Well yeee haw

Today I passed my first aid course.
So now I can start saving lives. Not sure that I really want to, but having first aid is not the worst thing. Plus I got to meet some real different people there, if you know what I mean. And I got to blow into molded plastic dummys.

They kept breaking us up into groups to enact different situations, etc. This whole scene is pretty foreign to me. The whole office thing, and the role playing thing. I'm used to meditating on foot, and garden gazing. So this woman says,
"last night I had a bath with my daughter and she tried to shave my legs, ha ha", so Geri and I looked at each other, thinking uh, ok, and then Geri says, "how old is your daughter?", and the woman says, "She's 15. Sometimes we like to take baths together".

Oh.

I guess it's normal for a 40 year old woman to take baths with her 15 year old daughter?

It was all too bizarre for me!

Go West Young Man

I have just received news that my delinquant 20 something brother will be arriving sometime this week in Vancouver. I'm not sure that he has a plan, nor am I sure that he has any money, but he will be showing up here after riding in a car across the better part of Canada. That alone is a pretty amazing feat.

I know he's done it once before, because my mother took both of my brothers camping back when they were young lads. Not bad for a single mother with 3 kids. I was already off at Uni by this time.
So anyways, yeah. I have fears that he'll just get hooked on the Chronsky and then spend all of his time on the couch, not to mention the harder drugs that are literally a stone's throw away. Hopefully he's smarter than that. The drug scene here is just so harsh, that I can't help but worry.

I almost committed a GIANT blog faux pas yesterday as I was setting something up for our little neighbourhood group! I just went about my business setting up a new blog, and then realized that it was DIRECTLY connected to this blog, where I rant and rave about the hood, and just generally blow off steam about this N that.
That would be SO bad, for someone to read what I have written if it's not entirely favourable. YIKES! This is just a problem that I seem to get myself into over and over again throughout the years. It goes back, baby, and I can remember very early shadowy memories of how this behavior started.
Just one of the many dangers of putting all this stuff somewhere.

HIGH-YAAAAAAAA!

fabulous Friday!!!

I just received great news. Aside from waking up today relatively head ache free, my neighbour Susan just emailed to say that the housing sale didn't go through, and that she won't be moving.

Fantastic!!

I don't know the particulars of why the sale fell through. Perhaps the asking price of 719, 000 was too much. Perhaps there was a problem with the foundation or some such, which is almost an epidemic these days. People will buy anything out of panic it seems. Even we are guilty of that to some extent, but we just figured if WE didn't take it, then somebody else would. So here we are now...

Yes!! So I'll have to celebrate this weekend with a good old fashioned street cleaning, and garden overhaul.
solidarity through street cleaning!!!!!!

Blaaaaaaaaaahg your pain away

I'm home sick, and there are some that say I'm sick a lot, even though I feel like a super healthy person.
I felt this cold coming on all week, and Ibuprofin is just not kicking it. I would love some of those designer drugs that seem abundant in the good ole' USA, but I can't seem to get my hands on any.
I need a corrupt doctor.
So I'm just wallowing around today, and wish the head would detach itself from my shoulders for a while.
I'm determined to get some 'home chores' done, half dead or not. This is so offensive to say as I watch 24 hour non-stop Storm Watch on CNN.

Why don't I just kill my television once and for all!!?!!

I just dumped the remainder of Vij's heavenly Bengal 5 spice curry down the sick, so now I can smell the delicious aromas wafting up from the drains. mmmMmmmm delicious. Because I always rinse my dishes with hot water over the sink WITH the drying rack, so now I can count on that hot water mingling with the 5 day old, 5 spice curry, and drifting up to tantalize my nostrils. Excessuvis commas Accumulus. Yes, that is disgusting. And how's that for mundane? fer christs.

I do believe he must put crack in his curry, 'cause I could certainly eat it multiple times a week. We took our friends C and A from Claremont there, and we loved it to bits. Vij's. It's a fusion restaurant, so there are some interesting hybrids, but I'm much to conservative, or habitual to try anything different. Their Saag Paneer is to die for. Creamy and spicy and out of control really. Their Daal, which I would normally never order, and find too boring, is even fantastic. I would recommend this place to any tourist coming into Vancouver. It's just not cheap, so be prepared to shell out and enjoy!!

I do feel better. Hope this passes whatever it is.
uggghhhhhhlllllllllk

My neighbour Susan, two doors down, has decided to spring for the $719, 000 house. I can totally understand why she needs to leave. When a woman sits on her porch in the middle of summer and weeps, it's time to go. I'm sad, and bummed for selfish reasons. She tends to a public garden here that will now fill up with crud. Unimaginable crud.
It is sad.
She will be missed.

In the Ghetto

We've run into some ideological conundrums within our little neighbourhood group. Hands Across Hastings. It's a good thing, because I know that there is a fight a brewin', and it's just a matter of time before the shit hits the fan.
You see, our neighbourhood is strongly politicized, with many services for the homeless, addicted, and mentally ill. This is fine, and encouraged. But it is the criminal element that I personally am begging to take issue with, and this eventually boils down to the police not doing their job. Now I'll be the first to admit that I have some preconceptions about police officers, and this is based on personal experience. I have seen many occasions here in the city where the cops have basically run amok. And then there are the issues of abuse, which include assault and various other human rights violations committed on these same people we are asking them to protect. It's touchy and troublesome, and I can't even pretend to have it sorted out in my own head. I'm just wary of trying to speak for everyone, so we need tolerance.


Some people in the 'hood work for this group called the Portland Hotel Society. This group is in the business of managing peoples live, and it does so while at the same time serving their own needs. Which at times are altogether self serving. So while doing good work, they also rely on a steady stream of disenfranchised bodies to house and manage, so the criminal element to them, must seem to be an important link in the chain. I'm sure that they wouldn't come out and say as much, but they help users to organize and protest and ask for gov't sanctioned crack pipes. So for this interest that they have, I wonder why they can't just provide a marketplace for drugs on their own property, so that addicts can congregate there instead of everywhere else, and getting killed in traffic wandering oblivious into the streets. Something akin to a Farmer's Market. They're already opening dealing on the streets, so why not just flip them a courtyard to hang out in?

I see this element as something different when I see how it preys upon people. Especially women and young girls who really aren't making good choices, and either ARE or aren't aware of how cruel the world can be. Not to mention how seriously fucked up some individual's can be. It is harsh.


As it happens, when the gentrification begins, groups form to oppose the existence of these services, or the mere presence of these needy individuals. It's the typical Not In My Back Yard syndrome. One member of our little group, was a former mouthpiece for another group that bought condos in a super sketchy part of town, then began to protest the already existing issues that blighted the 'hood. He basked in some brief fame on the local news, and is quite zealous about his views. I don't feel comfortable aligning myself with him, because I'm more moderate and tolerant that he clearly is. On the other hand, I saw another couple of my neighbours in a vigilante style posse shout a hooker off the block. She had the saddest face, and it was someone I've seen many times. I would never shout her off the block. This pissed me off, but I really don't care to have johns lurking around either. I just thought that the two guys were a bit too Resevoir Dogs.

Guess I'm just venting off some steam. Will likely change my mind in an hour anyways. That's learnin' I guess.

I got this stupid email today...

"There is a house for sale on 800 Union st. for 719,000. It has a
finished basement suite ready to rent and is beautifully done upstairs.
Garage back yard etc. if you want to let your friends know.
- Bink"

Isn't that fuckin' ridiculous? I don't even really know this person, so am wondering how I even got on this list?
Thanks for lettin' me know Binks, I'll take 2!!!

And I am SO sick of talking about real estate! UGH.
boring Sydney!!!

A Mom blab... be forewarned!!!

Now I know why they call them the terrible twos.
It's like the child is posessed, with some irrational, dramatic, force that just keeps them going on for hours and hours and hours...until......(%@#$%$#@!!!!!%@$%)!!! And this is not hard to deal with, if you are in the right frame of mind, but if you are in the least bit tired, or divided in thought, and nearing the edge, you can be carried along in the chaos quite nicely until you realize that you are being PLAYED!!!

So we've signed the toddler up for tumbling class, where she can go with one of us, to burn off steam in the gyn, on a mat, with other kids. Good idea non?She has literally been flying off the couch lately. She's ALWAYS trying to do front rolls, and headstands, and all sorts of silliness.
I have been in many discussions with other moms over this 'to enrole', or 'not to enrole' aspect of parenting. I fall soundly in the middle and tend to tune out when some mothers starting listing off the activities, they do, which can amount to 4 days a week. Let the poor kid be a kid....sheesh. But if you have no ideas, maybe it's good to get in there. I dunno.

music appreciation, tumbling, yoga, swimming, art, dance, etc, etc, It's all a bit overwhelming really. And these sound like the good ones to me. How many other weird ones are out there that I just don't know about?

On the other end of the spectrum is the 'phobic of the outside world' mom, who rarely, if ever enroles her children in some extra curricular activity. What's the deal? "Oh, we tried the swimming thing, the teacher spent all the time with the weak kid".
Uh, yeah, it's called life, and maybe your child needs to learn some tolerance. Not to mention that swimming can be a life or death activity.

A life skill even.

What good is a bunch of pre teens on the beach wearing life jackets? If there's one thing that you should teach your child, it is to swim.I don't wanna be a buzz kill, so I'll just add that something really terrible happened around here regarding a toddler drowning, and it was a BAD scene. It was also connected to me as a business relationship, so I guess I'm passionate about this one. Teach your child to swim!!!

now playing...

Chad van Gaalen is a young lad from Calgary. I'm just getting into his album Infiniheart. It's all over the place.
care to give it a listen?

Avoid the Beating F**K OFF

Yrmom took all the credit for this one on Buzznet, but believe me, I took all the risk.
That's him and little "e" getting into that Hampton.

Why would someone wear a shirt like this in public? It totally freaks me out. So did finding him beside me after he acknowleged me taking a pic of him. His neck tattoos didn't scare me.

The PNE was such a great mix of humanity, how could you not just love everyone out there? I was well onto the freaks though. It must have been my motherspowers kicking in. I saw one guy, a grown adult male, dressed completely like Huck Finn. Yup, little straw hat, pants pulled up too high, with a weird belt cinched around him. And of course because I have this Freak Radar, the people always spot me out lookin'.
I can't help it, it's the peeping tom in me...and am just glad that I didn't get a beating for snapping this one....

teee heeeeeeee

There's a break in the clouds

Wow, it has taken a few days for the gravity of the flood situation to sink in. I'm always so reluctant to wade in because my mind is so reactionary until I start processing things.

I must be handicapable in some way.

It's also that my political views lean quite far on one side of the spectrum, even with the pockets of redneck that embarrassingly splurge forth at times. I don't need to call out the freaks and haters, they already appear in my bubble enough as it is!! I am a freak magnet, but less of one than in the past at least. We are making progress.
And yes, that IS a royal we.

When I finally got the scope of what was going on in the south, I couldn't believe the photos I was seeing on CNN. And I really had to control what I saw and heard, because it's hard enough for me to stay positive as it is. It's seriously a daily decision to try and stay positive, and then to see so much neglect and hardship ON OUR OWN CONTINENT, it was pretty bad there for a few days. I was baffled by all the talk of the looters and how heinous their supposed thefts were...um it's a life or death situation people....who cares about a few vcrs or whatnot? Then I heard of some truly awful shit, and all the bad people that take advantage of crisis situations, to rape and such. I'm a bit of a Polyanna when it comes to that. I guess I need to have some falsely inflated optimism towards humans. Otherwise, how do you go on? Why even today I read something tawdry about cannibalism. Really? That's got to be a nasty rumour. But nothing would surprise me even more. Some cannibals get busy when times are good.


I don't really want to add much, except to say that I'm happy to see that America is confronting it's own biases for a change. It seems like the disconnect between reality and the media has been there for so long. Even in the mainstream, there was such an absence of self-criticism about so much. And I'm not even as focused as SOME bloggers. I usually get his news stories a couple of weeks after the event. But we don't come here for news do we? We come here to read the ramblings about the neighbourhood, and to survey the flotsam that bobs out of my head.

that's 'nuff rambling for now