A day in the sun

On Sunday, I went on a road trip with Leslie and a couple of her friends to Sandbanks Provincial Park. The weather was flawless, and the fact that everyone else in Ontario was there too wasn't as much of a problem as you might think. There was a long lineup at the gate, but Leslie just cranked the air conditioning and put on another CD of 1940s radio plays, and the wait wasn't so bad. The beaches are so huge that despite the enormous crowd we were easily able to find a wide stretch of sand on which to spread out our towels and beach blanket, and an expanse of empty water to splash around in. I walked along the shore and took pictures of all the sand castles, sculptures, etc. I liked this waving mermaid; while I was photographing it these two girls came along and said, "Oh look, it got wrecked!" and started trying to fix it. They told me two teenagers had made it.

When you live in the city and you go for a drive through the small towns and the countryside, everything looks like a setup for a horror movie. A derelict sign for the Hideaway Trailer Campground; a car emblazoned with advertising for Potpourri the Clown; a corn maze, offering "moonlight walks" and a "Haunted Halloween" event (which Leslie and I are dead set on going back for). I couldn't stop giggling over a shop at the front of a property that appeared to be a cattle farm and/or slaughterhouse; it had a big sign that said only "PROTEIN STORE", and all you could see through the front windows were stacks of unmarked cardboard boxes. And some things are just odd. Practical, but odd. Have you ever seen a vending machine that dispensed mealworms before?