Lists are the thing

I've been keeping myself busy of late, and perhaps that's why I haven't been on here too much. I always talk about the blog as a tool I use to ensure I write on a semi-regular basis, but when I find other creative outlets I suppose it falls by the wayside. Or outlets of any kind of activity really.

Black Creek is open for schools so I'm working there a few days a week, learning the Many Hands program and doing tours. We have three stations in Many Hands - spinning (and wool more generally), baking, and the workshop. Because I'm a fella I'm usually in the workshop. Historical accuracy and all that. It's fun and I still get to eat whatever is left over from the baking, so that's good. It's also fun to tour at this time of year when the village has no one else in it. You can talk in buildings for as long as you want and if the kids feel like losing there minds I can even send them running.

I've also been transcribing, doing taxes, drawing, reading and sometimes writing.

For the last while I've been listing what I want to get done and have been putting write/draw at the bottom of every list. Some days I get to it, others no, and I've been choosing draw most times when I do. I'll get back to the novel soon, no doubt.

Lists have been great as far as getting me to get things done when I have the time. When I run out of jobs like taxes and transcribing, hopefully my lists will see me writing and drawing all day long. Fingers crossed! They've also been helpful in sending me to bed at a reasonable time. If I'm tired and the list is done I go to bed. As simple as it sounds it goes against my normal tactic of finding activities that keep me awake.

Maturity (no matter how smell the steps in that direction are) is weird.

I was drawing last night, sitting on the couch and making little mistakes as I went. I'm inking pencil lines so I really don't want to be making mistakes at this stage, but I just couldn't stop. I was in a tired/out of it mindset where I convinced myself to keep working, and not make the tiny effort necessary that would make the working situation better. In retrospect I should have moved over to the table, set up a light and continued apace. Oh well. Next time. And looking at it now the mistakes aren't the end of the world.

Who knew being crunched up on a couch wasn't most conducive to tiny, detailed drawing?

I also have another show tonight. 8:30 at the Bad Dog Theatre and pay what you want as you exit. You should come. If I don't post this blog before the show, I wonder if I will remember to edit this part. MYSTERIES. (I'm going to make it!)

And I've signed up for a clown workshop, starting in May. That should be a real gas!

Maybe another improv class too, but I've also applied for a couple more jobs - more museums! - so I'm not going to rush at anything too forcefully.

Finally, look at this.

It's from my shower curtain, and it tells me one thing: polyester will bring the world together! Unless you use a different alphabet. In those cases I guess we're at war.

Sorry guy.

post Rama show show

I should also mention the 400 class show that I had in the evening after the casino went swimmingly.

I could have used more stage time, but what's a fella to do? It does seem a bit unfair though. I mean I was responsible for about 50% of the audience in attendance. 7 friends, SEVEN, were awesome enough to come out and see the show. The people in the class who invited no one, couldn't they have just performed alone in their bedroom or something? Why do they always have to piggyback on my notoriety.

Heh.

A great big thank you to all who came. And as a special treat I was even given my first pre-performance flower. And by flower I mean balloon with a green pipe cleaner attached. HAL had received a birthday balloon bouquet earlier in the day and was thoughtful enough to bring a similar gift to the show for me. She even came on stage for one part of the show, meaning I'm now allowed to say I have performed with her, thus upping my standing in the improv world (until people see me perform).

Of the two scenes I had one that involved speaking which was with a fella I have a hard time performing with sometimes. It went okay though and as usual was a good learning experience. In this instance we early on established that he was my father, we were in Vegas and he had recently killed mom. That last bit, one would think the most important part of the relationship we were trying to establish on-stage, was quickly forgotten. Oh well.

My other scene was a physical gibberish number and THAT I can handle. It felt really good. I even died in a satisfying manner. 2 minutes of stage time never felt so right.

2 major realizations came from doing the show:

1 - I have now performed improv shows twice and I get freaking hyper when I'm done. Mega adrenaline.

2 - We were talking to people on the casino bus about what we were up to that evening and it was awesome to be one of those who had a show that night.

Both things make me want to find more chances to perform and continue to improve.

I'm still up in the air over whether I want more classes, but I'm sure all that will sort itself eventually.

A day at the Rama

I have now been to four casinos in my life.

Gananoque is always a good place to start one's gambling life. I won playing roulette. Thousand Islands Casino as it's officially called, is a tiny box off the 401 with a soaring sign and a performance room in back, about the size of my bedroom, where a Blues Brothers cover band was belting it out.

I lost a bit of money at Casino du Lac-Leamy in Hull. I was there celebrating a one year anniversary. Relationships! We were down a bunch but then I noticed there had been 6 reds in a row on the roulette wheel so I bet $50 on black and won. Odds and logic not in support of the decision, but who cares.

Then there was the spur of the moment, let's drive 2 hours and across the border to Akwesasne Mohawk Casino just south of Cornwall because there's some sort of poker tournament on. Didn't win the tourney, lost more playing poker later and I think I lost at blackjack too. More importantly I learned a valuable lesson: don't loan money to gambling addict friends in a casino. Sure he paid it back, but I felt bad for enabling (also I didn't really realize what was up until the evening was drawing nigh and I was able to watch how he *ahem* played).

And now with a visit to Casino Rama this past Sunday we can make it four!

The casino trip was part of the increasingly infamous Swimprov class. Said class started as a way for musicians and non-improv performers to play and learn in a low pressure, high fun setting. Of course it's helped along by having two of the best improvisers in the city, HAL and Kayla, as coaches. (HAL is a great nickname for a number of reasons, but we'll see how it holds up, and Kayla will get one soon. I'm still searching for inspiration.)

We were at Rama, in part, to celebrate HAL's birthday. Her birthday isn't until June 6 of course, but why should that stop us from boarding a bus filled mostly with seniors? Oh, that's right. We took one of the subsidized casino coaches that had been organized through HAL's condo. Worried about fitting in we were costumed, approximating what we felt casino-bound retirees look like.

HAL had even gone so far as to have a 45 minutes chat with Betty, a condo stalwart and organizer of the trip, beforehand so we had all the hot tips.

-visit the buffet early, because it gets busy

-the Canadian buffet is vastly superior to the Chinese option

-the bread pudding is an absolute delight

-the 5 cent machines are fun

-if a machine isn't winning, try another one

-25 cent machines are actually 25 cents for each wheel, meaning they're actually 75 cents

And that's just a sampler of the tips!

Betty was right on almost all counts, except the bread pudding was a bit disappointing. The buffet as a whole was great though. I ate THREE butter tarts.

I should also mention, that after paying $6 for the bus, we were given a $10 credit on our players card, so everyone was making money. Then we left the restaurant and hit the floor.

After being confused for a while we figured out the 2 cents machines and went to town. Some of us more than others. You'd think with a 2 cent machine the games would last forever and at a low cost, but no. In order to win the big bucks you have to max bet, and that of course means betting up to 125 credits (aka 250 cents) at a time. Some people in the group were good at keeping their bets small, others were not.

I was in the latter group.

I can't help myself (those are good words to say around gambling!). I'll throw a few small wagers in, enjoy the lights and patterns, but inevitably think, Hey, what if the next one hits big and I don't max bet? Basically I'm a casino's dream customer, except that I can usually just stop. Especially when I know myself and am able to plan ahead, taking money from my wallet before leaving the house.

It's also interesting to watch some of the other people play. They might lose as much as me, but they aren't doing it try to win a pile in return. They were doing it because there was a machine in front of them with fun lights and noises and buttons that NEED TO BE PRESSED!!!

Speaking of slot machines, this was the first time I've played them since I dropped a single loonie into a machine at Lac-Leamy. The machines at Rama don't take coins, only bills and tickets. You buy in and the machine calculates how many credits you possess. When you're done playing, if you have money left, you print out another credit ticket that can be used to gamble more, or can be cashed out using a cashier machine, or even, dare I say it, a live cashier. Weird.

All the machines have trays underneath that could conceivably be used to catch untold riches in coins when you hit the big one, but instead just sit empty. When you win there're some fun tunes that play for you, becoming slightly more excited the longer the credit count up goes on. I don't know who wrote those, or how much research went into them, but they are great and have the, I would assume, desired effect of making the player want to hear more of the same.

Maybe it was just me and an irrepressible urge to dance though.

And while many machines have arms on the side that can be pulled, most people opt for the buttons up front that make all whirlies spin.

I've decided I'm not a slot machine fan. I don't have the patience to bet small for long enough that I get to play the novel bonus games they have. And I don't have the money to bet big for long enough to access the same games. Also, I don't know what the odds are set at, and while I don't think for a second it's set at ZERO CHANCE there's something alienating about having the fates controlled by an unknown algorithm. The fact you don't need to pull the arm, your wealth is tracked on printed slips and the machines feature useless coin trays is alienating as well.

I'm well aware that I'm describing modern slot machines as alienated from the human condition, just as Marx intended, but seriously. Those trays were designed to maximize the noise of plinking coins for crying out loud! Such a waste.

Table games at least give me chips to fiddle with, but when the minimum bet on those is $15, they're a big no no. Poker would have been nice, but there are a lot of people that felt the same and the poker room was rammed. That and it was a class outing that would have been defeated if I'd wandered off to play alone.

We were definitely the most 'dressed' people in attendance. I was expecting a certain amount of ridiculousness as far as good luck trinkets, funny hats and the like, but was grossly disappointed. The red bulldog I had hanging from my pocket all day not only did not bring me luck, but drew all sorts of odd stares from the hardcore gamblers around the room. Maybe it's because there's a preponderance of rural Ontarians in the crowd and you don't get the flash and sizzle of Vegas grannies.

Few people looked excited to be there. Perhaps the excitable people were at table games, but amongst the machinists if we made too much noise or were having too much fun people generally moved off or glared.

At the same time when we were getting all bent out of shape because one of us was up $4 people would sometimes appear. On more than one occasion a Chinese family arrived, different each time, but always composed of a couple aged 50-60 and a significantly older, presumed mother (in-law). At other times it was lone women who would hover, eying their chance to jump in on a winning machine. When they figured we were making all that noise over less than $5 they tended to leave.

The day's most confusing look, however, came when we were celebrating a modest uptick and I commented that I couldn't believe Kayla was up $30 000 playing the penny slots. A woman a few machines down turned and eyed us all. At the time I though she was either a) mad we were making noise, or b) trying to assess the veracity of my claims. Subsequently, I think it's something else.

She was sitting in front of a machine that has buttons and lights. She had probably deposited a pile of dough and had been moving her finger a minute amount, again and again, for hours. If that's what your eyes and brain are focused on when you turn to look at people it's not surprising that your face is blank and your eyes are empty. She probably wasn't thinking anything about us, and sure enough turned back to her screen in short order.

And I just remembered I've been to one more casino. It was the Circus Casino Edinburgh, but I can hardly count it because I was playing poker there and for me that's not gambling.

Then I lost.

My class is having a show

Hey gang!

As some of you may be aware I've been doing improv for a wee while now and I have finally finished the "beginner" levels offered at Bad Dog Theatre.

And what better way to celebrate the accomplishment than with a class show?

I can't think of one, that's for sure.

Here's why you should come to this show:

1) I haven't talked to most of the people in my class for a few weeks.

2) I haven't done any improv in weeks.

3) All day before the show I'll be at Casino Rama and I'm liable to be tired.

Who knows what state I'll be in at show time???

Basically what I'm trying to say is there's a chance my performance will be an unmitigated disaster!!!!! Those are the best kind, so you should all come out!

Also,

4) Because you love me.

And remember, even if I'm a wreck, there's a whole other class of people who will be there to entertain you. So, really, you can't lose.

It's a pay what you can event.

Bad Dog Theatre is at 138 Danforth Ave. and it's just east of Broadview subway station.

The show starts at 8:15 pm this Sunday, March 28th. 1 hour long.

This is in the actual theatre space so let's fill 'er up!

I don't care how the show goes...well I do but more than that I want it to succeed or fail in front of more than 2 people.

I'll likely be sending out a reminder about this again before the day, but you should add it to your calendars now.

patience

A quick heads up before we begin, there's a whole lot of self-indulgent self-analysis in here. A lot of words too. No pictures. You have been warned.

-----

Patience is a virtue, I want to be virtuous, therefore I need to be more patient? Flawed logic and mathematics!

I'm experimenting with patience of late, and it's tough, but I figure in the long run it should be beneficial.

The way I figure, developing better patience will help in a bunch of ways, but mainly it should help me deal with my ongoing dilemma of how to exist in now time.

When making a choice the past sometimes has too much say, while possible futures emerge in a cavalcade of thunderous distraction, too often leaving me lost and with no decision at all. Patience, hopefully, allows me to make decisions on a shorter term and utilitarian basis, or even just let me sit in the now and enjoy more moments as they happen.

The future will arrive regardless, and I need to stop running at it and letting it over-influence decisions. Especially since most of the possible futures I come up with aren't set in jello, let alone stone!

Zing.

Let's illustrate with examples shall we?

With improv I've recently chosen to sign up for a class that might not advance my theatrical aspirations **cough** as directly as another. As per usual these aspirations are vague; get into the Macro Neato cast in the short term and just get better at improv in the long term. Realizing that working toward these things can't actually be rushed took a lot of pressure off my class choice, and let me take the one I wanted for other reasons.

Now I get more time to play with friends on Sundays; salt water pool swims, saunas, all the stuff that's important in my life right now.

It also helped to realize that my internal debate was prefaced by the false notion that I KNEW which class would be better. I didn't and don't. Alongside patience, constantly reminding myself how little I know about all aspects of life seems like a good idea; just because I think it, doesn't make it true.

On a slight side note, I've also become more realistic with where I might go with improv. I remain positive about it but also know that I need to treat improv as a fun thing, not a "gotta be the best at this now" thing. Too often I've watched amazing improvisers and wonder how to get that good fast (the whole distracted by the future problem), until recently when I started getting my head around the reality that these people are not only talented, but have been working hard for WAY more than my 8 months. Obvious, I know, but ol' lizard cerebellum has never been one to care about reality.

As straightforward as it is, it's about patience and hard work, and whatever skillZ I have will make themselves apparent in time.

Patience is also great when it comes to my reading habits. For the past few months I've had a heap of books beside my bed on a variety of topics that, while interesting, were starting to stress me out. There were just too many pages!

Despite previous efforts I now understand I likely won't ever know all of all. I'm just not that clever and my eyes just aren't that big. So, the new patient plan is stop going library crazy, read when I have time and interest and not force myself into something that I think I should know.

Why was I reading a blog about Yemeni focused foreign policy for months? Why did I think an intense week's worth of reading and writing poetry would move me forward in a significant way if I was going to burn myself out and revert to a null-state immediately after?

I don't know.

And finally, patience might come in handy mit die Frauen.

I realized recently I haven't had a proper crush in a while. I'm wary of crushes and can't bring myself to trust them. Let me see if I can explain why and then make a guess as to how patience helps with these most pressing dilemmas.

At times, crushes, healthy or not, arrive and leave like farts in the wind, but other times they maintain and embed in my skull. Even when I can rationally recognize their hopelessness, certain crushes become self-perpetuating and drive me to actions and decisions that don't make sense and I have no desire to participate in. These eventually end when I'm inspired to do something so dumb that afterwards I feel like a being made of nothing but awkward ridiculous, and as a result I'm finally able to move on because of the sheer self-embarrassment of it all.

They start for all sorts of reasons. Physical attraction, an amazing personality, what someone is doing with their life, or my favourite, those that stem from my amazingly susceptible to suggestion self:

You say she likes me? I've always hated her soul, but maybe...

On top of this, if the person is already a friend I get to hack my way through all the above while considering the relative benefits, or not, of changing or risking pre-established relationships. And ALL OF THIS doesn't even consider what the crushee might feel about the whole thing, how they might react and so on.

Basically I get stressed because I'm never sure if a crush is a legit feeling or an infatuation that will be supplanted at any moment; am I interested for the right reasons, or am I going into this lying to her and myself from the start?

This is not an exhaustive list of what I take into account, and it varies from case to case, but you get the idea. After all, I'm sure you all have similar fun-time mental parties too.

I figure though, once again, patience can be a great help in all of this.

Wait it out a bit and shallow infatuations can reveal themselves. Or maybe the crushee ends up with someone else. THAT'S ALWAYS SO MUCH FUN.

I'm not saying I should pine from the bushes until the moment is lost. Instead it's about accepting that not all needs to be clarified immediately. In the past the urge to clarify something, discuss it with friends, look for advice, and act (always act) hasn't helped. It's like once the possible future has been imagined I want to make it real or destroy it as fast as possible.

If it works out, great, but if not then at least I have narrowed an infinity of possible by one.

And even if patience solves nothing, or only reveals the futility of a notion, at least it allows me to live in a moment for a time. Crushes are great because they hold so much promise. When you're sitting in their midst you get to revel in the magic and take time to imagine what might be. By forcing a resolution you miss the chance to soak.

If nothing is going to come of a crush I'll find that out eventually, and in the meantime I get to discover what's great about a person, laugh at their jokes, be amazed by their passions, and maybe, JUST maybe, share an amazing kiss that was months in the making.

Sigh.

Heh, and again, when you don't know what you want it's tough to ask someone to be interested. Unless they're into ephemeral boyfriends.

Frantically trying to find the way to an unknown goal doesn't help.

Breathing helps.

Observing helps.

Learning helps.

Realizing that no matter what opportunities were missed in the past and what the future might smack you in the jaw with there will be another day to sort it all out helps.

Unless the earth explodes.

First improv show

So that went pretty great. Nothing more to add.

I don't do much these days

Not particularly inspired by anything. Except improv, but there's sadly not enough of that in a week.

Olympics are on.

Meh and Angry Meh would be my main emotional descriptors of late.

Got out of the house today, saw some kids throwing snowballs and that was pretty great. Two kids were on top of the slide and had a toboggan, or maybe just apiece of plastic, as defence. All the other kids were throwing snowballs at them. Everyone seemed pleased.

Then I found a chocolate museum. Then I bought groceries. Then I found a Winnipeg atlas at the Salvation Army store that is a consistent source for random maps and atlases.

Oh, and I also got a membership at the Trinity Community Centre. $40 for 3 months, what have I been waiting for? Holy smokes. And they have a pool!

I did this thing.

Inspiration from Toulouse, Sauveterre-du-Rouergue, Istanbul, some book with pictures of an Italian town (upstairs, too lazy to look) and other stuff.

Sorry about the glare. You're smart. You'll figure it out.

This is not an unvitation

Ever wondered what I'd look like doing stuff while you sat in a chair close by? Do you sometimes think you could do with listening to me talk about things that may or may not make sense?

I didn't think so.

BUT, if you want something to do on Friday at 8:30, you should go to That Friday Show! at the Bad Dog Theatre. It's pretty good, pay what you can as you exit, and best of all you can watch me perform in my first real improv show...EVER.

I might be good, I might be awful. You get to find out!

Please come! However - the unvitation part - don't feel obliged, by any means. I'll let you know when I have a show that I would be personally hurt were you not to attend. This is not that show.

Just bear in mind, if you want to be able to say you've seen every improv show I've ever done then you have to start this Friday.

Ruminations on the brunch industry, etc.

The Hoof Cafe is right around the corner and it took a while for me to get there, although it has now been open for a few months. Lawyer is the expert on this sort of thing, and by that I mean food of the refined variety, so I thought to invite him out to Friday brunch but he was being a silly at work. I suggested he work hard later and come for brunch with me at 11, but no dice. He wanted to sit inefficiently at work all day, perhaps getting something done between spurts of his true passion, internet conversation.

Fancy was kind enough to join me instead (after he had already provided me with a morning's camera lesson, what a guy!).

The Hoof (as I like to call it as of now) has a menu thrown up on a blackboard daily, depending upon what's on hand. Fancy chose the ever popular toast and jam option, which given the establishment featured goat butter (made with the milk of really smart goats), some fresh blueberry party jam and toast that I assume was harvested from the surfaces of asteroids as they ripped into the earth's atmosphere and burst into flame. Quality place.

Fancy has been on a bit of a blueberry kick of late, so the jam was very appropriate.

I on the other hand thought it time to be a big deal, so I threw down for the the rabbit and buckwheat pancakes. That would be buckwheat pancakes, topped with feta, tiny bacons, blueberries, syrup and of course rabbit.

(I stole this picture)

There was also some unidentified green sweet things on the plate. Delicious unidentified green sweet things.

The following is me reviewing food:

(something that I would be better at if I had asked the undoubtedly knowledgeable server some questions such as, "Hey, those green sweet things in the corner of the plate, what are those things?", and possessed a wider food vocabulary in terms of both preparation and presentation.)

My brunch was pretty good. And by that I mean, I don't eat a lot of buckwheat pancakes, let alone pancakes of any kind supported by the aforementioned accoutrements, so it was delicious! Lot's of tiny flavours to swirl around my plate, mixing and matching, picking and choosing different combinations. This is the best way to eat because each bite becomes something of a distinct and unique puzzle. There are no correct solutions to said puzzles, just a whack of experimentation.

The one problem with the dish (and really, it's not a problem considering where I was eating) was the amount of food. As Lawyer said - when I talked to him, still online after I got back from brunch (see, he could have come with me if he'd wanted to) - it's not the place you go looking for giant portions. Although he wasn't explicit, I'm pretty sure Lawyer was really offended that I had besmirched the Black Hoof's good name with such a boorish suggestion, that portion sizes were too small. He didn't say it, but definitely vibed that I was dirt and deserved to have my eye spat into. Or maybe he just meant it literally when he wrote "There's a Grand Slam at Denny's for that," (contemptuously).

Whatever the case, the pancakes were about yay wide (yay = 5 inches) and there were three of them. I was wondering why they couldn't make the pancakes larger, because I figured the cost of extra buckwheat couldn't be that much more (and I guess I was sorta hungry). But then I realized, it isn't about the pancakes at all. You grow the pancakes and the proportions and aesthetics of the plate are all off. You'd need more rabbit, cheese, etc. and therein lies the cost of the dish. Bacons that small and thinly sliced don't come cheap!

Next time I go I will either buy another dish (at $14 for what I ate, not likely until I'm awesome rich) or just make sure I eat beforehand. A banana for instance.

(one of these)

I've always been more of a delicious and filling meal sort of fellow. Maybe someday I'll stop worrying about filling and move delicious toward scrumptious on the gradient of meal descriptors, but I have a strange feeling that all this may be tied to income somehow.

And to extend the post a bit more and add some context for both my hunger and desire to eat out I will take it back to before the beginning; I was up at 9 after sleeping at 3. I was in bed before then, exhausted, but couldn't sleep due to life buzzing. You know that stuff? In my case it was a result of Bad Dog Theatre, or more specifically Mouthmoney, and more importantly The Jam!

The Jam! is a chance to get up on stage and do improv things in front of real live people who are not in your class. And it was GREAT! I was nervy beforehand, but while on stage I heard a few laughs in response to things I did and really what more can you hope for? Big Ben and DuffMart (the latter nickname is already on the docket for a change) from my class were there and they were fantastic as well.

We chatted about our victories and failures in a lonely Tim Horton's on the Danforth late into the night, hence home late and remaining in an amped state. (I'd tell you more about my day because I also went to preloved's sample sale and bought an atlas, but that smells like a wholly different post.)

...and the rest of my day

You would think, standing up from a man who had fallen in the street would be enough to reset my brain, inspire me to smiles and bring thanks for my existence.

No way.

I brooded through the art stores and clothing boutiques as I made my way along Queen, contemplating the notion of nice pants and $400 boots. Quality versus ubiquity, everyone scurrying looking and buying. My unconflicted love affair with consumerism continues.

Did you know there is a paper store south of TB Park? Just paper. Such variety.

Then with a dark sky threatening (that's all it did) and my stomach grumbling I made my way home.

Fortunately Annie was about, so I vented my spleen and felt better. Sometimes you need to hear someone else say something, even when you know the answer already. And sometimes you just need to hear something when you aren't even sure what questions you're asking. Keep on keeping on dear reader.

And then because I was in the mood to do something I followed Annie out on her comedy rounds. I'd missed the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde show Friday night at Comedy Bar. That featured sober performances, followed 3 hours later by the same show but with the performers toxified in various ways. It was apparently awesome and I didn't want to miss any more fun.

Friday's show was good in part because a Chicago performer was in town and all the other people wanted to break out their best stuff. Or at least so suggested Annie. We went to Unit 102, which is a great little venue featuring an LCBO across the road and enjoyed a bunch of stuff including said Chicagoan, Jet Eveleth by name. Hilarity reigned.

She did this bit. Supremely funny, and of course even more so when I saw it, LIVE!

Then we motored north to Comedy Bar to catch the end of Jet Fighter Pilots before heading home to watch Empire of the Word.

Empire of the Word is very exciting for me. A documentary on reading and how it has affected society over time, I saw an ad for it on TV the other day and was rambling on about it last night when Annie informed me she had a screener copy of the whole series.

Win, me!

What I remember was good. I was too tired to follow it thoroughly but it's on DVD so I'll just try again later.

Who even regularly watches shows if they have to remember to sit down at the same time each week?

Cavemen. Stupid stupid cavemen.

See ya later Slippers

I'm going to miss this guy.

We had drinks in his honour at the Press Club.

There were pears in the trees above us, consumed before they were even picked. Insects win again!

Daydream wanted to look like some sort of beer-shouldered-behemoth, so I obliged.

The Pope was there, chatting business (no doubt) with Toon.
I was talking with Messy (I'm working on this nickname, but for the time being look at that facial shag) about improv stylings. I did not trust his words.

Then Toon put on her sexy face.
And these last two shots...they're what I like to call art.
Goodbye Slippers. You will be missed. Thanks for the CD, the good times and a great summer.

It's great when you make a new friend, it's shitty when they move to the west coast, but then it's good once more because you remember you'll see them again and when you do the good times will recommence. Friends are great like that.

See you soon!
Park?

and then he rested

Sore throat. No fun.

The plan therefore is to bed early and with the magic of sleep remedy all my ills.

I'm not sure exactly when this whole mess began, but I think it was when I started working a few weeks back. Remember those three days? Since then it has been a non-stop, never quite catching up with myself adventure. I regret nothing!

But depleting sleep reserves is a dangerous business. Especially in the land of germs that is Toronto what with all its various handles and doorknobs. I've been riding the TTC a bit recently as well, and I'm not surprised that I started feeling a tingle shortly after that.

So the plan: gargle with salt water, create and consume a fruit smoothie (the kind you read about in the bible), then shower (not connected to throat but a nice experience nonetheless) and then sleep.

Oh boy, I'm tingling like a pirate just thinking about it.

Last night was the multi-party hosted by the ever charming triumvirate of Slippers, TOMson and Mysterio (let's see if this nickname sticks), and I had a grand time. I spent a lot of the celebration on the roof, observing comings and goings, meditating on the skyline and pondering the urban life I am creating for myself. Silence and isolation in a mass of humanity remains a novel experience.

As planned, on the stroke of one we spilled into the park, and despite numerous cruisers doing the verb the noun suggests (ie cruising past) the police knew a good natured gathering when they saw one and there was nary a problem.

My only regret from such nights is the tiredness they beget. I'm not a big drinker these days, but having a few and staying up late has inevitable results in the morning and for some reason sleeping in isn't one of them. Being tired is.

Regardless of exhaustion I went to my first level 200 improv class today and had a grand old time. The new crew seems great and I can't wait to see my progress this time around considering all the good things that the 100 level did for me.

Hurray hurray for the life I lead. This week I have a TIFF screening to attend (The Informant!) and a by-election to be trained for and then work. And hopefully - fingers crossed, knock on wood, burn incense and sacrifice a newt - I'll be receiving a call from the good folks at Black Creek to boot.

Woot!