Hey! I have a 7-year-old.

I’m not going to start with the old adage; “Boy time sure flies” because it’s been a LONG, tiring 7 years, but Tuesday marked our oldest son, Linus’, 7th birthday. 

I sat with him last night, reflecting on the first 6 year of his life – I mistakenly referred to him as being 7 when he corrected me.  “Dad, I’m not seven.  From when I was born until I turned 1 was one year.  I’m already 7.  This is my 8th year being alive”.

Right you are… Smart ass. 

So I went further hoping in my pathetic way to get a good quote from him to tweet.  His brother and sister are destroying him with tweetable quotes and here’s what I got;

On growing older and being a leader: “Respect is the most important thing in the world”.  Not bad, eh?  All this brainwashing is rubbing off, until this came out; “Actually, respect is the second most important thing in the entire world.  Not dying before you are born is the most important”.

…

Who can argue that point.

So to my 7-year-old (or 8-year-old, whatever you want to call yourself) when you are reflecting back on this post down the road and you want to know what kind of child you were by this age I can tell you this.  Before you I had hair.  It was black, not grey.  You have the best smile in the world, but not the goofy one, the real one.  It is not correct that you “do not care” about absolutely everything, but instead you don’t mind, or are not concerned.  Saying you do not care means all the cool stuff we buy you and all the trips we’ve gone on as a family are a waste of time and I know that is not correct. 

It’s fun being the class clown, isn’t it.  I was one too until I awoke one day to realize I was a joke with crappy grades.  I turned it around and fast.  Please don’t wait until grade 9 like I did.

If only you would practice… Anything.  Karate, piano, swimming, then your brother would not be catching up to you and passing you.  On the bright side while he may be your equal in these areas, you destroyed him at potty training and night-time diaper training and your math skills are off the charts.   

You are hesitant to try anything new or different but trust me that will change when you realize what a rush it is.  Then you’ll be looking for adventure in all the wrong places.

You love the cold.  Aside from me, you are the only person I have met who does not get cold outside.  No hat, no gloves, jacket undone, even at the coldest of temperatures.  You look at me, I look back at you and we silently nod an understanding to each other than it’s Canada.  It gets cold.  We’re tough (and a little cool).

You are starting to like Star Wars.  YAY.  All I need is get you to practice baseball and hockey more, or dodge ball, then you will better fit in with all the boys.  The ones you don’t get along with should respect your karate skills and the girls will continue to dig your awesome smile.  Your parents… They want to see a more focussed son with greater patience.  

Yeah, good luck.  I told your mother that too.

Happy birthday son.  I cannot wait to work with you and plan your year.

Doing Christmas, Jewish Style!

Ahhhhh, Christmas.  I love it!  LOVE IT!

It’s an amazing time of year where people are stressed yet generally really nice to each other which makes it the perfect time of the year when its okay to be friendly without been seen as creepy.  I’m friendly all throughout the year but I get really energized this time of year.  People hold doors for each other, they greet each other, buy gifts for each other and hug each other.  It’s a great time of year and I wish people acted like this to each other every day of the year and not just in the month of December.  

So what does that mean for me and my family, being Jewish?  Absolutely nothing,  It’s not my holiday but it’s impossible to ignore.  I love to celebrate it with friends, family, colleague, anyone who wants to have us over to participate.  I love Christmas trees.  They’re pretty whether they are decorated with few homemade ornaments, or whether they are grand and decorated to the nines.  As well, the concept of waking up in the morning to a tree full of presents is pretty cool, no?  What about leaving milk and cookies out for Santa at night.  It’s also really cool nowadays that NORAD tracks Santa by radar and that kids can send letters to Santa at the North Pole and email him.  It’s magical.  Who couldn’t get caught up in all of it.

I like best when Hanukkah comes during the Christmas season.  Hanukkah, being 8 days long and a festival pales in comparison to the marketing juggernaut that comes with Christmas, and while dubbed the “Festival of Lights” we don’t put up any sort of “Christmas” lights (remind me why, again?!?) but we light a Menorah, or candelabra which holds 9 candles, 8 candles representing the 8 nights plus one candle called the “Shamash” which is the leader candle that gets lit first and is used to lights the others, starting from one candle for the first night, all the way up to the full eight candles on the last night.

As a capitalist, I like that Christmas stimulates the economy and I’ve even seen full cups of the homeless folks in downtown Toronto (and yes I was guilty of emptying my pockets for the one older fellow in St Andrew station on Friday).  Christmas is all about giving, not receiving, and that is a great message to reinforce to our younger generations, something that may be a little lost on our Generation y’s, wouldn’t you say?

For us, it all started two weeks ago, when I took both boys to assist in the selling of Christmas trees for our Boy Scout troop.  My Dad would have been so proud – since he really liked being involved in scouting.   But it was funny, because there was myself, Stewie and Linus, another family from India who did not celebrate Christmas either and one family from the UK who were our experts.  Once the place started hopping and people were everywhere, I had to be quick on my toes answering the questions that came to me.  After cutting the bottom inch off a tree for a family – with Stewie’s help, I might add – I had to ask… Why?  So the gentleman from the UK explained to me that by doing so, if the tree was going to be put up right away, would allow the water (sugar-water preferred) to soak into the tree and keep it fresh.  Who knew? 

I was also asked which tree would last longer, and which smelled better, which had the bluest hue and which would carry the most weight (ornaments).  Before I answered these with common sense, I recalled back to my first week working in the government way back out of University when the group I was in had just completed training and were assigned to teams.  My friend’s phone rang pretty much as soon as we got to our desks and all of us crowded over to hear what he was going to say to this caller. 

What we hear was him saying; “yup. uh huh, okay, yup, uh huh, yup” and we all sat with bated breath, then he said; “What do you think?” and after a pause, he said, “okay, bye”.  Turns out he had no idea what the person said, but that “what do you think?” got him off the hook.  Well, same theory applied here, folks.

So after selling trees during our shift, we headed home with another secret no one told us… That our jackets, gloves and clothes would be covered in the pine tar from the trees and be nearly impossible to remove.

So fast forward to Christmas day, and you will find all of us sitting down to a nice fondue for dinner.  It’s the first one the kids got to take part in and boy did they enjoy it.  We had tofu, tofu fishies, fish balls, baby bok choy, cauliflower, broccoli, mushrooms, noodles, that fake crab, and so much more.  So after an hour of stuffing our faces, we watched some Treehouse on Demand, then settled in for the main event, a dark chocolate fondue in which we dipped strawberries, apples, pineapple, lemon pound cake, kosher marshmallows, and eventually I chopped up a giant triple chocolate cookie and we dipped that too.  SO MUCH CHOCOLATE! 

Needless to say, the kids loved it and we all ate so much that we were stuffed, except for the room to roast some marshmallows over the lights from the menorah.  That was great.  I showed Stewie how to do it and of course he picked up really quickly.  Him and I roasted them, toasted them and created marshmallow fireballs from them.  Stewie did not eat one, only I did, but Berry took a bite and quickly spit it back out.  Now I have to hide the BBQ lighter in case they decide to try it again.

So as I complete this post, it’s about 1:30am on the 26th of December, and there is only 365 days until Christmas (it’s a leap year this year) and I miss it already.  I want to keep the tree we have up in the office lit for a couple more weeks at the least and I hope to be able to get into a mall at some point in the next week in order to make some purchases and pick up some cool things we saw over the holidays. 

As for Hanukkah… There are still 2 more days left in the holiday and it won’t be the same now that Christmas is past, but we’ll try.  At least we get to spend some quality family time together due to the Christmas break. 

Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and has a great end to Hanukkah.

My 775th post – for all readers for all seasons.

Welcome to my 775th post.  If you’re a blogger you will know this is a lot of writing, covering 8 long years.  If you are not a blogger, trust me, it’s a lot of writing.

The thing is, I’ve been getting a lot of traffic in the last couple years, and some very kind accolades here and there, but both of them are from all over the place, as are most of my posts. 

So for my 775th post, I want to make sure I cover off as many visitors as possible by touching on some of my most popular topics;

If you’ve come to read about politics, I can confirm that those on the left in (downtown) Toronto are still way off base in thinking that this financial crisis was ”created” by Mayor Ford so that he could solve it to look good.  False.  Look at Greece.  Run by socialists and on the verge of bankruptcy.  Look at the TTC.  In effort to cut costs, the Mayor and the TTC chair Karen Stintz cut some routes and there was backlash, so the public spoke that we needed those routes and a $0.10 fare increase was added instead and the public… Back in an uproar.  You cannot have it both way, folks.  I’d love to help the poor, keep all social programs, have amazing snow removal, etc., but someone has to pay for this and I can tell you I’m already taxed up to the top of my head.  If you think you’re not paying enough taxes, then you can pay more and help those in need.  I’m maxed out, thank you.  If I don’t have enough disposable income, then I cannot afford to go out, buy things, eat out, and help re-distribute my income to those in need.  It’s the way the world works… Get over it.

If you’re here to read about coffee, then let me tell you about this great coffee I tried recently at a place called Neighbours.  It came highly recommended from one of my awesome readers and I was really surprised how nice it was.  Not too bold, not too weak, and the cool thing about the location I went to was that they have flavoured coffee mate and that removed the need to have flavoured coffee.  I didn’t put any in for my first cup and I probably won’t for my next one, but it was very nice!

If you’re here to read about parenting, then you’ll be pleased to know that I am the “Daddy 101″ blogger for Pink and Blue Baby.com. Cool, eh?  I find this site really useful, and I have a ton of great stories and baby / toddler / kid tips from almost 7 years of being a daddy and 3 beautiful children.  For example, just Wednesday was my son (Linus’) 7th birthday party and we had a Lego party.  It was great.  The Lego ninja had the kids sitting in 4 teams of 4 and they raced to build a Lego tower, then the built a Lego candy house.  The hour flew by.  After the hour the kids ate Lego candy blocks (thank you Bulk Barn) and Lego cupcakes that I made and my wife decorated so beautifully.  Pizza, grapes, whole wheat pretzels and air popped popcorn round it all out.  It was totally worth it.

For 5-year-old Stewie, we had The Magic and Comedy of IncrediBrent, Toronto’s birthday musician and Brent was amazing.  The kids loved him, the parents loved him and he interacted with the kids so well.  He was a pleasure to deal with and have in our home and I would totally have him back for any future kids parties.  His web-site is www.incredibrent.com.

For Berry’s 2nd birthday party – you saw the Hello Kitty cupcakes in a previous post – we had Applefun Puppetry, www.applefun.ca, and Mike was also spectacular.  He had all the 2-year-old’s participating and his show was so clever and funny that he had me in stitches.  I’ve seen him a couple of times before but that did not stop me from being completely engaged.  Worth the price of admission.

If you’re here to hear my views about food then I can recommend Java Joe’s for catering because they have added some new sandwiches and they are killer.  Spicy chicken and their steak and hot peppers goes great with their chicken Parmigiano and eggplant Parmigiano.  The coffee is great – some organic too – and they have these wickedly heavy brownies and skor brownies.  Find the location at Leslie and West Beaver Creek, call and speak to Randy.  Tell him the Urban Daddy sent you.  He’ll like that!

So I’m not sure what else to cover at this point in time, except to say thank you to all of you who take the time to comment and who tell me you’ve been following along with my posts at home.  It means a lot to mean and it always makes me wonder what’s so interesting that keeps people coming back.  But I like to tell stories, I’m proud of my family, and I like to write, so there.  I’m going to do it if 200 people come to read or 20 million (LOL).

Feel free to subscribe to my feed, or like me on Facebook.  If you are reading this through my actual blog, then go on the right side, check out some of the amazing writers on my blogroll, and further down you will see the link to my Facebook page and some other sites that have featured me.

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah and Happy New Year to all of you from all of us!

Warren aka the urban daddy.

@urbandaddyblog

What crap are they showing on TV nowadays and why am I watching it?

So I found a show on TV called, “Geeklove” and I managed to catch about 10 minutes of it while waiting for the cupcakes I was making for Linus’ birthday party on Wednesday to cook, and I found that while I was weirded out by the premise of the show, I was also strangely attracted to it. 

The piece I saw centred around a geeky guy, a geeky girl and their love for typical “geeky” things like Star Wars and comic book superheroes and the show is all about finding love and finding someone who could appreciate and talk about these two things.  As I was watching I kept wondering what that made me since I grew up loving Star Wars and those super heroes.  Does that make me a geek?  Yeah, probably. 

Image via Wikipedia

The piece I watched had a 22-year-old woman meeting up with a 29-year-old guy at Comic Con and she was dressed as Batman’s side-kick Robin, she had her mother with her.  I guess she needed the chaperone in case the guy she met… At the Comic convention no less, was weird.

So as this clip played out, the guy liked the girl and the girl liked the guy and they’re both geeks and it took the mother to ask those exact questions and set up the next date.  It was awkward and, well, geeky.

The next clip had a guy and a girl meeting up in a restaurant and it was her first date too.  She was 22-years-old as well, and she was really nervous but after finding her geek-charming both him and her found that there are others like them and it was okay to set up a second date.  They were safe with each other. 

I turned it off when the guy geek told the camera that he liked his date and “felt a disturbance in the force”.  Yikes.  Let’s hope he wasn’t making a reference to something happening in his pants.

I then turned to Jersey Shore… Why?  Oh, yeah.  T&A.  100% T&A.

I guess the only type of “reality” shows I like to watch are called “sports”.  If I wanted to  watch what I suspected was a true reality show, I’d watch something on the Food Network, or that show called Survivorman, but nothing else.  To me, these other “reality” shows are about as real as wrestling, which I really enjoy as it satisfies my soap opera fetish.

What “reality” shows can you not get enough of and if you had the opportunity to be on any of them, which one(s) would it be?

Related articles

• Geek Love | TLC’s New Reality Dating Show (thinksoul25.com)

Ahhh, Sunday. Parenting is over for the weekend and the world has gone bananas.

It’s Sunday night, the kids are in bed, my wife is asleep and I’m getting ready for another busy week at the office and at home.  I have ball hockey this week and I was going to go for a run but I’m too fricking tired (or lazy) to get out, and I even fixed up the music on my iPod for the run.  I was hoping to be wide awake tonight, I had a large coffee at 4pm, and I took my vitamin late tonight but after spending the weekend looking after my kiddos while my wife worked, I was more tired than I thought.

On the plus side, Star Wars had been on TV all day today!

As a family, we played it easy and tight this weekend, allowing the kids an opportunity to play at home, together and relax instead of all the programming / birthday parties.  I even kept them home from karate again this week.  The weekend flew by, and now it’s after midnight and it leaves me with little time to I clean up the house for the upcoming week.  I still need to shower!!!

But as I get ready for bed, and by get ready I mean shower, shave, floss and brush, I wonder what event of this evening left the biggest impact on me; That North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il died or that Daniel Bryan won the WWE world heavyweight champion…Didn’t see either of those coming, really. 

Good old Mick Foley (@realmickfoley) summed it up best when he tweeted this;

“Just heard that Kim Jong il had a heart attack when told that @WWEDanielBryan was new World Champion – he’d always admired Daniel’s ROH work.”

 

He He He.

 

I found this out on Twitter – thank you Twittersphere - and understand that Kim’s son, Kim Jong Un is taking over the country and he’s in his 20′s.  OY.  South Korea is on notice, their stock market is low as a result.  Can’t everyone just get along? 

 

Reports indicate that he may have died on Saturday, or that the reported cause of death is fatigue which caused a massive heart attack.  Something about working really hard for the people of North Korea  Ummm, yeah, okay.  I think the news media is just being nice, and cautious, in case he’s really not dead.  This guy was suspected of being dead already in 2011.  He had cancer, then diabetes, then a heart attack… He’s been reported to have had it all, but apparently this is it.  He’s done.  What will this mean for the citizens of North Korea?

 

I like the concern from the PR department of the Death Star (@deathstarPR);

 

“Kim Jong Il is dead. Who will be brave/insane enough to build Earth’s first Death Star now that he’s gone?”

 

So 2011 has been a busy year, eh?  Dead: Osama bin Laden, Muammar al-Qaddafi, and Kim Jong Il. Ousted: Hosni Mubarak, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, and Ali Adullah.  

 

It’s also a bad day to die, as Vaclav Havel did, he the first President of the Czech Republic, post communism.  He was a playwright who started the “Velvet Revolution” which was a peaceful revolution that brought down communism in the Czech Republic and as a result, was voted president of that country.  He died today at the age of 75. 

 

I had actually never heard of him, nor this other guy who died 3 days ago; 

Christopher Hitchens, the engaging and enraging British-American author and essayist whose polemical writings on religion, politics, war and other provocations established him as one of his generation’s most robust public intellectuals, has died. He was 62.

So if he was one of his generations most robust public intellectuals, how come I had never heard of him?   Ever.  Considering my love of pop culture and knowing shit that I really shouldn’t know or even care about, I have never ever heard this guys name…

I’m going to have to research this one!

And the last news item I seemed to have missed is just getting started actually, and it has to do with a boycott of Chiquita Bananas after apparently the company, Chiquita Brands International, dissed us Canadians by themselves boycotting any crude oil that comes from the Alberta Oil Sands.  Chiquita has made a decision to rely on “conflict oil from some of the world’s most odious regimes.”

Some special interest group in need of a cause called ForestEthics announced Thursday it was working with the U.S. company to eliminate shipping of Chiquita bananas with fuel from refineries that use the crude.  So better to get your oil from countries that keep the riches in the “royal families” and who persecute their citizens, eh?  Even Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Jason Kenney tweeted Saturday night: “I gather that Chiquita Bananas has no problem with Iranian oil, but is boycotting Canadian oil. No more Chiquita bananas for me.”

I think it might have some traction…

Go bananas!  The rest of the world is!

Image via Wikipedia

 

 

Related articles

• Report: North Korea’s Kim Jong Il is dead (news.blogs.cnn.com)

 

 

Are the 2012 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees really HOF worthy?

The 2012 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has some new inductees, and they are;

Guns N’ Roses

Red Hot Chili Peppers

Beastie Boys

Late singer-songwriter Laura Nyro

Scottish folk icon Donovan

The Small Faces (which later morphed into The Faces featuring Rod Stewart)

Guitarist Freddie King.

Are you like me, and said, “who” to this list?  Sure I think GNR are great and I’m okay with the Beastie Boys and the Small Faces, but personally I hate the Chili Peppers and have no idea who the others are.  I gather this being the “Rock and Roll” Hall of Fame means quite little and really it’s just a music HOF nowadays.

Here is a little about the bands;

I always felt that Guns N’ Roses were the band that took the glam rock era and moved it into the grunge era.  Their first album, “Appetite for Destruction” featured the huge hit “Sweet Child of Mine” in which the band were portrayed with a little make up, a little hair spray and a little glamorous, but as their success peaked, they went more towards the jeans, and leather which made them famous. 

The band was led by volatile frontman Axl Rose and lead guitarist Slash, whose wicked guitar solos drove many of the band’s early hits including “Sweet Child O’ Mine,” “Welcome to the Jungle” and “Paradise City,” the original lineup produced their debut album, Appetite for Destruction in 1987 which I’m pretty sure I bought on cassette tape.

After that album came the majorly disappointing G N’ R Lies, which produced only one song, ”Patience,” which I refused to listen to until a few years ago.  Once I heard the whistling at the beginning of the song I would turn it off.  Fortunately for fans, quite soon after that disaster the band came out with Use Your Illusion I and Use Your Illusion II.  These albums produced a ton of monster hits including; 2 versions of “Don’t Cry” “Estranged”, “November Rain”, “Knockin on Heavens Door”, “Live and Let Die”, “Civil War”, “Garden of Eden” and “Yesterdays”.  Sadly, Axl pissed off the band and after no music for 15 years the new GNR put out the garbage that is Chinese Democracy, in 2008.

To me, the Red Hot Chili Peppers are vocalist Anthony Kiedis and bass player Flea.  The only stuff they did that I could stand was with guitarist John Frusciante on 1989′s Mother’s Milk, which featured a scorching cover of Stevie Wonder’s “Higher Ground”; Once their next album came out, Blood Sugar Sex Magik, and the songs  ”Under the Bridge” and “Suck My Kiss”, I was sick of them.  Overplayed indeed.  I like the Rollercoaster of Love… Sometimes. 

As for the Beastie Boys, the trio of Mike Diamond (Mike D), Adam Yauch (MCA) and Adam Horovitz (Ad-Rock) are three Yids from the Bronx (sorry, don’t recall where they are from), but their most famous song, “You’ve got the right… To Party!!” was the one I hated the most.  The rest is okay, but also in the category like above.  Are they Hall material? 

Nyro, a gifted pianist and composer who hailed from the Bronx, wrote numerous tunes that were recorded by such artists as Barbra Streisand, Peter, Paul & Mary, and the 5th Dimension before striking out on her own in the late ’60s/early ’70s and skyrocketing up the charts with such singles as “Up on the Roof.”

Donovan is best known for his ’60s folk-pop contributions, including “Catch the Wind” and “Sunshine Superman” and influencing the likes of John Lennon and Paul McCartney, among others.

Famed music producer and promoter Don Kirshner, who died last January, also received a Hall Pass in the nonperformer category for launching the so-called Brill Building group of songwriters including Carol King and Neil Sedaka through his company Aldon Music.

Of course, what’s always fascinating about the Rock Hall’s selections is who got left out. Among the artists getting the shaft this year include Joan Jett and the Black Hearts, The Cure, Heart, Rufus with Chaka Khan,  Rush, Kiss, Bon Jovi, the Moody Blues?

I asked Supernova.com’s founder, Toronto’s own Elliott Hurst, his thoughts on who was left out…

He totally agrees that Rush need to be in there, probably the Cure, but none of the others really fit the bill for “Hall of Famers”.  Elliott also questioned the inclusion of lesser known artists, or the one-hit wonders.  Do people come to the Hall to see the barely known guitarists, or international performers or do they come to see the big bands, like GNR.  I think we all know the answer to that. 

I think the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame more closely resembles the Hockey Hall of Fame in that there are some questionable folks getting in diluting the reputation of the Hall.  In baseball, however, some very good performers are not included in the Hall and not every Joe Shmoe gets in.

Now having never been to the Hall, I would think there is a super-group area where the majority of the folks go to see the big bands of today and yesterday and there must be an area tucked away somewhere for the families of the lesser lights to come and see their stories, because if I had to walk through the Hall and sort through the displays based on who got in this week, for example, I’d be pretty disappointed.

So in your opinion, do all the inductees deserve to be there and who would you add if you could?

 

Related articles

• Flea Talks About Red Hot Chili Pepper’s Hall Of Fame Induction With Kevin & Bean (kroq.radio.com)
• Snubbed!: Why the Cure Deserves to Be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (Sound Affects) (popmatters.com)

Taking a closer look at employing live-in caregivers, in Ontario. Their rights.

I received this great comment, which I didn’t want lost in my comment section and I felt was worthy of its own post.

I’m going to re-post it I’ve cleaned it up just a little bit.  
In case there are any nannies coming to this page who are being mistreated, here is some information about [their] rights. In Ontario, your work relationship is covered by the Employment Standards Act. This means that the parts of the Employment Standards Act relating to hours of work, breaks, overtime pay and termination pay apply to you. If your rights under the Employment Standards Act have been breached, you can file a claim for compensation.

For more information about the employment standards act, check out this website: http://www.labour.gov.on.ca/english/es/.

For information about filing a claim; http://www.labour.gov.on.ca/english/es/pubs/claim/index.php

If you think your human rights have been violated, for example, you were terminated or harassed because you became pregnant or took a maternity leave or you were harassed or terminated because of a disability, you may have recourse under the human rights code.

For information about filing a human rights claim in Ontario, check http://www.hrlsc.on.ca. if you call the number for the hrlsc you can call the intake line and get a sense of what assistance the hrlsc might be able to provide for you. Services can range from legal advise to representation at a mediation session or at a hearing.

I think the one thing that needs to be perfectly clear here is that in Canada, especially here in Ontario, no employee deserves to be treated poorly, and I think there is some misinformation about employing live-in caregivers as a result of the stories about how poorly they are treated in other countries, like Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia.  But let’s remember that as Canadians, we are better than that and respect that there are people coming to Canada to work and raise our children and look after the sick and the aged.  They deserve to be treated as any other employee would and as you would want to be treated if you were in their situation.

I’ll never forget a conversation my wife and I had with a former neighbour who was looking for a nanny.  She had terminated the employment of her previous one because she was unwilling to help out in the middle of the night when their newborn woke up and this caregiver wanted to go out on weeknights.  When my wife snapped at her that they are employees, not prisoners, the woman seemed surprised.  Needless to say, she never spoke to us again.,,

I want to thank the sender of this comment and if she would like to comment on this post with her information, I’d be more than happy to edit this post and include her details, if necessary.

Thursday Thirteen – Thirteen Iconic Canadian Bands according to Supernova CEO Elliott Hurst and me!

 

I am a born and raised Torontonian and as a result, I grew up listening to AM and FM radio which under Canadian regulations were required to play a percentage of Canadian music.  Due to that ruling which I believe is still in place, I became fond of Canadian acts such as; Platinum Blonde, Glass Tiger, Gowan, Mitsou, Triumph, the Box, TPOH, and the list goes on.

When discussing music around my office, with so few people as, ahem, aged as I am, and so many 1st and second generation immigrants, they have no idea who Canadian bands are, so I thought about creating a list – checking it twice with the help of Supernova CEO Elliott Hurst, and sharing some Canadiana with my readers.

If you are Canadian, you should recognize at least half of this list regardless of what kind of music you listen to.

If you are a non-resident of Canada, you should recognize 3 bands on this list.

Can you guess which ones?

So here are the 13 most iconic Canadian bands, and some honourable mentions.  For each band I have attached a YouTube link to probably their most memorable song and the name of that song;

1. Rush – http://youtu.be/U7DFsBcVMDA - Tom Sawyer

2. The Tragically Hip - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QE2joQsWXJg - Ahead By A Century

3. Guess Who – http://youtu.be/gkqfpkTTy2w - American Woman

4. Arcade Fire – http://youtu.be/NNfWC4Sgkcs - Rebellion (Lies)

5. BTO (Bachman Turner Overdrive) – http://youtu.be/NCIUf8eYPqA - Takin’ Care of Business

6. The Band – http://youtu.be/-WoI95PTizs - Don’t Do It.

7. Max Webster / Kim Mitchell – http://youtu.be/WUhc8-vUp8o -> Max Webster’s Paradise Skies.  Kim Mitchell’s Go For Sode –> http://youtu.be/ymORCbgSyEA

8. April Wine – http://youtu.be/hoSVPiuNqHM - Could Have Been a Lady

9. Triumph – http://youtu.be/yahBtp_1jWE - Follow Your Heart (LOVE this song!!!)

10. Steppenwolf – http://youtu.be/xm5DPlNCmtk - Born to be Wild. 

11. Barenaked Ladies – http://youtu.be/wPh_6_u98tI - 7, 8, 9.

12. Blue Rodeo – http://youtu.be/7vw3jUZo9FQ - Try

13. Our Lady Peace – http://youtu.be/O94CW_tIEzU - Starseed

 

Honourable Mentions:

Chilliwack – http://youtu.be/yahBtp_1jWE

Trooper  – http://youtu.be/STiuregSvHg 

Billy Talent – http://youtu.be/RPg63uxYwN0

Saga – http://youtu.be/gx7XbV82JfQ

I Mother Earth – One More Astronaut – http://youtu.be/8cZT4vYiMxU

Sloan – http://youtu.be/tirqAVBoHFI

Honeymoon Suite – http://youtu.be/1_1AhimnRT0

Glass Tiger – http://youtu.be/Dl1DtF_5dkU

The Pursuit of Happiness – http://youtu.be/pSDF8VvU13M

My personal favourite band – Platinum Blonde – http://youtu.be/I4SOnBDe7qs

The Headstones.- http://youtu.be/BukWT54Cv4U

Tom Cochrane and Red Rider - http://youtu.be/uqUa_G1h3pw

Great Big Sea – http://youtu.be/f-oC-kNtPTs

Nickelback – http://youtu.be/BxgeSv88c2w

So, what do you think?  Have you listened to any of these songs?  Did you recognize the bands?  Who makes your list?

How having an opinion can get you in trouble.

Here is a copy of a Facebook conversation I had with a friend of mine who has run for the Conservative party municipally and Provincially.  He posted that he will was invited to a dinner event with Immigration minister Jason Kenney, who I just posted about due to my concerns with the recent changes to the live-in caregiver program.

 

I congratulated my friend of over 20 years and asked him to get some information for me.  Now looking back, and knowing my friend, there was no way he would just up and question the minister, however if he had a moment, I guarantee he would ask for me.

 

Someone saw this exchange and must have thought I was criticizing my friend, or the progress being made by this government – which I kind of am doing – and below is a transcript of the conversation.

 

Urbandaddy: Awesome, Mike Yen. Can you ask Jason what he’s doing with the Canadian Live-in Caregiver program? He’s messing up the agencies and the nannies already in it. He’s causing headaches for the employers too. I posted a couple in-depth blog posts you can refer to @ www.urbandaddy.wordpress.com, if you’d like.

Urban Daddy

urbandaddy.wordpress.com

 

Person: Urban Daddy, you’re little unfair to the minister.. and also mike, by not completely briefing mike prior to meeting Jason kenny.First off you make no reference ( in your blog ) to ” why ” the new changes have been made. Nor do you offer any history into the amount of abuse that was bestowed, under the old rules.There are very good reason’s for the change.Caregivers now have 4 years to get in two years employment,( or equivalent hours ) up from 3 years. This was done, to allow the employee freedom, and not be locked into miserable jobs because of a calendar. Under Minister Kenny, a hot-line has been set up “just for caregivers” working / living in abusive situations… no other minister had done this before.

Clamping down of unscrupulous agents and consultants has been a great accomplishment by Minister Kenny. Maybe a blog on that topic would shine some light on the other side of the fence. And then another one or to on the “abuses of authority” employers rein down on some of these woman.

And of course the wait time to be processed is going to be longer.. more people are applying for the PR, and of course the process time to get here will be longer, more people are applying to come here.

Over the last 5-7 years, there has been a popular and very lucrative and in many cases, unscrupulous, industry created around ( primarily ) Filipinas coming to Canada via Hong Kong, Singapore, and Dubai. Again, this explains the extended wait times.

In my experience, the only ones that are “really upset” with the minster’s new rules, are those that are attempting to live off the avails of caregivers. See consultants and agents above.

To send Mike at the minister, using only the info in your blog, could very well be an embarrassment to him.

Jason Kenny has done a great job with the changes. They are not perfect, but the door has been slammed on the bastards that were using and abusing the caregivers. And for that, he gets my full respect.

 

Urban Daddy: Hi.  I don’t think I’m being unfair to Mike at all, actually. I’ve known him for over 20 years personally and Mike would never just read what I’m writing and speak to the Minister on that. I was hoping that if he knew him and had a moment to ask him about where the government is going on this he would. Mike’s a pretty strategic fellow. And as for my views on the program, I’m coming at it from a very honest straightforward view. I worked in government, and I’ve employed nannies (still do). Going through the process for me was a little more difficult because it had to be even more by the book. While I understand there has been some corruption in the program, I have never seen it personally, so I’m looking out for the honest folks, like myself, the agency that helped us on 3 occasions and the wonderful woman who have helped take care of my children.

 

- I’ll saw here that a lot of what this person said was legitimate, however, had he read any of my 3 blog posts on this topic he would know that not only do I have the government experience, and I’ve sponsored 3 nannies and helped them all go through the program, complete their paperwork and get jobs after, but I have also sent my posts to an amazing nanny agency called Wee Care here in Toronto to vete my thoughts to ensure they are not biased.  This agency is about as legit as you can get and just for doing business they are required to jump through hoops. 

 

I’m all for getting the bad guys but let’s not lose sight of the fact that not everyone is a bad guy.  Good guys can complain too about process / procedures because they make little sense.  Those trying to cheat the system will do so regardless of what obstacles are in front of them,.  So why make the honest guys suffer.  My kids current nanny is this petit sweet very Christian girl who just wants to get her residency so she can get her career moving and help her family back home.  She wants to run a business here and upgrade her education.  To do so, she needs her residency but until that time she can’t even take courses.  She’s devoted 4 years of her life to this country and in return she is asked to wait an additional 18 months to get her residency.  If the minister really wanted to be fair to everyone, he’d grandfather (grandmother) the current group and start fresh with the next lot.

 

Back to the discussion -

 

• Person: Urban Daddy, my wife is a Filipina, that came into this country through the caregiver program.. I have met many caregivers, and only one, has had what I’d consider a really good employer. By that I mean her employer stuck to the duties spelled out clearly on the contract.Caregivers are not dog walkers, snow removers, lawn cutters, house painters, furniture movers, car washers, gardeners ( read: weed pullers ) etc. However, most, almost all, are called upon to perform many of the tasks I’ve noted. Employers are getting all those services for min wage. If they were to pay the caregivers market value for those extra tasks, ok, then that would / could be acceptable.. but that is not the case.What Minster Kenny has set up, is a system whereby, caregivers can now leave their slave-driving employers, with no penalty to themselves. This is a great change.

  I agree with you, there are a few good agencies. Just a few. The new guide lines, are closing down the exploiters very quickly. I just heard of another one tonight.

  The new wait times are longer. I know this can be frustrating.
  But there are more than enough here, that will accept part-time, until the other caregiver arrives. We’re currently waiting for my brother in-law to arrive from Dubai. There’s a job waiting for him when he arrives, and until then it is being filled by a woman with a PR Card. She’s aware of the temporary nature of the job. Plus, she’ll be working there on the weekends when he’s with us. And of course, under the new guidelines ( as I’m sure you’re aware ) no fee’s are being charged to the employee, for the job.

  I really think it’s noble how you care for your employee’s future here in Canada. I also believe we have a great guy ( Minster Kenny ) steering the ship.

  Whenever I get frustrated at the new rules, ( that my brother in-law is experiencing ) I just think of the added protection to the caregivers.

Again I appreciate that this is his view, however, now in over 6 years of employing caregivers and having many at our house, often, I cannot say that I have ever seen this.  I have not heard of, nor would I ever ask an employee – nanny or tax staff – to do something not in their contact.  Again I think each person sees different things or gets asked different things.  I’ve been asked if nannies are allowed to go out at night, or if they are on call 24/7 and yes, I have set people straight.  How else do people learn. 

 

I like some of the changes to reduce nanny abuse and require them to be treated equally under the law as a regular employee but to up the costs to employers and make life difficult and expensive for potential employers tells me the minister is trying to make this program available only to the rich and I have problems with that since it’s usually the middle class who need the live-in caregivers so both parents can work as it’s a cheaper option that a live-out caregiver.

 

All I wanted from the minister was answers… Where is he going with the program.  I ended the conversation this way: It looks like we both pretty much see things the same way. Happy to see corruption kept out of the program and let the legit businesses run properly and help those fantastic workers do their stuff and come to be productive Canadians. Pleasure having this discussion with you. I’ve learned a lot. Cheers.

 

What are your thoughts?  If you comment and you have either a nanny or an agency, please disclose.

 

Thanks!

On Wednesday November 30th, my boys took a Vow of Silence. Read why…

On Wednesday, November 30th my boys, Linus and Stewie, were not allowed to speak above a whisper at school. I was hoping that would apply for home too, but it did not. Wednesday, you see, was the launch of Free the Children’s The Vow of Silence initiative.  My son’s school was an active participant in this Vow.
 
This Vow asks that all students in school, even if only for a short time, be silent to show solidarity with children around the world who are denied basic human rights, who do not “have a voice.”  Teachers were asked to modify their lessons to follow the philosophy of the Vow, and at least in my son’s school, there was an assembly at the end of the day in which the participants were allowed to break their silence and use their voices to affect change.

We have always mad e a point to educate our children on the fact that not every person is free to speak, pray, and marry whomever they want and we won’t stand by while children are subjected to exploitation, poverty and the denial of their basic rights. I expect that there are at the bare minimum, millions of children who are silenced by these abuses.

This organization is educating children and parents so that we can all take a stand for children everywhere.

A little more about the Vow of Silence… This is part of the annual fundraising of an organization called “Free The Children”.

The goal this year is to raise-awareness from Toronto to Mexico City, London to San Francisco, Beijing to Jakarta, Vancouver to Sydney and back whereby young people will go silent for 24 hours in solidarity with children who are being silenced by poverty and exploitation.

How silent is silent, you ask??? For Vow participants, being silent can mean refraining from speaking. It can also mean not using email, Facebook, Twitter or text messaging. It can even mean not using hand gestures, note writing or any communication at all. Participants determine your level of silence based on their comfort.

So my boys took the Vow. They took action, to raise awareness for Free The Children, but going silent during their school day.

As parents, we were asked to take a moment or two to reflect on the day’s activities with our children, which we did.
 
For further information, or to donate, you can simply follow the link here;

http://www.freethechildren.com/vowofsilence