Dog Buns, Geography King!

He's A South Canadian YouTuber

Whom I have never encountered before, and before you ask I have no idea how he managed to crop up on Youtube as it concerns me.  The title of his vlog was "8 Worst Places In The U.S." and he had a few criteria for what make a place worst.  First was "Ghetto", second was "Poverty" and third was "Weird".  We here in the UK often feel that we 'know' about South Canada because we watch their television programs and films.

     O no.  Not at all.

     Art!

     Jon is a British journalist who worked for the BBC in South Canada, and his book's title says a lot - if we here in the Allotment Of Eden viewed South Canadians as inhabitants of a foreign country, we'd understand them better.  Winston Churchill STAND UP FOR THE GREATEST ENGLISHMAN EVER* once defined our countries as "Two nations divided by a common language".  Your average Brit has no idea who the Founding Fathers were, what the Bill Of Rights is, nor why the Federal Bureau of Investigation is 'Federal'.

     So!  Prepare to be enlightened, gentle readers who reside within the hallowed boundaries <Mister Hand intercedes to get rid of a lot of guff> Isle.  Art!

     Surprise, not all the states within South Canada look like this, because not all of them have a Pacific coastline.  Geography King took a look first at the classification "Ghetto", which according to my Collins Concise, is: "Densely populated slum area of a city inhabited by a socially and economically deprived minority."  Art!

     This is GK, and he makes it explicitly clear that this is not any kind of sneering exercise at the places involved; these are places where real people suffer real problems.

     First up under 'Ghetto' is Detroit, in terms of sheer scale.  This, he considers, is the largest South Canadian ghetto out there.  Art!

     GK also qualifies his categorisation of 'Ghetto' because so much of urban Detroit is simply either derelict or empty.  Things have improved slightly of late, but not much.  The city council probably can't wait until OCP make them an offer and bring in Clarence Boddiker to - er - improve things.  Art!

Yes sir Mister Boddiker sir

     So you see, not everything in the garden is lovely.  Not that this phenomenon is unique to South Canada, you can dig up urban shothiles in other countries, too: take Walker Road in Salford, for example, or even Kennedy Road in Salford, where Conrad and work colleague Mike were taken to be "The Dibble" because we wore a tie and shirt -

     Which is a story for another day.

"The Dibble"

Larry, Surly And Mo

You young whippersnappers might have to cast around to make sense of this one.  Conrad's not going to help you.

     Okay, once upon a time there was a genius-level computer programmer called Tim.  He was very experienced and capable, and thus companies paid him wheelbarrow-loads of cash to work for them at a hedge fund.  Tim, being a free spirit, did not like the daily commute to work within New York State to a location in New York City.  Art!

     Then came lockdown.  Tim used this opportunity to buy a house in Michigan, whilst still continuing to achieve his targets in splendid fashion whilst being in an entirely different state.  He had a house, not an apartment, he had a garden, not a balcony, and he also had a lot less to pay out in mortgage than a rental in NYC.  Art!

     Enter Larry, the new boss.  Larry is a jackbottomwipe seeking to exploit his management power, so he calls all the staff into a meeting in NYC.  Tim politely declines.  Larry orders him into NYC.  Tim points out there's absolutely no need for him to be there in person.  Larry, who is the archetypical definition of a Little Tin Hitler, insists or Tim will be sacked.

     "Go ahead," dares Tim.

     Days later the CEO contacts Tim, begging him to come back in.  Because, you see, Tim being an ace programmer, the company needs him more than he needs them.

     Tim, having the company's delicate and tender bits in a vice, tells the boss that he isn't coming back to NYC.  If they want him back, they can come to him in Michigan.  They have four days until he starts to look for work elsewhere.

     That was on Monday.  On Tuesday they cave and give him a 15% raise and - O what's this?  Larry is nowhere to be found at the company.

     Sometimes you are the champ and they have to dance to your tune.

Tim, a wizard

"The Sea Of Sand"

The Doctor is trying to work out exactly what he's trodden on whilst also being a personal encyclopaedia for the bio-vore aristocracy.

A strategic pause.  For one thing, the three aliens were conferring.  Another concept difficult for them to understand?

     Strike whilst the iron is hot!

     "Lord Excellency Sur, may I put a proposition to you?" asked the Doctor.  Sur, busy hob-nobbing with his cronies, merely waved a hand.  "Why begin a war in which millions on both sides will die?  Planet Earth has flora and fauna with which you could re-populate your world, and I know reclamation techniques which could roll back the deserts -"

     "Silence!" shrieked Sur, bounding upright and looming threateningly close with his proboscis.  "Insolent animal!  Earth will be our larder and storehouse combined.  From it we will reap the necessary resources to achieve interplanetary conquest.  Conquest, alien, conquest, not petty co-operation!"

     "Your peculiar little pet is not properly trained, Sur," joked one of the other aristocrats.  Sur looked to be on the verge of attacking the Doctor, but restrained himself.

     "Take this one back to his cell," he ordered, turning back to the other two bio-vores.  He watched a dejected Thedoctor stumble back up the trench, under the guard's watchful eyes.

     Watch out for that stumble, gentle reader, because that's only what it looks like, not what it is.

More On The Theme Of 'Empty Spaces'

This picture is from the BBC's themed page on the self-same title.  Art!

Courtesy Andrew D Jackson

     Those dots in the background?  They're fishing boats akin to the one that we see in the foreground.  That 'cliff' in the background is actually an iceberg, because this picture was taken in Greenland, at Ilulissat, where an iceberg is as usual as a tree or a bird here in This Sceptred Isle.  That gives you a perspective as to the distances involved.  Scale at sea can be hard to come by without any kind of comparison, which is exactly what you've got here.

Finally -

Conrad is now officially dog-sitting Edna, which he diligently understands to constitute at least two walks per day, amounting to at least forty minutes walkies in total, despite the weather.  Plus all the usual mockery and toast crusts that begging can deliver; no licking porridge bowls clean as I tend not to have it in the morning since no longer gainfully employed.  Also am expected to post evidence of her well being on Facebook daily.  O the humanity!

*  <ahem> even if he was half-South Canadian.