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w w w . o a kv ill eb ea ve r.c o m O A KV IL LE B EA V ER Th ur sd ay , Se pt em be r 3 0, 2 01 0 6 THE OAKVILLE BEAVER IS PROUD OFFICIAL MEDIA SPONSOR FOR: RECOGNIZED FOR EXCELLENCE BY: 467 Speers Rd., Oakville Ont. L6K 3S4 (905) 845-3824 Fax: 337-5566 Classified Advertising: 905-632-4440 Circulation: 845-9742 The Oakville Beaver The Oakville Beaver is a member of the Ontario Press Council.The council is located at 80 Gould St.,Suite 206,Toronto,Ont.,M5B 2M7.Pho e (416) 340-1981.Advertising is accepted on he condition that,in the event of a typographical error,that portion of advertising space occupied by the erroneous item,together with a reasonable allowan e for signa ure,will n t be charged for,but the balance of the advertisement will be paid for at the applicable rate.The publisher reserves the right to categorize advertisements or decline.Editorial and adv rtising content of the Oakville Beaver is protected by copyright. Unauthorized use is prohibited. United Way of Oakville Ontario Community Newspapers Association Canadian Community Newspapers Association Suburban Newspapers of America NEIL OLIVER Vice-President and Group Publisher, Metroland West DAVID HARVEY Regional General Manager JILL DAVIS Editor in Chief ROD JERRED Managing Editor DANIEL BAIRD Advertising Director RIZIERO VERTOLLI Photography Director SANDY PARE Business Manager MARK DILLS Director of Production MANUEL GARCIA Production Manager CHARLENE HALL Director of Distribution SARAH MCSWEENEY Circ. Manager WEBSITE oakvillebeaver.com MIKE IVANIN / SPECIAL TO THE BEAVER A FAIR FOR SENIORS: From left, Bev Cathro,Terry Ponedel, Ruth Sheridan, France Fournier of Whole Foods Market Oakville, Ted Lambert and Nancy Beddoe, Town of Oakville manager of seniors services, at Sir John Colborne Seniors Centre promote the Aging at Home Information Fair held last Saturday at the centre. The fair offered a wide array of displays and exhibitors to help seniors shop for information about how to remain in their own homes to live well and as independently as possible. ATHENAAward Letter to the editor I want to say thank you to some nameless yet very helpful hockey parents who showed true community spirit by helping my family over the weekend. Hockey parents get a bad rap sometimes... so I wanted to share a Good Samaritan story and thank some local hockey parents from the River Oaks rec centre. My husband took our older son (age six years) to his first ever Timbit hockey tryout and had our younger son (three years) along with him. Our three-year-old can be a bit adventurous, and as result of scaling the benches, had an unfortunate fall that required stitches. I was out of town and an hours drive away, so my husband was in a bit of a panic. He needed to get our younger son to the hospital and our six-year-old was still on the ice. Although my husband didn't personally know anyone at the rink that morning, sev- eral parents stepped up on their own initiative to help get our older son off the ice, change out of his equipment and wait with him at the rec centre until a family mem- ber arrived to pick him up. My husband didn't have time in his rush to get the parents' names to personally thank them so we wanted to thank them in this open letter and let others know what a great feeling it was to live in a community where strangers, unasked, will come to the aid of another family. Thanks should also go to the great staff at Oakville-Trafalgar Memorial Hospital (OTMH) and Dr. Partridge who put our little guy's ear back together (literally) and sent him on his way. Thank you very much. ALLY COOPER, CRAIG COOPER, BLAKE COOPER (THE HOCKEY PLAYER), BENJAMIN COOPER (WITH THE REPAIRED EAR), OAKVILLE Tha k y u, hockey parents Keep right/pass on left The Oakville Beaver is a division of Last week summer officially succumbed to an aspiringautumn. Truth be told, up here in the hinterlands 10kilometres north of the middle of nowhere, as the sneaky heron (that always eats the goldfish in our pond) flies we dont need a man-made calendar to tell us what season it is. No, up here we have natural indicators. For instance, we know its spring when our long laneway becomes an impassible, pot- holed mudbath; when the insect world rises from the dead and bites us into submission; and when the local wildlife from birds, animals and amphibians to, well, our neighbors emerges from a winter hibernation (the groggier creatures immediately becoming roadkill). And we know summer has sunk and autumn has officially ascended when we witness a marked increase in the number of apparent suicide attempts amongst area amphibians, and by the size of the mounds of deer doo-doo we must studiously avoid on our excursions up and down the gravel laneway. It was a glorious summer, dont you think? Personally, we had more fun than any summer I can ever recall. Granted, thats one of the beauties of aging your diminishing powers of recall make every experience seem like a first, and oftentimes a best. Why, just yesterday I tasted a bowl of Kelloggs Corn Flakes again for the first time. All kidding aside, our summer was so spectacular it made us want to put the season in a hammerlock and never let go. But it got away nonetheless. I knew summer had escaped immedi- ately after Labour Day when our swim- ming pool sat empty. Its this odd phe- nomenon around our house: regardless of how hot it is outside, no one dips a toe into the pool post-Labor Day. The pool offered another indicator that summer was squelched. Come September, all forms of wildlife are on the move I have no idea why, or where theyre going, but theyre definite- ly on the move. And many of them end up belly-up in our swimming pool. Rabbits. Turtles. Worms. Frogs. Toads. And big, bloated bullfrogs (a sight ghastly enough to turn you off swimming, forever). We get a couple of these poor guys over the course of the summer, and about five a day, all autumn long. Another surefire sign of fall is when our laneway starts piling up with deer doo-doo. You see, there are assorted apple trees around our house. In autumn, the apples fall, the deer lazily overindulge, and this jolt of high-fibre produces an obvious, odi- ous outcome. Everywhere. Gross. Finally, up here in the hinterlands, we truly know its fall when the flies start going bonkers. They must know somethings up maybe they can sense their own mortality in the autumn air and it makes them batty. At any given time, we have dozens of flies outside our windows trying to get in, and dozens on the inside, dying to get out. Apparently they dont know that the grass isnt always greener on the other side. On some nights we sit in our family room, unable to hear to the TV for the din of flies doing their little death dance buzzzzzzzzzz upside-down, on the hardwood. And while I try my best to love all of Gods creatures, I have been known to lose my patience with these pests, and shout: Oh, for Gods sake, die already! Andy Juniper can be visited at www.strangledeggs.com, con- tacted at ajjuniper@gmail.com, or followed at www.twitter.com/thesportjesters. Signs of autumn were in the air long before calendar turned Andy Juniper As the organizer of the Mississauga Oakville Walking, Cycling and Activities Meetup Group I walk the wonderful multi-use trails that follow our creeks and ravines throughout the area every week. I promote one rule, which I have suggested to Oakvilles Active Transportation and that is: keep to the right/pass on the left. If all pedestrians (including dogs) and bicyclists follow this one simple rule there is no confusion on the trails and sidewalks. Everyone can use the trails in harmony and safety without fear of collision. I learned this in Philadelphia where they clearly promote this rule on the trails. In my group, we say bike up or bike back, we quickly move to the right. Dog walkers in particular must remember to move their dogs off to the right side of the path rather than moving left toward their dog. Happy and safe trail walking and cycling. DONNA FLEMMING, OAKVILLE