The latest pressing “Is a taco a sandwich” social issue is around the acceptable calendric date for the installation of one’s Christmas decorations.  On Halloween, my husband, the King of Christmas, texted me a photo of our neighbor’s fully decorated tree, sparkling through the window amongst the witches and goblins of the eve.

“No,” I texted back.

“Yes,” Kyle responded.

“Gratitude before gifts,” I replied, repeating a phrase I learned from my coworker.

“I did my gratituding already,” Kyle wrote.

I sighed.

“Canadian loophole,” I texted back.

As I’ve told you many, many, many times before, Kyle was born and raised in Saskatchewan, Canada.  Obviously, America and Canada are landlocked.  Not “Oh, it’s just a wee inlet” landlocked; smooshed together from neck to pelvis like two kids at a high school dance.  If I wanted to, I could drive an hour up to the Canadian border and do that thing where I hop back and forth from one foot to the other and say, “I’m in Canada!  I’m in America!  I’m in Canada!  I’m in America!”  And when a Canadian border guard ultimately arrests me for doing that, if the wind is to the north and that border guard sneezes, someone in America should take a Vitamin C because that Canadian sneeze is an American sneeze now.

The thing is, even though we are landlocked and speak at least one of the same languages and regularly frequent one another’s cities, Tim Hortons, and Targets, I think everyone (especially England, amirite?) would agree we are very different countries…which is something that has repeatedly caused mild consternation in my intracontinental marriage, and not just in using Canadian Thanksgiving (October) as the date marker for Christmas decorations.  So, in honor of American Thanksgiving (November), I’m going to show my gratitude for my dear husband by telling you about the absolute number-one thing we Canadian and American have disagreed on over the years: music and pop culture references.

First, though, for my American readers, here’s a fact: The Broadcasting Act of Canada requires that radio and television networks in Canada broadcast a certain percentage – 35% for radio and 50% for television – of content created by Canadian artists. 

“Oh, that Ryan Reynolds/Ryan Gosling/Justin Bieber/Bryan Adams/Jim Carrey/Drake/Keanu Reeves/Michael Buble/The Weeknd/Shawn Mendes/Michael J. Fox/Brendan Fraser/William Shatner is everywhere!”  Is a phrase you’ve probably said at some point.  Well, in Canada, they’re really everywhere.

Early in our relationship, Kyle and I were – doing something, maybe driving? – when “Crash into Me” by Dave Matthews Band came on the radio.  If you were teen in North Dakota in the late ‘90s, I bet a bottle of Drakkar Noir that you probably made out to “Crash into Me” by Dave Matthews Band.

“Woo woo, want to ‘Crash into Me,’” I said to Kyle, and then wiggled my eyebrows, which is the international sign for making out.

“What?” he said, but still made out with me because of the eyebrow thing.  After said making out, I questioned his confusion as to my incredibly obvious reference to the song.

“We didn’t have Dave Matthews Band in Canada,” he said.   “I mean, we probably did, but no one made out to it.  We made out to Celine Dion.” 

“That’s weird,” I told him.  “I don’t think lying on your bed staring at your poster of Kelly Kapowski hits the same with Celine over Dave.”

“We didn’t have Kelly Kapowski until Saved By the Bell was long into re-runs,” Kyle said.  “We had Megan Follows.”

“Megan Follows of Anne of Green Gables?”  I asked.

“Yeah, woo woo,” he said.  “She used to wear a turtleneck with a crewneck sweater; so hot.”

“I don’t know if everyone would agree that’s hot,” I said.

“Everyone in Canada would agree,” he said.

Not long after, Mr. Rogers passed away.  Like all Americans, I was distraught.

“I think you may be overreacting a bit,” Kyle said after I watched the clip of Mr. Rogers accepting his Daytime Emmy Lifetime Achievement Award for the 900,000^th time.

“How can you say that about Mr. Rogers!?” I demanded.  “Your childhood was CHANGED by him.”

“Not my childhood,” Kyle said.  “We had Mr. Dressup.  He had a Tickle Trunk.”

“He had a what?”  I said.

“A Tickle Trunk.  For his costumes.”

“That doesn’t sound right,” I said.

“You don’t sound right,” Kyle said.

We have repeated a version of this conversation over and over for nearly two decades – about the Canadian Sesame Street character named Basil (bah-zhil) and the letter Zed (imagine the fun we had when our oldest went to pre-school and didn’t know the proper pronunciation of the last letter of the alphabet); about the Video Hits in lieu of VH1; about the utter all-encompassing importance of Hockey Night in Canada…and don’t get me started when Kyle found out I wasn’t able to accurately converse on the detailed life and career of Alanis Morissette.  Quelle horreur.

Fortunately, we have found some common ground thanks to shows like Corner Gas (Canada) and Hard Knocks (America), and it turns out both Canadians and Americans can make out to Shania Twain, thank goodness.  This year, as you dish out your Thanksgiving sweet potatoes (Kyle didn’t have a sweet potato at Thanksgiving until he came to the States, by the way), pop in an old episode of Jeopardy, and be thankful for the international language of elastic-waisted pants.

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The photo above was taken in 2010 and was the kind of thing we did before having kids because all we had was time and bandanas.

Thank you for reading North Dakota Nice for the past five years, and thank you for sending in stories and watching North Dakota Today for the past few months. I very much appreciate all of you. I also would like to take this time to super-thank my friends Amy, Jim, Jami, and Steph, who were the only people to read this blog for about, oh, three (maybe five) months when I first started and kept me going when I reasonably questioned its purpose.

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This week on North Dakota Today we talked about Secret Santa for Seniors and a fantastic teacher named Heidi Geiselhart.  Check it out!  (Valley News Live)

In super-duper awesome news, after a snowy Halloween, it’s been amazingly warm all November. (Valley News Live)

An 80-million-year old fossil of a new genus and species of mosasaur has been named Jormungandr walhallaensis because it was found in Walhalla. (Fargo Forum)

In North Dakota-adjacent news, Moorhead’s Jessica Bentson – forever on a ventilator due to an adulthood head injury – uses her time to crochet creatures in order to spread smiles for children going through their own medical care. (Jamestown Sun) (Facebook)

This is my kind of Letter to the Editor. (Minot Daily News)

I don’t usually post about businesses on here, but a pop-up shop in Bismarck is hoping to change the narrative of mental illness and addiction. (KFYR TV)

NDSCS is one step away from a AAS in Fire Science program to help increase the number of firefighters across the state. (Valley News Live)

As a reminder, I’ll be appearing on North Dakota Today on Monday mornings. Tune in, and send me the people and stories that are nice.  Thank you in advance!

ALSO as a reminder, Kyle now has a North Dakota hockey podcast on Pulltab Sports. It’s called “North Dakota After Dark” and he hosts it with our friends Kelly and Corey. Episode 12 with Jamie Sperle is now up. Click here to listen.

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