Category Archives: Issues

behaviour, Consider, Homeless, Issues, Life, Municipal

Pond Scum

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Yin – Yang; Balance; The Good – The Ugly.

The Good.

The attention of the media to the City of Abbotsford’s use of chicken sh*t as a biological weapon against the homeless in Abbotsford got the chicken sh*t mostly cleaned up and it accomplished the more important task of preventing the use of chicken sh*t from becoming the city’s policy for dealing with the homeless and homeless camps.

The Ugly.

Media coverage of this issue resulted in several of the homeless appearing on television as part of the media coverage.

One such person was approached after his appearance on television by someone who stated there was an elderly gentleman who had won multi-millions of dollars on a lotto ticket several years ago. This wealthy gentleman had a policy of using his lotto wealth to awarded $500,000 to people down on their luck and needing help such as this homeless individual.

Just think what he could do with $500,000. Previous recipients have flourished after receiving their $500,000, what would he do with his $500,000?

The people who had approached him had visions of sugar plums dancing in his head along with dreams of what he was going to do with the $500,000 and the changes this would make in his life. He could own his own home.

And all that was needed for him to receive this $500,000 was a $1,000 to them so they could make sure the gentleman who awards $500,000 was aware of this homeless person so he would be awarded $500,000.

Fortunately greed meant there was a need to come up with $1,000 which led to this situation being shared and recognized as a scam. Given the speed with which this spread throughout the homeless community any others who were or scheduled to be targets will be warned.

Too many see the most vulnerable, such as the homeless, of our fellow citizens as a problem to be ignored; or as disposable trash, or as prey.

People constantly moan about the state of society carrying on as if their actions have nothing to do with the society we have.

Society is built by the behaviour and choices of each and every citizen. All the fancy, self-satisfied words and labels people employ about themselves are meaningless given the vast difference between their words and their actions.

“The True Measure of Any Society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable members” – Ghandi

We have the society we have chosen to build, the society we deserve.

Addiction, behaviour, Consider, Issues, Municipal, Politics

U, ME & ASS

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“Assumption is the mother of the screw-up” Angelo Donghia

Homelessness, addiction, mental healthcare and poverty are a complex, convoluted entanglement of interrelated issues. Like an onion there are multiple layers that need to be peeled away to get to the core.

The dominant barrier to making headway against homelessness, addiction, mental healthcare and poverty is the fact that the majority of people confuse their assumptions with knowledge, fact and reality.

Alfred Adler was a physician, psychotherapist, and the founder of Individual psychology and is often considered one of the most important figures in psychology history who stated:

“The human mind shows an urge to capture into fixed forms through unreal assumptions, that is, fictions, that which is chaotic, always in flux, and incomprehensible.”    

“that which is chaotic, always in flux, and incomprehensible”  is an accurate reflection of the reality one faces in tackling the muddle that is homelessness, addiction, mental healthcare and poverty.

People assume there is a solution when there isn’t; we can address the individual issues and challenges but there is no ‘solution’.

People assume the existence of one (or a few) ‘one size fits all’ approaches when the reality is that, while there are shared needs, each individuals journey to wellness is unique and your support system has to be flexible enough to deliver support reflecting an individual’s needs.

People assume that all that is needed is to go to treatment when the evidence is overwhelming that on its own our current system of treatment fails those who go to treatment. There is an interview available online where the interviewer is shocked when Dr. Gabor Mate speaks of 5% sober at the end of their first year as being excellent results – using our current approach.

People assume the current method is the approach we should be using. Our current system of treatment gets people sober and somewhat stable. The key to an individual’s success is what occurs after they leave treatment. The vast bulk of what an individual needs to do to achieve wellness remains to be done after they leave treatment and will require years of work. We know what community based supports and programs a person requires to achieve wellness; best practices elsewhere provide examples and guides as to how to dramatically increase a person’s probability of achieving wellness.

People assume dealing with addiction, mental health, poverty or those homeless is easy. I once had a chain smoker stand there puffing through cigarette after cigarette while explaining that all an addict needed to do was quit, never seeing the absurdity of the situation. Did you know that more people are addicted to nicotine after their first use than are addicted to heroin after first use?

People assume that people can be forced or motivated to find wellness. You can lock people up and deny them access to drugs [although drug smuggling and use in prison demonstrate the futility of trying to deal with medical issues outside of the medical system] but unless you plan to lock them up permanently…….. “please daddy, please dear if you loved me…” does not provide the will needed to slog along the path to wellness. The level of motivation needed to keep moving forward; even on the days the headwinds are pushing you backwards can only come from within, deep within, the individual.

“You can’t make assumptions when you’re dealing with health issues.”

Assumptions have mired us in the insanity of doing the same behaviour over and over as though somehow the results will be different next time.

The abundance of quotes available addressing the consequences of assumptions demonstrates the truth of Christopher Meloni’s observation “Too often, people find it easier to make assumptions and stick with what they believe……. it makes their job easier. The good people constantly search for something different.”

If we want to stop letting homelessness, addiction, mental healthcare and poverty ‘drive the bus’ and to take control of the bus we need to set aside assumptions [and what we want to be true] and focus on the realities.          

“If we worked on the assumption that what is accepted as true really is true, then there would be little hope for advance”              Orville Wright

Assume: to make an ass out of U and ME.

 

*****************************************

An Assumption Example from The James Commentary:

Stardate:        91041.31

Sol III Date:    13/06/08/22.02

On the matter of assumptions I offer for your consideration:

Thrifty:        practicing economy or economical management; frugal: a thrifty shopper

Thrift Store:   a retail store that sells secondhand goods at reduced prices.

We assume that shopping at thrift stores is frugal; after all they are thrift stores, how can a Thrift Store not be a frugal place to shop”

Caveat emptor: let the buyer beware:

Sometimes Thrift Stores are not very thrifty places to shop.

“The least questioned assumptions are often the most questionable.” 

Paul Broca

Consider, Issues, Municipal, Politics

Words of Apology…

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… are for those who speak them, not for those to whom the words are spoken.

The City of Abbotsford has issued an apology, assigned blame and exonerated the mayor, council and city manager in connection with the city’s use of chicken fecal matter against the homeless.

Is the City of Abbotsford apologizing for the policy that led, inevitably to this or some other scurrilous action against the homeless? Or is the City of Abbotsford apologizing for getting caught?

What reason is there for the homeless to think this apology and any promises attached to this apology are, or will be, any more meaningful that the apologies and broken promises made by mayors and councils to the homeless in the past?

The wolf was sick, he vowed a monk to be:

But when he got well, a wolf once more was he.

Walter Brower

The question is what will the behaviour of the City of Abbotsford towards the homeless be once the media is not watching and phoning the mayor about the City’s behaviour?

It is much easier to repent of sins that we have committed,

than to repent of those that we intend to commit.

Josh Billings

 The true crux of the matter of the City’s use of chicken fecal matter as a weapon against the homeless is not the deployment of chicken fecal matter but the City policies – the policies of the mayor, council and city manager vis–à–vis the homeless and homelessness – that culminated in the use of chicken fecal matter as a chemical weapon against the homeless.

Otherwise, while the City may not ever deploy chicken fecal matter against the homeless again, the policy that led to the use of chicken fecal matter now, will inevitably lead to future actions by or on behalf of mayor and council that are as or more reprehensible that the City’s current abuse of the homeless with chicken fecal matter.

Mayor and council have totally ignored the apology they owe the citizens of Abbotsford for the scurrilous actions against the homeless mayor and council have made them party too. There is also the matter of the total disregard for the health and welfare of all the citizens of Abbotsford that the city’s action in spreading this toxic material where it would be tracked throughout the City of Abbotsford.

Bad men are full of repentance. Aristotle

If you speak to the homeless themselves their concern is not with the chicken sh*t current behaviour that the mayor and council’s homeless policies have resulted in, but with the future policies of the mayor and council with regard to the homeless and the future actions by city staff towards – or against – the homeless that mayor and council’s policies bring about.

In regard to the City’s current media driven apology, the homeless will tell you that they are in agreement with Tryon Edwards:

Right actions in the future are the best apologies for bad actions in the past.

Consider, Issues, Municipal, This is so Stupid

This Stinks.

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The most recent steps on the path to this wickedness began about six days ago when City employees, as part of the city’s ongoing war on the homeless, stopped by a local homeless camp. The city truck brought along to cart off any belongings the homeless failed to rescue, contained plunder from prior stops at other homeless camps.

I was working on the words to speak, once again, about the utter pointlessness of trying to cleanse the city of the homeless when the city has failed [or been successful in denying] to provide a viable housing alternative to camping for the homeless, when the city employees and truck returned the next day.

And the next day, and the next day, and the next day………….

After being driven from spot to spot around Abbotsford like nuisance animals [think the rabbits at the University of Victoria] several Canadian citizens who unfortunately have found themselves members of Abbotsford’s homeless community, had come together at a common location.. Being together provided the ability to have someone to guard their belongings and prevent the city hitting the camp when no one was there to rescue belongings.

The location also provided access to people who would help maximize the belongings rescued from the city and has a sanctuary nearby to which any belongings rescued could be taken.

Hence the need for the city to return day after day after day after day………….

I decided not to write anything until revelation of the city’s next tactic, once frustration with the failure of the homeless to disappear drove the city to escalate to a new level.

Today [Tuesday June 4, 2013] the city’s frustration reached the exploding point .

 

I have, and have had, differences with the decisions of Abbotsford’s mayor and council and the consequences the decisions have had, the burdens they  imposed, on Abbotsford’s taxpayers.

Even so I would never have expected, would never have anticipated, Abbotsford’s mayor and council sinking so low.

The City did not sow the earth with salt. Instead the city sowed this patch of earth with a covering of chicken waste – AKA chicken shit.

What is the next step? Capturing the homeless and having the Abbotsford Police Department transport and release them in some non-Abbotsford locality?

And when the homeless find their way home, and Abbotsford is their home, will council decide to follow the University of Victoria’s example and cull them?

I am not sure that either option would necessarily be worse than the contempt, the depraved indifference, of using chicken shit as a weapon, a chemical weapon I suppose, against the homeless?

I know the spring of 2004 was nearly a decade ago but did nobody remember the need for a cull of 1.3 million birds on 42 infected properties.

Speaking of culls, why did nobody reconsider the use of chicken shit as a weapon in light of the 27.5% death rate in China’s current outbreak of bird flu? A flu transmitted to China’s citizens from China’s chickens?

I wonder how Fraser Health’s local Health Protection Office and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency will view Abbotsford’s  deployment of their chicken shit weapon?

Of more concern is the consequences of the city ignoring the fact that this noxious material was spread across [on] a major thoroughfare used by the homeless. As a consequence this material has been being tracked throughout Abbotsford since it was spread.

Given the ethical bankruptcy of this action and the callous disregard of negative health consequences the bylaw officers, bylaw manager and city manager have achieved a level of incompetence that demands their replacement.

With the need for a by-election to fill Simon Gibson’s council spot, it will not cost any more to replace the members of council responsible for this twisted action.

You ignore reality and keep acting without though for a long enough period of time and simple mathematical probabilities mean it is only a matter of time until you do something truly asinine.

Consider, Issues, Life

Mercurial Mood: The Saga Rolls On

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The record setting high temperatures provided solid evidence that with the power windows on the Cougar deciding to open or (worse) close only occasionally – a random, unpredictable occasionally – only the fact the air conditioning works so well will make the Cougar drivable this summer..

Even then driving will be a hot, sweaty affair. And the cost of the gas to run the air conditioner…….well, I could swear that with the air conditioner running you can almost see the gas gauge falling.

Still………..

But when the transmission began to feel……..off, off as in: even if you treat me gently, one of these days I won’t transform engine power into turning wheels…….it was time to consider asking people to keep their eyes out for new transportation for me.

Hoping to find that most rare automotive quarry – an economical vehicle in excellent condition and at a price I can afford. Casting to the winds, to the Universe, my wish to find an incredible automotive deal before the Cougar suddenly needs repair.

As if to encourage me, the pins on the driver’s door shifted allowing the door to sag which requires lifting the door up slightly to alight the latch mechanisms on the door and car body, allowing the door to latch closed. Now this isn’t a problem, when you are aware of it, when closing the door from the outside. The design of the outside door handle makes it easy to lift and close solidly the door.

Once you are aware and remember the need to pay careful attention to closing the door. Interestingly, before that awareness develops the unclosed door provides one a kind of likability index. As in how many people stop to warn you your door is not closed and that they could not get it close. Bonus points if there were two or more and one stayed by the car until you got back to it.

As I said, closing the door from the outside is easy. From the inside on the other hand……I now travel with a piece of yellow nylon rope on the passenger seat. When I get into the car I form a loop, hook it on the bottom corner of the driver’s door and if I lift and pull correctly the door closes and latches. If not done correctly: repeat until door latches.

Every time I get into the car provides encouragement to ask people to keep an eye out a suitable replacement vehicle; but does not provide a sense of undo urgency.

That sense of urgency was provided as I was making my Tuesday trip to Mission for coffee and conversation. As I was heading onto the Mission bridge a piece of tire flew past the driver’s window as the front end got a little wobbly.

1 + 1 = %$#@!!~!! The driver’s side front tire would appear to be having…….issues.

Wisdom winning out over convenience I pull over and stop, before I got out onto the two lane bridge deck.

Setting the four way flashers to flashing I carefully exit the car and take a look at the tire; finding a big piece of rubber missing, snapped steel strands and an ominous big bulge. Looking at that bulge I am torn between the wisdom of stopping and the knowledge of having to change the tire right there.

Maybe Fate, the Universe, is not using the Cougar to toy with me or test me or to get me and I would have made it across the bridge and into parking at The Junction. Right, and the phone call yesterday telling me I had won a free cruise and there were just an item or two I needed to take care of to get my (not so free) ‘free’ cruise was not a scam.

I empty enough stuff out of the trunk to be able to retrieve the tire changing paraphernalia and proceed to change the tire. A job made easier by having performed it on more than one occasion and having stopped where there is ample room. A job made dangerous by all the thinking challenged distracted drivers who apparently not only fail to see the big boat of a Mercury Cougar with its emergency flashers flashing, but fail to notice my non-petite self. Forcing me to pay careful attention so I can I scramble to safety when needed.

Interlude:

I was in Shoppers Drug Mart this week filing a prescription and while I was waiting for the prescription to be prepared I wandered into the drool and dream area – electronics and computers. And there in the computer area was the item from Jay Leno’s monologue – a product to allow you to attach your tablet etc to the steering wheel to make using your device(s) easier while driving.

Corporate profit is not an evil thing, but corporate profits on devices that promote and enable using electronic devices while driving is definitely Corporate Irresponsibility.

Returning to out tale, I have managed not to be hit, to remove the old tire and put on the spare. I lower the jack and discover that, as I should have anticipated, the spare is flat. Oh Joy!

It is my background as a Chartered Accountant, and not paranoia that Fate or the Universe is out to get me, which has me carry a big old fashioned heavy steel red bicycle pump in the trunk of my car. It is a decision whose wisdom has been proved on several occasions over the years.

150 pumps and a few breath catching breaks later the spare (rejoicing that it is a small spare and not a full size tire) is reasonably inflated and not leaking  I make sure everything is loaded in the Cougar, do a final walk around to make sure that everything is really in the car and that there are no other apparent mishaps waiting to happen.

I climb into the Cougar, loop the yellow nylon rope around the bottom corner of the driver’s door and with the door, with just two attempts, closed proceed over the bridge for coffee – and the opportunity to wash the grime off my hands.

Now prepared to spread my search for a ridiculously excellent……an incredibly, ridiculously, mind blowing excellent……an incredibly, ridiculously, mind blowing, unbelievably excellent…… an – you get the idea – deal of exceptional automotive value, an automotive gem at a zircon cost.

Casting my words, my petition, my orison as it were, into cyberspace – hoping they might…ahem….’net me a paragon, a pearl, a prize.

Casting my words onto the breezes and winds, hoping to open a path to an outstanding automotive prize.

Casting my words upon the ears of those whose paths cross mine that, in the manner a stone dropped into a pond sends outward ripples that rebound and intersect, the words may find their way to the ears of someone seeking to bestow the gift dependable transportation.

Coda:

Rolling along in my automobile

Bushwhacked by my front wheel

That adversarial fate

Decided to delaminate

 

In the blink of an eye

Past my window did fly

A warning most dire

A chunk of the tire

 

Forewarned

Forearmed

The Break

To Brake

 

Fortune turning away

Fate’s sly game play

Preserving the day

For walking the Way