Author: Allegra

Born when atmospheric carbon was 316 PPM. Settled on MST country since 1997. Parent, grandparent.

Douglas squirrel

I got within a metre of one this morning.  They are so cute!

 

Slept at the new place last night. Keith was there as well. Man, the faucets in the bathroom squeak like a b*st*rd.  Other than that, and leaving my cell phone there, I had a good nights’ sleep; tonight, more packing.  The commute takes a little under an hour door to door – that includes the ten minute walk down from the SFU bus loop.  I’m thinking of packing my bed up if I can figure out how to get the mattresses there; I’ve already got some clothes and a toothbrush over there….I’m also working on how to do the commute without the Skytrain in the middle, given that it quits working from time to time.

There was a pile of pussy willow trimmings in the back yard – I absconded with some.

Watched 23.  Meh.

 

 

Geeking out

Honest to god, Kung Fu Mike wasn’t through the door at the new place an inch before he and Jeff were geeking out.  Mike and I hung around for a Few Days in September and a single beer, and then I got a lift home.  A pleasant evening hanging around and watching a movie and shooting the breeze.

Earlier Mike and I went to Kathmandu Cafe.  Small menu but everything we ate was delicious.

We got to the new place and Jeff had already set up the tvs. He described how he got everything moved – I was stunned because that stuff is super awkward when you’re by yourself.  Mike drooled so hard on the tv (and why not) and examined it closely for burnt out pixels. Then they geeked out some more (Jeff moved through part of a scenario in Assassin’s Creed.)  Happy sigh. All in all a thoroughly satisfying evening, and I even got enough sleep!!  No packing, of course….
Oh, and Gizmo ran away earlier and came back while Mike and I were visiting. Then he demanded to be let out again, and I told Jeff to let him.  (He showed up, guzzled some food, and demanded to be let out again…. welcome to having a teenager, I said.)

Denvention

ooooooh…. I am about to spend a lot of money to go to Denvention, but I simply must sing Lady of Komarr to Lois McMaster Bujold and expose more minds to the Tapioca Song.  I haven’t been to a Worldcon since Torcon II.  And I went with my mother and brother, how the hell lame is that?  But I did get to see Harlan Ellison and I got to see Asimov, too.

 

More later….

Bad singing lesson

Kopper and I are still recovering from another singing lesson involving the most dirge like arrangement of “Down by the Riverside” you could possibly imagine. If this goes on I’m gonna bail on the rest of the lessons. I love the teacher and she’s awesome, but her music picks are not “what the people can hum” all the time. On the plus side we did some improvisational group singing last night.

After, I went over to the new place ostensibly to help Jeff move televisions but he declared himself too bagged; at least Kopper got to meet him even if he was far from being in his best shape. After all he’s been moving and driving large trucks around for four straight days, so exhaustion was not untoward.

My packing has slowed to a crawl, but I have set the moving day for the 19th of this month. Hopefully I will be able to get ‘er done by then.

Confirmed sighting

Well, nobody can say the Luddite’s imaginary any more – as fictional a character as he appears to be sometimes, even to me, he has BEEN SEEN by Jeff, and proved to be substantial enough to help move a freezer and a rug.  My nefarious posse is proving of service…..

It is snowing very hard and very abruptly. It started spot on 6:45 and it looks like staying, gosh darn. Another night of glorious weather while trying to get to singing lessons.

Busy day

I HOPE I didn’t catch what Tammy had.  She was not exactly deathly ill while she was here, nor was she knocked much out of her usual cheerful demeanour, but man, she was sick, and I am really glad I could put her up where she’d get some TLC. I got the car around 9 and drove her to the airport.  We had an extremely long and involved conversation on the way out there – and Tom L. tried to run me off the road in HIS Prius, which was amusing after I stopped cursing at this bozo who couldn’t stay in his lane.
I dealt with the flat (total props to Joe at the Shell at Main and King Eddy) and then thought f*ck it, I’ll call ScaryClown and ask him what he’s up to, seeing as how he lives about ten blocks from where the tire got fixed.  He was sitting with Tyson and Luke, two buddies of his, in the Starbucks at Main and 14th, and then we had a late brekky at the breakfast joint on the south side of the intersection.  His buddies (whom I have heard MUCH about, mostly positive and somewhat in relation to alcohol consumption, life threatening illnesses and mischief making) were funny and sweet and entertaining and it was a remarkably successful lunch given I’d never met them before. ScaryClown had of course said much about ME, which gave me pause, but it must have been mostly positive because they seemed disposed to like me.

Got a call from Kopper saying that I need to do something political soon, and I agreed, smiling at the notion that given what an absurd bunch of clowns we have on council in Burnaby anyway, why not have a comedian run for office?  So I will be supporting same.  Updates as events warrant.

Then I paid the March rent for the new place, crossed the alley and tried my front door key for the first time, and in a burst of energy, unpacked the kitchen so that when Jeff gets there in about three hours there will be one room of the house (besides the bathroom) that isn’t a complete disaster.   Then I called him and gave him an update.

Sigh.  Unpacking is way more fun than packing. I have now reassessed how much room will be in the new place and I will be storing every stick of furniture I have except my bed and dresser.  I literally won’t have room for anything else.  Oh, and I must have been taking colour blindness pills when I looked at the kitchen.  The kitchen is red white and green. Yup, I have a red (REDDDDD!!!! RED RED RED counters) and white (trim and cupboards) and SLIME GREEN (remember slime green???) kitchen.  The slime green is going to get buried under eggshell white as soon as I have the paint, the energy and the buy in from brother dearest.

Tammy was all upset on my behalf that Jeff is getting the lion’s share of room for stuff, but I think we’ll both be reassessing things after we’re in, and his furniture’s way nicer than mine anyway.

I am SO excited.  My life is about to drastically improve, and I’m already thinking of ways I can improve the shining hour during my commute.

Sickness

Tammy is quite sick but well enough that I don’t have to feel guilty about ducking out long enough to help with the move.  I’m going to set her up with a bunch of food and drink and then take off.

At some point I’m going to ask her if she can give me the full on rational/emotional description of her HORRIFIC trip back from Palm Springs.  Honest to God, if I’d been on the flight with her I’d have clipped the air hag in the face and devil take the hindmost.

Waiting

Boy, it didn’t take long for my mood to change to something more sombre! I waited at the airport until 10 after 10, and Tammy phoned to say she was stuck in SF. She sounded like she’d been through the old wringer washer. The plane she was booked on ‘went mechanical’ as they say. On a whim I phoned Paul and found out he was almost done work and hadn’t brought the car, so I bought a magazine and sat in the parking lot and drove him home. I poked my head in to say hey to Keith – who just got 40 out of 40 on a practical test, how a mother’s heart sings – found out that somebody had phoned in a ‘creditable threat’ whatevah the hell that means to David Lam campus so he had no school today – and got home around midnight.

Tammy offered to pay for the CAN car booking, I couldn’t believe it. After what she’d been through my troubles seemed pretty minor.