Yo, this is Ann Arbor!

Though I grew up in Newfoundland, both of my parents are from Michigan.  And though Michigan isn't the most populous or the wealthiest state it's residents and places seem to pop up rather frequently, or more than you might expect for a state of its size, in various media.  Because of my somewhat tangential connection to the place (and because it is still where most of my extended family lives) I always take note of these Michigan connections, even if knowing that so-and-so or such-and-such is from Michigan will likely serve me no real purpose in my day-to-day life.

A few years ago, just after I had started listening to This American Life, I learned that contributor Davy Rothbart (also of Found Magazine fame) was from Ann Arbor, Michigan.  When I eventually made it to the Found Magazine website I had a sneaking suspicion that the magazine's mailing address was on the same street as an aunt and uncle's house.

When I got around to asking about this they confirmed that while the Rothbart kids were a little older than my cousins they did know one another.  Maybe more importantly, my asking my cousin about this lead her to re-connecting with Davy.  I know that at one point here were plans to meet in-person, but I don't know if those plans ever came to fruition.

Then, just a few days ago, I happened to come across a relatively new blog, Yo, is this racist? that seems to be making waves on the internets.  I happened to learn about the blog through the author's recent Grantland piece on racist portrayals in sit-coms (though I can no longer remember how I ended up reading this article).

After reading the blog for a while I happened to come across the fact that the blog's author, Andrew Ti, seems to be from Ann Arbor and is about the same age as my Davy-Rothbart-knowing cousin.  I decided to ask if she also knew this guy?

Much to my surprise, just last night I found out that she does/did know this guy (though she said she really knew his sister more).

I find it very exciting to have a cousin who is tapped into things/people on the internet and doesn't even always know that she is until I sporadically ask her about people from her past.

The real problem I have now is how I might possibly extend my streak.  Is there anyway I can organically find a third Ann Arbor/Michigan person that my cousin knows who I can ask her about?  Taking my streak from two to three seems like it might be implausible, but then I thought going from one to two would be implausible.

Snow day?

As we were listening to the radio this morning we learned that the school children in the region (Kings and Annapolis counties) have been given a snow day.

So far things don't look too bad, but maybe they'll get worse?

Of course, given the latest satellite imagery (or at least give my reading of the latest satellite imagery) this seems a little unlikely (at least in the next few hours).

Unfortunately for the kids without school there isn't any snow on the ground and it's hovering around 0, otherwise this would be a perfect day for taking part in your favourite winter activity.

We're getting close

Montifax's 4th Annual blog-off is almost upon us.

Unfortunately, Neil seems a little less than excited.  Sadly, this isn't much different than past years.

I have found that one of the best ways to encourage Neil's participation is to handicap myself to give Neil a real chance of success.  This year I have decided to give myself more of a handicap than ever before - Neil's posts will now be worth 6 points to the 1 point that I get for each of my posts.  Hopefully this will provide Neil with enough incentive to participate.

And that we have a longer month of February this year should allow for additional blogging activity and more blog-off excitement than usual.

I hope that you will all remember to check back frequently during the blog-off to follow the competition and cheer on your favourite blogger.

This is surprising

Just a few minutes ago I decided to find some census data from the US.  I was mainly curious to see how much things had changed between the early 1980s and now.

While looking at the United States' Census' QuickFacts page I came across a few quick facts that surprised me.

First of all, who knew that the population grew by almost 10% over from 2000 and 2010?  That seems like a pretty substantial growth rate.

Secondly, who had any idea that even with the aging baby boomer cohort and increasing life-spans that people over 65 only account for 13% of the population.  This is all the more impressive/surprising when it is contrasted with the 24% of the population that is under 18.  Who knew there were so many young'uns out there?  Presumably this kind of population dynamic will mean a safe future for Social Security?

Finally, apparently only 85% of those over 25 have graduated from high school in the United States.  This seems a little low to me, but what do I know.

Three ingredient bread pt. 7

Well, today's bread project has now drawn to a close - and I feel pretty comfortable deeming it a success.

While the bread doesn't have an overwhelming pumpkin flavour, it certainly does taste like a little more than just white bread (in a very good way).  Furthermore, eating a few slices will provide you with a serving of vegetables.  If I had just slipped some protein in this loaf would practically be a balanced meal.

The only problem with this dream recipe being a success is that I am already thinking about other foods that I might use to make waterless three ingredient breads.  Raspberries came to mind first, but just a few minutes ago Nutella popped into my head as a potential ingredient (or maybe raspberries and Nutella for a four ingredient waterless bread).

Whatever happens with these future attempts to make waterless breads I will at least know that I did have at least one successful attempt.

Three ingredient bread pt. 6

So it at least kind of looks like bread.

Even if I did slightly over-bake it.

The real test will be what it looks like on the inside (and what it tastes like).

So far it looks as though it might actually be something approaching a passable result.

Three ingredient bread pt. 5

After a seeming unending period of rising, the liquid-less pumpkin dream bread was finally approaching a level of risen-ness I was comfortable with.

Obviously, I then placed the risen dough in the oven.

Placing the dough in the oven reminded me how dirty our oven door window is.  Gross.  I need to get on this cleaning project soon.

Oh, and while I was fooling around with this project (and doing some work), Jeannette baked and iced another batch of vegan cupcakes. 

This batch is chocolate-zucchini with chia seeds replacing the eggs.  Unfortunately I have an issue with zucchini so I won't be able to try them, even though they look great. 

Three ingredient bread pt. 4

There, I did it.  I rolled the bread dough into something approximating a baguette shape.  Now I will let it rise for a while and then stick it in the oven.

It was actually a little stickier than I expected.  This is something I am hoping bodes well for this loaf, of course I am also hoping that there will be enough gluten to hold the whole thing together.

Three ingredient bread pt. 3

So the bread is still rising slowly.

I am starting to think I am about read to roll it into a baguette shape and just throw it in the oven.

This is definitely looking as though it was worth my while (and the ingredients).

Three ingredient bread pt. 2

Well, my no-real-liquid added/recipe-came-from-a-dream bread is progressing somewhat slowly.  The rising process seems to be taking a little longer than I might have expected given the sugar in the pumpkin puree.  Maybe the fact the puree was cold when I started is the reason for the slow gas creation?

Shortly after this photo was taken I was able to knead in a little more flour.  I am thinking I may try to repeat this step a few more times.  I am worried that if I don't get enough flour into the puree that the who thing may not stick together.

At least I started with a small batch.

Three ingredient bread pt. 1

Last night I had a dream, a very unexciting dream.  I dreamt that, like the French, I could make a three ingredient bread.  Unlike the classic French bread recipe my bread would not have water, flour, and yeast but pumpkin puree, flour, and yeast.  As far as crazy dream recipes go, this one at least seems not to be entirely implausible.

Well, I am now in the midst of turning my dream into reality.

I'm pretty sure this is exactly what people are talking about when they talk about hoping their dreams will come true.  

Does the romance novel have a non-fiction equivalent?

Romance novels are everywhere in North America.  New or used, they are easy to come by.  Obviously they are filling some kind of demand.

But let's say you want something that's accessible, cheap, and easy to read that's also non-fiction what are the options?

My first thought is that the newspaper might be the non-fiction counterpart of the romance novel, but I am not entirely satisfied with that comparison.  Maybe magazines?

In the end magazines and newspapers both have the problem that their articles are much shorter than a romance novel, and I guess I am looking for something that is about as long (a very arbitrary requirement I know).

Is it possible that the romance novel just doesn't have a non-fiction analog?  Is such a thing needed?  Could we create something to fill this void?

A Few Quick Notes 559

-When I woke up yesterday it was close to -13 or -14.  By the time I went to bed last night the temperature was hovering around 0.  Today we reached a high of 11.  You may not be surprised to learn that the snow we received on Friday is now gone.

-This evening I borrowed a bread cookbook from my local public library.  Of course, I didn't even remember to consult this cookbook before beginning this evening's bread baking exercise (I ended up just going for a pumpkin/molasses/whole wheat/multigrain improvisation).

I may not be good a following recipes, but at least I am getting much better at making just one loaf of bread at a time.

-Listening to actors talk about acting is the worst, it's probably even worse than listening to pop musicians talk about what their music is about.

-Thanks to some inside info from my father about the relationship between meat consumption and kidney stone formation I have recently drastically reduced my consumption of meat.  So far I have been surprised how easy this has been to do, and how cheap.  If I learn to make it to foods more nutritious than rice it might even be healthy!

-Check out the hot plane puns the Judiciary Committe made in the title of its 2006 report on the Air Marshal's dress code.

How can it be so versatile?

I can't stop thinking about cotton and its various uses in clothing and other products.

Obviously I'm not the only one thinking about it.



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Baking update

When I posted yesterday about the weird chickpea based cake that I made last night I probably came to a few hasty conclusions based on incomplete knowledge.  Now that the cake is a few hours older I think I am in a better position to judge the recipe.

First of all, the cake definitely needs time to set.  I would guess that the 40 minutes suggested for baking is really fine.  Any gooeyness that I experienced last night was likely just because I didn't give the cake time to cool and set.  When I came back to it today the centre was not the least bit gooey.

Secondly, as the cake seems designed to be accessible for those with restricted diets the recipe is on the sparse side ingredientwise.  I think an easy way to really improve the cake would be to add a few walnut or pecan pieces, though this wouldn't work if you were preparing it for someone with a nut allergy.

This is definitely a recipe I will make again, if mainly for the novelty factor and to test my hunch about the  addition of nuts.

Oliver Sacks agrees (or is it the other way around?)

For the past few days I have been haphazardly picking at Oliver Sacks's The Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat (a book I first started reading in 2003).

Last night, while reading the section on Tourette's Syndrome I was struck by his discussion of a concept that seemed to parallel something I posted about a few days ago - our inclination to overlook concepts/ideas that aren't appropriately named.  Of course, Sacks's take on concepts without names, or johnny-come-lately re-remembered names, is a little more elegant than mine.

The day after seeing Ray, it seemed to me that I noticed three Touretters in the street in downtown New York.  I was confounded, for Tourette's syndrome was said to be excessively rare.  It had an incidence, I had read, of one in a million, yet I had apparently seen three examples in an hour.  I was thrown into a turmoil of bewilderment and wonder: was it possible that had been overlooking this all the time, either not seeing such patients or vaguely dismissing them as 'nervous', 'cracked', 'twitchy'?  Was it possible that everyone had been overlooking them?  Was it possible that Tourette's was not a rarity, but rather common - a thousand times more common, say, than previously supposed?  

Sacks also includes a nice footnote with another example of such an instance.

A very similar situation happened with muscular dystrophy, which was never seen until Duchenne described it in the 1850s.  By 1860, after his original description, many hundreds of cases had been recognised and described, so much so that Charcot said: "How come that a disease so common, so widespread, and so recognisable at a glance - a disease which has doubtless always existed - how come it is only recognised now?  Why did we need M. Duchenne to open our eyes?"

I can't help but wonder how many unnamed concepts are floating about whose naming would be of great use in my day to day life?

Branching out

Earlier tonight I baked a gluten-free/vegan chocolate chickpea cake.

Jeannette convinced me that instead of posting about it here (even though I wasn't really leaning in that direction) that I should write a 'guest post' on her blog.  To facilitate domestic harmony I created the suggested post.

For a 'cake' without flour, eggs, or added oil this thing is pretty tasty.  Oh, and as it is mostly chickpea it is probably higher in protein than most cakes you run across in your day-to-day life.

A Few Quick Notes 558

-On Thursday we received about 10-12 centimetres of snow in just a few hours.



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By yesterday afternoon/evening the snow was almost completely gone and it was almost 10.

Though Environment Canada is suggesting that it is currently about 1 in the region, I don't believe this. The continuing formation of ice suggests to me that it is at least below freezing and that it has been for a while.

Anyway, temperatures and conditions have definitely been yo-yoing recently and it is less than fun.

-Tonight Jeannette and I will be attending an Old Man Luedecke concert in Windsor.  The question on everyone's mind surely is whether or not he will perform the crowd favourite Joy of Cooking?




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-I think I will be making some leek and potato soup shortly.  Much to my surprise, we were able to buy both leeks and potatoes at our local farmer's market.

Gwynn-eh-a Pigg

A few days ago I couldn't stop thinking about "Gwynn-eh-a Pigg."  It was stuck in my head and I didn't know why.


Fortunately, after a few days of thinking and speaking this phrase I remembered the source - an episode of the Kasper Hauser Comedy Podcast.

Shortly after coming to this realization I remembered another episode of their's, this one dealing with spicy pony heads and I couldn't help but think it might be something that Kirsten would like.

Finally, some coverage of an issue close to my heart

For some time I have been concerned about the contemporary mainstream media practice of including content that journalists know to be untrue in their stories.  The situation frequently arises when a public figure says untrue and is then quoted, without a qualifying statement, by the media outlet.  To feign ignorance or simply fail to deal with such untruths, at least to me, seems to undermine the utility of the whole venture of journalism.

For quite a while I have had the sense that this is an issue that has been completely sidestepped by the mainstream medeia.  They just aren't interested in dealing with the issue and challenges that would be sure to crop up if such an approach were to be adopted.

My opinions on the issue aside, it seems that today an editor at the New York Times finally wondered if their readers were interested in having reporters actually try to alert readers of known falsehoods or claims of questionable validity.

Perhaps not surprisingly, at least based on an assessment of the article's highest rated comments, readers do seem to be interested in having their news sources call out politicians when they tell lies.  Most people seem to think that a news source isn't much of a news source if it doesn't accomplish this basic task.

Anyway, though the story was only posted this morning more than 250 comments have been logged and commenting further commenting has now been halted.

I suspect that they have attracted more of a response to this piece than they expected.

Anyway, I am curious to see how the paper responds to this uproar (as the editor's piece leaves the impression that they knowingly include false statements that they make no effort to correct in their paper on a regular basis).  Given the immediate web uproar surely at least a follow-up comment will be made?

On the Media lead me to this response to the original NYT piece.

Funny timing

Given my last post I thought it was funny that this afternoon I should happen to find in my RSS feed a report about the future of Via Rail.

A concept lacking a name

In Canada, as well as a few other Commonwealth countries, the term 'Crown corporation' is used to describe a set of entities owned by the state but run somewhat independently.  Good examples of Crown corporation in Canada include things like CBC or Via Rail.

Not surprisingly given the inclusion of the word 'corporation' in the term, these entities are often means through which the state can participate in economic activities.  In some instances these corporations almost look like their private counterparts while in other instances it is clear that they are government own entities.

So even though Crown corporations may be of provincial or federal origin, the term provides a sense of clarity about their origins and relationship to government.

When discussing similar entities I immediately encounter two problems.  Firstly, if such entities can't be called 'Crown corporations' what can they be called?  'Government-own corporations' is an entirely unsatisfying name.  And, secondly, because there is no unifying descriptor they don't seem to discussed in the same way.  I know that I often forget how many government owned entities exist is the US because we almost never hear discussion of the entire class of entities in the way that we do in Canada.

I can't help but wonder how political discourse would change in the US if there was an easy and accessible way to talk about the class of entities which includes Amtrak, the USPS, and the FDIC, just to name a few.

(Maybe it doesn't matter, but I find it funny that Amtrak and the USPS use .com domains while the FDIC has a .gov domain.)

Red sky

Jeannette just reminded me old sailing aphorism "Red sky at night, sailor's delight.  Red sky in morning, sailors take warning."

Now I guess we get to wait and watch the day's weather conditions.

A Few Quick Notes 557

-The temperature has been yo-yoing for the past few weeks.  For instance, yesterday we had a high of 5 while it is currently -13.  Apparently it is to be 10 on Friday.  Between now and Friday we are to have a series of different forms of precipitation starting with snow and ending with rain.  Sounds fun doesn't it?

-As Jeannette noted yesterday, we are currently in the midst of pomelo and blood orange season.  Is there a better time of year than a time of year when you can have a pomelo a day?

I think not.

-For better or worse it seems that to coincide with the beginning of a new season of Republic of Doyle a few new pitches have been posted at Doyle Pitches.  I suspect that the goal this year is, as Spike Lee almost said, "Mo' Better Pitches."

-Just days after I included a post about my podcast listening habits one of the individuals responsible for many of my listening habits also posted about his podcast listening habits.  Of course, Jesse Thorn's post includes a few more details about each of the podcasts he listens to than my post (one might even go so far as to say that it is informative).   What Jesse's post lacks, at least in comparison to mine, is an image that charts his development at a podcast listener.  I mean, really, who creates such a list without an accompanying info-graphic.  How gauche.

(I'm just glad tone comes across so clearly in electronic communications.)

Free parking in Halifax

As I have recently mentioned a few times, I just listened to the entire episode archive of the 99% Invisible podcast.  One of the first episodes of this show (but one of the last that I listened to) dealt with a new parking initiative that was being implemented in San Francisco.


99% Invisible-08- 99% Free Parking by Roman Mars

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The general parking scheme to be implemented in San Francisco, at least as described in the podcast, was to create a system that encouraged a more efficient use of available parking space (their goal is to always have one free space per block).  A key component of creating such an outcome is to have dynamic pricing that reflects usage.  Higher prices in high demand areas and lower prices in low demand areas.  Furthermore, such prices would change regularly to reflect changing usage patterns. (You can read more about the system at the SFPark.org site.)

Anyway, I was reminded of these concepts and ideas as I read a recent CBC article about planned changes to parking rules in Halifax.  Instead of dealing with parking congestion problems with an approach reminiscent San Francisco's, Halifax seems interested only interested in implementing a course permitting scheme that will be of the most benefit to homeowners on residential streets (who are currently complaining about the lack of available parking space on their streets).

Maybe I should take a second to step back and describe the parking situation as it exists on the non-campus streets near Dal, the province's largest university and an institution with a relatively well documented parking shortage.  What is immediately striking about parking near Dal is not that there are no available spaces, but that there are many near-empty streets with available on-street parking.  These streets have almost no cars because complicated no parking schedules (things like two hour maximums or absolutely no parking between certain hours) make them difficult to use for most people with commitments at Dal.  Of course, I should also note that the few completely unencumbered parking places are almost always taken.

So getting back to the new proposal, if streets in Halifax are uniformly converted from free parking to permitted parking a few problems may arise.  Firstly, streets that are now almost completely empty may fill up with newly permitted cars (making some aspects of the problem worse).  Secondly, homeowners will now have to pay for the privilege to park near their homes (though they will have reduced rates).  Thirdly, those with irregular commitments in areas impacted by the changes may have a harder time parking as they won't have a parking permit for the area in question (this is the change that really bothers me as it will likely impact me when I am trying to go to Dal).

But that brings us to a few questions: Do we have an inherent right to free on-street parking? and Do homeowners have an inherent right to street parking in front of their property?  I guess my initial response to both of these questions is 'no.'

Lets deal with the first question first.  As much as I like free on-street parking and as much as I think it is a reasonable thing municipality to decide to provide, I think one can make a pretty convincing argument that as streets that are wide enough to allow for on-street more parking cost more to build that such costs should be recouped from those using the service rather than the entire tax base.  Similar approaches are taken with regards to things like gas taxes or bridge tolls.  Thus a pay-for-parking approach isn't completely outside the norm in most North American contexts.

Now on to the second question.  Though homeowners in residential area might like to be able to park in front of their homes I'm not really sure that they really have much an argument beyond that.  If we look at cases of property ownership in areas of dense development we often see that there isn't enough room for all owners to take advantage of on-street parking, options other than parking in front of one's building must be found.  Thus I don't see that the home owners in Halifax should really have much of a claim to the on-street parking in front of their homes (particularly during business hours).  It should also be noted that as a property owner you can both choose how to allocate your property (such as how much of your property is dedicated to parking) and decide whether or not you own a car.  Expecting to also have some claim to street space for which you have not paid and that is not equally available to all property owners or residents seems a bit much to me.

Of course, the other part of the equation that has been seemingly completely ignored, at least if we use this CBC article as our only source, is that attempts could be made to reduce the number of individuals interested in parking in Halifax.  Maybe a better bus system or efforts to decrease sprawl might also help with parking problems.

I guess, in the end, I think that this policy is missing the point.  People parking on the street is fine, there is nothing inherently wrong with it (though a few parking garages and a more effective pricing scheme might not be completely uncalled for).  Furthermore, if you don't provide alternatives to street parking (either parking-wise or alternatives to driving) you won't really solve the problem, you might just shift it further afield.  And I suspect that in the best case scenario that is all this policy will do as they fundamentally haven't done anything to reduce the need for parking.

100% cotton?

For maybe the past four months or so I have been thinking about the composition of the material used in the construction of my clothing.  For the most part, though I don't have any particularly good reason for this decision, I have generally been trying to veer away from synthetics.  The result is that sometimes in the morning when I am selecting my clothing I happen to either examine a label or run through my mental list of natural fibre shirts.

Today was one of those mornings when I thought about such issues.  After some vacillation I ended going with a cotton/synthetic blend shirt, mainly because I hadn't worn the shirt since I started thinking about synthetic fibres and that seemed a little unfair to a shirt that I had purchased before I started caring about such things.  What had this shirt ever done to cause me to question my trust in it?  Had it not always met my expectations in terms of shirtiness?

So all day I quite self-conscious about the fact that I wasn't wearing a 100% cotton shirt.  It was weighing on my mind more than it should have been.

Late this afternoon, just as I was becoming comfortable with this morning's clothing choice I saw someone looking at my shirt.  He then asked "Is that 100% cotton?"

Really?

Who asks that question of anyone, let alone someone to whom they are not particularly close?  And why?  Does anyone really need to know that they are perfect at detecting 100% cotton shirts?

Anyway, now that I know people are thinking about the composition of my shirts I am sure that I will be a little more self-conscious about it (whether I should be or not).  Do I really want to be exposed more than once as someone who doesn't wear 100% cotton shirts?  What kind of animal would they think I am?

From This American Life to This is That

For a while I have been interested in creating a graphic representation of development of my podcast listening habits.  In particular, I was interested in looking at the podcasts that I have started listening to either directly because of This American Life or because of podcasts that I started listening to because of other podcasts I had started listening to because of This American Life.

Anyway, last night I got around to sketching out a rough diagram (which I then converted into the image below today). 

I'm sure this image will be as helpful to you as it will be to me.

Note: The Sound of Young America has received credit for referring some podcasts that I actually started listening to because of the Maximumfun.org Podthoughts column.  Also, I know that The Sound of Young America is now called Bullseye, but it was the original incarnation of the show that lead me to these other podcasts, not the one episode of Bullseye that currently exists.

Different takes on the same announcement

Earlier today the Government of Nova Scotia announced the details of a new MOU with the province's universities.  I gather that in general austerity is the theme of the announcement (with $25 million in funding specifically dedicated to cost cutting - however that is supposed to work).

Of course how the province is presenting this announcement is a little different than some media sources.  To demonstrate the difference I thought it might be fun to provide the first paragraphs from a sources covering this issue.

To start, here is the first paragraph from the government's news release:

A three-year memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the province and Nova Scotia's 11 universities will ensure tuition remains at, or below, the national average, increases research and development opportunities, and invests $25 million in universities to help them become more sustainable.

 From the Metro's story on the topic:

The Nova Scotia government will allow tuition fees to rise by three per cent a year while reducing its grant to universities.

From the Chronicle Herald's story:

Nova Scotia universities will see a three per cent cut in provincial funding, Labour and Advanced Education Minister Marilyn More announced this afternoon.  

 From the Globe and Mail's story:

The Nova Scotia government will allow tuition fees to rise by three per cent a year while reducing its grant to universities.

(As you may haven noticed, there is a striking similarity between the Metro and Globe and Mail paragraphs.  Though the stories had different headlines it seems that they both just re-issued the Canadian Press story.)

I guess the media wasn't too interested in going with the province's take on things in this case.

Vegans are my favourite vegetarians

I’m not always so hot on vegetarianism generally (especially those ‘vegetarian’ diets that consider fish to be an acceptable food for a vegetarian), but I tend to think that veganism is pretty great.  Not only have they fully committed to the ‘no animal products’ position, but so many of the foods I do my best to avoid are also avoided by vegans.  Because of these dietary similarities I always feel that I have a special bond with vegans and, thus, I do my best to accommodate their needs whenever I preparing foods for vegans.  Even if there are no vegans present, if I have prepared a vegan meal I will often make a point of announcing it to those present (and I will then try to remember the recipe in case I need to prepare food for a vegan in the future).

Given my feelings towards vegans I thought I should come up with a (hopefully only) mildly insulting and very personal list of the six best things about vegans/veganism.

6) Vegans tend to read labels and know what they are eating.  Though I don’t always do this myself, I am in favour of people being informed eaters.

5) Vegans take the heat for picky eaters.  If there is a vegan around I know they will make me look good because I won’t be the pickiest eater present.

4) Vegans never add unnecessary cheese or dairy products to recipes. 

3) Vegans never slip shrimp or the other invertebrate seafood into dishes. 

2) If there’s white stuff in a vegan dish I now that it isn’t mayonnaise, and this is good because mayonnaise is the grossest.

1) The best thing about vegans is that they never add honey to recipes as a sugar replacement.  Knowing that I never have to worry about this makes eating vegan deserts a real treat.

A Bunny Watson moment

This past weekend Jeannette took it upon herself to watch the three Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings movies.  Though I am not a fan of these movies, I did end up catching a few minutes here and there.

After watching the movies Jeannette and I were both quite taken with the similarities between the Lord of the Rings story and the Harry Potter story/books.

Of course, this discussion reminded me of the Radiolab piece from a few years ago about Wagner's Ring Cycle. While this piece is mostly about the Ring Cycle, they do discuss some of the similarities between Wagner's work and Tolkien's.



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This piece, like most of Radiolab's output, is easy to access and informative.

A Few Quick Notes 556

-I woke up this morning to find a fresh dusting of snow.  Though the snow has since melted, the temperature didn't really rise much above 0.  Of course tonight it is supposed to drop to -10.  And we are to have a little more snow.

-For the past few weeks, basically since we first started getting temperatures close to 0, we have huge humidity problems in our apartment.  Strangely, the humidity seems to be most problematic when it is coldest (in that the water is most prone to condense on our windows during in such conditions).  Fortunately the dehumidifier we bought a few weeks ago has made a substantial improvement.  Though, much to my surprise, even with this piece of equipment running almost constantly we still have so much humidity and condensation that we can't see through some of the windows in our apartment.

This definitely isn't a problem I had in Halifax or Montreal.

-When we moved from Halifax one of the things I had to part with was Neil's Sodastream water carbonating unit.  All of a sudden I was back into the habit of buying 2 litre bottles of carbonated water.

Fortunately, for Christmas Jeannette was thoughtful enough to give me one of these devices.  Since I have had this thing I feel as though I haven't stopped carbonating water.  Though it seem unlikely that I am actually drinking three to four litres of carbonated water a day, I don't think that there are any other reasonable explanations for all of my carbonating.

-Apparently today is the day of the Iowa caucuses. Do you think Obama win?

New/re-branded stuff on the internets

Today marks the launch of the re-branded/organized/titled/conceptualized version of the podcast/public radio show The Sound of Young America now called Bullseye with Jesse Thorn.  As was the case with TSOYA, Bullseye has pop-culture-y interviews and comedy stuff.  Oh, and in the first episode Jesse interviews a few cast members from everybody's favourite costume drama - Downton Abbey.

In honour of this event I thought that I might mention three other things from the internet that are either new or in the process of re-imagining themselves.

1) When Jessica, an early reader of this blog, moved to Korea about two years ago she expressed an interest in engaging in some form of blogging or blogging-like activity to communicate her experiences in her new place of residence.  It seems that the prospect of being "a blogger for the government of Korea" finally motivated her to create her own blog a few weeks ago.  And now that she has been selected by the Korean government to participate in their blogging program she will also be posting on their blog.

3)Andrew, a fellow Brinton Memorial Elementary School alumnus, has also recently started a blog after seeming interested in the prospect for some time.  Andrew's blogging goal is to watch and review at least 365 movies over the course of 2012.  At last count he has posted five such reviews.  If he doesn't watch out me my overrun his goal, and that wouldn't be fun for anyone would it?

3) To get back to the re-branding/imagining theme I first touched on with Bullseye, Jeannette has recently re-imagined her long-ignored Chinafax blog and is now using to document her exploits in the uncharted territory that is veganism in Wolfville.  This one is definitely worth checking out as I even get a shout or two as being someone who is not entirely antagonistic towards such a venture.

I think that just about wraps it up for new things on the internet.  I can't imagine that there might be more than three of them, that would probably be just a little too much for the information super highway to accomodate.

Note: Using 'blog' so many times in a single post makes me feel like a bit of a loser.  Sorry to have tarnished so many fine endeavours with this questionable word.

Did anyone else know about this?

I am currently in the midst of reading a Canadian Parliamentary Review article by former Speaker Peter Milliken.  Though just a few paragraphs into the article I was a little taken aback to find out that while in office Milliken routinely organized dinners for MPs.  According to Milliken

As Speaker of the House of Commons, I made use of a variety of tools, not all of which are found in the Chamber, to allow me opportunities to reinforce the Members’ perception that I was in office as Speaker to serve all regardless of party affiliation. For example, I instituted an ongoing series of dinners to which, in due course, every Member of the House was invited. Members from each of the parties represented in the House were invited to each dinner, always in different groupings. The effect of this was to encourage informal social contact between Members from the different parties with a view to fostering an atmosphere of greater collegiality and, by extension, greater civility in the House.

 Assuming these dinners had the effect Milliken suggests they did and given the relatively raucous nature of recent parliamentary sessions, I wonder how the last parliament would have behaved had these dinners not been held?

Now I know who to blame

For the past few years I have been frustrated by the increasing difficulty I am have when shopping for blocky toothbrushes.  Frequently I have had to settle for toothbrushes with displeasing round handles (they don't fit in so many toothbrush holders and they just look so big and clunky).

While listening to an early episode of 99% Invisible, a podcast I mentioned a few days ago, I finally learned why hunt for the classic boxy toothbrush has become so hard, and why it is likely to stay that way.

 

[Embedded audio]

It seems that someone finally thought about how people actually hold toothbrushes and discovered that the square shape wasn't necessarily best suited to the way most people grip them.  Seemingly overnight most major manufacturers dropped the old design and adopted the new one (Is this not also a major intellectual property issue?).

Of course this happened quietly.  There was no announcement made to indicate that one toothbrush handle style would be phased out and another introduced.  They were there one day and beginning to vanish the next.

Unfortunately, at least as far as I am concerned, I am one of those individuals whose grip style was suited to the classic toothbrush shape (though I don't know if my grip suited the shape or if the shape shaped my grip).

Now, years after the major shift in toothbrush design, I am left hunting for (and hoarding) toothbrushes with the handle style that I like with the knowledge that they are likely soon to be extinct.  With each passing brush the my remaining stash becomes valuable.  And replenishing my stash is becoming harder and harder.

Though it may have several admirable features and fans, like the incandescent lightbulb, the classic blocky handled toothbrush seems to on irreversible march towards oblivion.  And though our numbers may be few, there are at least a few of us who will mourn the passing of these simple bathroom accoutrements.

(Just to be clear, I really do appreciate 99% Invisible's story on design changes to toothbrush handles.  This clears up something I have been wondering about for years.  Furthermore, I don't even bear any ill will to those who have inadvertently lead to the demise of my preferred toothbrush handle shape - they were just trying to come up with a better toothbrush handle shape.  I just wish my preferred style of toothbrush handle hadn't been pushed out of the marketplace.)

Information they don't post in Newfoundland

A few days ago I noticed a CBC story about Newfoundland and Labrador not posting restaurant inspection results for the public to see, and not having any plans to do so in the near future.

At the time my thought was that the implementation of such a scheme would likely be relatively straightforward, particularly because the data already exists (and probably in a relatively accessible way).  Basically all the province would need to do is release it to the public.

Moments ago I happened to be browsing through New Brunswick related web-content and found their restaurant inspection depository.  From what I can tell from this site, it looks as though this process is just about as easy as thought it would be.  I imagine that they have a database that then feeds the site so that the most current reports are displayed and restaurant profiles automatically updated.  Presumably they would have such a database even if they weren't actively providing the information to the public, the internal management of the data would require such a structure.

Perhaps not surprisingly, most of the location being inspected seem to pass quite easily.  Though I was surprised to see some of the infractions.  In particular I was surprised to see infractions that I just wouldn't have really thought likely.

For instance, in at least one case a location was cited or not having refrigerators with thermometers.  Such an infraction immediately raises at least two questions.  Firstly, if fridge thermometers are required wouldn't you expect them to come with fridges?  Secondly, given that these inspections seem to be somewhat regular, how could such an infraction arise in a place that is not new to the food service industry?  Shouldn't such an infraction have been caught almost immediately?

If you examine the inspection report I just linked to you might also see that there seems to sometimes be inconsistency between the broad information provided about the report and the details contained within.  Notably, the report itself suggests that the last inspection was on November 22, 2011 and that the follow-up should be on December 6, 2011.  The higher level information suggests that the last inspection was on November 22, 2011 but that the follow-up inspection should be on January 16, 2012.

One final thing that I found interesting about these New Brunswick restaurant inspection reports is that they seem to either be done in English or French, not in both languages.  Furthermore, one has to open the report to see in which language the report was prepared.

Third time's a charm?

For the third time Jeannette is giving her Chinafax blog a go.

It seems that with each iteration there is an intended theme.  So far my sense of things is that if there is a theme to describe this attempt at blogging it would be 'projects,' though a very loose sense of the word.  Projects, in this case, might be taken to mean something like a crafting project or a diet-based project.

Anyway, if you are interested please check it out (my felting gets a shout out so it will definitely be worth your while).

Getting my felt on - 3

It turns out I couldn't stay away from felting (or time-lapse) for very long.


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This afternoon I made a small felted bowl-type thing.  I am not yet sure which purpose it will serve, but I am generally pleased with the outcome, particularly for a second solo felting attempt.

The only aspect of the project that I am not quite satisfied with is the fact that some of the coloured wool seems to have bleed through to the other side of wherever it was placed.

Maybe at some point I will even give Jeannette a chance to give her felting stuff a test run.

A Few Quick Notes 555

-After a remarkably warm and rainy day yesterday that wiped out our White Christmas snow we are back to wintery sub-zero temperatures.  Overnight we also managed to replace some of the snow that we lost due to yesterday's rain.  Given the current forecast it looks as though we may be able to ride this wintery mix into the new year.  Hurrah.

-Because of some recent holiday baking miscalculations I  recently found myself with an extra litre of buttermilk in my fridge.  Jeannette, as one who seems to have been completely unaware of the existence of buttermilk until a few days ago, has been less than helpful when it comes to suggestions for how to use this stuff before it spoils.

Fortunately I am on the case and actively trying to come up with reasonable uses for this specialty dairy product.

This morning I threw some into some pumpkin bran muffins with positive results.  Actually, I think I am now going to be disappointed with buttermilk-less pumpkin bran muffins.

When I next have to make bread, probably in a few days, I will try to toss some in.

Even with this two projects (one completed and one still in the conceptual stages) I will still probably have between one to two cups of buttermilk left.  Hopefully I can come up with something reasonable in the next few days.

-I am hoping that later today I can finish off the rest of the turkey by preparing a turkey pot-pie.  Once this is taken care of I think I will be through with Christmas leftovers.

Getting my felt on - 2

So the whole felting project moved along rather quickly.

Soon after starting with my basic and equipment and some unspun wool...

...I ended up with a mushroom shaped something or other, though it is currently functioning as a top-heavy pin cushion.

My only problem now is that I have an urge to do more felting and I can't think of anything useful to make.

Getting my felt on - 1

After a two-year hiatus I plan on getting back into needle felting tonight. My plan is to start small. I am going to try to start with some kind of needle cushion type thing. This will then be used by Jeannette when she uses her new sewing machine to make me socks and other sewing machine-made clothes. (No more clothes shopping for me.) The great thing about such a project is that just about any outcome will be at least somewhat functional as a pin cushion. That said, I really do hope to end up with somemthing functional and nice. Here we go.

As the year comes to an end

At the beginning of the year I was really cranking out blog posts at an unsustainable and unhealthy rate.  By the end of February we already had more than 140 posts.

Not surprisingly, it didn't take Neil long to comment on this prodigious rate of production.  Neil suspected that I might overwhelm readers before long.

And Neil being Neil he was also interested in turning the whole situation into something of a game.  Neil, Rebecca, Jeannette, Peter, and I all supplied guesses as to how many posts I would have by year's end.

My recollection is that a few people, maybe Rebecca and Jeannette, guessed close to 500 while I thought my own production would be closer to 400.

Amazingly, with little conscious effort to make it so, I suspect that my number will the the number that is closest to the actual number of posts.  And while some of you might point out that this isn't surprising as I was the only one in the position to control the output of blog posts I don't recall ever trying to manipulate the number so that it would be closer to my guess, though I did know that I would be embarrassed if I had close to 600 posts and had allowed other commitments to fall by the wayside.

Anyway, maybe this is all just a way of drawing attention to the fact that we are now approaching the end of the fifth full calendar year of Montifax's existence.  I guess I am not only surprised that it still is an active entity, but that five years in it was looking as though we would have more posts than ever.

To our loyal (and presumably masochistic) readers, thanks for sticking with us.  Our readers more than anyone else know that even after five years of blogging we really aren't that good at it yet and that even a few more years probably won't help that much.

Big week for the federation

Earlier this week news came out that Ottawa was, at least to some extent, relinquishing its use of the spending power to shape national health policy.  The likely eventual consequence of such a decision is that provinces will have more flexibility in terms of the structure their public healthcare systems.  Of course whether such changes in the way provincial programs are funded actually will lead to many changes (or more divergence than we already see) is not yet known.

And now today one of the federal government's big centralizing moves, the creation of a national securities regulator, seems to have been quashed by the Supreme Court of Canada.  Or as they put it:

The  Securities Act as presently drafted  is not valid under the general branch of the federal power to regulate trade and commerce under s. 91(2) of the Constitution Act, 1867. 

 Or if you want a slightly more detail rich version of their position:

In sum, the proposed Act overreaches genuine national concerns.  While the economic importance and pervasive character of the securities market may, in principle, support federal intervention that is qualitatively different from what the provinces can do, they do not justify a wholesale takeover  of the regulation of the securities industry which is the ultimate consequence of the proposed federal legislation.  A cooperative approach that permits a scheme recognizing the essentially provincial nature of securities regulation  while allowing Parliament to deal with genuinely national concerns remains available and is supported by Canadian constitutional principles and by the practice adopted by the federal and provincial  governments in other fields of activities.

Anyway, though it may be too early to tell how the healthcare funding changes play out, it looks as though this has been a pretty good week for a decentralized federation.  Of course, if you aren't a particularly big fan of Canada being a decentralized federation and are all about national standards this may have been one of the worst weeks for you in many years.

No matter where you stand on the centralization/decentralization debate, at least you will all now have good grist for the conversation mill this holiday season.

Holiday animation fun

A few days or weeks ago Jeannette suggested that we try to meld her love of making small clay figures with my love of horrible homemade stop-motion animation in holiday-y clip.

After weeks of procrastination (or in this case actually do more important things) we finally got around to it last night.  After about an hour of production time (including the creation of the figures and set, script conception and writing, principal photography, and editing) we were able to crank out the following 1:05 second clip.

 

[Embedded video]

Hope it was worth the minute.

And then there were three

As I mentioned yesterday, for the past few months we have been receiving calls from collection agencies for two individuals.  Given the consistency of these calls I just kind of assumed that these were the only two individuals for whom we would receive calls.

It seems I was wrong.

Just moments ago I received a call for a third individual, though in this case I don't think that it was a creditor calling.

I can't help but think that we managed to get a a particularly active recycled phone number.  Two to four calls a day is starting to get a little annoying.

Doesn't ring true

Grocery stores are some of my favourite stores.  Not only are they great places to visit in your hometown, but they are really wonderful entry points to local culture while travelling.  Grocery stores provide a pretty unvarnished glimpse into what people are consuming and how much they are paying for it.

Given my appreciation of these stores it may not come as a surprise that while visiting such establishments I frequently try to get a sense of some of the prices.  I am particularly interested common foods, like flour and bread, that one can find in a pretty wide range of locales.

Anyway, the reason for this discussion of my love of grocery stores and grocery pricing is because I just read a Globe and Mail article about higher food prices that really didn't ring true to me.

To be a little more precise, aspects of the article didn't ring true to me.  It wasn't really the general thrust of the article with which I had a problem (I agree that food prices do seem to be heading up), but it was a particular sentence that bothered me.

Canadians have had years of access to cheaper food, and on average devoted far less of their household budgets to groceries than people in other countries.

While it may be true that food costs in Canada are lower than in some other countries, they aren't countries I have visited.  When in the two non-Canadian countries with which I am most familiar, the US and the UK, I am always struck by the lower food prices.  More expensive wheat, particularly given Canada's prominence as a wheat producer, always strikes me as a particularly noticeable trend here.

Furthermore, though I didn't follow all imported food prices closely at the time, I don't recall ever seeing a dramatic price drop in Canadian grocery prices when the dollar surged in value a few years ago (a trend which seems to parallel the continuing discrepancy in US/Canada book prices).  For instance, shouldn't oranges, a entirely imported product, have taken something like a 30% price dip to reflect our increasing purchasing power?

For some reason I keep get the sense that in Canada the consumer is frequently not reaping the benefits of changes in global market places (though had the Globe and Mail cited their source it is possible I could follow up and learn that my sense of things is off).

A Few Quick Notes 554

-Though we have finally dropped down to sub-zero temperatures in Wolfville, things are still looking quite nice today.  A few recent dustings of snow are making things look particularly festive.  I am even hopeful that we may manage to squeeze out a nice sunset this afternoon evening.

-My Christmas preparations, aside from some gift shopping and thinking about all of the cleaning I will likely need to do, started in earnest today when I made some bread that I eventually intend to use for the turkey stuffing.  As much as I am willing to admit that it does seem a bit weird to intention bake bread to allow it to go stale, it seems even weirder to me to buy bread with the intention of letting it go stale.  Anyway, the deed has been done and the bread is now working its way towards staleness.

-The individuals previously associated with our phone number are still receiving daily calls from creditors.  While I seem to have talked a collection agency into not calling, we are still receiving regular calls for another individual from a major financial institution.  As I have already spoken to the company once I don't really know what my next step is (the calls are automated, making one-on-one interactions with the staff difficult).

(While writing this I had to deal with another such call, though this time from a person.  I suspect I was talking to a collection agency, but as there number was blocked I can't confirm this hunch.)

-I probably listen to too many podcasts.  I consume them while cooking, cleaning, walking, procrastinating, and riding the bus.  They're the best.  And there's little I like more than discovering a great new podcast with an archive I can compulsively listen to over the course of a few days.

Anyway, this is a long way of saying that I have recently found two podcasts that I am in the midst of acquainting myself with.  The first one, HOW TO DO EVERYTHING, which seems to be NPR/WBEZ associated, is pretty light and concerns itself with a Richardson's Rounduppesque assortment of topics.  The second one, 99% Invisible (which I discovered thanks to a recent Radiolab episode), is a little more serious and generally deals with topics relating to architecture and design.

How to construct an argument

I think I have been able to distill the fundamental approach to argument making used by many current undergraduate students.

The whole things boils down to a simple two step process.

Step 1: Define a term

Start by defining a term very poorly. To make this most of it you probably want to omit a few key components of the definition.

Example: A lady is something that has hair, legs, breasts, and a circulatory system.

Step 2: Identify an object

You then want to identify something that has these characteristics. Whether or not the entity should be labelled in this way is besides the point. Of course, once the faulty association between the term and the object has been made no effort should be made to confirm whether or not this position conflicts with the common understanding of either the terms or the objects in question.

Example: Gandhi had hair, legs, breasts, and a circulatory system. It has been conclusively proven that Gandhi is a lady.

Voila, you're done. You now have yourself the basis of your term paper. Add a little repetition and a snappy conclusion and you have your final product. That didn't take very long did it?

Not one, but two

So it seems that we our phone number was likely associated with not one, but two individuals being hounded by collection agencies. While it seems that I was able to shake one of the companies, and hopefully everything for the first guy, companies are still calling about the second guy.

Fun.

Do you think they will give us a Christmas morning call?

10 tips for a more successful essay

I am currently in the midst of grading a batch of first year social science essays. What always impresses me about the essay grading process is that so many of the same mistakes and missteps are made by relatively large proportions of each class.

Not that I expect people to necessarily find or read this, but I thought that I should maybe try to compile a few tips based on some of the most common problems I have encountered while grading essays.

Anyway, here goes.

1 – Though it seems that most of the essays I grade do it, starting one’s essay with a broad, but unsupportable, claim is not a particularly good idea. The person grading your essays know that you don’t really know that ‘Everyone loves X.’ Don’t start your essay by giving the grader a reason to think that you don’t know what you’re doing.

2 – Proof read your essay before submitting it. Make sure that what you are saying is what you actually want to be saying. Nothing gives away a rush job like an incoherent essay.

3 – Make sure that you use the right word. There are all kinds of homophones out there waiting to be misused. Don’t fall for them. ‘Poll’ is not the same as ‘pole’ which is not the same as ‘Pole.’ Not only are such mistakes embarrassing in hindsight, but they also display a lack of attention to detail and are frequently a good sign that the writer doesn’t really know much about what they are writing about.

4 – You aren’t Dickens - so don’t write like him. Though they may be tempting, avoid artificially long and complex sentences. While these guys may juice your word count they also make the essay harder to read (and many times there are also issues on the execution front). Clarity is essential. If the grader can’t read the essay it doesn’t matter that you managed to squeeze in a few extra words.

5 – Make sure that your essay is the required length. If the assigned essay is to be five pages long then it should be five pages long. Though reasonable graders will usually accept some flexibility around the edges, being 20% or 30% over or under is asking for trouble. The worst part about mistakes of this nature is that they are pretty easy to avoid. Before you even submit your essay you know how long your essay is and how long it should be. Make sure that these two things match.

6 – If the assignment requires that you use a certain number of scholarly sources then use at least that number of scholarly sources. Failure to meet the basic requirements as outlined in the assignment is a great way to lose points. Oh, and while you’re at it, why not trying using a standard citation format?

7 – An unsubstantiated fact or direct quote without a source isn’t worth very much these days. It is essential that you cite the sources of your information. Not only will this help you avoid charges of plagiarism, but it will also help you strengthen your position. And if you have done the work why not demonstrate that this is the case?

8 – Avoid repetition. Graders know if you are just saying the same thing again and again. And it gets old fast.

9 – Don’t write with your thesaurus. In my experience overuse of one word is almost always better than the misuse of several words. If you would like a larger vocabulary, always a laudable goal, try hitting your dictionary in the off-season so you are ready to go come essay writing season.

10 – Don’t underestimate the intelligence of the person grading your essay. If it is a rush job they will know. If you don’t know what you are talking about they will know. And there’s a good chance they will be able to tell if you have claimed a professional’s writing as your own.

Bonus Tip – And maybe this is the most important one, start early and do the work. It will show.

So it's going to be nice tomorrow?

Over the past few days I have heard reports about a 'weather bomb' that may be approaching the region. Apparently much of the province is for some heavy rain and wind.

When I went to the Environment Canada site to find the local forecast and warnings I was surprised to see that they didn't appear to have any for the region.

I then decided to check the general warnings page to see if they might have been listed there but not cross-posted to the local page. While there I saw that there are, in fact, warnings for much of the province, but we seem to live in one of the three counties without a weather warning.

I presume this means tomorrow won't be anything special?

And now it's the basis of a lawsuit

You may recall that a few months ago I brought up the issue that in Newfoundland and Labrador voters were able to cast special ballots before an election had been called.

Though I didn't hear anything about this issue from any of the parties during the election, it seems that a close election result in Burin-Placentia West has lead to a lawsuit being filed on this very issue. The NDP candidate is claiming that these provisions violated the Charter.

While I have no idea how this lawsuit will play out, I am certain that this is an important issue.

Hopefully a better process will be in place before the next provincial election.

No, not all skiers

So the bill about requiring ski helmets in Nova Scotia that I mentioned yesterday has now been posted online. As you may recall, I was interested in whether or not the requirement would actually apply to all skiers, as was reported in the CBC article, or if it would specifically apply to downhill skiers.

It turns out that this very issue is dealt with in s. 2 of the bill.

The purpose of this Act is to protect the health of Nova Scotians by requiring people to wear protective helmets while downhill skiing or snowboarding at ski hills where people pay to ski or snowboard.

Of course, I guess this means that if you are just out in the woods or at an abandoned ski hill there would be no requirement to wear a helmet.

There are also sections of the act that seem to provide the potential for abuse.

7 (1) For the purpose of enforcing this Act and the regulations, an enforcement officer may, without a warrant,
(a)investigate any complaint of a contravention of this Act or the regulations and examine any person to determine if a contravention has occurred;
(b) from time to time and at all reasonable times, enter the property or premises of an owner or any other person if it is reasonably necessary to do so in order to determine whether or not this Act and the regulations are being complied with;
(c) request that a person remove the person's helmet and provide it for inspection;
(d) require a person to provide the person's name and address or proof of identity; and
(e) do any other thing necessary for the purpose of enforcing this Act and the regulations.

Is it really necessary to allow enforcement officers to be able to request ID and proof of address if there is no suspicion of wrong-doing? Or that people must submit to helmet inspections? What about s. 8 of the Charter?

8. Everyone has the right to be secure against unreasonable search or seizure.

Can this invasion really be "demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society"?

Yesterday, while looking for a copy of the bill, I happened to come across the press release issued to announce the impending introduction of this bill. Something that caught my eye in the press release was the claim that "The Snowsport Helmet Act will be the first legislation of its kind in the world." Could this really be true? Had no other jurisdiction tried to implement a mandatory helmet law?

Well, after a few minutes of searching I came to the conclusion that the claim may not be entirely accurate (it likely depends on your definition of 'first of its kind'). It seems that in California legislation was introduced, and passed by both houses of the legislature, that would have required those under sixteen to wear helmets while downhill skiing. Though the bill had legislative support it was eventually vetoed by California first post-Schwarzenegger governor.

So if you take 'first of its kind' to mean 'bill requiring some segment of the population to wear helmets while skiing' it is clear that this bill is not the first of its kind. On the other hand, if you take 'first of its kind' to mean 'bill requiring all downhill skiers to wear helmets while skiing' then the claim may hold water, though I can't claim to have done a particularly extensive search.

All skiers? Really?

CBC Nova Scotia has just reported that "The Nova Scotia government plans to pass a law requiring all skiers to wear helmets." Not surprisingly, the story doesn't have too many details on the proposed legislation.

I can't help but wonder if it is really necessary to require cross country skiers to wear helmets as they majestically make their way through the countryside at sub-10 KPH speeds. Requiring cross-country skiers to wear helmets is practically like requiring a walking/running helmet. Until I get to see the text of the bill I won't know if this really is the intent of the legislation, or if this is just another instance of sloppiness in the original media report.

My favourite kind of email...

...is the kind in which the message starts with something like "As you are aware" and then the writer conveys bad news that you didn't already know. A few years ago I learned about not getting a SSHRC fellowship this way, and today I learned about someone leaving a job.

I think the special force of this email structure comes not only from getting the bad news, but also from the fact that it indicated that you are really out of the loop or not with it. And that's exactly how you want to feel when you get bad news.

It's gone on long enough

For some reason when one moves up from fast food coffee chains to more expensive coffee houses certain differences are immediately apparent. At least as far as the coffee is concerned I see most of these changes as positive. For instance, I do like having some choice when it comes to roast or whether I would like an espresso-based beverage (not that this is a choice I often make). But, unfortunately, there is one coffee-based difference that seems common to many of these operations that I really dislike. For some reason, these places do not add milk or cream to the coffee before it is handed to the patron.

Maybe the most obvious reason for my dislike of this practice is that the pourers routinely leave room in the cup for milk or cream. As someone who takes my coffee black this means that I am being shorted coffee and not making up for it by taking advantage of the available (relatively more expensive) condiments. This is all the more galling as I’m paying more for the pleasure of being shorted coffee than I would pay for coffee at the cheaper fast food coffee places where I’ve never been shorted on coffee just because I like it black.

My second problem with this practice is more of a safety/spillage concern. So instead of handing me a to-go cup of coffee that is ready to consume, this places will hand me unlidded cups of hot coffee. I know that I am unlikely to spill this coffee on myself, but when I am handling multiple flimsy paper cups at the same time I do enjoy the comfort of a lid.

Of course getting a lid for the coffee is usually another issue. Instead of having the lids near the cash register they are usually near the milk, so that those adding milk can grab them when they have done. Of course, if you won’t want milk this means a trek to the milk stand. If a group ahead of you is at the milk stand you may have to wait or contend with other customers ineptly milking and lidding their coffee. Oh, and this area is usually a mess as people have been spilling milk and sugar since opening time. And as a black coffee drinker spilled milk and sugar are exactly what I want to deal with after I have just ordered a beverage without those ingredients.

And if I have ordered a beverage with those ingredients, which only happens when I am ordering for others, I don’t want to have to figure out how much milk or sugar are typically served with coffee. And even if I knew how much were desired, that I have to add the ingredients myself makes life more difficult when placing an order for a group, a process which is relatively straightforward at most fast food coffee shops. And if nothing else, isn’t service what we’re paying for at a place like this?

A final consideration, and though it doesn’t really impact me directly would seem to be of some significance to the milk in coffee segment of the population, is that when cold milk is added to hot coffee (rather than the other way around) more damage is done to the protein in the milk. Put another way, adding coffee to milk means that more of the nutritional benefits of the milk are be passed along to the consumer than if milk is added to coffee. Ironically, the fast food coffee chains typically do it the healthy way.

So given these concerns, and more that I haven’t dealt with, I don’t understand why this trend seems to be spreading. How has there not been a major outcry from the coffee consuming public to end these unsafe and unhealthy practices? This inferior service model must be stopped.

That explains the daily phone calls

Since we have had the phone number we have now we have been getting all kinds of calls for someone named Johnson. These calls started within hours of the phone line's activation.

My guess would be that we are currently getting about a phone call a day for this Johnson, presumably the previous occupier of this number.

After a while Jeannette guessed that the frequency of the calls suggested that this Johnson likely owed somebody money. Well, after just having receiving an automated call from a collection agency I feel that I am in a position to confirm this hunch.

The upside is that we now know why we are getting so many calls. The downside is that we now also know that until we convince them that we are not who they are looking for we will continue to receive daily calls.