Oh, woe is me.
The new Dishwasher Initiative that started a few weeks ago in this house is failing miserably. The mother decided the children were old enough to rinse out their own dishes and place them in the dishwasher themselves after eating. Sounds easy enough to me.
More often than not they just get slung anywhere in the vicinity of the sink, resplendent with gunk left over from whatever they ate. I am at that jaded stage of feeling like it's just easier to clean up their mess since even if they do it themselves I generally have to re-do everything anyway. Was I a horrifically messy pre-teen? I have no recollection of this.
It's as if I just came out perfectly formed, with the mind of a 30 year old even as a new born. This is why my Grandad called me 'Here Before' perhaps.
This can't be true, yet the level of detritus left in the two sweet girls' wake leaves me frequently incredulous. The worst thing about the abject failure of the Dishwasher Initiative is that the parents contribute to its failure on a daily basis by slinging their own plates in or near the sink rather than putting them in the dishwasher. It's as if I am the dishwasher conduit and nothing may be cleaned unless it has first been placed artfully in the machine by my own fair hand.
The other day the mother made a note on this aloud telling me 'That little girl is going to need reminding to put her dishes away!' while simultaneously shoving her own dish in the sink, oatmeal quietly crusting at the edges.
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Monday, October 25, 2010
Culture
Winter in Van is on the way, the rain was torrential yesterday.
I spent my time holed up in the basement being warmed from the inside out by Gloria Steinem's interview on the CBC. I can't express enough how much this is worth listening to, if you are a woman or know someone who is.
In other news, I have a new crush. Her name is Ariel Schrag. See earlier post about how the best things in Van are free - the libraries. I borrowed all four of Ariel's awesome autobiographical comic/graphic novels on Thursday and today I am finishing the last one. If you have ever wondered how comic book sex looks, or would enjoy a flashback to that time you had to tape your friend's miniscule dress together as you got ready to go out while No Doubt blared in the background, then locate the last of your glitter eyeshadow, slap it on and put the kettle on. These are books to be devoured.
Also, Erika Lopez has a new book coming out soon. I was horrified (at first, because I am a selfish snob who wants to be cooler than the other graphic novel readers, but then of course I was pleased and delighted for her success) to discover people know who she is; like the writers of Bust who just interviewed her. I am nervously excited to read it. I was at university when I fell for her incredible wit and deliciously trashy illustrations that look like they were drawn by a horny, yet exceedingly talented, fifteen year old boy with a Betty Page fetish. Opening the first page will be like going back in time. I can't wait.
I spent my time holed up in the basement being warmed from the inside out by Gloria Steinem's interview on the CBC. I can't express enough how much this is worth listening to, if you are a woman or know someone who is.
In other news, I have a new crush. Her name is Ariel Schrag. See earlier post about how the best things in Van are free - the libraries. I borrowed all four of Ariel's awesome autobiographical comic/graphic novels on Thursday and today I am finishing the last one. If you have ever wondered how comic book sex looks, or would enjoy a flashback to that time you had to tape your friend's miniscule dress together as you got ready to go out while No Doubt blared in the background, then locate the last of your glitter eyeshadow, slap it on and put the kettle on. These are books to be devoured.
Also, Erika Lopez has a new book coming out soon. I was horrified (at first, because I am a selfish snob who wants to be cooler than the other graphic novel readers, but then of course I was pleased and delighted for her success) to discover people know who she is; like the writers of Bust who just interviewed her. I am nervously excited to read it. I was at university when I fell for her incredible wit and deliciously trashy illustrations that look like they were drawn by a horny, yet exceedingly talented, fifteen year old boy with a Betty Page fetish. Opening the first page will be like going back in time. I can't wait.
Sunday, October 24, 2010
Helloween
The 31st of the month is not yet upon us, but I have already decided I don't like Halloween.
When I was little I used to dress up as a witch and just walk around the house in my get-up. There was nowhere to go, Halloween didn't really exist then in England.
Here people have had their homes decorated for weeks. I walked by one the other day and I thought lots of plastic bags had got stuck in the bushes but on closer inspection I saw that each plastic bag had a face and that they had been purposefully tied on to resemble ghosts swarming near to the house. I saw another very similar thing a few days later. I always liked the idea of pumpkin carving but as the inevitable draws closer I am finding it hard to work up any enthusiasm.
Maybe this is because I have agreed to dress as a fairy godmother. This is because it's the only outfit in the house that fits me. There are hordes of frightful dressing up things, but I fit into a 70s broderie anglaise dress and a towering sequinned princess hat, almost as if they were made for me. There is also the upsetting truth that in Walmart the week before last I bought a bumper bag of Halloween sweets and they haven't even lasted until Halloween. (A hundred packets of Rockets which are the Canadian version of Fizzers. )
My initial reaction was that Rockets are not as delicious as Fizzers but after 100 packets* of Rockets I can't remember what Fizzers taste like anymore.
* Sadly not an exaggeration
When I was little I used to dress up as a witch and just walk around the house in my get-up. There was nowhere to go, Halloween didn't really exist then in England.
Here people have had their homes decorated for weeks. I walked by one the other day and I thought lots of plastic bags had got stuck in the bushes but on closer inspection I saw that each plastic bag had a face and that they had been purposefully tied on to resemble ghosts swarming near to the house. I saw another very similar thing a few days later. I always liked the idea of pumpkin carving but as the inevitable draws closer I am finding it hard to work up any enthusiasm.
Maybe this is because I have agreed to dress as a fairy godmother. This is because it's the only outfit in the house that fits me. There are hordes of frightful dressing up things, but I fit into a 70s broderie anglaise dress and a towering sequinned princess hat, almost as if they were made for me. There is also the upsetting truth that in Walmart the week before last I bought a bumper bag of Halloween sweets and they haven't even lasted until Halloween. (A hundred packets of Rockets which are the Canadian version of Fizzers. )
My initial reaction was that Rockets are not as delicious as Fizzers but after 100 packets* of Rockets I can't remember what Fizzers taste like anymore.
* Sadly not an exaggeration
The Best
I remembered! The absolute Best thing about Van is the public library system. My library on the North shore has the incredible bonus of being newly constructed with mostly glass walls so that if you go to the 3rd floor during the early evening you can watch the splendour of the sunset from the study section. This isn't just any sunset, it is the sunset over the ocean, from a pleasing height. It really is gorgeous.
This does not even have anything to do with the cerebral pleasures contained within the library's heaving shelves. Yes I can make the library sound sexy, because it is. (Especially the downtown library, which appears to concentrate on hiring nymph-like yet vaguely androgynous looking graduate students; the type that have Dewy decimal numbers tattooed on their wrists.)
I like to test the library, just to see if it is really as amazing as I like to think. I think of books I read long ago, books I only half recall the title of, then I look for them on the online catalogue and see if it true that this library could take all my crappiest thoughts on Neanderthalic North 'Cougar and flush them down the loo. This library just never fails. I found the wondrous works of the seemingly unheard of Elizabeth Knox, a book I recalled wanting to read that had Trieste in the title (Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere by Jan Morris) High Art on DVD, the whole of Veronica Mars, the legacy of John Marsden who scared me witless (delightful!) as a teenager....but then the best gift of all. The entire High School Comic Chronicles of Ariel Schrag.
Downtown I was awed to discover that the library not only carries another healthy selection of comics and graphic novels, but it has an entire section devoted to Zines. I had thought Zines were purley a mid-90s phenomena that sprung up solely to inform me of new bands and bad poetry that was being created across the country before the internet was even a figment of our collective imaginations. As it happens, they still exist. I shouldn't be surprised, since Book Art as a genre still exists. Book Art however, protects itself with the sparkling yet invisible cape of chic mystery bestowed upon anything with 'art' in the title. Zines are clearly made by people who do not believe in the value of the invisible cape, they think that what they scribbled on their wall last nigt at 3am is art and that computers and our reliance on them is the true embodiment of evil.
They are my people.
The reading room at the Regional Assembly of Text is another pure joy and it offers a selection of handmade books that wear the Book Art cape but have Zine-like sensibilities. I could live in there.
This does not even have anything to do with the cerebral pleasures contained within the library's heaving shelves. Yes I can make the library sound sexy, because it is. (Especially the downtown library, which appears to concentrate on hiring nymph-like yet vaguely androgynous looking graduate students; the type that have Dewy decimal numbers tattooed on their wrists.)
I like to test the library, just to see if it is really as amazing as I like to think. I think of books I read long ago, books I only half recall the title of, then I look for them on the online catalogue and see if it true that this library could take all my crappiest thoughts on Neanderthalic North 'Cougar and flush them down the loo. This library just never fails. I found the wondrous works of the seemingly unheard of Elizabeth Knox, a book I recalled wanting to read that had Trieste in the title (Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere by Jan Morris) High Art on DVD, the whole of Veronica Mars, the legacy of John Marsden who scared me witless (delightful!) as a teenager....but then the best gift of all. The entire High School Comic Chronicles of Ariel Schrag.
Downtown I was awed to discover that the library not only carries another healthy selection of comics and graphic novels, but it has an entire section devoted to Zines. I had thought Zines were purley a mid-90s phenomena that sprung up solely to inform me of new bands and bad poetry that was being created across the country before the internet was even a figment of our collective imaginations. As it happens, they still exist. I shouldn't be surprised, since Book Art as a genre still exists. Book Art however, protects itself with the sparkling yet invisible cape of chic mystery bestowed upon anything with 'art' in the title. Zines are clearly made by people who do not believe in the value of the invisible cape, they think that what they scribbled on their wall last nigt at 3am is art and that computers and our reliance on them is the true embodiment of evil.
They are my people.
The reading room at the Regional Assembly of Text is another pure joy and it offers a selection of handmade books that wear the Book Art cape but have Zine-like sensibilities. I could live in there.
Grease the Wheels
The other day I was mentally composing what to write here as I felt I had discovered the ultimate Best and Worst things about Vancougar. I even wrote a note about it later on something I cut out of the Georgia Straight (my notice board is full of newspaper cuttings regarding obscure events I rarely end up going to).
I lost the note. I no longer have any idea what the Best thing about Van is, but I definitely remember the worst:
It is almost impossible to get drunk.
It's not even that I want to get drunk, just to enjoy some drinks, but it takes a tremendous amount of effort. You can't buy alcohol in Safeway or at the 7-Eleven. Nowhere but at a liquor store (an off-license to people at home) or a bar. At bars you are often encouraged to sit and be waited on. This takes away the brilliant opportunity to drunkenly make friends with other patrons while standing at the bar waiting for a drink or to flirt with the bar staff. And drinking here is expensive!
However, my Fellow European and I are intrepid in our such for fun and alcohol in this rainy yet strangely dry metropolis. This led to my great idea of attending the book launch for Inkstuds at Blim. Inkstuds is a book of interviews with comic book artists (made from a radio show) and Blim is an art workshop/gallery space in Chinatown. Oh, my poor, beleagured artist's hopes were high for a night full of drinking cheap book launch wine and chatting to nerdy looking comic-book reading dudes with glasses and tattoos and sultry art school drop-out girls. In other words; heaven. (If you're 15. Or me.)
Having once (5 years ago) co-thrown an opening-night-of-an-exhibition-do along with 7 artful friends, I feel qualified to assert that I know the ropes*; I know how these things should go down. Namely, alcohol should be thrust upon you as soon as you enter.
The theory behind this is that hopefully you will get tipsy enough to ask questions about the art work so the artist can revel in describing their artistic intentions or enjoy making up a load of bollocks on the spot. Also, people get emotionally attached to pieces of art when they feel emotional. In the sense that they may simply have to buy that seven foot tall paper mache and cigarette butt sculpture of David Beckham right now, no matter what.
I liked the feel of Blim, but it was too reticent an opening to inspire us to stay when cocktails were calling from Guilt & Co. down the road. We looked at the book (which looks interesting) and we chatted to a nice but wary guy behind the book table, but it was too much like hard work.
* Please note irony, or something else if that is not in fact irony, it's too cold for my brain to function at optimum capacity.
I lost the note. I no longer have any idea what the Best thing about Van is, but I definitely remember the worst:
It is almost impossible to get drunk.
It's not even that I want to get drunk, just to enjoy some drinks, but it takes a tremendous amount of effort. You can't buy alcohol in Safeway or at the 7-Eleven. Nowhere but at a liquor store (an off-license to people at home) or a bar. At bars you are often encouraged to sit and be waited on. This takes away the brilliant opportunity to drunkenly make friends with other patrons while standing at the bar waiting for a drink or to flirt with the bar staff. And drinking here is expensive!
However, my Fellow European and I are intrepid in our such for fun and alcohol in this rainy yet strangely dry metropolis. This led to my great idea of attending the book launch for Inkstuds at Blim. Inkstuds is a book of interviews with comic book artists (made from a radio show) and Blim is an art workshop/gallery space in Chinatown. Oh, my poor, beleagured artist's hopes were high for a night full of drinking cheap book launch wine and chatting to nerdy looking comic-book reading dudes with glasses and tattoos and sultry art school drop-out girls. In other words; heaven. (If you're 15. Or me.)
Having once (5 years ago) co-thrown an opening-night-of-an-exhibition-do along with 7 artful friends, I feel qualified to assert that I know the ropes*; I know how these things should go down. Namely, alcohol should be thrust upon you as soon as you enter.
The theory behind this is that hopefully you will get tipsy enough to ask questions about the art work so the artist can revel in describing their artistic intentions or enjoy making up a load of bollocks on the spot. Also, people get emotionally attached to pieces of art when they feel emotional. In the sense that they may simply have to buy that seven foot tall paper mache and cigarette butt sculpture of David Beckham right now, no matter what.
I liked the feel of Blim, but it was too reticent an opening to inspire us to stay when cocktails were calling from Guilt & Co. down the road. We looked at the book (which looks interesting) and we chatted to a nice but wary guy behind the book table, but it was too much like hard work.
* Please note irony, or something else if that is not in fact irony, it's too cold for my brain to function at optimum capacity.
Saturday, October 16, 2010
The trouble with love....
....is that it is akin to carrying a bucketful of water on each shoulder.
On one shoulder you have the bucket containing your love for a person, and on the other shoulder is the bucket containing their love for you. When it's weighted evenly like that you can't feel the pressure of it. You're content to carry it forever.
Only when the balance drops does the burden of carrying one bucket reveal itself. It weighs you down so low, whether someone has withdrawn their love from you, or you have withdrawn your love from them, you are left with one heavy bucket to carry and nothing to balance it with.
I don't know which bucket is heavier, when you're left with one full of your love for someone who has left; or when you're stuck with a bucket of love you can't accept from someone else.
Eventually though, carrying it around unevenly, sloshing it about like that, or due to a hole in the bucket itself, it slowly empties and the weight is lifted.
There was probably a hole in my love bucket for Linus even at the start of our relationship. It must have been tiny because I didn't notice it. Even when it became evident, I didn't care. I just wanted to stare at him and listen to him sing. (Are you noticing a pattern?)
I was left with the heaviest goddamn bucket of love for that boy that one woman ever tried to carry alone. It nearly broke my back. But it didn't, and I would like to announce to the world that with a little help from home and the people in it, from Robin's unwavering support (because blood might be thicker than water, but golden syrup is thicker than blood) and from the lilting French accent of a hot 18 year old intern, that bucket is now empty.
That's not to say all the love goes away, that it all spills over and out or leaks and leaves. There is a residual sheen, like an undercoat of paint. I don't regret a single moment I sat on the kitchen floor of a 1920s apartment, and stared at Linus, and listened to him sing. I just don't need to do it again.
On one shoulder you have the bucket containing your love for a person, and on the other shoulder is the bucket containing their love for you. When it's weighted evenly like that you can't feel the pressure of it. You're content to carry it forever.
Only when the balance drops does the burden of carrying one bucket reveal itself. It weighs you down so low, whether someone has withdrawn their love from you, or you have withdrawn your love from them, you are left with one heavy bucket to carry and nothing to balance it with.
I don't know which bucket is heavier, when you're left with one full of your love for someone who has left; or when you're stuck with a bucket of love you can't accept from someone else.
Eventually though, carrying it around unevenly, sloshing it about like that, or due to a hole in the bucket itself, it slowly empties and the weight is lifted.
There was probably a hole in my love bucket for Linus even at the start of our relationship. It must have been tiny because I didn't notice it. Even when it became evident, I didn't care. I just wanted to stare at him and listen to him sing. (Are you noticing a pattern?)
I was left with the heaviest goddamn bucket of love for that boy that one woman ever tried to carry alone. It nearly broke my back. But it didn't, and I would like to announce to the world that with a little help from home and the people in it, from Robin's unwavering support (because blood might be thicker than water, but golden syrup is thicker than blood) and from the lilting French accent of a hot 18 year old intern, that bucket is now empty.
That's not to say all the love goes away, that it all spills over and out or leaks and leaves. There is a residual sheen, like an undercoat of paint. I don't regret a single moment I sat on the kitchen floor of a 1920s apartment, and stared at Linus, and listened to him sing. I just don't need to do it again.
Shipping Forecast
I can hear the long low bellow of a ship's horn. The quay is a half hour walk away if you don't want to hurry.
At night, or early in the morning, you can be woken by the moan of the ships as they slowly move their hulking weight through the harbour. The noise sounds like the ache of a whale's belly.
I never use the word belly for humans, I think it sounds ugly; it sounds huge and distended. We have tummies. Whales, though, have bellies that are gigantic and fit to swallow you whole. The rumble a whale's belly would make if the whale felt hungry is the sound of the horn. Or the low tone of a whale when it is sad, a deep baleful call because it can't cry tears underwater.
At night, or early in the morning, you can be woken by the moan of the ships as they slowly move their hulking weight through the harbour. The noise sounds like the ache of a whale's belly.
I never use the word belly for humans, I think it sounds ugly; it sounds huge and distended. We have tummies. Whales, though, have bellies that are gigantic and fit to swallow you whole. The rumble a whale's belly would make if the whale felt hungry is the sound of the horn. Or the low tone of a whale when it is sad, a deep baleful call because it can't cry tears underwater.
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