Warning: Cool people will be thrown from building

Credit: my keen-eyed nephew

Love means not ever having to say you're sorry you wrote Love Story

The New York Times announced this morning that Love Story author Erich Segal has died.

Some of the younger among you won't remember this (extremely) slim bestseller. That is good.

Just take it as a salutary warning that when the inevitable weepy movie appeared in 1970, the world was blessed with Ryan O'Neal and Ali McGraw as nanosecond superstars.

And that, back in the day, Love Story and Jonathon Livingston Seagull almost completely defined the philosophical thought of a, ummm, certain generation.

All of which may explain why many things so often screech sideways, now that this ummm, generation is runnin' things. I'm just sayin'...

Nature speaks to PM on climate change?

Last night, we coyotes hunkered down in our La-Z-Dogs to TV news reports of a big-mother blizzard in our old stomping grounds.

Soon after, a semimythical puppyhood friend with whom I used to tear up the occasional poultry coop - just youthful hijinks, y'understand - sent along this shot from the local Doppler, saying, "If a random image of Jesus on a pizza can awe and inspire people, I figure a death's head can appear on weather radar by the same token. The prognosis is for blizzard conditions later tonight. But I'd have called this a blizzard 4 hours ago. Spooky."

The accompanying legend doesn't make it look like much snow, but keep in mind that this was just the buildup. And that it is in the nature of the place that, inevitably, a helluva wind came with it.

Being who we are, and of a semimythical, partly-animistic bent, we couldn't help but wonder, what with the Copenhagen world conference looming, if maybe, maybe, Ma Nature was sending a big-mother memo to id(iot)eologically-blind PMs with southwest Calgary ridings? Who think climate change is a 'socialist plot'....? Say, about fatally-misguided policies that support stripmining the Alberta tarsands, and damn all ecological consequences for living creatures?

Because, well, the death's head is centered directly over those particular PM's southwest Calgary ridings. I'm just sayin'.

Life in Wasp-boro

Breaking news from Kitchissippi Times...

Pre-Posthumous Urban T**t (*) Zeitgeist Award

The observant among you will have noticed that I did not post Friday. I can explain: the dog ate my homework. Wait! I am the... oh, crap...

Actually, my reasons have to do with yesterday's state of high fuzzy-headedness. Thursday evening, whilst I was partaking of a postprandial aperitif, (often a blissful moment) the trouble began. Somewhere not unadjacent to the 'ol coyote den, a car with its antitheft alarum's sensors cranked to the max began to honk wildly at the transit of every squirrel - nay, every falling leaf. You know how many leafs are fallin' right now. It sounded like a freight train. Or a Buick.

I assumed some ass had parked and gone off to carouse on Elgin Street, and that all would be well in a few excruciating hours.

Wrong. All night, that horn fired off every five minutes. I then assumed that perhaps said ass had over-imbibed and taxied home. Still an ass, yet at least not endangering the public. But a quick stroll at eight-AM-ish Friday morning pinpointed the offending automobile - indeed a big honkin' new Buick - in a nearby residential driveway.

I contemplated this hyperactive excretion with an austere red eye. Well, two. As I did, a guy with an air of Steve Dallas about him stepped blithely from the porch with his Eddie Bean Insulated Travel Mug, Giant Squid Edition®, blipped the remote, climbed in, started up, and drove off.

I am grateful to Woodsy and Pandora for their thoughtful attempts to caffeinate my sleepless condition at a popular bean juice joint, later that day. They were well-intentioned and well-received.

Yet, maybe it's Seasonal Affective Disorder kicking in, but my ill humour remains. Steve: You are the lucky winner of coyote's Pre-Posthumous Urban T**t Zeitgeist (PPUTZ) Award. This means that I am bending my not-inconsiderable semimythical, totemic telekinetic powers to focus the universe's karma upon you. Kinda like a big psychic magnifying glass aiming the sun at your brain. Soon, your head will explode. All over your brand-new Buick's upholstery, I hope. Fair is fair.

* Toot. Twat. Take your pick...

Hand Kissing

Last Spring, I was kissed on the hand by three different men - a family friend, a taxi driver, and the doorman at a tavern all within a week of each other.

I was surprised by these unsolicited kisses, and I wondered if hand kissing was back in style. Why had no-one warned me?

I mentioned these incidents to the Word Wizard, who seems to know something about every topic. He quickly responded with questions, "Did you offer your hand to be kissed? Did they touch their lips to your hand?"

No, I had not offered my hand to be kissed, and in all three instances I was tricked into receiving the kiss. And, yes, all three had touched their slobbery lips to the back of my hand.

I have since become a little wiser about hand-kissing, and so, gentlemen, if you want to kiss my tiny tender nymph hand

• I must be the one who initiates the gesture by offering you my hand palm down;
• I must know you;
• You must be of equal or higher mythological standing than I am;
• You must slip your fingers under the palm of my hand and gently rest your thumb on my knuckles;
  
• You may either quietly air kiss the back of my proffered hand, or kiss your thumb;
• You must kneel at my feet as you kiss my hand to show that you are in awe of my charms, and
• be forewarned that, according to W.J. Bethancourt III, should you offer an unsolicited kiss I am in my right to eviscerate you on the spot!

FLASHFLASHFLASH!!!!!

Uh oh. Suddenly, Shania Twain is single again... and 4th Dwarf is a die-hard country music fan. When in his cups, he's been known to publicly bemoan the fact that Canada's Country Music Cutie In Incredibly Abbreviated Outfits ever got married. He always said it should've been her bed his moonboots were under. Fourteen years ago, and the shock still feels just like yesterday to him. She broke Dwarfie's heart. Oh, sure, he says he burned all of her CDs, but on certain dark nights, the sound of her digitally-enhanced voice could still be heard seeping beneath the door of his grotto, singing harmony to loud tormented wails. It was all very embarrassing.

What effect this earth shattering news will have on his revolutionary new dating paradigm research is anybody's guess. Will Dwarf's hope rise, phoenix--like? I dunno. But I bet this'll probably be interestin'...

Warning to a friend

This may be a good time to stay close to Elgin Street, Coyote. It looks like City Councilor Doug Thompson has a contract out on you. Even if the experts don't think you're necessarily to blame. From the CBC:

Ottawa hires trappers to catch pet-eating coyotes

The City of Ottawa has hired trappers to capture coyotes after reports that family pets were being eaten by wild animals in rural outskirts....

But Gary Fischer, one of three trappers hired by the city, said there have been only two confirmed cases of pets being killed by coyotes in the area and he's not convinced coyotes are to blame for the other disappearances.

"I've seen cats taken right out of a field by a hawk," he said Thursday. "There are other wildlife issues here other than just the coyotes." [full story]

Related Stories:

• Dec. 20, Citizen: 'Don't let your animals roam,' expert warns
• Dec. 18, Citizen: Family warns others after coyotes kill pet
  
• Dec. 18, CFRA: South End Coyote Problems - "Thompson is also working on a plan to trap the coyotes in Greely West, Greely Orchard, and Creekside Estates."