Despatie Still Not Gay

Despite several hundred attempts to make Quebec diver, Alexandre Despatie, gay by googling the search words "alexandre" + "despatie" + "gay", hundreds of new visitors to this site have been unable to turn the photogenic young diver into a homosexual.

"I don't understand it," said googler, Einojohani Kähkönen-Lappalainen, 32, of Turku, Finland. "I have googled over and over again and I have found several hundred sites that contain all three of these words – and Surly's is by far the superior one, by the way. Unfortunately I have not found any confirmation that he is, in fact gay. Perhaps if I continue to google the words, I will find the proof of my hypothesis. I just know that if I persist, it will come to pass."

"I just don't understand how he cannot be gay!" lamented Joop van der Ginckelschiep, 47, of Bruges, Belgium. "He has that angel face, the funky shaggy haircut, the imaginatively sassy facial hair, and that body that's is just bursting out of the little speedo! I just don't get it."

Although Surly has no direct evidence of M. Despatie's heterosexuality, he has it on very good authority that although the diver celebrates the diversity of all his fans and he thanks them wholeheartedly for their support, he is definitely straight and no amount of googling his name will change this fact.

Quel dommage.

Gloria

While strolling through Toronto's fashionable Distillery district yesterday, fantastically cool bloggers Radmila and Surly were attacked by an ignorant thing too young for its own good. The blogger were innocently perusing the artistic wares of the district while discussing the recent, untimely death of 80s superstar Laura Branigan. The ignorant young thing turned to the pair and asked, "Why does that name sound familiar to me?"

As Radmila and Surly Snobby regarded the ignorant young thing, they realised that it could not have been born before Branigan became a star in the early 80s, which really was not all that long ago. They then proceeded to cast a spell on it by singing a rousing chorus of "Gloria", transforming the ignorant young thing into a F*%#ed-Up My Pretty Pony that was left to melt in the acid rain on the Distillery's cobblestone streets.

Happy Birthday Song

Here is a very happy birthday song by my latest brand-new favouritest singer of all time, Quebec's Pierre Lapointe. They are very uplifting to the rapidly aging. I'm sorry there's no translation into English. I couldn't possibly do it justice.

Tel un seul homme
Et si je vous disais que même au milieu d'une foule
Chacun, par sa solitude, a le cœur qui s'écroule
Que même inondé par les regards de ceux qui nous aiment
On ne récolte pas toujours les rêves que l'on sème

Déjà quand la vie vient pour habiter
Ces corps aussi petits qu'inanimés
Elle est là telle une déesse gardienne
Attroupant les solitudes par centaines...

Cette mère marie, mère chimère de patrie
Celle qui viendra nous arracher la vie
Celle qui, comme l'enfant, nous tend la main
Pour mieux tordre le cou du destin

Et on pleure, oui on pleure la destinée de l'homme
Sachant combien, même géants, tout petits nous sommes

La main de l'autre emmêlée dans la nôtre
Le bleu du ciel plus bleu que celui des autres
On sait que même le plus fidèle des apôtres
Finira par mourir un jour ou l'autre

Et même amitié pour toujours trouver
Et même après une ou plusieurs portées
Elle est là qui accourt pour nous rappeler
Que si les hommes s'unissent
C'est pour mieux se séparer

Cette mère marie, mère chimère de patrie
Celle qui viendra nous arracher la vie
Celle qui, comme l'enfant, nous tend la main
Pour mieux tordre le cou du destin

Et on pleure, oui on pleure la destinée de l'homme
Sachant combien, même géants, tout petits nous sommes

Car, tel seul un homme, nous avançons
Vers la même lumière, vers la même frontière
Toujours elle viendra nous arracher la vie
Comme si chaque bonheur devait être puni

Et on pleure, oui on pleure la destinée de l'homme
Sachant combien, même géants, tout petits nous sommes

Paroles et musique: Pierre Lapointe
Édition: Éditorial Avenue

mother gives birth, eats children

An onlooker watched in horror as a mother gave birth and proceeded hunt her own infants and eat them. AlefAlef, 972, of Toronto watched Pearly-Jean Pnina, 6 months, his mother-of-pearl swordtail give birth to several offspring and then devour each and every one in the fish tank on his desk.

"It was horrible," he exclaimed. "The little ones tried to hide amongst the plants and gravel, but she found them all. She was relentless! And she's still giving birth. How am I supposed to do anything with all these high-pitched fish screams distracting me from my important work?"

Police have not indicated whether they intend to press charges against Ms Pnina.

Thanks Mr V.

C'était dommage hier, mais ce n'est pas la fin du monde. Aux prochains jeux, alors!

In exactly one week it is my birthday. I will transform with a little puff of smoke from the handsome, vibrant, active, vivacious young man into a dilapidated old man with perpetual bowel irritation and dentures. If only it were that simple.

The slow, steady decline of my body is subtly terrifying. It's a little like watching your house fall apart around you with the contractor telling you that "that's just the way it goes, eh". Granted I'm only turning 34 and that isn't that old (is it?), so it's not as if I have to replace the shingles, replace the boiler, redo the plumbing and wiring, undergo major foundation work, and build a new chimney. For now all I have to do is patch up the cracks, touch up the paint job on the front door, and maybe wash the front windows. That doesn't seem so bad. However, there are a few things I miss about the days when dinosaurs roamed the Earth and I was younger:

1. Being able to stay out until 5AM and still be relatively functional the following that day, or rather, late that day. Come to mention it, I miss having the desire to stay out until 5AM;


2. Eating food so spicy I cry – believe me, no one wants to be around me after such a meal nowadays (see above for "bowel irritation");


3. Knowing where little aches and pains come from;


4. Feeling invincible and optimistic about where my life is going;


5. Trusting people I've just met in social and/or romantic situations without automatically looking for faults and weak points and without wondering how I could possibly fit a new person into my busy, busy oh-so-cool life;


6. Answering, when asked by friends what I want for my birthday, as happened yesterday evening, "Socks. Sheets. Underwear". Socks? Sheets? Underwear? For my birthday? I admit that this request is partly inspired by poverty, but it is not the case that nothing screams love! like having a dear friend say, "Here! Please accept an acrylic sheath for your stinky feet". And then, as if to underline the inanity of my request, my friend and I ran into linguistic difficulties and I had to explain what boxer briefs are exactly. (How does one say "boxer briefs" in Hebrew? בריפים הבוקסר ?) Forget that crap! All I want is a two-four of Keith's and a stack of gay Brazilian porn and to be left alone! (Hi Surly's cool and open-minded parents who occasionally read this blog! Don't forget to wish me a Happy Birthday!)

Of course, there are advantages to aging as well. And if anyone can remind me what they are, that'll be birthday enough for me.

And to the scores people coming to my site by googling "Despatie" and "gay", I'm sorry that I have no good news for you. Despite the fact that I have proclaimed him one of my future husbands, he is straight as far as I know. If in the course your searches you happen to find out differently, please come back and let me know. That would be a pretty good birthday present too.

And now I'm practically a p@edophile. At my age I find myself lusting after a 19-year-old, born when I was already almost an adult already. Vive l'âge d'or!

We all know how amusing illness is. I myself adore that mix of claustrophobia and cabin fever swirled in with the lovely aroma of approaching death that wafts through my apartment as my fever climbs ever higher. The taste of chicken soup never gets old. A steady stream of orange juice down my throat is bracing and revivifying. The deliciousness of Tylenol crushed to powder because swallowing is agony is indescribable. Every second of a sick day is an adventure because I can never tell from moment to moment whether I will feel a shivery Antarctic chill or sweats from the Amazon. Exciting and new! I am incredulous that the calcium on my bones actually seems to contain nerves because I can certainly feel the things. The human body is an amazing thing. The past couple have days have been a total blast.

One very hilarious friend opined that my sick days can't actually be too different from my healthy days. After all, all I do for the entire day is sit in front of my computer, typing whatever comes to mind and screening my phone calls (if my phone is even on). Yes, of course. My life, and writing for that matter, is just that simple.

There is some truth to it however. My living room is my office and my computer knows all my secrets. It takes a herculean effort to convince me to leave my apartment and I do avoid the phone as much as I can and. Despite my apathetic, antisocial tendencies I somehow still manage to have a healthy romance and sex life and, much more importantly, quite a number of friends who still want to spend time with me for some reason. But that's not the point. I challenge anyone to sit up straight all day at a computer and be stupendously brilliant while your internal body temperature is approaching 50,000 degrees Kelvin and you wish your flesh would just slide off your bones already so they would stop aching so much, and then say such things to me.

But at least I don't live in my friend AlefAlef's fish tank, and not just because you would have to remove my bones to stuff me inside it. I am glad that I don't live in it due to the ichthyoid version of the bubonic plague that appears to be sweeping through his little marine community. Around 60% percent of his fish have succumbed to this pestilence. While this would be a disaster for humans, it doesn't appear to have affected the survivors in any enormous capacity – except for one gorgeous male betta who has been banished forever to a separate vase for, as I understand it, munching on the dead and dying. The affliction causes fuzzy white mold to grow all over the fishy body, inside and outside, until the poor creature suffocates. What a terrible way to go.

I cannot imagine a more nightmarish scenario to live through. You flutter from water plant to water plant, dodging zombies covered in white slime begging you for aid, their eyes glazed over with pussy white cataracts. A giant glowing ogre roams to and fro like the Angel of Death looking for corpses on which to feast. You are terrified he may mistake you for one of the infected and start with your fins so you can't get away as he slowly consumes the rest of you. All the while, AlefAlef's giant net ploughs through the water chanting, "Bring out your dead! Bring out your dead!" Horrific. I am certainly glad I don't live there.

So I'll stick with my little fever and weird dreams and pump the liquids through my system until I feel better. I'll fight through the invisible clay that has settled on my limbs until it cracks and falls away. The next time I go to AlefAlef's for supper, I sure hope he doesn't serve me sardines.

Children who cannot behave in public should be locked in their rooms until they know how to behave. The parents of children who do not know to behave on five- to six-hour train rides should be cast off the train along with the shrieking, screaming children as soon as the train slows to a velocity such that no one be too damaged when they are tossed off.

Teenagers who have just two seconds ago reached the drinking age who are on their first trip to another city where they can learn about all the potential colours and textures of alcohol vomit should be encouraged to take Mumsy and Papa's limo rather than torment peaceful passengers. Barring that, they should be tied to their chairs with adhesive tape on their mouths, forced to watch reruns of "Lassie" and "Father Knows Best" until tears sun down their cheeks.

The problem started when my walkman battery had decided to end its short life three hours before the train was to depart and I had to resort to the plugs to keep me in the sweet, calm, totally non-volatile disposition that I'm renowned for. I had put them in to block out all the possible annoying noises public transport has to offer, one-sided deeply personal cell phone conversations going on five rows back, the sound of tinkle and too much spicy food from the rest rooms, etc. Well, I learned on my seventy zillion million mallillion hour train trip yesterday that the only sounds that cut through earplugs are the sound of a two-year-old-screaming, the sound of Beavis and Butthead sniggering in the seats behind me, and the sound of Paris Hilton and Nicole Ritchie screeching in the seats across the aisle from me.

It was as if I were trapped in the scene in The Blair Witch Project where the three losers are lying in their tent terrified at the sound of laughter of approaching children who then – EEEEEK! – bang on their tent and cover everything with – * shiver * – blue slime! Only in my little choo-chooing scenario, I wasn't trapped in the doomed tent with two Kurt Cobain wannabes; I was trapped with two televisions that broadcast "Beavis and Butthead" and "The Simple Life" over and over and over. All other sounds, the train chugging, the drink cart squealing, the chorus of walkmans just loud enough so that you could hear only the bass and cymbals and the occasional wailing guitar solo, faded into a beige void that echoed only screeching, screaming, and piercing giggling. Just before the earplugs popped out of my head due the raging torrent lava that was about to erupt from my entire body, I removed them. If I were going to be engulfed in sound, it didn't have to be maddening sound.

The fun began when the screeching two-year-old realised that if she ran up and down the aisle screaming at the top of her lungs (years from new I'll be able to say that I once met the Whitney Houston of her generation), her very passive mother would have an even harder time catching her and disciplining her by completely ignoring the fact that she was disturbing everyone else in the car. As her shrieks echoed up and down my spine in minute waves of shattered glass, I was very tempted to trip her and watch her fall on her pretty little dimpled face. Luckily I realised that that would be mean and that the real culprit was her lazy, inconsiderate mother. Fortunately for the mother, someone else asked her to rein the child in. I wouldn't have done it so politely.

Next came the attack of the rocker bimbos on their first trip away from home apparently. At first it was funny when they read the sex advice columns of their various fashion magazines so that everyone in the car could hear. By the time one of them head a screaming match with her boyfriend on her cell over whether or not he was going to pick them up that the station if the train were late, their charm was wearing thin. When one reached across the aisle and punched me in the shoulder, saying "Where the f*$% is there to go out in Toronto", I had had enough; I assessed their neo-grunge, multiple-pierced look, decided that the area they would hate the most for going out would be Wellington Street, and promptly showed them where it was on the map. Have fun, girls! When the conductor came by and told them in no uncertain terms to clam it, they swore loudly but remained silent afterwards.

By the time the teenage boys behind me decided to fight over who should sit in the window seat, my nerves were a little frayed. When they began kicking my chair, giving me an unwanted roller coaster ride, I somehow transformed myself into the kind of late-early-thirties guy I mocked when I was much younger, wore plaid and ripped jeans, and had hair that went past my titties. I turned into one of those conciliatory adults trying to act all good-natured and hip and with it and cool (do the kids still say those words?), saying totally wussy things like, "I know you just wanna have fun, guys" and "I don't wanna ruin your fun, guys". It was a perfect example of the material teens and tweens mock. I am so looking forward to my birthday in two weeks.

Predictably, Bill and Ted just laughed at me. I sat down feeling old and ridiculous. However, when my chair suffered the first of a series of kicks and blows that were obviously not by accident, I transformed into the other kind of adult I can be. I rose from my chair like the demon from "Night on Bald Mountain" and fixed them with a stare that comes very naturally to me. I then let loose a string of swears and threats of bodily harm in French. Quebec French is far superior to English in the effect its swears can have because it is rocky, melodic, and faster than any manner of English that can be spoken. After a couple of seconds of silence, one of them responded the way most unilingual English Canadians respond when confronted with a bilingual Canadian and they can think of no comeback (unilingual Québécois just swear back in English). He haughtily said to me, "I speak English" as if it were an accomplishment along the lines of "I invented email". I knew I had won. And I responded, "You speak nothing for the rest of the trip" (which was greeted by a smattering of applause from other passengers as close to the edge as I. And they spoke nothing for the rest of the trip. Old age, here I come!

And because life sometimes often works the way it should, there was something to cut me down a peg or two from my dizzying military victories. Next to me was a young man from Sri Lanka with a name similar to Augustus, first Caesar of the Pax Romana. While I sat in my self-righteous state of spoiled desire to meld my immediate surroundings to my wishes, he told me all about his trip to the various churches of Montreal, his pilgrimage up the St. Joseph Oratorio. Even though I had already eaten and wasn't hungry, I shared his meal with him because I could tell his feelings were a little hurt when I refused the first time. His offer to share had less to do with food and more to do with sharing. He told me about his house in northern Sri Lanka that was blown up with him in nine years ago in the hostilities that country has endured for decades and how he can't rebuild (he and his family still own the land) until the hostilities finally end. He has the scars on his face and arms to prove it. I heard all about his family and girlfriend still in Sri Lanka he hasn't seen in eight years. He showed me the thick packet of photos of them he carries with him everywhere. He told me that he's here trying to save enough money to return to Sri Lanka, buy a house for his parents and his girlfriend whom he will marry, and buy a house. With such problems, such courage and such optimistic dreams within him, I felt like a petulant little child whining because I don't wanna go to school today.

He gave me his phone number when we parted ways, saying that he knows Canadians are busy and don't usually make friends with immigrants, but that we should stay in contact a little bit so that he can say goodbye before he goes back to Sri Lanka and invite me there should I ever want to travel to his beautiful country. And I do want to travel to his beautiful country, and meet his girlfriend I heard so much about on that long train trip. And I'll wear my walkman for the long plane trip.

My old place:

I'm off to Montreal for a few days. Just some alone time for the husbands and me. All 12 of us (meet husband no. 11, Quebec Olympic diver Alexandre Despatie) should have a wonderful time together, all except Alex who's competing in Athens right now. Go Alex!

Here they are (all except Massimo and Billo, who are still too shy for me to post pics) in all there clickable thumbnail glory.



It should be a great weekend!

Not the Gay Olympics?

Greek divers win gold.

Pillaged from Mr. "Rose Nylund" V

Signs

"The Crop Circle, which appeared near Silbury Hill in England last month, features a Aztec/Mayan calendar."

Pillaged from 2012

Roots Angers Both Sides of the Border

"Roots is a Canadian brand for Canuks, not for our Olympic athletes." -- MattyG

And Canadians resent the rows and rows of Team USA paraphenalia in our stores. No one is happy on either side of the border and we should all let Roots know.

הראלים

Pillaged from 2 כוכב נולד

Jaws in 30 Seconds . . .

.

מזל טוב , הראלים

Congratulations to both Harels, especially to the Harel Moyal, the winner of 2 כוכב נולד.

Once, when my sister and I were much younger, she and I had a colossal fight over a very serious issue of the utmost importance - who got which burgers for lunch - that resulted in her doing heavy damage to my bedroom door. I was, of course, entirely innocent and blameless in the whole matter, as I was in every single altercation throughout our childhood and adolescence as you may well imagine. Ô, the heady days of childhood!

Now that we're both all grown up, according to our birth certificates, I simply pester her on MSN while she's at work so often that she is simply unable to perform her tasks. This is a much more adult way of torturing your siblings, although I should seriously rethink my strategy if I'm ever going to get her to reimburse me for that bedroom door . . . and those burgers

Happy Birthday, Surly Snobby's Dear Sister! Pull out your old Laura Branigan albums and have a party!

I got used to talking about poo – its quantity, colour, texture, consitency, etc – when I worked on the colorectal and breast cancer project (the job that eventually drove me quite mad and into the state in which you currently find ol' Surly Snobby). Much in the same way, when I worked on HIV project (sorry I couldn't find a link in English) where two thousand gay men underwent regular, very detailed and thorough interviews on their sex life I grew accustomed very rapidly to discussing the finer point of fellatio, rimming, mutual masturbation, etc. around the office over coffee and croissants. I liked that job a lot!

So the day before yesterday when Médecin-sans-frontières who was to undergo a screening colonoscopy kept excusing himself to go to the little boys room kept apologizing, I had to tell him to stop worrying about grossing me out. I'd already seen it all (on that topic, at least). Everyone over the age of fifty needs to screen for colorectal cancer every four or five years with a simple fecal test. My friend, who is very much younger than fifty and has a history of colorectal cancer in his family, had to start screening with a colonoscopy when he was fifteen years younger than the age his closest family member was when they were diagnosed.

Part of the preparation for this procedure is to drink a vile, gag-inducing potion that cleans out every nook and cranny of ones digestive tract. Along with this concoction comes a forty-eight-hour fast during which you may drink nothing but clear liquids and eat nothing but jello, which is congealed clear liquid. From what I could tell, this is even more fun than it sounds. Observing my friend that afternoon as he oscillated between hunger-induced hallucinations and wrenching bowel movements, I could hardly wait for my own, very first colonoscopy.

We did, however, have a very good, very surreal conversation on the nature of life, love, and the universe that would have made Bergman proud. Neither of us discussed the possible results of the procedure he was about to undergo.

The next morning little fluffy pink clouds flounced in tiny puffs around his head as he sat in the recovery room when I arrived at the hospital to pick him up. Now of all my smiley friends, Médecin-sans-frontières is the one with the biggest, brightest smile. I can see it across the room in a dark bar when I arrive late. I hear it when we speak on the phone. The smile that greeted me was probably the largest I have ever seen, but it wasn't big enough to mask his dilated pupils.

"Hey there!" Up went his arms into the air.

"Hey. How's it going?"

"Great! Well, they pumped me full of air so I really really have to fart . . . oops!" he tittered through his fingers like a child who'd just said a dirty word in front of Teacher. "I'm on valium and demerol", he explained.

"I can hardly notice. And did they give you your results?"

"Oh yeah. I'm fine." He shook is head knowingly. "I knew I'd be fine. I'm a doctor."

"Well, that's great then!"

"Oh yeah! It's been a great morning! I am so hungry!"

A great morning, eh. Well, sign me up for my colonoscopy because I want to have a great morning too.

To celebrate his healthy colon, he selected the ever-health conscious MacDonald's as the first solid food to pass his lips in over two days. We munched on warm worm'n'grease burgers as we floated back to his place, both of us healthy and happy. The breeze was warm and the burgers were tasty. He glided through the sunlight along the sidewalk and I strolled beside him and I didn't much care where we were going. It was a good morning.

Yesterday evening while strolling through the Annex with Tallboy on our way to eat Toronto's most delicious falafel, we ran into Jane Jacobs – almost literally since I was distracted by some pretty flowers, or maybe something shiny, or maybe a pretty boy (ooooooo...shiny, pretty boy with flowers). Now, Jane Jacobs is the Empress of Modern Urban Planning. If she hadn't saved Manhattan's Greenwich Village from being knocked down and replaced by a superhighway linking New Jersey to Brooklyn, Toronto, hundreds of kilometres away, might today be crisscrossed by highways and access ramps and I wouldn't be able to stroll through the Annex with Tallboy on our way to eat Toronto's most delicious falafel. I'd have to drive fifty blocks to get to a restaurant that would most likely be a Denny's or an Olive Garden rather than someplace good while Tallboy drove in from the other side of the city.

I didn't bother her with any of this as she stood smelling pretty flowers in a garden. I just excused myself and went to eat delicious falafel with my friend.

First of all, my difficulties with the internet meant that I was unable to wish, Har'el Ska'at, my tenth and – at this moment – favouritest future husband a very happy birthday yesterday.

יום הולדת שמח , הראל

So despite my melodramatic pronouncements of the other day, my internet difficulties do not actually appear to be my computer's problem. Now, stupidity is something that I usually anticipate from the general public, but when I pay a lot of money for a certain service that becomes integral to the way I lead my life, I expect a certain amount of cerebral capacity from the people hired to give me technical support. I should know by now that the more money I pay, the lower the quality of the service I receive.

My conversation with my tekky on Friday started off pleasantly enough. She seemed friendly and I wasn't extremely worried since service interruptions are infrequent but a always possibility. At first we went through the same tests I had done myself (she was, of course, "an expert" as she reminded me) and came to the same conclusion: the modem was all happy and chipper but it just couldn't get it up, ie. connect to the net, although it could receive. I was pleased to know that I could figure out the same thing as a qualified, technical school tekky.

And then she got me doing things that made me feel a tad edgy. I had to sneak into corners of my computer I'd never even knew exist without the rest of the programmes knowing or they'd get jealous and angry (PC programmes are so sensitive!). Once in these little nooks and crannies I had to toggle things and dump other things and I began to feel a queasy sensation in my stomach akin to job interview/first date nausea and cold sweats.

"What do you mean, 'dump'?" I asked with more than a little trepidation.

"Sir, it's just a computer term," she replied barely disguising her impatience too well.

"Oh."

נודניק the Cat observed me from his vantage point on the living room windowsill and rolled his eyes. Humans . . .

I continued to click and toggle and uncheck and do all sorts of things I'm sure proper folk would never do in public to cajole the net to full performance. Soon I realized that all her words to me were words that I understood individually but made absolutely no sense when put in the same context with one another. Soon I didn`t even understand the individual words.

"Ok, sir. What we want to do now is mosulate the harpeffects of the pi-modulator. Ok? Now to do that, I need you to go into "My Synergeflizzlebox" and triple right click while scrolling with the middle roller and pressing "flx" + "F37" + "q". This should bospourize the metacomplexifier while simplificating the hyperstranding divider of your computer's warp drive and transporter buffers. Are you with me?"

I screamed in agony on the inside as I came to the horrifying realization that I had stumbled upon a pocket of Star Trek nerd trekker tekkies. In a desperate effort to quell my rising panic I stared out the window and sang I happy song myself. La la la la la la Eveything will be alright . . .

"Sir? Sir!" Her nasal voice cut through my reverie like a phaser set to "stun" through a Jelly Entity of the Planet Blobzmotroin XIII.

"La la la la . . . I mean, I'm here."

"Sir, do you type in ‘//ipconfig_-underscorerepairip//$#$%544sucker-idontknowwhatimdoing-either' like I asked you?"

"Um . . . how do you spell that . . . ?" Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!

Hours later, after w'd failed tp reinitialize the replicators and clear gamma particles from the aft nacelles or something, my tekky came to the conclusion that it was my network adapter and not at all Rogers fault.

"Don't worry, sir. It shouldn't cost too much to get it checked and repaired."

I wept.

However, it seems an interesting coincidence that the service cuts in and out at around the same times every day and that five other friends in the neighbourhood are experiencing the same difficulties at exactly the same time. Further investigation through a spy who works at my internet provider that they are rebuilding the network and not telling their costumers. I should be getting money back rather being told to spend more by sending my computer to the cyberdoctor. Canada's embattled health care system doesn't cover hard drives. The tekky covered her ignorance with a lot of flashy, intimidating words when all she had to say was "Patience. Please bear with us as we improve the network. I'll credit you for the downtime." I would have been happy. Now I'm angry.

Ah well. I'll find something else to do when the Net goes down again at its regular time in about thirty minutes, like dream of Montrealers and rainy days (see below).

Yesterday afternoon I hung out with this guy and I discovered that, as he had claimed, he does indeed have excellent taste in women. Did I forget to mention that he's pretty cool too?

Then on my way home there was an unexpected downpour and I found myself trapped in very very close quarters in the sheltered doorway of Pizzaiolo on Queen West with two very cute men from Montreal. These two very cute men from Montreal a) thought I was pretty cute and spoke about to at length to each other in French and b) didn't know that I speak French. So, although the potential for porn was high, what with wet clingy t-shirts showing off some very impressive pecs and Surly uttering such cheezy lines as "I know where you can come . . . to dry off" and all (Hi, Surly's cool and open-minded parents who occasionally read this blog!), I wimped out and simply gave them directions when they asked me how to get somewhere (can I flub a golden opportunity or what!) in my practically perfect Montreal French. However I did enjoy that the very cute one giggled like a child when he heard my French and that the even cuter one blushed.

I felt instant regret as they wandered away, damp shorts clinging to their perfect posteriors. Instead I came home and watched TV. Yay, Surly.

Because I am utterly without shame:


Alexandre Despatie se repose.

I won't set the dramatic stage ironically by stating that I woke up with glowing eyes full of hope and glory, eager to face another magnificent day. In truth, I woke up with a clunk. My eyes opened and despite the fact that I have had difficulties sleeping for the past couple of days, they would not then close. I didn't want to get out of bed. I didn't feel like getting out of bed. All I wanted to do was lie there like an aging, unemployed, creatively-challenged, poverty-stricken lump and feel sorry for myself. But that just would not do.

I have become very adept at giving myself pep talks and so I arose, my eyes not exactly glowing but there was definite luminous potential. I wasn't feeling spectacular, but "How bad could it be?", I thought to myself. Regular readers, what is your sign of a Quality Blog®? The answer is in the snappy comebacks below.

I stumbled into the kitchen to make my coffee and then fell onto the couch to doze while I waited. Now, I wear earplugs to sleep because I live on a very busy street. It is so noisy that I cannot sleep without them, especially in summer when I have to leave all the windows open. They were still in my ears as I waited so I of course could not hear any sound. Some of the sounds I could not hear were busses rumbling by, obnoxious teenagers rapping poorly, babies screaming as their parents wheeled them around in strollers, the sound of construction of the approximately ninety zillion quadrillion condos going up around me, and the sound of hot, brown liquid steaming on the burner and dripping off onto the floor. Had I heard that, I would have immediately put the coffee pot under the drippy thing where it can actually perform its function, which is to collect coffee. But I didn't hear that, and so the coffee fell to the floor. This was not a great beginning to the quasi-magnificent day I had told myself to have.

The day, which I began to suspect was going to be a bit of a sadist, continued on this path by filling the drippy thing with coffee just waiting to spill out all over my hand as I brushed against it while cleaning up the mess. I had never previously spent too much time wondering whether the water is heated in the coffee maker or whether it is heated on the burner, although I had wondered. Now I know that it is heated inside the machine and so when it reaches the pot, or as the case may be, my hand, it is already scalding hot. Pay heed. This is very good to know.

As I sat on my couch anticipating the next mini-disaster, I noticed that there was some dirton the floor in front of the living room window. I turned my head and there was ore dirt. And even more when I turned my head farther. There was a massive pile of dirt in the corner of my living room. And in the dirt were the shredded remains of a regurgitated plant. נודניק the Cat had once again lived up to his name (Noudnic = pain in the butt, kinda) and skirted all the anti-kitty booby traps I had placed around my two surviving plants and minced one of them and then, because most houseplants are slightly poisonous to cats, thrown it all up in little greenish lumps on my living room floor.

"It's no big deal", I thought to myself. "It's only cat puke. I've seen worse things." So of course, I stepped in a pile and it went squoosh! between my toes.

All this is framed against the backdrop of the news that my friend Lightning met and had an actual conversation with one of my future husbands at the TV station where he works and he did not even let my future husband know of my existence. Such betrayal by a friend! Yes, Lightning's job at this station is apparently to rampage through my future husbands and steal them all from me one by one. In any case, this future husband is apparently very sweet. And then again, so is Lightning. So I'm very happy for the two of them. Yes. It just warms the cockles of my heart.

So as I sit here with coffee and dirt all over my floor, cat barf between my toes, a wounded, throbbing, burned right hand, and minus one future husband, I have to wonder what next can happen to me today? Frogs? Boils? A third eye in the middle of my forehead? Athlete's foot? I'm going back to bed.

****IMPORTANT IRONIC UPDATE**** A few hours after I'd first posted this entry: three hours after I'd wondered what the day had in store for me next, I got my answer. Nancy's mother was right. Nothing is so bad that it can't get worse. My internet connection failed and after many long an arduous hours with my provider it turns out it's my network card, so it's my problem' Well, that's justsuper! So until further notice, blogging will be infrequent and angry.

So it doesn't look as if I'm getting married any time soon. While it is true that I have ten future husbands, so far none of them seem to be rushing to fulfill their vows with me (ie. put out), although I suspect that – and by "suspect that" I mean "think it would be really really cool if" – one of them visited my site a few days ago. I may have to dump them all and find new ones.

The real potential husbands aren't doing better for themselves either. I am an expert at choosing men who are practically unattainable. I apparently like them distant. Emotional and/or geographic distance are enormous turn-ons to me and is it my fault that they are the way they are or that they live where they live? The world ought to deliver me a decent husband. Right now. I deserve it.

OK, the phone didn't just ring nor was there just a knock at the door, so I guess I'll have to give the world a few days to work on it. But had better be soon or there will be hell to pay.

But at least I have my cat. At least I have the opportunity to live with a creature that does nothing but eat my food, mess up my apartment, shed hair, and poop. It's exactly the same thing as a husband minus the sex (don't even start on me with the bestiality jokes). All he needs to do is learn to promise to paint the apartment and to drink beer and the vision will be complete.

I can actually picture myself growing old and becoming the neighbourhood's crazy cat man. I will have exactly 67 cats climbing in and out of the apartment thought the windows. I will grow a beard, dye it purple, and braid it into cornrows, maybe with bells at the end of each braid to add extra annoyance. I will walk with a cane that I'll shake at children. I will walk through the streets, pushing people out of my way, singing old songs from the Turn of the Millennium like Christina Aguilera and Ricky Martin (I have years to learn them) at the top of my lungs. Just to freak people out, I will occasionally glare at random strangers and point at them as they hurry away. If I'm going to be old and alone, I really should make it as entertaining to myself as possible.

As I approach my birthday in around one month, I find myself thinking these thoughts with increasing frequency. If this is what birthdays are going to be like for the rest of my life, I renounce them completely. I deny the importance of the annual reminder that I am this much closer to lonely death. And I renounce men too. I will take a vow of gay chastity (not as paradoxical as it sounds) where I will live in bliss without the influence of either men or aging. Actually that sounds boring. I'd rather be the crazy, "Invasion of the Body Snatchers"-influenced, cat coot, terrifying his neighbours and amusing his friends.

What a stupid post. Happy Early Birthday to me!

Once again:

Best of luck, הראל !

The lengths to which some of us will go to receive attention from the objectives of our desire is absurd. For example, since I realized how much attention my little crush on a singer from a country 10 000 km from me was getting me, I have been shamelessly throwing myself onto the Net in the vain hope that Mr. סקעת himself will somehow discover me and instantly decide that he'd at last met the heart he'd been searching for his entire life, and live with me forever in bliss and joy. It could happen! The world is an odd place. That's why I have fantasy future husbands. You never know who is going to pay attention to you and why.

Predictably, no starry attention has come my way. However, the unexpected and very fortuitous side-effect of all this silliness has been inspiring contact from the other side of the world. Maudlin as it may seem, I marvel at the uncomplicated nature of the Net when, for example, a brand new friend clicks on a button 10 000 km away from me and a few seconds later I have received a song from afar. Now if only someone would invent transporter technology, as seen on Star Trek, to make the world as small small as the Internet makes it feel. Sigh.

Now for a funny story: yesterday my friend l'Urbaniteur-franco-ontarien went to quite a different length to gain the attention of a handsome man as he was walking down leafy Maitland Street. Allow me to set a little background to my tale. Although studies that I have only heard about and never actually read apparently prove conclusively that women are experts at multi-tasking whereas men fail miserably at anything that deviates from one complex thought pattern at a time. I beg to differ. Men are constantly multi-tasking. Whatever we do, driving a car, reading philosophy, performing delicate brain surgery, there is a constant porno flick playing itself out in the back of our heads. We are perfectly capable of functioning while carnality swirls about in the recesses of our minds. I myself have an unchaste series of thought buzzing in the background as I sit here typing.

Now, l'Urbaniteur was not naked as he walked down leafy Maitland Street, although what was about to happen would make him feel naked. Innocently he bounced down the street, humming a happy little ditty to himself, admiring the beauty of the birds twittering in the trees, naked men frolicking behind his eyes.

Suddenly a man so beautiful entered his view that even the naked frolickers in his head stood silent and gaped at his incredible splendour. L'Urbaniteur's head swivelled naturally on his neck in order to keep the gorgeous creature in his full sites as the man passed him by, oblivious of his affect on l'Urbaniteur and on his imaginary Greek tableau. And soon the tableau gained a new player as my friend's head rotated further and further on its axis, unaware that he had fallen so deeply into his internal erotica that with a slight booooing! an enormous shock when a "No Parking" pole leapt up and struck him in the forehead directly above his right eye.

The frolickers scattered into the pastoral distance. The birds peered down and twittered scornfully. Maybe one pooped on his head even (I don't know. I wasn't there). L'Urbaniteur staggered slightly and raised his hand to his head, unaware of what had just happened. He stared mutely at blood on his hand and rubbed it between his fingers, his brow furrowed. Beauty has the ability to completely addle all our upper brain functions. He simply stared as the beautiful creature floated away, still oblivious to the inane affect he had had on a very small part of the world.

It wasn't until his forehead was being stitched Frankenstein-fashion that l'Urbaniteur realized how absolutely ridiculous his actions had been. When he told me, I spit my coffee out all over the book I'd rested on my lap when I'd answered the phone. The book is ruined now, but that's ok. I wasn't liking it all that much in any case.

So there you have it. Gay sex is amazing but it's bad for books.