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Tuesday
Ottawa's looming graffiti crisis
Saturday, though, I sprayed a mouthful of my customary breakfast (Piping hot crumpets, cat marmalade, steaming mug of fresh-brewed vitriol) all over my morning Petfinder. Patrick Curran, OC Transpo's business development manager, was floating a trial balloon about selling transit station names to the highest-bidding corporate sponsors. Some city councillors and the usual suspects on the editorial page seemed to like it.
The argument is that Transpo needs the money, and there's no more space for ads on the buses. Seems to me that maybe the city should just fund the service properly. But dreaming up billion dollar tunnels and harebrained 'innovations' is way more fun than making sure the existing bus system works well in the most basic ways.
Mr. Curran rather disingenuously notes that St. Laurent transit station already is named for the attached mall, and argues that opens the door to more of the same. Nice try at historical revisionism to support a thin-end-of-the-wedge propaganda technique, but, ummm, no. The mall is labelled for the rather prominent nearby boulevard that the mall promoters swiped its name from.
Ottawa is a town where, when a boneheaded fuckwit has a idea that shrieks out for rapid trashing, then tries to smoke it past us by self-diagnosing it as 'innovative', a buncha other boneheaded fuckwits will nod sagely and murmur, "Mmmm... innovative!" It's how decisions are made. But non-sequitur-ish corporate sponsorship isn't innovative. It's already been inflicted elsewhere. Yoohoo! Senators Coliseum? Which became the Corel Centre? An asshatted monument to momentary corporate hubris - and sanctioned graffiti, really. Now it's ScotiaBank Place...
Transit is about moving people efficiently. Renaming transit stations - all of which now (very handily) key on nearby geographical features - is not. We already let businesses deface the cityscape by smearing it with their kind of graffiti. We just call them 'logos', 'signs' and 'advertising'. Why let 'em further confuse a bus ride, too?
Friday
The Dark Underside of Blogging
Black and blue and squirrelly all over
I had a doctor's appointment over the lunch hour last week and, afterwards, decided to pop home for a moment.
I was distressed to find a rather large black squirrel lying quite dead in the middle of my winding driveway, just a few paces from the moat that surrounds the observatory.
Did I forget to pay the Italian taxes on ESI's global headquarters? I wondered. Is this how the good fathers of Tuscany remind Canadian residents their payments are overdue?
I fork over a lot of property taxes in this country, too.
Now is the chance, I thought, for the City of Ottawa to make up for its lacklustre, sporadic and altogether uninspired snow-removal efforts on my Centretown street.
After all, the squirrel, though on my driveway, was actually on city property, which extends several metres inward from the curb. And you can't be too careful, right? West Squirrel Virus may be running amok, infecting the downtown core.
I dialled 311 and after a little push-button menu-manoeuvring was duly assured a city roads crew would come pick up my ex-rodent friend. It was dark when I got home, so I didn't notice till the next day that someone, likely a neighbour, had simply moved the squirrel slightly to the right, atop a small stone ledge that borders my driveway.
Another call to the city. Yes, at this point I could have bagged the fluffy-tailed critter (sorry, Coyote) myself. But it was the principle of the thing. Again I was told the squirrel would be gone by day's end. No such luck.
Day Three: yet another call, and another promise. But as of suppertime Friday, my open-air squirrel cemetery was still thriving. Call four: I was told a supervisor would phone me shortly to advise when the road crew would arrive. An hour passed. Still nothing.
Finally, I walked outside with a plastic bag, grabbed a shovel and scooped the poor animal inside, then disposed of him as nobly as I could under the circumstances. Death is never pretty. And the whole thing made me a little sad.
I called the city for the fifth time. Don't bother coming, I said. It didn't seem right to make the squirrel, or me, wait any longer.
Photo: Squirrel, not exactly as illustrated.
Thursday
Google Poem: Really I'm Not
* I'M NOT NARCISSISTIC BUT I KNOW I'M QUIT ATTRACTIVE AND WOULD NEVER EVER TOLERIATE THAT IN MY RELATIONSHIP THERE NEEDS TO BE EQUALITY ...
* I'm ENTp and no, I'm not narcissistic but I've always known I was different. Break The Shade.: Kissing Boys, Getting High, Drinking BeerI’m not narcissistic but I was looking hella sexy that day.
* and i'm not narcissistic, but honestly i'm not that interested in being in CE, is full of apex kids and i can't handle them.
*I'm not narcissistic, but I like to take care of myself. I'm attracted to women who are the same way. (who take care of themselves...not me, ...
* no i'm not narcissistic, but i applied for a job and the first thing they do is google applicants' names!!! i just wanted to see what came up!!!
* That's not to say that I'm not narcissistic, but this isn't evidence for it.
* I'm not narcissistic, but I do love the way I am and look and just exactly what I am.
* Me, myself, and I. I’m not narcissistic but I have to paint what comes from the inside.
* I'm not Narcissistic. But I really have to reveal this secret. I was a wonder boy when I was young.
* If you Log in you could create a "i'm not narcissistic, but i might be the one." node. If you don't already have an account, you can Create A New User. ...
* My hair, I'm not narcissistic, but my hair rocks, and it is normally the first thing people notice about me.
* I'm not narcissistic but look at me anyway.
* And no, I'm not narcissistic, but my mother was and my children's aunt is.
* I wouldn't say I'm not narcissistic, but there are times when kids get a bit self-centered.
*I'm not narcissistic, but I have lived for 19 years. I'm a little hard to impress. The secret to me, though, is that I'll be an asshole until you prove you ...
* I like to think that I'm not narcissistic, but I have a feeling that I probably am...at least a little. This list is probably a good indication that I am.
* You need to know that I'm not narcissistic, but I do know I have my charms and good qualities.
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