Native Canadians

I read that the Canadian government is considering a new holiday to commemorate the abusive residential schools.  I think they should call it Healing Day. (They could have it on the first Monday in August when provinces have all these different names for the holiday!) But the Beothuks will never heal:  they should build a memorial to them next to our Jewish Holocaust memorial.

I've been doing some editing work for Miriam on her memoirs.  One episode has her as a cook on a ship visiting the Haida nation in B.C.  One evening she had a vision of this dog coming out of nowhere, and apparently that's common with them!

I come from the Maritimes where the main First Nation is the Micmaq.  I can see a bit of their language in place names:  "gnish" clearly means beach, and "missi" means river. (Maybe I should learn some more of it.)

I first learned of some First Nations issues from watching The Beachcombers!  There was an episode where Relic found an old totem pole and Jesse Jim was angry because he planned to sell it to a motel as a tacky tourist decoration. Another time someone talking to Nick referred to Jesse as "your Indian," which didn't go over well.  In another episode Jesse was tasket with organizing a potlach. (When they outlawed the potlach in the 19th Century, that must have been like banning Christmas!)

Favorite meal

Italian food appeals to me.  I always like spaghetti.  I also like fettucine alfredo, especially when I cook it myself.

I also like Chinese and Indian food. (We're lucky enough to live around the corner from an excellent Indian restaurant.) And I like Ethiopian food and falafels too.

One snack I like is salted peanuts.  My favorite ice cream flavors are cherry vanilla and strawberry ripple. (Too bad I can't seem to find strawberry ripple ice cream anywhere.) But I don't get the point of mint-flavored ice cream...

What food don't I like?  I've never got the appeal of ratatouille.  Don't like potato salad either.  I've never liked onions or tomato chunks either.  And I don't like unfresh fish or undercooked potatoes.

When I was young and we lived in the Maritimes, I didn't like Scotsburn's local brand of butter. (I had an uncle who, it seems, was also choosy about butter.) In Toronto today, I can't eat Pizza Pizza:  it literally makes me unwell!

Drawing

I've never been much for drawing.  I remember when I played this piano piece in a music festival competition, and the adjudicator criticized my correcting a wrong note afterward.  What he said was true, but it got to me.  My sister Moira encouraged me to draw his face in caricature style. (I wonder what I'd look like in caricature...)

I like that transparent onion-skin paper that you can use to trace a drawing.  In school it was useful for tracing maps.

Do you remember when you were little and it was fun to take pictures and draw moustaches and sunglasses on them?  The illustrations in my school textbooks often bore those marks. (Sometimes they even drew lower anatomy!) 

Another fun thing is to take some picture of a guy with a big Donny Osmond-type smile and black out one or two of his teeth.  When I was little, I sometimes drew gloves on people's hands, go figure...

Telling a joke

One of the worst feelings in the world is to tell a joke, only to be informed that it isn't funny.  By that time, it's too late to take the joke back: you've ruined the mood, and it can't be helped now!

People don't tell jokes as much as they used to.  Back in the days of vaudeville a comedian could tell a joke for about seven years until it got that the whole audience had heard it before.  Today, when someone tells a joke on TV, so many people hear it right away that it'll have a far shorter shelf life.

I used to take singing lessons from Giuseppe, who loves jokes. (Especially dirty jokes about nuns.) When I mentioned this to my sister Moira, she suggested that it reflects immaturity!  I'd never thought of it that way.  That begs the question, would you rather have a friend who was mature, or one who laughs at your jokes?

I have a good memory (for most things) and know lots of jokes.  Don't tempt me to tell them all!  I know knock-knock jokes, elephant jokes, Tom Swifties and Mommy, Mommy jokes.  I even made up a Mommy, Mommy joke on my own:

"Mommy, Mommy, why would pirates hide their treasure in the zoo?"

"Shut up and search the lion pit!"

Tactics

Am I tactful?  Not as much as my father.  But more than some people.

My problem with the issue of tact is that, in practice, it's the people of lower standing who have to be tactful with their superiors.  When the latter are tactless, it's just irrelevant!

I remember this Peanuts episode where Lucy throws a tantrum because her mother broke a promise to her as a show of power, screaming "It isn't fair!" But Linus tells her it would be better strategy to say, "I've been bad, and you were right to break my promise.  From now on I shall try to be good." What it comes down to is that it's up to children to reassure their parents that the latter's disciplinary actions were the right decision, otherwise the kids are "proving their point." Call it speaking reassurance to power.

I remember this tongue-in-cheek children's poem by Edward Anthony:

It is the duty of the student,

Without exception, to be prudent.

If smarter than his teacher, tact

Demands that he conceal the fact.

Zippers

I sometimes have trouble with my jacket zipper and have to take it back down before it'll go all the way up.  Sometimes it seems to be stuck halfway!  But that isn't much to talk about.

I'll still leave my fly unzipped once in a while. (It mostly happens when I'm wearing a belt with my pants.) I remember in school how I'd change into my gym shorts  and sometimes forget to zip them, leading to embarrassment.  I don't really get nostalgic about physical education.

I've noticed train porters wearing shoes with zippers instead of laces.  Did you know that the formal name for a zipper is "slide fastener"?

Isn't there an amusement park ride called the Zipper?  It's like a Ferris Wheel but bar-shaped.  I've never been on it and I don't want to try it.