Canadian Coast Guard or Roller Coaster?

Hi Kidz! I hope that your Christmas and New Years was as pleasant as mine was. While you were unwrapping your gifts and playing with your toys I was down in Mexico digging my toes in the sand and perfecting my Margarita recipe*.

My father, Señor Spanky Senior, sent me some incredible photos of one of the Canadian Coast Guard's Self-Righting Lifeboats performing maneuvers off of Tofino, BC which is on the west coast of Vancouver Island. Apparently, these pictures were taken from shore via a tripod during an autumn storm last year. I stitched them together in Photoshop to create an animation to ensure your attention. Click on the picture above for a closer view. Quite the ride!

The self-righting lifeboats are part of the CCGs Search and Rescue (SAR) Program. The CCG's Pacific Region is responsible for 560,000 square kilometers (210K sq miles) of ocean and 27,000 km (~17K miles) of rugged and often inaccessible coastline. This is somewhat longer than Santa's naughty list.

If you have a penchant for being permanently damp you might want to consider a career in the Canadian Coast Guard. Arrr, Billy, have you ever been to sea?

Link

* Mr. Spanky drinks liquor for medicinal purposes only and in a responsible manner. He's old, he has aches and pains, and the citrus does wonders for his scurvy.

Who is Mr. Spanky?

Alert reader SO phoned me within minutes of my last post about the Pomegranate to let me know that that said phone is, get this, a FAKE. It's a teaser that the province of Nova Scotia has put on to let people know that a phone that has everything doesn't exist but there is a place that does. I've been to Nova Scotia. There's lots of trees. And a lighthouse and a ferry. Mr. Spanky couldn't see more than that because of the fog and rain. According to maps of Canada, it has interesting places like "Meat Cove", "Dingwall", and "Tatamagouche". Those places alone are worth a trip. A free limited edition Mr. Spanky Phunkidz T-shirt goes to the first reader that takes a picture of themselves in any of these fine places.

As a result of SO's quick thinking the highly coveted Mr. Spanky sticker sheet is on its way to blustery Canada (not in Nova Scotia) where her two sons can plaster them on foreheads, inside cupboards, and under the toilet seat in order to greet visitors with the handsome metallic visage of Mr. Spanky himself.

I have also taken the narcissistic liberty of creating MOO cards for Phunkidz, featuring my visage, to hand out, for free, to those last few children who may not have heard of me. This no more or less than a charitable attempt to spread the joy of Phunkidz. This has prompted concerns about exactly who Mr. Spanky is given his unusual name. Suffice it to say that there are some people with very sad and twisted minds, kidz, and it makes me feel depressed about the state of our society just thinking about it.

Speaking of your parents, here's the real deal on Mr. Spanky. Mr. is a reference to the fact that I'm am older than you. Spanky is one of the best characters in the The Little Rascals, a black-and-white children's show put on during the mid-1950s. He was the brains and enterprising leader of a down-and-out group of children that ran around causing mischief. In this photo, Spanky is shown on the right. His mother is credited with giving him his memorable nickname which originated from her repeated warnings of what he would get should he venture into trouble.

You might now be thinking, "I get the Mr. and I get the Spanky but why the wind-up robot picture?" Robots are generally cool--especially if they are hurling fire balls and slashing at each other with spinning blades of death. 'nuff said.

You might also be thinking, "Is Mr. Spanky really that old that he was alive during the 1950s? Shouldn't he be dead or at least in a wheelchair with a catheter bag? He probably smells like the monkey on the left-hand-side of the above photo." Simple answer here: no. I'm now thinking that you ask too many questions and probably have homework that you are neglecting.