The Big Box Store

There is this company that runs big box store sites in Ontario called SmartCentres. They are currently planning on building a big box store plaza in downtown Toronto along the waterfront. The land is currently being used as a film studio. This past weekend there was a protest on the site to keep the movie studio and not let the big box stores into the property.

I have seen this story in a couple of different media outlets. Local area residents do not want the big box stores to go there. The local politicians are against the big box centre going into that property.

So, if everybody near the property is against the big box store, then why would a retailer open a big box store there? Because the retailer knows something that the people do not. The retailer knows that the people are spineless jellyfish who would sell out everything they believe in to save a couple bucks.

Sure, everybody would like to shop at the little corner store that specializes in customer service but guess what, fewer and fewer people are actually shopping at those little corner stores. If people kept on shopping at those little stores, they wouldn’t be closing down, would they?

And the belief that the smaller store has better service is a fallacy. You can get great service at the small store, but you can also get poor service at the small store. The same goes with the big box store. If the associate helping you with your purchase is passionate about their work, you will get great customer service. Also, that little anecdotal story we all hear about how somebody got shitty service at the big box store or the time you yourself got shitty service, sometimes, the customer is a dick and doesn’t deserve good service. But you’ve never heard that side of the story, unless you’ve worked one day of retail.

As for this specific example with the movie studio on the Toronto waterfront; if the movie studio was making money, there wouldn’t be a push by the landowners to bulldoze it. So, let’s all rush to save a failing business from being replaced by a successful business. That is the Toronto way.

Insomnia Blogging: Racial Tensions

This morning, insomnia reared its ugly head yet again. My usual nocturnal television watching habits therefore returned as well.

CNN was focusing its efforts on the goings on in Detroit. You see, the mayor of Detroit is being brought up on charges of lying under oath in regards to having had an affair with his chief of staff. (I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: if our elected officials can’t get a little pussy on the side, what hope is there for the rest of us?) It seemed to me that everybody on the Lou Dobbs show last night was black. All the key figures in the story (the mayor and his chief of staff) were black. All the guests and so-called experts brought in to discuss this story were black. It just seemed a bit odd to me. Maybe it was just a coincidence. Or maybe CNN wants only black people talking about news stories involving black people.

Eventually I grew bored of the news and watched King of the Hill instead. In this episode, Hank was being courted to join a country club that caters to Asian Americans. The club needed him to join in order to appease the PGA and show that the club has white members.

Why do we still judge people based on the colour of their skin? It’s so much easier to judge people by their political affiliations. Oh, what’s that you say? You’re a Liberal. Well fuck you Libby! We don’t want you kind ’round here! Why don’t you go home and smoke a doobie with Maggie Trudeau and Keith Richards. You make me sick.

In completely unrelated news, remember that contest in which my friend Columbia put up $500 as an incentive to get Bob to go out and get laid. Well, the Wonder Twins look to be adding some incentive on top of that.

Recently, Bob has let it be known that he wants to cocoon himself in his home and play video games online. He’s just missing the XBox he would need to play the games. It looks like the Wonder Twins are going to offer up an XBox to Bob as a reward if he can pick up a woman.

Speaking of gaming, I’ve been playing a bit lately too. A game called Rainbow Six Vegas. I’m a picky guy when it comes to video games. I like a first person shooter that’s not so realistic. But this game is slowly growing on me. Or maybe I just like running around shooting Mexicans.

Insomnia Blogging VI

It has been amazing. I’ve had a decent amount of sleep in the past couple of weeks. But for the past two nights, no sleep.

One of my usual early morning pasttimes, watching CNN hasn’t been doing it for me. All CNN is covering lately has been the primaries. Sure, picking the President is important and people can’t wait to see President Bush take a hike, but it seems like this campaign started a year ago. These campaigns need to take some time off, give use news junkies a break, something else to get all worked up about. I haven’t seen one mention of CNN’s extreme weather. Or how about the fact that Polaroid is downsizing to 150 employees. This is a company that used to employ 21,000. If you ask me, that’s a news story, the downfall of Polaroid.

I ended up watching the west coast feed of Sportsnet Connected. Still, more talk on the Richard Zednik incident. (For those who don’t know, Richard Zednik is a hockey player who took a skate blade to the neck and lost nearly two litres of blood or half a gallon on the ice.) This is the second time in recent memory of something like this happening in the National Hockey League. I’ve seen both incidents and I’m still amazed that neither player collapsed or freaked out. They both immediately covered up and let the paramedics do their job. It was the quick response by the injured players that saved them from dying right there on the ice. I don’t know what I’d do if I was all-of-a-sudden gushing blood from my neck.

Insomnia Blogging V

I haven’t slept much this week. Following Christmas, I managed to get a fair amount of sleep at night. I wasn’t doing anything different, at least, that I was aware of. Oh well. It was great while it lasted. But its over now. I guess its time to go back to my usual insomniac commentary.

Late nights on CNN. Oh yeah, no more Lou Dobbs. Looks like he’s getting pre-empted by the primary coverage. Makes sense, he’s an enthusiastic independant and the primaries are for enthusiatic partisan politics. Unfortunetely, it would make the most sense to put someone who doesn’t want any party of win to cover the results.

Okay, I’m not American, I’m Canadian. I don’t have to deal with these primary dealees. If I explain this incorrectly, I hope somebody corrects me, but it looks like each political party is spending all this time and money trying to rip itself apart. Take for example the Clinton and Obama campaigns. These are two candidates competing for one position. In order to win, one will have to defeat the other. (My apologies to John Edwards and the other Democratic candidates, but I think its pretty obvious the winner will be either Clinton or Obama.) Until the party comes to a consensus on who should be the presidential candidate, these two campaigns are conducting campaigns in an adversarial style. But once that consensus is made, the loser will have to endorse the winner. After months of convincing voters to steer one way, how can they expect those voters to make a U-turn. Maybe I’m viewing this with some ignorance, but shouldn’t they be working together to make the Republicans look like a bunch of incompetant and corrupt bums with no right to be governing a country? (Yeah, like the Democrats have to get out of bed to make the Republicans look bad.)

After watching the Michigan primary results for an hour or so, I gave up and switched over to King of the Hill. What I saw on KotH was more inspiring than any political discourse or rhetoric. Bill, the lonely loser next door said something so brilliant, yet simple and very fitting with his character.

If everybody fried their food, there would be no war.

Sure, he said that while deep frying everything from bananas and candy bars to fried chicken (he was deep frying chicken he purchased already fried).

I cannot agree more with that statement. It is so true. If everybody ate only fried food, the world would be a utopia. Imagine billions of happy, fat people living harmoneously together. That’s the dream folks, people of all colours sitting down together to eat some crispy and warm fried food.

Take the first step, eat some fried food.

Red Light District of the Apes

For those of you who disapprove of evolution… monkeys practice a small degree of economics.

Researchers have determined that male macaques in Indonesia have to trade their services as bug pickers in order to receive sexual favours from the females. For a male macaque to get some, he must first pick the bugs off of his potential mate. In colonies where there are a higher percentage of females, the males have more mating options and thusly don’t have to pick that many bugs off the female. When the females are in smaller numbers, the males must spend more time picking off the bugs in order to engage in some hot monkey lovin’.

Last night, I tested this macaque behaviour with humans. I ventured out into the usual human mating ground, a bar, and looked for a potential mate. Using only my thumbs and index fingers, I began to groom a lovely, young lady. After only three seconds of grooming, I received some physical contact. She slapped me.

Undettered by the obvious rejection of the first woman, I tried again with another woman. She too slapped me.

I can take a hint. I left the bar. I wanted to make sure these researchers were not blowing smoke up my ass so I visited the macaque habitat at the local zoo.

Ladies and gentlemen, I’m in love. Her name is Mindy, she’s a macaque from a tiny island in Indonesia. I don’t care what you think, our love is pure and true, and we’re going to get married.

Source: Yahoo! News

Nü Werdz

I’m sure everybody knows that the word of the year was w00t. Yes folks, elite-speak has infiltrated the dictionary. Apparently it means something along the lines of “we own the other team” and has been frequently typed during games of Counterstrike and other nerdish pasttimes.

I figure, if that’s a new word, then I can make up my own words. I’m sick of letting über-nerds and rappers dictate words of the future. Here is a list of words I will be using from now on. And I will be using them a lot.

I don’t care if these words have or have not appeared on Urban Dictionary. I’ve already proved UB contains erroneous information.

• huffsparkle - to boast about oneself
• aslin - short for ‘ass lint’, a derogatory term
• dunckee - so bad its good
• ünga - of incredibly poor quality, often used as a prefix or modifier for unflattering adjectives
• mufofashik - music spefically made for obese women
• goatmeal - superlative used as a metaphor
• ichuck - (verb) to show displeasure for something found on the internet
• ichuck - (noun) that weird, chrunchy gunk found in the corner of one’s eye

Week Recap and Weekend Forecast

Last week I wrote about this guy who put a fake bomb in a museum and called it art. The people who operate the museum shut down the museum and the street around the building as a procaution. This guy was shocked that people took his art as a serious bomb threat. The debate over this incident has revolved around the issue of this act being art and therefore he should not be punished for causing a panic.

My opinion, okay, so what if it’s art; its still causing a panic therefore this guy should be charged with mischief and arrested and tried accordingly.

As for me this week, I had to shovel the driveway with my sore back. The large amount of snow on Tuesday morning reaggravated the sore back and had me laid up for a whole day. Other than that its been a long week with little to do. This has just seemed like a week that won’t end. I found out yesterday that I’ve got to work half a day Saturday. Yeah!

Bob floated the idea of going to Denny’s this weekend. I am totally looking forward to that. You see, I love a place with an all-day breakfast (which I’ve heard is Denny’s speciality) and I’ve never been to Denny’s.

Last Friday, me, Juicette and Janet were discussing breakfast foods, especially pancakes. I’ve been jonesing for pancakes ever since. So I am very looking forward to having some yummy, yummy pancakes.

On Sunday, my family is going out to meet the family of my brother’s fiancee. This will be the official first meeting of the families. Both me and my mother have met the soon-to-be inlaws. But my father has not. That worries me a bit. My father can be a lot to take in. He is certainly an odd creature. He’s my father and I love him. But I understand that he can rub people the wrong way. I am hoping that he can be respectful and humble when meeting these people. Its just that humble is the last word I’d ever use to describe my father. He’s flamboyant and loud. This is just the anxiety I’m going through. I can’t even imagine what my brother must be going through right now.

Recently, I have been asked by a fellow blogger to write about farting. I think she was joking. I hope she was joking. Who wants to read about what I have to think about farting? If you don’t want to read my thoughts on farting, skip the following paragraph.

I don’t see what the big deal is. Sure they can smell. But we all do it. Wouldn’t life be easier if we didn’t have to blame it on the dog. Yeah I farted. Whatcha gonna do ’bout it? Its offputting and certainly something you shouldn’t do around people you’re still trying to impress, but they’re funny. Especially those long sqeaky ones that don’t actually smell. At that point, its just a funny sound. I also think that putting up with somebody else’s fart is sign of true love. If your partner lets one rip without trying to hide it or cover it up, it means your partner loves you. And if you just let it go without raising a stink (complaing or bitching about it, I couldn’t avoid the pun), then you truly love that person and are willing to accept the fact that your partner is a human being.

Okay, I’m done writing about farting for this post.

Another fellow blogger wrote that I should post some photos of myself that can be seen on my Facebook profile. I don’t quite understand why. I mean sure I’m a very handsome guy. But she can see them through Facebook. Why should I put them on here too? If she needs to get a gander, she can click her way into Facebook and take a good look. I don’t blame her for wanting to take a look. She’s a woman, she has needs. Its just a shame the camera person had a shaky hand and couldn’t get the lighting right. I look great but the photos aren’t perfect. Shame.