Last week I turned a corner in my quiet existence. I became a radical environmental activist. ('Radical Environmental Activist' being our Federal government's description of choice for those registering opposition to Enbridge's proposed Northern Gateway pipeline.)
I'm pretty excited, actually - to be honest, I've always yearned to be a radical. The genetic code of people who grew up in middle class homes in West Vancouver generally precludes any tendency to non-conformity of any sort, let alone radicalism. A woman who religiously files her income tax by April 30th, would never consider checking out of a hotel at 11:05 if check-out time is 11, and drives the man known simply as Geoff crazy with her insistence that a paper bag which has been in contact with a loaf of bread is too contaminated to be recycled with the mixed paper is not exactly activist material. Nonetheless, it would seem that this pipeline issue has pushed me right over the top - driven me to the absolute brink - incited me to a desperate civil disobedience. I wrote a letter. Well, sort of.
I have flirted with protest in the past. However, honesty requires me to disclose that my previous efforts were to 'protest' as heating a TV dinner is to 'cooking'. That is to say that they have consisted of electronically signing my name to a form letter (generally passionately penned by the David Suzuki Foundation) and clicking 'send', whereupon, depending on the issue, the letter magically makes its way to the appropriate inbox in either Ottawa or Victoria. (I am particularly fond of the feature that, upon entering your postal code, automatically cc's your MP!!). This time, however, I find that Dr. Suzuki and his team have, to my great inconvenience, yet to provide a suitable letter. What to do?
Recognizing that writing a letter from scratch, much like cooking from scratch, actually requires effort, and perhaps even some time spent researching the facts, I quickly resort to perusing the internet for something I can plagiarize (preferably from a reasonably informed source which shares my views and encourages 'plagiarism for protest'). A few key strokes later, a suitable letter on the Pacific Wild site presents itself. Fantastic! What's this, though? I actually have to research the email addresses and contacts? Merciful Heavens - who knew this would be so much work - there is a rerun of Seinfeld that I have seen only three times starting in five minutes?! (and for the record? - I suspect that governmental email addresses, which are about the least intuitive addresses I have ever encountered, are purpose-built to be undeliverable... but that's a subject for my next blog post: 'How I Became a Conspiracy Theorist').
However, protest is not without a price, and so I persevere. At long last, the email addresses located and entered into my contact list, I have the letter signed and am poised to click the 'send' button when I suddenly think I should just tweak the letter a bit. I mean, there are a couple of phrases that just don't sound like me. Perhaps move a phrase here, change a word there. That paragraph seems a teeny bit wordy, and I would never .... wait a minute.... do I actually think anyone is really going to critique this letter? Will Prime Minister Harper personally open this email and say 'If only Karen Playfair had used the active rather than passive voice and avoided all that hackneyed simile I would stop that Northern Gateway pipeline project. Immediately.'. Probably not. I probably just need to get the damn thing sent before the damn pipeline is built. And so I click. Done. I am an activist. Sure - it took a plagiarized form letter and about fourteen 'Undeliverable' messages from someone called 'System Administrator' to express my outrage, but dammit, I am an activist. A bona fide radical environmental activist.
Thursday, 19 January 2012
Wednesday, 18 January 2012
Sh*t Winter Cycle Commuters Say
In the spirit of the latest trend of 'Saying Sh*t' - this is for my fellow winter cyclists:
- My handle bar light has 740 lumens - I can light up the whole highway.
- I can't feel my face.
- Get off the freakin' shoulder!
- Are you riding studs?
- Hi - ya - do you guys have any stock on the litre size of chain lube?
- Brakes are really just a luxury.
- I can't feel my feet.
- Do you know where I can get a Gortex case for my iPad?
- That's the third battery I've put in my blinkie since October.
- I can't feel my hands.
- I totally wish they made backpack condoms with glow in the dark fabric.
- That grinding in my drive train is starting to really annoy me.
- Had to book it when I heard the snowplow coming up behind me.
- Today my snotsicle actually went from my nose to my handlebars.
- Are you getting any more than 4 gears?
- I heard that Pricepoint has a sale on derailleurs - I totally need to check that out.
Monday, 2 January 2012
Welcome to 2012: Year of the Vegetable
Welcome to 2012. After a longer than intended blogging hiatus, I'm ready to hit the new year with renewed commitment. (no doubt bringing relief to my many, many followers....all two of them...).
Writing, it would seem, requires time and a fresh, optimistic mental state. December is not a month that offers either of those ingredients for me. For several weeks through November and December, I am utterly mired in budgets, business plans, and a general spiritual malaise triggered by limited daylight and a melancholic-yet-seemingly-fruitless quest to recapture my Christmas mojo. (Dude... I soooo need to MOVE on and MAN UP!)
In any event, flipping the calendar inevitably represents a fresh start. Though it will be some time before the increasing daylight kickstarts my non-hibernation mode, just knowing that we're on the upswing assists immeasurably in restoring both optimism and creativity. It's a lot like coming out of the forest on a long ascent... ya, you still have a big, steep above-treeline kicker ahead of you, and it's a royal pisser that the man known simply as Geoff is already at the top waving at you, but just being able to see the extent of the remaining climb somehow provides a second wind.
Of course, the new year also brings with it an abundance of resolutions - in my case, unimaginative resolutions such as 'I will eat better', 'I will exercise more', 'I will phone my mother more often' (well, maybe just the first two - I'm only human, after all...). This year, the man known simply as Geoff got an early jump on the resolution band wagon and, in November, after watching a movie on the alarming correlation between disease and the consumption of animal protein, decided that we should join (if only peripherally) the vegetarian revolution.
Let me be very clear here - we are not vegetarians, nor are we likely to ever be vegetarians - that DELICIOUS piece of venison I ate at the Rimrock only days after embarking on our 'vegetarian journey' is proof of that. However, we are exploring what I would loosely term 'recreational vegetarianism'. This probably doesn't sound like all that big a deal. I mean, what? ... so you leave the meat portion out of the dinner and bump up the vegetables. Can't be that hard, right?
Yaaa... so I quickly learned a couple of things: 1) 35 odd years of cooking experience is useless once the rules change, and 2) I don't really like vegetables all that much. (That second discovery? A bit of a setback under the circumstances.)
Nonetheless, we have persevered. I have resorted to actually following recipes, as my usual 'wing it and pray' approach was resulting in some particularly unappetizing offerings, not to mention an unhealthy rate of weight loss. Thanks to the internet and a couple of engaging vegetarian cookbooks, however, I am managing to prepare meals that are, for the most part, edible and, on the odd, not unwelcome occasion, even tasty.
One of the things I find most striking about this whole experience is the complete change of ingredients one is required to stock. Suddenly ginger, cilantro, parsley, and celery are on the shopping list every week - I don't even like cilantro. We go through garlic, yams and chipotle paste by the truck load, and I am frankly weary of washing spinach. The coriander and turmeric, generally released from the spice cupboard only when we 'cook Indian', are suddenly disappearing at an heretofore unwitnessed pace. And I sure hope we don't see a global shortage of cumin any time soon, 'cause that would really put me into a tailspin.
Don't get me started on the 'legumes', though - seriously - I am a woman who, as a rule, will decide on what to make for dinner guests, say, about seven minutes before they arrive. Like, 'soak overnight' is SO not on my program. (however, I will say that I made a baked black bean dish the other night that was well worth the soaking and boiling effort it entailed... wait...was this some kind of an epicurean hallucination???). Then of course there is the chopping - I never really understood why people were so particular about their knives. Now that I chop vegetables for the better part of my waking hours, I yearn for a knife with an edge sharper than a wooden spoon.
Yup - I wouldn't say this transition to vegetarian-based eating has been seamless. And of course, in a bizarre this-was-all-your-idea-therefore-I-must-make-you-miserable way, I fully plan to grumble and moan to the man known simply as Geoff for as long as possible. However, as with all things challenging, it does provide great material for an anecdote, and seeing as the other option for a new blog entry was 'How I disposed of the leftover Christmas baking', you should probably be somewhat thankful for our efforts.
Now, if you will excuse me, I have a roasted eggplant to puree....
Writing, it would seem, requires time and a fresh, optimistic mental state. December is not a month that offers either of those ingredients for me. For several weeks through November and December, I am utterly mired in budgets, business plans, and a general spiritual malaise triggered by limited daylight and a melancholic-yet-seemingly-fruitless quest to recapture my Christmas mojo. (Dude... I soooo need to MOVE on and MAN UP!)
In any event, flipping the calendar inevitably represents a fresh start. Though it will be some time before the increasing daylight kickstarts my non-hibernation mode, just knowing that we're on the upswing assists immeasurably in restoring both optimism and creativity. It's a lot like coming out of the forest on a long ascent... ya, you still have a big, steep above-treeline kicker ahead of you, and it's a royal pisser that the man known simply as Geoff is already at the top waving at you, but just being able to see the extent of the remaining climb somehow provides a second wind.
Of course, the new year also brings with it an abundance of resolutions - in my case, unimaginative resolutions such as 'I will eat better', 'I will exercise more', 'I will phone my mother more often' (well, maybe just the first two - I'm only human, after all...). This year, the man known simply as Geoff got an early jump on the resolution band wagon and, in November, after watching a movie on the alarming correlation between disease and the consumption of animal protein, decided that we should join (if only peripherally) the vegetarian revolution.
Let me be very clear here - we are not vegetarians, nor are we likely to ever be vegetarians - that DELICIOUS piece of venison I ate at the Rimrock only days after embarking on our 'vegetarian journey' is proof of that. However, we are exploring what I would loosely term 'recreational vegetarianism'. This probably doesn't sound like all that big a deal. I mean, what? ... so you leave the meat portion out of the dinner and bump up the vegetables. Can't be that hard, right?
Yaaa... so I quickly learned a couple of things: 1) 35 odd years of cooking experience is useless once the rules change, and 2) I don't really like vegetables all that much. (That second discovery? A bit of a setback under the circumstances.)
Nonetheless, we have persevered. I have resorted to actually following recipes, as my usual 'wing it and pray' approach was resulting in some particularly unappetizing offerings, not to mention an unhealthy rate of weight loss. Thanks to the internet and a couple of engaging vegetarian cookbooks, however, I am managing to prepare meals that are, for the most part, edible and, on the odd, not unwelcome occasion, even tasty.
One of the things I find most striking about this whole experience is the complete change of ingredients one is required to stock. Suddenly ginger, cilantro, parsley, and celery are on the shopping list every week - I don't even like cilantro. We go through garlic, yams and chipotle paste by the truck load, and I am frankly weary of washing spinach. The coriander and turmeric, generally released from the spice cupboard only when we 'cook Indian', are suddenly disappearing at an heretofore unwitnessed pace. And I sure hope we don't see a global shortage of cumin any time soon, 'cause that would really put me into a tailspin.
Don't get me started on the 'legumes', though - seriously - I am a woman who, as a rule, will decide on what to make for dinner guests, say, about seven minutes before they arrive. Like, 'soak overnight' is SO not on my program. (however, I will say that I made a baked black bean dish the other night that was well worth the soaking and boiling effort it entailed... wait...was this some kind of an epicurean hallucination???). Then of course there is the chopping - I never really understood why people were so particular about their knives. Now that I chop vegetables for the better part of my waking hours, I yearn for a knife with an edge sharper than a wooden spoon.
Yup - I wouldn't say this transition to vegetarian-based eating has been seamless. And of course, in a bizarre this-was-all-your-idea-therefore-I-must-make-you-miserable way, I fully plan to grumble and moan to the man known simply as Geoff for as long as possible. However, as with all things challenging, it does provide great material for an anecdote, and seeing as the other option for a new blog entry was 'How I disposed of the leftover Christmas baking', you should probably be somewhat thankful for our efforts.
Now, if you will excuse me, I have a roasted eggplant to puree....
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