Category: Vancouver

Plotting n planning

April 18th, so I learn, will be the date for the Willie P Memorial concert in Victoria.  I will consult with the folks and assemble a tune or two… more details as they firm up.  I am thinking about taking the day off.
This weekend a SPIT.  It’s been bally ages since we did that, and we’re meeting up Saturday in a bookstore, so all is good and beautiful.  Then church again on Sunday to set up chairs.  I will be faster this time as I know the drill.  It’s not particularly onerous, but I did feel it on Monday when I woke up; given that my set up partner is well old enough to be my dad further complaining shall be nixed.

This evening, if the fates are kind and the winds propitious, the Luddite will turn up for supper.  I’m thinking home made tortillas. Which reminds me, I should back away slowly from the computer and do some prep so I don’t have to when I get home.

I’m finding the commute okay.  I’m also thinking of finding alternate routes to shake things up a bit, like walking over to Rupert and taking the bus down to that station, to see if maybe I can’t work a little more exercise into the morning routine at least on mornings when it isn’t pouring rain.  The commute is improved by having an MP3 player.  Current set list is a bit eclectic… it’s everything from me singing Lifeline – (I usually skip over it, because as much as I love PD Wohl’s tasty backing I’m not liking my singing) to Verve’s Bittersweet Symphony, the Who’s Won’t Get Fooled Again, John Hiatt’s Walk On, Aretha Franklin’s Chain of Fools… eclectic, yup.  Oh, and the Bastard Fairies We’re All Going to Hell; it’s impossible to sit on the train and listen to that and not smirk.

Further plotting includes maybe taking a songwriting class with the aforementioned PD Wohl; considering maybe taking a course at BCIT now I’m ten minutes away by bus; and figuring out which of Vancouver’s cultural events of the month of April Jeff and I might want to take in.  Also, planning dinner for Friday, the first inaugural fall down.  Honestly, I’m thinking takeout.  Hopefully this large blank where my cooking thoughts usually get scrawled will fill in between now and then.
I can more or less see the floor in my room.

We appear to have blown a fuse in the kitchen.  Sigh.

Jeff, saintly geek that he is, has run his hands over Suzanne’s laptop and restored it to health. (Don’t anybody else get any funny ideas).  Suzanne and Katie dropped by yesterday to collect it with thanks.  Katie got her stipend for helping me move and get my deposit back which was awesomely swift – I hadn’t expected to see it until mid month, but Ray at Cornerstone is the best of landpeers, and he does what he says.

The landpeers here have not responded to Jeff’s polite enquiries about which of the minor irritants he can attack next, which means that he’s going to ignore their ignoring him, and I’ll have my doors fixed shortly.

Somehow I ended up with an autographed Groo in my belongings.  Happy sigh.  I love Groo.

Yet more Deadwood last night after supper, which was spaghetti.

Time to chop veg.

Finally, some packing.

I’ve managed to do some packing and I’m very happy about that.  I also dejunked a whole bunch of clothes including and through out a lot of the standard issue kitchen debris, and Jeff brought a whole bunch more boxes, so the packing will continue apace.  I’m going to sleep in town tonight and take the bus in to work tomorrow morning…. Oooo which reminds me, I should take something out to thaw!

More later….

FINALLY SOME CLOSURE

I have been waiting for months for ‘a conversation’ with somebody so I can get over a really interesting and intense part of my life.  I had that conversation last night, and I am so relieved, I can’t believe it.  I even predicted to someone in the phone conversation immediately prior that it would be happening soon – ha!  I should hire myself out as a sibyl. (Thanks Kopper…) 

Now I can pack! I had been resisting packing, and now I can pack.  And I’m picking my bike up tonight.  I’ve decided I’m riding it back to East Van, which may be six kinds o’ insanity with a side of fries, but I don’t care.

I went home sick with a migraine yesterday and I’m still feeling a little queasy and a little ‘odd’ – almost but not quite dissociative – but frankly the emotional lightness I feel right now is making up for all of it.

Pork uteri

Normally I would not juxtapose those two words, but now that I’m living in East Van, I have to tell you that they are for sale, very reasonably priced, walking distance from my house.  They look about as appetizing as they sound.  I’m going to try to find a recipe for them…. okay, now I feel really sorry for myself.  They go into pork sausage.  As a certain buddy of mine is forever saying, eyes wide and bright, “Good to know”.  I suppose if I told you Pork Bung is for sale too, you’d believe me?  I bet I know where that goes.  It’s probably stuffed and steamed and turned into a delicacy of some description or other.
As you may be able to determine from the foregoing, I have now completed the shop.  Everything Jeff put on the list has been purchased, and a couple of other things too.  Now for a bit of kip until the Luddite shows up.

Clichés so totally rock my world

I was horrified to read a list of clichés on gawker… and I’ve used almost every one.

I will try to “use my words” in future.  If I do any LOLcats stuff I’ll put in my Livejournal, how’s that?  And perhaps I will be more judicious in my use of italics.

I draw the line at my ‘Inertnests’ neologizm going away, though.  I thought it was a nice play on words, all those people in their little inert nests, smashing the stumble button, playing around with reddit, watching Noam Chomsky interviews on youtube….

Today I will do a bundle buggy shop.  I want to see how hard it is to shop locally…..

Oh my god.  I went to the Chinese greasy spoon at the corner of 22nd and Rupert yesterday am.  I ordered scrambled eggs and sausage and got scrambled eggs and fried wieners.  While I was contemplating this horkworthy attempt at breakfast, a trembling, staggering cockroach meandered down the far wall next to the kitchen.

I dropped by Planet Bachelor where the boys had a full house – Jessica W and Katie were there for brekky.  Christ, I should have gone there first.  I hung around long enough to suck back some coffee and pick up some more tax return stuff and then went home, where I stared at the walls and did zero packing for about six hours.  To intersperse with staring at the walls I re-read Curse of Chalion and read Oryx and Crake, which is like holy crap, how many dystopian novels does the world actually require?
Then I came back here on the bus… which only runs every half hour after supper on weekends.  Gizmo and Eddie are starting to get used to me and they are certainly handsome cats.  Eddie will walk right up to you and give you a shove when he’s hungry, with his paw.  It was quite funny.  Both of the cats snore; Giz is wheezing quietly right now.

I’m contemplating the pile of remotes and wondering if I dare try to turn something on.  I need coffee.

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.)

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.

New place

Look what we are going to beclose to.

Renfrew Pool (which has NUDE SWIMS) is .75 miles away, on 22nd.

There are FIFTEEN restaurants within half a mile.

There are EIGHT grocery stores, including a 7/11, within half a mile.

The nearest government liquor store is less than a mile away.

The nearest drugstore is less than a mile away.

The nearest fish market is less than half a mile away.

The nearest bakery is less than half a mile away.

The nearest meat store (halal, even) is less than a mile away.

The nearest Superstore is less than a mile away.

Closest dentist, less than half a mile.

Nearest doctor and medical lab, less than a mile away.

Tom’s Video is exactly a mile away.  There’s a lot of stuff in there you would probably never want to rent (mucho anime and bad kung fu movies) but there is a HUGE selection.

Happy Bats video is less than four miles away. 

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

Success – we hope

Looks like the place we looked at on Monday night is a go.  I will be forwarding my credit info to the landpeers shortly.  The place is a three bedroom upper floor of a house in East Van bordering on Burnaby.  It’s definitely ‘centrally located’. 

Yes…. we could be looking at lots of places for a lot longer, but frankly we both saw it, we both liked it, and the place is quiet and well kept.  Let’s see if this bears fruit or we have to keep looking.