By-laws

Greetings!

As the weather begins to cooperate with our ideas of being outside in the warmth of the sun, those wishing to be outside in a public place in Barrie with a smoke in their hand are out of luck. Two nights ago, the voting at City Council resulted in the decision to ban smoking in public places. This includes sidewalks and parks. Is Barrie ahead of the line of municipalities to create this ban, or are we a bit uptight about our health here?

I don't really care to bore you with my thoughts on this one. I get both sides. People who smoke need a place to smoke (but by the way, are you still smoking? Come on!!!) since you can't in restaurants or bars, where smokes and drinks kinda go hand in hand. People who don't smoke don't want to get the lung cancer without benefiting from a nic buzz. Blah blah blah. Like I said, I get both sides.

My point today, however, is that there are many annoying and inconsiderate things that are done in public that are just as worthy of by-laws as smoking bans. For instance, it is March 25th today-- and how many people still have Christmas decor up? On my walk yesterday, I saw lights, one of those bizarre mechanical reindeer--no longer grazing on a front lawn, mind you--- and further down the street there was a very creepy deflated gigantic Santa that was wrong in the first place! Sorry, boys and girls, Mommy and Daddy won't be putting up giant blow-up Santa next year because he got flattened by the snow storm and now that the weather is nice, the dog keeps lifting its leg on his remains.

Take your decor down by Feb 1st, or pay the fine I say.

How about zinging people who talk loudly during movies? I am not trying to sound like a grumpy old woman, but it is not cheap to attend a movie, and the topping for my popcorn is the price of gas-- so how about making it even more expensive to be a jerk at the theatre? I cannot think of a time a smoker would refuse to move away from you if you asked them to, but watch out for the stink eye you'll get if you ask loud movie watchers to shut it!

Watch your movie at home and talk all you want, or pay-as you-go, Motormouth.

Perhaps it is the Torontonian in me with some lingering road rage, but I know I speak for all of us when I include my dismay for drivers who wait in the left lane at a light but neglect to signal ahead of time that they need to turn left on the green. Maybe a by-law is impossible, but how about some public service messages to these people?

Help me get to work on time-- it takes one little click to warn us all to get over to the right......


Salad Girl's tip of the post:
Have you laughed 20 times today? To help prevent depression, we are all supposed to.
Create a list of by-laws you'd like your family members and fellow citizens to follow. (OK-- don't really do this, but it's pretty funny to make a list of all the annoying and stupid things people do all the time! )