Random Quote #6

"It was the least pleasant experience I've ever had due to weather." -Wookiee, on boarding 7th Heaven at Blackcomb

Sets Galore

I've uploaded a bunch of new sets to my Flickr site as well as added to the Dave Work Tour ("Under Construction") set and Life In Macro collection.

New sets include:

• The Question Jar Tour (Vancouver)


• Hollywood Bowl 2007


• Gorge (WA) 2006


• NYC Summer 2006


• Gorge (WA) 2005


• Red Rocks (CO) 2005


• NYC Summer 2005


• NYC Winter 2005


• Following The Band - Toronto (ON), Darien Lake (NY), & Saratoga Springs (NY) 2006


• Riding to Lillooet & Cache Creek (BC)


• Alpine Valley/East Troy/Milwaukee (WI) 2006
  

...and there's lots more to come. But for now my eyeballs - and 'copy & paste' shortcut fingers, need a little break.

List Excerpts

While Google searching for something entirely unrelated to what I found, I came across CBC.ca Arts' The Top 100 of 2006 list.

There's a lot of stuff there, but skimming it I saw a few highlights that I thought rocked for one reason or another...they're old, but they're still true!

Check it:

"9. Stephen Colbert at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner. When U.S. President George W. Bush sat down at this annual gathering of Washington reporters, he was no doubt expecting a light ribbing. What he got from Colbert, star of Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report, was a punch in the gut. This was satire at its ballsiest — ballsier even than Borat, for the simple reason that the leader of the free world was sitting only a few feet away. “I believe that the government that governs best is the government that governs least, and by these standards, we have set up a fabulous government in Iraq,” Colbert quipped at one point. The room responded with a gasp. Comedy so devastating it took your breath away." <-true dat. I thought Bush was so freaking angry that he wasn't even going to wait for Colbert to leave the stage before having him disappeared. The full 24 min video here.

"11. Watching The Wire on a string. One of us waited until early December to see a single episode of David Simon’s Baltimore crime series — and then plowed through all four seasons in two weeks. Yes, it’s true, Omar (Michael K. Williams) is 21st-century TV’s most excellent antihero. The Wire’s main draw, though, is its unblinking view of the war on drugs, the struggles of the working class, political corruption and the collapse of public education. HBO’s grand gift to devil-in-its-details, dystopian storytelling." -I watched the first episode and immediately decided to wait and watch them all "on a string" too



"13. Robin Sparkles, Let's Go to the Mall. The writers of the CBS sitcom How I Met Your Mother created this genius, faux-1980s music video upon revealing that one of the show’s characters, Robin, is hiding a dirty secret from her past: the Canadian ex-pat was once a bubble-gum popstar. For those who lived through Alanis Morrisette: the Early Years, this hysterically funny video — which boasts the line, “I’m gonna rock your body till Canada Day” — is dead-on in the details: rubber bangles, cheesy white-girl rap, synthesizers, a toy robot, moonwalking and name checks of Brian Mulroney and Wayne Gretzky. It’s awesome, eh." <-um, yeah it is!



"87. Tyra Banks. With her eponymous talk show and evermore me-Me-ME, dammit! appearances on America’s Next Top Model, the poor person’s Oprah has become the ego that ate television. Girlfriend is the guiltiest of pleasures." -"the ego that ate television"!

"94. David Caruso versus acting. It’s not that we enjoy Caruso’s performance as Horatio Caine on CSI: Miami. Rather, we are comforted by its existence. Shatner’s Kirk impregnated fewer pauses; Al Pacino eats less ham; and what — what? — is with the sunglasses? Proof positive that you can be a spectacular failure, and millions of people might love you anyways. So inspiring."

Brabe Asks #2

"...On that note, does our solar system have an actual name like magnatar 38 or something equally cool?" -Brabe

I did a little searching and confirmed that no, our solar system does not have a name like Magnatar 38. According to NASA, the IAU (International Astronomical Union), etc., we just capitalise the words to make them personal pronouns. Our solar system is called the Solar System. The galaxy is commonly referred to as the Galaxy (rather than the Milky Way). Our moon is just the Moon. It seems this is because we live on Earth so they are just our system and galaxy. If we started to live on other planets or in other galaxies, we might either give those new places unique names or perhaps change the names of Earth's neighbourhood. Hard to say at this point! A nice little paragraph (or so) explains that all here.


More links:

Wikipedia on the Solar System

From the University of Arizona's now incorrectly titled Nine Planets FAQ:

Q: Does our solar system have a name? Does our moon have a name? Does our sun have a name?

A: No. No. No. Sorry. They should. But they don't. At least not in English. There are, of course, many words used to refer to the Sun and the Moon in other languages. "Sol" and "Luna" are often thought of as proper names but they're really Latin, not English. So far there hasn't been a need for anything more. Maybe when we start living on other places besides the Earth....

Know The Players

The cover story of the current Entertainment Weekly is "The 50 Smartest People In Hollywood: It's Not About Power Anymore" and features a head shot of Will Smith. In the corner of the cover it asks,

"Who Are the Brains Leading the Film Business Forward? Will Smith Ranks #5 on Our List. Who's #1?"

"Could it be Judd Apatow by any chance?" I said aloud to myself, "Or will they make a statement and say Tyler Perry?"

I flipped to the cover story, and lo and behold, the #1 person is Judd Apatow. And Tyler Perry? He's #7.

Dudes, I read too much about the industry.

Man Overboard

This guy, in downtown Vancouver, took the local flood warning very seriously.

Monotheism, Rome, and Democracy

Why can't God be more like us?
by: Richard Handler

Christopher Hitchens, the British-born contrarian and atheist, has written a best-selling book called God is Not Great in which he thumbs his nose at Allah, Yahweh and all religion for that matter.

I don't know if God is great or not but I 'm sure of one thing: He/She/It isn't a democrat.

Now, this isn't meant as a frivolous remark. Leaving our Western worldview aside for the moment, a vast literature exists on the subject of polytheism, the belief in many gods who jockey for power.

Ancient gods litter the historical landscape. Witness the huge statuary that oversaw once mighty empires like the Hittites and Assyrians.

Present-day Hindus worship a collection of deities. And at one not-so-distant time in the West even, many gods were the rule. I was reminded of this, in the run-up to Christmas, while watching HBO's epic series, Rome.

In between the conspiracies and casual brutality, Romans worshipped both big and little gods with enthusiasm and piety. You want your business to prosper (or an enemy killed), you pray to the right deity for help.


A parliament of dieties

I have heard it said that the Romans, or the Greeks before them, hardly believed in their gods: They were seen more as just mythic characters in the literature of the day.

But as the American classical scholar Mary Lefkowitz reminds us in a recent article in the Los Angeles Times, the ancient Greeks believed that their gods were real and that they constantly intervened in human affairs.

The Romans inherited their panoply of gods from the Greeks: Zeus, the head god, became Jupiter, and so on down the line.

Zeus did not communicate directly with humans but his children — Athena, Apollo and Dionysus — did so continually. A mortal could have the support of one god while angering another. Belief and obedience were, at heart, political.

The ancient Greeks and Romans were always bargaining, praying and beseeching their gods for favours. Their world was a place where human beings were courtiers to a veritable parliament of deities.

Smart operators like Odysseus (Ulysses to some) knew how to play the game. Others, like the suitors he slaughtered when he returned home from Troy, were not so cunning.


Divine limitations

The gods of the ancient Greeks and Romans weren't sweet and gentle. They were often bad tempered, lustful and petty.

But they had two characteristics that ordinary humans envied: They were powerful and they were immortal.

These gods fought among themselves just like we do. Living forever, it seems, gave them no monopoly on wisdom. Even Zeus was not all-powerful or completely wise. He lived within his divine limitations. He had his favourites and his dreadful temper.

Still, there are advantages to believing in a polytheistic universe, as Lefkowitz tells us.

For one, it eliminates the problem of theodicy: Why would a good god create evil?

The monotheistic religions of the world — such as Judaism, Christianity and Islam — have to explain to their followers why God created cyclones and blood thirsty murderers. (After four thousand years, there's hardly a good answer, except, perhaps, have faith and mind your own business.)

The Greeks didn't believe in sentimental, loving gods. (When their gods loved, mortals had to watch out for their daughters!)

As Lefkowitz tells us, the classical gods made life hard for humans. They weren't out to improve our condition. The only things they seemed to have a true interest in were valour and human achievement.


Understanding fallibility

The Greeks, and the Romans who followed them, understood human fallibility. They believed mortals could question their gods, who were as imperfect as they were. They believed that all beings — divine and human — were prone to error.

The second great advantage to polytheism is its openness. It gave the ancient world a modern, Canadian virtue — diversity.

The Greeks were the original multiculturalists. There was always room in the temple for a new god, as long as his or her highness didn't want to take over the place.

Judaism, Christianity and Islam are downright exclusive when it comes to sharing the limelight. Have no other gods before Me, say the opening commandments (depending on your Bible).

People nowadays talk about wanting to encounter God in nice little gardens and in the joys of nature. But the God of the Hebrew Bible was a jealous God. The ancient Hebrews were always running from Him. Indeed, He was something of a holy terror.


In search of a democratic deity

Of course, Christians have the benefit of a meeker intermediary, a deity (Christ) who suffers, like the rest of humankind.

Still, their God is a rather mysterious being, an omniscient deity with control over his dominion yet who has allowed bad things to flourish.

Then there is the God of Islamic radicals who wants His enemies to convert or be struck dead. He keeps His compassion strictly for His believers.

A Greek would be puzzled by monotheism. But the Greeks understood the world as a complicated, savage and less than perfect place. Even their democracy was imperfect: It excluded women, slaves and many working people.

I've always found it puzzling that democracy, with all its ragged, free-for-all imperfections, is heralded as the supreme political model while our Western religious traditions are so monotheistic and narrow.

God is a dictator, demanding perfection from his underlings. OK, He gives us free will to make ourselves miserable. But if political life should be democratic, why shouldn't religion? If we were created in God's image, why can't God be more like us?

The Greeks and the Romans that I see in Rome understand the world is a quixotic and perilous place. They make allegiances and hope to command a smidgen of honour for their family, friends and community.

The ancient world lived as if all creation was a permanent minority government. Life tottered on the edge of a no confidence vote by the powers that be.

As coarse and politically incorrect as those ancient people were, at least to our way of thinking today, their many gods prepared them for a steely-eyed life without illusion.

We have progressed in many ways since then, especially in our science and technology. But perhaps those ancient peoples were wiser than us.

Today, we seem to live in a world of fierce moralists and one-God believers. Maybe we should take a lesson from the Greeks and Romans and allow more democracy into our modern religions. Then we might all rest a little more easily.

Elliot

This morning at the office we were informed that a pregnant friend of ours lost her baby on Sunday. Baby girl Elliot was full term, her due date just a week from now. Only two days prior, on Friday, mom got a check up and everything was going well. Her water broke and she and her husband went to the hospital only to find the baby had died sometime between the check up and Sunday. We shed tears for her and her family, and today everything is tainted with the sombre reminder that childbearing, even in modern times, can be so precarious and uncertain.

What would $611 billion buy?

"If the Bush administration succeeds in its latest request for funding for the war in Iraq, the total cost would rise to $611.5 billion."

It's hard to get perspective on how much money that really is...especially for Canadians who's Federal Government has a yearly budget of about $209 billion versus the American's $2,700 billion. In fact, Canada's entire budget is smaller than the yearly deficit incurred in the States over the past several years.

Rest assured the IntraWebs have provided perspective. Here is Boston.com's take on the war costs.

One of my favs:

More than a year's worth of Medicare benefits for everyone

In fiscal 2008, Medicare benefits will total $454 billion, according to a Heritage Foundation summary. The $611 billion in war costs is 17 times the amount vetoed by the president for a $35 billion health benefit program for poor children.

Because the veto is that much more appalling in this context isn't it?

and:

A real war on poverty

According to World Bank estimates, $54 billion a year would eliminate starvation and malnutrition globally by 2015, while $30 billion would provide a year of primary education for every child on earth.

At the upper range of those estimates, the $611 billion cost of the war could have fed and educated the world's poor for seven years.

Frogs v. Bears

Comedian Mitch Hedberg has a bit about the differences between frogs and bears. This has nothing to do with what is to come, but the title seemed appropriate for some reason.

Not long ago I was discussing the different spins or perspectives news agencies apply to their stories. I have begun to read the news on both CBC.ca and canada.com, the latter of which is a collection of the top stories from reporters and newspapers across the country, and have noticed some interesting variations.

Today Harper announced a $105-million-over-5-years aid package for African children. First I'll link you to the CBC's account the PM's trip to Tanzania here. This was, incidentally, on the same day that a report was released saying that child poverty rates in Canada have remained basically unchanged over two decades.

Okay, so this first article seems pretty benign, uninteresting really.

Now check the article from the Ottawa Citizen on canada.com here.

It's much more interesting, with critique related to the visit and a little bit of a mocking tone don't you think? "Stephen Harper made a high-profile aid announcement and paid a photogenic visit to schoolchildren", "a yard filled with hundreds of singing, flag waving children awaited, for a 20-minute photo-op" and leaves out any Harper quotes about the aid package (like CBC's "Canada has the lead role.") and treats the whole thing as secondary to his supporting of a large mining company who might be doing nasty things to it's employees.

In my opinion, the canada.com article is far better in that it is more skeptical - which is exactly the kind of attitude I want reporters to adopt when approaching political fanfare.

I also like this from the canada.com version; "Harper told a joint press conference...that he wasn't in the habit of telling visiting countries how to conduct their internal affairs." Which he likes to bust out whenever he tries to deflect the spotlight from his support of things that his constituents don't support. However we are all very aware that part of being the leader of a country, particularly one of the leading nations, means constantly telling countries, visiting or otherwise, how to conduct their internal affairs.

Harper does it all the time.

Did he not join the Commonwealth motion that put a time-out on Pakistan for General Pervez Musharraf's dirty deeds? "Representatives from nine Commonwealth countries, including Canada, voted unanimously to suspend Pakistan "from councils of the Commonwealth pending restoration of democracy and rule of law in the country," said Secretary-General Don McKinnon." Why yes he did.

CBC's Political Bytes

If you know anything about John Baird, the punchline rings so very true.

Environment Minister John Baird may have to refrain from one of his favourite activities for a few weeks — speaking in the House of Commons.

The bombastic Baird revels in sparring with the opposition during question period, but his enthusiasm on Wednesday led him to break a cardinal rule of parliament: He referred directly to some individuals who had come to watch him from the visitors' gallery in the House of Commons.

That kind of behaviour is certainly not a crime anywhere else in the country, but in the House they take these things seriously: Only the Speaker is allowed to refer to anyone in the gallery.

Baird himself apologized after QP, chalking it up to a "rookie mistake." But the apology was met with cries of "fair is fair" from the opposition.

Three different opposition MPs pointed out that they had made similar "mistakes" early in their careers — and all had been banned from speaking in the House for 30 days as punishment.

Speaker Peter Milliken has said he will review the tapes of the incident before making a decision.

But Liberal House Leader Ralph Goodale is encouraging Milliken to treat the minister with the same severity as other MPs, adding "We should also consider the beneficial effect that action would have in reducing greenhouse gases."

Long Overdue

Finally, there is real discussion about installing turnstiles or gates in our SkyTrain stations. Finally. We've only been asking for this since 1986.

When In Rome

Just read this story about the only Canadian on death row in the States whom the Conservatives have decided to stop fighting for. They say it's because it would weaken their tough stance on crime. Opponents say that it's a tacit endorsement of captial punishment (which is against the Canadian way) and that all citizens deserve a reprise from that form of punishment.

"Smith's case has caused an uproar in Canada because the Conservative government's surprise decision last week not to seek clemency for the condemned Canadian reversed long-standing foreign policy"

The prisoner, Ronald Smith, said,

"The whole idea in Canada has been to try and rehabilitate prisoners if possible," Smith said in a prison meeting room. "Why shouldn't I have the opportunity, just because I came down to the United States and killed somebody? What difference does it make? If anybody else deserves an opportunity, then I should as well - I'm a Canadian citizen."

I agree with the Conservative's decision, but not their reason. I believe that if you enter another country you are to abide by and respect their rules and laws. You can not expect to leave Canada but still be blanketed under our justice system. The murder is not being contested so this is not a case of false imprisonment, this is about whether you should suffer the consequences of your actions based on citizenship or geography. I go with geography. I mean, it is rather un-Canadian to export and force our way on others anyway. Aren't you a lot more careful about the law when you go to America? I'm certainly cognizant of these differences, and if you're not, well...guess you end up like Smith.

Hypocrisy Shout Out

I like how the States gets off on telling other countries that they can't do what the US does because they're not "good" or "God's favoured people" or "blind believers in American Democracy" or whatever.

You can't have nuclear weapons! Why do we have them? Oh, because we can be trusted, and you can't.

We always support the rule of law! Unless of course, we don't like your law.

Talking about removing the President of the US is treason! We only remove leaders of countries we like to bully.


Now, I'm upset as any human should be about what President Gen. Pervez Musharraf is doing in Pakistan. Today I wondered if I would risk what would be risked to go and help the protesters if I lived closer to their country. But I'm still going to jump on a comment like this:

"You can't be the president and the head of the military at the same time," Bush said Wednesday, describing to reporters his phone conversation with Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf.

Hold the phone.

From Wikipedia on the Presdient of the United Stats of America:

"Perhaps the most important of all presidential powers is command of the armed forces as commander-in-chief.

...To carry out this duty, he is given control of the four million employees of the vast executive branch, including one million active duty personnel in the military.

...While the power to declare war is constitutionally vested in Congress, the president commands and directs the military and is responsible for planning military strategy.

Sure we can, but Pakistan? No, they can't do that. Obviously.

Miss Poledance Australia 2006

Because this is just beautiful. It really is. I swear!