“A committee is a group that keeps minutes and loses hours.”
~ Milton Berle. Like that quote.
Don’t quote me, but I think the 20-year library tax ballot proposal coming to your mailbox at the end of the month will pass – $33 per year to each homeowner to keep library operations going. On the other hand, I’m skeptical at this point about Mayor Don Gage’s shotgun proposal for a sales or property tax measure that would undertake a smorgasboard of capital improvement projects. I just don’t think there’s a crowning jewel that the community can get behind. If there were a city recreational facility – like Morgan Hill’s wildly popular community hub, the Centennial Recreation Center – that would provide fitness options, swimming pools indoor and out, recreation classes and a plethora of programs for seniors, then the likelihood of passage in November would skyrocket. So would the amount residents would be willing to fork out. But there’s not – at least at this point. The $60 million test project list doubles the original amount of $30 million. It has, for example, $10 million for a water feature at Gilroy Gardens, $3 million for fixing unreinforced masonry buildings downtown, $2 million to build a sports stadium at Christopher High School, $5 million for park playground improvements. Heck, it doesn’t even address renovating the BBQ area at the Gilroy Golf Course, an oft-used community facility which really could be a fantastic project. Though the concept is a good one, the process – developing a project list via group political influence without reaching out to the grassroots community to ask what residents think would improve the quality of life first, is a flaw that might be insumountable at this point. We’ll just have to wait and see the survey results.
No survey needed since my 20-year-old daughter tells me the hair removal TV commercials aimed at men are just catching up with reality. It’s not uncommon, reports Mariah, for guys in college to remove arm hair, chest hair and even hair under their arms. Yowza, whatever happened to Sean Connery as James Bond. Hairy – short of being gorilla-esque – was manly. What’s next, eyeliner and lipstick? I literally flinched when I heard the guy in the TV commercial descibe the product as, “… better than a fresh wax.”
Definitely better than a fresh wax are responsive readers. A number educated me last week after my rant about all the advertisements for no-kink garden hoses which I found all to be false despite repeated and expensive attempts over a few years trying different makes and models. Two intriguing suggestions covered the low-end and the high-end. Pete Garcia sent along some testimonial literature on the Tuff Guard hose (tuffguardhose.com), a lightweight 100-foot model that costs $95. You can’t get it locally currently, he says, but the website says it’s available at “select” Ace Hardware stores, so it sounds like that could be fixed. Pete says the magazine and website Family Handyman (www.familyhandyman.com) is a great place for ideas. Numerous others suggested the inexpensive “expanding hose you see on TV” that’s $20 bucks at local drugstores. I’m hell on hoses, so after the next paycheck, it’s a likely buy for Tuff Guard, and we’ll see …
We’ll see if the Santa Clara County and the Santa Clara Valley Water District can ever move beyond the idiocy of the “No Human Swimming” policy enforced at our lakes and reservoirs. But don’t hold your breath. Meanwhile, I enjoyed the comment on our website from “gaffer1” who wrote, “Um last time I went to Calero they let us wakeboard. What a stupid policy. Boats cause pollution as well as humans peeing in the water. Just institute an inspection station just like they do for the boats! No sunscreen before swimming and don’t pee in the water. Common sense is what we lack …”
That’s apparently what some abrasive winery owners lack, too, who are delivering nasty, personal and unprofessional comments to their cohorts on the Wineries of Santa Clara Valley email exchange list – so much so that it’s causing some wineries to drop out of the association and others to consider that course of action. I have another idea – kick out the malcontents who grind their personal axes and snort insults to the group. Vote, and boot them out of the vineyard. Don’t throw the superb Syrah out with the sour grape skins. Make those who are – pardon me – acting like jackasses, persona non grata. It’s a privilege to be in the association, and the wineries in South County have made such tremendous strides in making good wine and marketing, it would surely be a shame to diminish the association and punish the many because a couple of boors can’t keep their nastiness from permeating their keyboards.
Keyboard compliment ending: couple Russ and Jamie, relatively new Gilroyans and owners of Anytime Fitness in the Nob Hill Shopping Center by “Rob-a-bank”, run a marvelous facility: clean, up-to-date equipment, fun classes and a very friendly staff. Looking for a new gym? This is it.
Reach Editor Mark Derry at ed****@ga****.com
