February 2017

It’s tough to be apolitical.  Sometimes you just can’t.  There’s an old saying in aerodynamics.  If it looks right it’ll fly right.  And that’s not happening here.

Chicago Tribune Image Grab
Chicago Tribune Image Grab

Something doesn’t look quite right here.  The aerodynamics are off.

Mattel, makers of the talking Kellyanne Conway doll, announce a life-size version.

There was a time when this reporter said, and he always said this, whether he was just trying to be funny or who knows what, “It’s probably the greatest name that was ever invented.  I never met a “Steve” I didn’t like.”

It sounds stupid but those days are gone.  It didn’t start with this guy exactly.  But the expression itself had its origin in something a guy named Will Rogers once said.  “I never met a man I  didn’t like.”  However improbable or implausible a concept, Will did apparently say that.

The Globe&Mail published a piece on the weekend by Robert Everett-Green about Masha Alyokhina.  in 2012 Masha Alyokhina was tried and jailed with two other members of “Pussy Riot” after a performance at a Moscow cathedral.

Masha, 28, has some interesting things to say.  “The modern history of Russia is written in the courtroom.  There are really  no opposition politicians who don’t have criminal cases against them.”

Masha co-founded “Mediazona” in 2014. Mediazona “Mediazona covers all topics connected with freedom in Russia, police violence, political violence and political courts,” says Masha.

“In two years we have changed the media discourse.  Before us, nobody covered political courts, prisons and police violence.  Now, because we are quite big (in terms of readership), others have to cover it too, even state media.  They do it in the old way, like propaganda, but they have to cover it, to be in opposition to us.”

Masha rejects comparisons of Donald Trump with Vladimir Putin.  “The difference between Trump and Putin is really big.  Putin is a product of the Russian state-security service, which has a long history of repression, almost a century.  Trump is just an asshole.”

This is a general, all ages site that doesn’t go in for a lot of swearing and cursing.  We save that for the TV.  But I thought that if the Globe can publish that word I can do it here once.

Back to “Honey Badger” Steve-o Bannon.  You may have read that the honey badger is his favourite animal and an animal he compares himself to.  Yes, he wasn’t joking.  Something to do with the badger’s thick skin and how Bannon, like the badger, can make it through the most violent personal attack.  He is unperturbed.  You can tell that by the simpering expression usually adorning his face.

Bannon’s due for a spanking and it’s only a matter of time.  Maybe it’ll be Kellyanne Conway, maybe it won’t, but one of these days somebody’s going to pull down his pants and tan his hide.

Here’s a link to the Globe&Mail story if you’re interested in reading the whole thing.

Dissident Russian artists try to break through ‘the zone of message control’

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Have a great evening…

 

 

 

January 2017

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Coming over the hill is almost always worth the terrible struggle it takes to get back here.  I  love this town.

We took the Crown Mountain trail.

I love that Los Angeles Times story comment a couple of days ago about, “fascist scum in the White House”.  My immediate thought?  Wrong network.  That show’s on NBC.  It’s kind of copy-catting the big hit of the new year.  Looking forward to another episode of   “Alien Zombies In The White House” on ABC tonight at 10.  Starring, you better believe it, the gorgeous Chris Hemsworth.

I was surprised, and I’m serious about this, that Mattel is in negotiations to bring out a talking Kellyanne Conway doll. Everything she says, including “and” and “the” is a lie.

You can’t make this stuff up.

That was a tough January and I’m glad I wasn’t around to experience it because I’m marshmallow soft.  I’m white and just a little ole piece of pudginess.  It’s too bad.  I mean good.  And I can’t make out why no one has mentioned “The Peter Principle”.  I guess no one remembers the 1970s.  I certainly don’t.  The lost decade.

Actually, on further review, “The Peter Principle” was published in 1968.  The author was Laurence J. Peter and the central argument of his book, which is still valid today, because that’s what principles do, is that people rise to their level of incompetence.  They go along, they rise based on what they’ve done, or said they’ve done, and then they get up to a place where they really have no idea what they’re doing.  Sad. Big bad disaster.  A killer.

Laurence J. Peter was born in no place else but Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.  He made his name though, like so many of us beaver people, in the United States of America.

Some smart person or publisher should get that book out again.  These days have done wonders for George Orwell’s career and Aldous Huxley’s career so how about the career of Laurence J. Peter?  It doesn’t matter if you’re dead.

Looking forward to February.  February’s got one thing going for it that January doesn’t have.  It isn’t January.  It’s also got that silent “r” in there and no other month’s got that either.  Cool.  Feb-u-ary.

We’ll be right back after these important messages

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Christmas Party

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That’s about the size of it.  Bravery is a necessary component of life.  Without bravery there is no life.  That is the most harebrained idea I have driving east down 9th Avenue this afternoon.  What happens when you just don’t know?  You’re looking for one final gift and you act on instinct.  Just deleting your account won’t help.  Not after this.  And there needs to be push-back.

Couldn’t agree more.  Undermines their tangled web.  Just put on the headset and we bring it to you.  That’s gift giving.

Did you say “Crinklies”?  That’s what disconnected thoughts sound like.  They do that. “Crink”.  They come in packages 40 to a box.  Superstore carries the 400 family size. Crinklies are round and about the size of a Ritz cracker except they’ve been around a lot longer than Ritz crackers.  They’ve outlasted them, like they said they would.  The stale taste is part of it.

Christmas crinklies and time.  There’s no difference.  It’s like “Fiddle Faddle”.  A memory you can’t get rid of.  And why would anyone try? Crinklies are good.  Mocha, ginger, a flash of arborite and and a long sausage finish.  Grease is good for you.  It’s too stupid but they’re under every tree every year.  It’s like Steve Allen only better.


December 19, 2016.  States brought the potted olive bush in because she thought it might die in the cold. It sat on the step-up to the upper deck just inside the sliding glass door. The temperature’s warmed up a bit and there’s quite a layer of sloppy wet snow on deck and the plant is back out there. It gives us a warm sloppy feeling.

Later.  Our inveterate happy partyer millionaire neighbour is out there on his deck even now at 5 pm in the cool blackness.  He’s with a couple of friends. I can hear their raucous, manly laughter. It sounds pretty raucous. They’re raucous-ing it up over there. They just went inside.  That wonderful time of year is back.

Sverdlovsk Dusk
Sverdlovsk Dusk With Putin Banners

I couldn’t really see them because he has a large rooftop deck and they were at the north-end or downtown view side.  He’s paying for it.  He’s a generous person.  He loves to share and have people over.  That’s my thought. That’s what I’ve heard about him.

We did a lot of work around the place in anticipation of all the hard partying we’ll be doing here Christmas Eve. It’s thoroughly modern, keeping up with the dust.  Battling the clutter is an exquisite feeling, difficult to describe.  So hard to get motivated.  So good.

We do everything for you. And for all of you who have to do everything, and do it, and do it well, that’s all I’m gonna say.  Thanks very much.  Is greatly appreciated by all mother Russiya’s children.

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There’s no other way to characterize it.  It’s a big tree for big people doing big things.  And really, it doesn’t matter what time of year it is.  It’s a nice little town and I hope I never go back there.  You try to dis-imagine that you’re stuck in Sverdlovsk.  It’s all you’ve got until you finally get out of here.  Later there’s nostalgia.  And it’s hard.  You miss Sverdlovsk like cancer.  That Russian tour was a beast.  Why do we do it to ourselves?  We do it for the love.


December 20.  No.  It’s better than that.  You scrape the tin-foil off the truffle and down she goes.  That’s when you know you’re in time again to the music.  Death by Christmas music.  One more Feliz outta you and this Navidad is over.  Holly jolly my stained neck muffler.

I’m in line behind this guy at “Customer Service” at the “Liquor Depot” who’s complaining bitterly there’s no Fireball on the shelves.  How can you be out of Fireball especially at this time of year?  Catastrophe.  All I’m after is the key to the washroom, but it’s okay.  This time of year you need patience.


December 21. So that’s it.  I’ve always liked December 21.  It means you’re getting close.  Close to the end and you can wrap a bow on it.  You don’t have to think.  Around here you can relax.  We’ll talk about it at the break.  The idea completely resonated with me when I first heard it.  Content-free content.  As chanteuse Dua Lipa so eloquently puts it,”I ask myself what am I doin here?”

I love the expression “Happy Holidays”.  And I doubt there was ever any irony intended.  I’m in good shape now.  I have time to do those final little things that are still out there and need to be gathered in as gifts.  I don’t need the car anymore.  I can walk out in the early morning and take care of it before traffic gets too bad.

 

Next on samoyeddogs Monsieur Charles Baudelaire in connection with an upcoming poetry reading.  Happy holidays….