“Intellectual Olympics”

Exciting news for Brock!

From the Brock website:

Brock wins bid to host Canada’s premier academic gathering in 2014

Published on November 20 2009

Brock University has been awarded the opportunity to host the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences in 2014, following a competitive bid and thorough review process. As many as 8,000 delegates are expected to attend the conference.

“Winning a bid to host Congress 2014 is like winning a bid to host the intellectual Olympics,” stated Noreen Golfman, president of the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences. “Congress will help put both Brock and the surrounding region on the map as an international destination for knowledge and research.”

Board members from the Federation made their decision based on a number of factors, including state-of-the-art facilities, an energetic staff and significant community support.

Besides showcasing Brock and its research capacity, the event has the potential to generate economic spin-offs of upwards of $10 million to the local host region — requiring some 17,000- to 20,000-room nights in local hotels and University residences.

“This is a great occasion to promote our Niagara region and regional partners,” says Liette Vasseur, vice-president of Research at Brock. “Furthermore, it will enhance our profile as a research-intensive university in a region with a great quality of life in a beautiful setting. Brock is very happy to have been selected as the host for 2014.”

Congress representatives noted that they were impressed with the well-orchestrated site visit, citing the enthusiasm and support of community partners as a key contributor in their evaluation of Brock’s bid.

About the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences
Organized annually by the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Congress brings together thousands of scholars, students, practitioners and policy makers in a different city each year to share ideas, debate and enrich their research. As such, it is the largest multidisciplinary academic gathering in Canada, attracting delegates from every province and territory and from around the world.

Delegates gather under the aegis of more than 70 associations representing a rich spectrum of disciplines in the humanities and social sciences. From theatre, literature and education to history, sociology and political sciences, Congress represents a unique showcase of scholarly excellence, creativity and leadership.

Brock hosted Congress in 1996. Hosting the Congress in 2014 will coincide with celebrations for the University’s 50th anniversary, as well as the culmination of events commemorating the bicentennial of the War of 1812.

Congress 2009 was hosted by Carleton University in Ottawa. Congress 2010 will be hosted by Concordia University in Montreal from May 28 to June 4, 2010.

For more information from Brock University, contact Jeffrey Sinibaldi, media relations officer, at 906-688-5550 x4687; jsinibaldi@brocku.ca

For more information on Congress or the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences visit www.fedcan.ca or contact Ryan Saxby Hill, media relations officer at 613-236-6112 x303; rsaxbyhill@fedcan.ca

Do We Still Call Them RBOCs?

When the semester gets busy the regular blogging comes screeching to a halt. When I first started blogging RBOCs were all the rage — a quick and dirty way to post about unrelated topics. I’m sure there are new terms for this practice now, but I’m too tired to think of them.

In no particular order:

-I had much fun in Toronto last week: The Royal, a play at the fabulous Tarragon Theatre, shopping in Kensington Market and a dee-licious dinner at King’s Cafe.

-I also took in a live NHL game last week. My favourite team (the Edmonton Oilers) were playing against the Buffalo Sabres, so Colleen and I got tickets, donned our Oilers gear and headed “over the river” to check it out. Ultimately the “good guys” lost, but we still had a most excellent time. The game was very good (the shots were nearly even), and the Buffalo fans were a lot of fun. I grew up in Edmonton during the “dynasty years” and was lucky enough to have gone to a number of games back in the day, but it has been ages since I’ve taken in a live NHL game. I must do it again soon!

-And on the subject of Buffalo, we discovered a very good brew pub. If you are into good beer, check out the Pearl Street Grill & Brewery. You won’t be disappointed!

-The James A. Gibson Library at Brock has just published their latest newsletter. In that newsletter is an article about Brock faculty who blog and it features yours truly. Neat.

-Rumblings of an expanded GO service in Niagara have me feeling hopeful. This doesn’t counter my disappointment over the decision to remove the recently-created bike lanes in downtown St. Catharines though.

-I’m thinking a lot about climate change these days. I’m also thinking a lot about how amazing David Suzuki and the folks at his foundation are. I wish our elected leaders would get with the program. Dr. Suzuki is urging all Canadians who care about climate change to give the PM’s office a call about this — there are even prizes to be won for doing so.

-Today in my Canadian Art History class I brought in a film on Pegi Nicol MacLeod. I seriously adore this artist and imagine she would have been a lot of fun to hang around with.

-Why is Battle of the Blades still on my TV? Why???

-On the other end of the CBC Television programming spectrum, I really, really enjoyed the 3 part series, Darwin’s Brave New World. If you missed it you can catch the episodes online.

Potato Soup

It is a beautiful autumn weekend in Niagara and we spent some time out working in the garden yesterday. This time of year means there is a lot of clean-up to do, but we also got one final harvest — we dug up two big buckets of potatoes! (If anyone wants any just let me know…seriously)

We decided to make potato soup today. We wanted a basic, classic potato soup. We looked online and in cook books for a recipe that we liked, but most were a bit too tarted up — rice in potato soup? I don’t think so! We came up with the following recipe and were quite pleased with how it turned out.

-6 medium potatoes, peeled & chopped
-1/3 c. onion, chopped
-1 clove of garlic, chopped
-1 900ml container of veggie stock
-1 Tbsp. cooking oil
-2/3 c. milk
-1 Tbsp. butter
-1 Tbsp. flour

Saute onions in oil until translucent. Add in potato and garlic. Cook for 5 minutes and then add veggie stock. Cover and let simmer until potatoes are soft.

In a separate pot melt butter and add in flour. Use a whisk to smooth out the lumps. Take 1 c. of the veggie stock from the pot of simmering potatoes and add to the butter/flour mixture. Stir until thickened.

Add flour/butter mixture to the pot with potatoes. Blend soup until smooth with an immersion blender. Blend in milk. Serve with grated cheese and (meatless) bacon bits.

Well, As Long As We Don’t Inconvenience the Drivers

Looks like St. Catharines is about to lose a set of bike lanes because the lanes are being blamed for causing heavy traffic jams. The message here? It is ok if cyclists and others going car-free are inconvenienced, let’s just not upset those in cars.

Sigh…

[Update: the weekend paper had more on this issue.]

I love the NFB

The NFB (National Film Board of Canada) has just released an app for iPhones and iPods. I have been watching all my old favourites.

This one never fails to crack me up – if you substitute the piano for a computer you get a pretty good idea of how I wrote my dissertation. It is a wonder that I ever finished!!!

Liberty! Bicycles to Reopen

As residents of St. Catharines know, a fire struck Liberty! Bicycles this past summer. The word is starting to spread that they will reopen in a new location downtown. This is excellent news — I’m going to start saving up for a new Electra bike to celebrate the occasion!

From the Liberty! Bicycles website: ” To carry us into the future, Liberty! Bicycles has purchased a 15000 sq ft facility in Downtown St. Catharines. Being true to our roots, we decided on a Downtown location although there was substantial pressure to move the business into either Megaland, or Boxville. Unfortunately, those non-Downtown options offered nothing in the way of style. For us, the decision was obvious. So, over the course of the next few months we will start the transformation of an old urban warehouse into what we hope will be the coolest bike shop this side of NYC. We will implement our plans phase by phase creating what we hope will become the centre of bike culture in Niagara. As we move forward, we will provide updates right here. Wish us luck! In the meantime, drop by our temp-shop if you need your bike repaired. We have 2010 catalogues and information about Cannondale, Specialized, Kona and Electra bicycles on hand.”

Day of Action on Climate Change

On October 24 there will be a global day of action on climate change. Check out the 350.org website or this video for more information. You can enter your postal code to find events in your region.

Observations from the Great Car-Free Experiment

I have been conducting the Great Car-Free Experiment for over 2 months now.

During this time I’ve only driven my car once and had disastrous results!! On a stupidly busy day about 2 weeks ago I decided to start up the car and drive over to the store instead of walk. It is about a 30 minute walk from my house to the shopping plaza I was heading to and I normally really love this walk as it takes me along the shores of both Lake Ontario and Martindale Pond, but that day I decided that I just didn’t have time to squeeze in a walk between finalizing my SSHRC application, prepping for class and the other gazillion things I had on my “to do” list. What happened next, I believe, was some sort of intervention by the gods and goddesses of exercise and all things eco — my front tire fell off! Fell right off the car. Wheee…I watched it spring from the car and land about a half a block away on the other side of the road. I’m very glad this happened on the residential street in front of my house and that I was driving very slowly as I was about to turn into my driveway. I don’t even want to think about how this might have played out if I’d been on the highway when the tire came loose.

So, yeah, not keen to get back to driving any time soon!

While there are some annoyances with getting around this region without a car (like the lack of regional transit or the fact that bus service on evenings and weekends is a little sparse), so far it has been going rather well. The cooler autumn weather and the hectic pace of the term means I’m not biking much any more, but the start of the school year means that the buses up to Brock run on a much more frequent basis. I also find that taking the time out to go for a walk to the store or pub or other such location is actually really important for my overall well being. We all know, of course, the benefits of regular exercise, but the catch is trying to fit it in. For me, combining exercise with errand-running is one way of doing this.

I’ve also recently started listening to audiobooks on my iPod. I’ve never been a fan of audiobooks, but I have discovered a narrator that I really like (Scott Brick), and this has helped to change my opinion of audiobooks. Another reason I have not really enjoyed audiobooks to date has been that I’ve always tried to listen to them while doing other things — an absurd idea, really, given that I don’t try and do other things while I read a book. So before I had a hard time following the story because I’d be distracted by all the other things I was doing. Now I use the time that I’m riding the bus to zone out and listen to whatever book I’ve recently downloaded from Audible, and I have to say it is a pretty cool way to start and end the work day. I’ve actually found myself looking forward to the bus ride home so that I can get back to the story.

I’m still not sure what I’m going to do with my car. The CAA tow truck driver that came out to help me after the tire flew off gave me a coupon for a free diagnostic appointment at the CAA car care centre. I might take it there and find out what the scoop is. I’m also eyeing the Retire Your Ride program which appeals to me because of its simplicity – sign a few forms and they take the car away. No fuss, no muss. I need to find out just how much it will cost me to cancel my car insurance before the policy is up for renewal, but I’ve been putting that off.

Let’s Hear it for New Sidewalks!

The recent announcement that there will be new sidewalks put in various locations around the city is surely good news for anyone concerned with car-free issues in the region. A big thank to the City of St. Catharines for this!

Another “trouble spot” that always worries me is along St. David’s road leading up to the Brock campus. I frequently see students walking along the shoulder of the highway, going back and forth from Thorold (where a lot of students live) to the campus. There have been many people expressing their concerns about this over the years, and I’ve heard various rumblings that this location might be a candidate for bike lanes and/or sidewalks. I do hope these rumours prove to be true before an unthinkable tragedy happens!

…Is in the Details

This week’s Photo Friday Challenge theme is “…is in the details.”

I took this picture on Botanical Beach last June.

Our visit to Botanical Beach was one of the highlights of the trip out to BC, however it was the one aspect of the trip that also caused the most post-trip stress. Imagine our surprise when Budget just went ahead and put a $1500 charge on Laurie’s credit card for “damage” to the rental car we used to get out to Botanical Beach. The alleged damage was that the display in the Prius we rented wasn’t working properly. Well, since neither of us had driven a Prius before we weren’t sure how the display panel was supposed to look/function, couldn’t figure it out and ended up switching it off so that we could, instead, focus on the lovely scenery around us.

It still infuriates me that car rental companies can get away with this kind of crap — google it, you’ll be amazed at how prevalent these trumped up “damages” are!! The good news is that Laurie had insurance through her credit card that covered this for us, the shitty thing was that it was our word against theirs and that this all took place a month after the fact. By the time we even found out about this we were back home, about 4500 km from the car rental shop and there was little we could do.

So, yeah, “…is in the details” is a relevant theme for this picture for more than one reason.