Ongoing Adventures in Semi-Conciousness

This is probably the best idea I've ever had. I could probably die now and they'd write at least a half page obituary for me. This will be in constant revision and testing throughout the rest of the current So You Think You Can Dance season.

One Drink
Mary finishes a statement with a three word reiteration (ex. "You were on fire, yes you were!" or "You've got to really feel it, yes you do!")
Mary claims a performance was the best of the evening

Two Drinks
Mary makes a self-deprecating comment about cosmetic surgery
Mary claims a performance was the best of the season
Mary makes a heat or fire metaphor

Three Drinks
Mary cries
Mary insists that the current group of contestants is the best of the entire series
Mary stands up to scream

Finish Your Beverage
Mary cries
Mary puts someone/a couple on the Hot Tamale Train
Mary does the classic psyche out (ex. "I can't say anything good about that. BECAUSE IT WAS GREAT!")

Chug
While Mary is screeching

I got some pretty serious roofles out of this site.

With the message intact and some good penis jokes, too.

Richard: Now, we have ultimate proof that Gul Dukat was the most committed to his evil doing.
Mike: Oh?
Richard: Right. Because he shagged Kai Winn.
(snorting laughter)

Discussing a past episode in which the regular hosts postulated which First Officer would win if all the First Officers got into a massive Battle Royale:

Richard: Hey, hey, now what about Chakotay?
Mike: Chakotay can bollocks.

(laughter)

Richard: He was the first to die, he had an accident on the way to the battle.
Mike: Chakotay or Robert Beltran or whatever his name is shot himself in the foot by slagging off Star Trek, so we eliminated his character.
Richard: You don't slag off the Trek.
Mike No, you do not slag off the Trek. Although we do on a number of occasions. But you've got to compliment it while you do it.
Will (guest): Cause you're not in it.
Richard: We do it out of love. He did it out of hate. If we were in trek we'd never say anything bad about it again.
Mike: Course not.
Richard: That'd be a deal.
Mike: Yeah that'd be like slagging off your employer. But yeah, that would be a deal. That's how they're going to get rid of us you know.
Richard: Yeah they'll let us be in the new movie as long as we stop doing this.
Mike: Yeah as long as we stop this podcast.
Will: Would you want to be killed on an away misson?
Richard: Yes! We've figured it all out.
Mike: Yes, we've already discussed this.
Richard: I would be somebody who is blown up by his control panel halfway through saying the word "captain" to alert the captain of something important and Mike would be killed as a demonstration of some creature's power on an away mission.
Will: Nice.
Richard: You see he's playing the odds, I'm far more likely to get the extra role because there might not be a creature with powers to demonstrate, but I can guarantee someone will be killed by a control panel.
Mike: That's true, that's true. And if it doesn't happen, it's a good enough reason to boycott the film.
Richard: Exactly.
Mike: If someone doesn't get blown up by a control panel, then you know whole movie is totally whack.

Men in skin tight striped outfits play soccer with binoculars tied to their faces.

This graced my WORK email account this Monday morning - somehow something must have spidered through my Apple Mail address book, or somewhere along the line, I must have sent her a message from the address. In any case, BEST start to a Monday morning I've had in a long time.

Oh god I just saw the best thing ever.

I was pretty close to my house on the way home from work, stopped at a light while oncoming traffic slowed to a stop across the intersection.
Two fucks in a huge land rover nearly killed this poor guy on a bike while they changed lanes to avoid a left-turning person, it was bad enough that other cars honked at them for not looking where the hell they were going.

The biker stayed calm and stayed back about two cars and undid the cap of his nalgene. When traffic started to move again, he whizzed by the driver's side, reached in the open window, and dumped the entire thing in the driver's lap.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beautiful_Katamari

Of course you do!

I fed the cat the last packet of food as I went to bed last night - fantastic as I'd JUST got home from the grocery store. Always the way. I took a quick stock of other things we needed, which was not a lot, as I did a pretty good shop on Thursday. Pop (not a neccescity but one of my few favourite things I can still have), cat cood, cat litter. And as of this morning, anti inflammatories. Oh lord.

I pushed it a bit far on Thursday night with my arms, for the first time. One of those workouts where you think you're going to lose your lunch. It was probably my most vigourous workout to date - I needed to go back to the studio after I got changed, because I was so blood-sugar low, and have a glass of juice. I was sore by the next morning, despite my best stretching efforts, and today I can barely use them. Too much weight to soon.

I tossed and turned from 8 - 10:30; DAMN YOU INTERNAL ALARM CLOCK. I eventually got up and threw on some sweats and headed down to loblaws. My shopper's distraction started in as soon as I got into the store, Christmas is coming, you see. It's starting slowly, nothing is hanging from the cieling yet, but it's only a matter of time. Tree decorations, paper, garlands, wreaths - it's all out there for sale. (Deb I'm sure you're getting this, too.)

I stopped in the cat litter aisle and started comparing the litter I've been using (silica gels) with traditional. The price difference was huge. For a month's supply of silica (which I was buying because it supposedly works better, doesn't track, is more economic and smells less - which I've decided are all lies) I can get like six months of regular litter. So I bought the huge econo-tub and promptly dropped it on the floor of the grocery store as my bicep just said "Bitch, are you kidding me?" and quit. It didn't open and I managed to get it under the cart.

I drove home through the mess that is St. Clair (streetcar installations) and by the grace of god managed to get the litter inside. I decided to empty out the old litter and take it out straight away, and left my coat and shoes on. To make a long story short, my arms just kind of quit on me again, and I spilled cat-urine filled sillica crystals all over our kitchen/office floor - evenly half on the tile, half on the hardwood. I got the vaccuum from the strorage locker, the the mop. Everything was clean but I could distinctly smell cat piss.

Dirtbike, that smug fucking bastard just sat on the fridge, watching and chriping. I returned the mop to the basement and took the old litter and everything outside. I still smelled cat piss. I ended up drenching paper towels in pure bleach and wiping down the entire floor surface, then drying it by hand with more paper towel so that the little piss machine doesn't lick the floors for some reason and die. That helped. I'm burning a bit of incense to cover the bleach smell. So right now we're dealing with a blend of about 40% green apple, 25% bleach, 25% vim, 5% cat piss, and 5% irony.

Lots of work going on at the moment. I don't have much of a social life to speak of at the moment.

Everything is fine at home, we are both healthy (for the most part) and focusing really hard on work at the moment. I'm averaging about 13 hours a day here at the studio, and am very proud of the fact that I am at the gym five nights a week, without fail. I'm murdering about 350 calories a night, and trying to get in as much resistance training as I can. I want my body back so badly it's ridiculous. I'm totally comitted and driven. I wasn't feeling this into it, but I did my BMI, and am officially in the "overweight" zone. Not for long bitches!

I remember asking my doctor - how did my mom have cancer for long and no one ever knew? It's because she was so heavy, and she tried to make her lifestyle changes far too late in her life. I won't go down like that - I won't go down because of something I can change. I can fix it now, it'll be harder when I'm 30. It has to be now.

I've been rowing and running like mad, and I'm of course changing my diet too. Our favourite make-up artist told me about a different way to percieve it - she called it "shopping the perimeter" - staying on the outer walls of the grocery store. Eating only fresh unfrozen vegetables and fruits, eggs, dairy, real meat. Besides dry pasta and the odd canned vegetable, I'm trying to "avoid the aisles" - stopping buying and eating novelty and prepared foods. They're so bad for you.

I got pulled over by a cop yesterday. I couldn't afford to renew my plate sticker around my birthday, and just totally forgot. I never got a notice in the mail, because my car ownership has the old address on it (I had changed my Driver's License address, thought it was enough?). And my glovebox is a mess, and I couldn't put my hand on my pink-slip.

Failure to present proof of insurance: $110
Failure to display current registration sticker: $110
Failure to notify change of address: 85$

Oh YEAH that feels good. No, no... give me some more, I like it like that. FUCK.

The cop was awesome though, he was terribly funny. "Happy Belated Birthday, but did you forget something?" I did a total headsmack on it, and everything just went downhill from there. He kind of sighed and said "I have to write you these tickets. I'm so sorry. But this is what you're going to do."

And he flipped the tickets over, and showed me the three options:

"One, you can just pay them. I really don't reccomend this." he said (I totally balked). "Two, you can go to the DMV and get this done, like NOW. I mean, like YESTERDAY. Like go there NOW. When you do that, take all the paperwork to Edward St. You can talk to the Crown directly, and they'll probably dismiss them for you, or most of them. Three, you can book a court date. It'll be in eight months, but I'll be there, and we'll get them thrown out for you. Or, I will be busy or bored or won't care and I WON'T show up, and they'll get thrown out. OR you won't get a court date for over a year, and that's an automatic dismissal."

I looked at him, running over in my head how I would ever pay these in any timely manner. "So it's going to be O.K, right?"

"Oh yeah, kiddo," he looked like he had eight children. "You'll be fine. What are you doin' down here anyways?"

"I work right there." I said, pointing accross the road. He pulled me over as I was about to turn into the parking lot.

"Oh jeez, you ALMOST made it. Sorry - but you can get rid of this,"

TOTALLY opposite to my first traffic pull-over, in which I recieved no tickets, but both cops came to my car at once and screamed at me, and I sat there crying for like ten minutes after they pulled off.

Regardless. I still felt like I had swallowed a basket-ball. I get this feeling so often, anxiety. When a cheque bounces. When I get a parking ticket. When I get a note from the Board of Directors at the condo "can you get this out of your parking spot". When I waited so long to get the mailbox fixed, and they finally sent me a very official looking angry letter. Total shame, anxiety, embarrasment - complete emotional chaos until I fix it. This shit keeps me up at night, it's so ridiculous.

It was so bad, my initial instinct was to just pay the tickets, find a way - beg borrow and steal - and just MAKE THEM GO AWAY and PRETEND THEY NEVER EVER HAPPENED. I got some good advice though "No, you're not nuts for thinking that. Doing something about it will help, get all your papers ready, make your photocopies, book the court date. That way you've done all you can."

The Big's greeted me this morning with a "You turn your stupid ass around right now and go straight to the DMV. Go. If you can't pay, put it on The Card." (company expense visa.) So I did. 75$ later I feel much better. I came in with a thick sheaf of documents, which Mrs. Big helped me go through and copy and highlight. We put all the stuff that needs to be in the car in a small envelope. She sent me out with a roll of tape and said "Tape that in the glovebox. Don't touch it. Ever." While I was gone, she stuck all the copies into an 8x10 envelope and tacked it to my office bulliten board. In huge pink hi-lighter letters, it reads:

"KATE'S PENANCE: aka Traffic Tickets and Court Stuff"

They're so great to me like that, they take good care of me. When I got the nasty letter from Canada Post, they were similar. I was so upset, I called the locksmith the morning after I got the note - 140$ flat to fix it, double for the weekends and evenings - and Canada Post was going to start charging me to hold my mail if it wasn't fixed the next day. This was the best quote I got. I said I'd get back to them, and went to work. My car instantly started making terribly ill noises. I was practically in tears when I got in - Mr. Big of course, "Hey Kate, how you doing?"

"SHITTY."

"What's wrong?"

"I have three problems and I don't know what to do."

"Well, tell me what they are, and we'll fix them." It sounds SO Mr. Rogers, but this is actually what the man said. I told him about the locksmith and the mailbox, the car, and the fact that I was totally broke. "Call the locksmith back. Book it for this afternoon. Take the time you need, get it done. Put it on The Card if you have to. Pay us back when you can. Give me the keys to your car, while you're calling the locksmith, I'll drive it around the block and let you know what I think. And if you can't pay for it, put it on The Card. Pay us back when you can."

I booked the appointment for mid-afternoon, and told Mrs. Big I'd be back around 4 o'clock to finish the day. She laughed. "Enjoy the afternoon. Go home. Have a glass of wine. You need it."

Best bosses ever.

Cousin Eric's birthday is this weekend-ish. Going to a party at his and Brooke's place, then out to the bars. I've missed that boy! Pictures to come for you family reading.

I thought I was the only one.

Since childhood I have had one irrational fear. Charlie Chaplin. As a child I imagined he was hiding in my closet, waiting there to come and CREEP ME THE FUCK OUT. Sometimes on Sesame Street Maria would dress up like him, and I would run and hide from the television in tears. People have always found this hilarious.

But today. In one of my favourite comic strips. I discovered I am not alone.

Achewood

I do remember buying the beer.

I remember going to katrijn_noelle 's baseball game.
I remember eating peanuts and pretzels and having an awesome time.
I remember meeting the retarded girl that Kate works with. She was priceless.
I remember getting to the Orbit Room, to see LMT Connection.

I very much remember pointing obviously and saying loudly to Nick, "Hey, that guy looks just like Shawn Desman. You should punch him." and it actually being Shawn Desman - who I am happy to report, is no longer rocking the sidehawk.

I know there was a girlfriend of someone who Justin works with, that we talked a great deal and eventually got to do some dancing, when LMT came on. I remember them being absolutely amazing.

I remember Nick howling at my observation that my Creemore Springs on tap tasted like there were at least four dicks in it.

Then things go very blank for like, an hour. I know we were there for like three hours but in my memory it's a much faster experience. Somewhere in that time, I gave the lead singer a big old kiss on the cheek.

For some reason - whatever reason - I decided the best thing to would be to join the band on stage, and provide vocal stylings on a cover of Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get It On." I remember Justin and everyone yelling and screaming and the club cheering and whistling for me.

I don't remember leaving, I don't recall getting a pizza, and I definitely don't remember getting into the shower with all my clothes on.

Think Mr. Big could tell I was a little hungover?

How appropriate, now that we've been New Hampshire talking - it appears they're in peril!

I sent out emails to Chrissy, Jennifer, Julie, Chuck and June - and googled their respective locations. Epping (Jenn) and Concord (Chrissy) have some rough road closings, but Derry looks to be the worst off (that's Julie and Alyssa) with voluntary evacuations going on.

I'm not too worried about Chuckie and June, however - the most pressing news break that came up when I googled their town Plaistow was this hilarious story:

Dough-boy Kidnapped

Okay, this is so cool.

www.myheritage.com

So, you upload a shot of your face, it does a net of your features and matches you to celebrities.

My glasses threw it off a bit - I got Sigourney Weaver and Eva Peron and every celebrity who wears emo glasses.
My second shot was glasses-less (but older and a bit blurry) and I got Mischa Barton, Hillary Clinton, and Cindy Crawford.

katrijn_noelle was in that shot too and matched well to Avril, Keira Knightley, and Sandra Bullock.

Our old camp bud Erin matched Idina Menzel, Grace Kelly, and Gwen Stefani.

A more recent shot of Kate yielded an 80% match to Kristin Kreuk (I never, ever thought of that) and a scarily similar image of Sinead O'Connor. Also Catherine Zeta-Jones.

When I find more pictures I'll go nuts.

Mrs. Big and Mr. Big's kids go to the same elementary school, being an appropriate distance apart in age. To raise some money for the school itself, we're participating in a little fundraiser organized by a group of parents - it's a lot of fun. Each class (I think there are 20?) was responsible for creating a big picture - they got a big blank sheet, and could do with it whatever they pleased - just a nice representation of their class as a whole. After they were all finished, Mrs. Big loaded them carefully in the back of the car and brought them down to the studio - where we shot the lot of them as copy work.

This afternoon I prepped each image to be sent off to the printers - where they will be made into 4x6 art cards - postcards, essentially. Each set will have every classes painting, and be sold to parents and at the school fun fair, etc. etc. A nice idea. I had a lot of fun looking through each of the paintings - some of them were so funny, others so obviously controlled by a teacher with a competitive nature.

One kindergarten teacher was intelligent, probably averted a paint cricis by having each child put their handprint on the sheet, and carefully printing their names under the appropriate hand. That was safe, but nice - a lot of the teachers appear to have drawn very nice graphic patterns on the papers, and allowed their students to fill in between the lines. Resulting is nice linear pop-art pieces completely devoid of much imagination, but very "neat" and "nice".

My favourites, though, are the ones where the teacher appears to have let the students go totally nuts - the results are a mixed bag of fun that I wanted to share.

Daughter Big's first grade class created sort of a medievil scene. I thought at first this was two panda bears on a dragon attacking a lego man with a kick-ass bow, but I realize now that those are wings (silly me) and maybe the little man is doing magic? He is standing on top of a huge black castle that takes up roughly one-third of the entire painting.

These little princesses on the left are down at the bottom of the painting. What is so great about twenty-five or so six-year-olds creating a painting simultaneously are the amazing proportions that sneak their way into it. And what is princess ugly down there holding onto? Or was it covered up in haste? I bet the hot one in the green cape up there will get rescued first.


This evil chick down here was my favourite part of the whole scenario, though - clearly the mastermind of the whole sordid situation. What is she standing on? I like to pretend she's playing a very easy version of DDR while brandishing that kick-ass sword and shield, but there is probably a less amusing answer to that question.

My next favourite painting had a unique approach - the teacher had drawn a huge stage, and let the kids go off and paint pictures of themselves. They cut them out afterwards, and pasted themselves all in rows on the stage. Then the teacher added the names in that careful right-handed teacher printing that they take an entire semester on.


This one was about eighteen times larger than all the others. Let's say that it speaks to her self esteem.
This one is my favourite. With one brown arm. Maybe he has a cast?
Child ninja?


One teacher painted the background like a big brick wall, and encouraged the students to grafitti it - these students were in the third grade, making them eight years old. This painting was a hoot. These are only my favourites out of 35 different little markings.


A popular approach was to split the painting into an equal number of blocks for each student - I imagine this arose when kids revolted against one another for creative control, and had to divide to conquer. Sometimes, though, kids would band together and combine their squares to secretly rise up and slip in one dominating image. Two grade four students merged their assets in order to create this lasting impression:

Meanwhile, when asked about his time with Harper at the National Citizens Coalition, Nicholls said: "I worked with Stephen Harper for five years and never once did he, in that time, eat a baby."

It's incredible when that unexpected cheque comes in mere hours from the end of the business day, on which at close over 700$ of auto-withdrawls would have otherwise bounced high as a kite.

I cannot express the gratitude I have towards the Canada Trust near our place that is open until 6 p.m. every weekday.

After that miracle sank in, I went grocery shopping. We pretty much buy the same thing everytime we go shopping, but it always takes me three times as long to get through the store as a normal person - and I partly blame the Loblaws. There is always something new and exciting that we don't fucking need but grabs my attention anyways - a scale model of a clipper ship in four different colours, a chrome bocci ball set, a four-sectioned mini lazy susan, clearance hair spray, expensive body lotion on sale, which has fewer calories, spelt, 12 grain, flax, or rye bread? Do we need more tupperware, which spring mix has the best VALUE, but can we eat that much lettuce that quick, are there still reese's peanut butter cups in the freezer?

That's a nifty ice-cream scoop, this basmati rice looks more "authentic" but takes longer to cook, does Katie Noelle cook stir-fry with egg noodles or rice noodles, is there a difference between greek style and naan style flatbread, why are there so many kinds of matza, is this pile of green peppers organic, why are these bananas so much smaller - I should ask my father, are plums in season yet (we don't eat plums).

Macedonian, Greek, or Canadian Feta? Pardon me, but why are the squid cut differently today? Are you sure they have been cleaned? Is that lobster supposed to be like that? No, I don't want one, I just was curious. These are the things that cause me to spend an hour spending $60 in a grocery store. I was, however very proud when a little old east-indian man behind me noticed my healthy grocery cart. "I see you eat healthy." He said.

"I/You try." we both said together, and laughed. He was buying the biggest can of tomatoes I had ever seen, which he said he would be making the most "beautiful sauce" out of tonight. The older ladies at the Loblaws down there are without a doubt the most talented baggers I have ever encountered in my life. It's like they are in a competition to build the sturdiest bags. They never mix anything that should not be mixed, and nothing ever, ever gets crushed. I should write a letter.

I made yellow thai curried squid tonight with extremely wide vermicelli. So, so good. I need to try and cook when it's just me more often - but I'm so lazy. I'm trying to screw up the energy to go for a run, but I haven't really thought up a decent route yet - at least not a long one. I suppose I could just go and see. The neighborhood is safe enough. I would probably last about 20 minutes or so on the first time out this year, but it would be worth it, I guess. Even if it ended up just being a nice walk. Oh fuck it, I'm going.

I know, sorry, sorry, but I had to relate this.

I just had the most hilarious uplifting conversation with katrijn_noelle and her and marbyco 's mother. We touched the following subjects:

1. Our grandmother and why she is white trash
2. Her usage of the term "COME" for orgasm at age 90
3. Sham marriges, and whether Big Brother is watching us on MSN
4. The merits of Star Trek in matchmaking
5. The politically correct use of the word "retard"