vintage clothes shopping in kensington with A
One time the church around the corner from us (back in the Walmer Palace days) was doing a free screening of the Passion of Christ. I was apprehensive, because well, it was a church and I imagined they wouldn't be too different from a sleazy guy buying some fancy dinner to guilt a chick into sex. except, instead of sex, they'd want my soul. On the other hand, free is free. yeah I'd take candy from a stranger. So Becky and I went and sure enough at the end they gave a big loooong talk about finding god. they had clearly perfected the art of making it difficult/impossible to leave in the middle of one of their 'talks'. then they asked us to close our eyes and put up our hands if we were ready TODAY, RIGHT NOW to accept the lord jesus christ as our personal lord and saviour. I guess no one did, because he kept emphasizing that it was anonymous, no one was looking.accept him blah blah. It was like he was waiting us out until we relented to jesus just so he get on with it already. i guess a few people finally saw the light. we opened our eyes. then he asked those who put up their hand to please come to the front. a couple people walked to the stage. Then dude called out the 4 or 5 people who put up their hands but didnt come to the front! he singled these poor people out, and made them come up to the stage and publicly accept 'jesus christ as their personal lord and saviour'!
I can't remember for sure, but I probably gaffawed loudly at that point, and that guffaw probably taught that dude a valuable lesson about the wrongness of his actions, and he probably knew never to pull that shit again.
maybe it's the music (the tough alliance. 2007/08 staple) or maybe it's the double gin with a splash of tonic I just downed, but I feel like I lost a part of me when I left Toronto. nostalgia's a bitch
ps. sorry sorry hed for being late tonight
I figure that every Beakman fan must automatically sort of hate Bill Nye, and yeah google image search told me that beakmanVSnye shtick's been done. the joke pretty much doesn't go beyond that, so nothing worth linking. I bet it's been a Family Guy joke. Klosterman should write an essay on this. I wonder if he google alerted his name. and all the misspelled versions, oh and how often he is searched. modern times.
So Sarin is in town (she is living in New Zealand and working for a radio station these days). Our old high school drama teacher offered her tickets to the yearly school musical and she made me her plus one. They were doing Little Shop of Horrors- same one we were both in way back in grade 12. Sarin played Mushnick- the ornery, jewish-eque shop owner. Originally he was a guy, but sarin played the role as a yente. I played the piano. I'm sure its just a coincidence that I thought Little Shop of Horrors: The New Class was better in every way except for Sarin's part and the piano playing.
but woah man was it weird to walk the halls of that place. I certainly don't miss it in the least, but it sorta made me feel old in a bad way. Gone are the years of knowing anyone who still goes there- but we did sit beside my old social studies teacher. I thought about what loud mouth I was; of the time he made me walk around the outside of the school a few times to burn off some energy (not the only teacher to do that. where did it all come from?!?)... as we talked I kept feeling like I should apologize to him. But it seemed a little feeble and in the end I just couldn't do it.
oh the creepy dad with the stout cross eyed wife was there too. his kids finished high school years ago.
Dude (who is hilarious by the way) was talking about Weird Al being underrated. Now I am.
Looking back, he was probably the number 1 inspiration for for my short lived music group ‘The Metamucil Mothers’. Just like Weird Al, I changed the song lyrics into humourous little ditties- only mine were all ‘toilet’ themed. Me and a friend would sing them to a captive audience of family and friends. Haha, nope no friends. Pets maybe. I remember doing a song by Jewel and a few by The Presidents of the United States of America. OH! I totally did Peaches!
This live version is a little lame, thanks to the record label removing the album version from youtube. as if that'll encourage me to go out and buy the album in its entirety. again.
oh apparently they only did that to the big hit. oh man I loved this band. I think I might've been talking about weird al, but I've moved on
OH! Weird Al DID a cover of Lump! full circle!
ah, those moments when I know I'm really not so unlike my mother- whenever someone even so much as sniffles, or mentions, 'I think I'm setting si-" I thrust a handful of vitamins at them TAKE THESE VITAMINS and take these ones in a few hours.
vitamins vitamins.growing up, le mother used to give me a little handful of unknown vitamins for me to force down. some of them were those terrible horse pill sized monsters that, if not swallowed properly, would haunt me with terrible vitamin burps for the rest of the day. The little handful was doubled and repeated throughout the day at the slightest indication of impending illness.
'did you take your vitamins?'
I just saw a girl wearing what I swear was our high school marching band skirts for the colour party. The colour party are the girls holding the flags. The skirts were blue and green plaid and so short it also came with matching blue underwear.
Marching band and band in general was big at our high school. I always feel the need to say that when I mention that I was in marching band' sorta like saying, don't worry, I wasn't one of THOSE. I did colour party one year yes. Then I moved on to playing my bass clarinet in the white pants and plaid blazer uniform. The thing about the bass clarinet is that it's not "so dorky it's cool" like the tuba' it's just dorky. ah well, It was pretty fun to play since most of the songs involved doing the oom-paa-paa style bass line. Thanks to my accordion playing skillz, I was already a pro at that. Now the accordion- definitely so dorky it's cool. oom-paa-paa.
from flickr
Heather and I once made a half hearted attempt at skateboarding. We bought these bottom of the line skateboards and all the cooler than thou skateboard dudes laughed in our faces right in the store as we were handing them our money. I took it to Toronto and played around a little on the side streets, but to tell the truth, the super loud sound they make on the pavement really unnerves me. so do vacuums. The final straw was the pretty bad fall I took while ride past an auto body shop. The whole shop full of mechanics were standing around outside and as I rode past and for seemingly no reason just went flying into the air and landed on my shoulder. I got up and acted like whatever, its no thing. I walked around the corner out of their view and did that whole lip biting, heavy breathing in thing. my shoulder still has a bit of the scar, which was retorn open during a much more brutal bike crash. I've taken the skateboard out a few times since then, but mostly the skateboard has become the worlds handiest furniture mover. We've moved entire couches through the annex with that thing
Once, when I was 16ish (so highly embarrassable), this right wing political group was campaigning in the parking lot of the supermarket my dad and I were driving out of. It was possibly for Stockwell Day's leadership of the Canadian Alliance Party. Stockwell Day is a Pentecostal btw; these supporters might have been from the Pentecostal church. One of them came up the to the passenger window of our VW (yep), and asked if we would be supporting them. In an uncharacteristic aggressiveness, my dad leaned across to this guy and said 'ha, but he believes the world is 6000 years old! Humans and dinosaurs would have existed at the same time! That means he believes the Flintstones were real! really! haha, I don't think so".
and on. oh I wanted to melt into the seat. I politely declined the free balloon.
At what price would you sell your soul? Well in grade 8 I sold it to Bessie for 4$. She was opening up a soul shop at the time. I seem to recall buying it back for 3$, but my memory is a little fuzzy on the details. So if I even have a soul left to sell, the new price is a big fucking bag of chocolate. E told me about this marketing thing where they give Dove chocolate to bloggers. I filled out a form, they called me and asked about social networking sites aswell (facebook, myspace) and how much socializing I do- online included. Never did I feel so lame. But apparently I am worthy! I got this big box in the mail today- fullll of chocolate bars, little chocolate squares. I mean full. Anyone in TO want some chocolate? Mm.mmm.mm. I already have that flushed feeling I get from eating too much chocolate or sugar. I’ m going to have to pace myself.
I guess they are marketing the chocolate as an ‘indulge yourself’ moment for the ladies, because I also got a little pedicure pack, a wine glass (too bad “Dove” is splashed across it, oh well) and a leather bound journal! Oh! And a stylish tote, for all my eco-friendly grocery trips to Kensington!
Another flashback- in grade 7 I made a newsletter, it maybe had two or three issues, and about 5 readers including myself. I held a contest to see who could guess what the initialized title stood for. The winner would receive a “Stylish Tote!”. The stylish tote was one of those dog poop bags from the park- I liked them because they had a picture of a guilty looking dog watching his owners delicately manicured hand pick up the poop with the protection of the bag. Ah ha, Sarin also recently reminded me that she submitted a story on the problems with parents wanting more control over your life. Apparently I rejected it! I said it wasn’t that kind of newsletter, I was looking for fun satire! The gall!
As I mentioned in le 6 things about me post, I lost my hotmail randomly one day almost 3 years ago. The biggest loss was all the emails from my dad. Something so devastating, I didn't even like thinking about it, let alone talking about it. I even recovered the OS of our old family computer in a failed attempt to retrieve them. Well yesterday, I was looking for an old document and thought to look in my uni email- which I started forwarding through to gmail ages ago. Well fuck how could I have forgotten about it! Most of the old mail was long ago deleted by the stupid webmail app... but amid the rubble, there they were, 20ish old old emails from me pa. I can't believe I had forgotten about them! A few were really meaningful conversations. most of them were quick and mundane, but great to see. Plus they were never really mundane. He always had a funny little sign off: The Dad, daadaad, He Who is Dad, Don Dad, Dud (that was the usual), Dudster.
It is really great and really difficult to see these again.
One line that really sticks with me was at the end of some quick technical email. and i quote:
Sun shining here. Hope you are the same
That's me, myself and I
So E tagged me, and I am to write 6 things about myself. anything? ok here it goes, dipping into the identity pillow case and pulling out six chloe mix tapes.
1. When I saw this Tagging and writing about yourself thing, I indulged myself in about 30 seconds of thinking how too cool I am for it, when I realized that this whole blog is me me me so why not just write six things instead of one. I guess that makes this a really extra special blog post.
2. About 2 and a half years ago my hotmail randomly stopped working . That meant MSN too, and I've been without ever since. It's been nice. Except it recently occurred to me that the last MSN name I had, the one that likely remains on the 'offline' section of most of my former contacts, is 'Explosive Chloeria'. For possibly dozens of people, a lame name barely funny the first time has now been embedded into my identity. Lame social networking names- it's the new going out without your underwear on. Explosive Chloeria. guh.
I'm skipping 3 to the end, otherwise it would totally wreck the mood of the rest of the post. you'll just have to wait.
4. I have always loved maps, blueprints and charts of any kind. My favorite are maps of statistics. drool. I still hold my first 'world factbook' dear to me.
5. I play the accordion. I started in grade 3, and luckily I switched schools soon after. Lucky because in grades 4 and 5 (maybe even 6, oh lord), I would return to the first school to play during the assemblies. Songs included- the banana boat song and achey-breaky heart.
6. Even if I had a really good time, I often leave parties or bars etc. a little early and take the long way home. I get really worried that this habit offends or bums people out, especially if they are new friends. Basically I just dont have the attention span. BUT I HAD A GOOD TIME
3. My Dad died almost three years ago. suicide. He was depressed pretty much his whole life, though almost no one would know it. We were really tight and his death completely turned my life insideout-upsidedown. Reality lost a benchmark or something. It was pretty much only 6 or 8 months ago that I truly began to feel a return to something normal. Life will never be the same though, and he is a part of a lot of my thoughts, . My opinions on suicide haven't changed since this- it is horrible and it is the result of a disease. it is NOT selfish, and it makes me sick when people think that. Despite my ambivalence, I decided I would include this because it is such a big part of my life and I also want to be perfectly clear that, as with a death from cancer or diabetes, depression is tragic and treatable, but not shameful. Also, I never want people to feel uncomfortable about bringing up my Dad or his death. I'm cool with talking about it.
With that I'm off to bed. I should transition in to pleasant things first. I wore my spring jacket today! spring jacket!!!!!! what a turn around!
oh! tag people. Well raymi. I think that about does it for untagged bloggers I know.
Me and Jason Priestley.
I'm 13 here. Lucy sent it to me. There is so much to write, but I should start with the unfinished philosophy paper.
when I was about 7 or 8 years old, maybe 9 I dont really remember, the older lady next door had her son and his family move in with her for a few months. I think they were in a tight spot, new to town, couldn't find a job. The family consisted of a french canadian wife and two young sons around my age. At that age,whatever it was, proximity is the basis of most friendships, so for that summer they were my best friends. I think we all sported matching mushroom cuts (looking back, I spent most of my youth with regrettable haircuts. Lets not even get into the rats tail). They were an incredibly wholesome family; the dad was always playing the guitar and the boys sang along. The boys were mightily impressed by his guitar playing, so I was too. They said that it was his gift from God. They said that everybody got a gift from God, though you probably wouldn't know what it was until you were a grown-up. I asked my dad what his gift from God was. My dad pragmatically avoided the question, but I was a brat a wouldn't shut up about it, so he said farting. So for a brief period in my life, I believed that my Dad's prolific farting was a Gift from God. Interestingly, it wasn't that I realized that farting wasn't a gift from God, it was that I realized I didn't believe in God.
*some guy in a Montreal hostel actually said this to E and I. I can't really remember what the protest was about, and I doubt buddy ever really knew. I seem to remember him taking along a Canadian flag, and us sorta being like 'wha?'. We declined.
We also declined the (whispered) offer to go to a "very reputable, classy strip club" with this reeeeeaally creepy guy pushing 40. We were both 18 at the time [holy shit]. He said he had been offered a deal he just couldn't refuse, and was charitably offering to let us in on it. Its guys like that who come up with those email scams- "Greetings, I am Alfonse Amoussou, an established businessman from the Crozet Islands. I am requesting your help with transferring 500,000." blah blah. Also, he had red silk sheets. to use on the bunk beds in the communal sleeping quarters. Fuck, I wonder what he is doing right now?
looking back, that trip was a seminal event in my young adult life.
Sometimes, my dad used to drive me to school on his motorcycle. I felt like hot shit carrying that helmet around, hooking on my coat hook (what the fuck are those hallrooms for coats called again??). To store the helmet, he later he added a milk crate attached by bungee cords to the back of the bike. less cool
Beautiful British Columbia is perfect too. Both because it is true, and because a BCian will never let anyone forget it (we have an official February ritual of calling all out of province relatives to let them know our daffodils are blooming). Imagine the city of Vancouver in the geography of Toronto. woof, no thanks.
Im not sure what Alberta plates say, but if it is "Texas North" then it too is spot on.
Quebec's Je me souviens (I remember), yep, also right on. 'I dwell' would work too, (let it be noted I am all for the preservation of the francophone identity culture etc etc).
In grade 9ish I did a sock puppet show about the battle of Abraham (to which the license refers)- we changed the words to the Gilligans Island theme... the only line I remember is replacing " a three hour tour" with "a twenty minute war". I DO remember Amy and M and S using the Pocahontas song 'colours of the wind'. They changed the line "have you ever seen the wolf cry to the blue corn moon" to "have you ever seen dead bodies spread across the field" (insert sweeping hand motions). Amy (later named in our yearbook as most likely to become a jewish childrens singer) belted it out like a fucking champ. It still makes me laugh.
POST SCRIPT: that cat picture was the second result (after casper the friendly ghost) in a google image search of 'friendly'
