only weapons can decide

so the architect's been away for a couple of weeks, now - two exactly, actually, and i've been ok on my own (i always have been) but i've missed him lots and i'm glad he's coming back. this evening i went for drinks with a friend who i haven't seen for a while - actually the last time i saw him 'in person' was the weekend i met the architect. he reminded me of how i was rushing off from our lunch date to a rendezvous with punkrockboy and i had to smile about my crashbangcrazy life of last spring. man we had some good times, didn't we?

i'm turning 35 in less than two weeks. i'm starting to feel a little old. my life is so different now than it was a year ago, and i wouldn't change it for the world. i love the architect and i'm so excited about our future but there are moments when i'm filled with anxiety about tossing it all in and running away to another country to be with someone - the only person i'll know in the whole city, state, country practically, that i want to run back crashbang and throw it all away because the uncertainty you know is better than the one you don't. or is it.

ah i don't know, and i'm just randomly typing as my brain comes up with these words. i didn't even know i was thinking them, really, but drinks with my friend reminded me how tenuous our grasps on our own realities can be - his wife just left him with their two kids so she can rediscover her 21 year old self - and what would happen if mine just slipped out of my hands?

this post makes no sense just random words put together on a page with a silverscreen nudie shot to distract you from my disjointed thought processes and absolute lack of grace in my style.

sometimes i miss all the people who stopped by to look at my tits.
most of the time i don't even notice that they are there.

paved paradise & put up a 5 bedroom suburban home

first off - who in dog's kingdom would paint a perfectly beautiful brand new audi A4 buttercup yellow, never mind drive it?

next.

so i live in a suburb of vancouver, on a quiet dead-end street surrounded by other suburban style homes. now, i grew up in this kind of neighbourhood, so it's nothing new to me, but i guess as i've aged i've become more ... i dunno ... sensitive to certain aspects.

whatever do you mean, ms sundae, you may be asking to yourself (or not, but hold fucking on 'cause i'm going to tell you anyhoo, 'cause that's how i roll).

i have come to the conclusion that the suburban male is almost entirely responsible for destroying our environment. now, granted, i have a bit of a hate on for middle aged moderately affluent men anyhoo (my dad and your dad excepted, of course). i think they are obnoxious and self important and (some of) the worst drivers on the road. what is my reasoning, allow me to explain.

1. SUV's - ok granted i'd give my left tah-tah for a black range rover sport with tinted out windows, but i'm not about to go out and *buy* one (mostly 'cause i can't afford to, but it's my blog and i'll adopt a hypocritical stance if i want to). they buy 'em for their wives to use for moving the children from playdate to playdate, and to drive themselves as they head to the home depot (and maybe do a little bed bath & beyond) on the weekends. do they need suv's? no. canada is fully populated, thanks very much. we don't need you to have four children, and the two that you do have will fit nicely into the backseat of a compact car. next.
2. powerwashing - let me point out to you that, here in the lower mainland, it rains 97% of the time. until the day the heavens open up and let loose with a torrent of mud instead of the nice, clean, rain it currently sprinkles upon us, you really have no need to power wash your siding, your driveway, or your car. seriously. has no one in my neighbourhood noticed that we are in a global water crisis? i guess because it does rain so much here people become complacent - the idea that elsewhere in the world (heck the country) water is a rare resource to be treasured and respected. be global citizens, people.
3. vacuuming - yes i said vacuuming. the guy down the road from me insists on vacuuming his car at 8am every saturday. after he power washes it. *EVERY* saturday. i feel guilty about washing my car - it's a (generally) unnecessary waste of water. *AND* (get this) yesterday, after he power washed his driveway for the third time so far since may, he used a leaf blower to dry it off. it wasa 30fuckingdegreescelcius and he's drying his driveway with a leaf blower. sweet mother of god.
4. legacy - what's worse, is these men are raising a generation of children who believe that this excess consumption is the norm. they buy their kids expensive, noise polluting, powered toys (mini-motorcycles). their kids *watch* them do these random pieces of 'maintenance' with no regard to the lasting impact of those gallons and gallons of water pouring into the stormdrain, the electricity consumed to run the shopvac for the car, the gas consumed by the mower, the leaf blower, the suv, the expensive toys.

le sigh. ok rant done. i feel like buying a copy of that al gore movie and leaving it in their mailbox in the middle of the night with a 'watch me' alice in wonderland style note plastered to the cover.

hm. maybe i will. at least then i'll feel like maybe, just maybe, i've *done* something instead of sitting here silently (or not so silently) fuming.

icky thump hmm hmm hmm hmm hhmmmhmm mexico!

i've got 2.75 days until i'm on vacation and, let me tell you, it could NOT come at a better time. i get to the point where i just go through the motions at work... twice a year. just in time for vay-kay. this year i'm going to lounge about, am going to drink cocktails and read novels, am going to shambhala for the second year in a row, and am going to otherwise be generally sungoddess-like in my demeanour.

in other news.... le bloggity has been outed to the architect's group of friends via.. somebody. anyhoo, somebody alerted vannasty to this humble journal's existence. she's promised to keep a lid on it just so the architect doesn't have ten or twelve of his friends calling him on a daily basis proclaiming "omg i saw your girlfriend's tah-tahs on the internet *AGAIN*".

not like i've posted my tahtahs lately for precisely that reason, but there they are in the archives readily available to those who care to delve backwards.

you know what i mean.

(ps - helloooooo check out the jay leno jaw on sundae!)

hangs head in shame

yeah yeah i know... i'm like the absentee blogger. it's been what - a week? this isn't going to be a normal occurence. i'd like to promise that but hey - who can promise? i'm like the wind beneath your wings constantly changing and scratching at the legs that you forgot to shave this morning. oh wait - that's me too 'cause both the kiddo and i slept in so had to make a mad dash through the house trying to put ourselves together so we wouldn't be late for work.

well it's not such a big deal for me 'cause no one else is here in the morning so i can show up a few minutes late and get myself put together, but he needs to be there for 8 on the nose.

so the architect is down in san diego, and has been there for over a week now. i'm going quite nutso about the whole thing. the house is very quiet and i have a great deal of trouble falling asleep at night. (no trouble at all sleeping in the early hours of the morning though. clearly.)

OH MY GOD i forgot - last night i opened a beer bottle with another beer bottle and didn't spill any. i rock.

if i get the money honey would you love me love me love me

so i received not one but THREE emails from the UK national lottery yesterday. apparently i'm now 19million pounds richer. dang rufus i'm goin on vacation!

so the architect has gone down to san diego for work. he'll be away for 2 weeks and already things are starting to fall apart. well that's not true - they could def. be worse. for example, this municipal strike currently castrating the lower mainland *could* be affecting my garbage pickup. this would be bad because a) i'd have to send the kiddo on commando missions around the neighbourhood to get rid of it and b) i don't have a lid to my garbage can. the suburb i live in, fortunately, hires independent contractors to handle the garbage, though, so all i have to do is nag him into hauling it down to the curb.

also - i've had to start washing my own dishes. i *don't* do dishes. i cook. dishes. sheesh. who does dishes.

er.. me for 2 weeks. fuck.

also - after almost 8 months of living in that house, i've decided it's time to get the boxes out of the bedroom and hang some pictures. so i started on sunday and had some wine. then i put the hammer down.

somewhere.

heh.

those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it

is anyone else horrified by proposed reforms to educational curricula in the UK? maybe i'm just old-fashioned but it seems to me that eliminating the pinnacles of the 20th century from textbooks (churchill? hitler? ghandi? king? seriously?) in favour of 'good nutrition' is nearly laughable. while i am 100% behind the idea of evolving educational practices, at the same time i see absolutely no value in neglecting to instill in youth the sacrifices and triumphs and horrors inflicted upon our society within our grandparents memory. it boggles my mind.

i can stand my own ground

crazy stuff that happened at soundwave this weekend:
1) a massive thunderstorm struck on friday morning. the architect and i hid in our screened dining tent eating homemade wholewheat blueberry pancakes with real maple syrup and drank french press espresso with baileys for the duration.
2) the architect had a massive bout of relationship angst and spent friday night in the tent instead of hanging out having a good time. he apparently almost left via the thumb express.
3) i sat on my favourite sunglasses.
4) after eating about 1.5 grams of mushrooms, i was lying on the beach admiring the fluffy clouds when i was suddenly stung by a wasp. i railed against the universe for harshing my mellow.
5) relationship angst forgotten, the architect and i retired to the tent mid saturday night festivities, during which time his gum somehow ended up lodged in my hair. i had to cut it out with a swiss army knife.

all things considered, it was still a great time. funny how such random things can happen and still not take the shine off a fun weekend with friends, huh?

random crapola from the sundae sanatorium

in lieu of doing any kind of coherent thinking of my own, i offer you the results of my morning coffee web surfing.

ok first off dave grohl. nuff said.

next up: things white folk shouldn't ever say: "get your drink/smoke/sex on"; "that's whack"; "get jiggy with it" (actually those last two should be slapped from everyone's lips, regardless of race or gender).

from the realm of the ridiculous: ecouture. seriously. a stella mccartney shopping bag? mind you, i did see a small example of this at vancouver's own eco-fair. $45 cloth grocery bags. yeah not so much for me, but thanks, eh? i prefer to go to value village and pick up the discarded cloth bags from tradeshows (like, say, the ecofair) for .75 or so. maybe not as chic as buying new but they probably have a smaller carbon footprint (add that last phrase to my list above). on the other hand, i wouldn't say no to a solar powered vibrator.

and from the land of holy mother of god how cool is this: adam freeland is playing at shambhala this year.

the economy of movement

i'm getting fairly excited about going up to soundwave this weekend. we're taking off on thursday afternoon, coming back sunday, and i have started packing-slash-getting organized already. heh. OH and i had the coolest idea for making lanterns for this weekend and the lantern festival... Ms. U and i are going to have a 'wine and crafts' night tomorrow or wednesday and get it all sorted. well mostly sorted anyway, depending on how much wine is consumed....

no title

we found out yesterday that our diggity has lymphatic cancer. it's in her blood, and they think it's already moving into her lungs, because her breathing is becoming laboured and she has no energy.

there are three options.

1) chemo. the vet doesn't recommend this - she's 12, and isn't the most healthy of dogs to begin with. it's an awful process, is extremely expensive, and very few dogs survive. in fact, the vet said she's never seen a dog pull through after chemo.

2) steroids. the vet could inject her full of steroids, but it would just buy her around 2 months during which time she'd become more and more uncomfortable.

3) put her down.

my sister asked the vet what she'd do if it were her dog. the vet recommended option 3. she's an old dog, and she's not comfortable. she's not really eating (except for swedish meatballs from ikea, baked and fed to her one by one like treats), and watching her climb the stairs at my parents' place last night nearly broke my heart.

when i look at her, or at these photos of her (both taken in the last year or so), i can't put them together with the idea that she is getting weaker and weaker - that she is dying. in my head she's still the dog that hiked 30KM with me on a day when the temperature reached 32deg and was still running laps around the car at the end of it, wondering why we'd stopped. she's still the dog who i took up bobtail mountain. she's still the dog who hopped up onto the garage roof to break out of my parents' backyard and took herself on a walk to visit me a few KM and a very busy road away.

everybody in my family is pretty broken up. my brother is (un)fortunately home to attend a wedding, so he at least has the chance to say goodbye. i'm by no means a 'dog' person, but this puppy has so much personality - she's always happy, always friendly, always has a wagging tail, a big smile, and a shoe in her mouth. she's part of our family and i will miss her.

you've got your big cheese. i've got my hash pipe

are those the real words? i really have no idea, but whenever i hear that song i picture an uber baked rivers cuomo leering at some semi-greasy hipster girl holding a giant wheel of american cheddar. heh. i crack myself up.

what doesn't kill us just makes us better whores

holy crap i had no idea.

leave it to the little brother to point out that i've reached 1000 posts. you know, i started this thing just 'cause i was curious about the relationships you form with people you meet online - whether or not they can be true friendships. it was my own little social experiment, if you will.

and man look where we are now. i'm in a (dare we say) successful relationship with someone i met online. i have what i would consider friends whom i've never met in person. i have friends whom i *have* met in person. i've watched people come and go, and seen people arrive and prosper.

i feel old.

anyhoo - on to other things.

so the architect, some friends, and i are all heading out to mayne island this weekend for some camping. well, that is we *hope* we are. when we tried to book ferry reservations earlier in the week, there was nothing available from tsawwassen to mayne island. soooo... the architect is packing up the car early, heading over to victoria, and *then* trying to catch the ferry over to mayne. i'm going to follow with our friends this evening but we will walk on straight to mayne. we hope.

if he can't get over to mayne island, we have the option of finding something on vancouver island, but it has to be fairly close to the ferry terminal, 'cause he'll have to drop off our stuff and come back and pick us up. when i packed the car last night i left barely enough room for 3 bodies - never mind our fourth camper and his gear. heh. fortunately the divine ms. u and i are fairly small people.

shut the g-darned f*** up

dear cfox muckimuck;

please god never again replace the jeff o'neil morning show with todd & karen. they are not funny. todd is a sycophantic cockrocker with, quite frankly, bad taste in music. karen is nothing more than a simpering pedant whose only redeeming quality is that she gives good voice.

the guy who called in this morning and said they were idiots was right. you'll notice that no one called in to agree with him? it's because everyone with half a brain has recorded themselves performing a mock radio show and put it on autorepeat. trust me - it's more interesting. i, unfortunately, can't pick up anything else on my shower radio, so i'm stuck with them.

please, i beg you, put cory price on. put lana on. put scott allen on. tell jeff & charis & scotty that they are no longer allowed to take vacation. hell put neil morrison on - i'd rather listen to nirvana than nickleback. I DON'T CARE JUST FOR GOD SAKES DON'T MAKE ME LISTEN TO TODD AND KAREN EVER AGAIN.

cordialment;
raspberry sundae.

dude looks like a serial killer. that or lead keyboards in an abba tribute band

i've been chatting with spo this morning. it just so happens that today is his 30th birthday. happy happy day, spo.

the architect, the sister and a few friends headed out on sunday for a grand day of greek festival in the thunder and rain, followed by the white strips up at deer lake park.

now, i freely admit that i was smashed a bit tipsy, but i had an incredible time. not only did i have line magic (that amazing ability to wander to the very front of the line and enter it seamlessly) but i also managed to weave my way to the front of the stage and spend the entire show with a clear view of the band.

plus i'd remembered to wear my kickass new pink rubber boots so my feet stayed dry and mud-free. they will be a fine addition to my festival wear this summer, let me tell you.

not to mention i look cute as a button when i'm wearing them.

a yay yay whoa-oh

never let it be said that god is not a reasonable man. i asked for sun, and i got sun. it may have been pouring rain at the same time, but it was sunny...

sorry god, but let it never be said that i am unwilling to call you on the stupid games you play with our lives.

anyhoo - onward. one of the other less than palatable aspects to living in vancouver is the proliferation of nickleback sound-alikes. because chad the apostle (what is WITH the god thing i have going on today) and his er... followers? merry men? bandmates? whichevs... because they are based out of vancouver and have named their record label 604 (the superior area code here in the lower mainland), vancity has adopted them as their own (i think that they are originally from calgary*, which says alot about their particular brand of cowboy rock). sooooo...... any band that is nickleback, is produced by nickleback, or sounds like nickleback is treated with a reverence usually reserved for luminaries such as the pope, the queen mum**, and david suzuki.

the music that these bands produce*** is infectious enough**** (therein lies their popularity) but normally i'm fairly immune to it. oh sure you may catch yourself tapping your fingers on the steering wheel as you sit in traffic, but if any of your friends noticed you doing it you would absolutely try and pass it off as a tic, or impatience, or some kind of seizure*****.

this morning, however, i found myself singing along with one of these nickleclones - specifically the refrain haphazardly reproduced as the title up there. fortunately i was in the car by myself and (as we all know) when you are in your car you are invisible to surrounding cars. i couldn't help myself - the tune was catchy, and infectious******, and if i closed my eyes i could picture myself on the top of ol' smokey yorbling away joyously.

well at least until i almost hit a telephone pole. then i opened my eyes and changed the station.


*i've just realized that i've been hacking on calgary a lot this week. i'm not sure why and no offense, sass.

**is the queen mum still alive? i really have no idea.

***the verb, not the noun. we have nothing against fruits and vegetables here in the sundae sanatorium.

****like herpes, or some sort of angry red rash.

*****i find that the addition of a head shake or two, and some explosive tourettes-like profanity goes a long way towards reinforcing this ruse..

******damn rash

hot sticky scenes

ug i wish it was hot sex that's on my mind, unfortunately it's just frickin rain.

rain rain and more rain - i don't understand why we get 2 nice days and then have to cope with 7 rainclogged waterlogged soggy bottomed weeks in a row before we see the sunshine again.

can you say i'm moving to california? amen sister, amen.

riot in belgium remix

so i'm back at work wearing my fun new he-man tshirt. while i like staying at home, i like being there when i'm feeling well and so am able to lounge in the sunshine, cocktail in hand, not when my belly is in knots and i'm afraid to stray more than 10ft from the bathroom.

so yes, it's true, i'd rather be at work than in that situation.

the camping trip for next weekend seems to be coming together slowly but surely, and soundwave a bit more excellently than that. even the sister has broken down and decided to come, which means that we should all have an extremely grand time.

question - what is your favourite beastie boys song, and why?

i love sample sales

oy i'm working from home today, since i'm not all that comfortable straying too far from the ladies room, if you know what i'm saying.

not that you want to think about that sort of thing but heck if i can't be inappropriately personal here, what good is having a blog? we can discuss that strangely pungent rash you are developing later on. feel free to divulge its location and the way it periodically expels spores in the comments section.

so i'm lying on my bed, lyrics born on the itunes, the architect clickityclacking away beside me, and it's sunny out. why don't these things happen when it's pouring rain? yesterday, for example, would have been a great day to be sick in bed. today? not so much....

you don't know what love is you only know how to do what you are told

oh i have some serious bad belly this morning. i know it's not normal to throw up (on average) one meal a day, but it's not like i'm forcing myself to do it. it's like i get this feeling in my stomach and the back of my throat and then i start thinking about it and whoops i did it again. it has to be the allergies, but it's so random - like i seem to have a lot of trouble eating tomatoes, even though i'm not allergic to tomatoes (god forbid!)

plus i'm not puky enough to have the positive side effect, which is being lovely and rail thin, so i get to yak like a bulimic but not fit into size zero jeans which seems like a cruel sick joke on behalf of the gods or something, doesn't it?

le sigh.

pushing forward back

you know, from back in the day when chris cornell was kind of cool. audioslave wasn't cool they were catchy there's a difference and while the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive there's a sincere relationship between something's catchiness and its coolness or lack thereof rather.

note from a guy i went out with a few times before the architect was in my email this morning. this was funny 'cause i'd had a dream where he played a role just last night. (something to do with his three dogs and children from a previous marriage and my reluctance to be part of the samsonite sideshow) let us never say that the world is not interconnected my friends. he was commenting that he'd not heard from me in a while and figured it was because of the capitalr-elationship and respected that.

since it was on my mind i responded saying that part of it was the distractions of day to day life in my world (the principal feature of the landscape being the guy who spends his nights sound asleep beside me) but part of it was, of course, my natural absentmindedness. i asked him if his inquiry was friendly or if he had ulterior motives. the chef, you see, made a sudden reappearance via facebook and, when i told him i was not interested in pursuing extracurricular activities, disappeared as just as abruptly. his reply was very nicely worded and so, i thought, bore repetition:

Always the question...one asks....I probably would as well..

I think it poses a barrier in a way
I would like to keep the memory where it is,,, as i like it...
If this makes sense

I am happy you have found someone ...I mean this
I think if i seen you in person i would want to kiss you or something................so maybe lets leave it where it is.

We can say hi by email though....

I wouldnt want you to step out on anything that makes you happy.......I know I wouldnt

funny how there are actual gentlemen out there on the planet and even in the midst of my rollercoaster of sexual self destruction i managed to find one or two hiding in the shadows...

we turn, turn out hate in factories

i've been bad with my meds this week. this fact, in combination with my 'special' time, has me feeling worse in my head and my heart than i have in ages.

i'm feeling like i want to run the knife across my wrists across the palms of my hands to feel the sharp it's like i have an itch that needs to be scratched and the craving craving burning to do it is almost overwhelming is all i can think about is the picture in front of my eyes blurring my vision clouding my perspective blinding me to the screen on the desk i just want everything to go away

nicotine valium vicodin marijuana ecstasy & alcohol

traffic at the tunnel was a fucking nightmare today. apparently there was an accident on the alex fraser bridge, so all the assholes from surrey came over my way to get over /under the river. awesome.

i seriously had seen so many boneheaded aggressive driver stupid moves by 6.45 this morning i was half convinced i'd be dead by seven - especially at the moment when a jerk in a silver jetta totally pushed his way into the lane two cars in front of me, causing the guy in front of me to slam on his breaks and me to slam on mine. i wasn't in any danger of hitting him but the big rig truck rushing up behind me almost turned me into a raspberry-flavoured slinky. quite the way to start the day, let me tell you. that adrenaline will certainly wake you up, however forty minutes later you are exhausted from the fight/flight anxiety attack and ready for a nap.

It’s 2007, people. If you don’t know what to do when your neighbors start shambling around and getting all bitey, you probably deserve to die

so i emailed him back and basically pointed out that i wasn't the one he needed to convince, but he'd very def. made a mistake that most likely couldn't be rectified. i let him know that we are all aware that he held off joining another ship so that he could be on the same contract as the girl he cheated on my sister with once they'd broken up, and i told him that i suspected he was having this sudden flash of remorse because something had happened in that 'relationship'. i also told him that the sister is happier than i've ever seen her - looks great, is going out, and (most importantly) isn't wasting any more time sitting around waiting for someone who only has his eye on the horizon, casting about in search of the next big adventure. i told him only the truth and i think i said it respectfully and clearly and didn't tell him that i'd like to put his dick in a meat grinder, though i fer sher was thinking it.

so that part is done - now i just need to tell the sister that he's emailed me and that i've responded. perhaps i'll wait until she's a drink or two to the wind this weekend.

i went to the driving range yesterday at lunchtime with a group from the office - for $13 you got a box lunch, a 7iron, and a bucket of balls, plus some time with the head golf pro. now, i'm no golfer, but i sure enjoy whacking things with a stick. today. though, my right hand is a bit... shall we say crippled - the tendon in my wrist is very tight and the whole typing thing is a bit of a challenge. should be interesting....

oh ps - i finally got new glasses yay!

we can't have parties like in spain where they go all night (shut down in north america)

first things first - ok so the stanley cup isn't coming back to canada this year but let's be frank: bc has about as much in common with ontario as we do with lower mesopotamia. and i gotta say - it was pretty sweet to see the niedermeyer brothers hoist that cup - good bc boys that they are. not like i watched the end of the game, or anything. i gave up at 5-2 in the 3rd and figured i knew how it was going to end.

so this am i got up to am email from the sister's ex - the one who cheated on her for 2 months before he came home and is now off sailing europe with another woman (from all reports). he says he has come to realize he's made a huge mistake (duh) and figures she's the one for him. how do i respond to this? she's doing pretty well w/o him - has started to move on, has found a guy she might be interested in. i can't *not* tell her i got the note, but at the same time i don't want her to be confused-slash-hurt-slash-set back in her recovery. what do do?

sick sick sick don't resist

there's me & the architect on saturday night. clearly (thanks to the non-bleary gazes and general lack of slobbering) it was early in the evening. things sort of went downhill from there.
not that this is a bad thing, by any means - we all needed a night out, since its been way too long, and an extremely good time was had by all.

today, on the other hand, i am dealing with the lingering remains of a migraine, slept all morning, and just yakked up my lunch. good times.

we've more or less decided that the right thing for us to do is move to san diego. career wise, the architect is stagnating here, and he has a great deal more earning potential than i do. not to mention the fact that i am not necessarily all that emotionally invested in what i do - while i do work with some great people, the shit the management has put the staff through in the last year (it can only be assumed that they were purposely driving the value and moral of the company down as a way to price it for an easy sale. i have even speculated that the constant restructuring, layoffs and everything else were part of a plan set up with the purchasing company a year ago when they first entered talks. the massive 'retainment' bonuses gifted out to the ceo et all would surely indicate something not quite above board, and also ensure that we will be working with the same underhanded ethics) make me less than set upon staying. so.... easy move for me to make, workwise, harder to make personally. my friends, the folks, the sister, the kiddo.... all so hard to leave behind. and even with spo's excellent advice i am faced with a great deal of trepidation about starting over again.

if i were in family guy i'd be brian

intelligent, sophisticated, slightly alcoholic.

man what a weekend. i feel as though summer has officially kicked off - dinner and drinks on a sunny friday night patio (our local - a restaurant with a pub "feel" so that the kiddo can come too), brunch saturday at provence followed by some sunny wandering in kits, clubbing with the sister, the architect, the divine ms u, our new downstairs neighbour and six more of our friends saturday night, then a morning of recovery, coffee and fresh strawberries on the sundeck, followed by the ladner annual salmon bbq in the park for dinner. there was a laid back, relaxed feel of who cares if we get the chores done (even though we did actually get through most of them) that really should accompany every weekend.

random facts -

• i painted my toenails bright iridescent pink
• i'm going to make pasta for dinner tonight, and drink red wine
• i'm wearing undies with skulls all over them
• my boss bought me a hat
• i really want to go shoe shopping
• scratch that - i really want to go shopping
• i wish i were still in bed
• secretly i think that i make better bbq'd salmon than i had last night
• that makes me worry that i'm kinda vain
• i'd gladly spend all of my money on groceries, now that i have an appreciative dining audience
• er... that's it for now

jam another dragon down the hole

i'm having a bad depression day of undetermined origins - the kind that is very hard to explain to the architect, because there is no real reason, and there is really nothing you can do to fix it. you can just sit back and try to ride it out without annihilating yourself en route.

this, shall we say mood is being aggravated by the kids playing on the street outside. they're doing kid stuff - yelling, riding bikes, banging on parked cars with hockey sticks, but the cacophony MAKES ME WANT TO RISE UP WITH A FLAME THROWER AND NAPALM THEIR SKINNY PREPUBESCENT ASSES THEN FEED THEM TO HOMELESS PEOPLE ACCOMPANIED BY A GLASS OF MERLOT AND A NICE CRANBERRY CHUTNEY.

i'm fine, really i am.

baby went to amsterdam

so do you think that amy winehouse will dedicate 'rehab' to lindsay lohan when she performs at the mtv movie awards? i'm not sure why this is interesting to me - it's just the thought i had when i heard the promo on the radio this am.

oh the police were fucking incredible, by the way. if you can, move some mountains to get tickets. 3 guys, only one guitar change (that i noticed) playing for over 2 hours solid.

heh. whoops - got distracted there.

anyhoo, the police rocked, i'm exhausted, and all i can think about is what some cracked out british laddette will be lipsynching on television. good times...

logic so inflexible

so today's the big day - the culmination of a lifetime of police fan-dom. i was too young to go see them 'back in the day' - this is the only opportunity i've ever had and i'm pretty frickin excited, let me tell you.

write every day... yes that's the way it has to be.

well put it this way - if we do end up moving to san dee-ahhhgo, i'll be unemployed so it'll be you and me my friends,

you

and

me.

whether you like it or not.

i'm kind of free-form thinking today. i forgot to take my meds all weekend so i'm a touch ... shall we say ... off this morning. i did have a decent weekend, though - drank WAY too much wine, especially friday. we had one of those accidental getting loaded while playing dominoes, though. i think we broke our new downstairs neighbour. she disappeared after taking a hit off a bong with the kiddo and we didn't see her again all weekend.

hehehe whoops.

talkin only me and you talkin only me and you

so we have a new downstairs neighbour (who, by the way, is from PRINCE GEORGE - how is it that we find each other?). she's pretty cool - came up for drinks on her first night, is pretty young but not too young... anyhoo. her long-term boyfriend moved to MALTA yesterday. she's pretty broken up about the whole thing (understandably). she popped up to say hi yesterday and i ended up feeding her a glass of wine and chatting for a couple of hours.

i don't know that i'm very good with the whole 'being a supportive female friend' thing. i think it's because talking about my own emotions/feelings makes me uncomfortable - i really don't mind it when people come to me to talk and i will always listen, i'm just not sure if what i'm saying or doing is the right thing, you know? so i get fidgety and second guess myself and play with my hair and twist myself into cross-legged knots and pour red wine on the problem 'cause let's not kid if red wine can't cure it nothing can.

tap tap - is this thing on?

*ahem*. yes, it's true, i've returned from san diego about 3 elle-bees heavier and slightly more tanned.

i'm almost 65% positive we are moving there in the fall. how do i feel about this? well i have mixed feelings - real excitement and very strong apprehension. i love the idea of a new place, new adventures, sunshine most of the year. i'm worried about making all new friends, missing my family (esp. the kiddo and the sister) and not being able to get a job. does anyone know anything (ie you, spo) about packing up and moving to another country, how to do it, advice to share etc?

i have a bunch of photos to upload, and a whole pile of laundry to do and some stories to tell (i saw a decapitated deer! visited a town called weed!) and i'll get to them over the next little bit, i promise. right now, though, i need to wander through my house and become reacquainted with my possessions, do some grocery shopping, and make my cat feel as though we don't hate him.

xo

don't love me discontent

the sister is text messaging me from the airport where she is currently awaiting a flight to vegas. she's headed down for a wedding and the weekend, and is suitably excited. we had to go shopping last night for a dress - i dragged her into banana republic, made her try on a dress about $100 more than she wanted and then pretended to listen while she talked herself out of it, knowing it was perfect and she wouldn't find anything else nicer.

she bought it, of course.

i then tried to get her to buy a necklace made up of three strands of large aqua coloured jade beads but at that point she proclaimed me the devil, made the sign of the cross and fled across the mall.

i'm very good at spending other people's money, you see. well and my own, let's not kid, i just can't spend anything right now 'cause i'm leaving for san diaaahhhgo (lalala holiday lalala!) on saturday.

mind you, i did buy the kiddo a digital camera and a 4gig memory card as an early grad present - he's headed up to kelowna to be the girl's date - but that was kind of necessary, don't you think? nice camera - much nicer than mine, i have to admit. ah well it's worth it, i figure, since a few years ago he seemed hell bent on self destruction, whereas right now self immolation is just another career option.

etymology and other road trip topics

so we've sort of vaguely started planning our roadtrip. the fact that we've just started is purely a testament to how busy-slash-stressed out i've been at work these past couple of weeks, because usually, with only five days left before departure i'd have the roadmaps memorized and a timetable laid out to the second.

hey - i never said i wasn't obsessive compulsive and/or a touch anal retentive.

like you're surprised.

anyhoo - i've only vaguely started to plan. like, i know that we are going to try to leave at 4am-ish on saturday and go as far as we can before the architect starts to fall asleep at the wheel, but other than that i have no idea. i *do* know that there are some very definate things i'd like to do en route - the whole point of driving down is so i can see a bit of the countryside. we figure we'll check out the california coast on this trip, and then do the oregon coast later on in the summer.

in other worlds, my mama is hooked on that show 'are you smarter than a fifth grader' and she keeps trying to catch us with questions she has gotten wrong. this is a source of constant amusement to us, because she tends to ask fairly easy questions. don't get me wrong - she's no dumb lady - this is just stuff she hasn't thought about since, well, probably since she was in fifth grade. case in point: last night at dinner she turned to me and asked "do polar bears eat penguins?" to which i replied "pffft no - there are no penguins at the north pole" she was heartbroken.

which is interesting, because you'd think she'd be delighted that her very well educated eldest daughter would be smarter than a fifth grader.

apparently not.

Elliot Gould's Golden Hammer Of Midnight

(disclaimer - uh.... i have a head full of random thoughts today, so i apologize for the incoherent nature of this post.)

1) i've somehow hurt my neck - it feels like i've got a sore throat but on the back of my neck, and i can barely turn my head. this bodes poorly for tonight's dodgeballs of doom extravaganza.

2) i wake up in the morning more tired than i was when i went to sleep the night before. is it my bed? is it the wine? is it my deep-rooted disinclination to go to work?

3) i heard on the radio today that some company has published their estimation of what a stay at home parent would be earning for performing the duties they do. it's up to around $130,000 or something stupid. i'd like to say fuck that shit. as a non-stay-at-home mom, i do as much work inside the house as those who don't work, *and* i'm out of the house between 6.30 (when i leave in the morning) to 4.15 (when i get back home - *if* i come straight home and don't stop on the way to grocery shop, pick up drycleaning, run errands etc). so, technically, when i'm mopping the kitchen floor -slash- cutting the grass -slash- cleaning the oven -slash- scrubbing toilets -slash- baking cookies i'm working overtime so i should be getting AT LEAST time and a half. so there.

4) my cat's preferred method of waking me up in the morning involves jumping up onto my bedside table as soon as the alarm goes off. if i don't throw back the blankets and put my feet to the floor immediately, he will stare at me for about 5 minutes, and then proceed to start knocking things OFF said bedside table onto the floor. this morning he jettisoned my glasses, a small balled-up piece of paper, and the remote control for my laptop before i conceded and made my way to the kitchen to fill his breakfast bowl.

i'm half the man i used to be

there is not enough coffee in the world to keep me awake today - just so y'all know.

when i stepped outside this morning the air reminded me of ireland... something to do with the smell and texture as i breathed it in brought me back in years and miles to a place that may or may not exist only in my memory. i have no definite recollection, just a sense of having been there before.

maybe i do just need a vacation - i need to be shaken up from my routine, released from my day to day lethargy. i need to see new things meet new people walk on different streets with wide awake eyes.

maybe i need something more - maybe i need to walk away from everything leave everything behind start fresh build it all up again. maybe i need to pack one bag put down my phone walk out the the highway and see where i end up put down roots in land that doesn't turn to water six inches below the surface.

maybe i just need a vacation.

my bright is too slight to hold back all my dark

blah blah blah it's monday and i'm having one of those days where i am not sure i can go on.

go on doing what?

i don't even know i'm just overwhelmed by a sense of hopelessness and apathy. this is strange 'cause it's sunny out and usually when the weather's sunny so's my disposition but not now not today not this very moment.

did you know that china puts melamine in pet food quite regularly? i guess manufacturers purchase it because it increases nitrogen levels in food, which mimic a higher level of protein without actually impacting the nutritional value.

oh and the canadian government apparently had intelligence that warned them about the air india bombing before it happened.

oh and the canucks lost last night.

oh and

oh and

oh and

meta-free-phor-all

oh my god i laugh in your general direction, stephen colbert...

hello robin sparkles? now *this* is ironic

snoop dogg has been denied entrance to australia because of his criminal record.

heh. irony at its finest.

you know, 'cause it was a penal colony and all.

heh. anyway.

dodgeball rocked last night - a veritable barrel of laughs. both the kiddo and the architect were on fire, and i played well myself, if i do say so.. er.. myself. it's funny how team spirit really affects you - the more fun that people are having, the more fun you have. it really is contagious. not to mention the fact that the stupider and clumsier i am, the more people laugh at me, and the better time they have. so, really, i'm not a shitty dodgeball player, i'm on a one-woman mission to make sure that everyone around me laughs all night long. yeah, that's it.

ahem.

carry on....

what's that dido song about the bad day? yeah that's me

so between the architect and the cat, who were both completely buh-jiggity all night, i got little to no sleep. but... still had to go to work, so suck it up and start getting ready. as i spritz body spray into the air, i let go a big sneeze, so inhale a mouthful. hack, hack, wheeze, gasp... on my way out the door i grab an orange for breakfast and shove it in my bag. traffic was average, but i missed 'stump the show' on the fox (always a giggle). get in this morning, pour myself a cup of coffee, and notice that i've *not* noticed that there was 2 inches of water left in the bottom of my cup from yesterday. fuck. oh well too lazy to go to the kitchen so weak coffee. pull my orange out of the bag, peel away, take a bite and - what's this? it's old, dry, and bitter. fun. have to go to the kitchen now *any*way to make toast. toaster is acting up so i get mostly warmed over dry bread. take a bite and choke.

le sigh.

if you ever have to knock on wood

so between 5.30 and 6am this morning they played two rancid songs. ok one of them was that faux rancid song snippetted above, but the other was timebomb which is guaranteed to get my booty shaking in the shower, let me tell you.

ok ok canucks, stars, i told you so they won let's move on. nobody likes that guy so i'll leave it at that. i'll give you my prediction on the next series when it starts. in all honesty, i spent half of that game with my eyes covered and a giant knot in the pit of my belly - if it weren't for bobby lu we would have lost for sure. hell - let's not kid. if it weren't for him we wouldn't have been there in the first place.

have i mentioned my pending holly-day? the architect and i are driving to san diego for a week. i'm rather excited, especially considering the fact that i get a paycheque whilst there. much more fun to be somewhere and actually have some extra cashflow. fun treats for me, fun treats for the architect, fun treats for the sister... i heart shopping. i heart lying on the beach more, but i do heart shopping.

canucks 4, dallas 1

told ya so.

seriously

someone found this blog by googling 'dave grohl's tongue'. if i had dave grohl's tongue do you think i'd be wasting my time writing this? heck no, i say heck no. i'd be lying back in a patch of sunshine, sipping a cocktail and enjoying all the pleasures that dave grohl's tongue has to offer.

and i'd definately take pictures of *that*.

got canned heat in my heels tonight bay-bee

so i dunno about *your* part of the lower mainland, but in my little section of the world yesterday was gloriously sunny all day. i walked to the market, walked back hobbling under the weight of too many groceries (what is it about sunny days that makes me spend too much money on food?), then lounged in the sunshine with a good book before bbq'ing steaks for deener.

lalala what else did i do with my weekend? hmmm well we helped the sister get the rest of her stuff out of her condo (it finally sold, the lucky financially solvent bitch), set up the bbq and deck chairs, oooo i know - we went to see the giants play on friday. it was nice to see at least 1 of vancouver's hockey teams show up and play the game. not naming any names of any other teams (ahem, rhymes with sucks) of course.

mind you, i guess i did predict a win in seven, didn't i?

pop culture ponderings for monday:
1) tim armstrong's new song is (dare i say it) not good. there - i said it. it's done.
2) go read this. funny shit man, funny shit.

tales from another broken

ok so yesterday i went to the army&navy shoe sale. for those of you who don't live in vancouver, this sale is one of the highlights of the gvrd shopping year. it's seriously legendary. anyhoo - this was the second year in a row where i haven't bought anything. it's sad but true. now, i did find a pair that i loved - saddle brown bcbg heels with a slightly rounded toe, 3-inch railroad spike style heels - but they didn't have my size. it may be worth a second trip maybe tomorrow to take another looky-loo, but then maybe not. le sigh.

the architect had the audacity to suggest that maybe i'm not interested in shoes anymore. can you imagine the cheek? sheesh. just 'cause a girl's had a couple of off visits to the shoe store....

i should go out today and buy four new pairs. that'll learn'im.


edit - red house blues by jimi hendrix is on innerweb radio and it is so perfect so perfect for my mood i can't even tell you. it's a slow sleepy friday morning full of sunshine and anticipation for the weekend: hockey game tonight lazy saturday maybe plant some flowers in the pots on my deck definately drink some wine... oh they're following it up with stevie ray life is so good

here lies janey purplepants

so j-mo is shutting down his blog. i'll be more than sad to see him go - for a while he seemed to be my male counterpart. of course, lately, we've wandered our separate ways - kind of like a fuck buddy who you spend lots of time with before drifting apart. it makes me a little sad inside, but it's the way of it, i guess. i find that even i have trouble coming up with stuff to talk about every day (as you may have noticed) and my dull content is starting to show - fewer comments, reduced hits. this makes me sad because i do really enjoy the back and forth give and take aspects of my little bloggity, but i just don't have the time to devote to it that i used to.

plus, and i am a bit ashamed to admit this, but i have completely tempered the way i write out of respect for the architect. not that he cares whether i put up half naked pictures of myself, but i figure it's only a matter of time before some if *his* friends who blog stumble upon this one and i'd hate for him to be embarrassed in any way because of it, you know? so is it even my blog anymore? can i find away to bring it back to being my own space, or is there another path i should follow - here or somewhere else?

i was catching up on my blog reading yesterday and caught ct overdrive's post from saturday about the decline of blogging and the rise of facebook and its ilk. blogging has peaked, he says, and for people who don't have the time or inclination to come up with decent content, facebook is a great place to post pictures of yourself and your friends getting tanked of a weekend, or pass quick notes back and forth, or whatever.

i don't want my journal to become another facebook. i don't want this to be a place where i come and spatter half thought out ideas and non sequiturs. i'm just not sure how to get it back to where i want it to be. maybe i'm too far gone. i need some help - what can i do?

there and back again

ok so on saturday we took an impromptu roadtrip to penticton for the festofales - a two day long beer festival. think lots of drunk early twentisomethings and late teensomethings mixed with drunk older biker style folk come down from god knows where - had we been in the gvrd i would have assumed surrey or chilliwack. interesting people watching, let me tell you.

anyhoo, spent the night in k-town, cruised some wineries on sunday and headed back last night. not bad for a weekend, especially since the sun stayed out the entire time.

so anyway we were listening to the game on the radio - we missed most of the first period 'cause (sadly) we don't have satellite radio, but caught the second and were at home in time to watch the third. i swear to god that, listening to the radio, you would have thought the only canuck on the ice was luongo. it was really, really sad. fortunately the rest of the team showed up in time for the third and they managed to squeak out a win. i don't know kids - unless they pick up the pace they ain't gonna make it much beyond the first round.

at least minnesota is nearly down for the count...

the mozzarella stick before the chicken fettucini, girl

i have no idea how to spell fettuccine. next.

so i've succumbed to the three or four manymany friend requests i've had to join facebook. i mean, there was such a deluge of invitations how could i possibly resist? seriously. anyhoo, i'm trying it on for size. i couldn't really get into myspace, for some reason, i was all about the blogger and it just seemed like an iffy substitute, but facebook - now this is networking! getting in touch with highschool friends and confidantes! people who i couldn't stand for years are now able to get in touch with me and say hello through the wonders of the internet, rather than just grab my tits (the guys) or call me a slut (the girls after the guys had grabbed my tits) in the hall! i'm so excited.

anyhoo, yeah. i joined but it's under my real name. shoot me an email if you have also given in to the latest social scourge and i'll send you a friend request.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

ok on to hockey. did anyone see the game (and when i say The Game i naturally refer to any game in which the canucks were playing) last night? bobby lu stopped something like 72 shots on net in what ended up being the 6th longest game in nhl history. i will admit to dozing through most of the overtime periods, waking up when the architect was especially vocal beside me, so i did get to see the winning goal. yay me.

i predict vancouver in seven.

The best jokes are dangerous, and dangerous because they are in some way truthful.

RIP kurt vonnegut

will wonders never cease

when i arrived at work this morning for the first time in 5 days, there was still candy left in my easter basket. now, if i were still sitting in the 'office' area and not in production, this would absosmurfley not be the case.

in other worlds, i apologize for not being around all weekend however i had to jet down to the bahamas in order to be on the front lines for the anna nicole baby daddy decision. i was in the running, of course, to be the father of the child. you cannot imagine my disappointment. i'm crushed - believe me. i may never recover. i imagine you all feel the same way, since, let's not kid, we *all* had as much likelihood of being the sperm donor as ZsaZsa's husband, or even the creepy lawyer guy.

i have no idea why i'm thinking about this.

oompa paloompa paloompa pa mau mau

how is it that i've never listened to architecture in helsinki before? i just didn't *know*. so light, so ethereal, so perfect for my present mood of anticipating 22degrees and sunshine on my front deck wearing shorts and a tank top. yes please.

i do need to get some groceries, and a couple of things for the architect and the kiddo for easter, but other than that i have no real plans for the next five days and i heart that a great deal. well except for watching my man gsp kick some ass in the ufc tomorrow. other than that, nada mes amis, nada.

so i played dodgeball again last night - we joined a league and last night took the kiddo with us. he's quite hooked as well. last week was less fun - it seemed like everyone was taking it way too seriously and i'm not nearly competitive enough for that crapola. last night, however, was seriously fun and i laughed my but off all evening.

can we revisit the fact that there are people who take dodgeball seriously? sort of invokes ben stiller in spandex, no? uh huh - ponder that for a mo.

anyhoo, i'm off to read my book. what other bands haven't i heard of?

treading trodden trails for a long, long time

so last week on FOF (fuck off friday) i discovered cracked. ok i may be the last one on the boat but i spent a very enjoyable day wasting time laughing away quietly in my little corner of the office. i turned it into one of my tabs and, this morning, flipped over to read this and had to wipe the tears from my eyes:

This is everything that's wrong with the modern media in one convenient image, for the busy modern person who needs to lose faith in humanity 'on the go'. A website dedicated to the commercials which prevent you from watching the programs on television. This is why technology hasn't done all the things it promised to, like curing cancer or constructing Killbots programmed to travel back in time and kill Steve Martin sometime after Dirty Rotten Scoundrels but before Bringing Down the House. A site dedicated to the very best in ads is like a drink brewed for the very finest of hangovers— they're focusing on a horrible unwanted side-effect and a head-injury inspired decision somewhere has somehow made it the point.

Worse, they're targeting the most annoying demographic on the planet: the "I only watch it for the ads" vacuum-headed smirkers. This is a public service announcement: SAYING YOU DO NOT LIKE SOMETHING POPULAR DOES NOT MAKE YOU INDIVIDUAL AND EDGY. It makes you dumbass— at least the unoriginal hooting herd enjoy the damn game. You're being equally unoriginal, dumber, and deliberately spending time to point out how you don't like it. Do you think a monkey that repeatedly eats stones and complains about it is the "cool, unique" monkey in among his friends? No, he's the stupid one even in a group whose main hobbies are masturbating in public and throwing shit at each other.

i had a long-running argument with a friend all through university about populist media. he had very strong ideas on the nature of 'good' music and 'good' literature. he refused to believe you could find quality or engage in active critical reading of most things present in pop culture: action movies, pop music or metal, mystery novels etc. as an aside, i wonder how he'd feel about the current popularity of the new modest mouse single? actually scratch that - he'd just say they'd sold out.*

i'm of the opinion that you can read a harlequin romance actively - approach it critically and pay attention to what is going on and what it says about society - and get more out of it than if you read, say, david foster wallace or vikram seth, or even shakespeare the way that most people read it. oprah's book club is great but if the people reading the texts don't participate in the dialogue the author is constructing between the novel and the world then they may as well be staring at a blank wall for all they are getting out of it.

furthermore, setting yourself *apart* from the mainstream by refusing to admit that you like the things that the mainstream embraces doesn't make you special, or better - it just makes you as closed-minded as a fundamentalist preacher running for senate and about as interesting. don't get me wrong - i agree that people have individual tastes and some people *don't* like popular music or movies or literature or whatever but, as someone who spent a long time in the academic world and so is rather familiar with elitist pomposity, i think that people who summarily reject *ALL* popular media are as shallow intellectually as the common masses.

i admit it - i have advanced education in literature and media and i love mystery novels. i like watching tv now and again, and love to watch hockey. i love to listen to the radio and i get really excited when a band i like becomes popular (though i'm always sad when i can't see the bands in small clubs anymore, and have to go to cavernous hockey arenas). there - i've said it. i dig pop culture. come on - say it with me. it's kinda liberating.




* saying a formerly 'alternative' or unknown band has sold out because they've achieved some level of mainstream success is a sure-fire way to throw me off on a fiery tangent of venom and proselytizing. they didn't sell out. it's the nature of the parent culture to absorb a subculture and adopt its tastes and characteristics - this is how fashion changes and evolves.

cast off the crutch that kills the pain

ok so i want to know what weather report jeff o'neil reads 'cause when i got up this morning he was talking about how it's going to be sunny and 18 on friday, but everything i've read says rain. i don't want rain on the long weekend - i want sunshine and happiness and to be able to stretch out on the lawn and read a book and warm my belly like a lizard on the rocks.

next question: crap, i know i had one. man this is like when you go sit on santa's knee and he asks you what you want for christmas, but you totally freeze up and can only spit out socks and underwear when really what you want is a Red Ryder Ranger Model Air Rifle. who the fuck really wants socks and underwear for christmas? (well me sometimes but really am i seriously going to tell santa that? i don't think so.)

so what's up - any plans for easter weekend? we had thought about heading down to oregon, but have decided to stay home and be lazy instead. this home maintenance thing sucks - i hate having to run around all weekend doing errands and cleaning and mowing lawns and and and. i just want to lie about, preferably in the sun (yes, yes i said that, i know), and do nothing really. well maybe have brunch somewhere downtown or something like that but really nothing too high pressure or requiring any energy whatsoever. what i really need is a manservant. any applicants?

oh and ps - guess who got a white blackberry pearl to play with? i love technology....

renegades are the people

more from the wild world of violence in sports: professional team play has been suspended for two weeks in greece after violence broke out between fans at a women's volleyball match and one person was killed.

ok ok you say that cricket inspires fierce loyalty and passion, but women's volleyball??? seriously.

it's not easy being green

so the first thing i did this morning was watch kermit the frog perform 'hurt'. i've gotta say - watching kermie do the h-twitch is more than a little disconcerting to someone who grew up watching the muppets. it's really not right. ergo, i refuse to link to it. however, if you don't believe me it's readily available on youtube or from your usual sources.

ok it wasn't really the *first* thing - i also got up showered got dressed ate toast drank coffee and came to work, not necessarily in that order. it was, though, perhaps the first sentient thing i did this morning.

that's a little scary, since chronologically watching hurt comes well *after* driving the 30 or so KM to the office.

i don't think i have any long hair pictures of myself on this computer (being chuck, the work laptop) that don't show me sporting a hat or an updo or something which would prevent anyone from making an educated 'cut or no cut' decision. well aside from my pervy little brother who has definite feelings on the matter.

oy i'm so sleepy i can barely keep my eyes open for some reason this morning. i'd better be perking up 'cause i've got dodgeball this evening. i heart dodgeball, even though i'm not all that good. it sure is fun, though.

xo

running towards nothing again and again and again

so the sister popped by last night and we ended up drinking wine and playing dominoes. somewhere along the line i've become addicted to dominoes. the kiddo came in with a buddy last night and introduced us all with the descriptor "they're always sitting around getting drunk and playing dominoes".

hm.

i may have a problem.

mind you, i could be sitting around getting drunk watching american idol and dancing with the stars, then falling asleep on the couch with a lit cigarette and burning the house down. that would be worse, i think. especially since i don't smoke and hate reality tv. actually the sister made us put american idol on in the background after the hockey game was over. her awesomeness gwen stefani was doing something with the contestants and she wasn't all made up and she looked, well, awesome as usual. i have no idea what she was doing there, but still.

regardless of the presence of gwen, the show met all of my expectations on the suck factor. fortunately i was a bottle of wine in by the time it came on so i can't actually remember how bad it was, i just have a general impression of awful.

dancing with the stars i removed from my memory with a slotted spoon. messy, yes, but very effective.

i'm thinking of cutting my hair off. i'm tired of the long.

overwhelm, destroying so sweetly

do i look as though i'm up to something?
nah couldn't be.

i have been pondering career options over the weekend and i'm wondering whether or not i should take a few human resources courses (and not just 'cause that's fun to say). whilst surfing about i came across a scandinavian company that does workplace wellness coaching, but focuses on making workplaces fun. this makes a lot of sense to me since it is kind of part of my role at my current employment but maybe turning it into something a little more formalized would be a rewarding path to take.

ok part of me thinks like that - the other part wonders if it's just a post-tekboom gen x conceit to think that workplaces should be fun. it is work, after all.

but then why shouldn't they? we spend more time at work than anywhere else. or i do, anyway, despite my best efforts to avoid doing much more than my 8hour stint each day. le sigh. all i know is that what i'm doing now isn't the most satisfying occupation in the world and i need to find something that gives me more.

more of what, i'm not sure.

spo's right though - i need to do something more creative 'cause i feel as though i'm becoming a spreadsheet slave, a corporate drone. bleh. before you know it i'll be buying suits and wearing sensible beige nylons under my conservatively heeled pumps, instead of knee high 3inch black leather boots and sheer black stockings.

blah blah blah this post goes everywhere. i need to sort out my head.

knew its name since before i could speak

hello saturday domestic bliss or something like that.
home depot, bed bath & beyond, big day big day
except we don't have that boring bathroom superstore just faded proximations

it's noon i'm still in bed too small white tshirt hard nipples thinking about looking for porn and fucking myself but too fucking lazy to be bothered.

(the picture's old, yeah, but i like it so deal)

who knew

that cricket was so (pardon the expression) cutthroat? i mean, you expect violence in hockey, football (the real kind not the padded up na version), and other such contact sports, but cricket?

jamaican authorities are now saying that the coach of the pakistani team was actually strangled to death after a st patrick's day loss to ireland which eliminated the team from the championships.

of cricket.

you know - that genteel english sport where they roll a ball and bat it along the ground whilst clad in a uniform that rivals golf for geeky. his wife is quoted as indicating that she immediately suspected foul play: "I mean some of the cricketing fraternity, fans are extremely volatile and passionate about the game and what happens in the game, and also a lot of it in Asia, so I suppose there is always the possibility that it could be that (murder)"

which makes sense, of course, 'cause they're .. you know ... cricket fans.

i hear the lawn bowling world cup is off tha hook.

we've yet to crash but we still might as well enjoy it

ok so i'm still home in bed. the headache has retreated to a dull roar behind my right eye, and i'm not nearly as achy as i was yesterday. i should be right as rain by tomorrow.

since i've been lying here with little to no concentration ability, i've been leafing through the resume book the architect purchased me a few weeks ago. as my company has been so tumultuous of late, i really need to put together a decent resume. sadly, i've never really had to job hunt too aggressively. the job i currently have i wandered into accidentally - i was assigned to this company as a temp and they kept me on. before that i worked with the university where all hiring is done through an archaic web of nepotism and reputation. add this to the fact that, for the past 2.5 years, my job has consisted of 'other duties as required' and resume writing becomes a bit of a pickle. i'm the girl who does stuff. whenever anyone asks 'who does that' and no one really does, the answer is always 'raspberry'. if i don't know how, i figure it out. this is, i assume, a valuable quality in an employee. however, it doesn't translate well into a tangible, definable skilset. le sigh.

i think i should make an appointment with a recruiter or career counsellor and just sit down and go through it with them. add this to the fact that i don't really know *what* i want to do and you have a situation nearly guaranteed to drive someone (and when i say someone i really mean me) insane.

le sigh.

thoughts? suggestions? great job openings made just for me?

tilling my own grave

i've been in bed all day. i spent the night drenched in sweat, waking up every few minutes with a headache that was all encompassing yet oh-so-elusive. did it exist or is it just the next manifestation of my psychosis? am i sick or am i merely incapable of dealing with the outside world destined to become a shut in trapped in a prison of my own design?

i have no answers for you. how can you expect me to know what's going on? i can barely focus my eyes on the screen in front of me for long enough to tap out my cry for help. i find solace only in motion dream of running away running running down the road with the sunroof open leaving my life behind dropping off the map. do you think it is possible? do you want to come with me?

picture it - you and i dancing on a beach with everything we own shoved in a backpack a bottle of cheap red wine propped in the sand by the fire. we'll have to be drunk, of course, have to be drunk in order to deny the pathos of our situation no food no money no friends just the constant sound of the voices in my head chasing us further faster away.

bury me at sea where no murdered ghost can haunt me

yeah i dunno what i'm doing tonight so i thought i'd post this classic shot of ciavarro and i in the spirit of the day. well i know that we are going to some sustainable living thing at the convention centre, and are then going out to do something or another, and i hope to dog that there is a vera's burger in the mix (if i didn't know better the rabid cravings i've been having for a pilgrim burger would make me suspect bun in proverbial oven but that aint the fuck the case sir, no sir not a chance).

i imagine there will be drinking.

i hope there will be debauchery.

i know there will be drunken idiots to trip over.

i'm not sure whether i will be one of them or not.

i suspect i will.

anyhoo.

i've been lapse about the blog reading lately as well. like instead of doing my daily catchup, i've been going in once or twice a week and binge-reading. that can't be good for you, can it? like they say that if you have a glass bottle or two of wine a night, it's very good for you but saving your weekly allotment for saturday nights and hittin' it large is bad for the system. it must be the same with blogging, no? (she asks, hoping for a logical reason to read blogs at work every morning). uh huh that's what i thought.

(ps that's me lying in the sunshine in sd waiting for the architect to finish work. i could get used to being a stay-at-home sextoy, my friends, i could i could)

first things first

san deeahhgo was awesome. i'm ready to move - i'm a sunshine girl and i can't help but be happy when i know that the grey in the sky is just morning haze and by 10.30am the sky will be nothing but blue blue blue.

the architect, however, doesn't really want to move backwards in life so we are trying to find a compromise - either an in-home tanning bed or a bunch of weekend trips. maybe both.

i'll have some photos to put up later, when i'm at home, using my new macbook (Angus MacIntoy II - Son of Angus). *does dance of joy*

the arctic monkeys are coming through vancouver in a couple of months. i was stuck in a meeting yesterday so i couldn't get the presale tickets, unfortunately, but you betta believe i'll be doing the refreshrefresh boogie on saturday at 10am.

Baxter! Is that you? Bark twice if you're in Milwaukee!

guess who found the camera!
well the architect, technically, but still. same difference, right? there was huge drama in the house today - the architect was pissed off & the kid was partially to blame so there was door slamming and yelling and wall punching and it was not fun all over the place. i came and hid in the bedroom and tried my best to stay out of the way. they have similar tempers, those two. le sigh. i hate arguing.

we're off to san deeahhgo today. the weather is calling for it to be sunny and lovely and warm, which is well needed and much better than here where it is supposed to be raining and nasty and gross, though not that cold, apparently.

i shall be spending the next few days (while the architect works) sunning myself and shopping. i can think of worse ways to live.

off i go!

make a killing on the dancefloor

sometimes, on a monday morning, all you have to do to shake off your early morning blues is grab a timmy's coffee and shake your ass to a little mstrkrft.

it could have been, should have been

lessee what's in my mind this am.... the architect and i are going to san dee-ahhgo next week for a few days. he's got to do some site visits and put in some office time, and i need some days in the sun. i haven't checked the weather or anything yet, but as long as it isn't raining i'm going to be deeeelighted. i really have to see if i can find my camera. i will have two days to explore on my own so i need to take a bunch of pictures and post them here. i'm a bit reluctant, though, 'cause i've experienced that oh-so-common new relationship phenomenon of a few pounds gained. not that i'm an obese slob or anything - stuff's just starting to feel a bit snug. this worries me 'cause while i do enjoy the thought of a whole new wardrobe, i really do like my clothes.

plus its almost bikini season. must deal with this asap.

i'm feeling a bit better today - mentally & physically. i have mostly cleared my head of the haze and phlegm, and i had a really good chat with one of my coworkers yesterday. when i realized that he's pretty much in the same headspace i am, it really drove things home. sooooo i went out last night and got myself a book on resume writing, and one on how to pick a good career. at least it's a start, right?

ok off to work i go...

the same ol' decent lazy eye

i'm not sure if i am just burned out or if i have finally reached the end of my rope with my job. i've been here for 4.5 years and up until recently it used to be a joke (kind of) how things never changed, even though we always heard 'after we just do this one thing, everything will be different'. stuff's never different. you can move people to new positions that they have wanted for years but if you don't give them training to do their jobs and don't get anyone else to take over their old jobs, you are just keeping them in the same place with a new chair and a new title. it's like filling a faultline full of plaster - it might look like you've made a difference but two days later the crack's going to be open again.

here's something weird - i found myself thinking about boy australia all the way in to work this morning. does that ever happen to you? even though you are completely and utterly happy with your relationship, you find yourself caught up in nostalgia for someone else now and again?

ach this post is all over the place and i have no focus today. i'm frustrated with my job and myself. why am i incapable of just standing up and saying NO i will NOT take on these new responsibilities until you have someone else to take on my old ones? see the problem is that my colleagues here are just doing that, so if i don't keep on with my previous duties my poor boss (who's already overworked and trapped doing six other peoples' jobs) will just take them on and be stuck doing them, too. it's as though the management and my co-workers know this - know that i won't let her get into that position - so are counting on the fact that i'll just suck it up. i can't though - i just can't make myself care right now because everything that i've been promised has always been just so much lip service. the side effect of all of this is that i know feel as though i'm not capable of doing anything - i've lost faith in my abilities and have no real sense of what my skills are. my confidence levels are lost to inertia. i need some kind of career counselling, or something. i need to be exposed to an employer who is a good team leader, who supports their staff and offers training and encouragement. senior management here gives the impression that they are sitting back and waiting for you to screw up; waiting to be handed the excuse to lay you off. when they get it they do just that and, frankly, i'm not sure that wouldn't be a blessing at this point.

maybe that's why i am thinking about boy australia today - he packed everything up and moved to australia. he took his dream job and just... left. maybe subconsciously i'm trying to find inspiration in someone i knew only for a brief time because i have no mentor in my current life.

i'm leading man

first things first: kanye west has remixed fall out boy's arms race and it's r&b funny. i can hear the emo masses wailing in protest & throwing up their arms in teen angst misery all across the darkcloud nation.

secondly: on thursday night, wolfmother rocked my world, rolled me over, slapped me on the ass and rocked me again. seriously. i would have never belived that three people could fill a 75year old hockey cavern with a sound so full and rich - never. they did, though and it was incredible. the crowd, however, was a bit weird. they were all so... big, and i kept thinking of the rolling stones concert at altamont. there was this barely restrained sense of violence that kept me, the kiddo, the architect, and the sister grooving quietly to ourselves in the bleachers along the side of the stage. spanky, the fifth member of our party (taking the place of the sister's boyfriend, forevermore to be known as asstard) headed into the crowd. he accepted a joint from some folks around him and is half convinced it was full of pcp. he ended up getting collard by vancouver's finest (cough, cough ahem) and spending the night in jail. they took his shoes and refused to give them back before turning him out into the rain at 5am at the corner of main & cordova which, if you know vancouver, is not the best place to be regardless of footwear decisions.

thirdly: (and this is the second third time that i have written this because my beloved angus has caught wind that he is about to be replaced by Angus MacIntoy II - Son of Angus and is perturbed by this fact) the folks are coming for deener tomorrow night for the architect's family birthday dinner and i am going to make a vegan chocolate raspberry cake. he does not know this, but i figure that he probably won't even notice. plus, i'm going to make him roast beef in my slowcooker (it has to be in there for 22 hours), so if i'm cooking dead cow he can deal with vegan cake. so there. actually if the beef turns out (i figure that being in a slow cooker for 22 hours has to be a good thing - like melt in the mouth good) i may go pick up a buffalo roast and try the same thing during the week. i'm doing really well with this 'new recipe per week' resolution. i guess that the trick is finding something that isn't totally life changing, rather something that is within your interests and means to fulfill and you can stick to it fairly easily. plus i get to try out all sorts of new stuff on people, which is funfun.

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there's a hole in my bucket

in which case my bucket is actually my nose and what is running from that bucket is not water but something else. something much less pleasant than water, let me tell you.

last night my sinuses were so congested by the time i got home from work i popped a couple of tylenol multisymptom allergy pills at 6.30, was asleep by 7.10, woke up to drag myself to bed at 9, and didn't get up till this morning, at which point i still felt high.

yes high - not stoned or drugged up these things made me feel like i'd taken some e full of heroin. seriously. not sure that i enjoyed it. in fact, if i wasn't fairly well versed in various states of altered... er... states i probably would have been freaked out like nobody's business. thank god for illegal pharmaceuticals preparing you for the legal ones.

in other worlds, tomorrow is the architects birthday. i took the day off so that (assuming i feel better) i could take him on a bit of a day-trip type adventure. we are going to go across to bowen island and take the bikes for a spin around if it's nice enough or otherwise just poke around and have a bit of lunch. i think that's a fun day and he seems up for it. tame, yes, but we are going to wolfmother tomorrow night and out with a bunch of people on saturday so it all will come together nicely, i think. i still want to get him a bit of a giftie, but may head out at lunch to see what i can come up with.

there's a bat caught in my chest hair

so how much do monday mornings suck rocks? it's cold, rainy, i took my meds before i went to bed last night so my sleep sucked, the architect is padding about the warm house sporting sleepy eyes and comfy clothes and i'm here. at work. yay.
x`
so it's the architect's birthday on thursday. we're going to see wolfmother and (i think) to see kaskade over the weekend to celebrate, but i have no idea what to get him as a gift.

you see, he has *way* more disposable income than i do, so when he buys gifts he does things like ... oh for example... orders me a new macbook for valentine's day. (insert mad extremely excited giggling here). i, however, am on a major budget, so am not sure what i'll be doing. i know i'm making him a cake, but other than that..... dog only knows. a new hoody? i know he wants a sonicare toothbrush, but isn't that kind of practical gift boring, unromantic and... well... practical?

you gonna want me

crap what happened to yesterday's post?

oh wait, that's right, i didn't write it. heh. whoops slipsy. i got fun treats for valentines - fleurs, jewelry (wooden, not sparkly), kisses... i haven't had a *real* valentine in god knows how long. it was a neat little novelty, i must say.

the sister found out last night that her ex did, indeed, screw around while he was away this last time. she's raging furious and, i must say, i don't blame her - being stuck here waiting for someone while they are off having a great time and sleeping with other people is kind of like being kicked in the teeth.

i wish i could say that i am surprised, but honestly i'm not. at first when this all began, i really hoped it wasn't the case, but there have been a couple of things that have happened in the last week that have made me convinced. it's unfortunate, though, 'cause i did really like the guy. no i'm forced to roofie him, bind him with duct tape, drag him into the swamp and leave him for the gators. i'm going to need a dolly, though, 'cause otherwise i won't be able to move him at all. maybe if there were a few of us it'd be fine - volunteers?

no more subliminal shit

i am completely obsessed with mildly distracted by hitting 'refresh' on the police fanclub website just in case they release the presale passwords early....

happy v-d ... er, i mean...

that closet door in your bedroom leads to the gates of hell

fech i wish i could find my camera (she says, knowing that it's probably in one of the three boxes in her bedroom she's decided to ignore until it's time to move again). i feel as though le bloggity has become far too text heavy and is sorely lacking in hothot photographic goodness. my sincere apologies for that.

whatch y'all doing for valentine's day? i'm going to send the sister some flowers, i believe, since i can't imagine it will be a particularly festive corporate holiday for her.

nine to five living lies

i've had a stupid flu all weekend - i say stupid 'cause i feel like crap then i start feeling better so i rush rush rush out of the house to eck-scape the cabin fever and then feel like crap again. so today i'm home in bed and the architect has brought his computer upstairs and is drafting away, propped up against the blankets beside me. all in all not a bad situation.

i did get out of bed earlier to put stuff in the slowcooker, though, so i didn't have to worry about cooking dinner later. the sister is coming over, i think. her bf of 4 years split up with her on friday evening. nasty stuff - they own a condo together and he isn't really *from* here, so they have to get all of their affairs in order before he takes off to go back to scotland or back to sea or whatever. part of me feels bad for him 'cause he's quite broken up about it, but part of me deeply suspects that there has been some infidelity and a larger part of me wants to flambe his testes for making the sister unhappy. i'll attempt to supress that impulse. mind you, he did break up with her the week before valentine's and her birthday. hm. perhaps i'll keep the welding torch at the ready.

i'm a punkrocker yes i am

i totally have that iggy pop / teddybears song in my head. completely contagious. other music related ponderings - wtf is wendy's doing making blister in the sun the musical accompaniment to their baked potato commercial? yes i get it - baked in the sun, but come on now if people are freaking out 'cause prince went behind a screen at the superbowl and his guitar looked like a devil penis, how is it ok to use a song who's lyrics include 'and i'm so strung out... i'm high as a kite i just might stop to check you out' to sell potatoes with brocolli-cheese topping? (i'm a punkrocker yes i am...)

we are supposed to go to the juan maclean tomorrow night but i'm so veryvery tired today that the thought of it (even though it's a full 36hrs away) makes me cringe and want to put on my fuzzy jammies and read my book. le sigh.

ok off to work i go - they've locked the airconditioners so that a constant gale force of cold air blasts down on me all day. my poor little space heater is getting a workout, let me tell you...

i'm a walking disaster

update 1 - still allergic to beer (i assume, anyway. that's not an experience i'm willing to repeat anytime soon. i may attempt to have ONE on the weekend, just to see (and a different brand, for sure) but surely not four)
update 2 - architect is fine, and apologized for being moody. he's promised to try and talk about stuff before it becomes a giant THING. for my part, i'll... well i'll pretty much keep going on as i do but will keep a closer eye on the kiddo's housekeeping habits. thank you for all your words of support and advice. i'm not so good with this whole relationship thing. my last one (tnb aside - too casual for inclusion in this pondering) was a fucked up emotionally abusive trainwreck headed straight off the tracks into a burning pit of despair and demolition, and that ended over four years ago. it'll take me a while to feel my way around, i guess.

aside from this, i also make some kickass black bean chipotle turkey chile, for a white girl of irish descent. yum.

cast afloat

oh my god i've never been so happy to see the end of a weekend. like i was actually happy to leave the house this morning - not because i wanted to go to work, but because i just couldn't stand the thought of what might come next.

apparently i'm allergic to beer. i've been having some odd reactions to it, lately, and on friday night i drank 4 beer at the giants game, ended up staggering and slurring, puked the whole way home, and then every 20 min or so until 1pm the next day when i took gravol and went to sleep. good times.

sunday started out pleasantly enough, with shopping and brunch, but when we got home the kiddo had left dishes on the counter and the architect went off the hook about how the kiddo isn't expected to do anything 'round the house and how it's lazy and how he wasn't brought up that way and how he didn't understand how it was ok with me. this totally took me by surprise - the kiddo will do stuff if you ask him but he doesn't really go out of his way to help out any (he's a 17yr old. did you volunteer to clean at 17? yeah me either). i just really had no idea that it was an issue. the architect deals with stuff by suppressing it until it's too late and everything bubbles over. we argued until after midnight - it was awesome, let me tell you. i still don't know if we are good. we seemed to come to an impasse last night - i had spoken to the kiddo about it but that wasn't enough. there isn't really anything else i can do, save take over all of the cleaning on my own, but that isn't the answer either.

all of my doubts and insecurities have come flooding back. it seems to me that this sort of thing proves that i'm not cut out for happily ever after. i meet a great guy and i can't even keep that going - no matter what i do. i'm happily continuing on thinking that we have a good thing going when out of nowhere i'm blindsided by issues that i had no idea even existed. i don't know why i ever opened myself up like this. i should have stayed where i was - at least i knew where i stood.

ug.

i get by with a little help

ever have the desire to turn your friends' personal quirks into a drinking game? we used to do it with instructors all the time - i had one who discovered electronic music. every time he mentioned the crystal method or kraftwerk (or spoke german, for that matter) we all took a sip of whatever beverage we had in front of us. of course, the class was at 9am so it was usually coffee, but i will confess i did on occasion supplement the coffee with the baileys.

the architect and i want to do it with our little group of friends. for example, chlorina swears. lots. so every time she says fuck, you take a drink. her boyfriend says wow. lots. same deal. the architect has a bit of a stutter. when he stutters, you drink. me, i blush. i blush all the time, for reasons that you'd never expect. when i blush, everyone drinks.

now this game can, of course, be expanded depending on the group of people you are with. i'm excited about trying it out. it's a great way to laugh at yourself, and to break the ice when you are introducing new people to the group - you bring someone in, you let them know what their little quirk is, and everyone watches for it. fun!

anyhoo - give it a shot if you are out between now and saturday. let me know if it works.


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on the decks - in the mix by tiga & ajax