Freedom of Speech

Looks like fairly good weather today. Calls for 5C/41F. That will melt some more snow.
Time to see what the newspaper says and what I think they are saying.

Half the front page and half the next page is about the meals for the athletes at the Canada Games. 1500 hungry mouths to feed. They are using the Convention Center for that. With Halifax having the largest navy base in eastern Canada, I would have looked into the navy galley for doing the job. They are used to large numbers.

I saw an ad from Kent Hardware for a vac to clean out ashes from the wood stove. It was $300. now on sale for $200. It looks exactly like a wet/dry shop vac. I wouldn't be buying a $300. vac, just to take the ashes from the stove. That goes on the list of fools and money. I take the ashes out with a small shovel, and suck the rest out with a $5.00 vac.

Speaking about the Americans and their freedom of speech, I wonder if it also covers Blogs.(I'm sure someone will tell me.) The reason I ask, because a teacher in Philadelphia got the boot for writing about her high school students. She called them lazy whiners, among other things. Can't say I don't agree with her. I love Philly, and not only the cheese. I've been there thirty times. Once I got lost and a policeman escorted me to a toy store.

This headline, I enjoyed the most. "Gadhafi tries to quell unrest by raising civil servents' salaries." What does it really mean? It means he gave a raise to all his relatives.

Retirement

The temp. this morning is -13C/9F and windchill is -20C/-2F. So that wind makes it really cold. When I see windchill, I'm reminded of weather forcasts that mention the coldest day in history at such and such a place. It makes me wonder what the temp. was with the windchill.

Well, the newspaper didn't have much today. The headline said, "Auditor General says he can go deeper into MLA's expenses." I guess he liked the cartoon yesterday.

Another item that caught my eye. The Government says it is spending too much on consultants. Well, yes! Imagine paying someone a $100,000. to come in and tell you you're doing this wrong. Most people in the office probably know what is wrong. I sometimes believe, consultant payments is a slush fund for relatives. "We need an opinion on what broom to buy. I can hire my cousin for $50,000 as a consultant. He works as a cleaner."

I see Billy Cryus is moaning up a storm. He is complaining his daughter's Hannah Montana gig was responsible for his marriage breakup and the reason his daughter is going all crazy. Don't recall much complaining when she started raking in the cash.

The Egyptians are still at it. Freedom? I think they are in for a nasty surprise. On top of that, they want freedom like Americans! I don't know if I would be wishing for that. They should be able to do better. Americans don't take care of their people, it's every man for himself.

I looked out the window at 7 am and saw a neighbour scraping the ice off his car window, so he could go to work. Glad I'm retired. Just found a great cartoon to add on. My pyjamis have long legs and I have slippers on.

Bed Bugs and Politicans

I had to laugh this morning, when I saw the political cartoon. It seems like the article is about bedbugs, but actually refers to four politicans, who got caught with their hand in the cookie jar. I'll have to scan and put it up.

As I look out the window, it is snowing like a bugger. I was not expecting that. We had two snow stormes last week. Two days in a row. Got to use my snow blower on my driveway and five others. Neighbours sick or working. Next time there will be one less. The house across the street now belongs to the bank. The wife thought the husband was paying off the morgage, but he wasn't.

Read this article about a guy in Ontario, on his computer, watching a webcam of ten guys working on building the new Bluenose. (That's a sailing ship. You have to look it up.) He called up the nearest Tim Hortons to them and sent over coffee and donuts.

In Halifax, we are busy with the Canada Games. So I guess the snow and cold is good for that.

I was at the hospital for something yesterday, and while I was there, I bought postage stamps. No tax on stamps, so it is like saving 13%. Usually you get ten stamps, and it costs six$ something. Bought two books, paid 12$ something. When I came home, I noticed the books had thirty stamps. So I will have to go back and pay the difference. It's run by little old ladies volunteers and I wouldn't want them to have to pay out of pocket. I'll phone them today and tell them to stop selling cheap stamps.

Coyotes Abound

I've mentioned coyotes before and they are in the newspaper again today. A few streets away from here, a coyote was hit by a car, and the police had to be called to put him down. This is not like the countryside. This is in the city and the other street is even closer to the downtown area. Scarey to go for a walk. I also read about a woman, in Point Pleasant Park, which is in Halifax, had a coyote run in front of he.

Of course there is my own experience, while driving to work at the airport one morning, I smucked one. He put a small hole in my bumper. On the way home in the evening, someone was throwing him into the back of a truck. Trapper, perhaps.

Just went outside to stack up on firewood. Temp. is -10C/14F and with windchill is -17C/1F. There is a snowstorm coming, either Tue. or Wed. or both. There seems to be two heading this way. Have to go and gas up the snow blower. We had a couple of inches of snow last night, which I wasn't expecting.

Chaos

Sunday morning and chaos in Egypt. I suppose this has no where to go but downhill. Countries have to be careful which side they line up with. A wrong choice could be a disaster for their foreign policy. And what happens afterwards. Perhaps a government of hard line Islamics, which spells nothing but trouble foe us, I suppose I mean us Christians.
Today it's 30C/32F. The word on the street is that we will have a snow storm on Wed. Supposed to be 20cm/8ins. That's not really bad, unless the wind gets rough. It's a long time between now and Wed. It could be rain, as it has been for almost every storm this year.
I'm writing a horror short story this time around. Midnight shift at the hospital. But I can't seem to be able to get enough blood flying. Not enough experience with hospitals I guess. Somehow I need a chainsaw in there.
I just noticed I have one follower. Thank you Regge from Cal. I've been there, and you don't worry about snow. I must say, I'm interested in the Blogs you follow.

Time Travel

Does everyone know what a continental breakfast is? It's a dinner roll, butter and jam. Learned that on my first trip tp England. "Continental breakfast provided." You do get a lot more than one dinner roll.

Freezing cold the last two days and right now it's not so warm. -9C/16F. Tomorrow is supposed to be a scorcher 3C/38F. Boston is supposed to be getting snow, which means rain for us tomorrow. I think the rest of N.S. is getting snow.

The Canada games start in three weeks, in Halifax. Every day, in the newspaper, there is an article about the skating oval. After the games are over, they want to keep it, which is a good idea. It's not like the city has ponds to go skating on. Lots of companies are coming forward wanting to lay ads under the ice and around the barriers. Good chance for the mayor to score points.

Joined a writing group at Echelon Press to provide stories for children/youth. Just finished the paperwork this morning, now to send it off. We have to provide six stories for six months. Mine is about time travel.

Brass Monkey Weather

The temperature here this morning is -11C/12F. The windchill makes it feel like -19C/3F. Not any weather, I will be walking around in. I'm glad I went to mass yesterday evening.

Every morning, my habit is to read the newspaper. There are usually not many articles I don't already know about. Newspapers are usually a few days behind my computer. So I need the paper to keep me informed of local matters. Thursday was the exception, where I found a large number of articles, to fill the empty grey spots between ones ears.

On the front page, the first item really shocked me. "Web surfers have eye on shoplifters." What it turns out to be is, convenience stores in the area have webcams to keep an eye on shoplifters, but the web surfers are in England. It seems a company in England charges subscribers $15. a month to join. They can have four feeds open on their screen, for different stores in Halifax. If they see a thief stealing, they press a button, the store owner gets a phone call and voila. The store owner pays $190. a month for this service and they figure it's worth it. The surfers get cash prizes.

Scarey eh? I know England is camera crazy and this is taking it to a new level. Shades of 1984. So watch where you pee next time, someone may be watching. When I worked at the airport, my job was watching the cameras. For practice, I would watch a car leave the highway and I could track the passangers all the way through the process till they boarded the aircraft.

Another article involved a woman and her new husband stuck in his country because he can't get a visa. Seen this played out many times. Dumb blond is usually at least twenty years older. I don't think I have to explain farther.

As far as I am concerned, people who go to Mexico are naive. That's a dangerous place. In the last two days, there have been two  instances of a Canadian getting raped and another shot. After something happens, you go crying to the government. The government didn't tell you to go to Mexico.