2006-08-13

VOL. 4 ISSUE 32

—

ST. JOHN’S, NEWFOUNDLAND AND LABRADOR — SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, AUGUST 13-19, 2006

—

WWW.THEINDEPENDENT.CA —

$1.50 HOME DELIVERY (HST included); $2.00 RETAIL (HST included)

THE INDEPENDENT LAUNCHES FRESH NEW STYLE SECTION 17

Sky high Cabinet ministers spent almost $20,000 for four helicopter trips this spring NADYA BELL

T

hree provincial cabinet ministers spent $18,500 on helicopter travel this spring.

Ministers took flights to assess flood damage in northeastern Newfoundland, view ATV damage on the southern Avalon, and to attend a youth career fair in Harbour Breton, according to information recently released to The Independent under the Access to Information Act. The spending comes since the government extended its contract with Universal Helicopters last winter to provide on-call service around the island.

Travel to view flood damage accounted for more than half of the

spending, at $10,772. On April 25, two helicopters flew four hours around the Baie Verte Peninsula, stopping in Fleur de Lys, Pacquet, La Scie, Nipper’s Harbour, Middle Arm, King’s Point, Little Bay and Beachside.

Human Resources Minister Paul Shelley and his executive assistant rode in one helicopter with two officials from Emergency Preparedness Canada and Fire and Emergency services.

Municipal Affairs Minister Jack Byrne rode in the other helicopter with his executive assistant, director of communications, and the fire commissioner.

Roughly 80 per cent of the travel to view flood damage could be paid by the federal government under a disasSee “One hour,” page 2

Convicted child sex offender living in St. Philip’s Parents notified by social worker have questions, concerns IVAN MORGAN

S

ome parents in St. Philip’s have been contacted by child protection services and told their children have been in contact with a registered child sex offender living in their neighbourhood.

A concerned parent, who asked not to be named to protect the identity of her child, says she was contacted Aug. 7 by a social worker informing her that her child had been at the house of a convicted child sex offender.

“The whole conversation just threw me. I didn’t expect to get that call. So I called her (the social worker) back the next day once I had time to mull over the information.”

The concerned parent also wonders why she wasn’t contacted earlier about a

registered child sex offender with multiple offences living in the community.

She says she should have the right to make up her own mind about the danger to her children.

“The thing is, you make judgements on what this person did. Not that any of it is benign, but is it something that was violent, or non-violent, or is it something that you really have to worry about the kids for?”

The Royal Newfoundland Constabulary has stated they are aware of the sex offender, but they aren’t releasing his name to the public. Constable Paul Davis says at any time there are people living all over the province who have been convicted of sex offences, sometimes involving children, but not all of them are of interest to police.

Davis says there is a process for making communities aware of the presence See “Workers walk,” page 2

— Teenager Brad Evoy reflects on his stay at Lion Max Simms Memorial Camp. See pages 8-9.

Susan Rendell chats with TV and film actor Sebastian Spence LIFE 15

Miami Vice disappoints: Tim Conway’s summer movie reviews

Paul Daly/The Independent

One shot, one kill

Retired sniper Dave Fitzpatrick says Canadians don’t understand the sacrifices their troops make

QUOTE OF THE WEEK “My disability is not a challenge, it’s another door that’s open to me.”

LIFE 13

Dave Fitzpatrick of Bay Roberts.

Life Story . . . . . . . 10 Gallery . . . . . . . . . 14 Food and wine 17-18 Business. . . . . . . . 21 Shift . . . . . . . . . 23-26

By Ivan Morgan The Independent

D

ave Fitzpatrick of Bay Roberts was almost killed by a sniper’s bullet while serving as a peacekeeper in Bosnia in 1993.

The retired master sniper coolly explains in expert technical terms why the enemy missed.

“It was perfect elevation — if he would have added another half minute for wind. He was roughly 600 meters away and, as his bullet was approaching me, 100 meters away from me, (it) had to pass between two buildings and

come out into the open.”

He moves his hand as if delicately adjusting a scope.

“On that particular day the wind was gusting, so when the bullet came between the two buildings and into the open, the wind caught the bullet and forced it off just one-quarter inch off the left side of my ear.

“I’m so glad that he didn’t know what he was doing that day.”

Since Fitzpatrick’s return, only four people have shaken his hand and thanked him for what he did as a peacekeeper in Bosnia. He wants the public to know what he and his col-

leagues did — the dangers they faced and the toll they’ve taken.

Fitzpatrick, who retired four years ago with the rank of master corporal, suffers from post-traumatic stress syndrome. He is matter-of-fact about his condition.

“I would literally go behind closed doors and have a good cry for myself.

And I didn’t know why, nor could I figure out why,” he says. “My body physically, mentally and emotionally was breaking down, and very quickly.”

See “I was scared,” page 2

2 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

AUGUST 13, 2006

One hour of flying time: $971

‘I was scared for my life’

From page 1

From page 1

ter management agreement.

The most recent flight, on May 31, took Department of Environment and Conservation Minister Clyde Jackman over the Cape Shore to view damage caused by ATV traffic. He was accompanied by the deputy minister Brenda Caul and two other officials whose names were withheld. The two-hour flight cost $2,530.

Shelly spent $5,265 on a flight to Harbour Breton, where he attended the Coast of Bays Career Fair hosted

Shelly spent $5,265 on a flight to Harbour Breton, where he attended the Coast of Bays Career Fair. at Kings Academy on May 2. MHA Oliver Langdon and Rob Feaver, the manager of youth services, accompanied the minister on the return trip.

Harbour Breton Community Youth Network hosted the fair that involved

students from eight schools and 22 communities Universal Helicopter’s contract with the provincial government was extended for one year this March by the Department of Works, Services and Transportation.

The “as needed” contract requires helicopters to be on call in different areas of the province for the exclusive use of the government. One hour of flying time costs $971, plus fuel and oil charges.

Helicopter fuel costs roughly $370 for one hour.

Fitzpatrick praises Veterans Affairs for their assistance in arranging treatment.

He also credits his wife, who he met in the 1998 ice storm, with turning his life around.

The St. John’s native says he knew by age 12 he wanted to serve his country.

With a military background — nine members of his father’s family served before him — he dreamed of being a peacekeeper. In 1984, at the age of 20, Fitzpatrick enlisted in the Canadian army.

His decision to become a sniper followed from his training in biathlon — a winter sport combining cross-country skiing with sharp shooting.

“Snipers are not made, they’re born,” Fitzpatrick says. “It’s something that comes to you naturally.”

He was part of a sniping team of four master snipers. He compares the work to professional golfing. “It’s kind of like looking at Tiger Woods lining up for a long drive, and both him and his caddy are off to one side and they are talking about calculations — wind, distance, instinct … and a little bit of luck. And with that, comes the ‘one shot — one kill.’

Fitzpatrick served for 18 years, but his sharpest memories are of his mission to Bosnia in 1992-93. There are things he won’t talk about, but his roles as soldier and peacekeeper aren’t among them. He speaks about his service with the cleareyed seriousness of a man trained to do difficult, dangerous and unpleasant work.

Fitzpatrick says he was told by “higher ups” not to speak about certain things that happened in Bosnia. “We were tasked to do some things, and we carried out those tasks,” is as specific as he will get.

He describes that tour as “hellish.”

Arriving in August 1992, the peacekeepers immediately went behind enemy lines.

“You literally slept every night with one eye open and one eye closed,” he says.

He and his colleagues delivered food by convoy to the desperate civilians of Sarajevo, trapped by violence.

“We went to Bosnia with a big picture that we were going to go over there and literally try and draw a line between several warring factions and keep the peace — and keep the bullets from flying.

“Once we were in there we could clearly see we were just another battle group holding its own ground, and delivering food to the people who really needed it.”

He says the Canadian military’s role in Afghanistan is a different type of

mission.

“They are not fulfilling a peacekeeping role as such, because no one has come to a ceasefire agreement over there — we are simply in the middle of a war.”

He worries about what this means for Canadian soldiers. “We are going to start losing many more lives because they are starting to, I think, develop a hatred for Canadians as they do for Americans.”

Fitzpatrick uses his experience in Bosnia to shed some light on what the troops in Afghanistan face.

“I was scared for my life. But every day I picked up my rifle and I carried on,” he says. “We did what we had to do.”

When asked what advice he might give a young Newfoundland reservist on the way to Afghanistan, Fitzpatrick doesn’t mince words. “That’s quite a trip he’s going on.”

He says most young people heading into combat “have absolutely no idea what they are getting themselves into.”

He knows because, he says, he was one of them. “I don’t think anything can prepare you psychologically for going to war. You can only train so much for war.

“You don’t know, when you are (to) come home on a plane, whether you are going to be sitting up in first class or if you are going to be in a box down in the bottom of the plane.”

Fitzpatrick says a lot of the men and women returning from Afghanistan are going to go through what he has gone through.

He advises loved ones to let returning soldiers have their space. They are going to have flashbacks, they are going to have “survivor guilt,” they are going to have questions, and they will need help.

Fitzpatrick tells a story he says defines the Canadian army’s reputation as peacekeepers. During one food delivery, Fitzpatrick and his group were confronted by members of the Bosnian army, who often stopped convoys at gunpoint, demanding food. The Canadians refused.

Fitzpatrick says the Canadian major negotiated for three hours, meeting the Bosnians’ threat of force with his own.

Everyone’s weapons were pointed at each other. “It was just a matter of one person pulling the trigger and it would have been a huge bloodbath,” he says.

The major kept his cool, the Canadians stood their ground, the Bosnian army stood down and the people of Sarajevo got their food.

“Kudos to the major,” Fitzpatrick says with a smile.

But most Canadians, he says, don’t understand the sacrifices their troops make on these missions. As he says of his return from duty, “There was no parade.”

Workers walk fine line From page 1 of such an offender in their midst, but it was not used in this case.

The St. Philip’s parent also wants to know how child protection services knew her child had visited the offender’s house.

Cathie Barker Pinsent, acting director of child services, says officials cannot release that type of information.

“We don’t know that anything has happened, we are not assuming that anything has happened and we have no knowledge that anything has happened,” Pinsent tells The Independent. “In essence when we go to a parent and give them this information we have to weigh (the consequences): Can we give this information? Obviously we have determined that we could. We have to be careful because these other individuals have rights too.”

Pinsent says her workers have to walk a fine line. “What we have to do is give the parents enough information so they can protect their child. And the situation where we contact parents is when we know that the person who has had the offence history has had access to the child.”

The concerned parent says a school project completed in the spring of this year has some area parents worried.

According to her, a woman who lives in the same house as the registered offender,

and whose children (who also live in that house) attend the local elementary school, sent home a form to every child in Grade 6 — 68 children.

Each child was asked to complete the form, and include a baby picture, current picture, and details about themselves, including their name, favourite sayings, favourite pets, friends, and activities. The forms were posted on the walls of the gym as part of the Grade 6 “school-leaving” ceremony. She says the activity was sanctioned by the school.

The concern is that all these forms went home to the house where the offender lives. In light of the information given to her by child protection, the parent wonders if the parents of all Grade 6 children should be notified.

“There was no phone numbers or addresses … but this is a small community and it is not hard to figure out where people live,” she says.

Pinsent says there is no evidence any one of those children came in contact with the offender.

“It isn’t easy,” she says. “All I can say to you is that in any matter involving children, child youth and family services will exercise whatever means it legally can to protect the children, and I feel we have done what we can at this point in the matter, with the information we have.”

AUGUST 13, 2006

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 3

SCRUNCHINS A weekly collection of Newfoundlandia

Climate Change Action Plan. Among the report’s predictions: rising sea level and increased wave energy at the coast is likely to intensify erosion and destruction of coastal structures; sea ice is expected to become thinner and less extensive (see this year’s iceberg crop), which could have positive impacts on marine transportation and the oil and gas industry.

The increase in climate change may result in more extreme weather events, such as hurricanes. Flooding is sure to rise. According to the report, flood damage over the last 15 years has exceeded $40 million.

Get this: changes to ocean temperature and currents may influence the distribution and migration patterns — not to mention individual growth — of important fish species such as cod. Which explains a lot …

An article published this week in the National Review Online talks about the heat wave that has gripped most of Canada and how that invariably leads to the media going mental with talk of global warming.

The media on Newfoundland’s east coast don’t have that problem, what with this summer’s monsoons.

In the article, James S. Robbins talks about how global warming could lead to vast areas of the country becoming “comfortably habitable.” He questions the premise of global-warming alarmists, namely that this is a problem rather than an opportunity.

“When deserts start blooming, blizzards stop hitting and you are enjoying the surfing at your beach house in upper Newfoundland, you won’t care what caused global warming, you’ll just thank goodness it happened.”

Watch for the mad rush for beachfront property. Never mind that — watch for the next outport singing sensation … The Beach B’ys.

COD BITES A 1996 report prepared for the federal Industry Department, The History of Northern Cod, included a chapter called The Great Destruction.

The following were given as examples of the significance of the fishery in Newfoundland: if a calamity such as the cod moratorium befell Ontario’s manufacturing industries, some 800,000 people would lose their jobs. In New-

WEATHER PATTERNS Climate change is old news in Newfoundland and Labrador. The province did a report last year entitled

By Pam Pardy Ghent For The Independent

foundland, almost 16 per cent of the total workforce depended on the fishery, in Ontario, 2.6 per cent of the total workforce works in the auto industry; in 1988, fish harvesting and processing employed about 48,000 people, generating a total income (including UI) of about $700 million.

That money is surely missed. The report warned that if no compensatory measures are taken, “large and small fishery dependent communities face economic and social collapse.” That probably doesn’t come as a surprise to towns like Harbour Breton …

WORLD’S END Newfoundland may have not much fish left, but it’s still a beautiful place to live.

At least according to the Boston Globe, which published a story on Labrador this week.

“Battle Island, Newfoundland — Standing on a hilltop on an island off southern Labrador, all I can see are miles of deep-blue ocean and icebergs drifting by a cluster of small islands whose fishing villages are abandoned now. A humpback whale surfaces nearby, and tomtits and ospreys soar overhead. I am reminded of the local saying I heard en route: ‘Labrador: it isn’t the end of the world, but you can see it from here.’

Paul Daly/The Independent

“I didn’t boil them with a potato,” she says, laughing. “Them I boiled alone.”

There were pressures, but the public health nurses took them in stride.

One evening a knock on Pardy’s door brought a woman who had arrived by boat, in labour with twins. Pardy’s husband drove while she tended to her patient.

“She didn’t deliver until we got her to Burin, but she lost one twin. You never forget that.”

Travel was a challenge then as it is today. “I still run into people and the children of those who changed tires for me over the years I traveled the Burin Peninsula on those rough, dirt roads,” she laughs. “All the truckers knew me and my car.”

Pardy’s parents were worried about her

Winner

“I was talking about the importance of brushing to this group of kids once,” she recalls. “I could tell from their faces that most had never owned a toothbrush.” She changed the topic, focusing instead on the importance of eating well and rinsing with water after every meal.

“It was a ‘when in Rome …’ deal out here, and I had to help them the best I could.”

Avery also had to make due. The lack of needles was a problem when she had to deliver mass polio vaccinations in the late ’40s.

“I would put my needles in the oven to be sterilized,” she says. “And I placed a potato in with them. I figured when the potato was ready, so were my needles.”

She had to reuse her needles, and boiled them when she was rushed.

DRIVE Our

“(Ray) almost passed out. He had been kidding … but I wasn’t, and the kids were supposed to start school that day and here the poor teacher was dead and gone.”

Regina Pardy paved the way for Barry.

In 1968, then 22, she moved to the Burin Peninsula and became the first public health nurse in the region.

“There was one doctor servicing 10 communities and all we had to travel on were dirt roads and tiny fishing boats,” she says.

“These people had never been educated about health care before … I found that the sickest people were the most disadvantaged and improvising became my biggest challenge.”

Visiting the sick and tending to wounds in homes that didn’t have any running water was frustrating.

Civic Sedan DX

$

$0

Security Lease

Lease

$

218 $2 60

Down or Tra de $

2,165 $0

*

cial Spe/ Finance

se Lea from

†

%

5.9

60 M O N TH S

†5

MOTOR TREND ™

Car of theYear

‡

2006 Civic Sedan DX All Honda vehicles are delivered with a full tank.

Best New Economy Car †3

Automobile Journalists Association of Canada

North American Car of theYear †2

†4

www.honda.ca

All lease and finance offers are from Honda Canada Finance Inc., O.A.C. *Lease is based new 2006 Civic Sedan DX 5-speed manual (model FA1526EX) for a 60 month term, OAC. Monthly payment is $218/$260 with $2,165/$0 down payment or equivalent trade-in.

Payments include $1,225 freight and PDI. $0 security deposit required. First monthly payment due at lease inception. Lease rate is 5.9%. 120,000 kilometre allowance; charge of $0.12/km for excess kilometres. Total lease obligation is $15,042/$17,940. License, insurance, applicable taxes and registration are extra. Option to purchase at lease end for $6,283 plus taxes. Special 5.9% lease financing for 60 months only available to residents of NS/PEI/NB/NL and only available on new 2006 Civic models (excluding Civic Coupe Si and hybrid models), O.A.C. †: 5.9% purchase financing for 60 months available on new 2006 Civic (excluding Civic Coupe Si and hybrid models) , O.A.C. †1: Based on annual sales by category in Canada as reported by AIAMC, January 2006 †2: North American Car of the Year awarded to 2006 Honda Civic at Detroit Auto Show January 8, 2006. †3: Best New Economy Car awarded to 2006 Civic Sedan by Automobile Journalists Association of Canada on December 6, 2005; www.ajac.ca. †4: 2006 Car of the Year awarded to 2006 Honda Civic by Motor Trend on November 22, 2005; www.motortrend.com. †5: As reported by EnerGuide published by NRCan – see www.vehicles.gc.ca for full details. Limited time offers. See your Honda dealer for full details. .

Kenmount Road 579.1999 / 800.667.9900 www.cityhonda.com

5-speed

218

hwy: L/100km

†1

traveling a road “with no livyers” she says, and their concern caused her to rethink her decision to raise her children in a remote area.

“I stayed for three years, but … I had small babies I was dragging back and forth over those roads,” she says. “I didn’t see a future for my own children, so I left my neighbours and my friends and moved back to C.B.S. to be close to my family.”

Pardy and her husband have since retired to the Burin Peninsula, where she began her nursing career so many years before. She no longer nurses, but still helps those who call on her. Children who take spills, the elderly out of surgery, a teenager with questions.

“Not as a nurse,” she says. “Just as a friend and good neighbour.”

From

50 5.7

8 YEARS STRAIGHT

INTERNET CRIME Finally this week, Paul Perrier, the man recently charged with mischief for mimicking Danny Williams’ e-mail address and sending out nasty and wild accusations about the premier, pled guilty in May 1999 to one count of criminal harassment. Perrier issued public notices on the Internet and around Town that his ex-girlfriend was HIV-positive and had unprotected sex without disclosing the fact. ryan.cleary@theindependent.ca

Elizabeth Avery

The runaway favourite best selling car in Canada for eight years straight. Totally redesigned... unequalled in its class.

Civic

HART BREAKING The Aug. 14 edition of Maclean’s magazine included a fascinating feature on the winding road that led to the laying of two first-degree murder charges against Nelson Hart in the 2002 drowning deaths of his twin daughters, Krista and Karen, at Gander Lake. Interviewed at Her Majesty’s Penitentiary in St. John’s, Hart insisted he played no role in the drownings and is the victim of a bizarre plot to imprison him. Hart is described as a “hard case,” who suffered from epilepsy all his life. Hart’s fits “prevented him from being normal,” said his mother Pearl. “They used to tease him and tell him how ugly he was — because he was,” she told Maclean’s. Hart left school at the age of 12, when he had already spent three years in Grade 5. The article details the elaborate sting operation — known as Mr. Big

Public health nurses reflect on how their roles have changed in the past 50 years

CIVIC

h wy : m p g

HARVEY’S ROAD You may have read in Scrunchins a few weeks ago about how Ken Harvey had been nominated for Italy’s Libro del Mare award for the best book published in Italy that deals with the sea. Well, Harvey won the award, which came with a $7,200 cash prize. The Town That Forgot How to Breathe has been been sold in over 13 countries and translated into French, German, Russian, Dutch, and, lucky for Harvey, Italian.

Doing it all

E

lizabeth Avery, 83, was the first public health nurse in Conception Bay South. When she started her career in 1945, she was one of 15 such nurses. Today there are 150 in the province.

“It was a big island to cover,” she says.

“You were expected to do everything … some people even expected you to blow their noses.”

Public health nursing has changed a lot over the years in Newfoundland. Lillian Barry, a nurse on the Burin Peninsula for 26 years, agrees with Avery.

“At one time you had to be everything to everyone,” she says. Today, with better rural access to health care, public health nurses do more education and health promotion than hands on patient care.

They hold lifestyle clinics to educate the public. There are school health and child health clinics focusing on immunization. Nurses lead healthy beginnings programs for newborns and babies, health-check programs for preschoolers, and they offer prenatal and breast-feeding support to those in their community.

Barry travels 2,000 kilometres a month servicing her area, from South East Bight in Placentia Bay to English Harbour East in Fortune Bay. “A lot has changed in this role, but the travel and the reality of the rural geography and the Newfoundland weather has remained a challenge for us,” she says.

“Whatever we face, our patients also face, so we do the best we can.”

Barry says out-migration has hurt patients in rural, remote areas. “Keeping the elderly self-reliant when their spouses and family support live and work away can be difficult,” she says. “Every community out here has unique needs, but every one of them lacks quality resources.”

Outports have no public libraries, no family resource centers, and are often far away from primary health care delivery.

These challenges sound familiar to Avery, who retired in 1981. She did everything from washing the dead to assisting in surgical procedures — sometimes performed in less-than-ideal circumstances.

“The first time I assisted Dr. Walsh in pulling teeth was something,” she says.

Walsh sat the man down at a kitchen table — and just did it. “Well, I was expecting blood to go everywhere that day and figured I’d be in jail by that night!”

But that situation turned out OK. Others didn’t.

One night Avery was called to attend to a schoolteacher who had arrived that day and was feeling ill.

“I was gone all night,” she says. “When I came home Ray (her husband) was giving the kids breakfast and said, ‘What, did he die?’ and I said, ‘Yes he did.’

Save More per km

— the RCMP organized to get Hart to confess.

4 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

AUGUST 13, 2006

File or be fined Not all paid lobbyists registered

By Ivan Morgan The Independent

T

here may be lobbyists working in Newfoundland and Labrador who don’t know they are breaking the law.

Dean Doyle, deputy registrar of lobbyists, says there are probably still a few people in the province who have yet to register their activities as lobbyists — but, he adds, they needn’t worry.

“Any and all who are hearing about this for the first time should contact the registry to learn about the legislation, what is considered lobbying and what is not considered lobbying under the legislation, and ascertain whether they have to be registered,” Doyle tells The Independent.

To date, 58 separate records have been filed, listing 111 people who are now registered as lobbyists with the province.

A lobbyist is defined as any person who is paid to influence the decisions of public office holders. That can include contacting public office holders, or using mass communications — such as newspapers or open line shows — to exhort members of the general public to con-

tact public office holders.

Under the Lobbyist Registration Act, an initiative of the Williams administration that came into effect Oct. 11, 2005, the names, addresses, and activities of all lobbyists must be listed and then posted on an open government website.

The act divides lobbyists into two groups: consultant and in-house.

Consultant lobbyists are paid by a business or organization to influence public office holders. They must register if they make even one phone call or have any contact with a politician or bureaucrat. For instance, highly placed Conservative party member Tim Powers is registered as a paid consultant for Provincial Aerospace, lobbying for contracts on their behalf.

In-house lobbyists are employees who, as part of their job description, lobby public officials. If an employee or group spends more than 20 per cent of their time (given as 12 working days in a three-month period) lobbying, they need to register. Bell Aliant Regional Communications has several records filed with a total of 33 employees registered as in-house lobbyists.

While fines under the lobbyist act can be as

high as $25,000 for a first offence — that includes not registered — and $100,000 for subsequent offences, Doyle and Lynn Ann Montgomery, the commissioner of lobbyists, both say people who are not registered need not worry — yet. They simply need to get signed up.

The commissioner has the power to investigate complaints, but says her current focus is on public awareness. With the legislation nearing its first birthday, Montgomery says anyone who has doubts about whether they should be registered — or has been lax in doing so — should contact the registrar or her office.

While the act was passed to add transparency to the lobbying process, the commissioner can grant a request from a lobbyist to have their activities remain secret, if making his or her activities public could “prejudice his or her abilities to do business.”

“I decide if (the request) makes sense or is he just trying to avoid disclosing information,” says Montgomery, adding that situation has yet to arise.

All lobbyists currently registered with the province can be reviewed at lobbyists.eservices.gov.nl.ca.

Dr. Stephanie Young

Paul Daly/The Independent

Not just drug dispensers Pharmacists must become more involved in patient care

By Stephanie Porter The Independent

D

r. Stephanie Young is out to save her profession. That may sound dramatic, but Young says the world and work of pharmacists has got to move forward, or “we’ll be extinct.”

Young is a practicing pharmacist and a faculty member in Memorial’s school of pharmacy. She’s also at the helm of both a pilot project and a research study investigating ways to better involve today’s pharmacists — and their extensive knowledge of drugs and medications — in the overall health care of patients.

The problem, says Young, is pharmacists are often seen as simply drug dispensers — technical work that could be replaced by machines or less qualified people.

“Pharmacists haven’t been as engaged as they need to be,” she says. “They only get paid if they dispense a product. That’s how revenue is generated and salaries are paid.

“Our goal is to have pharmacists be paid for what we call cognitive services, to be paid for the skills and the knowledge and their experience. So essentially, how I look at this project, I look at taking the selling of the medication out of it.”

For the pilot project, Young, in conjunction with the school of pharmacy, is developing an “expanded pharmacist role” within a family practice.

Participating doctors refer suitable patients to Young — generally patients who have been or are currently taking a number of medications — for

consultation.

“Then I do a full assessment, usually in their homes,” says Young. “I get them to pull everything (their medications) out, show me what they have, what they’re doing with them, how they take them, how often. I find out information about allergies and adverse reactions …

“I’m looking at the medications — are they working? Are they having any side effects? Do they understand how to take it?”

Young is given access to the patient’s medical files to help in her assessments.

So far, she’s seen more than 45 patients. She says she hasn’t come across any cases that have truly surprised her — but she has offered information, education, and made changes in many patients’ drug regimes.

Young says people often have expired medications or they’re taking incorrect amounts.

Sometimes they’ve decided not to take them at all — or to adjust the dose. And some patients are taking drugs they might not need to be taking.

“I might recommend a medication needs to be added. Or to use a different type. It’s basically using all the knowledge and skills we teach our students and separating it from the dispensing role.

“And hopefully at the end, this is a beneficial thing to do.”

Young’s research study is just getting started.

With the help of $185,000 from Health Canada’s Best Practices Contribution Program, and another $15,000 from the office of the vice-president of research at Memorial, the two-year project is edging forward.

During the study, Young and her research team plan to engage about 50 community pharmacists around the province in in-depth patient consultations and follow-up. Each participating pharmacist will use this team approach — already employed in the hospital setting — to work closely with family physicians and certain patients. It may mean home visits or consultations within clinics.

“This is the model we’re teaching our students,” she says. “It’s comprehensive, looking at everything that’s going on with a patient, as opposed to just filling a prescription.

“No other health care professional will ask the sort of questions (pharmacists can), not that indepth. Some medications should be changes, added, or removed. The system isn’t always there for the patient to go back to the doctor and reevaluate …”

The study will focus on diabetes patients in Newfoundland and Labrador.

“If we can show an advantage to this process … we can take it to the government and other third-party payers and say, there’s a group of professionals here that can help you achieve better outcomes with your patients.

“Then we can start to look at being reimbursed for cognitive functions.”

Young admits that’s a big change to make — though she says it’s already happening “in pockets” elsewhere in Canada and the U.S. “It’s taken a while for us to get a critical mass of people interested in putting this together … in moving the profession forward, in trying to change the way things are out there.”

A LITTLE OF YOUR TIME IS ALL WE ASK. CONQUERING THE UNIVERSE IS OPTIONAL. Think it requires heroic efforts to be a Big Brother or Big Sister?

Think again. It simply means sharing a few moments with a child. Play catch.

Build a doghouse. Or help take on mutant invaders from the planet Krang.

That’s all it takes to transform a mere mortal like yourself into a super hero who can make a world of difference in a child’s life. For more information...

Big Brothers Big Sisters of Eastern Newfoundland 1-877-513KIDS (5437) www.helpingkids.ca

AUGUST 13, 2006

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 5

Rural violence prevention services scarce

By Nadya Bell The Independent

T

Tim Buckle

Paul Daly/The Independent

Police parity Constabulary officers want same pay as RCMP in upcoming contract talks

By Ryan Cleary The Independent

“In fact, we’re pleased in the past months to hear the premier himself say that groups had to make their individual argument and should be he association representing treated as individual groups with individual Constabulary officers hopes to bridge needs.” the salary gap with the RCMP in upcomContacted by The Independent, a spokesing contract talks with the province. woman for the Finance Department says the A first-class constable (meaning an officer minister won’t comment on RNC contract talks with three years experience) with the Royal while negotiations are continuing.

Newfoundland Constabulary makes $52,000 a Again, formal talks have taken place in the year — about $20,000 less than a Mountie with two years since the contract expired. the same level of experience.

“Essentially, negotiations are always ongoing “Salary is the main issue,” says Tim Buckle, until an agreement is signed,” the spokespresident of the RNC Association, which repre- woman says. sents the force’s roughly 300 non-commisBuckle points out the RCMP doesn’t negotisioned officers. ate their salaries. Rather, the national force’s “Teachers in the province are paid the same pay package is decided by a pay council that throughout the province, averages out the top nurses are paid the same, three to five police general service workers salaries across the counare paid the same, but try.

“The fact that members there are two policing The only hope for the organizations in the Constabulary in terms of of both policing province, and because of getting more money is to agencies serve on wage freezes and rollget the province to break backs, especially away from pattern barvarious joint forces throughout the 1990s, a gaining. greater disparity develGovernment apparentteams, working together oped between the two ly did that for doctors. policing agencies.”

The Newfoundland in the same offices and Buckle wants to see and Labrador Medical that disparity addressed Association, representvehicles, highlights in contract talks between ing the province’s physithe Constabulary associcians, signed a memothis imbalance.” ation and provincial randum of understanding government, expected to with government this Tim Buckle take place this fall. The past February. two-year police contract The four-year deal expired June 30, 2004 gives doctors a pay and Buckle says the only talks that have taken increase similar to the package given to other place since then have been informal. government workers. At the same time, the “We’re anticipating initiating some discus- global cap on the doctors’ fee-for-service budgsions in the fall with government to see where et was eliminated. Other improvements to their it goes.” agreement will see the physician services budgThe Constabulary isn’t the only group of et increase by $18 million in the final year of government workers with an expired contract. the deal.

Negotiations between government and the Besides higher salary, RCMP officers have union representing the province’s 5,000 nurses other perks Constabulary officers don’t have. broke off in early July when the Danny Under the Workplace Health, Safety and Williams administration laid its final offer on Compensation Act, members of the RCMP the table. receive 100 per cent of net earnings when they The three-year deal includes a 0 per cent pay suffer a workplace injury, while an RNC memincrease in the first year (retroactive to July 1, ber receives 80 per cent of net earnings.

2005), another three per cent effective this July, In a recent submission to the workers’ comp and a final three per cent in July 2007. review panel, the Constabulary argued the disFinance Minister Loyola Sullivan has said crepancy should be eliminated. money is a factor, meaning nurses have been “The fact that members of both policing offered the same package as other unions, agencies serve on various joint forces teams, including teachers. working together in the same offices and vehiBut pattern bargaining wasn’t on for nurses, cles, highlights this imbalance.” and it’s apparently not on for the Constabulary.

Constabulary officers respond to an average “We don’t see that as an acceptable solution,” of 60,000 calls for service a year.

Buckle says.

T

racy Duffy says she hopes committees struck by the province this week will lobby for more violence prevention resources in rural areas to help prevent crimes like the murder-suicide in Hermitage Aug. 3.

Otherwise, Duffy says, those groups are still a long way from preventing family violence in rural Newfoundland and Labrador.

“In the different rural areas, if you can’t access the shelter, pretty much the police are your best bet to access help,” says Duffy, coordinator of the St. John’s-based Sexual Assault Crisis and Prevention Centre. The centre is a partner in the province’s violence prevention initiative launched this year.

“It’s not that police are doing it wrong — they’re doing a great job, but they also need more resources. They can’t do it all, and they can’t deal with violence as well as the other things.”

On Aug. 10, police said Goldie Loveless, 34 was shot and killed outside her family home by her common-law husband, Shawn Skinner, 38.

The closest transition house or shelter where Loveless and her two children could have stayed was in Gander, a three-hour drive away from their home.

Shelters provide a safe haven for people who must leave their home to escape a violent situation, including space for children.

“Several regions have got shelters, unfortunately the region in which this occurred does not … They would send people to Marystown or to the Gander shelter,” says Duffy.

“The resources are there, but it’s not nearly enough.”

Newfoundland has eight shelters, and most have 24-hour support phone lines for women in crisis. Some shelters have women’s centres, which offer outreach programs for the community.

Joan Burke, minister responsible for the status

“I think where we still struggle is changing public attitudes.

When it comes to family violence and sexual violence against women … there are still so many people who don’t want to talk about it, who don’t want to be involved in the fight against it because it’s such a huge stigma.”

Tracy Duffy of women, has said she will set up four additional committees this week around the province to help prevent violence.

“I think it’s a great mechanism for community and government to connect on violence prevention,” says Duffy. “These committees I see as a vital part.”

Through the committees, people speak to others involved in different areas of violence prevention on a regular basis.

New provincial legislation against family violence came into effect on July 1, but Duffy says more counseling and shelter services should be provided in rural areas. Currently, there are more services available for children than for adults who are suffering.

“I think where we still struggle is changing public attitudes. When it comes to family violence and sexual violence against women … there are still so many people who don’t want to talk about it, who don’t want to be involved in the fight against it because it’s such a huge stigma,” she says.

“I would say break the silence around it, that’s what we need to do.”

WANT A BEAUTIFUL LAWN THIS YEAR?

Call ServiceMASTER® LawnCare

576-0506

“We Make Lawns Beautiful”

Take Paul’s word for it.

Paul Shallow is finishing the (paid) workterm component of our IT program. He’s system administrator (LINUX, UNIX, Windows) for a local engineering firm. They’re happy.

We’re pleased. He’s delighted.

SHIPPING NEWS Keeping on eye on the comings and going of ships in St. John’s harbour. Information provided by the Coast Guard Traffic Centre.

TUESDAY No vessels to report.

SATURDAY Vessels Arrived: Atlantic Eagle, Canada, from Terra Nova; Rem Angler, Norway, from Norway; Maersk Nascopie, Canada, from Hibernia.

Vessels Departed: Maersk Chignecto, Canada, to Terra Nova; Riverton, Canada, to Fortune Field; Hudson, Canada, to sea; Maersk Detector, Canada, to sea; Cicero, Canada, to Halifax.

WEDNESDAY Vessels Arrived: Maersk Norseman, Canada, from Hibernia; Diamond Star, Canada, from Port Cartier; Burin Sea, Canada, from Terra Nova; Atlantic Osprey, Canada, from Terra Nova.

Vessels Departed: Maersk Chancellor, Canada, to White Rose; George R Pearkes, Canada, to sea; Wilfred Templeman, Canada, to sea.

SUNDAY Vessels Arrived: Oceanex Avalon, Canada, from Montreal.

Vessels Departed: Maersk Challenger, Canada, to White Rose; Oceanex Avalon, Canada, to Montreal.

THURSDAY Vessels Arrived: Jean Charcot, England, from sea.

Vessels Departed: Maersk Challenger, Canada, to Terra Nova; Diamond Star, Canada, to Come

by Chance.

MONDAY Vessels Arrived: George R. Pearkes, Canada, from sea; ASL Sanderling, Canada, from Halifax; Discovery, Luxemburg, from Terra Nova; Maersk Chancellor, Canada, from White Rose.

Vessels Departed: Maersk Nascopie, Canada, to Hibernia.

FRIDAY Vessels Arrived: Riverton, Canada, from Jeanne D’Arc Basin; Cabot, Canada, from Montreal.

Vessels Departed: Burin Sea, Canada, to Terra Nova; Riverton, Canada, to sea; Sir Wilfred Grenfell, Canada, to sea.

Information and Communications Technology Program

Admission for fall semester closes soon.

Call or write today.

(709) 737-3074 ehealey@mun.ca

“When I graduated with my computer science degree I had trouble finding a job and decided I needed something more.

That's when I found out about the ICT program at Memorial. I was looking for something in province, where I didn't have to go away and spend extra on living expenses.

I also wanted something quick; I’ve spent enough time in school. I want to enter the work world as soon as possible; one reason I found the workterm so attractive. Also, it’s a university diploma, backed by Memorial's solid reputation.

The program was exactly what I was looking for.

Paul “Progressing through the curriculum I quickly realized the value of the material I was being taught. Upon completion I’ll be ready to write many of the leading industry certifications including the A+ and CCNA exams. I also liked the portability of the program's content. I knew I’d be as employable in Newfoundland as in any other part of Canada. “ The ICT program has provided me with the stepping stone I need to begin my career in IT.”

6 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

AUGUST 13, 2006

We are dead to the premier “A

s a rule, we have in the past been very open with and available to your paper.

However, I must advise you that the premier will not be available to The Independent in future.”

— e-mail forwarded to me on Aug. 10 by Elizabeth Matthews, director of communications, office of the premier.

RYAN CLEARY

Fighting Newfoundlander So there you have it. It’s hard to get in the premier’s headspace when he won’t give the paper the time of day. The premier’s office wouldn’t have anything to do with reporter Craig Westcott when he worked for the paper (Elizabeth contacted me personally to make that clear), which still worked out fine, because Danny would speak to me or another reporter … good-cop, bad-cop routine.

Now he won’t speak to any of us — The Independent has been blacklisted.

We are dead to the premier. His office cancelled its five copies a week of The Independent. If that wasn’t bad enough, the papers were complimentary. Danny turned away free stuff. I initially upped the comps to 10, but then cancelled them altogether. If the premier and his staff want to get on like that then they’ll have to buy their copies.

This all started when I contacted the premier’s office to ask whether Danny cared to explain his position re: Max Ruelokke. (Actually, it started a few

SUBSEQUENT E-MAILS …

“Does that mean me — or all Independent reporters?”

“The paper.”

“Will you, yourself (Elizabeth Matthews), be responding to my e–mails if I have a question for the premier’s office? Does the boycott go for you as well?”

Matthews: “Ryan: it extends to the premier’s office.”

“Me, (Craig) Westcott, probably Ray Guy — who else is on the list? Tell me there’s at least one mainlander? Those journalists can be negative, more negative than us, don’t you think? (It’s OK — I don’t expect an answer.) Must be at least one oil company? Maybe a premier or two? No way to handle the media …”

End of correspondence.

Forever.

•••

weeks ago with the story on Danny’s charitable donations — a line of questioning he took as a personal attack, but I’ve been down that long and winding road.)

I can’t understand the Ruelokke standoff.

The Supreme Court of Newfoundland ruled earlier this week against the province, ordering that Ruelokke be hired as head of the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board. Justice Raymond Halley described the province’s delay in Ruelokke’s selection as “reprehensible.”

Danny wanted Andy — or at the very least Danny wanted Andy to rule with Ruelokke. The court wouldn’t go with that either. The judge also said Danny’s fight for the mayor was “doomed to failure” because Wells doesn’t have the credentials.

Andy says otherwise — and he has a point. The petroleum board/oil industry wouldn’t know what hit them if Wells got the job. No offence to Ruelokke, but I’d rather have Andy as my Newfoundland and Labrador point man on the offshore oil court — for no other reason than he’s a hell raiser, and hell must be raised to change the status quo in the high-stakes oil industry.

But Danny doesn’t appear to have a legal leg to stand on. So what’s his strategy? Is he prepared to walk away from the Atlantic Accord and tell Ottawa to stick it? Will he go that far to get his way? He can only warn of “dire consequences” for so long before someone calls his bluff.

What’s the reason for the delay in responding to the Supreme Court decision? In the absence of an answer the premier looks like he’s sulking, which would be rather childish of our fearless leader. (I’d tell him that if I was alive to him.)

The Globe’s Jeffrey Simpson picked on our Danny a few days ago, questioning whether he may have overplayed his hand with the oil companies that planned to develop the Hebron field.

“What Newfoundland needs is a steady offshore industry, with some projects in various states of exploration, development and production,” Simpson wrote.

“That kind of industry doesn’t exist without Hebron. Although Newfoundland’s oil represents only 0.4 per cent of world production, it’s worth 16 per cent of the province’s economic output, twice as much as the fishery. It puts about $1.3-billion into government coffers. That sums represents about 40 per

cent of all government revenues generated in Newfoundland.”

On the one hand, the premier has earned our support. He won the fight over the Accord and, with it, the people’s faith to champion another battle.

On the other hand, Danny’s every move must be questioned — days of blind faith ended with Smallwood, and Peckford, and Wells, and Tobin …

Look around Newfoundland and Labrador today. The roads are in desperate shape, the outports are crumbling into the sea, the cod fishery is dead, the provincial treasury is a few interest points away from tapping out. The sun may be shinning today, but it never lasts — a lesson we never, ever learn.

The political system as we have known it hasn’t worked for us. It’s worked for the politicians, who make more here than in Alberta, but it hasn’t worked for Joe Blow of Bunyan’s Cove who packed up yesterday and moved to Banff.

It’s all well and good that Williams is a fighter, but after a while the come-outswinging routine gets old. In the case of Ottawa, our politicians are always mixing it up because the federal government has it coming. It does not have it coming in the case of Max Rulokke. ryan.cleary@theindependent.ca

YOUR VOICE ‘Hard on the subject, soft on the person’ Dear editor, There is an old saying, “a welcome guest knocks before he enters, not after he leaves.”

In his Aug. 5 guest column, Danny: Napoleon or just the complex, Bill Kelly appears to have a penchant for verbally mauling his subjects.

Using the article as an example, is this fair and/or valid journalism?

In my opinion Kelly’s 18-column

inch article was nothing more than an outpouring of vitriolic verbosity.

Kelly certainly has a talent for stringing words together and if only he could or would incorporate the old adage, “hard on the subject, soft on the person,” Kelly’s work would make for good reading.

Ursula Dowler, Cartyville

‘Hurtful’ cartoon Dear editor, As a subscriber, I had to write to say I was disgusted to see the Page 6 cartoon on the food fishery in the Aug. 6 edition. It was in bad taste, poorly timed, and totally insensitive.

Editor’s note: Doug Bird, The Independent’s cartoonist, prepared the following response …

The above letter, and many others, expressed outrage at last week’s editorial cartoon. The cartoon was conceived before those unfortunate men drowned and I have no knowledge of exactly what happened to them. I do know that many unprepared and unskilled people head out on to the water every year for the food/recreational fishery. I hoped the cartoon would wake people up to the blithe disregard for human life that occurs during this fishery. Only people who

It must have been particularly hurtful to the family and friends of the father and son who tragically died during this year’s food fishery.

Mike Warren, St. John’s have gone through a similar loss can come close to understanding what the family of the men who were lost are going through. I’m sure this cartoon — again, not about those men in particular — is the least of their worries.

It often happens that good people are outraged on behalf of others they feel have been wronged. The irony is we seem to advocate more strongly for the dead than the living. If the family of those men feels wronged by this cartoon I am sincerely sorry. To all others, please direct your rage in the direction of positive change and let the families in any tragic situation speak for themselves.

AG should investigate Hydro Dear editor, With reference to the most recent application by Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro for a rate increase, I am reminded of how the provincial government has used this corporation as a cash cow over the years. Indeed when the last budget was handed down, the minister of Finance “bragged” that due to oil revenues the government did not need to go to Hydro, with cap in hand, to balance the budget this year. One would only assume that as a result of this there should be surplus funds somewhere.

Everyone in this province should

know well the price of oil has risen and is being used for all manner of excuse to gain extra profits.

Just recently the Public Utilities Board authorized a 5 per cent increase. Apparently this went over so easily they are trying to rubber stamp another grab. It is about time auditor general John Noseworthy had a serious look at this Crown corporation.

As a former supervisor with Hydro, I know very well the blatant waste that has taken place over the years.

Austin F. Winsor, Springdale

AN INDEPENDENT VOICE FOR NEWFOUNDLAND & LABRADOR

P.O. Box 5891, Stn.C, St. John’s, Newfoundland & Labrador, A1C 5X4 Ph: 709-726-4639 • Fax: 709-726-8499 www.theindependent.ca • editorial@theindependent.ca The Independent is published by Independent News Ltd. in St. John’s. It is an independent newspaper covering the news, issues and current affairs that affect the people of Newfoundland & Labrador.

PUBLISHER Brian Dobbin EDITOR IN CHIEF Ryan Cleary MANAGING EDITOR Stephanie Porter PICTURE EDITOR Paul Daly PRODUCTION MANAGER John Andrews

sales@theindependent.ca • production@theindependent.ca • circulation@theindependent.ca All material in The Independent is copyrighted and the property of The Independent or the writers and photographers who produced the material. Any use or reproduction of this material without permission is prohibited under the Canadian Copyright Act. • © 2006 The Independent • Canada Post Agreement # 40871083

The Independent welcomes letters to the editor. Letters must be 300 words in length or less and include full name, mailing address and daytime contact numbers.

Letters may be edited for length, content and legal considerations. Send your letters in care of The Independent, P.O. Box 5891, Station C, St. John’s, NL, A1C 5X4 or e-mail us at editorial@theindependent.ca

Fishery needs ‘a swift kick’ T he 2006 caplin season was a bust, but it wasn’t supposed to be.

There were two key positives leading up to this year’s fishery: caplin were plentiful and large, and the market was one of the best in years.

As the caplin approached the island’s shores to spawn, conditions looked good for a successful and lucrative fishery. The market was good because the Norwegian fishery remains closed for at least another year and Icelandic caplin are always small in size, which are less attractive to the Japanese market. The Japanese were committed to paying higher prices — possibly the highest in years — for our larger caplin.

Market dictates when best to prosecute the caplin fishery. Buyers prefer female caplin when the row is about 90 per cent mature — meaning fishermen have to be allowed to catch caplin at the right time, when the fish are at the right stage of development.

Thanks to the mangers of the stock — the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans — that did not happen this year. All that was caught and processed was small caplin.

As a result, Japanese buyers and others estimate the fishing industry lost $40-million US. This is the third consecutive year the provincial economy has experienced a loss in its lucrative caplin fishery because we couldn’t satisfy Japanese markets. I blame the loss on DFO mismanagement, as well as the Fish, Food and Allied Workers’ union, which runs federal Fisheries.

Japanese buyers have indicated they will not return to Newfoundland and Labrador if they can get their caplin in Norway when that fishery re-opens.

Given the downturn in other fish species — both in price and catch rates — there was never a time when the industry needed the money as desperately as it did this year. This was the year the caplin fishery was supposed to save the industry.

That likely won’t happen.

The criteria for opening a caplin fishery has gone from a simple opening on June 1st until the total allowable catch (TAC) is taken, to a mishmash of opening dates from point to cape, head to cove, to sometimes entire bays for a period of 10-12 hours. This system has pitted fisherman against fisherman,

FONCE BEST

Guest Column

fisherman against processor, one side of a bay against another, etc. Add more rules and regulations … the more the micromanagement, the worse and the poorer the industry becomes. My opinion is that the industry — both processing and harvesting sectors — is on the verge of financial collapse as a result of government mismanagement.

I started fishing when I was 12 years old; owned a fishing enterprise for 15 years; graduated from MUN with a bachelor of arts and education degree; taught school; worked three years as a DFO fishery officer; and have owned my own plant for the past 30 years.

I have spent time in all markets that I have exported to, including Japan, China and Europe. My company has had the same Japanese buyer for 30 years and I am friends with most Japanese buyers.

DFO has downloaded responsibility for the management of fish stocks to the FFAW. The department did this for two reasons: bureaucrats don’t have to worry about making mistakes or making any enemies in managing the resource; and politicians can keep the union on side for the next federal election, which is not far off.

SCREWED UP To start this year’s caplin fishery, prime caplin fishing time was lost in Placentia Bay, St. Mary’s Bay and the Southern Shore. The situation was brought to DFO’s attention when it happened and it was suggested that Conception and Trinity bays be opened immediately. But the opening times for those fisheries were also screwed up.

Pleas made to DFO — including one by the largest Japanese buyer on the island — were ignored. “Why is your government so stupid?” the Japanese buyer asked. The fishermen I talked to said the same thing. They watched their season — and the money that could sustain them — slip by.

To add insult to injury, after this year’s fishery was lost DFO reopened some of the bays to take black males (a condition where the male turns black

on the sides at the end of the spawning season), a fish that’s not overly attractive to the market.

At the same time, frustrated fishermen who are trying to make ends meet began to threaten fish processors to either buy black males or face repercussions in the crab fishery.

This made buyers do things they shouldn’t do — namely, put substandard product on the market, which only hurts future markets.

Another blatant example of complete and utter stupidity was the way DFO kept track of catch levels. The department and the FFAW instituted a new weight system whereby fish weight was estimated by measuring the containers — without taking into account water inside the containers.

This system is surely not legal and cannot be used for trade according to the weight and measures act.

And what about our provincial Department of Fisheries and Aquaculture? Not a word from either the premier or his Fisheries minister on this year’s huge losses.

On the other hand, everyday in the media I hear about the nonsense of the FPI Act, Harbour Breton, Fortune, etc., etc. — societal and economic chaos partly due to the complete micro-management of the fishery.

Now, just in case the readers of this article think I am a sore loser, or someone with a political axe to grind — not so. There is nothing trivial or frivolous about my financial losses. Most people I know in the industry suffer in silence from useless provincial fishery laws and manipulation by the provincial government — mostly for political gain. This kind of mistreatment has gone on for years and with every governing party since the Brian Peckford era.

Newfoundland and Labrador’s fishing industry, like all businesses, has had its ups and downs. We have lost our cod stocks through mismanagement, and are now about to lose our lucrative crab stock to the same fate.

The fishery, which is riddled with politics from the federal to provincial levels, needs a swift kick.

Fonce Best is the owner/operator of Port Enterprises Ltd., a groundfish plant in Southern Harbour. http://prateboxinnfld.blogspot.com

AUGUST 13, 2006

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 7

Avoiding festival burnout I

was getting overwhelmed with all the festivals that have been popping up over the last decade or so.

It seems like you can’t cross the street downtown this summer without stumbling over a festival. It began to get on my nerves, but I came to terms with it — I used one invented celebration to come to terms with all the other celebrations.

Festivus is the once fictional holiday invented by the writers of Seinfeld. The character Frank Costanza claims to have come up with it while “raining blows” upon the head of another man he fought with over a toy in a department store during the Christmas rush. There had to be, thought Frank as he beat the man senseless, another way.

So he invented a celebration, Festivus, which begins with “the airing of grievances.” To quote Frank: “I’ve got a lot of problems with you people, and now you’re going to hear about them!” So here goes.

Success breeds imitation, and when

IVAN MORGAN

Rant & Reason some of the older festivals began to enjoy some success — the Newfoundland and Labrador Folk Festival comes to mind — newer ones were started. Soon everyone and their dog were organizing festivals. Some are growing, some are dying on the vine, some flopped — but every year there seems to be a few more.

Most of the festivals now operating were started in my lifetime. I remember the first Peace-A-Chord. I thought it was a great excuse to hang out and smoke dope in Bannerman Park in broad daylight. We’d all listen to few tunes, chill with our friends, and publicly show our dislike of war … terrific.

Then, when I got older and had kids, the festival was a chance to take

Kelland-Dyer to front it.

Vowing she was in it for the long term, she actually led a small hand of compatriots into a general election. She ran herself in whatever they call the new Bell Island district and had a respectable showing. That election night, as the results pawed in, one of the TV commentators was effusive in his praise of Ms. Kelland-Dyer, suggesting she had made a good start and looked forward to her building it into a force to be reckoned with.

The next morning, Ms. KellandDyer glibly announced she was quitting, flooring admirers and detractors alike. She spent the next few years on the airwaves, losing no opportunity to criticize Brian Tobin and the governing Liberals.

However, when Roger Grimes replaced Tobin in a bitter struggle with the long departed, sulky and vindictive John Efford, Ms. Kelland-Dyer’s attitude and demeanor towards the Liberals did a 180.

Within a couple of weeks, she became an advisor to the newly minted Premier Grimes and she swallowed her tongue.

Curiosity got the better of me and I called an old friend close to the premier’s office and asked him what was going on.

His reply, wryly and succinctly, “Bill, better to have a stinky old camel inside the tent pissing out than outside the tent pissing in.”

Indeed!

Bill Kelly, St. John’s

‘Beyond my comprehension’ Dear editor, “A huge disappointment” is what I call the photographs I took on Sunday morning, Aug. 6, on a leisurely walk in Bowring Park in St. John’s. Some individuals spent quite a bit of time and effort early Sunday morning defacing the park environment.

Luckily the diligent workers at the park cleaned up the damage before most of the general public came to visit. Only the early walkers see most of this needless damage and destruction. The reason this is happening is certainly beyond my comprehension, but liquor and lack of respect may have some involvement.

There were tire tracks all over the park grass. Picnic tables and garbage cans were broken and thrown in the water.

Quite often while walking on the South Brook Trail there is a lot of broken glass, usually beer bottles, which result in injuries to animals walking in the area as evidenced by the trails of blood.

time and money — I suspect they didn’t have much. Now many people have more spare time and money, and no end of fascinating things to occupy their summer nights.

Festivus, as the joke goes, is for the rest of us. That’s kind of the way I see all these festivals: I am not a musician, or a street performer, or a filmmaker, and although I appreciate all those art forms, I can’t face a whole weekend of one thing — whether it’s folk music, or independent films, or people juggling flaming chainsaws. I know there are lots who can and good for them, but what about “the rest of us?”

For the rest of us I have some advice. Avoid the temptation to get “festivalled out.” It would be easy to surrender to general St. John’s crankiness and cynicism. Yes, so many festivals crammed together are kind of silly. And yes, like eating a pound of chocolate, too much of anything good isn’t. But our winters are long and dreary, and it is great to have nice things to do on a summer evening.

Pick and choose — there are some fine performances happening around town. There are going to be some good parties. Maybe get out of town and check out one of the festivals around the province. Now is a good time for a road trip. What the hell.

Maybe you’ll get lucky and pick the right place on the right night. In my case it was the Rose and Thistle on Water Street Aug. 5. A performer — Amelia Curran — and her small band of superb musicians, held us all spellbound with their talent and their quiet, confident brilliance. I will never forget the image of a waitress standing, a case of empties in her arms, lost in the music.

Not every festival is a blast, not every event life affirming. But they are out there, and I suspect, thanks to the yaffle we have at the moment, there are probably more such moments. And if you don’t go, you won’t experience them. ivan.morgan@theindependent.ca

RUELOKKE’S ROAD

YOUR VOICE Dyer warning Dear editor, A journalism prof once told a class of which I was a member to “never, ever, ever surrender your credibility. It’s the only thing you have that counts for anything in this life.”

That’s why I find Sue KellandDyer so offensive. Not the individual — I barely know her, but the interloper masquerading as a member of the fourth estate.

She’s currently doing some work at The Independent, but don’t expect her to be around very long before some politician or other vested interest rents or leases her for a while.

That’s been her history. She first came to be known to the public through VOCM Open Line. It soon became apparent she had come to love the sound of her voice and she became a fixture on the airwaves.

For a time, she won considerable praise for championing a successful flight to prevent the Clyde Wells’ administration from privatizing Newfoundland Hydro.

But the wiley Ms. Kelland-Dyer succumbed to her personal ambition and ulterior motives by turning up as some sort of flak with the PC opposition, then under leader Loyola Sullivan.

After her time with the Tories, she turned up on the payroll of one Al Chislett, one of the co-founders of the Voisey’s Bay nickel deposit.

Chislett, all of a sudden, had time on his hands and a lot of money to spend so he decided to bankroll his own political party and paid Ms.

the kids out and get them some fresh air while enjoying a few bands, all at the same time. Now the kids are running the thing and I can’t be bothered to go. Ah, the circle of life.

The St. John’s summer calendar is blocked with festivals, and every region of the province has one. They can be broadly broken into two types.

In St. John’s are the theme festivals, which are based on a specific medium: music (folk, jazz or classical), street performers, theatre, or film.

Outside St. John’s are the regionbased festivals, which are more tourist centred, their genesis probably in the local chamber of commerce’s desire to scare up a few tourist bucks in the summer. There are exceptions: Rising Tide’s Summer in the Bight in Trinity being the best example, but most regions now offer an almost obligatory regional summer festival.

When I was a boy there was the Regatta, and every parish had a turkey tea — that was about it. I don’t know what people did with all their spare

There is strong evidence of large fires being set in a clearing on one section of the South Brook Trail.

What will happen to the park — or, for that matter, surrounding neighbourhoods — if these fires get out of control? Maybe this area of the park could be patrolled at night.

Bowring Park is extraordinarily beautiful and used by thousands of people on a yearly basis. To see such widespread vandalism is disheartening and I feel more efforts should be made to minimize future damage.

Jim Costello, St. John’s

The Supreme Court of Newfoundland ruled Aug. 7 that an independent panel’s decision last year to hire Max Ruelokke (above) as head of the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board should stand. The province has opposed Ruelokke’s appointment as the board’s chair and CEO, preferring to divide the duties between Ruelokke and St. John’s Mayor Andy Wells. As of The Independent’s press deadline, the province had yet to comment on the court’s ruling.

Paul Daly/The Independent

Hearn needs refresher course in national pride Editor’s note: the following letter was written to federal Fisheries Minister Loyola Hearn, with a copy forwarded to The Independent.

Dear Mr. Hearn, The disappointment is all the greater since so many of us had such high expectations when you were appointed minister of Fisheries. It seemed inconceivable then that you would so quickly conform to the Ottawa mentality, even, it seems, beyond the point to which your predecessors were so conditioned.

If it is true that you have stated publicly that foreign nations have a “historic right” to fish on our continental shelf, while our own people are not only denied access, but as a consequence have had their way of life destroyed and are driven to the four winds, you have gone beyond the point where you can any longer claim to represent our best interests. I would go further and say that if in fact this is what you really believe, you have abrogated your right to call yourself a Newfoundlander. Maybe you need to take a trip to Iceland for a refresher course in national pride.

Lloyd C. Rees, Conception Bay South

On deaf ears Dear editor, I am so frustrated I could scream! I cannot believe what’s happening to deaf education in this province. If the government wants to save $3.5 million a year, why don’t they just close down the Newfoundland School for the Deaf quickly and end the torture?

Education Minister Joan Burke said the education of deaf children in the province would not be adversely effected by the loss of 28 support personnel positions because there would only be 12 students living in residence. What?

She also said the current trend in the department is to have the children educated in their local school districts near their home (inclusion) and to have them fitted with cochlear implants. Well that’s it then … this technology must be the “cure” for deafness, the panacea for educating children with a hearing loss severe enough to deter them from learning language aurally.

Well hell, I guess all that research being done in the U.S., Sweden, Australia, Great Britain and other countries means very little to the wellinformed advocates of inclusion.

Inclusion is the great politically correct method of education today. Take all special needs students and place them in the classroom with all the support staff that was identified through their individual student support plan (ISSP) and “include” them with regular students. That’s best for all. The “normal” students will learn about the problems

faced by the special needs students, the classroom teacher will modify the curriculum to meet the strengths and weaknesses of the Pathways 2, 3, or 4 students and everything will be hunky dory.

Where to begin? Perhaps with my personal definition of inclusion as indiscriminate integration. Special needs are not integrated, students are.

Disabilities are not integrated, people are. Every student, each person is an individual. Where Jane Jones may excel using a cochlear implant in a regular classroom, her twin, John, might become withdrawn, sullen or paranoid in that situation. However, both may have equal academic potential. Jane will probably reach her potential, but John may not and thus be labeled a failure. All in the name of “inclusion.”

When the current government stated that the Pathways system of education and the ISSP process was going to be reviewed, I thought there might be hope that this madness would end.

Obviously it hasn’t. The reason there are so few students at the school for the deaf is because of Pathways and ISSPs. To get a student enrolled in the school for the deaf practically takes an edict from God. Even when the ISSP team recommends that a student go to the school, the recommendation is turned down by the director of student support services.

John Reade, St. John’s

AUGUST 13, 2006

8 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

IN CAMERA

Breaking barriers During the annual Breaking Barriers Youth Conference, physically disabled teens from across Newfoundland and Labrador meet for four days and nights at Lion Max Simms Memorial Camp near Bishops Falls. While there, they learn, discuss, reconnect and take part in all sorts of youth activities — sports, crafts, karaoke, dance, gossip. Managing editor Stephanie Porter spent two days at the conference, helping the teens develop a camp newsletter (and learning a few things herself). Photo editor Paul Daly joined the group for some of the events.

O

n the first night of the annual Breaking Barriers Youth Conference, Lion Max Simms camp — with the moon high over the Exploits River and brown rabbits hopping across the gravel road — looks, at first glance, like any other spacious and well-groomed fully serviced camp.

Then three teenaged girls in power wheelchairs come out the front door of the main building, chat for a minute, and drive smoothly from sidewalk to driveway to grass as they join a gathering around the bonfire.

Here, there are no bumps or curbs to deal with, no ditches or sudden stops.

Walkways wrap around the building, through the playground, to the basketball court, down to the water.

Inside, the hallways are as wide as rooms, and doors are wider than any wheelchair — with space to spare.

The facility opened in 1981, the first truly accessible camp in the province. It was built, and is still maintained, by the Lions family of Newfoundland. It’s named in memory of long-serving Lion Max E.

For some of these teens, they’re the only kid in their school with a disability.

This is an opportunity for them to come, be part of a peer group where they’re cool, and accepted.

Jennifer Douglas Simms — Newfoundland’s first district governor for the organization — who was handicapped.

Its use is not limited to those with physical disabilities, but it is beautifully inclusive.

For one week a year, the camp is home to the Breaking Barriers conference. This year, 44 youth aged 14 to 19 gathered there, Aug. 6-10.

It’s immediately obvious confer-

ence participants are delighted to be around their peers. Some are more active than others, more outgoing, mischievous, talkative, fun loving, intellectual or shy — just as in any group of teenagers.

“They’re teens getting together to discuss issues that are important to them,” says Jennifer Douglas, an occupational therapist with the Janeway Child Health and Rehabilitation Centre, and one of the conference leaders.

“For some of these teens, they’re the only kid in their school with a disability. This is an opportunity for them to come, be part of a peer group where they’re cool, and accepted.”

“That’s the big difference,” adds co-leader and fellow occupational therapist Tanya Kenny. “A lot of the activities we’ve planned, these kids wouldn’t be comfortable doing in front of a group of able-bodied (teens) … they wouldn’t be comfortable getting up in front of their class, or speaking out. But because they’re amongst their peers, here …”

Max Simms Idol, held the Monday

AUGUST 13, 2006

night of the conference, is a perfect example. Everyone gathers in the camp gymnasium to watch as individuals, pairs, and groups of teens get up to sing favourite songs to background CD music. One girl sings without music; one fellow plays guitar and belts out a Johnny Cash song. All are rewarded with loud cheers and hoots.

There are other scheduled activities like swimming, wheelchair basketball, tie-dying, an outdoor cookup and — the highlight — a banquet and dance.

The mornings are generally reserved for educational sessions on career options, social skills, fitness and advocacy.

There are also social workers available for one-on-one sessions or chats, and an organized — though not mandatory — time to remember and pay tribute to friends who have passed away.

“It’s an opportunity for them to learn about things that are available to them, whether it’s careers or lifestyle or education,” says Douglas.

“It’s not a lot about self-care, because we do quite a bit for them so they can get out and have fun, but it is independence from their parents.”

And as Kenny points out, this might be the only week of the year the teens are away from their folks.

Camp participants come from all

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 9

over. There are eight “rehab staff” (most from the Janeway) there, and about the same number of personalcare attendants to help meet the physical needs of the teens. Nursing staff are also on hand to administer medications.

“Because this is a conference, there is a certain level of cognitive ability that the teen has to have, in order to be able to participate in group discussions about topics relevant to teenagers with physical disabilities,” says Douglas of requirements for participation.

“The point is, the teens learn from each other. And if you have a group of teens who can’t share stories and group discussions, then they’re not learning from their peers.”

The conference — which has an annual budget of about $30,000 (Easter Seals is a major sponsor) — does not provide for one-on-one care. Participants who require that level of attention generally travel with a personal care assistant.

According to all reports, the teens look forward to their week at Max Simms all year. Most articulate their reasons well: improved self-confidence, self-esteem, learning, friendship and above all, fun.

“It’s an opportunity for them to do things where they’re not going to be judged,” says Douglas. “Really, when they come here, their peers don’t see that they’re in a wheelchair.

The disabilities kind of disappear.”

Some of the conference participants wrote short reflections about the Breaking Barrier Youth Conference. Selected excerpts: “It’s that time of the year again … a day of immense and unforgettable fun at Max Simms camp located about five kilometres off the Bay d’Espoir highway, somewhere in the woods.

What truly makes it such an unforgettable experience is that we are around people like ourselves … I am around true friends who understand and know what it is to live with a disability. The second thing I feel what makes Max Simms such a great place is that it is the perfect world for disabled people because there are no obstacles. No physical as well as societal ones.

The third and final thing about Max Simms is that our disabilities are turned into abilities and that’s what I feel means everything.”

Justin Mercer, 17, Upper Island Cove (“I am a delegate of Max Simms for two years, as well as numerous other conferences and exchange programs, with dreams of becoming a pilot or architect.”)

“Challenge, what is a true challenge? Well, to me a true challenge is skiing down the Rocky Mountains in Alberta (like I did in 2000) or getting in a debate with one of my political friends … To me, my Cerebral Palsy is not a challenge, it’s an opportunity.

I know some of you must be wondering: how can you say that?

Don’t you have some kind of troubles caused by your CP? And yes, I have had trouble, like my fairly painful yet necessary surgery two years ago, but this is how I see it: without my disability, I would not have many of the great experiences in my life … like skiing with the disabled skiing program in Corner Brook (and going to Banff), or meeting many of my political friends or anyone at Max Simms (I shudder at the thought).

My disability is not a challenge, it’s another door that’s open to me!”

Brad Evoy, Corner Brook “Max Simms is a very exhilarating experience. It has brought the chance to strengthen my self-confidence and self-esteem and to

work towards seeing myself as a normal, everyday teen — but with some obstacles.

It’s also the chance to reconnect with some friends I haven’t seen in a while and to teach them it’s not the disability that makes the person — it’s the attitude that helps in everything you do.”

Carrie-Ann Bugden, 16, Bay Roberts Memories of Max Simms Sunday was a very long bus ride because I couldn’t wait to get to camp With friends by my side, I feel like a champ Max Simms Idol is my best part I love to sing, it comes from the heart.

I get dressed up and go to the dance, Hoping to have a night of romance …

Some of the food here is great, It’s nice and hot … unless you’re late.

The next year at camp will be my last My time spent here goes too fast.

— Nikki Lake, 18

“Max Simms to me is having a disability and trying to overcome it by seeing other people that are in a wheelchair too, and friends to help me feel confident about myself.”

— Samantha Tipple, 16, Bay Roberts “When I was first introduced to this amazing place called Max Simms, it was one of the biggest eye openers of my life. I was quite shy and not quite sure of myself or where it was I belonged. Though it didn’t take long to find my niche, with the aid of many amazing people …

Max Simms is a place where teens with disabilities can come to just feel like a kid again, make new friends and truly experience what the camp life is like. We have lost some of our friends, though the memories will live on! We all have obstacles and hurdles to over come, some larger than others, though they all make us stronger.”

— Katie Cashin, 18, Corner Brook

AUGUST 13, 2006

10 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

Home and away

I

know this column is going to be all over the place, but I have an LEIA excuse. I’m jet-lagged and trying FELTHAM to write with a mind still reeling from all I’ve seen and done over the Falling Face First past 10 days.

It had been 14 years since I’d been to Toronto, and I woke up one morn- Newfoundland weather, but I would ing in July I decided it was time for a have loved a good rainy, foggy day.

The weather wasn’t the only thing I vacation. Well, it was more like I was that desperate to get away that if I had to adjust to. One of the things I wasn’t flying out of here I was going love about Newfoundland is if you to launch a raft from St. John’s har- need a quiet place to go to think — like a deserted street for a late night bour — next stop Europe.

This was my first time flying alone, walk — you can find it.

But everywhere I went in Toronto, and I couldn’t stop the twinges of nervousness in my stomach and the there were people. Millions of them, “what if” scenarios entering my always in constant motion, like the thoughts. To try and relax a bit I held city is an anthill that needs to be onto the hope of meeting the perfect, maintained and the ants will work day unbelievably fascinating stranger who and night to keep it going.

I missed the laid back vibe of St. would just happen to sit next to me on John’s, the calm flow. Up there it the plane.

Of course nothing as romantic- seemed like everyone was racing comedy glamorous as that happened, around me and I was still at the starting line trying to get but I did run into an going. I managed to old friend who happened to be on the What I saw wasn’t make my way around the track eventually same flight. That little all cold brick and though, but at my own stroke of luck made pace and I’m sure my journey a lot easisteel, but much there was a few funny er. looks thrown my way.

My aunt met me warmer, greener I even felt painfully when we landed, aware that I was a viswhich saved me the and more inviting. itor and not a resident torture of trying to when I was grocery find my way around the Toronto airport — I would rather shopping. I got to the checkout and, have tackled a corn maze the size of a when I went to pay, the cashier asked football field. During the ride to me if I wanted to buy bags. All I could where I was staying, I realized the think was: “You want me to do way my four-year-old mind remem- what?”

I just nodded, because it seemed bered Toronto was a bit distorted. The image in my head was something like like the right thing to do, and paid five an endless highway flanked by sky- cents for each of my bags. I think the scrapers as far as the eye could see. girl realized this was the first time I What I saw wasn’t all cold brick and had ever heard of this because she had steel, but much warmer, greener and a little smile on her face when I nodmore inviting. It wasn’t the complete ded dumbly. I still think I should have just carried my groceries, but if I did opposite of home after all.

Once the initial shock wore off, and that I might as well have worn a sign I stopped looking around wide-eyed reading, “I have no idea how this city and open-mouthed at everything, I works.”

Most people I encountered were started to sink into the uncomfortable understanding about my confusion role of tourist.

First of all, I felt horribly out of and gave me directions or polite place. My skin colour was close to pointers when I needed them. There that of Casper’s while everyone else were a few who were standoffish was walking around sporting tans that enough I thought their coldness could would put David Hasselhoff to freeze over hell (or Toronto, the two shame. I went up there foolishly are interchangeable in terms of clidetermined to wear only long pants mate … just kidding), but generally I because of my hatred for shorts, but met friendly people that made a lasteven that wasn’t an option in a city ing impression.

I think the trip was just what I needwhere pants would make me stand out ed. It was exciting to be lost in a new even more than pasty legs.

During my stay I had the pleasure place, to learn and explore. Part of me of experiencing a heat wave. There feels like the dream is better than the are no words for what 48 degrees with reality and I crave to get away again. humidity feels like. It’s like the very Then the phone rings and I’m remindair in your lungs feels like boiling ed that there are reasons, amazing and steam and showering is pointless loving ones, that will keep me because there’s already a river of grounded here for at least a little sweat soaking you from head to toe. while longer. It’s good to be home.

Air conditioning is more valuable Leia Feltham graduated from than gold and diamonds combined.

The heat took a while to get used to Gonzaga High School in June. Her and I never thought I’d be missing column returns Aug. 27.

LIFE STORY

A guardian of history Devoted to archiving and preservation, Bobbie Robertson retired as secretary of the Newfoundland Historical Society at age 95 BOBBIE ROBERTSON 1892-1992

By Ivan Morgan The Independent

I

t’s ironic little is known about one of the most important people in the history of the preservation of this province’s archival treasures. But that was the sort of person Bobbie Robertson was: straightforward, industrious and selfless.

For the last 20 years of her working life, Robertson, as secretary of the Newfoundland Historical Society, collected, catalogued and preserved as much archival material as possible.

It is not an exaggeration to say we owe a huge debt to Robertson. A lot of what we know about ourselves, what we know of our history, and what we will learn in the future about our history, is possible because of her work.

Robertson saw the value in documents others would have burned, and worked to catalogue and preserve them.

Born Bella Pirie in Birkhill, Scotland in 1892, Robertson was given the nickname Bobbie as a young girl. She married a man named Robertson, and with their infant daughter in tow, came to Newfoundland in 1923, when she was 31.

Her husband took the job of manager of the Crosbie Hotel, then located on the corner of Duckworth and Prescott Streets in downtown St. John’s. As the family of the manager, they lived in the hotel.

Author and historian Paul O’Neill, an old friend, says she once told him her husband brought another companion from Scotland: whiskey. It eventually spelled the end of her husband’s career at the Crosbie, and the end of the marriage.

In 1935, he lost his job and booked passage back to Scotland, never to return. Robertson, in a move bold for a woman of her time, decided to stay.

With a daughter to support, she had to find employment, and soon did, working for the Commission of Government’s land settlement and experimental farming program. In 1942 she was appointed private secretary to R. P. Power, the first Canadian Trade Commissioner to Newfoundland. She worked there for 25 years, retiring in 1967, at the age of 75.

A remarkable woman, she was all the more remarkable for the age in which she lived — a time when society was not necessarily supportive of single mothers or women with forceful personalities. Robertson flourished, developing a wide circle of friends and a reputation as a highly competent employee and delightful companion.

She was aware of the obstacles she overcame. She had a photograph she enjoyed showing people, of all the Canadian Trade Commissioners and their employees — over 60 people — posing for a group photograph in Ottawa. She would proudly point out

she was the only woman in the photo.

After her retirement, she applied for and was given the job of the first fulltime secretary of the Newfoundland Historical Society, which she held for 20 years. It is for her work with the society that she is primarily remembered today.

And all through all those decades, she lived in the same room in the Crosbie Hotel.

A tiny woman, she enjoyed robust good health her whole life. Anne Hart, another well-known author, and the former head of the Centre for Newfoundland Studies, recalls Robertson’s charm, energy, and wit.

Hart remembers Robertson once complained about what a nuisance food was. She knew she needed it — but resented the time it took to prepare and eat. Most of Robertson’s meals were prepared on a hotplate in her hotel room, and, as O’Neill says, were usually “whatever could be prepared quickly on a one-burner hotplate.”

Hart also recalls her annoyance with holidays, such as Christmas Day, that kept her away from work.

When the Crosbie Hotel (by then renamed the Welcome Hotel) was torn down, she chose a small apartment over the former Fountain Spray convenience store on Military Road (now Needs), as

it was across the street from her office in the basement of the Colonial Building. She was well into her 80s.

O’Neill says the tiny apartment alarmed her, as she suddenly had “so much space.”

Robertson saw the importance of information in a time when data was low-tech, mouldy, heavy, cumbersome, and viewed as worthless junk by many.

She went about her important work quietly, with diligence and grace.

On any given day, one was as likely to find the premier of the day, a justice of the Supreme Court, or an overworked penniless graduate student toiling on a thesis in her small office. She treated everyone the same, and was admired by all.

With her gentle, lilting Scottish accent, she guided many exactly to the source, archive or record they were looking for — always with encouragement, patience and good humour.

In 1984 she was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws from Memorial University. She retired in 1987, at 95.

Old age eventually slowed her down, and she moved to a senior’s home in Goulds.

In 1992, on the occasion of her 100th birthday, Memorial University threw her a birthday party, which she attended. She died four months later.

Scattered Past will return next week

Would you like to swallow 20 pills every day, just to digest your food?

If you had cystic fibrosis, you’d have no choice.

Please help us.

1-800-378-CCFF • www.cysticfibrosis.ca

AUGUST 13, 2006

INDEPENDENTWORLD • 11

Combat clips raise alarm

By Steve Rennie Torstar wire service

U

nauthorized combat videos of Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan surfacing online may be endangering the safety of the troops, says an opposition MP. Liberal defence critic Ujjal Dosanjh says, “it is quite likely that they could pose a danger,” if they disclose operational tactics.

He’s referring to a growing number of videos popping up on YouTube.com, a website that allows users to post video clips online.

Entering the search terms “Afghanistan,” “Canadian Forces” and “Taliban” yields several videos of what are alleged to be Canadian troops in Afghanistan in a firefight with the Taliban. Some of the videos, posted by a user identified as Capit, identify the soldiers as “Alpha Company, 2nd Platoon, ‘Red Devils’ from Edmonton, Canada.”

Those videos are credited to “Scott Kesterson.” A link to Kesterson’s myspace.com website reveals that he appears to be a freelance photojournalist from Oregon embedded with the U.S. Army in Afghanistan. It’s uncertain if Kesterson posted the videos on YouTube.com.

Searching for related videos on Capit’s YouTube page turns up thousands of related videos, many showing combat footage of Canadian soldiers.

Dosanjh says the Canadian Forces should investigate the source of the

videos to ensure the troops’ safety.

“In these kinds of situations, if there’s any possibility, even the remotest possibility or likelihood, that our troops may be endangered — they’re already in a very difficult situation — we should be very vigilant about protecting their safety,” he says.

A Department of National Defence spokesman says it’s the Forces’ understanding that Kesterson, who is not Canadian, was one of several journalists embedded in Afghanistan with a multi-national brigade that was authorized to shoot video footage of the Canadian troops.

However, Lieut. Adam Thomson says there’s not much the Forces can do to stop unauthorized videos from popping up on websites. “We really can’t control it once it’s out there,” Thomson says. “Once it’s put on the Internet, it’s going to be widely circulated. It’s pretty difficult to pull it off a website if it’s already out there in the public domain.”

Thompson says some of the footage is similar to that on Combat Camera, the government’s official military video website. He says the Canadian Expeditionary Force Command, which is responsible for Canadian Forces operations outside Canada, must approve all Combat Camera footage.

Dosanjh says it’s the government’s obligation to ensure the troops aren’t exposed to undue risk.

“I can’t really criticize the soldiers doing this kind of thing. They themselves ought to know if it could be dangerous for them,” he says.

VOICE FROM AWAY

Bill Roche

Pint-sized mutual funds B.C.-based Bill Roche teaches youngsters to manage their money

By Nadya Bell The Independent

B

A passenger empties her water bottle at a security checkpoint in Boston.

Jessica Rinaldi/Reuters

Canada’s airports vulnerable: Senator OTTAWA

By Tonda Maccharles Torstar wire service

O

ttawa’s reaction to the London arrests is knee-jerk and ineffective at addressing the larger aviation security concerns, says a Liberal who has spent the last two years warning that Canada’s airports are vulnerable to a terrorist attack.

Senator Colin Kenny, who chairs the Senate committee on national security and defence, dismisses tighter handluggage screening measures as insufficient, saying with so many other concerns ignored, “you have to wonder, are they just doing it for PR?” Passengers at Canadian airports were ordered to ditch all liquids and gels from hand luggage last week and faced tougher screening. At Pearson there were long line-ups but Scott Armstrong, spokesperson for the Greater Toronto Airports Authority, says “everybody was very patient, very understanding and very accommodating.”

Government officials call their response “swift,” in keeping with the actions of allied countries, and in keeping with the risk level. The threat, they said, was not directed at Canadianbound flights.

Transport Canada authorities say they took immediate action once they were informed before midnight Wednesday of the unfolding terror arrests in Britain.

Government sources say the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service was aware of the operation as early as Saturday. CSIS spokesperson Barbara Campion says “it’s a separate investigation from anything that’s going on here.”

Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon, on his first day of a family holiday in Charlottetown, was alerted by phone at about 2:30 a.m. and flew to Ottawa Aug. 10 to co-ordinate efforts.

The Canadian Air Transport Security Authority ordered airport operators to match British and American security measures for flights bound for Britain and the U.S. The tighter on-board luggage restrictions were later extended to all domestic flights.

But unlike flights originating in Britain where only essentials — wallets, passports, identification documents — were allowed to be carried on, domestic airline passengers in Canada

were permitted to take hand luggage on board.

Cannon warned tighter restrictions on electronic gadgets, such as laptops and iPods, may be brought in after the situation is “reassessed.”

The ban on liquids and gels in hand luggage is in effect for at least 72 hours, although Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day said the measures are in place “until further notice.”

Still, Kenny says, banning certain substances doesn’t touch on what are the airports’ main weaknesses — the lack of screening of those who work with aircraft.

“We see a huge inconsistency and we see a tremendous focus on the upper half of the plane, where the passengers are,” the senator says. “We don’t see the same diligence applied to the lower part of the plane where the groomers, the baggage handlers, the caterers, the refuellers are working.

“Security isn’t really good at Pearson because nobody is checking the folks who can actually leave something on the plane. If your objective is to leave three litres of the liquid explosive, I can’t think of an easier way of doing it than having it arrive along with the rest of the food, or having a groomer come and place it beside a seat or in the container above a seat, so someone could set it off.”

Kenny’s committee issued a scathing report in 2004 saying it was matter of luck, not security measures, that Canada has avoided a terrorist attack.

It noted that Canada still doesn’t boost the scrutiny of checked bags, a surprising lapse considering the country’s most infamous terrorist attack — the 1985 Air-India explosion, killing 329 people on board — was caused by a suitcase bomb.

Kenny says most of the concerns expressed in the Senate committee’s 315-page report have been largely ignored by the previous Liberal government and now by the Conservatives.

“Both (governments) get Fs. That’s the grade, they get Fs. “We’ve talked to groomers who say they have no idea what a bomb looks like, they’ve had no training how to find a bomb.”

The government says it has taken various measures since Sept. 11, 2001, including random screening of airport employees, fortifying cockpit doors and deploying sky marshals. It has also started using a biometric-based identity card for airport employees.

Paul Daly/The Independent

ill Roche is the most fun financial advisor you’ll ever meet.

Good thing — because his clients are kids.

And his advice for kids? Go with mutual funds.

Originally from Pleasantville, Roche lived in Newfoundland for 30 years before he and his family moved to British Columbia in 1994.

“We just decided to essentially go exploring, so we sold everything and decided to experiment — try life in a new area, and haven’t looked back since,” he says.

“It’s great, but we love coming home of course, to visit our roots and see family.”

Roche was a financial advisor with Manulife Canada when a game he made up to teach his son Evan about finances inspired him to seek out new clientele.

“He had so much fun playing it, on Fathers’ Day he came to me and gave me a card, and the card said ‘I love my dad because he plays the spending and saving game with me,’” Roche says.

“I was just blown away. I remember thinking, ‘Wow, if I can impact a three year old, this is really cool.’”

With his child-friendly game as a

starting point, Roche started a company called PowerPlay Strategies to promote his model for teaching children about money management.

“It’s really important to allow kids to be the decision makers, and to allow them to experience managing their own money — even if it’s a just a nominal amount,” he says.

As another way to reach children, Roche published a children’s book about aliens. It’s also covertly about money management.

In Kip and Zara’s Money Adventure, two aliens go camping on the Planet Zorlu, but one of them plans wisely and the other wastes his money on his favourite treat, Moon Crunch.

Zara — the money-wise alien with blue hair — teaches Kip about how she puts her money in three different pouches labeled spending, giving and growing. Zara invests some of her money in a star fruit company.

Roche encourages parents to allow children to manage their own money, and even to take them to financial planners. Children are not allowed to invest, but he recommends parents open accounts in trust for their children.

He took Evan to a financial planner when he was six, and explained the concept of mutual funds to him.

“We talked about it and picked out something that was right for him,”

Roche says. “He really had the ownership of it.

“My advice to parents is that they always find an advisor who is going to respect kids as individuals and is happy to have them as clients.”

At the end of the alien book there are several pages of activities, including an allowance contract for children to sign.

Roach says dealing on adult financial terms shouldn’t be scary for children.

“It gives them that comfort level so they don’t have to feel intimidated when they are young adults — they already have that experience and that awareness.”

Teaching children about having a portion of money to give away is important to Roche, and he says parents often tell him they appreciate it.

“The giving component really allows children to experience the joy of giving, and an awareness that they can help other people with their money.”

Besides promoting his new book, Roche speaks publicly and does seminars for teachers and banks to help them teach children about money.

Kip and Zara’s Money Adventure is available at Granny Bates and Bennington Gate book stores.

Do you know a Newfoundlander or Labradorian living away? Please email editorial@theindependent.ca.

You’re busy, your phone shouldn’t be.

You focus on what you do best, let us do what we do best.

We’ll answer your calls, take the sales leads, and pass them on to you. And we’ll do it all at a surprisingly affordable cost.

Call our award winning answering services and find out how we can help your business grow.

1- 8 88 - 693 -2255 • 709-722-3730 • www.telelinkcallcentre.com

AUGUST 13, 2006

12 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

HOUSE FULL UNBELIEVABLE! 21pc Packages Of Furniture! For One Low Price!

Surplus Freight has just made an incredible bulk purchase of brand name furnishings at drastically reduced prices. Truckloads of merchandise will be grouped together to offer the public UNBELIEVABLE prices on entire HOUSE FULL PACKAGES. This is an event you do not want to miss!

9

Room Package pc Living Includes Sofa, Loveseat, 2 End Tables, Coffee

Package pc Bedroom Includes Dresser, Mirror, Headboard

4

Table, 2 Lamps, Glider/Rocker and Ottoman.

and Nightstand.

Get All 21pcs!

#2200

#0200

For Only!

5

3

pc Dining Room Package Includes Dinette Table and 4 Chairs.

$

pc Complete Mattress Set

Get All 21pcs!

Includes Mattress, Foundation and Bed Frame. Sleep Aid

#1119

2048

9pc Living Room Package

4pc Bedroom Package

9pc Living Room Package

4pc Bedroom Package

#0300

#2200

#0130

#8200

3pc Complete Mattress Set

3pc Complete Mattress Set Sleep Aid

Sleep Aid

$

For Only!

5pc Dining Room Package

$

2148

Get All 21pcs! #2100

For Only!

5pc Dining Room Package

2198

Get All 21pcs! #1113

Over 30 Different Living Room Sets To Choose From! • Buy More, Save More!

Sofa Only!

For Only!

For Only!

Sofa & Loveseat!

1048

$

#5200

Sofa & Loveseat!

1068

$

#3550

628

$

e br at -Fi ese ro ov ic & L M Sofa

648

$

Sofa Only!

e br al -Fi on ro cti ic Se M 2pc

648

$

Sofa Only!

For Only!

2pc Sectional!

1098

$

#7370

For Only!

Sofa & Loveseat!

1098

$

#7300

Incredible Deals On 5pc Dining Room Sets! • 7pc Dining Room Sets Also Available!

For Only!

For Only!

All 5 Pieces Only!

318

$

#2302

All 5 Pieces Only!

498

$

#1031

For Only!

All 5 Pieces Only!

598

$

#1052

For Only!

All 5 Pieces Only!

798

$

#4850

Factory Direct Pricing On All Bedroom Sets! • No Gimmick Pricing!

Also Chest ble! a l Avai

Also Chest ble! a l Avai

Includes Dresser, Mirror, Headboard and Nightstand

All 4 Pieces Only!

For Only!

618

$

#3100

Also Chest ble! a l Avai

Also Chest ble! a l Avai

Includes Dresser, Mirror, Headboard and Nightstand

All 4 Pieces Only!

For Only!

698

$

#0253

Includes Dresser, Mirror, Headboard and Nightstand

All 4 Pieces Only!

For Only!

728

$

#4700

Includes Dresser, Mirror, Headboard and Nightstand

All 4 Pieces Only!

For Only!

1028

$

#0900

Wheeling Out The Savings!

Truckloads Of Mattress Sets At Factory Direct Prices!

Quality Mattresses Starting At Only

76

$

Sleep Aid

154

$

Queen Size each piece

Any Value Plus Twin or Full Set

TWIN ...... $109 ea. pc.

FULL ....... $139 ea. pc.

QUEEN ....$154 ea. pc.

5YR PRO-RATED WARRANTY

Posture Care

194

$

Queen Size each piece

TWIN ...... $144 ea. pc.

FULL ........$164 ea. pc.

QUEEN .... $194 ea. pc.

KING ........$216 ea. pc.

10YR PRO-RATED WARRANTY

Chiro Firm

214

$

Queen Size each piece

TWIN ...... $149 ea. pc.

FULL ........ $194 ea. pc.

QUEEN ... $214 ea. pc.

KING ....... $223 ea. pc.

15YR PRO-RATED WARRANTY

Mattress Fabrics Vary By Store Location. Advertised mattresses sold in sets only. See store for individual mattresses at factory direct prices. King sets consist of 3 pieces.

ST. JOHN’S

22 O’Leary Ave. (709) 726-6466

Across from Avalon Mall next to Avalon Software Open To The Public

Mon-Thurs: 12-8 • Friday: 10-8 Saturday: 10-6 • Sunday: 12-5

Locations Also In: Alberta, Manitoba, Ontario, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, & Newfoundland

We Accept: Cash, Interac, Visa, Master Card, American Express, Cheques, FREE Layaway

Call Toll Free.. 1(866) 929-9949 for a location near you.

Visit our website at www.surplusfreight.ca

*Tables, Fabrics, and Colours may vary by store location. **OAC. Additional Terms Apply, See Store For Details. 21-Piece Packages consist of; a 9pc Living Room Package which includes a sofa, loveseat, a three piece table set (#2221, #2213, #9710, #3612, #3811, #3702, #3705), two lamps (#6117), glider/rocker and ottoman (#7291); a 4pc Bedroom Package which includes a dresser, mirror, headboard and nightstand; a 5pc Dining Room Package which includes a dinette table and four chairs; and a 3pc Complete Mattress Set which includes the mattress, foundation and bed frame. Other packages available, see store for details.

STJohns_Tele_11.5x21.5.indd 1

7/21/06 3:23:40 PM

INDEPENDENTLIFE

SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, AUGUST 13-19, 2006 — PAGE 13

SUSAN RENDELL Screed and coke

T

here’s a woman in Little Rock, Arkansas, who has devoted an entire page of her website to Sebastian Spence. His eyes, his hair; his brand of cigarettes. His pets. “A pit bull named Cappo,” it says. But when I ask the St. John’s actor if he has a pet, he looks at me somewhat apologetically. “I had a goldfish for three years once.”

The story of the relationship between Iris the goldfish and her owner doesn’t have a happy ending. But by the time Spence finishes describing Iris’s demise, I’m laughing so hard I’m choking on my cigarette. Not Spence; he can laugh and spin a yarn and walk along Gower Street and smoke and punctuate it all so perfectly you feel it’s a shame there isn’t a camera rolling along beside him.

There usually is: Spence, 37, has rarely been out of work as an actor — stage, film and TV — since he was a child. The son of local actress and playwright Janis Spence, his mother regularly wrote him into her productions.

“She’s responsible (for my career choice), entirely,” Spence says.

In the early ’90s, he moved to British Columbia to try his luck in film, and hasn’t looked back since. Well, that’s not strictly true. Spence pulls a face.

“When I first went to B.C., I must have gone to 300 auditions, and nothing was happening for me — all I remember is doors being slammed in my face, people being rude. I called Mom, I said ‘I’m coming home, I don’t like it here, I don’t like acting — I don’t like actors.’” But his mother told him to persevere. “Persevere,” he repeats, and he smiles and reaches over and touches his mother’s arm.

The summer afternoon is doing her ageing debutante thing, all pout and cold shoulder, when I walk into the Fairmont hotel to meet with Spence, his mother, and his sister Sarah Spence.

Shortly afterwards we’re in the middle of what seems to be a kitchen party at their table in the bar — yak yak yak, laugh laugh laugh. Coffee by the tank load.

We’re in the throes of some decidedly non-linear linguistic lunacy when the waitress suddenly appears, drawn by the steady click-click of the camera.

Arms akimbo, head tilted to one side, she looks at Spence and says, in an amused yet defiant tone, “Are you supposed to be somebody famous or what?” Everyone laughs, Spence loudest and longest. And then he says “No!” Quite firmly.

If Spence isn’t famous, he’s at least very well known in an industry in which thousands of talented, good-looking young actors don’t get to to dip their toes — much less land a part on Dawson’s Creek for five episodes. I watched two episodes of Dawson’s Creek back to back once, and felt a distinct need for insulin afterwards. “Katie Holmes,” I say, crossing my fingers under the table.

“Katie Holmes and Tom Cruise — do they deserve each other or what?”

“She’s really sweet,” Spence says, his voice sinking to a reverent register.

(Damn!) “She was as nice as pie. And at that point it (the show) must have been on for six seasons. They wanted to get out of there, they were like, ‘We want to get back to Los Angeles, we’re sick of North Carolina — please (referring to Spence’s character), kill me on the show!’

“And I was quite happy to be down

“I must have gone to 300 auditions, and nothing was happening for me — all I remember is doors being slammed in my face, people being rude.”

Sebastian Spence

Janis and Sebastian Spence

Paul Daly/The Independent

Spence account Susan Rendell meets up with Newfoundland actor Sebastian Spence, and the rest of the family talent there,” Spence continues. “I was like, ‘God, I’m on this, this …’”

“I’m somebody important?” drawls his mother, in a voice of false disdain and genuine pride.

“No, girl,” Spence says, sounding deflated. And then he catches her eye and they both throw their heads back and nearly laugh the roof off the bar.

Dawson’s Creek is only a ripple in Spence’s career: there’s 46 listings on his spot in the Internet Movie Database (imdb.com) — roles in the X-Files, Dark Angel, Battlestar Galactica, The Boys of St. Vincent, Andromeda,

Crossing, Drive, She Said, Category 7: The End of the World — the list, as they say, goes on. As does the list of familiar names Spence can call co-stars: Katie Holmes, Charles Bronson, Richard Dean Anderson, David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, Beau Bridges, Robert Wagner, Ione Skye, Swoosie Kurtz, Randy Quaid …

Spence is probably best known for his starring role in Francis Ford Coppola’s science-fiction series First Wave. From 1998 to 2001, for 66 episodes, he played alien-hunter Cade Foster in the Emmy-nominated,

Gemini-winning series, which is in syndication and still has a serious fan base in several countries.

Fervent postings on the web as recent as last Tuesday beg for Cade’s return, or at least the release of First Wave on DVD. I tell Spence I heard that Coppola himself picked him for the part. He smiles and says, “Yeah, I heard he might have had something to do with it.” A smile without a soupçon of smug.

Spence’s recent roles include two films featuring a gay detective, played

by Chad Allen, formerly Dr. Quinn’s (Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman) oldest

son, Matthew. (The second, newly released detective movie just got good reviews in The New York Times and Variety — the Times mentions Spence — and he doesn’t know a thing about it until I tell him.)

Spence, who plays Allen’s significant other in the films, says the gay role was difficult at first. Eventually, he says, he and Allen became friends, which made the intimate scenes a little easier. (“Ah, c’mere, Allen, honey — give us a hug!”

Spence mimes this, grinning.)

See “I dream,” page 15

Peace-a-conundrum

The 21st annual Peace-A-Chord will go ahead this week — organizers just aren’t sure where

By Nadya Bell The Independent

S

itting on the living room floor of her Gower Street apartment, it’s not hard for Kaya Payne to get worked up about Peace-A-Chord.

“Peace-A-Chord is beautiful,” she says. “But really, for a lot of young people it is an introduction to issues they’ll be hearing about in the news.”

The festival of music, love and social justice is going into its 21st year

in St. John’s, but just days before the event gets going, those involved are still not sure where it will be held. A deteriorating relationship with City Hall coupled with high security costs may drive the festival indoors for the second year.

Payne chairs the Peace-A-Chord board of directors for the festival. Dan Galway and Jen Bruce are organizing the events.

“Peace-A-Chord is intended to be a free public event celebrating arts and

learning about social justice in a very public way,” she says. “It is very much against the spirit of Peace-A-Chord to wall it up somewhere, hiding it away, not out celebrating public space.

“This is why we make it a free festival. It’s not about paying rent.”

Payne says an important part of the festival is for it to be open and visible to the public to encourage younger people to stay, listen and get involved in the arts community. She says for her and many of her friends, organiz-

ing the festival is an empowering event.

“Unfortunately this youth festival is perceived differently from other festivals in the city,” she says.

RESIDENT COMPLAINTS For close to two decades, the PeaceA-Chord was held in Bannerman Park. The festival ran into problems in 2002 when residents complained about noise and fighting. City council required extensive security and fenc-

ing the following year, which cost $12,000 for one afternoon.

“Peace-A-Chord is undergoing radical change at the moment,” Payne says. “We can’t continue doing what we’ve been doing for years. It’s not sustainable.”

In 2005, the festival was held indoors, in the LSPU hall, but organizers had hoped to return the festival to the open air this year. Because of the See “Festival changing,” page 14

AUGUST 13, 2006

14 • INDEPENDENTLIFE

GALLERYPROFILE

SUSAN PARSONS Visual Artist

S

usan Parsons’ pit bull Mattie is nursing a young tabby cat named Harry. With another dog in her arms, a pint-sized black Chihuahua, Parsons explains that her day job — an IT analyst with Revenue Canada — isn’t so different for her from her artwork.

“I find if you’re doing programming, it’s the same kind of switch as when you’re painting. You want to shut everything out and you paint, or you program, it’s right-brained,” she says.

Parsons’ seascapes are full of light and white chop on the waves, with rich blue hues. An oil painting of Quidi Vidi gut hangs in her living room, a wisp of fog around the cliff and the spring snow melting to show scrub on the hills.

Parsons says she’s been an art student all her life. She’s constantly trying new media and taking art classes — from jewelry design and sculpture to watercolours. She is proud of her developing style, and is always surprised when people say they recognize her art.

Another seascape painted when she was 18 is remarkably similar in style to her more recent works.

Monet and the impressionists are a source of joy and inspiration for Parsons. A large painting of a lily pond shows their influence with her personal twist: concentric circles from a dropped stone ripple the water, and a curious school of koi swim into the painting.

“I love impressionism,” she says, “but I find that I can be too picky. I’m trying to be looser … I love the colours. You can feel the painting, you can feel the sun and the fog. It’s so moody.”

A small bowl of fruit in a wooden frame sits on the mantle piece. It’s her first painting, completed at age 12, which she keeps as an inspiration.

She recently rearranged her house for her largest project yet: painting a mermaid for the Easter Seals Mermaids in the City project. Her mermaid, Shalaya, goddess of the deep, is in front of the convention centre on New Gower Street.

In the four days she had to complete the mermaid, Parsons says she wanted the top half to be very human, and the bottom very fishy. “It’s a little bit like a trout, the tail is,” she says.

On land, Bowring Park is included in her new series of pastel works. The trees overhanging the path dapple the light, giving the impressionistic air that Parson’s loves. Another pastel work The Same But Different, shows two

women sitting back to back, the light colours and blue cloth similar in style to Edgar Degas.

Parsons’ two daughters, Erin and Megan, follow her interest in art. Their work hangs in the house as well.

Employed by Revenue Canada for 26 years, Parsons says she’s starting to feel her recreational interest in art is becoming serious. She hopes by her retirement she’ll be more established and better able to devote herself to her painting.

Parsons’ paintings — including a series of oriental poppies — are exhibited in the Five Islands Art Gallery in Tors Cove.

— Nadya Bell

The Gallery is a regular feature in The Independent. For information, or to submit proposals, please call (709) 726-4639, or e-mail editorial@theindependent.ca

Festival changing From page 13 high cost of fencing Bannerman Park, Payne says they applied to hold the festival in the smaller Harbourside Park, Aug. 1420.

On Aug. 8, the city’s special events committee decided that venue was not suitable.

Payne is frustrated with the city’s decision, but still hopeful they may work out a low-cost, outdoor solution.

The alternate location for the festival’s musical events is the Masonic Temple.

In the days leading up to the concerts, the Peace-A-Chord committee will offer workshops in yoga, belly dancing, silk screening,

“My parents have a photo of my dad playing in the 1985 festival — and me sitting in my mother’s lap.”

Kaya Payne improvisation, acting, and sustainable living (entitled Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse). An art space will be set up at

the Masonic Temple.

A lineup of bands have agreed to play at the festival — outside or in — including the Kremlin, Funky Dory, .roundelay, Delf Hohmann, Skull Face and others.

The CD from last year’s concerts, Something You Haven’t Heard, with unreleased tracks from Cara Lee Coleman, Dog Meat BBQ and Cheri Pyne will also be available.

Payne personally has a long history with the Peace-A-Chord, being the daughter of musician Jim Payne.

“My parents have a photo of my dad playing in the 1985 festival — and me sitting in my mother’s lap.”

POET’S CORNER Isolation

By David Benson We build this island around the wash of the Great Bays, scorning overland travel, preferring perhaps the security of boats.

The bays become nations, the rockbound places — City States.

Isolated?

Our grandfathers travelled more than we do.

Persian rugs and Greek urns adorned front rooms of houses where women scanned the sea with German telescopes for their return; rough men and hard, with delicate print dresses folded over forearms thick from work in salted cold and porcelain headed dolls tucked beneath tarpaulin coats.

Yet there are those today who wax warmly about “our culture,” who have been as far a Toronto, who are scared to death of boats, who call those people isolated.

They rowed across Fortune Bay in five hours or so.

Now we go by car and it takes us ten.

What do we know of the back street politics of Naples or Lisbon, or the price of tea in China?

From And We Were Sailors, published by Killick Press, 2002.

lives here.

It’s here in our community. Please make a difference by volunteering.

1-800-268-7582 www.mssociety.ca

AUGUST 13, 2006

INDEPENDENTLIFE • 15

Searching for summer suspense Miami Vice and Night Listener not what they should be; small British film gory but memorable Miami Vice Starring Colin Farrell, Jamie Foxx, and Gong Li 132 min.

1/2 (out of four)

A

major undercover drug investigation by the FBI has gone horribly awry, and it looks like the only answer is corruption from within.

Uncertain of the leak’s origin, FBI Agent Fujima approaches the Miami police force for assistance, and the proposed solution involves detectives Sonny Crockett and Rico Tubbs.

Deputized by the Bureau, they are to go deeply undercover to expose a big-time drug smuggling operation.

Gone are the pastels of two decades ago, as this Miami Vice is dark, gritty, and oh so very 21st century. Absent as well are abundant scenes of cool cars, reptilian pets, hints of levity, and any kind of rapport between our two heroes.

Writer/director Michael Mann has focused a lot of his attention on replacing every element that was described as “slick� in the TV series with “raw� and “edgy.�

The result is an erratic motion picture that offers moments of brilliance offset by lulls that seem interminable, and plot details that make next to no sense.

Fortunately, the main thrust of the story — the perils of undercover work — is clearly illuminated through the relationship Crockett establishes with one of the key players in the drug ring, while Tubbs’ involvement jeopardizes the safety of someone close to him.

There’s a much better movie hiding within the over two hours this film runs, and a fearless, experienced editor could probably find it. We can applaud the effort to give us something completely different in this Miami Vice, but a dash or two of what made the show so popular in the first place couldn’t have hurt.

The Night Listener Starring Robin Williams and Toni Collette 82 min.

1/2 (out of four)

Armistead Maupin, best known for the mini-series Tales of the City, based on his novel, co-writes this screenplay based on another of his works. The Night Listener relates how a late-night radio personality develops a long distance friendship with one of his most devoted fans.

The relationship is initiated after popular radio storyteller Gabriel Noone is asked to read a manuscript written by a teenager, recounting the abuse he suffered earlier in his life. Young Pete Logand is subsequently put in touch with Noone, who is both impressed with the boy’s writing skill, and shocked by the child’s ordeal.

A still from the movie The Descent

TIM CONWAY Film Score Noone is feeling vulnerable, and a little depressed, since his most recent long-term relationship is on the rocks, so the youngster’s support and encouragement comes just when the radio personality is most in need of a friend.

As time goes on, however, Noone begins to wonder if he isn’t participating in something a little more unusual, and sets out to meet Logand in person, a journey that offers a number of unexpected perils.

At the core of the film is an exploration of how stories affect our lives, and the grey area between what really happens and how we choose to remember events. Presented here in the wrapping of a thriller, the concept seems underdeveloped, and so are the thrills.

The tale engages our interest, but never develops the energy it needs to sustain our concern for the main character and his plight. Despite running almost 10 minutes shorter than its original running length at the Sundance Film Festival, for what we get out of it, it still seems too long.

The Descent Starring Shauna MacDonald and Natalie Jackson Mendoza 99 min. (out of four)

For the past number of summers, a small film has come out of nowhere and become a big surprise hit. Unless something unusual happens, The Descent is this year’s equivalent, minus the big box-office numbers.

With six weeks or so left to the season, however, there is time to remedy that situation, especially if word of mouth still counts for something at the cinema.

Six women set out to explore a cave system in the Appalachian Mountains.

An adventurous lot, they annually participate in some rigorous outdoor activity, but this year is especially significant. Their white-water rafting expedition the previous year had ended in a tragic accident, and this is their first reunion since.

Writer/director Neil Marshall does an excellent job in presenting a convincing recreation of the dangerous, claustrophobic environment of underground caves. Despite a number of cheap, “boo� starts early in the film, we settle down to a thrilling, precarious journey through narrow tunnels and magnificent larger hollows beneath the Earth’s surface.

It’s not enough these folks eventually find themselves in a strange place without a map, Marshall complicates things even more by adding monsters to the mix. The result is plenty of thrills, chills, action and excitement, with generous doses of, believe it or not, honest to goodness suspense.

Unfortunately, the price we have to pay for all of these goodies is enduring an uncomfortable amount of gore and brutality, perhaps a bonus to some fans of this kind of picture. Whatever the case, like 28 Days Later from a couple of years ago, The Descent offers satisfying entertainment, and is refreshing in its straightforward, no nonsense manner.

Tim Conway operates Capital Video in Rawlin’s Cross, St. John’s. His column returns Aug. 27.

‘I dream about coming home’ From page 13 Spence says he’s just finished a movie in which he played Justine Bateman’s romantic interest; even if you’re straight, he says, you’re frequently called upon to fake passion with someone you don’t feel passionate about — and vice versa. That’s why it’s called acting.

Doesn’t the camera pick it up, the lack of chemistry? I ask. There are ways to fool the camera, he tells me, all blueeyed innocence. (If I were a camera, I think to myself, I bet I’d get taken in if this guy kissed a table lamp.)

Does he get homesick? “All the time.

That’s the truth. I dream about coming home. In my own mind, I feel like I’m prepping to come home.� He returns to the province as often as he can — “I love coming home in the summer because you can actually see the town.�

He and Sarah are leaving the next day for Random Island, for a stay at his father’s former home. Spence’s father, Michael Cook, also a playwright, died in 1994, but nevertheless gets his share of Spence stories as the afternoon slipslides along.

While her brother and mother are having their pictures taken in the hotel’s atrium, Sarah and I fall into conversation. Sarah is a textile artist who specializes in footwear; she’s shy, she says.

While she is describing her recent work for Ontario’s Stratford Festival, I almost miss her footnote reference to Lord of the Rings. “Wait a minute,� I say. “Back up. You made the footwear for Lord of the Rings?� She looks at me as if I’ve accused her of drowning kittens. “There was a group of us,� she says, quickly. It

wasn’t all her fault, then.

When Spence filius and mater get back from their photo session, I ask him what his plans are. He tells me he and his mother are working on a script; he knows enough producers now, he says, to believe he has a shot at getting their script read. No mean feat; he mentions that a friend of his in the business sometimes gets 100 scripts a day delivered to his door.

We drink up and pay up. (He pays and I forget to thank him — actually, it doesn’t occur to me that I walked out of the hotel without paying or even thinking about paying until I’m almost home.

Some slick, that Spence boy. And generous.) And then we go out the door of the hotel in a gaggle, into the peevish weather, heading east against a wind that would prefer we went west.

Iris the goldfish has just flipped her last flop as Spence and I catch up to his mother and sister, who are standing in front of the house on Gower where Sarah is staying. “It was lovely to meet you,� he says, and gives me a hug and a kiss on the cheek — brief shelter from the irritable air. Then he turns away, calling: “Sarah, are you warm enough?�

As I walk on down Gower by myself, getting progressively colder under a peepshow sun, I think of Spence’s story about overhearing someone call his mother a nasty name one night when he was 12, and a member of the audience of a play she was acting in. “I felt myself tremble all over,� he said, “and suddenly I was standing up and shouting, ‘You can’t say that about my mother!’�

And then I remember reading somewhere that the part of Cade Foster was reworked shortly after Spence took the role. They recognized his depth of feel-

ing, his compassion, the writer of the article said, and decided to give it to his character.

Luckily, there seems to be lots left over.

Susan Rendell is a freelance writer and editor living in downtown St. John’s. Her collection of short stories, In the Chambers of the Sea, was published by Killick Press in 2003. srendell@nf.sympatico.ca

Sheet Metal Worker This program provides students with the necessary job-entry skills and knowledge to be employed as a Sheet Metal Worker in the manufacturing and construction industries. This would include fitting and joining sheet metal parts using riveting, welding, soldering and similar equipment to fabricate products such as ventilation shafts, exhaust hoods, eaves troughs, partition frames, air and heat ducts, material handling systems, roof decking and sheet metal buildings.

Graduates may find employment with sheet metal fabrication shops, products manufacturing companies, construction contractors and various other industrial sectors.

This trades program leads to a Red Seal Certification.

Burin Campus has an on-campus residence.

For more information please contact: Burin Campus 709 891.5600 We’re so much more. www.cna.nl.ca

.BSUJOV #SBINT #FFUIPWFO

-JT[U 3FVCLF -JT[U 4IPTUBLPWJDI .P[BSU -JT[U 4DIVCFSU 4USBWJOTLZ

#SBINT

#FFUIPWFO

-JT[U 3FVCLF

"VHVTU

4IPTUBLPWJDI .P[BSU 4DIVCFSU 4U +PIO T /FXGPVOEMBOE -BCSBEPS

.BSUJOV 4USBWJOTLZ &WFOJOH $PODFSUT

1SFDPODFSU UBMLT BU QN "MM FWFOJOH DPODFSUT CFHJO BU QN

.POEBZ "VH UI c 3JDIBSE 3BZNPOE QJBOP #FFUIPWFO 4VTTNBZS 7BSJBUJPOT -JT[U #BMMBEF OP $IPQJO 4DIFS[P JO # nBU NJOPS PQ OP 8BHOFS -JT[U *TPMEFO T -JFCTUPE +VMJVT 3FVCLF 4POBUB JO # nBU NJOPS $PPL )BMM 4DIPPM PG .VTJD .FNPSJBM 6OJWFSTJUZ

8FEOFTEBZ "VHVTU UI c +VQJUFS 4USJOH 2VBSUFU #FFUIPWFO 2VBSUFU PQ OP 4IPTUBLPWJDI 2VBSUFU OP 4U ɧPNBT "OHMJDBO $IVSDI .JMJUBSZ 3PBE

4BUVSEBZ "VHVTU UI c.VTJD GPS B 4VNNFS T &WFOJOH .P[BSU 2VBSUFU JO $ .BKPS , 'SBODBJY 4USJOH 5SJP #SBINT 1JBOP 2VJOUFU JO ' .JOPS PQ 4UFQIBOJF 4BOU "NCSPHJP BOE /BODZ %BIO WJPMJOT 3FOOJF 3FHFIS WJPMB 7FSOPO 3FHFIS DFMMP 5JNPUIZ 4UFFWFT QJBOP $PPL )BMM 4DIPPM PG .VTJD .FNPSJBM 6OJWFSTJUZ

4VOEBZ "VHVTU UI c 'FTUJWBM 'JOBMF $FMFCSBUF UIF DVMNJOBUJPO PG UIF 5VDLBNPSF 'FTUJWBM BT UIF :PVOH "SUJTUT QFSGPSN HSFBU DIBNCFS NVTJD 1FUSP $BOBEB )BMM 4DIPPM PG .VTJD .FNPSJBM 6OJWFSTJUZ

'SFF -VODIUJNF $PODFSUT 8FEOFTEBZ "VH UI ɧVSTEBZ "VH UI #SJOH ZPVS MVODI BOE FOKPZ 4U ɧPNBT "OHMJDBO $IVSDI .JMJUBSZ 3E QN 7,&.(76 $9$,/$%/( $7 )5('¡6 5(&25'6 %(11,1*721 *$7( 086,& &,7< $1' $7 7+( '225 FDOO HPDLO WXFNDPRUHIHVWLYDO#QIOG FRP

)25 &203/(7( ,1)250$7,21 9,6,7 ::: 78&.$025()(67,9$/ &$

AUGUST 13, 2006

16 • INDEPENDENTLIFE

Not a book to be tossed lightly aside MARK CALLANAN On the shelf Angels and Miracles

By Kim Kielley Flanker Press, 2005

H

uman beings have been reading deeper meaning into the natural world for quite some time now, connecting irregular phenomena to their belief in higher power in their desire for a sense of overwhelming order. God being such a scarce figure in this day and age, there are those who seek out tangible signs of His (or Her) existence in the world around them. Kim Kielley, authorized Rex Goudie biographer and associate editor of The Express, is one such seeker.

In her early 30s, Kielley decided to put a certain theory to the test. She had recently read a book recommended by her sister, was on the outs with her God since the premature death of her mother years before and was looking for a helping hand. The author of the unnamed volume, “a realist and a psychic” put forth the idea that one could request a specific sign from God or from a deceased loved one that would then be delivered.

So Kielley requested such a sign and received it on three separate occasions.

The first two times she was presented,

upon request, with a butterfly. The third time, testing the limits (if not the patience) of her Higher Power, she asked “for the impossible … a purple butterfly.” And lo, God brought forth not one but a “cloud” of purple butterflies to reassure her in her time of need.

So begins Angels and Miracles, a collection of anecdotal narratives Kielley has amassed from various correspondents, combined with examples from her personal experiences, each selected as evidence of the existence of God, miracles and angels. There are stories about people surviving the tidal wave of 1929, a tale of a man who lived through a bad car wreck, grainy photos of purported holy visions reminiscent of ghost photography, and other spiritual sundries.

Some stories are more convincing than others. Or, I should say, some sound more like the stuff of miracles.

There is, for instance, something pleasingly biblical about Kielley’s story of the disappearance and return of the codfish to Hant’s Harbour in 1868 and likewise the stories of strangers appearing to lead the lost to safety.

In other places, Kielley reaches much too far in her search for meaning and design. In The Phone Bill, Kielley, worried about paying off long distance charges, finds $80 on the street — and while this may have been a fortunate turn of events, it’s not exactly water into wine, now is it?

Similarly, in The Glass Stopper, Myra Bennett’s daughter Grace simply

Some stories are more convincing than others. Or, I should say, some sound more like the stuff of miracles. finds the stopper to a crystal bottle her famous mother had lost years previous.

The point at which my faith in a higher power failed me was just after I’d read about The Miraculous Finding of the Cellphone in the Car Where it Had Been Hiding Under a Map, which Kielley insipidly entitles A Miracle is Still a Miracle Regardless of its Size. A gust of wind, you see, had lifted the map corner to reveal the missing phone: “If I hadn’t been standing in the open doorway on the passenger’s side at that moment, the map wouldn’t have lifted from the breeze and I would have turned around and gone back to St. Mark’s school, to retrieve my phone.” God grant you no greater loss.

Factual errors, tense shifts, needless repetitions, jarring changes in perspective, and awkward sentences abound.

Kielley’s Cold War finished up in 1947 while the rest of the world had to suffer the arms race and proxy wars for the next four decades. Writing on the fish miracle of Hant’s Harbour, Kielley puts it thus: “Hunger would gladly replace plentiful times while

fishermen and their families ran up debts that undoubtedly would turn bad with no payments in the near future.”

Much of the book is similarly garbled.

The real miracle is that Angels and Miracles (presumably) made it through some manner of editorial process without any sign of improvement — unless, of course, this published version does represent an improvement on the original manu-

script. But miracles like this are a dime a dozen and I happen to have one of my own I’d like to confess: having earlier launched Kielley’s book across the room, half in despair and half in contempt, I eventually picked it up again and (here it comes) finished reading it.

Praise be.

Mark Callanan’s column returns Aug. 27.

INDEPENDENTSTYLE

SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, AUGUST 13-20, 2006 — PAGE 17

Croc walk OF THE

By Mandy Cook For the Independent

A

re you a Croc-a-holic? If not, you may very well soon be. From kayak to sidewalk, these paddling/orthopedic perforated foam shoes are making a splash on feet everywhere. The decidedly silly-looking but ubiquitous shoes can be bought in every colour of the rainbow and are worn by little kiddies, nurses, teens — and by Nan and Pop. A fluorescent orange pair was recently sighted on a male engineering student.

If they’re so ugly, why is the cult Croc taking over? The answer on the street is resounding.

“They’re comfortable,” says Annette Manning, who bought a pair for both herself and her eightyear-old son, Joseph. Echoing his mother’s sentiment, Joseph also points out the practicality of a canoeing shoe becoming everyday Newfoundland footwear.

“When I go swimming they’re good in the ponds where it’s rocky,” he says.

Crocs started to catch on in 2003, as they poured out of their home factory in Boulder, Colorado. This year they’ve officially moved from outdoor sportswear to streetwear in this province.

Retailing at about $35 a pair, the breathable, lightweight shoe is a steal for anyone getting wet in the summer sun, and, as a huge bonus, Crocs are made of a bacteria resistant material. Thus, no nasty feet stink.

But it is the soft, supportive feature that is driving sales sky high with outdoors-y types and people who work on their feet for long stretches.

“They feel like you’re walking on a cloud,” says Matthew Murphy, floor manager at The Outfitters shop on Water Street. “They don’t feel like normal shoes.”

Murphy says the Croc craze started with the paddling community, who requested the store carry them. As an allaround water shoe, they work great in and out of the pond because they are non-slip and do not absorb water. Then people who have heel or foot problems started to come looking for Crocs. Next in line were the health professionals and chefs. The decision to buy a pair is seemingly easy — colour selection from the vast variety of hues is not.

“Probably one of the funniest things is watching a customer try to pick out a colour,” says Murphy. “I had a doctor who came in and asked for a double XL in hot pink and the reasoning he gave was that he worked in the children’s ward and he wanted to cheer up the kids. But his girlfriend thought they looked ridiculous so he had to buy a black pair as well to wear around her.”

Manning has no problem with the look of her Crocs. She is even designing little decorative plugs to decorate her family’s shoes. She says they’re “fun, funky and active.” Joseph thinks so, too.

“They’re awesome,” he says with a smile.

Paul Daly/The Independent

Days of wines and grills C

ooking is about feeding physically — and sometimes emotionally. In summer, cooking is an extension of how you feel: hot, tired, cranky, or as is always my case, excited — as long as it goes on the grill.

Anything that goes on my super-turbocharged, high-performance, builtfrom-scratch grill has to be special.

We recently planned a menu that could be prepared entirely on the new grill. My wife dove into the fray to make the first course — crisped goat cheese on field greens with balsamic drizzle. The drizzle was a basic vinaigrette of simple Tuscan olive oil, for that peppery snap, and balsamic vinegar.

We seared the cheese by cutting it into discs half-an-inch thick, and pan searing them like scallops until golden on the outside and meltingly tender on the inside.

I have been experimenting with various crusts for herbed goat cheese.

I found that a crushed, black pepper cracker works best, both for browning and for keeping the goat cheese togeth-

NICHOLAS GARDNER Off the Eating Path er when heating in a hot pan. As well, the crust has an earthy black pepper heat, which balances the sharpness of the cheese.

The heated discs are placed on the top of the greens and the vinaigrette drizzled on top. Greens should always be seasoned with salt and pepper to bring out the flavours. Served with a grassy and crisp Pinot Gris, this is a great start to a meal — balanced and summery.

The next course was grilled ribeye steak with béarnaise, haricots verts and grilled vegetable medley.

For those of you who have not had the pleasure of béarnaise with a good steak, this is a classical food pairing.

When I travel to France I love ordering steak frites as it is usually served with a béarnaise sauce.

Béarnaise is a classical Mother Sauce — one I had not prepared since my last tour in a professional kitchen. The technique and ratios were amazingly close to my memory: egg yolks, half a cup of butter (diced and at room temperature), and a reduction of white wine vinegar, shallots and tarragon. The technique involves using a double boiler — a glass bowl over a pot of barely simmering water.

Here’s how you make it: In small saucepan, simmer 1/3 cup white wine vinegar, half a shallot, minced, and one tablespoon fresh tarragon until reduced to about a tablespoon.

Remove from the heat, strain out the solids and set the liquid aside. The solids can be discarded.

In the double boiler whisk two beaten yolks, salt and pepper and a teaspoon of fresh squeezed lemon juice over low heat, until thickened to the consistency of heavy cream. While beating constantly, add the butter, one piece at a time until all has been incorporated.

Anything that goes on my super-turbocharged, high-performance, built from scratch grill has to be special.

Fold in the reduction and keep it warm until you are ready to serve. This sauce can hold while in the bowl for 20-30 minutes over the water bath, just occasionally stir it to keep it loose.

If it becomes too thick, a teaspoon of hot water will thin it out, but be careful not to add any more than that as the emulsion might break. Just before serving, add a pinch of fresh tarragon to bring all the flavours together and reintroduce that heady anise flavour of the tarragon.

For the rest of the plate, we steamed the beans lightly until there was still some bite and seasoned them with salt

and pepper. The steak, mushrooms and capsicum peppers were grilled to perfection.

I paired the main course with a wine purchase that I found using the “Zen method” of wine selection. Basically I was bored while in the store so I followed another bloke around and picked up whatever he got — it seemed reasonable at the time.

The McWilliams Cabernet Sauvignon 2004 from South Eastern Australia was a winner — not heavy on the fruits yet robust enough to withstand the rich butter sauce. It was a fortuitous choice and one I will make again.

The final course was a small bowl of cappuccino gelato and coffee. To cap off the meal I enjoyed a digestif of homemade whole vanilla bean vodka.

This is a menu we will have again. It was a gourmet meal easy enough to make on a hot day. Long live the days of wines and grills.

Nicholas is a freelance writer and erstwhile chef now living in St. John’s. nicholas.gardner@gmail.com

AUGUST 13, 2006

18 • INDEPENDENTSTYLE

DRINK

Nicholas Gardner takes on a Sonoma challenge

“S

how me what’s popular,” I ask the liquor store employee. A pretty girl with a small nose stud takes me on a whirlwind tour of the store. We search the shelves as she leads me to all the stops I have been before — Australian Cabernet and Shiraz, Canadian wines from the megaproducers, and Italian Sangiovese. Unfortunately, I’m in the mood for something my friends don’t know about yet.

“I don’t drink wine, myself,” she says. “But I will get you someone who does.”

Several minutes later, a wine bottle is thrust into my hand. “Here you go,” she says. “If you don’t like this, the bald guy over there will buy you anything you would like.”

That sounds like a challenge to me.

A manager had suggested the wine — the same person who still remembers the bottles of whiskey that my dad and I purchased a while back. Those were brought into town on a flight from Labrador … but that’s another story.

At the moment, I’ve had a 1999 Chateau Souverain, a Sonoma County Cabernet Sauvignon thrust upon me.

I walk over and introduce myself. “So, what’s the deal with this? And why are you going to such lengths to stand behind it?”

“It’s a wine that shouldn’t be here and it is fantastic.”

Sure, I’ve heard this line before from a sales rep. They always think they have the best product in the world. The manager went on to say the wine was not supposed to make it to Newfoundland — and it wouldn’t have, had it not been for the regional wine buyer who just plain asked for it to come in.

The real question: is it worthy of the challenge?

My first impression is that it’s a brash, over-the-top, bull-headed red. The opening nose of acetone and dark, rich fruits should have made me balk, but I push on. Then there was the taste — tightly tannic and astringent with lots of heavy oak. I’m simply disappointed. This is not what I enjoy in a red wine.

However, something makes me think it deserves a second chance. To be fair, I decant it to let it breathe properly and to see what happens.

A wine that started tight and tannic with a lot of breathing turned into a rich fruit wine, with hints of strawberries and leather with tobacco overtones lingering from the oak aging. It became smooth and very palatable with a mild to moderate finish. Now, it lives up to the hype.

Had I stopped drinking this wine after the first pour, this would not have been a happy ending. Instead, the Chateau Souverain Cabernet Sauvignon was well worth the price of $34.56. It needs time to breathe — lots of time — but it’s well worth the wait. nicholas.gardner@gmail.com

Paul Daly/The Independent

TASTE

Leg lift That ’80s staple, the legging, is back. Stylist Derick Chetty explains why — and how to avoid looking like you’re in a time warp

By Derick Chetty Torstar wire service

L

eggings have leaped back into the spotlight. Popular through the late ’80s and early ’90s, leggings were knocked off the fashion pedestal by the boot-cut pant. But skin-tight, bone-hugging tights are striding into fall as one of the season’s biggest trends. Even Madonna, the mother of re-invention herself, has come full circle and can be seen slinking around the stage in fishnet leggings during this summer’s concert tours.

The lean-legged look has also cropped up in a surprising number of fall runway shows from Missoni in Milan to Yves Saint Laurent in Paris to Derek Lam in New York, proving the garment has some serious traction.

Footless tights have already gathered a following in Canada as leggy types can be seen layering up on lithe leggings even on hot, humid summer days.

“If I had a million of them, I could have sold them all,” says Nagla Hamdy, manager of the luxury hosiery boutique, Wolford. Hamdy says the store has sold out of its entire stock of

leggings three times this summer.

At Legs Beautiful, a hosiery retailer with nine stores in the Toronto area, there has been a steady rise in sales for cropped cotton tights, says the company’s hosiery buyer Ronda Kerekes.

“It’s the comfort factor,” she says.

“They are easy to pull on with an elasticized waist, it doesn’t constrict you and it moves with your body.”

Kerekes also credits their popularity to the crossover yoga factor. She’s noticed over the past year, women are buying them to wear in yoga class and also when they leave the studio.

Susie Sheffman, fashion director at Fashion magazine, sees it as a fantastic affordable way for women of all body types to update their wardrobe.

“Women are discovering — whatever their body type is — they can wear it,” she says. “It’s not often you get a trend that all women can wear — as long as you wear it with the right thing.”

Aha. What is the right thing? Here’s a guide to getting a leg up on this trend.

THEY ARE NOT PANTS “We are not wearing them like we did in the ’80s with a big Cotton Ginny

T-shirt with shoulder pads.” says Sheffman. “Now it’s about layering.”

Wear it with mini skirts, dresses or go for fashion’s new silhouette and pair with oversize long sweaters or cardigans with boxy cropped jackets.

In other words, pump up the volume on top.

THE COLOUR “The top selling colours are black, black and black,” says Kerekes.

“Then chocolate and charcoal,” she adds. “These basic colours are good for the bottoms because then you can put all kinds of colours on top.”

Leave the neon brights, prints, patterns and lace to the kids. You’ll find it easier to work a pair of black opaque leggings into your wardrobe. And save the heavier ribbed variety for the colder months.

THE SHOE Anchor it with a chunky ankle boot if you are wearing a voluminous sweater on top to accentuate that attenuated look. Or cap it off with a delicate ballet flat for a gamine look. Either way, make sure there is a gap of skin showing between your legging hem and your shoe.

You’ve got dinner wrapped up

By Susan Sampson Torstar wire service

S

andwiches have grown up in the last decade. They are no longer relegated to lunch and teatime, and they don’t have to be boring. These wraps, for example, make an easy dinner for two.

SMOKED SALMON, AVOCADO & EGG WRAPS Adapted from Sandwich, an appealing little cookbook by Yisrael Aharoni.

You’ll be happy to have leftover avocado mixture for future dipping and spreading.

• 2 ripe avocados • 3/4 cup finely chopped red onion • 3 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil • 1/4 cup lemon juice • 1 jalapeño, seeded, finely chopped • 1 tsp sea salt • Freshly ground pepper to taste • 2 flour tortillas (10-inch diameter) • 1/4 lb (120 g) thinly sliced smoked salmon

• 2 hard-cooked eggs, each cut in 6 wedges • 1/4 cup cilantro leaves, loosely packed • 2 green onions, trimmed In medium bowl, mash avocado flesh with fork. Add onion, oil, lemon juice, jalapeño, salt and pepper. Blend with fork. (Makes about 2-1/4 cups; you will have leftovers.)

Lay tortillas on work surface. Smear each with 1/3 to 1/2 cup avocado mixture, to taste. Layer on smoked salmon, egg and cilantro.

Lay 1 green onion across centre of each. Roll up.

Makes 2

AUGUST 13, 2006

INDEPENDENTSTYLE • 19

Body Shop founder unveils campaign against violence

S

ome would say she sold out. But retail rebel Anita Roddick, who this year sold her chain of beauty-product stores, The Body Shop, to the multinational L’Oréal for $1.2 billon (U.S.), is still going strong.

At 63, she’s fighting for the causes that have always motivated her.

“The hidden victims of domestic violence are the children,” says Roddick, currently launching an in-store Body Shop campaign against domestic vio-

lence.

The chain will be donating proceeds from sales of a $4.50 bar of soap to the Canadian Women’s Foundation, which works to prevent violence in the home and supports shelters for women and children leaving abusive situations.

Roddick, who in 2003 was made a Dame in her native Britain, is still a figurehead for the company, which has 2,050 stores in more than 40 countries.

She travels the world sourcing ingredi-

“The hidden victims of domestic violence are the children.”

Anita Roddick

ents, speaking to staff and contributing creative ideas.

She says she’s confident L’Oréal will maintain the brand’s social consciousness. Ever the activist, she sees the link with L’Oréal as a way to spread her approach to business far and wide.

“My relationship with L’Oréal is very intimate,” says Roddick, a petite brunette who opened her first store in 1976, a young mother of two seeking a means of supporting her family.

She used the Quaker approach to business as social enterprise as her model. She said she hopes to instill the idea of community trading in L’Oréal — sourcing ingredients from disadvantaged communities around the world, and paying a fair price to people who might otherwise not have an income.

She will continue to campaign through her websites anitaroddick.com and takeitpersonally.org — Torstar wire service

DETAILS

Fun and versatile F

un, colourful and very versatile, Hurdy Gurdy and Wood Ya? necklaces are made in Newfoundland and Labrador by young women entrepreneurs.

Hurdy Gurdy pendants, made by Nancy Jacobsen in Corner Brook, are double-sided.

Using her background in stained glass, Jacobsen cuts, grinds and polishes two pieces of glass — one clear, the other coloured. A piece of Japanese paper or vintage material is inserted between the two. A strip of tin is soldered around the edges.

Jacobsen, a teacher and artist, has been making the necklaces as “a fun side project” for 18 months or so, and reports brisk sales. (The City of Corner Brook presented Governor General Michaëlle Jean with one last month during her official visit.)

Pendants can also be custom-made with any material for mementos or gifts, Jacobsen says — already, she’s made some for a group of bridesmaids.

Wood Ya? necklaces are also proudly one-of-kind, designed and put together by Jaclyn Gruchy. She says the

To little miss letter writer …

Faced with an unwelcome morning visit, Pam Pardy Ghent lashes out at small-town troublemakers

T

o the women of Harbour Mille and all of its picturesque surrounding communities: please be advised that I do not want your husbands.

They may be lovely, charming men you think are quite desirable. I do not. I am also sorry to disappoint so many of you who delight in the delicious chatter when I say I also do not want, need or desire your ex-husbands. If you didn’t want them, chances are I will have little use for them as well.

Nor do I want your sons, uncles, grandfathers, fathers, cousins, or any other male creature you may be associated with. Nor, as rumour has it from time to time in a slow gossip week, do I want you, or any other woman in the near (or far) vicinity.

What is all this nonsense about? Well, it’s about being different in outport Newfoundland and how painful it can be — if you allow it to.

This week I opened the door of my saltbox and faced a heartbreaking reality. I am, it seems, not totally accepted in this place I call home.

It was early enough in the morning that I still wore my comfy (read: non-sexy) jammies. There before me was an angry wife and her sheepish spouse. The pretty wife held a letter, handaddressed on the outside in childish scrawls, badly typed and, of course, cowardly unsigned. The note informed the woman her husband was doing “naughty” things with me.

I barely knew the poor man standing so silent in my kitchen. This was the first time he had ever been in my home. I had never met this woman before.

They live two communities away from my own.

This man is an acquaintance of an acquaintance if we stretched for a connection. I have served him at the store. He buys pop and chips. Maybe he bought a sub and chatted with me as he warmed it. The closest to being romantic was one hot afternoon — with many others in attendance — we watched a water-balloon fight at the nearby fire hall project where he works.

This horrid letter had other ugly accusations about me and my character. Yes, I know. Those who do know me know it couldn’t be true. It still hurts.

Thank goodness this wife wasn’t the sort to believe the rubbish. She did the honourable thing and informed me instead of stewing about it, or worse, clobbering me with her baywoman “fistis.”

Last week’s Independent had a story about Colin Windsor, the 30-year-old originally from my hometown who allegedly murdered 17-year-old Ashton Moen in Brooks, Alta.

Windsor was also different. I can’t imagine how this teen was treated in this community of sameness and conformity. A boy who wore eye makeup and nail polish would never fit in here. Not one person from this town has said Windsor will be found innocent. They all say: “We knew it!”

I may not know everything about psychology, but I can’t help but wonder how being smothered in

PAM PARDY GHENT

Seven-day talk such an environment could affect a child who is anything other than a cookie cutter of his peers.

I am not comparing my independent ways with the antics of an alleged murderer, I’m just saying the way we treat people can cause them to become even more different.

What is so different about me — besides the obvious fact that I am drop-dead adorable? I know this because my father told me — and I do own a mirror, however dusty it may be.

I moved back here after many years in Ontario where I worked for a living. I have never been a housewife. I also don’t have any desire to hang my clothes in colour co-ordinated rows on my line. I have a dryer. It takes the wrinkles out because I don’t iron. Anything.

I can, and do, cook, despite rumours I never have.

I do eat quite often at my mother’s. That is true. She cooks wonderful meals daily for my father, and I enjoy the company.

I am much too busy to carry on the way many think I do. I am in school full-time doing distance education from Memorial. I write to earn a few dollars. I own and operate a store.

I have a son who I am quite active with, as I am with all of his friends. I have bonfires and wiener roasts as often as I can for any child who wishes to participate.

I do have a good male friend here. Did something juicy ever happen between us? Is it still going on?

Why would I ruin a good rumour on you folks? The truth is boring compared to the stories I hear.

Not everyone who lives in this outport or ones like it are like this uninformed letter writer. Most are wonderful, kind, thoughtful and smart people. I have many friends in this place that I adore. The way of life here is the envy of most I know.

I am the first to admit that I am not your typical “bay woman,” but then, do we really need to have such a thing?

Instead of ganging up on those who live among us who are basically good, yet different, how about we unite and ban those with small ideas of what being a person and belonging to a community are all about?

To this community in general: I adore it here, and thank you for helping me love it so much. To little miss letter writer, I hope you are proud of yourself.

I hope this piece about you winds face up in bird cages and under puppy bottoms around this fine province. I will be burning your silly letter today.

Then, I will forget about it, and you, and go on with my life.

I suggest you do the same.

wooden beads of all shapes, sizes and colours are “found on the streets of Toronto and Edmonton when away on buying trips for the store.”

Gruchy is co-owner of Twisted Sisters Boutik on Water Street with her sister, Tennille Ashley. Now into its fourth year of operation, Twisted Sisters has become known for its commitment to independent Canadian clothing designers.

As for her necklaces, Gruchy’s goal is to keep them fresh, fun, and “the sweet deal (is) no two are exactly the same, and they’re all handmade right here in Newfoundland.” Wood Ya? is sold in her store and at Pro Girl in Halifax. In varying lengths, sizes and chunkiness, they range in price from $10-$70.

Hurdy Gurdy necklaces retail for $35-$40 and are sold at The Next Step in Corner Brook and Twisted Sisters.

E-mail Jacobsen at nancy.brubacher@gmail.com; Gruchy at twistedsistersboutik@yahoo.com.

— Stephanie Porter Wood Ya? wooden bead necklaces by St. John’s resident Jaclyn Gruchy and Hurdy Gurdy (inside) reversible necklace by Nancy Jacobsen in Corner Brook.

Paul Daly/The Independent

AUGUST 13, 2006

20 • INDEPENDENTLIFE

WEEKLY DIVERSIONS ACROSS 1 Japanese syllabic script 5 Bill 8 Competent 12 Baseball stat.

15 Make into law 17 Cask serving 18 Root vegetable 19 Paraphernalia 20 Go into 21 Of the Milky Way, e.g.

23 Wise to 24 Rotten 26 Ride 27 Expatriate author of Plainsong: Nancy ___ 29 Cunning 30 Young dog 32 Long 36 Narrow valleys 37 City in SW Siberia 39 These (Fr.) 40 Covers 41 Remove hair 44 Canadian poetry prize 46 October 1970 situation 47 Where Jeanne d’Arc died 49 City hit by Canada’s worst tornado (1912) 53 “My wild, Irish ___” 54 Author of The Museum Called Canada 55 Not: prefix 56 One kept in the bag?

57 Small island 58 Egg white 60 Waiting for ___ (Beckett) 62 Equal: prefix 63 Here to Hortense 64 Attention 65 Skater Browning 66 Con game 67 Environmentalist, originator of the blue box program 69 Fading out 71 Resume data 73 Specified food 75 Esteems 77 Town or city 79 Pistol 80 Kind of tide 81 Japanese gateway 82 Death notices, in brief 85 Building extension 86 Math subj.

89 Capital of Dominica 91 Sask.’s flower: western ___ lily 93 “Funniest Woman in the World” (b. 1894): Bea ___ 95 Related 96 Fur-traders’ food of dried meat, fat, and berries 101 Born yesterday, so to speak 102 Like new 103 Judge 104 French vineyard

105 Taunts 106 Notice 107 Fairytale bad guy 108 Que. neighbour 109 Killer: suffix DOWN 1 Hangs onto 2 Cancel 3 Smartly dressed 4 Maple tree genus 5 Chasing game 6 Park of “Air Farce” 7 Fasten (naut.)

8 Alphabet start 9 Wager 10 Floral neckwear 11 Engrave with acid 12 Leased 13 Majorettes’ sticks 14 Takes care of pressing matters 16 Capital of Libya 19 Canadian who created Java 22 Era 25 Sound and radio artist Chantal ___ 28 Most revolting 31 Vancouver time 33 Land unit 34 Rider’s restraint 35 Bad cheque letters 38 Author Sakamoto (The Electrical Field) 41 Beethoven symphony 42 It stands among stamens 43 Expert ending?

44 A Vanderhaeghe 45 Cold (Span.)

46 Lauzon of “Air Farce” 48 Canoer’s blade 50 Frozen drips 51 Some French vowels 52 Tiny particles of matter 54 Needlefish 55 Pesticide 58 Strait between Vancouver Island and B.C. mainland 59 ___ mine 60 Arm 61 Morse Robb invented an electric one 65 Josh 66 Conrad Black’s title 68 Port of Brittany 69 Colourless 70 Asian Bigfoot 71 Little 72 He dubbed Canada “Our Lady of the Snows” 74 Conceit 76 River of Wales 77 He takes wagers 78 Bear-like 81 Mine cars 83 Pod or dent starter 84 Fresco painted on dry plaster 86 Felon’s fish story 87 Survived 88 Six layers of a song 90 Gala coiffure

92 Drat alternative 94 Non-clerical 97 Brain test, briefly

98 Sea (Fr.) 99 Mrs. (Fr.) 100 Almond

Oops! Last week’s crossword clues did not match the grid or solutions that ran with them. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Solution for this week’s puzzle is on page 27

BIZARRO

WEEKLY STARS ARIES (MAR. 21 TO APR. 19) You sometimes go to extremes to prove a point. But this time, you won’t have to. Supporters are ready, falling over themselves, to help you make your case.

TAURUS (APR. 20 TO MAY 20) Venus might be your ruling planet, but Mars is in the picture as well.

So don’t be surprised if your romantic relationships are a bit rocky at this time. But they’ll soon smooth over.

GEMINI (MAY 21 TO JUNE 20) Geminis might rush into romance and risk being wrong about someone rather than be left with no one.

But this is one time when it’s wiser to be wary of where your heart takes you.

CANCER (JUNE 21 TO JULY 22)

With all (or most) of those pesky problems behind you, take time for your family and friends. Travel aspects are favored, with long-distance journeys high on the list.

LEO (JULY 23 TO AUG. 22) You might have started to question the wisdom of being open with someone you hoped you could trust. But be assured you won’t be disappointed. You’ll soon hear good news.

VIRGO (AUG. 23 TO SEPT. 22) You have a reputation for honesty and integrity, and that will help turn around a situation that was not only disappointing but also quite unfair. Good luck.

LIBRA (SEPT. 23 TO OCT. 22) A happy event creates a closer tie with a family member who seemed hopelessly estranged.

Positive aspects also dominate in important career matters.

SCORPIO (OCT. 23 TO NOV. 21) Your ruling planet, Pluto, helps you adjust to change. So, stop putting off that long-delayed move, and make it with the assurance that you’re doing the right thing.

SAGITTARIUS (NOV. 22 TO DEC. 21) You have a wonderful capacity to learn quickly and well. This will help you when you are faced with an opportunity to move on to a new path in life.

CAPRICORN (DEC. 22 TO JAN. 19) Good news: You suddenly find that you’re not facing that new challenge alone. You now have someone at your side, ready to offer whatever support you might need.

AQUARIUS (JAN. 20 TO FEB. 18) Your versatility — which is just one of those aspects of yourself that make you so special — helps you adapt to the challenges of a new and exciting opportunity.

PISCES (FEB. 19 TO MAR. 20) Your sensitive nature picks up on the needs of others. But what about your desires? You need to take more time to assess what your goals are and, if necessary, redirect them.

BORN THIS WEEK: You give your trust openly and easily. People find you easy to be with and enjoy your wit, your good sense, and your capacity to love and be loved. (c) 2006 King Features Syndicate, Inc.

Fill in the grid so that each row of nine squares, each column of nine and each section of nine (three squares by three) contains the numbers 1 through 9 in any order.

There is only one solution to each puzzle. Solutions, tips and computer program available at www.sudoko.com SOLUTION ON PAGE 27

INDEPENDENTBUSINESS

SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, AUGUST 13-19, 2006 — PAGE 21

Dominion on Blackmarsh Road, St. John’s.

Paul Daly/The Independent

Food and booze NLC profits this quarter ‘ahead of plan’; liquor stores leaving old locations to set up beside supermarkets

By Nadya Bell The Independent

F

ive liquor stores around the island will move next to supermarkets, as the Newfoundland and Labrador Liquor Corporation sets into a round of re-organization.

“It’s good for both of us,” says NLC president and CEO Steve Winter. “Supermarkets bring in more people with more frequency than virtually any other type of store, and the more people go into that store, the more opportunity they have to come into ours.

“Obviously we bring people on a regular basis who likely will need groceries. It’s a good combination for both sides.”

A new location is scheduled to

open Aug. 18 in the Sobey’s building on Kelsey Drive. The nearby Kenmount Road store will have reduced hours and be turned into an agency and licensing outlet, transferring services from the O’Leary avenue location.

“Really what we have done is consolidate three smaller operations into one bigger one, which will have considerable efficiency from our perspective, says Winter.

“We’re recognizing that there is considerable growth in residential and commercial in that direction in St. John’s. The proposal put to us by Sobeys was too good to turn down, basically.”

The liquor store leases directly from the supermarket in joined

locations. Winter says their rent from grocery stores has been less than the cost of a stand-alone operation in just about every circumstance.

Sales growth at liquor stores reflects population increases in St. John’s and surrounding areas.

The new liquor store next to Dominion on Blackmarsh Road in the centre of St. John’s saw the single largest growth in sales this spring compared to last year: $777,000. Second was the eastend Stavanger Drive outlet, which grew by $229,000 this quarter.

The Elizabeth Avenue liquor store still outsells every store in the province, making over $2

Branch Elizabeth Ave Murray Premises Kenmount Road Harbour Grace Churchill Square Mt.Pearl (Commonwealth) Placentia Topsail Road Bay Roberts Stavanger Drive Pearlgate Plaza Blackmarsh Road Agency Store Avalon Mall Village Mall Gander Grand Falls Clarenville Marystown Corner Brook Plaza Port Aux Basques Stephenville Labrador City Corner Brook Millbrook Happy Valley

See “Well ahead,” page 22

Customer sales

Customer sales

April 1 – June 30, 2006

April 1 - June 30, 2005

Growth

$2,434,272 $431,549 $636,925 $330,051 $427,737

$2,360,121 $494,228 $665,156 $257,749 $464,991

$74,151 -$62,679 -$28,231 $72,302 -$37,254

$762,996 $263,191 $1,273,603 $693,863 $1,611,110 $1,434,421 $1,437,131 $0 $514,414 $0 $781,685 $735,466 $455,968 $527,144 $412,055 $274,752 $621,026 $312,401

$761,213 $252,505 $1,350,743 $644,287 $1,381,554 $1,269,189 $660,113 $34 $463,774 $300,614 $725,976 $704,311 $412,160 $561,530 $394,478 $246,761 $597,891 $294,197

$1,782 $10,686 -$77,139 $49,576 $229,556 $165,232 $777,018 -$34 $50,640 -$300,614 $55,709 $31,155 $43,807 -$34,386 $17,577 $27,992 $23,135 $18,204

$1,001,026 $768,189 $18,140,975

$960,263 $637,202 $16,861,038

$40,763 $130,987 $1,279,936

Source: Newfoundland and Labrador Liquor Corporation

Take on the money grabbers M

oney grabbers: things and places where cash disappears with little to show and no way of knowing how much was spent. To understand this phenomenon a little, put yourself in this purely fictional fellow’s mind. Hear his private thoughts during a typical day: “Kenmount Road congestion has improved so much since they opened the Outer Ring. Tim Hortons outlets along the way are not so crowded either, five minutes in and out, ‘A double-double decaf please.’

“The terrified cat in the back seat is how old, nine or 10? I’m dropping him at the vets for a check-up and I’ll pick him up tonight. I really like this route, I can pop into the bank along the way too; our bank is at the mall, but it’s under $2 to use this ATM. What’s $2?

AL ANTLE

Your Finances “It will be a great weekend. The forecast is good so the lawn is being fertilized today, but the grass can’t be cut until Monday. I’ll pay young Christopher to do it; I’m too busy until next weekend and by then it’ll be up to my knees. Chris is a great kid, $15 to cut the grass in summer, $20 to shovel in winter. Boy, you can’t buy good neighbours.

“I hope I can find a minute when I get to work. I need to book a haircut for tomorrow. It’ll need to be an early one; tee off is 9:45. Hopefully the wife can pick up the dry cleaning when

she’s out in the afternoon. I won’t have time; I think it’s tomorrow that the kids are having photos taken. The Lions Club has a hotdog sale tomorrow afternoon too; I must try to remember my membership dues.

“This company is growing by leaps and bounds, I hope they expand the parking lot. Three out of four days I’m filling a meter, and parking close to these maple trees means two trips to the car wash every week.

“I’ve got to avoid David today, he wants to increase the weekly ticket pool to $10. I don’t like his idea but I’m lousy at saying no. He offered me a smoke seven months ago and already I’m up to two packs a week. He’s so persuasive. Just the same, me and the young fellow are having a blast with the modeling kits he sells.

Stop a heart attack before it starts.

Your support is vital.

Research into the root causes of heart disease and stroke will help millions live longer, healthier lives. As a leading funder of heart and stroke research in Canada, we need your help.

Call 1-888-HSF-INFO or visit www.heartandstroke.ca

“I’ve got to think about how me and the wife will celebrate 16 years together. Sixteen is such an odd number.

Maybe a dinner downtown, and then whatever’s on at the LSPU. But again, she’d probably be just as happy with bingo, a good book or bowling.”

“Holy crow, break time already. I’ve got 15 minutes to get to the pharmacy.

What will it be? Pop, bag of chips, two pull tickets and toothpaste. Hang on, that magazine looks like it’s got information on the Israeli strikes in Lebanon. My young one could use that for her history assignment.

“Check out the magnets with pictures of old fishermen in oilskins. The guy on the end looks like the wife’s uncle Harvey. $2.99; small price to pay for a laugh. No cold diet Pepsi, maybe there’s some upstairs in the vending

machine. It’ll cost twice as much but it’ll be cold. I’ll get this tie clip too, grandmother’s party on Sunday is a dress up affair.

“Maybe we could order from one of those basket stores to avoid shopping for a gift. They even carry cards.

“No lunch today. This project is due Monday. Maybe David can grab me a sandwich and water at Subway. I’ll have to drop off the film tomorrow. A new golf shirt will have to wait too. I have tickets for the old timers’ game tonight. I’m not missing that. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen Lanny MacDonald skate. The boys say they’re selling 1980’s Calgary Jerseys.

Got to have one.

“Afternoon break. Oh no! Can’t find See “Can you,” page 22

22 • INDEPENDENTBUSINESS

‘Well ahead of last year’ From page 21 million in sales from April 1 to June 30.

In the Conception Bay area, two liquor stores are moving to locations connected to Price Choppers grocery stores. Harbour Grace’s liquor store will move over the hill into Carbonear’s Trinity Conception Square mall at the end of August. The liquor store in Bay Roberts has moved out of its building already, and reopened in a location attached to Price Choppers.

The Bay Roberts liquor store does twice as much business as Harbour Grace. Sales at both increased modestly this quarter.

Clarenville’s liquor store will move to a building on Manitoba Drive with Sobeys at the end of August. The location in Corner Brook’s Mill Brook Mall will move this fall into the old Humber Gardens property where Coleman’s will be putting in a new supermarket.

Winter says a lot of the moves are happening because building leases have expired.

“We have had offers put before us that have very good business opportunities, so we have made some moves, and we have closed some other stores,” he says.

Winter is pleased first quarter results are well up from last year. The growth occurred despite the closures of the Village Mall store and agency outlets.

“Our first quarter income was ahead of plan,” he says.

“Sales are well ahead of last year.”

AUGUST 13, 2006

As globe warms, Ottawa sleeps Carbon dioxide-snatching technology exists — private sector showing little interest

By Tyler Hamilton Torstar wire service

A

researcher at Université Laval in Quebec isolates the enzyme in our bodies that extracts carbon dioxide from the blood as we breathe. A company is formed to explore the commercial opportunities.

Eventually, it manages to clone the enzyme, setting the stage for mass production.

A highly innovative carboncapture technology is born, right here in Canada.

At a time when society is acutely aware of climate change and the greenhouse gases believed to be causing it, you’d think Quebec City-based CO2 Solution Inc. would have a much higher profile.

Here we’ve got a home-grown venture that knows how to snatch carbon dioxide out of the emissions of coal plants and industrial chimneys, some of the biggest contributors to global warming.

A special enzyme-packed liquid literally showers down a smokestack and absorbs the carbon dioxide on the way down. A small pilot project at an incinerator in Quebec has proven that the technology and approach works.

What CO2 Solution needs now is the funding and partners necessary to take it to the next step, which would involve a largescale demonstration project with a major carbon dioxide emitter — a natural gas generator, a cement plant, an aluminium maker, whoever. It doesn’t matter which one.

It just has to be large.

But in a country that has no road map for tackling climate change, with a government that has no apparent interest in carbon trading schemes or carbon caps, a company like CO2 Solution has minimal value to the private sector — today, that is.

Energy efficiency technologies help companies save money.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper

Renewable energy technologies can become a source of income or savings, or at the very least a tool for marketing. Capturing carbon dioxide for the sake of capturing it? That’s an expense that comes with few rewards, saving the planet aside.

“It’s a tough market,” says Rick Whittaker, vice-president of investment at Sustainable Development Technology Canada, which contributed $1 million in 2002 toward a small project headed by CO2 Solution and involving the aluminium industry.

“Whenever you have emission controls, it’s a cost to business.

The market was hot for this kind of stuff when Kyoto was a bigger concern. The question now is if there’s a market demand, and that’s going to be driven by regulation.”

Lack of market demand may explain why the company, citing unfavourable market conditions, decided to cancel a $3 million to $7 million public offering in March.

CO2 Solution’s new chief executive, Jacques Raymond, a former GE Canada executive brought in just after the public offering was cancelled, is focused

Shaun Best/Reuters

almost exclusively these days on raising money.

“We’re looking at our total approach to the business to see how we could find the ways and means to satisfy this new focus on the investors,” he says. “To obtain short-term growth and get some revenues, we need to look at other business opportunities while we do our R&D and scale up our technology.”

It’s the rough equivalent of taking on a part-time job to pay your way through university after all the grants and loans have run out.

INDUSTRIAL APPLICATIONS So what are these business opportunities? The company could sell the gas it captures to players in the carbonated beverage sector, or a number of other sectors where carbon dioxide is used for a variety of industrial applications.

It could also be turned into sodium bicarbonate — simple baking soda — or processed into calcium carbonate (limestone), which is used by the paper industry. Sodium carbonate, used for making bricks, glass and some chemicals, and magnesium car-

bonate, essentially chalk, can also be produced and both open up a number of other markets.

CO2 Solution’s survival requires a carbon market to emerge, one that offers financial incentives to those companies that either reduce their carbon output or can figure out a way of capturing and sequestering the carbon they produce.

And this won’t happen, at least not in Canada, until some major carbon-capture projects are announced that give new technologies a chance to perform.

Europe, no surprise, is ahead of the game. The European Unionfunded CASTOR project began a large carbon-capture trial in March at the Elsam coal-fired power station in Denmark. It’s being touted as a world’s first.

About 30 industrial, research and university partners have come together from 11 European countries to investigate how to reduce the carbon dioxide that would come from such largescale plants. Their mission is to develop a working model for reducing carbon dioxide emissions from EU power and industrial plants by 30 per cent.

“That’s the type of project that would make sense in Canada if the Canadian government moved in that direction,” says Raymond.

As the oil sands grow, greenhouse gas emissions from the region rise proportionately. This is becoming a major embarrassment for Canada internationally as we try to take the moral high ground on climate change.

The jury may still be out.

Perhaps when the Harper government releases its made-in-Canada environmental plan this fall it will show the kind of leadership that’s necessary on this issue. It’s a stretch, but it’s possible.

“Politics are driving this,” says Whittaker. “And that political concern may be coming back this fall.”

Can you change your habits?

From page 21 my list. I remember; it’s a bottle of wine, milk and cat food. But what else?

Oh well, I’ll phone the wife. She and her sister have gone bargain hunting to Bay Roberts and Carbonear. I’ll call her cell. ‘Yes, dear, it’s wine, milk, cat food and … Oh yes light bulbs, the new energy efficient ones.’

“On the way home, stop at the mall, get movie tickets for our daughter, she doesn’t like to stand in line. Her buddies will pay her and I’ll collect after the movie. And pick up a video game for our son. We should buy some of these, they’re so darned expensive to rent.

“He wants the new dance mix DVD too, but I’m not going inside the music store. The wife will see to it tomorrow. And we need a copy of The Independent. That’s a great little

newspaper.

“Ah, my own driveway. Home at last. It’s been a long week. Here comes Christopher, Mr. Dependable; he’s selling chocolates for his soccer team. Yes my son, I’ll take two.”

This fellow has been thinking pretty normal things throughout the day.

Mostly, though, he’s been thinking about “money grabbers.”

Can you identify the 46 things this guy found himself “taken by?” Try estimating his costs and how they might be reduced. Do you think like this guy? Can you change the way you think? Can you change your habits?

Doing so will save about 40 per cent of what you spend on money grabbers.

Next time: financial goal setting Al Antle is executive director of Credit Counselling Service of Newfoundland and Labrador Inc.

AUGUST 13, 2006

INDEPENDENTSHIFT • 23

AUGUST 13-19, 2006

What’s new in the automotive industry

FEATURED VEHICLE

Around town or around the bay. The Honda Ridgeline is car enough for your family of four and truck enough for your four wheeler. Available at City Honda, Kenmount Road.

Paul Daly/The Independent

Tale of two cars I

t was the best of times, it was the worst of times. It was an age of reason, it was an age of foolishness. Dave and Murph lived in downtown St. John’s and owned identical cars. Dave drove his to work everyday while Murph drove his to golf tournaments. They formed a pact so that when one car died the other person would claim it for parts and they lived their separate lives in separate apartments, occasionally colliding during recreational hockey games. Dave was a nine-tofive working guy, checked the oil in his car and watched the tire pressure. Murph was a nine p.m.-to-five a.m. working guy who lived the rock-star life of a chef. He knew there was oil in the car somewhere and was pleasantly surprised that his car even started.

Dave dutifully shoveled his car out all winter, keeping it moving so it wouldn’t freeze to death. After one particularly nasty snowstorm Murph neglected to shovel out his car and it stayed buried on the side of Gower Street. It groaned under the crushing weight of the snow, the battery lost interest, and all moving parts fused together in conspiracy. A tire symbolically gave up its last breath and

Murph’s car ... died. And he concedstuff. We rolled down the windows, ed. opened the doors and checked Dave called me up, not to perform inside the car. Under the circuman autopsy on Murph’s machine, but stances, you realize there isn’t much as someone with the necessary skills you can salvage from inside a car and shiny surgical tools to pick the except the underutilized ice scraper. bones.

Besides, who really needs a spare “One car died so the other will ashtray? live,” he explained. The first availBy and by the street stirred to life, MARK able time happened to be Easter youngsters started playing outside WOOD Sunday so I picked up Dave early and traffic returned to normal. A car and we parked my truck behind WOODY’S pulled up next to us.

Murph’s car. It was a beautiful scrapping that car?” the drivWHEELS er “Ye sunny day and the street was eerily asked. void of inhabitants, not a soul on the “No b’y,” said Dave. road. It occurred to us that everyone might be “Yes b’y,” says I. hunting Easter eggs at home and we set to “You sellin’ ‘er?” he asked. work. Dave started unclipping tail-light lens“No b’y,” said Dave. es that he hoped he wouldn’t need, while I “Yes b’y,” says I. pried at the motor, hauling out plug wires and He offered $25 and I told him to come back

with a tow truck fast before she was gone.

Dave thought it was hilarious — scrap the car and sell it in one day. We plucked a few more parts off and got tired of waiting for buddy to come back so we left. We still had to unload a truckload of parts at Dave’s house.

Meanwhile, back at Murph’s the guy came back around noon with a tow truck and hooked on to the scrapped car. He couldn’t find us so he started pounding on Murph’s door. Murph awoke to a startling sight: there was his car picked clean, not a headlight, tail light, wiper or hubcap left on it, hoisted up on a tow truck and a guy handing money to him. “Here’s your $25,” he said, and went on, dragging the car away. Murph knew better than to ask questions — he got money, his dead car was gone and with any luck at all maybe it was Dave who took the parts. He went back inside for a cup of coffee, probably surprised that the kettle still worked.

“ONE CAR DIED SO THE OTHER WILL LIVE.”

Mark Wood of Portugal Cove-St. Philip’s hasn’t scrapped a car in St. John’s since the Dave/Murph episode.

24 • INDEPENDENTSHIFT

AUGUST 13, 2006

Writing for the drivers LORRIANE SOMMERFELD DEFENDS HER COLUMN OF ‘GENTLE MUSINGS’

T

he fact I can technically call myself an “auto colum- those people that only buy and drive them. You know, the nist” has summoned into question the meaning of majority. the word “technically.”

Everyone who knows me has often heard me preach After a blistering shot out of the blocks back in February about the necessity for great beds. I intone with the wisdom when I admitted that auto shows pretty much bored me to of Solomon, to people with the patience of Job, that we death, there has been some debate as to the just spend a third of our life in bed and should dediwhat form Power Shift would take. cate more than a casual thought to the imporLike an aimless drive on a perfect day with a tance of this. full tank of gas, I won’t know until we get there.

It’s a similar thing with cars. For most of us, Perhaps we should do a tally. we spend more time in our cars than we realize.

Number of test drives: 0 Even if we go through car ownership-free periNumber of references to engine displacement: 0 ods in our lives, we still rent vehicles or mooch Number of discussions about changes in this rides. But we tend to overlook or downplay the year’s Mustang over last year’s: 0 significance of vehicles if we don’t feel comScintillating insider information about pelled to have our head jammed under the hood.

LORRAINE NASCAR: 0 The car plays a defining role in every stage of SOMMERFELD Thoughts on my dad’s cars, cats in cars, driving our development. From sitting squashed in the music, drive-in movies, making out in cars, runback of the family truckster, to the first tremuning over frogs, traffic woes, driving quizzes, lous time you steer it on your own, to the first dangerous motorcycles, cute mechanics, and time you see your name on the ownership — cars street racing cretins — about a billion. define North American society perhaps like no “Why?” you ask. “Why is she doing this?” Easy. All that other. Babies are born in cars, and people are buried in cars, other stuff is covered quite nicely elsewhere. Bigger brains and cars mark every milestone in between. than mine can recite, chapter and verse, the specifications I gladly let my father explain the difference between from year to year on every imaginable vehicle ever made. 10W30 and 20W15 not because I had a lusting interest in Whole websites and publications are devoted to the auto motor oil, but because it was how my father spent time racing industry, and any dealership can give you beautiful with me. I gladly washed the car every weekend as a 15glossy catalogues on any new car you’re interested in. year-old so I had an excuse to wear a bathing suit in the There is no shortage of people eager to display their accu- driveway and hope 16-year-old boys would drive by. I mulated knowledge of any vehicle you can name, tell you gladly drove my parents to doctors’ appointments in their what kind of oil to use, and when to replace your tires. later years not because I had nothing better to do, but to I know more about cars than I probably let on. But I’m thank them for taking me roller-skating all those times. not sure that a display of traditional auto knowledge serves My 14-year-old Marc hasn’t stopped laughing since I you all that well in this particular forum. We live in a car started writing Power Shift. But he’s come to understand culture, and I’m at a loss to understand why most auto sec- that somewhere between my gentle musings and his techtions of newspapers, and all car magazines, decide to omit nological wunderknowledge is a common ground that we all traipse across.

A lot of men are most comfortable expressing their love for a dog or a car, perhaps knowing that their affection is unlikely to be rebuffed. With very few exceptions, every father I know expresses his love for his son by asking what kind of gas mileage he’s getting.

And they say women are hard to understand.

POWER SHIFT

www.lorraineonline.ca

Breathe through a straw for 60 seconds.

That’s what breathing is like with cystic fibrosis.

No wonder so many people with CF stop breathing in their early 30s.

Please help us.

1-800-378-CCFF • www.cysticfibrosis.ca

AUGUST 13, 2006

INDEPENDENTSHIFT • 25

An open letter to Jacques Villeneuve Dear Jacques: done that), but as an owner.

If your Formula One career is really over — as Kevin Kalkhoven and Gerald Forsythe have it appears to be, seeing as you’ve been replaced on done an incredible job, to this point, of keeping the BMW-Sauber team by young Robert Kubica that ship afloat. And the future is looking really — then you should start making plans to bid adieu good. A new spec car will be used by all teams gracefully and move on. next year and new and exciting venues are coming There’s nothing worse than a dismissed, embit- on line: Las Vegas will be in the mix, for sure, and tered, racecar driver crawling off into maybe even Phoenix. And don’t count the woodwork with his tail between his out Montreal just yet. legs, blaming people. I know you’ve Even better news is that more teams posted a statement on your website, but will be moving into the big league: at it would be much better if you called a least one Formula Atlantic entry has press conference and thanked BMW announced plans to move up next year Motorsport Director Mario Thiessen and your old friend Paul Stoddart, who and the team for giving you the opporrescued Minardi from the F1 scrap heap, tunity to continue in F1 after you’d has indicated interest in a Champ Car been out a year. Perhaps you should franchise.

NORRIS offer to help them out again if they ever Your manager, mentor and friend, MCDONALD find themselves in a bind.

Craig Pollock, dipped his toe in the And then you should announce that Champ Car waters a couple of years ago a) you are going to investigate forming when he teamed up with Kalkhoven and a team to race in the Champ Car World Jimmy Vasser to form PKV Racing.

Series, or b) that you are going to create Although he’s no longer connected with a Canadian super team of drivers and sponsors to that outfit, Pollock — who also owned the BAR win the 24 Hours of Le Mans for this country, or F1 team for a number of years (remember that!) c) that you are going to use your fame and connec- — knows his way around the Champ Car padtions do something positive — if not for motor- dock. sport, then for society as a whole.

You would think with your connections that If you do something like that, you will show sponsorship would not be a problem. And if your yourself to be a class act. If not, you will have new team should sign thrilling young Canadian missed a golden opportunity. drivers like Atlantic standout James Hinchcliffe of Now, I know you’re not really a Canadian any Oakville and Formula BMW prodigy Robert more. We like to think you are, but you’re not. You Wickens of Etobicoke, I’d be surprised if corpodon’t live here or pay taxes here or vote here. If rate Canada didn’t just line up to get on board. you come back at all, it’s for a race or a charity And Jacques: you and your band could play event or a visit with family. You’ve lived in concerts at all the races, It’d be a win-win!

Switzerland for a number of years and your new If, on the other hand, you want to continue drivwife is expecting and, well, you’re settling down. ing for a few more years, sports cars in Europe And I know you have a CD out and fancy yourself would probably be your best option. Which brings a singer and I say good luck with all of that. me to this.

But I would suggest you not turn your back The 24 Hours of Le Mans is the world’s most completely on the sport that made you and your famous sports car race. Although several family what you are today — Canadian icons. And Canadians have been winners there — John Duff it’s always a good idea to think about giving (overall, partnered by a Brit), Ron Fellows, Scott something back to the very thing that made you so Maxwell, John Graham and Greg Wilkins (class famous and successful. champions) — there has never been an overall Of course, you could still find yourself back in winning entry composed entirely of Canadian an F1 car. Stranger things have happened, but it drivers. looks unlikely. But in every cloud, there’s a silver So how about a supernova team made up of lining and you should go looking for yours. you, Fellows and either Maxwell or Paul Tracy Not NASCAR. Good grief, you mused several (maybe even both), managed by Graham and Indy weeks ago about possibly following Juan Pablo Lights king Brian Stewart and sponsored by Montoya over there. Your agent said much the Petro-Canada and Tim Hortons? same thing last weekend, Please! Montoya’s deal Put a team like that together and every eye in is an aberration. I guarantee you that NASCAR Canada would be aimed at Le Mans that weekend, team owners are not the least bit interested in I betcha. older F1 drivers; 20-year-old American shortOK, I’ll get serious. What I’m trying to say is track racers are more their style. that what happened to you this week does not have But the Champ Car World Series? Now, that to be the end of the Villeneuve auto racing world. would be a perfect fit. Not as a driver (been there, It’s undoubtedly very disappointing. And for a

TRACK TALK

BMW Sauber Formula One driver Jacques Villeneuve of Canada has a drink at the side of the track as he waits to start the Canadian F1 Grand Prix at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal.

REUTERS/Paul Chiasson/Pool

So Jacques, go forth and conquer. Champ Car, Le Mans — the sky’s the limit.

Show ’em they can’t keep a good man down.

Sincerely, Norris McDonald Distributed by Torstar Syndication Services

The Remaining ’06 Hondas Are Ready to Go!

Accord Sedan Special Edition

2006

ACCORD

1,750

$

Accord Sedan DX-G 5-speed CR-V Special Edition

*

@

$

%

288 2.9

from

CR-V SE 4WD 5-speed

$

¥

This Honda delivers class leading style, benchmark setting quality and precise race-inspired handling and performance all the way to your destination.

†1 Selling Intermediate Sedan 3 YEARS STRAIGHT

@

from

ACCORD

Best Family Sedan

*

The fun-to-drive fuel efficient 4WD SUV from Honda delivers winning value and enhanced safety for every adventure.

48 Month Lease with $ 0 security deposit

or choose

†2

CR-V

%

288 1.9

48 Month Lease with $ 0 security deposit

20th win in 24 years

Low 60 Month

2.9

Quadruple 5-Star Safety

†3

†

%

Purchase Finance on 2006 CR-V and Accord

Introducing the Brand New 2007 Honda Fit

MOTOR TREND ™

Carof theYear ¥2

Fit All your stuff in.

With room for 4 friends and more cargo space than any other car in its class this brand new 2007 Honda is the perfect Fit for you!

Civic Coupe DX

8 YEARS STRAIGHT

†2

Best New Economy Car ¥3 Automobile Journalists Association of Canada

Civic Sedan DX

CIVIC The runaway favourite best selling car in Canada for eight years straight. Totally redesigned... unequalled in its class.

Civic DX 5-speed Sedan / Coupe

$

**

218

from

@

% †4

5.9

2007 Fit DX 5-speed Starting At $14,980 ¥4

.

60 Month Lease with $ 0 security deposit

2007 FIT SPORT

All lease and finance offers are from Honda Canada Finance Inc., O.A.C. *Leases are based on new 2006: CR-V SE 5-speed (model RD7756E)/Accord Sedan DX-G 5-speed (model CM5516E) for 48/48 month terms respectively, OAC. Monthly payment is $288/$288/ with $4,658/$3,543 down payment or equivalent trade-in, respectively. Payments include $1,445/$1,310 freight and PDI. $0/$0 security deposit required, respectively. First monthly payment due at lease inception. Lease rate is 1.9%2.9%. 96,000 kilometre allowance; charge of $0.12/km for excess kilometres. Total lease obligation is $15,897.60/$15,897.60. License, insurance, applicable taxes and registration are extra. Option to purchase at lease end for $13,771/$10,664 plus taxes. ¥: Maximum value of Accord gas offer is $1,743 including taxes, OAC. Gas offer applies only to new in-stock 2006 Accords purchased/leased between August 1 and August 31, 2006, OAC. †: 2.9% purchase financing for up to 60 months available on new 2006: Accord and CR-V models, O.A.C. Finance example based on a 60 month finance term, OAC: $28,000 at 2.9% per annum equals $501.88 per month for 60 months. Cost of borrowing is $2,112.80, for a total obligation of $30,112.80. †1: 10Best Car Awards as reported by Car and Driver Magazine in January 2006 issue, www.caranddriver.com. †2: Based on annual sales by category in Canada as reported by AIAMC, January 2006. †3: Quadruple 5-star safety rating based on crash tests by NHTSA for CR-V for driver, front passenger and rear seat passengers in both front-impact and side-impact crash tests, www.nhtsa.com. **Leases are based on new 2006: Civic Sedan DX 5-speed (model FA1526EX)/Civic Coupe DX 5-speed (model FG1126E) for 60/60 month terms respectively, OAC. Monthly payment is $218/$218 with $2,165/$2,438 down payment or equivalent trade-in, respectively. Payments include $1,225/$1,225 freight and PDI. $0/$0 security deposit required, respectively. First monthly payment due at lease inception. 60 month Civic lease rate is 5.9% with 120,000 kilometre allowance; charge of $0.12/km for excess kilometres. Total lease obligation is $15,042/$15,042. License, insurance, applicable taxes and registration are extra.Option to purchase at lease end for $6,283/$6,185 plus taxes. †4: Special 5.9% lease financing for 60 months only available to residents of NS/PEI/NB/NL and only available on new 2006 Civic models (excluding Civic Coupe Si and hybrid models), O.A.C. ¥2: 2006 Car of the Year awarded to 2006 Honda Civic by Motor Trend on November 22, 2005; www.motortrend.com. ¥3: Best New Economy Car awarded to 2006 Civic Sedan by Automobile Journalists Association of Canada on December 6, 2005; www.ajac.ca. ¥4: MSRP based on new 2007 Honda Fit DX 5-speed (model GD3727E). Freight and PDI ($1,225), licence, registration, insurance and taxes are extra. ¥: Maximum value of Accord gas offer is $1,750 including taxes, OAC. Gas offer applies only to new in-stock 2006 Accords purchased/leased between August 1 and August 31, 2006, OAC. ‡: See dealers for full details. Limited time offers. See your Honda dealer for full details

driver who was once world champion, it’s downright insulting to be shunted aside in this manner.

But it’s always best to try to turn a negative into a positive. It’s better to go out with your head held high. And, as a guy once said, the best revenge is to do better.

All Honda vehicles are delivered with a full tank.

www.honda.ca

26 • INDEPENDENTSHIFT

AUGUST 13, 2006

Toyota gives GM race for first

T

oyota reported a 39 per cent jump in profit in its fiscal first quarter, with strong vehicle sales around the world keeping the company on a pace to possibly overtake General Motors as the world’s No. 1 automaker in coming years.

Toyota’s reputation for fuel-efficient cars is proving a boon at a time when drivers are balking at soaring gas prices,

analysts said. Toyota Motor Corp., the world’s second biggest automaker, is among a clutch of Japanese vehicle companies reporting robust results lately in contrast to U.S. automakers.

“Everything is going well for Toyota, especially in North American sales,” says Koji Endo, auto analyst at Credit Suisse First Boston Securities in Tokyo.

Endo says in addition to robust sales

of Toyota’s smaller models, such as the Corolla, the company’s light trucks and Lexus luxury models — which tend to produce healthier profit margins per vehicle — have also been doing well, boosted by the perception that they’re more fuel efficient than rival offerings.

Toyota’s profit in April-June totalled 371.5 billion yen ($3.65 billion Canadian), up from 266.9 billion yen in

the same period the previous year, as a weaker yen also helped earnings, adding 100 billion yen to operating profit.

Quarterly sales surged 13 per cent to 5.6 trillion yen from 4.98 trillion yen a year earlier, according to the manufacturer, based in Toyota city in central Japan.

Some analysts believe Toyota will overtake GM as the world’s No. 1

automaker in a few years if the current pace continues.

In July, Toyota for the first time beat Ford Motor Co. in U.S. vehicle market share, outselling Ford to be No. 2 after GM, although Ford’s year-to-date sales are still ahead of Toyota.

GM continues to outsell Toyota, selling 2.4 million vehicles globally in the latest quarter.

— Torstar wire service

SMOKIN’ VICTORY

At the Avondale Speedway MOTOCROSS AND ATV RACE RESULTS FOR AUG. 6, 2006 1. BEGINNERS MOTO 1 No. 2 Donald Squires No. 23 Kyle Walsh No. 3 Tristan Power No. 25 Nathan Dowden

5. INTERMEDIATE MOTO 2 No. 15 Andrew Burton No. 22 Kevin Dowden No. 1 Billy Joe Jackman No. 24 G. Tony Murphy No. 24 R. Andrew Morrissey

2. INTERMEDIATE MOTO 1 No. 15 Andrew Burton No. 1 Billy Joe Jackman No. 24 G. Tony Murphy No. 24 R. Andrew Morrissey

6. ATV MOTO 2 No. 11 Herbie Lewis No. 19 Jimmy Gushue No. 5 Sammy Butler 7. MOTOCROSS OPEN No. 15 Andrew Burton No. 22 Kevin Dowden No. 1 Billy Joe Jackman No. 24 Tony Murphy No. 4 John Robinson No. 2 Donald Squires

3. ATV MOTO 1 No. 11 Herbie Lewis No. 19 Jimmy Gushue No. 5 Sammy Butler 4. BEGINNERS MOTO 2 No. 2 Donald Squires No. 3 Tristan Power No. 23 Kyle Walsh No. 25 Nathan Dowden

8. ATV OPEN No. 11 Herbie Lewis No. 5 Sammy Butler Jimmy Gushue

www.AvondaleSpeedway.com

The Remaining ’06 Hondas Are Ready to Go!

Pilot LX 4WD

2006

PILOT

PILOT Here’s full-size fun – ready and able to take you and seven friends wherever your heart desires in a style that’s First Class all the way.

2,700

$

Element Y-PKG

8 Passenger Pilot LX 4WD *

@

$ from

%

418 2.9

Purchase Finance

*

@

$ from

48 Month Lease with

48 Month Lease with

$

$

2.9

%

%

278 1.9

0 Security Deposit

¥

or CHOOSE Low 60 Month

Element 2WD 5-speed

on 2006 Pilot, Element and Ridgeline †

ELEMENT

Delivering unprecedented versatility and distinctive personality ready to load up at the garden shop or take your dog for a walk on the beach.

0 Security Deposit Quadruple 5-Star Safety

Every Honda Truck Delivers a 5-Star Safety rating for BOTH Front and Side Collisions †1 2006

RIDGELINE With its rigid unibody construction, class-leading safety and innovative features – Ridgeline delivers unmatched advantages to pickup truck owners.

RIDGELINE MOTOR TREND ™

Truck of theYear

†5

2,000

$

Ridgeline LX V6 4WD *

$

398

@

%

4.9

48 Month Lease with

BONUS

$

0 Security Deposit Ridgeline LX 4WD

¥

.

from

All lease and finance offers are from Honda Canada Finance Inc., O.A.C. *Leases are based on new 2006: Pilot LX Auto (model YF1816E)/Element 2WD 5-speed (model YH1726P)/Ridgeline LX 4WD (YK1646E) for 48/48/48 month terms respectively, OAC. Monthly payment is $418/$278/$398 with $6,087/$2,916/$6,811 down payment or equivalent trade-in, respectively. Payments include $1,445/$1,445/$1,445 freight and PDI. $0/$0/$0 security deposit required, respectively. Lease rates are 2.9%/1.9%/4.9%, respectively. 96,000 kilometre allowance; charge of $0.12/km for excess kilometres. Total lease obligation is $23,073.60/$15,345.60/$21,969.60. License, insurance, applicable taxes and registration are extra. Option to purchase at lease end for $17,730/$10,648/$15,136 plus taxes. †: 2.9% purchase financing for up to 60 months available on new 2006: Pilot, Element and Ridgeline models, O.A.C. Finance example based on a 60 month finance term, OAC: $28,000 at 2.9% per annum equals $501.88 per month for 60 months. Cost of borrowing is $2,112.80, for a total obligation of $30,112.80. †1: Quadruple 5-star safety rating based on crash tests by NHTSA for Pilot, Ridgeline, and Element for driver, front passenger and rear seat passengers in both front-impact and side-impact crash tests, www.nhtsa.com. †5: 2006 Truck of the Year awarded to 2006 Honda Ridgeline by Motor Trend on December 20, 2005; www.motortrend.com. ¥: Maximum value of Pilot gas offer is $2,700 including taxes, OAC. Maximum value of Ridgeline gas offer is $2,000 including taxes, OAC. Gas offers apply only to new in-stock 2006 Ridgelines and Pilots purchased/leased between August 1 and August 31, 2006, OAC. Limited time offers. See your Honda dealer for full details.

Jimmie Johnson smokes his tires as he celebrates after winning the Brickyard 400 in Indianapolis, Indiana August 6. REUTERS/Frank Polich

All Honda vehicles are delivered with a full tank.

Fuel Efficiency is Engineered into Every Honda www.honda.ca

AUGUST 13, 2006

Wok with Paul

INDEPENDENTSPORTS • 27 Solutions for crossword on page 20

From page 28 than required for meat. The upper rack works best for me.

This summer I had a little expert help on the grill. My daughter Megan is attending the Culinary Institute of Canada in Charlottetown, PEI, and she was home for a twoweek break. The days she cooked full bore in the kitchen, there were heaps of pots and pans. The food was fantastic, but chefs apparently don’t wash dishes.

I steered her towards the grill and she expanded my horizons. We had company coming for supper and I wanted to show off my grilled vegetables. There wasn’t enough room on my top rack to grill veggies for seven healthy appetites.

We went shopping, and picked up a wok-shaped device with holes all over it. I suppose you could call it a grilling wok.

We filled it with sliced peppers (all colours), zucchini, onion, and snow peas. The peas were an experimental project, hatched while browsing in the produce department (I’ve discovered chefs also like browsing in supermarkets).

Megan threw in a measure of olive oil and tossed it all around before placing our new technology on the top rack.

I was somewhat apprehensive about grilling in a wok, but who am I to argue? Megan tossed the veggie mix four or five times while we tended our steaks. Sure enough, the vegetables cooked to perfection, with the peppers just a tad crispy, the way I like them.

So far no salt, pepper or spice was added, another break from my tradition. Megan dumped the wok contents into a large serving bowl and added some zesty Italian salad dressing. She tossed the veggie mix for a final time and topped it off with freshly grated Parmesan cheese. It was a delicious medley of colour and taste.

Give vegetable grilling a try. You might be missing out on delicious summer side dishes and washing too many pots and pans. Experiment and have fun.

Solutions for sudoku on page 20

Paul Smith is a freelance writer living in Spaniard’s Bay, enjoying all the outdoors Newfoundland and Labrador has to offer. flyfishtherock@hotmail.com

“

“

”

You have to see it to believe it.

”

The accommodations are magnificent.

“

”

Canada’s best kept secret.

1.866.686.8100 humbervalley.com

INDEPENDENTSPORTS

SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, AUGUST 13-19, 2006 — PAGE 28

THE ULTIMATE

Jane Crosbie (top) is a student at Memorial’s school of nursing and a member of A donkey, some ice and a nine iron, one of 16 teams in the Coors Light Mile Zero Ultimate frisbee league. On Aug. 11, the team met The Masked Avengers on Hatcher Field. For standings or other information about the Mile Zero league — or the Newfoundland and Labrador Ultimate Association — visit www.milezeroultimate.com.

Paul Daly/The Independent

Veggie grilling Or, how to avoid washing pots and pans in the summer

I

dislike washing dishes even in the depths of winter, but on a hot summer’s day … let’s just say I’d almost prefer to break my favourite fishing rod. And we own a dishwasher — I figure I should never be assigned dish detail.

Although I’ve done a little cooking and washed a few dishes, I am not remotely close to holding decisionmaking power in the kitchen. That’s Goldie’s domain and she has proclaimed pots and pans don’t belong in the dishwasher. The issue has been reviewed and debated enthusiastically, but the law stands. My two daughters and I simply have to live within its bounds. We sometimes sin just a little when Goldie is away.

I just got back from two weeks of

PAUL SMITH

The Rock

Outdoors tenting and fishing in Labrador, and although our camp was well outfitted, we didn’t have a dishwasher. This time of summer the heat and humidity are above my optimum comfort level. I’ve been fishing for quite a stretch and there’s work around the house I’ve been procrastinating, window painting and flower bed construction — that sort of thing. Goldie reminds me about it.

She works each day until 6 p.m. so in addition to manual labour in the unbearable heat, I’m quite often on the

hook for supper. I have no desire to wash pots and pans.

Eternal gratitude and praise to the benevolent and supreme being for the outdoor gas grill. I’ve learned to cook a complete meal with every utensil dishwasher-legal. Steak searing on the barbecue, while veggies cook inside has always been a summer tradition. I fondly recall warm summer evenings, out on the deck tending to the T-bones, sipping a rum and Coke, and Goldie preparing the side dishes in the kitchen.

In those days she didn’t work till 6 p.m. and she probably washed the pots and pans — most of the time.

The children have grown and the family dynamic has changed, and I’ve discovered grilled vegetables.

I began grilling veggies about three

years ago, after watching a cooking show on cable. For my first attempt, I sliced sweet potato and zucchini, coated them with olive oil, and placed them on the top rack of my barbecue. I added pepper and salt to taste. As the vegetables cooked, I tended to the traditional sizzling protein. And I still managed a beverage, multitasking efficiently.

My new barbecue side dish was a hit and I entered a whole new grilling dimension. Next time, I added peppers to my repertoire; red and green are distinctively tangy while orange and yellow are oh so sweet. I was really on to something. Unless you like peppers quite crispy, put them on before other veggies, as they take longer to soften.

Onions also require just a little longer grilling. Grilled Spanish onions are my

favourite. Add some baked potatoes and the pots and pans can stay clean in the cupboard.

You may discover your sliced veggies occasionally fall through your barbecue rack. There’s a cheap and convenient fix for this. Finely meshed racks that fit right in your barbecue are available at most department stores.

Generally, sliced vegetables will cook on the top rack of a barbecue in just a little more time than it takes meat to grill on the lower and hotter rack, so put the vegetables on first. I usually turn them over just once, adding a little salt, pepper and spice in the process. If you grill veggies on the bottom rack, keep the barbecue on a lower heat setting See “Wok with Paul,” page 27