how to hunt a fruit fly

'Tis the season. Here's some advice for those of you, like me, suffering from a fruit fly epidemic: build a trap. A fruit fly trap is economical and rather fun to build. Plus it makes you look like a friggin' genious/problem solver.

1. Get a jar or large cup.
2. Put a piece of banana at the bottom.
3. Make a funnel from a piece of paper. Ensure that the bottom part is almost closed but not quite. The idea is for the flies to fly in and not out.
4. Put the funnel in the jar so it rests on the rim.
5. Tape the funnel in place
6. Watch.
7. But not too closely. You don't want to scare them away.
   

If it gets too crowded in there, let them loose outside. Just make sure you close the doors and windows first.

does this box match my outfit?

It's moving time!!

On Saturday, Andrew's folks came in from Cambridge to help us with the new place. We measured things up and headed to home depot for some closet storage solutions. Cramming all of two peoples stuffs into a one bedroom place with only two closets is...complex. And since I refuse to give up any articles of clothing, and he refuses to give up any CDs, and we both refuse to part with any books it's not going to get any easier. While Andrew and his dad installed them, I took off the sliding closet doors in the bedroom. It's a good thing I have massive arm muscles muscles or I might very well have died being smushed between the two of them. (I have to work on my technique for next time.) After that, I installed a toilet paper holder and even used wall anchors (Special Tip: ensure they are FLUSH with the wall before installing screws.). All were amazed at my "good eye" for straightness when my line of installation turned out be be exactly level. So, if you're ever looking to hang a picture, you know who to call.

Yesterday, post-church at the meeting house downtown, we dropped off a bunch of boxes at the house, and them came back to my place for more. Andrew noted it was hot that I was moving heavy boxes of books in my nice cream-coloured, pink-flower adorned sundress.

Our new house newly decorated with a wall of boxes, and we sped of to the Family Reunion in the middle of nowhere/somewhere near St. Catherine's. Next year I may bring a box of "Hello, My Name is: _____" stick-on name tags, or suggest a rousing round of The Name Game.

Last night I learned that men with HIV/AIDS can decrease the amount of the virus in their genital secretions by getting circumcized. Although the research is new, this is a promising finding for the developing world.

Also, since Bean's comment on my blog last night I can't stop thinking about these guys and whether or not there might be a position there. Get back to Canada safe Beans, it will be nice to chat with you!!!

no limits to HIV/AIDS

On the first day of the XVI International AIDS Conference here in Toronto, what else is there to blog about but, umm, HIV/AIDS.

To begin, it's interesting. It's interesting that here in Canada AIDS is no longer a death sentence. Early diagnosis combined with treatment that is no more complicated than a single pill a day. Those who have HIV can postpone the development of full-blown AIDS for decades. And those who have AIDS can live into their 80s. Actually, the fact that they're living until they are senior citizens poses a new kind of problem. Time Magazine Online just did this amazing (I mean AMAZING) photographic expose called 'The Greying of AIDS'. It highlights some unique problems that have surfaced only recently...only since AIDS patients have aged to become heart patients, cancer patients, and altzheimer's patients (etc.) all at the same time.

But meanwhile, the situation in underdeveloped countries remains much the same. Avert.org's statistics page provides a frightening reality check. Over 38.6 million people world wide living with AIDS. Since 1981, more than 25 million people have died of AIDS. In Africa, over 12 million children have been orphaned due to AIDS. By the end of 2005, women accounted for 48% of all adults living with HIV worldwide, and for 59% in sub-Saharan Africa. Half of all new HIV infections worldwide are in people aged 15-24 years old; this equates to around 6,000 every day. In the developing countries there are over 6.5 million people who are in immediate need of life-saving AIDS drugs, while only 1.3 million are receiving the drugs.

And still we cling to the legalities of copyright that prevent cheap generics from being made. And still our government - all Western governments - fails to reach targets for development assistance. And still the US government and the Catholic Church refuses to distribute condoms or participate in safe sex campaigns. And still we hide behind a false hope that incites us to believe that this disease is limited to gay men, to Africa, to drug users. To people who are not us, not like us, not safe like us.

When will we wake up?

progress?

In the next few hours the third billionth cell phone will be produced.

The first billion phones took 6 years to produce. The second billion phones took 2 years to produce. The third billion phones took 18 months to produce.

Learn about the crazy effects of planned obsolesence and technology here.

minor battles

Planning a wedding is hard. It kind of never ends. It feels like it's this gigantic test you have to pass before you deserve to get married. It's like in the early Nintendo games: the bad guys just keep coming, and they get bigger and bigger and Mario and Luigi (I wonder who's who...) just have to keep fighting. Hiring a wedding planner is the equivalent of a warp whistle. Now wouldn't that have been cool.

Except of course that Andrew and I have this crazy idea that we can plan a wedding for under $12,000. (At first is was under $10,000, then under $11,000.............) The thing is, the expenses just can't keep going up. Our bank account just can't accomodate. And so we're always making choices - hard choices. We want to welcome our guests in style and in a way that suits our personality, our relationship and our guests. We want to honour our parents, and joyfully celebrate this once-in-a-lifetime day. We want to respect and love the people who are providing us with their services. And we want to make sure that we're going about the whole process in a way that's please to the Maker of Love Himself.

That's a tall order. Sometimes one or both of us gets a little frazzled. Or we start to think more about The Day than about The Relationship or The God who brought us to it. It's an interesting challenge trying to work on all those aspects simultaneously.

contrary commentary

Interestingly, the CBC show "The Contrarians" did a special on feminism today. After yesterday's post, I'm all about this stuff. Not the "feminist stuff" exactly, but rather looking into the choices available to women, the choices available to families. All this talk about individual callings and passions, and marriage and children...well, it's things to think about. Not that Andrew and I are looking to have children right away. But one day we will. And I want to be aware of my own desires and passions when it comes to my career and my children.

The Contrarians highlighted Professor Alison Wolf of the University of London who recently wrote an interesting article. And granted, she acedemic-alizes the issue, but makes some good points. Her main point is that our society places a higher value on those things that fall within an economic discourse (excuse the term): career, pay raises, salaries, etc.

The plethora of careers available to educated women today is amazing: anything their male counterparts do, women are welcome to do as well. Previously, well-educated, driven women would enter the workforce as teachers, governesses and nurses. Now, women of that description become CEOs, doctors, accountants, professors and lawyers. And as they do so, they have less children. Increasingly, Wolf suggests, our society provides disincentives to childbearing so much so that the disincentives

have become so high for upper-middle income families that the puzzle is not why professional women have so few children but why they have any at all. ...No society until recent times has expected love alone to support the family enterprise. To put it another way, parental love has never cost so much.

Wolf sheds light on the value we place on work done in the home. I agree with her when she notes,

[F]eminists and economists share the blame. For the feminist, unpaid home-based activity is labour performed under the lash of patriarchy. For the economist, unpaid work does not contribute to GNP and so does not exist.

Here we have a problem: we value work that has a dollar sign attached to it, and the work a stay-at-home parent completes doesn't fit the bill. Additionally, kids are getting more expensive. Our continued emphasis on the best education (which aims to create the best kind of productive, self-sufficient individual) mandates high-priced schools, tutoring, additional experiential learning and, throughout the process, the College Fund. Never before has our society seen such a huge inverse relationship between childbearing and education. This is not to say I don't value education, didn't love my undergrad, or am not continuing on the education track. It's merely to suggest that our society somehow has to re-evaluate what we value and find a way to make babies, the home, family and career work a little better.

Wolf notes that she herself was engaged in full time work out of the home while co-parenting her little ones with an also full-time working husband. She notes that she loved her job and was probably much happier working outside of the home than she would have been had she been a stay-at-home-mom. But she asks, "were my children happier because I worked outside the home?" And also, "was society better because I worked outside the home?"

Now those are interesting questions. Our society values a traditional upbringing that rears children with good manners, who listen to their elders, and eventually grow into adults, but we don't value the people who provide that upbrining.

Families remain central to the care of the old and sick, as well as raising the next generation, and yet our economy and society steer ever more educated women away from marriage or childbearing. The repercussions for our futures are enormous, and we should at least recognize this fact. This has brought enormous benefits.

What to do with all this information, I'm not sure. But as societal commentary goes, Wolf has hit the proverbial nail on the head.