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6 - Orono Weekly Times. Wednesday. June 21. 2000 Newtonville's Grist Mill Auction Bam was converted into a greasy spoon diner/gas station/bus stop last week Thursday and Sunday, for ân Always Pantyliners T.V. commençai. The commercial commercial was filmed by a French crew, and will only be seen in France. , Clarington - The time and effort that you have put Into making your garden beautiful beautiful deserves to be recognized. A lot of us garden for the peace of mind that it offers while some of us just plain enjoy the look of a freshly planted garden. Everyone » that works at beautifying their property and neighbourhood neighbourhood should be celebrated celebrated and the Apple Blossom Awards have been designated that responsibility. responsibility. Be proud of your accomplishments accomplishments - not everyone is able to co-ordinate a garden to its advantage. Celebrate your neighbourhood neighbourhood - recognize that a well- laid out street signifies pride of ownership and may increase your market value. Recognize a local business - let the local business owners owners know how much you appreciate them going the extra mile by making their exterior attractive. Becoming a part of the Apple Blossom Awards is simple. Just stop in at the Municipal Administrative Centre (40 Temperance Street)) or the Clarington Tourism Office (181 liberty Street South) and pick up a nomination form or nominate online at www.municipali- ty. clarington. on. ca. Nominate yourself, your neighbour, your street or a local business and start appreciating local gardens. Now the only question you have to ask is WHY NOT? BASIC BLACK ARTHUR BLACK TECHNOPHOBECOLOO ONE- SOME ASSEMBLY REQUIRED One of my favourite stories stories about Stephen Spielberg - (actually, my only story about him. In fact, I'm not even sure if it's Stephen or Steven) - is one that his wife tells. ■ One night in his Hollywood home, the guru of technological space movie wizardry complained about the heat. "Turn the thermostat down" his wife said. "What's a thermostat?" asked Spielberg. His wife pointed out the plastic doohickey on the bedroom wall. Spielberg looked at it like it was an artifact artifact from the asteroid Arcturon. "No kidding" he said. "How does it work?" My kind of man. I, too, am a technophobe. The last mechanical device I had any hope of actually understanding was my one- speed CCM bike, circa 1956. Mountain bikes mystify me. Hell, oven toasters mystify me. I have a TV set with access to 300 channels - so I'm told. I have to get Ruby to turn it on for me. Ruby is my niece. Aged nine.. My computer? You don't want to know about my computer. computer. I have mastered turning turning it on and turning it off and even typing a few pages (screens?) and printing them off. But that's only because I have painstakingly hand-let- * tered step-by-step post-it notes that are pasted across the bottom of my monitor, marching me through the process. And it never goes smoothly. That's why my nine-year- old niece is required to observe a 100-yard Profanity No-Go Zone when Uncle Art is dueling mano a mano with his computer. But it doesn't require the presence of working electrons to leave me in the dust. I never, for instance, program .VCRs. , When desperate maidens flag me down on the highway begging for a boost, I wave and shrug and smile haplessly, pretending I have no battery cables. I have battery cables. They are still in the original cellophane. Because I can't remember if the ##& A %@+** things go positive positive to negative or positive to positive. Not to mention which is black and which is red. I am a technophobe. Which is a sorry thing to be in this mercilessly technocratic age in which we live. Even sorrier when you consider that I don't live within within the same telephone exchange as Ted Stewart. Ted is the answer to a technophobe's dreams. He liv'es, in Fredericksburg, Virginia and each working day, he hops into his truck - the one full of screwdrivers and hammers and gauges and saws and awls and levels and miter boxes and all the other sundry mysteries of the handyman's trade, and...... ....save the bacon of technophobes like me. Ted is a freelance Mister Fixit. He can put 200-300 miles a day on his pickup, roaming the suburbs of Virginia to bail out all-thumbs nerdballs like me who can't put together their back decks or pool tables or hot tubs or exercise gyms. Ted is intimately familiar with no-talent bozos like myself. "These guys just don't want to mess with stuff, or they don't know how" says Ted. "There are a lot of guys who don't know how to turn a wrench." Oh, well said, Ted. I don't want to alarm you, but there are certain guys out there who aren't exactly sure what constitutes constitutes a wrench. Those flat steel things that look like Mr. Magoo's mouth on each end, ■ right? I knew that Anyway, Ted runs a one- man company called Some Assembly Required, which bails out klutzes like me and is just about the best business idea I've heard since Adam'nEve Apple Products Inc. Mind you, he has rules. "If I come in and do the job, it's one price. If you want to help, it's another price. And if you've already attempted to build it. on your own, it's going to cost even more." Sure, Ted - I can live with that. And I could use your help. Real soon, actually. I'm gôing to call you up and make an appointment. Just as soon as I can find somebody to help me turn on this cell phone. ♦♦♦♦♦♦ ♦♦♦♦♦♦ Corner of Taunton Rd E. & Bethesda Rd., Bowmanville, Ontario • 263-2293 Special Good June 22 till July 3 Daily after 12 noon 2 People & Power Cart $45 tax indeed Extra Special Monday & Thursday after 12 noon... 2 People & Power Cart $40 tax induded Breakfast All Day Bacon & Eggs $2.75 plus tax launch Special Hot Hamburg $2.50 plus tax Eat In/Take Out Fish & Chips $3.95 + tax 2 Fish & Chips $5.95 +