Wearing White & Piddling on the Cenotaph

Ottawa - Remembrance Day

We were invited to play at the cenotaph and accepted with some reluctance, as these ceremonies tend to be more conservative than we are comfortable with. Tippy was out of the hospital and doing fine, but had been told to drink lots of fluids. As such he arrived with a 2L jug of water, and spent most of this time drinking it.

We had been asked to provide a short show before the vets parade arrived at ten-thirty. This we did, playing from our repertoire of war-based material. Unfortunately, we only play anti-war songs Ballad of the Green Beret, Give Peace A Chance that sort of thing. Apparently this crowd was more in the mood for Battle Hymn of the Republic than Eve of Destruction.

While we might reasonably have been able to figure that out, I don't know how we could be expected to know that Stevie's poppy would give offense. Stevie had bought a white poppy from some guy in Edmonton, as a symbol of peace. He explained to Stevie that the white poppy told people you believed in supporting our troops by not sending them to war. The white indicated her pacifist views, while still supporting the young men who, frankly, are not smart enough to know that they are pawns of the imperialist intentions of the ruling elite.

But the Vets and other members of the Legion somehow found this quite sane view insulting. As soon as services where over, Tippy went to one to ask where the bathroom was:

"Excuse me, can you tell me where the toilet is?" Tippy asked an older gentleman.

"Hey, what do you think your doing wearing that white poppy?" he yelled at Stevie.

"I am supporting our troops, by supporting the peace." she answered very reasonably.

"No really sir," said Tippy. "I drank a big jug of water..."

"You support the troops by supporting peace?" he asked incredulously. "Do you have any bloody idea what the poppy represents?"

Stevie was ready for this one. "It represents the brutality of war, it's blood red colour a symbol of the blood of our children that has been left on the field of battle."

“If you could just tell me before…” Tippy tried again.

"You have children fighting then?" he asked.

"No, I have no children," said Stevie. "I mean our children as in the collective young of the country."

"Well George over there, he has a son who was lost in battle, let’s ask him what he thinks. Oy, George," he yelled. George came over, and he said, "this one here says your William shouldn’t have been fighting, but was too stupid to realize it. What's more that he is collectively all of ours, not just yours."

"Oh?" he said looking at us. "You cried when William died then?"

"No," we said. I was about to say "Sorry for your loss,” or some such, when he said "How about a good swift kick in the groin then, and you can get an idea of the hurt, although I'd have to stand here kicking you for the next six months to give full effect."

"No thank you," was all I could muster, when he said to Stevie. "So you would wear your cowards poppy in honour of my son, would you."

She was about to reply, when I heard someone yelling from the other side of the cenotaph.

"What the hell are you doing?” someone yelled.

Tippy came running around with his pants lowered. "I'm sorry sir. I drank a big bottle of water, you see. For medicinal purposes," he was saying. As he ran out, we saw an old vet, about 75 years old, running after him and belting him over the head with a cane.

"What happened," the fellow we were talking too asked, and the old fellow with the cane said: "he was pissing on the memorial."

"Don’t worry,” said another gentleman with a camera, “I got pictures."

Klein to Singer: "Keep Your Moo-moo On."

Calgary

We were asked to play a roast for Ralph Klein, Dangerous Neo-con Premier of that great bastion of un-Canadian intolerant regressiveness, Alberta. The cold dead heart of that moral prairie wasteland is Calgary. We entered the Lion's den because a) It was a roast of Ralph Klein, so we weren't going to have to listen to people praise 'Premier free market at all costs' b) Calgary gigs pay really, really well.

Besides that, it was a charity event for the Calgary Homeless Foundation. Why the Conservatives would suddenly care about the homeless is beyond me. Surely these conservatives would have you believe that there's jobs aplenty in Calgary, and anybody who is homeless could just get a job. These black and white types never understand that somebody with great potential shouldn't be lowering themselves to serving hamburgers and coffee to their lessers, so to protect their dignity, possibly the only thing they have, they must rely on government largess and a bit of panhandling.

The gig went well, the large paycheck in hand, and the roasting of Neo-Klein Ralph was great. Lots of drinking jokes, and very personal jabs where it hurts a guy the most. I must say for an intolerant, he took it all very well. Then it was NKR's turn to take a few shots back. This he did with the usual kind of rebuttal that you get at these roasts. Jabs about the drinking and habits of the people who took their shots, a few good-natured jabs at some people in the audience, that sort of thing. Then it turned ugly.

I can barely repeat the vile filth, but the gist is he said Belinda Stronach "didn't have a conservative bone in her body... well maybe one." Everybody knew this was a jab at her for her past mating habits with Peter MacKay. Stevie was standing beside me, and suddenly started to go crazy (Tippy couldn't make it, as he was still he hospital after his stoning). "He can't say that!" she yelled. "That's Belinda he's talking about. That's sexist."

I knew trouble was coming, and sure enough as soon as the roast was over, Stevie raced over to NKR and started yelling at him. "You sexist nazi bastard, you cannot be making sexual comments like that about women. Do you really think it's OK to just go around calling people names?”

At this one of Neo-Klein Ralph's henchmen stepped forward, in case Stevie reached for her Birkenstock I guess. "Ma'am, your going to have to move along now..." he started to stay, but Stevie was yelling back by the time he got two words out. "Back off brown-shirt. I am a citizen of this country and have a Constitutional right to speak freely with the Premier."

NKR tried to calm every one down. "Keep your moo-moo on," he started to say to Stevie. She turned on him immediately.

"What did you say to me? Keep my moo-moo on? That's sexist! Would you say that to a man?"

"A man wouldn't be wearing a moo-moo..." he started to say, but Stevie wasn't finished.

"You fat, bald, drunken, sexist boor. You cannot just speak down to every woman in the world. We have a right to conduct our business with dignity intact, just like every man does, you beer bellied Neanderthal, regardless of whether our business is music, politics or serving you Labatt's 50..."

Much of that was said from the ground actually, as she poked him in the chest when she called him a "fat, bald, drunken, sexist boor," and his secret police jumped her. They had the cuffs on her by the time she got to “beer bellied Neanderthal”, and as she was being dragged off I heard something about just because he's Premier doesn't mean he can go around indiscriminately calling people names.

It's too bad to ruin a night where we got big pay for fourty-five minutes work, especially as there was only two of us to split it between, but at least we made enough to cover Stevie’s bail, which isn't always the case.