The Urban Refugee

Grilling is cooking meat by the direct application of high heat with a gas burner or an electric heater.

BBQing is cooking meat by the direct application of heat with charcoal or wood.

Chicken that has been roasted, frozen, microwaved, deep fried, slathered with cheap brown slime from Kraft, and then thrown into an oven for another five minutes is not technically “BBQ Chicken” regardless of what the label on the slime said. You see, charcoal or wood needs to be involved at some point for the “BBQ” label to stick. No, the technical term professional cooks use for chicken that has been prepared in the aforementioned manner is “fucking disgusting”.

That is all.

“So, are you putting your daughter in dance lessons?”

“Hell no.”

“Why not? She’d love it!”

“Because I already did my time as a Mormon and I’ve sworn off joining any new cults in the future.”

** This only makes sense if you’ve met some of the parents of the kids who are in the dance program in Consort. They make the hockey parents look tame.

“That’s not a heat sink…

…THIS is a heat sink.”

I’ve been doing a bit of research for a kid friendly Internet course I’m going to be delivering in the near future. I decided that I would look a bit deeper into Wikipedia, one of the many resources I’ll be recommending, to see if any touchy subjects would come up.

Boy did they ever.

The Funk and Wagnall’s encyclopedia that my grandmother owned certainly never had a section on sex toys. There was one summer at age eight where I manged to read everything from A to C in her encyclopedia and I can tell you right now that I would have remembered an entry on the humble butt plug if it was there. I’m also pretty sure that sex acts such as doggying, felching, fisting, rimming, teabagging, and turkey slapping didn’t warrant a mention in Funk and Wagnall’s. I’m betting you won’t find them in any of the old volumes of Britannica gathering dust in basements across North America, either.

Now I have to figure out how to work around this. There’s such a thing as too much information.

You know, every time I start comparing Canada to China I wind up feeling a bit, well, underdeveloped. Inadequate even. I think I’ve got a bad case of Peking Envy. Let’s look at the facts:

• China became the third country to put a human in space in 2003. Canada can’t put a human in space unless we hitch a ride from our neighbors to the south.
• China can also put their own satellites in space, something Canada has to pay other countries to do for us.
• China can even blow up their own satellites, while Canada can’t even blow up Karla Homolka.
• China developed nuclear capability while Canada’s policy is to pour everything into social programs and hope that our nuclear capable southern neighbor will keep anyone from sucker punching us.
• China’s GDP was nearly two trillion dollars in 2004 while ours was a paltry one trillion dollars.
• Sure, China’s military is under equipped and using antiquated equipment, but that’s nothing new to Canada, either. They can still field a force of over 2,800,000 strong to Canada’s 64,000, and that’s damned impressive.

And the list goes on. Let’s face it, trying to measure up to China is like trying to not feel intimidated when Dick Rambone slides up to the urinal next to you in the men’s room.

So…

Can someone please explain to me why China is listed as a “developing nation” insofar as the Kyoto Protocol is concerned? ‘Cuz, from where I’ve standing, the buggers have several inches on us. If anyone is going to be buying carbon credits from someone else, I figure China should be buying them from Canada.

Hmph.

“You will not learn anything useful about good barbecue from recipes in the back of women’s magazines.”

Amen.

Dear Saskabushers,

We realize that many of you are unaccustomed to driving on pavement, or at the very least, pavement without Indian Reservation sized potholes every fifteen meters. We are glad to see you enjoying yourselves when you find yourselves on the Alberta side of the provincial border and actually driving on a serviceable highway for a change.

That being said, we would appreciate it if you would exercise some restraint and refrain from driving through our province at a minimum speed of 160 kph. We would be especially grateful if you refrained from doing this when the road and visibility conditions are particularly lousy due to inclement weather because, good pavement or not, someone is going to get killed if this keeps up.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Signed,

An east central Albertan who is amazed he hasn’t been flattened by a Ford F350 with Saskatchewan license plates on it yet.

I was proceeding to wire my spiffy new Terk AM/FM amplified antenna into the living room stereo when one of my wife’s girly decorating accessories — a candle in a brass holder in this case — attempted to infiltrate my right eye socket with extreme prejudice. When both my language and vision finally cleared I made a decision: I don’t care how badly I have to whore myself out over the next year so long as I find the money to buy a bigger home.

Said new home is going to be large enough to accomodate a girly zone and a testosterone zone. The doilies, potpourri, angels, trained attack candles, miniature ornaments, etc., all go into the girly zone. The big screen television, 25,000 petaWatt home theatre system, LaZboy Assmaster combination chair/commode, small refrigerator loaded with Diet Dr Pepper, Hellraiser/Pinhead/Reanimator movie posters, and my 328 remote controls go into the testosterone zone. Never the twain shall mix again.

Godamnit, my eye still hurts.

“Um…”

“…”

“Did he just say electro-ejaculator?”

“Yup.”

“Feel free to change the fuckin’ channel anytime now, dear.”