Pandemic lexicon

Business nude: A dress code only suitable for virtual meetings

Covidiot: A selfish person who doesn't take COVID-19 and the risks of the virus seriously, despite what government officials and the global health community say.

Quarantini: Whatever your drink of choice is during lockdown.

Coronababies: Children conceived during the pandemic.

Blursday: When you've lost track of what day of the week it is because you're working from home, or out of work.

Jeudredi: The French version of Blursday.

Miss Rona: A slang term for corona. Also "The Rona".

Maskne: Acne breakout from mask wearing.

Zoomeo: When a resident or pet from your home passes behind or in front of your video during a virtual meeting (play on word cameo).

WFH: Work from home.

Nose commando: Wearing a mask, but only over the mouth, not covering the nose.

Sanitation engineer: The person in your life (it could be you) who can’t stop sanitizing everything.

Brady Bunching: How you see your family members now, in blocks on a Zoom screen.

Mask shaming: Yelling at people who aren’t wearing face masks in public spaces. The flip side is the unmasked people who glare at those of us who are wearing masks.

Gray-cation: Letting your natural hair color (even if it’s silver) shine through.

Pandemic fine: A state of being in which you are employed and healthy during a pandemic but you're also tired and depressed and feel like crap all the time. Pandemic fine is like a vicious circle. No, you did not lose your job; you have not come down with the virus, or if you did, the symptoms were minor, so you don't have any reason to complain. But. Despite outwardly being one of the lucky ones, that does not mean that we're not struggling.

Walktail: You need to get out of the house and you also need a drink, so you combine both because you just don't care.

Doomscrolling: The catchall, platform-agnostic term for consuming bad news or information you know is detrimental to your mental health and wellness yet being unable to stop.

Brilliant seat belt ad from Quebec

 

Seen on twitter

"Screw your freedom. Because with freedom comes obligations and responsibilities. You cannot just say I have the right to do X, Y and Z when you affect other people. That is when you get serious. It's like no different than a traffic light. They put the traffic light at the intersection so someone doesn't kill someone else by accident. You cannot say 'no one is going to tell me that I'm gonna stop here, I'm going to go right through it'. Then you kill someone else and it is your doing." 

~Arnold Schwarzenegger

[make sure you say this in your head in your best Arnold voice]

Hallmark!

 

Songs that are 60 years old this year (2021)

Tossin' and turnin' - Bobby Lewis

Crying - Roy Orbison

Runaway - Del Shannon

Will you love me tomorrow - The Shirelles

Runaround Sue - Dion

Stand by me - Ben E King

Let's twist again - Chubby Checker

Take Five - Dave Brubeck Quartet

Are you lonesome tonight - Elvis Presley

What's in the jacket?

 

Small things 27 August

• Don't give up caring, or being kind, because others have. The world needs people like you.
• It's a good thing they picked horses to measure power in vehicles, because it would sound much lamer if you were bragging that your car had 42 elephantpower.
• Overdraft fee industry: $11 billion annually. Cheque cashing industry: $36 billion. Pay Day Loan industry: $9 billion. It's the socioeconomic equivalent of beating up crippled people.
• Saying climate change isn't human-made is like finding out you have cancer as a smoker and blaming it on your genes.
  
  
  
• I have a joke about construction. I'm still working on it.
• Movie idea: Dolly Parton and Elvira play estranged sisters who have to team up to fight evil together.
• Dear UK: "Ladybug!" Not ladybird. Not a bird. Bug.
• The look on my 13 year old granddaughter's face when I said, "Let's blow this popsicle stand!"
• Man trap: When your wife uses the word mansplaining incorrectly. Don't take the bait.
• "Who wants my leftover bacon?" ~said nobody ever
• If you choked on an apple are you pretty much screwed unless you get a paramedic?
• You're being asked to wear a mask, not a Nickelback t-shirt....
• Is it possible that some folks don't take hurricanes seriously because of their soft names?
• The point of golf is to play the least amount of golf possible. (That's a classic)

Where's mah pakidge?

 

The lights are on, but there is no-one at the wheel

 A Malaphor is the blending of idioms or clichés into something silly and possibly absurd.

• Airbrushed under the carpet
• We'll burn that bridge when we get to it
• It's not rocket surgery
• Until the cows freeze over
• There's more than one way to swing a cat in here
• The road to hell wasn't paved in a day
• A bird in the hand gets the worm
• A golden opportunity on a silver platter
• Does the Pope shit in the woods
• I wouldn't trust her with a ten foot pole
• Give them an inch, they'll take the cake
• Let them eat the rich
• Snug as a bug swept under the rug
• You can't teach sleeping dogs new tricks
• Beauty is in the eye of the tiger

Vincent van Dough

 

Things I learned lately 27 August

• The new Tesla Model S 'Plaid' does 0-60mph in 2 seconds. Not a typo. 2. It will do a 1/4 mile in 9 seconds. Electric cars are boring. Pfft...
• Norway has 35 EV chargers per 10,000 people. Canada has 1.3.
• There are about 350,000 EVs on the road in Norway. There are about 170,000 in Canada, the majority in Quebec.
  
  
  
• No racial or ethnic group dominates the US population in the under 18 demographic. I'll let you come to your own conclusions on what that means in about 30 years America.
• The IBM PC is 40 years old.
• Through the 1980s, McDonalds added 5,415 new restaurants, which works out to a new location every 16 hours.
• In the 1980s, A&W launched a new 1/3 pound burger to compete against McDonalds' Quarter Pounder. For the same price. It didn't sell very well. When management investigated, it turned out that Americans didn't know their fractions very well, thinking 1/4 was bigger than 1/3 because there's a four in it.
• St. Paul Alberta features a UFO landing pad.
• April Wine were the 1st Canadian group to ship Platinum status.
• You don't need anything to detoxify your body. Your liver does that all by itself.
• Food portions in European restaurants are much more reasonable than in North America.

"I'm hit!"

 

Small things 20 August

• Imagine if there were drive-thru therapists. "Welcome to Shrink-in-a-box, can I take your disorder?"
• "Voting isn't marriage. It's public transport. You're not waiting for "the one". You're getting on the bus. And if there isn't one going exactly to your destination, you don't stay home and sulk. You take the one that's going closest to where you want to be." ~Mohamad Safa
• You said life would get back to normal after June. Julyed!
• I wish that people who are passionate about vaccines were instead just as passionate about poverty, the environment, victims of abuse. Then maybe some serious shit might get done.
• The irony of antivaxxers saying they "don't want to be part of an experiment", not realizing they are now the control group.
• On 10 March, 1876, Alexander Graham Bell makes the first phone call ever. Moments later he gets a scam call from the "feds" threatening him with arrest for owing back taxes. 
• Chiron. Half man, half horse. Famous for knowledge of medicine. Basically the centaur for disease control.
• What do you call someone who never passes gas in public? A private tutor.
• Ever notice that when you witness bad driving you always want to get a look at the driver? Talk about looking for evidence to support your biases.
• When a spouse or other family member or friend starts venting to you, I think it would be courteous to ask, "Are we listening or problem-solving? Do you want comfort or solutions?" Because sometimes they just want to vent. They don't want your opinion.
• Emotional baggage. Could be called a griefcase.

Hypocrite?

 

Fire perimeter on 15 August 2021

 

Man Scouts

Imagine if there was Man Scouts. 

What badges would you have earned? 

For sure I would have one for 'possessing too many audio and video cables' and one for 'not forgetting anything when packing for a vacation'.

Others: 

• fixed a computer for my kids; 
• got the entire grocery list in one trip; 
• buffed out a car scratch; 
• no mansplaining for a year;
• told 5 dad jokes in under 3 minutes; 
• showered every day during the pandemic; 
• made a sourdough starter; 
• grew something then ate it; 
• no dead tool batteries in a one month span;
• made supper for the whole family and then cleaned up without bragging;

Wait - this isn't new

 

Things I learned lately 20 August

• Tim Hortons has 199 outlets in China, but they want to get to 2,750 in 5 years.
• Certain places in the world still buy microfiche.
  
  
  
• In a secluded woodland near Toronto, there is a hidden cabin that "disappears" into the trees because it's fully clad in mirrored steel. The exact location is a secret, and will only be shared with guests once they've booked a reservation to stay at the cabin. Arcana Micro Cabin Retreat.
• Houston's Katy Freeway is 20 lanes wide in places.
• For the first time on record, rain has been recorded on the summit of Greenland — a location where precipitation has previously always fallen as snow or ice.
• Florida now accounts for 1 in 5 new Covid cases in the US.
• Oksana Chusovitina is the only female gymnast ever to compete in eight Olympic Games. She competed in Tokyo at the age of 46.
• People who work at the food bank would like you to know that they don't buy idea that 'people will abuse the food bank and take food they don't need'. 
• The town I grew up in (Deux Montagnes) was originally part of Ste Eustache and tried to break away from that parish under the name Le Village du Bel-Air. It eventually succeeded in its split, becoming Ste Eustache-sur-le-lac, then Two Mountains (Deux Montagnes).
• Olympic medals were awarded 8 times to Canadian men in 2021. As opposed to 74 times to Canadian women. FYI, I counted a team sport by individual members of the team.

I was just asking...

 

How come I got no 5G?

I've had a lot of questions lately about 5G phone service in Canada. Then I came across this site.

If you want the deets on Canadian 5G, you could do a lot worse.

Small things 13 August

• Biplanes are also into jets.
• New word for Covid deniers, anti-vaccine folks, and mask refuseniks: 'Spreadnecks'
• And to think that at one time I imagined a future where Gov. Andrew Cuomo was president. So much for that.
• It's so dry here, there's now a ban on farts.
• If Fido made a vaccine, you'd be guaranteed not to get 5G. (Fido, a Canadian mobile provider, doesn't offer 5G yet)
• Quick poll: Who of you under 40 separates their laundry into lights and darks?
• "I trust my immune system" is a weird reason not to get the vaccine. I trust mine too, which is why I gave it a detailed dossier on what the virus looks like so it will recognize it tout de suite. 
• I think the Canadian Government should create and issue a formal vaccination passport that does not reveal which vaccine brand a person got for the purposes of international travel.
• It's going to be hard to explain to people that we once owned a device just for GPS navigation. Oh, but it gets better. You had to update the maps. Often.
• If you're in a Zoom meeting with your pet on your lap and someone else says, "OMG! Introduce us to that sweet little thing!", they may not be talking about your pet, but an actual baby.
• I have never used the snooze button. Ever.
• TIL some folks say they're boycotting any business that requires proof of vaccination to enter. Pfft! It's not a boycott if you're not allowed inside...
• For what it's worth, wearing a mask when you're out mingling with the masses not only helps protect you from Covid, but influenza too. 2 birds, one stone.

Definitely not a Boy Scout

 

Euler's Disk

This is possibly the most bizarre science-based video I've seen in a while.

Put them on ALL THE THINGS!

 

Things I learned lately 13 August

• The Burj Khalifa isn't connected to a sewage system, so all the sewage (15 tonnes) is carried away in trucks.
• Around two thirds of all cargo aircraft in use today were converted from used passenger models.
  
  
  
• The Bulgarian St. Stephen Church with its richly ornamented façade on the shores of the Golden Horn in Istanbul, Turkey, is made of cast iron.
• Most Scandinavian parents think that it's healthier to expose their children to as much fresh air as possible. Therefore, they leave them outside to take their naps.
• Stenographers can write 225 words a minute.
• Masks on airplanes generate oxygen by triggering a chemical reaction. If pressure in the cabin is disturbed and masks drop, tugging the mask causes a firing pin to ignite a small explosion in an ‘O2 candle’ where Sodium Chlorate and Potassium Percholorate combine to make Oxygen gas.
• A peeled orange sinks in water, but not an unpeeled orange. That's because the peel is porous and traps air, which makes it buoyant.
• France will be offering its residents €2,500 (USD$2,975) to trade their old car and get an electric bicycle to boot. Lawmakers in France have approved the measure in a preliminary vote. France would be the first nation in the world to give money in exchange for old cars.
• After the Civil War, the US briefly considered moving the US capitol to St. Louis.
• You won't find school buses in Europe. For one thing, public transit is ubiquitous.
• The spire on top of the Empire State Building was meant as an anchoring point for airships (blimps).

Cheating hand

 

Songs that are 50 years old this year (2021)

Three Dog Night - Joy to the World

Rod Stewart - Maggie May

Carole King - It's Too Late/I Feel the Earth Move

Bee Gees - How Can You Mend a Broken Heart

Donny Osmond - Go Away Little Girl

John Denver - Take Me Home, Country Roads

The Temptations - Just My Imagination (Running Away with Me)

Tony Orlando and Dawn - Knock Three Times

Janis Joplin - Me and Bobby McGee

James Taylor - You've Got a Friend

Jean Knight - Mr. Big Stuff

The Rolling Stones - Brown Sugar

Lee Michaels - Do You Know What I Mean

Joan Baez - The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down

Marvin Gaye - What's Going On

Paul & Linda McCartney - Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey

Bill Withers - Ain't No Sunshine

Five Man Electrical Band - Signs   

Tom Jones - She's a Lady

George Harrison - My Sweet Lord

Gordon Lightfoot - If You Could Read My Mind

Cher - Gypsys, Tramps & Thieves

Carly Simon - That's the Way I've Always Heard It Should Be

Ike & Tina Turner - Proud Mary

Chicago - Colour My World

The Stampeders - Sweet City Woman

Marvin Gaye - Mercy Mercy Me

Brewer & Shipley - One Toke Over the Line

Cat Stevens - Wild World

Olivia Newton-John - If Not for You

The Fortunes - Here Comes That Rainy Day Feeling Again

The Who - Won't Get Fooled Again

Isaac Hayes - Theme from Shaft

The Doors - Love Her Madly / Riders on the Storm

Small things 6 August

• Dasani is Italian for "Coke just sold you water."
• Dear fossil fuel industry: The Stone Age didn't end because we ran out of stones.
  
  
  
• Kids eat 168 more calories from snacks daily today than kids in 1977. But those 1977 kids weighed the same, what with all that hair.
• Forgotten party rule: If you're going to host some festivities at your house, at least invite the neighbours. That way, they might not get any sleep, but at least they can join in the festivities and have a decent reason to stay up.
• Yeah, but do you want YouTube Premium? No? Yeah, but do you want YouTube Premium?
• Remember when your mom would say, "I'm gonna go lay down."? I bet you totally get it now, huh?
• Instead of naming roads after leaders or celebrities, let's name them after the contractor who built it. Who knows, the quality of roads might improve.
• I am gruntled.
• Your brain is responsible for keeping you alive, not keeping you happy. You have to be intentional about bringing joy into your life.
• Whenever your spouse does something you don't like, try saying, "I'll be making a note on your performance evaluation."

Why no clothes though?

 

It's noisy under there!

OK, this is just way too cool. One of the flight crew takes us on a secret tour of the Airbus A350. The neatest part is when he takes us UNDER the flight deck to where all the avionics are.

I was not expecting that!

'Burta!

 

Things I learned lately 6 August

• The pandemic, in particular our forced isolation from each other, has had some interesting side effects. Not being able to communicate face-to-face for many months, whether it’s with coworkers, friends, family or even strangers, has made our social skills a little rusty. We may forget what’s appropriate to share with a stranger until we see a look of surprise, shock, or horror spread across their face as we describe what's going on in our lives. We missed out on over a year of meaningful human interaction. The pandemic essentially robbed us of the opportunity to connect with others in the ways that we usually would have pre-pandemic, and our craving for connection may be prompting us to be more open than typical. Now that we’re outside and able to connect and link up with people, now it’s kind of verbal diarrhea. Some people are finding it difficult to stop themselves, feeling they don't have time for boundaries anymore. We can crave telling someone, anyone, about our day. I've noticed a subtle shift in my behaviour. I don't typically strike up conversations in lines at the store, and other similar situations, but I have been lately.
• At Olympic swimming events, sprinklers spray water across the surface of the pool near where the divers will enter the water. This aids the divers in their visual perception of the surface of the water. The sprinklers create ripples across the water, which makes it easier for divers to see how far they are from the surface of the pool. That way, they can time their flips and twists to culminate right before they hit the water, avoiding a botched landing or full-on belly flop.
• A gremlin bell is a thing I just discovered.
  
  
  
• At the age of 16, Janis Ian met comedian Bill Cosby backstage at a Smothers Brothers show where she was promoting "Society's Child". She was underage and was accompanied by a chaperone while touring. After her set, Ian had been sleeping with her head on her chaperone's lap, an older female family friend. Janis was told by her then manager that Cosby had interpreted their interaction as lesbian and made it his business to warn other television shows that Ian wasn't suitable family entertainment and shouldn't be on television because of her sexuality. So he basically tried to blacklist her.
• According to Goldman Sachs, copper will be replacing oil. Not exactly as a new source for energy, but the material will be crucial in decarbonization and in producing more renewable energy sources. Copper has the physical attributes needed for creating, storing and distributing clean energy. Demand could significantly increase, by up to at least 600% by 2030.
• Fish wasn't a very popular thing to eat in America until fish sticks were created. It made fish less smelly, easier to store, cook and eat. And kids loved them.
• There's a giant perogy in Glendon AB.