I do so love my satellite dish and it’s time-shifting feature.  Less than 15 minutes before the polls close out east – although, I believe they’re already closed in Newfoundland – and I’ll soon be able to watch all the punditry and polling goodies I can handle.

At the moment, I’m listening to George Stroumboulopoulos give a run down of his opinions of the 37 day election campaign.  Yes.  I’m willingly watching CBC with no Dr. Who or Torchwood in sight. Peter Mansbridge and company will soon be handed the reigns.

CTV and Global don’t seem to be running coverage until 7pm.  I guess I shouldn’t be surprised by this.  The Maritimes are often ignored by the “East”.

I’m off to get my popcorn and beer ready.  Oh, and to call my mom.

Happy election viewing everyone.

Upperdate: *GRRRR*  Elections coverage is blacked out.  At exactly 5:30pm my TV went grey and a nice little message re: Elections Canada forbidding elections coverage in areas where polls aren’t closed is now being displayed on screen.  Someone please explain to me how Elections Canada can declare vote swapping/sharing (strategic voting by proxy) legal but learning of the results early is not.  Bah!  It’s not like this information isn’t going to be available on the Internet through non-Canadian housed blogs.

Today is Election Day in Canada. To mark the occasion, some bloggers, led by Ghost of a flea, are doing a blogburst featuring the above quotation.

I am a Canadian, a free Canadian, free to worship God in my own way, free to stand for what I think right, free to oppose what I believe wrong, free to choose those who shall govern my country. This heritage of freedom I pledege to uphold for myself and for all mankind.

-Prime Minister John G. Diefenbaker, from the House of Commons, Debates (on the Canadian Bill of Rights), July 1, 1960.

I’m off to vote.

h/t to Dust My Broom.

Upperdate: Convenant Zone has collected some additional Canadian quotations to fit the theme.

In the past few years, I’ve spent a number of Turkey days in foreign countries.  US. India. Philippines.  None of them celebrate Canadian Turkey day.  I did eat a chicken dinner when I spent Turkey day in Tucson, AZ years back.  No idea what I ate in any of the other cities.  Although, when it comes to Memphis, Bangalore and Manila, I can guess.  I was often eating the same thing…

Usually, when we’re both at home, Drew and I have a small Thanksgiving meal and save everything for the “morning after” leftover feast. Since Drew is away and I’d never cook a turkey for one, tonight I’m heading across the alley for a community Thanksgiving dinner.  J and S have been slaving over hot turkeys all day.  The rest of us had out own assignments.  Buns.  Veggies.  Salads.  Wine.  Pie.

Families.  Singles.  Adults.  Kids.  And me.  I’m sure we’ll have a wonderful evening together.

Hope your Turkey day is just as special as mine is about to be.  Have a wonderful evening everyone.

I’m looking forward to voting tomorrow and will be dragging my friends and neighbours along with me.  I can’t help myself.  I just think it’s really important to ensure every qualifying member of the public votes.  Then I can go home and happily plonk myself in front of the TV to rant and rave at the talking heads completing the election night coverage.  Of course with Drew in Montreal it won’t be nearly as much fun as it has been in previous years.  I was missing in ’06 so this is our second Federal election minus the popcorn throwing beer swilling peanut gallery.

As for results, a good chunk of me would like to see the same results as were in place before Parliament was dissolved.  After reading all 4 party platforms and watching this weekends Dion/May shenanigans I’ve grave concerns about all of them.  I think it will be good for the country to have the Conservatives have a small minority government again. They did manage to get a surprising amount of work completed over the past 2.5 years. A minority ensures that they don’t go too far off the rails when completing their mandate.  Perhaps then, the sheep that make up some of the Canadian population will realize that the US Democratic Party has more in common (policy wise) with the Conservatives than they do with the Liberals.  And perhaps then some of the other parties will begin cleaning up their platforms and the junk hidden in their back closets to make themselves more palatable in future elections.

Dion is certainly not someone I want to see lead the country (Hello Liberals – Get a new leader… perhaps one a little less divorced from day-to-day realities of the general population) and the Greens too should consider a new leader.  They’ve a number of excellent candidates in their party but May has failed in the most basic of leadership duties; Supporting her people and party values to the bitter end.  Abdicating her responsibility to the Green party and its candidates to crawl into bed with the Liberals and advocate strategic voting opens up a long line of questions regarding her values, loyalty, honesty, trustworthiness, etc. As for Layton, I have personal issues with Layton’s past actions that will ensure I’ll never vote for him.

On the bright side none of these leaders are running in my riding.  I can vote my conscience.  I can place my X beside the name of the best, in my not so humble opinion, man or woman for the job.

I know.  I was supposed to be home, locked in the basement, studying today. I promise to study tomorrow.  I don’t have much choice since my weekly assignment is due early Monday morning.  Procrastination can only carry me so far before the guilt kicks in and I buckle down.

In my defence, my awesome neighbours don’t have a vehicle of their very own.  They do most of their shopping in small increments to ensure they can always carry it home by hand.  Sometimes they need access to a vehicle.  Especially when trying to bring larger items home. They do so much awesome stuff for us that I always check and see if they need a chauffeur whenever I’m heading out on non work related activities.

This afternoon I noted a distinct lack of edible items in my fridge and did my neighbourly duty.  I called J to determine if she needed to go shopping and wanted to join me while I went out to gather fruits, vegetables and beer.  As luck would have it she needed an escape route from her afternoon with L and some groceries. Off to Costco we went.

Millions of dollars and side trips to Walmart (my fault, I needed new jeans) and the beer store later we were homeward bound.  I don’t really enjoy shopping.  If I have to go out I want to get everything at once.  On the bright side my fridge and cupboards are loaded with foodstuffs, I have new jeans and a few new blouses, and there’s a case of beer in the fridge and a CD full of blues in my iPod.  I have the first season of Chuck ready to load into my DVD player and copies of Greg Mortenson’s Three cups of Tea and the latest novel by Ian Rankin my bedside.  Yes.  Like any good child of Scottish immigrants I too am addicted to Inspector Rebus’ antics.

I’ve done my part for the Canadian economy today.  Now I’m off to study.  Yeah.  That’s it.  Study.

Have a great evening everyone.