Hi, James!  Recently you wrote in a message to Ardith Hinton:

JB>  Shocks all around here. I've been a little put off by PT,


           As in "Physical Terrorist"?  I can relate to that.  :-))



JB>  and a few chores long overdue here,


           Uh-huh.  While you're engaged in shovelling the white stuff
outside the house, other jobs... e.g. shovelling out the basement... have
to be placed on the back burner.  I can relate to that too... [wry grin].



JB>  and someone has beaten me to shoveling the public walks!


           What a nice surprise....  :-)  :-)  :-)



JB>  (PS:  Evidence is point to Welfare Mom!)


           Ah.  One might be tempted to consider such women deadbeats who
take unfair advantage of the rest of us hard-working souls... as I think
many other people do.  However, I am reminded of a couple of single mothers
we know.  One was sixteen when her first child was born.  Some time later,
she introduced me to a female friend of the same age who was living in the
same housing complex. Their conversation sounded quite immature to me. 
Maybe she needed the sort of example which you've been setting in your own
neighbourhood... and maybe she'd have taken it better from somebody who
wasn't clearly acting in loco parentis.

           The other person I had in mind left her husband when she was in
her early thirties.  We camped with her & her children at around the
same time.  I noticed that she often found it a challenge to deal with her
offspring... both of whom have special needs... and with her feelings
pertaining to the breakup. We were sharing a campsite, so when dishes
needed to be washed or a kid needed to be fed I just did whatever it was
without regard for whoever was supposedly responsible for it.  I never said
"Ahem... it's your turn to do xxx now!"  She would eventually
realize what had been going on, and then she'd do it....  :-)



AH>  And now that we're not busy shoveling snow... [chuckle].

JB>  Is this you, rubbing it in? 


           We've had snow three times in February & twice this month so
far... most of which melted before we had to shovel it.  Others weren't so
lucky.

           Heard on Nora's favourite (Vancouver Island) radio station just
the other day that the DJ was getting phone calls from people on the other
side of town reporting whiteout conditions but the sky was clear &
sunny for as far as he could see outside the station.  Ten minutes later,
we got a hailstorm.  :-)



AH>  ... to be replaced by a homeless man who had borrowed
AH>  a shovel from one of the nearby churches.  We haven't
AH>  seen him for some time either... [wry grin].

JB> ...Nor the shovel?


           We might have been skeptical too, except that he did the same
thing in two or three consecutive years with a shovel borrowed from the
same church. Dallas & I last saw him when we were feeling rather
overwhelmed.  We hired him to shovel our sidewalk, and he did a good job. 
So we paid him (in advance) to shovel my mother's sidewalk, a quarter mile
away, and he did a good job there.

           Sad story... he'd been ill for several months, lost his job etc.
 I hear a lot of stories like that & I don't necessarily believe every
word.  But this guy wasn't just looking for a handout.  He offered to do
something useful for us in exchange & we took him up it.  I respect
that sort of attitude.  :-)



JB>  Some of the young-uns I used to invite to parties here,
JB>  were astonished to see how many "Old & boring" people
JB>  were here. To most amazement, the boring assessment
JB>  usually vanished with haste.


           Uh-huh.  Good for you!  Seems to me they may have learned
something important there.  If not, it certainly wasn't for lack of
opportunity....  ;-)




--- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+