Jack Layton

Jack Layton was our MP and, though I never got to meet him in person, I heard him speak a few times and remember feeling at the last election that the wave of orange that brought the NDP to the status of official opposition last election was well deserved.  I always felt like Layton cared, like he was genuine.

Who knows how he would have handled the position of Leader of the Opposition.  His choice of (temporary) successor suggests that he would have fought hard for the needs the working folk, a voice that we are missing in politics, a voice that was needed.  One imagines that he might have done a fine job.

It is sad that he won't have the chance to have a go.  Ironic, in the mundane sense, that he reached a pinnacle only to be felled by disease.  Cancer is such a traitor. 

Don't fry an egg in the nude, and other pearls of wisdom from the edge.

It's all well and good to believe in a way of living, to invest in that belief, and to make life decisions based upon it.  That's values and should be the core of all of us:  to listen to the true voice of our souls and act upon that voice honestly and without shame.  But, if you're smartling from flying flecks of spattering oil, maybe, at least, you should put on an apron.

Toronto is currently under the regime of Rob Ford, a mayor who insists that he is trying to live by his ideals.  Those ideals include the right for the city's citizens to drive as many cars as they like while not being bothered by unsightly streetcars and other signs of mass transit.   In order to support that belief, this mayor cancelled a surface transit project proposed by the local transit authority and pushed through council a plan to build a subway that would cost twice as much (at least) but, also, served much fewer citizens.  He thought he was mandated to do this thing when elected by the citizens of this fair city.

Course, there's no money for this project -- the city has a 775 million dollar hole to fill already.  Now, Ford had some crazy idea that the subway would be privately funded or some such but, now, he is off, cap in hand, to Dalton Maguinty, the premeire of Ontario, our fair province -- a man who is ideologically opposite to Ford, a man who Ford should be fighting -- to ask for a lot of money to make this subway project fly.

That's gotta smart.

Actually, I don't think Mr. Ford was elected on his promise to decimate the transit system.  I think people wanted him to come in and set the city fiscally straight without reducing services or laying off workers or increasing taxes.  This was Ford's platform and I think that's what most people who voted for him wanted.  Funny, that we are going to suffer serious service reductions and lay offs, and probable tax hikes besides.  Funny that the transit system promise is one of the few that Ford could fulfill.  And it's going to cost us.  Really cost us.

Maybe Mr. Ford needs some new clothes.  Maybe an apron would help.

A smooth ride...

Well, the warm water and vinegar have been dabbed on the milk stained mattress and the last of the baking sode sprinkled over like icing sugar on a great big cookie.  Fine.  But I just figured out that I need more baking soda, more milk (oh hee) and, of all things kitty litter. 

So, now I have to get a ton done as cheaply as possible, which sounds like a walk to the stores.  And I am feeling very, very lazy after having had an interesting night no sleeping.  I could do everything without walking even a full kilometre, if I felt like it but I hate paying the convenience store prices.

Of course, it means that I am, likely, not going to French but will get Brenda half way there and come back with the supplies we need, only to turn around and go back to meet her after her French class.  In a car, this would take me about fifteen minutes.  On transit and walking, this little bauble will cost me about an hour's time, at least. 

Well, no one said that life without a car was going to be a smooth ride.  I just hope I don't get rained on.

No crying over spilt milk.

I was going to post something VERY IMPORTANT about taxes and shock politics but life got in the way.  My tall little girl climbed up on her brand spanking new top bunk and spilled about a half a glass of milk on her mattress tonight.  Zoinks.  She blotted the spot with towels and tried to hide it from me but to no avail.  Mommies are like blood hounds sometimes.

So, tomorrow, my priority will be to clean the mattress - a process I will continue over the next few days in the (probably vain) hope that the mattress won't stink.  Shouldn't be too much of a deal, right?

But, unhappily, I am gripped with anxiety over the thought.  Perimenopause is fun, fun, fun.  It will take everything I can muster to get that job done tomorrow as I am gripped by the certainty of failure.  Great place to be.  Stifling.  Paralyzing. I am resolved to not cry over the spilt milk, though.  It would probably make me giggle and defeat the purpose of having a good cry in the first place.

Stay tuned.  Tomorrow, we return to the VERY IMPORTANT POST.   Or not.