It’s me again ♥ Thanks for visiting and taking time to comment – it makes my day reading the comments and replying.

Today my post belongs to a couple of different categories such as Okanagan Related, and Thinking Out Loud. All the categories are along the right hand side of the page.

My life and yours includes all sorts of unexpected things, hopefully mostly happy, and I am sure you have some stories to tell on that subject.

My bike rides are all about the unexpected for me. I am talking about spotting eagles, osprey, coots, bufflehead ducks and even snakes.

Snakes? Yes; I was riding along the river channel a few day ago and I unexpectedly nearly ran over this tiny snake below. I circled back as I wasn’t even sure it was a snake, as I hardly got a look at it. It was a little one and he had a tiny black head and small tongue flicking out – he was pretty timid though. I thought that would be it for snake sighting that day, but I was wrong.

Only about 50 feet further along that I found another larger snake, and it was less inclined to move away when I got closer.

Since I know that small and larger teeth hurt, (guess how I learned that!) I left these snakes alone. I used pick up wild mice and things but after a few little bites I stopped doing that. (I guess I am learning, albeit slowly)

I am told that years ago, the Okanagan used to have a lot of snakes and in the hills when people went for a walk they swept the sidewalk in front of them to move the snakes out of the way. It is startling for me to imagine that now, it would make a person think twice before putting out the garbage at night!

Unexpected surprises come in all types including apparently lost wallets.

I lost my wallet in Stanley Park back in the 1970’s so there is still hope apparently because of this recent “found” wallet story that happened here in Penticton just recently.

Long Lost Wallet (story by Taya Fast – Global News)

Two construction workers separated by more than 60 years along Skaha Lake Road in Penticton, B.C., are now connected through a long-lost personal item because Scott Walls, was working in the area back in early March when something caught his eye buried in the roadway.

“We were putting in a sewer main and as we were excavating the hole we always watch for other utilities or conflicting things in the ground,” said Walls.

“When the operator was pulling the dirt back, I saw a red credit card — I didn’t know at the time that’s what it was — and it happened to be a leather wallet.”

The wallet was almost perfectly preserved and stamped on it was the name Roger Desfosses. Inside the wallet was an Arthur A. Voice Construction credit card.

Walls took to social media with the information and eventually connected with Defosses’s son, Danny, and widow Gisele Desfosses, who both live in the Edmonton area.

“It was neat,” said Walls. “We find a lot of things in the ground, but usually they’re glass bottles and plastic, but to find something leather and then have a name attached to it and then a credit card with the company he worked for, and the expiry date was 1964… that was super cool.”

Only a couple of days later, the Desfosses family drove out to Penticton from Alberta to meet Walls and get the wallet.

Giselle along with her son, grandson and his wife, and three great-grandchildren all piled into a vehicle to make the trip.

“I had to go. I owed it to Scott, and I owed it to Roger, because he can’t speak for himself and that’s something that he would have done,” said Desfosses.

“When I heard about it, I said we’re going, that’s it, we’re going. Scott wanted to mail it but I didn’t want to take a chance because we lost it for 60 years already, I didn’t want to lose it in the mail for another 60, I won’t be around.”

The pair had come to Penticton in the 1960s for civil construction work along the same stretch of road where Walls had recently been working.

Giselle and Roger Defosses were only in the South Okanagan for a few months, which is likely when the wallet was lost.

Giselle went on to say that the wallet brings back a lot of memories.

“It was a good time in our lives,” Giselle said.“We were just starting our family. Danny, he was four years old, and Suzanne was two and our youngest son was born seven years later, and he is now gone.”

The wallet had been sitting about three-and-a-half feet under Skaha Lake Road ever since.

Roger Desfosses died in 2020 at age 85. He and Giselle had known each other since Grade 1 and were married for 63 years.

Link to video here – click to watch

They say “expect the unexpected” which just doesn’t make sense to me but I will say “celebrate the unexpected” delightful events you can – they don’t get front page, and they don’t go viral but still taste sweet.

Savour them like lifesaver candies, as long as you are able.

I appreciate you reader! ♥ – Sincerely, David