A Year in BC

Byoliveridley

Or at least, it was when I started this post, now it’s almost 13 months!

  •  It is still beautiful, breathtakingly so
  •  We feel more settled for some reason, even though it is a new place
  •  Definitely more relaxed than I’ve ever been, which is saying a lot
  •  The cat is getting fatter, wait, that’s always been true
  •  Making friends is not easy in a non-university setting, but I’ve managed
  •  Fresh start, new habits, new zeal/drive, new person, not so much!
  •  The cable/cellphone/internet services make me long for the states. Rude monopolists abound and there is no competition/innovation.
  •  The “establishment” is very strong here, and the news media is very deferential
  •  Our famous social safety net is fraying, but it does not have the American charity/philanthropic base to replace the funding cuts
  •  We think we are an environmental leader, we are not and it is getting worse
  •  I worry that we are making no efforts to transition to the 21st century
  •  I still follow Carolina basketball, Go Heels!
  •  Facebook has made it very easy to keep in touch, given I am a terrible phone caller
  •  I still do not get hockey, did I mention I do not like fights?
  •  Let’s just say I’ve gone DIY on alcohol
  •  The BC Liberals are anything, but!
  •  Victoria feels like a slightly more urban Chapel Hill-Carrboro, but needs a Weaver Street Market.
  • Blogging has gotten non-existent, for a number of reasons.

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www.oliveridley.org

Byoliveridley

Every self important blog needs its own domain. I got https://www.oliveridley.org quite a while back. But I am finally setting up this blog to redirect to the eponymous url. The blog is still hosted on wordpress’ servers and nothing should change as far as the links, the rss, etc. Everything should forward seamlessly without delay to the new url. But, if there are issues with the rss feeds, the suggested fix is to re-subscribe using the new url.

Now, to cure those summer blahs!

Victorian

Byoliveridley

Warning: Personal post ahead, don’t read if you don’t know me!

Well, since life’s changing quite a bit, what with moving from Chapel Hill to Victoria and all, I haven’t been thinking of bloggable issues, which means this blog has been rotting away to almost nothingness. But, what the hell, mostly friends and the occasional person searching for sea turtles and/or India find me out in the far hinterlands of the ‘net. So, I will cater to my friends and post a personal update!

Made it to Victoria safe and sound, though not without all kinds of adventures in the security line at RDU, place was a zoo of unprecedented (for me) proportions. But, a beautiful and sunny day in Victoria greeted me, and if I had not left my camera behind and simultaneously misplaced the SD micro card on my cellphone (its memory is full up), maybe I would have taken some pictures! I am staying at this place that is half hotel half hostel. The room’s tiny and spare, the place has a homely feel to it, the kitchen serves excellent food for four bucks, and has nice beer on tap. The place is alive and has character in a way a hotel would never have.

Apartment hunting starts in earnest tomorrow. My very friendly bartender informs me that finding a place takes time, and that May 1 is a great time because a lot of students (it is a town with a decent sized university) leave then. But can I stay here for a month? hmm, don’t know about that.

Jet lag hits, so I am going to take it easy. Tomorrow’s a crazy busy day with apartment hunting, applying for all kinds of government cards, etc, luckily, I am a few blocks away from city hall (this ho(s)tel’s location is impeccable.

Adios, my brain’s fried and my eyes can’t focus any more, I’ve been up for 20 hours, time to wind down!

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Nepal Post box

Tracking my mail

Byoliveridley

On the sidebar, you will find a new donut chart which is a simple cumulative count of the mail we get at home. The measurement started on the 19th of March, 2012, so not much data yet 🙂  Useful – Mail I will find useful (yes, including bills). Solicited – Mail I find marginally useful, but comes from organisations I support, so I guess it is okay? Junk – Well, you know it when you see it; RTS – Return to Sender, addressed to previous occupant. Canada Post charges quite a bit for mail forwarding, whereas the USPS does it free for a year, so people get better at updating addresses and not missing a couple. I have lived in my current place for 18 months now, still get mail for multiple different people.

My Mail

No particular reason to do this, I was just curious, and this article about the US postal service starting to solicit more direct mail (what most people regard as junk) customers just triggered me to post the results online. My perception is that the signal/noise ratio on my mail is very low, let’s see… The underlying data is in a simple google spreadsheet and the image is linked dynamically, so should always be current.

Update: I don’t have a red dot on my mailbox, no particular reason, just supporting my economy and increasing the GDP, perhaps? More seriously, I would like a green dot campaign, where unsolicited mail is not welcome unless I place a green dot on my mail box for all unsolicited mail, and an amber dot for not-for profit, advocacy, political and generally non-commercial mail.

Update:  Not tracking my mail any more, as you can see. It was remarkably stable at around 58-50% “junk”. Interesting…

Featured image is of a letter box from Nepal, from flickr user manc72 used under a creative commons licence.

Home at Last

Byoliveridley

Wow, I woke up at 4 AM Eastern, caught a 6:50 flight out of RDU to Seattle, then drove 3 hours to the ferry, through the most peaceful immigration and customs ever where I forgot to mention my cat and somehow, it was okay! Being a Canadian is just so much nicer than living in the US of A. I got various questions barked at me by US immigration on the way to the states. The person at Canadian was calm, polite and took 30 seconds to clear me, though I guess she missed the pet.

A 1:40 ferry ride + 1/2 hour drive home later, it’s past 10 Eastern Time and I’ve been traveling for 16 hours. Did I mention I did all this with a cat? But, my beastie was the least of my troubles, he was very sweet! The Sherpa Delta carrier we got (on sale!) worked like a charm, very few people knew I had a pet with me at all times, and I was able to actually even smuggle him into the passenger deck of the Tsawwassen-Schwartz Bay ferry! Highly recommended. It fits very nicely under the seat, I was very apprehensive about carrying this supposedly “high maintenance” cat on plane, airport shuttle, car and boat, but he was such a trooper, very proud.

He’s still a little weirded out by the new place, no idea where he is and most definitely does not feel like he’s home. It’s gotten suspiciously quiet all of a sudden, wonder what he’s doing, napping, hopefully.

All right, no more traveling. I was supposed to blog some when I was in North Carolina, somehow, never happened. I don’t blog well when I’m relaxed, apparently. But, I want to snk my teeth into all this carbon tax brouhaha, and I finally found some time to read the definitive guide to Canadian environmental policy, Unnatural Law, so at least I am now not completely ignorant about Canada.

Update:

Found the cat, clearly he has a bath tub thing, he’s done this in Chapel Hill too.

Update!!!!

Open my mail to see an envelope from Citizenship and Immigration Canada, pick it up and instantly feel that tell tale card, yes, my PR card is finally here, and I guess the photograph I sent them in February from NC finally got to them, hooray, I am now mostly Canadian! If they’d sent it a little earlier, could have avoided this whole Seattle driving brouhaha, but who cares! Man, what a day!!

Pardon all the exclamation points, this card’s given me all kinds of grief, and it’s frigging crazy for it to show up just like that…

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BC Bicycle Helmet Law – NC Connections

Byoliveridley

(b.1) that a person operating or riding as a passenger on a cycle on a path or way designated under paragraph (b.3) must properly wear a bicycle safety helmet

British Columbia Helmet Law

I got my bike on Thursday and finally, the vile flu that laid me low for a week has decided to sink slowly back into a tuberculotic cough. Blogging should get back to normal speed and topics as I unpack, start biking, and can live life again without being racked by chills and bad dreams.

Figured I should get back on my bike ASAP, but I decided to first check if BC had any bicycle helmet laws, because we’re like that, we have a lot of what would be considered “paternalistic” laws south of the border. And, it does, and guess what, the project evaluating the law was performed by UNC’s Highway Safety Research Center, small world, ai!

Apropos nothing, here’s the US list of states and their various bicycle/motorbike laws. Note that only 20 states (and DC) require the use of helmets for motorcyclists, quite insane. Fall on your bare head at 50 miles an hour and you are dead, vegetable, or both. In contrast, All of Canada is under universal motorbike helmet laws. Of course, no U.S state has bicycle helmet laws that cover adults. In contrast, four Canadian provinces have mandatory bicycle helmet laws.

One Comment

  1. Interesting run down!

    Take heart — the social saftey net has been fraying for as long as I can remember, but somehow it holds on.

    You and I do need to get them sorted on the environmental piece though.

    Hope to see you soon!

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