Category: Journal

Well, at the very least, I’m indifferent towards the Olympics.

As far as I’m concerned, sports already gets a disproportionate amount of time and attention in our society. It’s not important and, frankly, it’s actually pretty silly, if you stop to think about it. Yet it gets about a third of the total news coverage time and takes up a good chunk of the public airwaves.

And that’s okay, I guess. It’s a free market and people have their preferences. But given the number of people already paying attention, it doesn’t need me. My time is better spent elsewhere, I think. I have more important things to obsess about. Things like programming paradigms and Doctor Who toys.

So I absent myself from the universal “experience” that is the Olympics, but I get [Sylvester McCoy with umbrella accessory](http://doctorwhotoys.net/seventhdoctor.htm) in exchange. I think it’s worth it.

I (try not to) harp on people who get excited about the Olympics. That’s just not cool. It doesn’t do either of us any good for me to tell them the thing they’re so excited about is stupid. I get excited about stupid things too! And that’s okay.

Oh, Adam, [this](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Giambrone#Mayoral_campaign) could have worked out so much better if you’d just read [[wiki:The Ethical Slut]]. Instead, I have to be subjected to the usual media tropes about philandering politicians.

*sigh*.

Wouldn’t it have been more fun if his “live-in partner” could come out and say “Yeah, I know and I’m cool with it.” Of course, if everyone was cool with it, there would be no jilted lover [going to The Star to destroy his career](http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/torontomayoralrace/article/762532–adam-giambrone-says-sorry-for-affair-with-young-woman?bn=1). Let this be a lesson to us all.

After the jump is the speech I gave to Waterloo City Council on Monday. The meeting itself [was written up in the Chronicle](http://www.waterloochronicle.ca/news/article/199579), but I don’t think the quote from me totally sums up what I was trying to say (you know, newspaper quotes…).

I’ve mostly been complaining about the media and the residents’ associaton here and on WWBA. It took me a bit to figure out what to say to council.

Continue reading My Delegation to Waterloo City Council

Do you read [Seth Godin’s blog](http://sethgodin.typepad.com/)? You should read [today’s post](http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2010/01/amplifying-complaints.html), particularly if you’ve been following the [HUG thing](http://www.waterloochronicle.ca/news/article/199579).

Which statement do you think is more likely to generate the desired response?

> I’ve been living here for 50 years! I pay my taxes! This neighbourhood is a disaster and the city needs to do something!

or

> I love this neighbourhood and I really like living here. I think it would be really great if more of the people like me who want to live here were able to.

Even if nothing else comes out of this, I hope some people at least learn something from it.

I’ve been moved to write a post about [HUG Waterloo on WWBA](http://waterloowellingtonblogs.org/2010/01/hug-waterloo.shtml). It’s a follow-up to a post I did a year ago on the supposed “[student ghetto](http://waterloowellingtonblogs.org/2009/01/in-the-ghetto.shtml)” in the Northdale neighbourhood where Ellen lives.

Ellen and I talked to Jan D’Ailly last night, offering some of the pieces of the puzzle that I’d been missing. We’re a little dubious about coming forward because this could get messy. But Ellen thinks it’s important. I do too, for that matter.

Waterloo council is planning to table a motion related to HUG Waterloo’s proposal, and we’re planning on speaking there, if Ellen’s up for it. Wish me luck.