Changes on the horizon?

Ok I'm exhausted tonight. I spent the afternoon helping a neighbour put up their "Tempo". A Tempo is an "Abri" or in English a tent for your driveway. Many people here in Quebec have them so they won't have to shovel snow and the car stays cleaner. In essence it's a "temporary" garage used only in the winter time. I actually have one of myself but unfortunately I don't use it anymore despite the gfact they are genuinely useful. My driveway for some strange reason is narrower than everybody else's and in order to install the tent it needs to be squeezed into place when assembling it. So I have to hire people to put it up and take it down and it just gets too expensive. It's also dangerous to take down as poles can snap out. They are ugly as hell too. So I shovel snow all winter instead. Sigh...

Anyways two and a half hours later we finished. It's nice having a regular wide driveway... I'd love to have one up despite it all. There's nothing worse than getting up at 5:30am to shovel snow then shower and eat then go outside to leave to work only to discover the snow filling in your driveway again and the plow came around and filled in everything you shoveled the city plowed in the over night. It's a Montreal thing I think... and after all these years I'm kinda sick of it LOL... I might rethink all this on my part.

Tomorrow is Halloween. I'm taking the day off. I have to admit I hate Halloween. I didn't even like it as a kid. It's the most senseless holiday of all the holidays in my opinion. We spend 364 days a year trying to teach our children not to talk to strangers, not to accept candy from strangers and not to eat too much sweet... then there's the 365th day, Halloween, where all that goes out the window and the rules suddenly don't apply and the strangers they're suppose to fear are sometimes even disguised to make it all the more fearsome for them and are now free to hand them candy. Then we check the candy for dangerous things like razor blades and poisons... and scare the little ones half to death fearing what they just got from strangers might be exactly what we told them it could be if you ever talked to them.... no wonder so many kids grow up confused. No wonder (and perhaps thank goodness, LOL) I don't have kids... but I don’t participate in any of this. It's too freaky and I won't even touch the notion of grown adults dressing up in fantasy clothing.... there's a whole other psychological analysis there alone LOL... but for those of you who engage in all this, Happy Halloween none the less.

Next week I'm off to South Carolina for a few days for work. I have to analyze an online Internet VPN setup with a major customer to see why it's not working to their satisfaction. My boss also asked me to go to Grand Rapids in December to have a look at the new facilities there. It will be my first trip there since they moved to the new place. I have a feeling they may ask me to move down there. It would be more logical to have the head of IT at the head office like I used to be when Montreal was the head office for Canada... now that the servers are back in Europe Montreal is just another branch albeit one of the most important in the entire organization. It is kinda pointless me being stationed here and not in the head office. I'm not sure how I'd feel about this if they really do ask me to move to the USA. I have strong objections to the right wing elements of their government and political thinking. I don't like the fact religion and morality is so entwined with politics down there. I do like the people individually in fact I admire a lot of them and how they help the world when there is trouble. They are the most generous people on the planet.

Grand Rapids is in the middle of this moralistic Republican right wing mindset. Montreal is such a large cosmopolitan liberal minded open accepting metropolis in comparison. Grand Rapids can't hold a candle to this city. Walk down rue St-Laurent and you meet people from Africa, Asia, Europe and South America. You can easily hear 5 or 6 languages apart from French or English. In fact Arabic is on the verge of becoming the second most commonly spoken language here knocking Engish into third place. There are restaurants from Mauritius next to Japanese or Portuguese or Brazilian. Further to the south gay people can openly walk hand in hand in the Village or elsewhere. Go to Rue St Denis and you can see outdoor cafes in the summer filled with people taking in the sun and sipping real cappuccinos while munching on fresh French croissants. Go to Vieux Montreal and you feel like you're in the heart of an Old European city. Chinatown bustles like a very little Hong Kong. Little Italy has that Italian flare from the markets to the Porches and Lamborghini’s that often lined the streets.

Grand Rapids is nice and quaint. It has The Bob... It has a pleasant downtown. It has a sprawling suburb reminiscent of the West Island or Mississauga. The people all smile and say "Have a good day". What it doesn't have is a soul or at least I have yet to see it... at least not a soul that pulses anywhere near as hard as in Montreal. It would be so hard to leave this city.... but for my job and perhaps for a short period I could do it... but it would be painful. I'd miss Canada. I'd miss hearing French all day. I'd miss the bring your own wine restaurants and the St Lawrence River... I'd want nothing to do with US Politics and couldn't stand the thought of listening to people rant on about Republicans and Democrats all the time... or God forbid Iraq. Oh God that alone would kill me... LOL I'd have to be very quiet and keep my opinions to myself and just live it out. It's a city that I'm told takes pride in have the least number of Black People in it's population.... like what's with that mindset? That alone should tell me to stay clear of them... but I'd at least be around respectful drivers... that alone should send me to a psychiatrist after all the years of brainwashing the streets here have done to my driving skills. I'd actually have to really stop at stop signs... not sure if I could handle that... I am Canadian and a true Montrealer... it's not something that's disposable and can be easily replaced. I take deep pride in that and even if I do go to the US this reality will never leave me.

Anyhow it's all speculation at the moment anyways. It may never even come up. I'm still a crucial contact manager to a major customer. Their overall happiness with all their accounts apparently rests on the fact the one division I handle is really happy with me and the service I've been giving them. I'll see in December how it all evolves I guess. I hope the trip is exactly what it is billed to be and nothing more. Anyways. I'm off to watch Six Feet Under where the swearing isn't censored nor are the straight and gay sex scenes... ya just gotta love living here. *Sigh*

Thanksgiving in the Distinct Society

Well it is Thanksgiving here in Canada. I'm discovering after all these years it really is just an "English" holiday. My French Canadian colleagues don't celenbrate it at all other than by taking the day off with the rest of us. No one had any special plans and turkey wasn't on their menu for the weekend... and when I stopped in at the Marché to pick up a pumpkin pie or something traditional for the celebration there was nothing set out specifically for "l'Action de Grace" as it is called in French. Stores in Ontario were closed while here in Quebec everything was opened as usual. In short it was a non event here.

I suppose all this is logical if you really look at it historically. The British Pilgrims started it in North America (I believe) and New France (Quebec) really wasn't following any Pilgim traditions therefore other than being absorped into a "British" colonial system once part of Canada the English tradition carried on but was never in the heart and soul of the people here. I'm just amazed it took me this long to realize it.

This is the holiday that makes me take stock of the year and what's happened so far. I see my friend's children getting much older. They aren't the cute young kids who used to run to the door in anticipation of our arrival. Now they are teenagers more interested in showing little or no interest. Not entirely but the change over has started. We are all getting older.

I look at work and wonder if I really am progressing or just stuck on an endless treadmill. I think more likely the latter actually. I'm not really all that happy at work any more. I'd like to break free of it all but now at my age it starts to become riskier than when I was younger. This is not to say it's impossible but it will take a lot of courage on my part and quite frankly that sadly isn't one of my better qualities. I'm a chicken at heart. Regardless I still have a good life by many people's standards. It's always been that way, not so awful it pushes me to change, not so bad that I get up and make a change. I'm standing right at the middle point of success and failure. I seem to excel at mediocrity.

On a personal level I've resigned myself to the fact I'll likely always be alone. This saddens me the most because deep down it does little to motivate me to try harder and grow. I have no central purpose in life. I feel like I'm stuck in neutral. However I am thankful for the good friends I do have. They are challenging though and there are days I love them from the core of my being while others where they just annoy the hell out of me LOL... I guess that's true friendship. They are good enough to stick with me but in the end it is true that all men are an island to themselves.

Anyhow hope you enjoy the pics.... of the turkey the dining room where I was at... I had a great time and quite frankly 24 hours later I'm still stuffed.

Also my grasses in my backyard that have finally bloomed. Together with the maple tree turning a beautiful redish-orange it looks pretty fall spectacular.

Given the Tsunami in Asia, the three devestating hurricanes in the Caribbean, terrorist attacks in Britain and now the earthquake in Pakistan we have a lot to be thankful for here in Canada. I can't forget the ongoing events in Darfur and the deadly effects of AIDS in Aftrica s well as the continuous trouble in Iraq and Afghanistan. It's been one long devestating year for everyone. I hope next year is better for the planet.

Aren't Angels suppose to have Wings? Whoa!!

I finished reading the latest Mitch Albom novel "the five people you meet in heaven". It's a short novel and beautifully written. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Normally I love non fiction but every now and then I head back to fiction to try and get my head into a space like no other. This book did the trick.

It's about a man in his 80's who is killed trying to save a small girl. He ends up in Heaven and meets five people there who explain his life to him. Each person was unrelated and in some cases they never met the man in life. The explanations gave meaning to what was on the surface a rather ordinary life. The message given was that regardless of how little and insignificant we feel we are we are ultimately connected to everyone. Our actions have meaning through the people they touch. We just may not know it at that moment in time.

The book makes you think about what lies beyond Life. Is there an afterlife? Do we come back as someone else later? Do our actions today have significance in the beyond? It's a very interesting topic to ponder. I've always believed that for our souls to devlope and grow we would have to experience many lives with many varied experiences. Some would be good others bad, some male and some female. At least that's what I'd like to believe. Maybe when we die we just cease to exist and that's all. I hope not though. The thought of coming back suggests that what we build in this life time we can benefit from it in the next. It at least gives purpose to contributions we all make to the growth of society while we are here. It also makes sense of very short or unique lives for instance children who die young or blind or severely handicapped people. Perhaps they were small projects to help the rest of us grow in this life. Then later they come back and live out a full more traditional life of their own. I don't know really what will happen, no one does. It is comforting to hold onto a belief like this. It gives me a purpose to my life.

Anyhow, the book was a nice read. I couldn't put it down once I started it. It's less than 200 pages so doesn't take long to go through. Enjoy it :)

Oh God Aliens have landed!

The movie Flightplan has come out thise weekend. It's a Jodie Foster thriller that takes place on an airliner. Her daughter disappears and no one claims to ever have seen her. The story revolved around her daughter or the Foster character's sanity. Interesting stuff.... but... for some reason the Flight Attendants union is calling for a boycott claiming passengers will start to mistrust cabin crews because of the film. Gimme a break...

This fear is up there with all the yahoos calling for Dan Brown's head over the Da Vinci Code. Another decent thriller that claims Christ married Mary Magdalene and had offspring that survives until today. Let's look at one very common thread running through both these stories. They're FICTION. One's a NOVEL (meaning: a made up story for entertainment purposes only) the other's a MOVIE (meaning a film presentation based on a made up story for entertainment purposes only). What is it the Flight Attendant's Union and all those religious yahoos don't get about the concept? Do they think we really are that stupid we can't figure this out? Dan Brown didn't write a serious thesis on theology and Jodi Foster doesn't talk to imaginary people (at least to my knowledge). Well adjusted people know the difference between fantasy and reality. Most of us fall in this category. Perhaps all that high altitude and holier than thou work has loosened up a few scews?