIND &#8211; RECOLLECTIONS OF MY PARENTS</title>
		<link>https://jimbored.com/ramblings-of-the-mind-recollections-of-my-parents/</link>
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		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Jimbo Red]]></dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Wed, 09 Dec 2020 16:15:30 +0000</pubDate>
				<category><![CDATA[RAMBLINGS]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[CANADA-all]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[EARLY YEARS - all]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">https://jimbored.com/?p=5447</guid>

					<description><![CDATA[<p>Now is the time to drift back a bit, and grasp onto a few of the fleeting reminders of my parents. A while back, I wrote a piece about how they came to live in Canada, where they met and how our family unit evolved. In this article, I&#8217;m going to let my mind drift and just write down bits and pieces of my memories of them. I guess it won&#8217;t be to dynamic but it will imprint some fading memories, on paper. For the time when I won&#8217;t be able to remember shit. In my mind&#8217;s eye, I can see Ol&#8217; Bubbaloo sitting at my bedside. Her arranging the bib at my mouth. Then wiping the drool from my chin, after spooning Peruvian sopa into my yawning cavity. Afterward reading pieces of my own memoirs back to me, as if for punishment. By then, I will be too feeble to protest. so will have to lay there and re-listen to my words hammered back at me. This scenario is a waking nightmare. I have had ever since she promised to &#8220;look after&#8221; me in my failing days. I still have vivid memories of my mother, ensconced in her wheelchair, surveying her domain. Always waiting for a new prey, to play a game, of the sucker&#8217;s choice. Any game (of your choice), any language, any time, but up at the table so there was no escaping your upcoming humiliation. Poor ol&#8217; Dad, had been in the loser&#8217;s seat far too many times. So, over time, had invented excuses to miss some of Mom&#8217;s invites. He had some whoppers! This did not get him out of all games. And most days he had to suffer a couple of head-on ass-kickings at cribbage. Mom&#8217;s games ranged from crossword puzzles, sudoku, word mazes, and number games when no victims were available and when Dad was pretending to be asleep in his rocker; to Scrabble in English or Spanish (if you so chose), to Cribbage, Canasta, Bridge (self taught), whist, hearts or any manner of card game, along with any one of her endless supply of board games. In many ways Mom was born years too late. Had she been wheelchair bound in today&#8217;s computer age, she would have thrived. There would have been no need for a constant supply of fresh victims, she would have found all she ever needed, online. Mom was very, very smart, read endlessly, had an inquisitive mind and a never ending thirst for knowledge. She was fact based in her outlook, while Dad was the cowboy, hard-ass, welder, inventor, musician, yodeller, poet and teller of tall tales. They both thrived on family. Their happiest times were when the house was full. My one biggest regret to this day, is that I did not spend much more time with them than I did. I left Canada as a grown, but still young adult, for adventures and a life of travel. For years I probably did not average 1 visit per year. This I will regret all of my days. They required nothing of us other than to come home, take your obligatory ass-whupping at a game from Mom, and then sit and listen to Dad reminisce of the &#8220;good ol&#8217; days&#8221;, play a few tunes and sing a few songs. I am ashamed to say that sometimes my Dad&#8217;s singing made me feel slightly embarrassed. God what an idiot I was. I was not even smart enough to understand real talent. Now I wish I could hear him sing or yodel every day. He was great and had a very traditional cowboy twang to his voice. In his later years, after Mom&#8217;s passing Dad was a &#8220;rock star&#8221; performer at the old folks home(s) in and around Camrose, where he chose to settle. He could, and this is not one of my ssstttrretttcchhhes, play anything that had a string on it. Dad owned many different stringed instruments and could and would play them all. He spent many thousands of hours, in his rocker, serenading Mom, across from him, in her easy chair holding her cat named ppprrrrtttt. For all those that knew Dad, at first appearance he might have seemed gruff, tough and hard; but after a short time you realized that he was kind, honest, funny, and then tough, and hard. He could spit-out a song, tall tale, YODEL, or recite a poem at the drop of a hat. Both his and Mom&#8217;s favorite pastime was sitting on their front steps watching the neighbours passing, talking of their kids and reminiscing about the past. Mom, as most of you know, was a transplanted Brit and had been in Canada since she was 6 years old. She had never been back home, however she was as much &#8220;Queen and Country&#8221; as any Brit ever born. Geezus, say a bad word about the Queen around our house, and you were about to feel the wrath of the Commonwealth fall around your ears. Dad just sighed and gazed up towards the ceiling. He had long ago, given up trying to break her link to the Crown. Both Mom and Dad were born and raised &#8220;country&#8221;, both were hard workers, loyal friends and staunch defenders of the family. Nobody ever did more, looked better, was smarter, quicker, sharper, funnier than their children or grandchildren . If you thought they were wrong you just had to mention it, to find out. Both Mom and Dad could cook! Mom was a legend with all of our friends, for her bountiful feasts of &#8220;kids food&#8221;, that she laid out whenever we had friends over. By the way, those friends also never got away without an ass-kicking at some kind of game or the other. Back to cooking. Mom was a legend. At the time where her illness made it impossible to stand and cook in the kitchen, Dad reinvented the kitchen for her. Her got out his tape, a piece of scrap paper, a stub of carpenter&#8217;s pencil and busied himself chopping up this kitchen to the exact height of a wheelchair bound person. I&#8217;m talking everything, cabinets, counters, stove top, oven, drawers, sinks, taps and microwave. He made her a stick that acted as her tweezers so she could reach anything she wanted from her pantry or cabinets. Everything was broken down into container sizes that she could pluck off the shelves and into her hand for cooking. Mom always liked to do her own dishes, so the sinks and taps were now at a level where she could clean up after dinner. Dad in his own right was a very good cook. His specialties were breakfast and barbecue. His flapjacks were legend. Bacon, eggs, flapjacks, fried potatoes, and homemade buns were a standard fare when dad was on the stove. His oatmeal porridge, that he made so &#8220;it stuck to your ribs&#8221;, was the best. He used to say he made a cement mixer full and poured it into a dresser drawer to &#8220;set&#8221;, then whenever he wanted some, he would just go in and cut a slab out. I think it was bullshit, but I never went in to check. He barbecued outside at 30 degrees below zero, in a blizzard. Neither rain, snow or hail stopped his inevitable barbecue. Cowboy steaks were his specialty. His bbq sauce was homemade and delicious. Mom&#8217;s meal of every year was the Christmas dinner. Along with my older sister &#8220;Mert&#8221; (my name she hated it), they started preparing for Christmas dinner in October, almost immediately after she had put the remains of Thanksgiving away. They baked endless goodies. Their butter tarts caused many family feuds; Deysi and Lalitas used to fight over the package of baked goods that mom sent us home every year. Christmas dinner was epic! As often as possible everyone was there. Where we all slept, is still a mystery, however, we never felt crowded. There would be 8-10 adults and 8-10 children. Mom had everything organized and tons of activities for the kids, that ranged from crayoning, puzzles, games, reading, movies, play acting, dress and every once in a while outside for a skate or run around the park. Oh to have these days back! I could go on and on, now that the floodgates of my memory have been opened. However, I think I had better stop here, at the risk of losing some to sheer boredom. Depending on how interested my readers are, I am thinking of delving deeper into this yawning cavity of memory and going further and further back with my memories, one article at a time. What say you? Anyone interested in the earlier years, where Mom was still mobile and Dad was still wearing his cowboy boots with the pants tucked in so people could admire the fancy tops. Let me know if I should drift backward in time?</p>
<p>The post <a href="https://jimbored.com/ramblings-of-the-mind-recollections-of-my-parents/">RAMBLINGS OF THE MIND &#8211; RECOLLECTIONS OF MY PARENTS</a> appeared first on <a href="https://jimbored.com">Before My Clutch Slips</a>.</p>
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