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i would like to know how can i published my blog to more exciting topics, most of all in my blog content that shows guideline for travel people to various type of each country.

That is a question from a person speaking English, of course, but not using the words the way that most everyone accepts. Now the basic idea is there, but if this writer tries to gain an English speaking audience, he will find it a difficult task until his use of grammar and sentence structure improves. Bonus marks for trying but not too many people will come back to read a second article. It’s a lot like listening to someone singing off key. You can’t wait to leave the room or for them to stop.

So my suggestion would be to try writing a blog in your native tongue first, and then work on improving your English skills and come on back. The words up there are not unlike a Google Translate approach to converting from one language to the other. It is a great start and I look forward to it advancing and making it easier for the world to communicate with each other in a very understandable manner. Think how we sound when we try to use a foreign language in their country. I’m sure it would be the same.

The English language is very difficult for just about everybody. When you add an accent, you wonder if we are talking the same language. I was once in Barbados, where I met a very nice gal, who happened to have her personal papers stolen from her purse on a bus ride into Bridgetown. When the two policemen arrived, she asked me to join them in the lobby to help with her problem. I didn’t hesitate and we left the beach and made our way to the nice open air lobby (not many doors in Barbados, just gates that they lock up at night).

Turns out the two policeman were natives of Barbados and Trinidad and both spoke English with very strong accents so the look on Joanne’s face, when they started asking questions, only meant one thing. “What are they saying? I don’t understand”.

Try to follow this next story because I will try to describe the interview with the use of phonetics. I pride myself in understanding people that speak English with a strong accent because of my exposure to so many different ethnic groups in my youth.

The first policeman asks Joanne the following question. “Wadd dahh mann tall or wadd dahh mann chort?” And if the other policeman had asked the same question it might have sounded this way. ” Woody mon toll o’ woody mon short.”

Joanne just looked at me with that “I don’t know look” and I turned to her and said “Was the man tall or was the man short?” The two policeman looked at me as if to say “U bin on da beach and bin vizzaten dah can-dee mon” (The candy man is local slang for a drug dealer). Eventually, the interview was over and Joanne was able to go to the Canadian consulate and get temporary papers to be able to leave Barbados and return home to Ottawa.

The lesson here is that, even though we speak the same language, we are not communicating effectively until the other party fully understands the meaning of your question or dialogue. So if someone asks or tells you something that you don’t understand, don’t be embarrassed, just tell them that you don’t understand and could you please make that a little clearer so I can understand it better and give you a proper response.

Choose your words carefully and phrase them is such a way that the other individual acknowledges that they understand what you just said. And that is called good communication.

OK dats it. I just got back from de doctair. He be playin’ Pokemon wit me. Get me a room and coke, I be goin’ to da beach. I be soakin’ up dee sun, I be drinkin’ da room, I be warin’ me wool ‘at.

I just love the way they talk in Barbados . Some really wonderful people there. Go visit.

Most of the time, when I write these “What Will Replace” stories, I don’t have a valid suggestion for the topic. Instead, the post is intended to make you and others think about possibilities for the replacement.

But in this case, I actually have a very feasible option that can be created using graphic editing software such as Photoshop and in my case Picnik. The concept is based on those algorithim things that mathematicians and computer geeks understand. I only know that they are a bunch of numbers and formulae that can be run through various iterations. The resulting jumble of numbers is pretty difficult to decode, I would think.

So I started with a graphic that I created and set it to 256 x 256 pixels. I learned that computers work well with numbers like 128 and 256 because they are divisible by 8 and return an even number. So this could be considered a variation on 128 bit encryption with the additional complication of colour and a password.

The next six graphics might make this a little easier to understand.

1. Original graphic
2. Addition of a password using a font. In this case, Georgia-Bold-Italic in various colours using the full range available in Windows. It could be randomly resized.
3. Rotating the password on an axis. In fact the password could probably be the owner’s real name or a username.
4. Resetting the font to difference in the text options in Picnik.
5. Run the new graphic through the Hypnotic option.
6. Set the Hypnotic option to Difference.

The final graphic could be used as a sort of electronic colour signature that would have to be matched on either a high resolution printed document or via a digital transmission. Scanners and id matching software would probably be required to identify the sender as the owner.

It seems to me that this has promise. Maybe the CIA can play with it and see if they can decode it. I’m hoping they might advance me funding for my research project. The annual fee for the Picnik Premium upgrade is $24.95 US.

Maybe you could send it on my birthday every year. I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you what it is. I’m thinking you might already have it on file.

Sing it Sheryl
“All I wanna’ do…..

MF, my Aussie friend, has been sharing stories of the tragic bush fires in Southern Australia. We only here about how hot it has been playing the tennis championships down there, but there is a starker reality to the heat. You are looking at a very desperate wild animal doing what it must do to survive. The picture appears to be a photograph of the latest newspaper article regarding this terrible situation.

In the middle of it all, is one of our saviours doing their job that they do so well. The uniform says that this is a fireman (fireys in Australia) doing his best to help this little creature. The helping hand is so touching. It’s what they are so good at. Just one of many throughout the world that protect those that can’t protect themselves from impending disaster.

I am always touched by the times that sports announcers take to thank our troops, our firemen, our police forces and medical personnel (ambos) and always thought that it was just lip service. But watching hockey on Saturday night, the pain that you feel in Don Cherry’s voice when he shares the picture of another fallen defender in some far away land, makes this all to clear. He is doing what he can to say thank you and I have no doubt it comes from the bottom of his heart.

So whenever it is possible, take the opportunity to say thank you to our defenders. Go to your local fire hall and drop off some homemade cookies, or when you are going through the drive-through for your next coffee, buy a bunch more and drop them off at your neighbourhood police station. For all the troops abroad, maybe find a way to send an email that just has to say “thank you for what you do”.

We never seem to be short of water, no matter how terrible we think it is for us now. Maybe think of our defenders and little Kooly Koala and put the idea of “chasing the next Bimmer” in its rightful place. One is significantly more important than the other.

Kooly may have lost his home and our defenders just don’t have the luxury of working so close to home, now do they.

TK, another Aussie friend, has been kind enough to provide an update on our “little creature” friend in the aftermath of what has been referred to as Black Saturday in the mountains of the state of Victoria. Officials are investigating the strong possibility that the raging bush fires are the result of a suspected arsonist who is currently under investigation.

Sam was saved just in time by the volunteer “firey”, David Tree, who has been reunited with our creature friend. David Tree and Sam are now world famous. (good on ya, mate)

The crime of arson in Australia carries with it a potential prison term of 25 years. My thinking is that this event may lead to a more appropriate penalty for all the death and destruction that has taken place here.

FACTS AND FIGURES ABOUT BUSHFIRES IN VICTORIA 

- Average number of fires caused by lightning each year: 149 

- Average number of fires deliberately lit each year: 145 

- Average number of fires started as a result of campfires each year: 59

(source HeraldSun )

I learned that the other day while taking an actual long walk and a lot of other things that I didn’t know about myself or maybe that I just need to be reminded of from time to time. Nothing like a good whack on the side of the head.

The Long Walk is about the cheapest thing you can do for maintaining good health—both physical and mental. I used to jog a lot but it was a lot harder than walking on some things like the knees and back and the pocket book. Good running shoes aren’t cheap and you have to wear good ones or you get shin splints and make it even harder on your knees and back.

So part of getting older is the getting wiser thing. You are reminded of the old doctor joke. You know the one. “Doc, it hurts when I go like this.” And the doctor replies with “So don’t go like that.” (For me, it’s always in the voice of Mel Brooks aka Melvin Kaminsky. He takes some really interesting routes on his walks)

And you have to try to remove the things that might confuse you in the Long Walk like I did with my multi-focal’s. They kept changing my focal point so much that I actually felt off balance. So next time, I will try the actual Long Walk with my glasses tucked inside my pocket.

And so I walk a lot more now. The actual long walk is something I need to do more often, but here are some of the other ways I take long walks.

Writing is a long walk. I try it in different “settings” so that it doesn’t get stale. Sometimes I write at night with only the light of the computer screen glaring back at me. Sometimes I have the television turned on but it is more like a radio because I haven’t moved it into a better viewing position. The television is talking to an empty couch a lot more these days.

And sometimes I have iTunes or Jango playing in the background because music will take you to places you haven’t been or have just forgotten. And sometimes, I slide the patio door open to hear the sounds of the world around me. And other times, I lay down on the couch with no radio or television playing and just plug in the recharger like I do so often with mouse batteries. (Use rechargeable batteries. “Mum” will thank you for it. see Listen…)

And I know I will discover more ways to take a Long Walk. Certainly the Internet is a really big one along with games that I play on the computer, especially the ones I make up for myself.

And other times the Long Walk is a short walk just outside my front door. I talk with my neighbours or a stranger that is at my door. They both probably think I’m maybe kinda’ little strange like I’m on something.

Yep, it’s called life. I’m understanding it better now. And like all long walks, it feels good.

Sometimes people think that there must be something wrong with you when you act that way. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that they haven’t experienced that sensation in life yet.

And I don’t get so discouraged when people don’t respond to my emails or Facebook messages or telephone calls. You see they are on their own Long Walks. Eventually, our paths will cross. When they’re ready, or maybe you could go on a walk and try to find them. Just a thought.

Winter’s recently have been a reminder to me that I don’t get out and do enough stuff for my own good. Back in the day I would go skiing or jog or even bicycle ride sometimes. You just had to dress properly. Most of the time the roads and sidewalks didn’t have that much snow on them.

Well the car wouldn’t start the other day and I had to go to the bank to sign some stuff for a retirement plan that I was transferring from another financial institution that only sends me an obligatory update once a year. The trip would be mostly down hill and I could take a cab back if I can find one. There aren’t too many in a town this size.

So I decide I’ll just dress for it and walk. It felt really good and I didn’t have to apologize to the sidewalks for pounding the stuffing out of them like I did when I jogged. I used to wear out a pair of good jogging shoes every two months. And my knees used to complain a lot because most of the time you had to run on concrete especially in the winter. I hated running on tracks. It was too easy to quit.

Jogging through a neighbourhood or park was much more interesting and you had to find your way back so I only resorted to walking when I needed to rest. Once sufficiently recovered you just started jogging again. It gives you time to think and relieves a lot of built up tension, not to mention all the cardiovascular benefits.

Well guess what walking does that too. And the old brain doesn’t take time off in a walk either. In fact I think it takes over. The only negative is that multi-focal glasses aren’t real good for a walk because you are changing your focus point so often. I actually felt off balance. Next time I think I’ll just put them in my pocket and see what happens.

And on the walk I met Striker, a 4-yr. old lab, who was just as interested in me as I was in her. Her master was really a nice person too. He was very pleasant and had no problem talking to strangers.

And I went to Alfonso’s garage to set up the repair of that stupid car sitting in the driveway. Went across to the bank and signed the papers and had a nice discussion about bank staffing with my advisor in the bank.

I learned that the bank is like a totally different business during the day when everybody in the branch wants to work those hours. Two staff members greeted me with smiles and another asked the gal sitting in the reception area if I was taken care of and tellers were joking with customers. I had been in this branch 2 nights before and was pretty much ignored and I felt like I was treated like a rag. So I won’t be going to the bank at night or on the weekends anymore.

And I walked another 8 or 9 blocks up and down some big hills, did some grocery shopping and turned back the way I came looking for a cab. None in sight. Might as well start walking and maybe one will appear.

And I passed a complete stranger who looked at me and smiled and said hello and I did the same. Still no cab to be found. No bus service in this town. Ah what the heck, I’ll just truck it all the way home.

Lesson learned today. Hills driven in a car are 10 times longer and 10 times steeper than what you feel while driving. I had to stop a few times and adjust the groceries and slow down the old ticker and breathing, but boy did it feel good when I got home.

I think I’m gonna’ go for a stroll in the old neighbourhood again. I just think I’m going to find a better route than that hill and maybe I’ll use the car to get me close and then walk the rest of the way.

It’s very much like the difference between walking a golf course and riding a cart. You become one with your surroundings. It’s a much better game.

Mick Dundee again?

Nope.

This is a story of what you can do if you buy carefully and look at quality and functionality as your first target and leave price further down the list. This particular kitchen tool is not that expensive, either.

If I could only have one kitchen knife, this would be it. I got it at Lee Valley which is a very unique retail outlet that also has an excellent mail order service via their website. The following link will get you started. One knife

Lee Valley sells a range of products that are all meant to be used by people that understand that quality, functionality and durability are what you need to get the job done but that you don’t necessarily have to take out a mortgage to do so. Their product range includes good stuff for woodworking, gardening and all kinds of hardware from cupboard door handles to screws and other hard to find useful hardware.

They don’t try to compete with the big box stores. They don’t sell much in the way of power tools or lawnmowers and most of the product has only one on display. You fill out an order form and take it to the counter where you are served by number. A friendly staff member will take your order and go back and hand pick each item and then show everything to you. If you have any questions they will do their best to help out. You take all the stuff and pay at the end of that counter.

The knife was something I saw on display in the store and decided to try. I also bought a unique sharpening tool that I also use on router bits, scissors and other knives like my Swiss army one. Its a two-sided folding contraption of diamond stuff that has 600x and 1200x grit to it. It is overkill, because it is superfine and ultrafine but I like it that way. It was twice the price of the knife, but I probably will only have to buy one in my lifetime.

The other thing that Lee Valley does is help you to do things better. As part of that web catalogue page for the Peasant Chef’s Knife, you will see a small link “instr” which is the instructions on how to take care of the knife and how to sharpen it.

The knife will never look that shiny again. The only thing that will is the edge because it takes an edge better than any other knife in my homemade knife block. I usually don’t sharpen it right away and start cutting away on one of my plastic cutting boards. A small tip. Knuckle your fingers under in the hand that is holding the stuff you are cutting or chopping and cut slightly away from that hand. Finger stew doesn’t go real far.

This knife will cut tomatoes & potatoes paper thin and is rigid enough to cut right through a rutabaga (waxed turnip). I sometimes make homemade oven-baked potato chips and this knife is essential in cutting them thin enough. Just go slowly and make your strokes deliberate.

As part of the after I-put-it-to-good-use-ceremony, I rinse the knife under cold water, get out the sharpener and sharpen it under running water and then wipe the knife with a paper towel to make sure that all the fine shavings are gone. Then it just goes back into it’s private slot in the big block. Sometimes the little paring knife gets to play but most of the time it’s this guy that does the work. Even cuts fresh baked bread.

I understand now what they meant when they coined the phrase “trusty knife”. It looks to me like it’s a lot lighter than Mick’s too.

In Facebook, you see it all the time. People joining different groups about all kinds of different things. Thousands of people in each, attaching their name to various banners.

I have never been much on groups but I loved being part of a team. A lot of people will say that a team is also a group but there is a big difference between the two. Groups are intended to align people under a single banner and they spend a lot of time talking about the cause or goal. A team is similar but the difference is they work together to actually do something about it.

A group embodies the true meaning of one of my favourite sayings— “They are like old men and sex. They spend more time talking about it than doing it.”

A team adopts the genuine spirit of one of the best advertising slogans I can recall—Nike’s “Just Do It”

My personal memorable teams involved a few football teams that I played on and a group of young men in their first year of university living in a residence called Edwards Hall. Throughout the year, we banded together in numerous actions ranging from frosh week rebellion against our residence executive. We dropped them off in a farmer’s field (20 miles away or so) in the middle of the night to find their way back to the residence like they did to us.

We peppered a nearby men’s residence’s balcony with locally purchased eggs as retaliation for crimes against some of the hall members’ girlfriends. The opposition dumped garbage cans of water on innocent passers by from that same balcony. We had numerous house parties that made Animal House feel more like a home movie made about our time in Edwards Hall.

But a visit to one team in particular gave me another look at what makes a team as opposed to a group. It was in Montreal while visiting the Montreal Canadiens. I was based in Toronto and used to visit Maple Leaf Gardens 4 or 5 times a week to conduct the business of providing team sales support to the Maple Leafs, Toros and Marlboros on behalf of Cooper Sporting Goods.

The Leafs were more like a group. In fact, it was the only dressing room in North American hockey that I was not permitted to enter as per the owner’s instructions, Harold Ballard. The trainers were always very embarrassed by this, especially after knowing I had just left the numerous visitor’s dressing rooms throughout the building and also the Marlboros dressing room right across the hall.

The Canadiens dressing room in the old Forum was charged with energy. The time was somewhere in the middle of their 4 year run of winning the Stanley Cup. It may have been the first or second season but that isn’t important. You could sense the confidence and shared in all the good natured fun that took place. The status lines between so-called Superstar and front line players really didn’t exist. They were all quite talented, but it is how they worked and played together that made it obvious that they worked together mostly as one unit.

They had techniques that weren’t dissimilar to my university residence experience to deal with non team players. I watched two players drink from another players coke that was chilling in an ice bucket awaiting the return of the other player from his shower. Upon his return the bottle was magically full again and the smiles of getting even were on all the other players because they were all in on the prank.

It was hard to follow some of the conversations because they were switching back and forth between English and French as if they had developed some new language called Frenlish. Most often the sentence was punctuated with group laughter. I now understood the meaning of what a team does to stay loose. Team chemistry is very difficult to develop and is much easier to destroy. Harold Ballard was very good at the latter.

It struck me as quite strange that I had to leave the room to talk to their starting goalie and go into his small and private dressing room to talk to him about the new designs of equipment that his brother worked so closely with us to develop.

Yes it was the Dryden brothers, Ken and Dave. Ken was not much of a team player while Dave was almost the total opposite. I guess their future careers reflected that. Ken became a lawyer and Dave taught school and worked at different levels in the educational system. Ken was more comfortable behind the scenes while Dave was in the middle all the time.

Some years later, I was at a conference where Ken was the guest speaker. He talked about his book, The Game. It is a very good book about hockey. I don’t remember the finish of his speech. Someone nudged me when it was time to clap.

While writing A Change Is Gonna’ Come?, I needed a link to that classic song and I tripped on to what I consider a goldmine for my style of music—old R & B. I actually found a second that I hadn’t heard. I knew Sam Cooke’s version but wasn’t aware of the Otis Redding version that played sometime later on one of the “stations”.

Well musically speaking, it was like I had died and gone to heaven. I found Jango.com. The description below describes what it does according to Jango.

It still has the beta tag (meaning it is new and still sort of in testing). The thing I like about it is that you could program the “radio” to the type of music you like by defining “stations”. You can create groups of artists and call up that station and let it play. If you like a particular song a lot you can have it play more often.

But what really impressed me was the depth of the library. I though my collection of old R & B was quite deep. Wrong. I heard stuff I didn’t even know was recorded and versions of songs that were different than the commericially successful cut. They weren’t junk either.

Two that stood out were a song by Shirley Brown called “Woman to Woman”. It was one of those songs that starts with a narration (woman to woman) about staying away from her man and then this voice kicks in. How come I never heard of her before.

And an old Ike & Tina live performance of the Wilson Pickett song “Don’t Fight It”. Sadly it was shortened because I suspect the original tape had deteriorated.

You can look at biographies of the performers. The black and white picture of the Chi-lites with a pumpkin-sized Afro is quite hilarious.

They provide lyrics for a lot of songs that scroll up like a karaoke machine. For a lot of people, that might not be a good idea. Only sing to an empty room if you are tone deaf. Listening to someone who can’t sing is almost as painful as the electric chair. Rosie and Carl Lewis singing the American National Anthem come to mind as two exceptionally painful renditions.

You decide what you want the station to play and it still provides variety. You can buy songs and ringtones as well. It isn’t like this is the only option out there but I am not aware of another program that has all these features in one package and such a deep library.

I look at it as a great supplement to my iTunes library and a way to eventually add my favourite rare songs to my own library by purchasing them. Meanwhile, I get to listen to the libraries and decide what I like and don’t like because you hear the whole song and not just a truncated version.

Jango & FoxyTunes Planet (also beta) are now two of the sources I use for music reference as well music enjoyment. FoxyTunes runs as an add-on in your Firefox browser and uses the media player of your to choice. For me, that is iTunes.

Sometimes you need to turn the music off to write and other times it only adds to the feelings and makes the words flow even more easily. I don’t have much problem with the flowing part. It’s the control that is a challenge.

This new age of music is quite something when you compare it vinyl, reel to reel tape and all the other formats that I have used. I’m glad to say that 8-track wasn’t one of them.

Digital music is just wonderful and these two applications are first class in my opinion.

I’ve got my fingers crossed.

The title is a reference to the great Sam Cooke song that I put high on my personal list of all time favourites. (Otis Redding’s version is also excellent). But it’s a wish I have as a Canadian watching this historic day in American and World History. A new sheriff will be signed in today.

I can honestly say I don’t know much about this Obama guy. But at dinner last night, my friend MW got this serious look on his face and started talking about him with a conviction that MW gets when you know he believes strongly in something. He’s a Canadian too but he’s really a humanitarian, as well. So I stopped talking and I listened a lot more. I have trouble with that. But I knew this was important to MW.

So I think I’m not going to pass judgement on another new political figure just yet. From what I can tell, he’s promised some interesting stuff to the American public and they have responded in kind with thier support. So the test begins. Will he cave and take the politically correct route, or as MW put it, will he just lie? Isn’t that what poitically correct really means? Not my question. MW said it but I agree.

I sure hope he doesn’t cave.

Mr. Obama seems to have a lot of soul and that’s not a reference to his skin colour. Why should that matter? I always wanted to take a trip from Toronto to Harlem in my youth and visit the great hall of music known as The Apollo Theater. But I always had this great fear of being perceived as a piece of white pocket lint amongst a sea of black-eyed peas. Shows you how smart I was back then. Not very.

But it was never a problem for me in Toronto. One of my best friends in my little hall of music, The Gogue Inn, was Bobby A. who had a skin tone similar to Mr. Obama’s. We didn’t care. Bobby used to borrow a copy of a fairly rare recording (at the time) by James Brown (Out Of Sight) so he could play it on his floor. His buddies liked to slide like James did it. Colin, the Irish guy, was pretty good at it.

The Gogue Inn had 3 levels and Bobby and I played records on our individual floors. When you left your floor and did your stint on guard duty on the back door, Bobby had the record stuffed down his pants like a second cup for a goaltender (maybe that’s where Dave Dryden got the idea for that one when I worked at Cooper). He was afraid that he might have to come to me and apologize for one of his friends getting a little selfish. The joy he always had was something I will find very to hard to forget.

And it was a special day when I ran into Bobby and his Dad on Yonge Street in Toronto and Bobby introduced me to his Dad as my friend John and the warmth would have lit up the department store where I was working at that time.

So maybe the American public will make new friends and introduce them to their dads and that Obama guy might have a lot to do with.

MW and I both agreed. We hope he is allowed to…