Injustice trial: summation and verdict

November 18, 2009 probablydontlikeyou 3 comments

Injustice Trial Ends

By Blatchie Christford

Toronto, Canada — With the last of the prosecution witnesses having finished their testimony, and a complete lack of defence witnesses, the trial of Injustice came to a dramatic end today when Frank Lee MeiDere gave his summation to the jury, the full text of which appears below.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury. You have but one question to answer: have the people giving testimony over the past week, some living, some dead, suffered at the hands of Injustice? Read more…

Injustice on Trial — Part Two

November 13, 2009 probablydontlikeyou 9 comments

Injustice Trial Begins




By Blatchie ChristfordToronto, Canada –

 

A witness for the Crown explores Old City Hall while awaiting her call to the stand.

Courtroom 33 in Old City Hall has been the site of many notable legal dramas, the most famous being the 1962 trial of Robert Turpin and Arthur Lucas, the last men to be executed in Canada. It is rumoured that their ghosts still haunt the site and judges have reported feeling their robes being tugged when no one is around.

Whether or not they’ve been present in the past, however, there was no sign of Turpin and Lucas yesterday — perhaps because they’d been displaced by the overwhelming number of other ghosts awaiting their turn on the witness stand. With the charges against Injustice reaching back for centuries, the lawyers for the Crown argued that they could not effectively prosecute their case without a special dispensation allowing them to call on long-dead witnesses. To that end, they approached the Holy Trinity who, through their divine powers, agreed to temporarily resurrect anybody willing to testify against Injustice.

“We were extremely happy that the Holy Trinity took time from their busy schedule to give us an audience,” said Crown attorney Hamilton Burger. “After hearing our plea, Pitt, Jolie and Gore were most gracious in granting our request.” Read more…

Bring me a bowl of burning mold?!

November 11, 2009 probablydontlikeyou 12 comments

I don't think this is what Blake had in mind.

Okay. I know that many people who visit this site do so because they were looking for something unrelated and, thanks to the democratic anarchy of Google, end up here instead. Searching the Internet can sometimes be like rooting through your kitchen cupboards for a can of beans and running across the entire cast of Gilligan’s Island.

Years ago, my old clippings and resume site received the greatest bulk of its traffic from people looking for “chicken art.”

I never knew whether they were looking for art created by chickens, or art with chickens as its subject matter. Either way, anyone doing the search would find my site within the first five hits. Read more…

Categories: • General issues

Injustice on Trial — The Arrest

November 10, 2009 probablydontlikeyou 4 comments

Injustice Arrested in Toronto


By Blatchie Christford

Protesters on College Street try to find their way to the police station

Toronto, Canada — Following on the heels of the arrest of Roman Polanski, another long-sought fugitive from justice will finally be brought to trial.

Injustice (no last name), wanted on a list of charges that has been growing exponentially since the dawn of time, turned himself in at Toronto Metropolitan Police headquarters yesterday at 4:45 pm.

“It was quite a surprise,” said the officer on duty, Sergeant Michael O’Leary. ” I mean, — Injustice. You know? The guy’s an Immortal. If he doesn’t want to get caught, there’s not much we can do about it. In that sense, he’s kind of  like Superman — or a financial advisor.” Read more…

Celebrating “Burying Celtic Musicians Week”

October 28, 2009 probablydontlikeyou 9 comments

Is 104 F high? For a temperature, I mean.

For a human temperature.

Did you know that this week is Intersession Week?

What a dumb name. “Intersession Week.” As in “inter,” meaning “to bury,” and “session,” meaning “a Celtic music jam.”

The eighth week of the semester is called “Intersession Week” and there are no classes. Apparently because we’re supposed to bury Celtic musicians or something. Read more…

Categories: • General issues

Honour, colour, and 1066

October 17, 2009 probablydontlikeyou 15 comments

Not long ago, JohnnyB, an American, dared to complain (on this very blog) about my use of Canadian/British spelling — specifically, of the letter “u” in various words such as “colour” and “honour” (comment section of Getting rid of a mould infestation in four steps).

Granted, the English language is not one of the world’s more logical languages.

We’ll begin with box, and the plural is boxes.
But the plural of ox should be oxen, not oxes.
Then one fowl is goose, but two are called geese.
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.

To add to the complications, when speaking metaphorically we often use the “wrong” form of the plural. For instance, we would say, “Those two dancers are bumbling around like a couple of oxes,” not “a couple of oxen.”

On the other hand, we wouldn’t say “those two are as clever as foxen,” rather than “foxes” — so it’s not like it’s a general rule or anything. Read more…

Categories: • General issues

Shaggy Dog Story: How Eustace broke his leg

October 14, 2009 probablydontlikeyou 1 comment

One more from the sludge pile. I’d planned on saving it for a rainy day (or an exceptionally cold one), but a recent comment made on MikeWJ’s post inspired me to put it in circulation now. I’ll tell you which comment at the end of the story.


Hey Jimbo, Bob, Tom. How’s about a bit of room by that stove? It’s cold ‘nuff out there to freeze the balls off’n a witch’s teat.

My leg? I was kinda hopin’ nobody would notice ‘cause I don’t want any special treatment an’ all.

Don’t get up Bob. … Oh, you wasn’t? Well, it looked to me like you was kinda thinkin’ about it and I just wanted t’tell you not to bother. Anyways, I got enough room on the end o’ this bench next to Jimbo. Now if only the pickle barrel were a tad closer – why thanks Tom, I believe I will have one.

And don’t go makin’ a big deal of my leg ‘n’ alll. It’s nothin’ more’n a broke bone and I’d just as soon that y’all ignored it, like.

What’s that? Well hell, Bob, a’course I got a red flag strapped to my foot. I may not wanna be conspicuous, but I sure’s hell don’t want some poor fool doin’ a mischief to himself ‘cause he don’t see I’m carryin’ a longer load’n usual. Where’s your sense, man? You stick a red flag on lumber when you’re haulin’ it in that foreign Jap pickup you drive, don’t ya? Read more…

Categories: • Stories

Getting rid of a mould infestation in four steps

October 13, 2009 probablydontlikeyou 10 comments
Yep, thats pretty much what it looked like.

Yep, that's pretty much how it looked.

Small mould infestations are fairly easy to clean up, but sometimes mould can spread with amazing rapidity.

There are many causes of mould, such as when your hot water tap begins dripping and you ask the landlord to fix it, but then the work order gets lost or something and weeks go by, and the tap is no longer merely dripping, but is actually flowing, and there’s no way you can fix it yourself because all the pipes and shutoff valves are locked behind a little door in the wall, and you remind the landlord several times about the situation, but by now the house has the relative humidity of a Brazilian rain forest and all the corners of the living room, the dining room, and the small bedroom that you use for an office and has bookshelves all along the walls (not the really good kind, but the cheap Ikea shelves, which may not look like much, but are quite adequate for your purposes) are starting to look like they’re covered in that hanging moss you see in movies about New Orleans, except it’s black and really ugly looking. Read more…

Plus? I’m Fabulous

October 11, 2009 probablydontlikeyou 10 comments
Its true -- I do look good in heels.

It's true -- I do look good in heels.

Recently I received another award, this one from Skye who writes a Weekly Injection of Chuckles. Thanks, Skye.

But, like the others, it has conditions.

  1. I must write about my five obsessions.
  2. I must pass the award along to five other bloggers.

The problem is, I don’t really obsess over anything.

It’s like I was telling Mr. Wallace.

Mr. Wallace is a man I met on the subway the other day and we got to talking. During our conversation he ranted about the eHealth scandal making news lately. A recent audit revealed that the government agency in charge of establishing a comprehensive, electronic health database in Ontario has squandered a billion dollars or so. Read more…

I scribble good

October 11, 2009 probablydontlikeyou 21 comments
See -- its a real award, just like the big kids get.

See -- it's a real award, just like the big kids get.

During the most hectic new semester I’ve had in several years, it seems that I won a Superior Scribbler Award.

Twice. I won it twice.

At this rate, I’m going to have to set up a special page just for awards. Counting this one, I now have two.

Or three, if you count the Superior Scribbler Award twice.

Of course, blog awards aren’t quite like other awards. Blog awards require the receiver to put in some work. Winners of the Meme Award, for instance, must follow it up with a blog exposing seven of their innermost thoughts and pass the award on to seven other bloggers. Read more…

Categories: • Awards