Safety is Swell

I'm currently very proud to live where I do.
I just finished a gawdawfully long course on Occupational Health and Safety, the safety regulations and all that good stuff so I can be our safety dudette extraordinaire and be on our college OHS committee, inspecting and handling safety complaints and being an all round safety do gooder. I'm already the safety nut around here for our labs and the one who trains everyone in lab safety, so I thought I'd make it official (plus, it's always the people (*cough* me *cough*) with the ability to hurt themselves on cotton balls and rubber tubing that end up the safety nuts...). It doesn't hurt that it gives me a bit more clout when have I tell off the grad students and lab staff for doing unsafe stuff in the labs ("no while working with concentrated acid you can't wear shorts and sandals...").

Our province has always been a labour province, an NDP province mostly...we pioneered unions and health care, sent Tommy Douglas to the Prime Minister's chair in Ottawa and were the province that pioneered the occupational safety acts. *We* were the template for the rest of the country - the first to say "no you don't have to do that if it's unsafe. And you can't be discriminated against for refusing". To say that your boss can't just make you do unsafe things or mistreat you for profit...and we have a giant book of regulations to say when they have to do to keep you safe at work to show for it. I've spent days learning the regulations about things and I'm really proud, at the moment, to know we in Saskatchewan are the ones who have helped lay out how important it is to treat each other with respect and dignity. To put people before profit and respect our fellow man in our daily lives. I could almost hug a wheat bale to prove it...but they're pokey and itchy and full of bugs and I really should get back to work. Currently, I could rant about how our new provincial conservative government is trying to destroy our social programs, affordable housing and lifestyles, union's right to strike and our worker respect in as short a time as they possibly can in pursuit of profit and being a "have province", but noone wants a provincial political rant on a friday morning. Suffice it to say our current prov. government are asshats, but we still live in a great place...and we'll move on.

So yeah.
Saskatchewan is great.
It's sunny, the pelicans are on the river and it's a beautiful friday so far.
Groovy.

The Lazy

I have just seen what might be the literal definition of lazy...
Looking out my living room window I have witnessed a man and his dog out for a walk...but it was downhill...WHILE DRIVING HIS SUV. I'm not kidding. He was driving along with a beautiful chocolate lab on a leash out the window of his gas guzzler.
I wish I could add he was smoking, just to put it over the top, but man- even the way it was, I cannot actually believe it...how hard is it to walk a dog?
I won't even get *into* how unsafe it is for the dog AND other drivers...I just honestly couldn't believe it. I was so stunned I didn't think to write down his plates to call it in for sheer wrongness...
I've seen people bike with a dog, but this?
I'm in actual awe and disgust of what I can only refer to as "the Lazy".

Muffin muffin muffin- oh- Muffin muffin hey

I love muffins. I could live on them...yesterday I made raspberry cornmeal muffins. I'm eating one of these muffins right now for breakfast...and they are delicious. I have to pass the recipe on so you can eat them too. I'd upload a photo but I should really get on with my morning and get ready for work...I'm just nibbling on a muffin and checking the news...and got distracted.
ANYways. Where was I?
Oh yeah. This yummy muffin here in my hand.
You can swap out low fat sour cream and a bit of applesauce (so I've been told by my Mum) in these for margarine and they're a bit healthier for you, but these are...delicious the way they are. They do not last more than a day or two in our house even when I make a bunch...too good.

RASPBERRY CORNMEAL MUFFINS

2 c flour
1/2 c cornmeal
1 t baking soda
1/2 t salt

2 eggs
1/2 c melted margarine
1 c milk mixed with 1 t vinegar (or buttermilk - I never bother as it doesn't make a difference in this recipe and healthier)
2/3 c brown sugar
1 t vanilla

1 c frozen raspberries

Mix dry together and wet together and then stir *them* together until nearly mixed. Add fruit and mix until just mixed-don't overmix. Put in greased muffin tin (with papers) and bake at 375 for ~17-20 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean or you tap on the top of them gently and they "just" bounce back. They'll just be starting to brown on the edges. Do not overbake and they will be the moistest muffins in the world. Add 1/3 c pine nuts to this for absolute decadence. Actually, with this recipe, take out the cornmeal and add any variation of fruits and nuts or even 1/2 c oatmeal (soaked in 1/4 c milk a bit first) and you have a totally versatile, any-muffin-will-do mix. A bit of nutmeg, cinnamon or cardamom is never a bad idea to toss into other fruit muffins with this too...I mutate this into whatever we want at the time. Trial and error to the perfect muffins...
And right now I want another muffin.
Gotta go, it's rude to type with my mouth full.

It's not a frog with a tophat, but it'll do

Made me laugh out loud...thought I'd pass it on.
Image: ICanHasCheeseburger

Holy Crap with a Parachute

I would have to say this is up there with best pictures...ever...

Sometimes humans can do things right.
Huzzah.

Lemon Jelly - Nice weather for Ducks

I love Lemon Jelly.
This song was all I could think of this weekend as the rain came down.
Have a great day...:)

Times A Wastin'

Nothing like rainy day time wasting on the interweb to discover essential things I never I knew I needed until now...
Like painfully bright headphones...noone would borrow them. Ever. I'd always have them.

Or revolting ice cubes...

A brownie pan where every piece is an edge...brilliant. No more fighting over the edgy bits.

And some fake mustaches. What? Tell me you don't want some too...

A lovely vinyl playdeck for turning my Grandpa's old Shadow LPs into mp3s...

And for a light nut like me: LED temperature tap lights...they've been reading my mind!

AND even better....a jacuzzi tube with LED lights in it...bwahaha! If I ever replace my tub...THAT is what I need.

But, of the things I may *actually* get...this shirt that says all you need to say about how cool science is...with the proof of the experiment on the back.

It's good to know there are people like me out there...
Hmmm...rain's stopped. Perhaps I'll go pull some weeds.
It's a thrill a minute here...

The boring part of fixing things...

Well I'm half done the yard (the back part of course, where less people will see it)...but then it rained. So that's that for now.
So I'm trying to be useful and do things inside and sort through our tools and stuff to organise them all...I'd just give up and read a book but I finished my latest book this morning over coffee so there's nothing for it...I should at least try and be useful. I've got lot of work to do this summer in and around the house, so I need to know what tools I have, where they are and what I need to put on my list of things to get...our current "giant pile o' tools" in the basement doesn't really lend itself to using and fixing things. It's more of a "***-****** where's the ******* drill and that bloody hammer around here?" whenever we try to do things...it tends to take more time to find what we need than to actualy do anything.
He heh...after all, I've only had the pegboard up to do this for 16 months now...figure I should actually get to it eh?

Attack of the yard

This weekend J has freelance work all weekend, so I'm taking that as a hint to attack the yard. Unfortunately it can't just be ignored, so there's nothing else for it.
Last weekend all our neighbors appear to have spent their time on their yards making them look nice while we were up at the lake relaxing...so our yard looks...well...pathetic in comparison. It is putting it mildly when I say that there is much to do.
I must mow and trim the backyard and pull the weeds in the car park... and our front yard is weedy. It is landscaped into teirs with virginia creeper all over it, but until the vines leaf up it looks like railway ties and weeds :). So Saturday will be weeding and raking a LOT.
Add to that two hedges in the front on the edge of the yard that need to be trimmed back (they've sprouted weird shoots and look very silly), and an old dead small tree in the back that needs to be attacked (with a chain saw-muahah!)...and well, I have my work cut out for me. We have 2 new neighbors on either side of us, who are very nice, but the old neighbors used to trim the hedges...the new ones don't, so I suppose we do now (I'm too chicken to ask them why they aren't doing it). I have to go and buy a hedge trimmer on the weekend and get to it. Our yard isn't exactly high maintenance, but we do...well, the bare minimum shall we say - and so there is always a lot to do in the spring. If we're not careful we'll be the "bad" neighbors and "what will this neighborhood come to?" and all that. Many of our neighbors are semi-retired with much puttering time...so we have a lot to do to even look like we are trying to keep up with the Joneses. There's some other things to do outside the house as well this year - some painting on the windows and tree pruning in the fall...and I want to do some painting inside too. I'm tired just thinking about it.

I've discovered that owning a house means using (and unfortunately buying) a lot of boring tools...but I figure if we don't at least make an effort on the yard people will come over with torches and pitchforks and demand justice. Once we have the tools, I don't mind using them, as long as there is time. J isn't a work in the yard kind of guy, and I enjoy it, except for the weeding part, so it works out in the end...it's just daunting to make a list of things to do on the weekend and see it's that long :)
Well...nothing else for it. Off to work and then - YARD ATTACK!

What the word needs now is pie, sweet pie

J pointed out to me the other day something interesting about a favourite cartoon of mine. Bizarro , for the last week or so, has had a piece of pie in it ...even when it has absolutley no relevance at all to what is in the cartoon. The further back I look, I see that lately there has been a firecracker hidden in them too. There is a firecracker in the one above from April 8...and a piece of pie as it turns out. Occasionally there is a little alien in a little saucer (yup that's in this one too)...or cockroaches carrying a nuclear missle (can't hav them all I suppose). I'm pretty smiley about the most recent discovery...pie.
I can't get any of the recent ones online or I'd post them in all their piey goodness...it's glad to see absurdity is still abiding in the greater world...pie and all.

But...my summer holidays...

I just found out that a summer staple for me - Motion Notion electronic music festival - may be in it's last year this year...my last one. It is, to me, my summer holiday.
It has been going for 9 years now.
Pity...I bet this last year, if it is indeed the last, will be sublime. It aways filled me up for another year, full of happy juice, with a whole weekend of camping and music and good people...I love it. I've gotten to know a lot of really amazing people through Motion Notion...and had so many great memories. I see them all every year, and catch up with them and have a fantastic time in a place I feel absolutely and perfectly at home. It's the highlight of my summer, other than Shambhala...it has a special place in my heart...it was my "first".
Sad to think this may be the end. It' s been growing every year...over 3000 people last year. They had a bit of trouble getting a permit this year...maybe it's just getting too big. the more the merrier I say.

I'm feeling rather wistful at the moment.
Not sure how to take this. It's not the end of the world...it just seems like I'm holding a vigil for something that isn't gone yet...but will be.
And it's a shame.
I really hope another festival rises to take it's place...my soul needs fuel.