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p4 the tribune tuesday november 18 1997 st the tribune tuesday november 18 1997 vol 109 no 75 comment send your letters to the editor to the address below editorial lets be civilized while the protest against bill 1 60 continues at a different level at schools and in the community the protest has sunk to a new low with a reported incident at a local trustees home recently teachers and union leaders are urging that parents and tax payers who oppose the education reform bill wear or display green ribbons to show their concerns apparently someone cut down the apple green ribbon protest put up at uxbridge secondary school and left them at the home of trustee faith neumann along with a rude note as one of our letter writers has written its a sad day when a peaceful protest becomes an irrational show of anger its irrational because in the current showdown between teach ers their unions and parents opposing bill 160 and the provin cial government and its supporters trustees are an unfair target of abuse like the school boards and the innocent students they are in the middle of this struggle not technically on either side as any private citizen they have a right to their opinion on the wisdom or folly of the current education reform bill before the legislature and they have a job to bring their constituents views on the bill to their school board table trustees do not deserve to be the target of anger or abuse in this situation the apple green ribbon campaign is a nonthreatening civ ilized way of protesting government legislation it is certainly far better than depriving our children of their schooling lets remember that adults demonstrate democracy in action for their children and sinking to nasty tactics in the struggle wont improve education or raise the morale standards now 1 wont need to rake deleaves j sabbath booze sales a drop in the bucket prohibition is over but nobody cares when the big cheese at the ministry of consumer and commercial rela tions announced friday that beer and liquor stores can legally open on sun day i took a break from reality closed my eyes tight crossed my fingers and toes and hoped wed see a radical pub licattention shift away from the spat between the teachers and the govern ment to sunday booze store openings 1 dont know about you but 1 know off the record joan ransberry what a double shot of whiskey will do while ive read this longwinded bill 160 complete with its 10 words i dont know if its a good thing or a bad thing maybe its too much work and no play but im taking this position if theres a government im against it besides what do you expect im an old hippie im a scribe living in the eye of a menopause hurricane with not a hormone supplement in sight and as a bonus im apprenticing to become a professional curmudgeon lets get back to the sauce society would unfold as it should providing it had a personality but since its the 90s felines clash with noncat lover our frolicsome felines spasm and poc skated perilously close to the edge one night last week when i was out and mr wallethead was minding le chateau had our daughter not been home at the time i fear that this charming but amoral duo would have been in seri ous danger of being strung up by their tails as a warning to other havocwreaking kitties while my old man has learned a significant lesson from the experi ence do not leave your jacket draped over a chair within a couple of feet of a glass cabinet the two perpetrators of the crime i am about to reveal remain blithely unrepentant the cataclysmic event as related to me in whispers by clare was over within seconds but the resulting mayhem was enough to send the blood pressure of one not entranced by cats right off the richtcr scale it seems that our animal compan ions challenged the jacket sleeves to a fight and their attempts to establish sovereignty over their inanimate ad versary caused the chair to tip and crash into the cabinet three panels were irrevocably kates corner m kate gilderdale destroyed clare wisely figured that pointing out to her distraught daddy that it could have been worse and that some of the crystal could have been smashed as well would not have been particularly helpful immediate ly postapocalypse even the most moderate of men needs some time to reestablish his inner child laugh at adversity and achieve closure expecting the unofficial head of the anticat league to smile tolerantly and then forgive and forget while his feet arc still surrounded by shards of glass from the great cabinet disaster would be unrealistic to say the least cats may have no sense of decency but they know when someone is out to get them and they proved extreme ly adept at avoiding contact with mr wallethcads flailing right foot jndecd they kept an unnaturally low profile all night sneaking out to test the emotional climate only when i returned from my own rendezvous with madness the annual fundrais- ing film festival at the queen street mental health centre my evening like the film was wonderful but had a rather bleak end ing one which resonates sadly every time i go into the dining room the glass cabinet now stands door- less its front facing the wall until the requisite repairs can be effected and the door replaced poc and spasm meanwhile are right back into the fray adding the finishing touches to the destruction of a wicker chair in the bedroom and clinging by their claws to the banis ters with all the tenacity of mike har ris clinging unwaveringly to bill 160 my husband was recently asked to name his heroes to his dad and sir winston churchill i would like to add ambrose bicrcc whose defini tion of the feline is one which i feel sure matches the sentiments of my longsuffering partner cat a soft indestructible automaton provided by nature to be kicked when things go wrong in the domestic circle nothing very human shakes us or wakes us sorry folks but compared to the 50s the 90s are dull if this was 1957 and the government announced it was taking the sunday lock off beer and liquor stores all heck would break loose the local bootlegger would cry in his beer the men in the god business would take to the pulpits and deliver their finest demon rum sermons yes siree the men of the cloth would join forces with char lie farquharson and tell us if we buy a bottle of beer well go to hell in a hand cart with worn brake linings on the home front local government would sway this way and that finally not knowing what to do the elected would rattle away about the importance of democracy when asking the people to vote on it at which point people would jump on wet or dry bandwag ons every opinion would be exaggerated bribes would be offered bribes would be taken and when the day was done nobody would be speaking to anyone id love it but since its the 90s heres whats taken place in the past few days when minister of consumer and commercial relations david tusubouchi said about 700 liquor stores and 425 beer stores in ontario will be allowed to open seven days a week providing its okay with local municipalities whitchurch-stouf- fvillc mayor wayne emmerson spoke up emmcrson is taking a waitandsee approach a couple of local councillors did the oneword choice chant and not one letter to the editor on the subject arrived in the newsroom i kind of wonder if we could lump the teacher- government problem and the booze sale issue together lets let the government have its way providing of course all education decisions are made by minds soaked in sundaypurchased booze stouffville tribune a metroland community newspaper patricia pappas publisher andrew mair editorinchief tracy kibble editor debra weller director of advertising mike rogerson retail advertising manager stacey allen classified manager barry goodyear director of distribution vivian oneil business manager pamela nichols operations manager about us news 9056402100 retail sales 9056402100 classifieds 9056402874 distribution 905 6402100 fax 9056405477 email 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