A rchive Date
[ 02-07-2000 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ Canada ]
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[A lot off the top
In honour of the colourful clamour of Canada Day today, I'm favouring everyone with a catalogue of Canadian-flavoured humour. Eh?
By STEVE TILLEY
Edmonton Sun
July 1, 2000
OK, it's not really a catalogue in the strictest sense of the word, and it's certainly no favour to anyone who reads it, and "humour" might be stretching the definition of that word a bit. But how else could I get all those most excellent Canuck spellings into one paragraph? The Canadian way, of course - cheating!
As we all know, living in Canada isn't all wine and roses (or 'rouses' as we like to pronounce it.) For every bit of good, there's a little bit of bad. For every Kids in the Hall there's a Royal Canadian Air Farce. For every deceased Rocket Richard there's a living Eric Lindros. For every Newfoundland dog there's a Newfoundland human. (Just kidding, my Newfoundland friends! Without you, we'd suffer from feelings of inferiority all the time, instead of just when we watch American TV.)
Thus it seems only fitting we talk aboot what's great and what's not so great about bearing the yoke of Canucklehood. In no particular order, the five best things about being Canadian:
1) Fresh air and wide open spaces. Oh, Canada. You couldn't ask for a more diverse yet tranquil landscape, with kilometre after kilometre of space to roam around in without seeing a soul. Perfect for those of us who like to build shacks in the woods from which to send packages to heads of corporations.
We've got everything from desert rock formations to majestic snow-capped mountains, from wide oceans to pristine lakes, from dense evergreen forests to steamy, sweaty jungles crawling with snakes, scorpions and VC booby traps. Don't go in there, man! Don't go in there!
2) Dominance in the sporting world. We invented basketball, it takes skill to play our version of football, and while other countries may participate in the sport, hockey is Canada and Canada is hockey. As such, I'd like to apologize to everyone on my team when I was nine years old and had to play goalie because the regular guy was sick, and I let in 10 goals. Sorry.
3) Canadian music. Somehow, the Tragically Hip manages to be a Canadian band that everybody likes and yet is still considered cool. Plus, absolutely nobody else in the rest of the world understands them. And if you don't think Rush are musical gods, then you're probably, like, really young or something. So get lost.
4) Those Molson Canadian ads. Joe Canadian, our new hero! I can't remember the last time the entire country got so swollen up with national pride, except maybe when Canada beat Russia in '72. I'm pretty sure I was eating bugs in the sandbox at the time, but I couldstill feel something in the air!
5) Not being American. This is not a slight against our friends to the south, a lot of whom are pretty decent folk when they're not shooting each other over who gets the remote control. But there are just so many advantages to being Canadian over American. People in other countries don't hate us unless we do something to deserve it, we don't have to blow our retirement savings just to spend time in the hospital, we're calmer, more rational, slyer, more humble and our TV is supposed to suck. Which, unfortunately, brings us to the inevitable five worst things about being Canadian:
1) Fresh air and wide open spaces. Much of that fresh air is full of snow five, six or 111/2 months of the year, blanketing the wide open spaces with its demonic frigidity. Is it any wonder 90% of our population huddles within 300 km of the American border, like cave people trying to stay warm around a fire?
2) Dominance in the sporting world. It would be nice to see a team that's not from TEXAS win the Stanley Cup once in a while, and while we may have invented basketball, we sure as hell can't play it. We kick butt at lacrosse, though. Sweet lacrosse!
3) Canadian music. Shania Twain may well be the antichrist (though she'd have to battle Celine Dion for the title), but many Sun readers responding to our best Canadian rock song poll voted for the Guess Who's American Woman, likely because they remember Lenny Kravitz doing it in the Austin Powers movie. Weep for us.
4) Those Molson Canadian ads. Hey, Molson? Just so you know ... WE GET THE $#@!&$! POINT! Not only are we treated to Joe "Shut the $#@! Up Already!" Canadian every five minutes, but now you're shoving the EXACT SAME idea down our throats with new, even more insipid commercials, this time backed by Blitzkrieg Bop, a song by that well-known Canadian rock band the Ramones. GO AWAY! It's enough to make a guy start drinking tea!
5) Not being American. Granted, our prime minister is more laughs than a barrel full of monkeys left in the trash behind the drug-testing lab, but when he's falling on his butt figuratively and literally every other day, it gets to be a bit much. And though we might like to believe otherwise, a huge chunk of the world either doesn't take us seriously or isn't really aware we exist. Americans may be loud, but at least people notice them. Often by blowing them up, but, hell, attention is attention.
Then again, living in Canada still beats living anywhere else on earth. Except maybe Australia. Or certain parts of Belgium. I kind of like England, primitive as they are over there. Japan looks cool, too.
Oh yeah, let's not forget: 6) We're way indecisive.
Happy Canada Day, neighbour.
Steve Tilley can be reached by e-mail at steve@compusmart.ab.ca
 World Fact Book (CIA)]]
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