50 Reasons Why Canada Can Pretty Much Go Fuck Itself, Four on the Floor

Thursday, Oct. 30th: Four on the Floor: #19-#10
By Merton Sussex, Unrepentant Bastard

Welcome back my friends, to the show that never ends. We're so glad you could attend, come inside, come inside. Part IV of my great big middle finger to our neighbors to the north is commencing apace. Just don't slip in the puddles of bile, because I'm not about to go to the trouble of putting up the "Caution: Wet Floors" sign for the likes of you.

19) Canadian Pennies. Question - What's the only thing more annoying than pennies? Answer: Motherlicking CANADIAN pennies. FUCK. Leave it to goddamn Canada to take something that's already abjectly worthless, and somehow make it even worse.

American pennies are already so useless that there might as well be Sam's Club-sized mayonnaise jars next to practically every cash register in the country for people to throw them into at the end of their transaction. Sure, it might SAY "Take a penny, leave a penny" on the side, but nobody's picking any up. American pennies are so without value that the government actually loses money minting them. The fucking eighth of a micron of copper on the outside is worth more melted down than exchanged for face value. When I clean my house, I actually throw the filthy things away. If you plan on leaving them for a tip in a restaurant, you'd better have a short, clear path to the door. BUMS won't even take them.

BUT.

In theory...pennies are still legal tender. You can still sort of spend them if you hoard them like a hermit long enough. At least on paper, you can dig out the hand-truck, wheel your 55-gallon drum to the CoinStar at the supermarket, and maybe come away with enough actual lucre to buy yourself a lunch that doesn't get passed to you through your drivers' side window.

But Canadian pennies?!? Ever get one back in change? Don't you just want to chuck that leafy, contemptible little son of a bitch as far away as you can throw it the second it hits your skin? And forget about trying to SPEND one. If the cashier catches it, and trust me, he or she probably will, don't be surprised if they regard it with the same contempt as they would a wad of blood-streaked tissue you had just finished rubbing slowly up and down the inside of the hairy, sweat-funky crack of your ass while softly humming the theme from "Mission: Impossible."

18) Avril Lavigne. OOOOH, how I hate you. I hate your stupid necktie and wifebeater. I hate the fact that your caked-on eyeliner makes every raccoon in a three-block radius come running up to try to hump your leg every time you stop moving for more than eleven seconds. I hate your brainless, insipid "songs"with their sub-6th-grade-poetry-class lyrics, and music that rips off actual artists. I hate the fact that you try to be all fake-attitude, pseudo-"punk" when you're actually so harmlessly prefab that the fucking GHOST of Dee Dee Ramone could snap your neck from across a room without even getting within 10 feet of you. I hate the fact that you buy into your own bullshit, and legitimately believe you're the greatest thing since floating soap when you actually have all of the depth of a goddamned Frisbee. I hate your fucking snaggle teeth, pointy nose and nonexistent chin. I hate the fact that you actually have the gall to claim to be a "fashion designer" and an "actress" just because you've got enough money to be able to sign your name to other people's work, and to hire an agent without investing the effort to put in the discipline.

But most of all, I hate your fucking fork-on-a-blackboard, eardrum-assaulting excuse for a voice. Seriously. Whoever told you you could sing needs to get tied down, and then have their nipples sawed off with a rusty steak knife. Slowly. Even with as much studio polish as they put on what passes for your singing, you still sound like someone receiving electroshock therapy while simultaneously trying to feed a burlap sack full of feral cats into a chipper-shredder with a bad timing belt. Please, PLEASE just go away.

17) Montreal's Olympic Stadium. The very creatively-named Olympic Stadium was built in order to be the primary competition venue for the 1976 Olympics in Montreal. It was conceived as a grandiose, sweeping structure with a revolutionary retractable roof, majestic buttressed cantilevers, and a gigantic, phallic tower, thrusting upward into the sky with laughably cartoonish mock virility. There was just one problem:

It didn't fucking work.

The genius team of architects and engineers that cooked up this gigantic turkey bit off far more than they could chew by about seven mouthfuls. First, the poor widdle construction workers who were supposed to be putting the fucking thing together weren't getting enough nap breaks, or something, so they went on strike....While it was in the middle of being built. Really. As a result, when the opening ceremonies kicked things off, the stadium was only half-finished. Oopsie! Not only wasn't the tower completed, but the retractable roof was sitting in a warehouse in France. It's okay, though...Because they had them finished and in place in time for the closing ceremony.

HA! Just kidding! The roof actually sat in that French warehouse until 1982. Of course, once it shipped, they slapped that bitch right on and called it a day. Whoo! Fucking with you again! The tower and roof weren't actually installed until 1987. No biggie, though. I'm all about cutting 'em some slack. They only missed their deadline by eleven fucking years.

But wait...It gets better. The roof was finally put in PLACE in '87, but it didn't actually operate properly until a year later. And even then, "properly" is a relative assessment, because it leaked worse than Scooter Libby, moved slower than the second coming of Christ, and froze up altogether in winds 25mph or over...which also tore the Kevlar shielding on the outside into ribbons. That's Kevlar. Y'know...Kevlar? The stuff they put into bullet-proof vests? That. Canadians are such fuck-ups that when THEY use it, a stiff breeze turns it into confetti.

But that's still not the end of the story. Because when all was said and done, the continual delays, repairs, strikes, and cost overruns on the project inflated the final price tag to $1.61 BILLION dollars, an increase of over 1,200% above the original budget estimate. In fact, the stadium project was so expensive that it plunged the entire city of Montreal into such ridiculous depths of debt that they didn't finish paying it off until motherfucking 2006. Best of all, 2006 was a full two years after the stadium's primary tenant, the Montreal Expos, had skipped town to became the Washington Nationals.

These days, it sits completely empty, a bloated, tarnished, money-pit metaphor-slash-cautionary tale about what happens when people as inept as Canadians try to hang with the big boys on the global landscape: They get fucked so hard, their GRANDKIDS get the clap. The irony that a building that looks so much like a giant penis ultimately came to represent the futile, impotent failure of an entire nation is totally lost on Canada because, as we've already established, they don't know the meaning of the word "irony."

16) The Canadian Flag. For chrissakes, LOOK at it. It looks like something you'd wipe up vomit with. If that was a Rorschach blot, I'd say, "Um...it's the bed sheet from the morning a teenage girl wakes up a woman." Canada has the single pussiest flag of any country in the world. Other countries, no matter how insignificant, make pretty good use of color and iconography, using things like crests, stars, shields and stylized kick-ass animals. Canada...has a leaf. A fucking LEAF. That's really the best they could do? We get it, you have trees, and I guess you feel as though that makes you unique, somehow. What, was the daffodil not available? Did the pansies refuse the contract? Couldn't the artist draw a limp wrist, a pack of Virginia Slims and a Judy Garland album?

In Canada, they put it a leaf on the flag. Here, we rake it into the gutter and leave it there for the street-sweeper.

15) Pamela Anderson. Of course, she really needs no introduction. If you have genitals, chances are you've touched them inappropriately at least once while thinking about her. Man or woman, doesn't matter. She sort of transcends the barriers of such common, base concepts as "sexual orientation."

In her lifespan thus far, Pammy has pretty much hit every single benchmark of excellence a world-class bombshell needs to in order to be taken seriously. Playboy spreads? Check. Cheesy acting career? Check. Fucks a lot of rock stars? Check. Sex tape? Oh GOD, check. In fact, the only thing she DIDN'T get around to was dying young. And dammit, even though she's 41 and has crow's feet that could hold a 3-day rain, there's STILL not a man alive that wouldn't pony up a week's earnings for a crack at launching their heat-seeking meat-missle on a deep-cover mission into Pam's TunaTown tunnel, if for no other reason than to be able to say they did. Shit, even gay dudes have to admit they'd at least launch an enthusiastic load onto her big, fake Tupper-Tits if you really put 'em on the spot.

A genuine, world-changing, bar-raising sex symbol comes along once per generation if you're lucky. In-their-day goddesses like Rita Hayworth, Marilyn Monroe and Farrah Fawcett don't just grow on trees...But they were still as American as credit card debt. However, it just so happens that Pam sprang forth from the dewy, fragrant wilds of British Columbia. So fuck the B.C. for drawing the long straw on the lottery this round, and breaking our streak. They didn't deserve it. So watch your backs, punks.

14) The Canadian Football League. Quick! Without Googling, name the teams that played in the championship game last year! Okay, name ONE of them. Alright, fine. Name any team in the fucking league. *Sigh*...Okay! I'll settle for you telling me what the trophy is called. Did you even know there WAS a "CFL" until I told you? Yeah, that's what I thought.

Just like most Canadian "versions" of our stuff, their football league is nothing but a pale, pathetic echo of what they're attempting to emulate. To give you some idea of how sad the CFL is, Canada's TSN channel (their weak-sauce version of ESPN) recently conducted a survey to determine the 50 best CFL players of all time, and coming in at #1 was...Doug Flutie. Yeah, THAT Doug Flutie...The puny twit who got traded around the NFL like a crotch-fungus, ultimately stinking up more home-team locker rooms than BenGay.

This is how low the expectations are set in the CFL...You can be the #1 player of all time, and it's still a largely hollow victory, because you're a joke by any normal standard. Y'know...kind of like being named Valedictorian of the "Special" school. In fact, the only reason the CFL even still exists is because Flutie keeps their panties good and moist by dropping hints that he might toss aside his walker, slip on some orthopedic cleats, and stage a comeback someday.

Shit...If he waits another year, he probably won't even need the tooth-guard any more.

13) Howie Mandel. Howie Mandel is ostensibly a "comedian," even though he's about as funny as a school-bus fire. In twenty-five years, his career has progressed from from playing an irritating spastic weirdo on the non-comedy show St. Elsewhere, to being his irritating, spastic, weirdo self hosting the non-comedy show Deal or No Deal. Hooray for progress!

I guess when the producers came up with the idea for a competition show that didn't involve skill, brains, reflexes, or talent, they needed a host who also had none of these things. For chrissakes, the whole fucking game is pointing out suitcases and hoping for the best. A fucking chimp could literally play this game with about the same success rate as the actual contestants do. So, why not hire a chimp to host it, too?

Oh, and make sure it's a chimp with OCD who refuses to shake hands because he's afraid that a few dozen of the quadrillions of microbes on another person's skin might find their way onto him, and start having dirty, microscopic sex with HIS quadrillions of microbes. THAT won't be weird. And on top of that, I know the pube-y curls he used to have were probably falling out on their own anyway, but the head-shaving thing weirds me out. You'd still think a guy who first shot to prominence from putting rubber gloves on his head might try looking LESS like an oversize walking penis as he gets older.

12) The CN Tower. Speaking of cocks...

Much like Olympic Stadium in Montreal, the CN Tower in Toronto was seemingly conceived, designed, and built for no discernible purpose other than to try to help Canada get over its understandable inferiority complex via the magic of architectural overcompensation. It's pretty much just a big 1,815-foot spire, standing turgidly just off the coast of Lake Ontario, waving itself around like a Viagra overdose and screaming "check THIS out!" while gesturing lewdly at its own tumescence.

Sure, they stuck some radio antennas on it, and put in a gift shop and shit in an attempt to retroactively justify its existence, but it's still pretty much just a big erection. One that Toronto has enjoyed rubbing in the face of the world since 1975. Yep...Canada's been pretty pleased with itself for being the global equivalent of that pimply, doughy kid you went to school with who picked his nose a lot, smelled like Gouda, and was never realistically going to amount to much...but who was still the undisputed king of the eighth-grade gym shower once the towels hit the tile.

Or, at least it WAS until late '07, when the Burj Dubai (a mixed-use structure in the United Arab Emirates) passed it up as the world's tallest freestanding man-made structure....even though it's even not finished yet. They're still building it, but even the unfinished project-in-progress is currently taller. When completed, the Burj will stand an estimated 2,684 feet. At that point, it will have have bested the CN by a whopping 870 feet...Or, roughly 10 feet more than the height of the entire Trump World Tower in lower Manhattan. The Freudian implications inherent in a prudishly uptight strict Muslim country (one that almost tossed a British woman caught having sex outdoors into jail for six years) actively whipping out the biggest, veiniest, most throbbingly purple-headed architectural one-eyed yogurt-slinger on the planet are best left un-chewed-on. Even so...Canada's been knocked down to #2...Or, as your high-school track coach used to refer to it, "the first loser."

11) Salé & Pelletier. Even now, the debate rages on. Figure Skating...Art, or sport? The problem is, that's a black-and-white question that fails to acknowledge a likely third option: That maybe it's just a bunch of frilly, sequin-spangled-spandex bullshit filled to near-bursting with horrible music, sprained ankles and repressed homosexuality. Hey, let's be honest: If you can turn down the commentators and STILL tell the difference between a lutz, an axel, and a salchow...? It's time to have a tough conversation with yourself. Maybe go shopping for some leather chaps, and a Pomeranian.

So, figure skating is a viable (albeit flamboyantly panty-waisted) option for the cold-climate nancies who don't have the sack for hockey, but still have a deep, burning desire to strap on some skates and freeze their gonads off. And speaking of gonads...The best-known Canadian figure skaters in the world are still these two shameless crybaby fucks. Too bad they're famous for all the wrong reasons.

You remember. They're the pair of pussies who whined and pouted and pitched a bitch during the '02 Salt Lake City games after their self-superior notions of entitlement failed to result in their receiving the pair of gold medals they simply wouldn't accept less than, nor go home without. To be fair, they had by all estimates admittedly skated a great program. One good enough that the spectators and commentators in attendance seemed to feel they'd more or less sealed up the top platform on the podium, and they weren't shy about saying so. But when the scores were tallied, the Russians had edged them out by a margin slimmer than Kiera Knightley on crystal meth. Naturally, this didn't sit too well with them, and they proceeded to launch a pity party the likes of which the world had never seen before, and has not seen since.

Well, boo-hoo, you ridiculous cunts. Looks like you'll have to settle for silver. You'll have to find some way to live with only being better than 99.999999999% of the rest of the world. Unless, that is, the Olympic Commission buckles like a belt, and gives you what you want in order to shut you up. Breaks down and placates you in order to keep you from continuing to weep big, fat crocodile tears to the world press about how much BETTER than the Russians you were, and how much YOU should have won, and how deeply UNFAIR the whole thing was.

Which, of course, is exactly what happened. The committee folded, and rewarded their terrible behavior. The Canucks got a pair of nice, shiny gold medals to take home, just like the Russians got. For their part, the Russians (though good-natured about the outcome and FAR more gracious than I would have been in the same situation) had to live with their accomplishment being cheapened by the inexcusably juvenile antics of the Canadians, even though they'd done nothing wrong. Some prize.

The Olympics are supposed to be a peaceful summit of the globe's greatest athletes, getting together to compete on a level playing field in the spirit of achievement and camaraderie, and setting a world-class example through good sportsmanship. But in 2002, a different message got sent: Kick and scream until you're blue in the face if your mommy doesn't stop the car and buy you the candy bar you didn't earn and don't deserve. Lovely. What excellent role models you were! I hope you both go to sleep at night with empty hearts, knowing what frauds you are, feeling perpetually ashamed for daring to turn up your classless, spoiled-rotten little noses at the silver medals thousands will never even get their shot at. But I'm not gonna hold my breath.

10) Rush. Hey, guys? I have an idea. Let's start a band! But not a ROCK band...HELL, no. BO-RING! I don't want to do songs people can dance to, sing along with, relate to on any level, or really even understand. I want to do bizarre, overblown songs about wizards, dog-creatures and frozen wastelands. Y'know, real concept-heavy shit full of obtuse, ham-fisted metaphors and half-baked pseudo-fantasy imagery that goes nowhere and means zero.

Wait...you haven't heard the best part yet! I'll SING those words in a screechy, nasally-ululating feminine warble over geeky, inaccessible, jerky math-rock full of soullessly mechanical time signatures from Mars! There'll be a ludicrous abundance of wanky, subdivided, atonal non-melodic noodling that conforms to no known musical structure, and we'll have to constantly count to seven-and-a-half in our heads...Unless we're counting to fifteen and three-quarters. And all that's gonna happen in the span of one 17-minute long song, of which we'll have dozens.

We'll be a smash! Everyone will be too afraid of looking stupid to admit that they don't really get it, or even like it at all...But we'll have all the Tolkien junkies and frustrated musicians standing there in little come-puddles...jaws slack and eyes glassy, eating out of our hands like parakeets! We'll be able to keep it up for YEARS, right? Huh? Is that GREAT, or what? Whaddaya say? Guys...? Hey...Hey, GUYS?!? Where are you going?!?

Guys...?

*************

Wow. This has been a fun week. Of course, the best (or, depending on your perspective, WORST) is still to come...So be sure to tune in tomorrow to catch the final round.

Until then, try not to get run over.