Author Archives: Rob MacD

Standards are a great thing. It’s comforting to know that when I go to Canadian Tire to get plumbing material to fix a toilet, for instance, that the flange I buy will be the same size as the flange I’m replacing.
But today, as I was sitting there, I started to wonder whether standards, at some point, begin to hold us back, developmentally speaking. How do we break free from the current set of standards and implement new, better machines that require a new set of standards?
The toilet, as it is today, is a pretty efficient machine. But could it be better? I suspect that it could. Yet I doubt anybody is investing much effort into making the toilet a better machine, because its design would likely involve the need to fundamentally change the standards we currently used. It would likely involve a total redesign of the flange? It would require us all to invest in this new toilet for our homes, and who wants to do that? The current toilet is good enough.
But is it? Who knows what exciting, innovative toilet designs and functions are in the designer’s brain? And what other facets of our lives are being standardized into complacency?

When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You know that your name is safe in their mouth. – Billy, age 4

Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other. – Karl, age 5

Love is what’s in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen. – Bobby, age 7

Love is when Mommy gives Daddy the best piece of chicken. – Elaine, age 6

When you love somebody, your eyelashes go up and down and little stars come out of you. – Karen, age 7

When I was growing up in Parkdale, our neighbourhood was, except for one girl, Norma, free of females of my approximate age. There were probably a dozen boys of my age. This made for a rather testosterone-fuelled environment. In fact, it was common to hear that the boys were going to go to Ginger McKay’s tractor junkyard and break some tractors, or that someone stole their mother’s smokes and people were going to meet at the back of the park (down by the manhole) to smoke them.

I say ‘common to hear’ because I seldom took part in such events. In fact, there were three of us, me and my two best friends, who chose not to go along with most of these deviant activities. As a result of our non-conformist decisions, we three were dubbed ‘The Fairy Gang’. I suppose if they were a more literate group, they’d have called us ‘The Faerie Gang’. This didn’t necessarily cause rifts or divisions amongst us, the kids of the neighbourhood. We all got along pretty well during times when they weren’t off causing havoc. We all played baseball, football together. We all played huge games of neighbourhood tag almost every summer night, and street hockey most every other night. We all got along well. It’s just that we three were sometimes referred to as “The Fairy Gang.”

Being upright and moral kids, we kind of embraced the handle, even though we understood the underlying implications. In fact, in later teenage years, when some of the kids upgraded their deviance to more serious vandalism and petty crime, there were some of the other kids who started hanging out more with us. They became unofficial members of The Fairy Gang.

One day, we were all playing football in the back field. It was the perfect field for playing football. A large rectangular, empty field of mowed grass that was contained within the center of our block. It was basically the field that was in back of everyone’s back yard. On this day, I was relegated to blocking and blitzing duty. I wasn’t pleased about this. I wanted to be a receiver, my usual position, but for some reason, I was blocking and blitzing.

Begrudging my position, I played half-heartedly, to the dismay of my team-mates. At one point, my lethargy and lack of effort caused me, instead of blitzing, to absent-mindedly pick up buttercups or dandelions. Of course, this behaviour was incongruous to a lineman on a football team, and it didn’t go unnoticed by Moe, the boy who was built like a tree trunk. He called me ‘Nature Boy’, and naturally, the nickname stuck.

So, here I am, Nature Boy of The Fairy Gang.

Just in case it happens, I want to be ready. I want to have my three wishes all set, phrased in such a way that the devil or the genie cannot find any loop-holes to trick me. I’d hate to wish, for instance, for ‘good health’ and then be stricken to a wheelchair, unable to use my legs, with the genie saying ‘good’ is a relative term. I want my wishes to be locked-solid; to be unmistakable. I want it to be absolutely clear what I’m wishing for, and absolutely clear what I’ll get for my wishes.

For this, I humbly ask for your free advice. I would be grateful if any of you would look through my wishes and offer any suggestions, additions, deletions to them, with the goal of making them legally clear.

My three wishes, in their most basic form, are this:
1) I wish that I will never have to worry about money.
2) I wish that I will have good health, until the day I die a peaceful death.
3) I wish that I will be creative, clever and coherent until the day I die.

I am not locked into these wishes either. If someone has suggestions for better wishes, please let me know.

I just want to be ready, you know, in case the situation arises.

When I was growing up in Parkdale, our neighbourhood was, except for one girl, Norma, free of females of my approximate age. There were probably a dozen boys of my age. This made for a rather testosterone-fuelled environment. In fact, it was common to hear that the boys were going to go to Ginger McKay’s tractor junkyard and break some tractors, or that someone stole their mother’s smokes and people were going to meet at the back of the park (down by the manhole) to smoke them.

I say ‘common to hear’ because I seldom took part in such events. In fact, there were three of us, me and my two best friends, who chose not to go along with most of these deviant activities. As a result of our non-conformist decisions, we three were dubbed ‘The Fairy Gang’. I suppose if they were a more literate group, they’d have called us ‘The Faerie Gang’. This didn’t necessarily cause rifts or divisions amongst us, the kids of the neighbourhood. We all got along pretty well during times when they weren’t off causing havoc. We all played baseball, football together. We all played huge games of neighbourhood tag almost every summer night, and street hockey most every other night. We all got along well. It’s just that we three were sometimes referred to as “The Fairy Gang.”

Being upright and moral kids, we kind of embraced the handle, even though we understood the underlying implications. In fact, in later teenage years, when some of the kids upgraded their deviance to more serious vandalism and petty crime, there were some of the other kids who started hanging out more with us. They became unofficial members of The Fairy Gang.

One day, we were all playing football in the back field. It was the perfect field for playing football. A large rectangular, empty field of mowed grass that was contained within the center of our block. It was basically the field that was in back of everyone’s back yard. On this day, I was relegated to blocking and blitzing duty. I wasn’t pleased about this. I wanted to be a receiver, my usual position, but for some reason, I was blocking and blitzing.

Begrudging my position, I played half-heartedly, to the dismay of my team-mates. At one point, my lethargy and lack of effort caused me, instead of blitzing, to absent-mindedly pick up buttercups or dandelions. Of course, this behaviour was incongruous to a lineman on a football team, and it didn’t go unnoticed by Moe, the boy who was built like a tree trunk. He called me ‘Nature Boy’, and naturally, the nickname stuck.

So, here I am, Nature Boy of The Fairy Gang.

Unleash the drummer in you with this virtual drum kit.

A friend pointed out to me, in a rather off-handed way, that lately some people, seemingly of the Jewish faith seem to have a vested interest in Christmas. There are a handful of Jewish performers, notably Kathie Lee Gifford and Barbara Streisand, who’ve released Christmas albums. I assume David Berenbaum, who wrote the screenplay for “Elf” is Jewish. When this was pointed out to me, I didn’t really give it much thought.

And then, last night, I was watching TV and there was a commercial for Kay Diamonds. In it, a man whom I assume is Jewish (admittedly I assume this only because he has some of the physical attributes stereotypically associated with Jews) asks his girlfriend if she believes in Santa Claus. She says ‘Yes’ then he says: “He helped me pick this out” and gives her a diamond necklace in a jewellery-box.

I don’t put any weight or criticism on this, other than I just find it somewhat odd. Then again, I don’t believe in the Christian religion and yet I enjoy celebrating the season. I’ll have an album coming out shortly.

I’ve always been envious of those people who can comfortably cross their legs when they’re sitting down. Those with the long, Jimmy Stewart-thin pegs that fit together so well, one atop the other, knee above knee, top leg dangling all loosey-goosey.
Me, I’m blessed with a couple of work-horse legs, the trunks you call on when you need an anchor for the tug-of-war. I have the thighs of an ass. When I cross my legs, there’s no dangling limbs, no looseness at all. It’s all about contained pressure. The energy consumed to keep the top leg crossed over the bottom is enormous and barely worth the bother. There it trembles and quivers, the right ankle perched at right angle on the left knee, gravity thrusting its constant force down, down, down on the right knee which hovers over nothingness, unsupported. A coiled weapon, ready to be unfurled and sprung upon the unsuspecting, held back only by sheer force of will.
There’s no comfort in that friends.