Birthday. Again.

Now that I'm older, let me impart some of my hard-earned wisdom:

First:

Parenthood has not turned Chris or Sara into nicer people.  Thank you for my birthday Motley Crue drinking cups.

For anyone who needs explanation:

1.  I hate Motley Crue.  Like, really HATE.

2.  Since the cups were a gift, I'd feel bad about throwing them away, so I won't.

3.  The plastic they're made of is likely indestructible, so I'll have them forever.

4.  Every time I open my cupboard, from now until the time of my death, I will see them and experience a few seconds of rage.

I've been using one of them today, incidentally, and feel both angry and dirty, sort of like I'm being molested.

Fuck you guys.

Second:

Drinking shots is rarely a good idea, even if it is your birthday.  I owe someone a punch in the face.

Cool Dads

Being a parent doesn't necessarily mean you're uncool forever.  I saw a dad at the train station the other morning.  Wearing a T-shirt that read "I Listen to Slayer", and explaining to his young son that he would not be buying a Cinnabon because it was bad food that might lead to a heart-attack.

Not that I necessarily think that Slayer = Cool, but thanks for showing me that parenthood doesn't have to change who you are.  At my age, that's kind of a turn-on.  Rock on.

Penetrated by Pumpkins

Several weeks ago I attended a street festival which involved some "harvest" type decor.  I saw a boy of about 6 sit on top of a pumpkin.  He said "ouch", of course, when the stem touched him a little more intimately than is probably legal to describe.  Which wouldn't necessarily be something I'd remember after the time lapse - except that he did it again.  And again.  And again.  And again.  His father eventually took the pumpkin away.  Stripped of his pumpkin entertainment, the same boy ripped off his shirt and started dancing very energetically.

Which isn't to suggest that I witnessed the beginnings of this young man's homosexuality.  I expect that might be offensive*.  But.  Well.  He didn't even try to re-position the pumpkin each time he sat on it.  Which yes, could be because kids are kind of stupid and he was expecting something different - ie, not being penetrated by the pumpkin - on subsequent tries.  Or... ?

I had a brush with gayness of my own a couple of weeks ago at the streetcar stop.  The other person waiting informed me that I'd just missed the car, and then engaged me in conversation.  I'm not saying she was a lesbian just because she had a short haircut and was definitely wearing men's jeans.  I expect that might be offensive.  And I'm not saying she was hitting on me just because she engaged me in conversation, over the course of which she gave me some pretty explicit directions on how to get to her house and mentioned that she wished she had a friend like me.  And, once we reached the subway station and parted ways, she said wistfully, "Maybe we'll meet at the streetcar stop again someday".

It's possible she thought that I checked her out first - I'd forgotten my glasses and squinted my way toward the stop, only realizing I was staring at someone when about 3 feet away.

I'm not sure if this next example counts as a brush with gayness.  It's not unusual for men to hold open doors for me.  Not that I'm so arrogant as to think that this is me-specific, rather than a societal convention.  I hold doors open for men and women alike just because I'm polite like that, but only insofar as I'll give the door an energetic push to keep it open for whoever's following behind me.  Unlike the men opening doors for me, I don't stop, open the door, and wait for people to pass, unless they're really old or disabled or have their hands full.

I don't think I've ever had a woman stop, open the door for me, and wait for me to go through until last Thursday.  Said woman may or may not have given me what could be considered a suggestive smile.  Needless to say, my hands were not full, nor am I elderly, nor do I have any obvious disabilities.  Otherwise I would have thought nothing of it.

I went on one one my quarterly grocery shopping expeditions last night.  Inside the store, I happened across 4 or 5 pairs of men who slightly resembled each other, shopping together.  Since couples slightly resemble each other sometimes, I was inspired to take their pictures and start a website called "Brothers or Lovers?"  Not that I care whether they were gay or not, but I've usually got pretty accurate gaydar and I couldn't figure them out.

So maybe I had gayness on the brain already when I was waiting - and waiting - and waiting - for the cab I'd called to pick me up.  I waited so long, in fact, that there was a woman who saw me standing in the entrance next to my full grocery cart both on her way into the store and on her way out.  After leaving her own groceries in her car, she came back into the store on purpose to ask me if I was waiting for a cab and if so, if she could offer me a ride home.  I'm not saying she was a lesbian just because she had a short haircut, was clearly wearing men's jeans, and offered a complete stranger a ride home from the grocery store.  But it seems a little beyond common courtesy**.

Have I been exuding a gay vibe lately or am I jumping to (conceited) conclusions?  Not that I particularly care if I'm giving off a gay vibe.  I'm pretty sure f I was a lesbian I'd know by now, so it's not like it's bringing on a sexual identity crisis.  But I hate to think I'm being misleading.  Maybe I should stop wearing men's jeans***.


Chris and Sara mentioned not long into the pregnancy that they didn't care whether either of the twins were gay, as long as they were happy.

I don't think there's much chance of Molly being a lesbian.  She has a horror of men with moustaches, but has intense love for virtually all others****.

I don't think Jack is exhibiting any predilections one way or another.  Except, maybe, towards snacks.  Everything else is cool with him.  The only thing that seems to bother him is being laughed at, as discovered last Friday after he'd hit his head against the side of a wooden rocking chair repeatedly and kept on smiling.  It was only after his babysitter mentioned that he does stuff like that all the time and everyone looked at him and laughed that he started crying.  Which isn't a sign of homosexuality, of course, but I'm thinking that since he's sensitive to ridicule, he might need some encouragement to come out of the closet, should he one day find himself in the closet*****.

I guess we'll know more when they turn twelve******.



*Really.  None of this is intended to be offensive towards the LGBT community.

**Second website idea:  "Lesbian or Kind Gesture?"

***I have not actually been wearing men's jeans.

****A sign of at least some selective judgment, in that she already knows to steer clear of hipsters, child molesters, and Magnum P.I.  Movember might be a difficult month.

*****Not that homosexuality = ridicule.  Except, a lot of the time, it does.  We don't live in nearly as enlightened an age as people sometimes think.  The stereotypes I have shamelessly used are not meant in any derogatory way.  It's not my fault if I've told these things as they actually happened.

******When Sara and her sister were teenagers, they convinced their younger brother that when he turned twelve, the Gay Fairy would come and tell him whether he was gay or straight.  He was terrified.  

Crazy Cat Lady Strikes Again

As time goes by, I find self-deprecating jokes about my future as a crazy cat lady less and less funny.  Not that they were ever funny in a I-should-be-a-stand-up-comedian kind of way, but... that is neither here nor there.  I'm setting myself up for it, really, what with my plan to start going to the Humane Society and adopting the old cats that no one else wants because they're going to die soon*.  I don't have any intention on moving forward with this until the Orange One dies, however, and that's not going to happen for a long, long time.  Ish.  A long time-ish.  So that part of my crazy cat lady metamorphosis is several years off.

That being said.  I crossed some kind of line over the weekend, and I can't un-cross it.  Visualize this:

I was sitting at my kitchen table with a beer and my lap top - doing... what?  Looking stuff up on YouTube, maybe.  A cold, dismal rain was falling.  And I heard the sad meowling** of an unhappy cat outside on the porch.

I opened the door and stepped outside, to find Roof Cat*** sitting on the railing looking damp and dejected.  Wanting to make him feel better, I slipped back inside to get him a treat.  Having a name for the stray cat that hangs out on my roof and feeding him from time to time may already make me a crazy cat lady in the eyes of some, I am aware****.  The usual handful of kibble was clearly not a good idea, given the weather.  My only other option was a can of tuna.  I may also have retrieved a bathmat from inside and set up a sweet little dining area under the overhang, where he could enjoy his meal without being rained on, resting on the warm and dry bathmat rather than the saturated wooden planks of my porch.  His tail rose a little, hopefully, when he caught the scent of tuna in the night air.  I tried to coax him down, but he paced back and forth along the railing, meowling again, occasionally looking like he was getting ready to jump, backing out*****, and pacing again.  It didn't take me long to realize that he didn't want to have to slosh through a frigid puddle to reach the oasis I'd thoughtfully created.  And here is where I crossed the line.  Consider this:

    

Except... substitute the lady with a stray cat, the man with a lady, and the jacket with a T-shirt, which I stripped off and arranged on my anti-gravity chair so he could have a soft jumping off point, still warm from my body heat.  I may have stayed outside T-shirt-less so I could soothingly convince him that it was okay to come down.  And I maybe smoked a cigarette.  By the time I was done I'd gotten a little nipply and Roof Cat was still on the ledge, so I retreated inside where it was warm and I had beer.

I peeked outside a few minutes later to find Roofie happily eating the tuna, and all was right with the world.  I don't know if my T-shirt was any help at all... but... I had to do laundry anyway.  And it's not like I've never been topless on my porch before.  I used to go out topless on my porch all the time.  That was before I got glasses and had not yet realized that my neighbours to the back could, in fact, see me quite clearly if they happened to look my way******.

*A couple of cats at a time.  It breaks my cat-loving bleeding heart a little bit every time I stop in the Humane Society to visit the cats and see a cage labelled:  Clyde.  Age 15.  At the Humane Society since January 2010.  (Did I just suggest that I stop in at the Humane Society now and then just to visit the cats?  No I don't.  That's crazy).

**meowling.  can it be that I just made that word up?  Google suggests that I did.  Mewling, yes.  Meowling, no.  I insist that meowling is a whole different sound, as anyone who's overheard a cat in the rain can confirm.

***If I have described Roof Cat before, stop reading.  If I haven't, Roof Cat is a possibly stray orange and white calico cat that hangs out on my roof all the time.  I say "possibly" stray because on one hand, he seems pretty well-fed, but on the other hand, I catch him out there at all hours of day and night.

****I started out to say, "Fuck you", but it seems a little harsh.  So instead, "Don't Judge Me".

*****Like someone bracing themselves before jumping into a lake in early June.  In Canada.

******Why lie?  I still go out topless on my porch all the time.  There're no secrets between me and my backyard neighbours at this point.

Please, no more pregnancies.  I can't do the drinking for everyone.  As much as it may have seemed like I was embracing the role weekend before last, when (two nights in a row) I re-learned my bi-annual lesson on the dangers of drinking on a virtually empty stomach.

I met Chris and Sara for a show on Friday, fueled only by a yogurt cup (at 2 p.m.) and a square of pizza (that's square, not slice, and I didn't eat the crust because I was full*).  The best part of the night by far was when Sara and I were waiting at the bar and a girl in front of us doing a round of shots with some guys made the classic throw-the-liquor-over-your-shoulder-instead-of-drinking-it maneuver.  You should really check the rearview mirror before pulling that move.  After Sara got soaked in whiskey, she made several horrified faces, removed her whiskeyed cardigan, and tried to get the attention of whiskey-thrower by tapping not very softly on her shoulder.  She may as well have been invisible.  Then the girl standing on my other side poked me and said, "she shouldn't feel bad.  that girl did the same thing to me an hour ago."

Six or seven tall boys of Steigl later found me dancing wildly with a middle aged Asian man, which is the last Chris and Sara saw of me before going home to relieve the babysitter, as Sara confirmed the next morning by texting me to say, "Last time we saw you you were dancing wildly with a middle aged Asian man**."

The second last time I saw me I was insisting*** that my cab driver accept a Passion Flakie as part of his tip.  The last time I saw me I was cross-legged on my living room floor, for some reason listening to The Postal Service on my iPod, and devouring a jumbo Ah Caramel and 3-pack of Twinkies****.  I didn't even know I had The Postal Service on my iPod.  How 2003 of me.

That was Friday.

Saturday was a scheduled Star Wars marathon for the benefit of someone who had never seen any of the original three - who brought an unscheduled box of wine.  At least, I didn't know the box of wine was scheduled.  It soon became apparent that no one else was drinking any - Sara fell asleep sometime in between the time the Millenium Falcon left Tatooine and arrived at the asteroid field that used to be Alderaan, Chris isn't a wine drinker at the best of times, and of the two other members of our marathon, one was driving and the other never drinks red wine, having had a very bad experience in her early 20's.  I felt kind of bad about it, so I decided to join the box o'wine fun, fueled only by one litre of milk (intermittently throughout the day), some potato pancake appetizer sticks and two Rice Krispie squares (all on arrival at Chris and Sara's).  The wine-bringer made the classic if-I-keep-refilling-my-glass-before-it's-empty-I've-still-only-had-one-drink-right? maneuver, and he took me down with him.  The end of the night found me insisting that Chris call me a cab because I couldn't see straight enough to find the cab contact on my phone, giving Sara $20 in payment of a theatre ticket she bought me, which she put on her coffee table and I (must've) picked up for cab money because the next day it had disappeared, and young Luke Winedrinker throwing the near empty box of wine into some shrubbery outside his apartment building.

On the bright side, I have a new Star Wars avatar.  I always want to be Yoda, but everyone insists that I'm in no way a Yoda*****, more of a Salacious Crumb****** - which I don't entirely appreciate.  Young Luke Winedrinker started the night as a Sand Person (which he didn't much appreciate - but since he's Egyptian, it just made racist sense).  Half-way through the night, he announced that he'd rather be Skywalker (which surprised everyone - nobody ever wants to be Skywalker, he's such a whiny little bitch*******).  Box of wine nearing on empty, Luke Winedrinker was born.  As was R2Drinks2Much, which I'll take over Salacious Crumb any day.  

As for the next day... I'll just say I eventually made it home and went back to sleep, cradled in my Star Wars bedding.  Not before noticing the box of wine in the shrubbery and lamenting that we didn't give it to a homeless person instead.

*it's not anorexia on purpose.  busy at work as usual, and I keep forgetting to eat.  the stomach so shriveled it couldn't manage a full square of pizza did manage about 3 litres of beer, however.

**whatever.  he liked it.

***he really, really didn't want the Flakie.  It took much convincing.

****I think, in spite of Hostess' bankruptcy in the U.S. earlier this year, that you can actually still get Twinkies there.  For the fun of gloating, however, I'm going to pretend that's not true.  Clamato, limitless Twinkies, gun control laws and universal healthcare... life is pretty sweet on this side of the border.

*****to be clear, though, I mean the Yoda that goes through Luke's lunchbox and gets into a fight with R2D2 when Luke first lands in the Dagobah system, not the strong, patient and wise Yoda that is able to lift Luke's x-wing fighter from the swamp with the power of his mind.


******

*******

There's nothing cool about that guy.  Am I right, or am I right?

Evan Dando vs. Mimosas

Not that anyone but me has been keeping track, but if I were having a contest with myself, awarding myself some kind of topical* prize for the post with the most page views, Evan Dando's penis was winning by a landslide for a very long time.  It was a matter of personal pride that anyone who happened to Google "Evan Dando Penis" would be directed almost immediately to drinking-for-two.

(I just tried it again.  I'm number one!  In the whole wide Google universe, Evan Dando's penis and I go together like peanut butter and pickles**).

So it was with some sadness that I logged on today for the first time in weeks*** and discovered that there's officially significantly more interest in whether or not it's okay to drink mimosas while pregnant**** than there is in a certain middle-aged musician's genitalia.

I'm not sure why, but it makes me a little sad.


*As in, on topic, ie, a trophy containing Fireball Whiskey.  Not like an ointment.

**Strange.  You'd think drinking-for-two would share some of Evan Dando's popularity.  Not that I'm suggesting that Evan Dando is a little lacking in popularity.  Or that there's virtually no online interest in an Evan Dando sex tape.  Except that I'm suggesting he's not very popular and there's no online interest in an Evan Dando sex tape.  (And if not online, where?)

***Not that anyone but me is counting, except maybe one other (I'm looking at you, Chris.  complainer).

****Answer:  still no.  Seriously. I presume if you're Googling it, you already understand that drinking other alcohol while pregnant is not okay, but believe for some unknown reason that there's an exception for champagne and orange juice.  What would make you think so?  Because of the juice?  By that logic, pregnant women would also be in the clear to enjoy most of the beverages offered at all-inclusive resorts and Mexican restaurants (ie - daquiris, pina coladas, maragaritas, rum punch), as well as screwdrivers, sangria, cosmopolitans, caesars... the list could go on forever.

... and then the earth blew up.

When I was a bright young creative writing student*, there was a guy in my first year fiction writing workshop who is best remembered for two things.  First, every time anyone came in with an untitled story and the class was asked for their thoughts, he suggested Babe:  Pig in the City.  Second, he ended every story he submitted with "And then the earth blew up."  (Now that I think of it, I think Chris routinely ended the stories he wrote in his youth the same way).

The first time he did it, P.S.L., the professor, rolled his eyes, laughed a little, and said, "Ran out of time, did you?"  The offending aspiring writer just sort of blushed.

The second time he did it, said aspiring writer had grown about half a ball.  He blushed, and in his own defence, muttered, "No.  I did it on purpose."

"Chicken," P.S.L. replied.

The third time he did it, he had grown the other half of his first ball, and the second one had just started to descend.  To justify his Molotov cocktail of a conclusion, he said (dramatically), "What other ending is there?  Eventually the earth will blow up.  I'm writing these stories about people and what happens to them and how they feel about it and what they learn from it - or don't learn from it - and then, once you're emotionally invested, the earth blows up.  Because that is what will happen.  I'm trying to put how important we think everything is into perspective."  

He said something to that effect, anyway.  

P.S.L. pondered this for a moment, then said, "Okay.  Well.  I'm going to point out three problems with that.  First, I'm not convinced that you aren't full of shit and just copped out rather than think of a real conclusion.  Second, in terms of perspective, these experiences that people have are important because they're important to them - and I think you'll find that most readers aren't going to like it when you point out that everything that they torment over or that brings them joy is insignificant.  And, that's only if they understand your message, which they probably won't."  He paused.  "Not that whether or not your reader understands your message is all that important, so long as they get something out of what they're reading."  He paused again, seemed to hesitate, then said, "The third thing is, frankly, you don't have me all that emotionally invested.  Maybe work on becoming a better story-teller before the earth blows up."

He said something to that effect, anyway.  Then he looked around at the rest of us.  "Does anyone have anything to add?"  There were some murmurs of assent.

The next and last story this guy brought to class was a little melodramatic - but it worked - better than his other efforts anyway.  I don't really remember the actual story, just that it was sad, things went from bad to worse, and right at the critical, anguished turning point:

... they lived happily ever after.

Everyone proceeded to debate on the content of the story itself, the writing style, etc.  Anything but the ending.  Only one person commented on that.

"So, about the ending," I began.

He didn't interrupt, just sat there looking smug.

"I think I liked it better when the earth blew up."

I'm not exactly sure why I told that story.  I guess I started because I was sitting at work yesterday and out of nowhere I wondered:

If the sun blew up would we have any warning that we would soon be incinerated, or would it just happen?

And if we knew it was going to happen, how much time would we have, and what would we do with it?  Or would we even want to know?

I quickly decided that yes, I would want to know, and I would want to be sitting on my roof or on the side of a hill, facing the sun, so that I'd have those seconds or that split second of knowing, "okay, this is it."  And I'd be sitting with my best-loved person, holding hands or something, and that we'd grip each other tightly right before we were engulfed by flames, the way Thelma and Louise held hands right before Louise drove over the cliff into the Grand Canyon**. And then it occurred to me that at this point, that person would be my cat, who would probably be struggling against me, but otherwise alone, which was depressing, so I very quickly reverted to wondering whether we'd have any warning or not.

I didn't have the chance to look it up right away.  But over dinner with a friend, I asked whether or not he had the answer:  he's the kind of guy who might know.  He wasn't sure.  "But the sun isn't going to explode," he explained.  "Researchers now believe that the universe is expanding like an elastic band, and eventually it will reach a point where it can't stretch any further, and then snap back into place.  So we're going to implode before the sun explodes."

"But," I wondered aloud, "that would mean that the universe has boundaries, and isn't the whole point of the universe is that it's all there is?  If it has boundaries it suggests that there's something outside it.  Unless our universe is suspended like an embryonic sac in the middle of the Negaverse***.  But that means the universe as I understand it doesn't even exist."

I tried to wrap my mind around this and started to get uncomfortable.

"Yep," he replied, conversationally, as he speared some tuna tataki with one chopstick.  "Kind of a mind-fuck, isn't it."

I don't think I'm alone in preferring life when my mind is not being fucked, so I fixated on an especially large piece of maki, and commented, "I don't think I can possibly fit anything that big into my mouth."

I looked the sun thing up when I got home.  Answer:  eight minutes.  Eight minutes from the moment the people of NASA or whoever monitors these things realize that the sun has exploded and the moment we incinerate.  Which would give me enough time to get outside, at least.  And then I wondered whether I could get an app for my iPhone which would alert me as soon as the sun exploded so I could make the most of those critical eight minutes.  And then I remembered I don't have an iPhone.

The good news is that apparently our sun is 4-5 billion years old, and is only about halfway out of gas, so it's a few billion years yet before we need to be start worrying about these things.


*hard to believe now, isn't it.

**spoiler alert?  that movie came out in 1991, so I figure I'm safe from ruining the ending for anyone.

***Thanks for the concept, Sailor Moon.

Oops...

it appears that I've been negligent.  again.

I'd like to say with good reason, but on second thought, I'm not in the mood to justify myself.

On third thought, I confess:

1. The last time I settled in to draft a post I quickly realized that it was going to be another erratic rant* and thought better of it,
2. I've been a little distracted by the 3 Day Novel contest**, and
3. I've got problems of my own.  So there.

However.  

In real news:  

Apres des mois d'attente, un gros bienvenue a Saskia, le plus recent resident de Pont-en-Royans, France!  I say this in French not to be pretentious and/or show off; it's not my fault if one of my oldest and fondest friends just had a baby girl and they live in France.

and

Baby's First Snack Hands!***  

Molly has been doing things like waving, clapping and uttering words like "Mum" and "Kitty" for several weeks now.  Although, I've heard her attempts at speech, and it's language that only a parent could understand/love.  

Jack, meanwhile, has been smiling at everything and smacking both of his hands against the wall or the floor in an expression of pure happiness.  

I've been making my patented**** "snack hands" gesture at him ever since he was a few months old, and, to my excitement, over the 3 Day Novel weekend, he started to respond.  Several times I looked his way and gestured, "Jackie... Snack Hands!" and he mimicked me as best as his tiny, unco-ordinated fists could manage.  Continuing to smile like a damn fool - or maybe, like a happy baby.

I consider this a personal victory.  It's almost as good as if his first word was "Granken".

*I can't help myself.  I read an article written by a mom/parenting-advice columnist, justifying using a stroller for her 4 year old when on day outings.  Thankfully for all of you, I don't remember all the details.  The excuses she made for herself that stick most in my memory are:

1. Her 4 year old does not have the stamina to last through a full day on her feet.
2. She is saving the public at large from exposure to her daughter's fatigue-induced "melt-down".
3. Her daughter likes it.

Let me counter this, point by point:

1. Her child is not going to develop stamina from a stroller.  Know how to increase her stamina for walking around all day?  Um... put her in situations where she has to walk around all day.
2. If at age 4, said mom is certain that, without the stroller, her child would have a public melt-down sufficient to embarrass herself and disturb others, there's more wrong with her parenting style than stroller use.  4 is plenty old to know that these sorts of fits are not acceptable behaviour, as it is plenty old for parents to have developed some coping strategies.    
3. In continuation of 1 and 2 above, maybe don't take your child on outings that will last all day if you know it won't end well.  Yeah, it kinda sucks.  You're a parent.  Sometimes it kinda sucks.  Alternatively, plan a mid-day rest period.  That's what my parents did, with three children all two years apart, and some measure of success.
4. I'd like to have two sherpas at my disposal at all times - one to back-pack me everywhere, and one to perform a real-time beatbox/rap narration of the events of my day, but that's just not how the world works.

 **http://www.3daynovel.com/

Sara and I entered jointly for the second time this year.  A grueling test of one's creative endurance, yes.  A grueling test of one's ability to spend 3 days in a row with one person, one lap top, and slightly differing writing styles, yes.  A grueling test of one's ability to subsist almost entirely on coffee, Coca-Cola, space-pops, lasagna and beer, yes.  We put off writing the riveting climax because neither of us could think of anything to say at the time, only to realize mid-way through our final read-through/edit (and one-half hour to go) that we still didn't have anything but "insert speech here".  We finished, typing madly on two different computers, with literally two minutes to spare.   

I'm reasonably convinced that What's In It For Ned will, eventually, go down as a masterpiece of 21st century fiction.  Gaps in character and plot development, maybe some general incoherence, and what some may consider an easy/quick conclusion aside.  Not that I'm admitting to any of these things. I maintain that any story set between an intergalactic mini-putt and a somewhat supernatural tavern can't possibly go wrong.  

***Sorry J - my excitement is not to suggest that Snack Hands are a bigger accomplishment than new life, but they had the benefit of being close to home.

****okay, maybe not "patented"

Happy (Belated) Birthday!

Twins are officially a year old.  Well, one year and five days old.  It would only be four days, but, leap year.

Which isn't to say that I didn't wish them happy birthday in person.  The update is that they're crawling around like... like babies... and have both acquired... dare I say "intelligence"? in their eyes.  Not so intelligent that they don't try to eat things like tissue paper and cardboard stacking blocks and have to be supervised like a couple of terriers.  But.  Still.

Anyway.

Personality development is in full swing.  Both have recently started exhibiting facial expressions specific to Chris.  Or, specific to Chris when he's being kind of a bitch.  But that is neither here nor there.

On a completely unrelated note, I feel like I should mention that Chris recently voiced some displeasure regarding the infrequency of posts and the erratic subject matter since... well, since the twins were born.  I've been going through the old posts little by little, both to explore that accusation and, for reasons of my own, to check to see if I've said anything overtly offensive or incriminating in the event someone tries to Google me.  Jesus H.  I'm so sorry.  Erratic rants indeed.

Anyway.

I've had some stuff going on that really trumps the blog in terms of priorities.  Not to say I've been accomplishing much on that end, considering I've spent a lot of the last week reading old Nancy Drews*.  But continuing ability to pay my rent really should come first.

Anyway.  Not sure where I'm going with this.  I'll leave you, for today, with yet another dream to be interpreted.  It went like this:

I was having one of those awesome afternoon/after-work naps where you lose just enough consciousness to start dreaming, but not so much that you become completely unaware of your surroundings.  I knew all the while that it was early evening, and that I was relaxing in bed, windows wide open, and it was raining.  So it was very realistic when all of a sudden I was making out with an under-privileged third-world kid of my acquaintance.  But there was something wrong in terms of suction.  "Hold on," said I, "I have to take out my retainer".  And then I woke up.

What could that possibly mean?


*I've also done some Nancy Drew-related research and have discovered two things:

1.  Many of the earlier Nancy Drews have been edited over the years so as not to be culturally offensive.  I give you the the culturally-sensitive first line of The Secret of Red Gate Farm:  "'That Oriental-looking clerk in the perfume shop certainly acted mysterious,' Bess Marvin declared, as she and her friends ended their shopping trip and hurried down the street to the railroad station."

2.  So much for that Master's thesis.  In about 2008, I had the idea to do some digging into female detective serials, the rise of feminism, etc.  I had this notion that if I were to do a survey of powerful women who would have been coming of age at the time when the Dorothy Dixons, Nancy Drews, and Trixie Beldens of the world were most popular, I would find a distinct correlation between the appearance of these fictional, intelligent, independent and empowered amateur sleuths and the rise of non-fictional powerful and influential females starting in the mid-20th century.  Apparently a copy-cat named Jennifer M. Woolston beat me to it in 2010.  Damn you, Jennifer Woolston!  I could be lecturing on cultural theory at Harvard now, if not for the  F I received in Rock n' Roll and its Roots, which precluded me from admission into even the worst graduate programs offered at Canadian universities.  This F has since been rectified, but that's another story entirely.

  

Splitsville, or, A funny thing happened on the way to flip cup..., or, One Hot Mess*

...or was it on the way back from flip cup**?

Either way, my work social events always conclude in some manner of mess.

All of these socials involve an open bar.  The summer socials also, invariably, involve a team building competition.  Perhaps it is inevitable that when you take the spirit of competition and add limitless alcohol that flip cup will ensue.

But first, the other competition.  It was an Amazing Race inspired event which my team was so disinterested in that we were at the bar doing tequila shots as the rules were being explained, thus missing the part about how we would only get our first clue after beating other teams in answering a trivia question.

More than half of the teams were gone before we figured out what was going on. However, after that, I dominated at trivia.  The question was this:

In what movie did a character played by Paul Reiser say the following:  "Look, this is an emotional moment for all of us, okay? I know that. But, let's not make snap judgments, please. This is clearly-clearly an important species we're dealing with and I don't think that you or I, or anybody, has the right to arbitrarily exterminate them."***

I also dominated at the American Gladiators style jousting competition.  Not because I was especially good at it, pent-up aggression aside.  However, with my awe-inspiring balance and core strength (ahem) I could not, and would not, be knocked down.  I wore my opponent down very, very slowly:  eventually he fell from sheer exhaustion****.

Last, I dominated at flip cup.  I sat out the first couple of rounds because I didn't want to aggravate a summer cold by drinking to excess, but then I decided what the hell.  I quickly earned the role of team anchor, and we didn't lose once*****.

The evening ended with me demonstrating that I can do the splits on a city sidewalk.  Not that I can only do the splits on a city sidewalk.  I can do them anywhere.  I maintain that it's an accomplishment not many women of my advanced age can boast of.  However... if you're ever hanging out with me and I pose the question, "Wanna see me do the splits?", it might be advisable to get me a piece of bread and a glass of water.

On the thought of the splits, this has been one of the most eventful weeks of my life in terms of the ending of relationships******.  If anyone asks after me, you can find me in my apartment listening to a break-up mix, which currently involves only a Whitesnake song set to repeat.


*http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=hot+mess

I only scanned through the first 7 or 8 definitions.  All are possibly applicable.  If I say so myself.


**If you don't know what flip cup is... well, I'm surprised.  I'd never actually played it before (another surprise) but I still knew what is was.  Here is an instructional video for the uninitiated:

***Answer:  Aliens.  Apart from the Star Wars and Star Trek franchises, I don't even particularly like sci-fi.  But I do like movies where female leads kick serious ass.  And... who hasn't seen Aliens?  Though, it may take a certain personality type to know (1) who Paul Reiser is, (2) that he's only been in like 3 movies, and (3) of that limited selection, that quote could only have come from one movie.  That movie being Aliens.


****I've recovered from some bruises which I blame entirely on the jousting.  None of the photos I took worked out, so you'll have to believe me when I say these bruises had a strange paw-print pattern, which made it look like I'd been in a slap-fight with a bear cub or a labradoodle.


*****how does one join the Beer Olympics?  Is it selected by country or fraternity or what?  I don't want to find myself alone in a room 15 years from now muttering, "I coulda been a contender".


******

P.S. My Cat is Not Dead*

This has possibly been the most harrowing 36 hours of my life.

It goes like this:

I was getting ready to leave my apartment for a 4 year old's birthday yesterday around noon.  As is my habit,   I made sure that my cat had fresh food and water, and then went to say "so long".  

But I couldn't find him anywhere.  I searched possible exits (2) to see if he'd somehow let himself outside.  Exits intact.  Next, I completely panicked.  He is not a cat that will ignore you if you are wandering around the house calling him, particularly if you're opening a can of tuna as loudly as possible (as I was).  I made a thorough search of every possible hiding place and finally found him barricaded under the couch.

Basically non-responsive.  I had to give him a good shake before he would eke out a quiet "mew".  The only sign of life he showed was when I forcefully removed him from under the couch and he fought me all the way.

I should backtrack a bit and say that in my searching, I found an alarming number of puddles of vomit.  

The Orange One has always been kind of a pukey cat.  He eats too fast sometimes, and throws up.  He over-grooms most of the time, gets hairballs, and throws up.  I don't think it's necessary to say that this vomit was much, much different.  But it was.  

After many phone calls, I managed to find a vet that could accept an emergency patient.  I took him in, and he was admitted immediately.

His first 18 hours were not promising.  He didn't get any worse, but he didn't get any better.  When I spoke to the vets on the phone (about every 90 minutes), they were carefully choosing their words, talking about "if" he got better, not "when".

The time I spent on the phone I tried to be strong and think of things in an objectively medical way, so that I could coherently ask questions and hear answers.  

The time not on the phone I spent clutching a photo of him, weeping, and repeating "you're going to be okay, you have to be okay, you're going to be okay.... etc."  Alternating that with very realistic images of having to make the decision to put him to sleep.  What I would do, what I would say.  Stroking his head and being as soothing as possible... I had specifics in my head that I can't go into because thinking about it has me crying like a damn fool.

He's taken a turn for the much, much better.  I visited earlier this evening, and while he is still not eating or drinking anything, he at least is acting like himself.  Not at all like the cat that crawled under the couch to die yesterday.  Exactly like the cat that is insanely happy just to be near me but has about a 45 second tolerance for being restrained by my loving arms and a 0 second tolerance for being restrained by anything else, such as a portable IV.

I had been in such agitation that I didn't eat any more today than he did, but after seeing him feeling better I felt confident enough to attempt a small meal.  After paying for my veggie dog from a nearby street meat vendor, I noticed a wooden box attached to the cart (with coin slot) labelled, "wishing well".  I naturally deposited some coins and made a silent prayer to the patron saint of hot dogs for The Orange One's return to health and subsequent longevity.

I remember a few years ago after a co-worker and cat-lover had a baby.  One of the things she said in the aftermath was that she didn't love her cats any less, but, if there were food shortages in the event of a zombie apocalypse, as soon as her daughter uttered the words, "I'm hungry", the cats would be shortlisted for the barbeque.

I'm trying hard to be casual and flippant because the alternative is to curl up in a fetal position and sob.  Anyway.  I'm off to watch episodes of MythBusters in the hope that I can be lulled to sleep.  

Myth: Confirmed

In the unlikely event anyone is interested in how I've been spending my time since recent drop in post frequency, the answer is simple.

Well, it comes in a few parts.

But, in the continued theme of complete randomness, first I will discuss something different.

Heatwave 2012 continues.  I don't exactly pride myself on not having air-conditioning.  But I don't have it on purpose*.

First, I didn't grow up with air-conditioning.  There was a horrible heat wave the summer my mom was pregnant with me.  After careful consideration of their financial situation, the speed at which possible solutions could be implemented, and my mother's pregnant-addled input, my parents chose a pool over central air.  Mostly because my mother announced carelessly (and I presume with some pregnancy-fuelled ferocity), "I don't care how you do it.  I want to cool off right now."  My dad is pretty good at things like this, so, with the help of some neighbours to dig the hole, they had a fully functional in-ground pool before a weekend was out.  I would like to say that my mother dove in thankfully, but it's more likely that she stepped in very much hesitantly.  Even now, after many, many years of pool ownership, she can't really swim.  She refuses to let her face underwater, and has developed a strange dog/frog paddle technique of her own, which only marginally staves off drowning.

They stuck to their decision.  I spent my childhood sweaty and uncomfortable on hot summer Chatham nights**.  Which has incidentally resulted in some very fond memories of being dragged out of bed at 3:00 a.m. to go for a swim***.

That was my long-winded way of explaining that it doesn't feel like summer if I'm not a little uncomfortable.

Second, the only time I've had air-conditioning as an adult was during two (three?) years of condo living. I went from my climate-controlled 16th floor unit to my climate-controlled 16th floor office.  I had SAD all year****.

Third, as an environmentalist, I know that air-conditioners suck up energy like nobody's business.  Unless it's literally hot enough that I could overheat and die, I suck it up.  Imagine a climate-changed world where the ice in the Arctic is gone and polar bears go extinct, because I (ironically) wanted to keep cool.

But I digress.

One of the things I've been doing on these hot, sleepless nights is watch old episodes of MythBusters, which I find oddly soothing.  Like Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman***** are singing a sweet lullaby******.  Don't judge me.  I know plenty of people who consider MythBusters good hangover-watching, because they're engaged enough to be distracted, but it has a strange power to bring on a much-needed nap.


I digress.


I have a 1950's kitchen table that I'm quite fond of.  When I bought it, the chrome was in such deplorable condition that I was told by many (who should have known) that it was irrecoverable.  But my heart was set on sky blue formica for a table top, so I bought it anyway.


I don't know why I decided last week to try and shine up the table chrome.  I just did.  After disappointing results with the products suggested by teen-aged Canadian Tire employees, I turned to the internet for help.  I clearly should have done this in the first place.  Coca Cola and tinfoil, as determined by Adam and Jamie back in 2003, has been time-consuming, but surprisingly effective.


Consider the results below.


Table corner, pre-polish:

Table corner, post-polish:

(Ooohh.  Aaaahh.)


Not that I stopped to bother to doubt the MythBusters before, but rest assured, I will not do it again.


Incidentally, the actual episode I recently watched that inspired this post had to do with brandy as delivered by a St. Bernard preventing death by hypothermia.


As Adam and Jamie determined, no.  The alcohol increases blood flow to capillaries in the extremities which reflexively constrict from the cold so as to direct heat to the organs required to survive at the core.  Sudden blood flow to the extremities results in warming in your hands and feet, which, while welcome, draws heat from your core really, really fast.  


The body heat from the St. Bernard helped, though.


But, in the continued theme of alcohol consumption in extreme heat, I wondered whether alcohol reduces your body temp in hot weather as well.  I figured no, capillaries of the extremities would not be constricted in 35 degree heat so there would be no draw on core temperature.  However.  Results:  Inconclusive (but plausible?).  I am not feeling quite as overheated as I did two hours ago, but since I didn't ingest an internal thermometer like Adam and Jamie did, this could be because:

1. it's now practically the middle of the night.  temperatures have gone down in general.
2. I'm getting kind of numb to it.

But I figure:  who cares about the science?  For cold weather drinking - I've experienced paralyzing cold in my hands and feet when inappropriately dressed in extreme cold.  Anything to relieve that kind of intense pain could save your life, in that it gives you the ability/motivation to seek out help.  For warm weather drinking - whatever helps you sleep at night, question mark?******

   

*much to the dismay of my allergist, who insists that I should only ever breathe in a controlled environment because I'm so allergic to everything in the air that it's a wonder I'm even alive.  For serious.  I had skin tests for the first time a couple of years ago and was off the charts allergic to virtually all airbornes (especially cats and horses).  I'm kind of afraid of horses - think of the damage they could do to your face if they suddenly and without warning flick their heads back because a fly has landed on their eyelid.  So no big loss there.  But I digress.  When I sat down with the medical specialist to discuss my test results, she looked down at the notes, then up to my horribly inflamed arm, and then actually into my eyes.  Her first words to me, and this is a direct quote, "how are you even alive?"

(Here's how.  Maybe I have an unworldly ability to adapt, but if I put up with the hay fever and asthma that follows the beginning of each allergy season and/or time away from my cat, I just adapt.  I'm not saying others should be so flexible.  But it works for me).

**I know that Canada is the land of snow and parkas, but in southwestern Ontario in the summer, it's friggin' HOT.  I've mentioned this before, but Chatham is surrounded by lakes and below sea-level.  The humidity rivals that of a tropical rain forest.

***When did City of Toronto stop keeping public pools open all night as cooling stations in the event of heat alerts.  I was really looking forward to a midnight (ahem, 2 a.m.) swim.  Yes, the air-conditioned libraries are open, but who wants to go there?  Most of them don't even have books anymore.

****Some may suggest that I'm torturing myself needlessly, because during my condo experience, there were many other circumstances impacting my mood unrelated to SAD.

*****Sorry Jamie... I can't help but assume that when you were in grade 6 or 7 people called you Jamie Hymen.

******Etymology of word lullaby.  Of course. Lull... Bye.

Joe vs. the Volcano

So I've been feeling a sadly repetitive combination of general blues and overwork.  Plus still feeling the after-effects of last week's high heat/humidity.

Six nights in a row (yes, six) I planned to distract myself with wine spritzers made with table wine and orange soda and a viewing of Joe vs. the Volcano - a movie which never fails to cheer me up.  If you don't know why orange soda wine spritzers were appropriate drinking/viewing than you really should watch the movie*.  But time kept getting away from me and six nights in a row I fell asleep from general exhaustion and heat fatigue before the opening credits were even over.

Put it this way.  I bought a bottle (ahem, one litre carton) of appropriately cheap wine for mixing with C Plus eight days ago and it hasn't even been opened**.  That is surely some kind of record for alcohol in my apartment.


*I've been assured many times over that I'm the only person who genuinely likes this movie.  I don't understand how that could be, because it's amazing on many levels.  Here's a taste.  If you don't like it, don't judge me.  I have enough problems without the condemnation of friends, acquaintances and complete strangers.  On second thought, I don't care.  If you don't appreciate this cinematic masterpiece it's definitely a problem with you, not me.

**Okay, that's a lie.  It is opened, but only 1/3 empty.  Still a record.

"Do you always look forward to the longest day of the year and then miss it?

I always look forward to the longest day of the year and then miss it."

The Great Gatsby was also prominent on the reading lists of so many English classes between Grade 12 and 3rd year that I remember some of the dialogue, word for word, even after not reading it for at least 8 years.  On the list of novels I've reluctantly had to write papers on, I think it comes second only to Frankenstein*.

Through inadvertance, I have NOT missed out on the longest day of the year this time.  The Southwestern Ontario heatwave has both continued and intensified, and I have been keeping cool since about 8:30 (p.m.) by lounging on my kitchen porch in an anti-gravity chair and sipping beer**.

I recall that I never missed the longest day of the year when I lived in the Canadian Rockies.  How could anyone?  You could sit drinking on a patio in full daylight until 11 p.m.  And quite often see the Northern Lights after it got dark.

And an hour later:

Kind of awesome.

The drawbacks to the rest of the summer Canadian Rockies were:

• just because it was summer it didn't mean there was no snow.  I remember one year waking up on the 4th of July to a full-on blizzard
• crystal blue, gorgeous and inviting bodies of water were everywhere.  on really hot days, it was very difficult not to jump in.  jumping in would have spelled death by hypothermia in less than 5 minutes, however, as the rivers and lakes were all directly glacier-fed
• sunburns.  when you think of how far the earth is from the sun, you wouldn't think that getting 1700 metres closer to it would make a significant difference.  It really, really does.

But on to other matters.

Does alcohol metabolize differently in intense heat?  The bottle collection to my right suggests that I've had much more than necessary for a school night, but I'm not really feeling it at all. 

Scratch that.  I just Googled the metabolism of alcohol in hot weather and started giggling hysterically when the site I landed on included a pop-up that said "If you close this box, you will not see it again." 

I just remembered an awesome game that me and a former co-worker (still friend) used to play at work.  Chicken Breast.  We'd stand at opposite ends of our long tunnel of a photocopy room, stand up straight, our chests thrust forward, and walk swiftly towards each other and wait and see who would be the first to flinch and turn away before we bounced off of each other's breasts.  Why did I think of that?  Maybe because I was thinking about eggs.  Oh, good times.


*If you have not read The Great Gatsby, I suggest you do.  It's a great book.  My reluctance to write papers on it stems only from the fact that I actually quite liked it and grew tired of dissecting the symbolic meaning behind East Egg and West Egg.  Like the island of Manhattan stretches out like fallopian tubes and East and West Egg are the ovaries that you find at the end.  Though I never used that angle.  I don't remember it from any of the criticism, either. Maybe I've got a Master's thesis in the works. 

**My heels are digging into the outer corners of the frame of the anti-gravity chair like I'm in stirrups for a pap test or child-birthing.


I remember that I've promised a video montage, and a video montage I will provide.  Though I'm a technotard and am not making very good progress.  By video montage, I might mean PowerPoint.  That I can work with.

5 out of 6 Dreams Uninterpreted

My Kiefer Sutherland Donut Dreams were eventually replaced by a disturbing series where my teeth kept crumbling and falling out of my mouth.

Without a handy copy of 1000 Dreams Interpreted*, I turned to Google** to divine the meaning behind my inner workings of my mind.

Dreams involving tooth decay are quite common.  They could mean a number of things, including a reflection of some kind of major life change, fear of getting old, and/or fear of making a fool of oneself... all of which could easily have applied in November of 2010. And still do, I suppose.  Though I haven't had a dream about my teeth in a very long time.

I came up with nothing when I looked up dreams involving celebrities violently coercing you into eating baked goods.  Feeding***, yes.  Force-feeding, no.

I similarly came up empty-handed when I tried to look up what it means if you have dreams involving being executed by celebrities. 

As I write this, I remember another recurring dream I had in my early 20's where I'm somehow caught up in World War II.  Different battle zones are divided up like a game of 3D Tic Tac Toe.  I know that reaching one of the bottom corners of the cube equals safety.  When I finally make it down (after much struggle but no serious injury), I find Roberto Benigni sitting safely behind the walls of a sandbag bumper, eating a burrito.  He offers me some of his burrito, and before I have the chance to accept, one of his arms turns into a pool noodle.  He then uses his good arm to remove the pool noodle arm, and starts beating me with it.  It doesn't hurt.  But still.

I found some stuff on dreaming about celebrities, but none of the celebrity situations offered seemed to really be applicable to me - there was nothing about celebrities threatening you in any way, anyway****.

I found plenty to indicate that recurring dreams are your brain's way of bombarding you with something that you're supposed to learn about yourself.  Fine.  I can accept that.

Once I got into it, I also tried to find the meaning behind a dream that I've had since... I'm going to say infancy, because I can't remember ever not having it:

I am jumping up and down, each time getting a little bit higher, until I bounce myself airborne.  Once in the sky, I'm at the mercy of the wind and such, but otherwise keep rising higher and higher.  Trying to steer myself is useless, but after a few moments of apprehension about being up in the air, I feel... (go ahead and be embarrassed for me) kind of like an albatross, content to let the wind push me this way and that, curious to see the world from this angle.  All the while confident that eventually I'll bump into a tall tree, skyscraper, mountainside or hot air balloon and make my way safely back to ground level.  Only that never happens.  I just keep getting higher and higher, eventually panicking when I realize that I've crossed through the cloud level and the next thing up is the stratosphere - and then incineration.  And definitely no way down.

I have found nothing online to explain this, either.  Jumping, yes.  Flying, yes.  Falling, yes.  Floating, yes.  Nothing that really addresses my particular situation*****.

I have also found nothing to explain a dream where I am staring absent-mindedly out the window of a taxi, stopped at a traffic light, and my eyes meet, just briefly, with those of a young woman picking at some vicious camel-toe.

But then again, that wasn't a dream at all.  It's just something that happened last Friday, when I was on my way to meet Chris and Sara for drinks at the museum.

As an afterthought, it's accepted that babies dream, in utero included.  But I couldn't find anything to explain at what point in infancy/childhood the young learn to differentiate dreams from reality.  Primary research shows that it's not any time soon for the twins.

As a second afterthought, I have self-diagnosed myself with an actual medical, hypersomniac condition known as "sleep-drunkenness".  When they waken, the sleep-drunk are disoriented, confused, unco-ordinated, etc.  Like being drunk.  Which is exactly how I feel in the morning...

As my grade 8 science teacher would say, "Wise up, Wisenheimers".  Actually still being drunk on wakening can only explain my state a percentage****** of the time.  The rest of the time, it's just me.  No wonder I'm always late for work.

*Am I wrong?  I very distinctly remember the existence of a tome called 1000 Dreams Interpreted as a standard on the bookshelves of the mothers of several friends in high school who would also have texts about how to better understand their star signs.  But, according to the internet, this book did not exist until 2003.

**Google taking third place behind a Freudian or a clairvoyant.  I had access to neither.

***Dreams involving feeding indicate "that someone in your life is in need of love and acceptance. That someone could be an aspect of yourself".  I don't think that really works for force-feeding.  Although, I did find that a dream of donut,  "especially if it's a glazed donut, tells us that we [are?] lost, and still struggling to find ourselves and our purpose in life".  Nothing about burritos, though.  If you don't believe me, here:  http://nelamoxtli.com/food.html.


****To be fair, though, none of the celebrities of my dreams have been threatening me, exactly.  Maybe Kiefer understood that I really needed more donuts in my life but knew I was going to walk out with only a coffee if not otherwise persuaded.  The executioners were really just victims of circumstance.  They didn't necessarily want to be there.  And beating with a pool noodle is hardly an act of aggression.

*****if I were inclined, I could try to piece together an interpretation using jumping, flying, falling and floating as starting off points.  But that only leads to a conflicting swarm of emotions ranging from exhileration, power, self-confidence, the need to take risks, belief that you will overcome your fears and obstacles, to, lack of confidence, fear of challenges and/or success, impatience, questioning of one's abilities, and doubt.  Oh Granken, you are a riddle.

******I said "a" percentage, I didn't quantify.  Did I?

Same Dream, Different Donut

Don't ask where these ideas come from.  There's no need.  I'll tell you.  My head.  Which includes, sometimes, some very vivid dreams.  Anyone who knows about my Jack Bauer miniseries knows what I'm talking about*.

Anyway. 

I recently had a dream of global civil war (G20 versus The World).  The G20 had enlisted/drafted celebrities as executioners/assassins.  A Celebrity Death Squad, if you will.   

It was an automatic death sentence if you were a member of the resistance (which I was), and had the misfortune to get caught (which  I did). 

However.  As a show of good faith (?), the G20 forces permitted you to choose both your celebrity and the means by which they killed you.  And a few other details.  Like when.  And where.  Whether your death was scheduled in advance or whether you were taken by surprise. 

It's quite a decision.  I was thinking so hard I woke myself up. 
I feel like a person's choice might say a lot about their personality. Are these the sort of questions you're asked when completing your eHarmony profile? They should be.


Do you go to your favourite restaurant the next Friday and have Christopher Walken march in, just before you have to pay, and shoot you in the face?  Do you have unprotected sex with Paris Hilton, then sit back and wait for infection to ravage your body? Does Bill Shatner come to your house late at night, and make you some tea - which is laced with a lethal (but painless) poison - and then climb into bed with you, put one arm around you, and read The Giving Tree while you fall asleep/die? 

Is this morbid?

I'm curious.  Not whether it's morbid or not (I expect it is), but who would you select to usher/catapult you into the afterlife.  And how they would get you there.



*For anyone who doesn't know:

During the 5 or 6 weeks I lived with Chis and Sara way back in 2010, I had a recurring dream where I was standing in line at a Tim Horton's.  Kiefer Sutherland was in line behind me.  Next thing I knew, he was up in my face, in full Jack Bauer-I'm-gonna-torture-you character, shrieking, "YOU WANT A CHOCOLATE GLAZED!"  And the next night, it was a Boston Cream.. And then a Cherry Stick.  There were a couple more after that, but never a Honey Cruller.  Sigh.

Shotgun

At one point this past weekend, I found myself staring at the side of a perspiring beer can, thinking things over. 

For example, I fell to thinking of the last time I shotgunned a beer.  I could be wrong, but I believe it was well over a year ago.  I must rectify that.  I try to shotgun at least once each year, just to stay in practice. 

We all have things that we want out of life.  I want to be able to shotgun a beer when I'm 75, dazzling all the other residents of my future retirement home. 

Other people want different things out of life, like the safety of their children.  I, of course, don't have any children.  But it brings to mind another topic.

I remember at one point over Christmas, Chris and/or Sara describing to me various ways that other parents are mentally irregular*.  For example, when they pulled their Sexfire into the parking lot of a Toys/Babies R Us.  Their car was the only non-SUV in the lot.  They encountered a huge line up to get into the store.  On the Toys R Us side.  They casually sauntered in through the Babies side, where, as everyone knows, you can also access the Toys side.  They shook their heads, thinking, "Retards!"  Both for the idiocy of standing in line for no reason, and for the gas-guzzling needlessness of the SUV.

I disagree with the existence of sports utility vehicles on principle.  I even feel that before you're allowed to buy one, you should have to offer some sort of proof why you need one.  There's a letter to parliament that I've written, in my head, on the matter.

But, having spent a portion of the last year riding shotgun in a sedan with a child safety seat positioned behind me, I sadly kind of understand the need for the SUV, or other unreasonably large vehicles, for people with kids. 

I'm not going to suggest that safety seats are unnecessary outside of infancy just because I survived just fine with only a lap belt as soon as I could hold my own head up.  That would be akin to my grandfather (rest his soul) saying  (in 1990) that acid rain didn't exist because he'd never seen any.

What I am going to say is that child safety seat laws in Ontario are excessive.  And I have my reasons.  The rule, quoted directly from the Ministry of Transportation website, is this:

Everyone including parents,grandparents, relatives or friends, who drives with a child under the age of 8 who weighs less than 36 kg (80 lb.) and stands less than 145 cm (4 ft. 9 in.) tall is required to ensure the child is properly secured in the appropriate child safety seat or booster seat based on his/her height and weight.

If the part about being exempt past age 8 didn't exist, I'd have to argue that I wouldn't have been allowed out of a safety seat until grade 9.  And I'd have to point out that I currently know of some licenced drivers who just barely pass the height/weight requirement.  They're very petite.  But they exist.  
 
I'm not going to point out that the reasoning behind the regulation, as spelled out by the MTO, is that the seatbelt itself poses hazards for tiny bodies.  If that were all, the age part wouldn't apply.  Would it?
 
I happen to work in an industry where I have first-hand knowledge regarding the efficacy of safety seats.  Believe me, if there was a way to make car travel safer, I'd be all over it.  Seriously.  I've seen pictures that no one ever wants to see**.
 
But the truth of the matter is this:
 
Child safety seats are effective in preventing minor injury in the event of a low-speed collision.
 
Child safety seats are ineffective in preventing injury in the event of a high-speed collision.
 
Children are less likely than adults to sustain serious traumatic injury, and more likely to recover from traumatic injury, because their musculoskeletal systems are still developing.  They're kind of made of rubber.
 
If travelling in a normal sized car, whoever is unlucky enough to be positioned directly in front of the child's seat is accordionned against the dashboard. Knees in chest.  I'm talking about toddlers, not infants.  The child's legs just stick out that far.  Which, regardless of collision speed, poses significant risk of traumatic injury, especially if you're an adult, with bones brittle compared to those of a small child.

Hooray for protecting our children.  But is it reasonable for a mother to suffer a potentially fatal crushed sternum to ensure that her child averts a sprained elbow?

Unless willing to disregard laws regarding privacy protection (which I'm not), I'm not in a position to explain how or why I know this.  I just do.  Anyone who thinks I'm being ridiculous can go fist themselves.


*Thank you, Rocky. I've decided to start using "mentally irregular" in place of "retarded", so as to avoid offending anyone.  But what I mean is retarded.

**For example, never, ever ride a motorcycle.  If you doubt me, try and picture your face on the grill of a truck.  Just your face.  As though it slid off of your skull.  Which is still attached to the rest of your body, 100 metres away.

Sorry if that's a little dark.  I don't like having that image inside my head, either

It Works Every Time

Southwestern Ontario has been enjoying unseasonal summer weather, with temperatures in the mid-20's up to low 30's* for the past few weeks.

I don't remember a summer that arrived in early May since the one between 2nd and 3rd year.  Not to reminisce about my university days... again.  But I'm going to do it anyway.

One roommate (to protect her identity, let's call her "Saucy") and I were finished exams in late April.  Some restrained, "kick off the summer" celebrations were had, but nothing too elaborate, because the other roommate (let's call her "CM") didn't have her last exam until the first week of May.  On this long anticipated day, Saucy and I splurged on a 12 of Sleeman's Honey Brown and sat around drinking it and listening to Ani DiFranco, waiting for CM to get back so that we could properly mark the end of a long winter of toil and study/ the advent of summer, ie, pickle ourselves with liquor.  When, at last, CM burst through the door, she came packing a 40 of Colt 45.  She bought it primarily because it cost $3**.  We were starving students, after all.  If you are thinking that this was maybe a bad decision on her part, you are dead wrong.  As the afternoon unfolded, we learned that $3 worth of Colt 45 was the perfect amount of malt liquor to achieve the perfect level of intoxication (ie, euphoric, but with fine motor skills*** largely intact).  As if that wasn't amazing enough, three dollars was practically free, even for starving students like ourselves.

The summer that followed went sort of like this: 

Well, maybe not exactly like that.  But for the next 8 weeks, we lived in a strange world where Colt 45 was the means by which we measured both time and money.  The time value of one Colt was about 3 hours, so plans were made around the question "how many Colts till then?"   No purchases were made without a quick tally of how many Colts they would cost.

Naturally, we thought we were the first people since the 80's to enjoy Colt 45****, until one day an acquaintance thoughtfully corrected us, saying something like "Colt 45?  That's what homeless people drink."

We didn't let that ruin our good times, of course.  However, the Colt era met its end in early July, when Saucy left town for a summer job.  We never really got back into after that:  as a moment in time, it had passed. 

So, the heat has me thinking about days gone by.  And time passes quickly these days.  For example, it seems like last month that Saucy sent an email to announce that she was knocked up and expecting in mid-July.  This was actually November, and now mid-July is only 7 weeks away.  I haven't been drinking-for-her on purpose, necessarily, but this weekend, I'll be glad to drink a 40 of Colt in honour of her and in honour of the summer-after-second-year, if I can get anyone to join me.  Actually, scratch that.  I'll be glad to drink a 40 of Colt in her honour this weekend, period.  I don't anticipate anyone wanting to join me in that particular endeavour, so they can drink what they damn well please.


*that's mid 70's to low 90's for my American friends.  Not that I mean to imply that you are slow and/or don't know these things and/or can't figure it out on your own.  But I grew up near the border (American news broadcasts) with an American dad, and once removed from those situations, I remember a summer doing math in my head to figure out what people were talking about when they said "28".  It was simple math, but still.  I'm trying to be helpful.

**in those days, in Quebec.

***not that I escaped entirely from mishap.  There was one night, after each savouring a Colt, Saucy and I wisely decided to ride our bikes down to the Fouf*****...

****sort of in the same way that, on the previous Thanksgiving, we thought we were the first to discover that canned whipped cream contained nitrous oxide, until an acquaintance thoughtfully informed us that what we'd discovered were whippets, which she used to do in grade 7.  In my defense, I come from Chatham, where, as gateway drugs are concerned, the youth bypassed things like whippets and went straight for more insidious things like dime bags and Robitussin.

*****Les Foufounes Electriques, which, roughly translated from Quebec French, means "Electric Asses".  No, this is not one of Montreal's many adult entertainment facilities (like Pussy Corps).  But it was a good 15 minutes outside what we considered reasonable walking distance, so our bikes made perfect sense - at the time.  My sparkly pink, purple and yellow miniskirt maybe wasn't the best clothing choice for a bike ride.  To give you a better idea, see below.  I still have the clothes, of course; these are self-portraits taken today:

If this isn't questionable enough, I had also opted to wear a pair of underwear that Saucy had fashioned out of a pair of Tommy Hilfiger sports socks, discarded by a former roommate (let's call him "The Mike Machine").  Beyond the obvious reasons, the trouble with this underwear was that they were somewhat lacking in coverage.  They served more as push-up underwear, if you get what I mean (if you don't, there was some nice lift from the bottom, but nothing up top).

Montreal is an island, and also basically a hill.  It was downhill all the way from our apartment to the bar.  Our bikes picked up more and more speed.  I got more and more nervous.  Traffic lights had been in our favour, but I soon reached the point where I knew that any faster and there would be no way for me to stop if I needed to.  Rather than slow down and brake, I slammed both feet on the ground.  The force of the impact catapulted me over the handlebars, my bike did a full forward flip over my head, and I skidded onto the pavement, arms and face first, exactly like I was trying to slide into home base.  Bike came to rest some distance in front of me.

Fate landed me on the road right outside a church, where a Portugese youth group event was just letting out.  Within seconds, I was surrounded by a group of 13 and 14 year old Christians, who were all pointing at me on the ground, asking, "heyy... are you okay??"

I couldn't respond.  The wind was knocked out of me when I hit the pavement.  Even if it hadn't been, I was laughing too hard to communicate:  my sparkly mini-skirt landed somewhere near my neck, exposing my Tommy Hilfiger sock underwear for all to see. 

My efforts to photograph myself face-down with my skirt around my head proved mechanically impossible.  Efforts to trace a life-size version of my naked body on paper also proved ineffective:  especially after I tried to dress the cut-out and realized that I needed musculoskeletal structure to hold the clothing in place (either that or reinforce the cutout with cardboard, but the former was the more obvious choice).  In short, you are all saved from images of my foufoune electrique - real or reasonable facsimile.  For today, anyway.

Bigfoot

To return to my previous thoughts on shoes, my first Fluevog purchase wasn't entirely a success. Fluevogs are crafted in limited quantities. I rashly bought a half size up when I learned that the pair I'd been salivating over for nearly two years was not available in my size, and it could be months before any more were available, if ever. They seemed okay when I tried them on in the store, but proved, perhaps unsurprisingly, to be one half size too large after the leather softened, which was roughly one day. They were wickedly comfortable even with the extra room in the toe. And I got compliments on them everywhere. I was not accustomed to having anyone compliment my shoes. It was an odd sensation.

If I were a completely different  person, I might've held onto them forever.  But for my mom, who wears a size ten, at height five-foot-three. Staring at her abnormally large feet in my younger years left me terrified of having big feet when I grew up, or even the appearance of big feet. My parents haven't been any help.  During my pre-teen awkward phase, I was less than five feet tall, Ethiopia skinny, had an overbite, and adult size feet.   I've been size 7.5 since I was eleven.  To my prejudiced eyes, they seemed like scuba fins.  It was horrendous.  I don't know if the pre-pubescent bigfoot phase only happens to girls?  My parents, being thrifty, spent my childhood buying me shoes a size up, on the assumption that I'd wear thick socks until I grew into them, and by the time I outgrew them, they'd be worn out anyway.  They started buying me size 8s at age eleven, and are convinced that's my size to this day, as they have proven when buying me thoughtful Christmas gifts like new snowboard boots. 

Anyway, every time I looked down at my feet in those beautiful boots I could not help but see someone afflicted with gigantism of the metatarsals. I left the slightly oversized Fluevogs at Chris and Sara's house after I moved out, because I planned to sell them on eBay and use the money to partially finance another pair - and Sara had an eBay account.  At that point, I didn't even have an internet conection. 

I eventually bought a different pair in the proper size, and have never looked back.  But I lamented the first pair.  It wasn't so much buyer's remorse as sorrow that such a magnificent pair of boots was going unused. Sara liked the look of them very much and tried them on - but they were impossibly large.  This was in the first trimester.  Her feet expanded to a size 8 during her pregnancy, and since I never got around to selling them, she is now the owner*. Which is nice, but did nothing to cure my bigfoot phobia, especially when I remember Nancy Botwin announcing in the first season of Weeds that her feet grew a size with each pregnancy.  Puzzle pieces started coming together.  My mom probably started adulthood with a size seven. And then had three kids.  Poor thing.  I've been so critical.  I'd previously understood that one's feet would swell during pregnancy, which made sense considering the extra weight, but I assumed they'd shrink back to size along with the rest of you.   Not so.

I thought that the pain of childbirth was our punishment for eating the apple. Physical disfigurements - such as vaginas stretched beyond the point of recovery and the swollen and loose-skinned post pregnancy cat belly - which sometimes doesn't go away - weren't part of the deal. Please, you've taken enough. Leave our shoes alone.

I can't close this topic without pointing out that two full posts about footwear has me kind of disgusted with myself.  Shoe obsession has always struck me as ridiculously girly, which I've never seen as a good quality.  I used to go out to bars with a male friend of mine and he would try to pick up**.  We several times discussed that he would only talk to girls who looked like they were wearing comfortable shoes - girls wearing heels or anything at all impractical may as well be wearing sandwich boards that read "High Maintenance".  I was a jeans and sneakers kind of girl, and emphatically agreed.  When Carrie Bradshaw used "shoegal" as her e-mail username, I was embarrassed for her. 

Crap.  First I go on and on about shoes, but a Sex and the City reference?  When I'm trying to redeem myself?  I'm not helping my case.  Grrr.

Hockey.
Wrath of Khan.
PBR.  Tall boys.
Emotionally detached sex.

That's better.

 
*She wears them all the time.  I think it must be love.

**Note:  girls do not make good wing-men for boys.  Especially a girl as adorable as myself.  I expect that his male friends were already settled and not interested in going out to alternative rock dance bars while he tried to meet girls, and as a wing-man, I was preferable to staying home by himself.  Maybe he got some pity attention when single ladies thought I was his girlfriend and would go express their disgust after I did a bunch of shots and then slipped away to make out with someone else?  Actually, scratch that.  Girls make magnificent wing-men.  Think about it.  I don't know that it ever worked, but what a way to get a girl to talk to you.  You don't approach her and come across as awkward or dirty (either way, just some guy trying to get laid).  She comes to you, with sympathetic feelings.  Once she finds out I'm not your girlfriend, you're already talking.

I also tried to convince this friend to use one-liners from Army of Darkness as pick-up lines***.  He refused, saying he'd get slapped.  I insisted that yes, he might take a few hits, but there was a girl out there who would find it hilarious, and she'd be a keeper. 

He's engaged now, and no longer requires my wise counsel or my service as an unlikely wing-man.  I take some credit for the engagement, however.  Had Sara and I not started a fake Lavalife profile**** so we could help him troll for girls, he and his fiancee may never have met.

***

"Yo.  She-bitch.  Let's go."

"You know, in my own way, I am king.  Hail to the king, baby."

"I've got plans for you, girly girl!"

"First you wanna kill me.  Now you wanna kiss me.  Blow."

"Slip me some sugar baby."

To name a few.

****sexpanther69