Is It Margarine or Is It Butter?

It's My Constitutional Right to Have Margarine That's White!

After 20 years or so, Quebec has buckled under to the blandishments and pressure of the international/interprovincial margarine lobby and agreed to allow margarine to be coloured yellow. No longer will we be able to purchase uncoloured margarine anywhere, no longer allowed to squeeze the little packages of food-colouring into the pale oleaginous blob of edible oil. I did an informal survey, and apparently this was a common rite of childhood for many.

Now I know you're wondering, especially if you're not from Quebec, what the hell Larry's talking about. Well lemme tell ya. Some years ago, the dairy industry in Quebec prevailed upon the government to pass a law requiring that margarine be left in its original state...white...so that there would be no doubt as to what it was. Margarine. Not butter. The argument was that if margarine were allowed to be yellow, consumers would be confused.

Confused? Yes, I know there have been those TV commercials where the margarine tub and the butter ball argue about which is better, or which is which, or who is whom, or what is what. I'll tell you what. Everybody knows the difference between margarine and butter, regardless of colour. But oh no! The dairy industry in its wisdom, and the government in its paternalism, decided that the pûr laine Québecois was too gullible, too ignorant, too confused to distinguish between butter and margarine. So they outlawed yellow margarine. And by doing so interfered with interprovincial trade. See, those big dairies desperately want to flood the Quebec market with cheap yellow margarine, but they were prevented from doing so. (I wonder if it costs more to produce white margarine?)

OK, I know it sounds like I oppose the Quebec government's decision all those years ago. In fact, I've only ever heard one argument in favour of the white margarine that really makes any sense, because surely it's clear that consumers are not so easily confused. But...in the restaurant, when you order the roti (toast)...then it comes already with the butter on...melted. Or is it margarine? Harder to tell then, eh? Makes you confused.

"Eh, garçon, q'est-ce que c'est, là? Butter or margarine?"

"Je ne sais pas, monsieur. Ees eet white or yellow? If yellow, zen eet ees buttair."

Now, this rationale makes sense to me. But it's the only one.

Except for this: freedom of choice! When the Quebec law was in force, Canajuns had a choice. They could have butter. Or they could have white margarine. Or...they could have yellow margarine. To be sure, if you lived in Quebec, you had to smuggle it across provincial borders, but we Canajuns are used to that. Laurentide beer tucked in the trunk from Montreal to Hawgtown. Montreal bagels. Smokes from Kahnewake. Innumerable levels of government have made experienced smugglers of us all.

I repeat. There was choice! Variety! Who wants to go into the dépanneur and be faced with an entire cooler full of the same thing? No! We want choice. We want the right to choose yellow or white margarine! Are you with me?

It's in the constitution. We all have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of the edible oil product of our choice.

Wait a minute.

That's the Murrican constitution.

In Canaduh we're allowed to have peace, order, and government. (Actually, the constitution says good government, but we seem to have given up on that a long time ago...)

I guess that's it then. Another long-standing Canajun tradition down the tubes. Next thing you know, they'll be telling us that poutine has too much cholesterol.

Lunchbucket ON aka "The Tower of Song"

Leonard Cohen came to Lunchbucket last night and played the Square Peg in the Centre of the Hole, looking almost exactly like this photo here. Despite its unfortunate name, the Square Peg is one of the best concert halls in Canaduh.

Miracle of miracles, I got to go. A day pass for the evening because, as I said to Nurse Ratchet while abasing myself and grovelling, "C'mon Nurse Ratchet! After all, he is a pote! He's Canaduh's natural national pote now that Irving Layton's gone."

Nurse Ratchet sniffed and said, "Larry he is a po-ette, not a pote. When are you going to surrender your shiftless rebelliousness and stop trying to rearrange the language according to your own arcane little rules?"

"There's nothing ette about Leonard Cohen", sez I, "And I'll surrender when they erect a monument to Ogden Nash in Timeless Square! Meanwhile, kin I go see Leonard Coe, kin I huh, kin I please, pretty please?"

And so she let me. And Suzy Homemaker too, as a sort of chaperone.

Really, it's no con to say Leonard Cohen is a pote. He's a real life, legit, musical pote. And he's a Canajun national treasure...one whom many Canajuns don't even really know. More's the pity.

But the audience last night was positively adulatory. They gave him a standing ovation before he even started! And then he started with The Future. And just went on from there into the past, the present, the non-existent, the fantastic, the revelatory, the self-deprecatory, the whole story.

I'm not sure quite how old he is, about 75. After the third song or so, he commented how he hadn't been on that stage for 15 years, back when he was just a kid with a crazy dream. He was clearly enjoying performing, but one can't help but wonder if he'd just as soon be home in his drawing room petting his partner. Because really, the only reason he's on tour...the only reason we get the pleasure of seeing him perform a 3 hour tour of his music, is because he needs the money. And that's a whole other story of not "Taking Care of Business" I guess and getting screwed because of it. Trusting someone too much, or not really caring about what might happen. And if it was the latter, then that was his secret, unconscious plan to end up back on the road playing to thousands of adoring fans.

The band was fabulous, of course. Naturally, because of HWSRN, I have an affinity for the keyboard player of any band. Cohen's keyboard player was Neil Larsen, an absolute master of the Hammond B3, and a name I recognized immediately, tho I can't say who he's played with. However, he has a sound-patch for the old Yamaha DX7 synth named after him.

Cohen rolled out all the hits. He started off his second set with Tower of Song which, for me anyway, is nothing short of sublime and contains what I think may be his most famous line: "I was born with the gift of a golden voice..." Pure irony, of course, but he actually does sing pretty well, although not always on pitch. He has a poet's sense of timing too...knows just when to be a little off-beat from the backup singers. At the end of the song, the back-up singers sing, "Doo dum dum dum de doo dum dum." When it was over, Cohen said that he had studied the spiritual masters looking for the key to life. And that was the answer. Doo dum dum dum de doo dum dum.

All night long, the songs, the lines, seemed to be making reference to his current situation...the financial one, I mean, and the necessity of touring. But also to his past. He made jokes about his spiritual quest, his drinking, his loves and losses. He even dedicated a song to Bo Diddley...the most un-Bo song he has, Take This Waltz. And the audience lapped it up.

Then the show was over. But the master showman (who barely has to even move to get a reaction) kept coming back for more. Giving more. Encore after encore. The people loved it. Even tho it was clearly planned that way. For one encore they barely went off stage and meanwhile the stage crew were bringing out Leonard's guitar and rearranging things. Obviously he was coming back. There were, maybe, two people who got bored.

Not me. If I could write one song as well-crafted as Hallelujah, I'd die a happy wayward pote.

Update on "Gonna Keep Dancing"

Gonna Keep Dancing Crashes & Burns

I'm sorry to report that "Gonna Keep Dancing" did not win the Juno Award last night. Sadly, for Eddie, the award was won by:

There has been no word from Eddie directly yet, but my guess is he's still recovering from the Juno parties. Even if you don't win, there's lots of fun to be had. And I expect also that he's not completely disappointed. He was astonished to receive the nomination in the first place. Congratulations to Ms. Gould, and to Eddie: Make another one!

Meanwhile, you can encourage Eddie by going to his site and buying his CD so he can pay for the next one!

For a listing of other winners, you can go to the Juno site.

Larry Fills in the Gaps

Well, of course I was somewhat derelict in my journalistic duties in the previous post. In my provincial arrogance I assume everybody knows who Wiarton Willie is. That's him on the left. And on the right. In the cage.

Willie is Canada's most famous weather prognosticator -- an albino groundhog who emerges (or is coaxed) from his lair every Feb. 2, Groundhog Day. If he sees his shadow, it means that we will have an early spring in good old Ontariario. If not, it means six more weeks of winter.

A few smartasses have sort of worked out that either way, we get six more weeks of winter, at a minimum.

And furthermore, it's been known to snow on the May Two-Four weekend...(Victoria Day holiday for all you loyal British Imperialists.) That's considerably more than six weeks.

Click on Willie to go to a little blurb website about him and his hometown.

Caledonia, Caledonia, What Makes Your Big Head So Hard?

Today is the second anniversary of the Six Nations native occupation of the Douglas Creek Estates in Caledonia, in good old Ontariario.

The second anniversary.

I haven't written about it previously. The world is full of occupations and disputes and land claims. Many of them bigger and more momentous. Israel, Palestine and Gaza. That's one big land claim isn't it?

But Caledonia is closer to home.

On Feb. 28/06, the members of the Six Nations took over a land development site called Douglas Creek Estates, on which building had already taken place, saying it was native land and it belonged to them. They blockaded the road, which was in fact, the main street of Caledonia and took over. The blockade caused major disruptions in the town of Caledonia, gave rise to protests by the local residents, and in some cases incited destruction of property and minor violence. Especially during the first year of the occupation, there was a great deal of tension. This abated somewhat after the blockade was finally removed, but other developments since then have ensured that the crisis is not yet past.

That's a little bit of background. If you want more, Google Douglas Creek Estates - Caledonia ON and you'll find that a little industry has grown up around this occupation.

So now we are into year 3. HWSRN just happened to be in Caledonia today, the actual day of the anniversary. He took some photos (from a distance, without getting out of his vehicle, because it is not a place that is inviting to people taking photos, unless you are big mainstream media, and sometimes not even then.)

The Caledonia occupation brings into stark relief all the problems Canada has had in dealing with aboriginals, land claims, and the reserve system. Overlapping jurisdictions exacerbate the problem. 200 year old treaties raise their hoary heads. Mohawk Warriors slip in and out of the territory relatively unimpeded. It's a mess. And the local residents suffer the consequences but don't have any of the power.

Ultimately, the Six Nations are claiming (based on a treaty of 1784) a huge swath of southern Ontario, six miles on either side of the Grand River, for its whole length, which they say was never legally ceded to the government of Canada. It was taken from them over the years by government fiat or shady dealings, anything but an honest trade.

And here's where the difficulty begins. Jurisdictional troubles. The aboriginal question is a federal responsibility. And successive federal governments, of any party you'd like to name, have managed to drag their feet when it comes to dealing with land claims. They seem to hope it will all just go away if they ignore it or prolong the agony.

It's not going to go away. The First Nations have, if not the highest, one of the highest birth rates in the country. (And there's an interesting anthropological study...)

As a result, the state of land claims by aboriginal groups in Canada is a disaster. There have been some successes, but the looming claims far outnumber those.

Furthermore, any action by aboriginal groups inevitably takes place within some province's territory. So the provincial governments have to become involved. This occurs mainly in the area of policing. And in Ontariario, policing of sites like the Caledonia occupation has become a thorny problem, because a native, Dudley George, was killed by provincial police in 1995 at a similar dispute in Ipperwash Ontariario. The current premier of Ontariario, Malton McGuilty was instrumental in setting up the public inquiry that excoriated the previous government's actions at Ipperwash. So, when it comes to Caledonia, he's walking on eggshells. The result is a lot of football tossing. Back and forth. Back and forth.

Many Canajuns I have talked to just want the governments to do something! On the other hand, their opinions about the Six Nations claims are quite divided. Everybody seems to agree, more or less, on the justice of their claims. The natives have begun to develop the idea that they are stewards of the earth. I think this is possibly just another version of the Noble Savage myth, perpetrated by the "Noble Savages" themselves. But the protesters clearly broke laws and have never been called to account for that. The OPP (Ontariario Provincial Police) has repeatedly failed in its duty to enforce the law, and there is not a citizen in the province who doesn't think the reason for that is political manipulation. Malton McGuilty is guilty. And the continued inaction (or, at the least, failure to make visible progress) is made worse by the fact that the Six Nations groups themselves appear unable to produce a united leadership.

Oh, there's so much more to be said. But I have only one thing more right now. You know, India, Pakistan, most of Africa, parts of Asia...they're all still working through the consequences of colonialism, that virulent strain of thought which presumes that you can take over and actually own somebody else's land, their homeland, their culture. We see it all happening far away.

Caledonia proves that we're still dealing with the colonial past right here.

"Gonna Keep Dancing" Nominated for Juno!

Hey! Here's some Fantastic news! Fabulous news! Wonderful news! Excellent news! Glad Tidings news!

This recording here, which I wrote about last September and which HWSRN played several tracks on a couple years ago, has been nominated for a Juno Award in the Childrens' Music category! (For those of you reading from other countries, the Junos are the Canajun equivalent of the Grammy Awards.


Here's a screenshot of the Juno Awards page taken with one of my latest blogging toys, Fireshot, which is a Firefox extension of Screenshot Studio. Neat little toy, when it doesn't crash your browser (which it has not the last few times I played with it.) Anway...the screen shot:



I'm just so thrilled and happy for both Eddie and HWSRN. The Juno Awards show will air on CTV on April 6/08, so be sure and watch. Meanwhile, you just go back to my posting in September cuz I also posted one of the tunes off the album and you can hear just why it deserved such a prestigious nomination.

Afro-Centric Schools

Update: Jan.30/08
Last night the Hawgtown Board of Education voted in favour of establishing an Afro-Centric school.

A couple things about this:
Why did they decide that Afro-Centrism was the way to go?

1. Apparently, the dropout rate of Afro-Centrist students is about 40%. That's pretty high, motha. It means that Hawgtown's school system is failing its students. Especially the Afro-Centrist ones. (No mention of whether the students themselves are failing their futures.)
2. No one has come up with a better idea. This, according to the leader of the Ontariario NDP (Notquite Deceased Party), Howard Hambone.
3. A high school girl interviewed on the radio said that calling this proposed school "segregated" was offensive. Let's not forget that it's the Afro-Centrist Cultural Community that's asking for it. And further, we can all agree that the theory and the policy are not "segregationist" OK? But the practical effect will almost certainly be such.
   

Something I forgot to mention in the original post: If we think the system is inadequate, or the Afro-Centrist Cultural Community thinks their needs are being somehow neglected, what will be said if this idea doesn't work? I'll tell you. It will be said that the financial and educational needs of the Afro-Centric school were neglected. They didn't get the resources they needed. They were failed by the Hawgtown School Board.
There is a major public debate going on in Hawgtown these days about the proposed establishment of what is being called an "Afro-Centric" school. In other words, a school mostly for black students with a curriculum that would be slanted towards the Afro-Cultural slice of the Canajun multi-cultural mosaic, but still fulfilling the curriculum requirements of good old Ontariario.

Why has this issue come up? Because it seems the Afro-Cultural youths are not responding well to typical Canajun educational practices. They feel alienated. So they join gangs and collect guns and randomly shoot the innocent. They hang out in housing projects and terrorize the neighbours, also predominantly Afro-Cultural. So they need their own school to tell them where they came from. The current party line on the school is that it wouldn't be exclusively black. Whites, Asians, Indians, etc. would not be barred from attending this school. That's the theory, anyway. But we all know that the point of a theory is to disprove it. And it sounds to me like what is being suggested amounts to a segregated school, for all practical purposes.

What's surprising to me is that most of the push for this school is coming from some (but not all) members of the Afro-Canajun community. Far be it from me to hold up the US as a shining example, eh? But I seem to remember something about a US Supreme Court decision way back in 1954 called Brown v. The Board of Education (of Topeka, Kansas) which reversed the earlier policy of many many states to operate legally-mandated segregated schools. Part of the argument in that case revolved around whether official segregation was just a way of ensuring that blacks received inferior education.

Here in Canada, apparently it's the other way around. Here we are, Alice Through the Looking Glass. I guess it's only appropriate that we would mirror the US, in reverse. It's our way of asserting independence from the behemoth to the south. It's the obstreperous Canajun way.

But I have a question: What the hell does "Afro-Centric" mean in the context of Canada? In Hawgtown, where the debate is raging, there must be black students from every country on Earth that has black people. So they all came from Africa originally? OK. But my guess is that most of the Hawgtown black students actually came from Jamaica or Trinidad or one of the other Caribbean islands. Or were born of parents who did. Do they identify as Afro-Canadians? Not bloody likely! Yes, there are lots of Somalis, Kenyans, Nigerians la la la. Or children of them. But the diversity of the black population precludes any exclusive identification of "Afro-Centricity". So what are they going to be taught?

I don't know. It just seems to me that this is an idea that has went fifty years ago.

(I should say, by way of clarification scarification darification sparification, that the Yoni School where I am currently deposited is fully integrated desecrated desiccated cheesegrated. The only criterion we all meet for sure is that we are Wayward Poets. Everything else is gravy wavy navy knavey.)

What's the 1st Thing You Need on New Year's Day?

Iran & World War Three? Pt.II

I hope the NY Times don't mind. I'm including this image of its front page from Nov. 15, 1969:

As you can see, on this day 38 years ago a quarter of a million people gathered in Washington to protest against the Vietnam war.

Oh, how times have changed!

Now, I ask myself, what's the difference between then and now.

I come up with really only one answer: fear.

The quarter-million Murricans (and many others) of 1969 feared neither the Vietnamese nor the Communists nor their own government. Such is not the case today. Murricans now fear Muslims (and that's a whole lot of the world's population these days) whether they live in Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia. They fear Mexicans. They fear their own government.

It's possible that this is not simply paranoia, I admit. Sometimes fear is the "rational" response. But if you allow the fear to rule you, then the logical consequences of that response become irrational.

There is some reason to fear the government. The Bush administration has made a concerted effort to feed that fear, to restrict the rights of US citizens (all in the name of security...and is there any as a result?...) I think most westerners (and that includes the Murricans) believe that they live in freedom. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Most, gazing off into the distance of the Middle East or Africa or China, don't recognize the repression in front of their noses.

Of course there is government repression in the US. In western Europe. In Canada. We may admit that it is relatively milder than so-called dictatorships in other regions, but it is repression nevertheless. Just ask those who do attempt to protest or demonstrate their opposition to unwarranted or unrepresentative government actions. Ask the people who protest against the Security and Prosperity Partnership right here in North America. (And some of these people are not even saying "Don't do it!" They're just saying, "Tell us what the hell's going on, tell us what your plans are!" Is this not anti-democratic? Is this not repression?)

The usual response to demonstrations and protests in the West is not so far different from what has outraged us recently in both Burma and Pakistan. The police (let's call them "security forces" as the media like to do for other countries) let it go on for a while (as long as it's not too rowdy) and then at some point determine that things must be shut down...for security. If anyone objects to being shut down, they are pepper-sprayed, tasered, arrested, beaten, charged and convicted. But of course, that's OK, because they're our police. They're not those brutal riot gangs in Rangoon.

A few years ago, former Premier Mike Harass of Ontariario put up barricades outside the Legislature. He didn't like the idea of people protesting there. At the figurative House of the People! He essentially instigated riots by trying to suppress the voice of the citizens of Ontariario. I had a hard time convincing some of my friends that the sight of police on horseback with riot sticks in front of our Legislature was something to be alarmed about...that the state was committing violence against its own citizens.

The people of 1969 may have been hippies and so-called radicals. But there is no doubt they had courage. They pushed back against a regime that did not seem to have their best interests at heart. Of course, many of those people are still around. But I wonder, have some of them become the people who need to be pushed back against?

As for the rest of us, I fear too. I fear that we have become hypnotized by technology, by media, by bland repetition of the Big Lie, by trivial pursuits, the latest iPod, the latest iPhone, the latest XBox, the latest celebrity scandal, the latest Hummer. And I lament. I lament that we have been cowed by fear. By complacency. By surveillance. By corporate power. By government power.

And I dread. That we have become sheeplike in our acceptance of authority.

BFB Impersonates Oktoberfest Band

Here are a few photos of BFB during Oktoberfest.

Phil In, Drummerguy, who replaced Helmet admirably for the 9 days, Helmet being temporarily unavailable cuz he was impersonating the president of the Lunchbucket Oktoberfest Committee.

Dozey (trumpet), HWSRN (accordion & keyboards) & Sonja (Jodelette)

BFB with Canada's Polka King, Uncle Wally Ostanek

Audience members perform the Polka Head Salute during the world-famous BFB Hokey Pokey

A Pome by Malcolm Lowry

As yet, I've been unable to finish Under the Volcano. I know it's supposed to be a masterpiece. I know it's what made Lowry. But it sat for years on my shelf before I even started it. Then it sat for years more with a bookmark about a third of the way through. At the moment, I'm not even sure where my copy of it is.

On the other hand, I've lately read a couple of his pomes which are somehow more accessible. Witty. Not so dreary. (And it seems that dreary is how I characterize Under the Volcano. But maybe I should give it another chance.)

Anyway, here's a pome by Lowry, and I'm sure anyone who has had some of their work published can relate to this:

Strange Type

I wrote: in the dark cavern of our birth.

The printer had it tavern, which seems better:

But herein lies the subject of our mirth,

Since on the next page death appears as dearth.

So it may be that God's word was distraction,

Which to our strange type appears destruction.

Which is bitter.

Breaking News Headlines From Mental Blog

CANADA TURNS 140!

MOHAWK NATION BLOWS OUT CANDLES & MAKES A WISH

CANADIAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION PRESCRIBES VIAGRA...FOR MEDICARE

PRIME MYSTERY STEPHEN HARPIE TURNS GREEN
AT THE SIGHT OF ELIZABETH MAYORMAYNOT

QUEBEC CREATES SEPARATE NATION...IN ALBERTA

NEWFOUNDLAND PLANS TO BUILD BRIDGE TO ITSELF

PROPOSED TOLL HIGHWAY THROUGH NUNAVUT WILL EASE GRIDLOCK IN HAWGTOWN

BC SALMON SWIM DOWNSTREAM TO PROVE THEY CAN GO WITH THE FLOW

NEW UNDERGROUND RAILROAD TO TRANSPORT RUNAWAY SLAVES FROM SOUTHWESTERN ONTARIARIO TO ALABAMA

AIR CANADA SEEKS BANKRUPTCY PROTECTION, CITES NO-FLY LIST FOR STEEP DECLINE IN PASSENGER BOOKINGS

Book Launch Announcement

My good friend Marianne Paul is having her second novel published.This has been a work in progress for several years. I had the pleasure and privilege of reading early drafts while attending the Dove Tale Writers editing circle.

Marianne is a fabulous writer. Her style is spare but always evocative. I always like to think I can take credit for encouraging her to write poetry, at which she also excels, because much of her prose is really poetry. You can check out some of her writing at the Dove Tale Writers website and her own website.

And if you are in or near the Kitchener area on June 21, make sure you stop by for the book launch. All the local glitterati will be there (except me...Nurse Ratchet demands a foot massage that night...)

Come and celebrate with me the launch of my new novel!

Tending Memory
BookLand Press

Thursday June 21st from 7 - 9 p.m.

Reading at 7:45 p.m.

Sam’s Steps Dance Centre

1252 King St. E., Kitchener

Corner of Sheldon & King St. (above Scotiabank)
Entrance & parking off Sheldon


Enjoy the accordion music of HWSRN and a gypsy dance by Samantha Paul

Light refreshments
Books available at a special book launch price

RSVP appreciated at mariannepaul(at)rogers.com

Hope to see you there!
~ Marianne Paul
www.mariannepaul.com

Sam the Record Man Closes Down

The flagship store of Sam the Record Man is closing down in old Hawgtown. A victim of modern technology. Ain't nobody buyin' CDs hardly anymore. How can even an institution like Sam's keep up?

Of course, I feel as if I'm solely responsible for the demise of this landmark. I just didn't shop there enough. (I have an excuse now, squirreled away in the Yoni School as I am for god knows how much longer...) In fact, hardly at all. Even when I lived in Hawgtown.

Still, in the misty days of my youth, Sam's was Mecca. Music Mecca. You would go in there and just wish you had a pot full of money cuz there was so much to buy. You could hardly decide where to start. All that music! Anything you wanted! Amazing prices! (In those days, some of the prices were amazing. Later, as Sam's became a chain, the prices became amazingly homogenized with the rest of the industry...)

I bought my first Steely Dan album there. I bought records there on my honeymoon. (Yessss, I had a honeymoon. It was short. I still have the records.) I bought an album by a loony called Screamin' Lord Sutch who drove around in a Rolls Royce painted as a Union Jack. Crappy album, really, but Lord Sutch could afford to pay guys like Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck and Nicky Hopkins to back up his screams. How could you not buy it? 99 cents.

Will I miss Sam the Record Man? Probably not. Will I remember? Definitely.

Parti Québécois Loses 2 Leaders in One Week

Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles DeSeat is known as an excellent debater. "Of course, I'm an excellent debater..." he often says. Here, he is shown defeating himself in debate:

GD: Should I run for PQ leader? Yes I think I should. (May 11/07)
GD: Non, I think you should stay in federal politics. Remain leader of the BQ.
GD: I really think my nation needs me. These Québeckers, they are so confused.
GD: You think the Québeckers are confused? Are you not a member of a federal parliament that is paying you to be a separatist?
GD: Sorry, I forgot. OK, I will stay as BQ leader. (May 12/07)
GD: Non, you should become leader of the PQ.
GD: Please, I cannot make up my mind. Do you think maybe I should instead become General Manager of the Canadian National Hockey Team? Dat way I could choose any captain I want.
GD: I think you should abdicate all responsibility and give it to a woman. How about dat Mare-wha? woman?
GD: Mare-who?
GD: Non, Mare-wha?!
GD: OK, OK, I will stay as BQ leader. B comes before P. Besides, a woman should lead the nation out of confederation. Dat way they cannot always blame it on the men.
GD: Oui, and she probably knows how to make up her mind too.

Buy a Book? Bring Photo ID

Get this!

Suzy Homemaker ordered a book from Chapters. It's in. It's paid for. In order to get it, she has to produce photo ID.

For a book. That's paid for.

I expect next we'll need financial documentation to buy coffee at TimHo's.

I answered the phone here at the Yoni School, cuz Nurse Ratchet's out having her bunions trimmed. I didn't mention to the young woman from Chapters, never mind photo ID, Suzy needs a notarized visa from the Mystery of Correctional Services just to get to Chapters!

A Quarter for Your (Paranoid) Thoughts

Really, this is too much!

AP reported yesterday that some visiting US Army contractors spotted an outlandish coin while travelling in Canada, and they considered it to be so suspicious that they filed espionage reports about it.

The suspicious coin turned out to be the one shown here, the famous (only in Canada, you say?) "Poppy" quarter, the first colourized coin in the world.

It caused quite a sensation (only in Canada, you say?) when it was issued in 2004, because the government chose TimHo's to be the main distributor of the coin...proving once again that Canajuns really are all TimHoes.

I don't like to be too critical but sometimes you just have to shake your head. We Canajuns are often astounded at the appalling ignorance of our Murrican neighbours to the south. You know, the home of Mom, apple pie and a Commie under every bed.

Especially if it's a Canajun bed. (Didn't some Yanqui senator call us the Republic of Canuckistan or something like that? Clever enough, and lots of Canajuns got a laugh out of it, but it was deliberately inflammatory. But never mind, quite a few loose-mouthed Canajuns are also guilty of that form of idiocy with regard to our Friendly Giant neighbours.)

The poppy is the symbol (only in Canada, you say?) of war remembrance and it is inspired by this pome, written by a Canajun, and proclaimed by the Arlington National Cemetery as "one of the most memorable war poems ever written". Arlington National Cemetery is, I believe, one of the better-known institutions in...where was that, now?...oh yeah, the Excited States of Murrica. (So that must mean that not all Murricans are appallingly ignorant, praise the Lord! and pass the ammunition...)

In Flanders Fields
By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

IN FLANDERS FIELDS the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Now, I don't expect the average Murrican to know this pome was written by a Canajun, or to know the pome at all, for that matter. It's a Canajun institution, for sure, and most Canajuns don't know all the words. But neither do I expect Murricans to come to Canada and proclaim, "Hmm, that's a mighty suspicious pome! We better test it to make sure it ain't gonna blow up!"

Which is what the US Army contractors did. (Or, rather, the Defense Security Service.) They suspected nano-technology! I suspect that nano-technology represents the size of the intellects involved.

What I want to know is: What the hell are US Army contractors doing in Canada anyway? I thought the war was somewhere else. What? Were these maybe a coupla Blackwater Boys on vacation in Niagara Falls, spending the combat pay they earned protecting VIPs in Baghdad? One of them buys a pack of gum and gets the quarter in his change? And, we Canajuns being so friendly (he wasn't being shot at by desperate Iraqis), he didn't realize he was in a furrin country where the money might be different?

And then, to compound the stupidity (and the arrogance) they label this coin a secret weapon that was somehow planted on them. In Canada. Which is the country that has had the longest-standing friendship with the US and is, in fact, an ally in that other adventure in Afghanistan. I ask you, should we be surprised when the US gets a bad reputation around the world? A nation that has considerable difficulty distinguishing between true friends and enemies.

Then again, maybe it was just four guys from Detroit on a weekend jaunt to the casino in Windsor who decided to play a practical joke on the Defense Department, just to see how far it would go...

The Stanley Cup Provides a Dharma Lesson

May 2, 1967.

That was the last time the Toronto Maple Leafs won the Stanley Cup.

Game 6 against the Montreal Canadiens.

George Armstrong, the captain of the Leafs, scored on an empty net in the final minute of the game and the Leafs won, 3-1.

And today is the 40th anniversary.

I remember watching that game. I don't remember much about the game itself.

But here's what I do remember. We were all cheering for the Leafs. Hey, I'm from Ontariario. Back in those days, the Leafs were it. (Personally, I liked the Canadiens' colours better. A Montreal toque was way better than a Toronto one...But that would make me the opposite of the kid in Roch Carrier's story, The Hockey Sweater...) Drive anywhere in southern Ontariario when the Leafs are in the playoffs and you'll see that even now, the Leafs are still it. Even though they haven't won the cup in 40 years.

But I believe I mentioned something about a Dharma teaching. Well, here it is. Naturally, we were all ecstatic when Armstrong scored that goal. The Leafs had clinched the cup! And beaten the Habs to do it, too! So there we were, all celebrating. TimHo celebrating. Bob Pulford. Johnny Bower. Frank Mahovlich. Terry Sawchuk. Armstrong. Ron Ellis. And us.

But then the camera panned across the Montreal bench. I never saw such a dejected-looking bunch of guys. Jean Beliveau especially.

I immediately felt sorry for them. Cuz they had worked their asses off. But somebody wins and somebody loses.

Now, we're taught that it's a cause of negative karma to rejoice in the misfortunes of others, or to wish them ill. It seems to me that's a fairly common practice in the world of competitive sports (and its fans.) But at that moment, I learned a dharma lesson, altho I didn't know that was what it was at the time. I could no longer rejoice over the Canadiens' loss. I could still rejoice over the Leafs' win, but now it was tempered by the knowledge that someone's joy could very well be someone else's disappointment.

And ain't that samsara all over?

(Note: the link up above is a Google video of the entire game. How cool is that? I haven't watched the whole thing, but maybe I will...I've also linked to it in Larry's Surfboard. The video is an hour and twenty-seven minutes long, but if you scroll to about one hour and nineteen, you'll see the final goal and its aftermath.)

And So It Goes Pt. 2

June Callwood
June 2, 1924-April 14, 2007

OMG! It's Friday the 13th!

Maybe I should go back to bed...
Bikers'll be all over the roads today, heading to Port Dover.

Postscript: OK, maybe I should explain for those of you not from Ontariario...Every Friday the 13th motorcycle afficionados travel from all over to Port Dover on the shores of Lake Weerie and have a huge street party. (Not what you might call biker gangs, per se, altho there's some of that too, but just bikers bikers bikers.) I'm not quite sure of the origin of this event but it's been going on for quite a few years.