RANT LINE: At least COVID-19 killed the phony two-cheek kiss

Callers sound off about COVID vs. the two-cheek kiss, Van Morrison vs. Noel Gallagher, masks vs. ventilators and Pascale Ferrier vs. the Ugly Tyrant Clown.

M Hail to Pascale Ferrier! A new Canadian HERO. Together we will defeat the UGLY TYRANT CLOWN. [BLEEP!]

M Shout out to JORDAN OFFICER for an awesome three-album release of blues, jazz and country! You are a local BIJOUX. [BLEEP!]

F Hey, who knew VAN MORRISON was such a moron? I hope he goes back to stay in Las Vegas where he’ll be right at home with all the dumbass American ANTI-MASKERS. Oh, and then there’s NOEL GALLAGHER but at least we always knew he was an idiot. [BLEEP!]

M Hello Rant Line™, I just wanted to say that I am loving this mask and social distancing thing. No more phony TWO-CHEEK KISS, no more PHONY HUGGING and nobody can smell if I have booze on my breath. [BLEEP!]

M If I see one more anti-mask protest I swear I’m going to head down and shove a mask down one of their throats until they need an VENTILATOR to get it out. [BLEEP!]

F Hello, this is to everyone who keeps going on and on about parking spots being taken away. You were all so happy when hundreds of thousands marched for climate change last year on the mountain — everybody was a GRETA THUNBERG — but the minute it means you can’t park directly in front of your house or favourite restaurant, you want all the bike paths taken down. Reality check: BE the CHANGE. [BLEEP!]

M Okay, about the REV bike paths being built on St-Denis. Listen, in case you hadn’t noticed, St-Denis is DEAD and this project may actually SAVE the street and merchants by bringing people to a greener, more people-friendly street. Contrary to the BULLSHIT PRESS this is getting, the whole thing will be done in a little over a month of work and it will eliminate virtually none of their beloved parking spots. Personally, I’m taking notes as to who the loudmouth WHINING MERCHANTS are and vowing to never set foot in their establishments again. [BLEEP!]

M Hello. I just want to tell my pandemic story. I am sure everyone has one, but this is mine. Today I went to the DENTIST for the first time. BROKEN TOOTH. Otherwise I wouldn’t have gone — I figure I don’t need a cleaning, fuck that, my teeth seem clean enough to me. Maybe a small bit of ROT or gum decay, but whatever, I don’t usually go to the dentist even in the best of times. So for me, minor GUM DISEASE is par for the course, especially during a pandemic, you know what I mean? But a broken tooth, that can really be a bitch. That can cause some big pain. Broke it cracking down on a NUT, by the way. Remind me not to do that again. Use NUTCRACKERS, people! Anyhow, I went to the dentist, not really knowing what to expect, and you know what, it went pretty well. This is a dentist in the Plateau area, by the way. They took my temperature at the door—they didn’t have to put the thermometer in my mouth, they just pointed a small kind of GADGET at me and took it in like a second. And the waiting room was okay. I didn’t have to wait too long, there were only two other people there and they weren’t too close, and they weren’t coughing or spitting up blood, you know what I mean? And then I got in the chair and the dentist and the hygienist had on lots of PPE and seemed prepared and ready to go to work on my teeth. And they even talked me into doing a cleaning — they said I could really use it, said it looked like it had been a while since I’d had one, and that it would be a good thing to do before fixing the broken tooth. So I figured what the hell, I am already here, let’s go for the works. But then that’s when the PROBLEM came up: It was the only problem, but it was a big problem. It was this — after the cleaning, and before they started fixing the broken tooth, I needed to take a PISS. I needed to take a piss bad. Guess I should have thought of this before, but you know, I hadn’t planned on getting a cleaning. And the cleaning took like, I don’t know, 45 minutes, and now I needed a piss. But they wouldn’t let me into the TOILET. No toilets available! The bathrooms were barred, shut, off limits to everyone. I’m like, is that even legal? But there was no arguing, and I needed to take a piss, and I still needed to have my broken tooth fixed. So they didn’t know what to do and I didn’t know what to do and I said, well let me go outside for a minute and see if I can come up with something because if I don’t piss soon I am going to piss right here in your dentist chair. So I went outside, I thought maybe a restaurant or something could maybe help me out, but there was nothing that looked open, and they probably would not help me out, so forget that. So I just took a piss in the ALLEY. Thank you Plateau alleys. And to be honest, I am fairly used to pissing in an alley, doing that at night, you know, drinking, but not so used to doing it in broad daylight, with people passing by. But I got the piss done, mission accomplished. And I went back in, got my temperature taken again — I guess in case I had caught COVID-19 while outside taking a piss — got my hands sanitized again, probably a good thing, sat back down in the chair and got my tooth fixed. And so the moral of the story is this: Take a piss before you go to the dentist. I don’t know if every dentist now is like that, with no toilet available, it doesn’t seem right. Was it just this dentist? But if I was you, I would ask the dentist if they have a functioning toilet when you make the appointment.Yeah that’s it, be prepared — take a pre-dentist piss. For me, it all turned out good in the end, but there’s one thing I worry about, maybe you should, too — what if I needed to take a SHIT? [BLEEP!]

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This feature was originally published in the October issue of Cult MTL.

See previous editions of the Rant Line™ here.