Let me tell you a story about my early days working for the House of Commons in a non-partisan position serving all Members of Parliament and all Canadians. While we all had our own political opinions, that ranged from right to left, we all worked professionally and in a non-
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THE FIFTH COLUMN: Annual Report on Kanata South Pathways Deterioration, Spring 2023
Another year has gone by and it is time to report again on the deterioration of the Bridlewood and Glen Cairn pathways in Kanata.Bridlewood Glen Cairn
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: More Fun With Photo Editing
I imagine most people have a favourite photo editor that they use for all their photo editing. Sometimes I like to mix it up and use different software for the different abilities each has. I will usually save my photos as lossless PNGs when transferring between different programs to avoid
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Translating the Negativity of Today’s Right Wing into the Reality of Their Beliefs
Today’s right wing loves to express itself in terms of what they hate, seeming to lack any positive messages. When you turn their negativity into positive statements it expresses what they really believe in. Anti woke: Celebrating a lack of awareness and caring for others Anti Political Correctness: Never do
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Object Removal with Adobe Photoshop Elements 2023 – The De-urbanization of a Pond
Back in the day, Inpaint used to be the standard for removing objects from digital photographs. Then I discovered Photo Stamp Remover which I found to be much better and easier to use. That all changed when I upgraded my Photoshop Elements 12 from 2013 to Photoshop Elements 2023. The
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Why Mastodon
So why did I open a Mastodon account and why do I think Mastodon can replace Twitter. I started looking for alternatives to Twitter soon after Elon Musk purchased it and sent it to hell in a hand basket. Of course, Twitter’s problems started much earlier than that. As soon
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: COVID-19 Pandemic Reflections and The Next Pandemic
Well the pandemic is over, at least according to most governments, science and medicine not so much. So now it is time to look back, and to look forward. Perhaps my biggest reflection is that governments, at least in Canada, did not receive the rational criticism for their failures that
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Photo Versions Created with Franzis Black & White Projects
Back in the day, not my day but the day, cameras were not an app on your phone but bulky and heavy apparatus with explosive flash powder that could only take monochrome photos. We have advanced a long way to today’s sophisticated DSLRs and prosumer cameras such as my Panasonic
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Photo Versions Created with Franzis Color Projects
Way back in the day when I used to be a member of the Camera Club of Ottawa and we met at the NRC building on Sussex Drive the most usual criticism of my photos was that they were “good record shots”. I did not see that as much of a
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Is It Time For The NDP To Rebirth Itself
The North American right wing has been overtaken by a vile hateful Donald Trump inspired populist MAGA movement that has spawned the Freedumb Convoy types and infected the Canadian Conservative Party and what was once a principled conservative tradition in Canada, although you have to go back awhile to the
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Left, Right or Centre – Explainer
In today’s age of populism, with ideology apparently dead, how do you now if you are on the left or right or in the centre. There are indeed some basic philosophical positions that determine if you are on the right, left or in the centre. If you are on the
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: The Benefits of Being a Nobody on Twitter (& free speech)
Following 193 accounts and with 329 followers I am a relative nobody on Twitter. By controlling who I follow and who I block I can protect myself from the worst of Twitter. By choosing to follow legitimate news sources and people with similar interests, like cycling, my Twitter feed is
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: An Open Message to Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe
The election is over and you can now free yourself from your election handlers. It is time to move your focus from getting elected to making Ottawa a better place to live. So what should your first priority be. During an election campaign it is obviously whatever the largest group
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: A Tale of Two Twitters
It is the best of the Internet, it is the worst of the Internet, it is the purveyor of wisdom, it is the purveyor of disinformation, it is the home of knowledge, it is the home of wilful ignorance. Beyond the literary allusion (words inspired by Charles Dickens) there do
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Norco Scene VLT, The E-bike For People That Hate E-bikes
Definitions first. How do I define e-bike. An electric motor assisted bicycle that can be pedalled easily without the assist turned on and that requires pedalling for the motor assist to function. Any so called “e-bike” that does not requiring pedalling to move (except when coasting) is a variation on
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Glen Cairn Pathway System Deterioration
Bridlewood is not the only Kanata South community with crumblingmulti-use pathways (MUPs) that are deteriorating due to multiplefreeze-thaw cycles every year as a result of climate change. This pathway through Glen Cairn is also crumbling away.
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: SocialCoin – The Socially Responsible Alternative to Bitcoin
I am placing this concept in the public domain for anyone with the necessary technical skills to create the structures and necessary algorithms to implement it. Wikipedia provides an extensive section on Bitcoin and in particular Bitcoin mining. Essentially Bitcoin is created by an energy wasting computer process they call
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Can Proportional Representation Save Our Parliamentary Democracy
Parliament – Etymology The English term is derived from Anglo-Norman and dates to the 14th century, coming from the 11th century Old French parlement, “discussion, discourse”, from parler, meaning “to talk”.[2] The meaning evolved over time, originally referring to any discussion, conversation, or negotiation through various kinds of deliberative
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: The Bridlewood Small Hydro Line Pathway – The Crumbling Continues
A year ago I wrote a blog post, Climate Change, The Pandemic and Multi-Use Pathways (MUPs), in which I talked about the state of Ottawa’s Multi User Pathways citing The Bridlewood small hydro line as an example. This is the current state of that pathway compared to a year ago.
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