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IN THIS ISSUE

• Dixie Augusteign is celebrating a birthday next week
• And here is the story of her life on an Ontario farm
• Pat Moore writes about lost dentures
• Neville Horsfall posts a quote about spammers
• Dick Monaghan lists some of the things we learn from movies
• Pat Moore forwards the solution to a puzzle
• Pat suggests a site for the sleep-challenged

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DIXIE!

I know you join me in wishing Dixie a wonderful celebration of her long life on Monday, July 6. She wrote last week: I thought I had lost the Spinner - I stopped getting them a couple of years ago and letters to you apparently never arrived. Imagine my surprise today when I found dozens and dozens of them in the deleted box. How they ever got there I can´t imagine. I had wondered and wondered what had happened to the Spinner and to you as well and - well - at our age? So glad the Spinner is still spinning and I am looking forward to reading all this enormous backlog while trying to figure out what could have happened. It is good to meet up again with so many of the old friends. I lost you shortly after Kate Brookfield went to Taiwan so have a lot of catching up to do.

In recognition of her many contributions to past Spinners, here is a repeat of Dixie´s account of her early days in Ontario:

LIFE ON THE FARM

I grew up on a typical southern Ontario farm - mixed farming, with a maple bush at the back and a creek running through it. I was the second oldest in a family with five boys, but don´t let anyone say that makes a girl spoiled. It is a fight for survival, as you always have to prove that you can do as much as they can, or be called a sissy.

One thing that has interested me is how far back my memory goes. I can distinctly remember when our telephone was connected. The lines had been put up and phones installed, but no connection until one day my uncle-to-be rushed in with the news that the phones were now connected and it was immediately put to use. It was only a few years back when I was doing some research at the archives and reading through old newspapers that I came across the exact date when this happened. To my surprise, I was only 13 months old! It made me think one should be really careful what one says around so young a child, as I would not have thought it possible. In fact, I think I have read that a child´s brain is not developed enough at so early an age to take in very much.

In contrast, about a year later I contracted polio, of which I can only remember trying to stand in my crib and my legs would not hold me up. One would think this would have been much more traumatic experience, but I have only vague recollections of the many treatments which my mother carried out with reasonable success. But enough of my early ailments.

Being the only girl meant the household chores were my department. I never had to do barn work like many farm girls; my job was to help my mother in any way I could. I grew up just naturally absorbing knowledge about looking after the house, dusting in the corners with the dried wing of a goose (I have never found yet anything as good for getting into corners). Then in the summer there was berry picking, helping with the canning and preserving necessary to fill up such a troupe of growing boys. But it was not all work.

Quite often when I had walked home from our one-room schoolhouse, it was my job to round up the cows from the back pasture, or sometimes from the woods. This job could be prolonged, especially when the wild strawberries were ripe, or the water in the creek was high enough to float a raft we had made. There was something very peaceful about following the cows back to the barn, where each went to her own stall ready to be chained for the milking which took place later.

Evenings the woodbox had to be filled, and water brought in for the house, but when work was done it was time for some good games of hide- and-seek among the bushes on the lawn, a thrilling game when it was almost too dark to distinguish shadows from a person hiding. And that reminds me of a story told me by a much older lady which happened when she was a girl.

Hide-and-seek must have always been popular, as she described the same type of game we played. Apparently this one time she was "it" and was running and had almost caught everyone, but she suddenly had a strong urge to visit the outhouse. She hung on as long as she could, but finally she simply had to go, so still rushing, and hauling down her knickers at the same time, she rushed into the darkened outhouse and - sat down in someone´s lap!

Despite our large family, we always seemed to have a lot of visitors, and not just for a day, but sometimes for a few months. One we enjoyed came from Toronto, and he quite fancied himself as a country man. What intrigued him were the groundhogs, and how they would sit up beside their burrows until you were quite close, when they would dive underground. He was quite sure he could outwit them - and we were just as sure he couldn´t - but he armed himself with a baseball bat and stalked one groundhog, which of course let him get just so close before it dived out of sight. But he reasoned it would be back, so he stood, club at the ready, until shortly the groundhog poked its head up from another entrance some distance away. The poor man tried several times before he had to concede that perhaps they were a bit smarter than he was.

He also loved to drive a horse. We had no motor car at this time and my mother would sometimes harness a medium-heavy horse to go into the village. Naturally he wanted to drive, and he did quite well until they were near the town, when he must have thought he was a reincarnation of Ben Hur as he stood up in the buggy and got the horse going at a full gallop down the main street, with everyone rushing out thinking there was a runaway. My mother was almost hysterical with laughter, but tried to keep out of sight so no one would recognize who he had with him. Yes, we certainly did look forward to his visits, as something different was always happening.

I got along well at school. I was always a great reader, especially any adventure books I could get my hands on. At one time I thought I would like to be a missionary - not particularly to save the natives - but because the missionaries seemed to get to such exciting places. My last year at public school was interrupted after Christmas when my mother had a heart attack, and my father could simply not find any help. It meant I had to stay home and look after her and the house. At that time I was 11.

My two oldest brothers were in school, I had one two-year-old at home and my mother. I often wonder what kind of care the poor woman got. I did the best I could, but what with meals, washing dishes and cream separator, looking after the kerosene lamps, etc., she didn´t get the care she should have. Some four months later my father was able to get a woman to come and help, my mother gradually regained her health, and to my surprise I was able to pass my entrance exams despite all the missed lessons.

CORRESPONDENCE

Dalton Deedrick´s tales of dentistry reminded Pat Moore of a strange experience years ago when the charity group she belongs to decided to have a garage sale to raise money.

They did not want to chance the weather and since they had a huge response of things donated for the sale, decided to use a vacant store in a shopping mall that was donated by the mall for a week.

Great fun was had by all the volunteers as we accepted the donations and sorted them out and since there was a store window, we often put special items in the window to attract attention.

One day, among many precious items we came across a pair of dentures - wow! Many giggles, but after a long discussion we decided to put them in the front window to cause a stir. Over the next few days we were very surprised to have seven people come in and ask to try them on, and at last one lady said they fit better than her own and decided to buy them. We decided to give them to her as the dentures had caused our garage sale to be a great success!

Nevil Horsfall quotes Howard Rheingold:

MYTHS AND URBAN LEGENDS

"Unless a great many people learn the basics of online crap detection and begin applying their critical faculties en masse and very soon, I fear for the future of the internet as a useful source of credible news, medical advice, financial information, educational resources, scholarly and scientific research. Some critics argue that a tsunami of hogwash has already rendered the web useless. I disagree. We are indeed inundated by online noise pollution, but the problem is soluble."

From the November 7, 1998 issue, here is Dick Monaghan´s list of

TWENTY THINGS WE LEARN FROM MOVIES

1. During all police investigations it will be necessary to visit a strip joint at least once.

2. All beds have special L-shaped top sheets which reach up to armpit level on a woman but only to waist level on the man lying beside her.

3. It´s easy for anyone to land a plane providing there is someone in the control tower to talk you down.

4. A man will show no pain while taking the most ferocious beating but will wince when a woman tries to clean his wounds.

5. Large loft-style apartments in New York City are well within the price range of most people - whether they are employed or not.

6. Even when driving down a perfectly straight road it is necessary to turn the steering wheel vigorously from left to right every few moments.

7. At least one of a pair of identical twins is born evil.

8. A detective can only solve a case once he has been suspended from duty.

9. If you decide to start dancing in the street, everyone you bump into will know all the steps.

10. Should you decide to defuse a bomb, don´t worry which wire to cut. You will always choose the right one.

11. Most laptop computers are powerful enough to override the communications system of any invading alien society.

12. Extremely beautiful and intelligent women are likely to become prostitutes or welders.

13. It does not matter if you are heavily outnumbered in a fight involving martial arts - your enemies will wait patiently to attack you one by one by dancing around in a threatening manner until you have knocked out their predecessors.

14. When you turn out the light to go to bed, everything in your bedroom will still be clearly visible, just slightly bluish.

15. Police departments give their officers personality tests to make sure they are deliberately assigned to a partner who is their total opposite.

16. When they are alone, all foreigners prefer to speak English to each other.

17. Radiation causes interesting mutations - not to your future children but to you, right there and then.

18. If you are blonde and pretty, it is possible to become a world expert on nuclear fission at the age of 22.

19. Honest and hard working policemen are traditionally gunned down three days before their retirement.

20. Rather than wasting bullets, megalomaniacs prefer to kill their archenemies using complicated machinery involving fuses, pulley systems, deadly gasses, lasers and man-eating sharks which will allow their captives at least 20 minutes to escape.

Pat Moore sends the story of

THE NEW TV

A farmer finally decided to buy a TV. The store assured him that they would install the antenna and TV the next day.

The next evening the farmer turned on his new TV and found only political ads on every channel. The next morning he turned the TV on and found only political ads again. When he came in to eat lunch, he tried the TV again but still only found political ads.

The next day when he still found only political ads he called the store to complain. The owner said that it was impossible for every channel to only have political ads, but agreed to send theirrepairman to check the TV.

When the TV repairman turned on the TV he found that the farmer was right. After looking at the TV for a while, he went outside to check the antenna. In a few minutes he returned and told the farmer he had found the problem.

The antenna had been installed on top of the windmill and grounded to the manure spreader.

WEBSITES

Pat Moore sends the URL for a site of interest to people who have trouble sleeping:

http://www.sleepeducation.com/

You don´t have to be young nor svelte to dance. Check this out:

http://arunaurl.com/3410

I googled the topic "Yahoo tracking group members" and got 1,950,000 hits, so it is possible that with this negative publicity, Yahoo will have already changed its policy. However, if you belong to any Yahoo group, it may be a good idea to investigate it yourself.

This statement is common to most of the posts: If you belong to ANY Yahoo Groups - be aware that Yahoo is now using "Web Beacons" to track every Yahoo Group user. It´s similar to cookies, but allows Yahoo to record every website and every group you visit, even when you´re not connected to Yahoo.

Look at their updated privacy statement. About half-way down the page, in the section on *cookies*, you will see a link that says *Web Beacons*.

Click on the phrase "Web Beacons." On the page that opens, on the left find a box entitled "Opt-Out."

In that section find "opt-out of interest-matched advertising" link that will let you "opt-out" of their snooping. Click it and then click the opt-out button on the next page.

*Note that Yahoo´s invasion of your privacy - and your ability to opt- out of it - is not user-specific. It is machine specific. That means you will have to opt-out on every computer (and browser) you use.

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY TO ALL OUR AMERICAN READERS!