It was a drizzly Saturday morning and I did housework. Normally I just do a little bit here and there, but I decided that today I would try doing it all at once and get it over with.
Three hours later, I had decluttered and scrubbed and swept and swiffered and mopped and dusted and stuff. I had even hauled out BOTH vacuum cleaners. I wasn’t done, but some of my rooms were looking pretty good.
Not this one though. This is my computer room. I can’t decide what to do with the big pile of ironing. I don’t want to iron it, but I’m tired of looking at it. Any suggestions?
That’s a pretty good trick eh, procrastinating about the housework by blogging about the housework?
But why stop there? I’ll just flip through my camera and see what else I can ramble on about instead of finishing the housework.
Here are a couple of walking-to-work pictures from earlier this week.
This is my favourite tree on a foggy morning in the Arboretum. It’s a European Larch. I swear if you lay your hand on its trunk, it vibrates and you can absorb its energy. I know how that sounds, but go try it yourself before you say I’m imagining it. It’s just west of Prince of Wales, and north of the Driveway, on the perimeter of a big grassy field. It’s the only Larch in that area.
I think these crows must have had a lovers’ quarrel.
Oh look! Here’s Nicky Diane, wearing the hat that Melinda in Switzerland knit! I delivered it to her shortly after that premature snowfall. I have to say, she seemed – understandably – a little puzzled when I gave it to her. I explained that a friend of mine in Switzerland had knit it and hoped it might keep her a little warmer this winter. Nicky Diane looked like she had questions, but she didn’t ask them. Finally she took off her other hat, put this hat on, said it matched her jacket, and then mused “Everybody spoils me…the people who love me, and now people I’ve never even met in Switzerland.”
Last night GC and I went to the 260 Fingers pottery show at the Glebe Community Centre. I bought two mugs: one from Chandler Swain, and one from Maureen Marcotte. I ran into several people I know there, from different parts of my life, past and present: an old boss from ten years ago, a woman whose daughter was in daycare with my son 24 years ago, and two of my blog readers!
Here’s a picture of Duncan having a nap for you Duncan fans. I just took this picture five minutes ago. The big orange pussycat opened one eye, stretched and went back to sleep.
Today is my sister Debbie’s birthday! She and I are the same age for a few weeks each year before she pulls ahead again. Debbie is smart and kind and generous. She’s easy to talk to, and she takes good care of the people she loves, including me. She also plays endless games of Word Twist and Scramble with me on Facebook and is a faithful reader of my blog. And she makes me laugh. I’m very lucky to have her as a sister and friend. Happy Birthday Deb!
Today I scheduled an emergency visit to the massage therapist because my legs have been aching like crazy for ten days and I finally couldn’t take it another minute. Both legs were achy, antsy, irritable and whiny. I marched them on over to the Elgin Street Massage Therapy Clinic.
“So,” said Kim, “What’s up?”
I launched into a litany of complaints about my legs, but refrained from talking about them like they were badly behaved children. I showed her where they hurt.
“Aha!” said Kim, “Ilio-tibial band.”
I’ve been getting this chronic leg achiness for at least 15 years. It comes and goes. It lasts a few weeks at a time. It demands to be rubbed, but I can never rub hard enough, and the relief only lasts for as long as the rubbing lasts.
And now, suddenly, all that chronic achiness has a name. It is not just achy legs. It has a name! I am inordinately delighted.
I’d heard of ilio-tibial band syndrome, or ITBS, from my running days. It’s a pernicious little syndrome, one that’s difficult to get rid of. If you have to have a running disorder, it isn’t the one you want. On the other hand, if you’re no longer a runner, it’s kind of nice to have a disorder with such a respectable athletic pedigree.
My delight didn’t stop there. No-sir-ee. There was more delight where that came from!
“How long have you had this problem with your legs?” asked Kim.
“Well, about 10 days this time,” I said, “But off and on since I was in my 30s.”
The massage was excellent: therapeutic and pleasurable both.
Afterwards, she asked me how old I was, because when I had said “since I was in my 30s” it made it sound like that was a long time ago. I told her my age and she was very surprised. She said that my muscle strength and tone and the condition of my skin were all ten years younger than my chronological age! AND she said that I had obviously taken good care of myself all my life.
I was thrilled and she was on a roll, so I didn’t tell her about my misspent youth, the drug abuse, the alcohol, the 212,000 cigarettes I’d smoked, the dead cows I’d eaten, the cheap chocolate, the years of sloth.
I just took my ilio-tibial band syndrome and my bright shiny compliment, and stepped out into the sunny fall day on my well-massaged legs. I noticed I had a brand new spring in my step.
On my morning of my birthday I was walking to work, listening to the Vinyl Cafe podcast, and it was so touching and heartwarming I almost cried.
Stuart McLean was handing out the annual Arthur Awards, which go to people who have made a difference. It doesn’t have to be a big profound thing they’ve done; it can be a small seemingly unimportant thing that affects only one other person.
Or, in this case, one little homeless paralyzed bunny.
It’s true. Andy Blau, a volunteer with the Toronto Humane Society, wanted to do something to make Blueberry the Bunny’s wretched little life better. Poor Blueberry had rear-leg paralysis. She just sat in her cage, and if she fell over she had to wait for someone to set her upright again. She loved attention and affection, but her world was very limited. Her prospects for adoption didn’t look so hot either, because there’s not much of a market for paralyzed bunnies.
So Andy built Blueberry a wheelchair. When she’s strapped into it, she can use her front legs to wheel herself around. Look.
Andy’s best friend – who nominated him for the Arthur Award – said: “There are lots of problems in this world, and chances are hardly anybody cares about one paralyzed rabbit in an animal shelter filled with needy animals. It’s a tiny problem in a big world.”
And here are some snippets of what Andy said when Stuart McLean phoned him and conducted an impromptu on-air interview:
Stuart: “Why did you do it?”
Andy: “… The world is a complicated, complicated place. Sometimes it’s hard to tell if you’re doing something good or you’re doing something bad. But I am absolutely certain that in building this wheelchair, I made the world a tiny tiny tiny better place.”
Stuart: “Some people listening today would say that building a wheelchair for a rabbit is not the most important thing a guy could do and he should be helping other people who are in need.”
Andy: “I agree that building a wheelchair for a rabbit maybe isn’t the most important thing to do. I think it’s important just that people do something. I would be absolutely thrilled if everybody did a little something extra for their society. This is where I chose to do it.”
He’s so right. We look at the world’s problems and they’re overwhelming. We feel like there’s nothing we can do because we’re just one little person and the world has so many huge, seemingly insurmountable problems.
So today, in honour of Andy Blau’s heart-warming philosophy of life, I’m issuing the Blueberry Challenge to all of us, myself included. Let’s all try to find one tiny way to make the world a wee bit better this month. Then come back here and tell us about it in the comments. Or write about it on your own blog, and leave a link in the comments. It doesn’t have to be a big thing like building a wheelchair. It can be very, very small. Remember, we don’t have to FIX the world, we just have to find a way to make it a tiny bit better.
(If I read this on someone else’s blog, I think I’d be scared to go first, so I’m hoping one of you is brave enough to leave the first comment.)
GC and I went to our first Dusty Owl gathering yesterday, to hear Ivan E. Coyote tell some stories. We arrived at the last minute and got the last two chairs. The person next to me struck up a conversation and then introduced herself as Ivan.
Ivan! Coyote!
Now the thing is, I knew virtually nothing about Ivan Coyote when I walked in there, but by the time I left I was completely enchanted by her. I wanted to buy ALL her books and her CD and get on her mailing list and follow her around the country like a groupie and watch her tell stories. I bet I could watch her tell the same three stories a hundred times and never get bored.
I love the way she looks at people in the audience. She doesn’t just make eye contact, she locks it in, then she delivers a sentence or two or three, and then she lets go, sometimes with a subtle wink or a raised eyebrow or a slight nod, before moving on. It’s riveting. And she’s brilliant and hilarious, with an instinct for timing, and she collects belt buckles and she’s from the Yukon, and even though you can tell she knows exactly what’s going on, she’s still got a soft spot in her heart for the kind of men who don’t know exactly what’s going on, like the old-timers smoking outside the taverns in Whitehorse.
Well, you know, I totally fell in love with Ivan Coyote. I even joined the Facebook Group Admit it you have a crush on Ivan E Coyote, which describes her like this:
“Women and Men, straight and gay, love Ivan. She’s funny and handsome. Likes to walk dogs and play street hockey, has good manners in a restaurant and is charmingly self-depecating. She’s a hunk in handyman’s clothing, can talk like a mechanic, and knows what a latte is, and knows how to make a romantic spaghetti dinner. She’s nice to children but can drink you under the table. If she was booking a trip to France, she would probably pick a fabulous Bed and Breakfast. On top of all this, she is a literary treasure and wonderful culture-making dynamo.”
And as if all that weren’t perfect enough, she knits too!
I wish I’d known about her earlier, because she’s been in Ottawa all year as Carleton University’s writer-in-residence. She’s been teaching writing courses right here in Ottawa. And she’s leaving at the end of this month and moving to Vancouver. I’m heartbroken.
But there’s good news too. She’s launching and reading from her new book, The Slow Fix, at Venus Envy on Thursday November 20th, and we’re all invited. And as an extra added bonus, my favourite local blogger-pornographer, Megan Butcher, will be reading with her.
I’m pleased to report that this year I finally managed to make it to the Ferret Frolic, which was held indoors at the Jack Purcell Community Centre yesterday afternoon!
If you’re not familiar with ferrets (and really, why would you be, unless you play Dungeons and Dragons?) they’re kind of weasly-looking things with elongated bodies and tiny limbs, and they smell funny. They’ve been compared to polecats, but I don’t find that comparison particularly useful since we don’t get a lot of polecats around Ottawa.
Ferrets are inquisitive and busy and their owners seem to really, really like them. A lot. It’s almost unnatural how much they like them. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, of course. I think everybody should like their pets a lot. It’s just a bit weird is all. There’s this whole freaky ferret subculture out there.
Okay, so what happens at a Ferret Frolic? Well, ferret owners brings their ferrets and they have a mini ferret fair with booths and displays and services and ferret games and contests and stuff.
There are cages of adoptable ferrets from the Ferret Rescue Society . However, there are no adoptions permitted on Ferret Frolic Day. I assume this is because they want to discourage impulse ferret shopping. (I wasn’t seized by that particular impulse.)
There are lots of ferret things for sale at the Frolic, like ferret harnesses and carry bags and magazines and slings and books and ferret health and beauty grooming aids and calendars.
There was a guy who spoke into a microphone about ferret health for a very long time. He said things like “And now I’m going to tell you about some exciting news about Adrenal Gland Disease.”
There were some practical health services available. For example, you could pay this Ferret woman to clean your ferret’s ears. There was a ferret toe-nail-clipper guy too.
There were plenty of frivolous ferret activities too.
This one struck me as kind of odd. It’s a ferret toboggan. You pay a dollar and a volunteer throws your ferret down a steep slide. At the bottom of the slide there are figurines, and your ferret can crash into them and knock them over. I’m new to ferrets, and I certainly don’t presume to know what they do or do not like, but I was a little skeptical about this particular game.
“Do you think the ferrets like that?” I asked a woman in a wheelchair who was waiting in the toboggan line with her ferret, Jack. She looked at me, and then she looked at Jack. She dangled his long wiggly body in front of her face and said “Do you like that Jack? Do you like it? Do you like the toboggan? Do you like it Jack?”
After a few minutes of this, I sidled over to the Santa Claus booth. For $5 you could get a photo of your ferret sitting on Santa’s lap. He wasn’t a very jolly looking Santa, and there wasn’t much demand for his services. Perhaps all the ferrets had already been photographed with Santa by the time I got there.
There was another photo booth too, where you could get a picture of your ferret sitting in a little red wagon. I wanted to get a nice blogworthy picture of a ferret in the little red wagon, but nobody was getting that done while I was there.
There was also a gift-wrapping contest. For a dollar, they’d wrap up your ferret and then they time him to see how long it took him to unwrap himself.
Here’s a ferret in a hand-knit sweater, checking out my shoe.
There was also a silent auction, with proceeds going to the Ferret Rescue Society.
There was a playroom, with mazes and ball tubs for the ferrets to play in.
All that frivolous frolicky ferret fun wore these two little guys out. I bet exhausted ferrets all over Ottawa were taking advantage of that extra hour of sleep last night. I know I did.
This is actually one of the things I love best about living in Ottawa. There are weird quirky things going on all over this city every weekend. Even if ferrets aren’t my thing, I love knowing that some people are passionate enough about ferrets to create an event especially for them.
Posted by zoom! on November 1, 2008, at 10:23 am |
When I was young and poor and couldn’t afford to buy furniture, I always kept an eye open for curbside upgrades to my existing furniture. I’d drag home a better couch and then wrestle my old couch out to the curb. A few hours later I might see someone else dragging my old couch away because it was better than their old couch. There’s this whole garbage-day scavenger economy going on out there, and without it, a lot of people wouldn’t have any furniture at all.
But I don’t think I’d participate in the scavenger economy anymore – at least not with upholstered furniture. This couch was sitting on the curb on Nepean Street a couple of days ago. I think it was awfully good of the people who discarded it to leave a note for would-be scavengers.
Bill 106 – The Safer Communities and Neighbourhoods Act – was introduced as a Private Members Bill by Ottawa Centre MPP Yasir Naqvi.
It makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
Essentially this is what Bill 106 proposes:
“Bill 106 (SCAN) would enable municipalities to appoint a Director of Safer Communities and Neighbourhoods that will accept anonymous allegations of unsafe or illegal activities occurring on or near specific properties. The SCAN Director has sweeping powers to conduct surveillance of accused tenants and homeowners. The Director can then apply to Superior Court to evict the tenant or close the property for up to 90 days through a ‘Community Safety Order’.” (Source: Advocacy Centre for Tenants Ontario)
1. It reeks of American-style approaches to crime and terror. For years now, Americans have been seeing their civil rights eroded under the guise of keeping them safer from evil-doers. (First we’ll pretend you’re in mortal danger, then we’ll pretend to protect you by systematically stripping away your rights.) That’s too high a price for the illusion of security.
2. It opens the doors of all our homes another inch for Big Brother. If we say they can peek into our neighbours’ windows, we’re also saying they can peek into ours. And that old saying about “I’m not doing anything wrong, so I’ve got nothing to hide” might feel a little less innocent when somebody hiding behind a cloak of anonymity points their creepy finger at you.
3. There are already provisions in the existing Residential Tenancies Act and in the Criminal Code to address these same problems.
4. The crime rate has been falling for two decades. We don’t need increased surveillance.
5. This tool will be used disproportionately against members of already marginalized groups, such as racial minorities and poor people. It’s a weapon wielded according to perceptions of danger, which are notoriously inaccurate. Even if it’s not deliberately used in a racist way, the effect will be the same.
6. It will be used deliberately as a weapon by people against people they don’t like: eg, ex-spouses, parents battling for custody, nosy neighbours, etc. (Welfare fraud hotlines provide good examples: see Walking on Eggshells)
7. It promotes secret accusations and paranoia while denying the right of the accused to an open process through which he or she can respond to accusations.
What we can do to help defeat Bill 106:
Bill 106 goes for its 2nd reading today. If you want to help defeat it, please email your local Ontario MPP and tell them you’re opposed to Bill 106. You can find the contact information of MPPs here. Send a copy of your letter to the Honourable Jim Watson, Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing (jwatson.mpp@liberal.ola.org) and MPP Yasir Naqvi (ynaqvi.mpp.co@liberal.ola.org), the MPP who introduced Bill 106.
Here are a few of the things we saw on Sunday while wandering the streets of Ottawa.
Snow at the Clocktower Pub but nowhere else. Of course this would have been a much more dramatic picture if I’d posted it in a more timely fashion, like before we got the first snowfall of the season. (In case you’re wondering why it snowed at the Clocktower but nowhere else: they imported the snow for a snowboarding competition the night before.)
Fresh from the Ontario Conference of Folk Festivals (okay maybe that’s a bit of an oxymoron, given what Hella Stella says about OCFF), for a jam at the Elmdale Tavern, from left to right: Jay Linden, Sean Peever, Eve Goldberg (my Haliburton guitar teacher, who is searching for a nickname), and Sam Turton (who encourages the audience to sing, so we did). We forgot to bring our knitting to the Elmdale which was a little disappointing because, as you know, tavern knitting is hot. But we managed to have fun even without the knitting.
Other sightings included:
A Pumpkin Esthetician – you don’t see one of these every day.
Pumpkin Cannibals might be a little more common:
And last but not least, we saw a favourite famous Ottawa blogger peddling south on Bank Street, but he was faster than the speed of light, so we couldn’t get a picture.
We were walking up Bank Street on Sunday when I spotted a new swap box on the other side of the street at Bank & Second. GC was impressed with my eagle eyed powers of observation, and said so as I bolted into Bank Street traffic to get to it.
Did you know the Swap Box got itself on the voters’ list this past federal election? Oh yes it did! But it did the right thing and spoiled its ballot.
There was a yellow highlighter in the heart-shaped swap box, along with a cookie. We didn’t need either one so we left them there. We didn’t have any treasures to leave in the swap box either, just a little package of peanut butter. In it went. Then I took a few pictures and we continued on our way.
But wait, not so fast!
A panhandler who was sitting on the sidewalk about 10 feet from the swap box started berating us. He accused us of taking everything out of the swap box and putting nothing in. We tried to explain that we didn’t take anything and we did leave something, but he wasn’t having any of it. We finally turned and walked away, leaving him to his ranting accusations.
It bugged me a bit at the time, but later I enjoyed the irony of being yelled at by a panhandler for abusing a swap box. Me, the Swap Box Project’s biggest fan, and loyal defender of panhandlers and underdogs everywhere.
Speaking of swap boxes…
For months now I’ve been listening to my neighbour’s alarm clock go off at 5:00 every morning, because our bedrooms share a common wall. A few days ago GC said “Don’t you think it’s odd that we hear her alarm so clearly? Maybe it’s not her alarm. Maybe it’s something in your house, not hers.”
Impossible, I thought.
But GC can be persistent, especially at 5:00 in the morning. He located the offending beeper in my art studio in a basket full of treasures accumulated from swap boxes over the months. I will be transforming these treasures into a piece of swap box assemblage art in the near future. I suppose this means the swap box assemblage art will beep every morning at 5:00, which means it will be multimedia swap box assemblage art.
I wasn’t actually planning to see the Cirque du Soleil this time round, since I’ve seen them three times in the last twenty-five years and the last time was only two years ago.
But, in the end I just couldn’t let them leave without seeing them.
My favourite character was Valentyna. She’s a mature, child-like, two-foot-five, dwarf acrobat, with a good sense of comedic timing, and I loved her. She was floating around, suspended from six giant helium balloons, and the audience got to play with her. She’d float down, and members of the audience would push up on the soles of her little wee feet and send her floating back up. It’s probably a good thing she didn’t come floating down near me, because I might have plucked her out of the air and squeezed her.
I was totally enchanted by her, but I felt almost guilty about it. When I was a kid I wanted a chimpanzee so I could name him Mikey and dress him up in overalls and striped t-shirts and baseball caps and sneakers and hold his hand when we walked to the park to play on the jungle gym. That’s kind of how I felt about Valentyna.
I know, I know – it’s wrong to feel that way about human beings. It’s probably wrong to feel that way about chimpanzees too. Sigh.
The thing about the Cirque is that everything they do looks like so much fun. Everything evokes that sense of childlike wonder and delight. Jumping on the bed, floating from helium balloons, learning how to fly, walking upside down across the ceiling, riding a bicycle through the sky…it’s all got that magical childhood thing going on.
I’m not sure I was ever that kind of child, though. I might have wanted a chimpanzee, but I didn’t even believe in Santa Claus. I distinctly recall my mother warning me when I was five years old, “If you tell Debbie there’s no Santa Claus, you’ll be in very serious trouble young lady!”
Debbie was my big sister and she believed. Years later Mom finally told her herself, because she thought Debbie would soon be a target for ridicule if she continued to believe. I remember Debbie lying on her bed sobbing at the news. Mom went on to explain that Santa Claus was “just like the Tooth Fairy,” which traumatized poor Debbie even further because, unbeknownst to Mom, Debbie still believed in the Tooth Fairy. I think the Easter Bunny bit the dust that day too, along with the tattered remains of Debbie’s innnocence.
Anyway, they say Corteo’s about a funeral for a clown, but to me it was about childhood. How about you? Did you see it? Did you love it? Did your childhood flash before your eyes?
It was a drizzly Saturday morning and I did housework. Normally I just do a little bit here and there, but I decided that today I would try doing it all at once and get it over with. 
Oh look! Here’s Nicky Diane, wearing the hat that Melinda in Switzerland knit! I delivered it to her shortly after that premature snowfall. I have to say, she seemed – understandably – a little puzzled when I gave it to her. I explained that a friend of mine in Switzerland had knit it and hoped it might keep her a little warmer this winter. Nicky Diane looked like she had questions, but she didn’t ask them. Finally she took off her other hat, put this hat on, said it matched her jacket, and then mused “Everybody spoils me…the people who love me, and now people I’ve never even met in Switzerland.”
Last night GC and I went to the 260 Fingers pottery show at the Glebe Community Centre. I bought two mugs: one from Chandler Swain, and one from Maureen Marcotte. I ran into several people I know there, from different parts of my life, past and present: an old boss from ten years ago, a woman whose daughter was in daycare with my son 24 years ago, and two of my blog readers!
Here’s a picture of Duncan having a nap for you Duncan fans. I just took this picture five minutes ago. The big orange pussycat opened one eye, stretched and went back to sleep.
GC and I went to our first 
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