Year: 2005

Mt. St Helens with attendant lenticular cloud. Just in case you hadn’t understood before, I REALLY LIKE lenticular clouds. My mother will remember a remarkable trip along the escarpment, as we travelled from Toronto to London, during which we saw more lenticular clouds in one day than I have seen over the rest of my life, including one classic ‘cigar’ that looked like it was hanging from the sky, one classic ‘UFO’ INCLUDING porthole windows (we saw that one up on the escarpment proper), and some amazing ‘Japanese character’ clouds.

The Oracle of Omaha, Warren Buffett, is alleged to have remarked that the US dollar can continue to do nothing but slide if the trade deficit and budget deficit continues to look so godawful. Check out also copvcia.com today; the debt drag on the dollar is assisted by energy costs, which are not triggering inflation (yet…) but are slowing global demand.

Americans are supposed to be pleased that the low dollar will mean more tourists. I don’t think so. I think it would be foolish to think that more Europeans and Japanese will want to visit the US no matter how low the dollar sinks.

Pangolins are frequently used as models for aliens. Maybe you don’t think he’s cute, but I do.

We are now double tracking Buffy and B5; it’s rather eerie how Katie’s bust up with the non-louse non-boyfriend mirrors Buffy’s relationship with Angel.

The Blue Man show, which (I did not know this) is bankrolled by Clear Channel refuses to work with unions. This is causing fooferaw in Toronto, which ALSO had some union bs last night when the ramp rats (oh, exCUSE ME) the ground crew wildcatted. Toronto, doncha know, is where an enterprising (cept of course it WAS misuse of company property, public mischief and a damned funny event) employee cleaned the new and universally loathed time clock off the wall within hours of installation by creative use of forklift tines. So ANYWAY to get to the point, there has been labour unrest for a while in TO at AC and this particular wildcat was triggered by disciplinary action regarding clocking out early at the end of a shift. I’m not going to go into how I feel about all this except I think the people who wildcatted could have done something that didn’t involve stranding people in Winnipeg airport, tabernac. Anybody who wants more details can collar Paul the next time they see him; he’s having his moles in Toronto do a little digging.

Frank magazine is dead. I am heartbroken, but less than I would have been had they not had the good taste to go mammaries north at the end of my paid subscription.

I have to get off the computer now; Keith is yelling at me that he has to finish his meditation essay.

2019 sez JEESUZ WAS I CLASSIST AND AM I STILL

Okay, I admit it! This blog is for my mother. I don’t call her nearly enough, like maybe once a week, and this is how she finds out what’s going on with me. Since I designed this blog with her in mind, I don’t talk about work, because my mother prefers me employed; and I don’t talk about my sex life because I can hear her grit her teeth 70 k away, and besides she raised me not to brag. And Brother James would send me a scalding email about how he’s gone from ‘wondering about me’ to being actively sure I am completely nuts.

I write about what interests me and post pictures I think my mother will enjoy. More or less. She wasn’t too keen on the cheese grater toilet paper, but I kissed and made up by sending her a link to an interactive Irish pig. Sounds cute, doesn’t it? She liked it.

I’ve read that some people end up in trouble when their mothers read their blogs, but I think if you’re cruising glory holes, planning the overthrow of the government, giving trip reports for ketamine, dissing your employer, or outing your uncle for child abuse, your mother finding out is the least of your worries. The internet is not forever, but it will definitely be hangin’ around as long as the power grid holds up. I mean, look at me, I even stopped swearing on my blog. Got the kids to think about.

Katie insists that I take back my comment about the non bf being a louse. Tonstant mommie fwow up. (this is a Dorothy Parker reference. Read her biography, What fresh hell is this. And while you’re at it read the Mae West bio A Life in Black and White).

WELL 2019 SAYS HE IS A FUCKING LOUSE

I did it again. I wrote a thousand words or so, and it all disappeared when I hit some key or other. Highlights: Keith saying “I saw the Day After Tomorrow the day before yesterday” causing me to have hysterics. Katie still MSNing with Non Boyfriend, and me having no further comment. Telling Tish that eventually hubby should be taking 1 gram vitamin C, 1 multi B 100, 50 micrograms at least of selenium, zinc but not at the same time as the vitamin C. Enjoying that LJ called me.

Dreamed that I crawled into what I thought was the truck of a friend to sleep and when I woke up I didn’t recognize either of the people I’d spent the night with. Me being apologetic, and them placing some weird looking objects on the ground for me to pick up, which upon closer inspection resolved into five objects which it would be impolitic to more specifically describe. I remember being really startled about that. I mean, it would have been impolite to refuse, but it was really inconvenient to accept, because the second I picked them up, I started getting chased around by the youth group, who were trying to get me to drop them. Ineffectual attempts to hide them. Finally they chased me onto the roof of a really elderly building and I dropped one and they ran off with it.

Weird.

I know animal abuse is never funny, but like most bad haircuts, this grew back. The cat’s expression sums it up.

Paul still has a job. He went in last night and checked the seniority lists and he squeaked through.

Katie’s complete and utter louse of a non-boyfriend dumped her via email last night. Katie is still siding with him, OF COURSE; claims that he is CONFUSED. Okay, he’s a CONFUSED complete and utter louse. I’d go into more details but candour at this point will just get me widdle skull staved in.

Here he is, recovered and contemplating a job change.

 

23 year old Patrick Lawler walked around with this in his head for six days. The neurosurgeon said, you know, this is the second one we’ve seen like this, where a guy whacks himself with a nail gun and doesn’t realize he’s millimetres from death. Anyway, he is making a complete recovery. His symptoms included toothache and blurry vision.

Mr. Lawler, who works in construction, opines that he’ll stick to hammers in future. I looked at the skull xray and just shook my head.

Janna, Morgan and Sam slept over again last night. At 4:20 am I got up and told them to knock it off, then I got up a half hour later and read the riot act again.

Keith’s winter training is happening in 3.5 hours. Seeing as how it’s literally the coldest day so far this year (house ambient dropped to 59 F overnight) and the wind is blowing, Paul is accompanying him so he has a warm car to retreat to in the event he can’t handle the cold or the promised on site hot showers fail to materialize. I imagine the turnout will be extremely thin this year; it’s so cold little kids would get hypothermia.

Hate to think what the house would have been like overnight before Dave and Paul insulated the roof. As it was it was pretty nippy in the biffy, if you know what I mean.

Paul’s making pancakes, Katie has an eye appointment (she’s claiming that her perfect vision isn’t, anymore).

Keith applied at Anime Jyanai; we’ll see if employment awaits.

Have no idee whether Paul was laid off effective the end of this month. There is, of course, a plan if he’s not working in Vancouver any more but he won’t know what is going on until he goes into work for midnights on Sunday. I only heard about it at lunch yesterday so I thought I’d give Paul a call, and believe me it was a rude shock to us both. One hundred and thirty people in maintenance were laid off just in Vancouver. You’ll not blame me if I’m feeling a little sick today; it’s just so tedious, being an adult and having to deal with this stuff without screaming or jabbering.

Keith is watching Last Exile, which I find disorienting and silly. Although it is visually stunning about 30 seconds in 1000. I’m picking up some Japanese, which is part of why Keith watches anime, of course.

Must go crash. Very low energy class tonight, so David got us all up and ‘working the crowd’. It didn’t help that some tone deaf duckwit was in the club underneath the office; I’ve never been in a situation when ersatz marimbae were so freaking loud that they raised dust and vibrated the fillings in my teeth.

More later.

Stuff like this makes me want to cry from happiness.

Quoted from the NASA/Cassini/Huygens site.

This is one of the first raw images returned by the European Space Agency’s Huygens probe during its successful descent to Titan. It was taken from an altitude of 16.2 kilometers (about 10 miles) with a resolution of approximately 40 meters (about 131 feet) per pixel. It apparently shows short, stubby drainage channels leading to a shoreline.

I am thrilled to report that the probe landed successfully on Titan, and that the data have started to come in. I will post what pix I can when they become available.

In the meantime, visit Eurekalert.org for some extremely cool pix of prehistoric rock carvings in Northumberland. I have wanted to get a tattoo similar to the cup and ring / and / or spiral patterns shown here for many many years. I never do because the guy I sleep with gets snarly at the idee of my messing up my pink and white corpus with nasty blotchy ink. However, I am announcing publicly that if my weight ever dips below 155 pounds again, I’m gettin’ a tat to reward myself. Maybe two or three. I still want a black rose (anarchy symbol) and a great blue heron (my totem animal) <—- 2019 called and it wants its racism expunged thank you and a scorpion (my astro symbol). I’ve lost three pounds since New Years. Many thanks to my mother for getting me off my ass about dieting again.

Brother James sold me a phone. He told that wasn’t why he was calling, but that boy was born to sell things….and I’ve been wanting a cell phone for ages, since Katie permaborrowed mine. I kin hardly wait til it arrives!!!

Brother Jerome is an uncle – he has a nephew. He sent me a pic, but I’m not posting anything until the healthy mite (8 lbs 2 oz) has a name.

 

 

I’m very happy, and I needn’t go into why. My peeps are all here. Didn’t do my homework. Sigh. Didn’t get my hat back from Mike’s, either, though I don’t need an excuse to go over there.

John sez the post offices in both Italy and Israel suck, and the Saudi post office is much more efficient. Paul finished his day four and is relaxing in a chair. For once his day four was showing a little slack.

Katie says SHE didn’t get enough sleep. Janna and her bf Morgan slept over. Then Katie didn’t go to school because A) she didn’t sleep enough cause she was up to all hours, beeg surpize b) her bed freaking collapsed in the middle of the night, which you’ll have to admit is inconsistent with restful sleep (and I woke up with the muffled thud and then listened to the bed slats get stuck back down therlumpa therlump therlumpa therlumpa therlumpa and then the sound stopped and I heard subdued cursing which I thought at the time was Katie and turned out to be Janna, and then the therlumping started again) and c) she actually was sick and slept most of the day.

Because I am a complete suckyfaced moron, (Look! A Suckyfaced Moron! Mind you they don’t look as good out of their breeding plumage) I dodged into the Sears Outlet and dowsed for children’s clothing. It took longer to check out, guh witness, than it did to select one pair of pants which fit Keith perfectly and of which he approved, and a blue blouse and Buffyesque black pullover pimped out with lacing and black ribbon for Katie, who yoinked the black top out of my hand with a laugh when I said that if she didn’t like it, I’d take it. As freaking if. Dang! And it would look good on me too, ‘most as good as the camo stretch pants which she is either wearing or washing these days. There’s no point me trying to dress young. If it isn’t effective Katie won’t touch it and if it is she yoinks it. As it is my children are happy with me.

Then three episodes (may I be struck with Jovian lightning) of B5 (2nd season). I think the guy who plays Londo should be strung from something, and the special effects bring into play the astonishing French advertising loan word “Fromidable!” which gives you that chemical, chimerical, cheesy tang. When John and I see something really big and really cheesy, we sometimes tandem bellow “C’est frrrrrrromidable!” The Fromidable is actually on the French speaking label of the generic form of that wizarding spreadable cheese I don’t want to mention by name.

My heart is full of the love of my coworkers. They are all wonderful people. There’s nothing fromidable about them.

Crap! Doesn’t this bleeding phone ever stop ringing! As Dorothy Parker (may her soul find an ashtray soon) frequently remarked, “What fresh hell is this!?”

Not much to report. Have to write down my five new bits. Too bad they aren’t funny!

A friend of Elly’s and his wife went to Thailand a few months ago and they haven’t been heard from since Christmas.

I was really sad to hear about that because her description of him made him sound really cool, and she saw him just before they left. We must love one another or die.

Have to mention that the last time I went to Mike’s, Tori pulled out a work of art that she had to do for school. Normally I don’t think of school work as art, but this was one of the strangest and most beautiful things I’ve ever seen, and I found myself asking the question of the Ultimate Philistine – how much money would it take to part you from this, because it is without a doubt one of the most lovely things I’ve ever seen. It’s done in the style of Edward Gorey, on transparent paper, mostly in black ink but with occasional splashes of colour. Mom, if you saw it, you’d be asking the same question. It’s just amazing. Because the paper is transparent, you can see through about 4 layers of art, and each page is designed in such a fashion that it tells a story, with foreshadowing. People who can think visually just thrill me, because normally I only think in words.

I work on my spatial from time to time and I’ve gotten much better at estimating what will fit where (useful in cooking and containerizing groceries) but I watch Paul pack a truck and just want to curl up into a fetal ball.

Writing class was cancelled last night. I wrote a passionate two page essay on why my heart has a rock tied to it, and then of course couldn’t read it to anybody. On the upside, I heard the new King Cobb Steelie album see pic and MUST HAVE IT; it would be the ultimate background music for my style of writing. One of the guys from Oysterhead has a new album out and it’s pretty good too, although I don’t think I’ll buy it. And I dickered with a bartender for a price reduction on my beer and he gave it to me. Weather going downtown on the bus just sucked, we were twenty minutes getting down Burnaby Mountain.