A month in Toronto, as I came out of the Air Cast for my Achilles Tendon injury from December, and started physiotherapy.
Toronto (out of an ankle cast, started physiotherapy)
Martin Centre: Doctor said ankle can come out of cast, although extra caution would prescribe 2 more weeks. Now in street shoes, no bouncing, physiotherapist is deferred for 2 weeks in case hard pressure is applied. DY and I stopped by Chinatown for shopping, with me on crutches, lower leg has turned numb. Wearing court shoes in the house instead of sandals, feeling my way after the injury 9 weeks ago. Not even a new ultrasound since Dec. 27. (Martin Family Centre, St. Michael’s Hospital, Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario) 20180301 UToronto Art Centre: Figures of Sleep exhibition @MueckRon (2002-2002) “Untitled (old woman in bed)” on loan from National Gallery of Canada. Hyperrealistic sculpture slightly smaller than real life, spotlit in a dark room. Show closes tomorrow. Standing on two legs after yesterday coming out of the two-month cast, both the injured and uninjured limbs are out of shape. (University of Toronto Art Centre, King’s College Circle, Toronto) 20180302 Toronto Light Fest: Illuminated long house may not be official art installation, but the shell of a patio on Gristmill Lane. Next to last night of Toronto Light Festival a destination for some walking exercise with crutches. Near-freezing temperatures, but no snow, lots of photographers out. (Gristmill Lane, Distillery District, Toronto, Ontario) 20180303 East York Town Centre: Mall walking on crutches, should soon graduate to cane. Enclosed shopping centre in Thorncliffe Park is central to Pakistani and Afghan community. Bulletin board in supermarket has homemakers offering special cooked breakfast on weekends, presumably too much work for fully employed weekday employees. (East York Town Centre, Overlea Boulevard, East York, Ontario) 20180305OCADU Grad Studies: Lecturing @OCADU_SFI with @redesign and Jeremy Bowes, on “Architecting for Wicked Messes” for “Understanding Systems and Systemic Design” class. Full-time cohort opted for a more loosely structured studio room, students spread out at tables and chairs. (OCADU Graduate Studies, 205 Richmond Street West, Toronto, Ontario) 20180307 St. Michael’s Hospital: Statue at the official address at the east entrance on Bond Street, the conventional entrance is at the south on Queen Street, or emergency off Victoria Street. Quiet halls with administrative offices lead to elevators to busy floors. (St. Michael’s Hospital, Bond Street, Toronto, Ontario) 20180308Onsite Gallery: Wool hand-tufted textile @ONSITEatOCADU@alexkeha (2015) “Stele” (which is defined as “the central core of the stem and root of a vascular plant”). Part of The Sunshine Eaters exhibition, artists and designers looking at land, plants, flowers and trees. (Onsite Gallery, OCAD University, Richmond Street West, Toronto, Ontario) 20180309 Sumac Creek Health Centre: Portrait in @BennyBing series @TheDanielsCorp Regent Park Rotating Gallery for March, on the walls by doctors’ offices and treatment rooms. In regular office hours, are only the sick, injured, and medical professionals privileged to view the collection? Appreciating art as therapy in addition to other healing services. (Sumac Creek Health Centre, Regent Park Boulevard, Toronto, Ontario) 20130312 Athlete’s Care, The Beach: First visit to physiotherapist for Achilles tendon recovery. Scheduled appointments twice per week for the month until we get on the plane for Shanghai. Flexibility of right ankle is at 25% of left ankle. Initial exercises assigned to stretch for mobility, strength will be the next priority. Went shopping, bought foam roller stick. (Athlete’s Care, The Beach, Queen Street East, Toronto, Ontario) 20180313OCADU: 69th meeting of @StronglySustain with web conferencing, featuring update on Flourishing Enterprise Innovation Toollkit Project. Watched experience report video from a First Explorer. Participants included both some from the founding, through to some coming new to the work. Had post-meeting discussion on activities in parallel communities. (OCADU, 100 McCaul Street, Toronto, Ontario) 20180313Yorkville: Looking southeast, Cumberland Terrace low plaza on Bay Street built in 1974 contrasts to the new One Bloor skyscraper at Yonge Street, the current tallest building in Toronto (since the CN Tower labelled a freestanding structure, not a building). The Manulife Centre on Bloor Street is also vintage 1974. We don’t visit this upscale neighbourhood often, yet it’s biking distance from home. Some personal business led us to check into some other shops. (Bay Street at Cumberland Street, Yorkville, Toronto, Ontario) 20180315Riverside district: Mastered homemade vegan black bean soup in Instant Pot. Day 3 on dietary portfolio prescribed by Dr. David Jenkins at UToronto and St. Michael’s Hospital, inventor of the glycemic index. Had negotiated with researchers for a menu without psyllium or plant sterol margarine, then spent 2 days reading journal articles to determine grams of viscous fibre, soy protein and pulses for consumption. Clinical trial published 2015 shows Portfolio Diet reduces LDL cholesterol, but adherence is only 48% compared to DASH diet with non-significant improvement but has 105% adherence. (Riverside District, Toronto, Ontario) 20180318 UToronto iSchool: Talk by @GeoffreyCBowker “How the West was Won by Data”. Full room for lecture by prominent academic, as part of a quick visit serving as external examiner in a Ph.D. defense, Long day for a professor coming from Pacific Time into Eastern Time. Digest at https://ingbrief.wordpress.com/2018/03/19/2018-03-19-1610-geoffrey-bowker-how-the-west-was-won-by-data-utoronto-ischool/ . (UToronto iSchool, Bissell Building, St. George Street, Toronto, Ontario) 20180319SystemsThinkingTO: Earlier selfie with @wjbellows reconnected @jp2connect to me, social tie through the Ackoff S3 program. Agenda for SystemsThinkingTO meeting was an open conversation with Bill Cooper to W. Edwards Deming, and the blend of ideas from multiple sources. (LoyaltyOne offices, King Street East, Toronto, Ontario) 20170322Snow Lion Meditation Shop: Selected buckwheat hull pillow to replace one that predates my current spouse. This shop offers smaller ones to be used as meditation cushions, we chose the largest for our bed. We may continue to look for just hulls, 5 lbs. should fill the old pillowcase. (Snow Lion Mediation Shop, Pape Avenue, Toronto, Ontario) 20180328
St. Michael’s Hospital: Signed up for MyChart personal record app at Patient Registration on Donnelly wing south, after seeing new brochure. Appointment with orthopedic surgeon about Achilles tendon confirmed healing, the additional mobility and strength is left to the physiotherapist. (St. Michael’s Hospital, Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario) 20180329
Moments March 2015 weeks 3-4: Toronto, Ontario; Niagara Falls, NY; Allendale, NJ; New York City (Manhattan), NY
Toronto, Ontario; Niagara Falls, NY; Allendale, NJ; New York City (Manhattan), NY
Former Unilever site . East of Don Roadway, north of Lakeshore Boulevard East, south of the Adelaide Street onramp, there’s 29 acres to be redeveloped, up to 60 acres with city and other private properties, says “Jobs, transit and the future: How an empty lot at the foot of Toronto could transform it” | Elizabeth Church | March 14, 2015 | Globe & Mail at http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/toronto/jobs-transit-and-the-future-how-an-empty-lot-at-the-foot-of-toronto-could-transform-it/article23461556/ (Toronto) 20150515Systems Thinking Ontario March 2015. Session on Systems and Resilience Redux: Deciphering Panarchy (Some More) extended discussion from last month. Some attendees had not pre-read article, so interpreting figures without visual aids was like described video on television. Returning attendees thought that extra time spent on the same theme helped unwrap the mystery, and the month in between gave time for consideration. (Systems Thinking Ontario, OCAD U. Lambert Lounge) 20150318SFI class fishbowl. Inner circle of discussants on systemic design methods, with outer circle of observers who can swap into inner. Smaller group enables richer interaction amongst active participants, questions build amongst students paying attention. (Strategic Foresight and Innovation program, OCAD U., Toronto) 20150319Niagara Falls from Rainbow Bridge. On drive to NYC, stopped for hour walk through Niagara State Park. Oldest park on the U.S., quiet on a March Friday. First time to see falls on the American side, we have seen the more commercial Canadian side frequently. (Rainbow Bridge, Niagara Falls, NY) 20150321Celery Farm. Nature preserve with pond mostly still frozen. Watched mallard duck couple getting fat on sunfish in surface ice, and just through a small hole. Snapping turtles may be driving fish to the top. (Celery Farm Natural Area, Allendale, NJ) 20150322Times Square. Sunday spring stroll down 7th Avenue, at temperature above freezing. Loose weekend before a Monday morning meeting. Benefits of a friend with a Manhattan apartment. (New York City) 20150322
Moments in November 2014, around Toronto. (No air travel!)
Toronto, Ontario
Systems Thinking Ontario, Nov 2014. Allenna Leonard leading conversation on Cybernetics Past and Present, relating Project Cybersyn with self organization from sociotechnical systems. Is big data today in an operations research precursor to systems thinking? (Toronto) 20141120Crowd outside Jim’s Restaurant. Orange cones on Queen Street mean film crew, not customers in diner. Also cones across street suggest shot will have actors walk over outside ice cream shop. Life when we live beside the film district. (Toronto) 20141124
Corkin Gallery. Stones arches and beam impressive in transformed Distillery District tank house. Art gallery behind nondescript doors is as engaging as the contents (Toronto) 20141125
A special issue on “Sustainable, Smart and Systemic Design Post-Anthropocene: Through a Transdisciplinary Lens” in the Journal of Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics edited by Marie Davidová, Susu Nousala, and Thomas J. Marlowe has been released. In that issue, the journey of the Systems Changes Learning Circle from 2019 through 2022 is reviewed. The editorial team, […]
In the ISSS 2022 Plenary talk, the first 25 minutes were a blast through (a) the rising interest in system(s) change(s); (b) appreciative systems (Vickers); (c1) the philosophy of architectural design; (c2) the philosophy of ecological anthropology; (c3) the philosophy of Classical Chinese Medicine; (c4) the philosophy of rhythms; and (d) methods of multiparadigm inquiry, […]
The theme for the February online meeting of Systems Thinking Ontario was sparked from the discussion from the January session on Root Metaphor and World Hypotheses. What does it mean to have a theory? How does sensemaking contribute to this? Gary Metcalf volunteered to guide a conversation on these topics. Two prereadings were to serve […]
Philosophy underlies the distinction in the three volumes of the Tavistock Anthology: founded on the World Hypotheses of Stephen C. Pepper, the Socio-Psychological Systems Perspective and the Socio-Technical Systems Perspectives are based on Organicism, while the Socio-Ecological Systems Perspective is based on Contextualism. This thread on contextualism can be traced from the association between E.C. […]
Researching the philosophical foundations of systems theory to understand the meanings of “causal texture, contextualism, contextural” from the Tavistock legacy led to philosopher Stephen C. Pepper. The philosophical lineage and contributions of Pepper were the focus for the January online meeting of Systems Thinking Ontario. A deep reading of Pepper’s work (over a month!) was […]
The first Systems Thinking Ontario session for 2023 is scheduled for January 9, on “Root Metaphors and World Hypotheses”. This is philosophical content, for which a guided tour and discussion will be better than attempting a solo reading of the World Hypotheses wiki on the Open Learning Commons. Upon announcing the session on social media, […]
In conversation, @zeynep with @ezraklein reveal authentic #SystemsThinking in (i) appreciating that “science” is constructed by human collectives, (ii) the west orients towards individual outcomes rather than population levels; and (iii) there’s an over-emphasis on problems of the moment, and…Read more ›
In the question-answer period after the lecture, #TimIngold proposes art as a discipline of inquiry, rather than ethnography. This refers to his thinking On Human Correspondence. — begin paste — [75m26s question] I am curious to know what art, or…Read more ›
How might our society show value for the long term, over the short term? Could we think about taxation over time, asks @carlotaprzperez in an interview: 92% for 1 day; 80% within 1 month; 50%-60% tax for 1 year; zero tax for 10 years.Read more ›
For the @ArchFoundation, #TimIngold distinguishes outcome-oriented making from process-oriented growing, revisiting #MartinHeidegger “Building Dwelling Thinking”. Organisms are made; artefacts grow. The distinction seems obvious, until you stop to ask what assumptions it contains, about the inside and outside of things…Read more ›
In web conference, #HermanDaly says #EcologicalEconomics used to get attacked from the right, now it's from the left. Panel @revkin @jon_d_erickson @ktkish @sophiesanniti #TimCrowshaw #KatieHorner livestreamed #sustainwhat .Read more ›
Complementing the idea of a @longnow , @nfergus provokes the challenge of a #shortthen as the online social media platforms distract the larger perspectives on history.Read more ›
In a recording of the debate between Michael Quinn Patton and Michael C. Jackson on “Systems Concepts in Evaluation”, Patton referenced four concepts published in the “Principles for effective use of systems thinking in evaluation” (2018) by the Systems in Evaluation Topical Interest Group (SETIG) of the American Evaluation Society. The four concepts are: (i) […]
How might the quality of an action research initiative be evaluated? — begin paste — We have linked our five validity criteria (outcome, process, democratic, catalytic, and dialogic) to the goals of action research. Most traditions of action research agree on the following goals: (a) the generation of new knowledge, (b) the achievement of action-oriented […]
After 90 minutes on phone and online chat with WesternUnion, the existence of the canton of Ticino in Switzerland is denied, so I can’t send money from Canada. TicinoTurismo should be unhappy. The IT developers at Western Union should be dissatisfied that customer support agents aren’t sending them legitimate bug reports I initially tried the […]
An online version of a special issue of Paunch (1980) on "Root Metaphor: The Live Thought of Stephen C. Pepper" has been preserved on the internet Archive
