October 15, 2011: Dorval's Maxi store – always looking out for their customers! Stop me if this sounds familiar! Go Snow Monkeys!

Hey, check it out.  The Dorval Maxi grocery store on Montreal's West Island is having a sale.  Was $3.49.  Now $4.69!

This would be hilarious if not for the fact that the item on sale is bottled water and said sale just happens to coincide with a boil water advisory that has affected much of Montreal's West Island for two days now.

Seriously.  I have no problem with law of supply and demand and certainly wouldn't expect the Dorval Maxi store to be giving the water away to those in need – but, hell, they shouldn't be jacking up the price and taking advantage of people's in distress.

I'm a firm believer in what comes around goes around.  The money the Dorval Maxi store makes off desperate people today will be more than offset by customers who will no doubt take their business elsewhere in the future.

So, tell me if this sounds familiar:

It's future Earth.  On the heels of a failed rebellion, the planet's totalitarian authority responds by instituting an annual event – a contest in which young people are chosen by lottery and forced to take part in a kill or be killed, winner take all competition. The media coverage of the event is frenzied.  Each participant is given a backpack holding a random weapon, anything from a bow and arrow to a gun.  An older participant, a veteran and survivor of a previous tournament, takes a younger player under their wing.  As the tournament progresses, kill counts are announced by the authorities.

It's a brutal scenario but, at the heart of the story is a couple who fall in love and, working together, succeed in surviving the ordeal by turning the table on the game's authorities.

Sound familiar?  It should.  It's one of my favorite movies – a Japanese film called Battle Royale that came out in 2000, based on a 1999 novel by author Koshun Takami.  It spawned two manga adaptations, a soundtrack, and sequel called Battle Royale II: Requiem.

Why?  What did you think I was talking about?  Ooooh, yeah.  That also happens to be the eerily familiar premise to the hugely popular The Hunger Games, a novel by Suzanne Collins.  Haven't read the book but similarities give me pause.  Anyone here familiar with both and care to weigh in with their take?

The gang's coming over for football tomorrow and so, today, Akemi and I spent the afternoon preparing.  Honestly, what's the first food item you think of when someone says "football".

Of course!  Truffles!

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We made an assortment including milk chocolate-eggnog liqueur with pistachio, Guinness dark with cocoa powder, gianduja with marscapone, and dark chocolate with cane sugar rum and almond.  Will report back on the winner tomorrow when —

My Snow Monkeys, currently in second place in the R.I.P. Stargate Fantate Football League, try to improve their record to a gaudy 5-1!

GO SNOW MONKEYS!!!

Tagged: Battle Royale, Dorval Maxi store, The Hunger Games [image error] [image error]