Pat Whalley

Smoking, don’t like it, so glad that restaurants and theatres no longer allow it, hate that you have to walk through a cloud of smoke when you hit the area where the smokers gather outside these places. However, if I were a smoker, I would resent the feeling of being “unwanted” and not allowed to smoke inside but, have to stand outside in all weathers.

My big peeve about Oliver is the ugly apartment/hotel/timeshare building, by the river, that has been on again/off again for fifteen years or so. Why is it allowed to be just left like this. Can council not demand it be finished or torn down. Better yet, could it not be turned over to another builder, at a reduced price, to be finished as affordable housing. Just standing there is no use to anyone and is an eyesore. There must be something that council can do to force the owners to complete or get rid of it.

Putting up with my husband, well he puts up with me, so what can I say?

My home is on Cactus Street, which is one of the only gravel roads in the area. We no longer can pick our way round the potholes as they take up most of the road, so we just go slowly through them and hope we do not break an axle. The street is off road 1 west, which makes us just inside the regional district. The right side of road 1 is in town and gets Thursday garbage pick up, the left side gets pick up on Monday. The snow plough clears the right hand side of the road but picks it’s blade up when coming down the left side. This means everyone uses the right side of the road. There are only three houses on the street but all the cars, and ambulances being serviced at Shadetree mechanics come down the street, also all their delivery trucks. Lordco and Napa cars race up and down the street, delivering parts, sometimes nine or ten times a day. So blacktop would really be nice.

Commercials, very annoying but sometimes more entertaining than the programs they interrupt. Some of the animal ones are so well done and show more talent than some so called stars. Programs have to be paid for and the commercial free channels spend so much time appealing for donations that it is not much different than commercials. However, public programing does offer better quality programs. Maybe I am biased as the programs are mainly English and so am I.

I don’t think anyone is happy with the price of electricity. We rely solely on a modern wood burning fireplace, which provides all our heat, but still have enormous bills. At least we can afford it, what happens to all those people who cannot and have to choose between keeping warm or buying food or medication.

Free trade seems to me to be rather one sided, in favour of the US.

We very rarely go to the states except for visiting relatives a couple of times a year. The great low prices of the past no longer exist so no point in going down there just to shop, however there is a terrific Mexican restaurant in Tonasket.

Oliver is a great place to live. Very slow paced, slow growth, too many empty shops on the high street and a big influx of transients in summer. On the plus side, however, we have a good little movie house, with very reasonable prices, lots of good doctors, a terrific, caring vet, a hospital and an excellent theatre. The people are friendly and the community is very supportive of people who have suffered a disaster or have a sick child. Too bad we lost our town post code, V0H 1T0 really does mean Valley of Heaven in the Okanagan and I intend to be here a long time.