Kay, I know that posts about politics are really boring, but lately the CBC has had some awesome coverage of the election on their airwaves and it has me thinking. One of the issues they are giving a lot of attention to is democratic reform, and I’m ashamed to say I’ve never questioned our democratic process at all, or given it any thought. Smarter people than me, however, have pointed out that our current system is not quite fair, because we live in a multi-party country. In any given riding, the votes might be split such that the winning candidate did not receive 50% or more of the votes; with enough candidates running, the winner might get as little as 30% of the votes. That makes it seem like the winning MP doesn’t actually represent the majority of his constituents.

Another major point is that parties that are relatively new on the scene are not likely to win any ridings, even though they may win a significant percentage of the popular vote; this makes people a) not want to vote for that party because it’s pointless, and b) find that their views, if they agree with that party, are completely not represented in the house. For example, The Green Party is trying very hard to become a legitimate party this election by running a candidate in every riding, but since they are unlikely to actually win any seats, anyone who likes them and votes for them will find their views completely unrepresented when it comes to law-making.

The CBC has been talking a lot about how European countries work. Apparently quite a few of them have mixed systems, where the winner in each riding goes to parliament, but some extra candidates go too, based on how much of the popular vote their party received. So, say the Green Party gets 5% of the overall vote, they’d be guaranteed some sort representation in the house — maybe 1 or 2 votes — in order to give the people who voted for them proper representation.

It makes sense to me, and I can’t believe I never thought of it before!

Someone bought our house! Life is good!

Bring on the mess! There’s no way I’m mopping the kitchen floor tonight, my friends. 🙂

The next season of The Amazing Race begins July 6th.

Check it out here.

Someone has written my novel.

A couple of years ago, when I got laid off from my job, I thought I’d try my hand at creative writing. Sir Monkeypants bought me a really nice journal to write in and I got started. My idea for a novel was to take a bunch of quirky, small-town characters and have them be in a book club. Each section of the novel would feature the club reading a different piece of classic literature, and something about the book they were reading would affect one of the characters’ lives. I had sketched out the basics of the characters and settings, and selected a few of the classic novels to feature.

Well, someone wrote my book! It’s called The Jane Austen Book Club and Entertainment Weekly just gave it a glowing review. I knew it was a good idea. I’m kind of sad about it, but I guess it was just an idea whose time had come. I’ll definitely be buying a copy and I’m sure I’ll love it.

Sigh.

We listed our townhouse for sale this morning, and already we have two viewings lined up. Whee!! Maybe this will all be over in a week — heaven knows we can’t possibly keep the house in such a pristine state of cleanliness for much longer.

So if you know of anyone who is looking for a great townhouse in Kanata, hook us up!

Man, I just watched last night’s season finale of The O.C. and I cried like a little baby. Crazy! The O.C. is definitely my favourite show on television — a show I love so much, it is totally filling the Buffy void. Despite the horror that is Mischa Barton, I highly recommend the show to all.

Other than The O.C., Monk, and Arrested Development (which I really, really hope gets renewed for next season), I’m finding there just isn’t much on TV these days. The West Wing has gone so far downhill, there’s now a website for fans of the first few seasons, devoted to trying to get NBC to pull the show OFF the air. Sad.

Anyone know of anything else I should be checking out in summer reruns, as a possible addition to my permanent fall lineup?

We did more packing on the weekend — finished the epic book sort, and packed away some non-essentials like knickknacks, photo albums, and some art. We also filled another couple of boxes full of “give away to charity” stuff.

I’m pretty impressed at how good I’m being about giving stuff away, stuff that just 10 years ago I thought I’d never, ever, EVER part with in a million years. I think the secret is that, now that we have a house and a kid, I’m starting to get all the stuff I’ve been storing in my mom’s basement for years delivered up here. My mom is a total pack rat — she keeps EVERYTHING. She’s been sending up boxes full of a) every toy I ever had as a kid, b) every essay, project, and note I ever took in school as a kid, and c) dozens of books of the “teen heartache” variety. I find it interesting that she is much more emotionally attached to this stuff than I am. I look at a box of old toys and think, yeah, the Captain is never going to play with those Pretty Ponies and I don’t really care about them, so off to charity they go. My mom looks at the same box and thinks, Pretty Ponies! You used to love those! You can’t get rid of those, no way! You must cherish them forever!

I think part of the reason she’s so into keeping our stuff is that it reminds her of when we were kids — happy memories for her, but nothing special for us. But more than that, I think her attachment issues stem from the fact that her mom, our grandmother, was not a keeper. She’s a streamlined woman who, I’m assuming, kept very little of sentimental value from her kids’ childhoods. Probably my mom grew up and found out that her mom had tossed out her baby clothes, her dolls, and her grade 10 essay on Julius Caesar, and was pretty pissed about it. So, now, she overcompensates by keeping every thing her own kids ever did.

Ironically, it is turning her daughters into complete non-pack-rats, people who are able to get rid of tons of stuff because we have to — I don’t have space to store all this stuff, I don’t care that much about it (those essays, in particular, are pretty freakin’ embarrassing), and it’s all really, really dusty. I did keep a few little things, but the majority is going. It’s sort of like the cycle of life — one non-keeper begot a total pack rat begot a non-keeper. Interesting.

My sister FameThrowa came by on the weekend with a cool gift for the Captain — a mixed CD of kid-friendly tunes she’d made herself. So far the Captain’s favourites are (surprise, surprise) the Phil Collins song and the Ricky Martin song (a poor man’s Enrique, he says).

But also at the top of the list, surprisingly, is “My Girl” by The Temptations. I’m pretty happy that he likes the song, and also happy that FameThrowa put several cool selections from the 50s and 60s on the CD. I’ve been searching for family-friendly music for the Captain for a while, and although we have several CDs that are expressly made for children, I’ve found that my personal favourites are early rock albums, like those by The Beatles and Elton John.

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about older songs from the 50s and 60s, and how Captain Jelly Belly will never hear them if I’m not really proactive about playing them. They just don’t play a lot of music from that era on the radio anymore. When I was growing up, my mom listened to an “oldies” station that played 50s and 60s stuff — stuff from her youth — all the time, so I know all kinds of songs by big bands like the Beach Boys and The Four Seasons, but also songs by one-hit wonders like Booker T and MGs or The Singing Nun. Now, our local “oldies” station plays stuff from the 80s and 90s — stuff from my youth — and the 50s and 60s stuff is all but gone. Sometimes you’ll hear a Beatles tune on the easy listening station, or a Rolling Stones song on the classic rock station, but there’s no one out there these days playing a lot of Elvis or Smokey Robinson or The Supremes. I guess it’s because all the folks that are my mom’s age have moved over to listening to the CBC.

When I was a kid, we used to have “song nights” at my house where we’d haul out my mom’s 45s (she had hundreds of them) and I’d play DJ, and my sisters and I would groove to the old tunes all evening. I don’t even have a turntable now, so there’s just no way to play those songs. It makes me sad — like a whole generation of good music (better than the 80s, as evidenced by that embarrassing local “oldies” station) is disappearing. I vow to do my best to illegally download all the old favourites I can remember, and play them for Captain Jelly Belly as much as possible. Maybe I’ll make my mom a CD, too.

You’re Ireland!
Mystical and rain-soaked, you remain mysterious to many people, and this
makes you intriguing.  You also like a good night at the pub, though many are just as
worried that you will blow up the pub as drink your beverage of choice.  You’re good
with words, remarkably lucky, and know and enjoy at least fifteen ways of eating a potato.
 You really don’t like snakes.
Take the Country Quiz at
the Blue Pyramid

Captain Jelly Belly slept for an hour and a half this morning, and I totally meant to have a nap, I swear. But time really seems to fly when he’s asleep.

Here’s what I did instead:

• talked to Sir Monkeypants about his plans for the day, and said goodbye to him
• called our lawyer to make an appointment to go in and sign our wills
• called ADT to get a quote for an alarm system for our new house (their customer service totally sucks, though, and I’m seriously rethinking hiring them)
• called my chiropractor to reschedule an appointment that conflicts with the Captain’s doctor’s appointment
• searched for a schedule of OLN’s upcoming programming, to try to figure out when The Lance Armstrong Chronicles is on, but their website sucks and I couldn’t figure it out
• tried to register for our 10-year university reunion, but it turns out it costs money, so I need to double check with to see if we really should register, or if we should just try to crash instead
• had a look at our epic “things to do before selling the house” list to see if there was anything I could knock off today
• checked all the websites I check every day (IMDB news, Fametracker, Tomato Nation, Dooce, Television Without Pity)
• read the LiveJournal posts of my buddies, and replied to some
• checked my mail
• looked at photos people had sent me of last week’s Mommy And Baby party, and integrated the new photos with our photos into one photo album
• showered, dressed, and dried my hair
• posted to LiveJournal

And now the Captain is awake. Go go go!