Pace went for an eye check-up the other day and I thought he looked positively robotic in this contraption…
Finally, Sasha doesn’t escape the nerd action either. I bought an app that works as a poor man’s video baby monitor and, in addition to providing a live video feed, also allows me to play her music and speak to her remotely as well as turning on a night light (the iPhone’s camera light).
This is currently the top rated comment about this story:
Education and building reading skills are part of life and in prison, part of rehabilitation. It is so important to have such things available in order to work with the prison population to prevent re-offenders. This government is not working towards crime prevention… they are working towards punishment and re-offending.
What these stories have in common is simple – no matter your role in society – police officer, librarian, politician – the ultimate truth is that how you treat others, and particularly the most disadvantaged amongst us, reflects who you are yourself.
I’m not sure if this fits as a May Day story or not but I like the sentiment – people who do tough jobs for very little reward sometimes deserve to be surprised with some over-the-top generosity (although there’s also a flip side argument that if we paid decent wages to our servers, tipping wouldn’t be required in the first place.)
At the risk of sounding like Mr. Pink from “Reservoir Dogs”, some jobs are deemed tip worthy in our society and some aren’t.
In high school, I worked a job that *wasn’t* deemed tip-worthy, pumping gas at the local Esso station while many of my classmates who worked at the attached restaurant earned 2x and even 3x what I did because serving food *was* deemed tip-worthy.
It wasn’t a big deal and pumping gas had its benefits that serving food didn’t (working outside much of the time, less being yelled at by angry customers) but it did make the odd tip I got very memorable. I never got a $500 tip but I have a fond memory of someone who came in right before closing one night, got me to do everything you could possibly do in a full serve station – fill gas, check oil, wash all windows, check tire pressures, maybe even change a wiper blade – but then gave me a $20 tip which, at that time, was probably what $500 would be to me now!
I repay that now in a variety of ways – anytime I see a kid training in their first job at a gas station or a grocery store or wherever, I make sure to give them a small tip. And anytime I fill up at the Indian Head Esso (who gained a lifetime customer by employing me for three years in high school), I tip whatever high school kid who happens to be working there now.
Tip your servers, folks (and be generous with interpreting who “serves” you – it’s not just about a restaurant meal!)
Part of what makes him so amazing is that he really shouldn’t even be here, having survived a bombing that killed three other people while riding on a train in Peru in 1986. That experience informs much of his work and if anybody can knowingly comment on the Boston bombings (and the bombing of people in general), he’s the one.
(Warning: The story he tells about surviving the bombing before playing the song “Angels” may be disturbing to some people.)
Sitting here with the new baby curled up, sleeping on my chest in the middle of the night (as she’s done many times in the past two weeks), I thought I should make a list…
TEN THINGS I LOVE ABOUT OUR NEW BABY
That amazing new baby smell!
How her little chest moves in and out when she breathes
How she sometimes does a few rapid-fire breaths before going back to her normal rhythm
She’s been a really good baby so far with very little fussing or crying (except when hungry or needing a change of course!)
Sitting with her on my chest like now is a perfect time for reading an e-book (one advantage over more unwieldy print books)
She’s given me an excuse to live in pyjama pants and t-shirts for nearly two weeks straight 😉
The way her eyes look, so curious and amazed, at things like her mobile, mommy’s face or even shadows moving on the wall
That, after some initial doubts, her big brother absolutely adores her, cares for her, and watches over her
Thinking about her next few months and years of development. I still maintain that around age three is my absolute favourites but the lead-up to that period is pretty cool too!
One benefit of being home with the baby for a couple weeks was that Shea, Sasha and I were able to slip out one afternoon earlier this week for one of Sasha’s first-ever outings.
We snuck into the SUN AGM & Conference to see my mom receive a Lifetime Membership from the organization (she’d also received a Leadership Award earlier in the day.)
Both were well-deserved honours after a nearly 40 year career in nursing (she “retired” four years ago but like many small town nurses, continued continued working after retirement). Although her nursing career pre-dated the union, she spent many years involved with the union in progressively more advanced roles including as a long-time member of their Board of Directors (working closely with one of the most effective labour leaders this province has ever seen.)
Based on that, you’d probably think that I get my political and union activism from my mom but for the most part, mom has never been a “brothers and sisters, rah-rah!” union member or taken the next step in terms of political engagement (until this year, she’s never held a party membership as far as I know.) Instead, like SUN itself, she’s studiously non-partisan with her main goal with her union involvement always having been the improvement of nurses’ circumstances, especially rural nurses and nurses of her generation (although I know many young nurses in Indian Head – including the one who nominated her for her Leadership Award – who cite her as a mentor and role model for their own careers.)
If I didn’t get my political activism from mom, there’s lots I did get from her – a strong, boisterous, fun-loving personality, an empathic dedication to the underdog, a career choice that allowed me to serve my community including those who are often in positions of greatest need.
I’d proofed her Award acceptance speech but she went off script with a couple points that also brought home our commonality in other ways – she cited a book that she encouraged all new nurses to read and she spoke about how, in her view, the union isn’t about the Executive or the staff or any one person – it’s about the grassroots, every day members. I feel that way about most organizational structures – whether it’s a workplace, a political party or an online community.
After a long and very successful career in libraries across western Canada – most recently as Executive Director of the province-wide SILS public library consortium, Maureen passed away after a battle with cancer.
At the same time, I’ve never seen any of them live (not even Ringo!) 😉 I almost got my chance last November when Paul McCartney was in Edmonton and a friend ended up with an extra pair of tickets. But he ended up giving them to a friend who lived there and it was already a mid-week concert meaning I’d have had to take off at least a couple days to attend the concert. (I’m a big Beatles fan but not “I blow unreal amount of cash buying the absolute best tickets plus airfare plus hotels plus missing work” big!)
So it was *very* exciting to hear last week that Paul McCartney was going to be playing Regina this summer. Mom and dad said they wanted to go as well but Shea decided to take a pass – not being as big of a fan and wanting to not leave the baby for too long either.
I got the advance sale code from Shea (who got it from a mommy board of all places!) and logged in today and after just a *minor* glitch (My sleep-deprived new daddy brain initially ended up buying three tickets for Winnipeg instead of Regina – oopsie! Luckily, TicketBastard has a 72-hour return policy), we’ve ended up with three of the best tickets available ($275 each but you only live once right? I could pay half that but would just end up watching it on a big screen in the stadium so what’s the point?)
So I’m pretty excited. A site called Setlists.fm gives you a pretty good idea of what songs he’ll likely play (anything that’s been played 36-37 times on the Tour Statistics page as I type this is a good bet) but there are also a few rarities that slip into the set list here and there.
I’ve got so many favourite McCartney songs, it’d be hard to narrow it down to say, five songs I’d most want to hear but here’s my attempt (okay, stretched to ten)…
4. Maybe I’m Amazed – more like “maybe this song is amazing!” I know Macca gets chided lots for his sappy melodies but so what?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzOBr-zq2gA
5. Live and Let Die – mostly because they say this is his most “explosive” performance visually
6. No More Lonely Nights – probably one of his best melodies ever
7. Get Back – my dad’s favourite Beatles song so it would be special to hear it live with him
8. Mull of Kintyre – I’m not fiery about my Scottish roots but hearing this song might do it! If hearing “Get Back” with my dad would be special, hearing “Mull of Kintyre” with my mom (whose mom was born in the town closest to where McCartney had his famous farm) would be an awesome experience as well!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dI8fRjmeinw
9. Calico Skies – one of many favourites I have from McCartney’s most underrated solo album
10. Something – I love the ukelele-based arrangement that McCartney put together as a tribute to George Harrison’s best-known Beatles song
Not on the list – pretty much all of Macca’s biggest hits – “Hey Jude”, “Let It Be”, etc. They’d be great too but, “Yesterday” excepted, I’ve heard them so much – especially in televised concerts and events, I want to hear the lesser known tracks more (although for an artist of McCartney’s stature “lesser known” is a relative term!)
No surprise that Shea and I have been reading a lot about being new parents the past few months. Here are some of the most interesting lists we came across…
