Sunday, a day of rest.

Hello Everyone,
One of the considerations of coming north was to uncomplicate life, settle my work hours down to reasonable levels and spend time with my family. That now means I have to take my family to work in order to spend time with them. Here's Christopher and I at the fire hall (so I can inventory the Med supplies and check the breather tanks), yesterday (my first Saturday "off" in 6 months) was spent cleaning the fire hall so we could get the new truck inside. Today I have to inventory all the modems for my newest job, I'm now the internet provider for the community. Luckily I have nothing to do for the DEA today (except for making 75 muffins for the breakfast program) and I'm not running a recycling day today as most of the cans in town are currently being donated to the school for a fundraising drive. Add this to my usual 60+ hours at the store and somehow I still prefer to be here than at Wal-Mart. Ain't life amazing?
Take Care
CG
P.S. We got half a foot of snow last night.

A Stranger Amoung Us.

   Hello everyone,
   My home has been invaded, compromised, infiltrated, my thoughts are no longer my own and frankly it creeps me out.You see I have a WiiFit program.  This thing is just too eerie, all it is a board that sits infront of your TV and connects via wireless to your Wii, no visable camera's, microphone's or any other nefarious device's that are apparent.  Yet the device can do things it has no capacity to measure, when doing Yoga it knows when I start to breath through my mouth, it knows when I use a item for support while doing strength exercises and I invited this stranger into my home.  What else is this incredible device doing, reporting my eating and television viewing preference's to big brother?  Influencing my political leanings while asleep, making my hair grow while I'm not looking. All of these things are currently of concern to me and undergoing rapid changes...  and I paid a lot of money for this device, simply cause the dark season is coming up and I wanted to lose 25 lbs. For this computer databases all over the world are filling up with intimate data about my life, I think it might even be making me a little paranoid.
   Seriously though, this is one cool little device that I am certain will allow me to reach my goals when actually going outside doesn't appeal to me, and a video game does.
   Take Care
   CG

Gotta love pop science.

Hello everyone,
Please click on the link to this article to really see what steams my shorts.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/09/23/arctic.ice/index.html
I am not a scientist, but I have been taught and understand the scientific method, so lets take a look at this wonderful article brought to you by the worlds largest and most authoritative news service.
"It's definitely a bad report. We did pick up little bit from last year, but this is over 30 percent below what used to be normal,".... please slow down, come on, we're not scientists, give us a chance to figure this out. We're better than last year, OKAY (although I seem to remember you telling me this would be the worst year ever)... "up a little bit"... what is that in layman's terms, 5% or 50% or maybe a complete avoidance of the actual number?
Now what was that last bit at the end, please remind me. "but this is over 30 percent below what used to be normal".
Okay, thanks. Now lets look at this professional scientific statement. 30% below what used to be normal... what is normal? Is he referring to 10 years ago, 20, 100, 1000 or the last ice age? I mean come on, what kind of statement is that?
Second paragraph.
"This past summer, the Arctic sea ice dwindled to its second lowest level. Arctic sea ice is usually 1 to 3 meters". shouldn't we quantify "second lowest level" wouldn't a year actually be shorter? "Arctic sea ice is usually 1-3 meters thick"... and what was it this year? Wouldn't that have been a useful number to a reader?
"Scientists have monitored sea ice conditions for about 50 years with the help of satellites." I never realized they had thermal imaging satellites in 1958, shame on me I guess (kinda like CNN's expert).
"We are still losing the ice cover at a rate of 10 percent per decade now, and that is quite an increase from five years ago,"......Ummmm, I thought the unit of measure was a decade, which I thought was ten years, so why, oh why, would you suddenly switch to a five year time frame unless ten years ago.... never mind, don't want to get myself in trouble.

"Scientists have noticed increasing reports of starving Arctic polar bears attacking and feeding on one another in recent years. In one documented 2004 incident in northern Alaska, a male bear broke into a female's den and killed her." Scientists have noticed? I though scientists document, people reading papers notice. The best example you can come up with is one incident from 4 years ago... Maybe that bear was having a really bad day, maybe he just watched the last Soprano's episode and was really mad, I mean come on. Scientist are supposed to speak in proofs, These sort of statements wouldn't be acceptable in a grade seven science class and yet here we are spoon feeding this tripe to millions.

I've never had a lot of respect for the media but articles like this shouldn't be allowed under any disguise of legitimacy.
Take Care
CG

School and other things.

Christopher's classroom.
His desk is the one in the corner closest to the camera, with no children around him. His best friends desk is the one on the opposite side of the room. This is also a different desk placement than they chose on the first day of school.... Hrm. Strange how these things just seem to move, I seem to remember steadily making my way to the front of the class during my studies as well, but even I never achieved the Full Monty in two weeks. This is the grade one and two class, seven students.

This is the kindergarden class in the opposite side of the primary class room. Christopoher's old Alma Mater.The senior class room, grades 6, 7 and 8. Four students.This is a strange fog that rolled in early last week. And I mean a wall of fog. blow up this image to see the sheer volume of the fog, it blew threw in less than ten minutes.The secret to great art is in deep planning. Here Christopher is sketching his next masterpiece, to be painted on a shirt. This event was part of his wellness weekend events.
Santina.Another key to brilliant art is attention to detail.
Here you can see Christophers focus upon his work.
And here is Christopher losing focus.
Sometimes you just need a break.
Time to draw up a new plan.
Some idiot wrote the last one on a shirt thats covered in paint.Christopher has a critial eye towards his mothers work.
Just a bit more planning to avoid that mess that mom is creating.
Apparently the key is to a color palette that contains all the colors.
Then you just have to brush them on and they'll sort themselves out.
The semi final result is...

Hello Everyone,
We'll see the final results of both efforts tommorrow hopefully.
The weather has been hovering around zero for the last few weeks, we has some snow last week but unfortunately the last few days have been raining consistantly so thats not good news to a early freeze up. It is now official, Christopher has lived more of his life north of 60 than south of it, I don't know what it means but I found it interesting. As you can tell I'm currently struggling to write in this darn blog with any regularity, seems when I have time I don't have interest, when I don't have time, I have focus, hopefully it will work itself all out when we get through this season change. I find this to be the worst part, adjusting to the daily reduction in light and resetting your body from 24 hours of light to ever decreasing levels of light. Maybe I should just turn this into a photo blog anyways.
Take Care
CG

Winter is coming :)

Hello Everyone,
Summer is over, its been over for about a month. Now everytime I check the forecast it contains at least one day of snow, none of which have actually appeared yet but we're certainly ready for it. The summer was brief for us a few hot weeks in June, a bunch of rainly mild days in July, nothing but rain for August and now we're gearing up for another winter. Sometimes you just have to accept the nature of time, smile, laugh and accept that the future for all it holds, hell, embrace it and keep moving forward. The pheasants are flying, the geese are flocking, the eagles are fishing, the bears are gorging on berries and I'm getting my ski-doo's ready.We seem to be a few weeks ahead of a normal schedule as we haven't really had any temps above 10 in a month the water seems to have cooled quite a bit so far, even the fish scales are getting hard meaning ice can't be far away.
Take Care
CG

One person, one vote.

Hello Everyone,
For those of you living in a cave, a very deep cave, in the middle of a swamp, on top of a mountain, in the middle of a jungle, on the moon, America is about to have a election. It is to the point now where CNN should just give up all semblance of a news service and declare itself "All politics, all the time". For the last year the world has been bombarded with scandal and innuendo about the various candidate's, when did she know, why didn't he put his hand upon his heart, did they really clone George W, who the hell is this guy running against McCain, and more recently..He chose who?
Over a year, a very long year and yet Canada is also on the brink of a election. Somehow ours lacks the fan fair of our southern counterparts however, ours will be announced on Friday, it will be held 32 days later. America will hold their approximately one month later. Apparently the USA isn't big on snap decisions.
Now things are just starting to heat up as senator McCain has either made a earth shattering (literally) blunder or he is the most paranoid man on the planet earth. Maybe the reason for his choice of Palin is that he did know everything about her past and was so terrified of being assassinated in office he choose someone so grossly incompetent for the executive office that no one on the planet would dare take the shot.... things that make you go hrrrrmmm.
In Canada one person represents one vote, in America one person represents one vote towards someone else who will cast a vote on their behalf... but hey, at least that person is in college as I understand it. (I have been advised this is a obscure reference for non-American's, sadly that clumps me in with Americans. This is a reference to the Electroral College style of voting, which I have on good authority was invented by a bunch of guys in the back room of a bar in Boston after just inventing the Boilermaker))
In Canada our politicians will say anything to get elected as they are all morally bankrupt, in America they like to surround themselves with celebrities so they feel less morally bankrupt. In Canada we've elected crooks and cheats, in America our crooks and cheats have been very popular and have been invited to all sorts of really cool parties. America's crooks tend to get two terms if their democrat's and a single term if their republican (I believe its actually in their constitution somewhere near the bottom).
In America there are two major parties represented by a donkey and a elephant, in Canada we have a basic three party system but all our politicians are essentially donkeys.
America sends troops all over the world to prove their dominance and to assert their military might. In Canada we send troops all over the world to prove America's dominance and assert their military might, so we break even there.
In Canada our politicians accept money from their Friends to win contracts that will make everyone a lot of money. In America people line up to throw money at politicians, these groups called lobbyists (or RRSP's) give you money in hopes you may help them at some later date and don't go running to the press every time they don't get the contract, they wait to write their memoirs then they can get a piece of the good life too. The majority of US senators are millionaires, the majority of Canadian senators are Maple leaf fans.
American politicians can get chicks, Canadian politicians look upon the chicks their American brethren get in envy.
Anyways the bottom line is... we are both going to make some mistakes within the next sixty days that we will have to live for for another 4 years, till we get to make another new batch of mistakes, or actually for Americans, you get to start making your mistakes again in about another two years when you start the whole damn thing over again. At least we Canadians look to elections a lot like removing a band aid, don't talk about it, close your eyes and just pull and hope for the best but plan for the worst.
I really am not as Anti-American as I sound but they just make it so damn easy, it is like the French. You don't hear people going around bashing Trinidad, they just don't take themselves seriously enough. I have friends whom are American, I have a aunt who has been there for 30 years and raised a flock of American children but damn people, get a sense of perspective (and Megan, I'm sorry to hear of your country of origin, with your sarcastic satirical sense of humor I never would have taken you for one of THEM).
Take Care,
CG
PS Vote for me and I guarantee the first people against the wall when I'm king will be all the damn politicians, including myself.

Just Photo's

My son believes if he sits very still in the grass, he's invisible...go figure.

What I REALLY miss about the South.

Hello Everyone,
For years I've been getting the question "What do you miss about the south" and I've never really knew how to answer the question. Partly because there is very little I actually miss about our former home. This weekend we went to Inuvik (A much larger town with many of the convience's of the south) and upon our return I was laying in bed and realized, finally what I did miss about the south. I miss bookstore's.
I don't miss the Chapters bookstore's or other of their type but rather the small bookstore's that lack the grandious scale of these retail monsters. I miss the bookstore I never found. I spent years wandering through bookstore's looking for my bookstore, somewhere with brown wooden shelves, a few large leather wingchairs in red leather. Maybe even a rolling ladder that slides reluctantly down the side of the store to unearth tombs that haven't seen the light of day in many years, with a dull indirect lighting that doesn't actually seem to come from anywhere but rather eminates from the walls themselves and hangs heavily in the air lingering around you like a bright fog. There's a subtle smell of coffee which permiates your senses as well as the sound of the books as they rest upon the shelve's. This was the store I searched for, one where the prices where never printed upon the books but the attentive keeper could simply recall it for you at their convience. Its the type of place that opens in the neighbourhood at noon and closes when the darkness is complete and the last of the browsers has seriously left, the bell above the door marking their departure. Nowhere will you find a sign advising you that this is not a library but rather you'll find a few of the propetiors' favorites gathered together on a small side table beside the large chair at the front of the store.| Unfortunately, this type of store could never survive today, I'm afraid that this type of store could never bulk up its shelves with Crichton, King, Roberts, Steele and all of our other favorites, thats what the others are for. This store would have the books we always wanted to read but just couldn't get into if they weren't prescribed reading for a course. You can still find some popular literature. Lord of the rings is ever-present but found in a single volume and you won't find any artisticly rendered visions of Aragorn upon the cover. I think you get the idea.
What is it about the image we have of books and their apparent mystic? I can't say I am proud of owning any books other than reference books, all casual reading books I view as a form of weakness. Why am I trucking all these novels around the nether regions of the world when 99% of these books I will never reread. I usually read a book a minimium of twice, once for joy and the second to see if I actually enjoyed it. After that, for some strange reason, I hold onto them, I cannot explain why. I know they will never be reread again and the ones that are truly brilliant and will be reread over the next 40 years or so aren't actually travelling with me, they have a treasured spot in a small storage container in Tillsonburg, they are works of philosophy, ficton and humour that have traveled with me for years and hold a respected place in my heart... but why? I can't exactly recall how many of them are signed first editions.... Oh wait, I do remember, none of them, no rare prints here, no special editor editions, or bonus content, just the sort of books you can walk into "chapters" right now and buy. But many of us view books as special, as different, to throw away a book is a sin, the only books that are allowed to be donated to charity (in my twisted mind) are the works of Daniel Steele and Harlequin's. It sometimes feels when you buy a physical book, that you've adopted it, to care for for the rest of your life, you are now responsible to ensure it is taken care of and loved as all good books should be. The problem arrises in the fact that a book is a simple collection of words and idea's, anything more it becomes is what we make of it.
Sadly, my bookstore is not in Inuvik, and I have another book I know is truly terrible, that I will continue to carry with me thoughout my travels till I hopefully lose it and it will never again sully my mind.
Take Care
CG
P.S. I also miss Taco Bell, but find it difficult to wax poetic about this subject.