joke stolen from my father's facebook wall, translated swiftly and shared joyfully

 -george, why so sad?
- you haven't heard? buddy's dead!
- what?! really?! how?!
- the day before yesterday, he came home, had a stiff drink, lied down and lit a fag and the bedding caught fire...
- he burned to death!?
- no, he had time to open the window and jump out...
- and he smashed to death?
- no. he had called the fire department and they pulled out a rubber jump net and he jumped into it.
- and it broke?
- no... he somehow bounced back and flew back into his house...
- and he burned to death!
- no! he bounced off the window frame and fell...
- onto the sidewalk?
- no! the firetruck stood there covered with a tarp. he hit the tarp, bounced off and flew back through the window.
- and died?
- no... he fell, bounced off the jump net again and fell back into the apartment!
- you're fucking joking! so how did buddy die?
- they shot him: he was starting to piss them off....

mad mad men

we were watching mad men last night, an episode where don draper says a rather curt goodbye to yet another mistress and we got to talking about our personal favourites. mine's joy, i don't know why, but there's something rather charming about her. mr. monkey was really taken with suzanne and could not understand don draper breaking up with her over the phone.

mr. monkey: i don't know, if it was me i'd go over there. i'd do it in person. i'd give her some money,  i'd say "please...please...go buy yourself some cake."

which, i'm certain, would fix everything.

animal, vegetable or mineral

tonight on the LRT:

mr. monkey (looking out the window of the train): hm, is she walking with a child or a dog?

moi: well, that depends: is it on a leash or in a stroller?

cold and alone in the night (in theory)

i am a member of the condo board in my building and tonight we had our monthly meeting. the meeting took 3 hours (we were discussing the various kinds of stupidity that cause people to flood things, but that's besides the point) (yes, there's a point) (wait for it). i got home and found mr. monkey fast asleep, clutching my cell phone. when i went in to give him a kiss, he sleepily handed it to me, all toasty warm:

moi: why are you sleeping with my phone?

mr. monkey: it was ringing. and i got scared: i thought you couldn't get into the building.

moi: why didn't you answer it?

mr. monkey: i forgot. i fell asleep.

moi: so i'm still standing out there? cold and alone?

mr. monkey: don't worry, i'll get you in the morning.

because wine lubricates social intercourse and who doesn't like well lubricated intercourse?

numbers rule (except words rule more):

3. when it's -45C with windchill and you're wearing no hat and your sexy little coat is open and your shoes have stiletto heels, you don't look lovely: you look like a complete moron.

7. when it's -45C with windchill, furry earflap hats are sexy.

1. why? i'm still not sure but the guessing keeps life interesting.

3/4. apparently some people do not realise that fractions denote dividing one number into another. i have it on good authority that some of these people will be administering your chemotherapy drugs in the near future. time to invest in a good solid firearm, non?

25. i am in the middle of changing my life dramatically. once i get shit done, i will tell you all about it. but - it's not divorce (dudes! i LOVE my mister monkey!) and it's not a goddamn baby.

57721.4 i am sitting on my couch, listening to my music and it feels good. as i said to crusty juggler earlier "really, all one needs for true happiness is the right chemical cocktail floating through your blood stream!"

9. who doesn't like baby animals? even though sometimes the cuteness makes you want to kick someone. hard.

18. can i be done now? ok, then. i'm done now.



[free-floating asterisked bit removed by author]

edit. note: the asterisked bit at the end that meant nothing can be attributed to one thing and one thing only: drinking and writing (wait, that's two things! i always said i was bad at math.) i have now erased it to avoid confusion, thank you to crusty juggler whose sharp eye and quick wit have saved the day. phew!

another crusty juggler chat (don't worry, c.j., all the embarrassing bits have been deleted!)

moi: i only like to embarrass myself...and stupid people (regarding the whole portugal debacle*)

yay! my show is on!

crusty juggler: which?

moi: the signal, on the radio, my first love!

crusty juggler: ah, i naturally assumed tv.

moi: you would.

crusty juggler: i can't seem to bring myself to listen to the radio without anything visual going on...like the tv on mute or something. it's a sickness.

moi: you are a strange one. you can do shadow puppets!

crusty juggler: i'm very visual. like a dude. dude's need constant visual stimulation according to the studies. why did i put that apostrophe there? nevermind.

moi: YOU!!! bad girl! your so dumb, lol.**

crusty juggler: hey!

moi: that's ok, once when talking to g i said "for mr. monkey and i" and then just about had a coronary.

crusty juggler: but you were likely the only one who noticed.

moi: nope. i made such a stink about it the entire restaurant noticed. had i been japanese i would have fallen on my sword... or fork, as the case may be.



*mr. monkey's facebook status tonight: "where is portugal? does anybody know?" to which those out of the loop responded earnestly, while those in the know (crazy joan, i'm looking at you, dahling!) referred the reader back to my book club for answers.

**i certainly hope that at this point in the proceedings i need not tell you that neither the "your" nor the "lol" were seriously meant, right? good, i thought not.

an emoticon for a banana ) (or (, depending on which way it is facing)

i don't see why i ought feel bad about being an intellectual snob - you don't see the vociferous ignoramuses of the world expressing any kind of shame, do you?

i'm sorry, what did you just say?

on facebook, on our private book club group chat, but a few short hours ago:

ms. implants: hmmmm. the book is not available at chapters ....

moi: but it is at the library.

ms. ten thousand dollar chest:  i don't do library.

and then my head exploded again because this woman is a teacher. of children. she doesn't "do" library but is willing to spend 5K per breast (what? me? judge? mais oui! everyone needs a hobby!)? thank christ my ovaries are shrivelled up and dusty because... well, because... sorry, interwebs, i'm stumped. to have to explain to a grown woman that portugal is not exactly in south america is bad enough; to have to find out that a teacher doesn't "do" library is grounds for immediate removal of self from society of said teacher. book club, i think this is good bye.

oh book club, book club, book club, what shall we do with you?

at book club this saturday:

moi: blah blah blah something totally irrelevant blah blah blah, blather blather blather so we're going to be spending almost 3 weeks in portugal this summer blah blah blah
book club hostess: where is portugal? is that in south america?
moi: ... um... no, it is in europe.
book club attendee: yeah, where is it? i totally missed social 20.
moi: ... it's next to spain. it's in the south. warmish bit of europe.

and then my head exploded, because, motherfucking fuckety fuck, we're not talking about social 20 here: we're talking about GODDAMN GEOGRAPHY!!! sweet jesus on a pogo stick, it took all of my self-control (the reserves that were not being used on not drinking, seeing as i was driving and we were in the midst of a 10 metre snow dump that night) not to look around and ask them if they were fucking retarded or what. i didn't. but only just.

honestly, i think i need another book club.


p.s. the rest of the night was spent talking about one attendee's brand new breast implants. like i said, i need another book club.

merry, merry, merry!

hey, all my wonderful poultries - i love knowing you are hovering around this here virtual gathering spot.

may your days be merry and bright and filled with all manner of love, delicious victuals, laughter and polyester reindeer sweaters and may the coming new year make all your dreams come true! may you be healthy, wealthy and wise and may it just keep getting better and better!

(thanks to crusty juggler for the festive pictorial contribution, courtesy of andrew bell)

why i possibly need to ease off the wine or never ever chat/skype with friends when drinking

moi: hi, i'm here with my friend and we're having wine. how you is/ crusty juggler: what the what? thought you were out!
moi: back here now. showed your pic to my roman friend/  want to say hi? crusty juggler: ok, errrr Hi! moi: get om sjkyle
crusty juggler: i'm not familair with S.J. Kyle, but I'll try moi: skjyle?  what the fuck? crusty juggler: that's the guy!
then we talked on skype (apprently) then 10 more minutes elapsed.
moi: sorry dude, i'm drunk. she's gone now and i have no recollection of phoning you.  god, bboze is bad  or good  it makes you think happy unicorn thoughtsand rainbows out the ass crusty juggler: when did you phone me? you mean skype? if you mean skype which we just spoke on, then I think you should get thee to a hospital for alcohol poisoning moi: shut up!!!  phone/skype  whatevs!
is all techonlololology crusty juggler: okay! you do remembe the past 10 minutes though, no? moi: what?  why?  what happened? crusty juggler: we conversed on skype  we said important things moi: oooh!  imporrant thangs  !
crusty juggler: dude! you are so wasted! moi: that sounds... impirrant  possibly  i haven't had much to drink lately crusty juggler: maybe that's why T was ignoring your calls... moi: so we only had 1.5 bottle of wine, IF that crusty juggler: sometimes it only takes a wee bit!
moi: especially if you haven't had any booze in like a week  which is moi  hard to believe, i know  i like my roma friend, she is nice crusty juggler: EXXactly. anyway, Rome friend sounds nice - although I hope you only showed her the good photos of me moi: also, she is not drinkig as much as usual. you only take GOOD photos  fuck! crusty juggler: Right!  anyway, i hope she's not a bad drink influcence moi: you is seriously nice looking what with your metabolism and blue eys and all crusty juggler: i am pretty great. moi: don't know which way that goes. you are!!!
crusty juggler: uh-huh. moi: uh0h crusty juggler: what'd you do? moi: uh - HUH crusty juggler: oh moi: whaddya mean? crusty juggler: this is a great conversation. transcripts please! moi: wanna talk like for realz?  oh yes. crusty juggler: ok, lemme get on it moi: fuck.  call?  skjpeuuueee? crusty juggler: yarp  yarp again moi: yarp

cookies for hitler

and so another yuletide season is upon us and that means only one thing. well, two things. well, okay, a whole bunch of things like sparkly balls in trees (or reasonable plastic facsimiles thereof (the trees, not the balls)), drinking hot spiced alcoholic beverages, getting warm hugs from drunk co-workers ("i love you, man!") and baking cookies! christmas is the only time of the year when i bake cookies but i bake them with a vengeance*.

imagine my disappointment, then, when i gather my ingredients, mix, whip, froth, swish, shake and gently fold things into other things, only to discover that the recipe generates a teeny tiny little cake or a mere half dozen cookies (i'm looking at you, smitten kitchen! i realise you cook your wondrous comestibles in a teeny tiny little new york kitchen, but give me a bloody break! i'm browning multiple cups of butter, vast bubbling vats of golden buttery goodness expecting mounds of cookies. mounds!!! you hear me? and what do i get (time and time again)? six fucking cookies. what am i supposed to do with six cookies? six cookies is an appetizer before one gets into the serious business of eating cookies. six cookies is nothing to a woman like me: NOTHING! mere crumbs in my dentition! a not particularly amusing amuse bouche. especially if they are delicious. and with that amount of brown butter, how can they not be? but you're messing with me, aren't ya? because just last week i made delicious mac'n cheese from one of your 2 recipes, and the other one, the one i didn't use, was for 12 people. really? you feed mac'n cheese to 12 people and then what? you give them six fucking cookies. that just doesn't make any sense.)

and lest all you daily bakers look scornfully down at me and wonder why i cannot tell how many cookies this amount of ingredients will generate, i'll tell you why: because i bake once a year and also, i have no imagination when it comes to measurements. of any kind. if mr. monkey doesn't explain it to me in football fields and tea-cups, then i don't get it. is it a little? is it a lot? i don't fucking know. but i do know that it is pure hitlerian evil to publish recipes for 6 cookies. especially around christmas.

as an aside: salted butter is a motherfucking bitch to brown, don't do it! i used only the tiny amount i needed to make up the difference (i used up all my sweet butter reserves! for 6 goddamn cookies!!!) and it still messed me up. but i set out to brown it and brown it i did. and why the hell is salted butter cheaper than unsalted? same with pistachios. why do i have to pay a dollar extra to have the salt removed? do they hire small expensive children from elite private schools to lick off the salt? these are the things that keep me up at night.



*great tagline for a movie, eh? "vengeance is back in town, and this time, she's packing a silpat®!"

the girl, she is a genyooos!

in preparation for tomorrow's pierogi making marathon, i spent the day making pierogi filling. this involved boiling things, cooling things, chopping things, sauteeing things, squeezing excess liquid out of cooled things and a vast amount of processing the hell out of things so that they became smaller, more manageable things. this last bit was hard. it was hard, frustrating, annoying and very very angryfying*. the mushrooms were not yielding as well as i wanted them to, the filling was looking far more fibrous and chunky that it needed to be and i started to give the evil eye to my cuisinart. you bastard (i thought bitterly to myself). you cost me a whole bunch of money airmiles** and now you're acting like the spoiled little french bitch that you are.

it was when i put a batch of sauerkraut into the cuisinart and it failed to do a thing other than faff about ineffectually that i realised that perhaps something mechanically serious was amiss. perhaps its motor was getting on in years (it's not that old, but then again neither am i and i can quite often be found faffing about ineffectually). perhaps its blade needed sharpening. oh yes, its blade. i dumped the contents, took out the blade and realised that the reason i've been making a bloody mess of all the things i have been using my cuisinart for for the past several months is because (wait for it) i've been using the dough blade. not the sharp cutting blade that cuts things with its sharpness but the dull dough blade that, to put it bluntly, does not. i have been handing my kitchen surgeon a plastic fork and asking her to do an open heart surgery. so dumb. so very very dumb.

correct blade in place, everything was reduced to the correct consistency in mere seconds (oh, the wasted minutes! oh, the chunks of beet in the lesbian dip! oh, the frustration! oh, the fucking stupidity!)

when mr. monkey came into the kitchen i promptly told him about my idiocy. oh, i knew that, quoth he, i was wondering why you were using the dough blade, but i figured you knew what you were doing.

christ. i always tell him when he does something stupid, i cannot, for the life of me, understand why he doesn't return the favour.



*why the hell isn't that a word? huh? it should be! let's petition the government! let's paint large banners! let's... let's get back to the story at hand, shall we?

** the only thing those things are good for, as far as i'm concerned. the one time i used airmiles to fly us to vegas was such a bloody hassle, it would have been better to just pay with cash. but i digress. again.

let's clarify things a bit

ok, some of you know me, some of you only know me through this here thing. in the interest of full disclosure, i must admit that i took some artistic license with that there last angry post. because while yes, i was indeed sitting and sweating and burbling over with the kind of anger that only comes from paying someone to make you hurt, i also want you to know that i am an avid walker (i know few people who walk as much or as enthusiastically as i do on as regular a basis), i do not subsist on cheezee puffs™, coca cola and a jar of mr. mallard's marshmallow fluff™. i do not live the kind of sedentary lifestyle that characterises a scary portion of north america where the day's exertion comes from a scooter ride between couch and refrigerator. i eat chips roughly once a year, mcdonald's once every two and the worst thing you can find in my pantry is polish chocolate covered prunes. i do indeed hoover seasonal fruits with a dedication that is akin to obsession, and i love salad, for which i make my own vinaigrette. so please don't picture me as one of the latest denizens of wal-mart because although i do wear sweat pants around the house, they are of the kind that make my ass look FAH!bulous (g will back me up on this, won't you, g?). and also, red wine has anti-oxidants in it.

just so we all know where we all stand. ok?

also, jesus christ, my ass sure does hurt today. i love you, zumbitch!

huh?

in the parking lot of a big box reno store, i am telling mr. monkey all about a co-worker who was stressed out because her daughter's letter to santa was filled with strange and difficult-to-find items:

moi: so she's freaking out about not being able to buy everything on her daughter's letter! can you imagine? who knew that a letter to santa was something that you had to follow to religiously? i always figured it was just a guideline. you know: they ask for a macbook, you get them a calculator; they ask for a pony, you get them a hamster sort of thing.

mr. monkey (slightly confused look on his face): ...

moi: isn't that odd? that she's getting everything on this letter to santa?

mr. monkey: what?

moi: letter to santa.

mr. monkey (increasing look of incomprehension): what?!

moi: her daughter's letter to santa!

mr. monkey (frankly horrified): WHAT? a letter of placenta?!?

moi: yes. a letter to placenta: "dear placenta, this year under the uterus i'd like a vulva." christ.

i (really don't) like to move it, move it

i am sitting here sweating sweaty ass sweat into my couch sheep following an intense hour of zumba. as i hopped, jumped, skipped and shimmied up and down the dance studio, i realised again just how much i fucking hate exercise. yes, dear poultries, i hate exercise. intense physical exertion makes me very very angry and being forced to look at myself in floor-to-ceiling mirrors is detrimental to my closely guarded life of self-delusion: is that really my waist? really? that's what i look like when i think i'm being sexy? sweet lord, it hurts. it hurts here and it hurts there and, i'm ashamed to admit, it also very much hurts over here. and the thing that hurts the most is my pride - there are several very large women in my class and they keep on coming back week after week while i spectacularly fail to do so. i show up here and there and spend the rest of the time hating myself and watching "castle." *

i recently started going to yoga with a bunch of kick-ass elderly polish women, who also make me feel like a pathetic loser as per my inability to hold the downward dog without my arms turning to jello and my ass wobbling all over the place, not to mention the instructor drawing attention (gently, lovingly, but still...) to my crooked painful crotchety hip. and while i search for the inner peace that yoga is supposed to bring, i must admit to myself that i fucking hate yoga.

so, what to do?

i am currently following my annual christmas orange diet (not so much a diet as a seasonal obsession - i'm on my fourth box in a month and i tend to eat up to 10 per day - is this normal? wait, don't answer that) but god knows the days of seasonal gorging are coming and i really really would rather not enter my fortieth year the way i entered the preceding bunch (with the notable exception of those 5 or so years in which i dramatically cut back my carbs, lost weight, kept it off and singlehandedly stopped all of my gastrointestinal issues**). i want to get in shape. i need to get in shape. and how does one do that when one fucking hates exercise?

ideas? pointers? speed? i'm willing to try anything (short of a regular exercise regimen coupled with responsible eating and reduced wine consumption, of course; that'd be crazy!!!)


* who is so delicious i'm sure the calories are simply piling up!

** i know, i know, you're wondering if this worked so spectacularly for me in the past why not repeat the experiment. and well may you wonder. i often wonder that very thing myself...

the one about the way we do it and the way they do it and the way it ought to be done

i love canada. it is a country that is law-abiding, peaceful, calm and its citizens tend to follow rules and obey signs. all this i like, because it is a reflection of my own obsessive-compulsive, orderly personality*. i always wear a seatbelt and will refuse to drive if you don't put one on. i am that person who will never trespass if there is a "no trespassing" sign. it makes me physically uncomfortable to even stand too close to one much to the amusement and chagrin of certain friends and family.

i love mexico. it is a country that is vibrant, loud, chaotic and its citizens seemingly take their life in their hands every day when they ride in the backs of trucks careening down cobblestone streets or let their children walk to and from school unsupervised or eat food cooked by some guy on the street using his hands (!).

the sidewalks of puerto vallarta, usually patchy, often 1-2 feet above street level, typically narrow and wonky, are a desecration of a thousand and one canadian laws, bylaws and occupational health and safety codes. in north america, a sidewalk like that would simply not be built**. or, if built, it would quickly become embroiled multiple personal injury lawsuits. after all, it is simply an accident waiting to happen. so why do i love it? i love it because in mexico, there is an assumption that we in canada and the US have long since forgotten - the assumption that the citizens have that most precious of unlegislatable commodities called common sense. americans fall and sue. canadians fall and write angry letters to the municipality. mexicans look where they walk, see a potentially unsafe sidewalk and act accordingly.

what i also love in mexico, sadly missing from most canadian and american cities, is a real sense of community. in the evenings, whole families bring out plastic chairs and sit around tiny restaurants, kids run around playing with their friends, parents take their little ones for walks on the oceanside promenade - what a difference from the sterile deserted suburbia where every house is a equipped with every electronic device money can buy to ensure that their children never ever go out to play. we live isolated lives, reaching out to friends and family occasionally and sporadically; they live as an integral part of their neighbourhood, extended family and circle of friends.

as nice as it was to come back to the quiet of our life here in canada, i feel like there's something missing - that street-level engagement with the rest of the human race. and granted, our 6-7 months of ridiculously unreasonable winter has a lot to do with it, there are ways we could get around it: we have malls, pedways, libraries and public spaces, but sadly even there we are most often walking around in our own little bubbles, and, even more sadly, what we're typically doing is shopping, and the acquisition of unnecessary items is not exactly the most social activity out there, now is it?





*my wine-drinking personality is a bit of loophole that we will not discuss, however, let it be known that even drunkedy drunk i will obey most rules of orderly conduct (although i have been known to fall down and spill stuff, but, again, we will not discuss this)

**with the notable exception of new orleans. and other places where poor people live. because who cares about the poor?

a horse is a horse, of course, of course

we just spent a glorious week in puerto vallarta and seemed to have hit a time of many parades. one night as we left our favourite watering place* we saw that the boardwalk had again been set up for a parade. we turned to the friendly bouncer to find out what was going on. obviously his english wasn't perfect:

mr. monkey: what's going on here tonight?
bouncer: parade of dancing horse.
mr. monkey (to me): awesome! it's a parade of dancing whores!
moi: look! there's one! (there was a young woman in an excessively short skirt and equally excessively high heels looking on with a bored look on her even more excessively made-up face)

sadly it was horses. twice as sadly, really, because i think mexican dancing whores would have been totally awesome and because i hate it when animals are made to do stupid things.


*delicious and boozy margaritas for a buck - what's not to like?

must be the moon

you know, i really ought to do the nomoblogomofo or whatever it's called, because i seem to be posting once a month and i tend to do well with deadlines, even self imposed ones. perhaps next november, then. if i live, that is.

tonight, mr. monkey and i were coming home from a pizza dinner, it was a lovely mild* moonlit night and my mind was... well, not sure really, but not here. not here at all.

we walked along a major downtown street, the traffic still fairly heavy and i decided to cross. i looked at the ground and lo, saw two stripes indicating a pedestrian crossing. and so i started to cross, feeling all warm and fuzzy thinking how lovely it was to live here where people are so very polite and (almost) always stop for pedestrians** and thus i made it almost halfway across the street before being yanked back by mr. monkey who grabbed my hood and yelled, "what the hell?!" or something suchlike. turns out that along with the lovely painted crosswalk lines, there were also traffic lights. which were most distinctly not in my favour. right there and then i became one of those annoying people who cross wherever and whenever they feel like. thing is, usually they're scruffy street people high on glue or mouthwash.

now, boys and girls, i know that in large metropolitan areas like manhattan and chicago, people cross when they reach critical mass, and traffic lights have very little to do with it. we're not like that here. in fact, after living in chicago i found it charmingly quaint, this standing around and waiting for a crosswalk light to change when there wasn't a single car around. but for the most part, i'm all law-abiding and shit. except today. today, i took my life in my hands and stepped out into the chasm and the city let me live.

i have no idea what happened and why but i'll blame the moon.


*by our sub-arctic standards that is, all you europeans out there would have frozen your buns off, but we's made of sterner stuff. also, we're fucking mad to live here.

**they most certainly did not in chicago. even at a crosswalk. festooned with large fluorescent "YIELD TO PEDESTRIANS" signs. and flashing lights. nope. not even a little bit.

i don't gots the skillz

you know, sometimes i really wish i could see better through binoculars. like right now, for instance. there's  a couple making out in the building across the back alley from us and everything i see is blurry. damn!

update: went to mr. monkey to complain and he came and sharpened the focus for me. sadly, they seem to be doing more talking than getting it on. come on, people! life is short! can your conversation be that good?

epilogue: when they really got busy, they turned off the lights. selfish bastards!

me, only better(er)

how can you not lose respect for yourself when it's almost 1am and you've just spent the last three hours watching back episodes of cougar town*, haven't had a drop of wine** and suddenly find yourself thinking that your life would have surely been so much better if you had only decided to grow your bangs out sooner.

because yes, my life is so much more awesome now that i've grown out my bangs. oh yes. whereas i used to be a wreck, now i am strong. whereas i used to fall apart under the tiniest bit of stress, now i am a rock and cruise right through all the vicissitudes that life chooses to drop in my way***. whereas i knew not who i was and where i was heading, now i have a firm sense of both self and direction. all because i no longer have to worry about my bangs. oh yes.

um, not really. but wouldn't it be nice?

this, if i choose to take it as such, is a little lesson that i ought to internalise and apply to my dreams of the brilliant magical future i will inhabit once i have lost those annoying 20lbs. oh yes, then i will really be somebody!

um, not really. but wouldn't it be nice?




*LOVE that show. really. it's my crack.
**well, just half a glass, much earlier on but then i lost my will to live open another bottle.
*** a cruising sort of rock. surely there is such a thing!

think first, speak second... or the other way around!

last night in bed:

moi: so, crusty juggler just told me she's flying down to see us for christmas!

mr. monkey: great! is she flying down... on a plane?

moi: ... yes, i imagine she will be using a plane.

mr. monkey: good, good.

so you has shoes issues, has you?

we have moved 7 or 8 times in the last 7 or 8 years (pardon the vagueness, but you must admit that's pretty damn exhausting which is my excuse) so a large portion of our Stuff has been living out their nomadic existence encased in large rubbermaid bins. since we've arrived in edmonton to some degree of stability and permanence, one of my projects has been to find an official spot for all but our least often used items (yoga mats, i'm (sadly) looking at you). this has proven to be a challenge i have met with skill and aplomb (in fact, this kind of challenge is the pretty much the only kind of challenge i enjoy. all others can please go away and leave me to my drinking.)

until we reached the shoes, that is. oh yes. the shoes.

whilst mister monkey traipsed along the shiny avenues of chicago this last week* i decided to Face the Challenge of the Shoes. the bin containing them is a mess filled with various plastic and fabric bags and baggies and digging out the perfect pair of pumps for that dressy soiree can be a heartbreaking affair (purely imaginary, that. our soirees, such as they are, are conducted largely barefoot. also, i'm fairly certain i don't own any pumps and neither does mr. monkey, which might explain the difficulty).

so, how hard can it be for an intelligent capable woman to find, buy, construct and fill a small simple shoe shelf? you don't wanna know.

wednesday at lunch, i purchased two different shelving units, thinking that one would work if the other one did not. wednesday night after work i cursed, swore, whacked, pushed and shoved my way through a minor construction project. during this physically and psychologically draining endeavour, i learned The Importance Of Reading Instructions Prior To Commencing Project (Or At The Very Least Looking At The Picture On The Box Really Closely) (although SPOILER ALERT i did not carry this lesson with me into the future). i also learned that what manufacturers call "shelving for shoes" tends to mean "shelving for flip-flops, ballet slippers and other flat objects because that extra centimetre of thermosetting polymer tubing seriously cuts into profits" which, in turn, means that hiking boots are out. because most of the footwear that was to be inhabiting the shelving unit in question was to be, in fact, hiking boots, this meant that i now entered phase two of the project: deconstruction.

deconstruction was marginally easier than construction, keeping in mind that despite my fondest fantasies, i could not merely take a baseball bat to the shelves, smiting my enemies into dust, but had to return them unscathed to their point of origin. more swearing ensued. (much more.)( though less than before.)( but still a fair amount.) tubes that previously refused to pop into slots, now resolutely refused to pop out. a hammer was taken out and used judiciously despite the very clear sign on the box that indicated that no tools were required. whatever.

thursday i took a mental break (also, my fingers were too numb and bruised to do anything constructive) and went to zumba after work. it didn't work that well as far as breaks go, in that my ass still hurts today, but at least there were no shelves to de/construct.

friday morning i revisited various stores and returned various shelving units, one elegantly repackaged in the original box, and one shoved haphazardly into a beaten-up box in much the same way one deals with a plastic christmas tree that first year**. while shopping, i came across a brand new exciting (and, more importantly, simple looking) set of shelves. i bought them. i took them to my mom-in-law's and, because i am occasionally logical and forward thinking, i opened up the box and found a flimsy piece of crap. i returned it right after brunch. this brought my total to 3 purchases, 2 constructions, 2 deconstructions, 3 returns, 100% fail. but hey, the day was young!

friday afternoon, i walked into wal-mart determined to find what i needed at that mecca of cheap shoddy sweatshop-produced garbage. my determination paid off. i came home with a set of shelves that were inexpensive, just the right size and ridiculously easy to put together.

right.

what ensued looked like an old charlie chaplin film. i put things into slots, i pulled, i wiggled, i shoved and it just wasn't going the right way. then i looked at the package photo again. oh. oh, i see. i swore and spent the next 5 minutes taking it apart again, seeing as i put it together wrong in every possible way short of turning it upside down. i started again. this time i was determined to do it the right way. except it wouldn't go. i held up one bit, the other fell down. i leaned one bit against a wall, held the other under my chin and attempted to hook the little hooks on the metal part. it fell apart. this went on for a longish while. i'm fairy certain my octogenarian neighbours are very curious as to the meaning of "KURWA!!!***" 


there came a low point at which i was kneeling with my head down on the floor, sobbing and swearing and feeling like the back end of a not particularly bright donkey. eventually, after i gave myself a very stern talking to regarding the segment of the population that wal-mart products are generally aimed at vis-à-vis my perceived intellectual prowess etc. etc. and after several more minutes of  clatterings, clangs and much muted swearing, i had myself a shelf.


it's not perfect: it could be bigger, it could be sturdier, it could be better quality. but i'll be fucked before i go another round: my ego cannot take it.



*surprisingly, i chose not to accompany him. i love chicago but i thought it was perhaps my chance to be a bread winning bacon homebringer for a change, and thus it was.

** they really ought to have a team of physicists and other quantum mechanics types working on this problem - how is it that a christmas tree never ever fits back into the box it came out of, no matter what you do to it short of setting it on fire.

*** very very bad word in polish. if you know one word in polish, chances are this is the word you know. do not use it in public.

tv on the radio (with apologies to crusty juggler)

a day or two ago, on skype with crusty juggler:

moi: we don't generally watch tv in the summer.

c.j.: why not? what do you do?

moi: i don't know, it gets dark late, and i like watching tv in the dark.

c.j.: not me! i turn it on first thing in the morning! i like the noise.

moi: ugh, i cannot stand tv on an empty stomach but i like noise too, so i turn on the radio.

c.j.: i could listen to the radio. but i'd like to see them, you know, sitting there and talking.

moi: um... that's called television.

c.j.: oh yeah.

occupy this!

yesterday was a perfect fall day - sunshine, a light breeze, the sort of crystalline aerial clarity that alberta is famous for, in a word, a perfect day for an anti-capitalist rally. i grabbed my library books* and off i went.

it was a decent turn-out. there was a nice range of people, from scruffy youths with purple hair who, i think, will pretty much protest anything, to disgruntled grandmothers to families with kids (you know the kind of families with kids i mean, right? the kinds whose kids wear delightfully daring colour combinations and hand-knit hemp hats and snack on home made granola bars (i loves me a good left-wing family, they're so aesthetically pleasing!)). there were silly signs, pompous placards and the odd witticism (toddler in a stroller had this sign taped to the front "i spit up on corporate greed," while his little sister held up one that said "even i know how to share"). ah, that feeling of togetherness, belonging, standing up for something, or against something, or something. you know, it was good.

but there i stood in the middle of all this, listening to an earnest choir sing "oh freedom" followed by the raging grannies who warbled some revolutionary ditties with an equal earnestness and i suddenly felt completely disconnected. disconnected from this earnestness, this purity of feeling and hope, these ideals. don't get me wrong, i think it is time we got angry at the growing economic disparity and the ridiculous amount of power corporations have in politics, angry at what is essentially the dissolution of any kind of meaningful democracy, but i felt i no longer have it in me to think anything will change. i guess my cynicism got the better of me, but hey, i was one more body to be counted among the 99%.

so once my sense of disconnectedness grew nice and strong, i walked away and... went shopping. but worry not, gentle poultries, i felt absolutely wretched as i perused the isles filled with glittering sweat-shop produced trinkets that i absolutely do not need, and then i bought nothing at all. take that, capitalism, you bloated swine!


*not for a any nefarious violent anti-capitalist purposes or even as a social commentary on the benefits of communal ownership, but because the public library just happens to be right there. two birds, one stone, you know...

rrrring!

the phone rang during the early part of the dinner party. because you never know, i picked it up.

moi: hello?

person: hello, may i talk to mister monkey?

moi: may i ask who's calling?

person: i am calling from your bank XXX.

moi: is this important? we are in the middle of a dinner party.

person: oh, is this a cellular phone?

moi: yes. yes it is. we have no other phone.

person: our regulations do not allow us to call you on a cellular phone. we will not be calling you again.

moi: oh. ok. bye.

person: good bye.

and that's that.

aaah...

caramelised onion mozzarella crostini, home-made pickled beets and plums, sorrel soup with hard-boiled eggs, wild mushroom risotto and roast pork loin in mushroom sauce and a dessert of cherries jubilee with vanilla ice cream and maple pizzelle, great wine, home-made fruit liqueurs and, above all else, fantastic conversation, laughter and good, good company.

i must say that coming back to edmonton has brought us many good friends, old, new and in-between.

the dishwasher is burbling away in the background, music is playing, candles are finishing their bit as another really good night comes to an end.

i am thankful to be home.

oh christ.

yet another dinner party in about a half an hour. i feel a drunk post coming on and i'm only half a glass into the "pre-dinner jitters" drink. could be the forgotten breakfast (and lunch). let's try to remain upright until the guests arrive, shall we?

what's on your platter this weekend, my beloved poultries?

isn't it romantic?

september first marked our tenth wedding anniversary. being us, we talked for ever about doing something Big, something Special, something Romantic and then promptly failed to plan anything at all. when the long weekend crept up we decided to drive to the kootenays because we'd never been and it seemed like a reasonable drive with the good rewards of mountains, beaches, hot springs in a cave and orchards dripping with fruit, not to mention a winery or two.

we packed up the volvo beast, intending to camp within its spacious swedish interior and headed off at the crack of dawn... ok, i was ready to go at the crack of dawn but mister monkey is made of softer stuff and so we left the city limits a smallish while before noon. the drive was filled with gorgeousness of all kinds - there were rolling foothills, rolling clouds, rolling grasses and other things that were rolling. overall, it as nice.

having had a late start, we did not reach our intended destination but had to find a campground on the way. it was a small, family-run operation and the woman who took our money had a strong italian accent. bingo, we thought. surely here, in the middle of nowhere, the gods were going to reward us with an anniversary dinner as supreme as it is unexpected. right? wrong, motherfuckers. you want minestrone of dry beans and flaccid overcooked pasta, thickened by time into a glutinous solidity? i know just the place! how about a caesar salad drowning in store-bought dressing sprinkled liberally with desiccated corporate croutons? ditto! luckily the wine was both cheap and good, so that's that. let's never mention this again.

and so, having washed our dirty bits and gotten into the belly of the volvo beast, we got ready to slumber. and that's when the adventure truly began:

mr. monkey, fearing the dextrous and eternally greedy paws of the kootenay bears, decided to lock the car. suddenly, and for no apparent reason, i decided to get a little more air and opened the door. this set off the alarm - you know, lights flashing, clamourous siren shattering the crystalline mountain silence, whoop whoop whoop whoop! mr. monkey jumps out of the vehicle in his underoos, runs to the front seat and attempts to put the key in the ignition. alas, he cannot. the ignition is blocked and the volvo beast continues its howling. with shaking hands, mr. monkey throws me the manual and, with equally shaking hands, i attempt to find something, anything, about the alarm system. i fail.

suddenly, it stops. 

the silence is a thing of glory, beauty and much relief. 

wilted with exhaustion and nerves, mr. monkey gets out of the car.

the alarm starts again with a vengeance. whoop whoop whoop whoop! lights flashing! siren blaring! our neighbours' hate is palpable. my mortification deep, dark and sticky. my hatred for the volvo beast complete. 

mr. monkey (still in nothing but his underoos, augmented now by a headlamp) desperately pops open the hood and starts to violently pull cables out of the machinery of noise and eventually succeeds. 

at nearly the same moment, with my husband kneeling nearly naked in mud and pine needles, i finally find the manual's solution to our woes: put the key into the driver's door. the end. 

mister monkey crawls into the nearby stream to wash his soil-encrusted limbs and eventually comes to bed. we decide to brave the bears and sleep with the doors unlocked. the rest of the night is uneventful but when we leave the campground in the morning, we carefully avoid the eyes of our camp-mates.

so yeah, the whole romance thing? we're not so good at it. however, the next night, at our intended campground, we have a lovely dinner of things roasted on the fire, a candle blazing away in a holder fashioned out of a beer can, a bottle of a carefully hoarded and utterly incredible '98 shiraz salving our psychological wounds under a sky thick with stars and it is perfect.

escalating violence

i used to get endlessly frustrated with edmonton's crowds for not being able to grasp the very simple concept that places like chicago and vancouver have down pat - on an escalator, you stand on the right and walk on the left. the end. not that hard a concept to grasp, but i suppose we're only now becoming a big big city (for years we were a small big city) and don't have all that crowd management thing internalised yet.

then a week or so ago i was in toronto and came to the shocking realisation that toronto, despite being a very big big city, has no clue about escalator etiquette.

yes, in the context of the economic melt-down of the EU, the looming collapse of the US, not to mention all that africa and the middle east have on offer as far as disasters, human rights violations and tyranny, this may not be much, but it's my blog and i can write about those little things if i want to.

so, where do you stand on the escalator?

lesbian dip

although the majority of the food i had made for book club remained untouched ("oh what a dainty bunch we are!"), one menu item was eaten into utter oblivion: lesbian dip. oh yes, let me tell you, lesbian dip is DEEElicious! it is actually a greek dip that comprises beets, walnuts, garlic, olive oil and breadcrumbs, but because the recipe was given to me by one of a bunch of neat-o academic feminist studies lesbians, it shall forever be known as lesbian dip. yum!

and then a unicorn flew out of my ass and shat sparkles upon the land

last night i hosted book club. although the night was mainly good, the end result was several levels of anger. anger because the food i spent two days preparing was barely picked at, including a brown butter sour cherry tart that was quite lovely, if i do say so myself. anger, because two people thought that one of the awesomest books ever written was... too long. and finally, anger because i discovered that the cult of positivity is alive and well and trying to convert me. and i bloody hate that.

what is the cult of positivity, you ask? well, it is but one of the symptoms of western civilisation's malaise: that utterly ridiculous belief that Things Have A Meaning. like fuck they do. the acolytes of the cult of positivity also believe that Everything Happens For A Reason and that Each One Of Us Has A Path. what i say to this, is give me a goddamn break. things often have no meaning. life is random. shit happens and, if we are really good at this sort of thing, we can try to make a reason out of it. we wander mapless and if there is a path, it is one made by us, not some random sky-fairy. and please, for the love of the god in whom i most emphatically fail to believe, do not tell me that an 8 year old's aggressive leukaemia diagnosis is some sort of a learning path for either her or her parents. if i have to believe in god, then a god who would let this happen just to Make Us Stronger And Better People is a complete asshole and can go to hell.

my book club ladies are nice and intelligent and interesting to talk to, but increasingly i see that they are not really my people. they tell me that i need to read books that are uplifting. books, by the way, in which i shall have to (i quote) "ignore dangling participles" and shush my inner grammarian. well, if something is worth saying, i believe it is worth saying well. if i have to drown in swooning ellipses and misguided pseudo-poeticisms, then the message becomes irrelevant. besides which, i find that most of these so called uplifting books are produced for (and by) people severely lacking in imagination - people who make up the bulk of western civilisation and are willing to vote for sarah palin and her ilk.

we are a civilisation that eschews instilling a work ethic in its youth, focusing instead on an ethereal and largely baseless self esteem (i know you've hear me rant on this here topic before). we change hans christian andersen's lovely but tragic tales and turn the little mermaid into a feisty red-head in a mollusk bikini who bloody well lives happily ever after just so that our children will never have to face one moment of ugliness and truth. we make cancer patients feel guilty if they aren't able to muster up a cheerful demeanour in the face of a truly horrific diagnosis ("oh! she's going to do great! she's so positive!" as if that has anything to do with it!*). we mass produce ridiculous literature (and i mean it with a small tiny little "l" much like the literature that jehovah's witnesses drop off at your house) like "the secret" and "celestine prophecy" and other such poorly written drivel that teaches Truths to sheep unable to muster up one single solitary drop of originality. we have achieved logic-defying feats of linguistic prestidigitation just so that we never have to call a spade a spade, because that would hurt its feelings.  and on and on and on...

now i know that when i write like this, i make myself fairly open to accusations of cynicism, bitterness and excessive anger, but you see, i think my way is freeing: things are the way they are, i need to be the best that i can be in the face of this (and boy, do i fail spectacularly), i need to sift the good from the bad and shape it into meaning myself, and if i fail, i need to take the responsibility squarely onto my own shoulders and not blame society, my low self esteem or worse, some ridiculous deity for trying to teach me something that if i have an ounce of imagination, i can figure out for myself.

now all anger aside, i happen to believe that a healthy dose of cynicism is not a bad thing. there's nothing wrong with looking at the world and seeing it as it is, instead of visualising unicorns in the hope that they come flying out of your ass - all the power of positive thinking will not change the fabric of the universe. oh sure, let's hope and dream and all that other fluffy stuff, because it is important, but it is ok to say that there are no unicorns, no matter how mean it may sound.

and that's that.


*if you say it does - well, positivity is, i'm sure, easier to live within than the alternative, but studies by reputable organisations have repeatedly debunked the feel-good-means-better-survival-odds myth, but tend not to get published because they aren't very nice.

bdbdbdbdbdbdddddd...

when you find yourself having a peppy conversation with the furniture, that might be the moment to reconsider the place caffeine has in your life. just sayin'.

today my face has:

• tired fishy eyes, still arguably my best feature (if you ignore my brain, which i kinda like but, for now, it remains encased in bone and skin and hair and blood and stuff so you can't see how swell it is, you just have to imagine).
• zits. lots and lots of zits. i think that when i said/wrote/thought that i have lately been pining for the carefree days of childhood, some evil bourbon-swilling fairy unsteadily waved her magic wand in my direction and gave me the complexion of a 14 year old. she did not take away my wrinkles, the bitch.
• a vague sense of something about to change, whether it's me or the world around me. it is not any sort of wooo-oooo presentiment or anything, more of a shift in the air, a feeling that perhaps one day in the near future i will make a decision and possibly start walking down a different path. i am not being cryptic: i have no idea what i mean. i could be wrong. perhaps it's just the vague discomfort of my premenstrual ovaries that i've taken to be something more. who the hell knows? not me, that's who.
• not had a drink. no, really.

hey, listen!

i hate to leave you all nervous about making any kind of noise when you are being dentally manipulated. what i meant, when i said what i said about the thing that i said it about, is the kind of sustained and guttural grunting generally associated with naked sweaty ass action, not dental discomfort, so unless you make naked sweaty ass action grunting noises whilst under the care of your dental professional (and if you do - what is wrong with you?), don't worry about it.

hm...

the more i drink, the prettier i get.

still here and as happy as ever

1. if there's one thing i hate* it's patients who grunt. honey, i am fairly certain i am not giving you oral pleasure. yes, it's oral, but no, it's not pleasure (although i do like me a good teeth cleaning), so please quit it with the grunting and the little tiny moans. it is disturbing. it is gross. it makes me feel even more unclean than all the blood i carry home on my skin. so QUIT IT!

2. today was a work day, followed by laundry, followed by a walk to the fringe whereupon i was assaulted by such an overwhelming feeling of ennui that i called everyone i knew. ok, i only called two people, but it felt like i was sitting by my phone for hours, grounded by my evil parents, forbidden from doing anything fun ever again ever. and nobody was home. i left messages and went for a vietnamese sub, because where else can you get such a delicious conglomeration of flavours for only four dollars? sadly, they were out of pearls for bubble tea, but such was the sadness of my afternoon that i was not at all surprised and put it down on the already teetering pile of my white privileged middle class tragedies.

3. suddenly! out of the woodwork! people! phone calls! chit chats! films with catherine deneuve with seriously weird disjointed song and dance numbers! (gerard depardieu! not peeing but dancing!)

4. then an i-pod enhanced walk home, because again nobody answered their phone thus saving me from what would surely have been far too many beer garden beverages, then some home-made pickle sandwiches (it's a polish thing, and when the pickles are home made, as mine are, then it's a thing of much culinary beauty) and a new william gibson novel in which i wish i was every single character. are there people that cool? why can't i meet them (no offence, pals, you're all pretty damn special and all, but come on! william gibson's peeps are the bee's knees!)? and where does a gal go for an anime haircut? these are things i need to know.

5. now i'm waiting for mr. monkey who is either at his parents' place turning pieces of metal into magical bits of the recumbent tricycle he's building, or screwing his mistress. at this point, the wine having nicely massaged my brain cortex into mellow insensibility, it matters not one whit.

6. still, i have wasted the last 7 years of my life and i deserve to be taken out back and whacked repeatedly on the noggin with something that'll wake me the hell up.

6a. these last few months i have been having a mid-life crisis, the main theme of which is: oh, for my lost youth, which was filled with so many possibilities. of course, and this is immediately obvious to anyone with even several functioning brain cells, i still have a hell of a lot of time left to me (if you are clairvoyant and know otherwise, keep it to yourself) (or maybe not, maybe i need the kick in the pants which an impending death my provide) (unless it's really soon, in which case i'd rather spend my remaining days (hours?minutes?) in blissful ignorance) and i can still do stuff. so do stuff already. DO IT! (you know it's bad when you bore even yourself with this unending whine of "what shall i be when i grow up?).

7. and so we come to an end of another wine-fuelled post. if you've missed me, i know what you'll say: hey! woman! drink more! write more! but you see, i am drinking more but this usually results in early sleep, inappropriate fanfic fantasies involving handsome men in tight pants on horses, and a headache the next day. creativity? not so much.




*yes, yes, YES. i know there are many things i hate. this is one of them, and, when it happens, it overshadows all the other things i hate. but when i'm complaining about this, i haven't forgotten world hunger or hitler, ok? ok.

sweet oblivion

several nights ago at the monkey household

moi: aren't you going to put that laptop away? it's bloody late!
mr. monkey: i'm counting sheep... using excel™.

this whole thing about bums and rather smallish elephants

monday afternoon mister monkey dragged me to a mall on a small but significant quest. yup, the mister wanted to get hisself some swimming shorts unlike the gigantic voluminous ankle-length type seen on most young bucks out there. oh no, mister monkey wanted to get hisself some ass-huggery in the form of speedos. now, lest all y'all close your wee little piggy eyes and imagine this, that is not at all what he was after (i admit i also closed my wee little piggy eyes and imagined this*) i believe he was looking for something more like this (and aren't we all, girls? huh? huh? am i right? nudge, nudge, wink, wink (what?! every girl wants a cute gay friend!)).

exhausted and crushed by both the futility of our quest and the nearly palpable miasma of mall despair, we decided to get something to eat and headed for our second favourite ethiopian restaurant (our favourite having burned down recently). the sign was off but the door was open. we walked in: could they, would they feed us? no, they could not, would not, on account of ramadan said the guy behind the counter just as another guy came out of the kitchen with a plate piled high with sandwiches. um, happy ramadan...

we ended up eating at the local T&T supermarket where mister monkey was ousted out of his place in line by a minuscule old asian lady who apparently really wanted her steam bbq pork bun NOW. i do prefer impatient old people, though, (they get it: they get the shortness of the time allotted to them) to the ones who drive like all their tomorrows are spawning in the corner of the unwashed hamster cage of time.

and thus we spent the better part of heritage day long weekend monday: from the swaying steppes of ethiopia through the haunting highlands of china to the short shorts of europe, though not exactly in that order or geographical accuracy.

the rest of the day was taken up with elephant removal. you think i'm kidding, but i am not, however, in an effort to be mysterious and shit, i will leave it at that.



* not that mister monkey looks anything like that: it's just that we are neurologically hard-wired to see visions like that when we hear the word "speedo", it's inevitable.

so, like...

y'all know i'm in a book club. overall, the books we've read have ranged anywhere from "oh christ, please make it stop, make it stop now before i gouge out my eyeballs with whatever implement happens to be handy" to quite enjoyable. this month's selection (no, not mine, not fucking mine) is a total fluff bunny of a romance novel. however, the book has brought into sharp relief two very interesting facts:

1. god, i wish i was filthy rich. sadly, the desire comes at a time when i no longer have the body/looks to gain wealth in the time-honoured non-respectable way, nor the energy to gain it the hard and slow respectable way.

2. romance novels are for women, what porn is to men - a dangerous path leading to ridiculously high expectations and consequently disillusionment. why, just now, i chided my beloved husband for not possessing either a chiselled chest nor the ability to bring me hourly to the brink of well lubricated madness. and also, for not driving a maybach (to which he level-headedly replied that hitler drove a maybach. (i knew that. but still...))

to return to the whole porn/romance novel thing, though, i find it curious that we (both boyses and girlses) choose to entertain and titillate ourselves in a way that is pretty damn close to impossible to replicate in real life. after all, few women are so cock-hungry that they'll enthusiastically devour a plastic dildo as the perky-chested heroines of many a pornographic cinematic feature, and few cold hard distant men reveal themselves to be vulnerable and loving providers who know all about foreplay and are willing to joyfully engage in it for hours at a time until the woman faints from sexual exhaustion and full emotional satiation as they are wont to do in romance novels.

christ, who picked this book* anyway?


p.s. and why is it that in romance novels every sexually charged relationship starts with animosity? wouldn't it be nice to actually like the guy you are aching to bed?

p.p.s. and furthermore, why is it that they never ever progress to that tragically underrepresented but glorious part of the relationship where one can fart in the beloved's presence? i, for one, would be nothing but a grey faced spectre of my current self if i had to live in the gasless wasteland of nothing but ripped clothing and heavy breathing. just sayin'.

p.p.p.s. and another thing, why is it that romance novel heroes always have names like hardy and gage and slade? what is it about your run-of-the-mill bob or floyd that makes him eminently unsexy, huh? unfair, is what i say.

p.p.p.p.s. and finally, why, for the love of pete, does the woman have to get pregnant in the end? a. with all the hot fucking that they do, you'd think birth control would have popped up on their to-do list and b. since when are babies romantic? especially in the first 2 months of a relationship? jesus!


* a teacher did: one more reason to savour childlessness.

tits in tulsa and tales of sexual lactation

we have just returned from a pot luck gathering at which we learned that, given enough time, patience, and correct pressure, any woman's breast can be persuaded to produce milk. the young man who shared this little scientific tidbit with us, was dead serious. apparently 15 minutes of vigorous breast palpitation can generate milk. the girl in question was moaning whilst being milked, and no, it was not moans of pain and discomfort from being thus manually stimulated for a full quarter of an hour.  and no, she was neither pregnant nor recently delivered of a child, just a random sexual encounter. apparently, said our talented guide to the world of sex and dairy products, he can make any woman bring forth milk.

how did we come to this rather unusual topic? our host had recently returned from a month-long company-sponsored trip to oklahoma where he visited a strip joint in which the lap dancer kindly allowed him to touch her c-section scar, and, like the rest of the girls, wore tasseled pasties to discourage public lactation. she had two children and a sad life. she was 19. kinda makes you want to go to tulsa, no?

a young couple in love leaving the party:

he: tonight, i'm gonna milk the shit out of you, baby!
she: let's go!


p.s. did you miss me? i'd say i was too busy doing fun summery stuff in the great outdoors, but that'd be a big fat lie, since it's been cold, raining and bloody miserable here more often than not. unusually hot and dry summer, my ass!

things that are beautiful (drunk? moi? whatever makes you think so?)

these are things that are beautiful:

• sitting on the balcony listening over and over and over to this and crying because of one small death in a book which brings my whole fear of death into sharp relief, no, not my death, who cares about that? i mean the death of those near and dear and even those a little further away, because it is the whole multitudinous multifaceted knotty colourful interrelated glorious mess of all the people that makes this place ok, that makes me want to continue to breathe, including those of you in the blogosphere whom i've never met, and those of you whom i met and loved and no longer see and miss, and those of you whom i only started to get to know and now will have a chance to get to know better, and those who knocked me out with your wit and wisdom, and those who ate and drank with me and listened to my endless tales, and those of you whom i like, and those of you have annoyed me lately but whom i still consider friends, and those of you whom i've neglected, and those who do not read this, and those who do, and everyone really, (not including the assholes in trucks who made me want to do murder today), and those who made my day by thanking me for making them bleed and talking them through it, and those who smiled at the crosswalk and well, hell, everyone (except for those truck driving assholes - you are the mosquitoes in my ecosystem, most likely necessary but, fuck, so annoying!). so there's that.
• spinning and spinning on my beautiful new honey-coloured floor to that same song, knowing that my inner ear will not be pleased but spinning like a five year old just because this song makes me want to run through grass, do cartwheels and spin, spin, spin until i fall down, and how often does a song like that come along? not often enough, i tell you!
• knowing, as i cry, that i am crying for the death of a good, talented, warm, sweet man at whose funeral i was on monday
• being more broke than we've been in a good long while and somehow knowing it'll be ok
• eating a whole half of a watermelon for supper
• getting seemingly smashed on 1.5 glasses of red wine (what gives? long week at work? 2 whole days' worth? really?)
• watching the storm clouds roll in (few things beat a prairie storm)
• looking forward to a trip to vancouver soon to see old friends, and new friends and the sea
• looking in the mirror and seeing my face, make-up running, nose grotesquely swollen, rapidly greying hair frizzy as hell and knowing that it is my face and it shall continue to be my face until i cease to be me, and that it's ok, all ok, the rapidly expanding mid-section, and frizzy hair, and strangely caprine days, and seeing the shy peeking out of maternal grandmother and others who have come before and thinking that come what may, this is who i am and it's been good and, i hope, shall continue to be good
• thinking that perhaps this life was all i was ever capable of living, that this isn't some failure of potential, some stupendous failure of mine to be the best that i can be, but, simply, the best that i can be. how freeing, how lovely, how nice to think that this, here, is what i am and what i ought to be. 
• thinking that perhaps i ought to have a breathalyzer hooked up to this here thing, but hey, i don't and it's all good!

pescadolicious

crusty juggler and i were busy in the kitchen preparing fish tacos and pico de gallo for dinner. she was chopping a large fragrant pile of cilantro.

crusty juggler: god, this smells so good i want to just stick your face in it!
moi: ?
crusty juggler:... um, i mean i want to stick my face in it.
moi: that makes more sense, yes.

and now, for something completely different

i have been absent not merely because of sad adult drudgery. oh no! also, there was a lovely visit from crusty juggler, who left the stunning natural beauty of vancouver in order to come visit me, have the car window explode upon her head en route from the airport, help me iron things, hem things, teach me to make salad rolls and also vacuum my floor. for fun, we sat on the balcony and drank vast quantities of campari and tonic, because we're ladies and these are ladies' drinks. we walked and talked and had a fabulous time - an easy guest is a thing of beauty and take my word for it, you can invite crusty juggler to your house any time!

whilst relaxing on the chesterfield with our lap-sized computational machines one evening:

crusty juggler: it says here that these shelves are 16" long. do you have one of those measuring things about the house?
moi: yeah, i can never visualise measurements either. mr. monkey! can you please show crusty juggler what 16" looks like?
mr. monkey (blushing furiously): ...
crusty juggler: well, you are a lucky girl!

there followed a bawdy exchange the likes of which i would not put down upon these here pages, since, as previously mentioned, i'm a lady and shit.

computer says no

so, as i was saying before i was rudely interrupted by moving out, moving in, getting a place ready for sale and all the myriad attendant details, adulthood sucks.

today we went, for what i really really hope is the very last time, to see our banker, max. max, if you feel inclined to visualise our little fiscal adventure, is like a small hairy italian ferret on some kind of twitch-inducing meds. the man is absolutely brilliant at making me feel placid, zen and radiating the kind of calm typically seen on stoned hippies and my cousin's wife. it's all relative, you say, and i say, put me next to a twitching ferret and i will be relaxed the rest of my days. of course the twitching ferret might get old rather quickly, but that's another tale for another day.

so, back to the bank - max always makes an appointment during the majority of which we end up sitting staring at him, while he shuffles vast piles of papers, filling in forms in triplicate and, alternately, banging on his keyboard. in the end, in what takes all of 5 minutes, he makes us put down several signatures on various pieces of paper. the whole thing usually lasts well over an hour. why he cannot have the mass of documents filled out prior to our actual arrival boggles my mind, but perhaps it is The Way Of The Ferret and one cannot question that.

today, while max was pounding away on the computer keyboard, a loud beep sounded. then another one, and some time later, another one still. it was obvious that the computer was not happy with whatever input it had just received. unfortunately i was instantly reminded of this, and so i turned to mr. monkey and said, computer says no. we then had to work really hard not to collapse in paroxysms of giggles. as it is, we find it endlessly amusing watching max do his paper-waving, keyboard-pounding magic while we sit and stare but adding little britain to the equation was just too much. thanks a lot, crusty juggler!

earlier in the appointment i had to soundlessly convince the man i love that the breath issuing forth from his mouth was particularly vile and that he should indeed take the gum i was offering him surreptitiously under the table. not an easy thing to do using only one's eyebrows. luckily for all, i succeeded.

whilst out on our daily walkies

moi (about something whose importance has been lost in the mists of time): i've loved you almost 13 years now!

mr. monkey: almost 13 years? almost? obviously i loved you longer!

moi: what? we met and you loved me immediately?

mr. monkey (defiantly): yes!

moi: you didn't even remember my name!!! "i don't know who that bitch is, but i love her!"

mr. monkey: yes! you'll have to make it up to me that i loved you longer. in fact, i might have to die sooner so you can make it up to me!

moi: bastard!

um...not exactly

last night at the monkey house:

mr. monkey: so, when you get a facial, they put wet rags on your face and then squeeze out your blackheads, right?

moi: uncontrollable laughter

mr. monkey: what? no?

moi: um...not exactly. why, you want a facial?

mr. monkey: yes.

that's the way (uh-huh, uh-huh) i like it (uh-huh, uh-huh)

just wanted to share with you that even as i write this, mr. monkey is scrubbing the toilet wearing nothing more than red heart-covered shorts and teal gloves. ain't this the life?

no, not dead, just shopping for houses

well, dear poultries, the mister and i have done it. we have shopped and shopped and shopped and at the end of it all, we bought our dream home. let's just hope the bastard lives up to our expectations. what? what do you mean didn't we see it? of course we saw it. for all of 15 minutes. that's normal, no?

what i always come back to is the ridiculousness of how one goes about shopping for various items. say you want to buy a pair of jeans. you walk into your local purveyor of all things denim and try on a pair. wait, does this one make your ass look big? how about this pair? not sure about the crotch area embroidery... hey! what about these? well... maybe. the next day you return, armed with a girlfriend of discerning taste or (if you're lucky) a mouthy but charming gay friend. (s)he tells it like it is and you decide... well... almost. the following day you return yet again. you can do this for weeks. and, if the pair you choose do indeed make your ass gargantuan, why, the following day you return them. all in all, if you're a real jean snob, you're out, what, maybe, 200* bucks. 

whilst shopping for a home, a purchase (if you're very very lucky, or live in a shithole) roughly 1000-2000x pricier, you walk in, like the look of a place, find out that there's another offer and scramble like a mad(wo)man to decide if it's a yay, a nay, or a nervous breakdown. shit, fuck, shit, what do we do? do we take it? is it perfect? and then BAM! you decide, sign an excessive amount of papers and then find that you have not a fucking clue whether the tiles in the bathroom were blue, chartreuse or purple. and if the drawers on your sexy new kitchen stick, you can hardly blame yourself, since you made this momentous decision based on a 15 minute perusal of the property. as for returns? do not make me laugh.

still, once we've moved and the tequila that's being hidden from mr. monkey's greedy little maw comes back to us, y'all can come over and i'll make you a margarita. how's that sound?

* i'm not so i'm out a whole lot less than that. especially if there's a sweet sale going on.

p.s. no, we didn't go for the marble clad foyer with fountains. but there is cool retro stone on the walls of the lobby and if you really want a fountain, you can bring a glass of water and a straw. still, that kitchen... oh, that kitchen!

what's so fucking funny?

last night:

moi: why can't you do this one tiny little thing for me? it's not like i ever ask you to do anything for me!

mr. monkey: uncontrollable laughter

"herbert, the purple chesterfield would look simply LOVELY in this space, dontcha think?"

yes, we've been shopping for a new monkey home and we are demoralised, overwhelmed, tired, and rather disappointed with ourselves.

having looked at countless (ok, 6) new condos, we have noticed a disturbing trend or two: first of all, the dining area is gone. no longer are you allowed to sit with your friends and family* at a table to partake of the lord's bounty in the form of kraft dinner doctored with some louisiana hot sauce. nay, from hencewith (forthwith? henceforth? what?) you shall dine, north american style, perched half-assed atop a bar stool at your breakfast bar. if you should crave the company of someone other than your spouse, you shall have your dinners on your laps, on the couch, eyes dully staring at the large screen tv, precluding any kind of conversation. your kitchen will be shiny, new and will remain virginal. damn it, that's why god invented mcdonald's. (or so it seems).

second of all, no matter how large (or, more likely, small) a place is, it is made that much smaller by the inadvertent mosaic of floorings. look! in the living room! wood! or a (more or less) reasonable facsimile thereof! look! in the foyer and kitchen! tile! and look! in the bedrooms! carpet! oh yes! sometimes even shag! because north americans are apparently morally opposed to the cold hard reality of a hardwood floor first thing in the morning and are more than happy to alleviate this with dust mites, allergens and filth! because area rugs are of the devil! (or so it seems).

last night, we saw two condos in a building that boggles the mind. unlike some, where a vegas style theme is created with little concern for taste or quality (i'm looking at you, venetian), this place was shiny and cool and tasteful (bits of it were covered in the kind of wallpaper i imagine adorns god's lounge - i could not stop fondling it fondly). there was marble where there ought to be marble**, there was subtle play of light and dark, there was a shiny glass elevator, there were gleaming expanses of things that gleam. in a word: wow.

our reaction to it, although initially one of awe and desire, soon gave way to a strange mix of guilt and unworthiness: imagine the heady mix of catholic guilt, middle class guilt*** and minimal-footprint guilt, layered with a pervasive sense of fiscal responsibility that makes us think and rethink and re-rethink every single solitary purchase until it becomes easier to just walk away (blame the immigrant experience for that, methinks). yes, perhaps it's a tad too much, perhaps the courtyard with the (very tasteful) fake palm-trees and the gentle murmur of the (very real) indoor fountain aren't really us. i'm fine with that. but why in the hell do we feel like we need to live in a hole? is it our hard assed reaction to the overwhelming consumerist message of "you deserve it!"? or are we really just closet hair-shirt self-flagellating types?



*perhaps it is assumed that condo dwellers are either the forgotten elderly (looming death!) or the carefree gay (eternal damnation!) and thus have no friends or family, and subsist on packets of crisps and bourbon.

**tastefully done, i assure you.

***upon coming home, mr. monkey even made a weak reference to "the children in africa" at which point i kicked him and told him that even this, our humble temporary lodgings, rotting floors and all, would be like balm to the sun scorched "children in africa" and not to be stupid.