The Rural Voice, 1998-03, Page 14WINGHAM
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10 THE RURAL VOICE
The World from Mabel's Grill
"As if cattle prices aren't bad
enough," grumbled George
McKenzie the other morning, "those
Texas cattlemen had to go and sue
Oprah Winfrey. We'll be lucky if the
whole continent doesn't turn into
vegetarians
before this
mess is over."
"Yup,"
agreed Dave
Winston as he
mopped up
some coffee
he'd spilled
with the
opinion page
of the Toronto
Star, "you
can't get the
better of those
media people
no matter
The world's
problems are
solved daily
'round the table
at Mabel's
what you' do.
They get the final word, no matter
whether what they say makes sense
or not."
"Especially not Oprah," said
Molly Whiteside, as she brought over
a cloth to help Dave clean up, then
refilled his cup. "People follow
Oprah like sheep. If she says a
certain book is good, three million
people rush out to buy it. If she
endorses some crazy diet, people will
be on it by tomorrow. I swear if she
said eating earthworms was the
newest trend fishermen would be out
of bait."
"Didya see where some futures
trader in Chicago sold off his cattle
futures just because he heard she was
going to talk about beef and mad cow
disease?," said Cliff Murray. "He
knew she'd wreck prices."
"And she ends up looking like the
underdog on this," growled George.
"She's the millionaire who cost the
Texas cattlemen millions and yet the
media makes it look like they're
picking on her."
"If you're a farmer, you're always
going to look stupid when the media
gets hold of you," said Cliff.
"Yeh, they're so smart and we're
so stupid," said Dave, "but if they're
so smart, how come they don't know
enough to come in out of the rain. I
mean there was Peter Mansbridge
standing out in the cold in Montreal
for days on end during the ice storm.
So how was our news coverage
supposed to be better because he was
shivering in front of an icicle in
Montreal than if he'd been in a warm
studio in Toronto? I mean you didn't
see the farmers in eastern Ontario
outside unless they had to be."
"And after that he went down to
Washington to hang out around the
White House like he was Bill
Clinton's private parts or
something," said Cliff.
"Yeh," said George, "talk about
dumb. All those American news
anchors could have been down in
warm Cuba covering the Pope's visit
and instead they rush back to
Washington to stand out in the cold
just because they hear the president
got randy again. What'd they expect
to find, him performing on the lawn
with some tour guide? Me, I take the
Pope and Havana weather."
"They probably loaded up on
Cuban cigars before they went
home," Dave said.
"I don't know, U.S. customs
might have thought it would under-
mine democracy if they had a few
cigars in their luggage," said Cliff.
"Did you ever think that if Castro
really wanted to take over the U.S. he
could do it by putting some sort of
drug in all those Cuban cigars half
the big shots in the U.S. manage to
get hold of?" asked Molly.
"Maybe he has and that's why
Clinton can't control himself,"
George said.
"Man, I wish I could get my boar
to be as randy as that guy," Dave
said.
"How come our politicians seem
to be so well-behaved these days?"
Wayne Bruce wondered. "We
haven't had a good sex scandal in
years.
"Yeh," said Cliff, "What's wrong
with Noble Villeneuve, for instance?
Isn't he in charge of rural affairs?"
"That's why people come in
here," Mabel said, "to find out about
the rural affairs."
"Hell, Clinton's got nothing on
Paul Martin," griped George. "He
manages to screw a whole country
about this time every year. It's called
income tax."
"Man, if they have to do it on
paper, Canadians really are as dull as
they claim," Dave said.0
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