When we last saw n. in this Web log, last Wednesday (Dec. 1/04) he had his foot in the door. He went out that night, and came back last night. He went to his classes on Thursday, and he kept his first appointment with a psychiatrist on Thursday and an appointment with his mom and Mediation Services on Friday. He showed up at the TRY program to get paid on Friday, but cut his Friday class.
Sunday Skate
With icy roads, short days, cold temperatures and wind chill, I have hung up my bikes and stripped the electronics and given up on cycling for this year. Last week I became restless, realizing that we may not have good snow for cross-country skiing until Christmas or later. I started to walk to the local community club and watched the man making ice on the outdoor skating rinks. He has only been making ice for the last week or 10 days, and the rinks probably won’t be ready for another week or two, if the temperature stays consistently below -5 C. Then I received and browsed through City Parks Recreation Guide and discovered that all of the City’s indoor arenas have a few hours a week dedicated to public skating, around the time devoted to skating classes and hockey and ringette leagues. They have been open since the beginning of October.
Epiphany
Several years ago Phillie Marcowicz, one of the hosts of one of CBC Radio’s folk, roots and world programs was on the Main Stage at the Winnipeg Folk Festival. She asked the audience if anyone had experienced a musical epiphany that weekend.
Pluralism and Orthodoxy
This is a book review that I wrote for the Blogcritics site. The book is the 2003 revised edition of The Dignity of Difference by Jonathan Sacks. The Blogcritics version of the review is nearly identical to this. The ISBN for this book is 0826468500. There is a copy of the 2002 first edition in the Winnipeg Public Library system.
Novelist Seeking Enlightenment
This is a book review that I wrote for the Blogcritics site. The book is “Seeking Enlightenment, Hat by Hat, A Skeptic’s Path to Religion” by Nevada Barr. The Blogcritics version of the review is nearly identical to this. The ISBN for this book is 0425196038.
Foot in the Door
N. has been spending most of his nights here, showering, doing his laundry, taking a few meals, since Monday November 22. I have had several discussions with him. He has seemed to be more empathic, more considerate, more helpful, more willing to accommodate my feelings, more candid, but he is still not managing his life. He says that he can only address his problems if let him live at home, and I have been feeling a lot of pressure and manipulation to provide him with more things, and not to worry about his problems with drugs, anger and “teen spirit”. He has talked about his drug use more openly. He describes himself as having gotten over drug use and talks about addiction in the past tense. I think he is trying to fool me again.
Irony Week in Ottawa
Rick Mercer is a supercilious prick, but he can be very funny. (Or should I say he is funny and can be a prick?) I wonder if he writes his own lines.
Tonight in the opening segment of his self-named CBC show he commented on George W. Bush’s visit to Ottawa, which includes a visit to the Canadian Museum of Civilization, “it must be irony week in Ottawa.”
Indeed, with the looting of the museums of the cradle of civilization during the American invasion of Iraq … Perhaps not the point Mercer was making but heh…
Greatest Canadian
It’s Sunday night, November 28. The CBC is playing the last episode of its Greatest Canadian series. There are 10 candidates, all in the process by popular nomination and previous rounds of voting. The concept was taken from a BBC series, and like the BBC series, it is an entertainment with a populist subtext.
My sentiments – I don’t think this program pretends to have any clear criteria for judging greatness – are with Tommy Douglas, Pierre Trudeau, Lester Pearson.
Cajun Recipes
In the course of making a crockpot jambalaya, I wondered if I should add file powder. I searched gumbo file and jambalaya and found the basic definitions and several recipe sites. Both dishes are classified as cajun or creole recipes within Southern US and Caribbean recipe classifications.
Dalmation Chili, v. 1.0, Crockpot
No dogs are harmed in making this chili. It uses pork, and it’s based on a recipe in one of Mable Hoffman’s books, called Black and White chili because it uses black and white beans. The basic recipe is kind of bland and I have adapted it. Claire asked about Dalmations when I mentioned it. It has a bit of heat, but is basically mild. Very tasty though.
It’s a crockpot recipe and would have to be adapted for stovetop cooking. It uses canned beans, which is simpler than soaking and cooking dried beans. There is some processing at the beginning, and then it cooks at the low heat setting for 6 hours.