PRESS RELEASE: United States Vice President Elect J.D. Vance To Be Appointed as Mayor of the Ontario City of Wa Wa

Wa Wa, Ontario, Canada: 29December2024: Spoof New Services: It was announced today that Vice President Elect of the United States of America, J.D. Vance will be appointed by the unnamed Governor of Canada State, thought to be Wayne Gretzky, as the new mayor of the Ontario city Wa Wa in early in February 2025.

Vice President Elect Vance expressed his delight with his upcoming appointment stating as Wa Wa was the site of the birthplace of Canadian statehood and the present capital of the republic of Manitoba his upcoming appointment will have an enormous historical impact. Vance stated the following upon attending a Proud Boys Reunion at an undisclosed Washington pizzeria, “It is an honour to accept this appointment to a city that powers the Canadian economy. Our presence in Wa Wa will solidify the enormous pride all Canadians share as a result of becoming the 51st state of the United States. My first act of administration of Wa Wa will be to offer an amnesty to all residents convicted of chowing down on dogs and cats. Wa Wa will be the pride of the 51st state of the United States, Canada State and it is the intention of federal and state governments that Wa Wa be the capital of Canada State. Once Canada State Governor Wayne Gretzky is sworn in as Governor of Canada State details of a grand inauguration will be announced.”

RKS 2025 Wine: Is this Chilean La Junta Carménère Stomping About in a Militaristic Fashion?

Junta is an unfortunate name for a Chilean winery considering the brutal dictatorship of General Pinochet and his junta buddies in 1973 Chile leading to the overthrow and murder of democratically elected Salvador Allende. Thousands of Chileans were tortured, murdered or simply “disappeared”.

Putting aside the unsavory connotations of junta in this wine’s name let’s give it a try.

Aroma: As befitting Chilean Carménère redolent with raspberry. Also blueberry, black cherry, strawberry and some mocha.

Palate: Low in the tannin tank. Firm structure ring fencing much of the fruit from the palate. Short finish.

Personality: If one can compare military decorations to the bouquet of the wine like General Pinochet this wine would have a chest full of hardware. But as for what is in the mouth perhaps send the winemaker for interrogation.

Food Match: A “Friday night wine” a code word for less than a stellar wine. Pizza, burgers or burritos.

Cellarbility: Drink in 2025.

Price: $14 CDN.

RKS 2025 Wine Rating: 85/100. jamessuckling.com 91.

(La Junta 2022 Reserve Carménère, Curicó Valley, Viña La Junta, Santiago, Chile, 750 mL, 13.5%).

The Penniless Pensioner: Misaligned, Maligned but Marvellous (The Final Version): Chapter 24: Reading John Lennon’s Tea Leaves: Yoko Ono’s Stuttering and Screeching

Being half Welsh and half Indian my bloodline was comfortable with high tea. I walked to the Plaza Hotel, well known for its high tea, and bought their incredible jasmine tea and some dainty cakes and sandwiches from the iconic Palm Room.

John arrived at my “pad” at 2 p.m. and we sat down to tea but not before hearing a litany of complaints about Yoko’s “stuttering and screeching vocals”. John explained it was giving him a headache! John mentioned that after our tea he would be heading down to Nashville to help a Canadian singer Stompin’ Tom Connors lay down a track “Maple Syrup and Peameal Bacon Hogtown Paradise”.

Canada’s beloved Stompin’ Tom Connors

I asked John to sprinkle a few leaves from the teapot basket in his cup. Turn it upside down in the saucer and turn it around one time while making a wish. Before giving me his cup I asked John if he wanted to hear both good and bad news. He replied that both were fine.

His wish would come true. There was a big sitar in his cup so out of the blue I asked if he had been chatting with Ravi Shankar. See what I mean by luck as he responded he had been talking with Shankar about a show in New York a few days ago. What disturbed me was a menacing figure in the darkness holding what appeared to be a sign with the initials H.C. Beside the sign there was a vehicle resembling an ambulance. John could not make any connections to H.C. and an ambulance. I explained based on my reading of the tea leaves in his cup careful of hot and cold water lest it lead to an accident. We both had a good laugh and he headed down the hall to his unit thanking me for the wonderful tea and dainties and my “powerful mysticism”. The H.C. and the ambulance began to make sense on December 8th.

PRESS RELEASE: Donald J. Trump to be Appointed as Governor General of Canada

President Elect Trump Appointed Governor General of Canada

Spoof Wire Services: 27December2024: Ottawa, Ontario: Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister Soon to Be Unelected announced today the Government of Canada has appointed President Elect Donald Trump as Governor General of Canada who will therefore become His Majesty’s representative in the Government of Canada.

Prime Minster Trudeau expressed confidence in President Elect Trump’s upcoming role as Governor General of Canada as fulfilling President Elect Trump’s longstanding desire to be recognized as royalty.

President Elect Trump expressed his appreciation of the appointment stating this will facilitate in a backward vertical integration of the United Kingdom as the 52cnd state of the United States.

Mr. Trump in a moment of gratitude repeated his offer to make Prime Minister Trudeau the Governor of Canada State the 51st state of the United States but made this offer conditional on Canada transferring all rights to its water to the United States to Eric Trump Enterprises.

President Elect Trump stated, “The United States has been subsidizing Canada to the tune of $100 gazillion dollars annually. It is payback time to recognize the generosity of the United States. I love to make “the deal” and Canada and the United States are winners here. We will start with your water to supply our water starved country and make Canadians’ lives easier as with less they will live a simpler life.”

Peter Polinever and Jag Bing leaders of the Canadian Conservative Party and Never Democrats Party were not available as spokespersons for their offices stated both were enjoying an all-inclusive vacation at Guantanamo Bay with its pristine beaches, excellent hot dogs in tomato sauce and a full range of waterboarding sports.

RKS Literature: The Sea Dictates Everything

“By the time we were off Livingston, any hope of getting into the harbour was out of the question. The entrance to Livingston Harbour is shallow with a series of low lying rocks directly in front of it. Even in calm weather you had to know your way in, as many a visiting sailor had discovered in the past. In these conditions any attempt to enter the harbour would be an act of insanity and we would almost certainly lose our lives in the process. So near and yet so far, but that’s the nature of sailing – the sea dictates everything.”

Bryce Courtenay, “Brother Fish”, 2004.

The Penniless Pensioner: Misaligned, Maligned but Marvellous (The Final Version):Chapter 23: Strolling Central Park with John Lennon: Getting Shivers from Chapmans

I met John Lennon in the lobby of the Dakota for his “guided tour” of Central Park. John explained to me the media was constantly on his tail as an ex-Beatle. We had a choice of a few service exits and slipped out to a bright spring day and headed into the park. John had put his hair in a ponytail, was wearing sunglasses and a baseball cap so he simply looked like any other celebrity New Yorker. We walked undisturbed from one end of Central Park to the other. The lagoon, the zoo, the promenade, the baseball fields and hot chestnuts. Those warm honey coated peanuts were fantastic. John had a chuckle about the carts selling Nathan franks saying he had been dinged badly eating a chili dog from a cart a few years ago. The “unpleasant poopies” he recounted with a grimace on his face.

John explained to me that he was happy to have befriended me as most people simply wanted to bask in his aura or exploit him for some purpose. He never forgot his humble days in Liverpool with Tony Sheridan, George and Paul. Vanished were the days of anonymity. The price of fame. And they were attacking Yoko Ono mercilessly in the media labelling her as the breaker upper of the Beatles. As much as New York was bad for John he was addicted by its vibes but confessed he felt a bit like a prisoner in the cell of his Dakota pad. I offered him the use of my compound in Bombay and with its grounds he and Yoko could feel less like they wee inhabiting a prison. John thanked me and said he would think about it.

John showed me the Met and the Guggenheim and suggested when I have some time that I should go there. He avoided these museums as there were so many British tourists he felt he would be “outed”. At 5th and 92 we stopped at the Jewish Museum of New York and headed downstairs to the cafeteria for some lox and bagels. John loved the cafeteria for its good food and lack of tourists.

We returned to the Dakota and John asked me to join him for some ice cream. Yoko had a strange looking woman visitor called Yayoi Kusama dressed in equal parts doll and a clown. John told me she was a famous Japanese artist. We had some of John’s favourite ice cream from Toronto. It was Chapman’s a brand I knew well but that name Chapman suddenly sent shivers up and down my spine. Strange. Did I sense something foreboding? I thanked John for his hospitality and asked him if I could read his tea leaves at a low tea I would host. My granny in India Sula had taught me the skill. Essentially it was a question of luck meeting the obvious. On occasion I was spot on. It was set up for high tea at my place the next Saturday. John said that after that he was flying to Nashville for a recording session.

The Penniless Pensioner: Misaligned, Maligned but Marvellous (The Final Version): Chapter 22: My Stint in New York Begins with a John Lennon Friendship

I arrived at New York’s Port Authority somewhat bleary eyed from my 10-hour overnight bus trip from Montreal. US immigration at the New York State border crossing had, due to “immigration falsehoods”, hauled off some twenty of the Amish on the bus returning them to Canada causing a two-hour delay.

That cherry pie at the Saratoga Springs rest stop was almost worth the delay!

I proceeded to the United Mutations headquarters near the corner of 43rd and Third Avenue more or less adjacent to the United Nations where I met United Mutations representative Melanie Stumps. Stumps was kind enough to arrange for my lodging at the International Hostel for Mutants way up in the 90’s in Harlem. Stumps advised me I had two weeks to find alternative lodgings before I started my United Mutation’s assignment. I would have preferred the Ritz-Carlton Central Park South but wanting initially to appear as “part of the team” I took the bus up to Harlem. After roughing it up at the cockroach infested hostel I purchased a two-bedroom condo in a charming Gothic building called “The Dakota” very close to Central Park. I was having difficulty with my keys entering my condo after the purchase deal closed and a long-haired fellow with glasses, who lived down the hall, helped me. Being a neighbourly fellow, he invited the newest Dakota resident for high tea at his “pad”.

What a jolly fellow with a British accent. I felt like I was back home in Bombay at the British Officer’s Club. Upon entering his unit he introduced me to his “old lady” Yoko Ono. Mr. Lennon’s full name was John Lennon. It had a familiar ring to it. Geez I knew that name from somewhere. We had a lovely pot of tea and some pot brownies, after all it was high tea, and chatted for an hour or so.

I asked Mr. Lennon about the many guitars throughout his rooms in his “pad” and John explained he was a musician. I explained I was half Welsh and half Indian. My late mom was Juanita Wallabong a well-known singer of Bombay Blues and my dad was Paneer Gupta an entrepreneur. Well to my surprise Mr. Lennon was a fan of my mom and had met my father several times! How could that be! Well Mr. Lennon was John Lennon of that British group “The Beatles”! Damn it I knew that band. He told me he had just recorded one of my mom’s unrecorded songs “Give Peace a Chance”! And when the Beatles were in India my dad had supplied them with lots of ganja! What a small world! Did it ever bowl me over hearing John saying that my mom, Juanita Wallabong, was the Lucy in the Beatle’s song “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”. John had said had he not been married….

Yoko Ono sat by herself in the corner of the living room writing poetry and kept stuttering to herself like she was mouthing lyrics of a bizarre song. Mr. Lennon insisted I call him John. John invited me to take a long walk with him in Central Park the following day.

RKS 2025 Wine: Jaque Mate 2019 Malbec Reserva

A Pavlovian reaction to “Wine/Argentina” might be “Malbec”! And upon shouting out “Malbec” a response might be Mendoza and if so what can go wrong with a Mendoza Malbec except perhaps for a growing sense of Malbec fatigue.

Jaque Mate is from a Luján de Cuyo vineyard at approximately 870 meters altitude. The 25-year-old vines grow in sandy loam soils. It was aged in mostly French oak barrels and a small amount in stainless steel tanks.

Aroma: Blackberry, cassis, black cherry, raspberry and a bit of smoke.

Palate: Moderately tannic. A heady combination of blackberry and Vermont artisan black licorice. The texture falls out of the parameters of the usual mug shot for Argentinian Malbec in that it is not of a lush and plush description. It is rich and full bodied without being unctuous. Light longish finish.

Personality: I am somewhat different on the palate from many of my Mendoza Malbec brothers and sisters. I am excellent even if so different from my brothers and sisters.  

Cellarbility: This wine will gain in complexity throughout to the end of 2026 and may just reach ultimate perfection in 2028.

Food Match: Italian Fennel Sausage.

Price: $14.60 CDN.

RKS 2025 Wine Rating: 93/100.jamessuckling.com 92.

(Jaque Mate 2019 Reserva Malbec, Luján de Cuyo, Mendoza, Bodegas Sanchez, Mendoza, Argentina, 750 mL, 14.6%).

The Penniless Pensioner: Misaligned, Maligned but Marvellous (The Final Version): Chapter 21: I Am Off to New York City as a Lawyer for The United Mutations

One night at a favourite bar of mine Marwin’s on Stanley Street in Montreal I met up with a couple of lively personalities Squid and Willie Montenez. I had worked with Squid and Willie Montenez while volunteering with the United Mutations in Montreal. Weird cats. They claimed to have been from other planets and dimensions. Initially I thought they were tripping on too much vodka and mescaline but I recalled that Jesus often spoke in parables and this must be the case with Squid and Willie Montenez. Their brilliant and passionate minds worked often in “otherworldly ways”.

I had heard of their activities in Montreal before I had commenced my studies at McGill University. Their enemy Eno Ergot from some far away planet had apparently landed at the campus of McGill University a few years back. They had battled Montreal mayor Jean Droolpoop during Expo 67 and had lead mutant revolts at the Queen Fairy Veterans Hospital and Douglas Psychiatric Institute. You might say they were the grandfathers of mutantism.  Robert K. Stephen, my collaborator on this book, has written a brilliant history of mutantism in his seminal “Mutantism on the March” so I encourage you to read that serialized masterpiece for a complete historical treatise on mutantism.

What I will say is mutantism involves advocates for the rights of mutants on a global scale. And who are mutants you ask? They are the limbless, the lepers, the deformed, the mentally challenged, some criminals, disadvantaged and exploited populations etc. Luminaries such as Santa Claus and Tarzan had been involved with mutantism so it was no far out pie in the sky irrelevant social and political movement.

I had developed an excellent working relationship with Squid. Squid had contacted me in Toronto to congratulate me upon being called to the Ontario Bar and offered me a job in New York to help draft the Charter of Mutant Rights. I had written an article on the Canadian Bill of Rights so he thought this and my legal training qualified me for the job. It sure beat an offer for a full-time legal position in Toronto with Mr. Donut. So here I was on the midnight Greyhound bus from Toronto to New York full of Amish.

RKS 2025 Wine: Armenian Wine: The Next Great Hope? Not Enough Volume in the Market to Make That Determination

Wine producing countries and their subregions, such as Armenia, have a scarce presence in Ontario with a state monopoly controlling all wines flowing into the province except for the miserable duty-free wine quotas a traveller can bring into Canada from abroad or “smuggle” in from other provinces. There is no free Canadian interprovincial wine trade.

We have had a couple of Armenian reds on the shelves in Ontario as of late. But what can a wine writer do to expand their knowledge of a country and its subregion’s wines? Either the wines can be brought into the province for a “trade show” so consumers, wine writers and potential agents can get a crack at sampling a multitude of wines in a short period of time or even better take wine tourism writers/tour operators to the producing country where they can visit wineries, talk with the winery teams, try wines, sample local cuisine and get a feel for local tourist sites of interest. You want tourists to visit your country bring over those who will inform their readers and viewers not only about wine but wineries, local cuisine and interesting touristic sites. These “FAM” trips require an outlay of money to transport, feed and lodge journalists and tourism wholesalers. If you are cheap about the expenditure remain in obscurity.

Without such trips to Armenia how is the world to be cognizant about Armenian wines, cuisine and Armenian tourist sites?

Speaking of Armenia we sample a Yerevan 2023 Red Dry Winemaker’s Blend. Yerevan is both Armenia’s largest and capital city. The wine is 65% Areni and 35% Kamrahyut the grapes being from the Vayots Dzor and Aragtsotn continental climate locations with altitude of 1700 to 5000 feet. Areni is a village in southwestern Armenia where in 2011 a cave was unearthed revealing a winery estimated to be 6,100 years old.

Aroma: Blackberry, cassis, boysenberry, dates, chocolate covered cherries and high-toned raspberry. No oak.

Palate: Minimal tannins and controlled acidity. Raspberry mingling with milk chocolate. Both strawberry and raspberry jam. This midweight wine has a gentle long finish.

Personality: Admit it. You have never had a wine like this before so perhaps you can stumble around clumsily and get some bearings as misguided as they may be like thinking there is some similarity to a Pinot Noir Gamay blend.

Food Match: Shashlik (grilled kebabs).

Cellarbility: Drink by 2025-year end.

Price: $20.65 CDN.

RKS 2025 Wine Rating: 89/100.

(Yerevan 782 B.C. Areni/Kamrahyut 2023 Red Blend Winemaker’s Blend, Armenia Wine Company, Sasunik Village, Armenia, 750 mL, 13%).