Odds & ends

• Monday was Family Day in Ontario. I mostly stayed away from social media -- but I couldn't stay away entirely... and yes, I regretted it! (Will I ever learn??)  Not sure which was worse -- the personal posts from  friends, with "happy family all together" photos, or the companies/brands I follow cashing in on the day by wishing customers a "Happy Family Day!" and offering Family Day specials. 
• Something else that got under my skin:  People posting "Happy Family Day, Canada!" It's NOT a holiday in all provinces, and not all provinces that have a February holiday call it Family Day (smart people!):  it's "Riel Day" in my home province of Manitoba, "Heritage Day" in Nova Scotia, and "Islander Day" in PEI.  
• We recently got new neighbours in the condo unit kitty-corner from ours. 
• It was for sale at the same time this one was, six years ago... we looked at both units, but ultimately decided on this one. Our unit is slightly smaller, but faces the back of the property (the other one faces the busy main road out front), has more storage/closet/kitchen cupboard space, and we liked the layout a little better. (Also, this one was cheaper, lol -- albeit it was still a little more expensive than the price range we were looking in.)  
• That unit sold shortly after we bought this one, and we met the new neighbours the same day we moved in -- a couple about the same ages as us. We're not sure why they decided to move now. (The wild parties we've been having, maybe??  lol)  
• Anyway -- we haven't met the new neighbours yet. But we've heard at least one childish voice coming and going in the hallway outside recently, more than once, which makes me think there's at least one young child living there. There's two bedrooms, and it's one of the more sizeable units in the building, so there's certainly room for one and possibly two children. This could be good or not so good (or just neutral)... time will tell...! 
• I had a visit with my family doctor last week to discuss changing where I get my mammograms done. (I'm due for another one  -- the last one was two years ago, just before covid hit...!) I've always gone to a clinic within one of the big hospitals downtown (near the provincial legislature) -- which was fine when I was working downtown and could just zip up there on the subway -- but for obvious reasons (covid, protesters, etc.) I would prefer not to have to make that trip (45 minutes on the subway now) or be anywhere near a hospital or the provincial legislature right now. 
• I'm now booked at a local clinic for later in March.
• I also wound up with referrals for a colonoscopy (has it really been 10 years since my last one?? -- I guess it has!) and will be getting one for a surgeon re: my gallbladder as well. (Yikes!)  
• I am having the colonoscopy done in late March at a clinic that is quite literally a three-minute walk away from our condo building, which is nice. 
• As for the gallbladder surgery -- there is a huge backlog of  "elective" surgeries that have been postponed/delayed because of the pandemic (the dr told me his own dad has been waiting for gallbladder surgery since before covid! -- yikes!!). So I'm not holding my breath, but I decided I might as well get my name on the waiting list for that sooner versus later...!   
• I am saddened by what's happening in Ukraine. I am, as some of you know, partly (one-half) of Ukrainian descent, on my dad's side -- albeit the Ukrainian part of my family has been in Canada for more than 100 years. I looked up the town in western Ukraine where my grandfather was born on Google Maps. It's about 1 hour from one of the targeted larger centres I've seen on the maps on TV, and 2-3 hours from the city of Lviv. (About 9 hours from Kiev.) I know there are still relatives "over there" --  the descendants of some of my grandfather's siblings. One of my uncles went there and met some of them, about 30 years ago, after the Cold War ended. I don't know their names or anything about them -- but they are my kin, and it makes what's happening there a little more personal.
• As Russian expert Tom Nichols said on Twitter, "I haven't felt this kind of feeling in the pit of my stomach since the 1980s." Me either. (Nichols and I are the same age.) 
• Someone asked Nichols, "Could you help describe how bad it is for the under 40 crowd?"  Nichols: "Not as bad as the Cuban Missile Crisis. But bad."  :( 
• (This rant comes a week or so late, but it's still bothering me, so here goes.) Another quadrennial, another Winter Olympics, another figure skating scandal. (eyeroll)  My usual enjoyment of the Olympics, and Olympic figure skating in particular (aside from the 5 a.m. wakeup calls to watch...!) was marred by the scandal over young Russian skater Kamila Valieva's positive drug test, revealed only after she helped propel Russia to a gold medal in the team event -- and how despite this, she was still allowed to compete in the women's event (with disastrous consequences).  
• Personally, I think the minute that positive drug test was uncovered, the entire Russian team should have been told to pack their bags, put on a plane and sent home. They were at the Olympics on "probation" for previous doping offenses as it was, not even allowed to compete under their country's flag. That seemed like an overly generous arrangement to me as it was. (But then, I'm not the IOC.) 
• I felt immensely sorry for a 15-year-old who was clearly being manipulated by the adults around her and should never have been placed in this position. I felt even sorrier after she was "allowed" to skate but fell apart under the enormous stress, with the entire world watching. Even more so after watching her coach berate her (in Russian -- translations were later provided) when she came off the ice. But I felt sorrier still for all the other athletes who skated drug-free and had their Olympic moment of glory tainted by what happened and how it was (mis)handled. 
• I'd never even heard of Valieva before this season, but apparently little girls who can do quadruple jumps are a dime a dozen in Russia -- at a terrible cost. This same coach has produced several other world and Olympic champions in recent years -- most of whom explode onto the scene in the same way Valieva did, and then flame out a year or two later, their bodies and spirits broken under the physical and mental demands. Few make it to two Olympics in a row.  (The Washington Post had a pretty good article last week naming other recent Russian blink-and-you'll-miss-her champions and what happened to them.) 
• Back in the 1990s, I read (and still have) a book called "Little Girls in Pretty Boxes: The Making and Breaking of Elite Gymnasts and Figure Skaters." (The author just wrote a piece for the Washington Post about Valieva, calling for reforms.) Sad to think that so little has changed, almost 30 years later.