Critters

So, I have run down the Time Trail flapping my arms like a hummingbird for the last time. Well, last time for this year, and although I would like to do it again next year, because I have really, really enjoyed that programme, if I'm still available, then something has gone wrong with the plan. You know, the plan where I get to resume my career. Not the plan where I infiltrate Stephen Harper's government and bend it to my will, although that plan would proclude me from being a hummingbird next year too.

There are two celebs in the global Big Brother house that have me scratching my head. One is, as you might expect, Dr. Traffic Management - head prefect for Iran. The only possible explanation that I can come up with for his bizarre behaviour is that he's trying to irritate the hell out of the U.S. OR...he may be trying a big old experiment to see EXACTLY how far you have to push the UN before you get chucked out of the GBB house. I am still hung up on this PhD he has in Traffic management though, you gotta feel that it informs his thinking, but for the life of me I can't come up with a traffic paradigm that accounts for his uranium enriching antics and his pissing off the head ayatollah by saying women can go to football matches. Even the 4-way stop can't explain it.

If a traffic specialist can become top banana in a country that was formerly great - ie when it was Persia - then I'm wondering how far someone with an MA in Education can go. Well, unless Battlestar Galactica is pure fiction, and I'm sure the Space Channel would tell us if it were, then the answer is President of the whole human race, or at least what is left of it. Right, but I wasn't really aiming for that. Bugging Stephen Harper appeals to me, but even Pres of the US doesn't - now that I have watched many episodes of Commander-in-Chief, I can see that it's not only a frelling impossible job, but your hair and make-up have to look flawless all the time, whereas I favour a more laissez-faire approach to grooming. Megolamania is just as tough a call as dieting, it's that knowing where to stop element that really gets ya.

The other celeb in the GBB house that has me watching curiously is the Headmaster of China. I'm quite surprised when celebs whose main claim to fame seem to be human rights violations come out of the House and play tea-parties. Last year I was struck by protesters against his regime standing in silent protest on Granville Street. We have a lot of people of Chinese origin in Vancouver, so I'm thinking they know what they're not talking about. Last week, Amnesty International told us that although China doesn't publish full figures, of the countries that allow us to know who they are killing, China executed 1,770 of a global total of 2,148. The organs of executed prisoners are frequently sold internationally and without the permission of either victim or their family.
Whatever you do, don't mention Tibet.
And yet this week, there he was, cosying up to Bill Gates and ignoring Bush, normally a sound option, but in this case, Dubya was trying to get him to agree to lay off the human rights violations for a bit and China being so bloody huge, he couldn't even poke him in the eye with a sharp stick for saying no.
Yesterday he was off discussing oil with Africa. Who the hell does he think he is, Angelina Jolie?

An interesting statistic reported in the Guardian this week. It seems that the more daughters there are in a family, the more likely the family are to vote politically left. It seems that reason alone doesn't make people want to make society more equal, it takes the birth of a daughter. I shouldn't be cycnical about this. In China they give daughters away.

Yesterday, Anne sent me a link to the site on Hornby Island, BC where the world is watching a daddy eagle sitting on his ...?... eggs. CBC last night reported that one had hatched, but it turned out to be just a bit of fluff. If you want to watch with apparently, 3 million others worldwide, then here is the link.

I started in the Park and I'll finish there today. On one of the walks I took this week, pantomime squirrels teased me. Everytime I turned round and faced the children, squirrels gambolled behind them, whenever I pointed, the squirrels scurried away. This just kept happening until I wondered why the squirrels were messing with my head, but in retrospect I guess they just recognised the wavelength.