Back to Business

Today in the apartment was “refresh day”, meaning laundry day and purifying the place generally followed by routine grocery shopping at our favourite stores Metro, Farm Boy and Dandelion Foods. Judging by the anxiety evident on the roads as we motored forth, there were many others likewise re-establishing themselves from their weekend holiday status of erstwhile inactivity and indolence. Everywhere there was a palpable bustle and imperativeness. Seemingly opening the cottage is not all work; or at least not unrewarded.

My contribution to this cathartic expedition was a pre-noon dawdle about the underground garage on my tricycle which I conveniently store immediately at hand upon departure from the elevator. While I encountered several residents coming and going throughout my half-hour repetitive cycling jaunt it was apparent from the collective devotion to determined enterprise that no one was especially in the mood to linger and chat. Nor did I corrupt my intended exercise model by breaking the rhythm for gossiping.

In answer to an earlier promise casually given, we delivered several copies of Country Life magazine to a British woman with whom I had chatted yesterday afternoon. My suspicion is that, based upon the cracking historical accounts of her Saxon and Danish ancestors which she shared, she relishes the magazines as much as I do.

While in the city we employed the opportunity to fill the gas tank of the car at Petro-Canada and then to put the vehicle through the automatic wash at nearby Halo®. Coincidentally the Petro-Canada station was engaged in water pressure cleaning of its pumps.  I know for a fact that the swab is not superfluous because twice in the past couple of weeks I have stained the front of my pants by having inadvertently brushed the gasoline hose against myself, in each instance rendering a remarkable stain on my vanilla coloured shorts.

Thus enlivened by this rampant productivity we resolved as well to go to the Almonte butcher to obtain slices of an assortment of dried sausage in which we delight.  But not before collecting an updated supply of our prescription drugs previously ordered on-line. And finally by entire unrelated theme I have privately settled upon two summer shirts which hitherto I have largely ignored for being too demonstrative but which now I conceive to be well-made and exceedingly comfortable. It is purely a sartorial accident, one which I have unwittingly revived from a venture years ago at Belk’s (amusingly previously called “New York Racket) on Hilton Head Island.

Formerly
  • New York Racket (1888–1898)
  • Belk Brothers (1898–1909)

Belk, Inc. is an American department store chain founded in 1888 by William Henry Belk in Monroe, North Carolina, with nearly 300 locations in 16 states. Belk stores and Belk.com offer apparel, shoes, accessories, cosmetics, home furnishings, and a wedding registry.

The final compliment to this day of relentless energy and retail necessity was a sudden driving rain storm which precipitously clouded the sky under a dome of bluish-grey and succeeded to saturate the entire spread of nearby farmland along the Appleton Side Road and the now darkened river. The heartening music of Symphony No. 9 In D-Minor, Opus 125, Choral Finale by Ludwig van Beethoven, Vienna Philharmonic enriched the unparalleled view and sentimentality.  Once again I am reminded, as I happened to have confirmed with another resident earlier today, that all is well.