Home
Slippery Wallet
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 2542
Mine isn't slippery so much as empty, which makes it difficult to grab, fumbling, too slow to pay, the boy's in the same predicament, reaching for his wallet, he fumbles, "It's slippery" he tells me, It's the showdown of incompetent gunmen, slippery because it's so thin, we're all on a budget here and our good intentions are hampered only by our inability to realize them...
The Hateful Eight
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Film
- Hits: 1890
Yet another well intended parenting moment gone abysmally wrong. The boy liked, the girl professed not to mind, I appreciated, not to say I liked, but that I appreciated the whole film - what an inappropriate choice this was, and I thought seriously of taking the daughter to Alvin and the Chipmunks to redeem myself. Thankfully she absolved me...
I'd forgotten how gruesome Tarantino's signature violence can be, and imagined it somehow as being more evocative, less explicit...Oooops.
And so apologies to the wide-eyed daughter, and gratitude that the friend with similar-aged sheltered daughter didn't attend, as that would have required some serious explaining I really wasn't up to...
Jeep
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 5412
And I need a new car. Yesterday. The old one is done-done-done. Bled out on the driveway, antifreeze and oil, transmission and wiper fluid stain the parking spot. Covered in 6 inches of snow, no sounds as I enter to raid the chocolates, the battery's dead, no Chinook will revive this corpse, the tires are flat, it's done.
I've set my heart on a jeep. 1988-1992, max. $2,000.
Lots of them out of town. Like Lacombe, Red Deer, Lethbridge, Edmonton...
The Catch-22 of you need a car to buy a car, and you need time, and I'm short on both...
I find others, an Isuzu Trooper, and as good as it looks I resist, foreign cars are a premium to fix. I don't need the expense.
Not so many Jeeps for sale in Calgary.
And in Calgary they command a premium, everyone in Bankview has one, they need them to climb the hill, 4X4 down 17th Ave to the Ship, everyone has a jeep. And there are surprisingly few for sale...or few, I should say, in my price range. I'm trying to keep it under a couple of G.
Most of the vendors on Kijiji, surprisingly, take days to respond to emails, if they do at all. Not to say that it's been sold, but they'll get back to you later...Jeep People are busy people. And phones/texts go unresponded to, and time passes, the necessity of a vehicle grows. Not a good position to make rational decisions from. Work, doubles, straight through, there's no time really to deal with this, but I have to, in the end I luck out (I think), before work on NY Eve I acquire a silver '97 Jeep Laredo. It's only fault is the automatic transmission, otherwise, mileage, body, motor, everything else is in good condition, my new vehicle for the next 2 or 3 years, to 500K at least...
The daughter, the son approves, me, it's more than I've spent on a vehicle in 30 years, it's cleanliness, order, maintenance was sabotaged the moment I bought it, but with the roof rack, the 4WD, if it can survive me it will do...
Black and White - Police
- Details
- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Ideas & Questions
- Hits: 2296
Discouraged by the rather stormtrooper black and white decor of the Calgary Police Force's vehicles, a mirror of their US counterparts, it occurs to me that what if we conducted a small social experiment...???
There's some precedent for this - In the early 1970's Professor Philip G. Zimbardo conducted what would become later known as the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment, in which he probed how ordinary people would act when outfitted with the trappings and privileges of authority and helplessness. It revealed the rather dismal results of conformity to "social" expectations and roles.
***
In lieu of the Black and White police vehicles we have now, which are designed, I suspect, not just to be readily identifiable but as well to somewhat intimidate future "victims" of the Justice system, and arguably the black and white coloring is too often mirrored in the black and white thinking of members of the force (when was the last time you witnessed a police officer using discretion?), I'd suggest a few changes.
Beginning with the Motto...IN the US (on Television at least), it's "To Serve and Protect". (well, no, it isn't, but we'll pretend and you can do your own research there...). In Calgary it's "Vigilance • Courage • Pride". Taking Issue with all of the above - Vigilance - too similar to vigilante, think the burning crosses of the KKK, we should all be vigilant of the rights and privileges we give the police. This should be our motto, not theirs. And "Vigilance" is nothing if you're every sense and intuition is misinformed. "Courage". Well, let's be real, "Courage" is an easy virtue when you've been outfitted with tasers, nightsticks, handguns, Kevlar Vests and a trigger happy partner. Give me all of the above and we'll go head to head and see who has courage...and no you calling for backup...
And finally..."Pride", The first of the 7 deadly sins. Nope, I, as a member of the public that pays your salary, am not even remotely interested in endorsing this. Not a bit, not even a whit...
Here's a few alternate mottos that give me about the same sense of security. "Coercive • Judgemental • Above the Law". Or: "Well Armed • Well Equipped • By You".
We are aiding the instruments of our own destruction...
Here are some new mottos: "Love • Harmony • Agreement" or "Friendly • Helpful • Paid For by You" or "Nurture • Encourage • Assist" or "Caring • Attentive • Supportive". Even with these few short words we're developing a completely different imaginings of the police. Now lets re-imagine their cars. Instead of the Black and White Imperial Cruisers they now patrol with, how's about floral VW bugs, or color schemes based upon pink and purple. What kind of policing would these cars face, and what kind of officers would they attract to the force, and more importantly, what kind of reaction would they generate from the public that required their assistance? I'm thinking criminals might feel a lot less criminal, and we might be getting a little closer to the grey and colored world you find when you drop all absolutes...
And the uniforms, lets get away from the black (I know, it hides the blood well), but lets try, an experiment, some more real, hippy, floral patterns. Why not? Try it out, we've nothing to lose...
There's a world of change in tiny details...
And other tiny details, too, like you can't shoot anyone you haven't hugged first, and if you haven't hugged them, they're too dangerous and crazy, well, too bad, that's what we pay you for. Lets get away from the polarities and realize the nuances of people, and hire the police on the same basis. Knowing you have to be hugged first will probably make you a lot less likely to shoot someone trying to hug you. It's easy to shoot someone trying to kill you.
Watch policing change and see what happens to crime. Hire cops that don't see the world in black and white and give them back the power of discretion and see how we can change the world...
Crazy Ideas. Maybe they'll work, maybe they won't, but surely they're worth the experiment...
Page 574 of 888