Life in the Slow Lane

Guess what? I'm baaaaaaaack!!

Hey everybody! How's it going? It's the Subliminal one, here once again to fill the dull void that is Friday morning with witty humour, keen observations on life, and just good, clean, wholesome fun!

...Except that it never turns out that way. Normally, I just end up running my mouth off on some silly thing, while trying to throw in any scrap of humour I can find. I know, you deserve better than that. Well, by golly, today you're going to get better than that! (You're going to run your mouth off on LOTS of silly little things?)

...Ummm, no...why would I do that? Heh heh heh...d'oh.

Okay, so you found me out. Shall we start then?

• It looks like Canada's hopes of bringing Lord Stanley home where he belongs rest with the team in the city that the rest of Canada loves to hate. The Toronto Maple Leafs are the only Canadian team left in the postseason, and with the top 3 seeds in the Eastern Conference gone, the Leafs look more and more like they will be representing the East in the Stanley Cup finals. I realize it's still early in the second round (by the time you read this, games 3 and 4 of the Leafs-Pens series will have been played), but I believe that when the smoke clears, we will see the Leafs get their first crack at the Cup in a long time. Sure, Pittsburgh is a talented team, and the third round promises to be a real goaltender's duel with either Byron Dafoe or (God forbid) Dominik Hasek at the other end of the ice. But, in my humble opinion, Pittsburgh, Boston, and Buffalo are teams that the Leafs should (emphasis on "should") be able to beat. You may laugh, and you may scoff, but I say unto you that I have waited my whole life to see the Blue and White carry Lord Stanley around, and I have faith that this is the year I finally get to see it happen. And if you're not down with that, I've got 3 words for you: GO LEAFS GO!!!
• I feel so let down. My last safe haven from the world of Corporate America has been breached. Now, keep in mind that I've been out of town for the last 4 months, and never really read the K-W Record all that often prior to then, so this may have been happening for a long time. Regardless of that, I'm still ticked off about it. I was reading the Saturday Comics — you know, the big, full-colour pull-out version. (Hey! I hear you snickering back there.) Anyway, on the first page, there's a comic "strip" called, "carsumer capers." (Yes, it is capitalized like that.) All this "strip" consists of is 3 panels with the company logo, which is a talking carface (who is called "Otto" for some strange reason), telling us one of the worst puns I have ever heard. And that's it! Oh, and we're told that this was "brought to you by Carsumer^TM, yadda yadda yadda." I realize that people have advertised in the comics section for years — but none that I've ever seen have gone so far as to make a strip out of their advertisements. Where have we gone wrong, people? How did we allow ourselves to reach this stage? I take this to be a sign that the Apocalypse is catching the next Greyhound to Waterloo.
• I just spent the last 4 months over in Kingston, as part of my program. I am part of the Math Teaching Option, and as such I am obliged to spend time as, of all things, a student of Queens University. When I went over there, I must admit that I did not think too kindly of Kingston. I simply did not want to be there. It was too far away from home, too far away from Waterloo, too far away from the things and people that I valued the most. However, looking back, I must admit that Kingston is a pretty decent city. It's fairly well laid-out, quiet for the most part, and fairly friendly. It certainly is a student-oriented city — outside of the downtown, you couldn't walk 2 blocks without running into a convenience store or laundromat. Queens isn't that bad, either. (Hey, they have anti-Western T-shirts there, so they can't be that bad.) My big problem with Queens was with the pathetic excuse of a computer lab that exists at the Faculty of Education. There are about 30 computers, of which roughly 10 are PC's; the rest are Power Macs. There are about 600 people in the Faculty of Education that need the lab. Oh, and the lab closed at 9:45 pm. on weeknights, and sooner on weekends. You do the math. Oh well. Anyway, I did learn a big lesson during my stay at Queens: You really do get out of life what you put into it. I regret that I didn't realize this sooner into my term, because all of the interesting research I started doing at the end of the term conflicted with all of the essays and reports that I had left until the end of the term. D'oh. So, overall, I certainly had a better experience in Kingston that I thought I would, and I learned that you can't give up on something before you even try it. So, this is my one little shining nugget of advice that I can give to you: Take on new experiences head-on, and make the effort to do things. You'll find that you get out of the experience more than you thought possible. That computer lab, though — it was as bad as a talking carface.

Chris "Mr. Subliminal (not to be confused
with a talking carface)" McGuire