environmental extortion!.... or is it?

i first learned about the situation when i caught the front page of the National Post (kind of a cross between the globe and mail and the toronto sun). it read something like "ecuador demands the world pay [some number of billions] to save the rainforest". basically, ecuador was "demanding" the world pay it to not drill for oil in one of the last remaining intact tracts of rainforest.

my first reaction - "the blackguards! that's blackmail! extortion!"

basically, same reaction as this decidedly VERY biased article: http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/10/un_environmental_extortion.html

Under the noble rubric of protecting the environment, native habitat, and local, indigenous peoples, as well as "preventing the discharge into the atmosphere of more than 400 million metric tons of carbon which would result from the burning of fossil fuels if oil were extracted," Ecuador has devised a plan through the U.N. Development Group (UNDP) to receive remuneration for its good deeds. There are few subtler ways to blatantly extort the world than under the guise of the U.N. Contributions are rarely directly funded, therefore the 2009 budget -- 22% of which is funded by U.S. taxpayers -- rarely gets dissected, scrutinized, and exhibited. Who wants to read about their constant stupidity and inefficiency? But this new fiasco is worth learning. The Yasuni-ITT Initiative, co-opted by the UNDP, requires 50% of the foregone value of the reserves to be paid by a collaboration of industrialized countries directly to Ecuador...or they will move forward with drilling. At a rough estimate of $76 a barrel, that's almost $32 billion due Ecuador for the pleasure of not becoming an oil producer.

and then i got to thinking: "i'm poor. i have barely enough money to scrape by from month to month. i discover i have gold in my back yard that would generate enough money not only to meet my needs but to leave me quite comfortable - BUT!

my much-wealthier neighbours (who've been telling me for years how i should decorate the house and landscape my front yard while somehow never managing to have the money on hand to help me keep up with the standards they demand) have decided i can't sell it to a mining company because it would ruin the look of the place and bring down property values and then some eco-tree-hugger bunch announces my back yard is one of the last remaining territories of some straggly little weed or a bedraggled little bird or maybe even some unappealing rodent-y little thing and they jump on the bandwagon to prevent me from tearing up my back yard with a horrible ugly ol' mine.


kinda puts a different slant on the whole thing, doesn't it?

quite frankly, i find it laudable that ecuador even opened the door to the option - were it pretty much any of the G8, they'd've had the drills sunk and the geysers gushing long before the rest of us had time to open our eyes over our morning coffee!

so, bottom line, there it is: if the world wants the rainforest preserved, the world better be prepared to put its money where its mouth is.

what do you mean, "not my problem"!?

so, okay - this morning, mea maxima culpa (latin for "my big bad"). never mind all the lectures, i *know* it wasn't the greatest option but it was the only one i had.

factor #1: i have a 3yr old. she's *very* strong, weighs 50lbs - if she doesn't want to do something, trust me: there's no way of forcing her without actually hurting her because of the force required to overcome the amount of inertia she can create which can probably generate its own gravitational pull. add to that a temper that registers on the fujita scale and you can see why dealing with her when she's stressed, frightened, or just woken up is SO not my idea of a party.

factor #2: i have a border collie mix, weighs 70lbs, and is hyper, hyper, HYPER. he *has* to be walked twice a day or he is out of control and demo's the house when left alone.

factor #3: mondays, tuesdays, and thursdays, i have a very tight morning schedule. we have to be out in the driveway at 9am or we miss our ride into town. hitch-hiking is pretty crappy in the mornings because the bugs are *fierce*. wearing mosquito gear is fine but even though it's mesh, you still end up hot and sticky because now you can't scratch and wipe it away.

last night, she got up around midnight - bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, ready to par-TAY. didn't get back to sleep until about 2am.

the usual schedule is:

0600 - wake up, get dressed
0630 to 0700 - walk the dog
0700 to 0830 - breakfast while going over Dog Whisperer and other PVR'd shows while she watches Caillou, Max and Ruby, etc.
0830 - 0900 - we watch Dora the Explorer together while i do her hair
0900 - outside waiting for our ride.

today, she didn't get up at 6. when i poked her softly to test for doneness, she shrieked "NOOO!!!!!" and whacked me across the side of the head before pulling the pillow over her head. i waited but when she started snoring, i figured i'd give her a little more time.

i spent the next little while going over the TV shows, brushing the dog, straightening the livingroom, drinking too much tea. i checked her again at 7, but she was dead to the world. by now, i was getting a bit nervous and the dog was definitely anxious - i let him out in the backyard to pee but when i called him right back in, he almost balked.

8am, she was still comatose. by now, the dog was literally going out of his mind. he would run from me to the door whining and pawing at it in between sessions of rolling on the floor at my feet.

when he rolled onto his back in front of me and peed all over himself, i realized we were out of time - i locked the front door, locked the gate separating the livingroom and bedroom from the rest of the house, loaded the dog's backpack up with six pounds, and headed up the road to the top of the hill and back - total walk time is only ten minutes but with his loaded backpack on, it drains him out pretty good. add a minute for him to do his number two (couple of them, actually) and that's it.

except on the way back, a pickup stopped and asked if i lived at the house across the bridge. i said yes and he said "your baby's in the road, you know".

WTF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!??????????????????

i *ran* back to the house and sure enough, there's saari, naked except for panties and crocs on the wrong feet, smiling and beaming at two girls who were giving me the stink-eye.

then all three of them start lecturing me! i tried to explain but they wouldn't even let me talk, just kept yammering.

finally i said "tell you what: since you're so concerned, why don't you come here every morning and watch her so i can give the dog a proper workout?"

"oh, well, that's not our problem," he said while the two girls sneered.

i said "if it's not your problem, why are you standing here getting all holier than thou on me? give me a solution."

then i asked him if he was a single father and he said no. i said how nice that he has a wife at home to do all the hard work for him. then i said until you know what it's like trying to split yourself into three pieces trying to look after everything all by yourself, don't you dare judge me.

he said if it happened again, he'd report me, i said that's certainly your right and took saari and the dog into the house.

today, i buy a lock for the bedroom door because i can't figure out for the life of me how she got out. the gate was still locked, the front door was still locked (it's a latch up at the top of the door, not the lock on the handle) so unless she managed to dematerialise through the actual wall of the house, i have no idea. the last thing i need is to have her pull the same stunt while i'm in the tub or doing laundry or something!

saari discovers coca-cola

hmmm - what is this stuff?


testing.... testing....



and the verdict?

Hellgrammite - yeah, i can buy that totally!

that nasty, butt-ugly bug is called a Hellgrammite and is the larval form of the Dobsonfly, which are those whacking huge hang-gliders-with-fangs we see around here every so often. turns out pitching the sucker into the lake was probably the right thing to do - that's where they live, for the most part, except i think they're coming out on land to do their pupating or whatever it is.

well, glad to have that sorted out. in conclusion:

YYYYEAAAAAAR-UUUGH!!!!!

WTF IS THIS!?????

you are *totally* not going to believe what the hunting pack (my dog and two housekittens) brought back last night - i'm SO glad saari was asleep because believe me, you'd've heard her shrieking in tajikistan!

anybody have any clue what THIS mutant exoskeletal being from hell is!??





i snatched it up into a jug and threw it out the door. this morning, i hope to hell it was the same one because there were blue jays in the front yard feasting on it, or another one of them!


ETA: did some checking up and it looks an awful lot like the dreaded "Molokau" found in Tonga and other tropical locations. otherwise, it's a member of the Chilopoda family and probably not only carnivorous, but venomous and dangerous to small children. must remember to tell saari to keep her footwear on outside.

sheesh. "bucolic country life", my ASS!

starting a business in rural ontario

well, today i had a meeting with the director of economic development, tourism, and marketing for haliburton county (minden office). it's a very grandiose title for what turned out to be a very warm, welcoming, and encouraging man.

great coffee.

anyway, he laid on me a packet of info about six inches thick and i have probably one or two days to digest it before he gets me a meeting with the small business enterprise lady, who will be coming up from lindsay just to meet with me. i mean... yoiks!

THEN i have to meet with the small business enterprise program and then the haliburton country development corporation and then the ministry of agriculture, food, and rural affairs.

....


wow.

i feel very important.

actually, i feel rather like a fraud. all this fuss for a wee little business - i feel like i should be starting up a diamond mine or some kind of manufacturing plant for the DND.

although... if it works out, then it could very well turn into a half-decent business that would definitely benefit the local economy.....?

total backfire!

i have been teaching dandy to pick up around the house. basically, anything on the floor, i want to find in a basket when i get home so i can just sort it out and voila: housework done.

it's been going very well - very well, indeed.

too well!

i was hanging the laundry and out of the corner of my eye saw a bright yellow blob go bobbing down the river.

"tennis ball", i though automatically and kept hanging clothes.

another yellow blob.

"someone must be having trouble with their serve," i thought, snickering mentally.

another yellow blob.

"rubber ducky."

RUBBER DUCKY!!!? dandy has a rubber ducky! he has yellow tennis balls, too! there ARE no tennis courts upstream - it's all bush!

i raced to the top of the riverbank just in time to see dandy wing his pink rubber boot into the water and head back for my watering can!

the balls and the ducky were history but he did get his boot back and i was able to safeguard my watering can.