daveb: general

cold air · Jan 26, 10:44 am

arctic air

i love new york. but wow – scarves make the news?

if all it took to make news in canada was a puff of frosty air and mufflers we’d have a busy press.

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it's a rough month · Jan 26, 10:28 am

if months had a popularity contest – january would not score well. in canada it’s cold and dreary. the sunlight, when it’s around, is harsh and the end of the month feels distant. everyone is down because the holiday season is over, and the bills come in the mail. not just for your credit card, but for all the excess of the season.

maybe january needs some rebranding. everyone loves the first day of the month, but after that it’s really let its image slide. extreme makeover – january edition.

there is good news though – february, with it’s promise of romantic nonsense is just around the corner. as near as thursday.

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maybe this for the duffer · Dec 21, 01:22 pm

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i know you're as excited as i am · Dec 13, 12:08 pm

canada has a new poet laureate: John Steffler

you may be asking yourself what a poet laureate is. if you are, wikipedia has the answer for you.

basically it’s a position set up by the government of canada – with the sole purpose of making poetry more popular, and active in daily life. this is by far, the best thing in the world in my opinion.

they give the laureate an office, and a salary of $13k a year – for a 2 year term.

robert pinsky – a laureate in the us – started the favourite poem project where everyone from the president to people in the streets read their favourite poems out loud.

steffler – according to his cbc interview says he wants to promote writing and literature in general in canada

i’m delighted we have this post in canada, but i’m sad that it doesn’t pay enough to support a writer full time.

Award-winning novelist
Born in Toronto, Steffler holds an BA in English from the University of Toronto, and a master’s degree in English from the University of Guelph. He has taught at Guelph and, most recently, at Memorial University’s Sir Wilfred Grenfell College in Corner Brook, N.L.

“Mr. Steffler has spent a good part of his career teaching others about his craft,” Milliken said. “I welcome his appointment to a position that seeks to enhance Canadians’ appreciation of the value of poetry in our society.“

Steffler’s books of poems include That Night We Were Ravenous, The Wreckage of Play and The Grey Islands. A novel, The Afterlife of George Cartwright, was shortlisted for the 1992 Governor General’s Award for fiction and won the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction award.

Steffler, now retired, lives in Montreal.

The poet laureate’s duties include composing poetry, especially for use in Parliament on special occasions, sponsoring poetry readings and advising the Parliamentary librarian on the library’s collection and acquisitions to enrich the collection’s cultural holdings.

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water, water, everywhere · Dec 9, 12:00 pm

today was pretty exciting. i had planned to spend the day at looking after my son. our office is being renovated, and i had to stop in at the office to let the carpet layers in. i assumed i’d let them in, head home and stop back in at the office later in the day to see how the carpet looked.

about an hour after i got home i got a call from one of the people i work with saying there was water pouring out onto the floor, and leaking down from our second-floor office onto the business below. i had just put the little man down to sleep, but i had to scoop him up, snuggle him into his carseat and tear into the office to see if i could do something about the water.

by the time i arrived the building manager had been in to turn off the heat for the whole building, remove the offending leaky pipe and cap it off.

i guess the carpet layers had nudged a pipe when they were levelling the floor and the pipe had broken because of old age.

i checked in with everyone, and they all seemed to be okay. no permanent water damage downstairs, and the carpet layers were alright. the project was okay and everything could proceed with the carpet laying. i assumed that was my excitement for the day.

i was wrong.

i headed home just before noon so i could get the boy lunch, and finish putting the groceries away. i got lunch for the short man, and we put the groceries away together. just when i was thinking about naptime the phone rang again. with some trepidation i picked up the phone. it was the same stalwart co-worker with an even more extreme message.

this time the water was across the room from the first incident, but there was water in great quantities. gushing out of the broken water line in the floor, ricocheting off the roof and walls. it was not good. i packed up and headed back to the office. when i got there i realized that my only agency was as a conduit. i could connect the carpet layers, who had cut the water pipe in their attempts to level the floor, to the building superintendant, but i couldn’t stop the flow of water. which was enormous.

luckily the carpet layers happened to have two wet dry vacs with them and they had them in full operation. two guys were vaccuming, and the third was carrying and emptying buckets as fast as he could. between the three of them they calculated they hauled arould 80gallons of water in a 45 min period.

it was wet.

after the water gyser was moderately in control i headed down to the business below us to see how bad it was. when i walked in two people were standing on desks desperately trying to direct or corral the water flow into one of the many garbage pails and recycle bins that had been recruited to keep their office from washing away.

i sheepishly introduced myself as the “instigator of the renovations.” they were very kind and understanding considering their office was in a dripping shambles. i think the fact that i was carrying around a cute kid helped me immensely during the whole thing. they seemed to have things under control, so i headed back up to check on the source of the springs.

our fantastic building superintendant had things under control, and as the water pressure drained – so did a bit of my anxiety.

it was a busy day mopping up and drying out.

the carpet guys are coming back in this friday to install the carpets. i’m hoping it’s a much less exciting day.

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