So let's talk about organics

Since 1995 (or thereabouts) when the former King of Hope Twp - Sir Ian Molsen Angus - cut the crap out of the County budget composting hasn't had a chance. When the County expropriated? (bought over landowners' objections) the land that the that Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) sits on in Grafton and designed a properly designed total waste recovery system Composting was to be an integral part of it. That empty space of land to the West of the big building was to have sited many rows of trommels and compost piles. But in his zeal to eliminate everything that made sense King Ian led the way to chop the composting facility from the plan, I think it saved about 1.5 million at the time. Penny wise and Pound foolish! We have been playing catchup ever since. Not only have we failed to divert 40% of the waste from the landfill but the cost of that unneccesary use of landfill has cost us money in lost opportunity costs, as landfill space gets more expensive with each load dumped.

Now the County's expert, who's last job was being cozy with incineration friendly operations, wants us to put off the idea again. Citing costs was his reason. Well I have some opinion for you - the cost of the next recommendation, which will be a multi-municipality incineration operation will be much more costly both in dollars and damage to the environment. So do we compost now or burn everything later, that unsaid debate will be a long and nasty one.

The flame is coming!

Whoopdidoo, the Olympic Flame will be passing, NOT STOPPING, through the County as it travels along Hwy 2 to Hwy 28 and up to Peterborough, where it WILL STOP. So a message for all the local pols - cool it. There are so only many photo ops that can be fitted in and I'm sure you (the pols) will grabbing all of them. I can just see it now - all the female Mayors rushing off to the local Curves, and all the male Mayors buying new bikes. Good for them to improve their personal fitness but ending the purpose with a vain grab at a good photo op is a bit tacky. Still they have over a year to train for it. I think that the spaces allotted to the run should be applied for by the municipality and allocated by lot. The way it is at the moment is anyone who wants to run applies here and they, RBC, will get back to you. Nothing said about the process, but I am sure there will be some form of vetting.

A YouTube comment on the subprime crisis here the one below Britney Spears - click on the barely clad female by the truck (who has nothing to do with the video)

I think we should sue them!

After living through a financial meltdown , one which anyone over the age of sixty will never recover from, I think we should be suing our financial advisors. All of us little people who have squirreled away money and fallen for the charms of whatever financial institution we use have been told "Don't panic, every thing is cyclical, it will come back!". Well I disagree. Financial advisors should be telling investors, their clients, that there is a time to rescue capital. And that time has more than passed. Don't worry the big money did this weeks ago and now are sitting in cash or certificates. As usual the small investor has taken it on the chin so that the crooks can get away with our money. The thieves and fraud artists started this by rigging derivatives and hedge funds, giving themselves big bonuses and fat fees every time a grubby hand signed the useless paper on to the next stage of the con game, and they are still playing the game selling short and making money. Enough is enough - rant over

Pay this place a visit

Last night my better half and I were invited to a sneak preview of "Jamaica Flavah" ,this epicurean delight takes place each Friday from tonight on at the Human Bean - Cobourg's Coffee House. Dave and Sue Glover have invited a Jamaican couple, who live in Ajax to take over the kitchen on Fridays to make food all day. Starting with Lunch and finishing with Dinner. The menu staples will be traditional Jamaican food - Jerked Chicken and Chicken Rotis to start but other foods will be on tap such as Curried Goat. Takeouts will be available and pre-orders are being taken.

[OK enough about the ads what about the food? - Ed]

The food last night was delicious, plentiful and if we had paid for it would have been cheap. The meal in the pic is a small spinach salad trimmed with raspberries and beans, the Jerked Chicken is traditional in flavour and set off by a mild rice touched by a savoury sauce. The Roti contains curried potatoes and chicken wrapped in light roti bread. Wonderful.

So if you want a bit of Carribean flavour on a Friday come on down to the Human Bean and meet Denry and his wife Michelle. I would suggest that Dave get a special permit for Friday's - eating this food isn't right unless you can quaff "Red Stripe" at the same time.

What a surprise Bob Rae's in the race

OK it took a while but BR wants to be the leader of the Liberal Party. Nothing wrong with that but I do think he should not be in. He is too old to rejuvenate the party. We need generational change not just change. I don't beat up on him for switching parties, Winston Churchill did it three times, but I do begrudge him the chance because in his last appearance as leader (of the NDP) he proceeded to jettison the party platform and govern like a liberal when he wasn't. Perhaps this time when he is a Liberal and there is no discernible party policy he might actually make it work. In fact his readiness to adopt Keynsian economics in 1990 in the last recession should be seen as a plus. I guess it's OK to run deficits now (come back Floyd Laughren all is forgiven) but not when you are a dipper. After all how could anyone govern with a majority when 67% of the population didn't support you?

A post from a loyal reader

Wally Keeler, a loyal reader, has sent in a comment on the previous post - check it out. But he asks us to read this Wally Keeler Overdoses on FREE SPEECH

Shove off Cap'n Spooner

What a half-baked idea that Bob Spooner is circulating. "The Town should buy its own harbour dredger". Read about it here With the Town just having told its older population to get out and shovel snow this winter because it doesn't want to spend $350,000 why we are even talking about it ; this is nuts. All kind of nautical figures of speech come to mind but the the easiest one to use is that Bob's all wet! Why even yesterday there was a plea in one of the local papers for Council to give us all a tax break by cutting spending. But Cap'n Bob says that we can make the money back by renting the dredger out, who to? Port Hope!

A new direction

OK I've been away too long and in order to satisfy a few demands it has become apparent that I have to get back to this endeavor.

So I missed commenting on the:

• Federal Election
• American Election
• The Economic Crisis
• The arrival of the Property Tax Assessment notices

Yep I sure did, and you wouldn't want to hear my wacky opinions about any of that

I want to talk about the real things I have been doing, for instance I have just finished the arduous task of tidying up my mother's estate. She died eleven months ago with a small estate. But not small enough to escape the clutches of the threat of probate. Probate is the legal process that is designed to prevent the criminally minded executors from pocketing all the money and running away with it. It usually involves a lawyer, who charges a minimum fee of about $1,000 to file one form and write a few cheques, this work actually costs more so the final bill is usually more the fee asked for once you enter the office and ask for probate services.

I decided to do it myself. Step one, buy a book ($35.95), read the book and understand the process. As you do this you realise why the lawyers have the leg up by being lawyers. A couple of the forms have to be accompanied by bonds, which you have to buy from an insurance broker who will demand affidavits, made up by lawyers, one up for the lawyers. You then have to file all the paperwork with the court, lawyers know which ones to go to first - you will flounder around the court building until you strike gold. Finally you will have in your possession a legal document that binds you to the executor process and ties you to being an honest distributor. In other words you have a form that the people who hold the estate can now blame if the distribution is dishonest. You did it not them and they are just following process because you had the right forms that indemnified them (the bank) from complaints from upset inheritors. Step two ignore the book and get creative. I decided to go after the first piece of necessary paper and challenge anybody who wanted probate. This estate was a simple one that demanded simple measures.

Luckily I was looking after a small estate but still it needed the most important piece of paper of all - Revenue Canada's "clearance certificate". Going on line I found the application form for a clearance certificate. Printed it out and sent it away. Waited three months and phoned. I was told that the person that I sent it to had approved it weeks ago but it was now with the auditor. "I will email him and ask what is going on, but if you haven't heard anything by Thanksgiving, (this was the end of August!) give us another call." Finally the certificate arrived, last week. Took the certificate to the bank. "How would you like the money, Ben?", said a smiling lady knowing damn well that she was indemnified. I smiled too I had a couple of phone calls invested, an online search and lots of conversation with bank people that had cost nothing. And the satisfaction of knowing that I had beaten the lawyers at their own game, and saved at least $1500.

See how easy it is when you do it yourself!!!!!!


Another part of my life is a job search. I have left my last job, without a sniff of another one. So the challenge now is: how does a 62 year old white guy without a degree or traceable career path get another job. I will find out. The things you come across. The last time I did this, about eight years ago the magic interview question was, "Tell us your strengths and weaknesses". This time the big question, and it is even appearing in interrogatory emails, "Tell us about a time when you had a conflict with a co-worker and how did you solve it?" What kind of crap is this? Do you have a job or not,if so can I have it, I know that you are going to treat us all like shit and not give a damn I guess the question should be, "How many times have you hit the guy next to you because he is an idiot?" When you realise that nobody is ever going to answer any of your phone calls or emails you make to inquire about the resume you gave them it is a shock to the system when it happens.

Yesterday I received a very elegant rejection slip, telling me my qualifications were impressive but they have decided to pursue other candidates. The very fact that I received a letter, on good paper, telling me that I had failed to be hired was a cause for celebration. They had answered. In fact I felt so flattered that this professional company had the poise to do this it necessitated a thank you email from me in return. Imagine thanking them for not hiring me, sounds a bit crazy to some folks.

A note for future retirees:
The greatest investment return in the world

The best investment you may ever could be right under your nose and you may not even know it. I refer to the buying back of ones pension. Anybody who has worked a number of years for a company/government and left before retirement age may be entitled to a pension. What you may not realise is that you can, in certain plans make extra contributions to buy more years.

One should look back at their working lives examine the jobs that you had where you made pension contributions. Contact the plan administrators and ask if you can make extra contributions to get more years. This is a common practice in National and State pensions, for instance I left the United Kingdom many years ago. In order to qualify for a full state pension one has to contribute for 44 years. However if one has paid13 years you can draw 25% of the full benefit. In addition you are allowed to make contributions for the missing years. In my case having paid some years already I now look at the possibility, and the efficiency, of making more payments. It will cost me $6,770 to buy the remaining seven years and if I do that will raise the annual pension payable to $7,440. A ten month payback - a fantastic return on ones money.

The last post

I am not going to be posting for awhile, but will still continue to monitor my emails (ben@eagle.ca)

The other shoe has dropped

Bye- Bye:
Now the intentions of metroland are becoming clearer. I cannot say the elimination of a local paper has been completed because I don't have a paper to prove it. But, the online edition of the "Brighton Independent" has been killed and now is part of a new edition of "Northumberland News". Pity, I enjoyed the quirkiness of the old BI and now it may be gone. Wonder how the traditionalists in Brighton feel about that.

This site:
There are problems with the comments section. I am not getting email notifications of your comments and you are not getting comments published. I don't know what is wrong but the mighty Google empire has a problem, and I am trying to get it fixed.