General at The Observer's Log

Archive for the ‘General’ Category

Evolution of the Know-It-All

7 Feb 2010

I’m a Know-It-All. (Most of you know that.) I freely admit this because a) it sometimes gets me into trouble, and b) it’s something I need to try and control. It’s the need for control that brings me to self-reflection, to look back on the things I do (or have done) and the things I say (or have said). Were they, in fact, factual? Were they right? Was I wrong? Who was right, and could I have approached the situation differently?

You may be wondering: “Why ask those questions? Isn’t that obvious?” Therein lies the ultimate pit-trap of the Know-It-All — the question isn’t obvious, only the answer. And the answer is what a burgeoning Know-It-All will readily offer up to anyone within earshot, regardless of whether or the Know-It-All was asked or even if there was a question to begin with. It doesn’t matter if they’re actually right — it’s the urge to be right that drives them…

…and often drives everyone else around them crazy.

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New Year’s Tea

1 Jan 2010

The New Year is always a reason for change. It’s always a reason to do something differently than you’ve done before. It’s a time when people hold to ages-old traditions, and make efforts to start new ones. It’s a time to look back on the past, and look towards the future.

And frankly, it’s a darn good reason to make a little trip out to Banff to see old friends.

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My Boxing Day special

26 Dec 2009

I’ve had some interesting Boxing Days in my past, but perhaps today will rank as one of the strangest.

This morning, we woke up when The Monkey — who has become very adept at waking up before Mommy and Daddy — came marching into our room somewhere around 7:00. We all lollygagged before getting up.

That’s when I knew something was wrong. The room was spinning.

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How to win the next Canadian federal election

11 Sep 2009

Dear Honourable Michael Ignatieff MP,

I recently read a CBC article where you made public a video of Rt. Hon. Stephen Harper in less than a positive light (http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/09/10/ignatieff-harper-speech.html). The article, including references to the video and a few comments from yourself, aimed to effectively attack Rt. Hon. Harper’s character and credibility. While this action may very well be justified in terms of raising awareness to the Canadian public, I (and likely many other Canadians) see this only as a prelude to what will likely be the fourth federal election in as many years.

What you have before you is a problem, Hon. Ignatieff: you might be right, but Canadians are going to hate you for it. We’re going to hate you for doing exactly what every other politician running for a major office has done for the last quarter of a century: make the election personal.

Canadians pride themselves on multiculturalism. We happily point to the different patches of our country that identify themselves as being distinct and unique. These are not faults, but are facets of a jewel that would not shine any other way. Along with those facets come — as an absolute requirement — differing perspectives, attitudes, and personalities. In effect, it ensures that no two people will approach the same scenario in the same manner.

You must remove personalities from the equation. All that mudslinging achieves is to showcase pettiness and desperation. If all you have to bring up is someone else’s poor judgement, it makes us all wonder what you can bring to the table. It does not matter what Rt. Hon. Harper has personally said, regardless of how inflamatory those comments may be. Your position should be a higher one, not of a tattle-tale elementary schoolyard child, but of the correcting teacher who directs a class to overcome a poor decision.

The Conservatives have something in their favour that the Liberals do not: since coming into power in 2006, the Conservatives have not made any serious mistakes — things that would normally cause Canadians to vote differently. That is a level of inertia that the Liberals — and you, as their leader — need to overcome.

You have another inertia to overcome as well: Canadian political apathy. As you may recall, the 2008 federal election had the lowest turnout in Canadian history. If you wish to turn the tide, you have to encourage everyone not just to perform their civic duty, but be engaged in the direction of their country. That is a task that no Canadian political leader is willing to, at the risk of being attacked by the others. However, this is a risk you’ll need to take.

And you need to take that risk to the west. I’m sure you saw the electoral map from the previous election (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/72/Canada_2008_Federal_Election.svg) — the west is a sea of blue, and your party acquired only seven seats. Alberta, in particular, love their Conservatives — attacking Harper will only lend sympathy rather than turning a tide. You need to appeal to the Western Canadian, and have them feel that Western Canada is as important to Canada as Quebec has been in previous elections.

So, how? I don’t presume to preach to a politician, author, professor, and journalist. Instead, I would like to talk to you as a fellow Canadian. You don’t need to tell us what’s wrong with other politicians — you need to tell us what’s wrong with us, with our nation, with the things that we hold as dear and true to our identities as toques, beavers, hockey, and the maple leaf. And then inspire us to help repair those things, so that we become part of the solution, so we don’t just hand our problems to our government and expect everything to be fixed.

We do not need promises or assurances. We need truths, no matter how hard they might be to hear. We need to be told — plainly — what has to happen. We need to be told that even the difficult is possible, and that hope isn’t just a word. We need to believe. We need to want.

Ignore Rt. Hon. Harper. Ignore Hons. Duceppe, Layton, and May. Rise above them. Rise above the petty bickering. Make your message speak for itself, and speak to Canadians. Make us believe that you have a vision that means something more than merely acquiring office. If we are to go to the polls again, we have to know it’s for a good reason, and not because of a political spitting match. If you can bring faith back into Canadian politics, you may also bring greater enthusiasm and support.

Sincerely,

Geoff Sowrey

Dear Honourable Michael Ignatieff MP,

I recently read a CBC article where you made public a video of Rt. Hon. Stephen Harper in less than a positive light. The article, including references to the video and a few comments from yourself, aimed to effectively attack Rt. Hon. Harper’s character and credibility. While this action may very well be justified in terms of raising awareness to the Canadian public, I (and likely many other Canadians) see this only as a prelude to what will likely be the fourth federal election in as many years.

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Canadian citizenship questions are kinda funny

30 Jul 2009

My friend Julia is getting ready to have her Canadian Citizenship test, as she’s tired of being merely a Permanent Resident, and now apparently wants to have more say in these taxes she’s been paying.

To that end, she’s received and is now reviewing the requisite materials for the test. (I offer you the list of questions she gave to me, unaltered, as a starting point.) As one might expect, the test has a number of questions that, yes, an average born-and-raised-in-Canada Canadian would flunk. (I would imagine the same is true of most countries.) Some of these are taken for granted, as just about everyone just accepts things as they are.

But some of these questions are … well, let’s say that they just scream for alternative answers.

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…I’m not old

16 Jul 2009

Happy birthday to me! 13,505 days and still counting! Whee!

20 years of blogging (and Post #1,000)

1 Jul 2009

Well, okay, not so much “blogging” as journaling, but most of them are now online for everyone to ignore.

Twenty years ago, I got to do something that (comparatively) very few westerners got to do, and will never get to do again: I went behind the Iron Curtain. I visited the (former) Soviet Union. Believe it or not, the journey was a field trip, organised by one of the teachers in my school board. We had to do prerequisite classwork and had to write two length reports, all of which added up to academic credits.

And we had to write a journal.

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WordPress 2.8 acting weird?

14 Jun 2009

I just finished a rather arduous upgrade from WordPress 2.7.1 to WordPress 2.8 (arduous only because I had to do a massive migration to get rid of a lot of old kruft in my previous WP install).

But it’s acting really weirdly. The dashboard isn’t working properly, some of the JS functionality refuses to work in any browser (and returns an error in Firefox: “commentReply not defined” when I try to use the reply shortcut). But no 404s.

Anyone else seen weirdness?

Failure is an option

7 Jun 2009

One afternoon, a few years ago now, the head of my department uttered something completely heretical while we were in a fairly high-stressed meeting about some technical difficulties we were having on a project. It was one of those utterances that made everyone take pause, look at him, and wonder if he was off his rocker.

He wasn’t, for the record. In fact, he was striving for us to not view impending doom as a bad thing. While his two words were at first shocking (especially to the Account Managers present, who’d ultimately have to deal with the client), it was also one of those moments you sat back and actually thought about what you were doing.

So what did he say?

Embrace failure.
- Allard Losier

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How to handle a problem

29 May 2009

Problems fill our daily lives. Sometimes they’re trivial (“where are my keys?”), sometimes they’re pretty significant (“how do I hide this dead body?”); sometimes you can solve them on your own (“they were in my jacket pocket”), and sometimes you need help (“Mr. Wolf”).

How you approach a given problem shows not just your critical thinking process, but also a lot about your character. People will react in different ways to the same problems, even seemingly trivial ones. Some people try to solve problems on their own, while others will look to others to solve the problems.

In a busy work environment, problems are frequent. And I’ll argue that putting the solutions in the hands of a few people is a recipe for disaster.

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