the blog quebecois

A compendium of military hand signals. You never know when stuff like this could be useful.

Some language might be NSFW.

Try it at someone else's place.

The old flour-in-the-hair-dryer stunt, eh? How childish.

Powdered wallpaper paste is much funnier.

Toronto Star:

Rail authority apologizes after mischievous rider hacks into electronic message board

Gerry Nicholls thought he was hallucinating as he kicked back in his seat to take the 35-minute GO train ride to his Oakville home.

About every three seconds, the scrolling electronic sign that usually carries transit updates and advertisements had a very different message that he just could not keep his eyes off.

"Stephen Harper Eats Babies. Stephen Harper Eats Babies. Stephen Harper Eats Babies," the message kept repeating.

Really? I've heard that Opposition placeholder Bill Graham likes to eat teenage boys.

Not every innovation is a step forward. Behold the ASCII Map:

Sure, it doesn't look too impressive -- but zoom in a bit and be rewarded with a truly incomprehensible screen of dashes and dots and random letters. Not recommended for planning your vacation.

Via Google Blogoscoped

A point-and-click puzzle to keep you occupied while I fix the stove. The main heating element is burned out and it's got a chronically cranky door hinge that would cost $80 to replace, so I will settle for beating it with a hammer.

There's a (now-closed) bulletin board with some clues to the game here (or Google "chasm hints" for more).

Click on the blue pipe in the middle to start. Warning: Sound effects and music.

forgot my six-string razor - hit the sky
half way to memphis 'fore i realised
well i rang the information - my axe was cold
they said she rides the train to oreoles

mott the hoople

FAA radar tracking FedEx planes trying to land at Memphis amidst a string of thunderstorms. Watching this, I have two observations:

1. They certainly play peppy music in the control tower; and

2. Has FedEx got a freaking unbelievable number of airplanes, or what?

Via Cynical-C Blog

I see that the CBC has a new hobbyhorse that they're busy flogging to death. Poor pony!

I refer, of course, to the comments regarding judicial activism made by Conservative MP Maurice Vellacott on the weekend. If by some strange warp in the space-time continuum you haven't heard about it, Kate will get you up to speed here. (The secret of successful blogging -- spread the links around and also get other people to do the footwork for you.)

So I switched on the CBC Newsworld news at noon today to find out what's going on in the world. Apparently not much, because the first (and only) item discussed between reporter James Cudmore and the mopey-faced woman anchor was l'affaire Vellacott.

Seven minutes they banged on about this. Seven minutes. I know, because I timed it.

Here's a newsflash for you: Canadians aren't interested in this sort of inside baseball. They have no idea whom Maurice Vellacott is, any more than they cared about David Emerson's defection to the Conservatives; they're even less concerned about what the Canadian Bar Association thinks about either or both.

And as a note to Beverley McLachlin, whose huffy reaction to Vellacott's remarks kicked this all off: You know, there once was a quaint concept, pre-Charter, where politicians were loathe to criticize the judiciary, knowing that ethics and etiquette forbade the judges from public rebuttal. That equation changed when you and your legal cohorts decided to get in the game, expecting that your each and every pronouncement would be greeted with hosannas and palm fronds strewn in your path.

Sometimes it works out that way. Other times you get crucified.

If you can't stand the heat, Madam Justice, get back in the kitchen.

Though I'm not sure I want to find out what's behind this one.

You ever seen Stevie Wonder's wife?

Neither has he.

What goes... *Click Click* "Is that it?", *Click Click* "Is that it?", *Click Click* "Is that it?"

Stevie Wonder doing a Rubik's Cube.

Stevie Wonder's favourite colour?

Corduroy.

In need of a few jokes to break the ice at the speech you're giving at Corporate HQ next week? You probably won't find them at Sickipedia, a wiki started by Rob Manuel of b3ta, dedicated to collecting -- you guessed it -- sick jokes. If you've got some of your own, you can contribute them there.

The Stevie Wonder examples are pretty mild (and at least we know that he’ll never read them). Be warned that many others are not for the squeamish, to say the least.

Belinda, your party and your country needs you. You have already shown your commitment to your principles once, by joining the Liberal Party. You have shown you can handle criticism, and weather a storm. Please, Belinda, take the leap!

Off the cliff, and follow her lead!

Momentum is growing:

The Liberal leadership is truely full of nothing but a list of poor candidates. I agree with you Jon, Belinda would put this country back on the right track! A good leader like he should be at the head of this nation! I sending my letter to endorse her now.

Me rite 2!

Via Nealenews

Warning: Some sounds.

as the snow flies
on a cold and gray chicago morn'
a poor little baby child is born

elvis presley

The Corner:

I don't think you are going to go very far in reforming the country until we have a better educated, healthier, wealthier population. . . .

You can start immediately to eliminate the barely educated, unhealthy and poor segment of our country. No, I'm not advocating some sort of mass extinction of these unfortunate people. Crime, drugs and disease are already doing that. The problem is that their numbers are not only replaced but increased by the birth of millions of babies to people who can't afford to have babies.

There, I've said it. It's what we all know is true, but we only whisper it, because as liberals who believe in individual rights, we view any program which might treat the disadvantaged differently as discriminatory, mean-spirited and...well...so Republican. . . .

I am not proposing that you send federal agents armed with Depo-Provera dart guns to the ghetto. You should use persuasion rather than coercion. You and Hillary are a perfect example. Could either of you have gone to law school and achieved anything close to what you have if you had three or four or more children before you were 20? No! You waited until you were established and in your 30's to have one child. That is what sensible people do. . . .

Imagine the uproar if this had appeared in a Freedom of Information request from the Bush Administration. It was in fact a letter (pages 61-64 here -- note: PDF document) written to then-incoming-President Clinton in early 1992 by lawyer Ron Weddington, urging FDA approval of the abortifacient drug RU-486.

As America's first black president, I imagine that Clinton was pretty steamed about that, especially since proven methods of contraception like blue dresses and cigars were readily available.

Mr. Weddington concludes with this postscript:

I was co-counsel in Roe V. Wade, have sired zero children and one fetus, the abortion of which was recently recounted by my ex-wife in her book, A Question Of Choice (Grossett/Putnam, 1992) I had a vasectomy in 1969 and have never had one moment of regret.

You sound like a lovely ex-couple. By the way, you neglected to mention your invaluable contribution to the Wannsee Conference, but I'm sure that it was just a youthful indiscretion.

Or a statute-of-limitations thing.

If you're fond of going down to the beach and scratching your belly, this just might be the tat for you.

Make sure that you leave before the cops show up, though.

Time! Time! Of which I have not a lot today.

Beakins Great Mango Quest is colorful and tricky, from what I've played of it. There's music, which you can turn off with a button at the lower right, and sound effects, which you can't. Go figure.

Or perhaps you're in the mood for a 72-piece jigsaw puzzle. The developer offers to make one using a picture of your choice for the low, low price of $250. Seems a bit steep to me, as all he'd have to do is plug it into the code and maybe make a few tweaks to adjust the number of pieces, etc. Again, go figure.

Via Ursi's Blog

san se chardonnay chaiblie
pinot gris jiot
just to take the edge of
just to get the glow

loudon wainwright

Cracked was the poor man's Mad Magazine; same comic book format, but not as well done, as I recall it. I haven't seen it on a newsstand in ages, but it's now got a Web presence, with some sharply-written humor.

Such as this collection of wine reviews, by someone who knows well the bouquet of a fine Muscatel:

Shiraz has a bit of kick to it-a little spice. It reminds you of that romantic night in Costa Rica with Gitana Dulcinea de Esperanza. You met her at the hotel bar where she was selling dead roses and chess pieces out of a wicker bag. You danced and danced and danced. It was so wrong but it felt so right.

(Warning: Safe for work, but other pieces and video clips onsite might not be.)

Rob Gonsalves is a Canadian painter who won the Governor General's Award in 2005 for Children's Literature - Illustration.

They're quite beautiful examples of surrealism. More here. The originals and prints are for sale here with prices from $100-$1650.

Or you could buy the books here.

Darth Vader has bad news. The Emperor is not happy.

Via Cynical-C Blog

The crowd at Something Awful have set in motion a funny and imaginative thread about movies played in reverse. (Warning: Language.)

Titanic:

An enormous iron ship surges up from the vast depths of the ocean in order to save a large number of people who are inexplicably, and somewhat foolishly, floundering in the water near an iceburg. It then kindly takes them back to Southampton.

The Passion Of The Christ:

A man awakens to find himself nailed to a cross without knowing how he got there, possibly after heavy drinking. Of course he is let down shortly after and the Romans tend to his wounds with a whip of +5 healing after he helped them get the cross back to storage. They parade him in front of a crowd as thanks, before re-arresting a criminal who had been mistakenly released in the man's place, despite the consternation of the crowd. He walks away with some of his friends, one of them lies about having said he didn't know him.

well tell me again what you were thinking
when you got that bruise tattoo
forever black and blue
owen

Dude, dude, dude. Having a badly-done tattoo of Pee-wee Herman is not going to get you any props in your local biker (unless it's of the three-wheeled variety) bar .

More flesh-and-ink atrocities here. SFW, mostly.

Make sure you don't miss "Mr. CooL ICE" (Don't worry, you'll know him when you see him.)

I don't make this stuff up, folks. Apart from the stuff that I do make up, I mean. But I didn't make this one up.

Ottawa Sun:

BUST IN VAGINA THEFT

A 19-year-old man faces a theft charge after a hand-held vagina was stolen from an adult video store in Kingston. Police said the suspect allegedly selected the sex toy, ran from the Bath St. store and was chased by a staffer. Police found the man 10 minutes after the $80 toy was stolen. "We found him around the corner -- and he had used it," said Const. Neil Finn. The toy was apparently dumped after being used and was not recovered.

Al Gore quoted in Grist Magazine:

Nobody is interested in solutions if they don't think there's a problem. Given that starting point, I believe it is appropriate to have an over-representation of factual presentations on how dangerous it is, as a predicate for opening up the audience to listen to what the solutions are, and how hopeful it is that we are going to solve this crisis.

Jonah Goldberg in NRO:

Gore told [Arianna] Huffington that this was his second trip to Cannes. “The first was when I was 15 years old and came here for the summer to study the existentialists -— Sartre, Camus. We were not allowed to speak anything but French!” This, gushed Huffington, “may explain his pitch-perfect French accent.” Perhaps. Though according to David Maraniss’s biography of Gore, the former vice president’s 15th summer was spent working on the family farm. . . . Then there’s the fact that young Al got C’s in French at his tony Washington high school, St. Alban’s. That’s some school if a kid who can intelligently discuss Sartre’s La Nausée and Camus’s Betwixt and Between in apparently pitch-perfect French still can’t earn a B in French class. Mon dieu!

Gore is such a chronic dissembler that I doubt even he knows what's real and what's imaginary in his life.

But as the first quote indicates, he feels that the truth is at best a flexible thing. All in the service of Higher Causes, you see.

More Photoshop witchery here.

Sweet songstress Sarah Silverman does her bit to promote racial harmony. Or not.

Warning: Music, obviously, and NSFW language.

Those

darn

monkeys!

Warning: Links open up embedded video with music and sounds.

The StarPhoenix:

Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay got a rough ride in his first appearance before the Senate national security and defence committee, but the proceedings turned particularly ugly when Liberal Senator Peter Stollery hurled an insult at Karzai, Afghanistan's interim [sic -- in Oct. 2004, Karzai was elected in a U.N.-supervised vote to a full five-year term] president, who MacKay said would soon be visiting Canada.

"You know Karzai, he's a stooge. He was put there by Americans. Everybody knows that," Stollery said.

By golly, he's got a point. Let's see what else we know.

Karzai:

Karzai fled to India during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, and remained until the fall of the Taliban. He took a postgraduate course in political science at Himachal University in Shimla, Himachal Pradesh, India from 1979 to 1983, then returned to work as a fund-raiser supporting anti-Soviet uprisings in Afghanistan during the Soviet intervention for the rest of the 1980s. After the withdrawal of Soviet forces, he served as a deputy minister in the government of Burhanuddin Rabbani.

Stollery:

His family owns Stollery's clothing store at the corner of Yonge Street and Bloor Street in Toronto, hence his designation in the Canadian Senate as Senator for "Bloor and Yonge".

Karzai:

When the Taliban emerged onto the political scene in the 1990s, Karzai was initially among their supporters. However, he later broke with the Taliban, citing distrust of their links to Pakistan. After the Taliban drove Rabbani out of Kabul in 1996, Karzai refused to serve as their U.N. ambassador. In 1997, Karzai joined many of his family members in [the] United States, from where he worked to reinstate Zahir Shah. His father was assassinated, presumably by Taliban agents, July 14, 1999, and Karzai swore revenge against the Taliban by working to help overthrow it.

Stollery:

Stollery has worked as a teacher and travel writer, as well as working for the family business. In addition, he worked as a cab driver in Toronto for many years.

Karzai:

Karzai was a candidate in the October 9, 2004 Presidential Elections. Despite a perceived lack of national support he won 21 of the 34 provinces, defeating his 22 opponents and became the first democratically elected leader of Afghanistan.

Stollery:

He was first elected to the Canadian House of Commons as a Liberal candidate in the 1972 election for Spadina riding in Toronto. He was re-elected in 1974, 1979 and 1980 elections. He served for a time as Chairman of the Parliamentary Caucus. . . . Stollery is currently Chair of the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs.

Karzai:

From a base in Pakistan, Karzai began to organize anti-Taliban opposition. When his father was murdered in Pakistan, presumably by agents of the Taliban, Hamid Karzai, was selected to succeed his father as Khan of the half-million Popalzai. He immediately defied both the Pakistan and Taliban governments by leading a convoy of tribal mourners to carry his father's body home for burial in Kandahar, a stronghold of the Taliban. The Taliban did not dare intervene. This act of defiance made Hamid Karzai the most visible leader of resistance to the Taliban among the Pashtun people.

Stollery:

In 1981, Stollery was appointed to the Canadian Senate on the recommendation of Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau. Trudeau wanted to open Stollery's Spadina riding so that Trudeau's aide James Coutts, could be elected to Parliament in a by-election. Coutts was defeated in what had been a safe Liberal seat by Dan Heap of the New Democratic Party in the subsequent by-election.

Karzai:

In October 2001, Karzai and three friends re-entered Afghanistan to raise a revolt. He had a single satellite phone, no sleeping bags or other supplies, little ammunition, few weapons, and no certainty of outside support, but day by day he attracted more followers. He narrowly escaped capture by the Taliban, and was even wounded by a stray American bomb, but by December, the Taliban had fled from Kandahar.

Stollery:

<crickets>

. . .

</crickets>

I seem to have run out of things to quote.

It's not all fun-and-games being an U.S. stooge, y'know.

Karzai:

On September 5, 2002, an assassination attempt was made on Hamid Karzai in Kandahar. A gunman wearing the uniform of the new Afghan National Army opened fire, wounding the Governor of Kandahar and an American Special Operations officer. The gunman, one of the President's bodyguards, and a bystander who knocked down the gunman were killed when Karzai's bodyguards returned fire. A second attempt on Karzai's life took place on September 16, 2004 when a rocket missed the helicopter he was riding to Gardez, where Karzai planned to open a school.

Of course, Stollery is a man of no small courage himself; the Senate still buzzes with the memory of his April 20, 1986 hand-to-hand battle with Sharon Carstairs for the last crabcake at the Parliamentary All-U-Can-Eat buffet. God, that was ugly.

So here we have a tale of two men. Hamid Karzai gave up a comfortable and prosperous life in America to fight for a country and people he loved and won a dubious (and dangerous) prize: the presidency of Afghanistan.

Peter Stollery gave up . . . well, nothing that I can see, with the possible exception of his eternal soul to serve as a hack for a morally-bankrupt political party.

Do us all a favor when Karzai makes his first state visit here and lock yourself in your office, Stollery. You're not fit to be in the same room as the man.

Via Nealenews