Gordon

The first Barenaked Ladies album was named Gordon. You only need to read the acknowledgements of the album to understand that this is a reference to the seeming plethora of Gordons in the Canadian music scene. Gordon Lightfoot,  Gord Johnston (Big Sugar) and the band with the most Gordons of all - The Barenaked Ladies with Gord Downie and Gordon Sinclair. 

Of course, Gordon is a pretty common name for that generation. My neighbour to the South is named Gordon, as is my father-in-law. 

While I have been listening to a bit of Mr. Lightfoot over the last few weeks, it's the Gordons from the Hip that possessed me this weekend. 

Saturday marked the 10th anniversary of the final Hip show by rebroadcasting the final concert, "The Tragicall Hip: A National Celebration." I had not seen the concert in the last decade since it happened and had never seen the whole thing. We were in Winnipeg that night, and I was able to watch much of it in a crowd at The Forks. I remember it being an emotional and monumental moment. It was a very Canadian night. A friend texted me on Saturday during the show, and we discussed how timely the rebroadcast of this uniting moment was, considering the fact that Canada pulled out of trade negotiations with the USA on Friday. 

Watching it again was very different. First, it had that Titanic feel to it. We didn't know for sure then, but Gord Downie would die about a year later. This wasn't the last time we'd hear him; his solo album "Secret Path" would tell the residential school story like we had never heard it before he left, and he left us a double album as well. We also got to hear the Hip once more with Leslie Feist singing. But this was the last time we would ever see them together. 

It's a sad document to be sure. Fiddler's Green got me, like it always does. Fireworks had me in tears to my surprise, but my band used to cover it in high school, so I think there was a strong bit of nostalgia there. And of course that final farewell of Ahead by a Century is also devastating. 

Also surprising was how much Gord called out then Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to help the First Nations. We know now, a decade later, that Mr. Trudeau failed in that challenge. And perhaps that's why he wasn't featured in the opening documentary, but our current PM, Mr. Carney, was. 

It motivated me to finally watch "The Tragically Hip: No Dress Rehearsal", a comprehensive documentary about the band produced by Gord's brother Mike Downie. It's a fascinating look at the band, their history and their struggles. It really is a good warts-and-all document, and the final part talking about Gord's final years is as sad as watching that final concert. Seeing the chaotic and wise voice of my Canadian musical youth reduced to weak whispers of  "I love you" is hard to watch, but it's lovely to know he was surrounded by his family and his friends. It's good to know that he was cared for and that he cared for others. \

Canada has come a long way since we said goodbye to The Hip. Maybe some of the people mentioned in these documents didn't, but the country has. We've walked further down the path of reconciliation, navigated a pandemic, looked our sovereignty in the face and staked our claim to our place in the world. I'm inclined to wish we had Gord and The Hip here to guide us through, but at the same time, we did it. We took the identity they showed us and the unity they created, and we've forged on. The Hip were important and something we should celebrate, but they were merely a spotlight on a people and a land I am becoming more and more proud to be a part of. 

Oh and fuck Donald Trump. Just fuck that guy. 

Three long breaths

I'm coming up on 4 weeks with this shoulder pain, and unfortunately things aren't really that much better. There's been a bit of improvement, but I'm still stuck in my Lazy Boy most of the day and up most of the night. Really disappointed in my body's ability to heal. 

I finally saw a physiotherapist yesterday and received a personalized exercise plan. Perhaps more positively, though, is that she doesn't think this is a major injury and that it should clear up with time. But that time might be a while. I hope it's not too long. My short-term disability expires in September. 

One of the interesting outcomes of this is applying a bit of meditation practice that I was working on while camping in the week before the injury showed up. 

Whether you're looking at insomnia, anxiety or just meditation, breathing exercises seem to be an important practice to help calm your body and get yourself through hard times. I've found breathing exercises to be very valuable through this shoulder injury.

I was practicing the breathing exercises while camping, just as a meditation practice. Breathe in slowly. Hold your breath for a few seconds. Breathe out slowly. It's amazing how hard it can be just to take three good breaths like that without getting distracted. 

Moving into the early days of this injury, I was using those same breathing practices just to get through some of the pain pangs that I was getting. Just try to relax the muscles so that I could feel a little less pain. 

Now, moving into the exercise and recovery part, that same long breath and hold and out is about 10 seconds long. So I'm using that to measure some of my exercises and stretches that need to last for 30 seconds. Instead of sitting there counting 1 one thousand, 2 one thousand… I just calmly take those three deep breaths with the holds. It counts about the same amount of time, and it makes the stretch a little more relaxed and calm, and I can end on a breath. 

I know it's not as glorious as designing my own crown, but slow, careful breaths have been an important part of my life over the past few weeks, and probably for the next few as well.

I wish this thing would just leave me alone already. I'd like to get back to my life now.

My Crown

This week's post is a counterpoint to a few previous posts by the Navigator. Namely, his post from last week about taking some indigenous history courses and learning about colonialism. And secondly, a post from a while back about making your own coat of arms. 

Being stuck in my Lazy Boy for the last few weeks has allowed me to delve into a few deep internet rabbit holes, as you can imagine. One of those rabbit holes has been watching videos about Crown jewels. But not just the British Crown jewels. The crown jewels of the Holy Roman Empire, the Vatican and other European countries. In fact, I've also learned that many of the trappings of crowns come from Arabic sources.

And so to that end, today's post is me setting out my requirements for my crown. Because the way I've been sitting around in my chair lately, I feel like a king on his throne. Plus all the gout. 

Modernity

One of the things you learn about crowns is that while many of them are ancient and have deep, deep history, a lot of them are made brand new for the coronation of the new Regent. And other Royals get crowns too. Maybe one of the best illustrations of this is the Coronet of Prince Charles, which was designed in the '60s when Charles was crowned Prince of Wales. When King Edward VIII went into exile after abdicating the throne, he took the traditional Coronet used to Crown the Prince of Wales with him. So it necessitated a new Coronet to be made. If you go check out pictures of the Coronet of Prince Charles, you'll see how very 1960s it is. It's undeniable.

So to that end, I want my own Crown to be very modern. I know by the time of Futurama, rings are very retro, but maybe they aren't quite so retro now and could be part of my crown. The papal tiara famously has three crowns on it. To upstage everyone else, I want four rings on my crown. 

Base materials. 

Of course, crowns have been traditionally made with gold and occasionally with silver. The state Crown of the United Kingdom also includes platinum, as does the Coronet of Charles. But we are living in the 2020s, so I need even more spectacular and rare metals in my crown, like titanium or purple gold. 

There are also a lot of modern metal treatments that could look really cool on the crown. You can anodize aluminum to almost any colour these days, which would also keep the crown light. I've also watched a little bit about bluing steel, which looks gorgeous when done correctly. So maybe some elements of blued steel or anodized aluminum could make the crown really pop.

The stones

One of the most famous parts of any crown and one of the greatest contributors to the weight of a crown is the stones placed in the crown. 

The stones in any crown, of course, are beautiful but often have stories as well. It's not like they just dug up a bunch of new stones to make a new Crown. They're handed down. They are stolen, and sometimes they are gifted, such as the Star of Africa stones in the state Crown of the UK. So here are some of the stones that I would like in my crown. 

Lab-grown scientific stones. Sticking with the theme of modernity, I would like to have some of the spectacular lab-grown stones used to create gems for lasers included in my crown. Some of them are fabulously fluorescent and gorgeous. I would like to include a good number of these in my crown. 

Black opal. I have a minor obsession with opals. It came from another internet deep dive sometime in the past. Not this most recent round of illness. But they are the most spectacular stones, reflecting the entire rainbow. But black opals are just a step above. They're so gorgeous. In fact, some are black opal with just purple and blue colouring in them, and I would love several very large opals set in my Crown. 

Stolen stones. Of course, no Crown is complete without something stolen from someone else. I'm not sure whom I'm going to steal a stone from, but with technocrats being the real power holders of today, perhaps I could steal a stone from Jeff Bezos or steal from Drake. But usually they're stolen from someone of lesser caste. So maybe I need to steal it from some hippie chick with a crystal shop.

Gift stones. Many crowns also include stones gifted by other Royals, by the parliament or by the people (mostly rich people) to the Regent. Since this blog only has one reader, it is falling to that reader to provide me with that gift stone. Better get saving, Andrew. 

Other elements 

Relics 

Famously, the crown of the Holy Roman Empire includes a steel ring on the inside that is storied to have been wrought from one of the nails used to hang Christ on the cross. I don't have access to any Holy relics of that type, but once I ascend to the crown, I'm sure that some of these relics will become available. For my part, I believe that I would like a part wrought from a fork used to try and eat the Flying Spaghetti Monster as part of the relics of my crown.

Fur

Many crowns are trimmed with fur along the bottom to make them more comfortable, and I would say even more stylish. It looks like ermine is the animal usually used to trim crowns. But I don't think that's going to do it for me. Now. This isn't a statement on veganism. I'm not saying that it should be faux fur. No, not at all. 

It's been revealed recently that scientists are very close to being able to clone a woolly mammoth from DNA found in rocks or other fossils. I don't know how soft a woolly mammoth is, but lining my crown with mammoth fur would be pretty spectacular. Or maybe there is another extinct animal that we can bring back from extinction that has much softer fur. Or hell. It's 2026. Maybe we can just make our own DNA for our own new animal with the softest fur ever, kill that bastard and line my crown with his fur.

Step it up a bit 

As long as we're leaning into modernity, why do we have to stick with precious metals and precious stones to make up the crown? This thing could be fully lit up and even have a smoke machine built in using modern techniques. 

Obviously we're going to want to include some LEDs in this. But I'm not trying to be garish. I don't want some RGB rainbow pattern coming off the top of my head. This isn't a gaming keyboard. No, no, we're going to be a little more classy than that. Maybe we can mount some LEDs behind the gems so that they shine out. 

And would it kill you to include a few lasers? As soon as I'm crowned, I want 400,000 lumens of laser light blasting off the top of my head. 

Considerations

There are a few things to consider when creating the crown to discuss as well.

Weight 

Crowns are famously quite heavy. It's not just the gold and the silver. The stones themselves are, well, stones, so crowns can be very heavy, and it's even been said you can't even look down without the crown pulling your head down. With my recent shoulder and neck issues. This is going to be of Paramount concern. Hence why I think we need to consider the use of some aluminum in this and maybe some lighter stones.

Payment 

I don't know how to pay for this thing. It seems in the past that the royal families would order this using their own wealth, which is typically very significant or by conning the parliament or government that they work with to pay for it. Again, I don't have access to a parliament or vast familial wealth, so I'll have to steal it from a technocrat. It's fine. They have plenty.

So there you have it, the requirements for my crown. Of course, this doesn't make up a full set of crown jewels. There's no sceptre or sword. No fancy Crown clothing. But I need to start somewhere, and I think I should start with a crown. Because that's a totally reasonable thing to want. I should maybe have my medicine reviewed with my doctor sometime soon.

What Crown Jewel would you like? What would you put in your crown?

Walk Back Technology or Perish

This week's blog doesn't find me very much further along in my healing Journey than last week's did. Still feeling pretty awful and still haven't been back to work. But let's focus on more of a thought piece instead of my screaming shoulder.

There is a group of people in Regina who like to protest for the sake of protest. Or at least it seems that way. They usually set up shop on the corner of Albert Street and Victoria Avenue. There's signs about contrails and technology. I like to call them the "climate scientists". Never really sure what they're protesting about but they sure are pissed and sure love neon paper. 

Which makes it a little uncomfortable to talk sometimes about what it would be like if maybe we walked back technology a little bit. 

In a recent video by YouTuber Alec Steele where he went to an ancient Italian blacksmith that was powered by water. The hammer, the Bellows for the forge, even the welder were all run off of the energy from some falling water. Yes are running like it still operates today. It wasn't even a large or fast flowing amount of water. It was mostly just a stored pond above the blacksmith.

It got me wondering how we could still in the modern-day directly power some of our machinery and technology without having to go through a power grid that strips efficiency from our energy production.

A prime example here in Saskatchewan would be grinding wheat using wind power. It's actually incredibly ancient technology using windmills to grind wheat and other grains. Why couldn't we be doing that here today? Why are we paying a power company to burn coal hundreds of miles away to run grinders for wheat all over the province. A few windmills and we could be grinding wheat a lot closer to where it's produced into flower. It's not like flower needs to be run 24/7 all the time. Anyway, you make flour while the wind blows and I think we'd be able to supply a lot without burning coal or otherwise using a power grid. And I'm talking direct drive technology here. Not electric windmills powering electric motors for the grinders. Like just attach a belt from the windmill to the grinder and get to work. It's all circular motion.

I think we could also use it on our infrastructure, particularly in place of pumps. We could we could use wind powered pumps to put water into stored energy and stored water areas like reservoirs and water towers.

In some ways we see this being done now already. I see plenty of street signs and construction signs that are powered by solar power. Not to mention parking meters like those seen in Saskatoon.

I actually think modern design and engineering has got 90% of the way there lately with USB charging. It's this consistent 5 Volt supply. The biggest problem is that they've designed everything with integrated batteries. If they had made it so that we can replace those 5 volt rechargeable batteries then we could leave a set of batteries at home on a solar charger everyday and switch them out every night for a fresh one leaving our dead one to charge the next day. You could have a few spares for cloudy days or charge it off the grid if it's really bad. It would be great. And if you were on the road and you needed to charge up you can still plug into the wall and charge up like normal. 

But I mean at the same time they can power steel mills with solar energy. So I think people are just making excuses at this point.

It was something I noticed when I was buying a lot of tools for my garage. When I was trying to get into woodworking. It was very clear that everything was just a spinning motor with a different attachment on it. The table saw the chop. Saw the drill, the sander. They were all just spinning motors with something different attached to them. I just wanted to buy one spinning motor and change the attachments. I think we could be doing that with wind energy quite a bit. Just switch out what is on the other end of the belt from the windmill. Instead of converting it into electricity and sending it into a grid. 

What are some ways of using old technology or even rethinking how we will you solar and batteries to produce our energy the you can think of? I think we get so caught up in the fact that renewables can't replace everything that we don't consider how how renewables could replace a lot of things, leaving more fossil fuels for the future and less pollution in the air.