I can write about the apocalypse if I want to

This appeared as part of my weekly column. Not 100 per cent happy with it, but it gives you an idea of how much free reign we have to fill that space when our turn hits.

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In Canada, I say global warming is your friend

It's snowing outside as I write this.

Not much. Maybe four centimetres by tomorrow, and I got my snow tires on at the last minute on Saturday, so I'm good. It's really not all that bad out. Almost nothing by Maritime standards.

But there'll be more. Oh, yes. There will be more.

We got off easy last year. It barely went below zero, and we got, like, two snowfalls, none major. It was like a holiday, and was awesome for that very reason.

Not this year, though. Having grown up in Brazil and subtropical Africa, my snow-sense is a little stunted, but I'm pretty sure we won't be so lucky this time.

Now, they say you can't control the weather. And for thousands of years, that was true. Mankind existed at the inscrutible mercy of thousands of imaginary gods keen on wiping us all out in horrific and creative ways involving everything from glaciers to molten lava to Europop.

But it's not true anymore. Friends and neighbours, we hold in our own hands the power to deliver ourselves from our yearly prison of snow and ice, and into a world where minus 5C is considered unacceptably cold.

I'm talking about global warming.

Yes, global warming, or climate change, or whatever it's called now. The science is supposedly solid, but most politicians either think it's some kind of Greenpeace plot, or claim to want to fight it, by using legislation that seems to have a nasty habit of "accidentally" falling down the parliamentary stairs before it can go anywhere.

Now, the earth goes through heating and cooling cycles and we're about due for another warm-up anyway, but with the amount of rubbish six and a half billion of us pump into the atmosphere every time we get up and drive to work in the morning is so staggering, to say nothing of the factories churning out the useless junk we spend our dwindling paycheques on, there's no possible way we aren't having an effect.

We better be having an effect. 'Cos it's the only way to save us from another Maritime winter.

Friends, Canadians, countrymen, whatever you're doing to make global warming worse ... I want you to do more of it.

Seriously. We need to turbocharge this climate change stuff. We need to screw up earth's weather patterns so bad, by the time the effects hit us, Americans will start flying north for the winter.

Sure, some scientists say, due to the laws of nature being so screwy anyway, the result might actually be apocalyptically cooler winters, which would be worse than warmer ones. Scientists say a lot of things, often backed up by fact-based, analytical, easily verified and peer reviewed science.

But because their scientific findings contrast with my anti-winter agenda (not to mention the fact we liberal arts majors never trusted those shifty whitecoats), I'm going to completely and arbitrarily ignore the research and insist global warming means warmer winters, 'cos that's what I want, darn it.

You've seen the effects. You remember last winter. It was a season-long Indian summer, sparing us the 60-centimetre blizzards that are to us what roosters are to farmers.

Yes, yes, I know what those environmentalists and scientists are saying about agricultural collapse, the worldwide famines and the sea levels rising.

Sure, meteorological mayhem will upset the balance so badly our ecology will die a dozen species a day, and our economy will collapse one building block at a time, while we stand around pretending we have no idea why.

They're probably right about all of those things and, as the snow flakes drift down outside and I'm facing a season-long ordeal of trying to drive home in this mess, in the certain knowledge that this is only the beginning of our collective national nightmare, I don't care.

It's really not even that bad out, and already I'm prepared to build a giant altar and sacrifice Canada's lucrative winter sports industry on it. Most hockey is played indoors anyway, so we can keep the indoor rinks. As the centuries of balmy winters pass, it'll become like cricket: played the way it is because it always has been, even if no one can remember why.

We might even be able to get folks to move up to the northern territories, if they can stand the crazy day/night cycle. Economic development's a great thing, right? We won't be annihilating our economy and displacing our society so much as moving it north. Economists say that, so it must be right?

So Alberta oil sands, with your gushing black stuff and toxic tailings ponds?

Captains of industry, with your nightmares of true-cost economics?

Consumers and drivers, with your wasteful idling and lust for useless plastics?

Yeah. Crank it, lads. Let's make this happen, and fast. 'Cos, as I'm wrapping this up, it's still snowing outside.

Miramichi mirror

Phenomenal shot of the bridge from the shore by our office in Douglastown, across from Chatham where I live, about a month ago.


We've had a pretty warm fall, and this was one of several sunny, totally windless days that made the Miramichi River a mirror for the Centennial Bridge. Love, love, love this shot.

Had a few bigwigs this summer. For a small, out of the way town, we sure get a lot of vote-seekers.

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First, the big man.


Prime Minister Stephen Harper, beside Miramichi's MP Tilly O'Neill-Gordon, made his second appearance on the Miramichi, announcing a new centralized federal payroll centre in the city. Estimated jobs are past the 500 range, by 2016. I'm not holding my breath, personally. 2016 is far away, and a lot can happen.

This shot was taken behind the Rodd Miramichi hotel, and was the result of about four days' worth of haggling and cajoling both the PMO and the local MP's office for an exclusive photo, on account of being local media. The reporter from the Times got in on it too, and got the same shot as me. He and I were clandestinely ushered through, and warned not to ask any questions.

There was a Q&A after the announcement, but you had to get your name on a list. I wasn't called.

But I could live with that. I got my exclusive shot, despite the fact another reporter had it.

After all the trouble he and I went through to get that shot, his paper didn't use it. They used some dumb shot of him at some historical site near Fredericton, King's Landing or something, with some folks in period dress. Not half as impressive as having the iconic Centennial Bridge as a backdrop.

We're all still scratching our heads over that one.

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And, about the time we got a visit from the robot, the alien decided to drop in too:


The Liberal leader, Michael Ignatieff, stopped by the Miramichi on his cross-Canada bus tour. If the bus broke down, nobody told me. With him is his wife, Zsuzsana Zsohar.

He was easier to talk to for media than Stevo was. Nothing out of the ordinary there. The opposition's only real job in any democracy is to criticize government policy and tell the media about it. If Iggy ever gets in, I'll never see him again.

Aside from the usual Liberal rallies, he did some paddlin' on the river in a replica voyageur canoe, and attended the folksong festival that was going on that day.

I snapped this shot of him and his wife in an unguarded moment. The politician looked like a human being. It was sweet.

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Election campaigns in the Miramichi sometimes involve armoured military vehicles.


Clambering about on top of the multi-million dollar piece of defense hardware is then-Premier Shawn Graham. He'd been made a campaign promise in the park in Newcastle, and then took the usual photo op at the main plant of the defense contractor in town, DEW Engineering.

Haha, I'm sorry, I just love how my town actually has a defense contractor. Priceless!

Graham went on to lose the election, along with three of the four Liberal MLAs in the area.

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He lost it to this guy, David Alward, head of the Progressive Conservatives.

That's him below, being accosted by a supporter during a Newcastle appearance.


As always, whilst in opposition, it was the easiest thing in the world to get ahold of him. If a little frustrating. I've heard him among supporters, and he sounds in real life like he's pretty easy-going. Then the microphones comes out and he tries too hard to be a formal, sloganeering politician.

Politically, I know too much about either party to have a preference one way or another, but I hate it when the people I'm quoting sound like they've given a good deal of time and thought about how they want to be quoted.

And this has been the latest episode of the Miramichi whistlestop tour.

A great feat of engineering

In civilization's millennia-long history, mankind has often turned his superior brain to the great task of engineering.

Unlike our animal cousins, we have developed the ability to mould creation into any shape we desire, transforming nature's raw fabric into a new form that will help our species move ever onward and upward.

I'm talking, of course, about the pumpkin cannon.


I've mentioned it before, but I don't think I'd ever posted a shot of it.

Basically, the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of New Brunswick made it, with the help of one of the local metal fab companies in town. It uses a burst of compressed air to lob a small pumpkin almost clear across the river, aiming at a small floating target.


I mean, jesus, somebody put time, effort, money and tender loving care into creating this thing! It's just plain awesome, and I wish I had one.

They only trot it out once a year, during September's Pumpkin Fest. Kids of all ages can buy a pumpkin for five bucks and tell the gunner the PSI and angle they want to use. Can't remember what they get if they actually hit the target. Me, I'd accept a free shot as a reward.

Some of the kids had realistic expectations from the freakin' giant air cannon.


Others were more eager. The lad below had to be restrained by both the gunner and his mum from turning the epic little valve before he was supposed to.


It fills my heart with sadness to know that, after the day was over, they just wheeled it back into the shed for another year.

Brraaaaaiiiiins!

The fall is moose season in New Brunswick, so part of my weekend assignment was to head down to the local DNR office, where I was treated to a vision of hunters bringing in nature's felled bounty, tied proudly to the back of their trucks.

Also, brains.

Observe:


The baggie being held up to the camera by young Ms. Legere, a grad student at the University of New Brunswick, contains a moose brain.

Well, half of one. The skull cavity on one of them things is pretty tough, and the little buzzsaw she carries around barely mananged the job of slicing it open enough to get the top half out.

The hunters let her keep the head for later, though, which I thought was rather generous.

The reason she wants the moosine grey matter is for her research into brain parasites, a common problem in the moose population around here. She did not seem squeamish about the whole thing.

I just included this because I figured running into a brain-toting grad student while out on assignment is worth writing about. It's like an omen from the gods, or something.

She was the only one doing scientific things to the beasties, though. The rest of the folks that were there were doing the usual hunting things, like below.


And that was moose season.

Lookin' good.

Those who know me, know me as a generally civilized man who nevertheless is not famous for dressing neatly, and who views shaving as some kind of illuminati plot, and avoids the practice as a matter of course.

Regardez, then, the one time when I have been better dressed than I ever shall be again.


I was in the wedding party for a bloke who is like a brother, and he honoured me by asking me if I'd be in the wedding party. I obliged, and was lucky to have a front row seat when the good man married a good woman in sight of the gods, perched on a cliff with an awesome view of the South Shore of Nova Scotia.

Figured no one would believe I could look that civilized, so here's pictographic evidence. Enjoy.

Mud fest!

Needless to say, I've had a long time to make peace with the fact I'm up to my neck in redneck country.

Driving home that fact was a recent weekend assignment that saw said rednecks up to their necks in something else.

Behold: Mudfest.


Dozens of these fine folks signed up for what can best be described as the four-wheeler Olympics, with an added dash of the totally non-sexy type of mud wrestling (i.e.: With ATVs, not bikini-clad spring-breakers).

No such bout would be complete without the wheelie competition, of which the gentleman below was the obvious master.


Dirt bikes, too. They had those, because when your event involves sunburnt rural dwellers mucking about with ATVs, there's logical steps that must be taken.

Besides, they were pretty damned good.



The mounds and police tape they're leaping so spectacularly over is part of the main mud-fest course. After the boring stuff like high-speed races and righteous wheelies, there was still the obstacle course, including a big long stretch where contestants had to drive their machines through a long mud trench.


It was man versus mud, a titanic battle of wills and wits that saw some claim immortal victory, while others sputtered into bogged-down impotence, or flirted with it anyway.


Note what it says on his shirt. I swear, if you're putting one of these on, at least be able to stay on your own damned machine.

Still, he made it, in time for the grand finale.

The first picture in this set is from one courageous ATVer who had the balls to brave the Great Mud Pit. But, you see, the good people of the Miramichi are kind, upstanding folk who value the future, and see the young'uns of the community as the generation that will carry their banner into said future.

So they let the kids have a go at the Pit first. Before testing it was the right depth, of course.


"Yep. She's good. Nice and toasty, too."

And then, kids being kids, and with an organizer waving an enticing $20 on the other side, it was full speed ahead.


And damn right. As I watched the carnival of mud splashes, I laughed at the rubes I find myself trapped with.

And, at the back of my head, tucked away somewhere, was the faint feeling that, somehow, my childhood had been missing a few things.

Like a mud bog.

Best of June

Here's the best of the month of June, late on account of me going on a kick-ass vacation. Slim pickings this month, but a couple shots of note.

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This boat below? Made entirely of cardboard.

Even the paint used for the outer hull is specifically designed and chosen for its lightness. This guy is from out of town and hopes to make an annual cardboard boat race out of these contraptions.

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This is a neat shot of a special Olympics bowler from just of the bay, in Neguac.


Terribly shy, but didn't mind the pictures being taken. Had to basically crouch in the gutter for this one.

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Love this one, taken at an evening practice between young kids and members of the Chatham Junior Ironmen. I got down on my belly on the grass to grab this shot. Nice angle and plenty of depth.

Rock Star

So Justin Trudeau turned up here the other day.


There he is with two of the horde of followers that turned up to greet him as he arrived in town for a talk, on the way to a youth event elsewhere in the north.

Detail: These two ladies buggered off after having their picture taken. Seems they were less interested in listening to his call for renewing Canadian politics and more interested in ogling his six-odd foot of manly, chiseled hotness.

And such hotness.


Yes. I am man enough to admit it. Justin Trudeau is hot. Good speaker, too. But mostly hot.

Seriously, look at this guy! Son of one of Canada's greatest Prime Ministers, and he turns up in jeans, a casual shirt, friggin' boots and a scarf. Also, great hair. Lovely, lovely hair.

The Tories must hate him. Lookswise, they got nothin'.

And, boy, was it like a rock concert in there. Took him ten minutes just to get to the podium, stopping to shake a hand here, pose for a picture there. It was like a cult.


Me? I was less impressed. Everyone saw Canada's next prime minister. I saw a good-looking, 38-year-old ex-teacher with a famous dad and two years of experience as an MP under his belt. Let him come back in five or seven years, with more experience in the cavernous abyss of grungy politics that is the House. Then I might be impressed.

Losing the war against caffeine

This appeared as part of my monthly column. I never actually posted it, so here it is. Enjoy.

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The year 2009 will mark a huge milestone for me. It's the year I lost a battle I'd been waging for more than a decade.

It was a long fight, lasting 27 years, a war of sleepless nights and heavy lids, of battles against the elements, and even the very night itself.

I'm talking about coffee.

Yep. It took a lot of time and effort but this was the year I finally lost the protracted struggle against coffee. I bowed down before the dreaded forces of caffeine, surrendering my sword and placing myself at its bitter, sweet mercy.

It was a long time in coming. Who knows how many times I've been offered coffee by friends or waiters, and refused. How many times have I had The Conversation with people about coffee, and how I've managed to squeak by in life without even a sip of the blessed elixir, insufferably proud of the dubious distinction of being probably the only reporter in Canada who Doesn't Drink Coffee.

I lived in Brazil for years. Brazil, the empire of coffee, where governments have been made and broken on the fortunes of the mighty bean. And I never touched the stuff, like a blind beggar wandering into an unguarded bank vault.

So you'd think, by now, I'd be immune to the unquenchable thirst, right? You'd think I'd have acclimatized my body to functioning without coffee, requiring only regular meals and decent bed times.

Except ... well, back in university, I was really a lazy bugger. I worked hard, but I avoided all-nighters like the plague, if I could. I even picked my courses so I wouldn't have to get out of bed before 10 a.m., most days, which was good, because me and the roommates were usually up until the crack of dawn watching bad movies and playing videogames. Even on the days when there just wasn't any way around a 24 hour marathon, I usually survived on adrenaline and sugar, then crashed for 12 hours to make up for it.

So, at last, when I emerged from my post-secondary cocoon and got a Real World job like the Big Person I now was, then began the nine-to-five. Or eight- to-six, or seven-to-seven, or however the split is, depending on how busy we are, plus the occasional weekend.

Yeah, 10 a.m. wake up times? All gone now.

So now, confronted with actual, tough work and sometimes difficult scheduling, of course, the mind and body get tired. They needed a boost. And they weren't getting one.

Enter: Tea.

I went to a couple of British schools growing up, so I picked up a lot of their mannerisms, but I didn't get to be a tea swiller until taking this job. But boy, did I ever become one.

One cup a day became three, then five, some days seven. It got to the point my boss could tell whether I'd had my cuppa, and when I hadn't. I became a regular fixture around the office, wandering from department to department, steaming cup in hand, lost in thought and wearing a track in the linoleum.

It was an ineffective placebo.

Finally, after a few hazy days of bleary mornings and titanic struggles with the alarm clock, I decided it was time to bow to the will of the universe.

I rose one Tuesday, gunned the car and made the grim, sandy-eyed pilgrimage I'd postponed for so long. The sun was just coming over the horizon, making it even harder to keep my eyes open.

When my destination, crowned with the two-word name so familiar to Canadians you could probably base a whole religion around it, hove into view, I pulled into the slowly filling drive-thru, like millions had done before me.

I was awed as the car inched forward, bringing me ever closer to one of the great Canadian rituals, central to our culture, like a young Aztec child's first trip to the sacrificial pyramid.

At last, the car stopped by the grille, and the tinny voice inquired as to my pleasure that morning. With a dry, slightly quavering voice, I said the words. Double Double. Medium.

There was a pause. For a moment, I feared I'd misspoken, and now the ritual was ruined. Had I doomed us all? Then the Voice spoke again, telling me an unfamiliar price and peppily asking me to drive on.

So I got my coffee, my first. As I drove to work, I gingerly sipped the hot liquid, like the last survivor of some Amazon expedition, happening upon the long-sought fountain of youth and unsure what to do now.

It was good. Now I have one every morning, just one - and one only - extra boost to get me going.

Although ... I could really use another right now ...

Blue Lobster

No, he ain't sticking that in the pot.


What we have here is a blue lobster ... one in two million chance of getting one. This lad hauled her up one day, stuck her in the deep freeze and intends to have her mounted in his finished basement.

He didn't seem to think it was a big deal. He claims he caught an albino one 15 years ago...that's like one in 500 million.

Never dream of eating one. First, they turn red when boiled. Second ... c'mon, really? That's like hanging the Mona Lisa in your basement bathroom.

Fail! Again....

Well, last weekend was that time of year again. Time for Danny boy to head to Halifax for the Atlantic Community Newspapers Association conference, gala and award dinner.

Like last year, I was up for an award, this time for outstanding photographer.

And, like last year, I won the vague honour of being a standing finalist, while top spot went to the photographer from the St. Croix Courier in St. Stephen.

:(

Ah, well. It's enough to be named top three in Atlantic Canada, at least for the weeklies! Suits me, and I got a free weekend in Halifax to boot.

For your viewing pleasure, here's the shots that almost got me the top spot. They've been up here before, but what the hell.

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The Hilary Bonnell vigil.


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The murdered girl's mother, Pamela, in a once-in-a-lifetime shot during the funeral.


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Nick Hardy of the Chatham Ironmen tumbles into first to earn the pennant-winning run of the 2009 season.

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Three ex-Boston Bruins in Miramichi for the pond hockey tournament.

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Lt. Tyler Hamm takes me up in the Air Cadets' training glider one fine Saturday.

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And, finally, local MLA and public safety minister John Foran caught in a moment of marvelous hunger


That is all.

Best of May

May turned out to have some good shots. Here you go.

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Here's Freeman Ward, newly elected chief of Metepenagiag First Nation, just upriver from us.


It turned out to be an excellent portrait of the guy. The incumbent was turfed out by, like 14 votes (a common occurrence). He had great ideas for the place, like alternative energy and, of course, a new gambling hall right in the heart of Miramichi. But it seems he pissed off too many folks, so out he went.

Or something. I don't know ... it's hard to tell what goes on behind the scenes in these places, but this reserve tends to be pretty quiet.

The new guy was VERY suspicious of me. When I got to his house, he was on the phone with someone in Mi'kmaq, and later he told me it was a band councillor from another reserve on the river who told him to slam the door in my face.

He didn't, and we had a long, long talk off the record before I turned the recorder on. I'm cautiously optimistic ... he called the next week to thank me for the article, and point me in the direction of a rising baseball star in New Brunswick who everyone thinks is from a reserve out of our coverage area but was actually born in Metepenagiag.

Of course, it happened to be his son. But hey, gotta start somewhere, and it turned out to be a cool story. Let's see what he does when I have to ask the tough questions.

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Aaaaaand, the token candid shot gone awry:

The lad on the left is Councillor Robert Trevors, just after he won the Tory nomination for the Newcastle area of the city in the upcoming provincial election. I love single-frame candid shots that make politicians look crazed.

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Just some lads painting the tennis courts. Turned into a nice enough shot, so here it is.

Apparently that paint is specially designed to deliver the right kind of bounce, and is used for the masters, or something.

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This lad, playing a young Max Aitken, shows off what a li'l scamp the old bastard was as a child.


Aitken, later Lord Beaverbrook, went to school in Newcastle, NB, and rose to become a cement magnate, later a newspaper giant who practically owned Fleet Street in the UK, rising to become part of Churchill's war cabinet. Apparently he was also a bit of a dick, but he left a sweet art gallery behind in Fredericton, so it's all good, right?

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This one isn't the best in the world. I just like the posing.

From a Saturday morning mosquito practice. Cute kids.

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This one is probably my favourite of this bunch: Opposition leader David Alward standing in the Miramichi city council chambers.


Stood on a chair to get the panorama shot. His handler was adamant he was behind schedule and wouldn't have time after the press conference. So I smiled, nodded, then went up to him directly to ask him to pose. As always, he was happy to oblige. Silly communications people.

Reason this is remotely significant is because the big Norwegian solar panel company that wanted to set up shop in Miramichi announced the lousy global economy was forcing them to shelve the project. The people blamed the Liberal government, and the Tories capitalized on that by arriving for a much-publicised meeting with the mayor just two days after the news hit. The speed of it was impressive.

This shot, sadly, never ran, but I guess I just liked its depth.

Best of April

April turned out to have a few good shots, so I've posted them here for your perusal. Enjoy.

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This young lady on the monkey bars was enjoying the first warm weekend on the Miramichi.



With a little help from her cousin, of course.

So, in other words, really slow day. So we all got kicked out of the office to go find people to take pictures of for a weather story. I felt like such a weirdo ... what must these people have been thinking? "Hey, you've never seen me before in your entire life, but your kids are really cute, and I'm from the paper, so could I get a picture of them playing?"

That's not exactly what I said. But you'd be amazed how often that works, as evidenced above.

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This guy, Lt.-Col. Joscelyn Paul, was down in Miramichi for a talk on a novel Canadian strategy for dealing with the Afghan insurgency. It involves not actually killing anyone.


Basically, he talked about this method of theirs where they garrison soldiers in actual Afghan villages, rather than just clearing out the Taliban and going back to base. If they stick around long enough, the villagers realize they can rely on them for security, so they start giving them tips. The guy claims it works, and it sounds like a good idea.

Pity about the Canadian soldiers dying for a hopelessly corrupt Afghan government, though. *sigh*

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That big hunk of scrap used to be the engine of a WW2-era torpedo bomber. Like many of its kind, it's been refitted extensively since then, and has seen service in water bomber fleets across the world, including the waterbomber base here in Miramichi.


About half an hour before this shot was taken, it was whirring happily away at a few hundred feet before the pilot of the craft lost control and crashed in the woods near the old airbase in town. He died on impact. Still don't know what happened, but he was in his 60s, and had been flying for 40 years. Probably had a stroke or heart attack or something, since Transport Canada said engine failure wasn't the problem, and it certainly wasn't inexperience. Very sad for his hometown.

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Also sad: This month was the birthday of Hilary Bonnell, who was murdered on one of the local First Nations communities last year. To commemorate, around a hundred residents launched purple-coloured Chinese lanterns.


Another example of upping the ISO, trying to keep camera shake to a minimum and hoping for the best. I'm not a good photographer, just a really, really lucky one.

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Moving unexpectedly away from the topic of death, believe it or not, here's a car that went flying off the bypass, flipped over a couple of times, then came to rest in the ditch.


The back window just shattered, the shocks and wheels are shot, but the young lady inside walked to the ambulance when it came, to be sped none-too-swiftly back down the same bypass she came up to the hospital.

She seemed quite glum about the whole thing.

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Also not involving death in any way, shape or form, here's Graydon Nicholas, New Brunswick's first and newly minted aboriginal Lieutenant-Governor, at a talk for aboriginal youth enrolled in a job training program on Eel Ground First Nation, just outside of town.


He's a better speaker than the last one, who tended descend into university lecture-style utterances. And, of course, by rising to the highest ceremonial office in the land, he's basically a hero to every aboriginal person in the Maritimes.

Impressive ... though I'll be more impressed when we have an aboriginal premier. We'll have to wait a bit longer for that, probably.

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And behold!

That magnificent mane and classic '80s suit belongs to Judy Losier, the wife of Dr. Gerard Losier beside her. He's mellow, laid back and obsessed with getting better equipment for the hospital. She's been involved in every community group ever and has the energy of a small nuclear reactor with a higher-than-allowed dose of Plutonium in the hopper.

Never ran this, but I thought it was quite the sight. Also, these two gave $1.5 million to the local hospital foundation, so they're pretty popular.

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*Sigh* And here the Losiers are again ... along with the mayor apparently sticking his tongue out and the city councillor on the right looking less than enthused at being there.

Well-timed goof shots FTW.

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Aaaaaaand, for your viewing pleasure: The back of my head.


A freelancer took this, and sent it along. Only time I've ever posted a pic of me at work, and what am I doing? I'm having a sip of fine ice brandy at a wine tasting one Saturday. Brilliant.

Hey, c'mon, this is journalism. The pay sucks. Let me have my perks.

Adventures in Redneckery

Observe, below:


Your eyes aren't deceiving you. It's a home made raft. With their backs to us are seated two young lads on a dislocated car backseat. Others weren't so picky. They're seated on what look to be barrels.

Also, that smoke from the centre? Yeah, that's from a barbecue. Not visible (but, boy, you know it's there) is a cooler filled with generous and probably illegal quantities of booze.

The water level was a bit low, so there weren't too many places where they could just drift like that. They'd probably have to get out pretty often, hip waders and all, to drag the divine contraption past the shallows and back into the pools.

So where did I see this marvelous invention ... and hundreds of others just like it?

Read on.

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Regardez: The Pollett River Run.

It is a springtime event, where the good folks of Albert County and beyond celebrate the seasonal awakening by a public appreciation of nature and the wild rivers of the Maritimes.

It's also, like, a vortex of redneckery.


You'll notice the numerous canoes in the background. That's the exception to the rule. The vast majority of vessels on the Pollett River that morning were of a somewhat more haphazard type.


I don't even know what that is. But it floats, and it stores enough beer, so, what the hell, it's good enough.

These fine lads were even lazier than me and my buddy, just got themselves an inflatable raft.


For their laziness, the redneck gods punished them by having their cheap paddles snap. A cruel blow, made easier to bear by the redneck gods' granting the two lads enough beer to see them down to the other end.

Others (quite a few, actually) took the time and effort to build their boats from ... well, scrap.

And to lock the event very firmly into this rollercoaster of redneckery is this baffling image:


Guh. Stars and Bars. Not the first time I've seen it in New Brunswick, but just as baffling. What, is that like the redneck national flag or something? It just makes no sense. Curiously, I've also seen it on some First Nations reserves during festivals.

I wanted to post a whole cavalcade of pics like that, but we never got the chance ... thanks to the lower than usual water levels, we just zipped by in our flat-bottomed plastic canoe, leaving the clunky rafts to founder on the shoals. From what I heard, there were hundreds.

Here's my guide, Ryan, a buddy of mine from the paper. Growing up in Riverview, across the mudstream from Moncton, he often took the 40-minute drive to the dark depths of Albert County to join the throng on the bridges along the way, laughing as the silly rafters capsize or hit rocks in years where the river was more than a couple feet deep.


However, he never actually went on the run himself in the past. He had to wait a few years until he could con a certain perpetual tourist to come with him. And even then he had to sell it as a "cultural experience."


These pics are taken with his little point and shoot. No way I was bringing my SLR. Kudos to Monsieur Ross for taking the occasional shot of me.

Shame. I could have stayed there all day. At the other end was basically a giant, drunken party in the middle of nowhere. A couple grim-faced RCMP officers could be seen by the road, but their function was mainly to check people for drunk driving as they came in and out. If there's ever any problems, they're fucked. Hundreds of revellers vs. a dozen mounties wouldn't end well.

And where there's rednecks, there's mudpools:


That's one of the many trucks and other assorted vessels whose owners prove their manhood through the time honoured ritual of getting 'em stuck in the mud, to the great cheers and adulation of the assembled, plaid-clad multitude.

No fear, though. They got, like, the biggest truck in the place to hitch up a rope and haul 'im out.

Yep. A rope. You can imagine how that ended:


Yeah. Anyone standing near the thing when the rope finally snapped like a piece of string would have had their heads taken clean off.

*Sigh* It was so awesome. But I had to head back to Miramichi, so we bade farewell to the party and headed back to Riverview, but I'll never forget my first-hand introduction to the great voyageur traditions of the great and storied province of New Brunswick.


Also, we ran out of beer on the way down.