{"id":4200,"date":"2013-10-09T15:22:22","date_gmt":"2013-10-09T19:22:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=4200"},"modified":"2013-11-06T14:51:19","modified_gmt":"2013-11-06T19:51:19","slug":"front-porch-perspective-pet-peeves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/front-porch-perspective-pet-peeves\/","title":{"rendered":"FRONT PORCH PERSPECTIVE: Pet Peeves"},"content":{"rendered":"

Top 10 and My Pet Peeves
\nBy Stephen Somerville<\/strong><\/p>\n

Three years ago your writer produced a column entitled, \u201cThe top ten reasons why I love Aurora and my pet peeves\u201d.
\nI think it is appropriate to refresh my two lists.<\/p>\n

The Top 10 reasons why I love Aurora;<\/p>\n

10.) Aurora has an abundance of parks and green spaces.
\n9.) The Aurora Chamber of Commerce Street Sale – purported to be the world\u2019s longest.
\n8.) Our family is blessed with having fantastic neighbors (even after accounting for the fact that my mother-in-law happens to be one of them).
\n7.) The size of Aurora and its proximity to other communities is just about right. We are close enough to Toronto for those of us who travel to work but also far enough away to maintain that \u201csmall town\u201d feel.
\n6.) Volunteers \u2013 I am struck by the impressive nature of volunteerism that goes on around us here in Aurora. My son is so lucky to have had such wonderful baseball and soccer coaches!
\n5.) The Auroran \u2013 It is important that we have a newspaper that is dedicated to our community by dealing with only local issues. I also like the fact that a lot of editorial space is reserved for reader feedback; this is one of the key reasons for the success of the newspaper. I have changed my mind on some issues as a result of various letters to the editor.
\n4.) The mural on the wall of the building located at the corner of Yonge and Wellington is something entirely unique to our community.
\n3.) War Memorial – for your writer, the Cenotaph is a place of reflection, solitude and introspection. The valour and selflessness of the fine men memorialized there is most humbling. In its entirety, the two structures are a simple and regal monument to the fallen.
\n2.) The Santa Claus parade is for me symbolic of our small town nature. It is an absolute joy seeing all the families lined up along Yonge Street at night waiting patiently for Santa. It is a \u201cmust attend\u201d event for our family. <\/p>\n

And the number one reason why I love Aurora is (still) my wife Julie. She was raised and has lived most of her life in Aurora. And besides, if I don\u2019t continue to install Julie as the number one reason, I will never hear the end of it!
\nAdditionally, I would have to equip the tool shed in the backyard (which would henceforth become known as my new sleeping quarters) with carpeting, cable television (including the Golf Channel and CPAC) bar fridge and a shower!
\nSince the time the column was originally published I have had to expand the list to lucky thirteen so as to include the Canada Day Parade (and related activities), the Aurora RibFest and the Easter Egg hunt.
\nAlthough Aurora is a wonderful community in which to raise a family, your friendly scribe does have a list of things that drive me to distraction. I have pared down my initial published list from nine to five items and also modified it somewhat.
\nSo, with the appropriate apologies to David Letterman, my top five pet peeves are:<\/p>\n

5.) The traffic at the intersection of Yonge & Wellington. I\u2019ll bet the amount of green house gases spewing from the idled cars during the rush hour period is just about as much as that emanating from the Town Council Chamber on a typical Tuesday evening. The only good thing is that driving southbound along Yonge Street we get to look at the mural while we wait to turn eastbound.
\n4.) Those of you speeding through the various back streets of Aurora \u2013 slow down, as there are lots of small children around. And while you are at it, please turn down the music \u2013 especially after 11 p.m. on a weeknight.
\n3.) Slow play on some of the local golf courses. When the course is busy, please do not spend ten minutes looking for your ball in the trees; drop another ball and play on.
\n2.) The following is not a local issue, but I am not happy nonetheless. Cowboys Stadium (home of my favourite NFL team, the Dallas Cowboys) being recently renamed AT&T Stadium for $20M of annual cash payments to the team owner. Isn\u2019t anything sacred? The Air Canada Centre should have been called Maple Leaf Gardens (even if the Raptors do play there).
\nAnd my number one pet peeve is\u2026our communities\u2019 collective voting record.
\nOnly 38 per cent of us voted in the last municipal election in 2010, 49 per cent in the 2011 provincial election and 64 per cent in the 2011 federal election. The next municipal election takes place in the fall of 2014; the next federal election is scheduled for the fall of 2015 while we could have a provincial election at anytime. Let\u2019s show that we can do better!<\/p>\n

Stephen can be contacted at stephengsomerville@yahoo.com<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Top 10 and My Pet Peeves By Stephen Somerville Three years ago your writer produced a column entitled, \u201cThe top ten reasons why I love Aurora and my pet peeves\u201d. I think it is appropriate to refresh my two lists. The Top 10 reasons why I love Aurora; 10.) Aurora has an abundance of parks […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-15K","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-09-07 16:50:32","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4200\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}