The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

THURSDAY, AUGUST 10, 2006 THE NEW TANNER 9 GRAPEVINE with Mike OLeary The Way I See It DECADE PARTY Congrats to Val and Bill Manes, dealer/owners of Acton Home Hardware who will celebrate 10 years in business on August 12 with festivities at the store includ- ing demonstrations, specials and a presentation to the Manes from head office officials. The Manes sold a Brampton travel business before buying the business, then downtown on Mill Street, on August 15, 1996, from Mike and Bernice Kinal who had operated in Acton for 25 years. The Manes moved to their new store in Acton East in March 1999. They have 20 full and part-time employees, including their chil- dren, Teresa and Brett, who work after-school and on weekends at the store. BBQ ENVY Die-hard grill fans are drooling over a $2,800 Weber stainless steel BBQ on display at Acton Home Hardware until its drawn as first prize in a Rotary Club of Acton raffle on September 17 at the Acton Fall Fair. Second prize is a 27-inch flat screen television and a selection of high-end skin care products awaits the lucky third prizewin- ner. Tickets are available at Home Hardware, at Alexanians, from Rotarians and at the Leathertown Festival on Sunday. CAREFUL CALLS Steely unflappable nerves, an encyclopedic command of the rules and a good sense of humour make Actons Dave Mills popular on the ball diamond. From August 5 to 15, Mills is working as an umpire at the Junior Ladies National Fastball National championships in Montreal. Mills has been an umpire for 15 years, working his way up to high- er and higher levels of provincial and now national competition. He was invited to the Montreal games as an Ontario representative. Mills is the recreation manager at the city of Vaughn. RELAY INFO The Canadian Cancer Society is staging a Relay for Life at Rock- mosa Park on September 22, and invites people to an information session at Actons Trinity United Church on August 16 at 7 p.m. FREE FLOAT Congrats to Actons Nancy Farceurs, a retired schoolteacher, who won the grand prize, a canoe worth $1,000 in the Sobeys, raffle. The real winner was ASAP the Acton Sports Action Park, because proceeds from the raffle - $1,940 will help pay for the new facil- ity to be built very soon beside the arena. Sobeys said all but seven ex- cited winners in the contest that was well supported by the com- munity have picked up the 35 raffled prizes. To date, Sobeys Reach for the Sky campaign to raise money for the skateboard park has generated $7,491, and Sobeys hopes it can double that to $15,000. MARZO MOVE? Its business as usual, for now, at Marzo Glove, but that may not be for long as the building that houses the company on Highway 7, west of Acton at the Fifth Line, is for sale and it looks like there is a serious offer on the table. Already two businesses that leased space in the building, Pro- Plastix and Automated Devises have moved to Guelph, but Teresa Paul, vice-president of Marzos retail arm, said its the worst time of the year for them to be relocat- ing because they have fall/winter seasonal goods. It would probably ruin us to have to move during busy mode, Paul said. TIL DEBT DO US PART The olde Hide House played sound stage to a television crew from the Life Network on Sat- urday that was in town taping a segment for an upcoming show on newlywed spending. Furniture salesman Clark Somerville, who said he couldnt reveal much because of confiden- tiality clauses, said the premise was the reality of newlywed fi- nances. There was no script I knew nothing of the Acton area couple in advance they were just in to have a look to see some of the various dining sets, Somerville said, adding the bride found sev- eral high-end sets while her groom appeared to want to spend less. The show, tentatively called The Newlyweds, will air in January. COYOTE CAUTION Acton pet owners might want to watch their smaller pets more closely after Willow, a McDonald Boulevard cat, was snatched re- cently by a coyote apparently in its backyard, or in the creek behind its house near Division Street. Neighbours of the owners re- ported hearing cries and seeing a coyote with a small animal in its mouth, and the next day Willow was missing. Whats Your Beef? Put it in a letter to the Editor! Deadline is Tuesday at noon. Drive to arrive alive Ive written about this before but think it bears repeating. There are far too many jerks driving cars on our major highways. Especially on the 400 series of highways. The bride and I slipped away up north last week. Except for the storm last week we had a relaxing time. We left on Sunday to beat the traffic, or so we thought. Then we hit the 401. Im not a pokey driver. I try to keep up with the flow and dont hog the passing lane. Traffic was heavy but moving at 120km or so. When we got to about Oshawa I thought I was in the Daytona 500. Let me set the scene. There were three lanes of traffic all moving along quite smartly. There were no appreciable gaps as far as the eye could see. So what would the drivers who were constantly changing lanes, and cutting people off as they switched back and forth, trying to prove? Ill tell you what they proved to me. They proved they were the southbound end of a northbound horse is what. Its also obvious that their gene pool is so shallow they dont have the brains to drive a car. What scares me is that these fools are often not alone in their cars. Often they have another passenger or even children with them. Its bad enough that theyre putting everyone elses lives in danger but youd think they would have some concern for the safety of their families. Obviously not. Of the tens of cases I saw last Sunday night one stays fresh in my mind. I was in the passing lane, moving with the traffic, when a little red fart-wagon (a Toyota something) suddenly ap- peared in my rear view mirror. He was tailgating me so when I could I moved to the middle lane. So he advanced one car length. I drive with some space between me and the car ahead. I dont want to rear-end the next guy if some- thing unexpected happens. The doofus, who was by now tailgat- ing again, took that space to shoot across in front of me then cut off the guy on my right. A couple of cars were exiting so he moved up and then repeated the process until he was back in the passing lane. Total gain for this asinine display of driving two car lengths including the one I had made room for. I watched over the next minutes and he continued to do his imita- tion of Jeff Gordon. Brake lights were flashing on all over his path which only served to slow down the other traffic behind him. Not that that would occur to him or concern him. Anyone who drives the 401 regularly knows that this happens regularly. I started to wonder why this aggressive driving seems to be getting worse? I dont remember it being that bad when I commuted into the city in the 70s and 80s. Back then there were lane chang- ers in the morning and afternoon. Usually, they were trying to take advantage of a faster moving lane. That in itself was often futile be- cause sure as shootin the faster moving lane would slow and stop and my lane would catch-up. An- noying but hardly ever dangerous. If you were to ask one of these kamikaze klutzes why they drove so stupidly you would undoubt- edly hear that they figured they had superior driving skills. What a load of manure. Superior drivers are also safe drivers. They keep their racing activity to the track where it belongs. These offensive drivers dont know the first thing about defensive driving. Its not how well you can handle your car. Its about how poorly the people surrounding you drive their ve- hicles. The police are doing their best. You cant expect them to have a cruiser every mile or so. When they do catch up to idiotic drivers they throw the book at them. Personally, I think the police should rip up these yahoos li- cence right then and there, plus impound the car. Perhaps a month or two on foot while waiting for a court date would prove how seri- ous society considers dangerous driving. I heard that last weekend a fam- ily of four pulled to the side of the 400 hwy. when police had stopped one of these lead-headed speed- sters. The father was so incensed at the antics of this driver he swore out an affidavit on the spot. The driver now faces dangerous driv- ing and speeding charges. As for me, I continued to watch this jerk in front of me and listened to the traffic reports. While he stayed in the core lanes, I moved over to the collectors. That way I avoided the back-up approach- ing the construction near the 400 interchange. I flew past him on a clear road. I figured that his antics might have let him get 30 or 40 cars ahead of where we started. With him stuck in traffic, I reckon I passed him and 2,356 cars, and lord knows how many trucks, by the time I merged safely back on the core approaching the airport. They say revenge is a dish best served cold. I smiled all the rest of the way home. BREEZY BOYS: Poor winds didnt spoil the inaugural sail after 25-some years in dry dock for George Elliott and his 11-foot sailboat, as he and first mate Eric Niblock tested the breezes on Fairy Lake last Wednesday. Frances Niblock photo