Neil Yan Dot Com

Swine flu is here! In our city, our schools, our offices, it’s everywhere, just like CityTV! But so is the vaccine! Yeah! A preventative measure to fend off the pig flu!! I hear it’s no ordinary flu virus. It’s been on the WHO’s radar for a few years now. Countries around the world have been monitoring this one closely in that same time period. What’s special is this one kills even healthy people (or so it seems; “healthy” people have died from it might have underlying conditions that they might not be aware of). Sixty percent of people who have died (in a small sample) have been young healthy women in their 20-30s. It’s fear factor X 10!

So, what’s the problem? Take the vaccine and you’re chances of contracting pig flu is 20%. Take the usual flu precautionary measures (wash your hands regularly, don’t touch your face, gargle with salt water, etc.) should decrease your chances even more!!

Ah, yes, the nea-sayers are out! The doctors (not a lot of them), the conspiracy theorists, anti-government rednecks and the such! They all have their arguments, some of them valid, most of them not. But the biggest one against it is the ingredients in the vaccine, namely formaldehyde, thimerasol (a mercury-base preservative) and a few other ingredients that shouldn’t be in our bodies, however minute. Some argue that these ingredients is a soup mix that can lead to cancer, autism, and whatever else.

My take: I touch a lot of people’s keyboards at work, I talk to a lot of people at work, we walk everywhere downtown. So, my chances of coming in contact with “pig-bug” is pretty good. I don’t want to bring it home and infect Ben. Period. For me it’s about transmission. It’s not about me. My immune system might be able to fight the bastard off without the vaccine, but Ben’s immune system is still in its infancy. I’m going to get it. Will Ben? Most likely. Again, it’s about risk management. What about autism and cancer? Well, if he dies from the pig-bug, both are irrelevant.

The debate goes on. All I know is the government has spend my tax dollars already. I might as well take the meds.

Here are a couple of links that may be of interest:

1) Globe and Mail opinion on why we should take the vaccine

2) Canadian Government information site, including ingredients of Arepanrix

3) Vaccine Risk Awareness Network (VRAN) site

I had one of those days that just blows you away! So much can happen in 16 hours that makes you think, “WOW!”. Here are my highlights:

1. I finally got my neighbour (a certified electrician) to wire my eight pot lights in my basement! It was 3 months in the waiting. He might have waited because I haven’t spoken to him in the 9 years he’s been my neighbour
2. I wore my mid-summer tennis shirt to work when it was 12 degrees out this morning, and by mid-morning, it was 3 degrees. Did I mention that the back of my shirt is perforated? I might as well gone topless to work! My nipples could cut glass, it was that cold!
3. My colleague and I went fixing a phantom “clock” at work for 40 minutes. The clock never existed.
4. The provincial government just asked me to send them a cheque for $13,000; my share of the $24 BILLION deficit they ran up this year. I want to be able to OVER SPEND just $1 Billion and never pay it back!
5. The best part of the day, watching Ben climb the stairs in our Markham home. He did it effortlessly! He did it so many times, he broke a sweat, and then he did it a few more times!! Now’s he’s tired! We need stairs in our condo unit!

Ben’s stands unassisted now, shuffles across the couch standing and now with his climbing abilities, we’re going to assume he’s going to be walking very soon. It was just a few days ago when I watched an old video of him IMMOBILE in his crib, yapping away. Those were the days!

I thought Thanksgiving weekend was over last weekend. Boy was I wrong. Since the long weekend, 2 weekends ago, I saw more family than I have in long, long time. First, Sheila’s brother and his family was in town for the week. That was fun. We only get to see them once a year, and this time they travelled to us instead of the other way around. Ben’s cousin is just 2 years older, so they played together well. Well, as well as a 9 month old plays with 2.5 year old. Carley takes the toys that Ben’s playing with, and expects a fight, but Ben moves on pretty quickly. He just picks up the next toy. Ben hasn’t figured out the concept of ownership yet. We like it that way for now;  there’s no crying when another kid takes his toys. He’s got his dad’s short attention span…it works in his favour

Then, we attended my sister’s father-in-law’s 75 birthday bash. My entire family was there, so we saw the whole family again! Imagine being in a hall with 250+ dancing Filopinos. There’s got a be a joke in there somewhere, but I can’t figure one out. It was really nice. We had to leave early; Ben was tired! Sadly, we love using that excuse. But we take advantage of it where we can…we can’t use it when he’s 15.

Then, Sheila’s parents came back from a 2 week trip in Taiwan…while her brothers and their families were here. What do you get when you cram 8 adults and 4 infants into 1000 square feet? Close conversion! It was nice to get to know Sheila’s family up close and personal. She’s been exposed to my family for such a long time, I guess I had it coming to me. I didn’t mind it. We actually had a lot of fun. But the best part of any family visit, the farewell. I don’t know about Sheila, but I was drained from the week! We were busy every night doing something with someone; that’s not a normal week for us. It’s usually just the weekends. So, last night, it was just the 3 of us. The only unusual part of it was we all went to be around 10pm…and we all slept soundly…or at least I did

On a different note, did you hear about the Australian baby in a stroller that fell off the subway platform in front of a moving subway? The baby SURVIVES!! Here’s the clip:

I’m going to say it, “Sheila and I are spoiled”. There, I said it. Sheila (and a little to some degree, me) has put a lot of effort towards E.C. (elimination communication) since February, four weeks after Ben’s birth. We were determined to save the environment and cut our diaper costs down to a minimum. We fast forward almost nine months later and the effort has paid off, Ben rarely craps in his diaper. When I mean rarely, I mean maybe once a month…maybe. That’s because we (mainly Sheila) catches them during the day when he starts grunting, or gets antsy..or the more obvious one, he FARTS! Onto the pottie, and he does his business. THAT’S MY BOY!!

So, what happens when we’re out and about and he needs to go? Well, we found that out yesterday! Ben’s been a little “stuck” over the last 2 days, so we knew it was going to happen soon and later. Sheila heard him fart just as we were leaving for the door to go shopping. She asked if we should put him on the pottie, but I said, “He should be fine”. As we’re walking around Loblaws, Ben’s bouncing up and down on my back in his carrier. He never does that…but he’s been surprising his parents with new “he never does that”, so I figure he’s just having a bit of fun on my back.

We get home and Sheila smells a nice aroma coming from his pants. We knew he “emptied” into his diaper. What we didn’t know was that the bouncing on my back also help the shit move up his shirt (personally I think the bouncing was to give his diaper more room to fill up). Sheila shouted from the other room, “Neil, come here quick! Hurry!”. Thinking he fell, or he hurt himself, I run into the room to find Ben smiling and covered with shit up to his NIPPLES!! WHAT DO WE DO?!! This is all new to us!! Sheila got shit on her arms! I picked him up and I got shit on my hands! Ben, in the while, is enjoying all the attention…and laughing…”take that daddy!!” was what he was thinking! This gives a new meaning to “you little shit!”

Sheila and I ponder for a minute on how to attack this mess. I suggested straight to the tub and hose him down. She suggested we start him off in the sink and then work our way to the tub. Either way, we were disgusted! How do normal parents handle this?! In the end, we still had to hose him down in the tub. The smell was unbearable. Again, how do normal parents do it?!!

Lesson here: if Ben farts, put him on the pottie, NO MATTER HOW FAR WE’RE AT OR OUT THE DOOR!

Over the years, I’ve been asked to audition for a commercial here or there. I’ve been in a couple of photo shoots, but nothing anyone would ever see, unless it’s in a female prison cell The most memorable one was being an extra a few years back in a Coors Light commercial. It was basically 16 hours of HELL!! It was a February shoot, 2 locations in Toronto, and during one of Toronto’s worst snow storms. The day started at 10AM and didn’t finish till 1AM the next day. Pay was less than minimum wage after you calculate the amount of time I sat on my ass.

The last commercial I did was last fall for an old seniors home in Scarborough. The new development was looking for potential clients, so they advertised it as a very family friendly environment. I played the young dad of 2 young kids in a couple of scenes. It wasn’t an Oscar performance. I was more sitting around than acting. And when it was time to act, all I had to do was cheer on 2 little kids as they blew out candles on a cake. All-in-all, a 2 hours ordeal with little fanfare.

Here’s the link to the commercial. Don’t blink…you might miss me…in the last 2 seconds of the commercial (I’m the guy with the back to the camera….my better side)