Loading stuff

Don't you just love the new language that's developed over the last few years when it comes to loading stuff?  I mean, really.  Now you can upload or download stuff (depending, I guess, if it's your stuff or someone else's) off the internet, top load or front load your washing machine (depending on what kind you have), overload your suitcases, packing crates and anything else that has limited space and you just MUST take whatever's too much with you because it might be important.  Directly related to loading stuff is sizing it.  You can down size, undersize, and over size.  I suppose you can even up size depending on how thirsty or hungry you are.  Mind you, if you are upsizing too often, your personal size will go up in direct proportion - or maybe even more than you expected.  So why would all of this wonderful new way to describe something be important?  Well, my darlings, I shall tell you,depending of course on whether you really want the answer or not - and even if you don't.  Such is the power of a blog.  Depending on how the phrase in question is used, it can become an adjective, adverb or, yes, even a verb if used creatively.  For example, if a boss says to his/her employee, "Did you upload and send off that document that needed to go?" and the employee says, "No, but I downloaded this really cool music off the net." you can count on the employee being downsized to the point of being unemployed.  Both sentences would be grammatically correct, though I'm not sure why the boss wouldn't just upload and send the document him/herself (actually the boss probably would and wouldn't need the employee any more anyway - such is life in a downsized high tech world).  How is all of this relevant to recent events in my life  Simple.  I'm packing to move, and so I must now downsize and load my four suitcases, plastic container and trunk with all the stuff I've accumulated over the last two to three years.  Nothing like moving to keep a person from accumulating all sorts of "stuff" that may or may not be necessary.  I'm offloading (another good word) some of my "stuff" and the rest I'm packing.  When I put my "stuff" into nice neat containers, there isn't really a whole lot.  It's not like moving an entire household with all the furniture, but still, it has to be moved.  Up to now I've been able to keep things to a minimum (well for someone who is located in the same place for at least two years), and most of what I'm hauling has direct relationship to my work, but it's still probably more than I really need.  I have found, though, that as soon as I eliminate some of the "non-essentials", those are the very things I then have to go out and buy at some point at my new location.  So, in order to stop rebuying the same things everywhere I go, I now haul it with me - whatever IT might be.  On that note, I think I'd better get on with up/down/over/off loading more stuff.  Until next time.

Moving

"On the road again ..." (thanks Willy Nelson for those immortal words - or maybe that should be irrelevant, or unrelated, or repetative - Which ever works best for you).  I'm not much of a country music fan, but everytime I move countries his song pops into my head - whether I want it to or not.  Yes, I am shifting (as they say here) again.  This time back across the Atlantic to South America.  New continent, new country, new school, new students (well for me anyway).  It never ceases to amaze me the kind of reactions I get from people when I tell them where I'm off to next.  First it was Kuwait, then Mexico, then it was on to Bahrain (where is that anyway?) and then India.  The reactions generally fall into one of two categories - the "isn't that a dangerous place?" or the "that's so cool!"  I guess to many who don't generally leave their home continents my choice of places to live may seem a little - bizarre.   But hey, who said we should live a "safe" life?  Where's the adventure?  Where's the challenge in staying put, like the vase great aunt Fluffy gave you for a wedding present and you've buried in the back of a cupboard someplace?  Maybe that weird vase will work with your decore now.  However, this time I truly will be challenged.  I'll be teaching grade 7 and 8.  Talk about towering infernos of raging hormones!  If that's not exciting enough I don't know what is.  I really must talk to my former army  buddies and get one of those flack jackets for the outbursts.  Actually what I really need is a large bucket and mop to swab up all the tears that will be shed over teen angst (and those are the teachers tears )- never mind the ones from the students, not to mention the tempertantrums and high levels of emotional ups and downs (I did say this was the teachers - didn't I?).  It will indeed be a new adventure, and one I'm ready - ok - bracing for.  I'll  be fine.  Can't guarantee the survival of my students, but I'll be fine.  Until the next time.

Naked airport scanners

I know, I know.  It's been too long.  My only excuse is that it continues to be incredibly hot and my brain is total mush.  It's slowly getting better, and by next week things should be almost normal, including my thinking.  Speaking of brains not thinking, this brings me to the topic of the day.  Naked airport scanners.  The question is, which scanners are naked - the machines or the people?  If it's the machines, what on earth were the airports thinking putting clothing on them in the first place?  What kind of clothing was it?  Was it a proper uniform or just casual jeans and t-shirts and where did they find clothing big enough to cover the machines?  If it was the people, then that's a whole different story.  Why are the scanners naked?  Can airports no longer afford uniforms?  Were the scanners complaining that the uniforms were uncomfortable or unfashionable (both a definite faux pas)?  Could this be a whole new trend and will the rest of us be offended by these naked people (unless they happen to be Heidi Montag clones and then that's just offensive - period - clothing or not)?  If the scanners are naked does that mean the rest of us have to be as well so that we don't offend them?  How will that go over with countries where women still have to be covered from head to toe?  If we go in dressed and have to come out undressed, where do our clothes go?  Do we get them back or are they put in a recycle bin and we get lovely black plastic garbage bags in exchange - much like what Lady Gaga wore the other day?  Is this something we really want to think about?  I'm sure there are many of us who would cringe at the thought of being naked in public, not to mention how it would make others feel. Who came up with the decision that airport scanners had to be naked and what were they thinking?  Just another wonderful day in the world of wierdness we live in.  Until next time, when my brain is functioning more normally.

Neurological Bakshish

Normally I try to keep things as light as possible on this blog, but something has been confusing me lately (not unusual as I am occasionally confused - unlike my coworker who is chronically confused).  The word neurology has to do with the study of the brain, and neurologists are those who deal with injuries to said body part.  No where, that I can find, does it say anything about veins, arteries or anything related to those aquaducts of the body.  True, we usually associate the liquid transported through these aquaducts as important to the proper functioning of the brain, so that the "little grey cells" (as one of my favourite mystery character calls them) will work the way we need them to work so that our body can do its thing.  However, it has come to my attention that neurologists are now telling people that they can't have a treatment that opens blocked veins which may lead to bodies functioning the way they should, instead of the way far too many of them are - poorly.  In this case I am talking about the Liberation Treatment, which is using the same technique as angioplasty, only this time unblocking veins, particularly those in the neck.  Why am I confused about this and what does it have to do with bakshish?  Well, it's the neurologists that are blocking this treatment, that they wouldn't deal with in the first place, and have convinced governments in Canada, the U.S. and probably Britain, to deny treatment to many MS sufferers for whom this treatment is intended.  So where does bakshish come into it.  Bakshish is, as all of you know, a nice word for kickbacks.  You pay an official "unofficial" money to get something done you want.  Works well in many countries of the world where red tape is so thick you could choke on it.  So why am I using this word in connection with neurologists?  Because it seems to me, and I'm no expert, that the very people who are throwing up barriers (not to be confused with throwing up your lunch, though the idea that kickbacks are changing hands is enough to make anyone want to rowlf their cookies) are the same people who are hustling the drugs pharmacutical companies are pushing.  (Talk about drug dealing!  And it's legal! Shouldn't the police be cracking down on this?)  These meds are not always useful, often have side effects and don't solve the problem in far too many cases.  So the question then is, my dears:  What kind of bakshish are the drug companies paying the neurologists to shut the Liberation Treatment out?  and who in government is getting their cut of the money to make sure that people who are literally dying a slow and often painful death are not getting the treatment they deserve?  I'd suggest a Parliamentary inquiry into this - but wait - those are the same people who are screwing the very people they are supposedly going to help.  Like I said, I'm very confused about this.  Anyone out there have any answers?  Well, Doctors?

It's Gecko time

Not to be confused with Miller time, or time travel, or for that matter time warps.  It's the time of year when gecko's of all sizes appear on my walls, ceilings and occasionally on the floor, racing to find the next "safe" place.  Watching them race around my apartment is quite fun, but can occationally be a little unnerving, especially if one is hiding under cushions, or flies off the door when you least expect it, and it's really yucky trying to peel one off the floor if you've accidently stepped on it (think sticker on the back of the door peel off).  Gecko racing, however, should never be confused with other kinds of racing.  Like bus racing for instance.  Why would buses race on a crowded street?  No idea, but the sign on the back of one here read "Your kind attention: If driver doing race driving please call (and then the number).  Given that people drive as if the overcrowded roads here are in fact the Indianapolis race track - on a moderate day - bus racing would be nothing unusual.  Then again, perhaps the company is trying to avoid any connection with the funeral home that had the sign "J.K. Funerals and Social Centre". Which left all of us riding home from work one day wondering what kind of events they have at the Social Centre and which part of the funeral home would it be held in.  Are the events mainly for the elderly who may or may not need the funeral part of the centre after a particular rousing game of parcheesie?  Do they hold weddings there as well (which given the cost of weddings might well give a parent a heart attack when all is said and done)?  Do they bet on bus racing?  How about organized gecko racing competitions?  Bring your favourite gecko to see which one can disappear the fastest (the geckos, not the people).  Do the buses race to see which one will get to the funeral home and social centre the fastest?  These are all things this inquiring mind really is not all that interested in, but there it is.  Just more of the wonderful strangeness of living in a different country.  Until next time, when I semi-promise to be more frequent with my postings.

Why you're still single

also known as the sex lives of birds.  Why you'd want to know about the sex life of a bird is beyond me.  Unless, of course, you raise birds, and then it might be important.  Of course this has nothing to do with finding the sexiest places to go, or the most wonderful hotels you absolutely must visit (for a very large sum of money for both).  Why am I rambling on about this?  I don't know, but someone must think these things are important for us to know, otherwise why are they posted on the internet.  Mind you, given that we are all now internet adicts who will spend tons of money on going to very expensive hotels in exotic locations, I'm not surprised.  After all, sexy countries want you to spend as much time as possible in their first class hotel rooms and what better way to do that than have you glued to the computer.  Wait a minute.  We can do that at home - be glued to the internet, not spend time in an expensive hotel, for free.  Whether your city is sexy or not, is up for grabs, but I'm sure someone would think it was.  Which of course brings us back to the sex life of birds.  Birds love hotels. The buildings are great for perching on, building nests, attracting a mate, and in the end no longer being single - and they get to stay for free. So the question then is:  If birds have such a great sex life, why are you still single - if you are single?  No idea, but there it is.  It must be important.  Why else would there be all kinds of articles on it all?  Until next time.