Cold

I'm cold. Very cold. Winnipeg has been in a nearly continuous deep-freeze for at least 3 weeks now, with never more than a few days warmer than -20C, and windchills usually in the -30 to -40 range. Last night our power went out for most of the night, and went out a few times again this morning, meaning our heat didn't work and is still not working quite right. It also scrambled our internet again and it needs to be sorted out properly.

I'm going to Edmonton on Saturday for a 4-day visit with Angela, including an evening with Elizabeth. Luckily it's supposed to be no colder than -5 there! That leaves me with the problem of what to wear to the airport...it's going to be -30 here that day, and -5 when I land in Edmonton. Hrm.

Edmonton plans:

-IKEA - I'm bringing an empty suitcase to fill with IKEA stuff. Seriously.
-WEM - there's some new stores (H&M anyone?) that I'd like to check out, as well as some old favourites like Sanrio, the Glow store, etc. I'm really hoping to find a bento box at Sanrio (if not, I'm still buying some Hello Kitty chopstick sets) or at T & M
-Whyte Ave
-Yarn stores (Hello! Of course! Never know what you can get in different cities right?)

-Restaurants: I'd LIKE to go to Yianni's and possibly more places, but my funds are limited

-Not sure what else we're going to do yet, but we're going to have fun! Tea drinking and knitting are of course included....Angela, should I bring any DVD's for evening entertainment? Have you seen "Stardust" yet?
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Silent Poetry Reading

Hamlet on Vaccination

Karlie Shorrock

To vaccinate, or not to vaccinate: that is the question:
Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The horror of polio and smallpox,
Or to take shots against a raging virus,
And through immunity eradicate them. To die, to get a shot:
No more: and by a shot to say we end the heartache,
And the thousand natural illnesses
That flesh is heir to, ‘tis an end
Devoutly to be wished. To die, to get a shot;
To get a shot: perchance to feel pain: Ay, there’s the rub;
For in that shot what pain may come,
When we have shuffled to the clinic,
Must give us pause: there’s the fear
That makes disease of so long life:
For who would bear the whips and scorns of malaria,
The itch of chickenpox, the breathlessness of pneumonia,
The fire of meningitis, the agony of tuberculosis,
The suffering of pertussis, and the nausea
That patient merit of the illness takes,
When he himself might his wellness have kept
With a mere shot? Who would sickness bear,
To fever and sweat under an ugly virus,
But that dread of pain after a shot,
The undiscover’d pain from whose clinic
No victim ever returns, puzzles the doctors
And makes us rather bear the pain and disease we have,
Than to get a shot which would prevent them?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of mass vaccination
With this regard their people turn awry
And let loose disease to run rampant.