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My brother drives me mad. In a good way for the most part. Since he arrived back in Hogtown from the Wet Coast, he has helped me organize my house. Left to my own devices, stuff will get scattered wherever PJ or I tend to leave it.
My brother is a little more methodical, and he has taken all of the assorted bits and helped put it all away. The unfortunate part is, sometimes I don’t know the place where my stuff has gone, and I have to rifle through all kinds of things to find the one item I am searching for.
Most critically, I haven’t been able to find the postal scale for a few weeks. I have been trying to keep track of Barney’s growth. Before Christmas and my trip to Aruba, Barney was gaining about 100 grams per week. I was just aching to find out how much the wee bugger weighed, and I didn’t have the means to do it.
The bathroom scale doesn’t quite cut it. It only weighs to the nearest half pound, and when you’re measuring in finer increments than that, you’re kinda lost. Luckily, the postal scale has resurfaced, and Barney is right on track. He has broken the 2 kg mark by 200 grams, and is well on the way to 2.3 kilos in the coming week or so. He’s just one ounce shy of 5 pounds for you imperial measurement lovers.
Not bad for what Sherry refers to as a “barking rat.” If she ever visits, I’ll sic Barney on her. When the throaty growl of a fearsome chihuahua reaches her ear …… oh never mind.
It’s kinda funny how the world makes some more sense when you’re sorta drunk, and not entirely shy when a doob comes your way. I have been listening to some tunes this afternoon, as well as having a wobbly pop or two. The bong was a factor too. What can I say? It’s saturday in Canada.
I really got off this afternoon by setting an MP3 player on my neighbour’s head and letting him listen to some new toons. My neighbour Bill, who shall remain namelesss, perked up when he heard Paul Simon’s latest opus “Suprise” on the headphones. He smiled and perked up at his barstool. He said “this stuff takes me back to my youth.” It was all I could do to tell him that Paul Simon is still releasing excellent records even now and that he was listening to a relatively new recording. Bill is not a young guy, and it was a treat to see him smiling as he listened to new music. I should be so lucky when I hit my seventies.
Old dogs new tricks you say.
The fact of the matter is we have a unique situation happening. Music and culture of the post war generation is not only accepted, but celebrated by the following two generations. Look at Bill. He has passed 70 years of age, and here he is listening to a newly released record. The headphones are hanging around his chin, and we all enjoyed the joke that a backwards baseball cap would properly accent his bobbing head. He was listening to an icon of the sixties and thinking fondly of those times. Paul Simon’s music is still making an impact in the present day.
Old dog indeed. We could learn something from these so called “old dogs”.
After I parted company with Bill, I put on a record that had a theme. This is what we used to call the “concept album” back in the sixties and seventies. The only thing was, this album dates from more recent times. It’s a topical thing full of social commentary, and politics that didn’t stand a chance on the charts. Cultural statements shouldn’t mean anything. They should be innocuous and bland for fear of political incorrectness I suppose. We should sing about nice things like love or stamp collecting. Heaven forbid we get a backbone and develop an opinion. Of course I’m oozing sarcasm. I felt empowered for a few moments. Listening to artists who have opinions and something to say seems to do that.
We can all stand to reevaluate our perceptions, and I’m glad I got to see an old geezer like Bill playing the fool and wearing the headphones. We should all be so blessed. We should also pay a bit more attention when someone has an opinion .
As some of you may have heard, another innocent man has been struck down in the streets of Toronto. There has been indiscriminate gunfire in a crowded street for a second time this week. Two family men are dead leaving two widows, and several orphans.
What a bunch of stupid gangsters. Rotten fuggers.
I started trolling through the comments section of the Globe and Mail website and read all of the regular yokels and their knee-jerk solutions to the problem. Lots of people are suggesting that Canada enact a handgun ban. Another bunch are advocating a gun in every home. Plenty more seek a return of the death penalty. A lot of people think mandatory sentencing is a good idea. Some folks have jokingly said banning Toronto, immigration and the Liberal Party of Canada would fix the problem.
It sure seems like an intractable situation, because none of these things seem to be the solution. Handguns will keep trickling across the border whether they’re legal or not. Having a gun in every home sounds like an even more nightmarish situation. There are far too many cases of innocent people executed for the death penalty to work. We all know about overzealous police and prosecutors putting the wrong man behind bars. Besides, our crime rate is lower than it was when we did have capital punishment. Depriving judges of the latitude they need to sentence according the the circumstances makes a mockery of the bench. I think we can all dispense with the idea of levelling a city of 4 million people. The Liberal Party isn’t to blame either. They’ve changed our country for the better for the most part, and it’s ludicrous to think that they’re the cause of our ills.
The worst part of the situation is that the culprits are an extremely small number of extremely stupid people. Their ethnicity, when it becomes known, will be held against everyone of that stripe, and the mob will begin looking suspiciously at everyone from that community … again. Exactly when people need to band together, we’re going to look over our shoulders and wonder if we’re going to be the next victim. Everyone else will be a suspect, and we’re all isolated as a result.
I’ve been there. About 10 years ago I was beat up and stabbed in front of my own home by a bunch of young drunks who were trying to break into my car. I was stupid enough to run after them, and I got pretty roughed up for my trouble. Not only was I incapacitated for several weeks while my injuries healed, I found that I couldn’t walk down my own street in broad daylight without feeling frightened. It wasn’t fun, and nobody should have to feel like I did. It’s difficult to believe in the innate goodness of people when you know there are thugs in the street with knives and guns. It takes a long time to overcome the feelings of suspicion and fear once they settle in. And those feelings are the last things we should have to contend with.
I hate these gangsters who think they can earn respect with a handgun. They do too much damage to the poor innocents who are killed and bereaved and to society at large.
Like everyone else, I’ve been bitten by the facebook bug. One of the features of facebook is a status update. You can plant a few words to tell your friends what you are up to, or what you’re feeling. The last two updates were “has sore eyes” and “has a sore neck.”
These are minor. I just listened to Bob Rae’s speech from the CBC Oscar Peterson tribute. It’s pretty obvious that he and everyone who was aware of Oscar Peterson’s impact on music, and Canadian culture in general has a sore heart. I know I do.
Oscar Peterson wasn’t just another pianist. He was the pianist which every other jazz pianist looked up to because of his formidable technique, and his almost unstoppable ability to swing. Oscar Peterson set the standard against which all other jazz pianists can be measured. That’s a pretty contentious statement, but I can’t foresee any arguments. Someone once called him “the Franz Liszt of jazz piano.”
It’s like every recorded version of Bach’s suites for Violoncello is compared to Pablo Casal’s. There may be people who might approach or even equal that sort of achievement, but there likely won’t be anyone who can surpass it.
Oscar Peterson was also noted for his contribution to civil rights in the USA and Canada. He battled racism wherever he saw it, and held his head high rather than stoop to the level of people who would belittle him or anyone else. He refused to play to segregated audiences, and as a companion of Norman Granz, he stood up for integration, both in the seats and on the bandstand.
I regret that I never had a chance to hear Oscar Peterson perform live, but I have still been blessed to have heard his recordings, and to have heard some of his exploits. He leaves Canada a better place, and a sadder place because of his passing.
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