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Times Advocate, 1989-06-07, Page 4• Page 4 Times -Advocate, June 7, 1989 Times Established 1873 Advocate Established 1881 Amalgamat d 1924 BLUE RIBBON AWARD 1985 Published Each Wednesday Morning at Exeter, Ontario; NOM 1S9 Second Class Mail Registration Number 0386. , Phone 519.235-1331 nes PCNA ;1'1;1 ROSS HAUGH JIM BECKETT Editor Publisher 8 Advertising Manager HARRY DEVRIES , DON SMITH Composition Manager Business .Manager SUBSCRIPTION RATES: Canada: $25.00 Per year; U.S.A. $65.00 Simply doing his job Doing his job and filling his ob- ligation to keep the public in- formed on what was going on. Is that a crime? The federal government and the RCMP seem to think so as they laid criminal charges against Global Television re- porter Doug Small in breaking the first news of the much publicized budget leak. Small has been charged with possession of a stolen document. First of all he didn't steal it. A copy of the summary of the budget was given to him and only God knows how many oth- er copies there. were, Now we hear Mu- tual Life Insurance employees had their hands on similar information even be- fore the television reporter did. Small probably did the government a great favour by revealing some details of the budget when he did. It forced Fi- nance Minister Michael Wilson to release the budget at least 24 hours earlier than he had planned. This was likely substan- tial in reducing the chance of anyone profiting from budget knowledge. The reporter and Mutual employees are not the only ones who apparently had advanced information. On the afternoon of April 26, before Small made his reve- lation, Air' Canada chairman Claude Taylor was hinting at a shareholders meeting that the government was all set SLAP Serving South Huron, North Middlesex & North lambton Since 1873 Published by J.W. Eedy Publications limited 1V6,. tris to sell off the remaining 55 percent of the national airline to the public. That sale of Air Canada was quickly confirmed after Small made his an- nouncement. Why should Air Canada shareholders, especially those at the board meeting have had this priviledged information. If Small is charged with possession of stolen goods, how about these other peo- ple who maybe only had the information in their heads? What will they be charge with? - It seems leaking of government secrets is getting to be more of the rule than the exception. If every reporter who got his or her hands on confidential and secret information was charged by the RCMP, the federal police wouldn't have much time left for anything else. Also, there wouldn't be many left to report the news. Doug Small is not a criminal, but a journalist doing his job to the best of his ability. Believe it or not, there is a prin- ciple accepted by almost every journalist in Canada that the public has a right to know. He became the scapegoat for an embar- rassed government that is flailing about - in its own misery looking for anyone to blame the whole fiasco on. - By Ross Haugh The roof over our heads Our house is about 150 years old. It was built in thc 1840s of 14" squared white pine logs. Built to last. Originally it had a genuine shingle roof. I know be- cause the shingles arc still there. • Under a layer of imitation shin- gles made of asphalt and a lad of galvanized sheet metal alias tin. It's the tin roof that we have to cope with today. When we bought the house seven years ago, the tin had never beennt- ed. It was battleship grey with a few little blotches and stripes of • brownish corrosion. The way - now realize - a tin roof t ..,I{)- posed to look. • spent hours deciding whether to have a , reen, blue, black or red roof over our heads. It had crossed my n.:rrl,to have all the more recent stuff removed and to restore the original wooden shin- gles. But I balked at thc cost. We votL.' for bright red. Any- thing to ' tike honest but unin- spirirw y. those of you who live it, .. 'ountry know what it takes tc 't a tradesman to look to quote you a P1 ', :i,.,. ► actually do•the job. kes patience, perseverance persuasion, that's what. \"' finally got Charlie to do the job. )n a rine summer day six years ago, Charlie and his crew arrived. In no time flat, they were done. The roof looked so beautiful that I didn't mind pay- ing the bill. We installed red shutters on the windows to match the roof. The house was gorgeous. For a fcw months. A funny thing happens in win- ter around here. it freezes. And snows. Snow and ice build up on the roof. Occasionally the snow and ice melt off the roof. I'm sure you've experienced it. Only as the snow and ice came off our roof, chips of rcd paint c . c down with it, litter- ing the lar iscapc all around the 13v spring, maybe half PETER'S POINT • by Peter Hemel the paint was still -on the roof, the other half was off, - ar. , 'lFPt'rsaki hed come by some time to look at it. A few phone calls later I must have said something that actual- ly got him to come' out. He looked at the mes, scratched his head, and said he didn't know what had happened, but he'd come over with an expert. Funny. I thought that Charlie was the expert. At least that's what I had paid him for. • A few weeks later, Charlie and the (other) expert showed up. They both looked at the roof. They both scratched their heads. Then Charlie said: "I guess maybe a coat of primer would have been a good idea. I'll do it over if you pay for the material". I just wanted the roof to be red again instead of half red and half grey. So I agreed to fork over another $200 bucks for primer and paint. Charlie and his gang scraped the roof clean and put on the primer. For a few hours we had a beige roof. Then they painted it red again. With the same paint as before; Tremglo red roof paint. The house looked gor- gcous that fall (we have pictures to prove it). - It would probably still look good if another winter hadn't in- terfered. This time the damage was fairly light. Instead of 1,000 chips of assorted sizes only 100 quarter -sized chips came down with the snow and ice. I called Charlie several times, but he never came back. So 1 hired a young fellow to patch the roof with some of the leftover paint. This has been going on for a couple of years now. Every spring the roof is getting balder. I call Charlie (who now has an answering machine): Charlie up one summer Advertising" who had painted the• blotchiest roof ,irt the township. Charlie couldn't be insulted. So I called the paint manufac- turer in Toronto. I talked with the company chemist. His first question: "Did your painter use acid to wash the roof before ap- plying the primer and the paint?" Acid? Not Charlie the expert. "That's why you have this trou- ble..It says right on the primer can to use acid before painting." The remedy? Scrape the roof again, wash it with acid, put on a coat of primer, and then paint. It would cost hie ,far more now than what I paid Charlie to start with. An expensive lesson. Fortunately there is another al- ternative. If left alone, the entire roof wiIJ be back to grey again iri a.couple of years. With blotches of brownish corrosion. The way it was meant to be . i think I'm going to let it go at that. Until i can afford to rip off the tile and the asphalt and restore the wood- en shingles. Then we'd finally have the roof this old house de- serves. It will be a pignic It's time again for one of the most popular farm -consumer oriented affairs in this part of Western Ontario. We arc talking about the Onta- rio Pork Congress which will be held June 20 to 22 at the Strat- ford Coliseum. It's the 16th straight year that the pork indus- try has been showcased. One of the aims of the Ontario Pork Progress is to promote pork to the general public. Food, with pork at its centre will be available throughout the show. This year the Meat Platter com- petition will be slightly different according to chairman Mark. Yungblut. Contestants will in- clude plant operators, meat pro- cessors, deli operators, restau- ranteers and caterers. The categories will be country bacon, pork platter and country style ham. The public will have an oppor- tunity to partake of the results when the Pork Platters are auc- tioned off on Tuesday, June 20. Another.relatcd contest will be the Whole Hog Barbecue. This will involve team effort with a maximum of eight teams. Be- cause of the long time it takes to barbecue a whole stuffed pig, there will be four persons to each team. Eight of these 150 -pound pigs will be carved and served be- tween 5 and 7 p.m. on Junc 20 for the annual PigNic. Rose Huitema, chairperson of the food committee says people coming to the Pork Congress must be convinced of pork's quality. She added, " When peo- ple get to know how exceptional our pork products have become over the Last few years, the more readily they will be accepted." In addition to the PigNic, From the editor's disk by - Ross Haugh smoked pork chops and smoked sausages will be on sale through- out the three Congress days. In order to educate not only the consumer, but the producer as well, quality breeding stock will be on display at the Congress and ultimately sold. It will be an educational display of physical attributes with superior genetic capability. An added feature of the breeder show will be a "People's Choice" where the audience will become judges. They will collec- tively select supreme champions in boars, open gilts and bred gilt classes. Looking toward the future, junior pork producers, aged 11 to 21 years of age are not forgot- ten. For them there is a special junior barrow show. The junior .participants arc expected to bring their live harrows to display showmanship as well as their judging abilities. We had a recent visit from an old friend Don "Boom" Gravett. He was in to tell us about the 28th edition of his Boom's Rec- reation Camp which is scheduled for August 13 to August 19 at the Camp Menesetung campsite, three miles north of Godcrich. A number of Exeter and area youngsters continue to go to this popular camp. Gravett started the camping event when he was rec- reation director in Exeter. It's interesting to note that the fee for a week's camping this year is $150. Boom tells us the charge for the first camp in 1962 was $12 and the Exeter Kinsmen club took care of $7 of the cost. * * * * We will get into the topic of gardening next week and another venture for us in growing large pumpkins. Before that we would like to ask for suggestions from any of our readers on how to keep rab- bits out of a garden. We don't have that problem, but our daughter in Godcrich does. She has been told to use moth balls, dog hair, garlic, cayenne pepper, Mood meal powder, fish oil fertilizer or a fence. None of the above seem to work. The problem with the fence is the rab- bits go over, under or through it. We would entertain any new ways short of a .22 bullet which her husband has already suggest- ed. Pun of the Week A long face and a broad mind can seldom be found under the same hat. We can't hide our blunders Mistakes. Everyone makes them, but some can hide them better than others. Doctors are accused of burying theirs. Law- yers can let theirs languish in jail. Plumbers flush them a Clothing «iT Wear (flat's. Grocers eat theirs: And polivi- cians count on our short methb• ries. Pity the poor journalist. Our errors appear in print, for every- one to see. Bringing the situation closer to home, about 6,(X)0 cop- ies of this newspaper are printed each week. Figuring an average of three readers per household, my boners have the possibility of being seen by 18,000 pairs of eyes. Picrre Berton, one of Canada's foremost writers and a former joumalist, was once asked to pin- point the most difficult part of the job and he replied "Getting it right". I know what he means. People seldom call up to con- gratulate us on a job well done. But misspell their names, and the phone usually rings two minutes after the paper hits the streets. I rarely refer to one long- suffering municipal politician by his right name. Fortunately, he has a forgiving nature and a good sense of humour. The last time I called to apologize for renaming him, he laughed and said "That's all right. My wife likes variety!" His son has inherited the curse. I once referred to that young man by the name of the organiza- tion he was representing rather than by the designation on his birth c e.rti(icatcT;�. Reynold's Rap by Yvonne Reynolds i have been known to forget that someone has remarried. Again, I've been lucky. The lady's husband is as gracious as his spouse. Errors slip by, despite the ut- most vigilance. Proofreading was given high priority at this paper after a story on a six - candidate confirmation service appeared under the heading "Sex confirmed in Dashwood". (Ap- parently church attendance shot way up for awhile afterward.) Luck again. This happened long before.' started to work here. i can also make mistakes with pictures. i recall the time i took just one hasty shot of a man who aired his opinion at a public meeting. When the picture was processed, the subject looked like an inmate of an institution for the criminally insane. One eye. was closed, and the other was rolled up so only the white was showing. As 1 needed the photo. 1 asked a staff member with an artistic flair to see what she could do. A few quick scrapes with her sharp knife, and. she opened the one cyc. She then added a pupil and retina to the other. Not until two a.m. thc following moming, long after the paper had gone to press, did I wake up in a cold sweat with a terrifying possibility rac- ing around in my head. What if thc poor man only had one good eye! I even went so faras to give an alias to a member of the local OPP detachment who appeared in one of my pictures. I like to live dangerously. Sometimes after the T -A out and a blunder leaps page to hit me between the eyes; I have the feeling some •n be- ing temporarily inha' J my body. i could not poi - lily have made such a boolx,;+. The next time you arc sweeping one of your mistikc undcr•the rug, or protecting it a stone wall, think of us u+,lrnalists,. writhing and squire ling in the merciless spotligt)t ( , I the printed page. And forgive us our press passes. 1r