There Can Be NO Debate....

None.
None at all.

Just TRY to tell me that there is a more famous band or musician, ever, than The Beatles.

Go ahead. Try.

But you'd be wrong.

Now, usually I am able to have a conversation of give and take, one where I offer my opinion, make my strongest argument, but take the feedback I am presented with and consider all the facts. If I've been particularly stubborn I might even go away and think awhile and then come back with a concession or two. Maybe even the "You were Right and I was Wrong and Now I Have to Sing a Song" song and an apology.

But not this time. Uh-unh. No way.

The Beatles are, hands down, no argument, the best and most famous band of all time.

Fact: More than 40 number one hits. That is only as the collective. That says nothing of the solo albums produced before and after the break-up of 1970. It says nothing of Wings or The Traveling Wilburys or Imagine.
Fact: 74 MILLION viewers watched them that first time they appeared on Ed Sullivan on February 9, 1964.
Fact: 6 full-length studio albums in 5 years, from 1960-1965. And 15 in the span of only 8 years. No wonder they burnt out in a decade.

There is still new merchandise produced with The Beatles likenesses, from all eras of their fabulous career. In September of this year a video game called Rock Band will be released, based on The Fab Four.

There are hundreds of video grabs posted on You Tube of them as The Beatles, of each of them separately, and of their various weavings in and out of each other's music. There are also scenes of their many films, and it appears, tons of old super 8 footage that someone has got their hands on and put up.

There are countless DVD's. They still have an active webpage and ALL 4 members have their own website in their name.

Yes, people, they are THE most famous band of all time.

But you want to know why ELSE I know this?

Because my 7 year old knows almost all of their music. Sarah knows who Richard Starkey is and that Paul McCartney is a "Sir". She knows that John Lennon and George Harrison have "perished" (her word for died), and that Paul is still handsome even though he is now a Grandpa. She knows about the 5th Beatle, even though she can't say who that is (and I don't think anyone else can either, though there is tons of debate. Was it Pete Best? Was it Phil Epstein? Was it George Martin? Is that another blog? Probably!). She knows that one of my favourite songs of all time is Eleanor Rigby, and she will not get out of bed weekday mornings before hearing "The Beatles for Breakfast" on our local Classic Rock station Q107. Which also has a "Beatles Break" which tickles Sarah no end.

And now, this same 7 year old, is doing her first school project on The Most Famous Band of All Time. And I have permitted her to say as much. Because it's a fact I believe unequivocally.

Want to argue with me about it? I could go all day?

Okay - you're entitled to your opinion. You are. But this one time, just this once, you've got to admit:

The Beatles are the best group of all time.
Okay?

Really, it's not that unusual.

Yep, ladies and gentlemen, it's snowing out there.

Supposed to snow for three solid days.

People are freaking out. People are depressed. People feel betrayed.

But really, it's just not that unusual.

I remember when niece Kelsey was born on April 22, 1991. Mom and I drove up the 410 in the wee hours of the morning and had a laugh because it seemed that every time we drove that route to be present for the birth of my sister's child, it snowed. Yes, it was snowing on April 22. And cold. After Kelsey was born we stood outside in the parking lot talking to her Dad Tom and we froze. I wished I had gloves. It was disgusting.

I also remember that first Jay's game. I remember that it snowed. Seen lots of images over the year of trying to find a white ball on a white outfield. How during points of the game the cameras couldn't even pick up the players in the outfield. Nuts.

And at the same time, there's always a last gasp, isn't there? JUST as we think we're past it. Just as we think we can take the snowtires off the car or put the boots into the back of the closet, bang! It gets us.

Carina says it is mother nature's late April fool's joke on us. That's a good way of putting it.

So it's Monday, which is bad enough. And it's cold, which we're all tired of. And NOW it's snowing on top of that.

Yuck.

But don't be shocked. Stranger things have happened. And with luck, this week WILL be Mother Nature's last gasp at the snow thing. And then we can FINALLY move on to Spring. And the promises therein.

With luck.

Have a good day all. Keep warm. And drive carefully.

Finally Blogging About Lost

All this time I have been blogging, I have managed to avoid the whole subject of that greatest of shows Lost. There are many reasons for this, not the least of which is that there are excellent theorists out there with incredibly intelligent and thought-provoking blogs. So why muddy the waters?

Well, finally I feel like I must speak. Not because something happened that makes me have to speak out, but because I guess I feel that I 'thought' the show was going in one direction, and Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindeloff pulled a 180 on us! Me. Me personally.

If you haven't seen the show lately and you don't want to know, read no further. In "talking the thing out", I am going to be frank and likely slightly spoilerific.

So.

Here we are approaching the big ramp up to the season 5 finale. The producers (Cuse, Lindeloff) have already named an end date of May 2010 for the end of the show. They did this last year at the end of the writer's strike, and when ratings were at an all-time low, and possibly at the start of the recession. Lost is a pricey show to produce.

I don't want to suggest that Lost has low ratings. It certainly is a very successful show. But for it's price, being shot in Hawaii, all those sets and extras and props and effects, it was getting costly. So Cuse and Lindeloff said, okay, we need 28 more episodes to tell this story and bring it to a satisfactory close. They were given the green light by home network ABC.

And the show picked up speed.

There were still character-centric episodes, but not one after another the way they once had been. The episodes seemed driven to telling the necessary details, like why Sayid is the way he is, why Kate kept Aaron for three years and then arrived at the decision to give him to his grandmother and return to the Island, like why Sawyer defends the Dharma Initiative now.

And the rest was the "Lost Lore", answering all those burning questions we've died to know these past 4 years. And we're getting our answers now. They're coming. Slowly leaking out like a painfully slow leak in a life raft.

First thing's first. Everyone wonders why Sawyer isn't as protective of his returning Losties as he should be. Everyone seems to forget that he only knew those people 108 days. Sure that shaped things to come, but he's been living la vida loca now for three solid years; found love and a life of respect and honesty. He's grown up. He's happy. So no freaken wonder the guy went WTF when they came back. I would too. And now we know that it is their return that is the thing that screws everything up. If they'd stayed away it would be fine. But no. They came back and started a cycle of events that it seems to me unravels the entire thing. THEY are the reason Ben Linus is eeeeevil with 5 e's.

So Sawyer and Juliet have my sympathies. Which is strange. Because until this last episode, I was for Jack. Not now. Unwitting though it might have been, Jack's refusal to operate on Little Ben is what drives Kate to take Ben to The Others. I know he didn't mean to, but he did. And that is what causes everything they've all been through for the last 4 years of their lives.

The only question is, what role does Christian Sheppard play in all of this? Clearly his body got smokey-ized, probably same with Claire and a good number of "the others". But why was it so important for him to get Jack back there to create such havoc? Maybe Widmore IS a truly bad dude. Shucks anyway. I wanted to be right about something.

But Cuse and Lindeloff have it in for me. Every single time I have come up with a theory I thought was strong and potential, they've done the whole Neslon Muntz "nahh-haaa" thing to me and left me feeling completely deflated. So now I have no idea. None. And it isn't sitting well with me. Because the rosy end to this saga, the end where people live happily ever after, I'm thinking was a utopia I built up in my head and it doesn't exist.

I've always thought Jack and Sayid to be the ultimate heroes of the show, despite being the most blemished and needing the most rehabilitation from past sins. But seems that it is Sawyer was destined for this. Spent 4 years being cynical, bitter, and slightly sneaky. Now it's him that can potentially save the world. Not my chosen heroes. Those guys are as faulty as the day the show premiered in 2004. And I am mourning this fact. Because I WANTED them to be redeemed. I wanted them to end up happy and fulfilled. But how can they now? Sayid shot a child. He drives Ben to The Others, back handedly. Richard Alpert said his innocense is gone. Sayid can't be redeemed now. Not knowing what Ben ends up growing up to do.

Same with Jack. He's trying, lord he's trying, to be careful not to do anything that backfires. And yet, there it is. He just did it. He did the one thing he was trying precisely to avoid. And once he knows it, he SHOULD be suicidal (again). He's as culpable as Sayid.

Diane made the point that they all end up having culpability in it. Kate, Sawyer, Jin, Juliet. All take part in driving Ben to Richard Alpert. None of them are willing to let him just die. True. But it wasn't any of them CAUSED Ben to need to be taken to The Temple.

So now I am completely turned around. Now I am wondering ever so slightly what the point is. They've come back and screwed up Sawyer and Juliet's utopia. They've turned Ben into the eeeeevil guy he'll forever be. They've made a mockery out of everything they were trying gallantly to do and be. And now none of them will be happy.

'Cause Phil the Security Guy has been hanging in the wings, noticing something reeks of the fishing docks at the end of a hot day. He's gettin' ready to pounce, which suggests to me a bad end for someone I care about.

I dunno. I've always ridden this roller coaster which is Lost, and I always will. I am in it until the end - so invested that nothing can drive me away. But I am feeling insecure about it at the moment. I am not sure I'm going to like it when the end comes. And I am POSITIVE that the season finale in May is going to make me Scream Out Loud and want to hurt the TV set.

I will spend the summer tearing my hair out. Of that I am certain.

So in that respect, a total smashing success for Cuse and Lindeloff.

And then I will have to own the whole series on DVD.

So thanks a lot Damon Lindeloff and Carlton Cuse, and JJ Abrahams, and Matthew Fox, Josh Holloway, Jorge Garcia, Daniel Dae Kim, Naveen Andrews, Evangeline Lilly, Michael Emmerson, Nestor Carbonell, Elizabeth Mitchell. Thanks a lot, gang. From the bottom of my skeptical heart.

Butterfly Effect and Consumerism - Post in Enough Stuff

Go here now. Click this link OR look over to the side and see it there in my "cool places" list.

But go. Now. Read.

http://enough-stuff.blogspot.com/

This stuff is important people! And Julie has a way of putting things.

It's really time to take the negative economic climate and turn it in to something thought-provoking and good on so many levels. We were getting crazy with the spending and the "stuff" and the toll on the environment, our pocket-books, AND the creation of the "must have" society. It's not too late for any of us, but especially the next generation.

So go and read it.

Oh. And don't forget Earth Hour on Saturday at 8:30 pm! (see post below!)

The Electric Company!

No, not the one that powers the lights.

The show. The show that ran from 1971 - 1977 and has been resurrected for today's kids.



Heyyyyy Youuuuuu Guyyyyyyys......


I remember the first go-round so well that when Sarah ran upstairs one Saturday morning to say "hey mom, there is a new show on TVO kids that is fun AND educational and you should come see it", I took one look at it and something whispered into the recesses of my mind "Electric Company". It had the feel. Notsomuch the look (it is after all 35 years later, I admit chokingly!)

Sure enough, within seconds, it identified itself.

Oh how I loved that show! So much that Hey You Guys was said (yelled in that gravelly voice) by me several dozen times a day. So much so that I never forgot that it was how Morgan Freeman, easily one of Hollywood's 25 Best Actors of All Time, got his start as Cool Cat. So much so that seeing the old show-opener online again after so many years brought back instant memories. I loved that show. I loved Sesame Street but would be equally excited when it ended and Electric Company came on.

Now, I know that the reason it's back is because once again the statistics show that early reading levels are at an all time low. And that's too bad. But on the other hand, the show helped once so I bet it will help again.

And it's just so darned funny and entertaining too! The main guy raps, another guy does beat box sounds and sounds of other kinds as well, they sing, and there is always a main story woven in to the "variety" show aspect. And well, we watched one episode together and Sarah knew from that moment on when a word had a "soft C" or a "hard C".

Now we have a standing date for 9:30 a.m on Saturday mornings. And I wouldn't miss it.

But to think that at first I actually told Sarah I was busy doing some "stuff around the house" until I looked at her little cherub face and saw that she was sad that I wouldn't take a look. I didn't want to be that mom. So I took her hand, expecting to go down into the family room and go "oh, yes, that's really good! I'm glad you found a new show to watch" and then go back to my chores. Instead, I got taken back, had a good chuckle, sat down on the futon and patted the seat beside me in invitation.

I highly recommend it. Sarah needs all the help she can get, and it appears to be working. But even for other kids, it's just fun. And funny. And it's problem-solving on so many levels.

So tune in! And enjoy! Sit down with the kids and be taken back. And well, you'll be sitting down with the kids instead of laundry or something else that prevents you from sitting down with the kids.

And then come back here and let me know what you (all) thought!

Have fun, "....youuuuuuuu guyyyyyyyyyys"

Here's the Facts, and nothin' but the Facts:

It's inevitable. We ARE going to be leaving this world. We are going to leave it, and whatever we mess we made WILL be left to the children. No ifs ands or buts about it. So here's the deal. If we CARE about our children, nieces and nephews, cousins, or friend's kids, then WE have a responsibility to do something about it while we can.

Last week I had a letter to the editor printed in the Metro newspaper, in response to an article written by a columnist about the proposed Wind Turbine project off the shore of Ashbridge's Bay in The Beach. Said columnist is against such an action by Ontario Hydro. She called the turbines "an eyesore" as well as an "ugly collection of industrial clutter." She said they should be put in some nice remote area. She said they were going to "mar" the lovely shoreline we've worked so hard to beautify in recent years. I got mad. Livid, in fact. I could not believe what I was reading. I couldn't fathom that this was a person who gave a single thought to what she had written, who was putting asthetics ahead of necessity. So here is what I said in response:

re: "Wind Farm Would be an Ugly Mistake" by April Lindgren, Jan. 30, 2009.

I can't believe what I am hearing.
First on 680 News and now reading in your paper.
Windmills as EYESORES??!?!?!?

I am SHOCKED and dismayed. Absolutely. It astounds me to read and hear such nonsense from people, who apparently and by all evidence have absolutely NO sense.

"Collection of ugly industrial clutter"? That will "haunt generations to come"? Apparently you have never traveled to Europe and seen windmill after windmill after windmill, dotting the landscape and sending the message that something is being attempted to save mother earth. Off the shoreline in Copenhagen they are ever-present. And NOT an eyesore. What are you thinking when you say these things? Do you honestly think they are so much more heinous to look at than the smoke stacks dotting the skyline and spewing their black toxins in to our city and water? It is time for us to realize that we are at the point in our evolution that we MUST seek alternatives to gas and oil. Harnessing what already exists in nature is not monstrous, it's beautiful. Let's please be responsible about this, and teach the children that these ideas are not something we "hide" in rural areas (since we're the power guzzlers right here), but something that we fit in to our lives right here, get used to, and see the benefit of. I say yes to wind turbines in my water. I'd much rather hear them than the hum of other types of electric generators. I'd rather see them than smoke-stacks. I hope so fervently that detractors come around. Our world depends on it.

I felt better after. A little.

But that's not the first time I have heard something of an environmental nature that has made my skin crawl. Friend Aaron over in Alma's Soulfood (see my sidebar for a link!) speaks of the many cities and towns that have outlawed clotheslines. Add to that the people I've heard say: "yeah, I don't want to see anyone's granny panties wavin' in the breeze while I'm sipping my morning coffee."

Or how about the people who think it's taking it too far if one adopts the "if it's brown, send it down, if it's yellow, leave it fellow" theory of toilet flushing? I mean REALLY. I keep my toilet bowls clean. But I don't need to send 10 litres of water down there every time James has one of his teensy wee boy pees. Do I?

I am not entirely there. I have some issues with cleaners (as in, use powerful, stinky ones. Have an impossible-to-keep-clean kitchen floor that I am after CONSTANTLY, and I have to let go of the idea that powerful smell equals powerful clean). But I am letting go, slowly. I don't use fabric softener anymore. I use cool or cold water to wash, and I air-dry lots. I fill up the machine. We use the dishwasher only a couple of times a week. I try to buy less packaging and I recycle everything allowable. I've taken to pulling tissues out of the garbage. I use old tea towels to clean my windows and dust, not swiffers or paper towel. I buy the large rolls of toilet tissue and teach the kids to use less of it. I talk about turning the lights off in rooms not in use, as well as not letting the water run for any length of time.

I know I am not doing enough and that I could be doing more. But I DO think of myself as a "green" person, so if I can admit that I am NOT doing enough, then what are the people who aren't nearly as green as me doing? Not their share, that's for sure. Not enough for their kids or grandkids. Not enough considering that each of us in this part of the world has created something like 5 tonnes of garbage PER PERSON.

I dunno. Maybe it's just me. But seems to me if you're going to make some of the mess, you gotta clean some of it up. I mean, isn't that what we teach the kids? You make a mess, you clean it. You make a mistake, you own it. You do something wrong, you work to make it right. So why all the hypocrites? You think this world owes you something? Because my dear, sad, friend, it owes you NOTHING. It's given you water and sunshine and nice things to eat and see and smell. It's sustained you and yours for generations. It's held up your home and car and given you a job (in my case, literally. My own juxtaposition is caring about an environment when the industry I work in rapes the moraine on a daily basis!) It owes YOU nothing, friend. You owe IT your life.

So my challenge is for each of us to do a tiny bit extra this week. Something we wouldn't normally do. Then in a month or so, add something else. And so forth until you're living greener. Use vinegar to clean the windows. Use baking soda to clean the sink. Use less paper towels and napkins.

Aha! Eureka, I just thought of my contribution. My kids are rabid napkin users. I am going to go home and drag out 8 linen napkins, and we're going to use those at supper time. I have them in my drawer! I might as well make use of them!

What's your contribution, dear reader?

I woke up in the rain....

......the rumble of thunder reverberated through the ground under me. Another flash. Lightening seemed to burn in to my eyes. As consciousness seeped in to my being, I realized I was wet - my back, my legs. Oh damn, the tent has a hole in it!!

The deep feeling of loneliness grew more palpable with the knowledge that my safe haven was against me. So much for the idea of running away to the wilderness to collect my thoughts, have some peace, do some reading and writing, and give myself a good stern talking to. Now it seemed obvious that The Plan would have to be abandoned and I would have to go home. My heart sunk.

No one was there. Wouldn't be for another 5 days. My time away was to have been double that. It was part of the deal. There wasn't money enough for me to get a room for all that time. And that was contrary to the whole idea of me getting away to collect myself. To find myself. To take many deep breaths in order to steel myself to continue to live my life.

No one was around. Not a soul within hearing distance. And who would hear me if I did have a much-desired tantrum? Who would hear against the raging patter of sheets of cold rain? Against the wind that threatened to tear the tent from over me? More lightening. I jumped. The tears began to flow freely down my cheeks and I didn't bother to wipe them away or blow my nose. I wallowed self-pityingly. Why not? It WAS unfair! I had worked for MONTHS on this plan. Had practically threatened that if it didn't come to fruition something more drastic was bound to happen. I finally got my way. And yet......now it was crashing down around me, my plan to reclaim my grip on my life.

I yelled. And yelled. And screamed. And cursed. And threw anything dry back into my back pack. Got dressed hastily. Grabbed my cash and the most valuable of my belongings. My car keys. Put on my rain jacket, a baseball cap, and steeled myself for the onslaught of water that would hit as I ran to the car. My more logical self tried to calm me, to make me wait at least until the rain wasn't coming down so hard; but I wouldn't listen. I was inconsolable and stubborn. And completely bereft of a plan......