“Everybody deserves lovely words,” Shepardson says. “Say lovely words.”
Obits glumly render all that is morally abysmal to flowing elegic
If y’ain’t got nuthin’ nice to say – don’t say anything
By Terrance Seamus O’Gavan
I admit to be a little peeved by the onslaught of valedictions that cascaded and caromed off the pinging walls of the Fifth Estate, in the wake of Michael Jackson’s untimely demise.
It’s almost as if we’ve forgotten - in our unbridled haste to plop another elegeic log on the funereal pyre – Mikey’s questionable predilection for sleeping with children.
Yeah, I know. Thriller. The Moon Walk. Storied legacy. Rock n’ Roll genius. Yada-yada-yada. I get it.
And yeah, I know, I know. He was never convicted.
Quick refresher.
In 1993, Jordan Chandler, a minor, received an out-of-court settlement for $20 million from the estate of Michael Jackson. The allegations of sexual impropriety poofed into the billowy clouds above Neverland. Jackson was charged formally in 2003, and faced more child abuse scrutiny in 2005. He moonwalked out of the courtroom.
Should we be surprised? Never. Not in Neverland, where childhood angst is lost midst the windrows of rides, Nintendo, Elephant man remains, hyperbaric chambers, and the toy-stocked “special room.”
Way too often, in celebrity trials, we’ve seen the scales of justice tipped in favor of that imposing wheelbarrow full of newly serialized Benjamins.
Jackson stated in a documentary with British journalist Martin Bashir that many children, including Macaulay Culkin, his younger brother Kieran, and his sisters had slept in Jackson's bed.
Y’know, I can forgive a litany of sins. But not this one. This is the biggy. It’s the one that has 35-year-old men and women torn to waking, bathed in cold sweats.
They still remember the trauma of that betrayal when they were 4 or 5 or 6 or 7.
No, the life of a child is too precious. An adult should never barter fame, power or a seat of influence to harm a child.
The whiff of serial child endangerment lingers around Michael Jackson. I never trusted him after the payout in 93, and the Bashir interview cemented that gut-ugly feeling.
The fact that Michael never expressed an iota of remorse, and sought to quash all interference through his battery of legal aid and that access to hush money just makes it worse.
And try as I might. I can’t jump on the bandwagon.
And I am totally flabbergasted at the number of people who rushed to the many available microphones and cameras proffered last week in the wake of Mikey’s untimely death.
But I understand it. Good music. A Rock legend. I get it.
Talk of the kids just spoils the nice buzz.
And, we are all taught from an early age not to speak ill of the dead.
Jan Shepardson operates a eulogy writing web service called www.lovingeulogies.com. She offers advice for the passing, or parting shot: “Everybody deserves lovely words,” Shepardson says. “Say lovely words.”
This long and flowery bouquet is not unprecedented.
Remember Adolf? Whooooo, boy. Now that guy knew how to party.
Do you perchance recall the long, flowing verbal semaphores that came-a-twinklin’ when they pulled gentle Adolf and wheezy Eva from that well-stocked bunker in Berlin back on April 30th 1945?
Glorious eulogies. Flowered elegies. Rousing verse dripping from all available nooks, crannies and corners. Say what you will about Hitler, but the trains ran on time.
“Ah, Adolf,” wrote his good friend, drinking buddy, and fellow world traveler, Ernest Hemingway.
“Remember the parades? Those marvelous mass meetings in the squares?” wrote Papa.
“Adolf brought us the pageantry. The goose-stepping phalanx of misanthropic palace guards, the tanks – god those tanks were beautiful - the long, long, long speeches. The pogroms, the genocide, the nihilism that literally tumbled from every inch of that scrunchy little man. To look into his eyes was to stare into the deep, dark depths of Nietchke’s abyss. God, I can hardly believe he’s gone.”
And Winston Churchill, Adolf’s counterpoint and contretemps, his bon vivant alter ego, on hearing the news of Adolf’s bunkered demise was heard to say: “I cried. Poor Adolf. Legacy, accomplishment, curriculum vitae. The body of his all-encompassing, grasping and overarching work. Compelling, awe-inspiring and visually stunning! The Volkswagon Beetle, those planes, those ships, the Bismarck, those unguided rockets, those glorious nights in London, cooking dinner in the dark – always in the bloody, goddam’ dark - that popping prance with the Polish Cavalry. Bloody Hell! The Swastika, and those lovely concerts in the park! Adolf, you lovable, overmedicated, megalomaniacal, little sociopath … goddamit’ you little shit! We’ll miss you.”
Too much?
Heloise, that eloquent etiquette diva says nay! Never too much when it comes to propping up the bygones.
“We will be dead too, one day,” says Heloise “And in death … do we not deserve kindness?” Ah, sweet Heloise, insight, oozing from every polite, proper and ponderous pore.
Okay here goes.
“Hi Mikey, sorry you’re gone. I had a chat with St. Peter and I’m afraid it’s a thumbs’ down. Anyway … I have it on good authority from Janis Joplin that there is a huge band down under. She says the acoustics off the canyons on the River Styx are ‘friggin’ mind-numbing.’ Kinda’ like the Demarol I guess. Love the shoes, the hat and the glove. And the songs. Except Ben. Rest in Peace, Michael.”
“Everybody deserves lovely words … Say lovely words.”
More important than the lovely words?
The children.
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Twitter and tweet ... prologue and dog
Twittering away on the field of play
Pro athletes finding solace in short course discourse
By Terrance Gavan
I just checked my Twitter account.
I count 18 pro athletes and 22 sportswriters and columnist among my rapidly expanding Twittering list of friends.
I am following Canuck hoopster Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Chris Bosh, Shaquille O’Neal, Lance Armstrong, Terrell Owens and swimmer Michael Phelps.
Steve Nash just twitted me the other day. He scored a guest shot on the popular HBO series “Entourage.” He also gave a detailed 140-character – the Twitter maximum - account of his vacation in Brazil. Lance Armstrong peeped vaguely about the wheelie goons from the drug-testing police in Europe. Shaq tweeted Kobe well in the NBA finals.
Do I need to know all this?
I follow Denver sports columnist Woody Paige, get tweets from my old friend, and Globe and Mail columnist, Jeff Blair, and I also follow tweets from New York Times sports.
Twittering is all the rage in professional sports today. It’s creating some dilemmas. For every real Shaq or real Steve Nash there are the imposters.
Recently someone set up a fake Tony La Russa account. La Russa is the manager of baseball’s St Louis Cardinals. The bogus Tony Tweeted this under La Russa’s name: “Lost 2 out of 3, but we made it out of Chicago without one drunk driving incident or dead pitcher” — that, an obvious reference to the deaths of two Cardinals pitchers since 2002 (Darryl Kyle and Josh Hancock) and La Russa’s own DUI incident two years ago.
I can’t help it. I smiled, a bit. What can I say, I like the sophomoric turn of phrase. Tony was not amused.
La Russa sued the San Francisco-based company for unspecified damages for harming his reputation and causing emotional distress. The suit was settled a few weeks back when Twitter agreed to pay La Russa’s legal fees and to make a donation to his Animal Rescue Foundation.
Which brings us to the LPGA and their commissioner Carolyn Bivens who said in an interview last week that she “encourages” players to use handheld devices to post content on social-media Web sites such as Twitter or Facebook during tournaments, even if it runs counter to golf etiquette.
Bivens said she would “love it” if players used the social media site Twitter.com to connect with fans during their rounds. Paula Creamer, a leading light on the LPGA tour rejected the notion outright.
Creamer says she is aghast at the idea and called Bivens “an idiot” for even suggesting the use of Twitter mid-round.
How do we know this?
Well Creamer told the world and her followers all about it on a recent post to her “Twitter account.”
“I will not be twittering in my round,” Creamer, who’s ranked third in the world, wrote on her Twitter page shortly before teeing off for a tournament last weekend. “It should not happen in any sport. The players have already told the tour no way.”
Begging the question. “Is Paula hitting irons, or ironies?”
I have my own brush with Twitter limelight.
It happened last week.
Tony Kornheiser a co-host – with Michael Wilbond - on ESPN’s popular Pardon the Interruption sports talk show, manages PTI’s Twitter blog. Kornheiser has a lot of time on his hands since his ouster from the third seat on ESPN’s Monday Night Football. Tony’s spending a lot of his off-hours Tweeting. He often asks for input for the PTI show.
But Tony also takes time for some non-sequitur meanders.
Lately it’s been raining in Washington. A lot. This has caused no end of problems for his dog Maggie, who apparently does not like to go out in the rain.
How do I know this? Well, Tony is tweeting … about Maggie.
“My dog didn’t go out again today. More rain. She simply won’t go in the rain. Might have to toilet train Maggie!” tweets Tony. “She puts her head down on the concrete, digs in her paws, and won’t budge. I’d tug at her, but she’s 14 and I’m afraid what might happen. It’s supposed to rain for two days, so she’s bound to go in the house.”
I tweeted back, warned Tony about the dangers of kidney disease in old dogs, the need for regular bowel movements and then I tweeted a suggestion for a trail of bacon bits from his porch to the backyard bushes.
Today, followers of Kornheiser’s PTI Twitter blog and I all shared some tweeted joy. “Hey my tweety peeps … Maggie went doodooo in the rain! All thanks to my Twitty friend terrancegavan, a.k.a. The Gavball. Big props to bacon bits, Maggie unfurled, and the Gavball.”
That hit went out to PTI’s 50,000 plus followers.
I now have friend requests coming out my ying-yang.
I am a full-fledged celebrity in Twitterland.
Steve Nash Tweeted me from the set of Entourage.
“Hey Gavball … nice job with Maggie. My dog Phoenix used to fetch the paper. Now he’s taken to ripping it up into tiny pieces. Any suggestions? Steve.”
I wrote back. “Hey Steve. I read my paper on line … now can we interest you in a jump from Phoenix to Toronto? Where you can reunite with your old National Team buddy Jay Triano and bring an NBA Championship to T-Dot?”
From Steve?
Nothing yet. Steve couldn’t comment even if he really, really wanted to. It would constitute tampering and go against strict NBA guidelines.
The trouble with Twitter?
All feathers, no substance.
And my mailbox is filling up with dog questions.
Anyone know what to do with a Labradolly who likes to twirl from the living room drapes?
It’s driving Tiger Woods and his interior decorator crazy.
Pro athletes finding solace in short course discourse
By Terrance Gavan
I just checked my Twitter account.
I count 18 pro athletes and 22 sportswriters and columnist among my rapidly expanding Twittering list of friends.
I am following Canuck hoopster Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Chris Bosh, Shaquille O’Neal, Lance Armstrong, Terrell Owens and swimmer Michael Phelps.
Steve Nash just twitted me the other day. He scored a guest shot on the popular HBO series “Entourage.” He also gave a detailed 140-character – the Twitter maximum - account of his vacation in Brazil. Lance Armstrong peeped vaguely about the wheelie goons from the drug-testing police in Europe. Shaq tweeted Kobe well in the NBA finals.
Do I need to know all this?
I follow Denver sports columnist Woody Paige, get tweets from my old friend, and Globe and Mail columnist, Jeff Blair, and I also follow tweets from New York Times sports.
Twittering is all the rage in professional sports today. It’s creating some dilemmas. For every real Shaq or real Steve Nash there are the imposters.
Recently someone set up a fake Tony La Russa account. La Russa is the manager of baseball’s St Louis Cardinals. The bogus Tony Tweeted this under La Russa’s name: “Lost 2 out of 3, but we made it out of Chicago without one drunk driving incident or dead pitcher” — that, an obvious reference to the deaths of two Cardinals pitchers since 2002 (Darryl Kyle and Josh Hancock) and La Russa’s own DUI incident two years ago.
I can’t help it. I smiled, a bit. What can I say, I like the sophomoric turn of phrase. Tony was not amused.
La Russa sued the San Francisco-based company for unspecified damages for harming his reputation and causing emotional distress. The suit was settled a few weeks back when Twitter agreed to pay La Russa’s legal fees and to make a donation to his Animal Rescue Foundation.
Which brings us to the LPGA and their commissioner Carolyn Bivens who said in an interview last week that she “encourages” players to use handheld devices to post content on social-media Web sites such as Twitter or Facebook during tournaments, even if it runs counter to golf etiquette.
Bivens said she would “love it” if players used the social media site Twitter.com to connect with fans during their rounds. Paula Creamer, a leading light on the LPGA tour rejected the notion outright.
Creamer says she is aghast at the idea and called Bivens “an idiot” for even suggesting the use of Twitter mid-round.
How do we know this?
Well Creamer told the world and her followers all about it on a recent post to her “Twitter account.”
“I will not be twittering in my round,” Creamer, who’s ranked third in the world, wrote on her Twitter page shortly before teeing off for a tournament last weekend. “It should not happen in any sport. The players have already told the tour no way.”
Begging the question. “Is Paula hitting irons, or ironies?”
I have my own brush with Twitter limelight.
It happened last week.
Tony Kornheiser a co-host – with Michael Wilbond - on ESPN’s popular Pardon the Interruption sports talk show, manages PTI’s Twitter blog. Kornheiser has a lot of time on his hands since his ouster from the third seat on ESPN’s Monday Night Football. Tony’s spending a lot of his off-hours Tweeting. He often asks for input for the PTI show.
But Tony also takes time for some non-sequitur meanders.
Lately it’s been raining in Washington. A lot. This has caused no end of problems for his dog Maggie, who apparently does not like to go out in the rain.
How do I know this? Well, Tony is tweeting … about Maggie.
“My dog didn’t go out again today. More rain. She simply won’t go in the rain. Might have to toilet train Maggie!” tweets Tony. “She puts her head down on the concrete, digs in her paws, and won’t budge. I’d tug at her, but she’s 14 and I’m afraid what might happen. It’s supposed to rain for two days, so she’s bound to go in the house.”
I tweeted back, warned Tony about the dangers of kidney disease in old dogs, the need for regular bowel movements and then I tweeted a suggestion for a trail of bacon bits from his porch to the backyard bushes.
Today, followers of Kornheiser’s PTI Twitter blog and I all shared some tweeted joy. “Hey my tweety peeps … Maggie went doodooo in the rain! All thanks to my Twitty friend terrancegavan, a.k.a. The Gavball. Big props to bacon bits, Maggie unfurled, and the Gavball.”
That hit went out to PTI’s 50,000 plus followers.
I now have friend requests coming out my ying-yang.
I am a full-fledged celebrity in Twitterland.
Steve Nash Tweeted me from the set of Entourage.
“Hey Gavball … nice job with Maggie. My dog Phoenix used to fetch the paper. Now he’s taken to ripping it up into tiny pieces. Any suggestions? Steve.”
I wrote back. “Hey Steve. I read my paper on line … now can we interest you in a jump from Phoenix to Toronto? Where you can reunite with your old National Team buddy Jay Triano and bring an NBA Championship to T-Dot?”
From Steve?
Nothing yet. Steve couldn’t comment even if he really, really wanted to. It would constitute tampering and go against strict NBA guidelines.
The trouble with Twitter?
All feathers, no substance.
And my mailbox is filling up with dog questions.
Anyone know what to do with a Labradolly who likes to twirl from the living room drapes?
It’s driving Tiger Woods and his interior decorator crazy.
Kris Draper please quit whining
Crosby passes off the allegations of “snubbery”
Detroit’s Kris Draper all whine and no cheese
By Terrance Gavan
I grew up in Ottawa, listening to General Grant on CFRA radio’s morning drive show.
He had a little motto that he recited at the end of every show.
“If you win say little … and if you lose say less.”
So. In the spirit of the Good General’s signature sign-off.
“Shut up Kris Draper!”
That would be Kris Draper, the yawning maw of the Stanley Cup losing Detroit Red Wings.
That would be Kris Draper, the social conscience and etiquette convenor of the National Hockey League.
That would be the same mealy-mouthed Draper who roundly criticized Sidney Crosby for snubbing many Wings’ players - including captain Nicklas Lidstrom – by “refusing” to shake hands at the end of Game seven of the Stanley Cup Finals last Friday at the Joe in Detroit.
Dear Kris: Kindly pack up your bags, unpack your clubs, head out onto the links and leave your junk at the door of the Joe. Oh, and shut your cheesy yap.
We don’t want to hear that mealy mouth whining, and that harpy’s scrunch about Sid The Kid.
And by the way Kris.
You lost. So just please shut up.
Draper says he has every right to criticize.
Lidstrom was up front of a handshake line, followed by the alternate captain Draper, congratulating many of the new champions while waiting for Sid the Kid.
“Nick was waiting and waiting, and Crosby didn't come over to shake his hand,” Draper told an Associated Press reporter a couple hours later as he was leaving Joe Louis Arena. “That's ridiculous, especially as their captain, and make sure you write that I said that!”
The AP guy did as he was told, launching a firestorm of rebuke, rebuttal, righteousness, and rectitude.
I don’t recall how many Detroit players’ hands Crosby shook after the game. I do know he did take time to commiserate with Johan Franzen. A second period Franzen hit put Crosby out of the game. If Crosby was going to snub anyone it would have been Franzen.
I’m assuming that Franzen didn’t apologize for the hit. I’m sure Crosby didn’t expect one.
And Sidney Crosby isn't apologizing to Draper or anyone else for unintentionally failing to shake hands with some Detroit players after winning the Cup last Friday evening at the Joe.
Crosby said that he didn't realize the Red Wings were leaving the ice before he joined the handshake line.
After that game seven 2-1 victory Crosby was rushed to several live TV interviews by NHL personnel, hugged some teammates and was handed the Stanley Cup by commissioner Gary Bettman.
And so Crosby was celebrating when Red Wings captain Nicklas Lidstrom, alternate captain Kris Draper and some other key Red Wings players skated off the ice and to their dressing room.
Big deal.
Crosby himself estimates he shook hands with about half the team, including goalie Chris Osgood and coach Mike Babcock, who congratulated him on his leadership ability.
That wasn't enough to satisfy Draper.
Again. Big deal.
Crosby finds any suggestion that he would intentionally avoid shaking hands a little disingenuous.
“It's the easiest thing in the world to shake hands after you win,” said Crosby, in a TSN story.
“I really don't need to talk to anyone from Detroit about it," Crosby said Sunday. "I made the attempt to go shake hands. I've been on that side of things, too, I know it's not easy, waiting around. I just won the Stanley Cup, and I think I have the right to celebrate with my teammates.
"On their side of things, I understand if they don't want to wait around."
At 21, Crosby is the youngest captain to win a Stanley Cup, but he is an avid follower of the game, its storied history and its entrenched traditions. He would never intentionally stoop to snub. Draper on the other hand stomped some sour grapes into a sublime mash with his stilted and mealy allegations.
“I had no intentions of trying to skip guys and not shake their hands,” Crosby said. “I think that was a pretty unreasonable comment. The guys I shook their hands with, they realized I made the attempt. If I could shake half their team's hands, I'm sure the other half wasn't too far behind. I don't know what happened there.”
And that explanation, from Crosby should be enough for Draper.
“I have no regrets,” added Crosby, already at 21, wise beyond Draper’s years. “I've been on both sides of it, and it's not fun being on the losing end. But it doesn't change anything. You still shake hands no matter what.”
“Nobody respects the traditions of hockey more than Sidney Crosby," team vice president Tom McMillan said via AP News. “It was a young team celebrating its first Cup and some of the guys might have been a little late getting into the handshake line.”
And while we’re talking apologies.
Exactly how many toe-to-toe confrontations went on in the course of this very exciting seven game Stanley Cup hockey series?
About time for Brian Burke, Don Cherry, Michael Farber, Gary Bettman, and a host of other pro-fight cognoscente, to apologize to “real” hockey fans in general for continuing to insist that, “fighting is, was, and always will be … part of the game!”
Please, fellas. Do me a solid. Take a look at the viewing totals for a series conducted miles removed from the milieu of the junkyard dog and brawler mindset.
And the next time you wish to spout generic about the efficacy of fighting in the game of hockey. And how much we need it.
Do me a favor and a Draper.
“Shut Up!”
Detroit’s Kris Draper all whine and no cheese
By Terrance Gavan
I grew up in Ottawa, listening to General Grant on CFRA radio’s morning drive show.
He had a little motto that he recited at the end of every show.
“If you win say little … and if you lose say less.”
So. In the spirit of the Good General’s signature sign-off.
“Shut up Kris Draper!”
That would be Kris Draper, the yawning maw of the Stanley Cup losing Detroit Red Wings.
That would be Kris Draper, the social conscience and etiquette convenor of the National Hockey League.
That would be the same mealy-mouthed Draper who roundly criticized Sidney Crosby for snubbing many Wings’ players - including captain Nicklas Lidstrom – by “refusing” to shake hands at the end of Game seven of the Stanley Cup Finals last Friday at the Joe in Detroit.
Dear Kris: Kindly pack up your bags, unpack your clubs, head out onto the links and leave your junk at the door of the Joe. Oh, and shut your cheesy yap.
We don’t want to hear that mealy mouth whining, and that harpy’s scrunch about Sid The Kid.
And by the way Kris.
You lost. So just please shut up.
Draper says he has every right to criticize.
Lidstrom was up front of a handshake line, followed by the alternate captain Draper, congratulating many of the new champions while waiting for Sid the Kid.
“Nick was waiting and waiting, and Crosby didn't come over to shake his hand,” Draper told an Associated Press reporter a couple hours later as he was leaving Joe Louis Arena. “That's ridiculous, especially as their captain, and make sure you write that I said that!”
The AP guy did as he was told, launching a firestorm of rebuke, rebuttal, righteousness, and rectitude.
I don’t recall how many Detroit players’ hands Crosby shook after the game. I do know he did take time to commiserate with Johan Franzen. A second period Franzen hit put Crosby out of the game. If Crosby was going to snub anyone it would have been Franzen.
I’m assuming that Franzen didn’t apologize for the hit. I’m sure Crosby didn’t expect one.
And Sidney Crosby isn't apologizing to Draper or anyone else for unintentionally failing to shake hands with some Detroit players after winning the Cup last Friday evening at the Joe.
Crosby said that he didn't realize the Red Wings were leaving the ice before he joined the handshake line.
After that game seven 2-1 victory Crosby was rushed to several live TV interviews by NHL personnel, hugged some teammates and was handed the Stanley Cup by commissioner Gary Bettman.
And so Crosby was celebrating when Red Wings captain Nicklas Lidstrom, alternate captain Kris Draper and some other key Red Wings players skated off the ice and to their dressing room.
Big deal.
Crosby himself estimates he shook hands with about half the team, including goalie Chris Osgood and coach Mike Babcock, who congratulated him on his leadership ability.
That wasn't enough to satisfy Draper.
Again. Big deal.
Crosby finds any suggestion that he would intentionally avoid shaking hands a little disingenuous.
“It's the easiest thing in the world to shake hands after you win,” said Crosby, in a TSN story.
“I really don't need to talk to anyone from Detroit about it," Crosby said Sunday. "I made the attempt to go shake hands. I've been on that side of things, too, I know it's not easy, waiting around. I just won the Stanley Cup, and I think I have the right to celebrate with my teammates.
"On their side of things, I understand if they don't want to wait around."
At 21, Crosby is the youngest captain to win a Stanley Cup, but he is an avid follower of the game, its storied history and its entrenched traditions. He would never intentionally stoop to snub. Draper on the other hand stomped some sour grapes into a sublime mash with his stilted and mealy allegations.
“I had no intentions of trying to skip guys and not shake their hands,” Crosby said. “I think that was a pretty unreasonable comment. The guys I shook their hands with, they realized I made the attempt. If I could shake half their team's hands, I'm sure the other half wasn't too far behind. I don't know what happened there.”
And that explanation, from Crosby should be enough for Draper.
“I have no regrets,” added Crosby, already at 21, wise beyond Draper’s years. “I've been on both sides of it, and it's not fun being on the losing end. But it doesn't change anything. You still shake hands no matter what.”
“Nobody respects the traditions of hockey more than Sidney Crosby," team vice president Tom McMillan said via AP News. “It was a young team celebrating its first Cup and some of the guys might have been a little late getting into the handshake line.”
And while we’re talking apologies.
Exactly how many toe-to-toe confrontations went on in the course of this very exciting seven game Stanley Cup hockey series?
About time for Brian Burke, Don Cherry, Michael Farber, Gary Bettman, and a host of other pro-fight cognoscente, to apologize to “real” hockey fans in general for continuing to insist that, “fighting is, was, and always will be … part of the game!”
Please, fellas. Do me a solid. Take a look at the viewing totals for a series conducted miles removed from the milieu of the junkyard dog and brawler mindset.
And the next time you wish to spout generic about the efficacy of fighting in the game of hockey. And how much we need it.
Do me a favor and a Draper.
“Shut Up!”
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Nuisance Bears and life in the country - The Highlander Rants
Nuisance Bears and life in the country
A chat with Smokey, Yogi and Boo Boo
By Terrance Seamus Gavan
A recent cottage country meeting outlined the depth of a recurring problem.
Bears are running wild, rampant, and free here in the Highlands.
And that has a lot of people very upset.
It’s taking a huge toll on the gentle psyches and genteel sensibilities of many residents and cottagers in the area.
All down to “nuisance bears.”
What are nuisance bears?
Well, nuisance bears are those rumbling ursine garbage scows that interfere with our god-given right to enjoyment of the assorted natural wonders flung so haphazardly and luxuriously here in the Highlands.
Bears who brazenly wander through the woods and into “our yards” with alarming regularity.
Bears who show utter contempt for “no trespassing” signs.
Bears who exhibit a blatant disregard for our innate property rights.
Hungry bears with an alarmingly excellent sense of smell.
Bears who are able to discern, from 5 or 6 hectares, the dusky aroma of last night’s salmon steak on a Weber Hot Blast 4000 Super Grill.
How dare they. Pesky bears.
Many people in the Algonquin Highlands have seen these bears.
I know. I’ve heard the complaints. Numerous complaints. At cottage meetings. At council meetings.
“It’s uncivilized,” says one cottager, Jake Usurper. “Bears running around like they own the woods! Just who do they think they are?” Jake Usurper says he’s done the due diligence.
“I keep phoning the bear line over to the Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) and they keep telling me that bears often wander this time of year. Wander, shmonder. I fought in two wars, I paid for this property, and I own a lotta’ guns,” says Jake, who says that locals may have to contemplate a “thinning of the herd.”
“I moved here five years ago to enjoy my cottage, the wilderness, and all of nature’s rich and bounteous beauty,” says Jake, 75, a transplanted Oshawite. “These damn black bears are ruining my retirement.”
I phoned the MNR hot line in Sudbury.
I got a recording.
“Thank you for phoning the Bear Aware Hot Line. Your call is important to us. The MNR appreciates your input … but all of our operators are currently running around the woods, willy-nilly, and chock-a-block, looking for endangered species, invasive fishies and the elusive Sasquatch. If you’re calling to report a black bear sighting, press one; if a black bear is interfering with your yard work, press two; if a black bear ate your dinner, press 3; if a black bear is doing short laps in your Jacuzzi, press 4; if black bears are ruining your retirement – Jake! Put that bloody rifle down! Now! Thank you for calling the MNR Ursus Horribilis hot line. This call may be recorded for quality purposes.”
It’s all very confusing. When I’m confused I go to the source. Last week Smokey Bear was in town for a photo op and presser.
I tracked him down after the press conference.
“Smokey, why are your brethren bears terrorizing the citizenry in the Highlands?” I asked.
“They’re hungry,” said Smokey.
“But surely Smokey, that cannot excuse the blatant trespassing, disregard for property, and the increasingly hostile reaction to incursive civilization? For instance, you seem to do all right, how do you manage to feed yourself?”
“Look, I’m on a full-ride government-sponsored expense account … so it’s like salmon, filet mignon, shrimp, caviar, and all the Big Macs I can manage, 24-7, especially during fire season,” growled Smokey. “It ain’t so easy for some of the brothers down in the deep, dark woods … Look, if you want the real skinny from a scavenger’s perspective I’ll give you a number of a good friend of mine,” said Smokey.
I dialed the number and the phone rang twice.
“Hello, Yogi Bear’s residence,” said the voice at the other end. I recognized it immediately –a nasally blast from my Hanna-Barbera past.
“Boo-Boo, is that you?” I asked, incredulously.
“Yes, how can I help you?” said Boo-Boo.
“Wow,” I said. “Look I was given this number from Smokey Bear up in Canada. He said I could get some answers about why bears are encroaching on our summer playgrounds, stealing our food, gutting our garbage, and generally making our lives miserable up here in cottage country.”
“Oh yes. We’re great friends Smokey, Yogi and I,” said the Boo-Boo. “But hey, the nuisance thing, that’s Yogi’s territory, and I’m afraid I have some bad news,” said Boo-Boo.
“Why, what’s wrong Boo?” I asked.
“Yogi’s in rehab,” sighed Boo-Boo. “Ranger Smith checked him into Betty Ford for the 60-day Pic-I-Nic Basket Withdrawal Program. It’s all my fault. I’m a classic enabler.”
“You’re being a little hard on yourself Boo-Boo,” I said. “I think you’ll find that like any addict, Yogi will have to step to the plate, own his addiction, make amends, stay off the pork-chops, and move on with his life.”
We talked for a long while. Boo-Boo brings Yogi five quarts of elderberries every day.
“The counselors at Betty Ford are very kind and understanding,” said the Boo. “They’re slowly weaning Yogi off the hard crack of that soda pop, hot-dog and deviled egg diet. It’s hard. People don’t realize how easy it is to become addicted to the fast fix of a free lunch, a leftover pizza or an apple pie.”
Boo has set up the Yogi Foundation, a not-for-profit agency dedicated to eradicating the nightmare of bears on cake.
So Highlanders. It’s up to you.
Make your donation, care of Boo Boo Bear, at beardespair.com.
Send a Highlands’ bear to rehab.
Do it for Yogi.
A chat with Smokey, Yogi and Boo Boo
By Terrance Seamus Gavan
A recent cottage country meeting outlined the depth of a recurring problem.
Bears are running wild, rampant, and free here in the Highlands.
And that has a lot of people very upset.
It’s taking a huge toll on the gentle psyches and genteel sensibilities of many residents and cottagers in the area.
All down to “nuisance bears.”
What are nuisance bears?
Well, nuisance bears are those rumbling ursine garbage scows that interfere with our god-given right to enjoyment of the assorted natural wonders flung so haphazardly and luxuriously here in the Highlands.
Bears who brazenly wander through the woods and into “our yards” with alarming regularity.
Bears who show utter contempt for “no trespassing” signs.
Bears who exhibit a blatant disregard for our innate property rights.
Hungry bears with an alarmingly excellent sense of smell.
Bears who are able to discern, from 5 or 6 hectares, the dusky aroma of last night’s salmon steak on a Weber Hot Blast 4000 Super Grill.
How dare they. Pesky bears.
Many people in the Algonquin Highlands have seen these bears.
I know. I’ve heard the complaints. Numerous complaints. At cottage meetings. At council meetings.
“It’s uncivilized,” says one cottager, Jake Usurper. “Bears running around like they own the woods! Just who do they think they are?” Jake Usurper says he’s done the due diligence.
“I keep phoning the bear line over to the Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) and they keep telling me that bears often wander this time of year. Wander, shmonder. I fought in two wars, I paid for this property, and I own a lotta’ guns,” says Jake, who says that locals may have to contemplate a “thinning of the herd.”
“I moved here five years ago to enjoy my cottage, the wilderness, and all of nature’s rich and bounteous beauty,” says Jake, 75, a transplanted Oshawite. “These damn black bears are ruining my retirement.”
I phoned the MNR hot line in Sudbury.
I got a recording.
“Thank you for phoning the Bear Aware Hot Line. Your call is important to us. The MNR appreciates your input … but all of our operators are currently running around the woods, willy-nilly, and chock-a-block, looking for endangered species, invasive fishies and the elusive Sasquatch. If you’re calling to report a black bear sighting, press one; if a black bear is interfering with your yard work, press two; if a black bear ate your dinner, press 3; if a black bear is doing short laps in your Jacuzzi, press 4; if black bears are ruining your retirement – Jake! Put that bloody rifle down! Now! Thank you for calling the MNR Ursus Horribilis hot line. This call may be recorded for quality purposes.”
It’s all very confusing. When I’m confused I go to the source. Last week Smokey Bear was in town for a photo op and presser.
I tracked him down after the press conference.
“Smokey, why are your brethren bears terrorizing the citizenry in the Highlands?” I asked.
“They’re hungry,” said Smokey.
“But surely Smokey, that cannot excuse the blatant trespassing, disregard for property, and the increasingly hostile reaction to incursive civilization? For instance, you seem to do all right, how do you manage to feed yourself?”
“Look, I’m on a full-ride government-sponsored expense account … so it’s like salmon, filet mignon, shrimp, caviar, and all the Big Macs I can manage, 24-7, especially during fire season,” growled Smokey. “It ain’t so easy for some of the brothers down in the deep, dark woods … Look, if you want the real skinny from a scavenger’s perspective I’ll give you a number of a good friend of mine,” said Smokey.
I dialed the number and the phone rang twice.
“Hello, Yogi Bear’s residence,” said the voice at the other end. I recognized it immediately –a nasally blast from my Hanna-Barbera past.
“Boo-Boo, is that you?” I asked, incredulously.
“Yes, how can I help you?” said Boo-Boo.
“Wow,” I said. “Look I was given this number from Smokey Bear up in Canada. He said I could get some answers about why bears are encroaching on our summer playgrounds, stealing our food, gutting our garbage, and generally making our lives miserable up here in cottage country.”
“Oh yes. We’re great friends Smokey, Yogi and I,” said the Boo-Boo. “But hey, the nuisance thing, that’s Yogi’s territory, and I’m afraid I have some bad news,” said Boo-Boo.
“Why, what’s wrong Boo?” I asked.
“Yogi’s in rehab,” sighed Boo-Boo. “Ranger Smith checked him into Betty Ford for the 60-day Pic-I-Nic Basket Withdrawal Program. It’s all my fault. I’m a classic enabler.”
“You’re being a little hard on yourself Boo-Boo,” I said. “I think you’ll find that like any addict, Yogi will have to step to the plate, own his addiction, make amends, stay off the pork-chops, and move on with his life.”
We talked for a long while. Boo-Boo brings Yogi five quarts of elderberries every day.
“The counselors at Betty Ford are very kind and understanding,” said the Boo. “They’re slowly weaning Yogi off the hard crack of that soda pop, hot-dog and deviled egg diet. It’s hard. People don’t realize how easy it is to become addicted to the fast fix of a free lunch, a leftover pizza or an apple pie.”
Boo has set up the Yogi Foundation, a not-for-profit agency dedicated to eradicating the nightmare of bears on cake.
So Highlanders. It’s up to you.
Make your donation, care of Boo Boo Bear, at beardespair.com.
Send a Highlands’ bear to rehab.
Do it for Yogi.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Memories from the suicide line
When in doubt – go for the big laugh – and a Newfie joke?
Did you hear the one about the two drunks walkin’ down the railroad track?
By Terrance Seamus Gavan
I was listening to some vintage George Carlin on the weekend.
He has a one-liner about crisis intervention workers.
“If you work on a suicide hotline, and you’re feeling just a little depressed one morning. Do you phone in sick?”
The answer is no. Because that work on the phones, when you get right down to it, is more important than any little thing currently meandering through your tight and pampered prism. So unless you wake up with a sudden urge to head to the roof of your high-rise apartment building and “try for the double line” – another George Carlin jive and jump (and album cover) on the big exit – you should just probably suck it up, brush your teeth, have an espresso, go on in and answer the phones.
“Hi, Suicide Line, my name’s Terry, and before we get started, do you have any Lottery tickets in your wallet that you haven’t checked yet? Cos’ y’know, life is good, and it may already have gotten better.”
I used to work the midnight shift three times a month at the Ottawa Distress Centre back in the mid-70s.
I was dillydallying around St. Pats College and Carleton University plodding through an undeclared year of liberal arts.
They put the young volunteers on the midnight shift. Back then, the Ottawa Distress Center was grossly under funded and we worked out of a ramshackle old building in the old Byward Market District.
The Ottawa Distress Center was not a suicide line per se, but the midnight shift did get the lion’s share of the “one and done” calls. It was before call display, and if we had a “live one on the dead line” who was fading fast from an overdose we were authorized to have the call traced, and once traced, we also had the authority to dispatch an ambulance. We had to phone poison control just to make sure that what the person took was actually gonna’ kill him. The centre got charged for all ambulance calls. It was all tied to the bottom line.
I got a lot of overdose calls. And if the person was fading, I traced, I dispatched. I once sent an ambulance and squad car to a house where the man had ingested a fifth of Jack Daniels and 10 packages of Ex Lax. I didn’t know what he had taken, hadn’t checked in with poison control, and I was listening as the cops and paramedics broke down the door.
I heard some swearing. A cop grabbed the phone. “Hey Terry?”
“Yes, that’s me, how is he?”
“He’s fine. He took Ex Lax Terry! EX LAX! Capiche? He’s doin’ just great, got a dumb grin on his puss. We’re all covered in shit! Thanks for the call out buddy!” Oops.
A Monday night 2 a.m. and I’m alone at the Distress Centre. A call.
It’s a young woman. She lives across the river in the Gatineau area. Her name is Jennifer, she’s 32 and has three girls sleeping upstairs in their large home on 10 sprawling acres. Her husband, a lawyer, is overseas on business.
“I have a gun, Terry,” she says, the voice a far off drift. No affect. Just statement.
“Is it loaded, Jennifer?” I ask.
“Just doing that now,” says Jennifer. And I hear the unmistakable sound of bullets being pushed slowly into the chamber of a revolver. “Click, click, click.”
I ask her why.
“I don’t know Terry. I just know it has to end tonight,” she says. I know that it’s too late for a call trace. I’m all alone. And I can hear in her voice a quiver, and that unmistakable rumble of despair. The kind of despair that rises like a tide from the abyss of a heart, too close to the breaking.
The training kicks in and I ask about her kids, upstairs sleeping. I need names. They are Suzy, Janie and Sarah, 3, 5 and 8. I remind Jen that they will be the ones to find her in the morning.
“It’s better for them if I’m gone, and in time they’ll understand,” says Jennifer. I hear the spin of the chamber. “My husband taught me how to shoot this thing,” says Jennifer. “Truth is, I really hate guns.”
And right there. I heard something in her voice. An affect. And I abandoned all the training.
“Can I tell you a joke Jennifer?” I ask gently.
“A joke? Why not,” she replies.
I continued. Breaking all the rules for a suicide call.
“A couple of Newfie hunters are at a truck stop diner when one of them grabs his chest and falls to the floor,” I begin - my own chest pounding. “He’s not breathing, his eyes are rolled back in his head. The other guy runs to the diner’s phone and calls emergency services. He gasps to the operator: ‘My friend is dead! What can I do?’
“The operator, in a calm soothing voice says: ‘Just take it easy. I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s really dead.’ There’s silence; then a shot is heard.
“The Newfie comes back to the line. He says: ‘OK, now what?’ ”
It seemed like an eternity, but I know it was only 3 seconds. Jennifer starts to laugh.
“Very nice, Terry,” says Jennifer. “I’m unloading the gun and I’m going up to kiss my three daughters good night … but not goodbye.”
“And the number I gave you?” I asked.
“I have it here on the pad and I’ll call the Shrink in the morning,” says Jennifer.
A month later at the Distress Centre desk, a note addressed, “To Terry.”
I opened it.
“Dear Terry – Seeing the shrink. The gun is gone. Life is better. OK, Now What? Jen.”
We pass a lot of signposts in our journey.
I come from a long line of Irish humorists.
My fallback philosophy?
“When in doubt … go for the big laugh.”
Sometimes it’ll keep you off that double line.
OK. Now what?
(Special thanks to Aunt Lorraine, the Reverend Donald Francis Gavan and my pops, who taught me to slay my demons with laughter.)
Did you hear the one about the two drunks walkin’ down the railroad track?
By Terrance Seamus Gavan
I was listening to some vintage George Carlin on the weekend.
He has a one-liner about crisis intervention workers.
“If you work on a suicide hotline, and you’re feeling just a little depressed one morning. Do you phone in sick?”
The answer is no. Because that work on the phones, when you get right down to it, is more important than any little thing currently meandering through your tight and pampered prism. So unless you wake up with a sudden urge to head to the roof of your high-rise apartment building and “try for the double line” – another George Carlin jive and jump (and album cover) on the big exit – you should just probably suck it up, brush your teeth, have an espresso, go on in and answer the phones.
“Hi, Suicide Line, my name’s Terry, and before we get started, do you have any Lottery tickets in your wallet that you haven’t checked yet? Cos’ y’know, life is good, and it may already have gotten better.”
I used to work the midnight shift three times a month at the Ottawa Distress Centre back in the mid-70s.
I was dillydallying around St. Pats College and Carleton University plodding through an undeclared year of liberal arts.
They put the young volunteers on the midnight shift. Back then, the Ottawa Distress Center was grossly under funded and we worked out of a ramshackle old building in the old Byward Market District.
The Ottawa Distress Center was not a suicide line per se, but the midnight shift did get the lion’s share of the “one and done” calls. It was before call display, and if we had a “live one on the dead line” who was fading fast from an overdose we were authorized to have the call traced, and once traced, we also had the authority to dispatch an ambulance. We had to phone poison control just to make sure that what the person took was actually gonna’ kill him. The centre got charged for all ambulance calls. It was all tied to the bottom line.
I got a lot of overdose calls. And if the person was fading, I traced, I dispatched. I once sent an ambulance and squad car to a house where the man had ingested a fifth of Jack Daniels and 10 packages of Ex Lax. I didn’t know what he had taken, hadn’t checked in with poison control, and I was listening as the cops and paramedics broke down the door.
I heard some swearing. A cop grabbed the phone. “Hey Terry?”
“Yes, that’s me, how is he?”
“He’s fine. He took Ex Lax Terry! EX LAX! Capiche? He’s doin’ just great, got a dumb grin on his puss. We’re all covered in shit! Thanks for the call out buddy!” Oops.
A Monday night 2 a.m. and I’m alone at the Distress Centre. A call.
It’s a young woman. She lives across the river in the Gatineau area. Her name is Jennifer, she’s 32 and has three girls sleeping upstairs in their large home on 10 sprawling acres. Her husband, a lawyer, is overseas on business.
“I have a gun, Terry,” she says, the voice a far off drift. No affect. Just statement.
“Is it loaded, Jennifer?” I ask.
“Just doing that now,” says Jennifer. And I hear the unmistakable sound of bullets being pushed slowly into the chamber of a revolver. “Click, click, click.”
I ask her why.
“I don’t know Terry. I just know it has to end tonight,” she says. I know that it’s too late for a call trace. I’m all alone. And I can hear in her voice a quiver, and that unmistakable rumble of despair. The kind of despair that rises like a tide from the abyss of a heart, too close to the breaking.
The training kicks in and I ask about her kids, upstairs sleeping. I need names. They are Suzy, Janie and Sarah, 3, 5 and 8. I remind Jen that they will be the ones to find her in the morning.
“It’s better for them if I’m gone, and in time they’ll understand,” says Jennifer. I hear the spin of the chamber. “My husband taught me how to shoot this thing,” says Jennifer. “Truth is, I really hate guns.”
And right there. I heard something in her voice. An affect. And I abandoned all the training.
“Can I tell you a joke Jennifer?” I ask gently.
“A joke? Why not,” she replies.
I continued. Breaking all the rules for a suicide call.
“A couple of Newfie hunters are at a truck stop diner when one of them grabs his chest and falls to the floor,” I begin - my own chest pounding. “He’s not breathing, his eyes are rolled back in his head. The other guy runs to the diner’s phone and calls emergency services. He gasps to the operator: ‘My friend is dead! What can I do?’
“The operator, in a calm soothing voice says: ‘Just take it easy. I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s really dead.’ There’s silence; then a shot is heard.
“The Newfie comes back to the line. He says: ‘OK, now what?’ ”
It seemed like an eternity, but I know it was only 3 seconds. Jennifer starts to laugh.
“Very nice, Terry,” says Jennifer. “I’m unloading the gun and I’m going up to kiss my three daughters good night … but not goodbye.”
“And the number I gave you?” I asked.
“I have it here on the pad and I’ll call the Shrink in the morning,” says Jennifer.
A month later at the Distress Centre desk, a note addressed, “To Terry.”
I opened it.
“Dear Terry – Seeing the shrink. The gun is gone. Life is better. OK, Now What? Jen.”
We pass a lot of signposts in our journey.
I come from a long line of Irish humorists.
My fallback philosophy?
“When in doubt … go for the big laugh.”
Sometimes it’ll keep you off that double line.
OK. Now what?
(Special thanks to Aunt Lorraine, the Reverend Donald Francis Gavan and my pops, who taught me to slay my demons with laughter.)
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Canada's Governor General Michaëlle Jean - in bad taste?
Governor General Michaëlle Jean … a whole lotta’ heart
Beware! Oscar the Cat is on the prowl!
By Terrance Seamus O’Gavan
There’s blood on her lips.
There’s blood on the ice.
A Hannibal slurp.
And it’s gone in a trice. (Inuit Ode to Governor General Michaëlle Jean)
Our lovely Governor General Michaëlle Jean put Canada on front pages across the world last week when she delved into an “ethical” dish of raw seal heart in Rankin Inlet.
It was touted as a show of solidarity and support for an ancient Inuit rite.
Many more cynical pundits and backbench wailers viewed it as a photo op to gain support for Canada’s much maligned sealing industry, which has been taking some heavy handed cranks from the European Union, Bob Barker, and Brigitte Bardot of late.
Of course, Inuit sealing for sustenance, and the hard banging, head-denting annual seal cull are two entirely different entities. Is Michaëlle Jean that slick?
I’m thinking that she’s no naïve waif, and she had some idea that her delicate and tasty meal might serve as a superbly crafted photo op for People for the Ethical Treatment of Maritime Seal Bashers.
Whatever. The picture of Michaëlle Jean, hands and lips blurred red with seal’s blood created quite a stir.
Buddhists cringed. People for the ethical treatment of animals (PETA for short) barked, mooed, baahed, roared, and whined. Rex Murphy, our loopy goofy Newfie, stuttered, moaned and groaned about the fate of his poor seal thumping Newfie brethren and their god-given right to earn a living.
Four words Rex. “Better schools and Microsoft.”
My God, to hear him prune, preen, and pine, you would think that poor old Rex made his living bumping baby seals on the head before leaping from an ice floe in the North Atlantic to the greener less crimson pastures of the CBC mother ship. Rex held a CBC Cross Country Check Up show about “Bloody Queen Jean” on Sunday.
People phoned in and applauded Michaëlle Jean’s intestinal fortitude. Rex corrected them. “Ma’am t’anks youse’ for calling, but it was da’ heart, not the entrails. T’anks fer’ da’ call. I’se da bay dat builds da boat. Next caller please.”
Rex, that adopted son of a Newfie cod-kisser, makes no bones about his own views on everything seal.
“Pussy-walloped, cod-duffers and ham-handed politicians … is killin’ dis’ here livliehood, my lovelies. Good on ol’ Michaëlle Jean. Chewin’ on dat bloody heart, fer’ da’ good of dem’ sealers from Dildo and Come By Chance! Arrrgh!”
Rex knows Newfoundland. He knows, unlike many of those unenlightened politicos and businessmen - who are attempting to drag Newfoundland into the 19th century - that Newfoundland’s future rests not with technology, call centers, universities, and offshore oil, but rather with the lovely, free-flow of the annual seal slaughter.
“It was delicious,” said Jean.
I’m no Buddhist. But I’m thinking we may have to punch a hole in the paradigm.
The animals are not dumb. And I’ve read Orwell’s Animal Farm.
Just last week an article in the Globe and Mail entitled, “Amateur researchers seek Spot’s sixth sense,” caught my eye.
It contained the story of Oscar the cat. Oscar was adopted by a Providence R.I. nursing home’s Advanced Dementia Unit. Oscar made headlines when it was revealed that he seemed to sense when a patient was about to die.
In more than 25 documented and recent cases, Oscar, normally very aloof, snuggled with an elderly patient, who invariably died within an hour of the cuddle.
Doctors blame it on some extrasensory biochemical reaction. “Oscar just seems to know,” said Dr. Hunter Kevorkian, (no relation) a staff doctor at the Providence Institution.
I’m thinking that their cause and effect exemplar might be a little skewed. Does Oscar know? Or does Oscar, nudge, nudge, and wink … KNOW?
Oscar might be an avid reader. Oscar may have seen Planet of the Apes. He might like to peruse the New York Times on occasion. He might have seen a picture of Michaëlle Jean, fingertips and lips smooshed crimson with the blood of a poor defenseless seal. Oscar might be getting a little tired of this feckless slaughter.
Oscar the Cat. Hospice healer? Or Serial Killer?
I reached 95-year-old Billy Bob Golightly, a Providence Dementia Unit patient, by phone last weekend.
“Oscar tried to snuggle up to me late one night, and I threw him off my bed,” said Billy Bob. “I know what that durn’ cat’s up to. Sixth sense my buttcheek! That cat’s the second comin’ of Hannibal the Cannibal!”
Billy Bob immediately took affirmative action.
“My nephew brought in my old Remington twelve gauge and my trusty blue heeler hound Baskerville,” laughed Golighlty. “Haven’t seen that cat in three nights.”
Oscar has left the building. Headed for god knows where. A serial killer on the prowl?
A wise whispered word to our crimson-tinged princess Michaëlle Jean.
Alert the staff at Governor General’s House on Sussex Drive in Ottawa. Do not, under any circumstances, feed any stray cats.
And Michaëlle. Do look under your four-poster Queen-size bed before closing your eyes for the night.
Oh, and … meeeeoooowww!
Beware! Oscar the Cat is on the prowl!
By Terrance Seamus O’Gavan
There’s blood on her lips.
There’s blood on the ice.
A Hannibal slurp.
And it’s gone in a trice. (Inuit Ode to Governor General Michaëlle Jean)
Our lovely Governor General Michaëlle Jean put Canada on front pages across the world last week when she delved into an “ethical” dish of raw seal heart in Rankin Inlet.
It was touted as a show of solidarity and support for an ancient Inuit rite.
Many more cynical pundits and backbench wailers viewed it as a photo op to gain support for Canada’s much maligned sealing industry, which has been taking some heavy handed cranks from the European Union, Bob Barker, and Brigitte Bardot of late.
Of course, Inuit sealing for sustenance, and the hard banging, head-denting annual seal cull are two entirely different entities. Is Michaëlle Jean that slick?
I’m thinking that she’s no naïve waif, and she had some idea that her delicate and tasty meal might serve as a superbly crafted photo op for People for the Ethical Treatment of Maritime Seal Bashers.
Whatever. The picture of Michaëlle Jean, hands and lips blurred red with seal’s blood created quite a stir.
Buddhists cringed. People for the ethical treatment of animals (PETA for short) barked, mooed, baahed, roared, and whined. Rex Murphy, our loopy goofy Newfie, stuttered, moaned and groaned about the fate of his poor seal thumping Newfie brethren and their god-given right to earn a living.
Four words Rex. “Better schools and Microsoft.”
My God, to hear him prune, preen, and pine, you would think that poor old Rex made his living bumping baby seals on the head before leaping from an ice floe in the North Atlantic to the greener less crimson pastures of the CBC mother ship. Rex held a CBC Cross Country Check Up show about “Bloody Queen Jean” on Sunday.
People phoned in and applauded Michaëlle Jean’s intestinal fortitude. Rex corrected them. “Ma’am t’anks youse’ for calling, but it was da’ heart, not the entrails. T’anks fer’ da’ call. I’se da bay dat builds da boat. Next caller please.”
Rex, that adopted son of a Newfie cod-kisser, makes no bones about his own views on everything seal.
“Pussy-walloped, cod-duffers and ham-handed politicians … is killin’ dis’ here livliehood, my lovelies. Good on ol’ Michaëlle Jean. Chewin’ on dat bloody heart, fer’ da’ good of dem’ sealers from Dildo and Come By Chance! Arrrgh!”
Rex knows Newfoundland. He knows, unlike many of those unenlightened politicos and businessmen - who are attempting to drag Newfoundland into the 19th century - that Newfoundland’s future rests not with technology, call centers, universities, and offshore oil, but rather with the lovely, free-flow of the annual seal slaughter.
“It was delicious,” said Jean.
I’m no Buddhist. But I’m thinking we may have to punch a hole in the paradigm.
The animals are not dumb. And I’ve read Orwell’s Animal Farm.
Just last week an article in the Globe and Mail entitled, “Amateur researchers seek Spot’s sixth sense,” caught my eye.
It contained the story of Oscar the cat. Oscar was adopted by a Providence R.I. nursing home’s Advanced Dementia Unit. Oscar made headlines when it was revealed that he seemed to sense when a patient was about to die.
In more than 25 documented and recent cases, Oscar, normally very aloof, snuggled with an elderly patient, who invariably died within an hour of the cuddle.
Doctors blame it on some extrasensory biochemical reaction. “Oscar just seems to know,” said Dr. Hunter Kevorkian, (no relation) a staff doctor at the Providence Institution.
I’m thinking that their cause and effect exemplar might be a little skewed. Does Oscar know? Or does Oscar, nudge, nudge, and wink … KNOW?
Oscar might be an avid reader. Oscar may have seen Planet of the Apes. He might like to peruse the New York Times on occasion. He might have seen a picture of Michaëlle Jean, fingertips and lips smooshed crimson with the blood of a poor defenseless seal. Oscar might be getting a little tired of this feckless slaughter.
Oscar the Cat. Hospice healer? Or Serial Killer?
I reached 95-year-old Billy Bob Golightly, a Providence Dementia Unit patient, by phone last weekend.
“Oscar tried to snuggle up to me late one night, and I threw him off my bed,” said Billy Bob. “I know what that durn’ cat’s up to. Sixth sense my buttcheek! That cat’s the second comin’ of Hannibal the Cannibal!”
Billy Bob immediately took affirmative action.
“My nephew brought in my old Remington twelve gauge and my trusty blue heeler hound Baskerville,” laughed Golighlty. “Haven’t seen that cat in three nights.”
Oscar has left the building. Headed for god knows where. A serial killer on the prowl?
A wise whispered word to our crimson-tinged princess Michaëlle Jean.
Alert the staff at Governor General’s House on Sussex Drive in Ottawa. Do not, under any circumstances, feed any stray cats.
And Michaëlle. Do look under your four-poster Queen-size bed before closing your eyes for the night.
Oh, and … meeeeoooowww!
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Havlat hit - headhunting, heartless, hack-ey, from Kronwall
“I can’t define pornography … but I know it when I see it. I can’t define gutless … but if the shoe fits Niklas?”
Running interference with the Wings Niklas Kronwall
Havlat hit may not be interference but it shows lack of respect
By Terrance Seamus Gavan
A red herring led the sports headlines last weekend.
The red herring?
Whether the headhunting hit by the Wings defenseman Niklas Kronwall on the Black Hawks leading scorer Martin Havlat was actually interference.
Kronwall was issued a major penalty for the hit along the boards.
The hockey pundits all waded deeply into the pond, sharks to the bloodletting.
Most of the big hammerheads, including the three loopily partisan musketeers on TSN’s The Reporters hosted by Dave Hodge all jumped on the teetering bandwagon, citing that referee Dan O’Halloran and his crew quite simply got it wrong.
“If that’s interference, then we might as well remove Scott Stevens from the Hall of Fame,” said panel member and Sun media columnist Steve Simmons, who can always be relied on to chuck it all at the wall. The implication? Apparently that Scott Stevens earned passage to the Hallowed Hall for an unabashed predilection for mayhem. Which is just patently untrue. And that suggestion from Simmons, come to think, is another red herring. Because Niklas Kronwall is a lot of things, but he’s no Scott Stevens. Kronwall is just another built for bluster, journeyman mucker.
Michael Farber, another Reporters regular and an unmitigated apologist for all things career threatening in the NHL, said there should have been no penalty called. Farber viewed the hit as part of the day-to-day NHL shuck and jive. And the other panelist, the Toronto Star’s Damien Cox, was equally dismissive about the officiating crew’s so called “make-up call.”
The hit, for the record, put Havlat (a talented scoring machine) deep into a concussive coma for a good two minutes. As he lay on the ice, eyes rolled back to the nether reaches of his melon, the game officials on the ice conferred and finally called interference.
Was it a make up call? By strict definition of the rules, probably it was.
It wasn’t interference by strict definition.
But who cares?
That’s the red herring. Shift the blame. Change the conversation.
Discuss the call and not the brutal reality.
And here it is, the crux, the minutia of the incident.
It may not have been interference, but it was a devastating and malignant headhunting attempt to injure another player. Let’s not forget that Eric Lindros is not the first and will not be the last player whose career was cut short by too many cranks to the noggin. This is a problem that hinges on body armor, bigger bodies, and the changing parameters of a game that is outgrowing old standards.
So if not interference then what?
Well the officiating crew deemed it ugly enough to offer the game gate to Kronwall. That prompted a one game suspension.
Ultimately, it’s a hit that, like fighting, must be addressed by the NHL.
The National Football League has bowed to increasing scientific pressure and the eye-popping reports of early onset dementia caused by significant and ongoing head trauma. They responded by outlawing flagrant shots to the head.
Of course this is the NHL, ruled by a different set of standards, and an old school dinosaur named Garibaldi Bettmanasourus Rex, so we can’t expect too much in the way of redress.
Farber, Simmons, Hodge and Cox, all guys with some pencil-pushing pop and pundit, all said no foul.
Of course they’re not on the ice. But they love the mayhem. Figures. Voyeurs and pantywaists love the vicarious rush of adrenalin.
Brian Campbell, Chicago defenseman, who is part of the NHL competition committee, offers a different opinion.
“I thought it was gutless all around,” said Campbell. “I thought he [Kronwall] jumped. Marty didn't have the puck. His forearm came up high. He’s done it hundreds of time in the League, and it seems like nothing ever happens. I just don't understand it. We've talked about it, and eventually we've got to clamp down. These guys got to pay for it - guys that are taking shots to the head. It’s unacceptable and it’s not like it’s the first time it's happened with that guy. There’s no need for it in this game.”
And for me, that notation, and snippet from a player, rates higher than all of the swollen rhetoric emanating from the bloated couch-potatoes that spew forth in talking head segments on OTR, PTI and ESPN.
Was that a dirty hit? Was it headhunting? Was it a gutless hit?
The NHL and the old-schoolers state emphatically that it’s all part of the long history of the game.
But is it?
Remember Habs enforcer John Ferguson? Six feet and all of 178 pounds in his prime. How about Eddie Shack? Six foot one and 195.Gordie Howe? One of the biggest guys in the league. Six-one and 205 pounds.
They all played without helmets, and with body armor that resembled a rolled up copy of the Sunday Star on a slow news day.
I don’t recall if Leaf enforcer Eddie Shack ever took a loose footed, leaping run at the Habs’ Henri Richard [5’7” and 160] or Yvon Cournoyer [5’7” and 172], but I’m pretty sure that he never did. I’m also pretty certain that he and Fergie both had better things to contemplate than the notoriety engendered by the possibility of ending another player’s season or career. Back then there was less money and more chivalry extant.
Sadly none of that former gallantry seems to enter the equation these days.
Bone crushers, in body armor worthy of an ersatz Robocop on Tacks, don’t seem so enamored of tradition and respect for another player’s right to earn a living.
Saying that this type of rampant head hunting is part of the game, is equivalent to the NRA’s loopy logic regarding the second amendment right to bear arms in the USA. When that American legislation was penned, the arms referred to included single shot muskets and bowie knives.
The right to bear arms was never meant to include 50 mm assault rifles, ouzis and rocket launchers.
By the same token, clean hits in the NHL were never meant to include a blindside, leaping shoulder crank to an exposed and unsuspecting melon, from a body-armored, 6’6” 260 pound projectile traveling at 42 mph.
Geez. Someone could get hurt.
Just ask Martin Havlat – but you’ll have to wait until he wakes up
Running interference with the Wings Niklas Kronwall
Havlat hit may not be interference but it shows lack of respect
By Terrance Seamus Gavan
A red herring led the sports headlines last weekend.
The red herring?
Whether the headhunting hit by the Wings defenseman Niklas Kronwall on the Black Hawks leading scorer Martin Havlat was actually interference.
Kronwall was issued a major penalty for the hit along the boards.
The hockey pundits all waded deeply into the pond, sharks to the bloodletting.
Most of the big hammerheads, including the three loopily partisan musketeers on TSN’s The Reporters hosted by Dave Hodge all jumped on the teetering bandwagon, citing that referee Dan O’Halloran and his crew quite simply got it wrong.
“If that’s interference, then we might as well remove Scott Stevens from the Hall of Fame,” said panel member and Sun media columnist Steve Simmons, who can always be relied on to chuck it all at the wall. The implication? Apparently that Scott Stevens earned passage to the Hallowed Hall for an unabashed predilection for mayhem. Which is just patently untrue. And that suggestion from Simmons, come to think, is another red herring. Because Niklas Kronwall is a lot of things, but he’s no Scott Stevens. Kronwall is just another built for bluster, journeyman mucker.
Michael Farber, another Reporters regular and an unmitigated apologist for all things career threatening in the NHL, said there should have been no penalty called. Farber viewed the hit as part of the day-to-day NHL shuck and jive. And the other panelist, the Toronto Star’s Damien Cox, was equally dismissive about the officiating crew’s so called “make-up call.”
The hit, for the record, put Havlat (a talented scoring machine) deep into a concussive coma for a good two minutes. As he lay on the ice, eyes rolled back to the nether reaches of his melon, the game officials on the ice conferred and finally called interference.
Was it a make up call? By strict definition of the rules, probably it was.
It wasn’t interference by strict definition.
But who cares?
That’s the red herring. Shift the blame. Change the conversation.
Discuss the call and not the brutal reality.
And here it is, the crux, the minutia of the incident.
It may not have been interference, but it was a devastating and malignant headhunting attempt to injure another player. Let’s not forget that Eric Lindros is not the first and will not be the last player whose career was cut short by too many cranks to the noggin. This is a problem that hinges on body armor, bigger bodies, and the changing parameters of a game that is outgrowing old standards.
So if not interference then what?
Well the officiating crew deemed it ugly enough to offer the game gate to Kronwall. That prompted a one game suspension.
Ultimately, it’s a hit that, like fighting, must be addressed by the NHL.
The National Football League has bowed to increasing scientific pressure and the eye-popping reports of early onset dementia caused by significant and ongoing head trauma. They responded by outlawing flagrant shots to the head.
Of course this is the NHL, ruled by a different set of standards, and an old school dinosaur named Garibaldi Bettmanasourus Rex, so we can’t expect too much in the way of redress.
Farber, Simmons, Hodge and Cox, all guys with some pencil-pushing pop and pundit, all said no foul.
Of course they’re not on the ice. But they love the mayhem. Figures. Voyeurs and pantywaists love the vicarious rush of adrenalin.
Brian Campbell, Chicago defenseman, who is part of the NHL competition committee, offers a different opinion.
“I thought it was gutless all around,” said Campbell. “I thought he [Kronwall] jumped. Marty didn't have the puck. His forearm came up high. He’s done it hundreds of time in the League, and it seems like nothing ever happens. I just don't understand it. We've talked about it, and eventually we've got to clamp down. These guys got to pay for it - guys that are taking shots to the head. It’s unacceptable and it’s not like it’s the first time it's happened with that guy. There’s no need for it in this game.”
And for me, that notation, and snippet from a player, rates higher than all of the swollen rhetoric emanating from the bloated couch-potatoes that spew forth in talking head segments on OTR, PTI and ESPN.
Was that a dirty hit? Was it headhunting? Was it a gutless hit?
The NHL and the old-schoolers state emphatically that it’s all part of the long history of the game.
But is it?
Remember Habs enforcer John Ferguson? Six feet and all of 178 pounds in his prime. How about Eddie Shack? Six foot one and 195.Gordie Howe? One of the biggest guys in the league. Six-one and 205 pounds.
They all played without helmets, and with body armor that resembled a rolled up copy of the Sunday Star on a slow news day.
I don’t recall if Leaf enforcer Eddie Shack ever took a loose footed, leaping run at the Habs’ Henri Richard [5’7” and 160] or Yvon Cournoyer [5’7” and 172], but I’m pretty sure that he never did. I’m also pretty certain that he and Fergie both had better things to contemplate than the notoriety engendered by the possibility of ending another player’s season or career. Back then there was less money and more chivalry extant.
Sadly none of that former gallantry seems to enter the equation these days.
Bone crushers, in body armor worthy of an ersatz Robocop on Tacks, don’t seem so enamored of tradition and respect for another player’s right to earn a living.
Saying that this type of rampant head hunting is part of the game, is equivalent to the NRA’s loopy logic regarding the second amendment right to bear arms in the USA. When that American legislation was penned, the arms referred to included single shot muskets and bowie knives.
The right to bear arms was never meant to include 50 mm assault rifles, ouzis and rocket launchers.
By the same token, clean hits in the NHL were never meant to include a blindside, leaping shoulder crank to an exposed and unsuspecting melon, from a body-armored, 6’6” 260 pound projectile traveling at 42 mph.
Geez. Someone could get hurt.
Just ask Martin Havlat – but you’ll have to wait until he wakes up
Monday, May 18, 2009
Junk food embraces healthy living
Vitamin-fortified junk – hallelujahs for techno
Bonbons, butts, buckshot and bullets – on becoming consumer friendly
By Terrance Seamus O’Gavan
Health Canada is investigating the efficacy of adding vitamins to junk food.
About time too.
Good stuff like potato chips, double-dipped chocolate covered cheese-puffs, and cotton candy have been taking some hard knockin’ raps of late.
Woebegone naysayers in Canada’s meds profession are already manning the ramparts, and calling on the organics cognoscente to fight this trending toward totalitarian technology.
“I think that almost certainly what it will lead to is the fortification of junk food, of highly processed food, that really we should be discouraging the consumption of,” says Dr. Yoni Freedhoff, medical director of the Bariatric Medical Institute in Ottawa.
Horse hooey. What a namby-pamby.
Relax and abate good doctors. The people like it.
Forget all that useless claptrap about apples and oranges, broccoli and carrots.
Forge ahead. Get with the program. It’s 2009 for god’s sake.
Your kids hate parsnips and pomegranates. They love Pringles, Pez, peanut brittle, and popcorn. Add a bit of Vitamin D, some Human Growth Hormone, a spackle of Vitamin C, B12, garlic, and testosterone to that 550 gram Mars bar, and voila!
Your compost and rubbish diet is fundamentally fortified with a mélange of anti-aging, cancer-battlin’, weight-wackin’, cold-crunchin’ and swine-flu fightin’ agents.
Win-win. Junk food crunched to healthy living.
The paradigm spins. Mottos move. A 21st century campaign is borne.
“A Snickers a day keeps your doctor at bay.”
And why stop there for god’s sake.
The good news is spreading.
The gun lobby is on board. Like Season Shot, an ammo supplier. Years ago they came up with bird shot made from oregano, garlic, onion, pepper and other spiced treats.
Check out Season Shot’s startling new ad: “Ammo with Flavor! Season Shot is made of tightly packed seasoning bound by a fully biodegradable food product. The seasoning is actually injected into the bird on impact … When the bird is cooked the seasoning pellets melt into the meat spreading the flavor to the entire bird.” Whoeeee! And it comes in a wide array of flavors.
Now, gun makers are jumping on board this techno train.
National Rifle Association stalwarts Remington, and Smith and Wesson, are even marketing a safe bullet. You heard me.
A spokesman for Remington, Cleveland Gusto, says that all of their bullets –even those flak-jacket piercing, cop-killing, tightly-wound titanium-alloy 44-aught loads – will now be injected and fortified with vitamins C, D and E, a broad-base antibiotic, and a full 100-milligram dose of Anti-Inhibitor Coagulant Complex, an agent that speeds clotting in trauma victims.
“Drive-by deaths are on the rise in North America,” says Gusto. “In an effort to help appease this upward trend in senseless carnage, we will now be using a beneficial clotting agent to give innocent bystanders, cops, firemen, and other collateral damage victims some extra time after receiving a typically fatal gunshot wound.”
Gusto says that field tests are underway right now.
“We’ve been experimenting with the blood-clotting ammo in some war zones – Afghanistan, Iraq, various parts of Africa, downtown Detroit and southern LA - and thus far into field studies, especially with the vitamin and antibiotic enriched ammo additives, survival rates of gunshot victims is up dramatically.”
Gusto goes on to say that the bullet will be marketed as “The Life Saver – Your Friendly Fire Friend!”
The ammo, in various calibers, and sold in pink packaging, will be in your local K-Mart or gun shop, just in time for Christmas.
Nice. And you thought the gun lobby was just another hulking, asset-accumulating monolith, tied tightly to the bottom line.
It’s not stopping there either.
Smokers of the world unite.
From Montreal – where else? – we hear about VitaCig.
A Montreal entrepreneur, Roger Ouellette, is marketing a new type of cigarette called the VitaCig.
The Pitch?
You can have your smoke and get some important vitamins at the same time. Roger Ouellette, inventor of the healthy smoke – no, you pussies, this is not an oxymoron - created it for his “smoking” wife. (Smoking, in this case, being a pejorative and not an embellishment we’re guessing?)
He says the VitaCig has fewer odors than a regular cigarette, and also contains important ingredients such as vitamin C.
Ouellette, who didn't return my calls, told CTV recently, “We give you all the vitamins you lose, plus some vitamins to help you.” Health Canada is not impressed, and stresses that there is no such thing as a healthy cigarette.
Pussies and panty-waists. Quebecois smokers know better. The VitaCig is now available in over 2,000 stores in Quebec and will eventually make its way to other parts of the country.
Roger is already in discussions with Philip Morris, the Mohawk Nation and a number of other big players in big tobacco.
In an interview on National Public Radio recently, Ouellette says he is presently immersed deep within the bowels of his semi-detached Lachine basement laboratory working on phase two of his groundbreaking VitaCig project.
“Me, I’m working next on the VitaCig injected with a Phase Four Lung Cancer chemotherapy drug therapy regimen,” chuckles Ouellette. “My wife, Celine, she’s 45, been smoking for 25 years. She’s tres healthy right now, but you gotta’ know, oh-la-la, she’s buckin’ those odds. I want to be ready with ChemoCig (Trademark registered) when Celine needs it. No ifs, ands, or butts. (Sic – typo by author, who couldn’t resist)”
And, of course, I know what you’re thinking.
How close the apocalypse?
And when can we expect the locusts?
Milksops! Embrace the technology.
And remember Marie Antoinette.
Who said “Let them eat cake.”
Taken back then as a pejorative dismissal of the masses.
We know today that of course she was referring to the good cake.
The Chocolate-Chip-Carrot-Cookie-Crumble with the injected smallpox and mumps vaccine, vitamin C, D and E complex, oxidizing tetracycline compound, herpes therapy, and whole wheat fortified anti-bacterial abstract.
Relax people.
It’s all good.
And that ominous gathering black cloud, blotting out the sun on the horizon?
I have it on good authority.
Not locusts.
Just grasshoppers.
Bonbons, butts, buckshot and bullets – on becoming consumer friendly
By Terrance Seamus O’Gavan
Health Canada is investigating the efficacy of adding vitamins to junk food.
About time too.
Good stuff like potato chips, double-dipped chocolate covered cheese-puffs, and cotton candy have been taking some hard knockin’ raps of late.
Woebegone naysayers in Canada’s meds profession are already manning the ramparts, and calling on the organics cognoscente to fight this trending toward totalitarian technology.
“I think that almost certainly what it will lead to is the fortification of junk food, of highly processed food, that really we should be discouraging the consumption of,” says Dr. Yoni Freedhoff, medical director of the Bariatric Medical Institute in Ottawa.
Horse hooey. What a namby-pamby.
Relax and abate good doctors. The people like it.
Forget all that useless claptrap about apples and oranges, broccoli and carrots.
Forge ahead. Get with the program. It’s 2009 for god’s sake.
Your kids hate parsnips and pomegranates. They love Pringles, Pez, peanut brittle, and popcorn. Add a bit of Vitamin D, some Human Growth Hormone, a spackle of Vitamin C, B12, garlic, and testosterone to that 550 gram Mars bar, and voila!
Your compost and rubbish diet is fundamentally fortified with a mélange of anti-aging, cancer-battlin’, weight-wackin’, cold-crunchin’ and swine-flu fightin’ agents.
Win-win. Junk food crunched to healthy living.
The paradigm spins. Mottos move. A 21st century campaign is borne.
“A Snickers a day keeps your doctor at bay.”
And why stop there for god’s sake.
The good news is spreading.
The gun lobby is on board. Like Season Shot, an ammo supplier. Years ago they came up with bird shot made from oregano, garlic, onion, pepper and other spiced treats.
Check out Season Shot’s startling new ad: “Ammo with Flavor! Season Shot is made of tightly packed seasoning bound by a fully biodegradable food product. The seasoning is actually injected into the bird on impact … When the bird is cooked the seasoning pellets melt into the meat spreading the flavor to the entire bird.” Whoeeee! And it comes in a wide array of flavors.
Now, gun makers are jumping on board this techno train.
National Rifle Association stalwarts Remington, and Smith and Wesson, are even marketing a safe bullet. You heard me.
A spokesman for Remington, Cleveland Gusto, says that all of their bullets –even those flak-jacket piercing, cop-killing, tightly-wound titanium-alloy 44-aught loads – will now be injected and fortified with vitamins C, D and E, a broad-base antibiotic, and a full 100-milligram dose of Anti-Inhibitor Coagulant Complex, an agent that speeds clotting in trauma victims.
“Drive-by deaths are on the rise in North America,” says Gusto. “In an effort to help appease this upward trend in senseless carnage, we will now be using a beneficial clotting agent to give innocent bystanders, cops, firemen, and other collateral damage victims some extra time after receiving a typically fatal gunshot wound.”
Gusto says that field tests are underway right now.
“We’ve been experimenting with the blood-clotting ammo in some war zones – Afghanistan, Iraq, various parts of Africa, downtown Detroit and southern LA - and thus far into field studies, especially with the vitamin and antibiotic enriched ammo additives, survival rates of gunshot victims is up dramatically.”
Gusto goes on to say that the bullet will be marketed as “The Life Saver – Your Friendly Fire Friend!”
The ammo, in various calibers, and sold in pink packaging, will be in your local K-Mart or gun shop, just in time for Christmas.
Nice. And you thought the gun lobby was just another hulking, asset-accumulating monolith, tied tightly to the bottom line.
It’s not stopping there either.
Smokers of the world unite.
From Montreal – where else? – we hear about VitaCig.
A Montreal entrepreneur, Roger Ouellette, is marketing a new type of cigarette called the VitaCig.
The Pitch?
You can have your smoke and get some important vitamins at the same time. Roger Ouellette, inventor of the healthy smoke – no, you pussies, this is not an oxymoron - created it for his “smoking” wife. (Smoking, in this case, being a pejorative and not an embellishment we’re guessing?)
He says the VitaCig has fewer odors than a regular cigarette, and also contains important ingredients such as vitamin C.
Ouellette, who didn't return my calls, told CTV recently, “We give you all the vitamins you lose, plus some vitamins to help you.” Health Canada is not impressed, and stresses that there is no such thing as a healthy cigarette.
Pussies and panty-waists. Quebecois smokers know better. The VitaCig is now available in over 2,000 stores in Quebec and will eventually make its way to other parts of the country.
Roger is already in discussions with Philip Morris, the Mohawk Nation and a number of other big players in big tobacco.
In an interview on National Public Radio recently, Ouellette says he is presently immersed deep within the bowels of his semi-detached Lachine basement laboratory working on phase two of his groundbreaking VitaCig project.
“Me, I’m working next on the VitaCig injected with a Phase Four Lung Cancer chemotherapy drug therapy regimen,” chuckles Ouellette. “My wife, Celine, she’s 45, been smoking for 25 years. She’s tres healthy right now, but you gotta’ know, oh-la-la, she’s buckin’ those odds. I want to be ready with ChemoCig (Trademark registered) when Celine needs it. No ifs, ands, or butts. (Sic – typo by author, who couldn’t resist)”
And, of course, I know what you’re thinking.
How close the apocalypse?
And when can we expect the locusts?
Milksops! Embrace the technology.
And remember Marie Antoinette.
Who said “Let them eat cake.”
Taken back then as a pejorative dismissal of the masses.
We know today that of course she was referring to the good cake.
The Chocolate-Chip-Carrot-Cookie-Crumble with the injected smallpox and mumps vaccine, vitamin C, D and E complex, oxidizing tetracycline compound, herpes therapy, and whole wheat fortified anti-bacterial abstract.
Relax people.
It’s all good.
And that ominous gathering black cloud, blotting out the sun on the horizon?
I have it on good authority.
Not locusts.
Just grasshoppers.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
A cautionary tale of sports medicine
The Domino factor and my aging frame
Sports medicine is an iffy solution to age old conundrum
By Terrance Gavan
You may have heard the story about the big league pitcher who developed a blister on his baby toe playing tennis on one of his off days.
Two starts later his pitching arm was ruined, his promising career was in shambles and his niggling baby toe boo-boo was fingered as the cause.
Now that sounds a bit farfetched you might say. How can a blister down there cause so much chaos so far up the totem? Is this the start of a bad sports joke?
Well no. There’s a very real and logical explanation. The pitcher changed his windup to take pressure off his little toe. He didn’t want to land hard on the blister so he tweaked his knee at the end of his delivery to prevent a hard bump on the offending digit. That caused his hip to joggle, which caused his arm to tweak and that caused his tendon to pleat.
Well you get the picture. It was summed up in that old Spiritual, Dem Dry Bones.
Your toe bone connected to your foot bone, your foot bone connected to your ankle bone, your ankle bone connected to your leg bone, your leg bone connected to your knee bone,
Your knee bone connected to your thigh bone, your thigh bone connected to your hip bone.
And of course the hip bone is connected to the pocketbook and the wallet’s connected to the contract and well, in our poor pitcher’s case his contract connected to the boo-boo. His real boo-boo was pitching with a boo-boo.
My Sports Medicine guy, Dr. Wabash Cannonball, calls it the Domino Effect. He even wrote a widely regarded paper on the subject entitled: The Domino Effect and the Aging Athlete. It was published in the New England Journal of Medicine. It won him a Chair on the Sports Medicine Board at Johns Hopkins.
I was the case study.
A while back I developed a bruise on my right instep while skateboarding. Well let’s back this up. I was actually headed out to the vert ramp when I stepped on a huge pebble.
Angry at not being able to crank some ollies and a few Kamikaze Noggin Knockers I immediately went home to pick up my tennis racket. Halfway through the first set my playing partner John asked why I was walking funny. I told him my Tony Hawke tale of woe.
Into the second set I noticed that I was hitting off my left foot, to protect my instep.
I was now developing a serious throb in the ankle of my left foot.
At about the same time my serve, which usually flows gently, like a butterfly fluttering in a spring zephyr, was slowly devolving into a chaotic spasm. I looked like I was connected to a manic puppeteer in the final throes of a Tennessee Holler religious rite.
I was hitting my serve in an exaggerated tiptoe stance to ease pressure on my ankles and I was twisting my upper body to compensate. Little twinges started shooting up my left side.
On changeover, at 5-4, I noticed that my left arm was hanging lower that my right arm. My neck was convulsed in a spasm that left me looking over my right shoulder. I was limping on my sore left ankle and standing tiptoed on my bruised right instep.
John, who was and still is ten years my junior, then mentioned that we haven’t been rock climbing in a while.
“Great idea John! That might work out a few kinks,” I said.
We arrived at the rock face and as I grabbed the belay ropes I felt a sudden twinge in my lower back.
“Nothing like a little free climb to loosen up the muscles,” I shouted.
About half way up, my left hand, which was lodged in a small crevice, suddenly went numb. At the same time the twinge in my back locked into an uncontrollable spasm.
As I fell from the rockface my crinkled neck gave me a perfect line on John, who, thankfully, was on belay. As the belay rope tightened and caught my weight, I felt my left knee lock up.
As John helped me take off the belay ropes I suggested that we should go for a jog to work out the cricks.
John ignored me and asked for directions to Dr Wabash Cannonball’s Sports Medicine Clinic.
“You, do not, look so hot and I think I heard something go sploooot when the belay ropes caught you.”
“Well, okay, but I’m sure it’s nothing that a few pushups and a good night’s sleep won’t cure,” I said.
I declined John’s kind offer to run in and get me a wheelchair, and I sidled into the clinic.
Wabash was looking out of his corner office window when I arrived.
I was tiptoeing on my right foot, and dragging my left leg with the sprained ankle and locked knee, my left shoulder was now fully 8 inches below the right, and my neck spasm was allowing me to maintain a conversation and eye contact with John who was behind me as I sauntered into the clinic.
I reached for the door and heard a pop from the vicinity of my right shoulder.
Dr Wabash met me in the lobby, watching as I slowly dragged my form into view.
“Hey, Quasimodo, the Cathedral called. I think it’s your turn on the Bells.”
Did I mention, that Dr Cannonball is a nice guy, but no bedside manner.
As I explained the day’s events, he shook his head.
“How old are you? Idiot!”
And then: “Are you sure you weren’t dropped on a hard cement floor when you were young?”
And then he started to hum “Dem Bones”.
“Hah, I got it… your head bone’s connected to your gluteus maximus. Take two aspirins and call me when you can pick up a phone.”
He did send me a copy of his article before leaving for Johns Hopkins.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Brian Burke - and Biblical Proportion
Brian Burke is not the Messiah
But he does know how to hijack a byline
By Terrance Gavan
And Brian the Burke sayeth unto the multitude:
“Whose is this image and inscription?”
And the gathered throng of Pharisees and ink-stained wretches respondeth unto Burke the Large: “Caesar’s.”
Then Brian the Superfluous sayeth unto them, “Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s.”
When they had heard these words, they marveled, they scribbled, they Twittered and they shot great amounts of video footage placing treasured pearls of Brawny the Brian’s blather unto Youeth Tube.
Columnists swooned, the multitude was hushed and the babbling Pharisees then left Brian, Tweeting, texting, and eulogizing along the way.
News spread swift in Toronto, the chosen city, and Leaf Nation rose as one saying:
“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder; and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty Burke, The everlasting, Brian the Brain, The Prince of Peace.”
Whoa!
Hold on here just a minute.
Prince of Peace?
Brian Burke?
Call St. Peter.
We need a rewrite!
All this verbal detritus is overkill.
He had us at “hello.”
The rest is just trash talk and hyperbole.
I hate to spoil the party.
And pardon me if I am not quite so enamored of the Leaf’s newest savior, Brian the Beloved, the little engine that could. “I think I can!”
Brian Burke is not the Messiah. “I think I am!”
Heck, Brian Burke is not even Punch Imlach, who like Burkey the Lame, was not without his detractors.
I know the Messiah.
He follows me on Twitter.
He too has his doubts about Brian of Blarney’s chances in T Dot.
I tweeted the Messiah just last week, after Burkey’s stellar and stunning (stunned?) season-ending press conference.
I Twittered, “Hey big G … what about this guy Burke, the Leafs new GM and President … People are saying he’s the real deal?”
Back came the big Guy’s Tweet: “Ye shall know me by my deeds. Terrance giveth thy noggin a knocketh. You bag of hammers. Thou shall have no other gods before me.”
Ah, behold, the beauty of Twitter. Succinct, terse, no nonsense.
Almost like Brian the Burke. He of Harvard Law, and Anaheim, with pit stop in Van City.
He wonneth nothing in Van City. He garnered Grail in Anaheim.
No one is convinced that he didn’t gain Grail from the fine auspices of that good Senator, Brian Murray, the Lisp that Roars.
Don’t ever mention this to Brian.
He will pick you up and shake you like a Terrier on a rat.
He did just that with a few of his front office staffers and many of the existing Leaf players at his season-ending rant.
The words literally flew from the Brian of Brawn’s motivational maw at that presser.
Concerned with the nonchalance of “certain people” in the Leaf’s front office, Burkey dropped the hammer on D-Day.
“That should be a day of infamy. ... That should be a day when everyone is pissed off.”
Burkey may always be just a juke and a jive from despondency, but he sure knows how to hijack a headline.
On a day when North America was girding for the playoffs and Leafs’ players were busy shopping for new Taylor Made drivers - and a patch of green in the Muskokas - Brian was busy writing the Gospel according to Burke.
“A player's here long enough, he starts thinking, ‘I’m special, because there’s 20 people who want to talk to me,’ ” said Burke, a face-wash with a stinky ReeBok glove aimed at some of the Leaf’s overindulgent underachievers.
“No. They're there to talk to whoever comes off the ice with a Maple Leafs uniform on. And I think players confuse their role on a team that's struggling with being a good hockey player. ‘Oh, I'm on the second power-play unit. I must be a good hockey player.’ No. We don't have a very good team, and so you get that ice time.”
They don’t teach this lovey-dovey rhetoric at Dr. Phil’s School of Piety and Good Karma.
They teach this stuff third year at Harvard Law, in Moot Court.
Moot in this case referring also to the Leaf underachievers, who better shut up and lie low, lest the axe fall on their apparently swelled melons.
More time on the bike and less time on the links for the Boys in Blue this summer.
“This group has to aspire to higher levels of achievement or we need different athletes,” said Burke. “That's how pro sports are supposed to work. That's why these guys make the big bucks. And yes, there's been a culture of entitlement here, and we're trying to change that, and we will change it.”
Yoicks!
Culture of entitlement?
A nice little rhetorical twist. “Don’t paaark yah caaar in Haavaaaarrd Yaaaard!”
And ironic coming from the man who for years has been the poster child for entitlement.
He’s used his bully pulpit in Anaheim to initiate a Jihad against Oiler GM Kevin Lowe, for presumed egregious poaching of Anaheim players.
And now he’s run a Panzer phalanx up to the front door of Islander GM Garth Snow, shocking many by offering hidden goodies for a shot at presumed number one pick John Tavares. (See an article on Matt Duchene in this issue for a surprising gander at Tavares’s sliding fortunes.)
“We’re going to talk to everyone between us and the first pick and see what the landscape is,” sayeth Burke. “We’re going to see what it costs, and we’re going to try and move up.”
There is a presumption here that John Tavares is the panacea; the cure; the solution.
Me. I’m waiting for the wedding feast, when Burke the Bland cranks that huge jug of Evian water into 17 large carafes of Beaujolais.
Until then, I’m sitting on the sidelines watching the show.
With my good friend, Doubting Thomas.
But he does know how to hijack a byline
By Terrance Gavan
And Brian the Burke sayeth unto the multitude:
“Whose is this image and inscription?”
And the gathered throng of Pharisees and ink-stained wretches respondeth unto Burke the Large: “Caesar’s.”
Then Brian the Superfluous sayeth unto them, “Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s.”
When they had heard these words, they marveled, they scribbled, they Twittered and they shot great amounts of video footage placing treasured pearls of Brawny the Brian’s blather unto Youeth Tube.
Columnists swooned, the multitude was hushed and the babbling Pharisees then left Brian, Tweeting, texting, and eulogizing along the way.
News spread swift in Toronto, the chosen city, and Leaf Nation rose as one saying:
“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder; and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty Burke, The everlasting, Brian the Brain, The Prince of Peace.”
Whoa!
Hold on here just a minute.
Prince of Peace?
Brian Burke?
Call St. Peter.
We need a rewrite!
All this verbal detritus is overkill.
He had us at “hello.”
The rest is just trash talk and hyperbole.
I hate to spoil the party.
And pardon me if I am not quite so enamored of the Leaf’s newest savior, Brian the Beloved, the little engine that could. “I think I can!”
Brian Burke is not the Messiah. “I think I am!”
Heck, Brian Burke is not even Punch Imlach, who like Burkey the Lame, was not without his detractors.
I know the Messiah.
He follows me on Twitter.
He too has his doubts about Brian of Blarney’s chances in T Dot.
I tweeted the Messiah just last week, after Burkey’s stellar and stunning (stunned?) season-ending press conference.
I Twittered, “Hey big G … what about this guy Burke, the Leafs new GM and President … People are saying he’s the real deal?”
Back came the big Guy’s Tweet: “Ye shall know me by my deeds. Terrance giveth thy noggin a knocketh. You bag of hammers. Thou shall have no other gods before me.”
Ah, behold, the beauty of Twitter. Succinct, terse, no nonsense.
Almost like Brian the Burke. He of Harvard Law, and Anaheim, with pit stop in Van City.
He wonneth nothing in Van City. He garnered Grail in Anaheim.
No one is convinced that he didn’t gain Grail from the fine auspices of that good Senator, Brian Murray, the Lisp that Roars.
Don’t ever mention this to Brian.
He will pick you up and shake you like a Terrier on a rat.
He did just that with a few of his front office staffers and many of the existing Leaf players at his season-ending rant.
The words literally flew from the Brian of Brawn’s motivational maw at that presser.
Concerned with the nonchalance of “certain people” in the Leaf’s front office, Burkey dropped the hammer on D-Day.
“That should be a day of infamy. ... That should be a day when everyone is pissed off.”
Burkey may always be just a juke and a jive from despondency, but he sure knows how to hijack a headline.
On a day when North America was girding for the playoffs and Leafs’ players were busy shopping for new Taylor Made drivers - and a patch of green in the Muskokas - Brian was busy writing the Gospel according to Burke.
“A player's here long enough, he starts thinking, ‘I’m special, because there’s 20 people who want to talk to me,’ ” said Burke, a face-wash with a stinky ReeBok glove aimed at some of the Leaf’s overindulgent underachievers.
“No. They're there to talk to whoever comes off the ice with a Maple Leafs uniform on. And I think players confuse their role on a team that's struggling with being a good hockey player. ‘Oh, I'm on the second power-play unit. I must be a good hockey player.’ No. We don't have a very good team, and so you get that ice time.”
They don’t teach this lovey-dovey rhetoric at Dr. Phil’s School of Piety and Good Karma.
They teach this stuff third year at Harvard Law, in Moot Court.
Moot in this case referring also to the Leaf underachievers, who better shut up and lie low, lest the axe fall on their apparently swelled melons.
More time on the bike and less time on the links for the Boys in Blue this summer.
“This group has to aspire to higher levels of achievement or we need different athletes,” said Burke. “That's how pro sports are supposed to work. That's why these guys make the big bucks. And yes, there's been a culture of entitlement here, and we're trying to change that, and we will change it.”
Yoicks!
Culture of entitlement?
A nice little rhetorical twist. “Don’t paaark yah caaar in Haavaaaarrd Yaaaard!”
And ironic coming from the man who for years has been the poster child for entitlement.
He’s used his bully pulpit in Anaheim to initiate a Jihad against Oiler GM Kevin Lowe, for presumed egregious poaching of Anaheim players.
And now he’s run a Panzer phalanx up to the front door of Islander GM Garth Snow, shocking many by offering hidden goodies for a shot at presumed number one pick John Tavares. (See an article on Matt Duchene in this issue for a surprising gander at Tavares’s sliding fortunes.)
“We’re going to talk to everyone between us and the first pick and see what the landscape is,” sayeth Burke. “We’re going to see what it costs, and we’re going to try and move up.”
There is a presumption here that John Tavares is the panacea; the cure; the solution.
Me. I’m waiting for the wedding feast, when Burke the Bland cranks that huge jug of Evian water into 17 large carafes of Beaujolais.
Until then, I’m sitting on the sidelines watching the show.
With my good friend, Doubting Thomas.
A Lazy Boy rises at dawn
Languid Landon takes a flyer
A Lazy Boy excursion run amok
By Terrance Gavan
In the town of Halcyon and beyond he was known mostly as Languid Landy.
His real name was Landon Jeans-Jacques Thoreau and he migrated to Halcyon, Manitoba after one stint in the Vietnam War back in 1968. He was a former pilot.
My first assignment with the Halcyon Packet and Times back in 1985 was an interview with Languid Landy who had something up his sleeve for July 1st weekend.
I arrived at his ranch on a sunny day mid-June. “Follow me,” said Landy, steering me toward a brown leather Lazy Boy recliner sitting just behind the shed in the back of his Ford pickup.
The truck was surrounded by a wide assortment of large balloons.
“What’s this?” I smiled, looking closer at the Lazy Boy. It was on a pedestal and on the platform were several impeccably soldered weld joints with hooks attached.
“This is my Canada Day project,” said Landy. “I bought 50 weather balloons and I’ll be filling them with helium and attaching them to the Lazy Boy on July 1st. I’ll be up there for most of the day with my camera, snapping pictures of the parade, the pancake breakfast and the ball tournament at Halcyon Field.”
“How do you know how high this thing will go?” I asked.
“High enough,” laughed Landy. “Oh I figure about 100 feet. I’ll have a cooler of beer, sandwiches a two-way radio and my pellet gun for the return to terra firma. Besides, I used to pilot jet fighters for the US Navy, so I think I can handle a Lazy Boy at 100 feet.”
Languid Landy’s launch proceeded on point, and at 6 am on Saturday July 1st, about 500 interested onlookers had gathered at the Halcyon baseball diamond.
Tommy Sigfusson was busy at a bank of four helium tanks, filling the balloons and attaching them to the central tether. The Jonasson twins were hard at it, checking the grounding straps that held the Lazy Boy to the bed of Landy’s Ford pickup. Landy was tying down his cooler, camera, and radio to the pedestal. The pellet gun was tucked alongside.
As the balloons were added, I noticed the suspension on the anchored truck lifting. It looked ominous to my untrained eye.
I approached Languid Landy. “Are you sure you did the math on this?” I asked.
“Hah, math, schmath,” laughed Landy. “I did some rough figuring on a napkin. No problem, 33 cubic feet of helium each should get me up to 100 feet. I’m a former top gun pilot … remember?”
Halcyon Mayor Sigmur Peturson was on hand to perform the countdown
“See you all at 4 pm,” said Languid Landy, strapping himself into his Lazy Boy. Ragnur Sigmundson was ready in the bed of the pickup with a machete in hand; ready to cut the tethering rope.
“Three, two, one … liftoff!” yelled Mayor Peturson.
And Languid Landy lifted off. An understatement.
It was visually stunning. Landy and his Lazy Boy rocketed toward near space at what I can only assume to be mach one.
“Holy crap,” screamed Ragnur who was thrown from the back of the still shuddering Ford pickup.
Five hundred heads snapped heavenward as one - some of the older residents later complained about whiplash.
Up and up Landy went. Up past the 100-foot target; he passed 5,000 at a clip; soared past 10,000 in a wink; and finally leveled off at 15,000 feet. It was beautiful, I swear to god. It was like he was shot from a gun.
Details get a little shaky after that. Because his only safety net, the pellet gun, shook loose 50 feet into his upward journey. I ran to the radio in the truck cab.
“Larry, where are you?” I screamed into the mike. “I’m leveled at about 15,130 feet according to my altimeter, and I think my gun is missing,” said Landy. “Get me the hell down, it’s cold up here.”
We scrambled four Cessnas from Halcyon field and Thor Gudmundson was the first to spot Languid Landy. Fortunately, Thor had gone up with a rifle.
Unfortunately for Languid Landy it was a twelve gauge double-barreled shotgun with double aught magnum loads.
Thor leveled off, took aim, and let loose with both barrels at the weather balloons holding Languid Landy and his Lazy Boy aloft.
The spread of buckshot popped 43 of the 50 balloons.
Languid Landy had gone up in a hurry. He headed down at about twice the speed.
Miraculously, Languid Landy’s Lazy Boy slowed down and leveled off at about 400 feet. Three of the remaining seven balloons seemed to have suffered collateral damage and were drooping.
He was floating just above Halberston’s Pond when 15 town sharpshooters arrived with the small caliber arms.
Anxious to get poor Landy back to earth the marksmen took aim. Unfortunately no care was taken to organize the firing sequence, and all 15 shooters opened fire at once.
All, save one, of the remaining 7 balloons went pop and Languid Landy and his Lazy Boy succumbed to gravity dropping quickly into the middle of Halberston’s Pond where he was quickly retrieved by the Halcyon Fire and Rescue squad.
The North American Air Defense (NORAD) scrambled four fighters to Halcyon on Canada Day 1985, responding to UFO reports given by two Japan Air pilots who, on approach to Winnipeg International, had to veer to avoid Landy and his Lazy Boy.
Languid Landy was a celebrity for about a week.
He became a local hero, and went on to become the Mayor of Halcyon, a position he still holds.
He presides over the meetings from an old battered and weather-beaten brown Lazy Boy recliner.
On the desk of his office sits a plaque with a picture – one I took – of his Lazy Boy rocketing skyward.
On the plaque, the simple inscription with arrow pointing to the weather balloons:
“The Buckshot Stops Here.”
A Lazy Boy excursion run amok
By Terrance Gavan
In the town of Halcyon and beyond he was known mostly as Languid Landy.
His real name was Landon Jeans-Jacques Thoreau and he migrated to Halcyon, Manitoba after one stint in the Vietnam War back in 1968. He was a former pilot.
My first assignment with the Halcyon Packet and Times back in 1985 was an interview with Languid Landy who had something up his sleeve for July 1st weekend.
I arrived at his ranch on a sunny day mid-June. “Follow me,” said Landy, steering me toward a brown leather Lazy Boy recliner sitting just behind the shed in the back of his Ford pickup.
The truck was surrounded by a wide assortment of large balloons.
“What’s this?” I smiled, looking closer at the Lazy Boy. It was on a pedestal and on the platform were several impeccably soldered weld joints with hooks attached.
“This is my Canada Day project,” said Landy. “I bought 50 weather balloons and I’ll be filling them with helium and attaching them to the Lazy Boy on July 1st. I’ll be up there for most of the day with my camera, snapping pictures of the parade, the pancake breakfast and the ball tournament at Halcyon Field.”
“How do you know how high this thing will go?” I asked.
“High enough,” laughed Landy. “Oh I figure about 100 feet. I’ll have a cooler of beer, sandwiches a two-way radio and my pellet gun for the return to terra firma. Besides, I used to pilot jet fighters for the US Navy, so I think I can handle a Lazy Boy at 100 feet.”
Languid Landy’s launch proceeded on point, and at 6 am on Saturday July 1st, about 500 interested onlookers had gathered at the Halcyon baseball diamond.
Tommy Sigfusson was busy at a bank of four helium tanks, filling the balloons and attaching them to the central tether. The Jonasson twins were hard at it, checking the grounding straps that held the Lazy Boy to the bed of Landy’s Ford pickup. Landy was tying down his cooler, camera, and radio to the pedestal. The pellet gun was tucked alongside.
As the balloons were added, I noticed the suspension on the anchored truck lifting. It looked ominous to my untrained eye.
I approached Languid Landy. “Are you sure you did the math on this?” I asked.
“Hah, math, schmath,” laughed Landy. “I did some rough figuring on a napkin. No problem, 33 cubic feet of helium each should get me up to 100 feet. I’m a former top gun pilot … remember?”
Halcyon Mayor Sigmur Peturson was on hand to perform the countdown
“See you all at 4 pm,” said Languid Landy, strapping himself into his Lazy Boy. Ragnur Sigmundson was ready in the bed of the pickup with a machete in hand; ready to cut the tethering rope.
“Three, two, one … liftoff!” yelled Mayor Peturson.
And Languid Landy lifted off. An understatement.
It was visually stunning. Landy and his Lazy Boy rocketed toward near space at what I can only assume to be mach one.
“Holy crap,” screamed Ragnur who was thrown from the back of the still shuddering Ford pickup.
Five hundred heads snapped heavenward as one - some of the older residents later complained about whiplash.
Up and up Landy went. Up past the 100-foot target; he passed 5,000 at a clip; soared past 10,000 in a wink; and finally leveled off at 15,000 feet. It was beautiful, I swear to god. It was like he was shot from a gun.
Details get a little shaky after that. Because his only safety net, the pellet gun, shook loose 50 feet into his upward journey. I ran to the radio in the truck cab.
“Larry, where are you?” I screamed into the mike. “I’m leveled at about 15,130 feet according to my altimeter, and I think my gun is missing,” said Landy. “Get me the hell down, it’s cold up here.”
We scrambled four Cessnas from Halcyon field and Thor Gudmundson was the first to spot Languid Landy. Fortunately, Thor had gone up with a rifle.
Unfortunately for Languid Landy it was a twelve gauge double-barreled shotgun with double aught magnum loads.
Thor leveled off, took aim, and let loose with both barrels at the weather balloons holding Languid Landy and his Lazy Boy aloft.
The spread of buckshot popped 43 of the 50 balloons.
Languid Landy had gone up in a hurry. He headed down at about twice the speed.
Miraculously, Languid Landy’s Lazy Boy slowed down and leveled off at about 400 feet. Three of the remaining seven balloons seemed to have suffered collateral damage and were drooping.
He was floating just above Halberston’s Pond when 15 town sharpshooters arrived with the small caliber arms.
Anxious to get poor Landy back to earth the marksmen took aim. Unfortunately no care was taken to organize the firing sequence, and all 15 shooters opened fire at once.
All, save one, of the remaining 7 balloons went pop and Languid Landy and his Lazy Boy succumbed to gravity dropping quickly into the middle of Halberston’s Pond where he was quickly retrieved by the Halcyon Fire and Rescue squad.
The North American Air Defense (NORAD) scrambled four fighters to Halcyon on Canada Day 1985, responding to UFO reports given by two Japan Air pilots who, on approach to Winnipeg International, had to veer to avoid Landy and his Lazy Boy.
Languid Landy was a celebrity for about a week.
He became a local hero, and went on to become the Mayor of Halcyon, a position he still holds.
He presides over the meetings from an old battered and weather-beaten brown Lazy Boy recliner.
On the desk of his office sits a plaque with a picture – one I took – of his Lazy Boy rocketing skyward.
On the plaque, the simple inscription with arrow pointing to the weather balloons:
“The Buckshot Stops Here.”
Friday, April 17, 2009
DUI Always trumps ERA - Drunk Driving dumb
Angels Pitcher’s promising career ends with chalk line on the road
In life off the diamond DUI always trumps ERA
By Terrance Gavan
Following a stunning pitching performance last Wednesday, a game in which he pitched six shutout innings against the Oakland As, young Nick Adenhart was understandably excited.
After the game the 22-year old rookie, touted as the Los Angeles Angels top-pitching prospect, sought out his pitching coach Mike Butcher.
He was thrilled, wide-eyed and wound tight as the game ball, locked into a special moment that few athletes ever experience.
Games come and games go in the course of a career. This particular game was special for young Nick Adenhart. Not for the six shutout innings, but for a moment.
A moment when clarity fairly clattered off the stands, rambling like an echo off the bleacher seats before finally stuttering to impact inside this young pitcher’s soul. The soul of a ballplayer is a mumbled place, where heart and mind meet, and moments of clarity meld as fleeting touchstones, marking the path.
“At the end of the game I asked him, ‘How do you feel?’ And he goes, ‘Butch, I got it,’ ” Butcher said (From the NY Times). “And that was a pretty special moment. Ahh. To see a kid figure it out that early and understand it and own it.”
If there is an upside to the paltry denouement of life that followed, perhaps it is here, in these words gleaned from a pitching coach, who saw for a second, the sparkle of inspiration reflected in those young eyes.
The sparkle that says: “Yeah, it’s all beginning to make sense.” An ‘aha’ moment, that passes from the ken so quickly, but remains locked there in that jumble of life’s lessons learned. In the soul of the bearer. Nick Adenhart was ready, says Butcher, to take that eureka moment into the season.
Some plans never come together, balanced so precariously on a stacked deck, a card totem that crumbles inexorably but sometimes too quick.
Butcher got the call at 2 a.m. Thursday and saw that the caller was listed as Nick Adenhart. “So I was thinking, ‘OK, I’m going to have to go get Nick somewhere, in a good way.’ And I heard his father speaking and he said Nick had been in a car accident.”
Butcher drove immediately to the hospital and stood vigil at the University of California-Irvine Medical Center. Butcher said he would hold on to Nick Adenhart’s delight in his strong outing against the Athletics.
That’s all he has now. Memory of Nick Adenhart. Nick Adenhart died early Thursday morning after a drunk driver ran a red light.
On Friday, the Orange County district attorney, filed charges, including three counts of murder, against Andrew Gallo. Gallo, 22, has been identified as the driver of the minivan that ran a red light at an estimated 70 miles an hour, twice the posted limit, and broadsided the Mitsubishi in which Adenhart was a passenger. Courtney Frances Stewart, 20, the driver of the Mitsubishi, and Henry Pearson, 25, a law student, died instantly in the crash, the police said. The fourth person in the car, Jon Wilhite, 24, remained in critical condition last weekend.
Two 22-year olds and a chance meeting on a road last Thursday. And if we’re lucky, a lesson here.
Usually, when talk drifts to DUI and professional sports, the circumstances are different. In most cases it’s about self-indulgent young millionaires, with lucrative contracts, specious attitudes, and way too much money to spend on nights’ out and expensive cars.
To wit: Cleveland Browns receiver Donte Stallworth, a recent recipient of a $4.5 million contract bonus. Stallworth like Mr. Gallo has been charged with vehicular manslaughter, after a regrettable night out on the town.
The Browns receiver’s indictment in relation to an accident in Miami March 14 that claimed the life of Florida resident Mario Reyes.
Mr. Reyes was a crane operator who was walking home after a night shift. Stallworth said he flashed his lights just prior to running the pedestrian over.
Stallworth blew twice the legal limit. Mr. Stallworth can get anywhere from 5 to 14 years according to Florida law. His lawyers are already greasing the pan, and the rumor mill is chugging. Snippets are surfacing on blogs and in news reports saying that Mr. Reyes was jaywalking, and that he hadn’t crossed the street in the designated crosswalk area.
Poppycock. Offering the death penalty for jaywalking might be seen as a little too presumptuous, even for Florida.
Sad fact remains that Donte Stallworth has the wherewithal to pay some high-priced flacks to deflect blame. Rumors are rife that his NFL career is over. Don’t bet on it.
We the people, life’s paying pundits, are blessed with a short term and very selective memory when it comes to drunk driving and death. Every day of the week, someone takes that long shot gamble, grabs the car keys, and makes that sudden, swift decision.
“No, nooooo … I’m okay to drive … really.”
Really?
The national stats don’t bear it out folks.
Drunk driving is one of the largest causes of alcohol-related death in Canada and other developed countries, and in Canada is the largest criminal cause of death.
In the last ten years, around 250,000 people died in alcohol related car accidents in the United States. Figures show that 16,000 people were killed in the year 2000, due to alcohol related accidents. In 2004, that figured climbed to 25,000.
Yes, you probably figured, like me, that with the abundance of campaigns and ads extant on television and radio and the increase in RIDE programs offered, that drinking-related fatalities must be on the wane. We’d be wrong. DUI-related fatalities are rising worldwide.
You don’t have to tell that to Nick Adenhart’s mom and dad. Who were there in the hospital last Thursday morning.
With a pitching coach and Nick’s Angels’ teammates.
Standing vigil as Nick Adenhart lost his grip on the ball.
Next time someone offers you a drive home.
Why not lose your grip on those keys.
And take one ride … for the team.
In life off the diamond DUI always trumps ERA
By Terrance Gavan
Following a stunning pitching performance last Wednesday, a game in which he pitched six shutout innings against the Oakland As, young Nick Adenhart was understandably excited.
After the game the 22-year old rookie, touted as the Los Angeles Angels top-pitching prospect, sought out his pitching coach Mike Butcher.
He was thrilled, wide-eyed and wound tight as the game ball, locked into a special moment that few athletes ever experience.
Games come and games go in the course of a career. This particular game was special for young Nick Adenhart. Not for the six shutout innings, but for a moment.
A moment when clarity fairly clattered off the stands, rambling like an echo off the bleacher seats before finally stuttering to impact inside this young pitcher’s soul. The soul of a ballplayer is a mumbled place, where heart and mind meet, and moments of clarity meld as fleeting touchstones, marking the path.
“At the end of the game I asked him, ‘How do you feel?’ And he goes, ‘Butch, I got it,’ ” Butcher said (From the NY Times). “And that was a pretty special moment. Ahh. To see a kid figure it out that early and understand it and own it.”
If there is an upside to the paltry denouement of life that followed, perhaps it is here, in these words gleaned from a pitching coach, who saw for a second, the sparkle of inspiration reflected in those young eyes.
The sparkle that says: “Yeah, it’s all beginning to make sense.” An ‘aha’ moment, that passes from the ken so quickly, but remains locked there in that jumble of life’s lessons learned. In the soul of the bearer. Nick Adenhart was ready, says Butcher, to take that eureka moment into the season.
Some plans never come together, balanced so precariously on a stacked deck, a card totem that crumbles inexorably but sometimes too quick.
Butcher got the call at 2 a.m. Thursday and saw that the caller was listed as Nick Adenhart. “So I was thinking, ‘OK, I’m going to have to go get Nick somewhere, in a good way.’ And I heard his father speaking and he said Nick had been in a car accident.”
Butcher drove immediately to the hospital and stood vigil at the University of California-Irvine Medical Center. Butcher said he would hold on to Nick Adenhart’s delight in his strong outing against the Athletics.
That’s all he has now. Memory of Nick Adenhart. Nick Adenhart died early Thursday morning after a drunk driver ran a red light.
On Friday, the Orange County district attorney, filed charges, including three counts of murder, against Andrew Gallo. Gallo, 22, has been identified as the driver of the minivan that ran a red light at an estimated 70 miles an hour, twice the posted limit, and broadsided the Mitsubishi in which Adenhart was a passenger. Courtney Frances Stewart, 20, the driver of the Mitsubishi, and Henry Pearson, 25, a law student, died instantly in the crash, the police said. The fourth person in the car, Jon Wilhite, 24, remained in critical condition last weekend.
Two 22-year olds and a chance meeting on a road last Thursday. And if we’re lucky, a lesson here.
Usually, when talk drifts to DUI and professional sports, the circumstances are different. In most cases it’s about self-indulgent young millionaires, with lucrative contracts, specious attitudes, and way too much money to spend on nights’ out and expensive cars.
To wit: Cleveland Browns receiver Donte Stallworth, a recent recipient of a $4.5 million contract bonus. Stallworth like Mr. Gallo has been charged with vehicular manslaughter, after a regrettable night out on the town.
The Browns receiver’s indictment in relation to an accident in Miami March 14 that claimed the life of Florida resident Mario Reyes.
Mr. Reyes was a crane operator who was walking home after a night shift. Stallworth said he flashed his lights just prior to running the pedestrian over.
Stallworth blew twice the legal limit. Mr. Stallworth can get anywhere from 5 to 14 years according to Florida law. His lawyers are already greasing the pan, and the rumor mill is chugging. Snippets are surfacing on blogs and in news reports saying that Mr. Reyes was jaywalking, and that he hadn’t crossed the street in the designated crosswalk area.
Poppycock. Offering the death penalty for jaywalking might be seen as a little too presumptuous, even for Florida.
Sad fact remains that Donte Stallworth has the wherewithal to pay some high-priced flacks to deflect blame. Rumors are rife that his NFL career is over. Don’t bet on it.
We the people, life’s paying pundits, are blessed with a short term and very selective memory when it comes to drunk driving and death. Every day of the week, someone takes that long shot gamble, grabs the car keys, and makes that sudden, swift decision.
“No, nooooo … I’m okay to drive … really.”
Really?
The national stats don’t bear it out folks.
Drunk driving is one of the largest causes of alcohol-related death in Canada and other developed countries, and in Canada is the largest criminal cause of death.
In the last ten years, around 250,000 people died in alcohol related car accidents in the United States. Figures show that 16,000 people were killed in the year 2000, due to alcohol related accidents. In 2004, that figured climbed to 25,000.
Yes, you probably figured, like me, that with the abundance of campaigns and ads extant on television and radio and the increase in RIDE programs offered, that drinking-related fatalities must be on the wane. We’d be wrong. DUI-related fatalities are rising worldwide.
You don’t have to tell that to Nick Adenhart’s mom and dad. Who were there in the hospital last Thursday morning.
With a pitching coach and Nick’s Angels’ teammates.
Standing vigil as Nick Adenhart lost his grip on the ball.
Next time someone offers you a drive home.
Why not lose your grip on those keys.
And take one ride … for the team.
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Fr Don Gavan and his unique take on golf
Loopy rules and my love affair with golf
Rev Donald Francis Gavan and the provisional ball
By Terrance Gavan
“Golf is the closest game to the game we call life. You get bad breaks from good shots; you get good breaks from bad shots - but you have to play the ball where it lies.”
Golfing legend Bobby Jones said that. Bobby Jones was a pretty good golfer.
Now I agree with most of the things the good Mr. Jones had to say about golf. But he’s dead wrong here.
You don’t have to play the ball where it lies.
There are always extenuating circumstances.
In Canada we have spring and fall rules. We have snow rules.
Rules that fly in the face of the Jones dictum. Rules that allow us to move the ball, willy-nilly, and chock a block, dependant on temperature fluctuations, poor grass, bad course maintenance, and the seasonal flux and flow.
On some courses in the Canadian Rockies we have the Grizzly Bear Conditional Rule.
The Grizzly Bear Provisional Drop: Rule 10 – Section VII (part d) states:
“If your ball comes to rest on the big toe of a 900 kilogram male Grizzly, just risen from winter’s slumber, you may of course take a drop and provisional lie exactly 2.5 club lengths from said Grizzly’s right toe. The ball will be played to the right, left or behind the point of progress and not closer to the hole. If the bear eats the ball, you may drop another without penalty. You may not advance the ball closer to the pin, even if the bear is very angry and threatening mayhem. You are golfers not wimps. Suck it up, you whiny pink-plaid-wearing pussies.”
When I golf in the Rockies I also like to travel with a high powered rifle loaded with hypodermic darts laced with about 2000 milligrams of Demerol.
After popping one or two Demerols into the Grizzly’s rump, it’s wise to prod his inert form with your longest club – the Driver – before measuring those 2.5 club lengths. Drop the ball in a place that ensures a good sight line to the resting Grizzly, just so an errant snore or twitch won’t interfere with your backswing.
You should of course note that most golf courses frown upon the carrying of high-powered firearms, so I like to plop the rifle in my bag covered with one of those cool Tiger head covers. I remove my one iron to make room for the Winchester.
Everyone knows even God can’t hit a one iron. Well, he can, but it’s always a wide ducking hook. Then he throws a huge hissy fit and Haliburton gets hit with another bloody snowstorm in April, or a dormant volcano suddenly gurgles to life in Alaska.
I learned golf from my uncle, the Reverend Donald Francis Gavan.
He taught me the value of the provisional ball, spring, summer and autumn rules, and the Footjoy wedge.
People have told me that I don’t really play golf at all.
“You can’t tee up a ball in the fairway for chrissakes!” yells my good friend Mortimer Gas, who is a scratch golfer with a golfing library that required the construction of a 500 square foot addition to his country home. “Who taught you to play golf anyway?” Mortimer is a bit of a pedant when it comes to golf.
“The Reverend Donald Francis Gavan,” I tell Mortimer. “And yes you can tee up a ball in the fairway, if your ball just happens to land on a piece of crappy green-tinged concrete masquerading as a lush fairway. It’s the ugly summer heat and poor grass management rule, and besides, I’m not good with the three wood off a flat lie.”
Mortimer also gets quite perturbed at my habit of playing three balls off every tee.
“You can’t just play three balls for the hell of it!” screams Mortimer. “Who taught you to play golf?”
Mortimer is really an easy-going guy, but get him on a patch of green fairway and he just loses it.
“They’re called provisional balls, Mortimer. And it was Father Gavan. Remember?”
“Geez, I don’t want to hear that name again,” screams Mortimer. “And by definition you play a provisional ball when you think your first ball is lost, not whenever you feel like it. And how do we know which ball you’re scoring?”
And here’s where you can really drive a playing partner nuts.
“Well, Mortimer, what’s a score anyway, in the grand scheme of Zen and green acres? But since you’re asking, I always count the lowest of the three-ball parlay. I’m eccentric, but I’m not crazy.”
Mortimer Gas will then turn the color of Tiger Wood’s final round red jersey.
I have been, of late, experimenting with the Happy Gilmour running drive, a method that requires a 10 yard running start from the back of the teebox to the ball.
“That’s downright embarrassing, and it looks awful,” sighs the Gas man.
I smile at Mortimer.
“Reverend Donald Francis Gavan hit his drives lefty and cross-handed, his irons righty and he putted ambidextrous, and he often quoted Sam Snead: ‘Nobody asked how you looked, just what you shot,’ said slammin Sammy.”
“Okay,” says Mortimer, smiling, “what did you shoot yesterday?”
“Accounting for three provisionals, and best ball parlay, and allowing for the two brand new Srixons I found in the woods on 12, I was about a three under 68.”
“You don’t even mark your scorecard!” screams Mortimer.
“Right on. Father gavan never kept score,” I reply.
Mortimer’s face assumes the glowering countenance of Jack Nicholson in the final act of The Shining, and he’s reaching for a club/weapon from his bag.
I gallop quickly toward my third ball on the first tee in my best Happy Gilmour and clobber a beautiful screaming faded rainbow that travels at least 310 yards out into the lake.
“Lucky thing I still have those two provisional balls in the fairway, eh Mortimer?” I shout over my shoulder in full sprint mode.
I look back at Mortimer Gas who is chasing me down the fairway, a hybrid club raised menacingly over his head. I’m running, golf bag jangling on my shoulder, and laughing. And I’m thinking: “Geez, what a great game. God I love golf.”
I’m sure that Fr. Donald Francis is watching from heavenly perch, with new partner, St Peter, from the back nine of some cloudy country club, where Amen Corner is a mindset and not a nickname.
And I’m sure that, like me, he’s smiling.
“See that Peter. Look at my nephew run. I taught him everything he knows. Now look out, third ball comin’ at ya’ … Fore!”
Rev Donald Francis Gavan and the provisional ball
By Terrance Gavan
“Golf is the closest game to the game we call life. You get bad breaks from good shots; you get good breaks from bad shots - but you have to play the ball where it lies.”
Golfing legend Bobby Jones said that. Bobby Jones was a pretty good golfer.
Now I agree with most of the things the good Mr. Jones had to say about golf. But he’s dead wrong here.
You don’t have to play the ball where it lies.
There are always extenuating circumstances.
In Canada we have spring and fall rules. We have snow rules.
Rules that fly in the face of the Jones dictum. Rules that allow us to move the ball, willy-nilly, and chock a block, dependant on temperature fluctuations, poor grass, bad course maintenance, and the seasonal flux and flow.
On some courses in the Canadian Rockies we have the Grizzly Bear Conditional Rule.
The Grizzly Bear Provisional Drop: Rule 10 – Section VII (part d) states:
“If your ball comes to rest on the big toe of a 900 kilogram male Grizzly, just risen from winter’s slumber, you may of course take a drop and provisional lie exactly 2.5 club lengths from said Grizzly’s right toe. The ball will be played to the right, left or behind the point of progress and not closer to the hole. If the bear eats the ball, you may drop another without penalty. You may not advance the ball closer to the pin, even if the bear is very angry and threatening mayhem. You are golfers not wimps. Suck it up, you whiny pink-plaid-wearing pussies.”
When I golf in the Rockies I also like to travel with a high powered rifle loaded with hypodermic darts laced with about 2000 milligrams of Demerol.
After popping one or two Demerols into the Grizzly’s rump, it’s wise to prod his inert form with your longest club – the Driver – before measuring those 2.5 club lengths. Drop the ball in a place that ensures a good sight line to the resting Grizzly, just so an errant snore or twitch won’t interfere with your backswing.
You should of course note that most golf courses frown upon the carrying of high-powered firearms, so I like to plop the rifle in my bag covered with one of those cool Tiger head covers. I remove my one iron to make room for the Winchester.
Everyone knows even God can’t hit a one iron. Well, he can, but it’s always a wide ducking hook. Then he throws a huge hissy fit and Haliburton gets hit with another bloody snowstorm in April, or a dormant volcano suddenly gurgles to life in Alaska.
I learned golf from my uncle, the Reverend Donald Francis Gavan.
He taught me the value of the provisional ball, spring, summer and autumn rules, and the Footjoy wedge.
People have told me that I don’t really play golf at all.
“You can’t tee up a ball in the fairway for chrissakes!” yells my good friend Mortimer Gas, who is a scratch golfer with a golfing library that required the construction of a 500 square foot addition to his country home. “Who taught you to play golf anyway?” Mortimer is a bit of a pedant when it comes to golf.
“The Reverend Donald Francis Gavan,” I tell Mortimer. “And yes you can tee up a ball in the fairway, if your ball just happens to land on a piece of crappy green-tinged concrete masquerading as a lush fairway. It’s the ugly summer heat and poor grass management rule, and besides, I’m not good with the three wood off a flat lie.”
Mortimer also gets quite perturbed at my habit of playing three balls off every tee.
“You can’t just play three balls for the hell of it!” screams Mortimer. “Who taught you to play golf?”
Mortimer is really an easy-going guy, but get him on a patch of green fairway and he just loses it.
“They’re called provisional balls, Mortimer. And it was Father Gavan. Remember?”
“Geez, I don’t want to hear that name again,” screams Mortimer. “And by definition you play a provisional ball when you think your first ball is lost, not whenever you feel like it. And how do we know which ball you’re scoring?”
And here’s where you can really drive a playing partner nuts.
“Well, Mortimer, what’s a score anyway, in the grand scheme of Zen and green acres? But since you’re asking, I always count the lowest of the three-ball parlay. I’m eccentric, but I’m not crazy.”
Mortimer Gas will then turn the color of Tiger Wood’s final round red jersey.
I have been, of late, experimenting with the Happy Gilmour running drive, a method that requires a 10 yard running start from the back of the teebox to the ball.
“That’s downright embarrassing, and it looks awful,” sighs the Gas man.
I smile at Mortimer.
“Reverend Donald Francis Gavan hit his drives lefty and cross-handed, his irons righty and he putted ambidextrous, and he often quoted Sam Snead: ‘Nobody asked how you looked, just what you shot,’ said slammin Sammy.”
“Okay,” says Mortimer, smiling, “what did you shoot yesterday?”
“Accounting for three provisionals, and best ball parlay, and allowing for the two brand new Srixons I found in the woods on 12, I was about a three under 68.”
“You don’t even mark your scorecard!” screams Mortimer.
“Right on. Father gavan never kept score,” I reply.
Mortimer’s face assumes the glowering countenance of Jack Nicholson in the final act of The Shining, and he’s reaching for a club/weapon from his bag.
I gallop quickly toward my third ball on the first tee in my best Happy Gilmour and clobber a beautiful screaming faded rainbow that travels at least 310 yards out into the lake.
“Lucky thing I still have those two provisional balls in the fairway, eh Mortimer?” I shout over my shoulder in full sprint mode.
I look back at Mortimer Gas who is chasing me down the fairway, a hybrid club raised menacingly over his head. I’m running, golf bag jangling on my shoulder, and laughing. And I’m thinking: “Geez, what a great game. God I love golf.”
I’m sure that Fr. Donald Francis is watching from heavenly perch, with new partner, St Peter, from the back nine of some cloudy country club, where Amen Corner is a mindset and not a nickname.
And I’m sure that, like me, he’s smiling.
“See that Peter. Look at my nephew run. I taught him everything he knows. Now look out, third ball comin’ at ya’ … Fore!”
Friday, April 3, 2009
tasers and why I peed on an electrified fence
The Taser factor and investigative journalism
And my early meanders with accidental shock therapy
By Terrance Harry Joseph Gavan
The RCMP is taking a pummeling at the ongoing inquiry into the death of Polish traveler Robert Dziekanski.
Remember poor Mr. Dziekanski? He was issued quick judgment and a summary conviction for the egregious crime of being lost, confused, and unilingually Polish in Vancouver airport.
Four RCMP officers, responding to reports of imminent mayhem, Tasered poor Robert five times in about a minute. They say they had no choice. He came at them with a Bosco stapler, armed, dangerous and allegedly ready to inflict office product mayhem.
He went down with the first pzzzzzzzt. The officer wielding the Taser said he had to hit him a few more times. He said he wasn’t sure the damn thing was working properly.
Wow. I saw the tape. Mr. Dziekanski went down on the first muzzled crack like a pole-axed steer. What was this RCMP Constable expecting? The flash, flare and flickering crescendo of a blazing laser light finale from an Ozzie Osbourne concert?
Do you think this incident might impact negatively on future immigration?
“Well, hello! And greetings from Canada Robert. We’re from Welcome Wagon. Please note that non-English speaking immigrants wielding plastic workstation accoutrements are viewed with suspicion. Now put the stapler down and back away from that pencil sharpener. Do you understand me?”
An important question that; considering that he didn’t. Understand them, that is.
And surely the Mounties just did what we all do in Canada when faced with an insurmountable language barricade. THEY TALKED LOUDER! Ever been to a foreign country Constable Ludicrous? And how did that talk louder in English thing work out for you?
Taser International takes umbrage whenever their product comes under judicial scrutiny.
Mr. Robert Oppenheimer, spokesman for Taser International recently said that no deaths had ever been attributed to a Taser attack.
“Read my lips. No Taser deaths! Sure, people die of heart attacks or massive strokes. Happens all the time,” said Oppenheimer. “The North American diet has gone to hell. Diabetes, obesity, alcoholism, and substance abuse are rampant. Tasers don’t kill people … sudden onset atrial fibrulations kill people. If any of you whiny pundits have any doubts, see me after the press conference in the lobby. I’m packin’ 85,123 volts of mean heat baby!”
I should just take Mr. Oppenheimer at his word. He’s armed with the facts – and that Taser.
But as an investigative journalist, well, I feel compelled to dig a little deeper, what with mounting toll of coincident coronary fatalities surrounding the 321 or so Taser-related deaths in Canada and the US over the past few years.
So I called our local OPP media guru Sgt Clark McBlaster to ask if I could set up a Taser demo, y’know, just to set my mind at ease.
McBlaster, a terse, succinct, and competent officer reached out politely from the phone.
“Are you out of your cotton pickin’ mind?” asked Sgt McBlaster. “Haven’t you been watching the news?”
“C’mon Clarky,” I laughed, “Oppenheimer says it’s perfectly safe.”
“You’re an idiot,” said McBlaster. “If you’re that curious, go stick your finger in a light socket.”
Hah. I received my investigative training from a very wise old editor, Lorne Bjornson, who once told me: “Go to the mattresses.” Something to do with Brando and the Godfather, I think.
So last Saturday, I donned a pink tutu, hopped on a skateboard and rolled the length of Highland Street in Haliburton swinging a desk-size paper shredder over my head. I glared at the tourists, and stuck my tongue out at well-meaning passers-by. And I shouted in my best faux Euro accent: “Nyet, Nyet, damn Canooskies! I no spikka’ English.” I’ve done the research. I know what it takes to generate a little Taser action in Canada.
Right on time, about two minutes into my ride, the OPP cruiser loomed into view. In the driver’s seat the aforementioned Clarky McBlaster. He glared at my pink tutu, grabbed my shredder, and pulled the cord out of my hand. He then took out his baton and proceeded to beat my beautiful stainless steel paper mangler to a pulp. “Now go home, take a shower, bring the shredder, and plug it in,” said McBlaster, tucking that nightstick back in the cruiser.
And just when I thought I was out of ideas, a sudden eureka moment. I don’t need a Taser. I have my own high voltage, low amp teenage memory to draw from.
From grade five to the end of high school, I traveled every summer from my Ottawa home to work on my uncle’s ranch in Manitoba’s Interlake. In the summer of 1970, my friend Arnthor Jonasson replaced the enclosure on his home pasture with single strand electric fence. I knew nothing about this new technology. I had just arrived in early June for the summer haying season.
Arnthor grabbed a few of his mom’s butter tarts, put them in a knapsack and suggested we take a walk to check out his new Simmental bull. As we passed the single strand barbed wire fence he stopped suddenly.
“First one to piss on the barbed wire fence gets the last butter tart,” said Arnthor. Too good to pass up.
I watched Art’s vain attempts to hit the wire – he was missing by a laughably wide margin. I prepared, took a deep breath, accounted for the 20 mph crosswind, and directed a laser stream right onto the wire.
“Yowwwwwwww! Jeeeeeppppeeers! And I fell to the ground like the aforementioned pole-axed steer.
Art joined me, but for another reason. He had tears in his eyes. He was holding his heaving sides, and he was gasping for air.
“Dammit Jonasson. That’s not funny,” I screamed.
“Wanna bet?” sputtered Art, rolling round and round in the alfalfa.
The pain was so significant and mind-numbing that to this day I can’t relieve myself within 100 yards of a barbed wire fence.
And, considering that the standard issue Taser delivers about 20,000 more volts than your average electric fence I’m beginning to have some lingering doubts about the efficacy of Mr. Oppenheimer’s and Taser International’s bold claims that this is still the most viable alternative to deadly force and the semi-automatic, nine-millimeter Glock.
My mind suddenly rebounds to that illuminating confrontation with Sgt Clark McBlaster.
An authoritarian stare, succinct communication, and the proficient use of a common nightstick.
Old fashioned? Surely.
Effective? You bet.
And my early meanders with accidental shock therapy
By Terrance Harry Joseph Gavan
The RCMP is taking a pummeling at the ongoing inquiry into the death of Polish traveler Robert Dziekanski.
Remember poor Mr. Dziekanski? He was issued quick judgment and a summary conviction for the egregious crime of being lost, confused, and unilingually Polish in Vancouver airport.
Four RCMP officers, responding to reports of imminent mayhem, Tasered poor Robert five times in about a minute. They say they had no choice. He came at them with a Bosco stapler, armed, dangerous and allegedly ready to inflict office product mayhem.
He went down with the first pzzzzzzzt. The officer wielding the Taser said he had to hit him a few more times. He said he wasn’t sure the damn thing was working properly.
Wow. I saw the tape. Mr. Dziekanski went down on the first muzzled crack like a pole-axed steer. What was this RCMP Constable expecting? The flash, flare and flickering crescendo of a blazing laser light finale from an Ozzie Osbourne concert?
Do you think this incident might impact negatively on future immigration?
“Well, hello! And greetings from Canada Robert. We’re from Welcome Wagon. Please note that non-English speaking immigrants wielding plastic workstation accoutrements are viewed with suspicion. Now put the stapler down and back away from that pencil sharpener. Do you understand me?”
An important question that; considering that he didn’t. Understand them, that is.
And surely the Mounties just did what we all do in Canada when faced with an insurmountable language barricade. THEY TALKED LOUDER! Ever been to a foreign country Constable Ludicrous? And how did that talk louder in English thing work out for you?
Taser International takes umbrage whenever their product comes under judicial scrutiny.
Mr. Robert Oppenheimer, spokesman for Taser International recently said that no deaths had ever been attributed to a Taser attack.
“Read my lips. No Taser deaths! Sure, people die of heart attacks or massive strokes. Happens all the time,” said Oppenheimer. “The North American diet has gone to hell. Diabetes, obesity, alcoholism, and substance abuse are rampant. Tasers don’t kill people … sudden onset atrial fibrulations kill people. If any of you whiny pundits have any doubts, see me after the press conference in the lobby. I’m packin’ 85,123 volts of mean heat baby!”
I should just take Mr. Oppenheimer at his word. He’s armed with the facts – and that Taser.
But as an investigative journalist, well, I feel compelled to dig a little deeper, what with mounting toll of coincident coronary fatalities surrounding the 321 or so Taser-related deaths in Canada and the US over the past few years.
So I called our local OPP media guru Sgt Clark McBlaster to ask if I could set up a Taser demo, y’know, just to set my mind at ease.
McBlaster, a terse, succinct, and competent officer reached out politely from the phone.
“Are you out of your cotton pickin’ mind?” asked Sgt McBlaster. “Haven’t you been watching the news?”
“C’mon Clarky,” I laughed, “Oppenheimer says it’s perfectly safe.”
“You’re an idiot,” said McBlaster. “If you’re that curious, go stick your finger in a light socket.”
Hah. I received my investigative training from a very wise old editor, Lorne Bjornson, who once told me: “Go to the mattresses.” Something to do with Brando and the Godfather, I think.
So last Saturday, I donned a pink tutu, hopped on a skateboard and rolled the length of Highland Street in Haliburton swinging a desk-size paper shredder over my head. I glared at the tourists, and stuck my tongue out at well-meaning passers-by. And I shouted in my best faux Euro accent: “Nyet, Nyet, damn Canooskies! I no spikka’ English.” I’ve done the research. I know what it takes to generate a little Taser action in Canada.
Right on time, about two minutes into my ride, the OPP cruiser loomed into view. In the driver’s seat the aforementioned Clarky McBlaster. He glared at my pink tutu, grabbed my shredder, and pulled the cord out of my hand. He then took out his baton and proceeded to beat my beautiful stainless steel paper mangler to a pulp. “Now go home, take a shower, bring the shredder, and plug it in,” said McBlaster, tucking that nightstick back in the cruiser.
And just when I thought I was out of ideas, a sudden eureka moment. I don’t need a Taser. I have my own high voltage, low amp teenage memory to draw from.
From grade five to the end of high school, I traveled every summer from my Ottawa home to work on my uncle’s ranch in Manitoba’s Interlake. In the summer of 1970, my friend Arnthor Jonasson replaced the enclosure on his home pasture with single strand electric fence. I knew nothing about this new technology. I had just arrived in early June for the summer haying season.
Arnthor grabbed a few of his mom’s butter tarts, put them in a knapsack and suggested we take a walk to check out his new Simmental bull. As we passed the single strand barbed wire fence he stopped suddenly.
“First one to piss on the barbed wire fence gets the last butter tart,” said Arnthor. Too good to pass up.
I watched Art’s vain attempts to hit the wire – he was missing by a laughably wide margin. I prepared, took a deep breath, accounted for the 20 mph crosswind, and directed a laser stream right onto the wire.
“Yowwwwwwww! Jeeeeeppppeeers! And I fell to the ground like the aforementioned pole-axed steer.
Art joined me, but for another reason. He had tears in his eyes. He was holding his heaving sides, and he was gasping for air.
“Dammit Jonasson. That’s not funny,” I screamed.
“Wanna bet?” sputtered Art, rolling round and round in the alfalfa.
The pain was so significant and mind-numbing that to this day I can’t relieve myself within 100 yards of a barbed wire fence.
And, considering that the standard issue Taser delivers about 20,000 more volts than your average electric fence I’m beginning to have some lingering doubts about the efficacy of Mr. Oppenheimer’s and Taser International’s bold claims that this is still the most viable alternative to deadly force and the semi-automatic, nine-millimeter Glock.
My mind suddenly rebounds to that illuminating confrontation with Sgt Clark McBlaster.
An authoritarian stare, succinct communication, and the proficient use of a common nightstick.
Old fashioned? Surely.
Effective? You bet.
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