Ground control to Major Tom

I remember going to a random bar on Davie St with my friend MH since they had a sandwich board outside advertising cheap as hell wings and beer -

Tangent! funnily enough, only recently am I concerned with the quality of food and more skeptical the less it costs - you gotta a coop out back? - Baka used to cut up a tomato from her garden and liberally swim it in oil and salt, it was my favourite effing snack when I was younger. Hell, today! However, I just am not availing myself to as many people's produce. I really want to participate in a community garden. Maybe I should look into sharesies, I'm great in a team. Unless it's sports. Then I'm great with showing up and being enthusiastic. I truly love being enthusiastic. And Tangent, scene! what was I...

I wish I could have a running scroll of the things I am saying follow me, but invisible to others -would be awkward. I LOVE being able to look up and have an answer to what the hell was I talking about? Eat your heart out Michael Ondaatje.

Anyhoo - so in we go to the bar where casual chatting and hanging seems to be the vibe UNTIL...
Literally 15 minutes after we get there there's the snap, crackle of a mic being set up. Oh, is it karaoke tonight? I ask innocently. Pfft! PFFT! is the response from MH and new joiner RMcD. Apparently, the karaoke at this bar on this weeknight is basically for regulars, who sing their regular songs. So the first couple gets up and it's Space Oddity and the guy has the most sonorous voice. But they're both looking off at this fixed point which a swivel in my chair told me was to nothing in particular so, sotto voce, I remark - Jeez, they are seri-OS up in here - which gets me a few shifty side eyes. To which I raise my eyebrow as the debil sits on my shoulder and starts chirping - oh, did I interrupt amateur hour? Is this your rehearsal time? Is this just before your big break? Did my presence disrupt the Arrrr-tiste? Fiiiine, lemme show you how disruptive I can be! Push up my sleeves, crank the brain to GIT'EM mode which is when the angel sits down and says is this really a big deal? You wanna be startin' somethin'? Which, really, I don't but I may have laughed a little louder at everything, could have chair danced with some flailing and/or slooooowly walked in front of the mic back and forth to the bathroom (broke the seal! oops)
Well, sure am glad I'm over that passive aggressive bullshit.

(I'm not over it)

There are so many funny broads out there it is truly shocking that Lorne Michaels had to do a secret mega audition to fill ranks. Wild. I love this other woman who does tipsy book reviews. Isn't that every bookclub? but for one! I can get behind this!
Who am I kidding, I do this all the time. Wine makes the characters a shade brighter, just like at a party with real people. 
Maybe it's because I know so many outrageously funny women. I am always loudly, whole-heartedly laughing out loud at my vivacious, hilarious compadre-ettes. I hateHATE hearing or seeing the letters/acronym LOL - like eye twitching hate. I know! Crazy! eh, everybody's got their special sauce.  

Omigod! Remember KoRN? Thanks iTunes with random tune activated! Shit - I thought I was SO HARD listening to this in the basement. The same one I didn't really leave while reading historical romance novels from 1993-1997. 

I'm cool today and that's what counts.

So, guys. Please click this link - it's the greatest one of all time. ( <-- No, seriously. click that)That I have discovered. And by discovered I mean given to me by a Facebook algorithm.  

I honestly love my cat's perplexed face when I scream at her for doing the things that drive me mental chewing my plants, drinking their water, cleaning her asshole in front of guests, singing the song of her people when I am in the bath, clawing the furniture. It's amazing to list off a small portion but when I swivel to glare at her, her little, yellow round eyes hypnotize me. Apparently cat's never made it past 50% domesticated which is why they truly don't understand us, don't reeeeally care what we say/think and would eat us if we died. 

I am subscribed to this page on Facebook, Word Porn and it truly makes me happy everyday. My favourite words so far are both Japanese. 
First - Komorebi ~ Sunlight that filters through the leaves of trees. The green glow that is sunlight through grass or leaves it truly one of my favourite things, lying under a canopy with a genle breeze listing over you is bliss. 
And then - Kintsukuroi ~ "to repair with gold" the art of repairing pottery with gold or silver lacquer and understanding the piece is more beautiful for having been broken. 
I feel like both are so beautiful. 

One of my other favourite words is because it was introduced by one of my most delightful friends - honestly, she just attracts and radiates sweet happiness - who is Italian and it's scarpetta which literally means, I think 'little shoes' but is the act of wiping one' plate to get all the sauces with bread. Mmmm, gluten-y, gluten-y, gas inducing bread. TMI? Onwards!

I wonder what the word is for making yourself cry with videos on the internet. I see the caption says tear jerker and still I click through, I do like the catharsis of it all. Especially kids or animals. I'm currently smearing my eye makeup like it's a horror film audition. I will take this as a reminder that I am probably dehydrated and some water with lightly added cranberry juice to it is what I need. I have a bit of a headache, that' f'sho dehydration. People, do not forget the water if only not to have haggard skin. Also, death. 

I am living into me going to SXSW, I am requesting of the Universe everyday that this happens through gentle, soothing hints to my boss. (You're #1!) I just want to be in the dry heat, sending smouldering glances to the man-hunks strolling around. When not rocking out with every cell on maximum vibration, partying with the people, arms up. God. I love rocking out. Being with abandon for a period of time. Also, to be able to see some people I love and have not taken real action in having togtherness with in some time. I really appreciate the FB for that, I want to know and be in contact but am also not to be relied on for phone calls and letters. I WISH you could rely on me for letters, I would lovelove a pen pal. So awesome. I could send stickers. 

Ok pen pals, community gardens, going to SXSW and becoming a ninja - first half of 2014 tasks. Hold me to it, I'm squirmy. 

You jam out with your clam out, y'hear?

a haiku:

a rock show vixen
a consultant of all things
corporate coquette 

xo

Remember, remember...

New research project for how does the brain pick and choose what it gives back to you. why does vanilla remind me of longing for the hot guy in the locker beside me in Grade 12 to pay attention to me as opposed to baking one thousand times with my grandmother?

Other research project, acquiring one of these: Pygmy goats. Holy cow do I want one.

Before 6 years old, all my memories are of my soul sister (no offence, brother) - pulling all the linens out of the closet for the Barbie condo (apologies to My Aunt K), running into the street without looking (sorry to the dude who had a heart attack thinking he' run over little girls) painting the walls with my moms new makeup (isn't enough time in the world to apologize to my mom) except for the time I got caught stealing jelly beans from the reward jar on my kindergarten teacher's desk. Which happens to be the first memory in my ingrained habit of pushing and testing boundaries. I had figured out long before that my teacher went out everyday for 3rd recess (ah, the perks of youth) which coincided with nap time. Nap time paling in comparison to those brightly coloured, sugar infused sirens. They never crossed the threshold of my house. How about a piece of fruit? Disdain and loathing. My teacher would barely close the door before I'd be elbow deep in the coveted reward. Turns out it took me longer to pilfer than it took her to write Wednesday, December something something. Foiled again. Although, to be honest, I am unjustifiably smug about it having gone on so long and probably should feel something shame-like for being an instinctual thief so early in life.  
Stealing bottles of tabasco in University. I can hear my bff saying, 'Fools!,' everytime one came to the table with the cap on. Honestly, I can feel the world go silent around me when there is something I want to take. There is always something I want to take. If I have been in your house, trust, you are lucky to still have everything. Something would have caught my eye with an inaudible Take me! 
My personal precepts dictate I don't steal from friends but sometimes, I gotta scratch the itch. Typically, it's moist towelettes from restaurants. I am a goddamn squirrel with those things, I need more. It's like I think I'm Frodo with the ring on and no one can see or hear me. I'm betwixt worlds going for my precious. 
Honestly though, moist towelette are like crack for me and then more smugness! when someone is all, 'Jeez, my hands are so sticky IF ONLY I had a method to clean this up.' Then like a super sexy, non-maternal Mary Poppins I brandish my plunder with relish (smugness)  to then affect humility - No, no it's my pleasure to do this for you, I only live to ameliorate the lives of my fellow person. When really, there's self congratulations, mental self high fives and a wafer of superiority. Fuck yeah, moist towelettes.

I remember Ali coming over in Grade 4 when my grandparents got hardwood flooring installed and Baka paid us one. whole. cent. per book to move them from where they had been stacked in the living room back into the library. We each made just over $4 and took our bounty to the corner store and got little brown bags full of sugary loot. There is a picture of us arms slung around one another (with me wearing a beauteous tied dyed, hella oversized t-shirt - glamour) beaming with joy as our popsicles (banana FTW!) melt in the summer sun. Bet we coulda used a moist towelette. It was the fleeting moments of innocent friendship before such a thing as popularity and pecking order became things we were aware of.

High school is goddamn blank. My best friend is often shaking her head at me when she starts with remember..? something about someone from those pithy years and I toss off - I have no idea who that is. I never met them. Yes you did, remember when we... Oh. that time. 
I DO remember, however, the OAC retreat. Teaching the BFF to play Euchre - tangent! I am goddamn Euchre champion, I'm honestly magical at it. Brushing dirt off  my shoulders - and truly my first drinking experience. Mostly I remember stumbling around in the dark (was not high up on the pecking order, thus, much alone time) going back to my cabin, having one, sweet rational thought that drinking to excess seemed a bit ridiculous in purposefully losing control whilst watching other Noobs barf their guts out in the shower. 

Again, a toast to a blend of Scottish and Croatian roots - keeping me alive in foolish times. Which continue to present day. 

Anyhoo, it was the slip and slide that got me on the track to being the loquacious, fun magnet envied by many today. 

I started reading a new book - Tell the Wolves I'm Home, Carol Rifka Brunt - and there is a passage where a character is reliving a conversation with her Uncle about an item he wanted to give her:

"And promise me you'll only serve the best people from it." His voice was cracking, splintering up. "Only the very best, Okay?"... I promised. Then he squeezed my hand and pulled away from me and smiled.

"That's what I want for you," he said. "I want you to know only the very best people."

That's when I broke down and cried, because I already knew the very best people. Finn was the very best person I knew. 

I'm on a plane reading this and I am immediately back in Gareth's living room, sitting on the edge of his gurney and he is asking me what I want. What do I want him to will me. I reply, I want more time with you and we both recoil from my statement. It was out of my mouth without thought. It was the truth but it hurt us both more than I expected as we had both been masters of dancing around the truth. Since I'm already crying, in public - I hate that, my mind takes me to the most beautiful spring day. I am soon to leave Vancouver and my best friend and I were graciously donated our friends' place which is in a valley surrounded by mountains and magical. Now she's crying recalling one night where mentally, emotionally I crashed and burned, with a vengeance. I was awesome at keeping going then. Thinking in 12 hour rotations and ignoring anything that didn't support him boldly crushing cancer beneath his heel. I had gone to his house, inebriated, and somehow ended up in an argument - which I cannot recall at all, completely have blacked it out. Incredibly we never fought, ninjas at avoiding one another's emotional landmines - and I took off into a PISSING rainy night, scream crying my way over the Georgia Street viaduct, the walk home probably taking me around 45 minutes. When I got home I remember her shell shocked face and her low tones trying to get the wild animal calmed down. She led me into the shower and pressed a mug of hot tea into my hands while I just stood and cried under the spray. That was one of the only times I actually broke while he was still here. I never thought about it from her perspective until we are in paradise and she is apologizing for not knowing what to do. I just about died with love for her in that moment. That someone would suffer seeing someone they love in pain, to rack their brain for a way to make it stop is the kind of love and friendship I want forever. With everyone. For everyone. 

Pro-tip: fungi and emotional upheaval aren't the best mix. 

What's amazing is that time has helped me to not stop in that recollection but see him waiting outside my tent with his last hot chocolate which reminds me of a comment he made on pictures from the BFF roadtip, which reminds me of making goat faces while driving, which reminds me of fleeing in the night from Marathon, Ontario 
Terrible! honestly fleeing! In mid flee, barreling down an unlit road (safe!) a guy steps out of the shadows with a wide brimmed hat pulled low, sloooooooowly extending his hitchin' finger. THEHELLYOUSAY! jump back as no one wants a human stain on the car and ain't nobody stopping this paranoid freight train! 
When we finally stopped the flee, got into a Motel and turned on the TV to calm the hell down MObama was speaking for the first time at the DNC - triumphant fist for for MO, incredible woman. Which makes me think of her get it moving (or something) campaign which OF COURSE makes me think of My Queen 

The times I have been behind the wheel (hahahaha license free!!!) always make me smile, it's often because of shenanigans and tomfoolery (in university - thievery) because I collect people imbued with a presiding modus operandi stemming from why the hell not and of course we should! OF COURSE! Let's try that. Spider hotdogs? Genius! Waterloo to Toronto because it's Thursday? Of course. Remember when I didn't catch that baseball and ended up with two black eyes? Those times the coolest baseball team in the Mabel League donned masks for topless, game interrupting sprints - glorious. 

I'm sitting next to an amazing piece of First Nation art - thanks Corrine Hunt! - which brings to mind the first (only) time I tried lawn bowling for a Friends Helping Friends event that I won for having the most spirit. That means I wore the lowest cut dress, outrageous hat and drank many drinks/was friendly. Was off with one Japswe for herbal refreshment not realizing my firecracker friend was extending out her thank you chat with everyone waiting for me to come back to present it to me. That was a great day. And my tits did look great in that dress. Classy great. I love low cut dresses. 

The greatest benefit of these fanciful trips down memory lane is that it serves to remind me that everything does happen at the right time, for its own reason. F'sho, there are things I would go back and change but that's because I have no idea of the 'why' or what it would change. 

I'ma let my main man Rilke wax poetical on these musings:

I beg you, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.

Well put, homeslice. 

I have a heart melting picture of my sweet nephew on my phone (those cheeks!) but it more often brings my brother's voice calling me Nana to mind. Somehow couldn't say my name so called me Nana instead. The recall, also heart melting. 

I really need to ward off the dementia since the memories are fucking great. They make me so happy for what came before and so excited of what could possibly come next. I never saw anything unfolding the way it did and as much as I am resistant to change and surprise, you're right, Universe. It's more fun this way. 

a haiku:

remember it all
memory shimmers a hint
regret none of it

xo

Wit and Wisdom

You'll find none of that here, pure nonsense but couldn't we all use a little brain vacation. I'm currently shimmying along to a playlist I made myself on Grooveshark. I love that shiz.

There's this:

I wonder how hard it is to shave a guinea pig? And whom amongst my friends would want to try this? These are the questions keeping me up at night.

I'm really enjoying my new thing of complimenting strangers. They are so startled at the interaction, then befuddled it wasn't wierd/negative (yes, in my mind) and then they laugh that this random thing is happening . It really brings me joy.
I could replay the opening scene of Love Actually with the Hugh Grant voice over ultiple times. And do. 

Pro tip - coconut oil, for everything. By the way - Nature, taking care of business.

I need to take better care of Nature. I really feel like I inch out of my dependance on 'stuff' but I like stuff a lot so it's slow going. Then David Attenborough reminds me the world is awesome and I want to be signing up with Sea Shepherd and only using glassware while bartering and attending clothing exchanges. Or other options but something. I feel so grossed out every time I read about garbage island. Jesus! We only have a million red flags and... I'm getting riled up, I need to simmer down. yet, still take action.

I really want to go tailgate partying. I may have mentioned it before and so I hope the next time I mention it, it's happened and I'm speaking in exclamation points. However, it looks like a humdinger of a good time, which I am a huge fan of. I just like American men. It almost pains me to admit it but the Southern ones especially. WEAK! I am so weak for. I have made bad decisions while dickmatized by Southern men. I have had a random sampling of several Southwestern states and I have to tell you ... nothing. But know my mind is on full replay mode.

However, football. It's way more enjoying now that I have an idea on how it works as opposed to a lot of tiny men on TV going smashy smashy plus beer. I also need to find a rugby watching friend in Ontario as I miss it from my life. Not to play again, I don't think. I really do want to take up a martial art. It's funny I often mention that on first dates and drop a casual, 'what do you think?' to the dude. I did judge that evening's bachelor based on his response but not anymore - totally judgement free zone here now. With 50% more truth.

I cannot wait to go to Moksha tomorrow and work out the remainder of my cold, before I get on a plane, and keep the joints lubricated. I need to get hydrated. I had a lot of coffee today. I love you, Coffee. I love you in every way you show up, campstove, Tim Hortons, french pressed, Vietnamese, in tiny cups. I should coat myself in a layer of coconut oil and get water in me as I had several raw cloves of garlic and frankly, that might be something in a steamy room. I mean, if it was me next to me, I would have a raging hunger if I had to inhale garlic while working on my fitness but, possibly not others.

Beyonce break. Shit.

I hope my future partner is a huge fan of peeling fruits and leaving them out for me. When he's not folding. After back massages. While smoking bacon in the backyard. And buying me tickets to Beyonce.

The sun stayed out until 6:00pm today so basically I feel like I am careening towards sweaty summer and sun dresses. People watching just is 72% better. I need to find a better paraben-free sunscreen though. The last one I got was too zinc-y and made me look like this:

Everyone's happier! They're on Cottage countdown. 

I just started Scandal last night, I'ma go ahead and leave you now to continue that. Which reminds me I need a good book to read. Research time. I love research time. Or I could phone a friend. 

New Pro-tip: gather as many friends as you can as they know shit, can do shit, will trade for yo shit. Larger network is basically like being rich. Only, cool. And I think it wards of dementia. Plus love and affection which I think wards off dementia. 

Happy birthday to El Tomo, genius party dog, margarita mixer extraordinaire and all around solid dude. Love. 

a haiku:

new year eve kicked ass
thrust joy into every day
advocate, don't hate

xo