Did you know that Ottawa’s anti-idling by-law, which came into effect on September 1st, 2007, is now being enforced? In a nutshell, if the temperature is between 5 C and 27 C, including the windchill and humidex, respectively, you are not allowed to idle your vehicle for more than 3 minutes in a 60 minute period and someone has to be in the vehicle if it is idling. You’re only allowed to idle your vehicle during extreme temperatures when the vehicle is occupied. If you’re not in it, it can’t be idling. Among the exemptions, which include emergency vehicles, buses while passengers are getting on or off and farm vehicles, are hybrid vehicles and vehicles that “eliminate the emission of green house gases and criteria air contaminants during the idling phase of operation”. (There are some exceptions for people with documented medical conditions, too.)

The daytime temperatures in Ottawa over the next few days are forecast to be as high as 10 C. If it’s not too windy, we may well hear about the first fine being issued to someone idling their car when they shouldn’t.

Only a few hours remain in 2007, so I thought I’d take a moment and look back at the last year as I experienced it.

I did a fair bit of travelling in 2007, most of it for work. During the year I visited Toronto a couple of times, Halifax (work), Sturgeon Falls (work), Sudbury (play) for a few hours on the Sturgeon Falls trip, Miami Beach (play), Winnipeg (work) and Edmonton (work). In fact, between mid-October and early-December I boarded 16 different flights, and passed through Toronto’s Pearson Airport (YYZ) four weeks in a row. I also passed through airports in Montreal and Calgary in the course of doing these trips. And, I think I’m missing a couple of trips from this list.

Work-wise, I was successful in a generic competition at work that saw me move from being in a technical position to that of a research analyst. This was a big move and I’m still getting used to it, even though I’ve had this new job for a couple of months now. Fortunately, though I changed jobs, I did not have to change the group of people I work with.

According to my records, I went geocaching 29 days in the year and in every month except March and August, with April and October being the two months with the highest number of finds. Overall, I found 119 caches, the most recent one yesterday evening. I went geocaching in Ontario, Quebec, Halifax, Winnipeg and Edmonton. (I was too busy lying on the beach in Miami Beach to do any caching.)

My friends Ken & Margaret got married in June and I was the best man at the wedding. The guys took Ken away for a weekend of golfing-and-other-activities-that-shall-not-be-spoken-of. The day of the wedding, we went trap shooting before taking Ken off to be married.

During the summer I did a lot (for me) of amateur radio. I spurred on the Manotick Amateur Radio Group to run special event station VC3R for a couple of months to celebrate the 175th anniversary of the Rideau Canal and its inscription on the UNESCO World Heritage Site List. We operated at several locks over the summer and had a lot of fun doing it.

I didn’t get out scuba diving this year, but I did join GoodLife Fitness through work and I’ve gone to the climbing gym about once a week and I’ve lost a fair bit of weight since the end of February. 🙂 I also took up golfing in 2007 and am looking forward to it in 2008.

To help offset the benefits of being less of a couch potato, I bought a Nintendo Wii a couple of months ago. It’s the first gaming system I’ve owned since the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) I was given years ago and I’m having a lot of fun with it. In addition to the games, it offers all sorts of nifty things.

Overall, 2007 was a positive year.

As of 01:08 Eastern (06:08 UT), it ceased being Autumn and officially started being Winter. The days are now getting longer rather than shorter, which is happy news for everyone who suffers from seasonal affective disorder.
In days gone by, the Norse celebrated Yule from December 21st through January. Huge logs called Yule logs were were burned until they went out, which could take as long as 12 days. As long as the log was burning, the festivities carried on.

If you were a cow, however, you probably didn’t look forward to the winter solstice because this was a popular time to slaughter cows — it saved having to feed them. On the upside (for everyone except the cows) people had a supply of fresh meat — a rarity in the times before refrigerators.

Canada’s newest satellite, RADARSAT-2, was successfully launched earlier today aboard a Soyuz rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

RADARSAT-2 is the next generation of RADARSAT-1, Canada’s synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging satellite that was launched in November 1995. At 12 years of age, RADARSAT-1 has exceeded its original 5-year lifespan by at least 140%, which is very impressive for any satellite.

RADARSAT-1 provides high-quality imagery of the Earth that is generally unaffected by adverse weather, cloud-cover or nighttime. The largest user is probably the Canadian Ice Service, which uses the data to produce ice prediction maps and guide ships in the Arctic. Other uses of RADARSAT-1 imagery include environmental monitoring, hydrology, geology and forestry.

Congratulations to the Canadian Space Agency on a successful launch!

Please stop for a minute this morning and remember those who have died so that the rest of us have our peace and freedom. Without them the world be a much different place than it is today.

To them and their families I say thank you.

So, it’s Wednesday, October 10th, 2007. That means that if you’re a registered voter in the Province of Ontario and haven’t vote yet, you haven’t done your civic duty. If you have already voted, thank you.

Depending on where in the province you live, you probably have at least three or four candidates to pick from. How you vote is entirely up to you. Some people vote based on the candidate’s party. Others vote for the candidate based on who the person is, regardless of their party. Still others cast their vote because someone they know voted for the same person. Undoubtedly, some people vote based on the order the names appear on the ballot. I’ll bet there’s even someone out there who flips a coin or throws dice to determine their vote.

And there’s a disturbing number of people who do not vote. For whatever reason, these people have decided that their vote doesn’t matter or perhaps they genuinely don’t care. These people do not get to complain about anything the government does until such time as they do cast a vote, which is probably in three or four years.

Oh, and there’s a very small number of people who find themselves in extenuating circumstances that prevent them from voting, such as being unexpectedly out of town on election day. If you’re one of these people and you intended to vote, that sucks.

For the rest of you, I can’t encourage you enough to get yourself down to your polling place and fulfil your civic duty by casting a vote for your preferred candidate and your vote on the referendum.

The polls are open from 9am to 9pm Eastern, or 8am to 8pm Central if you’re in the extreme western part of Ontario.

According to Section 6 of the Election Act, everyone is entitled to three consecutive hours within which to vote. So, if your normal work day doesn’t give you three consecutive hours before or after your working hours, your employer is required to give you enough time off that you have three consecutive hours within which to vote and they’re not allowed to dock your pay while you’re off voting:

Employees to have three consecutive hours for voting

(3) Every employee who is qualified to vote shall, while the polls are open on polling day at an election, have three consecutive hours for the purpose of voting and, if the hours of his or her employment do not allow for three consecutive hours, the employee may request that his or her employer allow such additional time for voting as may be necessary to provide those three consecutive hours and the employer shall grant the request. R.S.O. 1990, c. E.6, s. 6 (3).

Deduction from pay prohibited

(4) No employer shall make any deduction from the pay of any employee or impose upon or exact from the employee any penalty by reason of his or her absence from work during the consecutive hours that the employer is required to allow under subsection (3). R.S.O. 1990, c. E.6, s. 6 (4).

Time off best suiting convenience of employer

(5) Any time off for voting as provided in subsection (3) shall be granted at the time of day that best suits the convenience of the employer. R.S.O. 1990, c. E.6, s. 6 (5).

If you don’t know where to vote, you can find out online at the Elections Ontario website (www.elections.on.ca). Click here for a direct link to their “Where Do I Vote?” page.

If you don’t know who’s running in your electoral district, you can find out on the Elections Ontario website by clicking here.

If you still need help, you can call Elections Ontario toll-free at 1-888-ONT-VOTE (1-888-662-2629).

Finally, to draw on something John Hollins, Chief Electoral Officer of Ontario, said this morning on CBC Radio’s Ottawa Morning show: Get out and participate in democracy. Cast your votes for your candidate and the referendum. Or just the candidate. Or just the referendum. Or, if you truly can’t decide, go to your polling station and exercise your democratic right by declining your ballots because even that is participating in the democratic process.

Get out and be heard! Go vote! Now!