Tuque Souq 100th Birthday

The Tuque Souq happily celebrates today its one-hundredth blog post. We can't believe we made it this far.

To celebrate, we're going to get a bit personal and answer some Tuque Souq fan mail. Here we go...

Q--Hey Tuque Souq, do you have a favourite Tuque? How 'bout a favourite Souq?
Well, I'm personally averse to declaring absolutes, moral or cranial or otherwise. I suppose anyone's favourite to tuque should be that of his favourite hockey team, so of course mine is the tuque celebrating the 2002 Gold medal-winning Canadian Olympic team. (I don't actually have this tuque, however.) Souq? Probably the souq where I could find the aforementioned tuque. Failing that, I'd go with the souq of the Old City of Aleppo.

Q--Prez Obama says he's gonna give a speech from a Muslim city within his first 100 days in office. Where do you think it will be?
Might be Jakarta, capital city of Indonesia where Obama spent some time growing up. But what's going on over there? Nothing. Trip to Israel, then hop over to Cairo or Amman for a speech? Maybe Istanbul? Baghdad is a dark-horse candidate. Tehran? Nah. Kuala Lumpur? Too obscure. Islamabad? Too risky. Dubai? Too ritzy. Tirana? Too cheap. Beirut? Now that would be something. I don't know, but I'll take bets.

Q--Speaking of Israeli elections, who's gonna win?
Netanyahu... it's in the hopper, damn it. And since I have nothing else to say on the matter, here's an article about Ehud Barak taking his campaign into the bathroom.

Q--Any big predictions for 2009 in Middle East politics?
You mean who's gonna keel over? Well, we've got a few candidates just looking at their ages. Hosni Mubarak will be 81 in May. Sheikh al-Sabah of Kuwait turns 80 this year. Tunisia's Ben Ali is 72. Omani Sultan Qaboos is 68. Abdelaziz Bouteflika over in Algeria is 71. No guarantees, but someone's gotta knock off this year.

Q--Can you blog more about Mauritania this year?

You got it.

Q--Which part of a camel is the tastiest?

The neck. Actually, the worst part of a dead camel is better than the best part of a live camel. But of course I don't need camels to live.

Q--Who's gonna win the Stanley Cup this year?

The Habs. It's only right.

Q--Why do you spell Qaddafi with a 'Q' instead of a 'G'?

Cuz I'm a rebel, like he is.

Q--Why do you hate camels?

I have my reasons. Most of them involve saliva and triple-digit decibel shrieks.

Q--Is hummus good brain food?

I eat it everyday. What do you think?

Q--Which religion is the true religion?

Next.

Q--Who do you like in Harper vs Ignatieff?

Harper by TKO in the 9th round. Iggy has stamina but no knockout punch.

Well, that's all for today. Thanks for joining for the last 100 posts. Until a new day.