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Thursday, November 18, 2010 • 7

OPINION

A Thousand Monkeys

staying in touch... By John O’Toole, MPP

BLAKE WOLFE The Scugog Standard

Shop-a-phobics anonymous The most dreadful time of year is here, and sadly, it’s not Halloween 2, no matter how hard I’ve tried to get that recognized as an official calendar date.

It still feels way too early, but as much as I hate to say/type the words, it’s holiday shopping season.

If you’re single, you don’t have to worry about this until anywhere between two and four weeks from now, depending on how much of a last-minute shopper/miser one is.

But as a parent, it’s a time of year that often veers violently between a joyful glimpse back into a childhood past and a terrifying vision of infernal torment coming to a shopping centre near you.

I’ve been told I’m safe for at least a couple more years. At 14 to 15 months, children don’t usually talk and therefore don’t usually ask (at least not in ways other than pointing and squawking) for specific gifts.

But I still get that burning sensation in the back of my neck that says Dec. 25, 2010, is not far off and that one Christmas, my wee one may turn into a hollywrapped creature hypnotized by television commercials and holiday cheer.

I’m consistently amazed by what passes as ‘THE toy to have’ each Christmas. I’m also surprised that there is no new Elmo toy this year. There’s still plenty of mileage left in that idea - they haven’t even got around to Give ’em Hell-mo, Bates Motelmo or (Th)Elmo and Louise (death car sold separately).

Instead we get the return of the Zhu Zhu Pets - wind-up hamsters that don’t eat, drink or die but still require a habitat in which to live, as suggested by the amount of associated Zhu Zhu crap cluttering store shelves.

They were apparently so popular last year,

moms and dads were willing to part with their last dollars (and, in at least one case, their eternal souls) for the one type of rodent that kids actually want to find in a brightly-wrapped package under the tree on Christmas morn.

There’s also a Barbie that has an internal digital video camera, which is an idea I find creepy beyond belief.

There are other ‘IT’ toys but I couldn’t come up with witty things to say about them.

So far, Tara and I are safe from such requests. As Norah’s parents, the holidays pose a different dilemma. We are notoriously hard to shop for, and there’s reasons for that. We continuously eschew unnecessary holiday stress, partially under the guise of one-upping each other in terms of frugality and modesty. “There can’t possibly be anything I need or want,” goes the refrain. There must be something wrong with us.

This usually results in the following scenario: a couple of small gifts, stockings full of fun - and functional! - selections from the shelves of places like White Feather Farms (where else can you buy a boot brush in the shape of a laughing pig?

We’ve since named him Walter), with the remainder of the holiday war chest sunk into food and booze. I said we’re frugal, not uptight.

For us, this is an ideal situation. No must-have toys for mom or dad, no risk of empty shelves, and a child all too happy to play in wrapping paper and stare at the Christmas tree on Dec. 25.

At least this time. That’s why I’ve bought stocks in Zhu Zhu Pets. Will they still be cool next year?

One bad apple...

When Stephie was little and we were living in Whitby, I would take her swimming at the big recreation complex on Rossland Rd. Inevitably, her lesson would be cut short - or cancelled just as we walked out onto the deck - due to a ‘pool fouling.’

I couldn’t really blame the children who accidentally emptied the contents of their bowels in all that splashing and excitement, but that one kid’s peristalsis ruined everyone’s good time. It was infuriating and I was powerless to do anything about it.

Everywhere you look, there is one bad apple (or incontinent toddler) spoiling things for everybody else. The student who pulls the fire alarm and gets the class trip cancelled. The kid who shows up at the high school dance too drunk to stand much less move to music and forces the cops to shut the whole thing down.

Pontius Pilate. Benito Mussolini. Adolf Hitler. Charles Manson. Slobodan Milosevik. Colonel Russel Williams.

These are extreme examples, but history is peppered with angry, obsessive people who seem compelled to impose their will on others and make the masses suffer as a result of their inadequacies, compulsions or smug self-righteousness.

Last Sunday, Rob, Stephie and I went to our favourite little hole-in-the wall on the Danforth for Sunday brunch.

We had been to the Ricoh Big Ben Challenge at the Royal Winter Fair the night before and we were suffering from a serious euphoria hangover. Whenever we aren’t quite ready to let the fun end, we head to our favourite bar-cafe. It’s a

Concerns over energy costs The number one issue Caucus has demanded be in our Riding, according given to the public. to phone calls and e-mails It’s time for the we receive at our ConstituMcGuinty government to ency Office, is high energy come clean on how much and electricity costs. The its energy experiments will public is now paying attencost Ontario families by tion to their bills, which releasing the bill impact include the Harmonized statements, the details of Sales Tax. the Samsung subsidy and Last week, Opposition the government’s longLeader Tim Hudak made term energy plan.

John O’Toole public a leaked report on Petition Says Ontario energy in support of McGuinty govStudents Should Come First ernment policies. It gave Ontarians a A $30 million scholarship program rare glimpse into behind-the-scenes for foreign students was announced strategy for shaping public opinion by the McGuinty government this on energy. month. Individual scholarships would The document obtained by the PC be worth up to $40,000 per year. This Caucus confirms what a quick glance is another example of how out-ofat recent hydro bills has already told touch Dalton McGuinty has become us. Dalton McGuinty’s energy experiwith the priorities of Ontario families. ments are unaffordable for Ontario Ontario students graduate with an families and will cause their bills to average debt of $26,000. We have the increase. highest tuition and the largest class The confidential strategy report sizes in the country. Given the consuggests that this government’s failed energy experiments are expected to in- ditions at universities and colleges in crease Ontario families’ home hydro Ontario, doesn’t it make more sense to reinvest the foreign scholarship rates by 36 percent in 2012.

The document said, in part, that it funds in Ontario?

A petition is being circulated to ask will be important to ‘confuse’ the issue in the political/public/media away the provincial government to cancel its $30 million foreign scholarships from just price.

The McGuinty government has and reinvest these funds into scholarstonewalled the Official Opposition’s ships for Ontario students.

If you wish to receive a petition, requests for a release of their energy bill impact statements. The document they are available from my Constituthat came to light last week shows ency Office. I can be reached at 905special interest groups have been giv- 697-1501 or 1-800-661-2433 and by en the confidential information our e-mail at john.otooleco@pc.ola.org.

tradition. And not just with us, but with hundreds of local folks. This place has been serving weekend brunch for 22 years. Longer than Stephie has been alive. The menu is hardly elaborate - it’s a bar. They serve the basics. And that’s what makes it so popular.

So imagine our confusion when we walked through the door on Sunday to find empty tables - not just one for us, but lots of them. And where was our usual smiling waitress and the welcoming sizzle of grease on a counter-top skillet?

We sat down and were handed crisp new menus, not the beaten-down, dog-eared laminated black sheets we had grown so fond of. Gone were the staples; the standard bacon/sausage/ham, eggs, homefries and toast combos.

Fortunately, the waffle iron was still in service so Stephie could order her customary Belgian waffles with fruit and whipped cream but Rob and I were out of luck. We were staring down a salad, a bagel, a panino or huervos rancheros with a ‘sliced hard boiled egg.’ Hard boiled? Huervos ranchos are supposed to be scrambled! What malevolent force had toppled our carefully ordered brunch universe?

Apparently, it was a customer. This person (for some reason I picture a pursed-lipped woman who had no business being in a bar-cafe for breakfast in the first place) had found the atmosphere ‘smoky.’

There is no kitchen. No oven or stove or proper ventilation system. It’s a bar that does breakfast on weekends.

Sure the odd piece of ham sticks to the griddle. Sometimes a piece of bread burns in the toaster. A wisp of smoke is collateral damage.

The customer didn’t see it that way. She complained to the authorities and a health and safety inspector came in

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TRACEY COVEART The Standard the next weekend and shut the brunch down. She pointed her fingers at electrical outlets and ordered every frying and toasting appliance unplugged.

Permanently. Just like that, 22 years of tradition went out the front door - and with it a whole lot of regular customers who would now be forced to take their brunch money elsewhere.

I would like to put the complainer on a skillet and serve her up for brunch. I understand that the place might have offended her finer sensibilities. Perhaps the poor dear was afflicted with an overactive olfactory lobe. But as far as I can make out, there weren’t any explosives strapped to her chest.

There was no maniac with a remote detonator in a building across the street telling her to shut up and eat or he’d blow up the whole city block. And she certainly wasn’t going to be forced to come back at gun point. Why not just walk away, keep your tip in your change purse and cross the place off your list of desirable places to eat in Toronto? Why spoil it for everyone else just because your dining experience didn’t live up to your expectations?

And why, in this democratic country, do the rights of one always seem to trump the rights of many?

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Thursday, February 3, 2011 • 7

OPINION

A Thousand Monkeys

staying in touch... By John O’Toole, MPP

BLAKE WOLFE The Scugog Standard

Live and unplugged I’m probably not qualified to write a technology blog (this includes lack of stylish haircut), so I’ve done sort of the opposite.

If you don’t know and/or care what a blog is, you may have come to the right place. If you know of blogs and/or maintain one, you may hang up your tinfoil hat all the same and stay awhile. I can read your thoughts right through that thing, anyway. You want some pizza. See? I’m in that in-between spot as far as technology goes: too old to be left in a blind panic if my cellphone dies, too young to be mystified by the wonders of the Internet. Just somewhere in the indifferent middle. That said, I grew up with GPS (a.k.a. a map). No technology needed for that mind-reading thing, either. You’re thinking I’m kidding.

Technology is just there. I don’t want to destroy the mechanized looms that terrorized the 19th-century English countryside nor will I be lining up for a microchip to be sewn into the back of my hand when debit card fraud requires everyone to do as much (I thought that was why they made mattresses with material that could be easily hollowed out for money storage.)

If anything, I want to be less-connected.

If anyone reading this has an iPad, please get in touch. I’m dying to know what you can do with it that can’t be done on a laptop, besides serve drinks while playing a mean game of Pong.

I just recently reached the end of a three-year phone contract and, strangely, it didn’t feel like a prison sentence.

Others may change phones like they change underwear (or at least the daily recommended rate of swapping boxers), I hang on. Why? Because I don’t care. Which is to say I have a phone that

can usually meet all my needs and an iPhone would be out of place in my drab-yet-sensible wardrobe.

I already think it’s strange and out of place to be cranking out Screaming For Vengeance on an mp3 player (while washing dishes, no less). But if eschewing a touchscreen for vinyl when it comes to classic ’Priest is wrong, I don’t want to be right. You’re thinking you need to dig out the turntable.

But now my needs have surpassed the phone that clung to my leg (a little too snugly, at times) for the last three years.

Texting, while having a dumb name, is economical and allows the writer in all of us to leave witty messages that work better in type than voice, where they’re often punctuated by ‘um,’ ‘uh,’ ‘like,’ ‘anyway,’ or the occasional four-letter word, like ‘food’ or ‘hand.’

Ever try sending such a message on a normal phone? It sucks. Stray letters, misspellled words (like that one), empty messages accidentally sent by stubby fingers not nearly nimble enough to navigate the fjords and fissures of the ever-shrinking cellphone. You’re thinking that you agree.

I am now making that leap into the market for a phone with a keyboard I don’t need e-mail, I don’t need apps, just something to type on that is also visually appealing, moderately stylish and within my price range. The quest has not been successful thus far.

But it doesn’t matter too much - I’ve gone three years and could likely go another three years before I realized it, Pong be damned.

You agree. Right?

Post-op observations As I write this column, I am propped up in bed, surrounded by pillows, empty cans of coke, crutches and my portable office. I survived hallux valgus surgery but what I might not survive is the recovery.

It’s been a week since I was discharged from Ross Memorial Hospital in Lindsay after an operation to remove a bunion from my left foot and I have been out of the house exactly twice. I am not allowed to drive and I’m only supposed to get out of bed to pee. I am almost completely dependent on others and I’m sure they’re even more tired of it than I am.

I was warned that the operation would be painful and this was true. My surgeon explained that he had essentially stabbed me. It’s called surgery rather than assault causing bodily harm and it took place in a hospital OR instead of a back alley but the body doesn’t make any distinction. The morphine injections might as well have been horsefly bites. They stung like a bugger and did nothing to ease the excruciating pain.

By some Herculean measure of self control, however, I managed to refrain from moaning and swearing and screaming at three-minute intervals throughout the night.

Not so the lady across the room. She’d had her knee replaced so she had grounds for complaint, but could she not have made some attempt to suffer in silence the way my bedmate to the right - who’d had her hip replaced managed to do?

Eleanor (hip lady) and I were able to laugh about it in the morning, but if I wasn’t convinced that all the bones

The billion-dollar question Last week, I was part of ment has made a shambles the Official Opposition’s of the electricity file. campaign to raise awareness 2011 Budget Must Set over the billion-dollar-perNew Course for Ontario year debt retirement charge MPPs from the Official that Ontarians pay through Opposition warned durtheir electricity bills. Along ing pre-budget hearings with everyone in Ontario last week that the governwho pays a hydro bill, the ment must alter Ontario’s official opposition wants to financial course before it’s know why Ontario families too late. Since 2003, the will be asked to keep payMcGuinty government has ing a billion dollars per year increased spending by 70 John O’Toole in debt retirement charges per cent and is on track to when it appears that the debt double the debt by 2012. is paid in full.

Ontario’s hydro rates, auto insurance At news conferences in Campbellford premiums and post-secondary tuition and Peterborough, we pointed out that fees are among the highest in Canada. the total collected from the debt retire- Clearly, Ontario families and seniors dement charge since 2002 is $7.8 billion. serve some much-deserved relief.

At the same time, Ontario’s residual PC Finance Critic Norm Miller pointed stranded debt is estimated at $7.8 billion. out that, as we look to the budget for the If the money raised equals the debt to be 2010-11 fiscal year, we must protect frontpaid, then it would be reasonable to as- line healthcare and core services while sume that it’s time to take the debt retire- reining in government waste. Ontario’s ment charge off our hydro bills. But, the MPPs must keep in mind the fact that McGuinty government keeps pushing every hour, the McGuinty government back the repayment date from 2012 to spends $2.2 million more than it receives 2014 and then to 2018 with no explana- in revenue. Ontario’s projected 2010 defition as to why. Nor is there a clear explana- cit of $18.7 billion is greater than every tion of where the money is going. other province and territory combined.

It’s time for the McGuinty government Pre-budget consultations continue this to come clean on why Ontario families week (Jan. 31 and Feb.1) in Toronto. continue to be charged $1 billion per year, Unused Bowmanville Rail Bridge to plus HST, for a debt that is paid. The Ofbe Removed ficial Opposition is calling for a forensic The Ministry of Transportation audit to explain the debt retirement charge plans to decommission the Highway money mystery. Ontario families are 401 railway bridge on the unused Bowrightly concerned that the debt retirement manville spur line during the 2011 charge, plus HST, is turning into a perma- construction season. The same project nent tax grab. Ontario consumers were also includes decommissioning of the also alarmed to learn that a C.D. Howe Re- Highway 401 CNR rail subway in the port found the McGuinty government has City of Oshawa. The removal of the subsidized power exports to the tune of $1 bridges is scheduled to start this spring. billion since 2006. This allows energy trad- When detours and road closures are reers to sell provincially-generated power to quired to complete the bridge removal, other jurisdictions for less than what On- announcements will be made and signs tario families pay. In my view, this govern- will be posted in advance.

in my foot had been broken while I was under anesthetic, I would have walked over to knee-lady’s bed and put us all out of her misery.

For the first few days, the only thing that offered any measure of relief was a bag of frozen peas. After that, a cocktail of oxycodone, Tylenol and Advil seemed to do the trick. Now, my IV porthole aches, I have blisters on my the heels of my hands, my armpits are screaming, and when I’m up for any more than a few seconds, my toes turn purple and my foot swells up like a pulsating balloon. But I have found some small pleasures. Hooking rugs (not in an arts and crafts kind of way) and every errant bag and piece of clothing with my crutches as I limp around my cluttered home. And bathing. I can’t get my dressing wet or bear any weight on my foot, so I had to buy a special bag for my leg and a shower chair to sit on. Getting clean is an exercise in exhaustion. During my second attempt, I managed to break the tap with my super-human crutch strength and water just kept hemorrhaging from the faucet. I couldn’t get to the basement to shut off the water supply so I called my dad in a panic. Then it was Rick Mappin and his son Luke to the rescue.

Mealtime is also jolly and our first morning was the stuff of slapstick. I had asked Stephie to put a can of Coke in the fridge the night before, but she has chronic fridge/freezer confusion. When I opened the former and discovered a Cokefree zone, I knew immediately what I would find in the latter.

I mopped up the cola explosion while delicately balancing on my crutches and was trying to point out to Stephie the margarine container that was hiding in plain sight when I lost my balance and fell sideways. Fortunately a sharp corner

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TRACEY COVEART The Standard and the flesh of my thigh broke my fall. A few minutes later, Stephie dumped her breakfast leftovers in the cupboard instead of the garbage can, then stepped in cat vomit, which she tracked all over the house before peeling off her socks. I cleaned the floor by stuffing a wet paper towel under my good foot and dragging it behind me. Then I got down on all fours to clean up the barf. I asked Stephie to grab me a paper towel, but I had used the last one for the floor. “There’s another roll on the bottom shelf of the pantry,” I hollered. After about five minutes, I got up and went into the kitchen. There I found my daughter staring at the pantry ceiling. I patiently indicated the bottom shelf and the paper towel roll and headed back to the bedroom, but Stephie didn’t follow. I had made the mistake of asking her to take the garbage to the laundry room and she was still wandering the house searching for that mysterious continent.

That was pretty much all the fun either one of us could handle. We climbed into my bed and have stayed there ever since, relying on the indulgence of family and friends to sustain us while we watch chick flicks and crime dramas and get crumbs all over the sheets. Under any other circumstances, we might consider it a holiday.

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Thursday, February 24, 2011 • 7

LETTERS

A Thousand Monkeys

Remembering rower Rob

BLAKE WOLFE The Scugog Standard

Wii, Wii, Wii all the way home Now that we’ve got the parent thing down, the other week we resumed our quest to free the land of evil. A bit of background first.

Tara and I started playing the latest game in the Legend of Zelda series almost two years ago when we were expecting our little girl, on a Wii console we bought as a wedding gift to ourselves (we’re clearly made for each other). So really, we’ve been playing as a family from the get-go.

I recall being informed by my wife in the mornings that, although she shouldn’t have because we agreed to play through as a team - she the puzzle-solver, I the slayer of beasts - she just couldn’t sleep with the little gymnast kicking around inside, so she played a bit more of the game with the TV turned down.

Just one of the myriad aspects of life that was irreversibly changed on Sept. 4, 2009, with the arrival of Norah.

We actually attempted returning to our game that November, with a two-monthold baby who got quite excited at all the colours and bright flashes of light. The revival lasted only a few hours as newfound parental duties took precedence. Needless to say, a copy of Resident Evil that I purchased around the same time has seen little game-time. Feeding a newborn while evading zombies is neither possible nor recommended.

But we’re having another go at Zelda.

And playing through such a game is much different now, especially with a toddler running around.

Dad’s been away from the game - and gaming in general - long enough that he’s no longer used to rapidly changing camera angles and bright lights, to the point of excitability and delayed sleep.

Part of the game involves transforming into a wolf. A computer-generated wolf, but a wolf nonetheless. To Norah, a wolf,

computer-generated or otherwise, is a dog. Dogs are funny, dogs need to be pointed at and made the object of much giggling. Dogs - even if they are in fact a computer-generated wolf guided by mom or dad in a game-world on the TV - need most of all to be pet. She has been thus far unsuccessful. For the record, she is not allowed to pet dogs/computer-generated wolves without mom or dad present.

Will she be allowed to play video games when she’s older? Yes. Will she be allowed to play them to the extent that I did growing up? Hell no.

To give you an idea of that extent, I’m combing my memory for useless gamer trivia and in-jokes, fighting the urge to sneak one in. It’s a secret to everybody why I would want to do that, but head north, west, south and west again for the answer.

Video games are fine for crummy weather or for a few hours at night in lieu of TV. Considering we only get nine channels via antenna and about the only thing I watch with any attention these days (DVDs of the current season of Dexter notwithstanding - thank you, Paul Coveart) are re-runs of Law and Order, there’s not much on.

And Norah won’t enjoy a summer(s) locked away in front of a TV, game console blazing for hours on end and threatening to melt its way through the carpet if it weren’t for the air conditioner blasting an arctic draft at questionable levels. Not that I know about that type of thing.

More than year later, we finally finished the game. The land of Hyrule is saved and my sword, I mean Wii controller, has been re-sheathed, or at least placed back on the shelf.

Until the sequel is released later this year.

A real wipeout!

You’ve been there. You head to the bathroom and are horrified to find there are just a few sheets left on the last roll of toilet paper. Defying nature’s call, you make an emergency trip to the grocery store to replenish your vanity cupboard and are confronted with an entire aisle of TP choices.

Before the Chinese invented toilet paper in the 14th century, things were a lot simpler in the personal hygiene area.

People used whatever was at hand. Literally. In the Middle East - presumably because one eats with the right - it was customary to wipe with one’s dampened left hand, which is why folks in these parts still find it offensive for someone to proffer a left-handed greeting. (Not sure what lefties were supposed to do.... Never eat? Never greet?)

The Greeks apparently used clay (which baffles me) and Europeans made use of anything they could lay their hands on - leaves, grass, moss ... the cat. (I’m not sure about the cat.)

The Romans were a little more civilized. They used a sponge on a stick, which sat in a bowl of salt water and was replaced as necessary. As necessary? Wouldn’t that be AFTER EACH USE?! It begs the question, did everyone in the family use the same sponge or did they each have their own, clearly labelled or colour coded?

Because sheep were plentiful, the Vikings used wool - hopefully after it was sheered and not still attached to the animal.

But it was the Americans who took the cake. In the rural United States, they used corncobs. Clearly comfort wasn’t a big consideration. Neither was hygiene. The corncob hung

To the Editor: I turned to page 19 of last week’s Standard (Feb. 17) and saw the picture of Rob Millikin holding his framed picture at the time of his retirement. And then I read the headline ... ‘Renowned rowing coach remembered by community.’ My heart sank. And, although I am not a rower, I have some ‘Rob stories,’ too.

I was a rower’s mom. Actually, I was a ‘cox’s’ mom - with a van that could hold six plus myself. I will never forget Amanda’s first race. It was one snowy May day in Brockville and when Rob turned to see what I was driving, his eyes lit up and the wheels started to turn ... then the adventure began! Because Amanda could cox for both the men and the ladies, she would compete in several races all day long. I could bring anybody and everybody and that van wouldn’t head for home until the last boat crossed the finish line in the last race.

At that time, both Port Perry High School and Monsignor Paul Dwyer Catholic High School raced for the Durham Rowing Club. Rivals until the end of the school season, the teams would

blend and we would head to regattas all over Southern Ontario all summer long. We would regularly go to faraway places like London, Welland, St. Catherines, etc. No overnighters! It was every weekend, so we (I) drove up and back with a van full of teenagers! Other than the goose poop, it was a lot of fun. We were in St. Catherines at a regatta when Canada won a bunch of rowing medals.

Yay, Silken Laumann! Yay, Marnie McBean!

Rob was always pitching ‘commercials’ to me to try to get the school board to purchase a new boat. We’d laugh ... but he was serious! This was around the time that the boathouse was built. He was thrilled.

I started to run into Rob again a few years ago when he began to stop in to my (other) daughter’s Queen St. eatery.

He would reminisce and we’d chat. He missed his wife.

These are some of my memories, but the reason for this letter is to publicly acknowledge the great work that Rob did for our kids in Scugog. I did thank him personally, but I now do so publicly.

Kathy LeFort, Chair Durham Catholic District School Board

Solving the white-out danger To the Editor: The blinding whiteouts that blasted across a section of the west causeway off Hwy. 7A occur on a regular basis - and nothing is attempted to alter or modify their impact.

The worst occurs on a section stretching both ways from the culvert, where there are no reeds or shoreline obstacles to trap the snow.

from a piece of twine in the outhouse, so everyone could take a swipe. In coastal regions, where corn was scarce and abrasions plentiful, a mussel shell was used in place of a cob.

In more populated areas, people used the pages of the Sears Roebuck catalogue (which could last one resourcesconscious family an entire year), old newspapers (don’t throw away this edition of The Standard just in case you ever find yourself in dire straights and without a corncob handy) and, in wealthy households, pages from poetry books, which presumably could be recited fondly one last time before meeting their Waterloo.’

Today, there is no need to be so resourceful. There are, however, decisions to be made. Single or two ply? Quilted? Kittens or bears? And most importantly, new material or recycled?

I’m all for reducing my carbon footprint, but let’s get serious. Would you sooner attend to your bottom with a cotton ball or a slice of tree bark?

My friend Deb, a flag-carrying greeny, once convinced me to buy a hotel-sized pack of 100 per cent reconstituted toilet paper from Costco. I think I would have preferred the mussel shell. At least I wouldn’t have paid a premium to debride my nether regions.

Testing out the new product, my children howled from the bathroom, wondering if it was advisable - or even possible - to apply a BandAid ‘down there.’

Deb swears she doesn’t notice the difference between new and ‘used,’ but I am reminded of that old fairytale about the Princess and the Pea. Deb clearly wouldn’t have felt a little bump in the mattress. Of course, this is more akin to sleeping on a small village reduced to rubble.

Three to four years ago, I made the following suggestion to the foreman of road maintenance for Hwy. 7A: When the ice is established and safe, drill some holes through the ice and erect some cedar posts, roll out some snow fencing (with wooden slats) and attach it to the posts.

This snow fence has a good chance of being

beneficial - just as the reedy shoreline is!

When the ice melts, the wood will float. It can be loaded into a boat or towed to the dock, then stored for the next winter. The cost is negligible.

To attempt nothing only assures the same risk, which could be costly and deadly.

Jerry Blackburn Port Perry

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TRACEY COVEART The Standard Still, it’s hard to ignore the facts according to www.treehugger.com (sent to me by Deb just the other day in an effort to get me to repent my sinful ways): -In the US, more than 98 per cent of the toilet paper sold is harvested from virgin forests and this number is increasing.

-Americans go through three times as much toilet paper as the average European and more than 100 times more than the average bathroom visitor in China.

-The softer the toilet paper, the more likely it is made from old growth and virgin trees. (The wood fibers are longer, which creates a smoother surface.)

-Each year, one million miles worth of cardboard tubing the ‘donut hole’ in the middle of the roll - is tossed out (hopefully in your paper recycling bin). That’s enough to circle the globe more than 40 times.

We’ve come a long way from our sustainable corncob days.

We are a shamefully, shortsightedly wasteful, pampered society. And at some point - to save ourselves, not to mention our children and our planet - we are going to have to sacrifice comfort and convenience for conservation.

Bring on the recycled toilet paper ... and the callouses.