What's a Canadian doing in North Carolina?
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Sad
I'm sure by now everyone has heard the news that Heath Ledger was found dead in his Manhattan apartment, of an apparent accidental prescription drugs overdose, on Tuesday this week.
I've been trying to process this information in my head all week. I quite liked Heath Ledger and his movies, what I've seen. He was an incredibly talented actor, with so much more potential to be unleashed. Now we'll never know what he would have done with the rest of his life. Dead at such a young age of 28. Way too early.
His death makes me remember other talents taken from us too young, like River Phoenix, and Kurt Cobain. Both incredibly talented, and unfortunately very messed up young men.
Heath doesn't seem to fit the mould of drug overdose victim.
Heath was different. Apparently not a drugged out spoiled celebrity, but just a bloke having a difficult time trying to sleep on a regular basis. The role of The Joker wreaked havoc with his psyche and he hasn't slept well for quite some time. I can totally understand the desperate need to get some sleep, and the possibility of overdose is immense. If you take one, and it doesn't work, so you take another, and still it doesn't work so you take something else, and then you can't remember how many you've taken. When you finally fall asleep, it may be for the last time. Did he know it was happening? Or did he just fall asleep and that was it?
Reports are confilicting. I've read both that he was found ON his bed, and that he was found on the floor at the foot of his bed. His housekeeper said he was in bed and snoring at about 1pm. When his masseuse arrived at 2:45 they were unable to wake him. So sometime between 1 and 2:45 he died.
I feel very bad for his family, including his ex-fiancee Michelle Williams, and their daughter Matilda. They were in Europe when he died, and they had to fly back to New York for his funeral. Poor Matilda is only 2 years old. Her daddy is dead. Heath's parents and sister live in Perth, Australia and had to make that long trip to New York to get his body. I think he's being buried in Australia...I just can't imagine that trip.
Some people are probably sitting and thinking why the hell would anyone mourn for someone they have never even met? I've certainly never met Heath, but I've enjoyed his movies, and I will miss his talent. He'll be forever 28, just as James Dean will forever be 25, and River Phoenix will forever be 23. The world is a bleaker place without them brightening our movie and TV screens in my opinion. The last completed movie we'll see of Heath Ledger's is The Dark Knight, in which he plays the Joker. It'll be difficult to watch, I'm sure.
I've only got a couple of his movies that I own on DVD. A Knight's Tale, and The Brothers Grimm. I've seen a few others as well though, Brokeback Mountain, Ned Kelly, The Four Feathers, The Order, 10 Things I Hate About You. Maybe I'll go rent a couple today. I haven't seen Candy or Cassanova yet.
Sleep well Heathcliff Anderw Ledger. Speedy journey to the other side.
¶ 10:04 AM 3 Comments
I've been trying to process this information in my head all week. I quite liked Heath Ledger and his movies, what I've seen. He was an incredibly talented actor, with so much more potential to be unleashed. Now we'll never know what he would have done with the rest of his life. Dead at such a young age of 28. Way too early.
His death makes me remember other talents taken from us too young, like River Phoenix, and Kurt Cobain. Both incredibly talented, and unfortunately very messed up young men.
Heath doesn't seem to fit the mould of drug overdose victim.
Heath was different. Apparently not a drugged out spoiled celebrity, but just a bloke having a difficult time trying to sleep on a regular basis. The role of The Joker wreaked havoc with his psyche and he hasn't slept well for quite some time. I can totally understand the desperate need to get some sleep, and the possibility of overdose is immense. If you take one, and it doesn't work, so you take another, and still it doesn't work so you take something else, and then you can't remember how many you've taken. When you finally fall asleep, it may be for the last time. Did he know it was happening? Or did he just fall asleep and that was it?
Reports are confilicting. I've read both that he was found ON his bed, and that he was found on the floor at the foot of his bed. His housekeeper said he was in bed and snoring at about 1pm. When his masseuse arrived at 2:45 they were unable to wake him. So sometime between 1 and 2:45 he died.
I feel very bad for his family, including his ex-fiancee Michelle Williams, and their daughter Matilda. They were in Europe when he died, and they had to fly back to New York for his funeral. Poor Matilda is only 2 years old. Her daddy is dead. Heath's parents and sister live in Perth, Australia and had to make that long trip to New York to get his body. I think he's being buried in Australia...I just can't imagine that trip.
Some people are probably sitting and thinking why the hell would anyone mourn for someone they have never even met? I've certainly never met Heath, but I've enjoyed his movies, and I will miss his talent. He'll be forever 28, just as James Dean will forever be 25, and River Phoenix will forever be 23. The world is a bleaker place without them brightening our movie and TV screens in my opinion. The last completed movie we'll see of Heath Ledger's is The Dark Knight, in which he plays the Joker. It'll be difficult to watch, I'm sure.
I've only got a couple of his movies that I own on DVD. A Knight's Tale, and The Brothers Grimm. I've seen a few others as well though, Brokeback Mountain, Ned Kelly, The Four Feathers, The Order, 10 Things I Hate About You. Maybe I'll go rent a couple today. I haven't seen Candy or Cassanova yet.
Sleep well Heathcliff Anderw Ledger. Speedy journey to the other side.
¶ 10:04 AM 3 Comments
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Do Polar Bears Get Lonely?
It was a couple of months (or more) ago that my Mum sent me this email with these photos of a polar bear playing with sled dogs up in Churchill Manitoba. Since then, I’ve been using the photos as desktop pictures on my PC at work, alternating them every other week or so. The other day I was experiencing some down time (read: I was bored) so I made a screen saver and power point slide show with them.
The more I look at them, the more I have to wonder, what was this bear thinking? I’m actually more curious about the bear’s state of mind than the dogs’. I have dogs, I kinda know how their brains work. If they feel threatened, as these dogs no doubt did at first glance, then they’ll bark and growl and do whatever necessary to scare off a threat.
Once a dog realizes someone/thing is not a threat, then they’re curious and always happy to make friends. Whether person, squirrel or bear I suppose.
This bear appeared every day for a week to come play with these dogs. The owner of the dogs of course first thought that his team was about to be eaten by a hungry bear, and why he’d take out his camera to photograph the carnage is beyond me. He lucked out though, and got likely the only photos ever taken, ever to be taken, of a polar bear making friends with a dog.
Despite the plight of polar bears in recent years of early ice melt and food sources becoming scarce, this one appears to have been well fed. If she had been hungry I have no doubt she’d have eaten the dogs. Why then did she decide to come and play? Why did she return every day for a week? And what happened to her after that? Where’d she go?
Was she orphaned and lonely? She doesn’t seem full grown, she’s sort of small. Did her mother die, or send her off on her own too early? Did she move on somewhere else with more opportunity, more food, a mate, or maybe other dogs to play with? Did she die hungry and alone? The fate of too many polar bears unfortunately.
Why does it eat at my mind, wondering what happened? Why does it matter? It’s a bear, playing with a dog. Hugging a dog it seems even. And the dog reciprocates willingly, even stretching up to sniff the bear’s muzzle, as dogs do with other dogs, as if to say “hey, you’ve got a bit of seal meat stuck in your teeth there…”
When the bear did not return one day, did the dogs wonder where she was? Did they sit and wait for her? Did they pine for their lost friend?
Bears are special to me, my totem, my spirit animal. I have a rather large collection of stuffed bears, of every shape, size and colour. Quite a lot of them are polar bear like. My sister and brother-in-law even “adopted” a polar bear for me from the WWF as a gift a few years ago. One of my most treasured gifts ever. They also gave me a stuffed polar bear to go with it, which after we saw the movie The Golden Compass, I’ve been thinking about making him some armour and changing his name to Gandalf.
The other evening we were watching a programme on TV about global climate change, and the presenter was up in the Arctic with a research team when they tranquilized a polar bear. The team knelt on the ground next to the bear, which was paralyzed from the tranquilizer, but still conscious. His eyes darted back and forth, tongue flicking out now and again, drool collecting on his chin. I envied the presenter the opportunity to be that close; to be able to touch the bear; feel the warmth and rare vulnerability, smell it, tangle his fingers in its fur. I envisioned myself in that situation, would I have rubbed the bear’s tummy, like I do with my dogs? Would I have hugged it, lied down with it, talked to it? I have no doubt I would have. I also have no doubt that I’d have cried at the beauty of it.
As I cry at the wonder of this young bear who decided to make friends with a sled dog.
¶ 6:46 PM 0 Comments
The more I look at them, the more I have to wonder, what was this bear thinking? I’m actually more curious about the bear’s state of mind than the dogs’. I have dogs, I kinda know how their brains work. If they feel threatened, as these dogs no doubt did at first glance, then they’ll bark and growl and do whatever necessary to scare off a threat.
Once a dog realizes someone/thing is not a threat, then they’re curious and always happy to make friends. Whether person, squirrel or bear I suppose.
This bear appeared every day for a week to come play with these dogs. The owner of the dogs of course first thought that his team was about to be eaten by a hungry bear, and why he’d take out his camera to photograph the carnage is beyond me. He lucked out though, and got likely the only photos ever taken, ever to be taken, of a polar bear making friends with a dog.
Despite the plight of polar bears in recent years of early ice melt and food sources becoming scarce, this one appears to have been well fed. If she had been hungry I have no doubt she’d have eaten the dogs. Why then did she decide to come and play? Why did she return every day for a week? And what happened to her after that? Where’d she go?
Was she orphaned and lonely? She doesn’t seem full grown, she’s sort of small. Did her mother die, or send her off on her own too early? Did she move on somewhere else with more opportunity, more food, a mate, or maybe other dogs to play with? Did she die hungry and alone? The fate of too many polar bears unfortunately.
Why does it eat at my mind, wondering what happened? Why does it matter? It’s a bear, playing with a dog. Hugging a dog it seems even. And the dog reciprocates willingly, even stretching up to sniff the bear’s muzzle, as dogs do with other dogs, as if to say “hey, you’ve got a bit of seal meat stuck in your teeth there…”
When the bear did not return one day, did the dogs wonder where she was? Did they sit and wait for her? Did they pine for their lost friend?
Bears are special to me, my totem, my spirit animal. I have a rather large collection of stuffed bears, of every shape, size and colour. Quite a lot of them are polar bear like. My sister and brother-in-law even “adopted” a polar bear for me from the WWF as a gift a few years ago. One of my most treasured gifts ever. They also gave me a stuffed polar bear to go with it, which after we saw the movie The Golden Compass, I’ve been thinking about making him some armour and changing his name to Gandalf.
The other evening we were watching a programme on TV about global climate change, and the presenter was up in the Arctic with a research team when they tranquilized a polar bear. The team knelt on the ground next to the bear, which was paralyzed from the tranquilizer, but still conscious. His eyes darted back and forth, tongue flicking out now and again, drool collecting on his chin. I envied the presenter the opportunity to be that close; to be able to touch the bear; feel the warmth and rare vulnerability, smell it, tangle his fingers in its fur. I envisioned myself in that situation, would I have rubbed the bear’s tummy, like I do with my dogs? Would I have hugged it, lied down with it, talked to it? I have no doubt I would have. I also have no doubt that I’d have cried at the beauty of it.
As I cry at the wonder of this young bear who decided to make friends with a sled dog.
¶ 6:46 PM 0 Comments
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Snow and water
Well, we finally got some snow the other day. The first significant (for here anyway) snowfall since I moved here 3+ years ago. It was only about 2 inches, but work was closed for the day so we had a day off. Without pay I might add :p That'll hurt.
I got some pics of the dogs playing in it. James and I didn't get out in it though, we're wimps, and it was already raining on top of the snow by the time the sun came up and I took these photos! It was just slush by lunch-time. Its all gone now of course, but we're supposed to get more today.
This is our holly bush in front of our house
And the big pine tree at the front corner of our lot
The other day we were in Hickory and stopped by Sam's Club to get some Pig Ears for the dogs (cheapest place to get them, $10 for 25 pieces. They're about $10 for 6 pieces in the grocery stores!) and they had the Brita tap filter with 2 Nalgene bottles kits on sale for $25 (or so). We picked that up as well. Now I don't have to wait for the water to filter thru the jug when I need to fill a pot for cooking, or to make coffee or tea, now filtered water comes directly from our tap! We still have the jug in the fridge of course for cold water, I drink nearly 3 litres per day!
Check out the Filter For Good website. You can download coupons for Brita filters and Nalgene bottles.
Just by using re-usable bottles, filtering our own tap water, and not buying bottled water, we're saving about $500 per year and several tonnes of CO2. Which we've been doing for a few years now of course with the jugs already, but its extra convenient to also have the filter on the tap too. The bottled water industry is one of the worst rackets on the planet! All they do is filter tap water and put it in a bottle and then charge you $1.50 for a half litre. When it could cost you mere pennies to do that yourself at home! Mind boggling, it really is!
Didja know it takes them about 3 litres of water to bottle just 1 litre and send it to stores? How wasteful is that? Now how stupid do you feel for buying bottled water? Kick yourself in the butt and go buy yourself a Brita!
We've also been saving rain water (and snow!) in the doggie pool and bottling it for the dogs use. Check out the set-up
The other day when I was filling up some jugs my hands got so cold my fingers ached for an hour afterward! So yesterday when I was grocery shopping I bought some rubber gloves, like you use for washing dishes, and I put those over regular woolie gloves to insulate from the cold water. This morning when I was filling up the jugs, I couldn't feel the cold at all! I'm just bloody brilliant I am! :-D
We've got 3 - 7 gallon jugs and 1 - 5 gallon jug filled, plus a bunch of re-used 1 gallon milk jugs. I just re-fil them when necessary from the pool. The water is pretty clear (despite the mud at the bottom of the pool, as long as we don't stir that up!) and the dogs don't mind. With the current drought, we all need to do our part to conserve, and we're just doing a little bit extra. :-)
And if for some reason the tap water dries up or the pipes freeze, we've got purification tablets to put in the jugs so it'll be potable for me and James.
We're ready for the apocolypse...bring it on! ;-) ¶ 1:06 PM 0 Comments
I got some pics of the dogs playing in it. James and I didn't get out in it though, we're wimps, and it was already raining on top of the snow by the time the sun came up and I took these photos! It was just slush by lunch-time. Its all gone now of course, but we're supposed to get more today.
This is our holly bush in front of our house
And the big pine tree at the front corner of our lot
The other day we were in Hickory and stopped by Sam's Club to get some Pig Ears for the dogs (cheapest place to get them, $10 for 25 pieces. They're about $10 for 6 pieces in the grocery stores!) and they had the Brita tap filter with 2 Nalgene bottles kits on sale for $25 (or so). We picked that up as well. Now I don't have to wait for the water to filter thru the jug when I need to fill a pot for cooking, or to make coffee or tea, now filtered water comes directly from our tap! We still have the jug in the fridge of course for cold water, I drink nearly 3 litres per day!
Check out the Filter For Good website. You can download coupons for Brita filters and Nalgene bottles.
Just by using re-usable bottles, filtering our own tap water, and not buying bottled water, we're saving about $500 per year and several tonnes of CO2. Which we've been doing for a few years now of course with the jugs already, but its extra convenient to also have the filter on the tap too. The bottled water industry is one of the worst rackets on the planet! All they do is filter tap water and put it in a bottle and then charge you $1.50 for a half litre. When it could cost you mere pennies to do that yourself at home! Mind boggling, it really is!
Didja know it takes them about 3 litres of water to bottle just 1 litre and send it to stores? How wasteful is that? Now how stupid do you feel for buying bottled water? Kick yourself in the butt and go buy yourself a Brita!
We've also been saving rain water (and snow!) in the doggie pool and bottling it for the dogs use. Check out the set-up
The other day when I was filling up some jugs my hands got so cold my fingers ached for an hour afterward! So yesterday when I was grocery shopping I bought some rubber gloves, like you use for washing dishes, and I put those over regular woolie gloves to insulate from the cold water. This morning when I was filling up the jugs, I couldn't feel the cold at all! I'm just bloody brilliant I am! :-D
We've got 3 - 7 gallon jugs and 1 - 5 gallon jug filled, plus a bunch of re-used 1 gallon milk jugs. I just re-fil them when necessary from the pool. The water is pretty clear (despite the mud at the bottom of the pool, as long as we don't stir that up!) and the dogs don't mind. With the current drought, we all need to do our part to conserve, and we're just doing a little bit extra. :-)
And if for some reason the tap water dries up or the pipes freeze, we've got purification tablets to put in the jugs so it'll be potable for me and James.
We're ready for the apocolypse...bring it on! ;-) ¶ 1:06 PM 0 Comments
Sunday, January 13, 2008
3rd Annual
Well, we created 3 more Haggis heads last night!
Enter The Haggis was playing their annual show in Asheville last night, and we went up with Beth, JD and Ashley. Even though the band was not sounding quite up to par (more of a sound mixing issue than the guys methinks) we all quite enjoyed the show. Of course :-)
Here's a video from their website
I don't think Brian Buchanan's hair has ever been the same colour twice any time we've seen them (and I've seen them a couple times in Toronto as well). It's even a different colour on all 3 of the videos posted on their website! ¶ 12:03 PM 0 Comments
Enter The Haggis was playing their annual show in Asheville last night, and we went up with Beth, JD and Ashley. Even though the band was not sounding quite up to par (more of a sound mixing issue than the guys methinks) we all quite enjoyed the show. Of course :-)
Here's a video from their website
I don't think Brian Buchanan's hair has ever been the same colour twice any time we've seen them (and I've seen them a couple times in Toronto as well). It's even a different colour on all 3 of the videos posted on their website! ¶ 12:03 PM 0 Comments
Friday, January 11, 2008
How F*#@ing Stupid is This?
Ok, any reader here is well aware of the current drought we are experiencing in the South East of the United States. Its been going on for months, and its only getting worse. Water is scarce, and unless we get about 3 WEEKS of constant rain, we will soon be out of water. Completely.
So, what does the local County office intend to do about it? Raise our county sales tax by a quarter of a cent to pay to put in more water lines to households whose wells are running dry so they can be connected to city water sources.
Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat the FUCK are these people thinking?
How the hell is raising our sales tax going to help the drought? If they actually do this, the county will run out of water even sooner, and then where will we all be? Geezus! GAH!
Check this out:
I suppose the higher sales tax, and the additional water mains will somehow make the heavens open and send us rain?
Does this hurt your head, or is it just me?
This seriously has got to be the stupidest thing I've ever read! Here's the article
What we've done to conserve water, James and I that is, is we've put a large hose at the end of one of the downspouts, and put the hose over the kiddie pool that we had for the dogs. Yesterday when it rained for a while, it completely filled the pool! We're using this water for the dogs and to water the houseplants. Once we've got some proper containers, we'll store it for our own emergency use, should the need arise. We just need to get over to the sports supply or K-Mart to get some water jugs. Its not much, but IMO, its a helluva lot more than the frikken county is doin! :-p sheesh!
I also finally used up all the cleaning fluid in my Swiffer Wet Jet, and now I'm gonna hack it to put in my own Enviro-Friendly Watkins cleaning stuff :-) Just cut a hole in the bottom of the bottle, put in the stuff, then put a cork in it! James is drinking the wine from which we got the cork as we speak ;-)
Well, gotta dash...supper is ready! ¶ 6:49 PM 0 Comments
So, what does the local County office intend to do about it? Raise our county sales tax by a quarter of a cent to pay to put in more water lines to households whose wells are running dry so they can be connected to city water sources.
Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat the FUCK are these people thinking?
How the hell is raising our sales tax going to help the drought? If they actually do this, the county will run out of water even sooner, and then where will we all be? Geezus! GAH!
Check this out:
With the area seeing no relief from the drought, commissioners say they've been getting a lot of phone calls from residents whose wells are going dry. That's why commissioners say if voters approve a sales tax increase, the money generated will be solely dedicated to extending water lines throughout the county.
"It's going to take millions of dollars for us to come up to speed on water," said Commission Chairman Wayne Abele.
Commissioner Jack Carroll said, "We don't have any choice, the way I look at it, because it's not going to get any better."
I suppose the higher sales tax, and the additional water mains will somehow make the heavens open and send us rain?
Does this hurt your head, or is it just me?
This seriously has got to be the stupidest thing I've ever read! Here's the article
What we've done to conserve water, James and I that is, is we've put a large hose at the end of one of the downspouts, and put the hose over the kiddie pool that we had for the dogs. Yesterday when it rained for a while, it completely filled the pool! We're using this water for the dogs and to water the houseplants. Once we've got some proper containers, we'll store it for our own emergency use, should the need arise. We just need to get over to the sports supply or K-Mart to get some water jugs. Its not much, but IMO, its a helluva lot more than the frikken county is doin! :-p sheesh!
I also finally used up all the cleaning fluid in my Swiffer Wet Jet, and now I'm gonna hack it to put in my own Enviro-Friendly Watkins cleaning stuff :-) Just cut a hole in the bottom of the bottle, put in the stuff, then put a cork in it! James is drinking the wine from which we got the cork as we speak ;-)
Well, gotta dash...supper is ready! ¶ 6:49 PM 0 Comments
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
Happy New Year!
I woke up this morning, got out of bed, shuffled to the kitchen to make coffee and bleah....the coffee maker crapped out on me! :p I had to go to K-Mart and buy a new one. Luckily, Proctor Silex were on sale for only $10. I'm tired of paying more than that for an appliance that's only going to last a couple of years. I don't remember what I paid for the Mr. Coffee that just died, but its about 4 years old maybe. I know I brought it with me when I moved here, and I've been in NC now 3 years+.
It was a nice fancy one too, with a clock and timer function so that I could set it to have my coffee ready for me when I wake up. Which I never bothered to use really, because it always ended up tasting funny from the water sitting in the machine overnight er sumthin, plus to save electricity, I always unplug the machine after we've finished the pot. So the el-cheapo without clock and timer will suit us just dandy.
I tried to find a French Press, but I guess folks here in Morganton don't need such things, because K-Mart didn't have any. I may check the Kitchen Store sometime, but they're so overpriced on everything over there! Maybe the sports supply will have a lexan one in their camping gear section. Or maybe I can just order one on-line from somewhere. I dunno what I'd do without coffee if the power were to go out for a couple of days. We're due a good ice storm, it seems to have missed us the past couple of years, but 2 years ago, the power was out here for about 3 days. I don't even want to imagine the headache and cranky from no coffee for that long! Of course, I have my one cup drip in my camping gear, but ... *sigh*... that's just too much work, and only one cup at a time, it'd be a waste of stove fuel to have to keep boiling water every half hour. ;-)
Well, we didn't do much of anything last night for New Year. I did buy a bottle of bubbly and some strawberries and I made some chocolate pudding and put the strawberries on for dessert, and then we drank the bubbly while watching Top Gear and then Whose Line Is it Anyway, and then went to bed.
Forecast for tomorrow is calling for snow. I'll believe it when I see it. Today is sunny and warm (yesterday was 55F!). Where is Winter? ¶ 12:04 PM 1 Comments
It was a nice fancy one too, with a clock and timer function so that I could set it to have my coffee ready for me when I wake up. Which I never bothered to use really, because it always ended up tasting funny from the water sitting in the machine overnight er sumthin, plus to save electricity, I always unplug the machine after we've finished the pot. So the el-cheapo without clock and timer will suit us just dandy.
I tried to find a French Press, but I guess folks here in Morganton don't need such things, because K-Mart didn't have any. I may check the Kitchen Store sometime, but they're so overpriced on everything over there! Maybe the sports supply will have a lexan one in their camping gear section. Or maybe I can just order one on-line from somewhere. I dunno what I'd do without coffee if the power were to go out for a couple of days. We're due a good ice storm, it seems to have missed us the past couple of years, but 2 years ago, the power was out here for about 3 days. I don't even want to imagine the headache and cranky from no coffee for that long! Of course, I have my one cup drip in my camping gear, but ... *sigh*... that's just too much work, and only one cup at a time, it'd be a waste of stove fuel to have to keep boiling water every half hour. ;-)
Well, we didn't do much of anything last night for New Year. I did buy a bottle of bubbly and some strawberries and I made some chocolate pudding and put the strawberries on for dessert, and then we drank the bubbly while watching Top Gear and then Whose Line Is it Anyway, and then went to bed.
Forecast for tomorrow is calling for snow. I'll believe it when I see it. Today is sunny and warm (yesterday was 55F!). Where is Winter? ¶ 12:04 PM 1 Comments
