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The Goderich Signal-Star, 1980-06-04, Page 21I I\ T. suddenly fear:for my identity- belching loudly and insist on wearing People are often labelled with .tagant.1sulall t -shirts $o a hairy,expansive identity relating to their work, per-, ' rnid-section would protrude:noticeably sonality, habits, quirks, physical qp- pearance or a play on their name. Writing stories, a ;column and taking Pictures for the Signal -Star, this wretched writer is in constant contact with the public andgenerally identified by profession. To most colleagues at the Star, your diligent correspondent is simply referred to as Spike. Ever since I can remember, 1 have, for some reason, .been stuck with a nickname. Each time I move on to a new stage or location in life, the new people I meet find a different narne. What is it about me that prompts others to want to call me by something other than my name? The name Spike, I would suspect, has a direct bearing on my physical stature. And yet, to me, the name Spike conjurs up visions of a broad, burly dude, pants stained with remnants of the last oil change on his motorcycle. He would have a propensity for between pants and shirt- NQW, does my figure provoke such images? The evidence would sub- stantiate that theorY• The caricature of my friend and I,that appears in the left section of this responsible piece, is also contributing to the non -entity of this scribe. Admittedly, the column has directed some recognition my way, but, to my chagrin, people are more intrigued with the silly seagull. Sample the following. On Friday evening I made a few small purchases in a store and was at the register to offer payment when,the attending lady looked at me in a wird way over the top of her glasses,. She just looked straight at me and without a smile or formal introduction flatly asked: "Are you the seagull man?" It makes me sound like the Boston Strangler or something equally as evil. It's not as if .1 prey lonely stretches of :beach ,at night in search of dead Seagulls. Soon the townfolk will lock up their seagulls at night for fear they should fall victim to the sinister SEAGULL MAN. Anyway, the question 1144 me off balance and in response I offered a weak; "Yes, I am the seagull man." At least she had the decency and social graces to refer to me as a man. That did bouy the spirit some. On a different occasion I was con- ducting personal business at the home of a man when the iecognition was somewhat embarassing. He was filling out a form with in- formation and after writing down my name stopped, as if struck between the eyes with a boulder. "Dave Sykes eh. Aren't you the guy laying down at the top of the page in the paper there? he asked. "Yep, that's me,'."I said sticking my chest out a little in the process. got up from the,:table and starting - - "Maher,. mother dime here quick. I want you to se* 'something:1*AM"; who was his wife, appeared and, Stood at the end of the room. "This is that guy. That's him, the one with the seaguIL"he said pointing an accusing finger. • Mother seemed rather intrigued by it all and smiled and went O000h, while looking me over, She didn't say anything but just smiled and waved and 1 waved back. I was rather em- barassed by it but if bother was having a good time, what the hell. But for the most part, people simply ask me where the seagull js and I suspect it's just their way of relating to me. Now Maybe if I changed the caricature to include a scantily -clad young lady along side me in the same reclining position. Nah, nobody would give me a second look. Nobody could tell, but Max Webster's lead vocalist and guitarist Kim Mitchell is 39 years old. Mitchell and the rest of Toronto-based Max Webster gave a concert at the arena on Saturday night and wowed the 700 spectators that saw them. (photo by Cath Wooden) Max packs arena BY CATH WOODEN The ,point is not whether Max Webster gave a good concert Saturday night or whether it was worth six or seven dollars to go and see them. The point is that they came to us. Places like Goderich are starving for live, name rock 'n' roll. they got it Saturday night when Shadow Produc- tions brought Max Webster and Blue Maxx to the arena. Shadow, headed by promoter Lawrence Shulman, books bands strictly in areas like this one. It was luck that Goderich became one of them. Max Webster played in Hanover on Friday night and had a date elsewhere for Saturday the 31. When the gig fell through, the band asked Shulman if there was someplace else they could play in the area, and Shulman booked them, here . Blue Maxx, a com- mercial band from Toronto, opened the concert with an energy - filled set of top 40 tunes and a few of their own numbers. Their blazing rendition of Pat Benetar's Heartbreaker failed to bring the self- conscious crowd of about 700 to its feet and the band deserved more than the polite applause they received. The four -member Max Webster strolled cooly on stage at 9:45 and proceeded to play nearly two hours of dynamic first rate rock 'n' roll. The show belonged to lead guitarist and singer, Kim Mitchell, who's informal stage presence made you feel like he was the high school rebel Turn to page 2A • Gto:hderich 132 YEAR -23 SIGNALmanim STAR WEDNESDAY, JUNE 4,1980 SECOND SECTION Say bye to commercials BY JASON AINSLIE As television viewing becomes an ever more popular pastime in Canadian homes, there may be some relief from the flood of ad- vertisements just a few months downstream. Once begun, the rescue should be a speedy one, delivering the viewer from the interruption -of sponsOL.DAMs.age.s kg..the continuity of pay television. Pay TV, also called Home Box Office in the United States, is a closed circuit, narrowcast (as opposed to broadcast) system of television. It is transmitted in the same manner as ordinary cablecast systems and hooks into . ordinary television sets. The extraordinary thing about this development is not only the absence of com- mercial advertising, but a more organized schedule oF programming as well. According to Ron McIntosh, of Southport Cable TV in Port Elgin, the Home Box Office (HBO) will telecast 24 hours each day. The difference between the HBO system and the present system, he says, is that the viewer will be able to see up to, date movies and live sports presentations such as boxing -fights which have previousl-y been shown only on closed circuit television. The channel structure for the Home Box Office will be much different. A subscriber to pay TV will buy one channel at a time for five to ten dollars per channel,per month. The composition of a channel may be totally. specialized or integrated, with subject matter ranging from movies and sports to children's shows or religious programs. Programming will be uninterrupted except for announcements between showsof upcoming eyents on that channel. • A more pertinent consideration for the Goderich area concerns the arrival of •pay television „here. And Keith Murphy, a graduate of the Conestoga College radio and television course and former employee of the CBC, says that may not be for some months yet. The networks will produce the material to be televised, he says, and then sell it to local cable television companies who, in turn, will sell it to their subscribers. In a small community like Goderich, there may not be enough of a market for the Home Box Office to be successful. If, however, there is a. market, it will probably be enough to sustain only one or two channels while city systems can float up to six channels. The marketplace is the key. In the United States, pay TV is fast becoming a 20 billion dollar industry each year, and with Canada having about one- tenth of the States' population, that could mean upwards to three billion dollars a year for Canada. And as the greatest part of the Canadian viewing population is in Ontario, Murphy calculates, it will mean more industry, jobs and revenue for the. province. This detail, however, is the hold up for the in- troduction of pay TV into Canada. The Canadian Radio - Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has the final word. on the approval of the Home Box Office. Their concern is fairness, and the hearings which are now in progress will deter- mine how the potential profits from this industry will be divided. Mr. McIntosh com- pares this to a pie. 'The CBC,CTV and Global television networks all want a slice of the pie and it is up to the CRTC to decide who will have a bigger piece' ' and how some of it will be eaten. The Canadian Con- ference of the Arts (CCA) supports pay television only insofar as it will quickly channel adequate funds into Canadian production and distribution of program material. According to the CCA, the possibility of drowning the Canadian presence in the swelling tide of American cultural, entertainment and information in- fluences poses O. very real threat. The Conference says that Canadian en- tertainers, writers, musicians, actors, dancers and other artists are being denied TV access to the Canadian public largely because of pressures from the marketplace. Mr. McIntosh and Mr. Murphy both agree that, although this is the case, pay TV will not run for humanitarian reasons alone. It will be operated as a business should be and under the regulations set out by the CRTC as well. Th e s e regulations, however, will un- doubtedly assign •a percentage of the per channel fee toward the Canadian film industry,• McIntosh added. Through this contribution (probably one dollar per subscription cAannel), the Canadian content of each channel could be up to 50 per cent by 1985, he said. The beginning percentage of Canadian content would hover around the ten per cent - mark Turn nilto pthageer 2Aeis How often such pictures flash on the TV screen. But it may soon be a thing of the past as technology makes room for its newest addition - pay television. Among the many advantages of pay TV will be the total absence of commercial advertising as well as viewer control of the subject matter of the channels. For those Interested in movies alone, there will be continuous movie channels and so on. The decision on pay TV's entrance to Canada now rests with the CRTC, the country's regulatory body for telecommunications. (Photos by Jason Ainslie) 11. -11.1000 When summer comes, it permeates my very soul. I feel warm for the first time in the year, /and I feel generous and self-indulgent af the same time. Mostly, the advent of June and hot weather evokes fond memories of summers gone by. It seems that all my memories are enshrouded in a haze of misty green and sunshine. Remember all those neat forts you built? They were in a willow tree or under an evergreen or under the picnic table with blankets hanging off of it. Once one was cbmpleted, you ate your lunch in it and then didn't know what the heck to do with it. So you transformed it into a clubhouse and founded a secret club and you were naturally president or chief or captain. You only let your very best friends join. Then the neigh- borhood bully started his own club and bribed your members away. You never darkened the clubhouse door again. Remember those special summers your family went to a cottage or you went to camp? You and your very best summer friend cut your fingers and swore' an oath that you'd never forget each other not even in a million years. You shared secrets and told tall tales about family tragedy and how much, money your dad had. For the life of you, you tan't remember any of those very best summer friend's names. Remember all the great cuts, scrapes, gouges, slivers, bruises, and bites you got every summer? Everytime you fell off your bike or stepped on a thistle, your big sister (whom everybody knew was going to become a nurse Someday) fixed you up with iodine and gauze and adhesive tape very impressively. You showed off for three days until the bandages came off, and then you showed off the orange patch where the iodine went. However, you neglectedto mention how you screamed bloody murder when your sister administered it. Remember the hikes down to the river for crayfish and clams? You brought them home in a bucket and they sat on the back porch for two weeks until your mother screamed that they smelled and she wanted her bucket back. You buried them all in the garden and had funeral services. Remember how you sprained your ankle at least once a summer swinging from the rafters of that rickety old barn? Once a summer you landed where the hay wasn't and limped honk rather.proudly. You loved that old barn because it was full of leatherly old things and rusty nails and old crocks and history. Remember those rainy days when you played school in the basement, or dtess-up, or secret agent? Remember all the freshle stands you made fortunes from and your mother had to clean up after? Remember when there was nothing to do? When there was simply ab- solutely nothing in the world to do and you were so bored you thought you would just die. When the real crux of the matter was you didn't want to do anything and every suggestion was answered with a, 'that's stupid.' Well, it -seems like there's always something to do these days whether you want to or not. Our summers are a little different now. We look forward to getting 'Gone With the Wind' read all the way through for the first time and 'Lord of the Rings' the fourth time. We work in the garden and we work on our tans. We work on improving the old golf game and take up tennis. We stay up late and; get up early, for fear of missing some of those short-lived golden rays. We hurry hurry hurry trying to get everything done. It seems the old magic has gone out of summer. cath wooden