This Much is True

We don’t usually haul out the accessories of summer until well into May and, more likely, well into June. This year, however, our spring has been unusually spring-like and so the kids wanted to get a lot of summer toys out. Getting to them in the shed meant moving out the table and chairs for the deck and, with a few days of 20 degrees or more, we figured why not put the table and chairs on the deck. The kids have been asking all winter about when the trampoline could go up. We always said “maybe May sometime” but the weather prompted an early assembly for the trampoline too. My husband and I assumed that all these summer things we’d brought out would look ironic to us one day soon and this morning, with 10cms of snow called for, it has come to pass. But it’s not unexpected in these parts and these snowy summer things remind us that sometime soon it will be nice and warm again.

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I just told a toy platypus, that had made its weird little noise for the tenth time this morning, to go *beep* himself and threw him across the room. Sometimes motherhood is all love and wonder; sometimes it’s cursing out a platypus.

I copy, cut, and paste a lot when I’m writing and editing. I frequently need to highlight whole chunks of text to do that. Let’s say I want to copy 100 pages or even just ten or twenty. In Microsoft Word that always meant me having to highlight the text with the mouse then scroll through 100 pages until I get to the spot where the text I want to copy ends. Or at least I thought it did. Every time I’d have to do that, I’d think what a waste of time just holding down the mouse button and scrolling and scrolling and scrolling. And so many times I’d try scrolling too fast and then the cursor would go off screen and I’d have to go back and start all over again. When you need to do it a lot it gets so frustrating. So I looked high and low to find a way to avoid wasting that time. It was harder than I thought it would be, even with Google helping me but finally I found a way and I want to share it with you. Maybe it will save you some time and frustration too. All you have to remember is F8. Read the rest of this entry »

Since I have two children, ages four and eight, I’m not always sure what movies might be appropriate for both of them. Sometimes I decide only the older boy should see a certain movie and sometimes I figure it’s okay that they can share that time together. And many times I’m not even sure either of them should see a certain movie. Thankfully we live in the age of the Internet. I’ve seen warnings parents have posted on facebook and twitter about a certain movie for kids that is particularly scary or particularly loud. There’s also discussions, yes using mouths and ears rather than computers, with other parents. But I have to say the most valuable resource for the appropriateness of movies for my children has been the IMDB Parents Guide. Read the rest of this entry »

The other day, my husband and I were watching TV and there was an oh so familiar actor on the screen.

My husband said, “what show was he in before?”

“It’s driving me nuts trying to remember it,” I answered.

We furrowed our brows for a few seconds and concentrated hard. Then I picked up my phone and googled it. A few days later I had trouble finding the right word I wanted in a conversation. I thought about googling the word I was looking for but then it hit me: the reason I don’t remember stuff as well, besides age and the brain deficiency having young kids around gives me, is probably Google itself. Read the rest of this entry »

This is my little guy going on a year ago now. He loves music. And oh how he loves to dance but mostly when no one is watching. Same way he likes to count and recite the alphabet but not so much when you ask him. He likes to do it on his own terms and when the mood strikes. I was lucky enough to catch him when he thought no one was looking and was practicing a new butt wiggle into his dancing. And even though he’s shy about performing in front of anyone, he loves watching this video of himself. Funny that. I don’t think he’d mind me sharing.

A post I wrote five years ago, about the men lost on the Ocean Ranger, is the most popular post on this blog and it still continues to receive a lot of views, and some comments, over on my long abandoned blogspot blog. It is a place where people leave remembrances of their family members who were lost and even where people post and email me to look for long lost family members connected to someone who was lost on the oil rig. This morning, I listened as the names of the men who died thirty years ago were read out on the radio. When I wrote that post, I didn’t know any of the names but this morning many sounded familiar because they were men connected now to the people who had posted comments of remembrance and loss.

I received one email from a woman in the United States, who was related, by marriage, to a man lost on the Ocean Ranger. She was doing some research into the Ocean Ranger and asked me some questions. She also said, “I am curious as to your choice to blog about the incident with no ties to anyone on board the rig.” I was surprised by her question and told her so. I added, “I guess if you don’t live here, you don’t realize what a huge impact the disaster had on our province and people. It would be something like (although, of course, on a much smaller scale) asking someone why they would blog about the disaster on September 11, 2001. I would say that any Newfoundlander who was alive then remembers where they were when they heard of the disaster and the dark days afterwards. Every year we remember and think of those men and the families they left behind. There is a memorial service here and their names are read out.” She thanked me for that explanation and we had some more back and forth, her sharing with me her reasons for her research.

It was very interesting to see, from someone outside our province, our memorializing of that day and those men. I remember thinking at the time, that we Newfoundlanders and Labradorians hold the memories of our disasters quite close, but especially disasters involving the sea. More recently, the crash of Cougar 491, on March 12, 2009, is another one seared in our memories. But today, as on February 15 every year (and the 14th too because that’s when the storm started), we remember the men of the Ocean Ranger and the families and friends left behind. Today my facebook news feed is full of my friends who didn’t know anyone on the rig remembering those who were lost, with pictures, and quotes, and poems, and songs. That’s what we do. We remember.

I’m not really one to complain when I get bad service. I should do that more, I know. But I do like giving kudos when I get good service and I’ve had a great experience I want to tell you about.

Activision is the maker of the obsession known as Skylanders. In my house, both my boys love them (as does my husband, truth be told). It’s a video game that uses figurines, called Skylanders, that you can put on a special portal that is connected, wirelessly or through USB, to whatever gaming system you’re using. Whichever Skylander is on the portal is the Skylander you play in the game. Each has its own special powers and upgrades and the like. Collecting these Skylanders is something both my sons love but they are hard to come by. Pretty much as soon as a store in town has a shipment come in, they’re gone very soon after. So, when one of my son’s Skylanders, Eruptor, stopped working, it was cause for upset in the house of Chaulk, I can tell you. Now, my problem right away was that the Skylander had come in a package with two other Skylanders. In order to return them, I thought, I had to get all of them, pack them up and bring them back to the store which probably did not have replacements for them. So we’d be down three Skylanders (first world problems, believe me, I know).
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I got a Blackberry Playbook! Okay, technically my husband has a Playbook but I did all the research as to where and when to buy it, printed off the Telus web page where they showed their sale for $149 Playbooks and brought it to Staples for a price match then did all the setup so it is OUR Playbook and I intend to use it a lot. I know you might think a Playbook is a crazy buy right now. It seems like any day RIM might start giving them away. But I’ve always thought the Playbook looked like a good device. I’d tried them in stores and found them very responsive plus they work well with flash so are ahead of iPads in that way. And at $149 for a 32 gb, it felt like it was the right time. I knew there were not that many apps out there and the ones that were available were often more expensive than equivalent apps from Apple or Android but the rumour is that there will be a big update soon and that Android apps will become available for the Playbook. When and if that happens, I think the days of sub $200 Playbooks will be gone so I had to take the opportunity when I did. The question is, how has the reality of the Playbook worked out? Read the rest of this entry »

There’s lots of these going around but you know my ears perk up when it has anything to do with writing and publishing so here’s the latest (that I’ve seen) Sh*t such and such say. This time with extra funny for me.