Lake Etiquette - a dream or nightmare

A dream or nightmare?! I wrote a poem...I know, I need a day job!
I was interviewed for a Globe & Mail article!
That, and a couple of cyberfriend's poems got me thinking.

~~~~~~~~~~
In Muskoka's richly forested stand
Evidence of Her omniscient hand.
Sweeter tastes, sights, smells, and sounds conjuncture
With roads less travelled, seek your adventure.

Imagine ancient fur-clad Native bands
In history worshipped unspoiled lands
With citiot-raised ruckus enhances
I see them: angry Spirits' war dances

Fragrant foliage enhances the air
As creatures of the forest seek repair.
Of flora and fauna be respectful
Of neighbours you must not be neglectful

If only humanity learned the art
To do no harm, as did Descartes.
How deeply in gratitude toward nature
The city visitors - ‘tis conjecture

On byways and lakes be on your caution
Since such visitors we’ll welcome often.
It is hard to find some neighbourly love
As you light fireworks high up above.

The fauna we ken seek our protection
As jetskis you aim in their direction.
Our highways you treat like The Autobahn
Rolling in his grave: John James Audobon

Bi-ways you’ve painted with liquored up blood
Emergency crews find pieces in mud.
Volunteer firefighters we owe a blessing
Over gaping wounds placing a dressing.

Please show fragile Muskoka that you care
As north tired spirits seek well-earned repair
At Thanksgiving, as you bolt well-worn door,
We’ll line the road grateful -one season more.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~

unions, employees and employers

Re: Air Canada negotiations

In this economic climate it is a shame that everyone cannot work together to create a strategy that will look after all stakeholders: employees, retirees, business travellers, business owners, and the travelling public. And airline travel is, after all, not a right but a business that those who chose to use must pay for - not the taxpayer. Air Canada lost $1 billion last year.

The economy, the cost of gas, the cost of travel has been taken up by clever entrepreneurs, like WestJet, who have written new business policies, and changed their employee strategies, to take this business into the new millennium. Air Canada, a legacy airline, with pensioned employees that weigh down current union members, continues to fight for survival. Labour concessions on the part of airlines, like the Brits, mean reduced travel routes, reduced options for travellers, and more time wasted trying to get from here to there. Air Canada used to be government-owned, but that is a long time ago. Such private business corporations have unionized employees who cannot see the big picture.

The high cost of travel is based on employees who make high wages for fairly unskilled work, as well as the high cost of fuel, and underfunded pension plans. The baggage handlers (many are 50-somethings with bad backs) and flight attendants being replaced by 'cheap and cheerful' services on competitor's airlines, with lower wages but an increasing market share. Where else could such people make $50,000/year, except in the auto industry ($70,000/yr. to build cars) but then we know what has happened to THAT industry.

Pension issues are a difficult topic. Retirees are unable to vote. Many need pensions to survive. Yet, our tax dollars cannot build bridges for the automotive industry either. With fewer Canadians employed, fewer tax dollars available, but an aging citizenry with bigger health care needs, we are at a rock and a hard place.

I think it is time to set blame aside and consider the needs of people, not unions, unions leaders, or employers. Otherwise, there will be no options. There isn't a huge market for these skilled employees (e.g.,machinists) in Canada. There have been 474,000 job cuts in Canada between October and June, according to Statistics Canada. And all of us will lose out if all stakeholders do not change their vision of Canadian industry. The success with which the world views Canadian economics will be moot.

Competition high in sky- As WestJet boosts service, Air Canada vows to fight for market share TheChronicleHerald.ca - Halifax,Nova Scotia,Canada MONTREAL COMPETITION is heating up between Canada's two largest airlines as Air Canada vowed this week to compete ...

Getting Real -- it's reality check time Financial Post - Toronto,Ontario,Canada That does not bode well for Air Canada employees, who would like to win back concessions they made when the airline plunged into bankruptcy early this ... This is an interesting read (Left Turn-below): when employers are trying to create two-tier employees, some grandfathered with benefits, others not. It does not seem fair to me. I pay several hundred dollars a month for heath care benefits, being a retired teacher. They just demanded that retired auto workers contribute $30/month. Seems right to me.

Left Turn:: Cyber-scabbing? Lessons for labour from the Windsor ... By Andrew Taylor Members of the largest union at Air Canada have narrowly voted to reject an extraordinary agreement that would have frozen their wages for the next 21 months and allowed the company to suspend payments into the employee pension plan.

CBC's Publicly Funded Radio

I have been interested in the evolution of CBC radio. In a bid for higher ratings, methinks, they have been taking away from their more traditional fare. I used to listen to CBC Radio all morning (I adored Peter Gzowski) while doing home day care (30 years ago!) for developmentally disabled kids, while caring for my own 3 children, and/or driving in the car to do errands. Now that I am retired, I find myself turning away from CBC Radio.

For example: they have taken away classical music on CBC Radio2. As that article says, in a publicly-funded radio, operating on tax dollars why they are trolling for a younger demographic I do not know. We do know that the population is aging, and many radio programs feature whacko hosts, with music I am unable to tolerate.

The classy hosts - like Gzowski, are being replaced by, say, musicians, like Jian Gomeshi, whose tastes are quite different than mine. His arts show, Q, features artists I question as artists. There is little balance between the genres. Besides modern musicians have great ease in getting PR, it is the unknowns Gzowski used to feature, as well as books and book authors that were must-reads. Some of the language and the vulgarity and toilet humour leaves me no choice but to turn the radio off.

Then there are the CBC Radio shows meant for early morning.
They celebrate themselves:
"Thanks for making Ontario Morning number one in both London and Kingston!
(BBM ratings March and April 2009)"
What options do any of us have?
I rise early and used to plug in. I adored Anthony Germain, whose Ottawa morning show featured hard-hitting news, based on local, regional, provincial and federal politics. Why they sent him to China on my tax dollar, to cover news that the Chinese government will not allow him to report, is beyond me. He went to do a positive item on a new factory (I think?) that had a Canadian facet to the story, and they would not let him talk to anyone. What is the point in speding big bucks having him there? He had timely news items of the REGION, unlike the morning show I have to listen to in Central Ontario. Ontario Morning features a variety of reporters, many that simply do not interest people in my generation. Sophisticated technology reports not meant for regular folks like me, or dating or parenting techniques? I think not.

Eli Glasner - Why can you not speak on CBC's Ontario Morning on more classy films? I am tired of reviews of crap like Transformers, Bruno and other cartoons. Vulgar, puerile movies I would not be caught dead seeing. How about reviews on adult films?! The kids tell the parents what to watch, they do not need any marketing by you. I'd like info on little-known adult films. Or classics that our young people might be interested in.

How about featuring local events, as you do with Barrie's Jack Lynch on w/e events: Muskoka shows, or outdoor theatres, like Brampton's Rose Theatre?

There are spots that appeal, i.e., economic reports, and some that do not: Peterborough, London news? I think not. If they dealt in-depth with local issues that have an impact across the province, i.e., rural health care, senior health care, closing emergency room beds, LHINs doing the dirty work of cutting health care to save tax-payer dollars, municipal political trends.

Muskoka will host the G8 in 2010, as well as the Winter Games, and there is much going on in this respect. OPP are rehearsing, you can see the planes flying over, and emergency crews doing highway simulations. We were stopped behind one last month. A plane flew over, several OPP vehicles stopped traffic for a few minutes, while emergency vehicles sped past us. All in the middle of highway #11.

For heaven's sake, the sheer number of vacationers who visit us (OPP estimates a million on a long-weekend!) you'd think our weather should be covered well. That safety (land, air and water) issues would be highlighted.

• Charges laid in Muskoka
• Drownings continue in Ontario
• Weather coverage - a rant on disparities!

What about travel, the roads, cottaging, vacation travel, idling, Bonfires and leaf burning, environmental issues, rural municipal politics?

United breaks guitars

What a marvellous means by which Sons of Maxwell (a Halifax band) pointed out a terrible customer relations policy. Another passenger noticed baggage handlers throwing their luggage around. FLight attendants said it wasn't their problem. They made the right phone calls to the right departments. Months later the band had no satisfaction. Now they have a smash hit! Here is the full story, but Dave Caroll's made it on CBCs Newsworld.

Fifteen Days

Fifteen Days by Christie Blatchford



This is an excellent read. Christie Blatchford, embedded reporter for The Globe and Mail, put together these stories of our men and women. I often read her columns in the G & M. She is sometimes trite (writing about the death of her dog?) but usually hard-hitting.

This book is an incredible read. She tells it like it is. She tells their stories and honours their humanity and gives them dignity and respect. For, though I believe that our time is done in Afghanistan, and we make little progress, We must honour the fine work our soldiers do. Canada has a long history in the arena of war. Vimy Ridge, Juno Beach, the 65th Anniversary of D-Day, all are stories told well in print and in the media.

As an embedded reporter I question her ability to be objective. For example, she speaks to her soldiers about Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, and one of them, as I recall, suggests that this is not a problem. I felt, at the time taking my M.A. in Counselling, that this could not possibly be true. PTSD, on the Road to Kandahar, is a tough one.

Her voice a strong one. She reports well on war. She did dozens of interviews with the members of the 1st Battalion, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry. She is empathetic, and writes well of the bravery, as much as the heartbreak that affects the soldiers and their family members. For PTSD is something that has an effect on all of society.
To quote one review:

Christie Blatchford creates a detailed, complex and deeply affecting picture of military life in the twenty-first century.

RandomHouse.ca Fifteen Days by Christie Blatchford

Category: Current Affairs - Military; Social Science - Popular Culture
Format: Hardcover, 400 pages
Publisher: Doubleday Canada
ISBN: 978-0-385-66466-0 (0-385-66466-4)

Pub Date: October 9, 2007
Price: $34.95

Memorialization

I have been sitting, with a sore back, watching TV this afternoon. How delightfully decadent, aside from the shooting pain. Most of the big American stations have featured the memorial service for Michael Jackson(1958 - 2002). As Natasha said, on her All in the Mind blog re: Schumann,

"As I mention in the first show, I'm hesitant about the effort to posthumously hunt for signs of mental pathology in the work of artists long gone."

One blogger bemoans the joy and love heaped on the late Michael Jackson .
I wonder why taxpayer dollars went towards the celebration of life in the stadium, but that is another issue! I cannot begrudge the honour anyone bestows on a life. No matter how many children we have, there is enough love to go around. This is true of mourning. We can find enough love for this act: to honour a human being who has passed.

The highway memorials are significant is you travel in Ontario. We must laud those who do good works, aside from the mistake they have made. (Let she who is without sin...) MJ was a philanthropist, and to share your wealth is an honourable thing. There will be much written about the fight over his millions of dollars, and the custody of his children, but, again, many families fight about many things. Those in the spotlight are in an even worse position. It is the public's right, those who helped this family achieve fame and fortune, to mourn and experience their grief. For those who disparage him, they need to turn the page or the channel. I have made mistakes in my life. I hope they will not be held up at my death, for I try to learn from them.

This aforementioned blogger complained that

"Yesterday, seven American servicemen were killed in Afghanistan. Those are the heroes and they are the ones who deserve the coverage."

Again, there is enough coverage for all to be lauded as heroes. I am proud of the ramp ceremonies, as well as the people that line the highway from Trenton as we bring soldier's bodies home in Canada.

For example:

Ramp ceremony farewell for soldiers killed ...7 Jul 2009 ... TheStar.com | Canada | Ramp ceremony farewell for soldiers killed in chopper crash. Ramp ceremony farewell for soldiers killed in chopper ...

Highway convoy rolls to honour fallen Canadian soldiers- 3:13pm31 May 2008 ... Highway convoy rolls to honour fallen Canadian soldiers ... representing the number of fallen soldiers, led the memorial drive, moving under...

Perhaps her disapproval should be directed at American governments that do not allow such in their world. Everyone deserves to have their lives lauded. It is hard to explain the attention. Perhaps, because of all the media hype that has surrounded him in the past. Brooke Shields spoke fondly of their common child performer/media star lives. It cannot have been easy. It is said that he was a perfectionist. he must have been lonely, troubled, and I wonder the lessons we learn from these stories?

Certainly, it is crucial that we honour the good things a person has done. MJ was a philanthropist, aside from his problems later in life. We saw him grow up and, like other entertainers who have died before their time, we wonder why. I, like Sherry, wonders what went wrong in this case. It is something the Americans must ponder.

For all those who mourn, I hope you receive comfort. I hope that you mourn with dignity, respect and in privacy, for MJ's family has no choice in the matter. The family raised their voices in song, as I did at my Mother's service. There was nothing more joyful to her than having us all sing. It is what we did as a family.

My father's service was sparsely attended. It was painful at the time. That others mourn MJs passing may or may not be comforting to those who grieve. He was a public figure. Those who do mourn are to be respected. Those who must take away from such ceremonies should be ashamed. Turn off your TV. I'll be humming the Thriller, he's bad, so bad!, music that had young men and women danced to in the streets, celebrating the spirit of those in the entertainment industry, mimicking their hero, and raising the profile of those who face racism in the US.

Visit RedFridays.ca, to view the memorial pages for fallen Canadian soldiers. We know how to honour our soldiers.

Safe driving

I may be preoccupied with safety, at my age and stage of life you cannot blame me, but since we logged 1800 km on our Lake Superior Trip, and Sunday drove 200km south for a rendez-vous with our granddaughter's parents in a small S. Ontario town, I did a lot of drive-by shooting and vehicle watching.

We normally travel a normal rural 35 km to the nearest 'town' for major shopping and groceries, and we do a fair amount of driving for medical purposes. It is amazing the near-misses and the other things I see.

Big vehicles, small ones, motorcycles, motor homes, 4-wheelers being hauled home, happy and dirty!

At one point, two school busses were stopped, due to bikes on the highway. With much traffic going south, the bus drivers did not want to risk passing around them. I am sure their mothers thank them!

We were stuck in a busy intersection of a tourist town, with motorcycles and cars going which way and that. Motorcycles are quite frequent, and it is a succinct way to travel! For the most part they follow the rules and respect other drivers. They seem to understand the Sunday afternoon driving spirit: take your time, enjoy the scenery, follow the rules of the road. Those in larger vehicles are very important, though, and act as if they must beat you to their destination! On a gorgeous, sunny, Ontario afternoon there should have been joy and gladness about us.

Turning left onto a main street was well nigh impossible without the good graces of those waiting at the stop light. One young woman stopped to let us turn before she did. But then I could not believe the man in front of us. His licence plate said, 'I FIXUM', but I would have liked to fix HIM!

He was sitting on his cell phone, in really busy traffic, at this intersection full of Sunday afternoon shoppers and tourists.

I am further amazed by the number of vehicles that pass on on double lines, or people who drive under or over the speed limits.

The drive home was wonderful! The Sunday afternoon cottagers and campers were desperately motoring south, we headed back north.
Cows, horses, goats, hay, and many vehicles. We were happy to make it home safely.


Things were busy there, being followed too closely for our liking, you can see the 3 men in the truck in our rear0view mirror, but we made it. We took our time, let others pass, and kept an eye about us!

Summer travel on the roads

We had quite a drive up to Lake Superior. It is too bad that people do not have common sense, however. Such disrespect for fellow travellers.

The camper at left was being pulled by a truck too wee to drag it up the hills. We were so frustrated that we could not drive at the speed limit. I'm not sure what they were thinking.



Tourists like to travel with their little homes on their backs. As Cindy points out in her latest post -Education for the driving [m]asses: Tip 131 - How to tow- many do not buy vehicles strong enough to tow their homes away from home or buy homes too big for their trucks!

I cannot tell you how many times we were slowed down, with big truckers passing us, in an attempt to pass us all at the same time. The beauty of the Transcanada Highway is that there are many places with a passing lane. My Muskoka is not so good for this.

The hills of Lake Superior demand a strong vehicle. The photo (left) is a demo of the sheer size of the hills in Parry Sound. It is dangerous to drive too slow, as much as too fast.

The sparkling waters invite tourists to play and relax. Some relax too much. Coincidentally, Education for the Driving Masses published a very good article on this topic.

How bizarre that our tax dollars have to go to advise drivers to have common sense. The signage is phenomenal, as I travelled N. Ontario, and such a waste. I don't think people are listening, either.

It was a year ago that a big accident occurred in Muskoka. I wrote about The Message in the Bottle website previously, on My Muskoka.

My friend, Cindy, reprised the story and documented it on the one-year date in her post: Drinking and driving . It breaks my heart as a mom and gramma.

In the Weekender of July 3rd, 2009...same date, a year later the lessons have not been learned.

Teenager rolls vehicle following graduation
The local paper, Weekender, announced a drinking and driving accident after a high school prom.

I just wonder what the parents are thinking? The paper says the young lady was at an after-party, and driving in the family vehicle. Do they not know what happens at these events? Did they not ask questions to make arrangements for the kid to be picked up?

More Driving news items

• Man uses kayak to escape police June 18, 2009 - by Matt Driscoll

Only in Muskoka would a police pursuit involve a kayak.

Last Tuesday a Bracebridge courtroom heard the strange story of Cory Lamondin, 38, who fled from the police by land and water.

• Impaired driver ends up in jail for a month June 30, 2009 - by Matt Driscoll

You only get one chance when it comes to impaired driving, a Sebright man found out last week.

• Bracebridge woman found passed out in car at intersection June 3, 2009 - by Matt Driscoll

A young Bracebridge woman put herself in a precarious position when she was found passed out drunk behind the wheel of her running car.

Of course, the yahoos are as foolish on water as on land in My Muskoka.

Skywatch Friday

massive skies in rainbow colours
angels light their lamps --
solitary lifeboat
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The skies are massive; the clouds phenomenal in Lake Superior's bays. The music is by Ian Tamblyn: Days of Sun & Wind. It is bittersweet knowing the Edmund Fitzgerald sank an hour off shore. I spoke to the daughter of a captain of the day. Her father knew the cap't of this ship. It was a terrible tragedy.

1958	On June 7, 1958, the 729-foot Great Lakes ore carrier Edmund Fitzgerald was side-launched into the harbor —signifying the birth of the ship. www.chroniclet.com
1975	On November 10, 1975, in the most famous shipwreck in Great Lakes history, the Edmund Fitzgerald sank in a treacherous storm on Lake Superior.

Visit more Skywatchers by clicking on the badge for the meme.