Chapter 13: Stay here for a minute whilst I go and get some ice creams

A lot has happened in the last few days. Nothing of terrible importance, but terrible importance isn't what SWP is about. At least, not importance - terrible, I seem to have down. Har har. Plfth.

I'd say I hadn't had time to update all weekend, but that would be a falsehood, I was just doing other things. I don't need to justify myself for that.

Friday at work went well. It was back at the same couple's house, finishing up the bedroom and cleaning up whatever fuckups I (or anyone else) had made along the way (including an unsightly blotch of paint on their patio by an errant dropcloth, eep.) It went by pretty quickly. I got a ton of oilpaint on my hands from washing rollers, something I probably could have found a better way of doing, but it's going to happen, I try not to worry about it too much. We finished around 1 and Kerissa was good enough to give me a lift home. Except she made a wrong turn and we took a little detour. My general preference not to explain directions to people led me to just taking a lift to the bus station, which ended up as a lift to Trafalgar Village so I could grab a BLT for lunch. Word.

So I got home early for me, which was nice. I just kinda bummed around until dinner at Dad's, which was not a long ordeal because he and Deb were heading to the trailer. Sadly because of this I ended up not going to Joe's Snooker Club show, which was a shame because I try to catch them when I can. I don't feel too bad because I know there will always be another one, but I like to support my friends when humanly possible.

This led to a resetting of what was going on for the night. Adam, whom I had not heard from in months, took it upon himself to start a Risk game (at Chris',) so after waking up from a nap on the couch at 10, I rushed over there to find Chris, RyLai, Adam and Connor gathered. We got the game going.

It was a pretty intense game, actually, rarely getting stagnant. Chris and Ryan got Europe and Africa respectively in a hurry, and Connor got South America. This left me to attempt for North America (something I am loathe to do) fighting Adam's inconveniently-placed armies. Connor actually took care of Adam and became the problem for me in North America, preventing me from ever getting it by having a strong presence in Central America (quite a decent tactic.) Eventually I was blown out of that continent (save for some scattered territories I abandoned) and had to build my way out of a lone Asian territory, India. In this way I managed to survive, mostly by not being a good target. I worked my way back up through Kamchatka (which has the nickname of "Kam-chate-ka," because we're all about Oakville slang,) for the backdoor slice in Connor's weakened North America. In the meantime, Adam, a man without a home base, withered and faded from the game.

During all this, we watched Kung Fu movies Chris had bought, 4 for $10, two Bruce Lee, a Jacky Chan (*early, with a Y not IE) and a no-name.

So I mounted a decent return and Ryan ended the suspense and took both me and Connor out to win a controlling interest in the game and therefore win. We went home around 2:15 and I stayed up a while before going to bed.

Saturday, I bummed around and drew while Eric mowed the lawn and we got some replacement tubes for the fluorescent light in the basement that had been out for a week. After dinner, I went over to Chris'. We went with his parents* to Hamilton to see Cary in Alice: The Tea Party, an adaptation of Alice in Wonderland with the interesting twist that the author (Rev. Charles Dodgson before he became Lewis Caroll) appeared and had not written his stories down for young Alice.

(*Chris and I agreed that by now, I know his parents well enough that it wasn't weird.)

Along with us was Chris' Great Aunt, which in theory had the potential to easily be weird but wasn't because she was a super lady. That's a weird sentence (wouldn't stand in prose but SWP bitches out literary conventions on a regular basis.) Anyway, on the car ride over, Linda asked how I was, noting that the last time she'd read my blog I'd seemed down about my first day at work. I modestly and somewhat unconvincingly discussed why that was and whether I still felt that way (I'd been bummed but really just blowing off steam and making observations.) Chris, sitting between us in the back, noted fairly accurately that SWP wasn't my favourite thing to discuss in public. This is because well... everything I have to say about it can be found here, where it seems like an alternate dimension. I don't hate talking about it, I just don't think I have anything interesting to say about what I've already said here. When someone says "I read your blog" I just kinda nod and smile and take it as a compliment. It's nice, but I'd rather people were reading, say, RN Comics or Regular Guy. But if SWP keeps 'em coming back, you'll always be able to get more. I take it as a compliment, anyway, unless they say "I read your blog... you say a lot of stupid things on there." And then I would say, "Well then why do you read it?" NUFF SAID! HOO HAH! Ahem.

Anyway, I'm almost done with the meta-blogging (blogging about blogging) but I'll just note how incongruous it is to hear that an intelligent, reasonable person like Linda manages to sift through the rambling nonsense I produce here. Linda, I wonder what you get out of it. Maybe it reminds you of being 20 and frustrated with everything in life and so has nostalgic value? Maybe I'm just awesome. I'll go with that. SWP has outlasted a lot of readers anyway... since nothing of note ever happens to me, people come and go a lot, although I'll always be big in Korea and the Philippines, I think. Which is weird, but funny.

(As I often reiterate, I know where hits are coming from. It just so happens that so many are from Oakville and Toronto that it's pointless to speculate who's on the other end.)

SO YEAH. The play. We got there in time to miss the first one of the evening. The play was amusing and clever as an adaptation of stories everyone's heard 100 000 times before with some very energetic performances. Cary did a good job doing double duty (all the performers except Alice and the Cheshire Cat did) as the somewhat melodramatic Dodgson and the manic Mad Hatter. He handles the distinction well, a testament to his abilities (THERE CARY I KNOW YOU CTRL+F'd THIS FOR THAT SENTENCE.) There was a point where the poor Dormouse got her head slammed into the table by Cary, which sadly got the biggest laugh of the night. They also poured some tea on her, poor girl. Anyway, if I had to fault the play it would be the script being a bit inconsistent, especially when it started to get a bit low-key and quiet near the end, where it had previously been quite manic and exciting. So it's not on the actors or director at all. All things begin and end with a script, after all. But it was a good show, very glad to have seen it. Great costumes (borrowed from a recent nearby production of Alice.)

Chris and I came up with an idea that we agreed would've been funny, but long past relevance. We both would've liked, in hindsight, to have written me a cameo in No Way My Life, wherein I began the play onstage reading a newspaper, then after not long, set it down and walked into the crowd to take my seat. Would've been fun, if utterly pointless (the most fun things tend to be.)

Arnyway, we greeted Cary after the show, then went back to Oakville. Aunt Syl gave Chris a kiss goodnight and then gave me one, which was funny. I guess I make a good first impression. Chris and I began trying to figure out another Risk game. I had spoken to CB the night before and he was presumed to be down for it, but we soon found out, he was INCOMMUNICATO. Dios mio no!

Ryan and Connor came back and we got an ill-fated game going. It should've been a lot simpler than it was, with Conner being the first one out and then Ryan and I teaming up on Chris, but the attack that was to be my big strike proved utterly useless as I lost about 20 rolls killing about 5 guys. It was embarrassing and funny, only I was tired so I started to get really cranky and exaggeratedly upset as I often do. Not long after, we decided the game we just too fucked up to continue, speculated on what would've happened next, and went home.

It was actually a defender's night, at least against me... every big attack I made ended up being unusally costly to me. It was a shame, too, because the previous night's game had been so much more exciting and fun.

This ended around 3:30, before the end of the last kung fu movie. I fell asleep around 4 and woke up by 10, tired and sore.

That was kinda poetic.

Today I was to work in the Trafalgar-Glenashton area cold-calling. I was actually kinda excited for it since I can get there easily and would love to do jobs in that area, but the rain prevented it from happening. Kerissa called (after I'd started this entry) to tell me this, and we discussed whether I'd be able to make it to work on Tuesday (since it's deep in the heart of Mississauga, I'm trying to negotiate a ride with my co-worker Catherine, whose own travel is in doubt.)

Yesterday my project was to clean my jacket. In the course of duty on Thursday I got a few small spots of oil-based ceiling paint on it. I wish it had been latex, but no. So I had to devise a way to remove it. I eventually discovered a powerful all-purpose cleaner from when mom was involved in a non-Amway pyramid scheme. I smeared it on the spots and managed to scrub them off, or at least convert them into faded blots. I'll revisit the project in the future. It was arookie mistake, leaving my jacket out in the open. I'll not repeat it, for shore.

My mouse suddenly stopped working yesterday, so I found a little laptop mouse, which actually seems to be easing some of my computer's speed problems. Weirdly cool.

Anyway, when I start bringing up things like that, you know it's time to end the entry. Hope you've enjoyed it, Linda.

Keep on rockin'
-Scott