Michelle’s Musings

Yesterday, at approximately 19:00, a spy was seen hovering around my home. While I don’t know why the spy was there, he did little conceal his identity. Upon further investigation, and with the help of my trusty camera, I discovered the identity of this spy. It was Mr. Peanut! I snapped a few shots of him in the act, but he hovered away as quickly as he arrived. I will continue to watch the skies for this secret agent, thought if he wants to remain more anonymous, he should ditch the hat and monocle.

(Okay, so in reality, the above tale has been embellished just a tad. Last night, there were hot air balloons overhead, one of which was tailored to look like Mr. Peanut. I did take a few good pictures, but I doubt he was actually a spy balloon…or was he?)

Moving on to more legitimate things, I may have actually made my decision regarding the upcoming election. Well, not so much of a decision, but a clear choice of who will not be receiving my vote. Stephen Harper’s comments about the cost of gas this morning were less than convincing and more along the lines of being laughable. He claims that if his party hadn’t cut the GST by 2%, gas prices would be even higher than they are now. This is true in theory only. Of course something that is 2% less now is cheaper. That was indicated by the notion of a reduction in the tax.

Here’s the problem with that thinking. The GST is a consumption tax. This means that you only pay it when you consume, or buy goods and services. The more you buy, the more you pay. So if a tank of gas was $50 plus the old GST of 7%, you’d be paying $53.50 (let’s ignore the HST and other taxes to help my brain). With the new GST of 5%, you’re now paying $52.50. Savings here? That’s right, a whole dollar ends up in your pocket.

So if we’re all saving that dollar, why are we complaining? Perhaps because last year at this time, gas was approximately $1.08 per litre. So your $50 would have bought about 46.30 L of gas. Today, at about $1.33 per litre, you’re only getting 37.60 L. So according to the GST savings theory, you get to keep an extra dollar, but you have to give up 9 L of gas to get it. Math was never my strong point, but I think I’d rather have that extra 9L of gas than my dollar. If you factor in inflation too, it’s still pennies saved, if anything at all. Assuming that the inflation rate is 2%, you’re actually in the hole.

I suppose that my real gripe here is with the half-truths and double-speak that always fills the airwaves during an election. We’ll do this if you elect us, we’ll do that if you elect us, I’ll give you a pony if we get elected. I know it’s a long shot, but maybe this election, if we could all elect the person over the party, things might improve. It would also be good if we listened, or read from their websites, to what each party platform actually contained and if it would benefit us to vote for said party. I have a feeling however that the country is just to cynical to care about it anymore. Hopefully, we will have a greater turnout than the US election. With a 33% turn out rate, they don’t exactly live up to the democratic example they try to set.

A bit of sad news too today. Lilo passed away on Wednesday evening. She was 5 and a half years old, which is pretty old for a guinea pig. We knew it was coming, but it’s still somewhat of a shock when she did pass on. She was our last guinea pig too. I don’t think we’ll have any more for a while. It’s so strange though to not have her around. I keep walking over to her cage to say hello, but she’s not there. I’m sure she crossed the Rainbow Bridge and is wheeking it up with Spriggy, Eleanor and Gabby.

So, I guess I’ll end now. Just so you don’t leave with a frown, I’ll tell you what my crazy chi did on our walk this morning. I always walk the kids up the 221 because it’s exactly 2km there and back. Anyway, today was garbage day so there were a lot of spills and smelly things on the shoulder of the road. At one point, Peggy-Sue went completely nuts! She yipped, jumped and ran in circles. As I tried to get her to walk properly, she threw herself on the pavement and rolled in some mysterious, but no doubt smelly, stain on the road. I’m sure anyone who saw us thought there was something seriously wrong with her. Needless to say, this afternoon, everyone will be getting a bath.

Ciao! (Since I’m learning Spanish, maybe I should learn the Spanish word for good bye…which I think I know, but I can’t remember right now).

I’ve been religiously working my brain with the DS games this week. I think I’m getting smarter! Admittedly, my new favourite games are “My Word Coach,” a vocabulary game and “My Spanish Coach,” which, as the title alludes to, teaches you Spanish. Hey, I freely admit I’m a nerd; this is just proof of said label. Actually, the word coach game is pretty fun. I guess I just like words and language. Vincent is kicking my butt in the new “Brain Challenge” game I picked up. Apparently, he uses 34% of his grey matter whereas I only use 24%. I’m working on it though! The best part of these three games? They were only $10 each. Surprisingly, Zellers has a pretty good discount DS game section. Of course, it’s like anything, if you know the prices, you can shop accordingly. I’m not complaining one bit about my $30 investment.

I admit, I have a more sinister reason for writing today. I had the misfortune of seeing the new line of iPods when I checked The Source’s Circuit Breaker this morning. Typically, I don’t follow mainstream trends, especially when they mean I’m going to have to pay more for something that only plays music. Regardless, you’ve undoubtedly read on here before about my love affair with my Creative Zen player. Aside from the DS and the camera, I don’t think anything in this house gets used more than the Zen. I love the size of the screen and I love the features, like an organizer, photo gallery, FM radio, and the far superior ZENcasts. Overall, the Zen is a superior machine, and this is my opinion as well as those at other techy guides like PC World.

So of course, when I saw that Apple had ripped off a bunch of the features on the Zen, repackaged their silly iPods using different colours and a larger screen, you can guess that I quickly caught on to their thievery. Firstly, now on the iPod, you can turn the screen horizontally to view movies and other videos. The Zen is already orientated horizontally to maximize viewing space. The “Personal DJ” they’ve included? This is also a feature on the Zen, along with “Album of the Day” and other shuffling options. Apple seems to have also stolen ideas from other players, like a recent Sansa player that changed tracks when you shook it. This is also a new feature of the iPods. I’ve always thought this was a silly feature because it would logically make running or walking with the player impossible without constantly changing the song.

I guess my main annoyance with the seemingly endless re-launches of the iPod generations is two-fold. Firstly, if you have the majority share of the market, why do you need a re-design in the first place unless it’s to correct problems? To quote The Simpsons, “It’s Malibu Stacey, and she has a new hat!” All they’re doing is changing the colours, stealing good ideas from competitors and trying to convince people to buy yet another version of their product. The other side of the annoyance? Why do you need yet another iPod if the one you have still works? Furthermore, why can’t Apple just release one player with all those features to begin with and stop creating fake buzz around minor changes? I realize that this is all a seemingly brilliant marketing plan, but from my practical standpoint, Apple should be happy with their market share and stop trying so hard to have people buy more iPods. Personally, I will never buy an iPod; I’m too happy with my Creative Zen to bother wasting the extra cash.

Well, I can hear my tummy growling for breakfast so I’d better wrap it up. Rags is doing much better with his itchy spots. Unfortunately for him, he had to wear the E-collar for a few days. Fortunately for me, I had my camera handy. Yes, I’m exploiting the sickness of my kids to get a few funny pictures. I stand by my decision.

Off to waffle and yogourt land! I can’t believe I actually regularly eat breakfast after all the years of school that I couldn’t touch anything before 10:00. Maybe I’m maturing…or just getting old. It has to be one or the other!