Not recently, no. There was some blather about getting rid of “in all thy sons command” but that never took.
I don’t know what featherlou is talking about about changing the words a lot; it’s been the same at least since 1980, which is when it was officially proclaimed as the anthem, and that version dates back to 1908.
Hooey, sir! I SAY HOOEY! I know all of the words in English and French, and have known them my entire life. Even when they changed in 1980, I learned them and retained them.
We had a great day. Met two new ex-pat families, as well.
But then you left us.
Why do so many of the great ones leave us?
Happy Canada Day! Couldn’t see any fireworks from home - those darn skyscrapers were in the way… But we could see the tip of the CN Tower, and we could hear some loud bangs… (Those were firecrackers, weren’t they?)
Last weekend was our first official Pride Day since moving to T.O., and now Canada Day… What event should we look forward to next? (Other than snow next winter?)
I went for a wander this evening, and the fireworks from every direction sounded like the continuous small-arms fire at the beginning of the movie Demolition Man. This impression was aided by the continuous sirens I also heard. I suspect someone set their roof alight or something. Other than that, it was a superbly-beautiful night: cool, clear, low humidity, a flawless sky fading in jewel-like colours from sunset through dusk to the night. Venus stood out bright and stong in the western sky. The top levels of the CN Tower (easily visible from the top of the hill near my place) were lit up in red, white, and red by the Tower’s new fancy multicolour illumination system.
A perfect night to open the window, read a book, then sleep well. 
Happy Canada Day!
Let’s see… Caribana, Diwali, Chinese New Year, the Festival of Chariots, all kinds of things. Caribana is definitely the next biggie, though. And don’t count on much snow, either. Not if next winter was like last winter, or the one before…
Yeah, I remember hearing that but didn’t recall hearing that they had changed it. So I thought maybe it had happened during one of those lulls where I don’t have the time or inclination to watch the news and so I missed that our anthem had been changed and was now singing it wrong…
Well, this was an interesting Canada Day. Fun, loud, filling, and ooh, shiny! I’ll post pics in the forthcoming MMP and link here for those that don’t read it. Lots of nice fireworks shots, even if the fireworks themselves weren’t tremendously spectacular. I should have shot a video instead of taking pics though. The music that accompanied them was kinda cool. And loud. Very loud. Why the hell did I have to set up my tripod thirty feet from a damn speaker stack??
Here’s a teaser though.
YES! This place really knows how to party! 
I called my mother and my grandmother today, and wished I could be home for the traditional boiled dinner they were making. The small town I was from used to send up fireworks in the field by the highschool, or sometimes at the baseball field in the middle of town - one at a time. Hilarious. One would go up, and the crowd would go “oooooooo!”. Another would go up, and “ahhhhhh!”, then another, and “ooohhhh!”. And repeat until the end of the display, which always ended with something called “Niagra Falls” - some kind of wire rigged up across two poles that would sparkle madly and “sprinkle” to the ground.
I flew my Canadian and Acadian flags today. Wish I had some boiled dinner*. 
ETA: I’m going to make some Tim’s before bedtime! That will make me feel better!
What’s a boiled dinner? Does it involve snaring anything?
(BTW, my vote for Canada’s best firework show was the night the Hand’s firework factory in Milton blew.)
So did anyone else think it was funny that today is also the tenth anniversary of Hong Kong’s transferral from the UK to China? It’s like the Queen can’t hold onto anything when July 1 rolls around!
Nope, no snaring. Just huge chunks of ham, potatoes, and carrots (sometimes other root veggies) boiled for hours in the same pot. Very simple and very, very good.
Okay, so maybe they didn’t change the anthem that much. First they changed the words, then they added French - it seemed like a lot. But then again, my dad always called the maple leaf flag “that rag,” so maybe we just don’t like changes to our patriotic stuff much in my family.
Sunspace, we went out to see our fireworks display last night too, and it was a lovely evening here as well. Sat in the grass on a hill, swatted at mosquitoes constantly, and had a nice time.
As promised, here is my MMP post with all the purdy Canada Day pictures.
A bunch have already done this, but, from memory:
O Canada/Our home and native land/True patriot love/In all thy sons command/With glowing hearts we see thee rise/The true north strong and free/From far and wide, O Canada/We stand on guard for thee/God keep our land glorious and free/O Canada, we stand on guard for thee/O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
Ô Canada, terre de nos aïeux/Ton front est ceint de fleurons glorieux/Car ton bras sait porter l’épée/Il sait porter la croix/Ton histoire est une épopée/Des plus brillants exploits/Et ta valeur de foi trempée/Protégera nos foyers et nos droits/Protégera nos foyers et nos droits.
God save our gracious Queen/Long live our noble Queen/God save the Queen/Send her victorious/Happy and glorious/Long to reign over us/God save the Queen
Dieu protège la Reine/De sa main souveraine/Vive la Reine/Qu’un règne victorieux/Joyeux et glorieux/Rende son peuple heureux/Vive la Reine.
You have the Manitoba school system of the early 1990s to thank.
ETA: looks like I muffed a few lines of Dieu protège la Reine. It’s apparently “Qu’un règne glorieux/Long et victorieux.” I suppose it’s fortunate I haven’t had to sing it since I was 10, then.
For the interested, here you may find the words of the whole four-verse versions of O Canada in French (written in 1880), English (written in 1908 and altered in 1968, according to the Wikipedia article) and Inuktitut. (Only the first verse is commonly used as the national anthem, both in French and English.)
I know the first two verses of the French version. I also know parts of the first verse of the English version.
It’s interesting that there is a movement to change parts of the English lyrics to make them more inclusive. The French lyrics were written in a very different time, and make blatant references to God and Church (and King). They also make geographical references that are specific to Quebec (the “fleuve géant” or “giant river” in the second verse; I guess that could also describe parts of Ontario but I don’t think that’s what Routhier was thinking about when he was writing this poem) and use language (Canadians as a “race”?) that wouldn’t be acceptable today. Despite this fact, I don’t know of any movement to have them modified. It’s true that the first and most popular verse, while having a few religious references, is quite tame. The heavy stuff comes later.
matt, do you know if Manitoba school children still sing O Canada and God Save the Queen? I found it almost shocking when my Franco-Ontarian teacher friend told me that in Ontario, school children sing the national anthem at the start of each day. I never had to do anything like this in school.
I have no clue if they still do, but we sang Ô Canada and/or Dieu protège la Reine (and said the Lord’s Prayer!! :eek: ) every day in Manitoba public schools between 1986 and 1991.
Oddly, when I started going to private schools, which you’d think would be snottier about things like this, we only sang O Canada at school functions.
Interesting. I spent all of my high school at a private Catholic school, which basically only meant that we had to take a Catholic religious education class from Secondary I to Secondary IV. (It was optional in Secondary V, but at that level what it was was a class about the world’s major religions. Our teacher included a section on Christianity, but actually taught us about a few notable figures in the history of Christianity. People like Leonardo da Vinci, Henry VIII, etc.)
Other than that there wasn’t anything “religious” about my education there.
