Ontario election or voter suppression

Well, I voted, and it was really easy. Just needed some basic ID and some time to wait in the line I was, I admit, rather surprised to have encountered. Nobody tried to intimidate me or influence my vote. I went on just one of the several days that voting was possible. I didn’t have to register in advance. My vote was private. I saw it go into the machine and be counted.

And yet…

Holding a snap election in February in Ontario seems very much designed to ensure low voter turnout.

  • Weather: February’s always kind of miserable, but this year the province has been hammered with record amounts of snow. Some people literally cannot get out of their homes to vote, because they need clear sidewalks, and those are hard to come by. It’s also tough to get campaign signs in snow-covered lawns, or volunteers willing to stay out very long knocking on doors.
  • Condensed time frame: The election was announced one day, started the next day, and runs for only four weeks. It’s very little time to even let people know it’s happening, let alone any campaigns to gain steam and make an impression. No party started with a full slate of candidates! A lot of people won’t receive voter cards in time. (They can vote without it, but not everyone knows that. Or even realizes an election is happening.) Those who want to vote by mail are hard-pressed to get that completed by deadline.
  • There’s a lot else going on. The US keeps talking about annexing our country, along with doing various appalling things daily. The Federal Liberal party is having a leadership race, the winner of which will be Prime Minister. Shortly afterward, a general federal election is expected. Lots of competition for Ontario politicians trying to let people even know there is a provincial election, let alone who all the leaders, candidates, and positions are.

There’s nothing illegal about all this; but it kind of feels like it should be? Because this is not truly a free and fair election. Especially if you consider:

  • The governing Conservatives have been found to have inappropriate used taxpayer money to advertise themselves, before the election, and party money to advertise the Premier’s trip to Washington, which is also not allowed. The penalty? Bupkus! More votes for them, even though they’ve cheated!
  • The Conservatives have told their candidates to not attend any local debates, something they have followed, with few exceptions.
  • The Conservatives have not bothered to release a platform. (Today they did release one…)
  • Conservative leader Doug Ford has mostly avoided the media.

So the governing party, the one with by far and away the most funds, is doing its level best to ensure that voters are uninformed about anything.

They clearly hope that hardly any people will vote, since low voter turnout tends to favor incumbents and conservative parties. And polls have consistently shown them to be in majority territory.

Do the Conservatives deserve re-election?

I would argue no—and not only because of their “keep the voters ignorant” campaign style. Fortunately, I don’t have to personally write up all the reasons why, as many others have. One of my favourite examples is Please: Anyone but Doug Ford by Justin Ling. A few excerpts:

His years in office have been defined by shortages — a lack of homes, doctors, teachers, jobs, skilled workers, subways, buses, and bike lanes. Worse yet, his plan for a third term is ambitious only in its plan to build a massive new white elephant.

Let’s start with housing, inarguably the priority for any incoming government. But, somehow, Ford remains indifferent. Ontario is, in the full swing of a housing crisis, breaking ground on fewer units of new housing today than it was in 2012. It’s a stunning failure.

…

There are few problems in Ontario which don’t flow out of this acute housing shortage. Tent encampments, rising crime, the opioid crisis, sluggish growth, a stagnant culture, and declining productivity: All things that could be ameliorated by cheaper, abundant housing. 

…

Ford is addicted to giving private companies public money, often for no benefit to the province.

…

He has had nearly seven years to fix the province, and he hasn’t. What is he proposing for the next four years?

Ford’s healthcare plan is absolutely anemic, little more than a vague hand-wave at the crisis. If he has actual new plans to boost housing construction, he’s certainly been holding out on us. Does he have a real plan to improve education, reduce homelessness, hire more doctors, provide care for people struggling with addiction, or get real economic growth started again? No.

What Doug Ford has is a big dumb tunnel.

The opposition problem

If not Doug’s PCs, then who? And therein lies the problem. Both Liberals and NDP have new leaders that aren’t well known. Neither has managed to bust out a fantastic campaign to make them the clear alternative. The Green Party has a appealing leader and great platform, but are strong only in a limited number of ridings. The voter who wants “not Conservative” has to do the frustrating dance of whom exactly to pick instead.

I have voted. I will say it: I voted NDP. I live in a riding with an NDP incumbent who is excellent. I was happy to support her. I was less happy to support some aspects of the NDP platform. Really, you’re going to make the 407 toll-free to “reduce congestion” (which it won’t). Really, that’s your first announcement? And that whole grocery rebate thing? That sounds… complicated.

But as whole, it’s still a better platform than what the PCs have on offer. The party leader, Marit Stiles, is more appealing than Ford. And their Instagram ad today is one of the funniest political ads I’ve seen in some time (here’s hoping they also post on YouTube or somewhere more accessible than Instagram).

And they know the mission: Focus on the ridings they hold, and the ones they might conceivably take away from the Conservatives. From the Conservatives. Not so much from the Liberals or the Greens.

The Liberals haven’t played too much of a factor in my personal consideration, with the Greens having earned my “heart” vote, and the NDP clearly being the smart vote. But being someone who frankly doesn’t really understand political strategy, it’s been interesting periodically dipping into the writings of Evan Scrimshaw, who lives and breathes this stuff.

This one, pointing out that with Conservatives sitting at 45% support in polling (it’s since dipped a bit, not enough), there is no “rearranging of the deck chairs” possible to prevent them winning a majority, was particularly interesting: Ontario: Progressives’ Absurd Focus.

The idea that if you could magically optimize the Liberal and NDP votes, somehow Ford would be defeated is nonsensical. Not every vote who is voting for one or the other is a vote for the other. Not every Liberal trusts the NDP on fiscal policy or some of their more out there social values ideas (remember safety zones around drag bars?), while plenty of New Democrats are union, working class, blue collar voters who oscillate between the NDP to advocate for more health spending and the Conservatives because they’re mad at progressives, wokeness, and the general fact that the world isn’t how it was in 1995. Only 62% of Liberals and New Democrats think the OLP and ONDP should merge into one party, per a Friday Research Co poll. 

….

The unfortunate truth is that if you were to do head to head polling, Ford would easily beat Crombie’s Liberals, Stiles’ NDP, or some merged entity. He is what Ontario wants. The reason he’s what Ontario wants is in large part because the Opposition have not been good enough.

…

If there was some option of a merger or a deal, the Greens would also be a big impediment to it working. Green voters aren’t idiots who think the Greens can win, they’re about building slowly and adding to the conversation through presence and generally not making the compromises that the NDP and especially the Liberals make. It’s a party that is on some level about being anti-Liberal and anti-NDP more than it is about the environment or ecology or whatever else. It’s a statement of principles, and about one’s self. 

…

What both parties of the left have failed to do is create a coherent narrative for why they need to be elected. The real problem for Ontario progressives isn’t how the opposition splits their votes, it’s the fact that 45% of Ontario is about to vote for Ford, and any person or any organization focused on anything other than driving that down isn’t helping.

Vote anyway

The weather forecast has improved this week. The NDP still looks perky. The Greens are are encouraging you to not feel bad about voting for some other party if you don’t live in one of their favored ridings. The Liberals… Well, I’m not too sure what’s going on there, but they do have some good candidates.

You can vote any day between now and Thursday. Go here: https://voterinformationservice.elections.on.ca/en/election/search?mode=postalCode, enter your postal code, and it will tell you where and what form of ID to bring.

It’s not really a fair election, but it helps nothing to sit it out. Happy voting.

Were we heroes—just for one day?

My sister, a regular Guardian reader, was the first to alert me that there was to be a London (England)-based musical built around Live Aid, the big benefit concert for famine relief that took place on July 13, 1985. I wasn’t about to fly over there to see it, and I knew full well that not every play on a London stage finds it way to a North American one.

So while the Guardian article was interesting, it was downright exciting when Mirvish announced that they would bringing Just One for Day (the Live Aid musical) to a Toronto stage for its North American premiere, as part of its 2024–25 season. (Though, side note, at first I thought that it was playing just for one day, which made me think, my God! No way I’ll manage to get tickets for that single performance! Til I read the finer print and realized that it was a 10-week or so run. Phew.)

My sisters indicated that they would be interested in going also, with husbands in tow (some feeling more enthusiasm than others). Then it was a matter of waiting through the season subscription-only time til we could buy tickets. Then waiting for show day itself: February 8, 2025. This was about a week after opening night, which was quite the star-studded affair:

I had no idea how they were going to build a story around this one-day concert.

The setup was as follows: a mother is seeing her activist daughter off to university, and wonders if she’d like to take a copy of her Live Aid Concert Book. Daughter wonders how this ancient history could be of any use to her today. Mother tries to explain its impact at the time. She is assisted by Bob Geldof, cofounder of Live Aid, who says that to understand it, you have to go back to the beginning.

Jump to… The Boomtown Rats (Bob’s band). Then an influential BBC TV report about a terrible famine in Ethiopia. Then the idea of a charity single. Then an American charity single. And a visit to Ethiopia, during which it becomes clear… it’s not enough. There’s a meeting with Harvey Goldsmith. Then a countdown clock to organizing a worldwide benefit concert in an incredibly short amount of time.

We see the events from Bob’s perspective (and Midge Ure’s, and John Kennedy’s—the Band Aid Charity Trust lawyer, not the US President), but also from the mother’s, who is trying to sell as many singles as she can, and hoping to get concert tickets. All while crushing on a record store coworker. And also from the daughter’s, who is there to interrogate (for example, the problematic lyrics of “Do They Know It’s Christmas?”, and the specter of “white saviorism”). And from an aid worker in Ethopia. Also, from Margaret Thatcher…

And all the way through, the music of that time is woven through in amazing, reimagined ways, presented by an incredible, diverse young group of performers with fantastic voices. So though almost all songs included in the musical are ones that were performed at the concert, for the bulk of the musical, they’re used in a different context. The Cars “Drive” while watching the Ethiopian news reports. “Radio Gaga” while trying to get “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” on radio playlists. “My Generation” to address what this all might mean today. And so on.

They do, in the last quarter or so, touch on the famous moments of concert day, like Status Quo opening, Geldof taking in the day during an “I Don’t Like Mondays” pause, the “give us your fucking money” line that wasn’t, Madonna getting into the groove, Queen giving one of the best live performances of all time, and McCartney’s mic cutting out during the “Let It Be” finale.

Bob Geldof, arm raised at Live Aid.

Live Aid’s my thing, man. So I’m not exactly unbiased. But I did think it was one of the best musicals I’ve ever seen. In fact, our whole group gave it a big thumb’s up—even the skeptical brother-in-law!

CTV report on opening night

It was good at reminding you now, just as we sometimes needed then, that apocalyptically horrible things were happening amidst all the pop music fun. And yet, a lot of scenes were quite funny as well! The actor playing Bob Geldof, Craige Els, was pitch perfect. George Ure, as Midge Ure, was also very good—and apparently not Midge’s son. The staging of sometimes using actual photos from the time was effective in its lack of overuse. The music… I’ve already mentioned the quality, but it doesn’t hurt that I also knew all the songs!

And through the mother / daughter character, the story is brought through to today. Bob (and Midge Ure and others) got the talent together, but it wouldn’t have worked if individual young people hadn’t bought the songs and tickets and talked their friends into doing the same. Big charity music benefit concerts won’t cut it now. But the idea of a big mass of people agreeing that they can no longer support a great humanitarian injustice, that they feel driven to come together to do something about it… Well, we all have to hope that’s still relevant!

Ten percent of ticket sales for Just for One Day: The Live Aid Musical go to support The Band Aid Charitable Trust.

Doing what you can

Hansen, recuperating in his cage, was very sweet, full of purrs and head-butts. But his blankies and towels all seemed to be somewhat damp. Not smelly, though. And his water dish was really low. So perhaps a bit of water bowl spillage.

Following the morning protocol, I removed his food and water dishes, and replaced them with new ones, topped up. But before putting those back in the cage, I gathered up all his damp bedding and replaced each of those. Litter scooped, a few more pets doled out, then I gave him his new food and water dishes, and closed the cage door.

Whereupon he flicked, flicked, flicked almost all the water out of the dish and onto his newly installed bedding.

Good thing he’s cute.

Black and white cat with missing ear tips and pink nose.
From https://www.instagram.com/p/DFjK4W-o1a3/?img_index=1. Hansen was rescued from the cold outdoors, and his ear tips didn’t make it.

That was on my first day volunteering for Pet Patrol, the cat rescue organization from whom we acquired Gus and Mac (and previously, Zoë, McSteamy, and Mocha). Some cats in cages, but most were just loose in the sanctuary, and all seemed a bit crazed with energy after a night without people. It was a flurry of litter scooping, cage cleaning, food exchanging, and floor mopping, with just a side of cat petting.

I solved my Hansen dilemma by not immediately restoring the water dish after providing him with yet another set of dry blankets and towels. I snuck the water bowl in later, when Hansen had settled for a nap.

My next shift was in the evening, and the cats were much more mellow then. There was still a certain amount of crazy-ness, as several were heading to surgery the next day, and had to be given canned food to make sure they got a fill of food before their dry food was taken away overnight. Might not sound complicated, but remember that there are tons of cats loose who are not getting canned food—but would like some.

Fluffy black calico.
This is Monet. She got canned food that night. She is now ready for her forever home. From https://www.instagram.com/p/DFxwwnvIH2S/?img_index=5

My third shift, also an evening, was the quietest yet. Newcomers included a couple ferals temporarily being sheltered from the extreme cold. There was no point in trying to socialize them, but I was getting to know a few of the others.

So far, it has not been difficult trying to resist the lure of adopting one of these babies myself. It probably helps that there’s been a slow but steady stream of adoptions occurring. But it’s also true that Gus and Mac are enough for us right now.

Fluffy black cat.
Gus says hi.

I also heard from Mask Bloc WR recently, asking me if I’d like to join in their latest meeting. Per Mask Bloc. org,

Blocs are formed when individuals or groups unite around a common goal. Blocs can take many forms, ranging from voting and political pressure groups, to advocacy groups and mutual aid organizations.

Mask Blocs are independent mutual aid group providing high quality masks to their community for free. They may also provide other tools and information about COVID-19, clean air, testing, vaccination and accessibility.

I’d been hearing about them in various cities, and it seemed like an interesting thing to try to help out with. At the meeting (which was virtual), I learned that the Waterloo Region group, which is relatively small, has been making high-quality masks available to those who want them but can’t afford them for some time now. They have a number of community locations, but will also deliver for people who can’t easily get to those.

Recycle your used masks!
From https://www.instagram.com/p/DD2ZBEEOG1D/. I’m personally excited about this service, as I do have some guilt about all my disposable masks ending up in landfill. Now they won’t!

Recently, they have also expanded to providing rapid tests. The challenge there is that while the masks get donated to them (by the companies who make them), the tests are not. So they need to focus more on fund-raising now. Not really my forte, but they have other initiatives and ideas:

  • Holding more COVID-safe events (one of which is happening tonight!)
  • Providing assistance to those suffering from serious Long COVID
  • Doing more advocacy and research

During the meeting, the subject of the current Ontario election came up, and they noticed that I was able to rattle off various political facts and events rather easily. They asked if I could come up with a list of the Ford government record in this area, for potential use on their Instagram.

I did, though I did not really see how what I provided could be “Instagram-able”. It was stuff like this:

August 2022
Ontario eliminates the mandatory five-day isolation rules for people with COVID-19. (8)

September 2022
The Ontario Science table working group, which advised the government on COVID protections, is disbanded. (9)

November 2022
The Chief Medical Officer of Ontario requests that Ontarians mask in indoor settings to assist overwhelmed children’s hospitals. (10)
Most Conservative MPPs refuse to do so in the Legislature. All opposition members wear masks. (11)

December 2022
Statistics Canada reveals that 2022 was Canada’s and Ontario’s deadliest COVID year, and also the year with the highest number of COVID hospitalizations. (12)

March 2023
The Ontario government ends a program that gave workers’ access to three paid sick days.

(Covering not the early pandemic years, but the subsequent ones.)

But look what they came up with! At https://www.instagram.com/maskblocwr/p/DFqg7devZc4/

On graph of Ontario Wastewater data March 2022: End of mask mandates in most public settings, including schools, daycares, gyms, stores, restaurants, and offices (1) June 2022: End of mask mandates in public transit and healthcare settings. (2) August 2022: Elimination of mandatory five-day isolation rules for people with COVID-19. (3) September 2022: The Ontario Science table working group is disbanded. (4) November 2022: The Chief Medical Officer of Ontario requests the people maks indoors to help overwhelmed children;'s hospitals. (5) December 2022: 2022 was Canada's and Ontario's deadliest COVID year, and the year with the highest number of COVID hospitalizations.
March 2023: End of program that gave workers access to three paid sick days. (7) June 2023: End of free rapid tests in pharmacies and grocery stores. (8) August 2023: The Toronto Unity Health Rehabilitation Program for patients with Long COVID is shut down. (9) October 2023: The Ontario NDP introduce the Improve Air Quality for our Children Act. It has not gotten past first reading. (10) December 2023: There were 1199 emergency room closures in Ontario in 2023. ER closures were extremely rare before 2020. (11)
My additional comment: Note the change in the y-axis here. That was a hell of a peak in December 2023.

(If you don’t like Instagram, you can also see the whole thing—just five slides—here: A message from MaskBlocKW.)

A pretty smart group, and they seem quite nice also. There is a hope to safely meet in person at some point—likely in the warmer weather.

Times are nuts. I’m hoping that by finding community, and doing what I can to help, I won’t go nuts myself.

Pre-Christmas

It started with a bang.

Car with extremely damaged front end.

Two days before we were supposed to head north, Jean’s work car was struck by a flying tire on the 401, a major Ontario highway. This was both unlucky and lucky.

  • Unlucky: Getting struck by a flying tire
  • Lucky: Sustaining no personal injuries
  • Unlucky: Having to wait hours for a tow because of the location of the incident
  • Lucky: Was not a car we own, so ultimately not our expense nor responsibility

Handing off this responsibility did consume much of Jean’s next day after he was finally towed back home… Getting the police report in, getting the car towed the car elsewhere, etc.

But, we were able to leave as planned in our car the day after that. Automobile was chosen as the method of transportation this year because Air Canada’s fares have basically doubled, so even the “lower fare” period of early December wasn’t all that low.

It’s a long drive. We broke it up by stopping in to visit with Jean’s sister who lives in Sudbury, which was very nice. We also briefly saw one of Jean’s nieces, who is currently residing there while she plays for the local hockey team (and goes to school!).

Two young girls posing on ice with hockey sticks.
Not Jean’s niece. She’s somewhat older than these girls. But we didn’t take a lot of photos on this trip. This photo is by Oleksandr P on Pexels.com

The roads were mostly good, though we did get some blowy, slightly slippery snow near the end. We made it to Dad’s all right. Dad has just turned 89 and is still living on his own. He had a nice dinner prepared for us.

We then had two full days there, during which we managed to pack in a good amount of visiting:

  • We went over to see Jean’s other sister, catching up on family news over tea.
  • Jean met up with his brothers and most of their wives at a local restaurant.
  • A visit with old friends was a bit uncertain, as she was navigating her father through the hospital system. But he was discharged to his nursing home in time for us to be able to meet, which was great.
  • My brother, his girlfriend, and my nephew came over for a birthday dinner (both my brother and father celebrate around this time), which was jolly good fun.

We also got out cross-country skiing for the first time in years. We have some photographic evidence of that!

View of ski club buildings and trees.
The trails here are amazing. We did 5 km.
On cross-country skies in snow-capped tree forest.
The trees looked beautiful all along. Winter wonderland.
Me in front of Porcupine Ski Runners McNair Chalet.
No, it’s not named after me. But it is named after my parents, who have put in hours and hours of volunteer work here over the years.

The drive back went reasonably well also. Some slightly slick roads at the start, then a few somewhat intense flurries at the end, but we made it home without a bang.

Jean said that he felt as though he’d already had Christmas.

Continue reading “Pre-Christmas” →

Cutting the cord

There was no particular last straw.

Just that I’d been thinking for a while that the number of programs I watched on either “live TV” or recorded on the cable PVR just didn’t make sense for the amount of money I was spending monthly. Especially since most of it was available somewhere else, for less. Sometimes for free.

It was convenient, for sure. Turn on the TV, there it is broadcasting, or sitting in my Recorded Programs list. But $25 for the basic channels, plus $5 for some extra channels, plus $5 for the second cable box, every month… When I’m also paying for various streaming services… That’s quite the premium for convenience.

Scissors cutting through cords (get it?).
Cutting the cord. Get it? Photo by Yan Krukau on Pexels.com

No way to change Rogers services online, though. Got to make the call! My first attempt to make it through the Rogers voice mail labyrinth on a Sunday afternoon ended with a curt

No one is available to assist you now. Call back during regular business hours.

I was wondering how I might manage to carve out a couple hours during the work day for this task when I remembered I had an upcoming day off. What better way to spend it?

Young lady on phone making notes in a book.
Aging while on hold. Photo by Boris Hamer on Pexels.com

On the holiday weekday, I made it through to a human. Now, Rogers had recently increased the cost of extra cable boxes by $7. So above, where I had quoted $5 for the extra box—that was now $12. This had received some bad publicity, so the person I was talking to was pretty much tripping over himself to make that part of the bill better for me…

OK, so I can reduce the cost of that box to $5 a month, so that your bill will be the same as before. Is that good?

Sure, good, but not really enough! I made the point that even before this particular price increase, I was finding the service too expensive for my amount of my usage. I wondered if any other deals were available, such that I could keep my convenience… For less.

The options were just so baffling! It’s all bundles, so there’s no way to change the pricing of the TV package without also affecting the Internet service. Better deals were available if signing up for a two-year contract, but it wasn’t possible to do that with the same thing I had, only with slower Internet and the same TV channels, or with better internet and more TV channels, but then the price advantage wasn’t that great… And…

Paint swatch selection
Choices, choices… Photo by Antoni Shkraba on Pexels.com

I pondered. But finally went with somewhat better Internet package, bundled with $5 a month streaming-only TV service, on just one cable box. No live channels. No PVR. No cable.

Billing settled, next step for the Rogers people was my updating my modem and cable box with the new services.

… Which took about two hours, during which I was mostly on hold, but with the Rogers person regular checking in:

Are you still with me? Thank you for your patience. We’re still getting errors. We’re continuing to work on it.

But eventually it took. As parting advice, I got:

Call us back in a month. We should have new deals for you!

Hmm.

I tried things out that evening, and they seemed OK. The Internet was working. The TV was now just a portal into Netflix, Prime, Apple TV, YouTube, etc. (I should note, I guess, that all of our television sets are relatively old, so none of them have access to these services built in.)

Old television set
Albeit not this old

The next morning, though, our Sonos music system failed to deploy the alarm as expected. It should wake us up to the dulcet tones of CBC morning radio. What we got instead was the default backup, the Sonos chimes. Which was annoying.

When I tried to stop the chimes, I found that Sonos app was unusable, and unable to find any speakers. Now, Sonos has had its own troubles of late, with an extremely poor app update back in May that the company and all of its customers are still feeling the effects of. I was able to stop the chimes on the Windows version of the app on my computer, as that hadn’t really been updated.

That Sonos wasn’t exactly happy that my wifi network had been changed wasn’t overly surprising, and not necessarily generally worrying.

However… While we definitely still had Internet, it seemed to have become extremely fussy about what it would let us connect to. All Google services were happy pappy. But Reddit was inaccessible. We could use Amazon, but not Ebay. I could connect to X/Twitter, but not to Bluesky. (This is bad!)

But if I switched off wifi and used phone data, I could connect to everything.

Rebooting the modem wasn’t helping.

Woman sodering technology.
I hoped it wouldn’t come to this. Photo by ThisIsEngineering on Pexels.com

It was all extremely distracting, but it was also a work day. I started up the work laptop, and soon discovered that my work VPN was another thing that the new network was simply not going to connect to. Jean’s work VPN: No problem!

I messaged people at work that I was having technical difficulties. And I called Rogers support. Weird problem, I said. We can connect to this, but not to that. He ran tests. He asked questions, like:

What is Bluesky?

(Everyone knows what Bluesky is now, right?)

He reported that all looked fine for him. He tried to blame the company VPN, but I resisted the attempt.

The only other thing I can do is send someone out.

He said it as if that was a threat, but it sounded good to me.

I can have someone there within two hours.

And you know what? They did!

And that technician quickly diagnosed that the problem was that our modem was nearly as old as our TVs.

Magic modem
Though not this old

So he replaced it with a new one. And instantly everything worked again. (Even Sonos. Sort of. Mostly! But that would be a whole other blog post to get into.)

And the cable-less life has been OK. Even in the week after that election, when I found that I was mostly in the mood for unchallenging network television, rather than the “prestige TV” that is the hallmark of streaming. I figured out that I could watch the latest episode of Abbott Elementary and Elsbeth on the Global TV website and app. And that from the website, it somehow broadcasts them commercial-free, even after I turn the ad blocker off?

(I’m not going to pretend I understand that, but I’m running with it!)

And that the insanely dumb but somehow still so entertaining Doctor Odyssey is available not only the CTV app / website (commercial-free here too, somehow), but also on Crave, which I’m paying for anyway.

And that Shrinking and (especially!) Acapulco on Apple TV are also equally soothing choices.

And when feeling up to it, I can still watch CTV News, Global News, and CBC News.

Maybe followed by another Doctor Odyssey chasser. Look! A Shania Twain guest spot!

The home battle against the little c

Jean came back from his weekend biking trip with a bit of a cough, which he said was due to using his CPAP sans humidifier.

Seemed plausible.

He had a bad night, though, with cough persisting despite the now-available humidifier, and with congestion as well.

“You need to take a test”, I told him in the morning.

“I do”, he replied.

Results were clearly positive in less than 10 minutes.

Not our actual test. Image via JJonahJackelope/ Creative Commons

DEFCON 1—Wait

Maybe I was also already infected? I wasn’t on the bike trip, but then, he was gone only two days and came back sick. There was no way he got infected on that trip. Must have been in the days before. When we were together, at least in the evenings.

So, I took a test. Waited 20 minutes. Looked.

Continue reading “The home battle against the little c” →

Ambling, eating, and a bit of biking: Quebec 2024

A couple weeks before, I was feeling somewhat despondent about our pending vacation to Quebec City and Montreal, as the weather forecast seemed to be predicting rain, with some more rain, then a side order of rain. 🌧

But as of a week before, the forecast had completed flipped to sun, more sun, and a side of sun. This really perked me up. But I still had to deal with the jitters and the actual work of prepping to go. (Hiring a housesitter is great for the cats, but does mean having to prepare the house for a guest along with organizing oneself to be away.) 😟

The first night of vacation, I was back to dispirited. Lying in an overheated hotel room on a gray day in the uninspiring town of Drummondville, Quebec after an indifferent meal of St Hubert chicken, I wondered what the points of this was. Wouldn’t I be better off in my house, with its working air conditioner, and cute kitties? 😿

Six nights later, after a lovely dinner of French food on a beautiful patio with my best guy, I felt relaxed and content. Which I guess was the point? 🌞

Jean on a patio in Old Montreal.

Itinerary

We were away from Sunday, September 8 to Saturday September 14.

  • Day 1: Just a driving day; we got as far as Drummondville, Quebec.
  • Days 2 to 4: Québec City
  • Days 5 and 6: Montreal
  • Day 7: Another driving day to back home

Activities

Mainly, it was a lot of ambling, first around the Old Town of Québec City, then around the various neighbourhoods of Montreal. While no longer in the height of summer, Québec City was still pretty crowded with tourists, especially when the huge cruise ships were docked. But our hotel was very centrally located, so it was easy to walk to any part of Old Quebec.

Quebec City view.
Lovely view of the Quebec City port

Montreal is always a busy big city, of course. Our hotel was close to both downtown and Old Montreal, but not in either. So here we supplemented the walking with taking the métro. Figuring out the metro cards was a bit frustrating, but the system itself was great.

Leonard Cohen mural over patios in Montreal.
Crescent Street in Montreal

I was pleased to find how much my French came back to me on this trip—not that you can’t manage in English in both cities. But living la vie bilingue again was fun.

We fit in a few other items between the ambling (and eating. A lot of eating.)

Musée de la civilisation (Museum of Civilization)

It’s quite modern and interactive and full of technological gizmos. Featured exhibits on gladiators in Rome and wrestling in Québec were pretty good. But my favourite was the section on Québecois rap. There you had to don head phones that activated based on what exhibits you were standing near. You got the history of that type of music in this part of the world, and samples of it. It was kind of neat!

Map of the world in clothing tags.
The only picture I have from the museum. This map of the world is made up of clothing tags.

Ile d’Orléans

We’ve been before, so didn’t do as many stops this time. The best new discovery was Du Capitaine—Ferme, Vinaigrerie, Distillerie (the captain—farm, vinegars, distillery). We spoke at length with the owner and got to try various interesting vinegars and liqueurs, then buy a number for home use.

Flowers.
Not sure this photo was taken on the island, but it was definitely taken on this trip!

The best revisit was Vignoble du Mitan, where they make a lot of wines with the Vancliche grape that is native to the island. The guide to our tasting was very knowledgeable tasting, and we found that we enjoyed quite a few bottles, so they got patriated, also.

Bike tour

In Montreal we signed up for a three-hour bike tour of the city. This was possible for me because Ca Roule Montreal (Montreal On Wheels) offers ebike options for all of their guided tours. I of course went with that, and Jean decided to do the same. I was somewhat worried about riding an ebike that wasn’t the one type I had, and with keeping up with the group, but these proved to be no problem. I adjusted pretty easily to the bike (found it easier than mine, in some ways) and kept up no problem, given that the other five people on the tour (and the guide) were on regular bikes.

Map of Montreal showing bike tour route.
This was the route we took

It was fun. The other participants were five guys from the States who were in Montreal for the first time. It was mostly on bike paths, which are very good in this city and were neat to experience. And we were guided through the street parts. We would stop and the guide would give us facts about the city. The only riding I found tricky was through McGill campus, simply because it was so crowded.

On the menu

So much eating! It was a great week in these two very foodie cities.

Coffees and cafes

Sure, you can get a good latte and some nice pastries in Waterloo. But it felt like these were just so everywhere, and so good, in Québec and Montreal. And even Drummondville! Whether the Van Houtte coffee chain, the independant Baguette et Chocolat that became our Québec City breakfast go-to, or the lovely Columbian Cafe in Montreal, it was all caffeinated bliss.

The fancy dinner

Tuesday evening was also somewhat cool in Québec, which made patio options a dodgy prospect that day. We’d been talking about getting back to Le St. Amour restaurant for some time, and Google Maps reported that Tuesdays were typically their quietest day.

There was still some hemming and hawing over whether to go, because on perusal of their menu, we weren’t sure about the entrée (main course) options. But yeah, in the end, we went, early, sans reservation, and they were able to accommodate.

Amuse of fish-shaped cracker thing on little pates.
Appetizers of various kinds of foie gras.
At St Amour, not being disappointed by the amuse bouche and the hors d’oeuvre

The wine ordering was interesting, as the menu is 75 pages. We picked one bottle out (there wasn’t much by the glass), but said we’d be open to other suggestions. The sommelier came back with a map of the world to show the various areas of the lighter-style red wines he’d suggest and why. In the end, we picked the cheapest one he recommended, which was $105.

It was in fact delicious.

I resolved my main course dilemma by ordering a large appetizer to start—the beautiful platter pictured above—then followed with another appetizer, a seafood medley. Jean was more traditional, and had an actual main course of lobster. And we both had dessert. I don’t now remember what that were, but it was fantastic. The whole meal was fantastic, the room still beautiful with its natural light and high ceiling (excellent CO2 readings!), the service perfection.

Patio moods

We had many meals on patios, but they each had their own “feel”.

La Buchette. Now we’re on vacation: Our first meal in Québec City, this popular restaurant is right on the main St-Jean stretch. It had an excellent charcuterie board.

Charcuterie board on patio with blue umbrellas and glasses of wine.
Entering vacation mode at La Buchette.

Le Lapin Sauté: Cozy and casual. Located in lower town, they specialize in duck and rabbit. We had the main course platter; all good, with amazing confit in particular. The desserts were also nice. And we talked to people at the neighbouring table here, a rarity for us!

Umbrellas and a big pink man in lower town Quebec, looking up at Chateau Frontenac.
Le Lapin Saute is near this area. The pink dude was part of an art installation. He showed up in various public spaces in both Québec City and Montreal.

L’Echaudé: Joie de vivre. A discovery of the trip, L’Echaudé is also in lower town, a French bistro. The appetizers and main courses were great, and we were both excited to see tarte au sucre (sugar pie) on the dessert menu (which we had in the form of a dessert platter with other delicious things).

Dessert platter of tarte au sucre, creme brulee, meringue, sorbet.
Duck confit.
Lobster popper.
Foie gras with toppings.
Gallery of items from L’Echaudé.

Terrasse Place d’Arme: Cinq à sept night life. A rooftop terrace in Old Montreal. It was crowded (but not too crowded), there was music (but not too loud), well-dressed people, and a great view. Food wasn’t bad, either! Nor was the company.

Jean on terrace at Place d'Armes.

Boqueria Tapa Bar: Bustling. We stopped at this busy tapas bar after our bike ride, when drinks and some smaller plates seemed just the ticket at this point. The first picture on this blog post was taken there.

Bistro La Fabrique: Date night. Our last dinner of the trip was selected and booked just a couple hours before we went, and what a capper! It was at a French bistro on St-Denis, which was nicely decorated with fabric and plants. Though busy inside, we had the patio almost to ourselves (which the waiter was mystified about, as it was an absolutely gorgeous day). It made for a lovely, relaxed dinner.

The menu was very France French, with wine offered by the cL instead of by the bottle or glass, and items like rillettes, terrine, and tartare. I had the slightly less French (I suppose) squash ravioli with beets, Brussels sprouts, hazelnuts, and wild mushroom foam—fantastic. For dessert, we puzzled over what a verrine was (same word used on French and English menus), but ordered it anyway. Turned out to be a jar, filled with fig, nectarine, apricot cream, lemon foam, and hazelnut praline crumble. Mm, mm, good.

Hotels: Meh

The Drummondville Travelodge, booked in Expedia enroute, was renovated and very clean, but as previously noted, was difficult to keep cool enough.

Our Québec City hotel, Terrasse Dufferin, had a great location right by the Chateau Frontenac. But the room was quite small and a bit run down. The bathroom sink had two separate faucets. The shower had trouble maintaining temperature. The room could be a bit stuffy. There was no hair dryer. That sort of thing.

Quebec City port and Chateau Frontenac.
Our hotel was right around here.

Our Montreal hotel, Le Nouvel Hotel, was the biggest and newest of the lot, and had the best-functioning climate control. It offered a Chromecast-type television service, but I couldn’t work out how to connect my apps to it. It also had a bit of cockroach issue…

Precautions

We took some of those! Covid projections for that time weren’t great, but we were lucky enough to be able to do most activities outdoors, and then we supplemented with:

  • Mini HEPA filter for the hotel rooms.
  • Antihistamines, H1 (Allegra) and H2 (Pepcid), taken daily.
  • Nasal sprays before and after more crowded maskless activities.
  • Respirator masks, for places like the Montreal métro (where, hey, we weren’t the only ones!).
  • Laminar personal air purifier to blow clean air onto my face when indoor dining. Less obtrusive than I initially feared (you can see it in the pictures of the St Amour).
  • CO2 monitor, which is merely informative, not actually protective. Biggest surprise: The great readings on the Montreal métro stations and trains.

Whoo, that’s a lot! But if it’s still not enough, you can read this again, with a bit more detail on some aspects, at this location: https://culturearchive.ca/quebec-city-and-montreal-2024/

Candelight concert

Gotta hand it to Instagram: They have quite the good, personalized advertising engine. I find most of the products they push on me somewhat interesting. I have gone on to buy from far more than any other social media site, I’m sure.

And generally I’ve liked the products just fine!

I can’t always ferret out how they go from the posts I look at on Instagram to they advertisements they sneak in between, but one recent link was pretty clear: Brian May / Rufus Taylor / Adam Lambert > Fever Presents Candlelight Concerts: The Music of Queen. At Maxwell’s, in Waterloo.

But what are Candlelight Concerts?

That took a bit of off-Instagram research. Basically, it’s a string quartet! (At least, this show was.) As for the candlelight, well, they do decorate the venue with a bunch of electric candles. And they perform music by popular artists such as Taylor Swift, Abba, and Queen—interspersed with a few classical pieces. And they do some outright classical concerts.

It all sounded interesting enough. Jean and I decided to go.

We hadn’t been to Maxwell’s since seeing Lowest of the Low there many moons ago. This time there were seats! Along with very strict rules about getting there on time, not getting up during the performance, and not using your phone to take pictures or video until the last song. And an expected show time of 1 hour.

But despite all that structure, it was a pretty relaxed fun, evening. They did introduce each song, and I really enjoyed the way they arranged them for the four stringed instruments. The interspersed classical pieces were things like excerpts from Mozart’s The Magic Flute. I won’t remember all the Queen songs included, but there was Don’t Stop Me, Fat Bottomed Girls, Somebody to Love, Bohemian Rhapsody (natch), and this one:

Another One Bites the Dust (I recorded just the sound of the last song, since I find my videos never turn out that well. Sound isn’t terrible!)

More summering, more updates

Because it’s the most important topic ever, I’ll get y’all up to speed on my latest hair colour, while also providing a bit of a “tour de restaurant patios”.

First up, at Loloan Lobby Bar, you can see that the hair is kind of rose gold (and also windswept, and also my makeup is quite faded, but oh well).

Diner with rose gold hair in front of plate with scallops.

We biked over to the Loloan that Tuesday for dinner, and partook of their new summer menu. It was very good!

Then a couple weeks later, behold the blonde look at our anniversary dinner (32 years married, 36 together) chez The Odd Duck.

Blonde in white dress at patio table with red drink in foreground.

I now I understand why Jean commented on how their patio lacked charm—I hadn’t realized til looking at these pictures how much of the street view he was seeing! My view was pretty different…

Coffee pot, cheesecake, man in sunglasses against patio walls.

… because the canvas did block the streetscape for me. (Also note Jean’s weight loss, hey?) We’ll have to trade seats next time to be fair.

Regardless of charm or lack thereof, we both really enjoyed the meal. They know their food, and their wine, at The Odd Duck.

I ended up selecting a semi-permanent colour called light golden brown to dye my hair. I was quite happy with the result. You can pretty much see it in the photo below (along with more faded makeup—I’m really bad about reapplying makeup) from our dinner at Arlo, in Ottawa, last week.

Woman with golden brown hair in front of plates of appetizers.

Arlo also had excellent food! It’s been a good run. This isn’t even a complete list.

A couple days after our anniversary dinner, we biked over to Babylon Wine Sisters to meet some friends for vino and a meal. Less elaborate than these other places, but still très bon. And perfect weather for it.

Woman with cheese ball and sauce.
This was some sort of cheese bombé situation…

And our other big dinner in Ottawa, at Fairouz Cafe, was also fantastic and creative. Halloumi cheese with cappuccino cream, dates, and figs; duck confit flatbread; babaganoush with shaved truffle!

Foregrounded Brussels sprouts, duck flatbread, with cappuccino cream and babaganoush in the background.

And between meals…

we did a few other things. The Friday before leaving for Ottawa, we went to see Something Rotten in Stratford. Lordy, that was funny! It’s set in the time of Shakespeare. Two brothers are trying to compete with him as playwrights. With the help of a soothsayer, they come up with the idea of producing the world’s first musical!

It ends up mocking / paying tribute to numerous musicals, as well as various Shakespearean plays, and it’s all just delightful.

As for the trip to Ottawa, that went well! It was very hot and humid, but we managed by doing our longer walks more in the morning, and spending afternoons in cooler museums or drinking iced beverages. Our hotel, the Sonder Rideau, was very spacious and well-equipped, and located right downtown, so that was all good. We visited KIN Winery, the Canada Aviation and Space Museum, and Rockcliffe Park. If you’d like more details and photos, I’ve posted them here: Ottawa 2024.

Ottawa Rideau canal.
Great photo by Jean from that trip

The poop scoop

I and fellow activists have not been successful in saving the Ontario Wastewater Surveillance Program, but there have been some minor accomplishments:

  • Quite a few media articles about it, in The Globe and Mail, The Toronto Star, CBC, CTV News, the Tyee. The Health Minister got asked about it at a media scrum, which seemed to make her cranky. It’s definitely something, as other program cancellations have gone mostly unremarked.
  • The cities of Ottawa and London have come up with funding to continue the program, in a somewhat reduced capacity, for 2 or 3 more months. (Peterborough and Windsor might also have cobbled something together; not as sure here.)
  • The Federal government has given official statements that confirm the Ontario government has been lying about the reason for cancelling it (their claim was that the Federal government was taking it over):
    • The Federal program does not duplicate what the Ontario one did.
    • The Federal expansion will not result in a system as comprehensive as Ontario’s was.
    • Ontario did not consult or collaborate with the Federal government on coordinating wastewater testing programs.

I personally got a flurry of email responses about this in recent days, from the Mayor of Waterloo, the Chair of Waterloo Region, and my Federal MP, Bardish Chagger.

Solé hair and restaurant, and some updates

I generally don’t spend too much time thinking about or working on my hair. I have a short cut that suits its thin, straight essence, and a hairdresser who knows how to maintain that. “Styling” it takes only minutes.

But I’ve been getting so many comments on it lately. And that’s all because of the colour. A colour people naturally assume I deliberately selected for my hair. Which I kind of did, but it’s not so simple.

The hair is getting pretty gray now, but I’ve still been dyeing it. A while back, though, I switched to Clairol Natural Instincts, which has no ammonia. I figured that should be less harsh (and hopefully less likely to give me cancer or whatever). But it’s a semi-permanent colour. So it gradually fades away.

Clairol Natural Instincts Medium Auburn Brown box.

I selected Medium Auburn Brown. It looks lovely on the box. On me, when first applied, it looks more like, “Holy crap, that’s really red.” (Interestingly, I got some compliments at this stage, also. It was certainly vibrant!)

But then it fades to something closer to medium auburn brown.

Then it keeps going, to kind of a rose-gold colour, which I rather like. There are gray roots by this point as well, but they actually blend in reasonably well with the rose gold, which I also like. Because overall it means no big rush to dye the hair again.

But then it keeps going, and now I’m kind of… blonde? With more significant gray roots, which still kind of blend in. I don’t hate it, but I’m not sure what my end game is now.

Four people on patio table. Both women look blonde.
Not sure how evident my hair colour is in this photo, but it’s the only recent one I have.

Unless I embrace all-over gray next, I’m going to have to dye it again, but I’m a bit mystified about to how to approach that. Do I do the whole medium auburn brown cycle again from the start? Or do I start with something lighter in the first place?

I’m not sure how much “rose gold” hair dye there is on the shelf. And if I go with some sort of blondish brown situation, what is that going to fade to? Platinum?

While I ponder that, I will mention that the photo above was taken on the Solé patio on Canada Day. It was our first time at Solé since the ownership change (and our friends’ first time sitting on this particular patio!). We were all quite impressed with the place. It is perhaps the nicest patio in the region. But the food, in the past, could tend to be… uneven.

This time, everything was really great. Between us we sampled three appetizers, one main, and a dessert. High marks for everything, and I think Solé could be worth visiting for an all-out dinner.

The updates

My non-dairy quest has uncovered the most delicious vegan ice cream yet: Honey’s Premium rocky road. Made with “cashew cream”. And in-house marshmallows. Oh my, oh my. So creamy. So delicious.

Honey's Premium Plant Based Ice Cream: Rocky Road.

And while I haven’t heard back from any more Conservative MPPs—guess they’re pretty busy trying to keep Ontarians drunk—I did drop another line to Waterloo Regional Council for an update. I quite promptly got a detailed and personal response from Colleen James, the Kitchener representative who put forth the motion to try to get the federal government to invest in the wastewater surveillance system locally. She said they are consulting with the University of Waterloo as well. Here’s hoping something can be cobbled together, though I expect there will be some kind of data gap after the provincial system closes down in a few short weeks.

In the meantime, let’s admire this lovely local graph while we still can:

Waterloo wastewater chart for the last 36 months, showing peaks in January 2022 and 2024 and a currently rising trend.