I Can Explain... Rick Rolling

First appeared in the May 10 issue of Retirement News Weekly

This past weekend, I had a small group of friends visiting. At one point in the evening, one of my friends put on the music video for Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up” and I joked, “Don’t Rickroll yourself!” If you don’t get that joke (or get it and it’s too lame to be funny), then I can explain!

The Rickroll is an internet phenomenon in which a hyperlink is presented as if it leads to an interesting video or website. Once clicked, the link brings the viewer to the music video for Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up.” It is a bait-and-switch online prank and the person who has been tricked to watch the music video is said to have been Rickrolled.

The origins of the Rickroll are well-documented. The phenomenon began on an internet chat board. A discussion would be started with an interesting thread and a provocative picture, but when the link was clicked the viewer was presented with a picture of a duck on wheels and was said to be “Duckrolled.” On the same board, weeks later, a link to an “exclusive video game trailer” led to the Astley music video and history was made!

The choice of song has no significance. It was popular once upon a time, having reached #1 on the charts in Canada, the USA, and the UK in 1987. The video is predominantly Rick Astley swaying side to side (See “Dancing to the Music of the 70s, 80s, and 90s” for more details on this sort of dance) wearing a white shirt or trench coat. Throughout the video, the bartender at the hall where Astley’s dancing does flips and tricks. Ironically, when the video was filmed, the bartender was very hung over. However, Rick and his producer got in a two hour fight and by the time it was over, the bartender had slept off the worst of it. The cause of the fight? Whether Rick should or should not roll up his sleeves!

In April 1, 2008, as an April Fool’s joke, Youtube had all of their videos turn into Rickrolls for the day. This resulted in one newscaster getting Rickrolled on live air. There’s also been a variety of live Rickrolls. During the 2008 Macy Day parade, one float had a bunch of puppet’s singing about imagination. Half-way through the song, Rick Astley burst from the float and performed “Never Gonna Give You Up.” Other examples of the live Rickroll include a group of activists singing it at a protest against the Church of Scientology and a performance of the song by an impersonator prior to an Eastern Washington University woman’s basketball game.

So now you know! If you ever follow a link on Youtube and end up staring into the face of Rick Astley as he serenades you with his voice and wiggling hips, you have officially been Rickrolled! If, instead, you’re wondering why this skinny white man has such a deep, soulful voice... well... I can explain!

Act Your Age... Donating to Charity

First appeared in the March 2, 2011 issue of Retirement News Weekly

There was once a bearded guy who watched as various parishioners entered a temple to make their offering. They were handing over big bucks, but the dude wasn’t impressed. “What are a couple hundred bucks when you have thousands to spare?” he figured. Then this widow comes into the temple. The man watches as she reaches into her purse, pulls out the few dollars she has, and offers them up. It barely makes a difference to this temple’s annual revenue. But the dude’s impressed and he turns to his buddies and says, “That widow gave more to this temple than any of those rich guys.”

When you’re a recent graduate looking for work or a retiree living on a budget, it’s important to remember these sorts of things. Give of yourself what you can because everything is relative. That’s one of the reasons why every couple months I find myself at a Canadian Blood Services (CBS) clinic to donate a pint of blood.

I got the call recently from CBS, while in a grocery store (they always call me while I’m shopping for groceries somehow), and they prompted me to schedule my appointment.

“The sooner the better,” I said and I was booked a week from the day.

The clinic is only down the street, so on the evening of my appointment, I bundled up in my warmest jacket and made my way. I arrived with time to spare and after signing in with the receptionist, I was prompted along the assembly line of blood retrieval. The next stop was a nurse. She made polite small talk before stabbing me in the finger with a pin (well... she used a special contraption that pricks your finger to extract a touch of blood). Because I’m so strong and my blood has lots of iron (I think that’s what high iron means), I was approved and given a questionnaire to fill out.

Have I ever lived in Africa? No. Have I donated blood in Quebec? No. Have I played with monkeys? Only in my dreams (That’s actually one of the questions on the survey!). With the questionnaire filled out, a nurse brought me into a small room and proceeded to ask me a range of more personal questions about past illnesses and my sexual history.

This is the hard part for me. After the questions, the nurse checks your pulse and blood pressure and mine tend to run a little high (I’ve gotten it checked by my doctor and he said I was fine). She strapped me into the contraption and it did its thing. Too high. I was concerned because I’d already come so far and didn’t want to be rejected. They checked it again. Still too high. Finally she said she’d check it manually and thankfully it was just below the maximum. Perfect!

When I was younger I was terrified of needles (I was actually terrified of a lot of things). However I remember the exact moment I got over this fear. I was in junior high school and it was the Hepititis B vaccine. In the past, I had gotten it at the health clinic in order that my “freaking out” would remain confidential between me and my doctor. This time that precaution had been overlooked and suddenly I was going to have my skin pierced in front of all my peers. We were herded to the school’s library and one at a time stepped forward, got our injection from the school nurse, and earned a box of juice. Time stood still as I waited in that line, but that didn’t stop my turn from arriving. What was I going to do? I looked over at the cute girls in my class, stepped forward, and sucked it up. No problem. You do what you have to in order to save face in front of women.

My point is: the needle isn’t a problem for me. It was a small pinch, 11 minutes of slight discomfort, and presto! I was done! I got my cookie, put on my layers of jackets, and headed back out into the snow.

The pint of blood given by any particular donor is separated into three units – plasma, platelets, and red blood cells. These units are then administered to three different patients, each with a unique need: the red blood cells are used to help accident victims, surgical patients or people with anaemia; the platelets help treat leukemia and cancer patients; and the plasma treats patients suffering from burns or shock. Thus, when anyone donates blood, he or she has effectively helped save three lives.

But on a limited budget there are other ways to donate to a worthy cause and that brings me to Heidi Bezanson. As mentioned in the last Act Your Age, Heidi is a friend of mine that brought me to church. This week she donated her hair to charity.

Heidi wanted to shave her head for a while. It’s on her list of things to do before she turns 30. So this month she started raising money for the Stephen Lewis Foundation and luvHaiti in hopes that her upcoming baldness wouldn’t be in vain. She raised over $600 and the day of her shaving finally arrived. After a church service, she sat in a chair that she brought from home and let her friend Sarah Mott cut all the braids off her head. There was only a slight grimace and then a smile on Heidi’s face, as Sarah cut one by one. Then, came the shaving. She took it with high spirits and gave her hair to help!

You too can help! Like the widow in the temple, it doesn’t matter how much you give, but how much of yourself you’re giving. Whether its money or blood or hair, it’s important to contribute and help this human race truck along.

Editor’s Note: If you’re interested in donating blood to CBS, check out their website at www.bloodservices.ca. If you want to know more about Heidi’s balding and the charities she is involved with, check out her blog at heidisheadshaving.blogspot.com. And if you want to suggest a retirement activity for me to try, email me at jeffdeviller@gmail.com.

I Can Explain... Wikipedia

Originally published on February 25, 2011 in Retirement News Weekly

Google any word right now: retirement, beagles, existentialism. It doesn’t really matter what the word is. What you’ll likely find as one of your top three search results is an entry from Wikipedia. This collection of editable information has increasingly been used as a go-to source for quick explanations and understanding. But what is it, is it reliable, and what do its detractors say? In my own sort of Wikipedia entry-with attitude... I can explain!

Let’s start with the word itself. Wikipedia is a combination of the words “encyclopaedia” and “wiki.” We all know what an encyclopaedia is, but what, you may ask, is a wiki? And is it at all similar to a kiwi?

A wiki is a particular type of website that allows any user to edit its content. I’ve seen it used by businesses to compile schedules and stories; as well, I’ve seen it used in classrooms where a teacher may have his students create a wiki collectively with all the information they learned in class (Thanks, Professor Bradley!).

Wikipedia is just a very popular online encyclopaedia in wiki form. It was launched in 2001 as an experiment and now contains over 17 million articles in multiple languages. These articles were written by average people across the world and are corrected and edited by anyone with access to the internet. The theory is that with so many editors balancing out information, the ‘truth’ will be revealed. Users are strongly encouraged to cite their sources and uncited information is flagged as requiring further research. However the site does not leave it up entirely to its users and hires teams of individuals that oversee software which is ensures that entries are not edited for the purpose of mockery or misinformation. This team also can lock certain entries to prevent any editing if the entry is controversial and a target for vandalism.

One example of this is a stunt pulled by Stephen Colbert, a popular TV-personality and satirist, in 2006. On his show he explained how Wikipedia has created a kind-of “wikiality” in which anyone can edit and post information on the website and if enough people agree, the new information becomes a sort of digital truth. He changed his own Wikipedia post, George Washington’s, and then encouraged his viewers to edit posts about elephants. He wanted them to say that the population of elephants has tripled in the last six months. By changing it on Wikipedia, it would become reality he declared to playfully mock the idea of truth in an editable age. Twenty different articles were edited within the hour and Colbert was blocked from the site.

Critics of Wikipedia say that since the information is often edited by average people and not experts, it is not accurate or reliable. Others say the site focuses too much on Popular Culture, with 30% of its articles on culture and the arts and 15% on biographies; comparatively only 2% of the articles are on health and 2% are on religion. Conservapedia is similar to Wikipedia in format. However it claims that Wikipedia has a left-wing biased. It presents its articles with a very distinctive American-Conservative spin.

Whether you’re getting your information from television, books, or sites like Wikipedia it’s good that you’re at least trying to stay informed and I applaud you. While the site may not always be accurate, it has made information accessible and allowed for user generated content and editing. This development means we can all contribute to a better understanding of the world around us and that can’t be too bad.