A Little Less Floober, A Little More Tech

In the past few months, it’s become glaringly obvious that the amount of technology and telecom content here on jules.ca has been dwindling, being replaced by more and more floobergeist. As illustrated with this interesting little wordle art scrap. Wordle can’t lie. Apparently I’ve been pretty focused on politics lately ;-)

Cross my heart, more tech and telecom coming up. Two scoops.

Why are the Conservatives Ahead?

I throw up my hands and shake my head. I'm reading about polls, and debates and interviews in various resources. In almost all cases the Conservative response, if there has been one, has been one of suspicious, political dogma. Pick me because the other guys are scary. Pick me because I'm here already. Pick me and I won't change things up. Even with lukewarm responses to critical questions, the Conservatives are still expected to pull in over 30% of the vote.
The Conservatives have tried fear-mongering, playing to an idea that any other party doesn't have any international/foreign affairs experience. Ahem, this is Canada. We don't particularly have a requirement for serious foreign affairs expertise. We can't bully any one around, we generally follow suit with our southern neighbours (sometimes to our detriment). This should be a non-issue.

The Conservatives have tried to push us into believing that only they could assist with the Canadian Economy, yet everywhere we look, their actions aren't instilling a level of confidence in their economic prowess.

Status quo just isn't a good election promise. Not anymore.

There seems to be such a strong anti-Harper movement afoot, but for some reason, it's not translating into results in the polls. Facebook's got an *anyone-but-Harper* group.

Issues and platforms seem to be getting lost in the final days before the election.

Afghanistan

1. Conservatives to keep Canada involved until 2011.
2. Liberals don't specify an end date.
3. NDP wants to shift the military out now.
4. The Greens say 2009 is the end date for participation.

I don't think anyone really knew until this week that the Canadian cost of Afghanistan would exceed $18B.
You can do a lot for $18,000,000,000. Just look at all those zeros. $1500 per Canadian family. Every family.

The Economy

1. Conservatives go back on their word to have a no-bailout policy, provide $80M to a closing Windsor auto plant.
2. Gee, not even a Canadian owned manufacturer. Where was the money for Nortel?
3. Liberals will create a $1B fund to help adopt green technologies. This is a step in the right direction. Perhaps more green initiatives (i.e. solar farms) will finally get recognition and support.
4. The NDP will cancel corporate tax cuts. It's a nice change from the Bush-onomics that Harper has supported for the past 2 years.
5. The Greens follow a similar plan to the Liberals, with an emphasis on carbon taxes, without saying the words *carbon tax* in the same sentence.

But there are smaller issues at play that will eventually sway the average voter. Family allowances, childcare, the environment. The way in which the parties have run their election platforms. Even where they stand on innocuous issues such as copy-write, the Arts, health-care, gas pricing and Big Banks.

Where are you going to place your vote? Who are you going to trust? Will it be one seemingly insignificant facet that decides for you?

What If You Didn't Have to Work?

What would your life be like if you didn’t have to work? I’m not talking *win the lottery* type of life, but normal life. Say you continue to receive your same salary for ever, but never had to actually do the work required. Salary turns into allowance. What would you do? What would you do differently? All the time in the world, a reasonable amount of money to do what you want with.

Would you decide to *work* at what you liked? Take up a hobby? Go back to school? Loaf around?

It’s nice to dream sometimes.

It's Been WAY Too Long...

I have been negligent. I’ve been tardy, but I’ve been busy.
The past month has been chock ‘a block full of adventures of varying degrees of complication. I’ve been working with some very interesting customers.
I’ve been able to chat, investigate, share good conversations and furrow an eyebrow over difficult challenges.
I’ve spent 12 hours in a different country, learning how one of the most interesting companies in the world figures out things and makes buying decisions. You can’t beat that sort of adventure.

I’ve spoken to guys that you really only think about during Matt Damon movies.

I know - i’m just giving excuses for not staying current, but still, pretty interesting excuses.

With the Canadian Long Thanksgiving holiday approaching - Happy
Thanksgiving to all, and to all a good weekend.

12 Hours

To The Family Who Lives Behind Me

No matter how many times you say it, with umpteen different types of inflection, with anger, with baby-talk or with something in between, telling your dog to go *peepee* 50 times is not going to inspire it to do so.

Neither cajoling nor threatening, pleading nor negotiating will work.
Your dog doesn't speak English. Nor Spanish, and likely not even Portuguese.
 
The Dog Whisperer is on the Discovery Channel. Daily.
Watch it.
Your dog will thank you.
And so will I.

Think About How the Economy Downturn May Effect Your Finances

I've been doing some soul searching over the past few days, and a fair bit of reading from Canadian economists on the impacts of the insanity south of the border.
That being said, it's a time to reduce risk, reduce overhead and trim back on the low hanging fruit [expenses] that could increase our *working capital*, in the event that we find ourselves in a place where we need all the working capital we can get.

How is the economy going to effect you?  What have you thought about? Do you have a plan, just in case? it could be as simple as cutting back on the 300 channels you have on cable.

Harper's HomeBuyer Tax Credit

It's funny, the things that show up in my inbox.
A thousand years ago we had joined the Conservative Party, and despite no longer having any affiliations or inklings to vote conservative ever again, I keep getting email from them ;-)
This one was funny.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper today announced another step in the Conservative party’s economic plan to deliver practical help to hard-working families:  if re-elected, a new Conservative Government will give first-time homebuyers a tax credit for up to $5,000 of the closing costs on the purchase of a new home.

Up to $5000.

The tax credit will help first-time homebuyers to avoid stretching too far beyond their budget to meet these unexpected costs.

Now, I know a lot of people. I don't know many who have never owned a home at least once in their lives.
Of the folks who don't own a home, how many would vote, let alone vote Conservative?

A $5000 tax credit is not going to keep you from stretching beyond your budget. The closing fees on my most recent house were approx $7300. On my first house, they were likely in the $3600 range. Paying it upfront or adding it to your mortgage are essentially a wash.

If Harper wants to help out the first time home buyer, why not waive the Land Transfer tax? Why not allow home buyers to write their mortgage payments off against their income? Then EVERYONE would benefit. Why is it I can write off rent, but not mortgage payments? That might make me vote Conservative again.

Cripes. I should be an advisor to Harper.

A Guys Version of The Tupperware Party

I was relegated to the second floor of my house last night. The levels of testosterone were decidedly peaking beyond the safe zone. Last night was the annual Moosehead Cup Hockey Pool Draft. 14 males converge in one location, hockey magazines and scribbled lists in hand to determine their *team* for the coming season. The wiz had spent countless hours creating spreadsheets, pondering predictions analyzing websites to determine the best player picks for the coming year. This pool is *A BIG DEAL*. :-)


I couldn’t help but smile, organization was finalized only a few hour prior to their arrival. Pizza was on order. A case of beer chilling. Arrivals were announced with various hoots and a smattering of friendly insults. As the lone female of the house, I was awarded  hugs and kisses. I lit a scented candle to stave off any dressing room aromas.  Who knows what havoc 14 boys can reek on the atmosphere of a house?

After everyone had settled in, I disappeared upstairs to begin an evening of quiet entertainment with *The Fringe*. These boys, they take their hockey pool seriously. There’s a specific order, an agreed roster, and even a dramatic pronouncement when players are chosen.

“The Aurora North Stars choose as their third round draft:  the wiley winger from Tampa, Martin St Louis!”

It was hilarious.
3 hours, 6 pizzas and one case of beer later, the evening was deemed a success, and the boys disappeared into the night.


Technorati Tags: hockey pool, Moosehead Cup, tupperware

Houses, Salaries and Debt

Sitting on my back step, it's always made me curious what sorts of lives the people in my wee subdivision lead. What do they do, what are there house layouts like......
It's sort of an expensive subdivision, it's no Bridle-Path or swanky Richmond Hill address, but its' mortgage load is above average, so to speak. Let me even take one step back - all neighbourhoods north of Toronto carry a high price tag... +$400k for a detached home. A home that requires a household income greater than $150k to sustain.

I then wander over to Glassdoor.com, a new site that tracks salaries in North America via anonymous reporting and ratings of various employers.
Unless you are a rocket scientist at Google, or a serious banking type or corporate executive, it's unlikely you are making much more than $70K, and that's an excellent job in Canada.

The exceptions - folks making over $120K must be few and far between, based on the Glassdoor results.

Not everyone in my neighbourhood can be a V.P of something fancy. So - if most have a reasonably average paycheck, how the heck are they paying their mortgage and living? Where are these people working? Is there a cache of secret, super-highpaying jobs somewhere in Ontario?

Sure - households can have 2 incomes, but as soon as you throw some kids into that, your debt ratio must trampoline through the roof.  There are A LOT of kids in my neighbourhood. Is everyone living off of credit? Do the nice folks two doors down with the great backyard have thousands in debt? I don't mind coveting their back yard, but not if their debt comes with it.

I don't get it. Some families I know had more than $80k of debt, just from living expenses. Carrying it until a time when their situation can change and they can pay it off. Even debt in the $20k range scares the heck out of me, if it's been created to support a household.

It's the great unknown, I suppose. Hefty mortgages, average household incomes, ridiculous debt. Welcome to Toronto.

Canada Mortgages, salaries, debt

Update on Friday, September 26, 2008 at 06:31PM by jules

Macleans has a very timely article this week about the potential downfall of the Canadian Housing Industry.

We could be in for a case of the crashes, slightly less serious, but comparable on a smaller scale to what the US is facing.

Hrm. 

“Nobody likes to see their property values go down, but those values are inevitably tethered to economic reality,” Wolf told Maclean’s. “The reality is that after a wonderful few years, we’ve finally reached the end.”

I’m now looking around wondering how many people bought cheap in this neighbourhood, and refinanced their equity, assuming that the value of their home was simply going to continue to increase.

Guard Spider

Joe Source: Local Alternative to Ebay

A neat comment on one of my Craigslist vs Kijiji articles led me to check out JoeSource.

JoeSource is recently hatched, but bears some watching for the future. Local auctions... it's a worthwhile initiative, considering I was on Ebay last night, looking for Solar Lights, and immediately shuffled the results based on geography. ;-)

The only challenge is in getting the word out. An auction isn't much if there aren't sellers and buyers. Word of mouth, anyone?

JoeSource, Ebay, Craigslist, Kijiji

The Old Girl's Club; or Why Are Women Cruel?

A million years ago, human nature pitted male against male to *win* the female. Women just looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders.

A million years later, the females wrestle verbally and physically for the male, regardless of whether his worth is perceived or actual. Heck - sometimes there isn't even a male involved. It's cruelty for sport.

Today, men mostly play nicely, or not at all. Women tend to play nasty with each other, even when there's nothing at stake, and no danger, perceived or otherwise. Yes, I'll admit this is a fairly sweeping generalization, as far as generalizations go, but the truth remains: women usually speak cruelly before they speak kindly. And I'm not sure why. Full stop.

Where is this learned?
Perhaps this is something you grow out of to a great degree?
Maybe it's a byproduct of a vicious circle of cruelty?
The average woman doesn't want to see another woman succeed, or grow, or be comfortable. Silly, huh?
Men, these conditions don't even hit their radar.
They don't spend hours at a time conversing with others about the worthiness of members of their gender.


If you can get yourself into the inner circle of the Old Boy's Club, you're set. Supported, fetted and included. Even if you aren't an Old Boy, there isn't anyone looking and judging. Males are agnostic. Women can gauge anything and come up with an opinion and a judgment; with a negative response greater than 50% of the time.

There isn't an Old Girl's Club, yet. Maybe we are still evolving. We are still developing that sense of kindness usually reserved for grandmothers and babies. Our opinions are still razor sharp, not gently dulled by experience and reciprocity.
There's no way a man would be thinking these deep thoughts on a Monday morning.

Men, men look at each other and just shrug their shoulders.

Learn about Bill C-61

One of the least understood, yet most contentious issues of the Canadian election is going to be the political hopefuls' position on Bill C-61 - Copywrite Reform and Restrictions in Canada.
Unfortunately, most folks don't realize the implications this bill will have on their regular, daily lives. Implications on everything from what you can do with a movie you've bought, to how you can use your cell phone, your iPod or your computer. And don't even get me started on timeshifting or PVR'ing your favourite TV shows.

Ask your politician - what are they going to do about C-61? It's the main reason I can't vote for Harper.

Michael Geist has some AWESOME videos on the subject.

Google's Android Coming in October

It's been a long time coming, but it sounds like Google Phones might soon be shipping....
Different from the iPhone, which is a fine thing... Google may have found the iPhone's Achilles' Heel with the ability for folks to install *any* application they want on their device. Nothing is locked down, locked out or locked up.
With the ability to go wireless or wi-fi, this could actually be a phone I would consider as a personal phone. That being said, who knows if it will really come to Canada. And if it comes, could the carrier lock it up tigher than a drum? I wonder if Google's going to have some serious contract negotiations to contend with north of the border....

Google Phone, Android, iPhone

Blood Money in SouthWestern Ontario

By Melvyn Calderon/Greenpeace HO/A.P. Images The dark finger of Monsanto touches down in rural Canadian commuities like a twister. Offering $1500 scholarships to students enrolled in agricultural programs, Monsanto claims:

“Monsanto Canada is a big supporter of science and agricultural education programs and we’ve made a concerted effort to raise awareness of opportunities in the agricultural sector and support students who want to pursue agriculture or forestry as a career path,” said Trish Jordan, Monsanto Canada’s director of public affairs and coordinator of the scholarship program. “It’s just great to see such a positive response to our program. I wish we could have helped every student who applied.”

This hit my radar, as a local youth from Glencoe, Ontario [who’s name is withheld to protect the innocent] was one of the *lucky* recipients of a $1500 scholarship. Now who thought this would be a good idea? Monsanto, quite possibly the world’s worst corporation, is sponsoring Canadian youth in agriculture. Can you say payout with blood money?

From a 2008 Vanity Fair article:

Most Americans know Monsanto because of what it sells to put on our lawns— the ubiquitous weed killer Roundup. What they may not know is that the company now profoundly influences—and one day may virtually control—what we put on our tables.

Monsanto has always had its’ fingers in genetically modified seeds and is the world’s largest producer of herbicide and pesticide chemicals. More recently though, Monsanto has set its’ sights on the Canadian Dairy Board, and Canada’s milk supply. The Canadian Government has ruled that Monsanto chemicals are too dangerous to Canadians. Monsanto produces artificial hormones (bovine growth hormone) for cattle, intended to increase growth and milk production.

Monsanto’s genetically modified milk has been ruled unsafe by the United Nations.

In the US, Monsanto is fighting all varieties of Dairy Boards, trying to force their milk produced by cows on artificial hormones into the milk supply chain.

In Canada, Monsanto has been fighting local farmers for decades over its’ genetically modified seeds.

From USA Today:

Agribusiness giant Monsanto sued the farmer, Percy Schmeiser, after its agents found biotech canola growing in his fields in 1997. It contends he replanted seeds from those plants without paying a technology fee of about $12 an acre.

Canadians don’t want genetically modified seeds. Full stop. Don’t just take my word for it. The Google results are astounding.
Monsanto is the worst type of bully. Slapping Canadians with one had, and bribing with the other hand.

Considering the bad taste in Canadian’s mouths, it’s not so surprising that the marketing division of Monsanto is trying to *buy* improvements in Canadian public approval by sponsoring youth in agriculture.

Monsanto, Canada agrictulture, Blood money, bovine growth hormone

Lipstick and Old Fish

Alex Wong, Getty ImagesOMFG. The US tabloids overfloweth with insanity of pigs and fish and lipstick. Every possible comment is mistrued, distorted and then magnified 1,000 times by internet political pundits.

Would the same thing happen in Canada?


Yesterday the big 3 conceded to allow the Green Party into the debates. Were they bowing to Canadian Public disapproval of their original decision, or because of a huge Facebook group backlash? :-)
Technorati Tags: Obama, Palin, McCain, pigs, fish, lipstick

Underfoot.com Goes Live!!

I think it was one of those family bonding moments. Deciding to re-launch underfoot.com after a 5 year hiatus.

After numerous requests to sell the domain name, and a few overblown quotes from "website designers", we decided to move to Squarespace.
Now the whole family has a squarespace blog.

Underfoot.com supports Under Foot Flooring, a boutique floor covering company in South Western Ontario. It's outstanding.You should see it.
Of course I'm biased. My sister, my dad and I built it.

My sister Amy created A Change of Space to augment her creativity with home and design.

The Wiz has the Oak Ridges Men's Recreational Hockey League site. Sigh, I remember registering that domain a zillion years ago.

Squarespace - it's a family thing :-)

Squarespace, Under Foot, A Change of Space

A Chill in the Air

It's decidedly *fresh* this morning.
A brisk 4 degrees outside, and a shivery 59 degrees inside. It's a good thing I'm the only one home right now to enjoy the temperatures. (I might be the only one in the house who enjoys it COLD.

Where has the summer gone?
In 57 days it will be November 5th.
Last year, on November 5th, it snowed, and it didn't melt until April. I'm not ready.
The morning glories are still blooming, the butterfly bush is still attracting butterflies. The pussywillow is still willowing.

The only place where I've seen leaves change colour is along highway 416 on the way to Ottawa... and that doesn't really count - it's almost another time zone, it's so far away.... :-)

Still, sweaters have been calling my name.
And I'm feeling the old draw of warm socks lately.
Another summer... on its' way out.


I

2228 Comments

I'm an avid reader of Dooce.
In fact, I make the Wiz read her too, when I think he will giggle (which is most of the time, by the way). We both love Chuck, and contrast him to our own smapp dog (that is not a typo).


This week, post Republican National Gongshow, Dooce weighed in with personal, colour commentary.
One post generated over 2228 comments.
That's two THOUSAND, two HUNDRED and twenty-eight.
Comments.
From the internet.
Holy.

Excerpt from Dooce:

I am angry. I am infuriated. And I don't think I would be if SarahPalin were a qualified or competent choice as McCain's running mate.But the fact, the reality is that she is not. And instead ofdemanding better from their party, instead of going, wait a minute, no,we deserve better than this, many Republicans are contorting themselvesinto a denial of reality. (please read this,it's a report from the AP, not some spooky liberal blog that wants tokill babies) And that right there is what has been going on for thelast eight years.

And I am just so damn sick of it.