September 23, 2004

September 23, 2004

DAY 98

 

 

Well ... 29 degrees Celsius seems like a fairly decent temperature for a fall day, n'est-ce pas ?

This is the third hot day in a row here. Since we started this journey 98 days ago, we've had pretty decent weather most of the time. The glaring exception was in and around Winnipeg !

We took our time getting hitched up this morning, leaving about 11:00 A.M.. We were headed for Mississauga's Living Arts Centre, to attend the Canadian Snowbird Association's Lifestyles Show. The directions Joanne got were incorrect, so we had a bit of difficulty getting there, but eventually we made it.

The show started at 1:00 P.M.. It was a mixture of entertainers, and information presenters. Since we had not made reservations, we had to take whatever seating was still available. This turned out to be the 2 centre seats in the front row ! The main entertainer was introduced and began performing.

Two time Juno award winner. Inductee into the Canadian Country Music Hall Of Fame.

Mr. Ronnie Prophet !

After he finished his first song, as he stood at the front edge of the stage talking to the audience, doing his Johnny Cash impersonation, introducing his next song, a Johnny Cash song, his toes were about 3 feet in front of my face.

Yes, yes ... of course ... my freakin' cell phone began to ring ! ! ! ! !

Mr. Prophet stopped talking. I reached into my pocket and began fumbling around trying to pull the cell phone out of my pocket. It was tangled up with the 3 sets of keys that were in the same pocket. And ... let's not forget ... I had programmed the ringer to get progressively louder with each ring. By the time I managed to get it out of my pocket, it was ringing at maximum volume. While I screwed around with it like an idiot trying to figure out how to make the damn thing be quiet, Mr. Prophet took me to task ! Too bad I couldn't hear his chastising of me ; I was too absorbed trying to shut the ****ing thing off !

There's a moral in there somewhere. And ... to whomever phoned me at 1:19 P.M. EDT today, if you're reading this ; Thank you for calling !

Although the country music performers were not really our "cup of tea", we did learn a bit of useful information about health care and travel medical insurance issues. After the show ended, we battled Toronto rush hour traffic through suburban Mississauga to Hwy. 427. It's a real challenge to drive the rig through Toronto suburbia during rush hour. North on Hwy. 427, then east on Hwy. 401, it took about 2 hours on the highways to cross Toronto. Finally, at about Oshawa, the traffic began to thin out. I've always thought Oshawa is the eastern edge of Toronto, for practical purposes. We stopped for fuel in Bowmanville, then stopped again in Port Hope to buy something to cook for supper. We've stopped for the night at the Flying J at Nappanee, Ontario, home of Avril Lavigne. As if I cared !

DSK