Sunday, November 02, 2008
I usually ignore commercials on TV. Sometimes there might be a quirky or humourous element that I will remember, but then would be hard pressed to say what the commercial was actually advertising. Kev has been glued to the TV of late, catching the last race of the F1 season. There is a commercial on the channel (not network) that I find particularly offensive. I am almost certain its creators were all men, and can imagine how this ad was pitched to the client. It's a spot for a chain of auto-body shops. The premise is: think of a body shop as a day spa for cars! The commercial alternates between shots of a naked woman (with strategically positioned towels) undergoing various spa treatments (massage, make-up, hair) with shots of a car undergoing various stages of body work (filling, sanding, painting). The initial idea seems innocent enough, but the end product left me feeling rather uneasy. The car/woman comparison has been around for a long time, but rather than anthropomorphizing the car, I can't help but feel that the objectification of the woman is more emphasized. Ladies! Come in for a upgrade to your body, lest your owner trade you in for a newer model. Hey - I think I've just come up with an idea for an ad for a cosmetic surgery chain...
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Argghhh...John McCain just said in the debate that "Sarah Palin is a role model for women". Not this woman.
Friday, September 26, 2008
OK. I can't stand it anymore. Have to say something about Sarah Palin. When Kev first informed me of McCain's pick for VP, I was intruiged. A relatively young woman! What a progressive choice for the GOP! Then I read a little about her, and decided that the selection was based just on her gender. The guys at work (all conservative, save for 1, bless his soul) all couldn't believe that I could condemn her based on stuff I had read, not bothering to sit through a whole speech or interview. She's a woman after all, why wouldn't I like her?! Actually, what really ticked me off was one of the very first sound bites I heard comparing herself to Hillary Clinton, and how she may be able to break the glass ceiling that Hillary could not. It was an ironic or inadvertantly enlightened statement as it could turn out that breaking the glass ceiling has less to do with doing your job as well or better than a man, than with being pretty. Either she is taking the post-feminist view of "Ok, I'm being taken advantage of, but man, am I ever gonna work it", or she has a great amount of hubris, or she is just plain naive. I mean, out of all of the Republican women out there, this was the best they could come up with? Does she think that SHE is the best they could come up with? I wonder what Condoleeza Rice is making of all of this. And the no passport until last year. Clearly she is a person who is quite happy to stay close to home, and there is nothing wrong with that. Unless you're running for Vice President, and are 1 heartbeat away from the Presidency. Those positions of office require individuals who have an awareness and perspective of their country as it sits on the world stage, and in order to form that, you need exposure to other cultures. And the best way to gain that knowledge is to travel. For her to explain to Katie Couric the reason why she didn't travel until recently was that her parents did not give her a passport, and that she wasn't a back-packy kind of gal, and that she was working 2 jobs forever is rubbish. Could it be that she just wasn't that interested? She is even less travelled that George W. before he became President, but at least he could ask Dad for advice. I still haven't sat through a whole interview, and I don't think I could - too much cringing is involved. There, I feel better now.
Thursday, August 28, 2008
It's been a long time since a post. Still recovering a bit from Peru - I caught a nasty cold while in the Amazon, imagine! Anyway, I was concerned about missing the kids while we were away. I remember saying goodbye to them, and blubbering my way through the farewell. Luckily, the trip was very busy, and there simply was not much opportunity to get weepy eyed about them. One night, during our Inca Trail hike, we had pasta with a tomato sauce for dinner. When I was handed my plate, I took hold of my knife and fork, and without hesitation, proceeded to cut my spaghetti up into very small pieces. When I was done, I was suddenly disappointed that my dinner was so chopped up - I hadn't realized that I had been so well trained by the kids!
Monday, June 30, 2008
After reading Kev's blog, I can see his metrosexual tendancies have been bubbling to the surface. The other day, I caught him watching "Yentl". No wonder they called him the "gay-guy" at Corel!
Friday, May 02, 2008
Despite some intense ribbing from Kev, (or perhaps in spite of it) I went to see the Police last night. When I was 15, I had the hugest crush on Sting, had all of their albums, and knew all of their songs by heart. I know they rolled through Montreal and Toronto last year with their tour, but I would have to say I couldn't name any band that I would travel to go see these days (in the mis-spent days of my youth, not so much). So when I heard they were coming to Ottawa, with Elvis Costello as opening act, there was no way I could NOT go see them. I got even more ribbing (not just from Kev, but from everyone - except Dan - god bless) when people found out how much I paid for my tickets. All is forgiven, because that was probably the best stadium concert that I've ever seen. I had a grin on my face the whole time, matched only by my girlfriend's from high school, who was my date for the evening. I guess I must be getting older, because I don't care if people think I'm lame!
Monday, April 21, 2008
Today did not start out so great. Left my purse (my Coach one at that)...on the bus. Just the thought is anxiety provoking. Gotta cancel my credit cards, replace my driver's licence, my health card, the kids' health cards, my keys - OMG! Gotta replace the cylinder on the front door already! And so on and so on. I discovered my gaffe a full 3 minutes after I got off the bus and sat down at my desk. What to do?! Phone OC Transpo. Get transfered to 3 different people. Explain same predicament to all 3 people. Figure out exactly which bus I was on. Describe exactly which seat I was sitting in. Find out I won't know if they find something until "before 9pm" the same day. It's 9:30am. Can't wait 12 hours...arrghhhh! Go for a walk to retrace my steps, come back to my desk to see a message waiting. Phone OC Transpo asap. Receive very good news that the bus driver found "something". Find out what time the bus will be back at the bus stop on the other side of the street. Get there 10 minutes early to be sure. It finally shows up! Get on the bus to have the bus driver say, "You must be Elaine. Here's your purse." Nothing was missing. Remind me to buy a lottery ticket today.
Wednesday, April 09, 2008
Note to Kev: Spooky picture of you in that helmet. The good news is that the running man video will cancel out any nightmares due to the former tonight.
Friday, March 14, 2008
I'm at the grocery store yesterday. The cashier is a young woman who does not have extensive experience in identifying produce. An older man is in front of me trying to buy a rutabaga. Of course, the cashier asks him what it is, and he replies, "It's a turnip". Last time I checked, turnips don't come the size of bowling balls, so nosy me interjects: "No, it's a rutabaga." The man looks at me, and then says, "In Canada, we call these turnips." Hmm. In Canada, we would call that man a person who doesn't know his root vegetables.
Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Hey - what happened to my old post? Oh well. The other day, Kev was watching TV with Em, and someone on TV was smoking a cigarette. Em asks Kev what that "white stick" is....do you swallow it? Anyway, it's very cool that Emmett has no idea what a ciggie is. Certainly, when both Kev and I were 6, we definately knew what they were.
Sunday, January 27, 2008
About a year ago, Kev and I invested in some plastic bins for groceries, in an attempt to eliminate our weekly purge of the multitude of plastic bags that would accumulate over the week. The bins are great, and so much better than dealing with all those bags. The only problem is that I often get a cashier who has no idea how to efficiently stack a bin. After they've put the box of clementines, the 6-pack of kleenex boxes in the bins and the 12-pack of tonic water, there's simply no room for all the other pesky non-boxed items such as fruit, vegetables, meat, and bread!
Friday, January 04, 2008
When I was a young girl, I marveled at my mother's hands. Not that they were pretty or soft, but at how prominent her veins were. Their protrusion from the surrounding skin would temp me to poke and prod at them, all the while asking," Does that hurt?". The answer was always no. Well, 30+ years have passed by, and now I have those veiny hands. Meanwhile, I look longingly at Em's and Maddie's plump, unblemished and perfect hands and am reminded once again at how quickly time goes by. I am comforted, however, by the fact that my Mom is still quite active, and is probably traveling more now than she ever has in her life.
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
Merry Christmas! With Em being 6 and Maddie being 3, they were both giddy with excitement this Christmas morning. As Em ripped open his first present, he remarked, "Santa heard me! At Dexter's birthday party, he got one of these, and I asked Santa at that time to get me one too!". Makes it worth all of the shopping until 11pm to hear something like that. With respect to Walmart, I would have to agree with Kev. I find it depressing, however, mainly due to the incredibly horrible lighting. The colour of the cheap fluorescent lighting is enough to dampen anyone's spirits. I can't completely knock it, though. I had been phoning both Toys'rus every day for 2 weeks to get this $5 toy that Em wanted (#1 on his list) . I managed to find 2 of them at Walmart. Nevermind the fact that I spent $90 on yet another lego set, the $5 toys are his favourite, and he's been jealously guarding them since.
Monday, December 17, 2007
My god, it's been a long time since a post. I can't really blame Facebook addiction, like Kev, though. I guess I haven't had much to say. No longer. NEW FRONT DOOR. You have no idea how long this item has been on our to do list. Being an architect, and living in a house that someone else has designed (well, the exterior anyway) doesn't leave too much for creativity. So, I guess that's where the obsession with the door came in. The first task was what the heck was this door going to look like - you didn't think we would go stock, did you? Then came the hardware - which far flung country was that going to come from (Italy). And then the shop drawing phase, approvals, revisions, more approvals and revisions, get the damn thing into production, and 10 weeks later, we have a front door...sitting in our dining room. Having spent all this time to get what we wanted, the last thing to fret about was how to get a nice enough finish worthy of the door. It seems like we won't be able to deal with the final finish until the spring (and it's not even officially winter yet), so primer in the meantime it will have to be. I really hope this whole thing will be worth it in the end. I guess this is why the shoemaker's children never had any shoes...too many possibilities!
Monday, September 24, 2007
Given the continuous talk of the sad state of our health care system, I was pleasantly surprised with my experience today. Don't get me wrong, it still took 6 hours, but a lot of stuff happened in that time. At 3:15 today, I get a call from the daycare. Emmett apparently has a strange rash. I pick him up half an hour later. I call the doctor at 4pm, only to get their answering machine stating that the office is closed. No worry though, because the message also directs me to the after hours clinic which I have access to by virtue of being a patient of my particular GP. I get an appointment for 5:50 later that afternoon. When we get there, the doctor is puzzled by the rash, calls in another doctor, and both of them agree that we should head down to CHEO. Meanwhile they phone CHEO to tell them that we're coming. We get there, and there is a big long process of lining up for triage, getting triaged, getting registered, waiting, and finally being seen by an intern, and then the experienced doctor. Turns out Emmett has "idiopathic urticaria", med-speak for hives of unknown origin. Finally back home at midnight, but at least we can sleep sound.
Sunday, September 09, 2007
Oh it's been a long time since a post. Summer went by too quickly, of course. Yesterday, Kev replaced the last major window in our house. All of the others up to then had been fairly easy, and he did them all himself. He had fine-tuned the process to the point that he felt he could install this last window without taking off the trim on the inside of the house, and with the brick-mold already installed on the outside of the window. After a couple of hours, Kev was joined by Mike to help put the window in place. An other hour passed, and I noticed that Bryan had joined them. Upon seeing the three of them together, I couldn't help but remark that the installation of this single window took an architect, a window manufacturer and a contractor to complete. Just imagine what the bill would have been if there had been one!
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
There is this bus driver that I get sometimes whom I refer to as the "Bus Nazi". A very unpleasant fellow. He gets extremely irritated should you not follow every single rule and regulation. He will not let you on the bus should the bus leave the designated stop, even if it's just a few feet, and he's waiting for the light to turn green. He also greatly frowns upon disembarking at the front, and heaven forbid, should you cross the yellow line on the floor at any time other than when the bus is a complete stop. This morning, I had to run for the bus, and luckily, there were quite a few people in line, so I had plenty of time to get there, as to not delay the bus. No luck in not pissing him off, though. The extra three seconds it took to board me made him miss the light. He even said out loud, "Great, I missed the the light!" Like he had somewhere to go. If OC Transpo wants to increase their ridership, they should reign in these zealots on a power trip. I'm glad it's bike riding season.
Monday, June 04, 2007
OK, I have to comment on the pregnant lady's plight on the bus...she should feel lucky that she's only 17 weeks pregant with no one giving up their seat for her. I went all the way to the end with no seats offered, so it's only gonna get worse. Not that I'm excusing such behaviour. On to a subject I've been meaning to write about - a short dictionary of Maddie's favourite words/phrases: pigu: pigtails I not!: I'm not! lookus: little swim like a tail: well, swim and Kev's favourite - bewp: burp
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
I have to say that I am really feeling my age, with respect to my memory. It's the reason why my blog hasn't been updated for months - I couldn't remember the username or the password to the Google account. Then last week when I couldn't remember the combination on my lock, the one I've had for 15 years. And also when I couldn't remember my member number at the place where we buy our organic produce (it's only a 3 digit number, and I've been a member for 5 years!) I would like to think that the reason for my memory lapses is due to the fact that I have so much stuff in my brain that it's full, and something has to give.
Friday, March 23, 2007
It's been so busy, that I haven't had time to update my blog. Actually, I had found a minute or 2 in the past few months, but Blogger required me to create a Google account, and that little extra effort was enough to discourage me from posting anything. I have a minute now, because Em is once again sick. I knew this was coming, as we had an incredibly healthy summer, fall, and Christmas, so much so that I was congratulating myself and my family for being so healthy. Then came February and March. We have been pretty much sick these last 2 months. Lots of coughing, nasty cold sores, phlegm!!!! I think we've filled our illness quotient until next winter.
|