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The Brussels Post, 1974-02-13, Page 2Me 0,omc ovit to hel $.4 uplc './4 hos 100 • a B li t is [9:_ogr t st Hot rvic • re rdn f (t".i. 80 ttast rvic ph3 eral Ho lesig (.7 xpe ospi ome eed nip m Ho s larg crc i<vv ,‘ospit `41st ardi ho o me 9,rogr One omc ,,'wear aric, it 4 oct '1 om er orn; nde isitt oni aye - ere, .to I rs. '‘''rare rod coup s' the sych Sugar and Spice By Bill Smiley Women, as any man can tell you, are a mixed blessing. And every women is' a different mix. Some• are like beer. They slake your thirst, but make you feel a bit logey, and you wind up with a headache. Others are like an 8 to 1 niartini: cold, very dry, and they hit you right between the eyes. This is an interesting metaphor, but I think I'll pursue it some other day. Like when Women's Lib has crumbled back into a cringing sounding-board for male egos. Don't hold your breath waiting for that column. Anyway, there I was, living the happy, blissfully peaceful, sordid life of a guy who is batching it. Newspapers all over the floor, ash-trays looking like Mount Vesuvius, dishes in the sink• piled so high I couldn't see the taps. Cosy, like. My wife seemed to be so fascinated by her grandson that I thought this idyllic existence might go on for months. I'd make a duty call everysecond night or-so, and, as a matter of course, ask her if she missed me. "No", she'd reply cheerfully. One night I got carried away, and told her that I missed her. Ah, fatal error. "You do?", she chirruped. "Yeah. Well, you know. It's not the same without you," thinking of the facts: a pile of soiled socks; down to my last shirt, the one with the peekaboo look where the seams, are ripped; nothing but TV (ecccch!) dinners for the last four days. She took another, romantic meaning, and it didn't help when I' added, in jest, "Yep, and I'm sick of that big, strapping blonde I had to hire to do the housework.' Maybe she's only 28, but I think that bosom of hers is practically obscene. She should be in burlesque." My wife was home on the next bus. It didn't seem to help her normally furious disposition that I was out culling when she arrived. She was completely unsympathetic when I got home at midnight and explained the hour by telling her that I'd had to go through the usual exchange of chewing gum, inanities and recipes for cheap wine that we male curlers have to put up with after each game. She was reading a book when I came in Dangerous sign. "Hello, Bill", without looking up. Icicles. Proffered kiss was offered a forehead. Then the dam broke. The deluge began as a low, penetrating monotone, and built up into something closely akin 'to a fire siren. ' "How can you be so filthy?" This was `the theme of the ensuing monologue, during which your faithful servant stood' around with rosebud mouth and baby blue eyes agape, an innocent and a broad. Now, look. There wasn't a dirty dish in sight (though she did find some in the cellar-way.) I'd run the carpet sweeper over a couple of dirty-grey spots on the rug. I have no sense of smell, so how could 1 know that, the whole joint smelled like a cat-house? I hadn't made the bed for three weeks, but, hell, We changed our sheets ..only once a month in prison camp. So, O.K., her plants were dead, but who can think of watering plants when his mind is filled with anguish of the human race and whether or not the Leafs are going to make the playoffs?. What am I supposed to do, just because her feet go "Squish, squish", when she walks around the kitchen floor? It never bothered me. I wore my toe-rubbers. Dust? What dust?as she writes her name on the coffee table. Beer bottles? What beer bottles? They're all down the cellar except those three on the counter. I was pretty hurt and disappointed, I can tell you. I had sweated and slaved and torn my guts out for at least twenty minutes, gprucing up the place so she wouldn't have a mess to come home to. I didn't make that mess behind the downstairs toilet and then pull the toilet-lid cover down to hide it. The cat did. I didn't break that saucer in her favorite coffee set. The cat did. I didn't put that burning hole in the rug. It was the cat'. He was smoking a cigar-butt , he'd picked up on the street. My wife is the type who has the kitchen floor so clean you can eat off it. So, who wants to eat off the kitchen. floor? • To, the editor Citizens of Brussels: As people interested in main- taining the character of the small -villages of rural Ontario, we found John Rutledge's letter (Jan. 30 issue) worthy of attention.. It is a fact that villages such as ours are either dying out or are being 'transformed into quaint anomalies by city people who have no roots in the' area. As illustrations of this point, We 'Offer Bayfield and Elora. The alterna- tive to creating such a contrived atmosphere lies in a concentL rated ; united effort from within, to preserve Brussels as it was and I. We feel that John Rutledge's ideas reveal such an attempt and as such, deserve consideration. Citizens of Brussels; it is your choice. Is Brussels going to live lip to its boast as "Ontario's prettiest village" or will it become one More worn-out . reminder of the past? \tonne MeCtitch eon David Brister Brussels Post 411111M WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1974 BRUSSELS ONTARIO ) Serving Brussels and the surrounding community. Pidlished each Wednesday afternoon at Brussels, Ontario by McLean Bros.Publishers, Limited. Evelyn Kennedy - Editor Tom Haley - Advertising ,:Member Canadian Community Newspaper Association and ' Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association. Subscriptions (in advance) Canadar$6.00,a year, Others $8.00 a year, Single Copies 15 cents each. Second class mail Registration No. 0562. Telephone,887-6641. The travelling salesman Around here people are indoors during the winter more than any other time of year. Farmers can't get out on the land because it's frozen (it wasn't until recently, but it is now). That's probably why at this time of year, every year, a particular type of travelling salesmen come out of the cities (or wherever they headquarter) and head for the small towns and concessions. They know • they'll have a relatively captive audience stuck at home during winter days and nights. They move into a rural territory, headquarter in a small town and push like crazy to make sales. A man, we know in Nile Township was visited last week by two insistent life insurance salesmen for an American Company. They used an old con trick - telling the local man that his neighbours had all taken 'out insurance with their company. ."Yup, we sold Joe Blow down the road a policy and he asked us to call on you and offer' you the same good deal". The farmer we talked to in Nile asked to see a copy of the contract, which would obligate him to $18.60 'a month in payments for life insurance. No dice, the salesmen refused. He also said that if he did buy he'd like more coverage than the $10,000 policy they were pushing. Again the salesmen weren't interested. They also refused to let the man read the insurance policy and wouldn't really discuss the details of coverage. Instead the salesmen spouted terrible warnings about the fate of those without life insurance and kept bugging the man to sign. Our friend, who spent.over an hour listening, said he'd think about it and asked them to leave a copy of the policy and come back in a few days. "This is your one and only chance" said the salesmen, again putting on pressure instead of giving the straight facts about their policy. This farmer later asked a doctor he knew about this insurance company. The Dr. said he'd found them very hard to deal with in his medical practise. "They always wanted much more in the way of proof about an injury than any other insurance company", the doctor said. Well, our friend got rid of the life insurance salesmen, but quite likely some of his neighbours gave in to their pushy sales pitch. The product these pushy people are insisting you buy from life insurance to encyclopedias, isn't really important. The salesman doesn't even want to talk about it. What these fast-buck artists are selling is a way to improve your image of yourself. — You'll suddenly be safer and keep up with the neighbours if you buy insurance. You'll be instantly knowledgeable and will stop denying your children if you buy a set of encyclopedia. It just ain't that simple. Beware of the groups of salesmen that parachute in to a small area — fan out over a section of the country, sell all the people they can in a week or so then move on to another county and other suckers and are never heard from again. Consult Consumer Reports - a yearly buying guide With unbiased advice based on scientific testing and analysis which is available at any library, before buying insurance or anything eke. Any salesman who won't let you read a contract Or test his goody should be laughed out of your house. Most 'important, buy from local people — not only do you know there' and the manner in which they serve your community but even more important! you'll know where to find them if anything goes Wrong.