Signing off on signatures

Our paperboy Daniel delivered more than the newspaper the other week. He brought to our front door an opportunity for my 14-year-old son Tavish. It was an opportunity to earn some money by taking over Daniel's paper route.

Tav has asked me on more than one occasion about getting a paper route. He has a buddy who delivers the newspaper and it's a good way for a young kids to earn some cash. And if he's earning his own money then guess who Tav won't be coming to with his hand out? Me!

A few days later Tav was called into my office for training. I say, ‘my office’ because I work at the newspaper in the newsroom. Now two of us will be earning a living dealing in newsprint.

I accompanied Tav to the training session and at the end of it he had to sign a contract. He carefully printed his name where it asked for a signature.

I found it strange he couldn’t sign his name but then I thought about it and it made sense. Kids these days are not taught handwriting in school. They learn how to print but handwriting is something they are never required to use so they’re not taught it. Assignments are typed, emails are typed and text messages are … you guessed it … typed.

As a result, kids have also never had to sign their names. A signature is just you writing your name. If you have never learned handwriting how could you have ever learned to sign your own name?

The other night Tav saw me writing in my journal. I’ve been doing this since I was his age and when I started journaling a computer was something few of us knew about and even fewer used.

I asked him if he could read anything I had on the page. He looked at the writing and asked what a few of the words were. Then he asked me why it looked that way.

“How do you read that stuff?” he said.

“This is handwriting,” I said.

Tav just looked at me with a “so what” expression on his face.

I understand computers have taken over the world. There are three laptops in my house, I use a laptop at work and when anyone wants to kick back and relax we typically use one of our iPads. We use keyboards for all our writing so there’s really little, if any need for us to use handwriting these days.

It just struck me funny my son did not know how to write his name. It’s just a sign(nature) of the times I guess. Or maybe I’m just showing my age.

I may sound like an old man but back in my day someone who couldn't sign their name was considered illiterate. Now we all have digital signatures. Pen at hand has made way for keyboard at fingertips.

Lubrication works, just ask my locksmith

Lubrication can open many doors in life.

I am NOT a handyman. I cannot build or repair anything. When God was handing out talents I got in the wrong line. My talent was patience, something that would come into play when I discovered I had to pay people to fix things I couldn't.

When you're growing up it's not always apparent what your talents in life will be. For some people it's clear but for others, like me, it was muddy.

It was clear for my best friend. He could sell anything from a very young age. But I didn't think that was a talent when I was nine. Now he's living in a mansion, beautiful home, wife and family and I see what a God given talent he received. He was also gifted with a relentless work ethic and a desire to succeed and the results speak for themselves.

But when we were young 'talent' was just a word.

Which brings me to the other day when I discovered my house key would not fit in the front door lock. It would go three quarters of the way in and then jam. I tried the spare key. Same result. I tried my wife's key. Same result. Kids' keys. No go. I looked at the lock and thought, "Is this even my house?" The dog looking up at me with the sad hound eyes told me it was indeed my humble abode.

I have no experience fixing locks. I know how to open a lock and close a lock. Period. When one refuses to open I have no choice, I have to call a locksmith. And so I did.

The guy who showed up at my front door was personable and nice. I showed him the lock, he looked it over, poked at it with his lock picking device and then he reached into his bag of tricks and pulled out a small bottle of WD40.

Squirt, squirt. He put my house key into the lock and it went all the way in. He turned it to the right, then the left. Problem solved.

"I hope you're not too upset," he said. "Some people can't believe they have to pay for a house call for something so simple. It's just the tumblers. They needed lubrication."

I wasn't upset. As I said before my talent in life is patience because God knew I'd need it to live so long and be this stupid!

I paid the guy $90 for the life lesson. Lubricate your locks twice a year and they'll never give you a problem.

My wife came home a few hours later. She was very happy the lock worked. When I told her my WD40 story she shook her head in disbelief.

"I thought I'd asked you if you tried that?"

If she had asked me that question I may not have understood its purpose. But I admit, I don't recall such a conversation. Lubrication was never something I associated with locks!

Trust me though, lubrication works. Just ask my locksmith...

An indoor Christmas display

I have neighbours who live up my street, very nice people, but they do something every year that drives me nuts. They put up their Christmas tree and all their outdoor Christmas lights on Nov. 1. They still have their Halloween pumpkins sitting on their front step but it's Christmastime everywhere else.

I know I should live and let live, but seeing all that joyful cheeriness on Nov. 1 just makes me angry. For me, the spirit of the holidays should not start until after Remembrance Day. Wait until after American Thanksgiving and then go to town with the Christmas lights.

This year my house is dark. That's right, I'm pulling a Grinch and my youngest daughter is not happy about it. A couple of weeks ago I tested our outdoor lights and all but three of them were either broken or burned out.

"Screw it, I'm not buying any more," I said out loud to nobody but myself because I was inside the garage while my son hammered on his drum set in the house. Yes, we're that family, the Twisted Sister of our neighbourhood!

But what to do? You can't say no to an adorable 9-year-old with the biggest, bluest eyes you've ever seen.

Compromise, that's what I did. I told Bronwyn I would put up indoor lights this year. That way I didn't have to fall off the roof again trying to do my best Chevy Chase routine in Christmas Vacation. For a peak of that clip see the YouTube video above. You can also read about my experience falling off the roof at this link: Click here

So this weekend I'm going to buy some indoor Christmas lights and wrap them around our front windows. I'll be safe and warm putting them up, or at least that's the plan.

I even told Bronwyn I'd string some Christmas lights around her bedroom window. That sealed the deal!

For those of you who brave the cold and who are not afraid of heights, I salute you for putting up your outdoor Christmas lights. You brighten my evening walks.

But inside is where it's at for me this year. Merry Christmas!

With one pitch I got old

The Oshawa Legionaire Pee Wee Select team on the bench. No. 77 is my son, Tavish.

Most days you go through life living today just as you did yesterday and the day before. Some of them are good days, others are bad. You don’t often think that combing the number of days you’ve lived could only lead to one conclusion — you’re getting older.

But you’re not getting older, you’re getting better, right? 

Like most of you I rarely think about my age (except on birthdays) because inside I’m still young at heart. Then something happens that changes how you view yourself. For me that day came last week.

Major League pitchers report to camp in the next few weeks. That fact has not been lost on my son Tavish. He loves baseball, watching it and playing it. I’ve been told when the Detroit Tigers visit Toronto on the Aug. 28 weekend we’re going. I’d hate to disappoint him.

I took Tav to the Home Run Baseball Academy in Ajax. He got two baseball bats for Christmas and was anxious to try them out. I rented a lane at the indoor facility and off we went.

It felt good putting on the baseball glove once again and loosening up my throwing arm. Granted it took a bit longer getting used to pitching strikes but Tav was patient. It also helped we had access to a pitching machine to spell me off!

Tav hit pitches for about 40 minutes before he asked to take a break. He was making solid contact with most of my pitches but after swinging the bat for the better part of an hour it was time to put it down and play some catch.

That’s when it happened. With one throw I got OLD.

Last summer I was still a head taller than my son. Tav only came to my shoulder. Theoretically that made me bigger and stronger but even then I knew the day was coming when my son would surpass my staggering height of 5’7”! Today he looks me straight in the eye. He wears a larger shoe than I do. I carry more weight on my frame but other than that we’re the same size.

Another difference we share is our throwing speeds. Tav is officially . . . faster. In fact he throws faster than I think I even did when I was his age!

We were throwing the ball back and forth when I said to him, “Okay, throw me a good one.”

Tav let it fly and as I put my glove up to catch it the ball hit the screen behind me.

“What was that?” he asked sarcastically.

I would have loved to say “Lost it in the sun” but we were inside. Instead I just smiled and shrugged my shoulders. Inside I was thanking God Tav’s throw was to my left and not directly at me. Otherwise our game of catch would have ended horribly.

He threw a few more my way and they were coming in hard and straight. My hand was stinging from the impact. Tav threw hard last summer but these throws had even more velocity on them.

Or maybe they weren’t coming in as hard as I thought. Maybe, just maybe I missed that throw because my reaction time was S-L-O-W-I-N-G down. Maybe his throws were hurting my hand because I was getting soft? Maybe my glove needed replacing?

I’d like to think my boy is just getting bigger and stronger. I don’t want to think it has anything to do with my age.

You’re only as old as you feel, right? Right.

Tavish throws a pitch in a playoff game last summer against Prince Edward County.
Recorded the win!

What would your grandfather think?

If there is one thing I know about my wife it's that she adored her grandfather Howard Russell. He was someone who left an everlasting impression on his family. Almost every summer our immediate family travels to Port Elgin for vacation just so we can stop at the school house were Grandpa and Grandma Russell spent the early part of their retirement years. There hasn't been a single occasion when we've left the school house when Heather hasn't teared up. The times she spent there when her grandparents were alive were special, they were happy lifetime memories for her. I wasn't there but through Heather's stories about her grandparents I know they have helped shape the person she's become today. Howard and Hazel were much loved.

Howard worked for CCM for most of his working career. He was very much a man of the people and a proud union supporter. As such when the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) was organizing in the 1930s he put his energy behind the cause helping sign members. With Tommy Douglas as a leader it was a righteous cause, one that benefits Canadians from coast to coast to this day thanks to our universal health care system that was heavily influenced by the CCF and later the NDP.

When Heather became a woman's advocate and later the first person to set up a Workers in Motion Action Centre after Lear Seating eliminated the third shift at its Whitby manufacturing plant in 2006 family members often commented, "Your grandfather would be proud." His labour roots were branching out through the actions of his granddaughter.

Heather met Liberal leader Justin Trudeau
at a campaign stop in Whitby.

Today Heather is seeking the federal Liberal nomination in Oshawa riding. She commented to me the other day some people think her grandfather would roll over in his grave if he knew what she was doing. I disagreed. He may roll over but I think he'd also sit up and applaud.

Heather isn't seeking the nomination for personal gain. Like her grandfather before her Heather is standing up for people just like herself, people who want a better life, not only for themselves but for their children. The fact she believes this can be accomplished through the Liberal Party and not the NDP wouldn't disappoint her grandfather. If anything I believe he would be proud that his actions, his passion and his good example had a profound influence on his granddaughter. An influence that has inspired her to stand up for what she believes in and to help her community.

Heather's involvement in Oshawa spans years, many of which were spent with the Boys and Girls Club of Durham Region. She served on the board for six years and later as president of the foundation for three years. As part of the Whitby Chamber of Commerce she served on the Community Education Committee for three years and she also served on the Literacy Network of Durham Region's board of directors. And just last month she joined the Campaign Cabinet of Feed the Need Durham. This isn't something she does to pad her resume or for personal gain. She's just hard-wired to being active and she cares enough about her community to do it.

Her actions have not gone unnoticed. In 2011 she was given a Volunteer Service Award by the Province of Ontario, in 2013 she was given a business award from Business and Professional Women of Durham  and this year she was nominated to attend a Bold Vision at a national Woman's Leadership Convention.

What would her grandfather think? He'd be the proudest grandfather in the world and rightfully so.

There's no guarantee Heather will get the Liberal nomination but I can think of no better person for the job.

Contributing to your community is something to be proud of and something that won't change for Heather whether she gets the nomination or not. It's what she does, it's who she is.

Books are here to stay

I'm reading a really good book now by Joe Hill called NOS4A2. It's the first of his novels I've tried and it's been a real page turner.

I say 'page turner' in reference to the book because it's a real book, not one read off an e-reader. Books are dependable, you can count on them. E-readers, not so much as I've discovered.

I've tried using a Kobo before and must admit I found it easy enough to use. When the black line of death crept across the screen though it left me less than impressed. My wife Heather sent it back and it was replaced free of charge. But the other day when she picked it up to continue reading the latest Ken Follet novel she started a few weeks ago the black line of death appeared again. It was done.

There's not much you can do with an expired Kobo. It's been three years since it was replaced so the chances of the manufacturer replacing it again are slim. Heather downloaded the book to her laptop so she could finish it. A laptop is not as convenient as an e-reader but it will do in a pinch.

 I do a lot of reading online. Given the nature of the business I'm in (media) much of my days are spent in front of computer screens. The newspapers and magazines I help produce are all compiled using computers. At the end of the day the product is printed but to get to that point requires the use of a lot of online technology. Plus everything produced on paper goes online.

When I want to sit back and read for pleasure it's nice to open a book, you know those things we've been reading from for thousands of years?

Stephen King, who is Joe Hill's father, said in a recent interview with Huffington Post that books are not like compact discs or phonograph records that have now been almost completely replaced by music downloads.

"There's a deeply implanted desire and understanding and wanting of a book that isn't there with music. It's a deeper well of human experience. Here's another thing: if you drop a book into the toilet, you can fish it out, dry it off and read that book. But if you drop your Kindle in the toilet, you're pretty well done," he told interviewer Josh Zepps.

I couldn't have put it any better than King did right there. All I would add to his comment is that you don't have to drop a Kobo in a toilet to render it useless. It pretty much does that all by itself.

I look forward to finishing Mr. Hill's book NOS4A2. It's not hard to tell his father has had an influence in his writing. When I'm finished I'll put it on my book shelf alongside his father's many books. Then I'll go out and buy another and if I drop it in the toilet (I won't) so be it. Real books don't short out or need upgrades. They're perfect just the way they are.

No place to play ball in Oshawa

A few weeks ago I dropped off my son Tavish at Baker Park where he was meeting friends for a game of pickup baseball. They’d met there a number of times throughout the summer but at this last meeting  they didn’t get a chance to play ball.

It wasn’t because somebody else was using the diamond. Rather it was because the ball diamond wasn’t there. The City of Oshawa had torn out the fencing, removed the benches and cleared out the bleachers. The only thing remaining was a vague outline of the former infield.

“Why would the City do that?” Tavish asked me.

I didn’t have an answer for him. My hope was that because this summer was the 50th anniversary of Baker Park the City was in the process of improving the ball diamond. What better way to celebrate a milestone anniversary than to replace an aging diamond with a brand new one? The diamond had seen better days. It was the same one I played on as a teenager and it was obvious the City was doing NOTHING to maintain it. Weeds grew all through the infield.

I contacted Mayor John Henry and asked him what was going on. He told me the diamond didn’t meet City standards anymore and a community meeting with the park association had taken place and it was agreed the diamond would be removed.

I wasn’t pleased with this decision for two reasons. One, Baker Park was my park growing up. My parents still live in the same house I grew up in. So I’m a little nostalgic when it comes to ball diamonds. To see Baker Park without a diamond upset me. Second, I am now in the coaching stage of my life. I coached many years in softball and I now coach for Baseball Oshawa’s house league system. Last summer I struggled to get a diamond to practice on with my team because there weren’t enough diamonds to meet the demands of the various softball and baseball organizations across the city.

How then would reducing the City’s ‘fields of dreams’ by one help kids play ball?

I vented my frustration on a Facebook group I belong to, NASC Softball. Olga Field, who administers the page, replied to my post indicating Baker Park wasn’t the only park to lose its ball diamond this summer. So too did Nipigon Park. Eastview Park was also on the City’s list to have its three diamonds removed as was MacKenzie Park. The City held off removing those diamonds only after the NASC convinced them otherwise. How councillors could ever consider removing the three diamonds at Eastview is a head scratcher. Drive by Eastview Park on any night of the week during the summer months and you'll see teams playing, parents cheering. The NASC uses the park extensively and hosts its tournaments on the three fields. Remove the diamonds? Give me a break!

What should be done at Eastview Park and others across the city is proper maintenance of the fields. The City grooms fields such as the one at Connaught Park and the beautiful diamonds at Alexandra Park but visit Eastview Park or MacKenzie Park and you'll see the neglect. Yet our kids are expected to play on these fields just as often as they are at other parks. It makes me wonder if the City only wants to remove diamonds to save a buck. It's easier to rip diamonds out than it is to maintain them.

I sent a letter to every councillor a few weeks ago asking them to reconsider this foolhardy approach to running the City. Ron Diskey, Director of Culture & Recreation got back to me to let me know there is an upcoming needs assessment study taking place on parks and recreation to determine future needs and locations of diamonds, soccer fields, etc. It takes place Oct. 8 at the Civic Auditorium Complex at 6:30 p.m. You can be I'll be in attendance.

Our city needs to maintain and improve it's baseball and softball diamonds, not remove them. Like I said before my team was shut out of practices during weeknights this summer because there weren't any diamonds available. Removal of the diamonds at Baker Park and Nipigon Park will only make matters worse next summer.

I found it funny as I scrolled through the NASC Softball Facebook page to see photos of this summer's championship teams. There were a lot of kids who played for Baker Park in those photos. Yet the City felt Baker's diamond wasn't being used enough to keep it?

Shame.

Recall a time when quality trumped quantity?

Cars being shipped to dealerships.

Last summer my old 2003 Cavalier died. It was spewing black smoke and wasn't worth the money it would take to keep it on the road.

My wife Heather and myself replaced it with a Chevy Trax, one of the smaller SUVs General Motors produces. It wasn't too big, something my wife Heather preferred because this would be driven by her primarily. It was also big enough to carry our three growing children with room for luggage.

Not long after we bought the Trax we received a 'Recall Notice'. I have been lucky during my car-buying years in that I had never seen one before. The windshield wiper arms needed replacing. I  hoped that would be the last recall notice I'd get but two weeks ago we received another. This one was far more serious as the brake line had to be moved. It was too close to a heat source and could wear a hole in the line causing the brakes to fail. I took it in and had it fixed.

While I was sitting at the dealership waiting for the shuttle to take me to work I thought about recall notices and the increasing frequency you hear about them, not only from GM but most auto manufacturers. GM, in particular, has come under intense pressure lately regarding its ignition recall. According to a GM press release 1.6 million model-year 2003-2007 vehicles and 1 million model year 2008-2011 vehicles were recalled for the faulty ignition. That's a lot of cars with defective parts in them.

Not so many years ago Toyota issued recalls after its floor mats trapped gas pedals causing cars to accelerate wildly.  Just last week Ford issued a recall notice affecting 1.4 million vehicles North American wide. Google 'car recalls' and you'll find no shortage of stories regarding faulty parts on vehicles.

I realize mistakes happen. But recall notices from auto manufacturers have become chronic in recent years. Wouldn't it be nice if these companies got it right the first time and didn't have to send out quick fixes to problems that should have been caught before these vehicles were put to market? They're so busy pumping out cars, trucks, SUVs, sports cars etc. that scant attention is being paid to quality.

Quality trumps quantity in my books. You pay enough for vehicles these days, new or used. The least these automotive corporations could do is get it right the first time.

I hope I don't find myself sitting at the dealership again day dreaming about recall notices.

What about you, have you ever gotten a recall notice for one of your cars?

The sound of running water is never good

Last summer my youngest daughter Bronwyn got out our garden hose and had some fun with her friends. I heard later it was awesome.

The next morning I went downstairs to have a coffee with my wife Heather. We chit-chatted for a bit and then watched the news. As I sipped  my coffee I heard the unnerving sound of running water. My immediate thought was the toilet was running as it has a habit of doing. When I went upstairs to check it sat there silent. If it could have spoken (and I'm glad it didn't!) I pictured the toilet saying, "It wasn't me."

So who was it then?

I checked every sink in the house and found no running water. Then it dawned on me -- Bronwyn! I ran outside to check the garden hose but knew by the sopping wetness of the ground it was on before I could even see it. The water had been running for a good 12 hours.

Both Bronwyn and Daddy paid for that costly mistake. So you could imagine my concern when I heard the sound of running water again in March. It wasn't the same sound as the garden hose but it was running water. The outside hose was the first thing I checked but it had been turned off from inside since the fall. All the toilets and sinks were off too. So why could I hear distant, yet persistent running water?

The answer, I thought, resided with my neighbour who had water cascading down his driveway. A pipe had sprung a leak somewhere in his front yard and water was running to his driveway and down into the street. The Region of Durham came by, some very large holes were dug and the water mess was cleaned up. That was good for everyone, myself included, because I figured the running water sound I could hear from my laundry room would stop.

It didn't.

So I reluctantly called the Region of Durham myself to report the sound and my suspicion there could still be more leaks in my court. A guy came out and confirmed within seconds I was correct. There was a pinhole leak somewhere and that somewhere was within my own plumbing. A 'leak' specialist would have to be brought in and if the leak was on the wrong side of my property line I would be on the hook for the repair and all its costs. If the leak was on the Region's side it would be fixed by them. But I was warned, it would cost me a minimum of $500 and a maximum of $4,000 if that hole was on my side of that thin red line.

Gulp!

I didn't have $4,000. Actually I didn't even have $500 to spare on a plumbing problem so you could imagine the anxiety, the gnashing of teeth, the stress I went through awaiting the leak specialist's final word. When it came I breathed a HUGE sigh of relief. The leak was in the centre of my driveway, about a foot and a half on the Region's side of the property line!

I found out my neighbour's leak was also on the right side of his property line so he too dodged a financial bullet.

The repair work hasn't started yet so I can still hear the sound of running water downstairs. But at least I know its source. And the best part is that money won't be running out of my wallet to fix it!

Investigating things that go bump in the night

Oshawa Community Museums curator Melissa Cole has given thousands of tours of two of the city's most historic homes, Henry House and Robinson House. There's nothing she doesn't know about these beautiful houses or the people who have called them home over the decades.

Most days she gives these tours while the sun is up but a few weeks ago she gave me a tour many hours after the sun went down. I was there with the Paranormal Researchers of Ontario (proo(f)) and we were on the hunt for ghosts.

I have seen television shows where investigators walk into old haunted buildings with special equipment. Something always happens whether it be a voice telling them to "Get out!" or an apparition appears walking down a hall or stairway. It's meant to entertain and creep you out.

But proo(f) doesn't operate this way. The organization is there to investigate, document and attempt to draw their own conclusions as to why strange things might be happening. Many in the group are skeptical ghosts exist at all while others have had experiences they can only attribute to the paranormal.

So on this night  I accompanied them as they investigated Henry House and Robinson House. Melissa took us on a tour of the two buildings explaining the strange things staff have reported to her as happening while they worked. Melissa herself said she's a skeptic when it comes to ghosts. She's never seen one and she spends a lot of time working and taking care of the two houses.

"I don't get a sense of fear in here ever," she said.

But that doesn't mean others haven't had rather haunting experiences inside the two historic sites. As Melissa explained it there has been more than one person who has had some anxious moments inside Henry House. One girl who took a tour of the house a number of years ago stopped dead in her tracks outside Thomas Henry's study which is just to the right after you walk in the front entrance. She refused to go into the room and didn't want to finish the tour. Something in there made her extremely uncomfortable.

"People have seen somebody in Thomas Henry's chair," Melissa said. "This room gets a lot of stories."

Caskets are stored in the basement of Henry House.

I figured if there was ever going to be a night where a ghost made his or her presence known it would be this night. After all, I was with a group of professional ghost hunters who had cameras, mel metres, electro magnetic field detectors, temperature gauges and other devices used to investigate haunted houses. If a spirit was going to make itself known, these devices, in the hands of these capable people, would do it.

We investigated both buildings from top to bottom. On this night no spirit set off any of their devices but there were a few unexplained sounds and flashes of light we encountered in Robinson House. Proo(f) investigators Rob DiVenanzo, Brad Mavin and Melissa also complained of feeling a little disoriented near the top of the stairs inside the house as well.

"It felt warm. It felt very uncomfortable," Rob explained.

Then, as quickly as it happened, the feelings these three experienced went away. As for me I must admit to feeling a bit uneasy during the whole tour. It's not every night I get to walk through historic old homes in the dark. And who wouldn't experience the heebie-jeebies in the basement of Henry House where old caskets are stored for exhibits held throughout the year by Oshawa Community Museums? Think about it, I was in a dark basement surrounded by coffins.

Despite the fact proo(f)'s various devices didn't go off during our investigation that didn't mean there wasn't something else in those buildings with us.

Did the cameras catch anything not visible to the naked eye? I spoke to Brad  a few weeks after my tour with his organization to ask him.  Was Henry House or Robinson House haunted, in his opinion? Nothing stirred in either house on that night, he said.

In other investigations in other alleged haunted houses proo(f) has returned multiple times and received a variety of readings. In other places they’ve left their equipment behind and it’s picked up some bizarre activities.

What about the strange feelings that overcame his colleagues at the top of the stairs at Robinson House?

“There was certainly a strange feeling up there,” he admitted. “I rarely ever get some sensation or feeling. I had no fear of that place at all though.”

I can't say I didn't experience fear in either house. Being new to paranormal investigations I was feeling a lot of weird things. Could it have been my imagination? Probably. Could something have been watching us as we searched the two houses? Or maybe on this night the spirits just didn't want to come out and play? Who knows?

But it was a cool experience nonetheless.

Ice storm sheds light on dark problem

When the power went out on Dec. 22, I was one of the lucky ones in Durham Region. I was only in the dark for 12 hours. Others were left without power for days.

In Toronto there were thousands of people who went without power for upwards of a week while crews attempted to fix the grid. It was a cold, frustrating time for a lot of people.

When the idea of distributing grocery store cards came about I thought it was a good idea for the people hardest hit. If you're living on a fixed income or on social assistance and are forced, through no fault of your own, to throw out spoiled food thanks to a prolonged power outage it's nice to know the help is there. Fifty dollars for single people or $100 per family couldn’t be considered a lot but it’s more than enough when you look at the alternative – nothing.

Then the stories of the lineups for the grocery store cards started being reported in the media. Demand outstripped supply. In just three days $842,600 worth of grocery store gift cards were distributed in Toronto, more than quadruple what was expected.

This week another $450,000 in grocery store cards will be given out in Durham Region (Jan. 9), Northumberland County (Jan. 8), Dufferin County, Halton Region, City of Hamilton, Peel Region, Waterloo Region, Wellington County and York Region. It's a safe bet the gift cards being distributed won't be nearly enough for the number of people who will lineup for them. Like what happened in Toronto there will be many people turned away empty-handed.

When news of these frustrated, hungry people comes in it won't surprise me and I know it won't surprise you. However, what I find most startling about this whole situation is the number of people who need the grocery store cards. Knowing there are people living at or near the poverty level is one thing but seeing just a fraction of them lining up for grocery store cards puts the issue into a startling perspective.

That should be a wake up call for all of us, including the government officials supervising the distribution of the grocery cards. Poverty sucks but it’s what happens when middle class jobs disappear leaving people desperate and willing to lineup for grocery store cards to feed themselves.

Being a member of the media I hear the calls from food banks calling for donations because year after year there’s a greater need. Unfortunately these stories aren’t unusual, they’re the norm. Then Mother Nature shows her ugly side highlighting an already difficult situation.

The ice storm was traumatic on all of us for many different reasons. When the lights came back on our real problems came to light and sadly, they had nothing to do with storm. 

Blackout lessons for all

When the lights went out across most of Ontario back in 2003 I was at work putting out our regular Friday newspapers. Obviously the blackout changed what I was going to put on my front page and thanks to a back-up generator the papers went to press, a little late but they got out.

Fast-forward to Dec. 22, 2013 the lights went out a second time and where was I? At work again! You see a trend happening here. Obviously I like to work in the dark!

Ice hangs from a tree out front of my home.

The recent blackout though was far more dangerous for two reasons -- first, it was the dead of winter and when the power goes out so does your furnace. Second, the ice storm that caused the whole mess left felled trees and broken tree limbs hanging precariously over streets, hydro lines, driveways etc. It truly wasn't safe inside or out.

As I write this blog post the power is still out in many parts of Toronto, Peel Region and even here in Durham Region. Tonight there is high winds expected and you can be certain more trees and tree branches will come toppling down. I just pray the birch tree in my front yard stays up. It's bending right now in a completely unnatural way.

Unlike last week though I am slightly better prepared for any more power outages. This time I have propane, a new flashlight, a new set of lighters and food in the freezer. Cash also becomes king in the event of a blackout so for a change I am carrying bills in my wallet. It feels a bit nostalgic but I think I'll get used to it because in the event of a power outage debit and credit cards don't work.

Last week Heather went to our local No Frills to stock up for Christmas and while the power had just  come back on a few hours earlier the debit machines were offline. You wouldn't believe the number of people screaming at the poor manager.

Losing your power at any time of the year sucks but I'd take a summer outage anytime over a winter one.

Stay safe out there people.

Getting flashed at night not always a good thing

I left my iPhone on my nightstand the other night. It's a bad habit of mine but since I got rid of the home phone I still want people to be able to reach me in case of an emergency and I'm not convinced leaving it in the kitchen would catch my attention like the home phone used to.

The beauty of the old home phone was was its simplicity. If somebody called you it rang. If you didn't answer, the caller would be connected to your voicemail. Simple.

The iPhone will also ring. But have you noticed what else it will do when somebody calls your number? Mine flashes and vibrates. I have it set to vibrate but there's nothing I can do about the flashing, it just does that on its own.

I can appreciate these noises, flashes and vibrations are meant to catch your attention. If the phone's in a pocket or nearby the vibration is perfect when the ringer is off. During the course of the day the flash will also tune you in to your phone's status when you're on the go.

However, at 3 o'clock in the morning I've discovered the flashes in particular can be really distracting because they not only occur when somebody's calling you but also when one of your friends updates their Facebook status or follows you on Twitter.

I say the flashes can be really distracting not because they bother me per-se but rather they wake up  my wife. While I have no difficulty falling back to sleep Heather cannot shut down again. If she's up, she's up for the day and if that happens during the wee hours of the morning that will mean I won't see a lot of her bright, cheerful smile as often as I'd like.

The other night the phone flashed lighting up the whole bedroom for a split second.  I froze just expecting Heather's frenzied reaction. She must have been facing the other way or had the pillow over her head because she didn't stir. I breathed a sigh of relief and said a little prayer of thanks as I reached over to check who could have possibly updated their status at that hour of the morning. It wasn't any of my Facebook friends, rather a new follower on Twitter. The time on my phone read 2:25 a.m.

Two questions popped into my sleepy mind at that point. First, who would be Tweeting at that hour and second, what would make that person want to follow me? Then I noticed the guy was following 23K people. Obviously I was one of the few people in this world who he wasn't following until precisely 2:25 a.m. that very day!

For many social media savvy people the more Twitter followers the better. I appreciate anyone who wants to follow what few Tweets I send out into the world. But when a new follower poses a threat to my wife's sleep, that's where I have to draw the line.

Without thinking I put the phone in my nightstand drawer. As I laid there staring at the ceiling I wondered why I hadn't thought of that in the first place? It could flash all it wanted in there and nobody would lose a wink of sleep. And if some random person felt like following me on Twitter at some ungodly hour of the morning he could follow away and nobody would know until the sun rose.

A simple telecommunications solution to my rather dull but complicated life!

Taking fair play and respect out of the game

(Warning: This blog post uses explicit language. Reader discretion is advised.)

I've heard of crazy hockey parents. Those are the people who lose control of any rational thoughts while in a hockey arena watching a game and they scream obscenities at the referees. It changes nothing but makes everyone around them uncomfortable.

My guess is these crazy hockey parents also frequent lacrosse, soccer and baseball games in the summer. I hadn't had the pleasure of meeting any of these parents until Tuesday and Wednesday of this week. I hope I never meet them again. Let me explain...

Tuesday night I was coaching the Pee Wee Pirates down at Lakeview Park. We were playing the Giants and it was a close game. The Pirates held a narrow lead heading into the fifth inning when the Giants coach got into a dust-up with the umpire about a game ball. I didn't hear what was said from my dugout but it must have been nasty because the coach got ejected. Off he goes to the parking lot and his assistant steps in.

Two pitches later the assistant starts encouraging his players to scream at our pitcher while he's in his windup. The base umpire gives him a warning it's against the rules and he's to control his team. He argues his players are only cheering. The next pitch his players continue what their coach was encouraging them to do and the umpire stops the game. The two go nose-to-nose and before you know it the assistant coach gets ejected from the game. At this point the fans are getting lippy so the plate umpire asks the one remaining Giants coach and myself to get control of our fans or else the game will be called.

I saw three guys sitting on our side of the field and they were yelling a lot of obscenities at the umpire so I went up to them and asked them to cut it out or else the umpire would call the game.

The guy with the biggest mouth turns to me and says, "Why don't you shut up you four-eyed little faggot before I come over there and beat the shit out of you." He stands up and with him is a giant rottweiler dog. I shrugged my shoulders, turned around and walked back to the dugout. Obviously this meat head was not one of our fans.

As I'm standing there waiting for the game to re-start this guy walks up behind me on the other side of the fence and starts making baby sounds trying to get under my skin. A parent of one of our kids says, "Buddy just go sit down."

"You going to fucking make me. I'll lay you out too," meat head says.

He stood there waiting to be challenged but we didn't engage him so he and his dog went back to their place in the stands. I fully expected him to wait for me after the game but he sauntered off with his kids and only glared at me as I walked back to my car.

That was my first experience with a nut-job. The next night I was at my daughter's soccer game with my parents watching Connaught play Glen Stewart. No referee showed up so a parent familiar with the rules of the game volunteered to officiate.

Everything was going fine until about the three-quarter mark of the game when two players got into an altercation. The referee told both girls to head to the sidelines to cool off. They weren't being ejected from the game, they were just being given time to compose themselves.

This big lug of a father on my right starts dropping f-bombs at the poor parent/referee telling him to pull his "head out of his ass" because it was the Glen Stewart player who was in the wrong. A Glen Stewart father to my left yells at the guy to shut his mouth and let the kids play. The big lug stands up and says, "You want to fucking go?" A woman yells at him to sit down and to that he replies, "I'll take you on too lady."

I hadn't heard anybody challenge somebody else to a fight since I was a teenager. That's what happens with teenagers because they're young and stupid and figure disputes can be settled by beating one another up. It's not how the real world works but don't try telling those nut-job sports fans I met. Apparently they felt beating the snot out of me or another parent would solve the disputes on the field. Unbelievable.

Clowns like those two should be banned from viewing any kids sporting events. I don't care if their kids are on the teams, they shouldn't be allowed anywhere near the playing fields. Threatening physical violence and bullying coaches teaches EVERYONE the exact opposite of what is supposed to be encouraged on house league sporting fields -- respect and sportsmanship.

What happened this week was a poor display by a few parents that left a bad impression with a lot of kids. And that's wrong.

Enjoying time in our field of dreams

Last winter my son Tavish said he wanted to play baseball this summer. He's played softball for four years but with all the hype about the Toronto Blue Jays and the fact he participated in a baseball camp last year convinced him baseball was the way to go.

I warned him I didn't know how to coach baseball. My game has always been softball. Tav didn't care. He wanted to switch and so I told him I'd help out the coach as much as I could.

I pictured a carefree summer where all I had to do was drop my son off at the ball diamond and help the coach out if he or she needed it. No lineups, no practice planning, no scorekeeping, no dealing with vacations, call ups or arguing with umpires. It was going to be the summer of Ian!

Why not coach? Well I told myself I wanted to get to know Baseball Oshawa, I wanted to see how the league ran, I wanted to see how different it was to coach baseball. I grew up playing softball but I never played baseball as a kid and I certainly had never coached the game. Would it be radically different? No. But I wanted to test the waters, dip my toe in to see how cold it was if you know what I mean.

Then I got the call. The league needed coaches or the kids wouldn't be able to play. So much for the summer of Ian!

But as it turns out taking the coaching plunge with Baseball Oshawa hasn't been the worst thing to happen to me. The field dimensions may be different but the game is as fun to coach as softball. I told my team (The Pee Wee Pirates) at our first practice I wanted to accomplish one thing this summer, to have fun. If we won a few games that would be great but even if we didn't we'd learn a lot (them and me) and we'd get to spend some time together out in our field of dreams.

One of my players was sitting with me on the bench the other night and he said he played for another coach last season and all that coach did was yell.

"It didn't make me want to play that hard for him, you know?" he said. "But you don't yell, you make it fun. You're a good coach."

Hearing that from one of my players was a better feeling for me than winning a championship. And given we've only recorded one victory this season a championship is a long ways off! Don't get me wrong, I'd love to win a few more games but there's more to baseball than wins and losses. Together we're building character, we're learning teamwork and we've developed new friendships. It's a great game and I've got some great kids.

This has turned out to be the summer of Ian after all!

Men, we're not looking good

In the book Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus by relationship counsellor and American author John Gray states the two sexes could not be more different. The most common relationship problems between the sexes are a result of fundamental psychological differences between the genders.

Having been married 18 years to the same beautiful woman I understand where the author is coming from (That woman by the way is Heather McMillan and according to Gray's book this single line of text should give me a point in my wife's mind). I see and do things radically different than my wife and sometimes we have the ability to drive one another crazy. We're no different than any other couple anywhere else in the world.

But lately I've found myself in situations that no man should ever be in. I've become the 'fly on the wall' so to speak overhearing conversations I shouldn't be hearing. And men, we're not looking good.

A few weeks ago I was at the grocery store with Heather. We do this mundane task together because it gets us out of the house alone where we can talk unedited, no worries of teenagers overhearing what we say or complain about. It's not a date, it's just an excuse to be together and we like it.

As we were standing in the checkout line the woman in front of us looked up at me while she was bagging her groceries.

"How did you get him out of the house?" she asked Heather. "It's hard enough to get my husband to do anything let alone drag him out to the grocery store."

"Oh he doesn't mind," Heather said looking at me with a smile.

"I'm glad my husband doesn't come with me," said the woman standing behind us. "If he helped we'd end up spending twice as much."

I kept my head down for one simple reason -- I didn't want to get involved in the conversation because clearly I was outnumbered. And glancing around I didn't see very many men I could reach out to for help if I got into trouble!

When we got back to the car I turned to Heather and asked, "What was that about?"

"Clearly they're not happy with their husbands," she said.

"And me?" I asked.

"You're doing fine," she said.

A few days later I walked into the lunchroom at work where three female colleagues were sitting. I was heating up some soup when the women started talking about lunches and their husbands. The men in their lives apparently do nothing to help out and that included making lunches. One husband that very morning dropped a light bulb on the kitchen floor and rather than clean it up he left a Post-it note on the refrigerator door warning his wife to watch her bare feet.

"Yup, you could put a different head on the same stupid body," one of them said. Turning around she saw me standing there patiently waiting for the microwave to heat up my soup and said, "We're talking about our husbands, not you Ian."

 Now I realize in both these situations I was not the men these women were complaining about. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I wasn't meant to hear those complaints but I did.

So what do I do with this information? Well first off I learn from it. I do help with the groceries but I have to admit Heather makes the lunches. But I'm not a stranger to brown bagging it. I have pitched in and made my fair share of sandwiches. I've even made my own lunch from time to time (GASP!).

What I can't do with this information is change any other husbands' attitudes. If you're married to a dumbass who does nothing to help out around the house he's your problem. Talk to him, convince him it's not a good idea to leave broken glass on the kitchen floor despite the fact he warned you about it with a Post-it note!

Maybe if more husbands heard their wives complaining about them in public like I did on these two occasions they'd smarten up, help out, put a smile on their lovely wives' faces.

Or maybe they'd shrug, crack open another beer and continue watching the ball game.

We may behave like we come from two different planets but at the end of the day it's up to us to all get along on Planet Earth.

Or get divorced.

Now I wonder where my wife keeps the bread?!?

Killing us with personal responsibility

Most Canadians know the dangers of consuming too much salt. But how many hands shoot forward at your dinner table in search of the salt shaker?

I've never been a big salt guy. I trace it back to my childhood when a friend of mine used to always lick salt he'd picked up off the road in the wintertime. I wasn't yet 10 years old but even then I knew what he was doing couldn't be good for you.

So when I sat down to watch The Great Salt Shakedown last week on Marketplace I didn't think I'd be one of the regular Canadians overloading on salt. I was wrong.

Host Tom Harrington gave 80 Canadians containers to urinate into for one day. These people ranged in age from teenage hockey players, school kids, a senior's swimming club and other middle-aged Canadians. At the end of the day all the containers were collected to measure the amount of sodium each individual had consumed. The results were startling.

The daily maximum amount of salt you should have in your diet per day is 2,300 mg. Almost everyone tested was far higher than 2,300 mg. One of the teenage hockey players registered an astonishing 7,000 mg of sodium in a day. He attributed it to some Chicken McNuggets and pizza he'd consumed.

So how come the majority of these people tested registered high levels of sodium? It's in the food they eat. And it's not just the boxed processed foods that are high in sodium -- it's practically everything.

A number of years ago Health Canada went after food manufacturers to reduce the amount of trans fats they put into their products. Similar legislation was passed in the U.S.A. But no such rules were enacted concerning sodium which plays just as much a role, if not more in heart and stroke.

Mr. Harrington attempted to get an interview with our Health Minister Aglukkaq to pepper her with his sodium questions but she refused. Instead her Parliamentary Assistant Colin Carrie stood in her place. I took note because he's also my MP. When Mr. Carrie wasn't looking like a deer caught in the headlights he said his government believes it's a personal responsibility to limit your intake of salt.

The next morning I went grocery shopping to exercise my personal responsibility. I spent twice as much time shopping because I looked at every label and couldn't believe how much sodium is in everything outside the produce aisle. In order to consume under 2,300 mg of sodium per day you practically have to starve yourself! Don't believe me? Take the test using Marketplace's sodium calculator. It's not an exact science like the lab tests on the show were but it will give you a ballpark figure. Visit http://www.cbc.ca/news/interactives/sodium-calculator/index.html I took the test and my sodium count was 2,501 for a day. Scary.

Health Canada has raised a red flag over the amount of sodium in each and everyone of our diets but nobody on Parliament Hill is listening. If we keep this up you can count on the number of heart and stroke deaths to spike, especially among Boomers.

I understand that salt enhances the taste of food but I'd trade a bit of taste for a longer life any day. It's difficult to exercise personal responsibility when food manufacturers are allowed to pile sodium into everything (Even orange juice has sodium in it!). We wouldn't want to inconvenience big business would we? Put the blame on the consumer, how convenient.

I don't add salt to anything and as I found out from watching Marketplace I don't have to. Food manufacturers are doing that for us.

 

Hollywood in the classroom

 I love to watch a good movie. And if I can get out of the house with my wife and watch it at an actual movie theatre even better. If not, watching a flick at home is also an enjoyable experience. 

My children are no different than me when it comes to movies. Their cinematic tastes clash with my own most times but the other weekend we watched a teenage show that wreaked of the 1980s -- The Perks of Being a Wallflower. It was 90 minutes well spent and it provided another opportunity for me to reflect upon my youth.

It's nice to sit down and enjoy a movie. But there's a time and a place for enjoying these things and those times shouldn't be between 9 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. Monday through Friday during the school year. You may be asking yourselves, "Movies at school? Who watches movies at school?" To that I only have one answer -- your kids if indeed you have kids. Hollywood has taken over the classrooms in Durham Region.

I recall viewing ancient documentary films in grade school during history classes. No big name actors in those films, no special effects. Just dull, historical material that complemented the course curriculum we were studying.

These days DVDs are played in the classrooms for pure entertainment in my kids' classes. Last spring the students in the primary and junior grades actually went to the movie theatre to watch Dr. Seuss' The Lorax. The senior students saw The Hunger Games. I asked my kids if they were studying anything remotely associated with either of those movies. They weren't.

Apparently many schools got special deals to view these highly anticipated movies. So learning was out, entertainment was in. Hollywood 1, Education 0.

I thought once my eldest daughter Rebekah got to high school the movies would end. Not so. Two weeks ago she got to view the movie Top Gun in french class. No, it wasn't the french version!

Since September she has viewed in class the movies Babe, 1408, The Day After Tomorrow, Emperor's New Groove (a movie my 6 year old would enjoy), Babar, Mean Girls. Only one movie had any educational value and that was a documentary on water played in geography class. It's also the only movie Rebekah couldn't remember the title of, great!

Rebekah is in the academic stream, what in my day was called 'advanced'. If the course curriculum allows students the time to view this many movies in a semester and a half there's a problem.

My wife Heather called Rebekah's school to ask the principal what's going on? So far he hasn't returned her call. It will be interesting to hear his response.

The goal of all educators should be to educate our students and prepare them for their futures. Teach them, talk to them, question them, engage them. Don't pop in a DVD and ignore them. Viewing this many Hollywood movies during class times tells me the system is failing our kids, at least the system here in Durham Region.

There should be a ban on viewing movies in the classroom unless it has something, anything to do with what students are studying. If not, keep Hollywood out of our classrooms.

Falling for the holidays

A few years ago I stood as one of the few residents in my neighbourhood who DIDN'T put up colourful Christmas lights. I didn't see the need considering how bright my house had become from the glare of the lights from my neighbours' homes on either side of my own.

Then little Bronwyn Who, who was no more than 2, looked up at me last year and asked "Where are our Christmas lights Daddy?"

By the end of the week I had not only purchased my own strands of Christmas lights but I found myself up on my roof giving my best impression of Clark Griswold in Christmas Vacation. Well I thought it was my best impression but little did I know then that the best was yet to come.

This past Monday was mild so I decided to suck up some Christmas courage and head to the roof once again. I untangled my lights, made sure each and every bulb would light up and then got the ladder out and headed to the roof.

It was all going so well. In no time I had cleared the eaves of a few remaining leaves and strung up the lights in record time. I stood up admiring my handy work. I was on top of the world! Then things went south.

Picture me sitting at the edge of my roof with my legs dangling down. My feet find the rungs of my ladder and I swing around and take my first step towards earth. Now picture the ladder shaking as the bottom of it loses its footing. One second I'm on a ladder, the next it's crashing to the ground. Gawd did it make a noise. Fortunately I didn't plummet to the driveway at precisely the same time. I was too busy hanging by one arm from my eaves trough. I would probably of hanged there all afternoon if the eave hadn't broken away from the roof causing me to fall.

DOWN...

DOWN...

DOWN I went. And as I fell it never dawned on me that I had a strand of lights caught in my jacket. As each light broke away from the eaves trough it made a CLICK, CLICK, CLICK, CLICK, CLICK sound.

Fortunately my ass broke my fall and I bounced up like I was on a trampoline with a strand of broken Christmas lights in my hand.

My neighbour Bud came running out and shouted, "Are you okay Ian?"

In my best Clark Griswold voice I replied, "Never better Bud, why do you ask?"

He shook his head and told me to call him if I needed help. Looking up I knew I wouldn't need help in the immediate future. What I would need though was a new strand of lights and a couple days recuperation for my bruised ego.

Merry Christmas everyone and for those who enjoy Christmas Vacation as much as I do here's an appropriate clip from the movie.

When cash was king

Last week the Bank of Canada released brand new $20 polymer bank notes to much fanfare. The bills sport a fancy design and pay respect to our war veterans depicting the Vimy Memorial in France on the back. The front depicts a picture of the Queen. The colour remains the same as the older $20 notes -- green.

 The bank notes are touted as being nearly impossible to counterfeit. On Friday night I got one from a bank machine. It immediately ended up in my 14-year-old daughter's wallet. She called it her allowance, I called it 'money for nothing' but that's a topic for another blog.

The $20 note is the third one to be upgraded, the first being the $100 note released last November followed by the $50 note released in March.

On Sunday my wife Heather dragged me out to Justice, a new kids' clothing store, to spend a few of these new bank notes. We had Christmas gifts to buy for my niece and she apparently loves Justice.

The store was buzzing with activity. Kids and parents were everywhere shopping for the brightly coloured clothes. It wreaked of 1985. I saw styles hanging on the racks that would have made Madonna, Frankie Goes to Hollywood and Cindy Lauper proud.

Heather and I got in line and waited. Twenty minutes later we were greeted by the young teen cashier. After asking us for our phone number and postal code she said, "Will you be paying for this by credit or debit?"

"Cash," Heather replied pulling out some of Canada's fancy new money. The girl looked confused.

"I can't take cash at this register, you'll have to wait for that register," she said pointing to her right.

"You've got to be kidding me. What business doesn't accept cash?" Heather said.

"I'm sorry, I can't take cash at this register," she replied.

Stunned we went to line No. 2. When we finally got to the other cashier she too asked us for our phone number and postal code.

"I'm not giving you that information," Heather said.

The teenager didn't know what to do. Apparently Heather was the first person she'd dealt with who refused to give up her personal information. These days we're so accustomed to answering those questions it seems unusual if a cashier doesn't ask them.

"This store has a lot to learn about customer service," Heather said.

"I apologize for the long wait," the girl said. She had no idea the wait was only part of the reason we were unhappy.

It was amazing how quickly our purchase was completed by not having to plug in so much personal information into Justice's computer system. The girl took our money and put it into her register, just like in the olden days, you remember those back in the 1980s?

I know money is used less and less these days as debit and credit cards have taken over. But being refused service for wanting to use cash caught me off guard. That was our first trip into Justice and given our experience it will probably be our last.