Return to Moncton
September 15, 2025
Details on my second epic adventure to Moncton in as many years:
1. Please wait for your ass to be seated . . .
2. One of many catching a few winks before his flight. As I’ve discovered, airline passengers spend more time waiting than they do in the air.
3. In Terminal 1, the former WEF superstore I noted in my last trip, the one where you scan your credit card on entry and your purchases are automatically charged on exit, was replaced with a more traditional store with a real human on hand to ring up your order.
4. Taking a seat nearby was an older couple waiting for an international flight to Quebec. From his luggage tag, I saw that the heavy-set guy’s name was Rick Lee. He said he was looking forward to a big Canadian breakfast. From the size of him, he’s certainly enjoyed a lot of them.
5. I didn’t notice too many DWAMs™ on the trip, but I spotted a few while waiting for my flight. There were a handful of passengers, two bathroom cleaners and one Air Canada QuebAir gray-haired gate agent. Such people might as well put a big sign on their forehead that says, “Govern me harder, daddy!”
6. Flying to Fredericton was a teenager wearing a hoodie with the message “Happiness Project” on the front and “Growth is a process” on the back. Sounds Liberal enough. No wonder he was headed to the capital of the socialist unemployed workers paradise which is now being run by a batty HR lady. Maybe he’s going to meet her personally, I thought. And no doubt he lamented how many people like me declined to pay this extra fee to support “climate initiatives” when booking my flight:
7. Nearby was a guy with a T-shirt from the Stray Dog Brewing Company. His wife was reading a book entitled Julie Chan is Dead.
8. In the washroom near my departure gate was a line six deep waiting for one of the four stalls. Meanwhile, the urinals were nearly empty. A little preflight anxiety, perhaps?
9. At every gate, I kept hearing the line, “Thank you for choosing Air Canada.” In my case, I did have a choice. I could choose to fly Air Canada to Moncton or I could choose not to go Moncton. That’s not a choice.
10. Among the passengers waiting for the Moncton flight was an older woman with a badly shaking hand. Just like Hitler. A classic Parkinson’s symptom.
11. I was relieved that, unlike the case in my last trip, we didn’t have to be shuttled out to the tarmac in several busloads.
12. On board were three male flight attendants stewards and one female flight attendant stewardess. The lead guy introduced himself as the “service director.” Which meant he got to wear a fancy pin on his uniform. It’s like being promoted to a manager at 7-Eleven, where you get to wear a different colored smock.
13. Seated behind me was a middle-aged couple. The guy was wearing a blue Bills cap and a jacket from Lococo’s, where he works. When taking his seat, he asked, “When did this plane get smaller?” If he thought that plane was small, he should have seen the one that took me to Moncton last year. Now that was small. And once we got in the air, his wife announced she’d be listening to the Christy Wee podcast. Whatever that is.
14. Sitting across the aisle was a younger woman who was glued to the window and snapping pictures with her phone. She obviously didn’t fly much. Like me.
15. When the snack cart came, the stewardess handed everyone a free granola bar. Cinnamon bun flavored. She didn’t ask anyone if they wanted it. She just handed it to them. And not with a smile. Heavens no. It’s in her union contract that she has to hand them out. It’s not in her union contract that she has to smile.
In the end, it turned out to be worth exactly what I paid for it, because the aftertaste lasted as long as the flight.
16. When the drinks came, many gleefully took advantage of the complimentary booze. White and red wine, along with beer, were on tap.
17. Following the first garbage run, another conversation ensued behind me.
“Joe’s phone is broken,” he said. “He just texted me. Joe’s phone is broken. But his screen is OK.”
After another call, he repeated, “Joe’s phone is broken.”
“How?” she asked.
“Call and ask him. He threw it at the wall.”
Then he asked, “Do we have an alarm clock at home?”
She didn’t know. Then she asked rhetorically, “How are you going to get up for the next three days without an alarm or a phone?”
“He’s at a job interview,” he said.
18. As we waited on the tarmac for the ground crew after landing, the woman across the aisle was using her phone as a mirror and straightening her hair.
19. While waiting to get off the plane, I was talking with a woman from Virgil. When I told her I had used Niagara Airbus to get to Pearson, she told me she used them once and was late for a plane because after they got to Grimsby, they had to turn around and go back to Vineland because they forgot someone.
20. Even though I had been speaking to the cab driver in the Canadian language, when it came time to pay, he asked, “Carte de credit?” When I pulled out cash, he quoted the fare. “Dix-sept.” I understood, but I waited for him to repeat it in Canadian. I’d have expected and received better even in Quebec.
21. Welcome to summer. In mid-September.
22. Because there’s always an idiot out there who might try such a thing, even when it’s so high up . . .
23. This gay crosswalk was right in front of my hotel in Dieppe. This in addition to another one nearby and more than a half a dozen in downtown Moncton. As I noted in my last visit, I’m surprised the runway at the airport isn’t adorned in rainbow colors.
24. Standing at the bus stop on Lewisville Road in front of the Best Western was a woman with green hair making weird gestures at no one in particular.
25. As loyal readers might have expected, my first destination after checking in at the hotel was Carli Ward’s grave.
There, I noticed the restoration of the stone at her grandparents’ grave. That along with a fresh set of flowers. But no attention to the stone marking where Carli’s remains are interned. In fact, overgrown grass and clippings were covering the “loved and remembered” line on the bottom. I did what I could to brush them away.
26. More inspirational messages on garbage bins . . .
27. As it said on one of the bins, say no to drugs . . .
28. And you have an olive-ly day too . . .
29. This horse’s ass qualifies as “art” on the campus of the Université de Moncton . . .
30. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again–the SPRM continues to follow me around . . .
In addition to the SPRM, I would spot plates from Nova Scotia, PEI, Ontario, Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia, Newfoundland and Nunavut; Quebec; and the Great States of Maine, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Indiana, Georgia and California. It was a sharp contrast from last year’s trip, when I saw far fewer out-of-province plates.
31. Spotted at the mall was an old guy wearing a red T-shirt with the message, “I Have Feelings (just not for you).”
32. In the food court, an older woman with black painted fingernails took a seat nearby, licked her napkin and used it to clean the seat before sitting down. Then she opened up a case she took out from her purse and emptied a cocktail of multicolored pills onto the table. She proceeded to take each one of them during her meal.
33. At the Swiss Chalet, there was a large party at an adjacent table and one of the guys kept eyeing me up. “Who the hell are you and what are you doing here?” might as well have been in a bubble caption above his head. I obviously stood out as a non-local. Another guy at the same table, heavy-set with a gray beard, was bragging that he once had four quarter pounders with four orders of fries at McDonald’s for one meal. “I’m surprised you aren’t, like, 600 pounds,” said the woman seated across from him.
34. Based on my experiences crossing streets there, I think it would be wise to not place your foot on the street until the cars stop. The drivers in this part of the world have blood in their eyes and any pedestrian needs to keep his or her head on a swivel.
35. Probably some who’s very pro-Israel . . .
36. Two of a handful of bike lockers at the mall. Wheel your bike in and use a U-bar lock to secure the locker from outside. I suspect that the lockers are an attempt to combat thefts of seats and wheels.
37. I don’t know what was in there, but based on the looks of it, I can understand why this beverage fell below the customer’s expectations . . .
38. Spotted on the side of a bus was an ad from the province. Let us help you find your way, the slogan said, with a link at the bottom for information on accessing mental health resources. Asking the government for help with mental health problems is like a chicken seeking assistance from Colonel Sanders.
39. My inaugural experience taking Codiac Transpo buses was interesting. Perhaps not surprising given the number of gay crosswalks around town, but right by the front door on each and every bus was a rainbow sticker. Without exception, the driver said “good morning” to each passenger, and they all said “thank you” on their way out, with the driver responding with “take care.” The buses were clean and offered free WiFi on board. And unlike the case in the Old Country, the back doors opened automatically.
40. Sitting across from me was a woman covered in flowery tattoos and dressed in some sort of hospital garb. Probably a health-care worker, I surmised. Midway through the ride, she pulled out a Nintendo game and was playing it throughout her ride.
41. The #51 route I took conveniently went past Edith Cavell School, where Carli had attended. I was appalled to see the large number of bums foraging around. And a half a block away was a half-charred house, which looked to have been a rooming house. For a minute there, I thought I was in the ’hood in Niagara Falls, GSNY.
42. En route there and back, I noticed that when drivers need a bathroom break, they don’t just stop on the street and put their flashers on before running inside a gas station, they pull the bus right into the parking lot.
43. Scenes at Magnetic Hill . . .
44. Outside at the Wharf Village, they were playing a Calgary radio station.
45. The young girl in the gift shop with two nose rings asked me where I was from. “Is it that obvious that I’m not a local?” I asked. “Most of the people we get are tourists,” she replied.
46. Petro-Canada’s quacking goose . . .
47. On my return trip, the bus passed by a pharmacy still pushing the Covid “vaccines.” For those who haven’t died yet, apparently.
48. Later, near NBCC, an old guy running after the bus tripped and fell on the sidewalk. The guy seemed all right, though his lower lip got scraped and was bloody. “I just want to go home,” he kept telling the younger kid with him.
49. Seated at a bench in Victoria Park was a bum wearing a red hoodie and with two shopping carts filled with all his worldly possessions in tow shouting, “It’s like you’re avoiding me!” at no one in particular. And on the sidewalk in front of him was a yellow gas can. As I was walking away, a Gestapo Gendarmie Royale du Canada car pulled up and an officer got out and approached the guy. Maybe the officer was afraid the guy was going to go for a walk in the woods.
50. For your safety and security. Like they say in China.
51. I wonder if the refugee clinic is there to serve those fleeing to New Brunswick or those fleeing out of the province, as many do for economic reasons, just as Carli and her mother did many years ago. “She didn’t speak French well enough,” said Carli of her mother when asked why they left the province.
52. Artwork inside the washroom at the Subway across from City Hall . . .
53. Scenes like this with people on motorized scooters in the middle of traffic were not uncommon:
Everywhere I went, I found them available for rent, most often left on sidewalks despite the signs asking people not to leave them there. Yet given the dangers of riding a scooter or a bicycle on the road in these parts, one can hardly be blamed for sticking to the sidewalk.
54. Interestingly, I couldn’t help but notice that so many more businesses provide bike racks than they do back home. Yet the infrastructure for cyclists in and around Moncton just sucks.
55. Why on earth would anyone use the name “Bimbo” for their company?
56. Spotting this “merge/convergez” sign at Wheeler Boulevard, it struck me as to why the province, faced with the constitutional requirement to accommodate both languages, doesn’t adopt a more practical approach by using pictograms the way they do in Quebec. The real reason is because the French zealots want to see French wording in every place they can get it and piss off enough Anglophones to the point that they’ll leave, eventually putting the French in the majority. And when that happens, there won’t be any minority rights.
57. Poignant markers of child/stillborn deaths in Elmwood Cemetery . . .
58. For as militant the French zealots are about their own language, they can’t even get à louer right . . .
59. Back at the mall, an older guy noticed my Nordiques cap. Originally from St-Pierre-et-Miquelon, he was visiting from Montreal and said he missed the rivalry with the Nordiques.
60. Ahead of me in line at Sobey’s was a fat, ugly woman wearing a pink top with the message “BE YOU” written under a rainbow. How about “BE LESS FAT.”
61. While I was eating at Swiss Chalet, all of a sudden, the staff got into a line, started clapping and began singing some sort of Swiss Chalet-themed birthday song to someone at the other end of the restaurant. The same thing happened one night later. Some people like the attention. Others, like me, would hate it.
62. While eating breakfast at the hotel the next morning, I was watching a segment on the Quebecese version of The Weather Network being played on the big screen. As they talked about keeping healthy, they showed a scene showing someone walking the woods, where, as far as I know, it’s still “illegal” in nearby Nova Scotia.
63. Fightin’ words written on garbage cans outside the Atlantic Lottery Corporation’s offices in downtown Moncton . . .
64. Serving me at the Duo Café across the street from City Hall was a girl covered in tattoos and wearing a nose ring and long earrings. She called me “dear” and had a “cat lady” water bottle with her behind the counter. After I took a seat, Nose Ring Girl’s colleague told her, “I was, like, in Arizona a year ago and I said, ‘Nice day, eh’ and they, like, started laughing.” All because of the “eh,” she said.
Minutes later, a middle-aged woman walked in and said, “I’ll have my normal one.” This is a small town, I thought. She was followed by an older couple. Nose Ring Girl tried selling them on the peanut butter cookies, muffins and deep-fried croissants. They each settled on the croissants and took a seat near the old guy by the window reading a Quebecese book. “It’s a different texture,” the woman said after taking a bite.
The conversation behind the counter resumed. “Mark is, like, making fun of Adam. Mark is, like, so funny,” said Nose Ring Girl. “He spends, like, four hours throwing axes at, like, two in the afternoon. That’s what I, like, gave up,” her colleague said of Mark, her ex-boyfriend.
65. Cyclists who forget the lock for their bike can borrow one for free while visiting the Moncton Public Library.
66. More nauseating groveling . . .
Later, I noticed this new sign welcoming visitors to Dieppe, complete with some Indian writing:
All in all, I had the feeling I was back in the Old Country.
67. While leaving the library, I heard the guy behind the counter say to his colleague, “If I ever win the lottery, I’d have, like, a totally open library.” And the public library isn’t open to all? I wondered.
68. Alternative marriage counseling services . . .
69. I had hoped to make a return visit to the tourist information center, only to find it closed for the season. Pretty short season, if you ask me.
70. Words of wisdom at Bore Park . . .
71. How someone got up there to vandalize these signs is left as an exercise for the reader . . .
72. Back at the mall, while eating in the food court, a DWAM™ approached the counter at Subway. This older woman wearing a jean jacket made sure to keep a safe distance away as she picked up and paid for her order, which she presumably preordered through an app. After the clerk handed her the bag, she took off in great haste, no doubt to a virus-free zone where she could safely eat her sub.
73. Passing Crescent Gold & Diamonds, I noticed another DWAM™ behind the counter. Perhaps they should be called Dipshit Diamonds instead.
74. Leaving the mall, another guy remarked on my Nordiques cap, wishing they would put a team back in Quebec. “Financially, it wouldn’t work,” I said. “It’s still a shame,” he replied.
75. It’s great that they’re available 365 days a year, but what about those lost souls who find themselves in distress on a leap year day?
76. I hope Mr. Hoar’s wife indeed kept her maiden name . . .
77. Ron Brooks has an admirer . . .
78. Just as I noticed in my last trip, many people had their family names on their front plate alongside the Acadian flag. As if to say, “We’ve been chosen. We’re special.” Just like on the movie, The Island.
79. When it came time to pay for my meal at Swiss Chalet, the waiter left me with a POS terminal and walked away, blindly assuming I was paying with a card. He returned when he saw me waving a $20 bill. “Oh, you’re paying cash,” he said. Next time, ask your customer first.
80. Soon after getting into his smoke-filled cab, the crusty old driver with a gray beard who looked like someone who just got off a fishing boat after a week at sea asked me if I was the 5:30 call no one showed up for. When I told him no, he started bellyaching about all the idiots in the office who send him on wild goose chases. He was so angry that he said he’s going to have trouble staying out of jail. “This system is crap,” he said, pointing to the display on his dashboard. “It’s all the immigrants. You have to tell them four times to do something and you can’t get through to them.”
81. Once I got to YQM, I was a little surprised when I saw a bit of a line at security. Unknown to me at the time, there was a QuebAir flight to Montreal scheduled to take off an hour before the C.U. flight. Unlike the case last time, the kid working the line even asked to see my boarding pass. Then the scanner picked up something in my camera bag, prompting an Asian woman to start thumbing through the zippered pouches before finally letting it pass.
82. After repacking, two older couples took a seat behind me. “I’m worried about you,” said one woman to her husband. “Your brain isn’t working.”
“I’m a bit frazzled,” he said. “But I’ll be OK.” Then he asked his wife is she wanted something to drink. “Diet Coke, or Zero. Whatever they call it. I haven’t had one all week,” she replied.
After he went off to Tim Davinder Hortons to fetch the medley of artificial sweeteners, she spoke to the wife of the other couple.
“I went on one of those crash diets,” she said. “Eight days later, I gained all the weight back.”
After the guy came back, he told the other couple what happened at security when he tried to get a bottle of water through. You can drink it or we’ll pour it out, they said. He told them to pour it out.
83. At YQM, they have two separate WiFi connections. One for Canadians, the other for Quebecers. It’s apparently not good enough to have one connection where both languages appear on the sign-in page.
84. As was the case the last time I flew out of YQM, there was a group of Mexicans waiting for the C.U. flight. There were three of them–two guys and a chunky woman who somehow managed to squeeze her expansive girth and el grande ass into some stretchy black material three or four sizes too small.
85. The C.U. flight was delayed by a half hour, not because of any problems with our plane, but rather because the plane coming in from Montreal that was taking passengers back there was delayed, thus tying up the only ground crew they have with that flight. The perils of flying out of a small airport.
86. When boarding, we had to walk outside to the plane, then up a shaky ramp, where we were greeted by this dipshit Asian stewardess:
87. View of the Hub City from the air . . .
88. The first snack run was handled by a chunky stewardess with a thick Quebecese accent. In badly broken Canadian, she asked me if I wanted a pret-zel or a cooo-kie. Real slow. Words she hadn’t completely mastered in her “English as a second language” course.
89. The woman seated to my left pulled down her tray and noticed all the dirt. “They don’t clean too well,” she said. I felt like asking, “What did you expect from QuebAir? It’s probably not in their union contract to get rid of grime.”
90. During the drink run, I was served by the dipshit stewardess who was teaming with the young kid masquerading as a service director. They were surprisingly friendly. Must be new, I thought. Because I’m certain that’s against regulations.
91. Midway through the flight, the woman to my left started talking to me. As we spoke, I learned that she’s from College Station in the Great State of Texas. Home of Texas A & M. She was with a group of people from across the U.S., Canada, Belgium, France and Italy golfing in Moncton. She said the Belgians were very friendly, as were the people in Moncton. The French, not so much. And they had a three-hour layover in Toronto before their flight to Houston, where they’re taking United.
Then she asked, “Are you allowed to have guns in Canada?”
“Not really,” I replied. It’s very difficult.”
“Everyone has a gun in Texas. How do you defend yourself?”
“Police just tell you to comply with the criminals.”
“That’s terrible.”
I couldn’t disagree.
Later, she asked, “Do you speak French?”
“A little. I did well in high school.”
“If I moved to Canada, I’d have to learn how to speak French.”
After telling her I was writing books, she said, “You need to write something about JFK. Lyndon Johnson had him killed so he could get into power.”
As we were disembarking, she said she wants to go home and eat some rice and gravy. She hates fish.
92. On our descent into C.U., being at the back of the plane, I could hear the stewardesses chatting. One of them was bellyaching about how she gets taxed $1,100 per month. Poor babies, I thought. No wonder, as their union claims, they have to take multiple jobs just to get by. They really need to be paid more, especially considering the incredible amount of skill it takes to be able to push that snack cart down the aisle. One can hardly blame them for attaching tags with slogans like this to their bags, which translates to “my salary is theft” . . .
93. While waiting to disembark, we were chatting with one of the stewardesses. The stewardess said she likes going to Asia because they have good skin care products and Mexico because the food is cheaper. The woman to my left told the stewardess that when she comes back in another life, she wants to be an airline stewardess. I was also surprised to learn that being bilingual isn’t a requirement to be a stewardess. Just as long as they have both languages covered among the crew.
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