A Gross Depiction of (In)Significant Life Lost

Splat!

Don't worry, that was just the sound of the 277th insect slamming head first into your windshield as you pile down the TransCanada at a buck forty this fine Friday afternoon.

Could you imagine if that was the way you were to die? FACE FIRST into a sheet of glass that has something like 6 million times your bodily mass and travels 20 times as fast as you. (Sure, I suppose a person could compare it to jumping from a 20 storey building into a nice asphalt/concrete surface, but that's usually done at one's own will.)

Or else how about that wasps nest under your deck. Frick'n wasps. Better gas'm. No different than Agent Orange in the Vietnam War. "Let's get them foreign buggers before they get US!" I am certain that phrase had been used somewhere in the history of that "war". To have your lungs filled, your bodied poisoned so to become some sort of lesser being, by the hands of another manipulateur. Gotta suck. Mosquitoes get it twice as bad since when they aren't having poison washed over their eyeballs in the middle of flight then they are most certainly going to have their entire featherlite body pulverized into something lesser than dust as your gigantic palm smacks into the side of your arm, leg, cheek.

(Children?) set ants ablaze with gasoline and matches, or the various parts of its segmented body are stretched and severed just as Atilla the Hun liked to do to his captors in Night of the Museum. Earthworms are stretched in much the same way, or else are sliced into segments and forced to slide into some other trajectory, regardless of where this worm might have originally been heading prior to your "doctoring". We blast our garden hoses into corners of the fence rails where Charlotte spins her web. We do this til her lungs are filled with water and collapse completely. Cutting the lawn has never been so deadly since those moth wings came fluttering out of the side of the machine in a flurry of grey snow.

and it snowballs

as we pave

through paradise

Snap! Mouse trap. Pop! There goes the gopher's head as that thin sharp wire cuts through its neck. Let's go bigger.

Maybe you don't like some kinds of birds. Maybe you think "gross, a pigeon - they're so smelly and gross!" But I would rather think of it as pigeon nevertheless, rather than something that once was a pigeon, only now with maggots & worms crawling around through its bloody smashed-in skull in the middle of the Shopper's Drug Mart parking lot. Bigger again.


Farmers need land. And with ever-growing mega-corporate farming needing more and more land to feed this starving world, the need to rape and pillage the earth grows, too. "All in a responsible matter", mind you, but RAPE AND PILLAGE NONE THE LESS. So in the process - habitat destruction. Biodiversity loss. species extinction. Plants & animals alike, this life is being carded out.

We kill for progress. We need wider highways and more extraction of every kind for the best possible products and services that money can by. SO WHAT?!?! if proportionately more bears or deer or moose are being mowed down on our highways as we encroach further and further into their habitat (with the hopes of escaping the habitat that we've grown to hate so much). So we "progress" and "succeed". How can you tell? We get fat. How do we get fat? We eat The Meat. Hormone-injected cattle that had been crammed into corrals and lined up for slaughtering loin by loin for your dinnertime enjoyment.

should have listened to your parents
and doubled up on
all your peas and carrots

Let's' go bigger.

Tar sands. 300 dead ducks right? Nope, try 1600. At the hands of man. Or lack of hands, possibly. Windmills kill more? We're not talking about windmills. We are talking about dying. Dying stinking deaths. With 13 heavy metals and numerous hydrocarbons seeping into your bloodstream, disabling your ability to breathe as a soup of chemicals fills your mouth and nose. The tailings ponds associated with the tar sands are not just killing the animals that habituate in them. Dr. Habibi and Dr. Schindler and Dr. O'Connor aren't just called Dr.'s for nothing. Each can describe in more way than one as to how this region is causing estrogen levels in minnows to be significantly altered or how this region is causing some of the rarest and proportionately UNACCEPTABLE cancers are being diagnosed amongst human beings. People are Dying. So much for ants and spiders, hey?

Let's all just start treating each other and this world we live in a little bit better.

Ch. 64.

“A man who cannot choose ceases to be a man"

With everyone's big & crazy goings-ons and incredibly exciting lives they are leading, I can't help to feel just a little bit underwhelmed.

Whether it be going for work terms in Scotland, starting completely new lives in Van, having wild weekends at "The Lake", learning new languages, riding a motorcycle, gallavanting between concerts in Pomona or Chicago or Geneva or Boston, or even taking the random trip to CALGARY for drinking. These things makes the life I am living feel Oh Just So Goddam Boring. And it's all I can do but to just sit & contemplate the begging question:

"What In God's Name Have You Done With Your Life, Ryan?!"

and

"Where Did It All Go Oh So Effing Wrong??!"

I only have a few ideas...

So now a good friend of mine is getting MARRIED. Talk about the ULTIMATELY exciting (life-altering) moment in a person's life, hey?? To be that happy with your own life, knowing that the only way that it could possibly get any better would be to share it with the one you love. Must be nice.

Maybe it's because I recently finished reading about Alex Delarge's life and how he came to his own decision to begin living a different life that I am contemplating all of this "What Have You Done With Your Life" stuff. Having the epiphany of growing up at the ripe old age of 18 seems...young, but like - good. Becoming all settled and complacent by this point in one's life actually sounds kinda nice. Then again I probably just think this because I feel soooo incredibly OLD right now, what with not being married, n' all, haha.

I don't see myself marrying any time soon. It's all I can do right now to just. keep. breathing. Let alone bringing someone else into my own messed up life, where we could share the most dearest of times? Perhaps this is why I am so incredibly anti-social and non-commital to even the most important people in my life. Perhaps I am barely keeping up at all in this uber-fast-paced son of a bitch of a world.

"Carrying on". But that seems so...what I have been doing for god oh so so long. Kinda not really toooo ummm fulfilling? Kinda not really what I feel like doing any more!

I am craving adventure. No, not in the ultra-violent in-and-out kroovy filled tolchocking sort of vesche, but I do indeed need something to give. And this being at a desk job for a little over a MONTH, haha. Lucky for me I get to go to CALGARY (ugghh) for my pal's BACHELOR PARTY this weekend, and WEDDING the next! (Helllllo, Bridesmaides!) And the real kicker is, I even know what it is that I want! It's just a matter of getting out of This Freaking Cycle of apathy and negativity and realize that despite how much I talk about "freedom" and "choice" I just need to shut the fuck up and go and get it.

SCREAMIN' For Change!

Chapter 29: Screamin' For Change!

By now I have read enough current events in the News, enough non-fiction 300 pagers about economics & the environment, and enough classic and modern dystopian novels to develop a bit of an opinion about the state of the world and where it is heading.

Call me pessimistic, call me sadistic, call me unreasonable. But when the science of the non-fictions, the imagination of the novels, and the reality of the current news events can be kept independent of each other, it's not hard to see how at least some plausible outcomes in the next 50 to 100 years that are talked about now might just come true. It's the cynic in me that realizes that it's really no wonder that our "Leaders" have only enough foresight to give themselves and their buddies a comfortable pension so that they might suffer the least in the earth's final days.

After all, makin' a change is a hard thing to do. Keynesian economics is a tough thing to grasp especially in times like these. "Stimulate this BITCH!" is the phrase that is uttered as half of the next EI cheque is spent on pain-numbing sensations such as alcohol consumption, drug ingestion, or sexual preoccupation. Such healthy things that a person keeps on living for. better days.

Then there's that bum on the street begging for "change". Maybe. Just maybe he doesn't want your nickels and dimes at all. Maybe his bottle collection and social security cheque is allowing him to subsist really quite reasonably. Maybe what he wants more than anything is for you to see what kind of greedy, unjustifiably inequitable world we are living in to let people - human beings - fall into the cracks like this in the first place. Maybe "Can you give me some CHANGE?" is really just a plea for you to open your eyes and realize the change that is needed in this world, and how you - the average every day citizen are the only way to make this change happen. Or maybe he's a crackhead.

So be that change you want to see. Write that letter. Heaven knows are policy writers are hopeless, and the government will have soo many cabinet shuffles in their term in office that noone really will be able to focus on getting appropriate solutions to the problems in any reasonable amount of time. Ride that bike. Even if the emission regulations and targets are changed such that the newest coal burning power plant will only be the equivalent as taking 7 million cars of the road, as opposed to the 11 million as originally promised. Take that pay cut. (What?) Get out of that labour-intensive resource-depleting bureaucratic heirerarchial institution run by pimps, fat-cats, and lawyers, and try doing something honest once in your life. I dare ya.

The 1st headline I hear as Canada sends the world leaders packin' after the 1 billion dollar G8/G20 summit this past weekend is that our country will become a supplier of Uranium to India. Now that's what I call change. If any of the volatile countries in the eastern world get a whiff of the stuff that makes a-bombs in the area - watch out! I guess if push comes to shove, Canada can always try to plead ignorance. Plus heaven knows we are dependent here on Indian immigrants to come and sustain our workforce with the declining Canadian population growth rate. CHANGE towards a more nuclear world is undesirable change. Change towards a more tolerant multi-cultural patchwork of Canadian pride is desirable change. But when this change comes at the cost of losing or replacing any of the historical attributes of what it means to be Canadian, I'm not so sure. Then again, Canadian history can prove to be pretty horrible as well.

The 2nd headline out of this big All-Important Billion Dollar Conference was about Women's rights/maternal health. Which happens to tie into everything that is needed for a positive change in this world, but especially with respect to the world population that could either plateau at 9 Billion or 14 Billion, depending on actions taken now. There have been enough studies for us to take action now to achieve the former. That's why Harper's hypocritical conditions suggested for this form of aid is especially unreasonable!! Let's get goin', World!!!

The 3rd and final headline I paid any attention to was about the riots. Well maybe these anarchists are the closest things we have to the most blatant form of civil disobedience we have out there screamin' for "change". True, most of this behaviour is totally unreasonable. But is there such a thing as "unreasonably necessary"? Doubt it. But One day there might be. These are just stepping stones for us getting to that point. The cynic in me says that anyone can be bought, at the cost of a variety of things: our children, our planet, our very own health. Paving over green zones and having McDonald's (again) for lunch while we let our kids be UNDER-educated in our system's schools is how we do this. If we could just change our focus. Our Priorities. Our lifestyles to really reasonable things like health, the environment, and the family, a more sustainable and enjoyable world would result. Guaranteed.

Below is a little flowchart (ch.76) that I created that ties in with "priorities" and the choices people make when it comes to any extra available money (if any). Since "changes" and "choices" are the 2 things that need to be realized early into this 21st Century, I thought I would pop it in with this blog.

Let's Get Extreme

Chapter 82: Let's Get Extreme!!!

(or: When Did You Become So Boring?)

Doing things that are extreme can be fun. They are often deemed by others to be "hardcore" or "deathly", thus bringing one's cool-0-meter to a an all new high. So for the people that care about things such as these, then NOT being afraid to have hobbies & interests that are considered extreme will likely become a beneficial/crucial part of your every day life.

The following are a few examples of extreme things that a person could do, if seeking to be the least bit non-conformist, or at the very least - a tad adventurous:

• Tattooing and piercing - get the neck tattoo. I hear spiderwebs are popular. Or the nipple ring. You too, ladies.
  
  
• Get Motorbiking. Cycling is truly more non-conformist, but that loud, raucous causing, 2-wheeled chopper will always be the epitome of rebel. Not to mention there is a degree of danger to it that screams "extreme", depending on, of course, which tattoo & piercing studio you go to.
  
  
• Go Sky Diving. This puts bungee jumping to shame. And let's face it: That helmet is wearing you for protection.
  
  
• Attend a G8/G20 summit. Bust some shit up. Try to not get arrested. Or do.
  
  

Being extreme will be closely associated with having a unique and inexplicable range of taste in things. He or she will take a great pleasure in a wide, wide spectrum of places, books, people, and things. The more polarized these interests are will be indicative of how truly A) out of his/her mind a person is or B) how confused he/she is about the priorities in his life. This spectrum of interests can include things like:

• Foods. Living the vegan/vegetarian life one month and then having nothing but The Cow the next. Eating banana peppers on tuna fish and peanut butter & ham sandwiches will help you to achieve this whole new level on the extreme-o-meter.
  
  
• Politics. Be a neo-ultraconservative greedy self-absorbed capitalist bastard, that actually cares about the environment (or says he does, anyways). In a more general sense, "Being Albertan but having Socialist Ideals" are 2 extremes that really make a person fairly unique. Think that former coke-head Tory MP: Rahim Jaffer.
  
  
• Ideals (of Freedom). Becoming an ignorant intellect requires that you spend some degree of time thinking about the world & all of its wonders and atrocities - and then become apathetic about it. Live in a blissful oblivion and love being footloose & carefree. Because Freedom can be a wonderful concept, especially if you believe that it exists at all and is not just another societal meme. In the meantime, pack your 2500 sq.ft. home with as many 56"-3D-LCD-HDTVs as you can afford and legitimize this excessive expense by buying yourself a solar panel and wearing fair trade organic "elephants need love too" t-shirt. Cuz believe it or not, kids: This is the world, the system, we live in. It's a self-propelled machine that we are all components of. And remember that "unless your free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!" as this component. Not to mention that subsistence living is even LESS fun than it sounds. Books take sooo long to read. Natural gas is an affordable commodity. And shopping at West Edmonton Mall is just soooooo much FUN!!!
  
  
• Music. The degree of separation between 90% of the music I listen to is outrageous. The most distinguishable differences of genres on my iPod could be classified as either melodic hardcore or Canadian folk music. These extremes are very diverse and really have no business being on the same mp3 player. Right now SNFU, Propagandhi, Pennywise, Bad Religion, and Screeching Weasel are on the playlist, along with Matthew Barber, Justin Rutledge, Neil Young, Ray LaMontagne, and David Gray. It's almost inconceivable. But it exists nevertheless. Extreme.
  
  
• Sex. Extreme sex. Hardcore SEX. Better than soft core after all! Any guy is pretty much wishing for this every hour of every day, so the second that he will find a woman that is willing to "submit" to anything a little bit more wild than the usual semi-pornographic plights is usually the moment that the guy is usually ready for marriage. At the same time, us idealistic sex-craving philanthropic chauvinistic metropolitan men may like to cry & scream about Female Liberation! and equal opportunity ...as long as it doesn't happen in our own bedroom. Or dungeon.
  
  
• Exercise. Excessive Exercise. Running marathons and loving a good cigarette afterward. Bench-pressing 3 times your body weight then picking up a six-pack on your way home. Playing hockey, but having more PIM than Ice Time. Oh. And don't forget about Crashed Ice. These things are extreme. Also, UFC is popular amongst kids these days, or so I hear.
  
  
• Seeing the World. Traveling to Africa. The Dark Continent. Where stereotypes and prejudice and mis-information runs rampant. Go there. Learn something. Come back. Teach something. God knows we are ignorant. When back at home, realize how much change can happen right outside your back door, so to speak. Having a good appreciation of your local community and its faults and good things can be enlightening too. Just. Get out there. Anywhere. Especially if you can't afford the airfare (or are too socially conscious about the environmental costs of air flight). There's always sailing...
  
  
• "Work". The last paradoxical/hypocritical suggestion I have regarding extreme lifestyle choices is giving yourself the opportunity to make conscious career decisions, inasmuch as having a thorough moral understanding of any implications of the "work" you are getting yourself involved with. Try: Working in a lumber yard while listing the Rainforest Action Network as a beneficiary in your will. Try: working in resource exploitation while "liking" the links that your "friend" Mike Hudema posts on his facebook profile. With your wages, buy a bike but keeping on commuting to work in your gas guzzler...
  

Without these things, a person tends to fall into the first circle of hell called Ennui. Others see him for what he is: a complacent, middle-aged working class office stooge with mortgage payments and mouths to feed and the rest of it. Apathy advances to a stage far beyond you ever thought possible in your younger years. Ideals fade away. And the positive re-enforcement allows one's sense of adventure to diminish as he falls deeper and deeper into the well of "routine work" and "just getting by". Hello shot gun barrel. Travel plans become a trip to your backyard patio after the fence gets painted and food becomes bland as you listen to the latest study on the Local News about salt being bad. Exercise is walking the dog and the motorbike turns into an SUV (hybrid? Yeah Right!). Or worse: mini-van. Sex is infrequent and fast. What you are left with is a few cd's from those exciting days that are fading from memory and perhaps a government that left you with a social support network that your mother-in-law deserves.

So my advice to you as I close out this blog:

Never grow up. Always go for the "bad" girl, eat lots of spicy food, and travel the globe as much as possible.

And if submitting to the expectations of our surrounding means
growing up
I'll try wholeheartedly to refuse

-satanic surfers

George Carlin does this all soo much better.

It takes two... doesn't it?

Chapter 57

It doesn't take much to get a reaction from most people by saying ludicrous or blasphemous or just plain stupid crap. And a guy can really earn himself a reputation by using his big yap in a repetitive fashion such that people really start to think: "Is this guy for real?!" With borderline common sense and a sliver of "knowing your audience", I find that I can really get away with saying some pretty wild stuff while still staying out of trouble. So when it comes to talking to members of the opposite sex who may not know me very well, I have to try & push the envelope a bit while taking care to not push things too TOO far. Especially early on.

But some girls are just so damn' difficult to talk to. You can be within 2m of them and feel the sexual tension between the two of you. And that's usually when your voice becomes completely stifled and lips totally parched. Blame the hot dry Alberta air if you want, but between the two of you, you both know that only relative humidity that matters is the relative humidity IN YOUR PANTS! (haha, made myself laugh)

It's pretty tough in asking out a girl. Especially when you happen to know that she is more likely than not way out of your league. But it still is just one of those things that just has to get done. And a guy has got to be careful or he may very well end up as "Just Friends" - and what guy really wants that?! Then again, some of the best long-term relationships - Hell, I'll say it: Marriages - are more likely to last when a deeper respect and friendship is in place between both parties from a very early stage.

Some girls that a guy asks out will turn out to be prissy conceited beotches. This is their shield. The shield that my confident charm and charismatic character help to penetrate.

Ha!

So what a guy really must figure out is whether the persistence, endurance, relentlessness, and (false) hope he is investing in will be worth it in the long run. Finding something more than just platonic respect in a companion. Keep on keeping on. Fool, give UP already! How long can a guy really cling on to a glimmer of a hope after all? And what if he invests in a significant amount of time persisting, enduring, provoking - all to just find out that she's, say, more into girls in the end! Bummer dude. Call it: character development.

I think what it comes down to in the end is The Height of the Bar, degree of intrigue she may offer, and to a lesser extent: alcohol tolerance. It would be nice if I had a clue in hell as to whether any of the investments made (quick-witted conversations, flattery, shaving) pay off at a much earlier time. Rather than finding out that she is seeing someone or is just exceptionally career-minded & has no time to waste on relationships/me. priorities, right? I think I might have dwelled on "priorities" once or twice through this blog of mine... Also, initiation is key. Wouldn't it be nice if she took the initiative? This seldom happens. And when it does, the guy is usually so incredibly thick the he doesn't even realize it whatsoever. Explicit Provoking. That is really the only answer. Thank you "facebook pokes" for opening up a whole new gateway of possibilities, as unseemly as they might be. So if the lack of initiative on her part is just a matter of the guy opening up his eyes and realizing what's happening - that's one thing! But if the impenetrable shield she has in place simply for the fact that she can't stand him (or her bar's set Just That Much Higher), well - that's another thing completely.

Scarlett Johannson is pretty.


Sidenote:

This blog is about having more than one person willing to invest in and build towards a more meaningful relationship, rather than just having the guy torment himself with aggravating relentless attempts at having a shot with someone he has no business having a shot with. That Said. I am going to try to say something that doesn't sound overly sensitive (for the Pisces I am) or overly critical of my friends or the Institution of the Roman Catholic Church.

All good Catholics, I would have thought, would be much more welcoming to non-Catholics than I ever saw growing up. Once an outsider, always an outsider. Unless you baptize, confirm, and go to church every Sunday? No thanks. But truly, there was a minuscule amount of inclusion through this institution. As above, it takes two parties to be willing to show an interest in each other if any sort of relationship is going to have a shot. The lack of willingness of the church and its followers to embrace - heck, even save a lost soul is a little bit underwhelming.

And further yet, as friends grow apart with time and distance, it is really very easy to go from changing your thinking to that friend being "someone you used to know". That's why I find it funny that more/better attempts aren't made - even between friends - to keep in touch about any goings-on that the other might find interesting. Way to go, pal! Ya know, I would have liked to go to that strip club with you guys, too!



Old Blogs Semi-Related:
http://eternalhappyness.blogspot.com/2008/04/wavelength.html
http://eternalhappyness.blogspot.com/2009/02/hole-filler.html

5 Simple Rules for Writing A Propagandhi Song (and becoming at least mildly successful).

1 - First and foremost, be sure to have excessive (but always appropriate) use of the F-word throughout each of the songs, even if it is at the end of the song and there is nothing left to do but just add a loud unadulterated and raw "F&#$!!!!".

2 - A healthy dose of satire is essential to a successful Propagandhi song. Denouncing anything corporate or industrial with plenty of ridicule and judgment is always a good bet.

3 - Try to come across as a passionate humanitarian that really "gets it" by writing songs that speak to local, regional, national, and international issues. Re-enforce this Global Citizen persona by listing non-fiction books about genocide or planetary destruction on your website and album sleeves, along with lists of web addresses for the wee teenies to check out with their newest i-phones. A few dystopian quotes from famous dead people may also help your cause. Better yet? Incorporate these quotes right into your songs.

4 - Come up with a reason (as reasonable as this reason may very well be) to become an expatriot. Re-think today's Canadian Values (of greed and pirateering) and compare them to values in other countries around the world. After a brief glimpse at this website I can tell you that the things on Canadians minds most of the times these days are sex-related, and although sex-related crimes and topics are totally heinous, remember that these problems are stemmed from a much deeper roots in the ways that we are raising our children and conforming to so much of the pop-culture bullshit that bombards us everywhere we go.

Canadians need to get a better idea of what there is to be so "nationalist" about, aside from the Winter Olympics, and a national sport where over-paid dumb jocks spend half of their season playing for 1 of 24 American-Based teams in their home arenas, while the 6 remaining Canadian teams spend any of their "off time" golfing in Phoenix or holidaying in Barcelona (when you miss playoffs especially). Aside from sport? I guess we have Celine Dion. Wait. Isn't she in Vegas? Shania? Switzerland? Bryan Adams?!?! Oh right! Justin Rutledge annnnnnd Propagandhi. Good bands. Hmmm...what else do we have... Healthcare. And the rocky mountains. Some of the Canadian landscape is pretty damn' terrific when we're not busy fucking it up.

5 - Never sell out and keep the songs for the kids and not for the labels to make a killing. So many times a label will tell you what to write and how to write it. Case in point: AFI was on Nitro til 2003 and have had pretty weird albums ever since then. I don't think Propagandhi will ever sell out.

Other Useful Tips For Writing a Propagandhi Song

I - Make sure the title of the song is sufficiently long like these classics:

"War Is Peace, Slavery Is Freedom, May All Your Interventions Be Humanitarian"
"Ordinary People Do Fucked-Up Things When Fucked up Things Become Ordinary"
"Stick the Fucking Flag Up Your Goddamn Ass, You Sonofabitch"

II - Use the words:

misery, love, indifference, poverty, suffering, disparity, repress, devastating, catastrophe, Jesus, church, FUCK, meat, machine, homophobe, capitalist, tragedy, solution.


III - Allow:

• 5-10% of the song to be filled with incomprehensible rage-filled fits of screaming
• 10-15% of the song to be filled with mad guitar shredding
• Allow room to be effing hilarious (not just over-the-top blasphemy/hyperbole/satire) when after all this song may very well reflect real fucking life more than you can ever imagine.
  

Now, click this and read:

We were all together in the pouring rain!
Solvents being passed around to dull the pain!
The air was choked with the dismal smell!
The reek of sadness and despair!
Minds fucked up beyond repair!


She said she just turned six.
She’s got some good jokes for a kid.
She’s working hard to avoid a woman bleeding from her teeth.
Her life goes on despite the fact
her mom sleeps fucked up on the cement.

She flashed a look, an image burnt into my mind!
I know that sinking feeling all too fucking well!
Shame! Frustration setting in!
Confusion that eats us inside out.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me!
I don’t know why she can’t wake up!”
Her life goes on despite the fact
Her mom lays fucked up on the cement.

It’s an ugly fucking world!

the incalculable effects have been calculated to you here today by the one and only:

Ch. 69

This is not what I signed up for...

There exists an air of arrogance within the engineering discipline. A sense of entitlement and self-righteousness that might be all too expectantly acceptable. I mean, who else can spend the time learning a whole other language and then using it to come up with the most intricate solutions to solve some of the world's most pressing problems. Like cleaning water. Or making electricity. Doctors and lawyers memorize Latin terminology and ... business grads? Well, they are all just capitalistic pigs with hearts of stone.

So, become an engineer. Or try to anyways. You can become a steward of society. Really, it's like the ultimate thankless service industry job. God knows that there is money in it, too. And for one year now, I have held my engineering degree while working as a box cutter, getting paid box cutter salaries.

In all honesty, it's not a bad job. Especially for a student working part-time, earning habit money and having few other expenses. At work, all you have to do is deal with a couple of ungracious or effing rude customers that come through the store from time to time and try to get along with your co-workers. The hardest part of that is getting over the condescending attitude of people that look down on box-cutters and realize that you are going to get paid well below your Earning Potential that you have hoped to be enjoying by now. Then again, living the good life of having minimal responsibilities & being accountable only to yourself is nothing to sneeze at. There's casual weekday drinking, affording to go out to shows, going on vacations, and the like. It's not all bad not having to worry about the pressures of a high-expectation engineering job.

But I hate it. It's a time-consumer and a head-do-er-inner. Every day that I cannot find a job I am actually interested in, is another day that I am not developing and using the skills that I went to school for, and not working towards that ever-important salary-booster called a P.Eng. I feel like it's eating into the best years of my life (although I know that in all honesty that those were between 1992 and 1996). In addition, this company - like many others - thrives on environmental devastation and corporate greed. It breaks your back and it eats your soul. Although, they did pay for me to get my teeth cleaned...

Everyone should have to go through it though. The service industry is atrocious and everywhere. Working in it gives the consumer a much better perspective of the hard work that goes into whatever commodity it is that's being sold. It also gives a person a reality check. Without it, you don't have as much of a clue about how nasty day-to-day interactions with some people can get. It makes you actually look at the cashier at the supermarket in the eye and say "thank-you" with a little bit more sincerity than you would otherwise. It will make you neater - no matter how neat you think you are, and it will help you watch exactly what kind and how big of a consumer you are. Especially when making service industry wages.

This wages thing blows my mind. To think that so much disparity exists between the different kinds of rich and the different kinds of poor in this world is just: GAH! We are all just people born into circumstance, after all. Next round you could be living in subsidized Projects Housing in Harlem or the slums of Bangladesh (surely, not only India and Africa have slums, hey?) Then there's the opposite extreme where even Edmonton Police are making upwards of $85K after only 5 years of service. "And then she became a cop." "Shut the fuck up!" I think in my next life I am going to become a successful rock star. But engineers really do alright too. Even Civil Grads, with no real experience! And ol' recession-proof Alberta, with all of it's Oilsands and industry needs these grads to help run projects!!! But I still can't get a job I want. Bastards!

Then again, I know I am not alone. At least one other engineer and one geophysicist I know are not working. Another mate with credits from NAIT, UofA, and GMCC is working at the bottle depot with no real aspirations to focus on a career in any of the areas he spent time studying in! Then the real motivated ones had jobs set before they were even graduated! I don't know how, aside from their good fortune, and to some extent, willingness to relocate.

If I go anywhere, it will have to be for something worth while. "Like a girl?!" "No, Ryan, not a girl." Well, we'll see. But a sweet gig where providing/treating water to people who would really appreciate it, or anything related to the environment would sure be sweet. If I could get a sweet deal like that, I wouldn't even care if my salary was double of what it was now, rather than triple, as it very well COULD be. Half it and send me to a well in Kenya, I would also be thrilled. And I'd probably be blogging about something more important like poverty, water resources , disparity & conflict or something!

My issues with not getting the work I want could be psychological. In that I am psychotic. I am complacent and apathetic and idiotic for not trying harder to get any fucking job that will help me use my degree. That, or perhaps employers just don't like me. Real possibility. What can a guy do?!

As intermediate box cutter, I am taking it for what it's worth as yet another stepping stone in character development. God knows I'm not enough of a character YET! There is nothing glamorous or prestigious about this job that gives me anything more than just that. One of the things that comes with a sweet-ass environmental engineering job (aside from the money & independent that it brings), is confidence in having/building relationships. A guy can feel a hell of a lot better about himself knowing that the girl that he is after won't laugh at him for being, say, a box cutter. Even with the prestige of an engineering job, I feel that the humility of the box cutter's realism will earn him bonus points with her. "Real Workin' Man" points, where blackberrying and e-mailing and sitting in the cushy office chair are out of the equation completely. One might even go as far as to call it "honest work". Then with that non-box cutter job and a real engineering job - she will immediately think to herself: "Oooh - Brains And Money. But when was the last time he washed that shirt?"

Alright, this is gonna have to do as I have to finish my 2nd beer and have to get up for work in just over 4 hours. I wonder what the Jobs section will look like in The Journal tomorrow...


ch. 80

Canadian Girls Are Amazing

It wasn't too long ago that I was singing along to an old Propagandhi song called "I'd Rather Be Flag Burning". But that is far from where I am today where all I feel is insurmountable pride and ... happiness for my country over the past 2 weeks of the 2010 Winter Olympics.

Coming in, I was more disappointed than shocked when news polls were saying how it's more important to Canadians to win a gold in Men's Hockey than finish with a high medals total overall. Well maybe that's just because Canadians weren't as optimistic as I was about Canada actually contending with the likes of America and Germany or Russia. Well guess who we have to thank for the overwhelming success at the gold medals so far: Amazing Canadian Women. Out of the 8 gold's received so far, 6 have been by the most incredible, talented, high-spirited, crazy-good lookin' women. Maelle Ricker kicked it off with a kickass sport: snowboard cross, which was fastly followed by Christine Nesbitt, Tessa Virtue, Kaillie Humphreys, Heather Moyse, a bunkload of hockey players headed by Hayley Wickenheiser, and finally - my favorite - Ashleigh McIvor.

So if it's not gold it's silver. Well for silver so far our Canadian Girls own 5 out of the 6 events including Kristina Groves (Jeremy's time is done, afterall) and the cutest of them all: Jenn Heil! (No, we haven't forgot about you, Jenn!) Another local lady, Jessica Gregg, has also made me proud to be from a country that has so many amazing girls!!!! (even if they are living in Missouri...)

Amazing, amazing, just endless amazing. Hell! Clara Hughes has earned herself something like 4 Winter Olympic medals and 2 Summer Olympic medals! If that's not a sign that our women are made out of something special I don't know what is.

The bronze? Well that's just a ridiculous story. 3 out of Canada's 3 bronze medals are worn by women. And included in that is Joannie Rochette. This champion had her mother up and die on her in the midst of the Olympic Games. And she still competed. How? God knows. But she did, and won a medal. And for that, she will forever be the ultimate female Canadian competitor. Well, in addition to those hockey players that crush the dreams of the Americans. That's pretty cool too.

Next up is Cheryl Bernard, cougar. I mean curler. She will own and it will be great. After that? Who knows, but I am hopeful for more speed skating, bobsleigh, and snowboard.

So! I guess what I am saying is that I am putting away the Russian Bride Catalogue for good. I don't know what it's gonna take for me to ever win the heart of one of these amazing Canadian girls that amaze me in soooo much in all that they do - okay - there are amazing ones that aren't Olympians, too. But to start, I think I am going to take up freestyle aerials.

My, My, My - My Edmonton Oilers

Right now I'm listening to the Oilers lose. 4 - 0. In the 2nd Period. This will make about 18 losses in their last 20 games or something. They went one game less than tying their longest LOSE streak ever and for the first time in 30 years have they lost a complete season series to the Frickin' Flames. Well what the heck is a guy to do?! I'm not gonna pretend to have all the answers or know where blame should be placed, but I do have an opinion about where the team has made a few mistakes. It all started more than 30 years ago...

Oil. what a word these days. Everyone hates to love it but needs it so much. Loving to hate it is something that is easier done by those extremist greenpeace environmentalists (yay) or those who have been directly affected by the impact of oil in a negative way. (Although, you can buy your health here in Alberta). Well, thirty years ago nothing was heard in the mainstream culture with regards to global warming or environmental impact of oilsands. How times have changed. If this is what the Oilers' founders anticipated, maybe they would have named our Oil Kings something like the PLANETEERS or something like that! Nowadays, players are told they are going to be sent to Latitude 53° - the Gateway to the North - The City of Champions - The Roughneck Capital of Canada* - OIL COUNTRY - and they think "God, I sure hope the fans are at least passionate about their hockey, cuz the most northern major city in Canada doesn't sound like much fun otherwise". That's assuming you are a hockey player that dislikes Kid Rock anthems after any rare goal that the Oilers happen to score.

So there you are. A (multi-)million dollar athlete. In a place you can't stand being. With one of the oldest rinks in the league and and the least creative if not god-awful Game jerseys that could have ever been conjured. Little do you know, Mr. Hockey Player, that 65% of your live audience isn't paying any attention to you whatsoever, but is rather neck deep in his 4th glass of Eight Dollar Molson Canadian Beer. This is assuming he isn't straddling his girlfriend with his tongue down his throat in hopes of grabbing the attention of the "Cisn Country Smooch Cam" to make it on the jumbo-tron, for all of our most shameless perversions.

These are our fans. Funny thing, those abandoning band wagoners. Even if it wasn't 4 years since this same team made it to the 7th game in the Stanley Cup Finals. We would riot on Whyte with the passion that we had for our players. Back then, we could even attract the likes of Chris Pronger to show up in a real "hockey town". What's happened Mr. Katz? I'll tell you what happened. Cal Nichols and Steve Tambellini saw opportunity to make a quick buck to buy that second or third vacation home. Now, instead of having a well-balanced group of investors in which would decide the direction of the team, one man - a drug-pusher - will make those decisions. Dictatorship. The elusive and quirky, owner Daryl Katz, chooses to make his public announcements via texting?!?! and then have the said text messages not even be true. MacT IS going anywhere. Now, this drughappy oddball is even selling his drug products in baskets in the Oilers Giftshops inside of Rexall Place. Hand sanitizers, bottled water, headpills are a few of the products you could be indulging in when feeling uneasy and/or nauseated halfway through the 2nd Period. All in a neatly packed basket.


I had high hopes going into this season. We had the return of our favourite little twerp-hero, Mike Comrie who was going to redeem himself and prove that he is just not a total waste of space. "AhhhCHU!" That was his barbie doll girlfriend sneezing on him. Hilary Duff didn't like the idea of spending all this time in the Great White North so she decided to make him sick. This way, she could have them doing "couples things" together like him learning tap and dance steps in Radio City Music Hall, from her latest pop hit. It's very true that a woman can put a spell on a guy and he will do anything she wishes, but even so, it's hard to not be disappointed when all that a city wanted was for him to come and try to salvage some of what was once good of the club he represents - not to mention his own reputation.

Speaking of Big Babies. Penner. Last season this dumb jock was simply unwilling to suck it up and perform for a coach that he didn't see eye-to-eye with. How Professional. Then all of a sudden, the dude/douche (<-- can't decide) says he's all reformed and re-dedicated and eating healthier and doing the right things to be mentally into the game this year. Welllllll so much for that. Sure, his stats aren't terrible (45pts in 57g) but he is just one of those guys that you can watch not trying when it doesn't suit him. That reminds me of some of my own teammates back from the good ol' days...

Let's stop ragging on the individual players for a brief moment. The OILERS as a collective unit have had a hard time of it. First off: No H1N1 shot. Well jeepers, boys! Aren't you supposed to be the fittest, healthiest members of society who get paid millions to play a kids game?! With all that money, how do you excuse yourself for living the kind of lifestyle that enables you to get sick? Is it toooo much travel, being stuck waaay up here on the 53rd parallel and having so many 2 to 4 hour flights? Is it the $97,000 New Year's Eve Parties and hangovers that follow?! Not to mention that the H1N1 shot that got everyone in such a huff has stuff in it that informed individuals try to stay away from! But nevertheless you cry about it when your line-up is flu-stricken and missing games but the Flames are set, with Alberta and all of it's Healthcare Wonders. Just quit sharing Comrie's girlfriend. Oops. A bit far? Maybe. But then again, maybe if Pronger could keep it in his pants in this cold, cold climate, then maybe his wife wouldn't force him out of the no-trade clause and in to marriage counselling, and we would all still be seeing a team with at least one defenceman. If none of the above, is it the puke-practices run by your new coach Patty Daddy and him canceling your team break trip of golfing in Palm Springs?

Also, people fail to realize that the Edmonton Oilers organization has established itself as a player development team. The second that an 18 or 20 year old gets signed and prove themself as a player with potential and perhaps have a couple of big seasons, they will bugger off elsewhere. That's why Ryan Smyth was so well liked. He didn't leave. The bigger names that did ever play a season or two with the Oil must have had some pretty good agents to convince them to get out of Dodge before they get old and useless (unlike Staios' agent). On the flip side, skilled players that come in to the organization seem to lose their talent. I suppose when Hemsky's not getting nailed trying to make that pretty pass to our newest (hopeful) goal scorer, say, O'Sullivan, then we don't really have much left in ways of getting any offence generated, regardless of the skilled forwards that have come and gone.

Alright. So let's just pound out a few names here that, regardless of whether you like them or not, would be welcome additions to the team at this stage of the game, if we were able to retain them...

IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER:

Whitney, Dvorak, Torres, Weight, Guerin, Marchant!!, Smith, Arnott, Peca, Sykora, Lupul, Laraque!!!, and even Poti, Roloson & Markannen & Garon... Cujo (nahhh)...

Don't those names sound better than:

Oldman Staios, Dumby Head Moreau, What's Eating Matthew Gilbert, Horrible Horcoff, Hemorrhaging Hemsky, Goofy Grebeshkov, or Lubomir the Lubo'assholio?

I think so...

Lastly, leadership. Ethan Moreau. At the turn of the Century I would have loved an #18 Moreau jersey. He was a gritty checker who would drop the gloves and pound out thunderous mid-ice hits. Now he's old, slow, and doesn't seem to care anymore. Maybe he got sad when Smyth left. I don't know. But he's certainly nowhere near to being what a team needs from a leader. They would be much better off naming O'Sullivan, or better yet: Potulny the captain.

Annnnnd coaching.

Even though Craig MacTavish failed to get his boys into the playoffs 5 out of 8 times, he didn't do it not for want of trying. The years he did get us in always made for an exciting (albeit short) playoffs. And on average his team finished with 87 points over the MacT reign. And one of those times got us the Western Conference Championship. Right now the Oilers have 42 points. On pace for 47. All at the hands of some Eastern Pensioner - Pat Quinn.

Sure, say what you want. "But Pat Quinn's from Edmonton" and "Ohhh I have no more respect for anyone than Pat Quinn." Why? This guy got sent here cuz the price was right and he thought that his old-school ways could redeem this hurtin' team from the wild west. Well, blood's thicker than water, Old Man. And MacT was an Oiler. This homegrown passion and love is the reason why he would try year after year to make his boys win games, even if that meant benching lazy ouffs like Penner. He knew their capabilities and faults better than anyone and coped the best he could given the way the budgets were set up through til the Players Strike.

I think the Oilers would be a lot better off if this Old Man went and retired to Florida (take with Don Cherry with him) and we were rid of the coach that did sooo much for the Toronto Maple Leafs for 7 seasons??! The ultimate failure of Pat Quinn was when he went on the air and was recorded as saying "I've never been this embarrassed". This is your mess, fella. Even more than Katz's or Penner's or anyone's. You signed up to fix us, so quit crying about your circumstances or just shut up and go do some illegal trading with Pocklington in Disneyland.

An organization that is being run as poorly as this doesn't deserve as new arena either, regardless of how old it might be. The Edmonton North East is where the history is and where it needs to remain. Now let's go play some golf.


*Calgary is the Redneck Capital of Canada

p.s. Deslauriers is okay. Give the kid a break. Khabibulin is the disappointment (and 37 year old mistake - isn't Roloson being so old the reason why we wanted to get rid if him??) If I had it my way, we would have kept Mathieu Garon and Jussi Makkannen where I truly believe they both would have had much better luck in subsequent seasons.

p.p.s. I don't understand for the life of me why Rod Phillips won't call Lubomir Visnovsky "Lubo" when he called Boris Mironov "Bobo" for sooo many years!

The Best of Millwoods (Is Better Than What You May Think)

Ch. 62

So many people love to rag on Millwoods. They love to talk about the gangs, the muggings, the street drugs, sexual assaults at transit centers, and the opium busts, which may even lead to the question of what Canadian - Edmontonian - soldiers are doing in Afghanistan. They love to count how many minority groups are within their classrooms and how many white trash rednecks live within walking distance of the Millwoods town center in this place that is often referred to as "ghetto" or "the hood".

But I am here to tell you that this is really truly an amazing community, as communities go. The many minority groups have sooo much to offer and really, it's about time that we start appreciating all of our multi-cultural wonderfulness that really exists within that approximate 40 square kilometers of green spaces, golf courses, schools, dog parks, and even a water park. And as for the "white trash rednecks"? Well, they are not just in Millwoods. Of this, I am certain. Edmonton is falls into the jurisdiction of Northern Alberta, afterall. And really, the schools in the area are held to pretty high standards, as far as I have seen­ª. Not to mention that having schools that taught a different (i.e. better) curriculum is part of our jobs in electing a government with the values that reflect our own. (that's been blogged about already i am sure) Gangs are only of concern if you are in a gang and drug deals are usually done conspiculously enough such that your every day Millwoodsonian will not notice.


But what's so grande about this place I call home besides it having a moderately priced golf course and a mall with an HMV? And really, a much exaggerated reputation for being a bad place? Well I'll tell ya!

For 25 years now, I have been experiencing the grandeur lifestyle in this place called Millwoods. For my first 5 or 6 years, life was golden! Short walks to the local store, playground, or playmates. We would run around shooting water guns or nerf guns at eachother well into any given evening, with absolutely zero fear of being abducted or attacked. Between my ~7th and ~13th years, a lot of time was spent at the Millwoods Recreation Center - a building BUILT by the community. (Not like anywhere else now, where everyone wants new buildings and ask someone else to pay for it!!) In this rec centre, I remember my first jump in the dive tank, swing off the tarzan rope and step I took on the hockey rink. Later on, this rink would become the place where I would score hat tricks against the Millwoods Team in their own building (Go Knights!) and this pool would be where I would show off doing 200m swims in the "advanced" group of students in the high school co-ed gym class. I even remember that sign that said "athletes need fresh air" and the day that the city went "smoke-free" and it wasn't as bad walking through the players entrance to the dressing rooms anymore on the way out from the building. This focal point of Millwoods really brought together the community and allowed young families to let their children to interact and learn from eachother.


The freedoms in Canada are often highlighted in Millwoods, especially with all of its cultural diversity. I must have been about in grade 3 or 4 when I first noticed this. But it wasn't til Junior High til I realized that for me to learn some Tagalog was actually a legitimate possibility. And then only about a few months ago I saw children "playing" with actual sabres/swords/long blades of some sort in a church/temp/e parking lot that was obviously practice for some religious thing. Cool. In Millwoods, a person can where what they want and go where they want wearing that feeling reasonably safe. I just finished watching Mississippi Burning so I guess I am just trying to say that despite all of our short-comings when it comes to acceptance and prejudice - here in Millwoods - you can at least express yourself for the Millwoods Hero you are!!

On another occasion, there was a blackout. It must have lasted about 45 minutes to an hour. The whole community became unplugged from their electronic vices and got plugged right back in to the community. It was sunset and the whole of Millwoods was outside. This is no exaggeration. It was really incredible to see so many dogs for walks and just friendly greetings as people passed by each other.

The stores are pretty great in mdot. For starters, Sobeys has always produced an amazing staff of deli-workers. Namely, Heather & Heather. (although there are others!) Who can ask for anything more?!?! It's tragic, really, but with the JIT servicing & the Big Box Stores & globalization in general, I am finding myself traveling out to the new superstore who actually has much more reasonable prices. When I have to, the MWTC Safeway is actually not the worst thing, because at least then, I can see my favorite security guard in all of Edmonton. You know the guy I'm talking about if you live in millwoods!! But I will always love my Sobeys girls. The 2nd best place to spend money in millwoods is @ the 3 or 4 year old Dairy Queen in 23rd. Although, we have some pretty interesting pubs too...

This summer I hung out at the MWTC parking lot on another occasion. I went to a DRIVE IN!! They were showing the movie Up! so I drove down there with a friend and some snacks and had a pretty good time!! Millwoods has it all!!!

Our elected officials are con artists and I hate all politicians and think they are all corrupt. NEVERTHELESS, my old bus driver, Amarjeet Sohi is doing what he can to represent his electorate. This Millwoods councilor is not afraid to go in front of cameras & actually speak an opinion or idea - whereas David the Fat Ass Thiele - does nothing but sit on his ass & blackberry the shit out of his endless days on the city's payroll whether the council is sitting or not. They both showed up for the Conservative MP, Mike Lake's, pancake breakfast though. Lake represents Millwoods but really, he's just another back-bencher that keeps another seat from another party while desperately trying to use any political clout to bring attention to Autism, which his son happens to have. So yeah! Millwoods!! Pancake Breakfasts!!! Party on!!! Even though, you had to ask the conservative line cooks for a second pancake to be flipped onto your plate. I wonder how many pancakes Thiele ate? More than Benito cuz the PC-MLA was a no-show.

My Edmonton Public Library. What can I even say?? She and I have been going steady now for about 10 years. Before that, we were less frequent sweethearts, but now, our relationship is stronger than ever and I love her so. I can't wait to see her next week. I think she has something there waiting for me. I only ever cheated on her when I was @ Grant MacEwan and snuck around with her sister downtown. Shhh. Don't tell.


The timely release of this blog comes following a recent meeting regarding the fate of Graunke Park (on 50th & 34th). This green space is a hot spot for kids to "have a good time" - use your imagination. So one of the things they are doing now is actually trying to revitalize it. This might include incorporating kids from the area schools to clean it up, 55+ groups to maintain it, and a whole bunch more of us involved community members to have a vision and insight of how to make it better. Maybe next time I will even go to the meeting! As much as I want to travel and see the world and LEAVE EDMONTON for the mean time, I think that some of my time could be invested in helping to shape a part of a community that has truly shaped me over the past quarter century.