The people living there decided to pull letters out of a bag, like you do to start a game of Scrabble™.

Well, that’s a C, eh?

And an N, eh?

And a D, eh?

And, more specifically, here’s the top ten reasons to live in Vancouver:

1. Weed
2. Two million people and two bridges
3. The local hero is a pot-smoking snowboarder
4. The local wine doesn’t taste like malt vinegar
5. Your $400,000 Vancouver home is 5 hours from downtown
6. A university with a nude beach
7. You can throw a rock and hit three Starbucks locations
8. If a cop pulls you over, just offer them some of your hash
9. There’s always some sort of deforestation protest going on
10. Cannabis

And, to honor the Canadan hockey team which won a Gold Olympics™ medal to the United States of America’s Platinum Olympics™ medal, here’s some Manitoba jokes:

You know your from Manitoba, Canada, when….

You only know three spices – salt, pepper and ketchup.

You design your Halloween costume to fit over a snowsuit.

The mosquitoes have landing lights.

You have more miles on your snowblower than your car.

You have 10 favourite recipes for moose meat.

Canadian Tire on any Saturday is busier than the toy stores at Christmas.

You live in a house that has no front step, yet the door is one meter above the ground.

You’ve taken your kids trick-or-treating in a blizzard.

Driving is better in the winter because the potholes are filled in with snow.

You owe more money on your snowmobile than your car.

The local paper covers national and international headlines on 1/4 page, but requires 6 pages for sports.

At least twice a year, the kitchen doubles as a meat processing plant.

The most effective mosquito repellent is a shotgun.

Your snowblower gets stuck on the roof.

You think the start of moose season is a national holiday.

You head south to go to your cottage.

You frequently clean grease off your barbeque so the bears won’t prowl on your deck.

You know which leaves make good toilet paper.

The major parish fund-raiser isn’t bingo – it’s sausage making.

You find -40C a little chilly.

The trunk of your car doubles as a deep freezer.

You attend a formal event in your best clothes, your finest jewelry and your Sorels.

You can play road hockey on skates.

You know 4 seasons – Winter, Still Winter, almost Winter and Construction.

The municipality buys a Zamboni before a bus.

You actually get these jokes and forward them to all your Northern friends.

And, finally, for those of you from elsewhere who have a hard time telling Australians, Brits, Canadans, and USAmericans apart, here’s a primer:

Aussies: Dislike being mistaken for Pommies (Brits) when abroad.

Canadians: Are rather indignant about being mistaken for Americans when abroad.

Americans: Encourage being mistaken for Canadians when abroad.

Brits: Can’t possibly be mistaken for anyone else when abroad.

Aussies: Believe you should look out for your mates.

Brits: Believe that you should look out for those people who belong to your club.

Americans: Believe that people should look out for & take care of themselves.

Canadians: Believe that that’s the government’s job.

Aussies: Are extremely patriotic to their beer.

Americans: Are flag-waving, anthem-singing, and obsessively patriotic to the point of blindness.

Canadians: Can’t agree on the words to their anthem, when they can be bothered to sing them.

Brits: Do not sing at all but prefer a large brass band to perform the anthem.

Americans: Spend most of their lives glued to the idiot box.

Canadians: Don’t, but only because they can’t get more American channels.

Brits: Pay a tax just so they can watch four channels.

Aussies: Export all their crappy programs, which no-one there watches, to Britain, where everybody loves them.

Americans: Will jabber on incessantly about football, baseball, and basketball.

Brits: Will jabber on incessantly about cricket, soccer, and rugby.

Canadians: Will jabber on incessantly about hockey, hockey, hockey, hockey, and how they beat the Americans twice, playing baseball.

Aussies: Will jabber on incessantly about how they beat the Poms in every sport they play them in.

Americans: Spell words differently, but still call it “English”.

Brits: Pronounce their words differently, but still call it “English”.

Canadians: Spell like the Brits, pronounce like Americans.

Aussies: Add “G’day”, “mate” and a heavy accent to everything they say in an attempt to be cool.

Brits: Shop at home and have goods imported because they live on an island.

Aussies: Shop at home and have goods imported because they live on an island.

Americans: Cross the southern border for cheap shopping, gas, & liquor in a backwards country.

Canadians: Cross the southern border for cheap shopping, gas, & liquor in a backwards country.

Americans: Drink weak, bad-tasting beer.

Canadians: Drink strong, bad-tasting beer.

Brits: Drink warm, bad-tasting beer.

Aussies: Drink anything with alcohol in it.

Americans: Seem to think that poverty & failure are morally suspect.

Canadians: Seem to believe that wealth and success are morally suspect.

Brits: Seem to believe that wealth, poverty, success and failure are inherited things.

Aussies: Seem to think that none of this matters after several beers.

Happy End of The Canuckistan Olympics, everyone!

And — you may now go back to loving San Francisco best of all the West Coast cities.