Classic Snivel

July 27, 1997.

My grandmother is out of the hospital now -- and of course I probably ought to mention that she was in one. My grandmother is the sweet and supportive lady who has been providing me with board during my university education thus far (since the home that I grew up where my mother is happens to be quite prohibitively far away from school). She's been quite sick over the past year, though. I've lost track of how often she's been in the hospital -- for her heart, for flus, for asthma -- but it peaked almost a month ago now with her arriving in the emergency ward following a stroke. It was the morning after my boisterous Canada day -- the same day my present boss called me from Agriculture Canada to interview me over the phone... an interview I was certain I'd blown on account of the fact that I'd just been awakened by the ringing of the telephone, and my grandmother having been taken away only hours before that. Depression and worry being quite distracting when you're asked to recite your technical skills at 9 in the morning.

But they let her out this week. Not to here or anything though. Oh, there's no brain damage fortunately, but she was left extremely weakened by the experience, and still gets slightly confused in a way that more or less was akin to her natural forgetfulness (but I don't know for sure how serious it was or is. She forgets what time of day it is if she has a nap, which is something my relatives are worked up over, but in my opinion that would just happen in the dizzying numbness of three weeks in a hospital.), so she's going to be in a nursing home for a month, and then finally returns back here.
I suppose in some wisdom or other my aunts have decided that the best thing to do is to make ready the house in case she (they) decide(s) it's too much trouble to have her here. They have good intentions anyway.

The practical application of this is that I was given my notice, and now require new arrangements for the year. Which was something I guess I'd planned for anyway, but I do confess that I thought I'd be leisurely about it and move out at the beginning of September -- you know, all convenient like. But the process has been decidedly accelerated for me, and I find my doses of real life being given in lumpy spoonfuls that are both slightly sickening and conducive to terror. Kind of like Orbits. I hope you've heard of Orbits -- especially if what you've heard is "For the Love of God don't you ever drink a bottle of Orbits!" Orbits is this kind of sickening fruity syrup in which is suspended glutinous globs of coloured mucous. Because of the magic of density, the globs hover undisturbed in the beverage, displayed happily through clear bottles in an attractive kind of way. I actually recommend that you buy a bottle, and keep it around as a kind of pathetic impoverished student's lava lamp. You could put some Christmas tree lights around it in your room or something, and let the makeout pad fly.
I bought a bottle a couple of months ago, knowing full well it would be a highly disgusting taste experience, but the results were still a surprise. The combination of thick liquid and semi-solid triggers what must be an innate gag reflex that makes me better appreciate what I really am asking of someone who goes to the trouble of swallowing my semen. Youch.

The cramps and bloating got worse over the hours. In fact, that was the night I got the horrendous stomach flu, too (which you can read about somewhere deep in the archives of the Classic Snivel.

So there's kind of two morals here. The first is never to swallow 600 millilitres of semen or, really, very much at all. That was a lesson hard learned by this girl in high school who went down on the entire football team in the bus back from a game, because then she had to go to the hospital and get her stomach pumped.
Sometimes, when I tell these Smiths Falls stories, I feel like Rose Nylund on the Golden Girls. Or Woody on Cheers. Except that I don't recount heartwarmingly simple tales of the American Midwest. I talk about a backwards little redneck city where some of the less popularly conceivable deviations against man and nature occur like a stop light changing to green.

Oh, the other moral is never to drink Orbits. Maybe I'm just a lily-liver, but there are few things more undescribably surreal than a vote of no-confidence from your intestinal tract after sucking back a bottle of the stuff, when the verdict is handed down that you're going to be flushed dry, whether you enjoy projectile vomit or not.

I mentioned that I'm house hunting now. I would suggest that you all offer me a place to live, maybe a nice basement or something, for as long as I might possibly care to brighten your days with my wit and leg muscles, but I guess I should first point out how confused I am that no one has as yet presented me with a standing offer. Clorinda and Ficus being the exceptions. My tongue would get me a long way with those two. Unfortunately they both live a ridiculous number of miles, provinces, and states away from me. Lousy internet. It can tease you with free conversations, but never has the day yet been that I can mutually masturbate with my dearest droogs in real-time.

The reality of being a working boy has at least granted me a measure of upward mobility. I have no idea how much money I'll have at the end of the summer (including that ever-growing student loan, which is at best a floating figure right now), but the point is that I'll have some, and some of that will even be legitimately earned by hours of hard work and mouse-clicking, so there's a kind of security granted by that. Searching for an apartment is a bother, though. The idea of living utterly by myself is a delightful treat, but unfortunately one that I cannot afford. If it were up to me, though, I'd rent a bachelor, sleep naked from within the embrace of gravity boots, and walk on the walls like Spider Man -- alas. Thus I am also looking for the right roomates. This is an even more difficult task. Being the moody, freakish, outgoing yet private whore that I am, the majority of people would become quickly hateful to me. I'm also kind of a snob, and I'm trying to find someplace to live that isn't a slum. Ideally with a big room and a crime lab (because, after all, Charlotte and I are cyberpunky, vinyl-clad, crime-fighting civil servants by night).

The best place I have found so far is actually an all-round delight. We saw it last night. We almost didn't, because the person we'd arranged to meet was training someone at work, and she got home late. We left a note, but as we got in the car, we saw a skittish young woman in a hurry down the street, and decided it would be sporting to see if she actually might turn out to be that same person we'd made plans with. First of all, the house was drastically tidy. In my more leisurely days, I enjoy meticulous cleanliness, and she was actually apologizing with embarassment for what she perceived was a mess. I saw sconces on the wall, which earned quick points with me. Houses with cool candles are always happier for the wax. The kitchen was tiny, but there was an attractively studentish living room, with candles, a futon, a TV and a $5 coffee table to replace the one missing when the previous roommate moved out and took her furniture with her (apparently the house was spartan by previous standards I was still impressed by the results achieved by two people trying to make do with big empty spaces where couches and tables used to be). The bathroom was cool. I didn't bother to test drive it, but for some reason I was impressed by this hanging wire basket for magazines. The unabashed display of literature in someone's bathroom is always cool. I always hide my books when people come over personally.

And the room. Wow. It was something. My only raised eyebrow came from the slanty floor. Not only could you notice it, you could see it. An attractive hardwood floor in this enormous bedroom that just gradually tilted downwards. But the room was so big. I've seen some large rooms in my explorations this past week, but none that were bigger than mine. Oh, it had potential. I was figuring out how I'd beat gravity with my furniture even as I stood there. The girl explained that this used to be her room once, but she got headaches from sleeping in it. I think I'd adjust. My caffeine-driven circulatory system could probably deal happily with no gravity, let alone a slight tilt downwards. It even opened out to its own little balcony. I was highly charmed by this prospect. Moodily peering out into the city during storms and such.

I think in the end, I'll probably take it. I only have two real concerns. The first is the price. $372 per month, after hydro and everything. Which isn't exactly bad, but there's a lot better to be found. Still, what a great place. And unlike the other houses I'd looked at, the roommates I'd be dealing with would be girls. Which maybe needs explaining, but from my perspective, the personality conflicts would just get cut in half. Men can be quite irritating, leastwise so far as I find. And they're Carleton students too. And they work late, so we wouldn't be spending every free hour staring at each other tensely.

My other concern is the neighborhood. It's right smack dab in the bad part of the Byward Market, past where all the shops and cafes and pubs and bars can be found. It seems to be a family kind of area, with grubby little children running around, but I'm pretty certain that it wasn't far from there that a friend got himself mugged and beaten up two years ago. Still, she hadn't had any problems with the locals in the year she'd been living there, and the neighbors downstairs were a house filled with 8 decent bohemian student types as well, so everyone kept an eye on each other's affairs. And if two girls can feel reasonably safe there, then I can.

Plus there's the fact that my roommates would be two girls. Don't interpret it that way. I just like the idea of bringing just a little of Three's Company back into this world. Heck, I can do Jack Tripper without even trying.

Feel free to still offer to let me live in your house, though.

Keep the dream alive.

Goodnight.

They zapped somebody here today.

I don't know if you've seen Men in Black yet, but most people are by now familiar with the premise of the neuralizer. It, like all the weapons in this movie, is remarkably phallic in design. Part of the ray bans motif has to do with the fact that if you point the neuralizer at somebody, it emits a blinding flash of light that can erase and replace memories from a certain point in the past onwards.

Which is exactly what happened.

I was walking into the building this morning, happily grooving down the hallways to a musical mix blaring at me from my beloved walkman, self-consciously making sure my Gangsta-Rob (TM) accessory hat was still firmly locked in place, and otherwise minding my own business. I was carrying a gigantic cup of coffee, so I dropped it off in my office, hung up my trenchcoat (I have one of those big old fashioned wooden coat racks that Humphrey Bogart would have slung his trenchoat and fedora upon) and my briefcase, and sauntered back down the hallway to the washroom.

Upon exiting, the hall was decidedly quiet. All you could see were the heads of scientists bent ponderously over large microscopes as you passed by their offices. And it seemed like the most average sort of Monday morning. The only activity I noticed was a young woman walk around a corner into one of the stairwells. But as I kept walking, suddenly -- PAF!!! There was this blinding flash of light. As if somebody had just taken a photo or something. And this actually was my first thought. "Cool!" I thought to myself, "Spy stuff!"

About three seconds later, though, I walked past the scene of the flash, and there was nobody there. The flash itself had been followed by a groan, or something muttered by the victim, and then there was nothing.

Now, the most rational conclusion would be that, say, one of the overhead flourescent lamps had just popped, creating a sudden flash.
I mean, they do that.

Fortunately for conspiracy freaks, I have very little capacity for rational thought first thing in the morning, especially with so much on my mind. So, I've come to three possible conclusions...

(i) Somebody got himself neuralized, silenced forever by a secret wing of agriculture Canada.

(ii) Somebody got himself teleported to an awaiting mother ship, to report, to be debriefed, or to be dissected.

(iii) Somebody got himself vaporized by a secret agent of the Federal government armed with a ray gun.

All I know is, I'm getting my fillings yanked out now, and I'm going to make myself a tinfoil hat to block any transmissions.

Brought to you by Jolt Cola, with
the buzzing and mild irritation of
caffeine induced paranoia.

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