look ma, new tattoo

at four hours, i almost passed out. at five hours, i puked my guts out. at six hours, the outline was done and we decided to fill it in another time... sure is pretty, huh?

everything i know about the US i learned from the comedy network

in preparation for The Big Move, i've been doing some research on my soon-to-be-new hometown. i've found myself a vegan bakery / pizzaria, a list of the farmers' markets, and figured out which neighbourhoods i can see myself feeling at home in.

oh, and i've also been watching all the jon stewart i can get my hands on. that sort of informed political opinion should serve me well, no?

summertime, and the livin's sleazy

i'm on the countdown to my last day of work. you know, when i watched people give notice and then sort of mentally check out, i always thought 'why would you do that? it sort of screws over the people who are left!' and, of course, now that i'm like twelve days from the end i have almost entirely disappeared mentally.

it's not my fault, really, it's just that i've been swallowing some dissatisfaction with my current employment for quite some time (at least in the office). i've been pretty careful to not talk about it here, even, so i didn't risk getting douced, but i do believe i've alluded to it a few times.

anyhoo, it's almost done, i've got 11 days and 7 hours to go, and god help me it's not going to be over soon enough.

that said, two days in and i will be pining for my desk and my friends here at the office, but still. heh - not to mention my paycheque...

i guess one of the biggest things i've learned after the past 5 years is that i will never again kill myself for a company that doesn't make it worth my while either financially or personally...

le sigh.

uncharted waters

ok yeah i haven't been around much. sue me - it's summer. i'd rather spend my even-times lounging with the boozy balcony brigade (i.e. the sister and the architect) and a bottle or two of wine, than in here pecking away at angus jr.

check this - i gave notice yesterday.. i've worked at the lightbulb factory for 5 years. i've been through hell and back with this employer - bad boss, no direction, no communication, layoffs - but i've worked with some incredible people and i've made some really good friends. it scares me a little. ok more than a little but there it is. the architect and i are packing up and moving to san diego (tony? you hear me? i expect a wine and cheese reception and a socal culture primer. we're aiming for october 15.

i have a buh-jillion things i need to take care of between now and then, not the least of which is seeing the kiddo settled somewhere. he doesn't want to come with. him and the sister have plans to get a place somewhere in the city but they are both pretty laid back about organizing, and so i think that perhaps i should stick a bee under one or both of 'em.

scared like crazy, i am. i'm leaving everything behind, throwing caution to the wind, all those stereotypical altruisms. it's simultaneously terrifying and completely exciting. i won't be able to work, but i have a couple of under the table part time things lined up. i want to read, and write, and spend hours in the libraries at ucsd and do research and be smart again.

i don't regret my little sojourn into the business world, but i'm ready to get back to doing the kind of thing that makes me really excited again - i feel secure and confident in a way that i haven't in years. since i met crazyjeremy, anyway. i'm starting to feel stifled by my own lack of knowledge - i keep finding myself wishing i knew MORE about something again.

i love that.

so anyway, i imagine that there will be a few more weeks of sporadic writing, and then it'll just be the blog and me, and i'll get back into doing this all the time. i'll be wandering san diego with the laptop, a notebook, my camera, and a novel - seeing most of it for the very first time - and you guys get to come along for the ride.

why doncha kick yourself out

ok so

momentous occasion.

last week.

somebody turned 35.

it may (or may not) have been me.

your guess is as good as mine, let's not kid.

last night the sister referred to that person (the one who may or may not be me, and who may or may not be 35) as middle aged.

then, this morning, that person woke up at her alarm to discover that she was in the midst of some extremely fall weather, and that it was dark out.


that person who may or may not be me, and who may or may not be 35, may or may not be *extremely* depressed today.


le sigh.

i'm not aware of too many things

meet amy. she's come to be part of our family. ok she's kind of a homely puppy but dang it if she hasn't won my heart already. i'm looking forward to next week - the 'rents are away and the sister is at work so i think missy miss will be spending some time here with me, since i'm off work. i think i'll take her to the beach and let her play in the waves.

heh. i'm a little drunk. i've been like this for weeks now. i kinda like it. you know, i think the reason that people be come alky-holics isn't because of some deep-rooted need to find oblivion but rather 'cause it's kinda fun.

i'm addicted to internet radio, specifically left of centre. i've been listening to my old kentucky blog all evening and have found several new fun bands to download run out and purchase at full price so i am extremely happy.

conversational interlude which just happened:

the architect: "what are you clickityclacking at over there?"
me: "i might be blogging"
him: "hm. are you happy that i'm home?"
me: "let me thing. um.. we've had breakfast in bed, hung out at the beach getting drunk, have had 2 separate impromptu dinner parties, have fucked like crazy, and have napped all wrapped up around each other... mmm yeah i'm not sure."
him: "hehe. geek".

i love it when i see the party people get moving

ok so i'm two days away from leaving for shambhala and am starting to get a little panicky about it. i'm not sure why, but it's filling me with a certain amount of dread.
i have to:
a) sort out party vitamins
b) pack
c) figure out how i'm going to smuggle liquor in
d) organize something stylish to wear
e) get the house organized

now if form follows the fashion of our last 2 camping trips, the architect will end up working right up until the moment we leave and so i'll run around like a chicken with my head cut off trying to get it all done.

le sigh.

i'm not sure why i'm getting stressed out about this, but i am. maybe i'm just grumpy 'cause it's not sunny out, or maybe it's 'cause i'm on vacation and don't want to be responsible for doing anything that doesn't involve me relaxing and being selfish, or maybe it's 'cause we are really coming up to the point where i have to start thinking about moving a buh-jillion miles away from everything i know and am comfortable with and it's stressing me out. oh and i'm turning officially old next week.

boo boo dah boo boo boo

ok so generally my blog post titles are random lyrics from songs that have been floating around in my head or that i've heard recently. this morning,however, i haven't even gone so far as to turn on the radio. ergo, the only song i've heard is the ringtone from the architect's new blackjack.

though, now that i am thinking about it, i can hear the guy from interpol droning 'how are things on the west coast...'

how *are* things on the west coast, sundae? you may be asking yourself. well, let me tell you, they are fine fine fine. i've had a great weekend, so far - drinks with ben on friday night (he used to have a blog. i can't remember what it was called..); brunch with the toad and shopping at bosa on saturday, before the sister and her gentleman caller came over for bbq and drinks, and then the architect returned in th middle of the night, i made him breakfast in bed sunday, then we hit the beach and had people over again last night for salmon on the bbq before collapsing into bed, full and mildly drunk (ok that was me, not him).

i've got two weeks off and, besides a trip up to shambhala, my principal plans consist of lazing about, reading, and sunning myself.

preferably whilst drunk.

anyone who cares to board that particular raspberry freight train to liver-pickling contentedness, feel free to apply here.

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.