nakinagirl, please don't let a few ignorant blowhards distract you from the truth, which is that anyone i have ever talked to here in southern ontario that has travelled in the north, found the people there to be the salt of the earth. As one instance, my wife is from Newfoundland which is world-renowned for friendly, welcoming people and she was so pleased to find northerners across the board to be of a similar disposition to those in her home province.

To be fair, a huge proportion of southern ontario people live in the GTA or other large urban areas and the prevailing sentiment is to mind your own business and stay out of other peoples' hair, in the name of self-protection. It is much more difficult to be friendly and welcoming in the rush of urban life.

The economics of northern ontario life make it much more difficult to scratch out a living than in the south. This makes it possible for some ignorant people to categorize northerners as lazy, or not go-getters.

Let's hope our investors and government bodies can get the show on the road in the ring of fire and that before many moons northern ontario will be on the way to being a "have" area rather than "have not" as currently. When I was a child, Alberta was a hard-scrabble place with many in actual hunger. More recently, Newfoundland has become a "have" province after being in the depths of poverty. Let us hope it will soon be your turn in the north, with the lever of resource development done properly, and that is carried out with fairness and due regard for the people already living there.

and best wishes as always to Noront longs!

O.J.