Last night's episode of Little Mosque finally dealt with the curling schtick that was used in the previews for the first season. As far as I can tell, though, the preview schtick was just that, because none of the scenes I remember from then were featured in this episode. Which sort of makes it look like the preview joke turned into something they could use. Which is really very Terry Pratchett of them.

Essentially, what happens is that the Reverend Duncan tries to get Amaar to take up curling "for exercise," which leads to disbelieving hilarity from Rayyan. And then Fred, the right-wing radio guy, mocks the idea of Muslims curling ("you guys just can't get enough throwing rocks, can you?") and Amaar loses his temper and the next thing he knows he's agreed to field a team in the big Mercy Bonspiel. (Two days! Four teams! Winner take all!) As Amaar later remarks to Reverend Duncan, "Nobody wants to be in a bonspiel, it just happens to you..."

Amaar recruits Sarah for his team (Sarah:"What, just because I'm a convert you think I know about curling?" Amaar: "Well, do you?" Sarah: "Well, yes.") And then they twist Rayyan's arm a little to get her to join. And Baber responds to the challenge with the enthusiasm that gives this post its name.

Amaar christens his team the Iceslammers (get it?) to which Baber responds: (Happy face) "It's hilarious!" (Frowny face) "No, it's offensive!" (Happy face) "No, it's hilarious!" Honestly, does anyone on Canadian television have more fun than Manoj Sood? (and in looking up this entry, I just discovered he is Sarah McLachlan's brother-in-law.)

It turns out Rayyan, to everyone's surprise, is a natural. ("Well, I used to be good at marbles.") It also turns out, to nobody's real surprise, that in addition to being hypercompetent, she is also hypercompetitive, and Amaar, who apparently left the big city for a reason, finds her ever-so-slightly terrifying.

But he doesn't have to worry about her for long, for reasons I will not get into because of spoilers. Let's just say that if you're putting on a TV show about being both Muslim and Canadian in a small prairie town, you have to face up to curling.

The secondary plot involves Sarah's discovery that, as a Muslim wife, she should expect her husband to pay for her clothes ("I've been a convert all this time and Yasir never mentioned it? Why?") and Yasir's discovery of a way around this. You will not be surprised to hear that it's a sneaky way. You will also not be surprised to learn that he doesn't get away with it.

At least she didn't ask him to buy her a bunch of new woolly curling sweaters...

I've been meaning to mention that I conducted a little experiment over the weekend. In the Kowalski story I have Alan, the first victim, dying in a car accident. Jordy is eventually convinced the accident was no accident and wonders whether someone sabotaged Alan's car which, as Jordy notes, is a Pontiac Firefly "about the size of an amp case, but nowhere near as sturdy." Jordy figures someone could easily tamper with the car.

It turns out the car is fine, but someone gave Alan a beer containing enough methocarbamol to make him pretty wobbly. The effects only hit him when he's on the road, and the result is a fatal car crash (which was not exactly what the killer was planning on, but works for him.)

Methocarbamol is the muscle relaxant used in back medications like Robaxin, the point being it's easy to get hold of. But I thought I should check out whether a crushed capsule would dissolve in fizzy liquid. I had no beer, so I used a small amount of ginger ale and a Robax Platinum caplet.

Guess what? One side of the Robax caplet was purple, so when crushed in the ginger ale not only did the liquid have a nasty taste I'm not confident a larger amount of beer would mask, the fizz on top of the drink turned lilac!!!

So it's back to the drawing board. I'll need different types of Robax and I may need to buy a six-pack for experimental purposes. No, I'm not going to drink the doctored beers, but I'll see whether there's any combination that seems plausible.

I probably shouldn't tell my beer-drinking friends what I'm up to, should I?

No, not stalking. When the Attic closure was announced on a local message board, the post included a list of the last few shows. One is by a New Brunswick band called The Divorcees, who have been on my radar for months as a band I need to get around to checking out. (My default option is generally to see bands live rather than listen to their MySpace tunes, or whatever, so I haven't actually listened to any of their stuff except what I've caught on awards shows. But I digress.)

Anyway, the Attic post didn't include the cover or anything, so I thought I'd check Facebook to see whether there was an event created for the show. (I also like that Add Event option because it reminds me I plan to go somewhere. Hey, I'm old and my mind is going.)

So I looked up events involving The Divorcees, and as usual there are a couple of events for this show (opening acts and headliners often create their own copies of events to send to their friends, which once led to me having three separate events for the same show listed because I knew someone from every band involved and they all invited everyone they knew. But I digress.)

I picked the first event, which gave the cover, and added it to my events. And then when I went to look at it more closely, guess how many people in total were attending or had been invited?

One. Me.

Why would you create an event and then not invite anybody? I started to fear I had accidentally connected with a band member's personal Daytimer or something!

I've invited a couple of people because the event says I can, but come on!

I guess that's not so much inappropriate as possibly ineffective, but we'll see how many people show up anyway!

In their story about New Year's Eve events--posted as I was going on vacation so I missed it--Chartattack.com mentions Gloryhound & the Skyhawks' appearance with The Trews.

Relevant section quoted in its entirety:

There's also The Marquee, featuring probably the biggest name of the night in The Trews, though I personally haven't heard much from them since some lame beer ad a couple of years ago. Joining Canada's answer to Jet will be Halifax's Gloryhound And The Skyhawks. Their awesome name came to be when Gloryhound merged with their crosstown rivals The Skyhawks. Seriously, it's like The Jets and The Sharks shaking hands here. Gloryhound And The Skyhawks (is there no way to shorten that name?) have a very rocking Neil Young-meets-The Band kind of thing going for them, which I say has New Year's Eve written all over it.

(I generally go for GH&SH when I'm making a note, myself. Or, obviously, Gloryhound, although I admit that abbreviation leaves something to be desired.)

[I apologize to Trews fans for the slam--you know what Chartattack is like. Also, I suspect (in fact, I am pretty near positive) the reported origins of Gloryhound's name are a joke, much like the Sam Roberts Band bio that spun shaggy-dog stories about how the band members met each other.]

Whatever--that's a pretty nice mention in a national source!

In Ottawa, outdoors, in the rain:



Notice the ambient crowd noise completely stops while he's singing. I thought at first it had been edited out, but I think that's just the sound of people who are totally captivated.

I had to get hoof dressing tonight, so I went to the tack shop up in the big shopping strip. On my way I had to pass Staples, so I went in and got myself an iPod Shuffle, the smallest and least complex of the download-player things. Baby steps. My brother has one that someone gave him, in turquoise. It's cute and tiny.

I don't mind my CD player, but it will be nice to not have to worry about losing my grip on the thing on the bus. Also, I have a few music tracks that people have sent to me, and rather than saving them up and burning them to a CD so I can listen to them away from work, I thought it would be more convenient to put them on a playlist and load them on the iPod. (I'm assuming the people who sent me the tracks--and you know who you are--will not object, since I'm not copying or distributing, I'm just listening.)

Anyway, I know the Shuffle is as low-tech as high-tech gets. But it's cute and tiny and purple.

I'm sure we'll be very happy together.