Why must all cute things be so fast?

On my walk home today, I saw a baby bunny. This made me happy, because it is not often that I get to think the phrase, "Holy crap, baby bunny". In general, this is also followed by an internal happy dance. It would be external, except that my immediate response is to freeze up so as not to frighten away the baby bunny before I can convince it to be BFFs forever and ever. I also try to avoid frightening it away so that I can take a picture of it to remember it by if it doesn't buy the BFF bait. Really, I should carry around carrots, because I've noticed carrots are worth a lot more to baby bunnies than the offer of being their friend.

Unfortunately, my potential baby bunny friend scampered away before I could get any photographic evidence of our brief encounter, so all I have are the sweet, sweet memories. Me seeing it. Me thinking, "Holy crap, baby bunny". It hopping away while I got out my camera. Sigh, so many memories. It was probably smart for it to leave, since its baby bunny mind probably can't differentiate between me, a human, versus a hawk, bear, or hawk-bear hybrid (for which I have coined the term "Bawk"). That is how baby bunnies survive to become big bunnies who copulate far too much, allowing for me to have baby bunny treats on my walk home to brighten my day. This is the point where you are free to sing Circle of Life in your head. Okay, now stop because I'm still writing and you should be fully enthralled in this, not Elton John. Elton John can get his own time when I'm done, and I will fully support the two of you at that point.

The baby bunny is just one of many things that have gone right in my life. Yesterday I had my 1st ultimate Frisbee win. It was also the first time that I managed to assist in anything positive happening for my team, thus finally making me a valuable member of society after so many years of freeloading. Next week is play-offs. We are close to the bottom. That's okay though, because if there is anything I've learned from TV movies, it's that those who win early on are (a) usually massive jerks and (b) doomed to embarrassing defeat when the so called losers get their crap together. I'm not certain that we are the so called losers in this scenario, since we don't even seem to have plans for a good training montage, but the key thing is that we're not the skilled but evil team, and that is something to be grateful for.

The one thing I'm worried about is that my devotion to my team and my devotion to being a tame groupie might be tested if our game ends up being scheduled at the same time as the "I Only Date Astronauts" show (8pm at Bread and Circus, next Sunday, June 20...tell your friends). If this happens, I will likely die from my head exploding when I can't decide between the opportunity for a good playoff montage and the chance to call people out on the lack of dancing monkeys (or, alternatively, be amazed and disturbed by the presence of dancing monkeys).

Happy music: Make it Mine by Jason Mraz. This is the song that makes me delusional enough to think it's a good idea to write a play in a month, all the while living the life of a student with no free time. I also like to listen to it when life seems a little busy or mundane or both ("buzdane"...coined it!), because it makes me remember that life is still going on in and around the busy and mundane.

Is life weirder than dreams?

Last night I dreamed that I was at some sort of camp. What was distinctive about this camp is that at dinner, we were told that the only edible thing was the shrimp sandwiches. But then, when we got to the food, the room was completely dark, but it was still possible to make out that the only food was barrel after barrel of olives.

So, I guess, instead of eating, we decided to take a washroom break. The washroom was located about 100 meters from the main building, and people would sprint to and from it in terror. I couldn't figure it out. But, then, I did figure it out. Just off the path to the washroom was a live bear. Actually, 3 live bears, but 2 were babies. As people ran from the washroom, they would jump at them, but, luckily, the small slope between their location and the path seemed to give them trouble, so no one was eaten.

Then, as I further observed the situation, there was a large box beside the bear the had a picture of the bear on the side and writing that said "Security bears for hire". So, the impression I got is that this camp had specifically hired a bear to eat children who have to use the bathroom. The dream continued, and eventually, somehow, I was chillin' out with the bear. Well, actually, by this point I'd realized it wasn't a bear at all, but a guy in a bear suit. The baby bears were real though, which made it seem like a risky job for him. When I asked him how much he made, he said $100 a day. That seemed like a pretty sweet pay for hanging out in a bear suit trying to make campers pee their pants. Then I woke up, but I'm still thinking of seeing if such a job exists, and if so, applying for it. If not, maybe the point of the dream was that I'm supposed to start such a company.

My waking life is often as strange as fake-bear dreams. I was in the store today and heard Justin Bieber playing. After a second, I realized it was a cell phone, but could not seen any teenyboppers around, so wasn't sure where it could be coming from. A few seconds later, my question was resolved as a middle aged Asian man answered his phone. I thought maybe it could have been a trick played on him by someone cruel, but, if it was, he was quite skilled at playing it off, because there was not an ounce of shame or embarrassment in his face. Luckily, he was not wearing a bear suit or I would have feared for my mental health.

Happy song: The Show by Lenka. Once I was sad and Yelsel happened to be playing it, then I wasn't so sad. That seems like the very definition of a happy song. The only concern is that I'm not certain that them message of the song isn't that life is actually one big reality TV show. When Survivor was still at the height of its fame, I had a dream I was the likable one. You know, the one that all the fans like but will never win because they're too nice. I'm afraid if life is actually a reality TV show, I wouldn't fare so well, because I try to be nice, but like most humans, I'm human. If this is a reality TV show, I think I'll try to get in good with the editors, because that's the real key. Other than the series of reality show concerns arising from listening to it, it's definitely a happy song.

Yet another bear free gift

Today I learned a new lesson: The day that you receive notice of a package from a friend is not the day to decide it's finally safe to wear non-clear mascara. Byla, my Yellowknifian friend, had warned me that I should be expecting something, so I was sufficiently amped. After I picked it up, I spent the walk home thinking about what it might be. I don't know much about Yellowknife and what can be found there. I often wonder if the souvenir shops sell a lot of yellow knives, or if that is too obvious. It seems it would be dangerous for public relations, you know, due to the likelihood of the former souvenir becoming key evidence for the prosecution.

I didn't think Byla mailed me a knife though, if only because she seems smart enough not to send sharp things in the mail. Then I thought, crap, what if she sent a bear. I do often mock her very cold hometown, and maybe I went too far at some point, so she jacked a bear up with Fluoroquinolones and sent it to maul me just when I'm most defenseless (that being while opening an exciting package). That seems like a completely appropriate response to one too many igloo jokes, you know, the attempted murder. I realized though that, were it a bear, it was most likely dead from starvation due to the unexpectedly long transit time, so I would probably be okay, and thought, "Haha, foiled again, Byla Rong." You have to get up pretty early in the morning to kill me with a tiny bear. Or at least spring for a courier. Then it dawned on me that Byla would have been smart enough to pay the extra expense if she'd already gone to the trouble to create an adorably small murder machine.

If not a bear, then what? Well, the only other Yellowknife thing I could think of was ice. But the package was not as wet or cold as I would expect were it ice. Maybe the post office was nice enough to dry it off for me, but then, why was it so heavy still, like it contained something other than ice that had melted and then carefully dried off?

By this point in my train of thought, I was home and already grabbing random sharp things that I thought might open a package and thinking how useful it would be for future packages if it contained a yellow knife. Once I finally got it opened, nestled inside was the greatest card ever.

She knows me well, and below her wonderful card was a tea pot.
I did not include the full 360 degrees, but if I had, you would note there is are no bears on it. There are moose and wolves, but no bears. It's times like these I realize how blessed I am. Then I read the card, and I will not recount it here, but, as I mentioned at the beginning, I wasn't ready risk coloured mascara.

My happy song today is My Sweet Lord by George Harrison, my favorite Beatle. Regardless of specific religious beliefs, I have an immense amount of respect for anyone with that much passion for anything. I'm sad he got sued over it. But I'm happy that he played the intro to it on Monty Python, but followed it by a song about pirates, because everyone loves a song about pirates. Ooh, I think that counts as two happy songs. I'm not sure how two songs benefits me, but I bet someone, somewhere is giving me points, and I really want to win that car.

Things that are scarier than bears

So, I've graduated. Somehow, I feel the same though, only a little more embarrassed, because after graduating, I had a Marilyn Monroe moment on a subway grate downtown. Well, a Marilyn Monroe moment minus the holding it down part. Classy. And I was only afraid I'd fall on stage. Apparently in 22 years of education, I was never taught how to not make a fool of myself. Or I missed that class. Or I was there, but daydreaming about monkey butlers. Actually, that's probably it, because those with monkey butlers need not worry about things like subway grate drafts. Monkey butlers are good that way.

Speaking of monkey butlers, in addition to being a recent graduate, I also became a groupie about a month ago. I wasn't sure that I could actually be a groupie, because I'm pretty tame, but I was told that all types of groupies are needed (all the colours of the rainbow, from skanky to tame). So, I'm a groupie, for a band. A real band. Not in my head at all. The reason I bring this up now, is that they are having a show in June where they have promised dancing monkeys. Although I had already agreed to be a groupie, and thus was obliged to attend, I was also pulled in by the dancing monkeys. However, I'm also concerned about this promise, because, seriously, dancing monkeys? In downtown Toronto? Is that even legal? I'm going to say no.

I'm told that they're working on the dancing monkeys though, which is good, because that's not the kind of promise you should just throw around. People take dancing animals very seriously, and monkeys even moreso. Maybe they have access to a research lab I'm not aware of, and they're going to sneak the monkeys out under a giant lab coat. I hope they've thought this plan through though, because monkeys do not respond well to being shoved in an over sized sleeve, especially if that sleeve contains an arm. It's all the worse if that arm is that of a band drummer, bulked up from excessive drum banging, because lab monkeys like their angry revenge-for-being-shoved-in-a-sleeve meat as lean as possible. Because they've heard about heart health. Overall, animatronic monkeys might be a safer bet. They should try to stick to songs you can dance the robot to.

Today I gained a new fear, one unrelated to terrible bears. Apparently, there were fish going missing in an aquarium and the owners weren't sure what was happening, so they watched nighttime security footage and found out that the octopus in the tank across from it was climbing out of his cage, walking (wait, do they walk, or just sort of shuffle) across the catwalks and eating fish. This is friggin' terrifying, because if an octopus can climb across a catwalk to steal fish, it can climb across a catwalk to drop on my head and suck out my brains (I think that's what they do.) Then, for good measure, a bear will probably jump out to maul me.

In the same conversation where I learned that octopi are evil geniuses, we were discussing the zoo and the degree of awesome that it has. One person mentioned they'd grown up walking distance from a zoo. I thought it was cool, unless a tiger escaped (I believe I may have mentioned this theory in the past). Then, another person said to their mother, "Was it a polar bear that escaped from our zoo?" And I thought, "Holy crap." I don't think I need to add any more to that story at this point, because holy crap.

So that brings me to a happy song. This task seems easier some days than others. To comfort myself about the idea of polar bear escapes, I'm going to go with At the Zoo by Simon and Garfunkel. I don't think it needs anymore explanation than zoos are automatically happy (assuming all the cages are intact) and the zoo keeper is apparently drunk.

I was about to publish this post, when I realized that bear and octopus in the same sentence seemed strangely familiar. Then, I remembered that a few months ago a friend introduced me to the existence of the bear-shark-octopus, but I blacked it out (for obvious, terrifying reasons), until this unfortunate post. Now it's all flooding back, and I'm never sleeping again, which is probably good, because I'll have time to get a lot more done. Of course, most of that time will be spent trying to figure out how to escape a bear shark octopus mauling/biting my arm off/brain sucking. I know that you're supposed to make noise for bears, and hit sharks in the nose, but I haven't heard about octopi. Maybe you just have to somehow confuse them so they tie knots in their many tentacles. It would work in the cartoons, so it would probably work in real life.

I nearly ran out of tape, but I made it

I'm graduating today, so I don't have time to write much. Although I'm looking forward to seeing all the people that have been my family the last 4 years, I'm not looking forward to walking across the stage, because I don't have any shoes with treads good enough to ensure I won't become, "that girl who fell." I've spent 4 years cultivating the "that red head girl who wears a lot of green...and sometimes blue" image. Not that distinctive, I know, but dependable, like the colour green...or blue.

Graduation makes me nostalgic. Only 4 years ago, I had freshly graduated from my undergraduate program and was looking forward to exciting new adventures. If I have a fault, it's that I tend to be overly optimistic. I imagined that this new school would be like a hidden utopia nestled in North York. On nostalgic days like this I could almost imagine I was right. But I wasn't right. I was very wrong. Even if the heating system in the building hadn't been menopausal, the school still would have had some work to do to get to utopia. But that's okay, because now that I'm leaving, like my undergrad, it will slowly morph itself into the wonderful experience I wanted it to be. That is the magic of memory.

During the last 4 years, I've learned many things. Number one among them is the importance of crying. I had considered trying to drink enough at formal to replace the tears I shed over the last 4 years, but thought that dying of alcohol poisoning might not be the best way to celebrate graduation. I think it's a way though, and will consider it the next time I graduate from somewhere that seems to relish in repeatedly crushing my soul. That was another key lesson. For 4 years the school would intermittently smash my soul, and I would pick up all the little soul pieces and try to figure out how to put them back together. It was problem based learning. Eventually, I was able to eliminate the less essential parts of my soul, replacing them with shards of awesome. Yes, it's mainly held together by bits of string and scotch tape, but my soul is now 19% more awesome than it was 4 years ago. So now is the opportunity for me to thank my school for so thoroughly destroying my spirit, because, coming in, it was a mediocre spirit, at best, but now it is awesome enhanced.

So, what have I learned, other than what it feels like to have your soul repeatedly pulverized, and how to most efficiently repair it with odds and ends you find around the house? That's a good question. Well, I learned that anytime something goes wrong, saying things like, "there's nowhere I can be that isn't where I'm supposed to be," or, "this is part of my path," or, "this happened so I can learn," will comfort me more than I imagined possible. For example, if something goes wrong and I miss the subway, I'll think, "chances are if I'd caught that train, it would have been the train where a bear would have eaten me." Or if someone rejects me, I'll think "chances are they were a bear who would have eaten me." The point is, there are bears around every corner, and the only thing preventing you from becoming their delicious dessert is a string of seemingly unfortunate events.

Today's happy song is Ramble on by Led Zeppelin, which has, for a long time, been my favorite end of the school year song. I also like it because I'm a fan of all kinds of rambling, both the verbal kind and the kind that makes your feet hurt. The Lord of the Rings references are also a little bit awesome, because, even though I haven't actually gotten through the books, I respect those that are so open in their devotion to fiction. If I wrote a song, I would reference Fraggle Rock a lot. It wouldn't be as cool as Ramble on, and would probably contain more instances of the word "radish" than any other song in history. Actually, I don't need to write a song, because it already exists. It's called the Fraggle Rock theme song. Crap, I think I just wasted two happy songs in one day. Oh well, I guess it's a special day. I'll just have to turn a horribly depressing song into a happy song later on to make up for the loss. I'll try to find one with a high casualty count, just because I like the challenge.

Finally, the deal with the bears

Today someone asked me what my deal is with bears, and since it was not the first time I've been asked this question, I thought it was time for an in-depth exploration of that relationship.

But first, I promised a heart person picture yesterday, and heart person picture I shall deliver.



Note that the hearts are all intact. If you were to introduce a bear to this picture, it would be very different. This is one of my many issues with bears.

I was looking for a "Blood Red" crayon, but apparently that colour doesn't exist in either my 96 crayon set, or my various novelty crayon packets (personally, I think a sparkly blood coloured crayon would be pretty damn popular if they ever created it), so I had to use "Razzmatazz".

To get back to bears, I was not born with a dislike of bears. As a child, I once asked my parents if I could keep a baby bear as a pet. They said no. I said, "Why not? I could keep it in a cage in the back yard." We had a fair-sized yard, so I didn't see why we couldn't sacrifice a small chunk to my bear. My parents said, "But a little bear will grow into a big bear, and then it will need more space." And, of course, I replied, "Don't worry about that, I just won't feed it." This seemed like a perfect plan, given that I'd been taught you eat to grow, so if you don't want to grow, you just don't eat. I wasn't yet aware of the option of Fluoroquinolones . I kind of wish someone had taught me about them, instead of wasting time on useless information, like rhymes about piggies going to market. I just started thinking about that rhyme and realized I always imagined the first piggy was going to market to buy a pumpkin or something, but thinking about it now, I'm wondering if he was there to be sold and subsequently slaughtered for delicious bacon. Also, what kind of pig eats roast beef? Actually, I guess a smart pig that knows how to avoid being eaten.

Actually, the story of my dream of owning a pet bear contains a good lesson about talking to children. When you say "If you don't eat your broccoli you won't grow big and tall," always remember that the child also hears, "If I want to stay tiny and cute so that I can continue to manipulate these silly large humans, I should stop eating broccoli." A better way to phrase it is: "If you don't want to die a horrible death of scurvy then you should probably eat your fruits and vegetables. What? You don't know what scurvy is? Well, basically, your skin won't be able to hold itself together and then you'll bleed to death. It won't be pretty. So, eat your damn vegetables." This way there's no confusion about what the worst consequences of not eating are. It's also a good way to familiarize them with the various vitamin deficiencies and how they can kill you, which, like the adverse effects of Fluoroquinolone use in adolescents, would have been nice information to have ingrained early on to save me some study time this summer (I should probably note, there's a big licensing exam in August that's planning on taking my life and my brain...but don't worry, that M.F. doesn't know who it's up against).

Wow, I left bears rather quickly. Back to it. So, I did not get a pet baby bear in the end, which is good, because my ingenious not feeding him plan would have almost certainly led to death. By which I mean my death, because at some point I would have tried to hug my fuzzy baby bear and he would have hugged me back with his very sharp teeth.

The point of that story is that at one point I did not fear bears. In fact, I had a potentially lethal love of them. What changed? Well, my best guess is that it somehow relates to my brothers (Shamus and Mysterious Brother X), who both have had close encounters with bears trying to kill them. Bears are tricky though, from reading this blog and other sources, you might get the impression that they just wander around mauling people randomly, but, sometimes, bears also commit premeditated murder. Luckily, both Shamus and Mysterious Brother X both escaped mainly unscathed. To the best of my recollection (forgive me if there are errors, I have trouble remembering stories without me in them, you know, because of the boredom), Shamus was run off the road by a bear. I don't believe that the bear was also in a car at the time, but it might have been, because I just know he saw a bear on the road, and while one would assume that means it was running across, he very well could have meant it was waving at him from a red hatchback. My younger brother, Mysterious Brother X, had a bear walk right past another tent full of cookies to break into his tent and eat his bug spray. Clearly the bear didn't actually want to eat bug spray as much as he wanted my brother to be defenseless against the mosquitoes and blackflies so that they could kill him and no one would trace it back to him. How do I know this was his intention? Because I was that bear. Dun dun dun.

Actually, no, I'm not a bear. That I know of.

We still haven't reached the root of my bear fear, because if I feared everything that ever thought it might not want one of my brothers to exist, then I wouldn't be able to leave the house...or stay inside the house...or live inside my own body. No, I think it's more due to the fact that as long as I was around them, I knew that they would be eaten first, which was comforting. So, maybe my fear of bears is actually just that I miss having my brothers around.

Or it's because I had a nightmare in which a bear (or tiger...or bear-tiger hybrid, "teariger"...dreams can be confusing) ate the leg off one of our school's deans while we all watched in horror. Oh, and then another one where a family of bears chased me and a group of unfamiliar people up to an isolated cabin, and the dream ended with us hiding in the ceiling as the bears waited beneath. Periodically people would fall and then the bears would maul them to death, until I woke up. Then they stopped mauling/existing. Actually, that last one is probably the reason for the bear fear. And thus another mystery solved.

Baby Geese + Fluoroquinolones = Unemployed Optometrists

Today, I'm in class again. You know what I love to do more than anything on a Sunday morning? Learn about anti-fungals. Am I alone in this? No, I'm not. I'm fairly certain that only those who are a demon or of the demon variety would disagree.

I went for lunch with Yelsel D'Stupid, Neyney Charmin, and Lysha McSomji. We took the subway and as we were getting off, we saw EMS putting someone on a stretcher. There was a busker playing "Que Sera Sera" on the saxophone, which made me think exactly how awful it would be, after a horrible subway emergency, to have to stare up at the ceiling worrying about dying and listening to a song about the unpredictability of life. I also might start believing that I've actually passed on and this is God's idea of a funny joke. By the way, God, if you're reading this, it's not. It's just not. I got Neyney to promise me that if it ever occurred she'd run over and request another song. I think "I'm Alright" could be a good one, although I've never heard it on the sax, so it's hard to say for sure.

Normally, in emergency medicine (which we also covered today) you start every scenario with a scene survey, meaning you look for fire, wire, gas, glass and blood before approaching the victim to help. This is to avoid dying (or, alternatively, losing various appendages). I suggest that list be revised to also include "ironic music". Wait, is that irony? I don't know, I guess all my English teachers were right to be angry at Alanis Morissette for confusing an entire generation about the definition of "ironic" The point is, I want people to listen for music that would suck to die or near-die to and include eliminating said music in their initial emergency procedures.

Walking back to school, we were hoping to see the baby geese that have been hanging out around the tennis courts lately. Neyney kept calling them ducks. She said it was because she doesn't like geese, but I think she was just never good at "Duck, duck, goose". She was probably that kid who just kept going around the circle saying duck until the teacher felt so sorry for her that she would just start snack-time. Yum, cheesestrings!

Anyways, she said she loves baby geese but doesn't like the big ones. I mentioned that the little ones do grow into the big ones. She said, not if we give them Fluoroquinolones (we'd just learned that they will arrest bone growth if given to children, and we're nerds). The image of tiny, but adult looking geese disturbs me, but also kind of intrigues me. It would actually be pretty dangerous because you would see the goose, but think it must be very far away. You probably wouldn't realize the error in that assumption until it has already pecked your eyes out, preventing you from making the same mistake twice. So, unless you are an evil mad man/woman looking to take over the world by blinding people with optical illusion geese, please think twice before making a tiny novelty goose. Although, if all the geese were tiny, it would probably decrease the total amount of goose poo I could stumble upon, which would be positive. I think what I'm saying is I need to do a more in-depth risk/benefit assessment of mini-geese, before I make a final recommendation on the creation of them.

The other day, Shamus messaged me to say that I haven't been blogging about him enough lately, and that he's pretty sure that's all people want to read about, so I should increase my average Shamus percentage in my posts. I wasn't so sure, but then I remembered that I could add a poll. Actually, I've been looking for something to poll about, because polls are super fun and I don't get to do enough in everyday life. Please answer my poll question and I will reward you by either listening to or ignoring the responses.

To end off, I'd like to say that every emergency medicine course I've taken has been totally useless, because they never include what to do in the event of a bear mauling. Yes, it is helpful to know how to deliver a baby, but what is the ideal method for delivering a baby while a bear is eating your left arm? And how do I do CPR when a bear is clawing my face off? They just never give the important information, that's all I'm saying.

Don't make me crush you.

Today I had the pleasure of spending 5 minutes believing that the former contents of my office had fallen into some sort of mystical black hole in my school. There's nothing quite like realizing that every overpriced textbook that you've purchased in the last 4 years knowing that they would somehow benefit you in the future (and by the future, I mean, today) is gone, and that there's little you could have done to prevent it, except for to not trust anyone. Ever. But I had trusted people, and as far as I knew, those people had chosen to drag my stuff through an area with known mystical black holes, allowed it to fall into one said hole and then decided to pretend that nothing happened. "What thousands of dollars worth of texts?" (That's not an actual quote, it's more an imagined quote, but I don't know how to use imaginary quotation marks).

Luckily, my books somehow managed to reappear as rapidly as they were lost, and I learned to appreciate their existence again, which may or may not have been their plan all along. My poor lonely textbooks just wanted attention. Actually, that's probably a good plot for a Pixar movie. An incredibly boring Pixar movie, that's a lot like Toy Story 3, but for people that had a really depressing childhood.

During the time spent believing that other's incompetence had somehow lost me so much in such a short time, I was reacquainted with a side of myself that I don't frequently get to meet: The part of me that believes that if I'm angry enough I can bring down whole corporations just with my mind. She's often come out when dealing with cell phone companies. I like to think the only reason that Telus is still around is because I managed calm down before anything really bad happened to them. I like to think I'm like the Hulk, but prettier, and less with the smashing.

Once in high school, I decided that I would write a birthday story for my friend Izy Kigs, because I liked to write and I'm bad at thinking of gifts people would actually want. I can't remember what the story was about, but I think it involved mathemagic and it was the most fantastically awesome bit of awesomeness that anyone has ever created. Or so I assume. Either way, no one will ever be able to challenge that assertion because it has been lost to the ages. You see, I saved it on a floppy disc, because that was what you did at the time, and, when I tried to open it to print it, I realized that the disc had done one of those annoying things that discs do and erased itself. I went through all the stages of grief.

Denial: "It's still there, it has to still be there. It's just hiding, that's all. These things don't just disappear."

Anger: "How could you do this to me? Why? You did this, you horrible disc. Why do you suck so much? I will destroy you." (This is the point where I crushed it with my bear hands...oh wait, not bear hands, bare hands. Although, it was a little like I had bear hands, with the destruction and such, but it also wasn't much like bear hands because I didn't have claws.)

Bargaining: "I'll tape you back together if you just give me back my story."

Depression: "I'm not sure I even want to live in a world without my story of awesome awesomeness."

Acceptance: "It's okay. The story is gone, but I can rebuild." (At which point I taped the mangled disc to a picture of Harry Potter and wrote the story of how I'd written a story that would have been a wonderful present if this disc hadn't thwarted my efforts, because it's evil, but she shouldn't worry, because I have destroyed it. I know the whole battle of good and evil is a little cliche, but it's what I had at that point.)

The moral of this post: When life gives you evil discs from hell, crush them and give them to your friend for their birthday. Chances are they'll be much too terrified to ever indicate anything but pleasure at the present, which, as far as you're concerned, means it's a good present.

Clean!

...or at least clean looking from the angle I originally took the picture from, which is good, because it means most of the floor is clear for dancing. I'm sure the rest of my room will follow suit when it sees the attention that corner is getting.

Having arrived home late last night from the airport, and knowing that the next few days are busy, I took today to finish all the random things I've been avoiding for the last, well, forever. I tried to clean for awhile before I decided I should probably head into school to get some paperwork done. There I ran into my friend Tamari Ferrari, who was nervous because she had a job interview this afternoon. I like to think I'm good at giving unsolicited advice, especially the type that's completely unfounded in reality, so I was eager to help her out. And now, I'm eager to help you out as well, by repeating some of the advice I gave her today.

When approaching any sort of social situation where you feel nervous, it's important to remember that the other person is likely to be just as insecure as you are, but they might be better at hiding it. If you are the kick-ass employee you think you are, then they're going to want to impress you enough to take their job. The key to a good interview is to play into that insecurity, and make sure that everything you do is aimed at keeping them off-kilter. The number one thing that will achieve this is rapid, erratic movements. If they think you're going to zig, but then you zag, it will throw them off completely. As well as totally freaking them out, it sends a clear message that you are probably a gazelle, or maybe a rabbit. But it also sends a message saying, "This person will most likely survive if a bear ever enters our place of business." Unexpected bear attack survival is an admirable trait in an employee, even in a downtown setting.

Another thing to play into your potential employers insecurities is to vary the volume of your voice in a way that does not correspond to anything that you're saying. This is especially effective if your potential employer is old enough to worry about losing their hearing. If you want to take this to the next level, try adding in different accents or periodic singing. They'll be so confused by what's going on that they probably won't notice much else, making this a particularly good tool if you have no idea what you're doing.

The last, and most important way to throw them off is prolonged eye contact. This is how primates signal dominance, or something. Be aware that if they turn out to be dominant to you, they will most likely claw your face off. But, chances are they will crumble under your uninterrupted gaze, and then find you a delicious banana. There might be some moments while utilizing this skill where it feels so awkward that you want to look away. Don't. It's not creepy at all. Really.

Now that you've got the job, think of the person that got you there (by which I mean, me). Then send them money. Remember the ideal way to store such money is in a big bag with a dollar sign on the side. If I get enough, then I'll change it all into pennies and try to swim in it like Scrooge McDuck. Then, the next time you have to interview for a job, maybe it will be cleaning my giant penny pool. It's win-win, or something.

Clearly sweets are on my mind

Today I went to Vancouver to visit my friend Jemima Brooklyn. Actually, I'm writing this post on my iPod notepad (note: not equivalent to the iPad, which is continuing to confuse me as I try to figure out how something that's pretty much an awkwardly sized iPod/iPhone is so desirable) on the train(bus) home that I just had to sprint to catch. There's nothing quite like sprinting away from a plateful of desserts to catch the last train(bus) home. What makes such a trip particularly fun is the increased metabolism of the couple of drinks I had with dinner, one of which was full of cotton candy. It was so very awesome that the well dressed, stiff-shouldered children across from us looked incredibly jealous.


I felt sad for the poor stiff children, who struck me as just an accessory to go with their mother's perfect, and also stiff, hair. Jemima texted me on the train(bus) after I'd left to let me know that the mother had left them to go to the washroom and they relaxed for a bit. I noted earlier that the washrooms smelled like candy, so I'm hoping that kept her in there a little bit longer to allow their tiny trapezius muscles to get a good break.

We also were given complementary Kobe beef meatballs. Jemima thought that grinding up Kobe beef seemed like a waste of particularly good beef, then described how the process of producing Kobe beef involves regular massages to keep them tender. So, naturally, I asked, "Is that before or after they're dead?" and she said, "Before." Which made me think that they probably have a better quality of life than most farm animals. If it weere after, I would have thought it was about equal.

Then Jemima wondered if rich people who get a lot of massages produce better meat, which I thought was a good thing to look into in preparation for if you ever find yourself in an island planecrash. It's also a good reason to avoid massages if you're planning on flying anytime soon. Additionally, I'm not certain that the bears aren't already aware of the relationship between massages and deliciousness, so probably best to avoid bear country too if you're fond of massages.

I should probably mention that at the time of the Kobe beef discussion, I tried to write a note in my iPod to remind me to blog about it. But, the "M" button is so close to delete that "Kobe beef massage" became "Kobe beefassage", which seems quite unappetizing. Almost as unappetizing as cannibalism jokes, one might say.

Last night, I discovered one more reason that I very much love Char-char Junior the Second. She was a bit fussy, so I was singing her "New York, New York" which I know pretty well, due to my vagabond shoes' generally strong desire to stray (and also to step around the heart of it). Unfortunately, as impressive as my lyric knowledge and emotional connection to the song may be, it doesn't actually help me to sing it on-key. Usually, I get midway through and realize that the song is suddenly out of my very limited range and need to go down an octave, or just fake it and hope for the best. But Char-char, being the perfect niece that she is, actually smiles more the further off-key I get. This is good, because it happens often and baby smiles are like delicious candy, but in baby form and less likely to cause diabetes.

Based on that last simile, I'm wondering if I'm still missing the delicious plate of desserts that I left behind to ensure I could make it home to blog this. So, I'm going to end this post with a delicious picture of the aforementioned dessert. Enjoy.

It takes 21 Days to Break/Make a Habit

I bet you didn't notice the time passing, gentle reader, since your life has been abundant with metaphorical rainbows and puppy-dogs since my blog filled the dark hole in your heart you didn't even know existed until it was occupied by my musings. Or so I assume. But, time has passed, so much time that this is my 21st post. And, as my title may indicate, I've often heard it takes 21 days to break a habit, or, in this case, to make a habit. Unless you want to think of it as breaking my bad habit of not writing down random stuff everyday and posting it for your amusement, which is what I'm choosing to do. So today, I'm celebrating 2 things: My 21 days of posting, officially making daily posting a "habit" and the fact that I wasn't eaten by bears...yet. Everything's coming up Sharon!

Today I learned that when walking at Lilliput's place, it is important to watch for cow pies. That was a good lesson. I went on a quest to see their new calf while simultaneously not being eaten by bears, and though I was good on the second count, I could not find any sign of baby cow. I did see big cows though, and I think I need to apologize to Yelsel D'Stupid for mocking her belief that cows eat meat, because I'm pretty sure they were eying me in the way that something that wants to eat something else will eye up that something else. Then one licked its side, the universal sign for "I'm going to eat you and you will be delicious." Cows are terrifying and I'm glad for the invention of fences.

Thinking of fences, since going to the zoo, I have been considering ways it could be improved. My friend, Enna McLoggin suggested that it would be better if you could pay extra to go in a tiny cage inside the carnivores cage, so that they might be more interested in eating you. Also, to further increase the thrill, they could throw a rabbit in with you. I think that Alfred Von Bunnikins has super bunny senses, because after writing this I tried to pick him up and he bunny-ninjaed me.

So, later on (after first writing about my cow adventures) I went back with Shamus and did see the calf. Forgetting exactly how much the cows seemed to want to eat me earlier, I decided that I would try to pet one of them. Despite Shamus' assurances that the chances of them killing me were low (wait, in hindsight, he never actually assured that as much as didn't disagree when I asked whether it might be a possibility), I didn't manage to pet one because they seemed a little bloodthirsty as I approached. The point of this story is that I tried though. Tried and failed. And the lesson is if you never try, you never fail. But you also won't get to pet awesome cows. Although, I did try, and failed and also didn't get to pet cows, so I'm not sure what the point really is. Perhaps it's that before I die, I will pet a cow, even if it leads to my cause of death being cow.

From the land of bears

Music is my friend, but also, not my friend. It's very good at bringing me out of my many funks, especially when combined with dancing or walking, but it also will periodically create bad moods. This is due to my inability to listen to a song without believing it to be 100% true. For example, "You Can't Always Get What You Want" by the Rolling Stones. I listen to it and think "How poignant, it is true, I shouldn't always expect to get what I want." Wrong. It's not a matter of not getting what I want, it's about being vague in exactly what that is. You can't say, "I want 8.7 monkey butlers and I want them to all answer to the name Floyd" and expect to get what you want. What you need to say is, "I want some sort of something to serve me delicious Pina Coladas at some point in my future." There is every chance that this second choice will probably happen, but it does not eliminate the possibility that that something is a monkey butler named Floyd. By following this simple strategy, you can guarantee that you will always get what you want, especially if what you want is to prove Mick Jagger wrong.

"Don't Stop Believing" is one of my favorite songs, but it's also a little ridiculous. I mean, why tell me to not stop believing and yet never define what I'm supposed to believe in? It also gives me no clue as to what the feeling I'm supposed to hold onto is. I assume it's some sort of positive feeling, like "happy" or "exuberant", but it very well could be "anger" or "apathy", in which case, it's not actually a very good song at all. Although, to be honest, I've found both anger and apathy to be very useful emotions at times. Regardless, I think that this already awesome song could be far more awesome if it gave clearer instructions. Example: Don't Stop Believing (that leprechauns are going to give you delicious chocolate gold), Hold on to that (somewhat nauseous from delicious chocolate) feeling. Sometimes I wonder if Journey might have been aware of this, but concerned about unleashing a song that awesome on the world.

I've been listening to a lot of Dixie Chicks lately. It started with the song, "Not Ready to Make Nice" because I wasn't. Then, I moved onto "Top of the World", which I like for it's dramatic strings, but sometimes I allow it to convince me that I'm a songbird with a broken wing that's never going to fly to the top of the world because of some jerk. Then I feel sad and weak and imagine that someone has somehow broken me. Then I have to remind myself exactly how false that is. If anything, I'm something that eats the little song bird, like a hawk (I just Googled "What eat songbirds" and had a disturbing number of hits). Actually, a hawk is not quite awesome enough. I'm more like a dragon. Want to try to break my wings? Go for it, because now you're on fire.

Today I tried to bike to a river. It went well, by which I mean, I'm still alive and found my way back to the computer to write this. But I couldn't find a river, mainly because, as I learned later, it was to the South, and I was heading due West. Sometimes, when you want to go somewhere, it's helpful if you know where it is first, instead of just hoping that your bike might act as some sort of divining rod and find water. That is what I learned today.

We're visiting Lilliput's family's home, where apparently bears run rampant and eat many apples, then pass out on the lawn in a drunken apple stupor. Sometimes they have bear fights. So, I fear this may be my last post. It's been nice. If I survive the maulings, I'll post again tomorrow.

Hippo Bus!!!

Today was the last day I could spend with my friend Byla for a long time, so we decided to do something special to mark the occasion. Our dream was to ride the Hippo Bus, an amphibious vehicle that gives tours around Toronto. For a month, whenever I felt sad, or bored, or lonely, I would text Byla things like: "Woot woot, Hippo Bus." or "Guess what...Hippo Bus!!!!". I think what's so alluring about it is the thrilling potential of a horrible Hippo bus accident, because, seriously, buses should probably stay on land, even ones with cartoon Hippos drawn on the side. That might just be my opinion, but I think it's a good one.

Regardless of the safety of Hippo Buses, an important rule to live by is: check the price of tourist attractions before you get your heart set on them. I say this because we discovered the Hippo Bus is $38 a person. Pretty much, for $38 you get a 5 minute boat ride, because I'm sure the rest of the tour you're really just waiting to be in the water or wondering why the water part was not as cool as you'd expected it to be. I don't have the experience to know that for a fact though, because we quickly decided that the Hippo bus wasn't for us and instead went to the CN tower.

The CN tower has all the terror of the Hippo bus, but with the added bonus of a no-contact security systems that makes you feel like you're in the future. By the way, I just had to Google "security at the CN tower" to remember what it was called, so there is every chance I've been marked as a potential terrorist. If I stop posting, you should probably assume it's related to that...that or a bear attack. The glass floor is kind of fun, but would be better if it were cleaner, because I want to really imagine that I could fall. I think they should have a second glass floor that you can pay extra for that they carefully de-scuff every night for maximum terror (oh no, I just tried to Google "terror synonyms" because I didn't want to use it twice...this is not going to end well).

The CN tower is full of blatant lies, like the following:
I payed my extra 4 dollars to go up 33 stories and have the city bow to my awesome power, but nothing. I considered asking for my 4 dollars back, but didn't want to deal with the hassle. The point is, never trust anything the CN tower tells you, because it is a liar. Now, at least, I've saved you 4 dollars and a lot of disappointment.

While on the observation deck, I noticed this door:
Then I thought about how I'd walked the entire observation deck and had not noticed an exit route of any kind (well, none that wouldn't lead to immediate death) and was terrified by the futility of the so-called emergency exit. We decided it would be a good idea to take the elevator down shortly after this, which brought us directly into the gift shop, where I decided to take pictures of products I disliked, like this shirt:
How many children could honestly wear this shirt? Based on the father's size relative to the CN tower, it is clear that he is some sort of horrible gigantic mutant. That or a robot. Except, robots can't have children. So he's not a robot. Which brings us back to mutant. The worst thing about it is that giant mutant children probably can't even fit into a child sized t-shirt, so it's like the shirt is teasing them. Finally they find a shirt that accurately expresses their feelings about their giant dad and it's not available in their size. I thought I hated it the most until I saw this book:
Seriously, why do you need to say bears 3 times? And why is it in a CN tower gift shop? I came to this tourist attraction to be scared by heights, not by bears. Here I am, innocently walking around looking at various phallic souvenirs, and then, "Holy crap, 'Bears Bears Bears'"! No warning sign or anything. There is just no awareness of bear phobia in our society, it's ridiculous.

Speaking of phallic souvenirs, Byla commented on how our society has too many phallic symbols, and I said, "You're right, where are all the big hole tourist attractions?" Sometimes it seems that the universe is listening to me, because, within 30 seconds we came across this children's book:
That's my disturbed look. We left the gift shop shortly after that. I wondered if it might have been a better idea to just pay the $38 for the Hippo Bus.

I love the zoo, but hate the maulings

Spring is the best time to go to the zoo. Today I went and saw some giraffes mating. Well, kind of. He was trying really hard, but she was having none of it, which made it a thousand times more awesome, watching him get shot down repeatedly.

Animal sex is amusing all on its own, but what makes it much more amusing is listening to parents trying to avoid having to explain what's happening to their little ones through a variety of futile distraction techniques.

While they worked hard to preserve their children's innocence, I took a picture.



I also enjoy taunting animals that would maul me if I ran into them in nature. They mainly ignore it, but I think it affects them more than they let on.

I spent awhile standing behind a tree watching a polar bear and imagining that we were out in the wild in an epic man-against-nature struggle. I was hoping that he would see me and charge, but he only glanced at me briefly with a "Seriously, I can see you, but I'm pretending not to because I'm embarrassed for you," look. And that's when I learned that polar bears are surprisingly expressive. Also, kind of assholes.



Anything monkey or monkey-like is exciting to me. There was a monkey-like creature (clearly I don't go to the zoo to learn taxonomy) missing a hind leg. People seemed sad for it, but I thought he had it set. If he wasn't in the zoo he probably would have been eaten a long time ago. He worked really hard to make friends.

Too hard. I'm glad I'm not a monkey, because he would annoy me but then I would feel bad because of the missing leg, but then think, "Seriously, why so annoying?" The internal conflict of annoyance versus sympathy would almost certainly obliterate me over time. Luckily, I'm not a monkey.

Sometimes from a distance I'll see a parent pick up a small child and think "Monkey!" then get very sad when I realize it's not monkey, just a tiny human. I see those all the time. That is the part of the zoo that is sad, the tricks. I don't like to be tricked. Especially by small children masquerading as monkeys.



Driving home I thought, "This is a nice neighbourhood. I wonder if the property value is affected by the increased odds of tiger mauling." I haven't really looked into it, but if it isn't, I think it should be. Tiger maulings suck. Although, I have to admit that part of the draw of the zoo is the potential for some sort of terrifying animal escape, like in Jurassic Park.

After seeing Jurassic Park, I couldn't sleep for multiple days because I was pretty sure a Velociraptor was going to eat me in the night. The only reason I was ever able to sleep again was realizing that their big clawed hands can only open lever-style door handles. They are powerless against the common doorknobs, no matter how intelligent they may be. And that is the story of how I overcame my fear of Velociraptors.