Richard Harris's Blog, page 49

Toronto Hydro, Highway Robbery & A French Novel

                                         

You might be wondering what these two images have in common. That is a fair and righteous question. Let me explain.

After receiving my latest hydro bill, I nearly went apoplectic (see going postal in your own mind). Although I’ve been extremely conscientious about power usage at peak hours and using my dishwasher only at off-peak hours, my monthly bill seems to continue growing like a beanstalk into outer space. You know. Or something like that.

Yesterday I’d had enough and decided to go sleuthing. I signed into my personal page on the TH website and looked at my power usage for every single month I’ve been living at my current apartment. Sure enough, things didn’t add up. There was some stinky cheese at play in Denmark. When I phoned up the good folks at TH, I got a very pleasant woman who was kind enough to address my questions. She was intelligent, polite and professional. That, however, did nothing to mollify my apoplexy because it turns out my usage is in fact quite low and that I’ve been using most of my energy at off-peak hours. Why the constant bills in the hundreds of dollars, then? The answer is a plot worthy of an Alexandre Dumas novel.

While my cheapest energy usage has been $18 for the month, and my most expensive about $60, my hydro bills are consistently three figures. The discrepancy? Delivery. It actually costs more to deliver the energy than to produce it. How much more? Between 1.5 and 3 times more to get me the stupid stuff than to actually produce it. Curious as to how this delivery charge is broken down, I was told “It’s complicated. It’s broken down into a lot of different things, you know, like, ah, so many things, you know?” When I asked if that info was on the site like my usage stats, the customer service rep. said, “Unfortunately, it’s not.”

To clarify, cut through and capture the essence of what had just happened (in Gordon Gekko’s parlance): Unless you are lighting up a stadium, the delivery charge is always going to outpace the usage cost of your electricity as a residential customer, making it more expensive than any other household fixed cost. How is this possible? At 369.5 TWh, Canada has the world’s second highest annual production of hydroelectricity (after China) and second highest production rate per capita  (after Norway), accounting for more than 61% of our total energy production because, hey, we’ve got a lot of water here.

So what the Frankfurt is going on? It’s almost like Toronto Hydro, Hydro One (the provincial organization taking part in this dog and pony show), and the provincial government represent the villains Mondego, Danglars, and the double-dealing Magistrate, Villefort, respectively, in The Count of Monte Cristo. And we as Ontarians are collectively represented by Edmond Dantès, imprisoned without trial inside the Château d’If.

The question, of course, is when and how we as tax-paying citizens who contribute to the lavish paycheques of these hydro companies’ employees ($1.5 million a year for the outgoing CEO of Hydro One?), wasted resources, and overpriced electricity will exact revenge. The sad truth of the matter was summed up by Queen’s Park columnist Christina Blizzard last June: “Seniors weep when they open their hydro bills. Often they must make a choice between heating their home or buying groceries. And yet we’re paying millions for neighbouring jurisdictions to take excess electricity off our hands? It’s unconscionable — the outcome of a failed Green Energy Act that’s cost this province billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of jobs.”

 

 

‘The Vegetarian’ Wins the Man Booker International Prize

It’s official. Han Gang’s The Vegetarian has become the first Korean novel to win the Man Booker International Prize, arguably the most prestigious award for an English literary translation in the world, and worth a cool $72,000, which Han will split with her 28-year-old translator, Deborah Smith.

Congratulations to Ms. Han and Ms. Smith

 

2016 Inkitt Grand Novel Contest

Have you written a novel but just can’t seem to get it published? Then maybe it’s time to check out Inkitt: The Dynamic Community for Readers and Writers, where you can read and share free handpicked stories for your daily escape.

They’re currently hosting their annual novel contest and you can submit your story to the Grand Novel Contest between March 7 and June 7, 2016. If your novel is named the winner, you’ll get your story published by Inkitt. Check it out today!

 

 

What Will You Regret When You’re Old?

A close friend of mind lost a family member yesterday. As is often the case with death, especially when it’s unexpected, it gives one pause to reflect on life. In today’s society, we’re constantly reminded to “have no regrets” and “live life to the fullest” at every turn, it seems. Thing is, we’re human. To have regrets and feel disappointment about past failures or missed opportunities is completely natural; not having these feelings would make you alien.

While it would be nice to say “I’ll have no regrets when I’m old, baby!” the truth is probably a little closer to “I hope I have no regrets when I’m older.” In one of those ubiquitous lists you see pop up from time to time, I just happened to have one sent to me this morning entitled “Those Top 37 Things You’ll Regret When You’re Old.” It may sound shallow considering the scope of profound insights on the list, but No. 21 (Neglecting your teeth) hit me hard because I’ve seen too many people suffer from problems with their teeth when they get older, and even in a country with “universal health care,” dental work is not included. As someone who once had a nerve explode in his tooth and ended up in the ER, I can assure you it was a poignant reminder to be grateful for healthy teeth.

Personally — and in step with the theme of this blog — if I had to add a No. 38 to that list it would be “Read that one book you’ve always wanted to read/been told you have to read.” For some, that might be a Herculean effort like the Old Testament and the New Testament. Maybe it’s a classic such as War and Peace or Wuthering Heights. Perhaps it’s something lighter: Watership Down or Charlotte’s Web. For me, No. 38 would definitely be Kahlil Gibran’s 1923 literary triumph extraordinaire, The Prophet.

On this day, a somber Sunday when the weather is begging me to stay inside, I’ll take comfort in the things I have accomplished on that list and be grateful, more than anything else, that I have my health. And my teeth.

 

 

2016 Screenplay Contest Deadlines

 

The good people over at ScreenCraft have a bunch of awards up for grabs this year and in myriad screenwriting categories including, but not limited to, comedy, horror, adventure, shorts, action & thriller, and SciFi. They might not pay a ton in award $$$, but they can certainly open doors if this is the career you wish to pursue. Check them out today to see when your deadline is coming up.

Who is ScreenCraft, you ask? Per their website: “We are a boutique consultancy specializing in insider access to development executives at the best production companies and studios.”

Unword of the Year: Middle Class

Most people have heard of the Oxford English Dictionary‘s Word of the Year. Examples of how our language has become hipper and more robust include the latest additions to the club: 

Happy Canada Book Day!

Per Wikipedia:

Canada Book Day is a yearly event celebrated in Canada on April 23 to promote reading and books during Canada Book Week.

Canada Book Day is celebrated on the same day as World Book and Copyright Day, a yearly event organized by UNESCO to promote reading, publishing and the protection of intellectual property through copyright.

Canada Book Day was organized by the Writers’ Trust of Canada, a national organization whose mandate is to represent writers and support Canadian English-language literature. The Trust no longer organizes this event.

The Beauty of Anonymity

Jeff Goins wrote an interesting piece on medium.com about anonymity and the price of fame, especially in an era when people have become obsessed with it, called “Nobody’s Heard of You and That’s Okay.”

Before launching into all the reasons why it’s alright to be anonymous as a writer in this day and age, he details the story of F. Scott Fitzgerald, a heartbreaking story in and of itself. Inevitably, one of the fundamental questions he raises is this: If fame more often than not directly or indirectly crushes us professionally/emotionally/spiritually, why do so many of us constantly pursue it?

Four quotes he highlights concerning this subject that I thought were right on the money are the following:

We all love the idea of getting what we want now without realizing the negative implications of success.

Fast fame is the quickest to fade.

Successful people fail just as much as unsuccessful people. The difference is in how they interpret failure.

There are special privileges reserved for the unlikely and overlooked.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want more success with my literary career, but Goins is right to point out that there are certain advantages to being Joe Nobody. For example, there’s definitely something to be said about the fearlessness in experimentation because you’re not afraid of the blowback from society. That being said, it’s always tempting to consider whether it’s possible to reap all the positive rewards from fame (wealth and status) without taking on the negative (greed and insecurity). I don’t have the answer to that one, but I’ll certainly come back to it later in life if I ever hit the big time!

 

 

The Ultimate Literary Job

Penguin Random House Canada has a job opening. It’s for the position of fiction editor (Penguin). Your tasks and responsibilities will include, but not be limited to, the following:

You must read books.

You must enjoy discussing books.

You must be talented at all things bookish.

You must be a bookie at heart.

You must love penguins, especially the emperor variety.

Click here to learn more about the real job and how to apply. Deadline is April 29, 2016. For my own part, I hereby dedicate this short story to the person who fills this position.

Lit POP Writing Contest

POP Montreal has an associated writing contest called Lit POP and they want your submissions! They accept poetry (up to 5 poems) and fiction (max. 4000 words). The deadline is July 1 and the fee is $25 per entry, but if you submit by May 15 that fee goes down to $15. Winners don’t get mucho dinero, but they do get a trip to Montreal, publication in Matrix magazine, and a bunch of other cool stuff. Good luck to all those who enter!