Not sure where this is leading, so beware.

I am back. I am NOT Sam, though. I cannot, therefore, be Sam I am. I hope that I was clear on that one.





Ahhhh, a little, silly banter to begin this autumnal post. It is the first day of autumn. Of course, up in these parts, I could mention the fact that we did not have a summer and summer was rather spring/early autumn-like in terms of temperature and rainfall. We have been bone dry, but for yesterday and today, since late August, though. Apparently, we had our summer in early September.....with shortening days, so not as much sunlight, go figure.





The Lad is up at Camp White Pine with all of his middle school. It does now seem to be an awfully large facility for only grade 7 and 8. I recall middle school or junior high had grades 7 to 9, so there was a full extra grade and in my day it was a large cohort. Us grade 7s and the grade 8s had four classes of students each. The grade 9s had 5 and that was coming off 5 or 6 from the previous grade 9s. I could see the cohorts shrinking as the grade 7s when I was in grade 9 was down to 3 classes.





There are 4 or 5 grade seven classes for the Lad. He is also from a large cohort. That was apparent at his elementary school. The student number bulged for his year from kindergarten all through elementary school. He is in extended French, so there are 2 classes of 20 kids. His friends in the regular program have close to 40 kids in their class.

Enough about that shit. What is going on the larger world? Well, apparently, the world is supposed to come to an end on December 21, 2012. In some ways, I would like to plan on that. You can live really well for the next two and half or so years, then we are gone, so what is the point in leaving anything behind. Then again, I would hate to rely on an ancient civilization's notion of large change and then find out they were wrong, and I would have to start all over with nothing. I mean, if the Mayan's were so damn smart, where the fuck are they now? They ended up "extinct" before their calendar ended.

They, the Mayans, were also silent as to how things ended or changed. It could be a positive, spiritual rebirth or something rather apocalyptical and negative. Nobody can seem to find an ancient Mayan to explain it or how they "know". Was it aliens? Did somebody go back in time, Marty McFly or Professor Frink perhaps, and screw around with the space-time continuum and warn the Mayans (before being hurled into a volcano as a human sacrifice--better than boiling and eating missionaries, though). Sorry, that was really a value judgement, perhaps boiled missionary and missionary soup is quite tasty, if not a rather bland way of doing things, then again, the ending is the same.

I am not so sure what that last thought was all about, but that is for future generations to interpret, of course, that ain't going to occur after December 21, 2012. Man, that could be one cold winter!

Think about it. Ciao!

The end of a year

I am back. Let this final post of....whatever the year is on the Hebrew calendar be done in Italics. It is classing this shit up. How y'all doing out there in reader land? I am peachy keen.

I could go into the deaths of Patrick Swayze or Henry Gibson, but will not. Enjoyed their work, sometimes, they are dead. Pretty much end of story.

Jimmy Carter is coming off like a jerk. He was a shitty, weak president. He seemed to be able to garner greater respect as an ex-president and then he opens his mouth again. I am sure there may be many in the US that does not like the notion of a black president (fuck 'em, so what) and I still think that Joe Wilson's "You lie!" outburst, though rather childish, was not racially motivated. It was motivated by politics and disagreement for disagreements sake. There really is little actual debate going on there, or here for that matter, about health care.

I do like many Republicans citing Canada's health care problems as a reason to avoid a government pay/administered health care system. Let us look at those who use Canada as an example of poor health care. Let's look at the facts in the US, more money is spent per capita on health care, 40 million Americans are uninsured and have little to no access to medical care, and the mortality rate in the US is higher than in Canada.

Where is the bang for the buck there? How is it superior to Canada? Yes, innovation is greater there. Is there greater efficacy in the new, innovative treatments? Only time will bear that out, but given the mortality rate, which could be skewed by the untimely deaths of the uninsured. So the statements and assertions of Republican congressmen are somewhat assinine.

I won't get into their ignorance of all things that are not American, hell their ignorance of all this American, too. Sound bites are great but uninformative. Partisanship is great but does not help the debate and construction of where America wants to go and be in the future. It is much ado about nothing. A show of partisanship that tries to maintain a status quo that cannot be contained. You cannot stop change.

That is not to say that I am all for the Democrats solution. It is that they have put forth a proposal, at least, that challenges the status quo. Where are the Republicans on that one?

Further, the Democrats are not innocent in this game of misinformation. The Republicans are trying to play on the fears of Americans (Death squads, get fucking real!!) and Democrats have not been honest either as they underplay the costs, cost savings and their love of bloated administrative costs. Where it lands, I do not know.

Well, Shana Tova to those celebrating Rosh Hashanah and a great weekend to one and all. Ciao!

Another world's oldest person dies

I am back. It has happened again. The world's oldest person has died. Again, I would say that getting that "title" is really an imminent death sentence. So the prophecy comes true again. All I know is that, and my genes tell me that it really is not an issue, if that title passes anywhere near me, I will turn it down. I am figuring that is the way to cheat death. Or getting that title is somebody's way of saying `You`re next`.

Now, I have to say fucking Toshiba keyboard is causing me some grief here. I fucking hate this computer and Vista. I am thinking that my next computer will have to be another HP. Apple and Macs are too cool for me.

With that said, going to run. Have a great weekend, one and all! Ciao!

Back to School with no Rodney Dangerfield

I am back. It is the day after Labour Day up here in Canada. It can only mean one thing, back to school. The Lad started middle school today. Back in the day, it was called junior high school and consisted of grades 7, 8 & 9. Of course, we had a grade 13 back then. Today, there is no grade 13 or OACs, so high school goes up to grade 12 and begins at grade 9. There is no junior high, just middle school which is just grades 7 & 8.

Anyway, I can only look back to when I started junior high back in 1976. Like the Lad, I was in the same school and class as most of my elementary school friends. It provided a level of comfort as I became friends with the people who had gone to the other area public school. The funny thing is that among my friends from high school, most became my friends in junior high. In fact, I only really speak to one person from elementary school. Two, perhaps, but one was a friend from nursery school and we were never in any classes in elementary school. In fact, we only really reconnected as friends in grade 9, in you guessed it, junior high.

I get to relive, through the Lad, those awkward pre-puberty into puberty years, that lead into the gawky teen years. I saw one of the Lad's friend's older brother recently. The kid is 14 or 15 and is in complete teen-geek mode. He has the cheek acne (I hope that the Lad can avoid that but there is no guarantee given my skin, my brother's, my father's and the Wife's), the long, gawky limbs and the mono-syllabic grunt responses as a Neanderthal (without the full on body hair, at least that I witnessed). Then again, this particular teen, was a geeky, very bright, obnoxious pre-teen, so some of the geeky teen traits are not necessarily a teen thing but go much deeper in terms of socialization and empathy.

I know I was obnoxious and the Lad is especially so. He fucking thinks he knows it all, yet when quizzed cannot come up with the answers. That is where I have him beat, I have been there and I feel what he feels. I can also question him and will press for him to answer the questions. It usually forces him to hear how inane his questions or positions can be. When he is correct, I will be the first to admit it and let him go. It is all about taking responsibility for his thoughts and actions. He does that and I have no issues. He makes a mess and expects somebody else to clean it up, we have a problem.

Well, that is all for today. We have finally had a run of great, sunny, dry weather. Where the fuck was this in July? Oh well, what can I do? Shit all. Ciao!