General

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


  • September 11th 2001

    September 11th 2001

    It was sunny, and warm 23C late summer morning. My first year being away from home in Fredericton NB at St. Thomas University at 9:46am I would have been waiting by the door for the class before mine to end. By 10:03am, I was sitting by the door listening to my second morning Introduction to Microeconomics with Dr. Andrew Secord in the first floor class room in Edmund Casey Hall. We really were completely oblivious to the outside world, almost no one had cell phones and the computer labs were in the opposites side of campus. Let’s face it the opposites side of campus is a 1 minute walk across the quad.

    My location by the wall during the class.

    At 10:37am and 11:03am I would have still been in this class unaware of the world being changed forever. The class let out at 11:20am and prior to going to the cafeteria for lunch I returned to my dorm room on the 2nd floor of Harrington Hall. The room next to mine had two aspiring musicians and movie fanatics, one from Newfoundland the other a foreign student from Maine USA. On their television in the dimly lit room laid the Pentagon in exploded smoke as the plane had struck the building some time prior. I asked them what movie it was and they then told me what had happened, and that this was not a movie it was live TV. As we were taking it was 11:28am and the 2nd tower had fallen.

    One does not go to university for a degree in Journalism without a keen interest in the news, so I powered on my computer, since I had a TV tuner card to view cable. I tuned in to ABC and just watched, I remember skipping dinner that day and just watching for survivors to be found, one after the other. When Peter Mansbridge took over the desk at CBC I switched to CBC Newsworld. One of the early questions was the Premier of NB safe since he was in Manhattan on that morning.


  • Deaf Difficulties (one of two: General Difficulties)

    This was written in the early 2000’s this segment was recorded over and I no longer have the video. It originally aired on Rogers Television on a news program called Focus NB.

    Lead: There are many disabilities faced by New Brunswickers. One of the most noticeable is cultural deafness. Our Reporter Charles Frees-Melvin brings us the difficulties faced by the Deaf in day-to-day life.

    Stand-up: Deafness is a condition faced by several hundred residents in this province. Many people are unaware of some of the difficulties faced by these people. Gerald Frazee stressed that the biggest concern is the need of interpreters to be present.

    Gerald: (48:47-48:59) 12 sec

    “Culturally I am deaf and a lot of what goes on in the world I perceive with my eyes, so probably the biggest concern for me would to make sure interpreters are present”

    VO: Mr. Frazee can’t stress enough the troubles he would faces trying to cope with day-to-day life without an interpreter.

    Gerald: (49:08-49:21) 13 sec

    “Oh, Gosh it’s chaos, the communication breaks down, writing back and forth isn’t adequate enough only having an interpreter there are we able to interpret adequately.”

    VO: Joanne Burke also agrees with the need for interpreters.

    Joanne: (49:24-49:55) 31 sec

    “Without the interpreter present I have to rely fully on my Children, and it’s not their responsibility they’re not professionally trained so we have to hire a professionally trained interpreter. and then we can communicate and make designs that we need. For us English is our second language, and not necessarily do we know it so by having the interpreter present, being able to communicate in our language of American sign language we have the confidence to make the decision we need to make.”

    VO: Another difficulty is the lack of Public Tele-Type devices so the deaf can make phone calls. Mike Clark definitely thinks that stores and malls should be equipped with these devices for their deaf patrons.

    Mike: (59:15-59:41) 26 sec

    “A lot of deaf people go into stores or into companies and they have absolutely no devices for us to make phone calls. We must have a teletypewriter. It is a device that deaf people use to make phone calls we need to make in public.”

    VO: (Insert Name) and (Insert Name) say they want to see devices installed so that they can become more independent. And that New Brunswick is far behind other provinces in meeting their needs.

    Group 3: (04:29-05:21) 52 sec.

    “In Ontario they have a lot of services for deaf individuals, flashing alarms for fire in public places, TTY to make calls. When they are in the public however in Saint John there is nothing isn’t anything like that for deaf people, no fire alarms, TTY, every time I have to go to the mall, I have to get a hearing person to make a call for me, but I want to be independent. I don’t want to have to rely on someone else.”

    Stand up: A special thanks to Interpreter Shelly Williams for assisting us with the interpretations. In Saint John, I’m Charles Frees-Melvin, for Focus NB.


  • The Pink Tax

    The Pink Tax

    I have a great new item to review and this is a super overpriced chocolate bar. I bought this at Sobey’s for $2.99. It is the Pink Cocoa Kit Kat bar.

    This bar was a little bit smaller than the typical flavoured Kit Kat bars. It was a weird shade of pink to make it have the appearance of being natural. It tasted a lot like white chocolate but with an unusual sweet berry side favour. My rating is 1.5/10. Like most pink items it is overpriced for what you get. If you are considering it, go for the green tea version. You won’t regret it.


  • A Disappointment with an Italian Name

    A Disappointment with an Italian Name

    Tonight, I’ve experienced the $1.49 special Tim Hortons take on a Tiramisu style donut. My opinion is that it is the biggest disappointment I have ever seen.

    The traditional tiramisu has 2 distinguishing characteristics that any cake and variations of it are basically the same, and experience of heaven. The name itself means ”pick me up” or ”cheer me up”. Those ingredients are whipped mascarpone cheese and coffee liquor-soaked cake.

    The variation that I was served does neither and is a ”let down”, or”scoraggiare” in Italian. This donut is made from their standard filled yeast base donut with a coffee flavoured Venetian cream centre. The top is dipped in white frosting with a chocolate zig-zag crossing the top and powdered chocolate and one or two coffee bean halves.

    Those coffee bean haves are the worst part of this donut as you have to pick them off as they are terrible to crunch on.


  • Posts from SunTrip 2018

    Posts from SunTrip 2018

    This is a collection of posts from my cruise on December 14-22nd originally posted to Facebook.

    14 December 2018 – 19:04

    So there is an episode of mayday where the prop flies off the wing and takes out a seat. I’m in that seat. ?

    14 December 2018 – 22:11

    Thought it was going to be checked the whole way but $12.50 is not bad for luggage storage for the night.

    15 December 2018 – 03:29

    There’s a guy in the way of the stairwell smoking and cooking his crack pipe.

    15 December 2018 – 04:04

    Two very drunk men can barely stand on the standing room only night bus. Toronto should follow Vienna and London’s night tube on weekends.

    15 December 2018 – 07:08

    Overheard Air Canada Rep: Just follow the signs with the American flag. Passenger: Is that the one with Stripes and Stars? ?‍♂️

    15 December 2018 – 08:49

    “Don’t line up until your Zone number is called” works as good as looking for volunteers to check their bags.

    19 December 2018 – 14:31

    Life’s a struggle right now. Apparently, there is a snowstorm home right now.

    19 December 2018 – 14:35

    There is a very bad storm and we are skipping Great Sturrup Cay. Apparently, Friday afternoon and evening could be fun. But we now have a full day at St. Thomas.

    21 December 2018 – 23:55

    Back home tomorrow, I love travel days.

    22 December 2018 – 12:36

    Flight is delayed for about an hour. Apparently, there were tons of flights cancelled yesterday.

    22 December 2018 – 19:08

    Every time I look at this board I ask myself not where am I going but, where would I rather be going?

    Pearson Flight Board

  • Russell Stover Cookie Dough Confection

    Russell Stover Cookie Dough Confection

    This is the first of an eight-part weekly series that I am going to try out unusual foods and review them.

    This week’s item is from Russel Stover Cookie Dough in Milk Chocolate. It was about a dollar from Giant Tiger. It consists of one 28g piece of candy. Nutritionally it was (past tense since I have already eaten it ?)130 calories, has 5g fat, 17g sugar, 3g other carbs, 1g protein, and 2g other.

    As I open the package the item is a weird shaped glob without the pre-told story of the packaging is not anything corresponding with Christmas besides reindeer guano.

    It was nice and soft to bite into but the glob of cookie dough became overwhelming and hard to finish.

    I would not recommend this flavour, I would suggest solid chocolate or marshmallow varieties. As it is a marshmallow world at Christmas time.


  • IG: TV Posts
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    IG: TV Posts


  • IG: Food Instagrams

    IG: Food Instagrams

    This is a collection of Instagram posts over the last 5 years involving food.


  • Remember?! (Part 1)

    It is a beautiful early summer morning on a Maple tree covered cemetery and the lake morning sun streaming partially through the leaves. The winds were calm with just enough movement to make the light twinkle through the leaves. Amongst the tombstones, there is a body lying as motionless and at peace as those in the soil a mere few centimetres below. Then Fred awakens, as he rises the reality of the situation hits him like a cement truck. He is feeling envious that the souls below don’t have to suffer the terrible feeling from the over-exuberance of the night before that he has forgotten.

    It was quite obvious that he had been drinking and he was missing pieces of clothing like his left sock, it was nowhere to be found. Fred had woken up hugging a small headstone.

    Fred is stunned as he realizes where he is this time as he sees a group of headstones before seeing the with “Fred Useless” engraved. Fred exclaims “Damn… Not again… Damn!”

    Fred rises to his feet and staggers holding his head while entering a pathway noticing Phil lying hunched over a tree with a few beer bottles around him.

    “Phil? Is that you, man?”, shouted Fred. “Phil, dude, wake up.”

    Fred hoping that Phil is still alive; kicks Phil’s leg. (Several times) Phil awakens with some disorientation as he suffers from a nasty hangover, and really pissed off that someone, not just woke him up but made his body suffer blows of unexpected pain by kicking him.

    “What a night…” squeaked Phil as he stretched and welcomed the morning light. Phil can barely see Fred standing over him as the sun irritates his eyes. “Oh, hey Fred. How the night treat you?” Phil rises to his feet as Fred pokes fun at Phil’s physical state.

    “Apparently, not as good as yours.”, replied Fred

    Phil suggests that they go get breakfast and Fred agrees. Phil gets up and starts to walk away with Fred but stops when they hear a voice in the woods.

    “Phil!?”, a mysterious long and very sweet sounding voice bellows.

    “Oh, Wait one second.”, says Phil. Phil runs back and finds Bekka (Looks perfect) from hiding behind the tree.

    “I’m sorry I forgot you.”, apologized Phil.

    “It’s ok, but I’m hungry.”, Bekka replied.

    “That’s ok sweaty, Fred just stopped by to bring us for breakfast.”, explained Phil.

    “You’re the best!”, Bekka replied, followed with a passionate kiss that made Phil really happy.

    Fred rolled his eyes and wanted to puke a little bit, and not just from the hangover.

    The three of them start waking out of the woods.

    “Out drinking alone, eh?”, Fred asks Phil. Since remembering that Phil had blown him off last night that he was going to have a quiet night at home with his bottle of scotch.

    “That was the plan…”, says Phil as he looks into Bekka’s eyes and then Phil kisses Bekka as they are all walking out of the woods.

    Fred is scratching his head and thinks as aloud, “I think I am forgetting something important?”

    Back at the “Fred Useless” headstone, it stands bare as Rita’s head appears

    from behind it, her hair is in complete disarray, makeup smeared and clothes loose-fitting and unfashionable.

    “Mmm… Fred”, Rita says in confusion. Rita notices the headstone and jumps away startled. “What the hell? Fred!” Rita wonders aimlessly. Hoping desperately that she is not alone, she continues to shout, “Fred! Fred!”

    This effort is to be in vain as yes indeed Rita is alone.

    (More to come in Part 2)

    The preceding is an adaptation of a screenplay for a short film of the same name, portions of this story were enhanced with suggestions from Tony Tompkins. It has been formatted from the original to fit the blog format.


  • MoCo Downtown– The Best Italian Style Restaurant in New Brunswick

    The following is a repost of my review for MoCo Downtown that appears on TripAdvisor.

    I was there for the first time on Saturday and I was floored by how wonderful this gem of a place was. I ordered the Sussex Sausage Risotto and for a side paired it with the Sliced Brussel Sprout with Prosciutto and Pine Nut side.

    It was so creamy and spicy and flavourful that it blew me away. The Brussel Sprouts we very salty, but that is exactly what you would get in Italy. Unlike many Italian restaurants that simply mimics what you would get in various parts of Italy, this place cooks like a Tuscan or Venetian chef would with access and highlighting of New Brunswick ingredients.

    The food was so good but I would not want to not mention how friendly the wait staff was and how efficiently the kitchen was putting out plates. Definitely going to go back and explore more of this menu.