The Summer of 77

(Inspired by just driving home from the cottage through 3 inches of rain)

The summer of 77, I had just graduated as an engineer in UoT Engineering Science.  I had my horrible summer in Calgary when the entire oil industry had collapsed around my head.  Because of this, I had signed up for a Masters in Rock Mechanics.  My Engsci speciality was geophysics, so I was going to slay everybody with my skills.

The good thing about the horrible summer was that I had unemployment insurance, and because of my degree they weren't going to make me take ugly jobs.  I had a free ticket and I was lounging in the back yard all the time.  My neighbour couldn't stand it, and convinced me to take a nice job as a construction inspector on the old air force base.

It rained every day that summer, and one job was to supervise the grass mowing around the air field.  It was a giant swamp and the grass was 3 feet tall.  All the air force types were yelling at me that it was against regulations because of a fire hazard.  That grass wouldn't light with napalm!  Anyway, I had to keep after the contractors who kept losing equipment into the bottomless bog.  Finally, I gave the job to a nasty forces guy who had just come back from something horrible.

This summer is now like that.  We have the full 70's conditions.  Wait until the winter!