Big Cliff

I have done many but since we got CAA why bother unless I am in a hurry. However to behonest I think I have only had one flat in the past 10 years and even that was a slow leak with a nail in the side wall (thanks to our local land fill insisting I had to take weeds up to the dumping face) and I just went to our local Nissan dealer. Only cost me $300.00!

So why not just increase enforcement and fines to increase revenue?

Learn to use your mirrors! I can't even back up a trailer without them anymore (well I can but it isn't pretty)

$2.00, $2.00, $2.00! There never seems to be an end to the amount of user fees we get charged. "User Fee" is just another way of applying a tax on top of a cost so you can tax the extra $2.00. I guess they have to do something to replace the tax revenu they aren't collecting since gas prices are dropping and more people are quitting smoking.

Oh ya, well I still remember "crank phone", "Betty would you ring Harry for me please"/ "Sure Cliff but Harry is over at Jim's, I'll ring him there for you". God honest truth!!!!! (and the kids today think social media is a new thing LOL. Or two rings was us, three rings was the Petersons, 1 ring was the Dobsons...... We didn't need Facebook or Twitter, whe had the party line!

Anything for one of your smiles Joey!

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My heart goes out to you, I know the feeling all too well, violated is the best word I can think of to describe it! Report it to the police, I realize it isn't worth putting in an insurance claim on it but at least the cops will know what to watch for. The people that did this to you are doing it to others. Watch pawn shops and things like Kijiji for someone selling a generator and post as much information on here as you can to help identify the stuff that was stolen. I hope you get your stuff back but just remember; the bad karma isn't yours, it is theirs!

Perhaps the type of fishing Lew; there are a lot of zebra mussles in Sturgeon and I am constantly dragging a jig through the weeds and over logs. if I get a nick in the mono I can feel it just by running my fingers over it but I couldn't with the braid. I did like the line for it's casting ability and solid hook sets but I just found I was loosing too many fish that wern't snapping the line, it would suddenly just let go like it was a piece of thread.

Well, my experience was with PP and I wouldn't go back to it if you gave it to me for free. Nothing worse than fishing for a couple of hours, hooking into a decent fish and having your line just let go like it was a piece of wet pasta.

X2 on the braid, had a really bad experience with using a braid, lost several fish and some good tackle, changed back to a mono, reduced the problem significantly!

Now that PS sure made me laugh I am really glad to hear that you are making such great progress my friend, keep it going! Cliff

Good catch Lew, thanks for the heads up!

I want to thank each and every one of you for your kind words, prayers, phone calls, PMs, and emails but most of all for your understanding and forgivness! There isn't much anyone other than God and the Doctors can do so we will put our trust and faith in their hands and just try to make each and every day count and try to keep a positive attitude. Thanks again everyone!

Mods, please lock this thread down, it wasn't a good idea to start but now it is just going from bad to worse. I am embarrised enough!

I am sorry if I haven’t seemed myself lately, I haven’t been myself! A lot of things have been piling up and I think the stress and fatigue have made me lash out when I normally would have looked at things with a much more positive and sensitive attitude. Our daughter was recently diagnosed with non Hodgkin’s lymphoma; she is only 38 and handling it like a trooper. Me, I am having a harder time of it. Any of you with kids know how helpless a dad can feel when you can’t fix things for your kids. This past fall Sue developed more heart issues and because of her previous heart surgeries there were a lot of complications. They operated on her on Monday but had to abort the operation because things started to go badly. They were able to resolve one of the issues but not the other so she is left with her heart only pumping about 30% of what it should be. You have no idea how many times I wake up during the night and reach over to see if she is still breathing. Our police officers are getting gunned down in the streets, our kids are getting stabbed and shot in our schools, our soldiers are getting killed on Canadian soil by an enemy we can’t even see. This isn’t the Canada I was born and grew up in! The Canada I grew up in a fight in school resulted in a bloody nose; you didn’t mess with the Police, they were respected; and a soldier could wear his/her uniform anywhere without fear of being targeted by some nut. Yes, it does bother me that we have made so many changes to our way of life, things like the Lord’s Prayer, Christmas pageants, standing at attention and singing O’Canada at the start of the school day. These were all part of growing up for me, they were a way of life and it was a good life. I have watched as we have gone from saying Merry Christmas to “Happy Holidays” because we might offend someone. (Well you know what I mean, there is nothing to be gained by re hashing it all) Perhaps it is because of my age; might just be the stress and pressure lately; probably a combination but I feel scared for the first time in my life. It feels like everything I love and hold dear to me is in jeopardy and I am helpless to stop it, it makes me angry because I am not use to being helpless. So, if I have offended or insulted anyone I truly apologize, those of you that know me know that I have never looked down on anyone unless it was to offer them a hand up. I have never judged anyone by their color, race, nationality, or religion. To the moderators and all than have responded to my recent diatribes; thank you for your tolerance and keeping things civil. Reading and re-reading all the posts and responses provided gave me an opportunity to reflect on a lot of things while I sat in the cardio unit for 12 hours waiting for word on Sue. She is home now and while she has a way to go we are headed in the right direction. Sincerely Big Cliff

Lew that is fantastic news, I am so very happy for you both!

Cliff, I know you to be a very wise and well educated man and if you say that this works then I guess it will. It is a fact though that 13.7% of new immigrants are unemployed. To be considered unemployed they have to be looking for work but not have found it so they didn't come here with jobs already lined up. It is also a fact that we are only creating 156,000 new jobs a year and the number of new immigrants is almost double that. How long do you think we can sustain bringing in twice as many new people as we are creating jobs? It just doesn't make sense but perhaps my old school math doesn't work anymore!

And ccmt did put it very well, it still doesn't answer my question though; if we are bringing in more people than we are creating jobs in a given year, who is going to end up paying to support these new people? Our health care system is over loaded today, where are we going to find enough hospital beds and health care professionals to care for this huge increase? One of the reasons that Canadian families have cut back on the number of children they have is because they just can't support more children. Bringing in more people is just a short term fix, there will be a saturation point then all heck will break loose!

Well, I started enjoying halloween and going trick or treating 65 years ago, my kids did it, my grand kids did it, and this year my first great grand daughter did it! It's a tradition in our house hold!

Yes, and many countries have much higher standards of training. Why do so many Canadian Dr.s go elsewhere for specialized training? Sorry but your argument doesn't hold water.

Oh crap, wife said don't forget to move the clocks so I moved the kitchen one to the bedroom, the bedroom one to the dining room, the dining room one to the kitchen..... Ya got to be more specific with us old guys

Roy, I don't have a PROBLEM with immigration! My problem is in understanding how we as a country are going to be able to continue being one of the best places to live if we continue to bring in more people than we can support! As Spincast put it: Maybe instead of having a doctor drive us to the hospital in taxi cab to wait for 5, 10 hours or several days, he or she could treat us upon arrival? Even between provinces many accreditations are not recognized never mind foreign countries. Some of these countries have better education than we do! Our health care system is considered one of the best but how much longer will that be the case if we bring in more people than our economy can support? We are currently ranked 24 out of 34 countries for the highest tax rates (not the right end of the scale to be at). How much more can we give before we have nothing left to give? I have been working since I was 15 years old, I am 68. For 53 years I have contributed and paid my taxes but today my combined pensions are under $1000.00 a month, a new immigrant coming to Canada gets more than I do, why?

http://www.digitaljournal.com/news/politics/canadian-government-seeks-to-bring-in-285-000-immigrants-in-2015/article/412401 Now, the birth rate for all of Canada 2013/2014 is 385,937 and the Conservatives want to bring in 285,000 new immigrants in 2015, even if we subtract the deaths; 256,721 that is 414,216 new mouths to feed in one year. That is 414,216 new bodies entering our health care system in one year (and you wonder why you have to wait 5+ hours to be seen in emergency). Since the death rate in Canada for 2013/2014 was 256,721; and since the average life expectancy in Canada is 80, I think it might be safe to extrapolate that the majority of deaths would be people born about 80 years ago (established Canadians). That would leave us with a net growth of 129,216 established Canadian families but more than twice that in new immigrants. (which might explain why we are losing ground when it comes to our customs and traditions) Now I understand that Canada is a land of immigrants, heck my great grandfather emigrated here from England in the early 1800s. I don’t have anything against someone wanting to come to Canada to try to make a better life for themselves or their families. What I am having trouble understanding is why are we allowing so many new immigrants in? We have kids graduating college and university that end up having to take jobs working at or slightly above minimum wage because that is all they can find. Over the past year the labour market has only added 156,000 new jobs (according to the Canadian Labour Congress) and the majority of those jobs were in accommodation and food services, a notoriously low paid and precarious sector. The unemployment rate for recent immigrants (less than 5 years) stood at 13.7%, compared to 6.5% for Canadian born workers, (according to the Canadian Labour Congress). If that is accurate, it means that about 39,000 of these new immigrants are not going to find work, who is going to have to pay for them? I think it is wonderful that we want to help those less fortunate than ourselves but I also believe that we have to make sure that we take care of our Canada first!