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Tanya Huff is going to be there. 'nuff said.
I hope he rests in peace.
But all I can remember is my brother saying, "Roll the dice. Take a breath. Roll the dice, take another breath. Roll the dice, take a step..."
loi (laughing on the inside)
Underwear: check
socks: check
2nd pair of socks: check
long johns: check (from MEC)
black jeans: check
shell pants: check
undershirt (bright red): check
long sleeve shirt: check
old man's sweater (cardigan): check
skull cap toque from MEC: check
shell coat with liner: check
rockport shoes: check
mitts from MEC: check
face plate from MEC: check
sheer balaclava from MEC: check
Ready for Action!!
Going down with a friend...staying with friends... and...
S H O P P I N G ! With powerful Canadian dollars to back me up!
My first time in the 'States where my dollar is worth more than the US one!! Things were like this when I was young... but it hasn't been like this in f o r e v e r! :)
Lookin' forward to it! :)
So, I was innocently... well, as innocently as I could manage... watching Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles on Supernatural 2 (DvD).
There was a sound on the front porch, and a ringing of the door bell.
I answered, and fresh faced blond youngster was at the door.
Clad in my gym shorts, I stepped out onto the porch to talk to him.
He was beautiful. And, from some nature organization I give money to. He was here to hit me up for more dough. So I relaxed down onto one of the bench seats on the front porch.
And let him give me his speal. I noted he head bright blond hair, attractively styled. Bright blue eyes. A handsome face.
His phone rang...or bonged or whatever...
I suggested he was a popular guy.
He blushed, and ignored the call or text message.
He continued his speal. I answer his questions with pleasent mild interest, but deatchment.
I saw he had jeans on, worn jeans. And bright blue STRANGE shoes with something on them. Some weird design. Very arty.
I returned my attention to his right eye.
He was earnest, young, and delightlyfully committed to his cause.
His eyebrows were dark haired, and he had big eyebrows. Oh no. I said big.
My mind flipped into how delicious he was.
I knew I would be giving him money from the instant he showed up at the door. I kinda knew what he was here for since he's the 3rd one to come.
He showed me a pamphlet about some wetlands the Premier has already promised to protect...but hasn't made concrete (bad choice of words) strides in doing...
He told me the group had employed a children's entertainer to teach some kids...and that they were hoping on building from last year's modest effort...move from 2 days to a week.
He tried to give me some literature...or let me read what he had...but really, I had no interest.
I got him to start writing my donation up and went in to get the cash.
Came back out and sat on the opposite bench.
I complimented him on his ability to go out there and fund-raise. It is always best to use the truth when complimenting people. It is much more sincere ;).
He was pleased by this.
He seemed poised to recruit me...and he did try. But my skills don't lie with convincing strangers to follow causes they have never heard of.
He took my money, gave me my receipt and went on his way. Admired. Successful in this transaction.
I went inside...lay down again... and tried to watch the show.
I ate a strawberry. Just one. And imagined kissing him with the taste of strawberries in my mouth. Of saying, back on the porch before he left that he was welcome to come back anytime...but that there would be a price. One very slow, loooooooooong, kiss.
I tried to watch the show, but kept daydreaming of inviting him in. Kissing him. Stroking him. Opening him to the world of pleasure we could share. Exciting his imagination so that he could create such spaces with me again, or with someone else.
You can't pay back, but you can pay forward.
I hope I run into him and his blue shoes again. He is a treasure. And probably all of 18, maybe 20 at the most.
Sam, his name is Sam. Wonderful young man. I wish him the best whereever he fares.
Well matey, I harse to say that while I still have 2 legs, 2 arms and 1 head, I am not carrying a full load, me ship could use some more goods... so prepare to be boarded!! No quarter!
{Well, that went well. Let's just slip into regular talk for a sec: Tennis elbow, a new experience. I shouldn't fight the furniture. I shouldn't fight the furniture. I shouldn't.... you get the idea. There is some debate over the result... I'm damaged but the futon isn't. However, on the plus side for me, the futon is my slave. I sleep on the futon. You could say I sleep on the stomach of the futon--if it had a stomach (thank you Ghengis Khan).
Going to physio.
Rotting my brain in front of the one-eyed wonder: I marathoned through 24 Season 2, 3 and 4. 4 I much better than 3 and 2. Though I now that I stop to think about it, some the story arcs in each season were VERY strong. Then broke down and got Supernatural 2 and Prison Break 2. Partway through Supernatural 2, I'm thinkin'... gosh. They're running out of things to creep me out with/interest me with (characters)/amuse me (dialogue).
I really do like Jensen Ackles when he is a smart-alec. (Like in Dark Angel Season 2). They've made him much more macho (sounding)...though he still looks like a girlie-man. Both Jensen and Jared do really fine jobs acting, it is just that the scripts are lacking. The tension isn't there, the monsters aren't scaring me... whatever.
Time to pause Supernatural 2 and go to Prison Break 2. Probably Wentworth Miller will be a welcome change of pace.
Anyhoo--started this just to say: putting my feet up for a few weeks netted unexpected results: my feet weren't swollen yesterday. Which means, I gotta do it more often.
Left wondering if nasty, decadent (chocolate laded) chocolate chip cookies from Safeway (ate a row last night, +2 more!) have additives...or just that bowling at night Tuesday irritated the feet back to normal...
Yay TV!
Oops--Yay putting my feet up! ;)
=======
Arrr---ye'll be cleanin' the barnacles off me belowdecks if ye don't honour the Pirate code and Talk Like Yer a Pirate TODAY!
I took a walk organized by the hostel up to Diamond Head. It was cool. In the end, there was me, (Canadian), a Scottish guy (Tom) and an American (from Seattle) named Andy.
It was fun... then I shade-bathed/sun-bathed on the grass by Queen's Surf beach.
Now, internet.
Making friends, having fun, being laid back.
It's all good.
Am on anti-inflams and resting...thank God we have a long weekend! :)
Germany was a blast! Will post a pic or two (promise only 1 or 2!) once I figure out how to connect the Sony back to the computer (pre-trip clean-up cleaned away the USB cable! Doh!)
:)
- ExtremeMood:
content
I have about 5 (maybe 10) pounds to lose. That's all. I'm not Karen Carpenter. I don't have people surrounding me telling me I'm fat. I won't die from my diet.
However, I did try to start it off with a day of fasting. Which failed. I ate a big lunch. And someone brought fresh picked strawberries to work. So I had 3!
All that being said, I'm experiencing echoes of my visit to Montreal. This time, I kinda knew what to expect. (Tiny meals, big price tags). I managed to squeeze in a 'standard' American meal: (meat, rice/potatoes, veggies). At that point I found the standard meal to be HUGE. And heavy.
So I came back thinking, I gotta diet. I gotta be more like the Europeans. Less like the Americans.
So, first off: stamp down my chocolate addiction again. Stamp down my caffeinated addiction (which comes hand in hand).
So, my rules: moderation. Yes, you can have 1 cookie. No, you can't eat a row anymore. If you had the cookie, you don't get the ice cream. If you take the ice cream, you get a couple of spoon fulls. That's all. If you take a donut (from the huge supply at work---everyone's birthday is a donut day), take only a small piece (cut it up with a sharp knife on the handy cutting board).
Eat light, eat healthy, but by all means eat.
Skip an occasional meal if you feel like. If you're starving at bed time, eat a small sandwich (if you make a cheese sandwich, you get one slice of cheese, you don't get to fill the inside the sandwich with cheese anymore).
That's it.
We'll see how I do.
Anyway. Great info. The book was written by two newspaper journalists who stayed through the whole process: John McQuaid and Mark Schleifstein.
K folks. This will be gruesome. Don't follow the link if you're easily upset.
Personally, I can't imagine donating my body for this procedure.
Anyhow.... this display was educational. And upsetting. It reminded me that our bodies are made of meat. We have organs. I usually only think of 'people'... not collections of muscles, bones, ligaments, organs...
They extracted riches from the colonies, eventually letting the colonies go as recognized countries. When the Euro's divided up the world, they paid no attention to existing divisions, they just lumped together what they liked.
Now, today, immigrants from these colonies have "come home".
In Bordeau, France, Muslims live in a certain quarter of the city.
My friend from Bordeau told me she informed visitors about how to act when they drove through that quarter. Roll up your windows (it was a hot day, and the windows were down as "air conditioning"), don't look at anyone, don't get out of the car. Lock your doors. Don't antagonize them.
The female visitor kept her window down. The car was stoned. Luckily, the stones missed the people in the car. It put a scare into the visitor.
Another visitor, another time. Same drill. Windows were closed this time. Door already locked. My friend's car was not going fast enough for a Muslim couple. They swore (in French) at my friend...and eventually overtook her car and parked at a traffic light. The man got out of the car and shouted abuse at my friend. He approached the car. He tried to get in. He kicked and hit the car. Eventually he started to return to his car. My friend started laughing, he came back. More abuse. His wife in the Hajab ?spelling?, gave my friend the finger.
The male visitor was shocked. This was a modern country, and this was hooliganism.
It gets worse. My first reaction is: If you don't like France, go home. Don't revile where you live, go somewhere you like. However, very likely, the fellow who was so abusive is from there. Born in France, and unemployable.
Canada wanted it's immigrants to fit in. In the 1980s the Federal government came up with a university placement program called COSEP. Career Oriented Summer Employment Program. Basically, the federal government subsidized (or sometimes flat out paid) the wages for uni students to get some work experience. What I didn't know, was that the Feds funded it as investment. An investment against racism.
At the time, for instance, the Canadian Wheat Board (a government corp), only had white workers. No immigrants. People who had strange sounding names were never interviewed. "They wouldn't like it here."
After the COSEP program, people had been exposed to people of different ethnic backgrounds... And found they weren't all that different.
Today, the Federal government (conserative) is planning on abolishing the Canadian Wheat Board (most likely at the behest of big business...so Wheat can be like Beef: independent producers having to deal with very few distributors--who hold all the power cards. Bad barginners will get crappy prices for their wheat...which is good "big" business.
Today's Canadian Wheat Board is multi-cultural.
The office where I work is extremely multi-cultural. Tolerant. Intergrated. Hmm.
Back to France: Imagine: You're Muslim. You're dark skinned. You're born in France. Your parents don't see value in Western education...so you leave school early. No one will hire you. You're not educated enough to know you're in a pit. There's no way out. You're angry. You're a second class citizen in your own country.
The white French have money, cars, houses, vacations, fashions, perfumes... you have very little.
Recipe for disaster. Car burnings. Riots. Hooliganism. Gangs. We just don't get to hear about it all the time.
Then I ran across the dog listener. A woman from UK.
More than 1/2 through her book I've more or less learned the kernal of book is this:
Dogs are pack animals. Period.
So, in a pack, either your alpha or not.
Most problem dogs think they're alpha.
So:
1) by Token eating before them (alpha wolves eat first)
2) by ignoring the dogs for the first 5 minutes of any meeting (alpha wolves ignore the bad behaviour of the junior wolves (as does the lion and senior lionesses in a pride))
3) by leaving the dogs presence without asking (alpha's come and go at will)
4) by establishing territory the dog is not allowed to enter (alpha's have private territory)
you relieve your dog from
a) having to attack strangers (you acknowledge their barking and you decide how to deal
with the "threat".)
b) attacking family members (all family members should be alpha to the dog. All.) who
try to leave the house
and other bad stuff.
Interesting.
Excellent.
Great!!! Woo hoo! Tanya Huff's excellent horror/comedy/drama series of books has finally made it to the small screen! And will be shown in Canada!! Woo hoo!!!!!
Colour me ecstatic! :)
I'm sure it will appear in US before that. UK already bought it.
Civilization: the force that binds people together to work in the common interest.
The former is something "those who succeed" have... the latter is what we all benefit from.
And the latter really got a leg up when writing was invented. Ideas could be kept and shared without direct interaction...
And now, with the internet, we can interact across the entire globe... in more or less real time.
And now we have video imaging (youtube) that can be shared the same way.
Wow.
The possibilities just expanded again.
We've had 3 weeks of "roll-offs"--whatever they are.
We were the 2nd last team for the last quarter (I didn't pay attention to other quarters)...so we went into the consolation 1/2 of the league. The championship 1/2 was the top 1/2, and they bowl against one another. Pinfall + handicap (handicaps level the playing field so that even novice bowlers can win the league) decides your position.
So, we came out on top in the Consolation 3 nights of bowling. Hooray. I didn't gloat about this --and I was supposed to--or so I was told ;)
We are supposed to get some money. And there is a thing called pin money--the bigger your score, the more money you get.
So, colour me oblivious. I bowled. I had fun. I'm ordering my own balls (and bag and shoes). But ordering my own balls (just 2) sounds better to me. ;)
I began cycling to work this week. Go me! :)
(That show... had some kind of internet component. People were supposed to watch it while also sitting at their computers... It was an interactive show. Also featured in it were "Shake Hands Man"--and "Lady One Question!"--she would ask someone famous a single question (while being videod...the celebrity would answer the question... and the lady would hold the microphone up to the celebrity without asking any more questions...often getting the celebrity to continue talking...until finally...she or he would turn away. This was timed... and the audience had previously had to vote how long the celebrity would talk or at least give her some attention.)
Shake hands man would shake hands with a celebrity and not let go of his or her hand. Again. Timed. And again, the audience were to bet how long the celebrity would continue to shake hands while being videoed openly.
Oh--and "Lady One Question!" was always referred to with an exciting lift to the end of her name.
Sadly, the show was considered racist by Japanese-Britons. Some people have no sense of humour at all.
I've been screamed at.
Never happended before. I was waiting for the bus. (How sexy is that?) I was waiting for the bus in Honolulu. (Woo hoo! Sexxxier.) I was waiting for the bus after drinking beer. In the afternoon. (How depraved is that!?) On a Sunday. (Drinking on a Sunday? Shame! Shame!)
I'd been on a party boat. A gay party boat... that promised nude swimming. There was no nude swimming. (though I was ready to 'take the plunge' if suitable inducement was present.)
I'd discovered I had a costume malfunction with my existing slinky bathing suit...so I opted to wear a pair of very expensive black underwear...just as form hugging as the slinky bathing suit...and no, not revealing. Just very perfectly designed to conform to the male form in front...and in behind.
I was also wearing a very light cotton shirt--that was mostly black towards the bottom.
So: waiting for the bus. In Honolulu on a Sunday afternoon, around '4.
There was a loud scream from the street. As usual, I identified the source, and location of the scream. It was a now merely smiling black woman, a passenger in a car. (Luckily for us all, just a passenger.) She had an ear to ear grin. She was thrilled. And beaming. And staring right at me.
I was surprised.
20 years ago a guy whistled at me when I was walking home (I had long hair then, and I was slightly slimmmer). He was in a convertible... a passenger in a car. As the car passed me, said, "Oh my God! It's a guy!". I actually relished his discomfort.
But now, 20 years later... and I'm getting screamed at? What is the world coming to? ;)
In other news, my hair was a bit "Leif Garrett"ish. Before the drugs rotted him out. Let's say, at the height of his popularity. Perhaps it was the hair and the "trunks".
In the gay bar, someone suggested I should "go home and get some pants". I was a bit surprised. I mean...everything was covered.
I mention the hair... because during the same trip, I attended a street fair for the football tourney held in Hawai'i this February. I was walking around looking at the performers on various free-stages... and a woman... out of the blue... said: "I like your hair." That was nice, and unexpected. I guess... it should have set me up to be less shocked a few days later when I got screamed at.
Other than that, I just have to report that some ladies of the evening called me sexy (this was when I walked instead of taking the bus--during the aforementioned football festival week.). Being the altruist that I am... I suggested to her that high heels were not really necessary for her trade... she was so beautiful that making her (skinnier than mine!) calves shapely wasn't necessary... they already were shapely without making any extra effort.
Oh--and one of the other ladies squeezed my ass while I was talking to this one. She did it in passing, as I was walking with lady A. I commented on it in my "so-very-cool-way", "She just squeezed my ass!" Lady A replied, "I'll squeeze more than that!" I'm sure I blushed.
I really do lead such a sheltered life. ;)
Oh--by the way... Leif Garrett is gone. Make way Simon le Bon. (of Duran Duran fame). My hairdresser had his way with me on Monday night. He expected $50. I gave him $100. I'm worth it. ;)
