Ouellette Avenue overpass... AGAIN!

I took this picture, with my phone, driving home from work yesterday. Yep, they're working on the Jackson Park/ Ouellette Avenue overpass; AGAIN! ON what part? The expansion joints; AGAIN! (You know, those connector thingys between the sections, not all that important I'm sure!) I'm thinking that if they have to do this every single year, sometimes more than once a year there may be a bigger job coming. It'll be ugly if they have to close it down. It's one of the two main incoming roads from the 401!

You can click here for last May's post on this piece of Windsor roadway.

Spring has sprung!

Birds do it... bees do it... even educated fleas do it.




I love the part at the end when she sees looks at the window and sees me taping them!
Sorry it's not a closer shot.

McGuinty conducting business as usual?

These are not normal times. I live in a city that is gasping for breath, struggling to keep pumping and in reality, they're lining up in the US and Mexico for all the left over usable parts!

My city is Windsor, Ontario. A one trick pony, auto industry and all it's associated offshoots. My city is in the Province of Ontario, lead by a man, I once considered reasonably intelligent, Dalton McGuinty.

Here's the last couple of genius ideas that have seeped out of The Palace in Toronto. Lets start with the right hand of our conductor. Before you can sell you home in this province you have to have an energy audit... oh and it'll cost about $300.00.

Vladan Veljovic is president of Greensaver, one of Ontario's oldest energy auditing firms. "Home inspectors currently do between 25,000 and 30,000 energy audits a year across Ontario, Veljovic says. Under the new rules, that could to increase to about 200,000, with a corresponding jump in demand for inspectors." (thestar.com) 200,000 times $300.00, that's $60,000,000.00. (That's 60 million for those of you large number impaired, though there are far less of us now than there were prior to the numbers floating around since September 2008's financial meltdown.) Now they will need to " hire" or "certify new inspectors but there's not any detailed legislation covering the job description, so maybe those guys who keep knocking at my door trying to convince me that they are from my local power company while trying to get hold of my actual bill can get real jobs!

Certification requires taking a five-day course, according to Natural Resources Canada, followed by an exam and the supervised inspection of seven houses. The entire process takes about two months, depending on how quickly the home inspections can be scheduled.
http://oee.nrcan-rncan.gc.ca/residential/business/participants-networks/r-2000/plan-evaluators.cfm?attr=12

Now for the left hand... Harmonized sales tax. Wow, what a great idea! Apparently business will find the paper work easier. One report, maybe 4 times a year instead of GST 4 times a year and PST anywhere from monthly to once or twice a year, depending on the nature of your business. (Never mind that computer accounting software does it for you, that's non elemental to this discussion apparently.) Well bully for business! You who's trying to feed and clothe your kids. Now you can pay one convenient 13% tax on everything! Yep even the stuff that was PST exempt. Lucky you. Hey maybe it'll be as spectacular as the Quebec and PEI systems where they charge the PST on the GST in their great tax of harmony!
Can't see our conductor passing up that opportunity.

Mr. McGuinty, with all respect I cannot help but ask, have you lost your mind? Is this the time to saddle us with extra payments? Maybe you need to come on down to Windsor, lose a few filling driving over our rutted roads, oh, avoid Howard where the inside lane is often blocked by out of work factory folks staging a blockade to get what's rightfully theirs while Chrysler tries to get it's machinery out and ship it to the US! Oh, avoid the area around the Downtown Mission that's seeing a rise in numbers as the line up might delay your progress. Don't try to go down College because the bridge at Wellington is closed and well, our fight with the Feds over border crossings is holding it hostage no matter that those of us who live near or go to the University it find it a daily hardship. (I plan on doing something about this in the near future!)

All in all, I'm furious and frustrated. Why at this time would anyone, never mind one of the people we actually trusted to look out for our best interests, even consider such untimely and obviously ivory tower ideas. Come back to the real work Sir and open your eyes. I failed to mention previously we have two, yep two, Provincial Cabinet Ministers from our beleaguered town, haven't heard a peep out of either one of them about these issues?

Happy me day!

'Tis the annual honouring of St. Patty day and well, being a Patty/Patti/Pat... I claim all the benefits. My family on my Dad's side does live in Belfast; my name, in it's older form would have been Patty O'Toole and you can't get any more Irish than that! So, I'm waiting for all my presents! hint, hint... :)

Beannachtam na Feile Padraig!

Coincidences, Karma and 6 degrees of separation!

So a bit of background. My name is Pat, and my favourite radio station is CBC Radio, AM, (as I have blogged so many times previously.) I grew up in London, Ontario, I live in Windsor. My daughter's name is Michelle. Michelle is in her last year of Honours Biology, environmental sustainability, at the University of Windsor. She works part time as a Pharmacy Technician at a Shopper's Drug Mart... so...

As I blogged last weekend I left for Ottawa on business. I took the train there. From Windsor to London, I sat alone. At London a gentleman was my seat mate. He introduced himself. His name was Peter Leo, a senior producer at CBC Radio in Toronto! Now... that's not all. He grew up in London. He then mentioned the "Inter-City Student's Council of which he was a member." Well, it was one year and I was the rep for my high school! We met monthly at the Board offices on Elmwood. Peter and I had to be there, at the same time, for these meetings! We talked all the way to Toronto and are now facebook friends.

From Toronto to Ottawa was a woman, just a bit younger than me. Her name? Michelle! Her job? She works for an Global Company specializing in Environmental assessments and reporting! Her daughter's part time job? Shopper's Drug Mart, Pharmacy Technician. Michelle, (my daughter, not my seat mate,) was on her way to London to interview for Grad School at Western for her Masters in a program that Michelle, my seat mate, was very interested in! (Oh, by the way, Mich was accepted into the Grad program and accepted in return!)*EDIT* I forgot to mention that the woman's niece is a pyrotechnician! Being a Federally licensed pyrotechnician and Fireworks Supervisor myself it's strange to run into someone who knows someone who's licensed for this, along with all the other intersections in our lives it was even weirder!*

There are far too many coincidences for it to be mere coincidence! It seems my train rides were "engineered" by Karma!

Off to Ottawa... again... in the winter... again!

The last time was in November for crying out loud! Too bad it wasn't a couple of weeks ago when President Obama was there. This week the weather is somewhat better but really, I want Ottawa in the spring. Though since we are all fireworks folks, we really are too busy to travel to meetings other than off season.

What you can buy today...

(photo AP)

Using companies that were in the forefront of the news this week...

As of close of markets Friday you could buy one share of each of: AIG, Ford, GM, Citi Group and GE for a grand total of $13.04 (USD)! Prior to the global melt down, using their 52 week highs it would have cost you $148.40! (That's less than 10% of the previous total worth!) I'm just saying... wow! There are deals to be had if you're brave and have some extra coinage, and I mean coinage.

65 years after dying in the service of our country, questions are answered.

This is how the story starts, well, my part in it. In 1993 while visiting the Reichswald Forest War Cemetery in Germany I took this picture. When I got them developed and saw it, I wondered why I took it?



















In 1997 I decided to try to find his family. It wasn't so easy back then I did not get my first computer until 1998 and not very many people were even on the net then. So I wrote a column for the Star, I was writing about 1 a month back then.












After finding out E.K. Wilson was from Oshawa, I contacted the Oshawa paper who did this story. I then got a phone call telling me his Great Nephew wanted to talk to me! I sent him the photo of his Uncle's grave.















Shane, the Nephew sent me these copies of the newspaper articles from the time and a lovely letter. They had no idea where he was buried and had never seen his grave.














A few months ago, I blogged, in brief, this story. I tagged the post with E.K. Wilson's name. Enter the story, Susan Campbell. She left me a comment asking me to contact her. She and her partner, Joan Baron, (her father Walter Henry Powell was at No. 3 Bombing and Gunnery School with Susan's father in law, Cameron Clare Campbell and Dr. James McPhee;) were building a web site and she gave me the link. Kenneth Wilson was a handsome young man as you can see by this photo from the site. He has such kind eyes. It brings a lump to my throat to look at this picture.











On the site is this picture of the graves in Reichwald Cemetery. I did not realize that on either side of Ken's grave were the rest of the crew who did not survive that night in 1944.

http://www.thewhpfamily.com/mcphee/page1.html

*EDIT* the link is fixed, please take a look!

This is the link to Dr. McPhee's story and the website created by Joan Baron. The amazing story of Dr. Jim McPhee who survived, was taken prisoner and made it home at the war's end. The site is a wonderful tribute to these men and will stand as a remarkable testament to their service and sacrifices. It also gives Shane, the Great-Nephew, the opportunity to talk to survivors who knew and served with his Uncle.











Shane, Ken's Great-Nephew, proudly keeps his memory alive.








When I try to tell people this story and how amazing it is, all of us, finding each other, I cannot help but have to fight off tears. I am proud to be a small part of this story. Just the story of Kenneth Wilson alone is enough to make me cry but the whole thing, well, I'm tearing up now!

Apparently, there's no way to go but ... down!

(a collage of a few of the recent financial healines.)

The markets tanked again today. Globally. AIG is said poised to report a $60 BILLION dollar loss. So... well I don't really know what to say? Oil, in the $30's per barrel, gold; down a tad. Financials... don't even ask.

I never blogged about this back when it happened but I will now. On September 30th, 2008, I was invited to participate in a conference call with AIG executives including, Rob Schimek, John Doyle, Kristian P. Moor, Mark Willis and John Q. Doyle from the USA. I don't know how many others were on the call with me, but I do know I was the only Canadian. (I was also the only one not from a bank, huge company or Insurance brokerage.) It was very interesting, it was like being a part of history and I left that call feeling positive about AIG. I'm sure that call is on-line somewhere if you take the time to look. I'm not terribly worried about the insurance side of AIG though they could get pulled down with the financial side. Their assets though, are protected and it is very unusual for an Insurance Company to go bankrupt.

AIG aside though, what this entire melt down is doing to people's life savings, their pensions and their hopes and dreams is criminal. The problem... it was actually our own greed that brought us here.

When I see the commercials that "financial firms" are running now, the ones about..."hey we have a new product that guarantees your initial investment, come talk to us," I want to reach through the tv screen and choke them! Funny how they've changed their whole propaganda now isn't it?

The internet... a wonderful thing!

You can be just surfing the web... clicking through photos and videos of friends, of friends of friends of friends... on Facebook, (after all, all it takes is your friend to comment on a pic/video of one of their friend's pic/videos and you can see them,) and voila... it's someone you know, out on a Saturday night!

I love the interweb!

Heroes - Battle of the Atlantic

I also found this autographed picture in my Mother-in-law's papers. I cannot make out the signatures properly which is a shame! The sailor on the left signed "Black __ Jack" I think it may be an Mc? The other is Rufus Playfair maybe? The stamp on the back of the picture is K-491 which turns out to be HMCS Orangeville. (Previously HMRS Hedingham Castle (I). I assume that means these sailors served on the Orangeville If anyone reading this knows, please leave a comment or email me.

Colin Cahill; The Titanic and the Halifax Explosion

This is my husband's Great Uncle on his Maternal Grandmother's side. I found this clipping in some papers of my Mother-in-law. What an interesting story I thought it was and I think you will too. If you click on the picture and the article you can read them easily so I shan't needlessly repeat his story here.

Beaver in the Detroit River... first in 75 - 100 years!

(Detroit Free Press)

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009902160355

Click the direct link above so you can watch the video of the cute critter and read the whole story! Google Detroit Free Press, search "beaver" and you'll find it! (Unless you're using Chrome as a browser... not supported!)

Well our river is cleaner and this proves it. It is actually very, very exciting in ecological terms! Next who knows? The Ivory Billed Woodpecker? The Carolina Parakeet?
Yes, there used to be a "parrot/parakeet" native to our area! Who knew? I didn't until Mich told me.

All in all, the bad environmental news till outweighs the good, but the good is still great!

(here's a wiki link to extinct birds http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_extinct_birds

Ladybug in February... in my house.

Apparently, after Googling this, it is not uncommon. Who knew? Mich said it looked dusty, I didn't notice. My house, has a big, light coloured, Western exposure wall, that in summer attracts bugs as it is very warm. I guess, when it got cold, they found nooks and crannies in which to hibernate. Sometimes, they wake up and find a way inside. (Explaining the dusty appearance from living in the walls!) They do no harm. Folk lore says: "If you find a ladybug in your house in the winter you will have good luck and fortune will come you way."

Well, today I bought 3 lottery tickets, in 2 different countries! (Maybe I should have googled BEFORE I flushed the poor thing down the toilet?)

I could have put it in a container, in the fridge and released it in the spring once the weather is such that milk outside would neither spoil nor freeze.

So, now that I've posted this, and you've read it, remember, don't flush your lucky ladybug down the toilet the day you buy lottery tickets! :)

Valentine's Eve, and my full and happy life!

I was thinking today that were I to buy a rose for everyone in my life, whom I love and who loves me... I'd be broke!

I truly am blessed with a loving family, dear, close friends and work mates. I don't know what I've done to deserve these blessings but I am very grateful for them!

For all of you in my life, thank you. I hope I give even just a portion of what I receive! xo

Darwin Day; Happy 200 Charlie!

Darwin showed that by paying attention to nature, we can learn where we came from and how we got here.

Now, we must pay attention to nature to see where we will end up.

At the moment, it's not looking terribly positive.

Australia in flames.

I know there are thousands of pictures on the web of the horrific fires in Australia, these four, however, particularly effected me.

Welcome visitor # 14,999!

Actually, I'm over 15,000 now but this visitor, being from Wales, is just a tad more interesting than my darling daughter Michelle being visitor #15,000 from second story of my own house! NOT that Mich isn't important of course! (Even though I specifically told her NOT to go into the blog this morning as I didn't want visitor #15,000 to be her!) :)

Today's News!

From 60 year old women, going to India for in vitro, giving birth to twins... currently in a hospital in Calgary, for which the tax payers are shelling out; and likely to end up in someone else's care in the not so distant future; to a huge Child pornography ring bust in Ontario... in which there are three persons arrested, too young to name, protected under the Young Offenders Act. Does anyone else see the pitiful irony of that? Protected under the Young Offenders Act?

I sometimes truly just despair.