Schumacher Homes is described as an "on your lot" custom home builder ... I realize that folks are holding off on buying and selling and I would guess building homes right now due to fears about the US and even world economy... I ' m not an expert but I do try to keep up with the news in genral and it ' s been hard not to know what ' s happening to the United States economy in particular... Just yesterday, I read that retailers are bracing for the worst holiday season in perhaps decades... However stopping buying and in this case building a home is the worst thing you can do if you want to see the economy improve... It ' s important to keep in mind that individual decisions count and though cutting back-being a bit more conservative-will benefit you and is prudent, cutting things out completely can have a devastating impact on the economy... Be prudent, don ' t get in over your head, but keep moving forward-hopefully, each of us can help things from getting any worse by being sensible about the financial decisions we make... … View Post »

Haliburton, Ontario, October 4, 2008 Depending on where you were in Ontario today you were experiencing very different weather as these webcam shots-all taken within one hour of another-show... From temperatures a bit above normal in the immediate days to come to temperatures plunging severely next week, it ' s a mixed bag-typical of this "bridge" time between when fall turns into late fall, which depending on your definition can include winter-like conditions in respect to temperatures... … View Post »

I work at home via computer/Internet and I find my home telephone ringing to be distracting... To be honest, I actually find the telephone an annoyance so if I ' m offered information on how to reduce the annoyance of unwanted telephone calls I ' m going to pay attention and share any helpful information that I learn... Some helpful information that you may or may not have heard of allows you to Find Out Who Called You , which allows you to run a reverse phone number search for any phone number that is used to contact you... Though having your telephone information added to the National No Call Registry will usually help you with unwanted calls, if you desire further assistance, click the above links to take advantage of a reverse phone lookup service... … View Post »

Ottawa Confederation Park All webshots taken today, Sept 29, 2008 unless noted... My spouse was quite excited yesterdayas he informed me that he ' d found a slew of new "across Ontario"-type webcams from which we-and the rest of the world could watch the changing seasons in Ontario... I was excited too until I realized many of them suffered from the same issues that I ' d mentioned about my favourite Ontario webcam source-no one maintains the webcams ... What I found while looking through these webcams were non-functional ones, horribly out of date ones ( June?),... blurry to the point of unrecognizable shots, pointless pictures (your empty patio with a view of nothing?)... … View Post »

My spouse has been an avid gardener for much of his life... He devotes as much time as he can and he does a fantastic job... In the fall squirrels dig in your garden to bury their acorns and nuts and in the spring they dig once again to unbury their acorns and nuts... My spouse was so upset one spring about the damage that squirrels did to his newly planted garden that he dreamed that night that there was a product-"poison peanuts"-that he could use to get rid of them once and for all... No one had ever heard of such a thing... I had to gently point out that not only would using "poison peanuts" endanger other animals but a child could come along and eat one and then-disaster... Havahart ' s squirrel repellent has the following attributes: it has proven effective as a way ton to repel squirrels from bird feeders and gardens and it is organic so it is less harmful to the environment as was as safe for the animal... This is exciting news for gardener ' s and it may help my spouse win the war of the squirrels versus his gardens... … View Post »

in truth, many of the webcam shots available are nowhere near awesome... I ' m puzzled because when used correctly webcam shots of your area whether they be of an area of interest like a traffic cam or an area of beauty like the ones I showcase on this website can be very valuable tools... But the aesthetically pleasing ones have the potential to draw people to visit your area... Why, as in the case of Haliburton, is there an offering of a scene that is fuzzy and does not showcase the more attractive areas of town (and, for that matter, why is it the exact scene shown on one of their postcards for sale in town)?!... My goal of sharing the webcams shots that are quite spectacular is to share the beauty of Ontario with whomever wishes to see it... I get nothing and therefore cannot share anything... … View Post »

Raven and her people at Maple Lake, circa 2003 Although I love Labrador Retrievers, especially Chocolate labs, I don ' t yet need a source for Facts about labrador retrievers ... However every now and again someone will approach me when I ' m walking Raven and they know exactly what breed she is... … View Post »

Britannia Yacht Club view of Lac Deschenes, Ottawa I finally remembered to check Cams Across Ontario at sunset tonight and boy did I luck out... I ' m a huge fan of sunsets-as silly as that statement may sound... It ' s the thing at Maple Lake I ' ll miss the most this winter because no matter what the weather there is a sunset to behold at Maple Lake each evening... I know many people get excited by the changing colours of the leaves in fall and I think they are quite pretty as well but having grown up with them I can ' t help but assciate the leaves changign colour ( dying) with winter coming and I just plain do not like winter!... … View Post »

I ' ve only needed extensive water restoration services once-back when I was living in the ground-floor apartment of a two-story building... The neighbour lady above me went on vacation and she left her bathroom fan on... At some point the fan overheated or short circuited and a fire broke out... I was not home at the time but returned to a scene of chaos with folks milling about and a tangle of emergency response vehicles crowding the front of the building... Once their job was done, they left but the job for me had just started... Without boring you with the minutia, the first thing that had to be done was to get the water out of my apartment and for that we needed a professional... After that came the salvaging which included using professionals to attempt to save as much of the wall-to-wall carpet as possible... It was a very stressful time but having the worst part of it taken care of by a professional water restoration service made it a bit easier to bear... … View Post »