The governing Sask Party has come out and admitted they are forecasting a deficit of $427-million this year, up an additional $165-million from their mid-year forecast. Brad Wall and his people cannot be blamed for the nosedive on oil prices, so to hold them accountable for this isn’t where I’m looking. My focus will be on now that we have hit these brutal times, how can Wall and his government manage these difficulties without it getting any worse. Let’s judge them on that before we give up on a government that really righted a sinking ship when it took over from Lorne Calvert’s NDP. I also think people who are looking towards the NDP as a solution should take a peek at what’s happening in Alberta and that should be enough to make up your mind. Manitoba is about to send a strong message to its NDP government later this year too. Now is not the time to install a new Saskatchewan direction in government.
Despite tough economic times, it sounds like a new restaurant is opening in Yorkton at some point in the coming weeks and it also appears as though you will have a new option to do business as far as your insurance needs are concerned. Stay tuned.
I want to, publicly, thank a gentleman who stopped into the store I work at on Friday afternoon to inform me of a hit and run accident that occurred in the parking lot on Second Ave N. Apparently, I was struck in the back passenger corner by an individual who figured she could just drive away unnoticed. On one hand, I felt bad because a vehicle in a parking lot could belong to anybody, but then I looked at the logo on my back window and the big huge logos on the side of the building and then thought to myself, ‘but this witness knew how to find me’, and all sympathies went away.
If you have parked in that lot on Second Avenue N, you know it can be a tight squeeze to navigate your way through it, especially in the winter. I feel cameras should be installed. It’s not the first time I’ve been hit, but other times people have come in to let me know. I wonder how many times I’ve been hit and not been told. Obviously, no known damage has ever been sustained (until now); but I’m thinking other regular users in that lot have also been nicked with the offending vehicle driving away without being caught. Those massive metal barriers at the end of each row can go by the way of the dinosaur too. I think that would also help some folks trying to steer their way through the aisles. The other issue, of course, is that we have uneducated drivers who don’t understand it’s also a one-way system to go through there and backing into your stall only complicates matters further. If you are reading this and are guilty, please stop.
A Quebec man claims to have never hired an employee who smokes within the last thirty years. While he’s proud of this distinction, the practice may be illegal. I feel we are not far away from even more rights being removed from employers. It would not shock me to see laws in the future that prevent an employer from seeing the name of the applicants for a particular job. You will have to score the job seekers based on a resume and you will not be allowed to know the names and do your own background checks. Mark my words. Someday.
I don’t have enough space to write what I want about this whole ‘tanking’ issue in professional sports; needless to say I see it as a big time cop out that sports clubs use to trick their fans into thinking they will build a winner. The Toronto Maple Leafs are the current, biggest offenders, of this phoney proclamation. You see, here is who the Leafs could have drafted the year they picked Luke Schenn in round one: Mikkael Boedker, Erik Karlsson, Jordan Eberle, Tyler Myers. The following year they selected Nazem Kadri, passing on an offer from the Islanders to deal Kadri and Schenn for John Tavares. They also opted not to choose Ryan O’Reilly, Marcus Johanson, or Nick Leddy when they took Kadri. Two years later they had a pair of first rounders and went with Stuart Percy and Tyler Biggs, leaving John Gibson, Boone Jenner, Brandon Saad, and Richard Rakell still on the board. So, no, you don’t need to finish last or close to it in order to build a successful team. Look at Chicago: Panarin (not drafted), Teravainen (18th), Saad (43rd), Shaw (139th), Seabrook (14th), Crawford (52nd), Keith (54th), and Toews (3rd) were not first overall selections. The year Toews was 3rd, two other teams screwed up by making Erik Johnson and Jordan Staal the top two picks. The top teams in the NHL at the moment: Chicago, Washington, Rangers, Dallas, St. Louis, Anaheim, Detroit, Nashville, etc. have never bottomed out the way Toronto, Buffalo, Edmonton, and Arizona have.
Nice person mentions this week to Wendy McOuat, Alyson Stout, Beth Castle, Sara McKay, and Wayne Monka.
