Smells Like Yukon Flog

How many times has your vote helped to elect some government or 6th grade class president who subsequently went crazy with power? And how many times have you wished you could have a “do-over?” You know, a chance to go back, change your vote and possibly the fate of the world? Probably lots, especially if you live in the States.

Now, try to rememeber the last time that government or despotic gradeschooler selflessly re-opened the polls to grant you a second chance. It never happens.

This is just one reason why Smells Like Yukon is better than democracy. Just in time for the weekend cold snap, we’re happy to announce that all our online polls have been reopened in perpetuity.

Why, we asked ourselves, should we deny the democratic rights of those who never had a chance to vote the first time around? More importantly, we wanted to give everyone else the opportunity to reconsider their stupid choices.

For example, do you truly respect Larry Bagnell more than the guy who drives a honey bucket? Is writing a nasty letter to the editor really the best way to fend off a vicious attack by a plushy on a rampage? And if vomiting on Main Street was your favourite Yukon extreme sport last spring, have you matured enough to change your answer to “radio bingo?” We’d like to know.

When we first launched the Smells Like Yukon website, the SLY IT department decided to implement a cost-effective Google Analytics solution in order to track the thousands–no, make that millions–of visitors who would flock to the site. We actually had a whopping budget for this project, no thanks to Yukon government Strategic Industires funding but rather due to Jesse’s tireless part-time work as a charwoman. Nevertheless, we decided to go with the totally free solution (aside from the whole “selling your soul to Google” hidden cost), and reallocate the analytics budget to the purchase of the highest quality free stock photos the Internet has to offer.

Well, our investment has paid off. After some rigorous analysis, we have some interesting insight into who visits this site and why. We won’t get into all the details right now, but we would like to share one intriguing trend.

Between September 1 and today, almost 6% of visits to the Smells Like Yukon site came from Bulgaria. And the bounce rate (i.e. the number of visitors who left the site immediately) was far less than 100%. All of our Bulgarian “fans” were being directed to the site from www.yukonadvertising.com, another URL in the SLY stable, and every one of them arrived at www.yukonadvertising.com through a keyword search for “yukon advertising” on Google’s Bulgarian portal.

Naturally, we were a bit confused. The first thing we thought was that Tourism Yukon might have decided that Bulgaria would be the next hot market for dog mushing adventures or shagging under the northern lights, and had bombarded the poor Bulgarian population with Larger than Lifish promotional materialism, as if those poor people hadn’t suffered enough during 50 years of Communist rule. This was not the case.

We kept digging and, after a crash course in the Bulgarian language, finally discovered that there’s a company in Sofia, Bulgaria called “Yukon Advertising” which has been routinely advertising job openings through Bulgaria’s primary online job search site. Naturally, some job seekers search for the company online using its name, which brings up our www.yukonadvertising.com listing at the very top of the search listings (an optimization achieved entirely without the high-priced help of a certain local SEO “expert”.) Unfortunately for most Bulgarians, their minimal grasp of English means that they have to click and wail their way around the Smells Like Yukon site for quite a while before they finally figure out that the site isn’t much use to them, if anyone.

It was a little deflating to the ego, but at least the mystery is finally solved.

For the most recent Smells Like Yukon segment, Mark and Jesse paid a visit to the Yutopia Bar & Grill located at the corner of fourth and Main in downtown Whitehorse. There, they talked to a handful of patrons about the Yukon and whether or not it qualified as a Yutopia. And somehow, they then managed to turn this brief research into a radio story that lasted almost seven minutes, not to mention a “Behind the Sounds” account that ran on waaaaaaaaaay toooooooooooo looooooooooong.

You’d think that, somewhere in all that writing, they might have at least mentioned the quality of the food or the state of the bathrooms in Yutopia. But no, Mark and Jesse completely overlooked these things.

However, Mark returned to Yutopia today for the first time and was pleased to report that the food was excellent. His LDCs (Lovely Dining Companions) from the Flipper Lunch Club generally concurred. In this Yutopia there’s a place for something called an Eggplant Burger, which was apparently quite good. Perhaps the most intriguing menu option was a $22 item called the Yutopian Manwich featuring beef, chicken and… wait for it… pork. Unfortunately, a spending cap prevented Mark from making child’s play out of the Manwich.

Mark was equally impressed by the friendly service from Len (who didn’t seem to remember him from their interview) and the cleanly state of the washroom, which may have had something to do with the fact that none of the other Flipper Lunch Club members got in there before him.

At this point, we’d like to state for the record that Smells Like Yukon did not receive any sort of kickback for providing this favourable “review” of Yutopia, unlike a certain other Yukonish publication we could mention but won’t… because we have class.

Thanks to everyone who made last night’s online vigil, Vigiliante, such a huge success. Local numbers were a little lower than expected, even with 73 people crammed around one tiny 13.5 inch laptop screen at Mark’s house. But that was to be expected: our cause faced some tough competition from the final preview for the Guild Hall’s production of Laughter on the 23rd Floor.

It’s odd how some people can think of comedy when there’s so much injustice in Whitehorse City Hall. There was certainly no laughter around here, especially when some jackass accidentally set fire to some wooden venetian blinds. Those things don’t seem all that flammable, so we’re thinking it might have been deliberate.

All in all, Vigilante was a very solemn and dignified affair, at least until Hank Karr managed to hack into our South African satellite feed and spoil the mood. On the other hand, we were particularly pleased with the great turn-out at Graceland.

As many of you probably know, Elvis was a huge fan of the Canada Winter Games volunteer jacket. In fact, he would have worn one of his seven jackets (some sources suggest he had as many as 10) for his 1973 “Aloha from Hawaii” concert, but Colonel Parker vetoed the idea at the last minute. (If only he’d vetoed Elvis’ choice of film roles, history might have turned out much different.)

So, when Elvis fans heard the news that the photo of George Bush and Stephen Harper hadn’t made the cut for the City of Whitehorse’s Gameswear Where? Gallery, they didn’t hold out much hope that a classic image of the King with his beloved CWG orange jacket would ever make the grade. Hence, their sad participation in Vigilante. (Note: We hope to be able to share that classic Elvis image with you in the Subvert Smells Like Yukon Alternative Gameswear Where? Gallery in the very near future.)

In the meantime, you’re welcome to check out the Vigilante documentary. Thanks to the miracle of Youtube, we’ve put together a presentation that will hopefully give you a sense of what it was like to be part of this amazing global experience.

It’s funny–well, actually, it’s not so funny–that today is the anniversary of JFK’s assassination. You know how people say they can remember exactly where they were and what they were doing when the President was shot in 1963? Well, you’re about to feel the same damn way.

There has been another change to our candlelight vigil. “It sounds too wussy,” Mark decided. “Let’s call it ‘Vigilante.’” So, there it is: the final word on the matter.

Our marketing / event planning consultant–who has been to Lollapalooza one time too many–has insisted we re-brand this evening’s plain old candlelight vigil with a weirder and catchier name. So, we give you, reluctantly… Vigilicious.

Unfortunately, all our marketing collateral has already been prepared, and at considerable expense, so we’ll be asking Vigilicious participants who encounter the original branding (or lack thereof) to mentally substitute the new, marketing-approved branding in its place. We appreciate your cooperation and regret any inconvenience this may cause.

The date, time and location of the event remain unchanged. As planned, Vigilicious will take place this evening at 8:05 p.m. (PST) sharp at the Smells Like Yukon Vigil Page. If you plan to attend, we encourage you to light a candle. If you’ll be taking advantage of this balmy November weather to flame broil some meat on the barbecue, we’ll understand–but at least pause a moment to think of our cause. While you’re at it, have a beer. After all, we’re not trying to save the world. We’re just trying to win the freedom of one lousy digital photo.

Mandela would be proud.

After a dimly-lit and soft-spoken meeting last night, the Smells Like Yukon Vigil Sub-Committee has decided to hold a candlelight vigil tomorrow evening. Why? As if it’s not totally obvious, the vigil will mark the one-week anniversary of the City of Whitehorse’s failure to add the image by our own Fritzie Berkwissmier to its Gameswear Where? Gallery, even after promising–in writing, we might add–that this would occur imminently.

We know this is short notice, but we hope many of you will be able to attend this brief but important event. Through our awesome display of unity, strength and solemn resolve, we can hopefully send a message to the City that this injustice must be come to an end. If nothing else, it will be opportunity to share our grief.

In order to make your attendance as painless as possible, we’ll actually be holding the candlelight vigil online at the Smells Like Yukon website. You might want to head to the candlelight vigil URL right now for more details and to bookmark the page to expedite your return tomorrow night.

Now that we’re dialed into this whole Flickr thing for the Subvert Smells Like Yukon Alternative Gameswhere? Gallery, our in-house photo guru has suggested we create a second group. This one might have a bit more appeal to the Photoshop-challenged, who haven’t exactly innundated our first group with doctored images of Canada Games volunteer jackets in compromising situations. (If submissions don’t pick up soon, our effort will start to look almost as sad and pathetic as the City’s. Perish the thought!)

Anyway, back to our latest debacle-in-waiting. Our entire empire–the radio series, the website, the top-secret puppy mill–is branded around the Yukon and something that supposedly smells like it, so we said to ourselves: “Why not assemble the world’s smelliest collection of Yukon photographs?”

You can take a literal interpretation if you like, or you can recognize this as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to revisit your digital photo library and regard its contents in a whole new non-light, focusing on how your images might evoke powerful and familiar Yukon smells. We say “once-in-a-lifetime” because you can bet your ass that no one but Smells Like Yukon would ever be dumb enough to dream this scheme up, let alone admit to it in public.

If it’s the charred remnants of that Avril Lavigne CD case your stoner boyfriend threw in the bonfire during last year’s grad party at Pine Lake, so be it. If it means your last trip to the Whitehorse landfill with a truckload of second-hand Pampers, we want to see/smell it, too. Hell, if it means you have to wait a couple of years for the construction of a brand-new smoky mesquite crematorium in Porter Creek, we’ll be waiting with baited breath. No, make that “with our breath held.” Pleasant smells are OK, too.

But, that’s not all. It never is. Depending on the response, we could eventually leverage the awesome power of our collective photos, the Smells Like Yukon brand, and on-demand printing through CafePress (or some equivalent) in order to do some good in the world. (This would be a first for Smells Like Yukon.) How would we all accomplish this good? By establishing the first ever Smells Like Yukon Co-Op Store, with all proceeds donated to local charity.

It all starts right now, right here, with the Smells Like Yukon Scratch n’ Sniff Gallery.

Oops. Sorry, it all begins right here.

Somewhere in the Smells Like Yukon universe, a cool cat named Chairman Meow better double up on his or her serving of Tender Vittles. It’s going to take some serious head scratching for Mr. Meow to come up with more timely or captivating captions than the following entries submitted to Caption Contest #10 by another contender last night:

“Worried about what anti-sled-dog extremists might think, Murray Lundberg begins to walk his dog with him wherever he goes.”

“After setting the world record for the longest snowmobile ramp jump, Ross Mercer decides to celebrate by purchasing a new toboggan for his legless dog, Bombardier.”

However, we are deeply saddened to report that the individual who submitted these captions also prefaced them with this observation: “A great picture for the caption contest. I bet framed copies would sell well at the Gallery of the Midnight Sun or YAAW.” We at Smells Like Yukon, like many of you who smell like Yukon, find this remark highly insulting to the Yukon arts community. For the record, it is NOT our policy to poke fun at the Yukon’s cultural sector

Turning once again to verbally fluff our latest contestant, we’re pleased to certify that these entries we’re received before news leaked that Smells Like Yukon co-star Mark Koepke was considering augmenting the contest’s long-standing stupid prize with the even stupider bonus prize of the 1985 Subaru GL parked in his driveway. If Mark does decide to step up, it shouldn’t cost the winner more than about $75 to have it towed.

Keep your entries coming. But, please–make sure you also spare some time for the Subvert Smells Like Yukon Alternative Gameswear Where? Gallery. Your unelected officials are counting on you.

Well, it looks like we may have been too hasty in our decision not to be hasty about assuming the City of Whitehorse wouldn’t publish the beautiful Fritzie Berkwissmier image of Mark assaulting George Bush and Stephen Harper with a hockey stick. As of 2:30 p.m. today, the image still has not appeared in the Official Gameswear Where? Gallery and, after the very kind auto-kind reponse our submission received from the City’s servers late last night, no human bureaucrat has had the decency to follow-up with a grateful acknowledgement of our contribution.

So, until further notice, it’s “Game on!” for the Subvert Smells Like Yukon Gameswear Where? Gallery at Flickr. No rush on your submissions, though. We plan to keep this feature around until the very last Canada winter Games volunteer jacket has a found a home on the back of a Ladhakian, sherpa, pygmy, bushman, Sami or Romanian gypsy.