I had my second French class at work today. I work at a bilingual organization, so they offer classes for us anglophones. Totally awesome in super-anglophone Toronto. I don't get to take them very often because I'm not on the official list, but I get to fill in when people are sick or on vacation. Today I got a one-on-one class!

I haven't taken French for four years, so I was quite afraid that it would be very bad. It's been a really good experience. My French came back a lot quicker than I thought it would, and a lot more than I ever expected it to. My passé composé and imparfait are in good working order, and I'm remembering random words like plupart and blague. Our teacher is this incredibly enthusiastic Québecois woman, which is very good accent-wise for those of us who take calls from Quebeckers. I had a nice chat with her today about making curtains over the weekend, about Chris's trip and online gambling in general, about crazy American politics, and about using tu and vous as terms of respect/familiarity in Quebec.

A coworker took the class after mine and came back telling me that I'm the new "chou chou" (teacher's pet, in this case) and that she raves about my vocabulary and insists that they speak to me in French. It's funny, because they asked me in my interview how my French was, and I never know how to answer that question. It's okay, but I feel that I'm missing a LOT of vocabulary, and my accent really varies depending on how long it's been since I talked to a francophone. But from what she's saying, it's much better than she expected, and she would put me in the advanced class at work. So that's encouraging!

Labels: french

Rational Atheism: An open letter to Messrs. Dawkins, Dennett, Harris and Hitchens
By Michael Shermer

If it is our goal to raise people's consciousness to the wonders of science and the power of reason, then we must apply science and reason to our own actions. It is irrational to take a hostile or condescending attitude toward religion because by doing so we virtually guarantee that religious people will respond in kind. As Carl Sagan cautioned in "The Burden of Skepticism," a 1987 lecture, "You can get into a habit of thought in which you enjoy making fun of all those other people who don't see things as clearly as you do. We have to guard carefully against it."

If atheists do not want theists to prejudge them in a negative light, then they must not do unto theists the same.

Yes, yes, and yes. Please and thank you, Mr. Dawkins, stop being an asshole and inspiring my religious relatives to believe I am as haughty as you simply because we both bear the label 'atheist.' Terms like 'delusion' and 'brainwashing' are totally counterproductive and easily applied to you from the other side.

Churches that spend all their time on the evils of atheism are never going to get around to introducing people to Jesus. Atheists who spend all their time on the evils of theism are never going to get around to introducing people to the weird and wonderful world of science. If you would all get back on topic and talk about what you are fascinated with instead of what you are irritated by, we would all be better off.

Labels: atheism, dawkins, religion, shermer

In an alley south of Queen Street West between Spadina and Bathurst:



I love finds like this. Connie and I went for a walk last night and I decided to show her the graffiti along there, and I hadn't noticed this particular piece last time.

I've been thinking about Toronto lately. My walk to and from work goes along Queen Street West. It's a busy place. The summer bring full patios, street vendors, and lots of construction. There are always new stores being built. There's a nice unit going up that's going to have street-level stores, a few floors of business offices, and the top level will be condos. I love mixed development like that. It enables people to live, work, and shop in the same place.

I'm beginning to recognize the patterns of Queen Street. I used to see my councillor (Adam Vaughan) biking to work (in a suit!) every few days, but I haven't caught him lately. Maybe they have different hours in the summer.

Especially on my way home, there's such a hustle and bustle in the city. There are so many people walking and biking and driving everywhere. So many smells—incense, food, sweat, exhaust, garbage, flowers, and sawdust. Stooped-over old women, kids on bikes, TTC officials, homeless kids with lots of piercings, homeless men with matted hair, indie kids, men in business suits who are always on the phone, impeccably dressed women, bike messengers. Hot dog stand vendors, street artists, construction workers who always seem to be on a break, people putting up posters, people handing out flyers, beggars, people looking for charity donations, people waiting for streetcars, business owners sweeping their sidewalks, tourists.

It's insanity, and I love it. When I first moved to the city, I found it completely overwhelming, but I've grown accustomed to it and now it relaxes me. There's a dead tree at Queen and Soho that has been painted (and re-painted), and someone keeps hanging a pink mailbox on it that says "Hopes and Wishes" on one side and "HUGS" on the other. People regularly put things in this anonymous mailbox. I managed to spy one message on my way past and it said "Reconciliation with my daughter." I've seen a homeless man putting a note inside. It's always overflowing, and I'm so curious who is collecting these messages. But it doesn't even matter. What matters is that we do have hopes and wishes and that someone's out there listening. This city has a million stories.

Labels: city, graffiti, toronto

Holy crap, it is August already?! This year is flying by.

Christopher left for a 3-week business trip today. He'll be in Malta for a week and then Ireland for 2 weeks, so he won't be back until the end of the month. Unless, ,you know, they change the dates again. We found out about this trip last week. It started as 4 days, then a week, then two, now three... and now we find out that some of the equipment they shipped there is damaged, so who knows what he'll actually find when he gets there. Hmph. Stupid work, stealing my boyfriend. People at my work seem to think that this will free me up to do "what I want to do," but secretly I spend most of my non-work hours hanging out with Christopher and thoroughly enjoying it, so that theory is shot. (Does that make me codependent, or just in a good relationship? Maybe it just makes me an introvert, happy enough with one boy and two cats.)

I've been thinking academic thoughts lately. Thinking about how as humans evolved, the way we see the world must have become adaptive, and this makes me wonder how much of our social system is based on "truth", and how much is based on this niche that we've evolved to fit into. I've also been thinking about how we do so much of our thinking in narrative form, and how if those narratives are threatened, we get very defensive and illogical. It doesn't matter whether you question someone's religion or their vegetarianism or their politics or their stance on abortion... it's very hard to have a level-headed discussion about this. It's very easy to get emotions running high and to take these disagreements personally, and that's very interesting to me. It seems like our capacity to discuss these issues calmly and without offense is, well, kind of broken. But if it's similarly broken across the species... maybe it's an adaptive trait with some negative consequences.

Of course, I haven't a clue who else is writing or researching about this, so I'm not sure who to read. Seems like sociology or psychology at first glance, but you would think that a good theory of brain would cover this.

Labels: christopher, evolution, narrative