So I was listening to CBC Radio, a big mistake no matter where you live in the country, given that even when it’s doing its job right—which is rarely—you’re just going to learn stuff that’s going to depress you right down into your boot tops.

The reason why I was listening to CBC Radio AM was because some juvenile delinquent, low-life, low-rent, Darwinian reject went and busted the antenna off my Toyota Corolla. No doubt to use as a weapon or manufacture a zip-gun.

And yes, I know, my automobile is an embarrassment. You go and drive a Toyota Corolla; it’s like handing in your registration to the International Guy’s Club. I used to drive one of the old Dodge Dakotas, one of the early ones, almost as wide as a big-boy pickup truck. It had more chromium than a case of vitamins supplements and sported leather buckets, air, a stereo that could sterilize frogs at 50 yards when you cranked her up and a pair of big old fuzzy dice hanging from the rear view.

It also had a gun rack but, given the new gun laws, you can’t put a gun in a gun rack. Nope. You got to hide your rifle or shotgun in a case that—get this—isn’t shaped like a gun, lest you scare some feminist, communist, anti-gun socialist nutcases.

I’m serious. That’s the law.

Guess it’s not too hard to figure out that I live in Alberta. I’m originally from Northern Ontario, which is like Alberta with the hills and trees, and the people in Timmins make Albertans look like Yorkville coffee bar New Democrats.

Sometimes I wonder when the government is going to figure out that sooner or later, you can only push folks who own firearms so far. After all, you can annoy radical feminists all you want. What are they going to do? Stop shaving their legs? Hell, most of them are already wearing more leg hair than the average baboon.

Eventually, you annoy people with guns enough… Just a thought. Not advocating such a thing. Nope. Not little old me. Think about this, though. We’re living in a country where for the first time in our history—thanks to the Liberals—it’s even money that you take a small town in Northern Ontario or Alberta, and those towns have more serious firepower than the average unit of the cash-starved Canadian Armed Forces. Which maybe explains why the government is so emphatic about citizens disarmament.

Anyway, you got in that truck of mine, no matter where you are going, you felt like John Wayne attacking the Japanese Imperial Army in a bulldozer in The Fighting Seabees. Then the wife went and cranked out kid No. 2 and the next thing you know, instead of a Corolla and a Dakota in the driveway, we had a Corolla and a freaking mini-van because all the kids, the wife and the dog didn’t fit in the truck. I refused to drive the mini-van when I can, ‘cause there’s nothing that says Middle Aged Man With a Big Betty and a Couple of Kids and a Big Stupid Labrador Retriever, like a mini-van. Hell I get behind the wheel of it, I oughta just stick on a bumper sticker that says: Mostly Harmless.

Dodge Dakota equals John Wayne in The fighting Seabees. The min-van equals Dustin Hoffman in Kramer vs. Kramer.

Or maybe I’m just a shallow moron who worries too much about the cars he drives

Anyway, without the antenna, the car only pulls in AM and, in Calgary, AM radio is pretty much split between stations that play Garth Brooks and the CBC. I may be a redneck, but I’m the kind of redneck who used to listen to the Sex Pistols and Black Flag.

So without the antenna, I can’t listen to the FM stations playing real music, so I listen to CBC because country music does not speak to me. In fact, country music and I are on non-speaking terms. So on the CBC, they start talking about the stock market.

Like most Canadians, I own stocks. And like most Canadians, I try not to think about them. Sort of like the cellulite a women picks up on her thighs, as she gets older. Or like the way a man, as he ages, actually has to think about it when given the choice between watching the third period of a Calgary Flames games and following that same women into the bedroom to play a game that doesn’t involve ice. Like that. Owing stocks is a reality, but it’s not something you want to dwell on.

I didn’t pick my stocks myself, but I’ve put most of my retirement savings into the hands of the nice lady from Investors Group and she goes and buys stock in my name. The reason I trust her instead of myself is because, when it comes to money, I’m dumber than a radical gun-control feminist or Stockwell Day. You think old Stock is smart? Stockwell goes into the election after a corrupt and aged opponent, like Cassius Clay against Sonya Liston. The guy he’s going up against is old, tired, and basically runs the country like a Banana Republic dictator. If you get in his way, he’s liable to grab you by the neck and try to strangle you, for crying out loud. That was on TV a couple of years back, remember. Plus he cuts gravy train deals for anybody who asks in his riding. He’s considered, according to the polls, the least trustworthy party leader in the country.

But does Stock go for the jugular? No. He loses complete control of is agenda, and winds up talking about how he thinks The Flintstones is a documentary, with dinosaurs and people existing simultaneously. Hey Stock. Crack a science book, huh? And then old Stock forgets what direction the Great Lakes flow in front of a crowd of reporters. If he ever knew.

But I’m not bitter. Nope. Not little old me.

Anyhow, the stock market is going into the dumper, they say, and that mean there’s going to be a recession. The reason the stock market is going into the dumper, is because stocks aren’t meeting the projections of analysts.

The example CBC uses is this: Those nice people in Finland who work at Nokia make cell phones. Nokia announces that it increased its sales and profits by, get this, 60 per cent.

Now, in the space-time continuum in which I live, getting 60 per cent more income than you did last year is more than good. It’s fantastic. The only way I could increase my income by 60 per cent would be to eliminate sleep, get a second job, contract my children out for medical experiments, and start selling crack cocaine on the side. But the ANALYSTS decided that Nokia should have done better and as a consequence, their stock dropped.

Lemme get this straight. A bunch of pencil-necked accountant geeks who don’t work for Nokia look at Nokia. And they figure Nokia ought to increase its profit by 80 per cent. And when Nokia only increases sales by 60 per cent, the stock tanks?

And the analysts guess wrong on a bunch of stocks and a bunch of stocks tank. And now politicians and everybody else have the R-word on the lips?

Courtesy of Turf & Recreation Magazine
Canada's Turf and Grounds Maintenance Authority

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