senatorhung's pad
ramblings of an information troubleshooter
ramblings of an information troubleshooter
pay no mind to what they say
Sunday, 17APR2005:dragged myself out of bed and to the office in the early afternoon to finish something that i had promised done before monday. was planning on taking in the matinee showing of the movie 'les choristes' at the astro, but joe invited me to coffee at fantasy palace and since i hadn't eaten anything yet, the tasty treats at the palace seemed a bit more enticing than the buttered popcorn offered by the theatre.
so, we rehashed the events / non-events of the previous evening for a bit. angie came in all wired, having only slept for a couple of hours. then it was back to the office to wrap things up.
dropped my stuff off at home before swinging by kathleen's office (yet another sunday-worker !) and delivering her the mittens that she had left at karaoke the night before. we then walked over to the parish hall for the toonik tyme community feast where we ran into sue and olivia. the spread of seal laid out seemed impressive, but once the MC finished his spiel, it was a feast free-for-all.
now, traditionally, elders would be given the chance to get the best pieces, followed by the kids and then everyone else. anything left over after everyone had sampled a bit would be available for people to take home. instead of that orderly process, we watched as everyone scrambled to slice off their chunk, stuff it in a plastic bag and quickly skeedaddle out the door.
when all that was left were a few chunks, someone lent me an ulu and i carved off a bite-sized piece of seal for myself. it wasn't as strong as some of the seal meat that i've had before, but even that attribute wasn't enough to lure sue, that former vegan, to try a bit. however, her and olivia were impressed by the hand-knitting that one of the women demonstrated with the seal intestines.
after all that excitement, i just had to go home for another nap :) got up later in the evening to dig into all of the chores that i had put off for a lazy sunday - washing dishes, taking out the garbage, sorting recyclables, putting away laundry that had been drying on my couch, making lunches for the next week, eating food in the freezer so that i wouldn't need to leave it on during my stint in the south - and that was the day.
- link of the day: goodbye uncle sam, hello team europe
In 1989, the European Union banned imports of hormone-laden beef. Ten years later, when it lost the case at the WTO, the EU chose to pay the penalty of approximately $100 million to the United States and Canada over lost revenue rather than reverse its ban. Last November, however, the EU decided it was tired of paying through the teeth for its policies. Armed with new scientific evidence of the risks that such hormones pose for humans, its officials counter-challenged the North Americans at the WTO. They don't want our beef or any other type of U.S.-engineered techno-food. The United States has now gone to the WTO to claim compensation for five years of losses connected to the EU moratorium on new varieties of genetically modified organisms (GMO). The U.S. corporate food lobby is also pressing the Bush administration to launch yet another WTO suit to challenge the EU's labeling and traceability law, which is designed to give consumers more control over what they eat. At issue here is a very different approach to the application of technology to the food system. Where Europeans are cautious and more concerned about its effects on human life, the American philosophy is all about the corporate bottom line.
i change my plans, i change my ways
Monday, 18APR2005:it looked like such a nice day today that i thought i'd wear my fedora. however, i had miscalculated, and the windchill was still a bit much for my tender ears, so i had to pull my hood up over the hat. my hands were toasty, tho, so i pulled off the overshells, leaving the inner gloves that i had bought a couple of months back from a vendor at the storehouse. they were black hide, with a woolen lining and a rim of fur around the wrist - very spiffy.
i left the mitts in the usual place in my office, topped by my hat. sometime in the morning, i moved my hat to get at some papers underneath the gloves and neglected to move the hat back. at the end of the day, the gloves were no longer there. the audacity of some people !
i decided to soldier on to the nakasuk school to take in the toonik tyme opening ceremonies. met up with malcolm, olivia and sue there but before the festivities began, malcolm and olivia reconsidered and departed, leaving me to make sure sue didn't get herself into any trouble. sara managed to sneak in at the buzzer with the excuse that she needed to take a few photos and then had to be goaded into actually getting some.
heard the community choir and a school choir. next was the presentation of the honourary toonik award, in recognition of community contributions, to dick smith who was retiring after teaching for 23 years at the high school. he was responsible for most of the set construction for the various high school and community musicals that i've worked on since coming north. then we were treated to a drum dance, followed by a throat-singing performance.
at the intermission before the Juno-award winning Taima took to the stage, sara and sue decided that they wanted to head up to the storehouse with their new friend monty, and that sounded alright to me. ran into david, emilie, karen and lisa there and we hobnobbed over a few rounds, figuring out what our plans would be for the rest of this toonik tyme week.
- link of the day: British economist John Kay on the concept of obliquity
If you want to go in one direction, the best route may involve going in the other. Paradoxical as it sounds, goals are more likely to be achieved when pursued indirectly. ... This oblique relationship between intention and outcome is the subtle, but frequently misunderstood, message contained in Richard Dawkins' metaphor of the selfish gene. The gene is not actually selfish: the gene has no motive at all, in the sense in which we normally talk about motive. Genes that survive the processes of selection are those well adapted to their environment, and such adaptation was not the product of any conscious design.
keep track of visions in my eyes
Tuesday, 19APR2005:after staying up until 4:30 in the morning, you can bet that i wasn't very lucid today. uh, *understatement alert*. still, i managed to make it thru the day without chewing off my tongue by mistake.
left the office at the end of the day to check out the
fashion show at the nakasuk school gym. a variety of
beautiful sealskin fashions were modelled for the crowd.
my favourite pieces were ones which featured sealskin
that had been dyed a deep forest green that glistened
in the lights. some people seemed to cheer more for
the models than the clothing.sat 2 rows back from the premier, something that doesn't happen too often in the south :)
a bit of drum-dancing, a bit of throat-singing and we were sent on our way into the evening. you wouldn't know it from the amount of light, tho, as the sky didn't get dark until around 9 p.m. the 'nights' just get brighter from here on out.
- link of the day: montana governor brian schweitzer
on
electability
Just tell 'em what you are. You know, this polling stuff, having to go out and figure out which way the wind's blowing -- do you believe in something ? Did you have something when you started? If you do, tell 'em what it is. You'll be all right. If you're a kook, you're not going to get elected. But if you're real, you're normal, you're halfway bright, and you're willing to stand up -- that's the most important thing.
even when you're near, sometimes you're hard to find
Wednesday, 20APR2005:yay, it's comics day !! ooh, plus the 2-disc dvd of hayao miyazaki's 'Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind', and neil gaiman's storytelling cd, 'Speaking in Tongues'. first reads of 'Oddly Normal' and 'Random Encounter' made the cut. manara's 'Piranese' - enh, only so-so, but so-so manara is still pretty wild.
the biggest bummer, tho, was the fact that my comics store in calgary put this shipment into the mail on the 31st of march. it hit the sorting department for the north (in montreal ??) on the 14th of april. and i didn't get the card in my mailbox until today, the 20th.
3 weeks ?? what the f*** !! canadian north flies 3 times per week from calgary to edmonton to yellowknife to iqaluit on the way to ottawa. first air flies the same route starting in edmonton at the same frequency. why do things still have to get sorted in central canada - what, us colonies aren't allowed to trade directly with each other without their benevolent oversight ?
- links of the day: infrared cameras used to uncover classics from egypt (original 'independent' article now behind fee-wall) and vesuvius. oliver morton writes:
-
no one dreamed they'd one day be the last of their kind on earth, their words read with light that the eye cannot see, rewritten on discs of melted sand.
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