Teeny Stamp Nonsense

I did several errands yesterday only to arrive home to one more.

My wife wanted a few items from the grocery store for supper. Not a problem. She was offering to make one of my favourite meals!

I trudged off to the store with relative enthusiasm.

At the end of the transaction, the cashier handed me a teeny stamp. Just one. Months ago, when times were much simpler, I would ever so snootily refuse when they asked whether I collected the teeny stamps. Each time, I itched to reply aloud and haughtily, “No, not I - I have no time for your petty proletariat propaganda.”

Unfortunately, after weeks of me turning it down, it turns out my wife did have time for the teeny stamps. She urged me to start accepting the teeny stamp nonsense. Apparently, you can never have too many good pots and pans.

It was much easier when, after you spent a pre-determined amount, the cashier would offer you a choice between the complimentary gift, or a gasoline discount. I tried the gasoline discount for a while but decided it was perfectly pointless. I’d put gas in the car, hand them the discount slip and the clerk would hand me back a nickel. Golly, gee.

On the other hand, accepting the complimentary gifts meant unfamiliar breads, noodles, juices and cleaning products in our house. Naturally, when the gift was a chocolate bar or package of cookies, my wife would urge me to spend much and often, in order to get the gift more than once!

Now, I quietly try to cope with the stress of this teeny stamp nonsense. Sometimes, late at night, I scan the internet in hopes of locating a Teeny Stamp Anonymous group close to my neighborhood. So far, no such luck.

Days like yesterday are especially challenging because the single teeny stamp can disappear like a mischievous sock, carelessly transferred from the washer to the dryer. It’s there one second and gone the next! Every time I move my hand in or out of the pocket containing the single stamp, I switch to slow motion, staring intently, to make sure I’m not about to lose the teeny stamp.

A row of teeny stamps is not so bad, just slightly more difficult to lose. Provided you keep it on the down low, I will confess here to losing more than one row of stamps over the last several weeks, along with several single stamps. I haven’t told my wife.

They just float off to wherever; parking lots, snowbanks, lint traps...

Now, I’m resigned. When the cashiers ask whether I collect the teeny stamps, defeated and downcast, I nod yes. Crushed, I wallow in it.

Redemption

Anyway, after weeks of collecting the teeny stamps, we finally redeemed some teeny stamp sheets for a pan. We were still required to pay $10 cash! What’s the point of all this collecting! We have ten million teeny stamps and we still pay cash? You can’t put a dollar value on the agony I endure but let me tell you, that pan ought to be free!

I’m told the pots and pans are only in the store until January 28^th. Actually, I’ve heard different dates from different cashiers. No one seems certain. I ask whether the teeny stamps will continue, some think they will, others insist the teeny stamps will disappear. What if we have nearly completed teeny stamp sheets? Are we collecting the teeny stamps in vain? Am I continuing to endure this annoying stress for no reason? Will it be teeny stamps in exchange for cutlery or counter sponges?

I seek peace.

I need to know. No one at the grocery store has definitive answers. I’m hoping I’m off the hook, no longer required to accept and transport the teeny stamps, free and clear of all the teeny stamp nonsense. Not only is the alternative too difficult to contemplate, it could quiet seriously end with me stamping my feet.

Protect and Serve

Watching the living nightmare unfold Friday, we couldn’t stop wondering why police were not going into the Bataclan club.

There were reports of a tweet from someone inside, begging authorities to launch an assault because people in the club were being slaughtered.

Still, police made no move to rescue the innocent, unarmed people inside.

The killers simply fired into the people laying on the floor, re-loaded and went on shooting.

Watching the coverage, we were upset and disgusted by the lack of movement on the part of authorities. Has there been an explanation as to why none of the well-armed officers standing outside bothered to try to rescue the victims inside?

Don’t police feel some responsibility for the terrible number of people killed so casually inside? Aren’t the families of the 90 victims demanding answers – why didn’t police attack sooner?

The armed terrorists pulled up in a black car outside the club at 9:40PM Paris time and police only stormed the place at 12:20AM. How is that not criminal?

I’ve had arguments with police acquaintances before, telling them they have a responsibility to protect the innocent and unarmed in dire situations. I was told by one officer I know, his first responsibility is self-preservation.

Were police too afraid to go in to rescue the helpless Bataclan concert-goers?

Police have guns so they can protect people who do not have guns from evil individuals using guns to kill.

Where were the cowboys and overzealous macho cops as people were dying inside?

I want to believe police officers would assume the terrible risk in the name of the innocent and unarmed who are being targeted by violence; I was under the impression that’s their job.

Montreal police officer Denis Cote made all the difference back in September 2006 when he went into Dawson College and took down a deranged shooter.

If police can’t do the job, then make it easier for citizens to protect themselves and their fellow citizens.

Don’t just stand back and let innocent people die.

Avoid Asterisk

Forget that.

I certainly don’t think they should change the nets in the NHL.

There’s talk of making the nets bigger in order to allow more goals and increase the entertainment value of the game.

I’m entertained by brilliant saves and close shots. I really don’t see the problem. Players will find ways to score with more tic-tac-toes and breathtaking, pinpoint sniping.

Last night’s game between my consistently inconsistent Senators and the Predators had plenty of goals with a final score of 7-5!

Some say goalies are too big. The 12 goals scored in the game last night were against Ottawa’s Craig Anderson at 6’2’ and Pekka Rinne for Nashville at 6’5”. They were not too big.

There have been plenty of changes to goalie equipment; blockers, sticks, helmets, trappers and pads. There have been changes to crease size and crease accessibility.

Smaller equipment may be an answer, as long as protection of goalies is not compromised.

Even the role of goalies in the game has been changed. At one time, NHL goalies had to immediately drop any pucks they caught and were not allowed to fall down to stop a shot.

It was Perce LeSuer, a goalie with the Senators, who came up with the first crossbar on an NHL net in 1912. His proposal kept the 6 foot by 4 foot opening but added a webbed top 17 inches deep at the top and his design made the net 22 inches deep at the base. Before that, nets were open at the top.

Go ahead, make changes if you must, but don’t touch net size or angle the posts. The stats earned by the great players who make up the legacy of the NHL should stand against the numbers collected by modern players, just as they always have. 

Avoiding an asterisk situation, that should be the goal.

Celebrating the Bear Facts

I had my Voter Information Card in my coat and my son had his card in-hand as well. We backed the car out of the driveway, off to vote in Monday’s federal election. We barely got 50 metres from the house when my son commented that my wife’s Voter Information Card was on the edge of the kitchen table. We knowingly looked at each other, turned the car around and went back to move the card to the middle of the table.

Those are the Bear facts. There was a strong possibility that if the card was within snout distance, Bear might indulge his crazy cardboard craving by exuberantly mulching it.

As she reads this, I guarantee my wife is rolling her eyes because she’s identified me as the guilty party who allegedly nurtures his cardboard craving. He is so thrilled to be handed a finished paper towel roll, I can’t help it; I understand it!

I always pick up the shredded pieces afterward.

Do not be fooled by that adorable face

One week ago today, he indulged his craving for furry things by eating a thin, fluffy toy with round plastic squeakers at both ends. I saw him chewing it earlier in the day and idiotically gave him the benefit of the doubt. He hadn’t swallowed anything in a while; at least nothing we’re aware he swallowed.

Later in the day, we began searching for evidence the missing toy ever existed at all. There was none. Vaporized by aliens! Fairly certain it lay crumpled in his stomach, we went to the vet and asked them to induce vomiting. Five minutes after they took him in the back, they returned with the intact toy wrapped in a towel, squeakers and all.

Those are the Bear facts.

One year ago Saturday, we drove home with a little ALD on my wife’s lap in the back seat.

We had a hard time naming him but, because he looked so much like a teddy bear, we settled on Bear.

He was supposed to be 25 pounds but now weighs 40 and he provides us with no shortage of weighty adventure!

As I pointed out in an earlier blog ("Spotless Insanity" May 21, 2015), we’re a lot more careful about leaving potential ingestibles lying around. Clearly, we have some work to do yet.

The "Doodle Romp" in Ottawa

He's so darn cute and loveable! Those are the Bear facts!

He embodies sheer exuberance and, for his trouble, his personal Instagram account, @thedoodlebear, went over 1000 followers on October 18th! I’m way back there, eating doodle dust with a measley 250 followers. That’s my Bear fact.

Earlier this month, we attended the “Doodle Romp”, organized by his breeder in Ottawa. It was great fun for us and for Bear! The breeder invites owners of her Australian Labradoodles back to her home in the country to see how her dogs are doing and to, I'm convinced, surreptitiously, assess the mayhem they’ve sown.

What a year it’s been. We’re celebrating the first anniversary of the Bear facts on Saturday, although I’m pretty sure our unimpressed Westie, Spike, will choose to sleep through the whole thing.

Cardboard for everyone!

Brace Yourself for Mr Blotchy

We tape Montreal Billboard on Friday.

I got up this morning and noticed a nasty cold sore emerging on the left side of my bottom lip.

Swell. 

Then, I shaved and cut myself in the centre of my upper lip.

Tremendous.

I went to the studio and thanked Stephanie, the make-up artist, profusely, when she expertly made them disappear.

See, you can't even notice cuts and sores!

We recorded our show and as I walked back to the train later in the day, a TVA reporter and her cameraman cornered me at the red light as I waited to cross Ste-Catherine at McGill College.

I had initially waved her off, which is what I always do, since I work in the media myself.

She was good - and politely persisted, asking me about the federal election. I answered in French, explaining my mind still wasn’t made up. When she asked me why I was not yet decided, I told her none of the candidates have inspired me.

She asked whether I would be voting; I assured her that, without a doubt, I would be voting. The brave men and women of Canada who fought and died in the wars of this world sacrificed their lives so that I could cast a ballot, choosing the government and policies under which I live.

Do not doubt I will exercise my democratic right!

Thanking me for my comment, the reporter turned off the camera and kindly said she hoped I would be inspired over the coming weekend.

I was being honest.

None of the party leaders have anything new, inspiring, or the least bit visionary to offer. It all strikes me as gibberish and none of it helps me any more or less than I'm already being helped or hindered by politicians in this country. I sincerely wish that wasn't the case. I would like to sit up in my seat, convinced a politician and his or her policies could improve my situation. For the record, all of them are pushing some policies that I do not like.

Pierre Trudeau and Rene Levesque are two politicians that unequivocally inspired people because they fought to take us somewhere we had never gone before. These were men of vision, driven by unstoppable passion and conviction to strive, no matter what the odds, for their ideal.

Anyway, if you watch TVA tonight and they use me, without make-up at that point, as one of their “streeters”, I’m the guy with the nasty cold sore and shaving cut.

Brace yourself.

Montreal Billboard

I’m stoked to be hosting a new show on Videotron’s MAtv channel! 

It's fun to be working in television again and rewarding to contribute to a show that connects the anglophone community of Greater Montreal with the often-times unsung non-profit groups making our community a better place to live.

I think it’s cool that Videotron is offering anglophone programming to the community it serves. At a news conference last week, it announced 20 per cent of MAtv programming is currently being devoted to English shows.

So far, we’ve taped and aired our first two "Montreal Billboard" shows. On our first two shows, we featured the NDG Food Depot, the Fabienne Colas Foundation, A Horse Tale, Big Brothers & Big Sisters of the West Island, AIDS Community Care Montreal and Skateboards for Hope. Some of these groups I had heard of before and others I had never heard of at all.

First guest of our first show: Daniel Rotman of NDG Food Depot

I’m going to enjoy meeting more special Montrealers who are clearly passionate about their causes and their city. For the people who bring these groups to life it's about the good, not the glory.

From the beginning, I thought the MAtv studio was bright and colorful. The crew has been terrific and I’ve had the pleasure of working with some team members before.

When we did the photo shoot for the show, MAtv had a stylist pick out the clothing and Ariane is the one who looks after wardrobe for the show. If I appear dressed more fashionably, that explains it!  She uses clothing supplied by show sponsor, Canada's iconic Hudson's Bay store. Kinda cool. It also explains the hankie you’ll see in my pocket. So far in my life, I must confess to being too lazy to coordinate a hankie with shirts, jackets and neckties.

Montreal Billboard is on seven days a week! The newly-taped shows air Monday and Tuesday and the rest of the week, they're repeated. To find show times, go to matv.ca, click "English" and go down to "My Shows". For viewers who are not on Videotron, you can find our shows on-line at matv.ca under the heading “Mes Emissions”.

If you’d like to get in touch with the show, please drop us a line at mtlbillboard@matv.ca

Classics Rule

Years ago, living on my own downtown, I always enjoyed watching old movies; the classics. I still do.

Last night, I watched “Till the Clouds Roll By”, a 1946 movie based on the life and music of American songwriter, Jerome Kern. I didn’t know his name before yesterday, even if I knew his music. In fact, “The Way You Look Tonight”, one of my favorite songs to sing, was written by Kern.

I’m not sure the televised version I performed for International Jazz Day did it justice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ZQfz4ohDnk

The film, which got a little slow at the end, featured musical performances by Judy Garland, Lena Horne and Frank Sinatra, among others.

What an easy and fun way to casually learn about musical history, not to mention history in general.

We were recently sent a letter by our cable company, explaining NHL Network would be disappearing, so I lobbied successfully for the Silver Screen Classics channel as a replacement. Not only do classic movies allow me to appreciate North American film heritage, they show viewers many techniques, shots and story plots existed well before we became aware of them in newer movies. The classics also give movie fans a chance to compare today’s actors and actresses with the legends that came before them.

I’ve even got a soft spot for songs about old movies, like “Goodnight Mrs Calabash” by Ian Thomas and “Friends of Mr Cairo” by Jon and Vangelis.

Sunday night, I started watching “Love Affair”, the 1939 romantic film starring Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer. I had seen Boyer in the charming “Barefoot in the Park”, but wasn’t familiar with Dunne. I got hooked on the story. Unfortunately, the film, because of apparent technical problems, repeated segments twice and never showed the end of the story. Seeing it was scheduled again Monday morning, I watched, only to see it repeat again and abruptly stop before the end of the movie.

I had to go on-line to find out whether the characters, painter Michel Marnet and singer Terry McKay, end up together.

They do. Sigh.

Irene Dunne won the Oscar for Best Actress for her role in “Love Affair”. The film also won Oscars for Best Supporting Actress, Best Writing, Best Original Song and Best Art Direction.

Can I pick ‘em or what?

Oh, popcorn’s ready!