UNACCEPTABLE Part 2

UNACCEPTABLE part 2

So I just finished ranting about an unattended camp fire I found Tuesday night this week. And on the Monday I came across a six foot A-frame ladder in the left lane of Highway 406.

Two lanes each way with a broad ditch in between. Country, no street lights. Just half an hour before sunset.

How long had it been there?

Traffic was light, so cars were just drifting aside to pass it, but what about when the sun set? One distracted driver not processing what the weird rectangle ahead of them was?

So I pull over, spin the bike, drive back, and chuck it off into the grass.

Did I save a life? Or at least a damaged vehicle? Maybe? But who left it? Who was like "oh well I can't back up so I guess I'll just go buy a new ladder"? Did they even notice it fell off? How could they NOT?

Un-fucking-acceptable.

Unacceptable.

So I'm riding home last night, just after 11pm, and my normal route takes me along the Niagara Parkway to Queenston Heights, site of a massive failed assault by the Americans back in the War of 1812, and resting place of General Isaac Brock. The zone is a giant public park, memorial, and forest full of hiking paths along the Bruce Trail.

Note the 'forest' part.

So it's with some dismay that I notice a camp fire blazing away about 30 yards down one of the path access pull offs.

At first I'm like "not my problem," which is quickly overridden with "of course it fucking is, I'm a Canadian, aren't I?" So I double back and do a slow pass, looking for people.

I don't see anyone, but of course it's dark and in a dark forest. So I park, pop on my hazard lights, and approach the camp, flashlight on and pocket knife out (folded!).

Best case scenario; couple young people having an ignorantly improper marshmallow cook out. As long as they had a water pail or sand or an extinguisher... It's wrong but... Just be careful.

Bad scenario; I get jumped by some cracked up sociopaths and take as many of them with me as I can.

But what I found was worse.

Completely fucking unattended fully ablaze camp fire built with no brush clearance or containment pit in the middle of the hiking path. Surrounded by tall grasses, which embers were being blown into freely. And two deep tire ruts where a vehicle had struggled to get out of the mud when the party ended.

What the ever loving fuck.

At this point a car stops and another guy walks up asking if the fire is mine. Fuck no. He starts kicking it flat, but as you can see from the video, even knocked to coals, the fire would catch wind and pop back to life in seconds.

There was a car sized puddle about twenty feet away, but neither of us had a means to carry the water to the blaze.

So I had to call the fire department.

Who had to suit up and drive over.

To spray down a fire pit.

Firefighters who may have been needed at an actual emergency.

A camp fire that could have sparked a park wide blaze, destroying the historic sites, recreational grounds, wildlife refuge, and millionaire housing.

Why?

I must stress this was a -camp fire-. Whomever had made and left it had made zero effort to douse the blaze, stamp out the embers, or disperse the coals.

There is no "maybe they just did a poor job" or "didn't know better." They had enough knowledge to BUILD the damn thing, they would understand the inherent danger leaving it would cause.

Just... Fucking unacceptable.

Thanks to other random passerby and the respondent fire crew.

You can see the ruts left behind. Just above the car.

PEOPLE. YOU CAN DO BETTER.

Damnit again.

Damnit.

So I ordered a collector's edition of a video game, and the ETA was Monday.

I was out and about yesterday, and decided to give Garwik a call on his lunch to check if it had been dropped off. They're replacing the fences at our townhouses so he's in the back yard with the dog.

"Not yet," he responds.

I check my email.

"That's really weird... it says they attempted to deliver."

"What? There was no sticker."

"It says they attempted to deliver ... One minute ago?"

"Give me a second... Son of a bitch!"

So in true courier fashion, in the one minute Garwik was out back, the Purolator van had pulled up, jumped out, pushed the doorbell, slapped the prepared "sorry we missed you!" sticker on the door, and took off.

And of course you have to wait a day to go get it from the centre.

So I pull up outside the building today, on my motorcycle, in the rain, and the lady has the cleverness to giggle "Oh! I hope youre not picking up a BIG package!"

"Actually, I am..." I respond wearily, handing her the slip.

She vanishes in the back and returns with a torso sized brown box. "You weren't kidding!"

"Eugh," I grunt noncommittaly, finding my ID.

"You sure you'll be able to manage this?" she asks, making conversation, I guess?

I sigh, and glance up at her. "Well since company policy is 'Ding-Dong-Ditch' and we couldn't get to the door in the forty-five seconds it took to slap the sticker on our mailbox and run back to the truck, I don't have much of a choice, do I?"

She didn't know how to respond to that.

Thanks, Susan, for pointing out that lugging around big boxes on a motorcycle, in the rain, is less than ideal. I'm glad I paid extra to get it delivered Monday and instead had to get it myself Tuesday.

I parked on the lane right in front of their doors, because that's what their trucks always do, so it seemed appropriate.

Yay!

Damnit.

That feeling when you've got 90/10s and still insist on driving off road because why the heck not.

Most of the mud got scrubbed away on the Parkway but I'll take my "chicken strips" with pride.

PS: Judging a rider's skill by the edge of their tires is stupid and you know it.