“I hate to see all the beautiful leaves fall from the trees,” Cliff Murray said the other morning as the guys gathered at Mabel’s Grill. “Soon they’ll lose their colour for another year.”
    “I don’t mind leaves on the ground,” said   George Mackenzie, “it’s the ones that clog eavestroughs on our house that get me.”
    “Have you not seen the ads on TV for the companies that put covers on your eavestroughs?” Molly Whiteside said as she delivered menus to the table.
    “I have, and I actually called them up to get a quote and for that price I can climb a ladder for a few more years,” said George.
    “I don’t know, that’s a tall, two-storey house you have and you’re not a kid anymore,” warned  Dave Winston.  
    “Yeah but for that price I’d have a good piece of a downpayment for a new tractor!” George exploded.
    Seeing George’s mood Molly tried to change the subject. “I bought the kids a pumpkin that they can carve for Halloween,” she said.
    “We don’t get kids for Halloween at our place,” Dave said. “They all go to town these days so at our place pumpkins get spared.”
    “It used to be when I was a kid that we grew a few hills of pumpkins for Thanksgiving pie and jack o’lanterns at Halloween,” George said. “We save the work now that the supermarket has big bins of them.”
    “Yeah, it’s become a business, growing them now,” Cliff pointed out. “City people make trips to farms that have acres of pumpkins.”
    “Do you get pumpkins for cooking?” Dave asked Molly.
    “I gave that up long ago,” Molly said. “It takes too long, especially when you can buy pumpkin canned. that’s ready to use in a pie” 
    “Just shows that people have more money than brains” George growled.
    Seeing the kind of mood George was in, Molly quickly took the guys’ orders and headed back to the kitchen.
    “How’s the corn harvest going?” Cliff asked Dave to change the subject.
    “Oh, it’ll get done,” Dave replied. “We always get something, even in those early winters when we have to finish combining in the spring.”
    “Thankfully most of my corn goes in early for silage to feed the cattle,” George said.  “Good to have the worry over early.”
    “Except my wife hit me up the other day with a whole list of things to be done – put away the lawn mower until spring, and all the garden tools, the hoes and rakes and so on,” said Cliff. 
    “Well that’ll get you out of the house to miss all those scammer calls, like the people claiming to be Bell Canada, as if they’d use a recording to contact you,” grumbled George.
    “I’ve had those, and the ones saying somebody is trying to take money out of your bank account so they need your account number so they can prevent it, when they’re trying to clean you out,” said Cliff.
    “It’s so depressing that there are all these people who could easily make a living in an honest way who try to scam you instead,” sighed Dave. “What’s the modern world coming to.”
    “That kind of person has always been there, they just change their methods,” George growled. “My grandparents used to tell about the fortune-tellers who used to show up at local fall fairs and cheat gullible people. Then my parents used to get travelling sales people who used to prey on gullible people.”
    “What’s this about gullible people?” wondered Molly when she brought back their full plates.
    “We were just talking about all the calls you get from scam artists these days,” Cliff told her.
    “I’ve had those,” said Molly.”I tell the kids not to answer the phone anymore because they might say something those guys could use – as if I had enough money to worry about. The poor suckers are wasting their time on me unless you guys improve your tips!.”◊