Random Acts of Kindness

I was looking for some used camping gear on Kijiji on Prince Edward Island, which admittedly is a rather small population base to search within, and came up on with a hit on a car camping butane stove that Charlie was asking $12 dollars for, but as it was entirely unsuited for a motorcycle, decided against it and began to look at some of his other sale items when I saw a set of screwdrivers that he was only asking $5 dollars for.

Not too shabby for $30 CDN

Old school Mastercraft Screwdrivers

It took a few days as neither of us was in a rush, and it would be a hour long ride for me for only three inexpensive screwdrivers, so I put it off until I needed to go into town for a few things.

Charlie turned out to be a nice older gentleman who was clearing out his old camping gear from when he and his wife in their youth did a lot of car camping, and after handing over the money for the almost unused set of screwdrivers, I mentioned that I would take the stove off his hands as well, to which he replied "Is ten dollars a good price?". I handed him a twenty, got my change, noticed that the case had seen better days, but the stove was in good shape, and still had what I assumed was an empty can of butane still in the compartment. We chatted about bikes in his driveway for a moment or so, then said our goodbyes.

I headed over to Canadian tire to buy a three pack of butane canisters as I have a fleaBay gas stove and canister adapter enroute from China via the slow boat, and wanted to be ready to play with it when it arrives later this month (hopefully).

3 cans for $9.99

DPower canister stove for $13 CDN

$7.99 for this...

While looking at the canisters, I overheard an older gentleman and his young female companion talking about the stoves on the shelf and complaining about the costs, as I would do since they are pretty expensive for what you get, and I joined in by asking them some questions about what purpose it would be for, and if they were in a hurry, mentioning the deals that could be found on eBay or the possibility of making their own alcohol stove and how I'd cooked scrambled eggs and bacon over one last week.

I hope this doesn't get flagged as SPAM

It turns out that the young lady was visiting on the Island, and would soon be car camping her way across Canada and the U.S. back to her home in the states, so pretty much solo cooking etc, and hadn't quite figured out the details of food, such as just boil ups for coffee and noodles or more elaborate camp meals.   

I offered up some advice on cooking pots, butane vs. white gas etc, and I'm afraid that I rambled on a bit, as I've done a ton of research on the matter in the past few weeks, extolling the virtues of gas over petroleum, the uses of alcohol etc.

I'm an alcoholic

Now he's cooking with gas (oline)

I apologized for taking up so much of their time (minutes in reality), and heading out when I turned and mentioned that I had made an impulse purchase of a used stove not an hour ago and it was tied on the backseat of my motorcycle, and that if she wanted it, she could have it for the same ten dollars that I had paid for it. In truth, I shouldn't have spent the money, but I'm a bit of a stove-a-holic and was adding another flame producing device to my collection. lol.

They agreed to have a look at it, and trooped after me to the checkout line where I paid for the butane cans, and shortly afterwards I found myself opening the case and showing them the used stove. The can that was under the cover was still more than 1/2 full! I fired it up right there in the parking lot using the plastic case as a windscreen, and was rewarded with some lovely blue flames!

There were handshakes all around with best wishes etc etc as they handed me a ten dollar bill and took the stove off to their car in the lot.

It made me oddly happy that I could help someone out like this, and I think I got my money's worth simply in how fate or karma was at work that day.

Cheers!

P.S. I'm happy that I don't have the stove here collecting dust in my sister's garage. Lol.