Holy crap…Rage Against The Machine reuniting for a one-off at Coachella! That and Arcade Fire would almost make sitting through Red Hot Chili Peppers, Bjork and Willie Nelson worthwhile…
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This just in: global warming is real. Also just announced: Liberace was gay.
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Dinner tonight: not so promising. There was a barley & sausage salad. We skipped it altogether and went to Subway.
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When even the CEOs of energy, manufacturing, resource and heavy equipment companies are urging action on climate change, I think even the president will has to should listen.
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Managed to squeeze in some basketball last night, as well as watch both 24 (by the way, did NOT see the brother thing coming) and Heroes. Even watched a bit of the Raptors game. If the next two nights are like this it shouldn’t be a bad week.
[tags]climate change, USCAP, 24[/tags]
It’s eleven freaking degrees outside. This is ridiculous.
It’s not just today either. It’s the second time this week — the first week of January — that Toronto’s had temperatures around ten degrees (Monday’s high was 9.2 degrees), I can only remember two days so far this winter that actually felt cold, and 2006 was the lowest year for Toronto snowfall on record.
I’m not really a fan of winter, but…when it’s not around I kind of miss it. Or at least worry about where it’s disappeared to…
[UPDATE] This crazy weather seems to be hard on the wildlife too.
[tags]toronto, warm weather, snowfall[/tags]
Torontoist, not content with examining neighbourhoods, has begun examining intersections. They kicked things off with my local, Yonge & Bloor. I think I’m going to like this series.
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The Economist’s FreeExchange blog mentions an interesting idea: that the EU should impose tariffs on products imported from countries who don’t comply with Kyoto. It doesn’t sound like it’s going to fly, and it was probably political posturing by the French as much as anything else, but it’ll be interesting to see where that thread goes. We impose tariffs and trade embargoes for a lot of things; why not environmental recklessness?
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Speaking of environmental recklessness, American schools will be given 50,000 free copies of An Inconvenient Truth. Fan-frigging-tastic idea. Students should watch the movie and then be given the assignment to prove (or disprove) one or more of the claims Al Gore makes in the documentary.
[tags]yonge, bloor, kyoto, tariffs, inconvenient truth[/tags]
My brother Tim and my friend GB — math geeks both — will love this story: people who can’t do math are in charge of Verizon’s billing department (and managing their call centre, it seems).
Verizon: What do you mean .002 dollars?
Client: [big sigh] Okay, I think I have to do this again. Do you recognize that there’s a difference between one dollar and one cent?
Verizon: Definitely.
Client: Do you recognize there’s a difference between half a dollar and half a cent?
Verizon: Definitely
Client: Then, do you therefore recognize there’s a difference between .002 dollars and .002 cents
Verizon: No.
Client: No?
Awesome.
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I can’t wait to see Rona Ambrose debate pollution with these 700 scientists.
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Nicole Richie has been arrested for driving drunk. I think this is unfair; people who only weigh 85 pounds can’t be blamed for their intoxication as they would obviously get drunk smelling a single lite beer from across the room. Not to mention the weed & vicodin she took before driving, the poor dear.
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Speaking of vapid dormice, this Salon article about Paris Hilton is about 12 kinds of funny. When the article starts off,
“For years we’ve been paralyzed in the tractor beam of her brainless celebrity. Now it’s time to kiss the creepy dollie goodbye.”
…you just know it’s gonna be good.
[tags]verizon, math, scientists, pollution, nicole richie, paris hilton[/tags]
We’re a bit dozy today. We were out until 2:00ish last night celebrating CB’s birthday with dinner at Rain and drinks at the Chez Victor bar, and didn’t end up going to sleep until 3:30 (see below). We feel fine (which I suspect is better than how CB’s feeling this morning) but we’re still just tired. We’re trying to figure out how we can not go outside at all today. So far it’s our inability to conjure groceries from the air that’s getting in the way.
By the way, driving through clubland at 2 in the morning gives you a brief but entertaining glimpse into the drunk, retarded & homogeneous segment of our population.
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Because I was still completely awake when we got home I decided to watch the Leafs/Canadiens game, recorded earlier in the evening. It’s the first time I’ve been able to watch a Habs game in hi-def, and what an amazing game it was. The Canadiens were atrocious in the first period, just pathetic. Down 2-0 nothing early, and it wasn’t even that close. They managed to claw back into the game though, on the back of Saku Koivu, who practically willed two shots into the net. It went to overtime, then to a shootout, where Sheldon Souray (of all people) scored the winning goal.
Honestly, the Canadiens were lucky to get this one. They twice spotted the Leafs 2-goal leads, were outshot (and outplayed) badly in the first and parts of the second, and watched the final Leafs shootout attempt go off the crossbar. What really seemed to give them life was Francis Bouillon knocking Darcy Tucker out with a straight right to the nose after Tucker had run him into the boards. There were a bunch of big hits all night, and Mike Komisarek had an all-out war with Mats Sundin, so passions were running high…it must’ve been a hard loss for the Leafs to take.
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Stephane Dion, Liberal party leader. I certainly didn’t expect that, but I can’t say I’m disappointed. It’ll be interesting to see what happens in the next election though. As Rick Mercer put it,
“Liberals see a saviour who will bring them back to power and the Tories are rubbing their hands in glee over the prospect of heading into battle against a French guy who has a dog named Kyoto.”
Please god…no more dog jokes.
[tags]rain lounge, maple leafs, canadiens, stephane dion, liberal party, rick mercer[/tags]
Bob Barker’s been hosting The Price Is Right longer than I’ve been alive, but he’s decided to hang it up next year. I bet he’ll be really good at grocery shopping.
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Richmond upon Thames is one of the nicer neighbourhoods in London, and has decided to triple (or treble, depending on where you’re reading this) the parking fee for SUVs. I can’t imagine a Toronto neighbourhood like Rosedale or Hogg’s Hollow trying this.
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The latest evidence that people are dumb: more of them watched CSI: Miami than watched Studio 60 (which has now been canceled). Thanks a lot, dull squishy middle.
[tags]bob barker, richmond upon thames, suv parking, csi miami, studio 60[/tags]
We watched a movie called Layer Cake (imdb | rotten tomatoes) last night. It was pretty good; I described it to T-Bone as a movie Guy Ritchie would make if he was off speed. Not that I have evidence of Guy Ritchie doing speed; it was just an apt description.
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Sir Nicholas Stern’s report on the economic impact of climate change reminded me of a story CB told us on the weekend. She described a conversation she’d had with someone else where she was told, because she’s both an atheist and very passionate about environmental causes, that environmentalism is her religion. I don’t think the person who said it was pulling a Hugh, though I don’t think it was said in a malicious way either. I wish I’d been there; I’d have pointed out (’cause I love a good debate) that the statement was backward. Environmentalism is the opposite of religion; it’s how we conduct ourselves in response to a set of facts and theory based in science, as opposed to faith in a fictional work. Passion, zeal, overreaction…these reactions are common to environmentalists and depletists just as it does to atheists and theists, but the basis and foundation for religion and the basis for environmentalism couldn’t be further apart. The “_________ is your religion” canard is just a way of deflecting rational debate. And, sadly, we usually fall for it.
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Today in line at the grocery store we were behind a guy buying candy for Hallowe’en. I don’t think he’d done it before, though, ’cause he’d just filled a plastic bag with chocolate bars. Not the bulk treats you can buy, mind you, but the full-sized versions. They weren’t in any order, and he didn’t know how many he had, so the cashier had to scan each one of them individually. Well, she didn’t have to; she could’ve scanned one kind several times, but she was a kid, so she shouldn’t have had to figure that out. Anyway, after 50 bars or so she finally finishes up…and the guy starts arguing about the price. He claims that they were on sale — 3 bars for $1.44 — but the cash register said $0.48 each. The cashier may have failed speed-checking, but she knew enough math to explain that $0.48 cents is the right price. The guy persists and goes to fetch a flyer. Finally, between the cashier, her supervisor and the withering glares coming from my wife, myself and the poor woman in front of us who only had a pear and some cheese, he got the message and paid. Then my wife decided to get her funny on:
cashier: Hi there. Double bag?
dan: No, that’s ok, we can put everything in our backpacks.
nellie: By the way, we also have 40 loose chocolate bars.
cashier: [cold look of fear]
nellie: Just kidding.
cashier: [nervous laughter; color returns to face]
[tags]layer cake, sir nicholas stern, global warming[/tags]
Things seem bad sometimes. Manufactured wars. Constant, seemingly unresolvable violence in the middle east. Discrimination by religion, race, gender, sexual orientation and so on. Disingenuous, corrupt politicians. Disease. Neighbourhood crime. Rob Schneider. The list goes on; these things, and the way they’re reported, tend to make us feel as if the world is crumbling around our ears. These things certainly frustrate me, but I often think about something I heard Noam Chomsky say once.
A student attending one of Chomsky’s speeches asked him what we could do to turn things around, as the world was just getting worse and worse all the time. Normally you’d expect quite a pessimistic answer from Chomsky, but he replied that the student was way off, that life over, say, the last century has gotten — on the whole — much better.
I agree with him. There are still wars, still empires, still injustices, but there is progress. Most countries now reject aristocracy and elect candidates to positions of power. In most countries people can, to varying degrees, publicly decry unfair treatment or criticize the sitting government with little fear of reprisal. Personal freedoms are, more or less, at an all time high; it wasn’t long ago that women couldn’t vote and black people were forced to drink from separate water fountains. While too many people still live in impoverished conditions, it’s fewer now (on a percentage basis) than 200 years ago. Life expectancy has skyrocketed as diseases are cured and treatments discovered. And so on.
I’m even confident that issues like global warming, which — to my generation — seems like a circus of head-burying and political machinations, will eventually be solved. Just as it has done with every other seemingly insurmountable obstacle, mankind will slowly, irrevocably do the right thing, in spite of the conservative naysayers and authoritarian oppressors. Just
gotta keep on keepin’ on.
But first, I gotta get some sleep.
[tags]noam chomsky, kaizen[/tags]
1. A documentary called The Bridge. It’s about the Golden Gate Bridge, and specifically about all the suicides that happen there. The documentary consists mostly of footage from cameras set up to record the bridge continually for a year. It sounds morbid and voyeuristic, but if you watch the trailer I don’t think it comes across that way. It sounds like a fascinating look at a part of human behaviour that I just can’t get my head around. [via The Movie Blog]
2. A polemic from Christopher Hume against the NIMBY Toronto masses who light their torches and form a mob every time a building over 20 stories is proposed, lest it create shade in their neighbourhood. [via Spacing]
3. A new word: depletist. Invented (apparently) by some students at the Ontario College of Art & Design, it’s definition is as follows: “1) An individual or group showing apparent, negligent, or reckless disregard for the environmental consequences of their actions. 2) An individual or group that exhausts non-renewable resources and rejects positive environmental strategies.” I like it. Very much. Well done, OCADets. [via Reading Toronto]
4. A cover of Bruce Springsteen’s “The Ghost Of Tom Joad” by Jose Gonzalez (well, by Junip, which is Jose’s new band). Check it out if you can.
[tags]bridge documentary, suicide, golden gate bridge, christopher hume, toronto architecture, depletist, reading toronto, ocad, jose gonzalez, junip, ghost of tom joad[/tags]
Skirl | Dan Dickinson 