You Stole A What?

Today, I saw something sad. There’s a bakery downtown that I always walk by, and outside it, there was a bowl of water set out for passing doggies to stop and have a slurp. Well, today, I went by and there was no water bowl! I asked for some water, and wondered where it went. They said someone stole it!

Why, why, why, would you steal a doggy water bowl? What in hell for? Did it look so pretty that you just had to have it?

Ug. Senseless bullshit. Stupid people and the things they steal. I really don’t know what else to say.

Another Name To Add To The List

Ok, Steve, I’m going to horn in on your appropriate names for people in news stories action, because I can.

The chair of a conference on making cities more pedestrian-friendly, called Walk21, is named Jim Walker. Well, at least it’s not as bad as the poorly-named souls who are wheeling around in wheelchairs named Walker.

Allrighty, I’m outa here for real now. Must finish packing to head home.

Porn Sunday?

This story wasn’t too special. A bunch of churches want to designate one Sunday a year as the time to rail against porn. But two things stood out for me.

First, what is with this guy’s obsession with elephants? He refers to porn as the elephant in the pew because everybody sees it but doesn’t want to talk about it. Fine. But he just keeps talking about elephants. Does he have a thing for elephants? Does he think their long trunks are hot? Maybe he doesn’t like porn, but likes to spend some quality time out behind the barn if you know what I mean.

Second, he thinks that porn addicts should be helped by getting them to install software that sends info on what they’ve been looking at to someone else so this other person can make sure they’re not sneaking some porn-viewing time. Great! So he thinks people should be spied on. Just what we need.

And that’s about it. I think I might be able to slip one more post up here before I fall into the internet hole that is my parents’ dialup connection.

There were Thieves, Thieves, Stealing Dying Men’s Cheese, At The Corner Grocery Store.

The UK sucks, but you know where else sucks? Mesa, Arizona! Why? Because if you get smoked by a moron who doesn’t know how to drive because he toasts you at a bus stop, and you happen to have bought groceries, as you expire, and someone is trying to help you, the locals will steal your groceries, and those of your helper, too. Isn’t that a fine sign of the times?

What were they thinking? The old geezer is dying, he doesn’t need these? What a bunch of assholes. I hope something not so pleasant happens to each and every one of those soulless slime-buckets.

Drowning In Stupidity

Wow. The UK is sucking more and more each day. Now, police are being told not to rescue drowning people because they might fall in too. A kid has already drowned in greater Manchester because of this. Police saw him, and then didn’t even try to save him.

They’re being told that they shouldn’t even throw a lifebelt to someone before performing some kind of risk assessment! Good god, when someone’s drowning, there isn’t time to do a lot of risk-assessing.

Now, they’re trying to say the safety document was intended to emphasize that if the officer can’t swim, he shouldn’t jump into the water to save someone else. But that’s not how it reads. It says they shouldn’t hold a hand out, tie a rope to, or throw a lifebelt to someone, and they should call fire and other personell instead.

So if you travel to England, don’t go near the water!

Nazi Furniture?

There’s a new line of furnishings in Mumbai, India called the New Arrival Zone for India that features swastikas all over the furniture, but it’s apparently not a tribute to Hitler. What do you get when you take the first letters of New Arrival Zone and India, kids? Nazi! Uh-oh! But apparently, the swastika has been a hindi symbol much longer than its attribution to the goose-steppers of Germany. So…is it a tribute to Hitler, or not? All I know is Jews are mad, and the guy who brought out the collection is apologizing. One thing’s for sure. This poor soul should have taken a lesson from the poor souls who set up a Hitler restaurant in the same city and got a similar backlash.

Happy Canadian Thanksgiving

Even though we seem to have more American visitors than Canadian ones these days, I still wanted to take a second to wish everybody a happy Thanksgiving. What ever you’re doing and whoever you’re doing it to, I hope it’s a safe and happy experience for each and every one of you.

I’m sure very few of you care, but if you’re curious about how I’ll be spending my long weekend, I’ll be heading out to
The River Run Centre
with my Mom and Carin tonight to see
Jim Cuddy.
I’ve seen him as part of
Blue Rodeo
before and it was great, so I’m looking forward to seeing if a solo show is just as good. I can’t believe I bought those tickets all the way back in May for Mother’s Day. Christ time flies. After that I’m off to the family home to do all of the traditional holiday running around as well as the eating and drinking that goes with it. Good times.

One thing I more than likely won’t be doing though is posting around here, and the same goes for Carin who is heading off to see her own family for a few days as well. So if things get a little quiet around these parts, that’s why. Hey, at least we warned you this time, unlike in the summer.

And if you’re in Ontario, don’t forget to get out and vote next week if you didn’t hit one of the advance polls like Carin and I did yesterday. Carin can tell you if she wants, but if you read our
Guelph debate blog
and were wondering how either of us voted, I decided on Liberal and yes to the electoral system change question. Say what you want about broken promises and such, but it’s hard to look at Ontario now and say that it isn’t in at least a bit better shape than it was when we took it away from the Conservatives in 2003, so why mess with something that doesn’t need messing with?

I think that’s all for now. I’ll talk to you when I talk to you, probably Tuesday or Wednesday. In the meantime, go have some fun. It’s pretty damn nice outside for an October, so go enjoy it before it’s gone.

Let me Tel…ephone You A Story

When I read this story, I almost cried.

A library in Prince Edward Island has set up a way that kids can phone in and have a story read to them over the phone. This is because, more and more often, parents just don’t have time to read to their kids anymore, and some of the kids don’t even know the nursery rhymes.

Doesn’t the image of a kid being told to phone a number to get his bedtime stories break your heart? Curling up with a phone just doesn’t have the same appeal as reading with your mom or dad. Man. If you don’t have the time to read to your kids at least some of the time, something has to go.

We were such little tyrants as kids. We would ask for stories, and mom, even if she was tired, would try to read to us. But after a while, the sentences stopped making sense because her eyes were starting to close, but she was still trying to read aloud, so she started to read diagonally. We’d all laugh at her and tell her it wasn’t making any sense, and she would try again, until she just couldn’t read anymore. Laying on her bed while she read us Ramona books, or some story about a mouse named Ralph, or whatever she read to us made some pretty sweet memories. It’s scary that some kids just don’t get that. It makes me think Ray Bradbury’s the velt, a story in which the parents provide all the material things their kids could ever want, but never have time to give them the love and affection they need, is more real than he ever imagined.

Rogers Website Update

Well, I heard back from Rogers in response to my email about their inaccessible website. They said they would forward my message to the appropriate department. I can’t be sure if that’s an actual department or the big trash can, but one can hope it’s actually getting seen by someone.

That promotion is over, but I’ll definitely be watching their website for positive changes, and keeping on their tails!

So, there’s an update. Not much of an update, but an update nonetheless.