Don't join the military...join Tim Horton's!

My sister arrived back from Afghanistan tonight. For those of you unawares, she was serving a 6 month military term over there. For those of you wanting to see her now that she's back, we're planning on organising a get together for everyone.

After picking her up from the airport, we all went out for dinner to have a chance to talk and grab some grub.
She told us stories of the desert - the sand, the sand mites, the spiders, the locals, etc, but one in particular got me.
We had asked her if she had gone to the Tim Horton's on the main base. She said she had and then preceded to tell us an interesting tidbit about said establishment.


She said that those working at the Tims recieve the same medal she does for her stint of service in Afghanistan and they leave with about 10,000 more dollars than her.
I was shocked.
Now I know that those who go over there to serve coffee are doing a good thing, but I don't consider them to be doing as an important or dangerous job as our military personelle and I definatly do not think they should be getting paid more.
In other words, our government needs to step it up.
For that to happen, we all need to step it up and let the government know that we think our military is important.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that we should follow the American's lead and make our military the top priority; I'm saying we should at least invest enough so that our guys are appropriatly compensated.
Otherwise they might all quite and go work for Tim Horton's.

Irresponsible people SHOULDN'T OWN PETS!!!!

I want to begin my entry tonight by saying what a wonderful job everyone did today for Travis' celebration. It was very touching and I think Travis would have enjoyed it.

On another note...
I want to talk a bit about responsibility.

On Saturday, I had to take little Bastet into the vet to get his shots and his ears cleaned. I was in the examination room behind the front desk waiting while my kitty got tortured in the back. While I was seperated from the front by a door, I could still here conversation going on out front.
I was sitting, waiting and minding my own business when I heard someone enter the clinic.

"I have a question for you guys," a 20-something male voice began as the secretaries halted their chatter.
"I've got this cat and I need to get rid of it or I'm going to be evicted today. Do you guys take cats? I was going to just leave it in someone's yard, but I thought you guys might want it."
The secretaries, and myself (still in the other room) were appalled.
" You can't just LEAVE a cat in someone's yard!" the one secretary exclaimed, "And no, we do not except strays. I can give you the number to (insert some stray animal saving society here) and you can see if they'll take them, but I can't gaurentee they will. You CAN'T JUST LEAVE IT though!"
At this point, my heart strings were strumming and I really wanted to open the door and take the cat myself. But logic stepped in and I remembered that we're only allowed one pet at the place we rent and it would be irresponsible to take a pet I could't provide a home for.

The guy thanked the ladies (a fake, almost hostile response to being rejected) and left. I had missed my chance at changing anything.

Now this guy was a dirt bag. He was acting irresponsibly, selfishly and without compassion. But what did I do to solve the problem? Nothing.

I think I made the wrong right decision.

Now I'm not saying I should have accepted the cat, but I could have talked to him and given my number in case the stray foundation didn't work out. I could have called around and helped find a home for the cat. I could have listened to the screams coming from inside my soul and done something, anything to asure that the animal would be looked out for.

But would me having whisked the cat away have taught Mr. Dirtbag anything about responsibility? Probably not. But I don't think doing nothing helped either.

I like to think that the stray foundation accepted the cat and found it a loving home; this thought helps me sleep at night.
But I'm still left with the dilemma of what I should have done.

In all honesty, I refused to act not because of some higher hope that Mr. Ratguts would learn to deal with his own responsibilities but because I was afraid.
I was afraid of what my husband would say if I brought home a cat, what the guy would say if I had given him a piece of my mind, what the ladies would have thought of me if I had stepped out of the room and joined in the conversation; I was afraid to get involved.

In the end, although I had wanted to take the cat, I know I couldn't have kept it. I just wish I had done something to change things.
Sometimes it's hard to do the responsible thing.
Sometimes it's even harder to know what the responsible/ right thing is.


P.S. To all you jerkwads out there who think it would be cool to have a pet, make sure you can keep it for the long haul!

I've been having a hard time dealing with the tragedy of Mr. Panasiuk's death. Although I can't say I had the priviledge of being a good friend of his, I had the pleasure of instructing him during the lion dance classes.
I have to say, he was the ideal student in every way. I always looked forward to teaching him. He was like a sponge, always eager to soak up whatever knowledge was offered and he always did it with a grin.

One of my requirements for second degree black belt was to write an assignment on the five people who had most influenced my training.

He was one of my five.

To me he represented the irrepressible spirit of Kung-Fu. He never complained, never backed down; he gave his all in everything that he did. His enthusiasm and joy when it came to Kung-Fu awed me. I wanted to be like him and I aspire to be as driven as he was.

So I plan to work harder in the hopes that I can do his memory proud.

We'll miss you Travis.