So I Might Have to Move Now ...

Damn.  I started out today in such a good mood.  I had my long-awaited appointment with the orthopaedic surgeon today, found out my wrist has pretty much healed and is okay, just have to do some exercises to strengthen it again and I should be good as new.  So travelling can get underway again!!!  Yahoo!!

I went dancing out of the doctor's office, took myself shopping (bought a cool new, smaller backpack) and then went to see "Score: A Hockey Musical" -- seriously fun and goofy!  You even get to see Theo Fleury dance and sing, what more could you ask?    A good day all around.

Then I came home in the evening, started watching the election coverage ... and my beloved city has elected a complete berk as our next mayor.  Seriously can't stand this man -- he inserts his foot every time he opens his mouth and makes Mel Lastman sound like a diplomat.  Worse (to a government finance person like me), is that, for a guy who claims to be all about better fiscal management at City Hall, his financial plan is a joke -- i.e. he doesn't have one, just some vague promises to "find efficiencies" to the tune of a couple of billion dollars.  Yeah, thanks -- I lived through that with the Tories in the provincial government, it didn't work then (it just became a percentage reduction to every ministry's budget, because they didn't actually know how to save the money -- so hey, make the civil servants figure it out instead of making any actual decisions!) and it won't work now.  Unless you have actual, concrete IDEAS of how to save that $2 billion, don't pretend to have a plan.

I love that people in Toronto actually got passionate about his election -- municipal politics doesn't usually inspire the kind of fervour that this one saw.  The discussion flying around Twitter and Facebook tonight has been fascinating!

Saddening, though, in a couple of cases, as latent homophobia came out  ... one FB friend of a friend said he didn't vote for George (an openly gay man with a husband and child) because he was concerned about his "family values" -- oh, dear God, how I hate that phrase!!  It's almost always used to justify discrimination or bigotry, I find; this case was no different as he went on to say:  "The 'straight' premier was already trying to teach sex ed to eight year olds, so what's the gay mayor going to do? If he feels it's ok to parade around in the street naked in the name of 'civil rights', I don't want to vote for him."

I had to quote that verbatim just to see if I could believe someone actually wrote that in a public forum.  I'm still having trouble.  How things got from a debate about municipal politics to an attack on the "gay lifestyle" (another phrase I hate, like it's a choice you can make or un-make as the fashion changes), I'm not quite sure.  Sexual orientation as a screening tool for who you vote for?  Seriously?


*Sigh*  I might have to move until Rob gets booted out of office.  Any non-Torontonians looking for a roommate?  Reasonably well domesticated by now, I swear, so I wouldn't be all that difficult to live with.  (Shelley ... no comments, please!)

Anyway ... back to the good news.  I can travel again!  Now I just have to figure out when and how.  I have a brand-new smaller backpack, lots of ideas, and (hopefully) more time off than originally planned -- but as I don't know that for sure yet, I'm swithering about what to do.  If I knew FOR SURE I'd have January to March off, I'd go to India then and probably Ireland/Scotland before Christmas.  But if I have to go back to work in January, well, I probably want to squeeze in my India visit now, or I'm never going to get there.

Okay, note to self ... call boss and harass him tomorrow.  I'll keep you posted on what develops!