Category - Yada, Yada, Yada

Reviews, Yada, Yada, Yada

The #metoo movement is in full force and it’s really got me thinking. So much in fact that I feel the need to voice my opinion. It’s just the view of a “life broke”, “privileged, white male” so do with it what you will.

In 1991 a band who called themselves the Crash Test Dummies (from Winnipeg, Manitoba) released the single “Superman’s Song” and I think it helps define all men in the midst of #Metoo.

“Superman’s Song”

Tarzan wasn’t a ladies’ man
He’d just come along and scoop ’em up under his arm like that
Quick as a cat in the jungle…

Harvey Weinstein is Tarzan and Hollywood is his jungle.

Women are initially attracted to his power and the security he can provide in an otherwise very unstable environment. They come to Hollywood and seek him out for what he can provide. So much in fact that they may be willing to endure certain conditions otherwise unfavorable under normal circumstances to benefit and thrive under his rule. He wears nothing but a loin cloth to meetings but he’s also the key for survival. Weinstein knows he is king and feels like he can do what he wants no matter how unconventional or abusive. Women are lured back to hotel rooms like Jane on a vine for what might seem like their own good.

In the end these women are able to regain their own sense of security and self worth and see him for the animal he really is.

But Clark Kent, now there was a real gent
He would not be caught sittin’ around in no junglescape
dumb as an ape doing nothing…

Clark Kent is every man in this scenario. The people you work with, the mailman, the guy at Starbucks making your coffee to your boss at the bank. Some have power and wealth, some have a good looks and a sense of humor, and some have a kind heart and sensibility. The fact is they are all created equal, with the same biological instinct to copulate.

“I was just borrowing a little friction from a stranger.” – Dave Chappelle.

Clark was just a guy at the Daily Planet working his 9-5 who carried the burden of a huge secret. Not that he was Superman, but that he had the hots for a co-worker and didn’t know what to do with that. Should he ask her out? Tell her she looks nice in that dress? Instead he just pushed down all his feelings like a gentleman in hopes that one day she might feel the same way.

This isn’t Hollywood. This isn’t the kind of jungle where you can just swing in and sweep someone off their feet. There’s rules to follow and as men we have to do our best to separate ourselves from the apes. The only problem is that some of us are better at it than others.

Superman never made any money
For saving the world from Solomon Grundy
And sometimes I despair the world will never see another man like him…

Superman is the ultimate example of a man that all women want, and all men aspire be. A man who treats women with kindness and respect and requires no affirmation for doing so.

Hey Bob, Supe had a straight job
Even though he could have smashed through any bank in the United States
He had the strength, but he would not…

I love this lyric. It’s symbolic of a man with all power in the world, who could use it to have sex with anyone, even Brock Lesnar if he wanted, but he would not. A super male who makes all the right choices to protect the women in his life.

Folks said his family were all dead
Their planet crumbled but Superman, he forced himself to carry on
forget Krypton, and keep going

We need to stop making excuses for our actions and have the strength to confront them.

Tarzan was king of the jungle and Lord over all the apes
But he could hardly string together four words: “I Tarzan, You Jane.”

There will always be corrupt men, just as there will always be corrupt women. I think we need to be careful not to condemn the innocent and have a responsibility to expose the guilty.

Sometimes when Supe was stopping crimes
I’ll bet that he was tempted to just quit and turn his back on man
join Tarzan in the forest…

This lyric speaks to every man’s struggle to suppress the urges that make him a man. It’s the old saying that “good guys finish last”. It’s the draw to the dark side. I can only speak for myself when I say that being a good man is work. Men love women and that doesn’t turn off. There will always be sexual ambiguity that exists between a man and a woman in any place in time. In fact there is a great scene in the movie “Beautiful Girls” that sums this up brilliantly;

“Look. The supermodel’s a beautiful girl, Will. She can make you dizzy, like you’ve been drinking Jack all morning. She can make you feel high for the greatest commodity known to man – promise, the promise of a better day, the promise of a greater hope, the promise of a new tomorrow. This particular ore can be found in the gait of a beautiful girl – in her smile, in her soul, in the way she makes every rotten thing about life seem OK…A beautiful girl’s all-powerful and that is as good as love.”

Ironically there are only two things that can bring Superman to his knees. One is Kryptonite (a made up compound nobody can really comprehend because it only comes from a made up alien colony fictionally referred to as Krypton), and Lois Lane (a smart beautiful woman).

But he stayed in the city, and kept on changing clothes
In dirty old phonebooths till his work was through
And nothing to do but go on home…

There is a sexual oppression that “good” men face on a daily basis. It’s been said that on average most males think about sex every 7 seconds. To suggest that women are powerless and that we live in a man’s world might only be one perspective oppression. One that continues to see progress over the years as well. Men have very little clout when it comes to sexual pursuit. Of course I am generalizing here but if a woman wants to have sex, in most cases, she can just goes out and get some! In a black and white world based on sex and relationships women hold all the power. It’s the kind of oppression that will never change, a gap that will never narrow.

The pursuit of sex drives men to seek out these positions of power that men in Hollywood are exploiting as sexual efficacy. To play devils advocate it’s the same proverbial thumb that presses on my back to make sure I do my part as a married man to keep my wife happy and content, take out the garbage, and make dinner a few times a week. Happy wife, happy sex life.

When the #metoo movement first started flooding my Facebook page I copied the post and changed the “women” to “people”. Some of my friends didn’t like this much. I don’t think this is a man vs woman thing at all. You would be naive to think that I have never gone out to eat with a woman and not be expected to pay for dinner just because I am a man. You would be naive to think that I am the only man to ever have a woman forcefully push my head “down there”. In fact when I was a 19 year old privileged white male I passed out at a party and woke up naked in a girls bed who I was told had sex with me. That’s RAPE right? Me writing #metoo on my Facebook page isn’t taking anything away from women, it’s embracing and applying it to all people – hell ya #ustoo.

So what’s in it for old Superman? Why not join old Tarzan in the Jungle? Because we are better than that. So many of us are better than that. Let’s all be better.

Superman, in all his symbolic glory, is a moral compass for all men to follow into the jungle at a time when women are standing among treetops, cupping their mouths and screaming for help – MEEEEEEeeeeeTOOOOOOooooo! And like animals hiding behind trees careful not to expose ourselves men and women will step out and unite to forge a path through this junglescape that leads straight to a better and utopian Metropolis.

Man, what a great tune!

* “Superman’s Song” was the first single of the Canadian folk-rock group Crash Test Dummies and came from their 1991 debut album The Ghosts That Haunt Me.

Happy New Year

January 1, 2018

It’s only fitting that I start the year off going to bed at 1am and waking up at 5am thinking about the load of laundry that I forgot about. Now I need to make one of those resolutions that people make to motivate myself to be better at finishing what I started. Or in this case, remembering what I’ve started, because that seems to be more of the problem.

In just a couple of hours now we will all be heading over to Agape Table with this years load of toothbrushes and toothpaste. Once again the support we saw was overwhelming and each year I am thankful that through the generosity of others Lexi and Ashlyn get to have this enlightening experience every year. They both take away something different I am sure but it’s something we get to do on our break for other people, which is awesome.

It’s been a shut in week with the cold weather and Lexi on the verge of Pneumonia. Poor kid is just coming out of being sick with a fever since Christmas Eve thanks to some TLC and the antibiotics. Seems someone is always sick this time of year and then it hits us all. That didn’t stop us from having an awesome Christmas though. We just had to change a few things up and adjust a little bit. We spent some quality time with family and that is what matters most.

27 Handyside Ave.

We love to spend NYE with the kids and last night Joel and family came over for dinner and we had a nice casual dinner and just hung out. It seems like we haven’t seen them in a long time when Kevin shows up talking like crazy and racing Ashlyn up and down the hall. Joel and I took a selfie at one point and looking at it really brought me back. We have been friends for 40 years! One day you’re playing C.H.I.P.S on the street on your Big Wheels and 40 years later your watching 2018 come in on YouTube after putting your kids to bed.

So thankful for friends and family as always. Wishing you happiness and a benevolent New Year.

Heaven Is A Better Place Today

October 18, 2017

People Props, Yada, Yada, Yada

I woke up this morning and after my shower instead of heading downstairs to find some underwear I went straight to my closet and put on my Hip shirt. I know that doesn’t sound like anything odd but I ALWAYS do shirt last, after a teeth brush and layer of deodorant so that I don’t get anything on the shirt. As I was looking through my shirts I also brushed past the shirt I had made for the last concert that reads “Here’s a glue guy, performance God…” and it was just enough to put it in my head. I walked back downstairs to brush singing “heaven is a better place today”.

I was in the movement room at work, alone, when my phone started blowing up. “Gord died…” was the first thing I read from Al and it hit me like a tonne of bricks. I just had trouble pulling it together. Then as other people started texting me it was just too much emotion. It was definitely a tough day working with kids. One woman I work with also loves the Hip and when I first met her we were both wearing Hip gear. I was the one who told her when she got in this morning and her eye’s just welled up and she went straight to the phone to call her husband. The impact of it all was just so HARD, HUGE, and HAUNTING.

I tried hard to compose myself throughout the day but it was hard. One text I received said:

“sad day – I was thinking of you this morning. Great memories – thank you for bringing the Hip into my life!”

Back to square one. I just kept telling myself that Tom Petty died just a few days ago and I don’t remember any grown men walking around the office all welled up. Pull it together man, I kept telling myself. Then I read the obituary on Maclean’s – that was a mistake.

What I realized was that it wasn’t just about the passing of an amazing man. A man I feel some kind of personal connection to that I have never met. I realized it’s about all of you. All of the people who share this music with me and the memories that pop into my head when I hear it. The concerts, the road trips, the parties, the clubs, the camping, the hockey, the socials, the weddings, the friendships…all of it.

It’s the knowledge that today is the day the music died. Literally. What I can only explain as the soundtrack to my life now has a beginning and an end. I know that the music lives on but it makes me sad to think about the flame that brought so much happiness to my life has gone dark. Knowing that I will never again sit in an arena and see Gord live weakens my will a little. I can clearly remember them all and never wanting that feeling to end. Even just sitting in my car alone and cranking it up – it could never get loud enough, no number on a dial could ever explain it.

So that’s what I did on my way to pick up the kids after school. Got lost in it.

When Shan got home we asked GOOGLE to play some HIP and opened up a bottle of wine I never thought there would be an occasion for. We drank for Gord – and then Al came over and we all drank for Gord, just as we have so many times before.

RIP Gord Downie – Thank you for everything.

Back Step

August 23, 2017

It seems each summer Shan and I decide that we need to get at least ONE house project done on our summer budget. This year it was the back step and slanting sidewalk.

Destruction of the existing back step was our first concern. I took a few whacks with a sledge and broke the hammer so Shan said I should go and rent a jackhammer. I was still determined at this point to get this done frugally so I borrowed a hammer from a neighbor and channeled all that doubt into rage and this was the result.

Even Penny looks impressed.

Post project we always go back and forth about how to attack these things. Not being “very handy” there are some things out of my comfort zone and in this case it was drilling into the foundation. I wanted to put a header on the house to attach the frame so Shan’s dad offered to help with that. I also talked to my other neighbour who suggested I bring the step out another block so that you don’t have to step off the step to open the door like you had to before. Brilliant if you ask me. So we increased the size of our header to accommodate that and JD guided me with where to put the lag bolts and how the frame would come together and attach. Big thanks JD for all the help with that.

Notice those big holes in the frame so that it can be flush with the house and the lag bolts can come through? Well drilling those is not fun unless you have a really good drill. I found that out the hard way! Shan helped me put together the frame and I think we did a super good job. Once that was done I attached it to the house and built the legs to level it out and keep it steady. We ordered a yard of 1/4 down to fill the frame and planned on using the rest for the sidewalk. Shan thought a yard was too much but it turns out it’s not.

What $100 looks like on your driveway.

Honestly at this point in the day I was done after hauling in all the 1/4 down. I figured I could finish the rest tomorrow and that is when Nolan appeared out of nowhere! He came equipped with work gloves and shovel in hand. With his help we were able to lift and level the remaining sidewalk that was slanting toward the house. That was our initial job for the summer before it grew into a new back step. Nolan really pushed me to get it done that day and in the end there is no way I could have done that without him. Also, the next time I need that done I will hire someone. I think it turned out awesome but someone who knows how to do it properly could get it done with a lot less swearing. It also didn’t help that the kids were water bombing us while we were working but it made it fun! HUGE thanks to Nolan for being the kind of friend who just shows up at your house when you are doing this kind of thing.

Here is the end result…

Still need to move the hose over.

Kinda makes me want to do a front step next year!

Chewie

April 21, 2017

Lexi & Ashlyn, Yada, Yada, Yada

Welcome Chewie the Guinea Pig.

The girls have always wanted a Guinea Pig and every time we go near a Petland we are there for hours picking them all up and snuggling them for hours. The more we went the more they became attached and all of a sudden they were also very good at handling them very gently. Coincidentally one of the teachers at General Byng recently got one as a class pet and seeing the kids all pass her around made me think that getting one might not be so bad.

Also one of the kids I work with REALLY wanted one too so I decided to get myself one. This way I could bring it home and see how it goes and also have it at school for the kids and as a buddy for “Tribble”, our class pet. Long story short, this is Chewie.

I found Chewie on Kijiji for $0 and paid $20 for the cage she came in. I needed a cage anyway to bring her back and forth so it was really a no brainer. The girls love her and are starting to share her nicely (sometimes). Ashlyn wants a friend for Chewie for her next birthday so I made this cool home for them out of an old bookcase I found on Kijiji for $15. Ash helped me with the fancy lid.

I was worried about keeping Penny out but they have become really good furiends so it’s not really an issue. That was another big reason I didn’t want one at first because I though Pen would always need to be barricaded when Chewie was out playing with the girls. She still gets licked sometimes but doesn’t really seem to mind. Chewie even comes to Penny when she hangs her head into Chewies cage.

I really like these little guys. Need to clean the cage here and there but they don’t really need much. They are quiet when content and communicate by chirping ar you when they hear their food or when you pick them up. Fun and easy to care for that is forsure. Not sure what 2 will be like but we am sure to find out!

Santa Fe XL

April 5, 2017

It’s a 2017 Santa Fe XL with 30,000 KMs and it only took 5 months to find!

Yes we will all miss the van but it was time to say goodbye. Just like the stabilizer bars, the ABS, and the engine mounts on the van said goodbye to us. The “Memory Machine” was traded in but will always be remembered. Especially the next time I need to move something big or dirty.

Shan and I have been looking for a long time for the right vehicle. It had to be AWD, with low KMs and have the ability to pull at least 5000lbs in case we ever upgrade our trailer. That way we won’t need to go car shopping again for a very long time! If I had to give any advice to someone car shopping I would say to them what people said to us “be prepared to walk”. In fact the day we bought our car we walked and the salesperson was on the phone with her manager as we were leaving and I heard her shout “they’re walking, THEY’RE WALKING!”.

In the end we were able to make a deal though and we are very happy with our purchase. It’s “the latest” as Lexi calls it and I think it will be with us for a very long time!

Blue Lake 2016

July 23, 2016

Travel, Yada, Yada, Yada

Last year we camped at Blue Lake on the way to Thunder Bay and the kids loved it. This year we asked the Ratte’s and Morrison’s to meet us there for what would be the most epic camping trip to date!

We were supposed to leave on Sunday but I received a text from Paul letting me know that they were going up Friday. I looked online and could not get the site I booked early so I figured I would just stick to the Sunday departure time. After talking with Shan we decided to pick up a different site for the extra couple of days and we rushed to get packed and ready to leave Friday morning. Seven days is officially the longest we have been camping as a family to date.

Now camping with friends makes it all worthwhile. The kids just entertained themselves it seemed. Lexi was gone from the moment we stepped outside until bedtime. She played with Alyssa, did hand knitting, played games, and read her chapter book by the fire. Ashlyn has become such a swimmer this year it was hard to keep her out of the water. She also kept busy collecting worms, teasing the boys, and playing with her babues. She also loves to play with Haddon so when he arrived she was in heaven. It was such a nice trip.

More Photos

Camping tips for Blue Lake:

Firewood: The first night we arrived I bought firewood at the park like a dummy. I spent $21.00 on 3 tiny bundles that we burnt through sparingly between 6pm and midnight. I like to have fire in the morning sometimes as well so you figure at least 4 bundles a day at $7 each will add another $170 to the fire over the 6 days there. On top of the $300 we paid for the site that adds up. On the second day Paul and I drove to Oxdrift Country Store (about 20 mins past Vermillion Bay). There we met a nice lady who was selling 3 larger bundles of wood for $10. She ended up giving us 12 bundles for $35 which we burnt constantly at $3.00/bundle. Feel free to call ahead to make sure she has stock 1 (807) 937-4052.

The Poopers: At first I always liked Blue Lake for it’s flush toilets. It added that taste of home just in case you wanted to rough it and still have the dignity that comes with a flushable toilet. Of course you must bring your own toilet paper from home. This year I found it much better in the “plop toilets”. My reasoning for this is simply for the privacy it provides and the accessibility. I found myself competing for the flushers too often. Walking toward them with my toilet paper in hand and making eye contact with another camper who also has toilet paper in hand…both our pace quickening…butt cheeks clenched in anticipation just to be elbow to elbow in those tiny stalls! Not me, this year I went plopper. Just me and the clicking the of the automated light timer. Use as much toilet paper as you like in there as well because you’re not going to bung anything up.

Dogs: Bring em. There are lot’s of dogs here and as long as you keep them off the beach nobody complains. There is basically a “no dogs past this point” line on the beach but it’s reasonably close so you can bring your dog to the beach and sit a little further back with your pet and still go in the water. I also noticed several spots for them to swim off the hiking trails so that is nice too.

Busters BBQ: Just because you are camping doesn’t mean you can’t treat yourself! “Busters” is a five minute drive from your campsite and guess what? It’s air-conditioned and there are no bugs inside. It was super nice on our last night to break away from cooking and eating in the heat and covered in bugs. Make a reservation though (1-807-227-5256) because we went on a Wednesday night and it was packed.

Hip Summer

July 4, 2016

Summer holidays have officially started.

This summer is being dubbed the summer of the Hip. When the fan club pre-sale started we were all online trying our best to get tickets and luckily I think we got everyone covered one way or another. While I was trying for Winnipeg, Shan was getting seats in Calgary. Looking forward to taking in that show with Tim and Les and then following the band back to Winnipeg for likely the last time we will ever see them live. Pretty sad to think about really.

Brey had the great idea to get some shirts made up with our favorite Hip quotes as a tribute. This inspired me to really listen to some Hip in the past couple weeks and memories flooded in. I also realized I hardly ever really listen to music anymore. I mean, it’s on in the car and in the kitchen when I’m making dinner or cleaning up. It’s on my computer right now but I’m not really listening am I? One night last week I slept in the basement and just put the Hip on random and really listened. I forgot what that was like to be honest and vowed to do more headphones this summer.

If a song can’t save us then nothing can

I am looking forward to a slow paced summer of camping, good friends, and really listening to The Tragically Hip.

MALEFACTOR

March 27, 2016