George Mathewson
1 – Sarnia’s zombies are tougher than Petrolia’s zombies.
How? Petrolia’s zombies were so wimpy they rescheduled Zombies Invade Boom Town (from Oct. 3 to Oct. 24) because the weather report called for rain.
Really. An entire town of living dead put off by a little water.
Sarnia’s zombies, on the other hand, staggered through the streets in search of warm flesh for Zombiefest without a grunt of complaint.
Although, to be fair, Sarnia’s adolescent zombies did require a signed parental slip to participate.
2 – The recent Ontario budget increased government spending by $3 billion, to $130 billion in 2014-15.
The overall debt is projected to grow to $289 billion by the end of 2014-15, and to $317 billion by the end 2016-17. That’s a lot of numbers so big they’re hard to understand. But this helps.
Just paying the interest on the debt will cost $11 billion this year, according to the Ontario Chamber of Commerce.
And that’s about $3 billion more than government spends on colleges and universities.
3 – The number of local farms is in steady decline, the Sarnia Lambton Workforce Development Board has found.
There were 2,153 farms in 2011, a loss of 274 farms in a decade.
4 – The average unionized worker in Sarnia earns $9.27 an hour more than his or her non-union counterpart, Canadian Labour Congress research shows.
Across Ontario, the average is $6.42 an hour more for union than non-union workers, according to a survey of 76 Canadian metropolitan and other census areas.
5 – The classified website Kijiji carried an ad on Oct. 3 about a property for sale with this intriguing headline:
“Over 10 acres with no wind turbine, just minutes from Sarnia.”
Very quickly, turbines have become so despised that not having one around is a selling point.
6 – And while on the subject of online ads. This was posted by a young Sarnia-Lambton entrepreneur under the heading Tutor Your Child.
“Hi im (name here) a grade eleven girl, from (high school here). Im looking to toutor children 8 years of age and under. I charge 20$ an hour.”
At the risk of sounding curmudgeonly, shouldn’t a would-be tutor at least Google the proper spelling?
7 – Finally, another online ad for “Sarnia’s Newest Swingers Club” was apparently pitched at couples and single females only. It warned there would be “no single males aloud.”
Which ranks as a classic Freudian slip.
