A Little More Trailer Time

On By WinstonIn Loving Life, Personal, UncategorizedLeave a comment

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Tammy is back in Sudbury, and I’m back at my trailer. We drove up on Saturday, and back to Ottawa on Sunday. That’s about 650kms each way. Since I don’t drive, that’s a lot of driving for Lynn. From the get-go, we planned on stopping at the trailer on the way home. Officially, it’s to save Lynn the extra hour and change to drive all the way to the other side of Ottawa, really we just wanted some trailer time.

I was up and out on my deck by 7am, Lynn may have slept a little later. So I sat out here and enjoyed the cool, early morning breeze and watched chipmunks and birds in my yard. I read for a while, then took a little nap in the shade. When my shade went away I went inside and read for while before taking another nap. After that, I made a late lunch for Lynn and I.

Now I’m back out on my deck. The day is still hot, but under the awning there’s just enough breeze to make it pleasant. The only question now is, “Do we go home tonight or wait until morning?”

I haven’t been able to get up here for a while, and I won’t be back until mid-month. I think I should stay to the last possible moment. It is so peaceful here. We both feel renewed when we go back into town and back to the “real world”. I’m okay with getting up early if it means I get to enjoy a little more trailer time.

My Happy Place

On By WinstonIn Loving Life, Personal, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Today’s post is all about the things we take for granted. This has a lot to do with being home all alone. Lynn, Cynthia and Tammy have taken my dog and run away. At least as far as our trailer. That was another thing on my niece’s to do list, spend a few days at our trailer and relax for the last of her vacation. I can’t say as I blame her at all.

Perhaps, “take for granted” isn’t quite what I want to say. Maybe it’s more about comfort. We are a comfort loving species. We live for our routines and the security of the well trod pathways of our daily lives. Personally, my routine revolves around my wife, and my daughter and my dog. Not having them here always messes me up.

Don’t misunderstand, I don’t begrudge them the time at the trailer. I just don’t feel right in my skin or in my heart when they aren’t with me. I know that sounds all kinds of needy, and but it’s more than that. They are a major part of the fabric of of my life.

When we are all home, and Cynthia spends most of her time in her room on her computer. Lynn and I are together on the couch, and but often doing differnt things. My dog is there, snoozing on his bed at our feet. It’s how my world is meant to be. We don’t do everything together. But we can if we choose to. When I don’t have that option, life isn’t as enjoyable.

Everyone has the things that make them happy, and bring them peace, and and complete them. It’s different for everyone. My family is what gets it done for me. My home is wherever they are. When they’re away, I can sit in my living room and feel far from home. That’s what I’m feeling now. I’m not so much lonely, I’m homesick, but only for a couple more days. I can tough it out for that long. I’m sure of it…….. I think.

Then I get my happy place back! ;^D

Cheers, Winston

Keep The Good Times Rolling!

On By WinstonIn Loving Life, Personal, UncategorizedLeave a comment

If you read the previous post, you will recall the near disaster when when we took my neice to the Museum of Nature Monday.   I am happy to report that our trip to the National Gallery went more smoothly.

Neither Lynn nor Cynrhia were really interested in the gallery, so it was just Tammy and myself.  We managed to enjoy ourselves anyway.  In fact, we had a blast.

The first thing that struck me on entering is it’s similarity to Dr Who’s T.A.R.D.I.S.  It seems much larger on the inside than it appears on the outside.  From the outside, it looks big.  On the inside, it’s enormous.  This became painfully obvious around the same time I realized it’s a bad idea to try to do it all in one day. 

Not only is it a great deal of walking, but you become saturated with art.  It turns out that there is a finite amount of beauty and wonder that I can absorb in a given day.  Spending the entire day surrounded by the work of legends (Rembrandt, Ruebens, Krieghoff, Tom Thompson, to name a few) hit my personal limit.  I will go back at some point when I’m not on a timetable and take the time to sit and enjoy them at my leisure.

Afterwards, Lynn picked us up and we went to take pictures of the ducks at Billings Bridge.  While there, someone else was feeding the ducks, squirrels, and a very fat and friendly groundhog.  We were able to get some excellent pictures.  It made for a nice finish to a truly enjoyable day.

Now off to work.

Cheers, Winston

Another Awesome Day

On By WinstonIn Loving Life, Personal, UncategorizedLeave a comment

My niece Tammy is visiting from Sudbury, which is very cool.  I haven’t seen much of her since I moved to Ottawa in ’97.    We are really close, so it’s nice to have her here.  Of course, as I mentioned last time, I’ve just started a new job so not much time off during her visit.  Good news is, she and Lynn also get on quite well so they’ve been having a great time anyway.

Today was one of my days off so Lynn, Tammy, Cynthia packed a picnic lunch and spent the day at the Victoria Memorial Museum of Nature.   It’s a beautiful museum filled with amazing exhibits.  All of us thoroughly enjoyed it and had an incredible day.

There was one glitch. I left Lynn’s camera in the men’s room.  I didn’t realize this until we were walking to the car at the end of the day.  I ran back inside, ran up four (tall) stories worth of stairs only to discover it gone.  Not a warm fuzzy moment. 

Did I mention this was my wife’s camera.   Lynn really enjoys photography and gets very attached to her cameras.  You can imagine my dismay as I set off for the security office to report a lost camera.

On my way, I stopped to ask a guard for directions.  He asked what I had lost and where.  When I told him, he asked me to accompany him to the security office.  I was expecting to fill out paperwork.  Instead, he opened the safe and retrieved my wife’s camera.  Someone had found it and turned it in.  Thank you kind stranger whoever you are.  You just earned yourself a LOT of good karma!

And so, a great day was saved. 

Tomorrow Tammy and I are off to the National Gallery.  We’ll see how that goes.  Hopefully, crisis free. 

Cheers, Winston

New Job, New Toy

On By WinstonIn Loving Life, PersonalLeave a comment

So, my brief tenure at GameStop has drawn to a close.  Nothing against them, it was a great job while it lasted.  Unfortunately, it was only part time.  Not enough hours for me to live on.  So when I heard my local Fido store was hiring full time, I jumped ship.  Everything is very amicable, and I often stop by to visit my former co-workers.

For those not from Canada, Fido is a cell phone service provider.  The job is pretty  straight forward although there is a bit of a learning curve around the back end.  Sales are easy.  Learning the process to setup the sale and invoice everything properly is still a learning opportunity, but I’m getting there. 

The other news is the new toy.  I’ve been wanting a tablet for a while, but couldn’t justify the cost.  Well, Rogers found a pricepoint I couldn’t resist.  $21/mo on a three year plan.  So I talked to Lynn and went and picked it up before work yesteday.  It is sooooooo cool! 

I picked up a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 4G.  Big screen, fast dual core processor, 16Gb of storage, this thing is  a beast!  Yes, I am writing this post on it right now ;^D

Now I have to go to the new job, to pay for the new toy.

Cheers, Winston

Why Newt Gingrich Should Get The Republican Nomination

On By WinstonIn Humor, Politics, Rants, Society, U.S. Election 2012Leave a comment

Photo by: Joe Burbank/Orlando SentinelPhoto by:  Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel

For those who don’t know, I don’t live in the U.S.  I live in Canada, which means I still have a large vested interest in the activities of our friend and neighbour to the south.  As such, I have been following with some interest the campaigns for the leadership of the Republican party.  So far, I’ve been a little less than impressed by their “circus of the week” approach to selecting a front runner.

In their rush to find a political outsider who supports family [read Christian (read very narrow interpretation of Christian)] values, they have produced a series of truly spectacular failures with Rick Perry, Herman Cain and Michelle Bachman being just a few.  For me however, the most incredible candidate to date has to be Newt Gingrich.  This is a man who utterly typifies the very essence of modern democracy.

After serving for a number of years as the Speaker of the House, Mr. Gingrich then spent several more years selling himself and his political connections to the highest bidder.  All the while, he steadfastly refused to list himself as a lobbyist.  No-no!  He was just a consultant.  The beauty of this is not his non-lobbyist delusions.  The beauty lies in his ability to convince delegates and possibly himself that he is not a “Washington insider”.  That is hilarious!  But it’s not the best thing to come out of his campaign.  It gets better.

Mr. Gingrich also found time to work as a consultant for Freddie Mac.  You may have heard of them.  They, along with Fannie May, are the lending giants behind the sub-prime mortgage fiasco.  You remember that.  The record foreclosures, the collapse of the housing  bubble, and the bank bailouts that led to massive protests and the simultaneous destruction of faith in both business and government.  Yup.  Newt took a pile of consulting bucks from them.  This is still not the best part of his candidacy.  Nope.  The best part is his staunch defence of FAMILY VALUES.

That’s right.  Newt Gingrich values family so much that when Bill Clinton had an affair with Whitehouse intern Monica Lewinsky, Gingrich led the drive to have him impeached.  So it’s clear that he values family a lot.  The only problem, he isn’t sure which family he actually values.  You see Newt was cheating on his own wife whom he later divorced so that he could marry his paramour.  Okay.  That happens sometimes.  Right?  Maybe.  But then he cheated on that wife, divorced her and married paramour number two.  The second wife (first paramour) is now claiming that Newt “Super-Stud” Gingrich had asked her for an open marriage.  She declined, which she alleges is why he now married to paramour number two.

All of that would be “Yeah. Whatever.”  if he weren’t in danger of becoming the leader of a party which spends every possible moment screaming about Family Values and Christian Values.  Apparently, Newt never heard the bit about letting he who is without sin chuck the first brick.  The Republican  faithful seem to have missed the irony of having their holier than thou party led by someone who’s moral compass got smashed when his mistresses stepped on it.  Repeatedly.

Against the rest of the Republican circus, he polls well.  Against President Obama, the polls tell a significantly different story.  I’d like to see Obama get a second mandate.  Id like to see what he could do with another four years.

That’s the real reason why Newt Gingrich should get the Republican nomination.

Cheers, Winston

p.s.  I was just reading that Herman Cain (former candidate and pizza magnate) has thrown his endorsement to Newt Gingrich.  Mr. Cain dropped out of the running for the Republican nomination amid allegations of sexual harassment and marital infidelity.  His endorsement of Newt proves that birds of a feather really do flock together.

W

Too Many Police Or Too Many Idiots?

On By WinstonIn Personal Responsibility, Rants, SocietyLeave a comment

Recently I was browsing back issues of Maclean’s magazine when an article caught my eye from the September 5th issue.  It’s title “Too Many Cops?” makes the author’s position clear.  They aren’t asking a question, they’re delivering a verdict.  It just looks nicer if they frame it as a question.

The gist of the article is that crime is down, law enforcement is bigger than ever and minor charges are skyrocketing.  According to them, we have too many police with too little to do.  That’s why they’re handing out speeding tickets, manning record numbers of RIDE checkpoints and arresting far more people for marijuana possession.

It is pointed out that the RIDE program during the 2010 holiday season enjoyed only a .029 capture rate.  They feel that this is too low and there may be other, more beneficial ways to spend the same money.  Maybe, but I doubt that they’d find a lot of support among people who have lost family, friends or loved ones to an impaired driver.  They made “only” 294 arrests, but that’s 294 less potentially devastated families.  They lament that it required one million vehicle stops to achieve those arrests.  If they saved even one life, then it’s a bargain.

The article also insists that speeding ticket and moving violation increases are just a cash grab on the part of municipalities.  These would be the same municipalities that it states are allocating ever increasing portions of their budgets to law enforcement.  For example, if I’m the mayor of Toronto, I’m going to spend nearly one billion dollars on police services so that I can collect a few hundred million in ticket revenue.  Wow!  I’m a financial wizard with no interest in getting re-elected.

Montreal has long been recognized as having the worst drivers in Canada.  The article describes it as a “city long known for it’s spirited drivers”.  They aren’t spirited, they’re reckless with a blatant and potentially homicidal disregard for traffic laws.  According to the authors though, this has almost nothing to do with the 93% increase in citations for moving violations and the 140% increase for speeders.  Apparently, it has nothing to do with speeding and moving violations.  Nope.  It’s all about hordes of bored cops and greedy civc managers.

The other group of horribly abused victims they talk about are the pot users.  Yep.  Those poor people who get arrested and end up with a criminal record for committing a crime.  That’s just terrible.  The police are at fault again for charging people who commit crimes.  I agree that pot possession probably isn’t the greatest crime a person can commit, but it’s still a crime.  The amazing part for me is that they want to blame the police or the government.  How could they saddle this poor person with a criminal record that could interfere with their chances of crossing into the U.S. or getting the job they want?

Wait…. what?

This isn’t about over-zealous policing or government hard-liners.  This is all about the person who gets caught with a controlled substance in their pocket.  If someone is in possession of a controlled substance, after they get arrested is probably the wrong time to start thinking about the long term ramifications.  I agree that this isn’t the most serious crime in our society, but it’s not about the severity, it’s about the attitude.

Most people treat traffic tickets and minor pot busts like the Oscars.  “Who me?  Oh no.  I don’t deserve this.  Really.  I can’t possibly accept that.  This is only possible because of my parents/manager/co-workers.  Honestly, I wouldn’t be here right now if it wasn’t for God!”  Instead of implausible deniability, why not just opt for the truth.  “Yes, I screwed up.  Let’s just do this and hope I learn something from it.”

But that’s not where we live is it?  We live in a society where it’s always someone else’s fault.  Busted for speeding?  It’s not about my lead foot.  The cops must a ticket quota to meet.  Moving violation?  It’s not because I changed lanes without signalling and then hit my brakes almost causing a massive accident.  The cops must have a ticket quota.  Charged with marijuana possession?  It’s not because I broke some stupid law, it’s because some dickhead cop is trying to get promoted by making as many arrests as they can.

Wrong, Wrong, WRONG!

If I get a speeding ticket, odds are I was speeding.  If I get a moving violation, I probably did something stupid to deserve it.  Busted for possession?  I made the choice to break that law.  It’s not about too many police or generating extra revenue or appearing tough on crime.  If it wasn’t for the people who think the law shouldn’t apply to them, we wouldn’t have anyone for the police to be ticketing or charging.

It’s not about too many police.  It’s about too many idiots.

Cheers, Winston

The Uncritical Thinker

On By WinstonIn Discrimation, Global Issues, Personal, Politics, Rants, SocietyLeave a comment

A post has shown up in the Facebook updates of a couple of people I know which got me a little wound up.  Being me, I quite naturally fired off a response and moved on, but I couldn’t get it out of my head.  It kept nagging at me, so I did a bit more digging.  Turns out it’s good thing I did.

The gist of the post states that the Prime Minister of Australia made a public statement that Muslim immigrants who want to live by Sharia Law should go elsewhere.  It alleges that she then went on to say that if they wish to stay, they should learn english and accept that Australia is a Christian country founded on Christian values etc.  Basically, the entire rant is blatantly racist and offensive to anyone who takes the time to think it through.  The idea of the leader of a major nation saying something like this was frankly nauseating.  To see it re-posted and applauded by people I know and care about was even more so.

When I saw the post I only had my phone with me, so I just replied from there and made a note to check it out later.  Well, later is here and here’s what I learned.  It’s a fraud.

It was originally attributed to then Prime Minister Howard back in 2005 based on some much more generic comments made by one of his cabinet ministers.  Over the years, it has mutated and been expanded to include material from an article written by a retired U.S. airforce pilot for a newspaper in Georgia.  Absolutely none of it has anything to do with current Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard or her government.

What is fascinating about this to me is the context in which I encountered it.  The people who posted and endorsed this stance are themselves the descendants of immigrants.  Those immigrants certainly didn’t learn the language or respect the culture, or religious beliefs of the people who were already here.  In point of fact, our ancestors murdered them in wholesale lots, deliberately destroyed their culture and beliefs and forced them to learn the language of the immigrants.

So what is the difference between the immigrants of today and those of yesterday?  In both cases, they dream/dreamed of building a better life for themselves, their families and descendants.  Each considers/considered their way of life to be one worth maintaining.  They want/wanted the freedom to be who they are, live how they want to live, speak their own language and worship as they see fit.  Oh yes, that sounds evil to me too.

The whole point to this post is to underline the need to actually think things through.  Instead of just accepting what we read or see as being the gospel truth, we need to be willing to look a little deeper.  We need to see if someone isn’t just playing us and feeding off our dissatisfaction to push their own agenda.  We need to be just a little more critical in our thinking and step outside of our comfort zone.  It’s important to listen to people we don’t agree with to help us understand why we think the way we do.

Uncritical thinking is dangerous.  That’s the kind of thinking that leads to wars, genocide, prejudice and hate crimes of every sort.  That’s not how I choose to live and I hope it’s not how the rest of society chooses to live.  The greatest threat to our freedoms and our way of life is, “The Uncritical Thinker”.

Cheers, Winston

The Turning Of The Year

On By WinstonIn Uncategorized1 Comment

The old year draws fast to a close, wrapped beneath it’s recent snows;

Outside my door a cold wind blows, as the year draws to a close.

All within is warm and bright, on this the waning year’s last night;

We’ll celebrate returning light, here where all is warm and bright.

So very soon the new year starts, fresh new dreams within our hearts;

We’ll strive to better play our parts, right from when the new year starts.

Now gather friends and loved ones near, for the turning of the year;

Greet it with hope and banish fear, shout as one “HAPPY NEW YEAR!”

I’d just like to take a moment to wish all of my family, friends and occasional readers a Happy New Year.  I wish you all comfort, security and joy in the coming year.

Cheers, Winston

“Tintin” Review

On By WinstonIn Film Reviews, Personal, Pop Culture1 Comment

My friend Jason gave me screener passes to the new Tintin film as an early birthday present.  So bright and early this morning, Lynn and I dragged ourselves out of bed and headed off to the ten a.m. show.  It couldn’t have been more worthwhile.

I have been a been a fan of the iconic red-headed trouble magnet for years.  I suspect that Spielberg and Jackson have as well.  That is the only way they could have done such a fabulous job of interpreting it for the screen.

Going in, I was slightly worried.  These two industry giants are best known for massive blockbuster pictures and Tintin has never been a blockbuster character.  My worry was that he and Snowy (his loyal and absolutely adorable dog) might get lost in it all.  To their credit, that was never a concern.  No matter how impressive the location, or over the top the action the focus always stayed firmly on the characters and story.

The casting is similarly impeccable with Tintin played by Jamie Bell, Andy Serkis as Captain Haddock and Daniel Craig rounding out the main characters as the villainous Sakharin.  As note perfect as they were, I have to give a quick shout-out to one of my favorite comedy duos.  Simon Pegg and Nick Frost (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, Paul) play bumbling Interpol inspectors Thomson and Thompson.  They are in fine form and just added that extra touch to my enjoyment of this movie.

Visually stunning, well written and brilliantly played, Tintin stayed true to it’s source.  In my opinion a brilliant movie that could serve as a guide for a different sort of animated movie experience.  Sadly, it probably won’t.  Based on the quietness of the exiting crowd, I don’t expect it to get much box office.  As much as I loved it, much of the audience seemed indifferent to it.

The sequel is already in the works (surprise, surprise), set to be directed by co-producer Peter Jackson (Lord of the Rings).  I’m not sure if this movie will grab enough audience to get the sequel green-lighted, but I certainly hope it does.  It’s a rarity these days.  A movie chasing the mainstream that isn’t just another cookie-cutter clone of the last big box office hit.

Here’s hoping it makes it!

Cheers, Winston