the red south

The art of mediocrity

2006-12-25T13:39:00.000-04:00

The city editor of the Whig-Standard called me into his office on my last day on the job. He handed me an envelope he later told me contained a reference letter and asked me how I thought it went. I lied a bit and said I had a lot of fun and returned to the truth when I said I learned a lot. He said I’m a “good writer,” which was nice, I guess.

He said I need to work on pitching stories, which is definitely true. More specifically, he said I had to do “a lot more” to convince him that it’s in his interest to pull me off an assignment. This was a troublesome development, given that the days I pitched stories — and failed — he assigned me some fluff story about local residents complaining their Christmas decorations were vandalized or whatever. (Mind you, it turns out the Whig’s readers eat that stuff up, and I always got mail the day after. But that’s beside the point)

Then he said he places me in the top 80 per cent of Whig interns, which was somewhat comforting until he qualified that comment by saying “most” interns “can’t string a sentence together.” I laughed along with him as he described how these people left the office in tears, though fully realizing he sees me as average, at best. I suppose I didn’t deserve a much better assessment, and he did give me a reference letter, so that’s something, I guess.

He gave me the envelope unsealed, which was strange to begin with. As far as I know, job applicants aren’t supposed to read their reference letters. Will an employer consider a letter without the referencer’s name on the seal? Hmm...

Next there was, well, one. So… I just gotta make it count? He said “do what you want with it” when he handed it to me, and I’m still wondering what my options are. Nevertheless, it was a genuinely kind gesture. Maybe he can redraft when my rejection letters start pouring in.

So I read the letter. Call it journalistic curiosity. I considered posting it, but quickly realized the violation of ethical principles the act would demand. But, to summarize, it pretty much places me in the same average category I found myself in during the conversation. So, at the very least, I didn’t fail. So there’s that.

In sum, the internship went fairly well, an adventure indeed. I wrote some OK stories, but got sick of the fluff assignments by the end of it. And the process would have been quite a bit smoother if the other reporters actually talked to me. In a previous post, I mentioned they started turning around when I was speaking, but it didn’t get much better than that. Most of them didn’t say good bye when I left, and one barely looked up from his computer when I said good bye to him. So it was a bit tough working under a deadline with no one to talk to. But they still helped me when I asked for it, so there’s that too.

And I learned how to write fast. By the last week, I could write two stories before the six o’clock deadline, and another within an hour or so, which I really wasn’t expecting. I also have some pretty hilarious stories about how ridiculous it is to work in a community paper newsroom.

That’s about all the energy I have to report on that subject.

***

In other news, I’m enroute to Halifax as I write. I paid the regular fair for my ticket, but I’m sitting in the most pimp seat you could ever imagine. I’m in between the window and the isle, and there is a plug right below my feet. I feel like I’m in business class of an airplane without all the free stuff. I’m pretty much set.

The irony of this is that I’m going to be in Halifax for all of four days before I return to Ontario yet again — by car this time [insert continuous shudders]. There, I’ll see my grandfather and the rest of the fam for some holiday festivities before hightailing it to Montreal with my brother to hit up my favourite city in the country for new years. I haven’t seen my brother since last new years, so I’m stoked, to say the least. Unfortunately, my old man can’t make it out, but I’m planning on making a trip out west after graduation.

Alright, that’s it. I’ll see ya’ll when I see ya. Merry Christmas and stuff.

Best Of, part deux

2006-12-09T00:07:00.000-04:00

Here comes another lazy post. The "Best Of" the blog circuit I visit. The funny part of this is that most of you know each other. But I'm going to do it anyway.

Isn't it Friday afternoon yet? If I were days of the week, I'd be Friday afternoon. And I'd be asleep.

Saman

Reid what's a Parenthesis? is it like writing a long paper about changing diapers? I dont know, But then I was like "oh snap."

Danny

"Can I send someone by to look at the place?"
--silence--
"'Someone'?"
"Yes, I'm in Halifax. I'm moving to Toronto. I'd need to send someone by to look at the place."
--silence--
"Shouldn't you be moving to Edmonton?"

Chris

So, to recap, I’m cooped up in the comp sci with a bunch of people who look like they’re auditioning for “Depressedville” cramming for a failsafe exam worth 0% listening to some hick band that I don’t even like and the vending machine just ran out of regular juices and only had “Strawberry Orange Banana” juice left... so this is what rock bottom feels like.

If you had told me two weeks ago that Stephan Dion was going to emerge out of this thing victorious, I would have told you to that you were insane. If you had told me the same thing after the second ballot came in, I would have nodded in silent agreement, while still clutching my Ignatieff sign.

Jen

Thanks to the Gazette'er's that showed up and had fun, Rafal for taking pictures, Nadine and MK, Ian and Co., Andy showed up to celebrate his birthday, and well.. fuck everyone else.

Loukas
I only posted this one cuz I haven't yet bitched at Loukas for naming everyone else right next to the stage except ME, and instead lumping me in with the paper people. Bastard. That and I almost buckled over in laughter when Loukas kept trying to get back on the decks like a kid on a power wheels.

Alright, all this cutting and pasting is taking away from my precious drinking time.

The cubby and the underdog

2006-12-07T23:01:00.000-04:00

There's a really small sort of cubby behind the Whig-Standard. It's actually smaller than the closet I lived in during my first few days here, and most of the space is taken up by a picnic table, which the old bats from the business department sit around to smoke and talk about their kids and buying christmas gifts and all the rest. But I can tell you that little brick hovel is the most magical place in the building.

To explain, I'll digress.

I had a really hard time getting up today. I bullocksed this story the day before on the local children's aid society's response to the damning auditor general's report, which found that the societies were leaving needy kids in the lurch, meanwhile buying flashy cars for their executives. The whole thing had to be re-written - and I missed the last bit. For some reason, I didn't think it was as important as the former in my deadline-crazed mind. Yeah, I know. So getting up was tough, but quitting is just not in my blood (Re: recipient of recent dedications).

And by mid-day today, I had three stories hovering over my head and had no idea how I was going to write any of them. The morning began with only two reporters, and we were a mess. Well, I was. But a few others luckily emerged out of the woodwork and some of the tension eased. Meanwhile, I went out there with a smoke in my mouth as usual and a hope for ideas. And then came my Eureka.

My interview with Green Party Leader Elizabeth May went really well and the writing just sort of flew out of me. She talks really fast and the phone recorder thingy attached to my phone doesn't work that well so finding usable quotes was tough, but it still came together in about two hours. Well, they wanted it in a half hour, so I guess I disappointed them a bit, but the cubby once again came through in a clinch. It's amazing what you can do in two hours when the desk is breathing over your neck. Can't forget the cubby.

***

In other news, May made me a Green Party believer. I am honestly considering voting for that party next election. She has WAY more promise and charisma and leadership ability than Layton. I've interviewed them both, and May blows that mustache-sporting used car salesman out of the water. Although it will never happen, I really wish she'd get a spot in the national debate. If she did, I'm sure she'd wrap at least some of you non-believers around her finger. She's not a dummy and she's honest. That was her explanation for praising Dion's record recently when he came under fire for Liberal corruption. She says she will never tell a lie for her entire political life. Seems crazy and self-defeating. But she doesn't seem to care. And she actually seems honest.

Will the Greens get a seat? She might. She's thinking of running in Cape Breton next election after losing an extremely slim race in London North Centre just two weeks ago. I hope she does.

Then again, the Greens attract people like Nick Wright, the former Halifax candidate who used to be an ecstasy-head and apparently couldn't hide his drug-induced twitch during the debate at the Dal student union building. I'm guessing they allowed him to run just because Alexa is pretty much unbeatable.

Anyway, I never thought I'd say this, but I'm going to seriously follow the Greens over the next little bit (MAN I wish they'd change their names, though). Their Nova Scotia counterpart is beyond absurd, suggesting things like increasing gas tax so people will drive less. I think the feds have a bit better of a grasp over the reality of an economy.... well, over reality in general, so I'm going to stick it out. But this simply means I'm on the fence and no longer committed to the NDP. I usually vote for the candidate, so we'll just have to wait.

Iggy goes down

2006-12-02T19:53:00.000-04:00

Being right is pretty sweet. Although, the vote share was pretty slim: 437 ballots, or .09 per cent. So I was pretty close to being wrong, and Canada was pretty close to a major setback. I haven't been up to speed with the post-convention media coverage so I'll just leave it at that lest I go on about stuff that's overwhelmingly obvious.

Instead, I've pasted some entertaining quotes quipped by Rick Mercer during the convention:

I think Turner had the chili for lunch

The Ignatieff delegates I’ve been talking to have that tragic air of someone in palliative care eating apple sauce and making big plans to run a marathon.

The only guy having a good day at this point is the soon-to-be leader of the opposition Stephane Dion.

~ post second ballot

The Liberals went into this convention with a host of choices. They could have gone with a battle-tested politician, a former athlete, a world famous academic or a food bank founder from the West; at the end of the day they choose the nerd.

That’s pretty Canadian.

Stephen, can I call you Steve, like George W.?

~ Chretien. If I regret anything, it's missing that speech.

An update for the masses

2006-12-01T22:18:00.000-04:00

So it turns out that getting a story on the front page of The Whig isn't as tough as I thought it would be. The paper has eight reporters and I've never been there when more than five staff writers were on the clock. It's vacation time, so things are looking good. Surprisingly, staff morale is really high despite the heavy workload, and when things get down to the wire, every one jumps in.

A staff writer is running the city section for a little bit, and she's pretty much taken me under her wing. I'm gonna be sad when the editor comes back, but then I'll have a chance to pitch my own stories and get my foot a little further in the door. In other words, I'm lovin' this gig. I was SO frightened on my first walk to work, and wondered over and over why the hell I put myself up to this. But, I'm happy to report, it's worked out wonderfully. The other writers are actually starting to talk to me, and like actually turning around when I ask them questions instead of just grunting or completely ignoring me. So there's that.

And a lot of them know all about King's, too. Michael Cobden was the editor at one point, and served in several other senior positions. And one of the star writers who's won a national newspaper award and a few Ontario newspaper awards is a one-year alumnus. The court reporter worked for The Herald for a bit, who as an aside has lots of interesting things to say about management there, so he knows lots about the school. Everyone there seems to have nothing but nice things to say. So there's that, too.

There's not much more to report on that front. I love it there and only once wanted to leave at the end of the day so far, which was when I filed like four times on my second day.

***

In other news, I've decided that I'm not voting Liberal no matter who wins the leadership. I've grown to hate Ignatieff, though I don't think he stands a chance. He ran a really shitty campaign. He should have creeped up all slow like, therefore leaving less room for such sloppy blunders. The success of the Liberal Party, at least as of late, has been based on the leader's ability to stay out of the lime light as much as possible. That's why Chretien kicked ass and Martin failed miserably. Talkative politicians who think progressive policy trumps behaviour should have their heads examined.

Plus Ignatieff separated himself way too far from his competitors, which was a really stupid thing to do with such a massive candidate list. So he'll lose the first ballot, just because of the diversity of the slate. Then he'll lose every ballot after that because of his team's ridiculous campaign tactics.

So I don't think we have to worry about a foreigner/war monger running our country. As for the rest, none of them show promise. Kennedy lacks a pulse, Dion can't speak English and Rae allegedly destroyed Ontario and likely doesn't have a great chance there. So I guess I'm forced to vote with my conscience, which leaves me with the NDP. Not that it matters, though. As long as Alexa's running, the socialists will have that riding locked. I'm ok with that, too. She knows how to be in the opposition. She knows how to bitch, she knows how to whine and she knows how to raise a stink. What more could you ask for from any opposition MP?

Regardless, I'm still absolutely fascinated with what happens at the convention. While comparisons to 1968 are absurd beyond words, the end does mean something to the Canadian political landscape, though it's hard to surmise the scope of its influence. I just hope they don't pick a loser as big as Martin, cuz I don't think I can take another year-long campaign any time soon. The US presidential election is coming up pretty quick, and that's depressing. I hope the Liberals can appreciate the weight such a campaign has on the sanity of someone with a distinctively high level of political efficacy.

Alright, I'd just thought I'd rant for a while, cuz site meter tells me daily hits sky-rocketed to an all-time high (more than an avg of 40 page views per day!) when I wrote about about my grandmother. So I hope I didn't disappoint. To be honest, I've been so busy writing and reading about weather, fires and petty cigarette smuggling that I haven't been able to peer out into the wide world with any large extent for quite some time. So I'll try to get on that.

Until next time...

This one's for you, Nan

2006-11-27T19:18:00.000-04:00

As forewarning, this post is not specifically intended for the regulars who browse this blog. But, of course, all are encouraged to venture on down, as this is a small piece of a truly amazing story.

Eileen Nash George, circa 1947.

The family, that dear octopus from whose tentacles we never quite escape, nor in our innermost hearts ever quite wish to.

That's a quote from the 1938 play by Dodie Smith. My family recites it during traditional gatherings as we light candles for those of us who couldn't be there. On Nov. 19, 2006, we lost a major centrepiece of our family whose candle now burns eternally.

Eileen Nash George, or Nan, as the grandchildren always called her, was the most courageous fighter I will ever meet. She destroyed all odds with every medical ailment that came her way, forcing doctors who predicted her demise to see her as the great miracle she was. She commanded the attention of everyone she touched with her strength and her iron will. And we all looked to her for example, for inspiration and for courage to venture on no matter the obstacle that lay ahead. I often wondered where the fight in me came from. But now I've come to the realization.

Just a few hours after I arrived in Kingston last Sunday, I learned of her peaceful passing. After a few phone calls, and securing the understanding of the good people at The Whig-Standard, I got on a bus headed to a town just outside Ottawa to grieve and be with the family. We were joined by members from PEI, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Toronto and Ottawa. Dear Octopus, indeed.

We all emerged out of that painful but incredible week stronger and more united than ever before. In life and in death she brought us together.

She was quite the lady - a looker too. She disliked my grandfather at first. They were both actuaries in training at an insurance firm in Britain. When they first met, they worked together on a deal with a South African company that was apparently quite complicated. He had a little more experience and education than her and when she came back to ask more questions he snapped at her. Her diary apparently then started flooding with angry passages about that "silly George boy." Some time later, Dan's then-girlfriend wasn't available for a date to the theatre, so he asked Eileen. Though she severely disliked that mean old George boy, she accepted his offer to spite the girl who sat next to her and had a crush on him. During that date, the pair realized that they had a lot in common and shared a love for the theatre. The rest, of course, is history. They celebrated their 55th anniversary this fall.

I heard a lot of stories like that over the past week. The living memory of my family's history is a vast vault kept closed only by the nuances of daily routine. Once it's opened, jaws drop and eyes focus in.

It was a really hard week, though, and the grieving process still isn't over. I suppose it'll get easier over time, but in a way, I really don't want it to. I learned more about myself, where I came from, and what my family is capable of by living with that pain. My grandfather is an amazing man. Imagine. 55 years. He looked loss in the eye with a straight back and unwavering focus, even as the rest of us were collapsing. He is truly a remarkable man and a great role model. He's coming to visit me in Kingston some time soon for dinner, and I think I'll pay him a visit or two over the weekends.

The rest of that dear octopus is, as discussed, strong and bold. The good fight rages inside every one of them and She lives on. As I continue my internship and the first part of my, one would hope, promising career, I dedicate every effort to my Nan, my mentor who lives and speaks through us all. This one's for you, Nan. Well, they're all for you.

Newspaper journalism...

2006-11-24T10:59:00.000-04:00

...though self-indulgent and largely biased one way or another, is, as discussed, the best medium in existence.

from today's Globe

A national vision for combatting the scourge of cancer and its victims of geography who receive unequal care will move a step closer Friday when the Prime Minister announces the government is getting out of the business.

The Canadian Strategy for Cancer Control aims to do what nothing else in this country ever has: reduce the burden of cancer by preventing disease, detecting it early and ensuring those stricken by it receive the best possible care, regardless of where they live.

On Friday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper and federal Health Minister Tony Clement will announce in a Montreal hospital that the strategy will become a non-profit, arm's-length agency, The Globe and Mail has learned ...
The new strategy, which has a $260-million budget for five years, will operate at arm's length from the federal government but report each year to the federal Health Ministry.

It also comes in the midst of a Globe and Mail special project on cancer, which has catalogued the human toll of the disease and magnified the inadequacies of the health-care system.

Those deficiencies include unequal access to cancer drugs and PET technology, and the failure of hospitals to meet health-accord benchmarks by radiating patients within four weeks.

After the stories were published, the Tory government was twice taken to task in the House of Commons, with the opposition charging this week that cancer patients are taking out loans, racking up credit-card debt and facing financial ruin in an effort to pay for their treatment. The Conservatives were also accused of dropping the ball on waiting times; the series revealed how only 50 to 60 per cent of hospitals are meeting the health-accord standard of radiating cancer patients within four weeks.

Sure, there is only correlation between the series and the announcement (thought it hasn't happened yet), but I'd hate to call this a coincidence. Sure, this is likely a PR stunt to appease the House and the public, another Conservative installment of smoke and mirrors, but I suppose we'll have to wait and see...

***

Though she won't be happy with me for announcing this, Jessica's been quite busy in Hamilton over the past week. Yesterday, she worked a 13-hour day. You can check out her work here, here (sidebar), here and here.

Random and incomplete thoughts

2006-11-19T23:35:00.000-04:00

In a ridiculous amount of hours, I will post these words in Kingston, Ontario. And my journey begins with these words: “Be safe. Treat yourself with dignity. Eat well, sleep, aspire to balance. This is when our best work happens!”

Being a momma’s boy pretty much rules. The card came complete with some “pocket cash,” a massive sandwich, ketchup chips, a chocolate bar, napkins and a ridiculously large coffee. It appears that I’m all set.

I’m off to complete my internship at the Whig-Standard. This is probably one of the most random things I think I’ve ever done. Why Kingston? Good question. Journalism prof Kelly Toughill said she’s in good with the Osprey Media execs, and after perusing the company’s list of “products,” I settled on the Whig. I’ve heard some really good things about the paper, while I’ve also heard that it’s gone downhill. In what way, I’ve yet to determine, but this could get interesting.

I’ve noticed that the writing in the online version of the paper, while largely crisp and clean, isn’t exactly top notch. My hope is that I’ll be able to turn out some really good copy ON DEADLINE (hehehe), impress the higher-ups and eventually achieve my ultimate goal of making the front page.

Yes, oh loyal readers, my ambitions that manifested themselves across the first five or so pages of The Gazette’s news section last year are again going to see the light of day. I’ve seriously fallen off in the last few months, at school and at work. Sure, it’s just a campus paper, but we played an incredibly important role last year. President Tom Traves himself told me that the news section was the best he’d seen it since he’s been at the university. Indeed, at least half of the credit is due to Jessica. Her AIDS feature was one of the greatest accomplishments our paper has ever achieved... Oops. I digress.

A few posts ago, I wrote this massive list of stuff I wanted to accomplish. Sleep was a recurring theme, and it’s the only item I managed to secure. Most of the rest sort of went to the weigh-side. But I’m on my way to a new city, as crapy as I’m sure it is, to fulfill my responsibilities in my first real job. I’m starting fresh. And, god willing, if I manage to finish the pile of work I’ve conveniently saved for myself, I’ll be rip, roaring and ready to go by the time these ghetto, NON-SMOKING Via cars roll into Kingston.

But before I begin, I have to at least browse the weekend edition of The Globe. If you guys haven’t seen it, pick it up. This publication will show you why newspapers are the best mediums for journalism in existence. The edition launches a two-week-long series on the cancer problem in Canada. My step father was diagnosed with prostate cancer on Dec. 18, 2003. I will never forget that day. For those of you who don’t know the story, my step sister, Nicole Trask, found an alternative treatment centre in the Bahamas. In layman’s terms, the treatment harnesses the power of blood to fight cancerous tumors. The clinic has a long and fascinating history, and you can find my rendition of it here.

So, needless to say, the responsibility The Globe assumed in carrying out this charge is, in my eyes, incredible and inspiring. I’ll leave you with a few words from Globe Editor-in-Chief Edward Greenspon:

“[U]ltimately the point of this exercise is about getting public officials to address the unforgivable inequities and inanities in our caner care systems …

“Canada is far from the worst in the world when it comes to prevention, detection, treatment and research of cancer. But we are far from as good as we should be. We still await the national cancer strategy promised both by the former Liberal government and the current Conservative one. And Ottawa seems far less committed to medical research than it was several years ago.
“We intend over the coming weeks to challenge this system and the officials responsible for it. Shelby and thousands of others deserve more than good. They deserve our best.”

Rae's got it right

2006-10-26T22:20:00.000-03:00

The NDP has become "wedded to a culture of opposition and protest" over the past 20 years.

~Bob Rae, Canada in the Balance
Thank you, Whig-Standard

Living the hippie dream

2006-10-25T03:01:00.000-03:00

I went to an NDP press conference yesterday. That party is hilarious - both the federal and provincial varieties (we'll lump them together here just for the sake of grammatical sanity. They're the exact same, anyway).

It's not even a real political party. If it was, it certainly wouldn't feel the need to work outside of parliament/the legislature in order to get anything done. That silly little press conference, which featured an MP and an MLA, by the way, was just as pathetic as DSU election debates, if not more. In fact, the majority of the 20-person audience consisted of organizers and lobbyists (who they are invariably in bed with). I really wondered, are these people seriously kidding themselves? Or do they carry on with the charade simply because they feel that they have no other options?

The provincial NDP has just three seats less than the governing Tories. So what in heathen's name is one of its members doing whining about the fact that Team Rodney has married up with Team We're Completely Fucked? The philosophy of that party sets me reeling every time I think about it. On the one hand, they could be months away from winning an election. And on the other, they've reduced themselves to espousing a defeatist attitude, preaching to the choir in the SMUSA building; meanwhile, at least tens of students - who the NDP say they're the champions of - are walking back and forth, carrying on as if nothing else is going on.

It killed me not to ask the question, "Do you feel you're doing something positive, or did you suddenly realize when you hit the podium that you are completely wasting your time?" Or, more interestingly, "Are you so caught up with having been the born losers of NS and federal politics for so goddamn long, that no matter what inroads you make, you still try to fight the power from the outside?"

Don't get me wrong, I applaud the fact that the NDP has not abandoned its grass-roots approach even after electoral successes (well, successes, by their standards) at both levels of government. They're not sell-outs. Just a pack of fools.

But they've got nothin' on the CFS. There is no other word that can more accurately describe that organization than, drum roll please, lost. COMPLETELY LOST. Ok, that was two words. But still. I talked to Chris Parsons, a CFS national chairperson of some kind, and he told me about how excited he was to launch the Day of Action next January or February or something. He was pumped. "We're gonna be all over the country," he said, his eyes popping out of their sockets.

Wow.

I remember first-year journalism. One of my first actual assignments was to cover an event of some kind. I went to the CFS-sponsored Day of Action. The legislature WASN'T EVEN SITTING. I don't know how all that works, but I'm speculating that the cops wouldn't allow something like that to happen if, in fact, the lej was in session.

So what is the point? A media stunt? Fine. But what audience are they trying to reach? Government? If so, which level? Because their position/speaking points are going to significantly change, depending on who they're dealing with. But, of course, they have no position. Other than the fact that they want to raise hell just for the sake of raising hell.

Well, then. Is it Joe Citizen they're trying to reach? If so, what do they want him to do about it? All he's going to see is a flash across his television screen or newspaper of a bunch of snot-nosed, immature, whinny, ankle-biting kids who either have no idea how government works or simply ignore the fact. Is this supposed to inspire Joe Citizen into calling up his MLA (the name, of course, changes with the province) or MP and making a stink about the deplorable state of education in Canada? If so, and it works, the variety of Joe Citizen that would respond to such a stunt isn't worth listening to. Why? Because it's not about policy. It's about living the hippie dream.

You can go to any one of these laughable protests and ask any random participant, "What's the CST? What's a dedicated transfer? What's the MoU? And what are the problems with it?" and the reason they're there becomes apparent: livin' the dream.

Apparently, to the CFS, the 'power in numbers' principle has nothing to do with knowledge. I'm sure they've got a nice list of policy proposals that they want to see implemented. But they've seemingly abandoned the use of responsible, respectable methods to get their message across. Long ago.

***

That's all for now. Oh, except for the fact that I've secured an internship with the Kingston Whig-Standard. BOO-YA! Ummm..... where's Kingston again? And how am I going to afford to live there? Guess I hadn't thought that one through...

Fun facts

2006-10-06T13:34:00.000-03:00

Yeah, it's been mad long since I last posted and, from what sitemeter tells me, my limited readers have given up on me. Oh well. I never really intended for anyone to read the verbal diarrhea I irregularly eject onto this page. I was bored one day in the summer and decided to write a little rant, and then felt compelled to keep posting. So it was mostly by accident that I have a blog. Well, that's my excuse anyway (and I've got lots of those).

My honours project is a never ending saga. I'm profiling a former Daily columnist who, in spite of the paper he works for, is a fairly important dude. But regardless of my best efforts, the reporting looks sloppy. He's a recluse, keeps to himself and rarely talks about his past, so nobody knows that much about him. And he says most people he knows from before he came to Halifax are either dead or awol. In sum, I've discovered I hate writing profiles. Good thing I have another one due for Tidings in a couple weeks, eh? Fack.

In other news, Reuters has got some pretty sweet gems posted at the moment, and I've pasted some of them below for the perusing pleasure of, well, me and that person from Maine who seems to be the only one who frequents my blog.

Over a million motorists think about sex rather than the road ahead and millions more who don't indulge in intimate thoughts are worrying about work or thinking about their families, a survey said on Thursday.

I think this really means a million motorists are sexually frustrated. I wonder how many are women. Chris, I think you should head over to the states...

[A] survey of 1,505 American adults, conducted by market research firm Harris Interactive, found that over half of the respondents admitted to "re-gifting" with passing on gifts becoming a far more common and acceptable phenomenon. In fact, 78 percent of consumers who were polled felt that it was acceptable to re-gift some or most of the time.

So does that mean I can finally give away that Buck 65 CD my sister gave me a few years ago? Can't stand that paris-posh dooshbag.

U.S. police arrested an 83-year-old woman on suspicion of entering California from Mexico with 10 pounds (4.5 kg) of methamphetamine strapped to her body, officials said on Thursday.

Now that's one cool granny. I bet she gives the BEST christmas and birthday presents.

A German lawyer hopes to drum up more business by pursuing state compensation claims for people who believe they were abducted by aliens.

Well, that ends another post that I've managed to squeeze by without adding much of any original material.

If the whole world operated like Domino's Pizza, it would be a much better place

2006-09-24T22:50:00.000-03:00

Me: I'd like a medium pizza for pick-up please

DP: What's your phone number?

Me: ###-####

DP: That's a medium pepperoni with ranch dipping sauce (same thing you order every time)?

Me: You got it

DP: That's $7.95. It will be ready in about 12 minutes.

***

An efficient, reliable, comforting exchange. What more could you ask for from any human relationship??? Perhaps efficiency doesn't play much of a role in more compassionate exchanges, but it's still nice when it's appropriate.

I want SOMEone to blow my brains out right about...

2006-09-20T19:29:00.000-03:00

...be careful what you wish for.

In fact, my own will/negligence/will to neglect seem to be wrapped around the trigger every time I find myself before what I dramatically call death's door.

But today is going to be different. Yes, dear readers, how few you are!, I've decided to turn this wheel of fortune on its head and wish for exactly what I want... and I might even put some energy into getting it.

In no particular order, here is my wishlist for the 2006/2007 academic year and BEYOND!

1. To be able to chill with no other human being than the lovely hess-i-cita (with a few select peoples here and there)
2. To graduate. Like, with a degree and stuff
3. To find a couple grand under my couch cushions
4. Sleep
5. My honours project done and filed
6. Student loan approval
7. Pot, movies, you-know-who and NOTHING to do the next day
8. Sleep
9. To feel care free again, at least for a moment or two
10. For King's students to understand that public debate is necessary when the law is being broken
11. Lots of sleep
12. A job. A real one that I love. Like The Gazette, only real
13. To be able to think on the spot without churning my brain over and over (although that's prolly a done deal, given the first item in #7)
14. To travel. I love this place, but after 19 years (off and on... kinda), i kinda feel like stretchin my legs.
15. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
16. A bank account with a balance... or just the ability to go to the cash machine and not cringe in fear that nothing is going to be there
17. More drive. I'm feckin lazy. Way too lazy.
18. Sleep
19. Sleep
20. Sleep

There's 20. Not a bad number to start with. OK, back to the all-nighters...

Sundays suck

2006-09-17T18:47:00.000-03:00

But stuff like this makes me happy:

DJT says:
what story you working on?

DJT says:
making a petition for why the cafeteria should have sweetner for coffee?

DJT says:
bring it down man ill sign it

DJT says:
you lakey media slave boy

Quotable shit

2006-09-08T18:38:00.000-03:00

I'm mostly doing this because I have nothing to say that won't undermine my job at the student paper or my "journalistic integrity" or whatever that means. I'd love to use this space to bitch about people and situations at Dalhousie (AND KING'S) that piss me off, but I'm guessing that *could* get me into trouble. So instead I've decided to compile a "best of" series on the coolest, and weirdest, and most ridiculous, stuff I've seen on recent blog entries and in my everyday passings in life. Hurray to geekness!

**

Loukas, on working

"if I am working I want to be immersed in it. I don't want to see the sun. I want my coffee constantly at my side and my eyes straining against a computer with the blinds firmly shut behind me. Vacations are for pussies, let my billable hours ring out across the land with such force that it shakes the citys foundations."

**

Danny, on moving

"My room's still a mess, I should clean and organize things but I'm just so lazy. So lazy. I'd hire one of the homeless to help me, if I didn't think they'd rob me. Maybe I could make it a competition. I could get 5 shopping carts, fill them to the brim with clothes and books, then all i'd have to do is find 5 homeless guys (or girls, i'm not predjudice) and get them to race uphill from Hollis to Quinpool with my stuff. First one there wins 20 bucks? (is $20 too much?). Someone would drop dead of a stroke, though, and i'd lose my favourate pants or something, fuck that. why do I leave everything to the last minute?"

**

Jen, on the election of Dr. Brian Day, who "runs a private orthopedic clinic and has espoused the benefits of private healthcare delivery," to the presidency of the Canadian Medical Association.

"Day's private feelings cannot in any way affect the manner in which he conducts himself as CMA president as he is bound by the membership and by-laws of that body. Furthermore, the man isn't trying to spit on Tommy Douglas' grave here. He simply proffers a solution to what he sees as the major problem of patient suffering through extraordinarily long wait times. He holds the very sane and moderate belief that there is room for both private and public partnerships to improve both access and quality of delivery. Dr. Day gets a "brava" from me for sticking to his convictions and having the guts to tell Canadians that sometimes the sacred cow needs some company, lest it keel over and die."

**

Aaron, on being lovers with Joey (following Joey's suggestion)

"Even if I was gay, I'd like to think that I could do better"

**

Li, actually being funny for once... wait, wasn't that like four years ago?!

"Alright, so I kinda just read whatever the FUCK you sent me whilst real drunk and I must say, Catherine is just tooooo fuckin GOOD for you. You understand the fuck yes don't you motherfucker?! Yeah. I thought fucking so. AND another thing, Loukas' fuckin girlfiriend is hotttter than any girl you can ever GET ever ever ever (including Theressa, you prick). So I hope you (and everyone since I hit REPLY ALL by 'accident' so fuck you and all your newsworthy subjects you hear me motherfucker!) OH yeah, my motherfuckin lecture on how to listen to fuckin lectures was fuckin CANCELLED today so that made my 20min walking in the bitter cold worthless (much like yourlife) so Im NOT gonna have that story ready anytime EVER. GOT THAT. Great, fuck Im gonna go pass out now and hope I wil forget this email in the morning thus positively denying it on MONDAY.

SinserererererererererererereLY: Li "Justify my" Dong"

**

Li, on being an idiot even when you don't realize it

"Reid invited me to a stag party last night, strippers included. I had never been to one before so how could I resist the experience. The strippers performed for about an hour, doing all sorts of things with plastic objects over the faces of guys. I was playing the role of the DJ, volume up, volume down, next track back track etc. Wait, don't the DJs for strip clubs all get blowjobs? Wasn't that written in VICE or something?"

**

Rafal, on being an idiot even when you don't realize it

"I am speechless. I am not sure how to express my feelings about this. It is just plain ridiculous. The Superstore does not have fresh bread at 9 a.m. In normal countries (read: Europe), stores are out of bread by 9 a.m. The fact that Atlantic Superstore does not have fresh baguettes at 9 a.m. is unfathomable."

**

There's prolly more, but I'm bored and want to go drinking.

An update on the new wave of pluralism

2006-09-02T09:58:00.000-03:00

To be sure, the government has gone out of its way to sweep this consultation straight under the rug of the student movement in this country. The Tories have backdoored both national lobby groups, who have calculated, responsible policy recommendations, in the interest of reaching an unknown, likely ignorant, constituency.

It turns out that those two statements aren't exactly true. The mouthpiece for HRSDC says the department sent out letters to a wide range of stakeholder groups, such AUCC, CASA and CFS, on August 14, informing them of the PSE consultation. BUT it's now more than two weeks later and none of those organizations have recieved the letter (AUCC recieved an email in its general inbox, but nothing official). So somebody fucked up.

In terms of other "promotion," the government announced the fiscal imbalance consultation in its May budget (pgs 79 & 80), and posted a news release on August 8. Both HRSDC and finance department officials say that was enough, despite the fact that the release makes no reference to post-secondary education.

Next, an HRSDC spokesperson says the government is planning on meeting with provincial and territorial officials in the coming months to discuss solutions to the same sort of problems it put to the Canadian public. It will then incoporate the outcomes of both "consultations" into some sort of policy change in the 2007 budget.

The spokesperson says the budgetary deadline forced the government to run the public consultations in the late summer, eventhough the timeline is encredibly awkward for students returning to school.

Finally, Jen Bond wanted to know why the government is running this online consult when it already has at its disposal the body of knowldge collected during the Council of the Federation's summit on PSE, which had roughly 300 stakeholders in attendance. A finance department spokesperson speculated that the Conservatives are taking that body of knowledge into consideration, but he couldn't say for sure.

Despite all this, my opinion stands. If the government wants "to ensure that people from every corner of the country have the opportunity to provide their thoughts on how [it] should proceed," as Minister Flaherty suggests, then it *probably* should have gone a little further than an announcement three months before the consultation, a single, vague news release on the day of its launch and a bunk letter campaign six days later. The legitimacy of the entire process, including the outcome, has been completely undermined by the way it was administered.

To make matters worse, our paper goes out a day before the consultations end, so I don't know if we'll reach anyone in time. But for those of you who made it passed the title of this post, you likely care enough, and know enough, to participate. So DO IT!

Having said that, though, I need to stress that my reservations about the quality of insight that Joe Canadian can offer remain. While I'm not trying to suggest that public consultations necessarily inhibit the legislative process (weelll, does anyone remember the Charletown Accord?!), I'm merely saying that in this case, our student leaders should have been at the helm.

But since the government has gone ahead with this, informed students should take advantage of the opportunity.

My life as a drama, and why Rafal owes me BIG!

2006-08-31T10:18:00.000-03:00

Scene One: my bed

So I'm passed out and it's like 7:08am. Rafal knocks on my door and with one little "Hello," he tares open the door and starts frantically yelling about angry advertisers and distributing our paper "NOW."

Fuckin 'ell.

So he takes off to rent a car and I'm just stunned. I walk around my apartment in my underwear for a little bit, check my email and wonder how the fuck I'm going to make my interviews when I'm in a car downtown chucking Gazette's all over the place.

And then the laundry list of other shit I have to do starts flooding my brain. I have to prepare my apartment for the lovely Jessica's arrival. I have to report on a cow and lama shitting in random receptacles at Victoria park. I have to cut the mop top that's a sorry excuse for a hair style. Then I have to go to the wedding reception of my ex-girlfriend and the guy she cheated on me with. Then I have to drink all I can out of the open bar.

[pant, pant]

Scene Two: Spring Garden Road

I'm standing outside Subway with two bundles of papers in my hand and my contact for the international student work permits story calls me. "Hi Reid, I've got Megan Edwards here, she's the senior policy analyst with the Nova Scotia Office of Immigration, and Ron Heisler, the director of operations for Citizenship and Immigration in Nova Scotia."

Zoinks! Wasn't expecting that. I thought our 9am call was just to set up a time when he and "somebody from the province" could meet.

"Umm, could I call you back in like ten minutes?" The words literally just crawled out of my mouth. How does a gumshoe student reporter tell these important people to wait? But there was no way I could do it right then and there, two feet away from an intersection.

Dammit Rafal, you are ON NOTICE too!

Next Post: Reid Southwick's first STAG PARTY!!!

The new wave of pluralism

2006-08-28T19:20:00.000-03:00

It appears that the Conservative government in Ottawa announced on August 8 that it is running a series of "online consultations" to sort out the so-called fiscal imbalance in Canada. But in fact, the Tories simply posted a set of background documents and asked the Canadian public to study hard and answer the following questions by email or registered mail:

How should these key principles be implemented in order to help restore fiscal balance and reinforce a strong economic union?
What do you see as the areas for priority action?

Perhaps the questions should be prefaced with the following:

"The Government of Canada is committed to appeasing citizen demand for transparent governance and an active voice in policy-making. In this new wave of pluralism, the Government is asking every regular-Joe Canadian to study the complicated funding formulas already in place and devise a plan for a new, innovative fiscal arrangement between the Federal and Provincial Governments."

I might be way off track here, but it seems that the Tories are targetting Joe Canadian and not the community of experts and policy advisors, which might have a better idea on how to manage the problem. More specifically, I wonder about the value of judgment that Joe Canadian can offer in this case. That is, if he has even heard of the program. And if he can find out how to participate. And if he can navigate the confusing maze of links. And if he really wants to take the time to read ten massive webpages of facts, pie charts and graphs. And if he really believes that his voice will be heard. And, And, And...

Is this really their plan? Their torch of transparency? A webpage with links and contact information for some office in Ottawa? Well, if any benefit came out of this new isolationist government, it's that the staff at Tim Horton's save an extra penny every time I buy a coffee.

To their credit, though, the Conservatives have offered Canadians a valuable resource for channeling their input on the future role of government in post-secondary education. And it is... ...drum roll please... ....a survey!

Here is the list of themes and questions:

1. Objectives for post-secondary education (PSE) and training
What objectives should Canada aspire to for PSE and training?
Which objectives would you rank among the top three priorities for action?

2. Clarifying roles and responsibilities in PSE and training
Given what you have identified as objectives, what would be the most important roles for the Government of Canada to play?
Where would clarifying roles and responsibilities amongst governments be most helpful? Do you have advice on how these roles could best be defined?

3. Developing a framework for ensuring measurable results and accountability
What results would be most useful to measure in terms of PSE and training?
How could governments report on progress so that they are held accountable?

...and government emerges to save the day! Seriously. These questions are cut and pasted from every mediocre business consultant's play book in the country. "'What are the strengths of your business? How can we harness those strengths to build the success of your business? and blah blah blah." The questions are absolutely meaningless unless they are posed to right people with the right knowledge.

So why didn't any of our national student lobby groups hear about the "consultation" until they stumbled upon the site themselves? Who is the government trying to reach? What is it going to do with the data? More importantly, why doesn't it provide any background information with the survey, answering these questions?

To be sure, the government has gone out of its way to sweep this consultation straight under the rug of the student movement in this country. The Tories have backdoored both national lobby groups, who have calculated, responsible policy recommendations, in the interest of reaching an unknown, likely ignorant, constituency.

With no clear mandate or mission statement, with a deadline set for the middle of Orientation Week in most Canadian universities and no hope of reaching any stragglers, with little to no promotion or media attention, this program is heading straight to my ON NOTICE board.

All i can say is, 'Wayda go, Steve." Way. To. Go.

In case you didn't know...

2006-08-28T01:48:00.000-03:00

... how weird i am...

I sometimes wish i could use the excuse that it is only "lately" that i feel the throng of eccentricity rage through my blood. But it never works.

A couple of weeks ago, i was drunkenly stummbling down grafton street with a couple of friends. Feeling a bit hungry, i disappeared into Maxwell's Plum. My comrades could then see me through the windows racing like a fat kid on steroids toward the barrel of peanuts. Looking in either direction, i plunged my hands into the vat, filled my mits and raged back in the opposite direction, flooding the street with arms flailing and peanuts falling out of my hands and pockets.

Yesterday, i blasted Wonderwall while smoking a cigarette outside my window, wearing nothing but pajama pants and singing along at the top of my lungs. Passersby eight stories below just looked up in awe, but i continued on nonetheless. Then Phil started yelling at me through the living room window, saying, 'cut that fuckin racket out you piece of shit! don't make me come in there!' It must have been quite the show.

I also routinely get caught singing on the elevator. I feel the elevator is the best place for solo singing, besides the shower and my bedroom window. I eventually trained myself to quit the singing a floor before my stop, but people still seem to hear, as evidenced by the looks on their faces. But nothing was quite as bad as getting caught rapping to myself by a bunch of hoods. Never again... until the next time i''m wasted on the elevator by myself!

from informed confusion. a soft sequel to reidski's 2-4 abomination

2006-08-24T02:05:00.000-03:00

had to stick this in here.

excerpt:

Southwick said...
Chris,I happen to remember making some serious sport of you last night. my apologies. i blame it on li dong and all his money. let's rob him and spend it on happy meal toys.

oh, and i seriously can't remember what i said, only that i'm an asshole and you prolly should have punched me or something. my other excuse was that it was my birthday and since i didn't get kicked out of a bar (yay!!!) i had to even the score somehow.

sorry dude

Wed Aug 23, 10:21:03 AM ADT
C. LaRoche said...
Apparently I'm self indulgent, which is a fair enough assessment of me if I've ever heard one. So I'm going to consider your contribution to the Wisdom of the Month as being:

"Chris, you are a self-indulgent asshole."

:)

ON NOTICE

2006-08-23T21:52:00.000-03:00

thanks Jen.

Reidski's 2-4 abomination

2006-08-23T12:42:00.000-03:00

alright people, we managed to drink an astounding $540 in bar sales!!! so i'd like to thank each and every one of you for once again proving my friends are a bunch of raging alcoholics. mostly cuz i had NOTHING to do with it. HAH!

i was expecting a few more people to come, but i couldn't have asked for a better group of drunkards to help me bring in my 24th year in style. the only one missing, of course, was the love of my life. another time... and we're DEFINITELY doing it again!

as i've never been one to regret absolutely everything i do with my life, i have posted some photos for your perusing pleasure. all credits go to rafal. out of 625 shots, here are the highlights. the flying V

he could show me up

yeah boy

he can only be cool for so long

but he can't resist the camera

the fam

beautiful woman

the ex

...and another

things got out of hand... actually no. i got out of hand. still allowed in the building though!

more of the ex

alright, that's enough.

so suave

too bad his boyish looks only got him laid ONCE in europe!!! (it was a damn good story though)

before

during

after

ann bond, no wait, beringer! sorry ann. the two coolest girls are easily mixed up

the toast

where did those flowers come from?

yes that IS a pitcher of rum and coke. thank you nicole coffee!!!

no Chris, i am NOT taking this one down

like a fool

sandy still keeps it real with the punk rock

oh my, the TRAIN!!! forgot all about it till now. whose idea was this?

more training

and more

like a pack of villains

a bit blurry

seriously. how many people saw this pathetic display?

cuz everyone knows li needs a routine talking-to

a little too intense

steph on the patio

the second round. but everyone cheated and i ended up drinking last. pooheads.

drunk AND creepy. nikki's right up in the mix

wow.

THE AFTER PARTY

couchin and keggin

me dancing in my room. alone. rafal just came out of nowhere most of the time

what the fuck was i thinking?!

cuz the party just never ends

awww

i think that wraps things up quite nicely. not much more needs to be said.

thanks guys. that was a feckin amazing night.

Fearlessness as an object

2006-08-04T00:45:00.000-03:00

Morgue Madness pt. II

I had to knock it off first. mostly cuz i was fairly drunk and knew that if i left it, the anticipation of revisiting the very room where death lives on every molecule, every atom, would overcome any concept of responsibility, and i would simply quietly hand in my shit at 7:30 and not say a word. admittedly, all of that would normally be cool, but i showed up to work drunk. i do have a conscience, so into the morgue i went.

of course, my curiosity overcame me so i had to turn on the light to the fridge and peer in... and like, Holy Fuck. this isn't the normal drawer-type shit you see on law and order. it's a feckin open room where dead bodies would be draped over stretchers (hopefully covered) next to each other. with a hell of a lot of luck, the room was empty. sigh.

and then came the autopsy rooms, and with those came the usual suspects (saw and spatula). but i soon realized that i hadn't observed the full monty the time before. to illustrate, i must digress.

imagine your younger sister's class is having a science experiment expo. she's in grade 7, let's say, and each student has a model of their experiment on a table with directions and descriptions inscribed on a piece of bristol board on the wall behind it. now imagine that a student's illustration has inscribed above it the following words: HOW TO CUT A FIXED BRAIN ETC (emphasis in original).

wow. a little racy. but nonetheless understandable, given the circumstances.

added to this, the illustration features sketchy ass drawings of knives making particular incisions into what can only be guessed is a brain. However, the diagrams are, as discussed, the work of a junior high school kid who has no fucking clue how to draw.

cool. still no problems here. just a kid with a strange streak of originality.

then comes the last piece of the drawing, which is a SPATULA dumping what's left of the brain into a fecking GARBAGE CAN.

OK. this kid is mad disturbed, right?

NOW imagine this isn't a freakin science expo in some grade seven class. it's in an autopsy room of the QEII Hospital's morgue.

so THIS is how they teach people how to desecrate the bodies of the deceased. ahh.

good fucking thing i'm drunk.

Morgue Madness

2006-07-11T22:45:00.000-03:00

It was 5am when i stood in front of the door to the hospital's morgue, contemplating how i was going to get through the next half hour. the other housekeeper who showed me around at the beginning of the shift said that "luckily" there were bodies in the freezer so i wouldn't have to mop that floor, only the main room, an office and the two autopsy rooms. phewf. what a fucking relief.

when i opened the door, i felt like i was in the middle of the texas chainsaw massacre movie, and leatherface was going to emerge from the silence of the graveyard shift and hack me to pieces. there were five steel stretchers sitting across the doors to the two autopsy rooms, so, knowing that at least one of them had been used in the last few hours, i used as little of my gloved hand as possible to push them out of the way. Peering inside one of the rooms, i saw the stainless steel operating table, garnished with a serrated knife the size of a saw, and a fucking SPATULA.

more than ever, i could feel death permeating my skin. i was alone in the basement of the hospital when everyone else, save a few nurses and patients, were asleep, and i couldn't peel from my mind the image of dead bodies collapsed over steel stretchers.

i had to get the fuck out of there. as quickly as possible, i shut all the lights and locked the doors, paged the lead hand and told him there was no fecking way i was going back in there. i dunno. i've shoveled contaminated sludge, slung chicken at the dirty bird, washed dishes, harassed innocent people over the phone, all for a buck. i've pretty much done everything. but not this. definitely not this.

My hatred for blogs, and the shoe story

2006-07-10T18:26:00.000-03:00

Let's be clear about one thing before we get right down to it. Blogs are gay. i think the idea that these online message boards are the future of information sharing is a bunch of hogwash and i hope i'm dead before they completely take over. But, and i'm all about my "but's," i'm bored and mildly pissed off because i bought and broke a skateboard in a single day, eventhough i pretty much suck at the sport and little junior high school kids run circles around me at the commons. To top it all off, i have to work the backshift at the hospital all week (if you seriously believed the millionaire bit, you've been reading too far. stop now), and that is seriously going to cut into my most highly coveted drinking habits. And since yelling at people has never got me anywhere, i need a place to vent. And alas, here we are.

But of course, i doubt a single soul will read this little rant, yet i'm still compelled to push on. Contrary to popular belief, i've never really held with any degree of esteem what others think about the products of my brain. i'm social only when alhohal is involved; otherwise, i'm pretty damn hard to get along with. and i'm not the sharpest crayon in the box, either.

Let me take you a few steps into the shallow recesses of my mind. one day last weekend, i was an hour late for work. i ran out of my apartment without smokes or money, equipped only with a brutal hangover. Luckily, i work about three blocks from my building, so i came back on my first break and decided to hold the elevator with my shoe. Now, i've done this before because i routinely lose things (or at least i think i do, especially when they're in my jacket pocket, or my hand), and the elevator takes for-fucking-ever. So there I was, racing through my apartment looking for lose change and bills to purchase coffee and cigarettes, only to return to a set of three elevator doors - all closed. And, of course, the next elevator that comes isn't the one holding my lonesome shoe. Begrudgingly, i put on my new kicks and was off. But i haven't seen the lost shoe since.

It gets worse, but i have "some" pride.

In other news, i got booted out of Tribecca the other night because i gave the doorman, an old highschool friend, a "hard time" for not letting me in for free. i simply raised my hands up in a questioning jesture when he said i had to pay, to which he replied by saying, 'pay the fucking lady.' Now, i used to smoke mad gange with this dude when highschool classes were in session, and we've met up to shoot the shit many times since. The fact that he made me pay the measly $5-cover really didn't bother me, since he let me, and friends of mine he didn't know, many times before. What fucking got me was that he was so damn rude about it.

The bar was packed to the tits, and dancing combined with shots made me gasp for air. So out i went to smoke a fag and try to talk some sense into my old highschool friend. But he wasn't havin it whatsoever. I can understand that one can grow weary of handing out freebees, but did he really need to start snapping his figures all over the place and yelling weird shit like, 'i know you could probably kick my ass, Reid, but i don't give a shit"??? First of all, i'm five-foot-nothing and my arms are a little bigger than twigs. Second, I was trying to talk some sense into the dude, not start a fight. Blargh.

Anyway, now that that's out, i think i will be as well.