My Next Posting

I have no idea what our weather statistics will show finally for this summer. It just seems that our temperature has been quite hot for a good part of the summer. Seriously, when looking at the online weather channels, I could see the "feels-like" temperature of 40°C plus quite often showing up.

I wonder if we are going to have the same kind of winter that we had last year. It seemed to take much longer to start out yet lasted over a shorter period of time than I expected. Then, we hardly had a spring with a very hot summer starting so quickly. I just wonder if this the kind of weather we should expect to see over the next few years.

Enough about the weather talk. It is just so difficult to know what to say about it because it changes so quickly. Instead, let me be a bit more traditional in the way that I do things. I often start off my postings on more personal matters that I experience. I do this to let you know about events that happened to me and which I think you might experience as well one day. No, I'm not trying to be your "teacher" to let you know how to handle something. Rather I'm just telling you about an event that has taken place and what I'm doing about it. Hopefully, this will give you an idea about an alternative that you might consider if something similar happens to you.

My life has changed significantly over the last few years. I certainly am not experiencing carrying out "legal matters." In other words, at my retirement age, I stopped practicing law as my career. Moreover, I no longer perform the "journalist" approach that I did for so many years. Rather, I just seem to have a different way of living now.

Obviously, I had to change because of the illness that I experienced. However, I probably would have done so anyway because I just wanted to do things differently. I wanted to to "retire" because I think I just felt so worn out after working so hard for so many years.

I just cannot believe how I sometimes act these days. I will often stop during one of my walks and just stare at the beautiful, blue sky over my head. I don't think that I knew that such a sky existed before. I really never looked at it because I was so busy carrying out my profession starting early morning and ending quite often after the dark began. When there are these big puffy white clouds floating in the blue sky, it is just so magnificent. Of course, I often watch now the dark, gray clouds, especially if I can see lightning, expecting the rain to start pouring out momentarily. I have to get under my roof in time.

So much has changed in the way I live these days also. I exercise now a number of times per day to control my weight and to keep my strength up. I dropped quite a number of pounds when I was so ill and, surprisingly, have not added on all of those pounds back. Oh sure, I have put on some pounds but it is all because of muscle not fat. Exercising has helped but my diet has changed so significantly. I still eat very well but I'm careful about the kind of foods that I now eat.

I better stop writing about this now. Rather, let me write some stories that I trust will interest you as well.

SEARS SOLD

I have to admit that I cannot believe at all what has happened to Sears Canada. Yes I know that it went bankrupt!  The US Sears just filed for bankruptcy recently too.

It just makes little sense to me that this could happen to such a well-known company that I thought was doing so well in sales.

I am sure that you remember when the Sears store in Devonshire Mall actually closed down and had a massive sale to eliminate its products just before it went completely out of business there.

I'm not going to get into a discussion at all about what happened to Sears. Rather, I just wanted you to know this:

“The former Sears store at Devonshire Mall has been sold.

HOOPP Realty Inc., owners of Devonshire Mall, finalized the purchase of the building and adjacent land with the receiver of Sears Canada earlier this month.” (Kevin McQuaid Jr, Windsorite.ca, August 30, 2018) 

It will be interesting to see what replaces it and, importantly, when that happens.

BETTER RESULTS IN TECUMSEH

I have to admit that I did not see this news story before. If I had, I would have posted it.

Of course, what is being said is quite positive. As a resident of Tecumseh who experienced flooding for the first time in his life a couple of years ago, this news makes me happy:

“Tecumseh expects to spend millions more on flood-prevention efforts

the town is taking action to mitigate the impact from too much rain…

McNamara says the measures seem to be working, as the number of property owners who reported flooded basements after last year's major rain event was 144 - compared to 2,500 following a storm in 2016.” (CTV, Windsor, June 27, 2018) 

While my family was not one of those 144 families, our house did experience some minor flooding last year. We've taken steps to try to prevent even that happening again. We will just have to wait and see what happens in the future. Hopefully the new efforts will minimize any future risks even more.

TRANSIT IN WINDSOR

Before I moved to Windsor, I lived in the City of Toronto. While technically I did not live in "downtown" Toronto, where I always lived in the City was always close to public transit services ie the TTC or Toronto Transit Commission. I hardly ever drove to work on any day but took the streetcar, bus or subway train instead.

When I moved to Windsor, everything changed. Sure I worked for a car company and was provided with a vehicle so that I could drive it when I wanted to do so. However the reality was that the transit service in Windsor was so poor that I drove to work every day. I had no idea which bus services to use, the cost, when to catch the buses nor how long it would take to get to work and back.

That is why I found this news article of interest:

"This political stunt worked” (Anne Jarvis, Windsor Star, August 29, 2018) 

It described the action taken by a candidate running for Council:

"Call it a political stunt, but Ward 5 candidate Joey Wright’s “field trip” on a city bus Monday, documented in live videos, photos and posts on social media, was a smart, fresh way to make his point: that Transit Windsor is “wildly inadequate...”

Wright, 27, who doesn’t have a driver’s licence, set out from his campaign office at Milloy Street and Malta Road to the site of the proposed new hospital on County Road 42 across from the airport. It took two buses, the Transway 1C and Walkerville 8, each way and a total of more than three hours to get there and back.”

It was a smart move by him. He wanted to make sure that everyone knew what the status of transit service in Windsor was like:

“And as it is today,” he said, “it doesn’t work.”

However, it seems that we really don't have any need to worry. Here is what was said in the column by Transit Windsor Executive director Pat Delmore:

A lot more senior government money, which has already helped pay for current improvements, will be available for public transit in the next decade, Delmore said.

“That’s going to make way for everything we want to do in the future,” he said.”

I can just imagine how much money that would cost and what effort would have to be done to "educate" Windsorites so they will become familiar with the transit system.

I am sorry but I find that extremely difficult to believe. But who knows what will really happen.