Guitar Luv: KT Tunstall

KT Tunstall is an amazing artist. Coming up the hard way, busking and touring small clubs, she worked her butt off even after signing a record contract before they'd let her record.

The result is a live act that leaves people with their jaws dropped. This was best seen in her stunning performance on "Later... With Jools Holldand" in 2004. Her last minute replacement of Nas left her with only 24 hours to prepare for a live UK national debut that left other acts speechless. (Check out the members of Embrace at 3:24)

I've always loved this live version even better than the album version, just for the sheer surprise of it. The recorded show version had the second verse sliced out, but it's still great.

This performance introduced the non-musical world to the Akai E2 Headrush loop pedal, which she has dubbed the "Wee Bastard," as a tool that does more than just echoes the chorus. Here is a vid KT did for Akai showing how easily she can use the loop pedal.

And my favourite song from her debut album, Eye to the Telescope, is not Black Horse and the Cherry Tree, but Suddenly I See. There are two official releases for this, and in my house we're split over which is better. My sweetie loves the "Standard Version," a more traditional "band plays in a darkly-lit warehouse" vid with the twist that KT joins herself mid-song and sings harmonies... with herself. I'm torn but I give the edge to the "Larger Than Life" version, a trippy vid that shows KT as a normal-sized person and a giant moving through a trainset diorama. It fits the jumpy rhythm of the song and it's charming.

Pick one for yourself!

After four million album sales, KT has stayed true to herself and hasn't let her success go to her head. She's political and she has no delusions of grandeur. My kind of artist!

I had vague ambitions of being an actress when I was younger (who didn't?). Alas, it was not to be, mostly due to my brutal stage fright.

I did all kinds of things to get over it. I joined the school choir, public theatre groups, sold sex toys at home parties. Try being shy when you have to describe the function of a Kegel exerciser to a room of giggling couples. I dare you. Even so, I had too many nerves and not enough talent.

But apparently, I could have just done Daytime TV soaps. This quick acting lesson is courtesy of my favourite Edmontonian in LA, Nathan Fillion of ABC's Castle, but more importantly Malcolm Reynolds of Joss Whedon's Firefly.

Gender Equality: An Obsolete Concept?

Today is the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day. It's a day for focusing on equality for women in this world.

A lot of my friends (okay, Caucasian males) comment that we don't need these kinds of focuses anymore. They think the world is fair enough. Well, if that's the case, then we should find equality is drastically better than it was 20 years ago, right?

Not in the movies. In 2009, women directed 7 per cent of the top-grossing films, the same amount as in 1989. After Kathryn Bigelow won the Oscar last year for best director, I expected to see women nominated again this year. Especially with two Best Picture films that were directed by women. I was disappointed that there were none.

Well then, at least Canada is an example of gender equality for the world to follow, right? According to IndexMundi.com, the Canadian sex ratio (males/females) is 0.98, so we're almost evenly divided men to women. And don't forget:

"Canada was among the first countries to sign Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). The 1982 Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms enshrines the principles of gender equality in employment, public life, and education in Part I, section 15. These principles are also reflected in the Canadian Human Rights Act and the 1998 Multiculturalism Act, which introduced measures to protect and promote the rights of aboriginal women and foreigners." Wikigender.org

So how does Canada measure up?

I checked with the World Economic Forum, which selects the top countries in terms of gender equity by comparing 1) income and employment, 2) participation in higher education, 3) health, and 4) political involvement. Here's the top 15 countries for 2010:

Wait, where's Canada?

We're 20th. Out of 134 countries, we came in 20th. Not bad, but not great for a country that prides itself on being the vanguard for human rights and peacekeeping.

So where does Canada excel? Umm... socialism.

"One bright spot in terms of women’s equality is in the results found for women who work in unionized environments. Women make 82% of men’s incomes in such environments – even when comparing full time, full year employment. When assessing the impact of unionization, the study reveals that non-unionized environments create a wider gender gap – women make only 72% of men’s incomes in such environments." Center for Social Justice

"Women aged 25 to 29 employed on a full-time, full-year basis earned 85 cents for each dollar received by their male counterparts in 2005.

In 2005, the gender income gap was narrower for those new entrants that had achieved higher levels of education than for their less-educated counterparts:

• Women aged 25 to 29 holding a graduate or professional diploma and working on a full-time, full-year basis earned 96 cents for every dollar earned by their male counterparts in 2005.


• Women with a bachelor’s degree earned 89 cents for every dollar earned by their male counterparts.


• Women with a registered apprenticeship or trades certificate earned only 65 cents for every dollar earned by their male counterparts.


• Young women with no high school diploma earned 67 cents for every dollar earned by young men with the same level of education.

For the most highly educated Canadian women, gender differences in earnings within identical occupations are generally very small among new entrants to the labour force... Two exceptions are management occupations and sales and service occupations, where Canadian women consistently earn far less than their male counterparts. Young women employed in management occupations earned 86 cents for every dollar earned by their male counterparts in 2005. In sales and service occupations, the gap was even larger, at 72 cents for every dollar. Canadian women continue to be overrepresented in low-paying occupations in Canada." Conference Board of Canada

Wait, so women making at least 20 per cent less than men is pretty good? Awesome. And where are we failing?

"Statistics Canada's 1998 report Family Violence in Canada: A Statistical Profile, which analysed data provided by 154 reporting police agencies, shows that:

• Women continue to outnumber men nine to one as victims of assault by a spouse or partner;
  in 1996 half of all family homicides involved spouses;


• Between 1977 and 1996, three times as many women were killed by their spouses as were men killed by their spouses;


• Girls are at greatest risk of sexual assault by a family member while between 12 and 15 years of age;


• In 1996 nine of ten crimes committed against older adults by family members were physical assaults.

Violence is a major factor in women's health and well-being. The measurable health-related costs of violence against women in Canada exceed $1.5 billion a year. These costs include short-term medical and dental treatment for injuries, long-term physical and psychological care, lost time at work, and use of transition homes and crisis centres" Health Canada

Oh, and Canadian women have only 22% representation in government. And that's an all-time record.

So when I hear my friends say that they're pissed off that women and visible minorities get special programs and scholarships, I sort of want to punch them in the stomach. Not in the nuts. That's sexist. But hard. In the stomach.

Link Love: Goodnews.com

As someone who surfs the internet a lot, I see a lot of discount offers. There are tons of programs that offer to send you local deals. All you have to do is submit some personal information.

This is my favourite of these offerings. Goodnews.com donates a portion of their proceeds to a local charity.


First, they are partnering with Edmonton Food Bank, who will receive 5% of all sales generated from January 25 to February 27, 2011.

Send your friends to the website, because the discounts only happen if enough people apply for them.

Unproductive or not?

Today, I gave up on plans to go cross-country skiing and spent most of the day in bed finishing The Hunger Games trilogy. It's something I've been putting off for a couple of months, and I always find a good reason to do something more "productive."

"I have to paint the bathroom."

"There's Christmas shopping to do."

"I need to clean out my closet."

It feels like I've been going non-stop for months. Even the Christmas holiday was an exercise in constant motion. I try to maintain work and life balance, but there's always something to do. I came back from a week off work feeling like I hadn't had any time off. And to make matters worse, I'm so distracted by all the things I should be doing that I have trouble focusing when I read a book. So finishing a book takes a while, and I seem to find reasons not to read.

But today? Edmonton received a great snow dump this weekend. The snow is fresh and almost 30 cm deep (that's over a foot for the non-metric) and the weather is -16 degrees Celsius. It's a little too deep and kind of cold for cross country skiing. Also, my once-a-week meds have 12-hour side effects that are pretty much like being hella-drunk: dizziness, balance issues & nausea. So naturally, I took them last night and forgot how I'd feel this morning.

That makes it a stay-home day. Now, the house could use a good post-Christmas scrubbing, and I'm still cleaning out my closets for the clothing drive I'm running at work. Since Ukrainian Christmas is over, I should probably take down the Christmas tree.

But I woke up to the bright post-snowfall sunlight streaming into my bedroom window. My hon was already up and playing Call of Duty downstairs. So instead of rushing to get the day going, I said screw it and stayed in bed all morning and most of the afternoon, and read until the daylight started to fade. Like most Sundays, I wasn't hungry in the morning. Let's face it: I eat plenty as a middle-income Canadian, so skipping one meal won't be the end of the world.

And when I was done? My side effects had passed. I came downstairs and made a really tasty meal of leek soup and pan-fried pork loin and finished it off with a homemade latte. I'd finished the book series I've been really excited to finish. And I felt more relaxed than I have in months. One day did more to relax me than a whole week away from work.

It would be easy to dismiss today as an unproductive day. Oxford Dictionary defines unproductive as "(of an activity or period) not achieving much; not very useful." I could have been doing a lot of things. Instead, I see today as productive by just giving me time to breath and accomplish one of those "less important" things on my to do list that's been nagging at me.

By bringing down my stress levels, today was definitely useful.