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blog post R3Weekend: The Canada Reads "Weigh In" 2012

posted by Pete Morey on Feb 04, 2012

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Hey its Saturday Feb 4th 2012. Welcome to R3 Weekend. Pete here.

As always leave me a comment on the Blog if you want say hi and if you feel daring you can follow along on our TUMBLR

CANADA READS, CBC's Canadian Literature smack-down begins this Monday.

This year, five non-fiction books battle to be crowned “Canada Reads Champion 2012”.

Its two days before the contest begins, so here on R3 Weekend we’re having a WEIGH IN!

You see boxers stepping on the scales before they go head-to-head, well today we are literally putting the five Canada Reads books on the scales. Yes, we are actually gonna weigh them to see which book has the most beef!

Erin Balser a Producer on Canada Reads joins me in the studio today for the weigh in. She’ll give us a sneak peak at the five novels up for debate and an idea of the trash talkin’ that goes on behind the scenes between panelists.

If you’re not familiar with Canada Reads then here’s how it works:

Five Canadian novels are selected. They are then defended in a contest by five celebrity panelists.

Canadian rock 'n' rollers like to read because in the past 10 years plenty of musicians have flocked to Canada Reads to defend their favourite Canadian novels including:

Roland Pemberton (Cadence Weapon), Sarah Quinn (Tegan & Sarah), and John k. Samson (The Weakerthans).

This year Dave Bidini has a book in contention and rapper Shad is one of the celebrity panelists.

If you want to weigh in on any of the books up for debate, feel free to leave a comment below.

I’ll post my discussions with Erin and clips of the authors reading from their books on our TUMBLR.

You can check out the books in question at the Canada Reads website.

Let the WEIGH IN commence!

posted by Pete Morey on Feb 04, 2012

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#1 posted by
Pete Morey
on Feb 04, 2012

Allo allo allo

#2 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

You didn't mention that the host of the whole thing Jian Ghomeshi was in Moxy Früvous

#3 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

I predict it's going to be quiet on here today

#4 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

I wonder just how long I can sit here talking to myself before the men in the white coats come calling for me

#5 posted by
ursa minor
on Feb 04, 2012

Don't know any of the 5 books, at the moment busy reading 4 books but afterwards might check them out :-)

Good afternoon Garry!

#6 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

Good afternoon Kat, how have you been?

#7 posted by
ursa minor
on Feb 04, 2012

Busy with work, supporting the strike, reading, yesterday and today enjoying the snow :-) And you?

#8 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

I'm not too bad thanks, doing some workon the radio3wiki but at the minuye I'm watching France Vs Italy in the 6 Nations

#9 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

or even at the minote

#10 posted by
ursa minor
on Feb 04, 2012

Reading a book about a big hold up 8-)

#11 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

Is it any good?

#12 posted by
ursa minor
on Feb 04, 2012

France Vs Italy war? have no idea what the 6 Nations is? :-p

#13 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

The 6 Nations Rugby Union here

#14 posted by
ursa minor
on Feb 04, 2012

Yeah, great book to know more about the current crisis, Greece, Portugal, Ireland and basically how we get get screwed by Europe and their capitalistic masters everyday. The way it's going more than half of the people in Europe working full time won't be able to provide for their basic needs. Not very uplifting though, halfway through, the end is supposed to be a bit more uplifting

#15 posted by
ursa minor
on Feb 04, 2012

ah rugby, not as boring as footbal to watch :-p the last 10 years I've only watch sports on tv once: rugby match Australia-Wales a couple of years ago 8-)

#16 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

The only time I watch football (soccer) is when England are playing (men or women) or sometimes the Newcastle Vs Sunderland derby matches, but that's mostly so I know which group of fans I can pick on

#17 posted by
ursa minor
on Feb 04, 2012

Are the men in the white coats there already, sent them to get you 8-)

#18 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

Not yet, where did you send them from, they may be stuck in customs

#19 posted by
ursa minor
on Feb 04, 2012

they left here 20 minutes ago!

So how's the weather over there, here today between -4°C and -10°C and in the east of Belgium down to -18°C. chilly!

#20 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

1°C and light snow flurries here at the moment with a low of -2°C tonight

#21 posted by
laser beans
on Feb 04, 2012

Moxy Früvous was a local Toronto band with one or two songs that used to get occasional play on national CBC shows 20 years ago, in the pre-internet days. They were little known then and even less known now.

I stopped paying attention to Canada Reads when Bill Richardson left. If CBC ever hires a real host again, i.e. not another crony from the mafia, I would probably start listening again.

#22 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

So not a fan of Jian then?

#23 posted by
laser beans
on Feb 04, 2012

Nobody’s a fan of Jian, or George. Have you seen their ratings? They’re both lifelong Torontonians who know little to nothing about Canada, and whose only qualifications are that they are friends of CBC Toronto’s management. I should qualify that. I believe there are some Torontonians who think these two are relevant, and a number women over 60 seem to be smitten by them as well.

#24 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

#25 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

To be honest I can't say that I have seen any ratings for Jian or Strombo so I can't really comment and I only know a little about the people themselves.

Hi Zammy

#26 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

Oh darn. How am I ever going to make it through the day now?

#27 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

Better off?

#28 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

Does the preface count for first sentences?

#29 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

Until they play it again. I figure it'll happen about 8-10 times.

#30 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

No Grants not on today

#31 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

BABOOM!

#32 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

For fun I was checking online for prices of flights out to LAX and in March I can get return flights for £450 ($707) or one way (on the same flight) for £1200 ($1,886). How the heck does that work.

#33 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

How many layovers?

#34 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

I don't know, but I would guess at least once in Paris

#35 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

From Vish:

Last night a woman asked me if I worked with "Juan Ghomeshi." There's a fine line between name mispronunciation and ethnic reassignment.

#36 posted by
Pete Morey
on Feb 04, 2012

Yep preface totally counts...if its good!

#37 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

outbound 85minutes in Amsterdam

return leg 146minutes in New York JFK and 145minutes in Amsterdam

#38 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

did you get many comments when you posted the first line question on facebook?

#39 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

I agree with Rizzo that this is probably the best opening line of a novel.

The Marleys were dead to begin with.

#40 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

Those are pretty significant... Still doesn't explain the difference, though.

#41 posted by
laser beans
on Feb 04, 2012

Jian’s official numbers are hard to come by, and you have to keep your ears open and talk to people to get them. George, otoh, has consistently drawn around 100,000 viewers for his TV show as reported by BBM, far below what the CBC says they expected, and yet he keeps getting renewed. The National (news), which leads into George, draws around 750,000 last I saw, and it often draws over 1 million. The CTV news opposite George draws around 1.2 million. You could probably run an infomercial in George’s time slot and draw more than 100,000, and it’s no surprise why. He really has nothing to offer. He’s not very bright. He’s not very educated. He’s never lived anywhere but Toronto, so he’s very regional.

George also had a show in US television once. Don’t ask me how that happened, but there must have been some serious backroom dealings going on. It was an epic failure as well, and was cancelled after a couple of weeks. George also got an honorary doctorate from the UofC, supposedly because he was a prominent pop culture personality, but the students certainly didn’t see him that way, and the student paper published an article protesting the award. More backroom dealings?

A lot of media people privately refer to the Toronto CBC as the mafia, and these are some of the reasons why. Also note that an artist Jian manages, Lights, strangely gets a fair amount of play on R3, in spite of the fact that the poor girl is clearly not very good. Also note that she somehow won a Juno in a category supposedly based on artistic merit. Just for the fun of it, see if you can find any reviews for any of her albums that are more than mediocre. I’ll bet you can’t.

Anyway, such is the state of the CBC today. It wasn’t always this way, and hopefully better days will come again. I’m out now, off to start my day.

#42 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

As far as I know they are for the same flights outbound, I just think they want to put people off flying one way

#43 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

"Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun."

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams

#44 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

I'd considered looking up the Hitchiker's Guide. Great line.

#45 posted by
Pete Morey
on Feb 04, 2012

Nah I got bugger all comments on face book except yours which I will be using tomorrow.

Some topics never really set the blog alight.

Hmmmm now I want to read the hitchhikers series all over again

#46 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

I can't recomend it highly enough, I have read the first one at least half a dozen times (along with watching the TV show, listening to the radio show & reading the scripts and I have even watched the movie)

#47 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

Have you read the radio plays, The Salmon of Doubt? I have a copy of it on my shelf. Gonna go look at the first line now.

#48 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

Not a winner of a first line there... Rats.

#49 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

The Salmon of Doubt was the book Douglas Adams was working on when he died so was incomplete. He had not decided if it was the sixth Hitchhikers book or the third Dirk Gently book.

I think you should start with The Hithhikers Guide and work your way through those.

#50 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

"It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen."

1984, George Orwell

“No one would have believed, in the last years of the nineteenth century, that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were being scrutinized and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinize the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water.”

The War of the Worlds, H. G. Wells

#51 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

My mistake. You are correct. From the back cover:

The Salmon of Doubt comprises eleven chapters of the novel on which Douglas Adams was working at the time of his death, in which Dirk Gently is on the trail of half a cat and a mysteriously easy-to-track actor.

The Salmon of Doubt is the ultimate smorgasbord of the insanities, urbainities and wonders of life, the universe and everything.

#52 posted by
Absotively
on Feb 04, 2012

I suppose I'm probably the only one here who follows Kit Whitfield's blog?

She's an author, and recently she's been posting analyses of first lines of novels. I've had to skip many of them, because I haven't read all the books in question and want to avoid spoilers. But the ones I've read have been very interesting. Here's a couple of them:

Anne of Green Gables

The Handmaid's Tale

#53 posted by
zammachus
on Feb 04, 2012

That sounds absotively fascinating. I'll definitely check it out.

#54 posted by
TheRadioHead
on Feb 04, 2012

Are you talking about me when I'm not there?!? A little bird told me you were. I am not home and can't listen, plus I am busy at a volunteer gig Saturday mornings. So here is a quick Mennonite joke...why don't Mennonites have sex standing up? Because it might lead to dancing...That's an old groaner around these parts, but all I have time for. Ciao for now.

#55 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

What's sex?

#56 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

A young boy was telling his mother about a school play about a Mennonite family that he was going to be in. When he said that he would play the part of the father, his mother replied, "You should have asked for a speaking role."

Q. How do you break a Mennonite's finger? A. You punch him in the nose.

Q. How do you break his neck? A. You walk around his van.

One day there was van of Mennonites driving up the highway, and they saw a sign that said maximum 50, so they let off seven people.

I was thinking of visiting some friends in Manitoba, and I asked if I would have a place to stay. They said, "Oh yeah, you're Morden welcome."

Q. What do you call a bad Mennonite poet? A. Corny Reimer.

Q. Why are Mennonite guys particularly afraid of meeting their dates' father? A. They might play the Mennonite game, and win.

#57 posted by
Pete Morey
on Feb 04, 2012

Yay good menno joke yay the radiohead!

and garry how do you know so many menno jokes?

#58 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

I did a google search

#59 posted by
Pete Morey
on Feb 04, 2012

What is this google magic you speak of some kind of witchcraft?

#60 posted by
garfielduk
on Feb 04, 2012

I got them here I should have given it as a source.

A Google is a small impish creature that loves to seek informations. We in the UK have learned how to harness this power to help us find important things such as pornography, celebrity gossip and photos of cute animals.