Exactly how rich ARE you???

On Lakeshore Drive there is a house.  Situated on the south side of the street, its back yard opens to  Lake Ontario.  I pass it every time I go for my extended walk.  The new owners seem determined to transform this 1980s homogenized architecture into... something... more.  I've been watching its transformation for months.

In the spring, there was a new roof.   (TA-DAH!!!)  An oddly shaped,  pseudo-Mansard, steeply-sloped roof was added ON TOP of the original, standard suburban roof.  ON TOP OF IT.  What the...?  First there were roof trusses, then plywood was laid upon that and then...  SHINGLES! And they weren't just crappy shingles, they looked like the faux cedar shake, much more expensive than regular type, shingles.  This roof was a high class call-girl in a roadscape of suburban housewives.  The windows were out of proportion with the house - it looked like it was wearing the wrong hat.  I thought, "It's missing something - maybe they're going to add dormers.  That MUST be it!  There will be dormers!"  Course then, it would just be a house with a weird roof that had dormers - for that to work, you really need a house that has at least 3 floors underneath, all with 10 foot ceilings.  Really you need to be in Parisian townhouse to get away with that merde.

The original roof, with the profile of the 'new' roof.

Then a few weeks later, the fancy roof was gone. The original roof remained, it was as if the more elaborate roof had (POOF!) never existed.    Had we not seen the remains of the trusses in the garbage bin out front, it might have been some architectural hallucination.  We couldn't figure it out.  Why would they put a roof up ON TOP of the original one, and then tear it down? Why would somebody do that?  I joked that maybe the owners wanted to see what it would look like, but that couldn't possibly explain it - who would do that?  It was a mystery.  It was killing us.  One morning, the construction crew looked to be on a break and were enjoying their double-doubles.  David and I HAD to stop. 

"I'm sorry," David said.  "I just have to ask... What was with the roof?"

Every person on the  construction crew rolled their eyes.  One older gentleman, probably the crew boss, closed his eyes for a moment in... could it have been... pain? "She wanted to see what it looked like."

"The homeowner wanted to see what it LOOKED like?" I asked, incredulously. 

The older dude gave a short, mocking nod of his head "Yep."

"You are KIDDING!"

"Nope."

"Was she unaware that there are programs on a computer that can do that sort of thing?"

"It was suggested to her."  He looked like he might have an aneurysm.  "She said she needed to SEE it."

"So, I guess she didn't like it?"

"Nope."

"And she asked you to tear it down again?"

"Yep."

It was then that I realized how rich these people must be.  They would rather spend...   let's say $20,000 as a rough estimate for a completely new roof with near-Mansard sloping and then the fancier shingles.  Who?  I ask you, WHO, has that kind of money to throw around to just see how something might look?  And then, THEN, she had them TEAR IT DOWN, which would be another day's work for a crew of demo people, so I'm thinking at least another $5K in demo maybe, plus fixing any issues underneath.  $25,000 JUST TO SEE HOW IT LOOKS??  WHO DOES THAT?  In theatre you don't just BUILD the set, first you build a scale maquette  to see what things will look like.  This woman was one of "THOSE wives."  The worst I've ever done in a one of "THOSE wives" moments, was when I made David move an armoire all around the house because I didn't like the way it looked in the 2nd bathroom. 

One day, I plan on being rich.  It will happen soon.  When it does, I vow that I will never be THAT kind of rich.  The kind that just throws money AWAY.  You, know, just to SEE WHAT SOMETHING LOOKS LIKE!  You could have an architect show you a computerized mockup of that roof for probably $24,750 LESS than the cost of building what amounts to a life-sized maquette.

Now if it were $25,000 to put on a show...  THAT is totally reasonable ;-)

PMS and the Grammar Gazpacho*

What you don't see is the dude on the left then beats the other dude - TO DEATH

Okay, so YES - it IS that time of the month again.  And this time around, I noticed something...  The closer I get to my period, the greater the chance I might lose my mind over grammar/proper usage.    It's like I'm out for... wait for it... and I hope you've got a Band-aid handy... BLOOD.  HAH! 

This week, I nearly had an aneurysm when the word "nauseous" was misused in an otherwise well-written book.  All I could think was - "Does this person not have an editor!?!"  Even if the author doesn't know which word to use, an editor is supposed to catch this sort of shit, aren't they?  Unless the editor doesn't know 'nauseous' and 'nauseated' mean two vastly different things.  In which case the editor should be shot by a firing squad and then drawn and quartered, their body parts jettisoned to the far corners of the world.  Too harsh?  Perhaps if the editor where just beaten into unconsciousness with a copy of The Elements of Style, then fired?

Wired magazine recently had an article about the love of Japanese cutesy cat videos.  http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/08/ff_cats/ 

Musashi the cat, photo Panda Kanno

I am a cat lover.  Nay, that is too tame a title.  I am a cat adorer.   I have three cats.  If I could have a domesticated house cat the size of a tiger - I might possibly reach a state of nirvana. 

After I read the Wired article, I got suckered into watching Maru cat videos http://www.youtube.com/user/mugumogu?feature=watch and laughed myself silly at the antics of this large Scottish Fold beastie jumping in and out of various boxes.  The big box video almost had Rissa and me peeing ourselves. 

I love cute cats, kittens, puppies, virtually any fluffy mammal.  You'd think this would translate into my going nuts for the "I can haz cheezburger?" cat photos.  You would be wrong.  I know that these photos most likely were originally created by people for whom English is not their first language, but I simply cannot get past the poorly phrased, cutesy and incorrectly spelled words in these nauseous  photo/posters.  Plus, what cat do you know would talk like that?  Seriously?  All I want to do is create my own posters saying "NO!  You may not have a cheeseburger!!"  Then I want to drown those cutesy, baby-talking cats/kittens - which horrifies the cat adorer in me, but the proper usage gal in me is more dominant in these situations and will always win in the end.

* Yes, I could have used Gestapo.  It didn't feel right to make a quick alliterative joke with the word.

Fleas = BLACK DEATH

Fleas, the bringers of the Black Death, have infested our cats, our home, yea verily, our souls.  I am posting this picture of Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers because photos of actual fleas make me want to hurl.  A lot.   I have to say that as pictures of Flea go - it's a pretty good one - usually he looks way crazier, more gap-toothed and less, uh... toned.  This photo makes me want to get really close to him to read the tattoo above his left nipple and maybe just see how his chest might feel, you know, under my hands...  But I digress.

Flea

 Barely tolerable graphic of a flea deservedly about to be drowned.  Suck it you bastard!!

In a fog of repellent I type. (hack, hack, wheeze)  I despise fleas.  I despise that they can jump 150 times their height and escape if you're not vigilant when trying to kill them.  They freaking BOUNCE!  Fleas turn me into a vengeful, predatory, serial killer,  laughing manically as I catalogue my death count.  My eyes glaze over in a haze of vengeance as I watch them drown in 2 qt casserole of dish soap and water.  I see them struggling and do NOTHING to help them!

I get such satisfaction when I take a flea and pop it between my thumbnails.  It's gross and disgusting, but that POP! when one of these suckers dies, is frickin' music to my ears.  I wish I could find the milk of human kindness somewhere.  I rescue spiders, bats, mice, those hairy millipede thingies... worms on the sidewalk... but fleas... (shudder) I get all twitchy and itchy as soon as I find one and then go on a primate-esque grooming binge with the cats.  We have three freaking cats!  And Lola, the littlest, seems to be the tastiest.  I probably got a dozen (shudder) of the little parasites off her.  What is the emoticon for vomit partially filling one's mouth?

As soon as David gets home from work, I will be heading to the vet to get some Advantage and probably more flea spray. See?  This is the peril of a one-car household.  I NEED Advantage to start my home grown extinction of a species and I am car-less!  It had been such a great idea to go down to one car, when he was teaching in town, but now he teaches 50 km away and I am car-less  and we NEED to start Advantage treatment right NOW!!! And I need more flea-killing spray.  I already went through one full can which sprays 2000 square feet.  It conked out on our 2nd floor and I still need to do the attic.   And then I'll need to do it AGAIN in a couple of weeks.  EEEEEEEEW!!

I wish there was something like an EMP, that instead of knocking out electrical devices, it could fry every frickin' flea's brain - make their grey matter explode in their own devious, disgusting, disease-carrying craniums.  Wait!  David's totally a techie!  Maybe he could make me an app that would do that.  You hold your IPhone up to the flea-ridden animal and hit a button and presto the fleas' brains explode!  Just for fleas though.  Not cats, or dogs, or kids, or grownups,or mice, or bats or spiders or worms.

*Except fleas - that's the subtitle on the interior page

p.s.  
David, upon his return from work today: "What is in this casserole dish doing here full of water and, cat hair and... specks of... are those fleas?"

I laugh cruelly.  "Yes, fleas.  FLEAS.  FLEEEEAAAAS!  (my eyes get very wide and very crazy) This is the Casserole of Death - none shall survive."  Now I totally want to have a little gangplank up to the casserole with miniature palmtrees and signs around the casserole saying things like "Flea Spa Day, all parasites welcome!"  "Mani-Pedi specials here!"  "Aromatherapy Massage included!"   Then when they get to the edge and see that it's just dish soap and water...  I submerge the gangplank and watch them not tread water.

MOOOHOOOHAAHAAHAA!!!!
 

Duck Butts

Duck Butts.  They make me laugh.  I just can't help myself.  They provide sheer joy.  Their little webbed feet dancing to keep them underwater - delightful.  They then bob back up, reminiscent of that bobbing water toy from the 70s, adding an odd sense of nostalgia for me.  It's a two-fer.

hee hee hee

Sometimes they do it in duos and trios and that's even funnier.  They are like little feathered synchronized swimmers. 

They could give the Russians a run for their money in snchronicity.

It's the simple pleasures in life.  Duck butts make me happy.  They make me laugh.

True laughter, when it hits, is like a modern-day miracle.  I once laughed so hard in a film that I was "shushed" by the patron in front of me.  He was about 4 - the film was Horton Hears a Who.  The scene was with Vlad the Vulture who threatened to devour his prey...  "First I will devour it and then [coughs] regurgitate it and devour it again - so, two times devoured."  I almost wet my pants giving in to the true laugh, hence the vehement "Shush!!!" by the 4 year old.   It was that deep and chortley laugh - the kind of laugh that we all used to have when we were little - the contagious kind. Giving into that laugh is akin to rebirth for me. 

I stop and smell the roses too.  Truly.  There's no reason I would make that shit up.   I will actually back up and smell a rose, if I catch it out of the corner of my eye.  I gaze with awe at monarch butterflies - especially now before they make their trek to Mexico.  There are hundreds of them out on the beach - it's like walking through a fairy tale illustration.  I ask strangers if I can pet their dogs.  I carpe the diem as much as I can.  I've basically become my mother, which is a good thing.  She's like freaking PollyAnna - it's awesome to see her in action. 

I have not always been this way.  My mom was the ultimate optimist, my dad the ultimate pessimist.  It could have gone either way for me, but I took after my father.  Then, in my 20s, I suffered from depression.   The big, dark, seething pit of vipers in a bottomless pit in your stomach kind of depression.  I clawed my way out and basically had to rethink the way I looked at the world.  I had a choice.  I could either a) Be afraid that every day I would get hit by a bus and wallow in existential angst or b) I could live my life.  I chose b).   It wasn't easy.  Wallowing in existential angst takes way less effort.  I basically had to re-wire my brain.  It was like that episode of Seinfeld where George did the opposite of what his instincts told him.   I forced myself to focus on the positive and after a while, it became habit.  And now, I smell the roses.  I laugh at duck butts.  I find humour in a bad situation. 'Cause if you can't laugh at all the bullshit?  You're wasting an opportunity.  How often do you get the chance to almost pee your pants nowadays?  (Unless you've had a couple of babies squeezed out through your vagina and that happens every time you sneeze or cough.)

An open letter to the Bloggess's publishers...

Dear Amy Einhorn Books/Putnam:

Please let Jenny Lawson rest.  Please.  Let's Pretend This Never Happened was on the NY Times Best-Seller list for 4 months - often in the top 15 books.  You've made TONNES of money off it.  She's done her bit with touring and readings and book signings and BIG SURPRISE she ended up suffering from vital exhaustion.  Let her rest.

She should be doing this.

I'm sure that she, of the diagnosed generalized anxiety disorder, agreed to do all these signings, but dudes, seriously, LET HER REST.  And when she says she's ready to do more, tell her "That's okay Jenny, we're good.  Thanks for sacrificing your tenuous mental health for our book sales, but we'd rather have you alive and well."

This is me, and I'll throw myself in front of her, so that she has time to rest.

I'm in Mama Bear mode here.  I know that this touring has probably pushed her boundaries in a lot of good ways, and that she may have learned many coping mechanisms to deal with the crowds - all good - but when I read her posts about suffering from Vital Exhaustion - I got scared.  And I felt guilty - because I WAS a person in one of those crowds in Toronto - knowing who she was and how she copes (or doesn't) and I loved hearing her read and speak with clarity and compassion to people in that crowd.

And now, I'm worried for her.  I worry that she feels pressure to be in the public eye when she doesn't have to be.  Those who admire her will continue to read her blog and her book.  I've recommended both and will continue to do so.  But now, what I really want, is for her to have time to rest and relax and reboot and concentrate on being less exhausted, so that she doesn't lose it completely, because frankly, she's no good to me completely crazy.  Selfishly, I want the caustic, cuckoo-bananas writing that I've come to crave and if she's gone completely around the frickin' bend, I won't get it. 

Please.  LET HER REST.  There are a lot of us Mama Bears out there.  You don't want us to attack. 

Babysitting bulldogs...

Her name is Jelly.  Jelly Bean.  Jelly is blind in one eye, mostly deaf and breaks wind as only an elderly bulldog can.  She is in our care until Monday.  She is a french bulldog and, according to Rissa, near perfection.

Essence de Jelly.

"This dog.  THIS dog.  Is the BEST dog in the entire world.  I will have a dog like this of my very own one day."

The three cats in the house have differing opinions.  Steve, for one, might want to have a contract put out on her, but he isn't the sharpest claw on the paw if you know what I'm saying.  Minuit has placed herself on a self-imposed hunger strike for fear that she might run into Jelly at the food bowls.  (As Minuit is the size of a raccoon, this might not be such a bad thing.)  And Lola?  Well I'm pretty sure that Lola might be the one who called animal services to inform them of a rabid dog on the premises.  She's crafty that one.

 

Lola - plotting from doorway.

We're living in the midst of a Mexican Standoff.  The tension is high when they're in relatively close proximity to one another.  And by close proximity, I mean that the dog stays in one place, completely calm, and a cat is usually in an adjacent doorway ready to puff tail, blow fur, growl and race away the minute that Jelly's breathing hitches.  Half the time Jelly can't even see them.

I shall hug this Ikea basket - it will give me strength.

Steve's the bravest, but again, not so smart.  He's my sloppy tomcat - who executes a shoulder roll to have his belly rubbed the minute you're close.  Strangely, he has not tried this manoeuvre with Jelly...  there are still a couple of days to go though - it could happen.

Only the cruelest and most unkind of humans could resist this face.

The internet is not MAGIC

It's official - we are slaves to the internet.  Thankfully the internet does not manifest as Jabba the Hutt and I don't have to wear a bikini with a collar and leash - so that's a plus.  (Although to many, this might be deemed a perk.)

Not the Internet

While in Toronto last week, we found ourselves without wireless and rather than spending mucho dineros at Starbucks and the Second Cup in beverages/food we didn't need while leeching their Wi-Fi, we instead paid $200 for a Rocket Hotspot from Rogers and started a Flex Rate wireless plan.  No, the math does NOT work out.  But now we HAVE the hardware should this situation arise in the future.

I know... you're thinking "What, you couldn't survive for a week without the internet?!?"  No, in fact we couldn't.  I  need email.  Not like it's my heroin or anything, but I communicate with the cast, musicians and crew via email.  I required the ability to be able to check in at least a couple of times a day - and David needed to be able to work online when he wasn't troubleshooting the tech at the theatre.  We had thought we would have wireless at the theatre, but we did not.  Upon this realization, a medium-sized panic ensued.

I so wish that this could be animated into the panic dance that David and I did.

Shortly thereafter, David made the executive decision to bite the bullet and purchase the Hotspot.  David knows that neither he nor I are organized/have energy enough  to finish our day at the theatre and then spend an hour at a coffee shop  juggling administrative tasks.  Plus, we had Rissa with us who would not have appreciated the extra hour of keeping herself occupied, even if we were feeding her.  PLUS, I would have gotten really fat last week if I'd had more than one large flavoured decaf soy latte a day. No, we didn't save any money doing it this way, but we did conserve precious amounts of sanity.

I realized the first day with the Hotspot that I know NOTHING about how the internet really works.  It is not, in fact, magic and mostly free.  I thought that if you weren't opening new pages online and downloading crap, that you were not using bandwidth.  Apparently, I was wrong.  David should have explained how data is transferred and what bit rate exactly is before before he said "We're good to go - you can check your mail!"  

We got the bill today for our first few hours using the Hotspot - you know you're in trouble when your bill takes 8 pages to explain everything.  We used 214.40 MB (megabytes) in approx 4 hours of owning the Hotspot.  I was not downloading ANYTHING - I had thought.  I was again wrong.  It wasn't that I had been mis-informed, but rather that I was missing information - my knowledge regarding the internet and its true nature was... apparently almost non-existent.  I HATE when I'm stupid - even if it's due to ignorance.  I know enough that if you have a laptop that has Wi-Fi capability but don't have Wi-Fi anywhere near you that you can't connect to the Net.  I know that.  I know that one shouldn't download large things or get huge updates when you're worried about bit rate.  But I really didn't know that once you are on a site like gmail that information just pretty much flows like a tap and sucks like a dock hooker on the first day of the Merchant Marines' shore leave.

And there's this too: Our first bill from Rogers was only $40.89 - and I thought GREAT!!  We totally didn't use as much as David feared we had.  YAY US!!!  Then I realized that $35 of that $40.89 was  the activation fee and the rest was just for the first few hours we had the equipment in our possession.  Anyone care to guestimate what our bill will be for the other 4 full days we were using this technology?  David suspects we'll be in the upwards of $100 for the time.  But really, that's only about $25 a day - which we totally would have spent at a coffee shop,  PLUS - we now OWN the "HOTSPOT" - how many people can say that??  When we speak of it, we can instead pretend that it's not something the size of a deck of cards but is instead a Toronto nightclub - in which we have now invested with other hip, happening people.  I can confabulate with the best of them.   Plus this way... I didn't get fat.