Autumn Is Coming Soon

We are approaching the month of September. I just noticed this the other night when at around 8 PM it just seemed so much darker outside. I'm sure you know how light it was in the evenings until much later for so many months. I was just caught by surprise.

This has been a very hot summer. It just seems that we have not had a lot of rain so far and the temperatures have been so much hotter. Oh sure, I know that in the past we have experienced similar weather but it just seems to have been a lot warmer this year than in other years. Moreover, our green grass was before a lot more brown this year than in the past.

I have to admit that I am wondering a little bit now whether we will again have a summer that seems to last much longer than normal. Last year, it dragged on forever before it started getting winter-like. I have to admit that I expected the winter to last longer as well but it didn't. It disappeared quite quickly as we went right into summer.

I know that I speak too much about the weather but it is so strange to me this year. The weather forecasting just appears to be so inaccurate as well. For example on the day that I started writing this article, the prediction was that we would experience rain in late morning and the early afternoon. So far only a few drops and that was it. Again, I just think this happened so many times this summer as well.

Of course, just as our Condo gardeners have finally come here to cut the grass in the late afternoon, it started to rain. Mother Nature knows well how to fool people!

I better just sit down now and begin to write a story. Just one this time for this edition because I expect that we are going to see a lot more like it between now and election day.

WHO WILL BE WINDSOR'S MAYOR

I must admit that I have not sat down and tried to figure out who might be the next Mayor of Windsor. I might just do that between now and election day but not right now. I think what I will do now is write stories on matters that seem to interest me. Here is one of them.

I have to let you know, dear reader, that I was surprised that Mayor Dilkens took so long to announce that he was going to run again. But then, I thought previously that he might have another political job if things worked out in the timeframe that I thought. There was a good possibility to me that we might have seen the beginning of the new Metropolitan Windsor with him as the administrative Head of it. However, that never happened, at least so far. Accordingly, I assume that he decided that he had to run to be re-elected as Windsor Mayor.

To be direct, I believe that his only real opponent is Matt Marchand. He has been well known publicly in the City of Windsor considering his background with former Mayor Hurst (whose name he did not mention when I looked before on his website dealing with "About Matt") and on the Windsor–Essex Regional Chamber of Commerce. He is quite a tough political candidate as far as I am concerned and there is a good chance that he could be elected as Mayor as well.

Unfortunately for him, his background working for ex-Mayor Hurst could well be a big problem for him. I believe that it would be difficult for him to become the choice of Windsor Star Columnist, Gord Henderson, to become the Mayor:

“If Marchand is “uniquely qualified” from his 12 years as a policy assistant to former mayor Mike Hurst, then he must also shoulder some of the baggage from those dismal years between 1992 and 2003, before Eddie Francis took over and started cleaning up the mess.

Would anyone, apart from certain labour leaders, really want to go back to the Hurst era? Back to runaway debt, ever-rising taxes and good-ol’-boy department heads? Back to parking meter employees who had to be begged to come to work? Back to platinum city daycare operations, back to garbage collectors who could hold the city hostage during work stoppages?” (Gord Henderson, Windsor Star, June23, 2018) 

Can you imagine how difficult it would be for me to decide for whom I should vote to be the Mayor of Windsor if I was going to vote in Windsor!

Then, we see news stories that come out that could help us make a decision and also help Matt. Here was a recent CBC exclusive news story that helps explain what I mean:

“Exclusive

Ontario mayor uses alias email address for city business, experts question transparency

Experts question optics, urge further investigation

CBC News has learned Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens uses an email alias, by the name of Andrew Ray, to conduct internal city business.” (JasonViau, CBC News, August 15, 2018) 

I will let you read the stories that will come out about this issue over the next while, dear reader. However, I would expect that this story itself, regardless of the result, will not help Mayor Dilkens in the election.

Let us see what else happens. Who knows, I may have a lot to write about which may help you make an election decision.

My Latest Blog

Believe it or not, it is very difficult for me to write a Blog these days. No, I am not writing something for some online service that is producing articles for the public to help generate income. Rather, I am producing articles to express my opinion about different matters that I find interesting for my own purpose.

Oh sure, I hope that members of the public follow along with what I am writing but that is not the main reason why I am producing these articles. I am writing more as a means by which I can express my point of view about different topics. I want to continue writing to keep my mind working properly. Sure I am getting older, but I want to function as best as possible especially because my illness of several years ago has taken away some of my "brain power."

When I write my article, I try to do the best that I can to give people reasons why I am writing it the way I am. It does take me sometimes a long time to start researching a topic and then completing it. I spend time investigating an issue to get as much information as I can so that what I write makes sense, at least from my perspective. I do all that obviously before I write my article.

Of course, I spent a lot more time producing articles in the past than I do now. Clearly, I do not have the pressure to operate that I had before. I do not have to produce so many pieces of work as I did previously. However, I also do not have to write basically the same topic so many times as I did before. Now, I try and identify a subject that I write about it less frequently than before because there is no need for me to write it so many times now.

To be realistic, I do write about some subjects a lot more than perhaps I should. However, I do have favourite topics that interest me so I probably write an article about that subject a few extra times more than I normally do now.

I hope that you have a better idea now about how I write the way I do these days. Here are some matters that I found interesting recently about which I wish to let you know.

COUNCILLOR KUSMIERCZYK’S STATEMENT

The Councillor must have thought that he had to write notes about "Monday’s historic vote at City Council approving the rezoning of the Sandwich South lands on County Road 42.” After all, he voted as part of the majority vote on Council.

Take a look at his statement that he wrote here on August 15, 2018: https://www.facebook.com/irek.kusmierczyk/posts/1886360154779713 

I found it fascinating that he had to write such a long Facebook article to justify his position to Windsor citizens, especially voters in his riding.

Clearly, he must have thought that he might be in trouble politically in the election with the way that he voted. Or, perhaps he thought he might be elected anyway but that his future might not be as good as expected.

I will let you, dear reader, decide whether he is all right now politically.

WILL GROCERY PRICES INCREASE

What a fascinating article in the report about what the CEO of Metro Inc. just stated:

“Canadian grocery giant Metro Inc. is already facing pressure from suppliers to accept higher prices in light of a recent tariff war with the United States and consumers should expect slightly higher food bills in the future, its CEO said Wednesday.

“We’re starting to get demands from some suppliers who are, whose products will be, affected by the new tariffs,” Eric La Fleche said...

“If it’s legitimate and if it’s industry-wide, sometimes we won’t have a choice and we will have to accept,” he said, adding the company has already agreed to some minor cost increases.

Metro will continue to ensure its retail prices are competitive, he said, but expects the company, as well as the market as a whole, will have to accept some cost increases.” (Canadian Press, August 15, 2018) 

Another company made a similar comment:

“Empire Co. Ltd., which operates subsidiary Sobeys Inc., predicted a similar outlook in late June.”

Gee, how fascinating this is. I wonder what some of their other competitors will say publicly. Will they all say the same thing?

If they do, dear reader, expect that your prices will increase when you go shopping since you may not see too much price competition. After all, if no one in your grocery business competition wants to lower their price, then why should you!

I mean, really, the only ones who will suffer are the consumers who buy from the grocery stores. And seriously, who really cares about them anyway.

THEY ARE BACK

Here is an interesting story that I saw in the news media:

“Aecon Group Inc. says it has received approval to rejoin the group selected as the preferred proponent to build and operate the Gordie Howe International Bridge.” (Canadian Press, August 15, 2018) 

As you may recall, this Company was supposed to be involved in building the Government bridge between Windsor and Detroit. However, it was supposed to be taken over by a Chinese company. Accordingly, it dropped out of that project.

However, everything has changed now. The Canadian Government prevented the two companies joining up together. Accordingly, since that deal is off, Aecon has been allowed to get back involved.

Now that was pretty easy wasn't it. I just wonder though. What if the Chinese company again decides to buy the Canadian company. Would the Government still reject the merger?

Summer Is Moving Along

I give up. I am not going to compare the weather of this summer with that of past years. When I think that it is a lot hotter this year than in the past, up pops one of my stories that I have written in a previous year in which I talk about the heat that I am experiencing then. It is just as bad, or even worse, as the weather today. Therefore, all that I will do is talk about how I feel now with what I am experiencing outside.

Yes, I have done this before. I really do like to go for a nice walk at this time of the year not just for the exercise but to make myself feel better. Unfortunately, with the heat and especially the humidity that seems to arise at this time, I do not go out as many times as a do in other times of the year when the weather is cooler. It means that I have to do a lot more exercising inside to keep myself in shape.

It is around the middle of August now. While the weather is quite warm at this time of the year, I do know much better at this point in my life that the cool air is coming back a lot more quickly now. It means the end of the shorts weather and starting to wear long sleeved shirts again.

I understand that there are some negatives coming very soon but on the other hand there are some positives too. With cooler weather, not the cold, it means that I can exercise outside a lot more than I can do now and feel better doing so. I'll probably go out at least three times a day, once after every meal, and go for a walk in different parts of the area to enjoy the change in the landscape. It is really something to see the green of the plants change into magnificent colours.

I expect this year to do a bit more shopping than I have done in the past. At a certain period around this time in a calendar, the stores have sales at a reduced price to get rid of as many of the summer clothes that they were unable to sell in the summer. At the same time, they reduce prices in advance of some of their new winter clothes to get people interested in the future in buying them. I need to fill up my closets with good items so I will be out looking for sales at stores around town.

In the meantime, however, I must undertake my usual function: writing another article for you, dear reader.

PAY RAISES

I wonder if the new Windsor members of Council are going to see more money provided to them if they are the winners in the next election.

The amount of money that Councillors are receiving has been relatively low for a very long period of time. One of the problems arising now comes out of recent Revenue Canada action:

“Revenue Canada’s decision to eliminate (starting in 2019) the provision that gave municipal politicians one-third of their income tax-free. Committee members said that having their compensation frozen since 2005 means council members have lost about 21 per cent in spending power due to cost-of-living increases. Meanwhile, losing the tax-free exemption on one-third of their city income could mean a loss of $4,000 to $5,000 annually.” (Brian Cross, Windsor Star, August 8,2018) 

It will be very interesting to see what the members of Council will do now especially because, if they are the winners in the upcoming election, any decision made will have an impact on them financially.

Just in case you were wondering, here is what the Members of Windsor Council receive now in various payments:

“For the past 13 years, councillors have pocketed $28,770 while the mayor has a base salary of $86,895.

Add in board and committee work, and councillors take home closer to $40,000. The mayor hauled in $174,289 this past year.” (CTV Windsor,  August 8, 2018) 

IS YOUR HOUSE UP FOR SALE NOW

Seriously, the real estate market is so bizarre these days. Prices in my area have skyrocketed upwards over the last little while. I just cannot believe that the sales list price for homes here are so high. Yet the final sales prices seem to be even higher because a number of potential purchasers compete on the price that each is prepared to pay more.

Just to give you one example, I saw that an interesting townhouse was for sale at $199,500. I must say that I was not impressed with that amount because the unit lacked a lot of features that I wanted. However, I heard that a considerable number of prospective purchasers were involved and that the actual sales price was almost $50,000 higher than the list price by the time that the deal was completed.

Here is the reality right now for me anyway. The value of my townhouse has skyrocketed upwards. Who knows, it probably has gone so much higher than the purchase price which I paid. This is hardly just for my place when one looks at what prices homes are being offered for sale these days in many parts of the Province. Our area may just have taken a bit longer before it started going up so dramatically.  Everything seems outrageously high. Moreover, a lot of the homes get sold very quickly after being put on the marketplace.

I believe that I can put my house up for sale now at a very high price. And probably get it too! After all, a number of homes in my area have sold recently at extremely large amounts. So should I do it now while the market is so wonderful from a seller's perspective?

The answer is very simple: NO! It is not so wonderful for someone who is a buyer.

Any house that I buy would have to be a very nice one. That means its price would have raised quite dramatically higher these days as well. In other words, I could use my house sales price to help buy the new house but I expect that I would probably have to pay an extra money buy the new one. What that means is that I would have to go into debt now to buy a new townhouse, especially because I would be in competition with others. 

Here is something else to consider. Sure prices have gone up dramatically higher but will they stay that way or will they come crashing down. I have experienced that on a number of different occasions.

As one example, I bought my first condo at a very low price. Within about two months after the purchase, the real estate market in Toronto was so absurd that I probably could have sold it at twice my purchase price! However, the Government passed some legislation that effectively killed the market and almost overnight prices dropped by almost 50% IE the value my house now was just a tiny bit higher than my purchase price.

That could well happen in our area if the Provincial Government wants to see prices coming down. We have been warned on a number of occasions that the Government is not very happy with what is going on in the real estate market. Legislation could be well introduced to bring prices down dramatically.

I am so wrong now in my view of the marketplace. Mind you, I do not think that I am the only one who is confused about what is happening in land transactions. My guess as to prices is so out of touch with reality that I am not sure what the right price for a home is these days.

I am sure that the price that I would put my condo up for sale is probably not the correct one. It probably would be too low! Moreover, who would know if the price might come crashing down as happened in the past. And when it might happen.

This is what scares me quite a bit. I could find myself in a situation when I might ultimately have a huge loss in my real estate deal. I could be paying too much to buy a new residence first and then receiving too little when selling my unit because of the Government action. I have seen that happen before and want no part of it.

Just Some More From Me

I have to admit that I do live a much different life now. Sure, it has to do a lot about how old I am now. Since I am 70+ years old, I don't do the kind of work now that I did only a few years ago. Seriously, I used to start quite early in the morning and work until quite late in the evening doing all the tasks that I had working with the group with which I associated then.

I stopped doing that about three and half years ago. I think I just got tired doing the work I had done for so many years. More importantly however, as I am certain that you know by now, dear reader, within a relatively short time after I stopped working, it was discovered that I had a very strange disease that very few people in this area had. It was one that not too many medical people knew about at all. Because of being seen right away by one of the doctors in the Emergency Department here who knew a little bit about my illness, my life was saved. Fortunately, I have recovered from it reasonably well although not 100% so that I have difficulties that I have to live with forever.

I do look at my life differently now. I really have no idea about how long I will live. I think about this a lot more today than I ever had in the past. No, I don't really get upset about it because I think I have learned that no one can tell me when I ultimately will leave this earth. I just look at things a little bit differently.

What do I mean by that? I think it is reasonably simple. I don't get worried about the past anymore. The past is over. Period. I cannot deal with it anymore because it happened before and I really can't change it. What I have done is learn the lesson about how not to get into a situation like my past anymore, especially if it is a troubling one. Just as importantly, I can learn how to deal with situations in the past so I can handle similar ones now.

As for my future? I don't worry about that at all now either. I have no idea about what will happen after today. All kinds of things can happen that I can try and figure out how to handle them. However, I just don't do that now. Why worry today about what might happen tomorrow when one really does not have the faintest idea of what will happen tomorrow. Just deal with the time of your life that you can handle.

Accordingly, all that it is important to me at this stage of my life is the present. That is all that I think about ie what am I going to do today. I focus my attention on the particular day that I am up and plan what activities I will be involved in. If there is an issue I have to deal with today, then what I have do is deal with it today. I try always to solve any issue right away and have fortunately been able to do so. I do not want to carry it on.

So that is what my life is like these days. It has been quite a change from my past and sometimes is very difficult. However, dear reader, it seems to be how my life is being carried on and I have to learn how to handle it as best I can.

Now for some interesting matters that I would like to share with you.

ELECTRICAL POWER FAILURES

Fortunately, notwithstanding the very hot and humid weather we have been experiencing, the situation with respect to electrical failures in my area of Tecumseh, and hopefully others, has been quite positive recently. We have not had recently any disasters resulting in the loss of electrical power in the home!  Mind you, I have had a couple of outages recently.  So far, they were infrequent but  who  knows...!!

As you will recall, in the past, we have had a number of cases where we have experienced very short timeouts where our electrical power turned off and then on again. Accordingly, I along with others lost our power resulting in a number of our electrical appliances having to be reset. I was afraid that these timeouts would lengthen eventually resulting in very extreme power outages. These outages could cause severe problems in the home.

I along with others contacted Essex Powerlines Corporation and let them know about the problems we were experiencing and asked them to solve the problems ASAP. As you know from what I have written, they have acted very quickly, identified the problem and solved it just as quickly.

That Company and Hydro One have been working together to minimize any problems in the future. I just thought that I would like to let you see what their General Manager wrote to me recently:

“I am happy to communicate that since your last reported momentary outage on July 21, 2018 no further reports of momentary outages have occurred on the M25 feeder.

We will continue our efforts in mitigating any variables which may contribute to customers experiencing further momentary outages on the M25 feeder in the future.”

CANADA'S BEST PLACES TO LIVE 2018

That is a website as you can find here: https://www.moneysense.ca/tag/canadas-best-places-to-live-2018/

Out of 150 locations in Ontario, Windsor is number 92 in the list. My residence, Tecumseh, is number 59. The best location here is LaSalle which is number 36 on the list.

Here are some interesting numbers for Windsor and Tecumseh:

Economic Factors	Tecumseh	Windsor
Economic region unemployment rate	5.9%	5.9%
Average Household Income	$115,124	$71,896
Average Value of Primary Real Estate	$390,909	$263,959
Average rent for a two-bedroom apartment	$855	$860
Average annual property tax bill	$3,851	$2,032

Fixing Up Our Home

It took a bit of time but our Condo unit looks fantastic once again.

Over the last few weeks, all of the units in our Condominium Corporation and the separate one across the street were finally finished up by our relevant Boards retaining an outside company. That company, which also does our landscaping, made all of our Condo units look really wonderful once again and they were put back into great shape.

Hey, we have "new" units now!

It made sense for my wife and I to live in this particular Condominium Corporation unit. When we moved in, it had in its control a very nice chunk of money set aside to pay for projects like this. Our Board of Directors has acted in a very smart fashion to make sure that it has enough funds to pay for projects that have to be undertaken as well as having enough money to make any repairs required. As you can guess, each year, as part of our budget fees, the Condo Corporation Board figures out the kind of money we will need over the next few years and sets up the budget to help bring that money in at the proper time.

Of course, our monthly payments are higher than they could be. But that amount is not all that substantial compared with the amount of money that would have to be paid out in one big lump sum if a big job had to be done and there was not enough money in the Condo's bank account to pay for it.

I am so happy that we have organized our financial issues so well to make our lives easier.

What our driveway looked like as the work began:

Now take a look at what the finished driveway looks like after the work has been completed:

Just wonderful! 

More Issues To Discuss

Writing all of these articles for you, dear reader, is a bit time consuming to be direct about it. I have to go through a number of sources to see if there is anything to write about in the first place. Then I actually have to sit down in front of my computer and complete something which I hope is valuable for you to read.

It is not an easy task because I want to make sure that what I write is as accurate as it can be based on the information that I have found. I want to give you that information so that you can determine what is the best position for you as well. Of course, I am very hopeful that what I say can be supported by you. If you are opposed even after reading what I write, well that is what life is all about.

As I am sure that you appreciate, I write about all kinds of interesting matters on here. Yes, I probably write too much on border issues but I have been trying to write fewer articles because most of what I am saying now is what I have been saying for so many years before. I just look around now for all kinds of other interesting matters that I think that you might be interested in reading about.

You must have figured out as well why I actually put together these articles and distribute them. Sure, I am getting older and want to keep my brains in good shape by making them do some work. However a lot of what I do in life in general now is designed to help me after my serious illness of several years ago. It just makes my mind work and be as successful as possible in what it is trying to achieve.

Of course, dear reader, if there is something that interests you, feel free to send me a note about it and I will try to do an article on that subject if it is something that I think is useful for me to do.

NOW HE TALKS ABOUT THE PROBLEM

He is going to run to be re-elected as Mayor of Windsor.  Now we know.  However here is an issue for him.

I am sure that there might be an election issue that comes up for a number of people in one region of the City. This issue might be something that not only people who live in the area might be concerned about but also those who run a business there, especially those whose clients come from the US through the Tunnel.

Here is the story:

"Dilkens frustrated with delay in completing Windsor-Detroit Tunnel repairs

Mayor Drew Dilkens is concerned that repairs to the Windsor-Detroit Tunnel, supposed to be complete at the end of June, will now only finish sometime in the fall. (Craig Pearson, Windsor Star, July 16, 2018) 

I am not really going to report on the story because that is not what interests me. What is more fascinating is for you to go to that website and read the story yourself, dear reader.

Tell me after you do what the role of Drew Dilken is. The story is very interesting to me because it keeps telling us that Dilkens is the Mayor of Windsor. However, it does not make it clear, as far as I am concerned anyway, that he is on the Board of Directors of the Canadian owner of the Tunnel. It is his organization that has the big delay in completing its Tunnel project. In other words, he would be criticizing himself!

I would just love to see the Mayor slamming the Tunnel Board member, himself in other words, because of the delay. That probably will not happen. After all, the Tunnel delay could cost the Mayor some votes.

PROCESSING DATA

Does anyone have the faintest idea about what our future will be like because of computers and the programs that work with them? I would like you to read this story, dear reader. I am certain that you will find it very educational:

“How Fortnite approaches analytics, cloud to analyze petabytes of game data” (Larry Dignan, ZDNET, July 22, 2018)

Hmmm. So you do not understand it. No problem, because I don't have the faintest clue about what the story means in any great detail either. Oh, just so you know, here is what a petabyte means:

“To store a single PB would take over 745 million floppy disks or 1.5 million CD-ROM discs” (Tim Fisher, Lifewire, May 10, 2018) 

Epic Games….Have you ever heard about that company? I am certain that your answer similar to mine… No!

Again, I really don't understand what they do but here is an explanation of it”

“Epic is an interesting case study because it has more than 125 million of Fortnite users, millions of players concurrent and telemetry data used for analytics, KPI tracking and product improvements. In addition, Epic's Unreal Engine is widely used for everything from game creation to content to enterprise applications.

"We have stretched capacity to the limits," said Dyl. He noted that Fortnite has grown 100x in recent months. Indeed, Epic has seen outages as Fortnite has grown and the company has used post mortems of those incidents to refine its architecture.”

Pretty impressive isn't it? I assume that is because the numbers are so large. I think it would be worthwhile for you to read the story just to give you an idea about what working with computers and software means to us today and how our lives change because of it.

Now I am sure that you will not find this mathematical information that I am going to present all that useful either other than to tell you that what we will experience down the road will be situations that will be so strange to us now. All that I can appreciate is how my life has changed so dramatically since I bought my children some Commodore 64 computers many years ago to learn how to use this new system. No wonder I cannot even imagine now what will happen ahead of us:

                            BYTE TABLE

 

“Note: If you're curious what would come next in this table: 1024 yottabytes is equal to one brontobyte, and 1024 of those is called a geopbyte (the number 1 with 30 digits after it!)” (Lifewire)

I think it is time for me to stop. I just can't imagine what all this may mean even a few years from now.