Uncle Gerald
by: D
In other news, my sister is coming back from India at the end of August! I wonder what her plans are...
Saturday, July 13, 2013
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
When I was seven
When I was seven, I was an ardent Coca-Cola fan. Pepsi had cool commercials and Coke did not. I didn't get why Coke would just allow this to happen - were they unaware of the sucktasticness of their ads? Were their commercial-making people -- who knew what a copywriter was let alone a madman! -- just tragically uninspired? How could they let this injustice stand? I made up my own commercial. Picture it:
FADE IN
EXT. CITY STREET - LATE AFTERNOON
A man walks down the street, drinking a bottle of Pepsi. He is neither happy nor sad. Storm clouds gather. Suddenly it starts raining bottles of Coke! One Coke bottle hits the man's Pepsi bottle. Both bottles shatter. Another Coke bottle falls into the man's hand. He takes a sip. He breaks out into a huge smile just as the sun comes out.
CUE LOGO, CUE JINGLE
FADE OUT
I'm not saying that this ad was money in the bank but even now, it's not the worst thing I've ever heard. Perhaps this only proves how terrible the Coke ads were at the time but, sadly, I cannot remember any. While I conceived of the commercial when I was seven, it wasn't until I was nine that I wrote it down and sent it into Coke. I secretly thought that they would make the commercial FOR SURE but also be so impressed with my genius that they would fly me immediately to Coca-Cola headquarters and make me head of advertising. Spoiler alert: this did not happen. They wrote back and said thank you but they already had people to think of commercials for them. They enclosed a coupon for a 6-pack of Coke.
When I was seven, my favorite lunch was Kraft Dinner. We had it every other day because I demanded it. I might have won my battle to have it every day but my sister didn't like Kraft Dinner as much as I did and wanted soup and salmon sandwiches instead. Canned salmon is the shits. Anyway, sometimes my mother would call Kraft Dinner, "KD." I hated it when she did that because it was like she was cheapening it. I thought it was crass.
When I was seven, my great Auntie Florence had a chihuahua named Chico. He was so fat, I thought he was a Boston terrier. Everyday at 3pm, Chico would get one can of beer. My aunt would crack it for him and then pour it into his dog dish and say, "Happy hour, Chico!" The dog would come running from where ever he was and lick it up. Chico lived to be 19. My grandmother didn't believe that he could live for so long and accused Florence of secretly having replaced the dead Chico with a pig at some point. Florence was quite upset about the accusation for a while but then she got over it. My grandmother always called Chico, "Piggy."
When I was seven, another genius idea I had was for an invention called, "The Real Super Glue." It was glue that you could put on anything (your hands, for example) and say, "Stick, Glue, stick!" and it would. Then when you wanted it to unstick, you'd say, "Unstick, Glue, unstick!" and it would. Unlike the unreliable suction cup or magnet, it could help you scale any type of building or crawl across a ceiling AND you could steal things and just glue them to your pants and not worry about dropping them. The Real Super Glue would also know when you were telling it to do stuff and not react to someone else AND, ideally, you could give it commands with just your mind, especially in situations that demanded complete silence. No letter-writing campaigns emerged from this idea. I did, however, make a passionate argument to my friend Jason (now a male nurse-lawyer) about how The Real Super Glue was a better and much more realistic invention than something that would allow you to achieve invisibility. YOU HEAR THAT JK ROWLING?!
When I was seven, I was a major supporter of the color blue. To my mind, blue was by far the superior color and anyone voicing any other opinion was mentally deficient or just being a fucker. I remember being particularly upset with my friend Joel (now a realtor who sold my grandmother's house) for saying that red was his favorite color and that he actually, totally, for realz preferred it to blue. This was both unacceptable and incomprehensible to me and I remember kicking over the rocking chair in my room because the injustice was so unbearable.
When I was seven, I couldn't decide which star I would most like to meet when I was chosen to be on some TV show where I think Dick Clark or someone picked a deserving person to meet a star of their choice. Betty White or Bea Arthur? I decided that instead of trying to choose between them (and likely cause some kind of rift), I would probably just go with Angela Lansbury.
My seven-year-old self was a very black-and-white thinker.
FADE IN
EXT. CITY STREET - LATE AFTERNOON
A man walks down the street, drinking a bottle of Pepsi. He is neither happy nor sad. Storm clouds gather. Suddenly it starts raining bottles of Coke! One Coke bottle hits the man's Pepsi bottle. Both bottles shatter. Another Coke bottle falls into the man's hand. He takes a sip. He breaks out into a huge smile just as the sun comes out.
CUE LOGO, CUE JINGLE
FADE OUT
I'm not saying that this ad was money in the bank but even now, it's not the worst thing I've ever heard. Perhaps this only proves how terrible the Coke ads were at the time but, sadly, I cannot remember any. While I conceived of the commercial when I was seven, it wasn't until I was nine that I wrote it down and sent it into Coke. I secretly thought that they would make the commercial FOR SURE but also be so impressed with my genius that they would fly me immediately to Coca-Cola headquarters and make me head of advertising. Spoiler alert: this did not happen. They wrote back and said thank you but they already had people to think of commercials for them. They enclosed a coupon for a 6-pack of Coke.
When I was seven, my favorite lunch was Kraft Dinner. We had it every other day because I demanded it. I might have won my battle to have it every day but my sister didn't like Kraft Dinner as much as I did and wanted soup and salmon sandwiches instead. Canned salmon is the shits. Anyway, sometimes my mother would call Kraft Dinner, "KD." I hated it when she did that because it was like she was cheapening it. I thought it was crass.
When I was seven, my great Auntie Florence had a chihuahua named Chico. He was so fat, I thought he was a Boston terrier. Everyday at 3pm, Chico would get one can of beer. My aunt would crack it for him and then pour it into his dog dish and say, "Happy hour, Chico!" The dog would come running from where ever he was and lick it up. Chico lived to be 19. My grandmother didn't believe that he could live for so long and accused Florence of secretly having replaced the dead Chico with a pig at some point. Florence was quite upset about the accusation for a while but then she got over it. My grandmother always called Chico, "Piggy."
When I was seven, another genius idea I had was for an invention called, "The Real Super Glue." It was glue that you could put on anything (your hands, for example) and say, "Stick, Glue, stick!" and it would. Then when you wanted it to unstick, you'd say, "Unstick, Glue, unstick!" and it would. Unlike the unreliable suction cup or magnet, it could help you scale any type of building or crawl across a ceiling AND you could steal things and just glue them to your pants and not worry about dropping them. The Real Super Glue would also know when you were telling it to do stuff and not react to someone else AND, ideally, you could give it commands with just your mind, especially in situations that demanded complete silence. No letter-writing campaigns emerged from this idea. I did, however, make a passionate argument to my friend Jason (now a male nurse-lawyer) about how The Real Super Glue was a better and much more realistic invention than something that would allow you to achieve invisibility. YOU HEAR THAT JK ROWLING?!
When I was seven, I was a major supporter of the color blue. To my mind, blue was by far the superior color and anyone voicing any other opinion was mentally deficient or just being a fucker. I remember being particularly upset with my friend Joel (now a realtor who sold my grandmother's house) for saying that red was his favorite color and that he actually, totally, for realz preferred it to blue. This was both unacceptable and incomprehensible to me and I remember kicking over the rocking chair in my room because the injustice was so unbearable.
When I was seven, I couldn't decide which star I would most like to meet when I was chosen to be on some TV show where I think Dick Clark or someone picked a deserving person to meet a star of their choice. Betty White or Bea Arthur? I decided that instead of trying to choose between them (and likely cause some kind of rift), I would probably just go with Angela Lansbury.
My seven-year-old self was a very black-and-white thinker.
Tuesday, March 26, 2013
So, apparently this is a thing
If any of you 'Merican readers want to know what it's like to live in the socialist paradise called Canada, here's the latest from the Ontario Health Ministry:
It's less depressing than:
Add in about 3 uncharming, sexist, racist, anti-intelligent Tim Hortons ads and that's pretty much what a commercial break looks like here in the Great White North. As my students inform me, I am the only person left who still watches commercials so this is not a true barometer of anything.
It's less depressing than:
Add in about 3 uncharming, sexist, racist, anti-intelligent Tim Hortons ads and that's pretty much what a commercial break looks like here in the Great White North. As my students inform me, I am the only person left who still watches commercials so this is not a true barometer of anything.
Monday, March 11, 2013
I blame Barilla
Not only is Barilla the source of that strange commercial where the blonde woman is giving a dinner party and has a hot Italian neighbour who smiles at her whenever she looks up and then she realizes she sux at cooking pasta and the party might be ruined! but then the hot neighbour leaves a box of pasta on her doorstep and saves the day while Andrea Bocelli plays in the background... not only that but now this:
Sunday, February 24, 2013
Wherever you go, there you are
Last week, E and I were having dinner at the Vietnamese place on Bank (you know the one, right beside the Loonie Store) and we were seated behind a couple having dinner with their two babies and we went to sit down and the mother asked me if it was okay that their child was throwing his food at me and I looked at her and it took me a moment but I realized that I knew this woman from high school. In fact, more than high school, from Grades 7 through 12, at least. She appeared to have zero recognition of me and after telling her whatever Baby did was fine, I didn't indicate any recognition either, so I spent the rest of my meal wondering, "Is that Bekki Wallace?" Of course, this is exactly what Google was made for - six clicks later I found out that it was indeed Bekki Wallace (now Rebekka Roy), that she used to be a social worker for Planned Parenthood (respect!) and then married a French-Canadian shipping tycoon (are there really tycoons in Canada?) and had two children and now is KraftyYogaMom Supreme of Old Ottawa South (ie/ my overly-precious neighbourhood). She has an online business for providing the world with, "bags, playmats, toy buckets, baby mobiles and more using gorgeous material and lots of creativity" called Birdy&Bug (website: http://www.birdyandbug.com/) and writes in our community newsletter (that I never read but always recycle) about "Cardboarding."Here is an excerpt from the Oct 2012 edition:
I’m intrigued by the lasting effect the cardboard challenge had on my family. My husband, Marc-André, spent hours designing and creating an elaborate marble maze (complete with “pits of despair”). My 3 year old son, Oskar, created a dump truck, a fork lift, a ramp, binoculars, a boat, and many obstacle courses all out of cardboard and other recyclable materials....And so here are my two commitments to you. I’m going to include cardboard creating as a weekly family activity in our household. I shall call it "Makedo Monday’s" and we, as a family, will pick out a project, work on it, play with it and then, if need be, recycle it to make room for next week’s project. I’ll keep you posted on how this works and take some photos of our creations in my blog at www.birdyandbug.com!
I included the above because that shit deserves to be ridiculed. It's its own episode of Portlandia. Also, I like how her penchant for using 'k's instead of 'c's has kontinued with her son, Oskar.
[Aside: Note to self: pitch a Canadafied version of Portlandia to the CBC, call it Old Old Ottawa South. Topics of constant ridicule to be: unnecessary bilingualism, SUV baby strollers rated for -40C conditions, organic poutine, everyone's love of winter. First episode to take place on the Canal, everyone standing around on vintage midcentury skates freezing their asses off and trying to keep from falling while commenting on how beautiful it all is. Does CBC already have this program? Other note to self: watch CBC]
Similar to how it went down in jr high and high school, I look forward to hearing about Bekki's grand achievements, seeing her picture everywhere (there's one in every newsletter, I've since discovered), patronizing the same retail and recreation establishments as she and her ilk, but never actually exchanging words. Maybe she'll say hi to me in the hall, but I doubt it (even if we are on the same field hockey team). I shall retreat to my ivory tower and read heady books about Important Things and look forward to the day when I will... oh wait, it is that day and I'm still doing the same shit and so is Bekki.
What I am surprised to discover is that none of this actually bothers me. Yes, I did go look her up on google and Facebook but not really with a sense of emotional urgency or feelings of re/dejection. I don't care that we are not fb friends, I am neither happy nor sad that we have nothing to talk about, and I do not envy her parallel universe. It's all like a nice piece of furniture that I can admire in the store but have no intention of ever buying. Power on, Rebekka Roy, sell a million yoga mats!
In other news, I just found out that having a runny nose in wintertime is a condition called Rhinorrhea. This is absolutely hilarious to me. Seriously, it's funny, right?
I’m intrigued by the lasting effect the cardboard challenge had on my family. My husband, Marc-André, spent hours designing and creating an elaborate marble maze (complete with “pits of despair”). My 3 year old son, Oskar, created a dump truck, a fork lift, a ramp, binoculars, a boat, and many obstacle courses all out of cardboard and other recyclable materials....And so here are my two commitments to you. I’m going to include cardboard creating as a weekly family activity in our household. I shall call it "Makedo Monday’s" and we, as a family, will pick out a project, work on it, play with it and then, if need be, recycle it to make room for next week’s project. I’ll keep you posted on how this works and take some photos of our creations in my blog at www.birdyandbug.com!
I included the above because that shit deserves to be ridiculed. It's its own episode of Portlandia. Also, I like how her penchant for using 'k's instead of 'c's has kontinued with her son, Oskar.
[Aside: Note to self: pitch a Canadafied version of Portlandia to the CBC, call it Old Old Ottawa South. Topics of constant ridicule to be: unnecessary bilingualism, SUV baby strollers rated for -40C conditions, organic poutine, everyone's love of winter. First episode to take place on the Canal, everyone standing around on vintage midcentury skates freezing their asses off and trying to keep from falling while commenting on how beautiful it all is. Does CBC already have this program? Other note to self: watch CBC]
Similar to how it went down in jr high and high school, I look forward to hearing about Bekki's grand achievements, seeing her picture everywhere (there's one in every newsletter, I've since discovered), patronizing the same retail and recreation establishments as she and her ilk, but never actually exchanging words. Maybe she'll say hi to me in the hall, but I doubt it (even if we are on the same field hockey team). I shall retreat to my ivory tower and read heady books about Important Things and look forward to the day when I will... oh wait, it is that day and I'm still doing the same shit and so is Bekki.
What I am surprised to discover is that none of this actually bothers me. Yes, I did go look her up on google and Facebook but not really with a sense of emotional urgency or feelings of re/dejection. I don't care that we are not fb friends, I am neither happy nor sad that we have nothing to talk about, and I do not envy her parallel universe. It's all like a nice piece of furniture that I can admire in the store but have no intention of ever buying. Power on, Rebekka Roy, sell a million yoga mats!
In other news, I just found out that having a runny nose in wintertime is a condition called Rhinorrhea. This is absolutely hilarious to me. Seriously, it's funny, right?
Saturday, February 2, 2013
Great news!
There's always good news going on somewhere but sometimes it seems like it's too far removed or somehow impossible to take in. That is not the case today!!! Why?
Against ALL odds, things are looking up for Barb! The latest tests indicate that, after some incredibly intense chemo, her cancer is gone, the fractures in her rib cage and spine are healing, and her lawsuit against the city may eventuate in a settlement that could comfortably support her in retirement! After serving the world for 30 years as an incredibly dedicated kindergarten teacher AND surviving polio, paralysis, child birth, an abusive marriage, single motherhood, macular degeneration resulting in 85% sight loss, being hit by a car, being thrown from a bus, CANCER, and a bout of chemotherapy that actually stopped her heart twice, the fucking Universe might finally be doing her a good turn. Barb and her son Jason (stubborn, ridiculous, unstoppable, male-nurse-turned-lawyer) have been family friends as long as I can remember so I never properly appreciated how amazing they are but when you write it down in a list like that... I don't even know what to say. Go Barb!
Against ALL odds, things are looking up for Barb! The latest tests indicate that, after some incredibly intense chemo, her cancer is gone, the fractures in her rib cage and spine are healing, and her lawsuit against the city may eventuate in a settlement that could comfortably support her in retirement! After serving the world for 30 years as an incredibly dedicated kindergarten teacher AND surviving polio, paralysis, child birth, an abusive marriage, single motherhood, macular degeneration resulting in 85% sight loss, being hit by a car, being thrown from a bus, CANCER, and a bout of chemotherapy that actually stopped her heart twice, the fucking Universe might finally be doing her a good turn. Barb and her son Jason (stubborn, ridiculous, unstoppable, male-nurse-turned-lawyer) have been family friends as long as I can remember so I never properly appreciated how amazing they are but when you write it down in a list like that... I don't even know what to say. Go Barb!
Saturday, January 26, 2013
Today = awesome
1. ALEVE
Note to self: You seriously need to start doing some fucking yoga or something, you're too young for this shit. I hear it's called "core strength."
Hmmm. I don't know why today is awesome, exactly, but it is!!! Things are looking up!!!
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