I Love A Parade!

I have just an observation or two today.

Louise and I were coming out of the doctors today and had a short walk back to the car. I could have parked in the buildings lot, but it is a pay lot and the street has free parking. I think that explains why we were walking, besides as I told Louise the only good thing about your bad cough is that it is…well…your cough. Hopefully, I will be able to avoid this virus that is going around with my superhuman constitution. Strangely Louise doesn’t share my idea of good and bad, and I am sure I didn’t hear her correctly when she wished I would drop dead. I don’t think the virus is that bad? Well, at least not for me anyway.

We are walking back to the car and this young kid with sunglasses, a baggy top and army surplus pants comes around the corner towards us at about twice normal walking speed. I stepped off of the sidewalk just in case the kid ran into me and Louise, well, I’m sure she would be alright. Really, even though the kid had a Seeing Eye dog you just never know which way it will turn. One squirrel not paying attention and BAM! LOOKOUT! Blind kid being dragged down the road! I know, the dogs are really well trained but I have dreams and a somewhat sick sense of humour.

I am guessing the blindness explains the bad taste in clothing. I know it is bad taste, because it is just what I would wear if Louise would let me. So I was wondering about this kid and dog combination and why they were walking so fast. I am thinking one of them has to pee really badly and they needed to get home post haste. I don’t know this but I would think that the dogs would be trained not to disgrace themselves in public. Dog stops to take a leak, the kid thinks this is the bus stop and steps into traffic, BAM! Dog looks up and wonders where the little blind kid got to. I just don’t want to think of the kid trying to pick up number two, down on his hands and knees sniffing to try and figure out which turd is from his dog. They say that your other senses get stronger when you get blind, let’s hope that the kid uses his sense of smell and not his sense of touch.

It must be quite a relationship that develops over the years between owner and dog. They are both very dependant on the other for many things. The human needs the dog to get around and the dog needs the human for a roof over its head and food in its dish. It is a very symbiotic relationship. I have had a few dogs over the years and like everything with a pulse, dog’s age. Faster than humans, seven times faster than humans if the old wives tales is true. By the way, I found out the hard way that you should never ask a woman how old she is in dog years. It only takes about a week for the swelling to go down. I am getting older and I need to wear corrective lenses, I have aches and pains, my “seals” are leaking and I have hair sprouting out where it shouldn’t. I guess dogs wouldn’t worry about that last one.

Now, as I walked past that young kid and his dog I couldn’t help wondering what it would be like in ten or twelve years for them. By then the dog will probably be blind and how is the kid to know? Whenever they went anywhere it would be like following someone with Alzheimer’s, they keep moving but haven’t clue one where they are. Maybe you can get a Seeing Eye pet for the dog. After a few years it would begin to look like a circus parade.

I love a parade!

Me And Elvis-In That Order

When I was sixteen I bought a pair of blue leather shoes that had yellow soles and laces. Good God I loved those shoes! I would wear them everywhere. They complimented the rest of my clothes. You see it was in 1968 which was when our world was changing thanks to the British invasion and to some degree the war in Vietnam. We were all experimenting with our individuality and striving to be unique by listening to rock music and refusing to wear our parents clothing. We had no desire to be corporate puppets so we expressed ourselves through our clothing and appearance.

I wore my blue and yellow shoes, blue jeans, a tie-dyed t-shirt, a hand made tooled leather belt and pouch with matching leather visor which pushed the hair around the ears straight out and an enamel peace sign with yin-yang background hanging on a chain. Yep, I was a pretty cool individual. I would only be seen with others that would dress in a like manner. Now I realize that what we wore was just as much of a uniform as the society that we were protesting.

I went to demonstrations in order to “Save The Island Homes”, signed petitions and participated in sit ins trying to stop the war, as if the powers that be gave a rats ass about our silly little petition. I went to concerts to show how individual my musical taste was and suffered with 500,000 other individuals that were just as unique and wearing blue jeans and tie-dyed T-shirts. But not blue leather shoes! I’m thinking that the only other person that wore blue shoes was Elvis and his were suede not leather. Pretty heady company I was keeping.

Our parties didn’t involve drunken debauchery and fighting, but tea, good music, long conversations with good friends, hours spent trying to discover the hidden meaning in album covers and of course smoking marijuana. Lots and lots of marijuana. It is only in the past few years that I have started to read biographical histories of our Rock Gods that I begin to see that they were businessmen and women that caught the golden goose and held on for dear life. Just people after all, and in a lot of cases selfish, greedy people that now tour and charge $250 for the “good” seats. I guess “good” seats mean seats that are close enough for their aging fans to be able to hear them.

Oh, there were many musicians that believed in our movement to change the world, but they had a job to do and their own families to feed, clothe and fly to Europe, India and the Virgin Islands. I don’t blame them; in fact most of my best memories had their music as a soundtrack. Some are still playing small clubs and trying to save our planet. In many ways things were changed for the good, the war ended, Nixon was turfed out and we are more aware of what we are doing to the planet. Baby steps.

So, anyway, tonight coming out of the library I saw a group of kids dressed in loud shorts, sandals t-shirts and a hat worn sideways or backwards and I think all had a cell phone in their hands. They looked ridiculous! How are they going to change the world looking like that? Stupid kids! They could learn a lot from the way that we were…

I walked away shaking my head at how nothing really has changed for thousands of years and thinking that we will be the same in a thousand years from now. I noticed a poster for the Calgary Stampede that had a clown on it. It was a pretty silly looking clown, he had blue and yellow shoes, blue jeans, a tie-dyed t-shirt, a hand made tooled leather belt and pouch with matching leather visor which pushed the hair around the ears straight out and an enamel  peace sign with yin-yang background hanging on a chain…

They Mostly Come Out At Night...Mostly

Today was my grandson Ewan’s forth birthday.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY EWIE!!!!!!!

Today was the family birthday, the fun one at Chuck E Cheese with his friends was yesterday. There was pizza and games and noise and pop and gifts and candy and balloons and just general mayhem. My daughter commented on facebook was” When I die, I’ll know I was a bad person if I'm stuck at Chuck E. Cheese forever.” That has been my take on that particular restaurant since I first stepped over the threshold. I wasn’t invited L. I probably wouldn’t have gone, but it would have been nice to have had the opportunity to say no.

That last bit was trying to guilt my daughter. The trouble with that is that she would actually have to care how I felt to feel guilty herself. Oh well, I shall continue to suffer in silence.

Ewie was the perfect host. He was downstairs playing games when I arrived and I guess his mom or dad had to go and tell him that his guests had started to arrive.

You know an interesting social fact is that if you are fashionably late people think you are a social butterfly, but when you are fashionably early they just think you are an asshole. I am, unfortunately, the later.

Louise was sick and had to stay home and miss out on the festivities. Ewie came out wearing some of his gifts from yesterday. He had a watch and a Spiderman cape. I’ve got watches, but now I want the cape. I am not above stealing from my grandson, but I couldn’t even get it over my head. Too many brains do you think?

We sat around baking in the sun which is pretty rare in Alberta. Surprisingly I wasn’t that keen on it. So we are sitting around with drinks talking adult talk just killing time till the gift opening. Ewie got some cool soccer nets and ball and he proceeded to embarrass his uncle Brendan. He mainly got clothes from everybody which are admittedly difficult to play with but are much appreciated by mom and dad. There is a gift on its way that will be at least a three beer assembly.

I gave him a large magnifying glass. Oh I know that it might not be appropriate, but how cool is it to be able to look at bugs up close and personal? I made a pact with myself not to be the one to show him how to start fire with it. Fire like all technological advancements should come with maturity and sophistication of the society or person. His dad set to burning things right away. I like that guy!

I can’t imagine the number of hours I spent on my belly in front of an ant hill with a magnifying glass in hand as a kid. I guess that is why I have nightmares about the King of the ants. He is about eight feet tall when standing on his hind legs and looks like a …well…ant. Only really big and pissed off. Every time that I see a cracked sidewalk or driveway I know where the King tried to get out. It is just a matter of time before he gets me. That is why I carry a magnifying glass with me at all times! Now, I will admit that it wouldn’t do too much harm to the King, but I am hoping that just the sight of the Torch Killer with his weapon of choice will send him back into the earth where he belongs.

So, good family birthday and I probably won’t sleep for days. They mostly come out at night…mostly.

Talk About A Crappy Day

There is an article about a letter carrier in Portland Oregon that defecated on one of his customer’s lawns. The neighbour across the street took the time to photograph the mailman in the process and afterwards. Said letter carrier is now suspended without pay, completely embarrassed, taken off of his mail route and people are demanding that he be fired. This is all without hearing the mailman’s story.

http://southeastportland.katu.com/news/weird/postal-worker-deep-doo-doo-after-using-yard-toilet/439793

I was a mailman and have been in a position where I had to go and there was no where to go. The women that I worked with never had any trouble knocking on doors and asking the person that answered if they could use their bathroom. I can tell you that as a man if anyone answered the door the reply would always be “NO”. I suppose that men are more threatening, but they have the same urgent needs that women have.

I would always try to anticipate my needs, and try to take care of them before I left the depot, but there was always that one time…

I remember a guy that I worked with that must have had too much coffee or tea before leaving and about halfway through his route he needed to pee. When you have been on a walk long enough you find sheltered out of the way spots that you can relieve yourself unnoticed. So my buddy has to go and he has two houses with pretty dense bushes which would shield him from the casual observer. He pushes through the bushes, unzips and releases the pressure. Just about midway through he looks up and sees a woman that was doing her dishes looking out of her window at him. When he told me this his face was still red with embarrassment. He didn’t want to wave the flagpole at this house wife, he just needed to pee.

I was caught in a similar situation once except that I needed to deal with number two. I delivered to a mall which was about three blocks away and most of the time was a handy way station to a courier in need. This particular winter day however I had no advance warning but needed to go NOW! I was three blocks away! I knocked on a door and there was no answer. I went to the next door and the lady there said that she wasn’t comfortable having a stranger use her bathroom. She wasn’t comfortable! Well, I guess I have to walk to the mall.

Mao thought that he and his people went on a long march. I am not sure how long it took me to walk the three blocks and then into the malls restroom, but it felt like hours. I would walk three steps stop and clench my cheeks together. Walk three steps, stop and clench my cheeks together. Walk three steps, stop and clench my cheeks together. I mentioned that it was winter, probably about -20 C, but the sweat was beading on my forehead and dripping off of my nose. I had a prairie dog trying to get out of his hole if you know what I mean.

I have always wondered what my customers must have thought about that crazy mailman that wasn’t delivering the mail but just walking really slowly down the street. I can’t imagine what the mall patrons thought about my “silly” walk. I know that you are wondering, and yes I did make it to the toilet with about a second to spare. Thank God the stall was available.

I don’t know if the guy in Portland was complaining about his work conditions or if that house had told him to stay off of the lawn, but I have gone outside without the benefit of a toilet and it isn’t much fun. It is certainly not what you would choose to do if there was another option. I think that if the “good” neighbour of the story had befriended the mailman in question then this would never had happened because the mailman would have knocked on his “friends” door and there would have been no need to take pictures.

I can remember one situation when a woman phoned in to the depot to complain that her mailman was making snow angels on her front lawn. She went on to bitch about the lazy posties that don't have enough work to keep them busy. When the supervisor could get a word in, he asked where the woman lived. She told him her address and when the supervisor realized just whose route it was. He told the woman that she shouldn't worry, the postie isn't making snow angels, he is having an epileptic seisure and I will call an ambulance but thank you for your concern. 

We are quite a society aren’t we, to think the worst of a person without knowing the whole story. Don’t we just love to see someone else fall and I guess have his life pretty much in ruins. Kind of makes me sad. The next time I hear a story like this, I’m going to give the guy the benefit of the doubt…unless he is a postie.

Fork Them

We went out for dinner tonight to a Vietnamese restaurant. We have been there before and find the food good and plentiful. I always have #45 or #46 and drink the tea provided which really has such a subtle taste it could very well be just hot water. But, it is really hot! Normally when I order I will ask for a fork because all that they have on the table is a serviette, a lame spoon with a flat bottom and chopsticks. A couple of weeks ago I tried my hand at turning a pair of chopsticks (one chopstick is pretty much useless) in the shape of a drumstick. I called it Chopsticks for DRUMMIES. Yep, pretty clever.

Well, since I had the chopsticks I thought that I would practice using them to shock and awe Louise the next time that I was confronted with a pair of sticks to eat with. I have been picking up stones and pencils, large pieces of lint, cracker pieces, etc. etc. etc. Really, if a Chinese toddler can use them then a hungry, overweight, white man should be able to master the fine art of “Chopsticking”. Well, to make a long story just about the length that it is, I managed to “tweeze” my first meal ever! Yea me! I pinched, stabbed, scooped, twirled and flicked the food into my mouth. I guess the problem is that somehow I overworked the muscles in my fingers and they are sort of cramping. Can you get a Charlie horse in your finger? I guess that would be a “Charlie Chan horse” in this case.

I slay me!

So anyway, the point of this is I was wondering why the Oriental people still use chopsticks. It isn’t as if they are the pinnacle of food movers. Forks and spoons are far superior to the chopstick. Oh, I guess people think for some reason the use of chopsticks makes them worldly when it just makes them seem to be posers. I know the arguments, “But they have been used for thousands of years!” which really makes no sense to me at all.

Thousands of years ago people shit in holes in the ground and used one hand to wipe themselves and the other for food. There was no right or left, just the dung hand and the food hand. This is why when people meet they shake hands with their right hand. It was considered an insult to put out your left hand. Perhaps the reason why for a long time left handed people were killed or persecuted is that they ate with their left hand and coochie-cooed babies left handed. I can remember that in school they would force “lefties” to use their right hand to write. Who really trusts the left handed anyways? They are the minions of Satan!

The scouting movement always greet each other with a left handed shake, but I never really trusted that quasi military organization. Can you tie your shoes? Well, you just earned yourself a badge. Can you use your nose to suck in air?? Another badge. Invade Poland. Another badge. That’s the way to raise a group of over achievers!

Old ways aren’t always the best ways. I think that the reason the Chinese didn’t come up with the fork was that they were far too busy building walls, making gunpowder and fireworks,  pasta, silk, acupuncture, the toothbrush (why don’t they use them?), the crossbow, matches, the restaurant menu (no surprise there), tea, the wheelbarrow, the kite and civil service exams (the bastards). Oh God the list just goes on and on. But, what have they done lately? OK, they make everything now.

I think I had best start to learn Mandarin.

So, anyway back to the chopsticks, Fork them!

That's Why We Pay Our Taxes

A funny thing happened at Tim Horton’s today. It is a cold and rainy day, so I really needed a coffee. I was pulling into a parking spot and a woman with an EMS uniform walked right in front of the car so that I had to wait while she sauntered like some cow waddling back to the barn to get milked. OK, that was a little harsh, but she came between me and coffee! Her partner was standing by the entrance in his shirt sleeves and she was carrying a jacket so of course I thought that she was getting his coat for him. Lazy civil servants!

I noticed that they didn’t go inside, and as I got closer I saw that there was a native man passed out at the base of the garbage bin. No comment! So this was a rescue mission, I was definitely too hard on the EMS. I can be a real dick at times. I had my book with me, but why would I read when I had a floor show to watch? I got my coffee and took a window seat.

Nothing much was happening, so I started to read when all of a sudden I hear sirens in the distance. Can’t be too far because I’m inside and my hearing just isn’t that good. Holy crap! Two cop cars with lights and sirens, boy someone is having a shitty morning. Wait! They just turned into the Tim’s parking lot. Oh goody, and I have a window seat!

I wonder what the deal is? Whoa, another car, no two more cars. Should I get under the table? Is that another ambulance? No, just a EMS supervisors car. WTF?

The cops jump out of their cars and run to the poor drunk guy that is passed out against the garbage can. Really? Come on! One of them even had his hand on the taser at his belt. Huh?

One cop came in and walked up to the table in front of mine where this guy had his head on his arms and was sleeping I suppose. Not bothering anyone except for the manager I guess. The cop asks him if he had been asked to leave and he said “No”. The cop told the manager to ask him to leave and she did. The cop says “You have to leave!” and the guy (another native) said that “You can’t arrest me I haven’t done anything.” “I am not arresting you, but you have to leave.”

The guy gets up and walks out and away. All of the other cops are milling about and the passed out guy is now on his feet and they walk him over to the ambulance with half the cops acting as escort. A few minutes pass and everyone of the cops and EMS have a coffee in their hands. Surprise!

I guess when this call was dispatched every car in the NE wanted to respond. This must have been a cops dream call, “ Trouble at the Westwinds Tim Horton’s, anyone want to respond?” So, there were three police cars and one police van, an ambulance and an EMS  supervisor’s car. That’s eight cops and three EMS to deal with one drunk native. So, to total it up, eight cops making roughly $36/hr and three EMS at about $25/hr works out to about $350, not counting the gas and time to write up a report. Not sure one drunk is worth it.

In the “Good old days” The owner would have given the drunks a coffee, maybe a sandwich and no one would have made an issue of it. I don’t know what to think. On the one hand, I don’t like to see drunks hanging around my Tim Horton’s. I’m not keen on seeing the cops there either. I guess if neither one group or the other bothers me I can live with the situation.

That’s why we pay our taxes…

PS. I went to the doctors today with a sore throat and a cough. My doctor tells me to drop my pants (?). She puts on some latex gloves, the stethoscope in her ears and grabs my right ball with her left hand. Turns out the best way to keep me quite while she listens to my chest is squeeze until tears start to come out of my eyes. I can appreciate that she might not want to hear me talking, but this can’t be standard medical procedure even though my last doctor did the same thing. It isn’t normal is it?

I should be walking normally within a week and I should be able to ride the bike by mid June.

Jumpin' Puddles

Rain…rain…rain…

I guess we need it to make things grow. Mushrooms, mould, mildew, mosquitoes and mud puddles, where would we be without them? I am getting a little foggy about this, but don’t we also need sunshine for things to grow?

Speaking of puddles, This little boy arrives late to class and the substitute teacher says ”Tommy why are you late?”

“I’m sorry teacher, but I was jumping puddles.” Tommy replied.

Not a minute later, another little boy came into class and the teacher said “ Billy, why are you late?”

“I’m sorry teacher, but I was jumping puddles.” Billy told her.

No sooner had Billy sat down, and the door opened and a little girl came in. The teacher who by this time was exasperated said “I suppose you were jumping puddles too!”

“Jumping puddles? I am Puddles!”

Remembering old rain jokes is just something to do while it is raining. I feel badly for the farmers, they had a late start with early spring snowstorms which kept them off of the fields and now we are having fairly constant rain and no breaks to dry the fields up. I just hope they can grow enough food to keep me fat and happy. You would think that there would be an up side and my lawn would look spectacular. Not so much. The lawn is pretty much on it’s own for most of the year, I don’t bother it and it doesn’t bother me. The front lawn likes this agreement, but the back lawn is just impossible to talk to. I will rake and fertilize sort of and I did buy an aerator from Lee Valley tools a few years back and every now and then I put holes in my yard at regular intervals. I don’t think they do much for the lawn, but the worms probably consider them a super highway.

Tonight is a soccer night for my grandson and I don’t think I will be there. It is cold and damp and the mosquitoes will be the size of a Messerschmitt. Speaking of which, our dog left a Messerschmitt on the dining room floor this weekend while we were out. Every now and then he does this to keep us on our toes and I suppose to remind me just who the boss is. Well, anyway I hope that it is a good soccer game and Arwen and Chris manage to stay warm. I bet they don’t last the whole game. Any takers?

I shouldn’t complain about the rain when the people in the Midwestern United States are getting pounded by tornados. Really, that is their problem not mine. I will give moral support for the struggle to get back to a normal life, but whatever they were doing to anger Karma they should stop right now! I just checked the weather network and it looks like we can expect sunshine by Monday. That is a long way off and the forecasters have just about the same accuracy in predictions as that “end of the world” whack job.

Oops, got to go. It stopped raining and I have to go and water the plants.

The Saga Of The Man Eating Worm

Ken and I were dumbfounded by our good luck! Not only didn’t we fail outright, but we had a second chance and got off school early. This calls for a celebration! We walked back to Ken’s and discussed what we should do our project on. There was no way that we could do any research and get the project made and written by tomorrow. Well, if we can’t get the research done then we will have to make everything up.

It was really the only thing that made any sense at all. Ok, it didn’t make a lot of sense but it would be easy and if we were going to flunk then we should do it on our own terms. So, we got ourselves some paper and pens, a pack or two of cigarettes and a liberal amount of non alcoholic intoxicants. We had all of the fuel that we needed and certainly had the imagination. We began…

We had been given a directive from the prestigious Crawchuk Institute for Scientific Advancement to make scientific history. The choice was ours as to the direction that we would take in this endeavour, but we had a very limited amount of time in which to do it.

We had decided that it would have to be a historic discovery which would shock not only the science community, but the world at large. Funding was low to non-existent, so we had to rely on favours and goodwill that we had built up over time. My colleague, Mr. Ken Robison had fortunately been working on a project which would have significant impact and capture the imagination not only of the Institute, but the world at large.

We will find and return with non other than the legendary, mythical Man Eating Worm (M.E.W.) of Africa! It has been believed to be extinct these many years, if it ever existed at all, lumped in with other mythical beasts like Sasquatch, the Loc Ness Monster and honest politicians. My friend and I took a vow to return with the beast or not at all!

There was little time so we contacted our friends at the NFL and we were loaned six defensive linemen from the Green Bay Packers franchise to give us the power needed to subdue the M.E.W.. Luckily we had most of the equipment that we would need on hand and wired ahead for the remainder. The government gave us the use of a military aircraft for as long as we needed it, because of a past service that we had rendered which need not be recorded here.

Our quest seemed to be blessed from the beginning as there was a tailwind which helped us arrive at our destination in deepest, darkest Africa in record time. We drove in a convoy of trucks to the base of an escarpment where we met thirty native porters that would carry our equipment to the top and beyond. No white man and very few natives had ever penetrated this far into the “Manetscarame” region, which loosely translated means Land of Terror!

There are two ways to lure the M.E.W. out into the open; the first is with food and the second with one that is pure at heart. Luckily for us I would fit both requirements. Only a fool wouldn’t be frightened and I was of course terrified. Not for my partner or me, we had faced fear many times before but for those innocents that we brought with us. We were not sure whether the M.E.W. would attack from the side, above or below so we planned for all with reinforced steel cages and bars of the same material driven into the ground to herd the M.E.W. into our trap.

Were we lucky? I like to think that fate played a part, because the M.E.W. with lightning like speed came right up to me when my back was turned and seemed to pause for a moment. This pause gave our Green Bay Packers and Ken the opportunity to throw a steel mesh net over the M.E.W. and wrestle it into submission. The only other dicey part of the capture was defanging and purging the venom sac along with the transfer to a titanium reinforced matchbox. Job well done!

Exhausted and on the verge of physical and emotional collapse we retraced our trip from the escarpment and said goodbye to the many people that aided us in our quest, promising to return the favour if it were ever needed.

Now, although the M.E.W. looks like any other earthworm it definitely is not! Even defanged it can cause some serious damage so we caution all to keep their distance.

Look but DO NOT TOUCH!

There was only one thing missing from our project and fate intervened overnight with rain. In southern Ontario when it rains just like everywhere else worms come out to see just what the ruckus is about and end up taking unwanted swimming lessons in the puddles. We needed a big fat juicy earthworm, which we captured and made it comfortable with a little soil in a matchbox.

It seemed to us that the whole school was holding their collective breaths about our project. In reality I don’t think anyone cared except for us and one or two people that were hoping that someone would do worse in science than they did. We have a following!

Class came and we filed in with everyone else, taking our seats and trying to look angelic. It didn’t work. Mr. Crawchuk asked us first thing if we had done a new project and when we told him that we had he held out his hand and smiled what seemed to me to be a demonic grin. He even did the “come hither” gesture with his fingers. Ken took our essay and the matchbox up, gave it to Mr. Crawchuk and walked back to his seat.

Mr. Crawchuk’s eyebrows shot up and an even bigger smile crept over his face and he said “Give me a minute class.” He began to read. I don’t think his lips moved, it is just that time was for some reason moving very slowly. You know, what seemed like a great idea yesterday didn’t seem to be so great this morning. He turned the last page and looked up with a huge grin on his face, saying “Class I just have to share this with you.”

He read our report standing at the front of the class in his lab coat laughing and chuckling along with the hoots and guffaws of the class. I knew it was different, but for some strange reason I was getting pissed off. Ken and I looked at each other and did that shrug that says “We are dead, but what the Hell?”

The reading finished and I swear Mr. Crawchuk had tears in his eyes. He said that it was the most entertaining report he had ever read and it was worth 20% to him. That gave us 40% which is almost a pass! YES! He said he wanted to keep it for a few days but to get the worm out of his sight.

During the day other teachers gave us the high fives and my English teacher said that he would have given it a C+. I guess the staff room were having fun with the man eating worm story.

Well, it isn’t every day that you can earn 20% of you final grade with your imagination. The story isn’t really over, because the worm goes on to unite a class of more or less strangers in a struggle against tyranny, propel a man towards politics and ends a teachers career. But that is for another time.

I had mentioned earlier that there was nothing that the school authorities could do to me, that wasn't entirely true. It seems that if they think it is of benefit to the student they can make him or her repeat the year. Oh well, I had a good time in grade ten once, it should be easy peasy the next time...

Love and Donuts - Louise's point of view

Well, to be perfectly honest, I thought Ken would politely say no thank you, giving some reasonable excuse – like he was already full or it was time to go - something like that. The not eating food kids have eaten/touched rule has been in place for over 30 years so why would I think he would break it? I should have known that Ken would never refuse something that Ewan had offered to share with him. He did take the gooey mass of dough and melted chocolate and ate it, never giving any hint of discomfort or displeasure. Truly an act of unconditional love!

Just Ask Me

I have noticed that even though you are right, sometimes it is best not to draw people’s attention to the fact that they are wrong and you are right.

I know a woman that uses far too much makeup which is bad enough, but she uses it incorrectly. When I see something that is as odd looking as this woman I always question if I am correct in my judgement. I checked a colour wheel and purple, green, black with a touch of yellow is just wrong. Less is best. However, when I told this woman that the circus doesn’t arrive for two months and they usually bring their own clowns, you wouldn’t believe the reaction! For a slight woman she could really pack a punch.

I met this couple recently that had their first baby. I am assuming it is their first, because if they had had another child they wouldn’t have gone on and on about how beautiful she was. Anyone with anywhere close to 20/20 vision or a pair of corrective lenses could see just how ugly the kid is. I can understand how the mother may have damaged her eyes what with the strain of childbirth, but her husband really didn’t have an excuse. For some reason everyone else kept the lie going about this hideous creatures “cute” appearance. I will admit that I may have made a social faux pas when I gave them a bunch of ripe bananas for their new monkey. Some people just can’t take a joke!

I have always been amazed how women will spend hours and hours buying shoes and still manage to bring home a pair that are not only ugly, but don’t fit. I have often heard a woman say “The shoes are great, but you can’t walk in them.” Huh? Now I am not a fashion guru, but the whole idea of shoes is to protect your feet from damage. Nope, they don’t make your calves look sexy! Men that find feet and calves sexy are perverts more than likely and you are better off not trying to attract them. I told one woman that she should wear boots whenever possible because her feet were just plain hideous. Whoever said that women were the gentle sex never met this woman.

It has been said that there is no right or wrong, everything just is. Well, I am here to tell you that I know right and there is a better than average chance that you are wrong.

Just ask me. 

Can Young Men Be Sluts

I think that it was the summer between grade nine and grade ten that I discovered the secret of getting by in school. No, it isn’t study and hard work, although looking back that might have been a good idea, but simply that there is really nothing that anyone in authority can do to you. I mean really, no one is going to put burning bamboo shoots under your fingernails or whip you with a cat-o-nine tails. The absolute worst that they can do is to suspend you which at the time didn’t seem like a punishment at all. What a revelation!

This realization came the same summer that I discovered the benefits of non liquid intoxicants. There may have been a connection. Be that as it may, I began grade ten with a light step and an even lighter heart. Bring it on! It turns out that freedom from worry isn’t the same as knowledge. I was still way over my head scholastically but I just didn’t care. Yes, that was the fatal flaw. I spent quite a lot of time in extra curricular activities called detention. I thought that I was funny and unfortunately so did my classmates. The teachers may have appreciated the humour, but not in their classrooms.

Most detentions were pretty much the same, put in an hour or so doing homework or some writing of lines or even just sitting for an hour. Not so Mr. Crawchuk the science teacher. The man was a true innovator and dare I say it, a genius! I am pretty sure his name was Crawchuk , not that it matters. His detentions were quite simple; all that you had to do was stand facing the wall and remain perfectly motionless for one minute. Cool, I’ll be out in two. Unfortunately it was Mr. Crawchuk that was deciding if I were motionless or not and people that he wanted to stay, did just that for as long as he wanted. The longer you stand in one place the harder it is, unless you happen to be a Beefeater. I can remember one time about twenty minutes into the one minute detention a girl named Jan Vincent who was tall, quiet and really just one of those invisible people came in with a binder in her arms and walked up to the front of the room where Mr Crawchuk was.

The next thing we saw or should I say heard was Mr. Crawchuk screaming “You ignorant slut, get out!” and her binder hitting the floor and sliding across the floor coming to rest beside Don James. We all turned to look and saw a crying Jan gather up her binder and run out of the room. Our eyes went collectively towards a red faced and very angry teacher who told us we all had another detention tomorrow for moving and to get out of his sight. Now, from what I understand Jan got an apology and probably a pass for the year. Lucky girl!

The reason I tell you this is to demonstrate just how little I cared. We had a major project that was worth 50% of the terms grade and were given three months to complete it. My buddy Ken and I were lab partners (bad idea) and had decided to build a model of James Watts steam engine. Pretty ambitious, but we did have three months after all and I am sure that  Mr. Watt didn’t take that long to build his. Well, the day before it was due, Ken and I went to the library and realized that a day and evening might not be enough time. We needed to scale down our plans.

We collected all of the tin cans from both our houses and bought a can of silver spray paint, collected a few pieces of wood, string and dowelling and in next to no time we assembled a model of James Watts steam engine. We re-wrote what the encyclopedia said about the steam engine (triple spaced for ease of reading) and even photocopied a couple of pictures. This is going to be great! I guess in retrospect we should have waited until after we were done to begin celebrating.

We dropped our project off first thing in the morning and were confident that come last period today we would be recognized as scientific geniuses. When we walked into the class, the room was lined with science projects of all shapes and sizes, all of them assembled except for ours. Once everyone was in class and sitting in place Mr. Crawchuk came over to Ken and I and said “ I managed to put everyone’s project together to save time, but for the life of me I couldn’t figure out what this is.” I looked at him and told him “It’s a steam engine of course.” I think I realized  that we were in trouble while he was laughing. You should always be careful when a teacher is being overly polite . “Oh, please put it together for us.”

We got up and arranged the dowel and string holding the can lids (pistons) over the cans (cylinder) and the large soup can (boiler). The whole time we were setting it up Mr. Crawchuk was giggling and rocking back and forth. I thought that he was beginning to lose his mind. He looked it over and took the minute to read the triple spaced report and said “In all my time as a teacher I have never seen anything quite like this. I’m not going to keep you in suspense, but will grade this right now! You get 20%! That’s 20% each which if you look at it one way is 40% which is just a hop, skip and a jump from a pass.” We still couldn’t believe what was happening! All of a sudden it was like the sky cleared and I saw the project from his perspective, it was figuratively and actually garbage!

“I’ll tell you what I will do boys.” He said with what can only be described as the look of the truly insane, “ You have till class tomorrow to do another project and I will add the marks for that and the marks from today together. What do you say?”

“Well, what do we have to do the project on?” We said a little sheepishly.

“You can do anything you want, and since it last period of the day you can leave early to get a head start on it.”

Well, you can’t ask for a guy to be any fairer than that. I mean he could have called us ignorant sluts. Can young men be sluts?

TO BE CONTINUED

 The saga of The Man Eating Worm...

Love and Donuts

I would like it to be known that I love my grandson more than anything on this planet.

I think that I can honestly say that he is number one above my own kids. I have too much history with them to love them unconditionally. Too many frayed edges if you know what I mean. There is nothing that I wouldn’t do for them; it’s just that I would grumble while I was doing it.

I have had a long standing policy of never eating anything that a child has touched. It began when my kids were babies and Louise would feed them pablum and the odd time eat the left overs or things on the high chair that they had touched. Disgusting! Sometimes when the kids were older they would help with a cake or decorating a gingerbread house. I kept my policy and would avoid the parts they had worked on. In my mind it is much the same a when a kid offers you a mud pie that they had just made. You pretend to like it but the chance of it touching your lips is pretty remote.

Now, this policy has remained in effect throughout the years. When I would go to a scout camp and the leaders would get the kids to make the meal in order to build character or some such rot, I would be expected to eat that food. I always found an alternative that hadn’t been touched by the kids. I saw those kids earlier catching frogs, climbing trees and in one instance poking a dead bird. Not going to happen!

Now, don’t get me wrong, I am not a germophobe, I have been known to pick an earwig out of my thermos and drink it down. If food hits the floor I am from the school of don’t ask, don’t tell, just brush it off and enjoy. There is just something about kids and food that isn’t right. I just know that if Moses had more space on the tablets there would have been a Thou Shalt Not Allow Kids To Touch Food!

Now that my kids are in their thirties and are good cooks and know a lot more about food than I do, it is with a reluctant heart that I go to their places and eat a meal. I know the food is made with love and goodwill but you never can tell. It is sort of like going to another land and eating the local delicacies. Why would you if you didn’t have to?

So, let’s get back to my grandson. We had a sleep over last night, and after breakfast followed by a few cartoons we decided to go out and play in a park. We had a good time, Ewan probably more than Louise and I. I didn’t get injured, which used to happen quite often when I would show the kids how to have fun. So, after the park we went to Tim’s to get something sweet and refreshing. Ewan chose a green tea iced tea and a chocolate dipped donut. Louise had an iced tea with a tea biscuit and I had a dutchie with a coffee. Everything was going well until Ewan had enough of his donut. There wasn’t much left, it had been picked, poked, pushed, prodded and I am pretty sure licked.

This is when Louise said “Why don’t you give the rest to Papa?” There are times when I wish daggers would really shoot out of your eyes. What the heck was she thinking? Then I saw the ear to ear grin. Evil woman! Ewan said” Here Papa” and pushed the plate in front of me. What could I do? I thanked him for being so generous and ate the mashed and mangled, soggy piece of donut, smiled and said “Mmmmmm that is good!”

Does anyone know if a sense of humour a valid reason for divorce?

I Met Him Outside and I Was Upwind

Not too long ago, Buster and I were out for a walk and came across a pathetic creature. No, it wasn’t an incumbent federal politician, although it could have been. No, I saw a guy sitting on a bus bench with a cast up to his knee on his right leg and casts on both his left and right wrists, a neck brace and what must have been thirty stitches at different locations on his face. Those were the injuries that I could see. WOW!

I went up to him and asked if I should call him lucky? He looked at me for a while and then shook his head and smiled. I am sure that it must have hurt. Whenever I see someone in a cast or with some kind of mammoth bandage I just have to ask them if their injuries were worthwhile or just stupid bad luck. Invariably it is the result of bad judgement. This particular fellow was doing a good deed, and as we all know, no good deed goes unpunished. It seems that he was walking along feeling wonderful about himself as he had just started a new job recently, bought a good used truck and had moved into a new apartment. He came upon a woman and her two children who were very upset because their Frisbee was stuck in a tree. Glancing at said Frisbee and the tree that it was in, he felt that he could rescue the Frisbee and make someone’s day as wonderful as his own.

Well, you guessed it not only did he climb the tree and knock the Frisbee down, he did it with his body. Somewhere on the way down he tried to stop himself with his face and when that didn’t work his ankle caught in the crook of a branch which did slow him down until the branch and or the ankle snapped. Now, as he plummeted towards the ground his hands went out in front of him as is only natural, thus breaking both wrists. Poor bastard!

He hadn’t been at his job long enough for his employer to keep him on staff so he lost his job. Now, with no income and his severe injuries he had to give up his apartment and move into his parent’s place which no 33 year old man wants to do. With the loss of his job came the loss of his truck which he couldn’t make payments on, which is why I met him at the bus stop on the way to the doctors. This story unravelled and all I could do was wish him well and make the observation that since everything that could go wrong had already done so.

I wished him well and Buster and I continued on our way, content in the knowledge that I am not nice enough to have offered to help the kids in the first place and although Buster is that nice, without opposable thumbs he would never be able to get high enough in the tree to do himself any damage.

I don’t know why, but I felt much better about myself after talking to him. One thing still bothers me and I wish that I had asked him how he managed to wipe his ass? Perhaps it was a good thing that I met him outside and I was upwind.

Who's Your Buddy Now?

I have different protocols depending on who I am with when I go out for coffee. There are several different situations and groups of people at different times during the week, and all are handled differently.

There is a group that have met at the same Tim Horton’s every day at the same time for as far back  I can remember. With my memory the way it is, that could be saying a lot or a little. I go to see this group every now and then, not wanting to commit an hour every day for the rest of my life I just make rare appearances. There is another group that I will meet a couple of times a week at the A & W after exercise. I haven’t done the exercise for quite some time but I try not to miss the coffee because I enjoy the conversation and company. I also will go for coffee with a friend and complain about this and that. We generally go to Tim’s, but aren’t locked into it. Of course there are the “drop-ins”, friends you do a one-off with. I will also go out with Louise when I can and we can show up almost anywhere. You might be asking yourself how he can get anything done with such a gruelling schedule. The answer is pretty simple, I don’t!

I also have a secret coffee date whenever I can fit it in. Sometimes I feel that I need some “me” time and I will go to McDonalds and have their $1.46 coffee and a muffin. Personally I think that McDonalds coffee is the best of the bunch and you can’t beat the price. When I started, I would take my ipod, a good book, a notebook and all the cares of my life and let that fine Scottish restaurant sooth my jangled nerves. I suppose I am no different from everyone else, wanting some “Me” time. It is just nice to be able to let the day filter through you and come out in the proper order.

A few months ago something happened to disturb my solitary routine. There is an employee I have noticed. I am not sure what his duties are, but I have never seen him with food. He walks with a limp, is a little scruffy looking (who isn’t), tall with glasses and a simpletons smile plastered on his face. He came up to me and when I looked up he said “Where’s your buddy? Couldn’t he make it today?” Now I could have said that I am not the guy that you think I am, but instead I just told him that I wasn’t sure where he was. He told me to have a good day and went off with his broom. Hmmmm…that was odd, oh well, now where was I?

The next time that I was there, my friend once again came up to me and asked where my buddy was. What the hell? Once again I just said something like “You never can tell with him” and redirected my eyes towards my book, hoping that he would wander away and not bother me any more. He started talking about the snow for God’s sake! Well, the best way to get rid of him is to agree with everything he says and hope for the best. Of course he went away eventually and I went back to my book wondering what makes some people so thick? My next visit went pretty smoothly, and my “friend” wasn’t there so I could read my book and drink my coffee in peace. The trouble was, I kept looking for him and wondering if he was sick, because there is that bad flu going around, so I really couldn’t concentrate.

My next visit he was there but didn’t come over to talk to me as he was having a good discussion and a few laughs with a table of retired guys. Well, at least he isn't really sick. Everything is back the way it should be. We had had a light snowfall the next time I ventured out and he was shovelling the walkway around the building. I said, “Typical warm sunny Calgary weather, eh?” and he just chuckled and kept on working. He came in shortly, gave me a wave and went into the back room.

The next few times I went to McDonalds we either chatted or gave a friendly wave. I have come to look forward to seeing my friend. Still don’t know his name, but I have a strange feeling that he is the “buddy” he mentioned oh so long ago. Funny thing about that is, I am just fine with it.

If You Need A God, I’m Available

I am having a hard time understanding why people can’t get their heads around Arnold Schwarzenegger and his illegitimate child. Craig Ferguson was right on when he said “I am stunned that people are stunned!”

I just expect that kind of behaviour from the rich and famous. Let’s see, lately there has been Arnold, Strauss-Khan, Charlie Sheen, Lindsay Lohan, the late Michael Jackson, etc. etc. etc… The tabloids and television media just love to point their crooked little fingers and cry “Who do they think they are? They are just the same as we are!” Not by a long shot!

These people are human and they eat, get rid of waste, procreate (a lot), get sick, do drugs (a lot), spend money (a lot), adopt cute foreign children (a lot) and do most of the other things that define our humanness. The difference is that WE, yes WE have created them and their larger than life personas. Not different than us? Do you make $2,000,000 for a weeks work? Do you have waiters keep your used Kleenex and sell it on Ebay? Do the paparazzi follow you everywhere you go?

A single photo of one of the “A” list can earn a photographer $100,000. The first thing people read in the paper every morning is the entertainment and Style section. We watch so many entertainment news shows that there is now a whole channel of the crap. What do we do at the checkout in the grocery store? Yep, we pick up one of the many magazines about stars diets, which married leading lady is cheating with which married man, how to look just like your favourite hottie. It is enough to make me sick! Yes, I would probably sell my soul to attain just a small portion of their wealth and talent.

The truth is that a lot of these rich and famous people are truly superior beings. Oh, sure they are lucky and were in the right place at the right time, but when you read about them and dig through the garbage that is written about them you will find very driven and skilled people. Usually they are talented in more than one field. They may be obnoxious, but I feel that most could not be anything other than what they are.

Chicken or the egg? We made it possible for them to live in the clouds. When you tell someone that they are gods long enough they tend to believe it. Look at Michael Jackson. Do they deserve it? Does anyone? I think no, but I don’t really care one way or the other and I hope that one day I will be “lucky”.

If you need a new god, I am available.

Angels Are Light On Their Feet

 Is it just me or is the world going crazy?

This week Manitoba decided that in order to control the flooding they would have to flood a huge area which included 150 homes, businesses and many acres of farmland. In Alberta one third of the town of Slave Lake has burnt to the ground and there are currently 61 fires burning in the province. Thankfully 58 of them are now under control. Not too long ago Japan was devastated by earthquakes a tsunami and one of their nuclear power plants melting down. The world is coming out of the worst recession since the thirties and of course we have global warming hanging over our heads.

I think that there is madness afoot! Not your common everyday keeping jello in your underwear kind of madness, but serious "I think there is an alien invasion." type of madness. Proof? I don't need no stinkin' proof! I have the voices that tell me all about it. Sometimes they just won't shut up.

OK. I don't have any proof, but there is weird stuff going on in the world. Look at the Walmart people emails. Who the hell takes those pictures? Why do they take those pictures? Why do they send them to me? I actually can understand most of those people. I know a few of them.

The Mayans predicted that the world will end in 2012. If they are to be believed then all of the weird stuff that is happening will continue to happen. It also means that I only have a year to learn to play the guitar and win the lottery. I have given up on a career in ballet, but who knows, when I am an angel I might be pretty light on my feet.

Stupid Yellow Sun

Sometimes we just stumble through our lives. I would say that we rarely plan what is going to happen in anything other than a general way. I know, you are going to say that I went to university or college and took this course or that course in order to become…blah, blah, blah.

If we really stuck to our plans, I would have been superman and the people that I know would be nurses, firemen, circus performers or candy store owners. When I went to high school, you had to decide in grade nine which direction you wanted to be streamed, arts and science or business and commerce. My parents kind of coerced me into the business stream. Bad choice! I couldn’t have cared less about how businesses are run then or now. I suppose that all knowledge is worthwhile, but to date I haven’t needed to dredge up most of what I learned. Speaking of high school, how retarded was the school careers advisor? I can’t believe he only knew of about ten jobs, eight of them needed university and the other two involve menial office work or labouring.

Garbage men make good money. Mailmen do too. Vending machine operators don’t do too badly. The point is all the advisor had to do was say look around in the world, everything that is getting done or needs doing has to have someone to do it! His job should have been to point out that without a strong background in science then an astronaut would be a stretch. If you are terrified of dogs then a career in veterinary sciences or mail delivery could be a bad choice. He should have told us that whatever gives us joy is what we should pursue. I know that the councillor would have run into parental pressure to have their babies follow them into the car sales, restaurant or manure collection businesses.

I met a young man a while back who was the son of my old neighbours. I asked him how his mom and dad were doing and he told me OK, but he doesn’t see them as much as he would like. Now, this young fellow was a handful to say the least while he was in high school, nothing serious but he was just a pain in the ass to his parents and probably gave them most of their grey hairs. I chuckled and then asked if he had found happiness in his life? He said that “Yes he was very happy, he had a wonderful wife that loved him, a beautiful baby and he loved his job in construction.”

“Good for you, you have the world by the tail.”

 “Yeah”, he said “That’s the problem. Mom and dad say that they just want me to be happy, but only if I am happy being a lawyer, doctor or some other professional, not in construction.”

I wished him well, and haven’t seen him from that day till this. We all want the best for our children, but at some point we have to let them find their own joy. Maybe that is the hardest part of being a parent, letting the kids become the people that they are destined to be.

The worst day of my life was the day that the careers advisor told me that since I hadn’t been born on a planet with a red sun my chance of being Superman was very slight. Hmmmmm…What does that dick know? He was wrong about everyone that I knew, and I am a super guy! Really! No, really!

Cat Or Crazy

The wind blows and the dog barks. Could these two things be related? Normally I would say no, but when your dog is retarded this is exactly the kind of thing that happens. I could understand him barking if he was outside taking a leak (he had better be) and the wind blew his piss onto his fur. Nobody likes to lick urine off of fur. Well, cats don’t mind and I knew this guy in Toronto once, but both the guy and cats are crazy. That is the kind of day it is. Enough said.

I can remember being at our pre wedding party that was held on an acreage, in a house made out of a barn just east of Toronto. Still I rank that as one of the best parties that I had ever been to. Well, that I remember anyway. The house had been expropriated in order to build a new airport for Toronto and the plan had run into some snafu which meant that my buddy Ken could rent it for virtually nothing. The land couldn’t be used for anything else. Good deal! This was about thirty five years ago and they have yet to build that airport. I wonder if those homes are still being rented to deserving, low income party people?

I was outside smoking and drinking a beer at one point (yes, I can multi task) and decided that I would have to stop both and take a leak. It was dark and as I recall a moonless night so rather than go inside and wait for my turn I would just use nature’s men’s room. This house was on a hill and there was quite a strong wind. I had managed to light my cigarette by turning my back to the wind and cupping my hand around the match while sucking the flame in through the cigarette. I figured this method worked earlier so there was no reason I couldn’t use the same method to pee. Well, minus the cupping and sucking of course. I turned my back to the wind, undid the zipper and after fumbling in the dark for far too long when there are other guys around I managed to pee.

I was never good in school. I was especially bad in the sciences. However, I learned about aerodynamics that night on a hill in Ontario. Weight, lift and drag all played their part. It seems that when there is a stationary object (me) and a wind blowing past the stationary object, the air slows down, swirls and becomes turbulent. This effect causes a stream of fluid to spin back to where it originated. More urine hit my pants than the ground.

I know that nothing happens without a reason, but the reason I needed to have wet pants and smell like urine at a party still eludes me.

Oh well, I’m glad I wasn’t born a cat or a crazy guy…

Hairy, Fat, Myopic Animals

I just did a science experiment!

Unwittingly I will admit, but that doesn’t alter the fact that I learned something all on my own. I was trying to get the residual honey out of the plastic jar by melting it with hot water. I poured the water out and put the lid on tightly, and as the hot air inside cooled, the container collapsed. Talk about a EUREKA moment!

That’s right, I have figured out instant weight loss! I’ll admit there are a few hurdles to overcome. It could be a problem getting people to willingly drink boiling water and then sealing said person up tightly. People tend to have all sorts of leaks. More leaks as they get older. Their natural seals seem to break down. I guess we will call this the testing phase. I am in need of volunteers, just let me know by leaving a comment if you are interested.

This promised to be a very busy day, at least until about nine-ish. We have Buster scheduled for his spring haircut and Louise and I are planning to save six lives between us by donating blood. When we dropped Buster off we had about 45 minutes to kill until the blood letting.

Not enough time to go for breakfast and why buy coffee when a freebie is on the horizon. What the heck, we just went to Blood Services. They never turn anyone away.

Louise and I have a friendly competition about who is the faster bleeder. In normal circumstances this isn’t something to be proud of or at all desirable. In a bar, just after a knife fight or if you slipped with the carving knife it is a bad thing, but in this particular place it is a good thing. Everything in this life hinges on who, what, where, when and why. I went through the embarrassing questions and didn’t even get angry when they asked if I had recently been with a monkey. Now, I know I am not the most handsome man, but given enough time and money I am sure that I could get a date within my own species. Now, as it turns out the sadistic bitch that used me as a pin cushion was somewhat faster than the person handling Louise’s withdrawal. I was faster in total time, but Louise probably beat my time to bleed out. Big Deal! It’s not a contest! I had a coffee and a fantastic cupcake while I was recovering, which gave me enough strength to get to the restaurant for breakfast.

We had just finished breakfast when we were called and told that Buster was ready. Perfect timing! Yes, he is beautiful!

Hey, that just made me think about something that hadn't occured to me before. Where do vets get the blood when they do animal operations? Is there an animal blood donor clinic that I know nothing about? How would the animals get to the clinic and how would they fill out the forms? Where would they keep their donor cards? Hey, wait a minute! Is that why they ask about me and monkeys? You know, no one has ever said that my blood is being used for humans. All of a sudden I’m feeling less than heroic. Maybe there are a slew of animals out there that are overweight with bad eyes and a beard.

Well, maybe tomorrow will turn out better. I’m going to bed…