Better than a kick in the nuts - Ian

Good lord, I have been having a lot of trouble coming up with something to write about today. I thought that I had something when a triple homicide happened this week in Medicine Hat, but then I realised that I write too much about shit happening in Alberta as is, and the last thing I want to be seen as is a Westerner. I'm an Ontarian living in Alberta, dammit.

So, here's my topic: I've got nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Well, okay, let's give this a go. I'm getting my wisdom teeth out next Thursday, which should make for an entertaining post next Friday. I had been hoping to avoid having them out, but after my long overdue appointment with my dentist, it was revealed that the impactedness of the lower teeth has created two cavities because they're food traps. But just those two wouldn't be enough. They're all coming out. Most people get nervous when things like this come up, but not me. I have been counting down to this for weeks.

Why, you ask?

I hate my job so much that I am looking forward to the two days that I'll get off while I recuperate from the surgery. I'll probably be in pain once the anaesthetic wears off, but that is nothing compared to the daily agony that is the life of a claims adjuster. I don't get paid enough for the volume, repetitive and overall negative nature of my work. Today I was able to bear witness as one of my coworker's spirits was crushed down to my level after a typically cheery conversation with a complete assclown from Medicine Hat bitching about his hail claim. It's misery.

When I get my wisdom teeth out, I'll be all doped up, large teeth will be ripped out of my face and I won't be able to eat for many hours beforehand or any solid food for a day or two afterwards. I can't wait. Maybe this excitement and anticipation is a strong signal that perhaps I should seek employment in a new field.

Weak post, I know. I think Jon's in the zone, now, though. He'll rescue this bizzatch right in the face.

We have met the enemy... He is on the internet - by Jon

The big news at Queen's University hit the front page of the Toronto Star last weekend. You can check out the article here.

Twenty-three years on this planet as a Black and Jewish person, including the last few as a "serious" race scholar has taught me one unavoidable fact: trying to talk to people about the links between race and social disadvantage is usually an enormous waste of time. On one side, you have white people who don't want to believe that their skin colour has brought them any kind of advantage. On the other side, you have visible minorities who refuse to believe that their successes and failures are in any way related to their race. Both sides of the same just-world hypothesis.

Of course, then you have to problematize what you mean by visible minority. Are the Chinese in Canada, strong in numbers, economic and political power, a disadvantaged group? What of this "white" category? You can safely group white people in terms of social advantage in relation to vm's, but how do you convince a third-generation Italian-Canadian that they have lots in common with the second generation Greek-Canadian?

And then, you have to add class and socioeconomic status to the mix. A poor urban white kid has a significantly harder time getting to University than does a middle-class suburban black kid, but who makes this comparison anyway? Of course, when you correct for class, the white kid is still ahead, but that's neither here nor there.

What I'm getting at is, this is a very serious debate around a number of issues that people can rarely see past their own prejudices to study. As evidence, I give you the Queen's University Livejournal Community post about the subject.

One final thing... I had a quick look at the personal blog of the person who started this debate. I think their post about Hurricane Katrina reveals a lot about how students around here actually think. They said the following:

There is no reason that Americans should be suffering the way that they are. Babies being raped and dying because of it in the SuperDome? What is this, Rwanda?

Rwanda, indeed.

At the risk of aneurysm - Ian

Browsing through CBC Calgary, I came across a couple of articles that I was thinking of commenting on, but I touched on the topics of both in my last real article. The first was regarding a crazy cat lady that is being sought by Calgary Police after her house was found with 96 cats, 2 of which were dead and 10 that had to be euthanised, and one dog. The second was that Calgary Health Region cannot afford a new specialised ultrasound machine. Thanks, Rascal. We know you'll get us back one day.

Here's the headline of the day. One in ten Calgary homes is selling for at least one million bucks. Can you believe this? There are some nice houses here selling for over a million dollars that you could buy in the Greater Toronto Area for well under half that. Shit, some you could buy for perhaps a quarter of that. And what are some of these rich shitheads doing after they've bought the place? They're tearing them down to build a new house in its place. Apparently, there's quite a lot of money floating around here with the oil barons in town. This news comes on the heels of a story I read earlier this week that Calgarians are buying way more high-end stuff with their oodles of money than they ever have before. Why? Because they can, I suppose.

This really gets me for a couple of reasons. Reason the first: I can't find a house to rent because everyone is just selling them for 800,000 bucks in the Crackton area of town, when this same house in Oshawa would just have the keys in the lock and a wad of cash underneath it, with a note begging the first person by to take it. The key would probably just be made of chocolate though. That's just as well, seeing as the lock is just precariously balanced in the door itself and it's also made of mud.

Reason the second: This city is like Tiny America. The gap between the poor here and the rich is growing daily. I complain about my job, but really, I'm not doing so badly. Sure, I could be making more, but I've done alright for myself, keep my head down and do my job well. I'm going for 10 days to England and Germany in June to catch some World Cup, I pay too-high rent for my apartment, but I still manage to keep my head above water. There is a growing homeless problem, people doing far worse jobs for far worse wages than me, while some oil baron is paying 5000 bucks to give his dog radiation treatment, buy a house for a million bucks, spend hundreds on a Flames ticket and complain about the homeless problem, urban sprawl and all the new people trying to move here to get in on the prosperity train. Did I mention they just passed a new tax for people who want to buy a house out here? That's right, keep out people just looking to get a fresh start and get in at the bottom. No, they're catering only to the already well-off.

I could go on about this for awhile, but I'd get myself even more worked up. I think I'll look back at the archives of The Bull and wonder what ever happened to my basketball skillz, such as I had when I was but in high school so many moons ago.

Alpha Sierra Sierra, over and out.

The view from bed - by Jon

The past year of my life has taught me two harsh facts:

1) Whenever I don't get enough sleep (i.e. pull an all-nighter) I will get sick without fail.
2) Doing an MA means that a full-night's sleep is, on any given night, as likely to happen as G-d descending from the heavens to personally smite your cruel, oppressive thesis supervisor.

That being said, I've been fighting a cold/flu/cold/flu/cold combination for what feels like a solid month-and-a-half.

At present, the task that's keeping me awake is the marking of second-year history papers. When I started working as a Teaching Assistant, and I was all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed about helping the next generation of students become tweed-jacket wearing, pipe-smoking historians, I thought that an "A" paper would be:

1) Cogently argued, with a clear thesis
2) Free of any spelling/grammar mistakes and
3) Offer keen insight into the subject matter.

After this, my umpteenth round of essay marking, I have decided that such papers do not exist until at least the PhD level. I am thankful if:

1) The paper is written in English instead of whatever back-alley slang they're teaching the rich white kids in Oakville these days
2) They don't cite Wikipedia, or at the very least have heard of a "library"
3) There is a single sentence that doesn't make me reflect on the fact that should I make it through the Graduate School Gauntlet, I will one day have to teach students who think that in 1973, Allende's government was overthrown in "Chili," which I can only presume is the most delicious of the Latin American nations.

Thank you, and goodnight.

A prelude to Jon's post of the day

So I was just at the video store picking out some movies to watch over the weekend (for those that are interested I grabbed The Bourne Supremacy, March of the Penguins and the 1981 BBC Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy) when I overheard this little nugget of gold involving an older couple that were choosing a movie to rent:

Old Woman grabs Jarhead off the shelf, looking at it quizzically
Old Woman: Who's Jamie Foxx?
Old Man: He's black.
Old Woman: Ohh..
Old Woman places Jarhead back on shelf like it was smeared in Leprella, the Leprosy-flavoured spread.

Back to your regularly scheduled programming.

Has it come to this? - by Ian "The Original Thrilla in Manilla" Esputé

This evening I watched a newsstory on Calgary's City TV news, one that was intended to be heartwarming amidst the numerous stories of violence, greed and irrelevance that fill Alberta's newscasts. Tonight's story was the story of a lovable dog named Rascal.

Rascal is a 13-year-old bichon frisé, and wouldn't you know it, this poor animal has nasal cancer. Now, let me clarify that I wish in no way to mock the unfortunate creature. Rather, I seek to ridicule the priorities and sensibilities of humans. Whereas most people would look down at poor Rascal, who has just coughed up a tumor on the carpet in the front hall and is clearly not doing so hot, then take the dog to the vet and after learning about its cancer would decide maybe it's best to put the poor dog out of its pain, such is not the case with the loving owners of the aforementioned dog. No, they have coughed up 5000 bucks to give Rascal the best treatment money can buy at a local veterinary centre: radiation treatment.

This raises a couple issues, at least in my mind.

There is a waiting list for dogs to be treated at this centre. People are queuing to give 5000 bucks to these people to blast it with radiation, so that they can bring the mutt home on evenings and weekends to smother it with affection and breathe in the delicious radiation. If you asked these people to donate $5000 to the Canadian Cancer Society just once, or even spaced out over a 20 year period, they'd tell you right off and then perhaps remorsefully give you 20 bucks to make up for their former sharpness. You almost get furious at this, but then you see the family's three hastily set up pictures of Rascal on a bookshelf, and you realise just how much this dog means to them.

I heard someone say, once, that animals here have more rights than people and that animals' lives have more value than humans'. And you know what? That someone was right. Believe it or not, there is a man I work with that is 74 years old. He is in need of a hip replacement, but he can't get it, because at his age, the system doesn't think that it's worth the time and money to let an otherwise able senior walk. Now, let's look back at Rascal. This dog is well past his sell-by date. He's 13. But, with animals, if you've got the cash, the vet will GLADLY take your money. There's a tip, kids. Veterinary Medicine is the field to go into! Unlimited money! If people are willing to give you the cash, sure, zap that dog with radiation! It's lucky to still be alive anyway? Oh, don't worry. We'll take great care of it. Do people really have this much money to throw around on pets?

Some of you may think that I'm some animal-hating jerk, but that's far from the truth. In my time I have owned a bunch of birds, hamsters, gerbils, fish, turtles, cats and a dog. When my dog got sick at about age 11 from what I believe was some affliction of the kidneys, I was the one that made the executive decision to put the dog down. Why prolong the agony of the poor thing at great cost for what may only amount to a few months more life? I think some people just really need to give their head a shake. And on that note, I'm starting to save now for 20 years time when my cat is 21 and in dire need of a triple bypass after a life of living in a small apartment eating nothing but Golden Oreos and Fancy Feast.

This might just be funny to me - by Jon

Today I had a job interview.

The job entails working for a local synagogue, cataloguing some records they have graciously donated to the Queen's Archives.

The interview went as follows, by my best estimate:

15% - Jon answers questions.
85% - Jon chats patiently with his interviewers about bagels.

I got the job.

If nothing else, this confirms that my life is one, enormous stereotype.

Post! - a post by Ian

I'm not sure how many people read this thing at all, especially hockeyfans, especially Toronto Maple Leafs fans, but after years of this one ad,it just really started bothering me this week.

The cheap cordless phone (not cellular, but cordless) company V-Techsponsors a contest during Leafs games on TSN called "Score to Win withV-Tech!" If you miss the first part of the ad, it's not that bad. Afterall, you could win $1 million! What needs to be done for you to win amillion bucks? A Leafs player has to score FIVE goals. As you canimagine, there are probably no more than 10 players in history that havedone this in the NHL, so chances of someone winning this are slim to none.But I can only imagine the V-Tech execs everytime a Leaf scores a goal, letalone two or a hat trick. They're probably just dripping with sweat intheir suits up in the VIP box. I would think they probably have a guyhiding in the player tunnel ready to club anyone who's even looking for ahat trick all decked out in a black hoodie, something straight out of theTonya Harding-Nancy Kerrigan fiasco. It's absolutely ridiculous.

I'm proposing that a new contest be run with slightly better odds thanV-Tech's. I can see it being run during the first period intermission:"If any Toronto Maple Leafs defenceman is ordained during a TSN TorontoMaple Leafs telecast, YOU could win 17 BILLION dollars! Enter today at TSN.CA!!!!!!"

I'd probably be more likely to enter that one. V-Tech phones suck, anyway.Jon probably thinks I've dropped the ball on this one. Eat it, Jon. Eatit right up.

The "MA" stands for... well, nothing good.

I remember about this time last year, when I was sitting around waiting to hear back about graduate applications, and my friend Steve smugly told me that grad school was for chumps. I didn't believe him.

I should have believed him. Let's just put it this way:

As a graduate student, you can typically measure the level of suck in your life by the number of consecutive nights you sleep wearing pants. Because, sleeping with your pants on is never a sign of anything good.

That is all.

Fighting Crime in a Future Time! - Ian

So, Jon and I have decided that we are keeping The Bull on life support. I have to confess his drunken (though very well-typed) post of Friday evening caught me quite off-guard. I had been entertaining thoughts of taking down the old girl, startling as though it would be to the droves of devoted Irish Bull readers. But, if Drunken Jon (DJ, as he shall henceforth be known) thinks it's worth fighting for, then let us fight.

Now... A topic. Alright, I'm going to take one bit out of a much longer thing I wrote the other day. Calgary and crime, the topic du jour. So "du jour" in fact, that I believe it's already old news.

Calgary talks shit about how much safer Toronto it is here. The people are better here, they say. Toronto had 78 murders in 2005. That works out to just under 20 every 3 months for a city of 2.5 million (2001, StatsCan). Calgary has just broken 1 million and they just had the 8th murder of the year a few days ago. So, for a city less than half the size, they have just under half as many killings. So, the moral fibre of Calgarians is negligibly superior to Toronto's, but their cover-up method is the zinger. It's always gang-related, as if that makes it okay. The police just hire a few more guys to bust up the gangs and leave it at that. Why do they leave it at that, though?

Here's where the delusion sets in, kids. The good citizens of Calgary just don't acknowledge the gap between the rich and the poor here. "We've got oil and gas, our prosperity cheques, we're all rich!" There are lots of poor people here, particularly natives. I don't say that as a slight. It's true. I mean, poverty knows no racial boundaries, but natives in Calgary seem to have it worse than most. After I leave my job, I walk down to my train stop, which is right in front of the Telus Communications building, a tall gleaming skyscraper. Clean. A brand new steel and glass shelter to keep us dry from the rare occurrence of rain or snow while we stand. Across the tracks, on the south side of 7th Ave is the most pathetically dilapidated row of pawn shops/bodegas, convenience stores/bodegas, restaurants/bodegas, video arcade/bodegas I've ever come across.

A brief definition of bodega, from Dave Chappelle in "Half Baked" is a convenience store with very little in it and what items are there are generally old and dusty. The store is just a front for selling drugs. The only fresh things in the place are drugs and cigarettes. Everything along this stretch is clearly a front for something. There's a "Hamburgur" place that surely serves you a half-pound burgur with a side of crack and a cocaine cola to wash it all down. And the napkins can be replaced with acid for a bit more, too.

The point of this aside? Calgary lives in a fantasy land where it is unimaginable that people would have a reason to assault or kill someone. Who's desperate in this land of plenty? There's money for everyone! And to that end, I must concede, there's a point. There is help wanted EVERYWHERE in this city. I have made it a rule for myself to not give money to beggars, because if you don't have a job, you're just not trying. You can get a job doing anything here, so it seems. But be that as it may, some people do just fall on the wrong side of the tracks. They fall in with the wrong crowd and find it hard to climb out of it. There are some very poor people in Calgary. There is desperation. There is violence, and many people in this city are so naïve they think just because they're not in a gang that they can't possibly be affected. I wonder if the people I see fighting outside the arcade and buying drugs got their prosperity cheques that Alberta's 19 year old guys spent on XBox 360's. Maybe they did, but like everyone else on my side of the tracks, I'm too scared to go over and ask.