Speaker: And I got lots of help here. everybody's good to me and everybody in Liskeard's good to me. You can't say you got no enemies. I got no enemies but probably think some people because I'm in business think that I'm a- a square-head but there's nothing I can do about that. Interviewer: You've got to be a square-head in business, eh? Speaker: Yeah, but I don't think I am (laughs) a square-head you-know? I ah- Interviewer: (inc) you there- you said you were (laughs). Speaker: You-know I- I think I done the best of my ability in business to please people and the majority of them I'm sure I have. I think if you ask people they would say that.

So I got it, and all us Tollan boys have a distinctive walk and a kind-of distinctive for lack of a better word square head. So, I'm on the internet and I typed in Almonte, and boom this picture came up.

They never squawked about it too much.

But the people were squawking like hell it's- pollute the water one-thing-or-another.

I guess you-know now they likely squawk and complain but-

Super-smart like, practically genius level but his wisdom- he had no wisdom at all. You-know he, he screwed up a lot. Yeah. A knowledgeable squirt. I-mean he knew he had a lot of kno-- knowledge in him but um, you-know he 's too into that and wasting his life away.

You-know separate- showers, etcetera, but you're all doing exercises in the same place and um so, so you happen to be a little bit broader across the rear end than than some of these young squirts that come in they're you-know.

I was four on the seventh of June and I went to school in September with Daisy. 'Cause she was just a squirt.

Interviewer: Oh my goodness. Speaker: Yeah, so that's why it took us a little longer at that time and then just another couple of fields and we'd just- and there was a stile at the back fence into the ah- the schoolyard, so you'd climb up over the stile and there you were. Interviewer: Explain what a stile is. Speaker: What a stile is. Interviewer: Yes. Yes. Speaker: Yes. Okay so you have the wire fence, and that's really awkward to climb over. So they would build ah wooden steps up one side and down the other. So- Interviewer: A stile. Speaker: Yeah.

... such foolish things as coffee breaks. In my day, if you couldn't go from your breakfast time until noon, you wasn't much of a man. If you had to stop for to...of-course we old ones know that it's just a stinking habit that had crept in. That again has helped to put the cost of everything up. Because you have a coffee break, the other fella (fellow) had a coffee break so what you're working at and what you're producing ...

And Tom says, "Oh Ma," he said, "I traded a pen-knife to- to George-J," he said, "For- for the billy-goat." Well my mother says, "You're not keeping it here." She says, "That stinking little thing," she says "You get it out of here!" You-know?

Speaker: Yeah. But the only way you could get your paper- Interviewer: Was by sticking around? Speaker: Just stick around for the year. And ah third year was a repeat of the second year. (Laughs) Interviewer: So you paid tuition to get- Speaker: And we paid tuition- full tuition to- basically for this stinking piece of paper.

I don't have to keep up with the Jones. I was never that type where just because you have it, I have to have it, okay. I'm not- I'm not suffering, okay. I don't have to have a new vehicle every stinking year. If you don't like what I'm driving, leave me alone.

... and when West-Nile hit, they were gone. There was no jays here whatsoever and I thought, "Oh geez, that's what happened to them." That's why we don't have any because they- they were- their population was decimated by the stinking virus. Well n-- nothing last year, the year be-- okay, when it first hit, sure enough I guess it was just a week ago, looked out the back window, sunny day, was three jays in the backyard and I says- I said, "Ah they're back," I says, "Oh- oh goody.

Interviewer: Were all your siblings at home when the fire happened? Speaker: Oh, sure. Oh, sitting around there, we couldn't go outside because too damn cold. Had to sit in the house and try and blea-- breathe that stinking smoke in while- until the damn thing got- smoke got out of the house, you-know.

Interviewer: So you came back here on purpose? You wanted to? Speaker: Ah, yes. Interviewer: Yeah? Speaker: Yeah. It wasn't- (clears throat) I-mean when you- (bell rings)- after you live here ah, and you experience a few other places, you realize it's pretty stinking good here. Interviewer: Yeah? Speaker: Ah, you-know, ten minutes to the nearest golf course at half the price of the city. Interviewer: Mm. Speaker: Um, you can play hockey for next to nothing. Um, you can curl for next to nothing. Ah, people are pretty good. You can sit down with- what I r

Speaker: It was the day they were in Samuel-Payne's going out the goddamn laneway, I never had to feed the bastards ever again. Speaker 2: And run and try to catch them with ropes, eh? Speaker: (sighs deeply) Speaker 2: And they wouldn't come- Speaker: The stinking sons-of-bitches, they were gone. Speaker 2: Because they knew they would have to work like a bastard all day.

Speaker: See, we had a tractor then. Speaker 2: So you baited them with oats to catch them. Speaker: And in the-- in them days, like, a tractor was a lot more fascinating than a pair of stinking horses. Speaker 2: Oh yeah, oh yeah, yeah. Speaker: So that's my fondest memory.

Interviewer: Something that they'd throw the stumps onto, like- Speaker: Oh, well, a stoneboat, you could call it.

Interviewer: No no, not to- not to um- not to work the land, just to ah, they threw the stumps on- on these things that- Speaker: Oh, oh! A stoneboat. Interviewer: Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Speaker: Uh-huh. Yes, stone-boat. Well Dad had lots of them. We had lots of stone-boats. We had two or three of them there. We used to make it out of cedar (inc) you-know? And put boards on them and then put a team of horses and that, and we ah- well in the summertime we- for what we burnt, was pine-roots, you-know pine-nuggets.