Settler words&music in S'ólh Téméxw, (leanpub.com/upsun) living where privilege meets precarity in MST country. she/her/they———– Novels: Midnite Moving Co., Upsun; Sweep Off Those Waves coming soon, Hair Sinister after that. —Restore All Indigenous Lands!
Using fabric from mOm and fibrefill that I think also came from her I made two pillows today, one for the long suffering butts of Beacon (Christ those chairs are hard) and one for Mike for his birthday. Since he doesn’t read my blog, he don’t know nothing about it. The one for Beacon is a brilliant gold, black and peacock, and much more stuffed and smaller in dimensions, and the one for Mike is tiedye, mostly purple, and understuffed, it’s sort of a combo beach pillow and meditation cushion.
Paul’s second surgery went great; he skipped the Ativan and so experienced more discomfort and less jolliness than usual (n of 1.)
Actually did some editing yesterday while I was waiting for him.
Today I have his car while he waits to get the eyepatch off so I’m going to do a Major Garbage Run and get rid of as much trash that’s lying around the yard as I can in one go, plus putting down more dirt on the front beds and if I’m feeling really ambitious more weedwhacking in the front yard, which candidly looks like a playground for dirt bikers and chafer beetles.
Margot and Buster are getting along really well, it’s cute to watch them interact.
Still haven’t done anything about video from Tuesday, hope to get to it today.
Brekky out, lunch provided by Jeff and supper at Katie’s.
For whatever reason, Katie’s s/o didn’t join us for the meal, although he was there, watching TV very loudly, and then he left which makes the Mennonite part of my bones all sadface because sharing meals is the primate thing. However Young Sir was in fabulous shape although he refuses to call me GiGi anymore. I am now Zaza, and I told him most solemnly that he could call me anything as long as it’s consistent. He is using lots more words, just not consistently, which is making his mama somewhat anxious. He’ll be fine.
This time Katie booted us out; Alex was ready to party all night long but Young Sir needed a bath and a story and bed. Keith joked “So he’s going to Bed, Bath and Beyond,” which I found quite comical.
Fixed the bug curtain for the back curtain by the simple expedient of sewing pennies into the bottom; I found a use for pennies!
Brekky at IHOP, where I wish I had some of those atheist business cards lying around so I could circle Matt 6:5 for the dudes loudly thanking heavenly Father for their sodding breakfast. As well thank the woman who brought it to them, I wonder if they’ll leave a tract instead of a tip? Such behaviour is apparently tiresomely common across the US.
Dinner tonight at Katie’s.
The cacti are all set up in the kitchen window now. I cleaned the window ledge out before I went to the Island, and now it feels prescient since we actually had enough room for them all, just barely, in what is the only decent window for the purpose in the house (we may move some into the south facing window in the living room, but we have to ensure that the cats can’t knock them over first.
I knocked over my manuscript for book II. I’m thinking of saying fuck it, since none of the pages are in order any more, and editing it in random chunks. I tried to take some advice about editing this morning and just ended up feeling worse; it didn’t help and I can’t imagine who it would help who wasn’t already loco.
As expected I’m stiff as a fricking board this morning. I always hurt worse the second day.
The weather simply couldn’t have been improved upon. I was able to successfully navigate Mike through the Bridgeport to the Arthur Laing clusterfuck. JESUS GOD THIS TOWN HAS SO MANY FUCKED UP INTERSECTIONS I hate it, I really do.
There was a strong (strong!) onshore breeze when we got there around 11. Got back to Geekhaus around 5:30. (Had a shower the INSTANT I got home, the beach was marginally more disgusting than usual.) I managed the stairs at Wreck going down with a couple of stops and stopped at least half a dozen times coming back up, as I was messing around with heat exhaustion (sweating then clammy, sweating then clammy) and my knees kept saying YOU SUCK. I was fine once I got to the car. So glad I didn’t take Otto.
Cops busted two guys on the beach, and then left without putting them in cuffs. I think the bustees argued successfully that if the cops were okay with both of them falling in cuffs on the stairs they were okay with going up the stairs, and the cops hate filling out paperwork so bustees were going to report to the cop shop later. Or maybe not, it went on for the best part of an hour and really cast a pall on the beach since nobody could openly drink or smoke while they were there.
We got beers and a sammy. God, I am so happy Mike has that beach shelter, I’da fried without it. I did slather myself up with 50 sunblock and I am not burnt anywhere. My pubic symphisis doesn’t even hurt! what marvels are all these new sciences!
Today I’m fine, yay orthotics (I am finally convinced.) Tiny bit of pinching in my calves but I did all the stairsing at home to get the recycling and trash out and no problems. Margot was so concerned about me doing the trash instead of Jeff that she very patiently supervised me. Now she’s presenting her floofy tail and demanding skritches.
Buster is getting antsy. Where is Jeff!? and I want to know too. Apparently the ferries are jammed this morning, he’s due home later today.
I will be attempting the Wreck Beach stairs today in my new orthotics so that should be painfully interesting. Mike’ll be by in a few minutes.
I practiced for hours on the mandolin today ( I was awake super early and then went back to bed.) I hope Mike’s packing the parlour guitar, I’m likely to be too clumsy to carry Otto plus my other junk.
Margot is purring next to me. She tried to watch videos with Buster yesterday but I sneezed and she ran away (she’s terrified and disgusted by sneezes which is funny since she sneezes herself all the time, snuffly wet sneezes, usually directly into Jeff’s face or ear.) Buster just ran into the room and he and Margot are having little kisses and bum sniffings all ’round.
I wrote 1500 words yesterday on a new story called “Relevant Criteria” about a medtech who’s got PTSD and his mysterious new girlfriend which is set in the “Cousins Letter” universe. Wow, I must be really desperate to avoid editing.
Jeff’s off to the Island, so I have a couple of days to be even lazier than I’ve been in the last six weeks. I intend to catch up on some reading and practice mandolin and prod some edits out of myself.
Alex has made so much progress since the last time I saw him it’s quite remarkable. His mother recounts a story about him grizzling at her to try and get something out of her, since his ability to intuit when she needs 20 solid minutes to get supper happening is excellent. Finally she gave in and he teasingly signed thank you about fifty times; she’s willing take the teasing for him not having to be prompted first. Stuffing manners into kids is a tedious but ultimately rewarding task.
Alex played ON me. I am obviously not a threat to him any more, and he ran up and started using me as a roadway for a truck (gently, and with a little furrow in his brow.) He also flung himself on me once while I was indulging in floor play, flinging his amply pneumatic stomach onto my shins as I was lying down. He played nicely with the butterfly game on my phone.
And he called me GiGi, which is my name as grandma. More than once.
And then, proving that he is the biggest little clown in New Westminster, he brought me my shoes and umbrella, and I said to Katie, “He’s done with me! that’s my cue to leave,” so I did (it was nap time anyway.)
Ran into Kirsten at Deer Lake Park yesterday. Her sister has a three legged dog too, which is very kind of them both. Keith and Paul were accompanying me. We saw a coyote as we entered the park which makes all the people who ignored us because they were wearing headsets rather amusing in a sick way. Hey, we tried to tell them but they just wouldn’t listen.
After I got back I mowed the whatever it is that’s growing on the property. It is no longer grass in the front yard, and the mere act of turning the mower around created immense divots in what’s left of the turf. The back isn’t so bad but it doesn’t get so dry (we never water). The house is a tear down, so we’re never going to get new sod. C’est la vie.
I got the orthotics, and twice crossed the Pattullo Bridge, which is under construction and an amply proportioned clusterfuck at the best of times. WHILE I was trying to get across the mofo’ing bridge northbound, a guy leaned out of his truck and said in a heavy Arabic accent “I give you three thousand dollars cash right now for your car” and I casually explained that it wasn’t going to happen, and he started upping the bid, reaching five thousand, leading me to explain that it a) it wasna my car and b) it was not for sale for any price. Then the traffic shifted and I stopped having to deal with him. Wish I’d taken the camera, Jeff might have been entertained by the convo. Entertainingly, these convos always happen more in the summer.
Went and got beer and groceries and a few treats, and we ate store chicken, home made salad and corn on the cob for dinner.
Forgot to mention that we saw a grouse by the side of the road when we went up Mt Washington last week.
I will be adjusting to the orthotics by wearing them about two hours a day until I’m completely used to them. They feel pretty comfortable but I’ll know better how they are later.
Watched Eye in the Sky and Wave. Very much enjoyed both movies, but I liked Wave more since it is a classic style disaster movie, leaving no trope unturned, but effectively and non-cheesily played out.
I’m off to get orthotics this afternoon and then to an Aboriginal Day celebration really close to the house.
RAMSAY BOLTON IS DEAD. He’s fictional, but dayyam, took long enough.
Brekky this morning, for the first time in ages no coffee. Very glad to have quit, finally, it’s bad for me.
Wow… I had no idea that learning Arabic was so hemmed ’round with problems with vocabulary and intelligibility. I’m interested today because Beacon picked up the Syrian refugee family it’s sponsoring from the airport yesterday.
So I am happy to be home. In a few minutes I’m going to drive the rental car back. Mike took me out to supper last night and we watched a bunch of hijabi women play beach volleyball from the balcony at Brooklyns. This was after a bunch of Punjabi guys were playing beach volleyball on the other court.
Vancouver is a really cool place, y’all.
Mike is planning a party for his birthday next month.
I was richly fortunate in being able to give Nita a ride to the ferry from Courtenay and thus had face time that I would have had no chance for prior to her nuptials. She is one of the most wonderful and kind and intelligent people I know, and she cooked me Father’s day breakfast because I was playing gooseberry (Jan had left for work but I got up to hug her goodbye because she.is.awesome.
Breakfast as supplied by Nita (Jim helped, he can’t help himself) was home made refried black beans, mango salsa, chopped chives, gently warmed quinoa tortillas, crumbled goat cheese, perfectly ripe avocado slices and almost burned sunny side eggs, which I loved because every once in a while I really like chewy eggs. I ate every single scrap on my plate and felt like life couldn’t be improved on. Then I got her to her appointment in Nanaimo with a princely two minutes to spare, and we just barely missed the ferry but that just meant I had another two hours to talk with her, what a shame, hunh? She is so beautiful she’s almost scary.
Wrote another no-lyrics song at Mike’s last night. With a capo, can you credit it? He asked me “how do you do that?” and I said, “Well I’m using mandolin chord forms and messing about on the guitar, but even I was surprised how fast it came out – I hardly touch a guitar at all these days unless I’m at Mike’s.
I told somebody this weekend that I’m the world’s most cheerful depressed person, and then I started thinking about a comic to go with that, and wished I could draw.
Right now, however, I just feel cheerful.
This song was sung at Gerhard’s memorial service.
Heather dropped by Jim and Jan’s, and how lovely to see her! They talked and I listened about the nature conservancy efforts locally and how very political it can be.
Last night’s meal consisted of lamb sirloin, fresh steamed pea pods from the garden, fresh greens from the garden, homemade salad dressing, new potatoes boiled in their skins, a simply stunning home made mint sauce with mint from the garden, and all washed down with a growler of Gladstone IPA.
I want to curl up on the sofa like a rescue cat and NEVER LEAVE. But it’s okay, I’m coming back for another week in July. AFTER the wedding, obvs. Because I have to see the Morrison Headwaters for myself.
I’ll be seeing Mike and Nita today, yay, yay!
Also I’ll be nipping off to see Unca Garry and Ontie Diane for an hour before the funeral.
The Qatar story is a lie.
A VERY VERY FUNNY LIE.
A man has been arrested for entering Qatar with (and candidly, this is really hard to believe) in excess of 12 kilos of bacon packed in his ass. I’m not going to link to the site, but it shows a picture of the customs officials standing in front of the packaged bacon like it was a pile of seized cocaine. Also, it looks like 4 kilos of bacon to me, but what do I know.
He was selected for special inspection because he appeared ‘nervous and sweaty’. I am amazed he wasn’t ‘ruptured and lifeless’.
In other news the World Health Organization advises you to avoid any bacon which might make it onto the Qatari black market.
From the menu:
ATLAS BOUILLABAISSE
ling cod, mussels, Manila clams, oysters, prawns, crab & salmon in a lemon fennel tomato broth with toasted garlic focaccia bread
I have rarely eaten as fine a meal as Jim and Jan treated me to last night. The Atlas Café in Courtenay serves superlative food. Then we went and got growlers of Gladstone beer. I wish I could find work here!