Confidence Restored... A Little

Level 4..... 90%

What a relief!!!!

As usual I lost mark for grist issues....  but got a comment of "Stunning" on my 150 hour project and full marks for it...

I'm so pleased.

As Promised...Shit Hot And Blue Feminism, Batt Style

I've never really supposed myself to be a shit hot and blue feminist but I think I might be after all! I have listened to two interviews with Gloria Steinem recently and she just blows my mind.  Now I am not the kind of feminist that wants to see men going around repressed as women have been for eons but I am sick to death of our paternal society. Tonight my sister, (who I rarely hear from) forwarded a link to this Famous People Painting. I had a look at it and was quite taken with the technological nohow of those who are responsible for it but the first thing that I noticed, and it really pissed me off (I can't believe that I actually spelled it out so you know I've got my gonch in a knot) was that there are only 9 women in that painting and one of them is the very youthful Shirley Temple.  The rest are as follows.. Audrey Hepburn, Queen Elizabeth the II, Margaret Thatcher, Marie Currie, Marilyn Monroe... (I can't believe someone would put her in...), Empress Dowager Cixi, Mother Theresa, and Sung Qing Ling. Oh I really got mad... have a look at it and then tell me that all those famous, and influential people shouldn't include a few more women. Sad really... then I had a look at the comments... and that made me feel worse. There are so many women that have had great influence over modern society and they are never given the due that they are owed. Even the comments kept suggesting more men for the artist to incorporate into the painting... I read down through the comments quite a ways before giving up in despair.

Over the years, women have not only done amazing things and become famous for them, but have been so strong and in support of men, (who have gotten their reputation because of the women in their lives) that it astounds me that they can be so easily overlooked.  It frustrates me no end the popular and modern culture does not recognise more, the contributions of women.  Isn't that what the feminist movement is all about? Aren't women seeking the recognition for their contribution to this world? Aren't wee seeking more opportunity?

There have been women philosophers... there have been women doctors, there have been women rulers, there have been women warriors... and on and on it goes. If you don't know them let me introduce you to a few of the ones that come to my mind...

Joan of Arc.... some say that she was crazy because she sad that she had God-given visions, but she died most gruesomely at the hands of the English. She fought for the peasants of France and I believe she was caught in the crossfire between the church... which she loved, and politics. She had a Cause.... And how many of us would love to have the backbone to stand up for what we believe in.... (I'm trying)
Cleopatra.... she was just scary with her power, beauty, brains, and influence. Let alone her hutspa when it came to not being taken alive... I'm not sure I could hold a snake and wait for it to bite.
Katherine the Great... also a scary ruler who knew how to control one of the largest and greatest empires in the world...
Eleanor of Aquitane who was connected to every powerful family in Europe.
Pocohontas who was really the first female American diplomat and Shirley Temple (who's actually in the painting) could only hope to stand in her shoes.
More modern rulers would be Indira Ghandi, Golda Meir, Hilary Rotham Clinton is another powerful and political woman, though she should have kicked him where it hurts... maybe she did! Then there's Condoleeza Rice who was the Secretary Of State under George W. Bush, Eva Peron who married the president of Argentina and then ran for the presidency after her husband died. Benazir Bhutto who died only a few years ago and was intent on bringing Pakistan into the modern world... too bad she died. I wonder what the world would be like if she hadn't...
Then there's Aung San Suu Kyi... bet you are not aware of her. She is the leader of the Democratic party in Burma and has spent 15 years under house arrest as her country tries to shut her up for speaking about the rights of the people of her country.
Then there is Janet Reno who is less political and more legal... as Attorney General of the US, she must wield a bit of pow'r! And what about Sandra Day O'Conner who probably paved the way for some of these other American women.
Moving right along and out of politics and into health/medical fields, we have...
Agnodice who was a physician in the 4th century BCE who disguised herself in order to practice medicine without reprisal.
Florence Nightingale.... nurse extraordinaire of the Crimean War... who first established nursing as a profession and founded the first professional nursing school in the world.
Clara Barton who established the Red Cross... Yup now there's someone to look up too!
Elizabeth Blackwell who was the first woman doctor in the US and became a leader in encouraging and teaching other women to become doctors as well.
Gertrude Belle Elion who waas a pioneer of research into drugs that eventually led to AZT for the AIDS virus.
Margaret Sanger who was a nurse and sexual educator and established Planned Parenthood.
And of course we can't forget the very modern Dr. Ruth who taught us all to lighten up about our sexuality.
In other areas of science we have Sally Ride... first woman astronaut. Well if they can do it why can't we, and I should include our very own Canadian astronaut... Roberta Bondar who's right up there with all those early astronauts... ra ra sis boom ba! And then there is Simone de Beauvior who was a Philosopher extraordinaire. Also we can't forget Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper who was a significant contributor to this thing that I am typing on and you are reading from without her we would probably still be reading our news off newsprint!

Then we have civil rights activist and humanitarians in general... Of course Joan of Arc again was political but she was more so a humanitarian as she tried to free the french peasants from the rule of the English.
But we have all kinds of women in the bible who were humanitarians... all those Mary's... we can't forget them.
... but closer to home our time we have Lady Diana who almost took down the British Royalty single handedly and brought attention to the disease AIDS, and reminded us that children have a right to walk to school without the worry of having their wee bodies blown to smithereens on a land mine.  Claudette Colvin who fought against bus segregation. Susan B. Anthony, who fought for the suffragettes at the turn of the century... its a different kind of civil rights movement than that of black activists but still it comes down to basic human rights... right?
Harriet Tubman who secreted many slaves to safety on the underground train... certainly you learned of her in school.
Mary Harris Jones (also known as Mother Jones) of the US fought for the right to strike for many including and probably most importantly, miners.
Eleanor Roosevelt was a humanitarian indeed. As co-founder of Freedom House she was crucial to the formation of the UN.
Lady Baden Powell, (who is a personal hero...) established the Girl Guides and the Guiding way for many young girls and women. She helped to establish a bursary that to this day helps girls meet their dreams. How can we forget someone like her. She helped us to throw off our skirts and don hiking boots and canvas pants so that we could go out and investigate the wild and wondrous world around us.
Amelia Earhart who taught us to reach out to the sky and fly with our dreams.... she died over the Pacific ocean circumnavigating the world  and in search of her own dreams.
And Jane Goodall who befriended gorillas in the jungles of Africa... and reminded us that we humans are still apples that haven't fallen far from the tree.

Then for those sport enthusiasts... we have Nadia Komenich who won award after award with her gymnastics routines in the 70s... and is still WOW!
Billy Jean King.... does anyone remember her playing tennis.... man she was awesome. She won "the Battle of The Sexes" in 1973, in which she defeated Bobby Riggs, a former Wimbledon men's singles champion, for $100,000, winner take all.
There's tons more but it is so badly acknowledged that when I Googled it I could only find derogatory stuff regarding women in sports like info on sports bras and hotty women in sports that make it worth watching women sports programs ( if you could see me now there would be disgust dripping from every orifice in my body... it might be gross but I can't tell you how incensed I am)!!!!

Historical women authors of fame and influence would include... Beatrix Potter, and Emily Dickensen and certainly Jane Austin.

Then we have popular culture women who are influential (and we have only yet to learn how influential they are). Lets see... Madonna, Oprah Winfrey, Barbara Walters, Gloria Steinem is also influential... in the women's movement. And, I would have to say, though I'm not a fan,  Margaret Atwood to a lesser degree than these other women.... especially here in Canada. It's a sad state of affairs, and I don't think she belongs with the likes of Florence Nightingale, but (sigh)... Lady Gaga who is certainly no worse than Cher or Madonna.... has huge influence over our young people. Still, all 3 do have the WOW factor and certainly have a rock em sock em attitude and feel they can do anything.

I'll end on that note by saying that I can only hope that young women today don't allow sexuality and the prominent display of it to be the founding factor of the feminist movement for the future.... anyone can jiggle their boobs. (I do it regularly as I move around casually... not that I want to)! But it is not everyone who can bring our gender... and our species forward into the future with shining possibilities. We are the women of the past, the present, and the future... there are so many things that we can do...  and that's the best part. Feminism is all about inspiration.... inspiration to reach for the stars and find them.
 
Go girls !!!!

PS... I'm exhausted... all that inspiration ... it just tires me out... ; }

Currently

I have been having a great time texting Teapot in Victoria... I miss him for some reason today terribly. Teapot has been going away for years for a variety of reasons. But since he joined the Rangers and became the leader of the patrol here in HH, each autumn on the first weekend of November he has had to go to Victoria for their annual planning weekend. He's there right now. Our new phones make texting easy except that they have auto-correcting on it so last night when we were texting we discovered the joys of auto-correcting. It frustrates me no end when there are mistakes in the things that I type... (like yesterday's post! which I have now gone back and corrected...) so when I pressed send and discovered that Jiggs had become Higgs, I was quite disconcerted.  Later, "Did you have any problems(driving)", became,  "Did you have any to lens?"  That got Huh? as a response!  So it has been seriously odd texting conversations going on between us.  Still it's nice to get up in the morning and find, "Good morning," on your phone, which is what I just found.

Normally Sunday mornings are quiet retreats of pleasurable radio listening, big long drawn out breakfasts and lots of tea drinking and the pleasure of each others company, some chit chatting about whatever is on Sunday Morning (the CBC radio program). This morning I am taking Mudder to church, since Fadder's vehicle is at the dealership getting repair work done on it. Not quite as awesome a Sunday morning as usual... still I can't really complain.  I don't go to church as much as I used to or as much as I should... I kind of have been taking an hiatus from all of that since I resigned as Lay preacher 1 and 1/2 years ago.... still a little jaunt off to church doesn't hurt... right?

I'm still working on the blog post about feminism so hopefully I will get time to finish it tomorrow... Today is filled with breakfast, church, lunch... (for the girls not me as I'm too full after the pan scramble I just made... eggs, ham, hash browns, onion, cheese.... mmmm.... so good but oh so filling...) and then this afternoon..... I have all the new members of the HH Spinners and Weavers coming... I will see how serious they are.

It is much milder today in temperature.... than yesterday. The roads were quite icy going into FSJ, but by the time I headed home the roads were pretty much clear... it had warmed up to +1 degree. Winter, I guess, is upon us, though it is not "in earnest" yet as temperatures of the last low pressure only got down to -18... cold but not the end of the world. Today is sunny and lovely looking.  Weather is so all fired important to us here in Canada isn't it... imagine... I can write a post each day and include some weather info and it is not one bit boring.... (snork)!

See ya'll tomorrow and hopefully the feminist thing will be done and it won't be nearly so boring....

P.S. You guys really need to get a life. ; ) I hope all the blogs you read are better than this one!

Waiting With Baited Breath

So I got an email this week. I have been deathly quiet on the level 4 front.... but I'm sure you remember that I sent off the last of it in August. Then I waited.... and waited.... and waited.... I had heard that my instructor was really busy with his little contracting business... so I waited some more.... and waited.... and waited.... and, if truth be told, I kind of got used to the fact that I didn't have my level 4 mark back and so I kept waiting and not really thinking about it. But Thursday in came an email..... from my instructor. It's now in the mail and on its way to me.... so now my stomach does flippity flops when I think about it, and again I wait.  Will it be Monday that will seal my fate or Tuesday... I doubt if I'll have to wait beyond Wednesday. I hope it's not going to be another book burner mark! If I get another low mark, it will so badly undermine my confidence that I'll probably just give up.

This morning is a much better morning weather wise than we have been having lately... the wind has finally blown itself out. And I could see the stars this morning when I got up... that means clear skies.  This is a big concern since the day of snow that we had wrecked havoc with our roads.  As usual no plows were ready for road clearing and there were accidents galore.... if anyone loses their life in a first snow accident, I've always thought there would be a case for sueing the government for not due care of our roads.  Mind you I guess people could always stay off them.

This morning I am heading into FSJ for two hours of teaching Kumihimo braiding.... (look it up)! I have a sum total of 5 students... not many really... but they all want to learn, so teach them I will. So the highway and its condition are of particular interest to me.  We will see.  Everyone is on standby. It is only -1 degree and hopefully there has been enough traffic in the last two days to get it to "track bare". That I can handle. But I hate ice covered roads.

Anyway, I am working on a post about feminism .... coming up... but I'm going to have to leave this here this morning as I still have to pack my gear....

See ya'll tomorrow.

Snow!!!!!!!* * * * * * * *

-11 degrees Celcius this morning and everything is white.  Narmin had a strange reaction to first snow and wasn't quite sure what to do when he went out through the door. Then a few minutes later the kitty went out and was not sure either about what all the white stuff is. As we were going to bed last night the wind picked up again after a day of finally blowing itself out. We had been having high winds for a full week and it surely was a Chinook.  Yesterday, everything got really calm, then last night the wind picked up again only this time it was coming in from the North.... along with it came our first snow and the fist of winter, that reaches out from the mountains into the valley and opens its palm to let loose with our first swirling snow.  By 2 a.m. I woke up and had a look out the window and there was the snow. White ground as far as the eye could see.

This is a morning for hot chocolate and a fireplace and knitting (or hand work of some kind). It is cold and grey outside and there is no earthly reason to want to go outside. If I had time for reading I would settle down with a book... (I'm reading The Secret Lives Of Dresses... just a mediocre book). But level 5 homework awaits and I did manage to finish another sample yesterday... so now I have the first section finished.

I am thinking that it is time to start the book work for level 5 since I now have ink cartridges in the printer and the right paper and everything that I need. I even got Teapot to pick up baggies on the way home from work yesterday so I am all set to get these samples washed and finished and in my books. Level 5 has started in earnest!

Now that Daughter #2 is back at school and her Shingles has settled down Daughter #1 has decided that it is her turn... she doesn't have Shingles thank heavens but she has a bad cold and has decided that a day of staying in bed and laying her head low is a good idea. I always enjoy having the company of the Daughters at home... even if they are feeling rotten.  It is nice that we have good relationships so that we can enjoy each other even at our worst.

First snow got many groans and sighs of dismay this morning... not how they would act when they were little... when they were little we would barrel out through the door and make snowballs and snowmen and kick the snow about.... but now we are beyond those days. Still, it looks grey and cold and that fireplace and that hot chocolate are beckoning .... I think I'll go now and tomorrow I will be writing about something that has been on my mind lately.... Feminism.... I'm sure you will all be watching with baited breath to read my comments on that! (snork!)

See ya'll tomorrow.

Hmmm... Not Sure About This Look

This new look that I have for my blog is something that I'm absolutely not sure about... It makes me think that Ye Olde Batt is about health... which it is not . absolutely! Will continue to work on this so hang in there.... new looks coming as I work on trying to change the face of the Batt.

Doctors, Doctors, Everywhere And Not A One To See You

Hallowe'en certainly didn't turn out at all the way I expected. I went to bed on Sunday with the beginnings of a UTI. By 2 a.m. I really wasn't sure how I was going to get through the rest of the night. Yesterday, was spent in Emergency (since we don't have a full time doctor here in HH anymore), clinics and pharmacies. I really wasn't one of my more thrilling Hallowe'en days. Teapot and the Daughters went to the annual fireworks without me since I could barely keep my head up once the painkillers and antibiotics kicked in. I feel much better today!

One of the things that encouraged Teapot and I to move here to HH was the fact that there was a full time doctor and a fully working clinic. With two small children at the time of our move here, we felt that we really wanted a doctor in case of emergencies.  I do have to say that we are not the type of parents who will call out a doctor for just any old thing.  The only time I have called out a doctor was when Daughter #1 was having issues with her heath in grade one (so many years ago) and she ended up in the hospital twice. Teapot called out the doctor after hours when he had appendicitis. So we are certainly not ones to call the doctor for every ache pain and high temperature. So moving here seemed like a good choice since we had a doctor.

With the slowly declining population of our community, we have noticed that our medical services are on the decline.  About four years ago we lost our full time doctor and though our community advertised for a full time doctor we have not been able to find one. Instead, one of the clinics in FSJ (a nearby community) were willing to send a doctor out here to the boonies four days a week.  It meant that 1. there was a different doctor here each day and you never knew who you were going to see. 2. There was no one here at night.... ever. 3.You were at the whim of the weather or other unseen factors that would pull the doctor away from coming to our clinic... and do you know how in demand doctors can be? It was a very short period of time before we realized just how lousy a situation we were in.   That was the first year they were controlling the clinic.... four years ago. Slowly our medical services have declined to the point that we are lucky when the weeks go by and we have coverage by a doctor more than one day a week.  It is dreadful!

I'm one of those people who believes that nurse practitioners are the way of the future. We have to I think if we are going to be able to expect high quality medical services. It is not a step down....

Last week when Daughter #2 was diagnosed with Shingles.... well we already were 80% sure that she had shingles... our visit to the doctor was just to confirm and to get a prescription of anti-viral medication. Then yesterday I knew (98% sure) I had a UTI (I've had lots of them before) all I needed was to have it confirmed and have a prescription of antibiotics given to me.  Both of these things could have been taken care of by a nurse practitioner. I can't understand what the negativity towards nurse practitioners is.

After I got to the clinic yesterday (in the other community) I discovered that the doctor that I was supposed to see was called out to the emergency and I was going to have to come back later in the day for an appointment with a different doctor. As long as I got to see someone I was OK, though I didn't really know how I was going to pass the several hours in between waiting to see the doctor, but I managed and was really happy to receive the prescription that I knew I needed.

Anyway, part of living in a small community is putting up with strange situations when it comes to medical services, dental services... etc. I do know that if I ever have a heart attack then it is highly unlikely that I will live. The chances of having it on a day when there are medical services here in town is about 2%.  I also know that if I ever get cancer I will have to leave this community to get treatment. Pray God that my appendix don't burst. And if I have a stroke then I'm hooped.  For all those young ladies who have birthing issues I hope they have long dragged out labours because they will at least have time to get to the hospital.

A few years ago there was a really bad accident here in town.  A young man lost his life because he was driving (drunk) and hit a telephone/light pole. He died at the scene of the accident, but the passenger he was carrying lived.... only because the doctor who lived at the time in residence here in HH was called out to the medical clinic late at night and was able to stabilise him before he was transported to the hospital.

What will happen with our medical situation here in this wee small community is anyone's guess...  I hate to think about it honestly.

Another day... is passing by and I need to go get some work done. A little spinning on that level 5 homework which I have fallen behind on in the last week of cleaning.