The Scarborough Mirror

Can you imagine having summer 12 months a year? No let up and no snowmen. Just heat, sweat and discomfort, unless one is fortunate to work in an ice factory.

Our recent 30-plus degrees streak had many of us gasping for relief. Some turned on an air conditioner, swam or headed for the cottage. Not able to indulge in such luxury, my pal Three Beer opted for Cherry Beach.

Why he selected that stretch of shore is beyond me. He has a choice starting with Bluffer's Park sands, Balmy Beach or nearby Ferguson's Beach, even the stretch below the bluff at the end of Birchmount Avenue.

He wanted a different scene, one reputed to sport an abundance of bikini-clad sunbathers. I know this because he offered to take me along. I declined. My memories of Cherry Beach include dead fish along the shore and sand that was less than pristine.

Undaunted by refusal, Three Beer appeared on my doorstep on his way to his destination. He mustered every argument he could imagine including offering to lather my back with sunscreen. That gained my final no.

The thought of lying on a blanket and frying like an egg on a skillet does not appeal to me. Ditto for sand between my toes, dive-bomber seagulls and water I prefer not to enter, let alone swim in. I mean Toronto Harbour. A madman's bath.

So off he went and I began my day's chores. These included mowing the grass around my home and painting a front veranda that has been sorely neglected. Of course my wife had also a few ideas to add as well.

This included hauling away several large, very heavy slabs of stone she had dug up in her garden. Apparently there was a fieldstone pathway there some years ago and time had covered it with earth.

That seemed easy, far more to my liking than painting, I tackled it with gusto. However, it took a great deal more than gusto to get those chunks into the wheelbarrow. Then she wanted me to move them somewhere, preferably into the trunk of my car.

I refused. So she insisted a large, dead cedar tree beside our drive be cut down and reduced to fireplace-sized chunks.

"Hell," I said politely, "Bucky Beaver armed with a chainsaw would refuse to do that on such a hot day."

I was still chopping at the tree when Three Beer returned. His complexion was decidedly redder than when he left. Seems he forgot to lather lotion on his exposed parts and fell asleep lying in direct sunlight.

My mother always rubbed me with vinegar whenever I was sunburnt and I offered him a treatment. To my surprise he accepted. The problem was that I had no white vinegar, only malt or Balsamic from Italy. I mixed both and soaked his back, neck and shoulders.

Have you ever smelt vinegar? The kind I used? Strong aroma, right! Three Beer failed to notice the smell until he was well and truly covered. He smelt like a fish and chip shop or worse, a pickling plant.

Of course he thanked me, or at least I think it was thanks he lavished on me as he drove rapidly away.

Such appreciation.