My Favorite State

Canada has always been my favorite state.  It keeps to itself, doesn't cause any problems, and hosts good Olympic games every once in a while.

Up until the last few days, when I thought about all things Canadian, this had been my top 10 list:

10.    The Royal Canadian Mounted Police.  Come on -- Canada's most recogizable armed forces still ride horses.  Well, this isn't exactly true but it's fun to imagine that all their cops are still riding around on horseback, isn't it?
9.       Latin club field trips to Toronto back in the early 1980's.  Can you believe it used to be OK to send a bus full of teenagers off to the (relatively) big city for the weekend with only one chaperone --and that chaperone was Mrs. Mix?  Who's idea was that?  Did our parents even care what we were up to at that age?
8.      An effective parliamentary democracy.  How I wish we had one of our own.
7.     Saskatchewan (just because it's fun to say).
6.     20-yard deep end zones.
5.     Rush.
4.     Janet Jones, circa "The Flamingo Kid."
3.     Geese, of course.  I'm particularly fond of those that fall dead out of the air right at the base of the blind after they've been shot.
2.     Michael J. Fox.  His "Go Princeton.  Beat Yale.  I mean that." line at the end of the Family Ties episode where he makes a college trip to Princeton but has to bail from his interview because Mallory (who came along to visit Jeff, her high school boyfriend, only to find out he's now dating a pretty coed) is sobbing outside the Dean's door is still one of the best-delivered lines ever in the history of TV.
1.     O Canada!  Seriously, this is a great national anthem.  I always sing along.

Now I've got a new item fighting to take over the top of the list - Canada's AAA credit rating!   They have one from all 3 major credit rating agencies!  How awesome is that?  Do you think they could maybe loan (or maybe I should say "give") one of those to us for a while so we could have a complete set again?