Made in....anywhere but here.

The Ottawa Citizen ran articles this weekend by Shelley Page and Randall Denley about our country's increasing reliance on goods manufactured in China. I'm glad to see some concern about this, and I hope people will think about it a bit more.

I always try to buy goods made in Canada, or at least in a country with a better reputation than China. Sometimes, it's damn near impossible to do, however. Just try to buy an umbrella. Trust me, almost ALL of them come from China.

I used to work in manufacturing. The jobs I used to do are now done in the Maquiladora. I can imagine a young woman, dressed neatly, even if the clothes aren't new, leaving her cardboard-and-corrugated-tin shack in the morning, stepping over the open sewer that runs past every hovel, and catching a bus to go and do one of those jobs I used to have. She'll get paid a lot less, maybe 1/10th of what I used to earn. She lives in poverty. I know, because I was not rich on ten times her salary.

The jeans aren't much cheaper, if at all. Lives, however, seem to be going down in price all the time.

Mom

This Sunday we are having an open house to celebrate this wonderful lady's 90th birthday. She's my Mom, and doesn't she look great? We've been so blessed to have her for so long, and so healthy, too. She still lives in her own apartment, does most of her own housework, makes lunch for her daughters any time we say we're coming, goes to the cottage with us on weekends so she can work in her garden, and plays a mean game of cribbage. Nobody makes potato salad like she does, and her buns (dinner rolls, that is) always get rave reviews. I love her to bits, and so do most people who know her. This picture was taken at the cottage on the August long weekend.

Cottage Time

Blogging from the cottage presents a few challenges. We are on dial-up here, so I hesitate to attempt to upload pics. Also, staying online long enough to write anything is difficult - one wants to be off outside or puttering about instead. So....a quick hello is all you are getting for now! I'll add pics etc. once we are home again (or if it starts raining here....).

Weather Worries

I love hot weather. I especially love it when I'm on holidays for it, so I can be at the cottage. These nights our house is getting very warm. We have stubbornly refused to buy an air conditioner, which means the house has been getting progressively warmer for the past week. The thermometer reads 25C. this morning; I'm hoping the thundershowers forecast for tonight will bring in slightly cooler weather for sleeping. Hopefully they won't bring driving rain for extended periods that requires closed windows!


This reminds me of the Thursday night before our holidays last year, when a big storm went through, bringing an F2 to Combermere and several downed trees to our cottage lot. The old cedar we lost had shaded me lots of times since my childhood, and it was sad to see it go.



I'm praying it doesn't happen again this year, because we are starting to get low on nice trees on our property. The weather overall has been much like last year - very wet and cool for most of the month. That caused one of our tree losses last year - the ground was so wet, the wind just uprooted the tree.



Nothing like the damage done at Combermere, but still painful. I'd rather not start out my holidays this year with such a BANG!