8:30

Around this time of year, the sun comes shining in through my window and right into my eyes at about 8:30 in the morning, waking me up.

"So what's the problem?" you're thinking, "You chose eastern exposure to help with your circadiam rhythms, no?"

The problem is that 8:30 is too early for me on weekends - I need more sleep than that - but too late for weekdays so I still have to wake up to the alarm. And it's shining right into my eyes so I can't ignore it.

In the summer, the angle of the sun is different so I get ambient light to help me on weekdays but I can still ignore it on weekends. In the winter, I'm entirely dependent on the alarm on weekdays but the sun comes late enough for a sleep-in on weekends. But right now I'm in the rough patch where I just can't get a proper sleep-in on weekends but the sun can't quite help me get up for work.

On not being poor

The Toronto Star attempts to define poverty.

I can't define poverty. I know what it is, I grok it, I'm a language professional, but I still can't put together a definition that encompasses every nuance of the negative feedback loop that is poverty

So I'm going to talk about not being poor. A lot of this is going to dance on the border of being well-employed, which is why I'm not poor, but I didn't expect to be well-employed - it was a series of flukes, a cascade of freakish good luck that probably should make me believe in god were I not a congenital atheist - so I'm all too aware of how things would be different if I were poor.

Let's start with the potential TTC strike. I don't have a car, I'm dependent on the TTC. But I do have a carpool in case of a strike. And it's because I didn't grow up poor that I have a carpool. The driver is a friend whom I originally met as exchange students in high school, which I would not have been able to afford to do if I had grown up poor. If the carpool doesn't go as planned and I arrive later than expected or have to leave earlier than expected, that's okay because I'm well-employed. My boss will understand that it's an exceptional circumstance. If I didn't have a carpool I might be able to work from home, because I am well-employed in a sit-at-the-computer job. Or I could take a day off from my sick leave or my vacation leave, which I have because I am well-employed. And even if for some reason I didn't get paid for coming in, I could absorb the loss of a few days' pay because I am not poor. But if I ended up having to come in to work anyway, I could walk - it's a 90 minute walk, tops. Because I am not poor, I can afford to live this close to work. Walking would be more exercise than I normally do in a day, but I should be able to handle it. Because I am not poor, I was able to buy a pair of good running shoes that will hold up to a long walk despite the fact that my tendon injury never completely healed. And if I didn't have my friend's carpool and did have to come to work and couldn't handle the walk, I could probably get in on another carpool. Because I am not poor, I could afford to pay a carpooler for their gas or parking or just throw money at them. Plus it might be easier for me to get in on a stranger carpool because I'm harmless-looking.

Let's talk about how I'm harmless-looking. Politically-incorrect as it may be to say, being harmless-looking does make everyday life easier. People working in stores tend to trust me rather than accuse me of stealing. Strangers sometimes feel inclined to protect me. People assume at first glance that I'm honest and sane. Basically, I look harmless because I have good glasses and a nice smile. Having attractive glasses instead of fugly glasses makes me look intelligent and competent, like I'm a respectable person with a job instead of someone who has just been released from prison. This makes people treat me better. Having glasses with the correct prescription enables me to make proper eye contact (I have a lazy eye naturally) and makes it physically possible for me to open my eyes properly instead of squinting assymetrically. When I make eye contact with my eyes open properly and symmetrically, I look far more innocent and trustworthy than I do when squinty and shifty-eyed. And this is all in addition to the fact that they help me, you know, SEE! Because I am not poor and because I am well-employed, I can afford regular eye checkups and attractive glasses with good lenses. And because I am not poor and because I am well-employed and because my parents are not poor so I've had proper dental work all my life, I also have a nice smile. Just as proper glasses give me a full range of emoting in my eyes, a nice smile gives me a full range of emoting with my mouth. I don't have to hide my teeth by keeping my mouth closed (and thereby in a frowning position because that's how my mouth goes.) Best case, my smile charms and disarms. If not, it still labels me as harmless and well-intentioned. So if I have to take a strange carpool, when I meet the driver I can shake their hand, make eye contact, make my eyes light up, give them a big gorgeous smile, and they'll have no reason to feel like I'm a threat to their carpool - especially since I now have hardly any cystic acne (and therefore no oozing sores on my face) thanks to my latest birth control pills.

Let's talk about my birth control pills. Because I am not poor, I can afford birth control pills. Because I am well-employed, I can have the regular doctor's appointments necessary to make this happen, and if my doctor wasn't cooperative I could fit in the time and effort needed to find a suitable doctor or clinic. In addition to regulating my acne and thus preventing me from walking around with oozing sores on my face, my birth control pills also regulate my periods. This means that my periods are manageable instead of leaving me alternating between curling up in a ball and sitting on the toilet (although because I'm well-employed I could still work under those conditions, and could use my sick days if I couldn't work under those conditions, and because I'm not poor I could afford to take unpaid time off if I didn't have sick days.) Ironically, manageable periods also mean I don't need to buy as many feminine hygiene products, although I could afford to buy shitloads of the very best feminine hygiene products without a moment's thought because I am not poor. My birth control pills also make my period come like clockwork. Naturally, it's very irregular and only comes every 6-8 weeks. Unregulated, I could be 2-3 months pregnant and not even notice. With birth control pills, if I were pregnant I would notice by the Wednesday of my scheduled period week. And, ironically again, because I am not poor and because I am well-employed, I could take whatever time and resources are necessary to terminate my pregnancy, which would also be easier if detected earlier. Plus, with birth control pills I can have sex! Which, in addition to being geil in every sense of the word, also made it possible for me to land mi cielito. Again, it's probably politically incorrect to say so, but I wouldn't have landed him if sex were out of the question. We would probably have still ended up friends, but he would have found some other girl to have sex with, and she would have been his #1 and I would have been relegated to mere acquaintance status. And then I wouldn't have gotten...there's so much, I don't even know where to start. The man deserves a Nobel Prize for my panic attack coping mechanism alone!

Let's talk about my panic attacks. As you probably know, I have a severe phobia of bugs and get a panic attack whenever I encounter one. Because I am not poor, I was able to move into a lovely, new, clean building with understanding and attentive management. And, living in this lovely building, I have only had one panic attack in the past year and that didn't take place at home. Not having panic attacks keeps my blood pressure down, which makes it possible for me to stay on birth control pills. Not having panic attacks means I can go through life behaving in a way that appears normally, instead of peering fearfully at corners and jumping at pieces of lint, again making me appear harmless and trustworthy rather than shifty and odd. Panic attacks take up a lot of energy, so with this energy free I can think of new and innovative ways to combat anorexia and save both the environment and manufacturing jobs and discourage ipod theft. With this energy free I can translate better and faster, making me a more invaluable employee and perhaps more likely to stay well-employed and not poor. With this energy free, I'm a less needy friend and therefore better able to maintain the kinds of friendships that result in people just handing me carpools or dropping everything to help me get through a panic attack. And with this energy free, and with all these dozens of small freedoms afforded to me by not being poor, I have the luxury of dismissing any personal inconvenience caused by something like a TTC strike and instead looking at the bigger picture, easily absorbing the blow with this cushion I'm sitting on, so that other workers will also be able to enjoy the positive feedback loop of not being poor, and will be able to become as much of a better person as it has made me.

A better way to legislate away anorexia

In Europe, there have recently been several attempts to make laws to stop the fashion industry from promoting an unhealthy body image.

I think I might have a better idea: standardize larger sample sizes.

Models are thin in the first place because they have to fit into the sample sizes. So why not issue an industry standard that sample sizes have to be, say, a size 10 (or whatever size the average woman in Europe is). Then there will simply be no use for a 5'10" 90 lb. model. If my understanding is correct, the EU is big on legislating industry standards (at least whenever my terminology research leads me to EU websites they're always about industry standards for something), and Europe is the world leader in fashion, so it seems appropriate.

Things They Should Invent: ban lawns

Lawns are stupid resource-sucks. Giant swaths of land deliberately covered with one and only one species of plant that serves no particular purpose, with all other species eradicated if they dare infringe upon the area. It's ethnic cleansing on the botanical level!

Any areas currently used for lawns should have to be used for something beneficial to society. For example:

- growing food
- solar panels
- growing endangered native plants
- creating habitat appropriate for endangered native animals

Now not everyone can do these things. Some people own lawns but just aren't capable of farming or stewardship of endangered species. I totally understand - I have a black thumb myself. If this is the case, people should have the option to just neglect their lawns, letting the grass grow and the weeds take over and allowing the local ecosystem to slowly reclaim the land.

Things They Should Invent: a torrent of all the real-life songs parodied by Weird Al

I have a bunch of Weird Al on my ipod (I'm a nerd from the 90s, what do you expect?) but I keep thinking "I should get the original of that song too." I want to be able to download them all in one torrent instead of having to track them all down separately.

Serendipitous confidence?

I'm sitting here doing not much. I'm watching a movie, I'm drinking sauvignon blanc (I don't know where I picked up the habit of namedropping my wine, but it's very Stuff White People Like, isn't it?), I'm playing a rather dull Sims house where nothing interesting is going to happen until either the baby grows up or the elder dies, then suddenly:

There was one thing I was vaguely worried about. Quasi-sorta-work-related, but not really. Suddenly, as I was watching my movie and playing my Sims and drinking my wine, and I became confident about the thing I was worried about.

Nothing had changed. Nothing around me had inspired me. The confidence came from the normal Eddie Izzard method of "Here it is, this is what I've got." But somehow that didn't happen before, and it did just now. Weird

Things They Should Invent: demographic poll of the kinds of people who answer polls

Have you ever seen a poll published in the newspaper and though "WhoTF answers these poll?"

Have you ever declined to answer when a poll called you up? Have you ever just not answered the phone when an unrecognized number came up on your call display?

They should have a research company call people up, say they're doing a poll, and then just poll demographic information. Then they should compare that information with the available census data to see if it is truly representative.

Imitations

Phil Jupitus imitates Eddie Izzard imitating Obi Wan Kenobi



Eddie Izzard imitates Michael Gaston imitating Christopher Walken



So now all we need is Christopher Walken imitating someone else imitating Phil Jupitus, and the circle of life will be complete.

I really need to blog more promptly

Lately I've been thinking that the real problem with the federal political situation is fixed election dates. If they didn't have fixed election dates, they could just call a bloody election instead of getting into these constant pissing matches trying to get each other to trigger an election.

So I've been thinking all this and not blogging about it, because, like, I'm lazy, and, like, it's far easier to post links and covet Sarah Polley's boots than to put together intelligent commentary on what I freely admit is an amateurish theory.

So today Norman Spector beat me to it. His commentary is, rightfully, much better than anything I could have put together, but I still would have liked to have beaten him to it.

So how was your morning?

My mascara is hardcore. Not just black but "Ultra Black", waterproof, the lengtheningist kind I can find (currently Rimmel Eye Magnifier, although I'm always looking to go even more extreme, so if you have something that you know is better I'll welcome any recommendations). One of the few advantages of being hirstute is that I can carry off the 60s TV actress look (in my mind...).

So anyway, I'm putting on my hardcore mascara when I think I see something drip off the brush. Don't be silly, mascara doesn't drip! And it's not like seeing strangely-moving floaters out the corner of my eye is unprecedented. So I keep doing my makeup, eat my breakfast, brush my teeth, get dressed, do my hair, and take a quick glance in the mirror before I dart out the door. Hmmmm, a bit shiny. So I grab my compact, powder my forehead, and quickly blend it with my fingers.

Suddenly, there's a giant black smudge across my forehead. Turned out a huge clump of mascara did drip off the brush (first time in 14 years of wearing makeup that that's ever happened!) and landed on my compact - and I'd put my hand right on it and then used it to blend my powder.

So I'm frantically washing my hands, trying to get the black off my forehead, running late for work...eventually I had to use eye makeup remover on my forehead then redo all the concealer and foundation on my forehead to look civilized again!

Why couldn't this at least happen on Ash Wednesday?

Wherein my latent insecurities hinder the natural dissemination of language

You know how sometimes you pick up the speech patterns of the people around you?

Whenever someone near me picks up on my speech patterns and starts using them, I always feel like they're making fun of me, then get cold at them.

I'm completely fucking up the natural spread of linguistic innovation, aren't I?

Mash-up of the moment

Amy Winehouse vs. Linda Ronstadt. Seriously, it works. Not only a good mash-up, but they mashed both the audios and the videos instead of just two audios or one audio with another video.

My letter to Dalton McGuinty and to my MPP

I am writing regarding your recent comments on the possibility of banning plastic bags at the LCBO.

I hope you get the chance to read this before passing any legislation, because you have an opportunity here to do something that will have an even better environmental impact than banning plastic bags: have the LCBO give out biodegradable bags.

As I'm sure you know, plastic bags don't end up in the landfill because people unpack their shopping and throw the bags straight into the garbage. Plastic bags end up in the landfill because people use them as garbage bags.

If you ban plastic bags at the LCBO, that won't change this behaviour. People will still throw out the same amount of garbage, and will still use the plastic bags they have on hand at home as garbage bags. The plastic bags in the landfill won't say LCBO on them, but there will still be just as many.

However, if you make the LCBO use biodegradable bags, then when people reach for a garbage bag, it will be biodegradable. Every time the LCBO gives out a biodegradable bag, that's one less plastic bag in the landfill.

If the LCBO bans plastic bags, then consumers will have to deal with two inconveniences to achieve environmentally optimal behaviour: first they will have to carry a reuseable bag around with them all day if they plan to pick up a bottle of wine on the way home from work, then they will have to seek out and specifically purchase biodegradable garbage bags.

But if the LCBO gives out biodegradable bags, then consumers can achieve environmentally optimal behaviour without any effort whatsoever - just buy your wine, get it bagged as usual, then use the bag as a garbage bag as usual. They would actually have to go out of their way to be less environmentally friendly.

You are, of course, perfectly correct in saying that it is the LCBO's duty as a government agency and as a monopoly to set an example, and using biodegradable bags would be the perfect way to do just that. Furthermore, just as the LCBO uses its massive purchasing power get good wholesale deals and make a wide variety of products available to Ontarians, its sizeable influence could also have a powerful effect on the biodegradable bag market. If the LCBO starts using only biodegradable bags, the economies of scale could make biodegradable bags more affordable for other retailers to use. If the demand created by the LCBO is significant enough as compared with the number of biodegradable bags currently being produced, this meay even lead to the creation of more manufacturing jobs in Ontario.

You have an opportunity to do good on several fronts here. Please don't waste it with a simple and short-sighted ban.

Is the North actually empty?

If you look at Environment Canada's weather warning maps for Nunavut, NWT, Yukon, Northern Quebec, and Labrador, you'll see that there are huge areas for which there is no forecast service.

Are these areas actually empty? Or are they just sparsely populated? (Even more so than the areas for which there is forecast service.)

Looking Google Maps doesn't have anything labelled in those areas, but is that because they're empty or because Google Maps doesn't have complete information about these large and sparsely populated areas? Looking at the satellite pictures I'm not seeing anything, but it would be quite easy to miss a small fly-in settlement when skimming over such a large area.

So are there actually these huge tracts of Canada that are completely and totally empty? And if so, are they uninhabitable (as compared with the areas where there are settlements) or just uninhabited?

Open Letter to Sarah Polley

Dear Sarah Polley:

I will read up on, become informed on, and write a gorgeously eloquent and convincing letter to my MP and the most relevant Ministers and anyone else you want me to supporting your position on the arts funding issue you were lobbying about in Ottawa, IF you tell me where I can get a pair of red boots like yours.

Sincerely,

Someone who is maligning our whole demographic by being more enthusiastic about boots than politics

Wrinkles

I don't mind getting wrinkles. I've looked entirely too young for far too long, so I don't mind looking more like a grownup. (Although I do strongly resent still having to deal with zits at the same time.)

What I do mind is that the lines on my forehead, which are starting to not go away anymore when I'm done furrowing my brow, look exactly like my father's! I've already inherited his nose and brow and eyesight and body hair and adult acne and all the worst aspects of his bone structure and personality, and have been working very hard as I grow up to eliminate or conceal these characteristics and assert myself as a separate individual defined by who I actually am instead of by my genes.

How dare my body age me in a way that counteracts all this hard work??

Advanced pedestrian techniques

1. You're pushing an enormous stroller. This means you're slowed down a bit, and it means you have to use the rampy bit of the curb (what's that thing called?) to get back up on the sidewalk after crossing the road. We, your fellow pedestrians in the crosswalk, understand that. That's why we're walking beside you to pass you and straying slightly out of the crosswalk to get back up on the sidewalk on the non-rampy bit, so the rampy bit will be free for your use. So once you've gotten your stroller up on the sidewalk, please take one or two steps directly away from the road before turning left or right. If you get up on the sidewalk and turn straight left or right, you're preventing the people who've so kindly gone off to the side to make room for you on the rampy bit from getting up onto the sidewalk before the light changes.

2. It's raining. Some people have umbrellas and some people don't. A lot of the buildings have overhangs that cover half the sidewalk. So if you don't have an umbrella, walk under the overhang. If you do have an umbrella, don't walk under the overhang.

3. The tunnel doesn't quite connect directly to the mall. You have to walk outdoors for about 20 seconds. So some people might put on a coat, some people might not. I think we can all see both sides. So if you are wearing a coat and walking in a large group of people, make extra sure you leave room for people to pass you. As you know, large groups naturally walk slower than individuals, but there are individuals without coats who were planning on having to spend only 20 seconds outside and don't want to have to spend a whole minute outdoors without a coat stuck behind you while you talk loudly and laugh at your children for acting their age.

I've had a long day

Here are some gratuitous puppies. Substance later.

Wanted: an anonymizer that will let me watch hulu

Anyone know offhand of an anonymizer that will let me watch stuff on hulu that's blocked to people outside the US? I can google up all kinds of anonymizers, but for some reason the video viewer thingy (to put it in technical terms) will never load.