Saturday, January 31, 2009

Fine feathered friends








We have finally had a break from the snowing and blowing .. long enough to get outside and spend some quality time with my little chickadees!

Thursday, January 22, 2009

For all the cynics, who want to pour cold water on Obama supporters

J. Crew Shares jumped after the first family donned the company's clothing at Inaugural events. The company's website also crashed for a while due to the volume of searches for coats similar to those worn by the adorable First Daughters.

Who says that President Obama can't turn this mess around?

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

How we celebrated the Inauguration

With Cupcakes of Triumph, of course!



Hail to the Chief!


Would you like a cupcake, Mr. President?

Sunday, January 18, 2009

A SQUEEEE!!!!! for posterity

I'm watching The We Are One Obama Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial online.

Mr. Garth Brooks - the greatest artist America has ever seen, thankyouverymuch - is singing We Shall Be Free on the steps where my son and I stood four months ago.

This is the greatest country on earth, poised to enter its greatest moments.

Saturday, January 17, 2009

Sends shivers up my spine!


(Shamelessly lifted from The Huffington Post.)

I love, love, love this picture of our President-Elect on the train from Baltimore to Washington.

Some may say that the whistle-stop trip is overly theatrical, and perhaps it is. I love it anyways. I love trains, I love the dramatic, and I love the promise that is represented by this trip.

After seeing this picture, I started playing around on youtube. I love, love, love, Will.I.Am's homage to Barack Obama's "Yes We Can" speech. And I love, love, LOVE! this a capella version of it. Please enjoy!



I believe in the promise of this new inauguration. I believe in the promise of this new administration. I believe in the promise of change. I believe we can all be better.

Yes.
We.
Can.

Friday, January 16, 2009

Now, here's a bailout that I can get behind!

The California Nurses' Association has long been an advocate for single-payer, guaranteed universal health care. I have always been a believer in this approach - not just because I'm a liberal Canadian nurse - but because it is the sane and humane way to treat people. Anything less is uncivilized.

Now, more than ever, we need a single-payer system. Not only would it improve the health of America's people, it would also help to resuscitate the economy.

From that press release comes the quote of the day: Establishing a national single-payer style healthcare reform system would provide a major stimulus for the U.S. economy by creating 2.6 million new jobs, and infusing $317 billion in new business and public revenues, with another $100 billion in wages into the U.S. economy, according to the findings of a groundbreaking study released today.

Socialized medicine was already deeply carved into the makeup of Canada's culture and identity when I started nursing school twenty years ago. I remember, with great clarity, the words of one of my professors: Health care is not simply a fundamental human right. It goes beyond that. The health of a country's population is its greatest natural resource, and should be funded and protected as such.

Last year, I took care of a gentleman with multiple fractures who had fallen down a flight of stairs. He was one of the millions of working, uninsured poor in this country. My heart broke to see him crying in fear and despair, unsure of how he could possibly pay for this hospitalization. I'll make payments every week until I die if necessary! he sobbed. Those words are etched into my heart. No-one in this, the greatest country on the planet, should ever have to utter those words. And someday, in the not-too-distant, civilized, sane future, no-one ever will.

The joys of being eleven






Eat. Sleep. Do schoolwork. Ride the Millenium Falcon down Thompson Park Hill.
Sounds like a pretty sweet gig to me!

Thursday, January 15, 2009

Baby it's cold outside



I ventured outside long enough to catch a picture of the sunset this afternoon. No-one in this house needs to go anywhere for the time being, so we have hunkered down for the duration.

Earlier this week, I did battle with my first cold in years. With brandy, Buckley's, and bedrest in my arsenal, I emerged victorious.

I have come to view these periods of forced downtime as a necessary gift from Mother Nature. In the stillness of winter, we can finally hear our own thoughts.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

And the travesty continues

In the blight on the American ideal of justice that is Gitmo, they're playing games. Again.

Less than one week before Omar Khadr's trial was finally set to begin - after six years in detention - the charges against him were secretly dropped and then refiled. And back he goes into limbo. Again.

Tuesday, January 06, 2009

January beauty

I love the way that ice develops in a body of moving water. Crystal by crystal, it is constantly changing .. the very antithesis of a frozen entity.



Prince Edward County, Ontario, January 2009

Friday, January 02, 2009

The cat's got my .. brain!

Chalk it up to too much sugar ..



.. or too much snow ..



But this morning, after indulging in a bit of shared bird-watching with my crazy cat Gandalf ..



.. during which the conversation goes something like this: Meow Meow Meow meow Meow meow meow ..

.. I walked into the kitchen, where the Mister was making the coffee, and meowed at him.

And it took me a full minute of quizzically staring at his quizzical stare to realize that I had failed to switch back to English after speaking feline.

It's official. I am a crazy cat lady.

Thursday, January 01, 2009

This type of partying needs to go out of style

After the ball drops
Forty-two tons of garbage
Remain on Times Square

The same old, same old
Foolish, selfish "reverie"
Choking Mother Earth