I’m a happy boy now. Canada just pummeled Russia to win the world juniors.

Olympic champions, World Cup champions, World champions, World Junior champions. Canada owns.

Someone in my hallway is singing “Knowing Me, Knowing You” by Abba. Loudly. Badly.

BBC NEWS: Gervais writing Simpsons episode

Kick ass!

While sick as shit and pretty much restricted to the couch, there’s little else to do but watch movies. And so we did.

• 11’09″01 (imdb | rotten tomatoes) was a collection of 11 short films, each 11 minutes & 9 seconds long, that somehow dealt with the 9/11/2001 terrorist attacks. Some related to it in only the most obscure of ways (like the Japanese soldier who thought he was a snake), and some concentrated on it in very uncomfortable ways (such as Alejandro Gonzalez Inniaritu’s playback of TV & radio chatter from that day over a black screen, interrupted only with frames showing people jumping from the towers). Many dealt with the global impact (or lack thereof) of the attacks. Very, very interesting, and more than a little depressing.
• Garden State (imdb | rotten tomatoes), on the other hand, was anything but. Funny, smart, reminiscent of Grosse Pointe Blank (one of my all-time favourites), and (though I usually hate this term) heartwarming. I can see why my friend Stanzi likes it so much.

Had to go to Shopper’s to get some sinus meds, as I can no longer breathe through my nose and my head is killing me. Decided to pick up a small case of pop while there; as soon as I lift it off the pile the other end opens up and cans go flying everywhere. Some nice guy — who I think has realized that I’m very sick and very out of it — helps me pick them up.

Thus, armed with a bad mood, I walk home. Some guy in front of me tears open a new pack of smokes, drops the plastic and foil on the ground and lights up on front of me, blowing smoke back into my face. I mutter, “asshole” a little louder than I should, and he turns to look at me but doesn’t say anything. I don’t know if I was more pissed about having smoke blown in my face, or about the fact that he just tossed his shit onto the sidewalk, like he’s entitled to use Yonge Street as his personal dump. Fuck him.

MAN, I hate sinus colds.

No sooner do I rid myself of one cold than another one starts. Dang.

In alphabetical order only, these are 20 of the best songs that came out in 2004.

• Ambulance Ltd – “Primitive (The Way I Treat You)”
• The Arcade Fire – “The Crown Of Love” (although, really, “Neighbourhood #1” or “Rebellion(Lies)” could just as easily make the list
• DJ Danger Mouse – “99 Problems”
• Falconhawk – “Olympia”
• The Fiery Furnaces – “Single Again”
• The Hidden Cameras – “Mississauga Goddam”
• Mark Lanegan – “Sideways In Reverse”
• Ted Leo & The Pharmacists – “Me And Mia”
• Les Savy Fav – “The Sweat Descends”
• Marah – “Freedom Park”
• Modest Mouse – “Float On”
• Alanis Morissette – “Eight Easy Steps”
• A.C. Newman – “On The Table”
• Raising The Fawn – “Drownded”
• Sahara Hotnights – “Stupid Tricks”
• Stars – “Ageless Beauty”
• The Streets – “Fit But You Know It”
• Thermals – “How We Know”
• The Von Bondies – “C’mon C’mon”
• The Walkmen – “The Rat”

No doubt I’ll change my mind on some of these, or add new albums to the list, but for now these are my 10 favourites of 2004.

1. The Arcade Fire – Funeral
2. The Walkmen – Bows And Arrows
3. A.C. Newman – The Slow Wonder
4. Neko Case – The Tigers Have Spoken
5. The Von Bondies – Pawn Shoppe Heart
6. Ted Leo – Shake The Streets
7. Loretta Lynn – Van Lear Rose
8. Division Of Laura Lee – Das Not Compute
9. Jolie Holland – Escondida
10. Mark Lanegan – Bubblegum

Also worth mentioning: Friday Night Lights – Soundtrack, Jimmy Eat World – Futures, Kasabian – Kasabian, Thee Silver Mountain Reveries – Pretty Little Lightning Paw

Blueberry Boat by The Fiery Furnaces and PJ Harvey‘s Uh Huh Her would likely have made my top ten list had they not been so disappointing. Viewed objectively they’re probably great albums, but I just can’t get into them.

So we came home to find 4(!) Zip DVDs waiting for us (to go with the one already sitting on our TV stand), most of which we’ve watched already.

• We watched the last 5 episodes of The Wire, and we’re every bit as addicted to it as we were to Six Feet Under or The Sopranos. I love how it makes you work to understand it, how it doesn’t slow anything down for you, how it makes you keep up just the way the cops and criminals have to. In the final episode they made little references to things that had happened in the first one or two episodes, references that would make no sense to someone who hadn’t watched the series from the beginning. I loved it.
• Luther was a pretty good movie as well, one that I’ve been waiting to see for a long time but had trouble finding. I knew very little about Martin Luther, so it was interesting to watch…a litte skewed obviously, as it was partially funded by a Lutheran bank, but well worth a watch.
• More episodes from season 4 of South Park. That show just kills me.

Happy new year, everybody.

OK, going back to the couch now.