Snow fell on Monday, November 21, 2016 here in Montreal — the first snowfall of the season. For this Montreal minute, I take you along on my walk, in that snow, through the streets of our arrondissement (district) “Rosemont-La Petite Patrie” to my exercise class at the local “Energie-Cardio”.
I love walking in the snowy weather. The trick is to dress right. As the old Scandinavian saying goes: There’s no bad weather, only bad clothes.
A quick search on the web and I found this fun bit of language info.
In Swedish/Norwegian the word for “weather” rhymes with the word for “clothes”.
Swedish: Det finns inget dåligt väder, bara dåliga kläder
Norwegian: Det finnes ikke dårlig vær, bare dårlige klær
On dit en français, «Il n’y a pas de mauvais temps, juste des mauvais vêtements. »
I have been learning Irish for several years now. I don’t have as much time as I’d like to devote to it but I don’t let that stop me from persisting. Little by little, a word here and there, and now this crazy language doesn’t look quite as strange as when I first started to tackle it.
My longtime tutor and fellow learner sent me this one panel today. It gave me a much needed giggle. Of course, I had to work out the grammar and vocabulary.
Déanta na fírinne = Actually / In fact
is lú an bhuairt a chuireann = is less concerning
hionróirí seo ón spás = these invaders from space
ná = than
an ceannaire = the leader
a bhfuilimid á dtabhairt chuige. = to whom we are taking them.
Actually, these invaders from space are less troubling than the leader we’re taking them to.
If: Trompe l’œil = painting/drawing intended to create the illusion of a 3-dimensional object. Then: Trump l’œil = the art of making a racist, sexist, self-serving, demagogue, asshole appear normal.*
I suggest paying attention to how quickly folks are going to try and normalize the grotesque con artist now heading toward the White House.
Every Sunday during the good weather months, drummers, musicians, dancers and onlookers gather around the Sir George-Étienne Cartier monument* at the entrance to Mont Royal park.
Today, we took a long Sunday walk and came upon the gathering. We were surprised to see one happening given the cool weather and how late it is in the season.
In the summer of 1972, I went to Hawaii to help my youngest sister who had just lost her boyfriend in a car accident. She was 17 1/2 years old and several months pregnant.
She and Michael had been living in Tracy, California. Now she was suddenly alone, grieving and expecting. Rough times, to say the least. She wanted to go back to Maui where she had lived before and where she felt safer and more comfortable.
I picked up what little I owned in Sausalito, California and moved with her to Kihei, Maui to be her support. We rented a small one room unit on a property across from the beach. It was made of concrete blocks like many buildings on the islands were. It had space for two single beds on either side of the room. The bathroom was tiny. The kitchenette was just big enough. The geckos were easily seen on the white painted walls. We had a small table with two chairs and a record player.
I rented LPs from the library. We listened to music, drew, played cards, swam, walked, dealt with our crazy mother who lived “up country” and waited for “Tiny” to arrive.
I took the time to learn the words to some of my favourite songs. I would play a song over and over again on the record player, lifting the needle up and setting it down again on the groove just before the cut, and transcribe the lyrics by hand.
Here is my transcription from then of the Leonard Cohen song that I especially loved. You can click it to see it larger.
Throughout the months of the 2016 presidential campaign, much of the public and many in the media framed this odious man as a normal politician. His outrageous utterances and behavior were simply “rough politics”. His supporters were simply exercising their rights to free expression.
He is not normal. His statements and actions were and are crass and malevolent. His supporters are terrifyingly likewise.
I am disappointed, saddened and frankly, frightened by the outcome of the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
A large swath of American voters chose an intellectually lazy, loudmouth bully to be their president. Rather than choosing an accomplished, gifted politician and public servant who had real plans to help us move forward, 50 million Americans have dragged us so far backwards that I doubt we will see progress in the USA for decades.
Apparently, the average American citizen does not take the time to actually learn how the government works at local, regional, national levels. What we got this time for an electorate was an emotionally charge, grossly uninformed mob banging around a few convention centers with signs and tacky t-shirts and hats. Bullying and marginalizing minorities, sexism, sexual assault, racism and anti-semitism are all just fine and acceptable with those 50 million American voters.
There is nothing in this president-elect’s entire 70 year existence to indicate that he will do anything but self-serve. Once his supporters realize this, through their thick fog of fear, hate and fuzzy nostalgia, they will be beyond angry. He will enrich the elites, anger allies, slow any climate change solutions to a stop and do nothing for the average man.
The social fabric of America will dissemble. I see separatists movements, home grown terrorists, martial law, foreign investment waning, outside forces rushing in to take resources.
It is ugly, very ugly. But 50 million Americans want this. Or, they think they do.
I love this time of year. Oiche Shamhna, Halloween, El Dia de Los Muertos are all wonderful celebrations of life and death which totally appeal to me. In this short video, I talk about witches and hags and why we have reviled older women rather than give them credit for surviving past youth.
For this Montreal Minute, I chose Montréal’s distinctive metro which just had its fiftieth birthday on October 14, a couple days before mine. Lots to celebrate this October!
The entire metro system is underground. The trains are never outside. They roll on rubber tires. In fact the metro trains were the very first rubber-tired subway trains on the planet! I found that out here on this list of fun facts about le Métro. If you are feeling realy subway geeky, check out this Métro fan site for even more info.
The rolling stock is getting old so, the STM (Société de Transport de Montréal) is in the process of adding new fancy AZUR trains. I have been on the new trains just a couple of times now. They are sweet — modern, stream-lined, well-designed. Definitely an improvement.
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