The other day my cellphone died leaving me with no contacts and a new Blackberry i didn't know how to use.
   The helpful weirdo who gave me the tutorial on it's use overlooked the one feature I really needed to know about but is secondary and almost obsolete in today's world of twitter, youtube, instagram, facebook and skipeing. He didn't show me how to answer a call or hang up or you know, use it as a telephone.
   The next day I had to call CAA to have my truck towed from my new house to my mechanics. I placed the call and after everything was arranged, Joyce, my friendly CAA customer service rep, told me that when the truck was ten or fifteen minutes from my house I would receive an automated call to confirm everything.
   I then called Ross, my mechanic, to let him know it was on it's way. We had discussed it the week before but hadn't confirmed the details. There was no answer at his shop but I just assumed they were busy and decided to try back in a few minutes.
   Shortly thereafter my phone rang. It was CAA confirming the tow. This is when I discovered that I didn't know how to answer. I searched desperately for something clearly marked "phone answering button" or a picture of a cartoon man chatting on a tiny cartoon telephone, but to no avail. I felt like my dad trying to set the timer on a VCR. As the phone continued to ring I grew more and more desperate until I missed the call.
   I didn't know if by missing said call I had cancelled the tow, so I tried to call them back. I had already placed several calls but the strong mixture of panic, confusion and rage coursing through my veins somehow completely shut down the memory and reasoning centres of my brain and I couldn't figure out how to do that either. It just kept trying to find the number in my contacts.
   After what seemed like an eternity of fumbling around I finally got someone on the line who confirmed that the tow was still en route.
   Now it occurred to me that I had a guy coming to tow my truck 150km from Oshawa to Minden and I still hadn't confirmed with Ross that someone would be there to receive it. I quickly dialed the number of his shop again. I had actually figured out how to make a call, putting me on equal footing with everyone in North America born after the outbreak of World War One.
   The phone rang and rang with no answer. What if no one was there today due to unknown circumstances like a family illness or little known religious holiday? Ross didn't seem like the kind of guy who would shut down for Ash Wednesday but who knows?
   "Great Scott!" I thought, "I'd better call back and cancel that tow until I can speak to Ross!"
   It was then, as the phone rang on and on, that I realised I didn't know how to hang up either. Previously when I had managed to defy the odds and actually place a call, the person on the other end  had hung up and terminated the conversation. There was no one there to save my non tech savvy buttocks this time. If no one ever answered I might have to just throw the phone out and start over!
   In my mind I could see an imaginary clock ticking off the seconds until it would be too late to cancel the tow without suffering some kind of horrible consequences. A lifetime towing ban perhaps? Getting kicked out of the CAA? For the love of God! Where will I get my maps? I desperately jabbed at the device like a starving chicken pecking at a handful of corn.
   It was then that the panic, frustration and anger overwhelmed me. I began screaming "Why won't you hang up you..." well...lets just say I made some rather harsh and inappropriate accusations about the Blackberry's relationship with it's mother.
   Seconds later, as I stood there trying to regain my composure, I heard a faint voice say "Hello?".
   "Oh, hi Ross, how's it going?" I said nonchalantly.
   "Fine", said Ross in the tone of voice one uses when one answers one's phone only to find a crazy person screaming obscenities at one for no apparent reason. Sort of a mixture of confusion and barely restrained fury.
   I informed him that I had just gotten a new cell phone.
   "I see", he replied in the same voice.
   Clearly he would need more of an explanation.
   As my tale of stupidity and poor anger management unfolded Ross began to laugh and told me that he too had had his run ins with new technology.
   My wife has since shown me the two curved lines that are supposed to represent a right side up and upside down handset used for answering and hanging up. I'm not sure why the people at RIM chose icons so open to artistic interpretation, but I digress.
   Next week she's teaching me how to program a VCR.

A small change.

You can now post comments without being a member or signing in or whatever it is you used to have to do. Good or bad I appreciate the input.

Sunny Day at the Ballpark Bummed Out by Beer Bastards!

Saturday, June 5th was the kind of day baseball was invented for. Around 28 degrees, little wind, just a few faint wisps of cloud in the sky and the roof of the Rogers Centre wide open. With this in mind my good friend Doug, his charming sister Disey and I set out to cheer on the home team. $14 got us a seat in the upper deck and a mere $9.50 got us a beer, and I don't mean the big ass beer, just a normal beer.

Now I understand supply and demand and markups etc. but that's a little much. Lets assume that beer cost the concession $2.00, which it didn't but with wages for the beer sellers etc. lets say it does. I'm no math whizz but that's like a 375 per cent profit. Any where else charged you that much for a pint you'd tell them to get stuffed but they know they've got you. Who doesn't like some nice cold suds out at the old ball park?

Hank III hits Toronto

When I was a boy growing up on the farm it was just me and my mom and dad. Across the road at the top of the hill lived an aunt and uncle and at the bottom of the hill lived another. One family had 5 children and the other had eight. The oldest of these cousins had kids who were close to my age as well. Basically my family was my social world, and in that world you listened to country music...just country music.

I remember about grade eight I went over to my friend Dustin's house. He had young parents and they had a record collection. My life changed forever in that basement, listening to Pink Floyd and Alice Cooper.  Zeppelin, the Doors, AC/DC, Fleetwood Mac and Eric Clapton. I mean, we weren't Amish. I'd heard whatever crap they were playing on whatever radio station you could get in Miners Bay, Ontario back then, but to sit down and listen to "Are You Experienced" from start to finish, well that was an awakening. My love of Music was launched in that basement and I've always felt I owed Dustin a bigger debt than I could ever repay for sharing those dusty lps with me.

Scorcese, Weasel Pull Off Psycological Thriller

First lets get one thing straight. The movie reviews you read here are going to be for real people watching movies because they wish to be entertained. Most reviews I read are by some pompous dick telling me that some boring, plot less piece of shit is the movie of the friggin' year, thereby causing me to waste two and a half hours of my life watching the piece of crap. And if I don't agree, it isn't cause they're wrong, it's because I'm not smart or cultured enough to appreciate the delicate genius of the work. Bullshit!

Reports confirmed: Cleaveland Does in Fact Rock

I've always heard that Cleveland is kind of a shithole. Last weekend my wife, Mrs. Goat, and I travelled there to visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (RRHF from here on out) and, the Browns not withstanding, we found these reports completely unfounded. Through Hotwire we got a nice room for $59 on the 20th floor facing the lake with floor to ceiling windows. From left to right our view took in the Federal Courthouse (all the public buildings are done in that impressive/cheesy classical Greek/Roman architectural style our American friends love so well. It's like Caesar's Palace without the slots), Browns Stadium, the Cleveland Public Auditorium (this one looked so Roman I think I saw Russel Crowe fighting a tiger through the window), the Great Lakes Science Centre, Cleveland City Hall and the RRHF with beautiful Lake Erie in the background.

In the morning we ordered breakfast from room service and as always I was amazed by how inexpensive food is in the States and shocked and a little dismayed by the size of the portions. Mine included two eggs, a mound of home fries, four sausage patties and two pancakes. "Who the hell could eat all this crap," I wondered. I think I figured it out later as I watched my fellow patrons waddle around the RRHF, but I digress. Mrs. Goat ordered french toast which was four huge pieces with some kind of hazelnut, cream cheese concoction sandwiched between them, fresh fruit on the side, juice and a full pot of coffee and the whole mess came to about $30.

Coach Shanahan Makes Scientific Breakthrough?

Reports coming out of the Washington Redskins training camp state that the 'Skins have made an offer to elderly and fragile running back Brian Westbrook. With Clinton Portis, Larry Johnson and "Reasonably Fast" Willie Parker already on the roster, this makes the Washington backfield the NFL equivalent of the Rolling Stones in that their former greatness can't be denied but they really haven't had any great new stuff in years.
All of these signings have led to widespread speculation that Coach Shanahan has somehow developed a time machine because most agree that it would be the only plausible explanation for this running back corps. Shanahan has denied the rumours but did state that he would trade troublesome but talented DT Albert Haynesworth for a used flux capacitor in good condition.