Guy Things and Remembrance

My wife is away in Montreal on a work conference for 3 days. I drove her to the airport at 4:45am yesterday morning. Luckily it was a day off for Remembrance Day so I could be relatively dozy for the rest of the day and not worry about work. My dad has been visiting for a couple of days while my mother has been out in British Columbia. As Cathy Webster stated in an email to me, "Guy Paradise!...eating greasy food, not putting the toilet seat down, just guys sitting about in their underwear...scratching stuff." Well said, Mrs. Webster. It's as if you were peeking through our window.

I should clarify...I was supposed to be working yesterday but booked it off. Remembrance Day is not a national holiday here in Canada and many people have to work. Many employers in Newfoundland give the day off as the roots of folk here run deep with military service in the First and Second Great wars. Many Newfoundlanders were lost.

As usual, Sean's sea cadet corp gathered in the village of Torbay just outside St. John's to help remember those lost in service of this great country. Sean was especially thrilled to be asked by his commanding officer to be one of two cenotaph guards during the ceremony. I'm sure you all recall seeing the men and women who would stand at the 4 corners of the monument in a solemn pose--hands resting on the stalk of the rifle with the end of the barrel balancing on the toe of the left boot. In the case of the Torbay cenotaph it's only two guards as the monument is very small with a hill behind it. Sean donning his spats and white belt with brass buckle managed to keep the pose for the 50 minute ceremony. His attention span is normally very short and I'm very proud of him for keeping focus and maintaining the solemn pose. I managed to take three photos of him with his camera before the battery died. Since V is away, and I am a technological moron, I made do with a pirated image from the web (see above) of an unknown cadet standing guard at a cenotaph. It's a fairly accurate representation of what Sean was doing.

The cadets were then treated to a hot dog lunch and many of them will be taken to the 4 Nations Cup women's hockey bronze medal game tomorrow afternoon. How Canadian is that! Well, it's very Canadian aside from the fact that it's Finland vs. Sweden. But it will still be a good game to be sure.

I hope you all had a fine Remembrance/Veterans Day yesterday and gave thought to the men and women who have given their lives in service of their countries. I did not have any relatives die in the wars. My grandfather was a career army man and served with the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders (2nd battalion) and served for many years in Jamaica, China, India, Palestine, and north Africa. His son, my uncle John, was a tail gunner on Lancaster bombers and was fortunate to have survived the war.