Screwing up

Today has been a funny weekend full of 'Attaboys' cancelled out by one big 'Ohshit'. The 'Attaboys' were earned first thing Sunday morning when a pain wracked call from out of the blue sent both Mrs S and I riding to the rescue of an old family friend. Rides to hospital were organised and I spent most of my day hanging around Emergency, trying to be useful and keep out from under people's feet. This is not easy when the focus of your efforts is less than cooperative. However, we coped and ensured that people got what they needed and were comfortable. Family friend was admitted and put on Morphine.

The funny thing was that our family friend wouldn't call an Ambulance because they 'didn't want to make a fuss'. Yet obvious pain and lack of mobility almost meant we couldn't get our suffering friend into the van to get to Emergency. Regardless, we got them there and tried not to impersonate headless chickens in the process.

Quite impressed with all the technology in the local hospitals Emergency Room. Mobile Ultrasound units, very professional and businesslike staff, and in the five hours we were there never saw anyone wait more than fifteen minutes before getting attention. A sign at Registration about non-Canadian residents having to shell out $535 for treatment made me pause, as did a note about extra treatment charges to Quebeckers.

Everyone seemed to take all these complications in their stride and the thing that struck me was how reasonably good humoured both patients and staff seemed given the habitual background tension of Emergency Rooms everywhere. Even the Paramedics appeared laid back. Like a tensioned velvet covered spring.

We were doing well until a(nother) run in with a cell phone company and their lack of customer service left me fractious and upset. My best course of action of course would have been to take an hour to get myself properly fed and rested as I hadn't eaten all day, and maybe taken a break from worrying. Regrettably I did not follow my own internal advice and made some ill chosen remarks in the hearing of my other half. Mrs S was not amused. It graduated into a row. She walked out.

We have since spoken and I have apologised for my uncharacteristic ill humour pleading tiredness and low blood sugar. The matter is not fully resolved, but discussions between Mrs S and I will make it so. I have screwed up. Amends must be made.

Now it's raining. So much for a pleasant Labour Day weekend. Sometimes being a grown up truly sucks.

That's pretty mean....

When you're trapped underground by a rockfall, rescue is days, maybe even weeks away, and you ask for something to keep you going psychologically as well as food supplies. Then some prick says "It's bad for you. No."

If I was NASA's deputy chief Doctor I would not want to be there when the trapped Chilean miners are finally released from their ordeal. The phrase "Guess who just lost the popularity contest" wouldn't be half of it, especially to someone they would see as a busybody Norteamericano.

Update: At least one of the trapped Chilean Miners has more problems than being stuck underground. Oh dear.

Word addiction

At my writers group last night, which is a kind of Wordaholics Anonymous for the semi professional writer, I suddenly realised that I haven't touched any of my proper writing projects for over six weeks. Blog flu notwithstanding, this situation must be addressed. Two novels and a screenplay require urgent attention. That and all the other stuff sitting in my filing system awaiting resurrection.

For someone with a usual daily output of 2-3000 words, this is not a good thing. Posting may become even more patchy while I rummage through mental cupboards for the reasons why.

Ya gotta push the button, see...

Where we live is mostly heated by what's called a Heat Pump. Of late we've left the heating off and put fans around to stir the air a bit from the cool side of the house to the other. This afternoon has been warm enough to see Mrs S flaked out in the guest bedroom, which is the coolest in the house. I stepped outside with a cold one in hand and met our landlord.

"Warm one eh, Bill?"
"Surely is. Warm enough indoors. Not sure which is hotter, inside or out." I replied. "Plenty of mosquitoes around."
"Yeah, whole bunch of 'em over by the pool." He shrugged in that particular way Canadians do when faced with such inconveniences.
"So a swim isn't such a good idea."
"Not unless you want to get eaten alive." He grinned.
"Yeah, got bitten this morning while changing a light bulb on the truck."
"Uh-huh. Little buggers ain't they. It's hot in town."
"Seems as good a reason for not going there. Hard to know where to cool down."
"You can switch the heat pump on you know." He said.
"Oh, right." I had one of those 'oh sod I forgot' moments but kept a straight face.
"All you gotta do is push the button." He opened a cold one and gave me an almost geological look which said 'you forgot, din'cha?'
"I might just do that."
"Put it on for an hour or two before bed time to cool the place down." He's very tolerant of our occasional faux pas when it comes to modern heating systems.
"Good idea." As he lives downstairs he might have been wondering why we hadn't already. "I'll be out around ten to watch the meteors again tonight."
"Yeah, awesome ain't they?"
"They surely are."
"Catch ya later."
"See you." I said and beetled off inside to read the heating instructions before pressing the correct button.

The temperature indoors has just sunk below the eighty degree Fahrenheit marker, and the discomfort from the days heat is rapidly easing. Time for a beer. All this new technology eh?

Correction

In haste to post I got a little geographically challenged and would like to correct my error. See above an annotated geological map with the sites of historical significance (Red dots) indicating their position and relevance on volcanic fault systems to the current eruptions (Red squares).

For more in depth coverage of the geology, may I recommend this Ph.d Field trip web site which I found highly informative on the geology of the area.

According to some sources, the Katla Volcano partially covered by the Mýrdalsjökull glacier is a little overdue to kick off, as the last big blast was in 1918 and it is known to erupt every 60-80 years. According to some Geophysicists, the current eruptions just over 15km to the west might just do it, although no undue rumblings have been observed recently.

Looks possible that the current no-fly rule might last a bit longer than this weekend. Oh-oh.

Greenpeace are coming to get you

Seen first at Bishop Hill's blog. Greenpeace just stepped outside the law with this gorgeous piece of foot in mouth disease;

We know who you are. We know where you live. We know where you work.

And we be many, but you be few.

Of course the challenges were immediate, such as;

Congratulations.

You just crossed the line into being a terrorist organization.

Of course there's been a lot of hurried backtracking and weasel words about 'non-violent means'; but let's say some Greenpeace activists, as they will in their zeal to get at the 'deniers', step over the line; the resultant legal fallout will bury Greenpeace. The first blow struck. The first damage to a sceptics property. The first harassment of a known sceptic in their job, of their family, of their friends. All that can and shall be tracked back to this single Greenpeace sanctioned official threat. Ouch.

With those ill chosen words open warfare has been declared upon the unbelievers over the poor application of scientific method by the church of the true believers in man made climate change. May I, amongst I suspect many others, point out the following;
It wasn't the sceptics making false scare story claims over dubious science.
It wasn't the sceptics who exaggerated.
It wasn't the sceptics failing to fact check.
It wasn't the sceptics who tried to squash debate to advance their own cause.
Who was it?

The fallout I suspect, will be that a well funded media machine has been beaten by a bunch of sceptical amateurs. Amateurs who have done what they did for no other reason than to uphold the integrity of science. Amateurs who broke Climategate when the lamestream wouldn't touch it. Amateurs who found and publicised the false assertions in IPCC reports. Amateurs who offered an open and honest scientific debate and all Green'peace' had to offer of any substance was a direct threat.

Ooh boy. Someone's in trouble and it ain't the sceptics. Guffaw. Chortle.

Today I became rather hacked off because the tail end of a storm knocked the power out while I was half way through cooking supper. I have now been officially cheered up.

Update: As suspected, weasel words have taken the place of the offending blog, including this little gem;

Of course the anti-science brigade on the web has seized on the line in Gene’s post and run with it (and will run and run and run), taken it out of context and run with it some more – it’s what the climate contrarians exist to do.

'Anti-science'? That's a bit rich isn't it considering the thinly-veiled-scare-story-press-releases-masquerading-as-scientific-reports that Greensleaze seem to specialise in.

Cheeky sods. One thing Greensleaze doesn't do is science. It does scary stories to frighten the kiddies. Not impressed.

Oh dear....and ouch

Mrs S and youngest were due back this evening. At one o'clock this afternoon I received a plaintive phone call. "We're in Kamloops." Said my other half.
"Why?" Says I. Kamloops is five hours driving and a two and a half hour ferry ride away.
"The car was chugging at the traffic lights."

There followed several strained telephone conversations, both with Mrs S and the Service Manager of a local Ford Dealership. The upshot is that the transmission on our old grey battlebus has blown a gasket, which will require around seven hundred dollars plus to fix. Mrs S came over all stressed, and I put my best talking head on to keep her calm. The upshot is that Mrs S and youngest are stranded for two days in Kamloops waiting for the car to be fixed. I am left wincing at the size of a large unexpected bill which just wiped out my last paycheque. We'll cope, but it's just inconvenient. A client still owes me money for work done (Invoice put in four months ago, several reminders sent, second Invoice just submitted), so no extra tea, toast or treaties for a while. Bummer.

To keep my spirits up I'll end with a small joke which seems appropriate;

Percy the Amazing Penguin is driving through a small town on a hot day when his car goes phut and coasts to a stop. Of course he's 'amazing', you ever hear of another Penguin who can drive a car? Percy gets a tow into the local Garage, and having ensured that his car will be fixed that afternoon, goes to visit the local ice cream parlour.

Percy being a highly stressed Penguin, much comfort eating of Vanilla ice cream ensues. The day being hot, a lot of ice cream ends up all over Percy's beak. While in the ice cream parlour, greedily scarfing another pint of ice cream, Percy gets a text message summoning him urgently to the Garage where his car is being fixed. So quickly does Percy leave the ice cream parlour that he forgets to wash the melted ice cream off his beak. Arriving at the Garage all stressed, out of breath and his face covered in ice cream, Percy demands of the mechanic; "What is it? What's wrong?"
"Well it's fixed, no problem." Says the mechanic.
"But what happened?" Demands Percy.
"It looks like you just blew a seal." Says the mechanic. Percy suddenly catches sight of his ice cream daubed beak in his reflection and goes bright pink in embarrassment.
"No, it's really just ice cream." Said Percy.

You have to laugh of you'd go daft.

Honey, I blew up the router

Have been offline for the past day or so due to a technical failure. I was trying to change the security settings on my old wireless router and in the process of trying to reset after a typo in the wireless key managed to screw up the router. The result was that I had to purchase a brand spanking new wireless router which, obviously, is now up and running.

That'll teach me to watch what I'm typing in future. Smacked wrist! Silly Bill!

Helpful hint for UK Immigrants to Canada

The latest waypoint on our journey passed this morning courtesy of an e-mail from our distant but helpful immigration lawyers. Since we got bumped up the waiting list it's been a frantic scramble to assemble all sorts of paperwork for our application. Mrs S shouted from the spare bedroom where the 'pooter lives calling thus in that particular tone that always puts me at action stations. "Bill! You'd better have a look at this."

Fearing the worst I forgot all about preparing breakfast and quickstepped into the office. "What's up?" I asked, wondering what was wrong. I read and re read the e-mail from our immigration lawyers again. No, no problem that I could see, application looks good (The word 'great' was actually used), TEF (French language) test results better than expected.... Oh.

At the bottom of the e-mail read a little note said that although the rest of our application was fine, there was one detail we had overlooked; UK Police certificates. Shit. Was my immediate unspoken reaction. I took a deep breath and said; "Hand me the phone love. What's the Lawyers number?" Did a little mental arithmetic to work out what time it was at our Lawyers office in Quebec and dialled. Unlike previous attempts at phoning our Lawyer, I was pleasantly surprised to be put straight through by the French accented receptionist.
"Hi, William Sticker here." I said pleasantly and quoted our case file number, not knowing quite what to expect, but went and asked what I desperately hoped wasn't a stupid question anyway. "Erm, just asking about these Police checks. Do we really need a Police certificate from the UK?"
"Oh yes. From every country you have ever lived in for more than six months." Spake our Immigration Lawyer. Oops, didn't know that.
"Will a British CRB check do?"
"No." So Canadian immigration doesn't trust them either.
"Oh, how do we go about getting one of these certificates?" Said I, knowing that any such certificate would arrive at least three weeks too late to go with our main application.
"No problem, I'll send you the link." Spake our Lawyer, and here it is. A short conversation later, we had established that it wasn't a problem if the Police Certificates had to follow our main application, no, immigration were used to stuff arriving late like this, and it shouldn't delay our application for permanent residency. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Mrs S deflating with relief as she earwigged in on the phone conversation.

Half an hour later we were scratching our heads and reading through the notes about what information ACPO needed to verify that we were law abiding citizens of the UK with no besmirchment on our legal records apart from the odd parking ticket laid on Mrs S many moons ago. Until it came to verifying our current appearances.
"Someone we've known for two years?" I said.
"What about my sister?" Said Mrs S.
"Er no, her job has to be on this list." I ran down the list of 'professions' that could verify our photographs for us without an expensive round trip to the UK, mentally ticking people off the list as I went. A gradual leaden feeling hunkered down in my belly until; "Bingo!" I cried. "Thank you God!" Throwing my hands up in the air like a supplicant. Retired Naval Officer. It just so happens that one of my dear wife's oldest and best family friends who lives up in town is not only a retired officer from the Royal Navy, but also the Royal Canadian Navy. Splendid chap, just hit ninety and still going strong. "Of course." Mrs S beamed. Phew.

So today we went to have tea with my wife's fathers best friend, who signed our photographs for us without blinking. Excellent. Tomorrow those applications will be winging their way blightywards and shortly thereafter all our boxes will hopefully be ticked and we won't have to jump through flaming hoops regarding work permits any more. More work, more money. Hallelujah!

UK immigrants to Australia, Canada, New Zealand or the USA all need one of these certificates. They cost thirty five quid for each family member. Even if the skinflint inside my head is blustering "Sixty five dollars! That's a bit steep isn't it? I could fill up the 4x4 for that!". Expensive business this escape from the UK.

Getting warmer...?

Despite all the propaganda that in five, ten eighty or ninety years human, or anthropocentric CO2 emissions are going to result in the heat death of the planet, there seems precious little real empirical evidence that temperatures globally are actually rising. Sure there is the argument which says that "the models predict", but forgive me for being a crusty old sourpuss when I point out that there appears precious little actual extra warmth due to Carbon Dioxide. At present the opposite seems to be happening. Snow in Buenos Aires perchance?

To enlarge; having spent several years as a farmworker while working my way through college, I spent a lot of time out of doors and learned to read the sky. Mainly because what I did day to day was highly weather dependent, and it helped if you knew to take a waterproof coat with you. It got to the point that towards the end of my working time on the farm, my boss would often take one look at the weather forecast, grimace, and then ask me what local conditions would be like for the next day or two, rather than trust the Met Office. Said skill often helped me out during my life on the streets because it usually meant that I was heading for a covered beat ahead of the downpours. I'd occasionally run into colleagues who were either sweating buckets because they were too heavily clad, or soaked because they went out in shirtsleeves, and not a little annoyed at me because they were too hot / wet and I often wasn't.

Needless to say yours truly was rarely caught out by the notoriously changeable British weather, although on a few occasions I found myself forced to 'ghost' a couple of streets when downpours ensued. Normally these errors of judgement were more due to a poor sense of timing rather than a failure to predict on my part.

One phenomenon that has caught my eye of late is the increased prevalence of phenomena like Noctilucent clouds. Essentially these are caused by low angle sunlight reflecting off clouds of high level ice crystals in the mesosphere, normally seen between 50 and 70 degrees of latitude. However, in the Northern hemisphere at least these appear to be observed ever further southwards if you can take the photographic galleries on spacewather.com, and various other anecdotal observations as a guide.

Now I may be wrong, not being a 'professional' in these matters, but an increase in ice crystal phenomena would to me indicate a net cooling effect (Albeit of the upper atmosphere). So why on earth are certain people so all fired certain that it's going to get hotter because of CO2? We are told that global levels of this trace atmospheric gas are up and that according to the IPCC it's all our fault, and we're aall doooooomed but for the life of me I just can't buy into the hype. If it's a race between what the politicians and media say and a real live (Albeit anecdotal) cloud gathering above my head, I know whose predictions I'll be paying attention to, and it won't be a journalist or politician, although Christopher Booker of the Telegraph does try, bless him). When the Moonbats et al are figuratively (and vociferously) running around with their fingers in their ears, bleating about Anthropogenic Global Warming and ignoring the current weather trends, he's got an uphill battle. The only reason why I bother to think about the subject at all is the continuing insistence of politicians all around the world that there's a climate problem we as a species have any control over; there isn't, I confidently predict the climate will change on it's own without any help from l'il ole Hom Sap; and that tax is not the answer. Taxing to 'prevent' a natural phenomenon is rather like writing cheques to ward off double pneumonia; or as Douglas Adams once pithily pointed out "it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy"

Back to the grindstone.

Unhappy

My dearly beloved is not happy and I can't figure out why. She's been offered a new job with more money (Lucky her, wish I had) - she's miserable. We go to Sister in laws to plan multiple birthday party / picnic day and do giggly stuff. She comes away unhappy. I've tried everything; attention, ministering to her every need, treats, hanging on every word - nada. I've already been pushed into telling her that I'm fed up with having my head snapped off for things I have no control over (Immigration forms / economic conditions). It interferes with my writing and quite frankly her attitude is getting on my tits. Even trying to explain something to her is hard work as I find myself having to repeat everything three or four times, and God help me if I omit a detail. It's like her head is so full, everything else just bounces off. She's unhappy because younger sister makes her feel 'worthless'. She's snaps at me when I say that I've already told her something twice before. Well I'm stuck for answers. It's like the woman I married isn't there, and that bothers me. I might as well hunker down and get on with the stuff I have to do and wait for her to surface.

Mind you, I'm not the only one with cause to be unamused. The unelected idiot in the UK has just lost another minister and I give him another week, two at most before he has to resign and call a General Election. His Labour party almost got annihilated at the polls last week. county Council and EU elections have reduced their number of MEP's to 11, only one more than the Liberal Democrats, and the same number as the anti-EU UK Independence Party. Hells Bells! Even the National Socialist clone British National Party got two seats, although I put that down to a protest vote by disgruntled ex Labour voters.

Bugger it. I've more important things to do. I'm submitting three MSS samples to some agencies in Vancouver and Toronto this week. See if I get any luck this side of the water. I'm going to keep my head down, keep working and trust to luck. Something has to give.

Odd stuff

Today is going to be mildly fraught. Today mother in law comes to stay for two or three months. She's a nice old stick but doesn't seem to understand that yours truly has stuff to do, then bursts into tears when I just get on and do instead of hanging on her every word 24/7. This afternoon we have to go through the whole emotional scene of soggy greetings at the airport, heartfelt sigh. Fortunately Brother in law is in tow to keep an eye on things, so perhaps not. Dog is staying with friends for today and tomorrow until the dust settles, and all my work commitments will have to wait until Wednesday. She's not exactly the most mobile of people and I have the oddest of prescient feelings that my consumption of Jameson's will increase.

Computer time has been pretty restricted recently as Mrs S has been Skyping all over the world looking for old college, work related and school certificates to back up our permanent residency application. The only way I can get a look in on the 'pooter at present is by getting out of bed at 5 in the morning for some uninterrupted thinking and keyboard time.

In the Sticker household recently there have been some odd goings on; for example, coming in from a very pleasant afternoons fishing on Sunday, I walked in the door to be confronted by one of my dear lady wife's brassiere's hanging up where I normally hang my hat. I stared for a moment, wondering if I was hallucinating, then caught my wife's amused sidelong glance. "They're just hanging up to dry Bill."
"Thank God for that, you had me wondering." I said, looking rather nonplussed. There's something mildly unsettling about seeing empty lingerie hanging around the place where it shouldn't normally be.
"I just ran out of places to hang them up."
"The tumble dryer okay?" Why hang stuff up to dry when you have a perfectly good machine for the job?
"I'm not developing Alzheimer's." Mrs S cocked an eyebrow at me before returning to the keyboard. So what's a man to do under these circumstances? "Errrrrr..... Cup of tea love?"
"Oo, gorgeous." Came the response. So I put the kettle on (It's a nice one that doesn't clash with my eyeshadow - oh dear).

Another odd occurrence has been the Dutch Ministry of Justice showing up on my reader stats. I put it down to bored tech support,but apparently there's something a little more sinister. Via the Devils Kitchen, I came across the news that there is an unpleasant little troll who keeps on complaining about people's web sites and trying to get the Dutch authorities to shut down those he doesn't agree with. The dipstick concerned (No, I'm not going to dignify the nasty little slaphead with a link) appears to be an extreme lefty with one of the dullest blogs on the planet (Even duller than mine). He doesn't appear to think that freedom of speech is a good thing, and compares those of us with even a mildly Libertarian bent to kiddy pron pushers. Should the gentleman in question ever visit these pages again I have a little message for him; "Go 'way son. Come back when yer all growed up. Now push off, I'm a busy man."

The south end of Vancouver Island beckons today. I'm going out for a drive. I may be some little time.....

Normal service

Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible. This blog will resume sarcasm levels as soon as certain current issues are resolved.

Issue 1: Illness in family causing many alarums and diversions due to running about on errands and keeping concerned family members up to date with invalid's progress.

Issue 2: New development on the immigration front which will require many transatlantic phone calls and much old paperwork retrieval. I mean, who in the 40+ age group still has their old High School certificates for goodness sake?

A series of unfortunate incidents

The left hand side of the blogosphere seems to be rather angry about the death of an 'uninvolved' person at the G20 riot last week. There seems to currently be a lot of low level ranting on the subject, so I thought I'd have a good long dispassionate look at the situation and make as objective a personal assessment as I can, knowing how easily people can froth at the keyboard over incidents like these.

Firstly, one has to take a step back and see how charged the situation was. Nervous inexperienced Copper togged up in riot gear, which I am told gets hot and sweaty very easily, thus temporarily reducing officer in questions decision making ability; add a soon-to-be-dead man with a bit of a chip on his shoulder who has had negative experience with the Police before. Man with chip on shoulder also has heart condition which nobody seems to know about, least of all him. Uptight people all over the place looking for a casus belli. Inexperienced people all over the place in key positions which naturally leads to the rapid implementation of the universal law of cock up a.k.a. Murphy's law.

Let's have a look at the timeline of events; Dead man is on his way somewhere and runs into a tactical riot squad section (or whatever), all hot sweaty and nervous, with strict orders to 'let no one pass' their line in order to contain all the rioters and demonstrators in one place. He tries to pass their line. He is refused. Sharp words are exchanged and soon-to-be-dead man feels hard done by. He wants to get to his destination and no bloody copper is going to get in the way.

Having watched the video carefully, and basing my judgement on three years on-street experience observed the soon-to-be-dead man's body language, I was forced to the following conclusion; the soon-to-be-dead man was not best pleased at being baulked by a line of riot police that are nothing to do with him and is 'having an arse' or sulk. Passive-aggressively showing his disapproval. Note the posture, the expression on his face, the hunched shoulders and hands deeply stuffed in pockets. All danger signals that someone is going to try and be an immovable object. He wants to go and shows his disapproval by patently looking for a break in the line of Police in riot gear. Nearby officer (The one who made the baton strike) picks up on this and becomes more alert and nervous. Is soon to be dead man a threat or not? Briefing says let no one pass. Does soon-to-be-dead man's behaviour mean that he's about to kick off? Nervous officer tightens grip on baton, just in case.

Riot police get word to move from tactical based on rioters behaviour in another street, and soon-to-be-dead man either refuses to be shepherded out of his way or just doesn't move fast enough. Nervous Copper in line thinks he (Soon-to-be-dead man) is a threat to the line-which-must-not-be-broken's integrity, overreacts and makes baton strike, throwing man to the ground. Man may still feel 23 in his head, but his body says otherwise and loosened atheroma blocks blood flow to the heart muscle and bingo, one massive and fatal heart attack.

Now I'm not trying to make excuses for anyone, but based upon my own experience, I tend to think my précis version of events has the highest chance of being true. If confronted by Coppers in riot gear and with orders to 'contain' a situation, you might as well just find a nice quiet place to sit down out of their way and grab a quick coffee and read of the papers, or 'comfort break' and watch the fun from the sidelines. Trying to confront riot police in any way shape or form just makes them ready to kick off. Lose-lose all round.

A man died, and it was very probably for the reasons outlined above. The man should not have played his face, and the officer in question should not have used his baton. It was all an accident waiting to happen. It is worth noting that the man's resultant heart attack was in all probability only a few days away, whether the incident had occurred or not. Something else would have triggered it sooner or later. An argument with a family member, or anything else that would have sent pulse and blood pressure through the roof. What can you say? Wrong place, wrong time.

I feel sad for the man and his family, but also for the officer concerned. One is dead leaving an yawning emotional chasm where his presence once was, the other may have the rest of his career tainted. There are no winners here.

Dénouement

Apologies to those of you wondering where I've been. The last few days have been spent in introspection and making up after the relationship quake of last week. It has taken me a few days to fully appreciate the gravity of what happened and organise my thoughts once more.

For almost forty eight hours after my wife stopped talking to me, I was literally speechless, stuck for words, call it what you will. My normal glib eloquence had taken on a negative value. I was rendered mute by her refusal to speak; and genuinely thought that our marriage, the bedrock of my existence, was about to shatter and cascade around my ears like shards of broken glass. Mrs S was mad at me, that much was pretty self evident, but I just could not voice how low that had laid my heart. For the first time in many years I was genuinely terrified. Like a Deer mesmerised by the approaching headlights of a truck my leaden emotional feet would not stir to sidestep the oncoming juggernaut. I genuinely thought it was all over between us, and where would that have left us both? Adrift in a still-strange land with no one to turn to. I saw myself dragging my feet back to the UK with my metaphorical tail between my legs to an unforgiving family, no job, or prospect of gainful employment in the near term. Our dog having to be given to the uncertain hands of the SPCA (Not PETA, I'd rather kill him quickly myself than let him fall into their clutches). Everything we've worked for so hard for in fragments around our feet, followed by the echoing emptiness of our remaining lives.

Early Thursday morning I found myself staring haplessly out of our kitchen window. Hands thrust into jeans pockets and jammed in petrified introspection when I heard Mrs S say bluntly from behind me; "I don't want to be in a relationship where no one talks."
"But you stopped talking to me." I said plaintively, turning to face her. "You ignored every little gesture, every little olive branch I put your way."
"Some Olive branches." She said derisively, eyes lined with red. I was thunderstruck.
"Every time I asked you anything, you hardly answered." I complained.
"Maybe you need better olive branches."
"I don't get it." I said. My Dog slunk off to his box and put his paws over both ears. At this precise juncture I would have given the world to have joined him.
"You told me to sod off!" She was openly crying now. Tears running like a river in full spate. What?
"I did no such thing." My heart was in my mouth, and it didn't taste very nice. "I never said anything like that!" At this point my throat was tight and my eyes were beginning to fill. I was in complete comprehension failure. Where was this coming from? For fucks sake I love this woman like no one else and she was telling me she didn't want to have me around any more? Had I been suffering from a heart condition I swear the shock of the accusation would have killed me right there.
"Don't you lie to me Sticker!" She railed. "I only wanted to know what you were up to and you told me to shut up!"
"What?" I gaped. "Oh Jesus." Was that it?
"Jesus yourself."
"I didn't mean it like that." I replied plaintively. "But you did ask me the same thing three times like you thought I was lying to you."
"I only wanted to know."
"Yeah but..."
"But nothing! Don't you dare treat me as if I don't exist!"
"What?" The ground was giving way under my feet and I was powerless to stop it happening. "I never meant to. You stopped talking to me."
"Right!" She snapped.
"I've been stuck for words these past two days trying to think how to fix what went wrong, but I can't." I responded.
"You?! Lost for words?" Each syllable felt poisoned at the tip.
"You see me naked." Was my weak rejoinder.
"Well I don't feel so good about it myself."
"I don't know what to say."
"How about sorry?" She snapped, tearfully.
"If I was going to be sincere about it, yes." My major fault is that I am, at least with my dearest one, 100% honest. "An apology is no good unless I really mean it." This much seemed to strike a chord, but as I was hanging on to the last shreds of my self control, I wasn't paying that much attention.
"Well if you can't say sorry."
"You wouldn't respond to anything I said."
"So is that it?" The hopelessness in her tearful voice tripped one of my last fully functional neurons.
"I don't want to lose you. Not over this." I couldn't help myself. Somewhere within me a dam broke and all my careful defences were swept before the flood, all my mental armour crumbled like the rusty fake it was and I began to cry like I haven't cried since I was very young. Mrs S wrapped her arms around me and we both wept for my failure of intelligence.

Despite having faced down angry people waving fists under my nose, had any number of close shaves of the physical variety, and even on two particular occasions had loaded firearms brandished in my face. Despite pain that has literally stopped me in my tracks from various injuries, I have never let more than a few drops of moisture leak from my eyes. Now there I was, sobbing like a bairn because my wife was mad at me.

Thinking about it; Mrs S is my one weak spot, my emotional Achilles heel. I would cheerfully walk barefoot through all ten circles of Hell for her and never breathe a word of complaint. For this woman I would happily take a bullet, smiling as I did so. I don't think I could bear it if she and I were permanently parted.

"Now look at me." I sniffed away tears, mad at myself for being so weak.
"Look at us both." She sniffed and kissed me on my neck.
"I haven't cried like this since I was a boy." I let her go and grabbed a tissue, passing one back to her. "Look what you do to me."
"Well at least we're talking." She sniffed, and noisily blew her nose.
"I never meant to stop."
"Didn't feel like it." For the moment, our storm seemed to have passed. "But you told me to shut up."
"I didn't mean it like that. I just felt you were pushing me into a corner and I had no way out, so I bit."
"You shouldn't have."
"Well I did, and I'm sorry it happened." I said. That seemed to lower the emotional temperature somewhat and I gave her a deep hug. She hugged me back just as fiercely. We stood like that for a while.

"You know, I didn't mean you to shut up. I just wanted a little space. You shouldn't take me so seriously." I said at length.
"Yes, but you don't like it when people take the mickey."
"Them, no. You can do it all you want." I replied. She brightened a little and gave me a playful slap on the arm. I gave her another hug. "I still love you, you know." It may sound lame, but I still mean every word. "Couldn't live without you." I held her as close as I could.
"I couldn't live without you." She buried her head in my chest, still wet face leaving a large damp stain on my shirt front.

We hugged a little longer until a plaintive whine from nearby broke our mini reverie.
"Haven't you fed the dog?" She asked me. Dog was sitting there, head on one side, just staring at us in affronted canine disbelief. He wanted his breakfast, and wasn't about to take no for an answer. Bugger the human kitchen sink drama.
"Haven't had much time in the last ten minutes." I gave her a real smile. Our mutual good humour seemed to have seeped back. I hugged my (much) better half again and we disengaged.

"Come on, trouble." I said to my dog, and he bounced after me as I picked up his dog food and decanted the mornings rations into his food bowl. Mrs S finished getting ready for work. Back to normal.

Postscript: Since Thursday Mrs S and I have been making up with one another. My good lady and I are back on the same wavelength once more, and happier with each other than for several months by my counting. The small affections are once more common and we are communicating properly, fooling around like teenagers when the mood takes us. For my part I will heed this warning, and take good care to ensure I never put my most cherished possession, our relationship, in such peril again.

I'm in trouble now

I have managed to seriously upset Mrs S and she has stopped talking to me. All the little Olive branches I have motioned her way this morning in order to reopen a dialogue have failed. Didn't want the tea I made for her. Didn't want me to make her breakfast. Barely said a word to me except in a very tight little voice. All the little affectionate gestures that populate our behaviour have vanished like snow under a blowtorch. What this means is that I am in real stercus profundus.

Sometimes when a conversation goes wrong it is like watching a train wreck in slow motion. You can see it coming, but there's not a damn thing you can do about it. All you can do is wait for the crunch.

So it was yesterday evening. I was a bit distracted and let my metaphorical eye drift off the ball. "What are you doing tomorrow?" I was asked. Had I been a bit quicker on the uptake I would have seen this as the first warning sign that things were not as they should be. "I'm in the office. I've got a few things to do." I replied distractedly. Tell you the truth I've had quite a few things on my mind of late and wasn't paying attention.
"Like what?" Mrs S asked with a certain edginess in her voice which Mr Klutz here missed completely, but in hindsight was glaringly obvious.
"I'm trying to get the fixes for that laptop."
"Which one?"
"The older one. It's proving problematic. Needs a BIOS upgrade and I've no floppy drive to boot from." I said, wondering why she wanted the information. Normally her eyes tend to glaze over long before I've explained this much.
"Whose is it?"
"Terry's. You know the guy you spoke to on the phone last week?"
"I thought it was Larry." The sharpness in her tone should have made me pause for thought, but by the time Mister Brain had figured out what was going on, it was too late to stop.
"No, Terry." I said. "He's promised me the old machine as payment for fixing his other one."
"Why's that?"
"I thought it would be nice if we both had machines to work off."
"Yeah but it's Terry's machine."
"No, he's giving it to me for fixing his new one." At this point I'm starting to get a little uncomfortable. "Why the interrogation?" I asked, a little tersely. Well big dumb and ugly had to put his foot right in it didn't he? My other half gave me a long cool look that could have frozen the Georgia Straits. "You don't normally want to know this much." I added and her mouth tightened in a line of disapproval. Impact! Ouch.

Upon reflection I should have asked what she wanted to do this morning, as she was obviously angling for a favour. That simple act would have kept me out of trouble. Unfortunately now I have to figure out how to mollify my best beloved without a) totally screwing up our relationship, and b) feeling like I'm making an insincere crawling apology for being an unthinking cur.

Relationships are complex.

Write out 100 times...

I must be more precise in my use of English.

Dropping a comment on the Watts up with that climate blog (A very good science blog BTW, one of, if not the best) I came in for a little ridicule when I naively asked about the comparative numbers present at the New York ICCC conference, and the IPCC conference. I asked for enlightenment on how many properly qualified climate scientists were present at each conference. Several other commenters took pains to have a little dig at my expense. The IPCC conference attendance of course is widely toted as having 2500 attendees, and the ICCC 600 or thereabouts.

No contest, right? Of course there were more at the IPCC, stands to reason? More people, more properly qualified scientists, yeah? A-hem. I should have been more precise in my use of English. My question should have been; how many of the attendees at the IPCC and ICCC conferences had no real qualification in 'climate science' or associated discipline like atmospheric physics etc? Also how many were primarily economists, personal assistants, politicians, and their associated hangers on etc?

I really must be more careful how I frame my questions in future. It's at times like these the shade of my old High School English Teacher speaks unto me in sonorous tones; "Okay Sticker, now write that out 100 times, and don't do it again."

Sigh.

Screwing up the system

Living and working in British Columbia, Canada as I do, in many opinions (Including mine) one of the greatest places on Earth, and populated in the main by some lovely people. Their generally positive attitude never ceases to amaze and amuse both Mrs S and I. We're even getting used to the humour.

In particular, Mrs S and I even get on well with the folks at the immigration and tax offices. Two officers in particular seem to look after us personally, and have been about as helpful as public servants can get. Despite the monolithic look of the immigration process, when you get up close, you find it's made up of people. Specifically Canadians, who are famed for their polite correctness (Although gangland Vancouver and Toronto are notable exceptions). In our experience you only get the "No you can't" stonewall attitude from the semi automated call centres. Ergo, we take time out from our working days to go and talk directly to experienced officials who know what they are talking about, and whose word enforces the immigration and tax laws.

Asking nicely, for us at least, has often brought a positive outcome, so long as you are ready to meet officialdom at least half way. Especially in our little corner of BC where everyone knows everybody. However, I suspect the big city guys might see things differently.

At some stage Mrs S and I intend to invite our helpful folks over for a party when our immigration papers finally get processed. You can't let the officials in question know this of course, because that would be trying to unduly influence or corrupt a public official. That would be illegal.

Being the sweet natured and sentimental old fool that I am, I do think that rewarding helpfulness is a good thing. Positive behaviour should engender positive outcomes. Your simple people skills should tell you that. Shouting and hectoring doesn't work unless on the truly subservient, and public servants, despite the nomenclature, should never be treated as servile. It just puts their backs up, and is almost always counter productive, human psychology being what it is. Treat someone like an arse and they will respond in kind, if not to you, then to the next poor zeeb who crosses their path. If confronted by opposition, you can either figuratively throw shit about like some petulant teen, which covers everyone and causes all sorts of annoyance and unhappiness, or be grown up, helpful and smooth the way, which lowers almost everyone's stress levels. Apart from psychotic misanthropes who are only truly happy when everyone else is as miserable as they are.

Thus it was, on one particular occasion recently we were confronted by an issue when Mrs S and I went to visit Service Canada. Previously, Mrs S had some documents 'seized' by a customs official when we were at the border getting my work permit. Getting a work permit means getting a written offer of a job and the time and content of the advert, taking a correctly filled in form, note of National Occupation Code for your job, copies of bank statements, positive Labour Market Opinion and all that jazz out of Canada, reaching the US side of the border, turning around and heading back up to Canadian customs (Called 'doing a flagpole' by the US Customs guys) after getting a slip to say you'd been to the US border post. Then you present your documents to the officials at immigration to apply for the Work Permit. We were given a receipt for our seized documents, but firmly told that because of immigration rule changes it would be an offence to use said documents. Later on, a rather embarrassed official (One of our 'helpful' people) told us; "Oh, they shouldn't have done that. You can carry on using the reference." A-hem.

Turns out that with regard to this particular document, which Mrs S had been issued with long before she and I got hitched; you only ever get given one. You cannot be issued with another, as, to directly quote one red faced official "It would really screw up the system.".

Being the people we are, we shook hands cordially, and walked away with apologies ringing in our ears. Outside, Mrs S and I exchanged grins. We felt another little step on our journey had just been completed.

Feeling warmer?

Original source; National Post
H/T This post on Watts up with that c/o Smokey (09:09:49)
Original graph from University of Alabama, Huntsville.

Looks like evidence to me. Case closed. Game over. Now can we get on with our lives without all the extra taxes please?