Giveaways at Tim Hortons

Advice from Mom
By Rita Lessard

By now, everybody knows about the incident where that employee gave out a free Timbit to an 11-month old baby. In this Sunday’s edition of the London Free Press, a woman wrote in to say she has the solution: she suggests that since Tim Horton’s has a box for people to put donations in for their camp charity, they should also put a donation box beside each one for babies so they can get free Timbits.
Surely you’re kidding. Who, the heck in their right mind gives babies Timbits in the first place? Don’t babies eat baby food until they’re a certain age? I had five babies, and I don’t recall giving them sweets at such an early age.
Back to the topic of the poor single mother who was fired because of her actions, I agree it was a bit harsh, but it wasn’t right and she got caught. I really don’t think she was teaching her children a good lesson when telling the world you can give free stuff away out of the goodness of your heart at the expense of your boss’ pocketbook.
I’ve worked at Tim Hortons for almost nine years, and believe me, it’s been the best job I’ve ever had. Working the night shift, I get to see people put on their stupid-hats and think I’m working at the men’s mission and I’m there to give them day old free product (the rules are, we have to throw old product away). Sorry, folks, but I can’t and won’t do it.
I remember instances where grocery store owners would complain that people would take or, for lack of a better word, steal the fruit, for example grapes or cherries. I believe a lot of people have done this and perhaps still do, but it doesn’t make it right and it is especially wrong to do it in front of your kids.
Sometimes I think people don’t come to Tim’s for the coffee, but for what they put in it. We seldom get orders for black coffee; the most popular is double cream, double sugar, but as long as we start your day off with whatever fix you need, we’re only too happy to oblige.
Although it hasn’t been the easiest job I’ve had, it definitely has been the most challenging; every day is a new adventure. Who would have thought working a job so many consider “lowly” would bring such satisfaction?
So do come in and sit a spell, and hopefully you will have a good day.
P.S. Happy belated birthday, Joan. Thanks for being such a great sister!

The grand prize: a rooster that lays eggs

Keeping the Peace
By Tom Lessard

Years ago Bill Brady, the announcer for CFPL 980 radio, ran a fundraiser for Sick Kids called “The Bunny Bundle.”
Listeners of all ages found different ways of raising money. The fundraiser ran for years.
One night, after work at the Dufferin, the staff was sitting around having a well-earned staff drink. I happened to mention that I was looking for a way to raise money for the cause. One of the waitresses’ husbands (a farmer) was there to pick her up. He stated that he had an old rooster that he didn’t want, and if I wanted it I was to come out to his farm later in the morning and help him catch it.
I arrived at his farm at about 10 a.m. We used an old cabbage crate (which still had a few leaves in it) to put the rooster in for transporting it. I drove back to the hotel and installed the crate on top of the bar piano. The rooster didn’t seem to mind. Next, I went across the street to the little grocery store and purchased six eggs. These I also put on top of the piano.
I started selling tickets at noon for a quarter each, and by 5 p.m. I had raised $99. The draw was made. A fellow in the bar won the first prize: the first half-dozen eggs a rooster ever laid. The second prize – the rooster – went to a fellow who lived in Huron Park but had left earlier. So I loaded the crate and rooster into my car and drove over to the winner’s home, knocked on the door and waited.
His wife came to the door. I told her that her husband had won the rooster. She said, “What the heck am I supposed to do with that thing?”
I suggested she could sick it on him when he got home, and quickly left.
We received a certificate of appreciation from the charity in the mail a week later, but I have no idea whatever happened to the rooster.

A tribute to the Regiers and friends

View from the Strip
By Casey Lessard

It’s not often Grand Bend attracts attention on a national stage. Last summer, the country watched Grand Bend and Mt. Carmel for a horrible reason: the murders of Bill and Helene Regier. Friday night, my work covering their murders for the Grand Bend Strip was honoured nationally when I received the Canadian Community Newspapers Association Award for Outstanding Reporter Initiative. I took the stage with event host Ralph Benmergui and thanked my mom, Anjhela, and the Regier family.
Here’s what the judges had to say:
“There were many stellar entries in this category this year. The writing was absolutely superb and the initiative shown by reporters across the country is fantastic.
“This award goes to those reporters who went beyond normal reporting to give their readers something that was important, relevant, and compelling.
“First place: Casey Lessard of the Grand Bend Strip. Faced with murder story that was breaking nationally, Casey decided to tell the story of the victims through the eyes of the friends and neighbours who knew them. Through a series of one-on-one interviews presented in the newspaper in a Q&A format, Casey presented a poignant and fitting tribute to the murdered couple.”
Thank you to the Regier family, and to the people who opened their hearts to tell their memories of Bill and Helene. This award honours your stories.

Reading between the labels

Alternative View
By Anjhela Michielsen

Consumers have power. Using buying power in a capitalist economy as an active way of creating social change and is one of the most underused forms of expression, and yet en masse it is so powerful.
Our economy is built on supply and demand. Wal-mart started carrying organic produce in Canada in 2006 after the company realized the market demand. The fact that the giant retailer is carrying organic produce - food favoured by people who care about the earth, good environmental stewardship, and fair trade - is a laughable concept; their sale of the food is an attempt to portray Wal-mart as having good environmental and ethical standards, a form of green-washing for the benefit of those who demand such products. Considering the environmental damage caused by Wal-mart (as an example, “new stores built [in 2007] alone consume enough electricity to add about 1 million metric tons of CO2 to the atmosphere” – Stacy Mitchell, grist.org) and human rights violations committed in its name (Norway’s federal pension fund dropped its investment in Wal-Mart, citing “serious” and “systematic” human rights violations in Wal-Mart’s supply chain - New York Times, May 4, 2007). Yet Wal-mart has added organic products to its shelves because of consumer demand for the products. Our free market economy leaves business to govern themselves, creating a conscience-less money-making machine. This puts consumers in the position of making the crucial decisions about the products they buy, a power which many people do not exercise.
More than 70 per cent of Wal-mart’s goods come from China; in fact, if Wal-mart were a company, it would be China’s sixth largest trading partner, ahead of Germany, the United Kingdom and Canada (wakeupwalmart.com). The Boycott Products Made in China campaign has listed some crimes that are being committed in China and how buying products made in China supports this corruption. Buying a product made in China supports the “suppression of democracy and freedom, wholesale and indiscriminate use of the death penalty, commercial harvesting of transplant organs of executed prisoners, denial of basic rights to Chinese workers and farmers, nationwide forced abortions and sterilizations, sweeping and brutal repression of all religions, criminal psychiatric abuse of political prisoners, routine torture of prisoners, military occupation and genocide in Tibet, draconian repression in East Turkestan, military expansion and aggression, world’s tightest Internet censorship (and) the largest dealer of “Weapons of Mass Destruction” to rogue states” – to name a few (www.boycottmadeinchina.org).
People suffer when we financially support China’s economy and its present government.
People are suffering here, too, as a result of our actions. Too often we hear of lay-offs in industry jobs and plant shut-downs in Ontario, because domestic companies can’t compete with lower-priced off-shore competitors.
Boycotting Chinese products, as well as most foreign made products, can be very discouraging for consumers but, with some research and sacrifice, it is possible. If everyone stopped buying products made in China there would be no market for products made under the supervision of this oppressive regime.
Support our local communities. It’s better for our neighbours and the environment, too.
Useful websites:
http://www.boycottmadeinchina.org/
http://www.made-in-china.com/
http://www.walmartwatch.com/
http://www.canadianmade.com/

Letter to the Editor - May 14, 2008

To the Editor,
Last Wednesday I had the privilege of attending a conversation about Free Trade and Food Sovereignty. The speakers were Ubali Buerrero, a woman representing a farmers’ organization in the Mexican state of Guerrero, Miguel Conlunga, of the Democratic Front of Chihuahua, and Allan Slater, an Oxford County farmer and team member of the Christian Peacemakers.
We heard about the erosion in many countries of food sovereignty and the plight of small farmers around the world, who are forced to sell cheaply regardless of the costs of production. Many countries must now import food staples, and in the midst of world hunger, grain crops are grown to “feed machines rather than people.” Increasing food prices, privatization of water, and in some places victimization and violence toward farmers who attempt to resist these trends add to the gloomy picture.
Though our own situation is far less dire than some that we heard about, we too are feeling the bite of these changes. Recently the farmers at Sunnivue Farm in Ailsa Craig (http://www.sunnivue-farm.on.ca) received an apologetic letter from their flour suppliers, who find it necessary to raise drastically the price of the organic flour they sell. As a result, a loaf of Sunnivue bread will have to cost more.
Ellinor, baker-in-chief at Sunnivue, laments this increase. In all her years of bread-baking, she has never before had to raise the price. Despite the high quality of the ingredients and the labour-intensive process, despite sharp increases in the price of electricity and worries about the supply of honey, she has always felt that bread should be as affordable as possible.
Truly we are united with farmers and other families in Mexico and many other countries as we face challenges to our easy access to affordable and nutritious food. Perhaps our best hope lies in dialogue such as that undertaken last Wednesday, giving us the opportunity to compare experiences and to support one another in asserting the value of small-scale farming and the rights of all to clean water and decent food.
Sally Vernon
London

Moms say the darnedest things

True stories from the front lines of motherhood

Advice from Mom
By Rita Lessard

Motherhood. What a great adventure it has been for me; I wouldn’t change my station in life for anything. Mothers come in all shapes and sizes – physically and mentally. My mother was a self-taught woman of her generation. Although she didn’t have a lot of formal education, she was quite smart in my eyes. She was fortunate enough to read and write, and she read a lot and became quite smart. As clever as she was, she used to say the darnedest things. For example, she’d say, “If you fall out of that tree and kill yourself, don’t come crying to me.”
My mother was quite concerned about conserving energy. She was always saying, “Shut that door. Do you think I’ve got the money to heat the street?” Sometimes I think she got a little confused. For instance, she’d say, “Would you look at the dirt on the back of your neck?” Oh yeah, mom!
As a mother, I had a hard time leaving my kids in the care of a babysitter or even in Tom’s care. I just couldn’t get enough of the joy of their presence. On one occasion, I went away for a day and left Tom in charge of Tommy, who was about two, and Glenn, who wasn’t quite a year old and still in diapers (the cloth ones). So I said to Tom, “You might want to give Glenn a bit of prune juice as he seems to be slightly constipated.” He says, “Yeah, yeah, go already. We’ll be fine.”
Off I go and have a lovely time. When I get back, I asked Tom how the day went and he says, “Well, it wasn’t too bad, except for Glenn’s condition. Since you told me to give him some prune juice for his constipation…” Yes? “Well, he liked it so much, I filled his bottle up and he drank the whole thing. First thing I know, he’s getting rid of his constipation and he’s got it all over himself, it’s in his hair and straight down to his toes. It’s like a volcano all over the place. But he’s fine and happy and I got the mess cleaned up, but I think you might want to get rid of some of the clothing because that purple isn’t coming out.”
My God, sir, he could have killed him! It all worked out, though (literally), because Glenn’s still around to tell the tale.
I hope everyone had a great Mother’s Day. Keep smiling and enjoy every moment of your children’s lives (good or bad). They don’t stay young forever and before you know it, they’re parents themselves. Vengeance can be sweet!

A little prank

Keeping the Peace
By Tom Lessard

A lot of life spilled through the doors of the Dufferin, most pleasurable, but some not so.
I remember one time early in July of 1970 or 1971, Gig, Des and I planned what we thought was a funny prank. The 12th was coming soon (Editor’s note: July 12, 1690, Protestant King William III - on his white horse, as the legend goes - and his armies defeat the Catholic Jacobites at the Battle of the Boyne), and knowing there were a couple of Irish Catholics who enjoyed a drink or two in the pub, we dreamed up a surprise. My job was to rent a white horse from a farmer down the road. Gig was to play King Billy and Des was to play a drum.
Fortunately the two Irish gentlemen were in the pub when the day arrived. When we brought that horse inside the front door and out the back, all hell broke loose! These gents came running out and started pelting the three of us with stones from the parking lot. Little did we know that the man who owned the horse was visiting the garage across the street. The farmer hollered at us, “Get that horse back to the barn and don’t ever rent another from me again!” The two gentlemen were gone when I got back from taking the horse home.
King Billy and his entourage not only got stoned by the poor Catholic boys, but we helped to empty one of the bar’s kegs. We were happy go lucky RCR soldiers, so we enjoyed the day and started planning future pranks.
If you enjoy this newspaper, please write the publisher or email him. Contact information is on the bottom of page two. Also, if you have a story, don’t be shy. Happy Victoria Day everyone!

What to do about China

View from the Strip
By Casey Lessard

I wanted to briefly discuss the Olympic torch relay and the debate over how best to solve the human rights crises caused by China. While Tibet has been the prime concern for Western activists, we can’t forget that Darfur continues to be an unsolvable problem at the United Nations Security Council because of China’s oil interests in Sudan.
So what do we do? Boycott the Olympic Opening Ceremonies or the Games? Avoid the Olympic media machine? Keep working on the diplomatic front? Or do we expect our athletes – who have worked for years to stand on the podium – to represent the concerns of Canadians and boycott the games?
Don’t forget Ontario’s trade mission to Beijing this weekend, which forced the Liberals to pass the buck to the federal government, saying it’s not the provincial government’s job to speak up on national issues.
It’s everyone’s responsibility to speak up for human rights. For now, I’ll be speaking with my wallet and avoiding anything Made in China. If you have a better solution, drop me a line.

Running on empty: how biofuels are powering a world food crisis

Alternative View
By Anjhela Michielsen

Tempers are flaring in Haiti, Egypt and elsewhere around the world as grain prices rise out of reach. Haiti’s prime minister was fired Saturday and the government introduced a rice subsidy aimed at defusing the hungry rage that has triggered violence and looting.
A scarcity of supply is one of the main reasons for the price increase, and the move to replace fossil fuels – which contribute to global warming – with “cleaner” biofuels is one of the key factors in making food scarcer. The move to biofuels has increased the demand and price for biofuel sources, including corn, wheat and soybeans, and monopolizes on land used to grow other food products.
The dramatic increase in demand for biofuels is, as The Guardian’s John Vidal contends, “turning the corn belt of America from the bread basket of the world into an enormous fuel tank.” U.S. President George Bush wants to see the production of biofuels quintuple by 2017 to supply “24 per cent of the nation’s transport fuel,” according to British environmentalist George Monbiot, also writing in The Guardian, who is calling for a five-year moratorium on biofuel production targets and subsidies. The emphasis on fuel security is coming at the cost of food security “on a scale never seen before,” according to environmental analyst Lester R. Brown of the Earth Policy Institute, who notes the world has consumed more grain than it has produced for “seven of the last eight years.” Brown says the low availability of grains for human food consumption is the direct result of “misguided” U.S. policies intended to decrease reliance on fossil fuels by increasing the production of biofuels.
Growing demand for meat-centred North American diets, especially among the rising middle class in the world’s two largest nations, China and India, is exacerbating the problems of using food for fuel. Cornell University ecologist David Pimentel suggests it takes on average “nearly 6 kg” of grain to create 1 kg of high-quality animal protein, noting the amount of grain fed to livestock in the United States alone could feed 800 million people.
The rise in demand for grain for fuel and livestock feed caused a record price increase in 2007; the price of corn doubled and wheat increased by about 50 per cent (Vidal). While meat production is an important part of the increase, The Economist says “ethanol is the dominant reason” grain prices have increased. Elisabeth Rosenthal of the International Herald Tribune says food costs increased 25 per cent in the neediest countries, while the UN Food and Agriculture Organization saw its food price index increase by 40 per cent in 2007, four times the increase of the year before. Considering the impact the diversion of grains for fuel has on food security, its efficiency as a fuel is questionable; ethanol was “20 per cent of the whole maize crop” in the United States in 2006, but produced only enough fuel to offset “2 per cent of US automobile use” (Vidal).
The move to biofuels demonstrates a skewed set of priorities, valuing lifestyle over human life. The World Bank says ethanol is highly inefficient as a fuel, noting “the grain needed to fill up an SUV would feed a person for a year” (The Economist). The curse of the “have” nations is that they – meaning we – will not sacrifice the maintenance and enrichment of material lifestyle, and the people in “have-not” nations pay the price.

Article adapted from a longer essay. For more information, email anj at grandbendstrip.com.

Letters to the editor - April 16, 2008

To the Readers of the Grand Bend Strip,
With the ever increasing need for fundraising dollars to support community initiatives, those less fortunate and a multitude of other charitable services, now is the time to get involved and make a difference. For as little as a few hours a month, you can donate your time to a local service club. The benefits are endless, as are the rewards of giving back to the community and being part of an organization that is literally worldwide. The West Coast Lions Club is in fact a club that can help you make a difference not only for others but the sense of satisfaction that comes from belonging to a group that prides itself on many aspects of personal development and fellowship.
We invite you to attend a membership seminar located at the Pinedale Motor Inn April 16 at 7 p.m. This seminar will give a history of the Association of Lions Clubs, and insight into the work we do both at a community level and through the International Association of Lions Clubs. Please take the time to join us for an evening of fun, fellowship, and an informative presentation.
Yours in Lionism
Michael McDougall
Membership Chair Committee
519-238-5075

The Rotary Club of Grand Bend is pleased to welcome two new members: Ed Fluter, a retired educator and extensive world traveler; and John Smits, a retired plastics engineer. Both are seeking opportunities to make a contribution.
Interested in joining? Please contact Jim at 519-238-8800 or write Grand Bend Rotary, PO Box 1261, Grand Bend, Ontario N0M 1T0

To the Editor:
The Huron CNIB “Focus on Crocus” Campaign for 2008 was a huge success. The campaign raised funds by selling pots of crocus. Funds raised will help the CNIB provide service to the 273 clients in Huron County who are blind, partially blind or deaf blind.
Of course, the campaign could not have succeeded without the help of many businesses, nursing homes, and hospitals where we had displays and sold crocus. The displays were served by many volunteers - especially members of Lions Clubs from Goderich, Wingham, Auburn, Seaforth, Blyth, Londesborough, Clinton, Vanastra and Exeter. Lions truly are the “knights of the blind.”  I trust that everyone who helped in any way - either selling or buying crocus - recognize that their help is important and is appreciated.
Sincerely, Bob Fischer
519-233-1394
P.S. Anyone who missed the “Focus on Crocus” but wants to help would be welcome on our  fundraising “Walk Toward Independence” at the Menesetung Trail in Goderich on May 25, 2008.

Three cheers, Rita Lessard!!! (re: March 12 Advice from Mom)
Maybe your mother and my mother were related in the distant past. That was the kind of thing my mom told me too if I was too whiny… “Cut it out or I’ll give you something to really whine about.” Or, if she thought I was being too snively… “Cut it out or I’ll give you something to really cry about.” I guess it worked because I brought my kids up that way too, and they all seem the better for it.
So, let’s hear it for all those Moms who care enough about their kids to lay on a little bit of ‘tough love’ when it is needed.
Bill Metcalfe
Huron Woods

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