Monday, May 31, 2004
The Workin’ Girl Blues
In my twenty seven years I have held a number of jobs. The first of which, like so many girls before me, was babysitting. I was fortunate enough to have a father who worked with a large number of new parents. Oddly enough, many of the new mommies and daddies also worked together. My dad pimped me out to everyone and anyone, never asked for a cut, and he only beat me twice.
All of the families I sat for were very good to me, and their children were unfailingly well-behaved. I did notice, however, that none of them had cable, movies, food, or anything fun to read. The child I sat for most often, Jeffrey, had a particularly Spartan abode. When he was very young it was great to sit for him, often I would get there and he’d be asleep, and wouldn’t make a peep all night. For the first month or so I had no idea what he looked like. However, this also meant that there was absolutely nothing for me to do while I was there. I certainly didn’t feel like doing my homework. So, I talked on the phone and ate raisins and Flinstones’ vitamins. I hope that eating seven in a sitting didn’t render me sterile or anything.
Over the summers I would provide relief for the day care workers going on vacation. The most memorable of these stints was for Kenny and Rachel. Rachel was a very sweet little girl, beautiful, kind, loving, and (if it can be said about a three year old), gracious. Kenny, however, tried to find as many ways as possible to kill himself in a day. The very first time I sat for them his mother came up to me and said:
“Ummmm, we had a little bit of an incident last night. Kenny swallowed a dinosaur button and seemed to have some problems getting it down. We took him to the hospital, but they said to just keep an eye out for it and see that it worked its way through. So, I really hate to ask you to do this…”
“And I hate being asked, but I’ll look for it when I change him.”
It wasn’t unusual for Kenny to make several trips to the hospital a week. Anyway, sure enough, as I was changing him for bed there was a cheerful little pink button with a stegosaurus on it nestled amongst the contents of his diaper. I’m glad that they gave me a head’s up about that because I would have been a little alarmed if I had found that in there without any sort of explanation attached. I’m sure that his parents were very appreciative of the fact that I washed the button off and kept it for them. Perhaps it went into the photo album.
I’m not too proud of the way I “mothered” poor Kenny, and it’s a good thing there were no cameras around. I once held him down in bed to keep him from getting out and running around so he’d go to sleep. I also once held the door shut so he couldn’t get out of his room when he was supposed to go to bed. On one side I was yelling “Kenny, go to bed!” and Kenny would tug furiously on the door and yell back “No bed!” This went on for ten minutes, until I tried to open the door to force him back into bed, and he used my trick against me.
Little Rachel did whatever you asked her to do, and was happy to help out in any way shape or form. My only complaint about her was her addiction to crappy movies. We had to watch Thumbelina every day, sometimes twice. This movie never received recognition from any academy, nor is the art, plot, or music worth writing home about. I wished very fervently for the summer heat to melt the tape in the VCR, but God was indifferent to my pleas.
The first non-babysitting job I had was for a video store. That was extremely short-lived. Val got me the job, and trained me for two and a half hours. The first day I was due to start work they declared bankruptcy and the doors were locked.
One of the most horrible jobs was working at a sort of country club for trout fishermen. The grounds of this place were beautiful. Gazebos dotted the lawn, the gardens were immaculate, and the trout ponds, four in total, gave a cottagey feel to the place. Working here, though, was like stepping back into the nineteen forties. This was a place for old, rich, white men to drink and talk to other old, rich, white men. Four of us served in the dining room and were meant to be seen (our blouses were virtually transparent) but not heard. We weren’t allowed to enter through the front doors, but rather the kitchens.
There were about ten staff in total and we lived and worked together. The cabin fever was tangible. Two of the guys living there insisted on watching Dazed and Confused every single day. When they weren’t watching it, they were quoting it “All right, all right, all right.” I can’t watch that movie without shuddering. We didn’t have cable, most of us didn’t have cars, and we worked every day but Monday. Kathy Lee Gifford’s kids had better working conditions. It didn’t help matters at all that our boss was a smelly insane person. She would be friendly, then very abruptly not, and she reeked to high heaven the entire day. Her hair would still be wet from her morning shower and her stench could bring tears to your eyes.
If we’d been allowed to receive tips we would have made out like bandits at this place, but unfortunately that was not in the cards. There was a tip bonus that they held over our heads, and the only way we could get it was if we worked the whole summer through. I still have nightmares, wherein I’ve agreed to go back and work there. I’ll be in the dining room again receiving my instructions for the evening and a part of me will be screaming “no, don’t do it, you HATED it here!”
The winner of the worst job ever has to be a temp job I did over Xmas several years ago. For three days, eight hours a day, I wore a glowing yellow sweatshirt that said “Cantel Amigo” in peacock blue. The going rate on my dignity at that time was fifteen dollars an hour. Three of us would stand in front of various stores in a mall and hand out cardboard flip phones to passersby. One day my two coworkers were smoking and I was standing with them when one man ran out to us, and all out of breath said “Hey, the Three Amigos! My wife just thought of that!” My coworker, Kelly, gave him a flat stare and replied, “You’re a very lucky man, sir.” He didn’t get it.
Now that I’m all responsible and adult I can be more choosey about the jobs I work. Currently this means that I answer phones, do proofreading for two companies, email my friends incessantly, and write a blog. It also means that I get to take out the garbage every day and make coffee for tout le monde. It’s not all glamour.
In my twenty seven years I have held a number of jobs. The first of which, like so many girls before me, was babysitting. I was fortunate enough to have a father who worked with a large number of new parents. Oddly enough, many of the new mommies and daddies also worked together. My dad pimped me out to everyone and anyone, never asked for a cut, and he only beat me twice.
All of the families I sat for were very good to me, and their children were unfailingly well-behaved. I did notice, however, that none of them had cable, movies, food, or anything fun to read. The child I sat for most often, Jeffrey, had a particularly Spartan abode. When he was very young it was great to sit for him, often I would get there and he’d be asleep, and wouldn’t make a peep all night. For the first month or so I had no idea what he looked like. However, this also meant that there was absolutely nothing for me to do while I was there. I certainly didn’t feel like doing my homework. So, I talked on the phone and ate raisins and Flinstones’ vitamins. I hope that eating seven in a sitting didn’t render me sterile or anything.
Over the summers I would provide relief for the day care workers going on vacation. The most memorable of these stints was for Kenny and Rachel. Rachel was a very sweet little girl, beautiful, kind, loving, and (if it can be said about a three year old), gracious. Kenny, however, tried to find as many ways as possible to kill himself in a day. The very first time I sat for them his mother came up to me and said:
“Ummmm, we had a little bit of an incident last night. Kenny swallowed a dinosaur button and seemed to have some problems getting it down. We took him to the hospital, but they said to just keep an eye out for it and see that it worked its way through. So, I really hate to ask you to do this…”
“And I hate being asked, but I’ll look for it when I change him.”
It wasn’t unusual for Kenny to make several trips to the hospital a week. Anyway, sure enough, as I was changing him for bed there was a cheerful little pink button with a stegosaurus on it nestled amongst the contents of his diaper. I’m glad that they gave me a head’s up about that because I would have been a little alarmed if I had found that in there without any sort of explanation attached. I’m sure that his parents were very appreciative of the fact that I washed the button off and kept it for them. Perhaps it went into the photo album.
I’m not too proud of the way I “mothered” poor Kenny, and it’s a good thing there were no cameras around. I once held him down in bed to keep him from getting out and running around so he’d go to sleep. I also once held the door shut so he couldn’t get out of his room when he was supposed to go to bed. On one side I was yelling “Kenny, go to bed!” and Kenny would tug furiously on the door and yell back “No bed!” This went on for ten minutes, until I tried to open the door to force him back into bed, and he used my trick against me.
Little Rachel did whatever you asked her to do, and was happy to help out in any way shape or form. My only complaint about her was her addiction to crappy movies. We had to watch Thumbelina every day, sometimes twice. This movie never received recognition from any academy, nor is the art, plot, or music worth writing home about. I wished very fervently for the summer heat to melt the tape in the VCR, but God was indifferent to my pleas.
The first non-babysitting job I had was for a video store. That was extremely short-lived. Val got me the job, and trained me for two and a half hours. The first day I was due to start work they declared bankruptcy and the doors were locked.
One of the most horrible jobs was working at a sort of country club for trout fishermen. The grounds of this place were beautiful. Gazebos dotted the lawn, the gardens were immaculate, and the trout ponds, four in total, gave a cottagey feel to the place. Working here, though, was like stepping back into the nineteen forties. This was a place for old, rich, white men to drink and talk to other old, rich, white men. Four of us served in the dining room and were meant to be seen (our blouses were virtually transparent) but not heard. We weren’t allowed to enter through the front doors, but rather the kitchens.
There were about ten staff in total and we lived and worked together. The cabin fever was tangible. Two of the guys living there insisted on watching Dazed and Confused every single day. When they weren’t watching it, they were quoting it “All right, all right, all right.” I can’t watch that movie without shuddering. We didn’t have cable, most of us didn’t have cars, and we worked every day but Monday. Kathy Lee Gifford’s kids had better working conditions. It didn’t help matters at all that our boss was a smelly insane person. She would be friendly, then very abruptly not, and she reeked to high heaven the entire day. Her hair would still be wet from her morning shower and her stench could bring tears to your eyes.
If we’d been allowed to receive tips we would have made out like bandits at this place, but unfortunately that was not in the cards. There was a tip bonus that they held over our heads, and the only way we could get it was if we worked the whole summer through. I still have nightmares, wherein I’ve agreed to go back and work there. I’ll be in the dining room again receiving my instructions for the evening and a part of me will be screaming “no, don’t do it, you HATED it here!”
The winner of the worst job ever has to be a temp job I did over Xmas several years ago. For three days, eight hours a day, I wore a glowing yellow sweatshirt that said “Cantel Amigo” in peacock blue. The going rate on my dignity at that time was fifteen dollars an hour. Three of us would stand in front of various stores in a mall and hand out cardboard flip phones to passersby. One day my two coworkers were smoking and I was standing with them when one man ran out to us, and all out of breath said “Hey, the Three Amigos! My wife just thought of that!” My coworker, Kelly, gave him a flat stare and replied, “You’re a very lucky man, sir.” He didn’t get it.
Now that I’m all responsible and adult I can be more choosey about the jobs I work. Currently this means that I answer phones, do proofreading for two companies, email my friends incessantly, and write a blog. It also means that I get to take out the garbage every day and make coffee for tout le monde. It’s not all glamour.
Wednesday, May 26, 2004
It's So Crazy it Just Might Work
Lately I've been noticing that more and more of my contemporaries are listening to talk radio in an attempt to escape the monotony of top forty radio. Fewer and fewer people care who thinks they’ll be the next Beatles. In the Toronto area there is CFRB1010 AM, which features an entertaining cast, my favourite of whom is John Moore. Recently Mr. Moore has been doing quizzes with his listeners, inspired by the type of questionnaire given to those seeking asylum in Canada for fear of being persecuted for homosexuality in their own countries. Some of these people are being sent back to their countries for not being “gay enough.”
Obviously this is a serious issue, but this is not a place where I want to wax poetic, or philosophic, about all of the mouth-breathers out there who can’t let people live in peace. I want to talk about a radio program that made me chuckle. Having observed the fact that I consider this a pertinent issue, and that I am sensitive and savvy we can get down to the funny side of homosexuality: stereotyping.
The questionnaire that John Moore developed for his show is really quite fun, and I've started to use it as a way of screening potential boyfriends. What girl hasn't secretly feared becoming attached to someone only to find out during the relationship, or else years later, that he's gay? It's happened to people I know, I bet it's happened to people you know too. There have been times when I've been considering someone, or have found myself interested in someone but have held back because of being slightly unsure, of sensing that something wasn't quite between us (if you know what I’m sayin’ right here). Maybe it was because he was too neat, too articulate, or a little too sensitive. Or maybe his collection of scented candles and knick-knacks surpassed my own. These are the little things that can drive a wedge between two hopeful romantics. By utilising John Moore's quiz, prospective couples can have fun and learn about their orientation at the same time. There is only one area in which the questionnaire falls short. It only applies to men, not to women. At the end of my John Moore recap I'll provide a potential questionnaire for women so that men can determine whether or not the young lady in his life plays for her own team. Feel free to send me your suggestions.
The Questions
1. What two words would you use to come up with a new name for white paint?
2. Who was your favourite Golden Girl?
3. Have you ever used another word to describe a shirt?
4. What are Manola Blahniks?
5. Have you ever shaved an area of your body below your neck?
6. Do you know a woman who owns a potter's wheel?
7. What's your favourite movie?
When listening to the guys give answers to these questions it wasn't too hard to figure out who was gay , and who was straight. Straight men don’t say “top,” don’t know who the Golden Girls are, and would not admit to having shaved below their neck unless undergoing torture.
What could we ask the women that would be helpful for the gents out there?
The Questions - and the Answer Key
Q - How many items of plaid clothing do you own?
A - Any more than three, and if they aren't underpants, or pjs, are strongly indicative of same sex orientation.
Q - Explain "off-side" in terms anyone can understand. Can you recognize it when it's happening?
A - This one is tricky, because there are some sports' loving gals out there, but, by in large, if you understand off-side and can both explain AND recognize it, you're not into riding the bologna pony.
Q - Do you REALLY like Catherine Zeta-Jones?
A - Duh.
Q - Would you serve it up for any one of the following men: Brad Pitt, Orlando Bloom, Johnny Depp, Sean Connery, Jude Law, Denzel Washington, Bradley Whitford (personal favourite), Benjamin Bratt, Prince William, Lenny Kravitz, or Harrison Ford?
A - If there isn't one person on that list you'd shag rotten, well, then....
Q - What kind of car do you drive?
A - If the answer contains too many specifics about design or function you are likely gay.
Q - Do you prefer having sex with women more than men?
A - The answer to this question could be particularly revealing.
Q - Have you ever made out with another girl in a bar for any other reason than to attract the notice of horny post-pubescent men?
A - Shockingly, a highly successful way to instigate a booty call. Though who could vouch for the quality of transaction with whatever it is you'd pick up?
Q - How many pairs of shoes do you own? How many of them are either work boots or cross trainers?
A - If ALL of a woman’s shoes are athletic, you have to wonder. If all of the shoes are steel-toed, well…
Clearly all of these questions are wildly stereotypical and certainly offensive. That's what makes them so fun. I loved asking some of my cyber pals those questions to get to know them better. I always went with the Golden Girl question because I once dated someone who was obsessed with that show. Of the two men I asked the question to, one said "Blanche, 'cause she was such a horny old broad," and the other said "Bea Arthur, but only when she wore her thong and hooker pumps."
Lately I've been noticing that more and more of my contemporaries are listening to talk radio in an attempt to escape the monotony of top forty radio. Fewer and fewer people care who thinks they’ll be the next Beatles. In the Toronto area there is CFRB1010 AM, which features an entertaining cast, my favourite of whom is John Moore. Recently Mr. Moore has been doing quizzes with his listeners, inspired by the type of questionnaire given to those seeking asylum in Canada for fear of being persecuted for homosexuality in their own countries. Some of these people are being sent back to their countries for not being “gay enough.”
Obviously this is a serious issue, but this is not a place where I want to wax poetic, or philosophic, about all of the mouth-breathers out there who can’t let people live in peace. I want to talk about a radio program that made me chuckle. Having observed the fact that I consider this a pertinent issue, and that I am sensitive and savvy we can get down to the funny side of homosexuality: stereotyping.
The questionnaire that John Moore developed for his show is really quite fun, and I've started to use it as a way of screening potential boyfriends. What girl hasn't secretly feared becoming attached to someone only to find out during the relationship, or else years later, that he's gay? It's happened to people I know, I bet it's happened to people you know too. There have been times when I've been considering someone, or have found myself interested in someone but have held back because of being slightly unsure, of sensing that something wasn't quite between us (if you know what I’m sayin’ right here). Maybe it was because he was too neat, too articulate, or a little too sensitive. Or maybe his collection of scented candles and knick-knacks surpassed my own. These are the little things that can drive a wedge between two hopeful romantics. By utilising John Moore's quiz, prospective couples can have fun and learn about their orientation at the same time. There is only one area in which the questionnaire falls short. It only applies to men, not to women. At the end of my John Moore recap I'll provide a potential questionnaire for women so that men can determine whether or not the young lady in his life plays for her own team. Feel free to send me your suggestions.
The Questions
1. What two words would you use to come up with a new name for white paint?
2. Who was your favourite Golden Girl?
3. Have you ever used another word to describe a shirt?
4. What are Manola Blahniks?
5. Have you ever shaved an area of your body below your neck?
6. Do you know a woman who owns a potter's wheel?
7. What's your favourite movie?
When listening to the guys give answers to these questions it wasn't too hard to figure out who was gay , and who was straight. Straight men don’t say “top,” don’t know who the Golden Girls are, and would not admit to having shaved below their neck unless undergoing torture.
What could we ask the women that would be helpful for the gents out there?
The Questions - and the Answer Key
Q - How many items of plaid clothing do you own?
A - Any more than three, and if they aren't underpants, or pjs, are strongly indicative of same sex orientation.
Q - Explain "off-side" in terms anyone can understand. Can you recognize it when it's happening?
A - This one is tricky, because there are some sports' loving gals out there, but, by in large, if you understand off-side and can both explain AND recognize it, you're not into riding the bologna pony.
Q - Do you REALLY like Catherine Zeta-Jones?
A - Duh.
Q - Would you serve it up for any one of the following men: Brad Pitt, Orlando Bloom, Johnny Depp, Sean Connery, Jude Law, Denzel Washington, Bradley Whitford (personal favourite), Benjamin Bratt, Prince William, Lenny Kravitz, or Harrison Ford?
A - If there isn't one person on that list you'd shag rotten, well, then....
Q - What kind of car do you drive?
A - If the answer contains too many specifics about design or function you are likely gay.
Q - Do you prefer having sex with women more than men?
A - The answer to this question could be particularly revealing.
Q - Have you ever made out with another girl in a bar for any other reason than to attract the notice of horny post-pubescent men?
A - Shockingly, a highly successful way to instigate a booty call. Though who could vouch for the quality of transaction with whatever it is you'd pick up?
Q - How many pairs of shoes do you own? How many of them are either work boots or cross trainers?
A - If ALL of a woman’s shoes are athletic, you have to wonder. If all of the shoes are steel-toed, well…
Clearly all of these questions are wildly stereotypical and certainly offensive. That's what makes them so fun. I loved asking some of my cyber pals those questions to get to know them better. I always went with the Golden Girl question because I once dated someone who was obsessed with that show. Of the two men I asked the question to, one said "Blanche, 'cause she was such a horny old broad," and the other said "Bea Arthur, but only when she wore her thong and hooker pumps."
Sunday, May 16, 2004
Wilderness Detour
With the May long weekend fast approaching camping has been on my mind. I was talking to my sister-in-law about this today and we've decided that camping really isn't for us anymore. I used to go camping a few times a year, not the real hard-core outdoorsy "roughing it" type camping, but rather car camping. Car camping means that you bring all of the comforts of home with you (to a point) and you can drive into the closest little redneck town to stock up on the important stuff you either forgot or run out of. Beer, for example.
Alcohol played a VERY important role for me and the people I camped with. It was basically all we had in common. It's a good thing we don't see each other much anymore or we'd all have to think about checking into some sort of clinic. The only ways you could tell the difference between the camping trips, and our typical bar weekends were that it took longer to get to where we were going, there was nowhere comfortable to sit, and the facilities smelled like Satan's asshole. Aside from that everything was pretty similar, lots of second hand smoke (in the camping instance it was from the fire as opposed to DuMaurier), people fell down a lot, and we spent a lot of money.
No one ever packed very well for these trips. Well, that's not true, one girl did, and she was mocked brutally for it. However, whenever someone was hungry, or needed band aids or something, guess who they went to? She eventually stopped coming 'cause she was sick of packing for thirty people. As a result we had nothing to eat but hot dogs and NutriGrain bars and there weren't enough chairs to sit on. We drove into town every day, often more than once. This was in order to pick up all of the things we hadn't brought with us, as well as to sample the local culture. Val feels the need to buy sunglasses wherever he goes because he loses them so often. My favourite pair were dubbed "the creepy uncle's." We made it a point to purchase humourous hats to take pictures in.
Anyway, as the years went by and we started having more diverse interests and groups of friends our camping trips petered out. I'm not sorry about that. I didn't enjoy the trips all that much for a few reasons, but there's one that really stands out. When camping at a provincial park it's almost impossible to ever feel truly clean for more than ten minutes. Using the shower facilites was always quite the ordeal. You have to remember to take everything with you, and then make the trek across the campground to the least scary shower facility at the park (other campers are very useful resources for this type of information). Then it's time to wait in line for half-an-hour, with a hang over, carrying all of your worldly goods, which you are trying vainly to keep hold of. Inevitably, if you haven't lost your underwear on the way from your site, you will drop them now. They will be your largest and most embarassing pair.
Once you have collected your now leafy underpants you'll shuffle over to an open stall. This stall will be foul. Very, very foul. It is necessary for you to wear flip flops during your toilette. At this point it's time to try and find an area of the shower that is still dry. No mean feat, I usually ended up wrapping my clothes in my towel and stuffing the package into the least likely corner for the water to find it. I was always wrong and my stuff always ended up partially soaked. Once your belongings are stored you take off your pjs and put them on top of the pile of towel and future garments. You can dry them out later, so there's no point trying to keep them safe from water. These will remain dry. It's usually at this point, or shortly thereafter, when your underwear will fall out of the package, where you had them stored safely, into the murky water on the shower floor. Fix them up as best you can.
At that point you're ready to press the shower activation button. In keeping with the luxuries you have already become accustumed to throughout your camping experience this shower will be sub par. The pressure of these provincial park showers is much as I would expect the pressure to be of a fireman's hose. One blast from the showerhead and you are slammed back against the slimy tiled wall. Bacteria will immediately start burrowing into your skin, but, happily, you've consumed so much alcohol at this point that there's no fear of anything being able to survive inside of you. Please note that this is not an effective way to guard against camping related STDs. Or so I've read...shut up. The pressure of this shower is sufficient to rip the nipples directly off of your chest, so you'll have to protect yourself accordingly after the initial assault. Predictably, the water is either seeringly hot, or numbingly cold, but that doesn't matter all that much because it only lasts for about twenty seconds. When the water goes off there is now time to lather and count the number of giant hairy spiders waiting to make your acquaintance. Feel free to name them. Noticing these spiders ensures you will be unable to close your eyes during the rest of your shower. Guess where the shampoo ends up?
The rest of the shower is relatively uneventful. Since I was pretty young, I always had to do a touch up shaving job, but that was fairly unneventful. I will say this, however, a Bic razor, when it is new, can slice through time.
When it comes to drying up and getting dressed again you will have to do an elaborate balancing act. This is made more complicated by the acidic hangover threatening to cripple you at any moment. Since you're wearing shower shoes you can be pretty certain that you'll step on your underwear when trying to put them on and they'll have another introduction to the scary shower floor. You'll likely do the same thing with your pants, which, interestingly enough, have one very wet leg. Then it's time to collect your personals and make your way out. I'll leave you to imagine how many things you drop on the way out of the bathrooms. The number of girls who brought their hairdryers and complete make up cases on a camping trip never failed to amaze me. Isn't the point of camping to not have to wear that sort of shit? Although, I'm fairly sure that the point of camping is not to drink until you don't notice the smell of the outhouse, either.
By the end of the weekend I was always so exhausted and dirty and fat that I couldn't imagine ever wanting to go on another camping trip, but I did for at least three summers, until I started working in the restaurant industry and gave up any hope of having any weekend off, much less a long one. When my parents got a cottage I became spoiled by comfortable beds, a wood stove, a dishwasher, and screen doors. Who needs camping with that kind of luxury? Now that they have air conditioning it'll be a wonder if I ever see a tree in a non-landscaped environment ever again. Did I mention that they have satellite TV?
With the May long weekend fast approaching camping has been on my mind. I was talking to my sister-in-law about this today and we've decided that camping really isn't for us anymore. I used to go camping a few times a year, not the real hard-core outdoorsy "roughing it" type camping, but rather car camping. Car camping means that you bring all of the comforts of home with you (to a point) and you can drive into the closest little redneck town to stock up on the important stuff you either forgot or run out of. Beer, for example.
Alcohol played a VERY important role for me and the people I camped with. It was basically all we had in common. It's a good thing we don't see each other much anymore or we'd all have to think about checking into some sort of clinic. The only ways you could tell the difference between the camping trips, and our typical bar weekends were that it took longer to get to where we were going, there was nowhere comfortable to sit, and the facilities smelled like Satan's asshole. Aside from that everything was pretty similar, lots of second hand smoke (in the camping instance it was from the fire as opposed to DuMaurier), people fell down a lot, and we spent a lot of money.
No one ever packed very well for these trips. Well, that's not true, one girl did, and she was mocked brutally for it. However, whenever someone was hungry, or needed band aids or something, guess who they went to? She eventually stopped coming 'cause she was sick of packing for thirty people. As a result we had nothing to eat but hot dogs and NutriGrain bars and there weren't enough chairs to sit on. We drove into town every day, often more than once. This was in order to pick up all of the things we hadn't brought with us, as well as to sample the local culture. Val feels the need to buy sunglasses wherever he goes because he loses them so often. My favourite pair were dubbed "the creepy uncle's." We made it a point to purchase humourous hats to take pictures in.
Anyway, as the years went by and we started having more diverse interests and groups of friends our camping trips petered out. I'm not sorry about that. I didn't enjoy the trips all that much for a few reasons, but there's one that really stands out. When camping at a provincial park it's almost impossible to ever feel truly clean for more than ten minutes. Using the shower facilites was always quite the ordeal. You have to remember to take everything with you, and then make the trek across the campground to the least scary shower facility at the park (other campers are very useful resources for this type of information). Then it's time to wait in line for half-an-hour, with a hang over, carrying all of your worldly goods, which you are trying vainly to keep hold of. Inevitably, if you haven't lost your underwear on the way from your site, you will drop them now. They will be your largest and most embarassing pair.
Once you have collected your now leafy underpants you'll shuffle over to an open stall. This stall will be foul. Very, very foul. It is necessary for you to wear flip flops during your toilette. At this point it's time to try and find an area of the shower that is still dry. No mean feat, I usually ended up wrapping my clothes in my towel and stuffing the package into the least likely corner for the water to find it. I was always wrong and my stuff always ended up partially soaked. Once your belongings are stored you take off your pjs and put them on top of the pile of towel and future garments. You can dry them out later, so there's no point trying to keep them safe from water. These will remain dry. It's usually at this point, or shortly thereafter, when your underwear will fall out of the package, where you had them stored safely, into the murky water on the shower floor. Fix them up as best you can.
At that point you're ready to press the shower activation button. In keeping with the luxuries you have already become accustumed to throughout your camping experience this shower will be sub par. The pressure of these provincial park showers is much as I would expect the pressure to be of a fireman's hose. One blast from the showerhead and you are slammed back against the slimy tiled wall. Bacteria will immediately start burrowing into your skin, but, happily, you've consumed so much alcohol at this point that there's no fear of anything being able to survive inside of you. Please note that this is not an effective way to guard against camping related STDs. Or so I've read...shut up. The pressure of this shower is sufficient to rip the nipples directly off of your chest, so you'll have to protect yourself accordingly after the initial assault. Predictably, the water is either seeringly hot, or numbingly cold, but that doesn't matter all that much because it only lasts for about twenty seconds. When the water goes off there is now time to lather and count the number of giant hairy spiders waiting to make your acquaintance. Feel free to name them. Noticing these spiders ensures you will be unable to close your eyes during the rest of your shower. Guess where the shampoo ends up?
The rest of the shower is relatively uneventful. Since I was pretty young, I always had to do a touch up shaving job, but that was fairly unneventful. I will say this, however, a Bic razor, when it is new, can slice through time.
When it comes to drying up and getting dressed again you will have to do an elaborate balancing act. This is made more complicated by the acidic hangover threatening to cripple you at any moment. Since you're wearing shower shoes you can be pretty certain that you'll step on your underwear when trying to put them on and they'll have another introduction to the scary shower floor. You'll likely do the same thing with your pants, which, interestingly enough, have one very wet leg. Then it's time to collect your personals and make your way out. I'll leave you to imagine how many things you drop on the way out of the bathrooms. The number of girls who brought their hairdryers and complete make up cases on a camping trip never failed to amaze me. Isn't the point of camping to not have to wear that sort of shit? Although, I'm fairly sure that the point of camping is not to drink until you don't notice the smell of the outhouse, either.
By the end of the weekend I was always so exhausted and dirty and fat that I couldn't imagine ever wanting to go on another camping trip, but I did for at least three summers, until I started working in the restaurant industry and gave up any hope of having any weekend off, much less a long one. When my parents got a cottage I became spoiled by comfortable beds, a wood stove, a dishwasher, and screen doors. Who needs camping with that kind of luxury? Now that they have air conditioning it'll be a wonder if I ever see a tree in a non-landscaped environment ever again. Did I mention that they have satellite TV?
Wednesday, May 12, 2004
Clearly there’s no way any of you could know my brothers, but you should want to. There are two of them, and they’re pretty fabulous blokes. The middle child, Val, is almost thirty (which is clearly freaky) and a unique spirit.
He once went up to a girl he works with and informed her that she’d be “a fit vessel for his seed.” No one ever slaps him; they just collapse into helpless giggling piles of people.
When we were kids there was a bathroom on the main floor of our house, and the bathroom was at eye-level. The Peeping-Tom Design Co. was consulted heavily during construction. There was a sheer curtain across the window, but our yard was large enough that no one was going to walk past one of us using the commode and cripple us emotionally during our formative years.
My mother was a very unhappy woman when we lived in “Bumblefuck” New Brunswick, and in her misery she was known to behave somewhat erratically. One day we were to go swimming at the home of one of our parents’ friends. It was a very hot day summer day, one of the four you could experience in this town, known for its never-ending winters. We were all really looking forward to going, and were bugging her ass to get going when she said the following.
“Who keeps putting the Kleenex box on the window sill in the downstairs bathroom?”
This question was met by a trio of slack-jawed mouth-breathers.
“We’re not leaving until someone tells me that they did it. You’re not in trouble, I just want to know who’s doing it and why.”
We all sat down and twitched a little. Our mother is an unmovable force, if she says we’re not doing something we’re not. Sometimes I wonder if she didn’t secretly enjoy doing this sort of thing just to lord her power over us.
It felt like about three days had passed, so about five minutes, when I cracked under the pressure.
“I did it.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know, I just felt like it.”
“Okay, let’s go.”
It had been a gamble. Clearly she could have decided that that did make her angry, and that there was no way we were going swimming (I would not have been left there by myself. I was accident prone). It is a testament to her lunacy that she believed me. I was obviously lying in order to go swimming; otherwise I would have had a better story than the one I offered. She didn’t care, maybe she was just relieved that she hadn’t experienced a complete meltdown; that the Kleenex boxes of the world weren’t rising up and trying to escape from the house. If she couldn’t get away from this hellhole, the paper products certainly couldn’t!
So, we went swimming, and it was heavenly. For years to follow this was one of the great mysteries of my life. Everyone else was happy to tease me periodically, but predictably, about it. I maintained that I had lied to them, and that I had only wanted to swim, but they didn’t believe me. Plus, mocking me was much more fun.
Until I turned nineteen.
Val and I share a similar circle of friends. One night we were out at a bar when he was visiting me at school, and we felt the need to come clean to each other about some of our previous indiscretions.
“L, I thought that you should know, I was the one who put the Kleenex box on the window sill.” This was delivered with a certain amount of solemnity, such as you might expect from someone announcing an engagement, or serious illness. He waited expectantly.
I didn’t disappoint, I shrieked at him like a harpy on ‘roids. It was probably a great show for the bystanders, considering I was screaming my lungs out about a Kleenex box. After I’d had a chance to regain my composure; to come to grips with over a decade of false accusations and mocking, I knew how to get back at him.
“That’s fine. I thought YOU should know that I’m the one who took your Corey Hart “Boy in the Box” tape. Amanda didn’t steal it.” Amanda was this hyperactive kid I was friends with in grade school. He must have really missed that tape, because he had brought up its disappearance more than a few times over the years.
“What? Why?”
“You thumped me one in front of my friends and I was mad so I threw your tape in the garbage.”
Silence.
“L…that’s really messed up. That’s so vindictive. I can’t believe you didn’t say anything all these years.” He looked at me with a mixture of fear, awe, and revulsion.
I really don’t see how what I did was any different from him putting a Kleenex box on the window sill to keep the curtains closed so that no one could see his “bits” and then lying about it for ever. Because that’s why he did it. He didn’t want to risk anyone peeking in on him while he went to the bathroom. Because God knows there was a line stretching around the block of people who wanted to catch a glimpse of him in the can. Although, in that town…
He once went up to a girl he works with and informed her that she’d be “a fit vessel for his seed.” No one ever slaps him; they just collapse into helpless giggling piles of people.
When we were kids there was a bathroom on the main floor of our house, and the bathroom was at eye-level. The Peeping-Tom Design Co. was consulted heavily during construction. There was a sheer curtain across the window, but our yard was large enough that no one was going to walk past one of us using the commode and cripple us emotionally during our formative years.
My mother was a very unhappy woman when we lived in “Bumblefuck” New Brunswick, and in her misery she was known to behave somewhat erratically. One day we were to go swimming at the home of one of our parents’ friends. It was a very hot day summer day, one of the four you could experience in this town, known for its never-ending winters. We were all really looking forward to going, and were bugging her ass to get going when she said the following.
“Who keeps putting the Kleenex box on the window sill in the downstairs bathroom?”
This question was met by a trio of slack-jawed mouth-breathers.
“We’re not leaving until someone tells me that they did it. You’re not in trouble, I just want to know who’s doing it and why.”
We all sat down and twitched a little. Our mother is an unmovable force, if she says we’re not doing something we’re not. Sometimes I wonder if she didn’t secretly enjoy doing this sort of thing just to lord her power over us.
It felt like about three days had passed, so about five minutes, when I cracked under the pressure.
“I did it.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know, I just felt like it.”
“Okay, let’s go.”
It had been a gamble. Clearly she could have decided that that did make her angry, and that there was no way we were going swimming (I would not have been left there by myself. I was accident prone). It is a testament to her lunacy that she believed me. I was obviously lying in order to go swimming; otherwise I would have had a better story than the one I offered. She didn’t care, maybe she was just relieved that she hadn’t experienced a complete meltdown; that the Kleenex boxes of the world weren’t rising up and trying to escape from the house. If she couldn’t get away from this hellhole, the paper products certainly couldn’t!
So, we went swimming, and it was heavenly. For years to follow this was one of the great mysteries of my life. Everyone else was happy to tease me periodically, but predictably, about it. I maintained that I had lied to them, and that I had only wanted to swim, but they didn’t believe me. Plus, mocking me was much more fun.
Until I turned nineteen.
Val and I share a similar circle of friends. One night we were out at a bar when he was visiting me at school, and we felt the need to come clean to each other about some of our previous indiscretions.
“L, I thought that you should know, I was the one who put the Kleenex box on the window sill.” This was delivered with a certain amount of solemnity, such as you might expect from someone announcing an engagement, or serious illness. He waited expectantly.
I didn’t disappoint, I shrieked at him like a harpy on ‘roids. It was probably a great show for the bystanders, considering I was screaming my lungs out about a Kleenex box. After I’d had a chance to regain my composure; to come to grips with over a decade of false accusations and mocking, I knew how to get back at him.
“That’s fine. I thought YOU should know that I’m the one who took your Corey Hart “Boy in the Box” tape. Amanda didn’t steal it.” Amanda was this hyperactive kid I was friends with in grade school. He must have really missed that tape, because he had brought up its disappearance more than a few times over the years.
“What? Why?”
“You thumped me one in front of my friends and I was mad so I threw your tape in the garbage.”
Silence.
“L…that’s really messed up. That’s so vindictive. I can’t believe you didn’t say anything all these years.” He looked at me with a mixture of fear, awe, and revulsion.
I really don’t see how what I did was any different from him putting a Kleenex box on the window sill to keep the curtains closed so that no one could see his “bits” and then lying about it for ever. Because that’s why he did it. He didn’t want to risk anyone peeking in on him while he went to the bathroom. Because God knows there was a line stretching around the block of people who wanted to catch a glimpse of him in the can. Although, in that town…
Monday, May 10, 2004
Swimming with Sharks
I recently began online dating, and it’s a very addictive process. It’s much like being at a high school dance and standing hopefully on the sidelines waiting to be coupled off during the slow numbers. At first you hope for whomever you’re “crushing on,” then you hope for someone popular and cute, and then you hope for a mysterious, previously unnoticed, hot stranger. After that, pretty much any mutant will do as long as you’re not the only one unpaired. You hate to put yourself through this, but you can’t resist going to the dances with all of that potential for drama.
First of all, there’s creating the profile. You want to make yourself seem as desirable as possible, so you don’t want to include such information as, “when I get busy or distracted I routinely forget to put on deodorant.” Everyone seems to put the same things in these profiles “Hi, there’s an original opening line. Let’s see….a little about me. Well, I’m (blah blah blah) and I’m looking for someone fun and nice to have new experiences with.” As opposed to the rest of us who only want boring kitten-drowners.
Later in these profiles they get a bit more specific, and I have to say, the men of the Greater Toronto Area have some pretty high expectations from the girls out there. “I’m looking for someone fun, fit and attractive. You are an adventurous, spontaneous free spirit, who isn’t scared of trying new things. You are career oriented, but not a workaholic. You have goals and you’re working toward them. You aren’t high-maintenance, but you are graceful and have a sense of style. You should be independent, confident, and nurturing. You like kids, dogs, watching sports, running marathons for charitable organizations, while baking chocolate chip cookies and performing oral sex with the power and stamina of a Hoover vacuum. You will not make faces about the taste, either, but loudly exclaim that it is the nectar of the gods! Oh, and you should own your own house.”
I think I wrote in mine that I was looking for someone kind with a good sense of humour.
I’ve had a certain amount of success with Lavalife and I’m corresponding with a few likely looking gentlemen. I’m clearly not very good at this, though, as some of my intendeds keep ceasing correspondence with me. I keep asking, what I think are, interesting and thought provoking questions (explain why the only Cosby Show rerun you ever see is the one where all the kids do a lip sync routine for the grandparents’ anniversary? What’s your favourite kind of cheese?). When I answer their questions I tend to provide a lot of information. Maybe too much. Is it wrong to tell a boy you don’t know very well that you’d have sex with certain female celebrities if they showed any interest in you? This might make me look a little skanky. One of my cyber-harem did mention he was recently separated from his wife of four years. God, what if it’s a Ross-like situation and she turned out to be a lesbian? Then I jokingly say I’d hop on Jennifer Garner if she didn’t have man-hands and showed any interest in me whatsoever? Definitely need to start inserting a filter into my conversations.
He hasn’t replied to that last email. It’s really too bad, because he seemed sort of sweet. That being said, I wasn’t too psyched about starting things up with a recently separated person. We all know the dangers inherent in that sort of situation. Come to think of it, he didn’t say he was divorced, just separated. Perhaps my verbal diarrhea was Fate’s way of helping me dodge a bullet. People in the “Intimate Encounters” section regularly troll for extra-marital affairs on Lavalife. But details on that story will have to wait for another day.
I recently began online dating, and it’s a very addictive process. It’s much like being at a high school dance and standing hopefully on the sidelines waiting to be coupled off during the slow numbers. At first you hope for whomever you’re “crushing on,” then you hope for someone popular and cute, and then you hope for a mysterious, previously unnoticed, hot stranger. After that, pretty much any mutant will do as long as you’re not the only one unpaired. You hate to put yourself through this, but you can’t resist going to the dances with all of that potential for drama.
First of all, there’s creating the profile. You want to make yourself seem as desirable as possible, so you don’t want to include such information as, “when I get busy or distracted I routinely forget to put on deodorant.” Everyone seems to put the same things in these profiles “Hi, there’s an original opening line. Let’s see….a little about me. Well, I’m (blah blah blah) and I’m looking for someone fun and nice to have new experiences with.” As opposed to the rest of us who only want boring kitten-drowners.
Later in these profiles they get a bit more specific, and I have to say, the men of the Greater Toronto Area have some pretty high expectations from the girls out there. “I’m looking for someone fun, fit and attractive. You are an adventurous, spontaneous free spirit, who isn’t scared of trying new things. You are career oriented, but not a workaholic. You have goals and you’re working toward them. You aren’t high-maintenance, but you are graceful and have a sense of style. You should be independent, confident, and nurturing. You like kids, dogs, watching sports, running marathons for charitable organizations, while baking chocolate chip cookies and performing oral sex with the power and stamina of a Hoover vacuum. You will not make faces about the taste, either, but loudly exclaim that it is the nectar of the gods! Oh, and you should own your own house.”
I think I wrote in mine that I was looking for someone kind with a good sense of humour.
I’ve had a certain amount of success with Lavalife and I’m corresponding with a few likely looking gentlemen. I’m clearly not very good at this, though, as some of my intendeds keep ceasing correspondence with me. I keep asking, what I think are, interesting and thought provoking questions (explain why the only Cosby Show rerun you ever see is the one where all the kids do a lip sync routine for the grandparents’ anniversary? What’s your favourite kind of cheese?). When I answer their questions I tend to provide a lot of information. Maybe too much. Is it wrong to tell a boy you don’t know very well that you’d have sex with certain female celebrities if they showed any interest in you? This might make me look a little skanky. One of my cyber-harem did mention he was recently separated from his wife of four years. God, what if it’s a Ross-like situation and she turned out to be a lesbian? Then I jokingly say I’d hop on Jennifer Garner if she didn’t have man-hands and showed any interest in me whatsoever? Definitely need to start inserting a filter into my conversations.
He hasn’t replied to that last email. It’s really too bad, because he seemed sort of sweet. That being said, I wasn’t too psyched about starting things up with a recently separated person. We all know the dangers inherent in that sort of situation. Come to think of it, he didn’t say he was divorced, just separated. Perhaps my verbal diarrhea was Fate’s way of helping me dodge a bullet. People in the “Intimate Encounters” section regularly troll for extra-marital affairs on Lavalife. But details on that story will have to wait for another day.
Sunday, May 09, 2004
Here I am world. It's like being onstage naked, really.
I have so much that I want to say but now that I'm going to be writing to everyone I'm scared. It's like constantly thinking about the movies you want to see, and then deciding to rent one but forgetting about that mental list. Except with this, there's an element of fear.
Here's what we'll do for now.
Last night involved going to a club where there were lots of happy young whipper-snappers doing their best to find eternal happiness facilitated by pissy draught beer. They were giving out beer in plastic cups, the kind you'd use at keg parties in university. I felt like I needed a walker.
One guy came up to me and my friend G, he was a cross between Malachi from Children of the Corn and the Shermanator from American Pie. Automatically I'm pretty psyched, because this is going to be a wicked sociological experiment.
Here's how it played out.
Shermanator - Hi ladies, you two been together long?
Me - (with a withering glare over the top of my glasses à-la librarian) That's wretched.
Shermantor - Sorry, I was just kidding.
Me - Fine.
Shermanator - Are you having a good night.
Me - Yes.
Silence
Me - (with a flight attendant persona) Well, have a great night!
Shermanator - Ouch! That's harsh!
Me - No, it's actually pretty nice. I could have said, 'Get lost and fuck off' this was encouragement for you to go your own way and have a good time about it.
G is snickering at this point.
Shermator - Get lost and fuck off.
Me - Now that's just mean and you've hurt my feelings.
Then he kissed me on the face. Can you believe I'm still single with this winning attitude and specimens like that to choose from?
Love and hugs,
L
I have so much that I want to say but now that I'm going to be writing to everyone I'm scared. It's like constantly thinking about the movies you want to see, and then deciding to rent one but forgetting about that mental list. Except with this, there's an element of fear.
Here's what we'll do for now.
Last night involved going to a club where there were lots of happy young whipper-snappers doing their best to find eternal happiness facilitated by pissy draught beer. They were giving out beer in plastic cups, the kind you'd use at keg parties in university. I felt like I needed a walker.
One guy came up to me and my friend G, he was a cross between Malachi from Children of the Corn and the Shermanator from American Pie. Automatically I'm pretty psyched, because this is going to be a wicked sociological experiment.
Here's how it played out.
Shermanator - Hi ladies, you two been together long?
Me - (with a withering glare over the top of my glasses à-la librarian) That's wretched.
Shermantor - Sorry, I was just kidding.
Me - Fine.
Shermanator - Are you having a good night.
Me - Yes.
Silence
Me - (with a flight attendant persona) Well, have a great night!
Shermanator - Ouch! That's harsh!
Me - No, it's actually pretty nice. I could have said, 'Get lost and fuck off' this was encouragement for you to go your own way and have a good time about it.
G is snickering at this point.
Shermator - Get lost and fuck off.
Me - Now that's just mean and you've hurt my feelings.
Then he kissed me on the face. Can you believe I'm still single with this winning attitude and specimens like that to choose from?
Love and hugs,
L
