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WiyI3Pm, ,bne1,9,Pg 7 So I turned my attention to thie rad.io. rIime w Ltune it. That's strange. The volume on/off button lay on the floor. Oh, well. I_ picked up the two pieces and put them in place. Turned on the radio. Flipped te a station. Any station. No sound. I turned up the volume. No volumie. Nothing coming out of the speakers. Which speak- ers? Oh, the two in the front doors,y ou know the ones which used te be right where dose two litge holes are. The reality dawned slowly Four-inch round holes in my doors. Where my speakers are. Were. That can only mean ... hold it, M'i figure it out ... no speakers. Ripped off. From a locked car in my own driveway. A quick check teld me more. M y parking pass from Durham College had disappeared from its spot over the rear view mirror. A twenty-five dollar umbrella, untouched. Ditto, fifty dollars worth of paint. Jumper cables, avoided with disdain. Let's skip over the stuf about reporting te, the police, reporting te the insurance cornpany, pricing speakers, paying $25 te replace the parking pass. Let's get to the main point: who would want speakers from a Nissan Micra? I rnean, they're okay. But this is not a stereo system that wiIl blow you away. In fact, the speakers have been raised entirely on Mozart and wiII go into defibrillation if confronted with rock. Fitting, Verhaps, that the culprit(s) didn't take the radio. That s surely a style statement or an insult, or both. Kida, everyone tells me. Great. Makes me feel a lot better. Ripped off by kids who stay up after 1 a.m. You can bet they dxdn t get up at five. Is there a message here? Yeah. 1 grew up where people not only didn t lock their car but left the keys in the ignition so, they couid flnd themn easily in the morning. We've corne a long way, baby. 1 m Iy BilS a Ripped off It happened last Wednesday. After a cheerful breakfast, ýmy daughter chattered off to school. I scooped up my belongings and headed for my car. You kind of have to know my car to) appreciate it. Look up small Car in the dictionary. That's a picture of My Micra right there. Comfortable. Roomy, if you put only aduits under five foot ten in the front seat, and have only children to put in the rear. The seat folds down in the back. Sometimes we double as a cargo transport. To the dump, or other charming places. I turned the key in the door, hopped in, pushed the key in the ign1ition, started 'er Up. That is, er, we worked at it. This problem had been bugging me for the p ast moth. Nothing big. Something that can be solve by taking the car to the dealer wih h cargo space filled with money and saying, "Can you solve this problem for, oh, say, $366.73?"' .And the people at the dealer will say: "Oh, yes. That isafter-marketing, and it is what we do best. Espêçialy in a recession. If new cars don't seli, we have to make ail we can out of the service end." "You can fix it then?» "Even if there's nothing wrong with it.» See, the problem was this: the battery was in a terminal state. Every morning, it took every bit of its juice te turn the motor over. You know the sounds: Errrrr rrr, r. r. r. .. r voom! Every time, that last crank would get it. Now this problem was so acute that it drained every bit of juice from the circuits. I'm not kidding. Starting the car would wipe out the memory circuits in the radio. No station settings. No time. Just a quietly humming motor. BUILDING THE CANADIAN NOMRflEN MWÀY TILROUGHWITY 1910 This construction crew is building the Canadian Northern Railway through Fourth a'nd Filth Concessions of Wlutby Township. The railwaL operated for only a few years, and was dismantled in the late 19309. It passed south of Brooklin. Wih rde ht 10 YEARS AGO from the Wednesday, November 30, 1983 edfition of the WIUTBY FREE PRESS " The Whitby Chamber of Commerce has named Howard Smith as Business Person of the Year, Anne Marie Jolinson as Student of the Year and Cullen Gardans as Good Corporate Citizen. " Whiiby Hydro rates wilI increase by 7.9 per cent next year. " The Town council is offering a $200 reward te, catch vandale who destroyed trees in Willow Park. " Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corparation has approved the proposed 80-unit Pringle. Creek Co-operative. 35 YEARS AGO from the Thursday, November 27, 1958 edition of the W H RTBY WEkLY NEWMS " Nonresidential construction in Whitbhy in 1958 is expected to exceed $3 million. " Whitby residents want door-to-door mail delivery, says the Chaniber ofçComnnerce. *Construction of a new $390,000 water filter plant at the lakeshore la expected te gain provincial approval. " Viscount Greenwood Chapter IODE is holding a sale of used winter clothing, jewelry and china at the Town hall on Dec. 5. 80 YEARS AGO from the Thursday, November 27, 1913 edition of the WRTBY GAZETTE AND'CHROICLE * Two Whitby residents, W.D. Dykes and Epliriain E. Starr, are going to England te, advertise Whitby's advantages as an industrial site. * New electric street liglita are being installed in downtewnWhitby. e The Toronto and Eastern Railway is laying steel rails between Whitby and Oshawa- j* A railway car advertising the virtues of Northern Ontario stopped at Whitby on Nov. 25. 7-- b ........ . ......... .. ......... . ........ .........