#Million Dollar Quartet

Went to the theater last night. The #MTC (Manitoba Theatre Centre) in Winnipeg. Saw ‘Million Dollar Quartet’. The performers (Elliot Loran as Jerry Lee Lewis, Greg Gale as Johnny Cash, Matt Cage as Elvis Presley, and Kris Ulrich as Carl Perkins) put on a convincing and fabulous show. Kris Ulrich rocked with his unbelievable guitar-playing and Elliot Loran was entertaining and funny. He did not just tickle the ivories on the piano—he owned them. What a talent!
The only complaint I have is with the theater-goers. The people who have seats in the center of the row, why are they always the last to come in? So annoying and inconsiderate.

And that idiot in the parking lot? I admit, finding a parking space in that area of Winnipeg is always a challenge. I'm always there early and I found a spot in a lot where most of the spots are monthly parking for 24 hours a day, but there are a very few that allow parking after 6:00 PM and they charge $7:00 for the evening. Which is reasonable. Other parking lots charge $12:00. Robbery, as far as I'm concerned. Anyway, when we went to drive out of the lot, there was this car parked right behind us in the middle of the lot, which wasn't a parking space. This idiot just parked his car right there. It wouldn't surprise me if this person was one of the ones who had a seat in the center of the row in the theater. Got there late and couldn't find a spot.

Fortunately, I never just back out fast in a parking lot. I make sure there is nobody behind me. It could be a person walking by. The thing was, the parking lot was not well-lit and the car was difficult to see. If I had an old car with a steel-bumper I might have been tempted to back up fast and...you know! What a jerk! He was lucky his car wasn't towed away.

Otherwise, we had a great time. Listening to all those old rock-and-roll songs took us back many years. The majority of guests were older people who can relate to that area in our history. No terrorists in those days. You could relax at any gathering and enjoy life.

#Alone

This was the first time we watched an episode of the TV series 'Alone'-- the first episode of this season. It is the third season for that show. My wife and I are interested in it, but not yet hooked. We’ll see after we’ve watched a couple of episodes.

Sometimes you wonder how some of these contestants make it to the finals. There are 10 survivor specialists chosen from thousands of applications. Apparently, these 10 are the ultimate survivors who can survive under the most difficult conditions.

The first of them lasted two days. What a disappointment he was to the viewers, us included.

I don’t want to belittle these people. Just to make it to the final 10 is already an achievement, but come on! Quitting after 2 days of being alone in the wilderness? I consider myself to be an outdoors-man of sorts. I love hunting, fishing, camping and enjoy spending time by myself in the forest, but I’m not sure how long I would last being completely alone with just a few tools to survive. More than 2 days, of that I’m certain. The nights in such a hostile environment must be the worst, especially when you know there are wild boars and pumas around. Not exactly my ambition to be there in a makeshift shelter—without a gun or rifle, or even a bow. First thing I would make myself would be a spear.

What really made my eyebrows go up, was the fact that this macho man missed his wife and his three sons. Nothing weird about that. Now here is one thing though that wasn’t quite clear to me. When they showed him in his home environment he played with two dogs. He talked about adopting three sons. I hope he meant three human boys and not his dogs. Anyone calling a dog his son makes me wonder about his mental state of mind. A dog can be a friend or companion. I understand that. In fact, dogs make great loyal companions, more so than any human would, but they are not sons. Never sons or daughters! Unless a guy has sex with a female dog and somehow from that union a human-dog creature is born. But let’s not go there. That’s a totally different subject.

We have a bird—a canary. Sometimes I call him ‘my boy’ when I talk to him, and that is already weird enough. I make sure nobody is around when I do that, except for my wife, of course.  In the end, he is still a bird, cute and affectionate in his own way, a great singer, but only a little animal—not human.

So far on this first episode of Alone, they showed only four different people. I liked the woman. She caught fish, collected berries, and she made a chair for herself out of bamboo—for comfort. She came across as calm and competent. We’ll see what she does with building permanent shelter and preparing for colder weather, and how she makes sure she has food for those days when she doesn’t catch fish.

Let it snow...let it snow...let it snow

I've posted this once before, but with all the snow we've been having, I wanted to share it again with my readers. I don't know who wrote it, but it is extremely funny:

Subject: Diary Of A Snow Shoveler

December  8 - 6:00 PM

It started to snow.  The first snow of the season and the wife and I took our cocktails and sat for hours by the window watching the huge soft flakes drift down from heaven.  It looked like a Grandma Moses Print.  So  romantic we felt like newlyweds again.  I love snow!

 December  9

We woke to a beautiful  blanket of crystal white snow covering every inch of the landscape.   What a fantastic sight!  Can there be a more lovely place in the whole  world?  Moving here was the best idea I've ever had!  Shoveled for  the first time in years and felt like a boy again.  I did both our driveway and the sidewalks.  This afternoon the snowplow came along and covered up the sidewalks and closed in the driveway, so I got to shovel  again.  What a perfect life!

 December  12 The sun has melted all our lovely snow.  Such a disappointment!  My neighbor tells me not  to worry we'll definitely have a white Christmas.   No snow on Christmas would be awful!  Bob says we'll have so much snow by the end of winter,  that I'll never want to see snow again.  I don't think that's  possible.  Bob is such a nice man, I'm glad he's our neighbour.

 December  14

Snow, lovely  snow!  8 inches last night.  The temperature dropped to -20.   The cold makes everything sparkle so.  The wind took my breath away,  but I warmed up by shoveling the driveway and sidewalks.  This is the  life!  The snowplow came back this afternoon and buried everything  again.  I didn't realize I would have to do quite this much shoveling,  but I'll certainly get back in shape this way.  I wish I wouldn't huff and puff so.

 December  15

20 inches  forecast.  Sold my van and bought a 4x4 Blazer.  Bought snow tires  for the wife's car and 2 extra shovels.  Stocked the freezer.  The wife wants a wood stove in case the electricity goes out.  I think  that's silly.  We aren't in Alaska, after all.

December  16

Ice storm this  morning.  Fell on my ass on the ice in the driveway putting down salt.  Hurt like hell.  The wife laughed for an hour, which I  think was very cruel.

December  17

Still way below  freezing.  Roads are too icy to go anywhere.  Electricity was off for 5 hours.  I had to pile the blankets on to stay warm.  Nothing  to do but stare at the wife and try not to irritate her.  Guess I  should've bought a wood stove, but won't admit it to her.  God I hate  it when she's right.  I can't believe I'm freezing to death in my own  living room.

December  20

Electricity's back on,  but had another 14 inches of the damn stuff last night.  More  shoveling!  Took all day.  The damn snowplow came by twice.   Tried to find a neighbor kid to shovel, but they said they're too busy playing hockey.  I think they're lying.  Called the only hardware store around to see about buying a snow blower and they're out.  Might have another shipment in March.  I think they're lying.  Bob  says I have to shovel or the city will have it done and bill me.  I  think he's lying.

December  22

Bob was right about a  white Christmas because 13 more inches of the white shit fell today, and  it's so cold, it probably won't melt till August.  Took me 45 minutes  to get all dressed up to go out to shovel and then I had to piss.  By the time I got undressed, pissed and dressed again, I was too tired to  shovel.  Tried to hire Bob who has a plow on his truck for the rest of the winter, but he says he's too busy.  I think the asshole is lying.

December  23

Only 2 inches of snow  today.  And it warmed up to 0.  The wife wanted me to decorate the front of the house this morning.  What is she, nuts?!!  Why didn't she tell me to do that a month ago?  She says she did but I think she's  lying.

December  24

6 inches - Snow packed  so hard by snowplow, I broke the shovel.  Thought I was having a heart  attack.  If I ever catch the son of a bitch who drives that snowplow,  I'll drag him through the snow by his balls and beat him to death with my broken shovel.  I know he hides around the corner and waits for me to  finish shoveling and then he comes down the street at 100 miles an hour and throws snow all over where I've just been!  Tonight the wife wanted me to sing Christmas carols with her and open our presents, but I was too busy watching for the damn snowplow.

December  25

Merry f---ing  Christmas!  20 more inches of the damn slop tonight - Snowed in.   The idea of shoveling makes my blood boil.  God, I hate the snow!   Then the snowplow driver came by asking for a donation and I hit him over  the head with my shovel.  The wife says I have a bad attitude.  I  think she's a fricking idiot.  If I have to watch "It's A Wonderful  Life" one more time, I'm going to stuff her into the  microwave.

December  26

Still snowed in.   Why the hell did I ever move here?  It was all HER idea.  She's really getting on my nerves.

 December  27

Temperature dropped to  -30 and the pipes froze; plumber came after 14 hours of waiting for him, he only charged me $1,400 to replace all my pipes.

 December  28

Warmed up to above  -20.  Still snowed in.  The BITCH is driving me crazy!!!

 December  29

10 more inches.   Bob says I have to shovel the roof or it could cave in.  That's the silliest thing I ever heard.  How dumb does he think I  am?

 December  30

Roof caved in.  I  beat up the snowplow driver, and now he is suing me for a million dollars,  not only the beating I gave him, but also for trying to shove the broken snow shovel up his ass.  The wife went home to her mother.  Nine  more inches predicted.

 December  31

I set fire to what's  left of the house.  No more shoveling.

January  8

Feel so good.  I  just love those little white pills they keep giving me.  Why am I tied to the bed?

#Hello 2017

I posted this same article on my FaceBook page, but not everyone reads it.

It has finally arrived: The year 2017. What ever happened to 2016? It seems the older I get the faster the years go by. Why is that? Everything else seems to slow down, like walking, thinking, talking, eating…

My wife and I spent last night at home. Last year we went out for supper and it was a disaster. We planned to go to the restaurant in the casino and got a huge surprise when we arrived there. The waiting time to get a table was three hours. My wife suggested we go home, get a Pizza out of the freezer and have that for supper. Did not excite me. I wasn’t going to leave 2015 eating Pizza. Instead, we went to Aaltos in the same building. We waited only one hour. I should have taken my wife’s advice to go home. The food from the buffet was mostly cold and what they offered was boring. We walked out with a large bill and unhappy.

The year before, we went to a restaurant near our place for supper and ended up with a terrible cold that lasted most of the winter. We figured they didn’t sterilize their dishes.

So this year we decided to stay home. We bought a couple of lobster tails and a box full of butterflied ‘colossal’ shrimp in garlic. To compliment that we had lettuce, fried rice and peas. My wife drank wine and I drank a bottle of beer. It turned out great and we left the table satisfied, even though the lobster tails were somewhat on the small size and the ‘colossal’ shrimp not as large as advertised. It didn’t matter, they tasted good and we had enough. The best part: No waiting in line to get the food, either.

After supper, we watched three episodes of Season Four of ‘Game of Thrones’ and finished the last fifteen minutes of 2016 watching the CBC channel on TV waiting for twelve o’clock and the new year to arrive. Those last minutes were spoiled listening to a band screaming what is called music these days. I call it noise. At the stroke of midnight, they had fireworks. The government spending our tax dollars, but it was good. We toasted each other with a glass of sherry and then we watched a couple of comedians telling their jokes for 30 minutes and then we went to bed. Boring, I know, but more relaxing and satisfying than the last couple of New Year celebrations.

This morning, when the radio came on (We listen to CBC) we were treated to more screaming ‘music’. We shut off the radio after two songs, that’s all we could stand. Perhaps, some day, music will be music again and not screaming steel guitars and drums and the singers will have pleasant voices and will actually sing beautiful melodies—melodies that soothe and are pleasant and enjoyable. I probably won’t see that in my lifetime. The whole world is crazy. Modern music is only one aspect of that craziness. We can only hope and pray some day humanity will find its way to normalcy and the insanity that seems to have gripped us will be put to rest.

My wish for 2017 is that people begin to realize that hostility, intolerance, and hatred only spawns more of the same. When you live by the sword you die by the sword. Let’s all think PEACE and strive for it.

HAPPY NEW YEAR