Has 2020 Become a Curse Word?

Posted on 21 November 2020 by Larry Russwurm

The year 2020 started out innocently enough. In fact, for most of the world it seemed fine until March when the pandemic hit most of us hard. Really, it was Covid-19 that should have been next in line to become a swear word.

The thing that cemented 2020 as the thing that was malformed occurred a couple months later in North America. Giant Asian hornets had somehow managed to get across the ocean. I don’t remember their true name anymore, but I don’t have to. Their nickname stuck and these murder hornets were traced to at least one hive where a couple hundred queens were exterminated. Let’s hope that was their only hive.

I was tempted at the end of the summer, when I wrote about bigger black wasps replacing the yellow and black ones in my area, to invoke 2020 as the likely culprit. But I didn’t think it was a big enough problem to blame 2020. After all, although the sting was worse from these bigger black wasps, the swelling from the stings was less. And these bigger wasps had always existed in North America. It was just those of us on the northern front that were experiencing a 2020 moment.

Just a week ago, The Rockefeller Center Christmas tree arrived in New York and when being put up, the press couldn’t help but notice how scraggly it’s lower branches were. Immediately it was likened to the famous Charlie Brown Xmas tree. The press of course invoked 2020 as the reason for this tree having been picked and how fitting it was for this year.

And speaking of New Yorkers, I can just see Jerry Seinfeld saying 2020 just as he used to use the name “Newman!” in that derisive tone, indicating that the world had spited him again and he knew the cause.

So now I think that 2020 can be invoked like a swear word anytime anything goes wrong for at least the rest of the year.

Say your kids can’t go to school and you work from home so you won’t be able to concentrate or have use of your computer? “2020!” It snows before you have gotten your snow tires on your car? “2020!” You thought you could survive a Zoom Thanksgiving with your family without any alcohol so you don’t have any? “2020!”

It works so good as a curse word that perhaps it will carry on into 2021. Imagine you’re right at the start of the year and there’s a working vaccine but you can’t get it yet, while others do? “2020!” You’re an essential worker and you see all of what used to be your hazard pay go to shareholders as well as record profits! “2020!” Those who got the vaccine carrying on as if everyone else was immune, too? “2020!”

So it just might carry on. How about these as insults: “2020 head!”; “You twenty twentying piece of $#!+” ; “Have you got 2020 stuck up your @$$?”

I think 2020 makes a great swear word. But it’s up to everyone if it lives on in that way.

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Sons of Guns N’ Roses, Metallica and Stone Temple Pilots Form Band and Release Song

Posted on 14 November 2020 by Larry Russwurm

This Exclaim article has all the details. Included at the end of the article, you can watch the video of the song Long Awaited.

Anyhow the band is called Suspect208 and includes the son of Slash on drums, the son of Metallica bassist Robert Trujillo on bass and the son of Scott Weiland singing.

At first I went straight to the music, sure that it would be awful. When I first listened, it sounded most like Stone Temple Pilots because of the front man. But the song, Long Awaited, sounds like one of the better STP songs. The music part could be Alice in Chains or Soundgarden as much as it might be Metallica or Guns n’ Roses.

If they can just put a good album around this song, I think they will be successful.

And thinking about it, that’s how it goes for sons of famous musicians. They put out a successful first album and then think, ‘I’m just as good as my famous dad.’ Then they have no further need to prove themselves and thus don’t put out anything memorable ever again. Sons of famous musicians are mostly one album wonders.

I say that because of Jacob Dylan (son of Bob) in the Wallflowers whose first album had One Headlight and the Difference. I also say this because of Julian Lennon (son of John) whose first album had Valotte and Too Late for Goodbyes. I thirdly say this because of Tal Bachman (son of Randy Bachman (BTO and the Guess Who)) who had the hit She’s So High.

I have yet to like any of the sons-in-the-last-paragraph’s music past the songs mentioned. They proved they could pen a successful song and thought they were just as good as their fathers so they stopped. Maybe they didn’t like touring. Maybe it felt too much like work. Maybe they had no respect for their fans. Whichever way it was they are largely gone from the public’s consciousness though we still remember their fathers.

Anyhow, Suspect208, if you don’t agree with my assessment of your longevity, prove me wrong. That will mean lots of touring that’ll sometimes feel like work, the chore of songwriting and respecting your fans. Have a spite career!

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Hugging Cows

Posted on 7 November 2020 by Larry Russwurm

It came to my attention that people were hugging cows in the Netherlands for Covid 19 stress relief. Yes, Covid brings on stressors. Yes, hugging can help us manage this. But a cow? C’mon what are you people thinking?

I guess hugging humans is too dangerous. After all, they might be harbouring Covid 19 unbeknownst to even themselves. So naturally humans looked to our animal friends for comfort. After all there are all these emotional support animals that various people need.

I’ve raised my eyebrows over reports of what some of those emotional support animals are. I suspected they would all be dogs or, in extreme cases, cats. But the array of emotional support animals is more varied. Some are goats, pigs and even peacocks. These odd ones often make the news because just like me, some doubt the effectiveness of some of these animals to provide that emotional support.

If those animals can provide emotional support then why not a cow or a horse? They are awkward to take with you on a bus or in your car so they don’t quite make it to emotional support animal because they are so big and heavy. But people might like hugging these beasts more, precisely because they are big and heavy.

So emotional support pigs and birds should be no problem. Except they are. Guess where swine flu and bird flu got their names from. Why from hogs and birds. Living in hogs and birds changed the strain of whatever flu infected these beasts and made it more virulent in humans.

So why not an emotional support bat? That’s where some scientists think that Covid 19 came from. If we retreat from humans to the animal world every time something like Covid hits, guess what might be the result?

We get Covid 19 and retreat to emotional support bats for help. We then contract another new illness that makes us retreat to other exotic animals for comfort. These other animals give us a third illness that makes use seek comfort in more animals which gives us a fourth illness…

Do you really want to go down that rabbit hole? And rabbits likely can give us a fifth illness…

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Are We In Napoleonic Europe?

Posted on 31 October 2020 by Larry Russwurm

Last Sunday, I heard from London, that Paris had burnt Berlin, only to meet its Waterloo and be detained since.

Shades of the Napoleonic wars. Napoleonic France (whose capital was Paris), conquered Prussia (where Berlin is the capital) (Napoleon didn’t bother holding all his conquered territory) only to eventually proceed to Waterloo where once again they faced off against the Prussians (with the British, Russians and Austrians) where Napoleon lost decisively.

But my story occurred last week in Southwestern Ontario.

A man from Paris, Ontario along with a minor, torched three Walmarts in Kitchener-Waterloo. Kitchener used to be called Berlin before the the first world war. I don’t apologize for using its old name. The first two Walmarts torched were in Berlin (Kitchener). The last one was in Waterloo. Granted it took a day or two for the footage to implicate that Paris, Ontario man. I couldn’t see this news on the Berlin (Kitchener) television station because it was a Sunday when the news is preempted by American football. So I saw it on the London, Ontario television station.

That was an exhausting simile. Perhaps I’ll go rest up in Stratford on the Avon, Ontario or Brussels, Ontario or even Dublin, Ontario. You get the idea.

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New Source of Income for the Government

Posted on 24 October 2020 by Larry Russwurm

So much of the pandemic response has been about creating new social programs for business and people. Not surprisingly, government is getting strapped for cash and could use some new forms of income. I have taken it on my self to suggest new forms of income.

Not just any forms of income. Under civil forfeiture laws in the States, the government can seize assets if they just suspect you of a crime. I don’t want my government to become that ridiculous. As such I have come up with my own ways for a government to profit off of the fact there is crime.

One such crime is littering. Every fall the deciduous trees create a huge amount of litter. Their leaves which are pretty while changing colours also, unfortunately, litter the ground. Mostly it’s the homeowner’s tree leaves falling on their own grass. The homeowner picks it up so what’s the problem? Well the wind spreads the leaves around the neighbourhood to places not owned by the tree’s owner. I have two oak leaves on my balcony but cannot even see an oak tree from my balcony. Government is stuck cleaning up some of these leaves, so shouldn’t government get a take from the tree owners?

We could easily charge the tree owners with littering every fall. This would be stream number one of new income for government.

Corrosion and rust robs owners of the longevity they would like to get out of materials they own. Rusting of steel requires water. As such, I think we should fine water companies for this. Not the government owned water companies that produce our tap water (that would be silly), but the for profit bottled water industry, This way we might turn a blind eye toward the plastic pollution of these companies just as we have already been doing. But they will have to pay the rust fines.

Aluminum, for instance, corrodes differently. All it needs is to be in the presence of air in order to corrode. Specifically it needs the oxygen in the air in order to corrode. Fining the makers of oxygen for breathing would be like shooting our older or less fortunate selves in the foot. But we could fine welders, rocket companies, and farmers a fee for the oxygen they make. This would make a second line of new income for our cash starved government.

The third fineable crime I see is the weather. Yes weather has always happened but not as extreme as it is today. One industry does better the worse the weather is. That industry is insurance.

Now most people blame our increased hostile weather on global warming. But the insurance companies know they can charge more for crop insurance and damages from wind, hail and tornadoes if the weather is more extreme. So it is in their best interest to somehow make more extreme weather. But how do they do this without being caught?

Most people have heard about the butterfly effect. That is where a butterfly in Guatemala flaps its wings and this eventually cascades into becoming a tornado in the midwest U.S. Well it is my belief that the insurance companies are paying for millions of butterfly flights a day, hoping for more of those tornadoes.

And you thought insurance companies were there to back you in your time of need! Obviously the government needs to fine the insurance companies for their racketeering. Thus we will have a third stream of new revenue for the government. Thankfully! Or we would have to go to the unthinkable act of taxing rich people.

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Slaughterhouse Lego

Posted on 17 October 2020 by Larry Russwurm

Lego was not the first toy building system on the market. Far from it. I remember three systems that predated it and existed at the same time.

First there was the Red Brick House building system. I’m not sure what it was really called but it contained red bricks that snapped together like Legos and had white windows and doors that fit the system. So this was the perfect system for building red brick houses. They looked better than Lego houses but the lack of versatility is almost certainly what led to Lego dragging it behind the barn and shooting it.

I caught the tail end of the Tinker Toys days. They consisted of mainly wheels and long sticks made of wood. The wheels were also hubs that could fit the sticks in at different angles around the wheel and through the center of the wheel. The problem with this is that the sticks, thinner than pencils, could stand up with the hubs’ help and risk poking you in the eye or other dangerous places. Not surprisingly, Lego put Tinker Toys in the wood stove and burnt them alive.

Meccano taught kids how to use a screwdriver with nuts and bolts. It had metal pieces with holes pre-drilled everywhere so that it was easy just to bolt things together. It was getting expensive when I was a kid so receiving kit #5 for Christmas one year was a treat. The sets went up to #10 which was the best, I believe the bigger sets had motors and other fun stuff with them. That expensiveness continued. While looking for toys for my nieces and nephews as an adult about 20 years ago, I found teeny. tiny, build only one thing kits for $100. That was way out of my price range, so I never bought them. Lego tried to shoot Meccano with a small caliber gun, but that just went through its holes so Lego later sold Meccano for scrap metal where it was melted alive.

I don’t remember Lego with little men at first in its golden era where it first began to dominate. So we built Inukshuk like men. Although all the previously mentioned systems had problems, Lego did, too, and still does. Never put it on carpet or you will leave one piece and someone will painfully step on one in bare feet. And non rectilnear shapes are hard to make.

There were other systems that tried to compete with Lego in its prime. Zacs came out and were good at getting more organic looking shapes. But Lego liked their near monopoly on the building system toy industry. So they shot Zacs execution style and the blood went everywhere.

K’nex is still alive and competing with Lego since 1992. But they are not as popular. Will Lego kill them as they have other competitors? Maybe. You know they want to.

But here’s an idea for Lego. Instead of always killing other products, how about birthing new building systems? Or mentoring other systems by buying them out and putting your clout behind them. Make the world richer instead of more boring, which seems to be your goal. Just a thought. I want the carnage to end.

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Ghost Writers in the Sky

Posted on 10 October 2020 by Larry Russwurm

The Long Island medium, Theresa Caputo, used ghost writers for her new book, Good Mourning.

While she didn’t say as much on her recent Live with Kelly and Ryan interview, she came very close.

She asserted that she had some help with spirits. They helped her write this book. Spirit is a synonym with ghost so she was helped by ghost writers

Now some may quibble that ghost writers tend to be living writers, and by invoking the word spirits she means dead writers. But alive or dead, Ms. Caputo had help.

A medium with ghost writers just makes so much sense. That’s why I repeated it yet again.

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Stupid Pets

Posted on 3 October 2020 by Larry Russwurm

My cat is curled up on the bed right now. So I take it as a free moment to clean the house a bit.

Now my cat has seen me sweep lots of times. I feel that at this point, I should be able to tie the dust pan broom to her tail and send her on the way to sweeping the floor. But this never works.

You see all cats play dumb. They’ve been setting us up all their lives. Cats can’t be herded. You’re lucky if you manage to train your cat for one thing. And, just like their dog cousins, they have made it known that they definitely won’t vacuum. Cats aren’t scared of 300 pound humans or large dogs. But a vacuum sends them cowering?

Cats allegedly clean themselves. But does this mean they clean their scat? Of course not. Rare is the person who manages to get their cat to go on the toilet. So rare in fact that we might as well ignore it.

I think at this point we might as well say it. Cats are playing dumb so they never have to clean.

I remember my ungrateful self as a kid knowing I never had to clean. I would be upset when my mother made me lift my legs when I was sitting and she was vacuuming around me. I think pets are that ungrateful.

Dogs and other pets are just as ungrateful. Dogs have even suckered humans into believing they try to please. If this were truly the case they would help clean.

So stop feeling guilty for vacuuming around cats, dogs and ungrateful kids. They all could do their share but don’t. Stupid Pets.

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The Amish Wasp

Posted on 26 September 2020 by Larry Russwurm

The wasps in my area changed rather suddenly. I am used to the yellow and black wasps which have lived in my area of Southern Ontario all my life. Last month I saw my first black wasp while on my balcony. And since then all the wasps that I have seen have been black. They have taken over in my area.

I looked them up. After all it is 2020 and these wasps are bigger than the old wasps. Their sting is supposed to be more painful but causes less swelling. But mostly they are named sphex pensylvanicus because they have come from our southern neighbours in Pennsylvania. I hadn’t heard anyone say “Don’t go to Pennsylvania because the wasps are huge and can kill you.” So I now presume they can be lived with.

These great black wasps I would like to call Amish Wasps. I have three reasons for this. The first reason is that they are dressed in black all the time. A bit obvious perhaps but sometimes I’m not that much of an original thinker.

The second reason that I would like to call them Amish wasps is that they have immigrated from Pennsylvania. This follows the path of the Amish people who were originally offered lands in Pennsylvania to practice their religion in peace. They have pushed out into Ohio and Ontario and other places just like the great black wasps. Besides, as a group, Amish and Mennonites are known as the Pennsylvania Dutch. So the Amish sometimes have Pennsylvania in their name just like the wasp.

The third reason for wanting to call them the Amish wasp is the punniest. Just last month when I first spotted one, I said to myself, ‘something is Amish (amiss) here’.

And to the poor yellow and black wasps that have been losing territory to the Amish wasp, something indeed is Amish here.

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Maybe a Leap Day Could Help Canadian Politics

Posted on 19 September 2020 by Larry Russwurm

We hear the same refrain from western Canada every election. They already know the results before they are finished voting. Mostly it gets decided in Eastern Standard Time because of Quebec and mostly Ontario. Ontario has one third the population of Canada and Quebec has almost a quarter giving the pair a clear majority over the other provinces.

We’ve tried staggering the voting time in different provinces. But this could lead to confusion depending on what time zone you are in and where you get your information from. There just has to be a better way.

So I propose a unique solution. We could have a leap day for the province of Ontario. When we have the leap day could be at the end of any month. We could just make it February 29th 2021. After that Ontario would be about a day behind the rest of the country. This is not as weird as it sounds. Australia is mostly a day ahead of the Americas. Or the Americas are about a day behind Australia.

Then we could vote in the next election at the normal times and on the same numbered day. Western Canadians would be done voting long before Ontario had voted. This would leave some mystery in the relationship. No longer would there be spoilers for Western Canada.

Ontario would be happy with this because they could now strategically vote the hell out of the election. And most of us think Ontario loves to strategically vote. Look at the way Ontario votes for a different federal and provincial leader almost every chance it gets. When the Progressive Conservatives win provincially, Ontario’s federal vote usually goes to the Liberals. When the Conservatives have Ontario’s federal votes, the provincial government voted in is usually Liberal.

However, I feel that Ontario isn’t really strategically voting for the federal/provincial split. I think it’s more a “I can’t believe the monsters we have federally! Can’t have that provincially!” and “I can’t believe what monsters we have provincially! Can’t have that federally!”

But I live in Ontario and I love to imagine the possibilities to strategically vote. With 33% of the vote we could really sway the election if we already knew how the two thirds of the rest of Canada voted. It’s just too bad that the province seems to be divided between city (Liberal voters) and rural (Conservative voters).

Maybe then the rest of Canada could have its revenge. It might end up with the rural part of Ontario hating the city part of Ontario.

If you can’t beat them, divide them.

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