Judith Braun

            On Thursday morning I realized that when doing short gestures at work the day before I must have put a strain on my back because I was aching during a lot of my yoga poses and my flexibility was fairly limited, especially during backward bending.

There was a very heavy thunderstorm while I was doing yoga and the first lightning strike was very close.

Around midday I rode to Freshco because I was out of Earl Grey tea but I also went because Thursday is the day for the new deals of the week. I bought some more Ontario grapes but the season is over and they aren’t in the greatest shape anymore. I guess now that the trade deal has been signed I can start buying fruit from the US again but buying Canadian while I can isn’t a bad thing. I bought a whole chicken instead of a turkey because I like chicken better and also because turkeys are just too big for someone that lives alone. There always seems to be leftover meat that gets thrown away. I splurged on some extra old cheddar and got some chips and salsa as well. I picked the aisle of the middle-aged cashier who I think is the boss of the other cashiers and who’s been working there as long as I’ve lived in Parkdale. She is always sincerely friendly. As she started serving me she put a sign on the belt saying “Another cashier will be glad to serve you” but then one of her Portuguese regular customers came along who refuses to be served by anyone else but her. They were chatting in Portuguese as I left.

I went directly to Vina Pharmacy as I’d been told to come back there after three weeks of taking the medication for the fungus on my toenails. They'd only had one month’s worth of the pills and so they’d said they’d order more. At first it took them a while to figure out what I needed until the pharmacist that had helped me last time stepped in and sort of remembered me. It took at least ten minutes to get the last two-thirds of my pills. So far I haven’t noticed any change on my toenails but then they haven't grown much in that time.

It was a surprisingly warm day compared to the temperature of late and I was overdressed in my leather jacket.

That night I watched another episode of Perry Mason. Bob Dawson, the co-owner of an investment counseling company finds out that $80,000 is missing from a trust fund belonging to a Carol Stanley. He confronts his partner, Albert Tidings about the money and he admits to having taken it. Dawson wants to call the police but Tidings shows him a file that causes him to stop. After Dawson leaves, Tidings confronts his accountant Ellis about $20,000 that is missing from the same trust fund, Tidings had only reinvested $60,000. Tidings gets a call from Carol and she arranges to meet him at his office that night to discuss the trust fund. When she gets there Tidings is dead. She calls Dawson. Later Dawson brings Carol to see Mason but she is wearing a black veil. Dawson tears a $10,000 bill in two, giving half to Mason and half to Carol. He tells him that Carol will give him the other half if she needs his legal help. The next day an aggressive and loud middle-aged woman named Abigail Leeds storms into Mason's office. She claims that about twenty years ago she became the guardian of the young daughter of Polish refugees that died in a camp. She named the girl Carol and put her in a home that turned out to be a baby farm. She was adopted by a wealthy couple that died in a car accident and left Carol a six-figure trust fund. She says that Tidings is the trustee and he's robbing Carol. Mason says he can't take the case unless Carol approves it and so Abigail says she’ll bring her. Mason gets Paul to trace the $10,000 bill and finds that it was issued to Tidings. Mason goes to Tidings’s house and finds his body. It turns out that Dawson moved Tidings's body to protect Carol. Carol is arrested for murder. There is no courtroom scene in this episode. Mason uncovers that Abigail is actually Carol’s birth mother and that Abigail killed Tidings to protect her daughter from being robbed any more.

Carol was played by Judith Braun whose acting career was fairly short as she married screenwriter Walter Bernstein and had four children with him, one of which is director Andrew Bernstein who directed four episodes of "Mad Men”. Walter Bernstein          was blacklisted in the 50s because he had been a member of the Young Communists League in the 40s, but he started getting work again in the 60s and became successful.