Guess who's coming to dinner, and all day too, tomorrow

This guy- that's who. How many wet knickers will be found after the event, how many orgasmic dreams will be fulfilled just by shaking his hand? All questions answered tomorrow.
Itinerary below:

Date:               Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Time:              10:30a.m. – 11:30am 

      

Location:        Community Living Campbellford/Brighton 

                    65 Bridge St. E. Campbellford, ON

 Tour of facility then Mr. Trudeau will be speaking to a group of invited guests on Volunteerism in Canada

     

  - and -

Time: 12:15 pm-1:10pm

Location:  Kelsey's Restaurant 227 Dundas Street East Quinte West

Meet & Greet local residents.

  - and -

Time: 3:10pm- 3:40pm

Location: Cobourg Lions Centre 157 Elgin Street East,  Cobourg

Mr. Trudeau participating with children from the Victoria Park Childcare Centre to prepare for backpacks for the Northumberland United Way Backpack for Kids Program
 
- and -

Time: 4:15pm -5:30pm

Location: Home of Dr. Mark and Elaine Azzopardi 7330 Bell Hill Road Port Hope

Mr. Trudeau joining invited guests for a BBQ

I guess the tickets to the good Doctors house will be well sought after, after all it is invite only! 


Sponsored by Kim Rudd Federal Liberal Candidate Northumberland Quinte West, if any good libs want to take notes the BR will mighty appreciative - just email them in.

Just a quick sum-up

With the board agreeing that events mar the normal performance of Vic Park this thought has been nagging me for the past 1000kms - why can't the RibFest be placed on the pier? A much more secure and larger place for everything. Perhaps we should be using this space for something productive seeing as we don't allow people to park there.

A maaaarvellooous idea

Comments do work, not just mindless anonymouses sniping at each other, this snippet, from Gail Rayment, came into a previous post,  where ideas for beach activities are being discussed.

" Now - what I would like to see happen is that some of our visitors be invited to participate in a version of Food on the Danforth, so that we can sample all the delicious foods we smell being prepared. That would certainly get me to the beach" 

This is a fantastic idea. Why don't we pick up on it - suggestions anybody

Another negative comment about visitors

Councillor Bob (why do I have big feet?) Spooner gave his opinion about the visitors to Victoria Park and made a few revealing remarks. Quote from NToday story here, " Spooner said, is the fact that weekend visitors to the beach are leaving their garbage and not spending their money." Perhaps if the local commercial sector had something to offer then money might get spent.

The other worrying suggestion is the move to ban bbqs from the Park. This would seem to be punitive rather than helpful to tourism and should be resisted. In a remark that reveals a total lack of understanding about the visitors he is quoted, ""Whatever happened to Tupperware and cheese sandwiches?" What part of ethnic food is a cheese sandwich?

However all this discussion is good and maybe we can turn the debate into one of positivism - accept the influx of visitors as good and figure out a way to separate them from their money. [Good luck on that one Russell Peters has based his act on his tightwad Indian dad see this youtube excerpt. - ed]

An uncrowded beach?

Sunday 8th August, 1.30pm - no crowds on the beach yet. Maybe the weather, maybe not a holiday weekend and not a weekend with an event to crowd out visitors. Many suppositions but the fact remains the beach only gets crowded when there is an event - volleyball, Canada Day, ribfest etc. So perhaps the answer to the problem may be the curtailing of the outreach activities by the Town, stop the tourists coming and keep the beach clear!

A suggestion heard from a newcomer

As part of the ongoing discussion about the conditions on the beach: overcrowding, lack of local exclusivity and the inability to enjoy "beach conditions" because of the restrictions on beach vendors imposed by a Council beholden to DBIA influence the question was asked by the newest member of the BurdReport's extended Cobourg family, at the last family gathering - "why are there no vendors on the beach?"

Beach vendors - you know the type - hawkers of sunglasses, beach food, ice cream and other summery trashy stuff. The only answer available was that Council in it's wisdom has never allowed anybody other than the concessionnaire to be in business at the beach. "Why is that" was the next question. "Because the DBIA has always complained about the vendors, if allowed don't pay taxes and support the local community."

So here's the suggestion: allow the DBIA members to sell their wares on the beach and in the Park. If they don't want to and a case can be made for that, if they don't want to open on Sundays why would they bother to sell stuff in the Park; allow unrestricted "Pedlars and Hawkers licences" to be issued.  The DBIA cannot have it both ways complaining vociforously enough to kowtow Council and then not take advantage of the monopoly they have created.

Just a suggestion.

The same old problem

Anonymous comments are a pain in the arse! As regular readers are aware the BurdReport has been in the habit of moderating, and allowing, anonymous comments. This practice has been a source of amusement, annoyance and frustration for some people including the publisher. The BR's policy about anonymous comments is simple - if it is not abusive toward another identifiable poster, if is not too profane, and the profanity policy has been stretched lately, or if the comment is just way out of line - it is moderated but rejected.

Interestingly enough the other day the BR was phoned by another local blogger who asked if we knew a particular anonymous poster. The BR responded with the answer that if the post is not profanely objectionable or too personal it will get posted just to show how silly some people are.

However a question has been posed about the policy of anonymous posts - should the BR ban them? Well readers, we have had this discussion before - should we ban them? If we don't what sort of policy should be implemented. Let's make this a participatory discussion [redundant?-ed]. You tell us what the rules should be, we will post them and reject those comments that fail to match the policy. Unfortunately the programme does not allow an email back to the offender so for the time being only by not being posted will the miscreants find out how their comments do not match posting policy.

A response to the whine of the year

from Wally Keeler a keen observer of all things

According to Cobourg resident, Anita Steins, there is a "beach fiasco" of "epic proportions." Her letter-to-the-editor of Northumberland Today ended with her assertion that, "I too would like to enjoy our beach at least once this year." If she has not been on the beach once this year, how could she know there is any situation on the beach other than via Pete Fisher's smear-job journalism.

Many in 'Corktown' have wide boulevards between curb and sidewalk. It could easily be widened to provide ease of parking and permit emergency vehicles clear access on the very, very few days in the year when parking is stressed. Beach safety is enhanced by moving the lifeguard chairs forward and adding a few extra lifeguards for the very, very few days in a year when crowds necessitate it.

This is the part of Ms Stein's letter that I find particularly offensive. "Those who come here to enjoy our free beach rarely are the kind who spend any money here. They have their day, ignore our laws, leave their trash and go home."

I recall those endless summer days of hippies hitch-hiking across Canada. Occasionally, some rolled out a sleeping bag in the park/beach. Bigots-of-the-day smeared them: hippies were unwashed, smelly, girls had hairy armpits and legs, ignore laws and convention, leave their garbage and move on to pollute the next community. The Cobourg Sentinel-Star's letters page was a display case of this distasteful attitude. The slanders, smears, and sneers against visiting hippies (really, just teenagers with long hair) had two wonderful defenders.

The publisher of the Cobourg Sentinel-Star, Foster Meharry Russell, wrote a wonderful editorial about observing some hippies with a small campfire glowing on the beach. In the morning he returned, and observed that the hippies had cleaned up their spot, placed the camp debris in a bin, and moved on to enjoy their land, Canada. He extolled their freedom.

When the issue of sleep-overs in the park came to town council, Deputy-Reeve, Lenah Field Fisher, a fabulous suffragette who wore extravagant hats, extolled the virtues of sleeping under the stars on warm nights. She referred to the dirty Thirties when the homeless unemployed sometimes slept overnight in the park on their quest for employment.

I live one block away from Victoria Park. I enjoy its presence in my life almost every day, any time of day. The Park/Beach is open 24 hours 365 days a year. The Park is crowded 10-15 days in a year, less than one percent of the year. Why are the few selfish self-centred Cobourgers so resentfully tight-fisted of sharing Cobourg's greatest asset.

Local resident, Steven MacLaughlin in his letter-to-the-editor called for action, "Our park and beach both stink with garbage and outsiders and it is time to clean it up!" Bigotry is the cause of the foul smell and it needs a major disinfectant.

All weekend I strolled through the park, and witnessed extended families from grandma on down to tots, enjoying themselves and each other, laughing, playing games, bonding as a family. How many homegrown Cobourgers take their extended families to the park on the other 350 days of the year?

Many of these 'visitors' came from countries where life is stressed with too lethal consequences. It is a hardship of which most Canadians are unfamiliar. Immigrants have a great resource - their kids. Canada gets their kids. In the meantime, many immigrants take low level jobs, work hard, live in apartments/condos, and deserve to enjoy Canada's freedom and prosperity.

The presence of these visitors in Canada's free parks is part and parcel of their assimilation into our society. These new Canadians make me feel good. I enjoy the smells of their cooking. I enjoy the extravagant glee of their tumbling children. I enjoy that I can witness this in a feel good country, a feel good town and a feel good Park.

Shame on Northumberland Today's hyperbolic exploitation of NOTHING. Were there any picnic tables broken or garbage bins tipped over? Were any lamp posts toppled or broken? Bushes and flowers uprooted? Were there any brawls? In the absence of any this, why would Northumberland Today amplify the message, "Heads should roll"?

The first whine of the year

Well Pete Fisher has done it again. With a rewrite of his article of last year - Beach Woes in Cobourg (my paraphrase) the predictable response has happened. The first of many letters about the visitors ruining the beach for Cobourgers has appeared here.  The writer complains about visitors taking over and the crush of visitors causing a safety hazard. If the writer had been following the MSM she would have been aware that in the middle of that crush, lasr weekend, a missing child alert was issued. The beach was cleared of swimmers and a search initiated in the water. The children were found and safety systems worked. So where's the cry for less people on the beach going to go when we have proved that safety measures work and works well. If the writer of the article wishes to have the Cobourg beach reserved for Cobourgers she should say so. If not then get up earlier in the morning and get a spot on the beach. 

Unfortunately for the people who bought into the 'private' lifestyle that they think they have when they buy in Cobourg, private beach ownership is not on the list. In fact the Cobourg beach isn't an exclusive preserve of Cobourgers - it is a resource to be shared.

If it wasn't so bloody stupid it would be ludicrous

Minister Day, the man who believes the earth is only 6,000 years old, did it again yesterday - said something completely preposterous. The problem is that this statement is used to spend a whack of tax money. He justified the spending of money on new prisons because crime stats are not reliable, therefore we have to handle the influx of criminals, because of the number of 'unreported crimes'. Taken to its extreme we will build prisons to house the perpetrators of 'unreported crimes'. The problem is if they, the crimes, are unreported how do we trace the perpetrators to put them in prison?