From broken government provinces, voter apathy, H1N1 mix-ups, crime and a whole lot more, there's never a shortage of things to gripe about in this space.

Which is why today's topic is such a nice change of pace.

In Colchester County this week, community spirit has taken a variety of forms, each of them special in their own way.

Little wonder that hundreds of protesters would show up at the opening of a new session of the New Brunswick legislature. If your government representatives planned to sell off your public power utility, particularly without a mandate to do so, you too might feel so inclined.

The prospect that the Liberal government in that province would do such, sell NB Hydro to Hydro-Quebec, has many expressing feelings ranging from reservation to anger.

There was once a time when a royal visit to Canada was the stuff of fairytales and legends. Canadians were enchanted with the royal family and there was little talk about abolishing the monarch as this country's head of state.

That appears to have changed with speculation that once Queen Elizabeth II dies, it may spell the end of the constitutional monarchy we now have in this country. Whether our system of government will be replaced with a republican system similar to the United States, or some other system, it's clear some Canadians are growing weary of the House of Windsor and want to look at other options.