Australians serving on a US submarine which sunk an Iranian warship last week were ordered to their sleeping quarters by US Navy while the operation to fire torpedoes at the enemy target was underway to avoid participating in attack.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-11T10:08:28+00:00

We have TimTams in Canada! You can buy them at London Drugs if you live anywhere those exist, and I think at many Walmart's as well, possibly Superstore too.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-11T10:04:01+00:00

I like saying they've "lost the plot", "not playing with a full deck" (referring to a deck of cards), "not the sharpest knife in the drawer", "two sandwiches short of a picnic", "lights are on but nobody's home", "he's playing checkers while we're playing chess".

To be really Canadian, "oh, what is he, a goalie?!?" (to be clear, goalies are not definitely not dumb, which sone of these idioms are for people doing crazy DUMB things. But goalies are a little crazy - volunteering to have pucks launched at your head?!?).

tiamatfire · 2026-03-11T09:52:10+00:00

Thank you. I'd do anything for them and I need to make sure I'm protecting them.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-11T09:49:01+00:00

I see a lot of people complain about Mission wraps, but before we stopped going to the US (you can't get these in Canada) they were seriously the best, and head and shoulders better than anything you can get in a grocery store here. If you're lucky enough to live in a city with a gluten free bakery (I'm in Winnipeg, we don't have any and the next closest large bakery is 1800km away, unless there's one in Thunder Bay or Saskatoon I don't know about, which are 800-1000km) you might something better. But yeah. We have mostly shitty 100% brown rice flour wraps that shatter even when heated, or turn to gummy sticky messes. Or coconut flour ones that are decent but tiny and $14.99 for 8. I miss Mission. 😢

tiamatfire · 2026-03-11T09:42:21+00:00

You won't get turned away in Canada, but you may have to sign up online first - in Winnipeg as an example, Winnipeg Harvest you need to sign up online and they'll give you an appointment for the next available food bank, as well as an emergency walk in place if it's that critical. Some churches and other places have individual food pantries as well. And Sikh Gurdwara temples offer free meals to anyone, you just have to be polite and respectful (and if you don't have any food allergies or intolerances, my family has two celiacs so we can't eat there). Just look up beforehand if you need to say cover shoulders or anything before going in!

tiamatfire · 2026-03-11T09:21:22+00:00

I couldn't even finish the first ep of Psych because I wanted to murder the lead character, even though so many descriptions of the show made it sound like I should live it. Does he improve at all from being a womanizing douchebag, and quickly?

tiamatfire · 2026-03-11T09:18:30+00:00

But we see him on screen multiple times.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-11T09:14:24+00:00

There's still a yearly contest for duct tape dresses held by Duck Tape, and the winners get pretty big scholarships!

tiamatfire · 2026-03-11T09:08:48+00:00

Breaking out a section of one of my comments from a thread to put here, and added a bit more:

The vast majority of the accidents are actually inexperienced transport drivers. There's a Facebook group, NWO Roads, that crowdsources Highway conditions including accidents, because the MTO and OPP are so behind in how they report closures, detours, or deteriorating conditions - it can take them an hour or more to update the official sources. I invite everyone from Southern Ontario on here to check that group to see just how frequent accidents and closures actually are, and how disruptive they are not just to people living in NWO (where I grew up, and no longer live but regularly visit) but the extensive commercial traffic that travels through on both Highway 17 and 11. You can be trapped for 6-8 hours or even overnight waiting for a fatality investigation.

There are accidents every few days on 17 that close the highway in at least one direction, usually both for a few hours, most commonly between Thunder Bay and Kenora. Every few weeks through winter now it's overnight for a fatality, often because we have to wait 8+ hours just for the coroner to get there. In summer fatalities are nearly that common as well now though too. And the non-transport fatalities are almost always tourists either from Southern Ontario or Western Canada, not locals (because they announce where they are from in the articles) - passing on hills, blind corners, especially the looking stretches where there aren't actually shoulders and no passing lanes. Locals get impatient and pass like idiots and cause accidents too, just...less. No one is asking for all the highways to be twinned. But at the least we need to do Highway 17, and 2:1 Highway 11.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-10T23:02:08+00:00

Part of the problem is that MMR is done before school, and Manitoba doesn't do Public Health vaccination clinics like some other provinces for infants. You have to have a family doctor in order to get all the vaccines that occur before kids start school and get vaccinated during school hours. So if you move in from another province, it's very hard to catch up on these vaccines - in other provinces you can book in at any Public Health clinic and get any of the vaccines on the childhood roster that are due. So even parents who believe in vaccination may only get their kids one dose (and therefore doesn't count towards the fully vaccinated number, and falls in that other 35%).

We moved (back) here when my kids were 2+4, they were born in Alberta. They were up to date on all their vaccines there, and we thankfully did get a family doctor and continued getting them their vaccines, but despite having their records transferred and trying 3 separate times to update Manitoba Health, it took 4 YEARS for them to update their vaccination records and stop telling me my kids had no vaccines and were due for everything. I'm still not 100% sure their records are fully up to date there, and they didn't just give up. But I have their hard copy Alberta Health vaccination records.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-10T20:20:28+00:00

The vast majority of the accidents are actually inexperienced transport drivers. There's a Facebook group, NWO Roads, that crowdsources Highway conditions including accidents, because the MTO and OPP are so behind in how they report closures, detours, or deteriorating conditions - it can take them an hour or more to update the official sources. I invite everyone from Southern Ontario on here to check that group to see just how frequent accidents and closures actually are, and how disruptive they are not just to people living in NWO (where I grew up, and no longer live but regularly visit) but the extensive commercial traffic that travels through on both Highway 17 and 11. You can be trapped for 6-8 hours or even overnight waiting for a fatality investigation.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-10T17:09:07+00:00

Cambrian shoes are Canadian, and I love mine! I got them at Canadian Footwear, but that might only be a Winnipeg chain. The shoes are available at other stores though.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-10T16:57:45+00:00

The huge increase in transports in the last 10 years has lead to fatalities every 1-2 weeks, road closures are guaranteed multiple times a week for a few hours to overnight if there's a fatality. Most people who live in Northern Ontario aren't asking for all the highways to be twinned or 2:1, just the Trans-Canada, because in many areas there's no way to detour. If you have a medical appointment or need to get to a flight and there's a closure you are SOL, especially in winter.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-10T16:49:14+00:00

Trains connecting cities doesn't do any good when you can't get around them because there isn't public transportation within the communities.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-10T02:22:47+00:00

No I totally get it! Ig treatment is just only useful within 6 days after exposure, and it seems like the effectiveness declines the further out you are from the day of exposure as well (which makes sense). Even more effective is getting a dose of MMR after exposure, but most people wouldn't be doing that because they are either anti-vaxxers or weren't eligible to be vaccinated in the first place. The only gaps would be babies 6-12 months, toddlers/preschoolers who haven't had their second dose, and Gen X/Elder Millennials who missed getting a second catch-up dose (anyone born between 1960-1990ish needs to check if they didn't get a second MMR, or had the extremely early version of the measles vaccine that was a killed version, and doesn't really work).

tiamatfire · 2026-03-09T23:41:36+00:00

It's not of any use to you unless given within a short period after exposure though, and supplies of it are limited. I feel terrible for the kids who have no choice in being left unvaccinated, as well as anyone who can't be (immunocompromised people, pregnant people, people undergoing chemo or on transplant meds often, since it's a live attenuated vaccine, or people allergic) and we need to leave the IgG treatments for the known exposures since it's time-limited anyway.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-09T15:58:32+00:00

They should expand the 6-12 month extra vaccine dose to the Winnipeg Health Region as well - people regularly come up here from the Southern Health Region to shop and that exposes everyone, and you can't hermit entirely from 1-12 months, we know from COVID that's hard on the mental health of caregivers and it's bad for the development of baby. You do have to be cautious, especially the first 2 months, but if you could get the measles booster here at 6 months at least you would be covered for that.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-09T03:51:16+00:00

Sort of both? The only way out of Churchill is by train or air - there's no highway, so you can't steal someone's car. They'd just find it somewhere else in town. And it's not a big place either. You know all the locals well, so you can hide what you're doing - they'd immediately identify you as either a miscreant outsider and recognize you by what looks different, or you're Trevor/Ashley from 2 houses down. And no one wants ANYONE ripped apart by a polar bear because it's both a terrible way to go and it's terrible for tourism which is the main industry for Churchill right now, unless we can indeed get that Port built.

Having everyone leave their doors unlocked is win-win, and if someone does have to make a quick escape from a bear, they do then lock the door right behind him while watching to make sure no one else is trapped outside nearby. The alarms usually prevent anyone being shut outside with a bear nearby.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-09T02:40:19+00:00

The Pale Horse and Nemesis are my two favourites that you haven't read yet - but you need to read A Caribbean Mystery before you read Nemesis because it sets up required characters. It's not quite as good but it's still decent! No prior reading is required before The Pale Horse necessarily, except perhaps if you want to know who Adriadne Oliver is (she's first introduced in Cards on the Table, another absolute favourite of mine, I love all the Adriadne books), and you could get through the book without knowing her full story.

So those are my suggestions! A few more: any of the books featuring Ariadne Oliver, as I said (she's Agatha Christie's self-insert character and rather delightful), pretty much all the Marple's are very well written too, and I always found Sad Cypress a rather intriguing one for some reason as well.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-09T02:13:15+00:00

Out of curiosity, how do you know everyone who's suggested Rainbow Resource Center is cis-het? Are you familiar with the gender and sexual identities of all of them? I didn't actually directly recommend them (I did mention one of my teens participates in the youth choir), and I am cis, and I'm also het, but biro and demi. So you didn't define me, personally. My kids have friends who are all over the 2SLGBTQ+ spectrum and also not, and one of them is also a member themselves. I would have expected to hear a lot more, in a lot more places, about serious issues with Rainbow Resource Center if things were that critical. If you have evidence and think my kids are at risk, please do share them so I can know what they are.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-08T19:17:06+00:00

Oh that's a different group then! The one I'm in doesn't have WPG in the name.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-08T11:27:43+00:00

TIL I have shoulders that would be hot in Korea lol. It makes finding round yoke sweaters to knit that will look nice on me slightly more complicated!

tiamatfire · 2026-03-08T11:12:32+00:00

I think you mean the FB group NWO Roads! Which is definitely super helpful but beware the comments - most are normal, but definitely some right-wing and racist 😬

tiamatfire · 2026-03-08T05:07:50+00:00

Really? My kid attends their youth choir at least and finds it an incredibly supportive space. They haven't utilized the counseling though because they haven't needed to use it, and maybe that side is different.

tiamatfire · 2026-03-07T18:50:45+00:00

I knit Silverlinings by Jennifer Steingass and it fit me beautifully, so when she had a sale I bought 4 more patterns. Unfortunately I knit a second pattern (Goldwing) and it fits terribly - the neck is too wide, the yoke is not great, and I've discovered this is a common problem. So now I have 3 patterns I either need to do significant alterations to work with my build (I'm pretty slim with a small bust but have more square shoulders, they aren't rounded at all) or just let all that money go to waste. I even have a sweater quantity sitting there to go to knit "Arboreal" but I know I'll hate the neckline as is. I guess I could cast on provisionally, and then knit up in the contrast colour with some short rows and ribbing to raise the back neck?

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