Sorry for my absence, I had to wash my hair.

Wow. OK. I haven’t blogged in a while, and that’s nobody’s fault but my own. Recently I was camping and I had the time to do some journaling. What came out of that is a decision to add a bit more ‘structure’ and ‘routine’ in my life, so that I can follow through on some goals that I’ve set for myself. I feel like I’m doing the opposite of what most people do. I feel like when people decide to change things in their life, they try to add more spontaneity. I’ve got enough of that. I tend to put myself last, and other people’s wants and needs come ahead of mine, and if I’ve got enough time, after I’ve done everything for everyone else, I do what I need to do. Sound familiar to anyone?

One of the goals I have for myself is writing. My writing instinct is a weird one. I feel the need to write, but I’ve got no ideas for fiction in my head. I read other people’s work (just finished Daniel Heath Justice’s trilogy “The Way of Thorn & Thunder” Awesome work!!! Review will follow soon) and I’m amazed at the level of imagination these people have, the stories they weave, and how they capture my mind and my heart and my soul. Maybe non-fiction is my path? Except I hate research.

I’ve started stories before, but I get to a certain point, and I can’t figure out how to develop the story, where to go... I’m sure that I’ve got to be patient, and give myself time. I’ve got to let things develop in my head, and let things brew. Trouble is, I get impatient, and frustrated with myself. I’m sure that it doesn’t just happen automatically for other people, that it’s a struggle sometimes (or maybe most of the time). I tend to be self conscious, too, and my need for approval gets in the way of my creativity. I have to stop comparing myself to others. I’ve learned, in some areas of my life, that that is not a healthy thing to do, but in this area, it’s still very much alive. It's not like I haven't gotten positive feedback from esteemed people, for my writing. I won a contest , and had my WIP (work in progress) critiqued by this guy James Kennedy, who is one of the funniest writers I've "known". So, yeah, he gave me good feedback, and complimented my style. Yet that WIP remains on the shelf.

My tendency to compare myself keeps me from exploring what talents I might have for art, as well. My father, Jan Kee (also my nieces, my sisters and brothers are way too talented for me to even consider trying to put a brush to canvas or charcoal to paper. One day I hope to get past that. I don’t know the path that will take me there, tho.

I write, every day, that’s my profession. One of the themes of my musings has been ‘can I call myself a professional writer’. I feel like that’s a cop out, or I’m using semantics for my own self worth. So I don’t. To support that, I realized that a whole lot of what I do isn’t “real” writing, its synthesis of other people’s ideas and opinions into a cohesive format.

So, I thought, OK. What do “real” writers do, then? From what I’ve observed, they put aside a specific time and place to do their craft. My daughter’s been working at Grounded Coffee in Midland. I gotta drive her there anyway, so I decided that this is the perfect place to sit on a Saturday morning and work on my blog. I’ll write one entry a week (or so), with the intent that it will lead to bigger and better things. I figure that will get me into the routine and the practice of my fingers dancing across the keyboard. (OK, right now it doesn’t feel like they’re dancing. It feels like I’m pulling each word, each letter out of this machine with a pair of vise grips.)

Other things in my routine, I haven’t been so successful at just yet. I promised myself that I’d go to they gym after work on Mondays and Thursdays. That, of course, I decided to start on the hottest week of the year. Needless to say, I failed at that (instead of failed, can we say ‘postponed due to weather?) Instead of the gym, I did do a bit of swimming at a friend’s rented cottage, so I suppose that counts for something. I also went to the beach one morning before work, which is an awesome way to start a day. I plan on doing that more often.

P.S. upon review of my archives, I've realized that many of my blog entries have started with "sorry for my absence". Sigh. I've either got to be more consistent, or stop apologizing.

P.P.S upon further review, I realized that I've written this kind of thing before, too. Have i mentioned that follow through is a problem for me?

I don't want to offend, just inform

Cancer is a horrible, very bad, disease. It’s robbed this world of some of our best and brightest. My first “real” experience with cancer was the loss of Terry Fox, back when I was in high school. Like every Canadian at the time, I followed his journey, amazed at what someone with such a disability could do, to raise awareness, to raise money. I thought he was so freaking brave, so principled, and so strong. I cried when he died, sad that someone so strong could be strangled by this disease.

Cancer had never touched our family, until I lost my sister in law to ovarian cancer a few years ago. She was like my sister; she was a part of my family since I was little. She loved my brother and gave us a beautiful, smart, wonderful niece (who’s had her own troubles with thyroid cancer). Then, about a year or so ago, my brother in law was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. (I don’t know a whole lot about pancreatic cancer. I tell people that he has the “Steve Jobs” , not the “Patrick Swayze” kind. So, right now, he’s getting treatment and feeling good, able to work and play and be with his family. I have a close friend, who’s now lost both breasts to cancer. I hate this disease, I hate what it does to people, and I wish that there was a way to kill it, this “Emperor of all Maladies”.

What I’ve begun to dread now, is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. I hate the pink appliances; I hate the “I heart boobies” rubber bracelets. I hate the “thingamaboob” and I hate the T shirts that tell you to “fight like a girl”. I especially despise the pink toilet paper. (Weren’t we told years ago that the dye in coloured toilet paper wasn’t good for our lady parts?)

I hate all of those things for a number of reasons. First of all, I think that Kitchenaid™ is making a whole lot more money from those appliances than they’re donating to cancer research/treatment/prevention. Also, there’s not a whole lot of evidence that all of this “awareness raising” is doing a whole lot. Katherine Russel Rich says it a whole lot better than I do, in this Slate.com article.

I believe that the whole ‘cancer industry’ is making a whole lot more money than they’d care to tell you. When I’m at my most paranoid, it’s my feeling that drug companies would be loathe to fund research that would end up in a cure for cancer. Think of the profits they’d lose.

There’s also not a whole lot of evidence that indicates all of this awareness is working. That article in Slate.com talks about the information in Gale Sulik’s book, Pink Ribbon Blues.:
The risk of dying from the disease, upon diagnosis, decreased just 0.05 percent from 1990 to 2005. A woman with invasive breast cancer today will be bombarded with many more treatments and spend a lot more than her grandmother might have on care, but she'll have about the same chance of dying from the illness as women did 50 years ago.

"Survivors and supporters walk, run, and purchase for a cure as incidence rates rise, and the cancer industry thrives," Sulik writes. She points out that "cancer drugs are the fastest growing and best selling class of drugs" in the prescription drug market, which totals more than $200 billion and is ever growing. Given the profits, Sulik questions whether any amount of pink-ribbon volunteering can alter the medical establishment's investment in the current treatments. Who needs a cure if you can make so much money without one?

Also in that Slate article, this information about where all our money goes, and suggestions about what could be done.

The CEO of the Komen Foundation, who earns $459,406 a year (more than 5,000 race entry fees), could try living on the wages of your average oncologist—$250,000 a year—and top up the fund with that extra $200,000 or so.
This way, we'd have ample resources to help directly. We could provide cab service for the woman with brain metastasis forced to drive 40 minutes each way for a scan. We could pay for a counselor—couples' or otherwise—for the women whose husbands turn mean after their diagnoses. "He tells me he's waiting for me to die," one posts on Breast Cancer Insight. Women could get housekeeping services during the molasses days of chemotherapy, child care for scan days, money for a lawyer if their jobs are suddenly declared "redundant" upon diagnosis. If we can't yet abolish breast cancer, then let's at least tackle the social ills that come with the disease. We wouldn't even be diverting the majority of Komen funds from science. Only 23.5 percent goes to research, anyway.

And what about all those other cancers, the one’s that aren’t so sexy? Why don’t we have a brown toaster to promote awareness for colon cancer? Why don’t we have panties that tell us to check out our nether regions?

What I’m suggesting is, if you really want to make a difference in the fight against cancer, one that we’re clearly not winning, don’t go out and buy a pink coffee maker to put on your counter that shows your friends that you really care.

Give a friend a ride to chemotherapy.
Look after her kids.
Volunteer at a hospital.
Crochet a beanie to cover up a bald head.
Knit an afghan to give warmth in a cold hospital.
Pay for a tank of gas to offset the costs of traveling
Sit and listen.
Do something that matters to someone, not something that impresses someone.

Force of Nature, the David Suzuki Movie, directed by Sturla Gunnarsson

I had the opportunity to see Force of Nature, as part of the Huronia Museum’s Film Series. I’m not a subscriber, because I just can’t commit to going to a movie every two weeks, but I love the chance to see movies that aren’t usually available outside Toronto or possibly Barrie.

David Suzuki is a charismatic man, who I didn’t really know that much about. I remember watching “The Nature of Things” when I was growing up, but at that stage in my life, it didn’t mean all that much to me. Who knew that he was a fruit fly geneticist?

The movie starts off with his “Legacy Lecture”. I think that this is far from his last kick at the can; this man has a lot of life left in him. He did say that he is in the last stage of his life. He spoke about that, in the last part of the movie, but not in a maudlin way. Perhaps it’s his nature as a scientist, to admit facts like that in a non-emotional way. Life is a cycle, and he will always be a part of this earth.

An overriding theme in this movie was isolation. His family was isolated from their fellow Canadians, by virtue of their Japanese heritage. His parents were born in Canada, but were subject to confinement in an internment camp after the bombing of Pearl Harbour.

He wasn’t accepted by the other kids there, because he was one of the only kids who didn’t speak Japanese. He spoke about being chased home from school, along the train tracks, where he was rescued by his father. His trip back to that camp was incredibly moving. He was seeing the place through a grown-up’s eyes, saw the powerlessness that his father and everyone else experienced, and saw his ‘people’ through the eyes of those that put them there.

After the camp, knowing that they weren’t accepted any longer in BC, they moved to Leamington, ON, a town who’s citizens were proud of the fact that a non-white person had never been in the town past sundown. Here is another study in isolation. David wasn’t allowed to date the white girls, and there were no other Asians there. He talked about spending time in the swamp, and how “the swamp saved my life”. He spent countless hours there, exploring, learning about the things that lived in the swamp, and began a love affair with science.

From Ontario, after grad school, he went to Tennessee where he was completely accepted… No, just kidding. He loved the opportunities for research that were available, that grew out of the US government’s generosity, wanting to throw money at anything that would help them win the space race. (I’m honestly not quite sure how a fruit fly geneticist had anything to add, but I’m sure he did. I just didn’t get the connection.) His family life suffered a bit there, he was spending 7 days a week in the lab, and his wife and kids were left to fend for themselves, for the most part. Isolated from his family, only at home in the lab.

Scenes of him giving these (what seemed to be) impromptu lectures in his hippie gear and requisite leather head band were… trippy, to say the least. He had this way of connecting to people, to get his point across without seeming sciency or preachy.

He found his connection, with the help of the Haida people, after joining in their fight to save their trees from the logging companies. Aboriginal peoples, more than anyone else, understand our connection to the earth and each other. I wish I could do justice to how he explains our connection to every other living, breathing, existing thing in this world. Suffice to say that the argon I breathe in and let out will stay here longer than I ever will, but it’s a part of me, and now it’s a part of you. We aren’t, we can’t be isolated, or live like we are. We are air, we are each other, and we are the earth. And the earth is us.

The Warhol Gang, a review

Wow. Ok. Let me sit down and take a breath for a moment. I just finished The Warhol Gang, by Peter Darbyshire, and now I need to sit and let it settle for a bit.





This book,  (and PD’s first novel “Please”) is such a departure from other books I’ve read recently. The usual is for things to have a definite beginning, middle and an end. With this, I felt like things were on the run from the moment I began reading, and, at the conclusion of the novel, were still in process. That being said, I was a willing participant from first page to last.

The book is written in first person narrative, a style recently discussed on Bookninja . I’m not one to spend a lot of time thinking about the way something is written. It’s either a good story or it’s not. (I, however, will not read anything with more than one exclamation mark per chapter. If you can’t get the reader there with your words, don’t expect your punctuation to do it for you! {That’s my quota reached.}) The protagonist of the novel, Trotsky (Warhol) works for a temp agency and is presently working as a sort of beta tester for products at a neuromarketing company called “AdSenses”. Trotsky’s not his ‘real’ name. All of the characters in the book are just that. Che, Paris, Holiday, Nickel, Flint, Thatcher, Nader, Reagan.

I guess the book can be called an ‘allegory of our time’. We are not ourselves, but reflections of what other people think of us. We are replaceable (there’s a part in the book where one of the AdSenses workers isn’t there, and then is replaced by one of the others. “You’re Nader now”. I don’t know about you, but I’ve felt like that. Just stick a new name tag on this one, and that’s good enough.

Trotsky soon begins to need more stimulation to get the same effect. Just viewing the products isn’t enough. He needs to buy them, to feel them. But not use them. Soon that’s not enough. He seeks other ways to get the same feeling. To feel real. He attends scenes of accidents, and for a while that’s enough. He needs more, and starts impersonating emergency response personnel. Soon that’s not enough. The novel speaks to the way we need more and more stimulation to feel like we’re experiencing enough, and the way we expect that having things will fill that gap.

Trotsky ends up involved with Holiday, who calls herself the “Marilyn Monroe” of security footage, a woman who seeks infamy through being broadcast on news feeds hosted by Paris. Together, and in conjunction with a resistance led by Che, they accidentally become the Warhol Gang, and, of course, havoc ensues, culminating in a violent standoff at Ikea. “Everything ends in the Ikea.”

The Warhol Gang is described as ‘black comedy’, as an absurd tale, and a story about a dystopian future. In my opinion, it’s a trip, a ride, a story that you don’t want to believe could happen, but believe too fully.

The Curse of Bye Bye Birdie.

I feel a little trepidation, even as I type out the name of the cursed movie. I thought about the movie, the other day, as the rain fell, softly at times, other times seeming as if it would come through the windows… the sound of the rain took me back… to another weekend in August, how many years ago now?

The day started out, dreary and humid, much like every other day that summer. I was vacuuming the carpet, and right then decided it had to come out. So there I was, tearing up this old brown shag carpet that had seen better decades. Hauling it out to the side of the road, big pickup was scheduled for the next week. Exhausted that evening, settling in to watch a good musical on tv with my lovely daughters on the couch beside me.

The humidity finally broke, with the storm that was threatening all day long. The sky was dark, the lightning flashes breaking the sky in two. Thunder crashing, shaking the house. There were candles on the coffee table, just in case, and flashlights for all. The movie, Bye Bye Birdie on the television. Halfway through the movie, we’re laughing at the lame songs and the ridiculous premise of the movie, when one of the offspring says “what’s that dark spot on the floor?” Yeah…what is that growing dark spot on the floor.

Water. In my basement. Coming in from god knows where. Phone calls to my brother with the shopvac, sucking it up, pouring it down the sink, when I note that, not only is the water coming through the walls somehow, but its gurgling up through the hole in the laundry room floor, up from the sewer, I’m guessing. Now, I’ve got a late night call to the plumber going on. “Yes, coming up through the drain” I tell him. “It’s coming up from the sewer then” he says. “well what can I do?” I ask him. “Nothing” he says. “Nothing??” “Nothing.” I realize that, as I suck up the water and pour it down the laundry room sink, that if it is indeed coming up from the sewer, then I’m just making it worse. The kindly plumber tells me just to go to bed and get some sleep, there’s nothing I can do anyway. Nothing he can do.

A call to the insurance company the next day brings “disaster restoration” people. Well, it’s not quite a disaster. Maybe they should be called “devastation restoration” people. My basement gets fixed. New carpet, new drywall, after a few weeks time.

Fast forward a year or so. Again, just the girls and I at home, and we’re having a chick movie night. Gosh, we love those musicals. What’s on the tv schedule tonight? Why, its Bye Bye Birdie, oh good, we never did get to watch the end of that movie, as lame as it was, I always like to see things through to the end. It’s October, this time, a weekend, and the weather’s been unsettled. Snuggled on the couch with the offspring, laughing again at the goofy songs and costumes.

And then. Its déjà vu all over again. The storm starts, rain comes hard and fast… “what’s that dark spot on the floor, mom?” Again. Again the panicked call to my brother with the shop vac. Minus the call to the plumber, because this time I know it won’t help. Again, the call to the insurance company, when they tell me that this is the last time they’ll cover me for this, because, gosh knows, you’re not expected to make any claims when you have house insurance. Apparently, if we have another claim, they’ll drop us. Nice. But they fixed the basement, this one last time.

So… the connection I’ve made, through all of this, is that the classic movie Bye Bye Birdie is cursed. I cannot watch this movie ever again, because my house will flood. I don’t mean to be facetious or anything, but I wonder if someone was watching it in New Orleans when Katrina hit. It’s a dangerous movie. Should be banned.

A year after that last flood, I won tickets on the radio, to see a play being put on near here. What was the play? You guessed it. I didn’t pick up the tickets. Couldn’t risk it.

I recommend the following for your consideration

It’s been so freaking long since I wrote a blog entry, I began to wonder if I was still literate or not. Please, feel free to post your opinions about that. It’s not that there’s nothing to blog about, perhaps it’s that there is too much, and it’s hard just to pick one issue to have an opinion on.

Perhaps that’s where I’ll start. As you can tell, by the title of this blog, I enjoy sharing my opinion with people. (I call it sharing. Some choose to call it being overbearing and controlling. I don’t see it that way, Mary Ellen.) This issue came to mind this morning, when I was downstairs at the coffee place at work, and someone asked for “A muffin. I don’t care what kind”. I can’t imagine having the responsibility of choosing someone’s muffin for them. Why, the wrong pastry could ruin your whole day. That’s a lot of responsibility for someone making minimum wage (actually, the canteen operators here make more than that, but that’s not the issue here).

There is another area where the sharing of my opinion causes me a great deal of anxiety. George Murray over at the blog Bookninja.com posted a link about it the other day. Recommending books, to me, is a very personal thing. The types of books that people enjoy say a lot about them. When there are books that I’m emotionally affected by, it increases my trepidation exponentially. And yet, I’m torn between that trepidation, and wanting to share my finds with others. (I could name some, if you'd like...)

If you read that link to Bookninja, you’ll see comments from someone named Andrew, whom I don’t know (but have since learned is a writer), who uses people’s opinions of his recommendations as a friendship barometer of sorts. Works for me. I once had an almost heated argument with someone about the Time Traveler’s Wife, and ended up deciding that the woman was an idiot (no name, to protect the stupid). It’s most difficult, though, when there’s someone I truly respect, who says “yeah... it didn’t do anything for me.” So those are the people I am most hesitant about recommending a book to.

I respect the art of writing. It takes incredible courage to put pen to paper (or pixels to white space) and let people see it. I imagine (because I’ve never written anything that’s been let out into the world, save this blog, a couple of irate letters to the editor and my lame twitter/facebook updates. Oh… and my regular day to day job that involves writing reports on mentally ill offenders) that it’s like letting your child out into the world. (Which I am experiencing) You create something, edit it, perfect it … then let it go. Let it survive, or not.

Or not... how do you put something out there? Run the risk of it not being accepted, not being understood. Not being successful. Not surviving, in the real world.

Published writers, I am in awe.

One Bloody Thing After Another

I finished this book, sitting on the deck in the morning sun, with a fresh brewed coffee. If that's not a perfect situation, I don't know what is. It's the last day of a four day weekend, which is one of the most fabulous creations this government has ever made. It rained last night, but now the sun is shining (much like it did for this entire weekend). So, what better way to finish off the weekend, than to blog about a book that scared the living crap out of me!!! (well, not quite, but I was suitably creeped out. So, here I am, sitting in the afternoon sun, with another fresh brewed coffee, and my laptop. Another perfect situation.

First of all, I love the cover of the book. The picture on the front is unsettling, a wee bit creepy, and definitely intriquing. The title of the book is written in shiny letters, and the cover itself is a matte picture. It's really cool, you kind of have to move the book around to read it. Joey Comeau, the author, is also the creator of a web comic called A Softer World, which is one of my favourites. I didn't realize it until after I read the book, tho, so don't worry about any bias I might have had. I received this book through ECW Press, because i'm a Shelf Monkey.

The description of the book on Amazon gives a little too much away right off the bat, but this sentence, I think, describes things well, without going too far.

"...a cantankerous old man, his powerfully stupid dog, a headless ghost, a lesbian crush and a few unsettling visits from Jackie’s own dead mother, and you'll find that One Bloody Thing After Another is a different sort of horror novel from the ones you're used to. It’s as sad and funny as it is frightening, and it is as much about the way families rely on each other as it is about blood being drooled on the carpet. Though, to be honest, there is a lot of blood being drooled on the carpet."


This book had me from the prologue, the "title" of which is "Ann's mother isn't feeling so good today". We find out that Ann and Margaret's mother is going for a job interview, which didn't go so well, because Ann's mother coughed up something bloody. Ewww... Really? Seriously? This introduction, written so matter of factly that you might have to read it twice to see if you really read what you thought you read, reminds me a bit of Stephen King. You know how he just drops in these gross bits of horror so casually into the 'conversation' that you're having with him, that its not until you've shaken his hand and said 'see ya later' that you realize how gross it truly was.

The book follows Ann, Jackie and Charlie, as well as their families, through a short period of time in their lives. A period of time when Ann finds out how far she'll go to support her mom and sister, a time when Jackie finds out how her mom's death affects her, and a time when Charlie experiences living with his dog, losing his dog, and getting reunited with his dog.

This book has more layers than I thought it would. The first aspect of the book is about love and committment. The way Ann sticks by her family, goes way out of her comfort zone to protect and care for them is understandable. It's rare that you feel sympathetic for someone who does the kinds of things she does, but I did. I empathized for Ann. I might be reading too much into this, but I think there are many people who will find an aspect of themselves in Ann. (But hopefully not a piece of themselves in her mom...)

Jackie is a young girl, discovering that she's different from her peers in so many ways, not the least of which is her emerging sexuality. Charlie is a man who loves his dog, and is charged with helping a neighbour find out about her daughter's demise. This aspect of the book really reminds me of the way Robert Wiersema writes. There's such a sense of family and connectedness in this book, you realy feel like these are people that you might know, and might care for, just a bit.

The other aspect of the book is the abject horror. Live animals being fed to ravenous beasts chained up in the basement. A young girl with the ability to call up the ghost of her dead mother to help her escape from police custody. A headless ghost with a message for a loved one.

I absolutely reccommend this book. Maybe it's a novella, I've never quite understood the difference. In any case, its a quick and horrifying read, something to make you shiver in the middle of a sunny day. I see that the author, Joey Comeau will be reading from his book on April 27, 2010. He's the inaugaral guest at the event series "The Toronto Literary Salon". Sounds like something I'd like to hear. But I'm just a little afraid of this man.

Groundhog Day, and why it is better than Valentine's Day

For a few years now, my family has been celebrating Groundhog Day, in a way that's different than other people do. Sure, we listen to the news, and find out if Wiarton Willie saw his shadow or not, but its more than that. There is cake involved. (cake in pic made by Offspring #1, who has just been accepted to pastry arts and management at George Brown College)




Here are all the things that suck about Valentine's Day
1. Single people feel left out.
2. Lots of money spent on useless stuff like overpriced, bad tasting chocolate and bouquets of flowers that die.
3. Douchebaggy boyfriends/husbands who don't get you those things mentioned in #2 make you feel bad.
4. Husbands who give you a rose made out of panties, that come from the dollar store, but they found in the parking lot at work, look bad. (true story)
5. Men get the short end of the stick on this holiday, with having too many expectations put on them that they just can't live up to.
6. Kids who aren't as popular as other kids don't get as many valentines and feel like crap.
7. Restaurants are overcrowded.
8. Hearts aren't really shaped like that.


Here are all the things that suck about Groundhog Day.
1. Nothing.

Really... What is bad about celebrating the coming of spring? With regard to the accuracy, Wikipedia say "Groundhog Day proponents state that the rodents' forecasts are accurate 75% to 90%. A Canadian study for 13 cities in the past 30 to 40 years puts success rate level at 37%. Also, the National Climatic Data Center reportedly has stated that the overall predictions accuracy rate is around 39%." While an accuracy rate of 39% is not great, it's not horrible.

There is no consumerism related to Groundhog Day (while, not yet, anyway). Valentine's Day, however, makes giving an overpriced gift equal being in love. We should show those we love how much we love them every day. Not with overpriced chocolate and packaged sappy sentiments, but with kindness and sweet gestures, like Groundhogs do.

Jann Arden... goddess of Canadian music

I’m getting ready to go to a Jann Arden concert in London, Ontario. For those of you who don’t know her… well, your life is empty. I’m sorry to be the one who has to tell you that, but surely you had some inkling of that before I wrote those words.

She’s a Canadian musician who’s been on the scene (or, actually, just outside of the scene) since her first album in 1993. The biggest single from that album was “I would die for you”, which is a hauntingly beautiful song. She made it ‘semi big’ south of the border, with the song “Insensitive”. That’s probably the one she’s most well known for. My favourite song of hers, though, is “Good Mother”. There’s a line in there, referring to her father ‘and his strength is what makes me cry’. (Actually, I have no idea if it’s about her father, I’m assuming it is, because she and her parents have a close relationship, and, in fact, live, like really really close to each other) There’s also a duet that she’s sung with Jackson Browne, but on her album, I believe its someone from her band. “Unloved”, the most gorgeous song I’ve heard. I could (and have) listened to that song 10 times in a row, in the car, singing along (to both parts).

This will be the third time I’ve seen her in concert. I’ve seen her at Massey Hall in Toronto, and in Mount Forest, in a renovated movie theatre. She is fricking hilarious. The time I saw her in Mount Forest, she told this story of waking up on a Navy ship with a trumpet in her bed, or some such thing. (That concert was the first time I actually spoke to her… well, spoke... ok, I’m misrepresenting that. She asked where people were from, I shouted out “Midland” and she replied “Finland?? Cripes that’s far”. End of Conversation. Sigh.)

Jann is someone who’s never really hit the ‘big time’(like, famous famous, i mean. She can walk the streets without being mobbed) although she’s a familiar sound on Canadian radio. You might not be able to name a song of hers, but you’ve definitely heard more than one. If I played one for you, you’d say...Oh, yeah, I’ve heard that. Nice.


I’ve had this feeling, for so long, that if we ever actually met, we’d really get along. I like to think that our sense of humour is similar, we share that love of music, and we have similar values. (Well, what I can glean of her values through her twitter and her blog, and her song)

How does one tell someone famous that, without coming off as a crazy stalker? I had similar thoughts when I went to see Robert Wiersema at a reading he did at Yorkdale Mall, in Toronto. Although “Robert” and I are... well… you know, “facebook friends”, I thought it might come off as just thiscreepy for me to tell him that he’s my absolute favourite author. I tried to play it cool, when I asked him to sign my copy of his book, and I think I did ok, but, man oh man. I really just wanted to say “Hey, didja want to grab a beer or something?” (But I would have had to ditch my mother, and that’s not cool). (And, in all likelihood, I’d be a little star struck, end up being all tongue tied, I’d be out of my league, intellectually, and I’d sound like an idiot)

So, yeah. My dream in life is to sit and have a glass of wine with Jann, shoot the shit and just yak for an hour or two. If, from there, she asked me to jam with her, or sing back up, well... who am I to turn down a request like that?

This is crazy

I've decided that I absolutely have to do something with myself. I'm restless, i'm agitated, I'm angry at myself and I need to do something about it. I'm not sure if this is the catalyst or not, but I read about Myra getting a two book deal for her YA (that's young adult) novel. i don't know her 'for reals', but I've read her blog, she's a wonderful writer, I bet her novel is great, and she'll be very successful. Reading about her, tho, made me incredibly jealous.

I feel like I need to write something. I love books, I love words. The way they go together, and the way they sound. I love the way you can put them together and they can mean one thing, and then switch the same words around and they mean something else.

The trouble is, I don't feel a story inside me, trying to get out. I keep waiting to be inspired or something like that, and it's just not happening. It just ain't there. There are no characters in my head talking to me, telling me the story that needs to be told.

I write, all the time. I write for a living. I've written silly little poems to commemorate goofy adventures, I've written a eulogy. I've written reviews of concerts and plays. My friends tell me that I have a talent for writing. When people need an angry letter written, or someone needs a letter of reference, they call me. And I write it. There are times when i've done this, and i feel like it's a piece of crap, and people still seem to like it.

From the reading I've done, the quasi research, if you can call it that, writers need to have some discipline when it comes to writing. Author/bloggers that I've read talk about setting aside specific times to write, setting themselves goals of words per day. They say that you need to write, every day, and it doesnt matter that what you write is crap, but it needs to be done. Every. Damn. Day.

So, that's where I am today. I cannot wait for the elusive muse of writing. I cannot wait to be struck by inspiration. I need to go out and hunt down my muse, drag her kicking and screaming back to my lair and tie her to my desk until she spits out an idea for me. Apparently this writing thing is no airy fairy task, it's a freaking job that you need to take seriously.

Adventures in Toronto and other harrowing tales

Well, there are no harrowing tales, I should disclose that right up front. It’s just a trick to lure you into reading. (note to self. Maybe I should tell people it’s a trick later on in the blog, once they’re engrossed in the tale)

My sister, mother and I go on an annual trip to the William Ashley Warehouse sale. Half the fun is waiting outside in the tent gossiping and gabbing before you even get into the deals. It really is a lot of fun, and you can find a lot of your Christmas gifty and decoratey stuff there. As well as life size leather horses, and dishes.

This year’s trip, however, had a few another activity added on to it that made me terribly excited. I was going to a book reading by Robert J. Wiersema .

I read his first novel “Before I Wake”
probably about a year or more ago. I love this book, its one of the most amazing stories I’ve ever read. I borrowed it from the library, but then I was compelled to go out and buy it, because I couldn’t imagine not having it. I thought about writing a review, but I’m not good at them, yet, and I didn’t feel that I could do justice to it. So, this isn’t really a review, it’s just me gushing about the book. Here’s the blurb from the back cover.

Tragedy strikes the Barrett family when three-year-old Sherry falls into a coma after a hit-and-run accident. Her devastated parents, Simon and Karen, wait by her bedside, hoping for a miracle – one that doesn’t come. Told that she will never recover, they agree to remove her from life support. And then the miracle occurs. Sherry doesn’t die. But neither does she wake. Wiersema brilliantly weaves together disparate voices and sheds light on the inner lives of characters struggling against tragedy, finding each other, and themselves, in the darkness. In exploring how hope can be renewed in the face of unimaginable sorrow, Before I wake reveals the power of forgiveness, and the true nature, and cost, of miracles.

That gives an accurate description of the book. At the book reading, Robert (and I feel like I can call him Robert) said that he is a narrative writer. He’s not so concerned about the words that tell the story, more about the story itself. I have to say that I noticed that in this book. Sometimes, when I come across cool ways of expressing an idea in a book, I’ll underline it with pencil, and come back to it again. I didn’t do that in this book, I wasn’t distracted by cool phrasing, or unique sentences or any of that. Which is not a drawback, I was so caught up in the story, in the characters and their lives, that I read the story and believed it, and loved it. And I didn’t (couldn’t) take time out from reading to look for a pencil to underline something.

The way he depicted the parent’s relationship, I thought, was bang on. They came across as flawed, real, and sympathetic. (Even Simon, who I thought was a bit of a dick at first) The way they deal with the things they have to deal with, which could have been handled in a very heavy-handed, religious way, also came across in a very real manner. They were faced with a decision they needed to make, about how to deal with the miracles their daughter created. Robert described the novel as agnostic, and the parents’ decisions were made using that precept.

It was one of those books that you regret coming to the end of, because you’re not in it anymore.

Mr. Wiersema was actually there to promote his new novella, The World More Full of Weeping.

This is the blurb from Amazon, written by Jillayna Adamson.

Victoria local Robert J. Wiersema's soon-in-bookstores new novella The World More Full of Weeping, establishes an immediately-chilling mood before you've even opened it up.

That mood is set by its well-crafted cover - an eerie glow peeking through dark, fogged woods. It makes for a perfect introduction to the story, which wastes no time to reveal what will be a haunting tone throughout.

Eleven-year-old Brian Page is missing after wandering off into the woods behind his home. The story bounces back between the point of view of Brian's worried father and Brian himself. This is not your average story, nor your typical tale of a missing child. Once again (as he did with Before I Wake in 2006, which went on to be a national bestseller), Wiersema takes readers to a new and unnerving place, complete with spine-tingling chills.

Weeping is an immediately engaging, fully supplementing quick read that brings you back to the days of spooky campfire stories that go on to make for a sleepless night wandering around your own imagination. This novella is a refreshing break amongst the monotony of boringly average, everyday reads. It coasts along naturally with Wiersema's vivid writing, keeping you glued to the page.

Hearing him read his own words was wonderful. I always love hearing people read their own work, they know where they intended the emphasis to be, and they know how to speak their character’s voices. He also read from an essay that is included with the novella, which speaks about his use of a fictional version of a real place (his home town) as a setting for the novella (and other short stories, I don’t know about the availability of them). His reading of the essay prompted Offspring to say, on the way home. “Ok, now I’m confused about what an essay is.” Which, of course, forced me to actually think about that and give a reasonably intelligent answer. God I hate it when kids do that. I explained that an essay was a nonfiction piece of writing, which details and supports the author’s opinion and ideas about a particular subject. (I think that’s right, anyway. Seemed to satisfy her.)

It was terribly cool to have the editor (publisher) from Chiaroscuro Web Zine, sorry, I forgot his name, and the artist who designed the cover of the book, at the event. (I didn't get his name) Tres cool. I wish I had said something to the artist, because it is just so perfect.
I ordered a limited edition of this book, which includes the hard cover book, the essay, and a short story set in the same town. Haven’t yet received it, but when I do… oh my… ohhhhh myyyy…. I wish I had received it before the reading, but that’s ok. I did get Robert to sign my copy of Before I Wake. (Can I just say, I was just a little star struck. I had previously ‘friended’ Robert on Facebook, and when I asked him to sign my copy, he…. Oh yeah... he recognized me. “Monica, right?”, and them proceeded to sign the title page. Yep... that’s just how cool I am. ) (god I hope he doesn’t read this and get creeped out by me. Some people are gaga over rock stars. With me, it’s publishing stars.) This is when I absolutely thank Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee . The internet makes it possible for people like Robert (and Ben Esch, and Corey Redekop, and George Murray) more than esoteric celebrities, and turned them into real people, that you can actually have a conversation with. (when you’re not tongue tied)

I have been lax, it seems, in updating my blog. I apologize to my loyal followers (and to the not-so-loyal ones, who actually won’t know that I’ve been so lax).

It’s not because not much has been happening, gosh no. We’ve had thanksgiving, there have been family issues, it’s nearly hallowe’en, and I had an interesting thing happen at the local Salvation Army Thrift Store.

I went in there, actually, on the morning of Thanksgiving dinner with my family. I had made a triple threat chocolate cheesecake and I needed a proper plate to put it on. It was so yummy. I layered it wrong, but it was gosh darn delicious.

Anyway. All the plates I have are not right for cheesecake. I did stop in at the antique store on the way to the Sally Ann, and they had a plate that was almost right, but not quite. I did promise to go back there and pick it up, once I got some cash, cuz all I had was my debit card, but I did not. Hopefully she won’t remember me the next time I go there. I also wanted a cute purse, that was made of mother of pearl, and had room for your lipstick and cigarettes, and came with a tiny little comb in it and everything… I should have gone back for the purse. Still regret not going. It was kind of like this but without those little jewels… sooooooo pretty… I have a bit of an obsession with purses. I think I’ll go back and see if it’s still there.

I looked in the Sally Ann store, and they did not have what I needed, but I took a look around the rest of the store anyway. At the store I frequent, they have auctions, usually on a monthly basis. Out of the stuff that’s donated, they put some of the really special things up for auction. Jewellery, antiques, art, that sort of thing. You may remember that my father was an artist, .

On the wall, in the area designated for auction I saw a familiar style of picture. Sure enough, when I went up closer to see the artist’s name, it was my father’s. My father was quite a prolific artist. Of the framed pieces my mother had after he died, there was enough to give to each one of my siblings (there are seven of us in total), and enough left over from that for my mother to have a living room that looks like an art gallery. (We all got one as a wedding gift, too, over the years.) I know that there are lots of pieces ‘out there in the world’. It was just such a shock to see this one hanging there.

I asked the salesgirl if she knew where this had come from, and she didn’t, it was just part of the donations that come daily to the store. (I think she got a little panicked, too, thinking that it had been donated by accident. If I’d been more on my feet, I would have said yes, maybe and got it for free.) I ended up bidding on it and winning the auction. Which was surreal. I think my dad would have gotten a good laugh about it. I had a second thought about it, thinking that maybe I should have let someone else win it in the auction, let someone else enjoy his talent, you know, I already have so many of his pieces. But then I worried about them not taking good enough care of it, I pictured it rotting away in someone’s basement. So, I think I feel good about having it. Just weird.

Is nothing sacred anymore??? I hope not.

So, I heard on the news this morning, in response to fears about Swine Flu, the catholic church is making some changes.


Yep. Many churches are removing the holy water from the fronts of churches. This statement from a chancellor in Quebec City, kind of grossed me out a bit.

"In some churches the holy water is changed frequently, but there are churches that leave it there for months, turning [it] into culture fluid”.



Ewwww…. Double ewwwwwwwwwwwww…. Blech.

As a lapsed catholic, I used to dip my fingers in that water, oh at least on a yearly basis. (Yeah, I was that kind of catholic, which makes my ‘lapse’ kind of anticlimactic. I’m sure they don’t miss me too much). I have a fairly casual relationship with dirt. I’m not one of those germaphobes, who uses sanitizer at regular intervals. I firmly believe that letting your kids get dirty on a regular basis makes them stronger in the long run. (My offspring were rarely on antibiotics as children, no ear infections.) But that comment about the holy water turning into a culture fluid really did me in. And then I got past the grossness factor, and thought about how absolutely hilarious it is, that the catholic church is admitting that holy water is not some absolute protector against everything. They’re actually saying that holy water has the potential to spread disease. (Along with sharing communion and shaking hands)

(I hope I’m not going to offend anyone, please, if you’re catholic, don’t read any further. You probably shouldn’t have read up till now…. This is your warning.)

In the bible, Jesus uses spit, holy water and clay to heal a man. It’s used in the ritual of exorcism and to overcome witchcraft. It’s believed to have healing properties. It can be used to ward off vampires. I’m not sure if it has any effect on zombies.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad that the catholic church has gotten to the point where they’re not so arrogant that they can’t change.

But they’ve got a long way to go, yet.



My dad used to say that the church made rules for people in order to protect them, because the general populace wasn’t educated enough to understand some things. Hence the ban against pork in the jewish faith. Because people didn’t understand that they could get sick if it wasn’t properly prepared, the church told people just to avoid it. The ban against meat on Fridays was to stretch the supply of meat, when there wasn’t enough of it to go around. (During WWII, my dad said that his priest told them that if they could get meat, they should eat it; don’t worry about what day it is) But that’s his opinion. I’m sure there are other reasons for the rules they made up.

So, I’m glad that the church figures that we’re intelligent enough to know the real reason for the removal of holy water. And I’m glad that I’m lapsed enough not to worry about catching anything from the holy water.

Full disclosure: I do have a bottle of holy water at home. I got it from a priest in this church in a small town in the Netherlands, called Beverwijk. My grandfather was on the crew that built the church. Apparently the water is from Lourdes (the place, not Madonna’s daughter), so I keep it in case of vampires. You never know when there will be an infestation. They seem to be more mainstream these days. But now, at least I know it won’t protect me from Swine Flu.

So, suck on that.

Higher education and the function of parents.

Imagine my surprise when my daughters had the audacity to turn 18 this past August, without asking for permission or anything. Not that it was that much of a shock, I guess. They’d been threatening to do it all year, and had lobbed reminders at me, nearly daily. They each programmed their cell phone to count down the days.


With the whole ‘turning 18’ thing, came the incredible task of getting Offspring #2 ready for university. (Offspring #1 decided to put off the advanced education thing until next September, thereby staving off the onset of my empty nest syndrome. Very kind of her.)

So, Offspring #2 is now suitably ensconced in residence at Brock University. (Which, I discovered during the campus tour last spring, has a Oenology Degree available. Had I known that, 20 years ago, I’d have followed a vastly different career path. Who knew such a thing even existed? However, I’d probably need a liver transplant about now, so maybe things happened for the best.)

It’s a strange thing, as a mother, sending one of your offspring out into the world. If you look at it, intellectually, it’s a sign that you’ve done your job right. The function of a parent is to grow these little darlings up into people that become valuable members of society. So, when a child goes off to university, you should greet it with the proper aplomb and ceremony. Yeah…

As the days (and now weeks) passed by, I became more sure of my ability to survive this next step in parenting. I’m becoming more sure of her abilities to survive and grow outside of my direct line of vision. She’s doing laundry; she’s eating the right things, getting to bed at a fairly reasonable hour. She’s making friends, and going to classes on time. All the things I’d make sure she was doing. I’m proud of her.

Offspring #1 remains at home, for now. She’s learning from her sister, how difficult it is to go out on your own. I’m glad that she’s decided not to go away yet, and I hope I’ll be ready when it comes time for her to go. #1 consents to give me hugs when I need them (she’s not the huggiest person in the world, not sure how that happened), and we’re helping each other through this. (She’d like people to think she’s the strong one, but... I think she’s pretty mushy inside, actually)

So far, this milestone in parenting has gone ok.



So... suck on that.

David Foster Wallace, sadness, and life.

David Foster Wallace is a writer that was previously unknown to me, until I heard of him on bookninja.com last year. He killed himself last September.

At times like this, I feel like I'm incredibly unaware of what is going on in the world of literature. Time magazine included his book, Infinite Jest, in the list of 100 most influential books. (1923 - 2006) How could i not know who this man is? Was.

It’s not a surprise to me that he committed suicide. During the past 20 years of working in the business of psychiatry, I’ve come to know an incredible number of creative and talented people, who are plagued by depression. I’ve got a few theories on the subject, and I’m sure there has been research done about this subject. I don’t think it can be boiled down to statistics and numbers.

(Side note: I’ve just finished reading his review of A Dictionary of Modern American Usage by Bryan A. Garner. (ADMAU) It’s causing me to be overly aware of all the mistakes I make. I’m trying to correct the ones I know about, and trying not to be paranoid about all the ones I know I’ve missed. )

Mr. Wallace was a contributing editor of Harper’s Magazine, and shortly after his death, they released all of their content that was written by him. I, being the nerd (or SNOOT) that I am, of course printed it all up. Then, being the procrastinator that I am, I put it away to ‘read later’. I just found it back last week, and I’ve spent the intervening time reading his works.

Of course, reading his work posthumously puts a whole different spin on things, doesn’t it? Reading “The Depressed Person”, a short story about a woman’s experience with depression, the loss of a therapist to apparent suicide, and being a burden to her “Support System”, you have to wonder how much of this was autobiographical. The review of ADMAU gives glimpses into his life, how his parents were highly educated, and their attention to proper language usage made things difficult for him when he was growing up. (you know, nerdifying him as well) His name for people who pay way too much attention to proper language usage is SNOOT, and he calls the children of those people “SNOOTlets” So, when I read about how the “SNOOTlets tend to have a very hard social time of it in school… When his peers are giving the SNOOTlet monstrous quadruple Wedgies or holding him down and taking turns spitting on him…” I had to wonder if this was his experience.

During the writing of this post, a friend made the choice to take her life... This is no longer an intellectual discussion with myself...

Although i have respect for personal decisions, including the one to take one's own life, it is something I will never understand. It reinforces my belief that there are some people who think too much, who feel too much, and that sometimes that burden is too much to take. I know that people will make decisions like this, and I don't believe that there's anything we can really do to change their minds, no matter how hard we try. When people are truly suicidal, when they've made that decision, they don't give any outward indication of how they feel. They're past the point of talking about, of being talked out of it. They've made their decision.

Nudity and Nickelback

So, a few months back, my daughter said that she'd take me to see Nickelback, for my birthday. (Well, 'take' me is a bit of a misnomer. If i were a little more cynical, I'd say that she wanted me to go so that i could drive her and her friend. But I'll go with her interpretation) So, finally, the day comes, and off we go.

We left a little early, did a little shopping, and whatnot along the way. The concert was at the Molson Ampitheatre, in Toronto. We had seats, so we weren't worried about getting there early in order to get a good spot on the grass. On the way down, I remember thinking "I doubt if we're going to have an adventure like Paul Michael Murphy did, when he went to see Elton John and Billy Joel." Sigh.

So, we got there in lots of time, although, you know, there was the requisite having to turn around because I thought that surely can't be the line to get into the parking. Turns out, yes it was.

The concert opened with Saving Abel, who were very loud, and they swore a lot. I worried about the pigeons flying around under the roof. Are they bothered by the loud music? I wonder if they're deaf... hmmmm I don't really like birds in enclosed spaces, but, you know, they were pretty far away.

The second band was Papa Roach. They were also loud, and swore more than the first, if that's at all possible.

I felt old at this point.

The next band was really good, although they swore a lot, too. Hinder They were good, and i knew enough of their music that i could sing along with some of the songs. I didn't embarrass anyone, though, not like the woman two rows in front of me, who was 'whooing' along with girls half her age.... ok, less than half her age. Her daughter spent most of the concert looking like she hoped no one she knew saw her.

So, yeah. The weather report earlier in the day was calling for thunderstorms, but for most of the afternoon, it was nice and sunny. Real hot, though... then we saw the clouds coming. The bolts of lightning. then the rain... then the guy comes on the stage and says that they'll postpone the concert, until the rain passes... so we hang out for a while. and get wetter. and more wet. and then, you reach a point where you can't get any more wet. At that point, they cancel the rest of the concert. I guess Chad Kroeger is too cute to play in the rain. (well, i guess there were safety issues... )

So, off we go back to the car... the offspring is splashing in puddles like she was 3 instead of almost 18. And we're talking about how uncomfortable it'll be to drive all the way home (almost 2 hrs) in wet jeans, because, of course, we don't have dry clothes to put on, and even if we did, they'd be wet before we could get dressed, the rain was coming down that hard. Here's where the nudity comes in. It's night time, its dark... Yeah. we drove home nearly nude. (I did have a t shirt on, the girls had a bit less) Shockingly, the guy at McD's drive thru didn't notice.

so.....



suck on that.

Sounds in the Sound

I've been lax when it comes to blogging, and I apologize for that. No excuses. Except that I am the biggest procrastinator in the world. So, with that out of the way, on to the blog.

This Tuesday just past, I took my mom up to a concert in Parry Sound. They have this Festival of the Sound every year, it's a two week long festival of all sorts of music. (well, not all sorts, really. There's no rock, or metal, or pop. Classical, jazz, choral, that kind of thing.)(no rap either)

Anyway, I learned that the Elora Festival Singers were going to be performing at the Festival of the Sound, and I've really been wanting to hear them, since my choir, Serenata Choir sang with them a couple of years ago. They are truly amazing, and a joy to sing with. As a member of a choir, I love that kind of music, but i seldom take the opportunity to listen to it. I love the performance, but it's just so nice to be on the other side of the stage for once.

The concert we heard was in the Charles Stockey Centre for the Performing Arts, which, because this is Canada, after all, also houses the Bobby Orr Hall of Fame. The Stockey Centre is absolutely gorgeous, a really intimate setting, we were four rows from the front, and less than 20 feet from the stage. They even had seats on either side of the stage, but i liked where we were, in the centre, you get a more balanced sound.

Noel Edison is the Conductor of the Elora Festival Singers, and the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir. He's a wonderful director, able to coax beautiful melodies and wonderful phrasing from any choir.

The performance started off with four pieces by Eric Whitacre. (BTW, he does not fit my stereotypical image of a choral composer.)Two of them i don't remember the names of, and they weren't in the program. "i thank You God for most this amazing day" is an ee cummings poem set to music. "Sleep" was the other piece. So beautifully done, they were halfway through the first piece before i realized that they were doing it a capella (without musical accompaniment)The balance of this choir was amazing. Their phrasing is exquisite, the tone is beautiful. Singing a capella is challenging, an inadequately trained choir can easily fall off pitch. Um..yeah.. not a problem for this group.

They also sang a piece by Paul Tiefenbach, "Nunc Dimittis", which was lovely and lyrical and beautiful.

One of my favourite pieces, "Remember", is a poem by Christina Rossetti, which is sung to the music composed by Steven Chatman. It's a gorgeous piece, which is meant to be sung a capella, which they did. They gave me goosebumps.. truly a beautiful, wonderful, lyrical piece, which they did absolute justice to.

The next part of the concert was their performance of a work by Tim Corlis, who was a Juno nominee (you have to scroll down a bit on that page). "Missa Pax" was commissioned for the occasion of the Elora Festival's, and the Festival of the Sound's 30th season. This work was absolutely amazing. I can't remember how many movements there were, I was lost in the music. There were beautiful, long sustained notes from the women, gorgeous low tones from the men, and such wonderful mixtures of everything. The entries were clean, the ends of phrases were exact. It was beautiful. James Campbell, the artistic director of the Festival, accompanied the choir in that work, on the clarinet. I have to say, i was a little nervous about that. The clarinet has never been my favourite instrument. Well, apparently i've just never heard it played right. It was a beautiful addition to the work, absolutely lovely. He blended so well with the choir, that at times, i could almost not pick the sound of the clarinet out of the mixture.

I have only one negative thing to say about the whole concert. After the "Missa Pax", the audience stood up in appreciation. The program was perfect. It needed nothing else. I had the last note of the Missa Pax in my mind, and i could have died happy, right there. Then Mr. Edison led the choir in "So you want to write a fugue", by Glenn Gould. Now, this is a wonderful piece of music, its funny, its lovely to listen to, but i just so wanted that last note in my mind.



so... there it is.

What were they thinking?????

I'm just saying. As if clowns and nutcrackers aren't scary enough, what the hell would you do if you woke up on christmas morning with this freaking thing under the tree? HIDE!!! that's what. Wonder why you haven't already been taken by the children's aid, if your parents think that this is an appropriate gift. I found this on Cracked.com (where, incidentally, i found my new living room furniture)

My father

I’ve been thinking about my father a lot lately. Last night, I was kept awake by thoughts of him. These thoughts have been stimulated by a couple of things. I recently finished a book, Fugitive Pieces, by Anne Michaels. It tells the story of a young boy who watches his family get massacred during WWII. My father spent a year in a concentration camp during that war, and stories, movies etc that are set in that era are always difficult for me. I generally avoid them, but didn’t this time.

Another thing that set me down this path is this picture that i saw in Found Magazine. The man in that picture reminds me of my father, not just the way he looks, but the way he sits, the directness of his gaze, he seems to be left handed. It just struck me.

Found magazine has had a number of finds, these days, that seem to be things that people would be sad to have lost. Those photographs, notes from children. It’s sad, the way things get lost, people get forgotten.

I think that is what’s bothering me. I don’t want my father to be forgotten. My own children were young when he died. They have no memory of him being the incredibly vibrant man that he was when I was growing up. I think it’s sad that most of my nieces and nephews didn’t have a close relationship with him, mostly due to distance, I think. My children had the most potential to be close to him, and they were robbed of that by his sickness.

I see parts of my father that have been passed on. Two of my nieces are talented artists, as was my father. Several of them are talented in other ways, musically, creatively. My brothers can all build things without being taught how to do it, they have this instinctive knowledge of the way things go together. My oldest sister has an eye for beauty, and the sister closest to me is a talented artist, as well as having his trust of people. All of us have a love of nature, a love of water, and an appreciation for freedom.

So. I think it's up to me, to find a way to ensure that he's not forgotten. I don't quite know how I'm going to do that. But I will.

follow this other blog

This blogger, Amy is donating $1 per follower (up to 100) to 826 Valencia -- A group that teaches workshops and one-on-one lessons to children 6-18 in several cities across the US. The depend a lot on donations and volunteer time. So just give her blog a little look and follow if you feel so inclined.