Why I've been absent from this blog.

94% of a full slate for the Ontario Libertarian Party in June 2018

It’s very hard for me to believe, but March 22, 2019, marked the 10th Anniversary of this blog. Just as difficult is the realization that the last time I posted to this blog was Dec. 30, 2015, almost 4 years ago. Lots of things have happened in the past 10 years, and big changes have occurred in the last four.

In November 2011, I became Leader of the Ontario Libertarian Party. After that it became difficult to cater to the blog because I was heavily involved with social media, policy work and candidate recruitment, etc. for the Party. But after two “successful” provincial elections in 2014 and 2018, it was time for a change. I resigned the Leadership in July 2018, mostly for health reasons.

The Party successes involved candidate recruitment and voter turnout. In 2018 we had technically recruited 117 out of 124 possible candidates. I say technically, because we had to remove one candidate just before polling day, so 116 was the final tally, almost our goal of a full slate. That was the best we had ever done. Of course the more candidates, the more votes, and our vote total was almost 43,000, also our best ever. I suspect these numbers are going to be difficult to match in the 2022 election.

My health began to deteriorate in the spring of 2018. After going through a winter for summer tire swap, I experienced shoulder pain, then back/rib cage pain that did not get better with time. Early in July of 2018, I woke up one morning with unexplained permanent central vision loss in my left eye. By August I was experiencing problems in my right eye. Doctors called it bilateral CRVO of unknown cause. I had no idea that the rib cage pain was related to my vision loss and the CRVO. But it was. By September of 2018, the back pain was unbearable and became chest pain, so my family doctor suggested I admit myself to a hospital emergency. Initial tests suggested a heart attack, but further examination showed no apparent coronary blockages, but my heart was not right and so I was kept in cardiac ICU. Eventually I was diagnosed with Takutsubo cardiomyopathy and Multiple Myeloma in my spine and chest. The good news was my heart righted itself by early December 2018, and now its normal, though I’m still taking heart medications because they are “good for me.” 

In hospital September 2018

The bad news was Myeloma is an incurable cancer of bone marrow cells, and it also increases the viscosity of blood which is what caused the vision loss and CRVO. I did a course of radiation in my spine and chest, before I left hospital in late September 2018, followed by 10 brutal months of chemotherapy which ended in July 2019, the side effects of which I’m still recovering from. The Myeloma is in remission for now, but I’m assured it will return in months or years and then another course of chemo will be tried, and so on.

On a much more positive note over the past 10 years, I became a Grandfather twice, way more fun than anything I’ve ever done.

So here I am, back at you, with commentary and opinions on issues local, regional and planetary.

I’d also like to remove the “Bright” designation in the header, changing it to “Right.” The Bright’s are secular humanists, advocating social justice and climate justice (whatever that means). Atheism is all I have in common with the Brights now, so I’ve decided that I am not really one of them as they are currently defined. I also prefer the insinuation of being “right,” who wouldn’t? And I like the political direction implied. Problem is, if I change the URL to “right,” then I’ve erased hundreds of posts over the years. So I will keep the URL, but modify the page header. I’ll try and post once a week for as long as I can. Thanks for coming onboard you won’t regret it.