Archive for the ‘Personal stuff’ Category

Posted on October 24, 2009 - by J Lane

Flu vaccine: to be or not to be

There’s been a pile of debate about whether or not people should get the flu vaccine.  It’s probably been fuelled by the media’s hype of the “life-threatening” H1N1 strain of the flu virus.  Today, I came across this video via. a friend on twitter:

At one point, the reporter tosses out the stat of a “one in a million” neurological disorder.  That might seem like pretty good odds.  According to the US census bureau, the current population of the US is 304 million — so if everyone in the US got vaccinated, 304 of them would no longer be able to talk or walk normally.  Huh.  It would suck to be one of those 304 just because I wanted to avoid getting the flu.

I’m neither pro nor anti vaccines in general.  There’s no doubt that they’ve contributed to wiping out some absolutely horrifying diseases.  That said, I don’t know whether I’d be willing to gamble the inconvenience of a flu with a one in a million change of having a permanent, life-altering condition.  With our first son, we started out getting him vaccinated on the normal routine.  He had a horrible reaction to the first round though (high fever, listlessness), so we opted to hold off on the next few shots.  He’s all caught up now, as is our younger son, but we waited until they were over the age of 1 to finish it off.  I was talking with my Doctor about it at the time (a really great, practical guy), and he pointed out that we live in Canada where the chances of catching most of the diseases you’re being vaccinated against is pretty low.  He asked if we were planning to travel anywhere in the future (no), and said that we were probably fine.  He did say that there is that risk though (one in a million?)

I pretty much get the flu at some point or another every year.  I never have an easy time of it either.  Am I going to get a flu vaccination?  Nope.  There’s a couple of factors in play in that decision:

1. I work from home, and live on an island of about 1,000 people.  Sure, people come and go from the island every day, and I make trips over to the city on a somewhat regular schedule, but I think my risk of exposure is pretty minimal.  I doubt we’ll see H1N1 make an appearance on Mayne.
2. Coughing, sneezing, and flu symptoms suck, but personally I’m not likely to die from them.  I’m not likely to become permanently impaired from the flu.  I might have a couple of weeks of low productivity (sorry in advance clients, I appreciate your patience).
3. A significant portion of people that get the flu vaccine, end up with the flu.  The way a vaccine works is that it actually hits your immune system with a low dose of the virus being vaccinated against.  Your body then generates it’s own antibodies to deal with future exposures to that virus.  If you’re a bit under the weather, or if the vaccine dose is off a bit, you could end up with an all-out flu from the vaccine.

Posted on October 21, 2009 - by J Lane

A little something for the blog

My last six or so posts are Twitter aggregations, so it’s time to post something of actual substance.  Here’s what’s up:

1. Life, kids, family: things are good.  Reilly’s really digging Kindergarten, Parker is really digging not having Reilly around all of the time (he does miss him though, I can tell).

   Rae started up Damage Control and has been kicking ass at that.  She’s pretty busy, and has found something really cool that she’s enjoying doing.

2. Work: Industry Interactive is doing well.  Work has been steady, lots of new clients, lots of local work, which has been cool.  Yeah, things have slowed down a bit, but nothing to get worried about.
3. Mailmanagr: steady growth and improvement.  New designs this year, new features being added all the time.  I’m pretty happy with the way it’s going, and the feedback I get indicates that a lot of other people are happy too.
4. Living here: still love it.  There’s the occasional challenge, but this place is amazing.  I can’t imagine raising my family anywhere else.

And that’s about it.

Posted on September 5, 2009 - by J Lane

Is the PST legal (and can there legally be an HST in BC)?

I’m not a lawyer, but I can read.  Please don’t take this post as formal legal advice or something that is set in stone.  Think of it more as “I’m thinking out loud, and I’d like to hear your thoughts”.

A friend of mine recently shared a link with me on Facebook about whether federal income tax is legal in Canada.  It’s an interesting read, but I think that the argument is wrong.  If you go back to the Canadian Constitution, the sections that this person references say entirely different things from what the author alleges.  For example, section 91 which talks about the Powers of Parliament states:

…it is hereby declared that (notwithstanding anything in this Act) the exclusive Legislative Authority of the Parliament of Canada extends to all Matters coming within the Classes of Subjects next hereinafter enumerated; that is to say,

…

2. The Regulation of Trade and Commerce.

3. The raising of Money by any Mode or System of Taxation.

…

And section 92 which discusses the Powers of Provincial Legislatures says:

In each Province the Legislature may exclusively make Laws in relation to Matters coming within the Classes of Subjects next hereinafter enumerated; that is to say,

…

2. Direct Taxation within the Province in order to the raising of a Revenue for Provincial Purposes.

…

Based off of the generality of point 3 in section 91 and the specificity of point 2 in section 92, I’d wager that it is indeed constitutional for the Government of Canada to collect income tax.  But that took me to the next step in my thinking — based on the Canadian Constitution, provinces are only allowed to collect direct taxes.  Additionally, because the regulation of trade and commerce fall under the federal government’s jurisdiction, shouldn’t any type of sales tax or value added tax only be payable to the Canadian Government?

Another point made in the original article, that I’ve actually been able to verify as true, is that the Supreme Court (case ref [1951] S.C.R. 31, [1950], 4 D.L.R. 369) has ruled that the various levels of government are limited in their ability to transfer their various powers between them.  So it’s not okay for the federal government to just give permission to the provinces to start printing their own currency (as an example).  I’d think that it also wouldn’t be okay for one level of government to assign their tax collection to another level of government, as is proposed by the HST.

I’d love to get some actual legal opinions on this.

Posted on August 15, 2009 - by J Lane

Say no to the HST!

I received an e-mail from Chris Delaney today about the Citizen Initiative to oppose the HST.  Here’s the contents:

SAY NO TO THE HST!

Former B.C. Premier, Bill Vander Zalm,
together with leaders from business, labour and politics,
will speak at a rally to oppose the HST:

Saturday, September 19th

12:00 noon

Vancouver Art Gallery

Mr. Vander Zalm is calling on all British Columbians
to help organize a “Citizen’s Initiative” to rescind the HST.

Details on how you can help will be given out at the rally.

Come and show Gordon Campbell
and the BC Liberals what you think
about their HST!

Please pass this message on to all your friends,
relatives, contacts and associates.

If you’re available to help hand out information and sign up volunteers, please contact chris@chrisdelaney.com with your name, address and phone number.

Posted on June 17, 2009 - by J Lane

Discovergulfislands.com

I’m going to try something new.

Flyingtroll.com is charming in that it’s a complete mix of every random thing I feel like writing about, but there’s really no central theme to it.  I’ve been interested in working on a group blog for a while where I’m challenged to stay on topic and write about something of substance.  Enter DiscoverGulfIslands.com (hat tip to DiscoverSooke.com for the URL inspiration).

There’s a lot of great things about living on Mayne Island, and I’d like to group some of them together.  You won’t find posts about how Reilly and Parker are growing like weeds over there, but you might find posts about us hiking Mt. Parke, and how that’s a great activity.  You’ll definitely find posts about my weekly kayaking excursions (from now on) over there.  This week, we paddled Active Pass and it was a mind-blowing experience.

I’ll be honest, the eventual goal is that I’d like to sell some advertising on discovergulfislands.com, and see if I can do a little side work professionally blogging (but I’m not even going to consider that until there’s a good body of content in place, and we’re seeing some traffic).  Even if it doesn’t get to that point, it’ll be interesting to see just what I can make happen.

The first order of business is that I’d love to recruit some of the other islands.  Mayne isn’t the only island, and I’d love to see the occasional post from somebody from Pender, Galiano, Saturna and Saltspring (drop me a line if you’re interested).  As I alluded to before, there may be some revenue opportunities in the future, but there’s nothing immediate on the horizon (in other words, if/when there are ads, you’ll get a cut).

Posted on June 17, 2009 - by J Lane

M.Ed. in hand

I guess it’s official now, I’ve got the paper in hand.  My M.Ed. arrived in the mail today.  I had a mini-convocation at the post office to celebrate.

It’s funny how much it looks like my B.Sc.  Two of the signatures are different (new chancellor, and a different dean), and the University’s logo has changed.

Okay, now off to work…