test blog #10

I worked in law firms in New York City for 15 years. Up until a few months ago, the only law firms I had ever worked in were in New York City. Now I work in a law firm in downtown Toronto. When I pass a window and glance outside, I still expect to see New York. For the tiniest moment - a speck of time, barely registered consciously - I am disoriented. It's weird.

Here's something I keep forgetting to blog about: the CBC's decision to bump "The National" for several weeks this summer, in order to simulcast ABC's "The One: Making a Music Star". In all the uproar over this, I first thought The National actually wouldn't be aired during this stupid so-called reality show broadcast. Now I've learned that the news show is only being moved from its timeslot in the Ontario and Quebec time zones. Apparently CBC is not as insane as I first thought. In the practical sense, most fans of The National will be able to watch the show at another time. If you have digital cable, you can watch it at any time of the night anyway, by tuning in to a broadcast from another time zone. But with or without The National, the decision to air an ABC "American Idol" wannabee is moronic. When public television imitates commercial television in order to (supposedly) appeal to a younger audience, it loses everything. The audien...

I'm reading Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed . I'll start by saying that Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel : The Fates of Human Societies is one of the most remarkable books I've ever read. It permanently changed the way I see the world and how I view history, and that's quite a big thing to say about a book. I won't go on about it here; I'll just say that I couldn't recommend it more highly. Collapse is sometimes called the sequel or follow-up to Guns, Germs , but I don't see it that way. You can certainly read one without the other. Collapse has a very different feel from Guns, Germs . In the first book, Diamond is using a huge breadth and scope of research to alter your perception of history, to teach and enlighten. In Collapse , he's adding an additional layer: he's using that research to advocate, to impress people into action. He's drawing specific parallels between ancient societies that did no...

More from the Toronto Star 's report on diversity and immigration : He and his wife, Shweta, have a 2-year-old son, Om, who speaks English and Hindi, likes cricket and basketball and enjoys Bollywood as well as Hollywood movies. He is, says Tandon, the new face of a multicultural Canada, melding his birthright as a Canadian with the advantages of his cultural heritage. Tandon hopes Om will learn Cantonese and Mandarin someday, to give him a competitive advantage in a global marketplace. In Canada, anything is possible — his son could aspire to be prime minister, he says. "I'm living my dream. It's not the one I came with, but it's still good." * * * * The new face of Canada smokes and drinks less and is more physically active than the general population, according to a sweeping poll examining the behaviours and social attitudes of immigrant Canadians. For a country that loves its beer and bars, the results of the survey may sound sacrilegious. But the poll, c...

We're seeing The Real Thing today, the play from our Soulpepper subscription that we were supposed to see on my birthday . Love those weekday matinees! The joys of working weekends. After the play, we have to hurry home, as there's a big game tonight: Pedro Martinez returns to Fenway . Hey Mets fans, I'm up for a 1986 rematch this year, whaddaya say?

I've been making my way through the special report on diversity and immigration that the Star published last Saturday . Some of it is very interesting, if fairly intuitive, if you've lived in a big city and thought about immigration. Here's something from an article about discrimination and prejudice towards visible minorities. Overall, the people surveyed rate Canada highly, although not perfectly, for having a justice system based on fairness and equality. Most people draw a distinction between individuals who are biased or bigoted - those are found everywhere - and an institutionalized system that discriminates. In the US, I've found that people often fail to make that distinction. When talking about equality, they'll point to individual acts of bigotry as "proof" that very little has changed since the days of enforced segregation, which is ridiculous. Others, of course, act as if all discrimination has been rectified and the justice system is now 100...

Have you all seen Bruce Springsteen's recent performance on Late Night With Conan O'Brien? Along with the Seeger Sessions Band, Bruce performs a haunting version of Pete Seeger's "Bring Them Home" . Go here to see the video. A minor correction to the post linked above: this song is not on Springsteen's latest release, We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions . Thanks to Crooks and Liars for hosting the video, to Allan for sending me the link, to Conan for putting this on his show - and thank you, thank you, thank you, Bruce. Watch and listen.

Today is a National Day of Action for Lt Ehren Watada, the first US army officer to refuse deployment to Iraq. In cities and towns throughout the US, peace-loving people will be holding vigils, speak-outs, and rallies, distributing flyers, hanging banners, and otherwise taking action to support Lt Watada, and to build the anti-war movement. If you live in the US, consider joining a local action. If there isn't one in your area, write a letter to your local newspaper speaking out against the war, and in support of war resisters. And of course, post about this in your blog. From a recent email from Thank You, Lt : I am the mother of Lt. Ehren Watada, an officer stationed at Ft. Lewis. He is part of a Stryker brigade unit that deployed last week to Iraq. Despite an unflinching commitment to his men and to democratic ideals, he chose not to accompany his men. His decision came through much soul-searching and through research and consultation with experts across disciplines, inside and...

Every once in a while, I think I should wrap up this blog. I would keep it online, because people who are considering emigrating to Canada or in the process of doing so, use it all the time. But I'd stop writing, or maybe write very infrequently. When I first mentioned this to Allan, he was horrified, and told me I couldn't, I shouldn't. Then I got a second wind, or a third, felt good about wmtc again, and kept going. This repeats itself every few months. We're coming up on the one-year mark of living here, amazing as that seems (to me, anyway). Much of our settling-in has been done, and although we're still exploring and learning about Canada, we'll be doing that for a long time to come. I'm not going to blog forever. (Or am I?) Perhaps the first anniversary of our big drive north should be the end of wmtc as we know it. My original purposes for starting this blog have either been accomplished or never really worked. Writing helped me process this Big Life ...

A friend and former co-worker from New York sent this to his mailing list today . And who could blame him? It's not every day you're featured on the home page of a New York tabloid ! Harry lives one neighbourhood farther uptown than we did, at the northernmost tip of Manhattan. And yes, we lived there during the riots. Ho, hum.

Meanwhile, south of the border - way south - the only medical facility in the state of Mississippi that provides abortions is under siege. This from a fundraising letter forwarded to me by my former comrades at the Haven Coalition , which I helped run during my last years in the US. As summer begins, your Feminist Majority Foundation is preparing to protect the lone remaining abortion clinic in Mississippi. The Jackson Women's Health Organization is facing a week-long siege by Operation Save America (formerly Operation Rescue) from July 15-22 to make Mississippi "the first 'abortion-free' state in America." Flip Benham, the director of Operation Save America, has said "We will not wait for the President, Congress, or the Supreme Court to end abortion." Your Feminist Majority Foundation is determined to help this clinic and protect women's access to abortion in Mississippi. We are sending organizing staff to help the clinic withstand the protests...

Pride Week in the GTA culminates today with Toronto's big parade. Everyone tells me it's one of the best in the world, but I'm working weekends again, so I'll have to take your word for it. The Toronto Star reminds us that Canada remains a beacon of acceptance, dignity, and hope to people who are still persecuted throughout the world. Arsham Parsi had barely crossed the border into Turkey when he received the email. It was shattering. Two gay teenagers, it said, had been tortured and publicly hanged in his homeland of Iran. Mahmoud Asgari, 16, and Ayaz Marhoni, 18, were executed because they had contravened strict Islamic morality laws that command the death penalty for gay sex. "I had never met them, but I cried and cried," says the small, immaculately groomed gay activist, who won refugee status in Canada last month. Parsi, 25, fled Iran in March 2005, the moment he learned through friends that government officials were looking for him. He was in Ankara a...

Thursday night was a Red Sox night off, and we didn't even watch a movie. The same four DVDs from Zip.ca have been sitting on the coffee table since early April. After a recent influx of new CDs, we needed a Music Night. So what did we get? Some capsule reviews. We finally picked up Green Day's American Idiot - late, I know, but I don't buy music very often. I really like Green Day, and it's a good album, but I expected more. It's completely unsurprising - more of the same. That same is good, but... I guess I got fooled by the hype. I'm glad I have it, and I'll listen to it, but I was hoping they'd do something more. As part of my relatively new, ongoing exploration of jazz, and in my quest to buy more of the jazz sounds that grab me while listening to Jazz FM in the car, we got Sonny Rollins's Sonny Rollins Plus Four and Saxophone Colossus . I don't have enough vocabulary to write intelligently about jazz; I just love this stuff. I'm new ...

The Toronto Star has a special section on immigration and diversity in Canada. It looks really interesting; I'm going to read a lot of it before I post about it. (I know, how retro.) From the front page of the hard copy: A groundbreaking poll of Canadian immigrants shows a country pointed in a fresh direction. Our nation's newest builders are younger, smarter, healthier and committed to Canada. But if you're a fan of beer or baseball, you should know you'll soon be in the minority. You know what's funny about an observation like that? It assumes that no one changes in their new home, that immigrants don't pick up habits from their countries of choice, which of course can't be true. I'd bet quite a few fans of beer, hockey - and even baseball - are created in Canada. One section follows a handful of new immigrants through their first year. I don't think there are any US political defectors among the people interviewed, but then, very few of us have ...

An excellent editorial from the excellent St. Louis Post-Dispatch . Much of what is so terribly wrong about the U.S. incursion in Iraq has been on display in the last seven days, a misbegotten war writ small. — On Friday night, three young U.S. soldiers -- a Latino kid and two small-town white kids -- were left to guard a vehicle checkpoint on a canal bridge in the heart of the Sunni-dominated "triangle of death" south of Baghdad. Seven masked insurgents surrounded them, killed one and took the other two captive. Eight thousand troops spent the weekend searching for them. Their mutilated and decapitated bodies were found Monday. — Friday was the same day the House voted to approve a non-binding resolution expressing "solidarity" with the troops fighting the war on terror. Ignoring reality, the Republican-sponsored resolution linked the war in Iraq with the attacks of 9/11. The breathtaking stupidity of the resolution was best captured by Rep. Charlie Norwood, R-Ga....

What's the minimum wage in Canada? When was the last time it went up? In the US, the minimum wage hasn't been raised in ten years. Ten years. Think of how your living costs have risen in the past decade. Imagine making the same salary you were earning then - if that salary didn't cover those costs in the first place. Conservatives are fond of saying that government cannot create equality of conditions, only equality of opportunity. If a substantial portion of a population can't legally work their way out of poverty, how can there ever be equality of opportunity? When Howard Dean tried to talk about working people who always vote against their economic interests - the first Democrat in my memory to lay that on the line - Republicans disingenuously accused him of fomenting "class warfare". In The Nation , Katrina vanden Heuvel writes: The GOP just shafted the working people of America. By rejecting an attempt to raise the minimum wage, the Republican-controll...

Allan just solved two of our problems in one swoop, by bringing home a combination printer and scanner. Our scanner hasn't worked properly since we moved, and our printer died a few months ago. Now we're fully equipped again. This Epson model also makes photocopies. We always do our photocopying at work, but for the occasional one-off need, this is very handy. I can't believe how inexpensive all this hardware is now. I imagine the reasons for those low costs couldn't be very good, either for workers or the environment. But sheesh, it does make your life easier. I guess that's why we all look the other way. So now that we are up and running, we'll be able to post photos from our Peru trip. I have one more deadline to get past, and Peru photos will be our next project after that. I opened a Flickr account, in case Blogger's photo capability proves too frustrating. It took way too long to get the party pictures up, so links to Flickr might be the way to go.

Last March, Readers Digest International sent thousands of undercover "behaviour testers" into cities all over the world. For three days, the testers walked into public buildings behind other people to see whether they would hold a door open, dropped a folder full of papers to see whether anyone would help pick them up, and counted how many times people said "please" and "thank you" while conducting business in stores. Each test was conducted 20 times in each city. The results may surprise you, but they didn't surprise me. Toronto came in third . And the most polite city in the world? New York. New Yorkers are always in a hurry, and they generally don't spend time making idle chit-chat with strangers. But they hold doors, they pick up dropped change (and return it!), they give directions - constantly. In such a densely urban environment, where people are always in crowded public spaces, there is an ethos that encourages both anonymity and toleranc...

James's excellent photos of the wmtc party are now up on his Flikr site . You can click on "view as a slide show" for a nice walk-through.

Today, our summer solstice, I'm thinking about Peru, the Peruano friends we made, the ancient cultures we met. As in much of the world, it's winter solstice there, although so close to the equator, the hours of daylight and darkness don't vary very much. Even so, many Incan and pre-Incan tombs and monuments are oriented towards June 21. I see that Solstice-watchers are allowed onto the Stonehenge site today. Stonehenge is an amazing place, but if you should ever go to Ireland, do visit Newgrange, a passage tomb complex older than Stonehenge, and older than the Egyptian pyramids. After creeping through a narrow, sunken passageway , we stood in the burial chamber, under a corbelled stone ceiling, and learned that on June 21, the sunrise would light up that dark passage and flood the interior space. Ireland's Boyne Valley , a short drive north of Dublin, is full of neolithic tomb sites in various stages of excavation. But beware: like us, you may become fascinated with ...

Welcome! Cody will show you around back. Part of our backyard. We're gathered in the shade. More shade, and some food. Also some of our great next-door neighours. My sister-in-law Marcie ("mkk") made the trip from New Jersey. Our nephew Dave drove from western Massachusetts, met his mom at the Buffalo airport, and they drove up to our place together. We spent Saturday evening and part of Sunday with them, which was a really special treat. Our friends James (of wmtc commenter fame) and Lori. S&A, fellow US defectors. They moved to Canada three days before us - and found us through my Globe & Mail essay. Shane and his wife (not sure how to spell her name). A nice party photo. Someone showed up without a face. Cody and Ellen, who lived at our place while we were in Peru. Dave, Laura, Claudia, Allan, and some knees. Lori, Paul (Ellen's partner), and Dianne. Dianne and I met in an online community, long before I ever thought I'd move to Canada. Carlee (cleavage...

Last week, for my birthday , Allan gave me a treasure trove of books, CDs and DVDs - a real haul. Yet he said that my Real Present had been delayed, and these were merely substitute gifts. Apparently he was hoping Real Present would arrive in time for the wmtc party, but no luck. Meanwhile, in the excitement of party prep, I forgot all about it. When I came home tonight, he handed me a package (in between innings!), obviously a wrapped book, and a lengthy one. I couldn't imagine what book he could have been waiting for, what this Real Present could be. Wow. It's a slightly edited version (some posts omitted) from my first post (July 11, 2004) to my year-end wrap-up (December 31, 2005). He worked with a designer on the beautiful cover, and it's available for purchase at Cafe Press. Man, I don't know what to say right now. I'm overwhelmed. You can look at the front and back covers, and spine, here on my very own Cafe Press page .

From Democracy Rising : A Fathers’ Day Statement by Michael Berg Of all of the holidays a grieving father can be confronted with after the death of his child, Fathers’ Day is for me the most difficult. My son Nick died in Iraq on May 7, 2004. He is buried next to my father, who had died just a year and a half before. That is not the way it’s supposed to be. I’m supposed to go somewhere between my father and my son. My mother is on the other side of my father, and my mother’s parents are nearby. My proud immigrant grandparents died first, then my parents died many years later. That is the way it is supposed to be. I want to make sure no father suffers the loss of their son or daughter in Iraq or a future illegal war of aggression. I urge all those who oppose the military occupation of Iraq and do not want to see future wars of choice to sign the Voters' Pledge at VotersForPeace . Nearly fifty thousand people have already signed. It will let politicians know that we will not suppor...

I had an interesting conversation with someone at work recently, and I'd like to hear your thoughts. I'll preface this by emphasizing that the person I spoke with - we'll call her PA, for Person A - is not a bigot, not overtly racist, and seems open-minded. She grew up in Canada, and has traveled in many parts of the world. I'll also say that my conversation with PA was not confrontational or adversarial at all. I mostly just listened, or gently offered my own perspective from my own experience. PA said Canadians are "too easy-going," too unlikely to make a fuss when they should stand up for themselves. When I asked what she was referring to, it turned out to be about immigration and multiculturalism. PA took pains to emphasize that she appreciates a multicultural society, that she believes it enriches everyone, that Canadian society is stronger and more interesting for its diversity. I believe her. PA's central gripe went something like this. (I'll pa...

The iced coffee problem has been solved! (Alex E, are you reading?) Thanks to James and Lori, I checked out the Port Credit Starbucks. Lo and behold: ice brewed coffee and the horrendously named but delicious iced Americano. I don't know where there are Starbucks in Toronto, but I'll soon be learning. I'm also going to tell Second Cup, for what it's worth, that I'd rather spend my loonies there, if only they'd satisfy my summer craving. Ahhhhhh....

I think the first (annual?) wmtc party was a success. I really don't know. It appeared that everyone was enjoying themselves. When you're the host, it's so hard to tell. People talked, ate, remarked on the enormity of our backyard. It was a very hot day, and groups of people migrated around the yard, huddling in shade. I had no idea our yard got that much sun! It looked like a sparse crowd, but then, in our yard, anything would - kind of like listening to chamber music in a football arena. About 20-25 people showed up, including several wmtc readers. Attendees you might know included G , James , and Diamond Jim , who has just arrived in Canada! My friend D from Waterloo, who I met online long before I ever dreamed I'd live in Canada, came, as did three groups of American ex-pats who contacted me after my Globe And Mail essay ran, and long-time reader/lurker Shane, who made me happy by asking for an invitation. They all seemed like terrific people who I'd love to ...

The wmtc party is today! I have a serious, discussion-oriented post lined up, but I'll save it for another day. Now, to get ready.

At Zeller's: "Will you be using your HBC card today?" "No." "Do you have an HBC rewards card?" "No." "Would you like to apply for one today?" "No." "Would you like to donate one dollar to [unintelligible]?" "No. Thank you." And unfortunately, because I found the cashier nearly impossible to understand, the conversation actually sounded like this: "Will you be usinzyershababalalay?" "Sorry?" "Will you be using your sheesha bleeza today?" "No." "Do you have a kurjashablablahcard?" "Sorry?" "Do you have an blatherbebeddy card?" "I'm sorry, what did you say?" "Would you like to jabbawabbablabla today?" "No." "Would you like to donate one dollar to wazeewhahoolie?" "No. Thank you." Please just let me buy these two items and get out of this store!!

Whole Foods, the upscale supermarket chain, has announced it will stop selling live lobsters and soft-shell crabs. Customers craving fresh crustaceans will have to look beyond Whole Foods Market Inc. after the natural-foods grocery chain decided Thursday to stop selling live lobsters and crabs on the grounds that it's inhumane. The Austin-based grocer spent seven months studying the sale of live lobsters from ship to supermarket aisle, trying to determine whether the creatures suffer along the way. In some stores, they experimented with "lobster condos," filling tanks with stacks of large pipes the critters can crawl inside. And they moved the tanks behind seafood counters and away from children's tapping fingers. Ultimately, Whole Foods management decided to immediately stop selling live lobsters and soft-shell crabs, saying they could not ensure the creatures are treated with respect and compassion. "We place as much emphasis on the importance of humane treatm...

Cody has been so sweet lately. She's really thriving as the only dog in our pack. She spends lots of time outside, says hello to all the other dogs she meets on our walks, and has lots of new human friends (especially her Favourite Person In The World, our next-door neighbour). She's even more affectionate to us, in her own low-key way, now that she doesn't have a dog brother or sister to obsess on. Cody loves sticks. Finding them, chewing them, carrying them, chasing them (although not retrieving them). And the bigger, the better. She loves to bite down a huge branch - sometimes several times longer than she is, and full of leaves - and drag it around the backyard. She has a special corner of the yard where she brings all her stick treasures, stockpiling them for future use. The other day I was cutting down a patch of dead shrubs - mostly sticks with some leaves on the top. Cody came over, turned her head sideways, and tried to pick up a stick that was still rooted in the ...

About ten days ago, I blogged about someone who - at the time - was known only as "LT". Since that time, his identity has been revealed. From the website Thank You, LT : On Wednesday, June 7th U.S. Army First Lieutenant Ehren Watada became the first commissioned officer to refuse deployment to the unlawful Iraq war and occupation. He announced his duty to disobey the illegal order to deploy to Iraq in coordinated press conferences in Tacoma, Washington and Honolulu, Hawaii via a video taped messaged due to a direct military order not to attend the pre-scheduled Tacoma press conference. You can listen to Lt. Watada's statement here. It is no surprise that the US military is trying to silence Lt. Watada. From Thank You, LT : The following day, Thursday, June 8th, Lt. Watada's commanding officer moved to prosecute Lt. Watada for nothing more than his protected free speech. Lt. Watada was read his rights and declined to make a statement without a lawyer present. Although...

Thanks for all your birthday wishes, my friends. Here's how I spent the day. I had to get some work done in the morning, unfortunately, but it went well. Allan showered me with gifts and cards, as usual. The man is a great Birthday Guy. He says my Big Present is late, so yesterday's book, CDs and DVDs were "fill in" gifts. Cool! We had tickets to The Real Thing , part of our Soulpepper subscription, but I decided to exchange them for another performance. I'm feeling too busy to relax and enjoy a play. Besides, working three nights a week, we already miss too much baseball. We decided to see the play when it doesn't conflict with the Red Sox. (James, what's that you said about fandom as a career...?) So from the Soulpepper box office in the Distillery District, we walked over to the Jamie Kennedy Wine Bar . Many thanks to Genet for this excellent recommendation (seconded by Gazetteer ). It was fabulous, and such an Allan and Laura kind of place. We sat at ...

I'll just repeat what I wrote last year. This year I just feel all those things more deeply. And the fifth holiday ( also mentioned here ) will be celebrated on August 30.

In a review of Douglas Coupland's new book, JPod : And still we gravitate toward the familiar, no matter how frequently or profoundly it has let us down in the past; we always prefer the cold comfort of formula to the white-hot panic of unpredictability — modest security over the risk associated with trying something different. At least we do if we live in the United States, which is perhaps why we so desperately need a Canadian to make sense of our lives for us. I don't read Coupland, personally. I just liked that sentence.

1. I am still an American citizen. That is not a matter of choice. The US and Canada require that I retain my American citizenship for a certain number of years, no matter where I live. 2. I am not a Democrat. I have voted Democrat in some elections and for progressive third-party candidates in others. In general I hate the Democrats almost as much as I hate the Republicans. 3. You are free to express all your opinions. However, I am under no obligation to host your opinions. That is not censorship. Censorship would be if you were somehow prevented from having your own blog, say, wemovetocanadasucks.blogspot.com. I have no power to censor you and wouldn't exercise that power if I had it. 4. I am not attacking you. I did not post insulting, ignorant comments on your blog. You, however, posted insulting, ignorant comments on my blog, which you freely admit you did not even bother to read. 5. This is my own blog. My partner, whose blog you also know, reads and comments on my blog, an...