Around the World with Olive!

For a long time, I've resisted numerous offers to write a travelogue of sorts. An open postcard, if you will, to share my vast knowledge of the many splendors this crazy blue marble has to offer. Well, I'm weak. I just signed on with a reputable on-line entity to do just that. But, rather than prostitute myself and promote their website, I will simply re-print my essays and lists here so that you too may benefit from my sojourns. First up - the good ol' USA!!!

A United States of Mind
By Olive Duster
*title added by editor who is known in the office as "the brooch lady" on account of all of her colorful and whimsical brooches that she wears, mostly of angels doing unexpected things, like using their halos as hula hoops, or an angel whose halo is in the shape of a jack-o'-lantern.

So, you've decided to visit the States! Wow, you're in store for quite a treat. They are approaching their presidential election between John W. McCain and Barry Obama (middle name is Husssein, in case you weren't scared enough yet). If you're lucky, you might just get swept up in the "Get Out the Vote" mayhem that has the country in it's icy grip.

But, if politics isn't your game, you'll be pleased to learn that a plethora of global revolutions have emerged from the "country on the hill"; there is something for every kind of afficianado. Did you know that the automobile was created in the United States by a man named George Washington Carver, yet he is most well-known for his love of peanut butter? Consult your favourite travel experts for a more comprehensive list of fun facts and exciting destinations in this "melting pod" of a country!

But be forewarned. With democracy comes great personal peril. Here are some not-so-fun-facts-about-America:

1) Did you know that every 6 weeks, some unfortunate is actually shot with a bullet from what American citizens refer to as "personal firearms"?

2) People pay good money to watch other people drive cars real fast in a circle. These people have strong opinions about who drives which car the best. It's a sport there.

3) Some people can actually see Russia from America, and Russia is scary.

4) Nebraska is part of the US of A, yet no one seems to know dick about Nebraska. Why is that, Senator Nelson? Maybe so we don't all see your plans to open foreign markets to your cattle your so damn proud of? Isn't Nebraska where they filmed Children of the Corn, Part IV - The Shucking?

5) Mariah Carey and Celine Dion are there.

That's all. Don't forget to bring plenty of bug spray and try to avoid raising the ire of the locals (they have personal firearms there).

Happy travels,

O.D.

Ask Olive!

My chief adversary and confidant, Gail Horning, former dancing great, writes me three or four brief queries a week, not to mention numerous call-in questions that often go unanswered. However, once in a while, I will allow my followers to partake in the deliciousness of her insanity. Here goes:

Dear Olive,

I'm really worried about the economic crisis and how it might affect retirees like myself down here in Boca Raton, Florida, USA. What are your thoughts?

Your former dance teacher,

Gail "Former Dancing Great" Horning

_____________

Dear Gail,

There is no such thing as an economic crisis. We must look at times such as these as "oppor-tuna-ties" and not "panic-ities."

Look, remember Harry Browne? In 1974 he released his classic and prescient tome, You Can Profit from a Monetary Crisis. Read it, live it, and turn panic into profit. Or you can read his lesser known book, You Can Profit from a Monastery Crisis, a not-so-prescient book in which the prominent Libertarian foretold of a world without monks and robots controlled the opium drug trade out of Afghanistan.

Either way, please stop calling.

Your pepperpot,

Olive Duster

Saved by lithium

Remember how in Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children Saleem's telepathic powers were eradicated when his "father" tricked him into getting sinus surgery? If I recall, Ahmed Sinai loaded his wife, Saleem, and his sister, "The Monkey", into the Land Rover with a story of going to the beach for a picnic with just a quick stop en route.

Here's the thing. In my clandestine post a couple of months ago, I informed you, my own personal conference attendees, that Kieran, my thought-field therapist, had me beeping, bopping, tapping, boffing to the Nine Gamut and avoiding computer access (and cell phone access, and access to my friends and family), as this was the likely root cause of all of my psychological afflictions.

I admit that the adventure across Western Canada was fun. For example, in Alberta (where we spent 2 long weeks in local camp grounds), we attended the Canadian Professional Chuckwagon Association Finals, all four days of it. I got my face painted (Kieran paid - how sweet). Then we treked all over rural Canada. Kieran wouldn't stop singing Animal in Your Care by Wolf Parade ("It's in this language that I found..."). All the while, I dutifilly tapped and hummed, feeling weird, but exhilirated that someone finally got me (or brainwashed me).

Here's the thing. We had been gone so long that I had forgotten to replace the lithium ion battery what powers my prosthetic hand. So when that died, I couldn't do the tapping routine carefully set out by Kieran. He tried to get me to do it with the other hand (he tried to get me to a lot of things with the other hand), but I couldn't get into it. Once I stopped the therapy, I slowly realised - this guy is a fudging nut-job! And it is in that sense that I am like Saleem Sinai and in that regard that I was saved by lithium.

Love to you all. I am back home and ready to blog.