cktimes.ca Archives for Notes from a Garage


Notes from a Garage

With John Gardiner

Coke, Diet Coke and whatever that other stuff is!

Tuesday, February 18, 2003

Well, I've got to rave about cktimes this week again. Sorry to always be doing that, but I've really got to do a little cheerleading in order to keep my energy level up. I've really been tearing around Chatham-Kent over the last number of months. Remember, so far, I'm doing the cktimes singlehandedly – I'm really enjoying it, but I've really got to stay on the fly pretty well seven days per week. Twice last week, for example, I covered six stories over the course of a day – and they were not all conveniently located within a two-block radius. The site is continuing to grow. In Wallaceburg, for example, if you want to know about deaths in the community on an up-to-date basis, you can now check the "C-K Obituraries" section. Both funeral homes in Wallaceburg have started to send death notices and I'm hoping to get other funeral homes in Chatham-Kent to do the same. Unlike the mainstream media, I'm offering free obits throughout Chatham-Kent as a needed service to the community. I mention this just as an example of how we're trying to grow just a little bit each week. The number of visitors to the site has also been increasing and there were over 15,000 last week. I continue to think that we're on the right track and that you're enjoying the product I'm putting up on the net. I continue to find this a strange medium for an old guy like me, but I really enjoy the freedom. And gathering such a collection of wonderful columnists together has been an additional treat. Thanks so much for keeping my dream alive for even this long.

I've got a major beef this week with the Coca-Cola Company. I am a regular consumer of Diet Coke, but lately have noticed that regular diet coke is being squeezed off the cooler shelves by "vanilla diet coke" and "lemon diet coke". I've been into a couple of variety stores that didn't even have regular diet coke. What the heck is going on, I ask myself. So, I conduct an informal survey of variety store owners – I ask a few of them what gives with the diet coke thing. They tell me that the BIG COMPANY has instructed them to so allocate their shelf space on pain of penalty. So, I ask them whether they ever sell any of this new stuff – whatever it actually is – because it surely ain't "diet coke" in any sense of the word. I mean, coke and diet coke are a specific kind of drink – cola, I think. It's dark in colour and has a certain type of taste – that's why Pepsi-Cola and Coca-Cola are sort of the same – I know, I know, it's blasphemy to say that but it's true. So, you add "vanilla" or "lemon" to it and it ain't really "cola" which is what "coke" is supposed to be – I think. So, why would these marketing gurus at Coca-Cola think that people who drink diet coke might also want to drink "vanilla" coke or "lemon" coke? There is no logical connection between the two other than that they are produced by the same company and the bottle they're in is the same shape – other than that they're totally different drinks – vanilla "something" and lemon "something", but definitely not a "cola" which is what coke and diet coke are. Why don't any of these companies produce what they're good at and forget all about this other junk they all seem to want us to believe we need? In fact, back to the original question – do variety stores actually sell any of this weird pop? Answer: none or very little. So, why bother. Make Coke and Diet Coke and worry about holding onto that market. Everybody wants to have a piece of everybody else's market – that's why you can buy soup at your drug store and clothes at your grocery store. Strange, but true. Enough ranting!

I'm having a great time doing my "Good News Sunday" segment on Sunday mornings each week on CFCO. I've been trying to talk up the many positive things we're doing in the great big community of Chatham-Kent. I truly enjoy attending events like the Operation Red Nose Volunteer Appreciation Night at Crabby Joe's last week. There were Chelle Cartier and Janet Cunningham and Duncan Davidson and a whole bunch of great, community-minded people out to make Chatham-Kent a better place to live, work and play. Thanks to CFCO and its great staff for helping me try to help the community. Must say that it was great to see Greg Hetherington and Gary Patterson of CKSY fame out at John McGregor School last week for the "For Love of Emily" campaign. Both those guys are a great credit to our local community. Way to go!!!

There is a movement afoot in south Chatham-Kent to have the whole amalgamation issue revisited on this year's ballot. A group of community-minded citizens based in the Ridgetown area are leading the charge. We've got a short press release from the group in this week's cktimes and hope to have more in the near future. I see no harm in asking whether the people of Chatham-Kent support being part of one municipal community. After all, we had nothing to say about it when we were jammed together by that Meyboom fellow back a few years ago. I know there's been widespread unrest up here in Wallaceburg and people haven't generally been happy with some aspects of the amalgamation and the right question could at least set the stage for positive change.

Thanks for reading along in cktimes. Big things could be on our horizon. More on that later. Out of time for another week. Remember..."Hew to the line; let the chips fall where they may."



John Gardiner is a 25-year-veteran of the community newspaper business, but he is also a prolific writer of moralistic short fiction he refers to as "emotional thoughtscapes" or "adult fables". Samples of his fiction can be found at:

He has also produced a noteworthy piece of humanist philosophy which can be found at: http://www.xs4all.nl/~aboiten/ad502.htm He welcomes comments on his work.