Did any of you attend the “How To Get Rich In Canada!” promotion last week? The promotion, which seems to come out of St. Albert, Alberta is doing a tour of Western Canada at the moment. I went to the company's web site and they certainly do make a buck from selling their get rich quick ideas in books and on disk. The How To Make Millions Without A Cent In Your Pocket was temporarily unavailable. The Cashflow course was $240 for 101 and $150 for 202. How To Increase The Income From Your Real Estate Investments at $170. Canadian Tax Strategies for Business Professions for $499.

I don’t know this man Darren Weeks or Canadian Rich Dad as he likes to call himself but his promotion operation runs in high gear. I know I have many readers that look at these promotions that go through this valley every year making people richer from real estate, not paying taxes, or some
fabulous way to make more money. It makes you wonder why these people,
who say they have made all this money, just don’t live comfortably on the lake, relax and enjoy life?

I can see how they can make money but surely they don’t want all of us selling our make-more-money wares to the public...

Arizona foreclosures almost double the national average. Arizona now ranks as the third hardest hit state in the nation. 27,404 filings have been registered...

Spring allergies are always a problem for a few of us and we dread the yellow pine dust that will cover everything very soon. I just read a list of the 100 worst spring allergy cities in the U.S. and of course everywhere we travel is listed. San Diego, Las Vegas, Seattle, Spokane, Phoenix and Orlando...

The annual Sports Emmy Awards saw Bob Mueller of Kelowna, formally of Victoria, win a big one for the NFL network. His 11-minute feature, Finding Your Butkus, was rated by NFL Films as the best outstanding long feature. Doesn’t that make you feel good, that a local playing in the big league’s, has done so well for himself? We’re proud Mr. Mueller.

Mueller played football as a young boy in Saanich. His idol was the Chicago Bears, Dick Butkus. He became a fine artist and started a company producing greeting cards using the NFL hall of famer, Tough Guy Cards. He told the media that it took him years of faxes, phone calls with the Butkus legal and agent team before he got to offer the idea to the player and it has become a beautiful story. It is what this valley is all about, the people who move here to live and work. There are eight thousand stories like that in the naked city...

If you shop for groceries and have a budget then you have got to be a better shopper these days because prices are going to make a difference to the bottom line. In Canada we have always been fortunate for an extremely efficient food distribution system. Our prices have always been good and certainly competitive but that is being affected by the massive changes that are taking place in the industry. Rising commodity prices, especially in the grains category, are changing every facet of the food industry, which is under tremendous pressure dealing with the competitive marketplace we have today. With Wal-Mart opening their SuperCentres, the Canadian chains are ready for the fight and Wal-Mart faces some of the best food merchants in the world. This isn’t something that you should panic over, you just need to be a good planner and make use of all the buys that are available. It’s a global market as you know and whatever affects the market affects manufacturers who are being faced with increases at both ends of the supply system...

From The Standard in St. Catherines, Ont. came these words from Adrian Abbott, "If anybody's looking for canned Canadian fruit, you've got to do it at home." Abbott is the marketing services manager for BC Tree Fruits, which markets British Columbia-grown fruit...

He is a horseman through and through and racing has been his game since his teens. Charles “Chuck” Fipke, the Kelowna diamond merchant, was front and centre at Louisville, Kentucky the home of Churchill Downs, for the 134th running of the Kentucky Derby, the world’s largest sporting event. His stables entry in the race was “Tale of Ekati”. It placed fourth in a very crowded twenty horse race. With my horse-racing friend in Toronto we placed three bets as it could have been a big winner. Coming that close must have been thrilling. He has two four-year olds that are contenders. He has invested a lot of money in his stables and in 2003 he paid $2.3 million for a yearling. He doesn’t like to talk about it, but according to sources he does have thirty in training. When asked about the Queen's Plate, Canada's most prestigious thoroughbred race, Fipke said he has that as a goal as well. Fipke says his best prospect for this year is “Not Bourbon”, second in the Achievement Stakes at Toronto's Woodbine Racetrack in early April. The Queen's Plate is set for June 22 at Woodbine...