Update : Vote For Rory

Fringe player Rory Fitzpatick will play in the allstar game, if votes were tabulated today. This story is just too funny. I almost forgot about it completely until this article I stumbled upon.


"With 113,509 this week, Fitzpatrick received more votes than any other Western Conference player. He has 144,819 total. He is ahead of teammate Mattias Ohlund and L.A.'s Rob Blake. He is pulling up on Chris Pronger and Dion Phaneuf, and within sight of leaders Nicklas Lidstrom and Scott Niedermayer"

I guess he's the working mans role model?

SIMH #3 - Röyksopp "What Else is There?"

Just the way Sigur Ros makes you feel like you could be in Iceland when you listen to them, Röyksopp is doing the same sort of thing for Norway. Well for me anyways.



Their music is electronica at it's finest, and these guys even do covers of Queens of the Stoned Age, which is never a bad thing. In case you're wondering what Röyksopp means in Norwegian, you'll be happy to know it means 'puffball', whatever the 'eff that is.

People Fat in America

Surely someone would eventually find a use for American obesity.


Norwegians are saving the environment one fat-ass at a time, and they're looking to the fattest country of them all for help.

A Norwegian innovator has found a way to turn the sticky-icky from liposuction operations into biodiesel, a renewable resource. If this goes forth successfully, Americans are creating another money making scheme and eliminating any health scare caused through obesity. After all, money's more valuable then health eh!

This just makes me wonder what else human fat can be used for. Tyler Durdon managed to make soap out of it, now the potential is there to power your car with is. What will they think of next...

It's Official: Sweden's Perfect

If you’re like me, you’ve been waiting on baited breath for the results of the Economists democracy survey to arrive. Wait no longer folks. They’re here and the conclusion is this:

Sweden is the perfect democracy.

At least according to the Economist, but at the end of the day, does it matter? Talk to any Swede and the results wouldn’t cause them to bat an eye, and most likely they’d just say: “We’ve got a great state system”.

Don’t have a job? No problem: here's a cheque!
Don’t want to pay tuition? Taken care of!
The list goes on and on. But really, it is a great system!

And rely on state they do, to the point they seem… well (huge stereotype coming)… lazy. Lazy in the sense that at the end of the day, they know they’ll get something out of the system.

An example is this exact program I'm studing. Basically, there's a government initiated pursuit of educating young entrepreneurs, and they are teaching youth how to impliment entrepreneurial ideas and take them into action. Swedes are insanely innovative, that much is for certain. But the problem with pursuing entrepreneurial ventures is the risk involved in the uncertainty of success. Now why on earth would you enter into uncertainty with this great state welfare system that guarantees so much?

So correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t communism all about total reliance on the state and commitment to the government? Of course, Sweden is a free market democracy, but my god the people here sort of coast through life (in a way) because they know if nothing else, they’ll have government support of some sort to back them up.

To put this perfect democracy/hyper-individualistic society in context, where else would you be more then happy to dish 50% of your salary to taxation?

While taxes may not always make sense, I think Norway has it figured out.



Take strip clubs for example. If you’re the lucky owner of a peeler bar, you’re exempt from the regular 25% VAT. Why? Well, because stripping, in its “combination of dancing and acting” is an art; therefore, they don’t pay this astronomical fee.

Nordic regions all placed extremely high on the survey, and these happy-go-lucky folk clearly have not a problem in the world with their wonderful system.

I guess if I lived here fulltime, there are a few ways of overlooking the taxes and $10 pints…

Not a great picture, but you get the idea....

Useless fact of the day... "Left-handers 'think' more quickly" - BBC

I'm not sure who comes up with this shit, but I'll take it.

Taking after my grandpa in being a lefty, it was interesting to me to hear that when he was in the Canadian military, being left handed wasn't allowed, so they forced him to learn how to write with his right. Not to sure what the point of that was, but he did it nonetheless...

SIMH #2 - Sufjan Stevens "Chicago"

Not sure why plumbers like Jack Johnson and John Mayer get more publicity then him, but Sufjan Steven's music absolutely puts them to shame. Solid studying music, solid drinking music, solid driving music, solid everything music.

Jian Ghomeshi is to thank for getting me into Sufjan Stevens with his CBC Radio 1 program "The National Playlist" (a radio program somebody should reincarnate because it was the only thing worth listening to (music wise) that the CBC has had in years).

Anyways, have a gander at this song. Solid stuff (I'm loving 'solid' today).



This song, Chicago, reminds me of ripping through mud puddles in my Jeep out west and shot gunning Bud's with a couple lovely ladies I know. Ah, the memories... haha

People, The Planet Killers...

Walking around Stockholm with a t-shirt and a light jacket in December made a little light-bulb go off in my head: Isn’t it a little warm here? A few beers later, the thought was out of my head, I left environmentalist mode and returned back to tourist mode.


Then, I went back to the splendors of Umeå, where it was absolutely tropical outside. Albeit depressingly dark, tropical nonetheless to the point I saw a dandelion in bloom.

Considering Umeå is located on the same parallel with Canadian cities such as Whitehorse, it made me wonder “Why the hell is it so warm? +10 and muggy"?

Then after looking into this fun little global warming issue, I came across an article headlined:

“Man Must Leave Planet”

Jesus. I’m surely no environmentalist, but let’s be honest here: We’re screwed.

Sure, people in places like Edmonton, Umeå or maybe Reykjavik are loving the few degrees of increased warmth throughout the winter. But how are these few degrees effecting places in Arctic regions?




Maybe I’m just stating the obvious here, but this is the first time the issue has smacked me in the face first hand. Growing up in Canada, my brother, sister and I used to watch the TV in the mornings waiting for the temperature to drop below -32C so the buses wouldn’t run and we wouldn’t have to go to school. That was only a decade ago, and there's not a snowballs chance in hell kids there are thinking the same way today the way we did back then.

That’s my rant. Global warming isn’t a sexy topic, but when there are talks of people needing to move to other planets, maybe it’s time to not just take notice, but change things up a bit?

And not the Kyoto kind of change..... although if these kids can challenge the accord, shouldn't governments really be able to put their heads together?