Alex Carrick’s Blog

You have to like Twitter. It yields access to large numbers of people that one could not otherwise reach. Through “following” and “followers”, direct messages and other commands it is a far more powerful tool than its simplistic design suggests.  

However, its drawbacks are obvious. First is the brevity with which one’s message appears on someone else’s screen, if he or she is even logged in. Then there is the matter of how short that message has to be, no more than 140 characters. In my case, the intent is to provide a teaser with a link to a longer blog story.

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“When one scoop of ice cream is too much, two scoops can sometimes be just right.” That was something my wife, Donna, said one summer evening – perhaps unwittingly, we’ve never been quite sure – when the family walked to the local ice cream parlour for a cool treat. Then she demonstrated her belief in this reasoning by devouring a double-stacked concoction consisting of mocha mania and strawberry surprise.

I’m not good with the names of ice cream flavours anymore. For five years during high school, many years ago, I was one of several young hires that scooped hundreds of cones on Saturday nights as part of our summer jobs in a Wasaga Beach drugstore. It became a mind-numbing experience to hear customer after customer ask, “What flavours have you got?” when they were clearly marked on a sign-board over our heads.

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In another romantic space, long long ago, I wrote the following lyrics to a song that can only be heard in my own head. Nevertheless, I think they make for entertaining reading, particularly at a time such as this, when the economy is in rough shape. Furthermore, I would suggest these words could only have been written by an economist. Here goes.

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Six co-workers were gathered in a hotel room in Dallas, Texas because they were concerned about one of their own. Raj had come to work for the large consulting firm a year before and he was liked by everyone.

Lately, though, he seemed bothered and distracted. Far from his home in Mumbai, he was stressed and depressed and in danger of an excess of self-medication. The others were there to give him support.

Frank had been the final person to arrive. He’d only been invited at the last minute and was still in the dark about why they were all there. He was a know-it-all and his pushy inquisitive nature often kept people from confiding in him. However, since he worked in the office next to Raj, he could hardly have been left out.

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I was driving in my car the other day when a news item came over the radio that made me really pause and think. Apparently there has been such a shopping spree for guns in the United States that there is now, not just a shortage of ammunition, but a “critical” shortage. That’s how the announcer phrased it. This raises all kinds of questions.

First, I would like to know who makes the call about whether or not a shortage of ammo is critical. Is it a committee of elderly women? Is it the Surgeon General? Maybe it’s Tony Soprano? I suspect that each of these would have a different set of criteria.

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Hank and Harriet, single and alone in their own separate worlds, saw the ads on late-night TV. Their friends encouraged them to give it a try. Now here they were, staring each other down across a tiny table in a hotel ballroom filled with 100 other hopefuls.

They were about to start their final session in an hour of 10-minute speed dates. The partner rotations, with the girls stationary and the guys circling the room, had yielded few prospects so far. There were too many dudes and dudettes pretending an interest in fireside chats and walks in the rain. Or other inclinations that hinted at the seedy. Where were the people with the real interests? They were probably at home with their spouses.

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Whenever I hear a major celebrity has died, I am reminded that there is no such thing as time. Our most vivid memories of these individuals are when they were at their prime. Their vitality and life force made them seem indestructible.

Then suddenly, ten or 20 or 30 years later they are gone. It seemingly happens in the blink of an eye or the snapping of the fingers. I’m quite conscious the same will happen to me one day.

Michael Jackson has been the latest casualty to this phenomenon. A failure to understand that there is no such thing as time is what bothers me so much about teenage smokers. It is not as if they don’t know the long-term consequences in terms of addiction and ill health. It’s just that now is in the moment, friends are calling and the future is so far away.

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My nose knows and it is telling me that I need to write about Toronto’s garbage workers strike. We’re about to enter the fourth week. Negotiations between the mayor’s office and the union are getting overheated. Everyone is sweating over the details. The situation has become sticky. You see the problem? There is going to be a lingering smell no matter what the outcome. 

One has to be taken with the manner in which Torontonians are dealing with the circumstances. I am particularly impressed with the entrepreneurial spirit that has risen up. For example, there are the Internet services that are on “dumpster watch”. These alert private citizens of locations where a fat juicy and, even better, empty dumpster is lying ripe for a drop-off. But you have to keep your eye out. The authorities are everywhere.

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The weekend started off badly for me when Donna, my wife, announced she had purchased a couple of inflatable boats to take with us to the cottage. These were to help amuse two friends of Ted, our middle child, that we were bringing with us from Friday night through Sunday.

I hate rafts. They are the work of the devil. You’re always hearing about someone getting swept out to sea in one of these contraptions and drowning. Plus they spring leaks and need plastic patches. Once inflated, they are a devil − that word again − to lug around.

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Thanks for tuning in and paying attention to my ruminations since I started writing a Blog in February 2008. It’s been an interesting, exciting and fun time.

I’ve decided to mark this nearly year-and-a-half anniversary, which also happens to coincide with Canada Day (July 1), by considering a question that’s been intriguing me for some time.

Why are so many of the symbols of our nation sexual in nature?

Think about it.

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