Canadian Idol Can Suck my Ass

It's tricky, this summertime business. Not for decisions like what to plant, or where to go for a holiday, or what trendy new summer shoe/clog thing you should buy each year - no, I am talking about television. Whilst I usually have in-between shows to carry me from the end of the normal season to the summer Big Brother bonanza, most notably Canadian Idol, I am just a little too bitter to watch it this year. I understand a new version of the Mole is on, which was a show that I watched way back in the olden days of 6 or 7 years ago, when it was hosted by Anderson Cooper (before he was hip - back when he was an annoying dweeb, and only known for being Gloria Vanderbuilt's son - ah, little Gloria... happy AT LAST!).
Anyway. I don't even really remember much about the Mole, other than they were in Spain or something and they had a contestant named Bribs one year. I'm not shitting you. Bribs. Who names their kid Bribs? He was also white. It's like he was trying to be all down with his name, like a white version of Cribs. Sad, really.
Whatever the hell Bribs was all about, I seemed to have missed the beginning of this year, and I just don't know if I have it in me to start a reality show late again. Nothing says suckyass than coming to the party late, I say. But my one constant, the putrid Canadian Idol, I just can't support this year.
You see, I understand that the dorks who win Canadian Idol haven't a hope in hell of being famous. I understand that their records are the kiss of death. I know that I would rather listen to a medly of piss-poor Canadian content from the 80s rather than anything of theirs. Hell, I'd listen to Bryan Adams' Waking Up the Neighbors, an album I detest more than anything I can think of, than one of their albums. In fact, I'd feel more comfortable having Bryan Adams and Rita Macneil screwing on my livingroom floor, doing serious role play ("That's right, you dirty, hefty Maritimer, it IS a workin' man I am! And I fucked Cookie Rankin in your tea room, too! Don't frown, you like it!" or "Plug me, you scarred face grease monkey! I'll show you the summer of 69, Pocky Boy!" - you get the hideous picture) than listening to that crap. I mean, that guy who one the first season who wore glasses - who the hell is he? Or Kaylan Porter - Canada's answer to Clay Aiken... Then there are the dorks who came after that - the high school bitch from Cowtown, or the other guy - it's all meaningless. However, I still liked watching.
Until now. Let's back up to last year. Each year, in the top 10, there is always someone from Saskatchewan, and someone from Newfoundland. Then there are people from Alberta, B.C., and other places. Now, with the exception of the one year, when the chick from Sask. was pretty good, the "Regional" people are there because their provinces vote for them repeatedly. So, last year, in the Post of the Globe and Mail, I don't remember, a producer from Idol wrote a scathing editorial to viewers in Ontario, angrily telling off Ontario viewers because there was only 1 person from Ontario in the top 10, and there never was anyone from Ontario in the finals, and that shouldn't be because Ontario viewers should be putting their people through, and then he made mention of Sask. and Newfoundland I think and how people are voting regionally and that was destroying the intent and whatever. Sour grapes I thought, because it is just like some Ontario loser to think their people are kings of the world. Well, let me tell you this, you regional dickhead, Ontario is NOT central Canada - you are EASTERN Canada. You aren't the economic centre of Canada - Come west if you want to see a fucking boom, moron. It may be cold in the winter here, but it's not humid in the summer. We can swim in our lakes. Got the picture? Ontario is so 5 minutes ago. And by the way, all your tv shows sucked the rotten knob - King of Kensington? WTF? That was supposed to be funny? Al Waxman, may be rest in peace, was supposed to be the Canadian Everyman? Muthafucka, PLEASE. Smith and Smith? Again, WTF? Riversdale? I can't even go there. Hmmm, but what is the most popular Canadian show right now, that is now airing in the U.S.? oh yeah... Corner Gas.... go figure.
But anyway, fast forward to this year. Canadian Idol is doing the audtions, and it's not like the states where you have to be choosy - you pick the same 10 places and get on with it. And I mean, it's not like Sass Jordan is in demand or anything. Unless you call picking up her drycleaning in Etobicoke next Thursday a pressing event. But no, the Sask. auditions got cancelled this year. You see, they had to go from Winnipeg to Edmonton AND fucking Calgary in a span of a week, and they wanted to be in Cowtown for the Junos. So they cancelled Sask. Not one of the Alta. dates. But Sask. A bunch of people started a boycotting movement. And, I don't blame them. You see, so fucking what if Newfoundland and Sask. vote their people through? If Torontarians are too fucking busy to vote for their bland fucking Gowan wannabe's, so be it - I mean, if I was living in pleasure land like them, I guess I wouldn't vote either, since I'd be so busy NOT watching my dog run away. And why not cancel the Newfie auditions you ask? Easy. Have you ever seen a pissed off newfie? Hells bells, they'd be drunker than usual, hurling bottles at your head, and stuffing cod up your nose and writing angry, drunken sea shanties about you. You just can't do it. And since the image is out there of down and out Newfoundland, the producers let them keep the audition. Well, let me say this publicly - the producers of Canadian Idol, along with Ben Mulroney and the whole entire machinery of that loser show can suck my ass. Until you are ready to recognize Saskatchewan, you can all fuck off.
We shall be free. We shall overcome. Shine on, Saskatchewan.

Post Number Two: An Open Letter to Winners

Dear Winners,
Sorry, I meant to write this 14 days ago, but the birth of my son made me delay writing. Indeed, I was in your fine store the day of my son's birth. It was shortly after the store opened that Sunday, and my expectent wife and I were browsing. I found a really cool pair of sandals or shoes or some sort of footwear hybrid. They are green and look European, and supposedly they retail for 100 dollars, but I got them in your fine store for 40 bucks. I think they are cool, but I have a feeling people are looking at them going "freak!" We also bought daughter #1 some shorts and somebody else some sandals - I can't remember who. Anyway. I appreciate the store being open again. Even though we all know you closed for a year and a half because you were busting the union, I can overlook that this time only, because I appreciate your store and merchandise.
However, I was a little dismayed when I went to use your rest room. You see, one comes to expect good things of Winners. The store is always clean and you sell such quality underwear that one expects nothing less for the bathrooms. Imagine my suprise when I went into your bathroom that afternoon for an emergency store poop. Nobody likes to poop in stores. However, I had probably 1/2 a dozen bran muffins in the 24 hours before I entered your store - it was this recipe where you mix ALL Bran, water, and Betty Crocker chocolate chip cookie mix. So good. So fibery. So, when I was shopping, and felt heavy down in the middle like a Weeble, and then felt like my ass was crowning, I had no choice but to excuse myself and use the bathroom. I went into the nice bright blue bathroom, and I might as well have been in Zellers. The toilet seat had urine on it, and ass hairs were prominently displayed all over the rear of the seat. I cleaned it up as best I could and just grinned and bore it, praying there would be no back-splash, as I had to flush the toilet before I sat down. Then, when it came time to clean myself, I was again dismayed at the ONE PLY paper. Why one ply? You can't have that many poopers in a given day! You are about quality! You should be giving us squares of 300 thread count sheets to wipe with! Not institutional one ply that makes a chafed ass bleed. It isn't right. But then, as I moved from toilet to sink, I appreciated that there was soap available, but.... BUT. There was no dispenser. And the soap that was there was a hastily bought bottle of Life Brand liquid hand soap. It smelled nice, but the bottle was dirty with dirty, soapy bubbles dried on the pump. Why did you run next door to Shoppers? Why didn't you grab some olive and grape leaf hand scrub from your own store? And why, if the air dryer isn't working, didn't you pay for some quality paper towels instead of a roll of the stuff I clean my windows with? I expect more from Winners. It will be the last time I shit in your store. Unless, of course, it's an emergency.
Yours,
JT - Emergency pooper.

Brad Pitt's Holiday Inn

So, I just read somewhere that Brad Pitt is designing an "eco-friendly" hotel highrise in Dubai. Or he's HELPING design it. And this is his quote: "Acting is my profession. Architecture is my passion." Or maybe he said life. I don't know. But I think he said passion. Anyway, it doesn't matter. What does matter is this: It simply irks the everloving fuck out of me when celebrities get all sanctimonious in a grand Oprah-like fashion and pretend that they are some renound expert on something they do not have the skills to speak about or do or practice or whatever.
First, there is the obvious - all these damn actors who pretend they can sing or play music or whatever. They get these record deals, when you know that they couldn't get bus fare busking in front of the liquour store on a payday if they weren't celebrities, but yet we still have to listen to this bullshit stuff and then listen to them talk about their art or their passion for the blues or some such bullshit. We've talked about Willis and Don Johnson here before, and Eddie Murphy's Party All the Time, and what have you. Now, I don't begrudge them in one sense, I guess, because nobody is forcing anyone to buy this shit off the hit parade. But I mean, these actors act all serious about their music, and it's so stupid and such a joke.
Or there are those god-awful children's books by celebs. And I mean, they don't illustrate the fucking things, so where is the motherfucking challenge? And why can't I get a children's book deal? Huh? We accidently bought Jimmy Fallon's book "Snowball Fight" at a Scholastic sale this year. It goes something like this: 'Snowball. Snowball. SNOWBALL FIGHT!" That's about it in a nutshell. Now, I will exempt Carly Simon's children's books from these, because she's Carly and I love her, so fuck off all of you. No, actually, at least her father was Simon from Simon and Schuster (that doesn't look right but whatever), so she at least has been AROUND books before.
And I dig the one Jaime Lee Curtis book (Tell Me ABout the Night I Was Born) because it's about adoption and it always give me a huge lump in my throat when I read it to the kids (this was the book that made daughter number two ask if they had a birth mother). Anyway, it's got substance. I'd say it's worthy of a Caldecott.
But fucking BILLY motherfucking CRYSTAL writing kids books? Give me an everloving break. A bucket of shite, I tell you. And MADONNA? Yeah, she wrote that book. Much in the same way Milli Vanilli sang those songs. Whatever.
But back to Brad Pitt. It's no secret I have issues with him and his vampire woman. But the fact that he is given the folly of designing this building in Dubai, the richest place this side of Fort Mac, is sickening. I image there are thousands of budding Mike Brady's out there, fresh out of architecture school, with 100 grand in student loans, designing garden sheds for a living, while Brad Pitt with the barely earned grade 12 is making some green hotel in the garden of Eden.
Let's turn the tables on me - you know how I have a passion for reading about diseases and viruses, AND how I have always longed to be a medical doctor. It's like me suddenly saying 'well, you know, my ho-hum work in education is a job, but really, medicine is my passion ,and I am going to run up to the hospital and birth some babies." You think people would be happy if I was sitting there in the delivery room, with my hand up an expectent mother's hootchie, yelling "Push against my fingers, Patti. That's it! Push against them! You're crowning!" Somehow, I don't see that being acceptable. Or what if there was a big outbreak of polio or something and since I love me my epidemiology, I said I was mixing up a big vat of vaccine in my bathtub and was going to go immunize children in the mall the next morning? It wouldn't be acceptable for me to do that. So tell me, if you found out Brad Pitt designed the room on the 43rd floor of your hotel, would you feel safe? I mean, he WAS married to Jennifer Aniston, who he never collapsed a building on all those years, so he DOES have a good track record.....
Bollocks. Fucking bollocks.
Also, why the hell is his wife the good-will ambassador for whatever the hell it is she is? I mean, why should Angelina Jolie be the children's ambassador or whatever? Why not some nun who has devoted her life to Jesus and has spent her years in the habit living in the veldt washing lepers and feeding the kids that poi? NO, don't do that - let's make our rep be Angelina Jolie, who a mere 6 or 7 years ago was actively FUCKING Billy Bob, and wearing his blood around her neck, and humping drugged out looking women, and oh, let's not forget, necking with and dry humping her Ziggy Stardust look-alike brother on national television! And let's let her adopt kids from all over! Because nothing says good parenting like adopting and birthing 6 kids in 5 years! Nothing says quality time like that! I mean, look at us - people think we are complete freaks having 4 kids - people fucking STOP us on the street - it happened twice today, I shit you not. And one reason we are sadly probably stopping having babies is that any more than 4, and we will be spread too thin - right now, we each can take two each and handle it. Now, I know little Maddox was an orphan in the jungle and yes, if I was over there and had money I'd want to save them too, but then think about this when you decide to have babies of your own. She ain't no Mia Farrow and never will be. And I don't know how I feel about Mia adopting so many so close together, but I suppose anything to keep you too busy to hump Woody Allen. I mean, please, she was with Woody Allen - something just isn't right there.
So, in closing, count me out of staying in Brad's Dubai hotel. It's the Dubai Delta for me, baby.
And now you know the REST of the story.

midgets and babies and sweet fluffy kittens

Yes, I am actually writing something. Well, at least I think I am. I am multi-tasking, so God only knows what will get done. Anyway, this needs to be quick, because time is money, whatever the hell that means.
So anyway, just letting all you closet readers know that the birth of lil' JT occurred on June 2 at 12:05 am. Yes, I now have four, count them, FOUR children. No, we are not Catholic or Mormon. Yes, we understand how to use birth control. No, we weren't trying until we had a boy. We like kids, ok? So, please stop acting like we fucking popped out the motherfucking Dionne quintuplets or something, ok? And yes, if I was a few years younger and had a little bit more money, I'd gladly have number 5. So shove that up your ass and cogitate.
Ok, sorry for the vitriol there, but I am mighty sick of people acting like we are some sort of freaks like Jon and Kate plus 8. Oh, if only we could be like those mealy-mouthed, miserable SOBS Jon and Kate. Have I ever expressed my disdain for them and others of the TLC ilk? No? Well, it all started with that midget show we were so addicted to... what the hell... the Roloffs.... Little People, Big World. Ok, when it began, it was brilliant. If you've never watched it, it's a reality show about midgets - a married midget couple, their three normal sized kids, and their one midget boy. And yes, maybe they aren't called midgets anymore. I don't know - I don't know what is offensive about midget, but I am sure it is, and they are probably little people or dwarfs or zvergs or differently sized, or butterballs or some such new phrase, but forgive me if I call them midgets because seriously, I don't know what is wrong with that word. Anyway, when the midget show began, they were normal. Like, they struggled to make ends meet like normal people, and mama midget was working in a preschool and daddy was working two jobs and their house needed a billion dollars of work and yada yada. Well, fast forward two seasons, and mama and papa Little don't seem to be struggling, and I don't think mama works and they get a 50 grand kitchen and a pool and high-tech tools to shoot pumpkins across the field and they are FOREVER taking the midget twin to midget sports competetions, like over and over, and going to Hawaii and here and there and while I think good for you and run with it, for the viewer, it doesn't interest me because it's no longer "Real". And I mean, it's like TLC is sitting there going "hey, lets send them to Hawaii!" "let's give them a pool!" and whatever for their ratings. So, I've given up on it.
Same thing with Jon and Kate. I don't begrudge them either, because I mean, whelping six at a time is crazy, and I am glad they are getting the $$$ from TLC because that's lots of kids. But again, they don't struggle now or live a daily life like at the beginning. Instead, they are always on vacation or doing cutesy things, and it's just more TLC manipulation. Reality tv ain't real on the TLC tip baby, so dummy up. Don't take the brown acid, as they said at Woodstock.
So, back to me - I don't begrudge these people anything. Hell, I am probably just jealous. You wanna pay my mortgage and give me a pool? Sure, I'll do whatever you want on your TLC show. I'm your private dancer, a dancer for money.
But anyway, seriously, anyone wanna give us a reality show, I'm in.
But anyway, we had 4 kids because we love kids. And this one is great. However, you know how we were so ultra ready for this one for the past month? Well, he came on a weekend when we weren't ready. We spend a small fortune on plants and flowers this year, and spent the weekend planting all of them. Seriously, it was 8 hours of yard work on Sunday, and the house looked like we'd been robbed. But Rachel was all "Monday I can take care of it!" and so we did the plants. On Sunday night at about 7:30, I was just transplanting some perenials as per her instructions when we realized it was late and a school night so after chatting in the yard with my neighbor and my sister, we threw the kids in the van, and took them to the Arby's drive thru, and then I got the Mrs. a sub from Subway, and then I ran to Quiznos. We got home at 8, threw shit off the table and ate, planning for Show and tell for the kids, and whatever. The Mrs. thought she was having Braxton Hicks on the way home from Subway, and said "I'm just gonna shower now just in case tonight is the night" (ha ha, we always said that). So she is gonna stand up but apparently her water broke, and she blurts out "my water just broke!" and I lose it and jump up and run for towels and yell "girls, we're having the baby tonight" and then pandemonium breaks out because child #1 runs excited then runs back to us crying that she doesn't want us to go and #2 bursts out crying because she is just so tired (she bawled in the van on the way to Arby's because I told her she couldn't have a BRAN MUFFIN that was in the car). So I finally get the mrs. into the bathroom, where she cleans herself up (she's never had water break, so we were freaked right out, and since her labors are usually 1 or 2 hours, the doctor said if her water broke to get our fat asses to the hospital post-haste), and all I can think of is that I can't hold a baby with my dirt caked hands and dirty nails and I didn't have time to shower, so I do what any calm, rational father to be does and brush my teeth for 15 seconds, try and find her bag that she packed a long time ago, grab the camera and phone (but sadly not the charger) and wait for the inlaws. The inlaws were at a concert, but luckily they forgot to turn their phone off and luckily it was intermission. However, since they knew how fast this shit always is with us, they leave my father-in-law's 90 year old mother at the concert (my sister in law, who was performing, was given instructions to take great grandma home).
So we head to the hospital, and our house looked like it had been ransacked - shit EVERYWHERE, beds not made, not to mention amniotic fluid here and there. Well, I try calling the doctor and end up calling his son saying "it's your old babysitter, and we're having a baby!" so he tracks his dad down. Well, we march into the hospital thinking that she will be ready to push, contractions were 3 minutes apart, and the nurse checks her and she's only 2 cm. We were all WTF? We've never had it that slow. This is 9 p.m. She is checked at 10 pm and is only 3 cm., and the baby is not engaged, still sort of floating around. Close to 11, the doctor calls and asks if she wants an epidural, because if you want one, you need to ask before 11, or else you are SOL, apparently. She says no, and then regrets it and is having little panic attacks. At one point, my poor wife is on the toilet trying to pee and I am sitting on the tub holding her hand and she looks at me and says "4 is enough, I can't do this again, I'm done" and I swear, if I had a knife, I would have chopped my pecker off right then and there and sent it off to John Wayne Bobbit for a spare.
So anyway, the nurse checks her at 11:15, and she's 4 cm, and I think sweet merciful Jesus, this will be one of those all night things you hear about, and why didn't she take the epidural and whatever. Then, after laying silently for 30 minutes, she suddenly says at 11:45 "I feel like I could push." The nurse is walking by luckily and says "did I hear the magic words?" and checks her, and sure enough, she's ready to go. Long story short, we did a little pushing, and baby was born at 12:05 (after all of us wondering what day he'd hit). He came out with his hand next to his head, which mean Rachel had to get stitches. Also, his cord was freakishly long - I called it a clown hankie because it just kept coming out. It was frigging huge and coiled like a phone cord. Then the doctor says "Look at that - you only see this every few years" and it was TWO knots in the cord. He said we were VERY lucky nothing happened to baby. I did some googling, and yeah, we were frigging lucky. Thank you, Jesus.
Anyway, we named him - well, I hate giving anyone real names on here anymore, so let's make you do some research - his first name starts with a vowel and rhymes with the name of Brooke Shields' first daughter, and his middle name is my real first name, and his other name is the name of my favorite male singer songwriter who I am seeing on July 11th, 4th row, in Saskatoon.
He was 8 4.5 oz. A full head of black hair. he sleeps wonderfully, doesn't cry really, and is the sweetest little thing you've ever seen, and it brings me to tears to even describe him, so I'll leave it at that.
He was out the next day, after his little snip (nurses can be such bitches - if we want to snip off our baby's foreskin, it's none of your fucking business, so go back to your cigarettes and bitching, sister - I think cigarettes are LUNG mutilation, but you don't see me whining that you are killing yourself, so suck my fat hairy ass), and that night we had the girls' dance dress rehearsal and then the recital the next night, so in his first 2 and 3 days, he was out and about like a son of a gun.
But anyway, I could go on and on about it, but will stop there - welcome to the world my beautiful son - we are going to have such a lifetime of wonder and fun together. Every time I hear Lennon's "Beautiful Boy", it is like it was written just for you (and trust me, I've listened to it and sang it to myself many times these past 10 days).
Have a great weekend everyone.
xo