Smells Like Yukon Flog

In the last segment of the previous season, Smells Like Yukon paid a visit to Yukon’s Medical Officer of Health to ask about some of the most dangerous activities in the Yukon. In the finished piece, we did highlight a number of serious dangers associated with the way Yukoners approach sex, alcohol and ATVs. But, for the most part, we tried to put a humourous twist on the exercise–for example, by naming Man Yoga and watching TV in Lobird as two of the most dangerous activities. The following bit also seemed kind of funny, if only half-joking:

“We were ready… with a barrage of questions about other life threatening activities. Like trying to use a crosswalk on 2nd Avenue….”

Given the events of the past week–a young Alberta woman killed doing this very thing–any humour has been completely lost. This is one of those situations where you wish that an effort at satire could have fallen way off the mark; instead, it seems to have hit the truth head-on.

As bad as we should all feel for the victim and her family, Whitehorse drivers shouldn’t be too quick to judge the person behind the wheel, whose life, you’d imagine, has been destroyed in an entirely different sense. You don’t have to spend much time driving in the Yukon’s capital, and down 2nd Avenue in particular, to realize that 90% of local drivers should be saying “There but for the grace of God….” How many of us aren’t guilty of driving down 2nd Avenue with excessive speed, impatience or carelessness on a fairly regular basis?

Clearly, Smells Like Yukon’s attempt to raise a serious issue in a not-so serious way didn’t do much to make the crosswalks on Whitehorse’s busiest street any safer. We can only hope that a tragedy can finally succeed where comedy failed.

There’s a serious need for Yukon drivers to take a more vigilant approach behind the wheel. Collectively, we’ve been too cavalier for too long. It’s time to smarten up. And until that happens, pedestrians beware.

Like many CBC Yukon listeners, we learned this morning that Sandi Coleman, the long-time host of the morning show, will be vacating her chair for television reporter Al Foster, effective September 2. Sandi will take over Al’s duties in television.

Sandi has always given Smells Like Yukon good intro, and pretty good extro as well, so she’s certainly going to be missed by us. On the other hand, we look forward to the added testosterone that Al will lend to Smells Like Yukon over the coming season.

The SLY series has always been masuline fare–kind of like a collection of Hemingway stories. Some of last season’s pieces, you may recall, featured explosions, foul language, animal abuse and other stuff that men seem to value in popular entertainment. We can only see these aspects being enhanced in the future, as each segment is bookended by banter from a more manly host.

In other news, the production of segments for Season 3 is now well underway and, before long, we should be posting a broadcast schedule to the website.

We’re pleased to let our readers know that Blog-o-tronic has completed its overhaul of the Flog in less time than anticipated. In fact, the project was completed so quickly, and so far under budget, that we were able to re-allocate some resources to our long-delayed Guest Book. I’m sure some of the names will be familiar to many of you; we hope to add many more as the Flog continues to flourish and mature.

Thanks again to everyone who has taken the time to send us e-mails, especially during our recent difficulties with feudin’ and editorial transition. Now that we’ve sanitized our Archives, we’ll turn our attention to determing what kind of middle-of-the-road boring material we’d like to bring our readers in the future.

But if you can’t wait until we get our act together, please drop us a line. We’d be happy to recommend some alternate sources for middle-of-the-road boring material that should hold you over for the interim.

Smells Like Yukon is pleased to announce that it has secured the services of a dot com start-up called Blog-o-tronic Inc. to assist with the overhaul of the Flog.

In case you haven’t received the latest issue of Wired, Blog-o-tronic offers a revolutionary online technology that will systematically revise a blog archive to remove any appearance that the blog was ever written by a disgraced former employee. We’d like to give you more information about how this service actually works, but Blog-o-tronic doesn’t have a website.

Blog-o-tronic has been working its way through the Flog Archives starting from June 2007, and has already managed to erase any evidence of the Flogger Who Shall Remain Nameless up until the end of May 2008. The months between June 2008 and the present marked a busy period for the Flog, with no shortage of personal-style writing about urine ponchos, hairballs, grizzlies and gay bears, among other things, so the process will be more difficult and slower going forward. We hope you’ll be patient and offer the occasional kind word of support.

Some of you who have left comments on the Flog may also want to revisit them from time to time. Blog-o-tronic’s algorithm is still in Delta Tau Chi beta phase and has, on occasion, been known to produce changes that suddenly put comments in hilarious new contexts.

Our apologies in advance.

It is with no regret that Smells Like Yukon announces the departure of its Media & Public Relations Officer and Flogger-in-Chief.

While Jesse Devost, co-creator of the Smells Like Yukon radio series, has always distanced himself from our former Flogger, it is only in the past week that his behaviour has forced Mark Koepke to conclude that he must now do the same.

Until further notice, The Flog will be maintained by the Smells Like Yukon Editorial Board. While we conduct a throrough review of the Flog and all its content, readers can look forward to a kinder, gentler Flog, with a stronger focus on the radio series and related news. In the future, we hope that reading it will be more like being licked by puppies than, say, clawed by a gay bear. We hope this isn’t too disappointing to some readers who have been enjoying the spicier version of the Flog.

Our sincerest apologies to any readers we may have misled during the GooglePorn controversy–and to Murray, especially, for showing such maturity throughout the ordeal.

As some of you may be aware, the Smells Like Yukon Flog was recently accused of manipulating content to attract unsavoury high-yield Google ads.

We now wish to vigorously defend Smells Like Yukon against these outrageous allegations. And, honestly, we don’t care how many low-cost prescriptions for Viagra, Cialis, Levitra, Yohimbine or any other erectile dysfunction pharmaceuticals it takes to get the job done.

First off, let us emphasize that the Flog is written primarily for our own entertainment. It’s also used to disseminate (pardon the keyword) the occasional bit of news about the Smells Like Yukon radio series. As a result, the Flog receives only a handful of visitors every day—mostly from the Whitehorse Correctional Centre, mental asylums in southern Canada, confused Bulgarians, and YTG employees. If the Accuser (hereinafter “Silly Old Men”) believes that the Flog receives enough traffic—and stupid click-happy traffic, at that—to make the publishing of Google Ads (pornographic or otherwise) a profitable venture, he is sorely mistaken.

Furthermore, we were not even aware that Google Adsense serves pornographic ads—and, upon investigation, have been unable to confirm that this is so. In any case, we think Silly Old Men will be challenged to find any porn ads on this site.

We should also clarify that it was never our intention to attract pornographic ads. Rather, we were trying to attract ads for dating sites targeting hairy gay men. (If Silly Old Men can’t distinguish the difference between “porn” and “gay,” there’s not much we can do about that.) We did this not because we had any sense of the lucrative nature of clicks on text ads related to the romantic lives of hairy gay men, but because the idea amused us. Also, we found the man on the GayBear homepage kind of sexy.

While we’re at it, we might as well re-state for the record that we are NOT—and never have been—paid to blog about our acclaimed Grizzly Project. In fact, we think the owner of the Flying Pisces would probably be happier if we cancelled the project altogether. He’s scared of bears. And we mean the real ones, not the ones that seem to get Silly Old Men so hot and bothered. Nor, we might add, are we motivated by financial concerns to blog ad nauseum on other nonsensical subjects.

The shocking truth is, content (if not substance) always trumps commercial considerations when it comes to the Flog. We know this may seem hard to believe, especially for Silly Old Men who have no shame about flagrantly shilling all manner of schlocky electronics, travel deals, online get-rich schemes and other garbage through their blog posts. But that’s the way it is.

Perhaps Silly Old Men will read this explanation and find it wanting. Alas, what are Silly Old Men to do?

Well, we’ve now posted a warning that will hopefully keep them from stumbling too deep into the disgusting quagmire that is the Flog. But for those Silly Old Men who just can’t help themselves, we suggest you simply read the Flog with quiet contempt—you know, like everyone else.

We’d now like to take a momentary pause from feudin’ in order to call your attention to something that’s actually worth reading.

While researching a blog post about alternative wilderness activities, we came across an Up Here article on nude hiking. We then noticed a superb blog post by the article’s author, Tim Querengesser.

Some of you may remember Tim as a Yukon News reporter who took off to spend a year reporting from Africa. (Or maybe he was really at a secret Marsh Lake gulag building illegal docks for B&Rs.) He has since landed in Yellowknife, where he continues to churn out some of the most engaging writing about the North. In fact, if there’s anyone who writes better about the North, we haven’t found him or her–although fellow Up Here contributor Katharine Sandiford could give him a run for his money.

So, if you’re looking for an online source of quality northern writing, no need to wait for What’s Up Yukon to post its next issue to its website. Head to the Up Here blog and get a taste of the good stuff. Seriously.

It’s no longer enough that we simply respond to the insensitive comment left by one of the Flog’s visitors yesterday. We now feel the need to enlist the participation of more sinister forces… like the FBI and CIA.

As a result, the Smells Like Yukon Flog will be offline for approximately six hours while we complete the amendment of all previous comments by Murray to read like jihadist diatribes against America.

Your patience is appreciated.

We were so shocked by yesterday’s unprovoked online assault that we couldn’t come up with a reply–at least not before a reader who calls him(her?)self “The Hedgehog” managed to nose his way into the Comments.

If we had been a little quicker off the draw, we might have posted something along the following lines:

1. Your feedack is appreciated–almost as much as your assistance with increasing the number of times the word “porn” appears on our site.
2. Let’s not fight here. Meet you at GayBear in 10 minutes?
3. The failure to deploy your cherished smiley-face emoticon suggests that your comment was submitted in earnest. Please come again!
4. We are saddened to learn of your dislike for the Flog. Others seem to really enjoy it. Just yesterday, a reader named Meembedia dropped by SIX times to say “I have been reading this blog for some time now but never bothered to comment until today. Wanted to let you know that I am a fan and enjoy your work.”
5. If we really wanted to pad the Flog with salacious search terms, don’t you think we’d have made more frequent use of the word dolphin?
6. Sweetheart, let’s try to remember the good times.
7. If we ever receive a cheque from Google Adsense, we’ll eat an entire issue of a certain Yukon entertainment publication. Yes, yes, we know it’s probably healthier than the usual method of consumption, but it’s still pretty unpleasant.

We could have come up with, like, 10 ways, but we have real work to do.

You’d think we’d submitted our request on Wal-Mart letterhead covered in grease stains from McDonald’s. But it was through a polite, albeit last-minute, face-to-face meeting that Smells Like Yukon asked the organizers of the regular Fireweed Community Market if they might be willing, just this once, to relocate the Thursday event from Shipyards Park to Drift Drive in Copper Ridge.

“Give us one good reason,” they said.

Before Mark could answer, they added that a grizzly sow and cubs had recently been spotted in the area.

“So, you already know the reason,” Mark replied, snottily.

That’s when he was asked to leave.

We doubt the Fireweed Market people know or care that they’re prolonging the disappointment of our devoted Grizzly Project audience. They may try to justify their craven decision on the basis of safety concerns, but don’t be fooled: ruthless and naked mercantilism is the force behind the organization’s stance on this issue, as it is on most. In protest, we’re going to take a pass on this week’s visit to the market to enjoy our usual pig-out on Flying Pisces fish and chips.

In a somewhat related note, Mark reports that when he rode Boogaloo on Sunday, hoping to come across a certain special someone along the way, he and his riding companion encountered a black bear and two cubs instead. And no, that’s not code for a large, hairy gay African-American with a pair of midget lovers. We mean real bears.

Indeed, they are out in force this summer.