Big Cliff

To have a lot of money must be a wonderful thing but when is enough, enough? Most of the people I know that have a lot of money (by my standards) are always worried about keeping what they have and engrosed in finding ways to get more. No matter how much they have it never seems to be enough. Money is only good as long as it lasts. Memories are forever. Me, I'm all for memories because I'll never have a lot of money LOL.

Almost finished the second bedroom down stairs, just a little finishing touches on the trim and hang the closet doors and I'm all done there. Hope to finish the floor in the downstairs kitchen perhaps today or tomorrow. Got a few hours work "work" to do then try to get all my tax stuff together. Believe me, I'd rather be fishing but not in the rain that they are calling for today.

I don't know if that would help him, with his luck he'd probably fire the slug at the turkey, the bird shot at the deer, just as the CO walked around the corner LOL.

Perhaps I can explain it: I'm a senior, in fairly good health with two wonderful kids, grand kids, and even a couple of great grand kids. I have worked hard all my life to take care of my family, I'm very proud of them as they have done well for themselves. They now work hard to take care of their families. If and when the time comes that I can no longer take care of myself properly I would hope that (and they know this) they make sure that I am in a place where I get the care I need. To expect them to have to take on the burden of caring for me 24/7 while they have to work and care for their children just wouldn't be fair, in fact I think it would be selfish. Not only that but why would you think you would get better care at home than you could in a place with a whole staff to take care of you? Not all retirement homes are bad places, you should see the one they just built here in Lindsay. $2800.00 a month includes everything; beautiful accomodations (and I mean beautiful), support staff 24/7/365, 24/7 coffee shop, meals, a dinning room that is easily as beautiful as any fine dining restaurant I have ever been in with a menu and staff that exceeded most. House cleaning, laundry, a salt water pool, Phisio centre, nursing station, DR., theater, phone, TV.... Well, the list is huge and as I said, all inclusive! Oh, and that's for a single, double is only slightly more.

Steve Steve Steve; Man you just have to get out fishing before it's too late LOL! I do agree with you though, everytime you turn around someone up there is trying to take something from you. Our taxes keep going up and there isn't anything we can do about it. As CPH puts it, "bend over". You can keep cutting back and pinching pennies all you want, the better you get at doing that the less revnue our government and institutions are going to get so they will just raise taxes higher to off set it. What are you trying to save up for anyway, your golden years? By the time you get enough saved up to enjoy them, you'll be to old to do anything. Oh well, your kids will have fun with the money some day. I am at that point where I'm tired of working most of my life to support some politician gets more time off than the school kids do and I pay them about 3 times my annual wages to do it. The solution is simple, quit working, spend your time fishing or whatever you enjoy doing. Spend your money, go in debt to the hilt if you have to. When you aren't working anymore and all your money is gone, you will qualify for welfare. All the money you borrowed to buy new fishing gear and stuff; well now you claim bankruptsy, since you don't have a job or any resourses, you don't have to repay it. You'll get free health care, drugs, glasses, dental, and you'll get enough money to buy food, pay rent and utilities and have plenty of time to go fishing! Isn't that what you have been trying to accomplish anyway? Oh, and move to the Kawarthas and rent a nice small house now so that when you are out of money welfare will end up paying the rent and utilities for you.... Then you don't need to spend a lot of money on gas to go fishing anymore!!!!

Well, first of all I think I'd reconsider the wood stove thing. Any wood stove worth anything is going to be heavy and reduce your usable space significantly as it is going to be hot. Having to haul a supply of wood out to your hut and dispose of hot ashes "properly!" is also going to present problems and cut into fishing time as well. You'd be much better off investing in a nice wall mount propane heater that you can control with a thermostat. Exchange the AC fan for a DC one and a 12V battery will run it for a long time on one charge. I'd also consider wireing the hut for DC power so you can hook up lights, TV (DC), radio, the fan for the heater..... Many of the small generators already have 12V 8 Amp out puts on them so you could use that to recharge your battery (s). A small propane counter top stove, 2 or 3 burner, (the type used in many smaller trailers) will give you the ability to cook but also not tie up counter space when you are not cooking. If you want to get some good ideas on how to use space very efficently, take a look at some of the small camper trailers that are available, they don't waste a cubic inch of space, are light but reasonably strong and any RV place that sells them is going to have access to all the parts and accessories that you might want for your hut. Good luck and have fun with it!

That is wonderful news,sounds like prayers of thanks are in order!

All the very best!

No & No. That said however things seem to be changing and I wouldn't be surprised to see it being allowed in the not too distant future.

Well, if you really want to take up deer hunting, there ar a lot more questions that need to be answered. Where do you intend to hunt? Some areas you can't use a rifle. If you are going to hunt in tight cover a shot gun might be a better choice and a cross bow would be much easier to get than a gun (no permit required) If you are going deer hunting do you intend to hunt from a ground blind, tree stand, or stalk them? Again, your style of hunting will dictate what the best choice would be. I think a bit more research might be in order before you go off getting a rifle.

If you had suggested it before the wedding you might have saved enough to have paid for many trips (and even been able to go) LOL

Some very good points here, now that I think of it, we are probably doing a few of those things wrong! Thank you!

How do you plan for things like taxes more than doubling in the last 10 years when I am getting older and can't work two jobs anymore? My wages sure haven't doubled. I guess I could have lived in a shoe box and just put every cent I earned working two jobs into the bank so that when I can't work anymore I could afford to live in a shoe box. It has taken everything I have in me to pay my bills and support my family. i have never lived on welfair but from what I have seen, I might as well have, I know others that have and I'm not much better off than some of them. It would be easy if I could plan a budget where if I need more I just take it but today our fearless leaders just give themselves raises and pat themselves on the back and tell us they need more money to give us the services we want.

LOL, Always said I wanted to go out with a Big Bang (yours wasn't quite the kind I had in mind) but what the heck, I'm all for global warming and it would save the kids the cost of cremation!

Well, if you are thinking of Cable Cable in the Kawarthas, you might as well forget it, 24 hours later and three phone calls and still no call back from them. Rogers were fantastic, one call, got to talk to a real live well informed person, turns out I can save a bundle (only draw back is that there is a cap on up loads which is a bit of a problem for me as a friend and I tend to send some fairly large files back and forth but I think we can work around that. I will going to see Rogers tomorrow and make sure I totally understand everything.

No problem Wayne, I'll help you unload whatever you have in the box of your truck, I'll bring a big tow strap, we just put it around whatever is in the box, hook it up to my ATV, and I drive away, works almost like a dump box (with a bit of a bang at the end)

It is simple, if you are Canadian just bend over, and keep your mouth shut, it ain't going to hurt for long, you'll get use to it! What ever happened to "family first"?

Welcome to the board, sorry you are a little too far away for me to help you out with rides and all but I'm sure you'll do fine if you hang around here for a bit. Good fishing and tight lines!

As I read so many of the replies the trend seems to be consistant for the most part "we have to cut back"! Well, you are right in many cases; we cut back on our hydro usage by putting in CFC bulbs, turning off the computer when we aren't using it, doing laundry etc. during non peak periods, un plugging cell phone chargers when not in use and putting in high efficiency appliances where ever we could to name a few things. Oh but wait, Hydro isn't getting the revenu they were before so now they have to put our hydro cost up to compensate. Good deal if you can get it, provide less, charge more. When I start to look at what I am paying for things: phone/TV $112.00/month that's $1,120.00 a year. Wasn't that many years ago the only cost I had for TV was the cost of the TV set. True, I didn't have as many chanels but most of the time when I look there are only about 8 shows on at any one time, they are just spread across 36 chanels anyway. When I look at what I pay in taxes, I am working 6+ months a year just to pay my taxes, I wonder why that is? Am I so much better off than I was 40 years ago? I can't see it! I've worked two full time jobs, saved, drove old beaters, and given up a lot of things to try to make a good home for my family. The guy next door worked one job, drove old beaters sat on his deck on the weekend drinking beer. I get taxed at twice the rate, not twice as much, twice the rate he did because I chose to work harder to try to get ahead. Finally after working 45 years and saving I managed to finally buy a retirement home 10 years ago. Taxes were $1600.00 a year but because I chose to work hard and fix it up and invest in it, my taxes have now gone up to $4000.00 a year and just because I own waterfront I get assessed an extra $1200.00/linear foot of shore line/year which means I now pay taxes on an extra $90,000.00. I still get exactly the same services as the guy across the road, the same services I got 10 years ago. Sure I have gained some equity but believe me that equity has been earned by sweat and tears, mine, now I have to pay a premium? I'm 65, I should be able to retire but my pensions are only $1500.00 a month. I could bairly rent a 1 bedroom apartment and pay for food and necissaties on that so as near as I can tell I have no choice, live in poverty or work until I die. Good system we have here when Counselors make $100,000.00+ a year and all kinds of perks. There is no accountability in government, lie, cheat, steal, I'll pay your legal bills into the millions of dollars and the whole thing will just get swept under the rug even if you are guilty. Run hydro into the ground and get all kinds of bonuses then a golden hand shake and I get to pay for it. Pay to build the 407 out of my hard earned tax $ then sell it off to a private corp. so they can rape me some more! There will be a revolution some day, God grant me the life and health to see it because as I see things right now our kids don't have much of a future the way things are going.

Thanks Lew, I will look into it! Might be a good alternative for us.

Sorry to hear that your trip didn't go as you would have liked but I am glad you posted so others can be aware. I have used Anglers Haven before, now to be honest we had 6 guys in an 8 man hut. Plenty of room, accomodations were very upscale, the fishing was good and the service exceptional! But to be honest, we didn't have the same conditions you had either. Hut owners can't control the weather. What did the hut owners do for you? Were the huts clean and comfortable? Do you feel that they did their best to try to make sure you had the best experience you could under the conditions? That is the sort of things that really count!

OK, I have been with Xplornet for a couple of years now and to be honest I have been reasonably pleased with their service until just recently. When a letter to the office of the president goes unanswered for a week and on line referals don't get followed up on, I start to worry. Then to top it all off I get told that even though I have a contract "Unlimited up load, down load" they are implimenting a new "Fair Use policy" where if I exceed a specified number of GB, my speed will be cut. Not what I had signed up for! But the fine print says they can change it. I am now looking for a new internet provider but I also heard about a new phone system called Magic Jack (SP) and I am interested in finding out more about this also (I HATE Bell). So, I guess what I am looking for is some ideas. Cable Cable seems to have some very interesting packages but a call to them @ 3:00 pm today has gone unanswered. Not my Idea of good customer service! How long will it take to get a call back if I have a problem? Is Magic Jack any good? We tried VOIP here about two years ago, it was a disaster, am I heading down the same road? I know we have a lot of very smart people on this board, I need help! Opinions, suggestions very much appreciated!

There are always three sides!

Where is he located? Work experience, skills. Most Important, WHAT would he like to do? Does he have a hobby that could be converted to helping others of a like mind?

Look for two guys one short,round,and old; AKA Big Cliff (I'll be the one hugging all the beautiful ladies) (Steve, if you rat me out I'll get you back LOL)and the other short, not quite so round and much younger; AKA CPH. We are going to be there trying to win the big prize and having fun! Sorry I couldn't commit to doing the BBQ thing but it came right down to the wire if I would even be able to go or not.