Island City

Richmond, according to its own posters and flags is an 'Island City by nature'. Well, yes, I kinda think they could have stopped before the 'by nature' myself, but that's just moi being picky.

So today I have been back doing training for the autumn programmes at the Nature Park. Of course they are 'Fall Programs' here. One of the programmes is about insects and other insect-like creatures and I have learned much. I already knew that what Canadians call a daddy longlegs is not the same as what we call one. For us Brits, the Crane Fly with its little wings and long dangly legs, like a creature designed for lower gravity than ours, is the Daddy Longlegs. Here, it's the Harvestman.
I didn't know that a woodlouse is a crustacean. Interesting huh? And a ladybird is actually a ladybird beetle, which the children here call a ladybug.

Later on we have a play called the 'Halloween Howl' in which I may get typecast as a witch, an understudy witch. I'm looking forward to this.

The other interesting situation in the Island City that has been ongoing since I arrived here, is the Firefighters' sexual harassment case. It seems that female firefighters finally had enough and took the department to court. The case has been reported in the national news, but locally of course, out of the woodwork have come a different type of bug, people who have written letters to the local press, some of them even spelt correctly, bad-mouthing these evil houris who are trying to take down the noble men of the fire department.
Sounds like something out of the 70's ? No kidding. Finally in this week's freesheet, the Mediator appointed to the case has ruled that there is so much evidence to support the women's case that he has declared it did take place and warning what would be the likely outcome if it were to be taken to full trial.
The whole thing pisses me right off really. Not only have these women had to suffer conditions at work that most people haven't had to put up with since the 70's, goodness knows how many women have been put off joining the fire department, but they have had to have a lot of guts to fight their corner and then been hounded by members of the public. What a crock. And you know what? I still found it amazing that they won their case, because so rarely do these things see justice.

I can't leave the 70's behind though without mentioning a British TV drama that is being shown on BBC Canada. So Brits will have maybe seen it at the beginning of the year and North Americans may not be able to see it at all.
'Life on Mars' caught our attention not because of the inaccurate (as it turns out) description of the series, but because one of the actors in it, John Simm, had been in another BBC series we had watched.
Simm plays a Detective Chief Inspector of police investigating a murder when he is mown down by a car travelling at light speed (that's what it looked like) and is sent back to the 70's. Except that he isn't, because that would be ridiculous, he is in a coma and he is working out the clues he has already gathered by sifting through his own subconscious, and in his mind he is in the 70s. But it does bring back a lot of uncomfortable memories about the 70s workplace.
I guess the women at the Firehall didn't have to watch a TV series to experience that. I hope they don't have to go through it again.