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Post by mich64 on Sept 14, 2019 2:04:11 GMT
Questa, we basically have the same Medicare for all system as the UK and Oz, but indeed gaps remain in terms of dentistry and hearing. Also eyecare as well Lagatta? We have to now pay $100.00 for an eyecare visit that used to be included in our OHIP, has that changed for you in Quebec? Is that why you all go around saying "Eh" all the time? Goodness Bixa, some Canadians really do say it often! I never realized how much until my brain injury. I am sure it varies across the country, but here in Northern Ontario, it is used frequently.
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Post by bixaorellana on Sept 14, 2019 2:39:52 GMT
Oh, that's funny, Mich! I thought it was just a stereotype. I have been teasing my friend Charlie about returning to Mexico "talking funny" because she's visiting her family in Calgary right now & posted on facebook about eating poutine. That is interesting that you noticed it after your injury. I guess your brain was telling you it is something that doesn't really make sense, like so many regional expressions around the world.
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Post by lagatta on Sept 14, 2019 14:35:06 GMT
It seems to elicit approval or assent: www.lexico.com/en/definition/eh Hein? in French, but not specific to Canadian francophones; used as much in other francophone places. Wiki gives Huh or Huh? as a US-English equivalent, but I see that as not hearing or understanding well, or perhaps surprise - I'm sure others here will remember other uses. It is common in many parts of the UK, and also in some parts of the Irish Republic, if I recall: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eh
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Post by lagatta on Sept 14, 2019 14:40:35 GMT
I don't know but have to check it out, as I need new glasses.
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Post by kerouac2 on Sept 24, 2019 6:09:29 GMT
September 23rd is the day with the most births in France. Two reasons for this: New Year's celebrations + reduced contraceptive vigilance at that time.
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Post by kerouac2 on Oct 17, 2019 20:26:44 GMT
The concept of breakfast being the most important meal of the day was the invention of John Harvey Kellogg, a Seventh Day Adventist born in a sanatorium. He believed that masturbation was the greatest evil, which bland healthy foods like corn flakes could prevent. That got the ball rolling. Then the pork and poultry lobbies promoted the concept of bacon and eggs, and the damage was done. Moralization and health fears have reprogrammed quite a bit of western society.
Luckily most of the world never fell into this trap.
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Post by questa on Oct 18, 2019 1:33:12 GMT
September 23rd is the day with the most births in France. Two reasons for this: New Year's celebrations + reduced contraceptive vigilance at that time. I did my midwifery training in the early 60's in a large remote mining town. Population was 54% Catholic and the rest "other". The busiest month for us by far was always 9 months after Easter, as most families gave "it" up for Lent.
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Post by Kimby on Oct 18, 2019 1:53:38 GMT
September 23rd is the day with the most births in France. Two reasons for this: New Year's celebrations + reduced contraceptive vigilance at that time. I know a young lady who was born on September 23. Her parents, friends of ours, called her their “hot tub baby”. The spermicidal jelly was washed away in their New Years Eve frolicking.
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Post by Kimby on Oct 18, 2019 12:52:40 GMT
As part of a news story about airline seating, they said the average man had gained 10# and the average woman 7# in the past decade, though airline seat spacing keeps getting tighter. (There are concerns about the difficulty of emergency evacuations in such cramped quarters.) The really shocking factoid: the AVERAGE American woman weighs 170#!!!! My 6’ tall husband doesn’t weigh that much! www.verywellfit.com/average-weight-for-a-woman-statistics-2632138
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Post by whatagain on Oct 18, 2019 15:08:58 GMT
Jeez. I didn't weigh that when in the army and I am 1.835 cm tall.
I learned today that Bruxelles population increased by 240 000 people in 10 years. And that 1 child out 4 in Bruxelles lives in poverty. And we are going to buy F35.
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Post by kerouac2 on Oct 18, 2019 15:19:53 GMT
The population of Paris continues to decline, although it went up very slightly a few years ago.
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Post by kerouac2 on Oct 22, 2019 11:30:01 GMT
70% of the homeless in France have a mobile phone. Now there's something that nobody would have ever predicted in the 20th century.
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Post by lagatta on Oct 22, 2019 13:59:37 GMT
The same site says that three out of four men are obese; however, the study refers to the US, not the world. And the problem is much more serious among older men. I think a lot of people don't recognise that we should (in general) reduce our portion sizes as we age.
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Post by lagatta on Oct 22, 2019 14:41:00 GMT
I knew about Kellogg and "breakfast cereal" (as opposed to oat porridge). I always thought the eggs and bacon were a transatlantic descendant of the "full English", but don't know how or when either began to be served.
Kellogg really was an odd bird, but there were many such sectarian movements in the 19th century (in the US, but not only). Bland, cold food was supposed to discourage sex, and especially masturbation.
I don't eat that, and rarely eggs and bacon (or some other meat) for breakfast, but do confess to finding Italian breakfasts unsatisfactory, except for the coffee. Epecially the soft, often jam-filled cornetti. I do like a bit of protein in the morning.
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Post by Kimby on Oct 22, 2019 16:01:11 GMT
70% of the homeless in France have a mobile phone. Now there's something that nobody would have ever predicted in the 20th century. We are always surprised to see the ubiquity of cell phones in 3rd world countries, till we realized that without infrastructure for land lines it made sense to skip right to cell towers. (In “third world states” like Montana, that isn’t an option, because too many mountains blocking cell signals.)
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Post by questa on Oct 23, 2019 5:40:07 GMT
Right on, Kimby. In Indonesia there was no phone infrastructure and as business away from the main cities increased the government subsidised mobile phones and their use. In the 1990's they suddenly were everywhere, way ahead of the take-up in Oz. I found it funny to see the half-naked 8 year old boys showing the village old men living in their bamboo and thatch huts how to use the phones.
Bali had scanners and printers and fax machines way ahead of what we had here...with a market of a country of two hundred million people all the manufacturers were almost giving the latest stuff away.
Pres. Soeharto had made a huge effort to have an electricity line and one TV set in one point in every village so he could "talk" to his people who gathered around in the meeting place. The power is still a bit dodgy, but the latest in electronics keeps the people entertained.
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Post by kerouac2 on Oct 23, 2019 5:43:31 GMT
By the same token, Africa is way ahead of the developed world in electronic banking services, all done on mobile phones.
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Post by kerouac2 on Nov 1, 2019 5:36:26 GMT
Since it is the season for talking about death, they said on the news today that for cremations, cardboard coffins are not at all ecological, contrary to what one might think. Wooden coffins help with the combustion of the corpse, but cardboard coffins are useless and require much more gas to be used in the oven.
However, cardboard coffins are excellent for traditional burial if you can get over the idea of what is going to quickly happen in the ground.
In any case, it was pointed out that burial is better for the environment than cremation, which goes against all logic and even though most granite for tombstones in Europe is imported from China now.
Finally, old people release much more harmful pollution in a cremation than younger people, because our bodies are full of lots of inert trace elements like arsenic and other bad things that are released into the atmosphere.
Best solution would be not to die at all.
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Post by bixaorellana on Nov 1, 2019 6:36:00 GMT
Well, that is surprising until reading the explanations, which all make sense.
I assume what I read years ago is still true, which is that the the funeral home industry in the US lobbied to so that it's now law that all bodies must have a coffin, even though logically nothing is necessary when the family doesn't attend the cremation, for instance.
That last fact would seem to make the elderly safe from any soylent green solutions which might arise.
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Post by bjd on Nov 1, 2019 7:07:07 GMT
What about Muslims who die in the States? Aren't they buried in shrouds?
I always thought cremations were a way of packing more people into cemeteries rather than taking up ground space with coffins. I'm not sure that I understand why wood is better for burning than cardboard.
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Post by kerouac2 on Nov 1, 2019 11:35:09 GMT
Wood burns longer and at a much higher temperature. Cardboard is gone in 3 minutes, so it doesn't help the cremation at all.
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Post by kerouac2 on Nov 1, 2019 11:38:52 GMT
The latest idea, however, is "recomposing" (official term) -- turning dead bodies into compost. Apparently Washington state is about to authorise this and Belgium is looking into it.
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Post by bjd on Nov 1, 2019 12:27:36 GMT
I just heard something on the radio about all that. They interviewed the mayor of Niort, where there is a "green cemetery", coffins are made of cardboard, there are rules about decomposable things, no chemicals are used to maintain the greenery at the cemetery...They also interviewed a guy who makes cardboard coffins who said business is going up.
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Post by Kimby on Nov 1, 2019 15:44:42 GMT
Cremation with ash scattering would have a very small footprint in terms of land removed from other use, though cemeteries make nice parks (before dark, that is!)
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Post by kerouac2 on Nov 1, 2019 16:03:41 GMT
The trick is to make cremation more ecological.
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Post by whatagain on Nov 1, 2019 17:43:36 GMT
We have to have an inner coffin made of zinc - or is it an urban legend ? Must confess that when I bought a coffin I didn't pay attention.
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Post by bixaorellana on Nov 1, 2019 18:18:02 GMT
At the time most people are buying a coffin, they are probably also in the throes of grief. What a horrible thing to have to do. Apparently there are quite a few people who make or buy coffins for themselves well ahead of time. To serve them, there are companies which specialize in coffins which have regular home uses before their final use for the deceased: blogs.publishersweekly.com/blogs/shelftalker/?p=1878Also, if you google "wicker coffins" you'll get tons of hits from all over the world.
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Post by bjd on Nov 1, 2019 19:18:53 GMT
If the inner coffin is made of zinc, then you couldn't use it for cremation, could you?
My father-in-law organized everything beforehand so when he died, it was all paid for and organized so no decisions had to be made by his children. They just called the company in question who took care of everything.
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Post by questa on Nov 2, 2019 0:41:16 GMT
My son #2 has decided to leave his body to forensic science, specifically the time line for decay and absorbing into a bush environment. The Govt Research Dept has a very large allotment of fully fenced bush land. He told me that the cadavers are observed hourly, daily, weekly etc. Because of the nature of bush deaths...lost in a huge bush or desert, victim of foul play...It is often months or years before they are found. The information from my son's data will help change this. He is in his element in the bush and likes the idea of returning to Earth this way.
The Brain Bank in Adelaide has requested that, when I have finished using them, my brain, spinal cord and cerebro-spinal fluid be rushed to them for examination. Part of the Parkinson's research...I am more interesting when I am dead!
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Post by Kimby on Nov 2, 2019 1:10:35 GMT
Kudos to both of you!
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