Making It Up As I Go Along #336

MONDAY...
— Lazy day around the house... I worked on the shoulder and took it easy.
— Playoff slow pitch tonight. We lose, so we’re out. On the personal side, I get my first home run in this, the last game. A month away from fall ball.
— Laura was at the game to watch and then joined us for a drink afterwards. Nice to see her again.

TUESDAY...
— Up a bit early and waiting all morning and into the afternoon for Hydro to show up and change my thermostat. Annoying stuff as it makes me late for work. In the end, they don’t even come. I call and they say “it says here to reschedule.” And that means six weeks waiting. Hydro are not my favourite bunch of people today.
— The news speaks of what people want out of school. Teaching kids how to cook? How to be good people? What the recession is? Are parents insane? Do they want to do nothing with their kids? Seems like people want the school to raise the kids for them and they can just enjoy the finished product. Or maybe it’s parents who want to teach math from now on? Wacko.
— I work 4 to 11 tonight even though I was supposed to do 2 to 12. Thanks mostly to Hydro, I’m tired and cranky... plus it feels like I’ve got spider webs all over me from supper time on. So I go home at 11 and will make up the time Thursday (supposed to be my day off this shortened week but some make up time will be fine).

WEDNESDAY...
— Get new cleats this morning. Pretty good ones for a lower price. A few groceries after that.
— It’s hot today. Around 35 with the humidity.
— I work alone most of tonight. By 5:00 it’s just me. It’s good for the stats... I put on my headphones and go.

THURSDAY...
— Easy going morning. Go to work for 5.5 hours tonight. With the compressed schedule, this is actually a day off... so most of this time was just adding to vacation time down the road.
— Meet Karl after work for a drink.

FRIDAY...
— Little sleep... about 4 hours. And I’m off to work for 7:00 this morning. At 9:30 Annick, Sarah, Janice and I head to golf... the office tournament. It’s a good day for it. Sunny and hot (around 36 with the humidity). We have a good time and end up at +5 in the best ball tournament. Sun burn for me... but not a real bad one. And a quiet night at home with a little snoozing and TV.

SATURDAY...
— Lazy day. Naps and some movies on TV... and some working out.


We Need A Hero
It’s election time and we’re completely empty when it comes to political leaders on a federal stage.

Stephen Harper has begun the advertisements. He’s not attacking the opposition... not yet. He says he won’t, which means he’ll start doing it any day now. Harper is all about making a promise and then forgetting about it. Just look at the Atlantic Accord. And then there’s the law he put into place for fixed election dates (which is more than a year away but, oh well). Harper has always taken for granted the Canadian public’s ability to overlook and forget things. He talks about issues as if he’s trying to pass off issues to children who really won’t get it if he actually talked about it.

So these ads are Harper’s attempt to prove to the Canadian public that he is, in fact, human. Good thing that our leader needs to proof such facts. Other nations could be lead by bears or donkeys simply because they don’t make a point of showing the humanous of the candidate.

Not Harper though, he has people coming out describing him for us. They may be actors playing people... or they may be stupid people... or possibly they’re smart people who are being misrepresented by trickery in the art of video editing. But what we’re left with is such ground breaking quotes as “I like him.” “I like the fact that he’s a family man with small children”. “I’m proud to be Canadian.” And of course, because we’re now a military nation, Harper was lucky enough to find a World War II vet who happened to be sitting in the park with his medals pinned to his lapel. He also likes Harper... because he respects the military. It’s the spontaneous honesty that hits home. Brilliance.

At the end of that ad, Harper is seen sitting in a room, staring at a bookshelf with a grin on his face. He slowly shifts his head towards the camera... the only part of his body moving being his neck. The smile remained plastered.

In other ads, we’re blessed with only Harper sitting in that room with the bookshelf. He tells us about himself. That his boy would rather be with friends but Harper still convinces him to come in and play guitar while Steve hits the piano. Images like this bring tears to my eyes... so touching.

It’s disturbing when we need to have a focus on the fact that a politician is human. Time that could be used actually educating us on their views... on what they’ll actually do if elected... is instead used to describe a musical jam session with the boy or three second clips of staged people saying “I like him”. No wonder Steve lies about what he’ll do in office. He only has time to mention the notion of an idea before changing the subject to his favourite colour or how he likes his steak done on the grill.

The other leaders are no better. They may be more human than Harper but they’re no better when it comes to inspiring confidence.

Stephane Dion has taken a stance against those policies he doesn’t agree in... by abstaining from the vote. It takes powerful strength to just not bother showing up, and then it takes a lot of guts, to turn around and criticize the proposal you just did nothing about. All in the name of not causing an election. Dion says it’s because he knows Canadians don’t want that election. But Canadians know it’s because he can’t handle an election.

Today, watching Dion respond to the called election, he actually came across okay. That’s not to say he came off as a potential leader. It’s more like when you watch a very shy child stand up in front of a large crowd and get through a piano recital without making too big a gaff. You felt good for Dion for making it through without embarrassing himself. You didn’t feel any inspiration to have this guy lead our nation.

Then there’s Gilles Duceppe. The leader of the party that represents only Quebec. Only Canada would accept a federal party that only represents one distinct portion of the country. It’s too bad, because of all the leaders, Duceppe appears the most straight forward and credible when he talks. He doesn’t talk around a question as much as the rest of the group. I mean today, someone asked Harper if he felt Dion was also a family man... and it took five minutes of blathering about himself to get to it... and even then, he said that “I presume he is also a family man.” Good ol’ Harper, not even sure about whether the leader of the opposition has a family. Or not willing to accept the fact.

But it’s easy for Duceppe to appear straight forward when he doesn’t have to worry about representing any other culture or group of people. So a good leader, he is not.

On to Jack Layton. Today Jack stood in Gatineau with the Parliament buildings standing over his shoulder. A placard with his name stands at the microphone stand... just in case viewers had forgotten who he was. Layton often speaks the big game. The words coming out of his mouth sound reasonable and he comes across as likable. But he’s lead the NDP for too long when the NDP has remained in obscurity. On this day, it sounds like there’s about twenty people there live to react to his speech. He’d say something and a small group of whoops and hollers accompany some light applause. I heard a bigger reaction for myself at Friday’s golf tournament dinner after my name was called to win a DVD golf game. Poor Jack just isn’t listened to anymore.

Finally, there was Elizabeth May of the Green Party. She comes across as genuine. She didn’t have a real prepared speech with teleprompters. But she also appeared to be a hippy from another world. All that was missing was long hair and sunglasses for the people surrounding her. She kept on talking about our planet... how we can’t move anywhere else in our solar system and need to take care of this orb. I can’t say any of that isn’t true. But when you’re trying to be taken seriously by the general public, perhaps you should keep the solar system out of your speech when your aim is for a seat in the Parliament of a country.

So there’s our leadership possibilities. We have a group that includes one who needs to try to prove he’s human and another who talks to us about other planets in our solar system. Canadian politics, it literally is out of this world.