Well, The Roommate has returned from his brief sojourn away at his mother’s house, and suddenly, for no reason I can think of, the completely arbitrarily-chosen title of today’s covid briefing bingo simply came to me.
a sentence I never thought I would have to type
Have I told you the story of the time I nearly hacked his Google Home to tweet every time he burped or farted? He averages four an hour after dinner. I had to stop using the scented candles I love, for fear of blowing the place sky-high.
So far in our united-by-one-mysterious-yet-overarching-and-completely-arbitrarily-chosen naming convention we have had:
• Gassy (Today)
• Wolf
Guesses in the comments section. The winner receives an all-expenses-paid and completely virtual vacation to a hidden beach resort in the South Pacific or maybe just the Equatorial Pacific if we’re pressed for time and GIPHY doesn’t have what we’re looking for, prize-wise. Plus an equally-virtual Maserati, because why the fuck not?
Our video is here:
And our bingo cards are here, including the very newish Tenth Generation Card:
- First Generation
- Second Generation
- Third Generation
- Fourth Generation
- Fifth Generation
- Sixth Generation
- Seventh Generation
- Eighth Generation
- Ninth Generation
- Tenth Generation
- and all of our other Covid Briefing Bingos are on the category page.
And we’re off.
I think I should add a square for “I begin the #BriefingBingo with the words ‘Fucking Gutenberg!'” Today I remembered my coffee, and I know you will be relieved to hear it, Possums.
Mark Blue Suit, Mask, Maple Leaf Accessory, Starts more than ten minutes late, Begins in French, Pushes Hair Back, and Shout-out to frontline workers/nurses squares. He’s going to begin in French every single briefing until after the election, you know it, I know it, he knows it, and every pollster on the planet knows it.
Vocal malfunction for “first had/hand.” And “Third Wave” and “rapid tests.” Damn, I missed one. Mark “got your backs” I think it was, but the dog barked and it went right out of my head. Now mark PPE, “ramping up,” “Keeping Canadians safe,” and Vaccines.
WHAT’S THIS? Improving the GTHA public transit to the tune of $12billion? How about getting a functional mass transit system in Ottawa first? It takes my friend in Stittsville less time to get downtown than it takes me. I can get to Montreal about as quickly as I can get to Parliament Hill.
You know what that’s about, though? That’s about Justin Trudeau cutting the legs out from under Doug Ford, suburban Toronto’s homeboy. That’s what that’s about. And I love to see it. Mark “Shades Doug Ford” square.
There’s your “Foreshadows announcement to be made later” square.
And “Technical difficulties” for whatever happened to the camera for a second there, and “Feels parents’ pain” as well.
Dr. Tam square active, as is Dr. Tam (does anyone doubt it?). Mark “someone appears via video,” as usual. Cases are down (mark that square), although still high, with an average of 49 deaths per day. Dr. Tam also gives you your “Shoutout to religious holiday” for Ramadan and Eid and Trudeau gives you “Shoutout to non-religious holiday” for Nursing week. Dr. Tam and/or her speechwriter is and/or are kicking ass in the “Unmitigated statement of optimism” department, so mark that square.
And Dr. Njoo gives you the “Dr. Njoo isn’t wearing glasses” square, which nobody else could do.
And mark “Drinks water” although that was Trudeau, not Njoo. We have moderate pen usage and paper organizing, but not enough to qualify either for the “fidgets nervously with item in question” square.
Questions now, and mark your “Biden” square and “Five eyes” [nope, I misheard, it was “Line Five”] for question about the Canada/US energy cooperation plan.
Second question from Ryan Tumilty (whose name I spelled correctly, for once) about vaccine subbing, mark your “AstraZeneca” square and “Pfizer” and oh, I forgot Dr. Tam gave you the “into arms” square.
And Trudeau is giving you the “pushes responsibility to provinces” when it comes to which vaccine you get and when. Tumilty asks basically “Do you think premiers will support your efforts or are they gonna shit the bed again?”
Mark your “gesticulates” square because the question of getting the vaccines into as many Canadians as possible is getting him worked up. To the extent you can mark your “Chevelure deteriorates” square. I love that word, “Chevelure.”
There’s your “donc” square for this very long-form answer about different levels of vaccine uptake among different groups. The reporter actually uses the term “Big Brother” which is SOOOOOOO not what Orwell was talking about. Does she believe in the Jewish Space Lasers too? Do I have a square for “Vaccine passports?”
“One Does Summer/Two Dose Fall” is going to have to be a square in the next card. Tonda MacCharles is asking about federal standards for vaccination rates, which gives Trudeau the opportunity to really hammer home that we have a chance to get cases down now, and vaccinations up. And mark your “Summer is coming” square. And “Sign language interpreters swapped out.”
The question about politicians traveling gives you “Keeping Canadians Safe” multiple times, along with “Passive voice” for “decisions will be made” and Trudeau says with a straight face that all quarantine periods will be obeyed although the reporter gave a very clear example of that not happening. Mark your “From the very beginning” and your “Alberta” square although not your “Shades Kenney” because taking the high road is basically Trudeau’s brand and election strategy.
Some roads, Possums, are higher than others. Whoever cme up with this one was very high indeed:
Very surprised to see this question about renewed hostilities in Israel and Palestine, particularly since Trudeau calls out both sides (justly but it’ll cost votes), calls for de-escalation, and then dashes as another reporter is asking him a question.
Minister Leblanc gives you the “Fails to translate into the other official language” square, alas, because that was a long, complicated, and highly political answer and it would have been interesting in English. My French is nowhere near good enough to translate it, sorry Possums.
And that is a wrap, possums. Will re-watch vid and fill in whatever I missed, and should be live by 2pm EST or EDT or NFT or whatever we’re calling it these days.
OMG I should NFT these. I’ll be RICH!
I mentioned that I got my own coffee this morning, yes? More people are going to have to do that, unless the employers suddenly come to the realization that there are Reasons they call it a “labour MARKET” and make a more tempting offer.
Speaking of hot air:
raincoaster 