La Lune et Les Moutons
Nuit Blanche, the annual night-time art extravaganza, was last Saturday. I haven’t gone before because it’s the last weekend in September and and that usually means it’s cold, but there was this sheep thing down the street…. So we wandered out under the full Harvest Moon, headed to see Transhumance by Corpus. Originally based on…
Generational Dissonance
The automatic door opener on my apartment’s front door decided to become processed this weekend. Perhaps it is Regan being a bad influence. Regardless of cause, the thing started opening the door repeatedly without provocation or encouragement from me. This was a tad unnerving. It was also extremely frustrating, as this is the mechanism that…
Using Technology to Improve Your Quality of Life: Apps for Arthritis and Chronic Pain
My last post for HealthCentral’s Pain Awareness Month is about two new apps for people with chronic pain and arthritis. Very cool! “One of the most frustrating aspects of living with RA and chronic pain is the unpredictable nature of these conditions. Keeping track of your symptoms, activities, triggers and treatment can help you identify…
A Dance with Words
When I lived with my parents, dinner was one of my favourite times of the day. Not because my mother is an excellent cook – although there is that – but because dinner was the time where we all sat down together, ate and talked. And it was the talking especially that made this time…
Myths About Opiates and Addiction Affect Pain Management
This week, I wrote another post for HealthCentral’s theme of living with pain for Pain Awareness Month. Since it is also National Recovery Month, I combined the two topics: “You have the right to effective pain management. In fact, two years ago, the International Pain Summit in Montréal declared that it is a human right…
Delivery
Sugar Beach got its name not because the sand is as fine as sugar (although it might be), but because it’s right next to the Redpath Sugar Refinery. Living this close to a sugar refinery means that if the wind is right, my neighbourhood smells like molasses. It means often seeing really big ships docked…
A Bite of Yellow
I’ve never met a plum I didn’t like, but the yellow are my favorites. They remind me of a Danish plum sort called reinekloder. They have the same contrast of a very tart skin and a sweet flesh – wait, that sounded a bit cannibalistic – albeit a bit more watery than the Danish variety….
Life Line
There are times when this stress hits you so hard that you have made a conscious decision to build a wall against it. The stress can be a physical flare, unmanageable pain or the life crap that has a habit of happening without your consent. For me right now, it is the life crap. There…
5 Essentials to Coping with the Pain of RA
September is Pain Awareness Month in the US and HealthCentral writers are covering topics related to living with pain. This week, my contribution is about my go-to tricks to cope: “Last week, I cried in the shower again. It’s been a long time since the pain was so bad that my only response upon waking…
Strive to Include
I was going to take a break from writing about accessibility and barriers to same. There was enough of an inaccessibility flurry before my birthday, what with Winners and Metro, the LCBO and Buskerfest and to be honest, I’m tired. Tired of not being able to use stores and spaces the same way my able-bodied…
50, Sarah and Miss Piggy
For the last 30 years, I’ve battled against the prevailing North American belief that Copenhagen is the capital of Holland and that coming from Denmark makes me Dutch. However, thanks to Marianna, I will today claim some kinship with that other small Northern European nation. Because today is what the Dutch would call my Sarah…
The Annual Rant
This might be my last rant about Buskerfest. Despite it having become an annual tradition to which I know you’re all looking forward with bated breath (no?), it may be time to close the series (2005, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2011). Not because Buskerfest has magically become a paragon of accessibility – were it only so….