Just a quick caveat here, I am a smoker, much to the offspring's chagrin. I must admit that in the last few years we no longer smoke in the house and have certainly cut back but alas, can't just seem to quit.
Watching documentaries about cancer is always scary but I did force myself to recently watch Wendy Mesley's documentary on CBC called "Chasing the Cancer"
http://www.cbc.ca/consumers/market/files/health/cancer/blood.html

If you want to be scared just go ahead and read the story. Seems that very little of what we use in our daily lives is actually safe and most contain some form of carcinogens. I mean, who knew that face creams to fight our wrinkles can actually cause cancer? Stuff that we use daily to clean our houses? Why I ask myself is the only industry to be picked on the tobacco industry? Why do the rest get off scott free? What the heck am I going to do now to clean my house? Oh well, I think I'll just go clean my oven and hope for the best!

I have been thinking a lot about the new No Smoking Laws that comes into effect this week and have a few thoughts on this subject. Much to my offspring's disgust, I still smoke so I am somewhat biased here.
I think it is time to ban or restrict more than cigarettes. The time has come to restrict/ban alcohol and make it illegal anywhere except in your own home. Alcohol, as we all know is responsible for many deaths directly through liver and pancreatic cancers and indirectly through drunk drivers who insist on killing others with their vehicles.
I think also we need to restrict/ban all hamburgers, hot dogs, fried foods, cakes, candies etc that contribute to obesity and therefore can cause premature death and stress the health care system which costs us all money. At least most smokers die young and don't collect CPP.
I believe that everyone should wear helmets not just on bicycles and motorcycles but also in your vehicle. Think of all the people who would not die of head injuries in car crashes if they were wearing helmets. Come to think of it, I think maybe pedestrians should be wearing them as well since they tend to get hit by cars and might survive if wearing a helmet.
There should be a ban on the manufacturing sector that contributes to air pollution, after all we do not need the stuff they are producing, or do we?
Can we go back to the last century and live without all the stuff that we now take for granted.
Life is a risk and we will all die sooner or later. How much government interference do we want in our lives.
Lets get rid of Nitrogen Dioxide (power plants, cars), Carbon Monoxide Cars, Fireplaces, furnaces), Lead (smelters, refineries and old paint), Sulphur Dioxide (power generation, industry), Formaldehyde (permanent press clothes, press board, off gas from couches, carpets etc.), Ammonia (cleaning products, live stock waste), Radon , I loved this one (a gas that occurs naturally in soil and rocks and is the second leading cause of lung cancer after smoking), who would have thought hiking thru the woods could kill you! There are a lot more but I only listed the really important ones.
The bottom line here is that as long as we want all the stuff that this century affords us thru technology and manufacturing, we will all die from all of the above hazards. That's life in the fast lane.

Most of you who know me know that I was born in Germany. I bring this forth only as background. Germany is a country with incredible rules and regulations most of them written down somewhere in the bureaucratic jungle of various city offices. I have visited there myself with relatives on a few occasions and have been blown away by some of the rules. My aunt, for example, will do laundry only on Mondays and Tuesdays is always for washing windows whether they need it or not. I asked her once "what if you skip a Tuesday?" and the reply was "the neighbours will talk".
I recently came across an article in a German on line magazine that spells out a few more rules.
A German man took his neighbour to court because the frogs in his neighbours pond were too loud! The frogs won. The court told the man to get earplugs.
In another case this one over barking dogs (caveat to my neighbour, your dogs are fine and don't bother me), the court decided the dog may only bark 30 minutes a day in 10 minute intervals. How the hell can you get your dog to do that?
Quiet time in Germany is from 8 PM to 7 AM and all day Sundays. I have to admit this one sounds quite pleasant to me, it sure would be nice not the hear lawnmowers on Sunday evenings.
Barbecues are only allowed once month and I must admit I could not live with this rule as I grill most of the summer weather permitting as does most of the neighbourhood. Seems the smoke and smell bothers some people so they came with this rule.
There are so many more rules I wont bore you with but I think that if we all treat our neighbours as we would like to be treated there would be a lot less conflict.

Some time ago, middle grandson and I had a discussion about the Military. He was and still is thinking seriously about signing up. He told me at the time that he was not "afraid of dying" and he considered it a job.
Yesterday when I heard about the death of Cpt. Nichola Goddard my first thought was, oh God not another one. I thought about it most of the day and listened to various news reports and the debate in The House of Commons including the vote last evening. To say I was dissapointed by the lack of support of the mission by the Liberals, who sent our troops to begin with, is an understatement.
This morning by the light of day I did a little research into workplace accidents and remember, these troops consider this their job. I believe the death toll is around 18 for the last 3 years, correct me if i'm wrong please.
What I found is this, in 2004, 928 Canadians died in workplace accidents http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/workplace-safety/charts-fatalitiesbyprov.html
No one should die going to work but this puts a different spin on things in my mind.
I for one dont believe that we can/will make any difference in Afghanistan over the long term but I will always support them for doing their job.

The mission to bring about peace in Afghanican is being debated in the House of Commons today with the Government of the day asking for a two year extension. Appropriately, the left wing thinkers think we ought to bring our troops home and send them to Darfur instead?
Dont think I quite get that actually, wasn't it the Liberals that sent them to Afghanistan to begin with? And why pull them out of one country where Muslims are killing Muslims and have done so for centuries to send them to another country where Muslims are killing Muslims? What the heck is the difference here? Who gets to decide which Muslim lives are more valuable? We cant be everywhere.
I think I get it actually. The reason we dont want our troops in Afghanistan is because they are there at the behest of the Americans. Am I close? Help me out my Liberal friends.
Unfortunately this time I have to agree with my Liberal friends. Bring our troops home, all of them from countries where they insist on doing each other in. We are not going to change anything. Our culture is only a hundred plus years old where theirs is way older and no matter how long we stay there as soon as we leave they will be right back at it. Are we prepared to stay forever? That's unfortunately what I think it will take. Cant change centuries of tribal hatred and warfare.

My offspring the inveterate traveller just recently wrote a blog from Barcelona, Spain in which he speaks of the difference between North America and parts of Europe (Click on my sidebar Where's Teddy Now). One of his points is that here people would rather stay at home with their tv's and movies etc. than to go out walking at night and maybe meet people they know. Speaking for myself living in big bad Toronto I would like to say that walking out at night can be dangerous in this city. We all remember the Boxing Day shooting of an innocent girl and there have been numerous others since. I have always felt relatively safe in my neighbourhood, sleepy East York. Of course the furthest I go at night is into the backyard to have a cigarette. Oh, I know that's dangerous also if one remembers last summer when a young woman was murdered under the same circumstance. She went out to have a smoke and her neighbour did her in. Sad isn't it when your own yard becomes unsafe.

Last summer on our street every night from midnight until 3 am, there was a group of teens terrorizing the street on their skateboards. I nicknamed them the "skaterboys" and complained numerous times to our councillor Janet Davis. I was basically told I was nuts to worry about it and that they were harmless. I pointed out to Ms. Davis that small stuff leads to big stuff and I felt that police should patrol periodically and ask these boys to go home. In my opinion, young teens shouldn't be out at 3 am. She was no help and the boys are back at it.

On Saturday night as I was out in the backyard around 10 or so I heard lots of sirens, more than normal. I went inside to watch the 11 o'clock news and heard the "breaking news" of a shooting just down the street. Seems a young man was shot three times and a stray bullet went thru a window of a ground floor apartment. Two assailants were still on the loose. Bit of a shock really because I really didn't think it could happen here. Dumb huh! The young man in question will survive, but surprise surprise, he is not helping the police find his assailants.

Why we don't walk out at night? I think right there is a big reason why I don't and also why I wont sit in my backyard at night alone anymore. Sad really isn't it that life in the big city has come to this. Maybe Europe is safer after all

When the offspring was last in Toronto, he decided the didn't like my shoes. How many guys notice shoes you might wonder especially their mother's shoes! In any case, he thought that the shoes that I owned were not supportive of my 6 foot frame. When you are this tall obviously the feet are just as big and so we made a trip to one of the only shoe stores that carry large sizes. At his urging I bought 3 pairs of very expensive shoes because of course the larger the size the larger the price tag.
So, it's almost ironic that yesterday while walking thru the mall I spotted a handbag that I thought my Mom would like in a cute rate shoe store. On my way into the store I tripped over boxes of shoes that they like to pile up by the front entry way and went splat all over their floor. I was wearing my good shoes, in case the offspring reads this'
My immediate concern was of course for my new hip which didn't hurt but as I tried to move the pain shot thru my knee and caused me to feel dizzy. Security was called to help me to my feet after it was established that the hip was fine. Ice packs were put on the old knee and after some time I was able to hobble to the car and drive myself home.
Today of course is another story. The entire body aches with the knee being the worst. Good news is and x-ray shows no breakage just bad bruising.
So much for expensive shoes. Doesn't make any difference if your a klutz.

I might be getting in over my head here, but when a principal of a school in Montreal is receiving death threats over a students eating habits ya gotta wonder what's wrong with this world. In today's paper it tells the story of a 7-year old Filipino boy who was eating in his "traditional" manner in the school lunch room and was accused of eating "like a pig". Help me out here people, is there something I'm missing in this story. AP reports that there are demonstrations in Manila over this and the Philippines' ambassador to Canada calls this affair "an affront to Filipino culture" ??? Is this multi-culturalism gone a little far maybe? Shouldn't 7 year old have some table manners? Should everyone be allowed to eat in public according to their culture? The family has decided to file a human rights complaint? Am I missing something here?

Just over a year ago, after waiting 14 months, I was thrilled to finally get a new hip. Great, thought I, life will begin anew for me pain free and able to do all the things I did in my youth. Well, the reallity is somewhat different. Here is what I discovered after the fact and too late for me. All hips are not created equally and in our wonderful country of Canada not all provinces provide the same hip.
At first I was relatively happy, relative being the key word here, I mean I could bend over somewhat, I could sit and walk without the same amount of grinding pain I had before and I could actually sleep without waking up crying in pain and disturbing Steve every time I did that, so yes I was relatively happy. That is until one day in early January when I came across an article in the Globe and Mail, our premier rag in Toronto (being the most expensive) from a columnist named Margaret Wente. Now it seems Ms. Wente also had hip surgery, two to be specific, but had hers in the Province of Quebec. Now why would she do that I wondered until I read a little more and did a little research on my own. Seems that the surgery done in Montreal is less invasive and provides a better hip. In fact the hips provided to Ms. Wente are considered lifetime hips, the recovery was a lot faster than mine was, and allow her to live her life relatively unrestricted. There's that word again.
Now here's the things that are forbidden to me for ever and ever that Ms. Wente's superior hip implants allow her to do. I can no longer ski, run, jog or play tennis. Accidentally squatting or crossing my legs at the knee could damage the implant or cause me to fracture my femur, and worst of all, my implants will probably wear out in 12 to 15 years which would put me back in the hospital for a revision at around age 70 or so. The thought of having another operation like that has me lying in bed at night worrying.
The hip implant I have has a plastic lined cup to hold the ball and as I move around my daily life the ball grind away at the plastic. Over time, little bits of plastic will come away and start floating around in my body. The newer and more expensive implants are made of ceramic and therefore will not deteriorate.
I think our Government is penny wise and pound DUMB by not using these newer implants keeping in mind that revision surgery becomes unnecessary and that is were their savings will ultimately be.
Oh yes, I almost forgot the best part of this story. Ms. Wente had her Quebec surgery with her superior implant paid for by guess who? The taxpayer of Ontario thru OHIP. Neat Huh!