overthere

Actions speak louder than words and watching your teacher picketing out of sheer greed is an object lesson in (lack of) respect.

Bikes should stick to the sidewalks. where they can fight for space with pedestrians. Pedestrian vs Cyclist is a much fairer fight than Cyclist vs Driver. My friend rides a lot, but she is terrified of the bike lanes and the road in general after a couple of close calls and a road rage incident that cost her some skin. She rides the sidewalks a lot now, and tries to be very careful when around pedestrians so as not to hurt or even startle them. Most days on her way to work she passes an elderly woman who yells something harsh at her with an accent when she carefully passes. Last week the old hag yelled at her, then jammed the tip of her cane into the spokes which send her ass over head into the grass, fortunately not hurt. That's when she realized granny was yelling 'asshole', because she did it again as she stepped over my prone friend. Now she takes a different sidewalk to work.

I wasn't commenting on that. I'm not comparing Canada to the US, which is a curiously relentless fixation here and elsewhere in Canada. I'm noting that in Canada there was widespread civil and criminal disobedience of gun laws before the gun registry fiasco, during the gun registry fiasco, after the fiasco, and it will continue now with or without new laws. Normally law abiding people often ignore laws they see as pointless and/or arbitrary and/or an intrusion into their lives to no purpose. That is the case in Canada with control of long guns. Far too many people simply say **** it, I'm not paying anything to justify owning a tool that has been in a gun cabinet for generations.

Its not even the end of July, plenty of time for the government to hire some replacement workers for this important service. Please, think of the children!

A persons ability or lack thereof to form a bond with another person has nothing to do with 'these days'. There have been misfits and loners forever. No, I think people turn to replacing human relationships with an animal relationship is that it is so much easier in every way. Pets don't talk back, or argue, or insist on some small measure of respect and best of all you can behave horribly to them and they still come back for more- as long as you feed them. Human relationships can be like that too but it is so much more work.

I do not hate their pitching, but feel strongly that it is their priniciplal weakness. Their lack of bench/depth is also a big problem. They are weak up the middle : catching, second and center fields need better players there every day. But most of all their pitching..... They do have bright spots but overall they suck on the mound. ERA is a bellwether stat, much more important than wins or losses since it eliminates bats and bad fielding from the assessment of team pitching strength. The Jays being 24th overall in MLB team ERA is bad. Worse is how they compare to other 'good' teams. The Jays have a .524 win percentage now, and there are 12 teams with a better percentage, which means all the teams that are currently better than them. EVERY ONE OF Them has a better team ERA than the Jays. It is not unusual for a mediocre/worse than average pitching team like the Jays to beat anybody on any given night. It is quite different to sustain a drive to a playoff position, you need reliability from starters, relievers and a closer and right now the Jays don't have any of that. I realize that has been a Toronto sports mantra for several decades, but 'next year' is simply not good enough. I hope they do make the playoffs, but they don't get a pass for failing, not from me anyway. They have spent enough money lately to field a more competitive team, and the results are not there. Management failure. If they don't make the playoffs this year, that will be the end for Alex Alphabet. Same for Gibbons.

New gun laws will have the same effect that the old ones had: very little. Many, many guns have never been registered or documented in any way and that will continue.

Why the focus on AB? What is the overall value of hydrocarbon industries to the Canadian economy, given that our former industrial base in Central Canada is rapidly leaving for more profitable places? BC, SK, NS and the Newfs all have significant investment too.

There was bad weather to the southeast of where the 298 were eventually murdered. It is not at all unusual for flights to deviate from their flight plan to avoid weather. Russia is run by human scum.

Working together? Japan, Germany, China and a few other moderately successful corporations I mean countries do just that..... Imagine.

Privatization of retail booze sales in Alberta has been a monster win for consumers, a revenue breakeven for government coffers, and a win for taxpayers in that their future liabilities are greatly reduced. The only 'assets' that were sold were the liquor board buildings. Unless you're a supporter of vastly overpaid govt cashiers with great benefits gaining fat pensions for unskilled work, the change in Alberta has been a solid success. Of course, in Ontario it would unsafe to change anything.

Oh God, origin stories. 'Lost' lost me when they started that crap up for all 11,000 people on that plane that crashed. They milked that vein for about 5 years.

They also rejected 'Intelligence', a well written and independently produced beauty that CBC dumped after two seasons, in the middle of a compelling story arc. But those are not necessary elements, they are factors that some continue to insist be a part of keeping CBC on life support when clearly there is no further business or cultural purpose in maintaining that situation.There is an excellent example of a public, non profit broadcaster that has sidestepped both politics and bureaucracy to provide what their supporters want. It is CKUA radio in Alberta, a provincial radio network that used to suck at the government teat but is now supported directly by listeners. It is a cultural icon in AB and beyond, very well regarded by artists and heavily involved in promotion of the arts in general. CBC could move to this funding and governance model, but it would require something that will never happen: CBC "supporters" have to put their money where their mouths are, instead of demanding that everybody pay for their entertainment choices.

Weeds was good until they left suburbia and went on the road. It is unusual for a series to change locations in midstream, and it did not help Weeds. Aimlessly blah after that. Orange did not grab me. Does it get much, much better after the first few episodes? I was surprised to see recently that it was nominated for awards as a comedy. Is it meant to be funny? Been watching Tyrant, a new one on Bravo. Meh. Also just started watching the second season of a very good series called Ray Donovan.

The Catholic Church is rotten to the core. Any other organization that admitted it was thick with the very worst of the worst of criminals would act to publicly clean out all of them. Any other organization with this level of systemic criminal activity would have special prosecutors raiding every office and shutting down the enterprise, including the Vatican. But when your main products - accompanied by superb marketing and over two millennia of successful indoctrination- are fear and guilt disguised as hope and joy, the Popes options are limited to damage control and minimum action.

I fished for halibut in Prince William Sound last year and we enjoyed catching our limit in a very short time. There were also two salmon species running at the same time. Luckily we did not have to wait long at one of the two very busy processing plants.

"Ottawa leveled" Do you have an actual date on that?

the most notable thing that has increased in this century is life expectancy. Big upward trend and that is pretty much a global trend, despite a corresponding massive increase in population that needs to be fed and sheltered..

the only place I cannot copy and paste, so far, is here.

"How come you congratulated Marcus on the video before he posted it?" Oh oh.... Did monty16 just get busted for handlewhoring? The only plausible explanation I can imagine is that he is signed on under two handles to make sure he had a supportive sidekick. Monty?

thanks. Had many problems using chrome on at least two essential work related programs. annoying to have to switch browsers to be here.... oh well.

AB and Quebec don't trust a regulator based in Toronto that controls the capital markets everywhere. SK and NB joined because a) they don't many companies using those markets and they were bribed with the promise of deputy regulators based in SK and NB. Four provinces have now joined, six have not.

Japan is a wealthy country but their extremely low birthrate and refusal to allow significant immigration are strong factors in changing that, and quickly.

just got a new computer with IE 11 on Windows 7. I cannot copy and paste anything on the site internally, or from other places to here. Any suggestions?

Many of those people currently pouring double-doubles are intelligent, ambitious and well educated as well as being hardworking. I'm referring of course to the TFW crew. We sneer at those in menial jobs, but many in that group know that Tim Hortons and living in Canada is a beginning to a new and better life, not a dead end. Oh wait, not any more.