The Adventures of
Rubber-Man

The BIG Adventure
(May - July 2003)

Shortly after the attempted head-shaving I was moved to a different Big Machine and started to learn the subtle art of extrusion. An extruder is sort of a cross between a meat grinder and a pasta machine. Except it's 300 feet long and has assorted ovens (both microwave and hot-air) running between 400 and 275 degrees. Rubber goes in one end, gets ground up and pushed through a die, then the extrusion runs through the ovens to cure, then through a water bath to cool off, then a drill and then into the winder to be coiled into baskets. Pretty simple really, except there are FOUR extruders pushing rubber through TWO dies (so we can run two different profiles at once if we have too) and you need about 6-arms when threading the extrusion down the line and you start trying to learn all the trouble shooting and how to make adjustments to the profile of the part and one of the Newfies training you has an accent so thick you can only get every other word (tow tick, ya kin onni git ever' udder wird me ol' son!). But the Newfs were pretty relaxed and a great pair to work with. One time the Microwave Alarm went off with an ear-splitting End of the World sort of squeal and Tim calmly shuts it off with a quiet "Well, dat ain' good."

Another nifty part of the job is operating the Stacker which is kind of like a shortened fork-lift. Imagine the forks from a fork-lift attached to a phone booth and you've got the idea. So imagine, if you dare, yours truly stacking crates full of extrusion on top of each other up to 16 feet high. With all of 10 minutes training from the Newfie with the thick accent. Fortunately a couple of the new hires have extensive material handling experience and could give me some pointers. But I'm gaining in confidence at it and I'm not bashing in the gates on the crates nearly as often as I used to. I've only dropped three crates too, and two were empty and no one was underneath, so it's all good.

As you've gathered from previous episodes Zehr's-Woman has been increasingly disenchanted working at the Supermarket of Mordor. The Manager of Chaos never improved, and the higher levels of management seemed either unaware or unable to do anything about this person's incredible incompetence. Zehr's-Woman was increasingly frustrated by this woman's lousy scheduling, poor management and having to run around fixing her stupid mistakes. Zehr's-Woman was missing her family, Saturday's off and her own cooking. So after much soul searching Zehr's-Woman decided to hand in her two weeks notice the day before our holiday and hang up her Smock of Power. There was much cheering at the Townhouse of Solitude. Of course, now I have to come up with another name for Elizabeth. She suggests Laundry Woman. I don't know, it doesn't have quite the same ring to it.

Elizabeth was worried about feeling weird shopping at Zehr’s once she no longer worked there but after our holiday when we were re-stocking, our shopping trip took twice as long as she talked to all her old colleagues and found out that once she left all sorts of things just never get done. Minor things like scheduling which effects pay-roll....

So we've never really been on any sort of trip together before. A road trip with toddlers and an aging Chev never seemed like a bright idea. But we now have a reliable car and we figured we'd better go before the girls get too big and have summer jobs. Also Elizabeth's sister Kathy, out in New Brunswick, has a three year old whom we'd never met and the seven year old didn't really remember us. The girls had also been giving us grief about being the only kids in school who had never been out of the province (not even to Florida? the other kids ask incredulously). We didn't really have a clue what we were doing, but Elizabeth decided we should just shout cowabunga! and go. She's normally so cautious too. We did get travel health insurance and maps etc. from CAA eventually, but for the longest time our detailed plan was Drive to Quebec and hang a right. Travel preparations were hampered somewhat by OT every Saturday and Elizabeth working 11 out of the 14 days before we left.

After a frantic day of house cleaning ("I don't want to come home from our trip to a dirty house" Zehr's-Woman reminded us as she left for her last day of work), getting the car serviced (supposed to be an oil change and tire rotation turned into a $500 brake job, but they threw in a car wash...) and last minute packing we were all ready to go at 6:30 on Sunday morning. With an early start we could get through Toronto before traffic got too heavy and be in Riviere de Loupe, Quebec by about 6:30 PM. I was in my new bright yellow "Sponge Bob Square Pants" Tee-shirt that I got as a Father's Day present. For those who are unaware, Sponge Bob Square Pants is a cartoon character; he's an enthusiastic, but rather naive sponge who works as the cook at the Krusty Krab. The kids and I rather like the show and the shirt only got one comment in Quebec. Anyway, suitably prepared with cookies, a picnic lunch and bottled water we blasted off from the Townhouse of Solitude and tootled up the 401 to Montreal. Rachael started out with pretty low expectations I think; "6:39 AM Cows!!! Wow, this trip just keeps getting better and better..." but it's hard to make 12 hours in a car exciting. Colleen finished Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix about half way to Quebec and then contemplated the scenery. As we pointed out the rockier terrain north of Toronto (pretty exciting to those of us from relatively flat SW Ontario), Colleen wrote in her journal:

11:50 AM

Just passed the Canadian Shield. I don't think a hunk of rocks are going to save us from invaders. Also I don't think we could lift it

So much for some practical geology.

The drive through Montreal went better than expected although it was mid-afternoon and traffic was crazy. We just stuck doggedly to our CAA provided directions and tried not to panic. I did most of the driving but Elizabeth gave me a couple of breaks through the less complicated and more scenic stretches along Lake Ontario and the St. Laurence River. We crossed the St. Laurence via a tunnel which the girls found exciting and Elizabeth found slightly claustrophobic, especially once I pointed out to the girls how much water we were driving under at that moment.

The drive up the St. Laurence was the nicest, especially once we passed Quebec City, with very pretty scenery that we never stopped to photograph (du'oh!). We saw our first Moose Crossing sign at 4:14 PM. Despite seeing many more throughout Quebec, NB and New England, we never once saw a moose and felt slightly cheated. The rest stops along the A-20 were the nicest on our trip, with actual flush toilets and picnic facilities. Of course, the out-house in Maine was still better than the wide spot beside the highway with a garbage pail that was common in New Brunswick. We got to Riviere de Loupe around 6:30 p.m. and picked a decent hotel out of our CAA guidebook. After checking in, we trooped down to the dining room and had a very good meal which cost us more than the room. The girls were excited, referring to the Hotel Levesque as Motel Fancypants en francais! I wouldn't call it overly fancy, but it wasn't a Roach Motel either. Roo-bear still wasn't having that thrilling a trip though as this entry from her diary (quoted with her permission) indicates:

8:17 PM Hotel in Froggyagogoland, bed

Our room smells funny! Can things get worse?

9:05 PM

...yes. I am forced to sleep beside Spaz... while dear Vadi [that would be me-ed.] is snoring louder than the heating vent (which isn't much in El Spongebob's favor).

[editorial aside- For those readers who haven't had the pleasure, Rachael's writing style is currently heavily influenced by fav authors Louise Rennison (the continued adventures of Georgia Nicolson) and Jacqueline Wilson (inside the mind of 12-year-old Ellie). Georgia Nicolson is perhaps best describes as a 13 year old Bridget Jones. The first book is titled Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging. The wiener-heads say I'm not allowed to read them, it would be too frightening.]

The next morning we briefly drove around Riviere de Loupe looking for somewhere to get breakfast, eventually stopping at a Dunkin' Donuts. (Our box of six rather expensive donuts included an interesting donut new to our acquaintance: a jelly donut filled with a spiced apple filling and iced with a chocolate glaze on top. Sounds yucky but wasn't too bad really.) It's actually a very pretty town and since they rely on Anglo-Canadian and American tourists the language thing isn't really an issue. Although the wienerheads were under strict instructions NOT to refer to La Belle Province as Froggy-a-gogo-land outside of the car!

The highway south to Fredericton was quite scenic, rolling up and down mountains, which I'm sure the Echo didn't enjoy very much. After we got to our destination Kathy informed us that it's called Death Alley by the locals. The numerous roadside shrines should have tipped us off, but it's not like there was another route we could've taken.

After contacting Kathy we picked her up near her office and got the scenic tour of Fredericton (roughly 45,000 people) and about half of New Brunswick as we made the hour commute home to Chipman. A lot of bush. More Moose Crossing signs. About the only job in the area is cutting trees for Irving Lumber. But Kathy and Ian have renovated an old farmhouse that has been in Ian's family since the area was first settled in the 19th century. It's very comfy with a big porch over-looking the lawn that slopes down to the Salmon River with a view of the forest on the far bank. Deer wander out of the woods and across the lawn and there is a groundhog that lives under their out-building who comes out to graze around the cars (Rachael enjoyed all the wildlife and had to say good-bye to the groundhog before we left, who we think three-year old William has named "Porcupine".) I spent a couple of pleasant afternoons on the porch drinking beer until the deer flies got too interested in sampling some Ontario meat products. Actually I had several two beer days, which for those of you aware of my drinking habits, is quite a bit. Especially followed by wine for dinner. Between shift work and having to drive kids around, a 12-pack normally lasts me a few months. The parlor was also very comfy, and I was usually found there reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix while waiting my turn in the bath.

Our trip to cosmopolitan Chipman NB combined the best of a week at the cottage with doing some touristy stuff too. Ian took us all to see a nearby covered bridge that his grandfather had built, and then we went to a neighbour's for his Canada Day open house. The neighbour is part of the local RCMP detachment and helps his wife run a horse stables. Part of their herd is a collection of miniature horses which Rachael found so adorable she wanted multiple pictures of each animal! Another day my girls and our hostess bombed into Fredericton for some shopping while I played catch with my seven year old nephew and helped the three year old water the rhubarb, and the ants, and the weeds... he likes his watering cans, he does. Kathy (who I'm pretty sure has her Bargain Shopping Merit Badge) felt obligated to keep reminding me what great deals Elizabeth had gotten (figuring I'd freak at the bill), but I looked at it this way; the girls had had big chick-bonding fun with their Aunt Kathy, the dreaded back-to-school shopping was now done, Elizabeth's wardrobe isn't exactly over-burdened and could do with some additions, and they had in fact caught some deals, so really I had gotten a 4-for-the-price-of-one deal on my entertainment dollar. Later in the week we went to the Bay of Fundy for a picnic, since we'd never seen the ocean before. We missed low tide, but managed to get down to the beach around the Hopewell Rocks (the "Flower Pot" Rocks featured in all the travel brochures) before the tide came in. I got my sandals wet in the Atlantic and we took some pictures. That seems to be the way of tourism though isn't it? You spend hours in the car, to get out and look at a rock, or a building, or a giant lobster (we actually missed the giant lobster in Shediac NB, but you get the idea).

While we were at Hopewell, Ian says "Hey, we're only about an hour from the Confederation Bridge. Let's have dinner in P.E.I.". So off we went. The Northumberland Coast of NB isn't as dramatic, the highway passed a lot of little villages and wetlands. The Confederation Bridge (world's longest, last I'd heard) took about 20-30 minutes at 100 kilometers/hour (about 65-70 mph for the Americans in the audience) to cross. It took about the same time to drive across Prince Edward island to Summerside. I thought we were going to stop at the place by the highway that said LOBSTER, but Kathy and Ian were looking for somewhere nice. They found us a likely looking place in a hotel (The Loyalist Inn) where we all had an excellent meal. I figured I ought to try something with lobster in it, even though I had vague memories of it being rather rich, so I settled on a scallop, shrimp and lobster stir-fry. Pretty good. The boys were very well behaved. When William (the three year old) put his coffee cup against his chest and declared "I'm a robot!" it was hard not to laugh. But his mother didn't want any further clowning to be encouraged.

Of course, all good things must come to an end and our week in New Brunswick was over too quickly really. I could've done with a few more days on the porch, a road trip to Nova Scotia, and Kathy says there is a hobby store in Fredericton that I would've liked to check out (actually I would've liked to have seen more of Fredericton than the Chapters and the mall food court), but we were all missing our own beds too and we should save something for future visits. (A visit, or at the very least a call, to the Halford's will definitely be on the agenda next time we're in New Brunswick. We can only blame our rather slapdash trip preparations for the oversight. Sorry Ruth.) So on the Monday we let Ian get out the door to work and then we got ourselves organized and packed, getting a rather late start at 9 AM.

Our route had us coming home via the US, crossing the border at Calais, Maine and taking this crappy, curving two lane highway down to Bangor, where we got on the Interstate for a bit. Should've spent the extra time going further north and taken the I-95 all the way from the border. Unfortunately those New England states are more concerned with their north-south traffic, and having a decent highway linking New York to Maine (let alone Ontario to NB) isn't a priority. So we followed highway 2-West as it snaked through Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont. Maine was a bit too rugged for me, but I'd been looking at spruce trees and rocks all week, they just weren't picturesque anymore. We tried stopping for lunch at a McDonald's in Maine, but they didn't take debit cards (we had it on good authority that debit cards worked fine in the US. We didn't realize that its not nearly as widespread a payment option there as it is here). Oops. Good thing we'd packed more bottled water (had to use some for hand-washing when stopping at out-houses in Maine and Vermont too) and Kathy had made us a pan of Road Brownies. I had hoped to get some American cash before crossing but the crossing point at St. Stephen NB/Calais Maine kinda sneaks up on you, so we were over the border before seeing a bank of any sort.

New Hampshire and Vermont got prettier and Rachael tried to take some pictures of the mountains from the car. Don't know if they turned out yet, we still have to finish that film. Missing lunch was a bit stressful as Roo recorded:

July 7th 3:28 PM

I am hungry. We did NOT stop 4 lunch. I solely surviving off water, brownies and salt water taffy. Yarg.

By the time we neared Montpelier VT, we were all pretty hungry and needing a break so we decided to stop at the first half-decent restaurant we could find. A sign outside of town declared "Sarducci's Restaurant. Turn Right at the lights." Sounded better than a greasy diner, so we did. For a Monday night the place was quite busy, but the 15 minute wait for our table was worth it (everyone needed a potty break anyway). I had the veal marsala and all my women had some form of ravioli. All very excellent.

Of course we should have stopped in Montpelier and found a hotel room, but we kept on, hoping to get back to Canada. But after Montpelier there wasn't really anywhere to stay until Quebec, unless we wanted to get right off the highway. Our route had us crossing Lake Champlain and taking the ferry to Plattsburgh NY. Lake Champlain is rather big, and the sun went down while we were on Grand Isle in the middle of it. We didn't realize we were looking for a ferry so I missed our turn and kept driving up the length of the island. When Elizabeth said "If we get to a place called Grand Isle, we've gone too far." I answered "We drove through there 20 minutes ago!" Oops. Tired, grouchy and eager to get some place that takes debit cards or Canadian cash, Elizabeth said "Highway 2 is never wrong. Keep going on Highway 2 and we'll run into Quebec."

We crossed back into Canada around 10:30 PM and passed through Montreal around 11:30. We were tired confused and really worried about missing our turn since we were now off our CAA route plan. We used every rest stop between Montreal and Stratford on the drive home just to get out and stretch, wake up and buy some food or coffee (the rest stops along the 401 being provided with gas stations and restaurants which pay for the public toilets). Elizabeth tried to sleep but her worrying about me falling asleep at the wheel kept her awake (sort of) and her guts in an uproar. She tried to give me a couple of breaks but at 5:30 AM I was in better shape to handle the On-ramp of Doom in KW (a really brilliant highway on-ramp that is only a few hundred meters from an off-ramp, so that as you're trying to get on the highway and merge there are hordes of cars streaking past trying to get off the highway right in front of you; it takes iron nerves and a certain kamikaze attitude) than she was. We finally draggled into the driveway of The Townhouse of Solitude with the car covered in dead bugs at 6:30 AM vowing to never do that (drive all night, that is) again. After a shower we all had a nap, except Roo who was the only one who managed to get a good snooze.

So, let's have some statistics.

At least now the girl's have something interesting to say when they get asked "What did you do on your summer vacation?" I think I've earned my Long Distance Driving Merit Badge and the added Maine Challenge got me the gold level too.

The rest of the week was decompressing from the trip home; sleep in, restock the fridge, wash the bugs off the car, mow the weeds, clean the animals, do the laundry etc. Elizabeth and I went to London without the girls to do some shopping, which was fun. Elizabeth has been enjoying her time off with the girls and getting caught up on a lot of stuff that has been neglected for the last two years. Or even just getting caught up on her ironing. She and Colleen both have knitting projects on the go now.

It took about two days to get the extruder up and running right, since it had been shut down for the previous week and maintenance had done a bunch of work on it. I've put in over 12 hours OT the first week back and I could've worked more. There were a couple of nights they practically begged me to stay but I had other things going on. One night I could stay but no one else would stay to run the line with me, so I got an easy hour OT tidying up and cleaning the die out. The rest of the summer promises to be more of the same (three 12 hour days plus weekend OT the second week), so I should be able to pay off the expenses accrued lately and maybe afford to get the wing chair re-upholstered. The girls are getting big now and don't really like sitting on the floor much, so we'll need more seating in the living room soon. However, with Zehr's-Woman retired, weekends are more free and we can be available for visits again. Well I think that's about everything that's new here. I'll probably remember something I wanted to add tonight while watching the extruder!

Proud
Canadian

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