I hereby declare myself an Axis of Evil! I don't like people who aren't like me! I revel in complaints! Every single advertisement in the Canadian Reader's Digest offends me! I develop facial tics if the bus is more than one minute late! I lash out at any film that doesn't mirror my own opinions and views! Snivelling babies at restaraunts should be stranded to Baby-Australia! My cat is too needy! People should agree with me more! I'm not successful because I'm not challenged! Booze is too expensive! All my addictions are blessings and people need to stop making snide remarks behind righteous eyes! Curly hair is better! Coin collections are absurd, as are the people who purchase them! Cashiers should be faster, like me! I'm proud of my undesirable friends! Damn the pre-teen girls with thong underwear wrenched up over the waistlines of their rolled-down jeans! Damn the jocks who believe that large jaws and monosyllabic speech is sexy! Away with pop music, except for the bands that I like! Batteries should last longer! I should be given more discounts! Nothing is good enough for me and I should be compensated for this!
A strange, strange weekend of sushi out, the Felicita's patio, snapping pictures in the graveyard, the Rule Game at Jess's bachelor pad, martinis for breakfast, free beer at Pippa-and-Jay's going-away party, hot-boxing P's new pimped-up van (there is a mirror in the back, no seats), housecleaning, settling up another large library fine, Futurama, an egg-mushroom-tomato-bagels brunch cooked by Matt, and brooding in various areas of the house. I guess that's not so strange, strange after all. But things felt a little detached. I felt best in the graveyard, under a large tree. There is a quiet finality to shady graveyards that makes me want to read many books in my pajamas, and say good things about people.
An encounter between myself and a man of at least 60, both of us with beers in hand:
MAN: What's your name?
ME: Joy.
MAN: Oh! Joy! You must be joyous! Are you a joyous person?
ME: Well, I'm a bit more of a manic-depressive, I think.
MAN: Oh, you should hang out with me some time. I would make you joyous 100 per cent of the time!
MAN'S FRIEND: You idiot. She said she was manic-depressive. She's probably joyous like, 50 per cent of the time, anyway.
Tomorrow I rise at 7a.m. yet again, for work. I can't believe my stamina. I am in total awe of myself. Never in my wildest dreams, this.
I have missed the deadline for the Monday Magazine Summer Fiction Writing contest. Damn. This is like the fifth year in a row I've done that. I'm never going to win now. Must find someone to blame.
Gah! Bumped into Jess during my break today, and she very helpfully reminded me of a few of the things I'd done on Friday night (early evening, really) that I had forgotten: including throwing a beer bottle off the porch and onto the street (I hate people who do that - fucken yahoos - there is flimsy evidence that SB suggested I do it, though), and getting into a "ferocious" wrestling match/ fist fight with M, who I hardly know at all. (It's such a pity Joy doesn't get rowdy when she drinks.) I feel like a huge idiot.
Writing thang last night - very good, very good. I drank tea and was calm.
A very seedy Friday - on the campus pub patio by 1:30 in the afternoon, the usual campus pub patio crew, me calling people "ethnocentric" when there was absolutely no reason for it; drawings of clitorises that were mistaken for olives; charging over to my workplace yet again (this time with 2 others) to pester our boss to come out for a drink (which he eventually did); a fight with the lover at the bus loop; make-up sex on the floor of the hallway half an hour later; debauchery at Jess's house, the highlight of which was probably Matt and I trying to convince everybody to have an orgy with us, a huge tangle of bodies on the bed that went nowhere (though I think I remember kissing a girl - which one, I know not - and then being gently but firmly pushed away); yahooing on the patio high above Quadra St., smashed beer bottles (full ones); a screaming match between myself and M regarding Can-Lit (of all things! I am living a nightmare); Jess's cat scratching the shit out of my right hand; stumbling home, Matt with hand grabbing my backpack so I wouldn't fall; waking up in the morning with a swoollen toe and no cigarettes.
Then on Saturday I dyed my hair purple. It's purple now! I look like a mixture of Costa Rican prostitute, shrivelled fortune teller, and wistful dreamer ..... (Actually that's not true; I didn't do a terribly good job, and I'm thinking of blowing $45 to have it redone at a salon - this, when I can't afford bus fare.) Matt dyed his hair blue, and it looks fabulous. We're calling each other "Blue" and "Purple" now, and I swear, it's too cute for words .... I still have purple dye staining my hands, and was forced to eat popcorn with chop-sticks for fear of poisoning myself.
Had lunch at Hime Sushi yesterday. I'm still in sensory-pleasure-shock. What is it about sushi that makes me want to cry and die happy?
Have seen 2 movies lately: "Melvin Goes to Dinner" (decent; shitty ending; reminiscent of "My Dinner With Andre" only not as good and a bit more scathing), and an Afghani film called "Osama." I was blown away by that one. It's about a girl, about 12, who is nearly killed when the Taliban comes to power, so she disguises herself as a boy. As far as I know it's the first Afghani film in history, and although I was frustrated by the flow of the narrative (probably a stupid cultural bias on my part), the photography was astounding, and it's the kind of subject matter that haunts. I had nightmares after; so did Matt. I hugely recommend.
I've been reading interviews with famous people that I like. Here are some cool quotes.
Jeff Lyon: Name one thing people can do to better the world.
Wil Wheaton: Stop being so fucking judgmental of each other, and hold the door open every once and awhile, you bastards.
(from www.usedwigs.com)
Guy Maddin: I had a brother who killed himself on his girlfriend's grave. It's like something out of German romanticism. My father caught on fire during an argument with my mom and ran through the house asking for help from every one of his useless children, until he finally just turned into an ash on the marriage bed. My aunt, with whom I lived, did hair for 50 years and then got hit by a car and it knocked all the hair off her head. I don't know, these things are just melodramatic and poetically apt.
(from www.indiewire.com)
Irene D'Souza: Did you like the film version of The Handmaid's Tale?
Margaret Atwood: The end was weird. I think the acting was good. I wouldn't have had her in a red trailer on top of a hill hiding out from people in helicopters.
(from herizons.ca)
Everything is so surreal.
On Wednesdays and Thursdays I work at SUBtext till 1 and then my phone-job starts at 5. I've made the somewhat resigned decision to remain on-campus the entire 4 hours, and it's starting to get to me. First I have lunch (a falafal burger and fries) in what used to be Vertigo Nightclub and is now a lunch/study place. I sit at a small wooden table near the dancefloor and smear my fries through the ketchup, reminiscing about the drunken nights here, the dancing, the intoxication of the lights and the music, the crazed activity by the bar, the clink of coins, the shouts and revelry and tears and cigarettes. Now there is only the low hum of students on their lunch breaks, papers rustling, chairs squeaking. A pile of old boxes, filled with recycling, rests on the surface of the purple bar where pitchers of beer and gloriously cheap cocktails once changed hands.
Then I wander. I wander all over UVic, flopping down in the shade to read a magazine, then moving to the sun for a nap, then scribbling in my notebook near the fountain, then haunting the computer labs and buying snacks from the vending machines. It feels like being homeless - nowhere to hang your hat, nowhere to relax, just roaming back and forth, waiting, waiting, waiting, for four hours.
Everybody notice the new link on the sidebar: it will take you to the charming blog of Elisa, my sister-in-law. Rawr!
Last night I watched an old video that I made with my church's youth group when I was 16. The youth group was held every Friday night for the church's 'teens,' and I think it was designed to give us an alternative to Friday night drinking parties, etc. Good idea in theory, but on the particular evening the film was made, we were divided into teams, given video cameras, and instructed to go on a 'video scavengar hunt.' Basically we were supposed to roam around Vernon for 3 hours, asking people questions like "What is your favourite ice cream?" and then film their responses. Well, that's what the other team did. My team decided to make a shocking mockumentary about a young woman (me) who was raped by an alien, and then works her way through a series of recovery programs, including a help-line called 1-800-I've-Been-Molested-By-An-Alien, and an institution called "The Happy Place" in which inmates got to do arts and crafts for six hours every day and were fed porridge with glue in it. Some horrifying stuff - me shrieking "We're not alone!" and walking with my legs spread apart, indictated vaginal penetration; JC shouting, "Look at the pervert! He's gay! Holy!"; a boy named Nathan being trapped in a library water fountain without his clothes; JC chasing other members of our team (who we didn't like and were not allowed to act in the film) shrieking, "Hey! You kids! Got any beer? Dammit! Don't insult me!" and then dumpster-diving for food. I have never laughed as hard in my LIFE as I did last night, watching it. I almost feel like calling our old youth pastor to apologize. As I recall, he transferred churches a few months after that evening.
I stole this picture from Ryan's page. He gets photo credits for this one, and I love it because I look all mysterious and I'm writing in a notebook, and also if you look at the middle left side of the photo, it almost appears as if Satan is giving me the finger.
Some random selections from the last few days in my world:
- Buying cigarettes at the local trashy grocery store, being ID-ed, and having the clerk look at my card, register shock, and say, "Oh! You're old!"
- "Stealing" a tampon from the washroom at Emily's party, and feeling a little guilty, and telling Jess, who said, "Man, you do what you have to do. It's like the army."
- Having a nut burger at the Mint on Friday night. I know that's not very exciting, but wow. I believe there to be no greater experience, except possibly sex, coffee, sushi, and being witty with friends.
- Deciding to write and direct a dirgy short film with Ben, starring Jo and hopefully Miguel, about an orphan street-girl in the 1930's who rises in power and notoriety to become Victoria's greatest Madam. It will be shot in grainy black and white (hopefully? can we make digital look grainy? maybe in Photoshop), and feature music by Tom Waits, Peggy Lee, and Matt's accordian. (The direct influence of "The Saddest Music in the World" should be obvious.)
- Realizing that I both read and write fiction because I am lonely. That sounds worse than it is. I am rarely technically "lonely" (although I was almost constantly lonely as a child and young teenager, which is when my passion for literature forced itself into my life), but I read stories, and write them, in order to connect with that desperately quiet and miserable part of myself and everybody that just wants reassurance that they are not alone ... The tragedy and the emotional wasteland that practically waves a flag above the heads of my generation needs to be identified and laughed at, or with, or cried about, or with, in an artful way. (Where "The Science of Domesticity: An Erotic Tragedy" fits into all of this, I have no idea. Ditto with "The Chocolate Milk Revelation." But seriously, folks ...)
Last night I saw Guy Maddin's "The Saddest Music in the World," and emerged from the theatre reeling, my mind full of glass legs filled with beer, cellists shrouded in long black veils, telepathic tapeworms, and the mad nightmare horror of 1930's Winnipeg at night. I would presume to call this film a masterpiece, made up of the kind of grit you find at the bottom of an empty whiskey bottle that's been left at the beach, overflowing tendrils of miserable laughter and scarlet red lips and the kind of sarcasm and despair only playing a piano will fix. The best line in the movie is, "If you're sad, and like beer, I'm your lady," and I think I'll have to scrawl it out on an old napkin or something equally pretentious and tape it up on the living room wall near the "I don't feel a need to explain my art to you, Warren" sign. How rarely an inspiring movie comes around! How wonderful it feels afterwards to be a Canadian, and an artist, and one of perhaps fifteen people in the theatre, gasping at the amputation scene, eating popcorn like mad and feeling Today, tonight, something has changed, something has been peeled away to leave something dirtier and more painful behind, because after all, "what is sadness but happiness turned upside down?"
Yes, I have. Despite what some of my friends say. So. The story is this. I really LOVE subTerrain, think it's a great lit-mag, despite, of course, that they have rejected some of my work. That's understandable; most of the lit-mags in Canada reject my work, and most of the time I know there's a good reason for it. Anyway. Something of mine was actually PUBLISHED in their current issue - now, don't get excited, it was just a letter to the editor. Here is my letter:
"Love the magazine - original and relevant, and yes, like many others, I have the cover for issue #37 taped up on my kitchen wall. I did want to point out an error in issue #38, though - in "Dreaming in the Rain," movie critic David Spaner states that a woman has never been nominated for a Best Director Oscar. In fact, two women have: Lina Wertmuller (1976) and Jane Campion (1993). - Joy Waller, ON"
Now, what's wrong with this picture? Well, first of all, the mighty Joy Waller is NOT from Ontario; as we all know, she lives in Victoria BC, which is kind of cool becuase although she was born and raised in the slummy Okanagan, she was conceived in Victoria. Anyway, besides the point. What irked me - no, what ENRAGED me - is the caption they placed above my letter. It reads, 'Our Glaring Oversight.'
I am devastated. Some of us are not devastated, but my God. Can you get more condescending than that? And about such a topic? Yes I'm a raving irrational feminist who supposedly hates men (not true) and has nothing better to do than bicker innane points (also not true) but come ON. I'm embarassed for any Canadian film critic with a fucking MIND. As I mentioned to Steph and Jess on a sunny campus pub patio over a pitcher of Rickard's Red beer, "the line on the sand has been fucking drawn." Do they think they can get away with shite like this? My NEXT letter to the editor to that particular magazine will read, "By the way, despite your alleged coolness (which I once lauded and now reject), I wish to point out yet another 'glaring oversight' your so-called magazine is guilty of: Joy Waller is from Victoria BC, not pale and elitist Ontario. Cheers. I took the picture off my kitchen wall." I realize I'm engaging in a pointless pissing contest (particulary as the magazine is quarterly and no one will ever remember, much less some of us), but damn. I can't believe they said I was from Ontario. And that they had the gall to use 'glaring' in a sarcastic way, when it's such an important, easily censored/degraded topic.
Good God! Got home from work at 9:30pm, only to mount the front stairs thinking, "Where is that cigarette-smoke-smell coming from," and I open the front door and there's Matt and Russ, smoking weed and cigarettes, and eating perogies, and playing guitar, all at the same time. I got into the game and we listened to Tom Waits and then had this little "jam" in which Matt played accordian, Russ played guitar, and I slurred out spoken-word in a Greta Garbo affectation exploring shit about this guy in California who does things with a banana that "you've never seen before." Oh so good times! And now it's 12:10 and, as I just yelled, WHO HAS TO WORK TOMORROW MORNING??! And we all know the answer to that question. But this is one girl who isn't going to sleep any time soon.
"Gore dispersed with the group around me, and asked if he could bring his friends down." - Anais Nin
And I said No, what the fuck do you think you're doing, dispersing my friends like that? Gore was unapologetic. He said, "Sometimes, Sarah, what a person calls 'friends' is not so much 'friends' as a 'negative artistic influence.' So there." At this I scoffed, because Gore's friends, if we're being honest, are the type of people who yahoo at pretty pre-teens and dine at the all-you-can-eat chicken buffet. We discussed this, and Gore said, "Well, maybe I could bring my friends UP, then," and I considered this, that polarity of direction, but in the end I said No, becuase I didn't think there was much hope for them, for elevation I mean, and then 25 years later they were all - I mean almost all - astronauts with the Russian space program, and I wished I was still friends with Gore, but when I called him he said he was busy, but he said 'busy' like it was a celebrity excuse, and I had dinner with Anton, the one guy who wasn't a Russian astronaut, and he just about choked on a chicken bone at the all-you-can-eat chicken buffet, and as he coughed and gulped water and I slapped his back so hard I thought my hand would bruise, he told me that art is always negative, no matter who your friends are, and although I didn't believe him, I slept well that night.
(c) Joy Waller 2004
Feeling frazzled - just realized I haven't spent a whole afternoon/evening in my house for over a week. It's all work, training for work, partying in Nanimo, drinkin it up with the kids on a sunny patio .... No complaints, really, but I'm looking forward to a day (probably not till Saturday) when I can do laundry and read books and cook things, all day.
Yesterday was odd. The Monday Night Writing Thang happened, but I had gotten moderately drunk at the pub beforehand, so I was drinking black coffee to focus, and by the time I realized that all I'd had to eat that day was half a bagel, I was getting wracking stomach pains and a hollow, choked feeling all over my insides. I went to bed early, and I'm sure people assumed I was drunk, but I wasn't - just very pissed off at myself for organizing my time that badly. Half a bagel, some potato chips, 15 cigarettes, and 4 or 5 beers is NOT the ideal calorie intake for the day, and I'm stupid to think that my body's going to hold up much longer if I keep this up.
I joined a cool new chat forum at GoVegan.net, and it gets cheezy at times, particularly the pet threads. Today people were making up pet bios, and I think I wowed em with mine:
Sambuca is brown as burnt mocha and never leaves the house without her beige hemp collar. Her early years were fraught with excess and peril: a street urchin, she survived by fighting, stealing, and scavenging for scraps of food in the dumpsters behind 2-star restaurants. She picked her lovers poorly and trusted people too easily. In the Summer of 2002 she was rescued by the SPCA. A shell of a cat, she was covered in fleas, missing the end of her tail, pregnant, and sporting a two-inch gash in her side. A month later she was adopted by a young hippy couple who fell in love with the way she poked her brown paws through her cage, trying to make contact with the other cats. In their care, she gained 2 pounds, and became decadent in terms of nap-time and social engagements. Her preferred playthings are discarded plastic bags, empty juice cartons, and expensive pens. Her voice box is damaged, so her meows are a strange blend of Tom Waits nicotine-and-whisky hack and Sylvia Browne murmurs. She dislikes children, tolerates walks to the park, and becomes morose if left alone for more than a few hours at a time.
Hmmm ... So 'young hippy couple' is a bit of a stretch, but I didn't know how else to describe us. And I wanted to impress all the vegan kids. :P
How much lower can the people of this world SINK? Someone went and STOLE my mum's Mother's Day card. Stole it. Broke into the mailboxes and obviously stole everything else, too, but if it's two days before Mother's Day and you see a card, wouldn't you leave it? Monsters! It was a really cool card, too - it had a picture of Salvador Dali on the front, looking very severe, and angry about something, but he had one of those long skinny mustaches twirled at the ends, and on the end of each one was a daisy. It was perfect. I am heartbroken. It's not fair. I bet that thieving little marmot has it taped up to the side of his trashy ghetto fridge and he looks up at it and chuckles softly while pouring over all the credit card numbers he's stolen. Or maybe it was a girl, and she hates Salvador Dali, or daisies, and simply threw it into the recycling.
3:50pm
Not necessarily drunk off my ass, but getting there. Four cocktails on my patio in an hour and a half; now at the bus stop (Pandora and Douglas) while Matt goes for pizza at Maleko's. He will return for the 4:06 #30. I am desperately hungry - only half a banana and a handful of hard-bite potato chips (14 grams of fat, per handful, according to the bag) to eat today, but I can't stomach the thought of dollar pizza. When we get to the Cambie in Nanaimo I will have a vegi burger. ..... Since when does a handful of chips have 14 grams of fat? I will double-check the bag when I get home, but apparently a 'handful' is '10 chips.' And 14 grams of fat is fully one half the recommended daily amount for women in their 20's. Not that I count that sort of thing.
4:35pm
At the jam space. And I'm not sure ... But I think I just saw a 4-wheeled scooter go by. ........ Ryan just got here. I'm sitting on the pavement in the parking lot. I can see these things.
8:15pm - at the Cambie
Ryan just won $100 on a pull-tab! He's gone to buy a pitcher of beer. Excitement mounts.
9:15pm
An argument erupts within the band: do they play 'gritty' folk or 'abrasive' folk? Jay believes it's 'abrasive.' Matt believes 'abrasive' is a 'weak adjective.' Nothing is decided.
9:20pm
Sights and Sounds of the Cambie (Part I): wrinkled middle-aged women in bright dresses grabbing each other by the shoulders and shouting, "Hell NO! Hell NO!"; old Tool songs; overweight, good-natured men in Lucky Lager t-shirts; surly waitresses; old men bumming smokes; my friends telling stories about the 'pee trough' in the men's washroom (this is not a joke).
9:30pm
Actual graffiti on a bunk-bed in the Cambie hostel:
"Joy Waller. 'I am not a musician.' Aug 02."
"Joy Waller sucks. Jan 03."
"Some people have no couth. Joy Waller. May 04."
And some more, not related to me:
"The pope gives Nickelback head."
"Not every man can be a pimp, but every bitch is a slut." (yes, folks, we're in Nanaimo)
"Fuck you!"
10:35pm
I have just been introduced to a girl named Shawni who has the most gorgeous red bag I have ever seen. I will be anxious until I find out where she got it. Also: I am drinking Labbat Blue (nevah!). Also: Antilles just played a cover of "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots" by the Flaming Lips. The Cambie doesn't get much better than this. Aside from the Blue, of course.
10:50pm
Weird. I just looked across the bar and saw Danika. Danika! Of the Monday Night Writing Thang, fiction workshop, and soberingly brilliant short stories. People as pure as her don't belong in an establishment as sordid as this. ("Hey there ... What's a bautiful girl like you ...?")
11:35pm
Sights and Sounds of the Cambie (Part II): Floors in the women's washroom that, composed of uneven bricks, leak moisture of many kinds. Drunken laughter. Kick-ass JD and the Religion. Over-tipping waitstaff. Blue, Blue, Blue, that is warm and dish-washery.
11:45pm
A guy at the next table looks like Hermes. Is that mean of me? No. All of us should look like Hermes. All of us should have gorgeous 6-ft-tall wives who yell, "Hermes! Get to work!" and look decadent while they say it.
12pm (am? I can never tell)
I met at man on the smoking patio whose name is Vernon. Strange. My hometown is Vernon. I mentioned this to his friend Dan, who said, "You guys should get married!" I laughed, and Vernon said, "Yeah, as if I'd meet a girl in a bar who was from Vernon, and say my name's Vernon, and we'd get married." Good times all around. ("He probably calls EVERYBODY Vernon, baby.")
12:20 whatever
Drunken swirling beer-thoughts ... I just told someone that I like labels. Which I do. I label myself as a writer, feminist, and woman, plus other more negative things. And I like these labels.
12:35
I have just stolen a pint glass. I feel like a bad person. But on the other hand, I feel like a cool person. I am so daring!
12:55 - Last Call
"Dream's over, folks ... Get the hell out." (so says the Barkeep, as an old - 1999? - Korn album plays.)
1:10am
Ryan and Jay have gone to Queen's. Queen's! Why? They say, to make contacts. I doubt. I think they intend to party at that despicable club. What will 1:20 bring? Will they be back???
2am
I just beat Jay at a mercy fight. I think my night is complete.
1) Wake up and have three cigarettes on a sunny patio. Brood.
2) Put on a pretty orange sun-dress and then get back into bed. Daydream for half an hour.
3) Go to the Moka House and order a large medium-roast coffee. Sit at a table on the terrace and write in your notebook about things that disappoint you, and how to get over them. Or simply write about the disappointments in great detail, and make it seem that you are extremely gracious and perfect, whereas the people who disappointed you are well-meaning, but without direction. Feel self-righteous.
4) Get a refill. Read an alternative newspaper. Smoke a cigarette. Write some more. Think of how much more intelligent you are than the WASPy teeny-boppers with cel phones at the next table over. Wonder, briefly, if you are an uber-bitch for thinking you're so much better than everyone else, and then decide that you'd rather be an uber-bitch with a notebook then a WASPy teeny-bopper with a cel phone. Bask.
5) Have your lover join you. Complain about something boring, such as the fact that the lymph node on the right side of your face is swoollen YET AGAIN, and have him say something like, "Yeah, I noticed that," and say, "My God is it obvious? Does it look like a huge tumour?" and have him reply, "No, I just notice because I look at your face so often."
6) Go home and mix a rye and coke, with a wedge of lime, and drink it on the patio while your gorgeous black-brown cat keeps you company. Say things like, "Sambuca, don't spill my cocktail, or Mommy will be VERY ANGRY."
7) Have a long telephone conversation with Ben. Discuss everything. Laugh and vent and make witty comments and complain and decide to co-write a book about relationships. Don't forget to smoke several Belmont Milds.
8) Go back in and mix another rye and coke. Calm down. Realize that everything will be okay. Think, "I'm going to the Cambie tonight, and I'm bringing my notebook." Get over yourself.
- Lovely dreams in the early-morning hours
- A call from my boss at 9 a.m. in which he mentioned that my shift started at 8:30 a.m.
- Being driven to work in a hot red convertible
- 3 cups of coffee
- Not one but TWO union egg and cheese muffins for lunch at 2:15pm (first food consumed all day)
- One cold beer on the Felicita's patio, while reading Monday Magazine and feeling angst
- Feeling agnst in the bathroom, partially but not wholly due to noticing pee droplets on 3 of the toilet seats I almost sat on
- A cigarette under a leafy tree, contemplating the catterpillars
- Two depressed yet inspired pages of creative non-fiction written in the 'upper-lounge' of the SUB (by 'upper' they mean two steps up)
- 3 hours of training for my new job
- Meeting 18 new people at training for my new job, most of whom seem uber-uber cool
- Taking two buses home, for some reason (the #4 and the #27 - I had to use a transfer for the first time in my Victoria life)
- Two beers at home with my wonderful lover
- Receiving 5 free books from Brick Books, one of which ("Elimination Dance" by Michael Ondaatje, 1999) is freakin brilliant
- A bag of chips for dinner
- Plans to take a nice walk to the beer and wine on Cook St
Is it weird to put recipes on your adolescent little web-log? Maybe. I'm sure that if someone else was doing it, I would make fun of them. But regardless, here are two original joy-drinks.
"Rainbow Cocktail"
1 shot gin
1 shot red wine
top up with tropical fruit juice
Yeah. Not too much to say about this one. Virtually everyone who I've mentioned it to has looked at me strangely and said things like, "But I thought you were a hard-core drinker" or "Since when do you mix girly-drinks?" Then they take a sip and are horribly ashamed of their judgement of me.
"Ice Ice Baby"
1/2 glass of rye
several spoonfuls ice cream
a little bit of Coke
wedge of lime
Hm, yes, so I just invented this one five minutes ago. More or less. Tastes like a son of a bitch, but it's got a good tang, and nice if you're running low on Coke but can't stomach the thought of rye and water.
I'm so excited! After much well-meant procrastination, Matt and I have signed up with Share Organics and, this Wednesday, will receive our first "box." In this box there will be:
- apples
- garlic bulbs
- avocados
- asparagus
- bananas
- onions
- carrots
- many, many potatoes
- tomatoes
- lettuce
All this for $27, plus they deliver for free, plus it benefits local organic farmers, plus you can order stuff outside of the pre-set box, or you can customize the box. I realize I sound like a cult recruiter, but really, it feels like a sweet idea. I'll keep you posted re: the Wednesday afternoon First Delivery ... But anyone in Victoria should check it out, and for Vancouver, I've heard spud.ca is good.
Oh! And they also send you recipes every week! For meals to make with the stuff in that week's box!
Toady, everything has been a confusing muddled mess. This proves it.
| Which person in my life are you? Terry You're my step-dad. You're a bipolar ass.
|
| Click Here to Take This Quiz Brought to you by YouThink.com quizzes and personality tests. |
So, I was NOT on strike on Monday. It is all very strange and surreal. Apparently, the HEU is being charged, or sued, with "contempt" because they refused to stop striking after they were ordered back to work. So suddenly it is a crime in this fine province for the unions to strike ... Ergo, it is a crime to belong to a union. This is how I read it, anyway. So, I went to work, but it was odd, becauses the buses were on strike. I understand nothing. And to complicate things (although this is very good news), I got that job at Alumni House - yay! - but it means I will now be a member of CUPE. Wow. We'll see where this all goes.
Writing thang on Monday night was super-cool - we did around seven exercises, which made me feel so competent, and then we watched "The Big Lebowski" while others played poker. Let's see, best line from "The Big Lebowski" is .... "The bums lost!" Or maybe, "Vagina. Some men don't like the word." Or maybe, "Do you like sex, Mr. Lebowski. The physical act of love." "Well, I was talking about my rug ..."
Hmm. Matt has his dad's convertible for the week, and we've been driving all over the place, most notably to the Moka House for many coffees in the early morning. I like that. It makes the dream of a green convertible MG Midget and the cross-Europe tour that much more urgent.
My father is marking road maps. Nobody knows why he is doing this. Every few minutes we pop into the study and say, "Papa, the guests are growing restless," and he lifts up France, or Italy, or Wales, and says nothing. Mother saves the party by announcing with mock-drama that her husband has 'gone mad' and will not leave his study; the guests scream laughter and offer toasts. After they have left, Mother sits on an ottoman and tells us there is nothing wrong with travelling the world. "Nothing," she repeats, lips white, and we don't believe her, know only that Papa is unhappy, and trapped, living here with us.
(c) Joy Waller 2004 all rights reserved
(written this afternoon in my notebook)
Sitting on the rocks at the Sooke Potholes, I think I may have redeemed myself - in my eyes anyway - of my drunken embarassment two nights before. I've been reading the essays of D.H. Lawrence and smoking cigarettes while waterfalls crash all around. Does that make me a better person? I'm not talking appearances - the 74-cent book written in the 1920's, the king-sized Belmont Milds - but rather a shift in the direction I'm supposed to be headed. I've been meant to read D.H. Lawrence since I was born, for example, but not until the spring of my 22nd year do I accomplish it. In one of his essays ("Sex Versus Loveliness") Lawrence claims that woman can not function unless she is provided with a suitable pattern for behaviour developed by the men who are her contemporaries. If she engages in the wrong pattern, however, she will devolve into hysterics. He notes one exception: "Unless of course she has already chosen her pattern quite young, then she will declare herself absolutely, and no man's idea of women has any influence over her." I'm unclear at this point if D.H. is pleased or dismayed at this exception, but in any case there's no time to analyze it now, except to say that he was maybe a gifted prophet, looking forward eighty-odd years to a period when his exception became a rule.
"Impaled on my wall/My eyes can clearly see/The pattern of my life/And the puzzle that is me." - Paul Simon
For fuck's sake. The older I get the lower I sink. A friend of mine told me about an "embarassing series of moments" she had on Friday night, and I said, "Yeah? Well, last night I pissed all over myself, if that makes you feel better." It did actually, but I'm not sure if I can say the same for the other customers at the Lotus Pond ... What happened was our staff party was at Felicita's and then I went home and ran the last block because I had to pee so bad, and then I finally got into the washroom, and it was like, "Ahhhh, yes," and I let my guard down, as it were, thinking I was home-free, and then my BELT GOT STUCK, but my bladder had already been given the message we were good to go, and there you have it. It was one of the sadder moments of my life, all alone, late for another engagement, and then I broke my special green necklace, the one identical to the one Ben has. Not good.
So, I'm on strike. No work on Monday. Ben asked what union I was in and when I told him it was the American Steelworkers, he said, in horror, "But, Joy .... You're not gay." (Simpsons did it!) Nor am I American, or a steelworker for that matter. But we're striking in order to show solidarity with the HEU, who are facing a 15% pay cut, plus their contracts are getting ripped up. Fucking Liberals. Anyway, this is boring.
