General

Because every post deserves a category these posts could be about anything and everything.

  • The Books that Bite and Sting

    The Books that Bite and Sting

    Franz Kafka said, “we ought to read only books that bite and sting us.” What’s the last thing you read that bit and stung you, and why?

    Plinky Writing Prompt
    Let's Pretend this Never Happened Cover
    Let’s Pretend this Never Happened

    This is one thing that is difficult to come up with. Over the past 2 years, I have bought almost a dozen new books that I have not finished. I still have “1000 Years of Annoying the French” and my newest purchase “Let’s Pretend This Never Happened” by Jenny Lawson on the go. By on the go, I mean that they are in my room with bookmarks marking the page I am on. And by bookmark I mean the sales receipt it came with.

    Although I did finish an e-book the bites. In more ways than one. It was “Dead Sexy Vampire Erotica” by Kim Corum. It is about a woman who is married to a vampire and she hates her life most of the time and can’t stand him or his friends except for the “Erotic” part that makes up for it. It is one of those things that is so bad you can’t stop reading. Much like Patricia Harkins-Bradley’s “The Diamond Club” except worse.

  • My First Glymm Man Box

    My First Glymm Man Box

    This month was my first Glymm Man box. It is an online subscription that for $25 they sent eight sample sizes of products quarterly. In this month’s box was Atelier Cologne, Vitamine & Sea Mineral Clay Mask, Bentaberry G-1 moisturizing Face cream, Evolvh UltraShine Moisture Shampoo and Conditioner, John Allan’s Slick Water, La Fresh Body Soother and Vasanti BrightenUP!. So far I have only used the Cologne and Slick Water and am quite pleased. I will write more about each as I use them.

  • Renée “Rena” Mary Belliveau 1927-2012

    The death of Renée “Rena” Belliveau of Saint John, NB, occurred on Wednesday, September 19, 2012, after a long and happy life. She was born in West Saint John on June 2, 1927 and was a daughter of the late Andrew and Olive (Babineau) Cormier.

    Renée was employed at many jobs notably the DVA Hospital and Woolworth’s from which she retired.

    Survived by her brothers, Arthur Cormier of West Saint John, and Ronald Cormier of Bowmanville, ON. Many nieces and nephews also survive Renée.  Although Renée did not have any of her own children she helped her sister raise her niece Catherine Melvin (Morin) for many years whom remained close to Renée, and her children Charles Frees-Melvin and Rosa Frees-Melvin that assisted Renée right to the end.

    Renée is predeceased by her husband and love of her life Charles Belliveau; brothers, Joseph, Frederick, Lawrence, and Ralph sisters; Freda Cormier, Bella Felder, Eva Cormier, and Maria Morin.

    Resting at Fitzpatrick’s Funeral Home, 100 Waterloo Street, Saint John (634-1965) with visiting on Friday from 2-4 and 7-9 PM. Mass of Christian Burial will held on Saturday, September 22, 2012 from Our Lady of the Assumption Church at 10:00 AM. Interment to take place at Holy Cross Cemetery. For those who wish, remembrances may be made to a charity of the donor’s choice, would be appreciated.

  • Hands-on with Nokia’s PureView 808: “You shot that with a PHONE?!”

    I was reading this article about Nokia’s newest phone that has an amazing camera. Beyond that the thing that caught me first was that it was running Symbian OS. Despite being on an iOS device for the last 4 years I still love some of the intricacies of Symbian.

    The only real problem I have is that there are too many megapixels for the opening of the camera. Let’s face it a photon of light is only so small, and the pixels are smaller than a photon.  The second issue is the lack of optical zoom. If I am getting that much resolution I am going to want a zoom to replace my point and shoot camera.

    Hands-on with Nokia’s PureView 808: “You shot that with a PHONE?!” | MobileSyrup.com.

  • Teddy my Ted

    Teddy my Ted

    Teddy
    This was my Teddy Bear from my childhood.

    Yesterday evening I went to the theatre like I have almost every Tuesday night in forever. This week I when to see the movie “Ted”.

    I absolutely loved the movie, it was literally non–stop laughs from beginning to end. It was also very funny all the jokes and pop–culture that I remembered back from the 80’s. With memory lane returning from the 80’s was my teddy bear. I called him “Teddy”. Teddy was always there for me, just like Ted was there for John in the movie. Only I was not too nice to Teddy.

    Let’s just say that the head and most limbs have been pulled off several times and none of the stuffing remaining is original. I keep Teddy on the back of my couch but we basically split up around the time I went to school. I also had a huge (to me when I was 4) stuffed Strawberry Shortcake doll that my mother still jokes was my first girlfriend. 🙂 Though she did not survive as long as Teddy as the break-up was painful for her as  I, as a kid ripped her to pieces.

  • Was it Real?

    If you eventually break up with someone, was it ever true love?

    Keep in mind that as I write this I have never had a break-up. I think that there could have been true love for one of the parties and not the other.

    I think there are situations where someone can truly be in love with someone and then the other leaves them heart-broken after a change in their own personal situation. There could be a situation to happen when you have to say to your true love that, I have to move one and it is in your best interest, and I think too much of you to carry an unhappy you around, go follow your own dreams.

  • That’s My Boy

    This weekend I went to see the new Adam Sandler movie, “That’s My Boy”. I really laughed in this one even though the theatre was empty on Saturday afternoon. This is the first Sandler movie in a while that actually has a great story as well as being funny. This is one of the must sees this Spring/Summer season.

    On Tuesday I am going to go to see Rock of Ages.

  • A Difficult Goodbye

    Describe the last difficult “goodbye” you said.

    My last difficult goodbye was in London last fall. It was so difficult when you are in such a close group of people on a bus tour, knowing that you will likely never see any of them again to say goodbye.

    This one in particular was hard for the main reason I was extremely tired. That day we started the day with an early departure from Amsterdam to try to catch the 1PM ferry in Calais.

    When I should have been getting some well needed rest after an incredibly active day of walking many kilometres rather that trying to translate Dutch to take the street cars, the worlds most annoying creation decided that it was time for no one to sleep at 3:30am. That annoying creation was a damned rooster. Although I could probably sleep over the sound of a rooster in this instance, it was several dozen of those buggers.

  • Most Expensive Purchase – My Rebel 2000 SLR

    Most Expensive Purchase – My Rebel 2000 SLR

    Name the most expensive personal item you’ve ever purchased.

    My Canon Rebel 2000 SLR
    My Canon Rebel 2000 SLR

    The most expensive personal item that I ever purchased was my Canon Rebel 2000. I would have to say that it was not really worth it. To date I might have used 7-8 rolls of film in it. I just took it off the shelf tonight and the battery was still showing that I have 24 images left on the 24 image roll of film. I’m pretty sure the roll of film is a Black and White as well. Or, really the fake version that ends up sepia. When I turned it on the batteries were dead. This is amazing since it took 2 “L” batteries and the batteries were new when I inserted this roll of film.

    The main problem I had been that film is expensive to get developed. Most of the shots were too dark, too light, too narrow a depth of field, or some other issue of not getting to know the camera well. It was within a few months that I also bought my first digital camera after spilling shampoo in my point and shoot film camera.

    I have since bought 6 digital cameras bough have yet to replace this SLR.

  • It is June 1st

    Well hello to all my readers, including a certain someone who thinks/insists that I keep writing more.

    For this June I am going to shock everyone and have a new post for every day of the month. June is also anti-procrastination month so I will also not be waiting and posting the remaining 29 posts on the 30th. Though that does not stop you from waiting until then to read them. I am also attempting to complete a Photo-a-day challenge. If you follow me on twitter and Instagram (cefm) then you will get to see them all. In the interest of my blog readers, I will post them all here in a gallery on the 30th.

  • Preventing Service Cuts, not a priority!

    This seems to be a big promise by a lot of candidates this election. Let’s face the facts in the past 10 years this city’s spending has ballooned from about 90 million to 135 million.

    It is time to reconsider what services that city should offer. To have a reasonable tax rate this city needs to reduce its spending very drastically. In most accounts, the number that results in a reasonable tax rate is about $105 million dollars.

    Our fire service is one of the most costly in the country. Our transit services have increased in municipal funding from $250,000 to over $5 million dollars in the past 10 years. In addition, the biggest sources of revenue (the parking commission) and the biggest expenses (major facilities, pension fund, solid waste) are not under the city’s complete control and are hidden behind provincial legislation.

    These bodies are also not required to be either open or accountable to the public. Several years ago the spring garbage collection was removed for costing half a million dollars in one week, but was it really required?

    A truly responsible new council should take the necessary measures to remove Saint John from the ranks of the highest property taxes and water taxes in the country and instead promote measures to increase the tax base but offering a more advantageous tax rate to attack further development.

  • Saint John Road Conditions

    We have all heard or experience the pot hole haven stories about this city. But, do the numbers support the claims that Saint John is too big for its population to support its roads properly. In fact Saint John has 4x the population per km of road than Bathurst. It would however be interesting to see how well Bathurst does at their own road maintenance.

    Below is a table sourced from Statistics Canada 2011 census for population and NB Department of Transportation Road Mileage charts (2012) for the kilometres of road.

    These numbers also include provincial designated highways that the cities get a grant to maintain.

    City Population KM of Roads Population per KM of roads
    Bathurst 4979 184 27.1
    Miramichi 17811 325 54.8
    Grand Bay-Westfield 5117 87 58.8
    Rothesay 11947 149 80.2
    Edmunston 16032 199 80.6
    Ouispamsis 17886 203 88.1
    Saint John 70063 718 97.6
    Campbellton 7385 73 101.2
    Moncton 69074 541 127.7
    Fredericton 56224 429 131.1
    Dieppe 23310 153 152.4

  • It’s the most wonderful season of the year…

    Election Season! In under 2 months, every municipal, education, and health council in this province will be new. But this is my favourite part is waiting for everyone to announce and I need to pick the people who I will vote for. I need to vote for and choose a Mayor of Saint John, 2 Councillors at Large, 2 Ward 4 councillors, an education councillor for Anglophone District South-5, and Francophone district Sud-9, and Health region B-4.

    This Saturday the nominations open up and I will announce more of my thought.

    And for theses that are wondering. I will not be running again this year.

    My best advise is don’t run for the fame and glory either run to do a committed job, or run to say something. It is much worse to have an idea not considered. Leave it to the people to determine its value. It could be the idea that might inspire those that can do.

  • Goals Suck

    This is the time of year that everyone is setting their goals for the new year. Some unrealistic and some to easily obtainable because you are going to do it anyway. I have set goals like everyone else. But let’s face it goals still suck.

    One of my goals this year are to write more, in the range of 2-3 times a week. This is also one of the reasons that you are reading this is because I have written it.

    Next thing I want to accomplish is to become a better person. I am going to change my diet to be more reasonable and not so restaurant based. Let’s face it I could probably count the number of times I have cooked in the last year on 2 hands. Pretty much everything has been from Tim’s, Wendy’s, Subway, McDonald’s, Starbucks, Java Moose, Urban Deli, or Saint John Ale House for the past year. The exception being frozen stuff or sandwiches from Sobey’s. This has also resulted in a net weight increase in 2011. Although I am still down from the start of 2010.

    The next thing on my list is to read more. I am going to try to actually read 10 books this year. In addition, I am going to try to reduce the amount of movies I go see in theatre. I think that 40 should be a reasonable number. There are some good choices this year but it does not appear to be nearly as good of a year as my 300 year in 2009.

    I am also going to try to see somewhere new this year. Last year Vancouver, Hoboken, and Bologna where great new places but this year needs to be totally new. I also don’t really want to travel alone again this year so my big goal will be to find someone to travel with.

  • When I Started Using the Internet

    How old were you when you started using the Internet regularly?

    When I first started using the internet I was 13. My first exposure to the internet was using GOPHER, and having to search using Veronica.

    Then when I was 15 I made my first e-mail address (Hotmail pre-Microsoft, I had three within a month). Then in November of 2007 I make my first website “Charles’ Anything and Everything Site” on Tripod that eventually transformed to this site.

  • Council’s Last Chance at Transit

    It is now 7pm in the council chambers and the councillors are now arriving. As council begins there is 44 people here.

    The meeting has now begun the councillor are doing their opening thanks to different community groups.

    Joe Mott is absent tonight. Most of the routine business is quite boring and routine. The first item is 12.1 on the demolition of a dilapidated building on city road no one will miss. Next is a review of the Taxi by-law review and a full presentation with slides.

    Council has after an hour approved starting the process of drafting the new Taxi By-Law something that has been talked about for close to 15 years now. Now they are discussing changes to the procurement policies.

    Now it is time for transit (11.2). Councillor Higgins has moved to reassess the decision to cuts. Now the motion is a refer to budget deliberations. Councillor Farren sounds hesitant as long as it does not increase taxes. Deputy Mayor Chase does not seem to really support this. He is even denying that Higgins did know that the facts that she is denying and is stern on holding the budget. Councillor Norton is proposing a public review on route changes, but is being cautious. Councillor Snook is supporting transit but is supportive of the public consultation of optimizing routes. The City Manager is trying to educate council that this is not a cut but a limit to the increase to 1% even though Transit has been increasing the city’s subsidy by about 8%. Court was not favourable to the motion. Councillor Sullivan is not wavering on the fact that Transit is not a council priority. They are trying to wash their hands of transit and placing responsibility on the commission and the province for the taxes on the garage.

    Some appear on delaying a decision. Councillor Titus, the council representative on the Transit Commission, is placing the blame back on council. He is insisting that the transit commission placed much thought on the routes. The cuts were based on cost effectiveness of service. The pension issue is of great importance and that money has been already been spent on printing of new schedule.

    Titus insists that there is not really $5-million dollars extra. Insists that we have really good services, that citizens should be proud of.

    Higgins makes a good closing point that perhaps if more than one transit passenger was on the commission it could be more efficient. It could be better promoted, and that the larger percentage of users are renters and renters pay 2x the tax rate of regular residential.

    Considering that East Saint John is getting hit the hardest. It is despicable that Councilor Court is taking such a hard line against the prosperity of transit. Councillor Court does not stand up for is own ward and should likely be cut come election time. Voting time it is a referral motion 8-2 in-favour. Titus and Sullivan against.

  • Jade City

    There are menu items to avoid, but the rest of the food is very fresh and they have a good take out lunch buffet.

    212 McAllister Drive
    Saint John, NB E2J 2S5

    This Review was originally posted on Yelp, in 2019 I deleted my Yelp account and moved the reviews here.

  • MapleLeaf Queen’s Buffet

    There was a good selection of food, but much was reheated frozen food. The tables have cheesy plexiglass on them. Very large dessert selection but most of it looks bought and not cooked there.

     
    212 McAllister Drive
    Saint John, NB E2J 2S7

    This Review was originally posted on Yelp, in 2019 I deleted my Yelp account and moved the reviews here.

  • Urban Deli

    The food is always flavourful and of great quality. In the rare instance it is not they are great at taking care of it.

    The Ruben and Pulled Pork are to die for.

    68 King Street
    Saint John, NB E2L 1G4

    This Review was originally posted on Yelp, in 2019 I deleted my Yelp account and moved the reviews here.

  • A Memorable Mass Transit Story

    Remember that one time on the bus, when…? Share your mass transit stories.

    One of my best memories on the bus was on an East bus headed to the mall on March 25th, 2004. I happened to run into my friend Tony, we were both heading to the mall. At this point I had my first batch of 25 names on the nomination papers. This was where Tony signed as the witness.

    As soon as I got to the mall I instantly went to head back to the north end to file the papers. The first time 8 of my names were rejected as the people who signed were not actually registered to vote. Then the second time 45 minutes later I was 2 names short. Then 25 minutes later, I was officially on the ballot.

    When it finally got approved, the first thing I did was to run to every media outlet that I could find and dropped off my Press Release.

    Running for Mayor was one of the most interesting times of my life, and all the people and aspects of the community that you get exposed to is unreal.

    Then six and a half weeks, and 448 votes later that part of my life was over. Thus leading the way for 2 days later when I left the province on my first vacation and train ride later.

    And the travels continue…

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