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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes-Advocate, 1987-11-25, Page 4Page 4 Times -Advocate, November 25, 1987 Times Established 1873 Advocate Established 1881 Amalgamated 1924 imes dvocate Published Each Wednesday Morning at Exeter, Ontario, NOM 150 Second Class Mail Registration Number 0386.. Phone 519-235-1331 cn Bill BATTEN Editor DON SMITH Business Manager Mac 4►CNA JIM BECKETT Publisher & Advertising Manager HARRY DEVRIES Composition Manager ROSS HAUGH Assistant Editor DICK JONGKIND Vice -President SUBSCRIPTION RATES: Canada: $25.00 Per year; U.S.A. $65.00 R.I.D.E. gearing up The Ontario Provincial Police will again be speeding up their R.I.D.E. driv- er check program for the upcoming Christmas and New Year holiday season. While R.I.D.E. which stands for Re- duction of Impaired Driving Every- where is a year-round program, officers are gearing up for - more extensive sur- veilance during the next eight weeks. During the other 44 weeks of the year most of the R.I.D.E. efforts are carried out on the weekends. From now until the completion of the New Year's holiday, you can expect to be stopped at almost anytime,anywhere. As an officer of the Exeter detachment said this week, "We are liable to pop up anywhere with our spot checks. Drink- ing is not confined to the main roads, but our main object of being on the roads is to deter moreso than catch.Let's stop an accident before it happens." Drinking driving is still one of the most significant factors in about half of all fatal motor vehicle accidents investi- gated by the OPP. OPP Commissioner Archie Ferguson says, "The OPP R.I.D.E. program is an essential means of reducing the risk of accidents and fatalities on our highways at any tiny of the year." The potential for danger has tradition- ally increased during the Christmas se - son and for this reason the OPP places a high priority on taking impaired drivers off the road. In last year's blitz over the festive holi- day season, OPP officers checked 357,167 drivers across the province and charged 1,193 people with alcoholic re- lated Criminal Code of Canada driving offences. In addition to those charged, another 2,938 motorists were taken off the road with licence suspensions of 12 hours and 1,595 persons faced Liquor Licence Act charges for having alcohol easily accessi- ble to the driver. The OPP will operate a minimum of 40 R.I.D.E. check locations across Ontario every day during the holiday season, stopping more than 20,000 vehicles weekly. All available manpower aided by auxil- iary members will be committed to the program during this two month holiday blitz. The best policy for the upcoming holi- day season and then continue it for i1ie ,alance of the year should be "If you drive stick to milk or other non-alcoholic beverages", but if you must drink "get a designated driver." Just remember the life you save could be your own. Full year suspensions A misunderstanding seems to have arisen in recent court reports in this newspaper regarding the length of li- cence suspensions for drinking drivers. While the provincial court judge may suspend a driver's licence for three or six months under provisions of the Criminal Code which is federal legisla- tion, that suspension is automatically lengthened to one year by the Highway Traffic Act of the Province of Ontario. On a first conviction, an impaired driv- er may be fined up to $750 and will have his or her licence suspended for one full year. The judge has no alternative on a sec- ond offence to send the driver to jail for 14 days and suspend the licence for a per- iod of up to two years. A jail term of not less than 90 days and a driving suspension of up to three years faces a driver charged with impaired driving for the third time. In addition to impaired driving charg- es, a number of area drivers each week are issued with licence suspensions of 12 hours. Any driver who registers a warning on the ALERT machine at the roadside when stopped by an officer receives a 12 hour suspension. The driver is then taken to a police station for a breathalizer test.If the blood alcohol count is under .80, the only penalty for the driver is the 12 hour suspension. If the reading is over .80, an impaired driving charge will be issued. The main conclusion to this issue is the same as in the editorial above; if you wish to keep your licence don't mix your drinking and driving. Signs of Spring One of the signs of spring in some school systems is the big county music festival. About this time of the year we get the Sylla- bus describing all the various classifications and the little songs which the students get to labour over for many weeks before the big event. Some teachers really like to get into the festivals because they feel that the children benefit from standing up in front of a crowd, because of the exposure to good music and the values of good old-fashioned competition. Other teachers detest festivals because they fcel that children arc crushed when they lose by one mark and that competition should not enter into art. When I was a youngster the Halton County Music Festival 1• was the one in which our school participated. I can remember. be- ing part of the big school choir • T:,.. By the Way by Syd Fletcher directed by an excellent music teacher by the name of Mr. Harri- son. Hc had that group singing a song by the name of "Now thc Day is Over", singing it in beauti- ful four-part harmony. When we got to the festival and each group had done its part, the adjudicator had all five of the choirs get up, over three hundred children strong, and had us sing the whole song together. I can still remember the chills running up and down my spine as the choir began singing. All three hundred of us just poured our little hearts out. When we hit that final soft chord I believe you could have heard a pin drop, and then thewhole audience rose in a standing ovation. I'm sure that every one of those other children in the choir felt just as I did, just as if a priceless gift had been given. I would be will- ing to bet too that many of those children have gone on as I have to sing in many different choirs over the years, simply to recreate that fantastic feeling which comes with performance before a live audience. Serving South Huron, North Middlesex & North Lambton Since 1873 Published by J.W. lEedy Publications Limited mom nn/v..ww�► xova.�.�v�..�.�vexa acs�eie rf ::•:> �� f�rttttttttt "NOW, CAN YOU TELL US WHY y0U'D VOTE FOR MULRONEY AGAIN?" Househusband No wonder history is primarily "his story". Down through the ages, with a few notable excep- tions, males have been free to concentrate on important matters like politics and science and the arts because back home is a de- voted wife cooking the meals, making the beds and changing the diapers. Maryon, wife of the late Prink Minister Lester B. Pearson, was once quoted as saying "Behind every successful man stands a surprised woman". I agree with that sentiment. However, this thought has occurred to me: "Who stands behind a successful woman? Is it a surprised house- husband?" _ Men who keep the home fires burning while their wives go out to work arc becoming more nu- merous. Now there is even a comic strip called "Adam" star- ring one of this brave new breed. "What's for dinner?" is a very contentious question in our home. I must give my househus- band credit - he has a limited but quite acceptable repertoire. His meat loaf and salmon loaf, scal- loped potatoes and hamburgcr casserole would pass the most discriminating taste test, but he refuses to branch out. The very title of "The Joy of .Cooking" is an immediate tum -off as far as he Reynold's Rap by Yvonne Reynolds is concerned. The "I Hate to Cook" cookbook more accurately reflects his sentiments. Laundry - especially mine - is another of his pct hates. Many of our friends have been treated to a monologue on the difficulties of trying to unravel pantyhose that have tied the rest of the laundry into one impenetrable Gordian knot. A mesh bag solved this problem (and contributed to res- toration of amiable relationships with our longsuffering friends). Don appreciates a clean kitchen floor when he has done the scrubbing. Now he yells at me if I forget to take off my boots be- fore walking in. Strange, how one's perspective changes as one goes from walker to washer! Don is becoming quite inhos- pitable. He knows who gets stuck with the vacuuming if we invite guests. I became so tired of the sound of crashing dishes accompanied by quite unimaginative cursing emanating from the kitchen every night while I relaxed in the living room with the evening paper that I bought my househusband a dishwasher. "Peace at any price" is my motto, and this was well worth the investment. All my pockets are filled with indecipherable grocery lists. And do I hear about it when I buy the wrong thing. I keep reminding myself that my husband was not domesticat- ed voluntarily. The role was forced on him when I entered the full-time work force in 1981. Although he has been heard to say philosophically that he sup- ported me for the first 25 years, and its my turn for the next 25, he is not comfortable with the role reversal. Now I come home and he has the headache! Eight and three quarters At thc age of eight, a boy enters a wonderful phase. I don't know how long it lasts, but right now Alexander can both delight us and drive us up the wall, not ne- cessarily in that order. Actually, he insists that he is not eight, but eight and three quarters, and maybe the tuming point is near. Right now, when he is precise- ly eight and three quarters, I have begun to look through the ads in certain American magazines. You 'know the ones I mean: "Southern, Oaks Military Academy, Crack Creek, Alabama. We specialize in discipline, honour, physical fitness. Send us your wceklings, we tum them into leaders. Con- tact Colonel Rock E. Hart, C.M.H. at..." Why is it that a boy of eight and three quarters can voluntarily divide and organize his three-ring school binder into twelve neat compartments for which he wins high praise from his teacher (Bra- vo! Alexander), but cannot separ- ate his dirty (and I mean dirty) clothes from his clean ones on the floor in his'room, which drives his mother to distraction? Why is it that this eight and three quarter -year old knows how to play chess on my computer is having so much difficulty in clos- ing the outside door or flushing the toilet? Why is Alexander able to put together a complicated Lego spacecraft consisting of 350 i parts, but unable to put his bicy- cle back where it belongs? Why is it that Alexander who has to be coaxed and cajoled into practising piano every day and who protests that he hates piano lessons then goes on to win sec- ond prise in the music festival? What is it about a boy of eight and three quarters that makes him have a perfectly reasonable con- versation with his Dad about the principle of non-violence and then five minutes later beat thc living daylights out of his sister? What is it that makes him cry PETER'S POINT • compassionately whcn a puppy gets hurt in a movie and then al- most.in the same breath say that he wishes his sister were dead? Why docs a boy who remem- bers precisely what everybody promised him weeks and months ago forget what he himself prom- ised two minutes ago? Why -can he say words like "Tyrannosaurus Rex" or "extragalactic spacecraft", but not words like "please" or "thank you"? Isn't it incredible that at the age of eight and three quarters, a boy can tell exactly when twenty min- utes arc up during piano practice but finds it impossible to tell when five minutes arc up during his shower? That day after day he remembers to ask for his snack after school, but that at night he forgets to brush his teeth? That every Saturday morning at pre- cisely 10 o'clock he reminds his parents that it is allowance time, and that every Friday afternoon when he comes home and finds the garbage cans in the drivtway, he forgets to take them to the ga- rage, although that is one of his allowance jobs? And that even when he takes the garbage cans, he forgets the lids? What is it that makes Alexander so extremely clothes -conscious that he will wear only what he picked himself, but that as soon as he has wom clothes once or twice, he will either put grass or mud stains on them or leave them in school to be discovered weeks later in the lost and found box: Why is this eight and three quarter -years old too tired to get up at 7 a.m. on school days, but eager to wake up the whole house at 6 on Saturdays and at 5:30 on Sundays? Why does he never volunteer to go to bed at night, no mattcr how tired he is, and why docs he always loudly protest when bedtime is suggest- ed to him, no'matter how late? When is this boy going to learn to get along with his siblings whcn we're all in the car togeth- er? When is he going to stop hit- ting, punching, pinching, bother- ing, scratching and needling Stephanie? And when is he going to stop ridiculing, insulting, teas- ing and spitting at Duncan? And when is he going to stop blaming it all on them? Please, somebody out there tell us that nine-year olds arc evenly pleasant, and that this phase of tranquility will last for many years. We need a break in the worst way. Before the twins get to be eight and three quarters. An interesting thought just struck me. When he's double his present age, Alexander will be 17. If I'm still around by that time - and I have every intention to try - will I wish that the good old days would return? The days when he was only eight and three quarters?