On Friday I spent a lot of the day getting
caught up on my journal but also arguing with people online. I didn’t get
around to taking a siesta until later than usual and so when I got up to get
ready to take a bike ride I didn’t get going until almost half an hour behind
schedule. If I’d taken my usual ride I wouldn’t have gotten home with as much time
to write as I wanted so I decided to only ride to Bloor and Dovercourt, head
south to Queen, stop at Freshco and then come home.
It
was extremely windy as I travelled north and since it was coming from the west
it was throwing off my balance a bit. The rushing air had knocked lots of twigs
and a few limbs off of the trees and onto the street. On a couple of occasions
I had to ride with my eyes closed for a second or two to avoid getting my eyes
peppered with blowing dirt.
The
eastward one-way sign at the corner of Muir and Brock Avenues was pointing
south. I assume it had been bent by the breeze.
Dovercourt
was also littered with broken twigs. Just south of Bloor there was a large pile
of collapsed large cardboard boxes on the curb waiting to be picked up for
recycling. In front of the pile was one assembled box of the same size. I
wouldn’t have paid I much attention except for the fact that while I was a
passing a mother walking with her daughter glanced down into the carton as she
passed, which gave me the impression there might be something of interest
inside. I stopped and walked back. Inside were two small, feminine looking
mirrors, a white candleholder and a couple of other decorative items. What
stood out though were a pair of Doc Martin sandals that looked like they might
be my size, so I took them. I wore sandals for a while when I was in my teens
because my mother had bought me a pair, but the straps irritated my feet so I
never got into them. Now I don’t know if I want to subject people to seeing my
ugly toenails in public, but maybe I’ll change my mind when it gets hot.
I
tried them on and they fit but the ankle strap is too loose so I will have to
poke new notches to keep the Jesus boots from flopping around when I walk.
That
night I watched an Alfred Hitchcock Hour teleplay about a young couple, Dexter
and Joyce that hire a German nanny named Frieda, who had been Dexter’s nanny
when he was a child. We learn early on that there is a German nanny on the
loose who is being sought by the police for the poisoning murder of another
baby. Even though Frieda turns off the radio when reports about the murderous
nanny are broadcast and also hides the newspaper from the couple, it seems
obvious early on that Frieda is not the killer because then there would be no
surprise twist at the end. But Joyce finally does hear about the nasty nanny
and begins to worry. Frieda doesn’t make things any easier when Joyce wants to
take down Frieda’s information for tax purposes and hears that she doesn’t have
a social security card and she doesn’t remember the address of her previous
employer. The baby has been getting a stomachache ever since Frieda arrived but
when the doctor comes he declares that Frieda has been doing everything right
and that she’s an excellent nurse.
Frieda has been giving the baby a special mixture of her own for his
stomach but when Joyce catches her doing so she gets angry and tells her not to
give the baby anything without her permission.
The
names of the couple whose baby the German nanny had killed are published in the
newspaper and so Joyce gets their number from the operator and calls them. The
husband’s sister, Christine answers the phone and says the couple have gone
away for a rest after their ordeal. Joyce tells Christine that she is worried
that her nanny is the same one that killed Christine’s brother’s baby.
Christine says she can send Joyce a picture of the nanny. We see the photo and
it is of Frieda. Not long after that Christine shows up at Joyce’s door and
shows her the photo. Joyce sees that it is the same picture that Frieda has in
her drawer and she runs to the nursery where she finds Frieda giving the baby a
bottle. She grabs Frieda and pushes her into a closet, which she immediately
locks. Joyce comes back out to Christine and says she’s going to call the
police. Christine says she’ll do that for her, but she only pretends to be
making the call, as her finger is pressed down on the plunger. Afterward, as
Christine begins to relate the situation that led to the poisoning of her
brother’s baby, it becomes more and more clear that there is something wrong
with Christine. She had been attached to her brother and had lived with him and
his wife, but all of his love was doted on the baby and she began to resent it.
She reveals that she is the one that poisoned the baby and planted the evidence
among Frieda’s belongings. Christine then pulls a small pistol from her purse
and says that she has to stop Frieda from telling terrible stories about her.
She goes to the closet and lets her out but she points the gun at her. Frieda
calms her down and convinces her that she loves her and Christine comes to her
arms, as Joyce takes the gun away.
I
was up late arguing with people online. Over the last year or so I have been
looking at and reacting to my friend Cad’s posts on his Facebook page. The
things he posts or reposts are usually hateful, bigoted, racist, asinine,
humourless, ill informed and boring. I tend to do research before I respond in
hopes that I can get through and I also respond to the source of his post
whenever that’s possible, which often leads to long arguments. Rarely does
anything result from these arguments other than people responding to rational
arguments with name-calling and vitriol. I will be 63 years old this year and I
don’t want one of the last things I do to be wasting my time in an argument
with people that are immune to facts. I like Cad and still consider myself to
be his friend but when he’s on social media he loses touch with his social
responsibilities to an extreme degree. I’ve got lots of things I want to
accomplish in the years that are left in my life and so that night when I went
to bed I made a decision to stop reading and responding to Cad’s posts.
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