Outboard Motor Memoires

This is sort of a guy topic, but I am sure some of you gals know about this too.

The other day was the anniversary of Mr. Evinrude the man who invented the outboard motor years ago.

I thank Mr. Evinrude because without his invention I wouldn’t have been able to spend so many wonderful hours on a lake when I was a kid. That outboard motor attached to the back of the small boat that helped us get from our dock to someplace else on the lake was wonderful…..

I remember when the time came when my dad built a bigger boat and then bought a larger outboard motor, but still the joy of being out on the lake fishing or just being out there with my dad was great! And all that thanks to an outboard motor.

Sure we rowed around too in a smaller boat because we weren’t old enough to drive a big boat, but who cared…. Not me!!! The main thing was being outside enjoying the sunshine and water. Years pasted and we needed a new outboard motor (sorry, the brand name …I can’t remember).

But still the trusty outboard motor did its job…okay sometimes it wouldn’t start on the first, second or even the third pull because the motor got flooded and my dad would get really upset and use words I won’t repeat….. But, I learned some new words from those trying moments…Thanks dad!!

Or another time out fishing and my dad wanted to “start her up” as he would say and pulled the cord and it snapped….. Now that was something 2 miles from our dock and we had to paddle the whole way back…. I thought it was great fun, but not my dad as you can imagine!!!

Once back on shore I had to tell my mom all about the fun we had and my dad was about to explode because of the “GD-outboard motor”, and to make matters worse I asked my dad what “GD” meant….definitely a bad move on my part!!!

When I think back about all those great times I had I feel sorry for the Kids today because they aren’t allowed to do things alone anymore…. Like me and my friends out catching minnows with a net and rowing around the lake for hours…. No one worried about us and we were free to enjoy ourselves , but we never did anything stupid either and were responsible , or we walked around the lake on a path along the edge of the lake…… no problems, no injuries….just plain fun!!!

It was better that any computer game and taught us self-confidence , social skills and how to remember how to get from A to B and back without GPS or calling someone for help.

Those were the days, and if you have an outboard motor and boat…. Enjoy it and cherish the memories that it brings you!

Sunny days are on the way…

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Autumn Leaves

Looking out the window at all those wonderful colored leaves on the trees and seeing them slowly swaying in the wind and then just letting themselves go from the tree and sailing through the air to land softly on the ground… oh those lovely leaves of fall as you send us your greetings to tell us that colder weather is on its way.

There the trees stand no more birds in their nests just a lonely tree bare of its leaves stands there so proudly waiting for some bird to land on its branch and say hello. Not many people put real thought anymore into what happens with the change of season or notices that how lovely the trees are with their leaves a glow in the lovely colors of fall.

As a kid I remember every fall my dad hopped into the car with my mom and me and we drove off for the day just to look at the wonderful colors of the leaves on the trees… oh they were so lovely and bright, or at least they seem so in my memories. The tall majestic trees that were in the countryside and you could drive for miles just looking at all the colors that were abound and sometimes not see another car or person for hours. Those were the wonderful days of fall!

I have great memories of fall and of raking those dreaded leaves too. I always thought as a kid those leaves fell from the tree just to make me work!

My parents would say to me “Now, go outside and rake some of those leaves into piles”. That was a sentence that I hated to hear… those piles of leaves were bigger then me… We had thousands of leaves and they were only there on the ground for me to rake into piles….and then a gust of wind would come along and blow my wonderful piles of leaves away only to hear my dad say.. “Well, you have to start again”. I think the leaves on the ground were invented as a way to keep small kids out of the house so the parents could have their peace and quiet!!!

I hated those leaves and it seemed that the trees had an endless supply of leaves, because there were always leaves to be found in the yard no matter how good I raked!! I personally thought back then that the trees had gotten together in a conspiracy to shed all their leaves in our yard so I would have to rake them into piles.

Oh the fall leaves and their colors and wonderful memories they have left me with of raking them into piles… Enjoy the wonderful colored leaves that the trees are sharing with us!

Heading South?

Well, fall is here and the birds are starting to say good bye and make their way to warmer parts of the world. Every day I see geese flying over my house and saying their goodbyes for this year, how nature knows what to do is fascinating.

I wonder when I look at all those geese where are they flying too and what will they see once they have arrived and will they survive? It’s too bad they couldn’t send me a post card saying that they got there all right and that the weather is nice and there’s plenty to eat.

Sure, we folks head south for a couple of weeks or months depending on whether you are retired or working.. But does anyone send postcards anymore from those warm places that they visit? I haven’t received a nice postcard in ages and have almost forgotten what they look like.

A postcard.. What’s that? Anyone ever heard of that antiquated form of communicating???
Post cards are great and the pictures on them you won’t find anywhere else either. The pictures are always somehow one of a kind. When I was a kid I used to get lots of postcards from family & friends and I knew that they were thinking of me while they were away somewhere in the world.

Oh, how I long for a postcard in my mailbox and then I can say “WOW, my friends thought of me”.

So, think about surprising your friends next time you are away, by sending them a postcard, because I am sure that will bring a smile to their face and smiles are great things!

Those were the Days!

Below is something I just wanted to share with you that I got from my Aunt,and because I think it’s good for a laugh but brings back those great memories of those carefree childhood days. Enjoy reading and I hope it brings a smile to your face!

All the girls had ugly gym uniforms? And wore tennis shoes not $200 Nike’s!

It took three minutes for the TV to warm up.

Nobody owned a purebred dog.

When a quarter was a decent allowance.

You’d reach into a muddy gutter for a penny.

Your Mom wore nylons that came in two pieces.

You got your windshield cleaned, oil checked, and gas pumped, without asking, all for free, every time. And you didn’t pay for air? And, you got trading stamps to boot.

Laundry detergent had free glasses, dishes or towels hidden inside the box.

It was considered a great privilege to be taken out to dinner at a real restaurant with your parents.

They threatened to keep kids back a grade if they failed… and they did it!

When a 57 Chevy was everyone’s dream car…to cruise, peel out, lay rubber or watch submarine races, and people went steady.

No one ever asked where the car keys were because they were always in the car, in the ignition, and the doors were never locked.

Lying on your back in the grass with your friends… and saying things like, ‘That cloud looks like a… ‘.

Playing baseball with no adults to help kids with the rules of the game.

Stuff from the store came without safety caps and hermetic seals because no one had yet tried to poison a perfect stranger…

And with all our progress, don’t you just wish, just once, you could slip back in time and savor the slower pace, and share it with the children of today.

When being sent to the principal’s office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited the student at home.

Basically we were in fear for our lives, but it wasn’t because of drive-by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc. Our parents and grandparents were a much bigger threat! But we survived because their love was greater than the threat.

And our summers were filled with bike rides, Hula Hoops, and visits to the pool, and eating Kool-Aid powder with sugar.

Didn’t that feel good, just to go back and say, ‘Yeah, I remember that’.

How Many Of These Do You Remember?
Candy cigarettes…

Wax Coke-shaped bottles with colored sugar water inside…

Soda pop machines that dispensed glass bottles…

Coffee shops with Table Side Jukeboxes…

Blackjack, Clove and Teaberry chewing gum…

Home milk delivery in glass bottles with cardboard stoppers…

Newsreels before the movie…

Telephone numbers with a word prefix…( Yukon 2-601). Party lines…

Peashooters…

Hi-Fi’s& 45 RPM records…

78 RPM records…

Green Stamps…

Mimeograph paper…

The Fort Apache Play Set…

Do You Remember a Time When Decisions were made by going…
‘eeny-meeny-miney-moe’?

Mistakes were corrected by simply exclaiming, ‘Do Over!’

‘Race issue’ meant arguing about who ran the fastest?

Catching The Fireflies Could Happily Occupy An Entire Evening.

It wasn’t odd to have two or three ‘Best
Friends’…

Having a Weapon in School meant being caught with a Slingshot.

Saturday morning cartoons weren’t 30-minute commercials for action figures.

‘Oly-oly-oxen-free’ made perfect sense.

Spinning around, getting dizzy, and falling down was cause for giggles.

The Worst Embarrassment was being picked last for a team.

War was a card game.

Baseball cards in the spokes transformed any bike into a motorcycle.

Taking drugs meant orange flavored chewable aspirin.

Water balloons were the ultimate weapon.

Maple syrup goes astray

LEBEN UND GEDANKEN

Bad news for lovers of real maple syrup! I read somewhere in the world that thieves have stolen thousands of liters of maple syrup. How can anyone in their right mind do such a horrific thing so that all the maple syrup lovers of the world could possible not have enough maple syrup for their pancakes or French toast? Bring back that syrup!!!!!

This really makes me feel bad because I love maple syrup and don’t want to do without the real thing. Artificial syrup just doesn’t cut the cake and tastes terrible if you ask me. I wonder what those thieves are going to do with all that syrup. Have a giant pancake party and invite the world or are they planning on doing something else with it???

It’s a really sad day when those things happen were people steel our beloved maple syrup. Why those guys could just…

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Happy Mother’s day!

This is dedicated to my mom.

I want to wish my mom a very Happy Mother’s day because she is & was a great mom!

from your little girl..

Can I Drive my Car?

With the price of gas/petrol or whatever you like to call it there seems to be a constant increase in its price. Sooner or later I won’t be able to drive my car anymore because I just plain cannot afford it.

You read daily that prices are increasing and that supplies are dwindling and so forth, but no one has come up with a real alternative that could help us.

I was looking at the cost of gas on the internet in various countries and was somewhat surprised at the prices.(note prices are not today’s and have changed since I wrote this.)

UK: £ 5.00 a gallon / Canada: $ 5.15 a gallon / Germany: € 6.36 a gallon

My gosh, I need to be a millionaire to fill the tank up of my car. I need to ride my bicycle more. This is good for the environment and I get exercise at the same time. And there are more positive things to riding a bike, like it helps you lose weight or you get out of the house and see the world from a different angle, and you can do your shopping too.

My advice: plan ahead with grocery shopping, because you have to carry everything and balance it all too! Or else your eggs could break.

The bicycle is a great thing, though many have just forgotten about it and I think now it will be making its comeback in the times when gas prices are rising.

And my car? Well, I will put it in the garage all nice and shiny and on the wall in front of my car hang a screen and there you go. I have my own drive-in movie theater right at my doorstep.

When I feel like going out to the movies in my car all I have to do is make some popcorn load up the DVD player with the movie I/we want to see and sit in my car and enjoy a full screen movie. You can do this too and if your car is large enough you can invite some friends over for a drive-in movie in your garage.

Though, I would recommend the garage drive-in only in the summer months because you can’t have the cars motor running in the garage. Firstly, because it’s dangerous for your health and secondly it would be bad for the environment and expensive for your wallet.

I am getting a bit reminiscent about gas prices here. When I think back all those years to my very first car that my parents gave me for graduating from high school. Now that was a car!!!

A convertible with a couple of holes in the roof for extra ventilation on rainy days and a bit of Irish lace too; that added a special note to the car. Making it one of a kind and ooh, I forgot to add if it rained and the distributor cap got damp then it wouldn’t start at all and then needed a blow dryer to get the moisture out of the distributor cap. A must for all car drivers today…..

That car was great even when it cause my father many a head ache. It was simply cheap to run. I could fill it up for $1.00 and drive all week. I forgot to mention it was some small European thing whereas all my friends had larger models and couldn’t afford the gas. So when they were strapped for cash everyone wanted to have the luxury of my car. Even back then a small car paid off, but you won’t find gas that cheap anymore.

I rode my bicycle everywhere too back then because it was somehow more fun than always riding around in my car.

Try riding your bicycle and see how much fun it can be and get to see the world from a different perspective and save some gas too.

The Cent is Dead

Again a very sad day has come about in history. The death of the wonderful Canadian cent that will be put to rest and no longer produced.
This is yet again another painful episode in 2012 were our beloved treasures of yesteryear are fading away.

Every summer as a kid I visited my grandparents who had a house on a lovely lake in Ontario and there I would get from my grandfather a handful of those wonderful coins.
I felt like a millionaire with all those pennies in my hand and thought I could buy the world too!
And with my riches we would visit the “Five and Dime” store where I could buy the world with my handful of Canadian cent pieces.

I bought many a great thing with those coins for example great rings or a fan and many a barrette for my hair but the best was when I saved up all my pennies and had a dollar and then the world was mine to have, and that summer with my riches I bought myself a beloved minnow net and spent many an hour out on the lake with my friends trying to catch minnows in my net, and that all with the help of the lovely Canadian cent.

I ask those folks who produce that lovely coin “How can you do that to me?” My childhood memories are only a couple of cents that I have left that I can hold in my hand.

I am sure there are many of you out there with fond memories of the Canadian cent and could cry just like I do at the thought of loosing such precious memories.

Love and cherish your cents that you have because there will never again be a penny made like that again!