Sunday muffled

A gorgeous sunny morning, bitterly cold with a fresh coating of snow. I'm going to put on 19 layers and go for a walk. A brief report: heard an interview on CBC yesterday with Peter Bergen, an American journalist who has written a book on the Americans and Al Quaeda. I nearly wept, listening to him report that every single thing about the Iraq war has made the situation in the Middle East far, far worse. The whole world is far, far worse after the regime of George Bush and his band of venal thieves.

Yet the man has a best-selling book. Who is buying this book and why? There's a review of it in my newly-arrived "London Review of Books." My guess is that the reviewer will not think too positively about this book, and that the review will be fun to read.

Let's not forget: if Stephen Harper had been Prime Minister then, we would without question have gone along for the ride.

Yesterday I dawdled about Doubletake, as you know I am wont to do, and as often happens, wonderful vital things fell into my hands - two giant books published by "Rolling Stone," one on the Sixties generally and one on rock music. Fascinating reading. It does make me realize that though we share an enormous amount with the United States, there is still a huge difference between us. Much of the Sixties book is taken up with race riots and the Vietnam War; much of the rock book shows the Music of Philadelphia, of San Francisco, of Detroit. There is no section on the music of Windsor. But in the section "Singer-songwriters," there, huge pictures of Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Leonard Cohen. We're soloists.

Inside the Rock book I found a piece of looseleaf paper with some careful printing on it.

"Dada in world," it says, as a kind of title. "juice cans on window box with fruit globules/fat won't stick to ceiling but/won't nobody fly."

Dear poet-writer, have I got a class for you.

P.S. I just got an official email from FedEx in Nigeria - they have a parcel containing one million, five hundred thousand dollars for lucky me! I guess this is the end of teaching and blog. Goodbye suckers. It's the life of Riley from now on! Mwa ha ha ha ha!