Mein Bier ist Hier

IGA kept its word. I'm two cases of beer richer. I have a bottle of Black Currant Ephemère in the freezer, whose bubbly, yeasty bounty is about fifteen minutes away from my gullet.

This beer is art, but not for the faint of heart. Here are trophy pics:

Lovely. Now get in my belly!

So? Does the beer man cometh?

Mike, it's been three days since we spoke, and you said you'd call. I think your beer order arrives Tuesday, so I'm not too worried yet. But I'll be watching that clock all day tomorrow, waiting for the phone to ring.

Dude, don't leave me hanging. Telling a guy you'll get his beer and then failing to follow through is worse than breaking the original promise. It's a double-humped tease. Cruel and unusual.

Beer tease

One kickass thing about Quebec is we have cheap cheap beer. It's so cheap the government even set a minimum price to avoid... what?... undercutting bottled water? I don't know and I don't care. As long as that minimum is less than a buck a beer I'm happy.

Not all beer is less than a dollar, though. Imports and premiums can be found at $20 for a case of 12. Still cheap compared to the rest of this country, and even to the States. So imagine the twinkling this cheap-ass bastard felt in his toes when the IGA flyer advertised a mixed case of Unibroue premium brews for $14.99. I was on that like a fat kid on a smartie. Usually Unibroue beers (the good ones, anyway) are sold as six-packs, and cost $12. Their beers are unfiltered, many are retarded strong, and their artwork can be described as mythical Heavy Metal voyageur, with a dash of pixie dust.

Knowing that I was not the only one who'd jump on this, I went to IGA on the second day of the sale. No beer. There wasn't even an empty spot on the shelf where the beer might have been. It was like someone had folded space around my beer deal. Come back tomorrow, they said... our beer order comes in at 10. Fine. I pay for the groceries I didn't really mean to buy but which caught my eye on this beer quest, and resolve to come back the next day.

The next morning I happened to be by another branch, so I went in to grab a case. No beer. Hmm. No cardboard debris scattered around a tattered "SALE!" sign. No sale sign. No empty shelf space at all. Either these IGA guys are really good at restocking their shelves and changing signage right away, I thought, or this mythical beer really is mythical.

Next morning, 11 AM. No beer at store 1. I ask for a raincheck. No rainchecks on alcohol. Try the store at Cavendish. Manager sounds optimistic that they'll have it. Finally... I can taste the tiny bubbles. Well surprise bloody surprise... none at Cavendish. I look around for cameras. I'm in Montreal, after all, where all those 'Just for Laughs' pranks are shot. Maybe they're having me on and there's a pallet full of Unibroue in the back, just waiting to shed a little weight into my welcoming arms. Nope. Just no beer, no laughs, no semi-naked police. But there is Jasmine, and Jasmine writes me a raincheck! It'll be delayed gratification, but gratification nonetheless. I return home with a warm and fuzzy feeling in my stomach.

...Until I realize that if they didn't have my beer during the sale, they probably won't order it at another time. I fire off a letter through the "Contact Us' black hole on the website, with predictable results. My wishes are simple enough: order the beer, call me when it arrives and honour the sale price that I tried to act on four times. Internet silence. I'm patient. I wait a week. New flyer. What do you know? The Unibroue case is now $16.99. Armed with my raincheck, but sick of driving around in vain for beer, I check the IGA home shopping website to see if the beer is in. It doesn't even show up in the system. I call the customer service line, now wise to their non-email ways. Martine endures my story (which is a lot harder to speak than it is to write) and puts me on hold as she calls the three nearest stores to see if the beer is in stock. It's 11:50 AM, and no stores can answer the question because it's "lunchtime". Someone will call me back. Uh-huh.

I'm already planning my next step - consumer affairs, maybe? - on the road to making this merchant do what its advertisement said. 1:00 rolls around, then 2:00. Long lunch. But then - what's this!? - the phone rings and it's a very serious sounding fellow named Mike from IGA. What, did I get the legal department on me? No, Mike's the manager at Cavendish and he's going to order the beer, call me when it gets in, and honour the raincheck. Right on Mike! More warm fuzzy feelings in my stomach. That was two days ago. Still waiting. Don't tease me Mike. Not about cheap beer.

Talking to a wall has never been so much fun...

(Originally written and sent Jan. 6, 2010)

Dear Mr. Baird,

As you know, the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority (CATSA) recently implemented a "no carry-on bags" policy for flights from Canada to the United States. This policy is unnecessarily heavy-handed and is a disservice to all air travelers. It prohibits, for example, parents from carrying a bag of activities and snacks for their non-infant children. As any experienced traveler knows, no child suffers alone, especially on a six-hour flight. The policy forces an increase in checked baggage volumes at a time when allowances for such baggage are either being reduced or converted to for-fee services. It makes lineups at carousels longer as regular travelers with a single small bag have to join the post-flight scrum they had managed to avoid on every flight before this week. The policy, in short, makes traveling by plane generally nastier than it has already become.

The safety gains from this measure are marginal at best and counterproductive at worst. Instead of a tidy bag of conveniences, passengers who already struggle to keep their parkas to themselves will now be armed with cameras swinging from their wrists, bottles of medication and God knows what else dangling from every limb. In the meantime, the guy with the explosives strapped to his thigh can blend into the resulting melee and take his seat inconspicuously unencumbered by the only things that might have made him nervous before: a bag and belongings that authorities might take a curiosity in and swab for traces of explosives. In this sense the policy actually limits opportunities for screening officers to detect malicious intent.
The most bizarre thing about this policy is that the USA does not require it, and no other country is doing anything remotely close to this. Belgians flying into the USA have been limited by their own agency to one carry-on bag, but that's it. Domestic flights in the USA are not required to do this. Flights from Mexico and England are not required to do this. Flights from Iran and Libya are not required to do this. This is a self-imposed, reactionary measure by Canadians with absolutely zero benefit to Canadians.

While security is a priority, it is not the only priority. As the Minister responsible for CATSA, please endeavour to reign in those who have forgotten this. Let our children have their sippy cups and coloring books. Let a guy bring a sandwich, a novel and a book of crossword puzzles. Being safe really doesn't have to be so brutal. We can be safe and comfortable, provided we make rational, well-thought-out decisions.

Regards,
Name Redacted
Montreal

Inaugublog

The idea for this blog comes from my friend Chris, who, I suspect, got tired of hearing me blab all the time about my misadventures in small-scale activism. The name of the blog was coined by my brother Burt. Seeing how this is the first post, I might as well tell the story.

After the Christmas 2009 underwear-bombing attempt, the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority (CATSA... our version of the TSA) instituted ridiculous security measures for all flights from Canada to the USA. Essentially it was a no-carry-on-baggage policy with few exceptions. Apparently if you want to defeat the terrorists you have to figure out what they want and then give it to them before they can ask for it in their hey-let's-blow-something-up kind of way. Here's an excerpt from the policy:

Carry-on bag means items to which a passenger has access to during a flight, but does NOT include personal items such as medication or medical devices, small purses, cameras, coats, items for care of infants, laptop computers, crutches, canes, walkers, containers carrying life sustaining items, a special needs item, musical instruments, or diplomatic or consular bags.

Fed up with stupid, reactive security stunts, I shot a letter off to John Baird, Canada's Transport Minister, who is ultimately responsible for CATSA. I'll post that later, but the long and the short of it was that a ban on harmless items (such as backpacks or crayons for kids) posed more danger than a terrorist ever could. Three days later CATSA issued a new list of exceptions to the policy and Burt congratulated me on winning the 'Crayon Wars'.

So I told Chris, in my long-winded and incoherent sort of way. He noticed that this was one of many times I've elicited change (or at least seemed to... Johnny 'The Scowler' Baird never called to thank me for my insights) simply by writing a letter or making a phone call. He suggested this blog, so here we are. Thanks Burt! Thanks Chris! Thanks stupid underwear terrorist!