Mary Soderstrom's Blog, page 106

The turn out was very good--nearly 74 per cent--and the voters did their thing, making up their minds privately, and surprsing a lot of people.

As you probably already know, Pauline Maurois's PQ has enough seats to form a govenment--54--but the Liberals got 50, the CAQ, 19 and Quebec Solidaire, 2.  That certainly wasn't the result I expected Tuesday morning.  But the people, in their wisdom, have spoken.

And at least Françoise David will join Amir Khadir in Quebec City....

Yeah, Quebec goes to the polls, and I'm calling folks we've pointed as be on our side.  So no post longer than this....[image error]

Liberals, 33 per cent; Québec Solidaire, 27 per cent and PQ, 23 per cent!

Been making phone calls for Édith Laperle, the Québec Solidaire candidate in my riding of Outremont.  The response has been very interesting: lots of people are impressed by her and the party, but are undecided how to vote because they want to get rid of the Liberals, who've held the seat forever.

Sound familiar?  It does to me, and I've been canvassing around here for an awful long time.  In 2007,  Thomas Mulcair, now NDP leader and leader of the Official Opposition in Ottawa,  took Outremont.  That federal race was the NDP's beachhead in Quebec.  Provincially, the Outremont riding is not quite the same as it is provincially, but both contains the immigrant and hip neighborhoods of Côte des Neiges and Mile-End  as well as the Outremont borough.

The same sort of voter who have now elected Mulcair three times  is looking for a party which reflects his or her values provincially that the NDP does federally.  Perhaps these people have begun to see QS as what they've been hoping for.

QS's canvassing shows Laperle doing very well, but you can never go by that.  What is really wonderful is an extrapolation from polls by the independent website Votestrategique.com released yesterday, showing the split above.  All those undecideds who were thinking of voting PQ ought to vote QS, and then we'd something very interesting.  Can you imagine a PQ minority government with five or six QS MNAs holding the balance of power?

Congrats to Scotty in East Providence RI and Jeffrey in Las Vegas who won the Goodreads Giveaway for my book, Making Waves: The Continuing Portuguese Adventure.   Your copies will be in the mail by Wednesday.

And for those of you who'd like to read it even if you didn't win, the book is available from the various Amazons and directly from the publisher Véhicule Press 

The termperature is just about perfect today--24 C. or mid-70s F--with no humidity to factor in.  What is more, on this last weekend of the official summer, the neighborhood seems moreor less deserted as people try to stuff in one more good time before things begin in earnest.

Ths was taken at high noon in the backyard.  The grass practically glows in the sun and the shadows are deep.

What the photo doesn't show is how dry things are.  We had a little bit of rain Friday, but not much.  The forecast is for rain on Wednseday (perhaps Isaac-relatled?) and it won't be a moment too soon.

We're going to the polls on Tuesday in Quebec.  Here's a nice little video made by cinema wunderkind Xavier Dolan, urging people to vote.


VOTE QC 2012 1/2 from SonsofManual on Vimeo.

And here's something about Mitt Romney that is hilarious (aren't most things? )

Don't forget: today's the last day to enter the Goodreads Giveaway of two copies of my book Making Waves: The Continuing Portuguese Adventure

Much to-do this morning about two decorated pianos installed on Montreal corners for the month of September to provide a place for impromptu music.  Great idea, even if not totally original: Toronto had 41 during July, and apparently artist Luke Jerram has inspired a couple of dozen other cities to try the idea: Play Me, I'm Yours.

Mike Kowalsky who posted the photo on the left to Facebook notes that the piano at the corner of St. Viateur and Casgrain is painted with flora and fauna found in the nearby Champ des possibles, a former industrial space/parking lot owned by the city of Montreal and now gone to glorious abandon.  Another great idea.

But just a few hours before that piano was inaugarated I had an experience in the Champ which is troubling.  While out walking I came upon a big tree trunk burning in the Champ, apparently the remnants of a campfire of the night previous.  With the aid of a young man cutting across the field on his way to work in one of the lofts in the nearby transformed light industrial buildings, I was able to turn it over so that the burning surface faced the ground.  Then I was able to cover it with dirt and gravel.  Stopped by the firehouse on the way back, just to let them know so they could check to see if the first was indeed extinguished.

Okay, camp fires are nice, and wild places in the center of the city are even nicer, but to keep them EVERYONE has to be careful of them.  This summer has been hot and dry, and even if it rained a bit the night before, it's quite possible that left undisturbed, the fire inthe trunk could have smoldered for hours or even days before bursting into flame.

Hey guys, be careful when you play with matches--and with the commons that we would all like to protect!

BTW. the second photo is of the piano on St. Denis and Marie-Anne, a much more urban setting.

The racoons ranging in our backyards seem to have disappeared--or maybe they just figured out how to get out of trash cans and so don't make so much noise.  Whatever, we haven't been bothered by their shrill cries for the last few weeks.

But I just checked back to see the variety of pictures that readers of T he New York Times have posted about the wildlife that comes to visit.   Cynthia Williams reports: "Thiss little red fox lives in the wooded area by our home near Minneapolis. He seems to be very comfortable sitting on our back step while we run for our camera."

For the last several summers we've watched with pleasure as ducks raise ducklings in at least one of our neighborhood parks.  This photo was taken two years ago when it appeared that two couples had a total of 16 offspring between them.

But this year we spied one couple early in the summer in the park, but they seemed either not to next, or not to hatch babies. 

That's why we were very pleased when Lee spied two families last week gliding around the ponds, looking very happy.

This morning they weren't there, or in any other nearby park.  Perhaps they had been just passing through on their way somewhere else.  I'd like to think that their stop meant that the parents were showing the young ones possible places to nest next year.

But who knows?  And who knows why no ducks were successful in nesting there this year?  We have had an explosion of the racoon population, and I wonder if the greedy beasts might have feasted on the eggs before they hatched. 

Tha balance of nature is a tricky thing, as we are learning as the climate changes.