Any Dream Will Do

The Mullingar Nissan Garage Debacle

2011-08-17T06:33:00.000-07:00

My wife's family love Nissan. You know how I know that? She's only ever had Nissans. For 14 years, she's moved from a Micra to 2 successive Almeras and she currently has a Qashquai. We met shortly before she bought her second Nissan Almera. Her father and brother also bought Qashquais the same month, and all three are in different shades of blue. When the family is all together, the driveway looks like a Nissan forecourt. They both had Almeras too, before the Qashquai. They love Nissan so much, I even have a Nissan car. So, we're good customers.

I became aware that the Nissan garage in Mullingar was pulling a fast one with me when I got a service on my Micra a few years back. They told me that this huge part needed replacing and the quote was well outside my price range. If I could have afforded it, I wouldn't have questioned it. Sort of glad I did.

In my desperation to ensure my car wouldn't explode on me, I decided to see if I could source the part myself, even a used part. In my efforts, I met an honest mechanic (yup, they exist) who had a look at my car (in a car park) and told me it wouldn't need that whole part at all. It only needed some seals. I have brought the car to him ever since. That was at least 4 years ago and the car hasn't exploded on me yet and I have never replaced that part.

My wife still goes to the dealership. She drives a lot for work, has her car serviced twice annually and has a nice car, so she wants to keep up a service history on it, for resale value, I think. My car is 13 years old (with only 100k kms on the clock) and when I drive to work it takes 8 minutes. Our needs are different.

First Nissan Quote May 2011

In May, she was hit by a driver who pulled out onto a main street blind. The door was scratched and dented. It was entirely the other driver's fault and when we got the quote for repair, it wasn't contested. They just paid out. When she went back to book in the car for the repair (and a service) she was told that they were "using a different guy" and that they would have to re-quote for the repair.

We got that quote yesterday. It took 5 weeks for the re-quote to be sent to us.

The first quote was for €1200 (and this is the amount we have from the insurance company)
The quote we got yesterday was for €3300

Second Nissan Quote August 2011 (there has been no further damage)

The possibility existed, of course, that the previous quote was ridiculously low for what needed doing. To find out, today, she took her car to the Toyota Dealership beside the Nissan garage. The quote? €1160.

Quote from Toyota Dealership August 2011

She emailed Nissan Ireland yesterday and we haven't received a reply. Do we expect one? I would normally expect a reply to an email like that within -- at the most -- 48 hours. We've told them that one of their franchises is gauging customers. As it stands, however, the repair will be done by the Toyota Dealership. And you know, it might be time to look at a nice little Yaris. Because, to be completely honest, we're sick of dealing with our local Nissan Dealership.

Queer Gleek ramblings: Klaine and Brittana and stuff

2011-03-17T07:04:00.000-07:00

I can't quite get Kurt and Blaine's (Klaine!) kiss from the most recent episode of Glee out of my head. And it's not just that the kiss was kind of perfect. And it's not just that we almost never see gay kisses on television, but those are both bound to be parts of it.

I'm just starting to get a bit overwhelmed at how the writers in Glee have managed to pull this off so well.

Of all the things Glee does, the most incredible thing is how it artfully dances through minefields. The writers and cast have managed to be representative without being tokenistic; they've avoided stereotypes without losing the identities (class, sexual, gender, racial) of each character; they've navigated stories of identity in teenagers, and in the cases of their queer characters -- that's right, there's more than one, so far Kurt, Blaine, Brittany, Santana and Karofsky are all not straight -- they've managed to humanise what so many Anti-Prop 8 type campaigns have failed to.

So that's, what? Five queer characters in a show with a regular ensemble cast of fewer than 20 people. Karofsky is not a regular character, although it's been suggested that his story will be featured more prominently in coming episodes. But still, that leaves about 20% of the regular cast that isn't straight.

The Santana and Brittany story is unfolding right now, so it's hard to really give it an overview. But the way it appears is this: the two have been fooling around for quite some time, under the rationalisation that fooling around with another girl isn't cheating ("The plumbing is different," says Santana). But slowly we're learning that Santana may well be a lesbian, while Brittany is happy with her boyfriend, Artie, we are still left quite clear that Brittany is bisexual and has always had feelings for Santana. So it was easy to expect that when Santana came running to Brittany to tell her she loved her, that Brittany would immediately dump her boyfriend and ride off into the sunset with her lesbian love. But they didn't do that. Here, bisexuality is being handled well, with the character being someone we already know and love and who isn't angry/unstable/dishonest. It will be interesting to see how Santana -- the angry, bitchy and sexually confident girl -- evolves as she comes out as gay (if that's indeed what is happening).

Kurt and Blaine are both gay, although Blaine explored the possibility that he was bisexual after a drunken kiss with Rachel at a party. It should be noted that he managed to explore his bisexuality without hurting people or cheating, or being dishonest or becoming a serial killer -- all things that unfortunately tend to go hand in hand with bisexual representations in the media. But in the end, realised that he was "100% gay" (to Kurt's delight).

To be honest, (and feel like a total traitor to the ladies) Kurt and Blaine is the relationship I love the best. In the words of people significantly younger and hipper than I, I "ship" Klaine.

First, Kurt is a marvelous character. For those of you who don't know, Kurt wasn't originally in the show. After Chris Colfer auditioned for a different role, they created a character for him -- even going so far as to name the character Kurt after Colfer's role in The Sound of Music. From the beginning, Kurt is the outsider of outsiders. He can't help it. Not only is Kurt effeminate, but he lives alone with his mechanic father since he lost his mother at a young age. Kurt's also a countertenor and has a high-pitched speaking voice that sets him apart from the other boys, even if his clothing and demenour didn't. Now that he's at Dalton (which I'm convinced is temporary), we don't get to see his outlandish dress sense so much, so sometimes you forget how different he really is. Until he curtsies on stage, that is.

The story arc where Kurt admits he is gay and ultimately tells his father is almost expertly crafted. It's idealised, of course, -- Glee is a musical comedy by genre -- and the father admits he knows but that it freaks him out and he doesn't know what to do.

And Blaine is idealised too. While Kurt ends up at Dalton Academy -- a posh private school -- to escape the bullying at McKinley High, he does so on the back of his father (and new step-mother)'s life savings, and even that will only keep him there a year. Blaine gives another impression -- and although his home life has never been explored -- we know that he's from money and privilege. He's also not effeminate. He has a lot of advantages Kurt hasn't. But he's sound. The first time we meet him, he names his privilege too. He cares. We see the effect marginalisation can have on someone even with all these advantages. Being gay is the single dent in Blaine's well-adjusted armour. He transfered to Dalton (which has a zero-tolerance bullying policy) after having trouble at his last school. Blaine seems comfortable in himself and tries things out with absolute confidence that the world will bend to his terms. But Blaine looks out for the new kid who arrives and is so out of place. He even tries to help him confront Karofsky at McKinley. And while he's occasionally clueless and sometimes condescending (and I applaud the inclusion of these character traits), he is mostly pretty cool. Blaine is also a dreamboat. Just saying.

While we almost expect the world to fail people like Kurt, because it does on so many levels, it's important to show that when it comes to gay things, the world just fails. Blaine shows us that.

David Karofsky, the bully football player who shoved Kurt into his locker, and later kissed him, shows us another way the world fails gay people. We have to assume, or guess, because we don't know much about his background, that he has a less supportive family and group of friends than Kurt and Blaine have. Karofsky is plainly terrified of coming out. He doesn't question whether it's right for people to bully gay people -- he just knows that if he's gay, people will bully him.

All this means we have a rainbow of gays. From out and proud to closeted and terrified.

And Glee continues to rock.

Probable Irish government already hopelessly out of touch

2011-02-24T04:59:00.000-08:00

I've accepted it. I'm horribly depressed by it, but it seems the people of my adopted country are going to vote in the dicks at Fine Gael. They might even be the sole party in government. In fact, I kind of hope they are.

It's been said that a vote for Fine Gael is a vote for Fianna Fail in four years' time. I think that is true only if Labour join Fine Gael in coalition.

The Fine Gael strategy is unrealistic, capitalistic and full of holes. It will not work. Whoever goes in coalition with them will end up chewed up and spat out like so many Greens and Progressive Democrats. Nobody remembers the good done by the Greens, although they did accomplish several things that Fianna Fail would never have considered if they'd had the choice. Unfortunately, tainted by association, the Greens are almost obliterated.

Labour's best bet right now is to become the strongest opposition party. They need to be able to stand up and represent the people of Ireland who are definitely not represented by the earth-destroying, uber-capitalist, Christianist lunatics of Fine Gael.

Labour had the best ideas, but their campaign failed on a huge scale. They appealed to their base -- yes. But they didn't even appear to try to appeal to older people and rural people. They bragged about polling high in Dublin when they should have kept their smug mouths shut. They produced ads that were all words. Those slow to read wouldn't have paid a bit of attention. In short, Labour don't deserve to win this election. But they now have four years to campaign, and do it right.

This week, there is an uproar over Fine Gael's Equality spokesmoron Lucinda Creighton opining that marriage was simply not open to gay people and shouldn't be. She time warped a couple decades back and used the argument that marriage is about procreation. We can all look forward to Creighton's first bill annulling the marriages of the elderly, infertile and those who use contraceptives. We also look forward to her wedding and the very speedy proof of her eligibility to marry by spawning as soon as possible.

But the gay marriage thing is ridiculous for more that the reasons presented. It's ridiculous because the Irish people support it.

THE majority of people want gay marriage to be legalised.
More than six out of every 10 voters believe same-sex marriages should be recognised by the State, according to the latest Irish Independent/Millward Brown Lansdowne survey.
The figures show just 27pc of voters are opposed to the idea of gay marriage

Ireland is so totally unlike North America, where the courts tend to legislate for minority rights long before these have popular support. In Ireland, these rights have popular support but the politicians are genuinely shit and refuse to legislate for equality, despite the popular support.
The people of Ireland are better people than those intending to represent them. They are hard working and honest. They care whether their friends and children have the same rights as they have. They look at the church with skepticism, and even if they still go, are happy to take the comfort they get from their religious practice without obeying all the petty rules that might go along with it.

Unfortunately, they vote for people whose ideas are not as sophisticated, nuanced or as fair as their own. That said, the only real option was Labour and, as I've said, they practically threw the campaign. They were actually more popular before they started campaigning.

Will someone please wake me when the 4 years are up? Cheers.

A Queer Faith

2010-09-28T04:11:00.000-07:00

My best friend is Catholic. Properly Roman Catholic, she even enjoys going to mass. I abuse her for it. I mean, she's a queer. Why would she involve herself in an institution that has never done anything but belittle all that she is? We can rarely enjoy a drink together that I don't have a go at her for it.

As for myself, I left the church when I realised I was gay. It was heart-breaking because I felt I had a vocation within the church. I was planning to go to grad school to get my M.Div. and hopefully be the pastor of a church someday. I was lucky that I was in a progressive branch of my denomination. Being a woman would hold me back a little in practice, but officially, they were ok with it. And it all fell apart when I realised I was gay.

I might not have left the church altogether had I remained in Canada. At home, there is at least 1 protestant denomination -- The United Church of Canada -- which is full-on affirming of gay people in their churches and in ministry. Other protestant denominations struggle with the issue but you're likely to find individual churches that will welcome a same-sex couple. I, however, was a baptist. There would be no welcome in my own church for me.

I knew that well ahead of knowing I was gay. At one point, I had a discussion with a woman from church whose child I often babysat. Ellen had just come out and still had her sitcom. Nadine (not her real name) argued that she shouldn't be shown on television. Even as an evangelical who hadn't yet questioned the stock teaching on gays, I was anti-censorship. No, I said, censorship is bad. What if they try to censor Christians? After all, as an evangelical, I was brainwashed into the "Christians are already marginalised" mentality. Best to leave it be and simply police what your children watch, lest censorship be used against Christians in the near future.

My rhetoric proved unconvincing, and I was never asked to babysit again. Another religious girl I know was drafted to care for those children. She was objectively a better Christian, apparently. She had long hair and long skirts to prove it, and certainly never questioned whether a gay person should be allowed on television, making people laugh.

I guess I wouldn't mind except that I would have agreed with Nadine that homosexuality was wrong. I'd never questioned it. In fact, I have burned into my brain a conversation at the local tea room with another ministry hopeful about Ellen and "the gay". I stated that it was unquestionably wrong. The last time I saw her was the first time I went to the only gay bar within reach. I hope she understood.

Not long after I came out, I moved away, and when I arrived on this side of the pond, I did look for affirming churches. For a brief period of time, I tried to keep my faith alive by myself. But more and more, news report after news report, I found out how hard God's people make it to love God. As it happened, I haven't lived anywhere in over a decade where I have had access to an affirming Christian community. There are now some affirming churches in places I have lived in the last decade, but they weren't there when I was.

And if I found one, would I go? This is the question I no longer can answer. I am closer to atheism than I have ever been in my life. At the same time, it takes little or nothing to move me back to opening the Bible. Still, something, the years of exile, perhaps? Or that I've learned that I can trust nothing that isn't empirically real? Something makes me think I can never go back to the kind of faith I had as a student. Even then, I shuddered at the emotional, manipulative, and downright ridiculous tactics that were employed in my own church to make people feel like they were part of something supernatural. Have I thrown the baby out with the bathwater? Or did I just imagine the baby in the first place?

Sure, others have been where I am. Many Christians would insist I am in my wilderness years, being away only to arrive in a better place. I had a friend who came from the same church I did, who moved away from home and broke free. She drank, she danced, she dated a guy who already had a girlfriend. She hung out with my wife and I when we were dating. But she went back. I remember all too well her response to our wedding invitation. She wouldn't attend our wedding -- she couldn't condone a same-sex wedding, but she would love to see us. It made me physically sick to my stomach. To this day, I don't know if I could look her in the eyes. My Catholic mother said pretty much the same. She was happy to attend our "party" (wedding reception), but not our wedding. I had to remind her that she'd been invited to neither. We were married in a church in Nova Scotia amongst friends and family who supported us. It was wonderful.

My search for meaning -- absurd as it may be -- is a search for something that might reconcile my instinct towards faith and my need for intellectual honesty. It turns out what started as a handicap -- being gay -- in my search for faith has become more of a clearing house. No faith that breeds hate and exclusion need apply. Others manage to keep their faith alive despite the onslaught of hate from fellow believers. For me, however, I will continue my search keeping in mind

Matthew 7:15-20 "Beware of false prophets who come to you disguised as sheep but underneath are ravenous wolves. You will be able to tell them by their fruits. Can people pick grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles? In the same way, a sound tree produces good fruit but a rotten tree bad fruit. A sound tree cannot bear bad fruit nor a rotten tree bear good fruit. Any tree that does not produce good fruit is cut down and thrown on the fire. I repeat, you will be able to tell them by their fruits." (NJB)

I'm going out on a (rather sound) limb to list some recent rotten fruits: covering up child sexual abuse, supporting a law to put homosexuals to death, condoning harmful lies about "change", attempting to enforce Christianity through the law.

How does one navigate faith and honesty in this confused age?

Life's big questions

2010-06-11T02:17:00.000-07:00

I'm just playing with google, but I thought these were fun.

I do think some of the results were localised for Ireland. I only caught on after a a while, so you'll see one that's US localised, but the others are all .ie

Anyway, silly blog post, hoping to make you all smile with some of life's big questions ... or at least Google's.

Super exciting new blog! really!

2010-03-07T09:29:00.000-08:00

I've started a new project.

Indulging my obsession with coming out stories -- those of the famous and those of the not at all famous -- it's called Big Gay Closet.

I'm going to include stories of my own coming out, from drabbles to full on narratives. And I'll be inviting others to contribute their stories too. I think it could be really valuable resource for people thinking of coming out, and for people like me, who just love the kind of community feeling I get when reading these experiences, at once so unique and so uniting.

Also, it'll discuss news stories related to people coming out, running back in, and being dragged kicking and screaming out of the big gay closet.

Please drop by, and follow my new twitter account (@BigGayCloset) as well!

I'm just dying for my first contributor. Hint, hint.

A new art purchase this year

2010-02-07T13:22:00.000-08:00

In December I got my beautiful wife to agree to take down the terrible painting of the girl who appears to have some kind of impossibly curved spine. This means I get to buy something to put in its place.

I've been researching furiously, setting criteria in place.

What we buy should be either

1. local (Ireland = local for our purposes) or local to where I'm from.
2. by a LGBTQ artist
3. by someone known to us

So I've been surfing all around looking at Irish artists, Maritime Canadian artists and gay artists in general.

We've only purchased one print and that was last year -- by a gay artist, Noah Grey.

Other than that, we have in our home Spintal Curviture Woman and the Painting I Will Never Be Rid Of (because grandfather-in-law gave it to us) titled "Lady in Purple" or as it is known here, Insipid Woman.

It's the beginning of our search. We don't have a lot of money, so it won't be someone well known, but it will be meaningful. So yeah, the search starts now.

Suggestions?

Pastor Ssempa Lies about Uganda's Kill-the-Gays Bill

2010-02-07T13:09:00.000-08:00

Uganda’s proposed Anti-Homosexuality Bill 2009 has attracted all kinds of unwanted attention from the world.

President Obama briefly spoke out against it at the Family-sponsored National Prayer Breakfast, calling it “odious”.

Ugandan Pastor (and former break dancing champion!), Martin Ssempa, has responded to President Obama’s condemnation of the bill here.

Ssempa, who calls himself, “A passionate voice in the global fight against HIV/AIDS” responded to Obama’s comments in a statement, published by Kampala’s Family Policy and Human Rights Centre, available here.

He starts:

President Barack Obama makes two mistakes; first Ugandaʼs anti-homosexuality law only prescribes the capital punishment in cases where the victims are children or the handicapped.

So he’s saying that the death penalty will only apply for pedophiles, statutory rape, or having sex with a disabled person.

That sounds sensible. But it’s a lie.

The relevant section of the bill: (Anything quoted directly from the Bill will be in italics)

3. Aggravated homosexuality.
(1) A person commits the offense of aggravated homosexuality where the
(a) person against whom the offence is committed is below the age of 18 years;
(b) offender is a person living with HIV;
(c) offender is a parent or guardian of the person against whom the offence is committed;
(d) offender is a person in authority over the person against whom the offence is committed;
(e) victim of the offence is a person with disability;
(f) offender is a serial offender, or
(g) offender applies, administers or causes to be used by any man or woman any drug, matter or
thing with intent to stupefy overpower him or her so as to there by enable any person to have
unlawful carnal connection with any person of the same sex,
(2) A person who commits the offence of aggravated homosexuality shall be liable on conviction
to suffer death.
(3) Where a person is charged with the offence under this section, that person shall undergo a
medical examination to ascertain his or her HIV status.

Let’s go through this line by line.

3 (1) a. This appears to apply the death penalty to anyone who has homosexual sex with a person under 18, regardless of consent or the age of the “offender”. Thus the 18 year old lover of a 17 year old could be put to death. However, this does seem to be consistent with Uganda’s heterosexual age of consent law.

b. If the offender is HIV positive. This section puts no requirement on the law to prove that the “offender” had any knowledge of her of his status, and in fact provides in 3 (3) that an HIV test may be performed on anyone caught engaged in a an act of “aggravated homosexuality”. It also fails to specify whether the other partner must be HIV negative in order for a crime to have been commited. Barrier methods appear to be ignored in this case. It appears two HIV positive partners using barrier methods, neither of whom are aware of her or his HIV status could be put to death under this section.

c. and d. refer to having homosexual sex with your own children or people over whom you have authority or responsibility. This should clearly be offenses, regardless of the sexuality of the people involved. Death penalty offense? Debatable.

e. If the victim is a person with a disability. For the purposes of this bill, the word “victim” is defined as an unwilling participant (and therefore thankfully excludes convicting the sighted partner of a consenting blind person). Like c. and d., this exists to protect the vulnerable. Again, whether the death penalty should apply probably depends on your view of the death penalty.

f. This is the one they all wish we’d ignore. In this bill, a “serial offender” is defined as: a person who has previous convictions of the offence of homosexuality or related offences

Homosexuality is defined in the bill as well. “homosexuality” means same gender or same sex sexual acts. A person who is convicted of homosexuality (they use the plural so I’ll assume more than once) and re-offends can also be subject to the death penalty. A person who has had homosexual sex three times in her or his life could be put to death, if she or he were convicted for each instance.

Also — related offenses? What are those?

PART Ill — RELATED OFFENCES AND PENALTIES.
7. Aiding and abating homosexuality.
8. Conspiracy to engage in homosexuality.
9. Procuring homosexuality. by threats, etc.
10. Detention with intent to commit homosexuality.
11. Brothels.
12. Same sex marriage.
13. Promotion of homosexuality.
14. Failure to disclose the offence.

So the death penalty could well be applied to the allies of lesbians and gays, and those who would prefer their friends/family members/colleagues didn’t get put to death and therefore fail to report homosexual activity.

Secondly, homosexuals and lesbians are never targetted for who they are, rather what they do.
(from Martin Ssempa’s statement)

I hate to nitpick (no wait, I love to) but the very definition of “lesbian” in the bill is: a female who engages in sexual intimacy with another female. The very definition of lesbian in the bill is a woman defined by her sexual activity with another woman.

Another problem with this particular offense of Aggravated Homosexuality is that it confuses rape with consensual homosexual activity. Sections c., d. and g. (and to some extent a.) deal with sexual activity with someone who either denies consent, or is not lawfully able to consent, either through malicious intoxication, disability or age.

So, surprise, he’s lying, and it’s obvious from the text of the bill he endorses that the bill has nothing to do with HIV/AIDS prevention as he would have us all believe. One last quote from the bill will speak for itself. Spot the many mentions of HIV/AIDS prevention.

3.0. The objectives of the Bill
The objectives of the Bill are to:
(a) provide for marriage in Uganda as that contracted only between a man and a woman;
(b) prohibit and penalize homosexual behavior and related practices in Uganda as they constitute
a threat to the traditional family;
(e) prohibit ratification of any international treaties, conventions, protocols, agreements and
declarations which are contrary or inconsistent with the provisions of this Act;
(d) prohibit the licensing of organizations which promote homosexuality.

I welcome any and all comments and corrections.

Reblogged from here

Why I'll keep writing about Uganda

2010-01-30T03:35:00.000-08:00

(reblogged from Lezgetreal.com)

Recently I've been writing a lot about Uganda's proposed Anti-Homosexuality Bill. I've been accused of racism, of trying to subvert Uganda's sovereignty, cultural imperialism, and of ignoring the will of the Ugandan people to push a LGBT agenda in a country that is not my own. I've been accused of trying to sink deals that could potentially inject a lot of money into the Ugandan economy. (because I have that kind of power, right? C'mon Tullow Oil, Bank of America, Merryl Lynch, Harold Ford, listen to me!)

I would like to be a bit self indulgent and respond to some of these accusations.

My criticisms of the proposed law have nothing to do with the race of the people pushing the anti-gay agenda, nor of the people who it is intended to harm. If Sweden offered a similar law I would protest as fiercely.

Nor have my criticisms anything to do with some personal suspicion that Ugandans are incapable of governing their own country. The fact is, most Ugandans who present themselves on the internet in these discussions have demonstrated a frightening hostility to homosexuals in their own country, and even those who appear sympathetic often demonstrate an understandable discomfort with the distinction between homosexual, transgendered, bisexual and other sexual and gender identities.
The issue in both those cases is a lack of education about sexual and gender identities. As a Ugandan doctor writes:

In Africa, what most of us know about homosexuality is that it's a political taboo. That had carried over into my medical education. I did all my training in Africa. I was used to wards filled with patients, male and female, dying of AIDS. I knew HIV was spread by sex. To me, it was a heterosexual disease. I'd never been taught or told much about prevention or treatment for men who had sex with men.
from The Huffington Post

In 2004, the Ugandan broadcasting council fined Radio Simba for broadcasting a program that hosted homosexuals who defended their "way of life". Under the proposed legislation, speaking about homosexuality would become a far more serious offence, meaning that doctors will remain ignorant of the needs of their homosexual patients, and the Ugandan people will remain in the dark about their family, friends and fellow countrywomen and men who live in silence and fear for simply being themselves.

“Myself I am at risk,” Onziema [a lesbian Ugandan] told Reuters Africa Journal “I can’t move on the streets as I used to, I can’t go to a shop … I have been picked off the streets, detained for sometime, ridiculed, intimidated, some money taken away from my wallet…”
from Ethiopian Review

I keep saying this, but I feel it keeps being ignored. Far from ignoring the desires of Ugandans, I am doing my level best to voice the needs of the Ugandans who have no voice. The anti-gay agenda in Uganda isn't necessarily culturally pure. As reported extensively on the Rachel Maddow show, on Box Turtle Bulletin and several other news sources, American anti-gay fundamentalist groups and prominent US politicians (and some crazies like ex-gay Richard Cohen) pumped money and, most importantly, misinformation into Uganda in the run up to the introduction of this bill.

Even from a homophobic perspective, this bill is hardly necessary as homosexuality is already a criminal offence under existing law. The new proposed bill introduces the death sentence for homosexuals, and custodial sentences for those advocating for homosexuals and those who fail to report suspected homosexual behaviour. It simply ensures to a greater degree that LGBTQ Ugandans will continue to have no voice.

And when I say no voice, I am a little wrong and perhaps a lot rhetorical. I do not want or mean to belittle the incredibly brave work of gay Ugandans and their Ugandan advocates. There are gay Ugandans fighting for their rights, and straight Ugandans who fight for the rights of their gay sisters and brothers. People risk their freedom to fight for the right to live an honest life, and if this bill passes, even the act of speaking out could lead to incarceration. If the arrest lead to the discovery of actual homosexual activity, it could lead to death.

So to close, I will continue to blog about the Ugandan Anti-homosexuality Bill because I have a voice that costs me nothing. I will name those who support it, either intentionally, by proxy or by turning a blind eye. I will keep asking those in positions of international and corporate power to voice their support for freedom to those who have the power to make a difference. I will lend my support those in Uganda who have the incredible courage to speak up for themselves and others, because every person deserves to live a true and honest life without loss of freedom or indeed her or his life.

If you have a problem with that, you have every right to say it, but I have every right to press on.
And I will.
(In case you only read me here, some of this happened over at Irish lesbian website Gaelick.com, where I blog regularly as well.)

Harold Ford Mum On Uganda's Kill The Gays Bill (lezgetreal.com)
Homosexuals Can Forget About Human Rights (themoderatevoice.com)
Irish Oil, Bill Gates and Coca Cola spend spend spend in Anti-Gay Uganda (lezgetreal.com)
Can the Irish connection change Ugandaa s plans to execute gays? | gaelick (topix.net)

Tullow Oil and Uganda's Kill the Gays Bill

2010-01-27T03:07:00.000-08:00

You've hopefully all seen Rachel Maddow's coverage of Uganda's Kill the Gays bill.

Well yesterday, it came out that an Irish company (reg'd in the UK) is about to invest 1.35 billion dollars in Ugandan Oil interests.

We're going to hammer this. They can't ignore the statement their investment makes. They can't ignore the issues this proposed legislation will create in employment and in using their own employees from Europe/North America,etc in countries where homosexuality is illegal.

I really can't write another post on it right now, but you can find what I've already written:

On Gaelick

On LezGetReal

Where have I been?

2010-01-16T14:00:00.000-08:00

I realise it's been almost a month since my last post. Probably predictable enough given that it was over Xmas and how my Xmas went (see earlier post!).

However, it's because I've been writing elsewhere. I feel like I'm cheating.

So if anyone out there is wondering what I've been thinking, you can find me at:

Gaelick

and

LezGetReal

And I'll be around :) there's some stuff those guys don't want me to publish on their sites.

Frozen pipes, water shortages and bullshit all around

2010-01-16T06:36:00.000-08:00

On Christmas morning, I woke to find my house very cold. When I checked the heating, which runs on pressure from our mains water supply, I found our water was off. While our plan had been to spend Christmas day in Kildare, with family, we spent the vast majority of the day trying to locate the frozen pipes and aiming hairdriers at the most likely pipes.

It had only been -6c the night before.

We ultimately gave up, and went away, hoping that when we arrived back it would be flowing freely again. Sadly, it would be three of the coldest weeks in a generation before we had running water or central heating in our home.

Houseplants died, our cats & I caught colds and we spent three weeks in thermal underwear (not the cats), hats and coats in our own home. We showered with various neighbours, all of whom lost their water ultimately as well. We only flushed the toilets when we had adequate supplies of water to do so. We consumed about 25l of water a day during this time, compared to the Irish daily average of 150l.

What happened? Why did our pipes freeze at a frankly mild -6c? Why did they remain largely frozen for three weeks? Who is at fault?

The first council failure was their emergency number, which rang out for a full four days following Christmas. The council had no way of knowing so many of its residents were without water (and central heating as many of the houses have heating systems that require mains pressure).

It turns out our pipes lay only 14 inches in the ground, where building regulations state they should be 750mm or approximately 29 inches, minimum. This is obviously the fault of the developer. However, there is also supposed to be council oversight in this, and they should not have connected incorrectly laid pipes to the mains. Not only for the householders who would purchase and live in the houses, but because inadequately buried pipes will freeze early, and increase the chance of freezing in the water mains, which can cause breakages and leaks to occur. And Irish pipes are leaking a lot already.

An informal survey of our neighbours and locals from other new-ish estates confirms that everyone who lost water had pipes laid at the wrong depth. The most shallow-laid pipes I found were a mere foot in the ground. Most seem to be fourteen to eighteen inches, still a good 10 inches too shallow.

There were other problems. When the freezing temperatures hit, homeowners who didn't have already frozen pipes, started leaving a tap dripping to avoid losing water. The council then panicked and switched off the water at night, precisely the wrong time to switch it off. Not only was it switched off when people were home from work (yes, people do work during Christmas week) but it was also sitting still in the pipes during the coldest hours of the night. They couldn't have created better conditions for freezing.

So when on December 30th, we got a trickle of water through our taps, the water was switched off that night and it all froze again, and would stay frozen for another two weeks.

Nobody would have to leave their taps dripping if the pipes had been laid correctly in the first place. And while the council denies responsibility, they had to connect those pipes to the water mains. They knew, and their responsibility began with that knowledge.

Now the council have sought to blame the public in press releases and in conversations with the press. They have said that leaving the water dripping is the source of the water shortage.

We learn now that our pipes are old and leaking anything up to about 60% of the treated water that runs through them. In what way is that the fault of the general public? Are we not paying enough in taxes? Have we not made basic infrastructure a political issue in a while?

I'll take the blame for not asking my politicians about our water supplies in a while. And I will start fixing that right now.

I encourage you all to ask your politicians when exactly the developers will be made fix the pipes that they laid too shallow. Ask what the government is doing about aging water infrastructure, rather than spending millions on water metres (in order to charge us for a service that fell at the first hurdle), could they not simply repair the pipes, saving us half the water consumption with simply maintaining our basic and vital infrastructure.

Notes:

1. Turning the water off at "night" has also forced people to use electrical appliances that require water (washing machine, dishwasher, electric shower) during peak hours, which puts strain on the electric grid and costs the homeowner a lot more. Residents were also forced to use electric heaters to keep their homes livable. We will be seeing some record ESB bills shortly.
2. For those of you saying, "Stop complaining, think about Haiti". Haitians have been living in squalor for hundreds of years. I understand because of the earthquake and horrific mortality predictions it's suddenly in vogue to tell people off for complaining about anything other than being dead. Listen, I gave. I care. I'm not going to give up fighting crappy standards at home just because suddenly everyone cares about Haiti. If you're still freaking out about Haiti next month, I'll be impressed.
3. I am not going to stop annoying the hell out of any official I can get my hands on until I have a concrete committment to fix my pipes so this does not happen if the temperatures happen to drop below 0c again next year. If you want to help, let me know.

Why the BBC shouldn't have apologised

2009-12-18T07:24:00.000-08:00

And why we need to get over ourselves for our own good.

Yesterday, the BBC asked (on their Africa Have Your Say page) "Should homosexuals face execution?".

This question was relevant to the discussion of a new proposed (and likely to be passed) law in Uganda. This is a pretty big deal. The proposed legislation not only makes being gay punishable by jail or execution, but it makes knowledge of a homosexual person punishable as well, if you fail to report them.

And the outcry against the BBC began. I was puzzled by it, frankly. I still am. But I often am puzzled, and work was busy yesterday, so it all slipped past me.

Then this morning, I perused my usual blogs. I saw that Joe.My.God (one of my favourite bloggers) was blogging about it and I read his posts. I still failed to understand what the problem was. I did steal his screencap for this post.

The BBC did not say they thought that homosexuals should face execution. They simply asked others did they think so.

I can understand being afraid of the answer. I'm gay. I live in a country where homosexuality, while tolerated, is hardly embraced.

However silencing the debate is not the answer. Why do we want to hide the bigots? Without getting into freedom of the press, etc, I think this should only be curtailed in very extreme situations. This wasn't one of those.

The majority of the answers are "No! Of course not!" and I would have expected that. Even those who don't think homosexuality is a great thing, generally don't believe in killing gay people.

However, there are reasonable people in our societies who are unaware of the bigotry and hate that still exists. They have largely gotten over their general problems with homosexuality (so they believe everyone has). Their friends and colleagues rarely say anything objectionable about gay people, and if they do, it's all in fun, and not meant "that way" (so they assume). They have gay friends, family and they treat them like they do everyone else (so they think everyone else does).

What they don't know, and gay people cannot forget, is that there is still bigotry and hate even in our white-washed, supposedly PC-gone-mad society.

Why is it the end of the world if people see the nutcases, haters and homophobes for what they really are? Are we worried their ideas will catch on? I'm more worried that we're forgetting they are there.

A follow-up

2009-12-15T05:29:00.000-08:00

Ok. I wrote before about how we, as queers, don't need to pretend to be like the straights to succeed.

This is just one HUGE exhibit A about why we often shouldn't.

Brenda Power Claims Gays set back the rights of straight couples.

2009-12-13T03:18:00.000-08:00

Brenda Power: Two women can never become a child’s parents - Times Online: "Presumably it follows that unmarried heterosexual couples are not “de facto” families either, and if a marriage has been dissolved by divorce then single parents living with biological children do not, arguably, constitute families either. Thanks for that, folks, a big step forward."

With all due respect, Ms Power, Fuck you.

(oh yeah, I went there)

We gays are not in the business of fighting for the rights of straight people who blatantly choose not to avail of all their rights and freedoms. If a straight person chooses not to be married (or to end their very sacred marriage), that is their choice. I'll leave fighting for the rights of already privileged people to you and John Waters.

We're fighting to simply have a choice. Gotit? No? Didn't think so.

In other news, did someone really burn her in effigy? REALLY? Pics or it didn't happen.

More Art-y Stuff... finally

2009-11-19T13:45:00.000-08:00

I haven't said much about anything art-y recently, which is a shame. My head is so full of other stuff at the moment.

In fact, my last art-y post was here, my very first post on this blog. Pretty chuffed actually, as the artist actually commented on the entry where I went all fangirl on her painting.

But since then I've purchased two photographic prints by Noah Grey of Texas, formerly of Dublin, Ireland and Redondo Beach, California.

One went to my parents and the other is over my fireplace and I love it so very much. I'll get a picture of it later... it's one of the first things I've loved enough to have properly framed. The sad thing is that as of 2009, Noah Grey left the internet. Actually that's only one of the sad things about him.

He -- a gay, aspie, Texan -- lived in Dublin for a few years with his husband who was epileptic. When Barry died from a siezure in his sleep, Noah left immediately after the funeral. Shortly after his arrival home, his sister died of cancer.

I don't know why he left the internet, but I miss him. While I knew his husband Barry from various animal discussion boards, I never actually met Noah, but his writings and photographs were a regular part of my weeks.

I found a couple photographs of his (besides the one of Barry) still floating around on the internet.

Because I'm obsessed with marine imagines, I chose this one. Enjoy. :-)

Why the Outrage Gives me Hope

2009-11-19T12:03:00.000-08:00

Just a quick note really.

I'm not a sports-type person. Except for ice hockey, which is a constitutional requirement as a Canadian citizen, I really don't bother watching sports.

Last night I kissed my wife and said, "See you in a couple hours". I put on my earphones and proceeded to twitter and YouTube and work on a two page cat agility article. You don't want to know about this.

But then it happened. Ireland scored. France scored. It was getting exciting, so without revealing my interest, I started to listen a little bit. I'm afraid that if I reveal my interest, I'll lose my leverage I gain from "letting" her watch her sports.

But then it all went really truly wrong.

And while I don't understand much about the game, I know he cheated. I have no opinion on whether or not it was intentional, and to be honest, it's irrelevant.

What is relevant is that sports are meant to showcase the best of us. It's supposed to be where we see our best and strongest, working their hardest and being good sports... win or lose.

The outrage I have seen (from French, English, Spanish, Irish, Catalan, etc people) has cheered me to no end. The very fact that France's win left such a sour taste in the mouths of so many affirms my belief (in my better moments) that people really are intrinsically good and fair.

Whether anything ever comes of this, I'm delighted to have witnessed that people really do care about fairness and justice after all.

Now, if we could only harness that outrage for something other than football.

To be out or in? And how out, is out?

2009-11-17T14:14:00.000-08:00

I'm out.

I believe strongly in being out and in how that can affect our fight for equality.

I consider myself to be totally out of the closet, and that's been the case for a decade.

I'm out to my parents, brother, extended family, old school friends, colleagues that work where I work, and those in remote offices. I regularly post gay news items on my facebook page.

I left Canada after a very bad employment experience where my boss went ballistic after discovering my sexuality and I swore I would never be closeted again. And I haven't. Mostly.

I work in a shop. I deal with probably 20-40 individual people a day. Some take 10 seconds, others I deal with for hours, and some of them become regular customers, and I would feel like I know them quite well. It's not a corner store. In doing my job I have to ask for some sensitive information from people, so it becomes appropriate to share some as well... for comfort and rapport.

I've had this concern for over ten years, although the reasons for it have changed.

I remember ten years ago, a lesbian was trying to buy a gift for her partner. She played the pronoun game badly and clumsily and I knew. But I never said anything, although I made myself extra friendly so she would feel more comfortable. The following day, she brought her girlfriend in.

I resolved I wanted to be in some way obvious -- at least to other gay people -- so they don't feel uncomfortable around me. I bought a labrys necklace and wore a rainbow bracelet. It mostly worked. And for a while, that was enough for me.

But it's getting to me again. So many people I speak to often have absolutely no idea that my partner is a woman. Add to this that I wear a wedding band (we were married in Canada a few years ago but Ireland has no gay marriage or civil partnerships), there's no way for people to even suspect.

And yes, I get that "it's none of their business" and "why would I want them to know?" and I can be happy enough with myself if my closetedness was simply a sin of ommission.

But it's not. I play the pronoun game. While I certainly don't use male pronouns, I don't use the female ones either. And given that my wife has a very male-identified career, it's easy to just say what she does, while clumsily omitting the pronoun.

What do you think? Should I risk it and let a she/her slip on occaision? Should I get a new rainbow bracelet? Get a gay/lesbian themed ring? Should I just stop worrying?

My wife will not allow me to cut my hair. Just sayin'.

Newsweek Writer uses Rachel Maddow as example of how gays need to assimilate for Marriage/DADT rights

2009-11-15T13:34:00.000-08:00

Newsweek's Entertainment writer, Ramin Setoodeh, writes that Rachel Maddow is a good example of how gay people need to "dress the part" to join "someone else's party" to get marriage rights, and the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell.

And because she was named in the article, I will point out that Rachel Maddow values her outsider culture as a gay person. A person who identifies as a "big lesbian who looks like a man" probably isn't the right person to hold up as an example of a well-behaved gay who is, "dressing the part" to be "invited to someone else's party." While I'm not a fan of her tv "look", she wears a lot less makeup than most women on television and less than some men, I'd dare say.

The assimilationist argument is an old one. Bigots say they'd like black people better if they'd act less "black". Bigots even rail against "stereotypes" maintaining that minorities can and should act the way the white, Christian majority do... in order to make people like them better. All while sounding very PC of course.

Now the argument is being made to the gays. Come on, gays. Act less gay. Stop having those bothersome pride parades. Stop insisting on being so damned different. Leave that otherness behind.

The problem with that argument?

It doesn't work.

First of all, it's not acceptance of our differences if we first have to become the same as you.

And second, even if we're all dressing and talking and living like straight people, we're still fucking like queers. And that's what people fear... not our short hair, flaming demeanour or doc boots.

Third? We are different. The very fact that gay people grow up in a straight world makes us different. Our teen years and twenties (and later for still many people) are dominated by questions straight people need never address. Will our families abandon us for being who we are? Is it better to keep it a secret and remain alone? Is it possible to have a relationship but keep it quiet? When should I tell my boss? When do I tell my friends? Did I get made redundant because I'm gay? Did he mean that joke to offend me? Will people be offended by being invited to my wedding?

I remember arriving at the local gay bar shortly after I came out. Immediately upon entering I spotted a guy I knew from the university's Christian community. He stared, somewhat panicked. I smiled and so did he. We were secret allies then, two "others" among the rest.

My otherness is a part of my identity and is part of our community. I refuse to get rid of it. It's part of what made my younger years so tough and part of what made me, me. I don't want to be the same, I want to be a part of the same things, as me... otherness and all.

Assimilation should not (and I'm confident, will not) be a prerequisite for acceptance.

The Forgotten Employed

2009-11-14T12:06:00.000-08:00

The article in the Irish Times today quotes Taoiseach Brian Cowen

"Prices are falling at the fastest rate in 75 years. The latest inflation figures published on Thursday show that prices fell by 6.6 per cent in last 12 months. This means that the real value of take-home pay and welfare payments has increased by that amount in the last year,"

He goes on to say that the hardest hit are the unemployed... which is true, of course. I have huge sympathy for those who have found themselves unemployed at a time when there is so little employment to be had.

But what he, and so many others miss is that they are not the only ones impacted. Thousands have taken pay cuts, either through deliberate pay cuts or because they are self-employed or they make commission or tips as a primary part of their income.

I work on a basic that is lower than minimum wage and commission. Looking at my payslips, I took about a twenty percent pay cut this year, just in lack of commission and volume bonuses (this wasn't much anyway... I've never made the average industrial wage).

There were no big stories about pay cuts in my company. We didn't have any negotiations. Nobody lowered our bonus target levels. The company just happily ticked on by as the staff suddenly struggled to pay for the basics of life.

Those higher up are more cushioned, with higher basic wages and a smaller part of their income which is dependent on performance. For those of us at the bottom, we have nothing but the hopes that Christmas will bring more than peace and goodwill, but a small amount of money to pay those bills.

I'm told often I'm lucky to still have my job. It'd be nice to feel that way when payday arrives.

Love and Marriage... go together, right?

2009-11-13T03:07:00.000-08:00

Yes! Like a horse and carriage! *sings*

You know what bugs me? Well, if you've been reading my blog or twitter, or have ever met me, you know a lot of things bug me. But that's not the point... not today anyway.

I won't talk now about what bugs me (I'll tell ya later), but I'll tell you what doesn't bug me. Couples who are truly, stupidly in love.

I don't know what's been up with me lately, but it seems everywhere I'm seeing couples who really love each other, which, for me, is a stark contrast to the usual "Can't stand him but what can you do?" I hear from women I happen to see everyday. And nothing... well almost nothing... makes me happier than seeing two people (or more, hey I'm open minded!) genuinely crazy about each other.

I have to say, for all their faults, the one thing my parents taught me is that love is possible. They're together still... my mom's first marriage and my father's second. Thirty-four years of two very different people with almost a decade's age difference and still they kiss each other hello and good bye like they mean it. I'm not saying my parents make out in front of me (ew), but their quick kisses are sweet and more than just routine. And that's a good thing. On paper, these two have almost nothing in common other than geographic proximity, but somewhere in each other, they found that connection that kept them going through some hard times.

As I passed through my teen years, I grew more and more convinced I was not capable of that kind of connection. I thought there was something wrong with me. I went to university and dated a bunch of guys -- really lovely guys most of whom are still friends of mine. And still, no real connection. Three years into university, I decided to stop dating altogether. It wasn't working and was a total waste of my time. I threw myself into other things, but gradually my life began to fall apart.

Today isn't the day for my coming out story, but suffice it to say that when I stopped dating men, other things started to become clear... far beneath the surface, and caused several serious crises for me.

The long and short of it is that became very depressed, and then I figured it all out. But in figuring it out, I never replaced my conviction that I wasn't capable of a real connection with anyone. It's as if I simply transfered the idea that I couldn't have a real connection with a man to women. I just started sleeping with girls, with no real expectation that I could achieve true love.

I moved to England, where my coming out process really took shape. Away from family and expectations, I "found myself" in a very non-ironic way. I met some amazing people and was very humbled to be able to call them friends. All of them totally accepted me for who I am. I dated off and on, but for two years, I was pretty much celibate.

After two years, immigration issues caused another move, this time to Ireland. Not far from my new English friends and far enough from my family who were still struggling with accepting my sexuality.

A few months after I moved to Ireland, I met a guy who got me "back on the horse" so to speak. He forced me to talk to some women at the George (THE Dublin gay bar at the time). On the back of that, I met the woman who in 2005, I married. (Thanks Mike.)

She said it was love at first sight... for me it took a bit longer. I guess I didn't believe I'd find love and she was not what I was expecting either. Love totally took me by surprise, but before I knew it, was ready to say, "I love you" and the word "forever" rolled off my tongue... and felt perfectly right.

So seven years on, I've settled into a sweet domesticity. Coming home from work is still exciting. I'm always delighted to see her and to just be in her presence, even if we're both busy with other stuff. I'm really lucky and I know it. I found that connection I never thought I'd have.

So, what brings me to all this right now? Why after four years of marital bliss and the three preceding non-marital blissful years do I find myself thinking on the nature of coupledom and true love?

You can blame most of it on YouTube.

Enter Portia deRossi and Ellen Degeneres. While I'm not a fangirl of either, I'm crazy about the two of them together. Warning: This video will induce happy sighs.

Ellen and Portia have that magic... you can see when Portia is talking that Ellen is simply enthralled. It's all over their faces.

Then there was this, which I hadn't seen when it first aired. It's the video of the Obamas dancing at the Inagural Ball.

Two things about that video.

One: The Obamas have such undeniable chemistry. They're both attractive, intelligent and they dance and laugh as though there's no one else there, never mind the whole world is watching. They look grateful to be in each other's arms. This is a couple who knows they're lucky to have found each other.

Two: You'll hear Rachel Maddow as the sole female voice in the commentary. There are a couple notable quotes from her: "How much of a trial can it be to dance with your beloved?" and "That careful, sweet turn? It's not getting old."

I'd be remiss if I didn't point to Rachel herself and her girlfriend, Susan Mikula as another example of a truly fairytale type love.

From an article in Newsweek from December 2008:

She says their relationship "is the thing about which I am most proud and most protective. And if it made sense for my relationship with Susan that I needed to stop being on TV, and stop being on the radio, and go live full time in the Upper Peninsula in Michigan and raise chickens, we'd go live in the Upper Peninsula and raise chickens. It's the single clearest thing in my life."

Bingo. This is that thing of which I speak. Why settle for anything less than the relationship that makes you feel like that?

Ok, getting to the point (because I do have one).

What is the point of me showing you all these incredibly happy couples? What is the reason I decided to rant about how lucky I am to be in love?

Because one of the things I have learned from being in love is that love recognises love and wants there to be more of it.

Since falling in love, I am a far softer version of myself. I see those around me differently. I see people knowing that someone loves them. That in someone's eyes, that person is perfection, home and the whole world.

That worldview shift is massive. And I can see it in the couples I've mentioned and so many others. Unlike lotto wins, or fame and fortune, love is one of those amazing things that is quite everyday and quite within the reach of everyone. Love is naturally egalitarian. Love doesn't understand the boundaries that humans create. Love doesn't recognise race or ethnicity or age or beauty or IQ. And most of all, it doesn't recognise gender.

Yes, this is my point. For those people who really understand how lucky they are to have found true love, the question of same sex marriage has to be a no brainer. We are all invariably improved by our experiences of being in love, and being loved.

To attempt to limit the recognition and encouragement of this experience for a minority group is a hateful, useless and destructive path that I can only imagine is endorsed by people who have such a limited experience and understanding of love that they do not know the massive impact it can have on individuals and then, as follows, on society at large.

Seriously. Love is incapable of hurting us, and is infinitely more capable of improving us than any other force we know.

Go Go Go Rachel!

2009-10-16T01:25:00.000-07:00

This was full of win. Ok, I'm in my thirties and not entirely sure what that means, but I'm pretty sure that this interview is awesome.

There's not much to say, but Rachel eloquently slammed Tim Phillips, president of Americans for Prosperity, who are pretending to be a grassroots organisation campaigning against health reform. What they really are is corporate "astroturf", funded by huge corporations. He was well spoken, genial and he did very well, but Rachel went up one side of him and down the other without so much as breaking a sweat. Hot. Sorry. But it is.

Just watch. This time she asked the tough questions, and it was amazing. This so makes up for the limp Rick Berman interview.

And we're all delighted to see her back and well.

Part 1

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Part 2

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Go Ireland!

2009-10-10T08:42:00.000-07:00

Ok, long story, short.

Government in a mess. Greens threatened to pull out, causing an election when Fianna Fail is more likely to be hanged than reelected.

So the Greens negotiate and they jointly produce a Proposed Renewed Programme for Government which the Green Party has to approve. From the whispers, it sounds like it will pass easily.

There's a lot about the economy (which I frankly do not understand) and some good stuff about cycling, more teachers, and...

If they all stick to this, I could be one very happy lesbian.

Because a bisexual character would be dirty

2009-10-10T02:08:00.000-07:00

Last night, I was watching Criminal minds when Neal Baer, Executive Producer of Law & Order SVU, tweeted that the star of that show, Mariska Hargitay, was sitting with him. He asked for questions for her.

He got a lot of questions about her baby and her hair (she really liked those questions). She also got a lot of inevitable questions about when her character, Olivia, is going to hook up with Christopher Meloni's Elliot Stabler or Stephanie March's ADA Alexandra Cabot.

I suspect it wasn't Mariska, but Neal who came up with "Mariska asks: Who do you want me to make with more? Chris or Stephanie." Just historically, Mariska has never shown much eagerness to play with her lesbian fans or A/O shippers, unlike Stephanie March, who loves to tease us. And we love her teasing us.

SVU "shippers" (those who want a relationship to develop, or believe there is already a relationship, between the characters on the show) are roughly divided between those who 'ship Elliot & Olivia (E/O) and Alex & Olivia (A/O). There are other ships, but these are the two largest.

When @TheRealJackie tweeted "Both!" Neal or Mariska tweeted back

@TheRealJackie Hey now, it"s not that kind of show
Link

WTF? It's not what kind of show exactly? Not a show about a strong, bisexual cop? Or it's not that kind of show, as in... it's not porn?

Insert large loud sigh here.

Since when does bisexuality = porn?

For a show that routinely juxtaposes really hot actors and actresses in revealing clothing, with rape scenes, that statement can be taken really the wrong way.

Maybe they read it as "at the same time". And I'm hoping they did. Biphobia is uncool.

Thank you, again, Keith

2009-10-08T23:57:00.000-07:00

Keith Olbermann on Healthcare reform

Just trust me, you need to watch this.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Fashion Police!

2009-10-08T23:53:00.000-07:00

Awesome.

Things to consider before attacking a man in a dress

2009-10-08T07:28:00.001-07:00

... he might be able to take care of himself. In heels, better than you can.

Read the story here.

And watch the CCTV footage here.

Oklahoma Bill H.B. 1595

2009-10-08T07:16:00.000-07:00

Here's a link to a .rtf version of the Bill itself.

This is the questionnaire:

Individual Abortion Form
(TO BE COMPLETED FOR EACH ABORTION PERFORMED)
1. Date of abortion _________________
2. County in which abortion performed ________________
3. Age of mother _________________
4. Marital status of mother ________________
(married, divorced, separated, widowed, or never married)
5. Race of mother ________________
6. Years of education of mother ________________
(specify highest year completed)
7. State or foreign country of residence of mother ________________
8. Total number of previous pregnancies of the mother ________________
Live Births _________________
Miscarriages _________________
Induced Abortions __________________
9. Approximate gestational age in weeks, as measured from the last menstrual period of the mother, of the unborn child subject to abortion _______________________________
10. Method of abortion used:
Suction Aspiration ___________
Dilation and Curettage ___________
RU 486 ___________
Methotrexate ___________
Dilation and Evacuation ___________
Saline ___________
Urea ___________
Prostaglandins ___________
Partial Birth Abortion __________
Hysterotomy ___________
Other (specify) ___________

11. Was there an infant born alive as a result of the abortion? __________
If yes:
Were life-sustaining measures undertaken? ___________
How long did the infant survive? ___________
12. Was anesthesia administered to mother __________________
If yes, what type? _________________
13. Was anesthesia administered to the fetus? ___________
If yes:
What type? _______________________
How was it administered? _______________________
14. Method of fetal tissue disposal _______________________
15. Reason for abortion (check all applicable):
Mother cannot afford the child ______
Emotional health of the mother is at risk ______
Mother suffered from a medical emergency as defined in Section 1-738.1 of Title 63 of the Oklahoma Statutes ______
Mother wanted a child of a different sex ______
Abortion necessary to avert the death of the mother ______
Pregnancy was a result of forcible rape ______
Pregnancy was a result of incest ______
Other (specify) ______
Patient was asked why she is seeking an abortion, but she declined to give a reason _________________________
16. Method of payment (check one):
Private insurance _______
Public health plan _______
Medicaid _______
Private pay _______
Other (specify) _________________
17. Type of medical health insurance coverage, if any (check one):
Fee-for-service insurance company ______
Managed care company ______
Other (specify) __________________________________
18. Sum of fee(s) collected ___________
19. Specialty area of medicine of the physician ___________________
_______________________________________________________________
20. Was ultrasound equipment used before, during, or after the performance of this abortion?
Before? _____ Vaginal, abdominal, or both? _____
During? _____ Vaginal, abdominal, or both? _____
After? _____ Vaginal, abdominal, or both? _____
21. Was the information required by paragraph 1 of subsection B of Section 1-738.2 of Title 63 of the Oklahoma Statutes provided to the mother? ___________
a. If yes, was it provided:
In person ___________
By telephone ___________
b. Was it provided by:
A referring physician __________
The physician performing the abortion _________
An agent of a referring physician ___________
An agent of the physician performing the abortion ________
22. Was the information required by paragraph 2 of subsection B of Section 1-738.2 of Title 63 of the Oklahoma Statutes provided to the mother? ___________
a. If yes, was it provided:
In person _______
By telephone _________
b. Was it provided by:
A referring physician _________
An agent of a referring physician ________
The physician performing the abortion ________
An agent of the physician performing the abortion _______
23. Did the mother avail herself of the opportunity to have the printed materials described in Section 1-738.3 of Title 63 of the Oklahoma Statutes mailed to her? ______________
24. Were the informed consent requirements of subsection B of Section 1-738.2 of Title 63 of the Oklahoma Statutes dispensed with because of a medical emergency necessitating an immediate abortion:
To avert death ______
To avert substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function arising from continued pregnancy _____
25. Was the probable gestational age twenty (20) weeks or more? _____
a. If yes, was the mother provided the information described in subsection A of Section 1-738.8 of Title 63 of the Oklahoma Statutes? _____
(1) If yes, was the information provided:
In person ______
By telephone ______
(2) If yes, was the information provided:
By a referring physician _____
An agent of a referring physician _____
The physician performing the abortion _____
An agent of the physician performing the abortion _____
b. Did the mother choose to be given or mailed the materials described in Section 1-738.10 of Title 63 of the Oklahoma Statutes? ___________
c. To the best of the information and belief of the reporting physician, did the mother go on to obtain the abortion? ________
26. Was the abortion performed within the scope of employment of an Oklahoma state employee or an employee of an agency or political subdivision of the state? ________
27. Was the abortion performed with the use of any public institution, public facility, public equipment, or other physical asset owned, leased, or controlled by this state, its agencies, or political subdivisions? _________
28. If the answer to question 26 or 27 is yes:
a. Was the abortion necessary to save the life of the mother? _______
If yes, what was the life-endangering condition? __________
b. Did the pregnancy result from an act of forcible rape? _______
If yes, list the law enforcement authority to which the rape was reported ___________________
List the date of the report ___________
c. Did the pregnancy result from an act of incest committed against a minor? _________
If yes, list the law enforcement authority to which the perpetrator was reported ________________
List the date of the report ___________
THIS PORTION TO BE COMPLETED IN CASE OF MINOR
29. Minor’s age ___________
30. Was a parent of the minor provided notice prior to the abortion as described in Section 1-740.2 of Title 63 of the Oklahoma Statutes? ________
a. If yes, how was the notice provided?
In person _______
By mail _______
b. If yes, to the best of the reporting physician’s knowledge and belief, did the minor go on to obtain the abortion? ________
31. Was informed written consent of one parent obtained as described in Section 1-740.2 of Title 63 of the Oklahoma Statutes? ______
If yes, how was it secured?
In person ___________
Other (specify) _________
32. If no notice was provided nor consent obtained, please indicate which of the following apply:
Minor was emancipated ___________
Abortion was necessary to prevent the death of the minor _____
Medical emergency, as defined in Section 1-738.1 of Title 63 of the Oklahoma Statutes, existed ___________
Minor received judicial authorization to obtain abortion without parental notice or consent ___________
33. If no notice was provided nor consent obtained because a medical emergency existed, please indicate:
Whether parent was subsequently notified (state period of time elapsed before notice was given) ____________
Whether judicial waiver of notice requirement was obtained ________
34. If the minor received judicial authorization to obtain an abortion without parental notice, please indicate which of the following applies:
Judge ruled that minor was mature enough to give informed consent on her own ___________
Judge ruled that abortion was in the best interest of the minor ___________
Filed this ____ day of __________, _____ by:
______________________________
(Name of physician)
_____________________________
(Physician’s license number)

Too early for this level of wrong

2009-10-08T01:56:00.000-07:00

In the American state of Oklahoma, a law requiring the details of abortions to be published on a public website is set to take effect on November 1, 2009.

While HB1595 does not require the publishing of names, the questionnaire that is to be filled out certainly contains plenty of identifying details that should have Oklahoman woman fleeing the state to have their pregnancies terminated. Certainly women in rural areas will have no hope of anonymity.

And not surprisingly, the text of HB1595 contains a reference to the "Unborn child", in one of the questions women will be required to answer as part of undergoing the procedure.

I'm not sure why this is just making the rounds now, but I could have missed it back in May when it was signed into law as a "reporting [and] compliance bill" according to an anti-choice site.

And in case anyone thinks this is a thinly veiled attempt to undermine a woman's right to choose, think again. It's not veiled at all.

Representative Dan Sullivan and Senator Todd Lamb are the authors of the legislation that Lauinger says is a key to helping further reduce the number of abortions in the state.
(From LifeNews.com)

Courthouse News Service reports that two women are challenging the law.

The Oklahoma law, H.B. 1595, also changed definitions of abortion terms, used terms already thrown out by a court and barred certain procedures for the first time, according to the filing.
(From CourthouseNews.Com)

I just realised

2009-10-07T13:48:00.000-07:00

That my very first post mentioning the amazing Rachel Maddow is all crappy and negative.

To counter that, this post will be my adoring, fawning ode to the cocktail shaking, Rhodes Scholar, AIDS activist butch with her awesome footwear choices.

First, I'll have to get all negative again and say I'm not a huge fan of the debutching of Maddow. Her MSNBC appearance reminds butch lesbians at every turn that they are not attractive enough in their own right, and that biology is indeed, destiny, regardless of brains, personality and a Rhodes Scholarship.

But before the makeup people have put sea-green eyeshadow on her eyelids and pale sixties-style lip gloss on her lips, she's brainy butchy sexy.

But most importantly, she's got smart things to say. And she says them well.

And while her critics may be sometimes right, that she takes the easy shots and sometimes fails to dig below the surface... and sometimes takes stuff out of context when it's pretty damn obvious what was meant, her investigations into fake grassroots organisations ("astroturf") and her interviews with liberals and conservatives alike are the stuff of great television. It's amazing to finally have a real queer, feminist liberal on television -- warts and all. Because at the end of the day, we liberals are ourselves -- our greatest credit and failing at the same time.

That said, I'm not sure the level of discourse I'm seeking is possible on a 5-night a week show. Rachel certainly has raised the bar.

And I can stop explaining now, because this youtube video will convince you as much as anything I can think of to say:

*swoon*

I love you Rachel, but...

2009-10-07T10:31:00.000-07:00

... but Rick Berman wiped the floor with you last night.

He showed himself to be dressed in super PR teflon. Nothing stuck.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

You had three pages of notes in front of you during the interview. Did you really have nothing other to ask him other than who was paying him?

He said, "It costs nothing to put up a website." Somehow I don't see him with Photoshop and Dreamweaver open, putting together these websites in his spare time. He pays someone to do these. It does cost money. Even if he forks it out himself, someone paid him first.

Also, his facts are absolutely wrong. You could have attacked him on that, but you let him off, preferring to keep asking him to reveal his funding, which he is not going to do. You could have nailed him to the wall with some good research instead of letting him just sit there and grin and make very good points, while happily ignoring your questions.

This is so frustrating because you are so smart. If you weren't, it would seem inevitable, but you have more brains in your pinky finger than this guy could dream of.

I know you're pressed for time and I know it can be hard to come up with questions on the spot but for now I have some suggestions for the next time you have Rick Berman on the show.

Ask him about the medical implications of HFCS. No independent study I can locate has cleared HFCS of being a main culprit in insulin resistance and the epidemic of obesity. Only studies funded by the industry itself have made that assertion.

Ask him does he feel any guilt. Ask him how he feels, being an overweight person himself, about miseducating the general public. Ask him is he worried about diabetes.

And why wasn't he pressed on his ridiculous assertion that the average minimum wage worker has a household income of $50k? One of your viewers worked it out and tweeted that it would take two minimum wage workers working 66 hours a week, 52 weeks a year to make a combined income of $50k.

Since minimum wage workers are disproportionately women (60% of minimum wage workers are women, while we comprise only 46% of the workforce), he could be arguing that a low minimum wage is ok, because women usually have male spouses, who make more than they do. Of course single women and lesbians do not benefit from this serendipidous reality.

On most days, you would find me an adoring, fawning fan. But today, there was too much left unsaid

LEAD TEASER! STEPHANIE MARCH and BALLERINA TEASER!

2009-03-01T13:25:00.001-08:00

Woooooooooooooooooooooo!

Backing Up to prevent reinstall hell

2008-06-30T01:11:00.000-07:00

Well, yesterday I reinstalled windows Vista and Ubuntu for the 3rd time. I don't know what happened, but I'm pretty sure it was a cross between my fluffing the install of Ubuntu last time, so that it ended up on a weirdly high numbered partition (oops) and the Vista updates that had installed the last time I turned my laptop off.

Anyway, partitions suddenly had disappeared, and even the Super Grub Disk couldn't help me... I couldn't even find my Ubuntu files to back them up, so I lost everything from the past month.

On the upside, the install went quicker than before and my blog post about my issues from the 2nd time came in very handy.

Oh and the pink shadows issue is gone with this new install, i didn't have to put the fix in at all. There must be new nVidia drivers.

Actually it was a weird install; I used a disc that came with a Linux Format magazine and it had all sorts of KDE apps on it and tonnes of stuff in the menus that didn't belong there at all. Still, it had loads of stuff preinstalled that I would have spent the evening installing so that was pleasant.

So I spent the evening sussing out backup options to prevent this from being an issue again! I have been backing up evolution (it has a built in backup facility) to a folder on my desktop which I hope will cause me to remember to copy it to my external HD from time to time. The email really was the heartbreaker in all of this, setting up the folders and filters took ages.

The other heartbreaker was firefox... my add-ons and especially my bookmarks. I have LOADS of bookmarks and I love them. So I searched and discovered Foxmarks which saves my bookmarks on a server and allows me to have the same bookmarks on both computers, but most importantly, allows me to restore my bookmarks if I have to reinstall again. Brilliant. Firefox should make this a permanent part of the package. I know Opera have a similar feature (I use Opera mini on my mobile phones).

And for the rest of the stuff, I have downloaded Simple Backup Solution and configured it to back up to a samba share. Fingers crossed!

I rarely use my Windows install but there are some times it's handy, like when IT want to check my computer at work or if I'm on a dodgey wifi connection, Windows reconnects better than Ubuntu. Also the Nokia SDKs only seem to work on Windows so I have to use them sometimes too! But, there's nothing there I really care about if I lose. Anything I do on Windows I move to the external drive immediately anyway because I'll likely be needing it later when I'm in Ubuntu. So not worried about a backup solution for that.

I'll be happy if I never have to go through this again!

Driving is not a womens' issue

2008-06-29T02:20:00.000-07:00

Analysis, Opinion - Independent.ie

That's right Carol, I don't care how you phrase it. The new laws are not a womens' issue and have nothing to do with gender. Women are equally as capable as men of driving safely and passing their test, and I'm sorry if I sound "vociferous" but I actually bothered my ass passing a test (twice in fact, at home and in Ireland) and would prefer not to share the road with the lazy asses who think they're qualified to assess their own driving skill.

And no, there should be no amnesty for older drivers with clean driving records. Some of the worst drivers I know have "clean driving records" mostly because of the disgraceful lack of law enforcement on the roads of Ireland. I know a woman who has driven with no licence whatsoever (provisional expired) for over a year, every day, to and from work, picking up her kids (because having children is a licence to do what you want, with smugness). No garda has ever asked for her licence in that time. And she had a bloody breakdown when she realised, a week ago, that they might be checking licences in July... and she didn't even have a provisional, let alone a full licence.

Until the country starts enforcing laws, people won't bother obeying them... it's just that simple.

Ooooh Mariska!

2008-06-26T12:51:00.001-07:00

Dorothy Surrenders: Straight Gals Acting Like Gay Gals: Fight Club

Special Hotties Unit. Sorry, that was bad. But what’s not bad is the love that dare speak its name between Mariska Hargitay and Maria Bello. Look at those two lovebirds.

Best Blog post I've seen in forever. And yummy. Scrumdiddlyumpcious.

Go forth, and drool.

New ADA for SVU

2008-06-25T10:09:00.001-07:00

"Law & Order: SVU" has a new assistant district attorney: Young thesp Michaela McManus.

Interesting choice. I've never watched One Tree Hill, so I have no idea what she's like as an actress but she does seem very young for the part. Whatever happens I really hope she has some charisma. The show could really use some now that Munch rarely gets to speak, Benson is spending her days longing for a baby and Stabler is gradually self destructing under his massive ego.

I do hope we'll see Stephanie March reprise her Alex Cabot character, even if she won't be SVU's ADA.

Beanz meanz bigotz -- too right.

2008-06-25T05:06:00.001-07:00

Ben Summerskill: Heinz has insulted gay consumers | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

And while Heinz's decision to withdraw the ad might be seen by them as an easy way to palm off 200 fundamentalist Christian complainants, it seems to have been made under the quaint impression that it will cause no offence to Britain's 3.6 million lesbian and gay consumers. Or any of their friends. Or families. Or colleagues.

I thought I might be over this today, but I'm not. So much so that I've been searching the internet looking for some clue that Heinz might have figured out the huge mistake they made.

While searching, I cam across this article in the UK newspaper, The Guardian.

He says it better than I could or than anyone else has. Heinz made a knee-jerk decision based on a handful of complaints (200 complaints, while meaningful, was probably 1 church group in motion) and that decision has alienated millions.

They've also managed to draw attention to the high fat content of the advertised products as people have been pointing out that the complaints were groundless as the ads are not allowed to be aired during childrens' programming anyway.

I don't think I'll be happy anymore with the ad being reinstated. I expect a full on apology from Heinz. I've left a comment on their website, I hope you all will too.

Here's the link to tell them how you feel.

Queers United: Heinz Pulls Ad With Two Men Kissing

2008-06-24T02:46:00.000-07:00

Queers United: Heinz Pulls Ad With Two Men Kissing

This also comes under the "OH SERIOUSLY" category of stupid. I've seen this ad several times, and had a great chuckle. In fact, I hadn't thought of it as a "gay kiss" but that the idea was these sauces would make it just like having a New York Deli in your kitchen, sandwich guy and all.

I think it's disgusting of Heinz to bow to these weirdos. Newsflash: Gay is no longer a bad word. Get over it, or move to Iran.

(evil video in question)

(note the explicit gay sex)

(you don't see it?)

(look closer)

(watch it again)

(it must be there)

BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

Nokia: Open source developers should play by our rules

2008-06-19T12:04:00.000-07:00

Fatal Exception | Neil McAllister
Nokia could be following Google's example. Instead, it has allowed itself to be bogged down by notions inherited from a computing model that's rapidly becoming outdated. As Jaaski himself admitted, "As an industry, we plan to use open source technologies, but we are not yet ready to play by the rules."

Tsk tsk Nokia.

I've worked in mobile phone stuff in the past and it still fascinates me. But Nokia's attitude is less fascinating and more cringeworthy. While the overall quality and competitiveness of Nokia's handsets has plumetted over the past 18 months, other manufacturers are becoming better and more savvy. Nokia need a lead-in. They need something that will make their handsets must-have devices.

To do that, they need to open them up. They need to allow us to write apps that will work on their phones. They need to make them the most customizable (Nokia 5110 anyone?) phones available. They need to allow their phones to be the device that changes the way people interact with each other and the world. Phones are capable of this -- they've already done it -- and they are capable of bringing it along much, much further.

The open-source community are innovative, keen and clever. They are the end-users so they know what they want. Why the suits at Nokia feel they need to be telling the community how to operate is a question, but for those of us familiar with the feebleminded execs who head up most of these companies, it's not a tough one to answer.

Stephanie March Sex Change

2008-06-18T06:22:00.000-07:00

Seriously? I mean, the rest of the search terms all seem reasonable but... check out my list of search engine keywords that have lead people to my humble blog.

Open Source (aka there's more to the internet than p0rn)

2008-06-18T05:51:00.000-07:00

O'Brien: Mozilla's open-source model represents valley at its best - San Jose Mercury News: "For now, let's just be grateful to have Firefox 3.0 and the community that built it."

As I write, downloads of Firefox 3.0 have reached 6,124,310 since 18:16 UTC yesterday. It makes me happy :-) and I'll tell you why.

Now, I've loved the internet since I first encountered it in 1994. I spent my first year in university connected to a high-speed campus network, spending nights in chatrooms and meeting people around the world. I even operated a "pen pal" service in my dorm, matching 18 year old Canadian university students with Scottish grad students at the University of Edinburgh. I found a bulletin board for their university using Gopher.

I eventually met one of the Scottish students when I lived in England. Although we'd both changed and were no longer able to be friends, it felt incredible to know that we'd been such a presence in each others lives, having never met in person (although we did talk on the phone when my budget allowed). We'd even post each other books. That experience taught me early on that the internet was at its most powerful when connecting people.

I'm getting a bit weepy now. It's ok, I'll get over it. :-)

What does this have to do with Firefox? Granted, it sounds like I'm going to rhapsodise about Facebook.

I'm not.

While my earliest experiences taught me that the internet could connect people, what I have only just learned is that the internet can connect people and they can use those connections to make things happen.

WOW.

Think about it. On my laptop, I run Ubuntu as an operating system. It does everything my computer with Windows does. Only, people built Ubuntu because they wanted to. And they distribute it for free. And not free like some free software that only gives a company the ability to plant spyware and adware into your computer, but FREE. It's not costing you anything and they're not looking for anything in return (unless you want to help out!). It's also FREE as in "free speech". The source code is available. Anybody can look at it. Anybody can modify and make it suit their needs. Hardware companies can see the source code for themselves and provide drivers that work properly, instead of the guesswork involved with the OS source code is not available for viewing.

You've heard of Linux, right?

Basically, in 1991, this guy posted on newsgroup that he was setting up his own operating system, as a hobby. He was looking for feedback and suggestions. He never made it proprietary. He never claimed any kind of monetary rights to his OS. He never sought to sell it off to a company, he just allowed it to be used by the community and it became the root of the operating systems we call "Linux" (Distrowatch list 349). People just kept building stuff the way they wanted to use it. And they still do.

Wikipedia is an example of the same phenomenon in action. They claim 75,000 active contributors. While there are always warnings about the potentially unreliable information to be found on pages that can be freely edited, Wikipedia has proven to be one of the most reliable and current sources of information for those doing research, especially in the preliminary stages. I'd be hard pressed to find a reason to own a set of encyclopedias today.

Firefox, is of course, part of the same community developed phenomenon. The Mozilla Developer Center informs potential developers how to obtain the source code, write patches, and submit them for review and inclusion.

When you look at these (and so many other projects) it seems completely insane to continue supporting the proprietary software that keeps us bound to brands and restricted in our productivity(and charge us for it!). Recently the company I work for have started using Open Source projects, like Open Office. I also noticed our LCD display runs on a linux box when I unplugged it by mistake the other day and saw the startup script.

Perhaps there is hope for the old internet yet, beyond Bebo and porn.

Ubuntu vs Windows Vista?

2008-06-03T13:30:00.001-07:00

This guy asserts that the battle for our desktops is between Ubuntu and Windows Vista. He's not alone... I've been reading a lot of this since Ubuntu 8.04 was launched.

This has a lot to do with the massive failure of Windows Vista on lower-end machines. While €300 laptops are trumpeted as "Vista Ready", they don't support the vast majority of new features included in the new Microsoft OS, and they run incredibly slowly.

I was first introduced to Windows Vista at work, where I sell cellular devices that work with PCs. Before Vista I rarely, if ever, saw a customer in store with their laptop. The devices worked well with anything from Windows 2k onwards and Mac OS users were used to sorting themselves out, as were Linux users. Suddenly, I was working on several laptops at once, all low-spec machines running (or crawling!) Windows Vista. I remember explaining to the guy at tech support that after 5 minutes of silence that the laptop was still in the process of restarting.

The issue, of course, was that the defacto OS on most new computers is Windows Vista. This means that those who know the least about computers, spend the least on them and are largely uninterested in finding out how they work are all now saddled with one of the worst operating systems I have ever used. (And I've used just about everything available since my TRS 80).

In my senior year of High School I was the editor of the school newspaper. This is where I first met Macs. I fell madly in love with them and my first computer of my own was a Mac Quadra 605. I had that for almost 6 years. Ultimately I made the decision to buy a Windows 98 laptop because I had gotten sick of not being able to get software and peripherals for my computer locally.

My new laptop has Windows Vista on it, and I've used it. It's workable, and on my reasonably spec'd laptop, it runs quickly enough. The killer on Vista is the training wheels, guardrails, plug covers, rubber rounded corners and child proof cupboards. Using Windows Vista is like being told you're incapable of making wise choices, every minute. No matter what I try to do, a box jumps up and tells me that changing this particular thing might change something. No shit sherlock. It's seriously annoying. Not only that, but if you turn "Account control" off, Windows warns you you've turned it off all the time... and will not let you turn off the warning. The Aero effects are pretty, but I don't see any particular improvements on XP, which I think was possibly Microsoft's Golden Age. In summary, Windows Vista is pointless.

After I got my computer, I installed Ubuntu 7.10 on a small partition to try it out. Years ago I lived with my best friend and she used Linux on everything. I remember watching her setting up a new printer on it (all command line!) . I was so intimidated by it I promptly borrowed some money and bought my own computer with Windows 98 on it... which will go down in history as the worst computer I ever bought! Linux is a different beast these days. My first install was totally uneventful and it was love at first sight. It's pretty, very customisable and all the software I'll ever need is available in a little database. I just tick the stuff I want and Ubuntu installs it for me. I had to fiddle a few things (see my last post) but the information was readily available and command line makes things so quick. I've lost my fear of it now and am currently in awe. I hope someday that will all give way to understanding.

My point is that I don't think Windows Vista is a worthy opponent for Ubuntu. I've been reading however that Microsoft have far from buried XP and will likely be promoting it on lower spec computers, like the Asus eee (which first sold with Linux) in order to compete with the rise in Open Source operating systems and Free software.

It's still anybody's market but I don't think Linux-based operating systems can be dismissed out of hand. I also don't think Vista is going to be a real threat... in fact it may well be what drives some ungeeky users to trying the likes of Ubuntu.

My Ubuntu Install stuff

2008-05-31T12:13:00.001-07:00

I'm really just publishing this for my own reference, but it may help someone else!

I just reinstalled Ubuntu Hardy Heron 8.04 (just to get a larger partition) and had forgotten all the tweaking I'd done when I installed it the first time... so in case I'm doing it again, I decided to keep a record of what I have to do, and where to find the tutorials!

My Spec:

Dell XPS 1330

Core 2 Duo 2.0Ghz, 2GB RAM, 160 GB HD, Nvidia 8400 graphics card, Dell 1505 draft-n wireless card.
Dual boot Vista/Ubuntu, networked to my home PC in a workgroup with Windows XP.

First thing, I had to get my wireless working with Ndiswrapper. Although I've found articles out there about my own wireless card, they haven't worked for me. This does, even though it's for a completely different card. I even tried it with updated drivers and it didn't work. It works exactly as written.

Second, those pink shadows had to go. It's an issue with the Nvidia drivers apparently. But I just don't do pink! The workaround is here.

Third, I have to network my home PC so I can access all my multimedia on my external HD. Download Samba with Synaptic Package Manager. Go to terminal:

sudo /etc/samba/smb.conf

edit workgroup name to match the XP machine. save.

sudo /etc/init.d/samba restart

Wait a few minutes, then I should be able to browse the workgroup again.

That's it so far.

Time to re-think

2008-05-24T14:01:00.000-07:00

When your ITA ("I totally agree") moment occurs over a DailyMail aritcle, it's time to check in and sober the hell up.

On a related note, stupid people piss me the hell off.

And while I dislike people who publicise their personal lives, I have a far stronger contempt for bigots and people who agree with the DailyMail.

Maldrobe Warfunctions

2008-05-20T11:20:00.000-07:00

Maldrobe Warfunctions "Meanwhile, though, I'm developing and testing and checking in and not suffering and not yelling and not waiting for my seriously unhappy Windows environment to get things done. I am no longer desperately jealous of the happy Mac-heads in the office. At the level this thing is performing so far, I may never be."

Amen! It's the Mac jealousy thing that caught my attention. At work there are 4 of us with laptops. 1 of these is a shiny new macbook. I was a mac lover in my teens but got into gaming. Still, I've always been jealous.

But, since I've got Ubuntu, I'm no longer jealous. I even noticed a green eyed glare from macboy himself as I flipped my desktop cube around. Was I ever chuffed.

Very Preliminary... Stephanie March again!

2008-05-07T15:29:00.000-07:00

Ask Ausiello "Question: With Diane Neal leaving Law & Order: SVU, what are the odds of Stephanie March returning as Alex? — Judith
Ausiello: Officially, an SVU spokesperson denies that March is returning next season. Unofficially, I'm hearing that the actress is engaged in very preliminary talks with The Wolfster to appear in a handful of episodes next season."

*Thinks happy thoughts*

"No comment," says Stephanie March

2008-05-04T10:42:00.000-07:00

It's amazing how saying nothing can say so damned much. Someone edited the wikipedia entry for Stephanie March a while back, stating she was "in talks", but as it was unsubstantiated, it was best to ignore it.

This interview (if you can persevere through the annoying interview with her husband) seems to put things in a far more hopeful light!

NBC, please bring back Alex Cabot. Give Stephanie March whatever she's looking for. Especially if season 10 is the end, it would make so much good sense to have her back.

My Wii Fit Review!

2008-04-30T06:28:00.000-07:00

Nintendo

Well, I got one on Friday, and I am pleased with it so far.

Turns out it's selling for 90 euro which is cheaper than I'd expected a few months back, but that could be down to the relatively strong euro.

Setting it up was dead simple and went off without a hitch. (except... I had trouble stamping the date on the calendar... maybe it's my sensor but it took me ages!)

Starting up the game, you are prompted to be weighed and it measures how well you carry yourself. It's quite accurate, I think. The difference was obvious between my non-athletic self and my wife who is very athletic and used to do Tae Kwon Do. She stands still and her Centre of Gravity (CoG) is almost perfect. Mine is far from perfect but has been improving daily. I don't know if there is anything to the idea that the CoG determines how effectively you burn fat, but I have noticed since mine has been improving, I'm walking better. I actually feel more balanced, which I guess is good!

The board itself works well, even on carpet and turns itself off when not in use so at least I won't be constantly leaving it turned on like I do my wireless sensor. My one complaint about the board is that there should be an A button that you can kick. There are so many times in the wii fit that you don't want to be holding the controller, but you have to keep pressing A to continue.

Every day you are promted to do the body test, which I have mixed feelings about. You're not supposed to weigh yourself every day, and if you work a schedule like mine, you're not going to be excersizing at the same time every day either. I do like that it measures your CoG every day. It's also not a good game for those especially sensitive about their weight. If you are obese, it will say it, and your corresponding Mii will increase in size to illustrate the point. I think it's kinda cool (I'm fully aware I'm obese, that's why I bought this).

You can install the game so that the body test can be accessed on the Wii even if a different disk is in the machine. That's handy. To move on to the training segments, however, you have to have the Wii fit disk in. I'm hoping the Wii Fit game is a starting point, as far as a workout program, it's got a lot of improving to do.

You have four catagories: Yoga, Muscle Building, Aerobic and Balance Games.

The Yoga implementation is very good. I've tried Yoga classes before, and while I enjoy it, I always found it hard to judge if I was doing the positions correctly. With the balance board, it tells you if you're holding your body correctly. There are visual and audio cues to guide your breathing as well.

The Muscle Building is similarly effective. The balance board can tell if you've done a push up properly and the tutorials are good.

The Aerobics that I've tried -- Hula, Super Hula and Step have all been ok. I dislike the step but that's a personal preference, as the visual representation is contrary to what I expect as a musician. It would work better for someone who couldn't read music. The Hula is mad fun, and works very very well. It does leave you very sore, but I think that's a good thing!

The Balance games are tough, but this is of course the point. It also showcases the kind of things I hope we can expect from Nintendo in the future, like skiing games for instance.

My main issue is with the Yoga and Muscle Building parts. Each pose or excersize is separate. You then have to listen to the "personal trainer" prattle on and say the same things over and over. You can't skip the verbage. It's really annoying. You also cannot string together separate poses or excersizes, so your "flow" is constantly interrupted. It takes ages to do 10 minutes of excersizes because of all the Wii Remote stuff you have to do to get at the excersizes. I would love the opportunity to choose a string of Yoga poses, Muscle Building excersizes and even a balance or aerobics game. I think others would too.

In conclusion, I like the balance board... it should be a real winner when the software catches up. The game itself is passable but hopefully we'll see better things in future.

Bring back the Triangle of Lust

2008-04-21T12:17:00.000-07:00

The Whateverlah Blog » je souhaite…

So Diane Neal is leaving SVU. Sad yes. I have to admit a certain soft spot for the softball playing carrot top. But moving on (quickly)

Apparently they're looking for an "Up and coming" person to replace her. Seriously? why.

"Can you explain it to me?" (in the immortal words of Casey Novak)

We loved Alex Cabot. Everyone loved Alex Cabot. Alex Cabot, Olivia Benson and whatshisname Stabler. The triangle of Lust. They were beautiful and together they were unstoppable, especially in the raunchier fanfics. Seriously, like Energizer Bunnies.

I'm getting ahead of myself here.

They need to bring Stephanie March (and Alex Cabot) back. I don't really care how they do it. I'm not in the slightest bit bothered if they forget to show Casey leaving and in a random episode, Alex just happens to be the ADA. Or if Alex sleeps with Donnelly to get her job back. Or if she's granted just three wishes from a magic Genie in a bottle. Hey writers, it's ok. Write her back in however you can. She can pop out of a box of crackerjacks. But we want our Alex back.

Please?

A Gay Football Player and Livvie gets Laid

2008-04-19T00:14:00.000-07:00

The Preview for next week's SVU -- "Closet".

Lesbian couple with child 'a de facto family'

2008-04-17T06:15:00.000-07:00

ireland.com - The Irish Times "Mr Justice Hedigan said there was nothing in Irish law to suggest that a family of two women and a child 'has any lesser right to be recognised as a de facto family than a family composed of a man and a woman unmarried to each other'"

This is exciting and -- frankly -- emotional stuff! I'm thrilled to see a judge has actually taken a child's interest over that of the traditionalists.

This is a really great day.

Mother denied daughter's organs

2008-04-12T10:43:00.000-07:00

BBC NEWS : "A mother who urgently needs a kidney transplant has branded the system which denied her the organs of her dying daughter as 'ridiculous'."

As a family member of an extraordinary man who died of kidney failure after two transplants, I have the utmost respect for the process of organ donation.

While I can sympathise with the mother, if I was the local constable I'd be looking into the origin of the fatal asthma attack based on the totally selfish reaction to her daughter's death.

What person, when faced with the sudden and unexpected death of a child, immediately starts thinking about the organ that might suit them... and complains when those organs are donated to people who have been independently judged as needing them more than she does?

It smacks of McCannism... my own word for parental narcissism in the face of losing a child.

In related news, I saw a headline today that they actually finally admitted they were wrong to leave three babies alone in a room while they went drinking. Almost a whole year later, and they finally drop the "we did nothing wrong" speech.

Perhaps I expect too much from parents. Whenever I speak to people who have children, they tell me that I'll never understand the intense love for a child, until you have one, but I don't see much of this love in action.

SVU Season 9 is back on Tuesday!

2008-04-12T04:39:00.000-07:00

We'll see Mariska Hargitay's Olivia Benson character go undercover in a womens' penitentiary to catch a prison officer who she has heard is raping inmates.

I'm impressed. The last time Olivia went undercover as an environmentalist she was made up like the cover of vogue, which was a bit stupid. This time around it looks like she's actually given up the make up addiction in order to actually blend in.

The action looks pretty damn good too.

Criminal Minds" Returns, With a Great Guest

2008-04-12T04:24:00.000-07:00

The Five: Piet Levy on Pop Culture

Piet blogs about Nicholas Brendon guesting on Criminal Minds as Penelope Garcia's love interest. I have to admit, I've had a look at the clips on YouTube and it's a brilliant story, and he suits the character very well.

Season 3 has only just started here in Ireland, so we haven't got to him yet, but I'm definitely looking forward to it!

Bring Bruce Home

2008-04-06T09:38:00.001-07:00

I don't think I've ever seen anything so upsetting. This is the COUNCIL neglecting the animal in a way that would invite prosecution by the RSPCA if an individual had allowed a pet to get into that kind of condition.

Breed Specific Legislation is the stupidest, laziest political joke I have seen ever. The only successful dog-control legislation centres on punishing irresponsible owners, not the unfortunate dogs.

Please, sign this petition and also contact the USPCA to see can they prosecute the council for criminal negligence.

I love Geeky Chicks

2008-04-05T13:14:00.000-07:00

Ok. I couldn't find anything from the news to complain about, so I thought I'd write about something I love. I was having a discussion today about geeks on telly, and it got me to thinking how much more I love a show if there is a geeky girl on it.

To start, there is Chloe O'Brien from 24.

There's little not to love about Chloe. She's loyal, smarter than God, and cute. Sure, she has the facial expressions of a goldfish on speed, but she really can pull an episode together.

And the only other one I could think of was Penelope Garcia from CBS Criminal Minds. I adore this woman. She reminds me of Jenna Elfman's Dharma from the comedy Dharma and Greg except that she seriously knows her way around a computer, or a hundred. She's chirpy, funny, funky and dammit, she has curves! More women on telly need curves and attitude.

But mostly, I conclude more shows need she-geeks. I propose a new she-geek for CSI Vegas and for Law and Order SVU. After Olivia Benson's stint in computer crimes (season 7), maybe she can bring in a friend she met there.

Gay rights group pays tribute to Bertie Ahern

2008-04-05T00:21:00.000-07:00

Pink News: "Ireland has been transformed by Bertie Ahern's time in office, and no matter what conclusions history comes to about his involvement in corruption scandals, for the lesbian and gay community he will always be remembered as a friend and an ally."

It's too late for an April fools like this. HONESTLY. This guy is leaving office a thief and a liar, his party has stood fast against all bills presented to grant any level of security to gay couples, he has pandered to the church at every available opportunity and we're "paying tribute". I, for one, will not.

Ahern to resign as Taoiseach and FF leader on May 6th

2008-04-02T04:13:00.000-07:00

Independent.ie

I feel like doing a wee dance in honour of the man.

While he still maintains he has never put his own interest above the interests of the country, he is stepping down. If my next door neighbour did the things he did, she'd be in prison for 5 years, and branded a criminal. But not Bertie.

Watch while the political world falls all over itself now to point out the goodness of Bertie.

Top Ten Signs You're a Fundamentalist Christian

2008-04-02T02:16:00.000-07:00

Religious Left US: Top Ten Signs You're a Fundamentalist Christian: "3 - While modern science, history, geology, biology, and physics have failed to convince you otherwise, some idiot rolling around on the floor speaking in 'tongues' may be all the evidence you need to 'prove' Christianity."

Good article, and has me chuckling.

It's scary how true this all is. Having been a fundie myself I know. And it still makes me cringe.

Pregnant man: we just want to be a family - World news - News - Belfast Telegraph

2008-03-31T14:49:00.000-07:00

Pregnant man: we just want to be a family - World news - News - Belfast Telegraph: "Thomas Beatie's sex change treatment made him legally male, but he retained his female reproductive organs and he's not afraid to use them."

There's been a lot of blogging about this recently. People have been discussing if a transsexual is fit to be a parent, or why someone who didn't want to be a woman (or wasn't a woman at all, except physically) chose to retain a uterus, etc.

For me, the big question that keeps popping up is this: why are we obliged to be categorised by gender? If equality is a goal that most people recognise as valid, why then do governments persist in categorising us with a meaningless label?

It would take care of so many inequalities, not least the ones posed to homosexual, bisexual and trans people. And what does the categorisation give us? Other than medically, it seems to be an unnecessary detail.

I'm not a homophobe, but...

2008-03-31T11:32:00.000-07:00

Janet's Blog: Speaking the Truth

Ah, the old "I'm not a homophobe, but..." speech. It never gets old, does it?

You know what, Melissa and Tammy know they cannot have children that are biologically from both of them (because they're not total morons). And because the US is controlled by fanatical religious zealots (as is the country I now call home), they are well aware their relationship is not legally a marriage.

Now, I'm not unbiased. To me, Melissa is like an old friend... her music has been there through the roughest and best times of my life. Not only that, but she is a model of sanity in "celebrityworld" of all places. When she and Julie Cypher split, they did everything they could to make things easiest on the kids... they even bought houses that shared a yard, so the kids could run back and forth between homes. Then you see the Britney Spears' and Kerry Katonas of the world, doing everything they can for themselves. Not that I have anything against heterosexuals, the point is that whether you have an inny or an outy (or which your partner has) is no litmus test for morality, goodness, faith or salvation.

But it's the comparison this Janet makes between two women and Pharisees that boggles my mind. Are right-wing Christians so blind?

Princeton wordnet defines Pharisee as "a self-righteous or sanctimonious person". Melissa and Tammy are far from either. Melissa's autobiography reads like a confession of sorts and she never speaks of anyone with malice or anything approaching self-righteousness. Her motto, well known to her fans, is "Be Strong, Speak True and Spread the Peace." Not exactly something Jesus would have objected to.

As an ex-fundamentalist and reformed heterosexual I know that I was taught this stuff, but even then people who spoke like this always seemed so far from God. I couldn't understand what they found attractive about Christianity at all. One of the most Christ-like people I ever met was Buddhist, and I think my split from fundamentalism happened with that realisation.

At the end of the day, Janet Cassidy comes across as the Pharisee, not Melissa or Tammy. Honestly, Janet, if you have to preface your statement with "I'm not being mean or uncharitable, but" then the statement is obviously mean AND uncharitable and you know it. The truth is that religious zealots cannot stand Melissa Etheridge because she is good and honest. They prefer the promiscuous, scandal-laden homos who give them fodder for their hate speech and propaganda.

This I know: Jesus would hang out with Melissa and Tammy long before he'd darken the door of Janet Cassidy's temple of self-righteousness.

(told ya there'd be rants!)

TV's May-September romance - 03/30/2008 - MiamiHerald.com

2008-03-31T04:39:00.000-07:00

TV's May-September romance - 03/30/2008 - MiamiHerald.com: "even among actresses, where the conventional wisdom is that age is a curse, the top three are Law & Order: SVU's Mariska Hargitay (44), CSI's Marg Helgenberger (49) and sitcom star Reba McEntire (53)."

Very interesting! Personally, I watch very few shows where the actors are younger than thirty-something me. And although we always hear that in entertainment, youth rules, if I made a list of the most attractive actors/actresses on television, there wouldn't be one under 39 (and that's Jorja Fox).

I think in the last decade or so, new talent has been selected poorly -- often selected exclusively for looks and pop appeal, and that method has backfired. Audiences are no longer captivated by a beauty when you know she bought every body part she shows and spends months at a time in rehab. We want actors. We want people who make us feel a story and can hold our ever decreasing attention spans.

I do anyway.

While I have no idea who Reba McEntire is, Marg Helgenberger and Mariska Hargitay are beautiful women who really can act. Jorja Fox too, beautiful, but more than that, she can act. We might have forgotten about acting during the Baywatch years but thankfully, it appears to be returning as a priority.

Cuisine of Canada

2008-03-30T11:48:00.000-07:00

Cuisine of Canada - Wikipedia

You know, there are millions of reasons I love Wikipedia. But today, having discovered this article, I am more in love with it than ever.

Sometimes people ask me what would be traditional food at home, and I think back to all these wonderful foods!

Poutine, Kraft Dinner, maple everything, Sugar Pie, fiddleheads... but I forgot so many too.

Hot Turkey Sandwiches!
Bannock!
Butter tarts!
Nanaimo bars!

MMmmmm I need to go home for a wee visit, and loads of food.

:-)

Thanks to FX Cuisine for the poutine article that has left my mouth watering!

Anyone Else But You - Michael Cera and Ellen Page

2008-03-30T06:28:00.001-07:00

Oh yeah, I'm in love with Juno. I mean, who isn't? Ellen Page is adorable and offensive in that great teenaged way. Her boyfriend is dorky and honest. They're a little bit Dawson's Creek I suppose, but then I liked Dawsons Creek at the time, so I suppose it follows I'd enjoy Juno.

The Ellen Page "sexuality watch" is a tad annoying really, but it was bound to happen and I'm sure she knew that. Hell, she's Canadian, isn't that enough to make her gay? (I'm so joking)

I'm also madly in love with this song by the Mouldy Peaches even though I get annoyed when they hit sour notes... it's an ear worm!

"The X-Files" sequel: Invading theatres this summer | AfterEllen.com

2008-03-29T15:21:00.000-07:00

"The X-Files" sequel: Invading theatres this summer | AfterEllen.com

I'm sort of hopeful and frightened at the same time! I used to adore the X-Files. Used to... back in 1997-ish.

The last movie was a huge disappointment to me... I guess I wanted it to be more like the show.
But far be it from me to prejudge. I am looking forward to the new one.

Olivia Benson gets her Man sigh

2008-03-29T05:09:00.000-07:00

Olivia gets a Boyfriend: "New love on 'L&O: SVU'

Her mother, Jayne Mansfield, would surely be proud: Mariska Hargitay, who plays the tough yet tender -- and single -- Detective Olivia Benson on 'Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,' has bagged an awesome man.

Well, her character has: People magazine says that on April 22, 'SVU' will pair up Olivia with a new love interest played by Bill Pullman.

Last week Hargitay told TV Guide, 'I've been begging Neal (Baer, executive producer) for five years to give me a boyfriend.'"

Hoooo hum. Am I the only one who is a tad bored by this? And by bored, I mean completely annoyed.

I have no beef with Bill Pullman, or with Olivia having someone to love, but seriously -- over the past two seasons she's become more and more desperate and pathetic... not exactly a lead up to an affair to remember.

Of course, if it lasts more than this one episode, it'll mean the end of all HoYay which is sad, because Olivia did it very very well. I get the feeling more and more that Mariska Hargitay doesn't like the Olivia she created so well in the first four/five seasons. In the past 3 seasons, she's moved her character in a way that might have made sense had they chosen that direction after season one, but once you have seasons 2-5, don't seem to make sense at all.

Her hair has become more and more complex, her outfits are frillier and less practical. She's not dressing for her job, but a fashion shoot. If you saw the bit in season 8 where she went undercover, she wore tonnes of makeup while apparently going undercover with environmental activists. Perhaps environmental activists in New York are covered head-to-toe in Max Factor, but I doubt it. Even the recent cover of TV Guide speaks volumes... all the other actors are dressed in character, but Mariska Hargitay is wearing a bright blue evening gown, not exactly uniform blues.

Maybe that's why these days I find myself skipping the new episodes to watch reruns.

1 in 4 believe rape victims are to blame

2008-03-29T01:32:00.000-07:00

Rape: our blame culture: "ONE in four people believe women who have been raped are partly to blame for the crime because of how they dressed, their sexual history or how much they had to drink."

Read it and weap.

Shooting of Gay Student Sparks Outcry

2008-03-29T01:24:00.000-07:00

The Associated Press: Shooting of Gay Student Sparks Outcry: "Larry King was a gay eighth-grader who used to come to school in makeup, high heels and earrings. And when the other boys made fun of him, he would boldly tease them right back by flirting with them."

First things first -- I suspect Larry King (what an unfortunate name) was in fact transgendered, and not gay.

Second, what a frickin tragedy. And it's not even the fault of the kid who shot him-- it's the fault of the homophobic nonsense that is pumped into our children every day by fascist morons hiding behind the banner of "religion".

Irish teachers face dismissal for being gay

2008-03-29T01:18:00.000-07:00

Irish teachers face dismissal for being gay- from Pink News: "She added that gay and lesbian teachers faced 'isolation, alienation, harassment, discrimination and downright bigotry' on a regular basis and stated that only six out of the 35 members were in a position to be open about their sexuality in school."

Yet another reason to tell the church to feck off out of our schools and hospitals. It's 2008. Let's stop living in the middle ages.

I'm going to see Melissa Etheridge!!!

2008-03-28T03:24:00.001-07:00

I've got tickets for her Massey Hall (Toronto) gig in the summer. I'm so excited!

I've seen her once before, in Hammersmith (London) during her Lucky tour. My wife bought me tickets and I was over the moon. I've been a fan of Melissa's forever and had never had the opportunity to see her live.

And grrl, she does not disappoint. After four hours of rockin in our seats, we were exhausted and she was still rockin on stage!

This year, we'll rock some more after the concert as I've been told that the party continues at Toronto's best womens' bar, Slacks. This will be in stark contrast to our London experience where the concert ended late enough that we were unable to procure any refreshments for in the hotel. Even the bloody hotel wouldn't sell us a bottle of wine! Four stars, me arse.

And speaking of hotels, I haven't managed to pick one out yet for the concert. I was looking at the Pantages since that's where they are holding the travel package, and it looks lovely -- especially the serenity floor.

We stayed in the Radission Suites hotel in Halifax, Nova Scotia when we were married. I was really impressed! It wasn't cheap, but for the standard of accomodation and service, it was a true bargain. Sadly the Radisson Suites in Toronto appears to be near the airport, not downtown... and I don't want to be driving until the day we leave Toronto.

So any tips would be most welcome, and until then I'm waiting for the alarm guy to show up and surfing Trip Advisor.

The Big Gay Sketch Show

2008-03-28T02:59:00.001-07:00

Why don't we have stuff like this on telly over here? It's brilliant!

The Associated Press: AP Probe Finds Drugs in Drinking Water

2008-03-28T02:33:00.000-07:00

The Associated Press: AP Probe Finds Drugs in Drinking Water

I think I'd find this less scary if it was cocaine in the water supply than the crazy combination of stuff they have found.

Officials in Philadelphia said testing there discovered 56 pharmaceuticals
or byproducts in treated drinking water, including medicines for pain,
infection, high cholesterol, asthma, epilepsy, mental illness and heart
problems. Sixty-three pharmaceuticals or byproducts were found in the city's
watersheds.

And I know it's tiny tiny amounts of it, but still it makes you wonder.

2008-03-27T11:47:00.000-07:00

Sherrie Cannell's Rock

Oh dear god. The lust. The vitality.

Anyone with any good ideas on how to raise $1000 quickly?

Her other stuff is excellent too. I'm just in awe.

I found her because she the featured artist at Slacks in Toronto this month.

Oh and welcome to my sorta new blog by the way. The other one got suspended for being spam, which must be some kind of an insult I'm sure! They said they'd look into it, but I'm impatient like that. :-)

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A Queer Faith

Life's big questions

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I just realised

I love you Rachel, but...

LEAD TEASER! STEPHANIE MARCH and BALLERINA TEASER!

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Driving is not a womens' issue

Ooooh Mariska!

New ADA for SVU

Beanz meanz bigotz -- too right.

Queers United: Heinz Pulls Ad With Two Men Kissing

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Stephanie March Sex Change

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Ubuntu vs Windows Vista?

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Maldrobe Warfunctions

Very Preliminary... Stephanie March again!

"No comment," says Stephanie March

My Wii Fit Review!

Bring back the Triangle of Lust

A Gay Football Player and Livvie gets Laid

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Mother denied daughter's organs

SVU Season 9 is back on Tuesday!

Criminal Minds" Returns, With a Great Guest

Bring Bruce Home

I love Geeky Chicks

Gay rights group pays tribute to Bertie Ahern

Ahern to resign as Taoiseach and FF leader on May 6th

Top Ten Signs You're a Fundamentalist Christian

Pregnant man: we just want to be a family - World news - News - Belfast Telegraph

I'm not a homophobe, but...

TV's May-September romance - 03/30/2008 - MiamiHerald.com

Cuisine of Canada

Anyone Else But You - Michael Cera and Ellen Page

"The X-Files" sequel: Invading theatres this summer | AfterEllen.com

Olivia Benson gets her Man *sigh*

1 in 4 believe rape victims are to blame

Shooting of Gay Student Sparks Outcry

Irish teachers face dismissal for being gay

I'm going to see Melissa Etheridge!!!

The Big Gay Sketch Show

The Associated Press: AP Probe Finds Drugs in Drinking Water

Olivia Benson gets her Man sigh