Are government decision makers on holiday?

My solution for speeding up Perth-Andover flood ‘mitigation’         

                                                            by Robert LaFrance

            As one who was in the area and writing for newspapers and radio newscasts when the floods of 1987 and 1993 arrived in Perth-Andover, I can recall them clearly – far too clearly. In both cases we had to evacuate my Aunt Ella from Perth so she could come down here to Kincardine and spoil my kids and my dog. Also, she didn’t like fried trout, meaning she must have been either a Communist or one a them vee-ganz (vegans). Or both.

            What seemed to be different in 1993 was that the two top levels of government seemed eager to get things resolved – to tell people what was going on. Someone can correct me if I’m wrong – too bizarre a thought to entertain – but if I remember right, those whose houses were to be moved in the fall knew by the end of July, and that took a load of their minds.

            It’s hard for me, living on a mountain in the Scotch Colony, to appreciate what it is like for a family to be forced out of their home by floodwater, and still not know by late July whether they will be moving back in, building a new house, moving into an apartment (if they can find one), buying a house, or having their house moved. Of course there is always the option of taking the government’s cheque for the estimated value of their flooded home, seeing it demolished, and moving to Whitecourt, Alberta.

            It’s the uncertainty that is the worst, according to many of those I talked to. Most places saw everything in their basements ruined by floodwater, often mixed with sewerage and/or oil, so should they replace all that and hope it won’t flood again? I can see where there’s not a lot of incentive to do that, because if the government gets its finger out and decides to move that house, what of the new furnace, water pump, etc.? I was there in 1993 when the movers took houses to higher ground, and in no case did I see any furnace dangling from the bottom of a house being moved. It would have been like taking a flatbed truck-trailer (or trailer-truck if you prefer) and moving a whale with its guts hanging out.

            It was reported for a month or more that the FM committee would be producing ‘an interim report’ by June 30, and most people, including the Perth-Andover Village Council and Mayor Terry Ritchie, hoped that it would identify the houses to be moved so displaced families would finally KNOW, but it turned out that this interim report was one of those little fish called ‘an internal government document’.

CSIS, MI6, or the CIA might be justified in keeping documents like that secret, but not when it involves the well-being of Perth-Andover families. Call it ‘an internal document’ all they like, the fact is that it’s a secret document, and there’s no good reason for the secrecy. And by the way, in the weeks leading up to June 30, no one in government ever mentioned it would be a secret document.

There are quite a few Perth-Andover residents on the Mitigation Study committee, so one would hope they will make sure the government won’t do a SJAM or a WLMK. Know what those are? Delays, and I just coined the acronyms myself. The first refers to Sir John A. Macdonald, who was known as ‘Old Tomorrow’ meaning he was a world-class procrastinator, and the second acronym refers to William Lyin’ Mackenzie King, whose motto was “We will think about doing that – in a month or two and then put it off until the wheat crop comes in”.

Greg Inman and Jim Pickett are, I think, members of the committee, as are several other local residents. It would be hard to imagine Greg and Jim, whose houses were among those moved out of the flood zone in 1993, urging government not to move houses, and I’m sure Allison McPhail and Rick Beaulieu, who saw their businesses drowned in this year’s flood, aren’t about to say don’t move any buildings to higher ground.

Although I am sure we can count on government to do the right things and not let politics, finances, or the phases of the moon affect their decisions, it could be they need a bit of ‘encouragement’. Although sometimes even when a government decision is shown clearly to be wrong (Waterville hospital) they sometimes stick right to their pigheaded guns, I am sure Perth-Andover flooding will be dealt with sensibly.

Never one to complain without offering a solution, here’s mine: How about if all those members of the provincially organized ‘Flood Mitigation Study’ and its committee – the ones who don’t already live here - move into apartments – or tents, or cabins - around Perth-Andover until all the final (correct) decisions are made? If they say a certain house is liveable, let THEM live in it for a while. To paraphrase Mark Twain, that should concentrate their thoughts nicely and speed things up.
                                                    -END-

Somebody forgot to tell the trout!

Brook fishing is not for wimps           

                                                            by Robert LaFrance

            A few days ago my son Kinley and I went fishing in a little stream near here, and I was reminded once again that brook fishing is not for the faint of heart and definitely not for those who tend to fall down easily.

The Flying Wallendas were clumsy oafs compared to the average brook fisherman who will be balancing on a blowdown one minute, climbing across a thicket (note the first syllable of that word) the next, and a few minutes later squeezing between a butternut tree and a lodged poplar.

Why are people so crazy anyway? I can go to the grocery store and buy a can of salmon for a couple of dollars and avoid getting whacked in the face by a fir branch that had every intention of ripping off the top of my head. And don’t forget, the top of my head is the place this column comes from. Or could that fir be making a comment? Everybody’s a critic these days.

We finally made it to the brook, where delicious trout waited for us to catch them, clean them, and put them in a frying pan. The only trouble was, somebody – and I’m not mentioning names – forgot to explain to the trout that their entire function in life was to feed me and mine.

Segueing to the subject of lotteries, we in this hamlet, sub-village, Local Service District (LSD, man) or community had a lottery winner last week. My friend Flug’s ex-wife #7, Brunhilde, drove to Moncton on Monday afternoon and came home with a cheque for $90,000 from the Atlantic Lottery Corporation. Apparently it started out to be $100,000 but there were carrying charges, shipping and handling, and things like that.

            As a student of social psychology, I’ve been quite amazed at some of the results of Brunhilde’s winning that hundred grand. As I mentioned, she used to be Flug’s wife (I’m fairly certain it was number seven) and the reason she and Flug parted company was that she was so hard to get along with. Flug is, of course, a perfect human being. A Komodo Dragon would be charmed by Flug.

            Nobody likes Brunhilde though, or should I say nobody LIKED Brunhilde before she won that money. The funny thing is, it’s not because people think she’s going to give them some; it’s just that now she’s right on the edge of being respected, and even liked. After all, to win a lottery you must be a special human being, right? Last Saturday afternoon Ed Malrony tipped his baseball cap to her and that is about as unlikely as the Hatfields and McCoys having a pot luck supper together at Burns Hall and inviting a cobra to share the head table.

            I guess it just goes to show there just ain’t anyone as confusing as people.

            That same afternoon that Ed tipped his baseball cap, I was walking down toward Muniac Stream for a little fishing when I passed the Liars’ Bench at the store. On that bench were sitting the three Pellrick twins. They were staring at an odd-coloured rock that Leroy Pellrick was holding. Pay attention now; this gets complicated.

            Leroy had found that rock the day before up near Bon Accord Seed Farm and he immediately sprang into action, which is quite something for Leroy, who is roughly 187 years old as are the other two Pellrick twins, of course. Did I need to mention that?

            After he got home to the Pellrick estate (a cottage left to them by the fourth twin, Elroy, who took a job in Qatar) Leroy phoned a geologist he knew and described the rock. His geologist friend said it was probably Fool’s Gold since Leroy was holding it, ha-ha-ha-ha, but seriously it sounded like a mineral called painite, which is worth like $60,000 a carat. Previously it has only been found in Burma.

            Apparently Leroy was holding in his hand a piece of rock worth in the vicinity of $983 billion. So Leroy had to find out about sub-surface rights, had to lay a claim on that sub-surface lot, and had to show the rock to a real geologist, face to rock as it were. He did all that and sure enough, it was painite.

It kind of brings Brunhilde’s lottery win into perspective, doesn’t it?           

                                      -end-

How Bob tends to kid himself

I might win $121 million in a yard sale lottery...or not         

                                                            by Robert LaFrance

            On Saturday morning I gathered up whatever coins I could find and whatever little paper money my wife missed in the laundry and headed for yard sales in Perth-Andover, Plaster Rock, Grand Falls and points in between. It was my annual Search For A Picasso or Van Gogh.

            We’ve heard about people who found an Emily Carr painting in a yard sale in Flin Flon, Manitoba (haven’t we?) and things like that, so I had been asking myself: why not me? A Van Gogh painting sold in 2007 for the sum of $121 million, and would that be a lottery win or what?

            So I packed a nice lunch, for what would be the point in packing a lunch that wasn’t nice, and I headed out on my yard sale odyssey. The first place I stopped was a little place in Upper Kintore, and then I noticed it wasn’t a yard sale at all, but a garage sale. Although we already have a garage,  I rewrote my itinerary to include garage sales, lawn sales, porch sales, barn and driveway sales.

            At the Lower Kintore sale they weren’t really selling their garage (how was I to know?) but I did pick up a dandy set of swag lamps for a mere $5 each. They would go nicely in our living room; at least that was my idea at the time, but evidently I have since changed my mind. At the same sale I found a table made by a famous furniture maker. Scratched on the underside was ‘Duncan Fife’ so it was worth thousands. When I got home Flug pointed out that the real guy’s name was spelled ‘Phyffe’.

            On to Upper Kintore, where I found a barbecue at a porch sale. “It was used only six times by an elderly schoolteacher,” the homeowner (and I assume porch owner) told me in confidence. He was asking fifty dollars, but I wasn’t born yesterday. It wasn’t long before I had him happy to accept $45. Once I had removed the charcoal briquettes, it was much lighter. I also purchased what he said was an antique VHS tape containing the movie “Roy Rogers and the Line Shack Gang”. Only nine  dollars for that.

            Back to Perth-Andover, I was amazed at the number of yard sales, until I remembered that after the flood many people saw everything but their yards ruined by the St. John River. One item I bought was a dartboard with a picture on it of Beechwood Dam and the caption: “I had nothing to do with it!” Underneath the dartboard was the sentence, added later: “Now tell me the one about Goldilocks and the Three Bears!”

            Perth-Andover proved to be a gold mine, because it was the day of the Village Market. There was a great selection and a lot of food. This included Kathleen Farquhar’s table where she was selling pies, muffins, cookies, and all sorts of other stuff that keeps us all happy and heart surgeons in business. I bought a ‘raison’ pie and teased Kathleen about her spelling ability. It was an absolutely delicious pie, no matter how it was spelled. I was especially impressed by the label, which contained "π", the mathematical symbol for ‘pi’ or 3.1416. I find that cooks think a lot.

            In a Perth-Andover yard sale I found a painting that I was sure was one done by the famous ‘Saturday Evening Post’  illustrator Norman Rockwell. It turned out to be the work of house painter Norman Roswell of River de Chute. I should have known that Norman Rockwell wouldn’t have painted two Goths skating in front of the Perth Elks Club. Also, the velvet was a giveaway.

            (I should mention that my 2012 odyssey should in no way be compared to the Odyssey written by Homer, the Greek  8^th century BC poet. I don’t even know what part of BC he lived in. His hero was Odysseus, but later the Romans wrote the same stuff and called their guy Ulysses.)

            On to Plaster Rock, Bluebell, Drummond, Grand Falls, Portage, and Aroostook. In each of those places I found more treasure and I refuse to tell you where, because you’ll be there next week at Jensens’ yard sale or LaForests’ lawn sale and find just the sort of thing I did – two paintings that have to worth upwards of $75,000 each. True, that’s not $121 million, but it will keep the wolf from the door.

            NOTE: Pay no attention to my wife, who voiced the opinion that they didn’t have Paint-By-Numbers in the time of Manet, or even Monet. She’s the same person who, back in 1985, paid $300 for a rocking chair that I had seen the day before in Bon Accord  dump – excuse me, landfill.  

                                         -end-

Summer is way too busy for old people like me

Summer notes for the very un-busy       

                                                            by Robert LaFrance

            I know that everyone is totally bored, nothing to do, just sitting around, so this column will just be some short blurbs designed to relax you even more and let you doze off in your easy chair.

            Wrong. Even as I wrote those words, I got email letters from 47 people who all said pretty much the same thing: “You’re an idiot, Bob! Why did you write that?” I had just finished typing the previous paragraph and hadn’t even sent it to the paper, so that’s weird. Can someone be watching me? It’s not that I’m paranoid, it’s just that everyone thinks I am. They’re out to get me if I even relax for a second.

            Indeed, summer is a busy time. The front and back lawns are growing much more quickly than they do in January. It seems as if the minute I get up, there’s a list of things to do, usually duct-taped to the kitchen cupboard near the fridge. “Pile that millwood you just got…put the other wood in the shed and pile it…the red mower’s not working, fix it or pack a suitcase (it’s nice in Flin Flon in July)…paint the porch floor…take the dog for a LONG walk, like to Minto…finish your 12 newspaper stories and then wash the dishes…” and like that.

            Here are some summer notes anyway, and then I’m off to Minto:

            It is the source of some consternation that for many years (not quite so bad now) the word ‘impact’ has been used as a general verb. I realize that it can be used thusly, as in ‘an impacted wisdom tooth’, but that’s really about the extent of it. On the other hand, I have often used the word ‘stomach’ as a verb and didn’t get sent to grammar prison. I can’t stomach people who are intolerant about others’ use of words. It impacts my annoyance threshold.

            Someone said a few years ago that the CD or DvD tray in his computer made a great place to set his coffee while he checked his emails in the mornings. The way my computer has been acting, I can think of many other uses for it. How about as filler in a compost pile? In an experiment to see how many elephants can balance on one hard drive? The 21” monitor in a horizontal position would work nicely as a food tray. The speakers could be used to throw at stray cats. Tear out the insides of a CPU (we nerds know that’s really a computer) and you have a nice cupboard for holding short bottles of lemonade.

            Speaking of computers, I, and a certain Gleaner editor who used to be the Star editor but I’m not naming names, are still of the opinion that those who own computers and use them, but don’t understand a thing about them should be sent to computer prison. Their sentence should continue until they understand the computer’s filing system, how to attach a file to an email, etc. There are names that some computer repair persons have for the difficulties caused by such people. One is PEBCAK and it means “Problem exists between chair and keyboard.” Or ‘HKI’: “Human-keyboard interface.”

            I didn’t mean what I said a few paragraphs back about cats. There are cat lovers all around who would rip my face right off if they read that. I remember the time that I said a mean word or two about cats (nasty creatures that they are) and the late Myrna Tomlinson gave me 24 hours to get out of town. I apologized and mowed her lawn for a month. Her car’s licence plate number was CATSRGRT; that will give you a clue.

            Like malfunctioning computers (a pox on Windows Vista), the use of redundant speech continues to annoy. Why can’t people talk rite? I ain’t in favour of being redundant. Probably the most common one is the use of the phrase ‘first started’. “Yeah, I first started reading Ayn Rand books back about 1990.” I am always tempted to ask, in a case like that: “So how many times did you start?” And then I remind myself that I started ‘War and Peace’ about 12 times and still never finished it. I believe it involves Russia.

After all that, I have recently come across a usage of ‘first started’ that is correct. A soccer announcer was saying that a certain player ‘first started’ for England in 2011. That refers to the first game in which he was in the starting lineup. Exciting, huh?

            I don’t know how a door can be a jar, but if a Cat can be a bulldozer why not? 

                                                    -end-