A Conversation with the Afterlife

It's been nearly six years since my dad passed away. I often have dreams where he appears as he was when I was younger - sometimes even in his twenties or thirties, when only photos could have showed me how he looked. Nevertheless, my belief when he died is that he exists in an afterlife, where neither God nor Devil nor Buddha exists. It would be where people's souls exist on a plane different from ours, and we could communicate with them somehow, in mystic or an indirect manner. He was not a believer of any sort of religion as far as I knew, and this belief in a non-denominational afterlife comforted me when I woke up in tears from seeing him in dreams after his death.

Once I fell asleep and dreamt I could talk to him. In life, we could not speak directly as his English comprehension was not complete and my Cantonese comprehension is laughable; but to my knowledge, we were able to speak freely with complete understanding. An exchange could happen:

Me: Dad!
Dad: How have you been?
Me: Pas pire. You?
Dad: It's good. Nothing to complain about.
Me: ...
[Awkward silence.]
Me: So... did you hear about that Hockey Night in Canada theme controversy?
Dad: I heard. >:(

Wedding Planning - Part 1 of a gazillion

Date:Saturday, 15 August 2009
Place:Montreal

Completed checklist

• Reception: Kam Fung, full 10 courses of awesome

That's it.

To do

• Everything else

Possible Venue Locations for the Ceremony

• Holiday Inn Select - downtown Montreal, has a lot of rooms for meetings and closest to Kam Fung


• McGill University - some bookable rooms like the swank Faculty Club and Thompson Hall, but I'm sure we're all looking forward to a meaningful ceremony in the deep dungeons of the Burnside Basement, eh? BONUS: Alumni rates?


• Parc Mont-Royal - the Smith House has a room that is rentable with up to 120 people


• Montreal Museum of Fine Arts - as far as I know from the web site, the only room that is available at possible times is the members' lounge at the Jean-Noël Desmarais Pavilion


• Jardin Botanique de Montreal - expensive as #@$!

Who Gets to Marry Us?

• A judge


• Clerks and Deputy Clerks


• A mayor


• Certain councillors


• Certain notaries


• Absolutely anyone else you want (as long as they're old enough and not in jail)

MMOArrPG

My Portrait

On Health, Transit, and Sustenance

Since returning from Montreal for Chinese New Year at the end of January, I eventually had another day of supply teaching. Then the next day I developed the flu. And boy was that terrible. I suspect that one of the kids (or all of them, who knows where their grubby hands might have been) had been working on making their teacher sick, and seeing that their regular teacher was not present decided that this was the next best thing.

What made it worse was that in the next morning I had to shovel the nicely packed layers (more than 2) of snow that accumulated on our parking lot, way beyond the level that the contractor had said he'd remove, and the two feet of snow that the street plow generously piled just at the end of the driveway. This was the same morning I was supposed to get to the school again to supply teach that day, and I received an angry call that morning that confirmed my suspicion that I would probably never supply teach there again. And then I got sick.

I did contemplate just driving over the snow (as I have done with the Rav4 going to the Waterloo school), but after removing enough to inch the car through the passage I realized it would have resulted in yet another trip to the garage, and a separate trip to the hospital.

Anyway, I spent two weeks with a fever, then a cough and congestion, and now just a cough. On the positive side, I did have scheduled an interview at another school, when that school (the one with the interview) called the day before and asked me to work at the same time. (They suggested working around the interview so I agreed.) It turns out that the principal was sick, so I was briefed by the vp instead, during the one break in the day that I had. I also managed to expose six different groups of kids with the flu virus, so the cycle of revenge is complete.

***

The Ottawa transit strike is over, so Donnah is now back in her rented room and not stewing in the flu germs in our house. However, it turns out that the city of Ottawa did not "save" $3 million a week that the buses ran on, but lost money from offering free rides to entice people to trust the bus company again. Many people predict that because the bus strike allowed many commuters to make rideshare opportunities (and people met their neighbours who work in the same buildings), the bus company may lose lots of permanent riderships and have to cut back on expenses like, say, the bus drivers. (Oh, but weren't they striking to get better working conditions? Not if there's no business and money for it, buttheads.)

As a follow-up to the previous post, the NCC is now proposing an even bigger waste of money for the interprovincial bridge. Besides the one proposal that their own contractor told them would be the best choice, they are spending an additional 5 million dollars and even longer to make assessments. Ultimately, they will still choose Kettle Island because it will still be the cheapest and least environmentally impacting choice, and then everyone living in the affected region will poop their pants in agony while everyone else will poop their pants from the stupidity.

***

Horse meat burritos, and an overly-buttery, flour-less chocolate cake. Happy Valentine's Day!

Welcome, Transit New Year

Admittedly, the new year has been so for nearly two weeks, but I digress.

Media has already discussed the turn of the new year to be one that is full of hope (Obamarama) but at the same time full of crap (bomb-ba-bomb-bombs). Jason Jones as Baby New Year puts it best: "The Gaza thing - it's like being born with herpes!" (Not that I think babies born with herpes is funny...)

So here's the Ottawa hopeful new year news, besides the ending of the month+ long bus strike: Kettle Island Bridge.

Here's the Ottawa crapful new year news: Kettle Island Bridge.

You're asking, "What's this non-existent bridge, and why would I care about it?" Well, if you never intend to visit Ottawa, then you wouldn't - so you can just turn off your computer and bask in your city's lack of any transit problems. You have no transit problems? Wow.

***

As far as I know, Ottawa's downtown has always been a complicated stew of pedestrians, cars, and 18-wheelers playing Who Wants to Be A Pancake? (Hint - pedestrians win that one more than 18-wheelers.) This insanity is probably due to a huge bureaucratic mess called Everybody's Fault But My Own.

In any sane city, one would want to make a highway system to have heavy trucks bypass busy pedestrian areas, allow express buses to speedily transport workers from the quiet suburbia to downtown cores, and promote public transit and carpooling by reserving lanes on the road.

But of course, Ottawa has no sane people in it (see: bus strike, prorogue, 2008). So Ottawa is left with a downtown full of trucks and buses wrestling for room in an already congested pancake-filled Rideau/Montreal/King Edward/Elgin/Laurier/Everywhere Else.

Unfortunately, none of these things could be fixed in Ottawa because everyone from the borough councillors to the federal government have to be involved in the decision processes.

The current addressable issue is that the highway to Ottawa ends slightly outside of the core, and the rest of the roads to cross over to Gatineau run through downtown. Quebec and Ontario once had an agreement to build a highway on their respective sides that would be joined by a bridge, so people could go straight across, bypassing the mess. Quebec built their side (Aut-50), and the bridge was built. Guess who didn't build their side?

There are only a few bridges between Gatineau and Ottawa, and they all lead downtown. So the Kettle Island Bridge was proposed (cheapest, most convenient, fricking closer to home), and a whole lot of people were happy (especially this blogger), and probably ready to set it up.

Of course, people would be inconvenienced from having a few acres of land repatriated, some increase of traffic and noise to affected areas, blah blah blah. "Build it in another area - not in my backyard!1!!one!" Then a different set of people would protest with the same complaints.

Fight fight fight!

Anyway, the point is that most levels of government decided on this site after many, many, many years of studies, but some people at the local level don't want it there. However, if all the levels of government can't agree, then the plan will be scrapped and everyone will probably have to start all over again with another site. By the time another plan can be developed, more pancakes would line the streets of downtown Ottawa.

Murry Xmus

In short, my camera is not working so there's no pictures this year. :(

However, despite certain people's disdain (you know who you are) of artificial trees, our plastic tree still has many memories that you can never get from buying a farmed tree, dressing it up like a tart, and then chucking it out or burning it at the end of the season.

This year my mum didn't want to put it up because she said she'd be the one putting it away and it was just a chore for her. However, my siblings pointed out that she never did the putting up nor putting away anyway (except one year I think). In addition, she also went the environmentally conscious way and kept all the presents she bought in giant plastic bags to place next to the LED tree she made on the window. It looked ugly, so I surprised her by making the stupid tree on the 24th while everyone was out. Too bad I can't show you how awesome it is this year, Mario and Luigi and Kirby and all...

We just hot-potted ourselves to oblivion last night and this afternoon. This evening apparently there will be both turkey and roast beef. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a second stomach.

Sum'n thut t'wus unuswully guud t'mungl th'unglsh wuth u's. Nut tu fuur frum sum unglsh ut thur.

Daily Show mentions

After a week of waiting for some comedic commentary from our favourite show, POLITICKS finally appears on the Daily Show. :)