Score

My friend has succeeded in having a sexist advert removed from TV. 

Volkswagen ran an ad that showed a woman in labour being taken to hospital by her male partner. But the paramedic who meets them, is stunned by the amazing car they arrive in and both men are soon engrossed in car worship and ignore the woman. 

My friend filled in the complaints form on VW’s website, pointing out that they had trivialised an event which claims thousands of women’s lives every year. The reply she got was anodyne and grammatically toe-curling. I made a complaint on the website, pointing out that it was also sexist towards men. This is an offensive stereotype that suggests that men are all puerile cretins who don’t care about human life. The e-form barfed back one sentence at me and said this had a syntax error. Kevin said this just meant their server is fracked and you couldn’t really tell whether it was rejecting or giving a receipt. 

Next, my friend e-mailed them again and said that their response was unsatisfactory and that unless they told her they were removing the ad, by a certain date, she would be informing certain newspapers and media. She then received a swift reply saying that the ads were being pulled and that it would take a few days to remove them from all networks.

Booyah. Result, and a good one.

Nicely done.

Scheduling at the Schloss is hectic and for various reasons, I have had to go to the Static on Sunday afternoon and stay over until Monday.

I called in at the Market. A smallish child was hoverin by the pepperdew peppers as I was making towards them.

 ‘Are they very hot?’ She asked.

‘No,’ said I, ‘not at all, they’re quite sweet really.’ Then there was a moment when the unspoken thing hung in the air and we looked at each other.

‘Ok,’ said I, ‘I am British, we have a different scale,’

‘They’d blow my head off, wouldn’t they?’ she asked,

‘No, no, but….’

‘Maybe too much for a seven year-old?’

‘Yep.’

The Abbey

The temperature goes down, it goes up, and now, hopefully, it's back down a touche, Hurrah. Except that the number of road traffic accidents has become horrific. I suppose that's not so much temperature as weather related.

So, on the recommendation of just about everyone back in Blighty, we've started watching Downton Abbey, and I must say, I am rather enjoying it. Thought provoking. And it really holds the key to the English, I wouldn't like to say the British necessarily, but certainly the English.

I find it difficult to appreciate the gravity of the Amish 'haircut attcks'. I know, I know. But to compound it, the leader of the breakaway haircutters is called Sam Mullet.

Mercury's going retrograde now for two weeks. I'll try to stay calm.

Froideur

"I hear those sleigh bells ringing..." yep, already, outside of Superstore, the Sally Ann have stationed a Santa replete with bell.
Inside Superstore, an elderly lady was wearing a tiger-striped fun-fur hat with ears and dangly bits. I feel this is a stroke of genius, it makes seniors seem cute and lovable, which in fact many of them are. 

It's very cold right now, Janis cold. I actually had to put a coat and gloves on today - awesome.

Today, up at the crack of dawn to take Laurence to his forklift training, about a million miles away - a good fifty minute drive at any rate. We actually did watch day break and it was breathtakingly beautiful. Along Route 99, Bald Eagles were sitting in trees, enjoying the morning coldness.
Froideur.

Laurence now has a forklift licence. Good job laddie, made it well worth getting up at 6, driving across Surrey before the world was awake, and then down to chilly Washington State to rescue Kevin and Whisky.

First Snow

Yesterday morning we awoke to snow. Not deep snow, but a fair covering. Whisky was keen to investigate.
Me too.
Gone by this morning.

Crow Flying Backwards

Wild weather at the weekend, rain, torrential rain, get-your-ark-ready rain, and wind. Still windy today, bringing-down-trees wind. And crows flying backwards wind. Backwards flying crow - why isn't there a yoga pose called that? Maybe there is.

Finished 'The Elegance of the Hedgehog'. Alison Anderson, (translator) I did you wrong. The book has been re-translated into US English. I found this out thanks to the function on Amazon.co.uk where you can read inside the book. I searched for 'dime store psychology', the original translation said, 'amateur psychology'. I rest my case. It was a great book.

I'm liking US Prime Suspect. I like Maria Bello's Jane Timony, she's like an updated Christine Cagney, I loved Cagney and Lacey, but I'm peeved that it is called Prime Suspect. It has nothing to do with the original series.

Today was an excellent day, my day off, and Kevin took a day off so that we could spend the day together on our wedding anniversary. And we have had a fab day, doing really quite ordinary things, but together.

And we started the day watching telly in bed - the much recommended Downton Abbey. Excellent.

Rhizomes

Misleading actually, it has been raining a fair bit. Apparently it's going to rain a fair bit more too.

The World Economic Forum's Gender Gap Report for 2011 has just been published. The UK, USA and Canada are huddled together in 16th, 17th and 18th places respectively.
Sheer freaking disgrace for all three. And how is this disgrace being addressed? The usual lip service of course.

Yet two interesting pieces of research could inform us and allow a more spirited campaign to do something real about the situation. In June of this year, Science Daily summarised a study that showed how 'daily acts of subtle sexism' by both women and men, impact the lives of women. But when women were made aware of the 'unseen sexism', such as sexist language, they were more inclined to correct their behaviour, when men were made aware, they didn't see it per se as discriminatory, they needed an extra factor, such as empathy for women or certain women.

At the end of October, another study demonstrated a clear and strong link between the sexism exhibited by individuals and the extent of the gender gap in the society in which those individuals live. Jigsaw pieces falling into place? The subtle and often unseen sexism that is daily perpetuated by individuals, is self-reinforcing and reflected in the size of the gender gap.

Until we properly address what too many think of as 'pet peeves' and annoying whinges rather than the rhizomes of what become human rights issues, this gap will not close. And whilst men have privilege in those three western societies that should be shamefacedly shuffling their feet right now, the reality is that not all men benefit from that Patriarchy. The men who are important in our lives, lovers, sons, fathers, friends, are for the most part good men, good and supportive men who are also the losers in a system where a minority shit on the rest.
This is something that can be achieved by ordinary people for ordinary people.

So why don't we do it?

Twenty-five Hour Day

The clocks have gone back. It's nice to have that extra hour in the morning, but also confusing, in spite of the fact that most of the clocks change automatically.

But then when I took Whisky for his teatime walk, the sun was already setting. The sky was clear and denim blue, kissed with pink at the treeline. The almost full moon was already visible and the colour of platinum.

This weekend we stayed in Canada. Yesterday I had a day of really interesting workshops at a not-particularly local college. Today I pottered, getting my energy channels cleared by doing routine taks that had needed doing for too long. Therapeutic, good. Good for me in any case.

First Frost

Although I don't like that I have to drive to work, there are mornings, like today, when it is compensated by the sheer, jaw-dropping beauty of the mountains and the fields, and the mist and sparkle. It makes the soul soar. Intense.

One of the local mountains had snow, Snowvember? We'll see.

This week's expression de la semaine (see what I did there?) 'not in your/my/her/his wheelhouse'. An odd expression.

November

November.

So, Greece, what a freaking mess, huh? 'Backstabbing, skullduggery and political intrigue...' Well I never. And the formerly rioting citizenry think they are being blackmailed into agreeing to their country being rescued by the EU. Difficult to find any wronged party in it all.

Yesterday I discovered I was eligible for a free flu jab on account of being on blood pressure meds. The pharmacist seemed happy to have a customer, even one getting something for nothing. He offered me a lollipop, I declined, natch.

The Brompton Mix have an agent. Rock and Roll lads, rock and roll.

Samhain

Quarter past six, standing in the dark, watching the film of cloud drift gently over the morning stars. The last morning of October. My routine blood tests were due this month, so that's where I was.

 And the day has turned into a spectacular one, clear skies, and wind that makes me feel part of everything and a strong need to recite,
'O wild, west wind, thou breath of Autumn's being...' and I did. Whisky was dead impressed, so were the trees and the birds. On the phone, later, Alex listened to my recitation and humoured me. Only seven hours between here and there this week, the veil is thinner than usual.


Brightest blessings for Samhain.

At the Static

A weekend at the Static, yes, a weekend. I had Saturday off to make up for working an extra day earlier in the month. AND...a weekend when miraculously, we have internet. This hasn't happened since spring. Makes a difference. You think you want to step outside of the worldwide web, but only until you can't get back in.



I am reading a book that is very enjoyable apart from the sloppy translation that sends us back to the fifties. 'The Elegance of the Hedgehog' is an amazing read, but the gendered language of French does not need to be translated so literally into the ungendered English language. Yes, I know I could probably read it in the original and be less annoyed, but I didn't want to wait three months to have a copy couriered by tortoise from France.



'Flavorwire' (sic) gives us ten U.S. sitcoms that moved women forward. Of course, they are just that, sitcoms, and there are other shows, such as Cagney and Lacey, that really did the business. There are even other sitcoms that showed women as able to think for themselves, such as 'Cybill' and that leads nus right back to Britcoms such as Ab Fab, Girl on Top and The Vicar of Dibley that did the same. There are still programs that get it almost right, Bones for example, but then when you look at this season's offerings,  sometimes women seem so peripheral to everything, you'd think we lived in a different realm, oh wait.....



And at least in the UK, that isn't going to get much better, since 'Bird's Eye View',  a festival that screens films by women, has had to be cancelled due to funding cuts.



British TV presenter, Eamonn Holmes (Irish, but works on British TV), ended an interview with a rape victim who had the presence of mind to deliberately leave evidence at the scene of the crime, the rapist's car, by saying to her, 'well I hope you take taxis now.' Yes, yet again, blame the victim Eamonn, well done, not. Sometimes you've just got to wonder how the person gets the job.

After Dark

Monday night, Skytrain downtown. Walking to my friend's house, Vancouver after dark. City of tents outside the Art Gallery - Occupy Vancouver, the denizens high on something and righteous indignation.

Firefighters practising climbing a ladder while waiting for something to go wrong. Face it, they get called when something goes wrong, but meanwhile send the lads and lasses up high steps into the dark.

A pair of well-fed skunks amble along the pavement, snuffle in the undergrowth. They go undisturbed, people see the stripe, white against the darkness and skirt around them. Not fierce, this pair, they look fluffy and adorable, but when frightened, oh, no-one wants to go there.

Turning onto my friend's street, a dog approaches, on a lead, but with a bicycle's rear light attached to its collar, blinking red as the dog takes its owner for a walk, it too sniffing the foliage.

An ordinary evening in the city that never snores.

Colonel Who?

Who knew that Gadafi's first name wasn't 'Colonel'? Why didn't Noah Webster try to change the spelling of 'Colonel'?
Was Colonel Gadafi actually Fatima Whitbread?
I think we should be told.

When I took Whisky for his walk after I got home from work, three young men were quite openly smoking the stinkiest weed I'd ever smelt. Of course, even living in BC, my experience isn't extensive, but this did smell very strongly. That in itself doesn't warrant comment, but the fact was that each of them then got into a different car and drove off. Kevin had told me the same thing had happened yesterday. If it happens tomorrow, people will be informed.

Bees, Birthday, Band

Finally the leaves.

On Saturday I went to a fundraising event for work. There was a great talk on native bees. I don't understand the passive-aggressive response of some women.
Just like when I used to play Betty Bee, many of the women whooped and clapped when the speaker described the envisceration of the male bees after mating. Alright, not really that passive. Why, in this society, will women still accept being addressed as though they don't exist, and yet they will revel in such detail? Again, when laid out like that, the two do seem to go together.

This has been a week of meetings. Just two, but every evening counts.

My sister's birthday today.

Last Friday, Ben's band played at Indig02, and reports were that it was an amazing gig. Still no video up on YouTube. Their next gig is playing for the after show party of Liam Gallagher's new band.
Rock and roll.

All Over the Map

See if you can do this, I readily admit I was pretty poor at Geography at school, but I think this is more politics than Geography, and it still took me a while.

During the course of my researches today, I discovered this little piece of distress. If you remind women that breast cancer is a disease that predominantly affects women, then they are less likely to donate to cancer research, if you make it more gender neutral by, ooh, disassociating it from the colour pink, then they are more inclined to donate. Yes, women hate being reminded that they are women. Either that, or secretly, they really do hate pink. The men who love them are far more forgiving though.

Harvest Thanksgiving

After a cool, wet spring, and then a cool, wet early summer, followed by six weeks of endless sunshine, the trees have been late changing colour, which they finally, now, have done, or I should say, are doing. There are some coral pinks and dark reds out there, even a few golds from the Cottonwoods, but it's a fairly lazy turn this year.  

I came up from the Static on Sunday morning because I was reading in church. There were a couple of typos in mine, and God seemed to be issuing decrees, commands and statues. Now, given that a fair proportion of our congregation probably do still think of God as an elderly gentleman, the random presentation of statues would be in keeping with the ageing process. And it made me wonder - because some of the other readers would simply have read what was written on the page - whether God's mysterious ways may indeed seem more geriatric than mystical. 

The Schloss's own harvest has been sparse this year. (The picture is not representative).
We have a number of late-ripening tomatoes, both red and yellow, a massive amount of parsley, and likewise of lavender. But we live in a place and time where my own lack of success in the garden has not impacted my family's ability to obtain food, and for this I thank my Goddesses.

I know we live in a privileged society where there is no cause for anyone to starve, and yet people still do go hungry because whilst we pay lip service to all people being equal, when push comes to shove, we don't really believe it. We like to blame, somewhere deep inside, we buy into the concept of the 'undeserving poor'.
We mentally point a finger at street people, drug addicts, people with mental health issues and reassure ourselves that we are righteous, we do the right things not to be like them, and thus condemn them through our disregard.

At this time of Harvest Thanksgiving, where is our concern for humanity, where is mine? When I think about the contempt for the Earth, for the Environment, for the health and welfare of the other travellers through space and time, I realise the importance of the long, dark, teatime of the soul. Because whilst we're feeding our faces, are we starving our souls?

Orb

Kevin says it's a raindrop on the lens, I say it's something supernatural or otherworldly. It totes wasn't the moon.

Driving to work is something I haven't had to do for a very long time. Actually, I can't remember ever having to drive to work, but there must have been a time. Mostly, I'm going in the opposite direction from the majority of the traffic, but Tuesday night I was forced to do a long stretch of the road in second because there had been an accident involving 'a police cruiser and a truck carrying cranberries'. So very specific to our area at this time of year.

Kev and Whisky are down at the Static, Kev having taken a couple of extra days off before the long weekend. Even I get this Saturday, in lieu of Monday, which is the Harvest Thanksgiving holiday.  Of course, some of the harvest was spilt on the slip road to the Queensborough bridge.
To whom do Atheists give thanks?
Hmmm....

Waxing Moon

October. Luvvly.

Saturday after work, I drove down to the Static and thence to see Kev's folks. Cousin from Spain was there. Apparently  peanut butter is in short supply there. And why shouldn't it be? Much as I like a bit of beurre d'arachide meself, I'm sure the Spanish have more exotic things to spread on their pan.

Sunday, one glorious day of rest, swimming toute seule, since it's way too cold for anyone else to be doing lengths outdoors. Again, apparently.

Yesterday, Vancouver for a seminar followed by an evening seminar. The evening one was excellent.

I feel that Facebook is getting bossy. It e-mailed me to tell me I was missing all sorts of updates from my friends. Rookie mistake. What they should have said was, 'In the time it takes for you to read this fatuous e-mail,you could have checked out your friends' status updates.'

Yeah, well, quod non erat demonstrandum.

Casino Blah

Two mornings ago, a day when I had two classes arriving for a programme first thing, and another in the afternoon, there was a fatal motorcycle crash just outside the entrance to where I work. The police had a long stretch of road leading up to it cordoned off for most of the day, so I got to learn a new back way that I would never have thought existed. Live and learn. Except for the motorcyclist who was pronounced dead at the scene. The thought of that haunted me, someone's child, lover, parent, probably going to work first thing in the morning, and never returning.

Today, I had to go to collect my renewed Permanent Resident card from somewhere in the over-priced bowels of Vancouver. Actually, more like the appendix.
The young man at the counter asked me why I hadn't yet applied for citizenship, since I was illegible. Yep, he said that, he didn't say eligible, he said, illegible.
Remembering I was in Canada, I swallowed back the sharp reply, smiled sweetly, and said I was going to get onto it straight away. And I will, since Kevin keeps reminding me and it will make crossing the border easier still.

I went from there to YVR to update the information on my NEXUS card. The skytrain goes right into the airport, it's well thought out.
A German tourist who was trying to buy a ticket from the machine, asked me if I could split a $50 note. Again I swallowed back my sharp reply and simply told him I didn't have any cash. This was true, and I rarely have as much as $50 on me.

Coming back to Richmond, you have to change at the station that overlooks the Casino. This is the most painless train change I can imagine, you simply step across the platform and an electronic reader board tells you that the next train will arrive in 4 minutes. Done.
The Casino, sorry, Casino Resort, boasts all sorts of facilities, also increases the crime in the area by a factor of something like 500%.
There is some kind of entertainment place there where tired old celebs whose names we've all long since forgotten, come to earn their crust. Forthcoming attractions include Mitzi Gaynor and Matt Goss.
I rest my case.

Rain and Telly

Monday, and madre mia is it wet. Wet and blustery. And my day off. Whisky and I were scheduled for walkies but it was rained off. I have seen some quite astonishing driving today.

We watched the first episode of the US version of Prime Suspect. It has Maria Bello as Helen Mirren's character. Of course, Maria Bello is exceptionally good, but Helen Mirren she ain't. And I guess that Mirren's Jane Tennyson and Bello's Jane Timoney are quite different characters. The premiss of the US version seems to be a woman detective trying to be accepted in amongst a bunch of male detectives. Now, whilst inequality in the workplace due to gender are most certainly alive and kicking, the extent of the hostility in Prime Suspect, really does seem to be more a mark of the 70s. I dunno. Another police drama, but I think it's playing too heavily on the name. We'll see, I'll give it a few more episodes.

We also watched Bridesmaids, which I enjoyed, but I felt that rumours of the inherent feminism were rather over-hyped. Maya Rudolph's character's wedding was still being paid for by daddy, and I do mean daddy, not parents. It was fun, but it wasn't the sensation I'd been led to believe. Melissa McCarthy was undoubtedly the unintended star though.