On the uses of chemicals from MEC

This is the last weekend before I leave on the first part of the trip. I have spent part of the weekend getting ready. This includes waterproofing maps and Gore-tex. I have done the latter before, but the former is a first. As I will be mostly relying on the Route Verte guide, I have only two, informal maps to deal with. The first is a colour photocopy of one page of my Quebec Road Atlas on which I have printed information as to where I will be staying. The second is a double sided colour print-out of where I will be going on this trip i.e. these two images.
The idea is to be able to show to people what I plan to do and later what I have done.

Getting back to the title of this post, I am finding it a mite amusing that I am "playing" with chemicals that came from the MEC, a "green" company. Having said that, I can probably be reasonably sure that the chemicals were chosen with a view to minimizing their environmental impact whilst still delivering the desired waterproofing.

On Proust's madelaine

It is said that smells play an important role in unlocking memory. À la recherche du temps perdu was rather famously inspired by the memories evoked when Proust bit into an herbal tea soaked pastry known as a madelaine. The smell and taste brought him back to his childhood. I have similar experiences every time I drink Barq's root beer. For some reason, to me it tastes rather like the way the bathroom smelt in Granny's house on Upper Lansdowne. I know that sounds strange but trust me, it is a good thing.

Getting to the point, I was anointing myself with sunscreen today in view of trial run on Leonardo. The sunscreen I used was the one I bought in Spain. As I was applying it, I was momentarily transported back to Spain by the smell. Rather neat.

On some very good news

You may remember an earlier post about a friend in need of a bone marrow donation. According to this news report, he has found one. Very good news indeed. But no reason not to register if you haven't already.

On an additional map

My previous maps only covered from Quebec City to Deer Lake. Consequently, I have made the following map to show which route I intend to follow between Montreal and Quebec City.
The route I intend to follow is in red, give or take a dozen or so kilometers, and entirely ignoring the "diversion" of the Défi d'Acton Vale.

On Leonardo becoming the Moosebike

I had been meaning for some time to put a moose sticker onto Leonardo (my touring bike) partly in honour of this blog. However, I have yet to find a moose sticker for sale. Not even for ready money.

Consequently, I was forced to use my not inconsiderable ingenuity to make a moose sticker. I found some 3 inch wide chrome tape at a branch of Canadian Tire. I found a moose silhouette on the web. After adjusting the image to the desired size, I printed it. I then glued the image onto the backing of the chrome tape. After letting the glue dry overnight, I cut out the image, then peeled off the chrome sticker before applying it to Leonardo. Obviously, the image was the reverse of the one I printed, but I had anticipated this. While the moose sticker isn't as nice looking as the bull stickers from Spain, que sera, sera.

I can now refer to Leonardo as the Moosebike. Should I want to, that is.

On what a time to be alive

There was an interesting rock formation in the wall of the Lafarge quarry yesterday. Well, at least interesting to me. Then again, I was raised by a geologist which meant a certain amount of interest in rocks rubbed off. Anyway, I took the following image with my digital camera and later sent a copy of it to Papicito (a.k.a. my father) to ask what the diagonal structure was.
He sent back the image with his interpretation of the structure added to the image!!!
I had to ask both my father and Wikipedia to understand what a Diabase dyke was, but at least I will go to bed less stupid than I got up. "A dyke or dike is an intrusive igneous rock that cuts across the pre-existing structures, in this case the horizontally stratified limestone. A sill would have followed the stratification."

Got that? From this I am guessing that there is also a sill in this structure that seems to be at a geometric angle to the dyke.
What a time to be alive when we can toss around information like this!

On another Tour de l'Île under the belt

Well, another Tour de l'Île has come and gone. Only 45 km this year of the actual tour. They are getting shorter and shorter every year. Ironically, the starting point for the last two years has been well to the East of here near the Olympic Stadium. This is roughly 15 km from my place, so we end up doing roughly 30 km just getting there and back!

This year, the party underwent a change from the usual lineup of my parents, Joey LeBaron, Michael "the Mole" Meagher and myself. My father is suffering from a bad hip so he did not join in. However, his absence was made up by the presence of Margo's daughter Louise. This was her first Tour de l'Île which made it fun. Another cousin had threatened to join us, but failed to show up at the rendez-vous.

The Tour de l'Île often involves a wait at the beginning, and this year was no exception. These waits are the classic times to indulge in "cheese de groupe"'s or group photo. Here we have my mother and Joey LeBaron.
While here we have myself, Louise and the Mole.There are a lot of people (thirty thousand) in the Tour de l'Île and it is at start that you really see them en masse. This is only a tiny fraction of the multitude.
People frequently dress up for the occasion, often with silly head gear such as this group. They attached a number of plastic cups to their heads. I think they were supposed to be horns.
This woman went for the pink look. She was moving at a good clip. I paced her for a fair number of kilometers.This year's route took as through the Lafarge quarry of which I have written in the past. Unlike the previous time, they went in for some more blatant marketing. Rocky, the mascot of Lafarge, was there...
...as was a Long John Silver impersonator. What pirates have to do with cement is beyond me.The weather was grey and intermittently raining, though fortunately it never came down too hard. I didn't push very hard and had very little time to wait at the third relais before Louise showed up. I suspect she would have passed me had she not had a flat tire. This is despite the fact she was on a rented bike.
I tried to get some of "action" shots of her (one of the benefits of digital cameras is that you are not afraid to try some tricky shots). Unfortunately, once she noticed what I was doing, she took after her mother and pulled some faces.