To me, spring seems like a time of waiting and anticipation. As with most agriculturally based communities, Meota exemplifies this waiting in that the farm community is waiting for Mother Nature to put all things in order for them to get into the fields to prepare for seeding their livelihood. They are waiting for her to warm things up so that the seed will germinate once set in the ground; they are waiting for her to send lots of sunshine to dry things up enough so that they do not sink up to their you-know-whats when they do pull into the fields.
I think at this time of year we all are waiting for warmer weather to brighten our days and make it more enjoyable to get out of doors and let the spring breezes clear out the cobwebs that have accumulated in our senses over the winter months. We wait for the yards to dry up along with the streets so that we can traverse the town without having to find a way to enter a building without tracking in a couple of pounds of mud with us, and to be able to get out into our yards and clean up the refuse that has gathered over the winter.
Here at the lake one of the most interesting waiting games is the annual Meota Lakeshore Lions car sink. This event has been carrying on for many years now and is just one of the ways this service club gathers the cash it needs to fund the projects that have benefitted and will continue to benefit our little community. In the early days of this project it was pretty easy to carry this off but as time has gone on environmental regulations have made it a little more dicey to put just any car out on the ice, since when it sinks the water around it is subject to any pollutants that might be hanging on to the body and chassis. To answer these problems our local Lions were quick to answer the challenge by building their own car that is totally environmentally friendly.
For any of you who have not seen this masterpiece of environmental consciousness, also quite a work of art, I encourage you to take a walk down to the boat launch and gaze out across the ice in the direction of the opposite shore. While there observing the car, I also encourage you to observe and judge the ice mass and come up with your best guess as to when the ice will become fragile enough to allow the car to make its way into the depths of the water. Then make your way to one of the local Lions Club members, Meota Agencies or the café where you can buy as many chances as you wish to guess when the event will happen. Remember someone has to win the cash each year and it may just be you this time. How much cash is involved depends on the numbers who buy in. Remember the most important part is the portion of the money that stays within the Lions coffers to go towards community projects.
This past week, Meota had SaskPower tree trimming contractors roaming the byways of town to clean up any limbs that are coming within close quarters of the overhead power lines. This has given some of us, who fit within the realm of sidewalk supervisors, something to get us outside and make sure that things are being done right. As far as we can tell from our discussions of the project, all was going well.
The one thing that always stands out to me is how often we tend to plant trees directly under power lines or too close to buildings. It is so hard to judge what they are going to look like when we see these little small seedlings and try to visualize them 20, 30 or even more years down the line. My own yard has been a fine example of this as we have been slowly removing some 100-foot high (and this is not a guess as I measured some of the trunks when they hit the ground) black poplars that were planted way too close together, which in the end helped determine their demise.
The Do Drop Inn will again be sponsoring a shuffleboard tournament, to be held April 30. These tournaments are always well attended and offer a chance to test your shuffle board and visiting skills for a great afternoon of entertainment. If you are interested give Yvette or Nestor a call to sign up.
In Kaiser Action April 7, Anna Tucker corralled first place, Beulah Corbeil followed in second place, Jean Gansauge tied up third spot and Ken Tucker settled into fourth position.
In bridge play, in the contract version of the game, April 11, Eric Callbeck came in first with Terrence DaSilva tying up second place. Then April 12, in duplicate bridge, Vern and Judy Iverson took first honours with Bernard and Lucille Gregoire taking second place.
Quote: "It is said that one can tell how big a person is by how small a thing it takes to frustrate them." author Cori Dewitt
