It is now time that you were informed a massive conspiracy theory.  From the time you were very young, you have been told that the earth is round, blah, blah, blah.  Yeah, right.  It’s time to get it right people!  Humans have known for hundreds of years before the last half millennium, THE EARTH IS FLAT!

Well, how do you KNOW the earth is round?

Have YOU ever flown around it?  Have YOU ever sailed around it?  And, even if you have flown or sailed around it, how do you know you didn’t just go in a really big circle?  And, if you were at the controls so you KNOW by the controls that you went around the earth, just remember that those controls were designed by people who want you to believe that the earth is round.

How DO you know the earth is round?  Because the earth rotates and revolves around the sun?  No, sorry, the earth is flat and stationary, and the sun moves around it – just watch the sky every day, and you will see the sun rising at one side of the flat earth and setting on the other side.  Or do you know the earth is flat because it is cold at the poles and warm at the equator?  No, on a flat earth, it is just colder and warmer in some places.

Or maybe you can say that we can see that it is round from space.  Next thing you will be telling me that humans have actually been on the moon, lol.  Oh, but you have seen the photographs of a round earth from space. Well, I have news for you -  don’t believe everything you see in photographs.

Ever wondered where Swiss Army knives come from?

I am sure you heard of house-hippos.

Okay, when it all comes down to it, I don’t really believe in a flat earth, but I use this argument every year in class to teach my students not to blindly believe what they are told, but to evaluate the evidence for themselves and/or the credentials of the people providing the evidence.  (So, if the earth isn't flat...?)

I invite you to copy this list below, paste it in the response box, then complete it as it pertains to you.

About FT:

1.       Name by which you like to be addressed on FT?  Cher or Cheryle

2.       Favourite thing(s) to do on FT? Message boards, hourly/daily games, quizzes, whatever, depends on my mood

3.       Number of people from FT who you know/have met in real life? 2 who I met on FT, 11 who I knew before

4.       Number of different FT teams you have been on? 4

5.       Number of messages in you FT mail box right now? About 300

About your life:

6.       How far do you live from where you were born? 25 miles

7.       What’s your sign? Pisces

8.       Languages? English, but painfully trying to learn French some evenings

9.       Hair colour? Long or short? Curly or straight?  Long, brown, curly

10.   Eye colour? Glasses/contacts? Hazel eyes, glasses

11.   Children?  boy aged 10,  girl aged 13

12.   Instruments you play? Piano mainly, but others poorly

13.   Postsecondary education? Bachelor of Science, Bachelor of Education

14.   Job title? High school math and science teacher

15.   Number of years in the same type of work? 9  years

16.   Previous types of work? Customs officer, employment placement officer, camp cousellor, ...

17.   Number of over-night hospital stays? 3

18.   Pets? 1 dog, 6 gerbils, guppies, 2 giant millipedes

19.   Number of telephones in your home? 8

20.   Number of TVs in your home? 3

21.   Number of computers in your home? 3

22.   Number of email addresses where you receive mail? 4 or 5

23.   Places you have lived/traveled? Canadian prairies, Rocky mountains, Vancouver/Victoria, Yellowstone Park, Black Hills, Florida, Bahamas, Jamaica, England, Scotland, Paris, Quebec, Ontario, Niagara Falls, Canadian Maritimes.

I invite you to copy this list below, paste it in the response box, then complete it as it pertains to you.

About your tastes:

24.       Your most complimented quality? My smile

25.       Job you wish you would/could have done but never will? Engineer, Astronaut, Author, Geologist

26       Phobias? heights

27.       Random or sequential? Sequential

28.       Abstract or concrete? Abstract

29.       Love or lust? love

30.       Your personal style of dress? Professional, I love suits and high-heels

31.       Red or pink? Pink

32.       Black or white? Black

33.   Gold or silver? Gold

34.   Bling? Yes please, lots.

35.   Foods you would like to be able to eat more of? Cheesecake, seafood

36.   Favourite pasta? Any!

37.   Favourite pizza? Vegetarian thin crust, easy on the cheese

38.   Favourite ice cream? Something caramel with pecans, or vanilla, tiger tiger, actually, if it ice cream anything will do...

39.   Soup or salad? Salad, but only soups lately

40.   Liver or Spam? Spam

41.   Salty or sweet? Either, but not both at the same time

42.   Chocolate? Dark please (85% cacao)

43.   Burger King or McDonalds? McDonalds

44.   Wine or beer? Wine, red

45.   Tea or coffee? Coffee, black (herbal teas in evening)

46.   Chores you hate? Vacuuming, dishes, bathrooms, well all chores actually

47.   House work or garden work? Garden work!

48.   Places you want to travel? Quebec more often, Europe

49.   Fly or drive? Drive (I love to drive and HATE to fly unless I have happy drugs)

 

I invite you to copy this list below, paste it in the response box, then complete it as it pertains to you.

About your tastes, cont’d:

50.       Mountain or ocean? Mountain, but oceans are nice too

51.       Resort and cruise or tent and canoe? Tent and canoe

52.       Astronomy or astrology? Astronomy definitely!

53.       Math or English? Math all the way.

54.       Sunset or sunrise? Sunset (I am usually asleep, or wanting to be, at sunrise)

55.       Spring or autumn? Spring (but I love autumn smells)

56.       Favourite holiday? Christmas

57.       Some thing you like (or would like) to do in/with snow? Cross-country ski

58.       Butterfly or moth? butterfly

59.   Favourite bird sounds? Loon, robin, meadow lark, red-winged black bird

60.   Favourite pet? dog

61.   Favourite sport to watch? hockey, if I see it live and I know the players

62.   Favourite sport to play? Street hockey with my kids

63.   Preferred literature? Classic novels, Jane Austen, also JK Rowling

64.   Preferred movies? Romantic comedies or anything happy, but nothing stupid

65.   Preferred music? 80’s, classic rock, Baroque, musicals

66.   Board games you like to win? Trivial Pursuit, etc.

67.   99 Bottles of beer on the wall or 99 red balloons? balloons

68.   A celebrity you would like to have dinner with? Queen Elizabeth II maybe?

69.   Bad habits? Too much time on FT

70.   Something you are procrastinating doing right now? Making supper

71.   One thing you would change about yourself or your life? Lose 10 pounds

72.   The best things in your life? My kids

 

Ever had heartburn? 

 So, it isn’t pleasant, but not usually a major inconvenience either, unless you have it continually, and the medications don’t exactly work.  Consequently, I opted for a  fundoplication.  A what?  If you are interested or want to see a picture, try this link:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundoplication . 

 Basically, the top of my stomach is now tightly wrapped around the esophagus, and no stomach acid comes back up into the esophagus – woohoo!  No more heartburn!  On the other hand, it’s also pretty tough to get stuff down. 

 My diet now consists of mush, meal replacement drinks, things that come out of blenders, and things that crumble into the tiniest pieces or dissolve.  How would I describe eating now?  It’s like trying to get food through an opening the size of small straw.  Bread especially doesn’t fit through, and though the wrap will loosen up over the next several weeks and months,  I will likely never eat bread the way I used to.   My current staples include creamy whipped potatoes, cream cheese, rice crackers, applesauce, puréed cream of tomato and spinach soup, and meal replacement drinks.

 I successfully ate a piece of pizza the other day, but whether you can really call it “a piece” of pizza or successful is debateable.  It was 1 inch by 2 inches, thin crust, and it took me 50 minutes to eat it in the tiniest bites that were the most well-chewed bites imaginable, but I ate it!  After 2 weeks of mush, it was the best piece of pizza of my life! 

 Anyone who has had this surgery knows the excruciating agony of swallowing something too large to get into the stomach.   I suspect that it is not exactly a pleasant spectacle for on-lookers to behold either.   Ideally, food is supposed to leave the mouth, enter the esophagus at the top, then proceed without incident to the stomach.  If the food, however, can not get into the stomach because the hole at the top of the stomach is not large enough for the food to pass through, the food doesn’t really know where to go, and the esophagus is really not happy with food just hanging out there, and, consequently, the esophagus lets us know that is it not happy with the situation, and, oh, does it ever let us know!  Eventually (hopefully) the food somehow either finds its way painfully through the tiny hole at the top of the stomach or comes back to the mouth.  At this point in my life, one big gulp of orange juice is too large to swallow! Alas, I fear my beer-chugging days are over.  (Well, actually they were over about 20 years ago when I could no longer see the point in guzzling beers. )

 Other effects of the surgery?  I will likely never vomit again so I guess I will never become a successful bulimic.   I have been very lucky to get up what I think might be a few tiny burps, though.

 It is now 2 weeks after my surgery.    A most welcome side effect has been the loss of 10 pounds, and I won’t start to complain until another 15 pounds puts me at my pre-motherhood weight, but my weight-loss likely won’t get that far, lol.

  I will always have to take small bites and chew my food well.  I will never be able to take a large bite of fresh-baked bread.   I will always likely have some degree of swallowing difficulty.  I will never vomit again.  I spent 3 days in hospital, and couldn’t move without pain for several more days.  Do I have regrets about having the surgery?  Not at all!  It is worth every bit of the inconvenience not to be troubled with heartburn again!

I have recently discovered that when gerbils get old, they are killed by their offspring. 

 

Recently, I have seen that happen in two cages of our pets.  In one cage, two sons ganged up on their father.  I was there when it happened and quickly rescued the father from his dire fate.  He now survives in solitary existence, which is something gerbils generally do not prefer.  They are sociable creatures, loving the companionship of each other, sleeping in mounds, piled upon each other.   Should I have left him to die at the hands of his children as perhaps nature intended, or should he now be forced to live a lonely life and die quietly by himself after months of dreadful solitude?  Perhaps I should have had, or should have, the courage to quickly end his days.

 

Most recently, in another cage, the mother was viciously attacked by one of her two daughters, with results more graphic than I will go into here.  Both mother and daughter had to be destroyed. 

 

I assume that there must be other species of animals, where, in the absence of natural predators, the old and weak are destroyed by others of its own community and family.

 

As humans, we consider creatures to be more advanced based on the degree of care they offer to their sick, injured, and elderly counterparts, with the acknowledgement of higher emotions like love and empathy, and perhaps as recognition of the value of life.

 

When our pets and other animals in our lives are ill and suffering, we relieve that suffering and pain, calling it humane. I, myself, have taken a sick dog to the vet for her last moments of life when her condition in life became unbearable.  I believe it was the humane thing to do. 

 

Yet, when, as humans, our human family members are ill, suffering, and waiting for and wanting death, which we all seem to inevitably witness, we can not completely eliminate their suffering.  We and they must wait for death, and, sometimes, it can be a long, long wait.  I am most certainly not condoning euthanasia, but merely wondering, as most everyone before me has wondered, why we almost appear to be more humane to the other animals in our life than to those we love the most. 

 

At what point did those gerbils decide that the lives of those with whom they snuggled and cuddled for years and since birth are not worth living?  Are they trying to prevent the future discomfort and deterioration that accompanies aging?  Or were they merely acting with instinct, that when a gerbil becomes too weak to defend itself, it is destroyed by the stronger?  Personally, I suspect it is a combination of the two, the instinctive reaction to eliminate the weak, with an outcome that results in the former.

 

From the perspective of both a child and a parent, all I can say is that I am glad I am not a gerbil.

 

For her birthday this year, my daughter Hazel planned and skillfully executed an elaborate Harry Potter party.  The invitees received acceptance letters to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and were requested to come in costume as their favorite Harry Potter character.  On Friday the 13^th of April, students arrived at Platform 9 ¾ (our house) and received timetables outlining all the classes they would attend throughout the party.  We then traveled by Hogwarts Express (my van) and flying car (a car) to Hagrid’s Hut (our cabin) in the Forbidden Forest (ta nearby park/forest.)  My husband aptly played the role of Hagrid (type-casting perhaps), our dog was Hagrid’s faithful dog Fang, and I was the prim and proper Professor McGonnagal.  The party progressed as uneventfully as a party of eight 12-year-old girls can, through the sorting of students into houses, raucous Quidditch matches, and classes in divination, herblogy, care of magical creatures, muggle studies, etc. 

As darkness fell on that moonless night, it was time for Hagrid to lead the Hogwarts students into the Forbidden Forest to discover what was harming the unicorns (a scene from the first Harry Potter book).   As they embarked on their trek, I, having secretly transformed into the evil black-cloaked Lord Voldemort, began to slink about 30 feet or so alongside the trail, in an attempt to frighten the poor little girls.  Five of the eight, deciding that the noise in the bush was not the evil Lord Voldemort, nor a giant man-eating spider, nor any such malign mythical creature, but was, obviously just Hazel’s mom, opted to depart from Hagrid to catch me.  The race was on. 

I plunged through the dark bush, with the flashlight-laden girls following my noisy attempts at escape.  My challenge was to stay far enough ahead of my pursuers so that their flashlight beams couldn’t capture my form, yet to remain close enough so as to ensure that I didn’t lose these children in the 800 square miles of parkland  (because parents don’t really appreciate when you lose their kids in the bush on cold dark nights.)  As I was nimbly maneuvering amongst the fallen trees and shrubs, I came to a small clearing.  I felt I needed to safely reach the far side of the clearing before my hunters reached the spot in which I now stood.  As I went deftly sprinting through the wee meadow, I hit a small log cleverly camouflaged under some dead grass, I heard a crack, and I dropped like a sack of potatoes.  Lord Voldemort had fallen.  The game was up.  I surrendered the contest, and my trackers were kind enough to help me stand so I could stumble the quarter mile or so back to the cabin. 

As it turns out, I did a pretty good job of mangling the muscles, tendons, and ligaments in my ankle, as well as breaking a bone in my foot and sustaining a stress fracture in my lower leg.  So far, after eight months of X-rays, cast, crutches, tensors, more X-rays, physiotherapy, big black ugly non-fashionable removable Velcro-strapped orthopedic walking boot, cane, bone-scan, occasional wheel-chair rides, more X-rays, MRI, and more physiotherapy, I am now free to hobble along on my own.  Ironically, the fateful mishap occurred just days after my 40^th birthday, and I guess that stumble was my warning that it is indeed time for me to finally grow up.  (Alas poor stilettos, I knew them well.) 

On the humorous side, most 40-year olds can’t say they broke their ankle while running through the bush after dark pretending to be Lord Voldemort.

In the spring of 2006 (well over a year ago), our family saw the addition of two gerbils, Biff and Bertha, and by midsummer of that year, we had eight more gerbils.  Consequently, Biff and Bertha will never see other again. 

Hazel kept a female cage with Bertha and her two daughters.  I took Biff and two of his sons to my classroom, leaving four gerbil-sons for Emil, two of whom were arbitrarily named Lamar and two named Rascal. 

There had always been some discord and strife in Emil’s large gerbil-terrarium, which I merely attributed to the affects of testosterone on juvenile males.  Early this year, however, Emil called for my immediate assistance with a major gerbil-brawl in his cage.   There were horrendous gerbil screams (well, a few high-pitched squeaks really) and a roving malleable ball of fur scuffling around the cage. To quickly resolve the little skirmish, I reached in to grab one of the two fighters.  As I grabbed the gerbil, he grabbed me, with his teeth, right through my little finger.  I believe that I may have loudly uttered a sharp word of profanity, and when he refused to relinquish his grip, it may be been followed by a long line of similar expletives.  Hazel came running when she heard the commotion (or mostly when she heard her mother saying a lot of words that her mother doesn’t usually say).  Even the dog came running.  There I stood:   I was holding a gerbil, as he was holding me.

 As you may know, fingers are well-supplied with nerve endings, and those nerve endings were letting me know that they were not overly fond of having this gerbil impale his fangs through my muscles.  I couldn’t rip off the gerbil because his teeth were firmly clenched directly through the meatiest part of my finger, and I didn’t want to mangle my own flesh any more than it was already being mangled.  I tried to be careful not to squish the little thing, but, at the same time, I really wanted to squish the little *#%@.  The dog appeared very interested in the gerbil, but, if I let her have it, the consequences remained equally dire for my finger.  I thought perhaps I could place the gerbil under water to make it let go, so I ran to the kitchen, plunged my hand and gerbil into a stream of water and pried apart the tiny locked jaws.  I released the vicious creature.  It dropped dead onto a dishcloth in the sink.  Oops, I think maybe I squished it. 

(Please note, that, as no autopsy was performed, the cause of death cannot be definitively confirmed, though a healthcare professional has concluded that the death may also have been the result of a myocardial infarction caused by the shock of cold water.) 

I looked beside me to see Emil standing there with a look of horror on his face.  Now, I have no problem handling cute cuddly little gerbillies under normal circumstances, but when one lies dead like a drenched rat on a dishcloth in my sink, with an expression that comes as close to grimacing as I’m sure a gerbil face ever can, I confess, I treated it with as much disdain as I would a dead skunk that had been rotting in the hot sun on a highway for the better part of a week.  I used something white (I don’t know if it was a plastic grocery bag or a paper towel) to pick up gerbil, dishcloth and all.  I turned to Emil and curtly asked if he wanted a funeral, and, with the biggest eyes he’s ever had, he quickly declined, and I threw Lamar or Rascal, or whatever his name was, in the garbage. 

Not only do fingers have lots of nerve ending, they are also well-supplied with blood vessels.  There was blood, my blood, splattered in and around the sink and down the hall carpet.   Once the blood was cleaned, and my finger wrapped with ice and paper towel to stem the bleeding, I began to wonder two things. 

One, was Lamar/Rascal actually dead?  Perhaps he was just lying unconscious in the garbage, and if he awoke, I would either have to kill the rodent again, this time while I had greater control of my faculties, or I would have to nurse back to health this mentally-deranged gerbil who had by now, quite possibly, acquired a taste for human blood.  If he regained his health, we’d still be left with a psychotic demonically-possessed gerbil to contend with, or if he was dying, we’d have to watch him suffer in agony until the fateful moment. I quickly packaged up the garbage and took it/him outside to freeze in the -40° wind-chill.  

The second thing that crossed my mind was that there was a only a 50% chance that I plucked the aggressor out of the fight and a 50% chance that I had just murdered a poor innocent cute cuddly little pet, who, in his passionate attempts to protect his very life and save himself from the tyranny of an oppressive brother, had simply retaliated on whatever flesh was closest, which just happened to be mine.  Inspection of the gerbils in the cage, however, revealed one gerbil covered in blood, his own, not mine this time.  We feared that the wounds might prove fatal for the lowly injured gerbil, but his little gerbillie bothers cleaned him up nicely, and he has since made a full recovery.  So, either I caught and killed the villainous aggressor, or I scared the bully gerbil into good behaviour after seeing his dearly-departed brother squished before his beady little red eyes, as Emil’s gerbil cage has been amazing tranquil since that fateful night.    

And, as Hazel says, “we only have nine gerbils now.”