Category: Friends

Gas leak

Man, the last 48 hours have been jammed with incident. I was supposed to go pick Kopper up at 6:10 last night but between me getting tied up with something at home and then having to get over to the other Can car and her working late, I was a full half hour late picking her up. Well and good, we’re prepared to get the evil eye from the instructor, and then we run into a roadblock on Lougheed Highway right after Kopper says, “The Skytrain’s not running,” and we’re redirected way the hell off the highway, and we’re contemplating what this might be about including, Gosh wow, an Olympic security exercise (only 750 days to go until we host the world, barfula gagula).

We turn on the radio to News 1130 (the flexible enema nozzle of capitalism in the GVRD) and pretty much simultaneously with the announcer saying something about a broken gas line WE SMELL GAS. We’re not talking about a little whiff. It’s pouring bloody rain and the wind’s blowing and WE CAN SMELL GAS. For, like, six long city blocks. I remember thinking “Well, at least I’m on the explosion side, I should mask Kopper from most of the shrapnel.” Then Kopper says the equivalent of “Sod this for a lark, I’m taking YOU to the Keg.” At that point we’d been stuck in redirect traffic along Broadway for a while and we were going to catch the last 15 minutes of the class.
So we went to the renovated Keg on Willingdon and we ate and my GOD what it’s like to hang around people who don’t require you to censor every single thought. I think Kopper feels much the same – we ate and talked and talked and talked and it was definitely therapeutic.

Good times, ow, solar science

Went dancing last night to the melodious strains of the Blue Meenies, a fabulous cover band of these parts, and they had Winter Ale on tap at the John B! Home by 12:30 thanks to one of my fellow revellers. Daughter Katie jammed, mentioning something about self-care. We had a small and lively crew there and it was lovely to see Mike and Heather.

This morning, of course, the piper has arrived with his hand out; I am interesting varieties of sore. Daughter Katie is showing up this afternoon, possibly maybe, for a meal and a visit, and then I’m off to the Luddite’s for dinner. I really wish I could crosspost his last email to me – it is a masterpiece of British humour. Reference to this video was made. NOTE: it is nothing you won’t see on TV these days, but that doesn’t mean you want your boss walking up behind you while you are thoughtfully educating yourself with its four and a half minutes of hardhitting content.

So after all this gimping about with climate change, and everything supposedly getting warmer, some bunch of solar science geeks are saying we’re heading into solar minimum and it’s going to get ass freezing cold around here. Well, why not!? It’s a planet, it’s a complex system, and I wish I hadn’t given away my ski pants. Here’s the consensus view of the timing of the event.

Here’s the International MSM take on the science.

Not so fast, said RealClimate in 2005.

Please note there’s a big difference between the solar minimum of the 11 year (actually 9 – 14 year) solar sunspot cycle and a Maunder Minimum, when there are virtually no sunspots for many decades. The last Maunder Minimum put Europe in the fridge for about 40 years. Or so some people believe…. the deep freeze can also be attributed to the stalling of the thermohaline current, which might or might not have something to do with the sun.  I am seeing the ‘problem with climate change’ as not being so much a problem with the planet as a problem with interpreting what’s going on around us.
The scientific problem (how do prove that we know what is happening by developing successful predictive models) is  aggravated by bumps in the research road.  Human beings a) live for about 80 years and we’re trying to see patterns that are godlike in duration and grandeur, b) see patterns where none may be, c) fail to see patterns because they’re too close to a problem and d) hold opinions and field arguments for reasons which may line up with their breeding rights and status rather than the facts in the case.

So is the earth getting warmer?  Well, yeah. Ice doesn’t melt without getting warmer, and 2007 was a f*cking catastrophe for glaciers and polar ice.  But in ten years of bad weather we could get every cubic inch of that ice back and then some; this winter was an interesting study for me in how very minor changes in weather patterns and temperatures can make immense differences in snowfall.  East Van got rain!  I got 1 foot of snow – twice!  (And had to clean it off the f*cking CAN car, both times, but I’m from Ontario and I am used to cleaning a foot of wet snow off cars.)

The debate goes on, but I have one plea for the boffins – please continue to work on food crop seeds which can deal with temperature and moisture extremes, because I suspect that will do more good for humanity than arguing about what kinds of spots the sun finds fashionable this year.

I am toasting almonds for biscotti.

The landpeer will be showing the apartment starting Monday, so I gotta tidy up.

Two dreadful nightmares and a commute

I guess I am having fever dreams or I’m working off the last bit of sleep dep. Now, when I say I had two dreadful nightmares, I don’t have nightmares like other people, who wake up filled with existential dread and needing medication to go back to sleep; nope, I just have bad dreams. The first one involved cleaning spots off my parents’ wall. Somehow one wall in their house, which is not the house they currently live in, got COVERED in two inch across wax splatters. Think “meditation circle gone horribly wrong” and that would about cover it. And not nice white paraffin wax splatters, either, multicoloured nasty Chinese candle wax splatters that left stains. Sigh. Continue reading Two dreadful nightmares and a commute

Everything’s up to date in Kansas City

Including these signs recently welcoming George W. Bush.

The 25th anniversary of the church establishment dinner was yummy fun; I didn’t get there early enough to do the percussion thing.  On one hand I feel lousy for not doing what I said, or checking when I was supposed to be there; on the other hand I think I was miserably underrehearsed.  Public performing less than two months after you purchase an instrument seems the height of hubris.

I’m in a very strange mood.  I’ve come to the realization that there is something I keep doing which is really hurting my mental health, and I’m just trying to figure out how I stop doing it without going crazier than I was to start out with.  I think I’ll pour myself another cup of coffee, have a piece of the 85% cocoa chocolate the Luddite insisted on leaving here (“Oh, don’t worry, I have plenty at home”) and contemplate my options.  With any luck, daughter Katie will be joining me this afternoon.  The urge to kidnap her and do an intervention is urgent, but I think I can manage without doing anything dumb.

One of my LJ buddies was at the church dinner last night.  I was thinking, Gosh, we finally get to talk IRL! and then her daughter threw up and they had to leave.  For this, she commented wryly, I stuffed them all into their nice clothes (or words to that effect).

My granny is still in a lot of pain, but they found painkillers that work.  I light a candle for her, and for the heroic amount of care she’s been getting from her two sons and daughtersinlaw. It makes me shudder to think what old age is like when we have no children, loved ones, or adoptive family to help us.

I light a candle for the folks who went to Nancy’s memorial service yesterday. I hope everybody stayed cheerful and full of happy memories.  The grinding hard work of sorting the estate out – I light a big phalanx of candles for that heavy chore.

I made biscotti.

Off to meditate on mental health now.

I have added Corey Mintz’ food blog to my blogroll

He’s a foodie in Toronto; he’s an amazing writer and I have a soft spot for him because he was just about the cutest 8 year old I ever met.  HE’s the one who came up with the line Jew on Jus action, so blame him, not me.  I hope he’ll review some of my favourite watering holes on my tab when next he’s in town.

Continue reading I have added Corey Mintz’ food blog to my blogroll

List of things to do

  1. Learn the Code Monkey dance
  2. Write down about sixty LJ user names and friend them
  3. Actually put together a proper filk book of the stuff I intend to ever sing again (I think this means an evening with Shaddyr, and soon)
  4. Think about the logistics of going to Jersey in June.  I mean, I have a passport and everything now, it’s not like I can’t travel Stateside.
  5. It’s two-thirty in the morning…. shouldn’t I be sleeping?  Nope, they are still filking in the main room.  I heard about chocolate in the consuite and after administering aid and comfort to the consuite hostess – Shaddyr – and hanging with some younger filkfemfen, I thought.  Hmmmm.  I have eaten all the chocolate, now I should go back downstairs and do the pillage and rapine thing in the main room.

 

More con stuff

I am having a simply lovely time, and had supper with LMB, Dr. Filk, and Tom and Peggy. Right now Skinny White Chick is playing.  They just finished the Alligator Song, which is beyond words amusing, and a tango to boot.

I’m going to check the schedule again and maybe nap for a bit before the open filk / bawdy songs room opens up…Earlier today I got to sing the Tapioca Song, accompanied by about 35 people, in the Songbook Filk.  Happy sigh.

 

Blogging at the Con

So, last night, Jeff Hitchin did not one, not two but THREE filks of the Tapioca Song. One was in Spanish, one in Japanese, and one was about Oxycontin. I surreptitiously took a picture of him while he was about it. Jeff is a fabulous performer and great raconteur; I am honoured above my worthiness.

All hail the Con Committee. They planned for 80 and there will easily be 120 attendees. Runnerwolf – whose idea the whole thing was, enthusiastically endorsed by everyone in earshot, including, as I recollect, me – was looking a bit glazed but really happy when I met up with her at the reg table yesterday.

Met up with Lady Miss Banjola and Dr. Filk with no difficulties AFTER I got into my shared room; Shaddyr (I will refer to her & Runnerwolf by LJ names as it ‘s easier) gave up her room passkey from last night so even though I hadn’t seen the principals I had a place to stash my stuff.

I did some of the driving down from Vancouver, but long about supper time I started getting visual disturbances (I still feel kinda wonky today, although that may have something to do with my lack of cafFiend) so Peggy did the driving from there.

Open Filking last night was great; I heard many filk classics old and new, and which included a madrigal zombie filk, Jonathan Coulton’s “Eat Your Brains” ably performed by Tony Fabris, the funniest parody of Danny Boy Ever…. and I debuted “You Try Being Buffy’s Mom” a capella as I have yet to write it down, although LMB has an MP3 of it up on her website (v raw, being recorded the day I wrote it).

Anyway, I’m being a jackass hogging one of the two public internet access points in the hotel, so I’d best fly. I’m here, I’m settled, and apart from once aGAIN failing to bring earplugs, I’m doing great. I’ll post pics later; I remembered to bring my USB cable and this computer has a USB port, can you believe it?

Katies here

Both of the Katies were here last night… Katie K was only too happy to collect a massage on my NEW MASSAGE TABLE and daughter Katie had to be talked into it. I made shrimp salad for dinner and then daughter Katie worked on my leftovers.   I think all the way around everybody slept better last night. I woke up at 7:40!!! Now I have to jet or I will be late for work.

I light a candle for my granny, who is poorly (not, I hasten to add, mortal poorly) and for my mOm, whose back is owie, and for people experiencing unexpected and unhappy making breakups.

Persepolis was wonderful, see it if you can, unless you hate movies with subtitles.

contradancing

Well, what a Vancouver Experience. First off, people I’ve paid money to see were dancing with me…. that was bizarre enough. Then I had somebody come up to me – actually two somebodies – & ask me if it was a nice break from singing funny songs. I’m famous, don’t you know (their word, not mine) for my appearances at Jericho. I had three men ask me to dance in rapid succession at one point, which was interesting. I danced with the Luddite two out of three times. I’m just not used to dancing that hard with no help from sweet sweet beer.
So I completed three dances and sat out two but my god by a little before 9:30 I was getting shooting pains down my right leg as my enthusiasm outstripped the capacity of my back to cope with the jiggling. (Rock and roll dancing is much easier on my back… and I got invited to go dancing at the Rage by the Chef next weekend TOO but alas I will be filking up a storm). Giblitz Fancy from Point Roberts was playing, and mighty fine playing it was, too. The Luddite, as promised, will be closing the place; it was very amusing watching him shed about six layers of clothing in rapid succession as he warmed up.
The dance is at the bottom of the hill so I was home jiggety jig, packed amongst young folk plotting exactly how drunk they plan to get tonight. Me, I’m going to curl up with Love, Actually, as I really like the actors. Has Chiwetel Ejiofor been in every frikkin movie in the last three years?

later….. it turns out the movie was very scratched and unplayable so I started on Man of the Year instead.

Big big big shout out to Mike

He picked up the massage table for me…. Me happy!!!!!!  Kopper gets to get pummelled/try it out first, unless somebody sweet talks me into letting them cut ahead in line.

Life is sweet and gorgeous.  I was SINGING TONIGHT.  The teacher (Ms. Taylor, and a sweet little gal she is, too) ACTUALLY TAUGHT ME TO BREATHE better than anybody else who has ever instructed me.  Either that or I actually have something like an attention span and some motivation for a change.  Kopper says she has no rhythm but she was the only one in our section who could bring the last part of this Brazilian Samba Round in on time.  Life is indeed sweet and gorgeous.

What is with the WIND?  It is like blowing a berloody gale up here and the wind is so biting it’s alive.

Outing

I must admit it’s strange to be dating somebody who has zero tea, coffee or alcohol in his house.  If I want to drink something it’s pretty much water, with fizz and without.  As always a date with the Luddite is an adventure in a variety of ways.  This date included two delicious meals and a snack, a poetry recitation (the dog grr el of Les Barker, the Brit Shel Silverstein), one full length movie (Mae West’s delirious She Done Him Wrong); a number of Youtube videos to do with the tramways of Lodz, Poland, including one that’s extremely funny, and others that make Lodz look like the ugliest, oldest and most dirty snow-covered portions of 1970’s Toronto; much in the way of music, mostly contradance bands including Seattle’s KGB (highly recommended) and the US band Notorious, which is so supremely awesome, I’m going to have to buy two copies of it because one is going to go to Dr. Filk, and also an entire best of Grieg album; and me tricking the Luddite into watching the first 20 minutes of the most recent Pride and Prejudice because I promised him it had English country dancing in it; and we almost watched a Joe E Brown movie but it was getting late.

At 1:38 this morning (when I was snoring, quite likely) Katie texted me with the cryptic “I am sacred for myself.”  (read, scared) which of course I didn’t pick up until 11 this morning when I promptly panicked, burst into tears and called Paul.  After about 90 minutes of agony I got hold of her live and calmed down.

Yesterday I spent an arseload of money at Metrotown, as I am SICK OF MY SHOES.  Do you hear me?  SICK OF THEM.  I don’t usually care, but I wanted comfortable flats so I bought two pairs.  Also I didn’t think I had any shoes suitable for contradancing, and I’m going (may Goddess give me strength) on Friday.

Now I’ve rented the Can car and I’m back home and I’m off to put stuff back in my fridge to go bad for Katie to clear out about the time I move out.  Later….