Big Wide World

so ontario introduced the new pit bull legislation. everyone and their brother seems to have something to say about it, but there's one thing missing from most of the comments.... FACTS.

and this is the problem. a politician who doesn't know any better decides that there is a problem, and that HE has to solve it. and without much unbiased objective evidence, facts, research (pretty much without anything but myth and hate and... well, i won't go there), they decide to ban something that doens't even exist (here's fact one, there is no such breed as a pit bull, its just a name to categorize a few different breeds into one). here's fact number 2: their jaws don't lock, fact 3: they are not "naturally" agressive (i could go on and on). more chow-chow and dobermans are responsible for attacks than pit bulls (i know there's a slight difference with severity of the attack). bottom line, its not the dog, its the owner. if you raise a dog to be aggressive, it will be aggressive. same as a child. italy banned dogs, and now they have something like 92 banned dogs.

one woman said that she believes in the ban b/c she sees a pit bull like a loaded gun. ummm, does anyone see anything wrong with that statement? don't all talk at once. i know you do. here's my answer to this. a loaded gun doesn't go off by itself. it needs a pulled trigger to discharge. that trigger is always there, but it takes an irresponsible PERSON to pull it. last i checked, a gun didn't possess the ability to discharge itself. and neither does a pit bull. they don't attack for no reason. there are always irresponsible people involved.

so the legislation, besided being unconstitutional is just pointless and it punishes a lot of responsible dog owners, and a lot of innocent dogs. and you think the horrible people that breed these dogs or abuse them are going to all of a sudden become responsible dog owners. NO, ain't gonna happen. but what will happen? i'll end this post by giving you a very possible scenario under this legislation:

you and your neighbour hate eachother. you have a pit bull. the neighbour wants to get back at you. he gets bitten by some random dog. he accuses your dog (the innocent pit bull). the police come into your home WITHOUT a warrant. they take your dog. they need NO PROOF. they kill your dog. end of story.

well, school is starting, and i'm all about making it easier for myself (as much as possible). so my next semi big purchase is the QuickLink-Pen Elite

here's what it does:
Used just like a yellow highlighter, the QuickLink-Pen Elite allows the user to collect notes electronically from any printed text – anytime, anywhere!

Scan and Store up to 1,000 pages of text in English
# Transfer stored text to PDAs (PalmOS and WinCE), Smartphones (PalmOS and Windows Mobile 2003) or PCs via IRDA Infra red connection.
# Transfer stored notes to PCs via USB connection (and automatically create MS Word documents).
# Read aloud the scanned notes using the text to speech function, either through the built-in speaker or headphones.
# Scan and store small images that can then be transferred to a PC at a later time
# Display the definition of any word in the notes, using the included American Heritage® Concise Dictionary

totally excited about this next purchase. should be a real productivity booster. will let you know more after i start using it if anyone is interested.

so its sunday, and besides bbq with the parents, i had some time on my hands, after all, i should be packing, so i obviously HAD to do some other useless things. and i found a great philosophy/psych site that has a bunch of different tests to help you better understand yourself, your morals, values, etc. and i could tell you some interesting things like: " 'On a reductive view our beliefs are not about the world as it is in itself ... they are about the world as it appears to us.' As what we commonly understand by objective knowledge is not possible, it is accepted that reality beyond our experience is either not possible or meaningless and so knowledge is understood as being confined to what is possible for us to experience."

But i think that its more important to tell you that i did a test about "which celebrity would you hook up with if you were drunk?". you have to answer a bunch of questions (like 5 or something) and it tells you who you're most likely to hook up with. and guess who i got? out of everyone in that is considered a celebrity, i would most likely hook up with.... (drum roll pls)..... Regis Philbin. yeah, that's right REGIS. and apparently, even he's probably more wild and drinks more at parties than i do. umm, yeah, i don't think i can really say anything more to this. it speaks in volumes.

i don't know about you, but i know that the summer is over when everything starts to pile in on me all at the same time. the fun and games and relaxation are all gone (read sob), and its time to be a grown-up and stop putting everything off b/c "it can wait". now, i realize that those days should have been over for me a long time ago, but leave me be, i'm still a student and i can procrastinate if i want to.

now i'm on the way to finding a professional job (no more retail- can i hear an amen, sing it, and a hallelujah?). rewording my resume is a definate first step, but i also have to look into a particular area of the industry that i have no knowledge about. kind of exciting, kind of overwhelming. but good overwhelming. and now that i've started i do feel all motivated. i am officially in gear for the fall. to all my fellow friends that are feeling the same way, you are not alone, take comfort in the fact that we are all suffering, but hey, c'est la vie. chin up young person.

my calendar is starting to fill in for the first time in months and i actually feel like a grown up. yey

i don't watch the news. not that i don't want to know what's going on, but simply b/c i'm sick of the ugly disgusting, and sad things that happen around the world, and the vile things that we do to eachother. so i look to alternative news sources that are just plain funny or weird. one of the ones that i check out is fark.com

here's august 24, 2005 in a nutshell...

Man narrowly avoids winning Darwin Award after successfully dislodging a round stuck in his gun using a screwdriver. Naturally, man did this while the gun was pointing at him

Man charged with bulldozing under the influence

Thailand's prime minister searching for which of his cabinet members had penis-enlargement surgery. Suspicion is on one who keeps smiling

God tells Pat Robertson to backpedal

Woman sent away from own trial after turning up too drunk to make plea

Budapest to launch education campaign designed to encourage dogs not to poop so much

"You've got laundry." New laundromat system connects to email, cell phones or PDAs to alert you when a washing machine is ready

so, according to MY SELECTIVE NEWS, it was a good day.

lol. i'm blown away by the stupidity of extremists. and nowhere is this more apparent than in the words of pat robertson. i mean, i always knew the man was a little "kookoo for cocopuffs", but my goodness, it just keeps getting worse. except now, he's getting america into more international troubles (doesn't america have enough already?). now he's saying that america would be better off assasinating the president of Venezuela so that the government can save lots of money and lives: "You know, I don't know about this doctrine of assassination, but if he thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it. It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war... We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability. We don't need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know, strong-arm dictator. It's a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with."

yes, pat has been saying insane things for quite a while but publicly calling for a political assasination of a leader? doesn't that cross some kind of sanity line in the sand?

although i think my fav most ridiculous quote by robertson was: "Feminism encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians."(Rev. Pat Robertson, 1992 Republican Convention). How can anyone take this man and what he says seriously?

I remember a not so distant past in which we could walk the streets of downtown toronto at any time of the day and night and not worry about a stray gang bullet hitting us in the head and killing us. My friends and I were often on the downtown streets at 1 am, and it was usually the saftest time to be there cause the only ppl that were around were the drunk (and they're too busy being drunk to bother any passer-by). But recently, Toronto has started to go down the proverbial drain. And its not just the recent shootings and killing but I'll stick to that for now.

It seems that everytime I turn on the news this summer, there's another shooting. Gangbangers are running around killing eachother, and the problem is is that they're also taking down some innocent ppl. And since there are no real solutions to the problem, police, politicians, and the general public has adopted the bandage solution of blaming the rise on cheap american gun imports.

But advocates of Toronto "The Great" site that toronto still remains one of the safest cities in n.america since (despite of summer shootings, the local homicide rate is still lower than it was in 1991.

Couple of issues here. First of all, I hate quick solutions of using blame to try to control a situation. What's going on in toronto isn't controllable. its going to get worse and worse, even if american gun imports are controlled. gangbangers will just find other sources or methods. why? well, that's simple. its not the illicit guns, its the illicit ppl. we have created a society with a lack of accountability for anything, and that further fosters crime. for example, bullying is still on the rise b/c instead of dealing with bullies and curbing the trend, we are too afraid of imposing tough sentences on bullies b/c they were once bullied themselves. umm, ok. what does that do? it says that if you were bullied and you become a bully, its fine, we'll take care of you, but don't worry, you can get away with it b/c we just want to give you a hug.

its the same with gangbangers. we want to walk on eggshells. recently, one politician suggested targeting the communities are are most likely the cause of the problem. this "racial profiling" was rejected. now, i'm not saying that racial profiling is right, but at least it was a more productive step in the right direction to curb the violence. tougher attitudes, tougher sentences, tougher zero policies. that's the solution. not this liberal, boo-hoo, rehab, slap on the hand bullshit. we're too busy trying to find them jobs rather then focusing on the moral questions and the lack of values that have been created. if the parents can't do it, well then, someone should.

as for the fact that toronto is still one of the safest cities. well, i guess the only thing i can say is that: "if that helps you sleep at night". maybe its still true. fine, i'll give them that, but the problem is not that toronto is still one of the safest, the question is for how long? cause the recent state of affairs in toronto is just going to cause more crime and we'll go from mediocre to get-out-while-you-can. personally, my love-hate relationship with toronto (a permanent state of internal chaos for most true torontonians) is quickly leaning towards the latter.

ok, so apparently i have sweet blood and whatever is biting me can smell it from miles away (probably an exaggeration but the way it seems). i've been bitten hundreds of times, and if its mosquitos then ottawa is safe from west nile cause they're all biting ME and my chances in stats have now dramatically gone up (OTTAWA: i will accept some form of thanks in the form of monetary gratitude). oh, its not that bad. i'm on vacation, there's no real drama, so i must (yes must) create it out of my wazoo purely for entertainment purposes (though i'm not exaggerating about the number of times i've been bitten). and i was sitting this morning, listening to music on the love of my life right now, my iriver mp3 player, drinking coffee, smoking a cig (shut it), and scratching away, when i came upon an ariticle in yesterdays ottawa Dose magazine It was an article entitiled "Can the Mind Heal the Body?". basically, the jist of the article is what we've been stating in the form of a cliche for years and years, MIND OVER MATTER. apparently, we can heal ourselves, and it can be patient: heal thyself (do i see pharmaceutical company shares plummeting? - unfortunately probably not). this has something to do with new research on both hemispheres of the brain, and in one study individuals were asked to picture themselves in a warm environment, and their body temperature did go up, and spiritual healing is also showing health benefits. ok, so i'm not just going to take their word for it. i decided to put this to the test in my own research. i sat there in silence, and told myself over and over again that i am not itchy. and hell if i didn't become less itchy. ok, so it works. i'm not saying that i'm bending spoons with my mind, yet. but the possibilities are promising. the next time i have an exam that i didn't study for, i can guarantee that i'll be telling myself that i am desperatley ill over and over again, till i become sick. then i'll just heal myself.

well, so i'm in ottawa on the first real vacation that i've had in years (yes years i'm so pathetic). feels good not the have anything to do, and just sit and enjoy. ottawa's pretty hot but not as muggy as t.o., thought yesterday or last night, not sure which, i did get eaten alive by what i hope to be mosquitos. seriously, i woke up with 17 bites on just one arm (a couple of bites on the other arm, some on my legs). oh yeah, the mosquitos had a feast on my blood last night. damn blood suckers. and now i'm trying not to scratch, but sooo hard not to.

before i left, i finally bought my desktop (such a good price and good comp too), and my iriver 1gb mp3 player (drool). i have almost 200 songs on it, and its a radio, voice recorder, it also records music off radio, and it has other useful features like sleeper settings, and on and on. its my baby. costs about $230 but well worth it. so the only annoying part was ripping all my cds onto my comp, but i only have to do it once, and i'm set. still have a lot of cds to rip but i still have time before school starts. anyways, i'm off to jay's moms house to lounge and she's making some kind of ice cappucinos (with alcohol?). sounds delic.