The Adventures of
Rubber-Man

Zehr’s-Woman and the Grinch
(Fall 2002)

So when we last left off Rubber-Man and the Wiener-heads were in the midst of Summer Vacation (tralala!). I never did get any of the garden projects done. But we did get more gardening done this year than last, so it’s all good. I never did get the Barbeque of Chaos turned from the Forces of Not-So-Good either. But you can’t win ‘em all.

I did manage to dodge a bullet, however. The Townhouse of Solitude is located next to the nexus of power in our parish. Our neighbours over the back fence are Harry and Madeline. Harry is Grand Knight for my Knights of Columbus Council (kinda like the “Grand Poobah” for those of you more familiar with The Flintstones and Fred’s Loyal Order of Water-buffaloes) and his wife, Madeline, is President of our Catholic Women’s League. They’re nice folks though; they always buy Girl Guide Cookies from the kids and Harry is always ready to loan a tool or lend a hand. I bumped into Harry one day on the sidewalk and he said he’d wished I’d been at our last K of C meeting; he was going to nominate me for Door Warden or some such junior less-than-exalted Poobah job. I managed to contain my shriek of terror at the prospect and said this wasn’t a good time anyway. I only manage to make it to one or two meetings a year. Monday night is also my evening for driving the wienerheads about to Guides and Pathfinders. When there isn’t a conflict I usually manage to forget to go anyway…. Oops.

As I noted earlier Zehr’s-Woman had won a DVD player in a draw at work. So we spent many of our mutual days off this summer trekking through furniture stores looking for just the ‘right’ entertainment unit. We finally found one at the end of August. The delivery guys showed up late and left the box in the middle of the living room. When I unwrapped it I found myself staring at the bottom of the unit and it’s legs. To the delivery guys’ credit, the box did say: This End Up.

We’ve had an old piano in the living room for a few years now, ever since my dad said “I don’t want to move it again and anyone who can afford to get it out of here can have it.” We finally got around to tracking down a piano tuner and having him over to look at it during an incredible spell of hot, humid weather. The piano tuner thinks the piano is over 120 years old, but it’s still functional. The cracks in the soundboard aren’t irreparable and the sticky keys are getting fixed as Spazhead needs them. As soon as the piano tuner had left Colleen sat down to bang out Mary Had a Little Lamb by ear. Time for some lessons….

So with the return of the school year we have the return of the usual merry-go-round. Colleen and Rachael are signed up again for Pathfinders and Girl Guides. Rachael is now a third year Guide, patrol leader (Lily of the Valley patrol) and ‘Teletubby girl’ to her legion of fans among the Second year Guides. At the end of September both girls went off to Horse Camp. Spazhead didn’t want to go, but we made her. After all how often are you going to get a weekend of horseback riding for $55 a kid? They had big fun, even Spazhead. She’s really enjoying Pathfinders and hanging out with other spazzy teen-aged girls.

So the Big Thing around here this summer was World Youth Day, Pope-con, Popefest, Popestock, Pope-apolooza. I’m sure it even made the American news briefly. But the Papal visit did cause a stir even though Rubber-man didn’t attend. The thought of being in the midst of a few hundred thousand people with no shelter and minimal toilet facilities didn’t appeal to me. But it was exciting anyway and the Sunday before we had a Mass in English, Spanish and Italian with the groups of pilgrims staying in our town before they moved on to WYD. Fortunately, our Pastor at the time was multilingual and able to speak to everyone.

So most of the fall has been the usual grind; working shifts, getting the kids to some activity, trying to figure out what to make for dinner and trying not to look at the dirty house. But the week after Canadian Thanksgiving (Oct 14) we used our last weeks of vacation and took a week off together. We got a bunch of yard work done and one day we kept the wienerheads home from school when Elizabeth’s Mom and Grandma (just turned 90) came down for lunch. Spazhead hadn’t met Great-Grandma since she was wee, and Roo-bear hadn’t met her at all. (Great-Grandpa never comes down off Hamilton Mountain and Great-Grandma only rarely.)

December. Advent. Time for quiet reflection and preparing one’s heart for Christmas. Or more likely a time for frantic scrabbling about to fit in extended hours at work, extra Christmas events and shopping and wrapping in preparation for Giftmas. We managed to light our Advent candles and read the reflections published by the Diocese most evenings this year (last year I think we managed three times!). Zehr’s-woman also managed a few evenings of reading Christmas stories together with the Wienerheads. Even before the girl’s were born we started collecting Christmas stories and every year we’ve added new ones and read them to the girls. We’ve got so many now that it takes a couple of weeks to get through them all. It’s kinda weird to see a couple of young women ‘fighting’ over who gets to snuggle up closest to mommy while she reads a picture book, but Elizabeth is enjoying it while it lasts. Besides I like listening in to the stories while doing the dishes or packing lunches! I think when we’re grand parents we’ll have to go round and read some of the bedtime stories during Advent.

The School Christmas Concert was a pleasant surprise this year. It’s usually too long and airy-fairy. Last year it had been Shanghai-ed by September 11^th. Lots of boo-hoo-hoo-ing about what a terrible world etc. made me kinda grumpy and very un-Christmasy. This year the show was short and sweet and featured lots of traditional Carols. Spazhead was also in a Trio of Grade 8 girls who sang the Coventry Carol. Very nice. They also got played on the local radio station and the teachers had them sing at every school event.

It’s now January 5^th. I ought to wrap it up and send this out since tomorrow is Epiphany and I’m back to work. Our Christmas was pretty good for the most part. Although driving on Christmas Day when I’m tired, need a nap and it’s the only day of the year that Tim Horton’s (popular chain of donut and coffee shops for you Americans in the audience) is closed didn’t help. Zehr’s-woman really enjoyed shopping for the charitable gift-donations we supported through work and the Parish. We saw some friends and family that we don’t see very often and ate lots of yummy food. We even had a dinner out with real adult friends!

I’ve been off work for two weeks (I get paid for about half of it). Zehr’s-Woman had a bit more time off this year and we managed to get to see The Two Towers on New Year’s Eve. We tried to see Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets but it was sold out oddly enough. I wasn’t too upset to have to see The Two Towers instead (although I would’ve worn my Tolkien tee-shirt if I’d known!). Pretty exciting stuff, but we were all fast asleep by midnight being the Party Animals that we are. We’ve promised the girls to try and see HP for Spazhead’s birthday.

The family gave me (I picked it up for Elizabeth, wrapped it and pretended to be surprised on Christmas Day) the extended version DVD of The Fellowship of the Ring and it took us four days to see all the back ground documentary stuff plus the movie. Not that I minded. Friday was J.R.R. Tolkien’s ‘eleventy-first’ (111^th) birthday (Bilbo Bagginses age at the start of LOTR for those of you who haven’t read it) and the wiener-heads wanted to know if I had something special planned for all 6 hobbit meals. Sadly no, I handed them a box of crackers and asked if any of the brie was left.

Proud
Canadian

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