yoinked from ruadh1888What American accent do you have? Your Result: North Central
Couple thoughts...My cousin and her husband have moved to Quebec, he's in the forces and I guess got transferred there. She's a nurse... but she has to write some kind of exam or something, and has to learn French in 3 years. Also they had to pay some kind of "bienvenue tax" as he called it... an $1800 tax for moving to another friggin province???? WTF? The language thing I can see, but the tax is like a head tax. Sure, Quebec is in some ways a nation of its own, but it sure sounds like their bureaucracy is enforcing that it's a nation as well.I'm rattling around my apartment today. I have figured out that the only way I clean up my clutter is to actually spend time there, looking at it, then I get annoyed and clean it up. I have to go area by area, carefully looking for stuff that's gotta go... it's not obvious to me at first glance. I've potted a plant that I had stolen from a flower planter downtown, I'm finishing up a hem on some dress pants, I've finished crocheting a scarf for my new coat, and I have put the finishing touches on some crafty wood painted items. Yesterday I cleaned the bathroom and kitchen. Today I'll tackle the living room floor. And maybe change a bike tire inner tube.In another couple weeks, I'm going to a taping of The Hour. I told my cousin about it (she's 12) and she wants to come with me. I told her she has to be off school (they tape during the day) and I have to be off work as well. Also she has to make her way into the city; being 12 and all, I'm not sure how we'd engineer that. Hmm! It would be a hoot to go with her. I hadn't realized she watched the show, she says now that it's on at 11pm it's past her bedtime LOL I remember bedtimes. I have a few more vacation days to take still, I'm going to go to some tourist thingies in the area for good measure, hopefully a Cityline taping as well. Ha ha.I guess I'm a SOCAN member now. I got... nothing, except an email. I spose if I'd paid $25 to register via hard copy paper snail mail, I might have something on paper to show for it. I have an email to show for it. No probs... just anticlimactic.My dad held his new grandson at a get-together last night... LOL I think he'll have more fun with him when he starts to walk and talk and be able to participate in banter and gentle teasing.
So I'm reading my corrie updates again... last time I really followed the storyline was 6 months ago... so now when I watch the TV, ie Canadian storyline, I'm all caught up LOLbut the UK storyline is juicy right now, and I enjoyed giving my mom the spoiler info that she enjoys.
I liked this story. Maybe record companies should complain less about file sharing and do more actual work.Eye Weekly is a Toronto entertainment paper, and they dug this story out of their archives.http://www.eye.net/eye/issue/issue_10.26.06/features/anniversary.phpIT'S THE LATEST THING: THE WALL OF NO SOUND Taking a page from a 1989 stunt by Q magazine, Eye Weekly sends a press kit for a fake band (The Obvious) to 20 record companies accompanied by a completely blank fake demo tape. Seven caught on to the silence, five didn't get around to responding, three rejected it unopened due to policies against unsolicited submissions while five companies claimed to have listened closely to the tape without noticing it was blank, including Chris Manson of Duke Street Records, who said, "I listened to it two days ago, just the first couple songs, while weeding through tapes. It's in my 'listen to again' pile." (April 2)
These bullets crack me up... someone has gone to a lot of trouble to make all these the exact number of letters.
Well folks, it looks like I'm skipping church again today, both the new style church-in-a-gym I went to once recently, and the old-school Catholic one I haven't been to all year.I feel somewhat guilty... mostly that my playing hooky from church shows a lack of discipline, and discipline is what I need more of in my life. I need to clean this effing apartment up today, I've gone the whole week without milk or juice so I need to go grocery shopping BIG time. I need to finish altering these 2 pairs of pants I bought oh maybe last spring or fall, I forget. I should really buy a new winter coat... I have one, but I've had my eye on a longer wool style one since last year, and I should get my ass in gear while they're still in the stores. I'm trying to dress more like a 35 year old than a 20 year old. Well I do have 35 year old style clothes, however I just dress for comfort by default. I want to get some new shoes to wear under jeans, ie that are not running shoes. I was going to buy some cutesy Puma running shoes, but looks like I will get some more adult-looking dressy shoes. I like the look of the wee stiletto under jeans, but I realize that I'm more of a Birkenstock wearing girl, so I figured I'd find something with a wider, more stable heel. I saw some I liked on a person on the GO train, so I will seek out something similar. And it can be ankle boots, because it will be under jeans. Wearing stilettos in the snow would SUCK. I have heeled loafers that I like, but they're deteriorating, so I might get new ones of those too. Fuck I hate looking younger and having to explain all the time, so it's time to maybe ditch the T-shirts and skater runners that I love so much and start dressing like an adult... I like the dressier clothing too, I just am such a creature of habit that the white t-shirt comes out every morning. LOL However I think my face is the primary issue with looking younger - it's just how it's shaped. God I'm sick of talking about it too, I just want the discussion to end once and for all.I just have to make an extra effort to be stylish, otherwise I would wear the same thing every day. Heh I make that style effort twice a year when i go shopping, then I don't think about it till it's shopping time agian.I'm so fucking tired, I have so much shit to do, that going to church would kill my morning, it seems to eat up so much time, for an hour spent in church, that is. Also, the singer there is BRUTAL and it's primarily what keeps me out of that church. For a properly trained organist, he certainly sings like someone playing a kazoo.I called my sister yesterday. I wanted to pop in; I was going to visit my friend who lives nearby, who wasn't home yet, and wanted to pop in on my sister and say Hi. So after I'm settled in to my friend's house, my sister DOES call, and I have to tell her nicely No, I'm not coming over but maybe I'll come over tomorrow. (luckily I think she's so addled with caring for the baby that she doesn't realize I'm blowing her off) When I'm not really in her area at all. But I want to see the baby, so I will go later, after I'm done grocery shopping and spending money at the mall.I'm still tired, and I have a fucking headache, so I need to get this show on the road so I can get to bed early tonight. ARGH
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20061020.MATH20/TPStory/EducationGender bias in math skills doesn't add up, scientists sayWomen reminded of negative stereotypes underperform on tests, UBC study findsUNNATI GANDHI Are women worse at math than men? Researchers at the University of British Columbia think they have answered that question and can put an end to the fractious debate.Women who are told that their gender affects their math skills do poorly on tests; those told that their math skills depend on how they were raised perform better."If they think they can't do anything about it -- that they belong to a group that is mathematically dumb because of their genes -- [women] react by choking, or underperforming," said Ilan Dar-Nimrod, the lead author of the study published in today's issue of the journal Science.Mr. Dar-Nimrod, a PhD student in social psychology at UBC, gave 220 female study participants bogus scientific explanations for alleged sex differences in math, then had them write math tests. If they think they do poorly in math simply because it's more about nurture than nature, they will react by saying "that doesn't apply to me" and then excel, Mr. Dar-Nimrod said yesterday, adding that people can be highly malleable.The study highlights a key concept in psychology known as the "stereotype threat," where a person tends to underperform when reminded of a negative label associated with a group to which they belong. It also deflates the genetic-superiority argument that has been preached for decades, including a much-criticized statement last year by Lawrence Summers, who was then president of Harvard University.At a private talk, Dr. Summers suggested the shortage of women among the ranks of elite research scientists might be partly due to "innate differences" between the sexes. Dr. Summers, who resigned from his post soon after making the comments, said women have an inferior "natural ability" to succeed in science and math careers.His statements drew harsh criticism from academics of both sexes across the continent.Joshua Aronson, a professor of applied psychology at New York University who specializes in stereotypes and self-esteem, said in an interview yesterday that Dr. Summer's comments were based on incorrect assumptions held by many people."When people think about biology, they tend to confuse it with things that are fixed and immutable. That's incorrect," Prof. Aronson said.If women are reminded of their gender before they take a math test, they'll do worse than if they're told they are highly accomplished students at a selective university, he said. So are women truly worse at math than men?Mary Pugh, associate professor of mathematics at the University of Toronto, doesn't think so. She says stereotypes by their very nature are flawed, but society hasn't come to terms with this fact."When I went to graduate school, the math department had five storeys and there was a men's bathroom on each storey. There was a woman's bathroom only one place in the building and it was next to the secretary's office. So, what type of message does that send to female undergraduates, and graduate students and post-docs and assistant professors?" she asked.These new findings are among the latest research to show how stereotypes can affect behaviour. An earlier study found that the elderly did worse at cognitive tests when they were primed to think of age and its frailties, but did better when they were primed to think of age as a source of wisdom."We have to address the issue that when we study human beings, it's not like studying worms. People are affected by the information they receive," Mr. Dar-Nimrod said. "Making someone think something is immutable or unchangeable is very powerful and very dangerous."
I was suspicious that this woman who killed her two kids was abused... turns out it's very likely she was, and what's worse, seems she was hospitalized for depression into the bargain. What a sad sad story.http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20061011.wxbarrie12/BNStory/National/homeRole of CAS questioned after Barrie slayingsANTHONY REINHART AND CHRISTIE BLATCHFORD From Thursday's Globe and MailThe mother accused of first-degree murder in the deaths of her two little girls last week was admitted to a psychiatric ward of a local hospital as a suicidal patient just five months earlier.Frances Elaine Campione, The Globe and Mail has confirmed, was admitted to the Royal Victoria Hospital in Barrie, Ont., for an emergency assessment.The 31-year-old's history in an active file at the Children's Aid Society of Simcoe County raises alarming questions about why the agency returned her two vulnerable youngsters Serena, 3, and Sophia, who was just a year old to her care and what workers and supervisors were doing to monitor her.Ms. Campione was admitted to hospital early last June after taking an overdose of medication and leaving a suicide note. She was discharged June 30, and within a week or so, The Globe has learned, had managed to regain custody of the little girls and had them back living with her.Sophia and Serena Campione returned to their mother days after she left a psychiatric ward. Ms. Campione was discharged the same day that another mother who was on the ward at the same time walked out of the Royal Vic but with a battery of support services in place.This woman, who has asked to remain anonymous, was suffering from postpartum depression after the recent birth of a second daughter.When released, she was involved with various community agencies, on medication and feeling much better.But, she told The Globe in a lengthy interview, Ms. Campione was still acting very erratic, right to the last day. I have no idea how she got out at the same time.Indeed, on their last day in hospital, the woman said, Ms. Campione, who had fought with other patients and was considered very difficult to get along with, improbably presented them with fancy pens from the hospital gift shop as well as thank you cards.Even on the ward, where the woman said people were all there for different reasons and extremely supportive of one another, Ms. Campione kept her distance.According to this woman, it seemed Ms. Campione felt the whole world was against her. . . . It seemed like she would just kind of blame everything on everything that was going around her. It was her in-laws' fault that she doesn't have the kids; it was the CAS's problem; her husband destroyed her life, you know.Ms. Campione and her husband, Leo, whom she had accused of assault and threatening, were going through a bitter custody battle. As a result of those unproven charges, Mr. Campione was under a restraining order that prohibited him from being alone with his children.When Ms. Campione was hospitalized, Serena and Sophia moved in with their paternal grandparents, which meant that Mr. Campione, who was living with his folks, had to move out.But the suicide attempt and hospitalization were not the only warning signs that the young mother may have been in trouble.At least one of Ms. Campione's relatives, a member of the Goodine family, and one professional had expressed concern to authorities about the safety of the little girls in the months before their slayings.As well as the criminal investigation of the children's deaths, the Office of the Ontario Coroner is conducting a separate review of any community agency involvement with the Campione family.It is this Ontario government office that drove, through various coroner's inquests into the deaths of children who were either in the care of, or ostensibly being monitored by, children's aid societies, the most significant recent legislative change in child welfare: the requirement in law that it is the child's best interest, not the family's or a parent's, that must be paramount.There have been a raft of notorious cases in the past 15 years where youngsters, purportedly being watched over by one children's aid society or another, were revealed after their deaths to have been the victims of battering, abuse and even starvation.Inquests have shown that time and time again, child-care workers identify too closely with the mother's needs to the detriment of the vulnerable children involved.Indeed, a sweeping review of the death of a 13-month-old Newfoundland boy named Zachary Turner, released last week, found that despite the massive publicity in the deaths of other youngsters across the country, the social workers in Zachary's case made the same mistake.http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=b08df704-7817-4a00-83ac-3e1630af6d06&k=99226Slain girls' father was on verge of more accessCampione vs. Campione. Court files allege mother suffered years of abuse Allison Hanes, National PostPublished: Wednesday, October 18, 2006 BARRIE - After more than a year of barely seeing his two young daughters, Leonardo Campione appeared to have been on the verge of more regular visits with Serena, 3, and Sophia, 1, when they were found dead in his estranged wife's low-rent apartment.The 35-year-old construction worker was still facing criminal charges for allegedly beating his wife and slapping Serena -- charges he denies. But documents show Mr. Campione was headed to family court on Oct. 6, bolstered by a report from the Children's Aid Society endorsing unsupervised access to his girls for the first time since his wife filed for divorce in June, 2005.Court papers also suggest Mr. Campione, who is accused by his former wife of subjecting her to years of trauma, planned to alert the court to "clinical issues" he felt might be impairing his wife's abilities as a mother.Instead, the two blonde toddlers were found dead of unspecified causes the day before the hearing. On the date he would have made his pitch for joint custody, 31-year-old Frances Elaine Campione stood before a judge to be formally charged with the girls' first-degree murder.After the Campione vs. Campione court file was finally made public yesterday, it showed the tide may have been turning in the father's favour in the divorce and custody battle.After more than a year of being cut off completely from seeing his children because of his bail conditions and a restraining order, Mr. Campione enjoyed a series of closely supervised visits with his daughters last summer at a provincial custody access centre.He brought them homemade pasta, took photographs, brought gifts, played games and held the girls on his lap while they drew pictures during encounters that staff members reported were tender and loving.Along with the positive CAS report saying he posed no risk to the girls despite nine criminal charges including assault and causing bodily harm, Mr. Campione also had a letter from an anger-management counsellor saying he was making good progress.All this could have complicated Mrs. Campione's attempts to win sole custody of Serena and Sophia so she could return to her native New Brunswick and start a new life.After burying his two daughters last week, Mr. Campione decided not to oppose a bid by several media to scrutinize more than 250 pages documenting the disintegration of his marriage, despite the ugly portrait it painted of him."As difficult as it may be for me to publicly refrain from rebutting, through specific evidence or testimony, any defamatory claims made public against me, I cannot compromise the integrity of my upcoming trial," Mr. Campione explained yesterday in a written statement released by his lawyer."Furthermore, I do not want to compromise the investigation into the murder of my children."Mrs. Campione, meanwhile, failed to give her family lawyer any instructions from behind bars on whether to ask for the legal file to be sealed.Through affidavits, letters, reports, financial statements, judicial orders, medical records and social services reports, the court file tells a he said/she said tale of two parents playing tug of war over their kids.According to Mrs. Campione's version of events, she endured years of physical and emotional trauma by an alcoholic, controlling husband, only deciding to walk away from the marriage when he turned on their child.None of the allegations have been proven in court.Originally from New Brunswick, Mrs. Campione met her future husband when she came to Ontario to work as a nanny.The couple had been in a relationship for four years and already lived together by the time they married on Aug. 24, 2003.They officially split on June 3, 2005, when Mrs. Campione fled their Bradford home for a woman's shelter, was examined in hospital, and pressed charges against her husband.In an affidavit she filed asking for a restraining order 10 days after walking out, Mrs. Campione claimed the abuse began six months into her first pregnancy and escalated until her departure."In February, 2005, the Respondent father assaulted me so badly that she that at the time of the assault, I believed that I was going to die," she said in the sworn statement. "I still remember every moment of the assault and my eldest daughter was present for the entire assault screaming an crying as she watched the Respondent father smash my head off the bathroom sink and floor. He then kicked and hit me repeatedly while I was down, yelling at me that it was all my fault."The last straw, according to Mrs. Campione's affidavit, was in June, 2005, when she alleged her husband approached Serena in her "high chair and stuck her in the face causing her lip to bleed and swell."At this point I knew that my children were now unsafe living under the same roof as the Respondent father," she said.The family court file contains a medical report detailing Mrs. Campione's injuries on June 5, 2005, two days after walking away from her marriage.With diagrams and photographs, it documented bruises on the side of Mrs. Campione's face, eye, thighs, lower legs and knee. The file also reveals the separated single mother benefitted from numerous social services.She was given a cellphone programmed to call 911 by a group that helps "high risk victims of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking" and was receiving counselling and support services from Women's Resources of Simcoe County as well as "outpatient supportive counselling" from Royal Victoria Hospital of Barrie "on a regular and ongoing basis since June 22, 2006."Just as Mrs. Campione painted an unflattering portrait of her husband as a violent man, Mr. Campione described his wife in court documents as unstable and erratic."The Applicant unfortunately has suffered emotionally throughout the marriage," he said in an affidavit dated Sept. 25, 2006. "After the separation, the Applicant has been hospitalized on more than one occasion as a result of mental breakdown... I verily believe that there are clinical issues with respect to the Applicant which ought to be made known to this honourable court."Although there is no CAS report on his wife's fitness as a mother in the family court file, Mr. Campione's sworn statement said the agency temporarily placed the children in the custody of his parents while she was hospitalized in May, 2006."The children remained in our care until July 9, 2006, when Elaine's doctor stated that she was no longer a risk to the children," Mr. Campione's father, Diego Campione, claimed in his own affidavit.This wasn't the first time he and his wife stepped in to care for their grandchildren, his statement also revealed."On Oct. 1, 2005, Elaine Campione showed up at my home with the children unannounced... Elaine and the children looked malnourished and distraught. My granddaughter Sophia had a severe diaper rash," Diego Campione said."Elaine's behaviour was strange and disturbing because she made no sense as she spoke. She was incoherent in her speech. She stated that she wanted us to take care of the children and to not let them forget their mother; that they needed their father. She stated that someone wanted to kill her."Diego Campione took his daughter-in-law to the hospital, where she remained in the psychiatric ward for seven days."I was told by the attending doctor and I verily believe that Elaine was unable to answer basic questions such as the day or month or where she was," his affidavit recalled of the experience. "I was told by the attending nurse and I verily believe that Elaine was in very bad shape mentally and at a stage where she might have harmed herself and the children."OFFICIAL STATEMENTSMrs. Campione said in an affidavit filed in Ontario Superior Court of Justice dated Oct. 2, 2006:"His physical abuse caused me to sustain black eyes and bruising. I was not allowed to go outside, not allowed to go to the doctor or communicate freely with my family... When a fight was over, he would get drunk. He was always sober when he inflicted the abuse which makes it all the more frightening... Our life was a rollercoaster with the Respondent's parents cajoling me to return to the Respondent when I tried to leave. I was so intimidated I would stay."Mr. Campione said in a statement released yesterday by his divorce lawyer:"I am well aware of the contents of the file and the allegations therein. I am innocent of these allegations and I have maintained my innocence from the beginning. As difficult as it may be for me to publicly refrain from rebutting, through specific evidence or testimony, any defamatory claims made public against me, I cannot compromise the integrity of my upcoming trial or the judicial process. I look forward to my trial date when I will have an opportunity to discuss these matters. Furthermore, I do not want to compromise the investigation into the murder of my children."
so... I'm getting somewhat proficient at morse code... well, better than I was a year ago. A year ago I ordered a 2 CD set of morse code lessons. Since then it's been kind of on and off... but recently I have plowed through it with more enthusiasm, and I know all the letters of the alphabet except for Q, Y, X, and Z. Well, I know Q and Y, but I keep mixing them up.It's been a great thing for me recently, what with me having no social life whatsoever... it's a great distraction from that, better than eating in the Ikea cafeteria, or people-watching in Square One. It's a great thing to take your mind off of stuff, because, as daunting as it is, sooner or later, the more you listen to the CD, it actually starts to sink in, and you make progress. Like, the milestone I have now reached, is while I'm walking from the GO train to work, I look at something around me, and I mentally spell out its name in morse code to myself, or I spell out things on street signs or whatever. It's fabulous, it's another language, and I have mostly learned it. The first day I did that easily, it was like a little breathless eureka moment and it was awesome.And that's not all... I think I'm at around 5 words per minute, which is like 15 km/h. Slow. My next challenge will be to get practice MP3s on the net, which are rated at speeds up to around 40 wpm, which starts to sound like a human modem. If I can get 15 wpm, fabulous. That seems to be the higher level of ham radio license in canada anyhow, who cares about ever achieving 40 wpm. I will be happy if I can decipher the morse code automated IDs that the local repeaters beep out periodically during the day (on my scanner). Morse code is geeky? Faaaahhhhhkkkk... who cares. I have a ham radio license anyhow to go with it. One of my favourite things about playing the piano was practising scales... same thing - enough repetition, the skills start to develop, and it's satisfying.And! I am teaching one of my co-workers to knit. I started her off relatively hard, with a 2x2 rib for a scarf. I figured, we're all grownups, why not? Flipping gears between knitting and purling is still messing her up, but she seems to be getting it all right. I'm showing her how to recover from mistakes too... as a kid, I learned one thing at a time, but as adults, we need lots of things to keep our interest level and motivation high.
Wow. Scrapbooking drives me mental. First off, who decided that it was a verb in the first place??? Second, since when is a set of alphabet cutters $199? I was in Michael's, buying yarn and paint and I saw this locked cabinet of stuff. Locked, presumably because it's a highly shoplifted item? Beside the stickers? Yes, it was scrapbooking stuff. You can buy things that are like cookie cutters, only with blades sharp enough to cut paper or photos into fancy shapes, etc. but you pay quite a big price for it. I saw a thing that was like a printer, more like a plotter with a blade, for cutting out stuff into paper, with precision. You can buy acid free book pages, with little metal edges so the corners don't get dogeared, you can buy patterned acid free paper, to cut out little letters and things, themed stickers, permanent markers with different shaped calligraphy tips, crap, it goes on and on and on. And it is not cheap. I mean, I know that photos and mementos and whatnot are precious, but I have mine in a Rubbermaid tub. They're safe there. Now the patterned papers are adorable, and the cute cutting templates are super neat. But doesn't it get old? Isn't there some creativity lost, when instead of drawing something, you buy it all designed already? Are you inadequate if you don't have design skills to make your photo albums look like something not from this planet? It just seems all so ready-made. Are our kids going to laugh at the hermetically sealed, pinking shears cut out everything acid free everything whatnot? With the metal page edges so it doesn't get dogeared?Yep, I do feel confident buying stuff and making it with no pattern or stuff. I sand the patterns off the wood stuff and paint my own things on. But everyone has something to say, with creative stuff, I think. Do you want to look like the person with the matchy matchy everything storebought not a hair out of place? But the girl on Queen St. with the hoodie sweatshirt under the peacoat with the scarf with crazy colours, it looks much cuter.I sound like such a hippie.
I've been praying a lot lately... I suppose I'm doing a form of meditating... just kind of focusing on having peace of mind, (at work, primarily, LOL) and being a better person (ie trying not to let the people at work set me off, and trying not to be as gossipy). If anyone's REALLY super-interested, I've been taping the audio from Joyce Meyer TV programs and listening to it on my MP3 player.Well some of the good results already are a bit more clarity of mind, and less procrastination! Eg. I have just put a load of laundry in the dryer - this early on a Saturday morning, I'm awake, but not usually this productive. Also I managed to go shopping before work, without a car, two days this week. (I had the bright idea of shopping near work, which has better transit) Somehow I am managing to cut through all the mental disorganization that I normally have. It's good... mind you the effort of the meditation is quite a lot too. It feels a bit like forcing myself to read a book for a class.
We're getting a bit of snow right now. I highly doubt it's staying on the ground, but it's nippy enough out now. I have put my flowerpots with bulbs into my fridge - if they freeze they will die, (found that out the hard way one day) but I figure if they're 5 C all winter, they'll grow again int he spring. Out of the fridge, of course.
heh so after a couple weeks of there being nothing really exciting at my local movie theatres, this sight greets my eyes:not one, but TWO movies that I'd like to see. Two distinctly different movies. sigh Might as well see both today, I work late all this coming week. Not sure about the third movie below, but LOL I'm not ruling it out.
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