Thursday, November 20, 2008

Real Estate Monthly

In which Aviatrix bores you with a small town newspaper.

This restaurant has slow service and when I eat by myself, as I often do, that's very boring. I tried to buy a newspaper. There had been a sign at the hotel earlier saying that they had them for sale. The girl at the desk said they were a week old, and she couldn't bring herself to charge me for it, so she'd just give me one. It was the local town paper, not the national or big city paper I was hoping for. But that's okay, I took it gratefully. Better than reading the drink specials list again.

Service was even slower. I think my strategy backfired, and they decided they could take their time because I was reading the paper. Or maybe it just seemed longer because the paper was more boring that the drink specials list. I kept it, fully intending to report back on the fascinating news in Fort Nelson, but having read it slowly once, I couldn't bring myself to open it again. So I'll just tell you that the front page leads with a rollover accident on the Alaska highway. Victim with head injuries was taken by ambulance to the local hospital, then medevaced down south. Next to that is a 22 year old construction worker who mysteriously dropped dead at work, a Conservative MP celebrating his third election to office, and nominations closed for local elected officials. One of the two mayoral candidates withdrew his nominations, and the schoolboard has been elected by acclaimation, but it appears there will be an election for council. Also a house burned down and the company that closed the local plywood mill says they don't intend the closure to be permanent, but that the mill is for sale. Please don't say you want to know what's on page two.

The advertising supplement is Northern British Columbia's Real Estate Monthly: Serving Fort Nelson, Fort St. John, Dawson Creek, Chetwynd & Area. I'd tell you what a house costs here, but none of the ads actually mentioned WHICH of the communities the listings is for. You have to know the area. For example, here's a picture of what appears to be a double-wide trailer, with a bit of a deck and a side porch.

12314 256 RD * $369,900


Don't pass up this well cared for home located on 1.5 kms from the old Montney Store. This extremely up-dated home boasts new flooring throughout all sitting on 20 acres, perfect for horses. Located just 15 minutes from, pavement all the way to your driveway. Call Today.

I didn't realize how bizarre the grammar in that is until I typed it. The sentences that just end in odd places are from the original, not my typos. Also the Canadian Imperial Bank of Canada is offering a ten year closed mortgage at six and a half percent. Time was, that would be a good deal.

Now you can imagine how I feel, still waiting for my pasta to arrive.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Isn't that a little much for a double-wide trailer? I know the house prices down here in the US are crazy (or at least were), but I didn't know the insanity had made its way that far north!

dpierce said...

This is why you need a smartphone loaded with trivial diversions such as games, books, e-mail, that TV show you Tivo'ed but never got a chance to watch, music, and of course, the Internet.

Of course, in real life, I'd rather people-watch.

Anonymous said...

Andrew, I bet the price is for the 20 acres of land, not the house. Must not be farmable or it would be more than that. Or maybe the house is perfect for horses, not the land.

Aviatrix, I don't know what's funnier, you typing in the incredibly boring front page or all of us reading it.

I know I'm bored. All I have at the moment is my hotel TV and the Internets. Oh, and books. Hmm. Maybe it's not all that different from being at home.

Jack L. Poller said...

Get an Amazon Kindle.

It's an electronic book reader.

As it ships, it weighs 11 ounces, and the battery lasts forever (as long as you're not using the wireless). You can download content wirelessly, or over your computer, and transfer via USB or SD memory card. With the basic memory, you can put 200 books in it (about 200MB). For about $15, you can get a 2GB SD card, for effectively unlimited amount of books.

I never leave home without it!

jinksto said...

hah hah hah. I acutally LOVE small town papers. There's no end to the humor that you can find in them. Especially the classifieds.

My favorite was a small town in Arkansas where the ad. read, "George M Morgan: Your goats ate my flowers... AGAIN!!! -AnnieG" It was funny the first time I read it but then I got to thinking about how many time this woman had to complain before being driven to take out an ad in the paper at which point it became too funny.

Anonymous said...

I think local papers specialise in being boring to non-locals. My local paper has taken the ground-breaking step forwards of being boring to locals as well.

I like the sound of that Amazon Kindle, though...

Anonymous said...

I just can't get it through my head how new flooring would be perfect for horses. Crazy Canadian horsies...

Bob in Minnesota

Anonymous said...

Greatest small-town newspaper line I ever heard, from a comedian who had been given a copy of our local paper to read on the ride from the airport to the venue: "I read every page of it, front to back. Most thrilling 45 seconds I've spent in a long time."

I used to work for a small-town paper. If you think reading that stuff is a thrill, well, imagine having to be the one who writes it....

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Aviatrix said...

The keywords in this entry are going to attract a lot of spam, so I'm going to close the comments. Comment on the next day's entry if you want to comment on ths.