It wasn’t a total waste in the end.

My daughter’s friend Ed had a job interview today for an office-type job at a mega corporation this afternoon in a town an hour’s drive away and, since she had the day off work and I am an incredibly nice person, we kept him company for the drive, I bought him lunch, and then we waited while he went through the interminable interview process.

This town where this took place owes its present existence solely to the company which resides there. Little Princess and I had hoped to find a downtown area with shops to wander through, but there was nothing. We found a couple of restaurants, a bar, a grocery/liquor store, a garage/depanneur, and that was about it. So, after wandering around in the intermittent rain, we went to the bar for a beer. It was once a fire hall with three fire engine bays. There are still some of the paraphernalia lying around, but the walls are mostly decorated with vintage photographs of hockey players.

When I was a little girl, there was a beer in Canada called Dow which had to be discontinued because it had some ingredient which was shown to be poisonous. There was this item on the wall of the bar which I could not resist photographing:

Their logo was: Wouldn’t a Dow go good now?

When Ed’s interview was finally done (they made him take a battery of tests, some of which he failed miserably at and, if they call him back, he’ll be subjected to a medical exam as well), we toured the gardens for which this town is also known. Mind you, the gardens are only another manifestation of the paper company which runs the place. But they are nice.

Throughout are sculptures of people and things made from flowers and other materials. There is “landart”, and this particular one was my favourite:

Here are also photos of some of the sculptures:

There were also exquisite flowers:

As we drove home, the skies opened and rained upon us, but we were rewarded in the end:

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