Dear Michael:

I think you know just how much Caleb and I love you. We think you’re one of the most unique, misunderstood people that we have ever met, which is why this is so terribly awkward and difficult for us, but we are sorry to say that we can no longer host you at our wedding on April 13th. We thought carefully about it, and after you wrote in, “ A St**k sure would be nice!” when asked if you would rather have ‘Tofu Banh Mi Sliders’ or ‘Vegan Cauliflower Tacos with Chipolte Cream’ for your meal at our fully vegan wedding, Caleb and I realized we simply could not host murderers on our sacred day. There is nothing funny about killing, and we cannot start our official life together by compromising our ethics. We simply will not do it.

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The Citizens for Constitutional Freedom Press Conference, January 12th, 2016

Ammon Bundy: Our intelligence officers have informed us that David Bowie has passed away. After careful study we have confirmed this as true, and not some prepared government disinformation constructed to demoralize my patriots. The news came as an absolute shock to The Citizens for Constitutional Freedom, and we feel that we’ve lost a brother in our fight against tyranny.

Ryan Bundy: He was our Diamond Dog, may the Lord hold him in his sweet embrace! Swing low, sweet chariot!

Ammon Bundy: David Bowie was a formative presence in my life. It was difficult for many of us, confused young militia men marginalized by government tyranny, to come to grips with the strange and new feelings we were experiencing while growing up in remote Nevada.

Our constitutional urges were so strong and they felt so true, yet still, the mainstream shunned us for them.

David Bowie…. okay okay, just give me a sec. His passing there, guess it dug deep… Giving me feelings… You know how you put stuff in a closet and you don’t look in there, and then something happens one day and it all just comes spilling out in tears, gunfire and arson? That’s what this is like. I’m just a little emotional here, but let me tell you, if there’s one thing David Bowie taught me, it’s that it’s okay to be different, and I will be different for the Constitution, knowing that it is okay to enforce my interpretation of the Constitution on the nation by any means necessary.

Ryan Bundy: Hallelujah, they named a knife after the shape shifter! Bowie was the man!!

Ammon Bundy: As you might imagine, many of the men are shaken, some so much so that all of their resolve has left them. We lost five men to grief last night. Crippled by sadness, they drove home to their wives and families, and soon will be watching the NFL playoffs and listening to their favourite David Bowie songs. We wish them godspeed. However, the rest of us have rededicated ourselves to the struggle David would want us to fight. David Bowie, apart from being a creative genius, generous spirit, and fashion icon, was first and foremost a patriot, and he would want us to continue in our battle against tyranny.

Ryan Bundy: Anybody who slept with Susan Sarandon and lists Frank O’Hara amongst his favourite poets is okay in my books! He’s my starman in the sky!

Ammon Bundy: And so, until the government– stooge to the bird lobby– cedes to our demands and gives us, The People, all the land they own, we will remain, defending freedom.

We will be heroes.

Ryan Bundy: Please, American patriots, do not forget to send in food and snack donations, keeping in mind some of the warrior’s dietary restrictions, such as nuts and gluten! Nuts and gluten are weapons of tyranny! Just press Donate on the Donate tab on our Facebook page. Long live our Space Oddity and death to tyranny!

This was greeted by jeers and laughter from the crowd, and pretty much immediately, John Tory, Ford’s primary opponent, issued a statement accusing him of using “the classic refuge of racists, anti-Semites and homophobes” when he said this.

The next day, Doug tried to clarify his remarks:

“Matter of fact, my wife is Jewish. Her mother is Jewish. And they have to come after me? You got to be joking. My wife was furious last night at John Tory’s statement. It’s disgusting.”

But as it turns out, the Fords are a well—known family of evangelical Christians, including Ford’s wife, Karla.

As I used to drink with Rob Ford back at Carleton University in Ottawa, I am considered a trusted member of the Ford inner circle, and was asked by Doug to come in and consult on the election, offering some advice on the campaign and how best to deal with the sensitive matter of race relations.

These are some of the thoughts that I shared with Doug:

Come out swinging against ISIS!!

Paint your opponents as people who are weak on beheadings, and then in classic Doug Ford mode, intimidation level set to 11, issue a challenge to ISIS to just come and try to behead you. You let them know that if they want a war with Ford Nation, then they can have it! The Jewish community will love you for it! (From this point forward, the War Against Isis will be a primary plank in your election campaign.)

Exposing your neck for the cameras, ask, “Is John Tory willing to put his neck on the line for you?”

Demand to know if John Tory looked at any of the stolen celebrity sex pictures. When he denies that he did, in a mocking voice, ask, “ What? You don’t want to see Jessica Simpson naked, what’s the matter with you?”

You must then imply that you have evidence that he has indeed looked at the photographs, and that he is a sex criminal and a liar. Say it “disgusts” you, as the public loves when you do that, and then challenge John Tory to a boxing match for charity, perhaps to create a fund to keep West Africans who might have Ebola out of Toronto. When he says, no, say, “Geez, you’ve spent so much money on cosmetic surgery that I keep forgetting how very, very old you are. ”

Do not use the expression CHINGLISH when referencing Toronto’s Asian community.

Make note that the Asians are more than just a people who work like dogs, but also have a great love of gambling, and that as a businessman, you applaud both their willingness to take risks and to work hard. Let them know that you would gladly fight by their side against ISIS.

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Heidi always dog that very big into social media.

Heidi famous on Chatroulette for a while and into Snapchat way early!

Heidi do whatever it take to keep fan happy.

But even as savvy as Heidi is, still got confused and thought it Mice Bucket Challenge. Was SO excited for Mice Bucket Challenge!!!!

Through two-legger would dump bucket of mice over Heidi and she would chase chase chase all the mice and tear them to blood and little bone!! Be so awesome!! Be like dog Fear Factor where Heidi win all the prize! And then post Heidi’s glory online! Everybody see that Heidi the Alpha Dog and all send treats and squeak toys! It what Internet built for!!

Would be best thing ever!!

But turns out it was FUCKING Ice Bucket Challenge!

Worst day in Heidi’s life ever!!

Four-eyed-two-legged treat giver make Heidi sit in backyard. Say Heidi Good Dog and give her liver treats and summer sausage, but all a trick!! Never sincere! Not for one second! Four-eyed-two-legged treat giver some sort of ugly demon.

Heidi think something suspicious because bucket not smell like mouse terror and disease, and water fall from it, but Heidi in treat zone so not thinking clearly. Four-eyed-two-legged treat giver wheeze and pant when he try to lift bucket up. So weak. He pretend it more fun if he get pretty two-legger to help him, and Heidi just sit there thinking MOUSEKILL MOUSEKILL MOUSEKILL MOUSEKILL and then slave owners dump freezing cold water with ice rock in it on Heidi!!! PSYCHOPATHS!! Heidi run in circles for 90 minutes, so crazy she wish she was squirrel and could climb tree!

Days later Heidi still freezing!!

Things never be the same again.

Trust broken.

Heidi fucking hate two-leggers.

Maybe kill in sleep.

Heidi always watching now.

Celebrities, politicians and common folks jumped on the bandwagon, many wearing blue bracelets in support of the cause, and a little bit of over-sharing might have taken place, but still, a bunch of money and awareness was raised. The success of this venture has led Rogers, Bell’s rival, to do something very similar. On January 31^st, Roger’s launched their Everybody Poops campaign, where for every tweet or text that included the hashtag RogersEverybodyPoops, six cents would be donated to gastrointestinal health initiative across the country.

These are some of the tweets that went out on that day:

Clint Eastwood

Go ahead, make my day and RT #RogersEverybodyPoops

Anonymous

Bowel movements are nothing to be ashamed of!! Please RT #RogersEverybodyPoops

Sarah Polley

Life’s no picnic when every bowel movement feels like an emergency. Please help by retweeting #RogersEverybodyPoops

Anonymous

We need to end the stigma that prevents people from talking openly about their bowel movements! Fight silence!! #RogersEverybodyPoops

William Shatner

I had a rectal polyp the size of a walnut and the pain was unreal. #RogersEverybodyPoops

Anonymous

Fart jokes are not funny!! They are a form of BULLYING! Please RT #RogersEverybodyPoops

Justin Trudeau

What would Justin do? Justin would bring attention to the gastrointestinal health of Canadians. Let’s knock out Colon Cancer! #RogersEverybodyPoops

Anonymous

I didn’t fart in front of my boyfriend for three years. Why?? The silence and shame must stop! #RogersEverybodyPoops

Anonymous

Because of my IBS I have to use public washrooms all the time and it is unsafe #RogersEverybodyPoops

Dion Phaneuf

Nobody likes to leave a floater in the toilet. #RogersEverybodyPoops

Anonymous

My stool is very unpredictable and always smells horrible. It’s time for pooping to come out of the closet! #RogersEverybodyPoops

Rob Ford

Nothing feels as awesome as a good dump, so let’s give all Canadians, not just the elites, that opportunity. #RogersEverydodyPoops

Anonymous

The runs aren’t just something that happens to your stockings. We need to talk about this! #RogersEverybodyPoops

Pamela Anderson

Nothing is a bigger turn off than blood or mucus in your stool. Let’s get our shit together! #RogersEverybodyPoops

Like the restaurant itself, the waitress working when I was there was easy to overlook. She wore her generic black and white server’s attire as if camouflage. Bespectacled and with practical black hair that obscured her features, she moved quickly, whether she was approaching a task or finishing one.  She avoided eye contact and wore make-up in the fashion of somebody who wasn’t accustomed to wearing make-up, as if it, too, were part of the disguise she had to wear for work.  Perfunctory and with her head down, she was a delivery system who offered up no clues as to what her life exterior to the restaurant might be like.

The place wasn’t very busy and she was getting off early. She cashed out quickly, without hanging around to have a glass of wine or something to eat the way that restaurant staff often does. In her friendless manner she hurried out the door, stopping when a homeless woman sitting on a milk crate said something to her.  They spoke for a moment or two and then the waitress took out her purse, gave the woman some money and then hugged her right there on the sidewalk. For nearly a minute they must have embraced, and then after having wiped away a tear the waitress left, moving into the rest of her unseen life.

Cuba, I guess, was a bitter pill. Our frail efforts at visiting the “Real Cuba” as opposed to the “Tourist Cuba” only served to prove that we don’t like the real Cuba, and neither, of course, do most Cubans. We stayed in three different cities, two of which (Havana and Varaderos) are tourist centres, so the crippled, interior poverty of the country was  absent from our experience but only hinted at as we took a cab from city to city, passing by thatched roof homes with working donkeys living on the front porch. Our time there was one guided by hustlers, zombies and dead-eyed bureaucrats. Of course they would hate us, seeing in us only a mythic, superhuman capacity– one that was randomly dealt– to change their circumstances without damaging our own in the least. There’s an obscenity to wanting to have a fine lobster dinner in such a context, a very obvious one, and that tension was everywhere, invisible yet humming. We were billboards from the west– white, covered in corporate logos and sufficiently arrogant as to not know a word of Spanish. You know, I wanted to feel some sense of gratitude for my “charity” but what I felt was resentment and entitlement, which is probably the way that it should be. But in each small moment when we encountered what we hoped was the milk of human kindness or just a native curiosity about another human, it quickly revealed itself to be a prosaic, economic transaction.

The world is unfair in many, many ways.

It was a cold day in Toronto, blank and windy, and none of the people I was accustomed to seeing were around. The woman normally stationed right at the corner of Huron and Bloor, the one that I don’t much like, wasn’t there. Neither was the ghost man in front of the Second Cup or the woman with the swollen legs who dozes on the bench. It was too cold, and they must have all been taking shelter somewhere.

And then I saw two young students, happy and kissing on the street corner. Bright-eyed and lost in one another, they seemed wholly ascendant and in love, drawn to one another as if out of the pure, unbidden force of chemistry. Radiating optimism, they were a little stream of light running through this otherwise bleak day and I thought about giving the basket to them. I imagined how special they and their love would feel, that out of the entire universe– on the eve of the apocalypse, no less– they were chosen for this gift. At night they would feed one another the weird, unpredictable delicacies from the package, and cozy in their student apartment would watch a favourite movie on the laptop, excited about going home for Christmas, about growing up and being in love.

But then I thought, “No, I should stick to my plan.”

And so I kept walking and very soon came across an old man reclining defiantly on the sidewalk as if a Playboy centerfold. A burning cigarette was in the hand that propped up his head, his toque was askance, his beard dirty, yellow and mean, and he had a look of permanent indifference to him. I asked him if he wanted the gift basket. He asked what it was, more of a challenge than a question, really, and I told him. He said sure and so I put it down beside him. I don’t think he thanked me– it was just more stuff, something he might be able to translate into something useful to him.  As this was taking place a young woman was walking into the Noodle Bowl and witnessed this unexpected moment on the last day of the world, “Merry Christmas,” she yelled, chasing after me, “that was beautiful, Merry Christmas, Merry, Merry Christmas, and I love your dog, she’s just the cutest thing, oh, this is the best, thank you, thank you! You have no idea how much I needed that!”

The boy’s name is Jurg and he’s 12 years old. He lives in a city I’ve never heard of (Prokhladny) in a part of the Russian Federation I’ve never heard of (Kabardino-Balkaria), and by sending him $25 a month, I’m helping to feed, clothe and educate him.

What follows is my correspondence with Jurg.

Dear Jurg:

Well, it’s nice to meet you! My name is Michael and I live in the city of Toronto, Canada with my wife and our little wiener dog Heidi. I work as a writer and my wife as a graphic artist. She’s tall and I’m not. Toronto is a pretty cool place, and if you ever get the opportunity you should come and visit. I hope the small contribution I make to you is of some use, and that we become best friends over the years. Please, tell me all about your life in Russia!

Mr. Murray:

My English is not expert so forgive mistakes please. My father, before he left he never forgave the mistake and would yell, “Jurg, Jurg, you are bad in the head!” and he would hit me. I work in Tungsten mine to make bread. The money you sent is kind and I thank you. Send photograph of your tall wife?

Jurg:

I’m so sorry to hear that your father beat you. That’s awful, but I’m sure that he loves you very much and was likely just having difficulties managing the stresses in his life. It’s sometimes very complicated to be an adult. I am sending you a picture of our little family here in Toronto and hope you are well!

Mr. Murray:

Toronto is city where Maple Leaf hockey club play, right? They are the shits. Russia much better at hockey than Canada. Your wife not bad, though, much better than you. You have potato on face where nose should be! I say wife 8 out of 10. If you spare more money life be better for Jurg and maybe he get lucky with lady who 8 out of 10.

Jurg:

Ha-Ha, such a precocious boy! That line about me having a potato on my face is very funny! Maybe you’ll grow up to be a comedian! The ladies like comedians, you know!

Potato Face:

We are very sorry to see you no send more money. We now have picture of your pretty wife and little dog and have many cousins living in Toronto. Would be shame if something happened to them.

Something with brick happen to make blood.

When 9, I drown a bear in Tambuken Lake.

Jurg:

I’m afraid I cannot afford any more than $40 a month. I hope that this amount is able to help you and your family.

Potato Face:

That is better. Jurg now own pit bull for safety. In your sake I call him potato face. No more letters from you, just money assistance, understand?