Stunned?

Many of you know that we of the Elgin Street Irregulars are big on lists of, ummm, five. If you don't, read our archives. You'll figure it out.

Some may also recall that I take a dimwitted quadruped's dim view of high voltage electrical discharges applied to living creatures. Especially since the Vancouver death of Robert Dziekanski after he was tasered - five times, it turns out - in October 2007.

With a full-on enquiry into the man's death, Taser International, cops in general and the RCMP in particular all seem to be heavily vested in denying that Tasers, police, Dziekanski and deadness are in any way linked. These may be honestly held opinions.

But I admit that my first uncharitable thought, when I heard about the Alzheimer's-like testimonial trend at the inquiry was, "Yeah, right. Stonewall away, guys...." Because, I reasoned, these talking points may also exist because if any of 'em did hint at regrettable liability, there could be legal and financial hell to pay, in Vancouver and elsewhere.

But faced with RCMP Commissioner Bill Elliot's plea for the public to walk a mile in his police force's spit-polished boots before rushing to judgement, I am now wondering about the real victims here. Could it be that the guys behind those electric stun guns really are victims, and worse off than Dziekanski?

Because after standing nearby while one of them pulled the trigger - did I mention, five times? - all of the Mounties present seem to have suffered catastrophic memory loss about the event. I don't wish to be uncharitable and suggest that they made their original statements under the mistaken assumption that no bystander had video-recorded the entire incident. Which would now place them in a position of having to explain why their statements and that video seem to part ways on several, ummm, crucial points...

No, we coyotes will take the high (voltage) road, and a charitable view of such memory loss. Obviously, the poor sunsabitches' neurons were fried by the weapon's electrical fallout. One weeps! To think of all the incidents in which police will be medically unable to remember why they zapped anybody! We could lose respect for the Mounties. And the legal system would surely descend into chaos...

Don't worry, spring is just around the corner

Image: Audrey braved Florence traffic to capture this doggone vespa shot

Buy Curious

It is not the first time, that I have been left confused rather than curious about a real estate ad.

5 questions popped into my head as I stared at this ad:

1. Is it a condo for the bi-curious?
2. Is it a condo for nudists?
3. Are those the real-estate agents or models?
4. Is the guy on the left looking down at the woman's coochie or at the guys schlong ?
5. Why isn't there a fifth (person)?

Winging off in a New Direction

Spring, ummm, unleashed

Canadian spring is technically upon us. Oh, I know some of you sneer that you already had this august event timed to the very nanosecond, because your TV weatherman of choice quoted the friendly neighbourhood National Research Council/ Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics' cesium-slurping sidereal clock thingy to you, on last evening's news.

But we six millennia old, semi mythical, quasi animistic, partly totemic coyotes prefer to sniff the wind and read time-honoured traditional sign ourselves, and actually sense spring rising like green maple sap in our creaky old bones. Even if we've lately become a little more citified - and sap headed - than we would like.

To whit:

The receding snowdrifts' stripteasing revelation of a winter's worth of plastic bags full of toy poodle poo, not unadjacent to the mouth of the ol' den. They're courtesy of an elegant lady of a certain age, who looks law-abiding, in whose mouth butter would not melt. She scoops under duress (i.e. If she knows someone human is watching) but invariably chucks the distasteful little baggy into "somebody else's problem" territory, when she thinks potential eyewitnesses are past. Nota bene: Coyotes watch. Always. Yer busted. Happy Spring.

Legions of empty, abandoned Tim Hortons Larges, rocked gently in every downtown gutter by a light, chilly Northern breeze. A marked section of each paper cup lip is artfully unrolled to display the sad comment, "Better luck next time..."

The annual horde of complaints about the annual carpet of pate de merde graisse produced by the annual horde of Canada Geese, often in the immediate environs of Andrew Haydon Park.

The Prime Minister's and Finance Minister's protestations that the economy is just fine, darn it! Ummm, okay, that last one is not technically a sign of spring. They've been spouting pretty much the same "We're delusional! Re-elect us!" shit since last fall.

Ooh. Look! Point Number Five. Anybody see a theme here?

Come to think of it, things don't actually smell like proper spring yet. Not really. Pardon me while I just, ummm, hold my nose here. And keep popping Vitamin D for another week or two....