Dear GO Transit:
As you know, on trains travelling westbound on the Lakeshore West line, not every car can disembark at Appleby station. You address this situation by reading out the numbers of the cars that aren't going to open their doors at Appleby and asking people in those cars to move towards the middle of the train .
These instructions are not helpful. First of all, not everyone who gets on a GO train knows where they are relative to the middle of the train. If the train was already on the platform when you got there and you walked out of the stairs directly onto a crowded and narrow platform, there isn't an opportunity to step back and take stock of the whole train. You just think "Oh good, I didn't miss the train."
Second, the order in which you read out the numbers of the non-Appleby cars gives the impression that people should move towards the back of the train. I can't articulate exactly why it does this, but there were three other people on the train - all competent adults and native speakers of English - who got this impression as well, and waiting for the train home I met two more who had had the same problem on their outbound train. We all found ourselves at the back of the backmost car, staring through the inter-car door at a locomotive, entirely uncertain whether we'd ever be able to get off this train. There then followed a frantic sprint back towards the front of the train, through four moving train cars (and some of us find walking between moving train cars kind of scary), me in dress up shoes that I didn't expect to be sprinting through a moving train in, entirely uncertain whether we'd a) ever make it in time and b) were even running in the right direction. We did make it, but if there had been luggage or reduced mobility or small children, someone would have been left behind.
The people most likely to misinterpret your instructions are those who don't travel that line or that station on a regular basis. These are also going to be the passengers least equipped to find their way if they end up getting off at the wrong station. You get it wrong for these people, you've stranded them somewhere completely unfamiliar and likely ruined their day (and interfered with the plans of whomever or whatever they were going out to a strange city for).
So what you need to do is:
1. Instruct these passengers to move towards the front (or, if applicable in other situations, towards the back) of the train even if their ultimate destination is the middle, giving them the number of the first safe car so they know when to stop. It's better to have people wandering a car or two past the middle in the right direction than to send them off even further in the wrong direction.
2. Read out the numbers of the non-Appleby cars in the opposite order of what you've been doing. Just do it. If six people that I encountered yesterday were confused by it, others will be too.
Sincerely,
The girl who now has blisters
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Friday, May 08, 2009
Louise Marie Longhairs
Quite a while back I googled upon the fact that one of the few hairdressers specializing in long hair is right here in Toronto. Last time I visited a hairdresser (as a child) I came away looking like a boy. Since then I've been growing my hair extremely long to assert my femininity and eschewing all hairdressers. But, pushing 30, I was starting to think I might want better than just plain length with the split ends trimmed off by myself or my mother.
However, I was hesitant. Surely the website copy is hyperbole. Surely she has posted only positive testimonials and culled out all the negative ones (who knows how many there are?) And what's up with wanting to sell me all these pricey products? But I kept fixating on the idea, so I decided to give it a try. Worst case I'm out a bit of money and I'll stop fixating. So, last December, I went. The first time I'd been to a hairdresser in over two decades.
First thing that struck me is it's safe. No cooler-than-thou, no drama, you can talk frankly and realistically. Even the physical environment is safe. There's only one chair so you get her full attention, and it's set up so that passers-by can't see into the windows. (The idea of getting my hair done in full view of passers-by has always weirded me out). As we chatted, she accepted that my hair is in fact oily and straight. I've had so many people tell me "It isn't really oily, you just need to wash it less!" or "It isn't really straight, you just need to scrunch it!" that it's a relief to be taken at my word. She does want you to use her products (which do do what they say they do), but apart from that there's no pressure. As her site implies, she does recommend dietary/lifestyle changes, but she doesn't pressure. She informs me of stuff and if I'm not immediately into it, it's up to me to come to her if I change my mind. It's the Ani Difranco take what you can use and leave the rest approach.
So now you're thinking "Okay, but what did she do for your hair?"
I noticed results instantly, and I was able to duplicate them at home. Before I used her system, my hair would go hopelessly oily about 16 hours after I washed it. If I wanted to go to work in the morning then go out at night, I'd have to wash after work so my hair would look civilized at 11 pm. With LML's products, I wake up in the morning and it still looks civilized. It now takes 32 hours to go hopeless, so strictly speaking for the first time in my life I could get away with skipping a day. My hair was immediately less flat at the scalp, and it's been constantly improving as I continue to work on it. Length has increased noticeably, and I have brand new growth that is already two or three inches long.
The cut itself led my co-worker to ask me "Um...this is going to sound really weird...but did your hair just get longer or something?" I can now wear it down much more readily, and it moves quite interestingly (which is something I'd never given any thought to before). I feel generally sexier now, and more confident in my hair's ability to fulfill its various functions. In my professional life, it looks like it's on purpose rather than a result of benign neglect, and in my personal life it's better able to serve as a tool for seduction.
What I really appreciate about these products (and never would have ever expected) is if you do it wrong they still help your hair. It doesn't wreck anything, the results were just suboptimal. For weeks I was conditioning wrong but still noticing improvements in my hair. When I started conditioning right, it just started improving faster and more.
All these results aren't effortless. You have to put thought into your morning hair routine, you have to do some things differently with these products to the point where you're even retraining muscle memory (I can't tell you how many times I've done it wrong out of lifelong habit). It is work. But it does get the results it says it does.
This is an unconventional approach and not for everyone, but it is exactly what it says it is and does do the job to an extent I'd never before thought possible. I'd recommend looking a Louise Marie's website and seeing if it sounds like something you'd like. She wrote it herself, that is what it is. If it sounds good, go for it. If it doesn't sound like what you want, it's not for you.
However, I was hesitant. Surely the website copy is hyperbole. Surely she has posted only positive testimonials and culled out all the negative ones (who knows how many there are?) And what's up with wanting to sell me all these pricey products? But I kept fixating on the idea, so I decided to give it a try. Worst case I'm out a bit of money and I'll stop fixating. So, last December, I went. The first time I'd been to a hairdresser in over two decades.
First thing that struck me is it's safe. No cooler-than-thou, no drama, you can talk frankly and realistically. Even the physical environment is safe. There's only one chair so you get her full attention, and it's set up so that passers-by can't see into the windows. (The idea of getting my hair done in full view of passers-by has always weirded me out). As we chatted, she accepted that my hair is in fact oily and straight. I've had so many people tell me "It isn't really oily, you just need to wash it less!" or "It isn't really straight, you just need to scrunch it!" that it's a relief to be taken at my word. She does want you to use her products (which do do what they say they do), but apart from that there's no pressure. As her site implies, she does recommend dietary/lifestyle changes, but she doesn't pressure. She informs me of stuff and if I'm not immediately into it, it's up to me to come to her if I change my mind. It's the Ani Difranco take what you can use and leave the rest approach.
So now you're thinking "Okay, but what did she do for your hair?"
I noticed results instantly, and I was able to duplicate them at home. Before I used her system, my hair would go hopelessly oily about 16 hours after I washed it. If I wanted to go to work in the morning then go out at night, I'd have to wash after work so my hair would look civilized at 11 pm. With LML's products, I wake up in the morning and it still looks civilized. It now takes 32 hours to go hopeless, so strictly speaking for the first time in my life I could get away with skipping a day. My hair was immediately less flat at the scalp, and it's been constantly improving as I continue to work on it. Length has increased noticeably, and I have brand new growth that is already two or three inches long.
The cut itself led my co-worker to ask me "Um...this is going to sound really weird...but did your hair just get longer or something?" I can now wear it down much more readily, and it moves quite interestingly (which is something I'd never given any thought to before). I feel generally sexier now, and more confident in my hair's ability to fulfill its various functions. In my professional life, it looks like it's on purpose rather than a result of benign neglect, and in my personal life it's better able to serve as a tool for seduction.
What I really appreciate about these products (and never would have ever expected) is if you do it wrong they still help your hair. It doesn't wreck anything, the results were just suboptimal. For weeks I was conditioning wrong but still noticing improvements in my hair. When I started conditioning right, it just started improving faster and more.
All these results aren't effortless. You have to put thought into your morning hair routine, you have to do some things differently with these products to the point where you're even retraining muscle memory (I can't tell you how many times I've done it wrong out of lifelong habit). It is work. But it does get the results it says it does.
This is an unconventional approach and not for everyone, but it is exactly what it says it is and does do the job to an extent I'd never before thought possible. I'd recommend looking a Louise Marie's website and seeing if it sounds like something you'd like. She wrote it herself, that is what it is. If it sounds good, go for it. If it doesn't sound like what you want, it's not for you.
Also
My twitter feed should be showing at the top of the left-hand column. I suck at layouts and graphic design, so I have no idea whether this is a good way to do that. Any thoughts on a more appropriate location or how to incorporate it less fuglyly are welcome.
I wonder if Twitter makes people more likely to give others the benefit of the doubt
I've heard before people theorizing that twitter and texting make people rude because messages must necessarily be so terse.
I'm wondering if the opposite might be true - I wonder if extensive use of twitter and/or texting will make people more likely to give others the benefit of the doubt.
When you receive an ambiguous message on twitter, you practically have to assume the sender's intentions are benign specifically because of the restrictions of the medium. The whole thing would have imploded by now if people didn't. So I wonder if a person who is accustomed to that medium will be more likely to give people IRL the benefit of the doubt on statements that could be ambiguous.
I'm wondering if the opposite might be true - I wonder if extensive use of twitter and/or texting will make people more likely to give others the benefit of the doubt.
When you receive an ambiguous message on twitter, you practically have to assume the sender's intentions are benign specifically because of the restrictions of the medium. The whole thing would have imploded by now if people didn't. So I wonder if a person who is accustomed to that medium will be more likely to give people IRL the benefit of the doubt on statements that could be ambiguous.
Don't force our Olympic athletes to make a political statement
In what is possibly the most bizarre Parliamentary motion I have ever seen or heard of, a our parliamentarians voted that Olympic athlete's uniforms should include seal skin.
Regardless of how you feel about seal skin, the problem here is that they are forcing the athletes to wear a political statement. It is quite obvious from the motion that the goal is solely political and the seal skin serves no particular athletic purpose. So to have the athletes wear it would be to force them to walk around implying that they, as individuals, support the seal hunt.
Because it's a divisive issue, I'm sure at least some of them don't. And I'm sure at least some of the people who don't find the idea of wearing seal skin actively repulsive.
Our general societal standards are that Olympic athletes are to be admired and respected and looked up to. Elite athleticism is considered an honourable endeavour. These people spend years and years pushing their body to the very physical limits humanly possible to win glory for their country. Their diet and workout regime and entire lifestyle is taken over for their entire young adult life to serve the purpose of winning medals for Canada. Even if, like me, you aren't so very into sports or nationalism, you can at least see why our political policy and our parliamentarians should be treating our Olympic athletes with respect.
But instead they want to force them to be human billboards for a political statement that they may not agree with - that they may even find repulsive. They might be forcing some of them to choose between their own personal morals and competing in this elite competition that they've spent years training for. This is no way to treat people who have devoted literally their whole lives to what our society considers a laudable and praiseworthy achievement, whose success is considered to reflect well on us all.
If it really is necessary to use the Olympics to promote seal products, they can sell them there among the souvenirs. They can give them away to visitors so people can see how awesome they apparently are. They can hand out literature justifying how being clubbed on the head with a scary pointy thing is really quite a humane way to die. While not everyone would be thrilled with these steps, they are valid ways to achieve that goal.
But using the athletes as human billboards to make a political statement, putting them in a position where they have to imply that they agree with that statement, is completely inappropriate and disrespectful of the athletes as human beings.
Regardless of how you feel about seal skin, the problem here is that they are forcing the athletes to wear a political statement. It is quite obvious from the motion that the goal is solely political and the seal skin serves no particular athletic purpose. So to have the athletes wear it would be to force them to walk around implying that they, as individuals, support the seal hunt.
Because it's a divisive issue, I'm sure at least some of them don't. And I'm sure at least some of the people who don't find the idea of wearing seal skin actively repulsive.
Our general societal standards are that Olympic athletes are to be admired and respected and looked up to. Elite athleticism is considered an honourable endeavour. These people spend years and years pushing their body to the very physical limits humanly possible to win glory for their country. Their diet and workout regime and entire lifestyle is taken over for their entire young adult life to serve the purpose of winning medals for Canada. Even if, like me, you aren't so very into sports or nationalism, you can at least see why our political policy and our parliamentarians should be treating our Olympic athletes with respect.
But instead they want to force them to be human billboards for a political statement that they may not agree with - that they may even find repulsive. They might be forcing some of them to choose between their own personal morals and competing in this elite competition that they've spent years training for. This is no way to treat people who have devoted literally their whole lives to what our society considers a laudable and praiseworthy achievement, whose success is considered to reflect well on us all.
If it really is necessary to use the Olympics to promote seal products, they can sell them there among the souvenirs. They can give them away to visitors so people can see how awesome they apparently are. They can hand out literature justifying how being clubbed on the head with a scary pointy thing is really quite a humane way to die. While not everyone would be thrilled with these steps, they are valid ways to achieve that goal.
But using the athletes as human billboards to make a political statement, putting them in a position where they have to imply that they agree with that statement, is completely inappropriate and disrespectful of the athletes as human beings.
Toronto moment
Based on a snippet of conversation I overheard between two subway drivers, I believe the following occurred on the TTC yesterday morning.
1. A lady accidentally left her umbrella on a train.
2. Lady called the TTC asking after it.
3. Someone on a train found it - either a TTC worker found it or a passenger turned it in.
4. Someone at the TTC coordinated with the lady to determine that it was most convenient for her to pick it up at Finch station.
5. A subway driver took it with him on his train up to Finch station, with the intention of giving it to the collector booth for the lady to pick up.
I got on at Eg where the train was switching drivers, and I overheard the outgoing driver debrief the incoming driver on the umbrella situation, giving her instructions to take it to the collector at Finch so its owner could pick it up.
I'm impressed by all this because it was an ordinary everyday umbrella - the kind that's for sale for a few dollars on those racks that pop up on rainy days at every supermarket and drugstore and corner store and subway station vendor, the kind that's totally going to blow inside out and be ruined within the next two storms. If I had lost that kind of umbrella, I'd just shrug my shoulders and tried to find another one before I had to go back out in the rain, and I think most people would react that way. But the two drivers I saw treated the situation with complete and total respect, without a hint that there was anything unusual about going to all this effort for a cheap umbrella. And based on logistics I'd assume there were at least three other TTC people involved (the person the lady reported the missing umbrella to, the person who found the umbrella, the Finch collector) all of whom must also have been treating the situation with respect.
Very cool.
1. A lady accidentally left her umbrella on a train.
2. Lady called the TTC asking after it.
3. Someone on a train found it - either a TTC worker found it or a passenger turned it in.
4. Someone at the TTC coordinated with the lady to determine that it was most convenient for her to pick it up at Finch station.
5. A subway driver took it with him on his train up to Finch station, with the intention of giving it to the collector booth for the lady to pick up.
I got on at Eg where the train was switching drivers, and I overheard the outgoing driver debrief the incoming driver on the umbrella situation, giving her instructions to take it to the collector at Finch so its owner could pick it up.
I'm impressed by all this because it was an ordinary everyday umbrella - the kind that's for sale for a few dollars on those racks that pop up on rainy days at every supermarket and drugstore and corner store and subway station vendor, the kind that's totally going to blow inside out and be ruined within the next two storms. If I had lost that kind of umbrella, I'd just shrug my shoulders and tried to find another one before I had to go back out in the rain, and I think most people would react that way. But the two drivers I saw treated the situation with complete and total respect, without a hint that there was anything unusual about going to all this effort for a cheap umbrella. And based on logistics I'd assume there were at least three other TTC people involved (the person the lady reported the missing umbrella to, the person who found the umbrella, the Finch collector) all of whom must also have been treating the situation with respect.
Very cool.
Thursday, May 07, 2009
Ethical pondering of the moment
I wonder how ethical/unethical it is to mention (when the opportunity presents itself naturally in conversation) that I'm childfree to increase my perceived employability?
It isn't so much an issue with my current employer and perhaps not in the profession as a whole (it would certainly be foolish to discriminate against maternity in a female-dominated profession that claims to desperately need an infusion of young professionals), but I've read several things lately where employers discriminate against maternity, and it occurred to me that my childfree status could be an asset. Up until now I'd been keeping it a bit quiet, because I always thought people perceived it as immaturity.
On one hand, I shouldn't be facilitating discrimination against maternity. On the other, it could be a tipping point in my favour.
It isn't so much an issue with my current employer and perhaps not in the profession as a whole (it would certainly be foolish to discriminate against maternity in a female-dominated profession that claims to desperately need an infusion of young professionals), but I've read several things lately where employers discriminate against maternity, and it occurred to me that my childfree status could be an asset. Up until now I'd been keeping it a bit quiet, because I always thought people perceived it as immaturity.
On one hand, I shouldn't be facilitating discrimination against maternity. On the other, it could be a tipping point in my favour.
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
Me and my problems
I had some music on, grooving to the music, about to wash my face. As part of grooving to the music, I moved the hand that contained my face scrub, and some of the soap went flying into my eye.
Long story short, I had to cry to get it out. I can't cry on demand - it has to be induced emotionally or by chopping onions. I don't have any whole onions, and going out to buy onions during a rainstorm at night when you can't open your eyes isn't especially convenient. So I've spent the past hour making myself an emotional wreck and crying out all the tears that I have in me. Now it's my bed time and I still have to hang up my wet laundry, take out the garbage, prep my face, hair, teeth and ears for bed, and regain my emotional equilibrium.
Long story short, I had to cry to get it out. I can't cry on demand - it has to be induced emotionally or by chopping onions. I don't have any whole onions, and going out to buy onions during a rainstorm at night when you can't open your eyes isn't especially convenient. So I've spent the past hour making myself an emotional wreck and crying out all the tears that I have in me. Now it's my bed time and I still have to hang up my wet laundry, take out the garbage, prep my face, hair, teeth and ears for bed, and regain my emotional equilibrium.
There's something egregiously wrong with our classification system
A chihuahua and a St. Bernard can both rightfully be called dogs.
And yet a clemintine cannot rightfully be called an orange.
And yet a clemintine cannot rightfully be called an orange.
Tuesday, May 05, 2009
Is there sign language for "Excuse me"?
There was a group of people speaking (is speaking the right verb? If not, what is?) sign language and blocking the door to the subway station. I found myself trying to remember the sign for "Excuse me" so I could ask them nicely to move. Then I realized that if I could get their attention to sign at them, I wouldn't need to ask them to move because they'd see me trying to come through the door.
It then occurred to me that that would also apply for the "Please give me your attention" meaning of "Excuse me". You tap them on the shoulder or something, then you have their attention and the "Excuse me" isn't necessary.
So is there a sign for "Excuse me"? If so, when is it used?
It then occurred to me that that would also apply for the "Please give me your attention" meaning of "Excuse me". You tap them on the shoulder or something, then you have their attention and the "Excuse me" isn't necessary.
So is there a sign for "Excuse me"? If so, when is it used?
On Twitter
I am now impstrump on twitter. Not sure if I'm going to actually use it or not. If someone can tell me where to get a widget, I'll embed the twitter feed in my blog. If not, you'll have to wait until I have enough initiative to google it up myself.
The real threshold between Generation X and Generation Y
I was born on the cusp of Gen X and Gen Y. More timelines tend to put me in Gen Y than in Gen X., but, while I do have characteristics of both, I've always tended to identify more with Gen X.
Reading this article I've figured out why, and figured out where the dividing line between the two generations is.
Gen X was economically aware during the 1990s recession. Gen Y was not yet economically aware. I was (somewhat - enough for these purposes) economically aware during the 90s recession, so I identify with Gen X.
I hadn't given much thought to the economy before the 90s recession. What with being a child and all, I was far more interested in smurfs and ninja turtles. But reality as I knew it was that you have a job for life. My grandparents worked in the same factories for decades, earning enough to support their families. My parents and aunts and uncles went to university and got good white-collar jobs with benefits and pensions that they'd had my whole life. Then, suddenly, just as soon as I reached the age where I read the newspaper, job losses! Good jobs gone forever! Welcome to contract hell! People with university degrees flipping burgers and having to live with their parents! I couldn't see any way things could possibly ever change at all ever (I think we can forgive my 10-year-old self for not predicting the dotcom boom), so I read all this assuming it applied to me was well, and thus came to identify with the Gen. Xers who were currently trying to make their way in that job market.
So initially I was looking at the people in the Toronto Star article and wondering WTF they were expecting income security - they're about my age, why don't they remember the 90s recession? Then I realized, yes, they're about my age, but they're a year or two younger. That's insigificant now, but it was a huge difference back in the 90s. I was a 10-year-old reading about job losses in the newspaper, but they were eight years old at the time and not quite up to reading much beyond the comics. They don't identify with the 90s recession, and are therefore Gen Y. They're experiencing first hand the uncertainty of economic turmoil for the first time in their lives, while the couple of years I have on them made me economically aware enough to lose my recession virginity last time around.
But here's the great mystery of that article:
Why were their grownups telling them this? My grownups tell me that too. They tell me that I'm smart, I have a university degree, I'll have no trouble getting a job. As though I haven't always had trouble getting jobs. As though I (and others like me) haven't had employers who don't want to hire me because they think I'm too educated. As though they don't remember the 90s meme of degrees not being worth the paper they're printed on. What's up with members of the Boomer generation who forget the lessons of the 90s?
Reading this article I've figured out why, and figured out where the dividing line between the two generations is.
Gen X was economically aware during the 1990s recession. Gen Y was not yet economically aware. I was (somewhat - enough for these purposes) economically aware during the 90s recession, so I identify with Gen X.
I hadn't given much thought to the economy before the 90s recession. What with being a child and all, I was far more interested in smurfs and ninja turtles. But reality as I knew it was that you have a job for life. My grandparents worked in the same factories for decades, earning enough to support their families. My parents and aunts and uncles went to university and got good white-collar jobs with benefits and pensions that they'd had my whole life. Then, suddenly, just as soon as I reached the age where I read the newspaper, job losses! Good jobs gone forever! Welcome to contract hell! People with university degrees flipping burgers and having to live with their parents! I couldn't see any way things could possibly ever change at all ever (I think we can forgive my 10-year-old self for not predicting the dotcom boom), so I read all this assuming it applied to me was well, and thus came to identify with the Gen. Xers who were currently trying to make their way in that job market.
So initially I was looking at the people in the Toronto Star article and wondering WTF they were expecting income security - they're about my age, why don't they remember the 90s recession? Then I realized, yes, they're about my age, but they're a year or two younger. That's insigificant now, but it was a huge difference back in the 90s. I was a 10-year-old reading about job losses in the newspaper, but they were eight years old at the time and not quite up to reading much beyond the comics. They don't identify with the 90s recession, and are therefore Gen Y. They're experiencing first hand the uncertainty of economic turmoil for the first time in their lives, while the couple of years I have on them made me economically aware enough to lose my recession virginity last time around.
But here's the great mystery of that article:
Generation Y grew up being told that if they were willing to work and study hard they could have it all: well-paying, fulfilling jobs that provided all the comforts.
Why were their grownups telling them this? My grownups tell me that too. They tell me that I'm smart, I have a university degree, I'll have no trouble getting a job. As though I haven't always had trouble getting jobs. As though I (and others like me) haven't had employers who don't want to hire me because they think I'm too educated. As though they don't remember the 90s meme of degrees not being worth the paper they're printed on. What's up with members of the Boomer generation who forget the lessons of the 90s?
Open Letter to "Need Help" in today's Dear Ellie column
From today's Dear Ellie:
First of all, broach the subject with your husband by talking about funeral planning/wishes for after death in general. Do your own wills and plan your own funerals if you haven't already. Bring up Baby Kaylee who was recently in the news to steer the conversation towards organ donation. Then once you're on that, ponder whether you know your own parents' wishes (aging parents, you know) and ask your husband if he knows his mother's wishes.
Then your husband can use the same technique to find out his mother's wishes.
Allow some time to pass and price her wishes to find out whether you can afford them. Then, at a calm and neutral moment, have your husband say to her "BTW, Mom, remember a while back you said you wanted to be buried in a solid gold tomb? Today I just happened to stumble upon how much that costs and there's no way I can make that work. Do you have insurance or pre-planning or anything?"
At this point she should either agree to insurance or take responsibility for pre-planning. And if she doesn't, she has been duly informed that her wishes cannot be fulfilled without some action on her part, so you're off the hook for not doing more than you can afford.
I've been married for three years and am increasingly frustrated with my mother-in-law.
She has a gambling problem and often cannot pay her rent, or her basic bills. She has major health problems, yet smokes and is extremely overweight.
My husband and I help her financially when she needs it, but it's more difficult for us lately. I'd like to arrange an insurance policy for her, to help with the cost of her funeral expenses should she pass away. I feel that due to her careless lifestyle and health problems, she may not be around very long.
No other relatives are in a secure financial position to assist with final expenses. Or they'll refuse, since we're always bailing her out.
How do I bring this up to my husband? How do we talk to my mother-in-law about signing a policy for funeral coverage?
I cannot take one out on her without her knowledge. I feel my husband should be the one to talk to her. When I've mentioned this before, he got very angry and didn't want to discuss it. I'm just trying to avoid a disaster, not looking to make any money off her.
Need Help
First of all, broach the subject with your husband by talking about funeral planning/wishes for after death in general. Do your own wills and plan your own funerals if you haven't already. Bring up Baby Kaylee who was recently in the news to steer the conversation towards organ donation. Then once you're on that, ponder whether you know your own parents' wishes (aging parents, you know) and ask your husband if he knows his mother's wishes.
Then your husband can use the same technique to find out his mother's wishes.
Allow some time to pass and price her wishes to find out whether you can afford them. Then, at a calm and neutral moment, have your husband say to her "BTW, Mom, remember a while back you said you wanted to be buried in a solid gold tomb? Today I just happened to stumble upon how much that costs and there's no way I can make that work. Do you have insurance or pre-planning or anything?"
At this point she should either agree to insurance or take responsibility for pre-planning. And if she doesn't, she has been duly informed that her wishes cannot be fulfilled without some action on her part, so you're off the hook for not doing more than you can afford.
Monday, May 04, 2009
Leaving kids unsupervised
1. An article in Salon mentions in passing that Parents Today now wait for the school bus with their kids instead of the kids waiting at the bus stop unsupervised.
This made me think of Erica.
Erica was a neighbourhood girl a year ahead of me who would sit on the mailbox. She'd climb up on top of the red Canada Post mailbox and sit there waiting for the bus to come. I don't know why, that's just what she did.
Obviously, you're not supposed to sit on the mailbox. But there were no grownups around to stop her, so she sat on the mailbox. It was a harmless way of breaking the rules.
A lot of harmless rule-breaking went on at the bus stop. If someone had seen SNL or the Sunday Night Sex Show, they'd tell us all about it. If someone knew a dirty joke, they'd share it. People would apply the make-up their parents said they were too young for. People would eat the junk food their parents had banned from the family home. People would remove the toques their parents had insisted they wear. All against the rules, all ultimately harmless.
We'd also do other things that weren't against the rules, but you just couldn't do in front of grownups. We'd take a "Who's your ideal celeb crush?" quiz in Y&M. We'd bitch about our English teacher. We'd concoct elaborate plans for one of our number to Talk To A Boy. Harmless, not against the rules, but not for the ears of parents or teachers.
The bus stop wasn't utopia. The bullies were there too, and for this reason I wouldn't have minded if it was normal for parents to wait with us. (I wouldn't have wanted my parents there if it wasn't normal, but if everyone else's parents were there - or even if there were just a few supervising grownups to keep the bullies down - I wouldn't have minded.) However, I didn't feel any less safe than at school, and I do see its value as an unsupservised public space for kids.
So this makes me wonder what effect it has on kids to be closed out of unsupervised public space. When they can't sit on the mailbox, how does their adolescent rebellion manifest itself?
2. A Globe and Mail writer blogs about the difficulty of butting out of her kids' post-secondary education.
This makes me think of the value of OAC (i.e. Grade 13).
OAC students were generally over 18, and the OAC courses were managed with that assumption. Students who were over 18 could sign themselves in and out of school rather than needing a note from their parents for every absence. As legal adults they were accountable for their own education, and the teachers actually couldn't talk to the student's parents without the student's permission. As a result of this OAC classes didn't have the custodial element of other classes and didn't presume to be accountable to the parents. (It's possible that the parents of a minor OAC student might have been allowed to go talk to the kid's teacher, but it just Wasn't Done.)
Many students in my school started taking OACs in Grade 12 or even Grade 11 (for various reasons that I can get into if you're interested but are irrelevant to this blog post). I started taking OACs in my Grade 12 year, and becaue I was born in December I was 16 years old when I started my first OAC class. Starting at the age of 16 I had courses where if a teacher was absent, the class was cancelled. Where the teacher wasn't expecting a parental signature on my report card, and wouldn't give a parent-teacher interview without my permission. Where I wouldn't be disciplined for missing class, I'd just better damn well catch up and not accrue 20 unexcused absences. I was still in high school, still living at my parents' (and still expected to be), I just had full legal and personal responsibility for my own educaction.
For one year, half my classes were like this. For the next year, all my classes were like this. Then the next year I was in university, by which time it didn't even occur to me or my parents that they might possibly have any business interfering with my academics.
This may vary for people who are more mature or people who are old for their year, but for me OAC was a valuable transition and a key part of preparing me to take responsibility for my own university career.
This made me think of Erica.
Erica was a neighbourhood girl a year ahead of me who would sit on the mailbox. She'd climb up on top of the red Canada Post mailbox and sit there waiting for the bus to come. I don't know why, that's just what she did.
Obviously, you're not supposed to sit on the mailbox. But there were no grownups around to stop her, so she sat on the mailbox. It was a harmless way of breaking the rules.
A lot of harmless rule-breaking went on at the bus stop. If someone had seen SNL or the Sunday Night Sex Show, they'd tell us all about it. If someone knew a dirty joke, they'd share it. People would apply the make-up their parents said they were too young for. People would eat the junk food their parents had banned from the family home. People would remove the toques their parents had insisted they wear. All against the rules, all ultimately harmless.
We'd also do other things that weren't against the rules, but you just couldn't do in front of grownups. We'd take a "Who's your ideal celeb crush?" quiz in Y&M. We'd bitch about our English teacher. We'd concoct elaborate plans for one of our number to Talk To A Boy. Harmless, not against the rules, but not for the ears of parents or teachers.
The bus stop wasn't utopia. The bullies were there too, and for this reason I wouldn't have minded if it was normal for parents to wait with us. (I wouldn't have wanted my parents there if it wasn't normal, but if everyone else's parents were there - or even if there were just a few supervising grownups to keep the bullies down - I wouldn't have minded.) However, I didn't feel any less safe than at school, and I do see its value as an unsupservised public space for kids.
So this makes me wonder what effect it has on kids to be closed out of unsupervised public space. When they can't sit on the mailbox, how does their adolescent rebellion manifest itself?
2. A Globe and Mail writer blogs about the difficulty of butting out of her kids' post-secondary education.
This makes me think of the value of OAC (i.e. Grade 13).
OAC students were generally over 18, and the OAC courses were managed with that assumption. Students who were over 18 could sign themselves in and out of school rather than needing a note from their parents for every absence. As legal adults they were accountable for their own education, and the teachers actually couldn't talk to the student's parents without the student's permission. As a result of this OAC classes didn't have the custodial element of other classes and didn't presume to be accountable to the parents. (It's possible that the parents of a minor OAC student might have been allowed to go talk to the kid's teacher, but it just Wasn't Done.)
Many students in my school started taking OACs in Grade 12 or even Grade 11 (for various reasons that I can get into if you're interested but are irrelevant to this blog post). I started taking OACs in my Grade 12 year, and becaue I was born in December I was 16 years old when I started my first OAC class. Starting at the age of 16 I had courses where if a teacher was absent, the class was cancelled. Where the teacher wasn't expecting a parental signature on my report card, and wouldn't give a parent-teacher interview without my permission. Where I wouldn't be disciplined for missing class, I'd just better damn well catch up and not accrue 20 unexcused absences. I was still in high school, still living at my parents' (and still expected to be), I just had full legal and personal responsibility for my own educaction.
For one year, half my classes were like this. For the next year, all my classes were like this. Then the next year I was in university, by which time it didn't even occur to me or my parents that they might possibly have any business interfering with my academics.
This may vary for people who are more mature or people who are old for their year, but for me OAC was a valuable transition and a key part of preparing me to take responsibility for my own university career.
Sunday, May 03, 2009
Teach me advanced social skills
Sometimes people give me compliments that they don't really mean just to generally lubricate the social interaction. They are compliments that I would appreciate if they were sincere, but I can tell that they're just putting them in there to increase the overall postiveness, like how when giving feedback or critique you think of positive things to say and use them to sandwich the negative.
So WTF do I do with this?
So WTF do I do with this?
Current musical obsession
I like the song better than the video, but the video is good too so I'm posting it.
You're a puppy! Yes you are!
I was introduced to a puppy the other day, and I felt the need to say to him, repeatedly and in a very squeaky voice, "You're a puppy! Yes you are!"
My new goal in life is to do that to some creature that is very clearly not a puppy.
Bonus: the relevant xkcd.
My new goal in life is to do that to some creature that is very clearly not a puppy.
Bonus: the relevant xkcd.
I just had the weirdest dream
I was at my parents' and there had been this giant snowstorm. The snowplows in the area consisted of only a giant scoop, like you'd find on the front of a front-end loader, and the driver would sit on top of the scoop and move the snow around.
As we were driving up the street, we saw this one "plow" trying to dump snow in the ravine. Dumping in the ravine isn't allowed. (Aside: sometimes they put up "no dumping" signs in places where they don't want people to dump stuff. Does that stop anyone, really? Because the general rule for the universe as a whole is "no dumping", so I can't see someone about to dump a load of old tires into a ravine being stopped by a sign.)
So this plow driver sees us seeing him and decides that we're witnesses so he has to kill us. He makes two snowballs and starts stalking us on foot with one snowball in each hand. Despite the fact that we're in a car and there's three of us, we seem to take him seriously. We all got into the house safely, but we knew that the dude with his two snowballs was totally going to come back and get us. Fortunately I woke up to a beautiful spring day before that could happen.
As we were driving up the street, we saw this one "plow" trying to dump snow in the ravine. Dumping in the ravine isn't allowed. (Aside: sometimes they put up "no dumping" signs in places where they don't want people to dump stuff. Does that stop anyone, really? Because the general rule for the universe as a whole is "no dumping", so I can't see someone about to dump a load of old tires into a ravine being stopped by a sign.)
So this plow driver sees us seeing him and decides that we're witnesses so he has to kill us. He makes two snowballs and starts stalking us on foot with one snowball in each hand. Despite the fact that we're in a car and there's three of us, we seem to take him seriously. We all got into the house safely, but we knew that the dude with his two snowballs was totally going to come back and get us. Fortunately I woke up to a beautiful spring day before that could happen.
Saturday, May 02, 2009
Guidance
It recently occurred to me that the vast majority of the career advice/guidance I received as a teenager were given to me not because the adult (usually a teacher) thought the thing they were advising me to do would be a good fit for me, but rather because they had the general idea that more people should do it.
I had teachers tell me I should go to college instead of automatically opting for university - and this even after I'd found the right program for me (which happened to be a university program). I think they were trying to address the fact that a lot of students in general feel like they "should" go to university, like it's the "right thing to do", even if it isn't a good fit. But I'm very well-suited to university, and this should have been obvious to anyone who he taught me (and all these college-encouragers were people who had taught me). Even if I hadn't found my niche in translation, I would have wandered contentedly through university pulling in A's until I stumbled upon linguistics and completed my degree there, then ended up in an on-campus admin job, using my tuition waiver to do graduate work part-time. Not a perfect fit, but I wouldn't know better and it would certainly be better than doing some very specific college program I have no interest in ("Do travel and tourism! You're good at languages!" "Do dental hygiene! It pays well!") But these grown-ups - teachers who had taught me and knew that I was strong academically - just blindly advised me to go to college without a thought to my strengths to mitigate the fact that students in general feel pressured to go to university.
Once I had chosen translation, one of the guidance counsellors kept encouraging me to go to her alma mater. It was not a good fit. The only way a first-year student could get a single res room in that university was to join a religiously-affiliated college (and she knew that I'm an introverted atheist). It was quite a long way from home compared with other translation programs, and I was very nervous about moving out on my own. And, as it turned out, the program was dying. It closed down in what would have been my graduation year. It was, for multiple reasons, the worst of my possible options. And yet this guidance counsellor encouraged me to this specific program over the others because it was her alma mater and I think someone at some point asked her to promote it.
When I was a teenager, it was fashionable to encourage girls to go into engineering. As a girl and a gifted student, I was made to do all these programs to expose me to engineering. The more I did, the more I disliked it. The thing about engineering is you have to make actual real stuff that actually works in real life. I'm not good at that - I'm clumsy and abstract and not terribly physical or kinesthetic. I'm more of an ideas person, which is why I have a blog category called Things They Should Invent rather than having a dozen patents to my name. But they kept "encouraging" me towards engineering, culminating in a teacher telling me (after I already had chosen translation) that I should go into engineering to show other girls that they can do whatever they want. There was no thought given to the fact that it wasn't a good match for me, they just pushed me in that direction because I was the target demographic.
You might be thinking, "So why are you complaining about this? You got bad advice, you ignored it, you found your path." Yes, but I found my path by a total fluke. If life had gone normally, I would have been entirely trusting these grown-ups' advice on how to pick a post-secondary program and find a career. After all, they'd all done it, I hadn't. It's just like how as a teenager you look to your elders to for advice on how to do a job interview or complete a tax return or parallel park. They knew me well enough that they should have seen the unsuitability of this advice (they're teachers who had taught me multiple times - often in very small classes - and supervised my extracurriculars, in a small high school, near the end of my five-year high school career). I trusted them to give me advice that appropriately took into consideration the things that I knew they knew about me. But instead they shrugged off my concerns. You don't want to go to college? That's just because you're biased - college doesn't mean you're stupid, you know! You don't want to go to my alma mater? You should, it's a good school, you know! You don't want to go into engineering? Don't worry, girls can do engineering too!
This makes me wonder how many kids are out there right now receiving completely unsuitable guidance.
The other thing that surprises me now that I think about it is the number of grown-ups who encouraged me to follow their own personal path even though it was unsuitable for me. This surprises me because my instinct is always to guide people away from my own path if I see reasons why it would be unsuitable for them. It would never occur to me when a teenage cousin, for example, is panicking because they don't know what to do with their life to nudge them towards my path on the mere basis that it exists or that I'm familiar with it. So I find it really odd that I've encountered so many people whose instincts in this area are the opposite of mine.
I had teachers tell me I should go to college instead of automatically opting for university - and this even after I'd found the right program for me (which happened to be a university program). I think they were trying to address the fact that a lot of students in general feel like they "should" go to university, like it's the "right thing to do", even if it isn't a good fit. But I'm very well-suited to university, and this should have been obvious to anyone who he taught me (and all these college-encouragers were people who had taught me). Even if I hadn't found my niche in translation, I would have wandered contentedly through university pulling in A's until I stumbled upon linguistics and completed my degree there, then ended up in an on-campus admin job, using my tuition waiver to do graduate work part-time. Not a perfect fit, but I wouldn't know better and it would certainly be better than doing some very specific college program I have no interest in ("Do travel and tourism! You're good at languages!" "Do dental hygiene! It pays well!") But these grown-ups - teachers who had taught me and knew that I was strong academically - just blindly advised me to go to college without a thought to my strengths to mitigate the fact that students in general feel pressured to go to university.
Once I had chosen translation, one of the guidance counsellors kept encouraging me to go to her alma mater. It was not a good fit. The only way a first-year student could get a single res room in that university was to join a religiously-affiliated college (and she knew that I'm an introverted atheist). It was quite a long way from home compared with other translation programs, and I was very nervous about moving out on my own. And, as it turned out, the program was dying. It closed down in what would have been my graduation year. It was, for multiple reasons, the worst of my possible options. And yet this guidance counsellor encouraged me to this specific program over the others because it was her alma mater and I think someone at some point asked her to promote it.
When I was a teenager, it was fashionable to encourage girls to go into engineering. As a girl and a gifted student, I was made to do all these programs to expose me to engineering. The more I did, the more I disliked it. The thing about engineering is you have to make actual real stuff that actually works in real life. I'm not good at that - I'm clumsy and abstract and not terribly physical or kinesthetic. I'm more of an ideas person, which is why I have a blog category called Things They Should Invent rather than having a dozen patents to my name. But they kept "encouraging" me towards engineering, culminating in a teacher telling me (after I already had chosen translation) that I should go into engineering to show other girls that they can do whatever they want. There was no thought given to the fact that it wasn't a good match for me, they just pushed me in that direction because I was the target demographic.
You might be thinking, "So why are you complaining about this? You got bad advice, you ignored it, you found your path." Yes, but I found my path by a total fluke. If life had gone normally, I would have been entirely trusting these grown-ups' advice on how to pick a post-secondary program and find a career. After all, they'd all done it, I hadn't. It's just like how as a teenager you look to your elders to for advice on how to do a job interview or complete a tax return or parallel park. They knew me well enough that they should have seen the unsuitability of this advice (they're teachers who had taught me multiple times - often in very small classes - and supervised my extracurriculars, in a small high school, near the end of my five-year high school career). I trusted them to give me advice that appropriately took into consideration the things that I knew they knew about me. But instead they shrugged off my concerns. You don't want to go to college? That's just because you're biased - college doesn't mean you're stupid, you know! You don't want to go to my alma mater? You should, it's a good school, you know! You don't want to go into engineering? Don't worry, girls can do engineering too!
This makes me wonder how many kids are out there right now receiving completely unsuitable guidance.
The other thing that surprises me now that I think about it is the number of grown-ups who encouraged me to follow their own personal path even though it was unsuitable for me. This surprises me because my instinct is always to guide people away from my own path if I see reasons why it would be unsuitable for them. It would never occur to me when a teenage cousin, for example, is panicking because they don't know what to do with their life to nudge them towards my path on the mere basis that it exists or that I'm familiar with it. So I find it really odd that I've encountered so many people whose instincts in this area are the opposite of mine.
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