Category Archives: Politics

Apple

The recent revelations about Apple manufacturer managing to break even the Chinese Work Law in the production sites of the new iPad made me wonder:

When discussing the work ethics of Apple or the fact they manufacture all our gadgets in China, how come nobody is willing to discuss their outrageous profit margin?!?

Why the only solution people can talk about is jumping up the prices of their products?

How come nobody says: Apple profit margin is so large that they can easily bring back production to the USA, give decent jobs to many many people and still have a formidable profit level?

I wonder!

Far away wondering thoughts

Yesterday when I heard they again used measures against abortion coverage to get some of the “democrats” to vote for the health bill, a thought crossed my mind:  If all of us women unite and declare a sex strike, how long it will take them men chauvinists to stop meddling with OUR basic rights?!?

It may be the effect of the salty Mediterranean air on my head – yes I am in Israel again, dealing with real estate transactions, fighting with bankers to get the smallest fees I can and other such charming tasks,,, but the food is great and the scenery too – Tel Aviv is lovely in the spring! I am sorry I don’t have my camera here with me to share it with you in photos too.

It looks like every time I am here there are more food institutions like restaurants, bistros, bars, coffee shops and so on in this lovely, lively city and I am here every few months. All of them seem full and busy every time you pass them and it makes me wonder. I think Tel Aviv has the most restaurant seats per capita in the whole wide world! And without even counting the plethora of very original fast food places they have in this city.

I am knitting a baby surprise jacket in Rowan Purelife – Organic Cotton 4 ply natural dye. After I knitted almost a whole skein I took out the other 3 skeins I have to show my sister and in the Israeli light (much better and brighter than the Torontonian these days) we saw that the color is not uniform, there are patches of lighter color in weird places on the skeins…. I thought something happened to my yarn and emailed the shop where I bought it but the owner assured me it’s the result of using natural dyes and if I don’t like it I can get credit or exchange it,,, I decided to keep knitting and take a decision after I will see the effect of it on the knitted jacket, but I am not pleased at all! Without any doubt I liked the yarn in a solid color much better.

The first thing I saw when I got into my sister’s car upon arrival to Israel last week was the maplewing I knitted for her birthday last September, I took it in my hands and exclaimed: what did you do to it? you felted it!!! My sister got all pissed at me and replied: I did nothing to it, I hardly wore it and it never saw any water while with me, anything done to it was done by you! hmmmm,,,, I certainly sent her something quite different but how do I find out what she did to it, was my first thought, I tried exploring it some more but I noticed she is vehement in her denial so I left it at that until I will have internet access.

When I showed her the shawl on my Ravelry page and especially the photo of it drying on the wires she said: I never saw it like this it came out of the envelope as it is now but the envelope seemed dry and there were no stains on it…

The only explanation we came up with is that it stayed in some very hot place on its way from Toronto to Tel Aviv and somehow got felted – does this make sense to anyone, did you hear about dry or almost dry high heat felting?

In any case I am quite pissed. It is the last time I am sending any valuable knitted thingie by mail to Israel!

To end this in a positive note: it is good my sister didn’t see the shawl in its unfelted original state so she still think it is very beautiful, am I lucky or what? :)

Outraged

After the murder of Dr. George Tiller last May, I saw Dr. Susan Wicklund on Rachel Maddow Show:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

It took me awhile to get Dr.Wicklund’s book: This Common Secret:

and start reading it, but now that I do, I am outraged.

This is my common reaction to any news item, movie or article I read about this subject. It is unfucking believable to me that this is the situation in this country and even more, that you hardly hear anything about it. (I had a very similar reaction when I heard Obama promise in his last speech that there will be no federal funding of abortions in this country,,,)

I don’t understand how us women accept this situation.
I don’t understand how all of us women don’t protest, march, strike, whatever it will take, to change this situation.

How come we don’t try to actively and publicly support those so very few brave physicians that put their life in danger in order to make sure any woman in this country has her reproductive rights intact!

But when I think about it and after reading the first chapter of Dr. Wicklund book, I think I know at least part of the answer, actually, the answer is revealed in the name of the book.

As long as most of us regard an abortion as the most private and personal secret, as long as we accept the hiding and the shame associated with needing one, I don’t see a way that we can change the situation.

Our opponents are loud, crazy and are sure that god is with them.

Until we find a way to make this basic right of every woman a common subject that we can discuss publicly. Until any one of us who ever needed one will be able to talk about it with no shame, I don’t think we will be able to fight with them and win what is one of our most basic human right: our right to choose what is good for ourselves!

And this outrages me.