Shut Up And Listen 76

The Last Time I Spoke To One Of My Best Friends In Person Before We Both Left For University Or College—We Did Go On To Speak On ICQ After, But That’s Not The Point, Is It?
“This is the part in the movie where that music plays. You know, the music they play at the end of those teen movies when the group is splitting up. Like at the end of American Pie and shit, you know?”
	“Yeah, I know.”
	“But this isn’t like it, is it? I mean, we’re not all leaving tomorrow or anything. I’ll probably talk to you tomorrow or something on ICQ.”
	Pause.
	“So then I says to Mabel, I says . . .”
	“No! That’s wrong!”
	“What?”
	“There’s no “then.” It’s “So I says to Mabel, I says . . .””
	“Oh.”
	“When you going to Toronto?”
	“Couple of weeks. Start on the ninth.”
	“That a Monday?”
	“Yeah.”
	“I start on the Thursday. The fifth.”
	“Cool.”
	“Yeah.”
	Pause.
	“No Armstrong to label this an awkward silence.”
	“That guy is annoying.”
	“Well, yeah.”
	“Sucks that he has to use that piece of shit laptop though.”
	“Fanshawe is fucked up.”
	“Indeed. I mean, who cares what kind of laptop you use? Because it’s SO hard to get the software and hardware needed.”
	“Yeah.”
	“Hey, Farscape is on . . . well, I guess today.”
	“You know, I’ve missed like the entire second season. Just totally forgot about it.”
	“Shit, dude, how can you do that?”
	“I don’t know. Just forgot.”
	“And it’s almost over, too. The second season. Though, my friend from Ireland tells me that they get a new theme song in the third season.”
	“No more of that yelling?”
	“I like that theme.”
	“Me too.”
	“You know that “oh-ah-oh-chee-oh-ah-oh-chee” part at the beginning? Always reminds me of the Dilbert theme.”
	“Me too.”
	“Love that theme. That’s on every night except Monday and Friday. Dilbert. On Teletoon.”
	“Cool.”
	“I tell you, I am not looking forward to talking to Amanda. Been over a week. Like a week and a half since we last talked.”
	“Ouch.”
	“Yeah, and I know when I talk to her I’m either going to make an ass of myself, which is no good or I’m going to pretend like nothing’s happened and that’s no good, too.”
	“Lose-lose situation.”
	“Yeah. How do I get myself into those?”
	“No clue.”
	“And I was going to see if she’d come this thing. Save ten bucks, you know?”
	“Yeah.”
	“Guess it’s best she didn’t though. Then I would’ve had to be on all night. I’d’ve had to be funny and smart and witty. Apparently I can be quite funny while talking to her.”
	“Sure she isn’t humouring you?”
	“Nah, when she does that, I call her on it. Then she apologises and I tell her not to worry because people do it all the time to me.”
	“Like now.”
	“Like now.”
	Both laugh.
	“Doesn’t seem to stop me, does it? No, I just keep on talking and talking and talking and spouting off my idiot opinions.”
	“You do.”
	“You know, neither of us ever got picked on in high school.”
	“Huh?”
	“You know, like they always seem to show on TV and in movies. The geeks and jocks.”
	“Yeah. That was the good thing about our school.”
	“Everyone left everyone the fuck alone.”
	“Yeah.”
	“Besides, if you ever got into trouble, all you had to do was say a big word he didn’t understand and then walk away while he was confused. That’s the benefit of having an extended vernacular. A word my sister thinks sounds dirty, by the way.”
	“What?”
	“Vernacular.”
	“Why?”
	“No clue. She just does. I have a very extended vernacular. How about I show you my extended vernacular, baby?”
	Both laugh.
	“Well, in science for the first couple of days in grade ten this one guy bothered me.”
	“Who?”
	“What’ his name . . . That Luke guy’s twin . . .”
	“Tim.”
	“Yeah.”
	“Both those guy were assholes.”
	“He left the class after a couple of days.”
	“Lucky you.”
	“Weren’t you in that class?”
	“Don’t think so. Grade ten science I had like five teachers because of that whole strike thing that year.”
	“Oh yeah.”
	“I don’t think we had any classes together that year.”
	“Didn’t we?”
	“Nope.”
	“Whatever.”
	“Yeah.”
	Pause.
	“What’s that black globe thingy?”
	“Oh, it’s this word-of-the-day thing.”
	“Huh?”
	“It has all these words in it and if you need a word for a game or something, you just spin it around and pick one that’s showing.”
	“Okay . . .”
	“Expendability. How would you use that word?”
	“He’s an expendability?”
	“Wouldn’t you just say he’s expendable?”
	“I don’t know. The english language is fucked up.”
	“True.”
	“Yeah.”
	Pause.
	“You see the X-Men 2 trailer?”
	“What?”
	“The X-Men 2 trailer. It’s online.”
	“Let me see that . . .”
	“Yeah, some guys were posting about it on Millarworld the other day.”
	“I don’t see it listed.”
	“It should be under Fox.”
	“Not there.”
	“What? Let me see.”
	“Go ahead.”
	“It’s not there.”
	“Obviously.”
	“I watched it though. Here, let me see something.”
	“Okay.”
	“I’ll just check the link given on Millarworld.”
	“Okay.”
	“It doesn’t work.”
	“That’s strange.”
	“Guess they took it down.”
	“Yeah.”
	“I did see it though. Then I watched the trailer for Formula 51. Samuel L. Jackson and Robert Carlyle. How can you go wrong?”
	“Let me see.”
	“Go for it. It’s not exactly what you’d expect, but it looks cool.”
	“Loading.”
	“Look at that.”
	“What?”
	“It’s rated R and the preview is for all ages.”
	“So?”
	“I just think it’s funny, is all. Like I’m missing something in the preview they’d like to show.”
	“Red trailers don’t get much showing though and they want to advertise as much as possible.”
	“I know why it’s all ages, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it. I mean, there’s got to be some great lines that have swearing. Take Pulp Fiction for example. Wouldn’t it make sense to use that “What does Marcellus Wallace look like?” part in the preview? I mean, that would make me want to see it.”
	“I guess.”
	“Heh.”
	Pause.
	“Hey, it’s getting late, man.”
	“Yeah.”
	“Maybe I should head on home.”
	“Yeah.”
	“Your cat is fat.”
	“Just looks that way because of his fur.”
	“My cousin has the fattest cat ever, man. Named it Norm.”
	“Heh.”
	“Damn right.”
	Pause.
	“And here I am getting off on another tangent.”
	“Looks like.”
	“Thanks for a fun day, man. Sad this will be the last one.”
	“Yeah. For now.”
	“Guess I’ll talk to you later then.”
	“Yeah.”
	“See ya.”
	“Later.”
	Cue music. Fade out.

Canada Sucks
Seems the past few days I’ve been seeing examples of Canada just sucking right now. First we have our illustrious Prime Minister, Jean Chretien, who announced that he will retire from politics before the next election. He will step down as Prime Minister and leader of the Liberal party come the early spring of 2004. Why so long away? So he can fuck over leadership hopeful Paul Martin.
	We have a leader who cares not for governing our country, but only to fuck over a rival.
	There has been a slit in the Liberal party recently over who sides with Chretien and who sides with Martin (former Finance Minister, fired by Chretien recently). It went so far as to make Chretien get MPs and Senators to sign loyalty oaths to him. That’s right, loyalty oaths.
	Yes, this is interesting for those of us who follow Canadian politics and like to write about it, but other than that, this is not a good thing. Chretien is essentially fucking over Canada while trying to fuck over Martin. Great leader we’ve got there, don’t you think?
	And then there’s the case of the woman in Nigeria who has been sentenced to death for having sex outside of marriage. She will be killed by stoning. Canada has not spoken out against this and I am appalled at that.
	Of course, this law is because of the Islamic faith (luckily, Christianity and Judaism no longer stone women), and those who defend the decision say it’s a religious belief and therefore, no one can say anything bad about it. Well, fuck that. I am fucking sick of people using religion to defend heinous crimes. Fuck your religion. I don’t care if your god comes down and says, “Kill the slut!” If it does, then that’s one fucked up god and I still won’t do what it says.
	Many other nations, mostly European, have spoken out against this, but Canada hasn’t.
	But then again, Canada puts religious beliefs above all else, doesn’t it? Why else can you explain the ongoing fight in the newspaper over the gay marriage ruling in Ontario? Or the federal government appealing said ruling?
	Nice to see so many people follow religions that say “we don’t hate gays, but we don’t want to see, hear or come into contact with them, and we’re sure as hell not letting them get married because that would just about end the fucking world.” And it’s nice to see the federal government listening to these people instead of just upholding the rights granted by the Charter Of Rights And Freedoms, namely we don’t discriminate based on age, race, sex or any other superficial reason (and you know what I mean by superficial). Saying that homosexuals can’t legally marry is discrimination pure and simple, but people hide behind religious beliefs to cover their homophobia and irrational beliefs that gay marriages will somehow affect their lives.
	How many times do we have to go through this song and dance with a group of people different from the majority where they’re treated like shit at first and then slowly are given all the rights and freedoms of the majority? It’s going to happen, so why fight it? Why try to discriminate against a group of people just because they don’t fit into your little bubble of what the world should be like?
	Why not just get a fucking brain, begin thinking for yourself and stop listening to people from thousands of years ago who couldn’t recognize their ass from a hole in the ground, treated women like third-class citizens, thought the earth was flat, that the earth was the centre of the universe and thought that slavery was just about the greatest industry in the world?
	And that’s how Canada is doing right now. Almost makes me cry, it does.

Small Town/Big City
I live in London. It is like the third or fourth largest city in Ontario. It acts like it’s the smallest.
	In downtown London, a new nightclub has opened in an old bank building. It painted the outside bright red. Imagine that, a nightclub painted red. Weird, eh? 
	Enter city councillor Cheryl Miller.
	She is one in a group of “concerned citizens” who do not approve of the paint. They call it outlandish and somehow it harms the downtown area. These are people who think the city of London is the farming community of London. They don’t seem to understand the idea of a big city. 
	First off, big cities usually have nightclubs. They provide entertainment for the people in the city. Secondly, the clubs often look stupid on the outside. This is so people want to go inside, and not hang around. Thirdly, the idea of running a city is to encourage business, not bitch because they didn’t use paint you like.
	London really needs to grow up a little if it wants to play with the big boys.

Okay, Canada Doesn’t Suck THAT Much
One of the top Liberal MPs have said that by the end of the year, Jean Chretien will ratify the Kyoto Protocol. This is an international agreement that is meant to lower the amount of greenhouse emissions produced by countries. This is also that agreement that Bush said there’s no way in hell America’s signing it, as it would be too much of a burden financially to save the planet. Canada will sign it though.
	That’s not to say that there aren’t some who are opposed to it here. The largest opponent would have to be Alberta Premier Ralph Klein because of Alberta’s oil industry and the cost to that industry. 
	Fuck that though, I say—well, I’m not the only one who says that, but you get the idea.
	We’ve really got to stop depending on oil to make our lives work. The technology for cleaner, safer fuels exists, but because oilmen own politicians, we haven’t gotten them. And what I find funny is that we all know that politicians are killing our planet and us for money and we don’t do anything about it!
	So good for Jean Chretien! Good for Canada! Good for the world! Bad for oil, which I couldn’t care less about anymore.