it's another scorcher .. one of those days where you just want to find a shady tree, park your car under it and let it idle for a couple of hours .. have a nap with the A/C blasting, the radio on, the seat reclined .. ah, summer.
Okay, so apparently it's not okay for the residential hydro customer/consumer to use electricity during the day. As a stay-at-home parent I am sick and tired of being told to only use my appliances after 8pm. Oh yeah, it's my fault that we almost blew ourselves off the power grid. If only I had slept all day and stayed up all night to do laundry. There aren't that many people who are home during daylight hours ... stop laying the blame for over-consumption on us!!!!!! Let's stop doing little fun/fluff news pieces on the retail shops that blast their A/C while leaving their doors open and actually penalize them for it! I already run my dishwasher overnight, I have my computer and its entourage on a powerbar that I shut off, I use my dehumidifier's water for my plants or laundry, I barely water my garden, let alone my lawn. Leave me alone! I find it really offensive that somewhere down the line, the fact that I stay home to raise my child will cost me more in hydro payments. And as for switching to compact fluorescent bulbs and counting all the money they'll save me (never mind the kilowatts) .. when they do those calculations do they take into account the fact that they cost over $8 a piece?
Has anyone else wondered about that episode on Dora the Explorer where they have to sneak across "el Rio Grande?" .. does that mean that Dora's in the US illegally?
I went shopping at Goodwill yesterday .. spent about $30, the cashier says to me "why didn't you come yesterday? Do you know how much you would have saved?" .. I'm guessing that she was probably intimating that they had had a 50% off day on Tuesday (which I obviously hadn't known about, or I would have been there) ... I'm thinking to myself .."why didn't you call me?" She could have called me. It's sad, but it really does kill me to think that I could have bought Sebastian those 10 or 12 items of clothing for $15 and I paid $30! I feel badly when I complain about high prices at Goodwill or the Sally Ann or Value Village .. but not really that badly and not for a long time. Especially about Value Village because I do find them priced ridiculously high for second-hand items, and they are really only in it for $$$.
Can I ask this .. why do we care, or why should we care, or why do the local "weather" people think we should care about the weather, more specifically the temperature at Pearson International Airport (YYZ) ????? They actually mention it as "we reached a high of 43 degrees today .. at the airport .. ," as if it were a normal part of the city and not its own little micro-climate. Do you think the miles and miles of paved landing strips and all those jet engines have anything to do with the consistently high temperatures there?? Huh? You mean the front of my house that doesn't have Rolls Royce turbines blasting hot jet fumes at it wasn't as hot as it was at Pearson? Who'd have thunk it?
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends against letting children under age 2 watch any television ... The Canadian Pediatric Society's latest position statement is under review and doesn't address kids younger than 2 .. my question regarding this is .. does anyone in the AAP have children under 2? Have they been up 27 hours in a row with a crying baby who miraculously calms down when the wonderbox with the moving pictures comes on? Have they all gotten rid of their TVs? My son watches tv. Sometimes I think he watches too much, sometimes I think he just likes to have it on because he knows it .. he plays with cars or trains or reads books and catalogues, but he likes to have the tv on while he's doing it. When you're a grownup they call it "multi-tasking" but when you're a child it's apparently bad for you. I have friends who are very vocal about the fact that they don't watch tv, but they have no problems with letting their 3 yr old watch dvds, videos or daddy playing PSP. I think I've missed the fine distinction. I can just as easily control what is watched at my house. They rent/buy the dvds of the shows that we watch on tv. Go figure. My son dances to his favourite theme songs, has learned how to memorize things, and has learned about opera, pirates and various laws of physics way before he would have if he didn't watch television. And how else can we guarantee a future audience for Coronation Street if we don't start them off young??
Gotta run. Must pick Spiderman up from daycamp soon (it's Hallowe'en day) and since there were about 4 Spidermen there I might have to take some time to make sure I get the right one.
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