I’ve been thinking a lot about social media and how it and other services are subject to the Canadian boycott – and I realise that many other countries are doing the same – of American services and products.
Not that I have an answer, as the very service I’m using right now WordPress, is an American amenity.
So I’m posing a few questions which I hope you will be kind enough to answer. Have you dropped any American services such as AppleTV, Amazon, Wayfair or Netflix? Have you dropped any social media services such as X, Facebook, Pinterest or Instagram? If you have dropped some but not others, why?
I have dropped Amazon, Amazon Prime, Wayfair, Facebook and Instagram but have kept Netflix and of course, WordPress. My reasoning is that Netflix is a publicly traded company whose founder and chairman is clearly anti-Trump. WordPress, on the other hand, is non-profit, open-source project, which means that no one really owns it.
Nevertheless, while I am very conscious about shopping local and Canadian I really don’t want to stop Netflix and certainly not WordPress, although it frankly feels a bit uncomfortable.
Many thanks to all who have followed, liked or commented over the past year; you have been very much appreciated. I’ve enjoyed our comment-chats, your travels, your gardens, your walks and hikes, your photography, your musings and your thinkings. As the years pile up on this blog, it’s been, and continues to be, a wonderful experience to connect with so many different people from all over the world.
If you’re in Europe, Happy Saint Nicholas Day! Saint Nick – or as he is known in The Netherlands, Sinterklass – was also referred to as Nicholas the Wonderworker. He was an early Christian bishop from Turkey who practiced from about 300-340 CE and died on December 6, hence his feast day.
He was revered for his generosity and particularly for his custom of secretly providing desperately needed food or money to the poor or struggling. He also gave small gifts to children.
When Dutch colonists arrived in New Amsterdam, today’s New York state, they brought with them the tradition of Saint Nicholas or Sinterklass, which was translated into English as Santa Claus. However, Henry VIII – the much married 16th century king of England who also tended to behead his spouses if they upset him – had already decided to move any celebration around Saint Nicholas (known as Father Christmas in the U.K.) to December 25.
For countless centuries prior to the rise of Christianity this particular day had been celebrated as – among many others – the Feast of Saturnalia or the Celebration of Yule, a time to honour the return of the sun through light displays, gift-giving and banqueting. Over time, the traditions of the two sets of “New World” colonists, U.K. and Dutch, became combined into a December 25 celebration of a fly-around-the-world-in-one-night, North Pole-domiciled entity known as Santa Claus.
I think it’s important to remember that the tradition of Saint Nicholas or Sinterklass or Father Christmas or Santa Claus was based around the idea of giving – in secret – to the less fortunate, something that seems to have become terribly lost in our intensely spendy world.
Blue is a favourite colour. Rich, cool, elegant, business-like, cerulean, lapis … no matter how you describe it, blue is rather versatile.
I’ve always found it to be calming and relaxing; when I was tired after a long, difficult stint at work, just looking at the blue sky felt very comforting. The issues were still there, but I felt better.
I vividly recall coming to the Okanagan Valley for a beach holiday three months after the start of Covid. My brain felt drained, and so knew I needed to recoup.
M and I sat comfortably on Skaha Beach, swimming when we got too warm but mostly lounging with our feet up, the cooler nearby, a book in hand.
But reading wasn’t what I wanted to do. I simply sat and observed the blue water and blue sky, mind pretty blank, and began to feel rested. This simple activity was marvellously tranquil and relaxing; it was such a wonderful thing.
I’ve read that blue and green are both comforting colours, and I’ve found that to be true. I think one of the reasons why sunny days and long walks or hikes outside are so good for us isn’t just because of the physical benefits; the act of just being outdoors is so good for the brain and our general well being.
… that is the blogging question. With apologies to Shakespeare, I’m referring to comments left on your blog. Do you make a point of answering all of them?
You can’t stop the ducks from making lots of comments!
Unless it’s spam, disrespectful or rude, I always answer comments, and if I should happen to miss one, I feel a bit upset when I spot it later on – I hope I haven’t missed any, but since I started this blog in 2012, I unfortunately probably have. It certainly hasn’t been intentional, however. Nevertheless, I make efforts to ensure that I answer anyone who takes the time to comment, even if the commenter has only left a generic “nice post” comment.
Comments about the Rocky Mountains? Definitely!
I sometimes find it mildly annoying when I leave a comment and there’s no response, especially if I’ve taken an inordinate amount of time to think carefully about what I want to say or if there have been responses to other comments but not mine. I give the benefit of the doubt – maybe my comment was simply missed – so this has never lead me to drop a follow.
Autumn colours are often comment-worthy.
How do you feel about unanswered comments? Do you have firm rules or are you rather laissez-faire? Do you feel it’s not necessary to answer all comments?
Although the origins of St Valentine’s Day are somewhat shrouded in mystery, it’s likely that it was intended by the early Christian church to replace the ancient Roman fertility feast and celebration of Lupercalia with a more religious one.
Lupercalia was evidently a licentious, drunken, three-day blowout from February 13-15 where animals were sacrificed and their skins used to beat young women – apparently to ensure their fertility – followed by young men pulling the names of these young women from a jar as part of a mating ritual: the lottery of love!
Sounds brutal. I think I would have been in hiding somewhere outside the Palatine Hill. Yikes.
Ostensibly, into this mix came a couple of early Christian priests named Valentine, both of whom were executed by Emperor Claudius II on February 14 but in different years. They were honoured by the early church with a celebration in their name: St. Valentine’s Day.
About three centuries later, Pope Gelasius tried to get people to wear clothes and to eliminate the pagan aspects of Lupercalia by reframing it as St. Valentine’s Day, which was supposed to be a day of religious reflection and observance.
In the meantime, though, the busy Normans were celebrating something called Galatin’s Day – galatin meant “lover of women.” It seems that the word galatin became confused with Valentine, the Normans conquered England and passed it on, and the rest is history. The pope’s effort to make the original celebration a religious one was in vain.
Throw in some major romanticism from Chaucer and Shakespeare and we now have a “day of love” that’s cast in stone – or maybe that’s rose petals.
Having spent six winters in the subarctic Northwest Territories, I am accustomed to cold weather. I used to walk to work in -40C (-40F) and colder, in fact. The very atmosphere was frozen and crackly and my eyelashes and parka froze too, but dressed properly, I was perfectly comfortable and warm.
I am also accustomed to cold conveyances. Cold trucks, cold aircraft, cold snowmobiles, cold machinery, period.
Fresh snowflakes; photo taken outside my door in February 2023 while on my way to work.Dash 7 Combi – a northern workhorse that is capable of an amazingly incredible amount – ferrying passengers and cargo and getting into and out of demanding landing and takeoff circumstances. Underneath the snow is my reliable truck, also capable of a lot.
Any engine of any type has to be treated with respect, especially if it has been left outside to cool to the surrounding temperature. The north forces patience. Everything takes more time and more preparation and precaution, and trips, even “quick trips to get a litre of milk” are weighed more carefully. Do I really need to go outside in -42C for milk? Or can I go without it until tomorrow when I have five other errands to do?
Yellowknife street clearing.
It’s funny how everything is relative. Now that I’m in the south, I see our weather from a different perspective. A couple of days ago, M and I walked to our neighbourhood brewery for a beer and a sandwich. It was windy and snowing a little. Before we left, the waitress wished us a safe walk home “in this terrible weather.” M and I laughed a bit but we also are falling into that mindset, too. I recently complained to a northern friend about an expected cold snap; she laughed and told me that I’m getting soft. Simultaneously it also occurred to me that I’m no longer a northerner, a northern-domiciled nomad who travels to the south for breaks and lives “real life” in the (mostly) cold.
There’s a saying that “we are what we eat.” But after many years of wayfaring, I’m beginning to think that we also “are where we eat,” too. We take on the characteristics of the places where we root ourselves, even if we wish our roots were somewhere else. It’s part of the human experience, I think.
I find myself thinking of our upcoming cold snap with “my! That’s cold!” But really, I’ve experienced much colder, much more demanding weather with a lot more riding on the decisions regarding it. But that’s also not my reality any more and my perception has been affected.
At least, that’s one of my little theories of relativity.
In Canada, today is Boxing Day. It has nothing to do with sport but rather with the idea of “boxing up” the leftovers from Christmas feasting (including unwanted presents) to give to those less fortunate. I was raised with the notion that Boxing Day is for providing volunteer service (I was allowed to choose – and I always chose the SPCA – but I wasn’t allowed to skip it); however, I think that that philosophy has long since disappeared.
I know this photo looks early spring-like, but it was taken – as was this entire series of pictures – on December 23. It was a gorgeous day.
Perhaps we ought to try to bring back Boxing Day volunteerism or other forms of giving. I am tired of the Boxing Day sales that have now morphed into “boxing week” sales – whatever those are, I’m sure you’re really not going to save anything – that are bringing into disrepute a day that used to be about selflessness and giving.
Considering the narcissistic spending focus at this time of year – something that is industriously promoted by all businesses – a little required volunteerism might go a long way to helping a great many people, including those that do the volunteering.
When we left the Caribbean the temperature was about 30C (86F); here at home it’s 5C (41F), which is a rather significant difference but completely to be expected, of course.
A cold-looking Okanagan Lake.
Another big difference is that we’re now next to a lake, not an ocean, but I love how both bodies of water can exert themselves so strongly on our lives and consciousness, even down to their colour changes.
I very much like being close to large bodies of water (I was born next to and lived my early years near the Atlantic); I find them comforting and reassuring, even when they decide to whip up some good storms.
Breaks in the cloud cover allow shafts of sunlight to shine on an opposite bank – a beautiful effect.
I find it interesting that M finds the same sense of comfort and reassurance in the mountains; he was born next to the Rockies. Maybe we all have a sort of “birth set point location” that stays with us all our lives and for which we can unconsciously yearn.
In the Net! - Pictures and Stories of Life 