Emergency rooms are filling up. CBC offers some advice on not going to the ER. I hadn’t realized that there are some who overdo food and drink over Christmas so excessively that they need to drag themselves to the ER for help. Imagine the shame of having “surfeit of turkey” written in your medical record.
Shelters are also said to be over capacity.
Notes on New Year festivities from Radio‑Canada, from CTV and from La Presse, and notes on watching fireworks.
I wish the best for all readers of this blog as we lurch into a year of political uncertainty and weirdness. May the year nonetheless be favourable and fruitful for us all.
Happy New Year, everyone. I hope you all have a good year ahead.
Happy New Year! Wishing you all good health.
Happy New Year to all – thanks Kate!
All the best in the new year, Kate. (And others!)
Happy New Year, Kate, as well as everyone else!
Take care folks!
Happy new year to you Kate and to the community here!
Happy new year one and all!
Happy New Year Kate, all!
Happy New Year to all!
Happy New Year, Kate and all. May we all have the wit and wisdom to contribute to the good in 2025!
Happy New Year! May it be memorable, but only for good reasons.
May we live in boring times.
CBC has photos from 2024; La Presse with arts photos and drone photos of the year; Le Devoir has Marie-France Coallier’s photos of the year.
La Presse on the top 10 athletic achievements in Quebec.
The Gazette’s Paul Cherry lists the 32 homicides of the year with names and details about arrests if applicable.
Tastet’s 50 restaurants of the year.
It looks like there will be a party at the Old Port again this year with music, a countdown, and fireworks. Igloofest is putting it on.
Yes, and it will be mild out too, not dipping below freezing all night.
I think the fireworks were done very late. I could hear them from my house and they seem to have only started at 1AM!
Reports on reddit confirm that, dhomas. People were unhappy that there was no public countdown at the Old Port and then only a few fireworks at midnight. At least some of the crowd must have left after that, but then a full firework display started at 1 am, from over on the islands. I’ve not yet seen any explanation why it was delayed like that, and whether it was a mistake or a choice.
Maybe someone forgot to set their clocks back in the fall? (Not sure if that even makes sense, time change confuses my brain)
I don’t know why it’s so hard to think about, MarcG, but it is.
I had to think it out: if they hadn’t set their clock back, it would’ve read as midnight when it was really 11 pm, and the fireworks would’ve gone off an hour early, rather than an hour too late.
Nice to know it’s not just me! Your description makes sense.
What’s open and closed over the New Year holiday.
Mozai 13:32 on 2025-01-01 Permalink
If there were alternatives to the Emergency Room to get help, I’m certain the overindulgent would use them first. Alas, the ER seems (and I am told by clinic staff) to be the only option if you are ill outside normal business hours.
jeather 00:32 on 2025-01-02 Permalink
I just read the Defector roundup for “what did we do to our penises” and last week “what did we put in our orifices” so “I ate too much turkey” would be much preferable.
carswell 05:24 on 2025-01-02 Permalink
A friend who’s an ER physician at the Glen reports they’re seeing a surge in bad cases of pneumonia.
Kate 09:43 on 2025-01-02 Permalink
jeather, thank you for introducing me to Defector. I am once again glad I do not have vulnerable organs dangling outside my body.
MarcG 09:46 on 2025-01-02 Permalink
The word ‘pneumonia’ is difficult. We tend to think of it as something unto itself like Covid or Influenza but it’s really a description of lung inflammation symptoms that can be caused by an assortment of bacteria, viruses, or fungi. Influenza started late this year and is really surging right now, RSV is worse than last year, and Covid’s baseline is always high, and all 3 of those are common causes. What’s worse, having a viral infection can increase your risk of a bacterial infection. Unfortunately we don’t track the Mycoplasma pneumoniae bacteria (AKA walking pneumonia) in Canada but there’s been a huge increase in the US and UK recently so most likely the same thing is happening here.
Joey 12:44 on 2025-01-02 Permalink
@MarcG that’s precisely it. Our household was sick from early November to Christmas, with multiple people having multiple peaks to their various respiratory illnesses. Fortunately we seem to have avoided full-blown pneumonia, but not by much. I gather this kind of thing has been pretty common.
GC 13:36 on 2025-01-02 Permalink
I can speak from experience, unfortunately. I was pretty sick in mid-October, with what I assumed was a cold or Covid. After two painful weeks, I was mostly better. Except the cough never went away completely and got worse again mid-December. So, I went to my doctor and found out I had pneumonia. Was it Covid that turned into pneumonia or pneumonia the whole time? Hard to say, but it sure was a frustrating two months. It was bacterial, so I was able to take antibiotics. And…I think it’s gone now?
Tee Owe 14:45 on 2025-01-02 Permalink
@GC – how did they determine that it was pneumonia? I ask because a family member has had similar symptoms, was tested negative (in October) for mycoplasma and Covid – would be nice to see it gone
CE 15:17 on 2025-01-02 Permalink
My girlfriend and I came down with some classic mild colds between Christmas and new years. Our symptoms felt kind of quaint.
GC 15:49 on 2025-01-02 Permalink
Tee Owe, after listening to me breathe, my doctor was pretty sure that was what it was. But, we did an x-ray to be sure. In retrospect, I’m not sure how we knew it was bacterial rather than viral. Maybe it looks different on the x-ray?
MarcG 16:43 on 2025-01-02 Permalink
I have an old friend who I chat with every couple of weeks, and he, like most people, stopped taking any disease prevention measures after getting the Covid vaccine, and, also like most people, he and his family have been sick with a variety of ailments basically all of the time since. Around the start of 2023 he caught something that left him with a nasty cough. Some months later I mentioned to him that it was still hanging around. He and his family and friends and workmates had gotten used to it so no longer noticed and he was thankful to me for pointing it out. His doctor diagnosed walking pneumonia and prescribed antibiotics. Since it started two years ago, we’ve had one phone call where he didn’t cough at all. When we spoke today it seemed worse than last time. I don’t have the heart to say anything.