Snakes Not on A Plane!

Have you entered BOB FM’s ‘Top Dog Contest’? In conjunction with the Iams Wiggle Waggle Walkathon for the Humane Society, coming up Sunday Sept 10th at the Arboretum, we are going to crown ‘Ottawa’s Top Dog’!!! Send your entry to this website! Tell us why your dog deserves to be ‘head of the pack’ at the Wiggle Waggle! You could win 4 tickets to ‘Barney’, 2 tickets to the Black Eyed Peas, AND grooming service from the ‘Spaw Mobile Grooming Salon’!
Yours truly will be one of the judges, along with Laureen Harper, yes, ‘that’ Laureen Harper! I will be taking the Top Dog entries to 24 Sussex Drive, where we will pour over them and choose a winner! Laureen Harper has always been a huge Humane Society supporter, and fosters cats and kittens regularly! Gotta love it!

I had a pretty cool experience this week at ‘Little Ray’s Reptiles’ on Bank Street South. It was my first time at Little Ray’s, and I honestly had no idea it was such a huge reptile zoo! Thank you to my friend Karen Genge for the tour….she volunteers at Little Rays and not only helps to clean out the snake tanks and the frog tanks and the turtle tanks, she is also a ‘mom’ to a hognose snake and a carpet python! I’ve always had a love of snakes, which goes back to my childhood. My family had rented a cottage on Mississippi Lake near Carleton Place and when I was a kid, I found a garter snake nest. I put the tiny snakes into a bucket, I think there were about 80 snakes, and took them back to the cottage where my Mom shrieked and told me to keep them outside. That night, it was quite chilly so I felt sorry for the 80 baby garter snakes and brought them into my bedroom. The next morning I awoke to my Mom screaming. There were garter snakes everywhere. Climbing the drapes, slithering on the floor, one ended up somehow in the lettuce in the fridge. But the best visual of all, was the garter snake that sat on the top of the tv, its face dangling down and quite fascinated with ‘The Price is Right’ starring Bob Barker. The moral of this story: I can’t believe that Bob Barker is STILL doing the ‘Price Is Right’!!!

I guess it was bound to happen. The showbiz tabloids struck Bruce Springsteen. Claiming his marriage to Patti Scialfa was over, and that he was dating a 9/11 widow. As soon as I heard the story, I refused to believe it! Bruce Springsteen is my hero!!! He’s honest! He has integrity! He’s one of the good ones! Thank goodness, today, Bruce Springsteen released a statement saying that his marriage is as strong as ever, and that the recent rumours are ugly and untrue. Check out Bruce’s comments for yourself at www.brucespringsteen.net.
Phew!!!

Its that time of year!! How many times have you heard recently: ‘I can’t believe how fast summer went by’!!! Its almost Labour Day and once again, I have a huge list of things I meant to do this summer…but never got around to. I never learned how to wind-surf. I didn’t go to any form of water park. I never had a garage sale. Didn’t get around to buying one of those bug zappers that looks like a tennis racquet. But I did run through the sprinker a couple of times.
And I did name the frog that lives in my garden. He’s my Tony.

Have you been watching ‘Prison Break’? I admit that I had to bail out on ‘24’ last season, because while I know that you have to suspend belief to enjoy the show, I just couldn’t believe the incredible story lines. And now it looks like ‘Prison Break’ is taking a page from ‘24’. I half expect that, just before getting caught by the law, Michael Scofield and friends will be rescued by a flying pteradactyl.

Just when I thought TV can’t get much worse, I just watched ‘Celebrity Duets’, with Xena Warrior Princess singing with Michael Bolton. Right now the C-Pac channel doesn’t seem so bad.

I Must Stop Collecting Collectors Editions

I got the new issue of Entertainment Weekly Magazine, which is one of those ‘collectors’ issues. Its kinda cool, it features six different James Bond covers. I could get into a debate about which Bond is best….I could rate them (in my opinion)…blah blah George Lazenby was the worst, Sean Connery was the best…all the other Bonds are somewhere in the middle….but really, hasn’t this debate raged on for decades? I’m not interested in that debate. What I wanna know, is this: do you KEEP magazines that call themselves ‘collectors issues’? See, I always have. As soon as a magazine calls itself a ‘collectors’ issue’, it goes into a cardboard box in my basement, with all the other ‘collectors’ issues. Like the ‘definitive Seinfeld’ issue of Entertainment Weekly. Or the ‘Artist of the Decade’ (U2) issue of Rolling Stone. Or the collectors edition of People Magazine’s sexiest men alive. Or the collectors edition of The Ottawa Citizen, featuring the complete history of The Rideau Canal. What the heck, may as well save that too. Everything goes into the box in the basement. Why? Hmm. I’m not sure, exactly. Can’t throw them out, they’re collectors issues!
One day I’m going to free myself from those boxes of magazines that call themselves collectors issues. I think I can get by without keeping the collectors edition of Time Magazine’s 1987 Man of the Year.

I’ve never been very good at flying kites, as a matter of fact I gave up kite flying when I was about 9. But while on holidays, my husband bought a kite and it was actually quite nice, sitting on a big old rock in Georgian Bay, watching my husband fly this beautiful kite in the breeze…..and then…kaboom. Nose-dive. The kite smashed right into a rock. Exactly the way all kite flying experiences come to an end. Does a kite ever live to fly another day?

I got a new pair of binoculars. Serious binoculars for bird watching. I didn’t know much about binoculars, but I went to this great store on Merivale Road across from the CTV building, and I figured they knew what they were talking about because they also sell telescopes that are so powerful, you can see a Starbucks on the planet Mars. Anyway, I tried a lot of different pairs of binoculars, but I was absolutely sold on one particular pair. The big selling feature? When I looked through them, I could see the keys in the ignition of my car, through the locked car door.

Thank you so much to one of our fantastic Bob FM listeners, Paula, who delivered a life size cardboard cut-out of Ottawa Senators Mike Fisher to the radio station. He’s in the studio right now but eventually I plan to take him on a couple of outings. Thanks Paula. Let me know how I can return the favour. How about a life size cardboard cut-out of JR?

Help!! I've burnt my eyeballs!! But I can get up

Ouch! Just got back from vacation and I learned something the hard way. You can get a sunburn on your eyeballs. I was on a five mile kayak paddle directly into the sun in Georgian Bay, totally greased up with sunscreen from head to toe. But no sunglasses. Nope. Don’t own a pair. Later that day, it arrived. The sunburn. On my eyeballs. After careful thought, putting calamine lotion directly onto my eyeballs was ruled out. That would more or less be a ‘catch 22’. So, by passing along this story, if I could just save one of you from ever getting a sunburn on your eyeballs, then my suffering has been worth it. For goodness sake, wear sunglasses. Who would’ve thought they serve another purpose besides making you look cool!

My husband and I spent a few days in Quebec City, taking in all the history in the old city, complete with a day-long walk around the Plains of Abraham. I try not to use my holidays to ‘learn’ things, but you can’t help it when you’re in Quebec City. There are statues and memorials and plaques about every 10 feet, each a reminder of the year 1759, when the biggest war on Canadian soil took place…………..and it was all over in about 40 minutes. How Canadian is that.
While we were in Quebec City, there was a huge festival taking place, with hundreds of people walking around in period costume to celebrate New France back in the 1700’s. The women wore long dresses, the men had wigs and frills. The only thing that gave them away was their shoes. I doubt the men in 1700’s New France wore Reeboks.

Go, Steffi D, go Eva!! Canadian Idol is getting down to the wire and as I write this, we have TWO, yes TWO idol finalists from the national capital area!!! Eva is from Gatineau, Steffi is from right here in Ottawa and they are both really strong contenders. It sure would be cool if they ended up as number one and number two for the Canadian Idol final. If that happens, I think they should stage the final competition right in the middle of the MacDonald Cartier Bridge.

As always, Bob FM has your ‘last chance ticket grab’ for the city’s biggest concerts, including tickets for this Friday’s Steve Earle show at the Ottawa Folk Festival. Listen for Steve Earle songs all day Friday and be the 9th caller! I can’t wait for the show. I’m a huge Steve Earle fan. In the late 80’s, one day I decided I wanted to be a songwriter. So I wrote a song. (I think the next day I decided I wanted to be a dolphin trainer, but that’s another story). Anyway, I wrote a song called ‘I Can’t Break Out’. It was about a prisoner. It was one cliché after the other. But I managed to get it into Steve Earle’s hands. I told him that the song was written to sound like a cross between ‘I’m Eighteen’ by Alice Cooper and ‘Wanted Dead or Alive’ by Bon Jovi. All I remember is that Steve Earle was kind enough to sign my song and hand it back to me, without actually reading it. Which, in hindsight, makes this a much happier story.

My ‘Morning After’ partner JR is a huge Philadelphia Eagles fan. His three young daughters know all the words to the ‘Philadelphia Eagles fight song’. When I was in Vegas last year, he asked me to place a bet for him on the Eagles winning the Superbowl. (I don’t think they won) Anyhow, I recently saw a trailer for a movie called ‘Invincible’, which opens on August 25th. The movie is based on the true story of a Philadelphia Eagles fan, Vince Papale. Vince lost his wife and his teaching job. Needless to say, things are not going well for Vince. Then one day he decides to go to an open tryout for the Philadelphia Eagles NFL club. Judging from the trailer, he makes the team. Sheesh. For all the JR’s out there, sounds like the best movie ever made. Maybe for once, men will need Kleenex at the theatre. Or they can just pretend that they have something in their eye.

I’m still mourning the loss of Wiarton Willie, our national groundhog day mascot. He passed away recently, but he did live a good long pampered life. He was one of a kind. And not only because he was white. I’m not sure if Wiarton has found a replacement for Willie yet, but I have a suggestion. I think the Bell beavers, Frank and Gordon, should apply for the job. They’re not groundhogs, they’re beavers, but they are also actors so they could act like groundhogs. Just throwing it out there. I’ve been thinking a lot about this. It takes my mind off my sunburnt eyeballs.