THE COUNTY LIFE

SNOWMOBILERS ROCK!

By: Roger Tumminieri

Next, the third and final sled passed us, but this time the driver raised his left fist in the air. He must be so happy, I thought. So, in response, I pumped my fist in the air and yelled with glee: OH, YEAH!!!

We continued on our adventure and, to my delight, this kept happening. Every time we passed another sled or group of snowmobilers, they all told me I was #1, flipped me the peace sign, or (and this one is my favourite) pumped their fist in the air like the crew from Jersey Shore!

It got to the point where I preemptively pumped my fist every time we passed another sled. What an awesome culture.

Snowmobilers Rock! Or at least that’s what I thought.

I told this story to my new friend, Duane Bryan from DB Powersports in Markdale, while he was fixing up my sled. I could tell by the look on his face while he was replacing my spark plugs that I wasn’t reading the situation correctly. He politely chuckled and said...

“The first sled is telling you that there are two more sleds in his group behind him. The second driver is telling you that there’s one more in their group and the third sled is telling you that he’s the last one.

Oh, boy.

And here I was thinking that the number one rule of snowmobiling in Ontario was Fun, when in fact, it’s actually Safety.

All the more reason why Snowmobilers Rock!

I’ve never owned a snowmobile. But I do now.

We bought one last winter and I enjoyed booting around the property and along the trail system with our boys. I have to say, the local snowmobile culture here in Grey County is quite, well... exuberant.

We could drive for miles without seeing another sled. The quiet solitude and beautiful scenery were intoxicating. I could see how people get hooked on sledding.

Finally, a group of three snowmobiles approached. As we passed the first sled, the driver raised his left hand and flipped me the peace sign. I thought: wow, what a chill dude... and super-friendly, too!

As the second sled passed, the driver raised his left hand and extended his index finger as if to signal that I was #1. I waived and nodded happily in response. This is great! He must approve of me exposing my sons to the wonderful world of snowmobiling. Read more stories from The County Life at www.thecountylife.ca

When my husband and I first got married I worked in an IT department for a large insurance company in Mississauga. Part of my job entailed being on call when the batch programs ran overnight, if anything went wrong, I would have to analyze the error and fix it so that the programs could complete overnight. I hated being on call .... all we had was dial-up internet. If anything went wrong, it was up to me to diagnose and fix a broken program or file late at night. The programs had to run; auto & property insurance policies, renewals and claims had to be processed every day.

In this day of high-speed everything, millennials may not understand how slow dial-up internet actually was. Imagine walking from Flesherton to Markdale instead of driving. Yes, it was that s..l..o..w! The maximum download speed was 56K or .056 mbps and cost roughly $10 - $20 a month. The beauty of it was if you had a phone line, you could connect your computer to a modem which plugged into the phone line jack. The internet provider would give you a phone number which the modem would ‘call’ to connect your computer to the provider. You could hear the dial tone and the phone number being entered, followed by a series of clicking, beeping and a high-pitched screech. This was called the ‘handshake’ as your computer was identified to the provider and access was allowed. Sometimes you would hear a busy signal and have to ‘call’ again. Once the call was connected, your modem would translate your digital data into an audio signal to be transferred across the phone line to the modem at the receiving end, which translated it back to a digital signal. At the time, I was totally impressed with this technology (I was also impressed with the first video game “Pong” when it came out in the 80s). I could access work, emails and information at home. Websites were static, just basic information and small photos. But as I mentioned, it was really slow, while waiting for a page to load you could easily make a sandwich, throw a load of laundry in the washing machine, and still wait for the web page to load. The other drawback was your phone line was connected to the internet so anyone trying to call you would get a busy signal.

CINDY MCQUEEN

Surprisingly, dial-up internet is still used in remote locations across North America today. . . . . . . .

Did I leave you hanging? Waiting for me to finish my dial-up story? Well then, you just experienced dial-up! In this day and age of instant information it’s hard to remember what it was like to have slow internet while working from home.

CINDY MCQUEEN

Owner of WANNA WEB DESIGN wannawebdesign.com cindy@wannawebdesign.com

New look, same great service!

David Miles | Financial Advisor

Miles Insurance and Investments Inc.

43 Main Sreet West, Markdale, ON, N0C 1H0 T: (519)986-3353 F: (519) 986-3518 40 Main Stret East, Dundalk, ON, N0C 1B0 T: (519)923-2313 F: (519)923-3061

When Paul and I were looking for farm land in Grey County, it had to have certain features like a barn, suitable farm land and a house that we could move into. The first time Paul viewed it there was a lake in the basement, the second time I came with him and said “we aren’t that desperate.” And the third time I agreed the house just needed someone to love it. A month later at a 4H meeting, all the local women wanted to know what I would do with the kitchen, probably because it was on the market for a long time.

Our farm was bought from crown land to James Foy on February 26, 1850. They were an incredible young Irish family who wanted to carve out their future in Canada. When Paul and I bought the farm there had been only one other family since the Foys sold it, but very little work had been done to bring it up to standards. As we stripped the house down to bare bones we discovered 4 layers of original wood siding, beautiful Douglas Fir beams and even the stone cellar walls were still structurally sound. It was decided right then and there that we keep the century home look but just modernize it and I couldn’t have been happier.

There was no insulation in the roof, the floor bounced when you walked on it and when the addition was put onto the original house years before us, the beams were put in crooked. We gutted the addition and tore down the drywall to also find mortar and stones in the walls. Needless to say we fixed everything that needed to be done in order for the house to not collapse around us and added antiques to make it homey and welcoming.

We added new boards to the barn, gave it a coat of paint and still rent a part of the farm land to our tenant farmer who has been here for many years. The barn hasn’t had cattle for a couple of years now but we raise our meat chickens in the old grain room and built a new chicken coop for our layer chickens on the drive shed. But best of all, Paul built an incredible commercial kitchen on the property so I could continue to produce all the products for Pure Music Garlic. our house with her grownup daughters and introduced herself as the last Foy family member born and raised on the farm. I for one cannot say the amount of pride I felt when she walked through the house and around the property to reminisce with stories and beautiful memories of her family growing up here. We all love our home that’s new and old and how it blended the Foy and Irwin family together, and hope it’s kept that way for more many generations to come.

PAUL & LORRAINE IRWIN

LORRAINE IRWIN

Lorraine Irwin is a mother, a wife, a theatre buff and the owner of Pure Music Garlic Products. She makes all of her gourmet garlic products using Organic Garlic grown on their farm (Boars Rock Farm). Check out her ad on Page 7.

PURE MUSIC GARLIC PRODUCTS puremusicgarlic@gmail.com puremusicgarlic.com @puremusicgarlic (519) 942-5410

BOARS ROCK FARM 136407 Grey Road 12, Grey Highlands boarsrockfarm.ca @boarsrockfarm

Logical Levels for Personal Change: Environment

There are many theories of creating a change in your life. I’d like to share with you one of my favourite models at looking at and understanding where change needs to happen to make it meaningful and real in your life. Over the next couple of months, I’ll introduce each level of this model, called Logical Levels, and use the condition of diabetes as an example. We’ll start from the bottom and work our way up!

Logical Levels is a model for personal development, created by Robert Dilts. When considering a personal change, understanding these levels and their interactions with the change you are hoping to make can help guide your development. The levels in this model, from bottom to top, are: 1) Environment; 2) Behaviours; 3) Capabilities; 4) Beliefs and Values; 5) Identity; 6) Purpose.

The lower levels of this model are the ones that are more easily affected or changed, but may have a correspondingly minor effect on the overall change you wish to make. The environment around the change that you want to make includes the physical space, objects in the environment, and people that you interact with. How does this apply to a condition like diabetes?

For people who are living with diabetes, their bodies have an impaired processing of sugar that is taken in through the diet. The Diabetes Canada guidelines recommend lifestyle change as a foundation for diabetes management. This includes diet and exercise modifications. How can your environment affect lifestyle changes such as these?

Consider the types of food that you have in your house at this very moment. You may know exactly where the “bad” foods are kept. A change that you can make to this environment, is to remove these foods from your space. You may also consider what equipment or space you have set aside for exercise at home. If you created a space specifically for exercise and acquired equipment to use for this purpose, would it make it more likely that you would exercise?

Expand your concept of environment to include the places that you find yourself at most often. This can include your usual route through the supermarket. Change how you walk through the grocery store and notice what new and different foods you may encounter. Do you often find yourself at fast food restaurants? Making the choice to find food from better sources may help you eat better. Finally, do you make it a habit to be in an environment that is conducive to exercise (i.e. a gym)? This would increase the likelihood of physical activity.

Just as easily as it is to consider different ways that you can change your environment, it may be just as easy to think of all the ways that you can circumvent these environmental changes. Simply put, it’s easy to change your environment, but that change is easy to revert back to its original state. Even with that understanding, sometimes a change is environment a good catalyst to further changes higher up. How would changing your environment in a positive way have an immediate impact on your behaviour?

Find Jon at jnthn.ca

JONATHAN NHAN

Jonathan Nhan Co-Founder, Curate and Upgrade

Are you thinking of making some changes to your home? You’re certainly not alone. Many of us have been spending a lot of time in our homes over the last two years, and we’ve discovered things that bug us, that just don’t work for us anymore, that need updating, that would be better enjoyed if…

Some things you’ll be comfortable doing yourself. Think carefully about those items. Are you really, really sure you can do it? If you’re 100% certain, then go for it! If you’re a maybe, then think about the cost of it going wrong, and the cost of then having to hire someone to fix the mess you’ve made. Consider the potential downside to arrive at a reasonable decision.

If you’re going to seek out a contractor, be it a general contractor, plumber, electrician, painter, or roofer, I have a few suggestions for you: (1) plan ahead – these folks are tremendously busy and some are booking into the fall already; and (2) align yourself with people you trust to do the job right.

How do you find those people? You might be surprised by the wealth of service suppliers you’ll find locally. Ask your neighbours for recommendations. Call or email the Chamber, or visit our online business directory, which you’ll soon be getting a printed copy of in the mail. Finally, the Chamber will be hosting the Grey Highlands Home & Garden Show in Flesherton on April 30 to May 1, and you’ll be able to meet a broad spectrum of potential suppliers for your project(s).

MICHELLE PATEY

GREY HIGHLANDS CHAMBER OF COMMERCE 13 Toronto St S, Markdale greyhighlandschamber@gmail.com www.greyhighlandschamber.com 519-986-4612

WELBECK HOME BUILDING CENTRE

522598 Welbeck Road, R.R. #2 Durham, ON N0G 1R0

T: (519) 369-2144 building@welbecksawmill.com tools@welbecksawmill.com @welbeckhbc

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