I am supportive of people’s right to live with dignity and respect, and I agree that asking in front of a waiting room is undesirable (I have had that same thought in other waiting rooms, too), but I feel like a medical analysis setting is one in which biology (sex) actually does take precedence over identity (gender), because that has implications what and how things are analyzed.

That said, transgender persons taking hormones will have much greater variance in ranges of everything. I think it’s sensible to have additional gender markers in addition to sex.

Yes, I am in Ontario. Hmm, I should just go somewhere else to get the Covid shot. Thanks.

I went to my local pharmacy and asked for both, but the pharmacist would only give me the flu shot. He said I was too young to need the Covid shot… Which he gave me last year.

I genuinely snort-laughed at this 😂

Well, I mean, can you do better than Justin Trudeau?

Okay, I know you said not touristy stuff, but I have to say I absolutely love Pocket Planet (formerly known as Little Canada). I suspect it’s more fun if you’ve done at least some travel around the country’s larger cities, so you can feel nostalgic about your past travels, but it’s just super cool to see how the model makers have made things run/work. Trains and cars, of course, but things like the tide going in and out, the Skydome opening and closing. And maybe you’d love it if you want to travel across Canada and havent had the opportunity to yet.

… Is Canada getting the Brexit that was promised but never materialized?

She was a US PR who had been willingly living in the US for 14 years. Her Canadian citizenship is only an incidental fact that has no relation to the story; she could have been from anywhere. This was not a political move against Canada the way Spavor and Kovrig were. It was very unfortunate, and we should be sad about her death, and sad about the state of the US, but this is not the doing of any party, government, policy, or law in Canada. This was done solely by the US. They created this situation, they pushed her to her death. If you can’t see that, you’re either incredibly disingenuous or stupid.

I don’t see why LPC feds should care? I mean, beyond basic human decency. This is US policies and actions applied to US PRs. It had nothing to do with Canada or Canadian laws. Why don’t you leave the blame where it rightly lies, with the US and its unconstitutional gulag?

You’re right that interactions are not hugs, but they create friendships with people with whom it is both socially acceptable and emotionally healthy to hug. If you don’t hug your friends, you’re missing out in life.

How we got here is the world kinda sucks right now, and people want to blame the most convenient person, even if a lot of things are not municipal issues. It’s like the idiots who went to protest provincial health care measures at Parliament.

Well, as I said, I’m not actually interested in getting the worker in trouble. The employer, however, is taking advantage of multiple refugee and immigrant “employees” in various ways, this the most provable. I put employee in quotes because the others are being (under) paid by irregular means; meanwhile, the employer siphons money for their own self.

This happened to a young man I knew who was trying to get into HVAC. He had to start all over again and find someone new who would actually sign his hours. He eventually did, but I could just add easily imagine if it didn’t happen.

Essentially what you said, but I’d like to phrase it the way a counselor said it to me when I was under a lot of stress at work. Stress is the gap between our expectation and reality. Say you expect to be/produce/achieve/whatever 100%, but you are only capable of achieving 80%. The stress you experience is that 20% gap. Change your expectations to meet your reality and that stress will be resolved.

Now, it may still be that others might still want or expect that 20% from you, but that’s their problem and their stress. If you cannot produce it anyway (which created your stress in the first place), existing in the stress-gap clearly won’t make you able to do it anyway.

I have an American friend who is terminally ill, and it’s possible I may never see them again 😞

Not medical advice, but a suggestion of easy things to ask your doctor to check for if you have insomnia, and inexpensive to address if they are the culprit: taking taking B12 and D supplements gave me (back?) my ability to sleep. I’ve never slept better in my life.

Boox has 10.3" and 13.3" models: https://shop.boox.com/collections/all-products/13-3 The 13.3 would be closest to A4 (assuming that’s what you meant, A4 or 8.5x11). They run Android, you can install other reader apps like Kindle, Kobo, Libby. You can load PDFs by USB (which I do). There was a browser interface which I’d tried and it worked, but I just don’t use it. No idea if it’s still available. The built-in reading app can mark up epubs the same as PDFs. I purchased a Wacom stylus that has a side button for the eraser function because the original it comes with has the eraser on the top. I didn’t like having to flip the stylus over.

I have a predecessor 13.3" model, the Max Lumi, which is no longer available, but I am still fairly pleased with it. I’d gotten mine for the purpose of splitscreening a document on one side and notebook on the other side, to take notes for school. If I were to buy again now, I would go for the slightly smaller 10.3 size to be more portable, but unlikely to use spiltscreen. I would also opt for colour (which was not yet an option when I bought mine.)

Hmm, I see what you’re putting down. I may have to revise my thoughts on the matter. Thanks.

While I agree those ladies were a bunch of loonies, I don’t think the test is supposed to be predictive (this is how you will be), rather descriptive (this is how you are).

Although I’ve had this same argument with people over the function of dictionaries being descriptive (this is how words are used) rather than prescriptive (this is how you should use words).

FYI, the wait for processing is now years-long, due to the large influx of applications and the lack of foresight to increase staffing to manage that. Also, if you don’t already have the documentation to prove who your grandfather is, his citizenship, and who you are in relation to him, archives across the country have been inundated with requests for this kind of genealogical information, and they, too, are under-resource to handle it. (And not only so, but arts, culture, and heritage institutions have had budget slashed all across the country, so there are actually fewer people now to handle these requests.)