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Paving Day

For some reason, people like to complain about how bad the roads are in Saskatchewan. I don’t get it. Maybe it’s because I drove in Quebec for as many years as I did and know what truly bad roads are like. Sure, we get potholes in the spring, but they get filled very quickly. Pavement also gets patched and gravel roads are frequently graded. Considering the small population here and low taxes, I’d understand having crappy roads, but road maintenance appears to be a priority, another reason to love SK. I still haven’t figured out how Quebecers can pay such taxes and have such bad roads, but that’s another discussion.

The weekend around June 24th is always a huge one for my hamlet. Bikers from all over come to our little park for what’s called the Boogie to camp, listen to music, and talk bikes. For days before the event, motorcycles roar through the area en route to our sleepy, so unimportant, and forgettable hamlet. One of the hamlet access roads is paved and it is always in rough shape by this time of year. Once the freeze/thaw cycle is over, the potholes are marked with signs and fluorescent paint and we locals know where they are and can slalom around them. But a week before the Boogie, everything changes. Our gravel road to Willow Bunch gets an extra grading and the paving crews come out in force to repave our other access road.

And I just happened to decide to do a town run on Paving Day. It was slow trip to town, but I’m not complaining! All the potholes were filled with gravel and the crews were starting on the paving. Big shoutout to them for all their hard work!

My town run was prompted by the fact that I was completely out of food. I’m doing a good job of not stocking up on anything… Before going to the grocery store, I stopped in at SGI (our DMV) to find out if I can lower my monthly registration and insurance fee for the truck since it won’t be driven for about a year. Absolutely. The vehicle won’t be registered (street legal) and I will be covered for liability only in case someone  steals the truck, goes on a joy ride, and destroys property or, worse, injures or kills someone. The cost will be $50 for a year, saving me an $80 monthly payment! Wow!

Next stop was the art gallery to pick up a ticket for a Great Plains concert on Saturday night! Saskia and Darrel are friends of C&C and put on a great show. I’ve seen them play a few times and they never disappoint. I’ll be going in with C&C and we might do dinner first.

I then had lunch, did a couple more errands, and finally got my groceries. I don’t want to get into the price of crappy tomatoes, but boy is pork consistently a great deal!

My thieving neighbour was in the store and we did a great job of pretending we didn’t see each other…

I took a secondary grave road home to avoid the paving crews. Even a gravel road in SK is better than a paved road in most other parts of Canada, especially in a zippy little pickup truck!

Now, I’m going to finish my work today and then start experimenting with my packing. My last order of clothing arrived today, so I’m ready to see how much everything I want to bring weighs and then start subtracting pieces. I’m starting to regret deciding to go with a suitcase since it alone uses up a full quarter of my weight allowance. I suspect that I may do a frantic run to Montana next week to pick up a super lightweight backpack rush ordered from Amazon… But we’ll see what the scale says tonight! 🙂

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Internet Access Is the Main Reason I Am Going to Emigrate From Canada

This November will mark 20 years of my having access to the internet. And since that fateful night of discovering a service that would change my life completely, bringing me new avenues of accessing knowledge and entertainment, of communication with others, and a way of making a living anywhere, I have had to fight against Canada’s competition laws that give our tiny handful of ISPs too much power. Because there is no competition, there is absolutely no motivation to improve and expand services, and they can charge whatever they want.

I started my internet journey in this country with dial-up, as so many people did. That meant that as soon as phone service went down, so did internet access.

From 2003 to 2007, I lived in a rural community north of Ottawa, in the heart of cottage country. The best internet service I could get was 26Kbps dial-up, fully half of what dial-up service was just a few kilometres from my house. There were no plans to expand service. A local entrepreneur living in the nearest village, which had DSL broadband, had the bright idea of setting up a bunch of repeaters throughout the area so that folks like me outside of coverage could have broadband internet. All the data being used was paid for. He didn’t steal anything. Well, Bell made sure to shut him down. He had no legal recourse because of the competition laws. Never mind that he was offering a service they would not provide and that he was paying them for all the data used. I checked recently and if I still lived in that house in Quebec I would still have only 26Kbps dial-up internet and no cell service.

There were a lot of issues with the phone lines to my community and so service would go out frequently. I lost service once ahead of a massive incoming snowstorm and wanted to make sure that I could call out if needed, so I placed a service call and rated it as an “emergency.” Bell punished me for that by not fixing my service for a full two weeks (10 business days) and the guy who did the “repair” messed it up. I ended up having to fix his mess since I didn’t want to wait another two weeks (so a full month with no phone or internet service) for a repair on the repair.

In 2007, I moved to Gatineau, a large city, and was excited to have broadband internet. After 11 years of dealing with Bell, I was ready to try anyone else and moved on to Vidéotron, who were even worse in terms of customer service. Their catalogue of horrors is long enough to write a book, and I was only with them for 18 months! One of my favourite stories is that my neighbours who shared a wall were moving and asked to have their service turned off. Vidéotron turned mine off instead, said it would be up to two weeks before they could turn it back on, and that I would have to pay a $90 reconnection fee. I fought that fee until until 2009, 18 months after I canceled my service with them.

Another thing they did was that they offered an unlimited plan and then, after a few months, decided to put a 100GB cap on the “unlimited” accounts. Well, there is a silver lining to this story. Customers, including myself, filed a lawsuit against Vidéotron and… we won. The judgment came out in the last year. But, of course, it is under appeal so I doubt I will ever see a payout.

And then, I hit the road. While most of the rest of the world, even many countries in the so-called “third world” have super fast and inexpensive mobile bandwidth, Canada was slow to get on board with that idea. In 2008, there was no point in even considering cellular internet since it was super expensive and service was spotty. But within the next year or so, Canada’s various telecom providers got together and in a fit of madness upgraded cellular service across the country, with towers popping up like mushrooms. I got really excited about this, thinking that Canada was finally going to catch up with the rest of the world. And then, I saw the rates and plans.

These rates and plans really haven’t changed much over the last seven years. You’re looking at about $70 to $80 a month with Bell and Telus for 5GB of bandwidth on your phone (dedicated hot spot devices do a little better). I paid Telus $80 a month for several years for my 5GB and an additional $55 per GB. But, hey, at least I had decent speed internet almost everywhere. Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth and all that.

In 2011 to 2012, I  dealt with hard wired Telus while I was in Lethbridge, both with my own personal account and with internet access in my buildings in general. Their tech support did shoddy work, they refused to replace their own poorly installed wiring, and they couldn’t figure out why I was upset that I wasn’t getting the speeds I was paying for since “at least [I had] service.”

When I moved to Saskatchewan, I went back to Bell because they had the best rate for a mobile hot spot. I have to be fair and say that other than the rates being highway robbery, they gave me good service, especially from a technical point of view, replacing my hot spot repeatedly even when it wasn’t on warranty. But I was paying something like $120 a month for 12GB of data and $10 per GB after that. I use a lot of bandwidth for my transcription business and my internet bill was somewhere around $250 a month.

So I went to SaskTel, whom I discovered have an unlimited data plan.

Most of my readers are familiar with the issues I’ve had with the lack of service in my hamlet, well detailed over last summer, so I won’t rehash those details. But I will give an update.

I’ve had okay internet since I got home because of the heavy duty booster I installed last August. Service has been a bit flaky, but nothing like what I used to experience.

Until last night.

I hit my soft cap and I suddenly could not get internet on my computer anymore and only intermittent data on my phone. I thought there might be a service issue because of the weather, so I waited until this morning to call technical support. Thankfully, I got the Indian lady who knows what she’s doing so she walked me through all the steps of resetting my network settings, bla bla bla. She finally dug deeper into her questioning and pretty much went ha ha when I said that I had slooooooow data back on my phone after doing all that, but was having trouble with my computer.

SaskTel, in their infinite wisdom, apparently made some changes to discourage users from using their phone as a hot spot after hitting their soft cap. I guess those “changes” mean that your data service flickers on and off?

This is not a “you don’t have service and use a booster” issue. I’m experiencing it even up in the cow pasture where I don’t need a booster. This is definitely an account-level issue.

Again, I am paying for unlimited data and my ISP is making it difficult for me to use data. Didn’t another ISP get its ass whooped in court for doing that?

My contract with SaskTel was up in February and I thought of signing a new one to essentially finance a newer iPhone through them (did the math with a service rep and even if I don’t use the service, I wouldn’t be paying much more for the phone over that time than if I paid for it cash today). Moving to a new contract would mean having to move to their new unlimited plan at $120 a month ($40 more than I pay now), but which would give me 15GB of “high speed” internet before being throttled, rather than 10. I thought that this would be worth it, until today. Now, I can’t wait to call SaskTel in a few weeks and tell them to go fuck themselves. Pardon my French. I’m really not sure what I’ll do when I get back to Haven next spring, but knowing that there’s no internet here means that I’ll just be that much more motivated to get my Mexico visa sorted out and start packing up.

So that’s twenty years of dealing with Canadian telecom bullshit and I’ve just had enough now that I’m seeing that this is not “normal.”

My experience with TelMex in Mexico has been the complete opposite. I heard so many negative things about them and yet they have been nothing but customer-oriented, going so far as to send technical help after dark to restore my service after an outage. I didn’t pay them, but finally found out that my landlady was paying about 350 pesos (about 27CAD) a month for unlimited 5Mbps service. I haven’t researched internet prices in all the hardwired communities in Canada, but I’m pretty sure no one is paying less than $30 a month for unlimited and reasonably fast internet.

Mexico also has tons of free WiFi hotspots that anyone can use. It took me until the middle of my second winter on Isla de la Piedra to learn that if my internet went down, I should go to the school and see if their WiFi was up since it was from a different service provider. When in Mazatlán and Mérida, I could sit on a bench in pretty park and use free WiFi instead of mobile bandwidth. And mobile bandwidth in Mexico is less expensive than in Canada, especially if you have a plan instead of doing the pay-as-you-go Amigo route. Even that isn’t a bad deal since some sites, like Facebook and Twitter, are free to use.

I’m also researching mobile bandwidth in Europe, especially Bulgaria, since I will be heading there shortly. One of the reasons why Bulgaria came to the top of my list is its world ranking for internet access, penetration, and prices. A few years ago, it was 3rd in the world, with Canada somewhere around position 130… I’ve had many people assure me that if my apartment is not hard wired, I’ll be able to rely on mobile bandwidth without going broke. I’ve started to do my research on that and am finding that basic mobile pay-as-you-go plans start around $15 for 20GB of high speed data. Bell and SaskTel offer 12GB of high speed data for $120.

“Move back to civilisation” is not an acceptable response to my internet issues at Haven. I live in civilisation and, in fact, I’ve been to truly remote locations that have internet access. Moving to a more populated area will in no way guarantee that I won’t keep butting up against Canadian telecom providers, as illustrated above. This is the 21st century and internet access should be a given. Instead, ISPs treat internet access as a giant favour they are granting to the Canadian populace. Also, our rates are some of, if not the, highest in the developed world.

I’m tired of living in a country that exists in the past. I have a lot more reasons for wanting to emigrate, but the internet situation really covers them all. It represents the government’s short-sightedness and unwillingness to grow with the times. It represents the Canadian populace’s general apathy and willingness to settle for scraps.

I am a digital nomad of the 21st century. Canada not only limits my mobility within my own country, but keeps me from earning a living while taxing me to death. I’m just done with being here. My eyes are wide open at the kind of world I’m going and I’m ready for some new challenges.

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A Perfect Saturday At Haven

I awoke early to a pretty cold rig and turned on my mattress warmer, then dozed as my furnace kicked on and started to warm the rig to a more acceptable temperature. I had a warm spot that was just right and so no motivation at all to get up.  I read for ages and eventually got up around 7:30.

Then, I got right to work. I had my first assignment for a new client, so I spent the morning focused on that. Once I was satisfied with the file, I sent it off then went to Willow Bunch to visit the thrift store. There, I picked up good rain boots and a pair of barely used shoes for just $5, totally worth the drive down! I also visited the new food store, getting a really good deal on cereal. I’m glad Willow Bunch has a food store again after the Co-Op shut down the old one.

I got home around three and started to work on some translation for the Willow Bunch Museum (volunteer work) when the phone rang. It was my neighbour Caroline requesting assistance with their new-to-them fiver. I went over and showed them how to light the oven and stove (there had been air in the propane lines), work the fridge, and start the furnace. I’ll help with the water system next week when they dewinterize.

That earned me a glass of wine (okay, I stopped counting at three) and an invitation to stay for dinner! Caroline’s been curing meat, so she needed a test subject for her ham! We had that with apple sauce, Brussels sprouts (complete with a bread crumb topping), corn (complete with feta), and scalloped potatoes with cheese. Yum! Good thing I don’t eat like that every night!

I also got in loads of cuddling with their dog Brutus and one of their cats. I got lots of that yesterday, too, since Caroline and Charles were gone all day and they’d asked me to go in and try to coax Brutus out sometime in the afternoon. He was distraught that his humans were gone and it was only by sitting in a chair in the living room and cuddling with him for a long while that I was able to get him to go out — several hours later. He’s a stereotypical sweet old man stuck in his routine. I just adore him!

Today was also the first sunny day we’ve had since the weather turned on Tuesday. It’s been chilly, but since these are more seasonal temps, I can’t complain.

Perfect days at Haven are mundane and I wouldn’t have them any other way!

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I Can Get A Lot Done in a Morning

It was a cold night, just below freezing. I was grateful to be able to turn on my mattress warmer in the wee hours of the morning. Then, around 6:00, my furnace kicked on (thanks to my programmable thermostat) to warm up the rig to an acceptable temperature when I was finally ready to crawl out of my warm cocoon.

This awaited me outside!

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Notice, it’s just in the shade, but I still had snow on the truck when I left for town around nine.

First stop in town was the RCMP detachment to drop off my victim impact statement. Then, I went to a photography studio to have my passport picture taken. Might as well take advantage of my otherwise unnecessary trip into town and get my passport application sent off! I can’t buy a plane ticket until I have my new passport so this needed to be done ASAP.

I had my paperwork all filled out so I was able to go straight from the studio to the post office. $20 for the picture, $22 to XPress post the application to Canada, and something like $160 for a 10-year passport. Thank goodness we have a 10-year option now!!! And the renewal process is so easy. Nice to see one Government of Canada department improving its efficiency. My passport actually doesn’t expire till next March, so I’m kind of “wasting” nearly a year, but with most countries not granting entry unless your passport is good for at least six months beyond your entry, I would have been limited as to where I could go in Europe and forced to come back by March. Brr!

Then, I made a couple of stops. I went to The Bargain! Shop for household things — hand soap, dish soap, and laundry detergent, as well as to check out the clothes. I’m looking for a particular skirt style for my upcoming travels and they get out of season things from good brands, so it’s worth having a peek every now in then to see if they’re carrying any treasures.

I then went to the Salvation Army to do the same thing and also see if they’d brought their prices back down to more reasonable levels. Almost. Not as good as it used to be, but I would shop there again. They had tons of nice handbags and I caved and bought a gorgeous quilted tote with handy pockets in it. I just can’t resist a unique bag…

Next stop was the grocery store, where spent a whopping $20 on produce — a bag of onions, a bunch of bananas, four pink lady apples, two nectarines, a bag of satsumas, and a red pepper that was almost $3. Wow. The store was really chaotic and dusty as they’re laying down the flooring (tiles), with half the produce at one end of the store and the other half on the other side of the store. Most of the meat aisle was inaccessible. I can’t wait for them to be done, especially since I don’t see any real improvements being made. We didn’t need a shiny new store with new coolers. We needed more space…

Finally, I popped into the bakery for a coffee and bun to go because I was feeling a little faint. The bakery’s a little pricy, but it’s a nice treat now and then.

I got in just before twelve. Now, lunch and then I really need to get to work!

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Tuesday Was Memorable

Life at Haven tends to be rather idyllic. But the break-ins over the winter have really changed the atmosphere here, with doors getting locked even when folks are just wandering around the hamlet. My outbuildings are normally unlocked during the day when I’m here, but now I’m getting used to carrying my keys with me. It’s sad.

I awoke to lots of rain on Tuesday, which has turned to sleet today, Wednesday, a perfect day to power through the bit of work on my plate so that I could focus on looking for more today. I was making good inroads when the phone rang just shy of ten. “No number” came up on the display, but I still answered assuming it might be the RCMP calling me back. It was. I spoke to a kind-sounding constable who asked if he could come right down to Haven to take my statement about my attempted break-in. Yes, of course!

About 40 minutes later, the phone rang again. Wow, twice in one day. That has to be a record. It was Scotiabank doing a “courtesy call,” wanting to know how I like my account (a lot), more about my business, and curious about whether I’d consider changing to them as my main bank (not a chance in hell). It was a pleasant conversation and I didn’t mind answering the questions because most of my products are with CIBC right now and it would be good to have a backup. For example, if Scotiabank were to offer me a a credit card, might as well take it. Also, the woman wasn’t trying to sell me anything or convince me to move to Scotiabank. I was about to tell her I had to cut the conversation short as I was expecting a “visitor,” but, thankfully, she kept the call short.

Minutes after I rang off with her, there came a knock at my door. I checked that it was the constable and let him in. I’ve transcribed I don’t know how many statements over the years, so I knew the drill and he noticed that. He offered me victim counseling services (I’m not traumatised, so let’s leave the stretched thin resources to folks who need them) and to provide a victim impact statement. I accepted that because I knew that absolutely nothing was going to happen regarding my own break-in so I wanted something in her file about how she has destroyed the fabric of our community. The constable discovered he didn’t have the form on him but said he would “pick up” my neighbour and when he came back in a few hours to drop her off, he’d bring a form for me. I could then fill out the form and bring it into the detachment next time I was in town. Well, I hadn’t planned to be in town for a bit, so I’ll be doing a special trip for that as soon as the weather clears. Since I’m going through propane for heating, I’ll pretend it’s a propane filling trip not a “my neighbour sucks and is making me waste gas” trip. 🙂

He was back mid-afternoon and said that she denied everything, including stealing a pallet from my property, for which there was an eye witness. Unfortunately, rain destroyed any chance we might have had for fingerprints, which were a long shot anyway since the way the door is damaged makes it look like it was only touched with a tool. There’s no witness. The constable said that he knows she’s lying and that she did it, but he can’t do anything. He seemed incredibly relieved to be dealing with someone who knows the system and wasn’t expecting a miracle. I said to him that what I wanted to accomplish was done — she knows I won’t take her bullshit lying down. Apparently, she broke into some other neighbours’ places and they forgave her since she’s “sick.” Maybe she thought that would happen with me. Not a chance. The constable did say she is willing to take a polygraph, to his immense surprise. That’s not admissible in court, but sometimes the truth can come out in other ways that are admissible. He was surprised that I knew all of that. What can I say, I’ve transcribed the odd polygraph interview too.

I thanked him for his time and then came in to keep working since an unexpected job for Wednesday came in from a client I normally only work on weekends for.

And then, another email came in that really brightened my day.

There is a transcription firm I’ve wanted to work for since I started doing this five years ago. I had a chance to interview for them around that time and was deemed to need more experience. Just before I left Mexico, they emailed to give me a chance to interview again. Just like that, out of the blue. I did the test and then didn’t hear anything back… until yesterday. Soon as I get through my current workload, I’ll start with this new company on a probationary period. Too soon for exclamation marks, but I’m rather chuffed. They are another firm like an existing client of mine who would have as much work for me as I want as long as I meet their standards. I’ve had a run of bad luck with clients this year and I hope the tide is turning. We’ll see how the month goes with them. I’ll feel more comfortable leaving for Bulgaria if I feel I’m solidly in place with them.

The only progress I’ve made on Bulgaria is I’ve set up a price alert for airfare. Soon as I get something around 800CAD all-in (which I saw come up periodically over the winter) at the end of June or sometime in July, I’m buying a ticket. I haven’t decided yet where I want to settle in Bulgaria, but I’m narrowing it down based on the best places in the country to hike. I’ve been reading a lot about hiking in Bulgaria and am getting really excited about getting there!

So that was my Tuesday at Haven. Wednesday is starting off cold and snowy. Pretty strange after landing in summer weather! But things should start clearing up this afternoon and we’ll be back into the 20s by the weekend.

It’s still good to be home. 😀