so, what's going on?

i was up around 13:00, got something to eat, did some cleaning and put together some loose ends regarding some planning.

i got an email from a lawyer that will be representing the city of windsor regarding the judicial review, meaning i won't need to snail mail it, and that should save me a few bucks. great.

the cheapest way for me to print is probably going to be at the university of windsor library, which i haven't been to, yet. $0.08/pg. it's $0.25/pg at the public library. the application is going to be about 130 pages, so cutting printing costs by two thirds sounds like a good idea to me. 130*3 = 390. the factum has to be short, by law, but if i end up printing around 450 pages at $0.25/page, that's going to cost me over $100. at $0.08/page, i can hopefully keep it to around $30.

the appspot site is still up, for now. i'll have to get my g1 next week, once i get the printing dealt with.

i'm supposed to be getting back to the recording tomorrow. *shrug*. the sooner i get this dealt with, the sooner i can get back to work. but, i'm going to be off by a few days now, regardless.

so, i'm back to working on this for the night, and i hope it's not too much longer before i can put this aside for a bit.

where'd i go?

i made some eggs this morning and took what i wanted to be a nap around 6:00, but i wasn't up again until after noon. so, i checked my account, to make sure i didn't get paid, before getting back...

nope. got paid.

it's true that i had to get some food, but what i really had to get was a prepaid mastercard, before i missed my chance on cheap tickets to toronto. they don't take paypal. and, my debit doesn't have a credit card. sound familiar? but, unlike google, they'll take the gift cards.

i really wasn't supposed to get paid until tomorrow, but, as mentioned, those holidays in the states can make the banks act funny, sometimes. that would suggest that the canadian bankers in charge of my account took american thanksgiving off, or that odsp is otherwise routing through yankee financial channels. this is all being secretly run by charles koch....

so, i wasn't planning on leaving the house today.

but, on the news of early payment, i rushed out of the house in a dirty mess (well. i bought plaid tickets, first.) and down to the closest store where...they wouldn't scan it. they had them, in the store. i brought one to the cash, even. no scan. it was a clerical error, on their behalf.

what next? well, i got some fruit (kiwis & blueberries were on sale) and some peppers and some pens and went home. it's, like, 14:30. i can try the far store, i'm thinking.

so, i got some salami at the wholesale shop down the street, finished my extra large timmy's, bummed a few more smokes and made it to the far store, where i got some cherry ice cream, some creamy ceasar salad dressing, four cartons of vanilla soy, five "forever raspberry" air fresheners (i guess the raspberry fields were gone) and one $100 prepaid mastercard.

i wasn't home until nearly 17:00, which meant it was too late to get to the library to print, but i did indeed get a greyhound ticket to go back to toronto to drop off the application record & factum, which is something that i didn't know enough to do when i was there. hey, i'm figuring this out, still. i'll add the costs to the application record.

i wasn't done with my black friday shopping, though. the fresh mart closest to me doesn't stock the cherry ice cream i like, and the far store only had one (i needed at least two.), and i couldn't find any strawberries anywhere, so i decided to take a walk to the previous "store#2", which is now the really far store. i'll still go to store #1 when i'm downtown, but i'm very rarely at the ol' store #2 nowadays. but, a girl needs her cherry ice cream, so what can i say? task accomplished, even if i still had no strawberries.

and, i had to go back to the closest food basics to get the strawberries in the end. they were mildly overpriced, but they look ok. if it works out, it's fine.

i took a last run out to get some vodka, which i likely won't open until plaid and will likely last me the rest of the winter. i picked up a sub, as well. i took the sub home and i ate it. it was good.

i spent the night doing things like cleaning fruit.

a shower also happened...

....and, there's my day,  and the reason i didn't spend it ranting here about nothing.

this inevitably happens around this time of the month, and i have to spend the day doing it. i've ruled out dancing tonight. it's the rain. so, let's get some sleep and get this finished in the morning...

i'm up to the review on the emails, which is most of it, but if i don't stop to eat, i'm going to run out of time.

i was considering maybe going dancing tomorrow night, but the rain looks pretty hefty, so it seems like i'm in until monday, anyways.

but i'm well past due on this.

food, first.

so, i'm back up in my primary typing environment, and where were we?

i did not get paid last night, so i didn't blow the opportunity to get tickets and stuff. and, i am trying to save on the electrical...

i just lost 24 hours, though. what happened?

well, i stopped around 17:00 to take a nap due to a migraine. it was getting to the point that i couldn't see; i didn't have the choice, i had to stop. this is rare, but it's become a known issue for me since moving to windsor (and i'm sure it's the pollution). this was after having really been up all night the day before, so, whatever the primary cause was, i'm sure the lack of sleep wasn't helping.

i got up a little after 19:00 and the power in half the building was out, but i was able to connect to the internet by plugging the power bar for the modem & router into the stove (despite the stove not working). i also plugged the fridge into the stove. it's the end of the month, but the eggs and bread and cheese and salami i've got left in there seem to be ok.

i tried to focus, but the headache was too much, and i took a shower instead. then, i spent some time thinking about the electrical.

this was good until about 23:30, when the power went out entirely, taking everything - including the fridge - with it. so, i napped until it came back on around 1:00.

i noticed that the battery wasn't charging. so, i took it out and rebooted and the thing wouldn't get a video out through the port. i did some testing with the pc, and concluded the drive was fine. did the surge fry the battery? i spent the next several hours fighting with this.

what fixed it?

i don't know, but i think it was power related.

by close to 7:00, which was bed time, i'd decided that i was probably dealing with some combo ram/power issue. i had managed to get the thing to boot, but it was by mashing buttons on an imaginary pause screen that i didn't understand - and could never experience, because the backlight is burnt out. so, it was kind of like operating on faith, and i don't like doing that.

before i went to sleep, i took everything out of the back panel of the machine - hard drive, battery, ram, cmos, wireless - and just let it sit until i woke up. i think it was about 15:00 when i got up, indicating i slept well, but there wasn't a reprogrammed clock in the apartment to check the time for until i could get the machine back up. well, i could have launched the chromebook. i didn't.

but, i started slowly putting the machine back together and a problem didn't present itself - it just worked.

if all of the hardware is actually fine, could i have fucked something up in the registry? if i did, i didn't actually undo it.

i think the thing just got zapped and needed some time to balance out into equilibrium - to lose it's charge, to drain it's capacitors, to become one with the environment around it. electricity is inherently holistic, actually. and, large amounts of physics and chemistry are intrinsically about trying to find that balance....

this is what i thought the problem with the chromebook was, and what i did to try to fix it, but it didn't work - if there was some excess charge in the electrical components then that charge needed to be pushed out or otherwise just dissipate before the components would work properly again. and, while i wish there was a better answer, there doesn't appear to be one.

the battery is back to charging again, too.

so, what am i doing now? well, as before, i have to clean up last night's mess. then, i need to finish the last part of the application, which is piecing together emails between myself and the various police organizations. that's what i was doing last night before i stopped...

i haven't updated the vlog in a while either, and that's what the next part is for:

- slept all night wednesday
- was up early thursday morning. smoked. got info on po box from money mart. went home. ate. vegged. smoked a second time. slept very quickly.
- was up (very) early friday morning. smoked the last of it. came home. slept all day.
- tried to wake myself up with large amounts of fruit on saturday, but still slept.
- finished the form 10 on sunday. got some more fruit.
- had trouble getting started on monday, but got my head around the process, and did the concert look ahead over the evening.
- i got started more seriously on tuesday.
- i got mostly done on wednesday.
- and, now i've slept all day thursday - but am confident i'll be done in the morning.

yeah. that seemed to get stuck on the login page, actually, and if there's a power problem, it's on the whole side of the device.....

i'm going to swap a few power settings, change the time, etc.

wait.

i seemed to need to unplug the video and plug it back in. is that it? let's try another reboot...

but, i mean...

i don't want to use my brain at work at all. if i have to go to work, i just want to go in and do something stupid and go home and read and think by myself.

i'd rather be a dishwasher than a lawyer or a computer scientist or a mathematician.

it's not booting. ugh. i'm going to see if i can figure out how to change the cmos in a laptop, because i've never done that before.

broadly speaking, i have very little interest in computer science as a topic.

i did it because i was a kid, and when you're a kid, you do what you're told.

but, my disinterest is why i avoided it for ten years, and dropped out a half credit before finishing it, in the end.

my degree is in mathematics, not computer science.

i would be miserable working in the field - that's why i switched into law, because i knew i'd be happier in that field.

well....

i don't completely understand how i got the thing to boot, but i did.

albeit dated to jan 1, 2001.

i suspect i reset something, but i don't know where or how. i've been kind of smashing buttons, looking at lights, until it worked.

i disconnected the wireless and took out some of the ram, but i don't think that's it.

i may need to swap the bios chip. or, it may be that virus, again.

but, i've pretty much concluded that i don't have time to concern myself with this for right now.

and, i went to try and reboot and it didn't work again, indicating that whatever the magic keys were were important...

what if that machine is down for a while? i have no intention of moving to the chromebook - i just don't want to, i want to use windows as the gateway. and, the pcs are not allowed on the internet, because it's not safe. clearly.

so, i dunno.

i don't have the cash to buy a new windows laptop, right now. 

i wanted to replace the board in the newer laptop and use it for editing. i don't know if i can even get it to work.

and, i've mused about it, but i'm not going to pretend i can get the 90s laptop to work for this task.

i may have to use the windows machines at the library, i guess. 

i just have no interest in doing this in anything but word.

but, i mean...

word 2003 is probably the best word processor of all time, too.

being rich doesn't mean you're smart. and, my experience is usually kind of the opposite.

so, macs are for rich people, but they're also kind of for dumb people, too.

the blunt reality is that macs are for rich people.

i'm poor. i use word.

i can convert it to pdf in a printer, but i don't have the software to create pdf files natively, except through using crappy software in the cloud.

i don't know what i did this time, but i think it's stuck on a screen.

the power went out completely around 11:30 and came back a bit before 1:00. i noticed that the battery wasn't charging, so i thought maybe something got stuck and i could drain the capacitor....

the machine rebooted a few times just fine, but wouldn't come back after a few tries.

the drive is fine - i can load it in the pc. but, the laptop just won't boot. like, at all. and i don't actually really know where to begin, because i can't get a screen on the device. i have to wait for windows to load to get the video drivers out through the projector out, and i'm not getting that far.

i tried a boot log, and it's not loading, indicating it's not getting there. but, it isn't beeping. it's not shutting down. i don't get it.

it kind of seems like a bios, but i'd need a bios emulator to try to do it blind.

so, i don't know. is it possible that the boot database is fine for the pc but corrupted for the laptop? if so, i don't have time to work that out.

like i say: i don't actually know what happened, but i'm a little worried that the power outage may have fried the board. i just don't understand why it's not beeping, if that's the case.

so, i'm going to run a startup repair and otherwise see if i can get some kind of way to get the bios to read the projector out so i can see what it's actually doing.

with the american holiday this week (it's not a holiday in canada.), it's not clear when i'll get paid, but i'm going to need to get this stuff mailed or faxed by monday at the latest. i wanted this done by (last) monday. i'm not spending days and days fucking around. the chromebook is useless for this; i bought it for blogging. i'll have to install word 2003 on the 90s laptop, if it comes down to it...

there's no use in neuroticizing over what i can't remember.

but, i need to take more detailed notes...

well, let's hope they're right.

 

did i actually do laundry on sunday?

i don't remember.

i did it on saturday.

i know i did dishes. i know i went to the store.

the only other thing i can think of is that i got dinged on the scanner on sunday, but it's not adding up, either. was it coffee, then? the microwave? it was an only an hour, but it was a lot.

this is what can't happen. i need to know what i'm using. i'm going to need to take extra note of the electrical usage.

right now, i'm on track for 100-120 kwh this billing cycle, which is substantially less. so long as i stay low for the rest of the month, i should be ok (although i'm going to need to do one more load). i have to keep an eye on this, because i'm not paying this bill.

i'm slowly feeling better, but i'm going to need the fan on overnight, regardless, i'm sure.

the hot water works, at least.

the headache was better when in the shower, but came back as soon as i got out. and, the smell is back, too.

i understand that these things are probably all related, but these migraines are debilitating, and i can't just tough it out. i don't want to complain about the smell until the power turns back on, although that just confirms it's probably the heat. but, i might have to sleep it off....

i can't turn the fan off with the migraine like this. i know it's the dominant factor, even if it got triggered by something to do with the electrical.

the fridge is plugged in. that's the most important thing.

the stove doesn't work, but the fridge does, when it's plugged into the stove. figure that out. the stove is just blinking.

there's enough power to the microwave to run the clock, but not enough to turn it on.

some of the lights are on at about half power, some of them are on full power and some of them are blinking.

the enwin site claims the power is out for an unknown reason and, as mentioned, i'm not expecting anybody on it until after 9:00. the hours are 9:00-5:00, but you have to wait for the workers to shake off the beer from the night before and smoke a joint before they get to work on the power lines. i'll be lucky if it's on before noon.

it almost seems like something blew up....

i tried to sleep off the headache this afternoon, and it didn't work, so i'm going to try to nap it off for a bit more tonight. i've got some aspirin in me and some fruit in me and some soy in me. let's hope i'm better in a bit - let's hope i don't have to waste the whole night.

yeah, the electrical doesn't seem to be particularly out of the ordinary for the last week.

i think the power is out on the other side of the house for the night, unfortunately. the electrical company only seems to work 9:00-5:00. yeah.

my head is throbbing, so i'm going to see if the hot water works and take a shower if it does.

there's a very weird power outage, here. i can confirm that it's listed at the enwin site, but what i'm experiencing doesn't seem like a power outage.

it's more like i'm not getting enough amperage on half of the house - like the power has been cut. the lights flicker or come at half power. and, the weirdest thing is that one of the ports on the stove works, and the other doesn't.

so, i've strung up a bunch of power cords into the stove to get online and leave the fridge on. and, i'll need to call them in the morning if it doesn't turn back on.

i'm also dealing with a migraine for the first time in a while, and, yes, i'm wondering if it has to do with the fans turning off. i'm going to wait it out for a bit, but i can't suffer through migraines like this. if the migraine is still going on midnight, i'll have to run the fan overnight.

i've decided to be thorough, so the application record is taking longer than i wanted and is going to be a lot longer than i intended. but, i don't want to rely on the cops to provide the information. i think i'm almost done...

should an electric vehicle be able to pull a gas-powered vehicle up a hill in an apples-to-apples comparison? no. the thrust from the fossil fuels should win, every time. if the electric vehicle wins, it would have to be due to it weighing more. but, an end consumer may be more concerned about absolute results than discussions about the relative limits of the different technologies.

personally, i don't care about any of this.

my question is this: with so much material going into the vehicle, what is it's carbon footprint, in terms of manufacturing?

put another way: how long would you have to drive one of these tesla trucks (assume cleanly generated electricity) to make up for the extra carbon you're using in manufacturing a tank instead of a truck?

let's not lose the plot, here.

you really need to stop listening to capitalists, though.

really.

they're not smart.

guess i needed some more sleep....

it was less, this time. more of a nap, really, even, but i had to crash.

my landlord stopped to talk to me on the way home from getting soy milk yesterday, and he claims he's not going to file. he said he had a talk with his daughters, and they won't move in, after all. of course, the reality is that he was just angry about my tactics in getting him to do something about the sewers, and seems to have reflected that i had to do something because he wasn't paying attention. but, i also suspect that the underlying issue is persistent - i basically had to get on his ass because he's clinically lazy (or depressed.), and i think he's refusing to file for more or less the same reason. if anything, i seem to have pissed him off enough to become uncharacteristically assertive, and that initial reaction seems to have faded quickly.

of course, he also got my own suit, which i launched immediately. that appears to have also caught him off guard - but i warned him i was going to do it.

i can't immediately drop. he has several weeks to file still, and i need to ensure that he doesn't file the day i drop. in fact, i won't drop until the week of. but, if he doesn't file, and the issue remains largely resolved, i will cancel at the last minute, because i do not want to plan to move at this time.

he would like to revisit the issue in july. i hope that works out.

so, i came in, got something to eat, took a shower, and then it was 23:00. i decided to take a nap before i got to work, and it didn't really take - it took a while to doze off, and then i sat in suspended-awakeness for a while after stirring awake again after 3:00. i'm going to try to wake up because i'm feeling alert...but that was arguably not even really a sleep....

yeah. i can fit four scanned pages on one page, thereby cutting costs down to 25%. well, if i end up paying $0.25/sheet, and i have to print 60 pages three times, it's not a small sum. that's $45. i think i can find it somewhere for $0.15/sheet, but that's still $27. sure, i'd like to avoid paying for that.

if i can get it down to 20 pages or so, that's $15 at $0.25/sheet - or $9 at $0.15/sheet. i think it's $0.15 at the great law library in the building, and also at the public library across the street.

i'm going to do this in full size to start, and see how much it actually costs. if i can get it under $30, total, i'll just eat it. but, i am going to mail a copy to the windsor police by snail mail, in addition to sending them a copy by email, and i will have to print that from windsor, so maybe i can cut the page length down when i get to that point.

so, the application record is really more frustrating due to the need to convert all of these pdf documents to word 2003 format, which is just being done by inserting dozens of images.

like, i'm spending time typesetting. really. that's the work required for this.

and, it's kind of dumb in terms of requirements because the only reason i'm doing this is to create a table of contents, and number the pages.

i'm really just taking the file i gave them last week, along with the initial report, the review and some scattered emails. i could have just sent it in separate documents. but i have to number everything, which is rather daft.

*shrug*.

so, i'm almost done the first part....

i don't really have to do the third part and the fourth part is just filing, so, as expected, it's just a few hours. i'm sure i'll be done by the morning.

but, i'm out of soy milk so i need to talk a walk while it's nice.

it's currently looking like it'll be about 60 pages, but can i shrink that? i'll try.

is it surprising that they're doing so poorly? kind of, but not really.

i think that harris has simply demonstrated herself to be an unserious candidate. if i were her, i'd actually be worried about keeping her senate seat. her debate performances were atrocious.

and, booker is just kind of....white.

but, i'm going to throw this out there: in 2008, black voters rushed to go to "their guy", and found out he wasn't such a good pick, after all. he sided with wall street. he sold them out on health care. he deported people by the millions, he did nothing for criminal justice reform and he actually oversaw a decrease in living standards for african-americans, albeit mostly due to the global recession.

i know that black voters are loathe to criticize obama in public.

but, is there some lingering apprehension about voting based on race due to what obama actually became, and a kind of return to voting on street cred?

https://www.thedailybeast.com/heres-why-kamala-harris-and-cory-booker-cant-break-through-the-democratic-primary-field

but, i mean, if your argument is "don't let the gay guy win, because we'll lose texas for sure", then all i can really say is that we're not on the same side.

i'm not going to end up supporting buttigieg. i'm leaning socialist/green. i've been clear on that.

but, i'd kind of like to see this play out, because i sort of think it's necessary.

so, you've got people like harris and castro warning that the democrats need to elect somebody that will appeal to black voters, which is just a homophobic dog whistle - and should be interpreted and analyzed and treated exactly like that.

the church doesn't like the gays, and the blacks (in the south) are controlled by the church. ergo....

but, am i going to shrug that off and say "oh, well"? no. if the black church will not stand with gay rights, then they need to be openly and explicitly called out for it and opposed on those terms. fuck the black church, then. i'm not going to support a party that won't vote for a candidate because they're gay. those people aren't allies, they're opponents.

that said, something i learned in 2016 is that this narrative is all wrong, and that these attitudes are defined less by race or skin colour and more by geography. so, an argument that southern blacks don't like the gays (or the jews.) may have a lot of evidence to support it, but that evidence cannot be extended to blacks in the north, who tend to be more like northern whites. if you look at states like tennessee in 2016, clinton did about as well with whites as she did with blacks, and if you look at states like illinois, sanders was far more competitive with blacks than he was in the south, and sometimes outright won latinos.

so, arguing that blacks in milwaukee or detroit won't vote for a gay guy is probably wrong. arabs, on the other hand...

if your concern is about black voter enthusiasm and eventual turnout around a gay candidate, that's mostly going to be an issue in the general in the south, and the republicans are going to sweep these states, anyways. do the democrats have a serious chance of winning georgia or texas? i'd rather focus on michigan and wisconsin - i think the chances are a lot higher.

that said, this is why you have primaries, you let the voters figure it out. if wisconsin and michigan pick the gay guy, as the trends are suggesting will happen, the democratic process needs to be respected.

i said this in 2016, though - if the south wants to insist on picking candidates that the north won't support, then we're going to have to fight about it. the south can't expect the north to just go along to get along, or erect some kind of primacy for black voter preference in the party. the liberal north has been losing this fight in the party to the conservative south for decades, now. the west wants in, too, and they lean left. the liberal north has to come up with some kind of strategy to start defeating the black church. it's long overdue...

the way you beat biden is that you do really, really, really well with white voters in the north.

...which is, incidentally, also how you beat trump.

my preferred ideological candidate didn't listen to good advice because he's not very bright. a more intelligent candidate, who i agree with far less, actually figured that out, and he's on the only path there actually is.

all i can do is shrug and vote green.

and, remind people that you should listen to the mathematicians, not the marketing consultants.

so, that was another sleepy morning, and what can i do besides shrug it off and drink more coffee and try to stay awake longer?

i spent the evening clearing out shows for the first half of the month, which is relevant as i determine whether to go back to toronto mid-month or not.

i wanted to get most of the writing done overnight. i guess i'll have to spend the day doing it, instead.

i think it's $16 for the g1.

that's just the written test, which i think is mostly common sense. but, it gets me the card, and that's what i need.

again: i have never passed a driving test, or even ever really driven a car before. i have never driven a car by myself. and i have no interest in learning...

so, i'll call about that in the next few days, too.

i did have a g1 at one point, but the cops stole it, probably illegally, for driving my bicycle on the sidewalk. it took me years to pay off the fine, but i did do it, eventually. i never got the license back, though.

i think they thought they were sticking it to me, but the reality is that i had no use for the thing.

so, i made some calls.

- the hrto got my email. good
- there's still no evidence that the landlord has filed anything at the board.
- that td card did actually get cancelled years ago due to an rts.
- i talked to a few people in detroit about accounts, but they seemed to want a passport and a driver's license. what i have is a sin card, a health card, a birth certificate and a nexus card. i have no interest in driving, but how much does it cost to get a g1 nowadays? is that enough? i'll try again in a day or two.

*shrug*.

i'm going to get to building these documents up - as mentioned, i should be done in a few hours, if i can stay awake.

ok.

so, i would have until christmas, by my count, to serve and file four things. but, why wait?

could i have done this when i was there? if i wanted to spend $100 on printing, maybe. and, this is going to be an issue, regardless.

sorting through it, i don't think it's going to take long to get finished. a night. maybe two. so, i'm going to put it aside until tonight and make some calls, instead.

do i need to go to toronto?

do i want to go to toronto?

what else is happening this month? i've got plaid, and snow, so far. let's see if i like the new joy formidable or not...

obviously, that's the safest option.

so, maybe i am self-medicating, after all.

but, if i am, it's with caffeine.

i always tell people that i don't have symptoms of depression. i've never been diagnosed with depression, either. i've never gone to a specialist with the concerns that i'm depressed. i've never complained to people around me about it.

i legitimately have absolutely no clinical history of depression at all, whatsoever.

it tends to throw people off - i'm in many ways the classic depression sufferer. it is true that the only way i can handle being in public is to get shitfaced, but it's also true that i cherish my sobriety when i'm by myself. so, they're only getting a skewed interpretation of me. if they spent time with me in a more intimate setting, they'd get an entirely different perspective of me. but, the caveat is that i'd never allow for it - i keep people at a large emotional distance, and with a clear intent to do so.

so, if i'm talking with a doctor, it always comes with a caveat - that i don't think i'm depressed but, if i was, how would i actually know? i don't think i suffer from depression, and i'll defend the point. but, if i do suffer from depression, it's so profound that i don't realize it, because it's so deep-rooted that i don't have anything to contrast it against it. a person that's never experienced happiness wouldn't be able to identify their depression. maybe that's the actual truth of it.

but, i don't tend to take the idea seriously, because, to the extent that it might be true, what does articulating it actually accomplish? my life has not been so horrible as to deny me any experiences of pleasure. if i'm actually suffering from an inability to experience happiness, the root cause of it would be something in the realm of a personality disorder - clinical psychopathy, or, perhaps, something in the asperger's spectrum. i'm more likely to lean towards the idea that i'm a sociopath than the idea that i'm clinically depressed.

but, i'm not diagnosed with anything substantive. at all.

what i can state with some certainty is that i don't think that drugs that act as depressants or sedatives are going to do anything but make the situation worse. i don't complain that i can't focus, or that i have too much energy that i can't control - i complain that i'm tired and lethargic and unable to get going. if i need to take anything on a daily basis, it would be some kind of stimulant to give me more energy.

but, like i say, i'm generally happy with coffee, so long as it's not being counteracted, as it so often is.

i ended up sleeping all morning, and i'm still feeling tired, so i've wasted most of the last week, at this point, and i'm not happy about it.

i need to do this in order - i need to get the divisional court stuff done first, and then make some calls tomorrow, i guess.

actually, i guess i can call somebody tomorrow.

i should probably have some way to get paid in us dollars, if it ever comes up. as of now, the only way i've ever actually received any cash is by selling things over bandcamp, which is through paypal in canadian dollars.

i've never sold anything at noise trade. youtube has never sent me a check. nobody's ever sent me anything over patreon. and i very specifically don't want ads on the writing, or on any of the music. there's ads on the vlogs, and i hate it, but it's what they're there for.

i think all that stuff is setup over paypal. i'm not even sure.

http://livingoffcloud.com/us-bank-account-for-canadian/#How-To-Open-a-US-Bank-Account-From-Canada

i tried filling out a bunch of applications, and they all stalled at the ssn.

i should have known somebody's tried this before...

i guess that i'll need to actually get to detroit to do this.

it's a plan, at least.

https://btr.michaelkwan.com/2007/10/06/how-to-open-a-us-bank-account-as-a-canadian-citizen/

would it be useful to have an american account?

maybe - if i could transfer cash into it before i go, and carry a debit card instead of cash.

if the exchange rate is better....

etc.

when i went to get the billing information for one of the prepaid cards to add to my form 10 (to request costs) i realized there was $11.10 on it.

that shouldn't be. the fan was $10.99. there should be $0.11. but, it was persistent...every time i checked...

i came back from toronto with $0.05 in my pocket and $0.20 in my account, so an extra $11 would be useful, if it means i can buy some fruit, which was the extent of what i needed for the month. what's the worst thing that can happen by trying?

so, i took a walk to the store and was, indeed, able to buy some fruit. score. that means my diet won't get interrupted this week, after all (and that we'll be having eggs on tuesday and thursday - i can get groceries on saturday).

i made a fruit bowl when i came in, took a shower and sat down to get a handle on what i need to serve over the next few days. so, i started off by checking my email and came up against this annoyance at apppengine, again.

how do i get around this?

so, i started poking around and...

if i can't get a credit card in canada, maybe i can open a bank account in the states. i don't have a social security number, though.

maybe something like this can help...

https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/banking/undocumented-immigrants-bank-accounts/

so, that's done - there is a second request for an order filed with the tribunal and the cops to have them provide the address.

+ $96 for wasting my time.

i decided to avoid charging labour.

so, i didn't actually shower yet, i just did dishes and put a load of laundry through.

it seems to have mostly cleared up, for now.

i want to finish the new form 10 first, then get something to eat and take a shower after that.

this is easy to understand if you stop imagining that marijuana is some kind of medicine and recognize that it's a recreational drug, like alcohol.

if you're having a shitty week, will getting drunk with your friends make you feel better? for a while, probably. likewise, smoking a joint on a friday night might be stress-relieving, sure.

but, if you get shitfaced every day for a month, what are you going to feel like at the end of it? and, that's the proper way to understand these "medicinal" users - they're essentially just dirty, shit-faced drunks. from a data-driven perspective, they're having all of the same cognitive problems you'd associate with alcoholism.

the conclusion is that smoking drugs at the bar or with your friends may be fun on the weekend, but it's not something you should do on a daily basis, and especially not by yourself.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2019/10/29/marijuana-may-not-be-so-effective-for-mental-health-issues-including-depression-and-anxiety/#53e3ea3a56f0

what do you think are the chances that that's her real name?

i noticed this attitude coming from singh during the campaign as well, and what's underlying it is this kind of entitlement towards being voted for.

her argument is essentially "it doesn't matter what a politician believes, you should vote for him anyways because....". because you like his hair? and, it's really just laughable on it's face.

listen: nobody is saying that andrew scheer can't be a social conservative, and nobody is saying that he can't run for office as a social conservative. but, my voting rights are conscience rights, and subject to whatever whim i may fancy them on - i may choose not to vote for somebody because of their values, or their religion or their skin colour or anything else and that's entirely up to me to decide.

he can say he won't legislate all he wants, but smart people know not to believe a politician for very long. as a voter, i need to make a judgement call, and that judgement call is based overwhelmingly on what i think that person's beliefs are.

again: if somebody's politics aren't a reason to vote against them, what is? why are we voting at all?

it's just some classic right-wing entitlement.

yes, maria, your beliefs are up to scrutiny when you run for office, which doesn't mean you can't have them, but does mean i don't have to support them, and if you don't like that then you shouldn't run.

but, my concerns this election on this front were not about andrew scheer, they were about jagmeet singh. and, while the media coverage maybe didn't reflect it, this is one voter that avoided voting ndp due to discomfort about the leader's personal beliefs - and tried to make an issue out of it.

if there's any valid point to pull out of this, it's that we don't need less criticism of the conservatives on this, we need more criticism of the other parties. the ndp leader was a fundamentalist sikh and should not have gotten a free pass on it; the green leader was an ordained minister and should not have gotten a pass on it, either.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/opinion/opinion-maria-harrison-1.5359225

habitual pot use was in fact already known to increase cortisol levels.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/cannabis-stress-anxiety-study-young-adults-camh-1.5287192

it's not medicine.

it's snake oil.

https://www.livescience.com/weed-cannot-treat-depression.html

nor am i a likely candidate to become a marijuana addict.

the one thing i'm seriously addicted to is caffeine, because i like to feel alert and perky and awake - not tired and slow and lethargic. so, marijuana is just not the drug i'd want to find myself addicted to, if i were to find myself addicted to anything. i'd be more likely to become a cocaine addict. but, i'm actually happy with the coffee - or, at least, i am so long as i'm not fighting off somebody else's pot addiction.

if you're waiting for me to "relapse" or "go back to normal habits" or something, then you're simply operating on bad information.

i used to smoke cigarettes habitually. i quit in january, 2016 - almost four years ago. since then, i've only smoked when i'm out drinking.

i did not used to smoke marijuana habitually. ever. not when i was a kid - which is when people smoke habitually - and not when i was an adult. i have not self-medicated. i find it creates anxiety rather than relieves it.

i have only ever been a social smoker.

so, i did not need to quit, because i never had a habit.

and, there's nothing to relapse to.

i fell asleep around midnight, and i just woke up, and it smells like drugs in here again for the first time in a good while...

again: i don't smoke in the house. i *never* smoked in the house. i'm never going to smoke in the house. what i said changed nothing, but i'll repeat myself and clarify the point.

what i said was:

1) i brought a half a gram of pot back from toronto.
2) i smoked it in three small joints
3) i did not like the effects of what it did to me.

to begin with, when i say "i didn't like the effects of the drug", that's a strong indication that i don't want to smell it in the house. i didn't say "i smoked three pinners and i loved it and i'm a pothead now", i said "i smoked three pinners and it made me so tired that i slept for three days and i want that time i lost back.".

second, i did not smoke any of these pinners in or near the house. i took a walk and smoked them down the street as i indicated i did previously. as i have signed a non-smoking lease, i would expect the same respect from the upstairs tenant - i expect him to take a walk if he's going to smoke a pinner. but, he's not smoking pinners.

third, that was the first time i had pot in the house since april, and might be the last time i have pot in the house for another seven to eight months if i'm here that long. on average, one might expect me to buy a few grams a year, spaced out by distances of months, and to never, ever smoke in or near the house, ever.

i don't know why this issue continues to raise itself: i have never smoked anything in the house, and have consequently upheld my lease obligation. if i choose to smoke a pinner down the street every seven-eight months, that doesn't mean i should be condemned to live in an ashtray or a bong 24/7. this is why i signed the fucking lease: i don't want this. it's gross. and, i don't like being tired all of the time.

as it is, i am feeling a little tired and don't want to be. i wanted to be working, right now. so, i'm going to take another shower and hope it helps with the smell, which is just fucking gross.

again: i have not signaled any change of behaviour. there has been absolutely no combustion of marijuana or tobacco in the unit at all, whatsoever, and there never will be. i have and will continue to take all smokeables  a good distance from the house before combusting them. further, i have no plans to bring combustibles back  into the house any time soon. the december 1st date will have no meaningful effect on my habits, other than perhaps to move me to edibles, slowly. i want my living space to be free of drug and alcohol use. i always have, and i always will.

let's try a shower. ugh.

so, yeah.

i'm going to take a short nap, and get some pasta when i get up (and do some laundry as i'm eating), but what i'm going to need to do next is redo the order for the human rights complaint.

so, to recap.

i filed this thing some time in july. they got back to me in september and said "we don't have an address". so, i made a request to the cops to provide the address. the cops claimed that i didn't run a corporate search (which seems trivial), but the tribunal ruled that it would only break the mfippa after i've proven i can't find it in the corporate records search, which is what happened - i went to toronto and paid out a total of $95 to get a bum po box.  so, the tribunal should now be ready to overturn the mfippa and order the cops to give me the address like i asked for in the first place.

and, i'm going to request $240 from the cops in costs, too - the $95 for costs and $14x10hrs in labour costs.

do i plan on going back to toronto any time soon?

well, not if i can avoid it.

but, that's the next thing to figure out, and if i have to go back, i'd schedule in the 10th, to see the joy formidable. they seem to be skipping detroit with a full band......

i'll know in a few hours, once i've more carefully worked through the rules of civil procedure on this. i should be able to fax or mail virtually everything, and i know i have 30 days from the 19th, but i want to do it right, and if that means needing to take a second trip to the divisional court then i should take it as a learning experience, and make sure everything gets done all at once, this time.

i want to avoid spending $100 on photocopies.

so, i was up at about 3:30 on monday morning, finished the writing, did some errands in the afternoon, made a large meal to give me energy for the next few days, took a long shower and got ready to get out.

i took the 1:30 am bus on tuesday morning, got to toronto at 6:30 sharp, had to blow a few hours, got the first part of the filing done very early, was done serving by 11:00 and got the certificate of service in before noon. i then bought some drugs and went to hang out in the library for a few hours. i couldn't find a seat when i came back in from a smoke, so i was out to the second part of the night earlier than intended, around 15:30. i decided to just go down to the bar a little early for an early beer...

the initial plan was to catch a local guitarist - sean pinchin - play from about 18:00-21:00, have a few cheap beers while i was there, and then go to the bovine sex club for the rest of the night to watch some psychedelic rock bands (headliner: goon), before getting pho at about 3:00 and catching the bus out at 8:00.

but, beer is expensive in toronto. in windsor, beer runs around $3.50-$4.00, cdn. beer in detroit is $2.00-$4.00 usd, which is still only $2.50-5.50 cdn.  in toronto, $7.00 cdn is considered cheap, and people don't seem to like it when you complain about it. so, i wanted to go to what i thought was a dive bar to get some cheap beer early, but came up against a $7.00 beer that i just didn't budget for. i mean, maybe there's places in windsor with $7.00 beer, but they'd be full of middle class bourgeois types that i wouldn't like very much and i'd have so little interest in going to them that i don't even know where they are. even that spot across from phog that i complained about is selling tall boys for $6.00, not pints for $7.00. if i walked into a bar in windsor and they tried to charge me $7.00 for a pint, i'd just laugh at them and go somewhere else.

as it is, upon bitching about the price, i was informed by the bartender that i could get a beer for $3.50 down the street, so i took a walk to save a few dollars, and hopefully turn one beer into two. that's just smart fiscal management. clearly.

listen: it's not like i was just being cheap. really. i had a fixed sum to work with, which was down to $43 at this point. if i spent all of my money on an expensive $7.00 beer, i'd just run out of it in a few drinks. then, i'd be stuck in toronto until 8:00 with no money and no alcohol and nothing to do. that's not a question of being cheap, it's a question of being stupid. when you have a fixed amount of money to work with, you have to be smart about how you're spending it - and spending $7.00 for a single beer would just not be very smart. if i was working for the government, i could just print more; i'm not, so i have limits i have to abide by.

but, this bartender at the spot i thought was a dive bar but wasn't....he didn't like me after that. this was a middle-aged white guy with facial hair (and, you know you're special when you hit 25 and still insist on facial hair. lol.) that probably leaned pretty far to the right of the political spectrum, if you can judge a middle-aged white guy by his facial hair, and you usually can. so, my cheap beer at the early show at the dive bar idea failed in a few different ways....it turned out to be expensive beer amidst what was really a rather undesirable crowd of right-wingers that still believe in upholding class (!).

the cheaper beer (it was sill $3.50) was at a place called 'wide open', which started to pick up quite a bit after 17:00. see, i liked the cheaper beer, but the music in the place was truly awful. i'm just not going to want to sit around and listen to bon jovi. sorry.

so, i went back to the not-actually-a-dive-bar, talked the bartender into a $5.50 beer and caught the guy play the first part of his set.

i wasn't actually sure what to expect - it was advertised as a juno-nominated blues guitarist, and i was just waiting for the show at the bovine to start, anyways, so i wasn't that invested.

but, he actually did a lot of finger-picking, and it was broadly instrumental, in scope. so, i found myself enjoying the music in a more detailed way than initially expected, enough that i decided to close my eyes for a bit to float off into it.

uch-o. that's against the rules, apparently. tough guy bartender with the facial hair didn't like that, and asked me to leave for "sleeping at the bar" - an egregiously false claim that anybody in the room would immediately identify as such. rather, i think it's clear enough that he just didn't think i was wealthy enough to hang out there...

so, i sent the guitarist the following message, over facebook, when i got home:

so, i tried to check out your set on tuesday. and, it was a good set, from what i caught of it.

i was in town to do some filing at the court house; i live in windsor. i'm suing the cops for a warrantless arrest that shouldn't have happened, if you're curious. so, i caught the 1:30 bus from windsor in the morning, and everybody drinks on the greyhound, right? i was halfway through a long day full of lots of alcohol and marijuana, and i wasn't going to get home to shower until the next day...

what i said to the bartender was true i am a guitarist (you can check me out by clicking through the links), and i actually have a little bit of training in renaissance classical music, but i'm mostly a psychedelic blues guitarist. so, i like guitar music, and i was enjoying your set. i often enjoy listening to guitar music with my eyes closed, so i can experience it in three dimensions, in the context of the fret board. it's not exactly synesthesia, it's more of a math thing (i also have a math degree), but it's how i dig it. some people wanna get up and clap and dance; i want to close my eyes and space out. that should be fine, right?

but, i couldn't finish your set because they threw me out for "falling asleep at the bar", which is just an empirically and factually false analysis of the situation. i can be drunk and close my eyes and enjoy your set without falling asleep.

but, so what if i *was* falling asleep? beer in toronto is about twice the price of beer in windsor, and that caught me off guard, so i had to readjust my budgeting. i had $40 to get me through the night, period. but, i had bought a beer and was intending to buy another one. you'd think you're entitled to a complimentary nap after paying for two beers, right?

the impression i got from the bartender was actually that he interpreted me as too lower class for his establishment. and, i mean, that's his opinion, if he wants to be like that...

the point i'm trying to make is this: i came to see you play, and the bar threw me out. no, i don't have a lot of money, and, yes, i was kind of drunk, but i was legitimately interested in your art. the reality is that you're a dirty roots guitarist. correctly or not, i may have come off as a poor drunk, but in the sense that that was true, i'm your audience - those guys in suits aren't.

how many other people are going to show up there to see you and get thrown out because they're too drunk or don't want to pay $7.00 for a beer?

so, i'm writing you as an artist to ask you to question whether you think that's a good place to play at or associate yourself with. it's clearly not a sustainable weekly gig. but, are you hurting yourself more than helping yourself?

if you were playing on the sidewalk for change instead, nobody would have chased me off.

==========

and, i'd just leave the situation at that.

i didn't pay cover to get into this place, and it wasn't my intended destination for the night; i just stopped by for a beer or two, and i was planning on leaving within an hour or two. further, i did catch the first half of the set. so, being asked to leave did not affect my night very much.

i may suggest that the bartender is a bit of an asshole, but there wasn't a lot of point in getting upset about it. rather, my reaction is more along the lines of that i don't particularly want to go back to this place, and would plead with people that are in the neighbourhood to choose to play somewhere else, instead. i would choose to avoid that place by choice, next time i'm around.

so, after buying a $3.50 beer and a $5.50 beer, i'm down to $34, and i'm out of smokes. the cost of cigarettes in toronto? $11. and, i know it's $10 for cover, taking me down to $13 for the night.

it's a good thing i didn't buy that $7.00 beer, right? but, the beer at the bovine wasn't cheap, either - i paid $5.50 for a can, and then had to hang on to the rest of the change in my pocket, in the hopes that i'd be able to get something to eat.

my comments regarding the first three acts are actually the same, namely that they each had moments, in their own ways, that were dragged down by an insistence on returning to a poppier aesthetic. in all three cases, i found myself wondering why they'd go back to the saccharine over and over, when it just wasn't working, but maybe i'm missing a trend, or something, i dunno; i know that that was the commonality here, and i don't actually think there's a lot else worth taking much note of.

the first act were highly impressed by the sound tech's suggestion of turning the amp down during sound check, but i actually think they got quite a bit more grit out of the amp than the monitors would allow for. put another way: the monitors gave them more of a "solid state" type 80s rock sound, which they seemed to prefer over their crappy 90s analog pedals. i liked that creamy, sustained muff tone better than the brittle-digital-distortion-through-fender-jazz tone he fixed you up with, guys. but i kept quiet. *shrug*.

they're just kids. they know not...

sicayda were enjoyable as a gaze act, but, as mentioned, they kept going back to these poppy sections that just left me scratching my head.

and, i'll say the same thing about goon, who were almost an interesting psych act, but just couldn't leave the pop at home, in los angeles.

i will acknowledge that i had what i believe i am correct in calling an anxiety attack near the start of the goon set, which required me to cheat hypothermia in stripping down to my tshirt in order to sweat something out that i had breathed in a few minutes earlier. somebody was looking to kill their joint. i'll always take it if nobody wants it, but it took me up past some thc blood level concentration point and forced me to process it, in the way i know how. then i was fine, as always.

if you were to ask me, i would suggest that goon need to decide if they're a psych act or a pop act, but the kids might give you another story.

the place cleared out almost entirely after goon, but they did have one more act, which was even catchier and didn't really have the moments that the first three did. this was definitely more in a new wave or post-punk tradition, so i'm not surprised to realize that they're a little older. i like this general style, but i need something more abstract than this.

then, it was like 1:00 and they were done.

as mentioned, i had $9.00 on me, and i wanted to save it to get something to eat. i just underestimated the cost of everything. if i had saved an extra $4-5 by paying a little less for pretty much everything, i would have bought another beer; conversely, if i had an extra $20, i would have bought another beer. but, i just misbudgeted, and was kind of stuck.

my options were to go sit in a diner for the next 6-7 hours or hang around at the bar until 3:00, with the hopes that a conversation might open up....and then sit in a diner for 3-4 hours. it seemed like an obvious choice. but, this bar - which i hadn't been in before - was actually kind of a couples bar, after the bands had cleared out; there were lots of people there, but they were pretty much solely in units of two. again, this is abnormal for the kinds of places i go to, which tend to be less about going on dates and more about hanging out. i don't know when i'll be in toronto next, but i'll keep that in mind...

the people were at least friendly. mostly.

so, i was approached by a bassist/singer in a few local bands that seemed intent on telling me bad jokes, and arguing with me over the value of recorded music. and, i won't post her links here, but it demonstrates that the place was friendly enough, even to a stranger from out of town there accidentally on an unofficial couples night.

it wasn't quite 3:00 when i left - i didn't make them throw me out - but it was close. and, off i went for pho...

.....which i knew would be cheap, but how cheap? $9.00 cheap? it turns out, not - it was $11.00 cheap, but not $9.00 cheap. so, i went looking for a sub, instead...

....and, i found one, but i would have had to eat it outside, which i balked at.

instead, i got a sausage from the truck outside for $4.50 and a coffee at the denny's, and hit the internet where i read the news for a bit. but, i didn't want to fall asleep and miss the bus, so i went back to the bus station to type there....

...and learned that they shut down all of the outlets at the greyhound. yeah. well, it didn't click at first - i went from outlet to outlet and finally found one in the basement, before the cops came down and threw me out, for reasons that i couldn't understand.

i had two dollars on me at the end, and went looking for a bag of chips, when it clicked - they've installed charging ports. aha.

it would be one thing for them to install quick charging ports as a convenience for people with fast phones, but it's another thing altogether to actually disassemble the electrical plugs, to stop people from charging. my chromebook is misbehaving, so i can't charge it right now. but, it doesn't have usb charging, anyways. so, they're taking away something without fully replacing it.

and, they didn't have outlets on the bus, either, so i just slept on the way home....

*shrug*.

i was home at about 15:00 on wednesday afternoon, ate, showered and passed out until early in the morning.

next time i go to toronto, i'll need to bring a few extra dollars - or, if i don't have it, reschedule until i do. it was a difference of about $30.

but, i did the filing that i needed to do, which was the point of the trip, and i didn't not enjoy the show, for what it was.

dec 1st in michigan.

it's also dec 1st in windsor, but i know that it's just the same product from the ministry. i might try a few things, but my expectations are very, very low.

the problem in canada is that it's over-regulated, mostly for child safety, so you have to buy something that got pressure sealed weeks or months ago, for the specific purpose of putting it in packaging that children can't get at. it's true that i don't think that kids should smoke pot, but i don't have any kids, and don't see why i should have to deal with such layers of nonsense around an issue that doesn't concern me. i would shrug off things like mandatory packaging in principle, but it really is degrading the quality of the product, and, at the end of the day, it's ultimately not the government's job to keep your kids away from your drugs. that's your responsibility, as an adult, and as a parent....

i can't take the stuff across the border, or at least i can't yet. that might change after 2020. but, in some ways, that's an asset, as i'd rather keep my drugs at the concert.

it's a mild detour in either direction, and this is about as far out of detroit as i ever go. so, if they're open by the first, i should be able to pick something up on the way to plaid. in the long run, i'd expect something to open in hamtramck, and something to open in newtown or midtown.

i'm just hoping that the product is fresh. having them actually package it in real time would be the ideal.

so, i slept another nine hours or so overnight.

i am awake, now, and ready to get started on the tasks for the weekend.

note that i have no intention of leaving the house until at least the end of the week, and i want to get as much done as i can.

so, task one is to get the blogs in order, including writing the review. that should be done within a few hours, i think.

the historical ignorance is just astounding.

the origin of species was published in 1859, which was a mere two years before the american civil war. the architects of the american system of slavery had no understanding of darwinian theory, for the simple reason that it didn't exist yet. the association is an anachronism, an ignorant one, and one that you generally hear exclusively from religious people that want to whitewash the dominant and decisive role of religion in the history of slavery.

the american slave trade was built on a papal bull. it was neither science nor capitalism that set this off, but christianity. it was back in 1452, the year before constantinople fell to invading turks, that the pope - who was the hegemon over very catholic spain - declared by decree that non-christians (heathens and saracens) may be legally conquered and placed into "perpetual servitude" by christian forces.

and, if you doubt the legal importance of this papal decree, i will present you with the example of ethiopia, which was never colonized because they were found to be christian upon contact.

so, this was the initial justification for slavery - not race, not skin colour and not any feeling of biological superiority at all, but religious exclusionism. strictly legally speaking, africa was not enslaved because it was black, it was enslaved because it was heathen.

further, the 1452 decree that western slavery descends from has it's origins in earlier decrees by muslim caliphs, who had previously enslaved all non-muslims. so, not only is western slavery fundamentally a christian thing, but the christians were just copying the muslims in their implementation of it. slavery, as we understand it, is completely religious in origin and scope, through and through.

"but the church opposed slavery!".

the reality is that this statement is misleading at best and, if we are to be truly honest, should be labeled flat out wrong. the reason that the abolitionists used conversion as a tactic was to undermine the law in the first place, because they knew that if they christianized the slaves then it would undercut the argument for enslaving them. so, i mean, give the abolitionists credit for using a smart tactic, but don't give the church credit for opposing slavery - that would be a distorted concept of history, at best.

in fact, it was the church that first started to appeal to biology by citing biblical passages about the curse of ham, but this didn't start to happen until after the abolitionists got off the ground. when biology was used as a justification for slavery, it was done so by the church (by citing the bible.), and not via any scientific body. further, the church only started using biology as a justification for slavery after the slaves started converting to christianity, thereby denying them of their initial justification.

and, you can get into the whole catholic v protestant thing regarding this, and the question of what authority the pope had, and why citing the bible would be more convincing than citing a papal bull, if you were a protestant rather than a catholic. but, this is secondary to the basic point, which is that slavery was a religious institution that was upheld by the church using whatever arguments it could come up with.

after the end of slavery, it is true that religious leaders tried to co-opt science for their own end, but there were never any scientific institutions running these bodies. the history of eugenics in the united states and canada is mostly tied into the history of sectarian infighting, and was pushed almost entirely by religious bodies. remember: hitler was a catholic, not an atheist. we're walking back down this road of conservative propaganda, again....

broadly speaking, the role of eugenics in the united states was to stop catholics and heathens from breeding. if you read their writings, these people make it clear that they're being driven mostly be sectarianism, not race. but, even insofar as they adopted ideas like "racial hygiene", they interpreted them entirely through sectarian filters - the calvinists naturally thought that they were the master race, whereas the baptists thought they were the master race and etc.

the scopes monkey trials were in the 1920s, and i'm just citing that to put the situation in context - from 1865-1930, much of the united states was strictly under religious rule, meaning you had to run virtually everything by the religious authorities, which would interpret it as they saw fit. there was no room for science as an independent political ideology, during this period. so, i can cite specific examples, but it's best to put the era in context - to exist in america at the time meant that you were an extension of the local religion, which was deeply intertwined with the state. there was no independent thought, no movement outside of the church. so, if the government did things like pass sterilization laws, it was done because the religious authorities desired and sanctioned it - not due to some exotic theories being discussed in distant europe.

and, as our understanding of evolution has advanced, we've discarded most of these ideas as unscientific, altogether.

broadly speaking, the era of european and american slavery was from about 1500-1850, which is a period that preceded darwinism. trying to argue that darwinisim was a factor in slavery is consequently anachronistic and disingenuous. however, much of the capitalist theory that social darwinism (a pseudo-science that attempts to speciously apply capitalist economics to darwinian science.) relied on did exist, and was formative on at least the late stages of slavery, when it became more of a business.

the roots of slavery, though, are actually in the crusades, and the struggle between christians and muslims over europe and the middle east, a struggle in which they enslaved each other by mutual decree. africa very much got caught up in the middle of this, as the christians sought ways to bypass the muslims to reach markets in asia.

your blame should be directed at organized religion, and the judaic form of it most particularly, and not at the enlightenment principles of science that helped us work through all of these problems that organized (judaic) religion created.

so, i've yet to see any credible evidence of russia interfering in anybody's elections. and, i don't think that the idea that ukraine is interfering in anybody's elections is credible, either.

but, we can be pretty certain that the united states has been interfering in ukrainian elections - and decisively - for quite a while, now.

it's all a bunch of cia propaganda.

i think the issues regarding one of the three cases are dealt with, at least, for now.

i got the paperwork for the landlord & tenant board case, which has given me a hearing date of feb 5, 2020. given that i will have paid my rent on feb 1st, and he'll still have last month's for march, it is very unlikely that the court would order me to evacuate any time before may 1st. that said, i make no request in my case to end the lease. so, he will need to file for that. if he does, that discussion will no doubt come up, in context. if he doesn't, and the issue stays mostly resolved, then i'll certainly withdraw - but i'll wait a long time before i do.

i have filed a t2 for repairs, and not a t6 for harassment. is the issue fixed? it's not clear. it's better, surely, but i'll need to wait for the weather to warm up to really know. but, we can update the file if he's going to come in here like that.

so, he's going to want to be very careful about doing things like entering the unit illegally. i can't find any evidence of any kind of tampering or anything (yet.), but the reality is that the electrical is enough to suggest that the unit was entered into. and, i will be keeping a closer eye on this - can i find a pattern of electrical spikes when i'm not home?

in fact, i noticed something like this a few months ago, but wasn't as sure. this time, i turned everything off to make a point - that spike must be from an illegal entry. i will be keeping a closer eye on the electrical and will catch further break-ins.

what's he doing in here? i've had some creepy feelings.

but, i'll remind you that i've wondered for a while if the guy is actually a cop. he appears to have no source of income, and yet goes away on expensive trips - with cars and kids, so these aren't my hobo trips across to detroit, he's staying somewhere, and he's feeding multiple mouths. - several times a month. further, there seems to be people up there, even when there's no car in the driveway. and, while i can't prove it, i'm sure that somebody - maybe a specific officer - is smoking up there.

i'll remind you that i filed a judicial review against the oiprd on tuesday afternoon, and had to put the windsor police on the paperwork. did they pay me a visit on tuesday night? is that what happened?

it would be consistent.

and, there is no legal excuse for this, at all. it would simply uphold my claim that i'm being harassed by the cops.

i still don't know if he filed, but, if he didn't, he has until the end of the year to do it. i filed immediately in order to be sure he wouldn't get the hearing first. he has until january 30th to file his own case. it won't be until close to then that i make any attempt to cancel my own...

so, it's not the best idea to confront him immediately about the illegal entry. i'm better off waiting this out, to see if i can build a pattern.

i will still need to call on monday morning, and periodically afterwards, to see if anything's in, yet. but, that's in motion....

so, what have i done since i got back on wednesday afternoon?

it might be my own fault this time, but i've barely been able to stay awake - i slept all night wednesday (which was needed), then essentially all day thursday and now most of the day friday (from very small amounts of pot).

the pot is gone. and, i actually want to do laundry this weekend.

i did figure out yesterday that the po box i got on tuesday is no longer in service. so, i am going to need to file the initial order again on monday. and, i will take note of the costs to the board, in the matter - $52 for searches and $43 for bus tickets. these expenses would have been unnecessary if the court had ordered the cops to provide the address (which is what it's going to do anyways.), so i feel i'm entitled to at least ask for them.

i am also going to need to prepare some documents that i will need to serve to the parties (despite the fact that they already have all of them), and then mail to the board in toronto. i won't be mailing this until after the first, but i want to have a solid handle on it by monday.

and, i'll need to call the landlord and tenant board on monday as well, if the documents i'm seeking aren't already in my box.

so, i didn't get much out of my half gram - it just knocked me out. i was hoping i could get through the reviews and other loose ends with it, but it just didn't work out that way. i got absolutely nothing done at all. do i at least feel caught up on sleep? no - i'm still tired. so, i'm trying to wake myself up by eating a lot of fruit and drinking a lot of soy, and will be able to make a big pot of coffee after 19:00.

so, i blew a few days and wish i hadn't, but so be it. perhaps more importantly, i'm learning to stay away from government pot...it's just a totally boring complete sedative, in terms of what it actually does. it doesn't feel like pot....

what about the energy use?

well, this is tuesday, which makes sense, although it means that the background fan is running at a lot more than i'd like it to. i guess the fluctuations are from the fridge, meaning the fan is still running at 65W, minimum, even on the low setting. i was hoping for 40-45W. so, i'm halving my savings. *shrug*. so be it. i still need it on...

you'll note that there's a spike at around 23:00 - odd considering that i was in toronto, at the time, and even odder considering the following graph, which is for wednesday:

so, there's a spike in the electrical between 23:00 on tuesday night and 1:00 on wednesday morning. i have not experienced previous spikes of this sort related to the fridges - those spikes can be seen in these charts, and are the fluctuations on the order of 0.02 or so.

rather, 0.17 would be in line with the amount generated by somebody turning all of the lights on at the same time.

this is pretty strong evidence that somebody was in here, and i'll need to put it aside for later.

for the afternoon, as mentioned, i'm just nursing myself a little. the focus for the night is going to be on cleaning - and looking for signs of illegal entry. i want to finish these reviews and put together loose ends in terms of blog posts. then, the focus to start the weekend (at least) is going to be on getting those three legal issues in order for monday morning. and, then i have those liner notes to finish....

it's only two days lost, it's not the end of the world. but, it's frustrating that the product they're selling is not what they're advertising - government pot doesn't get you high, it just makes you tired.

so, i tried to get some high thc / low cbd marijuana when i was in toronto to prevent me from falling asleep when i smoked it.

this pot is remarkably dry - it's more comparable to the basil or oregano in your cupboard than it is to any kind of high quality bud. but, my plan didn't work very well.

i had about a half a gram left.

so, i rolled a small joint at 7:30 yesterday morning, and i napped from it for most of the morning. i tried to smoke another one at about 15:30, and slept until after midnight. i smoked the last little bit this morning at around 3:00 and am just waking up now.

so, a sixth of a gram of this pot knocks me out for six-ten hours at a time. i have a low tolerance, and i know that cbd makes me tired, but i'm not inexperienced with marijuana - i smoked my first joint in 1996. right now, i feel less like i've smoked a half a gram of pot and more like i swallowed a bottle of lorazepam.

i kind of saw this coming, though. what they did in ontario was essentially to allow the medicinal business to sell recreational product. and, i've been clear on the point - the idea that marijuana is some kind of medicine is retarded, it's purely a recreational drug. but, what that means is that the strains you can buy in the store were mostly designed for couch potatoes and lifers, and all they're really going to do is make you take a nap.

the reality is that it's shitty pot for sale here in canada.

...and i hope that the pot in detroit is a little better, when they open the stores.

so, a bit of a polling update....

this is pretty much the catastrophe that seemed obvious when sanders decided to run directly against biden in the south - biden is still going to win the south by huge margins, while a younger centrist is apparently going to win the north by huge margins. sanders got greedy, and lost everything.

buttigieg is essentially carrying through with the only possible winning strategy against biden, while sanders is clinging to what was clearly a losing strategy, from the start.

so, you might find that sanders is doing ok in national polls, and i don't dispute the point with any zeal, but the fact that his campaign is pushing national polls in the november before an iowa primary is a sign of desperation, on his behalf. why isn't he pushing polls in any actual states? because he's losing everywhere. national polls are all he's got. he could finish second in every single state, and then what? take it to the convention and argue that you're consistently second-place, and deserve a consolation prize? likewise, if warren doesn't start showing us where she's going to actually win, it's time that people start telling her to go home.

the story on the fake left appears to be that not only are they not in each others' lanes, but they've both hit support ceilings. classic prisoner's dilemma. again: they had a winning strategy of co-operation, but they picked a losing strategy of competition. when firms compete against each other, they both lose. that's basic economics.

the narrative is "ok, but buttigieg has 0% support in the black states", but that suggests that the black states were ever actually in play, and, of course they weren't. biden has plurality black support, which nobody else has in any other demographic, and if somebody is going to cut into that, it's not going to be bernie sanders. you're going to need a black candidate to do that, and booker is too educated for them to relate to him.

so, you have to sweep the north to win. and, the only person in a position to do that right now, however tenuously, is actually buttigieg. sanders has alienated too many people, and warren can only fool a fraction of the pool with her phony rhetoric. buttigieg's surge may not be real, but it hasn't demonstrated a ceiling, yet.

that would mean that, realistically, the fight right now is between buttigieg and biden, but that buttigieg has a very difficult path. as mentioned, he will have to put up numbers in the north that essentially mirror biden's numbers in the south - he'll need to be getting 60-70% of white voters in these states. there's little evidence he's doing nearly that well, but if somebody is going to pull off the only strategy that there is, he's the only one doing it right...

it's a long shot, though. even if he can't do it, and he probably can't, buttigieg may be positioning himself as an impossible-to-ignore vp candidate, because if that's how this works out - if buttigieg ends up with clear wins in states like michigan and pennsylvania and minnesota and wisconsin - then biden is going to have little other choice. he will need those states to win.

can that change? sure. i don't suspect that buttigieg will survive a serious policy berating. i'm not sure that people really know what they're claiming they'll vote for. most of his support in the north does still appear to be coming from sanders, who is running fourth in the north right now by some polling estimates, and i pointed to the queer sympathy vote, but he may be enjoying some kind of default transitional state, as people rule out the other candidates.

if they've ruled out biden, and they've ruled out sanders, and they've ruled out warren, they might sit with "buttigieg. i guess." for a few weeks. who do they vote for, in the end? nobody knows, yet.

but, if measured voting intention translates into real votes, and the vote is tomorrow, you're looking at a biden/buttigeg ticket, as biden scrambles to find a white running mate that can help him win in wisconsin.

a few notes on the cabinet.

- putting marco mendicino in the immigration file is an interesting signal, considering that they took ahmed hussen out of it. one would assume that ahmed hussen at least had grandparents that identified as muslim. marco mendicino's primary claim to fame is his work in prosecuting the toronto 18, which was an entrapment operation on an "islamic terrorist cell". we'll see if the policy approach is different or not, but this could signal a move towards a more restrictive immigration policy, which would be the party listening to public opinion.

- jonathan wilkinson is an interesting choice for the environment. the right-wing press is describing him as "pro-business", while the pseudo-left is describing him as a "clean technology executive". his actual history is in working for companies that sell technology to make fossil fuels less polluting; his industry would profit from greater regulatory enforcement. so, it's suggesting that the party is going to try and salvage this orwellian pr strategy about not being able to separate the environment and the economy by putting somebody that can do more than repeat talking points in charge of the file. he has already worked in the department, as well. on it's face, this would suggest that the policies will be pro-extraction, but that there may be some effort to pass legislation to try to clean the sands up (and thereby benefit the interests that wilkinson represents). if so, that would be something kind of along the lines of what i might hope for in a liberal government. this is the bankers' party, after all. they're all about profit. but, it's because they're the bankers' party that they have a history of passing legislation that is well-informed by actual research, rather than by ideology or populism. actual, real bankers don't watch fox news. they're usually actually pretty smart. so, when i see that they've put an executive with strong ties to an industry that profits from regulating emissions in charge of the environmental file, it makes sense to presume that this is because he will have significant business opportunities in the sector, which will benefit the banks' investment in it. if we want to shut these pipelines down, we're going to have to do it in court - everybody's known that for years. but, there is grounds for a cautious optimism, here, in the only feasible ways that you could actually expect from this party. environmentalists generally argue against ccs-type proposals, but what if you put the ccs industry in charge of the ministry? it's worth a shot, if it's actually in good faith. so, we'll see if it works or not, but i like this pick, and hope it's a good way to project how the government thinks throughout the remnants of it's existing mandate - that green energy is big business, it just needs some corporate welfare to get going. let them build it, we can nationalize it later....

- putting seamus o'regan at natural resources seems to suggest that the pmo is centralizing the file. 

- likewise, i don't actually think that putting chrystia freeland at intergovernmental affairs is a promotion, at all. this is a centralized file, so he's essentially giving her a job in katie telford's office. you could argue that bringing her into the pmo is a promotion, i guess, but she's going to essentially be losing cabinet status, and, with it, a lot of independence and power. while i think it's mistake to give it to her, the role of "deputy prime minister" is not constitutionally defined, and should not be thought of as being similar to "vice president", even if what trudeau's doing probably actually has everything to do with julia louis dreyfus. this would appear to be a pr ploy to make justin look very feminist. we'll see how she's actually deployed to fight against "wexit", but i would expect it to be as an extension of the pmo, rather than independently of it - and perhaps often in contradiction to her own suggestions. they're keeping an eye on her, as much as they're bringing her in...

- as was the case with wilkinson, the actual promotion of francois-phillipe champagne to foreign affairs is about as good a pick as you can hope for from this government. in 2015, this post was awarded to stephane dion, who was considered a protege of jean chretien, and was at one time his hand-appointed successor. there was hope that he would undo much of the mess that harper created at foreign affairs, but was quickly scuttled out after the election of donald trump, under fears that the republicans would hate him. freeland seemed more keen on carrying on with harper's policies than reversing them. but, the new minister is another chretien protege, so there is some hope that he will return to a more historically normal canadian foreign policy. the first thing he appears to have done is reverse harper's policies on illegal israeli settlements in the west bank, which has hurt our international standing over the past 15 years. i like this pick, as well, and hope that's a good sign of things to come.

- karina gould has some history working in international aid, which is perhaps a positive sign. often, people end up with "international development" as a kind of throwaway ministry that's just used as a stepping-stone. maybe putting somebody with some interest in the topic in charge of the ministry could help spark some much needed reform within it. i am an advocate of the idea that better spending on foreign aid could help reduce unwanted types of immigration.

- patty hajdu is again an interesting choice at health, and there is some cautious optimism that it may signal a shift to a focus on creating better funding models. she has a history of working with vulnerable people.

there are things i don't like, but not many of them are new things that i don't like. in terms of the actual changes that occurred here, this is almost entirely positive. but, i do have one concerning thing to take note of.

- there is no minister of science at this point. the file has been folded into the title "minister of innovation, science and industry". this would seem to suggest that this government has the view that science is only important when it helps industry maximize profit. again: this is the bankers' party. but, smart bankers should understand the importance of doing basic research. this is a progression that occurred, rather than something that happened all at once. if the implication is that basic science is being phased out in favour of letting industry take control of the resources, that is an extremely concerning continuation of the underlying harperism of this government, and needs to be mobilized against.

broadly speaking, though, they seem to be moving in the right direction, if you can get over the kind of meaningless symbolism that defines so much of their messaging.

i am home, and i've been home since about 15:00 yesterday afternoon. but, i got something to eat, took a shower and crashed for roughly 13 hours - just out cold, crash. i'd been awake more or less since 3:30 monday morning...

so, i wanted to get some things done this morning...

....as it is, a review is coming, but i need to make some calls and do some other stuff this morning, first.

i got both of the things i wanted done done but i don't know how useful the information that i got actually was. we'll find out soon enough.

the address that i got from the corporate name search is indeed registered to the name i was given, but belongs to a split commercial space owned by a sushi bar and a money mart. i don't know if there was ever any other business registered there, but it would seem to be an odd location for a property management company. it's a strip mall with a grocery store and some fast food restaurants and a dollar store and...well, a money mart. you'd think a company that rents apartments would want a more professional space.

the other option would be that the person that owns the company also owns one of those businesses, or also owned a business that was located there, and the property management component doesn't have it's own retail space. i would be more inclined towards thinking it's the money mart - or even in....does money mart rent po boxes?

(checks to see if money mart rents po boxes)

i can't find any current ads for money mart selling po boxes, but i can find some references to them doing so in the past. either she has an account that is in deep legacy mode, or the account is very out of date. but, it is on record that she recently filed her taxes, and the account open date is actually fairly recent. maybe they do sell them still, but don't advertise them. i dunno.

but, that seems to be the address on file - a commercial po box at a money mart.

which actually means i still have no idea where it is, but that's fine if the documents get to her.