05 May 2013
Garden Adventures and BookFest
05/05/13 09:24
I think I’ve mentioned that one of the former occupants of this house was a bit of a "self styled" handyman. I mean the one that mounted the curtain rods with four inch deck screws. The same one that wired the downstairs themselves, apparently while they were studying how to weave fish nets. The same one that built a frame in the garden out of four inch poles, tied the joints together with ten inch bolts through the verticals into the centre of the horizontal beams,and then ALSO drove huge spikes through the horizontals and down into the centre of the verticals. Oh and what wild creature is this massive frame supposed to contain? Cattle? Tigers? Elephant Seals? No, it’s there to control the unruly raspberries. Well, this week I found another example of their handiwork.
This all started last winter when I forgot to drain the water lines that go out to the garden. The first year I installed a vent port next to the house so when I shut the outside water off I could open up all the taps and the lines would drain. That was great but last winter I forgot to do it. It didn’t seem to get very cold and I just never did. Well, in January I noticed that the water pressure in the house was low. I wondered about that and then on a hunch I went down to the garden. There I found a fountain in the raspberry plants. One of the pipes was leaking. Apparently it had gotten cold enough to freeze and split the PVC pipe. So, belatedly I shut the water off, drained the system, and waited for spring.
This week I got back to fixing the outside faucet. As I looked at it I kept wondering why it had split. I mean it wasn’t really that cold. It wasn’t like a hard, deep soaking, Winnipeg freeze. It just got a bit frosty the one morning. Maybe −2 or −3 (mid 20s for those of you in the states) and by 10:00 in the morning was above freezing. As I looked at the pipe I suddenly realized why it had split. You see, white PVC water pipe is rated at what, 100PSI or something like that? What they used was grey PVC pipe. The thing is, grey is not pipe, it’s conduit. It is only designed to hold wires, not water, not pressure. A bit of digging (literally, like with a shovel) around the garden revealed that they had used PVC conduit for all the garden water pipes. Sure, it saved them a couple bucks per length, but it’s also liable to burst at any moment. Considering how they over engineered everything else they did, this is a really strange corner to cut.
But I have the water line repaired. I didn’t dig up the whole system, instead I cut out the split part of the pipe and put a new brass faucet on the end. We’ve also instituted a new procedure. We leave the line to the garden off and only turn it on when we want to water. That way if it does burst down the road sometime we won’t flood the downhill neighbours. Oh and from now on, on November first the lines get drained. I don’t care how warm it still is.
Saturday Marsha was at BookFest. This is a once a year celebration of books, especially children’s books and reading. It benefits Nanaimo Literacy, the library, reading programs, and such. This year Marsha said she’d help out and do whatever they needed. They asked her if she could introduce one of the guest celebrity authors. Not to worry though. she was the alternate, backup, only if the #1 person gets the plague. She said that sounded OK, and they immediately got back to her saying that the #1 person had in fact just gotten the plague while getting hit by lightening and holding a winning lottery ticket. She would now have to introduce the speaker, oh and by the way it’s on stage, in front of the assembled throng. Marsha was not really happy about this but she’d already agreed. But wait it gets better, who was the speaker. Bob Smith? Tom Jones? No it was an author from Quebec with the name of Roch Carrier. Now Marsha looked at the name and immediately realized two things. First was that, because it was a French Canadian name it would have a very French pronunciation. Second her Americanized guess at the name stood no chance of being even anywhere near right. I mean we both immediately pronounced Roch Carrier as “Roach Carrier”, and we were pretty sure that wasn’t right. She wrote to her contact at BookFest and who sent this:
“For the pronunciation, "Roch" is pronounced "Rock" and "Carrier" ends with an "accent aigu" sound, which is close to the pronunciation of the letter "A" in English. For "Roch Carrier", then, you can say "Rock Carry-A”.”
I’m glad to report that Marsha did very well with her introduction. And Roch Carrier was a very good speaker. Though he’s done many things, written many books, been both the Director of the Canada Council of the Arts and the National Librarian of Canada, he’s best known up here for his children’s book The Hockey Sweater. This is a true story of when he was a kid in Montreal in the late 40s. He and all his friends idolized Rocket Richard, (using the French pronunciation Ri-shard) who played for the Montreal Canadians. All of the kids in the neighbourhood had a Canadians hockey sweater, like Richard, and taped their stick like Richard, and did their hair like Richard. Finally Roch’s sweater was worn out and his mother bought him a new one. But she got (and the part of how she ordered the new one from Eaton is good too), a Toronto Maple Leafs sweater, not a Montreal Canadians one. He was mortified. It’s a very funny story:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgydkfnUEi8
Carrier is in his 70s and still active. By his own admission he’s “the worst hockey player in Canada”, but, unlike his friends who gave it up in their youth, he continued playing until he was in his 60s when he blew out a knee. He mentioned that the sweater, in the late 40’s, cost $3 and sticks were $.69 each, something that amazed the kids in the audience. Those of you who have or had kids in hockey may also be amazed. But it was a simpler time. Remember when I said they did their hair like Richard’s. Well, for those with uncooperative hair they would glue it in place. Not with a modern styling gel either. They used actual watered down white glue.
Amazing
Doug & Marsha
PIX: Apple and Rhubarb, and oh my.
This all started last winter when I forgot to drain the water lines that go out to the garden. The first year I installed a vent port next to the house so when I shut the outside water off I could open up all the taps and the lines would drain. That was great but last winter I forgot to do it. It didn’t seem to get very cold and I just never did. Well, in January I noticed that the water pressure in the house was low. I wondered about that and then on a hunch I went down to the garden. There I found a fountain in the raspberry plants. One of the pipes was leaking. Apparently it had gotten cold enough to freeze and split the PVC pipe. So, belatedly I shut the water off, drained the system, and waited for spring.
This week I got back to fixing the outside faucet. As I looked at it I kept wondering why it had split. I mean it wasn’t really that cold. It wasn’t like a hard, deep soaking, Winnipeg freeze. It just got a bit frosty the one morning. Maybe −2 or −3 (mid 20s for those of you in the states) and by 10:00 in the morning was above freezing. As I looked at the pipe I suddenly realized why it had split. You see, white PVC water pipe is rated at what, 100PSI or something like that? What they used was grey PVC pipe. The thing is, grey is not pipe, it’s conduit. It is only designed to hold wires, not water, not pressure. A bit of digging (literally, like with a shovel) around the garden revealed that they had used PVC conduit for all the garden water pipes. Sure, it saved them a couple bucks per length, but it’s also liable to burst at any moment. Considering how they over engineered everything else they did, this is a really strange corner to cut.
But I have the water line repaired. I didn’t dig up the whole system, instead I cut out the split part of the pipe and put a new brass faucet on the end. We’ve also instituted a new procedure. We leave the line to the garden off and only turn it on when we want to water. That way if it does burst down the road sometime we won’t flood the downhill neighbours. Oh and from now on, on November first the lines get drained. I don’t care how warm it still is.
Saturday Marsha was at BookFest. This is a once a year celebration of books, especially children’s books and reading. It benefits Nanaimo Literacy, the library, reading programs, and such. This year Marsha said she’d help out and do whatever they needed. They asked her if she could introduce one of the guest celebrity authors. Not to worry though. she was the alternate, backup, only if the #1 person gets the plague. She said that sounded OK, and they immediately got back to her saying that the #1 person had in fact just gotten the plague while getting hit by lightening and holding a winning lottery ticket. She would now have to introduce the speaker, oh and by the way it’s on stage, in front of the assembled throng. Marsha was not really happy about this but she’d already agreed. But wait it gets better, who was the speaker. Bob Smith? Tom Jones? No it was an author from Quebec with the name of Roch Carrier. Now Marsha looked at the name and immediately realized two things. First was that, because it was a French Canadian name it would have a very French pronunciation. Second her Americanized guess at the name stood no chance of being even anywhere near right. I mean we both immediately pronounced Roch Carrier as “Roach Carrier”, and we were pretty sure that wasn’t right. She wrote to her contact at BookFest and who sent this:
“For the pronunciation, "Roch" is pronounced "Rock" and "Carrier" ends with an "accent aigu" sound, which is close to the pronunciation of the letter "A" in English. For "Roch Carrier", then, you can say "Rock Carry-A”.”
I’m glad to report that Marsha did very well with her introduction. And Roch Carrier was a very good speaker. Though he’s done many things, written many books, been both the Director of the Canada Council of the Arts and the National Librarian of Canada, he’s best known up here for his children’s book The Hockey Sweater. This is a true story of when he was a kid in Montreal in the late 40s. He and all his friends idolized Rocket Richard, (using the French pronunciation Ri-shard) who played for the Montreal Canadians. All of the kids in the neighbourhood had a Canadians hockey sweater, like Richard, and taped their stick like Richard, and did their hair like Richard. Finally Roch’s sweater was worn out and his mother bought him a new one. But she got (and the part of how she ordered the new one from Eaton is good too), a Toronto Maple Leafs sweater, not a Montreal Canadians one. He was mortified. It’s a very funny story:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgydkfnUEi8
Carrier is in his 70s and still active. By his own admission he’s “the worst hockey player in Canada”, but, unlike his friends who gave it up in their youth, he continued playing until he was in his 60s when he blew out a knee. He mentioned that the sweater, in the late 40’s, cost $3 and sticks were $.69 each, something that amazed the kids in the audience. Those of you who have or had kids in hockey may also be amazed. But it was a simpler time. Remember when I said they did their hair like Richard’s. Well, for those with uncooperative hair they would glue it in place. Not with a modern styling gel either. They used actual watered down white glue.
Amazing
Doug & Marsha
PIX: Apple and Rhubarb, and oh my.