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Arts Council of the Central Okanagan is a resource centre and advocate for the arts in Kelowna and Central Okanagan. Find us at:
8-1304 Ellis Street
Kelowna BC V1Y 1Z8
Phone: 250.861.4123
Fax: 250.861.4155
Email: Click here
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Each month this website will feature a writer or poet, with introduction, photo, biography, and, most important, the writing.
Recently Featured Writers:
» Janet Hinton
» Harry van Bommel
» Rebecca C. Liman
» James D. Thwaites
» Isabel W. Sturgeon
» Grace Dodds
» Lorraine Drdul
» Cherie Hanson
» Sterling Haynes
» Denton Brothers
Submissions Invited!
» The story or poem should not be over 2000 words and must be your own original work. All submissions must be word processed and emailed to us at our email address.
» Submissions must include your complete contact information: Name, Telephone, Email, Mailing Address.
» Please also include a short biography and if possible a small photo of yourself.
» The anonymity of all that submit a story or poem will be respected. Contact details supplied as part of your submission will not be disclosed to any third party.
Join the Arts Council of the Central Okanagan today and you will:
» Meet people who are involved in our arts community, and stay informed.
» Receive our weekly email newsletter, The Junction.
» Become eligible for group member grants.
» Have a worthy advocate to protect your artistic and cultural rights.
» Be able to join ARTSCO's special projects.
Click here to apply.
Financial support for KADAC is provided in part by:
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Featured Writer for January 2006:
Sterling Haynes
Sterling Haynes was born in Edmonton, served as a British Colonial Officer in Nigeria and practiced medicine in British Columbia and Alabama. Sterling loved his life as a general practitioner and delivered thousands of babies - he wouldn't have missed it for the world. In retirement he started to write short stories of the Caribou, Thompson region, Alabama and the Okanagan. With the help of Dona Sturmanis and his wife and daughters as creative writing instructors and editors he has developed as a writer. He has sold stories to Harvard Alumni magazine, Okanagan Life, AlbertaViews, Rogers TV and the Canadian Journal of Rural Medicine etc. Most of his writing has a humorous twist to it. His book "Bloody Practice' was on the BC bestseller's list. Recently he won the Joyce Dunn Award at the International Creative Writing Festival in Salmon Arm and the first prize for his poem 'Bipolar' by the Mental Health Association of the Okanagan.
Snooper
When I purchased my new Senso hearing aids it opened up a new world to me. I leapt into a new digital age of eavesdropping. The acoustic abilities made me into a mole. Perhaps I could work as an uncover agent though I doubt the FBI, CSIS or the KGB would hire a deaf old man as a snooper, I thought.
The new aid is comparable to a Pentium computer. The processor samples "sound signals a million times every second", so the brochure states. It adjusts sound automatically and reproduces signals into mellifluous voices. I believe Senso does what it says - "suppresses noise and enhances speech" and even more.
This sophisticated machine that fits into both ear canals is a BTE [Behind The Ear] model. These aids are a marvel. When I drive across Kelowna's floating bridge every day or when a use them in an aircraft my information highway becomes a freeway.
At these times while sitting with the aids turned on I'm surrounded by metal . The sound waves from cell phones or from the cockpit of airplanes are transferred to my hearing aids by "the electromagnetic conduction effect of the metal superstructures", so my audiologist says. When traffic is delayed on the bridge or on the runway, drivers with cell phones and aircrew then start talking and I become a reluctant spy.
Every week or so, if the conditions are optimal on the bridge, I get snatches of conversation from the cell phones. I learn about business deals, the kids at home and school and marital spats. Once I even heard about a sexual tryst slated for the afternoon. Unluckily, I reached the end of the bridge before I got all the titillating details.
The most startling conversation I heard was when I was waiting on a Houston runway and was between the pilot, flight engineer and stewardess in the cockpit. The conversation started like this, pilot to flight engineer---
"When are you going to get that rudder fixed, its been malfunctioning for over a month. You call yourself a flight engineer but nothing gets fixed around here. We're going to have a serious problem if you don't get off your butt".
"Yah, Yah you guys are always complaining. Sitting here in your air-conditioned cockpit while I'm sweating it out on the tarmac. The rudder will hold up for this flight. When you get back we'll take this aircraft out-of-service. Better fill in another report".
Then I saw the aircraft engineer leave by the front door. A new conversation began with a female voice. The planes doors closed and we were wheeled out into the runway for takeoff before I could pick up....
"Hi ya'll boys. That was quite a party last night at the hotel. Ah hate the lay over here, be glad to get to Belize City. Ah love the beaches, ah'll try on my new bikini. Ya boys are going to love it. Hope ya ole headache gets well".
Then I saw a gorgeous flight attendant come out the cockpit door and start to prepare hot breakfasts. When she brought me the breakfast tray after takeoff I said, "that was some party you and the crew had last night at the hotel. You must have great recuperative powers. Thanks for the breakfast."
She turned a deep red under her tan and left quickly. I caught her eye a few times, she blushed but didn't take the tray away. On deplaning she never did tell me to "have a good day."
If you have hearing aids keep them plugged into your ears at all time. "Don't leave home without 'em". Scotland Yard or the National Enquirer, could be interested.
Three weeks later on the return flight to Houston from Belize City we boarded the same Boeing 737. I had an opportunity to ask the co-pilot if the rudder had been fixed and was in good working order.
The co-captain gave me a quizical look and said "yes it has been fixed and how did you know about it?"
It was then that I fumbled with my hearing aids and said "what was that you said". He looked at me, then left for the safety of his cockpit.
» Featured Writers for December 2005: The Denton Brothers
We invite submissions from writers.
» The story or poem should not be over 2000 words and must be your own original work. All submissions must be word processed and emailed to us at our email address.
» Submissions must include your complete contact information: Name, Telephone, Email, Mailing Address.
» Please also include a short biography and if possible a small photo of yourself.
» The anonymity of all that submit a story or poem will be respected. Contact details supplied as part of your submission will not be disclosed to any third party.
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