Raised by Wolves, and Other Random Things

Just saw this post today, and those who know me will certainly know how I feel:

This post appears on the student FB page for UOttawa:

"If your writing the midterm for PSY1102 with Emerson tomorrow msg me!"

If it were up to me, I'd fail this person on principle.  I don't think I need to elaborate.

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UOttawa has surprisingly relaxed its strict academic integrity policies to help students lessen their stress levels during this crisis.

They announced that for this semester,

1.  We can choose to not write the final exam.
2.  If we do write it, it will not hurt our grades.  We will get the better of the overall grade including the final,or the one excluding the final.
3.  And if we are still not happy with THAT grade, we can opt to have it P/F (which is NEVER an option at UO).  Now of course if the grade is a failing grade, then it's not going to help.
4.  All final papers/projects get a one week extension automatically.


That's pretty sweet, eh?  I think that helps people a lot during this unusual time.  I don't know about others, but it's quite hard to focus on school stuff with all this shit going on. 

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Hey, please check your basements, garages, etc., to see if you have any protective gear lying around.  Found some masks today which I took to the local hospital.  Healthcare workers need those.  You, unless you're sick, DON'T.  Help out those on the frontline!  :)

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Is this social distance thing getting to you, too?  It's hard, eh?  I mean, there's only so many times one can watch and rewatch Stranger Things.  So how are you handling it?  Wanna share some ideas?

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Where you live, are people hoarding (of all things) toilet paper too?  I wonder what they are going to do with 100 rolls of toilet paper at home.  Sigh.  I thought we'd be a bit more intelligent than that.

OK, signing off for now.  Hope all is well with you.  Stay healthy, and STAY AWAY!

Things we take for granted

For most of us who grew up and live in the First World, we tend to have a peculiar view of life, of normality.  My parent's generation went through two world wars and the Great Depression, onto Korea and Vietnam.  When the Vietnam War was in full swing, I was but a teenager.  So for people even younger than me, the Gen X and Y and Z of the world, what calamities have we (I include myself in this bunch of easy-living folks) ever actually encountered?

Well, I can speak of some pretty major recessions, and yeah, the Great Recession of 2008, and of course 9/11 and its aftermath.  But they didn't really affect me directly, you know what I mean?  True, they were of major social consequence, but compared to what my parents went through...

I guess what I'm trying to get at is that we need to calm down and take this virus thing in perspective.  Stop hoarding fucking toilet paper, for one.  And stop hoarding and wearing masks when you don't have to!  For fuck's sake.  The medical people who are on the frontline need that gear.  Not you, you tool!

Wow, feel better now that I let that out.

Anyway, was just thinking about some of the stuff that we just take for granted:

1.  I can always get anything I want whenever I want.
2.  Amazon has everything and I can get it the next day!
3.  Why do I need health insurance?
4.  I'm young, I'm invincible.
5.  It's a free country, so I can always count on bars and restaurants for drinks and food.
6.  My gym opens 24/7.  I don't need anything else.
7.  We have the best health facilities in the world.
8.  Shit things only happen in the Third World
9.  The US/Canadian Border NEVER EVER closes
10.  I can always get a job


Consider how untrue any of these things is.  I wish I had the foresight to prepare for some of the eventualities the above assumptions blinded me to.  Yes, Chunski is not perfect.  Never claimed to be, unlike some other so-called marketing professor I know.

On a brighter note, we get by, no?  We will pull through.  We make do.  And you know, we may even discover that we don't really need a lot of the shit that we normally get/do.  You know what I mean?

Anyhow, I hope you all take care and be careful.  Not point tempting fate.  I am going to make some homemade hand sanitizer now.  Can't buy that shit anywhere.  I guess assholes are hoarding them too.

Be well!

I am Legend

Know that book?  I am Legend?  Or the Will Smith movie?  Or the Charlton Heston version?  That's what it feels like.

I thought this would be a good time to continue my photo tour of Ottawa.  Today I changed my route to venture downtown.  It was pretty tiring for old me, let me tell you that, but 95 minutes later I got home in one piece.  And before the rain hits!  It's warm today, with a high of 12 Celcius!  But, tonight it will go down to -12.  What a temperature swing!  Well, I will deal with that tomorrow.

So let's continue our ghost town tour, shall we?

Reaching city hall and the downtown area.  Notice the lack of traffic? The brutalist building is actually not City Hall but a federal courthouse.  I just realize I didn't take a picture of City Hall.  The highrises behind are office towers.  And there's an Anglican church (I think it's Anglican anyway).

If you can believe it, this is a weekday in the middle of the financial district.  Most things are closed, though some offices are still operating (I think).  But basically...

This is the middle of the day in a city of 1 million.  Kind of made me think of the movie The Omega Man from the 60s...

You can see Parliament at the end of the street.  Some office buildings in the foreground.  More on that later.

More of the same.  Buses are still running on a reduced schedule, and they actually stopped collecting fares.  So basically free transit, though I'd rather not go on public transit at this point.

This is Ottawa's Sparks Street pedestrian walking strip, where no cars are allowed.  Not a soul.  I did see a Tim Horton's open (of course).  Some guy walking by just waved at me and said hello.  That's so nice.  We're all in this shit together anyway.  Social distance or not, we can still be civil towards each other.

Ah, Parliament Hill, shrouded in this mist.  Did anyone read the Stephen King novella The Mist?  Or saw the movie?  Yup, that's what it feels like.

That's the National War Memorial in the foreground, and the National Arts Performing Centre with that blue light thing in the back.  No performances now.  I always get the chills when I pass by the Memorial though.  And we think this virus thing is hard?

Reaching the hotel where my gym is.  Unfortunately the gym is closed now, till who knows when.  Wish I could still go, but I understand.

Heading home now, going east.  This is Rideau Street, normally a main drag with a big downtown mall (it's closed now except for the drug store and a grocery store).  There are still some people about, mostly waiting for their buses.  I didn't feel like going inside the mall.  Probably better for social distance if I stayed outside.

Well, that's it, folks.  A quick tour of downtown Ottawa when a city of 1 million becomes like a small town.  Hope you enjoyed the tour.  And maybe, when things get better, you'd want to come visit Canada's capital.

Till next time!  Stay safe!

Visiting an empty campus

Decided to route my ruck march thing through campus today, just to see what things are like.  I thought I'd take this opportunity to give you a tour of the campus as well.  So if you are interested, read on!

I walked onto campus, and the first thing that struck me was how quiet everything was.  This street usually shuttle buses (to the medical school campus) waiting for students, and a lot of people milling around.  Now... you can play street hockey there if you're interested.

The glass highrise is the Faculty of Social Sciences building, the other three high rise buildings are some of the dorms.  Absolutely no one around.  So eerie.

 Another angle.  The Student Centre is that grey building with the painting thing on the wall.  This square thing in the front usually has a lot of people chilling and having an outdoor lunch and what not.  Fuck, it's like the campus got hit by a neutron bomb (if you actually understand the reference, you are dating yourself).

This lane way typically is the busiest thoroughfare on campus.  Takes you right downtown.  Today, not much traffic.  Oh yeah, there's that ONE person!

This is the engineering research complex.  Even normal times you need a special card key to get in.  Wonder what they do in there.  Maybe like the LAB in Stranger Things????  Hmm.

The main gym.  It's closed, of course.  No varsity or intramural sports.  Nothing.  I tell you, as I walked through campus, it's really like a ghost town.

But apparently something is brewing at the STEM building.  Wonder if the smoke is someone making dinner, or maybe dead bodies being incinerated...

No one allowed into the other gym either, although, really, even if they stayed open, who's around?

The library is closed too.  I wonder how people will do their research if they need actual books or things that are not digitized.  Wow.  Didn't think that would happen.

Well, that's it, folks.  After that, I decided to trek home and drink more coffee.  Got my fucking online course material to deal with.  I attended an online webinar thing the other day.  Hated every minute of it.  How anyone ever learns anything serious from those things is totally beyond me.  But that's another story, IF WE HAVE ANOTHER DAY!

Hope you liked the mini tour.

Stay healthy, and stay cheerful!

In these stressful times

My friends.  These are stressful times, especially in light of calls for social distance and mass closures of things.  But no matter how bad we think things are, they could be so much worse.

I am thankful, through no effort of mine, that I am here and not in some refugee camp somewhere, with death and despair pursuing me, virus and hunger haunting me, and nothing but hell in front of me.

I am thankful, through no effort of mine, that I live in a plentiful society that, despite stupid people hoarding toilet paper and canned tuna, has more than enough food to go around.

Think about those who live on minimum wage in our so-called First World (have you ever wondered what the "SECOND WORLD" is?  I do know the answer.  If you are wondering, lemme know :)  ).   With the closure of restaurants, bars, gyms, etc etc, many of them are faced with a very uncertain future.  Just now Marriott is announcing the furlough of tens of thousands, without pay.  What will people eat?  So I am thankful, too, that I do not yet have to worry about that.

But of course we have legitimate concerns and frustrations.  Such is the course of everyday life, made more pronounced by this virus shit.  In this globalized world, shit happens, and it happens fast.  That is the cost of modern society, I suppose.

My gym has shut down, so I can't go and get my workout high.   This is probably something many of you face as well.  One can go running, I suppose.  Or do 6,000 pushups at home.  I don't know.  Today I threw maybe 25 pounds of books and shit into my backpack, and went for a one hour walk.  Pretty good.  Painless, relatively, and free.  And I kept my social distance!  Ha!

Speaking of social distance, I guess it's hard in congested cities (though they seem to be all emptied out now, even in New York).  But people are quite good at it.  Yesterday at the supermarket, people kept gaps between themselves and others while waiting in line.

Washing your hand all the time is good advice, I think, considering how much we touch our face and such.  But I don't get this face mask thing.  The CDC tells people not to wear masks unless they are actually sick.  In fact, putting on and taking off masks is often iffy, since you end up touching everything.

Friends, follow the CDC's advice instead of some random shit you picked up from the internet, lest we all be drinking bleach and munching garlic.

Please forgive these random thoughts.  I guess I can only handle online class material for so long.  My mind just explodes from the stuff.

Hope you are all (all three of you who actually read this distribe) doing well, and that you are safe and healthy.  Let's hope this calms down soon, and we have some measure of normalcy back.  For now, hang in there.  And remember, things could be (and still can be) so much worse. 

And get ready for the zombies!

Covid 19

Well, this virus thing is certainly wreaking havoc all over the world.  Dictatorships can go and lock down tens of millions of people, and regulate people's movements.  Democracies don't have that luxury, even though in times of emergency they too are employing more draconian policies, and so they rely more on people's good sense.  Unfortunately good sense is really not particularly a human trait.  Take this toilet paper run, for example.  What's with that?

Anyway, on Friday UOttawa, like most other colleges and universities, moved all classes to online and distance methods.  I understand that.  The purpose to do this social distance thing and prevent transmission.  But of course, the next day, this St. Patrick's Day weekend, guess where all the college students go?  Parties everywhere, no?  So much for social distance.

Some of you will know that I hate online courses.  I hate it's bullshit.  And now as a student, I maintain that it's bullshit.  And since many of the courses are not designed for online delivery, now switching channel of distribution is a bit of an issue, no?  Things are in flux, and I actually don't know how the semester is going to turn out.

I think, given that in Canada our semester ends in just another three weeks, since we start earlier, they should just cancel the remainder and give people grades based on how they have done so far.  And be done with it.

This is inducing unnecessary stress for many students who are already stressed out.  Why add the uncertainty?  Let them go home to their families and what not, and wait this thing out. In the overall scheme of things, what's an extra three weeks of classes.  I think we're missing the forest for the trees here.  Have students submit their papers online if they are due at the end of term.  Hell, give a takehome final if you want.  But lose those classes!

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I love it when all this public health people tell folks to use hand sanitizers.  OK, try finding some.  Sometimes these administrative types really need to get out of their fucking office and see the world for themselves.  Just like fucking college administrators.  Morons all.

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So I heard that Etown is asking their contracts profs to do more courses for the same money.  That things are bad.  Oh I get that.  With administration like that, how can things not be bad.  Idiots.

But I remember when they were so adamant about building that fucking gym, wasn't the rationale that it would be what saves Etown?  That they were so sure, despite the fact that THE ONLY PERSON WITH A MARKETING PHD told them it was a mistake?  Fucking assholes.

In my previous life I helped major corporations do billion dollar deals.  Etown administrators thought they knew better.

Fuck them!

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Anyhow, to my friends, stay safe.  Wash your hands.  But don't panic.  Listen to some MeatLoaf and drink some Johnny Walker Blue.  Fuck the rest.

Chilling while watching the trains

While waiting to see the TA, I was looking for a spot to chill a bit.  Got a seat by a bay window, overlooking the light rail station on campus.  Pretty cool.

As you can see, we had a bit of a respite yesterday.  Notice the snow was cleared?  Well, guess what? It's all white stuff today.  I knew it wouldn't last.  In Ottawa, spring doesn't arrive until May...