A question of priorities

So I had a bit of a huffing and puffing moment and the supermarket a few days ago, when my beloved picked up one of those celebrity tabloid magazines and openly wondered why Brad had left Angelina so soon after their baby was born. I did my usual rant of who cares, and why do people waste their time and money on this stuff.

My basic point is that since big name celebrities like Brad or Angelina don't care about me or my life, why should I care about them?

My question though, is why are people more interested in reading about Britney's latest blooper than about travel magazines or local politics? Why such an obsession over who is gay and who is not, and so little interest as to why we pay more for health care and get less?

Montreal in 24 hours

Who knew the Grand Prix was in town this week-end? Well, probably everyone except me, but I'm sure Montreal will be a good time nonetheless. It's one of those special cities that has an energy about it all the time, where one can never get bored.

Even more so during the summer. Yay!

Perche Italia?

So what's up with the traffic from Italy this week? Some 20 hits in two days?

Ciao bella! :)

On Canadian involvement in Afghanistan

As the casualties mount in Afghanistan, some pundits have opined that the mission to Afghanistan could become a millstone that hangs around the Tories neck in any upcoming election. This tends to overlook the obvious fact that the Liberals were the ones to send the troops there in the first place, and the NDP would be in an awkward position of having to argue that Canada's soldiers should leave in order to allow the Taliban to take over again, what with their sterling record on women and minority rights (the Taliban, not the NDP). Only the Bloc can really just wash its hands of the whole thing, as they don't deal with foreign policy much anyway.

In the broader context of things though, the mission to Afghanistan is necessary and should be supported by Canadians for a variety of reasons. First and foremost is that Canada made a commitment to the Afghan government and their people that we would help them rebuild their country and allow them to build their civil society and their democracy. We gave our word to our allies that also pledged to help Afghanistan rebuild after years of civil war and the Taliban, so just on an honour basis, we should fulfill our commitments. It is open to discussion as to how long we should help them out, and what to do if things turn for the worst and our efforts fail to improve the situation, but we have a two-year obligation that should be fulfilled.

There are other reasons to keep the troops in Kandahar though. Afghanistan as a whole has resumed its status as a leading producer of heroin. The central government's reach currently does not extend much past Kabul, leaving a vacuum that will easily be filled by the Taliban or any of the warlords who destroyed the country in the first place. The protection and promotion of women's rights and minority rights is also a noble cause, although perhaps a bit far from the original purpose of the mission.

The fact is that Afghanistan is unable to take care of itself just yet, and possibly never. Pakistan continues to fund and support the Taliban, and the warlords and tribal leaders are still unable to overcome their basic chauvinism or petty rivalries. The international donor community is still willing to help the Afghan people with schools, hospitals and other basic infrastructure, but if their staff put their lives in danger just doing their job, that's a problem. One, however, that Canada can assist with by having boots on the ground to allow the reconstruction to continue.

Yes, this will cost lives and money, but did we, as a country, ask to help out the Afghan people only if it was safe and convenient for us? Not too much of a bother? No need to work up a sweat? Of course not, Canada's commitment is to help the people of Afghanistan rebuild their country, full stop.

After all, as bad as it is for Canadian troops, it's even worse for the Afghan people.

Las delicias of summer

So at last, I had a chance to see a thunder storm from my deck. The muggy heat with oppressive humidity had been upon us for days, making it hard to sleep at night and providing a new appreciation for the A/C in my car. And then, without warning, as I enjoyed dinner, the sky darkened, the wind picked up and the thunder rumbled in the distance. In a flash (pun intended), lightning streaked across the sky, the clouds opened up and and a wall of water came crashing down. The wind whipped the rain into a fury, as the lightning lit up the darkness and the thunder made it that much more ominous.

Just as quickly as the storm arrived, it departed, perhaps no more than a half-hour. By the time we left to visit a friend on Design U., it was a cool summer evening with the sky streaked orange from the setting sun (indeed, red sky at night, sailors' delight; red sky in the morning, sailors take warning). And a good night's sleep.

Mirror, Mirror, On the Wall

We never see ourselves the same way that others see us, or something to that effect, is a well-worn line about how our perception of ourselves differs greatly from how others see us. It's not an easy accomplishment to be able to put yourself in someone else's mindset and look at yourself through their eyes.

This is something that has begun to occupy my mind in the last few days. I like to think of myself as a keen observer of how people interact with each other, trying to ascertain why some people get along easily with others, while some people just can't seem to get along with anyone. People for whom I have a low opinion can be quite popular with others, just as people for whom I have a generous amount of respect can be quite isolated from others.

A lot of how people interact with you is a function of what your appearance is. Some things we can control, such as our personal grooming or choice of clothes, but other things we're kind of stuck with, such as our height or our eyes. I've had comments in the past year that I should smile more with my teeth because it looks better. Upon further queries and evaluations, it may be that my default facial setting is one of intimdation or of being cross. Yet I like meeting new people and many of my acquaintances are quite charming or delightful to talk to.

Somehow, though, I may have been inadvertently conveying a sense of hostility through how I smile which, coupled with my height and facial hair, ends up being the opposite of how I feel.

A coworker commented to me earlier this week how I always seem to be annoyed when she comes into my office for a social chat. She knows me well enough to know that I am happy to see her and enjoy our banter, so she ignores the facial expression I'm alleged to have, but what of others who do not know me as well? How many people have been misled into thinking I was annoyed to see them when I wasn't at all? How does smiling with teeth change that dynamic? How is this default facial setting that I seem to have affecting relations with other people who aren't as candid with me?

Some people just have a goofy appearance no matter what they do; if I have an annoyed appearance most of the time, what impact would this have of people's opinion of me? How much does this confound how I think people are seeing me, and how they actually see me?

Or is this much ado about nothing?

Rove Walks, nobody Talks

So Karl Rove is off the hook, with Patrick Fitzgerald indicating he won't press charges against "turdblossom". I would like to believe that a full and thorough investigation took place and found no proof that he betrayed his country for cheap political points, as had been suggested. It seems odd that a White House so obsessed with control would allow Libby to be a rogue player and spill classified information on his own, with no one else aware.

All of this doesn't take away from the point I wrote last year, however, namely what the hell White House staffers are doing talking about covert CIA agents to reporters in the first place. That question has been lost in a hurricane of political partisanship that seeks to protect party rather than country.

I recently finished a biography of John Adams, who is well noted by history for his dislike of party politics, probably foreseeing exactly what has become of political life and civil discourse in the United States. Just like the Liberals in Canada confused what is good for them as being good for the country, so have the Democrats and, especially, the Republicans, who believe there is no price too high to pay to retain power.

Meanwhile, the country is left to fend for itself in the absence of a concerned (or qualified) leadership.

All's well that ends well

So it turns out that the medical situation wasn't as bad as originally thought, and the wedding went off without a hitch. Good times had by all and while the groom was unable to do more than the first two traditional dances during the reception, at least he didn't need to sit through the ceremony. A couple of power naps here and there and you could hardly tell he'd had surgery three days earlier.

Well, except for the cane I guess, but that was a minor part at the end of the reception and during the photos.

Cheers!

Country of Origin

According to the stats for my blog, China, Netherlands and Colombia are tied for 7th on the list of country of origin. US and Canada battle it out for first place with a huge lead over third place India.

Est-ce que la langue affecte qui visite le site?

O no es algo que tiene un gran impacto?

Shbik?!?!?

More on the Glass

So here is the deal. A good friend is scheduled to get married in Canada this week-end, but has been abroad for most of the last three years. He returns once a year on average to take care of paperwork and plan the wedding. Three days before his wedding, his appendix is removed. Bad luck or good luck?

Well, bad luck in that he'll be in bad shape for his wedding (which is going ahead regardless), but good luck for him because had the appendix ruptured in the third world country where he normally resides, he would have probably died owing to the absence of good medical care. His original itinerary called for less than three weeks in Canada. What are the odds? No one really wants to know.

In any case, he's opted to emphasize the second option, since he can still get married in a wheelchair. Getting good medical care to survive would have been a more difficult alternative, however.

What are you thankful for today?

The numbers game

In a nutshell, I tend to believe in destiny being pre-ordained, rather than individuals controlling their own destiny. In other words, there are no coincidences, everything is unfolding exactly as it was supposed to.

The genesis of this idea is that so much of what we are is a function of our birth. If you were born in Finland, you would have a reasonable chance to live past the age of 5, be relatively disease-free, fair-skinned, isolated from the world, but cosmopolitan towards its existence. If you were born in Somalia, you would probably be dead before your 5th birthday, without ever having left your country.

Who your parents are has a huge impact as well. Do they have an inherited medical condition? Are they exceptionally gifted with mathematics? Or were they professional athletes? Did they beat you repeatedly or give you unconditional love?

In other words, so much of who we become is decided by factors we can't control, such as our birth and our parents. So it seems incongruous to me that at some arbitrary point (8 years old, 18 years old, 28 years old?), we suddenly take the wheel of our future and start driving, when so much is already in place by that time.

Another way of looking at it is that our lives are like a book. The story is written, we are just turning the pages until the conclusion. Think again: we are on a train track whose destination we don't know, but is laid out before us to follow.

What we have is, in fact, an illusion of control, where we think we are making our own decisions and striking out on our own path, but really, we are just fulfilling our destiny. It's not plausible in my mind that time would be a straight, unchanging line behind us (the past), but an infinite series of lines in front of us (the future), but then this is something that our brains haven't wrapped themselves around in the first place.

Which is why it is a belief on my part, and I am a long way from saying it's a fact. My viewpoint is that we can't control what will happen to us, it's already pre-ordained. Our test of life is how we choose to react to events in our life. That is where we have our control. Or is that, too, an illusion?

All this to say that those who thought the world would end today (06/06/06 if you keep track of these things) were simply waiting for a destiny that didn't exist, and will not exist today.

What do you get when you cross...

...a creature of habit with a routiniaphobic?

A cranky creature.

Once a Liberal...

So it turns out, to much hilarity from everyone but Joe Volpe himself, that the would-be Liberal leader not only received $5400 from the Chairman of a drug company, but also from two 11 year-old twins and a 14 year-old whose parents are linked to the Chairman. With a straight face, Volpe's spokesperson says "All the donations were in complete compliance with the law but the perception was not good and that's why they were returned." Riiight....

Forgetting the fact that Volpe is one of the sleaziest politicans Canada has produced (try to recall who was Immigration Minister before Sgro got whacked by a pizza delivery guy facing deportation), it completely baffles me how a) the drug company thought it would get away with it and b) why people think the Liberals being out of power for four months is long enough to change their attitude. Volpe and his campaign team must think the public (and the media) have oatmeal for brains, on the premise that no one would notice the same donation amount from people with the same surname, all below the legal limit for individual donations. It is a powerful reminder that Liberals still don't understand that rules do apply to them just like everyone else.

As noted by a wag on the 'net, if 11 year-olds have a few thousand dollars lying around to donate to politicians, it may be time to have the tax man make an audit of junior's income sources.