Back to school special

Last Friday, we all trooped back to school. Summer sure went quickly. The renovations finally finished around the 15th of August and I spent the remaining week in Gatineau with Mrs. BB. Many cities could take example from the National Capital Region (Ottawa and Gatineau). The region is a paradise for those of us who like outdoor sports. There is one hundred seventy kilometres of bike trails all around the region. Not trails that share the road with cars, but wide paved bike trails made especially for people who like to ride. As opposed to Montreal all these trails are joined together so you easily get from point A to Point B with a minimum of fuss.
Then there is the Parc de la Gatineau. This is a large park that is just beside and inside the city of Gatineau. It is a 363 square km triangular shaped park that includes many mountains, lake, and streams. The park's location in the Gatineau Hills makes it a popular destination for cross-country skiing and biking. There are almost 200 km of cross-country trails and many of these trails are used by bikes and hikers during the summer. Since the terrain is very hilly it's a good thing to be in shape before riding up into the hills.

In Gatineau Park you will also find William Lyon MacKenzie King's Estate called Kingsmere. It is open to the public and can be accessed by car or by bike if you don't mind pedalling up some rather steep hills. Mackenzie King was the 10th Prime Minister of Canada and was the longest serving Prime Minister in British Commonwealth history (1921-26, 1926-1930, 1935-48). In his personal life MacKenzie King was rather eccentric. He was a firm believer in spiritualism and communed with Leonardo da Vinci, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, his dead mother and several of his pet Irish terriers (all named Pat, makes it easier to remember names I suppose).












Another of his eccentricities was his fondness for building "abbey" ruins from parts of old Ottawa buildings that had been torn down. So all around his grounds you can find "ruins" of old abbey buildings. (I've been to England and believe me these "ruins" are not even close to the ruins of Riveaulx or Melrose Abbeys)
Something that not many Canadians know is that he was the prime minister that first created the notion of Canadian citizenship . This was put in place on January 1st 1947, before that we were British citizens who lived overseas. In honour of this, Mackenzie King was awarded Canadian citizenship certificate number 0001. A little known fact is that Canada's first natural born Canadian is still living today in New Brunswick.
Here are a couple of more pictures taken whilst riding the Gatineau bike trails.

Wreck of a "draveur" boat

Parliament Buildings along the Ottawa River

Denizens of the river

Oh the irony...

How's this for ironic? Our beloved ex-Canadian, Conrad Black has written a biography of Richard Milhous Nixon.
For those of you who are too young, Richard Nixon was the 37th President of the United States. He also has the distinction of being the only US president to resign. Of course, he didn't have all that much choice, it was that or be impeached by Congress. This all came about in his second term when it was discovered that he had authorized and then had a hand in covering up a break in at the Democratic Election Headquarters. Known as the Watergate Scandal, after the hotel where the break in occurred, this finally lead to his downfall. During the investigation, it was brought to light, that not only was there a break in at the Watergate but also illegal wiretaps, other break ins, use of confidential medical records to discredit an opponent and assorted other dirty tricks. There was even a presidential enemy list of people who opposed his presidency. (Kind of makes you think of a more recent president doesn't it? )

Now on to the author of this new biography, Lord Conrad Black. Conrad Black is a newspaper mogul who was recently convicted of fraud and obstruction of justice. He now faces a possible long jail sentence, we'll know in November. Lord Black has always been a rather right wing law and order type of person and he and his wife have often railed about leftist softies. Using his various media outlets, Black denounced Canada's welfare system as "an overgenerous reinsurance policy for an underachieving people"; railed against high taxes and unions supporting worker's rights. He once called an Ontario liberal politician the Salvador Allende of Canada and was quoted as saying that he was " trying to strangle, disembowel, and immolate the vestiges of the incentive-based economy." During the strike at his Calgary Herald newspaper, Conrad Black even called the Bishop of Calgary a "jumped-up little twerp"and a "prime candidate for exorcism" because he dared to back the striking workers.
After the publication of Black's biography of Richard Nixon, he was quoted as saying “It’s hard not to acknowledge [Richard Nixon’s] sleazy side, which I do not have,* ”
Yeah right, it takes one to know one.

* bold italics are mine

Relativity

Well we just got over a big thunderstorm, plenty of rain, thunder and lightning. It's grey, wet and humid and that means that there'll be no work today. Mrs, BB and I are getting the front of the house redone. Before, the side walk was cracked and slowly sinking into the earth and the retaining wall, built of railroad ties, was disintegrating. (Hey the railroad ties were not my idea, the previous owners had put them in. They are a real problem because you just can't throw them into a land fill because of the creosote. ) But I am digressing, so this year we decided to have the sidewalk, driveway and retaining walls redone. So we got a bunch of contractors to submit for the job and finally chose one. We were told that it would take about three weeks, the last of June (finally started the first week of July) and the first two of July. Lo and behold we are now the first week of August and they are still not done. They are not even close to completing the job. Mind you the work that has been done, has been very well done.

Now comes my point, Albert Einstein stated in his Theory of Relativity, that time is relative. So it is between the time estimates of building contractors and real time. The contractor will give you an estimated time based on the optimistic assumption that

1. The weather will be perfect for the whole time.
2. Murphy's law will be suspended
3. There will be no other jobs to interfere with yours
4. There will be no statutory construction holidays in between. (In Québec they are obliged to give a "vacances de la construction" at the end of July.)
   

Now this is patently impossible. Based on the construction work we have had done in the last couple of years, I'd say that you must take the contractor's estimated time of completion (E.T.C.) and multiply by 2 to get the real time of completion (R.T.C.) so ETC x 2= RTC. Following this line of logic three weeks will become 6 weeks, which is about right. Another way might be to calculate using workdays. Three weeks is 21 days. 21 days / 3.5 days a week of work = 6 weeks. This can be called BB's Theory of Relative Construction Time.
So there we are. These R.T.C. estimates seem to be pretty much in line with what I have observed for all types of construction. If they say it'll take 2 hours, it'll be closer to 4 or 5. If they say a week, it'll be about 2-2.5 weeks. Having also done renovations, I would say that BB's Law of Relative Construction Time should also apply to whatever construction project you put your hand to. If you think it'll take a day to complete you can be pretty sure that it'll take about twice that. Now don't get me wrong I'd much rather they take their time to do the work and get it right, than rush a job and have to start over. It's just that if you are planning your summer it might be nice to have a timetable that is a little more exact. Since I'm a teacher it's not much of a problem since I can be home most of the time that they are working, but for someone with limited vacation time it must be rather complicated.

Odds and sods

Having been absent last week and also having a brain that is on vacation has meant that I haven't had much to say these last couple of weeks... and I still don't have much to say. So here are some odds and sods that I picked up these last weeks.
A couple of days ago I was riding my bike through Ste-Anne de Bellevue near the locks between Lac St-François and Lac des Deux Montagnes when I decided top stop for a couple of minutes and admire the scenery. There was a big house boat parked at the entrance of the locks and on there were two couples about my age. Now boat owners are often my age, especially the guys. (From my small experience the gals seem to be much younger. ) Anyhow back to the story, on this boat they were having a party, at two o'clock in the afternoon, in front of a whole pile of people walking along the waterfront. Now having a party in itself is not a problem, but having a karaoke party when you can't hold a tune and having your friends dancing with a Labatt blue in their hands lacks a certain amount of class, especially when the singer ad libs words to the song. Now close your eyes and imagine, greying 55 + guy with a beer gut overhanging his speedo, crooning into a microphone with the volume turned wayyyy up. Shudder.... total lack of class. Obviously having a bundle of cash doesn't procure automatic class.
As you all know from a previous blog, I bought myself a new digital reflex camera and I've been taking pictures ever since trying out all the functions. Here are some of the pictures.

Lamp post near my place
Sunset in GatineauChutes de Coulonge

Chutes de Coulonge
Panoramic of Lac Pink
Parc de la Gatineau
Lac Pink

I love taking pictures of flowers .

My first award, I'd like to thank...

An award for me??? *BLUSH*, stammer, (insert tears here) really you shouldn't have... gimme that thing. I'd like to thank Ian for thinking of me, my parents for making me who I am, my family for believing in me and my dream, the blog sphere, the world, the ahhhhhhh. (Lapses into stammering gibberish and tears)
Ok back to to reality, Ian is a great blog writer (a great writer period) and to have him choose me with praise, well it's a great honour and made my day. Not that we write our blogs for praise or awards, we mostly write because it's a way of throwing our message in a bottle into the wide sea of the internet. By the way Ian here's a little piece of linguistic trivia for you, the word schmooze comes from the late 19th century Yiddish word shmuesn which means to converse or chat.
Am I a schmoozer? Yes sir, give a me table, preferably on a terrace, some good strong coffee (or a Guinness), and some friends and we'll re-wire the world in no time. Blogs are just another way to schmooze, except we are a little farther apart. We put out our ideas and comment on the ideas of others...we schmooze.
Now for my choices to get the schmoozer award.
Choochoo is funny, with an off the wall sense of humour, and lives in a pretty weird town. (I thought she lived in the USA, but I heard through the branches that it is in Norway. I didn't think Norway could be so strange.). I always love reading her latest adventures. So Choochoo gets one. Then I'll nominate Evil Spock because I'd like to sit down with him and plan his race to world domination. (Can't be worse than Bushie and he's a lot more intelligent and funny.) Dr. Deb is my favourite shrink in the blog sphere and I would love to sit down and schmooze with her about the human condition. Her posts are always interesting and thought provoking. There are many others that I'd give the prize to, such as Jazz (my lil sister, she's funny and irreverent and I made her what she is today...LOL), Ian who nominated me, Voyager with her backyard chaos, Tai with her superb photos and L.B.D. ;o), cs a blogger I've just started following who has a definite knack with a camera and tells it as it is and Em a dad like me but woe is me, they have already been awarded the prize by others. ;o(

Good vibrations et al.

meme |mēm| noun Biology an element of a culture or system of behaviour that may be considered to be passed from one individual to another by non genetic means, esp. imitation.



I've been tagged by my lil'sister Jazz as to the five things that give me good vibrations. My darling sister is always thinking up ways of complicating my nice smooth life. After much thought, head scratching and cognition, I have come up with the following five things.

The first and second are no brainers. The first is of course Mrs. BB who has put up with me lo these 31 years and believe me I am not always easy to put up with. After 31 years it is no longer a great emotional passionate affair, but has morphed into a lasting, comfortable, love. It is like the difference between a new snazzy pair of shoes and a well worn pair of slippers. Which is more comfortable? My wife completes me in a way that is hard to describe. When she is absent, there is a part of me that is missing, a malaise, something that is not right. When she is there, even if we are both doing our different things, I can feel her presence and that is an eminently comforting and wonderful feeling. So yes she is a big part of my good vibrations.

The second thing that is a part of my good vibrations are my two children, BB's daughter and BB's son. They are now adults and are flying by themselves, but when I look at them my heart swells with pride because they have become adults to be proud of. It's funny because when I give them a hug, I do not just see the adult they are, but the baby smiling at me, the small child showing me the carrot from the garden, tears because of scraped knees, the children doing their homework, the ados going to their first dance, their prom night, his face lighting up as we discuss programming and OS systems, university graduation (my daughter winning the two prizes for micro-biology). I see their whole lives go by and that definitely gives me good vibrations.

The third is trekking in the mountains. I love trekking because of the sense of solitude. Making it to the top of a mountain with nobody around gives one a feeling of peace that is hard to describe. The wind whistling across the rock and remnants of winter snow, the austere beauty of the surrounding landscapes, the solitude, the stark white of a cloud against the deep blue of the sky, the chill of the air at altitude. It all makes me think of a line from the poem "High Flight" by Pilot Officer Gillespie McGee; "Put out my hand and touched the face of God." This line of poetry pretty much says it all.

Here is my fourth, books. I love to read and I probably have more books at home that many bookstores. I love to read and regularly have to bring boxes of books to my local library since they have taken over every possible nook and cranny in the house. Thank goodness that Mrs. BB also loves to read because this could have been a definite problem. I can read for hours at a time and get through a 300 page book in less than a couple of days. Love of reading and books is one of the greatest gifts my parents gave me. When I was young they would always find some money to buy a Scholastic book at school. Books are a great invention, hours of pleasure, easy to carry and use, never need batteries. They can be taken anywhere and when trekking in a lost land can be used as fire starter and toilet paper in an emergency. LOL ;o)

My fifth is travelling. We love to travel, not go south to a Club Med, but really travel and get to know the people and culture of the country we are visiting. Since we usually stay for quite a few weeks and we are not rich, we usually end up camping most of the time. In England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland, they have a well organized system of camp grounds. Staying at a camp gound permits us to meet the people of the place, talk with them and learn how they live. If you want to know how people live, go grocery shopping at their local Tesco or Morrison's. Travelling like this has permitted us to meet so many fantastic, helpful people and see things that ordinary tourists just never see. The local people are always willing to tell you about this great place that you must visit. Travelling opens our horizons and makes one realize that under the skin we are all the same, all having the same hopes, loves and fears no matter where they are.

Now to whom should I pass it on?
First of all to Em, who as a dad often makes me laugh and think.
Second to Evil Spock, just to give him an opportunity to do some PR for his run to POTUS.
And last but not least Tai, cuz she doesn't have enough to do with moving into a nice new house.

My new gadget

As everyone knows, we guys just love the latest gadgets. Yesterday I decided to buy myself a new SLR digital camera. I had been wanting one for a long time and when I stopped off at our neighbourhood Dumoulin store I checked their camera section and lo and behold they had an Olympus Evolt E-500 camera with two lenses for only $580. Now this is a REALLY LOW price. At Costco they had the Canon Rebel xt with 2 lenses for $980 (The two cameras are equivalent in features etc) So after having thought about it and talked to my better half (Mrs. BB) I bought the camera. Turns out that they had got the price wrong but their loss was my gain. ;o)
I can now hear my little sister Jazz saying to herself..."What the hell does he need camera for?" Well I've always loved taking photos, I started off with an Olympus Trip 35 then graduated to a Minolta SRT 201 35 mm camera way back when. (Both cameras still work after 30 years now that's quality.) The Minolta was completely mechanical and almost indestructable but it's heavy and bulky and 35 mm film is getting harder to find and costly to process. So I when I calculated what it cost to get pictures developed versus buying a new camera I decided to buy digital since just the cost of the film and developing paid for the camera. I bought an Olympus Camedia 575 zoom (my son is using it now) and last Christmas I got an Olympus FE-180 (it's small enough to fit in my pocket). These point and shoot cameras take good photos but aren't very flexible, so yesterday I got the Olympus E-550 which gives me much more flexibility than the others.
Taking photos is about as close as I get to being artistic, since I'm pretty much the un-artistic one in my family. I can neither draw or paint like my wife or my sister, nor can I play a musical instrument like my daughter's violin or my wife's classical guitar. Even Jazz used to play the tenor recorder. Hell, I can't even carry a tune in a bucket. So that being said, taking pictures is my way of expressing the artistic yearnings of my soul. (Boy that sure was a load of crap, I just like taking pictures.) So here are a couple of my better ones, enjoy. (The first two were taken with a 35mm film camera and digitalized)

Amadablam with Lhotse in background, Nepal

Gargoyle, Notre Dame de Paris

Beaumaris Castle, Wales

Twighlight on the beach, Achille Island, Ireland

Mountain top, Achille Island, Ireland

Sunset, Tewksbury Abbey, England

York Minster, York, England

PS: If you want to see our other pictures go to our picture site.

Sillines, just plain silliness

It always strikes me as strange how a nation of stiff upper lips like the English can produce such off the wall humour. They bring silliness to a high art form. Of course by now you have probably figured out that I've been watching Monty Python. Though it was made in the 60's it never fails to make me laugh. I've always wondered what it says about my character, after all British humour, from what I can gather by talking to my friends, is either a love it or hate it proposition. It seems to leave nobody indifferent. I admit freely that I find British humour irresistibly funny,
Now for your viewing pleasure, are two of my all time favourite sketches. One of them even has a Canadian connection. ;o) I love the Dead Parrot sketch because of the myriad ways John Cleese finds to tell the clerk that his parrot is demised, deceased, passed on, no more, expired, gone to meet his maker.

The other sketch with the Canadian connection (BC to be exact) is of course the Lumberjack song...the incongruity of a big rugged lumberjack in drag paints a picture that is hard to resist. So here it is, enjoy ;o)
PS: It's a sing along version so go right ahead...

Weird Canada

Since summer vacation is here and is conducive to levity, here is a collection of weird and wonderful little stories from our great country Canada.

WHO WOULD HAVE SUSPECTED?

In April 2001, police in Vancouver, British Columbia, ended a three-year crime spree when they arrested 64 year old Eugene Mah and his 32-year-old son, Avery. The Mahs had been stealing assorted lawn and garden items from homes in their neighborhood, including garbage cans, lawn decorations, recycling boxes, and realty signs. Why did they steal them? Nobody knows. Eugene Mah is a real estate tycoon worth a reported $13 million. One local psychiatrist said the thefts may be due to an obsessive compulsive hoarding disorder. They reportedly stole a neighbor's doormat ... and each of the 14 other doormats the neighbor bought as replacements.

BEAVER FEVER

In June 2003, two disc jockeys in Toronto caused a SARS panic in the Dominican Republic. Z103.5 Morning Show hosts Scott Fox and Dave Blezard thought it would be funny to call the resort where their co-worker, Melanie Martin, was vacationing. They told the desk clerk that Martin had smuggled a "rare Canadian beaver" into their country. But the desk clerk, who didn't speak much English, thought he'd heard the word "fever." With SARS (Severe
Acute Respiratory Syndrome) being big news at the time and Toronto being one of the cities where the disease had spread, the clerk panicked-and locked the woman in her room. The entire hotel wasn't quarantined, according to the station's news manager,' but staff were at the point of contacting medical authorities when the disc jockeys finally convinced them that it was all a misunderstanding. Martin was released from her room that afternoon.

COMING IN FOR A LANDING
Lucette St. Louis, a 66-year-old woman from Corbeil, Ontario, was rounding up three runaway pigs owned by her son, Marc, when she became the victim of a bizarre accident. One of the 180-pound pigs had wandered into the road and a passing car hit it. The impact sent the pig airborne, landing on top of Mrs. St. Louis and breaking her leg in two places. "Well, at least," she said, "I can tell my grandchildren that pigs really do fly."

DEATH MERCHANT

Roman Panchyshyn, a 47-year-old Winnipeg retailer, upset some of his fellow residents when he started selling $65 sweatshirts that read "Winnipeg, Murder Capital of Canada Escape The Fear" in his store. The shirts showed the city skyline dripping in blood. "We spend hundreds of thousands of dollars yearly to promote Winnipeg to the world," complained City Councillor Harry Lazarenko, "and I don't want this to give us a black eye." So he contacted the premier to see if Panchyshyn could be stopped. He couldn't-the shirts are accurate. Winnipeg has the highest murder rate in Canada. Said the unapologetic Panchyshyn, "The truth hurts."

WEIRD CANADIAN RECORDS

• On August 30, 1995, Sean Shannon of Canada recited Hamlet's "To be or not to be" soliloquy in 23.8 seconds an average of 655 words a minute.
• On August 17, 1991, 512 dancers of the Royal Scottish Dance Society (Toronto branch) set the record for the largest genuine Scottish country dance (a reel).
• In 1988 Palm Dairies of Edmonton created the world's largest ice cream sundae 24,900 kg. (54,895 lbs.).
• In 1993 the Kitchener Waterloo Hospital Auxiliary filled a bowl with 2,390 kg (5,269 lbs.) of strawberries.
• Four hundred mothers in Vancouver broke the record for mass breast feeding in 2002.
• In Feb. 2000, 1,588 couples at the Sarnia Sports Centre broke the record for most kissing in one place at one time.
• Dave Pearson holds the record for clearing all 15 balls from a standard pool table in 26.5 seconds at Pepper's Bar in Windsor, Ontario, in 1997.
• In 1998 1,000 University of Guelph students formed the longest human conveyor belt, laying down in a row and rolling a surfboard over their bodies. In 1999 they set the record for simultaneous soap -bubble blowing.

Stories taken from the Bathroom Reader collection, a hilarious collection of strange facts and trivia. For lovers of trivia and weird miscellaneous information, it's a great read.

School's Out!

Here I sit in front of my computer on the first day of summer vacation. School is finally out, all exams corrected, all marks dumped into the system and all students passing. My job is done. Being a teacher is not always an easy way to make a living. (Yeah I know we have summer vacation off) My students today live in a much more complex world than when I was a kid. The pressures they endure are sometimes mind boggling, broken families, peer pressures, an over organized lifestyle, parental pressure, and all the advertising materialism. I'm sometimes surprised that more of them don't burn out. As teachers, we often have to be more of a counsellor, an attentive listener than a simple dispenser of knowledge. We have to be able to get to the bottom of things, get help for those who need it and discipline those who won't listen or follow the rules. We also have to deal with uncooperative parents (in the minority thank god) who protect and sanction their child's misbehavior. (In French we call them "les enfants roi" or royal children) We also organize trips, activities, committees, clubs and many other things, often on our own time. We often have to do this with less and less resources and despite interference from bureaucrats and paper pushers who are completely disconnected from the educational world.
So why do I keep doing this after 3o years? Well as Ian's blog said, “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.” Horace Mann.
I guess teaching is my small victory for humanity, a way of maybe making the world a teeny bit better, of maybe helping a student become what he or she wants to be in an ever more complex world.
Last week out first cohort, had their graduation ceremony. They were the first and I remember them as being little munchkins with school bags bigger than they were. Now they are handsome and beautiful men and women, off to college and the rest of their lives. In their hugs, tears and thanks lies my motivation for the job that I do. They are our small victory for mankind.

What you see isn't what you get.

I came across this site on illusions while browsing. It gives interesting explanations about the different types of illusions and why our minds/eyes see what they do. Have fun.

My Siblings

This week both my sisters, Artsis and Jazz celebrate their birthdays. (The month of October seems to have been a busy one for my parents) For those of you who don't like mushiness, please go away cuz I'm going to sing the praises of my two little sisters.
I have been extremely lucky to have the family that I do. Our parents were caring and loving people who did all they could to see their children become successful adults. Our home life was harmonious and we always knew that our parents were there for us. Both of my sisters married men that I not only approve of, but that I also call friend. I often hear people going on about family squabbles between members of their family, and I count myself lucky to be in a family where that has never happened. My sisters and their husbands are our best friends as well as being our family and it is always fun to be together.
So let's start with my Artsis, she is two years younger than me and when we were kids we fought like cats and dogs. Having completely different characters did nothing for the peace of our relationship or for the patience of our parents. It took me until adulthood to really appreciate her intelligence, charm and iron will. Of the three of us, I think she is the one who most resembles our mother. Soft spoken, always polite and caring, she none the less has a will of iron. She has the knack of making people see her point of view without rubbing the person's nose in it. (She must have had a lot of practice with me when we were young.) She gets things done without fanfare and hoopla, but she always gets them done. She is an exceptional artist and we are the proud owners of a collection of many of her paintings and I hope to collect a quite a few more. (see her latest paintings)
My little sister Jazz has always been the bohemian of the family. She is younger than me by seven years, so she kind of became a mascot. I must admit, being a guy and seven years older than her, I wasn't always the nicest person, but in my defense, teenaged guys rarely are. After all I had to toughen her up didn't I? I obviously did a good job because she really turned out to be a beautiful, funny, articulate woman, with a wicked sense of humour. She knows exactly what she wants and she is, as we say in French, "bien dans sa peau." My wonderful daughter greatly resembles her and I'm glad that is so, because she can't go far wrong in being like her aunt.
So here's to you, my siblings, may the coming year grant you whatever your heart desires and may all your hopes and aspirations become reality. :o)

Big Brother Revealed

This weekend was the family celebration of my darling mom's 80th birthday. The whole family trooped over to my artistsister's place in Québec and had a great old time. It's not everyday that one's mom gets to be 80, and yes, she's still going strong as feisty as ever, all five feet of her. ;o)
During the party my lil' sister Jazz begged me on bent knees to take our picture together, so being the generous Big Brother that I am, I got out my trusty digital camera and took a picture of us. (It is totally true that despite the fact that she is a modern woman, Jazz is still living in the first half of the 20th century. I'm surprised that she has electricity at her place.) So if you have been intrigued by what we might possibly look like, go to Jazz's blog and there we are. (I would have published it myself, but she absolutely wanted to be the one to reveal our anonymous selves, and being a good Big Brother I let her have the honours.)

Ah Paris

Not Paris the city, but Paris the rich whinny blond brat. American justice just is not what it used to be. Paris Hilton, who was supposed to serve 23 days in prison for having ignored a judge's ruling about her driving her vehicle, was released yesterday. (She was banned from driving because of her DUI, but decided to drive anyhow since obviously that shouldn't apply to her.) Last weekend she reported to the slammer only to be released yesterday morning for medical reasons (she probably had a hissy fit and went all hysterical). The poor child will be confined to her million dollar mansion for 40 days instead, unless she does like the last time. She is quoted to have said, hours after leaving jail, "I have learned a great deal from this ordeal and hope that others have learned from my mistakes." What ordeal? Has she ever learned anything from her mistakes? This girl seems seriously disconnected from reality as we know it. Is it the peroxide?
Anyhow it now seems that the L.A. City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo has demanded a hearing before Judge Michael Sauer. They want to know why the Sheriff's Department permitted Paris to be released from jail when the judge had ordered her to serve her entire sentence. Maybe the poor little rich girl will have to finally serve her sentence. Hopefully justice will prevail, and she'll go back to the slammer with an additional time for contempt.
As for the icing on the cake, it seems that she might be paid 1 million $ for the story of her "ordeal"* and another million for her interview.
Is it me or is there something strange out there. Sometimes I wonder if we already are in... (insert music here)... Twilight Zone and we just don't know it.

*Beware, heavy sarcasm here!

*** LATE BREAKING NEWS... Judge Sauer has put her back in prison, so she can finish off her sentence. I'm amazed, I really am and I tip my hat to the judge who had the guts to finally stop her charade and make her do the time. My faith in the American justice system has gone up a notch. When she left the courtroom she was crying and yelled "It's not right." She then called for her mommy. My heart bleeds...it really does. hehehe.

It was all a hoax but be a donor anyhow.

Jazz has let me know that the infamous reality show "Big Donor" was a hoax. Certainly it was in very bad taste, but in a strange perverted way they did draw attention to the fact that donors are in short supply. As strange as it may seem, people are still hesitant at giving up the parts that they no longer need. Hey, when your dead, you're dead and you no longer need kidneys, eyes, heart, lungs, liver and anything else that may be useful.
I have had my little signed card in my wallet for years saying that they can take anything they want from my dead carcass if it can help someone. It's not as if I was going to miss it. I've also told my family that that is what I want. (Mind you being dead doesn't really give me much of a say and since I don't believe in an afterlife it's rather hard to come back and haunt them.)
So people if you haven't yet done it, sign a donor consent card (in Québec there is a sticker to sign and stick on the back of your medicare card) and tell your family that you wish to help someone after you're gone.
Here are some sites for different parts of Canada.
British Columbia,
Government of Canada site (contains the telephone numbers to become a donor for each province)

New Reality Game Show.

There is a new reality game show in the Netherlands called "Big Donor Show," where a 37 year old woman dying of an inoperable brain tumour, will donate her kidneys to one of the contestants. Like all reality shows the audience may vote for their preference via SMS text messaging at a cost of $1.35. The producers of the show are the same gang who produced that utterly insignificantly boring show, "Big Brother" (There is no association between my humble self and that sleazy show, I've got much more class. Can there be anything more boring than watching a bunch of ill bred yahoos picking their noses and talking about their insipid lives using an impoverished vocabulary mainly consisting of four letter words starting with "f" and ending in "k" )
I don't know about you but TV has really hit a new low, what's next, a reality show where contestants vie to see who will pull the plug for a patient on life support so they can get their heart? I think that I'll just go get myself a good book, cuz if that's where TV is going I'll be watching even less of it than I do now.

Here is the full news story

MySpace Outage Leaves Millions Friendless

Came across this little article in "The Onion" it's hilarious, but it's probably not too far off the mark even if it's satire.

MySpace Outage Leaves Millions Friendless

Star Wars Redux

On a happier note here are some sites that you might be interested in reading. They are all on the BBC web site. Enjoy! :o)

1. The Star Wars saga at a glance
2. C-3PO's golden moment of fame
3. Taking a walk on the Dark Side
4. Star Wars' R2-D2 to collect post
5. Star Wars stamps unveiled in US

Budget time

Our minority Liberal government has brought down their first budget and they've drawn their line in the sand. The biggest sticking point with the other parties is the income tax reductions of 950 million dollars, 700 million of which comes from the federal government to fix the fiscal imbalance. Don't get me wrong, I don't like paying taxes anymore than the next man, but it seems a tad illogical to go crying to Ottawa that there is a fiscal imbalance, that the provinces need more money for programs and health care and then turn around and give the money out as a tax break. I may be cynical, (which I am, as Jazz can attest) but it seems that they are:

1. provoking the other parties to vote against the bill so the onus of another election will be theirs.
2. painting the other parties as the ones who are taking money from the tax payers.
   
3. buying off the tax payers with their own money.

So it is very possible that we will be off to another election this summer... just what we all needed. Idiots!

** UPDATE: Both opposition parties have said that they'll vote against the budget, so our friend Charest has a choice, change the budget (humiliating to say the least) or go for the election... rumours have it that it'll be July 9th... what a waste of time and money.

Star Wars 30 years after.

On May 25th, we'll all have to get out our Wookie suits to celebrate. It has been 30 years since the launch of Star Wars. I remember when it came out, we were stunned by the special effects and the drama. Let's face it the story is a common fairy tale; princess needs saving, farm boy gets the message and decides to save her. He meets up with some acolytes and meets his mentor who trains his powers so he can slay the evil... in this case a death star. On the way he meets his arch nemesis whom he defeats (but he'll be back) and finally saves the princess. Pretty corny huh? Yeah but it worked, boy did it work. Maybe because as a story it is the perfect archetype of the legend genre. St. George and the dragon, the quest for the Holy Grail, Beowolf and all the others.
So in keeping with the theme, here is some trivia about this icon of the 20th Century.

1. The Millennium Falcon's design was modeled after a hamburger with an olive next to it.
2. Director George Lucas originally had a contract with Fox for $150,000 for writing and directing Star Wars. But he cannily insisted on total control and 40% of merchandising - something the studio agreed to because they had no idea of what a phenomenon Star Wars would become.
3. George Lucas wanted to do a Flash Gordon remake, but couldn't obtain the movie rights and developed Star Wars in its stead - hence the opening title sequence. Following the success of Star Wars, the owners of Flash Gordon decided to make a movie after all. Released in 1980, the same year as The Empire Strikes Back, it flopped.
4. Luke Skywalker's name was originally going to be Dirk Starkiller.
5. The Wookiee Chewbacca was inspired by George Lucas' beloved dog Indiana - an Alaskan malamute.
6. Peter Mayhew, who played Chewbacca, worked as a hospital orderly in London before being cast as the Wookiee. He was said to have got into character by copying the mannerisms of animals he visited at the zoo.
7. The name of the planet Tatooine came from the town of Tataouine in Tunisia where the movie was filmed. (True I've been to Tunisia and there is a town called Tataouin)
8. On the first day of filming in the deserts of Tunisia, the country experienced its first major rainstorm in 50 years and a rest day had to be called.
9. C3PO was named after a post office which is located at reference C3 on a map of Lucas' hometown. R2-D2 is an abbreviation of 'Reel Two, Dialog Two'.
10. Anthony Daniels as C-3PO and Kenny Baker, who played R2-D2, are the only actors credited with being in all six Star Wars films.
11. The droids R2-D2 and C-3PO are said to be based on the 1958 Akira Kourosawa film Kakushi toride no san akunin (The Hidden Fortress). Other characters in Star Wars were also drawn from the film including Han Solo and Ben Kenobi.
12. Anthony Daniels was injured during his first outing as C-3PO when a leg piece fell off his gold-coloured costume and shattered - stabbing him in the foot.
13. The reason why C-3P0 lets R2-D2 go in front of him as they enter the Skywalker's residence right after being purchased from the Jawas, is because the set guy operating R2-D2 by radio control kept on hitting C-3P0 from behind and pushing him down the stairs, so in the final shot, C-3P0 suddenly steps to the side, waves R2-D2 past, and the shot cuts out right before R2-D2 goes flying down the stairs.
14. George Lucas based the character of Han Solo on his friend Francis Ford Coppola.
15. Harrison Ford wasn't an original candidate to play Han Solo. He was originally brought in simply to feed lines to the other auditioners. After watching Ford, George Lucas realized he was the perfect Han.
16. In the bar on Tattooine (where Luke and Obi-Wan meet Han Solo), you see lots of aliens at the bar. Look carefully in the background of these shots, and you'll see a NASA astronaut in full space walk gear (helmet etc) walking across the back of the shot, complete with American flag on his arm. It's quite obvious once you know where to look.
17. Luke's line "I can't see a thing in this helmet" was not scripted. Mark Hamill said this to Harrison Ford when he thought the cameras had stopped rolling. But, the filmmakers decided to leave the line in.
18. David Prowse, the 6ft 7ins actor who plays Darth Vader, had problems filming lightsaber scenes as he kept breaking the poles that were used as stand-ins for the weapons. In the sequels, fight co-ordinator Bob Anderson stepped into the costume to film the lightsaber scenes.
19. In the Death Star scenes (yes, all of them), whenever the Imperials walk, you can hear their footsteps. But when Tarkin walks, you can't hear him. This is because Peter Cushing (Tarkin) found his Imperial boots so uncomfortable, he didn't wear them. He wore carpet slippers, so you can't hear him.
20. The US Post Office has disguised some of it's mail boxes as R2D2 in homage of the 30th anniversary of Star Wars. In fact we saw one in Georgetown near the market when we were visiting Washington with the students. There won't be any in Washington itself, because since 9/11 there are no longer any mail boxes there. (Or because George is on the dark side ;o) )
    

* thanks to the BBC and Movie Mistakes for the trivia