Tag: postaday2011

To Him It’s A Joke… To Her It’s One Hurt Too Many

On By WinstonIn Discrimation, Society, ValuesLeave a comment

“No Fat Chicks Or I’m Gonna Scrape”  That’s what it said on some wannabe cool guy\s lowered Acura.  If it’s illegal to put blatantly racist comments on public display, what makes this okay?  Is anyone going to try and tell me that this type of filth is less hurtful than a racial epithet?

Can I pull up beside him and call him out for his blatant offensiveness?   Can I point out that he’s apparently about 14 I.Q. points shy of idiot?  Or can I just wait for him to pull over and let nature take it’s course from there?  Is there any good reason that this isn’t covered under anti-discrimination legislation?  How is this not deliberately hurtful to any overweight girl/woman who sees it?

Maybe the answer is just to wait until he parks and paint over it.  Possibly remove the offensiveness with a wood rasp?  That could be fun.  Then leave a note advising that hurting other people for your own entertainment isn’t cool.  Even if you do have skinny tires on your over-sized rims and a big fart-can exhaust.  If you put something ugly, offensive and hurtful on your car, you’re a gigantic, pathetic ass-hat.

There is enough in our society to make any woman larger than a size 8 hate themselves without that.  On behalf of every girl who feels bulimia is better than being bullied, who cries when they look in the mirror, who hates themselves because others hate how they look, for all these and all the others hurt by a thoughtless joke, I say enough.  It’s time to stop celebrating stupid.

I’ll close for now because I have to go shopping for some spray paint and a wood rasp.

Cheers, Winston

You Sorta Need Someone To Command & Control

On By WinstonIn Canadian Military, Politics, Society7 Comments

A report from a former Lieutenant General in the Canadian Armed Forces seems destined to be ignored…. again.  Apparently, there are as many military personnel in Ottawa’s National Defense HQ as there are on active duty in the navy or regular force army.  During the last six years, Command and Support has grown at four times the rate of actual deployable force.  That seems a tad disproportionate to me.

Andrew Leslie, the author of the report, wants to see that change.  Of course after years inside the Canadian military, he knows the odds against any of his recommendations being adopted.  In the last forty five years, not one plan to reform Canada’s Armed Forces has been fully implemented.  It seems like maybe it’s time for that to change.

When there are more people running the military than there are in it, it represents a really skewed set of priorities.  It’s hard to justify the amount of money we spend on our military knowing most of it stays right here in Ottawa.  The government talks about Force Projection, but the bulk of their personnel don’t seem to project much beyond DNDHQ.

My nephew served three tours in Afghanistan while upwards of twenty-thousand military staff did their best to bring peace and stability to Ottawa.  Recent stimulus spending has fueled a large part of this expansion.  Now that well is running dry, and the deployable forces seem to have been left off the gravy train.  Thirteen billion in awesome new jets is a grand gesture, but it’s meaningless if there’s no actual people to put them in the air.  The same is true of the army, and navy.  When the budget is being drained by a top heavy administration, there’s not much left for actual boots on the ground.

If you think of it from a business perspective, it’s not a good idea to have more staff at head office than you do actually doing whatever it is your company does.  That’s a recipe for disaster in the private sector.  In the Canadian Military, it’s business as usual.  The status quo has been institutionalized in the name of stability and a healthy dose of hidebound leadership.  Case in point, former Chief of Defense Staff Rick Hillier.

Hillier’s take on Leslie’s recommendations: “You try to implement that report as it stands and you destroy the Canadian Military.  You simply can’t take that many people out of Command & Control functions.”  Really?  How many bodies do you need in C&C per deployable person?  Apparently, the idea of a leaner more efficient military has yet to breach the fortifications around Ottawa.  While the deployable forces are tasked to do more and more with less and less, DNDHQ is doing a little bit more with a steadily growing mountain of resources.

Andrew Leslie’s own words seem like an appropriate wrap up.  “If we don’t do something along these lines, battalions will be disbanded, ships will be tied up and aircraft will continue to be grounded while headquarters continues to grow.”

Note to Defense Minister Peter McKay and current Chief of Defense Staff Walt Natynczyk: YOU SORTA NEED SOMEONE TO COMMAND & CONTROL!

Cheers, Winston

Tech Etiquette or Keep It In Your Pants When You’re Talking To Me!

On By WinstonIn Humor, Pop Culture, SocietyLeave a comment

Once again the fine people at Maclean”s have answered the perennial question, “What shall I write about today?” Thank you very much nice people. As you can see from the title, this post is all about tech and how we use it. Specifically, it’s about portable technology and how we use it to abuse those around us. Because so many people seem not to have figured this out, it seemed worth sharing this quick set of guidelines.

Here at the LakeArt Institute For The Advancement Of Simple Simplicity (Proud Developers Of The V.A.P.I.D. Goal Setting System) we have a mission. Our motto is “Making Simple Things Simpler For The Simply Simple-Minded”. Our products are geared to those for whom the Herculean task of understanding even the simplest thing is just too much effort. If you or someone you know falls into this group, DON’T PANIC! We’re here to help.

** If you are on call twenty-four/seven in some sort of emergency or life-saving capacity, you are automatically exempt from the following guidelines. For the rest of you, stop texting for a minute and pay attention.**

1. If you are in the presence of actual human beings with whom you are interacting, they take precedence. Before any of you scream “Heresy!”, let me clarify. I know you paid a lot for your techno-thing and you want to get your money’s worth. I get that. You just need to keep in mind that everyone else paid just as much for theirs so they don’t care at all about yours. When in the presence of actual people, turn it off/down. If you absolutely must use it in public, excuse yourself, move away and then phone/text/send pictures of your naughty bits. When you have finished, put it away and rejoin the real world.

2. Treat your techno-thingy like your private thingy. Dont’t whip it out and wave it around in public. While you may think your techno-thingy/thingy is the most impressive one in existence, others probably will not share this view. Even those who are awestruck by the size of your display will likely pretend otherwise (although they may discreetly ask for your number later). Use of your techno-thingy during dinner/movies/social gatherings should be treated like urination. It should only be done when absolutely necessary. It should be done as far away from others as possible. And remember that no one wants to hear about it when you return.

3. Just because you can share doesn’t mean you should. You know what I’m talking about. Those late-night, drunken posts about how desperately you need to get laid. Or anyone who has ever posted a Lolcat. Or anything else that you are the only person on God’s Earth who might give a crap about. Oh, and that also includes anyone who sends pics of their naughty bits. I know that when you are far from the one you lust for it’s nice to think of them ogling a picture of your bits. Just keep this in mind. If they can’t remember what you look like naked, they probably aren’t going to remember your name either. Unless you get it tattooed on your bits.

(On a related note, a recent survey found that ten percent of people under twenty-five feel it’s okay to text during sex. Here’s a tip for them. If you’re thinking clearly enough to find your phone, let alone text, YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG!) If you were surprised when you read this and made some very rewarding changes in your life, you can thank me later.

4. If the person you are phoning/texting/sending pictures of your naughty bits to is that that important to you, invite them out to dinner/movie/club. That way they too can have the opportunity to be all impressed by your techno-thingy while you ignore them. Of course, there’s a fifty/fifty chance that they will also be playing with their techno-thingy. If they are, that doesn’t make it okay for you to do the same unless the two of you are totally alone. Here’s some basic math for you. One Total Tool + One Total Tool is not equal to Zero Total Tools. When in public, 1TT+1TT=2TT. Two Total Tools are in fact more annoying than One Total Tool. The formula is pretty simple. Annoyance = Number of Total Tools * Number of Non-Tools within earshot * the Relative Importance of the meal/movie/event to the Non-Tools.

So there you have it. A simple guide to Tech Etiquette. You are probably not the most important person in the universe. The people around you don’t really care about your half of your drama. The glow from you phone makes me very angry when I’m watching a movie in a dark theater. If your text is that important that it can’t wait for the end of the movie: Leave. Fill in the same sentence for meal, party, get together, sunset, cuddle time, etc. Yes, that includes sex too!

Remember. If no one is about to die. Keep it in your pants when you talk to me!

Cheers, Winston

Max and I Liked Zombies When Zombies Weren’t Cool.

On By WinstonIn Media, Personal, Pop Culture2 Comments

Okay, so I know this may be a bit of a departure from the usual, but the usual is usually over-rated.  I’m a Zombie fan.  Not Rob Zombie.  Not Voodoo zombies.  I’m talking contagion driven, George A. Romero ZOMBIES.  Ever since I first saw Night of the Living Dead many, many years ago, I’ve been a fan.  Long before the current Zombie renaissance, I was a fan.

Their current popularity is kind of a good news bad news thing.  The downside is that you get a lot of people who don’t give an infected rat’s patootie about Zombies and just want to make a quick buck.  The god news is, it lets all the secret Zombie lovers out of the closet.  That’s where it gets fun.

One of those long term Zombie fans wrote a couple of books that you may have heard of.  “The Zombie Survival Guide”, and “World War Z: An  Oral History Of The Zombie Apocalypse”.  It’s not just that these are both brilliant additions to Zombie canon, they were written by the last person whose name you would associate with horror.  Max Brooks.

Now I can tell that all of you are sitting there waiting for the punchline.  You are probably wondering who Max Brooks is and why I think it’s surprising that he wrote these books.  Well, I’m glad you asked.  He’s Mel Brooks son.  You know, “High Anxiety”, “Young Frankenstein”, “Blazing Saddles”.  That Mel Brooks.

At first, I was blown away to think that the son of one of the funniest people in movies was writing Zombie books.  Then I read a bit more and realized that like me, Max is a long time fan.  Just because his father did funny, doesn’t mean he has to.  My father was a hard-rock miner.  Me, not so much.  Once I got my head around that, I could enjoy the irony of it.

Here’s hoping that Max Brooks can enjoy a long and successful career.  Us old-school Zombie fans have got  to stick together.

Cheers, Winston

SMART Goals… Maybe There’s A Different Tool For Government

On By WinstonIn Global Issues, Humor, Politics, WarfareLeave a comment

Any of you who work in a corporate environment have probably at some point encountered the S.M.A.R.T. guidelines for decision making.  The acronym stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-bound.  You can see why I think perhaps  the government uses something different.

Some of the most outstanding examples of this are the “Wars” the declare.  The “War on Poverty”, “War on Drugs”, and my personal favorite, the “War on Terror”.  I believe the decisions to engage in these “Wars” are based on what I like to refer to as the V.A.P.I.D. guidelines.  This stands for Vague, Abstract, Pointless, Imaginary, and Damaging.  I’ll use the “War on Terror” to illustrate my point.

For starters, declaring a “War” on “Terror” seems a tad ill defined.  Not only is it not Specific, it’s actually quite Vague. It’s going to be hard to Measure results because “Terror” isn’t a person, place or thing, it’s an Abstract concept.  Victory could be difficult to Achieve in a “War” against a concept and with “Terror” still going strong after ten years, it seems kind of Pointless.  It doesn’t seem very Realistic to try to eliminate “Terror” from the world, although that Imaginary place would probably be very nice to live in.  With no clear objectives, it makes it hard to create a definitive Ttimeline.  That same blurriness of purpose also distracts from actual issues which is incredibly Damaging.  If you work it through, you will see it’s also true for the other “Wars” I mentioned.

This inability to set appropriate goals is dangerous and unacceptable.  These are the people whom we have charged and entrusted to act on our behalf and in our best interest.  Clearly, they have not.  Clearly this needs to change.  Let’s take a look for a moment at what things might have looked like if they had instead used the S.M.A.R.T. guidelines.

Instead of a “War on Terror”, we might have had a mission statement that looked more like this.  “We will  track down and bring to trial those responsible for the attacks against the United States on Sept. 11th 2001.”  Now let’s break it down.  Is it Specific?  Yes, it clearly states what we want to do and who we want to do it to.  Is it Measurable?  Yes, by having a clear goal, we can see how close we are to reaching it.  Is it Achievable? Yes, tracking down a relatively small group of people is very doable.  Is it Realistic?  Yes, much more so than taking on “Terror”.  Is it Time-bound?  Ye,s when the last trial finishes, the job is complete.  See how much better that is?

So, next time you get get dragged to one of those corporate training sessions, bring along your MP/Congress Person/Senator/Representative.  Who knows, they might actually learn something.  If nothing else, your boss will realize how lucky they are to have you on staff instead of a politician.  That could be just what you need to hold onto your job.

Cheers, Winston

Empowering Limitations and the Limits of Empowerment.

On By WinstonIn Self Awareness, Society, Values2 Comments

Earlier tonight, I was watching a talk delivered by British MP Rory Stewart about why it’s time to get out of Afghanistan.  That’s not the subject of this post.  It was a phrase in his closing remarks which caught my attention.  Mr. Stewart said, “If we accept that we cannot do all that we pretend, we can do much more than we fear.”

Wow!  That’s such a powerful idea.  If we stop putting unrealistic expectations on ourselves, we have a better chance of achieving the realistic ones.  As long as we remain focused on the big, unattainable goals, it keeps us distracted from the ones we can actually achieve.  What, you may wonder, does this have to do with empowerment?  I’m glad you asked.

We tend to think of empowerment as a removal of limits.  Yet without those limits, we start to believe we can do all we pretend.   That’s the kind of thinking that sets us up for disappointment.  Acknowledging our limits is essential to understanding ourselves.  For someone with a reading disability, pretending they can read isn’t empowering, it just prevents them from getting help.

When we accept our limits, it’s not a surrender, it’s the source of real empowerment.  The reason I refer to this as “real” empowerment is simple. Understanding our limits empowers happiness.  Denying them may seem empowering, but it just sets the stage for future pain.  The problem lies in the perception of limits as negative.  From a cultural perspective, It stems from a misunderstanding of the concept of equality.  Rather than an equality of value, it assumes an equality of ability, or at least potential.

Not everyone has equality of ability or opportunity.  Empowerment encourages happiness by allowing us to set believable goals for ourselves.  Denying limits leads to setting unattainable goals.  Attainable goals lead to happiness.  Unattainable ones lead to disappointment and unhappiness.  By accepting the possibility of failure, we appreciate our success even more.  At the same time, we save ourselves from being crushed by failure.

It’s time for us to empower our limits to celebrate how they empower us.

Cheers, Wintson

I’m Glad She Did This In Texas

On By WinstonIn Society, ValuesLeave a comment

A woman in Dallas TX has been charged with felony child abuse.  So what else is new right?  Well, this one is little more depraved than usual.  In terms of pure evil, she’s the kind of person that bumps Charles Manson out of last place in the human race.

When her two year old daughter had a problem with potty training she decided to solve the problem once and for all.  She dragged the toddler by the feet from the kitchen, glued her hands to the wall and beat her.  I’m not talking a couple of smacks on the bottom.  I’m talking about kicking her in the stomach, and beating her with a slipper and a belt.  Eventually, she called her own mother who arrived to find her granddaughter unconscious on the floor.  She rushed her to the hospital where she remains in a coma resulting from the assault.

The mother is being held on $500,000 bail.  When the little girl arrived at the hospital, her hands were covered with glue and paint from the wall and some of the skin had torn away.  Why is bail even an option for the woman who did this?  There’s no way in hell this person should ever see the light of day again.

The media are going to be all over this.  They’re going to paint her as a demon.  They’re going to paint her as a victim.  They’re going too maker her name a household word.  She doesn’t deserve that.  She deserves to be buried in the deepest hole they can find.  The kind of place they send you if you mess up in hell.  She should be forgotten.  Not her crime.  Not the horror of what she did to an innocent child.  But her name, her life, her very existence should be expunged from the world.

The only good news is that she did this in Texas.  Anywhere else, and she might get off on an insanity plea.  In Texas, there’s always a chance they’ll say, “Hell yes she’s insane!  That’s why we need to fry her!”  Probably not, but it’s the only way to be sure she’ll never do it again.  With her kind of crazy, it’s best to be sure.

Pray for Joselyn Cedillo, the little girl in a coma in her hospital room, because she belongs in a loving home.  Pray for the mother because her soul belongs to God, but her ass belongs in the Chair.  I’m glad she did this in Texas.

Cheers, Winston

Canadians Not Terrorized Enough?

On By WinstonIn Global Issues, Politics, Society, Values1 Comment

I was just reading an article on Maclean’s  app about how indifferent most Canadians are to the threat of terrorism.  The implication being our need to take it more seriously.  The fact is, we shouldn’t.

Aside from a couple of highly publicized “threats”, Canada isn’t exactly a commonly declared terroist target.  It isn’t amping up the fear factor that the domestic plots appear to have been orchestrated by people with the technical and organizational skills of a sleep deprived chipmunk.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying it couldn’t happen.  We don’t get any more of a free pass than anyone else.  I just don’t see it as really likely.  More to  the point, there’s not a thing I can do about it and frankly,  I’ve got better things to worry about.  Like a Prime Minister who feels that mumbling “Islamicist” is going to take my mind off the lack of employment in my immediate future.

Of course the average Canadian isn’t overly worried about terrorism.  We work in a job market where the idea of long term security is considered extinct.  Politicians boast about their job creation records without mentioning whether or not they pay a living wage, offer benefits, or have any career potential.  Young people graduate from secondary school unable to read, write or do even basic math.  This is supposed to be acceptable to us because technology is replacing these skills.  As someone who has experienced them in the workplace, I can assure you this isn’t the case.

There are so many real and immediate threats for the average Canadian to worry about that marginally possible terrorism doesn’t do it.  Even when our Beloved Leader trots out fun and unusual words like “Islamicist”.  It can’t be easy trying to scare people when  your bogeymen won’t cooperate.  I know a lot of people impacted by our economic and employment issues.  I don’t know anyone who’s been threatened by terrorists of any kind.

A foreign policy of military interventionism is hard to justify if the official bad guys aren’t really doing anything bad to you.  It’s even harder if the bad guys you’re trying to sell everyone on are not as bad or dangerous as others.  Muammar Gaddafi isn’t a nice guy nor has he been a benevolent ruler, but he’s no Kim Jong Il.  It’s just a lot easier and safer to bomb Libya.  Likewise, Afghanistan is far from stable and the Taliban were vile by any standard.  On the other hand, it is a rock solid, model of social justice compared to Somalia.  But again, invading Somailia hasn’t been so easy in the past.

North Korea is a nuclear state run by an absolute dictator who also happens to be an absolute nut.  Mr Harper feels this is less of an issue than the nebulous and ill defined “Islamicist”s.  Somailia has no functioning central government, and the only growth industry seems to be piracy.  They also have Al Shabab which is about as “Islamicist” as you get.  Not that it’s likely to be any quicker, more effective, or affordable than the fiasco which is Afghanistan.

So no, if the leader of the nation doesn’t want to address any actual terror threats, we the people aren’t likely to spare much energy for them either.  I mean really, what do they expect.  Do they truly believe that best way to Canada stay strong and vital is to drop bombs on Gaddafi supporters?  How is our pointless and over-extended invasion of Afghanistan creating jobs or improving the quality of life for ordinary Canadians?  Are they doing anything to encourage sustainable development in society or business?  Of course not.  They are useful mainly as distractions.  The contemporary version of the ancient Roman “bread and circuses”.

If Prime Minister Harper can keep us focused on events in Afghanistan, Libya or on “Islamicist” terrorists, we might not notice the real threat.  Contrary to popular (at least with Harper) belief, the greatest threat to our security is the erosion of our quality of life.  Declining education standards, a widening gap between wealthy and poor with a shrinking middle class, a job market defined by temporary/contract positions and health care cuts are just some of the things distracting Canadians from the “Islamicist” menace.  If our elected officials did their jobs and addressed these issues, maybe we could spare some concern for his “vaporware” terrorists.

That’s not likely to happen though.  Then again I’m not likely to lose any sleep worrying about the Prime Minister’s “Islamicist” bogeymen.  I get little enough sleep as it is worrying about my employment options.  Unless his paranoid delusions are going to land me a job, his sole relevance for me is relegated to providing me with fodder for this blog.  Not really what I look for in a leader, but about what I’ve come to expect from Mr. Harper.  I don’t have really high hopes for anyone who’s election campaign was based such classic staples as “in these troubled times, we need to stay the course”, and my personal favorite, “Vote for me because I’m not the other guy.”

No wonder Mr. Harper’s focusing on “Islamicist” terror.  With both the Liberals and new Democrats looking for leaders, there aren’t really any viable targets for personal attack ads.  That just leaves him with fear mongering.  If it weren’t for the teenie-tiny chance of a terrorist attack in Canada, the poor man wouldn’t have a sound bite available to toss out to the media.  Who knows, maybe then they’d ask about something that actually mattes.  Nah, probably not.

Cheers, Winston

Netbook Blues Are A Boon For Me

On By WinstonIn Personal, TechnologyLeave a comment

A couple of years ago, we bought our daughter a netbook to use for school.  She was thrilled and happy as a clam… for about a month.  Just long enough that we couldn’t return it.  It seems she might have been mistaken in what she needed from her portable computer.  As well as running office apps to use for school, it suddenly needed to stream video, play Facebook games etc.  It was never made for those things so of course she wasn’t happy with it.  She managed to tough it out until now.

For her recent eighteenth birthday, we bought her a new notebook.  It’s faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive and if it goes over any building, it’ll go poorly for her.  Short version, I inherited her netbook.

Now it’s pretty common knowledge that netbooks are underpowered.  Really, that’s sort of the point.  If you want a full power laptop, buy a notebook not a netbook.  On the other hand, this one has issues even by netbook standards.  The processor was bit slower than others at it’s price point, but it was a trade off for other perks.  When all the competition had 1gb of ram and 160gb hard drive, this one had 2gb of ram and a 250gb drive.  It also has an 11.6 inch display as opposed to the usual 10 inch,

As with any tech toy, it’s all about what you expect from it.  I don’t stream video or play Facebook games on the netbook.  I am using it to write this post.  I use it to surf news sites to figure out what I want to write about.  And even those things are a little clunky on this laptop.  Or at least they were.

I did some research and discovered the problem.  It’s actually one of the most ubiquitous problems in the computer world.  No, it’s not a virus.  It’s Windows Vista.  It turns out it’s a little resource hungry for this poor little thing.  On the other hand, there are apparently several Linux distributions optimized for netbooks.  I’ve used Linux before and have a current version on my desktop downstairs.  So I figured, “What’s the worst that could happen?”

Normally, that’s a question I try to avoid because I never really like the answer.  In this case, it wasn’t a problem.  I was going to install the Ubuntu Netbook Edition.  Yeah, that apparently doesn’t exist anymore, but that’s okay.  I’m not that picky.  Netbook Edition, Desktop Edition, whatever.  So I go ahead and install it anyway.

More accurately, I spent a fair bit of time trying to guess the secret of the setup instructions.  Then I spent more time swearing and attempting to guess the secret of the setup instructions.  After a fair number of guesses and a much larger number of words which I’m not about to repeat here, I got it to install.  There was much cheering and rejoicing, very quietly because by then it was 4:30am.

Because I installed the FULL Desktop Edition I sort of expected it to be as slow as Vista was.  Thanks to the God of all Geeks, it’s not.  In fact, it’s really responsive.  If I was typing this on the Vista side, I’d have a huge problem with lag.  When I typed last night’s post, I could literally type an entire sentence before it showed up on the screen.  On this shiny new Linux build, there’s barely a trace of it remaining.  It’s quicker loading web pages.  It doesn’t really care how many tabs I have open, it just goes ahead and does what it’s supposed to.

Now before everyone with a netbook clicks away to download Linux and speed things up, here’s what you need to know.  Unless you know at least a little bit about Linux, it’s not going to be as rewarding as you hope.  It wasn’t until after I installed it that I was reminded of just how many little things you need to know.  A software package I wanted to install couldn’t get some of the files it needed.  So I had to open a terminal window and type something like “sudko apt-get install whatever it was called”.

I’m not telling you not to do it, just be prepared.  Remember, Google is your friend.  The secret is, you have to know enough about what you’re doing to as the right question.  If you can do that, it should be okay.  Maybe.  If not, don’t use the comment section to ask for tech support.  I won’t respond.  No matter how much entertainment you have provided me with.

Cheers, Winston

The Beginning Of The End Of The Beginning…

On By WinstonIn Personal, Society1 Comment

Where I am at the moment, there is less than an hour until the end of rentals at Blockbuster Canada. It’s not easy for me to put aside my anger and look at the bigger picture. Still, I’d like to share a few thoughts about what it has meant, and will mean going forward.

For many years now, Blockbuster Canada has been the go-to solution for movie and game rentals. Sure, they pushed the independent, mom & pop video stores out of business. Just like Loblaws pushed the neighborhood grocer out of business and Walmart allegedly pushed every other retailer out of business. The fact is, the people who’ve been coming into my store for the past week haven’t been saying “I told you so.”. Mostly, they’ve been saying, “I’ll miss you, the store, the staff and and the movies.”

For many of them, Blockbuster has been more than a place to get movies. You can get movies from a huge range of sources. But we were never a movie business, we are a service business. That’s what kept putting feet on our floor every day and put money in the bank. This isn’t just my opinion, it’s the opinion everyone who’s first question isn’t about their rental options moving forward. It’s the opinion of every person who has asked if my staff, myself and our familiies will be okay. Not everyone shares this opinion, but enough do. I know that everything I did was not in vain. Every person who’s eyes mist up when we say “See ya around.”, they are the validation of what we have built.

So, the media misrepresents the causes of our closure. They say we couldn’t compete with the new digital world, and they’re full of sh*t. But that’s their job. It seems a lot of the alleged journalists writing about the demise of Blockbuster Canada are frustrated fiction writers. That’s the most charitable excuse I can find for the substitution of opinion for observation and fallacy for fact. The truth is, if you or I did our jobs that badly, we’d be fired. Now that I’m going to have all this time on my hands, maybe I should go to journaliism school. Nah, too muich self respect for that.

Moving forward, we come to the most popular question at Blockbuster. “Where a I going to get my movies?” I’ve got a better question. Where an I going to get my mortgage from. Movies are a luxury, but a mortgage, utilities, food etc, not so much. There isn’t going to be another business like Blockbuster. It was a product of it’s time and that time is not likely to come around again. There are a couple of regional players left, but movies rentals are sidelines for them. Sadly, that’s how they treat their rental customers, like an afterthought. Or a potential market for their main product lines. We were the biggest player in the video rental business. Some people hated us for being a big, corporate behemoth. They aren’t the ones who have stopped me in the grocery store to tell me how much they will miss me. Blockbuster Canada may have been a corporation, but they were the most people friendly, customer driven company I have ever worked for. I can’t see how removing that influence from the marketplace is going to be an improvement. Any time you reduce the range of options for the consumer, it rarely works out in their favour.

Having said all that, the time is almost upon me. It is nearly five, and that means the ending of an era in Canada. Some will view this as a positive thing, and others won’t. For myself, I think I’ve made my position abundantly clear. Blockbuster Canada isn’t dying because we failed to thrive in the face of emerging technologies. We are dying because people who couldn’t manage their own company were allowed to destroy ours also. To every person who worked hard to make Blockbuster Canada a success: Congratulations on your victory. To all the fine people with whom I have had the privilege of working for the past four and a half years: Thank you for a great ride. I wish all of you every possible success in your lives. May you be blessed with health, happiness and a long life to enjoy both.

Time ladies. Time gentlemen. The rental business will now be closing for the duration. Thank you, it’s been lovely.

Cheers, Winston