Standard Sizes

When I instigate my insidious plan for world domination it wont be because I want to rule with an Iron fist, have people bow down in homage before me, because I trying to downpress the average man or because I have a misguided belief that I can bring about world peace.

Nuh uh!



The catalyst for my terrible campaign will be because I man just get fed up with cup and container sizes being non-standard. (ps: if you ever google cup size all ya duz get is nuff sites for bras and god knows what else related to breasts but I not talking bout nuhbody breasts here ok)

How hard can it be for us as a people to have a standard cup size when someone is buying a drink? I not even looking for a worldwide standard I mean cause I know that in a US large is XX-large in Canada and a bucket in the West Indies and that a Bucket in New York is a large wash tub size in Barbados. No, I not even looking for standards to be world wide but what about even city wide? Ya mean that is impossible? Cuhdear man!

Go into one coffee chain here and a medium is the size of another coffee chain's small. Go into a sandwich place and a large cup is the same size as the food place next door's extra large. It is one of the most annoying things ever I think cause you have to ask them well what a large look like or what size is a medium. And when you dont ask and somebody give you a large that really the size of somebody else medium you duz be thinking dem tief ya money or the cashier din hear you properly and give you a default size. Man, you shouldn't have to ask something so. Standardize man, standardize.

It cant be that hard, we have standards in most other places. Just pick some sizes and call them the standard. A large can be a 12 ounce, a medium a 8, a extra large a 16. Not a 8 ounce is somebody large and somebody else small. That nuh mek it.

Time for a change man, wunnah nuh hear what de man Obama say? Time fi change! Well he din chatting bout cup sizes but the slogan is relevant. Don't let me have to call up my troops and march bout the place robbing and pillaging before we get together as people and decide that standardization is good for the nation and the people and the economy.

Cineplexia

I went to the cinema yesterday to see the new James Bond movie. Its not as good as the last one but all in all its not bad either. Hadn't been to the movies since the summer so I was a bit surprised that the price of movies had gone up. Used to be $9.95 now its $10.50. I mean with the world as it stands with finances these days I thought they might encourage more people to come to the movies by lowering the prices not raising them. Cause movies is a luxury it aint no necessity so dem better be aware a that.

Anyway a while back I tell y'all how the airport duz be like a country unto itself. Well the cinema duz be the same way too. That is the only way I can explain how it is that the woman at the concession stand tell me a regular drink and a lil pack a M&Ms was $9.02.

Nine oh who? Alright then faget that I will have to do without. Cause fa $9.02 I could almost see anudda movie at that cinema, fa $9.02 I could go out in the mall and get a combo from almost any a dem fast food places, drink, fries and a sandwicj or burger. Fa $9.02 I could go to the bootleg fella cross the street buy 5 movies and still give TTC $2.75 to get back on the bus and guh home. No uh uh I keeping my $9.02.

But its always been so in Cineplexia, whichis my new name for the cinema since I feel them got their own charter and delare demselves an independent country. Was always so, is juss I forget that is so the movies duz go. Cause when I was younger I remember deliberately stopping at the convience store on the way to the movies to stock up on snacks cause the people in Cineplexia looking to bruk ya pockets.

I feel personally they should be offering we free food at the movies though cause dem should be counting their blessings any a we duz actually go to a movie these days what when you can get bootleg dvds of the latest release for a handful for a couple dollars.

Best not to bite the hand dat feeding ya I say.

Right & Rights

So a mother here is claiming her fundamental rights were taken away from her when she wasnt allowed to breastfeed her baby in a swimming pool or rather on the steps into the pool.

Is it just me or is this just silly?

Yes you have the right to breast feed a child anywhere but is it right to do so? Come on now! It seems like utter lawlessness and laziness that she couldn't take the child away from the pool for a few minutes to feed it. Is a swimming pool, or its steps, really a hygienic place to feed one's child? All that bacteria in the pool, splashing kids, splashing water doesn't really sound like the greatest spot to me. In fact I would argue unless the chile name Aquaman then dont feed it in the pool.

But like every other thing these days everyone thinks they have rights and having rights mean regardless of if what you are doing makes sense , is right, or doesn't make sense, is invariably wrong, you can complain and argue your rights were somehow abused. Somehow the connection between rights and common sense just does not compute to many people.

This one will be interesting though cause according to the article:
"The Ontario Human Rights Commission says breastfeeding women can't be prohibited from feeding their babies in public, or ordered to move to areas considered more "discreet." But the Ministry of Health sets rules that ban food and drink around pools, says Karkouti, and if breastfeeding is allowed, bottles should also be allowed."

cigarettes & strollers

I think I've mentioned this before but just in case.

I've always wondered about women (most of the time its mothers i see doing it) out for a walk with babies who are casually smoking while pushing the stroller. It just seems kind of bizarre for lack of a better word.

I mean I aint grudge you your smoke but really does the child have to be that close to your second hand smoke? It just seems counter intuitive to taking the baby out for some fresh air.

And another thing I noticed with strollers is how some parents push them out into traffic way ahead of themselves at traffic lights like stop I'm coming through with a baby. Ok that's all fine and dandy but umm suppose the stroller get hit by a car. I mean its not like the stroller doesn't have an infant in it. Shouldn't you be more careful with how you stick them out into traffic with your assumption that everyone will stop simply because its a stroller. What if they cant stop? aren't you putting that kid in more danger than it needs to be and shouldn't the watchword with a child be caution.

Mountaintops

And though it seems heaven sent we ain't are ready to see a black president.

Just needed to correct Pac's line there.

Stop for a minute. Just stop. Consider where you are right now in your life and where you were when you heard the news that Barack Obama had won the US presidential election. Bask in the elation and the euphoria, take in the sights and the sounds. Remember them!

Without overly indulging in hyperbole this is truly a momentous occasion. Its one of those "one moment in time" moments that Whitney sang about.

In my lifetime so far I've seen such events as the end of apartheid and the end of the cold war. Those were moments back then that I hoped might come but still never really dreamed would occur. Similarly but oh so much more of a dream, pipe dream even, was the concept of a black president in the US. In fact it was so much a dream we didn't even dare to think it. But on this day, that dream has become a reality, well a reality in so much that a black man has won the election and is now just waiting to be sworn in as President in January.

I can only imagine what black folk felt like when slavery was abolished (lik an lock up done wid hurray for jin jin!) or when they got the right to vote. Maybe this occasion gives me an inkling as to those joyous occasions. Maybe not but just maybe.

Now understand my position. I am a Bajan, a West Indian, a immigrant to Canada, a black man, not necessarily in that order. I am not African-American and although we're all African many of my connections to that actual continent aside from my skin tone have long been lost in the depths of the middle passage and the annals of slavery. So some may ask why is this so important to me, what does Obama's election change, why should I care?

Well first off let me say that although race plays its part I embrace Obama not just for his skin tone but for his approach, his message, the way he ran his campaign and the possibilities that he represents not just for the US but for the entire world.

And now, I embrace his victory. We are coming full circle from the Dubya pick to Obama. Under and Obama presidency things may or may not change in terms of US policy, it may not affect the price of oil or the economy , at least in the short term, and it doesn't mean that we awake this morning and all racism (check this Globe and Mail racist poem) and prejudice has magically ended somehow but at least from a black perspective the outcome of this election says something has changed. We as black people, as minorities, have now seen a glimmer that possibilities lie ahead for us and our children that we might not have dreamed had existed before. We have the audacity to hope.

We may not be alike in many ways, him and I, and I definitely don't expect him to have a specific black agenda while in office and won't get mad when he looks out for the betterment of the entire country as opposed to just the betterment of a specific group but Obama's victory today is my victory, its our collective victory as black people. Note I didn't say the war has been won there are many battles yet to be fought but this right here this is a victory and a significant one nonetheless.

Obama has shattered a glass ceiling beyond most of our wildest expectations and the same way that some expect that we black folk should accept a collective shame and guilt whenever some random black man commits a crime well why shouldn't we now embrace Barack's victory, an achievement that gives us pride? So as I said his victory is mine and I cheer loudly and unabashedly for him.

We have a new hero. Especially for us who are here in North America as minorities. We no longer only need look to foreign leaders or dead African kings and Pharaohs or Marcus, Martin and Malcolm to point out to our children what black people have and can achieved. We have a real live person closer to home who isn't a rapper, who isn't an athlete, who isn't an entertainer who we can say has achieved the impossible, defied the odds, made it to the very top and looks like you and I. We can look at our children and point to Obama while paraphrasing his words Yes you can.

There is still a long way to go but each journey starts with the first step. As Mos Def said we living now with the promise of the infinite, we living now with the promise of the infinite.

Inshalla!

On a more somber note I also embrace this win on behalf of those who paved the way, those who sacrificed and were beaten and tormented and suffered to make this day happen. Those who didn't live to see the dream come to fruition. "I'm destined to live this dream for all my peeps who didn't make it." Obama's grandmother didn't live to see this day, my own father, who I know would have loved to see this, didn't make it and my friend Callie in Florida died last week, so close to this day but yet so far, a few days ironically after I had actually dared for the first time to ask her the question "so ya think Obama going to win?" She had replied simply "Yep...I think we are gonna have our first black president." She was right.

So today I celebrate for those who came before us, those who paved the way, those who didn't live to see the moment but yet shared the dream. Those of us who have lived to see this day should beyond all be thankful that we are here to see it.

So with that said congratulations and good luck President elect Obama. You have made it to the mountain tops but its not an easy road you now must travel. Our prayers go with you for the next and most likely hardest part of the journey. As Buju said "its not an Easy Road, many see the glamour and the glitter and think it's a bed of rose, Who feels it knows, Lord help me sustain these blows."

Make us proud son! Represent!