Canadian, Eh? Sorry Aboot That.

Here's another column I wrote for the Scribe. I got the idea when we had a completely inane discussion about whether or not a Canadian counted as a foreigner.

Canada gave us Celine Dion. Just to make it fair again, I think we should give them a few things in return, like our healthcare system, our violent crime rate, our education system and a big ol’ sack of crap. Recently in the Scribe’s office, I heard someone say that being Canadian is not “foreign enough.” I couldn’t disagree more.

People generally think of Canada as merely an extension of Minnesota, but with more French cuisine. I don’t think that’s fair to Minnesota. Or Canada. It’s a completely different country; they do some things very differently from the way we do them. So without the interest of international harmony in mind, I’ve compiled a list of reasons why America is, like, a billion times better than Canada.

The first reason is obvious: Mexican food. Our proximity to our friends to the south affords us some awesome food. Some people (most of them from Texas) think that we actually make better Mexican food than Mexico does. I don’t know about that, but I know for sure that you can’t get a decent tamale in Toronto.

Reason number two: morbidly obese people. I know what you’re thinking. “How could you possibly consider morbid obesity to be a good thing?” That’s easy; the fat ones make the rest of us feel better about ourselves. Oh, and they also keep kindhearted American businesses like McDonald’s and Krispy Kreme in business. That’s good for our economy, or something.

My third reason is quite simple. We know how to correctly pronounce the word “about.” All those Canadian hosers walk around pronouncing it “aboot” like an entire country full of illiterate hockey freaks. Hey, that reminds me of my next point.

In the last summer Olympic games, the United States won 103 medals. Canada won 12. That’s right. The state of Texas itself earned more gold medals than the combined number of all the
gold, silver and bronze medals won by our Labatt-Blue-drinking buddies up north.

There is one area in which I think I’d be morally remiss if I didn’t give proper credit to Canada, and that is comedy. Canada is, for my money, the funniest nation per capita in the world. Think about it. Dan Aykroyd, Jim Carrey, John Candy, Tommy Chong, Phil Hartman, Martin Short, Eugene Levy, Mike Myers, Dave Thomas, Will Sasso and Rick Moranis are all famous comedians and comedic actors. For a nation with a population of about forty, that’s a high funny-to-not-funny ratio. And that list was just off the top of my head.

I’ve developed a theory about this strange phenomenon of funny people coming from Canada. I think it develops in Canadian children at an early age when they discover that there’s nothing to do there but play hockey and pay taxes. In order to keep from going insane with boredom, they have to have a sense of humor. Otherwise, they’ll end up getting cabin fever and resorting to bestiality for fun.

Sadly, that last point only reminds me of yet another advantage we have over Canada. We have celebrities who actually live here. All the big-name celebrities from Canada have moved down to California. They realize that while it may be cool to be from Canada, it’s definitely not as cool to be living in Canada.

In conclusion, I think it’s pretty obvious who has the better country. Sure, we may have a staggering crime rate, and our citizenry may be very poorly educated, and I guess the smog problem in most major cities is kind of annoying, but dammit, at least we’ve got our trillions of dollars, our enourmous portions of food and our smug, holier-than-thou attitude. You can’t quantify something like that. Suck it, hosers.

Global Warming: We Should Be So Lucky

Here's my latest column from the Scribe (actually, it hasn't even been printed yet. Aren't you lucky?):

With all the partisan bickering over global warming, some people simply refuse to raise the issue in public for fear of causing a swell of politically slanted name-calling.

I, for one, love to see and hear people argue, so I’m submitting this column in hopes that I’ll get to see a Bush-voting, NASCAR-watching, racist, fascist Republican get into a fistfight with a hippie, non-bathing, baby-aborting, war-protesting, cowardly Democrat. That would just make my day.

It seems as though everyone is too busy debating over whether or not the globe is, in fact, warming, and they’re not nearly as sharply focused on a much more basic issue: So what? Before we get all angry and start throwing punches at each other, shouldn’t we first examine the issue of whether or not we give a crap about a warmer environment?

OK, so maybe what I just said wasn’t exactly “politically correct,” or whatever, but I think it’s an important question, nonetheless. I posit that global warming can actually be a good thing.

Now before you stop reading, I’d like to remind you to please keep an open mind.

Let’s think about the long-term effects of global warming. The first is obvious: warmer weather. Who doesn’t like wearing shorts? No one, that’s who. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m not too crazy about the cold weather we’d been having a couple weeks ago. It’s been nice lately. I love walking around barefoot, and I can’t do that when there’s a risk of my feet freezing directly to the ground. Thank you, global warming.

Another supposedly “bad” effect of global warming would be a rise in ocean water. That’s a good thing, too. Think about it. As the saying goes, “Buy land; they aren’t making any more of it.”

If the ocean were to swallow up a bunch of land along our coastline, then it makes the remaining land just a little bit more valuable. Plus, it’s a well-known fact that most people who live near the coasts are cheaters and rapists. Why would anyone want to allow a rapist to live in a nice beach house?

People will be so excited about the increase in their property value, they won’t have time to grieve for the loss of a few pretentious beach houses.

Everyone who wasn’t wealthy enough to own beachfront property will eventually get their own piece of slightly-more-valuable land. Sounds like a good thing to me. Maybe all those rich people with their fancy cars and indentured servants will get to eat their own great big piece of humble pie when their snooty, well-lit homes are swallowed by the unforgiving sea.

Yet another effect of global warming is the loss of certain species of animals whose homes, the barren wastelands on the north and south poles, will be ravaged by melting polar ice. Boo-hoo. If you’re an animal and your delicious carcass can’t be served at a fast food restaurant with some sort of dipping sauce, then I don’t care if you live or die.

Here’s something to think about: maybe instead of building more hybrid vehicles (whose batteries are quite bad for the environment and are made from aborted fetuses), we should all be spraying aerosol cans into the air, running our SUVs 24 hours a day, barbecuing for dinner every night, burning Styrofoam cups and looking for penguins to kill and fry.

Those are just the first steps toward a brave new world filled with nonstop beach parties, homeless millionaires, cities that are actually hospitable in the winter, things to do in Canada other than ice fishing, no more rapists, Siberians who love us and a new restaurant chain called Kentucky Fried Penguin.

That sounds like heaven to me. That’s the America I want to live in. I’m gonna go barbecue something.