The pacemaker has saved millions of lives, including the man who invented it. Seriously, how weird is that? A guy invents a gadget that keeps a dying heart beating, which then saves the lives of millions of strangers over a couple of decades and then, forty years later, his invention saves his own life.
In 1949 two Canadian doctors, Dr. William Bigelow and Dr. John Callaghan, working at the Banting and Best Institute* laboratory in Toronto, were experimenting with extreme cold as a way to better conduct open heart surgery by slowing the human heart. Along the way they determined they needed a device to restart the heart when and if it stopped.
Canada has a pure research facility, a “blue sky lab” in Ottawa where scientists can work on anything they can get government funding for, it’s called the National Research Council. At the same time Bigelow and Callaghan were researching extreme cold and heart surgery in Toronto, Dr. John Hopps, an electrical engineer, was a researcher at the NRC working on using radio frequencies to restore body temperature in hypothermia victims. During this research he discovered that the heart could be artificially started using electricity.
The two physicians found Hopps and the three men worked together and found that by “applying a gentle electrical stimulus to the heart would not only duplicate the normal body nerve stimulation but it would also not cause any damage to the heart muscle. In addition, this technique would start a stopped heart and increase or decrease the heart rate, as required.”
The first cardiac pacemaker was fully developed by 1950, and basically took over the hearts electrical system, artificially pumping blood through the body. It was mostly an external device that operated similar to today’s internal pacemakers but weighed over three pounds and had to be plugged into the wall. It was not meant to be a permanent solution.
The first human to have one of these devices implanted was in 1958. It was the first electronic device to be implanted into the human body. Today’s pacemakers are about the size of a Toonie (a $2 Canadian coin) and, of course, fully implantable.
In 1999 the pacemaker was chosen as one of the five most significant Canadian engineering accomplishments of the 20th century by “National Engineering Week”. The other four were the Confederation Bridge, the Canadarm, the Transcontinental Railway Rogers Pass project (which my grandfather was a project manager for) and the IMAX motion picture system.
Hopps spent most of his engineering career as the head of the NRC’s Medical Engineering Section of the Division of Electrical Engineering. Under his leadership, this group produced a variety of inventions to help the blind, to assist people with muscular disabilities, and to advance the diagnostic uses of ultrasound. He and his colleagues also developed technologies that built upon his early cardiovascular research. In 1984 Hopps had a pacemaker implanted to regulate his own heartbeat. Hopps passed away on November 24, 1998.
*Banting & Best, Canadians, “invented” insulin.
Just a quick warning about the comment section… for some reason the entire population of Colombia took exception with this piece. Or at least some Trolls had some fun, but so did I. Enjoy.
Pierre Berton (1980): History repeats itself, over and over again. We repeat it because no one learns. We think we do, then we walk into the same wall we should have torn down years ago. And even when some of us do learn, it’s generally too late or the Newly Knowledgable is declared a Nut Job because no one else knows what the fuck they’re talking aboot. America’s first lesson in how not to fight wars outside its own borders was taught by Canada in what became known as “The War of 1812”. But making direct connections between the past and present is not what this book, “The Invasion Of Canada: 1812-1813,” is aboot. Pierre doesn’t make direct connections in his books. I, however, do make them on my blog.
When I was in grade ten my history teacher once made a point of telling us about Pierre. He extolled the virtues of learning everything aboot Canadian history we possibly could and Pierre could be our gateway. And I ate it up because I was a Teenage Nationalist. Pierre, my teacher said, had written aboot all of the major points of Canada’s history and as he spoke I was writing down names of Pierre‘s books which I planned on reading as soon as I found them. Until Mr. Clancy said that Pierre had a team of research assistants who helped him. And I, being a Teenage Absolutist, thought that meant Pierre cheated*. The fucker. Plus his books were huge and I, being a Teenage Teenager, really didn’t like hardcover books. And so it went. Until I found this one (in trade paperback).
There’s a weird history between America and Canada. Canadians are, basically, Americans and Americans are, basically, Canadians because we were all once, basically, British. Then there’s our French roots. Most of what became America was once owned by France, while a large chunk of Canada — Quebec — was once a colony of France. Quebec was then conquered by the British in 1759, and as payback France then helped British-Americans defeat the British during the 1776 American Revolution. Then Canadians — French-Canadians along with British-Canadians and Canadian ‘Indians’ — teamed up with the British-British to defeat the American invasion of Canada during the War of 1812, which was really an extension of Napoleons war against Everyone Not French In Europe… which France lost to Britain.
This is from the back of the book: “To America’s leaders in 1812, an invasion of Canada seemed to be “a mere matter of marching,” as Thomas Jefferson confidently predicted. How could a nation of 8 million fail to subdue a struggling colony of 300,000? Yet, when the campaign of 1812 ended, the only Americans left on Canadian soil were prisoners of war. Three American armies had been forced to surrender, and the British were in control of Michigan Territory and much of Indiana and Ohio.” We had also burnt the White House to the ground. Pierre asserts in “The Invasion Of Canada” that if there had been no War of 1812 most of Ontario would be American simply through being more British than not, and if Canada had lost the war the “America” of today would be, basically, North America. But there was, and we won, and here we are with free health care, hockey and edible Beavertails.
The British colonies of Canada (Upper Canada and Lower Canada) and America (the 13 colonies) had already started to grow apart even before the American Revolution, but finally became fully independent of each other after the War of 1812. Before, since and forever-after Canadians, according to Pierre, “valued ‘peace, order and good government’ rather than the more hedonistic ‘life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness’.”
Pierre wrote this book, or at least it was published, in 1980. Way before Iraq Two, Afghanistan, Iraq One, Bosnia, Somalia, Lybia or Granada. But even if it had been published yesterday Pierre didn’t write to make points against current political policies. He wouldn’t draw parallels between the failed and humiliating invasion of Canada nearly 200 years ago and what’s happening in the world today. Although I would and, basically, I just did. Pierre wrote as an historian and as a (capital J) Journalist. He wrote to bring the events which formed Canada to people who currently call themselves “Canadian”. When I was in high school I was lucky to have two teachers who were able to teach aboot Canada. Most people my age didn’t have any. I was telling a friend recently that the first time I decided I was going to write a book aboot Canadian history (as opposed to an Elmore Leonard-inspired Pulp novel) was aboot fifteen-years ago… I was in a Chapters (a national bookstore chain) looking for a book on Canadian politics and I found four. Four books on Canada in a Canadian bookstore surrounded by rows and rows and rows of British and American history. It has gotten better recently, there has actually been a revival, a renewed interest in Canada by Canadians. But all of those authors will use Pierre Berton as their first source, because Pierre was always there first.
Pierre was born in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, in 1920. His first jobs were working in Klondike mining camps. He started his career reporting for the Vancouver Sun in 1945. By the age of 84, he had written 50 books on Canada. Pierre was made a companion of the Order of Canada in 1986, over his career he also received three Governor General Awards for Creative Non-fiction for ‘The Mysterious North’, ‘The Last Spike’ and ‘Klondike’; two National Newspaper Awards, and; two ACTRA Awards for broadcasting. In 2004, on a national television program’s “Celebrity Tip” segment Pierre — introduced as a “marijuana connoisseur” — taught viewers how to properly roll a joint (he had smoked regularly since the 1950’s). He passed away in 2004. Adrienne Clarkson, then Governor General of Canada, said Pierre “was the most remarkable writer of Canadian historical events in the last 50 years. So much of our nationhood and our collective identity as Canadians were created by him.”
Pierre wrote another book aboot the War of 1812 a year later called “Flames Across the Border: The Canadian-American Tragedy: 1813-1814”.
Excerpt One: (page 19) “The Invasion of Canada, which began in the early summer of 1812 and petered out in the late fall of 1814, was part of a larger conflict that has come to be known in North America as the War of 1812. The war was the by-product of a larger struggle, which saw Napoleonic France pitted for almost a decade against most of Europe. It is this complexity, a war within a war within a war, like a nest of Chinese boxes, that has caused so much confusion. The watershed date “1812” has different connotations for different people. And, as in Alice’s famous caucus race, everybody seems to have won something, though there were no prizes. The Russians, for instance, began to win their own War of 1812 against Napoleon in the very week in which the British and Canadians were repulsing the invading Americans at Queenston Heights. The Americans won the last battle of their War of 1812 in the first week of 1815 — a victory diminished by the fact that peace had been negotiated fifteen days before. The British, who beat Napoleon, could also boast that they “won” the North American was because the Treaty of Ghent, which settled the matter, had nothing to say about the points at issue and merely maintained the status quo.” [all italics are the authors emphasis]
Excerpt Two: (page 129-131) “‘A PROCLAMATION: INHABITANTS OF CANADA! After thirty years of Peace and prosperity, the United States have been driven to Arms. The injuries and aggressions, the insults and indignities of Great Britain have once more left them no alternative but manly resistance or unconditional submission. The army under my Command has invaded your Country and the standard of the United States waves on the territory of Canada. To the peaceful, unoffending inhabitant, It brings neither danger nor difficulty I come to find enemies not to make them, I come to protect you not to injure you.
[…]If the barbarous and Savage policy of Great Britain be pursued, and the savages are let loose to murder our Citizens and butcher our women and children, this war, will be a war of extermination. …No white man found fighting by the Side of an Indian will be taken prisoner Instant destruction will be his Lot… . — WM Hull [William Hull, American Governor of Michigan Territory, Commander of the Army of the Northeast]’ Yet Hull has overstated his case. These are farmers he is addressing, not revolutionaries. The colonial authoritarianism touches very few. They do not feel like slaves; they already have enough peace, liberty, and security to satisfy them. This tax-free province [Canada] is not America at the time of the Boston Tea Party. Why is Hull asking them to free themselves from tyranny? In the words of one, if they had been under real tyranny, “they could at any time have crossed the line to the States.” …No Daniel Boones stalk the Canadian forests, ready to knock off an Injun with a Kentucky rifle or do battle over an imagined slight. The Methodist circuit riders keep the people law abiding and temperate; prosperity keeps them content. …There is little theft, less violence.”
Excerpt Three: (page 309) “It was not the war that the Americans, inspired and goaded by the eloquence of Henry Clay and his colleagues, had set out to fight and certainly not the glamorous adventure that Harrison’s volunteers expected. The post-Revolutionary euphoria, which envisaged the citizen soldiers of a democratic nation marching off to sure victory over a handful of robot-like mercenaries and enslaved farmers, had dissipated. America had learned the lessons that most nations relearn at the start of every war — that valour is ephemeral, that the heroes of one war are the scapegoats of the next, that command is for the young, the vigorous, the imaginative, the professional. Nor does enthusiasm and patriotism alone win battles: untrained volunteers, no matter how fervent, cannot stand up to seasoned regulars, drilled to stand fast in moments of panic and to follow orders without question. It was time for the United States to drop its amateur standing now that it intended to do what its founding fathers had not prepared for — aggressive warfare.”
Excerpt Four: (page 312) “The Indians scattered that spring for their hunting grounds. Tecumseh was still in the south, pursuing his proposal to weld the tribes into a new confederacy. The British saw eye to eye with his plan for an Indian state north of the Ohio [River]; it would act as a buffer between the two English-speaking nations on the North American continent and make future wars unattractive. The idea had long been at the core of British Indian policy.
But the Indians were soon ignored. In the official dispatches they got short shrift. The names of white officers who acted with conspicuous gallantry were invariably recorded, those of the Indian chieftains never. Even the name of Tecumseh, after [British General] Brock’s initial report, vanishes from the record. Yet these painted tribesmen helped save Canada’s hide in 1812.”
Excerpt Five (From The Conclusion): (page 313-314) “Thus the key words in Upper Canada were “loyalty” and “patriotism” — loyalty to the British way of life as opposed to American “radical” democracy and republicanism. Brock — the man who wanted to establish martial law and abandon habeas corpus — represented these virtues. Canonized by the same caste that organized the Loyal and Patriotic Society, he came to represent Canadian order as opposed to American anarchy — the “peace, order and good government” rather than the more hedonistic “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. Had not Upper Canada been saved from the invader by appointed leaders who ruled autocratically? In America, the politicians became generals; in British North America, the opposite held true.
This attitude — that the British way is preferable to the American; that certain sensitive positions are better filled by appointment than by election; that order imposed from above has advantages over grassroots democracy (for which read “licence” or “anarchy”); that a ruling elite often knows better than the body politic — flourished as a result of an invasion repelled. Out of it, shaped by an emerging nationalism and tempered by rebellion, grew that special form of a state paternalism that makes the Canadian way of life significantly different from the more individualistic American way. Thus, in a psychological as well as a political sense, we are Canadians and not Americans because of a foolish war that scarcely anyone wanted or needed, but which, once launched, none knew how to stop.”
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I’m Canadian, it’s what we do. Off the ice.
1) Cop Killer Claims Self Defence: Last week Laval police officer, Det.-Sgt. Daniel Tessier, was shot in the head and killed while serving a search warrant. His partner was shot in the arm. They were part of a team of 30 officers carrying out search warrants in Brossard and the South Shore of Montreal to break up an alleged cocaine ring. A 41-year old man, Basile Parasiris, has been charged with first-degree murder. He’s also facing charges of ‘intent to wound’ and ‘intent to endanger a life’. During the raid Parasiris’ wife was also shot in the arm. There are some serious questions aboot how the police executed the warrants. It was 5am when Tessier and his partner, both in plain clothes, and their backup battered the door down. The defence is asserting that Parasiris thought it was a violent home invasion. The gun he used to shoot the plain clothed officers was legally owned and had been registered to that address, so if the police had used the Canadian Firearms Registry before entering they should have known that there were weapons in the house. Parasiris’ 15-year old son even called 911 to report the invasion as it was taking place. At the time of his death Tessier had been on the drug force for less than 10 days, he was a father of two and a 17-year veteran on the Laval force. The funeral, which will be attended by thousands of officers from around North America, will be held on Friday. Laval, Brossard and the South Shore are suburbs of Montreal.
2) Heritage Building Burns: I was kind of hoping that CBC Montreal would have some coverage of the rapidly upcoming Quebec Election, but it didn’t happen until way down in the editorial lineup and I couldn’t wait that long… Carl Johnson desperately needed my help. So there was a Five Alarm Fire in Montreal’s Plateau neighbourhood. A couple of heritage buildings were basically destroyed. When the damage is that extensive you might as well start over. Most of the damage was to one building which was over 100-years old — which, in Canada, is old. One eyewitness said “the building makes this area what it is, it’s a hallmark building.” There were no injuries. This isn’t the first time heritage buildings have been destroyed by fire in the area, back in 2001 aboot120 people left homeless after a fire broke in a building which was under construction. The fire quickly spread and destroyed six buildings. There’s actually a long history of Fire in the Plateau area. In 1999 a suspicious fire destroyed an historic fire station; in 2000 a fire bomb was set off in a coffee shop, and two more were found before detonating in two other coffee shops around the district; also in 2000 a series of suspicious explosions in the area shut down the subway system for 24 hours and, in 2002; “Police have arrested a man in connection with a fire that destroyed four buildings in the Plateau Mont Royal district of Montreal. The 36-year-old man lived at 4272 St.Dominique St. — the building where the fire started. He is expected to be charged with arson on Tuesday.” Fun place to hang out if you’re into weinie roasts.
3) Transit Workers Vote To Strike: There will be a strike by Montreal’s transit mechanics unless a deal can be worked out soon. 97 per cent of the union members who showed up at a secret ballot on Sunday voted in favour of walking out. There have been 18 meetings in four months between the union and the City in an effort to replace the previous collective agreement. The last time they walked out, back in 2003, Montreal was almost paralyzed. Millions of people who live, work and play in and around Montreal rely on transit to get them to and from the strippers and alcohol. Montreal is the most transit friendly city in Canada. The next meeting is scheduled for March 16. There was another meeting yesterday. This one was a gathering of Mayors from across Canada. They’re trying to get more cash for a lot of things out of the federal government. Cities are a Provincial responsibility and the Provinces have spent a decade downloading responsibilities to the Cities in an effort to balance Province budgets, but they haven’t been giving the Cities any extra cash to pay for any of the downloads. So now the Mayors are after the Prime Minister for $2B annually to pay for a “National Transit Strategy“… which would basically be guaranteed funding for trains, subways and buses. Apparently we’re the only G8 Country not to have one. Yes, Canada is a G8 country. The federal budget will be released in two weeks. There will be mucho bucks for environmental crap like buses… there is an election coming.
1) Iraqi Car Bomb: Initial reporting claimed 20 people were killed and 65 injured in a suicide attack. Despite this, NBC reported, relative peace seems to be breaking out in strange parts of Iraq. The cities of Hut and Ramadi are being pacified through a combination of large groups of US Marines and Iraqi soldiers with guns manning community outposts on almost every block, and cash handouts to community leaders and elders. A Colonel was quoted “the locals do not want us to leave. They’re not sure if we’re staying, but they want us to stay here and beat back the insurgents.”
2) Sadr City Pacification Program: Then there’s this wierdness. A large group consisting of the 82nd Airborne and Iraqi soldiers, walked into “Sadr City” — commonly referred to as “a Baghdad slum” — expecting to meet at least some resistance but found, instead, people outside enjoying their community as if it were Preston Street in downtown Toronto. Sadr City has aboot 2million residents, and until now they’ve all been in hiding. But Sadr has gone and taken his army and propaganda posters with him. There was even traffic. Cars on the street as people went to markets that hadn’t been open in months. A man, holding his three-year old daughter, even said he was happy to see the American troops because — in his words — it made him feel safer. What The Fuck Alternate Universe Is This?!? In December 254 murders were reported in Sadr City. In February it was 19. An Iraqi lieutenent said “they’re [Sadr’s Army] still here. They’re watching us.” An American soldier was then quoted saying something aboot if we can give these people some peace, maybe they’ll get used to it and want more. Which sounds pretty fucking logical to me.
3) Walter Reed Hospital: NBC chose this week to go back and report from Iraq. The problem with sending your A-Team off on assignment is that if something happens back home, you’re fucked. You lose. No one wants to watch someone else’s misery when their own is on TV. Plus, when you’re out in the field you don’t have the access to your editorial team you normally would and, basically, you become the distraction. So, to prove that it hadn’t gotten caught with no pants on at a pants on convention, NBC relegated the top story to third place. A little more than a month ago the Washington Post published some stories written by Dana Priest detailing some truly horrific conditions at America’s top military hospital, Walter Reed. At least one barracks housing soldiers recovering from wounds they received in Iraq and Afghanistan was infested with cockroaches, rats and mould. The story broke wide open when the television cameras got their own tour of the facility. Now generals have been fired, rehired, fired again.
If you’ve seen or read “All The President’s Men”, this could have been a replay. But only if the other side (re: politicians) hadn’t also seen or read “All The President’s Men” and learned the most important lesson the book / movie had to offer: blame the other guy, do it quickly, do it with authority, and do it as often as possible. Right now, and for the next few months, this scandal will have nothing to do with the soldiers. It has everything to do with deflection. Walter Reed Hospital didn’t fall apart last week, last month, last year or even ten years ago. Every single one of those fuckers elected to State or Federal Government is ultimately responsible for what’s going on at Walter Reed. The support network of the American Military has been — just like the Canadian, French, British and Australian militaries — neglected and falling apart since 1975. Which also happens to be the end of the Vietnam War. Ten years ago several hundred Canadian soldiers qualified for, and were receiving, welfare in order to support themselves and their families. While on active duty. The Americans, British and French have wonderful shiny weapons capable of doing awesome things but no western country has the ability, anymore, to care for thousands of returning injured and disabled veterans beyond the short term.
It will, and has already, come out that there has been a lot of incompetence bred into the health care support system in the American Military over the past two generations, simply because no one thought it would be needed over the long term on this scale. After Vietnam the system was proven to be broken, and there were cosmetic changes. For short term and even medium term use the system works and has worked. Soldiers get limbs replaced. They get their PTSD sorted out. But now, especially with long term head injuries, the system is being used the way it was intended to be used, as an actual War Time health care and rehabilitation treatment centre, and all of those years of neglect and misuse and abuse and… fuck. Fuck fuck fuckitty fuck fuck. Man, they really fucked up on this one. But the thing is, so has Canada, so has Australia, so has the UK, so has France, so have the Israeli’s, so have all the other Western nations who have let their militaries slide into complacency. It’s just that the rest of us haven’t had to deal with this shit on the scale of the Americans. Or we’ve been better at not letting reporters into sensitive areas… which seems more likely.
1) Walter Reed Officials Apologize: American VP Dick Cheney says it’ll all get fixed. Who am I to argue? Saying things like “American soldiers get the best care anywhere, period” is like saying “the average salary in the Canadian banking industry is $100,000 bucks.” Yeah, sure. Maybe. Probably. Okay. But my bank teller is not getting paid $100,000 so someone, somewhere is getting an awful lot more, and some American troops are getting the very best medical attention this planet has to offer. And some are living in roach infested shithole government barracks with no electricity. No one’s lying, and no one’s responsible. That’s how politics works. But there will be reforms. I’m sure some of this “broken medical infrastructure” bruhaha will get fixed in time for the invasion of Iran. Basically these are long term treatment centres that have had to be brought into the system in a hurry (the Army is either buying shitholes to make up for a lack of facilities, or they’re opening up previously condemned properties to handle the number of cases). There are a lot of people coming back walking and / or breathing from this war who, just five years ago, would have been dead under the worlds best private medical care.
2) Iraqi Violence Worsens: Just as the idea of Sadr City and Anbar Province being pacified was sinking into my skull… I was just aboot to smile when Jim stared at me and said the Iraqi car bomb reported in the NBC story as “hey, shit happens” was actually “the most violent attack in several days and followed the deployment of 1200 troops into Sadr City”. See, NBC reported the bomb as a “but”… as in “there was an explosion, BUT better things are happening”. PBS reported the bomb as an “AND”, as in cause and effect. The troops went into Sadr City AND as a result a suicide bomb went off. There was also a British led raid into a cop-shop in Basra where 30 Iraqi’s had been detained and tortured by Iraqi police.
3) Iraqi Cabinet Shakeup: Five of six supporters of Muqtada al-Sadr will be replaced as Iraqi PM Nouri al Maliki shuffles his cabinet. It’s part of a larger plan, which has always been the missing component to this FUBAR-ed mission. Fuck it. I’m falling to sleep.
1) Husband Confesses To Murder / Dismemberment: Some nut sack strangled his wife, took her body to the Tool & Die shop where he worked, sawed her into little bits, put the bits into Ziploc sandwich bags and dumped her all over a city park. Local 4 News spent twenty minutes on this story. They tracked down nannies, they filmed the children being moved from one family member to another, they spoke to some dude about how long it would take to strangle someone… apparently if you haven’t had a lot of practice it can take “several minutes”. Nut Sack, previously sane according to his neighbours, spent time getting evaluated in a mental facility. Now he’s in hospital being treated for hypothermia and frostbite from his, soon to be legendary, flight from the cops which involved a jogging-speed chase through the snow in a park. Nut Sack had been charged with 2nd Degree Murder but Nut Sack confessed today to two Detroit detectives in his hospital room and the charge was upgraded to 1st Degree Murder.
2) Night Cam Report — Fatal Shooting: NBC Detroit’s Local 4 News is a half hour broadcast. After 20 minutes on Nut Sack they only had ten left for the rest of Monday’s news, plus sports and weather. This was a, literally, 15 second bit on a “mentally challenged” guy getting smoked by a random dude with a shotgun blast to the chest while walking home from the corner store. The “reporter” sounded like an auctioneer at the apex of an eight-ball meth high.
3) Fire At A Restaurant: Some restaurant burned to the ground. That’s aboot as much time they gave it. The anchors at Local 4 are actually very professional and decent people who do a lot of community events. Thirty minutes is just not enough time to report on the insanity that is Detroit. It’s a million people living in a city with a burnt out core. There are parts of Detroit that resemble Bosnia pre-NATO. There is no centre to this city. It’s dying, dying, dying and almost dead. And thirty minutes a day of news — and even then it’s news aboot fucking crazy people doing fucking crazy things — is not enough to deal with the problems this city has. The CBS Detroit affiliate actually runs promo’s saying “No News Is Good News” because they’ve given up on having any newscast other than the national one at 6.30 with Katie Couric. Katie Couric is the only news many people get in Detroit. Katie. Couric. W. T. F.?!?
1) Chaotic Winter Accident: There was a 75-car accident on Highway 400 near Bradford, Ontario on Monday just north of Toronto. The 400 is one of the busiest highways in the world. Visibility in the area had been reduced to less than two feet due to a winter storm. People had to escape from a burning bus, a car had been crushed between two semi-trucks and a woman went into labour after crashing her car. The story quoted an Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) officer “visibility was poor to none. I’ve had twenty years on and I’ve never seen one this bad.” One person had undefined “life threatening” injuries, but that was it for serious injuries.
2) Sheets Of Ice Fall On Toronto: We’ve had two major storms in Ontario — basically the East Coast of North America was hit twice in a week by some harsh winter weather — the one late last week left the CN Tower covered in sheets of ice. Until yesterday, when they started to fall off. So giant ice cubes started falling on downtown Toronto from 3000 feet in the air. Exciting day in The Big Smoke. Police closed off the major thouroughfare through the downtown, the Gardiner Expressway, and the financial district around Bay and King Streets. Some of the Ice Bombs were the size of cars. There was one panel still stuck up there during the broadcast that was estimated to be 200 feet high and forty to sixty feet wide. The CN Tower, by the way, remains the worlds tallest freestanding structure, and there’s a glass floor at the very tippy-top. And a rotating restaurant. Very nice menu. And the restaurant rotates.
3) Canadian ATM Fees: Canadians pay some of the highest banking fees in the world. There’s an election coming up, probably this year — we don’t have set dates or term limits yet, we will by 2009 though. Last year the five major Canadian banks had a combined profit of $19B, that’s the gross. The five CEO’s made a combined $56M. They also raked in $420M in bank machine profits. My accounts are with Scotiabank. If I only use Scotia bank machines to do my banking I only get charged my monthly fee. I think I get 50 free transactions per month. If I use a Royal Bank bank machine I’m charged a $1.50 service fee. There are also “White Boxes”, these are bank machines owned and operated by independents. They look like the real banks, but they’re just regular folks. If I use their machine they get to charge me $1.50 per transaction, but my bank also gets another $1.50. The thing is, the five major Canadian banks can be independent operators. So the incentive for them is to put an “independently owned” White Box into every 7-11 and Mac’s Milk in Canada and charge us $3 for every transaction, which, really, they also bill us for at the end of the month. So our Finance Minister, Joe Flaherty, is having a series of chats with the banks. No one really expects anything to change. If you’re an American none of this will make sense because you hardly pay any banking fees at all. Same if you’re European or British, but we pay aboot a buck for a litre of gas and you’re paying around $6/litre and you have to pay to drive downtown so fuck you, you smug Limey Frog bastards.
Bonus Track — Obesity Causing Premature Puberty In Girls: Great. Now I’ve got a cough. Fuck. People have been wondering for a while now what’s with girls hitting puberty at nine-years old? I think the first time it was written aboot in the mainstream press was a Time Magazine cover story back in… 1999? I know I still have it somewhere. I collect news magazines. Anyway. A study has come out linking early puberty to having a high Body Mass Index. Basically if a girl is heavier than she’s “supposed” to be she’ll get The Boobies real early. The reporter went on to hammer someone’s point home by saying “girls would develop their period, breast growth, increase their chances for breast cancer later on, as well as an increased chance for alcohol and drug abuse”. I can remember the Time article being really delicate aboot talking aboot young children becoming physically sexualized. Things haven’t changed. Anyway… it was a preliminary study. They still haven’t really looked into the actual food or chemical issues yet. Surely it can’t be the oceans of synthetic estrogen we’re swimming in… did you know that when plastics break down the chemicals can fool male frogs into developing ovaries? The frogs do.
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I’m Canadian, it’s what we do. Off the ice.
Die Mannequin: Canadian “Autumn Cannibalist”; ‘How To Kill’ [Digital EP] (2006)
Canadians think sporting events are so nice we like to watch them twice. And three times. And maybe four in a row. Then sixteen times from every conceivable angle. Okay nineteen is too much. Slowed down. In reverse. Frame by single frame.
And now, thanks to a Canadian named George Retzlaff, the whole world can enjoy Instant Replay. George invented Instant Replay back in 1955 while working for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s (CBC) “Hockey Night In Canada” (HNIC). George used a new “hot processor” technique to develop a kinescope (film) recording of a goal which was then rebroadcast within thirty seconds for “instant” replay.
Every sport played on this earth today — except maybe the “Afghanistan Professional Buzkashi League” — uses George’s Instant Replay in some form.
George was born in Kiel, Germany and moved to Saskatchewan when he was six. In 1953, at the tender age of 30 — and just a few months after CBC started broadcasting — he became head of CBC Sports and producer of HNIC.
He produced and directed HNIC for aboot 20 years and devised many of the techniques and camera angles still used in most televised sporting events around the world today. In 1973, George became the original recipient of hockey’s Foster Hewitt Award for Excellence in Sports Broadcasting. He retired from the CBC in 1984. George died August 5, 2003, survived by seven children from his two marriages, 20 grandchildren and four great grandchildren.
Things Aboot Me:
Froot Loops, A Winter Storm And The Littlest Hobo
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Before (last week) & During (this morning)
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This isn’t even close to being the worst storm we’ve had in the past few years. But it is the worst one since I’ve had a digital camera and a blog. According to the TV People it’s -16C with the windchill. Which isn’t so bad. It’s the little icy pellets of stinging hate that stream into my exposed eyeballs that I have a hard time with. I also live in an old building, it’s one of the first ones built in my little village. So when the wind blows really hard things in my apartment move.
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Like the blinds next to the computer. They’re usually flush to the window. I’ve put one of those plastic sheets up, the ones you kind of melt tight with a hair dryer. I’ve also stuck putty all the way around the sill and around where the glass meets the frame. I think the breeze has a lot to do with there being no insulation between the interior and exterior walls. Just a guess. Actually there is insulation, I can see it when I’m in the parking lot looking up at the softball-sized hole under my kitchen window. It’s yellow with large burnt-black spots. I’ve never seen insulation that colour that wasn’t being pulled out of a burning house.
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Don’t get me wrong, I love my apartment. It’s massive and compared to what I was paying in Toronto and what some friends are paying in Ottawa the rent is nonexistent… this is my place when I moved in three years ago. Or at least the living room part. It’s actually not as crooked as this photo makes it look. When I moved to Toronto from Ottawa in 1998 I sold/gave away everything I owned and brought one gym-bag of clothes and my camera bag… it was for a new job at a magazine and basically I had two weeks to pack and find a place in Toronto before I started. When I moved back to my little village from Guelph in 2003 I brought back my decrepit computer, my camera, a bunch of books, a couple of CDs and my briefcase. And that cool lamp. So it wasn’t a total waste of time. My rent here is $375 plus gas and electricity, so aboot $450 per month (that’d be aboot 200lbs or US$400). The main part of the apartment is 30’x18′, the bedroom’s roughly 12’x14′, and there’s a large-enough bathtub and a mirror over the sink. For something similar in Toronto, within a 30 minute subway ride of Yonge and Bloor, I’d be paying at least one organ per month. But Toronto has enough bars, clubs, restaurants and events to justify turning out your little brother to pay the rent. Ottawa is actually more expensive to live than Toronto, at least in terms of rent. Ottawa, or Stubby Town, has some very nice museums but nothing else. There are a couple of venues worth seeing a band in, and a handful of restaurants in the Byward Market worth exploring, but… holy fuck is Ottawa boring otherwise. I lived in Ottawa between 1989 and 1998 and I actually had a lot of fun. Mostly because I moved to Ottawa from my little village where the weekend options were: drink, play Risk and get stoned OR drink, play guitar and get stoned. A really good weekend was doing all six at once. Architecturally there has been nothing or significance built in Ottawa since they had to rebuild the Parliament buildings 100 years ago. If you’ve got plans to visit Canada, stop off in Ottawa for a day or two to see the Museum of War and the Parliament buildings. And the Chateau Laurier. But only as a stop over between Montreal and Toronto. Halifax and Newfoundland are worth seeing for a little while as well. Edmonton sucks.
And now, some photos of my fridge and The Littlest Hobo (below). And some Froot Loops. The Littlest Hobo is classic Canadian Television… it’s aboot a dog who travels the country, which may or may not be Canada, helping out strangers. It was kind of like Lassie meets MacGyver without the socks. Most Canadian television programs created during the 80’s never took place in Canada. “Night Heat”, a fairly decent Cop Drama for a little while, was based in “Metro”, or “Metro City” or something equally stupid. It was because the producers always held out some vague hope of getting their program on American Network TV. I think Night Heat made it to an early, early morning CBS time slot. So Canadian taxpayers subsidized the creation of Canadian programs, which were filmed in Canadian cities but took place in Never-Neverland Cities with no names, and for ten years or more the word “Canada” was never spoken on Canadian TV. Except for “Street Legal”… but that sucked horse bag after the second season.
On my coffee table (bottom left) you maybe able to make out the DVD of “Bubba Ho-Tep” which is Elvis vs. The Mummy. If you can find it, buy it. If you promise to return it I may loan you mine. Elvis vs. The Mummy. Think aboot that for a minute. There’s also Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, which is as vital to my existence as Froot Loops, Extra Strength Tylenol and Johnny Cash. Yes, there’s a shiny unicorn on my TV. Where do you keep yours? The fridge (bottom right) is where I keep things I want cold. I haven’t been able to write anything serious lately because I’ve been sick all week. But, thanks to the miracles of antibiotics, mushy food and The Trailer Park Boys, I’m starting to get better.
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If you find a broken link, or the YouTube stuff isn’t loading
properly, let me know and I’ll find an alternative…
I’m Canadian, it’s what we do. Off the ice.
1) Serbia Didn’t Do It: According to the BBC “Bosnian Muslim leaders have voiced disappointment” after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague in a 13-2 decision ruled that the slaughter of 8,000 boys and men in Srebrenica was genocide, but Belgrade (re: Serbia) was not directly responsible. People get disappointed when there are no cookies left in the jar. I personally get disappointed when there’s no Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper left at the convenience store. There was a genocide, in Europe — who kind of promised that kind of thing would never happen again — and the ICJ rules that the state which sponsored the genocide is not guilty of said genocide. The State, they said, is not responsible for the States decision to commit genocide. Oh, genocide did take place, they gave the victims that much. And the State of Serbia did sponsor and support the Bosnian Army in their genocidal ways and dead people are still being found in mass graves all over Bosnia and, yes, there were mass expulsions, mass killings and mass rape, and… okay, Serbia did nothing to actually, you know, stop the rapes, killings and expulsions it explicitly knew were occurring under it’s command, but in no way can the Serbian State be held accountable because… ahem. I don’t know, maybe nobody needs that kind of hassle. The ICJ, in its ruling, did say “Serbia and Montenegro had violated the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide by not preventing or punishing the perpetrators of the genocide”. Oh. Well, there you go. Between 1992 and 1995 at least 100,000 people were killed in another European war that, once again, Europe was unable and seemingly unwilling to stop. Then American, British and Canadian troops felt compelled to step in — again (third time’s the charm) — to stop Europeans from killing each other because those civil wars were spreading right across the Balkans. The ICJ decision basically means that, unlike the last time, no State will be held to account this time for the industrial slaughter of citizens because of their ethnicity and/or religion. This genocide will be laid solely at the feet of individuals like Slobodan Milosevic, Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karadzic. I don’t think these were the lessons Europe was supposed to have learned from Auschwitz. You’ve come a long way, baby.
2) Iran’s Probably Doing It: Large caches of weapons and explosives are turning up in Iraq with Iranian markings and serial numbers on them. Kuwait is taking delivery of newer and better American Patriot Missile platforms. American refueling planes, those giant flying gas stations, are being redeployed to the region. The US Marine Corps has deployed several ships of heavily armed men and women to the general location. A second American Aircraft Carrier Battle Group has officially entered the region and has announced that if anyone, anyone at all, even looked at them funny they would retaliate with a whole lot of overwhelming force. The announcement was then repeated several times at varying volumes in Perisan. The second Battle Group is considered to be, on it’s own, one of the top six most powerful Navy’s on Earth. The other five being Britain and the other four American Aircraft Carrier Battle Groups. America now has more nuclear megatonnes within five minutes of downtown Tehran than Europe has rusting in their collective bunkers. Tony Snow, the White House spokesperson, said “we prefer to avoid military confrontation, but the United States in unwilling to live with a nuclear Iran.” Hans Blix, some old guy, was then quoted as saying “that may be the plan, but plans can change overnight.” This is Kissinger diplomacy. Without the hammer the incentives mean nothing. Personally I think if the Iranian leadership believes the Americans are bluffing there will be several new, and very bright, holes in the Persian sky next year aboot this time. But I think they’ve gotten the message. From here on it’s aboot negotiating a face-saving deal of some kind.
3) Iraqi VP Almost Gets Done In : Five people were killed when a bomb detonated inside the Public Works Ministry in Baghdad. Vice-President Adel Abdul Mahdi and the Minister of Public Works, Riad Ghraib, were slightly wounded. According to the BBC “police are investigating how explosives were smuggled into the building.” My guess is through the front door in large sacks marked “Danger: Explosives”.
1) al-Qaida Might Do It Again: American VP Dick Cheney was in Pakistan today (Monday), apparently Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf’s strategy of allowing al-Qaida to run the northern third of his country may not be turning the terrorist organization into upstanding world citizens after all. Apparently both British and American intelligence services have tied the recent plots to blow up airliners over the Atlantic Ocean and maybe blow up a few subway cars in Britain to people in North Waziristan. A spokesperson for Musharraf said after the meeting that everything was fine and that there was nothing to see here. ABC reported that the “meetings got rather heated” and involved a top official from the CIA and a very detailed powerpoint presentation involving lots of surveillance photos of North Waziristan. In a weird coincidence the American Vice President was also fairly close to an explosion a little later in the day while he was in Afghanistan when a bomb went off outside the Bagram airbase where he was staying.
2) Iraqi Militants Almost Do It: More aboot the Iraqi VP almost getting himself blowed up. ABC reports that ten people died in the attack. They also reported that the draft legislation is ready regarding the division of “oil wealth” to the peoples of Iraq. Some provisions were included to appease the Sunni’s in Central Iraq.
3) Al Gore Actually Didn’t Do It: It was a pop culture love fest as the Oscar’s, according to Leo DiCaprio, “went green”… apparently traveling a few miles in an hybrid car made of plastic which is made from oil, and printing irrelevant material on recycled paper is Hollywood’s idea of saving the environment. When something so shallow, so devoid of worth as “Celebrity” stands up and preaches from Babylon aboot anything we should take a step back, congratulate them all on their ability to memorize complete sentences, then put them back into their gilded cage for another year. Which is what has happened. Gore actually didn’t win the Academy Award. The Award went to filmmaker Davis Guggenheim. Gore just got up on stage and started talking. So this is twice he hasn’t won something but left Hollywood convinced he won both times. If he’s not installed again as President in 2008 look for Gore not to win the Nobel Prize and for Hollywood to celebrate his victory.
1) Jesus Tomb: The only thing the CBC loves more than pumping up weak stories into outright scandals aboot Canadian governments is trying to convince people that the Christian Church is being “fundamentally shaken to its foundations” every time a new movie comes out. “Last Temptation Of Christ” was supposed to turn Christians into right-thinking citizens… or something. “Dogma” was a threat to Catholic beliefs because… I don’t know, maybe because Ben Affleck was in it. Then “The Da Vinci Code” was going to expose the Opus Dei as a bunch of child eaters. If you’ve got a movie project based on slim to none evidence that Jesus was a gay-porn star who may, or may not, have sucked coke off of Judas’ engorged penis, the CBC will give you five minutes and Neil MacDonald will be only too happy to do the standup. This time it’s a “made for television documentary” aboot two limestone boxes the filmmakers believe once contained the remains of Jesus and Mary Magdalene during a news conference Monday at the New York Public Library. It’s called “The Lost Tomb of Christ”… I’m sure it’ll be in focus.
2) Canadian Citizenship Screwup: Okay… before 1947 there were no “Canadian Citizens”. We were “British Subjects”. So before 1947 there were no Canadians. But as of 1947 we’ve had our own Citizenship Act. Now… apparently, during the switch over, some people got lost in the Never Never Land of Canadian beaurocracy and they lost their citizenship because they didn’t fill out the right form. But no one told them they lost their citizenship, so they’ve been living and having children in Canada who then grew up not knowing either they weren’t citizens or that their parents weren’t citizens. They’re being called (as far as I can tell, only by the CBC) “The Lost Canadians”. The Canadian Government is holding hearings where one woman called herself a “tenth generation Canadian” but not a citizen. After applying for passports people were receiving letters telling them they had lost their citizenship when they reached their 24th birthday. The Economist Magazine ran an editorial called “Lost In Kafkaland. There are fewer than a thousand of these cases and the current Minister of Immigration says she’s working through each case as quickly as possible.
3) Judicial Selection Process Changed: And a chance to attack the government. Whoever was setting up the editorial lineup at the CBC must have been sweating through their underwear tonight. The CBC is a “public broadcaster” which receives around $1B/year from government subsidies, and they take every opportunity given to them to prove they’re not part of the government. Occasionally they do good reporting on stuff the government of the day fucks up on, but mostly it’s hype. The Conservative Government wants to put judges on the bench that reflect their philosophies regarding crime and punishment. Every Canadian government has done this since our country was created. Our judges are selected by Provincial committee’s, these selections are then offered up to the Prime Minister and, without consultation, he gets to pick whomever he wants. Instead of maybe bringing up this little piece of non-democratic Parliamentary procedure as something that needs changing, the CBC is going after Prime Minister Stephen Harper because he wants to put a law enforcement official (a cop) on each of the Provincial committees. That’s Billion, with a B.
1) The Jesus Box: The movie, “The Lost Tomb of Christ”, was produced by Titanic director, and Canadian, James Cameron and Canadian filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici. They claim to have found ten “ossuary’s”, or burial boxes, in Jerusalem which contain the skeletal remains of Jesus, his wife, Mary Magdalene, and their child. They have a few “scholars” and “experts” willing to stand up and be quoted.” The person who actually found the ossuary’s several years ago says that he thinks the filmmakers are full of dog crap. A professor of Religious Studies says all this Jesus-alternate universe stuff comes from a dissatisfaction with the original Jesus-narrative. But, he said, believing there’s truth in movies like this one and “DaVinci Code” is irresponsible and intellectually naive.
2) Hijab Banned From Soccer Field: An 11-year old girl was kicked off the soccer pitch at a tournament in Laval, Quebec, for refusing to remove her hijab. She had already played in two games without incident, but as she ran out for the third the referee kicked her out. The coach of her Ontario-based team consulted with his players and the decision was made to forfeit he rest of the tournament. Five other Ontario-based teams quickly followed. The girl says she still loves soccer, and wears a red hijab because that’s the ream colour. The tournament organizers backed the refs decision saying it was a safety issue and that the hijab could get caught on another player and cause choking or some such total bigoted bullshit. Women are playing soccer in Iran, Pakistan and in the West Bank wearing the hijab and no one has died from having a loose hijab. But this is Quebec, and in Quebec religion is treated in a manner very similar to Europe. The belief is, Quebec is a secular society having tossed Catholicism into the trash back in the 60’s, therefore everyone must give up their religious accoutrement. At least that’s what I thought until they said the ref’s a Muslim as well. And now I don’t know what the fuck to think because the reporter just dropped that bomb right at the end and threw it back to Lloyd at the news desk who… went onto the next story, which was:
3) Canada Puts $200M Into Afghanistan: The Canadian Government will be paying the salaries of Afghan teachers, police officers and increasing the number of road and school building projects over the next ten years. “Afghan’s”, someone said, “need to see short term, immediate gains to their lives so they can believe in their new[ish] government.” PM Stephen Harper said the money will go towards consolidating the security gains Canadian troops have made in Afghanistan. The opposition party’s in Canada’s Parliament automatically reacted by calling the new money an “admission on the government’s part that it’s strategy in Afghanistan is a failure.” The three Canadian opposition parties favour either 1) an immediate withdrawal of all troops from Afghanistan or 2) troops should leave sooner. Both options would never result in a return of the Taliban because the Taliban would be forced to negotiate with the three Canadian opposition parties because that would be the moral thing to do.
3b) UK Puts New Troops Into Afghanistan: France and Germany have troops in Afghanistan, making coffee and cleaning up after meals. So Canada, Denmark, the Americans and the British are doing the actual fighting and dying. In order to make up for the fact France and Germany would get crushed by a soccer team of Ontario-based 11-year old girls, the United Kingdom has to send in another 1400 troops and Canada, already stretched, is being asked to send in another 100. France and Germany have done more damage to this planet, they have killed, slaughtered and fucked over more civilizations, than anyone else on this planet and they are deliberately sitting inside their bases in the suburbs of Kabul watching as Canadians, Americans, Danes, Brits and — even more importantly — Afghans get killed and injured every other freaking day… I could go on but my tooth hurts and I’m jacked up on Extra-Strength Tylenol. The good news is I could be in love. But the EZ To Swallow Extra Strength Tylenol could be messing with my mental reasoning, so it could still be a Deep Affection.
If you find a broken link, or the YouTube stuff isn’t loading
properly, let me know and I’ll find an alternative…
I’m Canadian, it’s what we do. Off the ice.
0_o
cultural sn:afu 