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!
She ends up finding her former owner, getting all her limbs ripped up/off, and becoming a talking head queen of the rats when her severed head is thrown into a tip.
Yeah, not a happy story. Much body horror and interpersonal rejection.
Unbelievably hot yesterday. Worse today. I have to go to the dentist and I just don’t know how I’m supposed to walk over there when it will be 40 degrees C on the way back. I’m scared, I literally think I’ll collapse if I have to walk in that heat.
when that happens all I want to do is whine.
Whining is not attractive. Ranting is more attractive. Roar roar, let’s follow this fool off whatever rhetorical cliff is attached like an Ambrus sketch to the following: alas! alas! she said (picture a small porcelain doll, animated in dim natural light from two directions, flailing on a rag rug in a child’s bedroom) this means that I must come up with a topic! (montage of said porcelain doll, set to martial music, outlining something vague with a wavering stick on what appears to be the world’s smallest square sticky note, climbing up an expressionless and motionless one eyed teddy bear to deliver a rousing speech to the rest of the completely unresponsive toys, tossing a sticky-hand over to the door knob from the highest height close to the door that she can climb, with a book tied to her leg – the music shifts from martial to moody — you hear a terrifying rip and the door has sprung open, but the porcelain doll has paid a terrible price and -music shifts to glass harmonica horror with processed bowed bass and stays like that for the duration- now she walks a-kilter like a zombie, even though she is not a zombie, and man, it does not do a damned thing for her and she was pretty scuffed up when she started and you’ve only seen her from behind since she made it through the door but now the POV swings round to the front and you realize she isn’t porcelain she’s some kind of icky bakelite in white people’s skin tone beige and her nose has chipped off from her fall from opening the door) for the life of me I can’t think of a topic.
What could be finer as a backdrop for a wholesome family animated film.
The movie is called Luca, and I think I know a mOm and a pOp who would very much enjoy it. Everything about it harkens back to a simpler and less jam packed life. That’s a good thing, in my view. A less fraught life would be so lovely.
oh FSM, Parking Goddess, anydeity on this frequency, aid me now and for all time to come https://newwestrecord.ca/local-news/opinion-someone-is-finally-trying-to-fix-this-gong-show-burnaby-new-west-intersection-3904159 YOU HAVE TO UNDERSTAND HOW BAD THIS INTERSECTION IS
Opinion: Someone is finally trying to fix this gong show Burnaby-New West intersection
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1/ within the first 90 seconds of my brO having a dashcam, we watched a black suv go through this intersection southbound through a red light at 70 kph while stopped in the next lane over.
2/ there are three *heavily* trafficked driveways and two bus stops within metres of the intersection so you are continuously making evasive bumpercar/whackamole maneuvres with the most rancidly incompetent drivers in the lower mainland
3/ the advance green lights are wrongly bad and they should run all four ways, this is a busy intersection!!
4/ it’s at the bottom of a 150 foot elevation drop (over 6 intersections) people come screaming down that hill hoping to get through both the pedestrian crosswalk light which is two blocks away and the intersection itself, so drivers are routinely going 20 over the speed limit
5/ There’s a 7-11 + gas station on the corner and this weird fucked up fake lane that is basically how Mr. Audi and Ms. Accord get to know each other as one smashes the other trying to sneak around to the right while the other’s doing the same thing from the 7-11
6/ I’m not blaming the teens who go to the high school next to this intersection, they don’t usually seem too intent on throwing themselves under cars in my experience, but gawdam some of the wildest ad lib pedestrians on earth stroll adjacent to these crosswalks
6/ continued… I mean brO and I are happy if they make eye contact, mostly they don’t.
7/ every pole for a block around pleads for witnesses to accidents
8/ IT’S A SHARED JURISDICTION intersection. So the Burnaby RCMP (eye twitch) and the NWPD (shrug) get to share the duties when the blood/debris crosses the intersection. I don’t know how they figure out who does what but I’m sure it doesn’t make things sparklier
9./ I’d need a contour map and some dinky toys to demonstrate some of the ways in which momentum, gravity, common sense and, provisionally, space/time itself, fail to operate normally at this intersection, so please I beg you just take my word for it.
Further comments: I travel through this intersection an average of 4 times a week during the pandemic and more like 10 times otherwise. I live close enough that I once heard a collision there. This is on the bus route I mostly use.
So I read with interest that they intend to spend a quarter of a million dollars on this intersection, and this would be great except for one teensy problem. Not a single intersection ‘improvement’ I’ve seen in the last 20 years actually made things better.
brO and I are going to watch them spend a quarter mil to make it worse. The banging and construction delays will be horrific. and in the end…. I’m prepared to wager twenty bucks that it will be distinctly & measurably worse.
And I haven’t even MENTIONED the truck traffic, which is heavy and continuous during the day and steady at night because the biggest food storage depot (400 SQ METRES OF BUILDING and much more for truck parking and storage) in the lower mainland is a kilometre west.
Went for a lovely walk in Fraser Foreshore yesterday with Paul and Jeff before it got too hot.
This morning did a shop; time for a cup of tea and an apple turnover.
I got a couple of ‘kudos’ for old stories on Archive of Our Own, and one complimenting me on a single sentence, so it’s nice to know that a sentence which I am not going to repost here because it’s rather risqué is enough to make someone provide spontaneous plaudits.
The two worst characters in Supernatural are getting their own prequel show, and it’s going to be a disaster because John and Mary Winchester should not get their own fucking prequel show. Why? No. Don’t get me started. Anyway. Rifts are appearing in the fan continuum and it’s fascinating to watch. A lot of people who are huge fans of the showrunners/producers are saying they aren’t going to bother with it because …. it’s about John and Mary, who are fucking dirtbags. OK maybe not so much Mary, but wow.
I am still in a very low point but continuing to work on tunes in a desultory way. I haven’t had what it takes to write for ages now, but summer is usually not my peak writing time…
I have just now provided dimensions to Mike, who is finally going to adopt the pourover espresso machine I bought for the cafe.
Into the relative cool of the morning to mail a whole bunch of letters, plus the rent cheques.
RIP the Florida Man who banged an oxygen tank on the ground trying to get the valve off to scrap it….
It’s a drag, because Paul wanted to walk before it got too hot.
I made spaghettini and meatballs.
The air conditioning is blasting already.
I already had breakfast around 4:30 but now I want something else, plus more tea.
The dentist was unhappy with the crown and now I have to wait another week, and what does THAT DO?
It means that I have to get a crown installed, vote in a by-election and finally wring an ADD meds scrip out of my doctor all in the same fucking day. I plan to drink heavily when it’s all over.
Prior to all this Paul and I had a lovely walk at Fraser Foreshore. We saw two adults and one juvenile bald eagle play fighting in the trees and making a hell of a racket at the same time, it was quite funny. Parking lots were bung full, we had to park miles from the lot.
I decided there was no reason for Paul to clean up after his own party so after a brief consult with Jeff we threw Paul’s Father’s Day celebration here.
Paul came over first, then Katie and Alex came over next, then kMike, then the kids (those three) left, then Mike came, then Paul left, then Keith showed up and Paul came back and then Keith and Paul left and then Mike left. Nobody was driving drunk at all, like, no one.
Seafood salad consisted of, here, have a green salad (iceberg lettuce, salad mix of seeds and cranberries, heritage tomatoes sliced, purple onion in relatively large chunks, grated carrot, broccolini) and put over top of it your choice of Argentinian prawns, Digby Scallops, or Alaskan Sockeye Salmon. This was 123 dollars of seafood, mostly salmon cause I got two fillets. I know, insane. There’s just enough leftovers for salmon pate tomorrow morning with mascarpone cheese, and we got lemon juice and capers. Anyway, I cooked the shellfish on the stovetop and baked the salmon for 20 minutes at 400. On part of the salmon I put a ‘ground pecans cut half and half with maple syrup’ crust. kMike hosed that shit down like a good thing, and declared it quite fine. (I had a bit.)
Alex had to go home to eat, that’s why he left.
Mike serenaded me on the back deck in the golden hour.
quite inebriated me
This is not a song. I am only peripherally in it – at one point you can hear my phlegmy cough, sorry about that lol. This is so my mOm can hear her grandson’s voice babbling and laughing any time she wants. It’s two and a half minutes of sonic mayhem. it was the winter solstice….
CW SPOILERS FOR KING HEREAFTER
This is also called ‘The Standard of a Crow’ but GOSH it really should be a raven. The novel this comes from is King Hereafter, and it’s her take on Macbeth. It is a f)cking amazing novel; Viking and Christian life is shown in detail, and there are so many amazing battle sequences… it’s a lively book, with a love story at its heart and a really interesting and quiet depiction of the friendship between men as one of its many pleasures.
You don’t want to have find rhymes for raven. that’s why it’s a crow. AND FILK.
Please note that the previously published lyrics for this have been superseded by the lyrics shown below. OBVIOUSLY THESE ARE SPOILERS IF YOU HAVEN’T READ THE BOOK
The MP3 file is for the first two verses and choruses.
When you’re deep down in it (Note: battle rage)
As deep as you know how to go
There’s no end, once you begin it
Your foster father taught you so
It’s a dream, it’s a trap
For no matter how far down you go
You must rise up for the next battle
And stand under the standard of a crow
Pull the axe from my battered hands (forty miles a day, o!)
There was a lot of blood, not all of it mine (ridin’ in the rain, o!)
I am good at killing men (make a joke, run him through, o!)
If you would follow me, now you must ride (ride, ride, ride)
It isn’t wise to ask them (note: seers and fortune tellers)
Folks seeking comfort are rarely wise
The seer said I’d take half the battle
And mocked me for the doubt in my eyes
It’s a dream, my heart rattled
I saw her eyes, like oxblood on snow
Hers the first face that I am seeking
Standing on my stirrups, underneath the standard of a crow
Pull the axe from my battered hands (forty miles a day, o!)
There was a lot of blood, not all of it mine (ridin’ in the rain, o!)
I am good at killing men (make a joke, run him through, o!)
If you would follow me, now you must ride (ride, ride, ride)
She has an errand, seaward (note, he asks her to say goodbye to the sea for him, because he was a frickin’ Viking after all)
I die on land an aged fool
She’ll make my goodbye for me
make herself a young king’s school
It’s a dream, it’s a trap
Knowing that life goes on, just so
But she made it through one last battle
Still stands under the standard of the crow
Still stands under the standard of the crow
So much so that I’m wondering why I agreed to a father’s day hike with Paul. It’s supposed to be unbelievably hot today and I am still in spring mode.
Yesterday Jeff and I ate in a restaurant (last time we went out we ate outside) at IHOP and said HI to Lorna since it’s been a year and then we ran some errands since the ants are back and we needed ant traps.
I’ve been opening Scrivener files that aren’t finished and fixing typos and sentences in a desultory way.
We’re watching an Icelandic supernatural noir called Katla. It’s very creepy, without being full of jump scares, which I loathe.
I get my molar crown stuck on tomorrow.
Today I think I’m going to make a big pot of spaghetti.
It’s possible this mood is migraine related. I just feel kind of stunned and obtunded.
I’ll get my shit together later, or maybe tomorrow.
Lovely… and I mean absolutely life-affirming and beautiful …. walk in Fraser Foreshore yesterday. We took it easy and stopped at every bench to look at the trees and the water. SO MANY songbirds, the forest just rang with their voices.
Fed Paul homemade greek salad, the last of the garbanzo stew and homemade lemonade for lunch, also got a financial errand run.
Katie DROPPED BY AFTER WORK yesterday, I felt like a celebrity was stopping by. Love her so much. She’s just starting to show, she should be off work by Jeff’s birthday.
Live your life like this internet toddler:
Today is Juneteenth. Do not be fooled. As long as Black and racialized people are being shot, unjustly imprisoned and deported in such horrifying numbers in the US, it doesn’t matter what feel-good holidays are signed into law. It’s just more Martin Luther King Day: white people get the day off and Black people get to work two shifts, while the Republicans are doing everything possible to remove their voting rights.