Elbows Up

Elbows Up has quickly become a simultaneously humourous yet serious Canadian meme in these troubled times.

It's a hockey term. When players go into the corner to fight over a loose puck,  they will jostle for all that they are worth. The elbows may come up aggressively in such scrums and can cause damage to tender jaws.

Hockey is a tough sport, and Canadians can be a tough lot. Expect us to keep our metaphorical elbows up in the coming days.

Just as hockey players are willing to take a beating to gain possession of the puck, so are Canadians prepared to take a beating to stand our ground in the face of unwarranted aggression, for stand our ground we will.

I hope you didn't miss Prime Minister Trudeau's speech yesterday. He demonstrated intelligence and steadfast commitment and determination. It's not anything like the rambling and ranting we are accustomed to from the senile 47. 

It is below and only 13 minutes.

Morning Translations

I was a boy in Montreal, the largest city in the French-speaking province of Canada. However, it was the time of two solitudes in which the English did their thing and the French did theirs. Living in English was very easy, and young AC and everyone he knew were unilingual. Too bad, but that it the way the it was.

There were three English elementary schools fairly close to where I lived, and in 1960, they built a new English high school for me and all of the baby boomers as we began to enter that phase of our lives. A year later, they built another English high school for my friends who lived on the other side of the imaginary school border. That is where my closest friends went.

Even though we took French in school from grade 3 onward, it was just a subject, and I didn't become very adept. In fact, when I transferred to school in Ontario at the age of 15, I found they were ahead of me in some ways, certainly in reading. This was the case, even though, at that time, they didn't start French until grade 9 or maybe senior elementary.

Of course, that late start in Ontario hasn't been the case for a long time, and most schools and boards also have a form of French immersion from first grade and onward for those who desire it. My grandkids continue to take some subjects en francias, even in senior high school.

I also hasten to add that by the time I started teaching, 10 yeas after I left Montreal, English kids who moved to Southwestern Ontario from Montreal could speak French very well.

I have been sorry to not have learned Canada's other official language better. I did have the notion to makes amends in retirement. I remember signing into Duolingo, but the problem was that my hearing was compromised enough by then that I could not pick up the nuances of pronunciation. I soon threw in the towel, right after throwing my hands up in despair.

Even though I moved away more than sixty years ago, my favourite hockey team is still the Montreal Canadiens. I almost bleed the bleu, bland et rouge (their colours). In fact, the Canadiens (or Habs, as in habitants) are now my only sports interest at all in all sports. I guess tennis is an exception, but it isn't a team sport, and I cannot follow it in the same way.

There is very decent coverage of the Canadiens in English. I can watch the games and read many articles. But the French press (not the coffee-making kind) is very active, and I cannot read those pieces. Oh, if I struggle, I might be able to get the gist of a short social media snippet, but long articles elude me. Could I have improved my French reading comprehension skills despite my hearing difficulties? Possibly, but I can't see that it would be worth the struggle if I can't speak the language. Besides, I don't really have anyone to speak it with, other than my grandkids, who both do English much better than French although they do have basic French competency.

Back to hockey: I really wrote all of the above to get around to explaining how useful the internet is in keeping tabs on my team. Google provides me with an instant and automatic translation. The app is built right into my Chrome browser. It's set up, so that if I click a French sports page, and I guess any French page, the English translation is instantly there for me. I do not even have to make a separate click to tell it to translate for me.

Here is a sample paragraph in both languages.

Sur le second, il a pratiquement traversé la patinoire d’un bout à l’autre avec la rondelle sur son bâton, battant de vitesse deux rivaux et profitant de l’espace entre les deux défenseurs pour orchestrer un jeu de passe qui allait mener au 10e but de la saison de Josh Anderson.

On the second, he practically crossed the ice from one end to the other with the puck on his stick, beating two rivals and taking advantage of the space between the two defenders to orchestrate a passing play that would lead to Josh Anderson's 10th goal of the season.

Oddly, sometimes if I click a sentence, I will be asked if it was an accurate translation. The answer in my head is always the same: "How would I know?"

Being able to read these pieces helps to occupy my time when I get up cold and achy at 2:30 in the morning, as happened today. It is now almost 6 o'clock, and I will add this piece to my ever-expanding queue to publish . . . whenevah.

Alpaca Fun

When we go to Wheelers Sugar Camp, Sue likes to take photos of the two alpacas, but when she needed one for an odd photo prompt, she could find them in her camera roll. After rooting around in past Blogger and Flickr posts, I eventually found a couple of photos from October 2017, which I thought they would make a nice, light Monday post.

Sue tried to use ChatGPT from her phone to put a hat on the middle photo, above. The app wouldn't do that, but it did make a fun alternative image (bottom right in the composite). Read the captions within a Dr Zeuss frame of reference.

 

Then, I decided to see what I could do in Photoshop using the original image. First, I used AI to expand the canvas because there wasn't much head room in the original photo. Then, I asked for a top hat. The hat that they gave me was small, so I made it bigger on a separate layer. The result is unrealistic and mediocre, but it was fun to try something different.

Meanwhile, despite it being March, we are enjoying some of the coldest days of winter. However, the sugar shacks are beginning to open as the sun returns, and we hope to get back to Wheelers for the running of the sap and a breakfast of pancakes, French toast and sausages in a few weeks. As I picture that breakfast, my mouth begins to water. Seriously.

Seeking Pity

I have been awaking very early recently. On the morning when I write this, I stumbled to the bathroom at 3:30, but trying to get back to sleep, after maybe fewer than five hours, didn't work. I visited the bathroom again less than a half hour later. This time, instead of going back to bed, I tried to snuggle down in my chair, but that was a lost cause too. Soon, I was up visiting the bathroom again.

If I could do more than dribble, especially at night, I might empty myself better and, therefore, be able to get back to sleep, but this is not my lot in life these days. I do the self-catheterize thing before bed, but on some nights, I still struggle afterward.

I await surgery #4 to try, once again, to attempt to alleviate the problem. This may occur in April.

After a few nights like this, when I struggle to get even five hours of sleep, I tend to become overtired and discouraged.

Thankfully, after a few days, my troubles usually right themselves to some degree, and I will get back to 5+ hours of sleep. Even five-and-a-half hours make a difference. Sometimes, life even grants me the boon of 6 or 6.5 hours of sleep, for which I am grateful.

Meanwhile, I don’t like being awake in the dark, cold house at 3 or 4 in the morning, but it does give me something to moan and blog about as I, shamelessly, seek your pity.

Caturday 78: Snuggly Lacey, Good Grapes, and Bad Cauliflower

As I mentioned yesterday, I did have to do a small shopping — at a Canadian grocery store. The main reason was to get cat food, or Lacey would not have been a happy cat this morning.

There was a reasonable price on cauliflower, so I popped one in the cart. Same with grapes. Then, I looked down at the grapes and saw that they were from Mexico, and I realized that I hadn't vetted all of the products in my cart. That caused me to check the cauliflower. It was from the USA. I put it back.

We are serious about this up here. It is not just a one-day event although yesterday did demand a bit more of us than the average day. Many of us are avoiding American products as much as possible on a consistent basis. It's a small thing, but it is what we can do.

Meanwhile . . .  speaking of Lacey, I was surprised to happen by this old photo.

It was a picture of Lacey on my lap, six years ago, shortly after she moved in with us. She has never snuggled with me much, but she did on that day. 

The Day of Protest

While I will very likely buy nothing at all, as a Canadian, I will, definitely,
not shop American in any way.

Are you paying any attention to our Charlie Angus, who is giving it back to Trump in whatever way that he can? I am now getting his daily email and subscribe to the free part of his substack.

This is Charlie's email from yesterday.

What is about the richest men in the world that reveals them to be so petty, shifty, and money-grubbing?

Step forward, Jeff Bezos.

If you ever had any doubt that Amazon is one of the most predatory corporations on the planet, read the book The Everything War by Dana Mattioli. She lays out the mercenary strategies by which Amazon stole the ideas of start-ups, crushed competitors and destroyed small companies that posed no possible threat.

And, of course, Jeff Bezos is part of the MAGA mob using his control of the once-esteemed Washington Post to serve the gangster king in the White House.

On February 28th, Canadians are launching a national day of resistance against American corporate power.

But I would like to make one suggestion – instead of a single day of resistance, why not a total and permanent boycott of all things Amazon?

I am writing this in response to Amazon's decision to close all their warehouses in Quebec after workers chose to unionize because of the horrific injury rates in the plants and the lack of respect for basic worker rights.

Where are the Canadian politicians who have failed to demand Amazon pay back the massive subsidies they were given?

The Canadian people gave Amazon the red carpet treatment. Now, they’re treating us like some kind of third-class feudal state. And, of course, Jeff Bezos is laughing at us with his 51st state swag.

So, my friends, if Jeff Bezos is gonna walk away on Canada, let’s walk away on him.

*You can find Charlie Angus here on Bluesky and on the other places too, probably.                

Amazon became a bit of a lifeline for us during the recent plague. We live in a town, where the only other viable choice for many goods is Wal Mart. I dislike that place and feel like my soul is being sucked out of me when I enter the doors. But Amazon is a big part of the oligarch Bezos' empire, and I feel as though we are colluding. It will be hard to sever the tie, but we are going to work on it.

It will require an effort, and it will cost us, but doggone it all, what else can we do? 

Random Photos from our Walks

As you know, we go for an almost daily trudge. We often snap pics with our phones. As winter soon (hopefully!) begins to wane, I thought that I would post some shots that haven't made it into other posts.

Two somewhat buried benches: the first in our neighbourhood park, the second along the bridge trail. Both seem to have been sat upon but not by us. The second one has a bare patch right in the middle. I could show the patch better from another angle, but, compositionally, I like this view with the trail stretching into the distance.

From part of the trail bridge before it goes over the river. I like the curving road with the two lines where the car tires have worn down the snow. The road reduces to a single lane under the bridge, so not many cars use it, even though it is close to and leading to downtown. 

Animal tracks in the park.

The footbridge in the park.

Here's one standing below the door of town hall and looking up at the flags: the Ontario ensign on the left and the Carleton Place flag on the right. Maybe it will go into my project, or maybe I'll do a better one in due course.

Happy protest day down there. It's a start, but widespread work stoppages and protests need to happen. Pain will have to be endured, I'm afraid. That may be easy for me to say, but we shall have our share of pain up here. Just for today, however, we won't darken the doors of any American stores or buy American products. We are not even going to load up Facebook, run by another oligarch, or are we now saying broligarch? I have already all but abandoned Twitter, but I will remain on BlueSky, for they seem to be doing things right and keeping the site as circumspect as they can.