My Review of Canada
After spending nearly three weeks of my life in Canada, I feel obliged to offer a review of the country and specifically the city of Halifax, Nova Scotia.
First of all, I think I like Canada. It’s pretty nice. All of the people are pretty nice and easy going, almost like Mormons. Kinda creepy, actually. There’s not a lot of honking or rude hand gestures or angry people, and as an American this puts me in a very strange place. A place with butterflies and moonbeams. See? Creepy. I feel a little more at home in the places with rabid moths and harsh florescent lighting.
Television up here is another story. There are, as far as I’ve seen, only two good tv shows: Royal Canadian Air Farce and Corner Gas; but even these make me see why entertainment is such a dominant industry in America. The Canadian acting is generally on a much, much lower level than what one expects from prime time US shows; but the subject matter is usually a little more down to earth and realistic, while still quite funny. I really, really like Corner Gas, though; as a sitcom it works in almost all the right ways. Royal Canadian Air Farce is a lot like SNL. I’ve only seen the older ones, but they’re incredibly funny and the writers at SNL could learn a lot from these Canucks.
My radio experience has been very limited, and in a great way. I found 89.9 Hal FM on the way from the airport to the hotel and haven’t had to find another station. In three weeks. This station just plain rocks. They’re seriously one of three great classic rock stations that I’ve listened to in my lifetime. One was kzps in Dallas, which is still the best station in that town, I think. The other was the Bear that used to be in Abilene, which, unfortunately, has since started sucking profusely (this was once the greatest radio station in the history of ever; not once did I hear the same song twice and I can count using only my hands the number of commercials I heard, while they were in their prime, of course). Hal FM is a great station, and the personalities I’ve heard have been fairly knowledgeable and quite interesting. Candy sounds hott. Yeah, with two t’s.
Shopping sucks. Midland has a more impressive mall than the 5 downtown shopping centers I’ve been to combined. And, often forgetting the exchange rate, I sometimes feel like I’m getting ripped off. I think I am sometimes, especially at the movie theatre. I wasn’t pleased after that.
So all in all, Canada’s a nice place to visit for a week or two. Tops. Then get back to the sanity and strife of the States, or you’ll become a nice zombie just like these canucks.