shiz.ca

Have you ...

Ever been so tied that the writing instuments and acoutrements on your desk begin doing a slow waltz like in the subway scene of the Fisher King?

Me neitherrrrrr.

Later: Um, that's supposed to be tired. And I was.

Let's All Help the D

This guy needs our help, Ladies and gents, and when that guy is my husband I darn well do what he asks.

Because I love him.

Ok, gag. We need your multi-level marketing stories here. Not, "Oh it's not bad AT ALL you SO totally don't know what you're talking about why do you have to judge my company is different multi-level marketing will save the WORLD I love Mary Kay" kind of stories, but the stories from those of you whom mulit-level marketing has left a bad taste in your mouth, especially those of you who, say:

Have been suckered into a attending meeting under false pretenses

Lost your wife, car, and possibly your arm because of one

Have seen friends' personalities change when they get into one

OR those of you who just generally have nightmares about it

So come on over, pull up a chair, grab a drink and pour your heart out, everyone. We want all the good stories, man. And spead the word, because we can never have enough MLM hatred going on.

More Wisdom

Hello everyone and welcome to The Wisdom of Shiz' Dad Part II.

Haaaaallelujah! Haaaaallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hal-le-ay-lu-jah!

The first post can be found here. Those of you who were reading way back in the day will remember that I have a WONDERFUL, rockin' dad who says and think some things that are ... um ... unique. I have a unique, quirky dad.

I was on the phone with him last night in which he began telling me about how much he loves the deck on their 3rd floor apartment. My parents' apartment is at the rear of their complex, away from the street, and looks out onto grass, trees, squirrels, and the apartment complex across the way. They are quite a distance from the street, so it is quieter and shady.

Then Shiz' dad begins with the, "I'm glad we live in an apartment that's second-floor-and-above," speech, and he uses that phrase repeatedly, "second-floor-and-above," meaning, I think, apartment above the ground level. So then he goes into:

I'm glad we live second-floor-and-above. Because you know how, these kids? They steal cars and then they drive them away and then they run into your house for protection. But if you live second-floor-and-above they can't do that, unless they have super powers.

Now, you might be tempted to think that I am kidding or exaggerating. I'm not.

(Also, I don't know who these "kids" are that he's always referring to. Apparently there are bands of them that go around terrorizing the earth. IMF and warmongers be damned, it's these kids that are really to blame for the state of things.)

Then he tells me that he's finally purchased the movie Clear & Present Danger, which he's convinced they've taken big chunks out of since he saw it in the theatre ten years ago. And then he says,

And you know this guy James Earl Jones? He's in it a lot, and he's good. He's always saying, "Watch your back, Jack." (laughing). That is GOOD.

That's my dad, though this time I wasn't read to out of the phone book. And as quickly as he expresses his wisdom, he says in the next breath, "Do you want to talk to your mother?"

Short, sweet, and unique, but never dull.

I can do an uncanny impression of him. I am so like him.

Links Away!

Welcome to your Wednesday morning links.

First, a movie whose existence has put a smile on my face.

Then, an article that explains how it really is, followed by another one, and one more. Go America!

I think that's all. For now.

Oh, and these people make some dang good drool-over-it stuff. Mmmmm ... Buttercream Frosting. Arrrrrrglhhh ....

Thank you, Canada!

I tend to not think of holidays as close as they are, so just now when it hit me - Hey! Thursday is Canada Day! This week! - I got really excited.

Barbecue & fireworks & food & friends & drink. And much merriment.

I'm SO excited!

Smelly

The day we moved David into his (now our) apartment, the downstairs neighbors greeted us by sending up a refreshing waft of incence.

Um, no. Make that the bitter, pungent aroma of marajuana.

I lit a candle. I didn't smell it again until this past month, and it seems that they smoke it every night. As the weather is nice, it also seems that they are keeping their balcony door & windows open, so it wafts up to us from below. Every night. Without fail.

If a night passes where I think that I didn't smell any, the smell is there to knock me down when I open or close the bedroom window. Last night I could smell it while watching a movie, and it was strong enough that I had to get up and shut the window and go light another candle.

Now I'm not sure what to think about marajuana and this isn't the place to debate that, but it does seem harmless enough that I'm not worried if my neighbors smoke it twenty-four hours a day. What I am sure of is the stink. Marajuana stinks something awful. For those unfamiliar with the smell, it's kind of like a cross between the smell of a cheap cigar and the smell of baby diarrhea, with a bit of forgot-it-in-the-fridge-for-a-month rotten leftovers thrown in. It's bad; so bad that even a little waft of it is vile to my sensitive nose.

It bothers me more than it does David. Maybe my nose is more sensitive. I'm tempted to complain to our manager, but I hesitate slightly as they tend to not like that sort of thing in our building, and aside from the 2 or 3 loud parties they've had downstairs (over the past 8 months), they've been perfect neighbors. I hope they wouldn't be evicted on my account, but I concede that it's up to the management how they choose to deal with my complaint, and not with me.

I think I will say something to our manager, let him know that the smell is bothersome, and see what happens.

Besides, getting the munchies because of it would not be a good thing.

Look!

I look good in a picture! We look good! (This is not at all uncommon for David, but SO is for me.)

And I did not blink.

That never happens. I blink. I always blink.

The photo is taken less than an hour before David got his tattoo on Saturday. It was fun. And I've only hit his arm forty-seven times since then. He's really quite forgiving. And I got to sleep in our bed last night. Well, on the floor touching our bed, but that's the same thing, right?

I did end up being quite a doofus, though. While taking photographs of David's tattoo experience, the digital camera needed fresh batteries. It practically begged for them. So David told me that it takes "Four (something)-A batteries," so I was thinking, "Sure. Four triple-A batteries." I went across the street to London Drugs and bought them, hearing in my head "Double-A" but thinking, I'm sure David didn't say that, and maybe he didn't, but I came back to discover that they were the wrong size. So I next hit the convenience store next door and came back with four double-As, when I promptly couldn't open the battery compartment on the camera.

So they stopped the tattooing, and David helped me with the camera, which he had no problem with.

And then I discarded the old batteries into the biohazard wastebin.

The old, rechargeable batteries. You can't get those back. So I went a THIRD time to get batteries, this time for new rechargeables, and this time with a tattooed David.

I felt like such a dolt. In under an hour I managed to do several at least absent-minded if not doofusey things.

That is it. I was doofusey.

But my hubby loves me anyway, and knowing that makes the doofusey times worthwhile.

One another note, here are some posts worth reading:

One to make you cry;

And one to make you laugh.

Why Everything You Say is Wrong and Why I'll Be Sleeping Outside Tonight

There's a federal election on Monday. I'm voting for this guy. Got a problem with that?

I didn't think so.

Oh sorry, you do? You think maybe I should vote for these people? Or these people? Or maybe these people, these people or these people?

Riiiight.

I left two out. I'm not much into them either. Yes you all, I have EIGHT options when I go to the polls Monday. I'm going with the guy without a track record, but at least he has no screw-ups, and neither does his party. Yet. Go Rob Mattu!

You still disagree? I'm going to hell? You're probably the person who told Heather Armstrong she should be reported to child welfare. Geesh.

I was thinking today about the way we use the word, "diet," of what that word has become. It used to be -- and still should be, in my opinion -- that one's diet was what they ate. Take for example the phrase, "The Howler Monkey's diet consists mainly of leaves and grubs." The Howler Monkey is not on a diet. The food it eats is its diet. Same with you and I. What we eat is our diet.

We probably started using the phrase on a diet as an abbreviation of on a restricted diet or following a restricted diet plan. To say that you're on a diet is silly. We are all have a diet, even those freaky cult people who claim to eat air, it's just that their diet consists of consuming air. Saying that we're on a diet is literally like saying, "I'm on the food-that-I-put-in-my-mouth plan." Aren't we all?

Which reminds me of another literary noodle. I'm going to kill a beloved campfire and road trip song for a lot of you here. I feel compelled to point out that, in the second verse of You Are My Sunshine, when the narrator sings, "but when I woke up, I was mistaken ... " that that phrase is incorrect. He was mistaken all along. He never really held her in his arms. He realized that he was mistaken when he awoke, but the being mistaken part did not begin when he woke, it had been happening all along. Follow?

Yeah, I'm one of those. But the You Are My Sunshine song is wrong, and if you're going to hang around here you're gonna have to get used to me doing this from time to time: Correcting All the World's Wrong People. Especially when it comes to English grammar.

I wasn't going to spend much time on grammar today, but it reminds me of one of my biggest grammar irritants: The misused quotation mark. Overused, actually. My boss does this all the time. She puts things in quotation marks that never should be in quotation marks.

I'll let you in on a little secret. You know what quotation marks are for? They're for quoting stuff. So, you do not, for example, write: Thus, "Canada Day" was born.

or

I have a few "jobs" for you to do.

No, no, no, no, no. Never.

You know what she wrote on her vacation sheet? "Subject to change" Who the heck is she quoting? I don't get it.

Sometimes it can also seem that the quoted text is quoted with a wink-wink, tongue in cheek ha-ha attitude. The worst is when business do it. We get a fax every week from a produce company that uses, as their tag line, When "Freshness" Counts. But that makes it seem like they're kidding about the quote-unquote freshness, as though they're jokingly saying our stuff is never really fresh.

Note to Shiz: No one is reading this anymore. They stopped looong, looong ago.

My wonderful husband might get another tattoo today, and all I can think is ouch and I will so accidentally kick him in the tender tattoo area in my sleep for the next ten nights, which is a shame because I really like sleeping in the same bed as my husband, not alone, locked out of the apartment on the balcony.

(Note to anybody who still cares about the quote mark thing: If I had been trying to imply that I would kick my husband in the tattoo intentionally but jokingly claim that it was an accident, I could have written I will so "accidentally" kick him in the tender tattoo area in my sleep for the next ten nights. Get it?

Yes Shiz, we "get" it.

Egad. Even the imaginary people are doing it.)

But how do I know, you ask, that I will kick my husband while we sleep? Because once when he was badly, painfully injured in the shin, my foot reared back and there was a loud squealing-in-pain noise on the other side of the bed and I immediately jumped up with adrenalaine saying, "Oh God, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Oh my God David I am so sorry!" I can't not do it.

Personally, I don't see myself getting a tattoo, and for two equally important reasons. Firstly, there is no way I could ever choose something that I will want on my body for the rest of my life, and secondly, the Bible forbids it.

Just kidding. But I do change my mind about what I like and styles, etc., fairly often, and I can't imagine being happy with a tattoo forever. Plus, I'm bad with pain. I hate it. Ask me last night when I almost fainted from the pain of a deeply embedded pimple. I realize some people who hate pain still suck it up and get the tattoo, but I think that's because they tell themselves that they want this %$@! image on their bicep for life even more than they want OH GOD for the pain to stop, and as I said above I would never be able to choose a image that I wanted on my body that badly.

And even if my husband gets a tattoo on his shoulder, even if he gets one on his tongue, I will find a way to kick it in my sleep. Sorry, honey.

Anyone have a sleeping bag I can borrow?

Texas be Funny

Okay, you know what they do in Texas? They have this week called homecoming, which was on all the American sitcoms and I never knew what it was. So when I was at a small US college and we were taking about it, I turned to my friend Julie, a Houston-living-person-resident-thingy, and whispered, "Julie, what's homecoming?"

She said, more or less, "It's a week when a bunch of old grads come back and there's a lot of parties and a parade and a big football game."

No big deal, right? Practically every American school (and probably a few in Alberta) celebrate homecoming. It's normal, right?

Well, not normal to me. We didn't even have football teams. Some schools played rugby, but mine never got it together in that department. So homecoming? Parades? Football game? School spirit? They sound a little foreign to me.

But in Texas, as in other (predominantly Southern) states, they have a traditon, and I only just found out about it.

The girls wear something called a mum. This is not the potted plant. It appears to be a mutant Rose Bowl float decoration that's grown floor-length streamers, teddy bears, bells, etc., etc. Your boyfriend or your parents buy (or make) you one, and you wear a different one each year, and different schools have different rules about who can wear what kind/size/colour mum and when. AND? $100 US is not an unheard of price to pay for them.

Don't believe me? Look at this medium-sized mum right here. Is there a girl underneath all that? I certainly hope not. Oh wait, this just in ... I've been told that this is a large mum. There seems to be a bit of debate about that.

But I do think a mischevious cat could have a lot of fun with one of those. (I therefore want one very much.)

I found out about them on this post of This Fish Needs a Bicycle.

I couldn't believe it, and neither could half of her commentors, but the other half claimed to have actually worn one. I went to the mum site and then another mum site and this school website and looked around. Funny. Funny-scary.

PLEASE don't make me raise my children in Texas!

I might not even tell them there is a Texas.

Who knew?

You know how in The Birdcage little Calista Flockheart ("Barbara") claims that Dan Futterman ("Val")'s father is a "cultural attaché to Greece", and no one really knows what a cultural attaché is?

I just overheard two men having a conversation where the phrase "cultural attaché" kept popping up, so I googled it. A cultural attaché is a specialist in cultural matters assigned to the staff of a diplomatic mission. People can actually aspire to be a cultural attaché. Who knew?

Yaaaay!

The suits over at One Rubber Chicken Entertainment (these guys) are taking me here for dinner tonight. Wheeeeeee!

iWhat?

I've seen a bizillion names. I worked as a bank teller for six years, seeing hundreds of accounts and drivers lisences each week and also end up seeing names pretty much everywhere I go. But here's a new one:

Ihor.

I just saw a resumé for a guy named Ihor.

I've seen the surnames Mehboob and Cherry-Sweat, both of which I thought were unfortunate, not to mention the very unfortunate Castratti. But Ihor? For a first name? That takes the cake.

Let's hope at least that it's for a he.

On another note, a friend of mine taught in a school with siblings whose names sounded like Lamongello and Orongello, but were spelled Lemonjello and Orangejello.

Well, burn my biscuits. Now I can't name my kids that. But Grapejello is still free.

My Damn Monkey

It is no secret to anyone who knows me that I have more than a little share of anxiety. Fear. Paranoia. I handle stress badly and even when I should feel content I usually find something (or often somethings) to feel anxious about. You could say it's my damn monkey.

You know, monkey on my back?

So I've been running in circles, or so it seems, for months. I never seem to accomplish anything. I've had lists of ambitions which morph into shoulds and instead of being something I'm excited about, a simple thing like learning tennis becomes a cripplingly weighty obligation. Now instead of wanting to learn tennis, I'm a failure if I don't learn. Instead of being a positive -- the joy of sport -- it is a negative, reinforcing that I am a loser, a loser who never accomplishes anything I set out to do.

It became so bad that the thing that I wanted to do as a career -- to write, to write everything, and to write everything well -- became something I was afraid to approach. I was afraid to open the computer. Since I suddenly had to write, instead of merely doing it for the enjoyment I got out of it, it became a burden to me. And when I stress out or feel burdened, I usually flee the situation as readily as possible. So I've dumped writing, or put it on hold, for no good reason whatsoever. And I've done this with a zillion things already. There aren't many left to go.

It's worked the same way with my new "healthy" lifestyle. My motivation went from a positive -- I'll look and feel great -- to a negative -- if I don't do this I'll be a fat, unhealthy failure -- and the drive fizzled faster than a package of pop rocks in a can of soda.

And I couldn't get out of it. I was afraid to tell anyone that I "wanted" to do anything, since that came to be the kiss of death. If I told my husband that I wanted to go rowing, I would instantly feel the desire leave my body and watch it morph in front of me. Instead of being a challenge that I could attack jovially, it became a montrously huge, slimy green apparition, menacing and threatening, barring down on me, staring me into submission. I would be weeping like a four-year-old whose favourite toy has just been snatched by a bully.

Fear cripples me. Anxiety brings 'round the wagon train and I'm trapped. And now that I'm venturing into yet another desire, I fear that the same thing will happen all over again.

I've given myself the pep-talk. I cannot spend a fortune on education and supplies if I am going to wimp out. I've tried to see this challenge -- professional make-up artistry -- as an "other," something truly different, nothing that can morph in front of me. It's what I want to do, can do easily, can attack with happiness, have experience in, and have enjoyed in the past. It's been a struggle. Just days after the telling-of-the-husband (you know, the kiss of death), I had serious doubts. My zeal would never last, I thought. I can't really do it, I thought. Look, I'm already getting bored with the idea. This will never work, I thought, then I'll feel like even more of a failure, having started yet another thing -- and this an expensive one at that -- that doesn't pay off, that I didn't follow through with.

I hide my anxiety. My friends and family know of it, an see some I'm sure, but they don't see how much I really have. They see, as the saying goes, only the tip of the iceberg; there is so much more below the surface that they haven't seen. It's like I sit in the passenger seat, helpless, while my anxiety takes the wheel. Once, when meeting with a counsellor, I had filled out a questionnaire beforehand. He was reading it and observed, "According to this, you have moderate depression and pretty serious anxiety." I didn't disagree with him. I sat casually in his office, cross-legged on a chair. "Do you feel anxious now?" he asked. "Yes," I answered. "Well you don't look it," was his answer, "but then a lot of people with high anxiety learn ways to hide it." Apparently I'd learned that one well.

So I am coming out of the closet, so to speak. I am anxious. I am almost always, 100% of the time anxious. It's crippling and sometimes I feel it is killing me, and with all these constant looming failures I decided to try something. I'm trying to change my attitude.

Do I have to learn Photoshop? Hell no! Will anyone like me less if I do not learn Photoshop? No! Will I like me less if I don't learn Photoshop? Well that would be stupid, why should I? Will I disappoint anybody if I don't just learn Photoshop already, damn it? No.

I have to retrain my head. My thoughts are not used to going this way. It's like using a muscle that's been in atrophy. It hurts. It goes against the flow. But. I. Will. Train. Anyway. It's HARD. But. I. Will. Train. Anyway. It stinks, it sucks, it's JUST NOT FAIR! But. I. Will. Train. Anyway.

This is your notice, Monkey. I'm having you evicted. By force.

Stress

Okay, here's me: One thing to-do? No problem! I'm happy as a lark!

Two things to-do? I can do it. It's not a piece of cake, but I can manage.

Three things? Oh, wow. I have THREE things to do today. What if I don't get them all done?

Four? I think I am going BLIND. I don't think I can do any of these things. It's too much, maybe on another day, when I'm not BLIND.

Five things to do today? Shit. Which do I do? Or how do I organize the order so it's easy for me? Will people hate me if I don't do these things? I think I might hate myself if I don't. Oh God, how am I going to SLEEP tonight?

Six things to do, or six things I should do: Um, okay if I do just one I'll feel like a failure. Actually if I do four of them I'll still have trouble sleeping, because these are shoulds, things that I should do if I'm a good person, if I'm a "together" person. Why can't I be a "together" person?

Shit. I have TEN things I should be doing, should have done by now. This is awful. I can't see straight. I can't breathe. Even if I do HALF of them I'll still be a failure. I'll never sleep again. I'll never accomplish anything. Oh. My. I think I am dying. I think this is purgatory. And what will my husband think? I have all this potential, but I can't do everything on my plate, even though he can do everything on his plate and the work of several more people. I think I should lie down now. And pull the covers over my head.

Am I the only one?

Pimpin', part deux

I offended G
called him a girl and all, dudes
but can you blame me?

I say "Genuine"
along with castles on blog
hint at the female.

Forgive me, boy G
for not picking up on all
those masculine clues.

And now, down to biz,
another baby teaser
same photo, more stuff:

So go on and 'ku
Get your 'ku-mojo workin'
for this week's smackdown.

If you know the pic
kindly refrain from spilling
the beans, if you please.

Run, Run Rudolph

It's weird, that song. Firstly, why has "Run, run Rudolph (Santa's gotta make it to town)" been in my head so much lately? How was my brain inspired with that? It's a very dumb song. The tune is cheap and catchy, one of the worst combos ever. One it gets in your head it stays in your head, or at least that seems to be the case with me. And why does the singer tell Rudolph to run? Isn't he supposed to fly? But then, "Fly, fly Rudolph," might be taken with a different meaning altogether. It's always sounded like "Round, round Rudolph" to me, but THAT makes no sense whatsoever, unless Rudi packed on a few pounds of Christmas treats and really does need to get his lard-ass in gear. Maybe it's "Run, round Rudolph"; a Christmas Carol for fat people.

I ran this weekend. I ran like a crazy person. The most I've run - on an eliptical, mind you - in the past month is about 45 minutes, and the longest I've ever run was a 75 minute run mostly on pavement, and that was at least six months ago. But I wanted to run. So I ran. And like our friend Forrest Gump put it, "I just kept on running." And run I did. I ran all the way to the Stanley Park Seawall, all the way around the Stanley Park Seawall, stopped at Lost Lagoon and walked the rest of the way home. I ran for almost 100 minutes and walked for 35.

And I hurt.

I've been meaning to keep up running in 30 minute stretches but I've been walking around like an old lady. Still, I want to get out again, I really do. I guess if I keep on going some of the hurt will get itself gone. My best guess is that the total distance of my run was about 14 kms (8.6 miles) and that I walked about 3.5 kms (2 miles). Insane.

On another topic entirely, David left today for a killer trip to Los Angeles for a comedy conference-y thingy. I say "conference-y thingy" because with comedians, even a conference is not entirely serious. It's more of a time to let loose, network like crazy, and get some critiqueing and seminars in on the side. He'll work his little tailbone off this week and hardly have time to down all Pink Gin shooters between punch lines, but I hope that in there somewhere he'll have a chance to let his hair down.

Good luck, fella. May the force be with you.

Lastly, I saw a very good movie two nights ago: City of God. Not the old one, the new one. It's a beautiful, memorable film.

Pimpin' the Smack. Smackdown, that is.

I am happy to announce that Journalicious has been chosen by the powers that be over at the Judith Light Brigade to host this week's Haiku Smackdown: Smackdown #15: Kus to Amuse. You will not want to miss it.

What is this "Smackdown" I speak of? Every Thursday a bunch of us neglect to take our medicine, show up at a site and write haiku all the livelong day about that week's theme, which is usually a series of photographs. This week's Smackadowndilly will consist of EIGHT high-quality, glossy 8x10s, so mark your calendar NOW to return to this site on Thursday, June the 17th, 2004, and haiku-party like it's 1999.

Here's part of one of this week's photographs, as a teaser to get you going. Feel free to haiku about it, as a warm-up:

Go nuts, people. By the way, the official rules are here, while some faqs are here. If you've never joined in I encourage you to try it, it's quite addicting. It's part chat-room, part serious haiku contest, and one heckuva haikuin' good time.

Quidam

In which Shiz gets all arty-farty on your ass.

Big surprise, boys and girls. David & I saw Quidam. We were given tickets by an angel of the Lord God himself (too thick?) and saw their final Vancouver show tonight.

Cirque du Soleil is an all-human circus and a theatre troupe put together. The company is currently running five touring shows and three resident shows (two in Las Vegas and one in Orlando). It is everything you would not expect from theatre or from the circus -- or perhaps it is all you'd expect and more. In its endeavors to put on a good show, Cirque leaves no stone unturned. From the technical direction to the smallest artistic detail, Cirque makes everything magical, everything stunning, and everything perfect.

Here are some of the things I love about Cirque and/or more specifically, about Quidam:

Everyone gets a chance to shine, yet no one is the star

Quidam showcases a lot of talent. I counted about 40 members in the Vancouver cast, but I may have missed some. At any rate, there are a lot of performers and every one of them is fantastic. Every performer has the opportunity to show off their talents, yet no one ever steals the show. These folks know humility, or at least, some semblance of it.

The cooperation of all the elements of the arts -- and of the show -- shines through

The coordination to pull off a show like Quidam is amazing, and the cast works together with unimaginable synergy. Cast, musicians, and unseen crew, stage management, technical direction and tour management have obviously collaborated to make something unique to theatre, to athleticism, and to the arts. The cooperation alone of all these elements -- seen and unseen -- makes Quidam an impressive sight. It -- don't mind my rhapsodica -- makes me wonder what is possible when people really work together. It astounds me.

The music is the cat's ass

The music of Quidam stands out in my mind as being perhaps the best performance track ever. I love it, love it, love it until I love all the notes of it and wear it down to a nub. I should write love poetry to the soundtrack I love it so much.

Everything in Quidam is visually stunning

Costumes. Make-Up. Set decoration. Properties. Lighting. Hair. Technical properties. Not one thing is excluded from the Quidam paintbrush. And it all looks fabulous. Most memorable visuals include the costumes of the Banguine (tumblers), skipping rope, Spanish web, German wheel & aerial hoop performers as well as the make-up for the skipping rope, aerial contortion in cloth, statue vis-versa, Spanish Web, German wheel & Banguine performers, the lightning effects of the light design, the properties used throughout the show, the beautiful stage floor, the hairstyles of the Banguine ladies, German wheel performer and ariel hoop ladies, and the clever man hole in the stage floor. There's more, but I'll stop now.

You laugh

I can't explain the bits, I'm not good at that, but let me tell you that I belly-laughed long and hard and then some more.

Graceful, gorgeous performances

What spells grace better than a near-and-seeminly-nude woman suspended in the air, holding onto two red cloth banners, moving to the beat of the art within her, the music around us, as all the world stands still? What whispers of life more than tumblers throwing each other through the air, arcing high and coming down into the embrace of another tumbler? What is more lovely than a group of aerialists, spinning high above the crowd by only their right wrists? The movement is dance, the power is athleticism and the spirit is human. And I'm being all arty-farty again.

You want it to go on forever

Yup. Truly. I could take another 6 hours. Then another 8 tomorrow.

So with that, I leave you to see it yourself. In person is best, though dvd is good also. Quidam's Calgary and Australia shows are forthcoming (Varekai and Alegria are also touring the US & Canada, and the LA & Orlando shows are ongoing). Believe me, it's like you haven't been alive until you see it. Okay, it's like you've been alive but really been missing something. Something fantastic.

The Thing Is

Okay, let me try to explain this Canada thing. It's not that you have to know who our Prime Minister is to make us happy. It's not that you have to be up on our politics and current events. It's that you all have got to stop asking us if we have movies in Canada, or if we have barbeque or have ever heard of table tennis.

And so many Americans have said things like that to us. Recently it was, "Canada doesn't have a Nuclear Physics Laboratory," which is pretty stupid if you ask me. So the only physicists in the world are in America, and maybe 1 or 2 in Russia or France? It's not that we're insulted that they don't know very much about our world, it's that the only thing they know about is theirs.

I have friends who were asked, "Do you have cars in Canada?" And while I realize that the average American is not that stupid, we keep getting these questions. "Is Vancouver close to Toronto?" is one I get a lot. These people know where London and Tokyo and Paris are, but they haven't a clue that Toronto and Vancouver are as far apart as Boston is from Los Angeles. I realize that most Americans are schooled almost exclusively in American history & current events, and that the media never tells them about the rest of the world, so that in some ways it's hardly their fault, but where in the heck do people come from that say things like "Do you have VCRs in Canada?" or "You Canadians must get a lot of your water from us."

It's okay to not know where Calgary is, but this "Do you have toaster ovens in Canada?" thing has really got to stop. And I realize that Mir may have been partly kidding when she told me that Canada didn't have a Physics Lab (I think it was Mir), but it's like these people think that America is the only country in the world with any sort of small modern conveniences, or who fights diseases, or are the only place that matters, and the rest of us - all over the world - are really bored with that.

So now it's time for a bit of retaliation:

Do you all have mayonnaise in America? Or do you have spiders in America? Have you heard of fried chicken, do you have that? In Canada we have these jeans called Levis, you've probably never heard of them, have you? Do you guys have public swimming pools in America? Hey, I met a guy from the States once - Rob Rudcker - Do you know him? Have you ever heard of Sheryl Crow? We have her music in Canada, so you've probably never heard of her. Have you heard of Emeril Lagasse? Does anyone canoe in America? Do you go bowling in the US? Have you heard of macaroni? Do you have macaroni in America?

I have decided

I've decided that just because the oh-my-goodness-this-is-horrible-what-is-that-smell-and-I-can't-breathe overpowering baby-powder-and-bad-perfume scented bathroom deodorizer has a sticker that says PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE, it does not mean that I can't dump most of it down the sink and refill it with tapwater.

I think the DO NOT REMOVE stickers might have been put on after I tossed one in the garbage, which is unfair, really, since I didn't remove it at all.

Lookin' for School in All the Wrong Places

I visited two make-up schools on Saturday, though I keep wanting to say modelling schools, because they are those, too. But anyway, let me tell you my thoughts, and I have a hillion jillion of them.

The fist school I visited was Blanche Macdonald, and I already knew that Blanche is THE name in Vancouver for make-up and has been forever, or so the talk is that I've heard. I was 45 minutes late for my meeting with the associate director because I didn't leave on time nor check the schedules for the False Creek Ferries (I also vastly underestimated the length of time my travel would take), but wanting to make a good impression I called ahead and was able to blame my lateness on the Boat for Hope fundraiser. Yes: I used a children's charity event as a (false) excuse for my lateness. I LIED.

I feel bad about that now.

So anyhow, all was fine and I was able to meet the associate director. We hit it off right away; she understood my wanting to get into a creative career that I loved and called me "fashion forward" and "funky." (It's funny how jeans and a fitted black t-shirt are always fashion forward.) She showed me around the school, talked about the program, about the industry & instructors and let me peek into an airbrushing class with partial nudes in it getting airbrushed into various goddesses, Geisha and the like. She showed me a book of some make-up work and chatted with me for a while. I was there for almost an hour.

But then I mentioned the school I would be visiting next and she claimed to have never heard of it.

Granted the 2nd school is smaller and does appear to be inferior in terms of connections and budget. But they've been around for 24 years as a modelling & acting agency and as a modelling, acting & make-up school. Was she faking it to put the other school in a bad light, that if she hadn't heard of it then it must not be any good? It made me wonder if the two of us really had hit it off, or if she was just playing me, trying to reel me in.

I still lean towards we really hit it off, but think that maybe she was lying about not knowing the other school. Of course she didn't pretend to not have heard of the other two biggies in town, Vancouver Film School & John Casablancas.

The second school I visited is called New Image, and was definately unimpressive when I entered their offices. Their décor was terrible and they made me wait a good ten minutes. There was someone sleeping in the lounge. I considered walking out. Then their CEO came out and introduced herself, and while I had been skeptical, I warmed to her. She was very genuine and told me about their move into new, lovely offices in a month, and the expansion of their programs and some free advice for me no matter where I went (always have a camera with you & take LOTS of pictures of your work, for example). David came in and joined the end of our meeting. We both agreed upon leaving that the CEO, a former model herself, was a babe. She invited me to attend a make-up class and meet their teachers, to ask questions, and I'm going to take her up on it as soon as I can. And, I'm going to try the same thing with Blanche Macdonald and attend an open house for John Casablancas, a school I cannot attend because of their schedule but that I can make contacts with and get some answers from.

So far, Blanche Macdonald is by far the more professional, the more comprehensive school, but I'm not ready to give up on the underdog yet. I'm gonna look further into it, and I'm going to ask about town.

My Eating Habits

Have a new theme song:

The Pet Shop Boys' It's a Sin

Shiz' New Career. Maybe.

As a make-up artist, I will be able to freelance from home, choosing the jobs and clients that I want. I will be able to do make-up for film & television, weddings & special events, and theatre & editorial. I will not have benefits, sick days, extended medical or paid vacation, but I will be free from my desk and that will be worth it. Plus, I'll have a ball. I'm visiting two schools this weekend.

Stella

My iBook came back safely to me ... two days after she went in. They replaced her logic board, basically a recall on it, so it was all covered and I paid $0. Thank God.

When she got sick I was in a coffee shop with David. We both brought out our Apple laptops and a woman at the adjoining table was asking us about them. We told her some stuff, answered her questions, and then to erase any of the rampant (and inerrant) Apple-is-inferior stereotype she may have been exposed to, I said: "I've had it since January and she's never crashed, I've never even had to reboot." So a minute later when I tried to open up Stella she of course wouldn't work. But maybe the lady didn't see. Maybe.

Because everyone should have a Mac. Or almost everyone. Everything that peope told you about Macs being bad/hard/incompatible is a lie. You never have to worry about not having the right software, you can even run Windows on it if you want (though WHY anyone would want to I have no idea). You will never get a virus and you pretty much never have problems with your computer, ever. You just use it, and isn't that what it a computer is for?

There are people out there who have had legitimately bad Mac experiences, but I bet they are few, and of the people with the newest generation of Macs I bet you'd be hard pressed to find anybody with a legitimate compaint -- a the very least, disgruntled Mac users would be a very small percentage especially when compared with the percentage of disgruntled PC users. Macs cost more than PCs, but -- let me put it this way -- I'd rather spend money on a car that wasn't going to break down all the time and/or cause me a whack-load of other problems, rather than save the cash and get a lemon.

Now Linux people, on the other hand, are their own breed. Go forth and Linux, crazy geek-people.

A Royal Screwing

My pay raise - inflation raise - goes into effect in July: 2.5%. On my salary, that works out to be $20 more per paycheque (after taxes). Oh, man, y'all are so generous.

No, I'm grateful, really, because in one year that'll add up to $480. And with that $480.00 I'll be able to ... pay half my rent.

I get a "merit" raise, soon, too, which, if it's anything like last year will be another 2.5%. Another $20. So with $960 of extra take-home pay I'm thinking of taking a vacation or something, like, for two nights at a nearby cabin. Or start my future kids' college fund. Wait, how about my own college fund?

It just feels like so little. I get a "Gee, Sharon, you're doing a terific job!" followed by, "How's $800 bucks?" of which the government takes a quarter. This is the reward for a job well done? Actually, $800 is for the cost-of living (because we all know the cost of living only increases by $480 per year), and the other (hopefully) $800 is for being a good girl on the job. I have mountains of student loans. It just feels like so little.

Medic!

My baby is sick. My sweet little Stella. My Apple iBook.

She came down with a fever on Friday night, which is strange, because since I adopted her in January all she's ever had is a little a-hem, and then only a scant can-count-on-one-hand number of times. I tried to wake her up but she stayed asleep. So I tried waking her again but she stayed down. Then she woke briefly and started having a spazm, so I let her sleep again and tried to wake her with no avail. Daddy came in and she woke up nicely for him. I figured I must have been on crack. (Ever wonder when people [er ... when I] say that? Like I can't remember if I was on crack? Maybe that means I was. Was I? And what are we talking about?)

Stella was fine until Monday night, when she wouldn't wake again, not for nobody, not for nothing, but then we got her to wake up but here eyes wouldn't open, But we knew she was awake because her sister can do a vulcan mind meld thing with her, and she was definately awake.

iBooks do not get sick. Macintoshes do not get sick. Stella does not get sick. I'm taking her to Doctor Rick today to see if he and his team can get her to open her eyes, and hopefully it won't require expensive surgery. My poor baby!