Wow 2020!

January and days are already getting longer. It's surprising how quickly the angle of the sun changes at this time of year. Maybe all the more noticeable because November and December are low light months. I'm not into NY resolutions but I was going to try to do the Year Compass instead I thought I'd do a look back and...change the name of the blog (with the same intermittent posting😁)

I moved to Ft. Mac in 1981. There were no strippers allowed in bars (weird when in Vancouver you could see strippers after 3pm) and they closed at 1 a.m. (again weird because I was used to later closing). Fruit availability was pretty well restricted to red delicious apples and oranges and maybe bananas with seasonal stuff. I am reminded of this because at Christmas there was a complaint about how expensive blackberries are. In December. In an area they don't naturally grow. I reminded them blackberries only recently became available non-locally.

When I went back to school I made the financial decision to attend SAIT because tuition was half that of BCIT. Living with parents vs. living in Calgary (a fake friendly city with yucky weather). SAIT is a great school. Speaking of schools I didn't get (and still don't get) the public funding of the Catholic school system. What a waste of money to have two school boards for public education - not to mention the physical infrastructure and discriminatory practices of the Catholic system. Still, people seem to accept it.

My first (and second) real job was in heavy oil research where I was part of a team looking at reducing the effects of pollution. Funding for research was really drying up by the mid-90s. I guess the oil companies had committed to the extract, profit and run away business model they were working towards in the 80s. I would wonder where they would get innovation if they didn't do the preliminary work because oilsand/heavy oil is a Canadian thing. Silly me, at the time I also thought the interest rates banks publicized were non-negotiable.

I was here through the Klein years. The worse was how the nurses union was treated. They actually worked to reduce their workforce by the mandated amount then got reduced by the same amount again because it was about government making the decisions.

I was astounded there were nurses who voted UCP in 2019.

A few years ago, it came to the attention of the rest of Canada that Albertans have an average pay 25% higher than other provinces. At the time I thought - this is the lost wages of the rest of Canada as core provincial economies collapsed resulting in unemployment and wage stagnation. First QC with the separatist movement, then MB as Ag shifted; ON as manufacturing shifted and now AB as sustainable/renewable energy gains traction at the same time our major buyer (the US) became a net exporter.

We are lucky so far - except about our house value collapsing just before we wanted to retire and move provinces. Where we live there are a lot of services for the less fortunate and the effect of AB austerity will be mostly through city taxes, vehicle registration and such. Luckily we took advantage of the carbon levy to install solar since electricity costs are no longer sheltered. What will the future bring?