Beach(es) Beat

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I don't know what your opinion is on the subject but I feel compelled to report that World Laughter Day, which took place May 3, has evidently come and gone without so much as a snicker in these parts.

The big day was sponsored by an organization that believes laughter is good for the health and if that is true then Toronto is one sick puppy. It could well be that Toronto residents have been in a state of mourning since 1967 and I cannot blame them. Fans in other NHL cities dream of their boys winning the Stanley Cup but nowadays things are so bad at the Air Canada Centre that the lads in blue get a standing ovation whenever they win a face-off.

However, it is too bad that Laughter Day went pretty much ignored because we really do have a great deal to at least smile about.

Winter is but a bad memory and the month of May is that time when fishing lines are brought out of the basement and readied for another season and laugh lines are seen on faces that haven't cracked a grin since the first snowfall last October.

The Argos haven't lost a game this season and here's something that might interest young males now that the hanging-around-the-beach-where-the-girls-are season is approaching. About 30 minutes of laughter a day is said to develop abdominal muscles that would be the envy of weight lifters and the best part about that is you could develop abs that would attract droves of young women without having to hang around a sweaty gymnasium every day.

According to a survey taken of Canadian laughing habits Albertans laugh the most and British Columbians laugh the least which is probably the result of all that rainfall, and while all that giggling and such is a good sign I believe there is one area where most of us could use a little work and that is we could start taking ourselves a little less seriously.

This quality seems to manifest itself the most whenever federal finance minister Jim Flaherty drops into town for a visit and promptly gets right under our collective thin skins.

He does this every time because it works every time but in my opinion it is just an act on his part. What we should remember is that irritation is the sincerest form of Flaherty.