The collision between the top-down and bottom-up views of history is a collision of Leviathans.
— Read on book.thenetworkstate.com/
Author Archives: theunretired
Who’s drawn to fascism? Postwar study of authoritarianism makes a comeback | CBC Radio
A groundbreaking study conducted in the wake of the Second World War by a group of scholars rocked the academic world when it was published in 1950 — but fell out of favour. Now a new generation of scholars is reviving the lessons of The Authoritarian Personality to understand the politics of our time.
— Read on www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/who-s-drawn-to-fascism-postwar-study-of-authoritarianism-makes-a-comeback-1.6403074
How to ditch ‘fomo’ and foster ‘jomo’ – the joy of missing out
A prerequisite for jomo is to learn to value our limited time and how it is spent. In doing so, we create opportunities to experience the joy of being present. We value what we have, rather than worrying about what we may be missing out on
— Read on theconversation.com/how-to-ditch-fomo-and-foster-jomo-the-joy-of-missing-out-200400
Has social media had its day in the sunshine?
The Phenomenon and Psychology of a Book Hangover | Book Riot
Why do our heads get stuck in books long after the story has ended? I set out to find some answers to the book hangover phenomenon.
— Read on bookriot.com/psychology-of-a-book-hangover/
oh my God. Someone finally names this. I feel so much better. 😄😄😄
Nature Photo Challenge: Patterns
Here a few patterns from my portfolio for the nature photo challenge. The bigger challenge was using my iPad to import the photos.












God, State, Network | The Network State
The collision between the top-down and bottom-up views of history is a collision of Leviathans. — Read on book.thenetworkstate.com/
Who’s drawn to fascism? Postwar study of authoritarianism makes a comeback | CBC Radio
A groundbreaking study conducted in the wake of the Second World War by a group of scholars rocked the academic world when it was published in 1950 — but fell out of favour. Now a new generation of scholars is reviving the lessons of The Authoritarian Personality to understand the politics of our time. —…
How to ditch ‘fomo’ and foster ‘jomo’ – the joy of missing out
A prerequisite for jomo is to learn to value our limited time and how it is spent. In doing so, we create opportunities to experience the joy of being present. We value what we have, rather than worrying about what we may be missing out on — Read on theconversation.com/how-to-ditch-fomo-and-foster-jomo-the-joy-of-missing-out-200400 Has social media had its…
The Phenomenon and Psychology of a Book Hangover | Book Riot
Why do our heads get stuck in books long after the story has ended? I set out to find some answers to the book hangover phenomenon. — Read on bookriot.com/psychology-of-a-book-hangover/ oh my God. Someone finally names this. I feel so much better. 😄😄😄
Norovirus. Not to be dismissed quickly
I recently came down with a bug 🐜 of some kind. It might have been food poisoning or it might have been norvovirus. It’s the first time I have been sick since 2018 and it’s the first time I have had a stomach bug since living in North Africa in 1975. So it took me…
Volunteering- Be very careful about what you choose.
I’ve had quite a few volunteer experiences since I retired in 2017 and I am here to report on them all. I did a post on volunteering when I first retired. Nothing like real life experience to see how things work. Baby boomers are not your grandparents volunteers who beavered away at rummage sales and…
Going back in time.. to the 1500’s …
Reviews of ancestry and DNA websites. My initial curiosity in ancestry was tweaked by a search for a great grandparent who was a notable person in New Brunswick, according to stories from my family. I then discovered a family tree in Geneanet that detailed some of my ancestor’s life. From there, I become curious about…
Book Tracking Apps. What is your favourite?
Ages ago, I used Goodreads to track my reading. Then, I decided it wasn’t working for me and closed my account. I had a spreadsheet and that was all … Book Tracking Apps
Cook books reviewed by bloggers
New publications serve up classics and more, with flair! I don’t know about you, but I am one of those people who loves to read a cookbook from cover… Constantly Cooking’s 2022 cookbook gift guide Another bloggers pick: https://thebackfenceblog.wordpress.com/2022/09/10/373-cookbooks-and-counting/ The cookbook of the month club. Recipes tested by friends: https://cookbookamonth.wordpress.com A review of Mediterranean cookbooks:…
Norovirus. Not to be dismissed quickly
I recently came down with a bug 🐜 of some kind. It might have been food poisoning or it might have been norvovirus. It’s the first time I have been sick since 2018 and it’s the first time I have had a stomach bug since living in North Africa in 1975. So it took me by surprise. It was brutal. 7 days later I am feeling normal again. Why am I sharing this? Because I did not find information on line to be helpful. The information I read said it would be over in 2 or 3 days.
Here’s what I found to be helpful in order of helpfulness. The vomiting passed after about 8 hours and the diarrhea after 12 hours leaving me totally drained
Pepto Bismal while active vomiting and diarrhoea
Sleep. All day if necessary. For the whole week
Take Tums, especially in the evening.
Electrolyte replacement tabs lime flavour as I didn’t feel like eating anything for about 3 days. Nothing appealed to me. But the taste of these were tolerable. Even tea, coffee or soft drinks didn’t appeal to me. I did find a berry blend fruit juice that became appealing by day 4.
My first meal was 2 Coffeecrisp that I had in the fridge. Very satisfying.
Day 3 start eating with porridge… I was given cream of wheat as a child.
Day 4 Move up to plain toast and jam. I felt well enough to do a social outing for a few hours.
Day 5 try some tomato soup with crackers or some mashed potatoes and gravy with a little bit of roast beef
By day 6 I could tolerate regular cereal and more roast beef and mashed potatoes.
By day 7 I could tolerate soft drinks and a bit of coffee, more tomato soup and some sourdough bread. By day 7 I could stay awake all day and do a long walk. My sleep last night was disturbed by a homeless person who was smoking in a stairwell of the parkade and set off the fire-alarm. Such a waste of everyone’s time and energy, but this situation is not going away anytime soon here.
I did get out for a walk almost every day that was beneficial to get some air in my lungs. I was cold all week so I turned up the heat and used an electric blanket on the sofa during pm naps. I probably had a slight fever but not according to the thermometer. My heart rate was above 70.
What I didn’t find helpful: ginger tea. What I didn’t use: Gatorade. I don’t like sweet drinks.
I hope no one get this bug but apparently Novovirus is going around. It could have been food poisoning as I had my third serving of my home cooked chicken. However there have been no reports of food outbreaks so I am assuming novovirus. Since I haven’t had COVID I assumed I was invincible. Now the question is where could I have picked up norovirus? The mystery continues.
Volunteering- Be very careful about what you choose.
I’ve had quite a few volunteer experiences since I retired in 2017 and I am here to report on them all. I did a post on volunteering when I first retired. Nothing like real life experience to see how things work. Baby boomers are not your grandparents volunteers who beavered away at rummage sales and church teas. Many BB’s had responsible jobs and know how to manage people and things. BB’s have more knowledge and expertise than those who are hiring them as volunteers. This can be intimidating for young volunteer managers.
Clinical Trial at UBC
My first volunteer gig was being part of a clinical trial at UBC. The idea was to test an iphone App called BrainHQ to see if it improved your memory. There were already many studies on this app so I am not sure what was new about this study. The study involved two groups, one that used the app and one that did not. Sadly I was in the group that did not get the app until the end of the 6 week study. Of course you want to know the results but so far they have not published the results. There were many cool things about this volunteer gig. If you are interested in participating in clinical trials, some are online. Here is the link.
- I could walk because I was close to Vancouver General Hospital’
- We attended an activity three times a week for 6 weeks that included some exercise, games, spreakers and conversation.
- I got tested on a whole lot of cognitive function tests and they gave you the results at the end so you can see if you are loosing it.. or by how much you are loosing it compared to people your age. The testing included an MRI which is why I took one point off.
Rating
- Fun factor 7/10
- New friends 0/10
- Worthwhile use of my time 10/1
- Treated with respect 9/10
- Overall Rating 9/10
BC Science center tried to recruit me to stand in the lobby and click a clicker to count the people coming through. You much be joking.
ESL tutoring
The next volunteer gig was assisting at English as a second language classes at Mosaic in Vancouver which is a huge organization. I have recently recertified as a teacher in British Columbia so I thought I could get some recent experience. I was supposed to be a teachers assistant to the real ESL teacher. I was assigned to a class with about 10 people who had close to no English comprehension and were from multiple different countries and from ages 20 – 90. One elderly person was deaf and cognitively impaired. Another person had some learning disorders. There were about 5 people who had potential to learn English. My job was to help students when they were doing small group work. This will rank as my worst volunteer experience ever.
- Long bus trip to the classroom.
- Waste of my time
- Was told I was not to make any suggestions to the 25 year old tutor.
Rating
- Fun factor -1/10
- New friends 0/10
- Worthwhile use of my time 1/10
- Treated with respect 1/10
- Overall rating 1/10
Review of the literature on non- symptomatic Covid 19.
I volunteered for this as my real job had involved a lot of health care research and it thought this would be a good use of my talents. I was assigned and the question and wrote a paper on the topic for a group at UBC. This was early 2019 and there were not many papers on the topic so it was rather a short job but interesting. I have been very interested in the whole COVID 19 process. About 2 years later a received a lovely thank you letter from UBC that I am thinking about framing. I was invited to an online think tank on Zoom but there were about 30 people talking over each other.. OMG. Won’t do that again I said to myself. So I decided I had had enough of this project. It was overwhelming. It was my first experience with grandstanding.
Rating
- Fun factor -9/10
- New friends 0/10
- Worthwhile use of my time 10/10
- Treated with respect 7/10
- Overall rating 7/10
Immunization clinics
Fast forward to Covid 19. I volunteered at the immunization clinics for Vancouver Island Health Authority in Courtenay. I was responsible to herding people through the lines to the nurses and making sure everyone was feeling comfortable with the process. Then I would site in the after care space chatting with people. I feel that this has paid all my debts to society. It was very well organized. I was hard to stand for 4 hours. But I enjoyed chatting with the wide variety of people coming through the clinic. The big surprise at the end was the goody bag given to all the volunteers at the end include many gift cards and a bottle of wine. Who knew????
Rating
- Fun factor -9/10
- New friends 0/10
- Worthwhile use of my time 10/10
- Treated with respect 9/10
- Overall Rating 9/10
Habitat for Humanity online auction
I volunteered to research objects donated to the Restore to see if they are valuable enough to put in their online auction. This involved going into a dark and dusty closet can pawing through cartons of old stuff. Stuff included pseudo vintage snow shows, copper tea post, vintage figurines and other strange things that I could not identify. Since this was a new job, I set up a process to do the online search and set up a file with the results. The Restore is a busy spot and space it at a premium. It was interesting to see why kind of thing people donate. This was a surprisingly time consuming activity. I went to a few meetings. Not my cup of tea.
Rating
- Fun factor -0/10
- New friends 0/10
- Worthwhile use of my time 5/10
- Treated with respect 2/10
- Overall rating 5/10
While on Hornby Island I did some shifts sitting in the courtyard among the businesses selling tickets for a quilt raffle. This is the ultimate meet and greet job. You get to chat with everyone passing through Hornby Island for all over the world. What could be more fun?
Rating
- Fun factor -10/10
- New friends 1/10
- Worthwhile use of my time 5/10
- Treated with respect 9/10
- Overall rating 9/10
So what lessons have I learned?
- Volunteer work can be physically demanding so be sure you have the stamina to do the job.
- Do you like the person who is hiring you?
- Do you thrive on chaos. Some do! Not me.
- For me it is important to have some interest in the work
- I like doing meet and greet and I am good at it. And it makes everyone feel good.
-
Its hard to find a fun and interesting volunteer job.
- Have written job descriptions for volunteers, including the number of hours per week and the length of the volunteer commitment.
- Make it clear who the volunteer reports to.
- Have a schedule available from day 1 unless the job is on-call.
- Have a short job orientation including a tour of the premises and introductions to others.
- Avoid the requirements for criminal record checks if possible. It’s a hassle. Just because you can do it on the computer doesn’t make it any easier. I have an existing criminal record check as part of my teacher certification, had one done in 2021 to work in the vaccination clinic, and then was asked to do it again in 2022 to volunteer for island health. I was just asked to do another one to volunteer to teach Ukrainian refugees. That’s three times in three years. The RCMP has to process all these requests.
- I did appreciate the gift cards I got from one volunteer gig. I am not into volunteer appreciation events. Call me a curmudgeon. 😊😊😊.
-
What has been your favourite volunteer gig and why? Or why haven’t you volunteered?
artwork is by ALPIN KELLEY on Hornby Island
Going back in time.. to the 1500’s …
Gallery

This gallery contains 9 photos.
Reviews of ancestry and DNA websites. My initial curiosity in ancestry was tweaked by a search for a great grandparent who was a notable person in New Brunswick, according to stories from my family. I then discovered a family tree … Continue reading
Book Tracking Apps. What is your favourite?
Ages ago, I used Goodreads to track my reading. Then, I decided it wasn’t working for me and closed my account. I had a spreadsheet and that was all …
Cook books reviewed by bloggers
New publications serve up classics and more, with flair! I don’t know about you, but I am one of those people who loves to read a cookbook from cover…
Another bloggers pick: https://thebackfenceblog.wordpress.com/2022/09/10/373-cookbooks-and-counting/
The cookbook of the month club. Recipes tested by friends: https://cookbookamonth.wordpress.com
A review of Mediterranean cookbooks: https://deleciousfood.com/6-best-mediterranean-cookbooks-of-2022-healthy-food-cookbooks/
So what are your favourite cookbooks?
or have you given up on cookbooks in favour of on line recipes?