The inevitable time has come. No longer will we be able to casually look out our glassed front door to look out at the gardens and the urns at the front of our house, to take in their fresh greenery, brilliant flowery colours and shapes and take deep satisfaction from the scene.

All has turned sere, the leaves dropping with each succeeding touch of light frost that night-time brings, preparing us for that eventual hard, killing frost.

And finally, I've had to remove all of the still-spectacular flowering plants, the wonderful begonias, the ever-blooming lobelia, the trailing petunias that were still faithfully colouring our fall world. All to be deposited into the compost pile which will later, when transformed into ready, rich compost, be used to further enrich the garden soil.

And the begonia bulbs will be taken down into our basement for over-winter storage, to be brought out again once winter has blown its last cold gusty winds and covered the landscape with a thick blanket of snow for the last time. In the spring, out come the bulbs once again, to be planted in readiness of preparing us for yet another summer of glorious shapes and colours.

In the meantime, we look out now on a bleak, green-absent, flamboyant-flower-less landscape and dream about the season that will herald another year of extravagant growth and joyful ease.

Well, he said, coming to a complete stop before us, a twinkle in his pale blue eyes. How old would you say my cousin is? Which seemed rather out of character for him, judging by the usual conversations we normally have with him, meeting out in the woods, each of us on our daily rambles through the ravine.

We've known him for a number of years, as a chance acquaintance, a pleasant man with a slight European accent. Winter or fall he wears a light red jacket, and a light cap, irrespective of wind, snow, icy rain, chill temperatures. Mind, he's always chugging along full speed ahead, with the aid of two walking sticks, one in either hand to help propel him along, determined to shorten his time as he has built up a formidable level of energy, post a serious heart surgery.

We, on the other hand, simply forge on, our two little dogs in tow, accommodating our gait to that of our companion animals, getting on in age, reflecting our own situation. And we'd always called him "the youngster" because of the gap in age between him and us, just under ten years. He's fit now, and thin as a rail, but because he keeps up such a head of steam, remains warm enough garbed so inadequately, to our way of thinking.

I responded first with a hesitant 68? He grinned widely and motioned with his stick-encumbered hands to raise my estimation. And so I did, by five-year increments and still he grinned and said "higher, higher". We'd gone well past our own age, and I could hardly fathom that the cheerful, clear-eyed, petite woman we'd seen with him last week was older then us by such a degree.

But she was, our friend said proudly, fully 87 years of age, and more than capable of holding her own on a brisk walk through the ravine with its hills and valleys, protruding roots and uneven trails. And she'd travelled on her own, from Switzerland, to visit with extended family, a brother-in-law in Toronto, and now visiting him as well, preparatory to a visit to Niagara Falls.

Quite a comeuppance, actually, to my pride in negotiating all of that at merely 75 years of age.

We're no longer required to inconveniently seek out another source of food supplies with the closing of the supermarket we've long used as our major food shopping venue. Gone is the original store; closed, and moved to another nearby location much more commodious and able as a result, to stock far more choices than the other.

Under construction for a relatively short period of time, earlier in the week the new venue was opened, and there were many advertised food specials to attract a crowd.

How much of crowd we discovered for ourselves when we finally drove over to the new location, about a five-to-seven-minute drive from our house. At that new location where all manner of merchandise can be purchased from any number of large new box-style stores, located along a stretch of major roadway, the new parking lot of the new store was packed with cars, more coming by the minute, all vying for parking spots. There was a cadre of parking attendants in evidence, no doubt hired to help things move along smoothly for the first week or so.

Inside the store the shopper is greeted with an immense space and aisle after wide aisle of foods of various types, with store employees desperately attempting to pack shelves that were being steadily emptied by hordes of shoppers. Everything is gleaming, sleekly new. There is so much to view, to select from, that it becomes confusing, one is assailed by a sense of sensory- and attention-overload.

It's nice to see a wide array of food products available, and the cleanliness and neatness of the new facilities are admirable, but shopping that was once a relaxed affair is fast becoming a harried one, with too much to see, to choose from amongst, and end up with, the weekly supermarket venture becomes a chore.

The only thing that can be said to favour this new location of our old shopping choice is that it is sticking with the stocking of food. Unlike other big-box stores it has not ventured into other than comestibles, offering linens and electronics and other non-food items for sale, further distracting from the original purpose of a food market.

We're fortunate in a sense, since our doctor of 40 years having retired, leaving us at age 74 without a personal physician, that we were both taken up singly, by other family doctors. Judging from their names and their accents, our new doctors are symbolic of East Europe's loss, and Canada's gain.

The shortage of general practitioners in Canada is acute, in some provinces more than others, since our medical schools are not churning out enough MDs to meet the challenge of an ever-growing population - and mostly through immigration to this country. As long as sufficient trained physicians emigrate from their countries of origin, along with other types migrating to greener pastures, as it were, we can keep our heads above water, so to speak.

But because of the shortage, many people, numbering in the hundreds of thousands, are without primary health-care specialists. That has led to a situation of overcrowding at those doctors' offices which have accepted possibly more patients than their practise can comfortably service. But there is also a growing trend toward multiple practitioners operating out of clinic-like offices, as opposed to the traditional single-physician office.

That too has led to an atmosphere where patients are being treated as though they represent widgets on a production line - to be serviced as expeditiously and impersonally as possible, to ensure that as little time as possible is spent on the needs of any single patient.

Hopefully, without impairing the level of treatment and attention required by any single patient.

We were taken aback a few days ago while making our way through the ravine, in approaching the creek to discover that a number of poplar saplings had been 'beaverized'. Not surprising in a sense, since we've got beavers just downstream of the area we were traversing.

It's obvious that the beavers, just like the squirrels that abound everywhere now, are busy gathering food for winter storage. Most of the trees in the ravine, but for the evergreens, have now lost their leaves, and we scatter a colourful confetti of leaves as we progress on the trails, heaped with the leaves, some of them still beautifully red, orange, yellow, and those underneath become brown and crisp in their decay.

We saw quite a number of immature poplar that had been taken down completely, their thin branches obviously collected and placed within the beaver lodge. Others had been neatly 'wedged', the trunk still there, awaiting the coup de grace and final abduction. We thought we'd take a trail offshoot that led to that part of the creek they had co-opted and dammed and ambled along over there. As we approached we could see signs of a lot more young trees that had been appropriated by the beaver in their nocturnal forays.

And we saw also a garter snake, soaking up the late fall sun in a bit of a clearing by the side of the forest, unperturbed seemingly at our close passage to where it lay. It stayed there, unwilling to budge from its comfortable perch; the only sign it was aware of our presence, its flickering tongue, gauging us and our intentions.

It's a nice non-meat meal to make once in a while, one that my husband is very fond of. It just takes a few minutes to prepare, then it can be set aside, covered in plastic wrap in the refrigerator and when the final step is to be taken, brought out and the previously-filled blinis quickly browned in a frying pan, and served.

They can be served up with a garnish of sour cream, or applesauce. Or, as in this instance, with nothing at all to diminish the already-complete flavour of the cheese blintzes.

For just two people, a half-cup of flour is more than enough. A bit of salt, two eggs, a half-cup of milk and that's all it takes. A quick cooking of the pancakes themselves, flipping them on to a dry tea towel, once done, and then they can be filled.

I decided this time, instead of the conventional cottage-cheese filling, to try Silani's new ricotta cheese. Adding honey and cinnamon, then filling the blinis with the resulting mixture. The end result was a lighter filling and a wonderfully good tasting finished product.

Prefaced by a fresh garden salad, and concluding with a dessert of fresh mandarins; a perfect, light dinner.

We're well into fall now, it's cold, though we haven't yet experienced a deep frost. The barbecue has not been used in at least a month. It sits, covered, on the deck. It's a gas barbecue, directly linked to the natural gas pipeline that also heats our house, so it's clean and easy to use.

Because yesterday was my regular cleaning day, after hours spent cleaning the house it seemed like a break from cooking mightn't be a bad idea, so we agreed to use the barbecue; my husband would do most of the food preparation and cooking.

When he uncovered the barbecue and lifted the top he saw something tiny out of the corner of his eye, and then it began frantically scurrying about. We've had mice there before, over-wintering. He thought that by lifting the coals and making a bit of a disturbance he would encourage the mouse to vacate its winter premises and allow him to use the barbecue one last time.

But as he lifted the coals and set them aside, he saw a nest. And in that nest was a family of young mice. They too began scurrying about the bottom of the barbecue in confused fear, always returning to the nest, the home they know and found comfort (and, hitherto, security) within.

My husband carefully returned all the coals in orderly fashion as he found them. Closed up the barbecue and re-covered it.

Surprise! We've a morning that has turned, from overcast and damp to sunny, the skies cleared of most of its dark overcast, bringing us rays of sun to warm up our house. And when that happens of a morning, we open wide the dining room shutters and a warm glow settles over the room.

Little Riley adores the sun. He instinctively follows it, settles under it, basks in it, finds unending comfort in the sun. As direct as possible. He will, despite the cold that has now settled in permanently for fall, ask to be allowed outside to wallow in the sun, despite that he suffers in colder weather.

No matter where he happens to be snuggled down after breakfast in one of his beds scattered in various places of our home, he will, from a sound sleep, be instantly alert and respond when even in a quiet voice, one of us will announce "Riley, the sun!" if it has suddenly evidenced itself. He will trot determinedly to the dining room and luxuriate in the sun rays, for as long as they illuminate the room, before the sun rises higher in the sky.

In the sun's absence in this temperature, even in the relative warmth of the house, if he isn't wearing a little coat, he will shiver uncontrollably, and always has, since he was a puppy.

Yesterday morning's dismal weather of cool temperatures, wind and heavily overcast skies transformed themselves into partially blue skies by mid-afternoon, and the occasional bursts of sunlight did much to warm up the day and the feeling that we had, after all, a beautiful day before us.

It was also time for the semi-annual (fall) antique show held at Carleton University Fieldhouse. We missed the spring one, and looked forward to going along to this one.

We weren't disappointed, although some of the dealers who hauled their wares from all over the province (Toronto and all points in between) and from Montreal, might have been, since the turn-out didn't seem spectacular. One dealer whom we've known for years said the night before, opening night, was very well attended, though he didn't divulge whether he'd been able to sell much. He did have quite a few paintings of interest to us, but in the end we bought nothing from him.

Over the years the show has turned gradually into far more of a jewellery exposition than an antique show, and each year the creeping presence of dealers in 'collectibles' has steadily increased, so a lot of costume jewellery, pressed glass, and bits of pieces of nostalgia have comprised a greater inventory at various stands' showcases. These are the ones we pass by without much of a glance.

And The Brooklyn Antiquarian was there, one of the very few old-time dealers that still come out to the shows; we missed seeing an awful lot of the old faces from whom we've purchased desirable items over the years, they're simply not attending any longer. Whether it's because the market for acquiring decent antiques has begun to dry up, or they're too inaccessible due to price, or the fact that Ottawa isn't a very good antiques sales market to begin with, we aren't certain.

In any event, it was a nice break in routine. The Fieldhouse presents as a very accommodating, pleasant venue, and it's great fun to walk among the offerings, to see what people have been able to assemble and put out for sale. There is still a plenitude of interesting, unique, beautiful and desirable objects available, from porcelains, bronzes, clocks, paintings, furniture, and all manner of earlier-Centuries objects to be acquired. Some are prohibitively expensive, some affordable.

A fascinating pastime, poking among them, admiring them, speculating about them, to spend a few fall hours indoors. And then, once again outdoors, we have the spectacle of intense, bright fall colours with the trees approaching their apogee in beauty within the landscape of the city.

That time of year again to attend to so many things in our climate, to become prepared for the oncoming winter season. In this instance, it's cars that must be prepared, for survival.

Survival by way of driving with road safety in mind, replacing the all-weather, three-season tires with specialized ice tires to help with much improved traction on icy winter roads. And survival of the vehicle itself, by having it oil-sprayed annually before the onset of wintry weather requiring road salt to similarly improve traction, but which destroys the integrity of steel, impairing the survival of the vehicle itself after long years of road-salt exposure, to rust.

So yesterday morning was set aside to accomplish the first step of the twin manoeuvres. The ice tires were hauled up into the garage from their resting place in the basement, by my husband who now finds handling them immensely easier since he has instituted his regimen of weight-lifting. And then he proceeded to install them.

In preparation for taking the car out in the afternoon for the half-hour oil underspray treatment which ensures that the integrity and life of the car body is maintained for the long haul. Another fall task completed.

Until the oil treatment has sufficiently dried, however, the garage floor has to be covered with newspapers to soak up the dripping oil.

We were almost finished our afternoon amble in the ravine yesterday afternoon, just climbing up the last of the long hills to get to our street when we came across a neighbour, someone who fairly recently moved into a house down at the very corner-end of the street.

He was with his companion-dog, a Harlequin-coated pit-bull. This is a breed that, under a provincial by-law must be muzzled in public. For want of a more precise 'protection' for the public from the potential for dog bites, pit-bulls and pit-bull-like dogs have been targeted. This cannot be unknown to our new neighbour, but his dog wore no muzzle.

It's true enough that many people who opt to own pit-bulls encourage an inborn proclivity to aggressiveness. On the other hand, not all members of a particular breed share the negative characteristics of the breed. This one certainly does not. A more placid, sweet-tempered dog would be hard to find.

Coming across our own badly-behaved, yappy little pig-headed dog, this pit-bull simply exhibits mild curiosity and obvious concern at the socially ill-bred little yapper. He looks on for a moment, then distracts himself with following squirrels. He's a beautiful animal, wonderfully well-proportioned, elegance in motion, is that pit-bull.

But I could see quite obviously, when he came over to be petted, that he had pink eye, both eyes affected, and I made that observation to his owner. Who acknowledged that fact, and said that since the colouration is the only symptom, and the dog doesn't seem to be irritated by it, and his eyes aren't running, he'll just let it run its course.

Which laissez-faire attitude did not endear the man to my estimation; a quick trip to the vet would result in medication that would clear the infection up speedily. And halt his beautiful dog from posing an infection danger to other pets.

We've had an impressive amount of rain lately; persistent, heavy at times, accompanied by blustery winds, and cool, although not too cold. Since we have also enjoyed unseasonably mild and sunny weather pre-dating the onset of the cold-wet atmosphere, we really have nothing to complain about, at this time of year, transitioning into late fall and inevitably, winter.

There was a short article in yesterday's newspaper about the results of studies of people living in northern climates; that the onset of fall leading up to winter is a bitter-sweet time for many people. Autumn can be beautiful with the changing colours of a forest landscape, and a relief at first from the too-warm, humid days of late summer, but it also heralds the coming of winter. And that thought - the incessant cold, ice storms, wintry landscapes (beautiful, but inconvenient) snow events and traffic tie-ups, shovelling of driveways, and slippery sidewalks, people confined to their homes - makes a lot of people fearful.

It is during that time of year that people tend to weep more often, feel inconsolably sad, lonely and miserable. It's the effect of isolation and cold and less than ideal conditions for so many. On the other hand, for those who accept the inevitable and decide that they will do their utmost to live with it, even enjoy the opportunities to get out there in the bracing cold for recreational reasons and to admire the snow-filled landscape, it is a changed season to look forward to.

In any event, we're now in the lead-up to the final days when all the trees in our nearby forest will lose their leaves. And the trails in our urban ravined forest are packed with downed leaves, brilliantly coloured and made more so by the fact that the rain has given them an additional lustre.

Oddly enough, while digging in my garden yesterday, as part of seasonal tidying-up, I found the ground to be confoundingly dry, despite all that rain.

How does a tablecloth get misplaced? That is to say a tablecloth that is in use, one that was used for the breakfast table, and ordinarily post-breakfast the tablecloth gets a shake-out the side door, gets neatly folded and placed away for use the following morning. It's gone. Not where it should be.

I use a routine, one tablecloth used for breakfast, another for our evening meals and on Friday evenings when we have our evening meal in the dining room, yet another tablecloth is put into use. The breakfast-and-dinner tablecloths are washed weekly, when other, fresh tablecloths are exchanged for those that have been used throughout the course of a week.

Gone, nowhere to be found. I've got, I believe, a fairly orderly mind, and this shouldn't happen, should it? This kind of thing. Well, it does occasionally; something will be misplaced and hidden from view, frustratingly and maddeningly. I've put the wrong things in the wrong places on occasion, who hasn't?

I think I know what occasioned the disappearance of the tablecloth; the tail end of our breakfast was interrupted by the doorbell ringing, and then the telephone followed suit. My husband responded to the former while I did the latter. We were both kept a prolonged period of time at either of our responses. And while I was on the telephone, I became distracted; easily done when I'm speaking with our daughter.

Somehow, the tablecloth is involved in this little mystery of my mind going off on a tangent. It's there, somewhere, lurking mischievously in some drawer, on some shelf, in a corner somewhere I haven't yet checked, bedevilling me.

The insurance carrier with which we have our car and household insurance sent along a letter to all its clients a few weeks back. The letter described the insurance industry's consternation over the large claims being made for household damage due to water leakage.

It made mention of changing environmental episodes resulting in far more serious weather events that leave fearsome property damage in their wake, to public and private property. The letter described far more violent and changing environmental conditions; hurricane-force winds, heavier rains, resulting in tornadoes, hurricanes and torrential rain events causing widespread floods.

We know about all of this, of course, because it is all reported, voluminously, in the news media. Stories revolving around countries being inundated by cyclones, tsunamis, tornadoes and having to cope with truly monumental weather-caused catastrophes. Beyond what has occurred repeatedly in countries like Pakistan, India, Thailand, leaving countless people flood-stricken and homeless, refugees in their own countries, Canada too has experienced severe flooding events - in Manitoba and elsewhere.

On a smaller, no less destructive scale, floods and damaging water leakage occur closer to home, and they cause anguish to those whose properties are destroyed. Municipalities are faced with the reality that they must begin upgrading their sewer systems to accommodate the needs of larger populations and more extreme weather conditions. And the insurance industry is left holding the bag for restitution for their policy holders.

So they've undertaken an initiative, to educate policy holders about what they can do, small things like checking to ensure things are in good order, cleaning out areas like eavestroughs that require attention, sloping earthworks away from a house, as well as asking permission to enter peoples' homes to install small monitoring and prevention devices.

We had one such visit this morning. A technician employed by our insurance company installed a few preventive/monitoring devices, starting with the laundry room; explained their purpose, and leaving us slightly better equipped to deal with any potential water-flooding emergencies.

The unprecedently-mild and sunny weather we luxuriated in a week ago enabled us to proceed with outdoor fall work we don't normally tackle with that kind of enthusiasm brought on by the enjoyment of being outdoors in such unanticipated conditions.

It's time to put the gardens to sleep. Cutting back the perennials so they're in good shape to face the coming cold snow-covered months of interrupted activity.

It seems sad to do that when things still look fairly good, but better when it's done at such a time than when the really frigid weather has set in, when frost has made mush of the annuals, making it difficult to dig them out and dispose of them cleanly.

So the initial job of tidying up and making everything presentable was begun. By no means completed, but a start was made, and in so doing, a sense of satisfaction was accomplished. It's a beginning, there's plenty more yet to be done, but all in good time.

Now that we're back into cold, blustery and very wet weather it's a matter of awaiting those windows of opportunity. Which seem frustratingly few, truth be told.

We seem to lurch from bad to worse. It's the way it is with the steadily failing faculties of an aging being. No different for a dog than it is for a human being.

First we noticed her hearing had become impaired and that steadily progressed to completely diminished hearing. Then it was her eyesight, and we had to be aware of that deficiency and to try to make things easier for her. Now she has very little eyesight left as she completes nineteen years of life as our constant companion.

When we have her out for daily walks she sometimes gets along very well, with gentle guiding, wearing her harness attached to her leash; we ensure she stays out of trouble. But she becomes confused without her eyesight, and sometimes stands there unwilling to proceed and we pick her up and stroll along with her that way until she appears prepared to give it another try. She no longer walks a straight line, but tends to veer off rapidly to the left or the right, and keep going, as far as she can, taking her off trail. Even with a firm hand guiding her, she struggles to continue veering off. We're satisfied with her progress when she manages to walk however awkwardly at least for twenty minutes in total throughout the course of our woodland walk.

In the house she sleeps a good deal of the day. But when she's tired of sleeping she tends to wander about the house. She does this wandering not in the least bit tentatively but almost aggressively at times, so much so that she will walk into walls or furniture or any objects standing in her way with a notable crunch or thud and we automatically wince. Even where it seems obvious - or seems obvious to us - that she should deduce there is a wall, she stubbornly keeps committing to meeting it head on.

We've had to close off open access to stairways. At night we place a baby-gate across the door in our bedroom. She once walked straight off the top step and tumbled completely down the entire set of stairs. The same with the stairway leading to the basement; she has wandered directly to the top of that set of stairs and tumbled in the same fashion. She fear she may severely injure herself.

When we take her out to the backyard we wait on tenterhooks for her to conclude her business, urinating or evacuating. There is no longer much pleasure for her out there, although she does still, from time to time, indulge in a lengthy sniffing cycle - although her olfactory sense too is diminishing it is still in evidence. Out in the backyard she will stumble into benches, trees, lawn ornaments, and we've taken to installing upright stakes to fend her out of the gardens where she will stumble and become even more confused.

This very trying period and our concerns for her give us impetus to celebrate those small victories; she eats well, particularly when tempted by extra goodies, and she sleeps well. Her heart, lungs are in good shape, despite a heart murmur. She has adequate strength and endurance and still moves with her customary grace, for the most part. Although her sight insecurity sometimes results in awkward stances.

And when our daily walks have been successful, and all goes according to plan, we breath sighs of relief.

Yesterday's weather was quite strange, even by the standards we are accustomed to, never quite knowing what the 'next day' will bring. Our weather can go from warm and breezy to miserably wet and cold without notice; we simply find ourselves in an entirely different weather system puzzlingly, swiftly.

It had warmed to 20-degrees Celsius yesterday, with blustery winds, and in the morning occasional glimpses of blue sky and sun. But the forecast was for thunderstorms and thunderstorms are certainly what developed.

When we set out with our two little dogs, we in rainjackets and they as well in their little raincoats, the sky was threatening, with dark thunderclouds approaching from the western regions of that vast firmament. We set out nonetheless and weren't long in the ravine ambling along the trails when the first raindrops appeared. The forest canopy is not yet completely depleted, although the all-night rains of the last several days have done their best in loosing leaves from their hosts. We walked through trails packed with leaves; some of them still brilliantly coloured looking like confetti, others dry, brown and crisp under our boots.

There was an odd aura of light, despite the dark sky and the rain. In fact, the landscape looked quite beautiful and we were quite comfortable within in. Thunder kept rolling and rumbling as we proceeded. Despite which the rain occasionally stopped, before starting up again, but laconically, as though it wasn't at all that serious about whether it was committed to drowning the landscape. We did cut our amble short, not proceeding to the full extent of our usual daily walk.

And, as luck had it, managed finally to exit the ravine, return home and had entered the protective confines of our garage just as the sky finally decided to fully give vent to its determined downpour.

This house that is our home surely must be considered a new building, for it is less than a quarter-century old. It was built by a building firm we had full confidence in, one that had built our previous house. Before that, we had owned two houses in gradual succession in Toronto. Specifications for the first, built around 1950, were not as stringent as they are, by law, at the present time; there was no energy-efficiency built into that semi-detached bungalow, no insulation at all other than that which my husband installed.

Our second house was a step up for us, a two-story, four bedroom to accommodate our family of five, in an excellent part of the city, adjacent to good schools and all manner of amenities. There was a new-housing boom in progress at the time. Most of the homes being built were of immensely poor quality in their construction and materials, with basements so poorly poured of such inadequate quality that a dog could (and did) dig into them down to the ground below. Damage that had been done by vandals during construction was never corrected.

Our third and fourth houses, in Ottawa, where we lived twenty years in each home, were of superior workmanship and construction. Building guidelines mandated by law were carefully followed. Despite which, both houses needed their roofs replaced well within that time frame, and both houses required window replacement, as well. That, apart from the normal upgrades necessary from time to time to counter wear and tear.

Now that my husband has finished working on the windows at the back of our house and put away the cumbersome, heavy 25-ft ladder needed for the job on the upper stories, I can breathe a true sigh of relief. This morning, it seems, things are back to normal. Yesterday we had all-day rain, a stay-at-home-day, one where he could do no exterior work. And which I used to upgrade/update the virus protection on my computer and download a few little tweaks.

This morning the rain finally ended. I did some morning baking, of chocolate cupcakes, after breakfast, and some light cleaning and vacuuming. While my husband looked around outside at the front of the house, planning his next moves with respect to painting the window frames at the front. And discovered in the process, more rot on the frames, this time the dining room windows, overlooking the front gardens.

No end to the work he has undertaken. This 'new' house had its roof replaced four years ago with better-quality shingles than those originally installed. The garage doors were replaced a month ago, with those of an improved quality over the original installations. Perhaps the windows too will require replacing eventually, but perhaps not quite yet.

The lighter, nutritious meal preparations during the summer months - inclusive of using the barbecue to prepare delicious meals - have gone with the collapsing season of fall. Time to re-introduce what we commonly refer to as 'comfort foods' with the arrival of colder weather and the coming of winter cold.

We need more energy to keep warm during the cold months of winter when we face dropped temperatures, high winds, snowstorms and other inclemencies of the weather. And the stomach-comfort of hot food in place of summer-type salads are a reasonable accommodation to the weather that surrounds us. So it's back to what we know best; meals for winter time that we wouldn't dream of preparing through the warm months of spring and summer when lighter, cooler fare does nicely.

For us, a small half-turkey goes a long way. From a Thanksgiving meal on Monday to dicing up the leftover turkey in preparation for baking turkey-vegetable meat pies. As good a solution as any, to using up leftovers. The pies, baked on Wednesday, then labelled and wrapped for the freezer. To be used on those occasional days when I'd appreciate a break from preparing an evening meal.

Those days, for example, when I've spent many hours cleaning the house, topping it off with our daily ravine walk, and knowing that dinner has been pre-prepared. I do prefer preparing meals on a daily basis but I also look forward to those times when a frozen preparation allows me a brief break in the cooking routine.

A little bit of forward planning and attentiveness to details on one day helps out on a day to follow some time in the future.

The community in which we live is held to be 33% francophone. The rest is comprised of anglophones, including a good percentage of fairly recent immigrants whose first language is not English. On the street where we live, there is an excellent mix of people, hailing from India, Bangladesh, Egypt, Russia, China, along with indigenous, or long-term Canadians, making it a fairly diverse population mix.

When I first began two decades ago after moving to the street, to do door-to-door canvassing on behalf of charitable medical or social organizations there was an initial period of holding back, where people not given to responding to such solicitations on behalf of charitable enterprises were suspicious and loathe to make charitable donations. Over the years many of those same people have since become personal acquaintances and the canvass process turns into a bit of a social event at each house.

It became noticeable to me that among the general population it always seemed to be those of French-Canadian backgrounds who were indifferent and uninterested in assisting charities. Those among them who have become personal friends now give, their disinterest somewhat allayed. Those whom I do not personally know because they tend not to want to be known, among the street's francophones remain distant, distinctly unfriendly, and uninvolved although of course it is the entire society that benefits from support of these charitable groups.

The general unfriendliness bordering on outright hostility of francophones living in a majority anglophone community, or francophones reacting to the presence of anglophones was brought home to me during the Thanksgiving week-end. This represents the one time of year when the season invites people to take recreational pathways through our neighbourhood urban ravine and forest. On the week-end just passed we came across more people rambling through the ravine than we have ever encountered on any previous occasion.

Invariably, people were cheerful and appreciative of the natural beauty of their surroundings, and more than willing to greet others whom they passed, sometimes stopping for a brief chat. Everyone acknowledged the presence of other people with at least a smile of greeting, though they were strangers to one another. With the notable exception of francophones. Who studiously ignored greetings that reached their ears in English.

And this includes the children, who sullenly, like their elders, look right through you.

There was a time when people went into a frenzy of fall preparations for winter, revolving around stocking the pantry with canned fruits and vegetables from their own gardens, of ensuring that the root cellar was well stocked, and from the same source.

That kind of self-preservation in food sufficiency in preparation for the onset of winter and our dependence on our own preservation in over-wintering the fruits from our own resources no longer presents as an imperative to most people.

We do, however, continue to preserve fruits and vegetables in season, sometimes to stock them in a home larder or pantry, and more often in our home freezers. Even a modest, small freezer like the one we own and have had for a quarter-century comes in handy year-around, in preserving food items when they are in abundance for times when they are not.

Take this Thanksgiving Day, for example; I extracted a bag of cranberries from our freezer, to make cranberry sauce with it. I also removed a container of mashed pumpkin left over from a too-large container from the last time I baked a pumpkin pie, and then proceeded to use the thawed pumpkin for a spiced pumpkin pie for our evening dessert. And out of that same freezer came a small half-turkey, left over from when we'd had its other half on another occasion in the past year. That half-turkey was seasoned and prepared for the oven. Our modern-day pantry.

While my husband continued his work at the back of the house, repairing and caulking the window frames, I was busy myself, tidying up the garden, cutting back perennials, in preparation for the long winter sleep in the garden, trying to decide whether to pull up the tomato vines or leave them yet awhile, since we've more tomatoes still ripening.

As we both worked at our separate tasks, our little dogs in rest mode after our usual daily hour-and-a-half-long ravine ramble with them, we could smell the fragrance of the cooling pie, then the alluring aroma of the turkey nicely browning in the oven.

Is that not perfection, added to a truly magnificent weather day of mild temperatures and clear, blue sky, sun beaming benignly onto the welcoming landscape?

We're at that time of year when we're in between citrus crops; those we normally get from Florida and California are not yet available for market. What we've been offered for the past month or so is South African oranges and grapefruits.

There's a vast difference between the citrus coming from those two sources. If we had the option of Jaffa oranges and other fruits from that source there would be no problem; they're every bit as good and sometimes better, than their American counterparts. But fruit from Israel is seldom seen at market here in this area.

So we've had to make do with South African fruits, the only available right now. There are, it's true, some citrus fruits available at market coming from South America, from Morocco too, but that source is few and far between and again, not the quality of the citrus from the United States.

The fruit from South Africa is of inferior quality, decidedly, in comparison to Florida and California oranges and grapefruits. The south African varieties are hard, both difficult to cut and to eat. They are not uniformly sweet. Whereas one can easily scoop the interior of American citrus, you cannot with the South African; the pith and section fibres are wasted in the latter, appreciated and readily edible in the former.

We can complain, and we do, but there's not much we can do about it, other than wait for the Florida and California fruit to come to season for harvesting and distribution to markets like ours.

The day before Canadian Thanksgiving we are enjoying fabulous late-summer weather, much above normal warmth for this time of year. Fall always means plenty of exterior work to be done around our house.

This year is no exception, in fact, my husband worked throughout the spring on the windows at the back of the house, bringing them up to good condition. Canada's extremes of cold and moisture, heat and torrential rain events, frosts and ice pellets do their damage to vulnerable areas around the house.

This is the year scheduled for the exterior painting to be done, around the house windows. And it's also the year when my husband discovered quite a lot of rot around the window frames, particularly on the sills. So he was, and is continuing to be busy replacing all of that rotted wood. When he's completed the task, along with removing old, scaled paint, he will proceed with the painting itself.

Nudging age 75 he has found it enormously useful to have begun a regimen of weight training which he initiated last winter. It has enabled him to build his skeletal musculature after the inevitable decline due to age, making it far easier for him to lift and manoeuvre, for example, heavy, tall ladders.

For my part, I would far prefer him to hire professionals to do the work my husband has taken for himself. Not that he isn't capable of performing the work every bit as well as a professional would, but because of the element of both fatigue and danger to someone of his age.

He's an amazing individual.

I heartily and emphatically dislike large, box-store supermarkets. I dislike their pharmacy counterparts as well, each striving to capture as much of the consuming public's attention and disposable income as possible. I don't believe that supermarkets, whose primary function is to sell to the public foodstuffs, should emphasize durable products as well.

Who ventures into a supermarket for the purpose of buying bedroom-and-bathroom linens, electronics, clothing and footwear? If a shopper enters a pharmacy are they looking for an array of food products and electronic devices?

We've been shopping regularly and fairly well exclusively, at the same small neighbourhood supermarket for the past decade and a half. It has never had a full array of products but certainly enough of a choice to suit us. We're interested in the fundamentals of food, primary products, not factory-enhanced foods that bear little resemblance to what they originally were.

We've been able to obtain fresh fruits and vegetables, cereal grains and pulses, and other staples of the kitchen and the North American diet at that small supermarket at a very fair price. On those few occasions when we've ventured into another, competitor's installation, I've been aghast at the price differential, and distracted by the huge choice of offerings, fully redundant and unnecessary.

Now, because the small supermarket is preparing to close its doors because it is moving its operations to another location, purpose-built nearby and to much larger architectural proportions, we sought out another location that represented the same supermarket brand. It is a huge establishment judged by the standard of our old one, with an amazing array of foods.

The focus, however, is on food to the exclusion of extraneous, non-food, durable items so commonly found in supermarkets elsewhere. I was amazed at the immense selection of fish at this same-name, different-location supermarket. The emphasis on ethnic-type foods, both fresh and factory pre-prepared because of the ethnic-make-up of the neighbourhood involved represented an education unto itself.

Who knew there was black rice and red rice? How is it prepared? How is it served? What does it taste like?

Mightn't one be justified in thinking that in a country as wealthy and technologically advanced as Canada, one of its premier provinces would have an electronic means of casting votes in place? Doesn't it seem logical that this might be a priority? Obviously, it is not, and more's the pity.

In any event, we've just been through an election. A month since the writ was dropped. A month of miserable politicking which seems to bring out the absolute worst in people running for political office.

You might imagine that the circumstances that impact most worryingly on peoples' lives; in this instance the economy and the job market; would be addressed fulsomely. But as someone who wasn't very successful herself in the political sphere in the final analysis casually remarked, a political campaign is no time to address critical issues. Of course not. It's the impressively slight yet meaningless sound bite that gets attention and repetitiously repeated as though it represented an enlightened view about anything useful.

So the election is now concluded. After all those incessantly infuriating partisan telephone calls at the most inconvenient times of day, both live voices cajoling for a particular candidate, or a more universal and equally irritating canned message, after all the advertising, the leaders' comments published and reviewed by political pundits, the poll results and the litter of campaign signs on roadsides, it is done.

To no one's complete satisfaction. But this is the reality of life.

You might think that after two terms in office where the winning candidate acting as provincial administrator faltered one objective after another, sneakily broke one election promise after the other, wasted taxpayer funding enormously, he and his party would be hoisted out of office. Not to be. In this time of economic insecurity and bungled opportunities the scoundrel has been voted back into office, albeit without the majority that the polls had suggested.

When we went out to vote at our local riding yesterday afternoon, there were quite a number of election officials in the large school gymnasium sitting about cheerfully. While we two were the sole members of the voting public present and accounted for, to cast our ballots at that moment.

Once my husband finished building the second, larger garden shed, mostly for the storage of large, awkward tools, and including the lawn mower and snow thrower, shovels and items that could not possibly fit into the smaller shed full of my own gardening tools, and necessary winter-protective items, the two composters could no longer be seen. They stood, however, just to the side of the new shed, hidden from view, but readily accessible, where they remain, doing full service.

They've been in steady use for two decades, providing us with excellent compost for the gardens. And in the process, diverting tons of food and garden waste from landfill. Two times weekly the filled kitchen compost pail is taken out to the backyard, in all seasons, and dumped into the composters. One composter at a time; while one rests and cooks away, seasoning into garden-usable compost, the other is being steadily filled.

We hardly have any garbage to be picked up on garbage day, and would have far less if it weren't for packaging materials left over from containing food of one kind or another; juice containers, glass bottles, aluminum cans and all such waste items go into a recycle box, and into another recycle box goes the daily newspapers and any other paper products, to be picked up by the municipality and recycled by them.

At this time of year, while it is crisp and cold in the autumn preparing for change-over into really cold weather, the compost still cooks away merrily. Unlike the winter months when everything goes into deep freeze, including the compost. At this time of year, the tiny flies that seem to congregate within the closed-lid composter emerge in their huge numbers. Earthworms and maggots can be seen throughout the waste, doing their estimable work.

But remove the top of the composter to dump a new load and stand back - quickly, because the hordes of tiny black flies rise like a dark cloud to envelop whoever may be standing there, getting into any open orifices, including a mouth agape in wonder at their presence.

We've been experiencing an inordinately long run of heavily overcast, cool, windy and extremely wet weather. It is autumn, after all, and this is decidedly a northern climate. When we have this kind of weather leading us into the inexorable approach to winter, and there is no sun to gleam through our large house windows, the house becomes very cold.

Yesterday we set out for our daily ravine walk, when the incessant rain had finally come to a temporary halt. All of us wore rain jackets, including our two little dogs, and we all paddled through piles of wet leaves and puddles on the trails. Even so, the cooler weather appears more agreeable to our little dogs in comparison to the heat of summer when the smaller one would lag behind, heat exhausted.

The squirrels have been busy, putting away supplies for the winter months through their semi-hibernation period. It would be interesting to know how many squirrels recall where they've buried edible bits of organic matter, or whether they're just obeying their natural instincts for survival.

The two very small black squirrels whom we've named Stumpy and Stumpette because they're distinguishable from all the others - black, red and grey - as a result of each having a mere stump of a tail left to them, remain the boldest, approaching us directly for peanuts.

Some would venture the opinion that their trust and recognition of us personally might serve to hasten their demise, but they have handily outlived three winters where we've responded to their demands, despite the presence of owls and hawks, both of which pose a distinct danger to the little creatures.

The young woman who has come to Canada to work as a nanny is one of those people whose face is never without a smile. I suspect that she reflects the attitude and personality of many women from the Philippines, though I have no real yardstick for that thought. I do know that if I were in her circumstances, a smile would rarely cross my face.

She is here, after all, looking after other peoples' children, not her own. She works at a family home, three up from ours, where a new family with young children has recently moved into this neighbourhood of mostly older people who have lived here for decades. Occasionally a new family like theirs does move in. This family has a three-year-old boy and he has two older, school-age siblings.

Faye takes scrupulous care of these children not her own. Whenever she looks at one of the children, an authentically fond smile creases her face. She is the kind of person whom one can place implicit trust in.

We asked her whether her family has been directly affected by the hurricane season, annual events in her island home. Hurricane Ophelia had just passed through, killing 52, leaving many homeless, and Nesat was set to hit, while rescue crews were still frantically looking for people from the first storm. Last year, she said, her parents' roof had been replaced because of damage incurred in previous storms.

This year, she said, Hurricane Ophelia had blown off the new roof entirely. Her family is walking about in waist-deep waters. Her children live with her parents. The wages she earns, in large part, make their way home to support her children and her parents.

Would I be smiling pacifically scrupulously looking after other peoples' children, tending to their needs?

Optometrist: A health care professional who is licensed to provide primary eye care services:

• to examine and diagnose eye diseases such as glaucoma, cataracts, and retinal diseases and, in certain states in the U.S., to treat them;
• to diagnose related systemic (bodywide) conditions such as hypertension and diabetes that may affect the eyes;
• to examine, diagnose and treat visual conditions such as nearsightedness, farsightedness, astigmatism and presbyopia; and
• to prescribe glasses, contact lenses, low vision rehabilitation and medications as well as perform minor surgical procedures such as the removal of foreign bodies.

An optometrist is a Doctor of Optometry, an O.D. (not to be confused with a Doctor of Medicine, an M.D.). To become an optometrist, one must complete pre-professional undergraduate college education followed by 4 years of professional education in a college of optometry. Some optometrists also do a residency.

Patient/clients may be confused with respect to the professional/medical status of an optometrist, but the practising optometrist himself shouldn't be. He is, in effect, trained to be a capable technician, not a medical practitioner who diagnoses ailments and takes steps to treat them, but someone trained to observe the human eye and determine whether there are treatable problems.

That done, the optometrist, through a series of mechanical tests, approaches a specific individual through a series of test formulated to correct the vision of each of the presenting clients' eyesight, matching need to formula. When additional problems present, he then either consults with someone higher on the professional care scale like an ophthalmologist, or a surgeon.

The optometrist whom I have been using appears to have found his own useful formula. Through which he has become adept at milking the province's generous and trusting health-care system. The Ontario Health Insurance Plan will pay for an annual total eye check-up for senior citizens, of whom I most certainly am one. They will also pay for succeeding, follow-up visits, if required.

This optometrist, to whom I was referred after having previously been serviced by another whom I took a personal aversion to, as humourless, distant, cold and unfeeling albeit technically proficient, presented as someone in whose expertise I could trust. Particularly when he speedily referred me to an opthalmologist after his initial examination of my eyesight, over a year ago.

A year on and more, post-surgery, with the surgical opthalmologist looking after my care and checking my progress on a regular basis, the optometrist took tests, prescribed a progressive lens for me, and arranged a follow-up visit after I procured my new eyeglasses. The follow-up had no discernible purpose I could identify other than to ensure the optometrist had a coterie of patients re-visiting.

Although he entirely missed an eye event that my ophthalmologist readily picked up latterly, he has informed me he has every intention of seeing me on a regular, bi-monthly schedule. Billing OHIP, in other words, for follow-up checks there is no rhyme nor reason to pursue.

She was given five days by Canada Post Corporation to effect the change. As though it could be easily done. If she had the disposable wherewithal to hire someone at short notice, if she could simply go out into the marketplace and purchase a replacement and will it into place. If she weren't single, and could depend on a man around the house to do those things life would be so much simpler, one supposes.

And then again, perhaps not. Not all men are capable, of doing such things, after all. But presumably, a double salary would make it more feasible to run a household and attend to these little irritants that crop up. As matters stand at the moment she hasn't even one dependable salary, still awaiting the appearance of a contract that will help her meet her financial obligations.

When she'd bought the house the mailbox was there and had been in use for many years. The house itself dates to 1864. Evidently an inspection by the Post Office over the last little while found it wanting, not meeting the specifications of the Corporation, and she was warned that if it weren't replaced she would no longer be receiving mail delivery.

It was her father, as usual, who took charge. He awaited her invitation to step in, so as not to make her feel that she was not capable of making decisions on her own. She had obviously mooted over in her mind how she would proceed and had come to the conclusion that she didn't know how, adequately, asking finally for his help.

He acquired the constituent materials, from a concrete deck block to a two-by-four post, tee bar, the necessary hardware and cement, and proceeded to construct the required mailbox support. It took awhile, several hours' work on two succeeding days, then the delivery and the installation on Day 3.

Done.

This season of the year, when summer has departed and fall is preparing to welcome winter, must be the saddest time of the year for many who don't at all welcome the onset of winter. It is also a very beautiful time of the time, autumn colour seasoning the landscape with the brilliance of changing leaves that will soon fall, littering the ground below.

Hummingbirds and songbirds have since left the landscape, and the sky is creased with arrows of geese flying south for the duration of what is left of the year. If that isn't sad, then what truly is? On the other hand, crops are being harvested and we are invited to make the most of fresh gatherings of food we place on our tables.

It's as good a time as any, with cooler temperatures settling in, windy days, plenty of rain coming down, to begin making fresh-vegetable soup for warming evening meals. And ratatouille, a simple meal of eggplant, leeks, tomato, bell peppers, zucchini, stirred together with herbs and then served over a bed of rice.

This week our kitchen was redolent with the fragrance of cinnamon-flavoured pears baked in a crisp for a dessert served warm, and apple pie baked later in the week, with the huge, red luscious apples harvested from our daughter's bounteous apple tree.

Our backyard tomato plants have begun flowering again but it's doubtful there will be enough time for new tomatoes to grow and ripen, and we've taken off all the ripe fruit it has already given us, sweet and flavourful. We're still able to cut parsley from the garden, because nothing tastes as good as fresh parsley, perking up a dish, including chicken soup.

In the forest, the small mammals are busily rushing about filling their winter pantries. We're immensely popular in our own urban forest for the daily peanuts we cache here and there.