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John Lang
Eventually we all do it. The time will come when with gladness or misgivings we decide to relocate to a smaller abode. Most of us have relocated, some of us many times. While claiming no expertise in any aspect of this process, my recent experience might provide answers for those who expect to go through it. Looking back at my recent experience, it is the downsizing factor that differentiated this relocation.
John Lang
A recent press article revealed that Dutch plans for a “Holland House” in Vancouver during the Olympics might have to be shelved. After many months battling Kafkaesque bureaucracy and bolshie unions the Dutch are at the point of pulling the plug.
John Lang
As my 70th birthday loomed I knew the decision whether to buy a motorcycle could not be further postponed; I had to take the plunge or forget about one of the main items on my bucket list. For decades I had put it off, deferring to the opinion of friends and loved ones that getting on a motorcycle at any age, but especially in one’s dotage, was foolhardy to the point of idiotic. However, after ruminating on this, viewing the question from several angles, I felt such biased advice could be discounted: none of the motorcycle gainsayers had the slightest desire to get on one. I opened Kijiji and searched on ‘motorcycle’.
John Lang
A recent press article revealed that Dutch plans for a “Holland House” in Vancouver during the Olympics might have to be shelved. After many months battling Kafkaesque bureaucracy and bolshie unions the Dutch are at the point of pulling the plug.
John Lang
To endure living in Ottawa during the first days of spring it helps to be possessed of considerable inner reserves. The weather is wearisome. At worst, it is an extension of the previous three or four grim months; at best, the city is redolent of thawing doggy doo and March winds whirl unswept grit into your footwear.
John Lang
Building on the success of the Canadian Health Care System, generally acknowledged to be the most perfectly designed and efficiently delivered social program ever devised, the Canadian Government announced that it will apply the same principles to air transport.
John Lang
p> While at UBC in the early 60s I spent my summers as an employee of the Standard Oil Company. In those pre-self-service days, every car that drove into a Standard Oil gas station had its windshield washed, tire pressure checked, under-the-hood examined. We wore white uniforms, including a wedge cap. As a part-timer, my job was mostly at the front end, serving customers at the pumps, but I also did my fair share of lube jobs, tire repairs, lot sweeping and rest-room cleaning. I was a ‘floater’, assigned to stations in the Vancouver area as needed, and thus had the opportunity to meet most of the full-time employees in Standard’s Vancouver gas station empire. They were a fine lot of fellows, generous, hard-working, helpful and funny. I often think of them and wonder what became of them.
John Lang and General Rios Montt
Recent reports on the trial in Guatemala City of octogenarian ex-dictator, General Efrain Rios Montt, evoked memories of my posting there which began just as Rios Montt seized power in 1982. My posting lasted only two years, which was about six months longer than the general managed to stay in office. The court found him guilty of genocide against the Ixil Indians and sentenced him to 80 years in prison but an appeal succeeded in mandating a partial retrial on procedural grounds.
John Lang
Recent reports on the trial in Guatemala City of octogenarian ex-dictator, General Efrain Rios Montt, evoked memories of my posting there which began just as Rios Montt seized power in 1982. My posting lasted only two years, which was about six months longer than the general managed to stay in office.
Here are some links to sites of more than average interest. I add to these regularly, so come back from time to time and look around.
John Lang
Quotable Quotes
John Lang
This book fills a much-needed gap." Moses Hadas
"Hegel was right when he said that we learn from
history that man can never learn anything from
history." - GBS
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John Lang "English doesn't BORROW from other languages. English follows other languages into dark alleys, beats them up for their words and goes through their pockets for loose grammar." - unknown QUOTES BY LANG By John Lang (Article)
John Lang "Remember, Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, but backwards QUOTES BY LANG By John Lang (Article)
John Lang Some favourite quotations. Not exactly links, but they have been accumulating and I don't want to waste them. |