Valentinely Olympic

Valentine's Day is just around the corner. My earliest Valentine's Day recollections include constructing wheelbarrow loads of cards for my 30+ classmates in elementary school. The best recollection is of being allowed to eat candy in school. The years have matured me, and I only give one card now (to Erinn), but I still enjoy a little chocolate on Valentine's Day . . . and the day before . . . and the day after . . . and any day of the year, for that matter. It doesn't even matter if it's heart shaped.

Click here to read up on the origins of the holiday, including a story about the guy who supposedly ran foul of the law by marrying couples undercover.

Then there is the modern-day saga of people celebrating the day undercover in Saudi Arabia. Apparently Saudis could get into big trouble for giving their sweetie a red rose or a red card or a red anything this weekend. Religiosity is intimidated by the strangest things.

The Olympics is just around the corner too. Click here to read about how Canada plans to get it's fair share of gold.

Erinn and I used to make an annual un-Olympic skiing getaway to the slopes near Thunder Bay. One year we decided to try snowboarding instead. Several hours, and many bumps and bruises later, we limped to our hotel room and switched on the television. Olympic snowboarders corkscrewed their way back and forth on the half pipe in defiance of gravity, sensibility, and human sanity. They say that boarders sometimes get in trouble for smoking marijuana, but I think that's unfair. You'd have to be high to try those stunts.

Everyone is entitled to an interpretation of what constitutes insanity. I think snowboarders are nuts, even though I like to watch them. Other folks think firefighters are totally bonkers, and frankly, I have to agree sometimes. But we firefighters get to have an opinion on what constitutes insanity too.

A friend from another department told me about a fire call he responded to where an improperly installed wood stove had burned a hole in the floor of a mobile home. After the fire was out and things settled down a bit, the owner wanted to nail a piece of plywood over the hole and relight the stove. And people think firefighters are crazy.