“If you're shopping in a Home Depot store, and someone who doesn't work there offers you assistance, you may live in Canada.
If you've worn shorts and a parka at the same time, you may live in Canada.
If you've had a lengthy telephone conversation with someone who dialed a wrong-number, you may live in Canada.
If 'vacation' means going anywhere south of Detroit for the weekend, you may live in Canada.
If you measure distance in hours, you may live in Canada.
If you know several people who have hit a deer more than once, you may live in Canada.
If you've switched from 'HEAT' to 'AIR-CONDITIONING' and back again, in the same day, you may live in Canada.
If you can drive 90 kilometers an hour through 2 feet of snow, during a raging blizzard, without flinching, you may live in Canada.
If you install security lights on your house and garage, but leave both unlocked, you may live in Canada.
If you carry jumper-cables in your car, and your wife knows how to use them, you may live in Canada.
If you design your child's Halloween costume to fit over a snowsuit, you may live in Canada.
If the speed limit on the highway is 100 km/hour, and you're going at 120, and everyone's passing you, you may live in Canada.
If driving is better in the winter because all the potholes are filled with snow, you may live in Canada.
If you know all four seasons: Almost-winter, Winter, Still-winter, and Road Construction: you may live in Canada.
If you have more miles on your snow-blower than on your car, you may live in Canada.
If you think of minus-2-degrees as being 'a little chilly', you may live in Canada.”

Complete text of that part of an interesting-item roundup email from a friend Nov. 22 2025

“STEVEN GUILBEAULT HAS RESIGNED FROM CABINET/ A TRAGIC DAY FOR MEN WHO CUT THEIR OWN HAIR IN THE DARK”

Standalone unattributed image emailed by a friend Dec. 1, 2025 showing Guilbeault with a bad ragged bowl cut.

“The president [Ronald Reagan], apparently, was so totally unaware of where his foreign policy was that he had to appoint a distinguished commission to help him locate it, and when they commissioners called him in to testify, he told them, essentially, that he couldn’t remember what it looked like. Now, if Richard Nixon had claimed something like that you would at least have had the comfort of knowing he was lying. You could trust Nixon that way. But with this president, you have this nagging feeling that he’s telling the truth.”

Dave Barry Greatest Hits [re Iran-Contra mostly].

“Being funny has nothing to do with being untrue or undesirable.”

G.K. Chesterton in Daily News 14/9/1907, quoted in “Can’t You Take A Joke?” in Gilbert: The Magazine of the Society of G.K. Chesterton Vol. 27 #2 (November/December 2023)

“I think we may jest on any subject. But I do not think that we may jest on any occasion.”

G.K. Chesterton in Daily News September 1, 1906, quoted in “Can’t You Take A Joke?” in Gilbert: The Magazine of the Society of G.K. Chesterton Vol. 27 #2 (November/December 2023)

“A sense of humor. Back to Webster's Unabridged: humor is defined as ‘The mental faculty of discovering, expressing, or appreciating ludicrous or absurdly incongruous elements in ideas, situations, happenings, or acts...’ or ‘A changing and uncertain state of mind…’ The organizer searching with a free and open mind void of certainty, hating dogma, finds laughter not just a way to maintain his sanity but also a key to understanding life. Essentially, life is a tragedy; and the converse of tragedy is comedy. One can change a few lines in any Greek tragedy and it becomes a comedy, and vice versa. Knowing that contradictions are the signposts of progress he is ever on the alert for contradictions. A sense of humor helps him identify and make sense out of them. Humor is essential to a successful tactician, for the most potent weapons known to mankind are satire and ridicule. A sense of humor enables him to maintain his perspective and see himself for what he really is: a bit of dust that burns for a fleeting second. A sense of humor is incompatible with the complete acceptance of any dogma, any religious, political, or economic prescription for salvation. It synthesizes with curiosity, irreverence, and imagination. The organizer has a personal identity of his own that cannot be lost by absorption or acceptance of any kind of group discipline organization. I now begin to understand what I stated somewhat intuitively in Reveille for Radicals almost 20 years ago, that ‘the organizer in order to be part of all can be part of none.’”

Saul Alinsky Rules for Radicals [he’s listing the ideal elements for an organizer and I found the notion that left-wing radicals are consistently marked by a good sense of humour especially about themselves was itself so funny it was worth quoting].

“It is absolutely useless and absurd to tell a man that he must not joke about sacred subjects. It is useless and absurd for a simple reason; because there are no subjects that are not sacred subjects.”

G.K. Chesterton in Daily News September 1, 1906, quoted in “Can’t You Take A Joke?” in Gilbert: The Magazine of the Society of G.K. Chesterton Vol. 27 #2 (November/December 2023)

“Any car will last your lifetime if you are careless enough.”

“American Eagle” quoted in “Other Suspects I Quotes not by GKC” in Gilbert: the Magazine of the Society of G.K. Chesterton Vol. 28 #2 (Nov./Dec. 2024)