Random January

Today's Random post is a mix of links and questions. The latter due to having sat still and not done anything for the better part of a week, which bores me, so my brain tries to entertain itself and given that there was codeine involved, let's just say that things got unusual.

I've been wondering about this one for while, actually. Why don’t pigeons get whiplash from that back-and-forth thing their heads do when they walk? And now I have an image in my head of a pigeon with a collar on, being spied on by an insurance company agent (likely a black squirrel with hardly any tail and several bare spots indicating being so down on his luck that he had to take the gig for peanuts).

So our illustrious prime minister Stephen Harper (a pox be upon his name) has taken 1% off the GST. And admittedly I'm really bad at math to the point of possible innumeracy, but I was thinking... say I buy $400 worth of goods a month on which I would pay a GST. 1% of that is $4, right? That means I save $48 a year. Which makes no difference whatsoever to me. However, if you multiply that by the 35 million inhabitants of Canada, that's a lot of money. What's the impact of losing that 1% on the programs that are funded by federal tax, like healthcare? Here in Ontario, we saw the impact of the Mike Harris tax cut - we got a $200 refund and education and healthcare went down the tubes. I'd rather not save that tiny bit of money. Hell, I'd be happy with a 1% increase, if that would help improve tax funded infrastructures.

I get weird songs popping into my head, old songs, songs I haven't heard in a while. How Much Is That Doggie in the Window, for example, was on frequent rotation several years ago, but hasn't shown up for while now (except, now that I've invoked it, it will no doubt hound(!) me for days). Christmas carols in July, advertising jingles, 50s music, anything and everything. And lately, the Flintstones vitamins jingle – y’know, "we are Flintstones kids, 10 million strong and growing" has been playing over and over and over in my head and is it just me, or does that sound really creepy and ominous? I mean, there's 10 million of 'em... they're strong... growing... and really perky...

And now for the links.

Apparently, there's a new currency coming to the U.S.

Very apropos of last week's post, it didn't take long for a parody to pop up. Starring Jerry O'Connell and quite funny.

And last, yet another excellent time waster: Flight of the Hamsters. I haven't quite figured out how to make a work yet (elbow has sustained a re-injury in the exact way it was injured a week ago and I have subsequently have been forced into singing the Homer song repeatedly), but what I did learn had me laughing like a hyena...

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