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8 - Orono Weekly Times, Wednesday, January 15,2003 } Basic Black by Arthur Black Can't see the forest for the trees. Old-growth adj. (of a tree, forest, forest, etc.) mature, never felled. Canadian Oxford Dictionary Moron n. (informal) a very stupid or foolish person. Ibid Can I propose a moratorium moratorium on the use of the two words cited above? ' Old-growth' because it has been so over-used we can no longer be sure exactly what it means, and 'moron' because it is too precious to be squandered squandered by mere functionaries in the Prime Minister's office. For readers who have spent the last couple of months living living under a bushel basket, I should explain that Françoise Ducros, a flak for Prime Minister Jean Chretien, recently created a modest international diplomatic flutter flutter of dismay by referring to U.S. President George Bush as 'a moron'. And for readers who don't normally take the New York Times with their morning coffee, coffee, I should explain that Gordon Campbell, the current premier of British Columbia, recently enlightened the NYT readership by informing them, in à letter to the editor, and I quote: "There is more old- growth forest in British Columbia now than 100 years ago, amounting to 62 million acres. That total is projected to increase in the century ahead" (Where's Françoise Ducros when you really need her?) Mister Campbell's assertion assertion came as quite a surprise to many of us who had assumed that old-growth forest was a pretty finite resource, on account of they weren't making making any more of it. How do you increase a commodity that, by definition, was created created centuries ago? Annex Oregon? Ask Buck Rogers if you can borrow his Time Machine? Leaving aside the dubious fact-checking standards of the folks at the New York Times, a lot of Canadians began to wonder what they were smoking smoking down at the Premier's office. From here, it smells an awful lot like prime B.C. Bud. But there's something about a forest that seems to bring out the Homer Simpson in politicians. It was another myopic BC premier, the unforgettable Bill Vander Zalm, who once suggested brightly "Let's cut down the trees and create jobs". That's right up there with, Dan Quayle's mystifying observation: "Voters are like trees, if you're tiying to build a forest. If you have more trees than you have forests, then at that point the pollsters will probably say 'you win'". And Dan Quayle was hand-picked to be a heartbeat away from the U.S. Presidency by guess who? Dubya's daddy - George Herbert Walker Bush. Then of course there's Ronald Reagan. The 40th president of the United States was never likely to be mistaken mistaken for a Rhodes scholar at the best of times, but he saved some of his most magnificent malapropisms for observations observations involving trees. Such as: "If you've seen one redwood tree, you've seen 'em all." And: "Eighty percent of pollution comes not from chimneys and automobiles, but from plants and trees." Say what you will about Chretien, he never said anything anything that stupid about trees- in either official language. Or if he did, nobody understood understood him. Which brings us to the man whom Chretien faint-hearted- , ly defended as "not a moron" - the current resident of the Oval Office. Here are some of Dubya's pronouncements on the environment. environment. "Natural gas is hemispheric. hemispheric. I like to call it hemispheric in nature because it is a product product that we can find in our neighborhoods. "-Austin, Texas, Dec. 20, 2000 "I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully. peacefully. "-Saginaw, Mich., Sept. 29, 2000 "It isn't pollution that's harming our environment, it's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it." - Portland, Ore., Oct 31,2000. Françoise Ducros' epithet for President Bush has been called a lot of things •• rude, impolitic, disgraceful, outrageous. outrageous. But have you noticed how nobody's arguing that she's wrong? Learn how to talk to others about their smoking. j&smokers'HELPUNE ^ CANADIAN CANCÏK SOCIETY TOLL-FREE 1-877-5 13-5333 Mlini Sikma's Orchard GREAT SELECTION OF FANCY & CEE GRADE APPLES Pure Apple Cider made on our farm | located on Hwy. #2, 3 km east of Newcastle • 905-786-2153 Open Daily 8am - 6pm Closed Sundays « MORRIS FUNERAL CHAPEL LTD. SERVING DURHAM REGION SINCE 1841 ALL FUNERAL SERVICES PREARRANGED AND/OR PREPAID BURIAL CREMATION - TRANSFERS "WHERE PROFESSION AI. ETIQUETTE IS IMPORTANT FUNERAL DIRECTORS PAUL R. MORRIS DOUG R. RUTHERFORD. GARY M. CONWAY DEBRA I). KELLEHER 623-5480 4 DIVISION ST.. BOWMANVILLE ■ AT QUEEN ST. m The Metric Madness By Myno Van Dyke It was way back in 1970 that the Metric System was forced upon us. It took a number of years before various parts of it were enacted though. In 1974, it started with toothpaste and in April of 1975, Fahrenheit temperatures were replaced by Celsius. In September, 1975 rain started to fall in millimetres and snow in centimetres. Then in April 1976, wind speed, visibility, and atmospheric atmospheric pressure were changed to some type of metric units. During the Labor Day weekend in 1977, every speed limit sign in the country was changed from mph to km/h. From the same time every new car sold had to have a speedometer that showed speed in km/h and distance in km. The distances on road signs were changed to kilometres during the next few months. Gasoline pumps changed from imperial gallons to litres in 1979. The late Les Reid, prob- . ably Orono's most staunch Conservative, often said he no longer knew how fast he was going. "All because of Trudeau", Les would publicly state. Now you would think after all these years, we would finally be converted over. However, the facts are that we still speak and think 'Imperial.' Even though many of our younger population have only learned the metric system, they still refer to their height as 5T0 or weight in pounds. When a baby is bom, they announce the imperial weight-- 6 pounds, 8 ounces. When you go to the lumber yard, it is still two by fours and four by eight sheets of plywood. The strange thing with plywood is, the thickness is always in millimetres. Drill bits are still imperial sizes and we have wrenches and sockets in both. Good thing too, since I need them to fix our old Studebaker. Folks still look for a vehicle that gets "40 miles to the gallon" and any car dealer will tell you no one seems to understand litres per 100 km. They had to change the air pumps back to pounds from kilopascals. It seems a lot of folks thought the "30" meant pounds and put a whole new meaning meaning to 'blowing up your tires'. We still look for a "gallon" of paint at the hardware store--even though the can says 3.86 litres. And, in the Canadian Football League (CFL), you still have to move the ball ,10 yards--and center-field remains the 50-yard line. If you watch Hockey Night in Canada, you will never hear Bob Cole say, " Mats Sundin just fired a blistering fifteen metre slapshot from the blue line!" One of the books that really annoys me is the Canadian version of the Reader's Digest. They must have a computer program that automatically automatically converts the text over to metric. Norman, Oklahoma farmer Bubba Owens, saw the tornado approaching and said, "First that thing was 3.2 kilometres away and thought I was safe and then--there it was, just 30 metres east of the house. That tornado must have been doing about 161 km per hour and then it dumped about 227 litres of water on my head." Underwear and clothing still comes in imperial sizes too and that goes for men and women. The hourglass figure is still 36-24-36. We still use cups, teaspoons and tablespoons for measuring when we cook or bake and butter is still referred to by the pound. A miss is as good as 1.6 kilometers. You could put your best 0.3 of a metre forward. Give a man 2.5 centimeters, and he'll take 1.6 kilometers. The Indy 500 would be the Indianapolis 804.67. Twenty- eight grams of prevention is worth 453 grams of cure. Jules Verne would never have written 96,561 Kilometres Under the Sea. Why, even Tennessee Ernie Ford's song would be 14,515 kilograms and what do you get? Another day older and deeper in dept. Foreign car manufacturers and gas companies love metric. The United States still hates it and that umbilical cord is still firmly connected connected to our country, which is probably a good reason why we still | think Imperial. I think almost eveiyone over 45 hates it. The attempt to introduce it in the U.S. is an acknowledged flop. Now, they are try- ; ing desperately to get folks in England to change over and they sure aren't buying it either. Why is it so difficult? Because old habits die hard. Or, as Les Reid would say, "Those damn Liberals...." 0 L-j ! • Safe Permanent Hair Removal I • Reasonable Rates | * Comfortable/CoKifidewticil Atmosphere | Bowmtfnville Electrolysis ij 3565 Lamb's Rd„ Bowmcmville ij 905-697-3421 1 MENTION THIS AD FOR $5 OFF FIRST TREATMENT 1 1 1 ! s I 1 0 0