Surprises

I'm constantly finding things surprising here in Canada, sometimes in a good way and sometimes in a bad one. For example, I had a poster made for Isaac for his birthday and I've been trying to find those hard plastic things you slide on the top and bottom to hang it up but still keep it in good condition, but such a thing does not seem to exist over here; what's more, they don't use Blu Tack* either, so I'm left wondering what the hell you're supposed to do with posters if you're Canadian! Sellotape - oh no sorry, it's just tape here - seems to be the most oft-suggested option but it's hardly ideal. The search for a viable alternative continues...

Anyway, yesterday I had an example of a good way. We parked in the centre of town to pop into the shops - it costs $1 for an hour so we put 4 quarters in the parking meter and headed off to buy Isaac some shoes. We ended up chatting in the shop for ages to one of Isaac's friends, so when we headed back to the car, we saw a parking attendant writing us out a ticket. Oh no! We legged it over and Isaac said 'So...what if we were just leaving?' Ha ha, yeah right I thought. You know what these f*ckers are like, once they've started with a ticket there's no stopping them. "Well..." he began, "you'd have to put another quarter in the meter." he said. "Okay" said Isaac, and proceeded to do just that while the parking attendant put his book away and walked off, leaving me opened-mouthed, reeling, and only 25c poorer than before.

*in fairness, you CAN get it in a few places, but it's not commonplace at all and most Canadians look at you blankly - or in horror! - when you suggest it.