Brunette of the week

Smokin' hawt Canadian actress and radio announcer Shauna MacDonald.

Comedy heaven

You can watch every episode of Trailer Park Boys for free by clicking here.

It's genius. Comedy genius.

Canadian of the moment

Laura Calder.

It's time to face the music

I can't be a Republican because I don't hate Mexicans, gays, poor people, teachers and other public employees, want endless war, and no taxes on the rich.

I can't be a Democrat because the modern Democratic party is nothing more than GOP lite and it's filled with people who want to keep the endless wars going, want to cut taxes on the rich even further, want to neglect the poor and working classes, want to block universal single payer health care for all, want to compromise on core principles when it's not necessary, want to stop being the party of FDR, and who want to move the party even further to the right of where Clinton and Obama are dragging it.

I can't support any incumbents outside of Bernie Sanders and Dennis Kucinich.

I'm out of party politics, at least when it comes to the two parties that dominate our political landscape. I'm not voting for or supporting in any way that lying warmongering compromising backstabbing asshole Obummer any more, he's proven time and time again that he's not on my side and that he's working to undermine what generations of liberals, progressives, and working people built. I don't not support him because I've become a right wing teabagger, I don't support him because he's no longer a liberal, or a progressive, as if he ever was one in the first place. Clinton moved the Democratic party to the right in order to get elected, Obummer is moving further to the right in order to appease the Republican party who will never ever work with him and who will always hate him no matter how far to the right he moves the party of FDR.

I'm voting Green or socialist or writing in Kucinich/Feingold in 2012. Fuck the Democrats and their leader. And triple fuck the Republicans who have become the party of the John Birch Society and the US Chamber of Commerce.

I've faced the political music and I didn't like any of the tunes they were playing. But holy hell, I fucking love facing this music:

Rest in peace

In the summer of 1980 I had just gotten dumped by the girl who lived across the street from us. I was taking it badly because I was still very shy around and with women back in those days and I was convinced that I'd never find another girl who would go out with me again. I decided to get my mind off the dumping by going to the movies, so I walked down to the Cameo Theatre in downtown Bristol and I saw one of the funniest movies I had ever seen. That film was Airplane! and I laughed so much and so hard during that film that I forgot all about being dumped by Debbie Jones.

The biggest reason why I laughed so much and still laugh when I see Airplane! is because of this guy,
Leslie Nielsen. His deadpan delivery and his slapstick were out of this world funny in Airplane!.

I followed his comedy career for many years. I loved him in the Naked Gun movies and the TV version of it as well. I even watched some of his painfully unfunny movies just because he was so good in them. I really liked him in the quirky little film called Men With Brooms.
For me, his last great performance was in Scary Movie 3, which I saw right after my bypass surgery. I remember laying on the couch with a chest full of pain and high in Oxycodone and laughing my ass off while he stole that film from everyone except Anna Faris.

Leslie died from complications of pneumonia on Sunday. I'll miss him but I'll always have his great comedy performances to make me laugh when I'm down. If anyone deserved to go on to better things after this life, then it's Mr. Nielsen. Farewell sir, fare well.

Musical discoveries of the week

In my travels across the vast series of tubes we now know as the internet, I've discovered this great new to me musical group from Canada:
They're known as The Good Lovelies. They play really fun and harmonious 'roots' music. I hate that term but they use it themselves so I can as well. In their case 'roots' means they sing and back themselves up with guitars and mandolins.
All three of the are hubba hubba to the nth degree and even more than that what I love about them is how much fun they look like they are having while singing and playing their distinctive music.There's nothing better than being entertained by smart, funny, uber talented women.

Here's a great video of theirs:


While at my local library yesterday I perused the jazz CD's. And it was there that I found this great CD:I'm totally in love with this French jazz vocalist now. She sings predominantly in English on this CD but when she sings in her native tongue, it's va va va voom and hubba hubba all wrapped up in one beautiful package. Her English songs are flawless and they have that cute sound that non native speakers have when they use our language.
I highly recommend both Ms. Knopfler and The Good Lovelies.

Canadian musical discovery of the week

The Cottars are a blend of traditional, folk, Celtic, and Scottish musical influences. Their music is impeccable and the female singers have voices like angels. I'm in serious lurve with this band from Cape Breton Island.
Viva The Cottars!

Happy birthday David Cronenberg!

Thanks for making two of my favorite movies of all time:

And for giving a superb controlled performance in this fine film:
I just bought your film 'Eastern Promises' on DVD for three bucks and I'm looking forward to seeing it.

Happy birthday sir, you are in my opinion the finest film maker Canada has ever produced and one of the finest filmmakers to ever come out of North America.

Canadian of the year

Bronze medalist in Ladies Figure Skating
Joannie Rochette is Canadian of the year up to this point.
After losing her mother to a massive heart attack on Sunday she went out and skated the lights out on Tuesday and almost skated flawlessly last night. She skated her way to the bronze medal and she skated her way into our hearts here at Monkey Central.

Well done Joannie, well done indeed.

Brunette of the week (bonus gold medal edition!)

Ms. Tessa Virtue is
the first ever second brunette of the week.
She's also the one half of the gold medal Canadian ice dancing team.
I'm giving her a gold medal for being 'Hubba hubba!' and for not wearing one of those cheesy flesh colored t-shirts under her oh so striking dress, there's nothing like a bare back, especially hers. She's not only a gorgeous ice dancer and graceful artist athlete, she's also a gracious competitor.

A Monkey Book Report

This book is more the corollary to Ms. Atwood's previous book Oryx and Crake than it is the sequel. The action in The Year of the Flood takes place simultaneously to that of Oryx and Crake, so that's why I say that.

This novel like, it's predecessor, is a bleak vision of a world gone mad and then made barren by corporate science. We learn the stories of Toby, a woman, and Ren, a young girl, and how they navigate the plague, or waterless flood as it's called in their religion, God's Gardeners. Atwood tells their stories of their lives before, during, and after their initiation in to their apocalyptic religion and the effects it has on their friends and family.

This book, like Oryx, is a dystopian science fiction view of how things might end if we stay on the same path of the genetic engineering of animals and plants and if we stay on the path of non stop consumption we've locked ourselves into. Most readers and reviewers found these two books too bleak for their tastes but I highly enjoyed them, being a fan of dystopian literature and film that I am. When I finished Oryx and saw that Snowman wasn't the last man on earth I knew that somehow Atwood would not leave us hanging with the image of an infected sick, both physically and emotionally, man as the last human on the planet. She may have a jaundiced eye and a cynic's worldview but in the end she's hopeful about humanity, the ending of The Handmaid's Tale echos my point. And in fact I would not be surprised if Ms. Atwood doesn't write a book that bridges these two into the world she fashioned at the end of The Handmaid's Tale.

I recommend this book but I can see why others would not like it. It might be a bit too dark for some.

Oh Cananda...

...is there no end to your supply of spunky cute actresses who kick ass in sci fi movies and mini series?
If you missed this gal in Alice on Sy Fy, then you missed a heck of a performance in a 'made for Sy Fy' movie that was actually good. Caterina Scorsone's performance as Alice in this clever modern retelling of the Alice in Wonderland story is a thing of beauty. She delivers in every way as the plucky heroine of this mini series. Do yourself a favor and catch it in reruns.

Pillow talk

I spotted that at a beach gift shop and of course I thought of Calvin.

The greatest television show ever

There's no swag like Canadian swag

Barb the Bad Tempered Zombie sent me a CD recently. It's made up of cuts from bands that recently played the Calgary Folk Festival. How cool is that? And she also sent me a nice note on this card in the packet as well, here's the card:
And K-Line, the most stylin' chick Toronto has ever seen, sent me a paperback book recently and she sent a nice note on this card

in her package.

Thank you's to both of these lovely ladies from north of the border. You both are too kind to me, your humble blog servant.

Believe what they say people, Canadians are indeed super nice.

Benny Hill and I...

...want to wish all my Canadian readers and friends a happy Canada Day, eh!

Adopt a Canadian Politician

When I move to Canada I'm going to live in the riding that is represented by NDP MP Charlie Angus.  I've got a man crush on him for his efforts to spare Canadians the ill effects of the DCMA like bill the Tories are trying to shove on our neighbors to the north.  Go Charlie go, stick it to the Tories and to the American corporations.

Tag, I'm it

My great and good blog friend Barbara tagged me with a new to me meme.  The rule of this meme is to link five websites you like and visit frequently, write about why you like them so much and then tag five more people to do the same.  Strap in then, here we go:

1)  Flickr.  I'm on this website all the time.  I have about 10 different Flickr identities and at the rate I scan stuff and put it online I'll probably have 10 more before the spring is done.  What can I say though?  I love looking at everyones photo sets and one set usually leads to another, especially if someones photos are in a group pool.  Oh how I love you Flickr.

2) Think Progress and Crooks and Liars.  Ok, I cheated a bit but to me these sites will always be one.  I check one and then after I get done I click over to the other one.  I get lots of blog post ideas from what I read on both sites and I've been a fan of both of these fine sites since before I started blogging.  In the interest of full disclosure, I've been linked a few times on Crooks and Liars and I've gained a few readers as a result of it.  I owe Blue Gal more than I can ever repay her for all the times she's linked me on C & L.  If I never said so before BG let me say it now, thanks for all your link love on C & L.  

3)  BBC radio.  One day after I first got high speed internet I somehow found myself on the BBC radio website and I was happier than a pig in shit.  Growing up I always heard about how great the BBC radio programming was but I resigned myself to never hearing it since I did not have a world band radio, thank goodness that the internet changed all that.  I love that I can not only hear better news than I get in this country, I love that I can hear programs about science, history, literature, and my favorite, the comedy shows.  I've discovered The Hudson and Pepperdine Show (which is a talk show parody done by two of the funniest women ever) the radio versions of Little Britain and Knowing Me Knowing You with Alan Partridge, The Consultants (a great sketch comedy show), Ectoplasm, and many many many more great funny shows.

4)  Gamescene.  This is a great time waster website.  It's got a ton of games on it and one or more of them might get you hooked, so be careful if you check it out.  My favorites are this one and this one.  Before I became addicted to blogging, writing mine and reading yours, I spent entirely too much time each day playing those two games.

5)  Organic Consumers.  This website is not only a great clearing house for all kinds of information about organic food, it's also got links to local farms and other related organic and green businesses in what ever area of the USA you live in.  As I learn more about the horrible shit that big business puts in our food and the horrible unsustainable way they grow and raise food, this website helps me find other sources of food and it helps educate me on just what is and is not organic.  

Ok then, now for the dreaded tagging of others.  Since I got tagged by a C Cubed babe (Cute Canadian Chick), I'll start by tagging three comely lasses from north of the border Wandering Coyote, Captain Karen, and Jane Austen Jr.  And I'll finish up by tagging a couple of hot babes from the frozen north of the upper midwest, MNMom and Suzy.  Have fun ladies, I look forward to seeing what five websites you gals like.

You know what's really good?

This show: I did not see it when it first came out and I resisted renting it at Blockbuster but I had heard people, most notably my friend Todd, rave about it but I refused to believe the hype.

But they started running it again on HBO Zone and I am floored by how good it is. The writing, the acting, the direction, the sets, the costumes, everything is incredible. I'm not a huge western fan, I despise most of John Wayne's western movies, but I love love love this series. Of course it doesn't hurt that is has Molly Parker in it either.And boy howdy, Brad Dourif, Paula Malcomson, Ian McShane, Robin Weigert, William Sanderson, Kim Dickens, and John Hawkes are really really good in this too. They're not Molly Parker, but they're damn good.

Who's swagging me now?

Pirate Queen, blogger extraordinaire, and Tom Jones's number 1 Canadian fan, Captain Karen is swagging me now! She sent me a petit paquet via par avion! (That's small packet via air mail to you philistines.) And she sent it to me in spite of the fact that I often dress myself in clashing plaids. Case in point, I wore this blue plaid shirt with these green plaid shorts today: Anyhoo, this is what came in my package from north of the border: a travel pack of tissue with a cute monkey on it, a little plush monkey with stretchy rubbery arms, which I can do things like this with. Also in the prize pack was this little toy set: My bad photography skills prevent you from seeing the winged monkeys in the bottom left corner, so you'll have to trust me when I tell you how cool they look. She also sent a bar of super good quality chocolate with a chimp on it but unfortunately since the temps are in the high 70's to low 80's here and the sun is out in full force it was all melty by the time I got it out of the petit paquet. But like all smart commanders of ships that sail the high seas, Capt. Karen planned ahead, she put the candy bar in a little sealed plastic baggy. Said bar and bag are now residing in my freezer and hopefully I'll be able to have a nibble off it soon.

Many thanks to you my nautical liege Captain Karen for being so thoughtful, generous, and sweet. I'll be returning the favor soon.

On a side note, I lived for 45 years on this planet and I never ever got any mail or packages from anyone outside of this country. But now since I've made so many great and kind friends through my blog, I've gotten all kinds of mail and neat gifts from some wonderfully nice and beautiful women in Canada. And to be fair, I've gotten some great fun stuff from swell folks here in the USA too. I always wanted a pen pal from a far away place when I was a kid and now that I have a blog I've got a ton of them.