Here I was all caught up in the World Cup and the G Summit demonstrations that I forgot about the earthquake.
The quake happened after 1pm on June 23rd, I was sitting at my desk and I heard my boss make a remark about the floor shaking and sure enough, the floor was shaking. Most of us in the office just stood there with the same look on our faces, wondering if a truck was passing by or if it indeed was an earthquake. It was an earthquake. No one was in a panic but it was enough to cause a stir and sure enough the ever popular Twitter was on the move. In a matter of seconds after the tremor, there were thousands of tweets from Ann Arbor to Syracuse to Montreal to Toronto to Ottawa, you get the point. I sent a text to my sister in Toronto asking if she felt it, she did not. Funny how some people didn’t feel a thing but at the same time it’s understandable.
If you were riding in a vehicle or pedaling a bike then chances are that you wouldn’t have felt it but I figure if you were in a building or standing still then surely something would have been felt, not so for some.
Many people in the office said that it’s been a while since they felt a tremor but the last time I felt one was back in February. That one was fairly close to the house, app 35km or so and registered 3.9 on the shake-o-meter. The June 23rd quake was around 5 or 5.5 on the shake-o-meter, depending on who you ask but one thing is certain, it managed to spook many people, except for me of course.
I finished up the assembly on a kitchen cabinet for the girlfriend, it wasn’t from Ikea, hand built by yours truly, putting the woodworking skills to use. The Jazz festival started in full gear in Montreal and the FIFA World Cup was being watched at many places in the city. Of course we can’t leave out the G summit meetings in Toronto.
While the Jazz Festival entertained the people in Montreal the G Summit turned into a scene of violence and vandalism for the city of Toronto. The outcome of the Summit was not a big surprise, watching the clash between protestors and police is always a treat but in the end those protestors that are violent are the ones that get onto the news.
Here’s the thing, those protestors that are violent think they get respect and make a point by vandalizing property but in the end they don’t think. People will just see them as troublemakers and I do hope they get whatever is coming to them like becoming a new hood ornament for a Mack truck, I know I know, it’s mean. You shouldn’t have to do that to a Mack truck.
Many of these people talk the talk and protest like they do because they live in a society that tolerates it, people get angry, things get damaged, some arrests are made and then it’s over. Try that in a different part of the world where they shoot first and ask questions later, not so much protesting over there.
Anyways, the outcome of the Summit was no big surprise, so much for the billion dollar security force. I don’t think the Summit should have taken place in Toronto, too easy to access and too big to really contain. As I said, why don’t they hold it in a secret location and don’t call it the G Summit, call it something else. Hold it in a location where no one can really afford to go and where car and bus access would be difficult or impossible, one road in and one road out.
Anyways, I couldn’t watch anymore of the G Summit clashes because it was upsetting. Not as upsetting as England losing to Germany though.
If you had to describe yourself to a person with just one word what word would it be? The English language has a plethora of words so it should be possible to pick a word that best describes you. I had this conversation with a friend a while ago and of course anyone who picked a physical description like sexy, beautiful or handsome really didn’t get. Sure you can be sexy but that would be it, you’re just sexy and Kodiak’s (Ursus arctos middendorffi aka the Alaskan Grizzly) don’t care for sexy but I’m sure to them sexy people taste good. All that sexy would sure add flavor, mmm…sexy flavor. Okay, so try to pick a word and if sexy is the only thing you can come up with due to a lack of vocabulary then so be it.
One of my friends chose the word ‘oblivious’ and I wondered why but soon realized that oblivious was a good choice. Another one picked ‘rational’ and it really did not match, we did debate it for a while and then dropped the debate because it was anything but rational, my point was made. It’s funny how you think a word can define you and then realize that maybe that word may not have been the best choice. One of my friends described another friend as a ‘dog’, I said that it was an insult to the dog. It’s difficult to try and define a person with just one word because there is more to a person than just a word, unless of course that person is clueless then there is no hope.
The word that would best describe me is ‘clever’ and of course some could argue and say that ’smart ass’ maybe a better description or maybe even ‘bitter’ but I’m only bitter when people really piss me off. It’s safe to say that I’m clever 75 percent of the time compared to 5 percent of the time that I’m bitter, honest. Okay maybe 7 percent bitter, tops. As for being a smart ass, aren’t we all at some point in our life.
Acronyms, gotta love em. In this case the OMG would represent “Oh my God!” but I think it may soon stand for “Oil, Million Gallons”. Okay, it may not replace the original OMG but it was worth a shot.
All this BP oil is doing some serious damage and I along with a few friends were discussing this topic. We were kind of split half and half on the subject of oil companies being more responsible but I said that we as a society are partly to blame seeing as we are the ones who demand this stuff. It’s bad enough that we use it for our cars and other motorized toys but manufacturing uses it for other things too, think tires and the like. We have an obligation to be more responsible and limit our use of the oily stuff and not be so dependent on it. But I have to be real at the same time, it may take quite a while to achieve an alternative to oil and even then it will take some doing to convince people. As it is, many alternatives that could or should move forward are not and according to one of my friends, it’s the oil companies that prevent it from moving forward. My response was that it may not necessarily be the oil companies but industry in general but what do I know, I just work for a living.
As far as I’m concerned this whole mess in the Gulf was due to greed, it involves money so greed is in the mix there. Sure there’s other things that caused it but greed is what drove the drilling in the first place. Someone did mention to me that BP probably did not follow any environmental guidelines and that would make sense because if they had maybe they would have had a game plan to clean up the mess. No, BP is responsible for this mess and I hope that they do go belly up after they clean up their mess and I hope that those people responsible get prison time for their neglect or as one Facebook group suggested, Stuff the BP exec’s into the pipe.
I guess OMG won’t change to “Oil, Million Gallons” but that’s okay, it would probably just cause confusion, LOL :-p
It may have been better to write angry instead of pissed but let’s be real here folks, the citizens will be the ones paying for this billion dollar nonsense called the G8 and G20.
Really? A billion dollars for 3 days of bull crap, I think the f****** government is nuts. Oh wait it’s Steven Harper we’re talking about, so f****** idiot would be a better description.
It’s rare that I type in the ‘f ’ word ( a bunch of stars actually ) but I do have a billion reasons to be upset and so should the public. Some people might say big deal, they’re going to spend it on something stupid anyways. Well that’s the reason it’s a big deal, it could have been spent on something better and more useful instead of spending it on these meetings.
Some of the smarter people out there said maybe they could do it via video conference, lessen the cost and avoid this whole hoopla of a mess. But no, they have to go and spend a billion dollars because that’s the best way to spend the people’s money (should there be an apostrophe for that?).
I know that I already ranted on about the summit meeting in the other blurb but the price tag wasn’t at a billion dollars, it was only in the millions, not that it’s any better but it is the lesser of the two evils, sort of.
Maybe I should propose a billion dollar meeting at work and see what happens, it could be a yes but will most likely be a big fat no and then find my rear on the street begging to make a buck. A billion dollars for 3 days of BS, Steven Harper may have just given a billion reasons why he should not be a representative for this country.
