Keeping Hope honest...

The incoming Obama administration hasn't yet taken the reins of the White House, but they're certainly preparing themselves for the task at hand. His accompanying cabinet is bi-partisan in nature, with membership spanning both the Democratic and Republican parties. 

His cabinet selections are not without there own controversies. Obama's selection of Eric Holder as Attorney General upsets many who feel his ties to the Clinton Inc and his controversial pardon history are an unfair renege on Obama's earlier promises of "change". The new Secretary of Transportation, Ray LaHood has created an unwelcome stir among the environmental crowd because of his ties to the GOP and how he'll handle transportation issues as part of Obama's grandiose plan to revitalize the American transportation industry. Appointing Hillary as Secretary of State has certainly left some scratching their heads.

The point is that the days of tirelessly running around touting Obama over everyone else are quickly coming to a close. He's in. There's no one else to beat. You'll notice that the frequency of words like change, hope and "yes, we can" has fallen significantly in the media and from Mr. Obama. The country's (and the rest of the world for that matter) love for him should no longer be blind. And it is becoming clear that Obama is not the idealistic saviour that many (myself included) made him out to be during the last two years.

His faults are becoming increasingly clear as time progresses. He plays the political game like many other politicians, as his cabinet appointments have clearly indicated. The hulabaloo erupting with his selection of the strongly anti-abortion and anti-gay Rev. Rick Warren as part of his inauguration reflects the need to look at Obama's own values. He doesn't seem to be quite as left-of-centre as we made him out to be, as he's clearly tiptoeing the centre as he gets ready to take over the most difficult and responsible position in the world.     

This is not to say that I am angry at Obama, nor do I believe he isn't the right man for the job. He's doing what he should to run the world's most powerful country. But what makes the job so difficult is that he has to answer to his decisions and explain why and how he will make those decisions. The public and the media especially should not turn a blind eye to Obama's choices and statements, as many of us may have during the elections citing that "it's OK, he's the almighty Obama. Let's trust he knows what he's doing". 

So when Obama takes power on January 20, we can celebrate that we've finally got someone else running the country. But let's drop those pro-Obama allegiances, critically examine the administration and keep him honest. It'll keep the Hope-Train on the tracks and going in the right direction. 

The Take-Home Exam...

I just finished my last exam of the semester a few minutes ago. It feels wonderful. But it's also 11:43 PM. So what the hell am I doing writing this thing at such an hour, let alone writing about it minutes later?

It was a take-home exam. I've only heard of such things in myth, but this year I was given my first one. Now that I no longer need to fret about it, I realize that the take-home exam is quite an interesting concept. 

It's an exam, but such a quirky one. No need to study frantically for hours on end for that single session of intense exam writing because you are given it well in advance of its due date. Rightly so, they would expect more of you than what you might answer in a typical exam. But it's also not a paper. There is no need to heavily research external papers or information; everything is right inside your class notes and readings. And bonus, no need to cite anything.

But there are some other elements to it that stand out in my mind. Do they really expect us not to discuss it or work on it with other students? I mean, few of us are stupid enough at this stage to hand in carbon copies of work, but general ideas about questions can easily be discussed. This is not to say that one would do this, but the potential is there. Even though it's clearly prohibited, how on Earth are they going to enforce such a thing? The honour system is only so effective.

But maybe there's more here than we think. For instance, I considered this take-home exam to not really be an exam. I finished those awhile ago. And then I flew home immediately after completing them, still without starting the take-home. My ability to go over it and discuss with fellow students was therefore severely inhibited (although still possible...woo internet and telephone). So perhaps the same thing occurs for other students who may go home. They consider the take-home exam to be much easier than the other exams, so they go home (away from the university town) and work on it there. Perhaps the instructors take that into consideration? Or maybe I'm thinking way too far into it. But it's a possibility.

The take-home exam is an interesting thing. Not too hard, but not too easy. And worth enough for one to care enough about it to try to do a good job. But full of so much cheating potential. I wonder why they give out such things?  

If I had a billion dollars...

A billion dollars used to seem like a lot of money. But nowadays, that value has somehow diminished in my mind. 

Don't get me wrong, it is still a lot of money. I have no idea (and probably never will) what having that kind of money would be like and when a lot of thought is put into it, a billion dollars is a whole whack of cash. 

But I'm talking about the bigger picture. When I hear that a company is worth $1.7B, I think to myself, "Oh, it's only $1.7B. That's not too big." Or even when I hear that the Big Three are losing tens of billions of dollars; it just doesn't hit me as hard as it once might have.

So why is this happening in my crazy ol' mind? I think it has to do with the amount of money being thrown around in this economic crisis. Remember the much-heralded $700B bailout plan that was the talk of the town for so many weeks? I wouldn't be surprised if you forgot about it. Because apparently it wasn't enough. There were other bailout plans passed through, some in the $200B range, but even those don't seem all that big anymore. Compared to $700B, $200B is just a tack-on. 

Once it became known that $700B wasn't nearly enough to fix everything, the notional value of a billion fell off the map. With these absolutely ridiculous dollar figures being thrown around daily on the news, it's not hard to imagine why the lesser figures aren't as meaningful anymore. Remember when hearing that Bill Gates had $50B or something silly like that? That ain't nothin' in my head now, at least in comparison to everything else. 

It's strange. A billion dollars is a lot of money. But it just doesn't have that same ring to it. Who would've thunk it?  

Cur--sive??...

This past Saturday I took one of the more difficult tests that I have faced in my life: The LSAT. This is the uber-standardized test that plays a significant part getting people into law schools in Canada.

I was a tad nervous before the test, but went into it feeling strangely comfortable. Little did I know that the most difficult and stressful part of this 3 hour-plus exam would be the administrative hulabaloo right at the beginning.

Under normal contracts or tests of this nature, there is a statement that states that you will not cheat, not provide answers to others etc, and you are usually supposed to sign it. But not for the LSAT. Instead of simply signing the five-line statement, I was required to copy it out and then sign it. The worst part: it had to be copied out in cursive. Shit.

With the exception of my signature, I hadn't used cursive writing since grade 6. I quickly realized I had forgotten what many of the letters were supposed to look like, so I elected to make some up (after all, the test supervisor had said "cursive, or your best non-printing writing). It was atrocious.

Nothing could have prepared me for the stress of such a task. One by one, the people around me dropped their pencils to their desks as they completed the statement with ease, while I struggled having only completed half of the damn thing. It soon became clear that I was the only one left, as the test supervisor repeatedly asked when I'd be done. That was not fun.

I'm not sure where such a task came from or why it was necessary. Perhaps it is the real part of the LSAT that law schools look at, nevermind all those other mind-bending multiple-choice questions.

If this is the case, I'm screwed.

A bizarre request...

During one of my lectures this morning, someone sitting beside decided to convince those around him that I was a well-established drug dealer in Peterborough. This was done solely to amuse this one guy, who of course did not think anything would come of it. I passively ignored him, assuming the same thing and thinking his dire need for attention would slip through the cracks.

Before too long I was approached by an interested 'customer'. In a quiet and careful manner, he asked me whether I sold drugs. I very quickly told him no and he is asking the wrong guy. Hoping the topic would be dropped, I returned to my notes and listened to the professor give his lecture. The original perpetrator of this bizarre little situation was cracking up emphatically, perhaps trying to attract more attention to himself.

The 'customer' returned a second time, this time considerably more interested and little irritable. He claimed that he was told that I would say that I don't sell drugs because I deal only in highly illicit and expensive ones and do not wish to expand my market too large. He then went on to ask me for two types of hard drugs: MDMA (which I hadn't heard of at the time, but later learned is similar to ecstasy) and heroin. I was rightly amazed to be asked about these drugs and quite shocked, immediately telling him that he should go away and that I was sorry I couldn't help him out, but I wasn't the guy he wanted to talk to, nor did I know who would be. 

He was a little upset and fairly embarrassed. Justly so. The guy who started it all was laughing his head off. What an asshole. And to top it all off, this all occurred while the professor was speaking and the rest of the class was silent, perhaps catching every word of this bizarre encounter.

A few issues to mention:

1) The last thing I want is other people catching bits and pieces of that conversation and walking away assuming I'm a dealer of hard narcotics. It's not a good thing for one's reputation.

2)  I don't want to generalize, but people who are itching for heroin might very well be a little more, say, aggressive in their search. The last thing I need is an angry heroin addict coming after me for someone else's stupid prank.

3) I don't deal drugs. But even if I did, that's not how I would go about it, especially with something as illicit as heroin or MDMA. Silent, public places don't seem like a good spot for negotiations of that magnitude.

4) Jesus Christ! Heroin?!? 

   

If Canada only had a reset button...

So the last federal election was a humongous waste of time and money. Only about 60% of eligible Canadians showed up to wield their democratic right, the lowest in history if I'm not mistaken. It swamped the Canadian media for over a month and very little policy was discussed, but we did get to find out how each federal leader appreciates to arts. Yawn.

And after it was all said and done, what do we get? A slightly larger Harper minority; the expected land-second disappearance of the Greens; rambunctious Jack making up a bit of ground but still far from his unrealistic bid to actually run the country; and the downfall of the Liberal superpower at the hands of the outgoing (and not a minute too early) leader, Mr. Dion. 

So now what? The Liberals (still in debt) are in the midst of another unaffordable and overly dramatic leadership race, Elizabeth May has disappeared (perhaps abducted by eco-aliens), Jack is being Jack, Quebec is acting like the good ol' nation within a united Canada that it is and Steve, well, he's still leading this country into oblivion, sweater vest and all. 

Government finally got back into session and within a week or so there's talk of another election. The Conservative government released its economic update, stating that it has been forced to cut a number of programs including funding to the other political parties, all in the name of keeping the budget balanced. The big piece missing from all this: a nice big stimulus package for the economy.

Don't Flaherty and Harper keep up with the times? Big, fat stimulus packages are all the rage these days. And as much as we may like balanced budgets, this is one of those times where its OK for the conservative folks to roll down their socks and spend a little money. Otherwise there won't be much of a budget to balance next fiscal year after tax revenues have dwindled to nothing when the average Canadian Joe the Igloo Plumber doesn't have any money to be taxed of. 

So what's the other option? Obviously we can't let this go through, so now the opposition parties are considering a coalition. Oh, great. I'm sure this will be a very co-operative group. The drama that will unfold from that may be worse than holding another election. Who will be the new Prime Minister? We might all cry if its Dion. Duceppe isn't all that much of a national guy. Jack would be lousy because he'd have no one to complain about. And May doesn't have a seat, so scratch her off the list. Ignatieff or Rae might forego the leadership race and just step in, which could be alright, but I'd be a little bit worried about Rae after his time serving with a coalition government and then heading a majority for several very awkward years at the helm of Ontario.

So basically it's a huge mess. Election=bad. Even less people will show up and the last thing we need is an election at a time when politicians should be at work saving the country from economic collapse. Coalition=probably bad. Expect lots of infighting and hairpulling. 

I offer a simple solution. Perhaps we can grab a four year free-trial from the United States to join up and make up their giant 51st state. At least we'd have a decent guy at the helm who seems to know what he's doing, and we could sit back and enjoy the benefits of these massive stimulus packages. And by the time the taxpayers have to start paying back the $2 trillion or so of government debt, we kindly return to our status as an independent nation.  

 

Only at Trent...

Trent University has a fairly progressive reputation. It is often compared to UC Berkeley, the United States' uber-hippie school. Hacky sack, bongo drumming and Birkenstocks are essentially pre-requisites to get in.

But our President, Bonnie Patterson does not quite share those feelings about Trent. As a former professor of business, Patterson has brought a more corporate approach to running Trent, which as you can imagine, leaves many students less than impressed. She is often the main target in the student newspapers and is less than popular among the student body. She recently elected to sell (and threatened to tear down) Trent's famed downtown college, Traill College. As my witty roomate Travis pointed out, it was quite appropriate she was later named one of Canada's Top 100 Most Powerful Women by the Women's Executive Network. After all, she got the award as part of the Trend-Setters and Trail-Blazers category (zing!).

But it appears Trent has had a powerful effect on our 'corporate fat-cat' President. A rumour began floating around last March concerning her involvement with the school's chancellor, famed biologist, photographer, medical doctor and astronaut, Dr. Roberta Bondar. Apparently the two were now an item. Talk about a power couple. Rumours, right?

Not quite. The rumours have now evolved into near fact, as I have had confirming conversations about their relationship with members of the faculty, administration and senior employees of the provincial government.

I think Trent is one of the only places in the world where the right-wing university President can leave her husband and fall in love with a photograph-taking, nature-loving, doctor that happens to also be an astronaut and the chancellor of the school. Man, what a school.

An ever-so unexciting ceremony...

Last night I attended Trent's Academic All-Canadian Awards Ceremony. I was lucky enough to be awarded the title of an Academic All-Canadian, but I felt the ceremony to be quite disappointing.

The university prides itself on its Academic All-Canadians (which are members of a Varsity team that maintain a GPA of 80% or better). Considering it is a school of only 7000 students and has a rather limited athletic program, Trent still manages to more Academic All-Canadians than many of the large universities throughout Canada. It is the mark of having built an athletics program that not only works well in partnership with the academic setting of the school, but also improves that aspect of Trent, as it was remarked that more athletes graduate from Trent per capita than the average student. This is something that should surely be celebrated.

But alas, it was not to be. At least to the extent I think it should. The ceremony itself was held in the multi-purpose room of the Athletics Complex, rather than one of Trent's more comfortable and luxurious rooms where other small ceremonies take place. To the credit of the Athletics Department, the room was transformed quite well. But it was still lacking. White Christmas lights can only go so far. There was food and drinks provided, but it clearly came off the shelf within the past few days and the drinks were sadly without a touch of alcohol.

The ceremony itself was quick. Only half the recipients showed up to receive their awards, which happened after a brief speech by the Athletics Director and the President of the university, Bonnie Patterson. Getting the President to come and attend ceremonies is no easy feat, but when she does come, it means the ceremony means something. And the way the Athletics Director spoke of such an award also speaks to the importance of it. But it just didn't seem like it.

I've been told that in years past this event has been considerably better. Alcohol has been served and nearly everyone has shown up. Parents, coaches, friends; it's been a big deal. But quite frankly, last night's ceremony felt wimpy. I'm not surprised people no longer show up.

I know the university likes to pipe up any award given out and that I am slightly biased in this view, but if the school really feels that this is an important award (and I believe it really is), then put some work into it and make the students feel like they actually earned a nice ceremony.

Just a thought on bottled water...

Our school seems to be having a drive aimed at educating people towards the truth of bottled water. My intention is not to preach that sermon, but I do suggest looking into bottled water. There's a lot of mischief going on in that industry.

Something quickly came across my mind today concerning bottled water and its pricing. A 591 ml bottle of Dasani or Evian runs between $1.50 and $2.00 (probably higher if you're at some large event). Do the math and that's approximately $2.54/litre. Compare that with one of our most hated, but desired commodities: gasoline. Right now gas is cheap, hovering around $0.79/litre, but in the summer it was as high as $1.49/litre. Regardless, gasoline never even came close to the price of bottled water.

This will be a frighteningly interesting situation in the future. Considering our lives and economy seem to dwell so much on oil prices and gasoline prices, how amazing our lives will be when our water situation starts to look like oil's: falling rapidly. The price of water that we get essentially for free at this point could very well grow higher than the price of gasoline. We'll be kicking ourselves at that point. Or have inhabited the rest of the solar system (fingers crossed).

Bad outlook for next year's crop...

It seems tiresome that I write so often about the impacts of the financial crisis, but it speaks not to my nerdiness, but the truly incredible significance it has.

A recent article in the Globe & Mail detailed the impact that the crisis is having on the endowment funds of universities throughout Canada. The endowment funds, are far as I know, are the funds that a university has to spend outside of the income it generates from tuition and fees from students. This money largely comes from the government and private donors and is often invested in the money markets. October of 2007 saw the highest value of Canadian university endowment funds ever seen, with a total of nearly CAD$10 billion. My, things have changed.

With the collapse in the market, universities have seen their endowment funds crumble. Some have lost as much as $100m alone, nearly 1/3 of their endowment funds. And with the ever-increasing costs of running a school and the lack of adequate government funding, things are looking bleak. And it doesn't help that private donors are hesitant to dish out their now seriously important cash. This could have a massive impact on students in Canada and the quality of our education.

In light of their new financial situation, university leaders have been expressing concern over the parts of the universities that will be hit. The hiring of new faculty and the continued employment of some faculty will be ceased at some schools. This is already a problem at many schools, particularly Trent (which prides itself on its low student-to-faculty ratio) where instructors are being hired on a temporary and part-time basis at a significantly lower wage than their full-time counterparts. Believe me, you don't want the people in these positions teaching you.

Scholarships will also be hit. For many schools, scholarships are the best way to attract the best and brightest to your school. The main (and deciding) reason I am at Trent now is because they provide me with a more than healthy scholarship. My money won't be effected by the downturn, but it could prevent others who were in my situation from deciding to come here or to any other school, and that's a sad thought. Even more important may be the reduction in smaller scholarships, of which there are thousands. These scholarships (though sometimes not particularly huge) help to reduce the cost of university for many students, which is the largest barrier to education for many people.

Other programs on campus may get cut, though it is hard to tell which ones. Others may simple be reduced. But the whole combination of program cutting will reduce the overall quality of the education.

The biggest impact may be absorbed by the students themselves in the cost of tuition and fees, which may increase substantially from their already high levels.

It is important to note that the students planning to come to school for the first time next year may not be adversely affected because the schools have already budgeted most of their tuition and scholarship numbers for the next year, but the class entering in 2010 will certainly feel the pain.

If I were selfish about this I might think this is no biggie. But I have family who will be starting university in the next few years. They will certainly be hit. But I'll be gone after the next year, so no harm to me, right? Well, I plan on going on to professional school and I have many friends looking into graduate school. Undergraduate costs are nothing compared to those programs, so we might all get hit.

Santa's sleigh might be a little lighter this year...

No, jolly ol' St. Nick hasn't suddenly realized that he is at a massive risk of diabetes and heart disease and decided to sign up for Jenny Craig's attractive weight loss program. Although, who's to say he hasn't. It has been quite awhile since we've seen him last.

The lightness of his sleigh won't come from Santa himself, but from his bag of goodies. Something tells me Christmas won't be quite the same this year.

The economic crisis that has hit us is already starting to have significant effects on people's savings, values of their homes, their jobs and ultimately their spending practices. But here we are in mid-November. This is the time when our consumption-laden society starts to vamp up for the Christmas (holiday, to be politically correct) shopping season. This is when the wallets are supposed to open up so we can all buy those sweet, sweet goods we all know and love. I'm not quite sure that will happen this year.

The crisis is far from over and far from starting to recover. Many of the big box stores that thrive off the holiday season are preparing for the worst, as many of them have shut down numerous stores and the people who rely on them for temporary employment (students, stay-at-home parents, the elderly etc) during the season are being turned away in droves. And this crisis certainly won't be solved by people going out and spending money (circa 2001). Nobody has any.

So what will this mean for little Johnny and Sally Smith, who have been used to getting the latest iPod or XBox for the past decade of holiday seasons? Well, one can only hope the parents will be able to say no. And they better, because many will be financially forced to say no. I'm not sure how much good a new Wii will be if there's no electricity to run it after the hydro company shuts your power off for accruing bills that are far past due.

People may now be able to cherish those long-lost staples of the holiday season that are commonly gawked at: being with friends and family, non-materialistic generosity and being thankful for what we have. A little hokey, isn't it? But there's something to it.

I come from a relatively privileged household and grew up with my Christmas focus being all the great gifts I got. And rarely did my parents disappoint. This is not to say I was spoiled, but I put a higher value on materialistic gifts than on the other parts of the holiday. I didn't really realize it to its full extent until I moved away from home and was only able to see family every few months. I didn't care about the gifts or anything like that (although they still are nice to get); I was far happier to be home enjoying what I had.

I also had a terribly frustrating time during my first year of holiday shopping on my own. I figured that since I was away from home I could bring everyone cool, exotic gifts. The price tag was high (especially when I had become financially independent and much poorer than I had ever been), but I didn't care because I knew everyone would be happy with such things. I didn't quite get the reaction I was looking for, which was a little troubling. But I later realized everyone was just happy to see me and there was no materialistic value anyone can put on that.

So now I hesitate to spend ridiculous amounts on people. Not because they won't care about the gifts or be happy about them, but because they value the non-materialistic pieces more. And it is a far nicer way to enjoy the holidays.

There is a silver lining in this crisis. We've focused on consumerism and materialistic value for far too long. If people are able to shift away from this come the holidays, it could be one of the most valuable and humbling shifts we could ever take.

Student politics takes a step, but in which direction...

Seemingly from out of nowhere, Trent University's Student President is on the chopping block. A recent meeting held by the Student Union included several motions recommending the impeachment of Pres. Liam Mooney. As a result, he has been indefinitely suspended pending an investigation into the reasoning for the motion. A call for his resignation has also been proposed. 

Wow. That was quick. In all likelihood, Mooney's days are numbered as Student President, but it certainly seemed to come out of nowhere. I was aware that there was some discontent among the student body towards Mooney, but such discontent often exists with any Student President. I'm also adequately cynical to assume that nobody cares nearly enough about student politics at Trent to actually go as far as to recommend impeachment. But that's beside the point.

I'm not entirely sure whether or not this is a sign of a good student-political system. Sure, it's great that a President is being held accountable for his actions, but what were his actions? I'm a fairly well-informed student, but not to the degree that I would find anything so wrong with Mooney that would induce me to the point of recommending impeachment. This seems to be a common sentiment among the student body.

On a Facebook group that advertised the student meeting, nearly half the public comments pertained to students asking what exactly Mooney had done wrong. There was no mention on the site as to what this was all about. I've looked into it and I still don't know the full story. I believe some of it has to do with him wanting to audit the various student groups on campus, eventually weeding out the 'inefficient' ones. 

But when looking at this in context, I'm slightly confused. For the first time in my life, the student elections contained two distinct parties, one of which Mooney was the 'leader'. From what I remember last spring, the two parties were less than enthusiastic about each other. But a myriad of people from both parties were elected, giving rise to a Student Union that was hopelessly divided. I say I'm confused because I'm not sure whether having two parties govern the Student Union is a good thing or not.

Sure, one can keep the check on the other one, but party politics can be annoyingly, well, political. Does anyone else have any experience with student politics being run this way, or any feelings towards it? Because I'm at a standstill. 

Hope comes back down to Earth...

After nearly two years, one of the world's most memorable campaigns finally came to a close with the climactic and historical election victory of Barack Obama on November 4th. The chants of 'hope', 'change' and 'yes we can' have become staples of a revamped America and his campaign seemed to bring out the best in his supporters. Quite simply, the campaign was electric.

But now we're over a week past that momentous occasion and things seem to have settled down quite a bit. There's no more Barack supporters running around in droves trying to spread the word of 'hope' and Obama's speeches now lack the same vigour they were once made famous for. But is this necessarily a bad thing?

The campaign was ultimately successful in what it was trying to accomplish: putting Obama in the White House. The first stage of 'yes we can' was certainly met when his victory was announced. But the sense of 'hope' is still very much there, only it has now been toned down. 

After we all finally leveled off our post-Nov. 4th highs, it became time to get back to business. Not just for Mr. Obama, but for everyone else. Obama wasn't simply telling everyone how he could 'change' the world and America, he was saying how everyone together could do it. He was offering an open invitation for everyone to participate. 

And we did our first job by getting him elected. The next stage is on us to do our part in our own lives. 

You can sense it even here in Canada. We were more caught up in that election than our own election. But now that it's over, we can get back to our lives. It's nice. But it has nothing to do with forgetting Obama or his message and everything to do with being active participants in a system that does not always recognize people's contributions.  

Good Studying Music...

Studying comfortably and relaxed are two of the most important factors I attribute to academic success. I always find that in order to do so it helps to have a nice combination of music playing while you study.

Now, some may prefer to study with no music whatsoever, and that's cool, but I suggest trying it with some of the selections I recommend below. You never know, it might help.

The biggest keys I find to nice studying music are the lack of lyrics and fairly soft songs. We're not talking really quiet boring songs, just nothing to sharp or rough, like say, an instrumental of a Godsmack song.

Classical is always a good place to start. Many speak of the Mozart effect, whereby people are supposed to get higher marks if they study and read while listening to Mozart. I think there is something to that, but it also covers a wide range of classical composers; Beethoven, Bach, Handel and Chopin, to name a few. 

If playing around with classical, I find four specific instruments to be particularly nice. The first is the piano, which kind of speaks for itself. The violin and the classical guitar are also very nice. My favourite is by far the cello, which seems to span so many different levels of sound. Very cool. Give it a chance some time.

But classical can wear on you a bit from time to time. You can always try switching it up to some more ambient, electronic music. You can find this almost anywhere. I find mine on the online radio station, Iceberg Radio, under the genre 'Chill'. 

But my all-time favourite studying music is by a band from Texas called 'Explosions in the Sky'. They're an instrumental band that uses typical instruments you would find in a modern rock band and they use lots of high guitar. A lot of their songs are in movies, in those reflective and/or dramatic scenes, but they're wicked. They are a nice change of pace from classical. Highly recommend them.

Roc on, kids. 

Has our neighbour really changed?..

I've spent much of my past year considering different law schools to attend after my undergraduate time at Trent. For the longest time I had simply dismissed any possibility of attending an American law school, largely because it would involve living and eventually staying in the United States.

But during the last week I suddenly had a spurring interest in that very possibility; something that hadn't appeared on my radar for nearly a year. But why now?

Sure, American law schools have several advantages (and disadvantages) over Canadian schools, but these have been apparent to me for quite a long time. After thinking about it, I realized that it was the election results that led to this renewed interest.

I had been following the election and the campaigns incredibly closely for years, cheering for Obama from the get-go. But it had never occurred to me that he might have had such an effect on me.

I find it quite amazing. Here I am considering such a significant decision in my life and subconsciously the fact that Obama will be President has put America back on the map for me.

I also thought that this may simply be a brief cresting of interest coming off the election victory, but I realized that this was an interest that came subconsciously. At no time had I thought, "Oh boy, this is where Obama is President". The United States just doesn't seem like such an awful place to go anymore, at least at first glance. Of course, when you think about, it hasn't changed too much, but it's a step in the right direction.

I was sure that Obama's victory would give the United States a slightly better identity abroad, but I never thought it would hit me that quickly and stealthily.

I wonder if this is simply a brief spike in interest and whether I'm standing alone here in these weird experiences. Has anybody else's perspective of the United States changed at first glance, either consciously or subconsciously?

Just close your eyes and check back in two (or five) years...

I'm young. And I'm not particularly wealthy. But like many, I have investments in the market. They're not doing so hot these days. Surprise, surprise.

But, I'm also not running scared and taking everything out. For one, it's all mutual funds. With time, they'll go back up and start making money again. It's not as if I invested in some crappy company that has fallen into oblivion.

Why? I look at it in two ways. First, this money will come back up. I just don't know when, but it will. That's the nature of the market. And I'm in no rush. It's savings, so I don't intend on using it anytime soon. Second, I look at it like I'm buying cheap (yes, I continue to invest monthly).

So if you're in the same situation, try doing that. But I'm lucky. I'm not about to retire and I don't rely on the money invested.

My other piece of advice: don't watch the market. I started to, quite a bit. But it's so volatile that one day you'll feel super-excited and the next day will cause me to cry. In the end, it never really changed. But in a few years it'll make its way up and your cheap investments will start to make some solid moolah.

Rock on, kids.

Funding the unusable...

Here at good ol' Trent University, we find ourselves in a precarious situation. The school has no formal student centre. Because we're based on the 'college system' (whereby the campus is divided into four separate colleges), there is no large gathering space for students to call their own.

Apparently, many students are calling for the construction of such a building. It would house food services, student organizations and clubs, studying and meeting spaces and give the students a general feel that there was a spot on campus just for them. And the architects have put together formal plans for the centre, which is to be built in a location that wouldn't cause significant damage to Trent's naturalistic aesthetics.

Great. Sounds good, I guess. I don't really mind the way it is now, but the voice of the people must be heard. So let's get building.

But wait. Who is going to pay for this thing? Well, the university of course. We pay our tuition and all those extra fees (which go up every year), so why wouldn't the university be prepared to pay for this thing? After all, the other spots on campus would open up for other ventures now that the students would be gathering somewhere else.

Wrong. The university is somewhere in the midst of a $10m deficit, which will probably only get worse with the impending shrinkage of its endowment funds coming from this delightful economic crisis. And it's not like students are lining up to go to school. Enrollment rates around the country are falling, which means less money for the university. And the government is certainly not helping out at all.

So who does that leave to pay for it? Well, there's the private sector. "Booooo" come the disgruntled complaints of the left-wing, anti-establishment, hippie students. We don't want "The Man" owning our building. There is some justification to that. Much of Trent is becoming increasingly privatized and the consequences are slowly coming to fruition. For instance, the damn cafeteria food is priced up the wazoo. Today, in fact, I ended up paying an additional dollar to have ONE slice of less-than-fresh bacon put on my burger. Bastards.

So where does that leave us? The latest student president, Liam Mooney, is proposing that the students pay for it. A good $60-$100 each for the next four or five years (call it ten at Trent's pace). Wow. That's almost a month's worth of bills. I don't know about this.

The argument: we'll get to own it. It will belong to the students. Great. But wait, in five years I'll be long gone (fingers crossed) and I won't get to use the damn thing. And I sure as hell ain't paying for something that some damn grade nine kid will be using at my expense come 2012.

The student president continues to push for it and is threatening to put it to a referendum in the next student election. I hope (and predict) it will get blown out of the sky.

And even if it did go through, I would expect some recognition that I'm an owner. Perhaps a giant plaque with the names of every student forced to pay for the damn thing, with a special board dedicated to those who graduated or left before it was built. Or maybe, make it like some kind of a co-op, whereby each one of us receives a dividend of whatever profits this building somehow makes in the future. Then we can feel like those WestJet employees, you know, the annoying 'we're also WestJet Owners' people. Maybe they'd even build a statue to commemorate our hard-earned investment in the building, or at least call it the 'Poor Suckers' building.

McCain breathes a sigh of relief...

You may look at the title of this piece and notice the corresponding date. Yes, the historical campaign for the 44th U.S. Presidency finally came to a close as Sen. Barack Obama handily defeated Sen. John McCain to become the first African-American President-Elect in U.S. history.

But this piece does not focus on the country's next President, but instead his dearly defeated opponent, John McCain.

In watching John McCain's very gracious speech last night, whereby he conceded defeat to Obama, there was a sense that John was not about to raise hell or whine like a baby. There was a slight touch about his voice and they way he smiled that indicated McCain was feeling something quite unexpected that night: relief.

I may be relatively young, but I remember the pre-election McCain. He was a humourous, delightful old guy who routinely made appearances on late night television shows like David Letterman and Jay Leno, and was one of the oldest and only politicians to go on those shows. Despite the recent overdose of the term, John McCain was actually a maverick by Republican standards. He was loathed by many members of the Republican party because of it. He prescribed to a more moderate approach than many of them, taking a more progressive stance on health care, climate change and gun control. And just as he said repeatedly throughout the campaign, he had crossed the floor many times and worked with the Democrats.

While he agreed with numerous fundamental conservative principles, he was not a bad guy. From a liberal's point of view, you couldn't find a better Republican.

Then came the election. Republican's were unsurprisingly nervous when John McCain became the forerunner and ultimate victor in the race for the Republican nomination. He was considerably more moderate than his opponents: the bass-playing Evangelical Mike Huckabee, the millionaire businessman Mitt Romney and the former New York Mayor (and soon to be featured on next week's 'Where are they now?') Rudy Giuliani. But as the Democratic freight train began to pick up steam, with Obama at the helm, it became clear that McCain's moderate approach would sink him in the election.

The Republican party relies on a few key parts of the country: rural, old white voters and the religious white voters. McCain didn't really appeal to them the same way a Mike Huckabee might've, so it became clear to the party advisors (and to McCain) that John would have to change his tune. He began leaning considerably farther to the right and adopting many traditional Republican strategies including the notorious attack ads. His most notable move was his (though probably made against his true wishes) pick of Gov. Sarah Palin as his Vice-Presidential nominee. That sure pulled back the Republican base. But McCain lost a lot of respect among the more moderate Republicans, for good reason: Palin is an idiot.

I wouldn't be surprised if McCain is slightly relieved to not be assuming office in January. First of all, look at what he'd inherit. One of the world's most devastating economic crises, two seemingly-endless wars and an America that was reviled by many internationally and domestically. And he'd have to deal with Palin (whom I don't believe he ever would have associated himself with in any other situation) to work through it, not to mention a Democratic House and Senate.

And look who he gets to lose to: one of America's most dynamic and groundbreaking figures of all time, who has electrified an entire nation. Not a bad deal. It might've been a little worse if it had been some Joe-Schmo old white guy.

It's a shame that McCain was forced into changing his tune. Many have lost a lot of respect for him. But after his speech on Tuesday night, he may have gained much of it back.

I've thought throughout the election he's had to act a certain way, a way that was certainly not genuine John McCain. He's been an actor. Now hopefully he can go back to being the old John, keeping everyone in check and playing hardball with both parties. I wouldn't be surprised to see a very positive relationship form between McCain and Obama, or even some kind of post for McCain within the new administration. Either way, he's certainly not going anywhere.

McCain may not have been the worst President we've ever seen, but phew, thank goodness Obama won.

Do Not Call List Can Hurt at Home...

If you were as eager as hundreds of thousands of other Canadians today, you may have signed up for the Federal Government's much-touted Do Not Call List (DNCL) which became available for the first time today. As reported by the Globe and Mail, over 200,000 people had signed up by 9 am this morning and within hours the site had crashed. Clearly this is a popular move in the public's eyes.

While I may be more than happy to eat my Kraft Dinner without disruption come 6:00, there may be a large mass of people who now find themselves without a job.

In Peterborough, Ontario (where I live and go to school), a fairly hefty chunk of the local economy is made up of call centres. They may be annoying workplaces, but it can not be denied that they employ a solid percentage of the Peterborough population.

The DNCL may have a very detrimental effect on call centres in general and they will be forced to downsize with such a fall in the demand for their services. For Peterborough, this is less than desirable.

Peterborough is not the richest city in Ontario. Its economy has historically been centred around the manufacturing sector, which as we're seeing in the globalized world, is a dying sector in Canada. As community staples like the General Electric plant begin to downsize, the last thing the city needs is the gradual fall of another one of its main employers.

On a more personal front, Peterborough is home to Trent University's main campus, with roughly 7,000 students enrolled. For a student, additional cash throughout the school year is a definite plus and one that is certainly hard to come by in a city like Peterborough, where good student jobs are hard to find. This leaves many students to pursue part-time work through the call centres. These guys might be in trouble, too.

What a shame...

The art of acting is often overshadowed by the highly publicized and scandal-ridden world of celebrity that today's "stars" comprise. At every corner there is a mention of which Hollywood star has cheated on whom; which crazy drunken mishap another got into; and the ever-so entertaining adventures of the Spears family.

If we watch TV, listen to the radio, read newspapers or magazines and peruse the ol' interweb once and awhile, we've doubtless run into something along these lines. It's annoying, repetitive, addictive (to some) and downright foolish. It dominates our headlines, but that is not what this little diddy is about.

Because the world of acting (specifically in film) is so dominated by the public eye of celebrity, we often forget how truly amazing it is. There are, of course, many actors that stay out of the limelight and find themselves making tremendous films, and I imagine they will forever be remembered for their talents. But then there are those who find there way into the public eye, be it in or out of their control, whose abilities as an actor are immediately overshadowed by their status as a celebrity.

I just saw the amazing sequel to Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, and their is quite a bit of truth surrounding the acclaim for Heath Ledger's performance as The Joker. He was compelling, outrageous and wonderful, bringing a character to life like no one could have believed. When you see something so powerful, you're allowed to ignore the gossipy world of celebrity and you're reminded of the remarkable ability of great actors. You realize how sad it really is to lose someone who can do such a great thing like act.

We can only hope Heath won't be remembered for his tragic death, but for his ability to act; an ability that many celebrities and "actors" fail to share.

Read my lips, no new texts...

So you like text messaging, eh cell phone users? Well it's going to keep costing you money.

What's that? You don't even know what text messaging is? Too bad, you're going to have to start paying for it as well.

Customers with contracts from Bell Canada and Telus will soon be paying for incoming text messages, regardless of whether or not you want them. The policy will coming into play in mid-August and will incorporate a 10-15 cents/message charge to cell phone users.

Shit. That's me. And probably you, too.

They'll make a pretty penny off this. Not only will you get charged for incoming text messages from friends, family and business, you'll also be charged for the spam you get. And where does that spam come from? Most likely from companies that your cell phone provider has sold your information too. Sometimes it may even be sister companies that your provider owns, allowing them to make money everytime their sister company spams you. What crooks.

It's not all that hard for them to do it. The Canadian telecommunications industry is one of the most concentrated in the developed world. The price we pay for wireless service is one of the highest in the developed world and it's not hard to see why. The country is dominated by the Big Three: Rogers, Telus and Bell Canada. In economics we call this an oligopoly.

Think about it for a second. Do you know anyone who has a wireless plan through anyone else? And if you're thinking Fido; they're owned by Rogers.

Man, the Canadian wireless industry sucks.

But have no fear, for the government is here. The federal government has recently announced their intention to grant more licenses to companies that are currently prohibited from the industry. That should clear it up a bit. Whenever it actually happens.

And the whole text messaging issue has obviously put a lot of people up in arms. So many in fact that our trusty Industry Minister Jim Prentice has scheduled a meeting with both companies to try to desuade them from pursuing this new text policy. Pretty gutsy move for a government bent on deregulation of the wireless industry, but still a commendable one. We can only hope Prentice actually convinces them to do so. Otherwise there may be quite an uproar.

Hey Rogers, you want some new business?

The many faces of environmentalism...

Anyone hoping that solar energy will solve the problem of America's energy independence will have to wait at least another few years for anything to come about.

The federal Bureau of Land Management placed a temporary moratorium on applications for new solar projects to be placed on federal lands, citing that it had nearly 150 applications that still needed to be reviewed and that it would not be accepting any new applications until May of 2010. This certainly throws a damper on the development of solar energy in the U.S.

The particular area of interest is the southwest United States; namely Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico and California. There are vast hectares of desert in these states and in turn is recognized as being one of the world's best spots to capture solar energy. As a result, companies have been lining up to develop solar farms in these areas. In theory (which doesn't always work out in practice) the combined electricity production of these proposed solar farms would be able to satisfy nearly all the demand of the United States. To say it bluntly, that's a shitload of power. And it's all clean and renewable.

So what's the problem?

It isn't money or technology, and it isn't the meddling fingers of King Coal, Queen Oil or Prince Gas. Quite simply, it's the environmentalists. Gasp!

"But aren't the environmentalists the ones who love solar energy and all that hippie stuff?" you might ask. But there are several parts to environmentalism. Different people have different priorities, but all want to save the environment. It's more than likely that the enviro-types in favour of solar power are more focused on combating global warming, while those who are stifling this development are a little more holistic.

They feel (and justifiably so) that no work should be developed until there are legitimate environmental impact assessments done and that no work should be done if harm will come to the existing environment. The law certainly backs them on this end. But the controversy has arisen on two fronts:

Firstly, why has it taken so long to go through these applications? Other energy developers like the oil companies or coal companies don't seem to get backed up like this.

Secondly, where do our priorities lie as human beings?

This is probably the most important question in the entire situation. We're constantly being reminded that global warming is creeping up to deliver us our impending doom and so it is becoming ever so important that we start to save ourselves and the planet before it's too late. Do we sacrifice the strict and lengthy, but valuable impact assessments for the sake of saving the world before it's too late? Especially when the environment in question is the desert?

As a society, we're going to have to decide where to put our priorities in the age of global warming. We've passed the point of realizing that global warming is a real problem that needs to be averted. But now we've hit the issue of how far are we willing to go and what may need to fall to the side in order to keep the world running. We need to establish that very quickly. Otherwise, all of our good intentions may leave us screwed anyways. We'd be fucked.

But it's the thought that counts right...

The evolution of creation...

My recent visit to the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) was quite fascinating. The special exhibit was a feature on the life, voyages and legacies of Charles Darwin; the man credited with developing the theory of evolution. Like most ROM exhibits, the feature on Darwin was quite magical; full of skeletons, live and stuffed animals, and numerous pictures and facts. Quite a pretty penny was put into it.

My aunt had mentioned that their was quite a stir as to where this pretty penny was coming from. In most cases at the ROM, large corporations like the big banks tend to jump on board as the main sponsor without so much as a phone call from the ROM. But the Darwin exhibit lacked such enthusiasm from the traditional big spenders. Why was this the case?

Evolution continues to be a controversial subject in society. Much of it counters the historical origins of human beings accounted for by numerous religions, such as Christianity's Bible. Because religion plays such a large part in the lives of many Canadians, evolution is bound to cause a disturbance or two.

In my opinion, Darwin's theory is nearly foolproof and for that reason it is being readily accepted into the mainstream as the prominent explanation behind the creation of human beings, i.e. something turned into apes and apes eventually turned into humans. There is essentially irrefutable scientific data indicating this. The majority of society is gradually dropping the idea that Adam and Eve were the first human beings and accepting many of the propositions behind the theory of evolution.

So why would evolution still be considered so controversial?

Evolution is technically a theory and can not (and probably will not ever) be scientifically proven. It is a scientific theory, which brings into it the historical battle between science and religion. The two are thought to be polar opposites. While it is naive to simply disregard to the two as being completely separate, society still carries this belief and with it the notion that science and therefore evolution, are products of both non-religious and non-creationist thought. Essentially, if you believe in evolution, you must be an atheist.

While this is more than ever proving to be a false interpretation, remnants of it still float around. Widespread adoption of evolutionary thinking has recently given rise to next step in creationism; the idea of intelligent design.

Intelligent design basically states that the universe was created by a supernatural force or being that we can not understand. It's gained significant attention in the media as a result of the release of Ben Stein's controversial pro-intelligent design film, Expelled, as well from the ongoing debate over the theory of the Big Bang.

Critics of intelligent design feel that it is simply a convenient fill-in for unexplained facts in scientific theory and offers no actual evidence of the beginnings of any sort of plausible theory. And this is where the museum bit starts to become a little clearer.

At the exhibit, as part of the Legacies of Darwin, there was a video featuring several esteemed and highly distinguished scientists from prestigious universities around the world. This video was meant to offer an explanation of the differences between the theory of evolution and creationism, but it was remarkably one-sided and you could smell the pompous smugness of these people from across the studio. They come from the "we are scientists and know everything and you are stupid for even considering an alternative to evolution". It's pretentious crap like that that not only loses you big sponsors, but also leaves us all worse off as an increasingly close-minded people.

I agree, evolution is a pretty good theory and has many strong points, but it would be foolish to use it as a means of disregarding theories as to the creation of the universe. The Big Bang theory is still just a theory, and in my opinion, still not the greatest reasoning behind the universe. I think it's just as likely that some supernatural force may have created the universe (or at least caused its creation) than that there was a completely random explosion that came from nothingness. To tell people that they are wrong just because your theory may be rationally stronger than there's is is disrespectful and downright snotty. As far as I know, your shit doesn't smell any better than anyone else's at this point.

Despite the controversy behind the sponsorship, there was little indication that the exhibit itself was causing any controversy and I highly recommend to anyone who can get there anytime this month. Just remember to keep your mind open, even when a Harvard Prof tells you not to...

Unplug yourself for a second...

The other day I found myself making my way home and I stopped in to a little coffee shop to grab some sort of overpriced dessert. Directly in front of me in line was a very attractive and interesting-looking young woman who looked roughly my age.

As a young single male, my eyes are always open for opportunities to meet interesting women in Peterborough. Just as I had established myself in line, this really crazy guy started yelling as he left the shop. Everyone started laughing and I figured this would be a perfect chance to break the ice with this girl in a public setting.

As I turned to joke with her, I realized she was wearing headphones and listening to her iPOD. She hadn't even noticed that this guy had done anything. Lame. It would be super uncool and awkward to distract her from her music to joke about something that she wasn't even aware existed.

Strangely enough, such a thing happened earlier in the day while walking through the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. The Darwin exhibit was on and I went with members of my family, who predictably fell behind. I noticed a cute young woman who was checking out the exhibit and quickly realized she had come by herself.

How cool is that? A young attractive girl who goes to the Darwin Exhibit by herself? What a perfect combo. But much to my chagrin, she also had headphones in. I briefly thought it might be one of those audio guides you can get at museums, but then the iPod showed up. Dang.

One friend of mine thought that they might all have boyfriends (or girlfriends) and this may be a form of deterrent. That had crossed my mind, but it would seem to be a rather extreme form of deterrent.

It wouldn't surprise me though. In a much broader context, it's clear that the whole world is gradually plugging itself in and in the process shutting itself off from normal social interactions.

I used to have an iPod and I must admit I really loved it. It came in handy for running, travelling and getting hyped up before volleyball games. But then the battery got messed up and I've been far too lazy to get it fixed.

I don't want to sound corny here, but over time I have noticed that it is much nicer to enjoy whatever sounds the world gives you. Nothing is quite as nice as walking down the street and smiling at someone or saying hi and maybe even having a brief conversation. Then of course there are the infinite wonderful noises that nature and the outside world can throw your way.

Headphones shut people off from this. It's sad to be walking down the street and walk past someone with their headphones in who doesn't even glance at you, let alone smile or say hi. I'm even starting to find this in the older generation.

It's a real shame.

And text messaging on cell phones is just as bad. At least if you're talking on it you're probably talking to a real person on the other end, rather than selfishly indulging yourself and cutting yourself off from outside contact.

Open up people! We'll all be better off, especially poor schmucks like myself that can't seem to find a girlfriend....

Stereotypically Canadian...

The political atmosphere in the United States is absolutely riveting. Barack Obama was recently named as the official Democratic Presidential candidate after a historic and potentially damaging race with Hillary Clinton.

If you happen to be lucky enough to have access to cable tv, you may have noticed how some of the American networks have so entertainingly covered the race. CNN has been treating it like episodes of Monday Night Football; using ridiculous graphics and Who Wants To Be A Millionaire-esque thumping music.

Many people have mentioned to me that the Canadian political landscape is baren in comparison. I tend to agree. Stephen Harper is as exciting as watching paint dry and Stephane Dion's perceived lack of a backbone and forced yelps during Question Period certainly don't add any flare. Jack Leyton and the NDP might spice it up if he could ever pick one thing to get angry about.

Although the mix of a well-spoken Obama, feisty Clinton and McCain the Vet certainly overshadows our Canadian content, something must be said for the role media coverage plays in these things. Politics with Don Newman on CBC can be exciting, but only if you're a political junkie or a nerdy current events follower like myself.

So what would happen if Canadian media outlets took a page from their cool and hip American counterparts? Perhaps it would spark something from the minute level of fuel coming off the Canadian politicians or it could make a mockery of what traditional and serious politics is all about. The worst outcome would be some kind of Canadianized hybrid. From a historical perspective, this could suck. Just look at Canadian Idol.

One more thought to consider. When watching CNN or Fox or NBC for coverage of the Presidential race, check out who the commercials are coming from. You'll notice that the American Coalition for Clean Coal and ExxonMobil are regulars during the CNN breaks. And they're both spouting their dismissive and vague environmental messages. Keep yourselves aware; those ads are crap.

I suppose one advantage of keeping our political media coverage relatively mundane will be the prevention of corporatizing the system to the same degree experienced by our neighbours to the south. After all, democracy wasn't created to make politics "cool".

On another note...Go Pens!!!

Recreating creation...

Global warming, take a seat. The world may end much sooner than we think.

Over at CERN, 5000 of the world's top physicists and engineers have been working on creating the largest partcile accelerator in the world. Spanning nearly 24 km, two countries and coming in at a whopping $8 billion, the Franco-Swiss CERN accelerator is giving these hopeful scientists the chance to discover some of the mysteries of the universe.

I'm not going to pretend that I know what it is that these guys are looking for, but the Higgs-Boson sounds kind of important. Apparently, if they discover this particle then they'll unlock some truths to the universe. That sounds kind of cool. The process will essentially involve speeding up particles (protons? I don't know) so fast that when they collide, they produce effects similar to a mini-Big Bang. Sweet. Even cooler.

But then it gets kind of frightening. The physicists have openly admitted that there is a chance that the process could create a small black hole that would eat up the Earth and kill us all; albeit an incredibly small chance. That would suck.

Even two Hawaiians have submitted for a restraining order against CERN in order to shut down the project. I guess those bozos don't want to see the eradication of the human species for the sake of science. Lame.

My cousin recently made a very good point. What if we do create a black hole and destroy the universe? Would that not be the epitome of human power? We are so powerful that we not only destroy ourselves, but also the entire universe. We are the shit.

And what about aliens? Some have said that this is the greatest test of the theory of extraterrestrial intelligent life in the universe. If aliens know we're doing this, wouldn't they want to come down and stop us?

While I don't expect the universe to end, I would recommend spending some time with your loved ones throughout the summer when the project is set to start...because you never know.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/29/science/29collider.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Pondering...

Why is it that we say we're taking a dump, when it's quite clear that we solely intend on leaving one behind?

Just a thought.

Come on Tim...

I was sure I was going to win the brand spankin' new Toyota Matrix, or maybe even that boat. Hell, I would've been happy to win a donut; but sadly I got the ever so defeating "Please Try Again".

Tim Horton's Rrrrrrrrrrrroooooollllllll up the Rrrrriiiiim to Win (RRW) is back on and it means people are craving to settle their caffeine addictions at an even more remarkable pace than usual. I know Tim Horton's is known for having ridiculously long lineups at those peak hours of the day, but RRW fever has people lining up at all hours of the day. The Tim Horton's near our university library is as popular as ever, but it is here where I find my qualm.

During RRW season, Tim Horton's insists on giving customers a second cup with their hot drink purchase; one normal cup, the other an RRW cup. They also tend to do this from time to time during non-RRW season, but right now it is far more apparent that the customer has two cups. Tim Horton's will claim that this is to protect the customer from the dangers of the "very hot" beverage, which may be important to some. My problem is that they use a second cup to do this.

If you didn't know, Tim Horton's hot drinks cups are non-recyclable, which in this day and age is becoming quite the no-no. So rather than giving you something to protect your hands from the drink that can be recycled, they give you a second wasteful cup. Come on Tim, step it up. Even Starbucks gives out those little cardboard sleeves, which do tend to work quite nicely.

And one other thing: stop with those stupid little in-house ads about being environmentally aware. Giving people re-usable coffee mugs rather than 'to-go' cups when they're drinking in the restaurant is nothing new; look at every other non-chain coffee shop in the world. So stop patting yourselves on the back for being environmentally conscious; you're just making fools of yourselves.

Should we not have been able to use of technological praless to finally design a coffee cup that doesn't burn our fingers off?

Taking the Chef Home...

Now that I live away from home, I have been forced to learn how to cook on my own. In the past year and a half I've managed to improve my cooking skills drastically. Now I find myself glued to the Food Network whenever I get a chance.

One show that has grabbed me is Take Home Chef. The premise is simple. A good-looking Australian chef named Curtis shows up at the supermarket and finds an unassuming and lone shopper, offers to cook a gourmet dinner for them and their partner and foot the bill for the groceries. Pretty sweet eh? Only problem is, the unassuming shopper is always a young, attractive woman. Sure it looks good on TV, but it means that he'll never randomly show up at my Price Chopper and fix me and my roomate (maybe even some lucky lady) some delicious meal. Maybe one day...

Another show is Iron Chef: America. I used to watch the Japanese version all the time, which offered great looking dishes, but its main catching point was the ridiculous dubbing and translation offered for us ol' English-speaking folk reminiscent of 1970s Kung-Fu movies and the classic Godzilla series. The epic battles that occured in Kitchen Stadium were overseen by the Chairman, giving out amazing 'secret ingredients'. But the American version is nothing like the original. Sure, the food looks good, but it's not the same. Although the episode where the secret ingredient was Breakfast was pretty sweet.

It's all in the urine...

Our volleyball team recently finished our season after a proud finish at the Provincial Championships. As we made our way to the tournament on our washroomless bus, much of our discussion about the tournament centred around the issue of drug testing, and much of it had a relatively worrisome tone.

To my knowledge no one on our team uses steroids or Human Growth Hormone or any other performance-enhancing drug, and if they are, it certainly doesn't show. You would think that for this reason our team would have nothing to fear if we were approached by a doping official during one of their random drug tests. But this is not the case.

The league that we play under has an extensive list of prohibited substances, one of them being marijuana. This drug, which contrary to the implications made by the movie How High, is in no way performance-enhancing and is actually quite detrimental to one's performance, especially in a sport like volleyball.

Regardless, pot could very well act as our team's kryptonite. There is a good chance that if a member of our team were to be tested, they could test positive for pot. I understand how using performance-enhancing drugs should be monitored by an athletic league that wishes to ensure equality on the playing field, but should their jurisdiction be extended to a substance that is rivalled if not exceeded in potency by alcohol?

I realize that marijuana has harmful effects and poses several risks to the user, which include health risks, risk to schooling, jobs and one's career. But the people I know that use dope are aware of these risks and have more to lose than being kicked off a sports team.

Using marijuana is not necessarily the right thing, but it's also not necessarily the wrong thing. It may be illegal under Canadian law, but so is underage drinking, and both are enforced by the police. But the league doesn't check for underage alcohol use.

Should an athletic league really have the authority to extend its rules to something like marijuana?

A learning experience...

A few weeks ago the hard drive on my laptop failed for the second time in nearly four months. This is a little too frequent for my liking. While the first failure didn't surprise me too much (hard drives die from time to time), the second came out of nowhere.

After spending a few days taking it to different places to get repaired and hours on the phone with Best Buy to try to find out how they would pay for it (it's on warranty with them), I finally came across a place that would be suitable under Best Buy's little deal. There is no Best Buy in town, and only one place in town was accredited by them to fix my computer.

After waiting a few weeks to get it repaired, the computer guys told me that the probable cause for the hard drive failing was that Best Buy had given me a 'refurbished' (used and repaired) hard drive when my first one failed in September. This is pretty bothersome. Luckily these new guys were smart enough to give me a brand new one.

I learned two valuable lessons from this experience. The first: When buying a new computer, check to see if there is a similar store in your place of residence to make sure you don't have to go through all these annoying phone calls and store visits.

The second: Ask Best Buy (or any company really) to replace any failed parts with brand new parts rather than shabby, cost-cutting, used parts that have a much higher probability of failure.

You're no hero

Just because you're good at Guitar Hero does not mean you are good at guitar. Just thought I'd let you know.

Perhaps we should open our own eyes...

I recently stumbled upon a rather amusing poster on campus. It read:

Scared? Lonely? Conservative? We are here to help.

It was an advertisement for the school's Conservative Campus Association, directly affiliated with the provincial and federal Progressive Conservative and Conservative parties. This didn't come as a shock to me considering the incredibly liberal reputation that is rightly associated with my school. We have numerous student groups on campus that address a variety of issues I hadn't seen addressed in such a degree anywhere else during my life. But almost all of them have fairly left-leaning political views.

The advertisement I saw was not only intended to be funny, but it was also an unfortunate and complete truth. Conservative-minded thinkers at this school are more often than not induced into hiding their true identity similarly to an atheist living in rural Utah. The environment at the school is overwhelmingly anti-conservative that any conservative views are usually blown straight out of the sky by a parade of angry, reactionary voices.

Although my politics may not be in line with those of the Conservative sort, I certainly respect any views they may have. Alienating individuals who share conservative ideals (of which there are far more here than people think) is by far one of the more dangerous approaches a school could take, especially considering the level to which conservatism plays a part in the global arena. If we're taught that simply denouncing and ignoring conservatism rather than understanding and working with it is the best way to save the world, we're in for one hell of a wake up call when we step out of our utopian undergraduate bubble.

It's a true shame that a school that prides itself on diversity and acceptance of others can so blissfully enjoy the ignorance of its own hypocrisy.

Alternative idea for the Mighty Maples...

The Leafs suck. It's true. I love them, but they really suck. They're sitting in the basement of the NHL and are showing all the signs of a team poised to miss the playoffs. Again.

Numerous theories are running rampant throughout Ontario as to what to do with the ailing club. Some say blow it up completely and restart, others think we should get rid of the old guys like Sundin and Tucker.

I'm no expert on the situation. They have enough money to do whatever they want and it won't make any difference to media contracts or ticketsales whether they win or lose. But at least they made the right move getting rid of Ferguson Jr. The next step is finding a permanent GM. Perhaps the guys at Maple Leafs Sports & Entertainment should sleep over one night at the ACC and catch a glimpse of a Raptors game. They'll spot the well-dressed Bryan Colangelo hanging out in the corner of the arena, watching the team he rebuilt.

He may not be a hockey man, but the Leafs need something. Why not fork out some cash and see if he can build another division champ?

8th time's the charm...

As a wild and rebellious university student, I figured it appropriate to fill my weekly quota for reckless and inebriated behavior by taking a night out with a group of friends. Much to my dismay, the night was less than enjoyable.

We approached the downtown core of the city where the main nightlife is to be found. Our first venture was to a local bar resembling someone's basement that their father had hopelessly tried to renovate right before he had kids. It was a popular hangout, which proved to be our downfall, as it was full. But we were not to be discouraged.

After a rather lengthy walk, we ended up in our favorite little pub. We found a quaint little table and were ready to bask in the lively, pocket-emptying night. But all failed when a friend of mine made a comment to the waitress, which she found weirdly offensive (believe me, it wasn't offensive at all). An akward cloud fell over the table immediately afterwards and it was decided that any potential enjoyment at this place was dashed to pieces. So off we went.

Since we're students, it goes without saying that we're cheap. Therefore, when faced with paying a cover charge we quickly dart away with our tails between our legs. So much for the third place.

Places 4 & 5 were full, which didn't come as much of a surprise. The most irritating attempt was attempt number six. We ventured over to the local '40+' hangout. As you may imagine, we were growing slightly desperate. It looked fine until we were asked to show our IDs. We didn't figure this to be a problem as we were all of legal age, and most of us got in without a snag. But when it came to myself & my friend, we were prohibited from entering because our IDs weren't issued from the Ontario government. We are both out-of-province students, carrying valid, government issued driver's licenses. But apparently these are a little too 'suspicious', so we had to be on our merry way. Again.

We decided to try one of the places that was full before, and we got in. But it apparently smelled like natural gas, so we were forced to leave. Zero for 7. We were certainly not batting well that night. Luckily, we decided to try one more place which turned out to be fine.

For a city that boasts a wonderful student-centred nightlife, we certainly seem to have missed the memo.

So much for textbooks...

In first year university courses there are usually hundreds if not thousands of students enlisted in one class. Try to imagine the workload faced by the professors of these courses, especially if they lack sufficient teaching and/or marking assistants. Unfortunately, when put in these situations, profs may be tempted to cut corners. I encountered such a situation recently.

I provide tutorship to a first year student at the university which I attend, and while aiding this student with problems in an assignment we happened across certain 'helpful hints' on Google. It turns out that the questions posed on the assignment (for which there was only one correct answer) were all on the internet, along with the answers. All my student needed to do was type in the first few words of the question and voila!

Don't worry, we only used the internet answers for checking his answers, but other students may not have been quite as disciplined.

I know that being a professor is a tough gig, especially if its only one part of someone's very hectic life. But if you're going to cut corners, you should probably re-think your strategy.

The students may be happy as they walk away with higher than expected grades, but seriously, you're only hurting them in the long run.

The trouble with Beck...

There's just something about Glenn Beck. If you're like me, you may have found yourself flipping through the various American news channels during the highly entertaining American presidential nominee races. You may have also stumbled onto CNN's back-burner station, CNN Headline News, and found yourself face to face with one of their conservative pundits, Glenn Beck.

Beck hosts a talk show on CNN Headline News where he offers his right-wing insights into the going-ons of the world. To put it in a simple Canadian context, he makes PM Harper look like a raving socialist, and Beck will be the first to admit it.

Glenn Beck and I disagree on a wide variety of issues, yet I still find myself drawn into his show. By no means do I rifle through the TV Guide looking for his schedule, but when I run into his show I feel inclined to pay attention. The mystery of why this happens to me has been nagging at me for the past few months.

His show is not especially exciting. He doesn't have entertaining skits; his guests seem to be remarkably boring (and usually in total agreement with Beck); he doesn't have special effect-enhanced visual graphics to awe his viewers. Quite simply, it is Beck talking. He is very one-sided and not afraid to offend anyone, be it liberals or conservatives.

Watching him seems to ignite something inside me, which is perhaps why I'm inclined to watch his show. More often than not I question why I'm watching his 'anti-liberal' rants, similarly to the way that I may question why I'm watching Jerry Springer. But with both of these highly controversial hosts, I just can't seem to turn away very easily. Perhaps it is Beck's politics that fascinate me, or maybe even that someone can believe so strongly in things I believe so strongly against. The uniqueness of Beck is that he is the only one of these conservative talk show hosts that I can't seem to evade. Nancy Grace is just annoying and seems to make accusations rather than report on issues, making it very easy to turn away. The ramblings of Rush Limbaugh are met with the same fate. But Glenn Beck just has a weird gravitational pull.

I can only imagine the scope of Beck's conservative audience (he mentioned his best-selling book for the umpteenth time just this night) but I'm quite curious whether Beck attracts a good number of more left-leaning viewers, or whether I'm simply an entranced phenomenon.

A self-imposed welcome

Hey Kids,

So here we are. As you can imagine I will write about things that come across my mind. I offer no specific focus on any themes, but this may very well happen in time. I am a Canadian university student, and it is through these eyes that I will convey my ideas. I sincerely hope you enjoy and contribute.