Dear Fellow Travellers and Our Airlines:

Please note that this is, and all <> flights are non-smoking. Federal regulations prohibit tampering with, disabling, or destroying any smoke detectors in airplane lavatories. We are pleased to offer a variety of meals on this flight, and if you have a special dietary need, please let your flight attendant know. We have kosher, vegetarian, vegan, low-sodium, and low-sugar meals.

Hm. No "nut-free" meals on offer.

Can we please all make a pact not to bring any sort of nut products onto a plane for munching? Can we also promise not to select nut products as our "free snack" when offered? I do not smoke on the plane, which is a matter of your health and safety, as well as the comfort of all those on board. Well, you sitting there munching on your yummy salted peanuts or - even better - pistachios and hazelnuts is a health hazard for me.

Sure, I can pop reactine and drink a lot of high-caffeine beverages in an attempt to stave off what could possibly be a full-scale reaction, but this is not particularly comfortable for me. Nor is it, I imagine, particularly comfortable for those around me. And one thing that people may not be aware of is this: an allergy such as one to nuts gets worse with each and every contact.

So every flight I am on, where my fellow passengers are happily popping nuts, is one step closer to a full blown, red face, swollen membranes, anaphylactic-shock reaction. Yes, I carry an epi-pen, and yes I carry reactine. Reactine is effective - sometimes - against minor reactions. An epi-pen is effective for about fifteen minutes depending on the severity of the reaction.

I ask you, when we are 35,000 feet in the air, are you going to be able to get me to a hospital within 15 minutes, so that I can be put on an epinephrine and benadryl drip, and possibly a ventilator as well?

Unfortunately, I think a fair number of those who do not have nut allergies - similarly, shellfish and bee sting allergies - don't quite grasp the severity of the situation. Allow me to make it plain for you:

I will die.

I won't have several months or years of hanging on in the hospital, hooked up to a respirator. My kidneys will not slowly start to shut down. Within seconds, my tongue and throat will start to swell shut. My lungs will swell to the point where I can not draw a breath. Within minutes, I will be in a great deal of pain. Reason and rational thought will be gone within about five minutes.

Depending on the type of nut - ground, legume, tree, etc - I may or may not be vomiting. See, because I am one of the lucky folks who are allergic to em all. It's not just legumes (peanuts) for me, and there are a few different reactions that I am lucky enough to experience!

And though those who are allergic to bee stings actually need to be STUNG for the reaction to take place, those of us who are allergic to nuts and/or shellfish don't actually have to eat the offending food. For many of us, the smell is enough to provoke a mild-to-severe reaction. Couple that with the possibility of a random passenger cross-contaminating any of the public areas (ie - washroom door handles, arm rests, seats, etc) that we may actually have physical contact with and you have, essentially, a flying death-mobile.

It would be devastating for the airlines to require an in-flight death by anaphylaxis to consider banning all open nut products on their flights. There will be lawsuits, and enough ill-will and finger-pointing to go around. It's bad enough that - on a trans-Atlantic flight - we get to eat fruit platters, and that's it. And sometimes, depending on the airline, we get a nice big, open bowl of mixed nuts as a dessert.

There are no "nut-free" meals offered.

Rather than letting it get to the point where lawsuits are flung around, be proactive. Recognize that a vegan will not die at 35,000 feet if there is cheese offered in their meal. I respect the vegan lifestyle, but it is, in fact, a lifestyle. No less important than my particular allergy, but considerably less life-threatening.

At a restaurant, I can let the server know of my allergy and the kitchen will accomodate as much as possible. There is no attention like this on an airplane. My life is, quite literally, in the hands of the crew and the hands of my fellow passengers.

Though you might disagree, I kind of think my life is precious. If you could treat it with a little care, I'd appreciate it.

Thank you,

~Me

Dear Bronco:

Hey, how's it going, Mr. Mayor?

I understand there was a back-breaking amount of shoveling you had to deal with recently. Sucks, don't it? Me, I live in a condo complex - I don't have to do any shoveling except to clear the patio. I don't even do that, to be honest, my sister handles it. But I understand your pain.

You know what's worse than spending half an hour to an hour shoveling? Dealing with Calgary roads. Now, I'm not going to lie, I've been a supporter since you first ran for mayor. The fact that you've done - or started - most of your "campaign promises" has cemented my support. But, sweetpea, it might not be bright to piss and moan about the amount of shoveling you have to do when half of the city is shut down due to inadequate sanding and plowing and the resultant accidents.

Sure, in a perfect world, people wouldn't drive like arseholes when the roads are bad. In an amazingly perfect world, people wouldn't drive like arseholes, full stop. Alas, we don't live in a perfect world. We live in Calgary. And Calgary drivers are, in a word, arseholes. We are arrogant and impatient drivers.

Couple that arrogance and impatience with roads that haven't been cleared after the second day of snow, and what do you get? A lot of anger and a lot of accidents. I go over (*counts*) eight bridges - counting the ramp onto Glenmore - in each direction, to and from work. Three of these are over open bodies of water.

I mention this because these bridges - most specifically the ramp onto Glenmore and Graves Bridge - are woefully undermaintained during the winter. And the bridges over open bodies of water become considerably more icy than the rest of the roads. When the roads - and thus, the bridges - are not cleared, drivers are dealing with two to three inches - minimum - of hard-packed snow just waiting for one more set of tires to compact it into ice.

Bad news, Bronco. Bad news.

So here's a thought. Why don't we consider paying the drivers of the sanders and the plows enough to entice them to keep their jobs? It is, right now, an employer's market. Utilize that, and bend when the wind changes. If not, scrap the program altogether and offer the opportunity to bid on handling the city's contract, to private companies. Might be pricier upfront than maintaining the status quo...

... But when you factor in the lost productivity - CITY-WIDE - when half of the major arteries are shut down, is it really more expensive?

I don't pretend to know what the council has to deal with on a daily basis, and I won't pretend to particularly empathize. The ugly truth of the matter is this: Y'all work for the citizens of Calgary. If the citizens of Calgary keep losing time and money due to the inability to travel in this city in the winter months - you know, all nine of them - you're going to be out a job.

Winter comes at about the same time every year - earlier than we want it to. Though most of us don't put much stock in the weather forecasts, perhaps the city council ought to. Perhaps being PROactive about providing a safe living, working, driving space to Calgarians, rather than REactive, would reflect well on you.

No, you're not going to be able to please everyone, all the time. But everyone in this city relies on the roads. Drivers, city transit-users, even those who never leave their houses.

I'm just asking you to consider all of us out there before you start commenting about shoveling.

I'm just sayin...

Sincerely,

~Me

Dear City I Heart:

Good morning!

I hope you had a nice, restful sleep and that you're gearing up for one last day before the long weekend. A few things to keep in mind, and I'll break these down by the parties they are directed at. Makes life so much easier, doesn't it?

Calgary Transit:

To the bus who was on Crowchild southbound this morning at about twenty after six, and turned off onto 50th... Turn on your bloody lights. I do not particularly care that you are off-duty, it was still dark out and my fellow morning drivers and I would appreciate knowing before being on your ass that you are not stopped at the side of the road. This, of course, would be helped even more by you traveling at a rate of more than forty kilometres an hour. Speed limit along there is eighty. Speed it up, turn on your lights. Okay? Okay.

To the buses who were on Crowchild NORTHbound yesterday afternoon at about twenty after four... Really? Bus number 7245 (it was route 181 for anyone who's curious) and the bus that was in front (route 20, couldn't catch the bus number) - that exit for Bow Trail does not come up out of nowhere. You noticed all those vehicles in front of and behind you changing lanes in preparation for the bridge over Bow... Did it not occur that perhaps you ought to change lanes as well? Neither of you stopped at the stop before 17th. Transit vehicles, and in fact all vehicles, should not use the shoulder as a merge lane. Especially when you're heading on to a bridge and the vehicles you are cutting off don't have a whole heck of a lot of space to move over. And it's not like you're driving a Smart car that only takes up two feet in the lane.

Figure it out.

Drivers in Big Trucks:

Slow it down. The roads aren't icy yet, but visibility the last two afternoons has been somewhat shite. Sure, okay, you're driving an F-250 with a lift kit, cattleguard, and spotlights - you're pretty much indestructible (not to mention THUPERCOOL). The vehicles you're stomping all over, though? Not so much.

Yep, I drive a Jeep, and I occasionally get impatient with the smaller vehicles moving at a crawl. (haha, but if you've seen my Jeep you know it's a little one and generally my eyeline is below the lip of the truck beds around me) But hey, guess what? That's rush hour for you. Riding bumpers when people are a wee bit jumpy - and made jumpier by the fact that all they can see in their rearview is your TIRES - is bad news. You'll survive an accident, most likely, but hey - vehicular manslaughter and/or negligence causing death carries a worse punishment than being ten minutes late for dinner.

I'm just sayin.

Long weekend coming up, and that means higher rate of accidents on the highways and city streets. Give yourself extra time to get where you're going. If you're running late, accept the fact that you are running late - and if you're like me, I know that's no easy task - and keep your driving unasshole-ish. Everyone's got places to go, and everyone's got people to see. You're not special in that regard.

I'm pretty sure that - potential of aggravating family members notwithstanding - everyone wants to reach their destination in one piece.

In the immortal words of Ms. Julia Stiles:

"Remove head from sphincter, then drive."

*giggles*