Rick Mercer - A Nation Worth Ranting About

COPYRIGHT 2012 RICK MERCER

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LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION

Mercer, Rick, 1969
A nation worth ranting about : Rick Mercer report from across Canada / Rick Mercer.

eISBN: 978-0-385-67681-6

1. CanadaPolitics and government--2006- --Humor. 2. Mercer, Rick, 1969- --Anecdotes. 3. Rick Mercer report (Television program). 4. Canadian wit and humor (English). I. Title.

FC173.M464 2012 971.073 C2012-902378-7

Cover image: Christopher Mason/wenn.com
Photos (except ) Rick Mercer Report
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v3.1

For Pat and Ken Mercer:
Dad for loving politics and Mom for loving saucy.

In Whistler, B.C., with Paralympic Cross-Country Skiers Brian and Robin McKeever
Robin: Were going to get Brian to guide you.
Brian: The blind leading the blind.

I have the greatest job in the country. And dont just take my word for it; I have received thousands of emails from ten-year-old boys telling me so.

With the launch of the Rick Mercer Report, I did not set out to work through my bucket list on national TV, but that is basically what happened. Its been a great journey.

I vividly remember, as a young boy, watching a film of an astronaut experiencing zero gravity in a NASA plane. In the film, it was made abundantly clear that the only people who would ever experience the wonder of zero gravity were the brave men and women of the space program. I pledged then and there that someday, come hell or high water, I would be a member of that programI too would know the feeling of floating weightless high above the earth. I too would be an astronaut. When I proudly announced my ambition to the class, Miss Barnes said, Not with your math marks, buster, and my dream fell to earth.

A greater man than I would have ignored those comments, studied hard, excelled at mathematics and science and made it into the space program, but I am not that kind of man. More than likely, I spotted something shiny and became distracted. Long story short, I never excelled at math, I went into comedy, got a TV show, and next thing you know, I was in an airplane operated by the Canadian Space Agency, experiencing zero gravity high above the nations capital. Not a bad day at the office.

Of course, every week does not bring a bucket-list adventure. There are some adventures I would consider quite the oppositejumping off a wharf half naked into the Atlantic Ocean in January comes to mind. But as always, despite any initial reservations I might have had about actually taking part, I dont regret it. Why? Because of the people I met along the way, every one of them great Canadians with no sense of feeling in their extremities.

Even after all these years, I am constantly amazed at the things I am allowed to do on my show. I am amazed at the quality of people I get to interview.

Take sports, for example. I have no business training with, competing against or fetching towels for the great athletes I have had the pleasure of interviewing. I am thinking in particular of Canadas amateur athletes, our Olympians and Paralympians. They are just straight-up good people. To witness the level of commitment these people have to their individual sports is truly astounding. Other than eating or sleeping, Ive never come close to being as committed to anything in my entire life. Sure, the idea of being an Olympian is appealingyou represent your country on the world stage, you work to the point of physical exhaustion every day and you earn the salary of a hobo. And lets not forget that if it works out, you might get your picture taken with the Prime Minister or land a public service announcement.

Ive particularly enjoyed my time with the many Paralympians who have come on the show. I am proud to say I have been beaten and humiliated in multiple sports by athletes missing every combination of limbs imaginable. And then there are the paraplegics and quadriplegics. They are the ones that leave the big bruises. Watching a game of wheelchair rugby will change forever the way you perceive anyone suffering from any form or paralysisturns out they are happiest crashing into each other. I had no idea. Stealing a handicapped parking space is not just rudeif a member of Canadas wheelchair rugby team catches you in the act, it may be the last thing you ever do.

Its no surprise, really, that they are always fun and self-deprecating interviews. They have all had huge challenges in their lives and not only succeeded in life, but managed to become elite athletes. With everything they have had thrown at them, they are not the type of people who are about to be intimidated by a short man with a giant head and a TV camera.

Im referring to athletes like Josh Dueck, who broke his back in a skiing accident in his teens. He woke up in a hospital to a doctor telling him he was still going to tear up the ski hill, but he was going to be doing it sitting down. I think I would have headed to the bar, but Dueck actually took him up on his challenge and within months was back on the hill. Since then, he has gone on to be a world champion sit-skier, tearing up mountains all over the world.

I cant tell you how many brilliant adventures I have had with the Canadian Forces all over Canada and overseas. I have interviewed countless soldiers and have had the opportunity to do everything from skydiving with the SkyHawks to crushing a car with a tank. In fact, I was a little put out when the news broke that Defence Minister Peter MacKay had been airlifted in a Cormorant helicopter from a fishing lodge on the Gander River. I thought, Whoa, hes doing my act. You dont see me running out and marrying Miss World.

Im also always amazed, when I look back at past shows, at how many vehicles I have been able to drive. In my normal life I rarely drive a car, and when I do, its an automatic. And yet when I go to work, I get to do donuts in a hovercraft on the St. Lawrence River. Ive driven stock cars, race cars, forklifts and tugboats. I have taken part in a race where three stock cars are chained together and they race against other teams of stock cars chained together. Only one car in each group of cars is allowed to have brakes. The event is called the train of death. If you take away anything from reading this book, let it be this: if anyone ever asks you to sign up for an event called the train of death, do not do it. Train of death is not just a figure of speech to be ignored, like WarningHigh Voltage.