Tom Cochrane in Inappropriate Places

Posted on 9 July 2016 by Larry Russwurm

There is a country music festival (the CMT Music Fest) in my city this evening. Tom Cochrane with longtime band mates Red Rider appear as what could only be described as a Sesame Street bit along the lines of One of These Things is Not Like the Others. Tom Cochrane has always been a rock act. The only hint of something else was the instrumentation on one song, Boy Inside the Man, but that song is clearly rock music, too.

This isn’t the first time that Tom has been out of place. On the video of Wavin’ Flag by Young Artists for Haiti a few years ago, this aging rock star had only Jim Cuddy of Blue Rodeo as a peer. All the other talent were young Canadian acts and they were helping introduce Justin Beiber. Why these two had to make the artist’s name ironic, I just don’t know.

So where is Tom likely to show up next? I would say he might show up in a soul review but I bet he’s already been there. I bet he’s messed up the national anthem for more than one country. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him on an interview with the radio station Q107, because the last few times I listened to this station, Tom Cochrane was all the Canadian content (with more help from Red Rider).

I’m expecting Tom Cochrane and Red Rider will soon put a “y” in their last name in order to claim relevance to young Canadians and pretend Serena Ryder is somehow the band’s daughter. But I guess it is the band’s and Tom’s right to play wherever they might possibly be wanted.

Still, Tom Cochrane, if Life is a Highway I believe you’ve been on the wrong road a few times.

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Forcing Justin Trudeau to Keep Power

Posted on 25 June 2016 by Larry Russwurm

Justin Trudeau is such a newbie to politics that he is trying his best to give his power away. His government has already signed the Trans Pacific Partnership (the TPP). How does this give his power away? Why it makes it legal for corporations to sue the government for just about anything.

Has the government banned your pesticide? Why the honourable corporation just sues. Has the government regulated you so much that you could make a nickel under other circumstances? Why sue the government. Are you a meat processor and don’t like giving your power of life and death to your customers by being inspected? Sue the government.

The corporate and business side of the economy is way bigger than the government. The government doesn’t stand a chance. It can only hire so many good lawyers. It is going to rely on parts of the country to survive on their own, all unregulated.

We’ve added regulations to the economy in the name of fairness and a piece of the pie for all. The head of the government would switch to being corporations, and they have only one mission: to create value for the shareholder.

I prefer Justin as our prime minister as opposed to those corporations. But Justin you have to help us help you. Don’t ratify the TPP. It could be your last act with power.

I know some people are shaking their heads and saying Justin of course will be given a cushy job at one of those corporations. But I say no.

What corporation would give even the slightest bit of power to someone who just gave all their power away? The corporations will not have Justin after he has sold his country out. He might do the same to the corporation.

I’ve been writing about Justin over at Nooz Spun Right. I didn’t have a comedic slant to those articles so they remain at noozspunright.wordpress.com . There is at least one more serious Justin post coming, over there.

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I Come From a Long Line of Sons

Posted on 4 June 2016 by Larry Russwurm

When Quebec was being settled along the beautiful St. Lawrence River it was thought to be a shame to deny settlers the serenity of the might river. So the farms that were built were long farms, all with a small footing along the river.

What an egalitarian society! Everybody had a nice view. But as time wore on the families that went to more sons faced a problem. It was thought that every son must have a farm. So the retiring parents would split up the farm into however many smaller farms demanded by their sons.

But the old egalitarian society still threw its might shadow along the St. Lawrence River. The farms became skinnier and more numerous than having been originally planned. Still if a farmer only had to split his giant farm into three for his sons, that still left three viable farms.

A few generations in, it became a problem. Families that were cursed with too many sons, were now forced to divide the farm into farms that were only capable of providing part time work and money to the sons. Some of these sons fled to the towns and only worked their farms on weekends.

Too many sons may have been a curse but some of the sons had fun with it. One son extolled the virtues of his farm because it was extremely efficient. His farm was the width of a tractor implement. The one long farm eliminated the need for turns and with one pass the planting and the harvesting could be done. The barn was of course placed at one end of the long skinny farm.

Did the sons curse their luck? No, they were eager to show you their skinny tract of land and summed it all up with the line, “I come from a long line of sons.”

When weed whackers began to make their debut, some unlucky son from the St. Lawrence River, souped his up to ‘harvest’ the whacked, behind the weed whacker. His farm was so thin, that’s all it took. He briefly made money by selling the footage to a weed whacking company.

Today some St. Lawrence River farms have become even thinner. Max Lecoutier (the family liked the irony of his name) inherited a two inch strip of a farm. Basketball line markings are about this thick, so now Max says proudly, “I come from a long line.”

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Heat Wave Snobbery

Posted on 28 May 2016 by Larry Russwurm

I’ve been shocked to hear The Weather Network in Canada repeating the same dogma over the last few years. That is that a heat wave is defined to be at least 3 days in a row of temperatures above 32 degrees Celsius.

2 days in a row of 34 degrees Celsius cannot be called a heat wave. An unending week of temperatures above 30 degrees Celsius just isn’t good enough.

While I understand the reasons to impress our American friends with hot temperatures that make even them sit up and notice, I think that there should definitely be limits to this heat wave snobbery.

For instance, I live in the Great Lakes area of the continent, and when it gets hot it almost always gets humid. The humidex ranking of temperature would easily break the heat wave snobbery. Yet dry Arizona is said to break the heat wave standard almost all the time. Their dry heat is way more comfortable.

Plus, there is the basic fact that Canada sits north of the U.S. and as we enjoy colder winters, we should have lower standards for a heat wave. The temperature differential a Canadian has to survive should not be way greater than an American for us to say it is a spell of weather that is too hot.

But then there is global warming, so we had better get used to the hotter standards.

Still, I insist that Yellowknife in the Northwest Territories ought to enjoy laxer standards for what constitutes a heat wave.

This is my 500th post and hopefully by next week I’ll have spun off the serious posts to my sister site: “Nooz Spun Right”.

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Greetings From the Left End of Toronto

Posted on 21 May 2016 by Larry Russwurm

It’s angered me at least three times this year that Kitchener-Waterloo, Cambridge, Guelph and Brantford have all been included in maps that were said to represent the Greater Toronto Area (GTA).

I have always felt that these cities were just big enough and far enough away from Toronto to have identities of their own. For instance Mississauga might be bigger than all of Waterloo Region but no one has heard of it outside the Toronto area. Mississauga is simply too close to Toronto to have its own identity.

But back to the problem of being called the left end of Toronto. Anger should be the response because the government promised us a green belt around the Toronto to Hamilton region. This should effectively block all attempts by Toronto to include the counties of Waterloo, Wellington and Brant.

But these maps are encouraging the building sector to dream of an urban area with Kitchener, Brantford, Hamilton and Toronto as its four corners. And lately I’ve heard of investors from the GTA coming to the three previously mentioned counties for the purpose of investing in the real estate. Why not? The prices are ridiculously cheap when compared to the prices in the GTA.

Normally all of this would anger me. The GTA has 6 million people. What do they need with the inconsequential 800 000 people to their west? But maybe a mega city would be powerful.

The green belt will still halt a full union. But the megacity can say, ‘Look at our mighty park. Take that, minuscule Central Park and its New York City environs.’

And if we left enders know we are going to be called part of Toronto, we can all invest in the real estate in this area, knowing that it is going to rise faster in value than other areas of the country. So we all could get richer.

And the GTA is already taking advantage. They are saying that the swath from Waterloo to Toronto is the biggest tech area outside of Silicon Valley. I’d have to say that here, Toronto is the junior partner. Blackberry, Oracle and a huge number of incubated tech companies have come out of Waterloo, largely due to the renowned University of Waterloo.

So the left side of Toronto should take advantage and demand better transportation links. Because of sheer size, Toronto has many things that the left side of Toronto doesn’t have.

So I have gotten over my initial anger and welcome my area being called the left end of Toronto.

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Canada: Cheated Into Conserving in the Seventies

Posted on 14 May 2016 by Larry Russwurm

If you think the conservation nazis are tough these days, you must admit that they are at least trying to be honest. Previously they got their way by cheating the public in 1970s Canada.

You probably have not heard even the slightest whisper of this conspiracy. That is because it was done to math phobic consumers by not so math phobic conservationists. If you can do the math that says we are consuming our way out of a future, then you can also do the math that I am going to bring to light.

The cheat that was used goes by the much respected name of the metric system.

Sure, you say, many hated the metric system, but it hardly stopped rampant consumerism.

Maybe it didn’t stop rampant consumerism but it most definitely slowed it.

You see, in Canada’s old imperial system of measurement, room temperature was said to be 70 degrees Fahrenheit. In the metric system, room temperature is said to be 20 degrees Celsius.

Just look how innocuous this looks. But it is well known that math phobes like to round off their numbers instead of knowing them more exactly. So the fact that 70 degrees Fahrenheit is actually 21 degrees Celsius, just never made it into the minds of most Canadians.

Look at that. All those winters in the seventies, Canadian heating was lessened by 1 degree Celsius. That is a huge conservation effort.

But don’t fear, consumers, because the ecopigs of the eighties started bringing air conditioning into the burbs. Since then, air conditioning has spread to virtually everywhere. And environmentally it costs more to lower the temperature by a degree than raising it by a degree. The laws of thermodynamics ensure this. So despite the great seventies start I’m pretty sure that conservation efforts went the wrong way.

But I wonder if Canada’s metric turnover in the seventies caused a brief downward blip in the overall global warming temperature increases.

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The Personality of Graphers

Posted on 7 May 2016 by Larry Russwurm

Most people will interpolate graphs. Interpolating is an educated guess saying that, with uniform points on either side, you can assume points in the middle follow the same shape which is sometimes a straight line.

For instance the grid like design of Toronto’s streets gives many a straight line between points. If you’re at say York University on Keele Street at Steeles in the north of the city, and you also know a point along Keele, south of Bloor, most Torontonians would guess that Keele Street connects these points in a straight line.

If you only venture to interpolate things, you are a relatively cautious person.

Science fiction writers take calculated risks and often extrapolate. Extrapolation on a graph occurs at one end that has no measured points. To extrapolate, it is assumed that known features of the graph continue in the unknown space. For example, part of a straight line would continue out to infinity when extrapolation occurs.

People who extrapolate are light risk takers.

To me the hardcore risk takers are those who place a blindfold over their eyes and wave a marker around until it makes a mark on the graph. These often flailing people are those who try to balloon around the globe, try to sneak up on a stingray or invest everything they own in a penny stock.

Don’t get me wrong, the hardcore risk takers are a delight to watch. It’s just that you learn nothing useful from them in all the time you watch their escapades.

If you ever see one of these high risk takers enjoy a truly full life be certain that someone somewhere will call them a legend. I just think that they are the lucky few who beat the odds.

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The Answer to Toronto’s Condo Wall

Posted on 30 April 2016 by Larry Russwurm

A wall of condos and other high rises presently blocks part of the waterfront from the rest of Toronto. Real Estate is location, location, location and the waterfront is part of Toronto’s downtown area. There is money to be made with these towers and do you know what I say to this? Let them build.

For the reason why, we just have to look at Toronto’s own history. Front Street used to be the street that was built along the waterfront of Toronto and Lake Ontario. Toronto residents would be first to point out that Front Street isn’t anywhere near the lake. This is because in historic times, the city of Toronto infilled Lake Ontario for quite a long stretch. It was only then that Lake Shore Blvd. came into existence in central Toronto.

And some of you know that Lake Shore Blvd is only the closest road to the lake in some spots. In another historical era of infilling, Queen’s Quay was created. Don’t think that Toronto’s eras of infilling Lake Ontario are only in the past. The cries amongst opponents to the wall of condos becomes louder every passing year.

I say let’s finish up the condo wall then let in a Toronto government that says the waterfront actually belongs to the public. Then the city can put in more infill, enough to host a broad street and and a beautiful boardwalk. If the city goes into debt from this expenditure, the trick is to build a tower or two to pay for these costs.

Then the city can wait until future debts get it to build tower after tower. Then the cycle can repeat.

Personally, I believe in this cycle so strongly that I plan to buy property in St. Catharines, the city across Lake Ontario from Toronto. Sure, the port of Hamilton will kick and scream about being cut off from the rest of Lake Ontario by the kilometers and kilometers of infill, but Toronto is more populous so the governments of Ontario and Canada will always take Toronto’s side.

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Bill C51 as a Verb

Posted on 23 April 2016 by Larry Russwurm

For allowing Bill C51 to rule the land I would like to do things to the right honourable Justin Trudeau and Stephen Harper.

If I could do anything to the pair, I would turn Harper into a rat. Let’s see what a reception he gets in Alberta as that province likes to brag about its lack of rats. Also, there is the low quality of life to consider.

I would turn Trudeau into a truffle hunting pig. One that never gets to taste those divine treats. Just like he’s letting us sniff true electoral reform while he’s planning to make another first-past-the-post winner-take-all system the rule of the land. Because of him we will, of course, never taste true electoral reform.

For those who don’t know, Bill C51 allows police to arrest you without a warrant and CSIS can simply get a toady judge to breach your rights and freedoms in secret so you can’t defend yourself. CSIS handles way too many cases for the current overseers to make sure it remains ethical.

But I have finally decided to make peace with Bill C51. After all, it’s not so bad if you’re the prime minister, a member of CSIS, or a high ranking judge. Since becoming a member of CSIS or becoming a high ranking judge takes too long, I have decided to run for prime minister.

To make myself one of the contending candidates, I will simply offer to the public the prime minsterial act of BillC51ing someone. Sometimes I have the pulse of the voters and imagine I can offer up some Canadian resident that they truly hate. While running for prime minister I can offer up say, Jian Gomeshi or Karla Homolka or even William Shatner. I could BillC51 the least popular or even if its close, I could BillC51 all three.

Some of you may wonder why I listed William Shatner with the other two. Obviously the questioner has never seen an episode of TJ Hooker.

Then finally after gaining the Prime Minister’s office, I can finally do what I’ve planned all along. I can BillC51 Stephen Harper and Justin Trudeau. Perhaps they’ve never seen what the shoe is like on the other foot. Even former prime ministers aren’t exempt when we trod on the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Which might spell trouble for me in the next election.

But still, totally worth it.

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The Cultural Appropriation of the West

Posted on 16 April 2016 by Larry Russwurm

Much has been made about the developed world (otherwise known as the west) and its cultural appropriation of the developing world and other disenfranchised groups. But cultural appropriation swings both ways so I’d like to point out the cultural appropriation of the west.

Beijing, home to hard won smog, stole this symbol of manufacturing supremacy from the west. Beijing’s goal was the manufacturing centres of Britain that brought about the industrial revolution and also a shorter lifespan. Beijing might be able to hide the shorter lifespans due to respiratory illnesses by progressing in treating all other illnesses. I think it also wishes to steal the idea of class culture from Britain. Naturally those in power will be the new upper class.

Dubai and other Asian nations have begun usurping what once had been the pride of the west. From the time the Eiffel tower eclipsed the pyramids to a time only twenty years ago, the West had an unbroken string of the tallest buildings. But that is when the far east and then Dubai began making the tallest buildings. Finally western men no longer have the smallest junk and don’t have to over compensate.

And what small country has almost copied a decade of the west and thus has conservative westerners all in a tizzy? The island nation of Cuba has authentic 1950s cars, no shortages of doctors and an expertise in smoking. These are all things the west had in the fifties and the chance to visit that decade is top amongst conservative wishes. But Cuba has something that conservative westerners dislike. They are run by Cubans and thus have a differing cultural atmosphere.

So if the west cast Beyonce as an Indian and Rihanna as a princess of China, don’t cry cultural appropriation – it runs both…

Wait a second. Both those examples were Coldplay. Fine. Blame that British rock band. Carry on.

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