Random Nonsense

In the spirit of year-end lists, Uproxx has the top 20 memes of 2012.  I'm proud that Toronto's very own IKEA Monkey snuck on there just under the wire.

Lawyer Dog, Falling Bear, Sophisticated Cat, Go Home You're Drunk and Skeptical Third World Kid are all pretty amazing, but my favourite is clearly Inappropriate Timing Bill Clinton simply because that picture is so funny just by itself.  The expression on Obama's face is priceless…"ah geez, not this guy again."

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And, here's the commercial of the year, as voted on by Adweek Magazine.  In a world where Hansel & Gretel has been re-imagined as an action franchise, there is a 100 percent chance that someone is writing a gritty adaptation of Three Little Pigs at this very moment.  Ian McShane can, nay MUST, play the big bad wolf.



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So the city of Toronto, in its infinite wisdom, decided to remove the bike lane from Jarvis Street after complaints that the street needed the extra fifth lane to accommodate extra traffic.  And of course, the other day I found myself driving up a very slow-moving Jarvis Street, presuming it was just a busy day until I hit the cause of the holdup in the right lane….one lone cyclist, who couldn't get fully over on the right side of the street due to parked cars.*

Smart move, Toronto.  This was surely worth the thousands of dollars and months of construction.  You sure showed those cyclists, all of whom will continue to bike up and down Jarvis since, y'know, they might live or work on Jarvis.  It could also be argued that if you're worried about clogging up traffic on Jarvis, then shutting down vehicular lanes to build or remove bike lanes every couple of years is fucking nonsensical but hey, what do I know?

* = There's a special place in hell for idiots who illegally park their cars during rush hour.  Many is the time when traffic is jammed up on a major street because one clown has a lane blocked because he chose to park between the hours of 4-6pm.  I propose a law that would instantly solve this problem.…if you see someone illegally parked and blocking a major road during rush hour, you should have virtual carte blanche to do whatever you want to their vehicle.  Take a leak on the door handle?  Go for it.  Key the side?  Perfectly fine.  Slash the tires?  Well, that would actually block traffic for even longer because then they'd have to call a tow truck, but still, I like the cut of your gib. 

No driver would make the mistake more than once of leaving their car illegally parked if they knew it could be beset upon by an angry mob.  Yup, I see no possible downside in instituting virtual martial law on vehicles.  None whatsoever!  What lawsuits?  *dusts off hands triumphantly*

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And no, I'm not done talking about driving.  I've discovered I'm a superb reverse-side parallel parker.  I recently found myself on a one-way street having to parallel park on the left side of the road, and while my parallel parking skills are probably slightly above-average overall (*pats self on back*), such a maneuver is still a tricky bit of business for us North Americans.

However, not only did I pull off a thoroughly tremendous parallel park, a guy on the street CONGRATULATED ME WHEN IT WAS OVER.  I kid you not.  The guy was standing at the parking meter and watching my progress, and he actually said "very nice job" after I got out of the car.  Not a hint of sarcasm in his voice, either.  Blanche Dubois was right, you can always depend on the kindness of strangers.

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I see a clip like this (described by Film Drunk as "the most Christopher Walken scene of all time") and it makes me think of my friend Dave, a.k.a. the aficionado of terrible action movies.  This is exactly the type of scene that Dave would have watched 20 years ago and quoted incessantly ever since.  "I never forget a face, especially if I've sat on it."