Mmm, smooooooth

So, what am I having for breakfast you ask? Well I'll tell ya!

A smoothie.

The basic premise of this particular smoothie was to throw in things that I thought sounded good together, and see if they actually are. I didn't stray far from what has been proven, so no anchovies or anything.

Two frozen bananas (peeled, and put in the freezer the night before)
1 Kiwi
1 cup (or so) of frozen blueberries
2 cups of orange juice
1/2 cup of non-fat plain yogurt

and by George, I think that's it... I could have probably thrown in some strawberries and some melon, which I may do tomorrow.

Anywho, the end result was de-scrumptilicious, and filling, and sugar free (well... except for the orange juice I think, but you could make your own if you had bought a juicer at a yard sale last weekend for $1.50, which I did, but we only had one orange and that would make like a tablespoon of juice).

You can also add oatmeal, which lowers cholesterol. But my cholesterol is fine, so I'm going to hold off on drinking my oatmeal for now. Thank-you.

Did anyone watch ER last night??? Talk about stress! Gaw-ly. Is she ok? Is Kovac really alive, or are they going to tell us he died anyway? Why did the tie him down! I can't wait a whole summer for this... And that Will and Grace finale? Definitely one of the best ways to end a sitcom, much better than Seinfeld and friends.

I can move on now.

So! What else have I been thinking about, you ask?

Well, this upcoming Nova Scotia election has my thinker ticking. They keep telling me what the big issues are, and they just don't seem to apply to me or anyone else in my demographic, i.e. healthcare, public school funding, etc. What do I care about? Student debt my friends! And the obscene lack of jobs in the province for new grads.

There was a news report about student debt last night. It was about 15 seconds long so good thing I caught it! The only party with any kind of platform regarding things I care about are the Liberals. His plan? Propose a 10% rollback on tuition over the next two years.

Great. Roll out the red carpets.

First of all, it'll never happen. But even if it did, it would solve absolutely nothing in regards to student debt. If you saved me ten percent on my tuition, my student loan would still be the same size, I'd just have more money for things that we all do without near the end of a semester, like food and clean laundry.

Secondly, you already have a large crowd of post-secondary grads who have graduated with huge student debts (like... $40 000 how 'bout), for whom this 10% rollback will do nothing. And I didn't even go to school in NS, so it really wouldn't help me a tick.

If you want my piddly little vote, here's what you're going to do. You're going to create more effective programs for debt relief. Which may include, but is not limited to lower interest rates, incentives for those who can pay it off early, and more oppurtunites for loan forgiveness (maybe forgiving portions of the loan when we vote for you, yeah, I likey).

The second part of the problem!!! No jobs! I don't know very many people in NS who have gotten a job in the field for which they trained. Call centres, yes, but fulfilling work that they've dreamed of? Not so much. I spent 5 months here looking for work, but moved to Alabama for work in order to get some experience. So now that I have experience, I can finally qualify for those entry level positions with less benefits, and no guarantee of hours. Woo hoo.

We need jobs here, dude. How about creating incentives for employers to want to hire us and train us? Tax breaks for every post-sec graduated student they hire, or something of the like.

That's what would make me vote for you. And that's what's going to stop every other student from evacuating the province for Alberta or some such tropical location (the heat is from the hot job markets). But for now it looks like I'm gonna have to pretend that some of these election issues apply to me. They may apply to me someday, but you won't be in office and your reforms won't be in effect then anyway. So I do need to care about the here and now.

Mmm, good smoothie.