Finding Humour in the Harbour

I’m trying hard to find some humour in, or at least an upside to, the ongoing failure of the Halifax “Harbour Solutions” project.

It’s not easy, especially after you separate out all the obvious toilet humour.

“Separate out.” I kill me.

Anyway, there must be somebody who’s happy that the majority of Halifax’s solid waste is once again flowing directly into the bowl of our primary tourist attraction.

Gulls, for example. The seagulls of HRM must be ecstatic that they can once again simply plop themselves in the middle of a nice warm outflow and dine like royalty. There must have been slim pickin’s out there for a while, but now – situation normal, all fouled up. Literally.

Maybe there are some business opportunities to be found in our city’s failure to keep the system working properly. We could publish a guide for other waterside municipalities: “How Not to Build and Operate a Municipal Waste Treatment Facility.” We don’t even have to figure out what caused the failure, we just have to show them how our system was designed and put a big red circle with a line through it on the instructions. Very educational, and a service to others.

People who clean the hulls of boats for a living must be quite pleased. No doubt there will be lots of extra business being funneled their way now, if there are any boat owners who can actually bear the thought of once again floating their massive investment through the murky headwaters of Halifax harbour. (I know “headwaters” actually refer to rivers, but honestly, I just could not resist the pun. Purists, forgive me.)

And I suppose one upside is that it will be really easy to find a choice spot to lay your blanket at Black Rock Beach or the Dingle this summer. No jockeying for the best location near the shore! No municipal officials kicking sand in your face as they sprint anxiously from the chilly water. Just the sun and the sand and a bottle of bleach on standby for the laundry later.

I was also thinking that perhaps folks in the tourist trade could learn to embrace the sorry state of the water and exploit it in some way. And I may have just the thing: a sweet little story I found on Slate.com. Apparently, back in 2004, heavy rains had overloaded a sewage treatment operation near London, England, and excess sludge was allowed to flow directly into the Thames. (Hey, this sounds kinda familiar…) One rower was so shocked after rowing his shell through the disgusting brown “soup” that he went on to organize something he called the “Thames Turd Race,” where rowers sporting gas masks competed in towing giant inflatable feces up and down the river.

I think this is something that Halifax could definitely get behind. We could call it “The Chebucto Head Feculence Float,” or “The Halifax Regional Runoff Regatta,” – something to that effect. Our tourism catch-phrase could be “More Fun with Every Flush!” and prizes could include a year’s supply of hand sanitizer and a renewable prescription for amoxicillin.

Back me up here. Perhaps this forward-flowing approach is just what we need to get us over our embarrassment issues, so we can finally feel regular again.

What Not to Do When Google Street View is Around

You can run, but you can’t hide from the Google Street View camera.

Well, actually, you probably CAN hide, if you see it coming soon enough, but that means you’ll miss your chance to be immortalized forever as a prototypical citizen of this fabulous metropolis.

Google Street View is a feature of Google Maps and Google Earth which offers street-level panoramic photographic views of city streets all over the world. The views are usually shot from a rather bizarrely-mounted multi-lensed camera which sits on the roof of a rather nondescript car. That car then drives around selected cities taking point-of view pictures of the streets - and whoever happens to be on those streets at that moment.

And it’s been out capturing the streets of Halifax lately. A friend of mine spotted it on Quinpool road the other day. That means there’s a pretty good chance that the camera spotted him, too. Fortunately, he wasn’t doing anything immoral or illegal, so he was, in fact, quite tickled that folks in Upper East Estonia might soon be seeing an image of him walking into his favourite diner for breakfast.

But of course, there are legitimate privacy concerns raised by this technology and its permission-less application. There are serious reasons that you may not want your image randomly captured and posted online. To counter those objections, officials from Google have promised that Canadian faces and licence plates will be blurred. That’s probably a good idea, because the camera has already notoriously captured awkward situations in other cities such as people entering or leaving “adult” stores, people urinating or vomiting in public and even one fellow apparently in the midst of committing a break-in.

But I bet there are plenty of more trivial moments when one might not want the ol’ Google Camera to be following them around town, either. Perhaps if you are one of the following people, you should take note. For example: if you are in the midst of an extramarital affair, and occasionally enjoy an indiscreet stroll down Spring Garden Road, arm-in-arm with your lover. Now is perhaps not the best time for this, which, I might add, is generally not the greatest idea, anyway. You think your spouse wouldn’t recognize your cheating butt just because they blur your face a little? This is one time when the cliché, “get a room” might really be a good idea.

Or maybe you’re not looking your best lately - you’ve gained a little weight over the winter, or you haven’t touched up those graying roots in a few weeks. Perhaps you’re in desperate need of a good pedicure. At any rate, you might want to get right on those personal maintenance issues, unless you plan to stay confined to the indoor malls for a few weeks. They may blur faces, but nasty toenails are forever.

Also, if you’re playing hooky from work, you may want to invest in a hat and some dark glasses. Ditto if you’re a closet smoker, chronic nose-picker, or if you haven’t told your spouse you got laid off from work and have been spending your days sadly scouring the want-ads as you wander the lonely streets until you can “clock out” at 5.

On the upside, if you do get caught, uh, with your pants down, you can request that your image be removed from the site. But until we know that the Google car is gone, I think it’s best to be a little extra discreet – and remember that your mother probably knows how to use Google, too.

The Death of the Turn Signal

I am officially declaring it: the turn signal, as we know it, is dead.

I’ve been witnessing its slow decline in Halifax over the past several years, and I think it’s now safe to say that consistent use of car blinkers when turning has transitioned from palliative to terminal.

I mean, why would anyone use one anyway? It’s completely for the benefit of others. It doesn’t do you any good if you’re driving – you know you’re turning. And, really, who cares about making sure other people know why you’ve stopped dead in the middle of the road?

I see this epidemic of failure to signal when driving as emblematic of a deeper social ill. It’s hugely symbolic of our growing social isolation and our increasing lack of empathy for our fellow human beings.

Or maybe there are just more crappy drivers out there – I don’t really know. What am I, a sociologist?

My personal theory about what’s happening is that certain models of cars are now being manufactured without blinkers. Jettas, in particular, don’t seem to have them at all. But perhaps that’s just an issue of driver demographics.

Alright, so it’s time to offer solutions. Just complaining about it probably isn’t going to solve the problem, so I’ve taken to the interweb for help.

I’ve found a website called useyourblinker.com, which is simply a single page that says nothing but, “Use your blinker. It’s free. Bee-Otch.” Instructive, but not particularly helpful, I guess.

Coolpeoplecare.org (“Saving the world, 5 minutes at a time”) has lots to say about signaling. “From time to time,” the website chirps cheerfully, “we like to remind folks of the regular things they can do that make everyone happy. …It's time to add your blinker to that list. For some of you, it may be the least-used part of your vehicle. You can change that by employing its signaling features whenever you want to turn or change lanes. Make sure you don't pull the trigger too soon, and always turn it off once you turn. Feel free to send this along to a friend who you know could use a reminder.”

There, how proactive is that? You can use your turn signal as a way to make people happy and to spread peace and joy throughout the universe. Wow.

But my favourite signaling site is ehow.com, which lists a full set of instructions called “How to use your turn signal.” The complex instructions are, as follows: “(1) Locate the lever on the left side of the steering column. (2) Push down to turn left. (3) To signal a right turn, push the lever up. (4) Once you have moved the lever up or down, an arrow light will begin blinking on the dashboard. (5) The signal will automatically turn off after you have made the turn, in most cases, but if it doesn't, move the lever back to its central, neutral position.”

For real! Consider yourself informed.

And now that there’s no question about it’s proper operation, perhaps we can all resurrect the humble turn signal from its resting place on the great dashboard in the sky.
Blink on, my newly-educated friends. Blink on.

Emergency Preparation in Case of Alien Invasion

Every once in a while, when I was a kid, my father used to walk the family through whatever house we were living in at the time, and talk about how we would get out in case of a fire. He showed us which windows had screens and which had none, and he’d make sure we could open the windows all the way and climb out. I think we were supposed to tie sheets together or something to get down from the second floor.

When we eventually moved into a bungalow, jumping out a window became less of a big deal, from a “distance to the ground” point of view. From a “your house appears to be burning to the ground” point of view, yes, I suppose, that would still have been a fairly big deal.

My father, you may have guessed, was in the military, and he was a Libra, so making plans for unpredictable eventualities came quite naturally to him.

And I am my father’s daughter. I don’t like being caught unprepared, and I know from experience that, sometimes, uh, stuff happens. I have my crank radio and my battery-powered lantern and my cans of beans in the basement. You know, in case there’s a snowstorm or a hurricane or (as is sadly true in most of Nova Scotia) a teensy bit of wind, and the power goes out.

But, apparently, I am woefully under-prepared. Perhaps you’ve seen the PSAs on TV: A fully geared-up firefighter enters a darkened home and nods grimly to the frightened group within. “Will you be ready to take care of your family for 72 hours in an emergency?” the voice of the Government of Canada intones. Apparently I will not, judging by the Emergency Preparedness Guide I immediately ran and printed off (at getprepared.gc.ca) after seeing that commercial.

It’s not that my preparations aren’t good, it’s that they’re not nearly enough, and they’re not for the right things. Public Safety Canada advises that in Nova Scotia, citizens are supposed to be prepared for floods, hazardous material spills, hurricanes, infectious disease outbreaks, landslides, power outages, storm surges, tsunamis and wildfires.

I think they also meant to put “alien invasions” on the list, because, apart from the usual preparations – which they suggest you keep in a wheeled suitcase in a closet by the door – they “recommend” that you pack a few extras: a change of clothing and a sleeping bag for each family member; garbage bags and toilet paper for personal sanitation; safety gloves; basic tools, such as a hammer, pliers, wrench, screwdrivers, and fasteners; a small cooking stove and fuel; and, disturbingly, duct tape “to tape up windows, doors, air vents, etc.”

Now, I don’t know how you feel about all this, but I’ve read “The Road” by Cormac McCarthy, and seriously, if the situation is that bad, I hope to get blown up or swept away or sucked into the spaceship with everybody else. I don’t want to be the last one left wandering the blackened planet with my shopping cart, looking for unspoiled tins of tuna and loaded pistols.

But, hey, just in case that nightmare scenario does come to pass, the Emergency Preparedness Guide has kindly provided me with several convenient “non-perishable food recipe ideas.” After all, who wouldn’t be craving something sweet once the immediate crisis is over? With no irony whatsoever, the guide’s Peanut Butter Balls recipe cheerfully advises, “This recipe can easily be doubled if you are feeding a crowd.”

Or fending off cannibals. I guess it’s up to you what you use them for. Just remember to make enough to last 72 hours. That’s when help from the Government of Canada will officially arrive.