May 24 Income: I read in the newspaper that: "$22,000 is the lowest income for a single person in 2011." In 2009, I was working full-time the entire year, and I made something around there. In 2010, I was laid off and unemployed for 8 months and I made significantly less.
Inspirational people: So it's Oprah's final week and she has been talking to memorable guests.
Tererarai: One was a woman named Tererarai Trent. She's an African woman from an isolated African village. She learned how to read and write from her brother's books. The brother's teacher found out and talked to her to let her go to school. After two terms, she was married off at 11 yrs old.
She had 3 kids by the time she was 18. Her husband beats her. A woman from a charity organization helped her to come to the US with her husband and 5 children. She got a Bachelor's degree, Masters, and a Phd. Her husband was deported for beating her. She remarries someone else.
Oprah: You don't have to live like this for your whole life.
T designs t-shirts to sell and raise money for a school in Africa. Oprah bought 326 shirts for her audience to help T. O then donates $1.5 million to T's school to rebuild it. Save the Children charity will build the school.
Jacqui: Jacqui is a woman from Venezuela. In a Nov. 2003 episode, she talked about how in 1999, she got into a car accident by a drunk driver in Texas. J was on fire for a minute. She talks about how she cries for 5 min. a day, then she makes herself stop and live the rest of her day. She can talk normally.
She doesn't look like a normal person, but after multiple surgeries, she does have a face. She mentions about having chronic depression.
Matty: In an Oct. 2001 ep, Matty Stepankek is a young boy who has muscular dystrophy, and is in a wheelchair and has an oxygen tank. He says smart and thoughtful things like: "A champion doesn't bring a trophy home." He also has a park named after him and his mother who also has the same condition lives close to it. They have written a book together called The Messenger.
Matty passed away at 13 yrs old. He had written to Oprah that O was going to end her show after 20 yrs. He told her that he should keep her show for 5 more years. She thought about it and did.
Clementine and Claire: In another Oprah ep, she brought back guests Clementine and Claire. They are two Rwandan sisters. Their house had burned down during the Rwanda Genocide. For 6 yrs they lived in refugee camps. A church organization bought them to the US. They lived in foster homes. Clementine wrote to Oprah. The sisters went on the show and were reunited with their family. They screamed and hugged. Clementine is in Yale.
Erin Kramp: Erin was dying of cancer. She was on Oprah in 1998 and had recorded hours of video tapes that are motherly advice to her daughter Peyton. She was in her 30s. 6 months after she was on the show, she passes away. 13 yrs later, Peyton is 19 and in university.
The dad has gotten remarried and has 2 boys. He still receives letters sent to Erin and after she has died. He got teary eyed with the letters.
Divorce: Also on the show, they brought back this psychotherapist who talked to these 2 kids who are going through a divorce. One was a 11 yr old girl, and a 7 yr old boy and the dad is raising them. The psychotherapist said this: "Everybody wants to be mothered and nurtured. If you don't value yourself, other people won't value you."
Merge: The Edmonton magazine Merge is back. It had printed 5 issues, and then it folded due to lack of money to produce it. Now they found some money and are back to producing it. Good. Maybe they will publish that charity article I sent them.
Charity: I read in the Globe and Mail today that the singer Justin Beiber has created a girl's perfume and will donate the profits to charity. That's good.
Writing: I was thinking about how characters are agents to plots. That reminds me of Lana Lang on Smallville. I remember way back in 2001, I was reading an article on the internet about the character and how they treat her like a trophy and trade her around like currency. Clark often has to save her.
Smallville: I remember reading in jumptheshark.com that the show was bad because there was too much fawning over Lana. I only watched the first season because my favorite Edmonton actor Eric Johnson was a regular on it. He got written off. Then I watched the next couple of seasons out of habit and not because I enjoyed it. I definitely saw 1 ep in season 4 because EJ made an appearance in it, and then I totally quit.
It was a very boring and repetitive show with the freak of the weeks. Some character gets infected with kryptonite and acts crazy. Then he gets in a fight with Clark, and the bad guy will always accidentally kill himself/ herself, land in a coma, or go to the mental institution. The show has now ended after 10 seasons.
W5: W5 did a piece about mechanics scamming you last month. I got a flashback of a Maury ep of "Crazy things caught on tape" of a mechanic making the hole bigger in a tire to show that there was a hole in it.
Active Green and Ross mechanic shop did unnecessary work to a car, and they did the work badly. The W5 host Paula Todd confronts Canadian Tire. The workers delegate to the manager to deal with. I would have gotten the manager myself if a camera crew came in complaining about our work.
Mystery shoppers were going to mechanic shops. The shops in Toronto miss problems and give unnecessary changes. A Canadian Tire in Calgary switched spark plugs. They could tell because there's a mark. APA graded 22/30 mechanic shops failed.
There is some good news. There is a Fountain Tire they went to that made a mistake. The manager was very candid and apologized for it. He was going to refund the money. Delta Autocare is run by a Chinese man for his honest work.
To avoid getting scammed by a mechanic shop, always get a second opinion. Also shop around, because the services to get your car fixed could be cheaper somewhere else.
May 25 Job: Today I woke up 30min earlier, so I could get to work earlier and make a little bit more money since my hours have been cut. Back at the old restaurant I worked from 9am-2pm. Then we were transferred to another restaurant and we leave by 12pm. So I started work at 8:45am. Now I get there by 8:15am.
I did the math. If I work 2 hrs extra each week, I make $20 more. In a month, I would make $80. In a year, it would be $960. However, I started in May, so it would be less. But I didn't get transferred to this restaurant until Feb. So I missed a few months where I could have gone in earlier.
I'm proud of myself for sacrificing 30min of sleep to get to work earlier to make more money. That's quite a change than back in 2005, I could have gone to work earlier at Call Centre #1, but didn't so I could watch Dr. Phil and Maury.
It was also kind of crazy today at work. At the last hour of our shift, the lights went out. We still kept doing our work with the emergency lighting on.
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