Climate Change is the topic for sure this summer as wildfire after wildfire rages across western Canada and down into the Maritimes. We have had so many smoke days now it has dwarfed two years ago although the swirling smoke that we had two years ago has not returned. That at least is a good sign.
Cleaning all accomplished and the two floor day is always the hardest although I must admit I am handling it better and better. Getting rid of that big overstuffed chair in the basement was a good move - saved me maybe ten minutes of vacuuming it off and another five or ten minutes of managing it as it is big and heavy. The main floor will not change at all really; there is nothing to downsize there as it is pretty barebones and is both our television area and our exercise room with a stationary bicycle and a rowing machine as well as yoga mats and weights. The books are really the big things; all of those were donated as Edward requested. We kept the children's books and my books which do not amount to a huge number.
We bought (Edward actually) a lot of remembrances back from Europe and the British Isles on our seven trips there from 2001 to 2016. From refusing initially and then being very nervous to fly all the way across the ocean to wanting to go every year Edward's view of traveling changed drastically in that time frame. Eventually it was me that tired of going and I remain somewhat negative about a lot of traveling but then I am nearly 80 years of age and I feel I have seen all that I wanted to see even if it was with my less than perfect eyes. Now I would see so much better I was thinking until I picked up my letter and discovered that the only real new part to my eyes is the depth of vision; I remain far sighted although I do not wear my glasses except for reading and driving (I have now come to the conclusion that I do need my corrective lens and I suspect when I test on Friday that will prove it to me) although the optometrist said I did not need glasses to drive in actuality he did not put it into the letter so I am left to assume that that was just a pipe dream and personally I abhor pipe dreams!
I really do not mind wearing glasses as it keeps bugs out of your eyes although I admit I only wear them when I am reading or driving now. It is nice wandering around the house seeing everything 3D now but I wear sun glasses outside all the time and probably will all year round. Having cataracts again is undesirable. I used to wonder why people were so thrilled with 3D pictures when I was a child; they all were just flat really to me. The marvels of modern medicine in our lives.
Prayers ongoing for the children of Gaza and the children of Israel - protect the children of Gaza from their elders dear God. May their lives be better as the future dawns and Hamas becomes a thing of the past - a philosophy that hates the Jewish people but has absolutely no grounds in actual fact. The Jewish people have done nothing to the Palestinian people. Life has to change for Palestinian adults; they need to see that their lands were stripped from them in the same manner as land was stripped from the Israelis in 1948 by the United Nations (the world in fact as it is the people of the world that are the United Nations). They got a nice piece of property (Gaza) that could be full of plants and life but they chose philosophy and it got them nowhere. They chose terror and murder of Israeli children in their schoolyards when I was a child; it got them nowhere. What will get them somewhere is hard work creating a country full of plant life and animal life so that starvation does not look them in the face. The children of Gaza did not need to die; they could have brought them here and into other countries willing to take them in (just their DNA was needed to return them to their families). The Palestinians chose their path when Israel was invaded on 7 Oct 2023. Hopefully we will now see an end to this; Hamas gone figuratively (as a philosophy) and physically as no one wants that kind of people in their country or next door to them.
I continue to be approving of the methods of our current government with regard to trade deals. Slow and steady working our way through any difficulties as we move forward diversifying our trade and restoring our industries lost to free trade over the past fifty years give or take. In Europe free trade appears to work very well with small countries dealing with much larger countries and the small countries do not lose their industries. We must be very cautious in the future to maintain and retain our industries (if an industry is considered essential prevent it being bought or over-run by non-Canadians and then the Americans who bought them up or outcompeted them and they closed them in some cases didn't want to pay proper union wages in their own country and took that business offshore so they could greedily make more money and destroyed American industry in their own country). Good to see the Trade Mission in Mexico; I do enjoy having the Mexican vegetables in the winter here - it is so refreshing, as our stored crops become somewhat mundane, to have fresh vegetables every week on shopping day. Fresh fruit and vegetables came north from the United States and Mexico in the past and perhaps that will return again from the United States (we continue buying Mexican food at our stores) when there is a new administration - no ideas on that. Certainly miss Florida oranges. One does feel sad for one's American cousins struggling in some of the areas hit by flooding and fires with no government support although there was an article that the present administration might help them. Time will tell.
Drinking tea and doing solitaire puzzles; a quiet day today after two heavy days of cleaning.
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