Helping those in need – John Chow’s matching donations for UGM’s Thanksgiving Dinner and Rebecca Bollwitt’s Third Tuesday Food Drive October 7, 2008
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, Blogathon 2008, blogosphere, charities, friends, homelessness, Vancouver.3 comments
John Chow does know very well that I don’t blog for money, but that I’m always up for joining forces when it comes to social media for charity and social change. Thus, I was very happy when I saw that John was engaging in raising funds for the Union Gospel Mission ‘s upcoming Thanksgiving Dinner on October 13th, 2008 (which by the way is a kick-off for Homelessness Action Week). John is going to match every donation made to the UGM dollar per dollar up to $ 1,000.
As you may all recall, Rebecca and Duane Blogathoned for the UGM, and their campaign received a big boost at the end of the campaign thanks to Matt Good. Their collective all helped raise thousands of dollars for the UGM during Blogathon 2008. The UGM is a really worthy cause and it’s great that all these awesome bloggers have raised funds for them, so I’d encourage you to do the same.
And while we are at it, please also consider contributing to Rebecca’s Third Tuesday Food Drive. She is doing this for the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society , and I’d like to encourage my readers to donate non-perishable items (you can bring them to Third Tuesday).
I’ve been thinking of what can I contribute (in addition to highlighting the events and contributing with as little or as much money/non-perishable goods as I can) and I thought of throwing in a little something.
I haven’t yet thought of what else I can contribute, but I am guessing I could throw in a free, beginners, 2-hr salsa lesson for the largest contributor to both fundraising efforts — how’s that? Would people be interested in learning how to salsa dance? (I’ve taught this stuff already, so trust me, you’re in good hands). Or I could enter all participants who contribute to any of the two causes in a draw for the lesson?
At any rate, I would encourage you to contribute, remember, every bit helps.
Thank you all for your efforts August 7, 2008
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, Blogathon 2008.Tags: Blogathon Vancouver 2008
1 comment so far
I would like to use this last post to thank everyone who contributed to my Blogathon 2008, both in kind, with comments, encouragement and sponsorship.
First of all, thank you SO much to everyone who agreed to guest-post on my blog. Coming up with content is always hard, and I am really, really grateful that you agreed to do so. The following individuals contributed guest posts (all of them are acknowledged in each post, but here is a list – so please join me in thanking them for doing this for me!)
I would also like to thank my friends and fellow bloggers who participated in the Blogathon 2008, for their commendable efforts.
Finally, in a more important note, thanks to my good friend Rebecca Bollwitt for organizing Blogathon Vancouver 2008, in a completely self-less manner, and investing countless hours of her own time. You are a role model, an example and a great friend. Thank you.
Transportation as a life – Guest post by Karen Quinn Fung July 26, 2008
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, Blogathon 2008, public policy issues, transportation, Vancouver.Tags: Blogathon Vancouver 2008
2 comments
This post was contributed by Karen Quinn Fung, who blogs at Countably Infinite. Karen recently completed her Honors Thesis and is considered an expert in transportation. She single-handedly organized TransitCamp in Vancouver and was included in Raincity Studio’s 2008 Women in Tech to Watch. She also happens to be a friend of mine 
Raul and I were talking today when I told him I couldn’t think of something to write about for his blogathon, and he called me an expert in transportation. I, of course, now feel obligated to repay his generous compliment…however, I will do this with a blog post about why I am not an expert in transportation – at least, not the way that most people think of experts, and not in the way that most people think of transportation. (Much of this post is indebted to a book by Fiona Rajé called Negotiating the Transport System. I am currently crafting a blog post for my site with more on this book.)
When people think of transportation, they think of traffic engineers, people designing lane markings and curbs, thinking about where to put stop signs, bike lanes and pedestrian crossings, the headways (i.e. amount of time between buses) on bus routes and the logistics of a complicated transit system like the SkyTrain. Alternately, they may think of transportation planners, who study the number of people going where at what times of day, weighing land use with development goals, who make forecasts in the future about what people will be doing 30 years from now to get around.
In almost all of the above activities, I am, at best, a casual observer. My degree was in Communication, so I am ill-suited to comment on urban growth or community development. Instead, I am much more interested in the intricacies of how the act of getting around shapes what you can do, who you are, and who you can be; and, conversely, how not being able to get you are also keeps you from certain things. And finally, what people or organizations can do quickly and cheaply to overcome those obstacles and do what they want to, in the absence of solutions that might take a long time to implement. Funny enough, a lot of those tools tend to involve providing information to people – hence my hanging-on with the web and mobile communities in Vancouver.
Along this vein, one of the neatest concepts I’ve learned about recently is that of the “forced car.” It is exactly what it sounds like, and everyone knows what it is: it is when public transport is so lacking that people on low incomes have to put their money towards owning and running a car, which diverts valuable resources away from other parts of their lives. I have a friend living this very reality in Winnipeg. Yet as a society, do we collectively – through our representative in municipal or regional governments – take responsibility for precipitating these situations through the design of our cities? It’s hard to take responsibility for something that’s not directly someone’s fault, yet all too often it seems that the forethought that would enable these situations to be avoided is bypassed completely.
I’m certainly not the only one thinking about this sort of thing in Vancouver, either – the Vancouver Public Space Network is doing some great work, and Toronto’s Spacing Magazine is very prolific in bringing these issues to a human and emotional scale. If we think of cities as living, breathing organisms, then our transportation system is like our circulatory system, moving things around to where they are needed. That experience of moving around, perhaps not for the majority but for no small minority of people, is traumatic, wrought with difficulty and frustration, leading to (again with a loosely-defined academic term) social exclusion, that prevents them from taking full advantage of their potential or living their dreams. It’s this human element that I work towards…and I’m feeling
up to the challenge!
Now, does anyone know a Master’s Program where I can study this *and* hang out with bloggers and web geeks?
My experience as the wife of a cancer patient – Guest post by Air July 26, 2008
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, Blogathon 2008, friends.Tags: Blogathon Vancouver 2008, guest post
7 comments
This guest post was written and contributed by Airdrie who blogs at Talking to Air and co-hosts the Lipgloss and Laptops podcast
When I woke up this morning my husband was already in the kitchen feeding the kids. I noticed some small spots of blood on his pillow. My stomach sank — the sight of his blood always makes me queasy and worried. I’m guessing some of the pus-filled pimples on his face must have broken last night, and perhaps started bleeding.
My husband was diagnosed with stage IV metastatic colorectal cancer 19 months ago. Since then he has spent over a month in the hospital, had several operations, and endured months of chemotherapy and radiation therapy. You can follow his story over at his blog, penmachine.com.
The pimples on his face and torso are the side effects of an experimental drug treatment he is currently receiving through a clinical trial at the BC Cancer Agency. He has “used up” all his government-approved treatments, but there are still small tumors growing in his lungs. If this does not work, then I don’t know what is next – nobody talks about it. The future is uncertain. The only thing that is certain in my life is uncertainty. Thankfully, I have a great therapist who helps me, but that is another story.
When Raul asked me to guest post on his Blogathon, I had no idea what to blog about. Then I noticed that his charity of choice is the BC Cancer Foundation and I immediately knew that I wanted to write about: my experience as the wife of a cancer patient.
Let’s start with the good. They say every cloud has a silver lining. I have learned to enjoy each day with Derek. I now know what it means to live “one day at a time.” Each day is a gift, as they say. I have also realized that I am a strong person. I have inner strength. I take on the role of caregiver begrudgingly. But in the end, I am here for the long ride, through sickness and health.
I’ve learned that I need to ask for help, and that it really does take a “village” to raise a child, in this case, an adult child. My parents and his parents have played important roles in keeping him well, and keeping me sane. My children are flourishing, as kids do, despite the fact that their dad is sick. I have a huge support network, and it took Derek’s illness for me to see it, as though it was invisible before. For that I am grateful.
Now the bad. Cancer is not very sexy. Ileostomy bags, chronic pain, midnight runs to the Emergency room, multiple surgeries, medications and vomiting do not exactly fit into what I had pictured for our future together. There is a lot we can no longer do. He can’t get medical insurance to cover him for travels out of Canada. So I had to leave him at home during our family vacation to California earlier this month.
I was happy to leave him at home, close to his doctors. The truth is, I worry about him way more than I ever did before. It is almost at the point that I feel better when he is in the hospital, because when he is at home, I am always asking him, “how do you feel?” Not only is this very draining, but allowing myself to imagine a reprieve at some point in the future makes me think the unthinkable: only in his death will this pain, this cancer, stop controlling our lives. So I don’t think about it. But repressed feelings tend to build up and spurt out at inopportune times. And rather than keep it all to myself, I’m writing about it here for the world to see.
Truth time. It is most likely that my husband will die from this cancer. Even worse, nobody wants to talk about it. Everyone keeps saying to me that I need to stay positive. But what they are really saying is, “it is not helpful to think about the worst-case scenario.” Well, let me tell you right now, it is necessary for a wife and mother to think about the worst-case scenario.
Derek does not talk about it with me. His parents do not talk about it with us. But I have to think about it. I have two little girls to look after. So if I seem suddenly hard or selfish, I am. But it is not Derek’s fault. It is the cancer’s fault: the cancer that was not supposed to strike a young father at age 37.
Even the doctors don’t like to talk about it. I finally asked his oncologist the big question that everyone asks in the movies: “How long does he have to live?” The doctor said his cancer has a 30% five-year survival rate, with an average survival rate of two years.
So here I am, 19 months in to this role as wife of a cancer patient, and my husband is still alive. I am grateful for that. I honestly think I might fall apart if he were to die. But I am strong. I am realistic. We have put our “affairs in order.” I am drinking more margaritas than usual. I worry about blood stains.
I don’t understand what it means that patients only get 12-16 chemo treatments covered under the BC Medical Services Plan (what about Universal Health Care?). Who can answer that one?
I’m living life one day at a time. It seems some days to be getting worse, and other days to be getting better. I’ve never run a marathon, but I’m guessing it has to be easier than this.
Airdrie blogs at TalkingToAir.com and co-hosts the Lip Gloss and Laptops podcast.
Effective advertising or blatant mysogyny? – Guest post by Anya July 25, 2008
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, Blogathon 2008, blogosphere.Tags: Blogathon Vancouver 2008, guest post
2 comments
This guest post was written and contributed by Anya from Structured Moments and Beyond Robson
Ahh yes, some people bike across Canada, some run for insane distances, and others… blog. YEP. Welcome me to Blogathon. My name is Anya (or Anna, if you like to be formal) and you probably don’t know who I am. I’m actually quite surprised that Raul offered me to guest blog (thanks! -EDITOR’S NOTE – I like your writing, Anya, that’s why I invited you!) and I’m not too sure how long or thought-out these things are supposed to be. If this is anything like the entries on my own blog, it will be neither long nor thought-out. That’s partly because in about 4 hours I am supposed to be in a car (perhaps driving that car) and on my way to the Pemberton Music Festival.
I’m pretending to be excited about it, but to be honest I am thinking about all the atrocities we’ll have to go through to a) drive there b) get into the venue c) set up our tents and d) somehow get out on Sunday night. 40,000 people are expected to attend. I don’t like Vancouverites enough to spend three days in close proximity with that many of them. But I digress… the other reason why my blog entries aren’t generally accessible is that when I blog for pleasure, it’s really a stream-of-consciousness kind of deal, where I just let my thoughts roam in the jungle (or more like the attic that’s stacked with old creepy dolls) that is my brain.
Oh god. I just did it. I promised that I wouldn’t talk about my blog here because, as numerous people have articulated, talking about your blog is kind of like talking about your dog or your kids. Blah, blah, it’s great, but nobody cares.
So here we go, I’ll talk about something I’ve been meaning to write about myself but haven’t gotten around to. Recently, I saw this ad for BMW on ffffound (have you seen ffffound? It’s like crack cocaine), and it got me thinking a lot about advertising.
Here’s the deal: I am on my way to getting a liberal arts degree, and I’ve loved the little bit of Women’s Studies I have taken. I’m critical, supposedly socially aware, cynical, all that good stuff. But at the same time, I currently work in marketing and I really like my job. Marketing is fascinating and it can be a lot of fun. So when I saw this ad, two parts of me reacted. The feminist me is angry at the use of women’s sexuality in a blatantly demeaning way to sell used cars. USED CARS.
Hold on there a minute, partner, BWM would say: not just any used cars (women, whatever), used BMWs. Which means quality and sexiness and beauty and everything that that girl represents. Anyways, it’s pretty despicable that BMW is recycling the same stereotypes of male sexual dominance and experience in its campaign, and perpetuating the idea that a man is the judge of a woman’s value, which he bases on her level of sexual experience. All that draws me away from this ad, and pisses me off. But the marketer in me keeps going back to this ad because it’s good. It sticks in your mind, and it works. It’s simple and effective, especially for straight men, I would imagine. So, since my readership is a lot smaller than Raul’s, I thought it might be a good place to ask for reactions about the ad over here. What do you think? Are you enraged or do you love it? Are you running to a BWM dealership with cash or with a protest sign? Let me know, I’d love to hear reactions.
That’s it for me! Happy blogging and reading, Blogathon folk! If you’d like to read more of what I have to say, you can do so at Structured Moments or over at Beyond Robson. Or follow me on Twitter or something. The great thing about Web 2.0 is that it gives you myriad stalking options!
Launching my Blogathon 2008 July 25, 2008
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, Blogathon 2008.Tags: Blogathon Vancouver 2008
5 comments
First of all, thank you to Rebecca for organizing Blogathon 2008, and thanks to all my fellow Blogathoners (whom I’ll mention in a post very soon). I am really excited, as I just had a really nice afternoon and morning with JT, and now heading to meet HZ, CS and a bunch of other friends for another PhD defense celebration.
I invited a bunch of really great bloggers to contribute with guest blog posts, so you won’t be totally bored with only my content. Again, please remember that you can contribute to my fundraising efforts for the BC Cancer Agency by clicking here and donating online. The site is supposed to track the donations in real time, so I’ll know who has donated.
Thanks again so much to sponsors, fellow Blogathoners – good luck and we’ll see you soon!
Blogathon 2008 – Donations, posts, feeds, etc. July 24, 2008
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, Blogathon 2008, charities.Tags: Blogathon 2008
3 comments
Given my current workload (and some personal circumstances) I decided to still do Blogathon to raise funds for the BC Cancer Agency, but instead of doing the Sunshine Shift (5:00am on Saturday to 5:00am on Sunday), I am going to be doing Friday July 25th at 10pm to Saturday July 26th at 10pm. I’ll try to juggle my work commitments with my blogging commitments. We’ll see whether I succeed or not.
The BC Cancer Agency was kind enough to include me in their Calendar of Events!
A number of local blogger friends of mine are also doing Blogathon (see Rebecca’s wonderful Blogathon page). If you want to pledge and support my efforts, you could do one of two things
1) Go to Rebecca’s page and submit the form with your pledge. Once Blogathon is over, I will email you reminding you to submit your donation to BCCA.
or
2) Go directly to the page that BC Cancer Agency generated for me.
Thanks in advance! Please be aware that no money goes through me, and that all your donations will have a tax receipt issued by BCCA. Also – if you follow me on Twitter or you read my RSS feeds, you should know that you’ll be flooded with 49 posts.
Blogathon 2008: Preparing to launch! July 19, 2008
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, Blogathon 2008, charities.Tags: Blogathon 2008
3 comments
It’s amazing how soon things can change in a person’s life. I struggled with the decision whether I would participate in Blogathon or not after a meeting this Friday where I have to finish some stuff before July 31st, 2008. Therefore, I was in risk of dropping from Blogathon. However, I had a conversation with my Mom on Thursday and she reminded me that her sister is currently afflicted with metastatic cancer.
Therefore, I have decided that I’m not dropping from Blogathon 2008, and I’ll have to be extremely efficient with my time. I have also decided to implement a great suggestion that Rebecca got on her blog (hat tips to Shane Gibson) – if you are a business enterprise, you could pledge to donate $50 towards my cause (the BC Cancer Agency) and I could either write a blog post about your business or simply add a footer indicating “This post was sponsored by Company X“.
I am also trying to harness the fact that I’m currently Vancouver UrbanSpoon’s top restaurant review blogger (see my sidebar). I’m not 100% sure of how to do that, but I’m also accepting suggestions. And speaking of accepting, I’m currently wondering if people would be willing and able to write guest posts on my blog as part of Blogathon. I will also be e-mailing some close friends of mine who are also bloggers to request their help specifically (but also, feel free to drop a comment and say that you’re willing/able to write a guest post!)
This page explains pretty much everything you might want to know about my Blogathon 2008 efforts. Pleas spread the word, and thank you all in advance.
Blogging for charity March 17, 2008
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, blogosphere, Bowling for Big Brothers, charities, Vancouver.1 comment so far
After just having completed our recent Bowling for Big Brothers event (where some local Vancouver bloggers -yours truly included – participated), and still feeling a bit physically weak because of my week-long illness, I didn’t really feel much like I wanted to blog. However, I figured I would start getting a feel for what will be my next (and last, for the year 2008) charity event.
Phaedra asked me about the format of Blogathon, and about my experience. If you want to read all my Blogathon posts, feel free to do so. The short story is: you blog every 30 mins for 24 hours, and it is a gruelling experience. Both Rebecca (aka Miss604) and I Blogathoned last year, and I was really out-of-whack for a solid week and a half afterwards. But it was a good experience altogether, for many reasons. Many of my friends sponsored me, a lot of people accessed my blog while doing Blogathon and it provided a worthy charity with much-needed funding. Sharing this experience with Rebecca was also extremely fun and I thank her for tipping me over the edge after I had been sitting on the fence on whether I should Blogathon or not.
This year, I am much better prepared I think. I know what I’m going to do to fill the Blogathon with enough interesting content (one of my strategies – I will recruit guest-bloggers – most likely I will be guest-blogging for others too). I also plan to advertise widely about my Blogathoning. Furthermore, I have a much stronger platform (WordPress) and thus can plant trackbacks and link back to other bloggers with much more ease. And overall, I think I’m a more resilient person than I was last year, so I am hoping it will be fun. Phaedra is thinking of doing it, I think Rebecca is planning on doing it so the question is – who else will be Blogathoning?
To read a re-cap of the bowling for Big Brothers event, read Keira-Anne’s related post.
Update Blogathon 2007 – $ 151.63 USD raised! :-) August 3, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon.1 comment so far
Dear supporters of “Random Thoughts of a Student of the Environment”‘s Blogathon 2007 for “A Loving Spoonful“, thank you very, very much for donating! We raised $ 151.63 USD that I am sure will go a long way to help people in Vancouver living with HIV/AIDS that really need a meal. By now, most of you have been receiving reminder e-mails. You can donate via A Loving Spoonful’s online form (I contacted them re: the security, http instead of https, I still haven’t heard back from them) or through other means (e.g. a cheque). You don’t necessarily need to do this ASAP, you can do this at your earliest convenience. Your support during the Blogathon meant the world to me. To those of you who donated (you know who you are). THANK YOU VERY MUCH.
I survived Blogathon 2007 July 30, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, random thoughts.add a comment
You can still sponsor me using the link at the right of the screen (“Sponsor Me”). So far I’ve raised around $85.00 USD!!! Thanks to all sponsors so far, and if you haven’t pledged, you still have until Tuesday night (9pm PST) to do so.
My last Blogathon post. I did it! July 29, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, random thoughts.1 comment so far
Updates for late sponsors! Calling all sponsors! And this is my last post for Blogathon 2007!
I just read that pledges can be submitted by sponsors up to 48 hours after Schedule B is over (which means, 48 hours after Sunday at 9 pm Pacific Standard Time – therefore, you guys have up until Tuesday night, August 1st, 2007 at 9pm PST to make a pledge and sponsor me! I will be forever grateful, you’ll get positive karma and A Loving Spoonful will receive a few more donations!)
Sponsor me… you know you want to! You have almost three full days!
I felt a lot of pressure when I saw that someone was looking forward to Rebecca’s last post. Since this is my last, I thought I should make the most of it and call for donations. I’ll post the winners of my “pledge as much as you can” contest in the next few days.
Thanks to Rebecca and Jeff for contributing commentary, to H for suggesting the theme, to all my friends who kept encouraging me, to my sponsors (you know who you are) for donating to this worthy cause, and now I should also announce that I am going to turn my phones (both land line and cell) off. Actually I probably shouldn’t, come to think about it. I think I can sleep through anything!
It’s amazing how my body is shutting down at an astonishingly fast rate. I already took my contact lenses off, and am counting the minutes until I actually post this last entry. I have read in other blogs that they plan to stick it up until 9 am, or whatever. Sorry, can’t do. My body can only take so much pain.
The last 5 minutes (from 5:55am to 6:00am) have been painfully excruciating. My body is claiming “hey you started blogging at 5:40am, you should get some credit minutes”. So I am trying to brainwash myself into hanging on to 6:00am sharp. I’ve already congratulated Miss604 for completing the task. I survived too. Yowza!
“Because nobody living with AIDS should live with hunger” (A Loving Spoonful), please consider donating.
Ahh…. the pressure … and the excitement! July 29, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, random thoughts.1 comment so far
I’m starting to feel the pressure and the excitement at the same time. On the one hand, I feel pressured to post something significant instead of just dropping words and trying to scramble to finish Blogathon. Incredibly, I managed to actually go all the way. To be fair, I have pulled my share of all-nighters. This one was not the first time I’ve done it. I usually recover quite well with a few naps. The first one is (strategically) only an hour long. The others usually are a few hours. And within 24 hours, I am back to normal.
The excitement is that I have accumulated a total of about $ 66 dollars for my charity, which isn’t bad. It was very encouraging to have Jeff and Miss604 drop by and have them comment on my site. I have had some sad things happen throughout the day but I’ve done my best to counter them. And finally, I have done this for a good cause: A Loving Spoonful.
“Because nobody living with AIDS should live with hunger” (A Loving Spoonful), please consider donating.
Wonder Woman – Lynda Carter – More thoughts July 29, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, random thoughts.add a comment
The most beautiful woman in the world, Lynda Carter, as Wonder Woman. Boy, she sure loved to jump!
“Because nobody living with AIDS should live with hunger” (A Loving Spoonful), please consider donating.
The video is here.
More randomness July 29, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, random thoughts, Vancouver.add a comment
My blog is entitled “Random thoughts of a student of the environment” basically because I am interested in environmental issues, but that’s not all I blog about. I normally write about life in general, things that happen around Vancouver, I do a fair number of restaurant reviews, movie reviews, coffee shop reviews. And hopefully I’ll start to do some more Vancouver-centric content.
“Because nobody living with AIDS should live with hunger” (A Loving Spoonful), please consider donating.
A darker version of Charlie’s Angels Full Throttle main battle July 29, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, random thoughts.add a comment
I loved their first movie (Charlie’s Angels – Drew Barrymore, Lucy Liu and Cameron Diaz), but this video of their second movie’s main battle is a little too dark. Nevertheless, worth seeing
“Because nobody living with AIDS should live with hunger” (A Loving Spoonful), please consider donating.
The video starts here.
What’s in a name? Hummingbird604 July 29, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, random thoughts.add a comment
I know I promised H that I would blog according to a theme, but frankly, I was starting to go too technical. My next environmental post was going to be on the environmental kuznets curve (a theory that argues that as countries increase their GDP, their level of environmental protection also increases) but I thought “ok, you’re going a little bit too far”. I’ve tried to keep the environmental posts as general as possible, but this was going a bit beyond easy conceptual descriptions.
So, I’ve decided to continue with the somewhat personal journey. Some people have asked me if I have basically opened up my soul 48 times throughout the Blogathon. I wouldn’t say that, at all. I think anybody who knows me even a little bit knows that whatever is visible here, is visible everywhere else. I like house music, I love cooking, I tend to be sensitive, and sweet (but not fragile).
So H asked me why hummingbird604. Well, 604 is the area code for Vancouver (although now we also have 778). And hummingbird is a nickname I got a few years back (2003 to be exact). Hummingbirds fly at amazing speeds from flower to flower. I have tended to do many things really fast (I type fast, I speak fast, I think fast). So that’s why I am Hummingbird604.
“Because nobody living with AIDS should live with hunger” (A Loving Spoonful), please consider donating.
Overpopulation and the environment – A thorny issue July 29, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, random thoughts, sustainability.1 comment so far
I am so baked that even within my own specialty (environmental issues) I needed to go and ask for ideas. So I went over to Wikipedia and typed “list of environmental issues”. And voilá! There is a list. In the list, one of the topics that is touched upon is increasing population.
If we assume that the number of people that the Earth can sustain is a limited number, when population grows at high rates, increasingly our resource based becomes more taxed and stressed. Therefore, it sounds like a good idea to try and curb overpopulation. However, just like any other environmental issue, the linkages between population and environment are still hotly debated and contested.
I won’t enter into this debate, I just thought it was important to mention that we ought to think about population control when we try to reduce the pressures on ecosystems.
“Because nobody living with AIDS should live with hunger” (A Loving Spoonful), please consider donating.
Hybrid cars – Are they worth it? July 29, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, random thoughts, sustainability, transportation.add a comment
A good friend of mine studied hybrid cars for her Masters of Science project, and I have always been curious about their health impacts (she is defending soon so I’ll find out soon enough). But more importantly, I wonder if they really are worth the hype. These vehicles are predicated on their fuel efficiency and reduced air pollutant emissions. I just Googled a few pages and found this report, which sounds interesting.
A friend of mine owns a hybrid car, and paid a premium because he wanted to reduce the amount of air pollutants released by his car (if he had to have a car, at least it was a less-polluting one). He is not the only one to have done so, though. Leonardo DiCaprio, Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins are amongst the celebrities who are said to own hybrids (in the case of DiCaprio, apparently he owns a hybrid Prius)
“Because nobody living with AIDS should live with hunger” (A Loving Spoonful), please consider donating.
Blim Gallery – For the artsy folks July 29, 2007
Posted by Raul in Blogathon, Main Street, random thoughts, Vancouver.add a comment
The Main Street area (South Main or SoMa as some people tend to call it, extending from Main and 1st Avenue south up until about 33rd) is considered home to many artsy folks. It has a few funky art galleries, and one of the funkiest I think is Blim. Located on 17th Avenue, near Main, this is a great place and worth checking out. Now, bear in mind that it’s in my neighbourhood, so I am all for visiting my stomping grounds.
Blim organizes a number of movie showings, button-making workshops, and all sorts of really fun stuff. I remember that recently they organized a Mexican-themed event. But I declined to participate in this one because I actually think I know how to make tacos, quesadillas and a few other items. Yummy… now I am hungry!
“Because nobody living with AIDS should live with hunger” (A Loving Spoonful), please consider donating.
