The Parkdale Liberation Front: New Superfood Discovered

New Super Food

Epipremnum wonderissii parkdalensis

Common Name: Holysmoke Vine

Recently Parkdale horticulturalists have come across a strange plant in the lanes and backyards along Queen Street West. The plant, a clinging ground  vine, has been identified as a previously unidentified hardy variety of Epipremnum or the pothos vine so common in interior landscapes. The Parkdale Liberation Front department of Homeopathy, recently relocated from the patio of The Rhino to the back of The Cadillac Lounge after an unfortunate incident involving a dispute between the bar manager and Subcommander Annie, has been investigating this promising vine.

Holysmoke Vine contains most of the vitamins you need every day, just one serving of Holysmoke Vine contains Vitamin B15, Vitamin B21, Vitamin B305, Vitamin B57, Vitamin B66, Frolicing Acid, Vitamin C, Calcium, Iron, Magnum 4s, Bosporus, Potassium and Cement, not to mention genetically encoded messages of salvation from the King James Bible.

No time for a nap in the afternoon? Holysmoke Vine is an excellent source of naturally occurring amphetamines as well as genetically encoded pictures Pamela Anderson as Ophelia in Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Simply chew on the vine as you would a leaf of a coca plant.

Men, doesn’t it bother you when your bathroom mirror fogs up every time you let off a beer fart? Try a puree of Holysmoke Vine and shredded leather. Spray on and wipe clean. Not only will your mirror sparkle but your bathroom will boast an additional manly scent.

Are grubs and slugs ruining your planting beds? Wrap Holysmoke Vine around a cocktail onion and place in a Royal Chinette dish. The schedule B subprime chemicals in the Holysmoke Vine react with the paper to give off a scent undetectable to humans but drive garden pests crazy and cause them to emigrate to Etobicoke. If you live in Etobicoke, home of Rob Ford, obese Mayor of Toronto with a marginal grasp of reality, sorry, you are SOL.

Looking for a fast and easy way to remove cellulite before going out or to the pool? Try rubbing a leaf or two of Holysmoke Vine along your problem area for a few minutes, the phytochemicals in the vine cause the collagen in your skin to tighten, firming up the outer layer and reducing the visibility of cellulite. Works great on stucco.

Want to avoid a hangover? Holysmoke Vine doesn’t work for boozers. Be a role model for your kids and switch to a recreational drug.

Stuck in space, somewhere between Venus and the Ophra Quadrant, Clingons hard on your ass, the dylithium crystals exhausted?  Pas de problem mon Capitan Jean-Luc  .  .  .  .

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The Parkdale Liberation Front: Health Warning!!!

 

The Parkdale Liberation Front, Department of Health, currently located on the patio of The Rhino on Queen West in Parkdale has recently issued a cautionary Health Warning:

The Tim Hudak 
(Leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario)
virus is coming to your Hood

The deadly virus pictured here:

666

has currently infected about 30% of the Canadian Population. Similar viruses in the United States and Europe are widespread. In US Right to Work states, the virus is estimated to infect over half the population.

Symptoms: What to look for:

- individuals infected with the TH 666 virus have difficulty distinguishing between ideology and reality.

- the infection reduces and in some cases, particularly with politicians, completely eradicates the ability to reason effectively.

- the infection produces a very low tolerance for empirical data.

- in many cases the TH 666 virus causes individuals to hate-target certain groups, including but not limited to women, men, whales, visible minorities, the physically and mentally challenged, gays and lesbians, unions, squirrels, legal aid lawyers, cyclists and The CBC.

The Burning Question on Queen Street West:

Does the TH 666 virus make you stupid?

The Burning Answer to the Burning Question:

YES

How can you as a rational human being protect yourself?

- if you come in physical contact with some one infected with the TH 666 virus immediately and vigorously wash your hands or any part of the skin that was in contact with the sick individual.  Use an industrial strength antiseptic. Chill with the McGarrigle sisters for a couple of hours. Hope for the best.

What if I’ve been infected?

- the problem is that you won’t know it. Suddenly you have all the answers, somewhere cool to go to after you’re dead and  somebody to blame for all your problems. One day you wake up in a beat up mobile home on cinder blocks and have a bowl of dog kibble for breakfast. Along the hall your are kids coughing, too sick to go to school, your wife sick and in pain. A soft wind delivers the eye watering odour of a pig abattoir down the road and you shed a tear for the almighty glory of your good fortune.

Alternatively you wake up in a million dollar penthouse loft condo with a beautiful man or woman snoring softly next to you. You gaze out your window at a rind of toxic smog over the lake, comfortable in the knowledge that your Porshe Carrera is snug and safe in the attack dog patrolled underground parking lot. You turn over and go back to sleep and dream of extracting more precious metals from the earth assured that the downstream poisoning of native people's land, the poisoning of their children and their future, ain't your problem.

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Mary Dowser Kidnapping Update

 

The case so far: The charmingly odoriferous Mary Dowser met up with a mysterious stranger on the train from Paris to Kiev. The stranger turned out to be Thomas Beckett. They struck up a sudden friendship. Sometime after their arrival at Kiev the aromatic Ms. Dowser emerging with Mr. Beckett from their hotel was suddenly carried off by unknown assailants. 

See recent posts:

6/17/24

6/24/12

Concerned for the safety of Championship Typist, TVFP correspondent and intrepid traveller we hired the private detective firm of Dragon and Associates to pursue the apparent kidnapping of Ms. Dowser in broad daylight on the streets of Kiev, the Ukraine. The firm’s principal Nicholas Dragon has written to us with his preliminary findings:

I don’t know the Ukraine, but I know someone who does. Sergei Tov isn’t just tough. He invented tough. Sergei Tov isn’t just smart he invented a little computer gadget that made him rich while his compatriots were nothing more than pariah dogs ripping at the entrails of the old Soviet Union. How I got to know Sergei Tov is classified. I don’t talk about it so don’t ask. Now Sergei Tov agreed to look into the Dowser affair. Here is a copy of his report to me:

Hey Nicky old friend, old buddy, how was they hangin. Listen this place is a kennel, really. It used to be a nice place. And the girls, really.  Anyway after Uncle Joe starved a thirty million of these Ukrainines to death they was all different. I got something for you. I don’t know what it is. This car that was abducted Mary Dowser was minus one engine, probably four cylinder. Okay that is telling me something. How do one get abducted in a car with no engine? What is everybody seeing? That day of fut-bol everybody is drunk so maybe they are seeing pink elephants. So I’m asking around. I know this girl, okay. No question asked. Her name is probably Mariangela and maybe she’s Italian who was married to this American diplomat for awhile, but I don’t know for sure. This is what she said in English for your eyes only:

Sergei okay, buon giorno you are a real bastard okay I’m not saying that my sister is so don’t ask me for any favours unless you have the Euros right up front. Okay but I owe you one. I got a name for you. Rossario de van Rothskildenski, okay, his great old man was a Junker. How do you like that, bastard?

At this point TVFP asked to obvious question: who is Rossario de van Rothskildenski. Nicholas Dragon replied:

We’re working on that.

Stay turned for more on the ever fragrant Mary Dowser abduction.

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TVFP Introduces New Security Feature: The Invisible Font

 

Coming Soon: TVFP, responding to security concerns surrounding the kidnapping of Championship Typist and intrepid adventurer, the ever fragrant Mary Dowser, will be testing a the state of the art anti terrorist application for specialty Blogs.

(There is no new confirmed news regarding the whereabouts of the blossomy odoriferous Ms. Dowser. However there is a rumour that her kidnappers were not wearing clown masks but were actually employees of a Russian oil magnate. Stay tuned.)

Invisi- Font is the trademark name of a new font for sensitive data developed by technicians at the Parkdale Liberation Front’s Advanced Research Facility located at the back of the Rhino on Queen St. West.

According Commander Annie of the PLF, the genesis of the font was an observation of the response of the TTC to real concerns that terrorists might use the common garbage receptacles in the subways to create terror, death and immense suffering. The TTC, to combat the possibility of terror, death and immense suffering declined to remove the garbage receptacles. Instead they switched to see-thru garbage bags. Of course, it’s rush hour. You happen to glance at the waste receptacle and notice that next to the empty Tim Horton’s frosted latte cup there’s a package marked BOMB. You call it in and a catastrophe is averted.

As well in the invisible / transparency department, The Prime Minister and his army of trolls has embarked on a massive prison building project at a time when the crime rate is falling.  Why is the crime rate falling? Social spending. How do they plan to fill those prisons? Cut social spending. That is the transparency or if you like the invisible window through which the innovators over at the Parkdale Liberation Front look upon things.

Coming Soon from the Parkdale Liberation Front

Invisi-Font

‘If you can’t see it neither can anybody else’

The Parkdale Liberation Front

Dedicated to Radical Tinkering

Remarkable Solutions but Who’s Counting

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Jim Read

MARY DOWSER KIDNAPPED

 

The unfailingly fragrant Mary Dowser has been kidnapped by unknown agents outside her 4 star hotel in Kiev. Witnesses say her companion was knocked to the ground and Ms. Dowser was tossed into a Mercedes sedan by two men wearing clown masks. The vehicle made a quick getaway down Alla Tarasova Street. To date no ransom demands have surfaced. TVFP will keep you posted as this drama unfolds.

Prior to her kidnapping Ms. Dowser filed the following  two dispatches with TVFP. She writes to us:

Dispatch # 1

Let’s imagine you and I have taken the train from Paris. There is one final question that must be asked. But first, we leave on a grey cold day in June from Gare de Nord. We find ourselves on opposite sides of a compartment. I smell of Marlboros. I am half asleep reeking of German beer and cognac after a grand send off at the Brassierie de Ile du Saint Louis from my comrades and associates. You seem a little disdainful of my appearance. I manage a bleak smile. You retreat behind a newspaper. I scratch around in my bag for an ibuprofen. I fall asleep. When I wake up I find that you are resting with your head against the window nestled in a rolled up Burberry. You have taken off your unfashionable shoes. In fact I cannot help but notice that everything about you is unfashionable. You are snoring ever so gently. It is night. I look at my reflection in the window. Gaunt, haunted, melancholy visage. You stir and then suddenly your eyes open and you sit up quickly and we find ourselves looking into each other’s eyes. Pardon, je m’excuse, I say and look away. You give me a searching look and then reach in your suit coat pocket a take out a pack of Gauloises. L’exterior, mademoiselle, you say and tilt your head towards the sliding door of our compartment. This is where it happens, as cold moon light surrenders everything to the fierce dawn.

Dispatch #2

Mary Dowser on Euro 2012: A Fut-bol Tournament with Some History

My companion and I have made it to Kiev. Our four star accommodation is disgusting. The towels are dirty. The hotel staff smell of booze and marijuana. In the morning there was a pool of vomit outside our door. It was still there when we returned from breakfast. The people here are brutish. Neo Nazi Skinhead rule the streets.

What is also interesting about this fut-bol tournament is that at one time or another most of these nations were trying to kill each other or themselves. They were all pretty good at it. If they couldn't find a countryman to kill or a nearby country they went to Africa and killed Africans or Asia and killed anybody who didn't look like them.

As well as being a terrific fut-bol tournament Euro 2012 also features several countries that are in the midst of bailing out their incompetent greed driven bankers, politicians and business class. Ireland is bankrupt. Greece is bankrupt, except in Greece the bankers were the good guys. It was the petty bourgeois class who dodged their taxes and a government of sycophants who wouldn’t collect the taxes and cooked the books to get into the EU. Let’s see Spain is bankrupt. Portugal is almost bankrupt. Italy is on the verge. Oh and who’s running Europe right now? You guessed it, the guys who coined the phrase: Arbeit Macht Frei.

A note to my friends in Parkdale. My companion, a shy, affable Irishman from Dublin, who speaks perfect French, is Samuel Beckett. He is currently working on a French / Celtic fusion cookbook with the working title PLUS CA CHANGE / plus c'est la même chose / Potato Recipes for Every Occasion. His opinion of the Euro fut-bol tournament is that it is a parable. A house in the neighbourhood is on fire and instead of putting out the fire that will soon engulf them the neighbours are all glued to the televisions in search of glory, some, any proof that their petty, selfish lives have meaning when the true meaning of life and success is the neighbourhood. He also told me this charming joke which I now pass along to you.

 

An Irishman comes home and finds his wife in bed with an EU bureaucrat. The Irishman goes to the closet and takes out a revolver and points it at his head. His wife breaks out laughing. The Irishman glares at her and shouts, don’t laugh, you’re next.

Follow the links on my website and purchase this eBook of terrific short stories

 

Jim Read

Radical Golf for Beginners

 

The Parkdale Liberation Front’s Radical Golf for Beginners
 

Jean Paul Sartre, the famous existential philosopher and Kermit the Frog look-a-like once said: Hell is other people. For the golf enthusiast: Hell is other golfers.

One of the most prevalent obstacles to enjoyment of golf is slow play. Lorne Rubenstein, the golf guy over at the Globe and Mail has written eloquently on this nastiness.

Not so long ago we played a round at a public course. Ahead of us were foursome, only one of whom appeared to have learned the game. We thought, we’ll just play through. It didn’t happen because the group ahead of us picked and dropped errant balls on the fairway. They played a game that matched their abilities. I bet they had a fair amount of enjoyment in their round. Kudos to them.

Jack Nicklaus has a radical idea: stop building eighteen hole golf courses. Instead build twelve hole courses. There is some historical basis for this. After the battle of the Plains of Abraham beneath the walls of Quebec City the British turned the field into an eleven hole golf course. We think the idea has merit. It takes up less space, costs less to maintain, has less impact on the environment and takes less time to play. That is providing you don’t have to deal with the menace of slow players.

A nine hole round is a nice way to spend a couple of hours. We like to play nine as it fits in with our busy schedule, that is unless we run into slow play. Nine or eighteen though you need to prepare yourself before venturing into the murky world of gold merchandising. After all you are going to need some clubs and balls, a golf glove, a bag to cart everything around in. Not to mention shoes, pants, matching tops and hats and so on. Remember golf is a multi-billion dollar exercise in commodity fetishism.

What do you really need to play a game of golf? We advocate the use of four to five clubs at most. A fairway wood, a hybrid or rescue club, a mid range iron, a gap wedge and a putter. You will become more familiar with your clubs more quickly to fewer you have to learn to hit. You need a glove. You don't need shoes. A good pair of sneakers will do.

We advocate that you take some lessons from a CPGA pro. These men and women will give you a solid framework to help you master a simple swing that will put the ball in the fairway, on the green and in the hole.

But is it enough. Well think of it this way. The golf industry has managed to brainwash us pretty well. You have to play eighteen holes. You have to have twelve or fifteen clubs in your bag.  You have to dress the part. You have to carry a scorecard. You have to  .  .  .  .  Well no you don’t.

Let’s say the object of the game isn’t win but to enjoy shot making. As anybody knows who has ever played the game a perfect shot is its own reward. Each hole is an adventure. You begin with your fairway wood off the tee. You don’t hit it far but you hit it reasonably straight. The main thing is that you are in the fairway or the first cut of rough. Now you hit your middle iron. Chances are using the middle iron again or your gap wedge you next shot will put you on the green. Then you are one putting for par, two putting for bogie.

For the beginning golfer who wants to keep score achieving a round of bogie golf is an awesome achievement.

But who says you have to keep score. We don’t. If you don't keep score is it still a game?

Robin Williams on the History of Golf. Warning to children this link contains the words fuck, fucking and fucked up. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwzFagy7i3E

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 Jim Read's Website

The Limerick

In the opinion of no less an authority than George Bernard Shaw, a Limerick is innately obscene. A Limerick that isn’t properly rude isn’t really a Limerick.

The limerick packs laughs anatomical

In space that is quite economical.

But the good ones I've seen

So seldom are clean

And the clean ones so seldom are comical.

With that in mind TVFP has gathered together a few of our favourites for your enjoyment. Parental warning: you may want to ask the children to go and smoke their pot in the other room.

*

The limerick’s callous and crude

It’s morals distressingly lewd

It’s not worth the reading

By persons of breeding

It’s designed for us vulgar and rude

From what we can tell Limericks, with some notable exceptions, were written by the dispossessed. The writers were almost always men. Often as not the object of their deprecations were minorities, mostly women and homosexuals.  Most of these limericks are anything but funny, but rather reflect times of poverty and in some cases genocide by starvation, a soaring infant mortality rate, class and gender conflict, war and political frustration.

Having said that we find it difficult to dismiss the Limerick on grounds of political and social correctness. The Limerick would only laugh at us and would write a scathing five liner about the size of our penis or would endeavor to insert some article of commodity fetishism in our anus. The Limerick by its nature is defiant of any attempt to cleanse its anarchic soul. In truth that is why at we at TVFP are so fond of it.

Some of these limericks have been adapted by TVFP to reflect modern concerns. The rest are what they are.

*

Some time back there was a bombshell

Light Rail Transit might start to do well

Now that could cost loads

To the selfish who build the roads

So they brought in an exhaust hole from hell

*

Have the treasures of our land in thrall

Any chance of survival at all

With a dope like Kent to trust

It looks like a bust

And the Harper we know is a know-it-all

*

The thing about ‘Back to Basics’

And similar high moral tricks

Is they’re bound to backfire

When your Conservative choir

Have all got their brains in their dicks

*

A mathematician named Hall

Has a hexahedronical ball

And the cube of its weight

Times his pecker plus eight

Is his cell number – give him a call

*

There once was a young lady with such graces

That her curves cried out for embraces

You look, said McGee

Like a million to me

Invested in all the right places

*

An astronomer, pious but odd

To be honest a dirty old sod

Who’d searched for a sign

Of the presence divine

Cried, I’ve just found Uranus, dear God

*

Her husband is in the Hussars

A colonel all covered in scars

But it isn’t his weals

For which nightly she feels

But the privates he lost in the wars

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