Throught a fluke of collective bargaining, history and the need to find something good about February, the City has a holiday Monday this weekend. Not a bad thing at all. I will report Tuesday whether it is recommended for all the nation. There were a couple of Danes on the CBC Ottawa news last night saying how the minimum 6 weeks annual holiday made people more productive and more sane. Are Danes otherwise? Should we take the word of Danes? I have no idea.
Martin Responds to Auditor General
Separated at Birth 2.0
I just noticed this today. Left is President Andrew Jackson on the new $20 bill who was US president from 1829 to 1837. Middle and right is John Kerry, the nominee for Democratic presidential candidate in 2004. The Kerry photo could better show his long face.
Later: I added the one now on the right later.
Cool Scots Traditions
In all the yappitry about marriage and “tradition” recently, in the back of my mind I had that the tradition in Scotland was incredibly free until very recent times. I found a good reference to the principles today:
A `regular’ marriage was one for which the banns had been proclaimed and which was then celebrated by a minister in the parish church. An `irregular’ marriage, under Scottish law, could be of three kinds: per verba de praesenti (a mutual agreement to marry at that moment), per verba de futuro subsequente copula (a promise to marry in the future followed by sexual intercourse), and `habit and repute’ (cohabiting in such a way as to imply that mutual consent to a marriage had been given). It was only the forms of constituting it that were irregular. The marriage itself was in every way as binding as a regular marriage, and with the same restrictions: both parties must be free to marry, they could not be within the forbidden degrees of kinship and they had to be over the age limit (twelve for women and fourteen for men). Neither witnesses nor parental consent were necessary.
All very none of yer friggin’ business. The church, professionals and, indeed, the state are quite the johnny-come-latelies to the issue of marriage as well as most community ceremonies such as funerals. So why someone suggests we need to move back to Christian traditions, those are some of mine – I quite like the principle of “a promise to marry in the future followed by sexual intercourse”.
Gdansk
Roaming through .jpg files just now I came across this beer label from 1991 in Poland where semi-attentive readers are aware I lived. Buying beer in Eastern Euope then was hit and miss. Local families, in our district of new suburbs, ran shops out of their bottom floors and the beers for sale were those Pan Sklepu would go and get. Supply lines were a bit erratic as a result. So happy were the days when Pivo Gdanskie would show up as opposed to some rot from Slupsk which used cloves instead of hops – but only on some weeks when their hops supply didn’t come through. Nothing as refreshing as the surprise of a bubbly mouthful of cloves.
Rude Mexico
Chanting “Osama, Osmama” as you are cleaning the clock of the USA 4-0 in pre-Olympic soccer? Mexico, really. That is rude:
GUADALAJARA, Mexico, Feb. 10 — Few of the young Americans had experienced such grown-up soccer antagonism, with blowing horns creating the sound of a throbbing hive at Jalisco Stadium and 60,000 people jeering with the sting of hostility.
The shouted vulgarities began as the United States under-23 team appeared for warm-ups on Tuesday night. The name of each starter was heckled with collective booing. The national anthem was derided with shrieking whistles. The Mexican team, meanwhile, was greeted with fluttering confetti, waving flags and the urgent rhythm of drumbeats.
In the 26th minute, the throng began chanting “Osama! Osama!” at the Americans, but they appeared inured to such taunting and eager for a game of beautiful desperation in an attempt to reach the Olympics. And then, out of nowhere, it all fell apart. Defense had become a vulnerability for the United States in this qualifying tournament, and its opponent deftly pounced on this weakness…
“Soccer is our national sport,” Carlos Placencia, 21, a publicist, said. “We cannot let the Americans beat us at our game.” Diego Gonzáles, 23, a graphic designer, said it would be important for the collective Mexican self-assurance to defeat the bigger, richer country to the north.
“This game is a way to show them that we can win,” Gonzáles said. “It doesn’t matter if it is the United States or another country. We need to show what Mexicans are made of.” Both Placencia and Gonzáles said that anti-American chants of “Osama! Osama!” were meant in large part as a joke, even if a tasteless one. “We make fun of everything,” Gonzáles said. More seriously, he added: “We think the United States exaggerated its reaction about terrorism and security measures. We criticize the reasons why America goes to war.”
From The New York Times today.
I Am So Proud…
…to be a citizen of a country where this happens. From the Toronto Star‘s unlinkable report:
The RCMP’s 125th anniversary in 1999 turned into an embarrassing waste of taxpayer dollars, Fraser said. Public Works contributed $3 million to a trio of ad agencies – Lafleur, Media/I.D.A. Vision and Gosselin – who were responsible for transferring the money to the RCMP. Those three agencies took a combined $1.3 million in fees and commissions and transferred $1.7 million to the RCMP for its anniversary celebration. Fraser’s audit concluded that the RCMP’s Quebec division received its payments through a separate non-government bank account, which violates the federal Financial Administration Act. The transactions were recorded manually rather than in the RCMP’s standard accounting system, and some of the supporting documents were subsequently destroyed.
Just to let Belize guy know, the RCMP is the national police who are supposed to investigate things like…umm…widespread breach of fiduciary duty by public officials. So, I’ll likely be voting NDP if only to give that crowd a kick at the slush fund as the other two crowds have eaten more than their fill. Seriously, how in God’s name can anyone say now that they would do worse.