Happy to be stuck at a traffic light

The other day I found myself caught in traffic in a shopping mall. Hard to believe, I know. It was Boxing Week so I expected the chaos but judging by the looks of the drivers around me they didn't.

So I'm sitting there waiting to escape out of the mall parking lot and while I sat there at the red light a young woman was attempting to turn left into the mall. But unlike most of the drivers surrounding me this young driver was different. I couldn't hear the music in her car but this woman was grooving to whatever beat was coming out of her radio. Her arms were up and she was literally dancing inside her car and singing at the top of her lungs. It brought an immediate smile to my face and I was happy she was stuck at the light because it gave me a few extra moments to marvel in this woman's happiness. Talk about refreshing.

Remember the days when singing and dancing came naturally to most of us? Young people hit the clubs every weekend and go crazy on the dance floor because they're happy. Singing + dancing = happiness. Some time after 30 most of us forget to sing and dance. We ignore the primal urge to be happy and that's too bad.

I try to be happy most days but singing at my office is outlawed (right Christy?!) and dancing, well without music you just look silly bopping around the newsroom. At home my kids tell me to shut up when I break out into song and Rebekah rolls her eyes every time I strut my stuff on the kitchen floor.

But think about it for a moment, some of the most popular shows on television revolve around singing and dancing. Dancing with the Stars, Glee, American Idol are all top rated shows. Remember that dancing baby on Ally McBeal? Everybody smiled when he appeared.

I think we should all sing and dance a little more even if we aren't the most talented at it. I couldn't hear that young woman singing but it didn't matter. She was happy and for a few moments in time she made me happy.

Beware the Party of ME

I am Ian McMillan and the  leader of the Party of ME.

I have been living and reading about the concerns of Canadians and they all point in the same direction -- our financial well being.

Why? It's simple. Every day we as Canadians are being inundated with bills. Thanks to Dalton M Guinty's HST those bills are higher today in Ontario than they were one year ago. Chances are they'll be higher next year. Bottom line, nobody's looking after our best interests.

How does it feel to be out there alone, having NOBODY look after your self interests. Not good, I know because I am you.

I am not a Baby Boomer because I missed that generation by 3 years. I'm a Generation Xer but really, anyone who was born after 1960 is in the same predicament that I am. What does that mean for us? Well there's a lot of us and not a lot of people younger than us who can sustain two things -- our Canada Pension Plan and, if you've got it, a pension plan.

There's also something that's even more important than those two things -- our health care system. Judging by the number of OLDER people, ie, you and me in the next few years there will be an incredible strain on our health care system. Will it survive? Who knows.

What we have to do is simple. Governments of the day, both provincial and federal, have to prepare for tomorrow. That doesn't mean the next election. We all know some party will form the next governments. What the brain thrust of our political system has to come to grips with is the future. It doesn't matter what name of the party is that forms the next governments of the day, it's what their priorities are when they take office. Boom, Bust and Echo by David Foote should be required reading for everyone seeking office whether it's at the municipal, provincial or federal levels.

We as a Canadian society, have gotten older. We need to be taken care of and that doesn't mean voting for the party that promises the biggest tax cuts. The next few years will be tough for everyone and the party that takes power has to focus on taking care of the Boomers while also giving the upcoming generations some hope, some jobs, some money.

Will (in Canada) the Conservatives, Liberals, NDPers, Greens et al. be able to step up to the plate and save the day? It's yet to be seen. But if they fail to step up to the plate and save the day there's only one hope -- the Party of ME.

Giggle if you want but I shit you not, in  the next few years, if the traditional parties fail to step up to the plate, the Party of ME will become very real.

These days people are looking for a party that will offer them hope. The traditional parties are not offering them much of that but the Party of ME will. How do I know this? Because I am the leader of this party and if Canadians get fed up they'll be looking for a Party of  Me. What needs to be done is simple.

Keep it simple stupid.

Easy.

I don't need my own Christmas lights to enjoy the season

I enjoy the Christmas lights around my neighbourhood. While walking the dog I love to stop in front of some of the houses and marvel at the EFFORT some homeowners put into their displays.

Don't expect to see any of those spectacular displays at my house though. It's not that I'm anti-Christmas because I do love the holiday season. I just don't have the time or the enthusiasm to put such elaborate displays of colour all over my house.

My neighbour though, who commutes to and from Toronto each and every work day, has very beautiful white lights up so what's my excuse? I really don't have one. I'm just a fair weather holiday-goer. Guilty as charged.

Every neighbourhood needs somebody like me. Could you imagine all the homes in your neigbbourhood looking like the Griswold family homestead? That just wouldn't be cool. It would also give our Premier Dalton McGuinty a mild stroke as energy usage would spike like nobody's business and he would regret taking his coal fired plants off-line before getting anything else in place to fill our energy needs. Not a very bright idea, I know!

That's not to say there isn't some hope one day I won't be a regular Clark Griswald. My father, who's been retired for a few years now, puts up a beautiful display of lights. They far outshine the lights he used to display when I was 12. What's my 12-year-old daughter supposed to think though at her father's completely dark house? I'm hoping she'll be pre-disposed to grandpa's lights and won't remember my dark display of the holiday spirit.

Inside our house we do not lack for light. Two Christmas trees are alight in colour. I've also got some reindeer display near the front entrance that's all a glitter with twinkle lights. From the outside it may seem like a dark Christmas but inside we're just like most families.

That said, I do like a good light display. Can't wait to walk the dog around the neighbourhood tonight.

Keeping Christmas secrets not easy

I know Santa Claus isn't real. That became abundantly clear when I was 12 and my mother turned to me while we were driving in the car and said as much. I remember suspecting he wasn't the real deal but I needed somebody I trusted to confirm it.

My oldest daughter Rebekah is now 12 and my wife Heather broke the news to her last year. I suspect Rebekah didn't need Heather to confirm Santa Claus' existence for her because if you've ever met my daughter then you'll realize that she knows everything!





So one daughter knows the truth while her younger brother and sister do not. Considering they are eight and four years old that's the way I would prefer to keep it right now. But it's difficult to maintain this Christmas secret when television shows aired in prime time keep letting the truth slip out. Tonight for example, Glee, a popular television show all my children watch, all but screamed "Santa Claus is a hoax, your parents have been lying to you your whole lives!" One character in the show still believed in the big guy and her Glee friends did everything they could to make sure she continued to think Santa was real.

I would have no problem with this show if it aired at 9:30 or 10 p.m. but it started at 8 p.m. and all my kids enjoy watching it on a weekly basis. Why then would the television networks air this content at such an early hour? Give me a break.

Believing in Santa Claus adds an element of excitement and suspense to the Christmas season for children. They're careful to be good in anticipation of a big payoff on Dec. 25. And let's face facts, parents around the world take full advantage of the season getting their children to be good and behave "or Santa won't bring you anything for Christmas." 
I'm disappointed in Glee's Christmas episode. I wanted to keep at least two of my children young at heart for a little while longer. Lord knows they grow up quick enough as it is.

Dalton McGuinty's road to another broken promise

If you travel to Columbus you'll see many of these signs. If there was more room on the sign
it would have said, "Keep your promise Dalton and don't end Hwy. 407 at Simcoe Street"

I loathe Hwy. 407 but I have to admit I've driven on it many times.

The thought that my tax dollars paid for the highway and now I have to pay some Spanish-owned company highly inflated rates to drive on it is just wrong.

Fortunately the majority of my travels along Hwy. 407 were work related when I was employed in Toronto. Since 2005 I've been fortunate enough to work in the very city in which I live, Oshawa. The transponder has been returned and now I rarely think of the roadway.

While Hwy. 407 is not on the top of my mind these days the same cannot be said of the poor residents who live in Columbus, a tiny hamlet within the City of Oshawa situated in the city's north-west end. They've recently learned that Dalton McGuinty's Liberals will no longer be extending Hwy. 407 through to Hwy. 35/115 but rather stopping it at Simcoe Street. Translation, Columbus residents' quiet little piece of the globe will soon become a noisy, congested on/off ramp for the highway.

No warnings were ever issued by the government that this would happen, no public meetings were ever held beforehand, just an announcement a few weeks ago making it official. Sorry about your luck people but the government's broke, highway's going to end in your backyard.

This wasn't how it was supposed to turn out. A March 2007 agreement between the federal and provincial governments stated that Ontario agreed to complete the Hwy. 407 extension from Brock Road in Pickering to Hwy. 35/115 with construction slated to begin in 2009 and wrap up by 2013.

Yes, I realize it's completely out of character for the McGuinty government to renege on a promise. I was as stunned as everyone else when it happened. Not.

The fallout from this will not be good for the City of Oshawa. There will have to be some major upgrades to road infrastructure that were not forecast in the municipal budget. Given the new council's vow to spend our tax dollars more responsibly, tough decisions will have to be made. So Oshawa residents will have to do more with less thanks to a broken provincial promise.

The highway was promised to Durham Region because it's needed to ease congestion along Hwy. 401. Economically it just makes sense.

Would McGuinty have stopped the highway in Oshawa if we had a Liberal MPP here? Probably not. But we're Tory blue from Whitby through to Clarington so there's no worry of any incumbent MPPs getting turfed over the issue.  

It seems that every time we turn around the McGuinty government continues breaking promises under the guise of 'good government' (HST, Eco tax, Hwy. 407 etc.) and taxpayers keep getting inconvenienced.

For once it would be nice to see a promise made and a promise kept. Is that too much to ask?

A tough job to win, a tougher job to hold on to

It's deja vu in the Oshawa political arena.

Back in 2006 Julia McCrea ran and won for school board trustee with the Durham District School Board. Her victory was short-lived however, when it was discovered that she was ineligible to hold office as a trustee while working in education. She worked as a teacher in York Region but lived in Oshawa.

One would think her background in education would have served Ms. McCrea well as a school board trustee in Durham Region. It was actually one of the reasons I voted for her. But rules are rules and Ms. McCrea was forced out of office before she could be sworn in. A by-election was held and Michael Barrett was re-elected to take her place.

Fast-forward to 2010 and Mike Nicholson finds himself in a similar situation. He won a seat on Oshawa council but today he got word from the Toronto Transit Commission, where he works as a bus driver, that if he was sworn in today with the rest of his council colleagues, he'd be terminated from the TTC. As a result, only Mayor John Henry was sworn in. (Visit http://durhamregion.com/news/article/167108)

City councillors work part-time and make about $30,000. TTC workers make considerably more than $30,000 so it's not a job Mr. Nicholson wants to lose.

Mr. Nicholson says he  checked with the TTC before he ran for city council and got approval. He was even congratulated by his supervisors and colleagues when he won the election in November. Now the story has changed and Mr. Nicholson has until Monday to get the situation figured out. If he can't hold office while employed at the TTC will the City of Oshawa hold a bye-election to replace him or award the job to the candidate who placed one behind Mr. Nicholson in the election? I for one hope we have a by-election. Otherwise Maryanne Sholdra will once again be on council. What a disaster that would be.

The City of Oshawa's slogan is 'Prepare to be Amazed'. Given the way this situation is playing out the slogan is proving true, but not in the way it was originally meant.