The Seated View

Twelve years ago, I went with Janne to pick up her new baby, a tiny tabby kitten. The kitten was named Jag and grew into a gorgeous cat, with long striped fur and sooty back legs. Jag has been my sister's faithful companion through the past 12 years, a constant presence when life upended and changed, at her side through it all. Jag was always Janne's cat and then he met John, who set out to win him over. And did so with charm, playtime and treats and in the end, Jag was Janne and John's cat. My sister’s first baby has been sick for a long time and was cared for with love and devotion, until the most loving act was to end his suffering. This morning, Jaggy was given peace. We will miss him. (photo by a JagParent)

It appears that after merely a few days of puttering about doiung whatever I wanted has resulted in me going feral, as Stephanie calls it. It occurred to me this morning that it was Thursday - don't laugh; awareness of what day it is was a huge step towards civilization - and that I have a blog that might be in need of updating, what with regular posting being sort of the point with a blog. However, said burgeoning glimmer of a possible return to real life is not yet large enough to actually... y’know, write something. Instead, I present the Tinks at Christmas (click on pictures for larger version). Liam is developing his flirting skills, while Morgan channelled her inner hamster. It was nice to see my mother's floor strewn with toys and playing children (the one in the middle is Ken ). When I say that Janne and John wrangle the twins, I wasn't kidding. Tissue paper was a big hit. Morgan made confetti (lots and lots of very tiny confetti) and Liam liked waving it about...

Every December, I'm reminded more so than usual of my roots. We may celebrate the same holiday on both sides of the pond, but we do so in very different ways and several times each December, someone will ask me to tell them about Christmas in Denmark. And so, I tell stories of waking up in the early morning as a child, during a time of year where it is dark about 18 hours a day - a kind of darkness unparalleled by anything I've experienced in Canada. I tell stories of eating my cornflakes while the advent candle burns down another day, of watching the Christmas calendar on Danish TV - every year, they make a different one and it's such a big deal that the entire country grinds to a halt at 6:30 p.m. to watch it. There are Danish Christmas lunches, with endless smorgasbords and equally endless supply of alcoholic beverages - they last hours and effectively shut down workplaces for the remainder of the day. We make Christmas ornaments - braided hearts, garlands and other ...

When I did my undergraduate degree, I had a bit of a reputation for being radical (so I discovered later). There were a bunch of political stickers on the back of my wheelchair and I possessed some fairly left-leaning opinions (I know – big surprise). The radical bit surprised me - when I lived in Denmark, I wasn't very ‘political’. Which means, I had opinionated stickers on the back of my chair, impassioned debates and even attended a demonstration or two. I remember one of them very fondly - it was an evening demonstration, early in December. The snow was falling and we marched through the dark streets of Copenhagen carrying torches - it was beautiful. (And for the smartasses among you, no. there were no pitchforks and no, we didn't burn the monster) But in comparison to many of my peers, that wasn’t very politically active. Later, in Canada, I was always somewhat involved in 'the disability thing'. It was a subject of interest - not the only subject ...

What is it with the spam these days? In the past couple of months, I have received more spam than I have in my entire computing career (and I started in 1991). I am inundated, everyday receiving at least 50 spam messages and I was getting worried that I might miss actual real e-mail in the frenzy of hitting the 'delete' key. Then I updated my darling Internet security program ( TrendMicro’s PC-cillin, easily the best and most unobtrusive antivirus/anti-spyware program I've ever used) and am madly in love. The wonderful and talented people at TrendMicro have added an antispam function, which installed itself in my Outlook Express and takes care of 95% of the spam I get. Woo-hoo! I saw a clip from a talking heads program discussing the movie Happy Feet . The 'journalist' - and I use the term loosely - asked her guest if it wasn't clear that, what with the message about being accepted and happy with you who you are (hardly ever seen in kids movies, y’...

I never liked sweets much. Let me rephrase that, as it sounds as if I didn’t like candy. As a child (and still), I did/do like candy, but not the sweet kind. I went for the sour, the salty, the licorice that rips off the top layer of skin in your mouth (yum) and growing up in Denmark, I was lucky because there are an awful lot of those kinds of candy. It works for fruit, too - I love oranges, clementines, have been known to actually eat pieces of lemons for the fun of it (not often here in northern climes, but my first California lemon was an almost religious experience) and things like papaya, mango and ripe bananas are... Well, you don't want to see the face I make. In terms of chocolate - I adore dark chocolate, the darker the better, but back in the old country, even milk chocolate was pretty darn good. Moving to Canada was a shock for the taste buds. There are many wonderful things about North America, but dear god(s) in heaven, you people can't make chocol...

I like watching movies more than once. Mind you, not all movies are worthy of repeatedly spending a few hours in their company, but there are some that I usually end up buying and watching once a year or so. While 'on vacation' at mor's, we watched a couple of older favorites that both sent me wandering down memory lane. The Hunt for Red October . What's not to like? It's got a young, very hot Alec Baldwin and an even hotter Sean Connery (what is it with that man? Every woman I know, regardless of age, would happily... erm... 'spend an evening in his company') and a nailbiter of a plot that gets me every single time. After watching this movie more times that I can remember, I know exactly what's going to happen, can even quote certain lines of dialogue, yet it keeps me on the edge of my seat, happily worrying about the outcome until the end. The first time I saw this movie was on a first date with a man I was quite infatuated with -...

I have a theory. I'm not sure if it actually qualifies as a conspiracy theory worthy of investigation by the X-Files, but let's pretend, shall we? This particular theory requires an excursion into both politics and religion and I gotta admit, there’s part of me that’s a little nervous about that, as these topics can make for some irate flaming in the comment box, but we’re all civilized creatures here, right? So, with no further ado (or trepidation), here goes. In September, when his recent trip to Turkey had already been planned, Pope Benedict XVI made a speech at a university somewhere in Germany in which he quoted a 14th-century Byzantine emperor by the name of Manuel II Paleologus as saying "[s]how me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached". Naturally, many Muslims found this offensive, as did many non-Muslims - myself among them. I live in...