Who Stole My Paper

Lil Sis says it was out there at 4 am.  It’s not out there now.

Bastards

Earth Hour

Tonight from 8 pm to 9pm is Earth Hour.  Last night I was listening to CBC radio and someone was saying that it was a nice gesture but completely useless, implying that the people who participate will then go home and consume the typical ridiculous level of electricity for the rest of the year, thinking they’ve done good because they participated in Earth Hour.  Her view was that what we really needed was a committment from people to reduce consumption year round.

What I like about it, though, is that if people actually participate, instead of just signing up to the Facebook group or whatever, then our politcal leaders can see that people are willing to put up with some discomfort for a better environment.  People can also see that if we all make a small change, it can add up to a big difference.  And most importantly, all the walls of advertising at Dundas Square will be turned off.  And anything we do that has that result is a Good Thing.

My lights (and other electricity consuming devices – except for the fridge) will be off.  I’m curious to see what percentage decrease in consumption we can get in Toronto. Too bad S is playing hockey tonight, or we could go to the David Dunlap observatory and do some star gazing.

The most interesting thing is Sydney’s 8pm Sunday has already happened.

First Day of Spring

Ok – so this morning on CBC radio they mentioned it was the first day of spring.  And I thought “you’ve got to be kidding”.  This isn’t spring.  It feels like we’ll never have spring.  Spring is dead, over, just a pretty story we tell kids at night.

And then Ivonne, Cream Puff extraordinaire, brought in a layer cake.  White cake with rasberry and buttercreme between the layers, white chocolate shavings on top, garnished with rasberries.  It was beautiful.  It tastes beautiful.

Maybe spring is real, after all.

Welcome to Toronto (your advertisement here).

When I walk to work, I am treated to the view of the MaRS building with Hydro Place as its backdrop.  I always find it uplifting, a wonderful juxtaposition of old and new.   The MaRS building itself is a wonderful blend of old and new – retaining the beautiful architecture of the old General Hospital while transforming it into a modern, light filled building and adding new unobtrusive buildings to the site.  Why can’t more of Toronto look like this?

Unfortunately, there is now a huge and ugly ING sign atop the Hydro building.  It’s a blight on my otherwise uplifting view.  It seems to have taken its cue from the horror of Dundas Square.  I am yet to understand how building a garish concentration of oversized billboards and rapidly flashing electronic advertisements will enhance the look of the downtown or bring tourists to the area.

Welcome to Toronto (your advertisement here).

The Quest Continues

We did the insemination thing at LifeQuest again yesterday. So there’s S, nekkid from the waist down, sitting on a table with a hospital cloth over her legs and this man walks in. He says “Hi Ladies” and starts looking at S’s chart. I say “Hi… Perfect Stranger.” His back is still to us as he says pleasantly “I’m Perfect Stranger Cadesky. Sorry I’m so rushed, but it’s busy today. Is this washed or unwashed?”.

Um – how about introducing yourself and explaining why our doctor isn’t there. And what if S or I had some sort of man-trauma-issues and didn’t want a man to be anywhere near S’s girl parts? Crazy. Anyway, it is done, and we’ll find out in 2 weeks.

If it doesn’t work, next time we’ll inseminate two days in a row. We had asked our doctor whether there was any benefit to inseminating twice per cycle. She hasn’t seen any studies indicating that two inseminations is more effective, but said that another doctor in the practice (I believe it was Perfect Stranger Cadesky) who says that two are better, hadn’t provided any studies to back it up. So she is happy if we only wanted to do it once per cycle, to avoid unnecessary expense.

I looked online and saw that studies showed a 6% increase in the chance of conceiving with two inseminations per cycle. So we thought it wasn’t really worth the expense for just a 6% increase. But I’ve since done some math and have changed my mind. Let’s see:

-Ovulation happens within 36 hours of the start of the LH surge.
- Bloodwork is done 24 hours apart in the morning.
- Insemination takes place in the afternoon, after the surge starts but prior to ovulation. But how close to ovulation is anyone’s guess.
- Frozen sperm may only live for 12-15 hours after thawing (fresh lasts from 3-5 days… so the window of opportunity is a lot bigger there).

If insemination happens 15 hours before ovulation (entirely possible), the egg floats through a $600 tangle of dead sperm. You get an ultrasound the next morning confirming ovulation and you think “hey, it worked out. I inseminated yesterday and ovulated sometime between then and this morning”.

And god pisses his pants laughing while you wait two weeks wondering.

Oh – to add to the experience this time around, while we were in the waiting room before the insemination, we were in deep conversation about timing etc. The counsellor we were required to see before we started this whole thing sat down and started talking to us. Asked how we were, how things were going. We told her we were there to inseminate, second time around yada yada. She then launched into talking about her upcoming project, telling us one of the staff members died on the weekend from an aneurism, talking about her project again. I suppose at any point I could have said “We were in the middle of a conversation and would like to get back to it, and to focus on one another, before this insemination” But I didn’t.

It seems working with LifeQuest is a lesson in advocating for yourself.

Now that’s progress

There are Avon catalogues in the women’s washroom at work.  I noticed they had photos of these stubby phallic roll-on deodorants.  I misread the label as Tranquil Moments Roll-On Anti-Depressant. 

Tranquil Moments?  What an odd name for an anti-perspirant, but a fabulous name for a roll-on anti-depressant.

Tranquil Moments Roll-On Anti-Perspirant Deodorant

Lowest Price Ever!

price: $1.99 $0.79

Larger roller ball for twice the coverage! Non-whitening, 24-hour fast-drying odour and wetness protection. 50 ml.