Artificial Intelligence

Hey everyone, I'm slipping in one last post before the year ends because it will push me past my previous year's count on the main blog.

I wanted to talk a little about artificial intelligence. Recently there have been some significant advancements in this technology, and the focus has been on visual art and script writing. This has led to a lot of controversy between people who enjoy using these tools and those that find them disturbing.

This isn't our first foray into artificial intelligence. When I was younger, Google's Deepmind was being developed to play chess. It eventually managed to beat the world's best human chess player, but after his loss the guy practiced a bunch, came back and beat Deepmind. So they kept developing the AI, had another game, and the human lost again. From there on out he wasn't able to bridge the gap and AI has been consistently better at chess than the greatest human players. This happened as well with the Japanese strategy game Go, which has simpler rules but is far more complex. Eventually AI was able to beat the world's greatest Go master.

They have developed AI to write classical music to the point that it can produce pieces that can fool musicians into thinking they are human-made. The limit here is that the AI can only create music by blending pieces in its dataset, so it can't predict changing music genres. Basically, it can create something passably good and original sounding from an established time period, but it's still not "inventive".

Our most recent developments aren't our first attempts to use AI for visual art or written script either. Even in the early stages of the Internet, we had things like Cleverbot and iGod, which basically had a bunch of pre-programmed responses to common questions and statements that it would present when it saw them, as well as some sassy vague lines that it could say if it didn't recognize what you were talking about. It was kind of  off-base more often than not but this is still sort of the premise of the current technology.

I also remember systems that would let you merge faces to show what a combination of traits shared between two people could produce, and systems that could predict what you might look like at various ages. Kind of similar to the AI art.

The difference is sophistication. Our newer tech is far more sophisticated than it used to be. Visual art and written word are both areas that AI has had incredible difficulty adapting. In fact, both of these fields are listed as belonging to the "humanities", as if they are what distinguishes humans from everything else.

I'll give you a little history on these developments. Things got big when a program called "Dal-E" was created, named as a combination of the artist Salvador Dali, and apparently Pixar's little trash collecting robot Wall-E. I think it would have been self-explanatory for them to leave the "E" as assumed to mean "Electronic". Wall-E isn't an artist.

Anyway, how it functioned was that you could put in some prompts, like "steampunk, vampire, Seinfeld" and it would search the Internet for images of those things, find shared traits between them, blend them together and produce thousands of unique images for you to sift through and decide which ones you like.

But you could take it further and request that it be in a specific genre, like cubism, or even a particular person's style, like Van Gogh. I saw someone request a picture of the New York skyline done in the style of Salvador Dali.

An interesting point about this tech is that it has as much bias as the human hivemind, because it's dataset is the collection of human thought online. So if you ask for a wedding, you'll see only images of white people getting married, or if you ask for a doctor, you'll only see images of male doctors because those are the prevailing human biases. But if you want something more nuanced you can just further specify the traits you're looking for, like "woman doctor". 

Dal-E wasn't available to the public, but a little bit later a clone of the program called Midjourney was developed and released for only a $10 monthly subscription fee. Now I see AI art plastered all over the front page of Reddit.

Honestly, it's still not perfect. Notoriously it still can't draw hands for some reason. They bend in all the wrong places, are disproportionate and not realistic at all. Also, while I can't verify that I haven't been duped yet, I will often think "That looks kind of like AI", check the comments and the OP will say they used an AI system. It has a certain "look" it hasn't been able to get rid of, even with its better pieces. But it will likely get better, the music bots started off "creative but bad" before getting sophisticated enough to create passably good pieces, while admittedly being still a little uninspired.

I'll get to my overall opinion on this, but let's first talk about our written word AI, which is called GPT.

This has been around for awhile and honestly, only tech people seem to care about it. It failed to create the social stir that Midjourney did, but scriptwriting has been an even larger hurdle for AI than visual art. Basically, you can speak to it conversationally and it will respond to you, and you can ask it to write you stories.

I know a guy with the app "Chat GPT". He asked it to write a story about Pikachu and Albert Einstein. The chatbot made something up about how Pikachu got separated from his friend Ash and ran into Einstein experimenting with electricity. Einstein became fascinated with Pikachu as an energy source, and he taught Pikachu that he could one day be a genius too.

So it's a crappy story, but it did a few "human-like" things that are kind of creepy. It screwed up about Einstein experimenting with electricity, because the man was known for other things, but it did figure that he was a genius and that humans associate historical geniuses with electricity. It then gave Einstein this trait because it knew that Pikachu has lightning powers and it could create a connection between the two characters this way. Again, it's not great, but all previous attempts to use AI for script writing has resulted in bizarre, disjointed stories, and who knows how far it can be developed?

So these are the new technologies. What do I think of them? I don't like them. I think they're creepy and weird. I'm not really asking for them to be dismantled, I don't really think that's an option at this point. But from a subjective, human perspective, I find these things gross and disturbing without much potential to fill a need or improve lives.

There is some controversy surrounding who "owns" art produced by an AI. Is it the person who put the prompts in, or the moderators of the AI? Also, some artists worry about people claiming their works by putting it through the AI but having it change almost nothing, then saying they "put it through a filter" and that the almost identical work was just it "taking inspiration".

AI artists, sometimes referring to themselves as "prompt engineers", claim the AI produced work is genuine art, as the program still requires human direction and discernment. They point to the invention of photography and say that classical artists back then said it would ruin the medium as it could produce more accurate images with less effort.

I guess there's a point there. I don't think high-end art is going anywhere anytime soon. Originally, the greatest physical advantage humans had was our long distance running. We weren't the fastest, but we could outlast any other species and we used this skill to stalk and hunt prey. Then we tamed horses and invented cars, which could outspeed and outlast our best runners. The skill of running became less important and less practiced, but we still celebrate and value marathon runners. Also, we wound up getting horse farmers and mechanics. New skills were developed because of the new technology, so society didn't simply become "less skilled", it became more varied.

I mentioned before that AI can beat the best chess and go players, but we still have tournaments and champions for both these games, because even if humans aren't the best anymore, people are still impressed to see a human perform at such a high level.

I do think that the field of commercial art could change significantly, because even if you still need a human to operate the AI, it requires less skill. But commercial art was the worst form of art anyway.

What I don't like about Midjourney is that it changes the medium from one that is visual to one that is descriptive. Also, creativity is about the process of creation, and this changes it to something closer to consumption.

Whenever technology makes something easier, it makes people less skilled at it. This is even true for memory aids, even at the level of photography. In Mali, the people out there didn't have regular access to photograph technology, so everyone had super strong memories. This is because if you forgot something, it was gone forever. Since we're able to instantly look at anything we want, there's no need to remember everything anymore, so we let our brains release more information. This sounds bad, but if we can access our memory aids, what's the point of putting so much effort into remembering everything. Is that skill even necessary?

So from that perspective, maybe it's fine if people become less creative and less skilled at traditional art, if they're able to manifest their creations more easily with new technology. If it gets sophisticated enough, we might wind up in a world with better creations but less creative people.

Or maybe we're capping out on how good this technology can get. In terms of food, highly processed items are more "high-tech" but they're also less appetizing and worse for the body than more organic food. It still has a function because it can be mass-produced and feed a higher quantity of people, but in terms of quality, artificial foods have been used and modified extensively and have never been able achieve as high a quality as their lower tech alternatives. Maybe AI art will be seen similarly, as more accessible but lower quality. 

But what I'm really wondering is, who benefits from the introduction of this new technology? I can see how photography may have been intimidating to realist artists who spent their lives perfecting their crafts only to be outdone by any commoner with a camera, but at least photography had a strong utility for recording information. With this AI art, it just seems like it gives corporations an excuse not to hire a graphic artist.

Also, this stuff might get misused. If you've got access to enough of someone's signature, you could plug them into an AI and get a bunch of approximations of it. The concept of a signature is that the subtle, unconscious habits of the writer can't be reproduced easily but there's still some variation, indicating it's not just a photocopy or whatever. You can get the subtle habits with slight variations through this technology.

The chat stuff might be even worse. You could use it to spread propaganda online. Create lots of dummy accounts and have it auto-generate "creative" dialogue to give the illusion that plenty of people are engaging and agreeing with your cause.

But anyway, for myself the damage has been done. Even if AI art hasn't quite gotten that organic look down, it's good enough that every time I see someone's work online, I have to ask myself "Is that from a person or a robot?" And as silly as that sounds, that has just made my life a little bit worse.

It's 15 minutes to the new year and I haven't had a chance to look over or edit this post. I want this to count for 2022, so I'm posting it now. Hopefully it hasn't been too meandering or nonsensical

Frustration With Medical Tech

Somehow, one of the things I haven't mentioned between my "I'm Diabetic" and "My Health Journey" posts are the frustrations that have come with the use of medical technology. As tools used by some of our most respected professionals to determine highly sensitive information, you would think they would be reliable, but this is not always the case.

After I received my adult ADHD diagnosis and before my home blood pressure monitor was delivered, I decided out of curiosity to test my blood pressure with one of the publicly available cuffs at my local Shoppers Drug Mart. My results were very elevated.

Later, I received my home monitor and my results weren't fantastic, but in a far less alarming range than what I'd got at Shoppers. In fact, I was in an allowable range to begin the stimulant medication for ADHD. I was uncomfortable because I didn't know if I should trust the home monitor over the Shoppers one, but after some encouragement, I decided to try the meds.

I'd been monitoring myself at home for awhile, and my blood pressure hadn't changed significantly. In fact, it was better than before I started the meds. Out of curiosity, I decided to go back to Shoppers to test my blood pressure, to see if my results had improved by their machines standards as well.

My results were far, far worse than anything I'd seen before. I asked the person at the pharmacy if their monitor was reliable, and he said it was "typically reliable", but told me the temperature that day and the fact that I'd been walking could have elevated my numbers, and encouraged me to keep monitoring from home.

The next day I went to work, brought my monitor with me, tested myself and it said that I had an "irregular heartbeat" which was something I hadn't seen before. I panicked and got my coworker to drive me to the ER.

A nurse did my blood pressure and an ECG. When I saw an ER doctor, he told me that my heart rate was elevated, but that I didn't need to stay for monitoring. I told him that I'd tested my blood pressure and it said I had an irregular heartbeat. He said that my heartbeat was fine, it was just moving fast. I told him that I'd had an extremely high reading from a Shoppers monitor, and he said that those cuffs tend to push numbers up. I gave him my exact numbers and said, "Really, do they push them up THAT much?" and he was like "Yeah, I wouldn't trust that reading. Just keep track with your home monitor."

This was weird to me, because I thought that the Shoppers ones would be more reliable. They're larger and seem like more of a commitment to install, and the monitor at home requires me to fasten the cuff myself, which seems to leave more room for human error.

Later on, after I was reacquainted with my family doctor, I brought in my monitor to be assessed for accuracy. Apparently, the monitor that I'd been sent by the ADHD clinic was for 37 cm arms and lower, while my arms were 42 cm

So not only were the Shoppers cuffs pushing my numbers up, but also, the comparably more favourable home monitor was ALSO pushing my numbers up by being too small.

I was then fitted for a 24 hour cuff. This is pretty much what it sounds like. It's a monitor that is attached to you for 24 hours that you can take home, and it measures you every half hour. The idea is that when you're being tested, some people tense up, causing their blood pressure to increase. This is due to the increasing pressure on their arm, anxiety about their numbers, and the presence of an authority figure. The name of this phenomenon is "White Coat Syndrome", based on the idea that a medical professional, likely wearing a white coat, is causing you anxiety with their presence and it's boosting your numbers. 

Apparently you can't get anxious about tension on your arm every half hour, and without a medical professional around and no access to your numbers, the 24 hour cuff is supposed to get a better impression of your baseline blood pressure and heart rate.

So I went through all this. My numbers came back and they were... pretty much ideal. So not only were the Shoppers cuffs pushing my numbers up and the home monitor being too tight, I was ALSO impacted by White Coat Syndrome.

I've got a properly fitted home monitor now, and supposedly it gets roughly accurate results.

It's funny, when I was getting my arms measured, the nurse said "Maybe if you lose some weight your arms will get smaller." Talk about something I've never felt compelled to be insecure about. If there's any part of the male body that is predicted to expand with fitness, I'd expect it to be the biceps.

Another piece of equipment that has caused me grief is my glucose monitors, the freestyle libres. In a previous post, I said that these had judged me favourably, with a 96% rate of being in my target range. Thing is, I'm probably doing even better than that, because most of that outlying 4% is from low glucose events.

When I first started monitoring my blood sugar, I noticed that I would sometimes dip low during the night, and sometimes around 4 pm. I opted to correct this by drinking a glass of milk before bed and after work.

At one point, my sugars were coasting real low so I kept trying to get them back in normal range by sucking on jolly ranchers and eating spoonfuls of maple syrup, but the numbers kept dipping. After about two days of me anxiously eating candy, the monitor died.

I had an appointment with my dietician and told her about this. She said that the machine had likely just malfunctioned, and that with my condition and the medications that I'm taking, I shouldn't be concerned about low blood sugars. I told her that my numbers tend to go low at around 3 am and 4 pm. Turns out, if pressure is put on the monitor, it triggers a low blood sugar event. 

It's fixed to my arm. I toss and turn in my sleep and often take a nap after work. The times that I got the low sugar events were when I was laying on the monitor.

White Christmas

I can now retire the "coloured Christmas blog title" tradition, because we had a white Christmas this year.

 In 2019, due to a lot of sad news, I made a post called "Blue Christmas" as a play off the phrase "White Christmas". It carried over the next year in 2020 when we were using a colour coded system to track COVID cases and decide precautionary measures. Grey was the worst on the scale, and meant lockdown. That's where we were at, so I titled that post "Grey Christmas" to play off the previous year. Then we almost had a white Christmas in 2021 but we had a flash thaw so I titled that "Brown Christmas", and now in 2022 I can finally let the theme go.

In fact it was a really white Christmas. We had planned to go to Brampton to see Lee-Anne's family, as we visited my side last week. There were weather warnings and Lee-Anne headed up on the Thursday, missing the worst of it. I came two days later on the Saturday when things were supposed to be bad. Luckily I made it without much issue.

This wasn't the case for everyone. All flights going out from Pearson Airport in Toronto got cancelled. There was a story about people getting snowed in at a Wal Mart in Chatham and having to stay overnight, and trains getting stuck for long stretches of time.

I felt bad leaving the cats behind in a natural disaster. I kept imagining pipes freezing and bursting, or frozen branches falling on the house. Our upstairs neighbours are gone right now, which added to the anxiety of leaving the house empty. But we're back now and everything was fine.

Before I left, the garbage bins kept blowing everywhere. I tried to secure them but had no confidence they would stay put. I was kicking myself for not thinking to put them in the garage or something, but somehow they were where I left them when we got back.

Lee-Anne's mom is very generous at Christmas, and this year I got a charcoal chimney, which is a tool that lights charcoal grills without the need for lighter fluid. I've been wanting one for awhile, but it's not something I'd bother buying for myself and my birthday is at the end of barbecue season. Even though it's out of season right now, it's a little closer to the next barbecue season.

As a joint present, we got a new spice wrack. We already had a very nice spice wrack, that I got when I helped a friend's sister move in college. It had bottles with metal engravings of the leaves of each represented spice. I was very proud of it, but my tarragon and coriander bottles broke. Also, during our roach infestation, some of them got into the crevices of the spice wrack, and even though we've dealt with the issue, it's felt a little... tainted since then.

Anyway, we're moving up from a six (started at eight) spice wrack, to a 24.

The new wrack contains: onion powder, turmeric, allspice, chili powder, cardamom, cinnamon sticks, rosemary, cumin, garam masala, chipotle, dill, black sesame, coriander, ground cinnamon, ground savory, cream of tartar, nutmeg, ancho chili pepper, cloves, caraway seeds, summer savory leaves, and white pepper

Of these, I don't know how white pepper differs from black pepper. I also know that baking powder is made of baking soda and cream of tartar, and that you're supposed to use baking soda to make a "bath" for pretzels and bagels before baking, but I don't know what you're supposed to use cream of tartar on its own for. Also, very weird name when it isn't a cream. There's ground savory and summer savory leaves, but I don't know what either of these things are.

In fact, despite having 24 spices, my old 6 spice wrack had the following that are not available on the new one: thyme, sage, basil, and oregano.

The good news is that this new wrack is a McCormick, which is a common brand of spice that you can buy in reusable bottles at most grocery store. In fact, we already had thyme and cayenne pepper in the appropriate bottles before getting the wrack.

Lee-Anne got me a set of headphones. I broke my previous pair, which were still working but holding on by a wire. I was fairly content balancing the one side on my shoulder, but it's nice to have an intact pair again. She also got me a tarot tracker. It's made by the person she got her deck from, so it's someone we've vetted. It has a proposed year ahead spread, which I'll likely use on the new year, and a bi-weekly 6-card draw, and a daily single card draw, to use for reflection. We'll see if I keep up with that.

As for my present to her, she had a set of bowls that she'd gotten with her mother like ten years ago. Since we moved in, one broke and the other one looks like it's preparing to break. She's tried to find replacements, but hasn't found anything as vibrant as what she had. She made me promise not to buy dish sets without consulting her, so I did check in with her. She responded with "Where did you find those?!", so I ordered them. They haven't shown up yet.

Here's the url. I'll post a pic if they arrive in person: https://www.wayfair.ca/dining/pdp/wrought-studio-12-piece-dinnerware-set-service-for-4-c009490364.html?piid=615698983

Between this and the hand-carved bowls I bought for my mom and brother, I bought a lot of bowls this Christmas

Premium King Suite

Me and Lee-Anne went to Guelph this weekend to spend some time with family. We stayed at a hotel, but because four hotels in Guelph closed over the pandemic, it's difficult to find a room. By the time we had made plans, there was only one left, which was a Premium King Suite, likely the most expensive room in the building. I am not accustomed to such luxuries, so let me share with you the experience

The place was more like an apartment than a room, so we had our own living area. Last time we stayed at a room at this place, it was airplane themed, with a little metal airplane model and a painting of an airplane. This one didn't have as prominent of a theme, but it did have this birch tree painting. I've found that artists love birch trees, and I'm not sure why.

Bathroom. Pretty typical.

TV on a bulging chest. 

King sized bed.

TV with a fireplace beneath it. I highly doubt the fireplace is meant to be used. We found some candles out in the hall that had their wicks removed. This place likes to give the impression that it's ready to start a fire while not actually giving guests the option of starting an open flame.

Little table in the kitchen with a print of a wine glass crossed by a bottle.

We got a full kitchen, including a full oven and refrigerator. In my experience, you usually get a microwave and a mini fridge. There were even pots and pans in case you wanted to do some home cooking. It's funny, if I was going to be doing any cooking it would likely be because I was staying for awhile and eating out was causing financial strain. If I were planning on staying for that length of time, I'd likely be staying in a cheaper room. I think the people who can usually afford to stay in this suite don't need to worry too much about being able to afford takeout. Maybe it's because they might be holding some kind of social function.

Overall it was kind of cool. Because it was sort of a rare opportunity to have access to something like this, we hosted my mother and brother and a few others in the suite for kind of a Christmas function.

It sounds a bit random but I brought home some bowls as a gift.

I mentioned in my "Old Neighbourhoods" post that I went to an annual event called the Frederick Art Walk, and that a friend of mine had a booth at it selling wood-turned bowls. I contacted him about getting a couple to give as presents. I was expecting to get two mid-sized bowls but he talked me into buying that larger one, as its what he'd get for his mother, and then the second largest was for my brother. He threw in the smallest one for free. The second smallest was mine, that I bought at the art walk.

It's a soup bowl, and I never really trusted it not to stain, but since this summer plenty of soup has moved through it and it still seems to be in good condition. After coming home with the other three bowls and finding that they fit together nicely, I realized that my bowl was sized perfectly as a set with them. I mentally wrestled for awhile about whether or not I wanted to give up my bowl and ultimately decided to do it. Now I need a new soup bowl.

Today we traveled to Toronto to visit my Oma and Granddad, and we met up with my aunt as well. This is my grandfather who has dimension. Last time I saw him he was still able to hold conversation, but at this point he does not speak for the most part. He is able to answer yes or no questions, he can repeat words when prompted, he can still read writing out loud which I confess surprised me, and he's still able to sing. We sang Felis Navidad together. On that note, he can speak as much Spanish as English.

He seemed comfortable around me. He was able to say my name when told who I was. As a group we had lunch together at the place he is living.

Then me and Lee-Anne came back to Kitchener. It was a pretty transit-heavy day. We took a bus to Toronto at 8:30, then transferred to a subway and met my Oma at 11:30. Then later we took the subway again, and between two buses got back into Kitchener, then took the light rail home.

My Health Journey

In my "I'm diabetic" post, I spoke about the diagnosis and some new accommodations that I've had to make. I said that I did some bloodwork that wasn't because of concerns about diabetes, although it did reveal it. I didn't talk about the circumstances that brought me to that point, so I will now.

I mentioned in a post earlier this year that I've been re-diagnosed with ADHD. Before that, because I'd been struggling to stay on top of some of the responsibilities of my new position after being promoted, I connected with a therapist who specializes in ADHD. He connected me with an agency that does assessments for the disorder. I was assessed, diagnosed, and given a blood pressure monitor to see if I was eligible to take stimulant medication.

My blood pressure was in an allowable range to take the stimulants, so I got a prescription. I was on them for six days. I was really paranoid about my blood pressure so I brought my monitor to work with me. I tested myself at work, it said I had an irregular heartbeat, I panicked and had my coworker drive me to the ER.

I had an ECG done at the ER and talked to a doctor who said that my heart wasn't irregular, but it was beating extremely fast. 

They let me go home. I counted my ADHD meds, found I was one less than I should have. What probably happened was, I got up, took a pill, went back to bed, woke up again and forgetting that I'd taken one, took another, accidentally double-dosing.

So now I'm worried about my heart, which led me to contact my family doctor, which led me to getting my bloodwork done, which got me diagnosed with diabetes.

In my "Johnny Barnes" post, I mentioned that I was in Guelph for a doctor's appointment, which is standard to do every three months for diabetics. I didn't mention how my meeting went though.

Three months since starting diabetic meds and my new diet, my blood sugar dropped from 10.5 to 6.9. If I recall correctly, anything over 7 is considered diabetic. The range from 6-7 is considered "pre-diabetic", and between 4 and 6 is standard. So my blood sugar levels have entered the "pre-diabetic" range, meaning that my organs are not presently taking damage.  

Even though I'm in the pre-diabetic range, that doesn't mean I am pre-diabetic, as I'm only maintaining that status with the aid of medication. To properly go into remission, I would have to drop below an average of 6 and maintain it without the aid of medication.

Going into remission is possible, but generally diabetes is considered a progressive disease that gets worse over time. This is because people who have it often struggle with lifestyle habits that make it worse, and unfortunately, because they've gotten to this point they require better lifestyle habits than those that don't have it just to maintain their current status. Even if I go into remission, the lifestyle changes that I've made need to be commitments forever, because at this point my body is more susceptible to regression.

Also, medication for diabetes prevents the organs from taking damage, but it often makes it harder to lose weight as well, which is a big part of recovery. So the odds seem stacked against the person with diabetes.

All this being said, my decreased blood sugar level is considered a resounding success. I had a bunch of other numbers too, which I don't remember but were a lot better than they were before. My doctor told me to "keep up the great work" and seemed more positive than I'd ever seen her. I'd been connected with a dietician, and in my second session, on looking at my numbers she broke down laughing because of how much better they'd gotten. Apparently I'd improved enough that I no longer qualified for a dietician, and she said that I'd "graduated from the school of diabetes"

I mentioned to my dietician that I could have developed diabetes at any time in the decade that I hadn't seen my family doctor, but she said that it could have happened sooner than I thought, as apparently there was a huge influx of diagnoses post-COVID, due to all the change in lifestyle and the increase in stress.

She said that success for type 2 diabetics is considered staying within target range (4-10) on a glucose monitor 70% of the time. When I was talking to her, I'd been in range 96% of the time.

I'll list the things that have spiked my blood sugars into an unhealthy range:

-Charcuterie board. This was a provided lunch from my agency for a team-building day. I ordered one of the few things that didn't have carbs but something in it still got to me

-Waffle with jam. I got this at a hotel breakfast. There was someone in charge of meal prep instead of it being buffet-style. There wasn't much of a menu and I felt put on the spot so I wound up going with this. I got the jam instead of the maple syrup because I thought maybe the berries would offset some of the sugar, which of course it didn't

-Qdoba burrito. I got this because of a lunch-provided training at work. I made sure to get the whole wheat tortilla and the brown rice, but of course restaurants are only concerned with your enjoyment, and if you try to order something healthy, they offer only the illusion of a nutritional value

-Potluck. This was for a work holiday party. There appears to be a theme here of me violating my diet because of work provisions

My dietician said that she would rather hear that I was allowing myself the occasional indulgence, as that reduces my chance of having a relapse.

At the time I hadn't lost any weight, but she said that of the five key factors, weight was likely the least concerning and I should still be proud. She said that I shouldn't use weight as my measurement for determining health, but that if I followed my diet and lifestyle guidelines, eventually weight loss would follow.

Since my last session I finally saw a decrease in weight by ten pounds. Overall, I'm down 23 from last year.

Go Trains

A little while ago I was riding a Go train. Before leaving, an overhead voice mentions if there are cars that will not open at the next destination and lists the car numbers. This can be quite anxiety provoking for a few reasons. First of all, if you're not familiar with the system, you will likely not be ready for it and just tune out the voice, expecting the usual spiel of welcoming you to Go transit, saying what the next destination is, and warning about the doors closing.

The first time this happened, I didn't realize the message was different until a few of the car numbers were listed, and I panicked because I couldn't be sure if they'd listed my number or not. You don't get a second chance because they don't repeat themselves, and they don't say it as they near the destination. There is also usually no one around to ask for help.

It's also difficult to know what your car number is because they put it in tiny print in an obscure location that isn't labeled. It's also very difficult to correct yourself after arriving at the destination, because they only open the doors for 15 seconds (I counted). It's intimidating even if you know you're where you need to be.

So anyway, I'm riding the train and they put out this message about certain cars not opening their doors. I'm familiar enough with the system to be paying attention and to know what my car number is. They say that my car will not open, and that I should move in the direction of the train toward the accessibility car.

I try going into the next car, which is not something that I've done from the inside before. There is a button that says it will open the door, but it doesn't. There's a latch that I pull that opens about an inch and locks. A bunch of teenagers are sitting nearby and I feel a bit of a fool for not being able to open the door.

I'm nervous that I'm not supposed to be forcing the door like this, but there's no one that I can ask for help. I put all my weight against the latch and it opens. There is a small airlock and another door which opens automatically.

The next car's number is in descending order instead of ascending, which was not what I expected based on the number given for the accessibility car. It causes pause, but since I'm moving in the direction of the train, I decide to keep going. The next car is latched shut as well.

The train comes to a halt at my destination. I hope that moving forward one car is sufficient despite the fact that I didn't make it to accessibility. The doors don't open. An older woman is looking at me and shaking her head but doesn't elaborate. In a panic, I pounce toward the doors to the next car and wrench the doors as hard as I can. A man on the other side is hammering away uselessly at the button, which isn't working on his side either. He sees what I'm doing and pulls at his handle with full force as well.

We manage to pull the doors open. He's going the opposite direction as me and I had that doubt about car order number, so I figure he must know better than me and together we ran in the direction of the car I'd just come from. We managed to get to the car I was in originally, which doesn't open and we miss our location.

Now I'm moving to a completely different city with no stops inbetween, and since the card system they use charges by distance, this means I'm paying to travel to the next stop. This is the last train, so I figure I'll have to call an uber on the other side but the next destination is a small town and there's no guarantee that there will be any drivers available, or if there are, any willing to travel between cities. The overhead voice lists car numbers that won't open at the next destination, and he mentions my number again.

It's a special kind of fear, shuttling down a rail, locked in a metal tube, further and further from anywhere you know with no way to ask for help.

I play around with the button that doesn't work and find a small bit in the centre of what was presenting itself as a button, painted the same and level with the rest of it. The door opens. I start moving between cars with this knowledge until I reach accessibility. Apparently the car numbers are random and don't go in any particular order.

I've been communicating with Lee-Anne throughout this and she tells me I should complain to the worker in accessibility. I say that there isn't anyone there, and she says there should be.

The train comes to a stop and it doesn't open. Then, an invisible door slides out of a windowless, egg-shaped protrusion on the opposite side of the car and a worker comes out. She has a portable ramp for wheelchair users. The door in front of her on the opposite side of the car from me opens (the one in front of me still doesn't).

Clearly I am the only person in the car that is getting off and I don't need the ramp, but she insists on unfolding it and putting it down before I get off. Then, as soon as I hop by her, she folds up the ramp and jumps back on the car right before the doors shut. I wonder how someone who actually needed the ramp would manage to get off in the allotted 15 seconds when it seems like she spent seven seconds putting it down and seven picking it back up.

I call an uber and luckily I get someone who brings me to Guelph.

Last time Lee-Anne took a Go train, it had barely left the station when it shut down from complications. The overhead voice said that there would be shuttle busses that would replace the train. She gets off with another passenger and the two of them return to the station where they find an employee fielding questions from customers. Lee-Anne asked where the shuttle buses were, to which the employee said they'd already left. Those busses must have left almost exactly as the overhead voice announced their presence, as Lee-Anne had to get off in the allotted 15 seconds and went directly to the station at the same pace as another passenger that was equally confused by the behaviour of the shuttle busses.

Apparently the employee fielding questions was pretty rude, too, and, unprompted, responded to the confused look of the jilted passengers with something to the tune of "Hey, it's not my problem"

The Go train system works well when it works, but when it doesn't, it really doesn't.

Clay Art, Bestival, Multicultural Festival, Baptism

This summer me and Lee-Anne went to a clay art lesson at a local event downtown. Before this, I'd tried it in Katimavik during the Summerside rotation where I made a mug with an anchor on it. I've also attended similar sessions when I worked at the Summer Program every year during Wacky Water Week. Sometimes facilitators got to take part in activities but I might have just supported people. If I did make something, I can't remember what it was.

This was a little different because we didn't get to keep what we made, but we got to use the wheel. In the past, all I did was form the shapes I wanted with my hands, then cut grooves in the clay (called scoring), wet it, and stuck the pieces together. This time, the clay was placed in the centre of a round platform which span when you pushed on a pedal.

You shaped it by running your hands up and down the sides and pushing down on the top, then pinching the walls as they form. Objective was to make a cup. I was pretty good at it, but because the session ended after a time limit instead of when you completed your cup, I wound up getting it where I wanted, but then just playing with it until time ran out. Because of this the walls of my cup got too thin and eventually tore.

There was also a local event called the "Bestival" in Belmont Village. This is an annual event, but the first year we were here it was just a smattering of stands with a handful of people walking around. I guess people were still COVID conscious, or maybe it was required to be scaled down, because this year it was at a totally different level. Huge crowds, live music on stages set up on opposite sides of the Belmont area, lots of local artists and restaurants with stands. An Indian restaurant that's usually sit-in that me and Lee-Anne haven't got around to trying had a stand out and we tried it. It was okay.

We stuck around for one of the bands. I don't know what it was called but it was like big band/rap fusion. Main instrument was trumpet. Kind of cool.

I just looked through my posts for this year, and I guess I never mentioned going to the multicultural festival. I didn't go on purpose, I was just in the area and saw a bunch of people going somewhere so I followed them. I go to the multicultural festival most years, but it's always by accident. I ran into a handful of people I know and listened to a few songs from an Indigenous group called The Sarcastic Onions. I didn't try any food, all the lines were way too long.

I also went to a baptism recently. I'm not Christian so I'd never been to one before. I always imagined them as either fully submerging the baby in a body of water or pouring water over the baby's head. What happened was the person in charge, I think wetted her hands and touched the baby's cheeks and forehead, but I couldn't be quite sure there was any water involved. Much quicker and less dramatic than I was anticipating.

At one point she told us all to reach out in the direction of the baby and offer our protection. Part of me worried that my non-Christian energies would inadvertently cast a hex on the child

Johnny Barnes

 Since I'm diabetic, I have to do bloodwork and have a check-up with my doctor every three months. In my "old neighbourhoods" post, I mention having walked from the medical clinic to the train station, guided by memories from my teenage years. I talked about seeing a few new developments at my old high school, as well as passing "Blossom Junction", a train made of flowers.

Since then I had to do another check-up and had the opportunity to redo the walk. Unfortunately, this time around Blossom Junction had been removed for the season, but I did manage to snap some pics of the developments by my old high school. Classes were in session, so I felt a little creepy as a 33 year old man with my camera out.

Anyway, here they are

I don't know if the arch has more significance than it appears to have, but at first blush it seems pretty self-explanatory. It says "Here lies open the field for the quest of knowledge" which makes sense for a school, and it also says "Since GCVI 1854". The school prides itself on its age, as it is the oldest secondary school in Guelph, and third oldest in Ontario. Back when I was attending, we did a thing where all the students stood in the formation of the number "150" and had a photo taken of us from above, to celebrate its birthday at the time. I myself was 15.

The school has a "new building" and an "old building", and in the old one, you can see dips in the stone staircases made by the footsteps of of students over generations. We have portraits of every principle over the course of the school's history hung up, and the older ones are paintings. It's said that in the painting of the first principle, if you look closely enough you can see the blood flowing through his veins. I remember inspecting it and believing this to be true. There was once a fire that ripped through the school but all the paintings were spookily undamaged. There's a book with the names of every student to ever graduate set in the entranceway of the old building.

As far as the statue goes, there was a bench with a plaque beside it that gave a bit of context

Apparently the person's name was "Johnny Barnes" and it says "Famous resident of Bermuda, exemplifies GCVI's welcoming, inclusive culture" It doesn't say how he managed this, so I Googled him

So first of all, here's a picture of him in the pose of the statue

There was a Guelph Mercury post on the topic as well, here's the link

https://www.guelphmercury.com/news-story/6126507-johnny-barnes-welcomes-guelph-cvi-students-with-open-arms/

I'd like to note that that article opens with a quote from Mr. Tersigni, who was the guidance counselor back when I attended the school. 

Anyway, according to the article, Johnny Barnes was "a 90-something Bermuda man, known for waving, smiling, and greeting commuters daily".

Apparently the statue didn't originate with GCVI, and was actually on a property in Caledon. When the land was being sold, GCVI asked to purchase the statue. Despite the fact that Johnny wasn't a graduate of GCVI, a citizen of Guelph or even Ontario, the staff of GCVI believed that he still represented the "welcoming spirit", the "international-mindedness, global awareness and respect for diversity" that GCVI prides itself in. According to the article, GCVI had North America's first black high school principle, which is a neat bit of trivia I didn't know.

I don't know. I do like the idea of celebrating a regular person with a strong personality. It seems like that might preserve us from the phenomenon of honouring powerful people, leading to disappointment when information surfaces that contradicts their public persona. Choosing someone without too many information walls feels like a wise choice.

However, the fact that Johnny wasn't a student of GCVI, and the school wasn't involved in the creation of the statue kind of invalidates him as a symbol of the place, in my opinion. Johnny sounded like a cool guy, though.

Lee-Anne's Birthday

Friday was Lee-Anne's birthday. We don't have a ritual of exchanging gifts on these days, but this time I made an effort. She hadn't asked for anything, and was surprised when I let her know I'd gotten something. While she didn't ask what it was, she put forward a lot of questions to narrow down what it could be.

"Would my mother like it?"

"She's never given the impression that she would, but it would be of her generation, so she might"

"Would my grandmother know how to operate it?"

"Since she knows how to use a TV, I assume so"

"Would my youngest brother like it?" (I'm omitting names for the sake of the post"

"He seems sentimental, so if he ever had one of these in the past, he might like it"

"Would my second-oldest brother like it?"

"No, he'd think it was outdated"

It was a clock radio. I've been transparent since the "I'm Diabetic" post, so I guess I'll admit to the fact that we had a cockroach infestation last year. We had exterminators come over, and it's been many months since we've seen a roach, but while they were around they occupied and destroyed Lee-Anne's radio. Now that that danger has passed, it seemed right to bring it back.

She loves to fall asleep while listening to the radio. She had programmed a setting that let it run for half an hour and then turn off, which was helpful to me because I absolutely cannot fall asleep while it's on.

After the roaches destroyed her radio, she found an app for her phone that gave access to all the same options, including one that gave a delayed shut-off time. But since she's a sentimental person, I had the feeling that she would appreciate having an actual radio. It also serves as an alarm clock, and since she's legally blind, I got one with a large display of the time.

She seemed to like it! She mentioned that she should have asked if her father would like the gift, since he's the only other person in her family with a specific fondness for radio.

I was surprised that there were as many options for radios as there were, since I thought it was a mostly outdated technology. Before choosing the one that I did for her, I ordered another one. It had a smaller display and didn't have an alarm clock setting, but could play CDs.

I was recently surprised to learn that CDs are still being developed. I was in Wal Mart at one time, and I noticed their CD section. There was one for "Encanto Songs", which is a modern Disney flick, and there was one with a visual of someone wearing a facemask, symbolizing production during the pandemic.

I cheated my diet for Lee-Anne's birthday as well. We went to a local place that specializes in deep dish pizza. I justify this because I have to see my doctor every three months, and I just saw her last week, so if I cheat my diet I have three months to recover and correct before having to report on my health

Old Neighbourhoods

A little while ago I was in Guelph for a doctors appointment. Afterwards, I was going to call an uber to bring me to the train station to travel back to Kitchener, but I thought I'd walk down to the apartment building that I lived in when I used to walk to the clinic. From there I remembered that I used to walk to high school, and from the high school I would sometimes walk downtown, and from downtown I could get to the train station. It felt pretty strange, doing a walk that I'd never done before, but patched together from different familiar routes, mostly from over ten years ago. I never made a wrong turn.

I walked by my old high school. Now they've got an arch and a statue of a guy with his arms outstretched. One of my coworkers who is ten years younger than me that went to the same school said they put both of those up while she was attending.

This wasn't my only opportunity to revisit old neighbourhoods. At work, we were exploring community centres because our main building was getting painted. I wound up getting assigned to facilitate a group that was near the old shopping centre that I would go to while I was in college. It looks a lot different now. It used to be a strip mall, and now it's like a square made of mall strips.

There's an LCBO (Liquor Control Board of Ontario). I used to find it strange that the one nearest was a half-hour bus trip, and then 15 minute walk away. I heard it theorized that this was by design, and that there was some agreement to not let students have such easy access to alcohol. That is apparently not the case anymore.

The Rabid Fox, which was the local pub, relocated slightly to one of the new mall strips. There is now Shoppers Drug Mart, which is a chain pharmacy that also sells everything else. This at least offers some competition to the Zehrs, which was previously the only option for groceries. Before, if you wanted a cheaper option, you'd have to take a half hour bus ride and walk for 15 minutes to the Food Basics next to the LCBO I previously mentioned.

Zehrs is a slightly more upscale Canadian grocery store. If I were a student nowadays, worrying about my budget and without the time to leave the neighbourhood, I would probably buy the bulk of my groceries at Shoppers.

For some reason, the area around Conestoga College has never seemed marketed to students. Across the street we had Pino's Pizza, which was advertised as gourmet, and we had Mango King, which was a sit-down Thai-Vietnamese place.

Last weekend I went to the Frederick Art Walk, which is an annual art exhibition held in the Central Frederick area. After graduating college, I lived for about five months in a connected neighbourhood. I was an independent facilitator at the time, and it seemed like all my colleagues lived here.

These people are really proud of their neighbourhood, and say that the century homes and urban forest are as impressive as the local artists. I always found this attitude to be slightly pretentious, but it is a nice area. I've got a friend who had a booth there selling wood-turned items and I bought a bowl.

I was going to bus back but I checked my Pokemon Go to see if there were any new locations and I noticed the cat hospital, which I recognized. From there, I pieced my way back to downtown and then walked home.

This weekend, Lee-Anne took me on a walk up by where she used to to live when she was going to university, and she showed me where her brothers lived too. It was good because I'd only walked 15 km this week, and I have a goal of 30 km weekly The walk she took me on wound up being around 12 km, putting me in a good spot to complete my goal by tomorrow.

I'm Diabetic

Almost three months ago I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. I haven't talked about it except for with close family members, but I did mention in a post awhile back that I'd seen my family doctor for the first time in 10 years. The meeting wasn't about concerns over potential diabetes but we decided to do some bloodwork as part of the health check up. My blood sugar was crazy. Since I was asymptomatic we had to do a second test to confirm and I was consistently above the diabetic threshold.

I'm on several medications now and I'm wearing a glucose monitor called a freestyle libre. The monitor is like a little computer the size of a button, which fastens to the back of your arm. You can download an app and use your phone to scan the sensor to get information on your blood sugar at any given time. You can see your average levels throughout the day separated in three hour timeslots, you can see a chart of your levels each day that you use it, or see one based on an average over seven days, 14, 30, or 90. It has alarms to notify you if your glucose is high or low, and today I just started using a notes system that you can use to record your behaviour when your sugars are acting strange. I thought I would hate being monitored all the time but it's actually pretty cool. Each sensor is supposed to last 14 days, although that isn't always the reality.

You have to apply the sensor yourself, and it's very intimidating at first. I didn't have a person to guide me, just an instruction manual that came in the box and some steps presented by the app. It uses really clinical language, like "place applicator over injection site and push down to apply sensor", which is a fancy way of saying STAB YOURSELF IN THE ARM WITH A GIANT NEEDLE.

The needle does really look absurdly large at first, like the stinger on a murder hornet. There is a spring mechanism in the applicator, so it's not quite like just pushing it into your arm. The weird thing is that it doesn't hurt. The first two times I tried to apply a libre failed. The first one started to itch and it fell out inside an hour, and the second one stayed and I was able to set it up, scan it and get some data but it fell off while I was sleeping that night.

The relevant change I needed to make to keep them on, was I needed to shave a patch of hair. I also got some additional adhesive to put on my arm. The instructions just told me to clean the area with plain soap, swab with an alcohol wipe and let air dry, which is what I did the first two times. Now shave the injection site, then shower, washing with soap and exfoliating, then clean with an alcohol swab, let air dry, then use skin tac, then apply the sensor. Four different liquids hit my arm before injection.

My first successful sensor was fastened to the side of my arm, because for some reason I had trouble figuring out where the back of my arm is. It lasted the full 14 days. I had it on my left arm because I figure you move your less dominant arm around less, so you're not as likely to knock it against something, same reason you wear a watch on your left hand. I realized though that I usually sleep on my left side, so the second sensor I put on my right arm, but it only lasted six days. It didn't come loose, it just stopped working, I'm not sure why. Third sensor I put back on my left arm and it lasted 12 days but it stopped working the same way that my second sensor did. I'm on my fourth right now, and it's on my right arm again because when I see my doctor they're going to want to take my blood pressure on my left side.

I've had to cut out almost all carbs and added sugars. So I'm not supposed to have juice, pop, bread, pasta, rice, or potatoes. Pasta isn't too bad and I never made a regular habit of drinking juice or pop, but I've got some of my identity wrapped up in my status as a baker. In Katimavik when we divvied up house manager duties during the last rotation, I was selected to be the group's bread maker. I kept my family in homemade bread after finishing the program, and I made a habit of giving people surprise loaves of bread. I even gave Lee-Anne a loaf of bread before we started dating and I was trying to impress her. Katimabread is my first post on my recipe blog.

Rice also sucks. I've often said that fried rice is my most basic conception of food, that if I were sent into a kitchen and simply told to "make food" I would produce fried rice. I've often said that it is the perfect cross-section of sustainability, nutrition, affordability, flavour, and ease of creation. Many times, when not knowing what to make for dinner I would start to prepare a protein, start throwing vegetables in, make a cup of rice, throw an egg on it and only then see what I'd done, add some sauces and call it fried rice. It was the first thing I learned to cook after leaving for college, which I did by reverse-engineering the stirfry sold in our campus cafeteria. Among other impoverished students that didn't know how to cook, I was a king when I whipped up a giant pot of fried rice.

I can kind of get back into using rice, but it's got to be long grain brown. Not too bad since my favourite was basmati, which is already long grain. I like to buy the giant sacks of rice that you can get in the international aisle, and luckily I found one with long grain brown basmati. The sack is plastic, not burlap like my previous brand, but it's still cool.

Lentils share many of the virtues of rice, with their sustainability and affordability and they are diabetic friendly. Canada produces three times as much lentils as India, the next highest lentil-producing nation, 95% of our crop produced in Saskatchewan. I'm trying to make lentil soup the new fried rice.

My sugar levels have been really good. Like, non-diabetic good and consistently low. That doesn't mean that I'm cured, though. It means I'm able to prevent active damage to my organs with the help of medication.

I've had to get my kidneys, eyes, and feet checked. These are the three areas they use to determine if you're symptomatic. I'm still okay in all three of these categories, and I've never had a dizzy spell or anything like that either. We only know about my condition through the blood tests, which is a good thing.

It's hard not to speculate about when I developed it. Since I didn't see my doctor for ten years it could have been any time within that span. It could have been when I was working in the group home, doing obscene hours. At one point I was doing sleep shifts full time, while maintaining four direct support contracts and taking five university courses. I kept clothes in my backpack and did my laundry at the group home, kept a bar of soap on me and showered at local pools, and ate leftovers at the grouphome or fast food all the time. I was so busy I was functionally homeless. My body could have crapped out then.

Or it could have been near the beginning of the pandemic when I went full survivor-mode. I thought society was going to collapse, and my fear drove me to exhaustion. I didn't leave my unit except for groceries for months at first after having been accustomed to walking over 50 km per week. Combination of stress and sudden drop in physical activity could have done it.

But I guess we will never know. All there is to do is keep trying to lose weight and keep my sugar at a healthy level.

Birthday, Engagement, Sunflowers, A Powwow, The Queen, and Orange Shirt Day

I just passed my thirty third birthday. It wasn't very exciting, it's not a very pivotal year. It was on a Wednesday and I was working. I celebrated by eating a shawarma and Lee-Anne made chocolate peanut butter tarts.

When I was going over my birthday well-wishes on Facebook I noticed that I never updated my relationship status when we got engaged. When you update your status to "In a relationship", it sends a notice to the other person and waits for their approval before announcing it. So I thought that when I updated my status to being engaged, it would send a request to Lee-Anne.

But no, it not only updated my status, it also published on both my page and hers as an announcement. I was going to take it down since it was late at night and Lee-Anne was asleep, but I didn't know if it would make an additional announcement saying we broke off the engagement if I tried to edit it back. I was getting lots of support quickly, too, and I thought I was past the point of no return.

So Lee-Anne had a fun surprise in the morning with tons of congratulations pouring in. She was cool with it though.

We had EAFy Day recently. The past few years I've dedicated full posts to it, but this year I wasn't on the committee planning it. It was still pretty fun. We were in Cambridge and the theme was Extend-a-Family Feud. We rotated through different gameshow inspired activities throughout the morning. We had these fancy boxed lunches from a place called EVO, which I've mentioned before. I had the antipasto platter, which seemed exactly like the charcuterie board I ordered the last time. Oh well, it was still good.

We got two more tiny end-of-year sunflowers.

The top one grew out of one of the flowers that had their first blossom torn off. I made an attempt to save both of them, but only one survived. Despite having lost its flower, it grew another one! In the bottom image, we have a blossom that grew out of the tiny and slow-growing flower that survived getting its stem snapped in a storm earlier on. It seemed unlikely that it would bloom at all but it wound up making two flowers! So we wound up with five blossoms total, even though we lost two early.

We went to a Powwow held in Waterloo Park last weekend. It was cool because the different dance categories, which were Jingle, Grass, and Fancy were the same as the ones featured in a powwow that I went to in Chisasibi during the Katimavik program. The person hosting the event spoke a little on the background of each dance before they were performed, so I finally got a little clarity on the specifics between the genres. They also sold frybread tacos there, and Lee-Anne got to compare the real thing to the imitation I make at home. 

I should mention that Queen Elizabeth II passed. She was 96, having reigned for 70 years, which is longer than any other British monarch in history. This is significant to Canada, as we are technically part of the commonwealth and we use her image on all our money. Our Prime Minister called for a federal holiday for mourning. However, Ontario's Premier decided against this, so only government workers in my province got the day off.

I have to admit I wanted the day off, but if I'd got it I probably wouldn't spend the whole day mourning. I don't have anything against the queen, but I've always been a little confused about the purpose of the Royal Family in modern England, and Canada seems a step further removed.

Speaking of days that our Premier decided shouldn't be holidays, today is Orange Shirt Day, or the Day of Truth and Reconciliation. It is dedicated to reflection on the damaging influence of colonization on our Indigenous population, with a focus on the residential school system.

Lots of things have happened in September!

Second Encampment

Back in June I made a post about a homeless encampment that had been developed on an empty field near the train station. They were issued an eviction notice for the end of the month, but the city has extended their notice on a monthly basis since then. They have port-o-potties now, I don't know if the city provided them. There are sunflower blossoms at the there right now, it looks really nice.

My position was in favour of the residents of the tent city. I said that in my view they are less dangerous not more when they are working collaboratively inside a community and have a reputation to preserve, and that the move to evict them wouldn't decrease the number of homeless, just divide them into small enough factions that the people complaining would be able to ignore the issue. My only reservation was that if we considered these living accommodation satisfactory, it might lead to complacency when I believe that all human beings deserve access to running water, heat and electricity.

Since then, a second encampment has developed in Kitchener's Victoria Park. Initially it was stated that it was in protest to the move to evict the train station tent city, however over time it became clear that the protest was at least doubling in purpose as another place of residency for our homeless.

The camp is set on Roos Island, a piece of land that branches into a wide river that flows through the park. It connects on one side by a bridge and on the other by a strip of land. There is a gazebo in the centre on which they have mounted a list of demands. They are as follows:

1. Stop evicting campers on city region land
2. No more police at overdose emergency calls
3. Stop ALL drug related arrests
4. Decriminalize ALL drugs and expand Safe Supply by 50%
5. Stop increasing the police budget
6. Use vacant properties in the downtown core for low-income housing
7. Provide low-income housing at 10% of income
8. Create space for housing alternatives in DTK
9. Create 1000 new low-income housing units in the downtown core
10. Stop CAS child abductions from Indigenous, Black, and low-income families
11. Sign over ownership of the bus terminal to the Indigenous Community
12. Formerly rename Willow River Park
13. Remove all colonial statues from the region; starting with Willow River Park 

I don't know what the process was like to come up with this list or if there's full consensus. They seem to be presenting themselves as strongly associated with the Indigenous population, but I've no idea what percentage of them have ancestry. Apparently a group called Fightback KW initiated this movement on Canada Day and has been supplying residents with many basic necessities. A local activist named Julian Ichim has been an outspoken representative on behalf of the tent city.

To clarify some of the demands, the call to rename the park is because the current name, Victoria Park, is based on Queen Victoria, whose rule oversaw expansion of the British Empire into what we now know as Canada. The idea is that having a park named after this woman celebrates the suppression of the Indigenous People. Similarly, the call to remove colonial statues is inspired at least in part by the big statue of Queen Victoria across the river from the tent city. After the discovery of the bodies of Indigenous children under former residential schools, red paint was splashed onto this statue representing the blood of these children. It was left up for awhile, and when the city eventually cleaned it up they put a plaque in front of the statue explaining its controversial nature.

The bus terminal they're talking about is Charles Street Terminal, the former centre for Kitchener transit. It got closed when they introduced the ION lightrail, and now we don't have anything like it, just a small transit office connected to a hotel. Since the terminal's been closed, it's been used as a homeless outreach centre during the initial lockdowns, and later a COVID testing site. Otherwise I think it's just a break area for ION security workers. I don't know why the Indigenous community would want this building, it's nothing special.

Reception to the train station encampment was divisive, and the Roos Island encampment has been received more negatively. That being said, it hasn't stopped people from going to the park and enjoying it, so far as I can tell. The playground still always looks full, there's always a lineup by the sausage vendor and ice cream truck, and I think every time I've gone, I see wedding photos being taken. 

People walk through the tent city. I've walked through the tent city, no big deal. So I still think people talking about safety concerns are playing it up. I will admit that I feel a slightly higher level of tension in the Roos Island tent city than the train station encampment, and that may be because the people of Roos Island are intentionally challenging the city by occupying land they understand is considered valuable.

I must admit, I think their demands seem a little lofty. Protesting encampment evictions and demanding an increase in affordable housing make sense, as these are driving our current housing crisis. Demanding a name change to the park and the removal of colonial imagery makes sense, because it concerns the space they are currently occupying. 

I understand that laws regarding drugs are a concern for some of their residents, I don't think the city has the power to decriminalize all drugs anyway. Affordable housing at 10% of income sounds like a challenge, I don't think I've ever had housing at that price even before the current market. I don't know why they want a bus terminal.

And while I believe that people with addictions should be valued and treated with dignity and that harm-reduction methods are more effective than prohibition, there is a lot of stigma around homeless people and the Indigenous community, and this strong emphasis on drug use in relation to these populations could bolster stereotypes.

The original encampment was developed by the homeless community, whereas this second one was developed by homed activists who brought in residents with the offer of resources. I worry a little about their being a coercive element. People will allow themselves to be represented by your message if you're willing to offer them something. Also, I hope that they do have Indigenous representation, and they're not just using a popular movement to give themselves credibility. 

If I were an activist working alongside the homeless population, I think I would want to provide them with resources and make sure that any relevant demographic within them was represented, so I'm not accusing the organizers of wrongdoing, but with this current setup it looks to me like there's room for exploitation due to an imbalance of power between the organizers and residents. So I hope everyone is collaborating.

The city says that it doesn't plan on making moves to evict based on their belief that people will move out once it gets colder. I suppose they believe the same for the train station encampment. I don't really see where they think people will move to, though.

Flowers

Last year, me and Lee-Anne tried to grow sunflowers unsuccessfully. This year I planted 60 of them. They started to sprout but then someone ran over them with a lawn mower. Five survived. Three broke in wind storms. I tried to stake them up, but only one of the broken sunflowers made it through. Three left. Fortunately, two managed to blossom

Weird thing is, I thought I planted purple and teddy bear sunflowers, but I got regular ones. I don't remember if I put regular flowers in the mix, and the standard are just more resilient than the variants, or if I got ripped off. They were from different parts of the patch, and I thought I'd sorted the different types into sections, so it seems like they should be different types. Oh well.

Not only did we get the two standard blossoms, one was growing at least two additional blossoms in the joints of its leaves. I had a neighbour in Guelph who managed this, and I never knew how or why it happened. I have since heard from other sunflower enthusiasts that this is a semi-common phenomenon, and flowers like these are called mutants. Kind of a gross way of referring to them, when the outcome is so pretty.

Unfortunately, something attacked in the night and tore both their heads off. I don't think a human stole them, it seemed way to chaotic. It might have been a skunk. I've run into a skunk in the backyard twice and both times it was coming toward me, not away. Me and Lee-Anne also ran into three baby skunks one evening, and it seems like there's a lot of skunk sightings in general.

Anyway, I tried staking up the two now-headless sunflowers. I thought that if the mutant survived, we'd have a shot of its two additional heads blossoming but unfortunately it didn't make it. The non-mutant sunflower survived without its blossom.

This left one final flower, which had yet to bloom. It was the smallest of the three due to being one of the ones that broke in the wind storm. I'd been saying all along that it was my favourite of the three, since I love an underdog story. The first sunflower I ever grew broke in a windstorm and similarly survived.

Well, it eventually happened

 Missing a couple of petals since whatever creature took the other two blossoms also took a bite out of it. It also didn't fully unfurl, maybe due to its size, but I still think it counts!

While I'm at it, I'll show you some pictures of the bulbs that sprouted earlier this year.

They mostly came through in the spring.

As an aside, that sub shop that I've been talking about, Big John's, finally reopened after seven months, almost as unceremoniously as it closed.

Genealogy Results

A couple months ago, an ancestry detection service called 23AndMe was having a Father's Day sale. Despite not being one myself, I decided to take advantage of the offer and made a purchase. The bundle included an ancestral background check and a health and traits overview. I would have likely only bothered with the ancestry data, but I got the health information as it was a part of the sale.

They sent me a kit, I spat into a tube and mailed it back to their lab for analysis. I just got my results. 

Before going into them, I'll give a brief overview of what I understand of my heritage based on what I've been told by family members. On my mothers side we have the Landstreet family, which is an English adaptation of something like "Lundstrat", which is Dutch in origin. When they immigrated to the US they likely anglicized it.

Going by name origin is a weak way of tracking ancestry though, because it only follows the male line. An example of why names aren't always the best way to determine heritage is that my last name is "Sibbald", which is Scottish. However, my father was adopted.

Because of that fact, my father's side is a little difficult to trace. I did wind up in contact with the genetic side of his family when his biological mother wanted to meet him. Apparently they migrated from Sweden two generations back, making my dad 1/2 Swedish and me 1/4.

This is the bulk of my understanding. I think it's likely that I'm 1/4 Swedish with a drop of Dutch. Other than this, I've no idea.

People have guessed that I was Greek, and people have guessed that my brother is Italian. Back when I was in highschool, when I had long hair and no beard, some people thought I was at least partially Indigenous. I've been told I look Arabic a few times. 

Lets see if that holds any merit. 

Genetic Background

According to 23AndMe, I am...

99.3% Northwestern European

No surprises here.  Goes along with what little I knew of my ancestry. If anything, it's surprising that it's so consistent.

Narrowing it further, it looks like within this continental region, I am primarily

Scandinavian, at 35.6%

Coming through my father's side, probably. Scandinavia includes Norway, Sweden, Denmark, the Faroe Islands and Iceland. Of these places, they found genetic markers for me only in Norway and Sweden. Looks like I've got more than the 25% I estimated.

Next, I am

British & Irish, at 27.8%

I've got genetic markers spread throughout both the UK and Ireland. Up next, I am

French & German, at 13.9%

This region is composed of Germany, Austria, Belgium, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Switzerland.

Despite the name of the category, I don't have any French in me. Interestingly enough, I have nothing from the Netherlands either. I had guessed that I was a bit Dutch, which is the language of the Netherlands. All of my DNA in this category comes from Germany, so it looks like the Landstreet lineage comes from areas that are seen as modern day Germany.

Specifically, they found potential links to Baden-Wurttemberg, Brandenburg, and Saxony. Next up, I am

Finnish, at 3.9%

I almost feel like you can tack this under Scandinavian. Honestly, before doing this, I thought Finland was in that region. Geographically, it neighbours Sweden and has a lot of similar cultural elements at least nowadays.

Finally, I am

Broadly Northwestern European, at 18.1%

Basically, this is DNA that they were able to trace to this region but couldn't narrow it down further. Could be more Scandinavian or German DNA. Pretty consistent with everything else they found.

Of the remaining 0.7% of my DNA, I am

Eastern European, at 0.3%, North African at 0.3%, and 0.1% undetected

I think they leave the 0.1% undetected as a caveat, since it's essentially impossible to determine anything at 100%. Kind of like when ads say that cleaners kill 99.9% of germs.

They weren't able to narrow down my Eastern European or North African ancestry to any more specific regions. North African is the only real curveball here. That region includes Algeria, Libya, Morocco, and Tunisia, although who knows exactly where my DNA comes from.

Next up we have my health report. This one is scary because it could imply issues further on in my life. They made me give specific consent to reveal this information and I had to go through tutorials for the stats on Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and cancers saying that 23AndMe does not diagnose, that it doesn't guarantee anything, and that these conditions are impacted by lifestyle and environment as much as genetics.

So let's see what we have

Health Report

Looks like I have no increased chance of any form of cancer detectable by this analysis and no indicators for Parkinson's. Unfortunately, I have a slightly increased chance of developing late-stage Alzheimer's past the age of 65. I have one genetic marker passed down through one of my parents. Unfortunately, I suspected this might be the case as my granddad is currently suffering from dementia, as did his mother.

According to 23AndMe, this means that I have a 4-7% chance of developing it by age 75, as opposed to the usual 3% and at 85 my risk is 20-23% as opposed to the usual 11-14% Basically I'm twice as likely. Unfortunately I think there are other forms of dementia that aren't detectable by this analysis.

There are 10 additional health predispositions. I'm clean for all of them except Age-Related Macular Degeneration, which is a form of vision loss occurring in late life. I am at an increased risk, which means both my mother and father passed on this gene. The site is not giving me information on what age it might start or how likely I am to get it. Oh well, at least Lee-Anne comes from a family of optometrists.

Now let's look at what genetic conditions I could be at risk of passing on, were I to choose to have children.

Carrier Report

This section covered 45 inheritable conditions. Of them, there is only one that I have a genetic variant for, which is Congenital Disorder of Glycosylation, Type 1a. This is a condition that causes developmental delay, muscle weakness, and failure to gain weight. However, it says I only have one variant in my system, and it takes two to develop it. So if Lee-Anne also has the potential to pass it on, it could be a concern, but my genetics alone cannot cause it.

Next up is my wellness & traits report. This covers trivial info that I will be able to verify.

Wellness & Traits

The Wellness Report covers 8 categories. According to it I am...

• Unlikely to flush when I drink alcohol. This is true, never noticed a flush and no one's ever said anything
• Likely to consume more caffeine than average. True, I currently drink 2 mugs a day
• Less likely to be a deep sleeper. True, I am a notoriously light sleeper
• I am predisposed to weigh about average. This is false, I weigh significantly above average
• I am not lactose intolerant. True, I can handle dairy just fine
• I likely have the muscle composition of elite power athletes. That's a fun way to say it. I'd say true. I haven't trained for it but I am uncommonly strong with a naturally hulking build
• I likely have similar saturated fat and weight. Apparently this means I don't have a specific issue with processing saturated fats. I, uh... have no idea.
• I likely have average or less sleep movement. False, I toss and turn in my sleep.

So, factoring out the saturated fat one because I didn't understand it, 23AndMe guessed correctly 5 out of 7 times.

Now for my Traits Report, which has 37 different factors. According to it, I am

• Less likely to be able to match musical pitch. True, I have a tin ear.
• More likely to be able to smell asparagus. True, I can smell it
• Less likely to have back hair. False, I'm a sasquatch 
• Likely not to have a bald spot. False, balding since 19
• Likely able to taste bitterness. True, I love bitter tasting foods
• Less likely to have bunions. True, I don't remember ever having them
• Likely not to have dimples. True, don't have any
• Slightly higher chance of disliking cilantro. Is this that gene that makes it taste like soap? I don't have that, I'm cool with cilantro
• Likely not to have a cleft chin. True, don't have one
• 50/50 chance of having dandruff. Doesn't matter because they went middle-of-the-road for this, but I don't think I have a dandruff problem
• Likely has detached earlobes. True, they're detached
• Likely no early hair loss. False, already said I've been balding since 19
• Likely has wet earwax. It's not like I've done much comparing, but yes I would describe it as wet
• Likely brown or hazel eyes. Yes, dark brown
• Less likely afraid of heights. False, I'm terrified of them. I can't look at the roof of an apartment building without getting dizzy
• Less likely to be afraid of public speaking. Kind of true. I do some public speaking in my job and I seem less hesitant than my peers to take on roles that involve this. Funny as I consider myself introverted
• Likely to have a longer ring finger than index. Yes, this is true
• Likely not to be flat-footed.  This was awkward to verify, but I believe this is true, I don't have flat feet
• Likely not to freckle. True, I never freckle
• Likely to experience hair photobleaching. I don't think so, my hair seems to be a pretty static colour
• Likely to have straight or wavy hair. I barely have hair anymore, but in highschool it was long and straight with a slight wave, so this is true
• Likely to have thin hair. SOME of my hair is thin, that is the stuff I'm losing. The hair on the sides of my head is thick, and I had a thick head of hair growing up. I think this one is false
• More likely to prefer vanilla over chocolate ice cream. Oof, this puts me on the spot. Both are kind of boring flavours. I thinks it's true overall, although I have no problem with chocolate. Vanilla is a little underrated because of its reputation for being the default
• Likely to have dark hair. Yes, dark brown
• Average odds of hating chewing sounds. They went middle ground with this, but this is not a particular pet peeve of mine
• Likely bitten by mosquitoes about as frequently as average. Sounds about right
• Less likely to experience motion sickness. True, it doesn't get to me
• Likely to have lots of hair as a baby. I think this is true? I think I remember seeing baby pictures of me with hair. It was a lot lighter than it is now, too
• Likely not to have a photic sneeze reflex. Apparently some people sneeze as a reflex to bright lights. This does not happen to me
• Likely not to have red hair. As I've already said, it's dark brown
• Likely to have lighter skin. Lighter than what? I'm white but I tan. I think I have slightly darker skin than most Caucasians
• Less likely to have stretch marks. I've got some
• Likely to have longer big toes. False, I have longer second toes
• Likely to have a bit of a unibrow. This is about right. A slight unibrow if I don't take care of it
• Likely to wake up at around 8:23 am on days off. False, that's way too early. Try 10:00
• Likely no widow's peak. I mean, I'm bald. I don't have a peak anymore, widow's or otherwise but that wasn't my balding pattern. I got a bald spot and it spread, Fat Friar style

They asked some questions that would be easy to get right based on statistics, and they went middle of the road a few times, but overall 23AndMe was right about 22 traits, wrong about 10, and indeterminate for 3

Haplogroups

This section talks about my maternal and paternal lines specifically. It's not as interesting as it sounds. It doesn't say what traits, vulnerabilities, or nationalities were passed down either side. But it does say that my mother's line is H1, which is the same as 1 in 19 23AndMe customers and my father's line is R-L2, which is the same as 1in 56. It gives some vague movement patterns of our ancestors, but each line just says we're European, which isn't new.

Under this category they do tell me what percentage of Neanderthal DNA I have. The Neanderthals were a type of primitive intelligent life that evolved alongside Homo Sapiens. The two were genetically similar enough that they interacted and bred together. Modern day humans are primarily Sapien in origin but geneticists are finding that we are much more closely tied to Neanderthals than we thought.

It is popularly considered that the Neanderthals died out, but it is likely that they were simply absorbed into the modern human genepool overtime, their genetics overtaken because of their relatively sparse population compared to the Sapiens.

The Neanderthals were larger, stronger, more solitary, and more dependent on trapping or ambushing their prey, as opposed to the Sapiens, who were better long-distance runners, more slight of build, and more collaborative in nature.

When I heard that we have as much Neanderthal DNA as we do, I suspected that I had a bit more than most. After all, I am strong, solitary, and don't do much running. My forehead has a ridge to it, and I've noticed in some team pictures of the Summer Program staff where we formed a human pyramid, I wasn't as able to crane my head up as far as the others to face the camera due to a slight ridge of bone and muscle at the base of my neck. After all, I do have that aforementioned "Elite Power Athlete" build that was in my Wellness Report.

My theory does not bear out though. I have fewer Neanderthal variants than 86% of customers through my father's side, and less than 96% of customers on my mother's side. I am actually far less Neanderthal than most.

Family & Friends

This section tracks down genetic relatives that have taken 23AndMe and have chosen to share their information. I thought this would be a lot more interesting than it was. I found one of my greatuncles on the Landstreet side, and a handful of relatives on my father's genetic side that I've already got as Facebook friends. If I was looking to reach out to more people I guess this would be more interesting, but it seems like I'm already in touch with most people that I share a significant genetic connection with. It's otherwise a lot of 4th cousins with names and faces that hold no significance to me

Conclusion:

It was interesting to see that I actually had a pretty accurate guess as to my lineage. I've seen a lot of people be really surprised by what they got. Weird that I was 0.0% Dutch, and that that line likely comes through a German origin. Even though I was only confirmedly about a third Scandinavian, Germany and Finland are right near that area as well, and the general Northwestern European ancestry could as well. Seems like there's a lot of geographic consistency.

 People were pretty flatly wrong when guessing my ancestry, as I'm 0.0% Greek, Italian, or Indigenous. The people that said I was Arabic weren't as wrong, but I don't think my North African trace ancestry shines through enough to give a visual indicator.

The North African ancestry was the only real curveball. Not enough to have any real significance, but it's kind of fun to learn a detail like that.

As for health, the late stage Alzheimer's is a bit troubling but I'm still more than likely not to get it. It looked like I was more likely to get late stage vision loss, so it's good I know so many optometrists.

The trace data was fun but less accurate than I'd hoped, and I was disappointed not to have as much Neanderthal DNA as I hoped.