Ten years later, did it even matter?

This is a column I had planned for a little while but was a teeny-weeny bit distracted in November by, well, stuff. Anyway, in the end my connection between the book and the protest may be a tenuous one but it occurred to me while I was reading it and I stuck with it.

Paul J. Henderson, The Times

Published: Friday, December 4, 2009

Ten years ago this week, my curiosity—invigorated as a new J-school graduate—took me to downtown Seattle to be among thousands of protesters that filled the streets and shut down the World Trade Organization Ministerial Conference.

I admit I wasn't entirely clear what it was all about and I didn't go down on Nov. 30, 1999 to join in what would be dubbed the Battle in Seattle, to shake my fist at the power brokers attempting to link our global corporate world in ever-more intimate ways.

I was just curious and yet soon was amid frustrated delegates, more than a few anarchists, and large groups of parading environmentalists and union workers worried what liberalized trade would do to workers' rights and the environment. And, of course, hundreds of riot-gear-equipped police officers that eventually filled the air of downtown Seattle, not to mention a few eyeballs, with the burning sensation and acrid stench of tear gas and pepper spray.

That day illustrated the power of organized protests and showed the world that Americans, and more than a few Canadians, weren't necessarily all in favour of the supposed oligarchy the WTO represented.

Of course complete opposition to global trade is silly. Opposition to the World Trade Organization whose power and influence waned considerably after the near riot scenes was a little different.

But in his recent book, Canadian economist Jeff Rubin points out that because of the simple fact that cheap oil makes globalization tick, it may soon all be over anyway. In Why Your World is About to Get A Lot Smaller: Oil and the End of Globalization, Rubin explains how cheap oil holds the global economy together and there will be no more cheap oil.

"Expensive oil may mean the end of life as we know it, but maybe that life wasn't particularly great to start with," Rubin writes. "Smog-congested cities, global warming, oil slicks and other forms of environmental degradation are all part of the legacy of cheap oil."

When exactly the serious oil shocks Rubin warns of will occur is unclear, but what is clear is that the trade advantages of cheap labour in developing nations will disappear when transportation costs start to skyrocket.

And while I like my lemons and coffee, maybe, overall, that's not a bad thing. For those who are already seeking to purchase more food and other products more locally for environmental reasons (an insidious trend, according to the Fraser Institute) that urge maybe just become the new reality because of oil prices.

"Get ready for a smaller world. Soon, your food is going to come from a field much closer to home, and the things you buy will probably come from a factory down the road rather than one on the other side of the world. You will almost certainly drive less and walk more, and that means you will be shopping and working closer to home. Your neighbours and your neighbourhood are about to get a lot more important in the smaller world of the none-too-distant future."

Sounds good to me.

There was a lot of misinformation and misdirected anger 10 years ago on the streets of Seattle, and I don't want to claim that the protesters who galvanized themselves so powerfully that day did so for no good reason. Maybe the WTO would have come to be a powerful and insidious global rulemaker forcing nation by nation into abandoning their individual environmental policies if they were deemed to be barriers to free trade.

But it looks like globalization as we know it today may become a footnote of history anyway.

Baby Vogue

What it took Madonna years to develop as a dance pose—or whatever it is—my baby Nadège does in her sleep.

Madonna's a hack.

pjh

• pauljhenderson1971.blogspot.com •

. . . and the photos continue

This is a little birth announcement I made up to e-mail to people about the arrival of Nadège Autumn. I made a different one that I'm giving out and snail-mailing to people but I figured this would be good to send out via e-mail. But the funny thing I realized is that there are very few people who I exchange e-mails with who are not on Facebook. And since I've posted so many photos on Facebook there are few people to e-mail this too except those last few stubborn Facebook holdouts.

But here it is on the blog and maybe I'll put it up on Facebook too. I don't even have that many photos of Nadège yet but I'm going a little crazy, I admit. I even just printed up a bunch of wallet-sized ones and I want to attach them together so I can open up my wallet and they will come falling out in a dangling spread of cliché daddy pride.

Wallet-sized are in the mail to grandpas and grandmas too.

pjh

• pauljhenderson1971.blogspot.com •

Nadège arrives

Little Nadège Autumn Menard Henderson finally arrived and is at home with mom and dad, the three of us getting to know one another.

Mommy is still in full-scale recovery. Daddy is still exhausted trying to catch up on sleep and back at work. Little Naddy is beautiful and is exploring with sights and sounds and feeling her way around the world.

I'm sure I'll have much more to say about this incredible experience in the days, weeks and months to come. Not to mention photographs. Having a daddy who has photography as a hobby means little Nadège will be one heavily-photographed baby.

Good thing she is so incredibly cute.

pjh

• pauljhenderson1971.blogspot.com •

Mr. November

"I used to be carried in the arms of cheerleaders" - Matt Berninger


Well, October 31 is coming to a close (7:07 p.m. in B.C.) and the baby just isn't coming. Due date was Oct. 25 so as of tomorrow he/she is a week late.

I know that 10 days late is common for a first baby, but we are more than ready. I guess we will have a November baby now.

Right now I'm giving out candy to kiddlywinks in costumes with my horns on.

Only one little girl looked scared just now and started backing away saying, "No more treats! No more treats!"

Her mother said the little girl had issues with all costumes so I wasn't to take it personally.

Damn, I thought it was my scary horns.



At least we got to make Joanne's belly a Jack O'Lantern with an orange T-shirt and some felt.

Happy Halloween everyone.

Carving without a kid

Joanne is three days late now, a little more if you go by her calculations, and we await our new housemate patiently.

Tonight she put a few acupuncture needles into herself in particular places, meditated with her iPod while I watched the Leafs lose (bad), the Yankees lose (good) and I decided to carve a Halloween pumpkin despite having no kids around to participate and/or appreciate.

It wasn't always going to be a mouse, but when I cut off the bottom to make it sit flat, the two ears were just obvious and Jack the Mouse Jack-O'-Lantern was born.

Just wait until next year when I have a little one to carve with . . . or be oblivious as a one-year-old?

Happy Halloween everyone.

pjh

• pauljhenderson1971.blogspot.com •

Not making friends

My latest column from last Friday's paper. Not going to endear me to some people, but I felt strongly about this and given the letters the paper received before and since, I think many others agree.

Bailout for least in need

Paul J. Henderson, The Times

Published: Friday, October 23, 2009

What a horror to have one's home destroyed—or at least rendered valueless—all because of an unlucky geotechnical gamble.

What happened to the homeowners in the Panorama subdivision in the Eastern Hillsides has been developing for years and has ended with an agreement with the City of Chilliwack to purchase the 42 homes for 80 per cent of what they are worth.

Early on a few owners saw mysterious damage that, while not catastrophic, triggered deeper geotechnical study that found the whole are to be on a 4,000-year-old landslide. The homes may not be unlivable, but they are unsellable. What a nightmare.

But just as a thought experiment—as many letter writers to the Times have already done—I'm going to play devil's advocate here. I do not mean in any way to be cold here, but let's be honest: for the most part, we are talking mansions. Maybe these houses aren't all mansions, but they are all very nice homes with views most of us only dream about. On these four streets sit some of the most exclusive homes in Chilliwack.

The crux of the matter, and something that some Times readers have suggested, is that when upper-middle class homeowners lose a portion of the value of their home, it's a little hard to find too much sympathy from down here on the valley floor.

Personally, my sympathy is reserved for those initial owners in the area who actually did see damage and who began this whole process. While those owners are under a gag order, we do know they fought the issue in court at their own expense and they likely received a lot less than 80 per cent of the value of their homes.

The rest of the owners will get that 80 per cent and, not inconsequentially, won't have any real estate fees to pay when they sell.

When it comes to our homes, whether we buy a pre-owned home, brand new, or build ourselves, we are making an investment, i.e. taking a risk. Most of us get a mortgage and while what we are purchasing is a place to live, we are at least in part, taking a chance that while we make mortgage payments for 10 or 20 or 30 years on this building, the value will increase.
For the more wealthy, some own one home where they live and then purchase one or two or more homes elsewhere as investments. The risk is clear.

For those who decide to build a dream home in a remote or geotechnically complicated location, the risk-benefit ratio is also there. Living next to a lake, on a river or on a hillside overlooking anything is very desirable. Homes like this cost more to build, but the return is great as the rest of us that can never afford these elite locations are jealous. And jealousy increases property values.

Generally the gamble, which all investment is, pays off. So when the wealthy roll the dice and build homes on a hillside that, it turns out, is slowly sliding to the valley floor just how sympathetic should we be?

Loss is loss, but most of these homes are still totally livable. Most of them will take a 20 per cent hit and move off the hill. And the taxpayers of the City of Chilliwack will foot the bill for developers who built on a landslide that moves mere centimetres a year.

Those who unwittingly bought or built unique and sought-after homes got really unlucky in this situation. But they'll be fine, take a financial hit, and then the rest of us are left to pay for their investment and lifestyle risk.

Panorama really is a no-win situation.

Holding a torch

The Olympic folks were over in Greece this week getting the torch lit for the 2010 games.

We had a torchy preview in Chilliwack a little while back and it'll be back in town in February I guess.

I took this shot out in east Chilliwack, in Rosedale, as they tested the lit torch briefly even though organizers told the media the torch would be unlit. No one was out in Rosedale with me when I got this, and all the media horded around when the unlit torch rolled into downtown Chilliwack.

Not to suggest I'm something special, but I got this shot, the Vancouver Sun used it, but after I took this shot and then later went to where VANOC told the media to show up I had to laugh at the pretense of the Canadian Press shooter. It reminded me of a while back when another guy, some Reuters git, was at an RCMP display of illegal ammo and body armour with me in Chilliwack. I tried to chat with him and I was amazed how arrogant he was. Maybe photographers are just socially retarded, but it felt more like arrogance. I laughed further when I saw his photo that the Sun printed, which was no better or basically the same as mine.

At the torch run a couple of weeks ago, a couple of obviously out-of-town guys were looking dumbfounded in the park where they were told to be. Not necessarily a good place to be, but whatever. I asked who they were with and the one guy from Canadian Press was such a pretentious twit I found it funny, but a little intimidating because, well, he was a pro shooter with extremely expensive equipment and, well, I'm a writer who just has to shoot.

But then I saw the shot he got (below) with all his equipment and all his pretense and all his money and I laughed.

That's it?

Saturday shooting

It's always a bit of an adventure on the Saturdays when I have to work taking photos.

Yesterday I hit the Hobby and Train show at Heritage Park, Trevor Linden at the new CIBC, the Cultus Lake 'Round the Lake Give 'R Take 30, rugby and little kids playing football at Townsend and a few leaf shots.

Here is a bit of what I got:

First up a nice Mennonite family peruse the Lego train display. I note that the woman is pregnant and there were at least two other kids pregnant. Those Mennos know how to make babies.



A model train keener assembles his creation. The attention to detail is almost disturbing amongst these guys.



Here baby Eliza just can't take here eyes off of Trevor Linden



Runners complete the last hundred metres or so in the rain at the insane 30-kilometre trail run 'Round the Lake Give 'R Take 30.



The Chilliwack Harmony Chorus practises



OK, so rugby isn't the sexiest of sports. Or is it?



Miniature footballers make some good tackles



A leaf. Yay.



pjh

• pauljhenderson1971.blogspot.com •

Two Names for Everything

Wrote a column for tomorrow's paper that I've had half-written for a long time.

Simply A Musing • By Paul J. Henderson

Two Names for Everything

Welcome to Chilliwack, the land where everything has two names, if not even more.

Newcomers to this city can be forgiven for getting lost and confused by areas, streets, facilities and even bodies of water. I've been here for less than four years and am still baffled at the multiple references given to things here in Chilliwack—or Chilliwhack as the municipality was spelled prior to amalgamation.

Within the city itself many residents live in Rosedale, Greendale, Yarrow and so on. When I first came to town, I had a friend from journalism school who I contacted because I thought she was from here.

"I live in Chilliwack now, aren't you from here?" I asked.

"No, I'm from Sardis," she said.

Of course all cities have this, but I feel like here, particularly with all the First Nations bands, duplicate naming is rife.

At the end of this month, the Evans Road Connector will be officially opened. (Of course this was originally to be called the Evans Flyover, and is often referred to as the Evans Overpass or the Evans Interchange.)

The bridge links Evans Road on the south side of the highway with what was once called Evans Parkway. A few months back the city officially changed the name of Evans Parkway to Evans Road to avoid what is, as manager of transportation Rod Sanderson told me, one of many examples where roads have two names.

Evans Road was to go right through the Squiala Reserve to join up with Ashwell Road, but Squiala had other ideas. The road will be called Eagle Parkway through the band's land, so it'll be Evans to Eagle to Ashwell.

Once it's open, follow Ashwell and turn right on Spadina and you come to a building that is my particular pet peeve, much to the amusement of my colleagues: The Landing Sports Centre, which is still almost always followed by—even on the city's website—with the brackets (Ag-Rec Centre).

Can we not drop the Ag-Rec by now?

But The Landing is located near the Landing Leisure Centre and that whole area is called the Landing, which is just confusing so maybe it should be Ag-Rec?

From the Leisure Centre, follow Hodgins east and it turns into Cheam across Yale.

Ahhh, Yale.

Yale Road east of Five Corners is Yale Road East and when it veers off at the highway and the southbound road becomes Vedder the road that veers becomes Yale Road West. Maybe from the highway to Five Corners it should be referred to as Yale Road Middle.

On the Sardis side, follow Vedder and you'll see Britton one way and Spruce the other, Watson one way and Promontory the other, and so on.

Now you're in Sardis or Vedder Crossing or just Vedder. At the end of Vedder the Chilliwack River becomes the Vedder River, the water of which becomes the Vedder Canal. That first change happens at the Vedder Bridge, a road from which heading east is called Chilliwack Lake Road. That heads to Chilliwack Lake and runs along the Chilliwack River. (Chilliwack River Road,
on the other hand, is nowhere near the Chilliwack River . . . well, it is near the Little Chilliwack River which isn¹t much more than a ditch.)

Then there is the Panorama subdivision in the Eastern Hillsides. The area, near Marble Hill Road, I thought was referred to simply as Marble Hill, but even if it was, definitely not anymore.

Another new(ish) area is Garrison Crossing, which was once CFB Chilliwack and is situated in Vedder Crossing, which is in Sardis, which is the south side of Chilliwack. That whole area is still claimed by some of the Soowahlie First Nations as their traditional land so they probably call it something else.

At least we can all agree that we live here in North America.

What's that you say?

Turtle Island?

pjh

• pauljhenderson1971.blogspot.com •

Hey Tiger, how'd you do? I won some pomegranate wine and a crock pot

Played in the annual Bubble and Squeak golf tournament at Meadowlands Golf & Country Club yesterday. It was lots of fun. A Texas Scramble and I played with a work colleague Ken, an ex-work colleague Darren and an ex-ball team member Mark. We didn't do as well as we thought we should have as we missed way too many birdie attempts.

One highlight for me was the 13th hole, 137-yard par 3, was the men's guest KP—closest to the pin competition for those who don't know much about golf. (There was also one on different holes for female guest, female member and male member.)

And lo and behold, I won the KP! Some guy had popped one on the green about eight feet from the pin and I hit a sweet seven-iron that landed about one inch closer than his. What was my prize for hitting the sweetest non-member male shot on the 13 hole in Bubble and Squeak? A bottle of someone's homemade pomegranate wine and two wine glasses.

OK, it's not the President's Cup, but it's my glory nonetheless. I also got a crock pot off the prize table for how our team placed. I wanted one of the golf bags chosen before me, but the bald fellow who had one of them said he'd only give it to me if I shaved my head like his. And his friend who got an angle grinder suggested he use that to cut my hair.

I stuck with my crock pot.

pjh

• pauljhenderson1971.blogspot.com •

I'm the story

Our newspaper competition here in good ol' Chilliwack used a photo on their website of my
feet: Boo tinyurl.com/ybd8cmd

OK, my feet weren't the focus of the story, but check out those Stan Smiths, those
crossed legs, that note-taking. Man, I'm doing my job and my lower body is looking pretty journalisticnish ain't it?

(My story's better though: Yay) tinyurl.com/y8b32m

pjh

• Simply A Musing pauljhenderson1971.blogspot.com •

I didn't shoot from the book depository

It was a year ago that Canadian rock music workhouse Tom Wilson was in Chilliwack to film a live DVD at Tractorgrease Studios for his newest project, Lee Harvey Osmond. Jeff Bonner of Tractorgrease invited me to come by, watch the show, and take a few pics. I did just that, wrote a little piece in the paper with some of them, but I was using my own gear so I could also contribute some photos for the DVD cover itself.

And finally—no fault of anyone—the DVD is out and Bonner dropped one off at the office for me. I haven't even watched it yet but nice to see I got photo credits and three pics on the back of the DVD cover.

For those who don't know or remember him, Wilson was biggest in the 1990s as the lead singer of Junkhouse and later was part of Blackie and the Rodeo Kings.

I was never really a fan, but as can happen with a live experience, watch a guy of this talent perform in an intimate setting with a handful of people watching and it's hard not to be amazed and impressed. What a talent and what a live performance.

Granted it was a year ago so I barely remember, but I guess I gotta watch that DVD to remind myself.

Check out www.tomwilson.net to hear som of his stuff.

pjh

• pauljhenderson1971.blogspot.com •

One really fresh baby

Wow.

I just literally had tears in my eyes as I went over to bring brownies I had baked for the neighbours and lo and behold I met 7-pound, 11-ounce, Charles Elliot Zonta who was born two-and-a-half hours ago.

Wow. A perfect little bundle and Mike had a smile no one could erase. Both grandmas and two midwives were in the house and they were thankful for the brownies.

But, wow, I just can't believe that perfect little boy came out of little Beth. I know it may sound corny and naive and whatever else, but I'm just so amazed by babies right now. And I really feel surround by them. Maybe it's kind of like when you get a new car, and the next day you look around and it seems like everyone's got a Toyota Matrix. But I see through Facebook that a high school friend, Mike Hubbert and his wife had a baby yesterday (well, his wife had it), and another high school friend Sue Simpson is 33 weeks pregnant. Our neighbour behind us has a newborn and three other women we know quite well in our complex have three young boys.

Now Beth and Mike have a baby and we are next. Joanne and I can't wait but I'm doing all I can to get Joanne to remember that just because she is term in five days, our due date is Oct. 25 and it is her first so the baby likely won't come early.

We just have to wait until he or she is ready. Can't wait to meet him or her.

Wow.

When herons attack

OK, "attack" is a touch inaccurate, but when they scare pregnant women it's pretty funny.

We were on Salt Spring ready to come home on Sunday and we arrived at the ferry a little early. (OK, it was because I thought the boat was at 3, but it was at 3:30 p.m.) So we went for a little wander down the road and Joanne went out on a little point for a sun-dappled pregnant-lady photo when right above her head a Great Blue Heron (we think) took off out of a cedar tree and made some loud noises of discontent at being disturbed by this human mainlander.

Damn mainlanders.

Baby time

I assembled a crib.

Our neighbour Beth's water broke today.

Joanne's baby has dropped.

Some acupuncture needles were placed.

A couple of dads-to-be share a Tuborg and freaked out a little.

Contractions happened. Some real. Some Braxton Hicks.

Tomorrow there may be another person in the world. Right here in our townhouse complex. But not in our home.

Soon enough.

Flame on

One of my torch run photos made it into yesterday's Vancouver Sun, page A3.

Frankly I thought it should have been the page 1 photo but I got beat out by biker gangs. That's beat OUT, not beat up.

I probably got one of the few photos of the lit torch because this was out on the east edge of town and no other media were around. Back in the 'Wack with the Province, CP, Reuters, et al, they never lit it up.

Eddie Vedder hates my cufflinks

I was a big fan of Pearl Jam in the early 1990s and frankly forgot they existed, but apparently they have just put out their ninth album.

I have just been informed, though, that if I am ever to interview Eddie Vedder (not likely) I should make sure I do not wear the cufflinks I wore on my wedding day (not that I would given the aforementioned unlikely circumstance).

I have vintage typewriter key cufflinks of a P and an H, which I love. Well, Vedder loves vintage typewriters too. In a recent Billboard Magazine story he explains the name of the band's new album, Backspacer, is an homage to typewriters. In fact, he likes them so much that he uses typewriters for lyric writing and personal correspondence and he gets very upset when he sees keys used in jewelry.

"For me it was like shark fin soup: 'You're killing typewriters for a bracelet!'" he said.

Come on. Shark fin soup! That's one melodramatic neo-Luddite.

I'll probably go buy Backspacer now.

Pathological Enthusiasm

I've renamed my blog and decided to pump it back up again with daily and weekly thoughts on the job as well as the imminent baby. Simply A Musing is also the name of my some-times column in the Times and I'll post some of them here as well.

Not yet accepted in the DSM-IV, the title of this posting is my diagnosis for many of the Vancouver Olympic 2010 torch run volunteers I witnessed today during a test run here in Chilliwack.

Sure, I like the Olympics. Notwithstanding all the other social issues overlooked and important services cut by the provincial government to pay for a 15-day party, I have always been a big fan of the games. But, wow, some of the keeners running alongside the Coke-sponsored truck were enthusiastic for this dress rehearsal to the point of, well, pathological. Especially because no one was paying any attention to what they were doing. I had one guy at Five Corners put his Canadian flag in his mouth, do a little dance as I aimed my camera at him. But there was no one else around. Just me. Creepy.

I guess the idea is to get themselves hyped up for the real thing on Feb. 7 when hopefully there will actually be people watching.

PJH

The magic hour

This is a barn on Prest Road near Bailey here in Chilliwack that is photographed by dozens of people at the magic hour—that hour either before sunset or after sunrise.

I decided it also served as a metaphor for the city: It stands on a small piece of farmland at the foot of Promontory, a sprawling residential suburbia atop a hill. A man is day by day taking the barn down piece by piece while just up the hill new houses go up one by one. Agriculture, the heart of this city, is being displaced by . . . oh forget it. Saying a barn is a metaphor for the city is pretentious and dumb.

It's a pretty picture.

A vent long in the making

Here is a photo I took last week, and a column I wrote for the paper last week, that have absolutely nothing to do with one another.

The photo is of swans that had just taken off from a Banford Road farm in east Chilliwack, here seen with Mt. Cheam in the background. The column was one I had half-written about a dozen times in my time in Chilliwack and declares this city as home to the world's worst drivers. Driving here truly is putting your life in your hands with morons in pickup trucks and tailgating idiots.

Our roads home to the worst

Paul J. Henderson, The Chilliwack Times

Published: Friday, February 06, 2009

I've been conducting a highly unscientific experiment over my nearly three years in Chilliwack and while I'm loathe to engage in hyperbole, I have come to the conclusion that Chilliwack drivers might just be the world's worst.

For starters, to indict everyone who operates a motor vehicle in Chilliwack in one fell swoop in this way is admittedly not just unfair, it is a false use of logic. The same human use of logic—specifically inductive logic—that allows us to recognize everyday objects and expect the sun to rise each morning also leads human beings towards making gross generalizations and such things as racism.

Point being: I know all Chilliwack drivers aren't bad, but there does seem to be a proportionately larger number of crappy commuters in this community than others.

My experiment began, unknowingly, when I began driving a little over 20 years ago in Oakville, Ont. From there most of my driving was in the Greater Toronto Area and east to Montreal and west to London where I went to university.

But over the years since then I have visited London (England), Amsterdam and Zurich. I've been a passenger in a BMW travelling more than 200 km/h on the German autobahn. I've been in a car on the Champs-Élysées merging through about 16 lanes on a traffic circle around the Arc de Triomphe.

I've ridden in taxis on the winding ridges and small alleys of the Greek islands of Santorini and Crete. I've ridden questionable buses in the hills of Guatemala and wandered the streets as vehicles zipped by in Nicaragua and Honduras.

I've also worked as a bike courier riding eight hours a day in the streets of downtown Vancouver. And I've lived, worked, ridden my bike and driven a car all over Toronto.

But in all that experience in vehicles on roadways never have I seen such consistently moronic driving manoeuvres than I have in Chilliwack.

I can't understand why there aren't more accidents unless the reason is luck. Or maybe the drivers in Chilliwack are not only not bad, but that maybe there is some secret NASCAR training facility here and so while so many drivers are irritatingly aggressive and ignore the rules of the road, maybe they are skilled at avoiding accidents.

I suppose the one positive thing about the bad drivers in Chilliwack, from my observations, is that it truly is an egalitarian phenomenon. There are those who are sexist to the point of cliché and will see a woman do something dumb in a car and declare all women can't drive. Someone else will decry the skills of the elderly who putter around the roads and yet others will slam young people who drive like maniacs.

But every time I see a moronic driving move I look closely to see who is guilty and I have seen people of all ages, genders and colours. There are young women texting, smoking and applying make-up all while tailgating me all over town; over-stimulated, testosterone-filled young men in ridiculous pick-up trucks swerving in and out of lanes with the bravado of youth; stressed out mothers in oversized SUVs being clueless to the rules of the road; and angry, middle-aged men careening past fire trucks to get the kids to school on time.

When it comes to stupid behaviour, those who mess around with guns are, in my humble opinion, right up there as Darwin Award winners, but the reality is that guns, relatively speaking, kill very few people, where as the ubiquity of cars and trucks in all of our everyday lives, coupled with the horrendous driving of so many Chilliwackians, means we are all literally roaming the streets surrounded by ticking time bombs.

I always remember as a young man telling my mother I would drive safely, and thinking she was patronizing me by saying she wasn't worried about me, it was the other drivers.

But now I know what she was talking about.

Water

Chilliwack is swimming. Well, at least Greendale is, basically the west side of the city. The hills are sliding into the valley. There is water everywhere and I'm sure someone in this town is literally thinking about, if not building an ark, the apocalypse.

We had a record snowpack on Monday and then back-to-back record days of rain and, presto, water, water everywhere. Not surprising really given we are on a flood plain surrounded by rivers, lakes, streams, sloughs, and ditches. All of which are at their peak and some of which are overflowing into basements and living rooms.

Mike is away so I'm basically alone with all the news and my usual Friday arts section so I was feeling a little swamped today . . . pardon the pun. And of course then the Sun and the Province want Chilliwack photos so I'm filing for them as well. In fact the Sun took my story today and, I just noticed, along with some changes have posted it on their site.

The Sun also used one of my photos six columns wide today along with a small one underneath, which is kind of cool (although they used some that weren't as good on-line). Even the National Post used one of the photos at least on-line to go with a flood story. Ironic that after all the flood stories I did in the massive scare last year nothing ever happened. And then snow and rain caused a real flood in three days and the big guys come calling for help.

Oh well, better too much news than not enough and better the big guys come calling than forget we exist.

Think I'll go chase some water tomorrow.

Giddyup 2009

OK, here we go. A new year and that means some changes. Went for a brief run today, the first in a series to get back and shape and train for the Sun Run.

But writing too. I want to re-ignite this blog if for no other reason than for the discipline of articulating my thoughts every day. Maybe not every day, but as often as possible, at least once a week.

So 2008 is in the books and 2009 begins. Last year saw a lot of drama in Chilliwack and I foresee a lot more for 2009. I need to go through my stuff from the last year this week to submit for the Ma Murray community newspaper awards. I think I have some potential stuff, but then again I thought that last year and got zilch.

For one thing, I wrote a column in early December that I think was a good one. Likely my best of the year. I think I'll paste it here below.

Let the writing begin . . . or continue at least.

---

Pickton was no 'serial killer'

Paul J. Henderson, The Chilliwack Times
Friday, December 12, 2008

Women had been disappearing for years from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside before the Vancouver Police Department really started to look for a killer.

It didn't take a detective to figure it out, but the police and the elite of the city had another threat to combat.
Sure, woman after woman was listed as missing by family and friends, but because of their addresses, their occupations and their addictions, the wealthy didn't care.

Missing women? What missing women?

Yet when a string of garages were robbed the police sprung into action; a $100,000 reward was offered for information leading to the arrest of the criminal who had been stealing mountain bikes and lawn mowers from the wealthiest residents in Shaughnessy.

It was the late 1990s, long before the jury in the Robert Willie Pickton would deliberate on his guilt or innocence in the murder of six of those missing women who, in the words of then-mayor Phillip Owen, would probably turn up in Calgary or Seattle or Portland.

I was in journalism school over the winter of 1998-1999, learning the ins and outs of covering the news, talking to politicians and dealing with media spokespeople. We had a field trip one day down to Vancouver Police headquarters to the media room where our class met with the then-ubiquitous Const. Anne Drennan.

Drennan was a familiar face in Vancouver in those days as she was on the news almost daily telling TV viewers about the crime du jour. I remember distinctly on the walls of the media room photograph after photograph of women families and friends had reported missing. Most of them looked rough after years of drug use, prostitution and hard living on the streets of the Downtown Eastside. Yet they were people, and they were missing.

There also was a poster advertising a $100,000 reward for the Shaughnessy garage robbers. One of those in my class, and I can't remember who, asked Const. Drennan why there would be a reward for the garage thieves and not for whoever was responsible for the missing women.

She gave a less than satisfactory response and more hardened reporters would have pounced I am sure, but still, those of us rookies in that room were confused by the juxtaposition. I personally was angered at the opulence of a reward provided by taxpayers to stop someone robbing rich people, while dozens of women were gone with little police effort being invested to find them.

It is almost a cliché to say it now, but it is so true that if even two or three daughters of Shaughnessy had gone missing an integrated task force would have been created and the search for the killer would have been relenteless.

But not for the "junkie scum" as at least one of those missing women knew they were viewed as by the likes of Owen and Drennan.

It didn't take a genius to see this might be the work of a serial killer, and while applying hindsight is arguably unfair to the police in this case, it did seem obvious. By the end of 1999 there were 60 women missing, almost all since the mid-1990s. No similar situations were happening in Calgary, Toronto or Montreal, yet Mayor Phillip Owen insisted on assuming these women just moved or were on vacation.

Keep focused on the missing lawn mowers.

But what I will never forget about that visit to Vancouver Police headquarters was when one of our group pursued the question, not with the force and authority of a Kim Bolan or a Terry Milewski, but as a humble J-school student, just wondering, why in the world do the police not see what is happening and put out a reward at least equal to the garage robbers? Well, the steely-faced Const. Anne Drennan angrily barked back at us, "This is not a serial killer!"

I wonder if they ever did catch that garage robber. I hope Shaughnessy is safe again.