Category Archives: Uncategorized

This has been one of those weeks where a whack of stuff got wrapped up or put out there in the public eye.

Number one with a Taser was the RCMP apologizing to the mother of Robert Dziekanski, the victim of four RCMP officers taking liberties with their training and killing Dziekanski at the Vancouver airport.  RCMP Deputy Commissioner for the Pacific Region, Gary Bass delivered the news.  About freakin’ time. 

The Sunshine List, is an Ontario government document that tells us innocent taxpayers who is sucking how hard on the government teat.  It is the list of salaries of the various government, hospital and public offices that exceed $100,000.  Hospital executives like Jeffrey Lozon, president and CEO of St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto has a package that compensates him around $700,000 a year. 

Which explains why I do not give to any hospital or health care charity or lottery.  If the head honcho has a carpet in the office that is thick enough to lose children in, they’re making too much money and not directing the cash to the real business of hospitals:  Healing sick people. 

The job of the head of a health care foundation, or CEO of a hospital does not need to be remunerated at Lehman Brothers levels.  HR and management consultants who mouth platitudes about “executive compensation grades” and “a market-competitive package” should be made to stand in the ER waiting room for six hours on a Saturday night to find out what a hospital really does and who really does it. 

It sure as hell ain’t some paper-pushing bureaucrat behind a $10,000 mahogany desk.

On Tuesday there was an Associated Press report of 21 infants washing up on a riverbank near Jining in Shandong province.  Apparently the remains were labeled Medical Waste and included children that appeared to be several months old.  Along with the weekly “120 Killed in China Coal Mine Explosion” headline, the more I look at China, the more I see a country that has learned all the worst capitalist lessons possible and is determined to put all of them in place at once. 

Incidentally, a Chinese company is looking at buying Volvo, so even the Birkenstock-wearing class can sleep soundly knowing that their safety-eco car was built by political prisoners.  Any manufacturing residue and toxic by-products will be very deliberately placed in the land surrounding the ‘organic’ agricultural farms that grow your garlic and vegetables.  Please enjoy.

Sandra Bullock has ‘come out of hiding’ according to various fansites and has started proceedings against her hubby Jesse James.  James is suspected of breaking certain marital vows regarding sexual exclusivity and Sandra is understandably deeply offended. 

We have no opinion regarding her choice of spouse, but be assured Sandra, if you need some serious revenge-makeouts, I can always offer my services.  It would be a personal sacrifice, but I suppose I could suffer through. 

Big plus?  Headlines like “Academy Award Winner goes to Pizza Joint with No-Name Dork in Ottawa” and “Random Moron Captures Sandy’s Eye in Canadian Capitol” are a vast improvement over the press you’ve been getting lately.  I’ll take one for the team, just so you know, restraining order be dammed.

By the way, it’s Easter, technically a Christian celebration, which we now mark by force-feeding children as much chocolate as is possible under the guise of hunting for eggs that a rabbit brings in a basket and hides in the garden for all the good little girls and boys. 

How we got from crucifixion and resurrection of the main character of the Christian religion to a commercially-sanctioned sugar-buzz festival is beyond even the twisted capabilities of the marketers of the Pet Rock.  The new slogan for Motel 6 during this time of the year is “Bring Three Nails, We’ll Put You Up For The Night.” so at least there is some tie in, (called synergistic guerilla viral cultural meme placement in MBA-speak) to what was a significant occasion on the Christian religious calendar.

Hi Ho, Hi Ho, A day off work we go…

With the Olympics on the tube and some work intruding, I’ve called up our esteemed commentator Mason Baveux to pick up the Olympic thread by giving him the password to the blog.

So, Davey gave up the password to the bloggery for me to write up some Oly Moments for all to read.  Now, it’s not like I’ve gone all Twattterd with them micro-bloggisms.  I’m just a guy what watches the Olys and speaks my mind.  Here we go:

Openin’ Ceremonials:  She was about a hour too long.  I liked the four totem poles comin up from the arena floor.  You know what else I liked?  That we finally up and recognized them First Nations as them what was here first and they be just as rightful to be part of the show.  We sometimes forget that our First Nations are the guys and gals that met the Voyageurs and kept the explorers from starving to death as the Voyageurs didn’t know shit from salad in Canada.

I read some other blogs what said “What the hell was that?” about the trees and water and the flying skiers in the opening.  That just tells me them other writers don’t know boo from woo about being Canadian.  Canada is damn big country and it’s got a lot of land.  If we didn’t get to flyin, we’d never see it all.  I like to fly Molson Airways and I’ve got my stocks in for the Olys.

What I liked most of all from the opening ceremonials was the Standin O for the team from Georgia.  One of their lugers lost’er on the luge run and went head first into a pole.  Killed him dead in a half a second and just broke me heart as he was young and doin one of the truly dangerous sports in the Olys.  Damn shame that.

Watched some of the speedy skatin what with the women’s where we won a Bronze medal.  Now, I’m all for celebratin’ the female form, but Mother of Pearl, them women are so fit, their nostrils can run a marathon on their own, but someone from the Olys should mention the camel toe to them girls.   

After a nap, I made sure I was ready with a fresh glass for the men’s moguls.  Lord Thunderin’ Jesus!.  Slide down a bumpy hill on skis, over bigarse lumps, leap ass over teakettle at least twice and try not to die while doin’ it.  If the wind comes up, one of them will wind up in the crowd, impaling some kid from Scrotatia with a ski pole.  Now, I watched the women the night before, basically doin’ the same thing, but during a fog attack in a rainstorm and it scared the jeebers out of me.  The Men’s?  They’re just plain crazy to the point of maybe being under a Lieutennant Governors warrant.  But we won the Gold now didn’t we?

Curling I’m most looking forward to.  The Chinese and the Koreans might just kick our arses in the roaring game, but we can drink them under the table at any bonspiel your care to mention. 

Speaking of under the table, howcome nobody has talked about the 30 or so atholetes what got suspended just before the games for dopin?  Was it just the snowboarders, or was there some bobsledders what were all hopped up on the wacky-tabaccy?  I think there probably wasn’t no ski-jumpers in that list as you’d not want to be three sheets to the wind then jump off a big hill.  Or then again, maybe you do and that’s how you do the ski jumpin’

Fancy skatin I don’t care about, unless they make the costumes look more like the wardrobe at the peeler bar.  For that matter, I could even enjoy the biathlon if the IOSee went that route. 

Speakin of the biathlon, I’d like to see the targets shoot back.  The skier gets a round and a guy inside the target hut gets a round back at you if you miss.  Or just face the shooting range on either side of the targets.  If you miss, you might just get lucky and pop your competition.  Oh and wolves.  I’d like to see wolves in the course just to add some spice to it.  That’s what you got the rifle for isn’t it?

The hockey is coming up and our Women’s team already laid a shellacking on the Slovakian’s.  About half way through the second period of the Slovak – Canada women’s game, the Canadian team was bringin spectators down out of the stands to take shots at the Slovakian goalie.  I saw one old gal with a walker and her portable oxygen put a wrist shot at the five-hole and get the red light to come on.  Either that or the Slovak coach should have yelled “Car!” and got the hell out of the arena.  At least they got a gracious standing O from the crowd for taking the beating.  I think they maybe should have a 12 goal mercy and wrap the game early.

I’ll write more later, but I’m halfway into a case and I’se got to take a piss.

I promised a couple of updates on Movember that went beyond the growing of the moustache and here’s one of them. 

The high concept behind Movember is Men’s Health and the lack of interest and knowledge about what can be loosely called men’s health issues.  There are plenty of events and knowledge promoting women’s health:  Breast Cancer awareness, Run for the Cure, various tests and so on.  But Men’s Health, not so much.

The reason: Men don’t talk about their health, specific to the parts we don’t have in common with women.  To paraphrase Spike Lee; It’s a Man Thing.  You Wouldn’t Understand.  We were and are brought up to tough it out, no matter what.  If a javelin is stuck through our head, we might consider seeing the doctor, but only because we’re having trouble going through the revolving door at the office, or can’t get into the cab of the forklift.  Which is utter bullshit.

Men absolutely do not, even under interrogation, admit to anything being abnormal, unwell or strange below the belt.  We don’t discuss it, we don’t ask our men friends any questions about the goods and we will not tell our doctors about anything that might be off.  It’s all perfect, wonderful, fully operational, potent, big and robust.  Which is also utter bullshit.

The penis, testicles and prostate are as susceptible to medical problems as any other part number, male or female:  Cancer, inflammation, injury, decrease in operations and so on are all just as prevalent in men, but being men, we’ll never admit it.  Which is why Movember exists:  Men should talk about it, and do what they can to prevent or find out about the afflictions that can befall us.

As an informal survey here:  How many men check their testicles on a regular basis for swelling, tenderness or abnormal growths?  Hands up please?  That would be none, as best as I can see from here. 

You remember Tom Green?  Ex-husband of Drew Barrymore and one-time funny man?  He lost a testicle to cancer because he didn’t check his junk on a regular basis.        

We were never taught or told that yes, indeed you should check the boys every month or so.  Give them a good feel, look for unusual tenderness, and run them through your fingers to check for swelling, or something misshapen.  Each testicle should be about the size of a walnut, give or take and shouldn’t be unusually tender.  Yes, testicles are tender, that’s their normal state, but if you’ve owned a pair for a while, you can tell if they’re more tender than they should be.  If you press on one and it goes “OwFuck!” then that’s not right and should be checked by a doctor.

The “Official” Junk test is here:  http://tcrc.acor.org/tcexam.html from the Testicular Cancer Resource Centre.  The issue they bring up is not to find cancer with a monthly self-exam, but to get used to what your testicular state of “normal” is, so you find anything odd, early enough. 

It’s the same drill with women and a breast cancer self-exam:  Get used to what is supposed to be there (there is a wide range of ‘normal’ be it tits or nuts) so you spot an anomaly early, then get it checked by a doctor. Most women understand it, so why don’t men get it?  Because we are not as aware and have never been taught or told to check the junk on a regular basis.  Men, you have now been told and click on the link to be taught.

Can you turn this into a saucy event?  Sure, with a little imagination, a willing partner and some knowledge, you most certainly can.  One would think that you would have a reasonable base of knowledge about your partner’s bosomy delights and should feel comfortable enough with their geography to go touring on a regular basis, why not?  Since turnabout is fair play too, invite your partner to be more involved in your health. 

Bottom line?  Check the Boys on a regular basis. 

For many years I made most of my own bread for our nuclear family unit.  Not every day and not all the time, but often enough.  There is something satisfying about creating an essential food from nothing more than flour, salt, sugar, yeast, time and effort.  Moving to Toronto, I stopped making bread for the duration of the stay, but now that I’m back home, I’ve returned to the craft.

Bread, in its many forms, is delightfully schizophrenic.  In some ways, it is rudimentary cooking.  In other ways, it is black magic of the highest orders in the deepest circles of hell, plus physics and chemistry.  The fun part is you can’t tell where one starts and the other leaves off.

There is also the schism of technology:  The Breadmaker Machine.  I’ll confess, I own one, I have used it and it makes a perfectly acceptable loaf.  However, I tend to use the technology for the initial proofing and mixing, then take over from there.  Breadmakers are a fine substitute for a proofing box that home kitchens don’t really have these days.  Yes, I know, there are antique proofing boxes and likely there is a YouTube how-to video of a guy in Idaho who make a seventy-loaf computer controlled, two-axis rotary proofer out of an Atari video game console, five sheets of Coroplast and a lawnmower engine.  I don’t care and don’t send me the link either.

I don’t approach bread making as ‘gastro porn’:  My flour isn’t from some organic farm in Wetaskiwin, only ground between stones of a certain provennance from a quarry in Delft, with yeast cells raised free-range, thawed 4,000 year old iceberg water and sugar from organic fair-trade, eco-responsible cane, dehydrated by Caramelite Nuns in Haiti.  Sorry to all the foodies out there, I won’t reach your standard of anally retentive.  I actually make bread

I could easily write another 2,000 words about the emotional giving and receiving and deconstruct the social pathways of hand crafting and appreciation of the cultural variances that cross socioeconomic markers.  Or, I could just make some nice baguette loaves that we will share with guests later today.

There will be butter of course and since it is our Canadian Thanksgiving, there will in all likelihood be gravy.  Possibly a sandwich later with dressing, cranberries and some thinly sliced white meat with a dusting of cracked pepper and salt.

So, in a round-about way, we get to thanks giving.  I’m giving thanks that I get to do this today.  Best of all?  It will taste great.

I really didn’t feel like staying up half the night watching the US election results, as it would impact my beauty sleep in a negative way.  Technically, I’d have to have beauty sleep continuously until 2036, so I decided to not risk a late night. 

Instead I sent a case of Red Cap and a mickey of Palm Breeze rum to Mason Baveux to watch and comment on the US Election Results.  Here is his report:

Thanks fer the pops Davey.  And the Palm Breeze pours nice too.

So’s I watched’er come in.  Watched four channels at the same time.  Not that I’ve got four TVs, but I put a new set of batteries in the remote and went from channel to channel every few seconds when the talking heads got too stuffy or started using the big words.

Them TV networks decided to pull out all the stops with so much jeezly technology on the screen that your head started to spin.  On every channel what was doing the election there were bar graphs and whirring things that kept going up, down, sideways and in and out. 

Then there was some crawly thing on the bottom and across the top too.  By the time they finished putting stuff on the screen, you were left with a picture of Katie the size of the Carling’s label.  It made me dizzy so’s I bit the head off another beer weasel and things straightened out fine enough. 

Then they showed some nimrod plugging an extension cord into a lump of coal a half-dozen times.  I think it was a commercial.  When I’d see that come on, I’d take a leak, as you don’t buy beer, you just rent it.

As the first results came in, there was the a race to say if they was good or bad for McCain or Obama.  The maps kept going blue or red depending on how good or bad the news was, then they’d go over to some touchyscreen TV and make things whizz around tellin me that some Rotarian in Buttcrack Vermont voted for Bush in 2004, then voted for Obama in 2008, but used a ballpoint pen instead of a HB pencil, like he was supposed to.

I don’t know where they got their information from, but she scares me that Bill Hemmer or John King can see what my buddy Derek in Defiance Ohio is thinkin as I don’t think Derek has had a straight thought since the forklift hit him in 1989 and he had to move back home to the US to not get health care.

There was a pause from half-past ten to eleven o’clock when the talkin heads come on.  I don’t know all them commentaters, as I don’t follow it as close as Dave does, but they kept sawing and sawing on how McCain was winning in the polls and the popular vote but there were too many real votes for Obama for McCain to win big enough to drive. 

At least that was on the FoxNews what wanted McCain to win.  The other ones, at least the ones that were tryin to be fair and ballanced, kept at it.  The FoxNews stopped at 10 o’clock and said ‘We’re goin home”  Then they run an old Seinfeld with the story about the sofa.

Back at the CNN, come eleven, they just said “She’s done.  Barack Obama’s gonna do it.  Go to sleep.”  They showed the folks in Chicago, all jumpin up and down and cheering like the Leafs had won the cup. 

Johnny Mac came on with the Alaska girl and said a nice speech about trying hard and going forward.  He was polite and didn’t try to bust a chair over someone up on the stage with him, although you could see he wanted to real badly.

After a bit, Barack Obama came on in Chicago, at the park, which was all lit up, just like I was, as it was close to six friggin hours into’er.  He made a nice speech about America is good and told the story about some old doll who was a hundred and six who voted for him.  By then I was startin to nod a bit, so’s I turned it off and went to bed.

This is part where I sums up the election.  Here goes.

First up, John McCain got his arse kicked four ways to Easter.  I coulda told you that was gonna happen when her hired on that Alaska girl named Sarah Palin.  I’m not one to kick a man when he’s down, but jeeze Louise, that about as dumb a draft pick as you could make and still be allowed out on Saturday night for bingo.  Once in a while you’d see John McCain look at her like he’d suddenly found a retarded cousin had come to live with him. 

Every time she opened her mouth, she’d change boots.  Which worried a lot of folks as she’d have the nuclear codes if Johnny Mac cashed his cheque.  I don’t care how nice you are, you don’t give your retarded cousin a box of matches and the Coleman lantern fuel sayin “Go play in the basement for a while.”

Then there was her knocked up daughter and that meatpole she married.  He looked like the kinda guy who’d drive over your foot on a quarter dare then try to take a TIG welder to your arm to see who was tougher.  Course, he’d never go first.  The Alaska girl proved that you can be dumb enough to go into politics and find enough people who were even dumber to vote for you.   

Barack Obama did good enough in his talking.  They kept the gag on Biden during daylight hours and kept him full of rye in the evenings, so’s he wouldn’t cause too much trouble, as Biden’s crazier than a bus full of shithouse rats when he gets near a microphone.  Be that as she be, Obama said a lot of things about change and hope and faith and the people bought into her enough to vote for him. 

Which I think is a good thing, as Americans are smart people most of the time.  They stop takin their medications once in a while, but generally they’re pretty good folks. 

Now they’ve got to unfrig eight years of that Bushie proving that Americans are dumber than arse lint.  Even the Italians were laughing at them half the time, which should tell you something about how messed up America is, or was, with Bushie.

Unfriggin should take Obama a year or two but there’s still the war and the economy in the shitter, which might take a little longer, but he’s got good bench strength, a couple of enforcers and some good defensemen who’ll take care of the power play when they’re short handed.

But at least she’s off to a good start, as long as Obama keeps his stick on the ice.

Thank you Mason, for your always insightful observations of real-politik south of the border.

We’re down to it south of the 49th and depending on which media spinning outlet you care to listen to, the results are all but counted.

The general call is for Obama to take the big chair, but only just.  McCain, Palin and the Republican National Committee are working the states up for grabs with a fervour only the desperate can muster.  McCain knows his campaign has cratered, especially since Sarah Palin has opened her mouth for anything more than food or lipstick.  The RNC power mongers no longer refer to McCain or Palin as mavericks destined to shake up DC:  They know better. 

What is looking very likely is the RNC will do what is called ‘finish hard’:  It’s a wrestling term.  Greco-Roman Wrestling is real, competitive wrestling, like at the Olympics, not the theatrical wrestling you might watch on the wireless picture device. 

Finish Hard means you’ve already lost on points, but you are going to punish your opponent mercilessly so they remember the match and will not forget the damage you’ve inflicted.  To that end, to finish hard means reduce their ears to red flaps of flesh, ‘inadvertently’ knee their balls into their abdomen, stick a finger in their eye, then try to dislocate a shoulder, or at least a couple of fingers.  You want to make sure the opponent is pulling their singlet and associated lint and threads out of bodily orifices for the next six months. 

That’s what is known as Finish Hard.  It is patently illegal in competitive wrestling, but since the referee can’t see everything all the time, it happens all the time.

About the only nasty trick the RNC hasn’t gone for is calling up The Base and letting it slip that Obama’s inauguration will see Obama swear the Oath of Office on the Qur’an, then run into Pennsylvania Avenue screaming “Where’s all the white women!” 

However, I do expect that rumour to come out on Monday via such sludge monkeys as Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reily and a Robo-call phone bank run by the American Heritage Institute.  That kind of action is to be expected from the mouth-breathers.  All the Obama camp has to do is ignore it. 

Unfortunately, there is a component of the right wing that also considers it a done deal that Barack Obama won’t even make it to January 20th 2009 for the Oath of Office.  That speaks to a very disturbing component of the American Psyche that America has to examine. 

In looking at the calendar in front of me, I see that it is November 1st and the year is 2008.  It isn’t 1963.  Trust me, it is perfectly fine for Barack Obama to be President of the United States.  The world will not end.  Toast will still be available on November 5th.  So will the banks, grocery stores, gas stations, bad morning radio and shirts with an inadvertent ink stain on the pocket.  Life will go on. 

Hopefully those who ascribe to the mouth-breathing, racist and violent perspective will climb back under their respective rocks, being deliberately shunned by “Real” Americans who will not tolerate that kind of attitude from a fellow citizen. 

“Real” America isn’t racist.  “Real” America isn’t violent.  “Real” America just wants to move forward and get on with life in a way that is fair for everyone to have a chance. 

That’s all the “Real” Americans want, a fair shot at success in a game that isn’t rigged against them, as it has been for the past several decades under politicians of both parties.

“Real” Americans, if they stop and think for a moment, will vote.  They might even vote for Barack Obama as he’s the candidate who is most likely to give everyone in America, “Real” or not, that chance at the American Dream.