I
cannot make up things like this
by Robert
LaFrance
Because I used to live in Hamilton
and later Burlington, Ontario, I occasionally tune in to CHCH-TV that covers
the area just to see some of my old haunts. I have to say that something I saw
on last evening’s news broadcast knocked me to the ground and stomped me.
You know how I keep asking who’s in
charge of the weather? I found out. The TV reporter was interviewing a Hamilton
city employee whose name and title were: “Bob Paul, Hamilton’s Acting Manager of Winter Control.”
Go ahead,
look it up on Google. I swear I am not making this up.
In other
breaking news stories, the ongoing Senate scandal (The Three Vomiteers)
is…well…ongoing. It reminds us that some people have no shame and no respect
for others, especially for us little people. Of course there are government
flacks, PR people, and downright liars (all of the above) telling us that all
is well and they’re taking care of it. It has been ‘fine language’ at its
worst.
Coincidentally,
shortly after I listened to The CBC National News, I picked up an Agatha
Christie story called ‘The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding’. Someone was
complaining about the ‘mess’ things were in even though government spokesmen
tried to smooth it all over. Here’s the passage: “Mess?” said Mr. Bonnington.
“That’s what’s the matter with the world nowadays – too much mess and too much
fine language. The fine language helps to conceal the mess, like a highly
flavoured sauce concealing the fact that the fish underneath it is none of the
best.”
Turning to sports, I have to mention
the most expensive Christmas present of all time – the NHL’s deal with Rogers
which will now broadcast all NHL hockey games for the next twelve years for a
mere $5.2 billion.
I can’t imagine a world without Don Cherry (I joke).
What does this all mean, I ask myself? Will I have to watch the Stanley Cup
playoffs on my cellphone? Back to the future indeed; when the first TVs came
out the screens were about that size.
Here I have to tell you the truth; I don’t watch
hockey on television – or cellphone, or tablet, etc. – and haven’t since the
1970s. What I am about to tell you will probably get me kicked out of Canada,
but the truth will out, as they say. I much prefer watching soccer on
television to watching hockey. I do like hockey, but it’s the local live games
that I prefer, especially high school games and minor hockey when the kids are
out there doing their best.
Talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth.
Recently I was reading a book about Canada in the 1890s and came across a
passage about Sir Henry Pelatte, an eccentric Toronto millionaire. I probably
needn’t have used the adjective ‘eccentric’ once you know what I’m going to
say. This guy once had a set of false teeth made for his horse. As I said, I
can’t make this stuff up.
Every year at this time there’s the Politically
Correct argument that we shouldn’t say “Merry Christmas” but instead we should
go around uttering “Happy Holidays!” People really get into this minor quarrel
as if it were something that mattered. My friend Flug phoned me last evening
and greeted me thusly: “Merry Christmas slash Happy Hanakah slash Happy
Holidays slash blah blah blah!” I wasn’t sure which ethnic group the blah blah
blahs were aimed at, but I got the point.
Speaking of Christmas, last evening
I attended a choir performance in a county long ago and far away and
particularly enjoyed one feature of the program – Carol singing. A young choir
had just finished their performance and the MC, a nice lady with blue hair,
announced that they would now have Carol singing. “Come on up on stage, Carol,”
she said. And Carol proceeded to sing some Celine Dion numbers, except she
wasn’t so skinny.
As we speak, it should be a storm
day for the schools, but it isn’t, probably because there was one last week.
Are they rationed or what? Looking out my living room window, I saw the cars of
two acquaintances going by. When I was talking to both of them (the people, not
the cars) at that concert last evening, they both said they would be staying
home if the weather was bad today.
I think there’s something about bad weather that
forces some people to go out on the roads. No doubt it’s a syndrome of some
kind. Or how about plain stupidity?
-end-
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