Be it resolved I will not make resolutions

I don't make New Year's resolutions, so for 2011, my resolution is to continue not to make resolutions.

But in 2011, there are a few things I will try and continue to adhere to anyway.

2011 will be my third year living in the UK as an adult. Including the three years I lived there as a child, that makes six altogether.

After I moved to the UK in 2008 from Toronto, I faced a real conundrum. There are so many places, spaces, plays and exhibitions to see, that I at times felt overwhelmed by the options -- torn between doing domestic daily routine chores, or going out to explore.

It may sound odd, but I came up with guidelines for myself, so I would not miss out on opportunities to see and do new things, but at the same time not do things at a frenetic pace. I decided I would do one new thing a week, see one play and watch four films a month, either at the cinema or on DVD.

I launched this plan in February 2009, and it has gone quite well, although my theatre-going dropped off in the second half of 2010 due to out of town visitors and travel.

I think I will continue to keep these as goals for this year but I would also like to read more novels, do more crafts and find out a lot more about the River Thames.

I am heading towards 2011 feeling a bit tired but refreshed after three weeks of holiday and another one ahead.

I started a new job at the Thomson Reuters Foundation as production editor in September after almost six years working as an editor and producer with the Reuters consumer websites in Toronto and London.

Working on the AlertNet and TrustLaw websites is proving to be both challenging and interesting.

So I am looking forward to 2011 providing a lot of new fulfilling opportunities at work and in terms of travel and exploration in the UK.

Sweet sugar beach on Lake Ontario

My father took me to Sugar Beach across from the Redpath Sugar plant on the shore of Lake Ontario today. 

The area consists of trees, sand, pink umbrellas and granite rocks apparently brought from a Quarry in northern Quebec cut into 1.5 metre wide pieces.

This is a very cool addition to the Toronto waterfront. In fact, it is a cool addition to Toronto's landscape, which is dominated by grey condo towers.

Air travails

I arrived at about noon in Toronto from London and have been struggling against fatigue to stay awake ever since, failed and crashed for two hours late this afternoon.
Flew to Toronto via Air Canada on a Boeing 767.

During take off water started dripping on my arm and leg apparently from the luggage container overhead. I had no idea what it was.

The woman sitting next to me pushed the call button for the flight attendent, and I waved to her from my seat. She could not come over because we were required to have our seat belts on during lift off.

She didn't come over once the seatbelt sign was off, so I went to the rear of the cabin and asked another flight attendent for help.

Before take off I was lingering at the back of the plane and this same flight attendent breezed by saying "What a frigging nightmare".

When I mentioned we had rung the bell and required help, she got defensive and said they couldn't come over during take off. This however didn't explain why no one came over afterwards.

She came over to see what had happened and checked inside the luggage container. When she found nothing, she said it must have been condensation and handed me a wad of paper towels. No apology and very surly attitude.

I followed her to the back of the plane and told her I didn't like her approach,

The other flight attendent was there and she apologized for not coming over after the seatbelt sign went off, saying that she thought it was just a matter of me wanting to get something out of the overhead luggage container during lift off!

The flight attendent who had come over to check out the problem said: You need to relax.

Bizarre and unappreciated given the price of the ticket.

The law at UK student tuition-fee rise demo

Today I watched on television from work as London police officers rode their horses into a demonstration, apparently in order to disperse a protest against a tuition-fee hike increase of up to 9,000 pounds for UK students, up from 3,290 pounds.

Under the plan 75 percent of graduates will pay more than under the current system, despite the introduction of a sliding scale repayment scheme.

I later went down to the demonstration, which was at Parliament Square, but found my way into Whitehall blocked by a row of riot police. People standing around the barricade told me to go south to Embankment, so I did. There were maybe 1,000 demonstrators there chanting, listening to music and being told by organisers not to go to Parliament Square, but to head east along Embankment and up to the Strand or Trafalgar Square.

It was difficult to know what had happened to the students who had been kettled by the police earlier. I couldn't figure out how to find them given that Whitehall was blocked off.

Not many people left while we awaited the results of the vote in Parliament, which showed that it was approved by a majority of 21 votes, with 27 members of the coalition parties voting against it and a handful abstaining.

Afterwards most people marched west along Embankment past Portcullis House, protected by a row of police, to Bridge Street.

But there was a barricade of police and police vans stretching across the road and sidewalk. Protesters stayed for about half an hour chanting, playing music and hurling abuse and the odd bit of rubbish at the police.

What we didn't know was that in other parts of London at around the same time, there were reports of protesters breaking into the Treasury, attacking the car of Prince Charles and Camilla, burning a Christmas tree in Trafalgar Square.

I have attended a lot of demonstrations and rallies in various cities, including Ottawa, Toronto and Washington, D.C. and I have never seen anything like this.

I wonder if this was an appropriate way to treat young people trying to exercise their democratic right to demonstrate in Parliament Square against a decision that will have a huge impact on their future.