Is Brad Moonlighting?

Have you noticed how much Broil King BBQ's new pitchman looks so much like a slightly younger Brad Wall.

I almost drove off the road when I saw him on a billboard in Medicine Hat. This clearly could be Brad at a fund raiser, talking about the Saskatchewan Party with evangelical zeal. No question about it.

I wonder if Broil King really thought it through. I don't know about you but, it kind of puts me off my steak.

I Broil King wants to woo the right wing crowd a better choice might be newly appointed senator Mike Duffy. He looks like a man who really enjoys a steak. Or two.

What about this Swine Flu?

I find a few things bit unnerving about this swine flu thing.

To start with, if it is spread by tourists bringing this flu back from Mexico and considering that it seems everyone here in Saskatchewan but me, and a few other floor hockey players goes to Mexico every year. We most likely are at peril.I am becoming very suspicious of anyone with the sniffles and a tan.

To be honest, I am not sure if the World Health Orginization (WHO) is just being very cautious and covering their asses or if we really are on the edge of a pandemic. In any case, no matter what warning are out there, nothing much will be done to prepare until it is too late. I am willing to bet that 99% of employers are not doing anything special to prepare for a pandemic should one occur.

Pandemic is a very frightening word, or at least it should be.

What about the food distribution for example? If a pandemic occurs and there are not enough truck drivers around willing or able to get our food to stores, we are in big trouble. How much do you have in the cupboard? Don't forget, most stores only have enough stock of the shelves for a very short time. We'll probably all have to learn how to cook lentils. Not to mention driving out to the country and lining up outside some grannery with our bags.

Another thing, although we have been assured that this sickness is not spread from pigs to humans through our food supply Canadian pork inspections have been increased. That doesn't give me confidence. No wonder the pork producers are a bit ticked.

Perhaps this is nothing to really worry about but even so, I am washing my hands more that usual, keeping an eye out for Mexicans and giving people with tans a wide berth..

Lady Bug Rescue.

Most people clear their lawns of leaves each fall without fail. My neighbours are out there with rakes and other tools, making a real project out of it. They are all keen to get at it. Those piles of leaves are carted away before you know it. Except at my place, it doesn't quite ever happen that way.

I never quite seem to get to it. I am not sure if its because I am nostalgic or what. It has been a long time since we all raked the leaves up into big piles and burned them. I fondly remember those chilly fall nights hazy with leave smoke as we walked home.

I'm not really sure why I never get to it. Leaf blower exhaust and piles of orange bags just doesn't quite do it for me besides, it it is too damn cold and I have other things to do.

So I leave it for the spring.

This weekend I got to it. I have been raking up all of last years leaves that haven't cooperated and blown onto my neighbours lawns. I'm having fun. It is good to get the fresh air after a cold winter and it gets me an early jump on my tan.

What I always forget about are the lady bugs. I have never lived anywhere where lady bugs seem to thrive quite the way they do here. There are thousands living in those piles of leaves. I had been gathering the leaves up and dumping them in the dumpster in the alley when I notices that hundreds of lady bugs were climbing out of the leaves and were crawling around the top layer.

I just couldn't send lady bugs to the dump. That was what prompted the rescue. We gently gathered them up by the hundreds and put them back in bushes, the garden and what leaves were left. We made several trips.

So I am not a slacker after all. What I am actually doing by not getting to all this in the fall is creating lady bug habitat. Who knew I was so "green".