An Idea Is Bulletproof

I've just got permission to share this story with you all and I feel that it's a really important cautionary tale no matter where you live. Please remember to be safe in taxis and be really cautious with police officers, clearly not all of them are doing their job for the right reasons.

I've also purposely left this post open so anyone can read it, not just my LJ friends. Feel free to link this to your friends.

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So I love how I totally missed that there was going to be a TTC strike today. I woke up before my alarm (when it's hot I can't sleep much) and so I didn't hear the news on the radio, and I knew there was a possibilty of a strike but I'd pretty much pushed that aside in my mind. Ergo I got up, got ready for work at the regular time, and had just gone out the front door when my dad came running after me to tell me there was no TTC. Fuck. I was lucky enough that my mom was in a pretty good mood and she got up and drove me to work. It's not a walkable distance and it's about a $50 cab ride on a good day, in the traffic today it would have been more. Ergo I was so stuck. So I got a ride in, and then of course realized I was then stranded at work since my mother was not playing my chauffer all day and wasn't driving out to get me at 7. Fuck again. I lucked out though because the one other person I know in the building had a ride to Bathurst and King so I got in on that.... which meant I had to leave work 2 1/2 hours early and I was almost 1/2 an hour late getting in. Oy. By the time we were leaving though the TTC was starting to run but I still took the ride just in case, I really did not want to find myself stranded when there was no one in the office at all.

In the end this was a good plan because we got on a street car right away, and there were 3 in a row and one just ahead as well.... and then at Yonge they announced a short turn, we got off to catch the subway and the subway was all barracaded off still... and then we looked around and the other streetcars that had been behind us were totally gone. The hell? So we just walked from there. My friend lived about a 20-30 minute walk away and I went with her to Queen and then decided that I was just going to walk since there were no streetcars in sight. And I didn't see a streetcar until I was about 20 minutes from my house!

However I bought more sunscreen, only SPF 45 (as opposed to my crazy SPF 70 I have at home) so I think I stayed pretty burn free .

In other ailments, I thought I had a splinter in the bottom of my foot so tonight I tried to pull it out and it turned out to be a piece of glass, ow! That was not fun to get out.

And that was my crazy day. However I did get a slushie at the end of it *yum* because it was so hot! Well it's not really that bad, just walking in the sunshine for over an hour is hot.

I walked all over the city today :) My legs and feet are SO tired but I feel great :) The weather was just perfect so I walked downtown to meet Nicole for coffee and since it was warm we got ours to go. I tried one of Second Cup's frozen hot chocolates (not Serendepity but I've never tried one anywhere before so I figured I'd try them here then compare at Serendepity whenever I get there) and they are tres yummy.

We ended up feeding a lot of birds, cute little sparrows, then a starling, then something similar to a starling but louder... then pigeons.. then a squirrel came... it was like a little woodland scene (well it was until the pigeons.)

Then we wandered to a great furniture place on Jarvis... I liked it, I'll have to wander back when it's time for me to furnish my bedroom, i.e. buy a bed lol. Because the Ikea put it together yourself approach daunts me. I can do it but their instructions make me want to cry. LisaLisa do you remember me putting together that closet thing? Yeah it's not pretty when I'm in the middle of those projects.

Then from there we wandered to the Blockbuster on Spadina (I have a weakness for DVDs what can I say lol) and I found 'Slap Her She's French'... but the renamed and horribly horribly repackaged version which is now called 'She Gets What She Wants.' It's not a stellar movie by any means but it's funny and I can still remember seeing the trailer for it (twice!) with Viv. I also picked up 'My Date With Drew' which I feel I must watch this week. Tanya recommended it to me and I just like the premise of making this random dream come true. How great that things like that can happen if you work for them!

Then I walked home. Much walking, but I liked it, I ended up wandering passed the store where (almost a year ago now) I bought the 'Big Daddy' cookie when waiting to get inside the Phoenix for the Slean show. I was too tired by then to check on their cookie status, I have no idea if they even make those anymore. But they were yummy and funny as hell.

The reaction to the shootings in TO is driving me crazy. First of all, we live in a big city. How long did the government and the general population think we'd avoid big city crime? Honestly now!

I of course don't like that it took a little blond girl getting shot to finally get some public attention. How many black people were shot this summer? Can we even name them? And now some blonde princess gets shot and the city stops. It's not a fair thing. Not her fault either, just not a fair part of society.

However I think that now that there's attention being paid to gun related violence in the city it's the wrong sort of attention. Saying that we're going to get "tougher on crime" and make more laws to ban guns does nothing. Did I miss it being legal to walk downtown and shoot at people? Did I miss the fact that the shootings this year have been committed with guns which were lawfully purchased and registered? No? So what was done was already against the law and it didn't stop anyone. So how is making more laws going to solve the problem?

The issue for me is this: no one seems to really want to examine why it is that people are picking up guns and shooting people in the first place. We just classify them as "bad guys" and the people who get shot are the "good guys" and there's no grey area to be had inbetween. I think there's a world of grey area there with nothing is exclusively bad and we should be looking at that. What is it about our society or the particular neighbourhoods that the people who were the shooters are from that made them feel they needed a gun in the first place? No one seems to be thinking about maybe funding more community projects in those areas to keep the younger kids out of trouble so they don't grow up and buy guns.... instead we're thinking of harsher laws to punish people after society fails to help them in the first place.

Also the media's spin on the stories is terrible. When the girl was shot on boxing day they just played it in a "it could have been your kids" paranoia way. My mom started worrying and I haven't been shopping there on boxing day in at least 6 years! It's complete garbage which is broadcast not to give us news but to make us afraid to go outside and then to make our fear push the police into working "harder" or more violently... I mean this is just the start of how big cities in the US end up having black people being afraid of the police because of racial profiling. And no one seems to talk about that, it's okay as long as "they" are stopped.

Absolutely insane.

Today it snowed, our first real snow, the flurries yesterday don't count. But now there's some white staying on the ground so today was snow. It was actually quite lovely. Going to work early this morning was freezing. I refuse on principal to wear a winter coat before December... so being outside as the sun rises not so much fun lol Also it was windy and just cold cold cold. But this afternoon when I left work it was snowing and it was beautiful snow. Not enough for slush yet :D I got off of my streetcar early and walked for 20 minutes just to be in the thick of it.

Also my Dad came to pick me up at work today. Well no, he didn't come to pick me up but he was passing through just as I finished my shift so I went part of the way home with him, he stopped off to pick up fancy bread and cheeses for dinner :) So that was nice. Our paths don't cross that often at home anymore between our work schedules.

I want to hang my Sarah Slean posters... Neal gave me a good tip on poster hangers so I'm off to search for them tomorrow. And then I can decorate a little bit :) This room is bare. So messy but the walls aren't mine, they either have my dad's office stuff up on them or nothing at all and that's not me. I need something to look at in here :) 9 more months maybe... I need some art!

Harry Potter came out today, I didn't go :( too broke still... perhaps next week. But that's RENT, eep.. Also I want to see the new Pride and Prejudice movie. Le sigh.