LINK! This is a strong, stubborn and determined attempt to resurrect the Vancouver Area Link group!
If you are between the ages of 18 and 30 and have ever been, currently are, or never have been involved in girl guides of Canada but thought about it (oh, and female), come join us! I'm the area rep (now I have like, 6 guiding hats!) so I'm the one you want to talk to!!
We're still hashing out details, but leave a comment!! We'll do fun stuff like trips, events, dinners and whatever else we decide to do. Time commitment is fluid and is pretty low compared to being involved with a group!
Sexual assault gives you 2 years of house arrest Oh boo fucking hoo.
I'm so angry right now. Tom Ellison (former teacher at Prince of Wales Secondary school here) sexually assaulted several of his students when he was a teacher. He was convicted today with 2 years of house arrest, 1 year or probation and 60 hours of community service.
Fuck the "justice" system. That is so incredibly fucked up it blows my brain away.
But I'm totally unsurprised, since sexually assaulting a woman means absolutely nothing. The judge said something about how it was pointless to lock him up because it would put too much strain on his wife and 10 year old daughter.
What about the women who still struggle every day with the after effects of sexual assault? Somehow their suffering doesn't mean anything.
People are SURPRISED at Robert Pickton (mass murder who abducted and brutally murdered, and most likely violently tortured and sexually assaulted 49 women who lived and worked in the downtown east side). Jesus Christ, it only took them what, like 8 years to be like "oh, hey, these women are going missing...".. and still no one DID ANYTHING ABOUT IT.
Our society is so fucking fucked up. It protects the rich and rapes the poor and the marginalized. ARRG:KSJDL:GKJSDGLKJ.
60 hours of community service is nothing. I probably do about 60 hours in a month for girl guides. 60 hours is something I would sentence a fucking moron for leaving dog shit in a park, not a serial rapist. Fucking creep.
If this doesn't make you angry, you need to take a better look at your life.
Tag! RULES: Each player of this game starts off with 10 weird things/habits/little known facts about yourself. People who get tagged need to write a blog of their own 10 weird habits/things/little known facts as well as state this rule clearly. At the end you need to choose 10 people to be tagged and list their names. No tag backs.
1) I'm terrified of pool drains. 2) Traveling scares me. Like, traveling anywhere.
3) I want a baby. Like really really really badly. More so than any actually realizes. 4) I can't stay in bed all day. I get too antsy. 5) I love photography.
6) I hate hate hate cilantro.
7) When I eat French toast, I have to cut off the crust and eat it first, and then I cut the rest of it into tiny pieces and try to spear as many onto my fork at one time. 8) There are 4 parrots I would love to own in my lifetime: Green cheek conure, a Quaker (have one Yay!), a senegal and a black masked lovebird.
9) I'm an adrenaline junky, but terrified of injuring myself.
10) I've stopped binge drinking alcohol.
I tag: Kierston, Shannon, both Andrea's (saying Andrea P doesn't help because you're both Andrea P!), Cherina, Tim, Ash Riot, Kerry, Kirsten, and Stephanie. AHAHAHAHA.
The end to Child Pornography A really cool website with the purpose of educating the public and building advocacy to put pressure on government officials, internet service providers, and the public at large, to stop child pornography. You get to light a candle! Go light a candle.
Winter Wonderland Seriously, I love the snow. I love the way it makes me feel, and the way it makes the city feel. I don't even mind driving in it! It's currently 0 degrees outside and it STILL HASN'T STOPPED SNOWING! The snow is very wet and melts instantly, cause it's right at the freezing mark. It also makes shoveling it sooooo easy! Huzzah!
I went to church this morning, I was surprised that so many families were there! My boyos were there. I was having an ADD attack and couldn't sit still, so I wrote in my agenda. Topic today was "so what about Heaven and Hell?". I'm going to e-mail the minister (who very pointedly said that he REALLY LIKE how our church loves to ask questions and discuss and talk about stuff like this) and see if he would like to go for coffee to discuss last week's topic!
If you live in BC, pay attention I've handed this number out twice in the past 24 hours, so I'm just going to post it here.
If you don't know about it already, the BC Nurse Line is a free, confidential phone number that anyone who is a resident of BC (you need a care card) can call to ask questions about anything and everything health related (treatments, medications, symptoms, whether you actually need to go to the doctor or whether you just need to poop, etc etc etc). Website is here, http://bchealthguide.org/nurseline.stm
Why we're all fucked Shawna and I chilled for several hours today. I told her about why I truly believe that we're fucked and why we're all gonna die in 200 years, or less.
1) Economic: Our entire global capitalist economy is based on the exploitation of poor people, or people in general, who are voiceless, nameless and apparantely expendable. They are usually women and children. It's all about the person at the top making the most, who wins. If you don't compete, you can't get anywhere. This system could change, if those of us who were being exploited simply stopped working, stopped sacrificing themselves to continuing the global machine. The chance of that is absolutely zero, considering the absolute poverty that the vast majority of the global population lives in. People will do ANYTHING to feed themselves and their families.
2)Political: As far as I'm concerned, all politicians are corrupt, or at least the ones in power are. They are in the pockets of huge global powerhouse companies, and again it goes right back to economic. The politicians who are in power are the ones with the money. In places of economic crisis, there is often great political incentive... The powerful bribe and threaten the powerless into submission and control.
3)Individualistic thinking: Nobody gives a shit. Period. Our culture breeds the "power of the self" above anyone and everything. It's not about community, or society, it's all about me. Obviously this is
4)Western Culture: Somehow North American culture came to be the global "norm". Everyone wants to be like the states, companies, economic policies, consumerism, etc etc etc. Western culture is greedy, self-absorbed, evil, exploitative, manipulative, secretive and again, EVIL.
5) Consumerastic society: Our economy is built on things always being bigger, better, faster, cheaper. We live in a disposable culture. We had landfills, but most kids have no idea where they are. You throw it in the garbage, and the trucks take it away. Same thing with eating animals. You buy chicken breast, nicely cut, cleaned and wrapped, from the grocery store. We do not think about killing animals for food. We are SO displaced from where our food comes from. Fuck, I don't even know where advocados grow (like, a tree, vine, what?!). We throw everything out.
6)We rape our children, murder our women and dehumanize ourselves: We are raising our children in a world where violence, exploitation, and dehumanization is NORMAL. Nearly 1/2 of women in BC are raped at some point in their lives, nearly 100% of women have experienced some form of violence period. (I got those stats from WAVAW). Our media portrays strict gender roles, our children exclude people who are "different" than them, victims of car accidents don't even make the news, it goes in the traffic report. We do not value our children for simply BEING, we have to push them to become smarter, to know more, to get to the top of the career ladder.
7) The rape of our environment: OUr economy is also built on making things bigger, better, faster, cheaper by exploiting the environment. We are polluting the ocean, burning rainforests and creating holes in the ozone. We DRIVE TO THE FUCKING GYM FOR GOD'S SAKES. Our communities are not pedestrian friendly, we live in a culture dependant on cars for transportation, which consume oil, which we have to pay for, which is being drilled out of the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Africa. I mean, PLASTIC is the most produced product in the world, yet it is totally unbiodegradable. We use nuclear power to light our houses and our electric blankets.
8) There is no accountability: A tanker spills a million tons of oil into the ocean, killing sea life and making a huge mess. They have to pay for the cleanup costs (and even then, not always!), but that's it. They maybe get a slap on the wrist, but most of the time they get off scott free. The Sudanese government is killing it's people, yet no one does anything.
Like, no wonder most of us don't do anything, it's so utterly hopeless. We CAN'T. We can send as much money to tsunami victims as we want, but the vast majority of it ends up in the pockets of those who control the money stream, the rich and powerful.
Humans are a virus. We have infected our host, there is no method of control, our world is in crisis: humanitarian, political, economic. We will eventually kill our host, because we don't know when to stop. We are sitting on a time bomb.
If it's not the shit we put in our air, water and food that kills us, it'll be war, famine and nuclear bombs. Fuckin ace.
PS, I am not perfect. I eat chicken, I have no idea where advocados come from (I don't even LIKE advocados!), I ride a motorcycle, and I have three computers. I take long showers, use way too much kleenex and sometimes throw paper in the garbage instead of into the recycling because it's closer. I throw food out, I waste resources and I don't appreciate the environment enough.
WE ARE MOVING OUT APRIL 1st!!! THIS MEANS THAT WE NEED TO FILL OUR APARTMENT SO THAT WE DON'T HAVE TO PAY RENT FOR THE MONTH OF APRIL!!!!
therefore...
BACHELOR APARTMENT FOR RENT, 10th AND PINE LOCATION (1 block East of Burrard and 1 block south of Broadway). IT'S CARPETED (except in the kitchen and bathroom) BUT FAIRLY BIG FOR A BACHELOR! GROUND FLOOR! BIG WINDOWS! EAST FACING! RENT IS $650/month! CALL 604-725-9544 IF YOU ARE INTERESTED!
Legacy Update In our last installment, Quinn grew into a toddler and I received many compliments on her cuteness! She was dressed in her PJ's in all of the pictures, so I have a picture of her in her outfit with totally cute hair. I was also distressed because she had red hair. But I figured out that the wife of my FOUNDER (aka Quinn's GREAT grandmother) had red hair... Wow for the crazy recessive genes!
Legacy Update! (a short one) So, the last part of my legacy found that Anna Legacy had just given birth to Quinn Legacy. Nathan grew into a child. Both boys were admitted to private school (after cleaning up the hedges). They are good kids! :)
Legacy Update! I've been trying to update more frequently, because then I remember whose who in the baby pictures! Damn babies all look alike pretty much!
Anyways, when we left off, little Nick Legacy was still a toddler. Anna Legacy (one of his mommies) was pregnant with her and Jessica's 2nd child.
Anna went into labour after a relaxing bubble bath. Her wife (Jessica) and mother-in-law (Danielle) came running into the bathroom at her screams of agony.
My 2nd generation Legacy heir, Edward, lost his frickin job after he had transitioned into an elder, so now he's stuck. No more lifetime platinum for him! JACKASS!!
Anna is now pregnant with her and Jessica's 2nd child (all grovel to the inSIMinator!). I plan to make her a stay-at-home mom after Edward dies (which should be soon). Edward is currently staying at home to mind the baby, because I kept picking really crappy chance cards for him, so I decided he would be better off at home than out terrorizing the world... He also lost ALL THEIR MONEY... ARG. Fortunatly it was after I had just moved them onto a new lot and build a really kick-ass new house. I'm not putting anymore kids through university. It's boring and I HATE IT. I cheat all the way through it just to make it go faster cause I get so bored!
James and Katherine got married and have had one child, who I named Adam. Adam is still a baby 'cause I don't play that house very often. James and Jessica's 3 cousins (Alex, Midori and Nora) are also around, Nora is still a child, Midori moved back in with her parents (Samantha, Edward's sister, and Tiffany) after graduating from university, and Alex got himself married to Allegra Gorey.
I made the NIFTIEST house ever though, for James and Katherine! It's a loft! I'm obsessed with lofts right now because my girlfriend has to move soon and is looking to actually buy a loft.
It just keeps getting worse... For anyone who went to Churchill...
Mr Henderson, I don't know what he taught but I think it was biology or chemistry, died on the weekend. Apparantly he was on his treadmill and his heart stopped (my interpretation of that would be that he had a heart attack). I ran into Naiomi.... can't remember her last name.... but she works at Kidsbooks, and she said that Katie Howard had e-mailed her and told her... I think Johanna had him for IBHL chem... but I might be totally crazy...
But again, this sucks, because if I'm right and he was Johanna's chem teacher, that he was a really neat dude and that he will be sorely missed by both the staff and students (former and current) at SWC...
RIP Julia Sit, keep riding the twisties of the sky and may your gas tank always be full... This sucks. I woke up in a good mood this morning, and was checking LJ when I noticed that zandaralee has commented to someone about a prominent person in the Vancouver riding community having been killed on the weekend. So I went to check out the main page.
Her name was Julia Sit, and I was supposed to ride with her tonight (hot chicks ride). She was a wonderful person and I could tell that by her comments and enthusiasm on the VROM board. I never actually met her in person (that was supposed to be tonight) but she made me feel really welcome the first time I ever posted on the message boards. She was the president of the Flying Swann Cafe on 4th and she was prominent in the riding community. She was a smiling happy person and I had a feeling that we would totally click just like that.
She was supposed to get married at the beginning of August. She also lost her soulmate last July to another riding accident.
She was killed in a low-side slow speed accident, I don't know anything other than that, but it really really really sucks and it makes me really really really upset... :P
[edit] There was a small blurb on the accident in the B section ofyesterday's Vancouver sun. It didn't say her name, but I'm pretty sure it was her. It said she hit the curb in a right handed turn and fell down a 2 metre deep ditch... ouch.
Current Mood: sad Current Music: The Cranberries - Zombies
A quote from a "concerned parent" says "Lise Encontre is so worried about possible side effects she is refusing to have her children vaccinated for anything. 'Maybe we are not getting the measles, maybe we are not getting the mumps like we did in the past. But we are getting things like asthma, we're getting things like learning disabilities,' said Encontre."
Hello, are you TOTALLY IGNORANT ON PURPOSE?! Asthma is caused by all the pollution in the air along with a combination of double recessive genes predisposing your kids to having asthma. Learning disabilities is a completely different issue that has nothing to do with vaccines. There's also this whole thing that the vaccines are causing autism. AUTISM IS A BRAIN DISORDER. VACCINES DO NOT CAUSE YOUR BRAIN TO SUDDENLY CHANGE SHAPE AND STOP WORKING PROPERLY. Good lord.
So now Health Canada is worried about diseases like measels and mumps coming back, especially in kids who are most at risk for stuff like this. There are other things that we've all been vaccinated for, like tetanus (ohhh that's a FUN disease! It causes all your muscles to contract so it snaps all your long bones and your spine, because yes, your muscles ARE THAT STRONG) and hepatitis B (which can cause cancer) and hepatitis A (any hepatitis wrecks havoc on your liver... that's why they are so so so bad) and whatever else we've all been poked for. Smallpox was nearly erradicated and now it's back due to people not getting their kids vaccinated. Smallpox still kills thousands of kids in 3rd world countries, and so do diseases like tetanus, diptheria and measels.
Vaccines are good things, they accomplish 2 major things. They prevent you from getting sick, and they also prevent the spread of the disease. The first vaccine was for smallpox. A dude noticed that milkmaids who had gotten cowpox never got smallpox, so he acquired volunteers from the orphanages (I highly doubt they were actually volunteers, and that's totally unethical and would never be allowed today) and shot them all up with the contents of the pustules from cowpox. Then 2 weeks later he exposed them all to smallpox, and voila, none of them got sick.
The medical community does not believe that vaccines cause any kids any negative side effects (except for the "ow my arm hurts". I pulled this off the American Austism webpage,
"The question of a relationship between vaccines and autism continues to be debated. In a 2001 investigation by the Institute of Medicine, a committee concluded that the "evidence favors rejection of a causal relationship.... between MMR vaccines and autistic spectrum disorders (ASD)." The committee acknowledged, however, that "they could not rule out" the possibility that the MMR vaccine could contribute to ASD in a small number of children. While other researchers agree the data does not support a link between the MMR and autism, more research is clearly needed."
I dunno. I think I'm really stubborn about this issue. Why would you not vaccinate your child? Why would you expose your child to such great risks that could kill them? I think it's really sad that this rumour went flying around and now all these kids are walking around just waiting to get infected with the measels (which is a really yucky disease). Polio is another disease that was erradicated. Polio paralysed children, or else deformed their legs. It's a really really really sucky disease, and I really don't understand the rational behind these parents who can just sit there and be like "well I'm not going to vaccinate my child because it might cause autism". Autism will be the last of your concerns if your child dies because they got infected with the MEASELS and had such severe brain damage that their brain could no longer function.
This is what tetanus does to you... it's a drawing, I left out of the pictures of the little kids with tetanus cause it's actually quite disturbing.
I have voted in the national e-referendum on whether Parliament should pass bill C-38 which would legalize same sex marriage in Canada. This referendum is located at http://www.referendumcanada.ca and I hope you will take the time to visit this site and also cast your vote.
Go fill it out, bitches. It's in the "defense of marriage" website, fucking bastards. They should get off their high horses and deal with the 60% divorce rate that afflicts straight people instead of whining that gay people shouldn't be allowed to get married because we're perverted.
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