Come First of May... oops, missed it

It's the lusty month of May. It's not very warm yet, though. It was hailing a few minutes ago as I sat in a phone meeting. Outside, I mean. The hail, that is. Not the meeting. Anyway...

Friday I went out with P-Doug and had pop and bruschetta. Cost me about eight bucks. We talked for a while, but nothing gelled for the weekend. I had my heart set on going to the Anglican Book Centre and he was talking about going the following weekend when he'd have money. For me, I'd have even less by then. Mostly, I think, I just wanted to do the subway adventure.

G, apparently, we keen to get out of town and do some driving. So, Saturday morning when we all touched base, it was clear to me it was a loss to make it all work. So I wished them well, got dressed, and headed out. I walked up to Fairview. It was cold enough that I wore my sneakers, but I did see people here and there in sandals. But I had a lot of walking to do and it was cold on my hands, so I think I made the right choice. I got the subway and transferred at Yonge. The trip to Bloor was shorter than I remembered it. In the course of it, I ended up surrounded by these four women, one of whom, it seems to me, had been on the train even before the others, but they clearly knew her. How they found her in that particular train and car I don't know. These women switched back and forth between French and unaccented English with the ease of an automatic transmission. It was interesting, if strange.

Anyway, I got off at Bloor and made my way to Hayden. Turns out the ABC is across Church Street. I went in, went downstairs, and there it all was. There's a lot of interesting material down there. I was introduced to a couple of intriguing Bible translations I may eventually follow up on. The NRSV has the whole Apocrypha, and has a version where it's presented in the Catholic format (Susanna and Bel and the Dragon are put into Daniel, for instance). Very cool. I bought a book on the Anglican catechism called "What Anglicans Believe" and another book called "In the Beginning" that's about the creation of the King James Bible and the conditions leading up to it. It's a really good read so far; I'm about 160 pages in, just getting to the point where James commissions the new bible to supersede the Geneva Bible he found too republican. I was at the ABC a little over an hour, and $40 later, I left to go home. This was about 12:45.

I got on the subway on the same side. Bad move; that sent me southbound again. I couldn't easily switch to the northbound train till Union Station. Oh, well. I had my books. So I got to Fairview about an hour after leaving the ABC. I bought the chicken curry and lentil soup at Fit for Life and a couple shots of the frozen yogurt at Cultures, and when I left the mall, it was 2:00. Lunch was good. I really enjoyed it. I spent the afternoon just quietly reading "In the Beginning".

Sunday, Roc came by around 11. About noon, we went to Swiss Chalet. We both had the Santa Fe chicken sandwich, him with a potato and me with a salad (he had a salad for starters and I had the soup). We shared a bottle of White Zinfindel, and then had the frozen yogurt. It was his treat; cost him about $70. It was a really nice afternoon.

I had a couple of encouraging signs of spring, despite it all. At Swiss Chalet, I caught a glimpse of a guy about my age in sandals and peddle pushers, so I'm not the only guy who likes them. Also, Roc had to go to Aurora to get his mom and sister, so I suggested showing him how to get to the 404. As we drove up Leslie, I saw a woman walking barefoot up the sidewalk with her sandals in her hand. I was pleased by both of these occurrences. Maybe I'll be a little freer myself this summer.

April 15, the First

This is the first April 15th since 1978 without Jody in it.

Today is Jody's birthday. It's also tax day in the US. I suppose that's one way to get your friends to remember it. Even ones in other countries, like me (our tax day is April 30, as it happens). I suppose I should look back in my logs and see what we were talking about today last year. If he was on. Jody was pretty sick those last few months and wasn't on for days at a time. But it was often that way the first time, so I guess I wasn't seeing it for what it was. I guess he was, but he rarely let that show through. I guess the death of hope in me would have been the death of hope in him. Or something like that.

Tuesday, a little package arrived from Jody's dad, Jim. He saw The Corporation, a three-part documentary on corporate culture, and he wanted me to see it so he sent it on CD. He also sent a card for my birthday. It had two little bugs sitting side by side on a swing hanging from a flower; it said "Friends Forever". It just overwhelmed me for a couple of minutes. Everything came flooding over the dam. My love for Jody and how much I miss him and how shitty it all is that he went through what he went through for nothing, how we've lost him, how much I've come to love his dad, and this gesture of remembering my birthday five days before the birthday of the son he lost. And the bug motif, harkening back to Flea... I don't know if that was intentional or not, but I bet it was. I put the card on Jody's cedar chest on my mantle. I don't know if I'll ever take it down.

Today I'll go to Wal-mart and buy a couple of copies of the new book, Terry, about the life of Terry Fox. I'll keep one for myself and send the other to Jim. It will probably be a hard read for him, but it seems appropriate. And it has to be today, Jody's birthday. I remember telling Jody about Terry back when Jody was in remission, in the summer of 2003. That's getting on for two years ago now. I guess at the time we spoke about it, Jody actually had less than a year to live, though neither of us could possibly have imagined that at the time. I remember being a little wary of talking about it because, after all, Terry's cancer came back and killed him. I know it's just a coincidence, and that it happened because it was going to happen. But it sure seems bitter now that we talked about it.

I was going to get a new vacuum, what with my raise and all, but it turns out to be about $100 a month, effectively. Big deal. I guess it's better than treading water, but I did so much this year. Travelled, took on a whole new job, ramped up to new products, new applications, new people, got a 2 rating... and I got less of a raise this year than last. I still got the same line I got from "Devil Face" three or four years ago. "We know you're not even making the median salary for your job in your market... we're working on it." Yeah, for five years. I'm probably making the median salary NOW for the job back THEN, anyway. So, no new vacuum. Between the books and the $60 Larry asked to borrow from me, that's my fucking raise for the month, right there.

We were out last night, me and Larry and P-Doug and G, at Swiss Chalet down Don Mills. It was nice. P-Doug wants to do the beer thing tonight, but I'm 215 lbs. Like, Christ, it's time to put the brakes on and really mean it. So I'm going to say no. Maybe we can go somewhere for coffee, but the beer thing's got to get more infrequent. I am going to get down to 200, and I am going to go back to Harvey's this summer. That's all there is to it. The fancy restaurants and cut corners are out. My pants are still comfortable, but only just. I'm bulgy, though. I'm not going to take the deliberate step of buying bigger pants. That's just hopping on the slippery slope. It's barefoot weather again, and I want to feel good about being out in the sun with some skin showing. There are shorts I want to wear I can't, and I need to get back to the 180s. No more goofy shit about being happy with the 190s. The 180s.

As God is my witness, I'll ever be hungry again. :)

God bless you, Jody. I'm going to be your "sex beast" again. At least, inasmuch as I ever was.

Not quite, but almost...

I always wondered when the first 7th of a month would come and me not remember. Well, it nearly happened. It's nearly 4:30 as I type this, and I went nearly the whole day without remembering Jody died on the 7th. It's been ten months since he died.

But I did remember.

May's going to be tricky. June, of course, it goes without saying that I'll remember. But April... should have been on my mind. His birthday is Friday next week, the 15th. Tax day in the States. Payday for me.

Obviously, I haven't done a lot of reflecting about Jody's death today. Things have been busy. I think he'd forgive me. Right now, I'm copying my work directory to my portable hard drive. I'm going to back it all up on a DVD — or maybe several CDs would be a better idea — and free up some room on this computer. I have stuff backed up on the corporate drive that actually predates my employment here... stuff my first boss worked on in 1999 before he hired me. I don't know when, or if, I'll ever leave this job and have to hand stuff over to a successor... but man, is he or she ever going to have the whole enchilada. There's stuff here that's useless to me now. So why do I keep it? I guess so I can look at it and go, yeah, this is what I've been doing for the past five years.

The copying dialog box keeps swinging back and forth in its estimates of how long this will take. Right now, it says 25 minutes. There, it just fucking crapped out, like I knew it would. Windows is such a piece of shit. It can't hold it together long enough to write 1.8G down a USB cable, so I'm pretty much obliged to fucking start over. What a pain in the fucking ass.

Rainy April

A couple of days shy of April. That's the month that houses both my birthday and Jody's. This year, I'll be 37. Jody would have been 27 five days later. What was I doing at 27? Still struggling to get established. That was the year I got my first real full-time job, computer animating at Hoffmann. Shit, has it been ten years? Apparently it has. Back then, Jody was just a teenager finishing high school, fretting about things that didn't matter, and spending time with me and DM online.

Jody really got out of the gate faster than I did. He was a really sharp programmer and it didn't take employers long to spot it. He was better off at 26, when he died, than I am now. Almost infinitely further ahead of where I was at 26, scratching at the Animation House, employed this week, laid off the next. What a nightmare. Fucken Waiting for Godot. Still, here I am, all this time later. I'm here, and he's gone. It just doesn't make sense, does it? And that's depressing all by itself. Not that I wanted the pain and suffering he had to endure. But if someone had to go, frankly... It's not self-pity, honest. My life's not bad. It's just an academic anger at the illogic of it.

The weather's finally, finally getting warming. It's been a long winter. Snowy. Never tons of it, really, but it just kept falling. It started early and fell as late as last week! I remember going for a walk without my jacket on St. Patrick's Day two years ago. But I'm looking forward to being able to get outside in sandals and shorts again, that's for sure.

Company's about to shut down AIM. Probably ICQ, too. After all these years, I'll be knocked out of touch with some of my friends during the day. Particularly Jody's dad Jim, and R-Lang. I don't know why they have to do this. It seems gratuitous. The company hasn't been hurt, that I'm aware of, in allowing it all these years.

That wasn't very interesting, was it? :) I'll try to remember to log on and record fun and interesting things. I'm not as good at it as I was last autumn.

The muse

It's nine months today since Jody died. It occurred to me this morning. I keep wondering when the first 7th of a month will pass without that happening. I really hope that never happens. But I guess deep down I suspect that sooner or later, it will. Aside from memory, Jody hasn't been a daily part of my life for a while now. There are things I see I want to show him, ideas and dreams I have I want to tell him about, time of day I just want to pass with him... You know, I was thinking about it on Friday, nine months to the day since he and I last shared a conversation... that there's still this childish part of me that looks back and wonders what else I could have done, what bargain for good behaviour I might have struck with God to preserve Jody's life. I mean, I know that there was nothing anyone alive today could really do. His doctors, the closest thing we have to the power of God on Earth in practical terms, could not with all the king's horses and all the king's men hold back the tide of Jody's cancer. Obviously, there was not a thing I could have done that would have given him five more minutes. The only thing I could do was what I did... be there for him, pray for him, sincerely ache for him as was his due. Give his life meaning by resonating to its vibrations. But there's still the seven-year-old inside me who used to make daily bargains with God so that Dad would come home on time and not go drinking with his buddies. It seemed to work then, so why not for Jody? So what might I have done? Nothing. This argument between a simple, honest, childish yearning and cold, clear, adult reasoning goes on and on inside my mind all the time.

Relatedly, on Saturday morning I went looking for pictures of South Park's Kenny without his hood. It always bothered me that he was kind of mute and faceless, except for that one time in the movie. I happened across a Japanese site that worked the South Park boys up as serious anime characters, and it was pretty striking. I got back that old jealousy and it's kind of inspired me to go back to my art and see what I can develop. Yesterday when I was out with Roc, we went into Curry's, and while we were there looking at all the media, I decided the time had come to try to put together a good, decent drawing of Jody to send to his mom in New Mexico. Jody's 27th birthday (or what would have been) will be April 15th. I want to see if I can do something for her by then, or not long afterward. She's said a few times, I've heard through the grapevine, that she'd welcome a drawing by me. I really should have done something long ago. This is something that needs to be done... for her sake, Jody's, and mine.

Hot tramp, I love you so...?

I had a dream last night about David Bowie, believe it or not. He was visiting the city and giving little concerts. This particular one was in some little concert hall, or convocation hall... you know the type. Wooden seats, wooden stage, wooden actors. That kind of thing. I was there with some girl I don't consciously recognize but apparently knew in the dream. She was young, heavyset, and ethnically Asian, as I recall. Kind of bubbly. I liked her. Anyway, the David Bowie who was there was the younger, androgynous Bowie. He was on stage alone, no band, and there were only about 30 people in the audience, but he was still playing up a storm and going down like gangbusters with the crowd. Joking with us, making wry observations, and singing his ass off. At the end of it all, this girl and I hung around talking with him, and he was really friendly. I ended up helping him put his equipment back in his van. Nice dream. Worth the price of admission, I'd say. :)

Saturday's little trials

I made arrangements to get together with Tan and Roc on Saturday down at Tan's place. Tan's planned Friday night trip with his friend Simon to a coin show because Saturday's trip instead. So he made plans to meet me at The Phoenix at 6. That's a little hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant on the corner of his street. Nice food, cheap prices. About what you'd expect.

The remote for my new DVD player quit working Friday night... don't know why. Anyway, I bundled the whole thing up and took it back to Wal-mart. They replaced the remote, no trouble. So I headed downtown after that. I guess I got down to Parkdale about 5:20 or so, and I wandered around. Went into Blockbuster and actually found a movie I've been looking for for a long time, George C. Scott in The Last Days of Patton. It cost $8 and was sure worth picking up. It's really well-acted. I haven't seen it in years and years, but I remember being impressed by it, and now I know why. I also went into the local Sally Ann, but I didn't find anything worth buying, so I wanded back to The Phoenix and got a table just before 6, and I started waiting for Tan. In the meantime, I ordered won ton soup with pork slices. It was really good, but whoa, a week's worth of salt, I bet. 6:45 rolls around and still no Tan. So I get out the cell and call him. I reminded him we were due to meet at the restaurant, not his place. "Oh, I forgot that detail," he says. So just before 7, he comes in. He's broke. He's got four bucks. Can I float him the rest? Sure, whatever. Kind of grating when he starts talking about hundred-dollar antique coins he's picked up, but we were talking about just a few bucks after all. Simon's supposed to come by with "cat food" money for him later, and he'll settle up.

Anyway, we both had the curried chicken. It was great too. Like the food there. Not sure how healthy it is, but I don't suppose it's really all that bad, either. Roc, as it turned out, had family issues that, not uncharacteristically, tied him down for the evening, and so didn't join us. Simon was due sometime between 8-8:30 so we left just before 8 and went back to Tan's place.

On the way up in the elevator, we shared the ride with a young black girl and a scruffy little white guy in his 30s. There was a strong note of alcohol in the air. Tan was going on about the cost of something... I forget what now... and it apparently elicited enough interest in the scruff little guy for him to pipe up and politely enquire as to what Tan was talking about. Tan laughed and said, "Not drugs." I couldn't believe he said it. I don't think the guy knew quite how to react. He was a little cowed, and he said, "Well, I'm not after drugs. I'm an alcoholic, but I don't have that problem." About then the door opened, and he exited, sheepishly. I said to Tan, "Do you know that guy?" I thought it might have been understandable if he knew the guy and his habits at least. But no, Tan didn't know him. He just saw an opening for a cheap shot and took it. I really wanted to go back down and apologize to that guy, but it wasn't my place, and what difference would it have made? An apology from me would have been worthless; it wasn't me who said it. But it was just one more example of how oblivious Tan is where other people and their feelings are concerned. There was no reason in the world for him to say that. I really like Tan's company, but sometimes I have this real urge to lay into him. But what good would it do? He's 52 or 53 years old. If he didn't learn by grade four that he shouldn't hurt other people's feelings if he doesn't like having his hurt, is he going to learn it now? So I decided there was nothing to be gained by spoiling the evening and I kept my trap shut.

Tan and I traded some movies... I gave him my copy of Roger & Me on tape and he gave me a copy of Shrek 2. I haven't seen it since it was in theatres so it was nice to get a copy. We did a lot of talking about politics and stuff. He gave me a few photocopies of some of his recent work. Eventually Simon did come by, but wanted Tan to come down for the money. He gave Tan a wad of 20s, but since I didn't have a ten, I was out of luck to get re-embursed. I hung around till about 1:30, which was unusually late for me.

Sunday I got up and inked a couple of his drawings; one of an orcamorph boy and one of Lola Bunny. I coloured them in Illustrator and sent them off to him and P-Doug. For once, Tan actually deigned to respond favourably, though, as usual, with reservations. I don't know why he can't just acknowledge the tribute without feeling compelled to put in his two cents. And I can't remember him ever commenting on anything I've sent completely of my own, much less him working from something I drew. It's just enough that if I ever do it again, I think I'll keep it to myself, and do it just for the sake of practice. Sketching's the hard part; inking a finished sketch is easier, and it's bringing it to life in colour that I like best anyway.

I got drunk on Mom's white wine yesterday and, typically, I listened to the little devil on my shoulder. I ordered from Double Double for the first time in years... large pizza, eight pieces of chicken, twenty potato wedges, four pieces of garlic bread. I didn't need it, and really couldn't afford it at this time of the month, but went with it anyway. Man, it was really good. Not that I ate it all! I did polish off the bread and spuds, but I have most of the chicken and half the pizza left, bundled up in the freezer for next weekend (hopefully I'll make it that far without touching it), and what I did eat was lunch and supper. Still, $35, I didn't need to blow that. But, all told, that was a good Sunday. Sittin' around skyclad, drawing and colouring, getting drunk, and doing the comfort food thing. If only I had more money and didn't lard on the pounds, that's how I'd spend every Sunday. As it is, I'm back on the lemon juice and maple syrup bit. I mean to make it last all week, like the first time, but I haven't managed it since. Well, let's just see if I can stick it out and pay back yesterday's deficit at least. :)

Kirk to Enterprise... beam down some Charmin

I have to wonder if this is what Gene Roddenberry had in mind when he envisioned the communicator.

So what kind of an age are we living in?  Why, it's the age of the cell phone!  Nevermind those geniuses you see on the road, gazing off into space as if to envision the face of the loved one miles away to whom they speak while using one hand in an attempt to keep the car moving more or less in a straight line, no...  No, we've moved into whole new territory.

I've just returned from a quick trip to relieve myself of a couple of cups of marginal coffee.  I walk in, sidle up, and notice that someone in one of the stalls is holding a rather lively, seemingly one-sided conversation in one Asian language or another.  Having been born well before the advent of cellular technology, my first instinct was that this fellow was indulging in some private time with his multiple personalities.  But then, no! I have to wonder if this is what Gene Roddenberry had in mind when he envisioned the communicator.

So what kind of an age are we living in? Why, it's the age of the cell phone! Nevermind those geniuses you see on the road, gazing off into space as if to envision the face of the loved one miles away to whom they speak while using one hand in an attempt to keep the car moving more or less in a straight line, no... No, we've moved into whole new territory.

I've just returned from a quick trip to relieve myself of a couple of cups of marginal coffee. I walk in, sidle up, and notice that someone in one of the stalls is holding a rather lively, seemingly one-sided conversation in one Asian language or another. Having been born well before the advent of cellular technology, my first instinct was that this fellow was indulging in some private time with his multiple personalities. But then, no! The answer came to me! He was on a cell phone. Yes, that's right. Apparently, something was too important to wait the three or four minutes it would take him to squeeze out last night's chow mein to discuss. In essence, he took whomever it was on the other end in there with him, making him or her the beneficiary of whatever gruntings, strainings, explosive outventings, and splashes might result. How very charming. As a person with only a solid command of English, and a very very basic acquaintance with French, I have no idea just what had this fellow so excited. But I can imagine it went something like this...

"I'm telling you, Wei, these mmnnnnnFOURTH QUARter earnings are jjjjuuuSSST uhhhhphenomenal.You should nnnnnffffRRREALLY FREE UP... a few... DOLLARS... erf... ...leverage an asset or two, and take advantage of errrrrfff! this golden opportunity... Why don't we talk about it over lunch?"

...It plays something like that in my puerile imagination. Anyway, whatever. It's none of my business, not really. But then, the guy stands up, and exits the stall. Well... he's got a cell phone in his hand. This is an important call! What to do? Can't put the phone down, can't end the conversation... that'd be rude. Nope, nothing for it but to leave without washing his hands. Which he did. Ten seconds after wiping his ass, he's turning the knob. A few seconds later, there I am, washing my own hands. Looking at the doorknob. Wondering what's the fucking point.

There's a line in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, written way before the rise of the cell phone, about an entire world being wiped out by a virus contracted from a dirty telephone. I can't help thinking that Douglas Adams must be getting a big laugh out of this if he happened to be looking down on me taking a leak this morning. Ha! Don't put it past him.

I take P-Doug to bed

Oh, yeah, I also forgot to mention my adventure with P-Doug, fixing my broken box frame. This one's kind of fun. :) No, not that way. Listen...

I have a computer beside my bed... yes, I know how sad that sounds... and I'm in the habit of sitting on the right side of my bed (queen size; no obviously jokes, please), surfing and working and pirat— errrr, backing up my collection on it (yeah, that's it). Anyway, one afternoon last summer, that corner just separated, and BANG!!! dropped, about 18", and hit the floor, with me on it. Shit! There was nothing I could do but prop it up on books.

I didn't really know what to do about it, so it's been that way ever since. Till a couple of weekends ago. I know P-Doug's had a fair amount of building experience... he's one of these guys from up north, so what else was there to do growing up? So I knew he'd be the one to know better ways to go about fixing it than I'd come up with. That was sure true. He suggested not just fixing that corner, which would have been my plan, but strengthening all four corners. He pointed out that the screws hadn't pulled out, they'd sheared off at the base of the thread. They were only 1/8" thick, four to each post. So on each corner, a half an inch of cheap steel was all that was holding up the frame, the box spring, the mattress, and me, with a weight that's varied from a high of 310 lbs, to a low of 185 lbs, and a current weight of 205.

We went out to Home Depot down at Ellesmere and Warden — the worst intersection in the city — and bought some 1/4" thick screws. We drilled new holes and put the screws in. Problem was, the 1/4" screws had heads too big to countersink properly. We couldn't get the frame back together. Luckily, we only did one post before trying the connection. So we knew we needed other screws. This time we went over to the new Canadian Tire store on Sheppard, just up the street. We got 3/16" width screws with the right countersink size. It took us ages, though, to find screwdrivers and the right sized bits for using my drill as a power screwdriver. We did finally manage it, and drilled new holes. This time, it all came together pretty quickly; probably 15-20 minutes for the whole job. The screws are longer, thicker (ahem), and new, and the bed's pretty sturdy. I think it will be a few more years before it's unsound again. Sure is nice.

I'm not going to pay a lot for this muffler... but this monitor? Ehhhn...

Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention my little adventure with the monitor earlier this month. Because of the weird way I paid for it, I wound up paying for it twice.

The monitor was $149.49 with tax. I didn't think I had $150 Canadian left on the gift card the company sent me, but I was pretty sure I could cover $140. So I paid $140 with the gift card, and asked to pay the other $9.49 with my debit card. That's how we did it. Or so I thought.

I don't know why, but a few days later, I just spontaneously decided to check my chequing account. It was like WAAAAY down. And I'm like, WTF? Then I see it. The monitor charge. $149.49. The full price of the monitor. Luckily I still had the gift card on me, so I check the printing on it, and see the website to check transactions. I find the $140 one (denominated in US dollars; $109 or something; I forget now). I print both statements, zoom home, find the receipt in the waste paper basket in my bedroom, and zip down to the store on Kennedy. It took me about five minutes to get it all straightened out, but thank God I did. They refunded the $140 difference to my chequing account, and I zoomed back to work. Took about an hour. Whew, what a lucky break I checked, then had all the proof, and then that they weren't assholes about it.

The New Brew

I was invited a couple of weeks ago to this sort of quasi-business dinner last night. A couple of our guys were up from Atlanta, dealing with the Bank of Montreal. One of our BAs here got reservations at a place called The Milestone. It's an upscale bar and restaurant in the mall where Lablaw's is at Yonge and Empress. Nice place. I got there ahead of the others. The Brick brews a set of beers just for them called Palamino; I had the honey red. It was really something! And I sat there for about half an hour, watching yuppie types come and go, looking at TV talking heads going on about the federal budget, drinking a house beer on Yonge Street. I got this really weird feeling, a moment of self-realization, and I was surprised to find myself who I was, where I was. I realized it was a pretty good place to be in. I mean, people tend to make the best of things wherever and whenever they are, but not all that many in history or even now can consider that sort of thing just casual.

The guys from Atlanta were pretty cool... you know, just guys. A white guy, Ron, and an Asian guy, Jay. You could tell Jay was not originally from the South, though he did say he'd lived there 20 years. He had a Northern accent (he sounded like the three Canadians there more than a Georgian...). The talk was about BBQ (the real thing, pulled pork and all that; got me thinking about that festival every summer on Front), the SWIFT wire protocol, how people working at Canadian banks hmmm and haw and don't want to commit to anything (expressed by one of the Canadians)... it was a nice place and good company.

Bang Zoom

This morning it's snowing out there. Big, slow flakes, the kind that fall when the temperature is just slightly below freezing. Heavy, dry, packing snow. The best kind for walking or driving in, it seems to me. It was just gorgeous. I took out that little video cam I bought and filmed it from time to time on the drive in. I know, I know, irresponsible. But how often do you see something so lovely when you have the means to capture it? The incidental loveliness of life that often escapes us. I had some music on by Simon and Garfunkel, too. It was just wonderful.

Well, till I got to the runway to Hwy 7 (that's how I've been thinking of it... the long run up to the exit). Some guy in the fast lane, furthest left, just suddenly turned 90 degrees, and zipped right across all five lanes, and hit the barrier about 100 yards ahead of me. Not near enough to really frighten me, more like shock. It must have been brown-trousers time for guys three or four cars ahead of me. As I passed him, he'd managed to straighten out, and was creeping sheepishly along the shoulder. His trunk was buckled open, and his car had a number of dents and wrinkles in the bodywork. But at least he was okay, and the car was obviously still operational. Man, he got off so lucky. So did the rest of us behind him, I suppose. I turned the camera on and filmed him as I passed. I'll have to review that and see if any of it came out.

The onward march

It's eight months today since Jody passed away. This, too, is a Monday. Like then, it's overcast. It's quite a bit colder, though.

Last night I had a dream about Jody. He was with me on a Greyhound bus, or something of the kind, roaming up and down southern Ontario. In real life, Jody never made it to Canada, but we mused on occasion about him visiting. He was talking about doing so, tentatively, in the summer of 2004, when he would have been well for a year. As it turned out, he died that summer instead.

In the dream, we were riding the highways under threatening skies. I remember us stopping at some sort of restaurant or hotel. It was built completely of wood, in some sort of faux cabin style; the wood stained a deep red-brown... very dark inside. I remember another scene in which we stopped at a gas station. The gas pumps gave change, like a vending machine. Dollars and dollars worth of coins that people had just walked away from. Jody and I went from pump to pump, scooping up change. I don't remember too much more of the dream. In fact, when I woke up, it took me a moment to even remember it was Jody who'd accompanied me in the dream. Jody and I never got together face to face in life, though we spent the equivalent of months, maybe even a solid year, together online. Last night's dream is the very first I can explicitly remember being about us being together. Naturally, I don't have a very well-formed idea of what that would be like. Jody was quite a bit shier on the phone with me than he was on ICQ or online. I suspect our initial face-to-face would have been an awkward adjustment.

It's the first monthly anniversary of his passing that doesn't make me feel really down. It's because of this dream. I can't explain it. I know he's gone. I do understand that. But somehow, I feel like we... I... accomplished something in our relationship last night. Does it have to make sense for me to be happy? Well, no... happy's the wrong word. Soothed, maybe. Eased, somehow.

On other matters, last night, I slammed my DVD remote down in frustration. Now it's not working. The DVD player is, just fine. But since there's no way to control it, it's now essentially a three-pound perfectly-functional piece of garbage. I can't afford to replace it for a couple of weeks, but when I can, I'm going to look for something that's got at least basic selection controls right on the unit.

On Saturday, P-Doug and I wound up buying the same 19" monitor... HP 91. They were $129 each, and in really good shape. Unfortunately for me, my digitizer card doesn't seem to like monitor settings higher than 1024x768, so I have to keep changing the settings when I want to record anything. I also picked up a couple of cheap speaker sets, powered by my USB 1.1 ports (oh, which I superseded with 2.0 ports a few days ago). The don't have much chug... in fact, they suck... but they do allow me to modulate the signal leaving the digitizer and entering the sound card, so I can finally (I think) tape stuff without ever spoken "s" sound bursting my speakers.

Friday night I went out with Alan for the first time in over a year. He looks thinner than he did. He works in Vaughn now... long drive... close to that new mall, Vaughn Mills. Ha ha. How clever (it's a rip off of fifty-year-old Don Mills, if you're not from around here). It's a huge mall, stuffed to the gills with yuppie clothing stores. He and I ended up eating in a bowling theme bar. No kidding. Lucky Strike, I think it was called. We had a couple beers and — shame on me — burgers and fries. Man, that was a good burger. First I've had in ages. Before that, we wandered into Cinema One, a movie store that used to be in the mall near me, but left. Now I know where it went! I got the 3rd season of King of the Hill for $38, and an old tape of cartoons of The Inspector for $4.

Sunday... jumping around here a bit, aren't I?... I went to Wal-Mart and bought a water purification system for the 10-day purge I'm trying out. Maple syrup, lemon juice, cayenne, and water. Stuff's hard to get down. We'll see how it goes.

I should be better at keeping these up...

I should start recording the little events of life here again. That's what it's for, after all.

So, before I forget, as I look up at the date, it occurs to me that today is the anniversary of the Apollo 1 fire that killed Gus Grissom, Roger Chaffey, and Ed White in 1967, if I'm not mistaken.

Tuesday night, Larry came over. He brought loads of DVDs with him... the whole Johnny Quest collection, Invader Zim volumes I and II, a few others. A little after seven, the phone rang. Turned out it was Dave over in Dublin. Yeah, Ireland. He was soused, and had three euros left on his cell phone card, so while he stood at the edge of a field waiting for a cab, he just up and phoned me. The conversation was kind of disjointed, and given that we'd never spoken a word to each other before, it took me about 15 seconds just to figure out who it was. All in all, kind of weird, but funny. We're living in a remarkable age, when you think about it.

Larry stayed over, but we didn't get up to anything. We haven't for a long time now. That's cool; it's not the nature of our relationship anymore. Still, when we came out of the apartment in the morning while one of my Chinese neighbours was waiting for the elevator, I remember wondering what assumptions he was making. How ironic that where he once would have been right, he now would have been mistaken to assume it was what it looked like.

Today's Thursday and I mean to finish copying the John Weldon video I got out of the library (due back tomorrow). If I don't, I have to phone them up and renew, and to me, that's just admitting I was too lazy to manage it in a week. Tomorrow night I'm supposed to go out to the Monk and Firkin with P-Doug about 8:30. I like those times with P-Doug. I can talk about things I don't get to talk about with anyone else. The beer's not that great for my gut or my wallet, but it's kind of "our" place now. Be better in the summer when it's warmer, though. Still, I'd like to drop about twenty pounds by then. I'm working on it... I'm working on it. ;)

Saturday I'm going to down Parkdale to hang around at Tan's, likely with Roc. I'm looking forward to that too. We were talking about doing it last week but the weather didn't cooperate. I told Roc if we were getting 6" of snow during the day, I wasn't driving down there. He offered to pick Tan up and bring him to my place. I didn't want to say anything, but if I wasn't going to hit the roads, with 17 years of driving experience, what made him think it was such a hot idea with a little over a year's worth? I told him, nah, wait till next weekend. This weekend looks like better weather, if colder. It's been almost mercilessly cold the last couple of weeks around here. I sure hope we get a warm, early spring. We deserve it.

All the while in the background is the knowledge that Jody's dad, Jim, is undergoing treatment for cancer again. He has this interesting, often confounding outlook on it... at once, resigned to the desperation of it, and yet still determined to beat it. It's almost like talking to two different people at once. I'm scared for him, the same way I was for Jody... it's the same. I can't admit the likely eventuality. It feels like treason to do that, as though my hope and good intentions made some material difference in the world, and withdrawing them would make the events they supposedly guard against more likely. It's a strange, superstitious way to live your life; it defies the sort of logical outlook I like to imagine I have. Makes a lie of it. But there it is. That's who I am. I look at the picture of Jody I have here at my desk — something I never had while he was alive — and I'm more acutely aware of him now than I was all those years he was a young man in good health with decades ahead of him to share with me. And so now all that is transferred to Jim; it becomes his inheritance... a reversal of fate, something handed down from son to father... the aching regard of some distant, powerless little man. I can't stop imagining talking to him years from now, though he's the first to gently remind me that's unlikely. Isn't it odd that the one more immediately facing the darkness has more courage than the one for whom the end is still nebulous?

Simon sent around this list of goofy questions. You fill it out and send it out to friends, and they do the same. Supposedly you learn things about them by this. What you really learn is which questions evoke snappy answers in which person. But in the course of it, a few people teased Alan about his recent (i.e., married fatherhood) incommunicativity (is that even a word? Well, it is now...). This morning he sent me e-mail with his work phone number, so I called him when I got in and we talked for about fifteen minutes. We're supposed to link up Friday next week. I sure hope we do... it's been about a year, maybe more, since I've seen him. A far cry from 1999, when I saw him every workday and often on weekends.

Whew.

Those old sad songs

It's my day for sad old songs.

The laptop they gave me in October has a great CD burner in it. I moved some of my MP3s over to it and burned a disk (just picked up 50 blanks for $16); I'm going to see if they'll work in my car. It's been surprisingly stubborn about playing burned disks. Some work, some don't.

Anyway, I'm reviewing the disk. The song that's playing now is Feels Like Heaven by Fiction Factory. It's from the late 80s, but it really escaped my notice till I was in Curry's art supply store one day in summer 2003 with my buddy Roc. I found a copy of it and I can remember testing Camtasia software by filming an icon of Invader Zim's dog-suited robot Gir dancing while I played the song. I sent it to Jody to amuse him. That was during the beautiful renaissance in which everyone, especially Jody, believed he'd beaten the cancer and come through the other side. There were still months of good times ahead before that awful day he told me he was feeling the pain again.

So many of these songs have become about Jody, and the strange but beautiful, multi-layered relationship we shared all those years. I've written about that in this journal time and again, and though I'm aware of it,I make no apologies for it. It still makes me desperately sad to remember I've lost him, that his cleverness, kindness, humour, and uncomplicated, unconditional brotherly love exist only inside me, standing like the sole remaining support of an elegant bridge, tumbled into the water with the support on the far shore gone. You know, it still hurts. But oddly enough, deep down, my greatest fear is that someday it might not. What an utter betrayal that would be... of myself, of Jody. I would be a whole other person if that happened, and the person I am now would be dead too, because my love for Jody and our friendship is a defining characteristic of who I am. I wouldn't be the person I am now without him, those ten years. And dozens of other people could make that same claim.

O simple thing, where have you gone? I'm getting older and I need something to rely on...

So I end on a happier note... Someday, Someway by Robert Gordon.

I'm crazy, fly me

Yesterday around noon I decided, damn the snow. I want to go to Wal-mart and get an electric wok.

Well, I didn't exactly get that. I bought an electric skillet instead. Made really great fried eggs with it this morning. But I digest...

So on my way back, taking it easy along 16th Ave., I come to a set of lights where the signal is just about to turn green for us. Doesn't some asshole turning left into the lane I'm in decide to race the light. He hits the skids, and his car turns 180 degrees, facing sideways, pointed in the direction he just came from, in front of me and the guy in the lane beside me. Luckily, we had plenty of time to slow down, and let this jerkoff right his car. And when he does, I see his bumper sticker.

"KISS A PILOT".

Terrific. The federal government lets this dickwad fly a plane.

So I'm watching him, wishing I could get in front of him so he could read my bumper sticker, which says "pog mo thon" — "kiss my ass" in Irish Gaelic. As it turns out, I do manage to pass him, as he stays in the westbound lane and I move into the left turn lane at the next intersection. I glance over. Huge beard, giant turban the colour of Big Bird's ass. Really. Welcome to Canada, numb nuts. Get some driving lessons; the temperature occasionally falls below "tropical" here.

Happy Newd Year

It's been a while since I posted anything on here. A few things have gone on, of course.

Well, first of all, it's seven months today since Jody died. He's been in my mind a lot lately. Yesterday, I printed a photo of him to put beside the little cedar chest with his ashes. It was the one where he's sitting at his computer desk, turning in his chair, smiling at the camera. I guess it's from 1999 or 2000 or so. Everything was still ahead of him.

Jody's dad has started chemo and radiation treatments again. He says he'll fight but I sense a certain resignation. He keeps saying that he's on the same path as Jody was. But what else can he say, I guess? He did all that research in the course of Jody's illness. He knows what's typical.

Trying to think what else. There's a lot, but I just don't have the patience to lay it all out right now. I'll try to get back to this later.

Into the snow

Friday night I went out P-Doug and we had a few beers. I gave him some music and animations on disk. He had gone over a "read me first" section of a resume site I've been working on. Pretty much everything he's suggested so far was all good and made sense but I kind of balked at this one. The read me first I'd written was a brief, very personable piece about who I was professionally; how I'd started out in the animation industry, found it unrewarding, and wound up in tech writing. P-Doug thought it was off-putting where it got into the downside of the animation industry. He felt that it should focus on "these are the skills I bring". To me, that's nothing more than a restatement of the resume. If that's all it is, a summary of the resume, what do I need it for? Maybe I'm wrong; he's the guy who has to do the hiring where he works. But I was proud of what I wrote, and how human a document it is. Everything else on the disk is dry as the Sahara. Aside from a couple of cartoon foxes to give the site personality and the "read me first" part, there's nothing else there about who I am. The bottom line for me is this: yes, it's about looking for a different job. But if the guy at the other end couldn't give a shit about who I am behind the skills set... if he or she couldn't care less about me as a person and I'm going to be nothing more than talking corporate property, then I'm not interested in working there. If I sound like someone interesting to work with (the read me first file), and I've got the skills to do the job (resume and work samples), then we should talk. I think he's right that it needs to at least say general what I can do, and I'll rework the piece on that basis, but I'm sticking to my guns on the general slant. I am really not interested in trading this job for one that's LESS attractive.

Saturday I decided I needed to shop for a few gifts and stuff. But it's two weeks till Christmas. No way was I getting in the car and trying to park somewhere. I decided I'd walk up Sheppard to Mark's Work Warehouse and Canadian Tire. As I got ready, it started to snow. I decided to walk it anyhow. I brought my camera so I could take pictures in the snow to show my friend in Dublin. It was the first time I've walked through Lescon Park in the nearly five years I've lived where I do. It was beautiful. There were footprints in the snow, but I didn't see another person till I got all the way to Sheppard. I went to the stores up on the hill, and then headed back. I thought I'd take a new route through the burbs, but it turned out to be a hopelessly long one. A nice walk, but I was frustrated by not knowing where I was going. A couple of times the route took me in directions I didn't want to go. But I eventually got home. But then, it was pretty dark. I was surprised how very suddenly it got dark, too. It was gloomy for most of the trip, and then suddenly, pow. It was definitely night. The temperature was right around freezing, so the sidewalks were a little tricky. But all in all, it was a great little wander. I was on my feet for nearly three hours, and I expect I walked about three miles or so. Sunday I meant to get out and mail some things, but I just never got around to it. I did drive to Lick's for a nature burger (with cheese, for once) and nature chili. That was a good meal.

Infamy

History buffs will remember that today, December 7th, is Pearl Harbor Day. It's the day the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, bringing the United States into WWII with the rest of us.

For me, it has another connotation, one that I've been dwelling on. A kind of turning point, or milestone. It's six months today since Jody died. That was a Monday; this is a Tuesday.

So I'm left sitting here this morning wondering what I'd do if I could turn back time. I "spoke" to him last on June 4th, via ICQ, sitting right where I'm sitting right now. When I got up to go home and said "adore", how could I have known it was for the last time? That it was farewell? Six months ago, at this very moment, he was still alive, though he must have been in a very bad way. I'm not sure exactly when he died; no one really is because he was alone in his room, and found collapsed on the floor. He must have been trying to go for help when the pain or lack of breath took away consciousness. Forever. Timber, the roommate who found him, reckons it to have been between 8:30 and 9 (as I recall) CST. That would have been 9:30 or 10 here. I was just sitting at my desk, busying myself with little things, while perhaps the sweetest person who's ever been in my life was dying. If I'd known, what would I have done? Called him up more, certainly. Talked to him, covetted his time. I would definitely have visited him; something I never did. It's all too late now. But maybe it's better this way. At a distance, he could always be just Ruby, not Jody-with-cancer every single second. He told me a few times what a bittersweet thing visits were. Nice to see people, nice to be loved, but physically exhausting, and emotionally... I mean, every visit must have seemed like good-bye when you weren't sure how much time you had, but you knew, odds were, it wasn't much. "Two years" became seven months.

Something fundamental about my moorings in life was about to pull loose six months ago right now. But I didn't know that yet. I had a sick friend I was very worried about, and in cold, honest moments, feared would soon die. But "soon" was a year and a half. And then he was gone. And all that's left is sweet memories, a name on the ICQ bar, and a little pouch in a cedar chest at home with a few grams of my RubyOcelot's powdered bones inside. Bones that once made a happy little boy run and jump, and carried around the brilliant mind of a wonderful young programmer. Oh, Jody. I miss you. This world's a poorer place, and hardly even knows it.

How they shine

I'm missing Jody quite a bit this afternoon. We're closing in on six months since he died. Less than a week. This is a major milestone coming up. It wasn't quite summer yet that day, that horrible day I took that drive in the rain, in a new world that didn't have Jody in it. In a world where I could no longer get on the computer or even pick up a phone and talk to him, touch souls with RubyOcelot. Know for sure he/she was there. I'm only guessing these days.

Is the pain and sadness the only thing I have left to give him? This soulhunger and yearning, something that can never ever be filled... is that all there is left? Jody, I want to talk to you so much. I know you know what you meant to me, and I know you know that I know what I meant to you in return. But would it be so terrible if we could say it again, just once in a while? I'm grateful I had you in my life and that I was in yours, but it feels wrong that I didn't take it for granted, I cherished it, and it was still taken away. Worse yet, that you had learned in the greatest possible terms not to take your life for granted anymore, as you once did, and still it was taken away... not after a long life of 50 or 60 more years, but almost instantly.

I don't know. Maybe that was all the growth your soul needed to do in this life, or something. That and the magnificent bravery you showed in the face of so much pain, fear, and disappointment. There should be monuments to you. Even as base and shallow a creature as me can see that. Sometimes, like this morning on the way to work, I find myself wishing it had been me instead. I would have been unbearable, and it would have been a fitting end. And it would be over for me now. Jody deserved to go on and on. If I could close my eyes and cease, with only the consolation of certain knowledge that Jody would wake up instead, I would do it. How sweet it would be if we could pass each other in that split second, clasp hands, and he could know and understand. That's selfish of me, but I would only want him to know how beloved he really was. It wouldn't be driven by bravery. I'm not a brave man. But I think I could do that. I don't have courage, but I do have love. That's fuel enough.

Oh, God. Is the sadness Jody left in his wake the only monument You're prepared to give him? Please... inspiration. Give us something. Give me something. Show me what to do.