Sustainable living

I am incorporating some sustainable living habits in to my life. One thing I have done is bought grocery bins in order to decrease my plastic bag consumption. But I have come across a problem. It is too stinky and unsanitary to leave a huge black garbage bag under the kitchen sink (it also wouldn't fit under there). It is also unsanitary to continuously place garbage into an un-bagged waste container without cleaning it every time you empty the contents into a large garbage bag. Cleaning uses even more polluting chemicals, which get washed away into our water system. So what I'm getting at is : what is the sustainable living way to empty your garbage into a small sized garbage bin without using those perfect-size grocery plastic bags? And if you didn't use grocery plastic bags, you would be buying small garbage bags. How do we sustain a life free of plastic bags?

Though It Might Look Good To Eat, Like A Muffin Or A Beat...

My dog Molly has eaten poop in the past. My past dog Maggie used to throw her frozen poo into the air in the winter time, which looked hilariously like flying poo because her white fur blended into the snow. It's true that what tastes good is not always good for us. Some governments deem it necessary to act as an 'owner' and remove some food choices from their population's diet. New York has made a ban on restaurants serving food that contains trans fats for the same purpose. I understand why this may be necessary in some instances, but there is a great deal of money involved in the food industry. I enjoy the morality of this decision to ban an ingredient instead of a particular restaurant. Very democratic. And it ensures a less political or money dirtied decision.

Medical History

Eureka! I struck gold. This information, regarding the history of the medical profession in various faculties, is a wealth of knowledge that you normally only obtain in package form when paying $500 to a University. I'd much rather learn on my own terms, than take tests - tests which are set up with the sole purpose of decreasing a professor's marking time and barely meeting standards of student knowledge testability. The internet is an information gold mine. Tap that.

www.hom.ucalgary.ca/Proceedings%202005.pdf

Hybrid Vehicles Will Dominate

This morning I am doing my typical online surfing as well as reading the paper after working and before going to sports for kids for the day. I received a free carguide magazine in the mail today by an accident, woot woot. It is surprising how low many of the prices are..top end vehicles are as low as $20,000. Is this because the government is contemplating making a ban on selling or buying vehicles that are not hybrid or using some other sort of environmentally sustainable fuel source?

Unions - Your Opinion?

If you happened to stumble upon this blog, please comment on your thought on labor unions in Canada. Is this another battle between conservatism and liberalism?
From what I have heard through people that I have worked with in the past, the ups of unions are that they protect workers from bosses who have the power to blackmail them by demanding unfair requests such as working too many hours in a row or not having breaks. The downside that has been expressed to me is that workers who do not provide quality labor are still guaranteed to get job security even though they bring down the coorporation, due to all of the rules about reasons for firing an employee.

To open business or not?

A viable solution to the annual tax problem has been used by many people in Canada, but is it causing a higher tax rate for the rest of the population? It has been known that if you open up a home business, such as selling candles or other merchandise from a home-based office, you can file for 50% of the majority of living expenses as deductions. These deductions include natural gas, rent, internet, cable and even gas and car expenses. This has been pulling me in to the option of opening up my own home business... but if so many people are doing this, the Canadian government is getting less and less money each year and solves their financial problem by increasing the percentage that they may take off of each cheque of non-home business earnings. For the mean time I may as well jump on the bandwagon and profit, while keeping my eyes open for alternative ways in which the government may take money from consumers... hey, I hear that in Ontario their liquor stores are government owned, versus the privately owned liquor stores in Alberta! A little bird told me.

Edmonton Turning Liberal

It seems that Edmonton is behind in its Justice System when it comes to finding the best way to rehabilitate and facilitate learning of living a functional and productive life outside of jail. In Toronto there is a crown prosecutor, Margaret Creal, who determines which people would benefit more from this new treatment which includes more support and rehabilitation efforts specific to the reason for their adverse behavior. I believe that this is a great way for the system to become more efficient at finding the root for a person's crime(s) and determining an effective rehabilitation route. These people will still go to jail if their case deems to be that serious, but will have opportunities to speak with a mental health professional and to hopefully be able to return to society and function fruitfully.
One issue that I can see immediately is the possibility for people to go to a medical professional prior to commiting a crime and saying they have the symptoms of a mental disability and recieving pharmaceutical treatment. Then the issue would be whether it is possible for them to defend themselves on the basis of not taking their medication as perscribed and being sent away with a slap on the wrist and being told to 'take your medicine.'
The creation of a crown prosecutor whose job it is to determine which cases can go through the normal justice system versus the mental health route, will help with finding the truth in the cause(s) for criminal behavior.

Rubbish in Naples

Normally italians are resistant to media attention. But now they are shouting for it, and it helps that the medical industry has become alarmed by the sharp increase in liver cancer in Naples. It appears that there are unsanitary conditions here, high levels of toxins in the soil, due to the primary waste management system taking christmas break off. How, you could ask, is this possible in a democratically run city?
Italian and Neapolitan President Giorgio Napolitano has followed the trend in this geographical area and transformed himself post-election. It seems he has become an absent dad to a city that relies on him to ensure their basic needs are met.
Mr. Napolitano is refuting charges or inhumane living conditions. He has not solved the problem of the monopolizing criminal group, Camorra, taking the work away from the city's municipal garbage trucks. Camorra has been banking on the multi-million dollar waste management industry for their own profit. This issue has only become illuminated recently because the Camorras stopped their criminal activity (ironic?!). Mounds of garbage have been left around the city which has forced the citizens of Naples to turn to their president and ask, "How could you let a crime organization overrun his own your own responsibility and allow us to end up knee deep in $#*%??" (or something along those lines).
This president is obviously in way over his head by taking this position. I hope the next election includes a candidate whom the people deem to be responsible, propose a solution to this complicated issue, and who will stand by their word.