My Experience in the Freedom Convoy - YEG Edition

 

Let's see how many people read past that clickbait-iest of clickbait headlines.

So, yeah. I totally ended up a part of the Freedom Convoy as it meandered up Highway 2 to Edmonton. When it's filling the entire right lane of the highway, and you merge onto said highway, you're sorta stuck participating. And going 30. On a highway.

I was totally calm.

Just absolutely chill as can be.

On an unrelated note, steering wheels may or may not be delicious. Who would know? Certainly not I!

Total calm.

So there I was, stuck going slower than the average senior citizen at the hip replacement clinic, trapped in a giant column of barely sentient red neck idiots, unable to get out of my predicament because the other lanes were going 75. That's also an absolutely fucking pitiful rate of speed for a highway, but it seemed like a Formula 1 straightaway next to the average rate of travel in the Driving Miss Daisy lane. So there I sat, obscuring my face as much as possible to avoid showing up on some goddamn newscast as the 'Face of Alberta'. What an absolute moment of pride THAT would be. White pride, maybe...

Easy! It's a joke. Geez.

Finally, after crawling along to one of the Nisku turnoffs, I was able to achieve the center lane. And then the left lane! I was free of the convoy (is that ironic? I don't even know anymore)! At least for a short distance before they blocked all three lanes, then went back down to two? They could never seem to decide exactly how much of a pain in the ass they were willing to be. There was about as much thought pumped into this entire boondoggle as was put into the spelling of their ridiculous signs.

Seriously, you would think that those obsessed with Communism might learn to spell the fucking word.

Or understand that Fascist Socialists would be extremely conflicted people. 

 Also present were Confederate flags and that stupid Gadsden snake on a background of piss yellow. Because these empty-headed fuck bags are so incapable of coming up with a single goddamn synapse worth of thought that they just co-opt their heritage from other countries. I wouldn't have been remotely surprised if one of them had adorned their F150 with WWII propaganda posters insisting that loose lips sink ships. Or advertising for KFC, because I strongly doubt that Slackjaw Jim knows the difference between Uncle Sam and Colonel Sanders.

"He done beat dem Jermins with dem el'ven herbs n' spices!"

"Vict'ry be finger lickin' gud!"

I have to say that the supposed column of truckers featured 'surprisingly' few big rigs. Lots of pristine shiny Dodge Rams with lift kits, though. The truck of the typical Alberta outdoorsman which has never been off a paved road in 6 years of service. There were also a decent number of vehicles wearing BC plates. It seems like a significant number of the 'brave heroes' from Kamloops made it all the way to Edmonton before deciding that Ottawa is really far away and just bailed on their entire commitment. They made it ONE ENTIRE PROVINCE before giving up. Truly an impressive level of gumption. These 'truckers' will not quit for at least one whole day of driving on a highway. How grateful we are as a nation for their work ethic and resolve.

Also present were a lot of Honda Civics and Toyota Tercels. I understand that you want to be a part of something, but you're just not a trucker no matter how hard you wish upon a fucking star. You're not.  Have a little dignity for once in your life before your father completely finishes off his liver in shame. It's pathetic.

Oh, and let's not forget the tractors! As in farm machinery. 

There is absolutely no way that these people do not possess any other vehicle. Like, they aren't hopping on the John Deere and driving it into town when they need to drop off a package or get some fucking butter. They obviously have others means of transport. The truth is that they were likely too stupid to understand that when people mentioned tractors in the convoy, they meant semi trucks.

Imagine being one of these poor idiots. You show up more than a little bit chilly from a long cruise in an open air tractor, but feeling like you're really going to impress people when you arrive all revved up and ready to join in the fun. He's feeling all big and bad. And then he gets there and looks around and the shame fills him as he blushes red like he just pissed himself in church. He's trying to put on a brave face as he crawls down the highway but those tears are not due to the wind.

It was right around this time that the standard issue Alberta highway driver decided to enter the fray. You know the one, the guy who gets angry when he's impeded from driving faster than necessary to tear a ragged hole through existence itself and travel through time. But not this day. His dreams of heading to the past and trying to impress the Victorian age ladies with his sweet Oakleys is ruined by literal tractors on the highway. He pulls right up on them, slams on the brakes and honks angrily. The big pipes coming from his 4 cylinder engine roar adorably. A quick slice over into the center lane and he's doing the same behind a guy flying three flags 

in honor of the patron saint of dipshit truck guys in a completely different country. Praise be to ye Covfefe! 

But his time he gets the attention of the pack of smoothbrains directly around him. They perk up. They've had Born in the USA playing on repeat for 79 minutes because right wingers apparently can't read lyrics, but now they shut it off and act. This entire collective of Pavlovian dogs begins also laying on their own horns. "Yeah, fuck Trudeau HONK HONK!" It spreads up and down this carnival ride straight to Hell as the morons further along hear the clarion call and repeat it like good little boys. Apparently nothing shows your rage at whatever the fuck they're angry at (Again, not exactly a clear focus going on here besides 'We have tiny genitals and this makes us saucy!') like honking horns over and over again. And they don't ever stop the rest of the way. A flock of mentally deficient geese would honk less than this. Truly showing that they don't mindlessly follow the pack by doing exactly that. It's a clever subterfuge. It's also really fucking annoying. 

All because of highway guy. He vanishes from sight soon after. I kind of hope that he died.

It's around this point, with the cacophonous noise of idiots filling the air, that I began flipping off everyone on the side of the road recording this mess. Did this really need to be kept for posterity? Like anyone required video evidence proving that Albertans were the only people really jumping full bore into this stupid bullshit? 

"Wait, ALBERTA is all on board with this Freedom Convoy stuff? That's it, it's over. Time to cancel Canada. We never would have believed it without those recordings. The collective of Little Boy Bitch have won. Commence the Wexiteering."

Wow, you won favor in Canada's dunce cap. Truly impressive. You convinced a collection of people who respond to anything slightly difficult with the predictable halcyon cry of 'LAURENTIAN TYRANNY' to clap like good little seals. Whole families are gathered, having arrived at overpasses and turnoffs in vehicles that no doubt smell like a loaf of bologna left in the hot sun for hours. Truly incredible. Much amaze.

Oh, a suggestion for this cabal of absolute Brainiacs for future events (and we all know there are plenty of these to come in this smoldering crater of a province) : Putting a long statement on a flag is really

fucking stupid. Nobody can read it once it starts whipping in the air as flags are wont to do. I have no doubt that it was some lengthy and phonetically inaccurate version of BABY GO WAH! 

Finally I was released from this nightmare at the Henday. Apparently they went downtown because hollering around the Legislature ON A SATURDAY is totally going to get noticed by the poor fucker stuck running the floor polisher over the weekend. And that guy wields some power! He alone bears full responsibility for the absolutely oppressive layer of wax he lays upon those scuffed floors. 

They loudly cheered for no more mandates, and no vaccines, and immigrants taking the jobs, and we need to overthrow the government, and whatever happened to Pogs, and a moron MP did an interview in front of a Canadian flag adorned with swastikas. Isn't it funny how the goosestep contingent always

JUST HAPPENS to join in whenever the right wingers throw another one of their teddy bear picnics? Weird that. And then this clown car version of a Mad Max convoy got bored or whatever the fuck and went home, having accomplished absolutely nothing beyond pissing people off in the province most supportive of their views in the entire country. So amaze.

At least they didn't spend the day taking meals from soup kitchens, waving actual Nazi flags around and shitting in public parks. Good job. The bar was low and you managed to barely clear it. Much clap for Cletus.