Month: August 2007

Ferries break down.

I think it’s wonderful that BC Ferries decided to take the Queen of Alberni out of service on the third busiest long weekend of the year.  I mean, it was wonderful that I wasn’t there in the line up.

Also, I think it’s wonderful that the rain held off until this morning.  That hardly ever happens, especially on a long weekend.

I am working on Tom’s resume.  Man, you’ve done a LOT of WORK in your life.  Just doing the functional summary is breaking my brain.

Holy crap…..

This stuff fell out of the sky and trashed chunks of Ft. Macmurray towards the end of July this year.  Cousin Gerald forwarded a lot of pics – all I can say is that the insurance adjusters must have been working like hens with two rear ends after this storm.  SO many busted windows and trashed cars.

ftmacmurrayhail.jpg

More on Pride

Met up with Al Sather, the minister’s husband, on Robson, more or less by accident, after Patricia said farewell (she went to the beach to do yoga, healthy chica that she is). We sat in the wrong spot for a while and then joined with the rest of the U*U’s. Peggy and I and some other woman – me and my distinctly dopey inability to get names at appropriate junctures – carried the Beacon banner. Then the Parade was so late getting going that Al had to jam to go pick up Katie Sather from the airport, as she was returning from being with her father at the close of his life. I light a candle for Katie and her family.

There was a large, active and CELEBRATORY bunch of U*U youth there, who kept up the energy level in the mindblowing heat. Fortunately the breeze kept up for most of the parade. Katie K, who went through at float 28 (we were back at 128) was done by one, but I didn’t get to sit down and relieve me feet (among other portions of my anatomy) until 2:52. Continue reading More on Pride

Personal remarks is rude

Okay, yesterday was a day crowded with life and incident.  Woke up around six and reheated naan and chanar bhatur (sp?) for brekky, with mint tea.  Jeff dozed while I went downstairs and did a very scant and not very repetitive 20 minute workout…. okay, of all the movies, in all the world, on all of IMDB, which movie is on TV when I come downstairs?  A Monty Python movie, and I walk in in the last minute of the Parrot Sketch, which segues into the Lumberjack Song.

Good morning, Burnaby!!! 

While I’m in the weight room, this Asian dude in his early twenties, dressed a la Jackie Chan (ie, no shirt) and holding a clear plastic container that you could tote two or three dead babies in (just to give you some idea of the volume) comes in, fires money into the drink machine, removes a soda at speed, and departs like vapour under a door.

At this point, the day signs are all REALLY pointing to a truly spectacular day.  It was not until 24 hours after this moment that I discovered that I had not, indeed, packed underthings.  Time is no more linear than memory is.

Ahem.  Anyway, working backwards from this moment, I watched Coronation Street, drank coffee, took a shower, woke up, dreamed all night about somebody (Patricia knows who, and is laughing at me), crashed at Patricia’s, came back to Patricia’s from Leanne’s place, watched fireworks, ate Greek, shot the breeze, hung out at Lexi’s (and got just enough into a Colette bio to get my mouth all ready for more – who could resist something called Secrets of the Flesh by Judith Thurman).

Prior to that I spent a glorious afternoon with Katie K and got sunburnt.  Prior to that I went to an NDP fundraiser at which Jack Layton spoke.  It was the 12th annual NDP Pride Brunch.

Now, whatever your private opinion of Jack Layton, here is one simple truth that will not go away.  He was one of the first Canadian politicians of any stripe who stood with gay people.  Like, marched in Pride Day, voted in favour of it at City Council meetings in Toronto, took the time as a young politician to hear what it was like to be a gay man in Canada in the sixties and seventies and on hearing the story thought, “This sucks, and I’m going to DO something about it.”  When he gets up and starts reminiscing about ‘my first Pride’ he’s got 25 or so years of Pride to be proud about. 

Moved by the mindless obedience which characterizes so much of my behaviour, I bid on something – a night in a hotel, and won.  Zoing…. Now my brain leaps forward, into the fireworks, which, apart from Michael jeezly Bolton music (Patricia’s disgust was subtle but effective) were truly, deeply wonderful.

To return to something like conventional chronology, after our brief repast and some messing around on the intertnests, Jeff drove me to the hotel where the NDP function was, which, strangely enough, was four blocks from Lexi’s place.  Among other speeches there was a list of four recent queer rights issues raised in countries overseas – Bolivia, Poland, South Africa and India.  I was particularly impressed by the references to trans issues because there are definitely ongoing legal and humanitarian issues about transgender and transsexual rights, globally.

But holy cats, imagine marching in the first Polish Pride Day!  Ten t’ousand marchers and seven bleeding thousand cops, militia and regular army to stop you from getting your faces stomped in!?  I’m marching in Pride this morning and the only gun that will get pulled on me is a super soaker.  One of the organizers of the first Polish Pride will be a grand marshal of this year’s Pride Parade.  I’m sure it will make a nice change from what he went through in Poland.

As you may ascertain from the foregoing, it was a busy day.  I only drank three beers all day, I stayed close to a bathroom, I didn’t lose my blanky, and all was well.