Where Have You Gone, Sheila Copps? A Nation Turns Its Lonely Eyes to You.

“Greetings from the Shire!”

There is the very good possibility that we’ll be in full-on election mode this time next month. Now for political nerds like me, that’s fantastic but other Canadians aren’t as thrilled with the prospect.

“But we just had an election. I don’t want another so soon,” they whine as, halfway around the world, Iranians get arrested for wanting free and fair elections. “Besides, it might be cold that day.”

Oh, boo hoo. Suck it up. We voted a minority government, and the last day of the current campaign is always the first day of the next one. We can go at any time. Or we can go coalition government like we almost did last  year. It’s all part of the process we agreed to. You want a four year gap between elections? Give a party a majority.

Except, it’s hard isn’t it? Nobody’s particularly jazzed about Stephen Harper as a prime minister nor Michael Ignatieff as Liberal Leader. Meanwhile, the BQ, NDP, and Greens are not budging in the polls in any meaningful way.

It’s actually as good a time as any for an election. The Liberals can only threaten to vote against the government for so long before they actually do it. And if you’re tired of the two main options, an election may be the only way to change anything. Look at the possible outcomes:

• Conservative majority: Ignatieff quits.
• Conservative minority: Harper and Ignatieff quit.
• Liberal majority: Harper quits.
• Liberal minority: Harper quits.
• NDP majority: Just kidding.

My predictions are usually wrong but I don’t think the Liberals are going to win this one and that may be better for everyone all around in the long run.  So who would replace him? Well, you know how you weren’t all that crazy about someone when you knew them but then when they go away, you kind of miss them?

Somewhere in Hamilton, Sheila Copps sits in front of Newsworld, tents her fingers, and waits.

On Your First Birthday

“I don’t have a lot of personal life experience, but if I have learned anything from my Sims family, when a child doesn’t see his father enough, he starts to jump up and down, and then his mood level will drop–until he pees himself.”

-Liz Lemon, “30 Rock”

Dear Bud Bud

One year ago, on a Sunday morning, I was sitting on the computer, going through my Google Reader, as your mother was enjoying a breakfast of leftover apple pie when you gave us a heads up that you were coming. And that was the end of our lazy Sundays for, well, ever.

Within an hour we were at the hospital and after several hours of false starts, you arrived at 2:27am, Monday morning, September 1st, 2008. And ever since then, I can say that we’ve been living in a post-9/1 world.

Despite all the warnings we were given about big babies, you came out completely average at 7 pounds, 6 oz. Did you know your pre-birth nickname was Hagrid? You lived up to it, of course when you quickly grew to a bigger than average baby and, so far, one with a happy disposition.

Your mother and I aren’t sure what we did to deserve such a good child. We’re certainly not the luckiest people in the world. So perhaps you’re here to make up for that.

Today, you can stand a little bit but you still can’t walk. However, you do think you can run and that means you fall down a lot and you cry, until we pick you up and hug you. You might have noticed we hug you a lot. It’s the first thing I do when you wake up in the morning, just before we open the curtains to find out what kind of day it is.

This coming year, you’ll be walking and talking more. You’ll fall down a little less and will say a little more than “mama”, “dada”, and “diaper”.

I can’t wait to see where you’ll go and to hear what you have to say.

You’ve done year one. Now, on to year two.

I love you,

Daddy.