Month: December 2007

Pure evil

Here’s my comment about this Best of Craigslist post.  Safe for work.  Please note I like animals, but I have always been of the opinion that I could eat a domestic animal I owned if I had to, and kill, clean, cook and serve it to somebody else even if I couldn’t stomach eating it myself.  My ancestors didn’t survive by being either squeamish or sentimental.

Vera Johnson and Philip Pullman and coworkers….

I had never heard of Vera Johnson before, but I’m currently listening to her thanks to the magic of the Internet and the CBC and the tipoff of a gent whose non-ad I responded to on craigslist. I think if I ever get fired…. I wanna run away and turn into Vera Johnson. Dr. Filk, in particular, I refer you to this link.

Listen to the end… there’s a Unitarian hymn….

Especially listen to the first bit if you want to hear the Minx from Pinsk. And a lovely song about censorship. And a funny song about the 1968 vagrancy laws in Vancouver.

Patricia, whose new hairstyle rises above, in all beautiful ways, the norms of sophistication of a company where the dress code regulations include the words, “Clothes…. please!” has announced that she will never deign to view the Golden Compass (which I intend to view with my son this evening at Metrotown). I would caution her that books and movies are actually two separate disciplines. Yes, the Pullman novels are masterpieces which will stand for the ages. Yes, it’s impossible to jam the sophistication and beautiful language into a two hour movie. Yes, they’ve drained the movie of any nasty references to the horrors of religion. But any fricking movie that has armoured bears in it I have to see!

Speaking of the dress code at the company which may not be named, it is entertaining in the extreme to think that it took six months for us to get Scary Clown to quit wearing tshirts with holes in them. I think my habit of sneaking up on him preparatory to giving him a neck rub and poking one of my fingers through the hole might have assisted in this regard.

I am very happy to report that I dined with Daughter Katie last night, who showed up with a pineapple in tow. The symbol of hospitality…

Deep Fried Mars Bar followup

This Friday at 3PM at the deleted Cafeteria a team building exercise of colossal proportions will occur.  We will challenge our digestions, our pancreatic capacities, and our ability to keep a straight face when our coworkers are covered in smears of grease and chocolate. 

Mmmm.  Chocolately grease. 

Will you eat yours with dignity, will you wolf it down, will you pause between bites?  Will you allow yourself to be filmed eating the world famed comestible?

Chris, our esteemed chef, has agreed to do it but he has not calculated costs yet.  Fifteen people confirmed their willingness to pony up…. Will you join the contingent?

From this day to the ending of the world, But we in it shall be remember’d; We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he to-day that eats his deep fried Mars Bar with me Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile, This day shall gentle his condition: And folks in Kitsilano now a-bed Shall think themselves accursed they were not here, And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks That ate with us upon Saint Crispin’s day!

With apologies to Will Shakespeare.  St Crispin’s day is actually October 25th, but who’s counting. 

Allegra

PS there’s only one deep fryer so no side of fries.

Stiff.sore.happy

So I did work out at Curves down the hill last night, combining it with a quick car booking, a brief and powerful shop, and a sojourn with Kopper.  Some of the machines extended the digitus impudicus at my back, but mostly I worked out and mostly I feel okay this morning. I took 6 methocarbamols yesterday, resulting in my almost complete silence at work… yay! but I think today I will get by on maybe three and maybe tomorrow none. I am maybe not as injured as I feared.
Tonight, Zombies.  Brrrrains.

Prospects for the week and further out

Tonight, off to a commercial gym for a workout with Kopper – a gym which is also located next to a Safeway so I will sneak in a small shop.  There’s a promotion on so I don’t have to pay for it, and as is obvious I find it murderously hard to exercise if it’s removed from a social context.  Tomorrow night, Zombie Night with Dances with Sheep.  The rest of this week I am keeping open with an eye to either having Kopper over for dinner or having Katie over, as she is actually wanting to spend time with me-someone fetch the smelling salts.

Much is happening which is unbloggable.  I’d blog about it and not give two hoots, but as the years drain away, tact forces itself on me much as age does, that and the occasional threats of a good bang in the nose or wretched social snubbing.   Fortunately I still have a functioning telephone.  I will confine my remarks to this tidbit.  Recently an attractive single man told me I’m too fat.  This hardly constitutes news, but it certainly helped chivvy my ample ass back to the gym
Daughter Katie has removed the first season of Deadwood from these environs, hoping to infect her father and brother… we shall see if the disease takes hold.

My back is somewhat improved but I am not looking forward to making it through a day of work without painkillers, as I cannot function on Robaxicet at work. Vitamin I (ibuprofen) makes me sleepy.  Opiates make me formicate.  Yes, that’s an m and not an n.

I have signed up for a singing course Monday nights starting in January.  I am probably going south with Tammy sometime in February or March.  And Jeff is moving to town!  All in all, I have lots of good things to look forward to!

Happy birthday nautilus3.  I hope your last radiation treatment is your last radiation treatment and that we don’t have to stick a fork in you to ensure you’re ‘done’ on that side.

Last night I dreamed about a magic building.  It was where Harry Potter and all of his buddies put their old school stuff in storage, and where rooms turned into elevators, and people changed appearance with abruptness but their voices stayed the same.  There was also REALLY bad wallpaper.  The funny thing is I’ve dreamed about this building before, but the building is magic, so it looked different the last time.  Does that make any sense?  Also last night I read the Tarot (Celtic Cross layout, as usual).

  1. The Lovers
  2. King Pentacles
  3. Moon
  4. 3 Pentacles
  5. Hanged Man
  6. Queen Pentacles
  7. Knight Swords (again!!)
  8. 4 Pentacles
  9. Hierophant
  10. Devil

I won’t get into a big long dissertation about it, but I thought it would be entertaining to put the first and last cards side by side, so you can get the ‘joke’ of the layout.  (My deck is capable of being very snarky, and very playful, and very, very direct).

6loversriderwaite.jpg15devilriderwaite.jpg

Notice any similarities between the two cards?  The layout is virtually identical. The Lovers represent the struggle between sacred and profane love.  The Devil represents both the ease with which we are ensnared by our passions, and the key to getting free (the chains are not tight… the two figures can ‘check out any time they like’ although one is tied to her physical addictions – the wine – and the other tied to the mental – the fire representing both anger and lust).  The two outcome cards are the Queen of Pentacles and the Devil.  La lutte continue.

Church this am

LOTS OF SINGING.  This is a goooood thing, especially around Christmas.  The vein of gossip at church this morning was solid gold, with hinted deposits of platinum and neodymium.  Let’s just say that if you hear me snickering with nothing in sight worth laughing at, it is because my thoughts, so recently dark and sad, have been transformed into joy, mirth and mild self-derision at my not having faith in my long term prospects for happiness.  I really do carry happiness, sanity, and the ability to assist others in their pursuit of happiness and sanity, around with me. If I am occasionally self-serving in this regard, it’s only because I wasn’t crazy to begin with.  As daughter Katie remarked, I am right more often than I am wrong, but I need more patience in waiting for results.
And I’m working on a new song… the chorus runs

Be wary

Be wary

Be wary of the fury of a patient man…

Peaceful

Apart from Daxus’ phone call to kid Katie yesterday morning, from which much heat and little light and me itching to slap him one, it was an extremely peaceful day.  We took a walk across campus in the early evening and inspected the statuary and the reflecting pond, covered with a skin of ice, and considering that we’d been closeted with Al Swearengen all day, we really needed the walk.

In about an hour I’ll head off to church.

Ow

I tripped and fell over a piece of furniture last night (thanks be daughter Katie was out of the room and did not, therefore, see my humiliating pirouette and crash) and now I am in a somewhat pained and feeble mood – and of course I injured myself in exactly the same part of my back as I hurt 2 years ago.  Grrrr.  However, Deadwood is keeping us occupied….  We are well into the second season.

Let’s all thank big pharma for Robaxicet, I have been sucking them back like candy.  On the basis of my mobility I estimate it will be about two weeks before I’m feeling back to normal, or what passes for normal these days.