If you were anywhere near here last week, you saw the flies. Clouds of them. Thanks to my neighbour Carol for capturing the image above as they emerged from the lake. When not flying, they crowded in clusters on anything from buildings to rocks. They ruined people’s morning coffee on the patio and evening dinner on the deck. They’re gross but harmless, and short-lived.
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…“Invest in real estate. They’re not making any more of it.”
My Dad
My back yard in the north Toronto neighbourhood of Willowdale was the closest thing to a cottage that I ever owned. It was private, fenced in, surrounded by cedars. I could enjoy the inground pool without feeling watched. On long weekends, it felt like the entire city emptied and headed for cottage country. I only had to open a sliding door to get there.
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ImPort Stanley is weekly series about life and discoveries by a recent “import” to Port Stanley, ON.
If you only visit, say, once a summer to hit the beach, you wouldn’t even know this happens. Unless you catch it on the news or the Weather Network.
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ImPort Stanley is weekly series about life and discoveries as a recent “import” to Port Stanley, ON.
Watching the lift bridge in Port Stanley is oddly compelling. A patio with concrete picnic tables sits at the water’s edge, and there’s nowhere I’d rather be on a warm summer night than on one of those benches, enjoying an ice cream cone, watching the boats float past. We try to guess how much they cost. Or where they’re from. Or just enjoy the view of happy-looking people doing what they love. When the bells sound and the bridge breaks in half, rising to 80-plus degrees, you can’t look away. It’s never boring. It opens every half hour during peak season.
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It will not come as a surprise to you that Ms. Clever Pants, Erin Davis, came up with the title. She proposed it for the name of a side hustle I was contemplating. But Port Stanley, like many small towns, is all about local-local-local. Importing stuff, or implying it’s imported, doesn’t excite them. However, we are imports.
…One year ago today, Derek took a flying lesson in a helicopter. I wrote a happy post about it at the time because it was exhilarating with spectacular views of the Lake Erie shoreline. But there was something about it that I left out. …