On the DEWLine 2.0: Dwight Williams

I went to Perfect Books this morning, having pre-paid, to pick up Stumptown V.4 and ST:DSC Wonderlands. Both books were pretty much as I expected them to be, hence worth the money and time to get them.

The trip was mildly eventful because of the weather. The trip from home to downtown requires switching from bus to train at Blair Station these days, and the rain that was being given 40% odds of happening by Environment Canada fully happened during the train ride. The "wave" passed over my route when I was between Cyrville and Tremblay Stations and left me behind when I got to UOttawa Station and - at that point - off the train.

Finally got the transit pass updated for this month - thanks again for the current unemployment insurance rules, federal government, or that (and much of my current ability to keep looking for work) might not be possible! - after I got there.

Looking at the Rideau Canal as I crossed the Corkstown Footbridge connecting the University of Ottawa's Sandy Hill campus with the "Golden Triangle" section of Centretown, I saw...a lot of underwater plant life blooming. I think that's normal most years, but with canal boat traffic largely shut down because of the Pandemic (like so much else), the greenery comes right to the surface in much of the canal that I was able to see.

Perfect Books is in the midst of an upgrade of sorts. Their longtime next-door neighbour, Elgin Jewellers, has shut down in part due to Pandemic and partly because the owner was already thinking of retiring. That decision opened up an opportunity that the bookstore has taken advantage of: to double their then-current floor-space. They'd already been managing to weather the Pandemic "storm" - and the reconstruction of Elgin Street over the year prior to the Pandemic's beginnings - fairly well due to bulk-order business, a devoted long-time walk-in clientele willing to pivot with them, and other factors. So owner Jim Sherman's taking this chance. I'd really like this to work out for him and his staff.

Maybe it's because of the binge-reading of the Retail comic strip series' archives these past few days, but I'd like to see independent bookstores - and other retailers - be able to keep going, and maybe a little bit of careful growth, too.

And that leads me to my next reiteration: that we need a better "new normal" to move into from these Pandemic times. I worry that we're not going to get that better "new normal" because of far too many reasons right now.

Random stuff is random.

I don't work nights, but I do wonder about similar consequences resulting from other ways of achieving lack of sleep.

There's a project in Toronto devoted to rethinking Toronto's history and culture...through its street names. It's got me wondering about Ottawa now.

Re: Alternative maps of Canada...the Huffington Post noticed something of interest happening on Reddit devoted to that subject. What changes would you make to our national map if you were of a mind?

Did anyone else in town know about this program at City Hall?

http://ottawa.ca/en/city_hall/policiesadministration/protocol/veterans/

For those of you living outside of Ottawa, do you have anything similar where you live?

(Yeah, I'm researching stuff for blog articles.)

spacing_ottawa just announced an experiment you might be interested in: Spacington. Some of you SimCity players past and present may want to have a gander at it and report back about your impressions.

Also, I decided to Watch toronto starting this week, especially in the wake of the latest kerfuffles about Transit City having a halfway decent chance of a full-blown resurrection rather than mere "zombie" status at Toronto City Hall. For better views of the situation, you might want to keep an eye on both Spacing Toronto and the Toronto Star.

More on other stuff later in the day...

I took this picture during my travels downtown today.

The man who is honoured - so we hope - by his inclusion in the statuary of the Valiants Memorial was known by several names. Thayendanega was one. Joseph Brant, another.

We call him a hero of the British side of the American Revolution, this man of the Ganienkeh(or, by some accounts, the Mohawk). He helped some of our ancestors keep what was left of "British North America" out of the hands of the United States. And so we have Canada today.

I've looked at this statue often. Sometimes, I wonder what he'd make of what we've done with what he left us.

Note: thanks to wallflower for some corrections on basic facts that I should have remembered about this man.