blogging, I'm bad at it.

I haven't written anything in forever so this is going to be long. I'll break it down into sections so you can hop, skip and jump over things (all of it?)

Vaccination/work
We held our own little H1N1 clinic here at the office yesterday, and it was pretty much awesome. We opened it to all of our clients (HIV+ as well as the clients who use the needle exchange) as well as community care-givers, the homeless, sex trade workers, those with mental health issues etc etc.
I usually feel pretty great about the work that we do, but yesterday amplified that by a ka-billion. Everyone came together and got shit done and it was really neat to see people who are so marginalized overall to have a place to come where they're treated with respect.
Delightful, just delightful.
I was the first to get poked, and no crazy side-effects thus far... aside from a sore arm.

Ottawa
Ottawa was amazing. I love that city and would like to live there. I didn't get to see half of what I'd like to see, but that is what vacation time is for I guess!
The PrEP workshop was beyond interesting, but the whole concept (especially the clinical trials currently taking place in Asia, Africa etc) left me pretty uneasy. Long story short: use condoms. always.
I had emailed Jack Layton's office to ask if I could perhaps meet him while I was on town, and he obliged. He's a really genuine person as far as I can tell. I was only able to spend about 10 minutes or so, but his office and his demeanor were both diverse and understated. Super nice guy and very funny.
Prior to my meeting with my favourite NDPer, I watched question period. It reminded me a lot of sports fans at games who just yell for the sake of yelling. I know that the majority of the serious (read: real) business takes place behind doors, but it was still pretty amazing to see parliament in action.
Ottawa also meant my first ikea trip (as my boss would say I'm "straight off of the farm") and I'm in love. The chair I had my heart set on was too big to count as checked bagage, so I had to leave it there. Again, that chair is what my vacation time is for. I did find a wonderful lamp and cookie cutters shaped like woodland animals. Christmas baking will be ADORABLE.

Christmas
I've jumped head first into crafting this year. Barb posted a little while back about reconstructing old jewlery to make something new and fun, and I had my first trial run this week for a birthday present. I think it turned out cute, but I have no real concept of length. Everything else will be knit, baked, or sewn. Wish me luck.

On being passive aggressive
Occasional venting is something we all do but if you hate something so much that you need to complain about it all the time then maybe you should reevaluate. If you put thoughts (albeit limited) out into the world, expect a response. Nothing is worth wasting your life over and pettiness only makes you look like silly. Nothing is all bad, posi up!


Random extras
+the tree is up and covered with minimal "real" decorations. It's more covered with dinosaur finger puppets, KISS comics, papier machier vegetables and broken/found jewelry. I think it's charming.
+ Krys is coming this weekend and you can colour me excited to see her.
+ I (finally) have a real health care provider. She's a nurse practitioner and is delightfully relatable (spell check is telling me relatable isn't a word, whhaaatt), considerate and compassionate.
+ Oh, I also have a dentist and an eye doctor. All this health care is a sign that I'm getting older (both in a "mature" [yuk, yuk, yuk] sense and a physical sense [yuck, yuck, yuck])


c'est tout!

rar

stupid rain. stupid friends. stupid rar rar.
I am in a terrible friggen mood.

Ottawa! Exciting!

I emailed Jack Layton on a whim, he emailed me back and maybe we'll meet. I'm thrilled.

Also, I reserved a pass to go watch the Question period. Awesome.

I would like to see the following things:

The feral cat colony behind Parliament hill
Parliament hill
the Diefenbunker
The Canadian Museum of Civilization
The Byward Market
The National Gallery
And Zaphods, which Megan suggested.

hon hon hon!

I'm enrolling in a French course to upgrade. Colour me excited to return to the world of academia (in a tiny little scope).

I'm hoping that by this time next year I won't panic when I have to speak french and that I'l be able to carry on a conversation with Eric/his family.
Goals, what what.

1. My scholarship for ICADs PrEP conference in Ottawa has been confirmed. It's going to be super interesting and as an added bonus, I'm taking the opportunity to see the city and staying an extra day. What should I do in Ottawa? Nick tells me it's like Fredericton, but bigger (which sounds A+ to me).

2. I spent 24 hours in Fredericton. It involved an adorable 2 year old, MCing a formal gala, a man twice my age teaching me how to dance at this gala, too much wine, changing from a formal dress into white denim and smearing fake blood all over my mouth, randomly seeing Cuff the Duke, drunk girl dragging me to get my CD signed (I was *that* girl, yikes.), swooning over Wayne Petty while simultaneously raving about my Erad, way too many drunkdrunkd-runk text messages, the phoniest apology ("I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings or whatever..." right.) I will ever hear, too much Gin, "IM ANDREWWKATE!", an argument with a surly bus driver about why inconsistencies between the Acadian Lines bus schedule and his schedule are not my problem, getting home much earlier than expected.

3. Erad and I watched* Throw Momma from the Train last night. By watched I mean, he watched the whole thing and I fell asleep.

4. My parents are coming to visit for a few days (I think?) this week.

5. Erad is gone for another full week and I really don't like it.

So, I'm more of a "know it all" as opposed to a "doctor" per se...

So, after a long week of harassing calls from family members I decided to look at the H1N1 Vaccine more closely. I had initially blown it off as unnecessary, but after insistence from family/coworkers I looked a little further into it.
I'm now of the position that it's would be silly and irresponsible not to get it. For me not to get it.


I'm all for healthy debate, and after a little bit of discussion (side point - I absolute can't stand when people start to debate, and then when they have no rebuttal just say "oh, well, do what you want".)I started wondering "why" people were so adamantly against it. I had asked myself the exact same question three days ago, and realized that I have no concrete reasoning. Most of the people who I've talked about this are in the same boat, they don't want it but their reasons have no actual science behind it.

I want good reasons NOT to have this vaccine. Substantiated reasons that go further than the drug companies are making money... of course they are, they always have and they always will... that doesn't make the vaccine ineffective. Reasons beyond just following the normal influenza guidelines (fluids, no hand shaking, washing your hands etc), which are all fine and well for the normal seasonal flu (I'll let you do your own research, but the main difference here is we don't have the normal "buffer" group in the population that already have the anti-bodies, so the normal guidelines just aren't enough.

Personal/moral reasons? I'm not going to debate that, everyone has their personal reasons and thats cool. I can't argue with personal morals... you know? Science? I can argue, belief systems? tricky!

As for the rest of it (and I can't believe Im about to say this), I think there is way too much of a "damn the man!" mentality going on.

I agree - people are going to profit off of this, it's unfortunate, but in our current system it's going to happen. If this was a valid reason to boycott, we'd need to talk to the grocery stores who do markups right before a winter storm. It sucks, but it doesn't mean the vaccine is ineffective.

I agree that it's important to do what you can to ensure you don't get sick - Wash your hands, stay home if you feel ill, take the vaccine

I disagree that the potential side effects of the vaccine are greater/more harmful than what happens if you catch this virus.

I know that the current health care system in NB is not equipped to deal with even a minor outbreak. There aren't enough staff, respirators, beds etc.

I know that the vaccine development with SARS and the avian flu made major headway in the development of the H1N1 vaccine. I agree that it was fast tracked, but the legwork was already done.

This just isn't a case of over-vaccination (which is something that I normally believe is happening), it's a case of there is potential for major fan-shit-hittage, and in this case it's irresponsible to pretend that threat isn't there.


Science, bitches.

fml

Today is Erad's birthday.
I made carrot cupcakes.

It turns out today is also "National Pro-Life cupcake day"


...


........

Bring in a tray of cupcakes for any group of people and you will find that they will flock to get them. As soon as they take a bite they will probably ask, "Who's birthday is it?"

Then you answer. "It's no ones birthday. These cupcakes represent the 50,000,000 children who weren't allowed to be born, who never had a birthday." The cake in their mouth will become dry and the moment will hopefully become quite somber. Then you say, "If you and I were aborted we wouldn't have a birthday party either.

http://jezebel.com/5377908/worst-holiday-ever-national-pro+life-cupcake-day