Winners & Losers

With the speculators taking a big hit it might just prove good news for the rest of us mere mortals. If they don't have the funds, they can't use panics to artificially inflate prices. Take for example the local gas prices, now down to 111.9 / litre, and oil price per barrel $60 ish. Elsewhere in Canada, this is dipping below the dollar a litre mark. This is good news because the rises that have been stoking the underlying inflation of food prices will slow down.

For example; nine months ago, a 500g pack of thick sliced bacon was $5, now the same product has been seen around $8.29. I cite an example at the top of the price range (Premium product) but my grocery bills have gone up from $70-80 a week to $120 for roughly the same goods, so it's pretty much happened across the board, although if you're canny, you can keep the bills down to size (Not always possible with Wife in tow). These rises take an unwelcome extra bite out of the finances, I can tell you. Forty bucks here, another forty there. It all adds up.

In addition; immigration to Canada isn't a cheap business; every month brings new expenses. The latest item on the list is around three hundred and fifty bucks for a medical examination (Each). Took us a working day to track down which clinics did what (Loss of working time & pay), and who could fit us in on their list. Wife's new job is going through the full process, and it's like the old Cat Stevens number, 'Matthew and Son'. I think the lyric goes; "The works never done, there's always something new." So it is with immigration. Always something new.

On the other hand, when I negotiate past the false flags of nostalgia for Sunny early mornings on the Fosse Way and other Gloucestershire roads, I realise life for me in the UK wasn't as good as it is here. Less stress, fewer crowds. Just the weather alone is a compensation. Brilliant sunrises over the Islands, little traffic. Sometimes the silence can be deafening. When I walk Dog in the woods this morning, the only sounds will be a Sea Lion snouting and snorkelling as he hunts up and down the Narrows, one of the local Black Tailed Deer running away, Dog crashing through the underbrush and the sound of leaves falling.

Have been doing some work on my Sci-fi MSS "Sky full of stars", which grows by the day. Current word count, despite ditching paragraphs of unnecessary verbiage, is over 135,000 words. A tweak here, a sentence there, a single word change. It all adds up. One of these days it might even get finished.