Now, I consider myself to be the sort of person who doesn’t make a connection with something just because it is from the same place I am. Just because a movie or television show or book or a band is made in, or by people from, Halifax, I don’t give things any extra credit for being from here, in fact, if someone is telling me about something and they bring up its local origins before convincing me of the thing’s quality on its own merit, I’m likely to hold it against the thing, telling myself that if it’s localness ranks so high in its importance, it must not have much else going for it. Unfair? Probably, but this is how I am (That is, always looking for something to complain about).

That said, I don’t think I can separate the Halifax Explosion Heritage Moment from my being born and raised in Halifax. I have no specific memory of when I first was taught about the Explosion, but there is a good chance this was the only Heritage Moment about an event I knew about before I saw it. In fact, it is one of the few that I can say with certainty I was taught anything about in school (Though, the Underground Railroad is another of those few. If I was ever taught anything about Irish immigrants to Quebec or the struggles of women trying to learn medicine, I don’t recall it. And I know for sure that the Canadian school system doesn’t teach enough about Superman.). So, as a child, it was neat to see this one.

It’s a simple story, Vince Coleman see that the ships are gonna blow, he warns everyone he sees to get as far away as possible, then he remembers a train is coming into town and he sends a Morse code message for them to maybe not come into town, on account of the explosion that’s gonna happen.

Someone sacrificing his or her own life to save others is always the sort of thing I like in a protagonist, so I’m behind Vince. I guess, in real life, some of the facts were not quite the same as depicted here, but the message he sent (“Hold up the train. Munitions ship on fire and making for Pier 6… Goodbye boys.”) does make it sound like he knew he was going out, but he still managed to keep his cool and get the message to the trains. So he’s a good guy, even if the commercial did kinda feel the need to fluff him up.

Still, historical accuracy has never been one of my criteria for these reviews. As an entity unto itself, the commercial tells its story quite well in the minute. We get the set up, the struggle to get the message out, the success, and the tragic end all at breakneck speed. As for quotability, I could see “C’mon Vince, C’mon” being the sort of thing I’d say if I knew a Vince (which would likely annoy Vince). But “C’mon, c’mon, acknowledge.” is the real star. If I’d been asked before re-watching, I would have been sure that line played a much bigger role. Anyway, we should all use it on computers when they’re taking too long to load and stuff.

So anyway, it’s entirely possible that there was a time in my youth when I would have called this my favorite Heritage Moment (with the possible exception of the Superman one), but that was just my regionalism. But still, I do like this one even looking at my new, bitter-about-everything eyes.

It is not often that I bother to draw Adventure Dennis by hand, so this sketch I did on Marq’s whiteboard a few months back is clearly of historical significance. I’m told it is gone now, but here is a picture Marq was nice enough to take first for posterity.

Haiku!

All the drunken cows
are making it hard on me
because they hate me.

I have supposedly been trying to bang out a quick crappy novel that I can publish on the Internet over the last couple weeks. I’ve only got a little bit done, but suddenly I’ve been doing all sorts of other things. Funny how procrastination on one thing can actually make me more active on other things.

I wanted to get a non-Phone Guys strip done today. Then I didn’t. Okay then.

So I have just now posted an add on Kijiji advertising that I could use a roommate. I’ve never had a roommate that was someone I didn’t know, but my monetary situation isn’t going to heal itself without some kind of help. I figure I’ll help out someone who is trying to get one of those educations that there are. At least that way I’ll feel like I’m helping someone, right?

Also worth noting: Kijiji did not allow me to describe myself as an “anti-social prick”. What manner of police-state censorship society are we living in over here? I had to call myself an “anti-social jerk” instead, which isn’t nearly as accurate.

There’s these Phone Guys that there are:

Over the last couple years I have manufactured something of a tradition here in the Nation of PDR. National Bookorderin’ Day is the one day in the year I waste some money on the ordering of new books from the Internet (I get books from my mother for Christmas as well, but I don’t pay for those, obviously) and the date of National Bookorderin’ Day is entirely decided by when the new John Swartzwelder novel is made available on Amazon. Well, the announcement of that novel has just been made: The Million Dollar Policeman will drop in a matter of months, so I’ve got to start figuring out what books will be coming with it.

Obviously this year has the Nation of PDR in a sort of financial state where maybe we shouldn’t be spending much money on books, but I remain confident that by the time this book rolls out (in the vicinity of April or May) I should have at least enough disposable income to make this one order. I’m diggin’ myself out of the red, so it’s good to have a reward waiting on the other side.

I have, in the past, put more thought than is necessary into the topic of superheroes who were probably just created, used, and forgotten by their creators. The previous ones were used to decorate a box of tissues, but today’s offering is a couple of superheroes even more mercantile: They’re from ads.

Working, as I do, in the industry of putting paper with ads on it into people’s homes, I occasionally pay attention to those ads. Basically this is only when they have superheroes in them… Anyway, over the couple years since that last post, I’ve bothered to take two of these superhero-using ads home and I will now introduce you all to those heroes.

(I won’t be showing what the ads were for, though. I’m not getting paid, why should I?)

First up:

This man is basically Superman. Anyone can see this. This is Superman, but blonde. And he has a different symbol. A fiery symbol. This guy is depicted lifting the world (though this is probably metaphorical. Or at least a model world. I’m ruling out that he is giant. I won’t allow it.) he probably has Superhuman strength on a Superman level. He can also clearly fly. It would be easy to assume that this guy has your basic Superman Powers powerset.

Except fire is apparently enough of a recurring for this guy that it is his chest insignia. This implies he has more than just heat vision. This could come in the form of fire-breath replacing the ice breath of superman, but I’m going to assume more. I’m guessing this guy has full pyrokinesis. So what we have here is this guy who can fly, is super strong, can probably go really fast, and can generate and control fires. Sounds like a pretty heavy hitter to me.

Secondly:

This second guy looks less stereotypically like a superhero. Your typical superhuman guardian has a strong square jaw and impossibly muscular physique, but this guy, owing perhaps to the cartoony style he has been rendered in, looks like more of a goof. The smile isn’t helping. It’s also worth noting that this guy is the first of the ones I’ve discussed so far who is actively pitching the product he was designed to pitch, instead of just looking superheroic on an advertisement. This guy is actively looking the reader in the eye and pointing to say: “Check out this deal here. Maybe you’d like it?”

I get the feeling of a normal man in a costume from this guy. Just some athletic man who wore a costume to try to improve his community by crimefighting. But in a world with guys who can fly and shoot fire, maybe this guy finds it a hard job, as he would. And because of that it isn’t quite so insane that this guy would have to resort to taking advertising jobs. He probably also does exhibition shows at carnivals and public service announcements where he tells kids not to talk to strangers. He’s the workaday hero who can’t help much, but does everything he can to help. But I bet there is some drawbacks. He’s bound to feel some resentment, and I doubt he personally enjoys every ad that he has to do. But bills need to be paid, even for a man in a cape.

So there we go. Two more superheroes who I am probably the only person who has ever discussed them on the Internet. I win again.

I like music quite a bit, which sometimes makes me ashamed about how little I know about it. I have trouble even understanding the concepts of basslines and tempos and treble clef aria reverb synthesizers. I also don’t know a lot about the people who make music. But just in case I ever get roped into some sort of Music Knowledge contest, I’m going to make this list, so that the facts will be on the Internet to back me up! Here comes a list of the Top Ten Things PDR Knows About Music:

1. Music is played by musicians or groups of musicians (colloquially known as “bands”). The act of playing music (called a “gig”) is, in fact, a form of communicating with noise!
2. The first musician was probably Beethoven! This was ironic because in his later life, he suffered from a condition which would make it hard to appreciate music: Orneriness!
3. Instruments were first added to singing by accident after a singer forgot the words and tried to cover it by pretending to get a trombone stuck in his mouth, but it turned out even better.
4. Modern music was invented by humans (Homo Sapiens), a species on the planet Planet Earth. They use music to give people time to think between commercials on the radio!
5. Elvis Presley was a musician whose name is an anagram of “les evil’s prey” because he was constantly being hunted by Les Evil, supercannibal.
6. Rick Davies from Supertramp and Ray Davies from the Kinks are not the same person, in spite of the fact they have the exact same name!
7. Speaking of names, the band Radiohead takes their name from a song by Talking Heads. The name of that song is “Radio Head”, which leads to the astounding coincidence that the song the band took their name from, has the same name as the band! Spooky coincidences like that make me suspect their may be some truth to those people who think musicians are in league with the devil (or multiple devils).
8. They even have music in Greenland! It is not even punishable by death there!
9. Even the full twenty-three minute long version of Pink Floyd’s “Echoes” is not long enough to sate me. I could listen to that song for roughly Four Hours at a time.
10. From classical to country, from reggae to rap, from folk to funk, music is always, always, capable of rocking.

Here’s the part with Phone Guys:

Okay, so, as I’ve mentioned, I’m in a state of brokeness these last few months. But having just gotten paid and having woken up pretty early by my standards, I decided to get some shopping in. Today, I’m spendin’.

First off, I went down to the comic shop to pick up the stuff in my account. I figure I should at least clean out my account every few months so they don’t hate me. Judging by the number of Captain Americas that were waiting for me, I’d say it had been three months since my last trip to the shop. While I was there, I also picked up the Hark A Vagrant book, since that’s something I wanted to pick up a few months back or whenever it was when it came out, but I wasn’t spendin’ then. Today, I’m spendin’.

Then I went and got groceries from that store that is below my apartment. I think most people will agree that food is not something I should feel bad about spenin’ on. Mostly I think I did pretty good. I got stuff that was on sale and stuff that is frozen, so I don’t panic and assume I have to eat it all right away. But then I went and bought some juice. I love juice and all, but if I’m supposed to be saving money, it is a dumb expenditure. There is water, free water, pumped into my apartment for free! Someone remind me not to buy juice ever again until I’ve got at least $2000 less debt than I’ve got now. I don’t care if I am spendin’, I could be spendin’ more wisely.

One of the other things I decided was worth spendin’ on was a pack of four Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup “bars” which, despite being called bars on the package are actually the regular three cups, which is exactly what I was expecting, I’m not complaining about that. My thought process was like this: “Those things cost $1.50 each in the vending machine at work and this pack of four costs only twice that. Sound logic. I could get them pretty cheap and they could last several days. Probably worth spendin’”

But now I’m actually looking at these things. They have simply got too much associated garbage. There’s the bag they all come in, then there’s the four wrappers for each “bar” and then each one also has a paper support thing and then each individual cup is also in a little individual cup/wrapper thing. I’m not good at math, but I’m pretty sure that adds up to A LOT of garbage. It makes me feel wasteful. Someone needs to get me a better means of enjoying Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups without producing so much waste. Until then, I don’t think I should be spendin’ on them either.

Also, I suspect they will not last as long as I’d hoped either.