Kals' Korner

"I've missed you, too!"

2012-01-10T01:05:00.000-07:00

There's a little boy in the centre where I work who makes no bones about letting me know he loves me. When I am off for a day, or out of the room all morning doing administrative work, or something else takes me away from the children for an extended amount of time, a few of the children run to wrap their little arms around my knees and have their heads tousled in a hasty, spontaneous toddler-hug upon my return. This little boy, however, is rarely one of the huggers (in fact, he is quite conservative in doling out physical affection of any kind, under any circumstances). Instead, he is usually the first to notice and announce my return: "Hey, Melissa's here!" Then, he makes eye contact with me, and very earnestly proclaims, "I miss you, Melissa!" to which I always reply with a smile, "I've missed you, too!"

Today marks the first day back to daycare after the Christmas holidays for a handful of children, most of whom either have school-aged older siblings or parents who are teachers, and therefore didn't come back last week with their friends. The boy I'm talking about was one of those for whom today was the first day back after two weeks. Today, when I arrived at work, rather than say anything at all, the boy leapt to his feet, abandoning his very interesting project in the block centre, and raced over to cling to my legs, starting the impromptu flood of hugs from his friends. "I've missed you, too!" I assured him, and he smiled and returned to his project.

I never cease to be inspired and amazed by the emotional honesty of very young children. They haven't yet learned the terrible lessons of life that lead us to fake our responses to one another. If they're angry, they scowl and clench their fists and stomp their feet. If they're afraid, they cry and seek comfort in the safety of loving adult arms. If they're excited, their little bodies cannot contain all of the energy that generates. But most of all, when they love you, you know it. Young children are generous with their love, and so very sincere about expressing it. They don't waste time waiting for the right moment, or looking for the right words to tell us. They are spontaneous, living in the moment, as for many of them the present is all that exists. They give us hugs and sloppy kisses. They follow us around, copying our every move. They bring us treasures. They tell us their joys and their fears. They may not always use the phrase "I love you," but the message is still there, plain as day. I think we all could learn something from them.

The Trouble With Ugly

2011-08-23T09:25:00.003-06:00

Recently, I have stumbled across some well-meaning blog posts addressing people who make poor choices. That is not a big deal; we all make poor choices, some of us more frequently than others, and learn from them at our own speed. What is a big deal is that these bloggers call the people making poor choices "ugly". Specifically, ugly on the inside.

Here's a surprise for you. I have taken high school biology classes, and I can tell you we are ALL extremely ugly on the inside. We are filled up with guts and blood and food in various stages of digestion, mucus, pus, you name it. Inside of a human being is very gross and disgusting. It's also awesome and amazing and beautiful.

Now, I am assuming that the people whose posts I take issue with were not being quite so literal. One woman, a professional photographer, found that some girls who had booked sittings with her were openly involved in online bullying. She cancelled their sessions and emailed their parents explaining why she was unwilling to take their photographs. That is fine; admirable, even. But calling another human being ugly in that context is damaging. She failed to make the distinction between the person and the action when she made the statement "If you are ugly on the inside, I’m sorry but I won’t take your photos to make you look pretty on the outside!" Sure, the actions those girls took, the poor choices they made, were very ugly. But the people making those choices and performing those actions are not ugly. To say otherwise would be to doom them forever to remain "ugly", making poor choices, and hurting others. It's the same distinction between saying "I did a stupid thing" and "I am stupid." The first statement acknowledges my stupid choices and actions while allowing me to learn from them and move on, hopefully making wiser choices in the future. The second statement implies that stupid is something ingrained in myself, something that I cannot change. By saying "I am stupid," I am saying that I am, always have been, and always will be stupid. That is a very dangerous distinction to overlook.

The "I won't take your picture if you are ugly" thing has been bothering me since it crossed my screen a few days ago, but what really spurred me to speak up about it was a post by a childcare provider and early childhood educator calling out "ugly" parents. The issue here is parents who are afraid that doing "girly" things will make their sons into homosexuals, or that doing "masculine" things will make their daughters into lesbians. She really has a number of good points, but it is still damaging to call parents "ugly" because they are misguided and/or misinformed. A parent of one of the girls at the childcare centre where I work was concerned because her three-year-old daughter started saying the word "penis" all the time. The parent can't even bring herself to say the word. She was upset that we would ever teach her child such "filthy and sexual" language. The parent was not being "ugly", she was trying to protect her child from perceived harm. We explained to the parent that we use the correct names for all of our body parts, and when her daughter tries to urinate whilst standing facing the toilet, we have to have a conversation with her about why she cannot do that without making a mess, even though boys do it all the time. When a child walks up to a teacher several times in a week, sometimes several times a day, and asks "Girls has penis?" she is not being inappropriate. She is seeking information. She wants to make sure it's still true, that we all give her the same answer, and that the answer isn't only true in the bathroom. "No, girls do not have penises; girls have vulvas." The child's parent is not "ugly on the inside" for being afraid of such conversations. She is struggling with her own upbringing. She genuinely had no idea, until we told her, that using the correct terminology for human genitalia is important for protecting children from abuse and for fostering healthy body image. She just thought her child was using filthy language to talk about filthy things and if she had ever said something like that when she was a child, she would have gotten a smack.

I'm not sure I am explaining this very well. No parent wakes up in the morning and says "I think I will limit my child in the most damaging way possible today." Every parent does the best he or she knows how to do with the resources he or she has available. Every parent wants his or her children to be healthy, happy, and successful. No parent has all the right answers or the right information. Misguided, misinformed choices can have ugly results, in parenting as in every other area of life. That doesn't mean the parents are ugly.

And then there's the whole issue of our appearance-based societal values being bought into by such talk, but I am not prepared to open that can of worms just now.

NOOOOO!!!

2011-07-12T01:17:00.000-06:00

Windows Live whatever whatever jerks apparently shut down windows live spaces, and I lost all my posts from my old blog because of it. D: This makes me sad. Profoundly sad.

Small Town Life Lessons

2010-07-31T19:13:00.006-06:00

A childhood friend, old neighbour, and former classmate of mine recently blogged about some of the areas around our hometown that he recently revisited, and it got me thinking about some things. The recent explosion in the mosquito population of Edmonton also helped. AND today marks the twelfth anniversary of my first day as a resident of Alberta.

So. Growing up in a small town in the middle of nowhere (Central Interior BC, to be more precise; the government keeps redrawing the line for the Northern Living Allowance to include or exclude Mackenzie) gives one a fairly unique perspective on life in general. Fast food chains are considered a bit of a novelty when one has to drive two hours to get there. Mackenzie is a sort of a microcosm by necessity; two hours north of Prince George, with extreme amounts of snow in the winter, makes it necessary for this tiny little town to be very autonomous. I was shocked and appalled, twelve years ago, to discover that the even tinier town I had just moved into had no drug store, medical services of any kind, high school, laundromat, or ATMs. That's right, there were NO bank machines in Bruderheim twelve years ago. There was a bank though.

Mackenzie is, by its nature, not at all anything like the real world. But the things I learned growing up there are some of the most important things I can think of for surviving in the real world, and they are things that I probably would not have learned elsewhere. So, once again, I am giving you a bulletted list! Yay! >.< Things I Learned in Mackenzie That Are Important In the Real World:

Wild animals are dangerous. I have seen grizzly and black bears across the street from my house, bear tracks across my back yard, a fox in my carport, coyotes peeking out of the greenbelt across the street, and very rarely, deer and moose across from my house as well. While all of these critters were facts of life, I knew from a very young age to keep my distance from them. Someone recently linked an extremely disturbing video of a cat harassing a fawn in Cranbrook, and the doe's reaction (basically it tried to lead the fawn away, was surprised by a big huge dog that came bounding out to investigate, and proceeded to trample the dog, possibly to death). I could not watch to the end of the video, but my brother tells me it aimed a kick at the cat's head near the end, too. This video did not surprise me. What surprised me was the fact that someone saw their cat bothering a baby wild animal and went "aww isn't that cute, where's my video camera" instead of calling the cat AND the dog into the house before momma showed up to protect the baby. ANY mother animal is dangerous if she perceives a threat to her babies. Any wild animal is dangerous if it perceives a threat to itself, too. No matter how cute and adorable a wild animal is, unless it's small enough that you can crush it with your boot if it tries to attack you, it is dangerous to get too close to it. If you are driving through Jasper National Park and you see a cute baby bear, stay in your car. If you see some cute mountain goats... Stay. In. Your. Car.

Everything is within walking distance (if you're willing to walk long enough). This is true just about anywhere in the world, actually. If it's on the same continent as you, you can walk to it. This concept actually is more involved than one might think, at first. You may think I am being overly clever here. But really, if you can walk somewhere within the time you have to get there, it's in walking distance. I could walk to West Edmonton Mall right now (approximately 60 blocks from here) in time to catch the movie that starts in an hour. That's about on the edge of my "reasonable walking distance" radius, especially if I have to carry something with me. My reasonable travel radius basically doubles if I ride my bike. I can get downtown in about 45 minutes to an hour. That's how long I have to allow if I am taking the bus. Growing up in a town where there was no public transit, many families had only one car, and there was only one taxi company with only a handful of cars, walking or biking from place to place was just part of life. I walked a mile to school and back every day in high school (which starts in Grade 8 in BC, in case you are not from around there). Sometimes I would walk that distance twice to get to an event or grab a slushie from 7-11. Some people rode their bikes to work out at the industrial site. In fact, enough people rode their bikes out to the mills that someone put in a paved bike path alongside the highway.

Dress for the weather (and be prepared for the weather to change at a moment's notice). Ideally, a town with no public transit, in which many people walk everywhere, would be located in a temperate region of the world. Not so with Mackenzie. Thanks to that one-mile walk to school (yes, it really was uphill both ways, but not the whole way) I learned how to deal with unexpected windstorms and thunderstorms, fog so thick you can't see your hand in front of your face, freezing rain, ice, hail, sleet, sun, extremely hot weather (we're talking over 30 C and it didn't happen that often!), extremely cold weather (under -40 C, and that was much more common), extremely deep snow, and everything in between. Growing up in Mackenzie is the reason why, in Edmonton, I take my backpack with me everywhere I go. My backpack contains an umbrella and my jacket if it's too warm to wear the jacket. It has sunscreen in it right now, and when it's not summer out, it has a spare pair of gloves, a pair of dry socks, a lighter, and possibly some hand warmers. I have had occasion to use all of these 'just in case' items at various times while living in Edmonton. I am also not ashamed to wear long johns in cold weather, and tend to dress in many thin layers that can be stripped off if I get too warm, rather than wearing a huge parka when it's only -15. I do not freeze to death waiting for the stupid bus to arrive, although I am sometimes not very comfortable. Even if I don't expect to spend a lot of time outside, I make sure I am prepared to do so if I have to. And yes, I still check the weather forecast before leaving the house.

You can't always get what you want. Did I mention it was a 2 hour drive to the nearest McDonald's? We would make a list of things that we needed and every two or three months, we would all pile into the car early in the morning and drive to Prince George. We would spend the day going to optometrists, shopping for clothes, buying things in bulk at Costco and Superstore, browsing Coles, getting dog food, buying Christmas and birthday gifts, demanding that the thing we ordered into that store must be there that day because we wouldn't be back for another two or three months, looking for specialised craft or camping gear, and basically running around like headless chickens trying to get everything on the list that we couldn't get in town (or couldn't get at the same price or quality). Then we would have a late supper at either a restaurant or from the sandwich cooler at Mr. G on the way out of the city, and drive back home again. This was costly in terms of time and gasoline. We learned to delay gratification because well... We didn't really have a choice.

If you do something bad, one way or another, your parents WILL find out. People might not even intend to rat you out to your mom when they casually mention "Oh, I saw Jimmy at the mall yesterday, he sure is getting tall!" the day before your week-long grounding ends. The rumour mill is certainly not designed to carry word to your dad that you were smoking up behind the gym during shop class, but it sure does a good job of it. Heck, in a small town, if a random stranger sees you littering and shouts out the window that he or she is going to call your mother if you don't pick that up right this instant, you BELIEVE it. Outside of that microcosm where everyone knows everyone else, the same principle actually applies. Especially with things like Facebook being so willing to create a virtual small town for you. If you crash your car, your parents are going to hear about it eventually. Also, parents have superpowers that alert them when you are lying or covering something up. Don't do that. Just be honest with them, it's better for everyone involved.

Entertainment does not require electricity. At some point every year, the power goes out in Mackenzie for at least a few hours. OH NOES! What will we ever do without our internets? Well let me tell you something, young whippersnapper. When I was your age, TV was called BOOKS. No wait. That's something else. By the time I left Mackenzie in 1998, I think there were 20, maybe 30, dial-up connections available through the local ISP. It took half an hour of setting your modem on redial to even get connected to the internet, and then it took five minutes to load a website with a lot of graphics on it, and oh yeah did I mention you had to pay by the minute to use the internet? Mackenzie was actually an awesome place to have no power. In the summer, there's a lake just down the hill. Voila, swimming pool, boating, fishing , you name it. In winter, the ice was thick enough to skate on, ski across, and do some epic ice fishing. There is a 9-hole golf course, and as a teen, I could play a round of golf for $7. There are miles and miles of hiking trails (with dangerous wild animals about, granted) that translate into cross-country ski trails in winter. There are about a zillion epic tobogganing hills. There are huge back yards to play in. Actually that's how I met the guy I mentioned at the start of this post; I was playing in my back yard, he was playing in his, and his dad had pulled down the bit of fence between our two yards to repair it. Once the power went out for about 48 hours during Christmas break. It was -40 the whole time. We had a fire in our fireplace, played cards by candlelight, read books, told stories, played board games, drew pictures... It was actually really fun.

There is no such thing as a 'snow day'. In the winter of 1993/94, there were so many non-instructional school days due to cold temperatures (the rule was if it's colder than -35, school is optional) that the school board declared no more cold weather days. We were missing too much instructional time. I was in Grade 7 that year. In high school (when I had the one mile each way walk) the only time school was closed was when the power was out. Otherwise, rain or shine, blizzard, thunderstorm, or absolute zero, school was in session. Real life works that way. Hate to break it to you. three inches of snow is no reason to miss work or school. Neither is eighteen inches. Of course, it would help if the city would do its dang job and plow the roads in a timely fashion. For those of you who have never lived through a Mackenzie (or other northern community) winter, you probably have no idea why I laugh hysterically when someone complains that Edmonton has had a lot of snow this year (or any of the twelve years I've been here). My dad would get up and shovel the driveway and walkways at 6am before he went to work. Then my brother and I would shovel again a couple of hours later before walking to school. My mom would shovel again sometime in the middle of the day. Then we would come home from school, shovel the driveway again, do homework, have supper, do the dishes, and shovel again. And I'm not talking scrape a wee skiff of snow away here, I'm talking between one and five inches of snow each time. If one of these shovelling sessions was missed for whatever reason, we would have to deal with up to ten inches of snow at a time. The total snowfall each winter was somewhere around 15 to 16 feet, on average. FEET! That's roughly 5 meters, or three short-to-average height women standing on each other's shoulders. If we stayed home from school every day that it snowed a substantial amount or the weather was extremely bad, I would still be in grade five right now.

Natural resources are precious. Mackenzie was a boomtown founded on the softwood lumber industry. It was built on the southern tip of the Williston Reservoir after the WAC Bennett Dam was built, creating what was, at the time, the largest man-made lake in the world. Mackenzie is now a bust town. All of the mills have closed (although I hear rumours that someone bought at least one of them and is planning to reopen it). Without the booming pulp, paper, and lumber industry of the late 20th century, the town has withered. On a very small scale, this is an example of what happens when natural resources are depleted by overproduction and unchecked consumption. Also, Mackenzie is blessed with a source of clean, delicious, fresh drinking water. The water comes from the underground springs that feed into Morfee lake, and is filtered through natural charcoal beds. Have you ever had Fiji brand bottled water? It might be the best bottled water you've ever tasted. Possibly the most expensive as well. It is almost (but not quite) as good as the water that comes out of the taps in Mackenzie. We have to be very careful to keep the lake clean in order to continue to have the best tap water in the universe. There are restrictions on using boat motors on certain parts of the lake, and steep fines for dumping into it. Every body of water on the planet needs to be treated as carefully as Morfee Lake is. I may sound like a hippie, but as our population increases, the amount of drinkable water is decreasing and becoming more and more polluted and unsafe to drink. Water is the second most basic requirement for humans to live (the first being air). Speaking of air, the air in Mackenzie tastes sweet. Well, in the summer it does. It's because of the huge amounts of clover blossoms. It doesn't smell like car exhaust or sewer gas. It almost never smells like the pulp mill unless the wind blows the wrong way (well now it never smells like pulp mill...). It just smells like... outside. You know why? Well, partly because it's a small town in the middle of the forest, far away from civilization. But mostly because everything is in walking distance. The majority of people in the town will choose to walk fifteen minutes if the weather is good and they don't have a bunch of stuff to carry, rather than drive three minutes. Fewer people means fewer cars, granted, but a smaller population actually uses their cars, too. People use people-driven modes of transportation more often. They walk, bike, rollerblade, and skateboard where they need to go far more often than the general population of a large city like Edmonton.

Everything changes. It was heartbreaking to go back to Mackenzie after being away for so many years. My mom and I spent a night at my cousin's house after a camping trip to Crooked River Provincial Park a couple of summers ago. My elementary school has been bulldozed. There is just a huge empty field where it used to be. The scenery, the beautiful forested mountains that surround the town, are horribly scarred by the pine beetle decimation of lodgepole pines. Very few of my friends and their families are still living in town. My house is grey. The spruce sapling that I planted when I was six or seven years old and watched grow for ten years appears to have been chopped down and a storage shed erected where it once stood. Not everything is bad, though. I remember when the Petro Canada station's store became a 7-11. I remember when Subway came to town. I remember the creation of John Dahl Park. I remember when they dismantled the awesome slide at my school and moved it so they could build a new Adventure Playground. Things change, and they make me feel happy or sad or indifferent, but change is change.

Family is more than just genetics. After moving to Alberta, I came back into contact with some childhood friends who had moved out here years earlier. One is my best friend. We met in preschool. She spent every possible moment at our house when we were little girls. We rode our bikes together and went tobogganing and swimming together. We went to Guide camp together. We fought over boys and over mutual friends and over stupid little things that no one remembers anymore. We loved each other and we hated each other. We did spiteful things and thoughtful things for each other. We traded shoes and jackets (and our mothers promptly made us trade back). In truth, we are as much sisters as if we had been born in the same family. We are probably only still friends because we didn't have to live with each other through puberty though! Seven years of fifteen minute birthday phone calls, sporadic letters, and occasional incidental visits may have killed some friendships. Not ours. There are a couple of other people in Edmonton whose parents were friends with my parents and who just happened to be close to my age, so we ended up playing together a lot as kids. When we hang out with other people, they assume we are related to each other. I suppose it makes some sense; our parents sort of raised us communally in a lot of ways. Growing up together forges sort of a bond between people, I guess. I am not very good at explaining it, but there is a connection.

Mosquitoes are vicious (but blackflies are worse, and horseflies are the worst of all). So, I mentioned a population explosion of mosquitoes in Edmonton. It recently rained a whole bunch here, and then it got hot. TA-DAAA! Mosquitoes everywhere. They bite. Lots. The thing about the skeeters out here, though, is that they are small. And their bites are small. And while their bites itch like crazy, they only last a few hours at most. Mackenzie mosquitoes are twice the size, have been known to produce dime-sized bites, and the bites itch for DAYS. I am not going to complain too much about Edmonton mosquitoes. Blackflies don't exist in Edmonton. They are weeeee tiny bugs that can fit through the screen in the window I have right now. I would have to replace this screen with a much tighter mesh if I were back in Mackenzie. They take a bite out of your skin about the size of their own bodies. But first they inject a local anaesthetic so you don't feel the bite. And they inject an anticoagulant agent, so their bites bleed like crazy. And they itch once the numbing venom wears off. And the only thing in all of creation that has even half a chance of keeping them from biting is Muskol. Muskol is a very stinky bug spray. It's one of the ones that can dissolve certain plastics. It's very bad for you, but it's the only thing that works. Horseflies are just assholes. They're gigantic blackflies (bigger than house flies) but they don't even bother to numb your skin when they bite you. They just chomp away. and it HURTS.

Anyways, I'm sure I just made your head explode, but... Mackenzie =/= the real world. The real world could stand to learn some lessons from Mackenzie, though. Annnnd now I have a craving for low-bush blueberries (harvested while singing at the top of my lungs and constantly looking around for the bear who left that poop over there...)

Things to do instead of Earth Hour (that will acutally make a difference)

2010-03-27T20:14:00.011-06:00

This post is under construction! New edits as of March 26, 2011 are highlighted like so!

Unplug and sell or donate your "second fridge" and learn how to use your main fridge efficiently. Use the freezer compartment of your fridge rather than having a deep freeze. Grow your own vegetables so that you can harvest them as you need them, without having to store and refrigerate them. If you would like to freeze your excess produce for use during the winter, consider only running your deep freeze during the "off season" as your storage volume increases. If you have enough room in your fridge freezer, use that instead.
Unsubscribe from cable or satellite television. That way, your TV will only be on when you are watching a movie or playing console games. Once you adjust to not having the TV on constantly, you'll be amazed at how much you don't miss it. Also, an HD cable box pulls about as much power as an average laptop computer, or a 17" LCD computer monitor. So if you must keep your cable TV, turn off or unplug the box when you're not watching.
Replace all of the incandescent lightbulbs in your house (as they burn out) with compact fluorescents or other energy efficient bulbs. CFL blubs use approximately one quarter of the power to produce the same amount of light as their incandescent equivalents.
Always turn off the lights when you're not in the room. In order for it to "take more energy to turn back on than you would have used by leaving it on" you would have to leave the room only for a fraction of a second. So unless you're Superman or The Flash, turn em off. If you're worried about wearing out your bulbs before their appointed time, switch to the longer-lasting compact fluorescents, which don't have fragile filaments like incandescent bulbs do.
If you want to have a light on when you come home at night, use a timer instead of leaving the light on all day. You can get an outlet timer for under $15 CAD at any hardware store. Program it to turn on shortly before you're scheduled to arrive home and to turn off again at around your usual bedtime. You can always manually turn it off as well. These are also handy when you're going on vacation and want to create the illusion that there is still someone at home. You can also get timer lightswitches to install in place of your existing switches, allowing you to program your overhead room lights to turn on and off at specified times. The last one I saw ran at around $50 CAD at Rona.
Use your toaster oven for baking small items like a small batch of cookies, brownies, one or two portions of fish, meat, or fries, etc. Basically if you can make it fit in the toaster oven, it's best to bake it there; A toaster oven uses about 1/2 to 2/3 as much power as a conventional oven to provide the same amount of heat for the same amount of time.
Eat more raw foods. The less heating, cooking, blending, microwaving, and food-processoring you can do, the lower your power bill will be! Also, fresh, unprocessed food is delicious, and good for your body!
Keep a vegetable garden. I know I mentioned this in the fridge thing, but seriously. If you grow it yourself, you don't have to worry about where it's been, what kinds of pesticides were used on it, transporting it home from the store, or disposing of packaging. Also, vegetable gardens help with important environmental things such as nitrogen and water cycles, reducing carbon dioxide in the air, preventing soil erosion, and maintaining urban biodiversity. Even if you don't have a yard in which you can plant a garden, you can grow food in containers. I've got a nice big planter of spinach in my kitchen that gives me tasty year-round fresh salads, and another with stevia, providing me with a natural sugar alternative.
Turn your thermostat down to 18 C. Use sweaters and blankets if you're chilly. Seal any drafts in your home (this is a tough one at my place, the whole building is one big draft, it seems!) and make sure your furnace filter is cleaned or changed regularly.
When the weather is temperate enough (above freezing), use portable space heaters to heat only the room that you are in, rather than using central heating to heat the entire house. This works well on rainy miserable summer days, chilly summer nights, and in early autumn or late spring in my part of the world.
Dim your computer monitor. Seriously, you can still see what's on the screen. Especially if you're not in an unnecessarily brightly-lit room.
Replace your bulky old CRT monitors with LCD monitors; They use less than half the power for the same sized screen. Either wait to do this until you're buying a new monitor anyways, for whatever reason, or donate the old one to someone who can use it, tuck it away to use as an emergancy backup if you have storage space, or take it to an electronics recycling centre. If you've taken anything to the Cloverbar Landfill and driven up to the main dump sight, you've see the "Great Wall of China" -- the massive fence made entirely of stacked-up CRT monitors and televisions!
Use a dark-coloured background on your desktop and on any websites that allow you a choice. It takes less energy to display black than it does to display white.
Walk, cycle, or take public transit whenever possible. If you live in a major city, there are VERY few instances in which a private motor vehicle is actually necessary. On the rare occasions when a vehicle is actually needed, you can take a cab, borrow a vehicle from a friend or family member, or rent a vehicle for the required amount of time. These things are actually more economical than owning and maintaining a vehicle year round, especially with fuel prices what they are.
Compost. It is mind-boggling the amount of compostable materials that end up in landfills. You can compost most kitchen waste (as long as it's not meat) including paper towels (used to mop up spills, not ones used with cleaning chemicals), coffee grounds and filters, teabags, fruit and vegetable peels, rinds, and cores (careful with seeds though, you might get some volunteer plants!), shredded paper (especially newsprint!), eggshells, and some new plastics made from corn (they usually say "biodegradeable" or "compostable" on them), as well as things like nail clippings, pet hair, the soiled woodchips from your hamster/guinea pig/mouse/bunny/other small furry animal's cage (avoid composting the feces of omnivores and carnivores though), and the inner cores of certain types of diapers (again only urine here, human feces is not healthy compost material).
Choose to buy items with minimal and/or biodegradable packaging.
Drink tap water.
Air-dry your laundry.
When you must use the dryer, clean the lint trap before EVERY load.
Set your washing machine to use warm or cold water instead of hot.
When it comes time to replace your furnace, hot water heater, and household appliances, look for energy efficient options! They may cost more out of pocket, but will save you money on your energy bills in the long run!
Take cooler showers. Especially in the summer! You don't need a scalding-hot shower to get clean. You can still be comfortable and use a tiny bit less hot water.

More suggestions and links to resources are forthcoming. But right now, I need to do homework and get some sleep.

In the Twilight of my Soul: I am not a failure.

2009-04-21T11:56:00.000-06:00

In the Twilight of my Soul: I am not a failure.: "I am not a failure."

-- As many of you know, I was diagnosed with ADHD, social anxiety, dysthymia and dysgraphia in late October of 2008. I wrote this poem in response to the diagnosis and the relief and validation it gave me.

Katie's First

2006-12-26T12:40:00.000-07:00

Well, this has been quite the Christmas. This was the first year that my sister-in-law was able to join us, and it was also Katie's first Christmas. On Christmas eve, Katie was standing unsupported for an unprecedented length of time, so I whipped out the video camera to see if she would do it again. She obliged by standing, getting excited, kicking her feet up and down, and then running across the living room. Auntie managed to get these exuberant first steps on video. Sadly, it was not a digital camcorder so I don't have an uploadable video or I would share with all of you.

In Concert!!!

2006-11-17T00:03:00.000-07:00

So, for those of you who are local, you may be interested in the concert I will be performing next week. Here's the info:

The King's University College Concert and Chamber Choirs, under the direction of Melanie Turgeon, sincerely invite you to their upcoming concert "Program Pairs" on Friday, November 24 at 8:00 p.m. at West End Christian Reform Church (10015-149 Street). A special feature of the concert will be a performance by a famous local pair Duo Majoya, which includes Dr. Marnie Giesbrecht on organ and King's faculty member, Dr. Joachim Segger on piano. In addition, the sounds of the saxophone will fill the air when Dr. Charles Stolte performs two works with the choir. The program includes music by Bortniansky, Rheinberger, Arvo Part, Geraint Lewis, and Joachim Segger, as well as some beautiful advent and Christmas music by Victoria, Robin John King, John Tavener, John Rutter, and other Johns!

Tickets are currently on sale in TKUC Bookstore (adults $12; students and seniors $10; children under 10 free). Tickets will also be available at the door.

If you have any questions, or require any further information, please contact Melanie Turgeon at (780) 465-3500 ext. 8028 or melanie.turgeon@kingsu.ca

Videokeycodec 11.0

2006-10-28T13:48:00.000-06:00

I am a software technician for a major computer corporation. Within the past two days, I have had calls from at least two customers regarding the following malware infection. Googling the main application, Videokeycodec 11.0 yeilded no results, so I thought I should make my experience available to the general public.

DISCLAIMER: This article is based soley on my own experience with removing this infection. So far it appears to be successful.

Symptoms:

Yellow triangular icon in system tray, giving frequent notification that "Your Computer Is Infected"
Clicking on this notification is reported to have opened porn sites in internet explorer.
The following items are present in Add/Remove Programs:

Public Messenger (usually version 2.08)
IE Security Update
Videokeycodec 11.0

Cause:

Unconfirmed, but may come from opening certain messages on Myspace. I've had a report that the pogram opened itself when the recipiant opened the message. This also appears to be similar to one of the myriad "download this codec to watch this free smutty video" trojans out there.

Removal:

Boot to safe mode with networking (tap the F8 key repeatedly after starting the computer, select "safe mode with networking" from the Advanced Options menu that appears.)
Go to Start>My Computer>Program Files
Delete the folder named Videokeycodec.
Empty your recycle bin
Go to Start>Control Panel>Add/Remove Programs
Remove Public Messenger, IE Security Update, and Videokeycodec 11.0 (NOTE: you will get an error message stating that the program appears to have been uninstalled already, and asking if you would like to remove it from the add/remove programs list. Click yes.)
Reset your Internet Explorer settings to defaults, as detailed here
Update the definitions in your antivirus and antispyware applications. If you do not have any, visit free.grisoft.com to get some free (and effective) software.
Reboot your computer in normal mode. Your computer should now be clean, but it would be a good idea to run a scan for other spyware, as this does appear to be a trojan.

Following up

2006-09-24T19:34:00.000-06:00

So today was the Heart&Stroke walk. It was fun, Mom and I had a great time, but my feet hurt.

In Edmonton, the walk raised over $100 thousand for heart and stroke research. Not too bad. If you still want to donate, I believe you still can, using this link.

Wow!

2006-09-01T18:58:00.000-06:00

It's been a while!

So, ummm... what's new? Not much, brother still dating close friend, still doing tech support for major computer corporation (but getting better at it!), still disconnected from most of my friends, still taking life one day at a time. And still struggling against the writer's block of the century.

I had my choir audition today, I'm really really hoping to get into chamber choir, but I seriously botched the sight reading bit. I think I may have made up for it with the rhythm sight reading part though.

Last night I went to the hospital to have blood taken for some blood cultures. Something about having a fever every night for a week with no other symptoms really (except for the headache I usually get when I have a fever) is kind of worrisome. Hopefully not a heart infection because that would really suck, especially right now when I'm trying to work AND go to school.

J and R are coming up this weekend and bringing Katie, of course. I'm so excited I finally get to meet the little (or not so little anymore, I'm given to believe) tater. And of course I get to smother her in Auntie's love and spoil her rotten.

Walking for life.

2006-08-18T18:30:00.000-06:00

On Sunday, September 24th, I am participating in the Cheerios Heart&Stroke Walk for Heart. Our goal is to raise over $3.2 million in support of heart disease and stroke research and health education programs. The reason? Heart disease and stroke remains the leading cause of death in Canada.

Millions of Canadians – family, friends and colleagues - may develop some form of heart disease and stroke throughout their lives. By helping The Heart and Stroke Foundation fund the best research possible, we can find the answers that will make a difference to their future and yours.

You can help me raise funds for this important cause and help the Heart and Stroke Foundation reach their goal of $3.2 million for life-saving research. To sponsor me online, just click this link to access my secure fundraising page.

As many of you know, I have a congenital heart condition, a bicuspid aortic valve. While this condition does not currently have much effect on my day-to-day life, I will eventually require open-heart valve replacement surgery. So I have a special reason to want to support this organization.

If you are interested in participating in the walk, please visit this site.

the adventures of a paperback princess: more adventures of the paperback princess

2006-07-29T02:29:00.000-06:00

the adventures of a paperback princess: more adventures of the paperback princess

Crazy Sunday.

2006-07-26T22:39:00.000-06:00

Sunday was quite the exciting day.

H. and I were going to go shopping, then head to the Ex to see a concert. Sounded like a good time. We left my house and started walking to the LRT station.

So there I was, walking along, pushing H's wheelchair as we embarked on a mission of shopping and concert-going, when I saw the jack russell terrier from the junkyard on the corner running loose. I mentioned that it had gotten out and then described the two other dogs in the junkyard. Obligingly, the other two appeared at the fence and started barking at us. (We were on the other side of the street and about to turn the corner in the opposite direction of the junkyard). We turned the corner and I thought that the barking suddenly seemed closer, but before I could turn to look, the frickin jack russell bit the back of my leg! WTF!!!

Good thing I'm not a small person, or he would have had a much better grip and possibly ripped out my achilles tendon. As it is, I now have a small fang-gash and some bad bruising.

Why can't my life just be normal for once?

We went up to Clairview, had lunch, found new gloves for H, new clothes for me, then hopped back on the trian and went to Northlands, wound our way through the crazy crowds of people in the midway, and got to the concert venue.

All the wheelchair people were let into the concert venue first and given places up front where the crowd wouldn't block their view of the stage. We had a blast listening to the first opening act (Murder City Sparrows rock, and thier bass player is yummy), were tortured by the second one (I think my ears were bleeding by the end), and then all the wheelchair users were dragged out to the back before the main act started.

Why? "Because if the crowd rushes, they'll get hurt" or "because we can't get over the barrier if they're up against it"

At least, I think that was what was said. The security guards didn't talk to myself or H. about it at all. We got this information from what little we could hear of the conversations with the other four wheelchair users and their companions.

Then all of the sudden this security guard comes out of nowhere and says to me "We're moving you out now." I stare blankly, not knowing what she's talking about. "Please don't look at me like that!" she snaps. I make some vague noise of incomprehension and she points at H. "Are you with her?" I nod. She gives me some vague explaination that "we're moving them" to a different area on the other side and in the back. I ask if H. will be able to see, and the security lady says yes impatiently. We are being a nuisance by not cooperating like good cattle and following orders without question. I grab my bag and step back so that H. can go ahead of me and wheel out through the aisle they had opened in the crowd. The security guard at the other end was waiting for us and talked quite pleasantly to me. H. at this point was extremely angry. We had to wait for the others to wheel out of the crowd before they told us where we were going. They herded us like cattle to our assigned area, about 20 feet behind the crowd on the other side of the venue. Then the rude security lady came and snapped something to H. about moving closer if she wanted. When H. expressed her extreme displeasure at the situation and stated she wanted to get her money refunded and to leave, the security lady said "You'll have to talk to ticketmaster for that" and walked away. This was the only time that anyone bothered to even talk to H. directly. She was so furious and mortified she was in tears. And to top it all off, she couldn't see the stage. Then as a consolation prize, we were told we would be first in line to meet the band and have stuff signed. We were there to watch the band perform, not listen to them and then get their autographs.

So many things are wrong with the way this went.

1: Why did they seat the wheelchair users in that location if they were going to move them? It's cruel to let them see the opening acts and drag them away for the main act. These people came for the main act, just like everyone else.
2: What gives a bunch of able-bodied teenagers more right to be able to see the concert than people in wheelchairs? Since when did people with disabilities become second-class citizens in this country?
3: The fact that H. is sitting in a wheelchair does not automatically make her deaf or stupid. Why did no one do her the courtesy of speaking directly to her?
4: People in wheelchairs do not all belong to the same party or group. Just because you talked to one person does not mean that all know what is going on.
5: The 8-year-old girl that was standing by us was in far greater danger of being crushed by the crowd than the five people in wheelchairs were.

I think that the security guards were more concerned with liability issues than with the safety of concert attendees. I was apalled and disgusted at the treatment that all five of the people in wheelchairs received. What an awful state the world is in. I'm not saying they should get special treatment, I just think they should have the same rights as everyone else.

We stuck around and enjoyed most of the rest of the concert, ate some greasy carnival food, won a few stuffed animals, and got some cotton candy to bring home to Shane, ignored most of the fireworks, and then went home and crawled into bed.

What a day.

Monday, I went to the doctor and showed her the dog bite. She gave me a tetanus shot (which still hurts worse than the dog bite) and some antibiotic cream. Then I called animal control and they sent a couple of officers over to take a statement. Looks like I get to go to court and hopefully get the dog owner a tasty fine for dog attack causing injury. Yesterday morning the doc called me to ask if she could give her report on the dog bite to the bylaw officers. I said yes, of course. The health inspector called me this morning but I missed it, and he wasn't answering his phone when I called him back. The dog is under a 10-day quarantine to make sure it doesn't have rabies. I hope that's not the reason the health inspector is calling me :S

In case you wondered...

2006-07-22T06:21:00.000-06:00

I hit a dark patch in my life. most of my writing energy is on the blog that fits: soultwilight.blogspot.com

it's linked in my profile as well.

Pickle.

2006-07-15T18:09:00.000-06:00

It's my cousin's wedding today. Congratulations Carey and Joe! Sorry I couldn't go, but work is work.

Still alive, after all these years!

2006-05-27T12:04:00.000-06:00

Ok, so maybe years is an exaggeration. But I'm sure some of you are wondering where I disappeared to. The answer... Nowhere! My computer got busted while I was trying to make it better. And so now I'm waiting on my new case so I can put together the newer better computer. Hopefully my hard drive isn't actually dead, like it seems to think it is.

Anyhoo, hope for the future; I shall return, with more than just this paltry one hour per day whenever I manage to get to the public library.

ps. Happy birthday, Dad.

Yeah, I'm still here.

2006-04-21T11:29:00.000-06:00

So, I got the job, working as a software helpdesk tech for a major computer corporation. 3 weeks of training are just wrapping up (yay, free pizza day) and then I get 4 weeks sort of half on the phones and half in class. Today was also payday; Man being poor sucks the big one!

Uh, yeah I thought maybe I had something else interesting to say, but I guess I thought wrong.

Normal stuff never happens to me!

2006-03-27T00:30:00.000-07:00

So, here I am, preparing for a hiring fair tomorrow (yes, I'm going back to the phones), when a couple of facts become apparant:

1. I haven't touched my resume since November.
2. I haven't installed Word on my computer since the last time I formatted my hard drive.

So, I set about rectifying point #2 first, since Word makes it much easier to edit my resume and come up with a decent-looking end product. Everything is going according to plan. My computer tells me to insert disk 2 (I'm getting word from a works suite) so I do that. A few seconds later, I hear BANG!!!!! CRUNCHACRUCNCHAGRINDACRUNCHA...until I hit the power switch on the back of my machine.

I grab a screwdriver, unhook the cdrom drive from the guts of my computer, detatch it from the case, and pull it out. I grab a safety pin to open the drawer and... sure enough, there's disk 2 of microsoft works suite 2000 shattered into a gadzillion bits and clogging up the inside of my drive. *sigh*

Who has CDs explode inside a cdrom!?! Seriously, that stuff never happens to real poeple!!! AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!

Springtime Mantleth Every Bough

2006-03-25T18:11:00.000-07:00

At least in Katie Land (also known as the lower mainland of BC) it does! Here, not so much. It's grey and snowing and the only daffodils to be found are the ones the Girl Guides are hawking in the shopping malls to support cancer research.

I'm still sick, bit the bullet and went to the dreaded doctor today, who agreed that I have a sinus infection and gave me a prescription for antibiotics. Whee. Getting better soon though. Speaking of which...

Everyone mark your calendars; Friday April 7 is the date of my next concert. Email for details!

You did WHAT?!?

2006-03-22T20:29:00.000-07:00

Yeah I caught a cold from the young fella upstairs. Katie hasn't heard about it, but I though this facial expression was rather appropriate. She's getting so big now. Hopefully I get to meet her before she's all growed up!

I've been sick more or less all week, and must admit I haven't been to work during that time. We'll see if I still have a job tomorrow.

That's it for me for now, just wanted to make you all aware that I am still alive (if barely).

Paradox

2006-03-13T00:38:00.000-07:00

The cold, dark winter lifts
as the long-overdue snow
quenches Earth's despairing thirst.
Life begins anew.

I'm still alive!

2006-02-21T13:47:00.000-07:00

Yup that's right, I still exist.

I'm working for a temp agency these days; they have me doing accounts payable stuff for an oilfield company. The work is not too monotonous, and I am picking everything up quite quickly. The accounting manager has been talking about hiring me permanently, we'll see if that pans out once they discover I have virtually no accounting background! The location is perfect; I have a 15 minute walk from my bus to the office in the morning and a 20-25 minute walk to class after work, or to my bus, as the case may be. The walking does me good, and the way things work out, I don't have to be late for my choir rehearsals.

Last week was my 25th birthday... quarter century, kinda funny to think of. I'm a bit depressed because I am no farther ahead in my life than I was 5 years ago, and I certainly haven't accomplished any of the things I wanted to do by the time this landmark came around. Hopefully I will be there by 30. Sigh.

I went out for dinner with Mom and Dad, which was very nice. Well, the "with Mom and Dad" part was nice. The resteraunt, we do not plan to revisit. After that, I went to the bar with some friends, had a good time there too.

I think I've just run out of useful things to say, so I guess I'll just publish this....

Oh, by the way, if you want to see newer Katie pics, click here.

2006-01-17T21:57:00.000-07:00

Here's Katie in the carseat, making good use of the blankie her Auntie made for her...

2006-01-17T21:54:00.000-07:00

Doesn't her Grandpa look proud? I love this pic!