December Things

   It has been a little while since the last post, so this will be a mixed up post here of various subjects. Where shall I begin. How about the snow.

Snow
 

   We got our first storm on Wednesday, it was an average storm I would say. It was about 25-30 cms of the white stuff, that lasted most of the day and turned the city white. I say that this is an average storm, because when I was younger they seemed so much bigger or they were much bigger.

   I seem to remember some really big snowstorms when I was a kid, or did they just seem bigger because I was so much smaller. Memory at times is an odd thing, but I still think that the media exaggerates these days when it comes to certain things like snow storms. I think they call 15 cms a snowstorm these days. Come on that is just 6 inches, not a whole lot of snow, if you ask me.
  
   Slow Politico Season

       What else has been going in the city, besides the snow, it has been slow the past few weeks. Our politicians are not doing much, it is the quiet period before the holidays, so they are very low profile.

     We will not here much about politics, till mid-January I am predicting and even later than that , our politcos take long vacations.  As a lead in to the next topic, our politicians could be doing more work on the environment to keep themselves busy.

Climate

          I have brought this up on this blog before and I will do it here again, since the climate conference is now happening in Copenhagen. Some people have argued with me that there is no global warming.

        I still believe that there is, and besides the warming there are other environmental problems affecting our planet. We need to make a concious effort to do something about it. The smallest gestures can make an impact.

      The planet is pretty messed up environmentally and some people will argue that it is too late to reverse the damage that has been done.  I will argue that is never too late to try and make things better for future generations, it is our responsiblity.

   When I read about stuff such as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, I am almost in shock and wonder how can we as a population let this happen. Take a look at this video, it is quite unbelievable if you ask me.  People are just dumping plastic into the ocean, it is unreal .

       Well that is my environmental rant for today, I will leave you with a website for the climate justice movement and a  video that is  a remake of a great song that is their theme song.

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       Well that will be all for this post for today, hope you enjoyed it and that you reflect on the environment a bit. Cheers till next time.

     PS: One more thing, I have setup a twitter account and will be  experimenting with that a little.  For those that want to take a look, and follow me there,  here is the link. 

Saturday Post

Tree and River
Originally uploaded by Montague4

      It has been a long time since I have written here so I really do not know where to begin. I have been stuck in a writer`s block I guess and I have also been experiencing a bad case of the fall blues. The fall is definitely not one of my favorite seasons.

     I am more of a spring and summer type of guy. I can even handle winter at times, if it is not too cold and we do not get too much snow. Sometimes winter can be real nice, and we can have some great sunny days.

   Fall can be really grey at times, with rain and more rain. That is not always the case though as the pictures that I took last weekend can show. We had what they call Indian summer, it was really warm for about four days and very sunny.

    So what has been going on since the last time I wrote. Let me think here.

Politico

   The political front has been real quiet on the federal and provincial scene, everything there is the status quo.

     On the municipal scene we had the city elections on November 1st and the same corruption ridden mayor and government got re-elected. How unbelievable is that ? 

    It is really quite unbelievable if you ask me, he was the least worse of the choices maybe, I really do not get it. One of the main reasons that he got re-elected I think is because people did not go vote.

    The turnout was barely thirty-five percent, which is really low. I find it hard to believe that in a democratic system people do not take the time to go vote.

    As I stated in a previous post about the election, the municipal elections are the ones that affect us most at a local level and that alone should encourage people to go vote. What really irks me about non-voters is that often they are the loudest complainers.

 Current Events

     Prince Charles and I am not sure what we call Camilla came to visit Canada last week. I am not much of a monarchist so I do not really get this royalty stuff. We are almost in 2010, does this royalty still have a place. I really do not think so.

     We should in my opinion abolish the monarchy, as it serves no real purpose any more. We as Canadians pay these people a salary I think, how ridiculous is that. I am almost certain that we footed most of the bill for the trip. Once again I repeat this is the twenty first century, not the fifteenth, bye bye King and Queen I say.

Musica

   In keeping with the spirit of this blog, I will leave you with a musical suggestion. In the past week I have been re-listening to a group from the eighties that is still around and they have just released a new CD.

     The group in question is MTL band The Box, that had quite a bit of success in the eighties with hits such as Closer Together and Ordinary People. In the eighties The Box had a style that was very pop rock one could say, but this new CD and the re-incarnation of The Box is much more progressive rock.

     The driving force behind The Box was and is always the singer-songwriter Jean Marc Pisapia. This new album has been a project of his for many years now, and may not be a huge radio success, but he is alright with that he says.

    The new album is a concept album based on the story, Le Horla written by French author Guy de Maupassant. It may definitely not appeal to all but is has good tracks that can be sampled on The Box`s website here. For some older tracks by The Box, I will refer you to Youtube. I am sure that you will enjoy and that it will bring back some memories.

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     Well that is all for this rather long post, hope that you all enjoyed it. Ciao, till next time.

Fall Colors

Fall View
Originally uploaded by Montague4

     Autumn officially started this afternoon, and in that spirit, I am posting a photo that is a view from my window.

Retro Music

    This week I came across the video for the new single by French rock group Indochine, and I decided to re-explore them a little. The single, "Le Lac" is from the eleventh studio CD, " La Republique des Meteors ", that came out last March and it has been a very big hit for them.

    Indochine was founded by Nicola Sirkis in 1981, and they have been one of the most successful French groups of all time. The group has changed members and collaborators numerous times, by has always been lead by Monsieur Sirkis who is the heart and soul of Indochine.

     The band Indochine has had almost steady success since the 1980s, when they came on the scene. Indochine has stayed true to their style thoughout the years, a style that can best be described as a new wave rock blend.

     At times they were compared to the British new wave bands of the 80s but I think that they stand apart in their style and texts. They have had many hits and I am sure that everyone has heard some Indochine.

    As always I will leave you with some links to see and listen to Indochine that I am sure you will enjoy and that will  bring back some memories. For the newest video click here, their official site is here, and for some older songs I recommend a search on Youtube. 

 

City Elections

       As I was mentioning in the previous post there is a municipal election in about five weeks, and so far other than the construction scandals there is not much going on to get the excitement going.

      The oppostion party is screaming that the city administration has lost control and that they should not be in power. Other than yelling about the party in power I do not see how they can be much different. Can they really change things and are they really for change is the big question.

     In June they picked a new leader, Mme Louise Harel, and I do not really understand this choice. Mme Harel has been in politics in Quebec for what seems like forever, and she really represents nothing new and she lacks a certain charisma I feel. Mme Harel was definitely not a good choice as far as I am concerned.

    If Vision Montreal wanted my vote they should have picked someone fresh and new as a leader, not Mme Harel. I will not even discuss her PQ  background or the fact that she is not fluent in English here, those do not really have an impact in my decision.

    This blogger for now is backing the current mayor, M.Tremblay. Scandals or not, I just can not put my faith in a party that did not even have a mayoral candidate till about four months ago.

    I feel that M. Tremblay cares about Montreal and he has been involved in municipal politics for many years, and that is why I will back him and his party.  Sure there have been scandals, but there is no guarantee that a new party will not have any, so I will stick with the old for now.

    Stay tuned to this blog for more posts on the municipal election, and I will also leave you with a link for more election coverage.