Old Ironmaker

Let the mud slinging begin. I don't expect any here but it has started based on the personal comments on the Yahoo article. Not 1 comment offering condolences. Tragic to say the least. I offer my condolences to the friends and family of the deceased, it looks like 6 have perished.

I remember you when I 1st joined. Welcome back, you are the real deal O.G.

Mount 50 cals on those things and you guys have your own military division. Great work as well Terry. Dan what did the MOT title your machine as?

Once you are finished the mechanics a nice wrap of something resembling various scenes of ice in various shades of blues and whites would be cool, a coulauge , even some scenes of guys icefishing. The sunsets we saw when the orange Sun dipped behind the bridge at Deseronto is something I will never forget. Cool not meant to be a pun.

You are insane. -10C outside and 70F inside my shack and my fingers are freezing looking out the patio door just looking at the ice cycles hanging from tree branches.

Man I must be old. I was told to learn Word Perfect for 5.0 DOS in 95'. The co op student in the hole next to me said not to bother as something called Word was out and far better. My IT guy insisted on me learning and using Word Perfect. I refused and reminded him he was a contractor that works for me. Within a few months the IT crew was walking from office to office cubical to cubical telling everyone to dump WP and learn Word. Latter on I learned we were paying this group of IT contractors 500K annually just for our division. We had 5 divisions then. And the board wanted to know why were not profitable. Contracting out IT groups soon stopped and we promoted within and hired a few of them on as full time for much less than 2.5 million a year

No Terry not cool, stupid cold.

Erie doesn't have an inch of ice on shore. But it sure is cold. The lakeshore trees are all covered in ice cycles from splashing waves yesterday. I haven't stuck my nose outside once today. and don't plan on it. The garbage pail and blue boxes will still be there tomorrow, or the day after. As soon as I think about going outside I just remember those frozen body parts working on the docks in February and turn up the heat.

I remember watching an episode of The Guild Garage. They were trying to get the tracks on a old Model A Ford, made back then for the ice. They realized to get them on and tight they had to let air out of the tires, put the track on and refill the tires with air. Hope that may help, it worked 100 yrs. ago. So simple it's stupid.

It not only won't fall apart if you build it Sally will be overbuilt if I have learned anything about you Dan. You will have a running prototype when you are finished. Then onto Dragon's Den. There is a market for a sled on anabolic steroids, for those that have snow and ice on the ground at least. Those ice fishing guys will do anything to get to the fish, anything. I wonder if Sally would qualify to run on public snow machine trails? It isn't a truck, it isn't a traditional snow mobile, way smaller then a Bombardier. What is it? The Burgermiester says it's a Frankensled!! Ooops, forgot to wish you a very belated Birthday old man. You are catching up to me. In a few years the Government feels so bad that you are old they give you a few bucks every month. Enough to go to dinner at The Keg a few times, maybe, and that's about it after they take their pound of flesh out.

I think we use Lunar tables more up north. Dany Columby swears by them hunting Musky on Nipp.

Great tips Reef Runner, you are bang on. No tips from me Cliff but you are lucky to get warm weather in S.C. this time of year, that's warm for spots in Florida actually in mid January. I remember we were down there golfing on Halloween and woke up to a dusting of snow. It didn't stop us from golfing, the guys in the clubhouse thought we were insane. Walmart down there does not sell Longjohns!! Enjoy you lucky guy.

It would be prudent to jump in the water in a controlled environment and test new suits. The best test would be now rather than June. I've gone under the ice twice at work when I was getting the experience part of my motto below. It hurts and is frightening all at the same time.

This sport of ours is becoming more expensive every day if one were to keep up on all the latest "gadgets." I agree for 900 bucks no way it is cost effective, just upgrade to the tried and true electronics that are proven to work. I wonder how many very expensive Smart Phones are lying on the bottom of lakes and rivers? Apparently you can't fish without holding one in your hand. Unless you have 3 arms casting, retrieving and looking at the screen has to be tricky. the ProNav Angler does not require cell service or a data connection to function. How can that work?

Drove my TR-6 and MGB's all winter, into the ground. I carried a spare battery to get them to start. Sometimes I actually had a back window in the winter that was a sheet of plastic. Sure was nice in the summer or when it didn't rain. The things we did to get a date.

I have plenty of stories of watching Rocky Johnson wrestle during tapings of "Maple Leaf Wrestling" when they taped the show at the Channel 11, CHCH studio on King Street West in Hamilton in the 60's. He was one of the 1st black wrestlers and had a body like Mr. Universe back then. One of our favorites. I didn't know he was from Nova Scotia. If there were 30 people during those tapings it was a lot. All the future WWF superstars were there from Bruno Samartino , Abdula the Butcher, The Beast (who worked at Dofasco) Whipper Billy Watson, Billy Red Lyons and Ivan The Terrible Koloff to name just a few. Condolences to the family and his many fans around the World. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/rocky-johnson-curtis-bowles-johnson-1.5429494

Just because my name ends in a vowel doesn't mean I took the blood oath. Maybe my grand father, not me. A Datsun or Toyota just as good a getaway car. I remember so far back that if one of those cars, Honda's too, would have their tires slashed or headlights smashed out if they were in the parking lots of a union steel plant, construction site or any of the big 3 auto makers. Guys took imports seriously. For some reason my British Leyland cars were never touched. Many Brits ran the unions then. Now we make those cars and trucks. My wife's Nissan was built in Kentucky and my Silverado was built in Mexico for Lords sake. I don't think I would have bought the Chevy if I knew that. I was never in the United Steelworkers of America (USWA) union but without them I would never have gotten my wages and benefits. At my retirement dinner the USWA pres. of our local gave me a local 1005 hat and jacket. Still have them but can't wear them. I didn't earn them.

More bad years than good years now. My niece and nephew and the kids are ardent snowboarders. They have to travel to Quebec in the last few years if they want to find good snow. Man made and plus temps make ice here like Blue Mountain. I just spoke to her and they have a trip booked to Vermont. Even there conditions are sketchy. It was normal for us to have great skiing conditions as early as the 1st week of December even in November one year. In the 70's it really snowed. I remember the plant being shut down for almost an entire week mid 70's. Nothing could move by rail or rubber tire.

QPP = Sortie de Quebec? I've had the pleasure to meet a few. So how much was your take? A stolen Bug is the perfect getaway car. No one would be stupid enough to use one so you drive right by, slowly until you get to the Valiant with the 340 Duster engine slapped in it. Don't ask don't tell.

I really hope you guys get your ice. I don't think there was ever a winter when we wanted to hit the ice we couldn't find any. Nipp always had ice, every winter 30 plus yrs ago. It has to be frustrating for you guys Brian. Cold enough down here today to make ice but far too late for any safe ice this year in Southern Ont. Reminds me I have to cover my Palm trees.

I thought so. 2000 you say. There's 1440 mins in a 24 hr period. Spend a minute on each and you haven't done 25% of them in an 8hr day. Come on, you chuck them all, admit it, then do what you are paid to do for the rest of the day. That's what I did with 50. I said if it was that important they would walk the 20 feet to my hole and ask me personally. Most were bad jokes and forwards where my name was 24th on the CC's. I never answered the phone either. Voicemail was the greatest invention ever.

Oh man, done that been there. The shower after 3 to 11 often took seconds depending how much crud we had on us. Back then the hotels, later called bars and now are clubs, had last call at 1AM. When they extended closing to 2 AM showers took a tad longer, 5 minutes! Often my wife was getting up and I hadn't been to bed yet and the kitchen was a disaster area.

Big Cliff both you and I are so "early" 2000's. No one uses email today. Many go into the garbage can before they are opened. So I have been told many times. My nephew is a global manager for a Canadian Engineering firm. He says he can get more than 300 emails a day. If his assistant had to open, read and forward to him the pertinent ones that's all he or she would be doing the entire day, including him reading and answering them. If it's that important they tweet or text or twitter or Facebook or whatever they do. I guess phones don't work any longer in 2020. What do you guys that still work deal with emails? Even back in 2000 when I had a job to go to I could get 50 or more emails on a Monday AM.

It was a big deal 27 years ago when Coyote were spotted on the brow of the Niagara Escarpment in Hamilton just west of Centennial Parkway reported by friends of mine that lived there. Everyone from the MNR to national television news crews were out hoping to spot one. The MNR set traps. It was a really big deal then. Now it's common to see these animals in highly densely populated areas as close as downtown T.O. I have read where Wolves are as far south as us here at Lake Erie. Wildlife will travel until they can easily find food. Whether they are Wolf, Coywolf, or Coydogs they are thriving where we live. It's legal to hunt them here and many do. More than a few family dogs have gone missing.

There was a time I only drank good Scotch. Now I can't even smell it without getting ill. Too much at one sitting can do that. Definitely get to your LCBO manager with the bottle. When I read your topic heading about a booze rant and saw the time to be 1:30 AM I thought it might be a rant tainted in wiskey. Not so. Go see your LCBO mgr. They are very accommodating, it's their job to be.