By Adam Hooper

World AIDS Day display at Carleton University. Photo: Britt Harvey

A new Canadian report released in time for World AIDS Day reveals that HIV, the virus that leads to the AIDS, continues to spread throughout Canada and particularly in Ottawa, where infection rates are the second-highest in the country.

The report – released in advance of World AIDS Day on Dec. 1 – estimates 65,000 Canadians were HIV-positive by the end of 2008, a 14.7 per cent increase over 2005’s count of 57,000.

The incidence of infection in Ottawa is much higher than in the rest of Canada and is climbing faster. The Ontario Public Health Agency confirmed over 3,000 infections in Ottawa by 2007 and added another 165 diagnoses in 2008. And those are just the known cases.

“On average there are about two new HIV infections in Ottawa per week,” said Jay Koornstra, executive director of Bruce House, an organization which provides housing, care and support to people living with HIV and AIDS in Ottawa.

“We’re really far under-serving people living with HIV-AIDS in this city,” said Koornstra. Bruce House offers support services to 35 homes, but there are still 250 infected people on the waiting list. Many are couch-surfing or hiding their status from the people they live with.

The higher incidence of HIV cases disguises some good news. According to the report, part of the reason for the higher infection rate is that people with the disease are living longer. But it also estimated that 16,900 Canadians don’t know they are infected with HIV.

“More and more people are infected by people who publicly don’t know they’re HIV-positive,” said Koornstra.

And some don’t want to know. Koornstra pointed out that many people who suspect they have HIV are afraid to get tested.

“The repercussions of being tested are very real,” he said, citing concerns over people being jailed for not disclosing their status to their partners, or being turned out of their homes after telling the people they live with.

“We’re still dealing with stigma and discrimination,” said Monique Doolittle-Romas, executive director of the Canadian AIDS Society, which advocates on behalf of people affected by HIV.

World AIDS Day, said Doolittle-Romas, is a moment to stop, think, and work towards a world without AIDS. To mark the occasion, her organization handed 300 red AIDS ribbons to MPs and senators. Doolittle-Romas hopes the ribbons worn in Parliament on Dec. 1 will spread awareness of the disease.

“We need to talk about it on a regular basis,” she said. “We still have a lot of work to do around education.”

By Mark Brownlee

Carleton Health and Counselling Services (HCS). Photo: Meghan Potkins

As final exams and term papers loom, Carleton students aren’t just skipping class. They’re not showing up for their H1N1 vaccination appointments, either.

Roughly 30 people failed to show up at the university clinic Monday, representing about 25 per cent of the total appointments booked, Carleton health officials said.

The clinic was met with high demand from the university community when registration opened last Thursday. All of the roughly 500 spots were filled only hours after booking began.

Unlike H1N1 vaccination clinics run by Ottawa Public Health, Carleton’s clinics are by appointment only. University students, staff and faculty were to register for a given day and then show up between 2  and 5 p.m. on that day.

“It’s the first time we’ve used a registration system. Normally, we just let people come on a first-come, first-served kind of thing,” said Maureen Murdock, director of health and counseling services at the school.

City vaccination clinics use a wristband system to cut down on wait times. Those looking to get the vaccine go to the clinic to pick up a wristband, which establishes their place in line, then show up later to get their shot.

A huge thank you to everyone who voted for our Aviva funding proposal. The campaign was a publicity success but we did not secure enough votes to qualify for the semi-finals. Happily, some other great proposals did qualify!

Because of your support, we generated substantial publicity for the Ottawa Theatre Network and Ottawa professional theatre. Most importantly, our message was heard by people in the wider community, they listened, and they cared because you did!

Thank you for your effort and support! You are the engine of growth for Ottawa professional theatre and you made a difference.

Let’s continue to make a difference by talking about Ottawa theatre whenever we can! Check out What’s On – À l’affiche and enjoy some Ottawa theatre this week!

P.s. We will be announcing the details for an informal meet and greet very soon. Stay tuned!

Students were asked to 'air out their dirty laundry' at a sexual assault task force meeting last month. Four of the students who wrote on clothing at the meeting said they had been sexually assaulted by someone who still goes to school at Carleton. Photo courtesy of Coalition for a Carleton Sexual Assault Centre.

By Kim Mackrael

After two years of student lobbying, Carleton University says it is prepared to consider a proposal for the creation of a sexual assault centre on campus.

“The sexual assault centre has always been a possibility,” Carleton president Roseann Runte said in an email Monday.

But Runte’s statement contrasts with what student groups have characterized as strong resistance to the centre on the grounds that it could be bad publicity for the school.

“I cannot emphasize enough how much of a shift this is from [the administrations’] previous attitude that the centre was just not going to happen,” said Julie Lalonde, co-founder of the Coalition for a Sexual Assault Centre.

Runte’s comments came one week after the university’s equity services department posted a notice on its website asking for student feedback on the school’s sexual assault services and stating that a student-run sexual assault centre “will be included in our review“ of services.

The notice is the first public reference to a sexual assault centre by university administrators since the idea received overwhelming student support in a January 2008 referendum run by Carleton’s graduate and undergraduate student councils.

In September 2007, a student was sexually assaulted while working late in a Carleton chemistry lab. The high profile case and subsequent lawsuit have landed the school in the media several times, most recently for a Carleton statement of defence alleging that the student failed to properly look out for her own safety.

Lalonde said her group was told the school would not consider a sexual assault centre because of the potential for additional bad publicity.

But Runte said any hesitation from her administration about creating a sexual assault centre was based on the need for a careful evaluation of all options, not a concern about the school’s image.

“In addition to space and funding considerations, we want to make sure that whatever we might offer would be [a] best practice and be equipped to meet the need it is intended to serve,” Runte said.

“We already offer on campus a number of support services that complement those offered by the City of Ottawa.”

She added that Carleton has spent more than $1.6 million on campus security in recent years for cameras, lights, emergency telephones and the school’s new emergency notification system.

Linda Capperauld, the school’s director of equity services, said she thinks the administration’s message was misunderstood by the coalition.

“We have some really interested students who want the best services possible,” Capperauld said. “Sometimes not all the communication gets through.”

“What we want is whatever is going to be best for Carleton. The issue of sexual assault is a public issue, we all know it exists and we’re not going to hide our heads in the sand. It’s all about finding out what’s best for Carleton.”

The University of Alberta established its own sexual assault centre in 1993. Director Kris Fowler said her staff and volunteers see about 150 new clients each year, in addition to the centre’s prevention and outreach services.

Fowler said she is concerned that emergency systems like the ones Carleton has put in place don’t recognize the reality that most sexual assaults are committed by someone the victim knows.

“My frustration is that that kind of funding and money going towards those measures is limited in the types of sexual assaults it can address,” Fowler said. “An acquaintance sexual assault happening in residence isn’t going to change with blue phones and lighting.”

And while there are sexual assault support services off-campus in Edmonton, both Lalonde and Fowler said many students just don’t venture that far away from campus, especially during a crisis.

“You have to know to call or email to find out where the centre is, make an appointment, find the place,” Lalonde said. “People don’t do it. People at the [city centres] are rarely students, and it’s not because students don’t need the services.”

Carleton’s review is expected to last throughout the academic year and will likely involve a series of meetings with interested students and staff and communication with other university initiatives.

Capperauld said she hopes to present a recommendation to senior administration before students leave campus in April 2010.

For more information or to get involved with the discussion on sexual assault services, visit equity services’ sexual assault awareness campaign announcement.

Good news for fans of semi-pro baseball.  The Ottawa Citizen is reporting that City of Ottawa staffers are recommending keeping the former Lynx Stadium — known in a former life as JetForm Park — and using it for baseball.  This of course makes it a lot easier to lure prospective baseball clubs to Capital City, which would be a good thing seeing as the Ottawa Lynx and the Rapidz both went belly-up and The Ottawa Voyageurs never happened.

The challenge of course is finding a minor league that has something to gain by expanding into Canada, if they are American, or finding a Canadian league that wants a team in the Capital.

And while we’re at it, maybe someone could spin straw into gold.

But I would love to see baseball come back to Ottawa.  I used to play and coach and even though people say it’s boring (compared to the fast-pace of hockey) I think it’s a great game and nothing beats an evening at the ballpark.  After all, the city is large enough now to support one, and as long as the team does well, the seats will be filled.  Right?

The human nose is miraculous. It is a complex organ of smell. In fact, one percent of human genes are devoted to olfaction; smell was central to our evolution over the past seven million years.

The main role of smell is to protect humans from decaying foods and poisons. Foods that are indigestible tend to smell woody or musky and are made up of large molecules. Edible foods, on the other hand, have low molecular weights, which can be processed by our digestive enzymes.

The primary role of scent is not about sex.

Interestingly, the exact way the nose works; that is, the way we smell is not fully understood. Scientists know that there are receptor neurons continually shooting axons or neutral connecting wires up to the olfactory bulb – the brain’s control centre for smell.

There are at least 1,000 different receptors in the human nose that are able to distinguish between some 10,000 different molecules.

There are 112 known types of atoms. The human nose can detect most scent molecules because they are made up of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and sulfur.

Humans sneeze in order to shed viruses and things trying to get inside us.

When we breathe through our nose, we tend to breathe through only one side of it for a while, then for a while through the other side. The erectile tissue lining our nasal cavity only works one passage at a time. This is called the nasal cycle. 

Smell information from the right side of the nasal passage is sent to the left side of the brain and vice versa. Incidentally, when you breathe from the left nasal passage your verbal skills increase significantly. 

Women have a better sense of smell than men and it lasts longer. As humans age we experience a loss of smell. Epileptics show considerable smell loss. And loss of smell is one of the first symptoms of the onset of Parkinson’s disease.

The loss of the sense of smell is known as anosmic.

An atom is made up of a cloud of electrons frenetically orbiting a hard core of protons and neutrons. All molecules pulse with vibrations. Those vibrations are the result of the electron string holding them together. In essence, molecules act like a musical instrument. Each one emits its own unique set of vibration notes.

Until about 10 years ago, scientists believed that the human nose was able to discern the scent of a molecule based solely from its shape.

In the late 1990s a biophysicist named Dr Luca Turin put forward a theory on the way the human nose functions – it caused quit a buzz in the science community.

Turin used his obsession with perfume to redefine how the human nose functioned. He devised a scale of molecular vibration ranging between 0 and 4,000, or the number of times an electron bounced back and forth as it bonded one atom to another.  Within just a few vibrations a molecule can either smell of shoe leather or rose tea or shrimp shells.

Turin proposed that as the molecules entered the nose, electrons are met by microscopic electrical protein receptors, embedded in nasal flesh, and that the receptor holds the molecule and reads its vibration, not its shape.

Years of experimentation, tens of thousands of smells later and about a decade since the theory was first presented, it’s finally starting to be accepted. 

The scent of Tide laundry detergent, Clorox bleach, Calvin Klein, Channel, L’Oreal and Miyake all come from five huge corporations: International Flavors and Fragrances, Givaudan Roure, Firmenich, Takasago, and Symrise. It is a $25 billion per annum industry.

Armies of organic chemists create between 500 and 2,000 different new molecules at each company per year. About 20 interesting and strong molecules per company are used each year for a host of new products.

To me there is nothing as remarkable as natural scents of wild forests. My favorite pungent scent comes from the peppermint leaves of colossal montane Eucalyptus delegatensis or woollybutts of the Australian Victorian Alps.

SAVE THE HONEYBEES http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6w-Z7XlnHI

Dr Reese Halter is a conservation biologist, public speaker and founder of the international conservation institute Global Forest Science. His most recent book is The Incomparable Honeybee and the Economics of Pollination http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=The+Incomparable+HoneyBee+reese+halter&x=0&y=0 He can be reached through http://DrReese.com

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Hello. I’m still here. Barely. Last weekend was full of  busy fun. It was full of knitting, book club, cookie swapping, Christmas wrapping and novel-writing.

On Thursday, I took another class at Wabi Sabi to learn how to knit mittens. I have to say, mittens are probably my favorite thing to knit so far. They are much easier knit than socks and I find that I can see results quickly. Carole was mentioned that socks was her thing that she always has in her purse. I think mittens will be mine. I’m so happy with the way that mine are turning out. I can’t wait to make my next pair. (will post pictures soon)

This weekend was my first cookie swap. Have you ever done one before. It’s really fun. Everyone makes a plate of Christmas baking, brings it over to someone’s house, put the plates out to nibble on and then towards the end of the evening, you go around and take samples from each tin for yourself. I think I took too much of Amy’s. Thanks Amy. I promise, we’ll eat them all.

In other news, I’ve managed to kill all of my indoor plants. Not because I didn’t water them, I did water them. I think it’s that we don’t have much day light in our place right now. They didn’t survive very well without this light. I look at this as a learning experience, leave the plants outside.

At the A&J household, we’ve also decided to not do our advent calendar this year. I’m a little disappointed about this, but I’m afraid that our schedule’s this month would be accommodating to any extra activities. I think we’re still going to do as much Christmassy stuff as possible, but it won’t be a day-by-day thing.

I’m jealous of all you mommy bloggers doing the advent calendar. Have fun doing it this year.

Je viens de voir une entrevue entre François Paradis et Richard Cléroux sur le sénat canadien.  C’est difficile de croire que les sénateurs soient toujours  nommés à Ottawa  pour un salaire de 132,000$/an pour 60 jours de travail par année, et que certains trouvent le moyen d’y aller seulement 2 ou 3 jours par année.

Dire que les sénateurs sont en fonction jusqu’à l’âge 75 ans, et souvent quand on a la possibilité de les voir au travail à la télé, plusieurs d’entre-eux sont souvent en train de dormir.

Il serait peut-être plus que temps, que Stephen Harper fasse ce qu’il a toujours dit, c’est-à-dire mettre le sénat élu pour une période de 4 ans, et que pour le salaire qu’ils gagnent, qu’ils travaillent plus de 60 jours par année.

Greetings arts enthusiasts!

Last week I was at the grocery store and overheard the song “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” on the sound system. Guess it’s that time again! Now I realize that many people embrace Christmas time and savour every snowfall, while other people despise the very mention of the holiday season. So I’ve divided this month’s newsletter into two sections: Christmas time joyful activities, and other stuff to distract the Grinches.

Have fun!

HOLIDAY JOY

December – January
Eddie May Murder Mysteries presents “And To All a Good Knife”
http://www.eddiemay.com

Just when I started talking about Yuletide joy, Eddie May goes and puts a knife through it! Experience interactive dinner theatre with some of Ottawa’s funniest performers, including newcomers Sterling Lynch and Michelle Leblanc. You can catch the show at the Velvet Room, or at the National Arts Centre; there’s also a show called “Survive This!” on tour.

December 3 to 19
The Gladstone presents “The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen’s Guild Dramatic Society’s Production of a Christmas Carol”
http://thegladstone.ca/

Speaking of hilarious theatre, this one should be a hoot. A misfit group of ladies decide to mount A Christmas Carol, and things go horribly, horribly wrong. Features a great collection of local talent, including Kristina Watt, Colleen Sutton, and Chris Ralph. The Gladstone will be holding a food drive for families in need, so bring your canned goods to the show!

December 5
Tarts and Crafts Holiday Edition
http://www.ottawakiosk.com/event/tartsandcraft.html

Avoid the crowded malls… and hit up the crowded craft sales! But seriously, Tarts and Crafts has locally made, creative, original gifts for the whole family; you’ll be pleasantly surprised at the variety. Get there early to get the good stuff!

Thursday, December 7
Musica Viva Singers “Vespers and Carols”
http://musica-viva.pinetree.org/

Highly recommended by Brian Carroll and Barb Popel, this Christmas concert in the Glebe features Mozart’s sublime Solemn Vespers (note: not actually solemn at all!) and many other works, as well as a special appearance by the Harmonia Choir of Ottawa.

December 8 to 26
The NAC English Theatre presents “A Christmas Carol”
http://nac-cna.ca/en/theatre/0910/christmascarol/

Knowing director Peter Hinton, this will be A Christmas Carol like you’ve never seen it before. With Stephen Ouimette as Ebenezer Scrooge and local actors Kris Joseph, Matt Miwa, and John Koensgen, you can expect great things with this production. Also, this is the first time we’ll be seeing a performance from the National Arts Centre Resident Company; this company has been in the making for some time, so I’m looking forward to seeing how it pans out.

Sunday, December 13
Arts Court presents a “Holiday Helping of Christmas Soup” starring Jen Gould
http://www.artscourt.ca/

Children, aged two to six and their adult accompaniment, will delight in some of Juno award winning Jen Gould’s best-loved tunes, and may experience a Winter Wonderland after the show. I do realize that most of my readers aren’t between the ages of two and six, but sometimes kids’ activities are just what we need at Christmas time!

Tuesday, December 15
Ottawa International Children’s Festival presents “Angel Square”
http://ottawachildrensfestival.ca/

Check out this special performance fundraiser for the Children’s Festival, the second-annual staged reading of Brian Doyle’s Angel Square, adapted and directed by Ottawa writer-director Janet Irwin. This performance features actors Todd Duckworth, Mary Ellis, Andy Massingham, Sara McVie and Alix Sideris, CBC Radio’s Alan Neal, and a group of Canterbury High School students.

REGULAR JOY

December 1 to 2
Pixie Cram film trilogy release: Nature and Technology
http://artengine.ca/pixiecram/factory

The Nature and Technology trilogy will be screened in its entirety for the first time at Club SAW, and include themes of cyborgs, cloning, and artificial intelligence, with a focus on the natural world and questions of human creation and responsibility. Set in rural locations, the films are also linked by a sense of isolation and mystery.

December 2 to 5
MiCasa Theatre presents “Countries Shaped Like Stars” vs. “Inclement Weather”
http://micasatheatre.com/

Both these crowd-favourites sold out at this year’s Ottawa Fringe Festival, and now they’re back for a short run at the Irving Greenberg Theatre Centre before touring across the country in January. Whimsical and playful with elements of clown, these productions showcase the many talents of performers Nic DiGaetano and Emily Pearlman. Bring the kids!

December 6
Komi Olaf’s exhibit “Angels of Music”
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=164452035965&ref=ts

Spoken word performer / visual artist Komi Olaf captures various Iconic Musicians through an artistic translation of portraiture. The exhibition will open at the National Arts Centre- Salon and will run throughout the month of December at the Ottawa Public Library. The paintings are accompanied with music from Dj Memetic and Musk Ox.

Saturday, December 12
GuerillaLIVE Sin+Innocence
http://getguerilla.ca

Guerilla Magazine and The Loft salon on Elgin Street invite you to a sinfully innocent night out to celebrate in high style. Don’t miss the launch of Guerilla #22 online and in print!

Wednesday, December 16
Dipna Horra in “The Colonial Times”
http://www.dipnahorra.com/
http://www.ottawafocus.com/events/The+Colonial+Times+-+Dipna+Horra.aspx

Check out this intimate sound installation where a teapot, a tea cup and a table tell stories of migration from multitalented Ottawa artist Dipna Horra.

Thursday, December 17
isme(e) Performance Cabaret – Third Year Anniversary
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2344143106&ref=ts

Catch an evening of great performances and lots of experimentation at the 3 year anniversary of isme(e) performance cabaret, one of my favourite underground events. Rumour has it: I’ll be performing. But shhh, that’s a secret.

ONE MORE THING!

For the national multimedia challenge entitled Roots/Racines, CBC Television is calling on Canadians of all stripes who have a story to tell about their roots/identity to turn their tale into a short film or web/multimedia production (film, animation, slide show, podcast) for a chance to win professional equipment (iMacs, camcorders, etc) and gain international recognition. For more information, visit www.rcinet.ca/roots

Thanks for reading! If I’ve missed anything, please post your event information on my website at http://jessicaruano.wordpress.com/blog

Artistically yours,

Jessica Ruano

–
Tschüß!

Jessica Ruano
Ottawa Arts Enthusiast
Publicist, Journalist, and Theatre go-er

www.jessicaruano.wordpress.com

This week is going to be “one of those weeks”. Not one of those bad weeks, but rather one of those busy weeks.  While most of you will trudge through a five day work-week, I will only have to deal with a two-day week.  That’s right. My week ends on Tuesday night.

Or should I say, my week in Ottawa ends on Tuesday.  From Wednesday onward, I’ll be on the road.

Right about the time someone working downtown gets a craving for Beaver Tails on Wednesday, I’ll have already had my hair cut (my personal stylist only works on Wednesday and Thursday) and be on my way to Toronto.  (Yes, I have a personal stylist.  Don’t you?)

Then, after spending several days in Megacity (do people even still call it that, or has the novelty worn off and be dwarfed by the high cost of living, taxes and overcrowded city?) I’ll make the worst drive known to mankind: Toronto to Montreal along the Highway 401.

Okay, while I’m sure dodging bombs and rockets in an army jeep, driving through a warn-torn country might actually be the worst drive known to man, the one along the 401 is certainly the most boring.  Especially when you spent the last seven years doing it and swore that you would never need to do it again, seeing as you figured all drives to Montreal would most likely start from Ottawa.

Basically put, I’ll be gone for almost a whole week.  Just another example of how I seem to travel more now that I live in Ottawa, than I did before.

Although I will say I’m looking forward to heading back to Toronto, even if only for a few days.  As much as the city does get on my nerves, I always liked being there around the holidays and I do miss some things about it.

The Ottawa River races under the Champlain Bridge. No snow on the ground yet. It is late this year. But it sure feels like winter.

It was still pretty early and overcast and thus quite dark out plus I added my polarizer to darken the scene even more and reduce light by about two more f stops (I don’t own a ND filter). The shutter was open 2 seconds at f22.

Web site: www.robhuntley.ca
Click on the image to go straight to the same image on my website.

This is Lady GaGa’s third show on the North-American leg of her “Monster Ball” tour in Ottawa.

01. LoveGame
02. Boys Boys Boys
03. Fashion
04. Speechless
05. Monster
06. Bad Romance

It’s a November to remember because I had been going to a lot of shows and on Monday’s radio show, I played the ones that I attended. Before I get to that, I will review the shows I attended on the final weekend of November. First, it was Hey Ocean! at Bands Undone. To my own amazement, they played a great acoustic and intimate set. Of all the previous Band Undones I have attended, this was so unique because they were missing their members and the setup was very simple. It was David Beckingham with his guitar and Ashleigh Ball on her voice. Overall, I was pleased to see Hey Ocean! as they are down to earth and nice performers. Again, thanks to Kara for always organizing a great show for the bloggers, photographers and media for this unique session.
You can check the photos by going to this link.
Link to the video should be posted later.

My radio show for Monday, November 30, 2009. I didn’t expect to go on half an hour early. Played some fillers like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Metric and Said The Whale. I aired the Immaculate Machine interview and then I played the bands and artists that I attended at their concerts throughout November. They were Elliott Brood, Silver Starling, Ohbijou, The Most Serene Republic, Think About Life, You Say Party! We Say Die!, Bravestation and Jill Zmud. The last segment of the show, let’s say that I had to talk about Lady GaGa. She performed at Scotiabank Place on Sunday night and I had a guest join in on her thoughts of the concert.
I will give a nod to the radio DJ in Hong Kong because she knows I’m not a big fan of Lady GaGa. Anyone will have a nice laugh that I try to not like her music and style. It’s difficult to admit and not give in.
Without further ado, here’s Monday’s show. Press play to listen.

Forgot to mention that I will be participating in the YouTube Battle at Bablyon Nightclub on Friday, December 4, 2009. Wish me luck!

OC Transpo decided to finally redesign their web site in an effort to assist customers with using transit in our Nation’s Capital. Gone is the old, eye-sore red background, replaced with a much more user friendly interface.  The redesign includes a Q&A with the answer to such burning questions as “How come I can’t figure out how to use the Travel Planner?” and “How to get to Scotiabank Place?“.

The New Hotness that is the OC Transpo web site

Old and busted (and a strain on the eyes)

The new site also features interesting Transpo-related news, bus delays and construction project updates.  It even has a place where you — yes you – can assist OC Transpo in making service improvements by taking part in a focus group.  This might actually be interesting as Transpo is willing to compensate you for your time by offering you a free monthly pass.

It’s also worth mentionng that recently OC Transpo launched a mobile site for mobile phones. While it lacks the splash and style of some mobile sites, it does make taking the bus and Transitway a little easier.

It took a few days to sink in, and honestly I’m still not sure what to think of it. It seems Big Larry and Ottawa City Council are actually looking at ways to avoid a 10% tax hike set to be lumped on Ottawans in the coming year.  However, it’s not all good news.  Taxes are expected to still go up anyway — somewhere in the area of 3.9% (That just sounds better than 4%, doesn’t it?)

And of course if there’s only a 3.9% tax increase, that means the city has to find a way to make up for the loss of cash.  And how do you think they will do it? By cutting city services and the hiring of paramedics of course! Because, if the recent strike in Toronto and other labour disputes have taught us anything, cutting funding to essential services in a major city is always a good idea.

That was sarcasm, by the way.

And if that wasn’t enough, the city seems to think that OC Transpo buses are nothing more than giant piggy banks because Transpo users could be staring down the barrel of a 7.5 per cent fare hike next summer.  The idea of cutting back service or dropping routes all together has come up too.  (Although no routes have been targeted just yet.)

The silver lining is that we may have dodged the bullet when it comes to having to pay a Green Bin Fee, which is great news seeing as a majority of the people don’t want to pay for something they are being forced to do.

I really thought that things might be a bit different in Ottawa than compared to Toronto, but I guess no matter what city I live in, there will always be people running it, who have no idea how to do their job.

The City’s budget will be tabled on December 9.

According to a report on the Bloomberg website back in February, Canada had at the time the world’s best financial system. President Obama was even there to see it, and even HE said it was true…

Source: read more Obama in Canada Finds World’s Best Financial System

Ottawa, Canada

On November 28th, Hey Ocean! came by for Bands Undone and sang three amazing acoustic tracks.
This time it was just the two members of the band that came.
Ashleigh Ball on vocals

David Beckingham on guitar

Both were amazing singing acoustic and it was a great intimate session.
The songs they sang were Liar, Alleyway and a song title which I forgot.
Also in attendance was the members of apt613 who totally enjoyed their set.
Overall it was a great Saturday afternoon seeing this band in an acoustic setting.

Ottawa Bahá’ís work to blend ecology into the rhythm of their community life

Children gardening at Ottawa Baha'i Centre - photographer and teacher are Dan Jones

The long-awaited purchasing of a Bahá’í Centre in 2005 has continually given the community opportunities to put its environmental values into action, and this is a process that will surely continue over the years to come.  The building at 211 McArthur Avenue in Vanier was largely chosen for its central location and easy access to public transit and the Rideau River bike path.  Over a series of weekends, dozens of skilled volunteers transformed what was then an Italian restaurant into a community centre, improving the building’s insulation and replacing many windows, installing CFL light bulbs while reusing and recycling material wherever possible.  Dishes are available and users of the centre are asked not to bring in any disposable plates, cups or utensils but rather to use the provided dishes, dishwasher and a three-compartment sink.  The Bahá’í Centre is also equipped to recycle those other materials that do find their way into the building, and environmentally friendly products are used for cleaning.

Participants of International Environment Forum conference

Along with regular activities, the Bahá’í community of Ottawa also aims to engage in environmental discourse through supporting the special events such as the 11th  International Environment Forum conference (subtitled ‘Responding to Climate Change: Scientific Realities, Spiritual Imperatives’) which the community hosted in October 2007.  This conference brought together aboriginal, scientific, religious, political, academic, business, international development, activist and youth voices to address the spiritual implications of the climate crisis.

On November 27th I went to Black Sheep Inn again.
This time I went to see three different acts which were:
The Wooden Sky

Evening Hymns

Lake Of Stew


It was a great night of music besides seeing The Wooden Sky various times.
This was a first time seeing two acts which were Evening Hymns and Lake Of Stew.
Lake Of Stew totally impressed me alot, music was entertaining and funny.
Also a first time seeing them play not on the Black Sheep Stage more like the floors of the Black Sheep Inn.
A great band to totally see live!

Second was Evening Hymns.
Totally amazing set.
I’ve heard some buzz surround him and the music he plays.
Very mellow and experimental.
I sense big things might happen for Evening Hymns.

Lastly it was The Wooden Sky.
The show was taped for CBC Radio.
Very surprised with the turnout, never knew their fanbase is growing
Sang mostly from the new album “If I Don’t Come Home You’ll Know I’m Gone”
They surely got people dancing during their lively rock set.
Faovrite was when they sang Oh My God and people sang the lyrics so loud. So ya it was “OH MY GOD!” moment.

Here is a live video of them singing North Dakota



Setlist:

• When Lost At Sea
• (Bit Part)
• My Old Ghost
• Angels
• Call If You Need Me
• Darker Streets Than Mine
• This Bird Has Flown
• Oslo
• The Wooden Sky
• A.G.
• When We Were Young
• Something Hiding For Us In The Night

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• Oh My God (It Still Means A Lot To Me)
• The Late King Henry
• North Dakota

MacDonald Hall at the University of Ottawa. This building is the home of the Department of Physics. The smokestack behind is part of the heating plant, not MacDonald Hall.

Web site: www.robhuntley.ca
Click on the image to go straight to the same image on my website.

The Senators are in Boston tonight after winning their last five home games. Here is an image from each of those games. This post isn’t too inventive, but it’s all I got right now.

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