Whoo hoo! [08 Oct 2008|09:08am] baglady25  We just watched School House Rock in class (Conjunction Junction, what's your function?) and now we're watching Royal Canadian Air Farce. Good day. 1 comment|post comment

Sitting in a park [02 Oct 2008|02:56pm] brassfire [ mood | chipper ] ...checking teh intarwebs! Enjoying fresh air, sunshine, clouds, more sunshine, music in one ear and wind in the trees in the other. Just bought some veggies for really cheap. Yummy. About to record later today with an AMAZING local artist on a collaborative song. He had the title and a great riff, I wrote lyrics, melody, and the break. So happy to be working with him. Doesn't hurt that he's also drop-dead gorgeous and great to flirt with - although that's all I want here, because the focus is the music. Learning flash, been doing various webthings and computerthings and musicthings. Vannessa came by today to pick up some of her stuff, I gave her a deadline of yesterday and then she only called yesterday. I really need that tiny extra bit of space in my room though, just so I can move MY things around enough to clean! lol. Only two boxes gone today and I already feel so much lighter. Eryn's graduation from her business program is tomorrow, and I want to be there, however now I have Vannessa picking up more stuff tomorrow and then lunch with Holly because her company is hiring and that's really important. I'd like to be there for my "sister" though. That and I did a flash file for her presentation so I want to see how it went across. Hehe. Internet in area, not at home yet though the guy upstairs is supposedly getting it soon, but there's free internet close enough that I can check in more regularly now. Well, battery's almost drained and I've g2g. SO GOOD TO BE BACK!!!!!!!! 8 comments|post comment

interesting... [01 Oct 2008|11:12am] brandnewlow ( clicky the texty ) post comment

Yes, some people DO want poverty to exist! [30 Sep 2008|09:57am] brassfire [ mood | awake ] Originally posted as a comment but it got huge, so posting as a post. Some people are misguided enough to think that poverty is a good thing because they think that being hungry MAKES people want to work. Because obviously, there's no intrinsic rewards from work itself, or the self-esteem of doing a good job, or the external status of being employed. In my experience, being hungry makes me not have the energy to even look for work, much less work even one full shift at anything. I'd be more motivated to work if I had the energy to be motivated. Working on that, I've spent money I don't have on food and it's helping, I just hope I don't run out of credit before I actually find a job... and being poor in the first place I don't have much credit either. "Tough love" is a vastly misunderstood concept. In the countries that have a basic living allowance for everyone, we always hear about the people who abuse the system and just sit back to have kids. We never hear about the people who were ABLE to go to college and ABLE to go to work and ABLE to contribute to their community, who do more with their lives (and pay more in taxes to return the favour) because they had a safety net they could actually rely on. Besides, what's wrong with a single mother actually taking the time to CARE FOR HER KIDS and be there for them? Even a small reduction in military spending would get a fuckton of families up to the poverty level instead of artificially held below the poverty level, if the funds were diverted. If conservatives have a severe dislike of a permanent safety net, more subsidies for farming would reduce the cost of food and therefore reduce living expenses and the poverty level itself would be reduced. Reduced property taxes, requirements for new housing to have a certain percentage of affordable units and caps on property values would make more affordable housing and also reduce inflation. Green building practices also often reduce housing costs AND energy consumption afterwards. Minimum wage is below the poverty level. Disability is below that, and welfare is below even THAT. That said, the poverty line in Canada and the US is still not as destitute as the poverty line in other countries, it just feels that way when everyone else has a blender and you don't even have money for food to put IN a blender... then you end up with everyone else's castoff things and don't LOOK as poor as you are, but can't afford anything unless someone's giving it to you. I now have a blender... without the cap in the lid. Someone gave it to me, that's the only reason I have one at all. I have an ipod, a cellphone, a computer, a laptop, decent clothing from donation and value village... I don't LOOK poor. I just don't have money for basics like food and transportation. I pay rent on a crappy hellhole that would be condemned if it wasn't a not-for-profit. (Every apartment should have two exits according to the fire code... I guess the window's large enough to count as an exit?) I deliberately try to fit into the society around me and the job level I want to have... because I know that my lower-middle-class friends with jobs are terrified of poor people from all the myths and scapegoating that goes on. But I still have to pay my groceries on credit that I'm lucky to have at all, and every time I get any extra money it goes on food or on paying back my credit so I can buy more food on credit later. It's a pathetic existence right next to unbelievable affluence. It's kinder to kill someone outright than to starve them half to death and then tell them all they need is to get a job. PS: I has laptop nao thanks to someone who believes in me! There is free internet in neighborhood and friendly internet at friend's places, so whenever I'm well enough to go out I can has internets and do webwork and stuff! 3 comments|post comment

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