Ever notice how it's the little things in life that amuse us so much? More to the point, ever notice how it's the silly little idiocies in life that amuse us more than anything else? Well, this is not as much ''the little blog that could'' as it is ''the blog that enjoys going up the down escalator in your local mall.'' Will it have anything of real importance? No, probably not. But enjoy the ride never the less!

 
"Whee-hah, that one blowed up real good!"

If you're reading this, then you know I survived Boxing Day. In all honesty, when I dragged my sorry ass out of bed at an ungodly hour in the morning (by my definition, any hour of the morning is ungodly when the sun has not yet risen, but you have), I was expecting Boxing Day to look more like Judgement Day. I had painful visions of Terminator endoskeletons trying to dress up like customers and mow down the kiosk.

And yet, I'm almost disappointed to say that there was no need to make use of the Customer Appreciation Pancake Maker yesterday. That was the most peculiar thing about Boxing Day: the whole mall threw its doors wide open all day with big sales...and not a lot of people came.

Certainly we made steady sales throughout the day, but the volume was probably half of what I was told to fear. In a lot of ways, I've spent the last two weeks dreading what amounted to nothing. I wish I had known this prior; I would have rather liked to not waste all that perfectly good dread. In the stead I could have dreaded something like lichen, or bikini waxes.

And yet, the horror I was anticipating was not wholly wasted. I did make the unpleasant discovery (probably due to exhaustion and stress) that morning that Corn Flakes taste the same an hour later coming up as they did going down. Blind luck that one of the other kiosk staffers arrived for her shift when she did; I made a beeline for the nearest bathroom, and discovered that Gerber might be able to score big with a pureed version of breakfast cereals. The form may be liquified, but the taste marches on.

Disgusting anecdotes aside, I am pleased that Phase Two of Operation: Get This Freakin' Season Over & Done With has come to an end. So has the season, for that matter. Things can now quiet down. Is it peculiar for me to look forward so much to Christmas just so it can be finished?

In other news, some of you are now doubt wondering about the SCTV reference found in the title of this particular bit of nowhere. It all relates to Boxing Day evening, where despite my physical ailments, Mel was suffering more than I was. So I tried my best to cheer her up by doing many things: steaming rice for her, throwing a movie in, bundling her up in a nice, warm afghan, reading Neil Gaiman's The Wolves In The Walls to her, and exploding a chocolate milkshake for her.

Mel adds here that if my intent was to have made her laugh, I succeeded. She also adds that if my intent was to get drops of chocolate milkshake all over the ceiling, then I also succeeded. In my defence, when your wife tells you (after you've removed the lid of the blender's pitcher) that the milkshake could use a little more blending, and forgets to add that you should put the lid back on first, it's not entirely your fault.

(Mel's Note: "Excuse me, it's common sense!")

And so, as Mel sits next to me, and plucks my shoulder hair with a pair of tweezers, I leave you with the

Pondering of the Day: if you cross paths with an abandoned, uneaten tunafish sandwich, is it considered unlucky?


posted by Phillip at 6:29 PM

 
Christmas Hours Are...

This little bit of nowhere is closed for the holiday. So go drink your egg nog and demand your figgy pudding and make funky-looking origami animals out of your wrapping paper. I tried to make a swan. It looks like an exploded ladybug instead...

As for tomorrow, if there is any life in me after the hell that will be Boxing Day shopping hours, my rant will probably be short and homoicidal or delusional. Something along the lines of: "Smash...customers evil...all of them...smash....just smash..."

Today's Lesson: a little phone call can go a long way to endearing you in someone else's heart.


posted by Phillip at 7:39 PM

 
Night of the Merry Ho Ho

Well, it's upon us all once more. Let the retailers rejoice, let the people be glad, Christmas Eve has arrived. In my slightly more cynical mindset, the significance of tonight runs more along the lines of, "At last, Phase One of Operation: Get This Freakin' Season Over & Done With is completed."

Incidentally, Phase Two will be over in the next few days, once the Boxing Day crowds are satisfied and placated, shot and sedated. After that...I don't know. The world around me might quiet down for a while. It's a bit of a frightening thought, to suddenly find yourself enjoying some quiet time. I don't think I've seen that since, oh, maybe July or August.

So, in dropping all snarky guises and "Curse you, Red Baron!" cries at what Commercialmas puts the retail industry workers through, I might as well offer this up to everyone: Merry Christmas. May tonight be filled with peace, quiet, and the sounds of either laughter or collective sighs of relief. Especially since tomorrow will be filled with the sounds of shredded wrapping paper, get all that peace while you can.

I plan on sleeping in most of the morning myself. I've bloody well earned it...

And as God is my witness, I swear if I see any of you in my over-crowded mall on Boxing Day, you will be klonged in the face with my Customer Appreciation Pancake Maker.

Today's Lesson: amazingly enough, a season filled with exhaustion, exasperation and incessant homicidal-tendencies-inducing Christmas music still can't entirely kill the serenity needed to enjoy the next day and a bit.




posted by Phillip at 2:24 PM

 
God Is A Bollywood Karaoke Singer

So there we are, Mel & I, sitting pleasantly in our living room watching some of the deleted scenes of A Knight's Tale, when suddenly loud music Bollywood music fills the room. And then as sudden and unexpected as it appears, it vanishes again, like a vision. It does make one wonder if God is indeed as the title of this suggests, or if He has a deranged sense of humour.

As Kevin Smith suggested, God must have a sense of humour; look at the duck-billed playtpus.

But sudden, booming Bollywood voices speaking to us aside, the day is over, I somehow have defied the odds and have energy to continue on through the remainder of the evening. I really have come to loathe the whole Christmas season now--shopping and songs especially--as I now find it more exhausting than exhilarating, and more aggravating than inspiring. I am at least relieved to know that this loathing feels only transient, and so long as I don't spend another Commercialmas in retail, the loathing won't grow to eternal despising.

The last thing I want to do is have Mel shoo me off because I'm ranting a tirade to the grandkids about how much Christmas sucks [insert word I shouldn't be saying in front of grandkids, though senility has gotten the better of me here].

In other news, the mustard incident mentioned in the last little bit of nowhere has now become known as "Mustard Bukkake." Those of you not familiar with Japanese might be best to remain blissful in their ignorance....

Today's Lesson: it is counter-productive to go to a store to buy garland for the Christmas tree that you'd selected the day before, and then completely forget what sort of garland you had been looking at.


posted by Phillip at 4:18 PM

 
Where Everybody Knows Your Nickname, 2.0

It's always good to hang around with friends, especially when it's a day off that can be spent with friends. Not that many days off have been given to me as of late (which could see me being blamed, since I did technically make the work shift's schedules), but it does make me rather viciously savouring the fact that when New Year's rolls around in a few weeks, I'll be calling in the favours everyone else at the kiosk owes me. I'm starting to understand the Maquise de Carabas' joy of collecting debts owed & favours to call in one day, instead of collecting knickknacks of some form or another.

Currently Mel is lounging on a couch watching Iron Chef with Donna (where French Master Chef Sakai is dueling a Buddhist monk for supremacy of Yam recipes); Servo is cooking a meal for happy carnivores; Shady is lounging around with their two cats; and I am sitting here writing about what everyone else is doing. I suddenly feel like Randy Newman.

Friends always make for wonderful sources of entertainment as well as conversation. Servo is the type of guy who will happily walk with me down the path less travelled where deranged writing ideas are concerned (I still maintain that I'd be the Scarecrow if we were an Oz movie, though I guess that would make Servo the L33T Lion), and watching Mel's horrified reactions to the ideas we concoct is quite amusing. It's equally amusing to see which of us fights not to lose bladder control whilst watching 2 hours of Robin Williams live on Broadway.

We also sank a small, plastic Usagi Tsukino action figure into Servo's fishtank. Read into that as Fruedian as you want to.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have meat to consume and Jet Li kicking some Hong Kong butt to enjoy.

Addendum: in other news, tonight has also seen me assaulted by a jar of mustard (thankfully I was wearing black instead of white), and bested by a balcony door. But in my defense of the latter, how was I supposed to know that in order to unlock the bloody thing, you have to push the lock downwards instead up upwards? Yes, yes, insert your favourite Midvale School for the Gifted line here...

Today's Lesson: it was homemade relish in that jar in the fridge after all, not homemade chili sauce. Either way I'm happy I didn't use it for lunch.


posted by Phillip at 4:42 PM

 
"That was Ali BaBanwah and the Punjabi Band..."

Have you ever wanted to sing karaoke to Bollywood's Greatest Hits? Have you ever wanted to hear someone sing karaoke to Bollywood's Greatest Hits? Well, if you were in our apartment right now, that's exactly what you'd be hearing from the next door neighbours. It's Karaoke Saturdays, and enthusiastic words I can't even pronounce let alone spell (though I'm sure most of those words have at least 4-5 syllables) are sounding through the walls.

You'd think that after suffering the incessant prattling of Commercialmas carols all day long at work, hearing this somewhat muted karaokefest would drive me to foaming at the mouth. But oddly enough I'm quite enjoying it. The karaoke music is a welcomed change from season's greetings I'd as soon shove in someone's ear. It's not loud, the songs actually change, and it's curiously effective at enchancing the quiet, relaxed mood I'm in.

In short, I like these neighbours. I think more people should have neighbours like these. May their Karaoke Saturdays be forever blessed.

In other news, Mel and I have the most unique and wonderful relationships. Take this actual conversation we shared a few days ago as we left the mall together...

Me: "Mel, I can't sing with you fondling my crotch like that."

Mel: "That's the point."

Indeed, my wife and saucy wench is like no other. Who else can say to me with a perfectly straight face and menacing voice: "If you pull your groin muscles [by falling on the ice], I'm going to kill you"?

Today's Lesson: there is a time and place for everything. Whispering naughty bits into your wife's ear while standing in a crowded line at Walmart is probably not a good time or place for that.


posted by Phillip at 3:23 PM

 
Elucidean Rage

50 boxes of merchandise sent in from the Head Office.
1 small kiosk.
0 places for anything to sit, let alone walk.

I've never been good with math to begin with, and I believer earlier on in this little bit of nowhere I ranted about the restraining order Calculus and I filed against each other at the end of high school. I'm not ashamed to say that math is been victorious over me in a war of wills; I may be strong, but I have not the stamina to figure out what the inverse cosine of (dx) over (dy) is. You'd be lucky if I dared venture an answer like, "Tuesday?"

Subsequently, it would appear that the Head Office is following mathematical logic of another kind. To make a Lovecraftian reference, they probably checked out the specs for Ryleh and thought that our kiosks would conform nicely to the angles and dimensions. If only some sort of Old One would eat them.

Fifty boxes of merchandise (almost all of which are photo albums) cannot simply be stored out in the mall corridor. We tried. The fire marshall begged to disagree with us. The Customer Appreciation Pancake Maker begged to disagree with him. The first officers arriving on the scene begged to disagree with the pancake maker. And in the end I somehow evaded getting charged with anything.

So the result was that 50 boxes of merchandise (mostly photo albums) sat inside the kiosk, which doesn't have a lot of walking room in it to begin with. The boxes were at least stacked about chest-to-shoulder height on top of each other in a long, single row running the length of the kiosk's interior. So at least there was some form of narrow walking space. It still didn't stop one's chest getting crushed between boxes and the cash drawer whenever you made a transaction on the till.

Though I am considering patenting the concept as part of a slim-fast diet, or ab-cruncher exercise machine.

But at least we were able to start receiving all those pesky boxes, and put the merchandise either on display outside the kiosk, or store it amidst the understock inside the kiosk, yes? Well...that would have truly been a smashingly good idea...had the long row of boxes not been blocking access to most of the cupboards we could have used to store the box's contents in.

Not to mention that while roughly 150 odd photo albums are sitting in some, way, shape or form at our kiosk, the kiosk can only hold 70 comfortably at best. All empty space underneath the kiosk has been pretty much used up to store extra albums. We've been resorting to clearing as much space on the kiosk counter behind the displayed items at the front end as possible to make more room.

I left when only 1/3rd of the boxes had been opened, and 9/10ths of available storage were already used up. I'll have to visit the kiosk again tonight to help close it down--the disadvantage of being short-staffed due to college final exams being on, having part-timers who are college students taking said finals, and me being the top banana of the kiosk and having to actually assume some degree of responsibility.

I am going to be quite...irritable if Head Office sends us another 50 boxes of photo albums tomorrow. And my wife is suddenly Puu-ing behind me.

There she goes again: "Puu! Puu!"

So it's perhaps best that I stop ranting, and distract her from channeling the spirit of Mokona any further.

"Puu!"

Too late.

Today's Lesson: Cthulhu was right by eating them all first and not even bothering to sort any of 'em out, period.


posted by Phillip at 6:06 PM

 
Crack Santa!

Today's been full of firsts.

Now I'm sure by now everyone knows how much I am coming to cheerfully and downright despise Christmas music, after having to suffer a constant chanting of it over the mall PA system for the last month and a half at 8-hour intervals a day.

Well, fate has never been one to lack a sense of humour, or be ever so helpful in rubbing a little salt into one's wound/evolving psychosis. this morning there was the radio on the car ride to work, where the D.J. happily told me that since they were going to be gone after Christmas, I should be requesting and enjoying as many Christmas classic songs as possible. I promptly flipped the radio (and the D.J. on the other side of it) the bird. This is the first time I have ever given the one-finger salute to a voice that doesn't even know me.

And then there was the visit after work to the grocery store to stock up on food. As we passed down the cereal aisle, I spotted a festive cover on a box of Cornflakes. It featured this Norman Rockwellian Santa Clause face wearing a happy Ho-Ho-Ho smile. However, the expression coupled with his open mouth made it appear as if Santa had taken a little too much crack, and was laughing maniacally at me through the box. (Probably because he was delighting in thinking I'd never find the free toy inside, because there was no free toy inside that particular box)

That, or else it was a blow-up Santa doll leering at me. I swear, his mouth had that disturbingly "round" quality about it. I was certainly unnerved by it. That sort of face seems better suited for a box of Porn-Oh's! rather than Cornflakes. (In a similar vein, please don't think about the type of "milk" you'd find with a bowl of that...)

I advise anyone out there to check it out and determine for themselves whether or not this festive Cornflakes box cover is of Crack Santa or Blow-Up Santa. In the meantime, I'm sticking with the much safer and blase Special K boxes. And I'm also waiting to see if someone else thinks that it's a Blow-Up Santa on the box, and protests or sues the Kelloggs Corporation.

Quote of the Day: "You're a sexual pervert, you'll never get reincarnated!" (from a badly-dubbed Hong Kong ganster movie)


posted by Phillip at 6:45 PM

 
Curiouser and Curiouser

It's been a strange day all around. The sort of strange day that makes you half expect to see actual Puchuu bears running about the hallways of your apartment complex. Either that, or the day ending where you watch Batman & Robin or Battlefield Earth and start to think, "Hey, that movie wasn't so bad after all!"

Mel has also just informed me that should a Puchuu infestation be found in our apartment, we're moving.

Anyhoo, the day started out with my alarm clock going off at 10am. This wouldn't have been a problem...but the night before I had set it for 9am. It wasn't even a digital clock either; the alarm hand was still pointing at the big "9" when it was distinctly ten in the morning.

Then the water in the apartment was out. This wasn't really surprising, since the supers had warned us of it the night before, saying that a few water valves had to be replaced, and could we pretty please refrain from speaking to them in words that really shouldn't be repeated in front of small children. They hoped (and I stress, hoped) to have the water on by 9am.

Six and a half hours later...the water was finally back on.

This proved rather problematic for me, since I had to be at work for noon and could not exactly shower. So taking some bottled tapwater we had stored in the fridge the night before, I doused my hair and gelled it up. I still haven't showered yet. I don't think my scent's reached the skunk-funk levels yet...though the skunk never does smell its own scent.

Added to this is that Shady, our beloved Shih-tzu does something auspiciously not Shady, and craps all over the rug. Sure, she has to do this on the rug, the one thing on the floor that needs to be washed, since the rest of the floor is vinyl tiles. Not to mention the night before, she must have dropped 3 pounds worth of the stuff in the snow while I was walking her at night.

But at least I wasn't the one to discover the evidence. Mel was. More specifically, her foot. At the risk of stating the obvious, she wasn't exactly thrilled. Especially since there was no water in the apartment aside from what we had bottled to wash the sole of her foot with.

Then I arrive at work, and discover as I pass some television sets at the Rogers store that Saddam Hussein has been captured. In all honesty, I half expected the U.S. to find him hiding out in Disneyland inside the It's A Small World ride, where he was ethnically cleansing those dancing puppets on one of the continents.

The remainder of the evening has more or less been quiet, a mere echo of what strangeness slid in from underneath our front door this morning. I have yet to encounter a white rabbit with a pocketwatch scurrying about, but if I do, I'll share with you all a wonderful recipe for hassenfeffer.

Today's Lesson: look first, then step on the rug.


posted by Phillip at 8:30 PM

 
Not Quite A Waterfall

Remember that Commercialmas song, the one that proudly boasts, "It's the most wonderful time of the year!" ? It makes me laugh, it really does. Granted it's the sort of half-maniacal, half-you go squish now with our Customer Appreciation Pancake Maker laugh that makes everyone edge away from you, but it's a laugh never the less.

This is the sort of season to be experienced from the purchasing side of the retail counter. I'm not entirely thrilled with working large crowds to interact with and watch so no thefts occur, equally large daily shipments to sort through, 6 work days a week for the next 3 weeks, and the knowledge that on Boxing Day I have to be at the bloody mall at 8:30am.

As always, I'm keen to keep in mind that my entire situation could be worse, but there's nothing that gets one's eyebrow twitching like discovering that someone at the company's head office thought it was a brilliant idea to force our stores & kiosks to open 15 minutes before every other store in the mall, and stay open 15 minutes after every other store in the mall has closed.

They're paying us for the extra half-hour, which helps balance it out somewhat (not to mention that if they didn't, the unions would come down on them like the mighty foot of Godzilla), but I do not appreciate the prospect of having to get up earlier to go to work, and staying even later than usual. Luckily I don't have to take a bus (which would be ridiculous since most of the buses leave right around the time we'd otherwise get everything closed up), but some of my co-workers do.

Remind me to send that brainiac in the head office a Customer Appreciation Pancake Maker, along with the proper instructions on how to use it on oneself. Ideally they'd take the hint and the hit. Of course...that does make me wonder of the victim would become a Darwin Award honourable mention, or else an Upperclass Twit of the Year honourable mention. Or else maybe they're a masochist.

In any case I'm still not impressed.

But I think I've ranted enough about that. Let's rant about something else, shall we? It's time for me to tell a story (and it's not of the fearless crew of the S.S. Minnow), and I only wish it was fiction. Last night, Mel & I were in the parking lot of our apartment complex, having just come back from some happy shopping.

We headed to the elevator, which connects the parking garage with the 4 other floors of the complex. The call button was pushed, and we waited for the elevator cab to glide on down. There was a whirring of air as it descended, and then abruptly stopped on another floor. And there it stayed.

And stayed a little longer.

After a minute or so, Mel & I decided that perhaps taking the stairs would be faster. So we headed for the nearest staircase. We had only taken three or four paces from the elevator doors when the sound of the elevator getting itself back in motion greeted our ears.

So we returned to the elevator...only to have a new sound greet our ears. Splashing. Lots of splashing, as if someone had spilled a drink (and a large drink at that), and it was dripping down through the base of the doors.

Suddenly the elevator doors opened up, revealing a man reeling with a beer bottle in one hand. His other hand was busy zipping up and adjusting his pants. I don't quite think he was expecting to see Mel and I standing there on the other side of those doors. If he wasn't so drunk, the expression on his face would have been priceless. Instead, he staggered out over the puddle he'd left behind and went back upstairs via the stairway.

I don't know if he had in fact spilled his beer all over his pants and the floor, and was merely trying to clean himself up. I wasn't about to test the puddle on the floor either. I'd like to think that in the ideal world, it was at worst spilled beer on that elevator floor.

In any case, Mel and I took the stairs back up to our apartment. We didn't use the elevator for the rest of the night.

Today's Lesson: two words, people. Bladder control.


posted by Phillip at 6:33 PM

 
Territoriality
(or, This Is How Pillow Fights Start)

When I woke up this morning, I discovered that I had roughly a foot of the bed's length all to myself. My feet and knees were dangling over my side of the mattress, as were my elbows, and there was not a thing I could do about it. You see, Mel had curled right up into my back, which also means she had taken up half of my pillow. And as if it had been a conspiracy of sorts, our Shih-tzu, Shady, had curled up right against the back of my knees, which made it near impossible to move with her weight pinning down the sheets.

Moving Shady would have required me to get up and physically pick her up and transplant her furry butt to another part of the bed. However, I was also pinned down by Mel's arm draped over my side and holding onto me rather snugly. So I couldn't move, and was practically teetering over the edge of the bed.

Mel was vastly amused by my recounting of this when she woke up. She also added that I deserved it for always hogging the comforter at nights. In my defense, I don't overly set out to yank the comforter over to my side of the bed; it amazes me just as much as anyone else to discover each morning that most of the comforter is not on Mel, or even on me, but is instead sitting on the floor on my side of the bed.

I'm beginning to wonder if laying claim to all the mattress space is a subtle declaration of war on Mel's part. And what's worse she's managed to coerce our puppy to fight for her side. This can only mean one thing. I don't really know what it is, but I'm sure it's something important....

Today's Lesson: Leonard Nimoy should eat more salsa.

http://web.tampabay.rr.com/lnsemsf/lowres/menu02.htm


posted by Phillip at 8:26 AM

 
A Quarter-Century of Chaos

Apparently, while I'm not as old as dirt in general, I am now older than some layers of strata found in the earth.

Mel is rather enjoying herself as she calls me, "Old man!"

In response, I've had to cup a hand next to ear and mutter, "Eh? What was that? You're not insulting me again, are you? That's the way it is with youngsters today! No respect, and no sense of resposibility. Why in my day [insert walking-naked-in-snow-uphill-both-ways rant], and what were we talking about again?"

Personally, I'm rather amazed I can even recall how old I am. And no, I'm not going senile. This is what happens when you inherit genetics from your parents that make you look about 5 years younger than you really are, and your parents exploit said genetics to get better deals at restaurants.

For the longest time, since my sister and I both looked about 12 or 13 even though we were roughly 15-16 years old, my parents would look at the Kids' Menu at restaurants and see if there were any decent deals. If there were, they'd be, "Great! This looks pretty good, and we can save money! You both are 12 today!" So we'd get the Kids' Menu.

Other times, they would frown and remark, "Well, this one's not so good, so you can be over 13 today." And thusly my sister and I were allowed to be as old as we were. After a few years about this, we were the ones walking into the restaurants asking, "And how old are we today?"

You can well imagine what jumping back and forth with your age does to a kid. As a result, I regularly lose track of how old I am (or am supposed to be), and need friends and family to remind me of my age.

With any luck, this year will prove easier to recall than others past, since it's a bit of a milestone. Just think: I've been on this earth for 25 years now...and it's a miracle I haven't either managed to accidentally get myself killed, or cause the world to implode. Here's to life's little victories!

Today's Pondering: if you're only as old as you feel, then what is the age for insanity?





posted by Phillip at 8:25 AM

 
Chaos FM

So here I am working on my little bit of nowhere, listening to Tom Servo & Crow T Robot's fleshoriffic song Boobular Tubular!, followed almost immediately by R.E.M. singing Furry Happy Monsters with a bunch of Muppet monsters. I've also just managed to crack my elbow against the side of a chair and loose all feeling in my hand.

It's been a strange night.

Then again, the Arrogant Worms' blasphelicious Jesus' Brother Bob just came on. ("Hey, Bob!" / "Hey, Judas.")

Of course, it's been an overall strange day, so it seems only fitting that the evening be this way. Though I'd prefer the strangeness to be without the inability to feel my fingers no matter how hard I wiggle them. What sort of strange things have transpired today?

Well, in a Mulberry Street-esque recounting, let me tell you what I bore witness to. As I was idling about at the kiosk, I saw a man. He was a modern man, a new-millennium professional with his business suit, slick sunglasses and a wristwatch that no doubt cost a lot more than my "PH33R MY L33T NeKK1D SK1LLZ!" Megatokyo boxers. Yes indeed, this man looked every bit the cutting edge of the new and distinguished century.

A shame his hair was trapped in the 1980's and refusing to let go. Ah, the mullet: it is simply amazing to see the power it can still hold over those with lesser minds...or no fashion sense.

Then onto my lunch break, which is meant to be a relaxing time. A time where I should be able to eat, relax and take a refreshing breath away from work. Instead it became something my therapist will no doubt rue once I start ranting about it without showing any signs of stopping. I'm quite certain that my sheer, stunned disbelief is the only reason I haven't already regressed the memory.

The lesson of the day could very well be: Walmart is not as safe as their corporate propaganda would have you believe.

As I was pricing some presents for friends & family, nature called and like an insistent telemarketer I could not put this call on hold. So to the Mens' Room I go. Now I've apparently a bit of a reputation for being able to move very silently and "sneak up" on people who never know I'm there until I'm right behind them. It seems that my stealth mode was on as I stepped into the Mens' Room...and I wish it hadn't.

There I am in front of the urinal...when I hear a curious noise coming from one of the toilet stalls behind me. It's rhythmic. It's rapid. It can only be described as the word: "Fap." Those of you familiar with the online strip Sexy Losers are already screaming and planning to write me harsh Emails about how unnecessary it was for me to share this with all of you. But hey, the way I figure it, if I'm going to hell, I'm taking you all down with me!

The "Fap", as it's known, is the sound effect for someone enjoying their own company way too much. Now I don't ask for much when I go into a family-oriented store like Walmart: just a little courtesy from employees if I have a question or two; products that are properly priced; and the knowledge that if I need to use the facilities, there's not going to be some guy in the stall wanking off!

Alas, I was unable to leave the restroom with the loud shout of, "For God's sake, keep it in your pants, you bloody wanker!" in as best a mock-Irish accent as I could. Someone walked into the Mens' Room with louder foosteps than I'd had, since the fapping stopped. I escaped while I could, my bladder still full, and decided that the Mens' Rooms in Sears would be much safer. And I was right.

So Today's Lesson could also be: don't use stealth mode when entering a Walmart restroom, or else that "fap" can be both a verb and a noun. But instead of dwelling on that unpleasant reason for me sooner or later developing an extreme phobia of Walmart, I think I'll sit back and groove to the sounds of Marvin Suggs and his Muppaphones, followed by Tim Curry's brilliant rendition of Sweet Transvestite.

Today's Lesson: ladybugs who drop dead and land on your muffin without you noticing taste a lot like a bad walnut. No wonder people cover these things with chocolate first before eating them.


posted by Phillip at 6:19 PM

 
Brought To You By W.K.R.P.'s Flying Turkeys!

Thanksgiving in the U.S. has shown me many new and strange things. Such as: unusually happy & cheerful border guards (not that it's a bad thing, and I am rather hopeful to encounter such an uncommon thing more often than not); a woman grocery shopping for turkey in her pyjamas, housecoat and slippers; and Mel eating more voraciously than me.

I'm not sure whether to be proud or frightened by the fact that my saucy wench, notorious for grazing on food at best, packed away the equivalent of two meals in a single sitting, and still had more than enough room for dessert. I'm beginning to think she eats all this food and then stores it for the remaining winter, like a bear or a squirrel.

(That earned me a tongue being stuck in my general direction from her too. But it is admittedly better and less painful than a pillow.)

But now after 3 days off, 16 hours of round-trip driving, and 2 more days of slow recovery amidst work shifts, I have returned. I think there was supposed to be some trumpetting fanfare somewhere around here, but I might have left the procession in my other pants.

Speaking of pants, the film's resident costume designer/screenwriter/assistant director/jill-of-all-trades has informed me that she has finished my costume for the big medieval dance sequence. I have pants now. Glorious!

Today's Lesson: it's probably a good idea to make new additions to this little bit of nowhere when my brain is not on auto-pilot.


posted by Phillip at 7:33 PM

 
Doko Desu Ka?!

I don't really know what's worse: being somehow unable to locate not one, but two (count them: TWO) inanimate, unmoving, cemented-into-the-damned-building student overpasses at the University of Waterloo; or alternately, finding absolutely no moral support from my wife at all, who just giggled at my helplessness.

She's currently sitting behind me, reading this and sticking her tongue out at me. Though whether it's because she's being childish over my bemoaning of her endearing support (and notable lack thereof), or mocking me because I have the navigational skills of a dead, blind mole rat.

And after reading that last paragraph, she's currently sitting behind me with a no doubt indignant look on her face as she wallops me on the head with a pillow.

The night just isn't going in my favour.

(Mel adds somewhat caustically that, "Well it could have, but you just said "no" to sex in that part of the University's deserted and under-construction section of the Physical Mechanics building.")

And that just earned me another beating with the pillow.

Apparently, it's counter-productive to mention such things in this little bit of nowhere.

And just for mentioning the obvious in that last sentence, Mel decided I hadn't been injured enough and is currently and repeatedly pummeling me with that aforementioned pillow.

I mean, it's not like I set out to get lost in trying to find either of those two overpasses. It looked so easy to find them when we were on the outside of the buildings. They were right there! But nooooo...you get indoors and while you get to see a lot of neat mechanical shops, you can't find a single, bloody, well it has to be here somewhere as it's not trying to sneak away from us! walkway. Not to mention there was also a blatantly obvious staircase that could have led us right into both walkways, but I somehow failed to find that too.

Apparently there's a piece of metallic something-or-other inside or near each person's nasal cavity, and that helps give us some sense and semblance of direction. I'm strongly beginning to suspect that my metallic something-or-other was switched with styrofoam. Or else the material those super bouncy balls are made from.

Stupid overpasses...why is it that all the inanimate objects can get the better of me?!

Today's Lesson: mentioning or even inferring to your wife's libido online can be hazardous to your health.

(Ow...there goes the pillow again.)


posted by Phillip at 6:47 PM

 
What's A Blog Like You Doing On A Page Like This?
(or, "Where the hell have you been, you lazy bastard?")

And in response to that last remark any of you out there may pose to me, my answer is that I can only divide my time outside of work in so many ways. I mean, a regimen must be maintained! There's the sleeping, and there's the eating/washing of dishes, and then there's the walking of the dog, and then there's all the sex, sex, sex. I mean, my goodness, she's bloody insaciable! I'm not a machine, so why must you torment me so! A man can only last so long!

To quote Mick from Gunsmith Cats: "I don't...believe it...twenty frigging times!"

Now then, I'm sure those of you who dared to ask where the hell I've been are now regretting they had and are vowing to never ask such a thing of me again. (In other words: success!) The only downside, and there is a significant one, is that Mel will no doubt deliver grave, physically-debilitating injuries involving the hand mixer, and one or more of my bodily orifices.

Unless she's not quite done with me yet. In which case I may just last another week.

But enough about unnecessary mental images! Let's shift gears and hope that the gearbox doesn't stick in the process. It's time the focus be on what really matters this time of year: capitalism. Yes indeed, the season of Commercialmas (or alternately, $-mas for short) is upon us, and it's time to celebrate by slapping hokey Santa ads on every item you can see.

Some of you are well-versed with my inherent distate for the commercialism of Christmas, and many no doubt share my views, though as far as I know I'm one of the most caustic and acerbic people regarding it. Now I'm not about to go on with some half-assed thesis on how the sacredness of the December month has been reduced to whatever Bite-Me-Elmo doll they've come out with this time. That's too petty.

I'm not as much petty as I am wanting to give my pettiness a panache that sets it apart from all the other seasonal whinings. Besides, considering how the sacredness of Commercialmas was originally found in the pagan Winter Solstice festivals, I can't exactly argue we need to take back the religious aspect without snickering.

Anyhoo, I'm becoming accustomed to Commercialmas' rampant, unchecked marketing ploys. However, what I have quickly discovered is how easily I have come to deplore the incessant Commercialmas carols being played over the mall's PA system. It started a week ago, and hasn't stopped. All-Christmas-all-the-time. At the very least they're playing remixes and varying renditions of old tunes to ensure myself and other mall employees don't spiral into homicidal twitches right away. But I really am believing that come December 12th, give or take a day, I will more than likely clock across the head with our kiosk's Perfect Pancake Maker the first person who hums "Jingle Bells" in front of me.

When and if that does happen, I'll be sure to send you all the newspaper clippings regarding the incident.

Speaking of potential incidents that will validate my high school graduating class' voting of me as "Most Likely To Be Seen On The News One Day", my staffers and I have come up with a new way to ensure that we sell more products. It goes something along the following lines:

Me: "Hello, Sir. Did you want to purchase that wallet you're looking at?"

Customer: "No, I was just browsing, thanks."

[I immediately slap him across the face.]

Me: "As I was saying, did you want to purchase that wallet you were looking at?"

Now granted, the Taste-Of-The-Backside-Of-My-Hand policy needs some ironing out, but I'm sure that with a little lobbying and effort, we can have this implemented soon as a part of our company's official store policy. I think it'll work wonders for our customer service! It's a complete "I win" situation, what's not to like?

Today's Lesson: it is a bad idea to chug down a large mug of chocolate milkshake shortly after having eaten a mint.


posted by Phillip at 5:14 PM

 
“Hey Look, An Update!”

In the words of Monty Python, “I’m not dead yet!” Though thanks to a 24-hour flu bug, more work/fatigue than I’d care to contend with, and watching all 26 episodes of Excel Saga in the past week, I admittedly felt that I was nearing the almost-but-not-quite-dead stage, which isn’t to be mistaken for the supposedly-dead-but-will-reappear-in-two-years-dead you see in soap operas; or for the undead you see in zombie movies; or the dead-but-not-fatal you see the hero suffer in action movies; or the evil dead you see in a Bruce Campbell movie.

The world has gone a bit of the hard-core helter skelter on Mel & I. As of me writing this she’s back in Connecticut not only moving as much of her stuff back up to Canada, but she’s also helping her mother & sisters move out of the old family homestead. Currently I’ve been working many an hour to completely empty out the kiosk I work at, then brace myself for the incoming 100+ boxes of new kitschy swag it’ll now be carrying, and now brace myself for the countless shoplifters who are going to take advantage of our theft-friendly set-up.

But who among you all really cares about that? You’re all no doubt wanting all sorts of fun information on that honeymoon thing. The many rolls of film, once they’re developed, should be able to tell better stories than I in not so many words, but suffice to say Mel & I are now planning on spending a weekend or longer at the Royal York Hotel in Toronto at least twice a year.

Truly, it was an adventure in luxury and ridiculously large suites with more room than either of us knew what to do with. The bedroom was large and spacious by any sort of hotel standard. Of course, when you opened the bedroom door and discovered a large wood-stained meeting table that can comfortably seat 10 people, a fully functional (but alas, unstocked) bar complete with working freezer, display shelves and sinks, plus a sitting area that could handle 8 people, and beyond that another bathroom and sitting area with so much wide open space the hotel staff seemed at a loss as to what other bits of furniture to put there.

For those of you familiar with the gathering sizes, this suite could have fit the entire Fanboys! crew in just half of the space it carried. That’s a lot of luxury to revel in. Funny how Mel & I saw more of the bedroom instead though...

(Oh come on, admit it: you were all expecting at least one “bedroom” remark, if you hadn’t made any sort of innuendo yourselves about it already.)

Mel & I took full advantage of many of the Royal York’s added accommodations, though. Complimentary breakfasts in bed were had...though I was the one who actually bothered getting out of bed to let in the nice man wheeling the table of food into our room. And it’s not often one can call down to room service at 2am and ask for a variety of cheeses, a salad and a club sandwich, so full advantage was taken of that as well. The Sunday night also found the both of us at the health spa, romping around the pool or soaking in the Jacuzzi hot tub (though a slight bit of warning: those jets are strong enough to blast you straight across the tub.)

As for the rest of Toronto...we saw mainly anything that sold books or Anime. Kikiwai, the local Chinatown hotspot for all things Anime, enjoyed doing usual business with us. Namely 2 artbooks, 9 pencil boards and 3 manga tankobans. Combine this with all the books we bought, and it was a successful venture.

Interestingly enough, the Sunday we were there also happened to feature another wedding taking place. How did we know this? Well, the bride’s party running around the hotel lobby getting pictures taken was the first clue. Second was all the fancy set-up in the hotel’s convention area. When you’ve got the entire wedding party staying in some of the Royal York’s suites, and having the ceremony and reception in the convention area...damn, you be rich (or about to be in debt for a lifetime).

I wanted to dress up again and see if we couldn’t sneak into the reception to try the donuts. Mel didn’t seem to share my enthusiasm for the idea.

And then came Niagra Falls. Many of you know the whole tourist angle: see the Falls, see the casino, see the whirlpool, see the Haunted House and watch Mel scream and nearly crush your ribs in her grip. We stayed in the Ramada Inn, located in the Skylon Tower. As a reference point, it’s the white hotel that looks like someone stuck a giant Sunbeam hand mixer in the ground. It made for a unique room set-up though, given how the entire hotel is octagonal. We didn’t get much of a view of the waterfalls, but we did have a magnificent view of anyone sitting around watching television in the hotel rooms across the street from us.

And our floor had a private elevator too! Yay!

Back to the touristy thing. We visited the Horseshoe Falls and took a few pictures. Then we toured beneath the falls and got soaked from all the spray. It was actually quite fun. Though I’m not sure what was more fun: the invigorating spray itself, or seeing Mel giggle and run around like a little kid in the spray as everyone else around realized that when you get this close to a waterfall you get wet, and were running for cover.

We marvelled at the whirlpool. I toured a haunted house with Mel, and discovered that she can actually scream. (Plus that, her grip is sufficient enough to choke even a camel) We also blew a grand total of $5 CDN at Casino Rama. There was one slot machine that wouldn’t let me leave. Not that I was addicted to the one-armed bandits per say; I dropped my quarter-value token into the slot and, having three tries to score some cash, pulled the lever. I lost. I tried for the second time. I won three more chances to score. I tried again. I won five more chances to score. Four more failed chances later, I win another three chances to score. I won no actual cash, but I rather like to think that the slot machine was bored and looking for some good-natured company. It certainly did make me grin as I got a ridiculous amount of free turns.

Yet the highlight of our Niagra Falls trip was the Butterfly Conservatory. Think of a giant greenhouse with hundreds upon hundreds of butterflies flapping about. Watching the butterflies is beautiful. Watching some hapless woman actually freak out and run scared from the butterflies is vastly amusing. I wonder if there’s an actual term for having a phobia of butterflies.

We managed to get a picture of me holding a butterfly, and it wasn’t even through trying. The hapless little guy was perched atop the ledge of a glass plate letting people see the coccoonery, and he wasn’t looking so good. I cupped my palm next to the glass and held it there. Mel told me to stop antagonizing the butterfly. Seconds later the butterfly pitched over the ledge and landed softly in my awaiting hand.

I flashed Mel a triumphant smirk.

She punched me in the shoulder.

As it turned out, the butterfly was having to contend with a number of small ants crawling all over him (and quite possibly trying to either eat him on the spot, or arrange to make him their take-out dinner). So I helped by gently blowing all the ants off the butterfly, and returning him to a nearby tree. It was one of those reaffirming National Geographic moments in life.

The ultimate trick proved getting a picture of Mel with a butterfly in her hair. We spent a good 15 minutes subtly trying to place butterflies in her hair. I now have newfound respect for any sort of butterfly wrangler. They’re easy to get on your hand if you know how (we learned from a pair of obvious butterfly fans), but get them to settle onto your wife’s hair is another matter.

Dejected, I was preparing to leave the conservatory without success. Yet providence smiled down upon me. In the end, a solution presented itself: Mel was busy admitting an Owl Butterfly…and apparently the butterfly was admiring her too. I turned around just in time to see the butterfly take flight, perform a 360 around Mel, and then zoom in right for her head.

It would have landed perfectly atop her hair all of its own accord, had Mel not thrown its plans all awry. She flinched at the last minute. So as a result, instead of a large Owl Butterfly gracefully spreading his wings atop her hair, there was now a large Owl Butterfly happily glomped onto the side of Mel’s face.

Mel was indignant. I’m not sure why; I was so busy laughing that I almost ruined the 3 different pictures I took of her with an overly-amorous butterfly sticking out from the side of her face. We toured the conservatory a few more times, where I enjoyed showing off Mel’s new fashion accessory to the various kids and senior citizens we encountered along the way. Mel blushed and whispered loving & affirming words of violent physical vengeance when it was all over.

Well, it came time to leave the conservatory, but the Owl Butterfly just didn’t want to part ways. So I had to gently shoo him off Mel’s face. The butterfly subsequently thought he could smuggle himself out by posing as part of my backpack. The attempt failed somewhat, considering Owl Butterflies are a greyish-brown, and my backpack’s a deep blue. So we shooed him from my backpack. The butterfly then glomped back onto Mel, this time latching onto her arm as if to protest our leaving him.

In a final attempt to help the butterfly understand, I whispered to it a recipe for Owl Butterfly Soufflé I’d recently found. The butterfly quickly returned to a nearby tree. This makes me wonder how many more butterflies are going to glomp my wife the next time we visit. I might need a net. Or some of whatever pheromones she’s carrying.

There are a number of other things, some quirky, some poignant in a not-so-poignant way, but the hour grows late and I’m still wishing I had another few days off work to recover from everything. In the meantime, I leave you with…

Today’s Lesson: Owl Butterflies are a very aggressive species of butterfly, and apparently are not shy about initiating inter-species dating.

Today's Quote: "Dammit, I lost my pen in the pile of monkey heads again!"


posted by Phillip at 2:34 PM

 
Leaking Like A Seive

There's a reason I don't pick Belfast, one of the family Shih-tzu's, up in my arms regularly. He gets overexcited easily. And the level of overexcitement he has is inversely-proportional to how much bladder control he can exercise.

The sleeve of my shirt now has a funky scent. It's a good thing I'm planning on doing laundry tonight anyways. I'm sure it's Belfast's special way of showing me how much he loves and adores me. I just wish he'd show it in other, more drier ways.

Today's Lesson: perhaps "Puddles" would have been a more appropriate name for a dog who automatically pees whenever all his legs are lifted off the ground.


posted by Phillip at 3:10 PM

 
At A Loss

Today's little bit of belated nowhere will be short, like most of the contact I've had with the outside world as of late, on account of a number of things:

1) a lack of time to sit and write

2) a lack of easily-accessible Net connection

3) a lack of any sort of phone (ideally remedied by next week)

4) a lack of energy, as the kiosk I work at has undergone a radical changeover that saw us this week mail everything out to other stores, and then receive roughly 100 boxes of new merchandize (among which is obscenely large quantities of overpriced wallets)

5) a lack of wife, as Mel's down in CT moving her family to a new house, and more of her stuff up here

Sincerest apologies, and reassurances that in the next few days, things will hopefully return to some sort of status quo that involves more free time, less exhaustion, and definitely no more wallets.

Today's Math Lesson: 1 kiosk out in the mall promenade (+) floor to counter shelves filled with expensive wallets (-) any sort of easy way to keep an eye on all four sides of the kiosk (=) shoplifter's paradise. And also my latent paranoia.

posted by Phillip at 3:41 PM

 
"That bwessed event..."

I feel like pulling a bit of a Neil Gaiman and let the entirety of this little bit of nowhere be wholly comprised of the joyfully bemused, casual remark: Fuck, I'm married.

The night however is rather late and having only just returned from the honeymoon (and right into an 8-hour afternoon/evening work shift), I'm not entirely in the mood and possessing of time to rant at great length.

Yet rest assured for all of you out there who were not on hand for the event: Melissa and I are now husband and wife, which means that somewhere down the line, we're going to have kids. God help the world. The day was beautiful and blue, and saw lots of silly photographs, limo rides, and processional & recessional music from the respective movies "Hannibal" (as in Lector) and "The Last Temptation of Christ." What can I say, I love the beautiful and the peculiar all at once.

The reception saw lots of dancing, lots of food, and a frightening set of bedsheet-oriented presents from 3-4 different people who all coincidentally and without consulting each other prior managed to buy linens, a duvet and a knitted afgan all with the same colour scheme. And Mel still refused to acknowledge the fact that we made her dance to Hubba Hubba Zoot Zoot.

And as for the honeymoon...bedroom inferences and "wink wink nudge nudge" jokes aside, it was a fun time spent at the Royal York Hotel in Toronto, and the Minolta Tower in Niagra Falls. Many books and pencil boards were purchased, many more books were purchased, waterfalls were admired, room service was ordered in the dead of night more than once, and poor Mel had to contend with an overly-romantic Owl Butterfly glomping itself onto the side of her face.

I have pictures. (ha ha!)

More thoughts, intimations and silly remarks will be sent along in the next few days, but for now I'm content to sit back and stare blankly at the large set of bags and luggage that now must be put away. Gyaaaaaa...

Today's Thought: Fuck, I'm married.




posted by Phillip at 6:41 PM

 
"The body is willing but the brain is weak."

There are 2 days until the wedding.

Today was spent in run-around-like-chicken-with-head-cut-off mode. Liturgies, hand-outs, wedding party gifts, champagne purchases, hair stylist rehearsals, homework, CD playlists for the ceremony and reception, and a 2-in-1 bridal/bachelor party for Mel & I thrown by our Toronto-based friends.

Happily that last one was exactly what I needed: something to unwind and momentarily forget about...well, everything else. This is what good friends are all about. That, and giving you alibis and spare shovels when you need to start hiding bodies. Tonight's fesitivies made me forget about the stress, the seemingly endless details to be work on, and more than anything, that damned Japanese language program built into my uncle's computer.

Work on the hand-out was halted when I found myself engaged in battle against said language program. The declaration of war was made as I type out a rough draft of the hand-out for the wedding ceremony, only to discover that my words were turning into nonsensical hiragana characters. I wish I could say I won. Alas, the Japanese language program defeated me, and I was left having absolutely no idea how the hell to type in English again.

My uncle showed me about an hour ago how to turn off that program. All it took was 2 clicks on the right icon, and the problem was solved. You've won this round, language program, but next time victory shall be mine. Oh yes, it shall be mine....

Today's Thought: did I ever tell you how tired and incoherent I am?


posted by Phillip at 10:58 PM

 
Five To Midnight

It's been one of those days. Not a "sometimes the bear eats you" day. Not an "I sat next to you on the bus" day. Not even a "the wolves are coming out of the walls!" day. It's simply been one of those days.

It was all preceded by a "body of a limp, dead noodle" night, where I discovered that I could have passed for a large Raggedy Andy doll, red yarn hair and poufish uniform not withstanding. My fiancee can attest to my seemingly boneless state, and how it was fun to roll me across the bed.

But enough about yesterday. Today began with potential...what that potential might have been for, I don't exactly know, but it seemed rather ominous if you ask me. I dragged myself out of bed--which wasn't exactly much of an effort since I woke up to discover that Mel had rolled herself up in the covers, leaving me nothing to curl up underneath. I has to quickly shower since the apartment complex was shutting down the water for most of day to do some repairs. This was just as well, since there were (and to an extent still are) scads of wedding details to continue sorting out.

And then I went to work, and opened the wrong store.

It's not like I went to an HMV and tried to open it instead of opening my Bentley store. When your job has you bouncing between a store and a kiosk, sometimes it gets hard to recall where you're supposed to wind up. I had marked myself down as opening the Bentley store. The manager of the Bentley store who showed up a few minutes later assured me that she was doing the opening.

But at least her cash float had already been nicely counted by me, which saved her some tedious work. I'd like to think that I open the wrong stores because I care. I'm also thinking that none of you are buying this attempt to save my ass from further embarrassment.

The evening has consisted of running around, packing, more running around, driving to Toronto, and realizing that have a whole bottle of Vanilla Coke at the start of a car trip that won't see any immediate bathroom breaks is not really a good idea.

I shall sleep now. Sleep is good.

Today has been long. Tomorrow gets even longer. Ideally I can survive. I'm sure I will; I just need to speak softly and carry a large tazer.

Today's Lesson: if you ever want to indulge your masochistic side, plan a wedding.


posted by Phillip at 9:24 PM

 
"We Named The Dog Indiana."

Today, I made a new and amazing discovery, one that made me feel like the adventurer Indiana Jones. Sure, I didn't have to brave angry mostly-naked natives or booby-traps that would have rendered me two-dimensional (though some people would argue I have a two-dimensional personality anyways), but much discovering was seen!

What amazing thing did I discover? The Holy Grail? Pants?

No, I discovered that the Walmart in the mall I work at has an aisle I hitherto had never before known to exist. There I was, walking along with my fiancee in tow, and suddenly I turned my head only to realize that there was an aisle I had never seen before. It stunned and amazed me.

My fiancee is currently standing behind me, shaking her head and rolling her eyes at me as I proudly tout my newfound earth-shaking discovery. Come to think of it, she did that when I first exclaimed in Walmart, "Hey, look! I found a new aisle here!"

Today's Lesson: geniuses are never appreciated in their own time.


posted by Phillip at 2:39 PM

 
If You Spit Off The Edge Of The World, Would There Be A Ripple In Space?

And this incredibly, existentially pointless question has been brought to you by a long day capping off a long week which has in turn capped off a long month which has in turn capped off a long year. That's a lot of capping, come to think of it. I wonder if I'm over a legal limit of some kind.

Oh well.

Today brings with it a brilliant yet useless observation. It's about music. Everyone has peculiar songs they like. Eveyone has loathsome songs they dislike. On any given day, some of Column A and some of Column B will pop into their head, and more often than not, they can't get rid of it.

As my uncle can attest, the Evangelion Fly Me To The Moon (Asuka's Bossa Techno version) falls under the "Damn you! Damn you for playing that before I went to work!" category.

For me there's been a combination of good and bad songs. And then there's one very unique song that holds a special place in my heart...er, head. It may sound strange. It may sound silly. And for most of you who know me well enough, it seems oddly appropriate. But fact is I cannot consider it a good day unless I have Scarecrow's song If I Only Had A Brain from the "Wizard of Oz" movie spontaneously popping into my head.

I will be sitting around or walking or working, and then suddenly I'll be humming the chorus. Then I find myself singing the line, "If I only had a brain!" Usually the song stops there. Probably because I know very little else of the actual lyrics. Yet this song surfaces in my daily goings-on almost without fail every day. I've grown rather fond of it.

So if one day I suddenly blurt aloud, "If I only had a brain!", you know why. You'll probably also agree that it would be nice if I only had a brain. But that's another self-depreciating moment we'll reserve for later.

In other news, this little bit of nowhere may very well fall off the edge of the world (though a cosmic wrinkle or ripple resulting has yet to be determined) over the next few days. The short of it is this: my fiancee is arriving tomorrow. To stay. Much rejoicing.

And somewhere out there, one of you reading this has started up with some acapella porno music...

Regardless, it's been about 2 months since we've been able to be together. And this will make it a 3-week time before the wedding. Half the items in my bedroom (notably the bed that makes it a 'bedroom') are gone, and sitting happily in their new apartment. The rest will ideally follow tomorrow. So will Mel. Tomorrow will be the first night we can spend together in a long time, and it will be done in our own, our first apartment.

So if you can't get a hold of us or find us, it's probably because we're celebrating. Or we're dead asleep since the last while has proven rather exhausting for both of us.

Hmm...upon rereading this, I see I was trying to sound quirky yet endearing, and I don't think I pulled either of them off very well. Oh well, you'll just have to make do with it. After all, it's been a very long week....

Today's Recant: sleep is good. (formerly was 'Sleep is for the weak!')


posted by Phillip at 7:54 PM

 
Karma?

And now, a definition of Ironic Timing:

You and your fiancee both receive promotions at your respective jobs...while you both live in different countries...and you're going to be married in 3 weeks...and she's about to move up to where you live in 3 days....

Riiiiiiiiiiiight.

Today's Lesson: life will never cease to be interesting. As such, it's highly recommended one carries a spare barfbag for those occasions when life starts to spin around rather fast.




posted by Phillip at 7:56 PM

 
A Bachelor's Built For 2

It could be said that certain doom smells a lot like burnt cookies. Alternately, almost-certain-doom smells a lot like gasoline. Or barring that, turpentine. Such smells do not tend to garner any sort of status on my "Good Things" list. Especially when such gasoline-enriched smells are coming from a basement where there is no gasoline supply of any sort.

Suffice to say, the next-door neighbours tend to treat their house garage like an actual mechanic's garage. They did some heavy engine work on a car of theirs a few days ago, and then just sealed shut the garage. Those of you who've taken WHMIS courses on proper ventilation of noxious and dangerous fumes are all cringing right now, I'm sure.

Since this place happens to be a duplex of sorts, we learned very quickly that their garage needed to air out. Two days of gasoline fumes building and building in their garage seeped into our basement. If none of what I'm writing makes sense, it's probably because I'm still a bit high on the fumes. At the very least, they were informed and have opened their garage door to let all the toxic odours escape into the wild.

I am, though, rather impressed that their garage didn't spontaneously combust. Anyone lighting a match near that place would have probably been killed by the flying, flaming lawnmower if the initial blast didn't do it first.

Neighbours like this worry me. I really don't care all that much if they decide to be reckless idiots and nearly blow themselves to bits. It's their perogative to at least try, if they feel so inclined. It's that whole I-live-next-to-you-and-would-probably-be-blown-up-too part I'm not fond of. That part I do care about.

Happily, this won't be a worry in the near future.

Why? Well, I am soon to be joining the ranks of the few, the free, the rent-paying public. Yes indeed, an apartment has been found for Mel, myself and Shady the Shih-tzu to settle down in as the wedding comes and goes. It's not the grandest of places by any stretch. It's a far cry from luxury, and it's not near my place of work (though it is next to a major bus route).

But it's going to be ours.

It's probably been 2 years since I've been able to call any place I've stayed at a home. A house, certainly. Someone else's house, definitely. But for all that they've been, the good and the bad, there were not a home. More to the point, they were not my home. Perhaps it's a territorial thing (though many of you will no doubt be happy to know I don't mark the doors or doorways of whatever room I happen to live in), but I like having something decisively all mine. When you live in someone else's place, it's hard to bring yourself to call it a home. It's nothing more than a domicile, a fixed location.

I may be there, but my heart is not.

Looking around the empty 1-bedroom apartment a few days ago, right after the lease and last month's deposit had been signed, brought with it an unexpected smile to my face. I stood there in an empty, tiled living room with white walls and large balcony windows, and realized this was where I was going to live. Not just myself, but my fiancee and my dog as well. This was where something I could call a family would begin. It was something I would be supporting. It was something I had fought for, in more ways than one.

It had lost the feel of just another building, of just another apartment. It had life. It had warmth. It had potential. It was someplace I suddenly knew I could call a home. More than that, it would be our home.

If you happen across me on the street in the next few days, and ask my why I've got such a quiet, enigmatic smile on my face, I may tell you, "Because there's a home waiting for me when I leave here."

Today's Lesson: great things start with small beginnings. And, always air out your garage on a regular basis, just in case it suddenly decides to try and spontaneously combust on you.



posted by Phillip at 6:36 PM

 
Blarg....

The past few days have been nothing short of frenetic. I think that word has something to do with frenzy, and if it does, then it's an apt description of what I've seen, endured and almost amazingly survived. If it does not, those of you haughtily waggling thesauruses at me will be shot first. Those haughtily waggling dictionaries will also be shot first. (What can I say, I like imaginary weapons with large kill zone spreads.)

The details and dizziness can all come about in a later bit of nowhere. Right now this last week has finally caught up to me, and it's late enough in the evening for me to want to sleep. Suffice it to say, a lot of things can be said, not so many things will be said, and a few things will be left unsaid.

In the meantime, I shall leave you with this...

Anecdote of the Day: the scent of a pizza box being accidentally baked in the oven smells a lot like a computer harddrive about to burst into flames. I can now personally attest to this. And since I know at least 1 person will ask: no, I wasn't the one who cooked the pizza box.


posted by Phillip at 5:50 PM

 
Shinju

As I was working at the kiosk, talking on the phone with the store manager, a most peculiar thing happened. Two bags perched on the top shelf of the kiosk suddenly leapt right off the kiosk together. This wasn't one tipping into the other like dominoes. If I didn't know any better, I could swear that both bags jumped together of their own volition.

It's not like they were the same type of bags either. Pardon the technical this-guy-knows-way-too-much-about-it jargon, but one was a green Roots-brand schoolbag with a single over-the-shoulder strap. The other was a red Point Zero-brand postman bag. They seemingly shared nothing in common.

So why would they both attempt to leap to their deaths (or escape) from atop the kiosk counter?

One could go for the old Shakespearean Romeo & Juliet angle, and that the two bags had fallen in love despite the rival name brands they wore. Forced to admit that their vastly opposing corporate logo-families would never approve, the two bags decided to commit shinju: a lover's double-suicide.

Like a pair of ill-fated young lovers leaping from a cliff into a low tide and a cove filled with scads of painfully sharp rocks, the Roots one-shoulder and the Point Zero postman felt that it would be better to acknowledge their life of live by tragically ending it.

Not that it really amounted to much in the end, since I just tossed them back onto the kiosk counter. And there's also the fact that they're inanimate objects too.

Today's Lesson: when you are asking for a glimmer of hope or a sign of confidence from someone, don't overlook what they're already presenting before you.


posted by Phillip at 8:51 PM

 
"And Brace Yourself, Because This Is Really Going To Hurt..." (Take 2)

When there’s a lull in your work shift when barely anyone stops in to peruse you merchandise, it can be a welcomed change from the usual madcap rush of a retail store. When there’s a longer than usual lull in your work shift, it can be a wonderful chance for you to tackle a number of tasks that could otherwise never get finished since you’d be always interrupted by customers. And when that lull reaches out to encompass, oh, most of the whole day, you quickly discover how easily your brain can be entertained.

Entertaining brains even in a shallow fashion is preferred over having your brain get so bored that it decides to vacate your cranium and take a tour of the wolf just to get some stimulation. So with that said, prepare for an extraordinary exhibition of the silly and sad antics of those we call: the bored-bored-bored-bored kiosk employee!

The horrible ailment know as “Boredomus Non-Compus Stimulus” (which in all likelihood can be found in the textbook, “False Medical Conditions and Diseases”) first began to set in the later hours of my shift. And by that I mean 11am...which is rather sad considering how the 8-hour shift began at 9:30am. As the boredom set in, it caused me to contemplate giving a discarded Bob The Builder keychain doll a frontal lobotomy. It was a discarded keychain doll to begin with, so I probably could have gotten away with it too.

This subsequently led me to consider a brain transplant between Bob and a Winnie-the-Pooh knapsack doll. After all, it is widely known that Pooh has fuzz for brains, and I was wiling to bet that Bob would make for a compatible donor despite his apparent skills in construction.

For such precision surgery, I decided the best course of action as using one of the company’s matknives in lieu of a scalpel. In the end, though, I decided against this radical if not brilliant experimental surgery. First off, I had no anesthetic. Second, I had no malpractice insurance. And after that admittedly misguided attempt involving a grafting of Mr. Potato Head’s facial features onto Barbie’s head, better safe than sorry.

This is not by any means an indication that it ended there.

Hours passed by with all the speed of a bonsai tree. Desperation swelled like an overripe goiter. Pathetic analogies were constructed with all the respect and class of the Batman & Robin movie.

But then I was rescued by something most unexpected: a change of places. Yes indeed, I was switched over to the kiosk. Surely a change of scenery would do me good! And it did. However, the complete lack of anyone stopping to check out the kiosk’s merchandise, was not so good. Yet once again I was rescued by something even more unexpected: cardboard!

Yes indeed, cardboard. A number of smallish cardboard boxes had been collapsed and were sitting in a pile in the kiosk, just waiting to be sent to the recycling bin. But I had other plans for them in the meantime, oh yes...

At first I set two of the small, collapsed boxes down on the shiny mall floor, and used them as skis. I happily glided about inside that narrow walking strip in my kiosk, thinking that if it was winter outside, I could pretend I was out skiing. Though knowing my luck, I’d manage to clock myself into an imaginary tree and have the paramedics take me to the hospital for a strange concussion.

Then when the ski trip was over and I could no longer hole up in the chalet drinking hot chocolate, I took these same collapsed boxes and randomly set them down on the floor of the kiosk’s little walkway. For the next hour, I only stepped on the collapsed boxes, going so far as to delude suddenly-six-year-old myself into thinking that the mall floor within the kiosk might be some terrible, horrible, no-good-very-bad stream of oatmeal. Evil oatmeal. Evil undead oatmeal.

Today’s Disclaimer: not all oatmeal is evil or undead, and the views expressed in this particular bit of nowhere are by no means derisive or definitive. Oatmeal advocates and lovers need not start protesting this Little Bit of Nowhere.


posted by Phillip at 7:21 PM

 
"And Brace Yourself, Because This Is Really Going To Hurt...."

When there’s a lull in your work shift when barely anyone stops in to peruse you merchandise, it can be a welcomed change from the usual madcap rush of a retail store. When there’s a longer than usual lull in your work shift, it can be a wonderful chance for you to tackle a number of tasks that could otherwise never get finished since you’d be always interrupted by customers. And when that lull reaches out to encompass, oh, most of the whole day, you quickly discover how easily your brain can be entertained.

Entertaining brains even in a shallow fashion is preferred over having your brain get so bored that it decides to vacate your cranium and take a tour of the wolf just to get some stimulation. So with that said, prepare for an extraordinary exhibition of the silly and sad antics of those we call: the bored-bored-bored-bored kiosk employee!

The horrible ailment know as "Boredomus Non-Compus Stimulus" (which in all likelihood can be found in the textbook, "False Medical Conditions and Diseases") first began to set in the later hours of my shift. And by that I mean 11am...which is rather sad considering how the 8-hour shift began at 9:30am. As the boredom set in, it caused me to contemplate giving a discarded Bob The Builder keychain doll a frontal lobotomy. It was a discarded keychain doll to begin with, so I probably could have gotten away with it too.

This subsequently led me to consider a brain transplant between Bob and a Winnie-the-Pooh knapsack doll. After all, it is widely known that Pooh has fuzz for brains, and I was wiling to bet that Bob would make for a compatible donor despite his apparent skills in construction.

For such precision surgery, I decided the best course of action as using one of the company’s matknives in lieu of a scalpel. In the end, though, I decided against this radical if not brilliant experimental surgery. First off, I had no anesthetic. Second, I had no malpractice insurance. And after that admittedly misguided attempt involving a grafting of Mr. Potato Head’s facial features onto Barbie’s head, better safe than sorry.

This is not by any means an indication that it ended there.

Hours passed by with all the speed of a bonsai tree. Desperation swelled like an overripe goiter. Pathetic analogies were constructed with all the respect and class of the Batman & Robin movie.

But then I was rescued by something most unexpected: a change of places. Yes indeed, I was switched over to the kiosk. Surely a change of scenery would do me good! And it did. However, the complete lack of anyone stopping to check out the kiosk’s merchandise, was not so good. Yet once again I was rescued by something even more unexpected: cardboard!

Yes indeed, cardboard. A number of smallish cardboard boxes had been collapsed and were sitting in a pile in the kiosk, just waiting to be sent to the recycling bin. But I had other plans for them in the meantime, oh yes...

At first I set two of the small, collapsed boxes down on the shiny mall floor, and used them as skis. I happily glided about inside that narrow walking strip in my kiosk, thinking that if it was winter outside, I could pretend I was out skiing. Though knowing my luck, I’d manage to clock myself into an imaginary tree and have the paramedics take me to the hospital for a strange concussion.

Then when the ski trip was over and I could no longer hole up in the chalet drinking hot chocolate, I took these same collapsed boxes and randomly set them down on the floor of the kiosk’s little walkway. For the next hour, I only stepped on the collapsed boxes, going so far as to delude suddenly-six-year-old myself into thinking that the mall floor within the kiosk might be some terrible, horrible, no-good-very-bad stream of oatmeal. Evil oatmeal. Evil undead oatmeal.

Today’s Disclaimer: not all oatmeal is evil or undead, and the views expressed in this particular bit of nowhere are by no means derisive or definitive. Oatmeal advocates and lovers need not start protesting this Little Bit of Nowhere.


posted by Phillip at 7:54 AM

 
A Lemony Snickett State-Of-Mind

What’s this? Suddenly this little of nowhere has an occupant again? Doest your eyes deceive you? Well, they’re only deceiving you if you somehow see the image of a giant commando carrot somewhere on this page. But other than that, yes indeed, there is life yet in this little bit of nowhere.

So where have I been, you ask? And furthermore, you still ask, where’s Waldo? While I cannot answer the latter question, I can say that a series of unpleasant if not unfortunate events has been dogging me the last few days, and where my philosophy is concerned it’s good to stay silent when you’d as soon not talk to people.

Certainly the last few days have by no means been wonderful, but I’m not about to dwell on them and rant and whine and complain. That will really accomplish nothing, and besides, I have already set my resolve to move past them. Winston Churchill was indeed right when he once said, "When you’re marching through hell, keep marching."

And besides, that’s not to say that nothing of the peculiarly ridiculous has crossed my paths in the last few days either. Why, just the other day I discovered that my sex appeal extends to more than mere elevator doors: I was goosed by a laptop carrier bag. I had placed it atop the cash counter and was filling it with the usual crumpled paper so as to let customers see how much the bag can hold. Well, I turned my back on it for but a brief second to grab another handful of stuffing…and the next thing I know, my ass had been smacked.

Some of you may argue that the bag was just sitting off-balance, and just happened to smack my ass by sheer accident when it toppled over. But I’m pretty sure this whole incident was pre-meditated on the laptop carrier’s part. I’m suddenly concerned to turn my back on the large 29' luggage carriers we have in the store….

I should also add that nothing is so amusing in the morning as coming into the mall and seeing a kindly old lady with a flyswatter, racing madly across the foodcourt in an ultimately futile attempt to swat an offending fly. She almost managed a kill over the course of five different swats on five different foodcourt tables before giving up.

In other news, I note that Fox Kids is adding a new TV Anime series to their Saturday morning line-up: Shaman King. For those unawares, the series is about a bunch of people (most of then in high school) who are shamans and can communicate with the spirits of the dead. In fact, these shamans are so good that they can use these spirits in actual combat, and the one destined to be the ultimate Shaman (or, the Shaman King, for those of you not paying attention to the title of the series) has to contend with a lot of very nasty shamans who want that mantle and power for themselves.

Oddly enough, when I first learned about this being picked up for, of all things, a Saturday morning slot, my first thought was not to cringe and say, "I hope they don’t botch up the series when they dub it." Nor did I think, "Well, one more series to help Anime become more accepted as not-just-for-kids."

Knowing full well the shamanic nature of the series, my first thought was this: the betting pool is open as to how fast overreactive parents and religious groups panic about the series and start protesting.

Today’s Lesson: even if life hands you lemons, you still need sugar and an outdoor stand before cashing in on any sort of lemonade.


posted by Phillip at 8:25 AM

 
"Bad Coke, No Biscuit!"

And the calvalcade of catastrophes continues! That colourful bit of alliteration aside, yesterday saw more incidents involving inanimate objects trying to usurp my authority on this planet. Now I'm not overly paranoid or anything; I don't live in fear of being subjected to an alien rectal probe, nor do I believe that the second shooter on the grassy knoll was in fact a squirrel trained by the CIA as a sniper. However, yesterday's events give me reason to be suspicious that my bike is nursing some lingering homicidal tendencies.

There I am, biking to work, when I cross over a bridge. It's right about then that the chain on my bike decides it no longer wants to be dragged back and forth along all those gears. It tries to break free, and discovers that, like chickens, it can't fly away to freedom. This proved rather troublesome for me, since the chain is somewhat needed to keep both forward momentum and balance. I'm sure that amidst all the panicked "I-think-I-just-wet-myself!" expressions on my face in those few seconds, I looked very unimpressed.

More than likely, that sort of look occurred when I realized I had to choose between two options as my bike careened wildly in its Jenny-Craig-thin bike lane. I could crash into the curb of the sidewalk, which is higher than most other curbs since it's on a newly-renovated bridge. Or I could crash into the cars driving along next to me. For as tempted as I was to snag that lovely little BMW hood ornament as my hapless body bounced over the bumper, I chose the sidewalk.

The bike manages to do some sort of potentially physics-defying move by sliding sideways with the front and back tires parallel to each other, and both of the bike tires hit the curb at the same time. This is followed by the rest of the bike hitting the sidewalk. That, of course, is followed by the rest of me hitting the sidewalk. Happily, all my gymnastics skills saved my face from going all Phantom of the Opera-ish, and I was able to put my hands out and stop my head from cracking against the concrete with a few inches to spare.

And yes, I am well aware that could have also given way to a substancial hairline fracture of the wrists.

In the end, the chain was scolded severely and rethreaded onto the teeth of the gear, and I managed to make it to work on time, albeit with a slight limp. It's nothing to worry and go, "Oh, does it hurt?", because quite frankly, yes it hurts. It's not a horrible pain, but when you manage to connect the top of your kneecap with the edge of the curb, then hurt will come of it. It's more of an annoyance than anything, and most of that is directed at the bike for letting the chain get so uppity.

Later on that evening, as John & I sat around outside drinking our respective caffeine-enriched draughts, we tried to teach a Coke can to sit/stay. It only listened half the time, but it really seemed to know how to "roll over...and over and over", which does make me optimistic about teaching the Coke can to fetch my a newspaper and slippers in the mornings.

Life-Affirming Link of the Day: http://www.8legged.com/


posted by Phillip at 4:02 PM

 
Chaos Vs. Window....Gravity Wins!!

There are people in this world who have a strange connection, a bond if you will, between the most unlikely of things. You have your horse whisperers and pet psychiatrists; your automechanics who can simply listen to a car and know what the problem is; and your web-surfers who have an uncanny, William Gibsonesque knack for intuitively finding exactly what they want on the Net, no matter how obscure and nigh impossible to find, within 2 minutes.

And then there is me. I have a peculiar link with inanimate objects. Whatever this nexus is, it involves a lot of petty-bickering and what could best be described as childish sibling rivalry. I have had to battle a pair of shorts in an attempt to escape them. I have killed kettles. And I've been involved in a lot of other silly, embarrassing incidents/melees that I'd rather not go into right now.

The latest escapade involved the screen in my bedroom window. At first I thought it was a screen held in with a latch and a really horrid set of hinges that needed replacing. Today I discovered that my window screen is in fact held in place with only a latch. I had opened the screen about an inch or so, which was as much as it seemed to allow, and then tried closing it. The screen, it seems, had other ideas. And so the battle of wills and wits ensued. And in the end, I think we both came out losers.

I fought to bring in the persnickety screen and latch it shut. Then with a great heave I brought the latch into the frame...and the screen demonstrated that Newton knew his stuff. Out pops the screen, and down it plummets onto a hapless and unsuspecting plastic deckchair below. I, however, am standing there with my head now sticking outside of the house, drumming my fingertips upon the windowframe and thankful that the only witnesses around to see that were the birds.

A quick trip downstairs and onto the back patio, and the screen was retrieved. I guess the landing took out most of the screen's proverbial wind, since there was very little of a fight as I now put the entire screen back into place in my window. The battle has ended, but I fear the relationship between the windowscreen and myself will ever be the same again...

In other news, I have recently been entertaining the notion of starting up my own webpage: www.dingosateyourbaby.com If anything should come of it, I'm betting it's a lawsuit.

Today's Lesson: the window screen in my bedroom takes approximately 2.3 seconds (or the time it takes for one to casually remark, "Well, shit.") to fall from its window frame on the second floor and have its landing be softened by one of the plastic patio chairs.


posted by Phillip at 4:54 PM

 
And Now Here's The Buckinghams With "Kind Of A Drag"...

The short of it is: closing paperwork for retail stores really deserves to die a horrible, horrible death and spend the rest of forever writhing in anguish and damnation in the 9th level of Dante's Inferno, where it is constantly being chewed by one of the mouths of Lucifer's three faces.

The not-so-short of it is: my second time closing the kiosk ever found a single "oops" involving an early printing of a cash balance list that proved damned near impossible to rectify. Sure, I learned what the problem was (don't print it until closing) and will never repeat it again so long as I live, but try to fix it, and...gyaaaaaa. I was supposed to depart 9:15ish at the latest. I left the mall at 9:50.

I am...displeased.

Today's Lesson: for the love of God, never EVER print out the Z-reading for the store until you are closing.


posted by Phillip at 7:10 PM

 
Paranoia Groove

For reasons that escape me, there are three Bentley-related stores in the mall. Two of them are kiosks called "Unic", usually pronounced You-nick. I do have a problem with that pronounciation since it bears a striking resemblance to the word eunuch. It's unnerving being the only guy working at a store that seems to proudly tote its male employees as being castrated man-servants.

Equally unnverving is the location of one of the Unic kiosks, which happens to be in the mall corridor right in front of a Silk & Satin lingerie store. I was covering another employee's lunch break at that kiosk, and the entire time I could feel the eyes of those scantily-clad models on their cardboard backing giving me these sultry looks when I wasn't looking. It's really does make one twitchy, regardless of the push-up bras they are showcasing.

In other news, necessity is indeed the mother of invention. This portion of today's Little Bit of Nowhere can be aptly titled, Don't Worry, I Saw This In A Macguyver Episode. My family volunteers making dinner Tuesday nights at a soup kitchenesque establishment. One that has an inherent lack of manual can openers, and a really fancy-looking automated can opener that really only opens air; if you try to give it a can to open, it gets all snobbish and refuses to cut into the lid for you. Well, when forced without any working can opener at all, my Dad managed to pry open a large metal tin of coffee using a knife sharpener (the metal baton-shaped kind) and a dulled meat cleaver. Go Dad.

Today's Lesson: there is such a thing as a "wrong side of the bed" and waking up on it. Subsequently there is also such a thing as a "right side of the shower" and counteracting the wrong side of the bed by standing there. It's somewhere around the stream of nice warm water....




posted by Phillip at 6:24 PM

 
Magical Blog +1

Rarely do I ever like to think of my Little Bit of Nowhere as a blog or an online diary/journal. It is, by definition, a little bit of nowhere. Quite frankly, I get easily bored and annoyed with myself when I openly whine and vent about the silly things in my life that occur. And you should too. Why listen to me vent when you can hear me rant in glorious Dolby 5.1 surround?

Okay, so you can't actually hear anything in a textual medium, but just gloss over that.

Today's rant is about why I'm avoiding the main floor of the house like the plague. Namely because it smells like the plague. A horrid, cheap, nauseous, anti-bacterial-smelling plague, to be precise. Someone decided it would be an idea to air out the house with some sort of sprintime fresh scent, so they plugged in a no-name air freshener. The debate currently rages on about whether or not this idea was good. I think the intended pleasant odour died somewhere in the freshener, and all I'm smelling right now is the initial decomposing stage.

You know the soap dispensors you find in those clubs or public bathrooms that no one in their right mind ever goes to, the bathrooms whose names even the street gangs whisper in frightened, cautionary voices? Do you remember how sickening that pinkish goo the label tried to reassure you was soap smelled? Well, the closest sort of description to this odour is skin-crawling pinkish soap-goo. Every time I catch a trace of that unnatural smell, that's the first thing I think of.

This is one of those scents not found in nature. I offer this up as proof that human beings sometimes go too far. Play God by creating new (and not necessarily pleasant) smells? While we're at it, let's open up a children's petting zoo featuring Velociraptors.

So here I sit before my Little Bit of Nowhere, safe in the depths of the dungeony basement where the corrosive smells of the "air freshener" cannot reach me. Sadly, I cannot remain in my Little Bit of Nowhere forever. Sooner or later I must venture out from its protective walls, and brave the dreaded stench upstairs. But until that happens, I revel in being able to write this without my face turning the colour of mint toothpaste from the smell.

Today's Lesson: fear not death. Fear the smell of it.


posted by Phillip at 2:24 PM

 
"Would You Come To My House And Lick My Table?"

The temptation to utter those words in stammering, adoring fashion to one of my favourite, illustrious and rather jovial authors, Neil Gaiman, was overwhelming yesterday. Not to actually have the honour of him actually licking any of my tables, but just to see the look on Neil Gaiman’s face. I enjoy making everybody’s day more surreal.

And he really has nothing to worry anyways; I don’t own any tables.

But yesterday was thoroughly enjoyable as I loitered around a Chapters bookstore for a few hours amidst throngs of other Gaiman fans, eager for the chance to walk up to the distinguished writer, try to sound cool and coherent, and in the end only manage to drool and make Wookiesque noises. Fortunately, I did not require a bib.

There’s nothing like a line of fans to inspire outlandish silliness. Especially when one shows up two hours before the signing just to get a good spot in the growing line, and you wind up getting stuck in the section filled with nothing but computer programming manuals. I can only read so much about C++ and Java before throwing caution to the wind (or in this case, the HVAC systems) and conjuring up strange ideas.

Initially, there were two of us setting off on the quest for Neil Gaiman’s book signing. My friend Kevin decided to surprise everyone by showing up in Toronto all of a sudden. I learned this when I buzzed in at the front lobby of my uncle’s apartment, and instead of his voice, I have Kevin saying, "Ah, wonderful! The crossdresser’s arrived!"

Naturally, this loud question being broadcasted through the intercom speakers garnered some funny looks in my direction. I think we almost gave that poor elderly lady a heart attack. Don’t understand why she seemed so upset, though. I mean, I only crossdress on Thursdays!

So the next day, Kevin and I meandered into the line-up. Being there two hours early earned us a place where only 30 people were ahead of us. Beforehand, we had decided to try and be witty by finding a banana daiquiri for Neil. Apparently this is more difficult a task than you’d think: the local liquor stores had no such thing. All they had were strawberry daiquiris and banana mudslides. We really should have bought a banana mudslide for Neil.

After all, if the scientific rumours are true, bananas might be extinct in a decade or so, and he should really enjoy them while he has the chance.

During our wait, we were given a coupon for a free Spinach & Artichoke Dip that could be used at the restaurant across the street from Chapters. Upon retrospection, I really should have given this coupon to Neil too. That way be could have had a dip and a mudslide!

But alas, I was unable to demonstrate such Canadian hospitality and thoughtfulness.

There was also a quest amidst all this. It was a great and epic and holy quest. I quested throughout the downtown core of Toronto to seek out a copy of Good Omens, written by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. Like the banana daiquiri, this adventure turned out to be more arduous than initially expected.

"How hard is it to find a popular paperback in downtown Toronto?" you may ask.

Pretty damned hard, as a matter of fact.

The Chapters where the signing was taking place did not have any copies. The equally enormous Indigo Books store in the not-so-large-as-very-long-and somewhat-deep Eaton’s Centre mall did not have any such book. But perchance would the World’s Biggest Bookstore have one? Nope.

In the end, a small Coles bookstore tucked away in the lower dungeony depths of the Eaton’s Centre had Good Omens. A lot of them. You’d think they had stolen all the books from their competitors and were hording them on their own shelves. So Good Omens was purchased. And it killed an hour of waiting for me so that was an added bonus. Sure, Kevin languished in the bookstore as he kept our place, but if you can’t exploit your friends then who can you?

And then Neil Gaiman graced us with his presence. I was half-expecting there to be a procession of nubile, faerie maidens prancing down the book aisles casting petals of flowers before Neil as he sauntered to his signing table, but I guess in the end there wasn’t enough in the budget for that. At the very least they were able to afford a Depeche Mode CD which they played during the first hour of his signing.

I wonder if that was at Gaiman’s request?

Anyhoo, soon enough it was time for Kevin and I to stand before his Gaimanness, and place our offerings of books for him to sign. With Good Omens atop my stack, I gazed wistfully at him and gushed (though I might be paraphrasing), "I am such a big fan of yours, Sir! It’s such an honour to meet...hey, wait a minute! You’re not Terry Pratchett!"

Whereupon Neil laughed and said, "No, no I’m not."

Whereupon I turned to Kevin and said, "You told me we were meeting the author of Good Omens!"

Whereupon Kevin said, "He IS one of the authors of Good Omens. There’s two of them! See, his name is right after Terry Pratchett’s!"

Whereupon I said, "Oh. Carry on then."

After my books were signed and lovingly caressed (though the Chapters employee attending to Gaiman’s every need and whim expressly forbid me from putting any of his freshly signed books down my pants in Neil Gaiman’s presence), I asked if I could take my photograph with him. And Neil cheerfully agreed.

Go Neil.

I scooted around the table and stood next to him, and he lifted his head for the typical pose stance. But then I asked, "Should I assume some sort of pose or something here?" Neil immediately went back to signing Kevin’s books (Kevin was taking the picture at the time) and told me to, "Leer menacingly."

Well, who was I to argue?

So there’s a picture on my camera waiting to be developed with Neil Gaiman signing a book, and me leaning over his shoulder with this evil, "Oh yes, you want to sign this book or else I shall force-feed you that horrible screenplay for The Sandman!"

Now this picture was taken without the flash, and I really didn’t know if the picture would turn out properly since the lighting was questionable. (I still won’t know until the pictures are developed.) So another picture was taken.

Neil added, "Leer not so menacingly this time."

So ideally the second picture will be of Neil Gaiman signing a book, with me peering over his shoulder as if I’m not sure if he’s really signing it and just faking the pen motions, or else because I’m still not sure if he’s really Terry Pratchett.

After the signing, I flitted off like some drunken hummingbird, happily clutching at my signed books and singing Scarecrow’s "If I Only Had A Brain" to myself. Overall, if I had to describe the experience, my single-word response would be: inspiring. Being an aspiring writer and novelist myself, it was a wonderful experience to simply be around a fun and imaginative author.

I’ve managed to get back into writing more in the last few days--an impressive feat considering I’m balancing it alongside a fiancée, a wedding, a job, and an apartment hunt. One day I hope to be there signing books at a table next to Neil Gaiman. One day I hope to write a book with Neil Gaiman...well, actually he could do most of the writing and I’d just share in the glory.

One day....

In the meantime, it suddenly occurs to me that I still need to mention my newest book idea to Neil and see if he thinks it might work. Personally, I think Neverwhere’s Waldo? would be a surefire best-seller.

Today’s Lesson: Neil Gaiman is not Terry Pratchett.


posted by Phillip at 5:50 PM