New Website Now Online!

Well, the day has finally come at last.  My new site, tanveernaseer.com, is now officially up and running.  I invite all of you to come by to visit my site.  I’ll be leaving this site up as well, but over the next few days, I plan on shearing the entries here and adding a link to the full text to the blog on my new site.  This site will most likely remain to catch any legacy links from various social sites, but in terms of new content, you’ll find that over at my new site.

So, be sure that you update your bookmarks and/or feed readers to this new site to keep up to date on the latest entries on my blog, “So, what were we talking about again?” now found at its new home at www.tanveernaseer.com.

See you there.

Why Self-Esteem Shouldn’t Come From A Bottle

A few weeks ago, I watched a movie on TV with my family that got me thinking about the issues of self-esteem that young girls and women face. Interestingly enough, this train of thought wasn’t brought about by the movie; instead, it had more to do with the main sponsor of the film – Dove, the personal care products brand. Instead of simply airing commercials, Dove presented short segments at each commercial break that featured mothers and daughters talking about ideas or activities they do to feel good about who they are and how they look.

As a man, I have to admit I found these conversations reasserted the notion of men and women being from different planets, the ideas and concepts verging almost on being alien in nature. But as a father of young girls, I found the mere idea that such measures were useful or even necessary for improving self-esteem in girls, as well as women, troubling to say the least.   Click to continue reading this entry

Saying Goodbye To The Ones We Love

The first time I met my maternal grandfather I was eleven years old, on a trip to visit the homes and places where my parents grew up and lived before moving to Canada. Sadly, it also turned out to be the only time I got to be with him as two months after our return home, he died from a brain aneurysm. While the news hit me hard, what I remember most from that fateful morning was the sounds of my mother’s mournful and inconsolable weeping, of a daughter crying out to her father who just mere weeks earlier had held her in his arms to say what turned out to be his last good-bye. Although that trip was the first and only time I ever got to be with my grandfather, as is the case with life, his passing was to be the first of many times where I’d be reminded of the inevitable truth that no one lives forever.   Click to continue reading the rest of this entry

Dear Susan Boyle – It’s Not You, It’s Us

Much has been said about Susan Boyle’s performance on the variety show “Britain’s Got Talent” and of our initial summary judgment of her based solely on her appearance before she even began to perform.  But there’s a new chapter to this story that hasn’t be addressed as of yet.  In the last few days, word has come out that Boyle has recently undergone a makeover – nothing really dramatic unless one considers a woman getting her hair done and buying a new outfit significant.  What is noteworthy, though, is the public’s perception of Boyle’s decision to pamper herself.

Within hours of pictures being released on the web showing Boyle’s new look, people were either expressing dismay or cynicism regarding her ‘transformation’.  It was clear that many people were disappointed that she decided to make such a change in her appearance.  And yet, Boyle’s makeover sheds some light not only on how this whole situation has impacted her, but what it says about us. Click to continue reading the rest of this entry

Of Fathers and Daughters

Over this past long weekend, there were two events that had me thinking about the impact being a father has had on my life. The first was the news of a good friend of mine welcoming the birth of his baby daughter while the second was my family celebrating our oldest daughter’s birthday. Although they’re disparate events, they serve to highlight what I’ve experienced so far being a dad and what I expect will come around the corner in the years ahead.

Near the end of last week, my good friend Matt and his wife gave birth to a baby girl. Talking to him mere hours after the birth of his daughter and hearing him struggle for words, I couldn’t help but smile and remember how the birth of my daughters had had the same impact on me, of how seeing my newborn daughter for the very first time brought to light the reality that our family had now grown by one. You see for men, the idea of there now being this new little person sharing our life doesn’t really sink in until  Click to continue reading the rest of this entry

Food Network’s “100 Mile Challenge” – A return to simpler times?

It’s been a few days since I watched Food Network’s newest program “The 100 Mile Challenge” and yet there’s some lingering thoughts that the concept of the show has brought to mind. For those who didn’t watch it, the premise of the show is following a group of families who have volunteered to only eat produce that was grown/bred within a hundred mile radius of their home for a period of 100 days. To give you an idea of what this implies, for those living in North America, this would mean no coffee, no sugar, and no chocolate to name just a few. Although there are tangible benefits to such an approach to food consumption, there is an interesting sociological implication that arises from this in regards to what our society’s relationship with food might be down the road. But before I get into that, let’s look at this concept and the benefits it derives.

The idea behind this show stems from the “100 Mile Diet” experiment created by Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon in 2005 where they only consumed locally grown food for a whole year. While they took this on as a personal challenge, it has since become a source of inspiration for others in taking a closer look at what they were eating and especially where it came from. As the plan’s creators pointed out during the premiere episode of “The 100 Mile Challenge”, there are numerous advantages to taking on such a lifestyle approach to what foods we eat. Click to continue reading the rest of this entry

What Is The Value Of Homework?

One of the things I remember about high school was having all these hardcover textbooks that I would trudge home with in my school bag. And more often than not, when I would drop my bag on the hallway floor with this loud reverberating thump, my mom would ask me why on earth was my bag so heavy. My answer to her query was always the same – I needed those heavy books to finish all the homework assignments handed out to me that day.

I’m sure this is a memory most of you have as well from the rites of passage through the hallowed halls of the high school education system and beyond. And yet, looking back on it now, I can’t help but wonder if our parents worried or obsessed over homework to the degree that parents do these days.  Click to continue reading the rest of this entry

Twitter and Me – My Trip ‘Round The Twitterverse

(Twitter icon bird set, created by Mirjami Manninen, can be downloaded here)

It’s been about a month now that I’ve been using the Twitter social-networking platform and I have to admit, it’s been an interesting study of how human communication is evolving through our interaction and usage of new software communication platforms. Now to be truthful, I’ve been wary of starting up a Twitter account because like anyone else viewing it from the outside, I couldn’t make heads or tails of it. Indeed, the most common question posed when someone hears you’re “on Twitter” is what exactly is Twitter. The most common explanations are that Twitter is a “micro-blogging platform” due to its restricting entries to no more than 140 characters or that’s it’s just another social networking outlet to stay in touch with a group of friends/acquaintances. Although my experience with Twitter is still new and thus, rather limited, I think this other definition sums up Twitter best – Twitter is whatever you make it out to be. Confused enough? Well, let me share my own experience with this platform to shed some light on this.Click to continue reading the rest of this entry

Religion Vs. Science – Oh, Enough Already

I went out for dinner last night with an old friend from my university days and invariably it was a night filled with sharing recent news as well as reminiscing about our time spent in all those lab sessions and seminars. During the course of one of our many conversation threads, we ended up comparing notes over the growing debate between religion and science and the typical rise in louder and more obnoxious participants on each side as such issues go “mainstream”. It was no surprise to me that, as products of a science education and from working in the sector, we were in agreement about the need for both the science body and the general public to wrestle back control over these two aspects of our society from those who are clearly abusing both to further their own myopic agendas. It’s thanks to that wonderful and engaging conversation that I decided to write this entry to start clearing the air on this whole absurd debate.   Click to continue reading the rest of this entry

Food For Thought – Why Aren’t We Thinking More About What We Eat?

While watching TV a few nights ago, a pensive ball of wax got rolling regarding a subject that I’ll admit is not often on the forefront of my mind. One of key contributers to kick-starting this thought process was the semi-regular bombardment of commercials for these weight-reduction programs geared primarily toward the female set of the population. Now this isn’t about the ads themselves; instead, this has to do with our collective perception or relationship to a key factor for living – food. More specifically, it has to do with our lack of respect or appreciation for this most vital survival need.

Obviously, one of the great benefits of living in the “developed world” is the easy access to a plethora of foodstuffs. Indeed, the last couple of years has seen vast improvements on this front, both with an increased diversity through the inclusion of more ‘ethnic’-styled food offerings as well as increased governmental regulations on the quality of the food content and the requirement for more accurate product descriptions. And yet, despite all these benefits, we still seem to harbour this uncertain relationship with food, at many times more a love/hate relationship than one where we respect and value its necessity and contribution to our overall existence. Let’s get into the, uh, meat of this topic, shall we?

First off, let’s be honest about the fact that all of us at one point or another has done that dance of worrying about how much fat, calories, salt, cholesterol, yadda yadda yadda we’re sticking in our mouths. I know I’ve had moments where Click to continue reading the rest of this entry