More money for cops!

Toronto mayor Rob Ford has demanded a 10-per-cent cut from every city department.
Chief Bill Blair insists that public safety depends on a budget increase.

Hamilton has 792 officers for a population of 504,559 = 157 officers / 100,000 people.
Toronto has 223 officers / 100,000 people.

Hamilton's budget of $130,752,220 works
out to $259 per citizen.
Toronto's pays $381 per citizen.

According to Statistics Canada, police spending
in Canada increases by an average 7 per cent a year.

While Canadian police budgets have increased, the crime rate has plummeted to its lowest levels since the mid-1970s, and officers deal with one-third fewer offences than they did in 1991.


Read more in the Globe and Mail.

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Read the signs (again)

more examples of why i love graffiti...
signs of other intelligent life
in the universe, all mixed
into the day to day...

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Climate change?

global warming?
cooling?
climate change?

when will we stop acting
like an infection
on this planet?




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What If God...

if i was an all-knowing, all-seeing being, i'd be less surprised when humans did dumb things... who needs a god that's always blowing his top all the time?

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the Objects in mirrors

Sometimes space is not as glamorous as it looks from a small town on Earth. After an hour or so of routine valve maintenance, his suit was soaked in with his perspiration and exhalations and felt like a size too small. All he wanted from the universe now was a hot shower and few hours of sleep.

He waved to Jared and signaled his return to the portal, then he saw it again. He'd noticed the other ship maybe ten minutes ago, flashing chrome against the blackness of the stars. In galactic terms, it was on a collision course but by his human reckoning, it was more than fifty miles away - enough to make you curious, but nothing
to worry about...

He was nearly at the hatch when he saw it accelerating at an incredible rate. He blinked his eyes and suddenly realized it wasn't another ship... it was an M102 Remote area denial device, headed straight for his future.

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Learning to Fly

"It's Science, Bertie" said Andrew, casting his
young tenor a little crossly into the gusting dim.

"I'm frightened" said his young companion, shivering from more than the blistering wind
off the Channel, and for a moment, that sound was the world.

Andrew stared back across the meadow and said "The kite flies, Bertie, yes?" and after a moment's hesitation, Andrew replied "Yes".

"So if the kite flies, and you're holding on to that lite very tightly, then you will fly too, yes?".  After
a longer hesitation and with much less certainty, Bertie's little voice answered "I suppose so... ".

"Do you want to fly, Bertie? Do you want to soar above us all and see what none of us have ever seen? Is that what you want Bertie?" said Andrew. There followed an even longer hesitation until Bertie responded without any certainty
whatsoever "Yes....?".

"Then fly, Bertie, fly! Fly now, fly today, fly into history and show us the way!" said Andrew and tugged on the string as hard as he dared. Bertie stumbled into a jog that became a run. The golden rays of the sun broke through the clouds and illuminated his face. Flushing pink, he ran as
fast as he could and then even faster.

Holding on to the kite for dear life, he lept
into the sky and the first true moment of exhilaration in his life. As the ground dropped
and disappeared beneath his feet, he was flying, high above the white cliffs, the green grass and the wet blue of the Channel. Straining his eyes, squinting the misty distance, he saw France!

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Canadian Dream

Canada used to be a place where big dreams could come to life. Sir John A. MacDonald, Sir Wilfred Laurier, John Diefenbaker, Lest Pearson...

now it's a place where dreams die. Thanks, Harper.

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