Fleetwood Mac has been one of my favourite bands for a little while now and Rumours has been in heavy rotation on my stereo. While I've owned Fleetwood Mac's self-titled 1975 album for a couple months now, I didn't really start appreciating it until last night. Rumours is a fabulous album, a classic album--one that, sadly, tends to eclipse the rest of the band's stunning ouevre.

Last night, Fleetwood Mac's Fleetwood Mac was given a closer listen. There are, of course, the well-known goodies "Rhiannon," "Say You Love Me," "World Turning" and "Landslide." Truly, though, the gem of the album is the Lindsey Buckingham-penned track "I'm So Afraid." All biases aside (I admit, I think Lindsay Buckingham--then and now--is so sexy. He's got the whole tortured artist thing going on; I get the sense that he never really got over Stevie Nicks), those guitar solos are sex itself: sensuous, melancholy--beautiful.

Conversely, I'm still not thrilled with Blogger's performance as of late. Changes are taking days to publish. Other items that have been removed are re-appearing at random. I don't know. Maybe I should give Blogger the benefit of the doubt. Maybe it's a problem with my browser? Maybe you readers could give me a hand: give me a ShoutOut if you've been experiencing Blogger troubles of your own.

In the "Bad News" column, Canada has slipped to eigth on the U.N.'s Human Development Index despite still ranking first as far as life expectancy goes (79 years). This is extremely disappointing (we were first on the index from 1992 to 2000, slipping to third on the 2001 index), though not surprising. The reasons for our demotion: the absolutely atrocious treatment of the Canadian First Nations, the education system (I'm not sure what the U.N. thinks is wrong, but I know it's poorly funded!) and a lower gross domestic product per capita.

What's especially devastating about the 2002 Human Development Index is that the bottom twenty-five countries are all in Africa. Proof once again that that whole continent doesn't receive nearly enough aid.

And now we move on to the truly absurd... A California-based environmentalist group is calling for a boycott of the 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver because the games coincide with the seal hunt on the other side of the country!

Now, as an animal lover, I'm opposed to the seal hunt, but I question as to how exactly an environmentalist group will save seals by boycotting the Olympics. It's not like they have any clout in the first place--they weren't participating in the Games or anything. It's more likely that this little-known group is merely looking for a way to elevate its profile.

Their site even claims that the B.C. government is "calling for a slaughter of seals and sea lions"! What sensational bull shit! There isn't a seal hunt on the West coast! And the B.C. government is not calling for one. If they were, don't you think that the bigger organizations like P.E.T.A. and Greenpeace would have been all over it?!

Grrr... Propagandists piss me off.