What an annoyance! I've been trying to find out what the import duties on electronic musical instruments into Canada are. But could I find such info on the Canada Border Services Agency website? Nope, a big fat no. You'd think they'd have such data available, but no such luck. At least they indicate that you'll have to pay GST on the value of goods imported to Canada, which is useful.

Well whatdayaknow! For once this actually worked and generated a hit. I may actually have to try it again.

Thanks to Orac for a heads up to this description of why Apple is evil. As someone who uses a PC clone, and hasn't touched a Mac since my university days, who am I to disagree?

Here's another discussion page for guitar nuts, The Gear Page. Its interesting to read all the people obsessed with boutique stompboxes and such. Me, I like getting cool old stompers for cheap.

Anyone wanna lend me 5 or 6 grand American? Thats probably what the new limited edition Pete Townsend Les Paul Deluxe costs. I think its neat that it even has the much derided "pancake" body common to the Les Paul Deluxes Townsend used in the '70s.

Here's an interesting essay from the Harpers website about the ludricrous Left Behind Christian fiction series, thanks to Amygdala via Pharyngula. (Boy, hows that for a mouthful!)

Its amazing the kind of things people with too much time on their hands come up with. A Japanese Powerpuff Girls fan has stuck the PPGs into various situations as parody here. A typical example is this one based on the cover to Robert Fripp's The League of Gentlemen album.

And from the "you're not asking for much, are you?" department, a hit I got today on the blog came from this Google search: guitar tabs for all tv shows played on ytv Frankly I doubt you'll find even 1 in 10 theme songs of the shows played on YTV that have any sort of tab version online.

Here's another one from the "religious weirdness" files. An auction for an Ibanez acoustic guitar that's described as having a "Jesus face" in the figuring on the back. Personally I see some sort of weird clown, or member of Gwar, or some such, above something that looks kinda like an owl.

It seems there are more than a few people out there that like Teletoon's current teen mall comedy 6teen. The couple of mentions I've made of the series here keep generating hits for me. And it seems that Teletoon must be doing well ratings wise with the program, as they've apparently decided to purchase a second season of episodes according to Emilie-Claire Barlow, who has been doing some of the voices. Perhaps they're considering it as a potential replacement for Braceface, which they've beaten into the ground pretty heavily with repeats, and which has apparently ended its production cycle. I do have to wonder about Teletoon playing 6TEEN 6 nights a week when they've to date only played 14 episodes, with the 14th premiering this week after a couple of weeks of no new episodes. Then again this is the same station that managed to play the 13 episodes of Undergrads over and over again for long stretches.

I was just listening to side 2(as it was on the original LP) of King Crimson's Lark's Tongue in Aspic. It had been a long time since i'd listened to "The Talking Drum," and tonight I found the first 2 or 3 minutes of that track sounded a lot like Can, which I'd never noticed before. It was the combination of the drum sounds and what Bill Bruford and Jamie Muir were playing, along with John Wetton playing a repeating bass figure, that reminded me of Can, although the track eventuals moves in a less Can-ish direction as Fripp makes his prescence felt. Its probably nothing more than coincidence. I've never read anything from the members of Crimson that indicates they were influenced by what Can was doing, although I would hardly be surprised if they crossed paths with Can along the way. Then again Bill Bruford was always a big jazz fan, and Can's Jaki Liebezeit was a jazz drummer before he hooked up with Can, so perhaps some parellel influences were at play.

Have you ever wondered what Jesus smelled like? Well, now you can find out, as a couple have developed His Essence candles, which they claim smell like Jesus. (This example of nonsense comes via a post at Stupid Evil Bastard.)

Here's a suggestion for Canadian Tire: Partner up with other companies and allow them to take Canadian Tire money. I'd love to be able to buy junk food, batteries, and so forth with it other than at a Canadian Tire store.

I came across a rather amusing review of the film What the Bleep Do We Know? Sounds like the typical new age crapfest of stupid ideas and credulous thinking.

Hmmm, I just realised that the use of a sexual slang term in my last post may get me hits from people looking for porn and related material. Hopefully they'll hang around and read some of the content.

A new study indicates that abstinence only sex education programs may not have the results their backers want, leading to some teens engaging in higher risk behaviours. Personally I found this statement from the linked article amusing:

'Leslee Unruh, president of the National Abstinence Clearinghouse in Sioux Falls, S.D., called the study "bogus," disputing that those involved had pledged true "abstinence."

"Kids who pledge abstinence are taught that any word that has 'sex' in it is considered a sexual activity," Unruh said. "Therefore oral sex is sex, and they are staying away."'

I think Ms. Unruh is rather naive if she believes that teens won't engage in semantic wordgames and other philosophical dodges to get their rocks off. "Its not really sex because you can't get pregnant" is sure to be the attitude of many towards things like oral and anal sex, and if you use an euphamism like blowjob the term sex won't even come into things.

American visitors to this blog who've read my Dr. Who post are probably wondering when the show is going to debute on US tv. Unfortunately it may not. The new series has yet to find a home, with a number of stations, including the Science Fiction channel, taking a pass. So it seems US viewers may have to wait for a DVD release. As a result CBC will be showing the exclusive North American premiere of the series when it airs the first episode April 5th.

If you've ever wanted to visit New York's famous CBGB's nightclub, focal point of the '70s punk and new wave explosion in the US, you may want to do it now. The club is in danger of closing due to a rent dispute. Kind of hard to imagine that a club thats been around for more than 30 years and is world famous would still be renting its space from a landlord, but hey, I know nothing about the intricacies of the New York real estate market. Reportedly other NYC clubs are facing problems for similar reasons.

Today's cover of the Toronto Globe and Mail was rather interesting. Dealing with yesterdays acquital of Ripudaman Singh Malik and Ajaib Singh Bagri in the Air India case, it showed pictures of the two accused with "Not Guilty" printed beside them, while the rest of the page was taken up with a list of the victims below the word "Innocent." A rather interesting presentation, and I can't help but assume the subtext was supposed to be yes, they may have been acquited, but they may have gotten away with murder of these poor people. Are they truly guilty? I don't know. But the fact they've been acquited makes me wonder if a front page like that isn't putting the Globe at risk of being sued for defamation.

In somewhat more ridiculous news the Supreme Court has ensured that no one in Quebec will accidentally confuse butter and margarine by upholding a Quebec law that requires magarine to be white. Quebec's dairy industry claims that if margarine is coloured yellow people will be confused and it will hurt butter sales. At one time you could buy uncoloured margarine here in Saskatchewan, and perhaps still can, since you really don't need coloured margarine for most baking. I remember my grandmother having some once back in the mid or late '70s that came with a dye package so you could make it yellow.

Here's an early heads up for Canadian science fiction fans. The new Doctor Who series will be debuting Tuesday April 5th on CBC. You'll need to check your local listing for the precise time. Interestingly the reason CBC got it was supposedly in part because BBC wanted the series on a major network instead of a speciality channel like Space.