In doing research for this piece on the relationship of the suicidal tendencies of Lemmings vs. the Regina pedestrians I came upon some information that was not only disturbing but has destroyed my trust in the Disney Company and all of their affiliates. As a child growing up in Washington State it was a special event to have a movie shown to the elementary children. These movies sometimes involved a story about a little french boy and his close relationship with a Red Balloon or in this instance it was about the wild animals of the north. You know it was one of those stories with that kindly voice over of some white guy talking about oh look at how that fox runs to chase the rabbit, oh darn Mr. Fox maybe next time you will get that darn rabbit. As I remember we never saw anyone dying except for these poor little lemmings. In this film we saw hundreds of lemmings throwing themselves off a cliff into the sea and dying. This of course was a ploy by the pet stores who sold all manners of small furry rat type things and like the lemming many of us, me included, demanded to own a lemming or a hamster, guinea pig, kangaroo rat to save them of course from some forced suicide march to their death. For our kangaroo rats this might have been a better option then having them eat their young, which they did because we went away on a back packing trip and forgot to tell someone to feed them. But that is another story that will probably be debunked by my mother, though it is true, along with the time when I wanted to be a veterinarian and put one of our sick roosters into a box to heal it. Having a messy bedroom and a short attention span I soon forgot about the sick rooster and we once again went on a back packing trip. To come back with bloated black flies, flying around my bedroom and a smell wafting from the room that had nothing to do with dirty socks, made me realize that, I shouldn't shove crap under my bed as a way to keep my room clean and two that I shouldn't be a veterinarian.
But back to the lemmings and what this has to do with Canada. In the movie as I stated we saw hundreds of these furry little bastards flying to their death. In reality this is what happened, this comes from http://www.abc.net.au/science/k2/moments/s1081903.htm - now why they would spend so much time debunking lemming suicides is beyond me but I found it fascinating, especially this part:
The myth of mass lemming suicide began when the Walt Disney movie, Wild Wilderness was released in 1958. It was filmed in Alberta, Canada, far from the sea and not a native home to lemmings. So the filmmakers imported lemmings, by buying them from Inuit children. The migration sequence was filmed by placing the lemmings on a spinning turntable that was covered with snow, and then shooting it from many different angles. The cliff-death-plunge sequence was done by herding the lemmings over a small cliff into a river. It's easy to understand why the filmmakers did this - wild animals are notoriously uncooperative, and a migration-of-doom followed by a cliff-of-death sequence is far more dramatic to show than the lemmings' self-implemented population-density management plan.
Obviously in this film their was no disclaimer about "no animals were hurt or injured in the producing of this film" Evil Disney bastards and is it no wonder that this is where the distrust of the United States started I ask you?
Well after reading this I was as dismayed as probably you that this occurred. For me it was for different reasons. I mean come on those lemmings died before I was born and I was trying to make a witty comparison to furry rats of the north and the pedestrians who walk the streets of Regina.
So I will just quickly finish this blog because well Disney fucked me over long before I was born and thanks just a whole lot for screwing up what would have been a really funny blog, but now it will turn into another confused and rambling rant about my relationship with the community of individuals up here who choose to call themselves Pedestrians.
Those few from the United States who read this blog (thank you mother and Karyn I do not live in the 80's you are so on my piss off list right now, it used to be my shit list but being in Canada I learning to be oh so polite) need to understand the crisis I am in every day and why I have had to increase my anti anxiety meds after having moved up here. In the states, we are taught many things that I believe are useful to survive. They are: 1) Look both ways before you cross a street, 2) sidewalks were created for you the pedestrian to walk on and if I am going to drag my ass outside in -19 degrees to shovel "my part of the sidewalk that runs in front of my house" then don't you dare walk in the street, see sidewalk humans, streets for car, pretty simple eh? 3) no matter what your body mass index is my Toyota 4-runner weighs more then you and can take you down 4) if Saskatchewan wants to have a population of a million people then I suggest the politicians take notice of this blog and suggest that ya quit pissing me off.
I mean sure in the states their is this stupid law that pedestrians have the right of way, but whatever, they understand that we don't really mean it, in the same what that we don't mean that if you are elected president you actually get to become president. Up here they take it seriously. People honestly think that if they walk out onto a pedestrian marked walkway with blinking red lights and the such that I am supposed to slow down and in some cases stop for them. No not swerve so they can feel the hot fumes from my exhaust pipe burning their legs but stop.
If that wasn't bad enough (this is where the lemming part comes in) they just assume and will dart out like a jackrabbit without looking both ways and I am required by law to slam on my brakes with snow and ice on the street and not nudge them a bit. Sometimes it is one or two, sometimes it is a herd of them just walking like they have a right to be there.
So you see there is no way that I can pull this entire blog together unless I say that the Disney company is putting these poor pedestrians on some spinning contraption and tossing them out into the street just to drive me to insanity. In conclusion all that I can say is the reason is there are so few serial killers up here in Saskatchewan is the ground is frozen which makes a shallow grave near on impossible and even this far north the snows do melt and what evils you do in the winter will be discovered in the thaws of the spring.
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