Personal Coffee

"Anything from the specialty bar, sir?"

I looked around. I was pretty sure I was in a Starbucks, looking for coffee. The "specialty bar"? Maybe I was wrong. But no, the ubiquitous green and white stripes...the glass case full of carefully over-priced confections, the annoying choice of talle, grande and venti...it was all there.

So what in the name of God is a "specialty bar", and why would I want anything from there?

"No, thanks," I said.

"No PROBLEM- EXCELLENT!!" replied the barista, as she fixed her eyes on the next customer "The usual?", she perked.

The woman in the sensible power suit behind me stepped up to the plate, drew a deep breath, and took a mighty swing. "Not today, thanks. Today I want....okay, I'll have a grande...no a venti...a venti half-caff...Himilayan...soy...extra hot...no whip, no lid."

There was a slight pause. Tiny beads of perspiration appeared on the customer's upper lip. Had she hit it over the fence, or was this a swing and a miss?

"EXCELLENT!!" smiled the barista, as she leaped into action. "I need a personal venti half-caff Himalayan soy extra hot no whip no lid!!" she shouted to the person standing approximately right next to her. The instructions were repeated back with the precision of a submarine fire control officer preparing to launch a volley of Polaris missiles. Large, highly pressurised pieces of coffee-making machinery were pressed into service. Hisses issued forth. Gauges fluttered, buttons were pushed.

Power Suit Lady relaxed, smiled. She headed for the Special Section reserved for those who order "Personal Beverages".

Meanwhile I ordered a large coffee, dark roast. No special section for me. Naturally I had to have the mandatory "I'm sorry sir - I don't understand "LARGE" " conversation, which resulted in me (as always) pointing dumbly to the middle-sized cup on the Starbuck's cup decoder display. Then I forked over my $2.05, dumped in a load of half-and-half, twiddled it all with a wooden stir stick, and found the correct cup lid.

With a firm grasp on my coffee cup I headed for the door, stepping carefully around the area inside the velvet rope where Personal Coffees are prepared, checked, and ceremoniously delivered. Power Suit Lady was pacing nervously. "Would they get the "hot" right? Was the "no whip" a mistake? Could she get retroactive "whip"? How would her personally designed coffee beverage go down with the baristae? Had she checked her bank balance? Is "Himalayan a no-no...or was that Tibetan...or Ethiopian? DAMN! She forgot to say "fair trade!" DAMN, damn, damn....

As I reached the exit, the personal coffee exchanged hands, its arrival signalled by a loud "I have a personal venti half-caff Himalayan extra hot no whip no lid here..."

I looked back. Power Suit Lady had pulled it off. Her beverage - her personal beverage - had been prepared to order, following her instructions. She glowed. She looked ready to strut. And then....it came apart.

"Will there be anything from the personal accompaniments bar, perhaps?"

Power Suit Lady was stuck. She hadn't prepared. Hadn't scrutinized the offerings. Hadn't done ANY sort of beverage/accompaniment matching. She took a shot.

"A no-wheat no-egg yolk thigh pressed steel-cut oatmeal kamut hotcake?"

A hand snaked across the counter, snatching back the personal beverage and disdainfully flinging $7.38 in loose change in one practiced motion.

"Perhaps madam would be more comfortable at Second Cup? I hear they offer free coffee at the "Y" - just down the street...it comes with a cookie."

In Three's

What just happened? One minute I was vaguely worried about the situation in Iran, but that was pretty much eclipsed by worrying over the fact that I can't find time to strip the old wallpaper off the walls of my new old house.



Then Ed McMahon died.



I never really watched Johnny Carson, and McMahon was in his 80's. I was mildly sorry that he had lived out his last years fighting to keep his own home. For all the escapist amusement that he has provided for millions of TV viewers, one would have thought that the President could have absolved him of his financial sins. But Ed McMahon didn't touch my life, and I went back to worrying about wallpaper.



Then Farrah Fawcett died.



Farrah Fawcett was the big-haired, tight-bodied, gleaming-toothed poster girl of my early university years - until she was replaced by a scantily clothed Cheryl Tiegs. Farrah went on to amuse us as one of Charlie's Angels, although in that role she was stacked up against Jaclyn Smith and Kate Jackson - both of whom held more appeal for me than Farrah and her big hair. Not that I ever watched "Charlie's Angels" - I think I avoided it with the same degree of disdain that made me perhaps the only person in the Western Hemisphere who has never seen a single episode of "The Love Boat." Farrah Fawcett was a very ill woman when she died. She had struggled privately and ultimately in public with a rare form of cancer. Somehow she largely avoided the ghoulish tabloid death-watch to which most stricken public figures are subjected. Her death was untimely and sad, but not unexpected. Farrah Fawcett had not touched my life in any meaningful way. I shrugged it off and went back to thinking about Iran.



Then Michael Jackson died.



Michael Jackson died.



He died.



Michael Jackson - the frenetic, Afro-headed micro-star of late nights with Ed Sullivan, when I was so glad that, tonight, it was the Jackson 5 and NOT the dweebish Osmond Brothers. Michael Jackson, who roared into our 20-something lives with "Thriller" - an album that changed everything about pop music, and made modern pop culture what it has become, set a standard for sheer innovation and excitement that every "So You Think You Can Dance" hopeful, every "American Idol" aspirant, every performer on the stage of popular culture only dreams about meeting.



Michael Jackson - the admirer and confidante of Elizabeth Taylor, the increasingly weird, shape-shifting hob-goblin in his oxygen chamber, a real-life Peter Pan surrounded and consumed by ghosts and demons, always trying to fly, sometimes succeeding - that guy. He died.



I didn't think that it would matter. At least, not to me. Why should it? His music was great when it was good, but it was never more than a diversion for me. I didn't watch him on television unless he happened to be on. I didn't intentionally follow his press - although at times it was hard not to. At most I occasionally shook my head in response to some news article, some photo of the King of Pop looking more like the Invisible Man in his surgical mask and fedora, or, mostly, I looked on in wonder as the star-maker machinery dissected the man before our eyes, as the smug entertainment media hypocrites who really run all things mainstream decided that Jackson was now a road-side attraction to be treated as such.



It was the newspaper covers that got to me.



Michael Jackson - 1958-2009.

Michael Jackson was a month younger than me.


Thanks for doing something with you life, Mr. Jackson. It was by turns weird and wonderful, disgraceful and uplifting, bewildering and enlightening - but at least it was something.

End of the Transit Strike

With scant hours to spare before the Federal government was scheduled to hold an emergency sitting of Parliament to deal with Ottawa's record-breaking transit strike, it was over. Looking like Larry, Curly and Moe, Ottawa's Mayor Larry O'Brien and the two senior union bosses for the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 279 (the drivers, mechanics and dispatchers who have been on strike against OC Transpo for over two months) emerged to announce that they had agreed to send the entire mess to binding arbitration, without any conditions attached.

For THIS we have been schlepping around the world's coldest capital city, in the coldest January in recent memory? For THIS we have wasted untold hours sitting in traffic, burned untold extra litres of fuel, paid untold parking fees, missed untold numbers of appointments, endured the wrath of an untold number of pedestrians, drivers, employers, shop keepers, appointment secretaries, wives, husbands, children, hockey coaches and hair dressers? What is there about this "solution" that could not have been achieved within 24 hours of pickets going up?


Oh, and then there is the little side bonus. We will probably get to pick up the $15,000,000.00 tab for the privilege of NOT having a transportation system available to us as the world economy crumbled, as Christmas, Boxing Day and New Year's came and went, as university exam schedules went into spasms, as retail workers who rely on the extra cash from the Christmas season spent it all and more just getting to work.

And when they say the buses are running again, of course they don't really mean it. As the buses sat idle in their sheds, or outside in the freezingness, their safety certificates expired en masse, requiring inspections and maintenance before they could get back to the business of missing their stops, breaking down, and being late as usual. we're being told it could be "many weeks" before the system is running to full capacity. I thought that OC Transpo operated buses - not space shuttles. (Although there are drivers who would disagree with me, judging by some of the rides I have had).


I don't even use the bus system on a regular basis. By the time I calculated the cost of bus passes for myself and my wife, and factored in the inconvenience of making a couple of transfers to drop off and collect our son at daycare, it became pretty clear that it was cheaper for us to just drive to work and pay for parking. That's the great irony of the whole thing, actually. Even when it's running, OC Transpo is an over-priced, under-achieving system that fails to impress. The fact that the city touts the system as being world-class strongly suggests that no one from the Ottawa city council has even been to Toronto, much less some of those cities on this Earth where transit actually works. So to be ham-strung for half the winter by an impasse between the owners of a crap transit system and the people who bring us that crap every day, was frustrating to say the least. And to think that, in the middle of a world economic meltdown, the Parliament of Canada was going to convene a special emergency session to get the buses lurching along once more simply defies the imagination. The business of the COUNTRY is being interrupted to deal with a ......BUS STRIKE?


Give us all a break.


First step - get this bus system under the control of the Ontario Government. It is ludicrous that a Federal Minister, let alone the Federal Government and Parliament as a whole, had to be called upon to get involved with this debacle.


Second step - give very serious consideration to making transit an essential service. Cities all over the country are telling residents to leave their cars at home and to take transit. Traffic patterns have been deliberately configured to favor mass transit over automobiles in many cities, Ottawa included. That may be quite proper. A good transit system can deliver tremendous benefits to a community, both in terms of convenience and environmental responsibility. But when cities tell us that we can and should rely on these systems, they should expect us to take them at their word. When we rely on transit, we choose not to have two cars - maybe no car at all. We arrange our lives with access to transit as a "given". We support infrastructure and planning initiatives that favor transit over private cars. We buy in. Fire fighting services and policing services are essential to our health, safety and well-being. And yet the average citizen relies far more heavily on transit than on fire fighting or police services in the run of the average day. Watching ambulances and fire trucks trying to negotiate the clogged Ottawa downtown during the transit strike made me wonder how anyone could think that transit, with its ability to so drastically reduce traffic congestion, is not an essential service.


Third step - get the city out of the business of providing transit, and put it in the hands of the private sector. Naturally, there would have to be regulation to ensure that routes are designed to provide service and not just generate revenue. That is clearly within the city's authority. But take the politics out of running the buses.

Fourth step - city and union, hope for forgiveness, even if you don't deserve it.

Prorogue - emphasis on the "rogue".

I had written a lengthy diatribe to assuage my political frustrations, but thought the better of publishing it. It was mostly cathartic, I guess. Anyway, I'm glad Her Excellency Mme. Jean acceded to the Prime Minister's request and prorogued Parliament today. (Note to G&M posters - the word is "prorogue". Not "parole" (although that has a Freudian attraction). I really do believe that Mr. Harper brought this crisis down on his own flat-topped head, and he ought to be booted in his political ass for it - but he is still the best choice to lead Canada through the economic mine field we now face, and the "coalition" (which is already being talked of in the past tense here in Ottawa) is/was a total nightmare scenario by comparison. Mr. Dion is about as credible as a cardboard cut-out of Dabney Coleman, and the NDP has the combined leadership qualities of a four-slice toaster. Maybe a two-slice toaster - the kind that can do bagels.

Anyone who thinks that the fact that the Bloc wasn't a part of the coalition matters a tinker's damn should stop drinking the Kool-Aid. Here's what those guys were up to: The "coalition" was between the NDP and the Liberals, but they agreed to establish and maintain a continual liaison with the Bloc. The Bloc agreed, in advance, to support the Throne Speeches and the budgets of the coalition. Now, think about that. A budget is normally prepared in great secrecy by the Government. It is presented to Parliament. Opposition parties respond to the Budget during debate in the House. But in the "coalition" scenario, the Bloc (NOT a member of the coalition, and therefore NOT a member of the "governing party") has agreed IN ADVANCE to support budgetary measures it hasn't seen. Suppose the NDP/Liberal coalition brought in a budget that was prejudicial to the interests of Quebec. Are you going to tell me that the Bloc would feel constrained to support it? Not bloody likely. The only way I can figure this out is that the Bloc would have considerable input on budgetary measures BEFORE the budget was introduced. This is completely outside the protocols of Canadian democracy. Either you are in the Government and make budgetary policy, or you are NOT in the Government and you comment on budgets through debates. Budgets are the most intimate reflection of the intentions of a Government. The coalition could NOT survive without the support of the Bloc on budget day. Ergo (not "herego", to all my Newfoundland correspondents) it is an inescapable conclusion that the Bloc would have direct influence on the drafting and content of the budget. That's cool if they want to be a part of the coalition - but not cool if they pretend to be independent. And the Liberals and the NDP couldn't survive a minute with the Canadian electorate if they made the Bloc a member of the coalition. We are actually too smart for that. Nice try, you nasty little men. Nice frigging try.

Meanwhile, I sincerely hope that Mme. Jean had the fortitude to tell the Prime Minister to knock it off already with the dirty tricks, to take the job of governing seriously, and to leave all that small-town partisan bullshit nonsense for another day. The country needs leadership - not watercooler gamesmanship.

The GG is taking a lot of flak (not "flack" - "flack" isn't a word - oh, wait. Maybe it is. As in "Political Flack") for her decision. People are getting little bits of white foam in the corners of their mouths as they try to say "precedent". (Another note to G&M commentators - it isn't "president". That confuses two different political structures entirely). What are they worried about? The GG has considerable discretion to make determinations based on the facts that are before her. The precedential relevance of this decision is directly related to the chances that the same scenario might be presented to another GG at some future date. And I mean EXACTLY the same scenario, including all the current economic circumstances, the personalities (or lack of same) of the players involved...everything. Her Excellency was required to weigh ALL of the information available before she reached her determination. The fact that she decided as she did means very little to a future GG who is asked to prorogue Parliament by a fraidy-cat PM. This is no threat to Canadian democracy, or the Parliamentary process. In fact it is the reverse, because it demonstrates that we are not hide-bound by process, and what is best for Canada on any given day is really the guiding light.

So lay off the GG. And I don't say that just because she's really, really cute. I would have said it in defence of Romeo (wherefore art thou) LeBlanc if he had made the same decision. And I think he would have.

Blog Management

I don't know how to manage this thing yet. I haven't figured out a lot of the details, and I hate looking them up. Anyway, I started writing an entry on November 17, but I only just finished it. But it still shows up in chronological order - so even though it's the most recent post, it is also the oldest one. Go figure.

Big "X" Little "x"; what begins with "X"?

Not much, actually. A couple of scientific prefixes (xero- and xeno-) provide most of the words that you can use your "X" to create - but since Scrabble only gives you seven letters to play with, there is little likelihood of plopping "xenophobic" down on a triple word score any time soon. Any opponent smart enough to spell "phobic" wouldn't put it in a place where that "xeno-" prefix could do much damage, anyway.

The relative futility of "X" came home to me this evening when I was curled up with a small glass of port and a copy of "Dr. Seuss' A-B-C". I try to get through a letter every night. The man who brought you Uncle Ubb and the Tuttle-tuttle Tree; the very same man who put a wocket in my pocket and a noothgrush on your toothbrush; that guy was telling me that "X" stands for...wait for it...."X-ray and xylophone".

X-ray and xylophone? If Dr. Seuss can't do any better than that, then I say it's time to give this whole "X" thing another look. What can you accomplish with a "X" that you couldn't accomplish with, for egzample, a few strategically placed z's and g's? Almost all of those "x" words SOUND like they start with "z", anyway. It isn't "eksylophone". It's "zylophone."

I know - I know. It's those pesky Greek word roots. They get you every time. But what sort of ekscuse is that? And seriously, wouldn't the alphabet be more wieldy with a nice group of 25 letters? a nice number with a square root and everything - makes a pleasant 5 x 5 block of characters. Then when you use "X" to create any one of those non-words ("X-Men", "X-Factor", X-Box") it would REALLY be cool. The idea of 26 letters isn't cast in stone. Other languages that use the Roman alphabet have differing numbers of letters. They are merely symbols, after all, used to give shape to a sound. And "X" fails at that task most miserably, almost every time. Apart from "X-Ray", which shouldn't be a word and only gets to be one because of the Scrabble lobby, the only other words that even sound like they start with "x" rely on partnering "x" up with "e" - for example...well, example, for example. It's like "x" can't be trusted to go out there on its own and lead a word. I can imagine those word police guys, who I know egzist: "Sounds like it starts with an "x"? Ooooooh. Better slap an "e" on there. Can't be too careful about those "x's"."

The dictionary writers - lecksicographers, I guess - could have cut "x" some slack by saying that all those "ex" words started with a SILENT "e" so that 'x' could live up to its name....but they didn't.

The bottom line is clear. X may mark it, but it doesn't cut it.

And then there's the question of "Q". What kind of self-respecting letter needs to be surgically attached to a "u" all the time? Unless you are spelling "Qatar" (which you can't use in Scrabble), or "Iraq" (which you can't use either) or "cinq" (nope - it's French), you had better have a "u" handy. Turns out "q" doesn't really have a sound, at all - at least not one of its own. Without a "u", it's a "k". And with a "u" its a "kw". So what's the point? You don't even save the trouble of making a letter. And doesn't "delinquent" look more edgy and apropos when spelled "delinkwent"? Very street, as they say (far too often) on "So You Think You Can Dance."

Now we're down to 24 letters - another nice number - divisible by 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, and 12, capable of being arranged into all sorts of geometrically pleasing patterns, and no one will care except maybe the Queen and Jian Ghomeshi.





Note: The mark in the photograph is neither an "X" nor a "Q". It is a stonecutter's identifying glyph, cut into a limestone block that forms part of a wall in St. Jeronimo's Monastery in Lisbon. Using this symbol correctly in "Scrabble" is worth 1,000,000 points.

Cranes

These are Sandhill Cranes. I photographed them a month ago, not far from where I now sit in the shadow of Parliament Hill, the US Embassy, or the Gatineau Hills (depending on where the sun happens to be at any given moment). I saw them as they began drifting down to find their evening roost at the back of a stubble-covered corn field, silhouetted against a blazing sky. They are awkward, ungainly creatures by most standards, with the sort of grace that cartoonists exploit to great advantage. Their resemblance to the prehistoric skeletal remains of their distant dinosaur ancestors - or what we assume those creatures must have looked like - can be startling, especially when they are viewed in the failing half-light of late October, through wraiths of freezing vapour seeping out of freshly turned black soil. These four kited down to join an already-assembled flock of forty more, all of which had remained invisible until their presence was betrayed by the new arrivals. With much croaking and agitated flapping of wings, the flock offered an edgy greeting, although there appeared to be plenty of mud and stubble to go around. The newcomers had disrupted some sort of "settling in" event, and the mysterious symmetry of the larger group, understood only by them, fell in to a shambles of discord. Only an extended period of squawking and stalking about indignantly could put matters right, and the birds set to it, dutifully. Eventually the dynamic was restored. They all settled in again, and as one began moving methodically eastward across the muck, stalking, probing, raising their massive wings, then stopping to consider their circumstances, check the air, perhaps do a bit of gratuitous croaking. The four new arrivals, having been fully assimilated into the flock, were now indistinguishable. Their places in this particular hierarchy of crane-ness had been established, and harmony had been restored. If anyone was put out as a consequence of being moved down a notch or two on the pecking order, it was not evident. Ultimately, the addition of a few more birds was advantageous to the group - more eyes and ears to look for danger, more feet probing the ground for food that could benefit everyone, and more potential targets for the predator that would only need one bird to satisfy its hunger. They are tremendously primitive creatures.