Travel Insurance

 I must admit that travel insurance is one of the few types of insurance I agree with.

Health insurance, very good.

Accident / liability / theft insurance for your car, very good.

Life insurance... kind of pointless after you are dead. Really only useful if you have family to worry about and haven't already arranged your funeral.

But travel insurance is basically health insurance for when traveling in other countries. Its also supposed to cover financial default of travel suppliers (eg. if they suddenly declared bankruptcy and no longer honoured prepaid tickets), and other losses incurred while traveling. But most of the "other losses" are pretty vague and not used very often so its really just health insurance for tourists.

Standard travel insurance is supposed to cover:

• Medical emergency (accident or sickness)
• Emergency evacuation (volcano, earthquake, tsunami, hurricane, war-zone, etc)
• Repatriation of remains
• Return of a minor
• Trip cancellation
• Trip interruption
• Accidental death, injury or disablement benefit
• Overseas funeral expenses
• Lost, stolen or damaged baggage, personal effects or travel documents
• Delayed baggage (and emergency replacement of essential items)
• Flight connection was missed due to airline schedule
• Travel delays due to weather

Thanks to the internet (Huzzah!) you can now buy travel insurance online very easily. You can even buy travel insurance on your iPhone in roughly the same time it takes you do download an app.

So lets pretend you go to Mexico... and you get sick from drinking the water... or shot by kidnappers... or robbed by bandits... injured during a hurricane... fall in a sink hole and break your leg... Seriously, every year there is some problem with Canadian tourists stuck in Mexico and there has been some kind of catastrophe, murder, kidnapping or whatever.

I know Mexico is really cheap (and fascinating if you love pyramids like I do), but its really got a bad reputation to stuff happening. Having travel insurance when traveling to Mexico should be pretty much mandatory.

So yeah, if you are traveling to a dangerous part of the world like Mexico is, you really should get travel insurance. Mexico is like a jaguar... beautiful, but dangerous.

I remember when I was in South Korea (a country that is still technically at war with North Korea... and the North has nuclear missiles) I got travel insurance. Mostly to cover my health costs in case I ever needed a hospital.

One time I got sick and did need to see a doctor and get antibiotics.

Another time I was mountain climbing (freehand) and nearly fell. Thankfully I did not fall. But if I had fallen I would have either been:

1. Dead, in which case who really cares if I have travel insurance.

2. Very injured, in which case that insurance probably would have been used quite a bit.

That is really the point of travel insurance I guess. When traveling you are more likely to be doing new things - including mountain climbing, horseback riding, deep sea diving, swimming with sharks, dolphins, jellyfish, piranhas, and eating new foods that you could be allergic to. Or drinking water that might not be safe.

Thus travel insurance, even if not traveling to a dangerous part of the world, is still a wise precaution.

Grocery Shopping Challenge

CAN YOU BUY THREE BAGS OF GROCERIES FOR $20?

Because I just did. Just got home from the grocery store, still amazed from my feat.

Included veggies, fruit, meat, pasta and even desserts. Only $20.05 and frankly the 5 cents is barely worth mentioning.

THREE BAGS! Averaging $6.68 per bag.

Probably would have been more value per dollar if I had actually paid attention to what I was doing.

Go and see if your shopping smarts are good enough to beat that and still come out with a good balance of different foods.

A Good Day to Die Hard (Die Hard 5 Trailer)

Wait!

The're coming out with a new Die Hard film on Valentines Day? Really? How come I didn't find out until now?

Jackie Chan's Romantic Comedy

The following film (available for free on YouTube) is a romantic comedy starring Jackie Chan and Shu Qi. It is also, sort of, an action film, as part of the plot pertains to a boxing / martial arts fight between Jackie Chan and the hired champion of his rival/friend.

The Chinese title is "Glass Bottles", based on the plot device of Shu Qi finding a glass bottle in Taiwan which prompts her to go to Hong Kong looking for love. The English title is horrible and has nothing to do with the plot.

For the guy and gal who can't decide between an action film and a chick flick, this film makes a great compromise.

The English dubbing on the YouTube version is above par.

Richard Nixon Comedy "Dick" Surprisingly Funny

"Dick" is a 1999 political comedy about the Watergate Scandal, telling a fictionalized version of how Richard Nixon was removed from office by the source known as "Deepthroat".

While it is true that the real Deepthroat was Mark Felt and this was later revealed in 2005, this rather amusing comedy about how two teenage girls took down the president and all the president's men is surprisingly funny and smartly written.

What I also like about this film is the soundtrack. It has a lot of great songs from the 1970s on it.

The cast includes:

Kirsten Dunst as Betsy Jobs
Michelle Williams as Arlene Lorenzo
Dan Hedaya as President Richard M. Nixon
Bruce McCulloch as Carl Bernstein
Will Ferrell as Bob Woodward
Saul Rubinek as Henry Kissinger
Dave Foley as Bob Haldeman

And best of all you can watch it for free on YouTube.

Rogers Internet Outage

On January 9th 2013 Rogers Internet went down all across Ontario for over 5 hours.

No warning. No explanation why it happened after the fact. No refunds either to compensate people who lost productivity for their work or leisure.

The fact that Rogers Internet doesn't have any backup systems in place suggests to me that they're really running a shoestring budget operation - and overcharging customers for shoddy service.

There are OTHER companies available. Including faster companies. If you know of any in Ontario please leave a comment below about which internet providers you think are more worthy.

Shakespeare Baby!

Call it a personal preference but when it comes to live theatre I watch very little other than good ol' Shakespeare.

I have watched other things... Ie. Death of a Salesman is boring! Lysistrata is amazingly funny... But basically a lot of non-Shakespearean plays are annoyingly bad or boring.

Frankly I've enjoyed ballet events more. If given the option of watching Death of a Salesman or watching ballet... I would choose ballet everytime.

Same goes with musical plays like Les Miserables. I prefer the 1998 non-musical version because it has more story and less fluff. I haven't seen the new film of Les Miserables... But I have heard from friends that it sucks. Some people probably won't care however because they just LOVE Les Mis.

But maybe I should point out that I am an hypocrite. I am writing a musical theatre script... Whether it will be very good and get performed someday is questionable.

Three Books for Zen Archers

If you recently got into archery and want to go a step further to learn zen archery then I highly recommend the three books in the photo below.

Simon's Cat Review

"Simons' Cat" is a series of short (and relatively quiet) cartoons featuring a cat and his owner. The cat basically rules the house - just like a normal cat!

The beauty of this cartoon is that cat basically does everything a normal cat would do in similar circumstances. And then usually one thing more above the top to make it extra funny.

Five Stars! :)

Leather Moisturizers

A good leather moisturizer can help restore the beauty to dry, stiff leather products. It basically works the same as a skin moisturizer, and indeed, you can even use skin moisturizers to treat your leather products if you don't have any leather moisturizers handy.

Most leather products, if they have not somehow been chemically sealed during the manufacturing process, tend to become dry and brittle as they age and a way to fix that dryness is to apply a moisturizer. A moisturizer applied to the leather will slow down and prevent the leather from cracking or splitting - you will need to do this on a regular basis to prevent dryness, especially if your leather products are stored in a warm, dry place.

When leather is cleaned you should also use a moisturizer to protect the leather after the cleaning is done to protect it from water damage. Cleaning leather with just water and then leaving it to dry is a sure way of robbing your leather of its moisture and causing it to dry out and harden. (I had a baseball glove that that happened to when I was a kid because I left it out in the rain.)

Now you might wonder why did I bring up this subject?

Well truth be told I am currently restoring an old pair of hockey skates. I didn't have any leather moisturizers handy, so instead I used Aveeno Creamy Moisturizing Oil.

And it worked wonderfully! I am very pleased with the results (and it gave the old skates a nice pleasant smell too, which was good because it was in a basement for 20+ years).

Types of Moisturizers

Lotions and creams are offered by many different manufacturers of leather goods specifically for the products they make - mostly because selling moisturizers is very profitable because the chemicals themselves are very cheap.

Neat's Foot Oil and Saddle Soap are two such products. The soap is for cleaning leather and then the oil is a traditional way to keep leather soft and supple. After cleaning with the soap, the oil is applied and rubbed into the leather with a soft cloth. Many soaps also contain lanolin, which also acts as a moisturizer - but its not the only kind of moisturizer out there, there are many oils that make a good leather moisturizer.

How Do Moisturizers Work

Moisturizers work in exactly the same way oils or lotions work on dry or chapped skin. They fill in the pores of the leather with needed fluids to bring the leather back to a soft, pliable state. When the leather is cleaned, the soap or solution used can strip the moisture from the leather. This can cause the leather to dry and form cracks or become stiff with time. Like skin, age can cause moisture loss in leather, giving the hide a brittle, dull look. In this case, the moisturizer serves to restore the leather to its previous beauty.

For best results apply the moisturizer every team you use the item so it eventually becomes "as good as new". There may still be permanent cracks in it, but the rest of the item should be fine.

Applying the Moisturizer

Either apply a small amount of the moisturizer directly on the product and rub it around with a soft, clean cloth or saturate the cloth with the moisturizer and then rub it into the leather. When the leather has absorbed the oil, lotion or cream, the excess is then wiped away with a second clean, dry cloth. If the leather is extremely dry, it is often recommended that the moisturizer be allowed to stay on the hide overnight in order to absorb deeply into the leather.

Moisturize Regularly

Leather goods should be moisturized any time they are cleaned or otherwise show signs of dryness, but a routine cleaning and fresh moisturizer works best. By catching the problem early, a moisturizer will prevent the leather from cracking or dulling in appearance. Leather moisturizers can be found at most shoe or leather goods stores and are applied by the consumer. Most dry cleaners also offer leather moisturizing services for their customers.

If you can't get a leather moisturizer then skin moisturizers work equally well. Skin moisturizer will be more expensive because of the types of oils and lotions inside them, but I would argue they actually work better.

Things to Consider

Not all leather needs to be moisturized. For example suede doesn't need to be moisturized.

The consumer should ask the sales clerk if the manufacturer of the product recommends the use of a moisturizer, and for recommendations on how the product should be cleaned - and of course they will probably say yes because they want you to buy more things.

In general leather products such as shoes, boots, coats and purses, the consumer should be considered water and stain repellent - and if they aren't then you should be applying things to them to protect them. Stain repellent will help prevent staining of the leather, making cleaning and moisturizing less frequent.