Monday, Dec 3rd

We got off to an early start this morning.  Marg had a commitment to drive Lynett to her doctor appointment this morning.  It was her eye specialist who injects her eye so she needs a ride to this.  As it turned out it was quite a ways up the 60 [the freeway], probably one of Marg's longer trips driving this route.  She was so proud that she not only made it there, but back as well without any help.
  While she was gone I looked at the pest problem I detected on the patio out back.  The patio is not poured, rather made with paving stones.  Anyway I detected a hole in the sand back there and when I pulled up the paving stone adjacent to it I saw a tunnel or small trench, but am still wondering what made it.  Not only the trench, but a network of it under the stones.  Still not certain what I am dealing with here, but it is bigger than a mouse trench, so when I pulled the paving stones up I used a hook thinking it could be almost anything: a rat, a gopher, a snake, a pack rat and I still don't know.  There was a good sized hole going deeper, so I dumped about 2 litres of bleach down there, thinking not may pests could handle that.  I went to ask Gary what he thought and his opinion was that it was something.  LOL  Anyway he gave me a piece of mouse poison to put in the tunnel and a live catch trap.  I'm not certain what to use for bait, but he recommended marshmallows, it worked for the skunk.  I put some cheerios and mini marshmallows in the bait holder and set it up.  We'll see what it brings.
  After Marg got home we went out and got a couple of pails of clay to level up the blocks.  I pulled up about a dozen paving stones and filled the tunnel.  I also put some wire mesh in key spots so a rodent could not get past.  After levelling it again, I swept off the dirt and washed it down, so stay tuned, we'll see. 
  Marg did some laundry after she got back and with the combination of sun out back and the breeze, it was perfect drying weather.  Her strategy of working on small loads on a regular basis seems to be working for her.
  After that I went and played some pool for about an hour and a half.  I played the fellow from Ontario one on one.  Usually we play in a group, so it was an interesting experience.  I would like to say I won all 3 games, but in truth he scratched on the 8 ball in the first two, so gave me the win both times.
  Supper tonight was brats and fried potatoes.  Actually they were left over potatoes and veg from our bbq last night.  She has a new technique that works quite well with these.  She boils the brats in beer before frying them and it really works well.  We skipped happy tonight as our time was tight if we were having supper.
  We went to the bingo at casino Arizona.  We have gone here in the past, but today we had 3 other people from here go with us.  One never played bingo, but the other two ladies are two of the gamblin' gals.  The gals were close all night, especially Marg, but I pulled off the big win.  I got a bingo by myself on a purple card, well it was the electronic game machine where you place huge numbers of cards.  To make a long story short, I won $1,199.00.  Pretty exciting.  We have a standing arrangement to split with Gerry & Deb Canuel, so that made for two happy couples.  On a couple of occasions Marg had her winning number in the monitor when someone called bingo.  The same thing happened to me on the last game, it would have only been $300.  Listen to me, ordinarily that would have been a huge win.  LOL  We got home about 11:00 PM.
  A fun night with our friends.