the daily snivel
This of course is all further complicated by the fact that Mel lives in the apartment upstairs from me, and we have joint custody of a cat that she adopted in January. George lives downstairs with me, because it turns out that Mélanie is severely allergic to him (to the point of having asthmatic attacks), but she adores him and visits him every day, brings him upstairs for snuggly naps, buys his food, pays the veterinary bills, etc. I have a good arrangement. I just put the food in his bowl, add some love, scoop out the litter box and give him a warm place to sleep, and he wakes me up every morning with disgusting cat kisses all over my lips and nose. So, we still don't have a clearly delineated home situation. This makes moving on difficult, not only because our daily lives are peppered with constant communication and contact, but because that is such a comfortable way to do manage our lives right now. It would be very hard to introduce new people and new situations to that balance, or to want to.
By no means am I ready for a new relationship in any event. I really am happy with things the way they are right now. It's fuzzy but uncomplicated. I think it's a good idea for people to get comfortable with the idea of being single -- to learn that they shouldn't define their lives in terms of a relationship or another person. Loneliness is natural, and the more time goes by the more frequently one's thoughts will turn to lovin' or smooching or something similar, but the rush to be in a relationship can mean making bad choices, and can make it harder to leave a relationship if it goes sour. It's better to see solitude as a choice, and a bit of a luxury, so that sharing oneself with another person becomes a bit of a sacrifice (or a love offering), and not a "completion" or something similarly self-abnegating. This is not easy for someone who has been known to be very sucky and needy in the past, but I'm trying to see things in a new way, especially after historically alternating between being badly hurt and similarly hurting others.
Still. I do admit (from personal experience) that a body does sometimes want the thrill of going out on dates with new and interesting people. It makes you feel attractive and desirable and buoyed by optimism and a little positive momentum. It's possibly even zesty. And, yes, it can lead to smooching.
So, I decided to try my luck within the bizarre world of on-line dating. It's a bit like the cybernetic world of TRON, having adventure and pitfalls and computer generated images and lots of acronyms (like... shudder... 'LOL' and 'RU' and 'PPL'), but without the reassuring certainty that because it's fiction, and Disney, and 1982, everything will work out perfectly in the end and everyone will be happy and get what they deserve. No, on-line dating has no such guarantees.
I'm sure you've all visited websites like The Onion, Salon.com, Nerve.com, and Television Without Pity (and so on), and I'm sure you've all noticed the photo of some hottie of the day posted prominently at each. This is the front face of an interconnected network of portals run by Spring Street Networks, which has been making lots and lots of money of late by hooking readers of said sites up. Granted, the demographics involved (young, educated, liberal, urban) makes for a fairly enlightened sample, and so I decided to sign myself up.
If curiousity ever got the better of you, I could be found therein as 'atypical_male' (I mean, what else?).
I'm swallowing my pride by admitting all this to you, but I figure it's about time someone was honest about it. And, to be sure, I felt that the guy I saw last week when I was out with friends at The Honest Lawyer -- who was really and truly dressed in a shirt that was halfway unbuttoned, with chains around his neck, and was all by himself and looking to pick up drunk chicks -- was a LOT more pathetic and desperate than someone who can face up to the fact that it is sometimes hard to meet new, single people in this big and disconnected urban civilization. I basically decided that since I wasn't looking for a serious relationship anyway, I had very little to lose by dating some local smartypantses and adding some cheese (not spice) to my social life.
So, interested in the dates themselves? Tired of contrived romance on so-called reality TV? Got a voyeuristic penchant for some genuine dirt? Wanna live vicariously through me by getting the juicy details?
Then stay tuned.
You're the United Nations!
Most people think you're ineffective, but you are trying to completely save the world from itself, so there's always going to be a long way to go. You're always the one trying to get friends to talk to each other, enemies to talk to each other, anyone who can to just talk instead of beating each other about the head and torso. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't, and you get very schizophrenic as a result. But your heart is in the right place, and sometimes also in New York.
Take the Country Quiz at the Blue Pyramid
Describes me right down to my Netherlands. Thanks to Cruinne for pointing that one out.
I like to periodically capture images of myself through the reliably terrible medium of bus terminal photobooths, because nothing captures a soul like grainy, grainy film drenched in overexposed lighting. My only regret about this photo is that it cut off the best part of my hand, which of course was pointed at my pretty head like an imaginary gun. And I'm trying to wince, but of course I can't take myself seriously and am smiling quite genially. One of the reasons I took it was so that I could post it on the salon/nerve/onion personals site so as to update my profile. After some waffling and wrestling with the last lingering vestiges of my personal pride, I decided that I'm finally going to write a piece about my many tragically comic (or comically tragic... tramedy?) experiences in on-line dating in the next couple of days, and I want something obvious out there if people are at all inclined to find me and see what sorts of offerings I'm dangling in front of my fellow electronic lonelyhearts.
Meanwhile, of course, I have to talk about the crazy blackout that I and millions of other people in Ontario and the US Eastern Seaboard endured through 24 hours or so of pure inconvenience. I was at work when the lights went out, and at first we assumed that the problem was confined to our floor, or at the very worst our building. Looking out my office window, however, I could see dozens of people stepping out onto their balconies, almost in unison, and looking out at one another in a shared consciousness of confusion and a/be/musement. People met each other's eyes, and shrugged, and milled about, staring into the streets for some sign of what had happened, and so I knew that the problem spanned at least a significant chunk of downtown Ottawa. After fifteen minutes of blackness, it was clear the lights weren't coming back on in time to save the afternoon, so my colleagues left work early. I promised to lock up, as I had to change into my bicycle shorts and didn't want to have to do that in a pitch-black bathroom.
The neat thing about cycling everywhere is that one tends to rely on a security blanket of tools and attachments that might come in handy in adverse situations. Some would find it inconvenient to always have a backpack, but I wouldn't head out without its reassuring presence. In mine I keep a tire pump, a hand-sized toolkit, LED head and tail-lamps, spare batteries, lubricant, and of course gobs and gobs of ire to share with motorists who aren't sharing the road, and those pesky people sashaying through life on in-line skates. Anyway, the important extra of that day was my Cateye headlamp, which served quite well as a flashlight and allowed me to see my way through dark hallways and the sightless depths of the bathroom, which I ultimately had to make use of despite my best efforts.
When I finally left for the day, I found the streets locked up in the worst kind of traffic, as traffic lights everywhere were dead and people essentially had to commute through rush hour on good intentions and barely remembered Drivers' Ed instructions on how to treat a four-way intersection when the lights go out. I stopped by a pet store on Bank Street in the hopes of finding crickets for my hungry tree frogs, but all I found were the employees sitting outside and glued to a portable radio. "There won't be any crickets until tomorrow," the clerk told me, "and I'm not even sure about that." From what she could gather, all power in North America was out, and it sounded to her like a terrorist attack. I was incredulous, and speculated that in all likelihood the grid for Ontario and the East Coast had been overloaded in much the same way as in 1965 (knowledge of which I gladly attribute to James Burke's amazing series Connections, which highlighted the cascade of events responsible for this). Ontario hydro officials have been speculating about something similar for years now, because demand is far outstripping supply, and in the summer heat as transmission lines sag and strain to provide enough precious juice, all it would take is an overload somewhere to send the system tumbling.
I sound much more like a know-it-all in hindsight. At the time, my gifted insight sounded much more like, "Nah, it was probably just one air conditioner too many."
On the ride home, I tried (oh, how I tried) to obey the rules of the road. I sat at one intersection for ten minutes, waiting for a bus to move enough past me that I could see whether the lane I wanted to turn into was clear, even for a moment. A young woman had taken the opportunity to park herself on the corner with a notebook, and was busy jotting down everyone's reactions to the outage. For the most part, it seemed like people were just confused. No one had a great deal of information, and conflicting accounts drifted through the air from one conversation to the next.
On Elgin Street, stuck at another intersection, a very nice young woman walking down the street smiled at me and suggested that I should just ride on the sidewalks, as she'd come from further downtown and there was simply no hope as far as traffic was concerned. I'd been thinking the same thing, but had hoped it wouldn't come down to that, as I think it's obnoxious when cyclists hog sidewalks. We agreed that the extenuating circumstances provided something of a justification, and I guiltily hoisted my shiny red bike up onto the sidewalk and continued on my way -- guiltily, but also a lot more speedily. Here and there, at very major intersections, the police were directing traffic (at one or two places, private citizens had bravely or foolishly taken it upon themselves to do the same), but for the most part it was driving anarchy.
I stuck to the roads when I could, though. I didn't believe it when I read it, but most cycling accidents happen on paths or sidewalks or otherwise off city streets. On reflection, though, it begins to make sense, since most of the people who cycle on the road are basically competent to do so safely, whereas any jackass can ride on the sidewalk down a one-way street or zip around the many twists and turns of a recreational path. Indeed, one of our law school colleagues is having a practical exercise in torts right now, as she was involved in a bike accident when the person cycling ahead of her stopped abruptly and improperly. Our friend was thrown from her bike, ruined her knee, required facial stitches and broke her helmet into three pieces. The police kept her helmet. Apparently they like to show the crushed helmets to kids as a reminder of what could have happened to a head in that situation. Our friend needs reconstructive knee surgery and one of our professors is helping with a legal action against the tortfeasor to recover the costs incurred. And all this on a bike path.
Anyway, I made it home safe and sound, and plugged into all the radio news I could get through the CBC. I made sure my friends were also home and safe, and actually had a long nap instead of running around getting freaked out (or drunk). I woke up and lit some candles in the bathroom, making use of some iron sconces there and in the hallway that only rarely get used. Dinner was simple fare -- I could have lit the barbecue or something, but I was tired, and running low on useful foods, so I made peanut butter and jam sandwiches for my friend Mélanie, and ate two cold tofu burgers myself. Overall, it was a pleasant evening, and not really all that humbling. I mean, the lights went out and we all survived. People behaved themselves for the most part, and the power was back on in most of the region by midnight or so. The next day, we put up with rolling blackouts, but the local grocery store had its own generator, so I was able to drop by and pick up everything I needed to survive for a week of blackouts, and still go out later with friends for drinks.
Since then, it's mainly been an exercise in saving power. I bought a laundry rack so that I could dry my clothes outside, and have avoided the air conditioner, the TV, the stove, and the dryer. My iBook has been my trusty friend through all of it, since it has its own battery, connects through dial-up internet, and uses very little power compared to a desktop when plugged in. I actually have the entire week off work, though I'm trying to get work done from home, and find myself trying to make projects for myself that require leaving the house so that I don't turn into a slug. Just yesterday I cycled all the way to Billings Bridge along the river just to buy those crickets I'd been needing, and some school supplies. Today I even cycled to work so I could pick up some files. It's just nice to get out and be productive, even if I am sleeping in to ungodly hours.
In other news, I finally learned which division of the Community Legal Clinic I will be working at come September. As part of our degrees, all law students are required to fulfill oral advocacy requirements that strengthen their presentation, research, and advocacy skills. This can be done through things like moot courts, but I opted to apply for a position at the clinic. Clinic work is similar to what I did with the duty counsel during my undergraduate degree. We're assigned to different divisions (criminal, civil, women's, tenant, HIV, and community legal education) and in these we interview clients, manage cases, and even make some court appearances. It's a lot of extra work, but nevertheless a privilege to be selected for the clinic program. My older sister loved her work in the Women's Division last fall and winter (and she has a summer job there as well), and I knew from before I applied to the University of Ottawa that clinic work really spoke to me.
Anyway, I learned in July that I would be in the clinic program. I learned three days ago that I would be in the criminal division, which was my first choice for placement. This means I'll be responsible for low-level criminal cases (no risk of jail time), assisting people who cannot afford their own legal representation. I may even get to work with some of the amazing lawyers who guided me so aptly during my stint with duty counsel. Needless to say, I'm delighted. It's a lot of responsibility (which does still intimidate me a little), but is real, hands-on experience that most people don't get until they start articling.
Which also reminds me that I have to brag and let you know that my older sister Tamara just found out that she'll be articling with the Crown Attorney's office in Newmarket, Ontario (an hour's commute north of Toronto). Yep, this family is big on crime. Sometimes we're even on the good side of the courtroom (the side that's being paid to be there).
After more headaches, it occurred to me that the most recent addition to my computer's bitter and twisted little days has been a dodgy upgrade to Windows Media Player 9. I did this in the mistaken assumption that upgrading was oftentimes synonymous enough with "improving" to be worthwhile. Plus it managed playlists, and could at least rip a song or two. But, you know, it was really the most precarious piece of the puzzle. So, I got rid of it, and I think my problems are going away. Even so, I'm sure I'm still going to squint suspiciously at my computer at work, expecting (as always) that it will double cross me again.
Testing out the "avoid unecessary Microsoft entities" theory out later, I uninstalled the last remnants of "Microsoft Intellipoint" on my iBook (Intellipoint came with my optical mouse) and now the mouse works properly for the first time since I bought it. Huh.
There's no moral to this story, really. I just like it when stuff works.
The computer I use at work is most respectable. It's an AMD Duron 1200 system with 256 megabytes of RAM and a 20 gigabyte hard drive, running Windows 98 Second Edition. Technically speaking, it's got four times the clock speed of my desktop PC at home, and twice the clock speed of my iBook. It has twice the memory of either machine. In an ideal world, this computer should work quite well.
But man, does this computer ever hate me. We've had a stormy relationship since I first started working at CBCN, with an initial honeymoon period that was sweet and lovey-dovey, but nothing but marital strife ever since. I feel abused. Explorer has been crashing almost every day (sometimes more than once), which effectively takes the OS with it since they're so closely related. Media Player is even worse about it. I like listening to music at work, but the cost of this luxury is unforeseen disasters that can wipe out everything I'm working on unless I save every couple of minutes (which I do, because computers have long taught me to be paranoid about that).
I scanned it for viruses today -- or at least, I tried to. It turns out that our prescription of Norton Antivirus has run out, and it hasn't updated its definitions since March. I will have to talk to someone about that. But, undeterred, I installed a copy of McAfee Antivirus that was sitting in a drawer. To my delight, not only did it want me to pay it money for the privilege of having an updated antivirus engine and updated definition set, but it crashed Windows upon start-up without fail. I never got past the login screen before I got the dreaded Blue Screen of Death. I had to boot in safe mode and delete a handful of .exe files from the McAfee directory just to be able to run Windows again and uninstall the darn thing properly. I downloaded a trial copy of Panda Antivirus, which was able to determine (finally) that I had not just one virus on my computer, but ten of 'em. Mostly Klez and Bugbear worms, which have probably been on this thing through several generations of previous users. I rid my system of them, and am cautiously hoping at least some of my performance issues will now go away.
Well, that was short-lived. Between the end of the last paragraph and the beginning of this one, it all happened again. I could feel it coming, however, and saved a copy of my blog to Notepad before happy computing dreams crumbled yet again.
This isn't going to be a Windows vs. Macintosh rant, or at least it's not meant to be. I mean, sure, my iBook is immune to just about every virus, worm, and backdoor shenanigan out there, and -- sure -- iTunes never crashes the way Media Player does, and even with half the RAM it doesn't skip or lag playing music when there are too many other applications open (in fairness, the iBook doesn't yet have enough RAM for me to want to run three other applications while ripping files). But I was brought up on PCs and I would hate to start pretending that they're just computers for suckers. I obviously like my newfound platform, but then again some people like it when other people pee on them. Why flaunt either pleasure unnecessarily? For a lot of people Windows PCs work, and for some people they work well. To be sure, I'm also a devilish user. I push the computer too hard. I don't run demanding video games, no, but but I run four or five different programs at once and repeatedly switch between ten or twenty windows as I work. Mainly, I'm just annoyed that I've lost a good two hours of my day to sloppy code, a registry from hell, and the viruses which proliferate on a steady diet of all of the above mixed in with user ignorance and dodgy system security.
I mean, really. All I wanted to do was listen to the used copy of Bjork's "Post" CD that I bought last night while out with Broken.
The best I can say is that I'm glad the W32.Blaster worm that's slaughtering everyone's networks doesn't work on Windows 98, or I'm sure we'd have that, too.
I'm mad at computers for being so evil. I'm mad at Microsoft for largely being responsible for making them that way. I'm mad at IT managers who insist on having ONLY Windows systems that tumble like a deck of cards when an attack hits the system or the OS is out of date. I'm mad at lots of things. Heck, I'm mad that I'm lonely, and computers certainly haven't solved that problem either.
Why, I'm probably also mad at you.
"Liberals planning revolt on same-sex issue" by Jane Taber.
Ottawa — Some Liberal backbenchers are working on a plan to force Prime Minister Jean Chrétien and his cabinet to back down on same-sex marriage, at what is expected to be a bitter and emotional national caucus meeting later this month. "This [same-sex-marriage issue] is going to possess the caucus," Sarnia Liberal MP Roger Gallaway said yesterday.
Toronto Liberal MP Joe Volpe says he and his colleagues will be "compelled to come together" at the three-day caucus meeting "because our constituents are forcing us in that direction." "All of us are going to have to do that [come together with a strategy to confront the Prime Minister], all of us," he said.
...
Meanwhile, Mr. Gallaway says that at the coming caucus he wants to force the Prime Minister and the cabinet to reverse their position on the same-sex issue by either staying the Ontario court decision or withdrawing and restructuring the reference made to the Supreme Court of Canada.
Earlier this summer, Justice Minister Martin Cauchon referred to the top court draft legislation that redefined marriage to include same-sex couples.
Since then, Liberal members of Parliament have been inundated with phone calls, e-mails and letters from constituents, who are angry over the government's handling of the issue.
One MP received about 450 letters and another says there are "boxes" of mail from constituents that haven't been opened, sitting in the office.
Mr. Volpe, who has received more than 300 letters, phone calls and e-mails on the issue, said he hasn't had time yet to co-ordinate a formal strategy with his colleagues. But he figures it will happen soon.
...
Mr. Volpe says he plans to address the Prime Minister at the caucus, demanding to know why he and his cabinet are allowing three Ontario appeal court judges, rather than the elected legislators, to decide public policy.
Mr. Gallaway characterized the Ontario court decision in June that legalized same-sex marriages as "a terrible attack on the democratic principles in Ontario."
"Ontario members have been disenfranchised," he said. "When they are disenfranchised the people they represent have been disenfranchised, and they have been disenfranchised because the courts have made policy in law and the cabinet cares not to defend the institution of Parliament."
Mr. Gallaway even predicts some Ontario Liberal MPs will lose their seats in the next federal election as a result of the proposed legislation....
I couldn't be more upset about this.
A majority of Canadians support same-sex marriage. I am among them. I think that including same-sex couples strengthens the notion of marriage. We have, for too long, allowed ourselves to have circular stereotypes about gays and lesbians.
"Same-sex couples can't be considered families because they're unstable and can't get married" goes the battle cry, but as conservatives like to have their cake and eat it too, they say "Gays and lesbians can't get married because marriage is only for the sake of having a family."
Critics are attacking the Prime Minister and the Justice Minister for drafting legislation instead of appealing the recent decision by the Ontario Court of Appeal which makes same-sex marriage a reality in this province by declaring the old restrictions unconstitutional and unsupportable. But appealing the Ontario decision to the Supreme Court would most likely result in a further declaration that excluding same-sex couples from marriage is unconstitutional, except that it would be binding on the country and yet more conservatives would be lamenting the state of "judge-made law." The Liberal government knows this, and took remarkable initiative in bringing forth legislation to harmonize the state of family law across Canada. Rarely has a government taken such a hot-potato issue into its hands directly. Indeed, it's politically safer to let judges deal with a controversial issue and also take the blame for deciding in favour of human rights and the culturally diverse Canadian society we take such rightful pride in. That such action is taken is certainly a recognition of its inevitability, and (I think) its justness.
Politics can be short-sighted, however, and the letters are pouring in. The politically squeaky wheel often gets the most attention, and it's more common (and natural) for people who are vehemently against something to make their voices known than for the passive majority that supports it. Accordingly, it's time to let our politicians know that we're out there, too. I've set up this page which provides a form letter, in rich text format, that you can print and send to your MP. All you have to do is fill in the blanks, and I've also provided a link to the "look up your MP page" of the Parliamentary website to make it all the easier.
Now is the time to make your support for this remarkable development in equality known. Otherwise a good cause could be drowned in conservative backlash and political expediency. And you don't want to be a part of that.
I got a call today from the bank that has seen fit to issue me a credit card, asking me to verify a charge for $8000 that had been made by a mail-order company somewhere in the United States. I've rarely made a funnier face than the one that crossed my mug when I heard that request, and I kind of wish you'd been there to see it. The moment was unique, and (hopefully) now one that hopefully has been relegated to the past.
I immediately had the card cancelled and destroyed it. Ever since then, I've been picking my brains trying to figure out the last time I used my card, and how someone else might have gotten the number. I can't remember purchasing anything on-line with it, or even going out to dinner and paying for the meal. Nothing on my last statement suggests anything suspicious -- in fact, I've barely used it at all since the Spring, mainly because I was extremely poor until I started working, and tended to hover around the limit.
The most disturbing possibility emergest out of an unfortunate blunder I made last weekend. It was a Friday, around 6pm, I was in the office by myself, and I was getting ready to go home. After picking up my bicycle from the shop (it had a broken spoke), I returned to work to change out of my work clothes and into a comfortable t-shirt and cycling shorts for the ride home. It was late; I was tired. I emptied the pockets of my slacks and went to the washroom to change. Then I packed up the rest of my things and cycled home.
That is, I packed up the rest of my things except for my wallet. It lay, forgotten, on top of my desk; a stupid mistake that I'd made in the numbskullery of a late afternoon without coffee. I hadn't realized this until I made it home and intended to go out and see my friend Celeste, and by that point it was much too late to go back for it. The building gets locked up over the weekends, and I only have key to our office door. So, all I could do is hope that it would be safely waiting for me when I returned on Monday morning.
Now, implicit in that hope is the hope that no one like cleaning staff would, say, come in over the weekend, grab my wallet, and copy down my credit card numbers. But apparently something like this may have happened. It's very difficult to say for sure. Still, here we do have a mysterious charge to my card for quite a lot of money, and no other explanation for how the number got out into the world. I'm normally very, very careful with my credit card information, and I was furious with myself for leaving my wallet behind at work.
Anyway, I've since had to cancel my other card, because I don't want to take the chance that it was compromised as well. I'm hoping -- really, really hoping, that this is the end of the dodginess and fraud. On the bright side, I'm so poor that no one's going to be able to steal much from me anyway.
I guess the moral is: It Could Happen To You.
