Avoiding the Gaze

I had a conversation recently with a friend of mine who was entreating me to take the subway downtown so that we could have a proper night out. I was stuck between the decision of driving, therefore cutting down the travel time by half, but limiting my alcohol intake (and thus the severity of a subsequent hangover); or taking the TTC so I could quaff indiscriminately (after a later arrival, of course).

But the time and the drinking did not factor into the decision making process. My major concern was the feminist idea of the male gaze, identified in movies and magazines, but also observable in any public area.

In general, I find that I can blend into the masses of people on a streetcar or on the subway in the day. People are reading or chatting or listening to music. I am often doing the same. But taking public transit at night as a single female is a slightly different experience. One becomes very aware of the male gaze and all the complex power realationships that it involves.

In her Saturday column in the Globe, Karen von Hahn touches on the male gaze and its relation to the niqab (a type of veil worn by Muslim women), after British Cabinet minister Jack Straw stated that the veil is a "visible statement of separation and of difference" and asked women visiting his doctor’s office to consider removing it. Von Hahn asserts that the niqab makes a “fashion statement” beyond its original religious purpose based on its colour and the degree to which it conceals the body.

However, Straw’s comment about "visual statements of separation and difference" can be applied to myriad styles of dressing, and not just religiously based ones. Goth-style dressing is the first statement of separation and difference that comes to mind; so does the punk style or any kind of anti-establishment fashion movement based in politics. And more often than not, these styles are mainly worn by teenagers who are going through a stage in life where they are questioning authority and attempting to find their place in society.

I’m a little less political in my dress. When I “blend in” on the TTC, it is often because of several “fashion” factors: I wear jeans, a ubiquitous dress item; I usually wear sunglasses, concealing my eyes from any chance of eye contact with others; and I often listen to my iPod, the earphones making the loudest (ironically) statement that I do not want to engage in any social contact. I send out strong signals that I don’t want to be looked at or participate in any kind of interaction.

This becomes more difficult when my demeanour says something different when on my way out to a social event. I have no sunglasses (usually it is nighttime), no iPod (don’t want to risk losing it) and the jeans have been traded in for a slightly more “polished” outfit (this is when the H&M impulse buys make their debuts). While this style of dressing is completely appropriate for a social event with my peers, it facilitates the unwanted male gaze on the transit system. Hence my reluctance in the aforementioned conversation with my friend.

So can we blame the Muslim women that von Hahn references in her column who “claim relief from the oppression of the male gaze”? Do the various Muslim headdresses allow women to “blend in” as my daytime uniform on the TTC does? Or do we see any piece of clothing as a “continual manifestation of intimate thoughts, a language, a symbol” as von Hahn quotes Balzac in her piece?

You can’t escape where symbols originate from or the process of how they come to mean something. But this is where knowledge and freewill come into play. If Muslim women are given the choice to wear a headdress, and they choose to do so, that is their prerogative. If wearing a niqab or burqa makes them feel less conspicuous and more comfortable, then why shouldn’t they wear it? I see a problem arising when women are not given the choice, or when a politician interprets a "fashion statement" with limited knowledge of the full symbolism and function.

So what was my travel decision for my social engagement that night? I made a "visible statement of separation and of difference" by driving my car, my entire body hidden inside my car and my face somewhat obscured by the reflection of streetlights on the dashboard. I felt comfortable, I felt safe. And I felt a hell of a lot better the next morning for the modest amount of alcohol I drank.

The Love That Dare Not Bark Its Name

Oh, those open-minded Scandinavians with their liberal views on sexuality and toplessness!



The Oslo Natural History Museum in Norway has opened an exhibition of photos depicting animals engaging in homosexual activities.

Even better is the reaction from the political right which has said that the exhibition is "propaganda invading the scientific world" and that the organizers will "burn in hell".

Perhaps by "burn in hell" they mean "sweat vigourously in a free state of nakedness, stretched out in a sauna somewhere in Stavanger, perhaps indulging in a litte whale meat and man-love".

(And to my astute biologist readers, yes, the picture in this entry is actually heterosexual sex. But, somewhat surprizingly, it is actually quite difficult to find G-rated homosexual animal sex on the internet.)

Confessions on a Market Stall

I can't believe there's a second photo of this sort out there (see first). Who buys these? (Is that Putin in the background?)

The Annex, September 28th

Lyla leans back in her chair and crosses her arms across her chest, taking in the boy who has just walked past her table. He walks with a familiar smoothness, his eyes focused beyond the heads of the people sat around the tables that fill the room: a man on a mission. His slim, muscled shoulders are visible through his tight-fitting T-shirt and Lyla lets her gaze drop to his waist, the band of his underwear visible above his jeans.

His hair is slightly disheveled, a style that probably took him 15 minutes and a whole lot of that molding mud he used to use. His eyes do not pass over Lyla, although she’s sure he’s seen her, scoped her location the minute he passed through the door.

He greets another guy at the bar, shakes his hand and smiles his coy, closed-lip smirk he employs to keep any overt emotions in check. He casts a glance over his shoulder, mid-sentence, his eyes not quite meeting Lyla’s.

He is still the irresistible, unattainable bad boy that Lyla met 5 years ago. It was his aloofness that first attracted her. Well, that’s not true. It was his brown eyes that first attracted her. It was his detached demeanour that intrigued her. There’s nothing like a boy who doesn’t want you...

Throughout their brief courtship, which consisted of long spaces of time between phonecalls and run-ins at the bar where it seemed that he was only then reminded of her existence, Lyla fantasized him into a good boy. He became a boyfriend who would watch movies with her on a Friday night, someone who would cook her dinner and drive her to yoga class. Someone who would fall in love with her.

Funny, how we do that, she thinks, arms still crossed warily across her chest; how we rise to unachievable challenges in love.

Her pint arrives, delivered by a short blond waitress, someone who, she has found out through the grapevine, has been his latest conquest. Lyla thanks the unknowing blonde girl and uncrosses her arms to reach for the glass.

Lyla has her eyes on him as she brings the beer to her lips. Just then, he turns his head and locks eyes with Lyla. A rush of adrenaline surges through her, starting in her chest. She can actually see him consider whether or not to acknowledge her. And just as his face warms into a smile, the bartender taps him on the arm and his attention is pulled away.

Lyla swallows the bitter-tasting beer, places the pint glass on the table, and leans back in the chair.

Autumn in Toronto

*

Summer remains my favourite season, but I am really enjoying autumn in Toronto this year. Trees gradually taking on their warm-hued colours: reds and oranges and yellows, the leaves fluttering to the ground in gusts of wind that hint at chills to come. Glorious, sunny Sunday afternoons where all there is to do is brunch, stroll along Bloor, then perhaps head home for a nap. I’m even loving the rainy Saturday afternoons, the air edging toward mild, the rain providing a gloss for the fallen leaves that pepper the sidewalks...

(Image from http://owlfish.com/weblog/2004/10/archive.html)

Guess the Sport III

What sport are these men playing?

Hint: It is a slightly decelerated version of the original, with, perhaps, not so many royals milling about.

The Break Up

For 20 euros (about $30), a German “separation agency” will phone your spouse/partner/lover to tell them that you no longer want to be with them. For 50 euros ($70), they’ll do it in person.

Oh, man! This is the get-out-of-relationship-free card that Jerry Seinfeld advocated in his stand up routine! How nice would it be to finish with a failing relationship in one easy motion (like a band-aid – right off!). There could be no long, drawn out conversations about where you went wrong, no forced falsehoods about how it’s not you, it’s me (it’s totally you), and no awkward explanations about why you stopped liking someone because of the way they punctuated a phone message (ah, Elaine…). For the price of a good bottle of wine, you can be free of the guilt and uncomfortable atmosphere that a break-up conversation evokes.

But really, do we need to pay for this? Surely there are cheaper ways to split from a partner. However each break-up method has its social rules…

PHONE-CALL FADE-AWAY

Involves, rather simply, just not calling someone back. Easy, low-stress and should be picked up easily by the undesired partner. Perfectly acceptable in the first month of dating. If being let go by this method, you are allowed one (1) phonecall after the first unreturned phonecall (to allow for undelivered messages etc.). After that any contact within a 6 month period is unacceptable.

TEXT MESSAGE OR E-MAIL EXPLANATION

Not really cool unless the partner you are trying to dump is proving hard to shake. If he or she doesn’t get your subtle hints (see PHONE-CALL FADE-AWAY), perhaps a written explanation in the “it’s not you, it’s me” genre is required. Do not attempt this method of separation if you’ve been together for several months (see FACE-TO-FACE).

FACE-TO-FACE

Required if you’ve been dating regularly for two months or more. Should be done in a public place that offers some privacy so that a) dumpee can’t go mental on you and, b) dumpee crying won’t cause a scene. Not acceptable on Valentine’s Day, dumpee’s birthday or any major religious holiday. Amount of time acceptable to spend discussing the relationship and where you went wrong can be found by taking the number of months spent together, multiplying by 20, then converting that number into minutes.

And of course, never forget the formula that Charlotte from Sex and the City employed after a break up: it should take exactly half the time you spent in the relationship to get over the person that dumped you. (This, of course, is only applicable to women. The men’s formula for time spent getting over someone is a quarter of the time spent in the relationship.)

Phew. When did this get all so complicated? Maybe the German company is onto something…

Zimbabwe Business

Death is one of the few growth industries in Zimbabwe due to the number of people dying of AIDS.

Vancouver's Bilingual Signs

Now I’ve Heard It All…

In the sleepy county of Cornwall in England, police have served a man with a notice for "placing a garden gnome with intent to cause harassment".

Stop for a minute. Re-read that last sentence again. Okay, continue.

Apparently the gnome is solar-powered and lights up at night, annoying neighbours and upsetting potential home buyers in the area. And I thought I was uptight…

Gnome Story from bbc.co.uk

Secret Agent Search Engine

In an article that appeared in The Guardian a week ago, Andrew Brown reveals the vast tracts of information that search engine Google maintains on its users. The major case study in the article is the story of a Portuguese soccer fan from Florida whose wife has left him, and is told through chronological search words, starting with “marriage counseling” and “spying on the wife,” and ending with “motorcycle insurance” and “video surveillance.”

Google gathers this information by identifying each computer with a cookie, assigning a number to the user, and storing all search records. This kind of Big Brother monitoring, although seemingly anonymous*, is kind of scary. And I wonder what kind of records Google has on me, with the random search words I type in to solve crossword puzzles.

This type of invisible monitoring makes me think of the Sitemeter webcounter I have linked to this blog. If you go to the very bottom of the page, you’ll see a little square icon in rainbow colours. Clicking on this will take you to the Sitemeter website which keeps information on who goes to this website. If you click on By Details (under Recent Visitors) it will give you a whole whack of information about who is checking the blog, complete with where in the world they are, what type of computer they are using, and, if they found it through a search engine, what search words they used to get to the blog.

My number of hits increased after an entry entitled “Naturally Nude Naturists” was posted because (as I discovered with the use of Sitemeter) people were coming to my blog after searching the words “nude” and “naturist.” I also see hits increase when I send out e-mails with links to a specific post (like Guess the Sport) and I can tell if people have entered my blog from one of these e-mails. Given that almost every detail except someone’s name is provided, I sometimes like to guess who each user is, based on computer type, time of hit, and entry method.

My data analysis is rudimentary compared to that of Google. And my motives are for passing interest, whereas Google uses its information to inform advertising (I’ve always wondered how Hotmail knows to put Lavalife ads in the bar to the right of my inbox), which seems innocent enough when compared to lawsuit that saw Google fight to keep its collected information out of the hands of the US government.

And do you remember the ruckus caused when China tried to censor its citizens’ use of the internet earlier this year? Brown notes that “the real power for a totalitarian government is no longer just censorship. It is to allow its citizens to search for anything they want – and then remember it.”

Who would have thought that such a clear picture of someone’s life could be constructed based on words you type into your search engine’s window – the spurned Portuguese soccer fan certainly didn’t.

Careful what you search for.


* Brown’s article mentions the case of a Midwestern church lady whose penchant for Christian quilted wall hangings caused her to be exposed for using search words for vibrators and frigidity because her interests were so specific (the wall hangings, not the vibrators).

Lavalife, c. 1850

I have read theories that the rise in popularity of internet dating sites like Lavalife, and match-making events like speed dating, is due to our increasingly busy lives – singletons just don’t have enough time to find that special someone.

However, a 150-year-old Irish festival held in Lisdoonvarna every year shows that “putting yourself out there” is an age-old tradition.

It started out as a small event for farmers to find brides and grooms for their children, but has since grown, attracting visitors from across Ireland, the UK and beyond. There is an official Matchmaker (whose father and grandfather before him held the same title) who sets up introductions between potential partners during the festival.

I could find no statistics as to the number of people who hook up at Lisdoonvarna (or on Lavalife) and how many actually stay together for the long term – I wondered if the antiquated Irish festival was just as good as internet dating for finding your soul mate…

The fact remains, though, that both the festival and websites like Lavalife serve the same purpose for participants: they act as that friend in real life who facilitates the meeting of potential partners: The web designers for Lavalife are to the dating website as the Matchmaker is to the Lisdoonvarna festival. And when a singleton has run out of friends with other friends to introduce, they have to step outside their circle and dip into other pastures (pardon the farming metaphor).

Personally, I have yet to be convinced to try any kind of dating service. Perhaps this is because I haven’t run out of friends with other friends yet. Or maybe my life isn’t busy enough. Or maybe I’m just happy watching the cows in my pasture…

Une Autre Bicyclette

...this one is one of the winners of the BBC photo competition for the subject "Uniform".

(maybe I should start an abandoned bicycles blog)

Do Not Enter

...Lakeshore Blvd at Don Roadway, by me.

Webquest

Find this magazine. Turn to page 178.

Match the photo on the page to a photo on this blog.

Find the secret code word in the comment window of the matching blog photo.

First person to post the code word in the comment window of this post wins.

Checked Baggage

While in the UK on holiday over the past few weeks, I was caught up in the terrorist threat and subsequent heightened security. Worried that I would have only a clear plastic bag as my carry-on, I watched the news for updates about the dimensions of carry-on luggage and what could be placed in this baggage. When I finally arrived for my flight on Wednesday, I was met by about 8 separate airport employees with elaborate displays of banned hand luggage items and the same cheerful call: “Any liquids? Cosmetics? Make-up?”

This team of reminders started before I’d even arrived at the check-in desk and continued until I was about to pass into the security zone. My answer was always the same; a brief smile, a shake of my head, and a cognizant, “no.”

Well, it wasn’t until I was halfway through the lengthy line-up for security that I actually looked through my carry-on bag. Sure enough, even with 8 different people entreating me to check, I found a bottle of (liquid) perfume. Bollocks, I thought, surrendering the prohibited item to the security guard and passing my bag, laptop, sweater and shoes through the scanner. I walked through the metal detector without incident and collected my belongings.

The moral of the story? Check your bag(gage).

Shadow Puppets

We Didn't Teach Them to Write for This

Israeli girls write messages on shells ready for firing towards Hezbollah targets in Lebanon (from news.bbc.co.uk).

Servers, Me and the GST

So I’ll start briefly by asking, has anyone really noticed a difference with the GST being 1% less now?

It was a bit of a headache for the manager at a Harvey’s in Barrie (with whom I discussed the change in tariff while in cottage country on the Canada Day weekend), but apart from him, no one’s really expressed their glee and gratitude to Mr. Harper for lessening our burdensome levy.

And if no one really has noticed, why didn’t we just leave the GST at 7% (adding up that 1% of what Canadians purchase in a year makes a huge difference to funding) and keep putting that money back into education, healthcare, social programmes, blah, blah, blah.

My friend Thadd pointed out that one group may notice a difference with the GST reduction: people in the service industry. When leaving a tip at a restaurant, many people use the tax as a guide to tipping since it is 15% of the bill. Having been a server myself, this doesn’t really count as a 15% tip (I know, I know, some reckon you don’t have to tip on tax, but really, that extra dollar change that you’re waiting for means more to me than to you). And now, with the taxes coming to 14%, servers will be out even more cash.

Taxi drivers have managed to circumvent the problem – their totals are tax inclusive, therefore customers will tip on the grand total (although I have heard that cabbies tend to be tipped less of a percentage than servers).

So what does all this mean? Don’t forget to tip your waiter or waitress. They’ve been on their feet all day, running in and out of a hot kitchen (the heat, my god, the heat!) and dealing with obnoxious customers. And if you can afford to go out to dinner, you can afford to tip 15-20% of the entire bill.

(Thanks to Thadd for inspiring this post.)

Ramblings from the Rock

I've just returned from Newfoundland (the only province I hadn't been to), and from there, I bring you this street sign.

Instead of signs detailing the elaborate rules of parking (now we're in July, and it's between the 1st and 15th - does that mean I can or can't park on this side of the street?) and announcing snow routes (does this count in the summer? how about if the snow has already been cleared? no one seems to heed these signs anyway...), the Newfies post signs banning all from damaging trees.

My tone sounds mocking, but really, I couldn't agree more with the environmentalist Maritimers. How great a city is it (the photo was taken in St. John's) that these are standard issue street signs. And don't even get me started on Last Call. No one was familiar with the term when I asked, because you can drink any time of the day here!

While I'm at it, the scenery is beautiful and they paint their houses in bright colours....


view toward the village of Quidi Vidi


houses on Duckworth Street

All I Really Really Want Is Zigazig Ha...

In an article entitled “Girl Power as Anarchism”, that appeared in The Guardian on Monday and has now been reprinted in this past Saturday’s Globe and Mail under the title “What Happened to Girl Power?”, John Harris writes about the legacy of girl power, ten years after the Spice Girls’ single “Wannabe” topped the charts.

Harris claims that despite heavy media criticism and the band being “shot through with absurdity and contradiction…their claim to be waging war on a testosterone-heavy consensus just about held up.” That the Spice Girls were a valid form of feminist thought is an argument I had with many people during those first heady years of Spicemania.

The Spice Girls were widely criticized for declaring their maxim of “Girl Power” while dressing in revealing outfits and generally not being very cerebral. (I remember reading a Vogue interview where the author gave a list of words that the girls had to have defined during a conversation, one being “sibling.”) The irony of the situation was that critics divorced the women’s sexuality and intrinsic interests from the band’s explanation of Girl Power: we are going to do what we want to do and we’re not going to let men dictate what that is (which is basically a tenet of feminism). Critics wouldn’t let overt sexuality and an interest in fashion exist with feminist thought. But these two things are not mutually exclusive.

Being the feminist that I am, I can’t ignore the fact that many societal factors influence what women perceive as sexy or interesting. I shave my legs because I say I like the way it feels and looks, but really, through many subconscious avenues, I have been told that I like the way it feels and looks. But the basic underpinnings of the Spice Girls’ assertion were that you should feel good about yourself and not let anyone cut you down. Is this way of thinking so inconsequential and enslaved?

Harris mentions in his article that he read “The Whole Woman” by Germaine Greer, published in 1999, “when Spice hegemony was fading fast. ‘The Spice Girls did make a difference,’ [Greer] wrote, ‘because their most passionate fans were eight-year-old girls.’ A study of children's oral culture had found, in the post-Spice climate, that ‘whereas half the space in school playgrounds used to be taken up by a self-selecting group of boys playing football, girls' clapping and dancing games were taking over’.” The eight-year-old girls took on board the message of Girl Power and were putting it into action; and not by becoming part of the male world by playing football. They maintained their interests (just as the Spice Girls maintained theirs, as well as their sexualities), marrying that with a greater sense of self-worth and entitlement.

The Spice Girls are not the voiceless, nameless girls that we see splashed across men’s magazines. They may have dressed similarly to the nameless girls, but their voice was what set them apart. They took their notoriety and influence and changed the thinking and actions of little girls.

And all they really wanted? To “zigazig ha…”

Bicyclette Quebecois

Faithful readers of this blog will recall a photo of an abandoned bicycle underwater in Amsterdam in a previous post. Here is another abandoned bicycle, this one in Quebec.

The View From Here

What is it about the restricted area around the Chernobyl reactor that makes for such despondent photos with dolefully muted colours?

Mongolian Wrestling

Congratulations to those who guessed it - the Guess the Sport II post was a picture of wrestlers waiting to compete at the annual Naadam Festival (in Ulan Bator, the Mongolian capital). The festival coincides with the 800th anniversary of the founding of the Mongol empire by Genghis Khan.

Panhandling

Jane Pitfield, conservative and mayoral candidate, is pushing for an anti-panhandling by-law to be read at City Hall. This from a woman who lives the high Leaside life where, if the undesirables of society make it too far up Bayview, they’re quickly shooed back to their Don Valley homes (Open-air bedrooms, complete with surrounding trees and pleasing tarps to keep out the rain. A great fixer-upper option!).

How does panhandling make it to the top of Ms. Pitfield’s agenda of things to change?

I can’t remember a time when someone was rude to me if I did not fulfill their request of a quarter or a loonie. In fact, all I hear these days is the polite phrase: “Thanks anyway, have a good day,” even to people who have whole-heartedly ignored their fellow human’s plea. I once heard a guy, seated comfortably in his SUV, tell a panhandler to get a job. An exchange of words occurred, the panhandler remaining polite and dignified, the SUV driver disintegrating into insults and epithets.

Perhaps it is not an anti-panhandling law we need, but an anti-asshole law. Just as you would politely decline being able to give the time to a fellow human being because you weren’t wearing your watch (and not scold them for being so imbecilic and inept for forgetting to put one on that morning – oh wait, you forgot, too), so should you acknowledge the request, “spare some change?” with eye contact and a polite, “sorry,” instead of ignoring, or worse, chastising the person below you who, “but for the grace of God,” go you.

Clapham, July 3rd

”Simon!” calls Lyla as she sees him stoop to fit his tall frame through the truncated door.

He sees her and smiles, nodding slightly and comes over, his eyes flitting self-consciously to the table of girls who have noted his entry with stares and whispers.

“Hello!” he says warmly, receiving the embrace that Lyla has offered, half-standing out of her chair.

She holds him a moment too long, protecting him, perhaps. He is still her sweet Simon: innocent and unknowing, struggling to figure out his place in this world. Although the sunglasses he places on the table are ten times the price she has ever paid for a pair. She can’t quite see him in the light that most people do, especially the table of girls who are surreptitiously trying to get Simon in the viewfinder of their camera phones.

“It’s like a bloody fishbowl,” says Lyla, not moving her lips in a lazy attempt at her own surreptitiousness as Simon sits down and leans in to hear her.

“Yeah, well, I know,” says Simon, unsure if he wants to get into another discussion about his newly-found fame.

“So, how are you?” asks Lyla, sensing his hesitation, eager also to return to the distilled form of normalcy the two friends now inhabit.

“Good, good,” says Simon. “I’m off for a week in France with Charlotte.”

“Ooo! Whereabouts?”

“Down near Toulouse – we’ve found – “

“Excuse me…”

It’s one of the girls from the table. She is grinning and can’t be more than 16 or 17 years old. Lyla and Simon look up toward her.

“Are you Simon from Seafish?” she asks, her made-up eyes eager and focused on Simon.

“Er, yes, I am,” he says, casting a quick glance at Lyla, who smiles slightly and then looks at the table.

“Can I have your autograph?” She offers Simon a pen and a journal, white with pink flowers on the covers, the first half of the blank pages covered with snippets of writing in different hands.

“Sure,” says Simon, taking the journal and finding the next blank page. “What’s your name?” He looks up at her, eyebrows raised.

“Charlotte.”

“Ah. Same as my girlfriend’s,” he says, and Charlotte giggles, receiving the closed journal and pen when he is finished.

“Thanks,” she says, raising her shoulders to her ears, still grinning.

“No worries,” says Simon, grinning back.

“Bye!” she says, backing away slowly.

“Bye,” says Simon.

“Bye,” says Lyla, after the girl has turned away and is walking swiftly back to her fold.

Simon and Lyla watch her until she sits, the heads of the other girls forming a tent around the journal. Simon and Lyla turn back to each other. They exchange a look that is half-quizzical, half-surprise, which then dissolves into a shared snicker.

“Right,” says Simon, “Where were we?”

Guess the Sport II

These participants are waiting to compete in which event (and in which country if you're feeling sporting)? First correct answer receives a replica pair of briefs, worn in the photo.

Thoughts from Terry

"It's like, sometimes you go to a party, right, and everyone's all fuckin' loaded and you're not loaded, so you go up to people and you're like, how's it going and they're like, woooo!!! And then you're like, ya, okay; and you're trying to talk a bit and they're fuckin' loaded and then you realize the only way to keep going is to catch up to them. So you shotgun a few and then you get good and pissed right away."

FUBAR, 2002

The Pub Quiz

I was first introduced to the Pub Quiz on Wednesday nights at the King's Head pub in the English village of Battle while spending a year working overseas. I was still in an American-tourist state of finding everything in Britain romantically quaint, so sitting in a low-ceilinged, 600-year-old building was new and exciting. I paid my quid’s entry fee and started the first of 5 rounds on all manner of topics. This became an almost weekly event, my team winning the competition only once. When we won, we only got about five pounds apiece, but it was the weekly title of Pub Quiz Winners that was so coveted.

Later, while living in Sydney, Australia, I found another Pub Quiz at the Trinity pub. My knowledge of North American sports teams proved to be an asset to my team of mostly-British backpackers, although one overseas call was made (illegally) to discern the name of the Pittsburgh hockey team (Penguins). My trivia talents were better rewarded at the antipodean quiz night: my team was announced as "Last Week's Winners" twice.

Upon returning to Canada I was able to sate my thirst for trivia by playing the NTN trivia game that some bars have where you type in answers on a little box with an antenna. But this form of competition lacked the focus, camaraderie and social interactions of a proper pub quiz.

So I tried to do my own. The only problem was, being a primary school teacher, I wanted everyone to do well and began giving hints and clues and awarding extra points, much to the dismay of some of the more serious participants.

And now I have discovered a better-organized pub quiz with a better turn-out which runs at the Duke of York pub in Toronto. It is run by Pub Stumpers, a trivia league established in 2004. Upon entry, I noticed quite a specific demographic: participants were university students, the girls clad in trendy retro-80s outfits and the boys in graphic t-shirts and thick-rimmed spectacles. I sat down in my simple jeans and ordered a pint, in anticipation of my brother’s arrival. Surely our collected genepool would see us to the top of the tables.

I felt immediately intelligent, easily answering questions like, which animal has the highest blood pressure (the giraffe) and according to the poem, which child is full of woe (Wednesday’s – and I know this because I was born on this sorrowful day). My brother cruised through such queries as Frank Beard is, ironically, the only member of which band to not sport a beard (ZZ Top) and which South American country is named after the Latin word for silver (Argentina). The music round was the most fun, trying to extricate the name and artist from only a few bars of a song. Embarrassingly, I got “I Need to Know” by Mark Anthony and was convinced that a Foreigner song was actually “Join the Joyride” by Roxette. Brother Tim came through with “Video Killed the Radio Star” by The Buggles, which I was sure (along with most of the other contestants) was an A-Ha song.

So, what is it that brings people out to quiz nights? The pursuit of intellectual dominance? The team spirit and co-operation of the contestants? The arguments that erupt over whether a “grimalkin” is a cat or a hamster (it’s a cat)? The excuse to have 3 pints on a Tuesday night?

All of the above. The pub quiz gives a focus to the night’s events, it provides a goal for revelers to co-operatively strive for, and it supplies conversation starters for people to get to know each other better. The Pub Quiz also has a way of bringing every person in the room together, creating a community of trivia buffs who call out to the Quiz Master and to each other, all in pursuit of that elusive weekly title: Pub Quiz Winners.

Avoiding the Paparazzi

All those celebrities that complain about being hounded by the paparazzi need to become more creative with their avoidance techniques.

Instead of sending out decoys or exiting at the rear of buildings, follow Kate Moss's lead: party until really, really late so that it's early (like 5:45am) and then sneak past the photographers while they're sleeping.

Genius.

I Hate These Shoes

I've been away. I've been away trying to come up with other fashion trends that I have hated, like the ubiquitous shoes shown above. However, I can't remember any.

Comfort, schmumfort. These shoes make a seemingly normal person look like a mammoth-hooved garden gnome.

Eat Your Heart Out, Jack Handy

Then all of a sudden,
something turned your world
upside down...

World Cup Equalizer

Sudanese refugees watch a World Cup game at a camp in Darfur.

Baby Brangelina

A couple of years ago, I swore off ever buying another one of those glossy, graphic gossip magazines because, like that bag of chips that looks so tempting on the shelf a the corner store, I knew that after the purchase and consumption I would eventually end up feeling empty and slightly stupid.

Even though I have not actually purchased Us or People or a similar rag for several years now, I have managed to keep abreast of the events in the lives of several celebrities by reading magazines at the gym and wandering the internet: I know some of the details of the Heather Locklear-Denise Richards feud, I’ve seen Britney Spears’s various maternal mishaps and I can name the offspring of Gwyneth and Chris, Katie and Tom, Gwen and Gavin, and now Brad and Angelina.

But it wasn’t until the birth of Shiloh Nouvel and the subsequent interview that “Brangelina” gave in Namibia, thanking the country for hosting the birth, that the complete weirdness of our culture’s obsession with the lives of famous people really hit me.


Here are two parents, one a UN Goodwill ambassador, who have just sold their newborn pictures for over $4 million (the money will be given to charity) and are now discussing the birth in a country where the infant mortality rate is 48.1 in 1000 births (compare to 4.69 in Canada). And this is major news.

It just seems such an odd thing to hold an almost “press conference” about the birth of a child. But, as celebrity magazine sales show (and column inches in respected newspapers around the world exhibit), we want to know about the exploits of those in the public eye.

Now if I could only swear off the chips…

Notes from the Classroom

Okay, this is slightly self-indulgent, but when you're a teacher and a kid says something funny or you say something you never thought you'd have to in your life; you only have yourself to laugh with. And so, I share:

CUTE KID QUOTES

My children were using unit cubes to explore division problems with remainders when one student became convinced that one of his unit cubes had been taken by a fellow student. He said to me, “I had remainder 7 and now I only have remainder 6! She has my cube!”

PHRASES YOU NEVER THOUGHT YOU'D UTTER...

I said this right after a boy fell on his hands and knees, positioned his face 10cm from the floor, and blew out his nose as hard as he could: “If you have something up your nose, get a tissue. Now, can you find the booger and clean it up."