Watching Anne of Green Gables

Watching one of the Anne of Green Gables movies, closer to the end of the series. She just walked back into Green Gables (the house) long after Matthew and Marilla have died and the house was empty for a long time. Made me cry along with her. I wish they could make more Anne movies, with Megan as the star.

And The Cat Came Back The Very Next Day

The Cat Came Back has been stuck in my head ever since I posted about the song on the CMF forum a day or so ago. I found the Canadian cartoon based on the old folk song. It was fun to watch too. Originally created by Cordell Barker who was nominated for an Oscar for The Cat Came Back.

Old Mister Johnson had troubles of his own
He had a yellow cat which wouldn't leave its home;
He tried and he tried to give the cat away,
He gave it to a man goin' far, far away.

But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn't stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea

The man around the corner swore he'd kill the cat on sight,
He loaded up his shotgun with nails and dynamite;
He waited and he waited for the cat to come around,
Ninety seven pieces of the man is all they found.

But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn't stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea

He gave it to a little boy with a dollar note,
Told him for to take it up the river in a boat;
They tied a rope around its neck, it must have weighed a pound
Now they drag the river for a little boy that's drowned.

But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn't stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea

He gave it to a man going up in a balloon,
He told him for to take it to the man in the moon;
The balloon came down about ninety miles away,
Where he is now, well I dare not say.

But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn't stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea

He gave it to a man going way out West,
Told him for to take it to the one he loved the best;
First the train hit the curve, then it jumped the rail,
Not a soul was left behind to tell the gruesome tale.

But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn't stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea

The cat it had some company one night out in the yard,
Someone threw a boot-jack, and they threw it mighty hard;
It caught the cat behind the ear, she thought it rather slight,
When along came a brick-bat and knocked the cat out of sight

But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn't stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea

Away across the ocean they did send the cat at last,
Vessel only out a day and making water fast;
People all began to pray, the boat began to toss,
A great big gust of wind came by and every soul was lost.

But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn't stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea

On a telegraph wire, sparrows sitting in a bunch,
The cat was feeling hungry, thought she'd like 'em for a lunch;
Climbing softly up the pole, and when she reached the top,
Put her foot upon the electric wire, which tied her in a knot.

But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn't stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea

The cat was a possessor of a family of its own,
With seven little kittens till there came a cyclone;
Blew the houses all apart and tossed the cat around,
The air was full of kittens, and not a one was ever found.

But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn't stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea

The atom bomb fell just the other day,
The H-Bomb fell in the very same way;
Russia went, England went, and then the U.S.A.
The human race was finished without a chance to pray.

But the cat came back the very next day,
The cat came back, we thought he was a goner
But the cat came back; it just couldn't stay away.
Away, away, yea, yea, yea

Effective Advertising for Canadians

There's a pretty effective ad. I came across this ad on the site for the York Region newspaper. Someone had sent me a link to follow to a story they had printed. Anyway, I was struck by that ad with the maple leaf falling down. I even went to the site for the Nature Conservancy.

Just Another Ordinary Miracle

I love that song. So many of Sarah McLachlan's songs are beautiful in that simple kind of way. Sometimes I wait for them to put out a 'best of' album cause I don't want to spend the money OR start another collection of any kind of stuff, including CDs or DVDs for music or movies. But, in this case I might see what I can find next time I'm in Zellers. Would be lovely to listen to her at home while I'm writing.

Sarah McLachlan - Ordinary Miracle Lyrics

It’s not that usual when everything is beautiful
It’s just another ordinary miracle today

The sky knows when its time to snow
You don’t need to teach a seed to grow
It’s just another ordinary miracle today

Life is like a gift they say
Wrapped up for you everyday
Open up and find a way
To give some of your own

Isn’t it remarkable?
Like every time a raindrop falls
It’s just another ordinary miracle today

Birds in winter have their fling
And always make it home by spring
It’s just another ordinary miracle today

When you wake up everyday
Please don’t throw your dreams away
Hold them close to your heart
Cause we are all a part
Of the ordinary miracle

Ordinary miracle
Do you want to see a miracle?

Its seems so exceptional
Things just work out after all
It’s just another ordinary miracle today

The sun comes up and shines so bright
It disappears again at night
It’s just another ordinary miracle today

It’s just another ordinary miracle today

Roll Up the Rim Online

For Canadians... You can roll up the rim online everyday on the Tim Horton's website.

The Canadian Book Challenge

Canadian Book Challenge. 2nd annual and it ends on Canada Day 2009.

The rules are simple: read 13 Canadian books (books by Canadians and/or about Canadians) before next Canada Day (That's July 1st for you non-Canadians in the audience). Make sure to blog about each one! Participants will have their name entered in for some kick-ass prizes. Well, not really. If you've ever seen a Canadian gameshow, you know we're not big on monetary rewards.

Canadian Idol: Earl

The Early Bird was the next to go this week. All the fun guys are gone, not much to watch now. Likely I will give a few votes to Mitch but it sure won't be the same show without Mookie and Earl to keep it moving. Seems kind of dead in the water now. Too bad when Bryan Adams is finally! coming to Canadian Idol (next week).

Good luck to Earl. Listen to his songs on MySpace if you want to hear him. One thing for sure, none of the other guys make everyone smile and laugh the way Early does. Though he looks like a goof there really is something great about Earl. If you smile at him you know he would always smile back.

Mookie Morris: Canadian Idol

Mookie Morris was eliminated from Canadian Idol this week. I did not expect him to be gone. He was my choice to be the Canadian Idol this year. So I'm surprised and disappointed. Some of the articles about the voting have said Toronto does not vote for the contestants from Toronto. I'm from Toronto originally and maybe it is true. I don't think much about where they are from when I vote. I just vote for those I like. I voted for Mookie, over and over. I really wish he was going to be on next week and the week after, right up to the end.

The Mookie Experience on MySpace.

Toronto's own Mookie Morris rocks Idol judges
July 21, 2008

Andrea Gordon

Mookie Morris, the easy-going baby in a brood of four, has always been called "the coolest Morris," says his sister Deirdre.

Three weeks ago, Canadian Idol judge Zack Werner called the 18-year-old singer "the coolest guy in the history of the show."

Quite a leap for a kid who started teaching himself to sing and play guitar four years ago, when a broken ankle put his elite AAA hockey season on hold.

Quite an inspiration for zillions of kids banging drums and plucking bass strings in basements all over the GTA.

Morris is one of the remaining nine Idol finalists, including fellow Torontonian Sebastian Pigott, who compete tonight to become one of the top eight.

"Yeah, it's kind of a lot to take in," Morris chuckled over the phone last week between rehearsals.

Nicknamed for former Blue Jay Mookie Wilson's game-winning hit the evening he was born, the teenager (whose real name is Peter) honed his performing skills in garage bands and battle-of the-bands gigs around Toronto. "I must have been in about 10, I can't even remember them all."

After his ankle injury, he gradually eased out of hockey but diverted that same intensity to his music.

His first band was Gong Show, back in Grade 8. They got their start at a concert fundraiser set up by his brother in university. Deirdre Morris, 23, remembers Mookie rocking the house with his version of "Twist and Shout." The college kids went crazy. A woman's undergarment was flung on the stage.

Four years later, when he performed that classic at an Idol audition, judge Jake Gold said: "I really do believe you are a star."

At Northern Secondary School, he was lead singer for Blind Sight, which attracted a loyal following to all-ages events at teen haunts like The Kathedral and Reilly's. He finished his last school credits at City Academy in January and has been devoted to writing music, playing and "just trying to grow up" since then.

He's registered for Concordia University in the fall, but says he'd rather end up following his musical dreams.

His mom, Julie Wang Morris, is still in shock. "These were kids who played in the garage!" she hollers over the phone. His dad plays piano and harmonica, she likes to sing and figures musical genes also came from her parents, who lived in a fishing village in Taiwan. Mookie, who she describes as "remarkably secure in himself," is her only musical child.

She was one of those moms with a minivan who ferried guitars and amplifiers and wannabe rock stars all over the city on Friday and Saturday nights. She was also one of those parents who wasn't too keen on the venues packed with pumped-up adolescents, questionable supervision, and lots of noise and body-slamming.

"I always worried," she says. "But it was their only choice if they wanted to play."

Guitarist Sean Fischer, 19, says Mookie is "a regular dude," kind of shy. "And then once he starts to sing, he completely transforms."

Over six-feet tall, dark-haired, brown-eyed and clad in punky blazers and Ts, his look inspired Idol judge Sass Jordan to once describe him as "Louis Armstrong meets Elvis Costello."

"He has phenomenal presence and soul – you can hear it in his voice," adds his bandmate, drummer Daniel Singer, 19. But audiences love him mostly because "he's true to himself."

That showed up in some of his unusual song choices for Canadian Idol.

Deirdre warned him against "Valerie" by British band The Zutons. Too obscure, she said.

He did it anyway. The judges loved it – it was what prompted Werner's "coolest guy" compliment. And judge Farley Flex praised his understanding of "who you are, why you're here and what you want to do."

"Now I just keep quiet," Dierdre says.

Last week was "a bit of a low point" though, as Mookie describes it. The response to his rendition of David Bowie's little-known "The Man Who Sold the World" didn't overwhelm. He and Pigott were both in the bottom three. The judges noted Toronto isn't voting.

His mom and sister took matters into their own hands. They produced 300 "Vote Mookie" lawn signs, hung a giant banner over a Yonge St. overpass in their neighbourhood. They've organized another "Mookie Night in Canada" tonight at a pub to watch and vote.

Mookie meantime, is revelling in it all, but in his typical laid-back style.

Sure, he wants to win. But his ultimate goal: "just to be happy in life . . . I want to just be able to do music as a job, you know, go on tour, travel the world and record."

Toronto Star

How Canucklehead are You?

I have 76%

Almost perfect - you are the 'Shat'. Named after William Shatner and that my friend is full of awesome. You are a worthy and proud Canucklehead, eh? You may enjoy a beer while watching Hockey Night in Canada. Cheers.

Manic Monday: Pride

Canada Day is July 1st.

Manic Monday

They Killed Nash!

I don't watch the soaps as much as I used to when I had night shifts. But, I still teared up when Nash died and today the sisters, Natalie and Jessica were dealing with the fallout. I didn't think they would really let Nash die when he fell through the skylight. What a shame. Jessica/ Tess and Nash made a great couple. Lots of fun to watch and I liked that both actors are Canadian. I hope Forbes March gets another science fiction series instead of another soap opera.

Bob Blumer - Glutton for Punishment

Bob Blumer - The Surreal Gourmet and Glutton for Punishment

There is no one quite like Bob Blumer. Down under they will always have The Crocodile Hunter, Steve Irwin. Here in Canada we have Bob Blumer, the Glutton for Punishment.

The Food Network has a Glutton for Punishment marathon on right now. I stayed in on my day off today to watch Bob.

Canadians Eh!

My Absent Mind posted this:

Canadian Eh!

So, What Do Canadians Have To Be Proud Of ?

1. Smarties(the real ones, with chocolate!)

2. Crispy Crunch, Coffee Crisp

3. The size of our footballs fields, one less down, and bigger balls.

4. Baseball is Canadian - First game June 4, 1838 - Ingersoll , ON

5. Lacrosse is Canadian

6. Hockey is Canadian

7. Basketball is Canadian

8. Apple pie is Canadian

9. Mr. Dress-up beats Mr. Rogers

10. Tim Hortons beats Dunkin' Donuts

11. In the war of 1812, started by America , Canadians pushed the Americans back...Past their 'White House'. Then we burned it...and most of Washington ..
We got bored.. Because they ran away, so we came home and partied...Go figure.

12. Canada has the largest French population that never surrendered to Germany .

13. We have the largest English population that never ever surrendered or Withdrew during any war to anyone, anywhere. EVER.

14. Our civil war was fought in a bar and it lasted a little over an hour.

15. The only person who was arrested in our civil war was an American Mercenary,who slept in and missed the whole thing...but showed up Just in time to get caught.

16. A Canadian invented Standard Time.

17. The Hudsons Bay Company once owned over 10% of the earth's Surface and is still around as the world's oldest company.

18. The average dog sled team can kill and devour a full grown human in under 3 minutes.

19. We still know what to do with all the parts of a buffalo.

20. We don't marry our kin-folk.

21. We invented ski-doos, jet-skis, Velcro, zippers, insulin, penicillin, zambonis, the telephone. And, short wave radios that save countless lives each year.

22. We ALL have frozen our tongues to something metal and lived to Tell about it.

23. A Canadian invented Superman.

24. We have coloured money.

25. Our beer advertisements kick ass
BUT MOST IMPORTANT!

24. The handles on our beer cases are big enough to fit your hands with mitts on. OOOoohhhhh Canada !!

25. And we don't bomb our allies. Oh yeah... And our elections only take one day.

Pass this on if you are proud to be Canadian!!!

I AM CANADIAN!!!

Canadians.... Be Counted!

Canadians! Count yourself in on the Facebook Canada versus US Challenge It's too bad you have to join Facebook to do it but if you are already there... add yourself to the fray!

Can the Canadian or the US group can get a million members first. No real point or reason to the whole thing.

The New US Dollar

The way the Canadian dollar is rising I think a US chain of department stores needs to come up with a new US dollar which people can bring up here and try to fool us with, as the new US dollar. Do you think it would work?

Another Maple Leaf Forever

 

This was on a soldier's grave.

Maple Leaf Forever

This stone maple leaf was part of a gravestone at the cemetery on Kingston Road and Woodbine.

Zach Lipovsky

I'm watching On the Lot, the reality show about film makers trying to win an opportunity with the big shots. There is one Canadian guy on the show and of course I'm wishing him luck. He seems to be doing well and his films so far are holding up well. So, good luck to Zack Lipovsky. I don't think Canadians can vote for a US show but we are voting in spirit.

Maple Leaves Background

This was an ad for the Robert Simpson Brewing Co. which was on our table when my Mom and I went out for breakfast last week. I loved the maple leaves so brought it back with me. Just spent a bit of time fiddling with it to make it into a web graphic. This is what I have so far. I'd like to do more and bring out more of the darker red shades.

The Canadian Anthem and Hockey Night in Canada

It's a shame that they only time you really hear the Canadian anthem sung any more is before a hockey game. I know I'm not the only person who watches hockey just to hear the beginning of the game when they sing the anthem. I tuned in CBC tonight. Not cause I know who is playing or know who any of them are or who is winning or how far into the season they are or who is out for injuries or who fights and how often. I only tuned in so I could hear the anthem. The CANADIAN anthem.

I miss hearing the anthem. I even miss that beer commercial, I Am CANADIAN. The second time I heard it and knew what was coming I really listened and it brought a tear to my eye. Canadians do have pride, national pride. Maybe not if you're from Quebec apparently since they seem to be forever wanting a referendum so they can rob the rest of Canada and then pretend to exist as their own country so they can tax every Canadian crossing their border. (Bloody ignorant Quebec politicians should be charged with treason!)

Did you know they don't sing the anthem at school any more? I can see them stopping the Lord's Prayer, not everyone is Christian now. However, we are all Canadian, we are here, in the same country? Why can't we have that old loyal tradition? Why did the government take away this show of national pride for young Canadians? It was wrong. Canadians like hearing our anthem. It makes us feel happy, proud and unified. Why should the Americans be the only country allowed to be proud of themselves without being told how arrogant they are? Let Canadians be arrogant bastards too. Let us shove our national anthem in all their faces. We Are CANADIAN. Hear us sing!