High Five From Myself

I sometimes receive high fives from past versions of myself when I feel like I'm doing something that a younger version of myself would think is cool.

Bending the space-time continuum to ensure that present versions of myself feel adequately psyched up is a challenging exercise, but one always worth the effort. I should explain.

As a young man I made the decision to supply future versions of myself with mementos of my brilliance. It was, at first, difficult to discern the most effective way to do this. I'm not very photogenic, so pictures of myself giving me a thumbs up would have been more mortifying than encouraging. I never really understood the mail system, so mailing myself letters of encouraging would have been very challenging. Even if I had been psychic the fact that Canada Post can't find my address to save their damn lives (I live at a 1/2 address...in unit A) would have a Back to the Future-esque letter to future me completely inconceivable.

Hence my decision to send forward high fives..the most righteous of fives.

Awesome pun? High five

To better explain how this works, if I did something awesome and unexpected as a younger man...for example, managing to speak to a girl without sweating too much on my palms and saying something extremely stupid and mildly offensive I would send myself a high five. Scored the game winning basket? Send myself  a high five. Scored perfect on a test? Send myself a high five. Go on a swing-set without getting so nauseous that I puke? You get the idea.

A particularly good "Your Mom" joke... high five

While all of those examples seem rather pedestrian (minus the girls one...did I ever mention how bad I was with girls?) the sum of the events that shaped your late childhood and adolescence add up to a pretty decent stable of high fiveable moments.

Why did this matter? Why do the delusions of a pretty weird little kid still translate into an ego boost for a 21 year old, soon to be graduate and real human? Partially because I'm now a deluded 21 year old rather than a deluded child...but also because receiving high fives from a less complicated version of yourself is, actually, a genuine pick me up.

I didn't think this through when I was a child, but looking back on it as a (slightly) wiser young man I think that acting in a way that younger you would be proud of is actually pretty cool. If I am being entirely frank, most of the time I like the younger version of myself more than I like the current version of myself. He may have been a bit rounder, completely incapable of playing sports, lacking all ambition that didn't involve the high score on a video game and completely incapable of communicating with children his own age but he was still a pretty legit character.

The younger version of myself tended to call things how it was. He went out of his way to do things that were nice (most of the time) because that was what the good people in the cartoons taught him to do. He also treated absolutely every person with the kind of respect they deserved without having to prompt himself. He rarely, if ever, made pre-judgments of the people around him and accepted absolutely anybody and everybody as a friend. (Maybe he did that last one because he was in sorry need of more friends, so not quite as legit.)

I say that because life is like this. 

I'm watching a lot of my friends post about their graduation this week, and have had a lot of chats with them about how they think going out and being a real person is going to be. My impression from those conversations is that being a real person is tough. It takes a lot out of you to be a responsible and functioning individual in a society where banks are out to screw you for the rest of your life because you looked at them funny and the only people that know you in the city you have to relocate too because that was the only place that offered a job is the student loan representative that is half-threatening to break your knees with a bat. These challenges can wear people down physically, emotionally, and morally, and it can sometimes be cool to look back at a younger version of yourself, even if they were covered in goobers, and receive a high five that tells you that things are going alright.

I think the best feeling in the world would be to know that a younger version of myself would look up to me and think I was cool. I'm starting, however preliminarily, to look at the rest of my life. I'm frantically trying to make connections, foster closer relationships, evaluate where I want to be, what I want to be doing, who I want around me. When I'm doing this, it is sometimes helpful to remember that the people I used to look up to when I was a pretentious, snotty, little 8 year-old were all going through something similar and managed to carry themselves, not only with grace and respect, but in a way that I thought was unbelievably cool.

It helps me to believe that I might be doing the same thing, however imperfectly, and that is why I covet those high fives from a younger, stickier, stupider, but much more together version of myself.

/endpreaching

Why Men Don't Belong in Clubs

I've been talking something through with a dear friend and we reached an irreproachable stance on a defining issue of our times.

I hate you

Men do not belong in clubs.

Allow me to walk you through the logical processes behind this genius deduction. First, we should analyze the reasons why people would actually want to go to a club. By my count, you can go because you like the music, you can go because you like to dance, you can go in search of companionship, you can go because you like the atmosphere, or you can go because you literally hate money and are trying to find the most efficient ways to waste it. Absolutely none of these things appeal to me, and I would be much obliged if you were to let  me elucidate in excruciating detail why.

First, websites such as Grooveshark, Youtube, and Pandora have made access to music free, convenient, and even added a phenomenal you-can-control-the-volume-so-that-your-eardrums-dont-explode-and-bleed-all-over-your-friends-option should you desire it. Not only is music easy to access, you are also able to choose it at your leisure. With the click of your mouse you can do what, in clubs, is traditionally reserved  for drunken valley girls/Canadian Jersey Shore wannabees with no filter who are willing to scream ridiculous things at DJ's just trying to do their damn jobs. 

Second, I can't dance. I have never been able to dance. I am a self-conscious person by nature, and the thought of flailing my arms, legs, and hips around like an idiot reminds me so much of my childhood attempts to run, play sports, and talk to girls (all of which I sucked at) that the thought of doing it literally makes my brain want to crawl out of my ears, find a baseball bat and hit me in the legs until I will stop doing it.  I wish I could explain to you how bad I am at dancing but the sheer number of characters I would need to sacrifice at the ruined alter of my dignity to sufficiently explain how atrociously, even nauseatingly, bad I am would warrant a feature length independent project. I would add that I am not the only person that feels this way (I hope) and if at any given time you were to compile a list of the 50 worst dancers at any given club, all 50 of them would be awkward males like myself. In short, unless you are in the rare group of men that can actually dance, or are in possession of the Herculean amounts of self-confidence it takes to just dance anyway, this option doesn't really appeal.

Third, the regulars at an average night clubs are unapologetic douche-lords and I hate their faces. By no means does this extend to everyone at a club. Most of my best friends love to go out and I respect their decisions, but they are normal people that happen to be at clubs. The "regulars" to which I am referring are the sorts of people that almost certainly live at the club. You never see them during the day, they are freakishly tanned for people that you know have not seen real sunlight since their 17th birthday and the only thing more confusing than how they manage to spend so much money on drinks is how they manage to spend so much money on hair products. If you are going to a club to scam on a member of the opposite sex these are the people you are invariably going to end up running into.

Fourth, the atmosphere. I'll keep this one short. If I wanted to spend what seems like an eternity jostling around in a dark, unventilated, underground hell-hole that reeks of overpriced, watered-down rum and Axe body spray I would have accepted that offer to go hang out with Charlie Sheen. In short, I hate the atmosphere in clubs more than GHG's hate the atmosphere of the Earth.

If you want to go a level deeper, the only thing worse than being a Man at a club is being a Man in a relationship at a club. This is the definition of a no-win scenario.

I literally dance like that...but worse

Option 1: You leave your girlfriend alone and hang out awkwardly, maybe with a friend, near the side of the club. Within 5 minutes you are going to realize that by standing at the side of a club staring blankly at the surroundings you could not look weirder. The only logical things that any person that happens to look at you while you haunt the outside of a dance floor could conclude are a) you are leering at every woman in the club and are worthy of extreme contempt, or b) you are so crippingly socially awkward that you can't dance and have therefore relegated yourself to timeout like an overgrown pathetic child. (I realize option b) is probably the truth, but nobody wants people to think that about them)

Option 2: You dance with your significant other. Bear in mind that there are only two ways this can go.

A) You give your significant other space and just sort of dance nearby but not too close. In this situation you look like someone who is trying to pick but are such a bad dancer your advances are being continuously thwarted for the duration of a full evening. Everyone has seen the guy that awkwardly tries to get close to a girl while she shimmies away using her friends like human shields until the awkward butt-face takes a hint and now you look like that guy.

B) You dance with your significant other like a normal person at a club dances with another person and you look like one of the aforementioned J-Shore rejects scamming on a random. This is also an unappealing judgment to have thrust upon you. 

In short, going to the club is like a Catch 22 mailed by express post from Satan himself. Given a million years, and an infinite amount of resources I don't think I could find a thing that better preys on my childhood insecurities and effectively overloads my senses with things that offend me.

I wish I could say there was some moral to this story. I wish there was some way I could wrap up this rant with a pithy statement or clever zinger but, in truth, all I really wanted to do was to talk about how much I hated clubs.The answer? More than you could ever imagine.

Angry Bird Edition

I just punched a bird.

First, I want to make something absolutely clear, I hate birds. However, punching this particular bird had very little to do with any predisposition I may, or may not, have towards the avian menace.

Dear Birds:

I punched that bird because it punched me with its terrifying claws in the back of my head. It foot-punched me first.

I am not an advocate of violence. I do not believe in committing violent acts against animals, I don't believe committing violence against people, I don't believe against committing violence against television (which is why I hate the Slice network). I'm also not smart enough to premeditate violence against flying critters. I actually just spent the last 20 minutes sitting around spreading silly putty on my hand in order to give myself a second, sillier, epidermis.

No, ladies and gentleman, this was a primal response to a crow swooping down and accosting my brain cage.

You may have all heard about the "angry birds" incident at Queen's University. I'll keep the story brief, a bunch of green pigs tricked a bunch of birds and, in the resulting confusion of their dastardly trick, the green pigs stole the bird's eggs and fled. Now the birds are foot-punching me in the head for no reason and I'm pissed right off.

Does that make any sense? No, none of this makes sense and I'm furious.

None of this makes sense...

I can hardly even call what I did to that bird a punch. To put my actions into angry bird terms my fist was like a single blue bird trying to break a concrete block. My fist didn't punch so much as gently suggest that the crow get the hell out of my hair before it gives me bubonic bird lice. In short, I struck no great blow to this menace. Like a dwarfish kiln on the magical gold of Sauron's ring I did not but earn this great evil's ire. 

I'm not sure what needs to be done to stop these birds from dive bombing pedestrians, but if all they want is the pigs to give their eggs back then I am going to eat nothing but bacon sandwiches until they are returned (including the golden ones.) If that doesn't work I would appreciate my University getting rid of them. We don't have enough space for our students to live next year, it doesn't do us any good to further overcrowd our campus with these hell-spawn.

/endrant

I'm Not Very Cool

When I was 6 I broke my father's heart.

Allow me to set the scene: 

Enter Kevin:

A slightly overweight, overly-precocious, smug-as-hell first grader  is sitting on his kitchen counter. You feel an unconscious urge to punch his annoying little face. It is unclear what he is doing, or why your fist remains divorced from his smug little face. One would suspect, upon reflection, that the mega-maniacal cogs of his puny little child brain are frantically searching for the best way to ruin the sometimes strained relationship he has with his father. Suddenly, inspiration hits.

Enter Father:

He is a long suffering man. His patience, and hair, worn thin by over half a decade of dealing with what is, in all likelihood  the single most annoying child in existence. His relation to the hateful creature on the kitchen counter is, aesthetically, doubtful but a brief confrontation reveals that they share a particular, and impossible to replicate, sense of self-righteous stubbornheadedness. He is holding a registration form for the coming year of child hockey. 


Father: Kevin, I have your hockey registration. Would you like to fill it out with me?


Kevin: Umm, sure.


Father: Kevin. You don't sound very excited. You want to play hockey this year right? ...right?


Kevin: I don't know, Dad. I think I would rather try bowling.


Enter 16 years of awkwardly trying to repair the damage caused by this decision.

An alternative dramatic recreation

To clarify, this is indeed a dramatization of one of the more embarrassing moments of my childhood and the one that most troubled my father. The time I quit hockey to try bowling.

It wasn't like I was ending a potential Art Ross worthy NHL career. I was a chubby, awkward, athletically stunted ham-sandwich on skates. I had no killer instinct, (my most vivid memory is being scared of playing a girls team from a nearby town because they were older and "mean") I didn't have a nose for goals, (I didn't score a single goal...) and I clearly didn't understand the game (I spent more time picking up other players and brushing snow off them than actually playing the game.)

I might have qualified for the Lady Byng, but everyone knows that trophy is for wusses.

In retrospect, all of those above attributes would certainly make it seem as though I was better suited to bowling than hockey, however, I was my father's first born son and heir to his hockey legacy. Choosing bowling was a real smack in the face to his hockey legacy.

My father was not a bowler. He was in the rodeo, he was a goalie/defenceman who spent more time slashing players than legitimately trying to prevent goals. In short, he was the kind of kid that would have beat me up on the regular.

It goes without saying that my complete inability to play hockey would have been a disappointment to my father.  My decision to quit it altogether in favor of bowling would have been a nearly insurmountable obstacle in the formation of a healthy father/son relationship. Going forward, the fact that girls do not like me (a story for another day), my bookishness. general status as a social pariah and  inclination for "back talk," would all combine with this seminal moment to create a perfect storm of confusion and lack of understanding between my Dad and me.

Why the confession? I forgot to get my Dad a Father's Day gift (to be honest I don't even know when Father's Day is) and I figure that showing sympathy, if not empathy, for what most have been the most frustrating moment of his life was a pretty good replacement.

Also, the Canucks are in the Stanley Cup Finals and, thanks to the undying patience of my Father, I have developed enough as a man to appreciate and celebrate this wonderful event.

It also doesn't hurt that I can still be a smug-as-hell know-it-all that needs a good face punching and sharing this kind of story helps to keep me (more)  humble.

Political Strategy 205: Listen to your Elders

http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2011/05/party-leaders-do-they-wield-too-much-power.html

Yes, yes they do. The real travesty is when you compare the amount of power wielded by Pary Leaders and compare that to the amount of power wielded by those who would be willing to use it on behalf of the public good in accordance with the primary assumptions of Canadian democracy.

In short, I don't like the centralization of power in the hyper-partisan party politics system. According to that CBC poll neither do 92% of Canadians.

Why? For one, people like Peter Milliken who intimitely understand the history and processes that define an effective democratic system traditionally do not end up in those roles. What we tend to see is a House of Commons that looks more like Spy vs. Spy or a hockey game than a house of debate and representation.

The only difference is that in the House of Commons there would only be white spies....

Over the last year I have had two of the people who I respect most in Canadian Politics, the Rt. Hon. John Turner and the Hon. Peter Milliken, address me on a topic. You might not be surprised to hear that the topic was over-centralization of power in the hands of Party Leaders, and the marginalization of the MP in the current party system. These are not men who lack an understanding of our parliamentary system.

 John Turner is a Rhode Scholar who won his first election in 1962, served as an MP in 3 provinces, served in 5 of Canada's most important Departments and sat as Leader of the Opposition for 6 years. In short, he knows a thing or two about being a Party Leader and how parties operate.

Peter Milliken is Peter-God-Damn-Milliken. If you don't know his resume then you can just look it right the hell up.

The problems that these men have identified are pervasive, and strike at the very fundamentals of an effective system of representation. They argue that whipped votes, extreme party discipline, a marginalization of Private Member Bills and the prevalence of wedge issues such as the Long-Gun debate all damage the ability of Members of Parliament to effectively voice the opinions and needs of their constituents. This, in turn, makes it nearly impossible for the average Canadian to have a say in the management of our political system.

When the only Bills that can be passed through our Parliament need to come through the Prime Minister's Office the ability of individuals to affect change is minimized. Systems of governance where only the wealthy are able to develop policy become (even further) entrenched. There is no need for meaningful regional representation, there is no space for local issues, the only person the Prime Minister needs to listen to is himself and, on occasion, a massive and unwieldy Caucus in which no individual member carries enough weight to leverage for change.

This isn't only a Conservative problem either. Within the Liberal party under Jean Chretien and Paul Martin the only individual whose opinion mattered was the leader. Anyone that actively worked against a leader would risk being marginalized or even exiled from Caucus (Sorry John Manley).

The New Democratic Party may well provide an alternative, but given how important Ol Bon Jack is to the operations of the party, and the rapid and fundamental change in the look of the NDP Caucus nothing is guaranteed to be carried forward.

Or any other day for that matter

So, when all is said and done the only people left to speak out against a slowly developing system that gradually chokes the ability of Canadians to participate in their governance are those retiring from that system. The only ones that can speak without damning their own political futures is the longest serving Speaker of the House sitting on the twilight of a brilliant career in his "farewell interview" and an old man, gradually growing sicker, in an address to the House of Commons filled not by real representatives, but students.

As my friend Charmander once said: "Not a single (firetruck) was given to this fundamental shift in the nature of Canadian Democracy." (I might be paraphrasing). The really disgusting thing about all this is that if you were to ask the average Canadian if they believe that the most effective system of Governance is one where policy is determined not by the individuals who we choose to elect, but determined almost exclusively by the party leader they choose through a system of wheeling, dealing, and backstabbing at a Holiday Inn conference center somewhere in Oakville I am willing to bet they would disagree. But, of course, nobody informs themselves of how the system is changing and, as a result, there is not a single firetruck to be found.

I don't have any answers to this problem. If I'm being fair, there are plenty of people who would disagree that there is any problem at all. However, I'm a firm believer in the primary lesson of Political Strategy 205, listen to your elders. If two of the smartest, best informed people in Canada point to a phenomena and say this is a serious problem I'm fairly likely to at least give it a look.

In my opinion, a system that marginalizes the voices of the people it is meant to represent is a broken one. Unfortunately, there isn't much that either of us can do about it... we aren't Party Leaders.

Its the End of the World As We Know it? But I Feel Fine...

This is the way the World Ends -- Some Dude

The World is ending.

Canada has lost its soul.

Gay Marriage and Abortion are over.

With the collapse of the Liberal Party, and the electoral map of Canada looking more like the Firefox logo than a graphical representation of Canadian democracy, I've started to hear a number of outlandish claims like these.

Following Election 41 I could barely hear the sound of a million upper middle class elderly hearts breaking over the sound of political pundits screaming "WHAT" at their television screens. This upset me greatly, as my favorite sound is the sound of overprivileged and underinformed hearts shattering. The fact that I was kept up all night by journalists frantically hammering out under-considered conclusions to a very confusing evening only managed to frustrate me further.

In short, I'm pissed off. 

Haters Gon' Hate -- Sir John A. Macdonald

I wish I could explain to the heartbroken how ridiculous it is to suggest that Canada is no longer Canada because the Conservative Party won a majority. Our first Prime Minister lead a Conservative majority government. The largest majority in Canadian history, which passed some of its most meaningful legislation, was Conservative. To suggest that a win by today's Tories is an extension of under-informed voters, a failure of democracy, or a signal that Canada is no longer Canada is ridiculous. 

I'm not a Conservative, and I don't like their politics either, but I respect the process. This poor loser attitude that has permeated a very significant percentage of population is the real poor reflection on the health of democracy in Canada, and this accusatory and bitter rhetoric is considerably more "uncanadian" than any Conservative majority.

The sense of entitlement that permeates the Liberal Party of Canada and its supporters is, perhaps, the biggest challenge facing the party. The parties willingness to rest on the laurels of men that have been dead for decades--and stole most of their best ideas from the CCF/NDP--is unacceptable in the current political climate. Their inability to realize that running as a "Blue Liberal" is not simply being a blue blood running as a Liberal is crippling. That the Liberals could be so decimated by Stephen Harper, a man who is no doubt a brilliant strategist, but has the personality of a soggy blanket, is an embarrassment. 

Brian Mulroney Says: LOLZ

 I want to have faith in you people, I really do, but you make it so damn hard sometimes. If the Liberal Party wants to come out of this looking good, it needs a fundamental change of attitude. 

First, you need some policy. I don't mean "here is free money to students" policy. Nor do I mean "here is some free money to old people" policy. As you saw in the last election bribing the electorate with its own money isn't the answer. You need to take the right side on a serious issue, come up with a comprehensive plan for Mental Health, talk renewed national infrastructure, hammer the Conservatives on their ass backwards Public Safety policies, anything.

Second, get young, smart, talented Canadians to associate with your brand, and don't just tokenize them. If you want to be successful, and actually gain something positive out of riding the coat-tails of old dead Liberals use the allure of Pearson, Trudeau, King, St. Laurent and Laurier to attract the best and brightest and let them speak to the values of the party. If you had given a bigger voice to your best and brightest you wouldn't have lost so many of them in the last election. 

Finally, give us a reason to vote for you, not against someone else. The Liberal party has been playing the role of protest party for too long. If you want to be the big dog, then act like the big dog. You can't keep cowering behind your history and only venturing out to whine about the Government's mistakes. That was the sort of thing that kept the NDP from making up any serious ground, and used to draw ridicule from serious candidates. Look what happens when you show some personality and exhibit leadership. Ol' Bon Jack is over 100 seats.

The Liberal Party is a long way from coming back, but perhaps it needed a solid ass kicking. The Liberal Party that suffered massive defeat was stagnant, older, weak, and divided. Perhaps some time as third party will teach them a bit of humility, teach them how to focus, remind them how competitive the political process is. With any luck, the party that comes out of the desert will remember where it comes from, remember what Canadians want, and show the kind of leadership we have come to expect. But before it can do that, its supporters need to quit whining. 

You Were Always On My Mind

No Jokes. Just Mad Respect.

Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter are my new best friends. They don't know it yet, and neither do the Secret Service--I would be much obliged if you didn't tell the Secret Service...

If you don't know anything about Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter, all I can say is that they are the most successful couple in the United States. In fact, they are the only couple to surpass Ke$ha and Glitter in my esteem.

Mrs. Carter has devoted over 30 years of her life to research on Mental Health and the destigmatization of mental health around the world. Her, and her Carter Center Team of 100 journalists work tirelessly to ensure accurate and educated writing on the topic of mental illness and her many books on the topic are written with such a poignant combination of knowledge and care for her fellow humans that I will freely admit to tearing up while reading them. In short, she is the most brilliant, human individual I can imagine who is not named Jimmy Carter, and even then we have a tie.

Jimmy Carter has been, beyond the shadow of a doubt, the most successful former leader of a country.  His Carter Center fights treatable disease, oversees elections, and work's to bring to the world's attention human rights abuses committed by any and all nations.

In short, they are super cool and, as a couple, accomplished more last Thursday afternoon than I will in my entire life.

Why my obsession? Because I went down to Georgia and had the honor to meet them. It was cool

My Favorite U.S. State

I'm not going to drag on forever like I usually do. This isn't funny. I just wanted a chance to briefly share the Carter's story. I have a real interest in politics, and was generally aware of Carter's story. What I didn't know however, was the close connection between the Carters and Canada, and the Carter's work and issues that have taken center stage.

Carter shed tears at lunch while discussing Canada's contributions to protecting Iranian prisoners during his Presidency, and spoke passionately about his work as one of the leaders of the team that worked on the Chalk River Reactor. My Father was an American Citizen until 3 years ago, both of my parents were members of the American Military, when he spoke about the relationship between Canada and the United States as being not one of neighbors, or even friends, but in many ways a familial one. 

When we finally live in a world where mental illness is treated in a way not so dissimilar from physical illness. Where we offer support, acceptance, and encouragement rather than publish articles using pejorative and inaccurate language for highly prevalent disorders it will be the work of Rosalyn Carter that brought us there.

Finally, if we ever have a class of politicians that speak bravely on the topic of human decency, contemplate their action and devote themselves sincerely to public service they will be following in the footsteps of Jimmy Carter. To borrow from my friend Arthur Milnes, we'll be standing in his bright shadow.

I Shall Take The Ring To Mordor...Though I Do Not Know The Way

One Game To Rule Them All: "The Fellowship"

To plagiarize myself: The Fellowship is an elaborate drinking game set to all 3 of the Lord Of The Rings Extended Edition DVD's. It is an epic quest to vanquish one's dignity in the aching abyss of Mount Hangover set to a soundtrack of extreme nerdiness/epic cinema at its finest depending on how you view the fantasy genre.

Anyone That Brings Up The Animated Version Will Be Thrown into Mount Doom

I could easily just ask 8 of my friends to sit in my basement, but that isn't how I do things. This Fellowship will be worthy of the franchise that made it all possible. I'm looking to get as many of my fellow Kingston summerers together as possible for a weekend that will go down as the greatest party of the decade.

The plan is to get as many humans together as possible for one legendary saturday. Beer will be consumed, Pizza will be ordered, Jacket Bars will be earned. 

I have scoured the internet (how cool does that make me sound) to discover the best possible set of rules for this Fellowship. Here is what I came up with:  

"The Fellowship": Whenever the fellowship is mentioned everyone toasts the team.

The Party your Party Could Look Like

"Does This Rule Need A Name?":Every time someone drinks anything, take a drink. Careful during the Legolas/Gimli drinking game. 

"Really?": Every time someone eats anything, take a drink.

"Oh, Sam...": Every time Frodo says "Oh, Sam...," turn to the person beside you and do the same. Drink to make things less awkward. 

"The Killer": Every time someone looks mopey/angst-ridden recall that they have neither beer nor pizza. Sad Drink. 

"9 Riders of the Drinkpocalypse": Every time a Black Rider appears do your part to fight the impossible manifestation of evil. Drink. 

Rule 1 and Rule 2

"OmNomNom": Every time we see someone's filthy, chewed-up fingernails, take a shot.

"Home For A Rest": Every time someone sings a song, take a drink, try to sing along. If it is in elvish just mumble loudly and in an angsty tone. 

"Phallic Imagery": Every time someone draws a sword, take a drink. Its what a real man would do. 

"Fool Of A Took:": Every time Pippin acts like an idiot, take a drink. Think Gandalf is a bit of a grump, remember he dies and feel really guilty about it.

"OmNomNom #2": Every time Gollum hacks up a "gollum! gollum!" drink.

"Precious Is An Awful Movie": In an attempt to unsee the unsee-able, every time someone says "precious" try to drink the pain away. 

"Size Doesn't Matter": Drink whenever a reference to the hobbits size is made. Get bizarrely defensive 

"Is Peter Jackson A Sexist?": Take a drink whenever a female (who doesn't want to sleep with Aragorn) is seen outside the Shire. 

"A Ballad For Steve":Steve the Uruk-Hai (First Uruk-Hai that gets shot at Helms Deep) has been brutally murdered? Have a drink in memory of his life. 

"So Young": Sean the Cave-Troll Gets killed. Remember he probably had a wife and family somewhere. Drink to hide your shame. 

"This is Getting Old": Dwarf/Elf insult or vice versa? Drink. Wonder why Peter Jackson didn't mix up his dialog a bit. 

"Do Not Meddle in the Affairs of Wizards. They are Subtle And Quick to Anger": Gandalf says something wise? Drink. 

"He Who Shall Not Be Named": If Sauron mentioned by name you should drink. (Harry Potter nerds/Lord of the Rings Nerds simultaneously freak out that I misused that reference). 

"Royalties Anyone?" Bilbo's book is mentioned? Drink. 

"Are We There Yet?" Anytime there’s a false ending in “The Return of the King” drink and groan. 

And That's A Wrap: Hilarity Ensues

 Finished? Hardly. After going through a quest of that magnitude you can never truly be finished. You also have the hardest part of the whole journey to go through, next morning.

P.S. Ke$ha.

Looking forward to seeing everyone this summer.

The Most Heinous Thing I've Ever Heard

‎"Just cramped up real bad. I could feel it coming after the second...It was real frustrating...Its something that used to happen to me in the AHL. A lot of nervous energy, probably sweating a little more than normal, got a little dehydrated." -Cory Schneider.

Everything I Hate:

Me? Bitter?

My vote for 2011? The Water Jug.

John A Macdonald is reported to have said, after vomiting during a political debate, that his illness was brought upon by his opponents repugnant policies. I managed to make it through last nights AMS hosted debates for Kingston and the Islands without vomiting, something I found fairly odd until I realized that there wasn't really that much policy to find repugnant.

Artist's Rendition

I've been struggling for a way to format my post on Thursday's debate. Do I do it by candidate? Do I rank them out of 5 stars? Do I rank their performance in individual categories? Do I stand on the street corner and scream myself hoarse at how awful a display it was?

None of those really seem to fit. If I did the whole debate out of 5 they would all get a "what the hell were you thinking" out of "go find a different career." If I ranked each individual based on the individual sections I would have to give a unanimous "why the hell didn't you answer the question" out of "that doesn't even make sense." As far as screaming myself hoarse ... I tried it. It didn't really have much of an effect.

At the end of the day, isolating individual portions of that blind assault against both reason and competency is not the way to approach it. I could very easily go through the debate transcript and pick out every time Alicia Gordon said "I don't really know the answer to that" (approximately every time she started a question). I could also isolate the exact moments that Ted blew a chance to score a few political points or highlight a key point of the Liberal platform (approximately every question). That only highlights the candidates that have a chance at winning.

Realistically, all that would do is raise my blood pressure even higher and I'm too young to die at the hands of another humans stupidity. I need to wait until I'm at least 30 when an under-trained doctor at an underfunded hospital botches a basic surgical procedure and I catch a deadly infection from a super-virus while trying to recover because severe cuts to health care and public health programs cripple our ability to care for each other. (No, I'm not bitter...why do you ask?)

Ironically, the only super-virus I want to catch is the one I'm least likely to. 

In the end, all I can do is point to the common themes of the evening. First, almost the entire time I couldn't quite get a particular scene from Community out of my head. I'm talking about, of course, the scene from Abed's documentary filming where stand-ins try to perform the legendary "Spanish Rap" . At about the twenty second mark, Troy leans in to the two trying to recreate their performance and shouts "DO YOU HATE THIS? DO YOU HATE DOING THIS?"

All night, I couldn't shake the feeling that if Stephen Harper, and Michael Ignatieff had been sitting in the front row one of them would have stood up and shouted at the two individuals awkwardly pantomiming their policies something similar.

To be fair, there were to exceptions to this general malaise. The first was when Alicia Gordon actually leaned forward and chastised the audience, which was as close as we got to someone actually admitting that they hated being there. The second set of moments came when Ted "rose up" at various points and tried to inject some passion into his speech. It was appreciated, if a bit awkward, but I figure he deserves credit where credit is due.

Prison whats? Will Mother Nature fix that?

Second, and in honour of exams, I was reminded of kids sitting at the back of the class that hadn't done a single reading all year and were stunned that what they crammed for wasn't on the exam. If I had a dollar for every time the candidates just had absolutely no idea what was going on around them or what was in their party platform I would have enough money to fund my own damn campaign. Mr. Beals suggested that MP's are expected to know everything, and that is pretty hard. I would agree, but that doesn't mean they are excused for not knowing the basic issues in Kingston and the Islands.

I work for the Hon. Peter Milliken, and part of my job is helping with all of the letters that he receives on issues that matter to local Kingstonians. The questions that came up during our debate were, largely, products of those concerns. It was personally upsetting to see a general lack of knowledge on the part of almost every candidate, with the general exception of Eric Walton, on issues that anyone who paid attention during the class would expect to find on the exam.

On that note, I think I'll let you out of this exam early, and on a positive note. Rather than ramble about everything I hated about that evening I'll end on something that made me incredibly proud. Many of you saw, or heard, of the Queen's U vote mob. Many of you might also have seen the constant flow of students going to the various early polling stations to vote. This is excellent, and highly commendable. We might not have the best candidates this time around, but the fact that people are taking the time to engage with the system gives me hope. So, for all of my peers that have managed to make something good out of the turd sandwich that was the debate, thank you.

...I lied. I was going to try to make this non-partisan but just re-watched part of the debate. Go out and vote, but please don't vote for Alicia Gordon. During her response to the open Governance question she spoke briefly to the contempt motion that toppled the Conservative Government. She suggested that the documents were not read by committee (false) and that they were submitted (false). She also suggested that Peter Milliken charged the Government with contempt (false). I'm not sure where the stupid stops and the lying begins with this particular response and, frankly, the thought of anyone that is willing to put that toxic clustershit of an argument out in public representing my voice in Ottawa makes me sick.

/endrant

Zombie or University Undergraduate?

Everyone, it is April. That means it is time for my favorite bi-annual extravaganza: "Zombie or University Undergraduate."

I can already hear some of you asking "Kevin, surely you aren't a complete moron. Even if you can't grow facial hair and have questionable taste in music and women you can definitely tell the difference between a mindless, rotting sack of consumption and hatred personified and an 18-22 year old that isn't quite smart enough to avoid shelling out 35,000 or more for a degree of absolutely no value."

Where does he get the time to dress up during such a busy season?

AHHH! GET IT! ITS BITE IS CONTAGIOUS! GET IT IN THE HEAD!

See what I mean? It's impossible to tell the difference between the pale, soulless, wraith dragging itself through a living nightmare and the zombie. 

But, as a University Student I can't just rely on my highly convincing graphical representations to defend my thesis, especially not when the comparisons go so deep.

Similarity 1) They do not sleep

Not to sound bitter, but I'm fairly certain that exam period is a way for all of our professors, University administrators, and older people in general to take out their deep seated hatred for how much more awesome it is to be a young person in the age of Youtube, Smart Phones, and relatively minimal threat of Nuclear Holocaust at the hands of Communist Russia. Nobody that actually has love/respect for humanity would ever mandate a gruelling month long period where students are asked to forsake eating, sleeping, exercises, hope, fun and everything else worth loving for.



ITS A TRAP



The most dehumanizing loss however, is definitely the loss of sleep. Maybe the fact that I'm going to get a maximum of 3 hours of sleep is biasing my judgement, but I think that the absolute deprivation of my greatest solace, a strategy employed by most modern secret services as their most effective form of torture, should be a criminal offence. Much like the living dead, however, students grow to accept this reality over the course of April.  Their initial resistance to the deconstruction of their humanity gives way to a passive acceptance flittering in the back of the mind of a rotting brain struggling to push a decaying body as it shambles its way around campus.



Similiarity 2) I simoltaneously hate/fear/am fascinated by both of them.

I don't know how much more I can say about this point. The truth of the matter is that both groups exist beyond the pale of reason. They both exist in the uncanny valley of the unhuman.  University Students sit between the positions of real student learning valuable life skills neccesary to their operation as functional humans and actual productive members of the workforce, manging to fail utterly at fufiling either category for 4 years or more. Zombies just can't quite figure out if they are living or dead.

This inability to pick a side is frightening, and infuriating.

Similiarity 3) The Three C's: Consumption, Consumption, Consumption.

Book Learnin', Coffee, Human Brains, the life of a University Undergraduate/Zombie is all about the single minded shuffle towards material gratification. Could I tell you which one really desires what? Probably not, but the way that these empty, hollow, shells of former humanity pursue something that, in all honesty, is completely useless to them and have absolutely nothing to do with their futures is both impressive and soul-crushingly depressing.

Similiarity 4) Neither of them are very likely to vote in the next Federal Election.

#BOOM #Couldn'tResist

My vote goes to Undergrad: A mob of undead wailing at the cruel
universe is considerably more musical than Ke$ha.

Similiarity 5) This is less of a similiarity and more a question: Which does this individual most resemble?

Covered in dirt and reaking like a hamburger left in the sun for 6 weeks, devoid of discernable focus, and lusting for human flesh Ke$ha would, it seems, resemble a zombie in so many important ways.

However, her age, lack of hygiene, constant nocturnalism, affinity for auto-tune and ability to somehow mix considerable latent intelligence with a lack of willingness to apply herself to anything academically also make a strong argument for Ms. Sebert a seeming ringer for Team Undergrad.

In short, if you can explain to me the difference between the hordes of post-secondary humans longing for death and the hordes of undead hoping to help them along please let me know. This inability to distinguish Team Undead from Team BarelyAlive may well prove to be a serious liability.

My Greatest Failing

Some of my close friends will know that I am meant to be with Kesha Rose Sebert. She is the radiant light of my life, the spring in my step, the Jack on my toothbrush. Her charm, incredible social grace, impeccable fashion sense and the almost regal way she carries herself under the incredible burden of superstardom draws me, like a fly, to the million-volt bug zapper that his her personage.

Kesha or Kate Middleton? Sometimes I can't tell either.

Much to my dismay, however, there is something that stands between us. An uncrossable divide between what should be star crossed lovers.  Much more to my dismay, is that this one problem has confounded me before, and will likely confound me again and again until the eventual heat death of the Universe.

I cannot grow a beard.

What does this have to do with my face again?

Seriously, I cannot grow one at all. I can grow a patchy monstrosity over some parts of my face, sure, but there are sections of my beautiful visage that will have nothing of it. The entire left side of my face, for example, is barren as the womb of a 97 year old flaming sandstorm from Dante's Seventh Circle of the Inferno. For those of you that haven't wasted your life going through 14th Century Italian Poetry, that is best translated as "fairly barren."

Why am I sharing this? What can possibly be gained by sharing another of my crippling failures to properly perform the male gender role? I only do it because I need you all to do me a favor. It may seem like a big inconvenience, but here me out:

STOP HAVING EVENTS THAT DEMAND I GROW A BEARD. JUST STOP IT.

For God's sake, what am I supposed to do? Events like Movember, (known amongst my friends as "Mo-what-the-fuck-is-that-on-your-face-oh-my-god-someone-kill-the-spider-growing-on-the-right-side-of-Kevin's-Face), Winter (which lasts 7 months in Kingston), and most depressing of all, the NHL Playoffs, all encourage men to sport their most spectacular facial hair, which leaves me to sport the visible representation of my spectacular failure as a man.

Take the NHL Playoffs, for example. For those of you that aren't aware, during the NHL Playoffs players do not shave, which results in:

Angry Jesus?

And

Gandalf?

And



Vengeful Old Testament Irish God?

What do my best efforts over a similar period of time period yield?





I look like Wolverine in this one - Me at Halloween Last Year

So, in short, atop hosting events that ask us to grow a beard, have a beard, wear a beard, anything like that. Its bad enough that as a Canadian I have to spend the 9 month long winter watching people with beards look simultaneously cooler and warmer than me, stop making me feel even worse by institutionalizing events that make me feel like more of a failure.

The Menaissance: It's a Thing!

Before I explain what I'm talking about it is crucial that you know that this: http://ca.askmen.com/daily/austin_150/165_fashion_style.html is not what I mean.

For starters, I'm not really sure I accept the premise that testosterone is what makes me a logical being.  The author also doesn't do his thesis any favours when he assures us that men must "take charge and lead the way" so that  "we can steer the way to a true equality between the sexes." A very ... special ... logical formulation in its own right.



Even at 99 cents this is not the
Menaissance meal of choice.



 I can assure you that double whoppers are not the emblem of the modern man. Nor is a demand for "the ultimate respect," allegations that "women trade money for respect" or trading genuine respect for "being nice".

Predictably, Mr. Fitzgerald (I'm going to wager a guess and say no relation) isn't the only one to get it wrong. The marketing world, god help us all, dropped the ball on this one too:

Miller: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RLCD-PpWqU 

Wiser's: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlEcYhUpnKY

Burger King: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGLHlvb8skQ

Even Barney Stinson: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w8rbCzhUS5Y

All of these articles suggest, as our friend Mr. Fitzgerald did, that real men need to end this female oppression. They are rallying cries to throw off our chains and do exactly what we want to do! As long as what we want to do is eat, drink and act exactly as imaginary panels of our peers demand.

The more nuanced opinions on the phenomena are more appealing but still not what I'm looking for. This discourse is based on the "retrosexual" ala Don Draper from AMT's Mad Men. The narrative, at its worst, argues with the Burger King (Who are you?) that real men are men that do what they please and flaunt social norms, the only difference is they do it in classic cut suits. At its "best" (I use the term best loosely) it suggests that the new man is all about stepping beyond the "metrosexual" stereotype and drawing his inspiration from what was best about classical manliness.

The Guardian,  The Toronto Star, and CNN Washington all embrace this view of Don Draper being representative of the ideal man and vanguard of the "retrosexual" cause in the battle against metrosexuality. They point to the way that men and women alike flock to his character and this should indicate that he is the new alpha male.

This argument is what keeps telling my testosterone (thanks Fitz') that we actually do need a Menaissance. I disagree with the idea  that Donald Draper's appeal is a product of him being a perfect man. While I do like Don's  drunken lurching into the future, I wouldn't call him the answer to what men should be. He is, more effectively, the question personified.

Masculinity may well be a drunken lurch, and not always forward, but the answer is not in a Texas Double Whopper, or a classic cut suit, or even in eating a Texas Double Whopper in a classic cut suit. Don, by the retrosexual standard, already has it all. He does what he wants ala Burger King, looks good in a suit ala The Guardian, but he is still a lost--and often broken-- man, and that is why he resonates.

If the two major arguments for what it is to be a man are caveman vs. 50's advertising executive then we definitely do need a Menaissance.

If it took the Renaissance to drag European civilization kicking and screaming out of the dark ages, then maybe a Menaissance is what it takes to move men beyond the idiot dad, Donald Draper, or knuckle dragger typographies which seem to be all we men have to work with.

If you want my guess, the Menaissance man looks something like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnzyzsOqMOY

I could be wrong, but until the Menaissance maybe we should just do our own thing. Maybe we should worry less about AskMen, skinny ties, and six packs (of miller or otherwise) and just do our best with what we are.

I bet that when we do find out what it is to be a man it will have less to do with how men view ourselves, and a whole lot more to do with how we treat those around us.