On Facebook

OK, I guess I put more time into Facebook nowadays. I might tire of that and return here more often. Until then, here is a link to my Facebook profile.

Facebook me!

A new addition to the family

With fond memories of the previous other occupant in the driveway, I am now happy to say that I can get around in my own car, registered in my own name (of course Debbie agreed to it and helped pay for it).
Introducing the family's 2004 Saturn Ion. Specs: silver, 5-speed, 2.2L Ecotec engine, 4 doors, AC, AM-FM-CD, crank windows, manual door locks, no fob.

Thanks to Mary at Ultimate Suzuki in London for her help.

Let's hope it lasts a long time with us.

Good News Network

I have added the Good News Network to my list of "Links of Interest" because we all can use a little good news each and every day. Reminds me of Anne Murray's song. Have a blessed and great day!

Sorry, been caught in Facebook

Sorry for no recent posts. I have been expressing myself--and watching the expressions of others--on Facebook. You can see my profile there at http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=538880134 . I haven't given up here yet.

Congrats to National Cannonball Champ

Congrats to Brian Utley, a 350-pound Calgary high school teacher, who won the Trident Splash National Cannonball Championship on Wednesday in a lighthearted contest that featured elaborately costumed competitors leaping from a five-metre tower into a swimming pool. Read more (and video) at
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/WeirdNews/2007/08/15/4420804-cp.html .
I don't know Brian, but I love a good soaking splash.

Supporting MMP referendum in Ontario

On October 10 Ontario voters will have the choice of keeping or changing their government. They will also get the choice to keep the current first-past-the-post electoral system, or bring in a Mixed-Member-Proportional voting system. 

For the record, I am supporting the betterment of our democracy and urging Ontarians to support the implementation of the MMP system of electing our representatives.

Here are some links to the issue (h/t to Gary S and www.voteformmp.ca ).

 

About MMP   About the Campaign

GaryS's blog

Recent Blog Posts

• $10.10 for 10/10
• Bloggers for MMP
• Supposed Flaws in MMP Already Flaws in FPTP
• Time to make some waves.
• They all need to know....Help us help them!!!
• Wanted: Ergonomic office chairs
• Wanted: Techie help - MMP Bloggers
• MMP Critics Ignore Reality
• Democracy's foes reveal themselves
• Cast a Blind Eye on Electoral Reform 

Useful Links

• Ontario Citizens Assembly
• Equal Voice in Politics
• Ontario Citizens Assembly YouTube Channel
• Ontario Referendum
• Vote for MMP Video Blog
• Liberals for MMP
• Progressive Right Blog
• Elections Ontario's "Your Big Decision"

Tell a friend  Tell your friends about Vote for MMP

Wet phones not always a disaster

Phones flushed down the toilet

Mon, July 30, 2007

By COLIN PERKEL, CP
http://lfpress.ca/newsstand/News/National/2007/07/30/4378890-sun.html

TORONTO -- Vincent Soper won't soon forget the fleeting moment of panic he felt as he jumped to reach a switch in a washroom of the movie theatre where he works and his beloved new cellphone lurched from his right-hand jacket pocket.
The 15-year-old, from Hanover, made a desperate attempt to stave off text-messaging disaster.
"I tried to hit it away from the toilet, but it just bounced off the rim before falling in," Soper said. "I didn't think. I grabbed it out."
In an age of instant e-mail and smartphones, it seems, dumb users are multiplying. And toilet bowls are swallowing cellphones with untethered regularity.
"You'd be surprised how many people drop it in the toilet," said Todd McLauchlin, with Prairie Mobile in Regina. "That's very common."
Flushing phones, however, isn't the only way people find to inadvertently damage their mobile devices.
There was the woman who left her phone in a pair of pants that went through both the washer and dryer cycles. Another multi-tasker, who was texting and doing the dishes at the same time, saw hers nosedive into the sink full of suds.
The list goes on.
There's the guy who went swimming with the phone still in his trunks; the priest who dropped his into a pitcher of beer; or the sleepy man who one night grabbed his cell instead of a glass of water from his bedtable, then promptly dunked the phone in the glass.
Hapless users talk of phones that bobble from pockets to sidewalks -- sometimes into puddles -- during a sprint for the bus, while the butter-fingered have seen theirs end up under car tires, on subway tracks, in their breakfast cereal or morning cup of java.
Sebastien Charest, a technician with FirstComm Wireless in Ottawa, remembers one guy coming in with a plastic bag filled with cellphone bits. It had flipped from his hip as he cut the grass and the mower made short work of it.While a mashed phone will never see last call again, technical gurus say all may not be lost if one does end up in the neighbourhood swimming pool, local cesspool or some other potentially watery grave.
The key, they advise, is to get the battery out immediately to avoid short circuits. The secondary danger is internal circuit corrosion, so it's essential to dry out the phone as quickly as possible, perhaps with the help of a blast of compressed air, a handy vent or just bright sunshine.
Soper, with some TLC from a hair dryer, got his high-tech buddy back into pristine working order. His mother's phone -- which ended up with her in the Saugeen River when her canoe tipped -- never did work quite properly again.
While there are no guarantees a drowned phone will recover, water damage is guaranteed to void warranties.
Fibbing about what happened likely won't help, either, experts say: A little white sticker, usually under the battery, turns red when it gets wet, so the service centre will know the phone's been swimming.

CELLPHONE FIRST AID

Technical experts say all may not be lost if your cellphone ends up drowning in a toilet bowl, swimming pool or other watery destination. Some first aid tips:
- Retrieve phone as quickly as possible
- If still on, turn off. If off, leave off
- Remove battery immediately
- Dry off battery and outside of phone
- Use hair dryer, compressed air, an air vent or sunshine to dry out phone as quickly as possible
- Cross your fingers.

Many lives of children saved in Afghanistan

Exiting leader praises saving children's lives

Sun, July 29, 2007

By MARTIN OUELLET, CP
http://lfpress.ca/newsstand/News/International/2007/07/29/4376896-sun.html

KANDAHAR -- Canada's outgoing military commander in Afghanistan says Canadian and NATO efforts there have helped save the lives of 40,000 children.
And Brig.-Gen. Tim Grant says that's a "conservative estimate."
In a CP interview at the multinational base in Kandahar, Grant said he's handing his successor, Brig.-Gen. Guy Laroche, a country more "confident" than it was a year ago.
"There's 40,000 babies in Afghanistan more this year than . . . last year," said Grant, whose return to Canada is days away. "That's a big number."
He attributes the success to improvements in health care, which has led to a drop in the region's infant mortality rate.
Grant says the international community helped put a vaccination program in place and increased access to doctors, particularly for women.
Meanwhile, even as Taliban activity remains prevalent in Kandahar province, the level of confidence has surged among the city's inhabitants, he said.
"The town was empty," Grant said of Kandahar 12 months ago. "Now you go there, (it's) like Kandahar City is a successful little town.
"The shops are open, kids going to school, people have gone back to a normal life. We see farmers have returned in large numbers, thousands of people have gone back to live in their homes."
He also said villagers in the Panjwaii district, west of Kandahar City, who fled last year after fierce fighting broke out between insurgents and NATO forces, have returned.
"The streets are full, people are going about their daily lives," Grant said.
"Yes there are risks, but people have a sense that the situation is manageable, much better than last year, and its getting better."
Still, Grant's optimism is relative, as Afghanistan remains poverty-stricken and the prey of an insurgency.
At regular intervals, convoys of Canadian soldiers are the target of suicide bombers and improvised explosive devices.
Earlier this week, Grant himself narrowly escaped an attack.
"We do absolutely everything we can to reduce the risks for our soldiers," he said.
"There will always be a risk here.
"Soldiers understand that though. Every soldier who is over here realizes that there is a risk with the lifestyle they have chosen."

In another interview, posted at http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/War_Terror/2007/07/30/4379832-cp.html , Grant pined for better media coverage of the work in Afghanistan:
In a second television interview also broadcast Monday, Grant expressed frustration with the difficulty of explaining the importance of the Afghanistan mission to the Canadian public.
"I can give you examples across the board about how we're making a difference with the people here." Grant said. "This is a poor country, 30 years of war, it needs a lot of help to get back on track."
Grant blamed a lack of information for poll results that suggest Canadians are uneasy with Canada's role in Afghanistan.
"The focus always ends up being on casualties, attacks, on the military-security situation," he said. "In fact, where we're making the most difference is on reconstruction and development."
"If I could find the magic solution to explain to Canadians how important this is, it would make me a happy man."

Introducing ChristianConnections.ca

I have acquired and am posting to a new website, www.ChristianConnections.ca . There I can host the Christian Connections Calendar for SW Ontario, links to The Shepherd's Guides across Canada, and start the links pages I have been envisioning. Thanks to Gary Herrfort, the previous owner, for the seamless transition. I hope that this new site will be a useful tool and help "Making Christian Connections".
Any suggestions and comments are welcome, and thanks in advance. Leave your comments here, or visit the site to click on the email in www.ChristianConnections.ca .

Think of what the Palestinians could have accomplished by now...

Kudos to Mindelle Jacobs for her succinct portrayal of the abuse of the Palestinians. With the manpower and innovation evident in both the Palestinians and Israelis, the Palestine region could have been an economic powerhouse long ago--if they could only get along. Sigh.

Tue, June 5, 2007
Leaders have failed Palestinians
By MINDELLE JACOBS
http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Columnists/Jacobs_Mindelle/2007/06/05/4235398-sun.html

For almost 60 years, Arab countries and factions have pretended to help the Palestinians while using them as pawns to demonize Israel or as a pretext for tribal and religious infighting.
The clash between the Lebanese army and two shadowy radical Islamic groups is the latest calamity to befall the long-suffering Palestinians.
Little is clear about what goes on in the Middle East, but one thing is certain. The militants holed up in two of Lebanon's Palestinian refugee camps don't have the Palestinians' interests at heart.
REFUGEE CAMPS
The greater tragedy is the Arab world has left the Palestinians to fester in refugee camps, in the hope that Israel would be vanquished. A two-state solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict is the only route to peace.
Repeatedly, the Palestinians have had a chance for their own state, ever since the UN proposed dividing a small piece of what was formerly the Ottoman Empire into Jewish and Arab countries. The Jews agreed. The Arabs chose war. Think of what the Palestinians could have accomplished by now if they'd chosen state-building instead of war-mongering.
Their leaders failed them -- and continue to do so today -- and the Arab world has, by and large, left them to wallow in misery because of its undying hatred of a dynamic, successful democracy -- Israel.
Lebanon, for instance, confines its Palestinians to 12 refugee camps that have, effectively, become mini-states within a state. The Palestinians aren't allowed to own property or work in professions such as medicine, law, engineering and journalism.
Last year, the Lebanese government eased the restrictions slightly, allowing Palestinians to work in previously prohibited clerical and manual jobs, according to the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI).
But the permit process is so burdensome and expensive that only two or three refugees had applied by late last year.
"The consensus view in Lebanon is that whatever happens to these people, we don't want them to stay here," says Tamara Cofman Wittes, a research fellow at the Brookings Institution.
The Palestinian refugees stuck in camps in Lebanon are worse off than their counterparts anywhere else, she says. The Lebanese resent the Palestinians because Yasser Arafat stirred up so much trouble when he was based in Lebanon in the 1970s, she adds.
SYRIA
In Syria, Palestinian refugees are a little better off. They're allowed to work and live where they like, although they don't have citizenship. Still, more than one-quarter of them -- about 115,000 people -- live in 13 camps, USCRI says.
The Arabs have always supported a political solution rather than a practical solution to the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, says Cofman Wittes.
"A practical solution would have been to resettle them where they were a long time ago," she says. "But the refugees have been a powerful symbol of Palestinian suffering that the Arab states have wielded in the conflict with Israel. As a result, they've been a political football."
Tens of millions of refugees displaced after the Second World War rebuilt their lives in new places. Why not the Palestinians?
It hasn't been a question of what's best for the Palestinians as a community or as individuals, says Cofman Wittes. Instead, the emphasis has been on the most effective political use that could be made of the Palestinians.
The Palestinians will have their own state when their leaders yearn for it more than they want to annihilate Israel.

Later: My friend Ron Gray commented: This last sentence reminds me of Golda Meier's comment: "There will be peace in the Middle East when the Arabs love their children more than they hate us."