God, this is SO EMBARRASSING

Today's episode of Little Miss Know-it-All: You know my editor's forcing me to ask this, right?

A few days ago, I had a truly awful conversation with a reporter.

REPORTER: We heard that the jail was hit by lightning.

ME: No, a transformer was knocked out very briefly. The back-up generator kicked in right away.

REPORTER: So the power didn't go out?

ME: No.

REPORTER: Not even for a little while?

ME: There might have been a flicker as the lights came back on.

REPORTER: What do you mean?

ME: Have you ever been in a building when a generator kicks in? There's a flicker as the power goes out, then everything comes back on right away.

REPORTER: So I guess the power was only out for a few seconds.

ME: Less than that. Half a second, maybe, if that. It wouldn't even have been noticeable. We have a pretty amazing generator.

REPORTER: My editor says I have to do a story about this. Why do you have such a powerful generator?

ME: (I started to laugh openly at this point.) Because it's a jail.

REPORTER: How long have you had it? When did you realise that you needed it?

ME: (I continued to laugh.) Are you serious? Is it that slow of a news day? Really, it wasn't noticeable.

Naturally, I was quoted in the next day's paper, 1) saying that the jail had indeed been hit by lightning, and 2) bragging about the amazing generator. Fortunately, I still have a sense of humour about all of this. Before I get started, I will confirm that jails do indeed have back-up generators, as do hospitals, large stores, and many other buildings that need to keep the power on for any number of reasons. In this new-media world, it's important to break this kind of exciting news on the Internet.

In the world of journalism, reporters are at the bottom of the heap. The editor has total control, and in a small media organization there is nobody to appeal to. A reporter who's been around for a while can work his way up through the pile, but new guys don't even have a chance. They are ordered to do certain stories, and they must deliver. They usually don't dare to tell the editor that his great ideas are not really any good.

Think how exciting it would be if the jail really HAD been hit by lightning! That would be a great cover photo -- naturally, it would have to be a photo illustration created on a computer, but I can totally see it already. It's pitch black outside, but the scene is starkly illuminated by the single bolt of lightning that is running straight from the sky into the jail. The building has been electrified and is literally glowing. Inside, all of the inmates look up in shock and horror as the lights go down. Then their faces light up as the electric locks pop open. The inmates run off into the night, leaving the guards to chase them on foot over the tundra.

What a GREAT story! Thwarted only by the amazing back-up generator and the fact that the jail was not actually hit by lightning!

Reporters are paid to find great stories. They DREAM of finding great stories. Unfortunately, life is not usually quite so interesting. Life is full of intricacies and yes-buts and it's-a-bit-more-complicated-than-thats. These do not play so well on the evening news. The editor needs to deliver a certain number of eyeballs to advertisers, so he's always looking for something to draw people in. Reporters with a few years of experience are usually allowed to find their own stories, but a newbie can be forced to "chase" whatever the editor thinks might have happened. These reporters are usually embarrassed when they call: they know their questions are amazingly stupid and they can't believe they are being forced to ask them. Often, they will make it very clear that they do not want to ask these questions.

Some of my recent favourites from the last few years (covering several employers/clients):

• Is my employer splitting in half? Someone thinks we're getting rid of furniture, so obviously we're splitting. (Answer: No. And we're not getting rid of furniture.)
  
• If it's smoky outside, what should people do if the smoke bothers them? (Answer: Stay inside with the windows closed.)
• Have we made a deal with a multi-national corporation that will affect everyone in Canada either directly or indirectly? (Answer: No. If we make that sort of deal, we'll be excited enough to let you know.)

My dear readers, I'm curious: Do you get similar questions? Do reporters ever call you, mutter an apology, and ask if your CEO is an alien who's trying to take over the province through a combination of gum disease and plantar warts?

You know that ghost is me

Hughie misses Rory

Trading spaces

Free communications advice to CBC management

My hair is like a flock of goats

(Somehow I remember that being a compliment. Perhaps there's a problem with the translation.)

I've been growing my hair out for almost a year. This has been a long ride, and my hair is still not even long enough to put in a ponytail. (I started with very short, spiky hair.)

Fortunately, my mom has introduced me to a website that can motivate me through the dark times. Call it the SELF Challenge for hair, except it's Clairol. I am guessing that they consider it a marketing tool, but really, it's just plain fun.

First, you need a photo of yourself. I don't take pictures of myself, so I pulled this screenshot off my latest vlog:
I'm not getting ready to kiss you; I'm in mid-sentence as usual.

As you can see, my current hair colour is pretty boring. Also, the style is not going to get me on Jay Leno any time soon. This is where Clairol can help. I can imagine myself as a redheaded porn star:
Hot diggity, this could be all I need to jump-start my career as a Hoffette! But there are other choices, too. For example, all-over hair colour is so 90s. Today's hair design is all about highlights and lowlights:
Until now, I've never seen the value of maintaining twelve different shades of red in my hair. But now Clairol has opened my eyes and shown me how truly hot I could be.

There's a lot at stake. If I don't maintain an age-appropriate number of colours in my hair, I might as well give in and get Newfoundland Mom Hair:
Yeah, I think we can all agree that that's not a great idea. But you know what I think MIGHT be coming back in style? Perms.
I actually did have hair like this when I was 13. (I was super hot.)

You are OURS. We OWN you.

Today's episode of Little Miss Know-it-All: How NOT to set up a blogging policy.

It's funny that I'm about to criticise CBC for its new blogging policy “guideline document.” CBC employees have been asking for some direction about blogging for quite some time now. When none came, a few of them proposed the CBC Blogging Manifesto. They signed their names (well, except "Ouimet", who blogs under a pseudonym because as management, he'd be fired if anyone finds out who he is). I don't know everyone on the list, but I respect those I do know. I thought the manifesto was a great start, but essentially forgot about it when nothing seemed to come of it.

Well, there's a new policy “guideline document” that's been posted to the Web. My comments are in bold text.

Personal Blogging – Guidelines for CBC/Radio-Canada Employees

As the internet becomes an even more important part of people’s lives, the popularity of blogging will increase. Blogging is becoming a form of public conversation on the internet in which CBC employees may wish to take part.

True! I agree with this. That last sentence is a bit clunky -- I would have reworded it -- but I agree with the sentiment. Usually "Internet" is capitalized, but still, this isn't bad.

These guidelines apply to any personal blogging or other self-publishing such as podcasting by CBC/Radio-Canada employees if the content clearly associates them with CBC/Radio-Canada. They apply not only to CBC/Radio-Canada journalists but to any corporation employee.

I think I need some clarification on what it means to clearly associate yourself with CBC. There's a difference between running an official blog and running a personal blog that occasionally mentions where you work. I've got over 600 posts. This blog isn't about my work, but work's a big part of my life. I don't think I've ever named my current employer, mostly because it's not interesting or important, but I've mentioned projects from time to time. I've also been pretty clear that I'm in the communications business. Have I "clearly associated" myself with anyone? Actually, I think the only employer I've ever mentioned by name is the CBC itself.

Hmmm. ANY employee? Well, that cuts out any confusion about who they expect to follow this, but I'm hesitant to apply journalistic standards to janitors, set designers and PR people, especially when they're, um, NOT AT WORK.

When bloggers clearly identify themselves as CBC/Radio-Canada employees, they are expected to behave in a way that is consistent with our journalistic philosophy, editorial values and corporate policies.

I would agree with this if it said "When bloggers clearly identify themselves as blogging on behalf of CBC/Radio-Canada...". This is sort of like your office's dress code. Your boss can tell you that a ripped T-shirt's not acceptable for the office, but you can wear the same shirt to the store even if the checkout clerk knows where you work.

Such blogging should be done on an employee’s own time, posted through a personal e-mail address and not channeled through CBC/Radio-Canada’s e-mail system.

I agree with this, although in practice, it really shouldn't matter if someone occasionally blogs at his desk over his lunch hour. I think this is trying to say the same thing as those annoying Technology Policies that really boil down to "don't waste too much time at work, OK?". Your personal blog should use your personal e-mail address, not your work e-mail. Work time is for work. That sounds reasonable.

These blogs are expected to adhere to the principles outlined in CBC/Radio-Canada Human Resources policies regarding Outside Work, Advocacy and Opinion, Conflict of Interest and the Code of Conduct.

Excellent. Yes, CBC already has several policies for employee conduct that appear to be working just fine.

To start and maintain a blog of this kind, you need your supervisor’s approval.

Whoa. What kind? This comes right after the bit about adhering to existing policies, so Little Miss Know-it-All assumes that that's what this sentence refers to. You still need your supervisor's approval if you're playing it safe?

The blog cannot advocate for a group or a cause, or express partisan political opinion. It should also avoid controversial subjects or contain material that could bring CBC/Radio-Canada into disrepute.

Yikes. That's awfully vague. What's a group? Does a quilting bee count? Is family violence a "cause"? "Partisan political opinion" is vague too -- clearly, campaigning for a federal party is not on, but what about advocating on behalf of Jill Carroll or Alan Johnston?

CBC/Radio-Canada material such as pre-interviews, interviews, research, etc. created or developed while doing your job is the property of CBC/Radio-Canada and can only be used with your supervisor’s permission.

Boy, that sounds reasonable...wait a minute, what's a "pre-interview"? And what's "research"? Those things can be pretty fluid when you work for CBC. You do tons of stuff that never makes it to air. You talk to lots of people about ideas that aren't good enough to fit the "someone doing something for a reason" rule. This can be a formal taped interview that never goes anywhere, or it can be a quick conversation in the coffee shop.

Program blogs or other “official” CBC publications are not addressed here and can only be designed and launched with the approval of the appropriate supervisor. Blogs or websites which do not identify the bloggers as a CBC/Radio-Canada employee, do not discuss CBC/Radio-Canada and are purely about personal matters would normally fall outside these guidelines.

Well, I certainly hope so!

If you are uncertain about any of this, please have a conversation with your supervisor to clear it up.

This is indeed the best way to end a policy “guideline document” like this one. However, the standard way to deal with this is to talk to supervisors first to make sure they actually CAN answer questions. It's a good idea to talk to staff first, too, instead of just dropping something like this on them.

This is far too vague to be of any use at all. It could include just about anyone who works for CBC and blogs about anything. I'm guessing that's the point: cast the net as wide as possible so you always have a policy “guideline document” to point to when your staff piss you off. In real life, there is no way anyone will be enforcing these rules. No manager has time to monitor the Internet on top of regular programming.

Feel it on my fingertips, hear it on my window pane

The rest of you will be kept in prison, so that your words may be tested

A reader asked about my demographics compared to Uriel's, so I will elaborate:

Here are the last 100 hits on Uriel's blog. There's a definite cluster near New England; you can't see it on this map, but I can tell that many of these visitors are coming from universities: Yale, Salem State and some educational facility in Winchester. Apart from that cluster, all parts of the States appear to be represented: Flint, Michigan; Tarpon Springs, Florida; Woodland, California. She has a few readers in Canada: Penticton (hmmm), Brandon, Napanee. Across the Atlantic, you can see visitors from the Netherlands, Lithuania, Poland and England. Near the bottom right: Australia, the Philippines and Fiji.

Now, my readership is not nearly as eclectic:

I've cut out the other parts of the world because, let's face it, nobody from there is interested in anything I have to say. I have several readers who share the same URL (for example, everyone who uses a CBC computer is represented by that dot over Ottawa, no matter where they work) and several readers in the same town (Name of Town Withheld, Victoria, Toronto, Edmonton) who also share dots. I do not have many American visitors other than my immediate family: although they are loyal readers, I don't appear to have caught on south of the border. Apparently my brand of grammar analysis and David Hasselhoff worship is not valued internationally in the age of Dancing With The Stars.

Two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends

Reader-Submitted Question: Is Uriel a friend of yours? Why is he (she?) the only one who gets a little "Updated" note?

Uriel is not really a friend of mine. Little Miss Know-it-All and I, however, are very close. I have had sexual relations with her husband.

I have very few friends in real life, and I don't have room for a friend like Uriel. However, I do spend a lot of time thinking about what she thinks:

• Is she a racist?
• What does she think of Stockwell Day?
• How often does she vandalize Wikipedia?

A friend of mine says that I am much more like Uriel than I would like to admit. I'm not sure that this is right, but it's true that I often don't have to wonder what she would think: I automatically know. For example, she's against safety equipment because she thinks it makes people careless. She's in favour of picket lines and court actions, but only because she knows that if she takes the kind of violent action against the government that she'd like to take, she will be arrested and her opportunities for preaching will be limited. Well, Uriel doesn't preach so much as angrily judge people who disagree with her.

Uriel only gets a special "Updated" note because she used to be allowed to write here on this blog, so some of my readers are still interested in what she's doing. She has her own blog now, which is good. She has attracted her own audience over there, one that's not quite as interested in grammar or videos of Michael as the people you'll find here. She has a very diverse group of readers from all over the world, but mostly the United States. My readers, on the other hand, are mostly Canadians: I never have visitors from outside North America unless I've been linked on another blog.

CBC is dumber than I thought

It is getting so bad, maybe I should start calling them Name of Broadcaster Withheld as the ultimate insult.

They want to set policies for employees' blogs. Not the official CBC blog, which broke the story, but personal blogs maintained by staff. And not just Peter Mansbridge and the people who you could say are the public face of the MotherCorp, but all staff. Now, any media organization as big as CBC has a ton of staff who have nothing to do with journalism (out of respect, I will not make a snarky joke here) but who pay invoices, answer phones, and generally are just everyday folks with jobs. CBC wants to make these non-journalists conform to CBC editorial values in their blogs.

It's a good thing I don't work for CBC anymore, so they have no control over what I say here on my personal blog that is neither reviewed nor controlled by my employer or anyone else: You guys are a bunch of morons. You discovered this nifty thing called the Internet and decided you wanted to use it as a "platform". You even tried to hitch your star to Facebook and still have mud (afterbirth?) on your faces. Now you want to control what your employees say in their free time. Good luck.

CBC doesn't need a separate policy about blogs. No employer does. Most large companies already have broad policies that use general terms to describe what employees can talk about. This is not that difficult. There are only two principles:

1. Employees can say what they want about public issues.
   
2. However, they can't use their jobs to give their personal opinions added weight.

Now, was that hard? I didn't think so.

You've probably already spotted the difficulty here. There's a world of difference between a file clerk's opinions about caribou hunting and the education minister's assistant's opinions about school space. (I am going to ignore the obvious no-nos like nurses blogging about patients in ways that identify people.) It's true that this is a sliding scale, and I always tell people to err on the side of caution. Well, it isn't really a scale so much as a two-dimensional chart.

First, the content of your comments matters. If you are speaking publicly about issues you deal directly with at work, it can confuse people. They won't be sure whether your statements carry the extra punch that would come if your employer was saying these things through you. In fact, they will often assume that you are speaking on behalf of your employer. I usually don't recommend that people become vocal about their personal opinions about work because of this potential for confusion.

Second, the forum of your comments matters. There is a big difference between talking to a friend at your house and giving a presentation to the prime minister in the House of Commons. Personal blogs are closer to the "friend's house" end of the scale for two reasons: they have limited readership and they are obviously not approved by the employer. By their very nature, they have limited credibility and have no support from anyone other than the writer. They don't pretend to speak on behalf of anyone else or to repeat any organization's talking points. That's what makes them, uh, personal blogs. (Duh.)

CBC is so terrified about the first part that they are proposing to upend the second part. Ironically, this will have the opposite effect they are hoping for. A blog that has your supervisor's stamp of approval becomes an official extension of your work. For an employer, there could be nothing worse than imagining that employees' random musings about mullets, photos of their kids and Twitter statuses could be considered official communications from head office.

This is so obvious that I can't believe CBC would actually want to approve anyone's blog. I read a lot of personal blogs, and no employer would ever want to be associated with any of them. Employees are people: they have personal lives and they like to write about the things that are important to them. Which makes the CBC look better: a page full of press releases or an honest blog about the ups and downs of working there?

You would think that the CBC would know this. They always say they're looking for "honesty" and "real people" instead of talking heads. Now I see that when it comes to their own employees, they can't wait to squash anything that's different.

UPDATED: Esther Enkin, acting CBC Editor-in-Chief, tries to make this better (HAHAHAHAHA):

Hi all: Just to set the record straight –the guidelines Tod refers to are just that - guidelines. Policies need to be approved by the Board.

As the digital world continues to expand, we are trying to provide guidance for CBC staff that is consistent with existing practices and ensure the same high ethical and quality standards that are hallmarks of CBC.
This particular set of guidelines is consistent with existing practice re outside work or publication - just as one must do now when publishing in traditional media.
As for this being “unsigned”, Jon Dube, a Director at cbc.ca sent this to his staff recently. In the accompanying note he said these guidelines came from the Editor in chief’s office. Not really anonymous.
As with all guidelines, there is always room for discussion.

Esther Enkin
Acting Editor in Chief

Happy birthday, Ben

Sweet Child O' Mine

A reader pointed me to a story about penalties for parents when children die in cars.

I have to admit that this was always a fear of mine. I used to live much further north (yes, that is possible), and it would be easy for a baby to freeze to death during most of the year if left alone in a car. These parents almost never mean to hurt their kids; they are simply distracted and forget that there's another person in the back seat. When driving alone with Michael, I would keep up a steady monologue, partly so I wouldn't forget that he was there: "Hey look, it's the northern store! I'm really hungry, aren't you? We'll go there in a few minutes and get some bagels. Do you think they have any without mould on them? You'll have to help me check. Yes, I'll get you some seaweed, too."

This terrifying story reminded me of something funny, and I will spread it around to keep my loyal readers from getting too depressed. I'm certain I saw this when it was a news story, but those disappear from the InterWeb and are replaced with your standard-issue urban legends, so I can only refer to this link as (shoddy) proof that I didn't make the whole thing up. The people who run that website are using the story as proof that angels protect people (I wonder what Uriel would have to say about this idea), but I prefer to think of it as proof that men are, underneath it all, morons.

One Mother's Day (yes!) a man decided to go for a drive with his two children. He placed the baby's car seat on the roof of his car while he helped the older child with her seat belt. Then he got into the car and drove away. During the ride, he noticed an odd sound, which is when the baby seat came flying off the roof and landed in the middle of the highway. Don't worry; the baby wasn't hurt, and neither was the man, at least until he told his wife this story. My favourite part is that he did not notice that he had only 50% of his children with him, but he did notice that his car was making a funny noise.

Hide your heart under the bed and lock your secret door

Yesterday evening I wanted to throw something at the radio, but for once, it was not because my journalism standards are higher than those of people who are actually in the profession.

It was because of an interview with a local woman who wanted to talk about the shame she’d felt after having a certain medical procedure. You see, she’d been pregnant, and always intended to do things a certain way, but later changed her mind. She felt a deep sense of shame and her family was disappointed in her. In fact, she was afraid to tell her family, and this was clearly a reasonable feeling considering their reaction.

She’d had an epidural.

THE HORROR! THE DISGRACE!

It’s official: There is no decision a woman can make about her reproductive health that others will not feel free to judge her for.

No kids? She’s selfish!

One kid? She’s still selfish, and she probably hates children!

Three or more kids? She’s irresponsible and possibly a sex addict!

She uses the pill? She’s definitely a sex addict!

She’s had her tubes tied? She’s short-sighted and stupid!

She doesn’t want to use hormonal contraception? Stay away! She’s a lefty and will probably preach at you about putting Birkenstocks in your vermicomposter!

This is a new one. I didn’t realize that women were being guilt-tripped out of having epidurals. Well, I knew that there is an anti-painkiller movement, but hearing women talk openly about the shame they felt after taking the drugs is new for me.

This is the last straw. I’ve put up with the talk about working moms (we are selfish!) and stay-at-home-moms (they are just begging for everyone to hate them!) for years. It seems that women just can’t win. I’ve read a lot of profiles of women: they often mention that so-and-so has a fabulous career EVEN THOUGH she has kids. Oddly enough, I have never ever read a profile of a man that talked about the many things he has accomplished EVEN THOUGH he has kids. These stories almost never show the man packing lunches, attending soccer games or doing anything that would normally be expected of a mother. If this information is included, it is there to demonstrate that he is such an angel that he has taken on both parental roles (perhaps his wife has died).

I have an idea. Let’s set a new standard for men. They should have to go through surgery without anesthetic. Those who think the pain is too much for them should feel ashamed of themselves because they’re not “man” enough. Also, they should have their reproductive choices scrutinized so they can be judged accordingly. Finally, they should be made responsible for all parental duties and (again) judged accordingly. If they are late for work because the kids had to be dropped off at school, it should be noted on their personnel files. They should be passed over for promotions because they might not be available for free overtime during soccer practice. If they do make themselves available, they should be known as selfish jerks who don’t care about their families. This will do for a start. I’m sure we can come up with other standards as we go along.

We report, you decide

Today's episode of Little Miss Know-it-All: No, you're NOT gonna pin this on us! We have no obligation to actually verify the information we broadcast! It's enough that someone TOLD us it was true!

In 1995, one of my journalism professors told our class something that I will never forget: Journalists look for facts; courts look for truth. Sounds pretty deep, eh?

It's true, to a certain point. Journalists do look for facts. But I'm reluctant to think that morose Eugene Meese meant that the current state of journalism is something to aspire to. I'm sure he didn't mean that journalists have no obligation to check their "facts".

Journalists usually fall back on their traditional defense. This won't work in a court of law during a libel case, but it often placates the court of public opinion: This is Joe's fault. He said it was true, and we didn't report that it was true, we just reported that Joe said it. Our hands are clean.

You see, journalists, particularly bad ones, don't think it's up to them to weigh competing accounts of how something happened. This is how the "intelligent design" morons got into the news in the first place: they are mavericks (see previous LMK-i-A entry) with an alternative version of the story, so that's good enough for most reporters.

I was watching the Daily Show one evening when one of their "reporters" pointed this out. Rob Corddry (I think) was expounding on something ridiculous as usual, and had quoted two competing versions of the story. Jon Stewart asked which was true. Corddry gave a condescending laugh: "Jon, I'm a reporter! My job is to tell you exactly what one person said and exactly what the other person said! I don't pick between them! That's for the viewer to decide!"

Yes, it's for the viewer to decide. It's funny, because there are very few viewers who understand that reporters think this. For what my opinion's worth, this shows that journalists pay very little attention to their own industry. You would think that by now, they would have figured out that people don't think that they are supposed to make up their own minds about who is telling the truth. People think that because something's on the news, it must be true.

When you really probe, you'll discover that reporters do understand this, but you have to ask the right questions. When you're talking about the news, they'll tell you it's up to the viewer to decide who's telling the truth. But just ask them about advertorials, and the mask cracks. Most reporters hate advertorials (ads that are designed to look like news stories). Why, I wonder, when news consumers are making up their own minds? It definitely wouldn't be because they read these advertorials and believe they're true because they're in the paper, right? That would imply that people unquestioningly believe advertorials but use critical thinking on the rest of the paper. So that can't be it.

Dear Britney Spears,

What...the hell...is wrong with you?

I am pretty sure that Glen is going to have something to say about this, but please let Ms. Prudence McPrude take a whack at you before Mr. Prudential Prudie starts in. (Unlike Glen, I actually enjoy innuendo.) (Hehehehehe...I said "innuendo".)

Fishnets are not so expensive that you should continue to wear them after large holes form in them. You can get them at department stores for $12. Heck, I would have given you mine if you'd asked. They're still in the original packaging, although I can't quite remember why. Oh wait: I do remember. It's because they make women look like skanks, even when we are running for President or in charge of the Supreme Court. There is no way to look dignified while wearing them. It is like wearing a flashing sign that says MAKE ME AN OFFER QUICKLY, I'M OUT OF CRACK.

Maybe I am being too harsh. Maybe it IS possible to look dignified while wearing fishnet stockings. Perhaps it's all about the total look. For example, having your butt hanging out of your hot pants is super classy. It's definitely an option for the modern office. I could wear those with my SLUT T-shirt the next time I go to the jail.

I don't know what the hell that thing on your torso is, but it appears to be Fonzie's jacket, shrunk in the wash and set upon by rabid wolves. And honey, we all know that you went nuts and shaved your head. I suggest that you try one of the following:

1. Get a short haircut that will be easy to take care of.
2. Find someone who isn't blind to fix your weave.

And the crowning glory: the stripper pole. I was already a bit annoyed about stripper poles today because Canada's Newspaper Of Record printed a giant picture of Lindsay Lohan rubbing her butt on one to illustrate a story about the horrible movie industry that is profiting from the objectification of fragile young women. (Seriously. It is like they think we are all idiots who can't see right through this.) The latest talk is that stripping is empowering. Riiiiight. I can follow this logic to a certain point: the men in a strip club are definitely being taken advantage of, but not by the women on the pole. The dirty old club owner's having the last laugh; the strippers are just there to line his pockets and the men are so dumb they don't know the difference. What a GREAT thing for Ms. Spears to be photographed humping! This is going to do wonders for her career.

Family

I figured that it was time to change the image of our family over there on the right side of the screen, considering that it now bears only a passing resemblance to us. However, this was easier said than done.

I got a reasonable Michael:
and a reasonable me:


but was unable to do one for Steve. You see, Steve's hair does not seem to correspond to anything in the South Park universe. So I stuck one of the Skipper's hats on him:

As you can see, he does not look happy about this. Steve never wears hats.

I am forced to conclude that he should get a haircut. It is the only solution to this problem.

You ask, I answer

Reader-Submitted Question: Did you go to journalism school with Rebecca Eckler? What's with the intense hatred?

OMG like that is so not true and I am gonna sue you for spreding leis about me. Like I siad before I do not hate her I am just super-jelous of her becasue of her amazing stardom and the fact that she gets tons of book deals wehn I am just as good of a writer and i still donot have a single book deal.

It is ok though I am probably not going to sue you because I am SUPER SPIRITUAL now and I was takling to my preist and he said I should let go and let God. I totlaly thoughtt that should be ona sign somewhere because it is so freaking deep. Like YEAH HATERS I have a preist now to give me spiritul advice and not one of those guys who hurts little kids either -- gross!

So yeah I am just gonna let go and let GOd and that is gonna be my new like moto because it will keeep me from beign jelous all the time. It was like eating me up insdie, you know? So now I can just forget aobout al of that stuff that was bothering me and just be super-spirital without having to pary all the time becasue that is really not good for my knees when i spend so much time at the spa getting them pummised.

Thanks for asking but I really dont know her at all I am just a writer in Canada and she is like ALSO a writer in Canada and people were like saying that she spoak for young women in my genration and I was like OMG i so wish that was true because then I woud be just like her! If I could just get a boost from a celibaty like her that wouldbe exactly what my patehtic writing career would need!

You better take care if I find you've been creeping 'round my back stairs

Today's episode of Little Miss Know-it-All: THAT'S A LIE!!! I KNOW YOU DID IT!!11!!!

There are two things I cling to:

1. Journalism is a noble profession.
2. Smoking pot for years will not turn you into a paranoid freak.

Okay, so I don't actually "cling" to the second one, but it is relevant to today's discussion. Actually, I have lost my grip on both of these things over the past few weeks.

One of the editors of Name of Paper Withheld is leaving his job and going to work for a local diamond mine. This has brought about a flurry of talk about the "dark side", and I think I've had just about enough of it.

Perhaps someone could explain to me which of these jobs is closer to the dark side:

1. Providing factual information to the public.
2. Writing stories that mix facts with misunderstanding, speculation and rumour, passing all four off as facts and ignoring any facts that don't fit with what you think the story must be.
   

I mean it. Please tell me which is closer to the dark side, because I'm very interested in your answer. TELL ME RIGHT NOW, DAMMIT!!!

Hmmm. Maybe I am coming a bit unglued myself.

I understand the pressures journalists work under. First, they need a story. Never underestimate this. Journalism is a tough business, and reporters are expected to file stories every day, whether there is anything happening or not. That old joke about the slow news day is real: a desperate reporter will start asking questions about the weirdest things if there is no actual news. (What? When it's smoky outside, people should stay inside if the smoke bothers them? Hold the front page, we've got a scoop!)

Second, they need a story. Yes, this sounds like the same thing as the last paragraph, but I promise that I have not completely lost my mind. A true story is not just something to fill a hole at the top of the hour. A true story has a beginning, middle, and end. It has characters and some type of action. CBC is totally on the "story" bandwagon, and their reporters will tell you that they tell stories for a living. (This is very important to them.) Other reporters will call it a "piece", but the idea is the same. A really good story includes some sort of struggle. This is why the news is full of crime: it is not because crime is unusual, but because it falls neatly into the "story" format, complete with characters and a beginning, middle and end. Best of all, there is no pesky research for a reporter to do: the details are spoon-fed by the prosecutor.

Third, the story needs to be understandable. This is where I usually start to get annoyed. You see, most issues are not black and white. Usually there is a lot of gray, with some red and blue thrown in for good measure. However, this does not make a good story or an understandable story. Watch the local news and you will almost never see anything like this: There is no typical client. Many have complicated needs, and we can't help them with all of their problems. In fact, unless they take responsibility for changing their lives, we can hardly help them at all. (Funny, I don't think that's hard to understand at all.) Complicating details are left out, and others are summarized into something that is understandable but not quite true. I call this "more punchy, less true" journalism. In fact, if you call an editor to complain about this, he will argue that a) it really is true or b) nobody would ever understand the difference.

Fourth, the characters need to fit into one of about six different journalism stereotypes:

• The harried small-business owner
  
• The ne'er-do-well
• The angel
• The expert
  
• The uncaring authorities (usually but not always the government)
  
• The maverick
  

If the characters don't fit into one of these categories, the story won't work. Deadline journalism is not about shades of gray, and characters can't be three-dimensional. Some details will have to be ignored for the sake of the story. (There are bigger issues at stake here, people: Journalism itself requires it!) If a person is cast as an angel, for example, everything he says will be completely true. He will be long-suffering but never to blame for any of his troubles. And remember: the true angel in any news story is the reporter herself for having the courage to shine a light on the tragedy.

Journalists, of course, will never admit to any of this. They are usually convinced that they can explain complicated issues better than those so-called "experts". Knowledge isn't power, it's suffocating! In fifteen minutes, a journalist can learn everything he needs to know about an issue to be able to explain it to people.

Right. And I'm the one on the dark side.

Culture shock

Steve and Michael went for a walk on "the track" the other day. "The track" is not actually a track; it is the path that was left behind when the railroad was ripped out of the Newfoundland landscape. This path runs near his parents' house and I suppose that if you put your mind to it, you could follow it all the way across the island.

I have no fond memories of "the track": unlike some of my friends, I never took part in any hanky-panky on or near it. I'm sure my brothers have some interesting stories to tell, though.

During their walk, Michael made an exciting discovery. There were strawberries GROWING OUT OF THE GROUND. This was a big deal. Steve and I grew up in places where we could pick berries all summer long, but Michael has never seen this before.

What, am I not good enough?

Seriously, I can't handle this any longer.

Rebecca Eckler has got religion. Yes! This might be too funny for words, but I'll try.

Ickler still doesn't know how to pour milk over cereal, so she was out for breakfast with her daughter the other day. Being a little girl, Rowan brought three stuffed animals, which of course was hideously embarrassing, so Eckler was trying to look in another direction. That's how she saw a blind woman who needed her help. Most normal people would have helped anyway, but you have to understand that this was a major breakthrough that ought to be trumpeted from the rooftops.

However, some things never change. Even though Rowan was RIGHT THERE, Eckler didn't bother to talk to her or even mention that there was a third person walking along with the blind woman for goodness knows how long.

Get it? Eckler is SUPER GOOD NOW. And as proof, she has decided that she wants to go to an ashram. Excuse me while I fall over, clutching my sides from the pain of laughing too hard.

I'm not sure she understands that an ashram is not an extra-quiet spa. The main benefit seems to be that there are no ashrams in Toronto, where her daughter lives. She wants to go to California, because there are no icky Indian people with germs there. Whoops! I meant that California's closer than India, so she could see Rowan more often. Wait, that can't be it, either. This is the woman who says goodbye to her child but kisses the dog.

Facebook's good for something after all

Michael looks like a young offender in all of Cousin Charlotte's posed shots from Sean's wedding, but this shot of the Elms boys is just too cute to pass up.

It seems to me that David should be about twelve years old, but you will recall that I am still suffering from the delusion that Ben is Michael's age. That's David's daughter, Leah.

Sean was a year ahead of me in high school, and everyone used to confuse him with Steve. This is probably because he has a bigger personality than Steve does: while Steve will sit quietly in the back of the room, Sean will demand loudly that someone join him as he dances on the table. If you never get close, he's definitely the one you'd remember. From time to time someone would ambush me near homeroom and say she didn't know I was going out with that Elms guy -- how long had we been together? Surprised, I would stammer out some variant of "a year", and Little Miss Cheerleader would be halfway down the hall before I figured out that I had just started a rumour that Sean was cheating on whatever girlfriend he had at the time.

Sean moved to the NWT soon after we did and was living with us throughout my pregnancy and after Michael was born. If this was a "bookended" news story, this is where I would triumphantly close the loop by noting that he used to work at the young-offender facility, but you, dear readers, deserve better than that. Sean quickly proved himself to be the best substitute teacher in town as well as the only uncle Michael knew as a baby. He kept us well-stocked with tiny Maple Leafs jerseys and homemade baby-sized hockey sticks. I was really sad when he moved out of our house: after fourteen years, he is like my brother too.

By request

I pulled this off Cousin Charlotte's Facebook. I refuse to believe that Michael is really this big. Can he really pick other children up? This has to be trick photography, like those pictures of the Loch Ness Monster.

What's in my MP3 player?

This is for the benefit of those who always think the worst of me. Excuse me: I feel like coughing.

Every now and then I fall apart

Apparently I promised to lend Deathly Hallows to Glen when I finished it. I do not remember this, but his description of the circumstances of our agreement does sound vaguely familiar, and I am disinclined to do battle with anyone who seems to enjoy contract law as much as he does.

I am going to put most of this in white text, but I'll break it up so you can choose to read one section and not another. Highlight the white space to read what I've written.

Unanswered questions:
I've pored over enough interviews to be expecting certain things that were never delivered in this book.

What did Dudley see when the Dementors attacked him?
Who does magic late in life?
What was the veil?
Why did we get so many subtle references to time that never paid off? For that matter, what was up with the constant references to hurt fingers?
If Regulus drowned in the cave, how did Lupin know he was dead and how many days he'd stayed alive after leaving the Death Eaters?
How did the Potters defy Voldemort three times?
Weren't we supposed to see more of Ginny Weasley's power?
Why were Harry's eyes so important? Just to reinforce that Snape would see Lily every time he looked at Harry?

Pacing:
I read a few reviews that claimed the pacing was really fast, but I thought the story dragged in several spots. There were chapters and chapters of Harry and Hermione just sitting around doing nothing, and then all of Snape's back story was revealed in about five pages. Come on! I deserve better than that!

Epilogue:
ARGH. You have GOT to be kidding me. This is what she's been hiding in a vault for the past 17 years? Sorry, but this was really lacking.

Revealed Secrets:
I figured most of these out, thanks to my scrutiny of the earlier books. I even knew what the last Horcrux was, despite the fact that it had never been described before HP7. Something about the subtle reference in book six made me take note, and as soon as they mentioned Ravenclaw's crown I knew I was right. That felt good.

But I was incredibly wrong about Harry being a Horcrux. I thought there was no way this was possible, and I scoffed at people who clung to the theory. It turned out that they were exactly right. Honestly, I have no idea how they figured this out, because it seemed so incredibly unlikely to me. A Horcrux created by accident that can be destroyed without physically destroying the object it's in? Please explain to me how this is possible, because I don't get it. I've spent so much time convincing myself that it wasn't real that I really don't understand how this could work. The only thing I can come up with is that it is related to the look of triumph: Harry can't die because Voldemort is still alive, so the only thing that can die is that bit of soul.

Deaths:
I do not get upset when characters die, because the deaths are supposed to add something to the story. I am confused about Lupin, Tonks and Fred, though: their deaths moved the story along only to show that nobody would be safe, and we'd had plenty of that already when Mad-Eye died.

I'm not sure what the point of creating Tonks was. She was a great character in book 5 (although just a bit player in the movie) but it seems like she had no real role and could have been pulled out of the story without missing a beat. Cindy says she thinks Tonks' role was to show Lupin that he could be loved, but I still think there needs to be a bigger purpose than this. Any of the other characters could have done that.

Overall:
Yes, I sound really negative, but I really did like the book. I think I just need to wait for an interview with JKR to explain some of my lingering questions. This probably won't happen unless she does another interview with The Leaky Cauldron, so I won't be holding my breath. On the other hand, I can look forward to many more stories that "break" the news that she came up with the story on a train, wrote in coffee shops and never told anyone the story for 17 years. (Way to go, Mainstream Media!) It is not the best of the series -- "Prisoner of Azkaban" has always been my favourite -- but I did enjoy it. Now I will have to go back over the other six to find all of the clues I missed along the way.

END OF SPOILERS (but no promises about the comments box).

Charming witches is more than just wandwork

I really ought to stay away from the religious nutcases, but if I did, I'd have to shut Uriel down, and that would be no fun at all.

I can never get over the crazy people who pop up every time a new Harry Potter book comes out, and I closely follow the antics of parents who try to ban the books from local schools. They really don't seem to understand that the spells don't actually work and that they are the only ones who think it is real.

I knew that the series would end with voluntary self-sacrifice to save others. This is not just because I am a geek who studied previous books; it is also because I am a geek who read every JK Rowling interview I could get my hands on. She has often been asked how she feels about the crazies, but she usually gives a very pat answer about the books being fiction. But one day she said something different. The interviewer had asked if she was a Satanist or some such nonsense, and she responded that she was a Christian and that knowing that, anyone who had read the books should be able to figure out where the story was going.

I'm going to give my readers a little more time to finish the book before I talk about the details. Yes, I will be doing that: you have been warned.

If I squeeze you too hard, God knows I'll break you

Well, it's over. I have finished the last Harry Potter book. I waited at the bookstore for hours last night with Fisher and a few other adults, but mostly a bunch of kids. Yes, I felt a little bit geeky, but I gave up any pretensions of being cool long ago.

It took me eight hours to finish it. I am not going to give away plot details here, but if you do not want to read anything about the book, STOP RIGHT NOW. This is especially important if you have talked to me about theories, because I am going to discuss my reaction to the book.




I mean it.




Since you're still here, I'm going to assume that you are taking on responsibility for not being spoiled. In fact, if you're worried about learning the ending, I'd advise you to stay off the Internet until you've finished the book.

I've been a fan for years now. One of those weirdo fans who searches for clues and is openly mocked, even by friends. I've had theories for years and have scoured the earlier books, looking for hints to the ending. So I wasn't really caught up in the recent backlash against the New York Times when the paper printed an early review of the book. I already had a pretty good sense of what would happen. The only thing I learned from the review was what the Deathly Hallows were, and this wasn't a huge blow.

But I definitely had my theories, and I knew that today it would all be over. I resisted the temptation to jump to the back of the book. I admit: I did look at some early spoilers, but I found them very unsatisfying. There were lists of characters who would die, but all of the lists were different, so there was no way to know which was right. In any case, the list does no good to anyone who likes to read: what's important is how the death moves the plot along. I had a list in my head anyway, and I was reasonably certain that I was right, based on clues in the earlier books.

Well, I was right about many things, but incredibly wrong about one of the biggest issues that has been batted around ever since book six. Actually, when book six came out, there were five big questions:

1. Who is RAB?
2. Is Dumbledore really dead?
3. Is Snape evil?
4. Is Harry a Horcrux?
5. What's the last Horcrux, and where is it?
   

I was convinced that I knew the answers to all five questions. It turns out that I got four out of five right. Well, to be totally honest, I wasn't convinced on one of the questions. I was reasonably certain, though, and with this one, I think that's as far as anyone could have gone. My geekiness has paid off. Yes, there was a gleam of triumph in my eye as each secret was revealed.

However, I got the ending wrong. Through years of study, I had worked out the pattern the books were taking, and had a general sense of how it MUST end and how it would have to happen. I solidified this into a theory of how the climactic scene would end. If I do say so myself, it was a pretty good theory that strung together several of the loose ends that had never been really explained but that I was reasonably sure I had figured out.

Unfortunately, I was wrong. Not about the pattern or the loose ends or how the end would come, but my theory about the scene was wrong. This is hard to take, because I was very sure. It is related to my error from the five big questions: I was so sure about that one that I got the ending wrong. Yes, I am a bit annoyed with myself.

I also got the list of deaths wrong. I had used clues to work out a list of people who would die, and I was very close, but missed a few and guessed a few others incorrectly. This is sort of spoilery, so if you want to see my list, highlight the space below. I repeat: this is NOT a list of the people who actually die, it is the list of people I thought would die.

Voldemort: Duh.
Snape: I had an elaborate theory about how this would happen.
Lupin: I thought that all of the Marauders would be dead at the end of the series.
Wormtail: He has to repay his life debt to Harry.
At least one of the Weasleys, with my money on Ginny: There are so many of them that it seemed at least one of them had to go, and I thought Ginny was the logical choice because she's Harry's girlfriend and because of a clue in book five.
Draco: I thought he would run away from the Death Eaters and be killed.
Hagrid: It just seemed like Hagrid's time to go.

And now it's all over. No more theories and no more clues. I'm not sure how to feel.

Congratulations, Sean and Adrienne

______________________________

A note about this video that is completely unrelated to today's festivities but will be seared into my brain as long as I live:

I first saw this video when I was about sixteen. My best friend throughout high school was a second-generation Brit whose mother and grandparents had moved to Bay Roberts years earlier. She was a huge fan of Rowan Atkinson, and was keen to show me samples of his stand-up comedy.

But there was a catch.

You see, before I was allowed to watch the video, I had to answer a skill-testing question that had stumped her, her mom and her grandmother but that she was fairly certain I would know: "What's fellatio?"

It just so happened that I did know what it was, but I was not keen to broadcast this. Fifteen years later, I still get a long way on I don't know what that is and I think you can get germs from doing that. Come to think of it, I'm not sure what to make of the fact that she had no doubt that I would be able to shed some light on this matter, but I suppose that is a post for another day.

In any case, I explained quickly and without much detail. She silently got up from the couch and walked into the dining room, where her mother and grandmother were playing cards next to the baby grand: "Megan knows what it is."

The spotlight burns a hole in me

Boy, it's hard to be me, especially with all of the criticism about what is and is not on the blog. Here I am, trying to reflect community standards so I don't cross any of the invisible indecency lines, but it's really difficult. Apparently Maggie Gyllenhaal's breast is OK, but Paris Hilton's man-boob is not what readers want to see.

You know, it's hard to read minds. Fortunately, my prudish critic has let us know what he would like to see in the blogosphere. And as always, I am doing my best to keep up with the requests.

Yes, I know what you think of me; you never shut up.

Apparently, some of my readers *coughGlencough* are too prudish to be able to handle a picture of Paris Hilton's naked breast at the top of the blog. I live to serve my committed readers (even those who probably should be committed), so this post should be welcome.

Things Paris Hilton makes me wonder

1. When everyone in the entire world has seen her vagina, how can there still be a market for photos of this woman's nipple slips?

2. Is this a market I could get in on, considering that:
a) my breasts are larger than hers;
b) Glen says I don't have the proper physical characteristics to be a Hoffette; and
c) the Girls Gone Wild guy is still in jail?

3. Is it really a nipple slip when she has obviously pulled her top down to pose for some guy with a camera?

If you turn your other cheek to me, you'll find a place to radiate

Hello, Pot? This is Kettle.

Today’s episode of Little Miss Know-it-All: Hey, you can’t do that! Misleading pictures are OUR business!

My American readers may have seen a new TV series about ice-road truckers. The series was filmed during the winter and follows truckers as they drive from Name of Town Withheld to the diamond mines several hundred miles away.

Ice roads are distinctly northern. I assume they have them in Alaska, too, but I think of them as Canadian. There are no permanent roads to many communities, so when the rivers and lakes freeze, they become temporary roads.

These roads are not hundred-mile ice slicks; they are built in a way that keeps vehicles from sliding around too much. However, there are always dangers: driving too fast or too close to another vehicle can weaken the road. Ice thickness is checked often to make sure that the road is as safe as possible. The road is flooded with water, then graded and flooded again to thicken the ice. When you drive over it, the road can jiggle up and down like Jell-O. Big trucks can jackknife or even fall right through the ice.

So I’m not surprised that producers would want to do a reality show about these truckers. They work in conditions harder than you or I could imagine. If their trucks break down and they have no heat, they can quickly freeze to death all alone on the ice.

The CBC, naturally, is interested in this show. I suspect that they wish they had had the idea first (something about a mandate to reflect Canada to Canadians), but in any case they are out of the running now. Instead, they’ve been interviewing people who worked on the show. I always like these interviews because I am a geek who likes to peer into the guts of programming.

During my morning coffee I was treated to an interview with the producer of the show. It was standard stuff until the interviewer established that the scary shots of trucks falling through the ice were not, in fact, shot by the production team while filming the show. That led to this question: Don’t you think that’s a bit misleading? I mean, the people who maintain that road take safety really seriously.

Hmmm. What an interesting question! You see, I’ve seen those images, too. Many, many times. I wonder who filmed those shots and who would be replaying them over and over on the supper-hour news. It couldn’t be CBC, could it? Definitely not – that would be misleading! It must have been the reality show’s production team. They probably also filmed the historical shots of people fixing giant scary-looking holes in the road years ago. The CBC would never mislead people into thinking that the road is unsafe and then re-sell the footage, especially not when the engineers who work on the road take safety really seriously. No, that’s what trashy reality-show producers do. Not the national broadcaster. They’re above all of that.

I'm a fisherman's son, got fisherman's ways. I fished with my father in my young days.

The Ickler bump

Visits to the blog follow a fairly predictable pattern. I get 25-35 "visits" (in gold) and 40-70 "page views" (in red) per day. Each person who comes here counts as one visitor, and if you come back twice a day, you're counted twice. If you click an internal link, like one of the comment links, that counts as an additional page view. Visits drop on weekends but are reasonably stable throughout the week.

I'm a little freaked out by the number of new visitors and the fact that I'm not completely sure that they're not secret Ickler fans. Things appear to be going back to normal, which is good. I like to know who my audience is.

Mother told me, yes she told me I'd meet girls like you

When I was pregnant, the father of my child went away a lot, and I fell in love with someone else and carried on an intense emotional affair with him. I figured this was OK because a few celebrities did the same thing. In public, I pretended that we were a couple. I wished that I could plan falling in love the way I planned my C-section, and I was really upset because I had gained 47 pounds. Also, I was going to have a baby, whatshername.

So I wrote about my emotional affair in the New York Times, because I am super classy.

Oh, wait. That wasn't me at all. That was Eckler.

UPDATED: Welcome, Technorati users. The full list of my Eckler posts is here.

Every whisper of every waking hour I'm choosing my confessions

It has been a rough couple of days.

The worst part is that I cannot really talk about why it has been so bad, especially not here on the blog. There has been a fair amount of self-loathing (see yesterday's post) and hours of gut-wrenching fear.

However, the experience has taught me a few things:

1. If someone is convinced that he is always right, telling him that he is wrong will not change the final outcome of your conversation.
2. When things are really bad, there is comfort in knowing that they could be much, much worse.
3. Getting really drunk on shots of Newfie screech does not actually help the problem, but does deaden the pain for a few hours.
4. Drinking water is good. Very very very good. Also, Tylenol is my friend.
   

Weeping silver tears on a rusted heart

Do you guys in the States know who Jann Arden is?

I've always listened to music at work. This used to be easier at the MotherCorp, where it's normal to wear headphones at your desk. I had a really great set of headphones that drowned out the entire world -- necessary with a job like mine that entailed fixing the mangled carcasses of botched interviews. When I was pregnant, I used them to play Mozart to my stomach (my boss thought this was hilarious). And just before I quit, I used them to ignore my co-workers and listen to Jann Arden.

Leaving CBC was like a sucker punch. I'd just spent $40,000 on an honours degree in journalism and moved to the Northwest Territories. I couldn't have moved any further away and still been in Canada -- I'd gone from one corner of this giant country to the opposite corner in the name of journalism. Journalists have it hammered into them: they are professionals in the most noble cause there is, and "public-relations officers" are the excrement of creatures that live in pond scum. I imagine it is like leaving a tenured position as a philosophy professor to sell vacuum cleaners door to door. Except that as a professor, you do understand that some people need vacuum cleaners, so somebody's gotta sell them. The jump to public relations is sort of like that. You have this deep-seated self-loathing for the first little while, and all of your former co-workers look on you with disappointment, or (worse) say things like "I knew that's where you'd end up" or "Enjoy the money".

I usually tell people that I left the CBC because I had a baby. The truth is more complicated. Yes, I had a little guy underfoot and no child care. I really did need a job that would allow me to work from home. But I also felt like I was heading up a show that had little to no support from our head office. I was very sick while I was pregnant and took pains to show my devotion: I used to joke that I would give birth in the studio while directing the show. I came back from maternity leave wanting to prove that nothing had changed; that I was still the same person. I didn't want to admit to myself that I had indeed changed.

Jann Arden's known for her sense of humour, but you'd never know it from her music, which is usually about pain and sorrow. This song and every other song from Living Under June brings me back to early 2002, writing "greens" and re-writing intros with tears in my eyes.

Mystery solved

I have been outed by a poster over at 9 Gram (see comments). This is quite a relief: I first wondered if an Eckler fan club had stumbled over my blog, but I soon realised that there were far too many visitors for this to be a group of her fans.

I do indeed do satire, even of Eckler herself, but I am not 9 Gram. Fellow Eckler haters, you are more than welcome to stick around.

And a short note about copyright: I will immediately remove any material on this site that I did not create myself if the copyright holder contacts me and asks me to take it down. This could be done through the comments section if the message comes from the copyright holder's account. All this person would have to do to assert copyright is to admit that he or she created the material, and I will pull it down right away and replace it with a review/summary.

UPDATED: I actually started to feel bad for Eckler, so I pulled down her post without being asked. I wrote the review myself and did not create the source material.

UPDATED AGAIN: Welcome, Technorati users. The full list of my Eckler posts is here.

Hmmm

I'm not sure what to make of this, but I will just put it out there: Three hours ago I started to get some unusual traffic here on the blog. Since then, about two dozen people have come by to read my posts about Rebecca Eckler.

I can't tell if the Ickler fan club has suddenly discovered that I exist (in which case I assume that her entire worldwide fan base has already checked me out and found me lacking) or if something even weirder is going on.

UPDATED: Welcome, Technorati users. The full list of my Eckler posts is here.

A new Plan B

I have a new back-up career plan.

For several years, I planned to become a Girls Gone Wild girl if anything went wrong with my current career path. This seemed to be the perfect plan: it would offer me the lasting fame I have been seeking for my entire life.

However, over the last few months, Glen has pointed out that this is probably not the best option. There were several reasons:

1. Girls Gone Wild girls do not really get lasting fame. They are on screen for a few seconds at most.
2. The pay is really bad. They're probably paid in cheap vodka, which you have to drink out of another girl's brassiere.
3. The Girls Gone Wild guy is in jail. Who would've thought that it would be illegal to allegedly ply allegedly underage girls with alcohol and allegedly videotape them while they allegedly take off their clothes, then allegedly profit from sales of the video? Fascists!

So I need a new plan. And I found it close to home.

David Hasselhoff needs women to shake their butts and lip-synch behind him while he lip-synchs. These women are called Hoffettes, and I think you can see the attraction. This could be a long-term career. It would be the perfect combination of not-really-singing, not-really-dancing without having to join the Pussycat Dolls and show off my "confidence". (Yes, I am so lonely that I actually watched their TV show last night.)

Anyway, back to the Hoffettes. These women have indeed gained lasting fame. Not only do they get to travel all around the world, but they have been immortalized in music videos (the gritty video for this song includes some kick-ass special effects at the end). And I think it's unlikely that David will be arrested anytime soon. If the police tried to cuff him, they would probably burst into flames from the sheer sensuality of it all. Some people can't take it. I, however, would be really good at shaking my butt while wearing high-heeled boots. If this communications career of mine ever falls apart, it's very comforting to know that I have other options.

Stars fall from the sky for you and me

Just before bedtime last night, Steve made an unexpected discovery: his plane ticket to Newfoundland was not for tomorrow. It was for today.

So here I am, sitting all alone with no boys to love me. And this is Hour 1 of my three weeks of solitary confinement. I wasn't ready for this so soon.

For the past few weeks I've been swinging back and forth between loneliness and excitement at the thought of the boys going away. Part of me likes the idea of ordering whatever I want on my pizza. It's been a long time since I've gone any length of time without hearing a knock on the bathroom door. The freedom might get to my head. I might start smoking or stay up past my bedtime.

But right now I'm feeling lonely. I miss my boys.

BREAKING NEWS

You know that old joke about the guy who murders his parents, then asks the judge to go easy on him because he's an orphan?

A 13-year-old girl from Medicine Hat is guilty of murdering her entire family.

Old men watch from the outside, guarding their prey

You probably did not know this, but apparently blogs are dangerous. Yes.

I'm sure you can think of a few ways blogs might be more dangerous than, say, the Government of Canada's website. For example, they're often not designed very well, and it can be hard to find what you're looking for once you get into the guts of a blog. Wait, I suppose that's not really much different than what you'll find on the federal government's site.

So I'll cut right through the suspense and tell you why blogs are dangerous. You see, if you have a blog, people can disagree with you. Yes! Quick, let's shut THAT feature down before anyone discovers it!

Also, people who disagree with you can -- wait for it -- LINK TO YOUR BLOG. I am so annoyed about this craziness that I almost slipped into my Uriel voice for a moment. (Uriel fans: I promise to bring her back, but I've been staying away from the religious hypocrites for the last little while. This is good for my sanity, but has put me into contact with an entirely new group of hypocrites.)

Apparently it's impossible to link to a non-blog website. Also, people without blogs have no critics and total control over the things other people say about them. This is important, because when someone has a different opinion, the best way to deal with it is to make them stop talking. You definitely don't want them to disagree with you on your own website.

I'm glad we cleared this up. I am going to start making plans to pull my blog down right away. That way, nobody can tell me to go to a nunnery, criticise my taste in music or disagree with me at all.

For my new reader in Ontario

Hi. It's great to have you here. I'm really glad that you like my posts about Canada.

There's a whole blog here too, and it's more than just posts about Canada. Of course, you're free to keep coming back to check the Canada label every day if you aren't interested in anything else I write about. This blog is mostly about my life and family, with some media analysis and grammar advice tossed in.

Welcome, Karan

I am now very close to achieving my goal of getting everyone I know to start their own blogs.

Glen...check. Cindy...check. Capitalist, Philosopher King, Blueberry Princess and whatever we're calling Ben these days...check, check, check, check.

And now: Welcome, Karan.

I've known Karan for a few years, and she is now a constant presence in our lives. You see, her son is Michael's new best friend. They live right across the street, and Michael spends more time with her son than he does with me. In fact, you'll recall that there were some tense moments when it seemed that I might lose out on the coveted bike-riding lessons. (Or as Glen put it: You do know that you're jealous of a six-year-old, right?)

When my phone rings after supper, I know it's Karan calling to invite me over for a cup of tea. The two boys spend their evenings running back and forth between the two houses creating mischief while we chat about life in general.

As I look back on my older posts, I can see that she inspired one of my earliest posts about grammar -- in a good way, of course. This was so long ago that Little Miss Know-it-All didn't exist, and in fact I didn't talk about grammar or journalism very much at all. I can see that I was already known as a grammar enthusiast.

I've added Karan's blog to my links list: please go and check it out.