home safe and sound. amassed a pleasing postcard collection, and not much else.

ps

all of a sudden, i'm going to england. the departure date keeps jumping closer. current projections have me jetting off next tuesday, all exhausted from celebrating old vicky. i'll be in a tornado of queues. pick up passport in the morning, rush off to YVR by eight, and then a hop and skip across the international date line (hopefully not too much airport boredom, but it is inevitable) to BAA gatwick. lordy i haven't planned this at all. what to do over there? i can't begin to think. would have wanted maybe a cursory medical exam (rubber glove at least) to make sure my brain won't deflate in transit.

if it weren't for these two things here, i'd have packed myself into a fifty gallon drum by now.

oddly enough, i haven't been spending every waking moment at the computer. what's wrong with me!? maybe if i smash everyone's ice cream cones i can go back to sweet complete apathy. still gotta get a job. my main considerations are either michael's (because i have been going through a fair amount of craft supplies. katie lowe if you see this i need your help!) or red hot video (because porn stores are a dying breed thanks to this here internets, and i do love pornography, but i suspect it would be awful and make me feel filthy). but boy howdy am i terrible at getting shit done.

the animal is a success. she is a slut and a nag but remains adorable at it. she may be gassy. definitely a smell. i can learn to ignore it. she's got an amazing capacity to be in the way, above and beyond the call of duty. i floated "victoria" but mum likes "priscilla" and i'm warming to it since it has good derivatives like "cilla." on the other hand, lacks any good history (early missionary? ho hum) and has an unfortunate association with that movie. there was a martyr victoria whose day falls a day after i brought cat home. she defenestrated herself to avoid marriage and then got caught taking the eucharist in africa. she and the rest of the congregation were " racked, torn with iron hooks, and then beaten with cudgels." the little kid of the bunch, when that rackin', hookin', and cudgelin' was going on, said "yes, torture me ,too; anyhow, i am a christian." i also like the royal possiblities in "victoria" but it's short on nicknames. any suggestions? looking for girl's names that aren't awful.

ps. the other victoria, whose day isn't so conveniently close to a-day, has a much more interesting story which i will include in full:

"At that time," the account begins, "the madness of the pagans raged throughout
the entire world, so that if one despised the cults of the gods, he would
be subject to torments of various kinds." Arrested for claiming that the
Roman gods were "nothing but stones, no better than those who worshiped
them," Acisclus and Victoria found themselves face-to-face with the prefect
Dion, an "iniquitous persecutor of Christians." In an attempt to punish
them for their error, Dion ordered Acisclus and Victoria cast into a fiery
furnace, only to hear their songs of joy emanating from within. Next he
had them bound to stones and cast into the Guadalquivir, only to find them
floating on the surface unharmed. Finally he suspended them over a fire,
only to have the flames get out of hand and kill hundreds of pagans. Having
sufficiently demonstrated both their resolve to remain Christian
and the power that their God wielded, Acisclus and Victoria finally yielded
to their would-be executioners and died."

what a shitty shitty day. it shat shitty shit all over an already shit-encrusted shitpile of shit. fuck goddamn fuck fuck fuck. fuck. fucking fuck.

i can tell i'm starting to burn out on polyhedra by how much i like this bird. maybe it's the new paper. so now i can't decide at all. geometry, practicals, flora, or fauna? to do: 1 more good modular base unit,preferably of a more triangular variety; a solid travel box with fastenable lid; full nature scene. hopefully by the time the tomoko fuse box book goes through its library hold cycle down to me i'll be ready for it.

oh i'm so hungry

this is what i made today. i'm not sure i can part with it. her. i think i will name her pella. are there any homes deserving enough? would you be able to sprinkle fine granulated sugar on her daily? give her lots of indirect sunlight? refill the creamer when it gets dry?
the rolling paper resolves several issues i'd been having with other materials, thanks to its thinness and glue strip. very nice for stems and splicing. juicy fruit still is the prettiest and nicest smelling but seems almost garish in comparison. when i first made a cluster of these i cradled it in my hand and almost fainted it was so dainty and delicate, like a little baby bird. all the blood rushed to my head and it was difficult to breathe. damn what a mess of sublimated urges this hobby has become.

christmas, as it's supposed to happen, doesn't really fit this climate. i feel almost personally gulty for the lack of snow. as if it were one of my bad deeds that made santa's snow-shitting horses skip over the town (shit->piss->rain please connect your own dots, i don't want to put it together). i can't identify with chipper young couples taunting make-believe snowman clergy with premarital sex. and white christmas only makes me think of racism. could we work out a deal with coke to fulfill its duty as father christmas and pipe in some ski hill snow? throw an inflatable tennis dome over victoria and drop flaked styrofoam from sacks. at work i got to attack ice with long (over a foot, for sure) curved scary looking knife and a less intimidating hairdryer. this year i would like only rooty-toot-toots or rum-a-tum-tums, whichever is more expensive($$=friendship points). i'm considering some sort of alternative welfare christmas where stomping in puddles replaces snow-angels, UPS->reindeer, amazon->santa, and so on, but i ran out of steam there. end on a low note.

caught a mouse in the new tipping box traps baited with chips and pb. still at least one left. currently buster is in captivity at slurpee penn. awaiting prosecution and processing. so buster will you be exonerated of your crimes and be released into the freezing wilds, or found guilty and thrown in the freezing chamber? at least if you're guilty you'll get a dignified funeral at the foot of the eternal hillary memorial. what an honour to be eaten over and over forever. and to that end while you're staying here you'll be given the finest processed human food so hillary has a good meal up there.

hillary has cancer. a big old tumour on her stomach, so it feels like she's full all the time, and won't eat. at least it wasn't bone shards from leftovers cutting her up, just a bulb of blood (and other pulpy flesh cells). this can't be happening, i did the terry fox run. the vet (once, in like third grade i completely broke down because we had "vet" or "veterinarian" on a spelling test. i can't remember what kids are suppoed to spelling at that age. it was a couple weeks after our first cat died. i had skipped out on the funeral so i could throw rocks or pretend to shoot guns. i'll have to remember to ask where she's buried.) says she has two or three months left. from what i've been reading, starvation isn't such a bad way to go. probably once you get past the first bout of cramps and pains your stomach goes to sleep and leaves a message for your body to start cannibalizing all that delicious fat you've been saving for a rainy day. note to self, two: reread the starvation artist. has anyone read any decent first person accounts of long (more than two months) hunger strikes? other than gandhi, i guess. hooray for november.
on a lighter note, i'm considering sucking it up and capitalising like a real boy. don't you all understand how hard it is to hold down two keys at once!!! see like that three in a row christ i need to take a breather. readability be damned. does it matter? it's keeping me up at night.
oh i forgot. caught a mouse today at work. it was under the ice cream cooler and i nabbed it with a bubbalicious box. carmen put it in a tub. i tried to give it to some kid but her mom was no fun.
paul if you see this, i have nfs,mw and must bring it to you asap. rsvp 10-4.

three words for the evening: steamy hot piss

The Romans were first in on the act of having the boar as the main attraction during a banquet. Petronius, who died in A.D. 65, described such an occasion:

...The slaves spread coverings on our couches which had hunters with their hunting spears embroiedered; in fact, the whole hunting scene embroidered on them. We did not as yet know what this meant when, suddenly, a great noise was heard outside and Laconian hounds rushed into the room and began running around the table. They were followed by a platter on which lay the most enormous wild boar. On its head was perched a cap of a freed slave; on his tusks hung down two baskets lined with palm leaves, one was filled with Syrian dates, the other with Theban dates, little suckling pigs, made of pastry and baked in the oven surrounded the animal as if pressing on the teats, thus giving the guests enough indication to see that it was a breeding sow that was served them.
Drawing his hunting knife, a slave gave the wild boar a great stab in the belly and suddenly, from the opening in the animal's side flew out thrushes. Vainly the birds tried to escape, flying round and round the room, bird-catchers, provided with fowler's rods, instanly caught them and, by order of the master offered one to each guest.



The boar's head, presented at banquets today, or more often forming the centre-piece of a cold buffet table at Christmas, will be one of three types: the true wild boar's head, the disguised pig's head, or the modelled, glazed replica of the real boar's head.
Dressing a real wild boar's head is a long process, taking at least a fortnight in all. The head of the wild boar is severed from the rest of the body, as long in the neck as possible, and the ears are cut off to be dealt with separately.
The head is then soaked in water, cleaned, shaved completely, singed so that no hair is left and boned so that nothing but the outer skin remains. This is an expert's job worthy of a top embalmer's skill.
Once the mask of the head has been separated, a mixture of salt, saltpetre, brown sugar, ground pimentos, ground mace, powdered marjoram, and garlic is rubbed by hand into the skin, once every day for a fortnight.
During this time the meat from the rest of the boar is chopped up, seasoned, and cooked and mixed with diced tongue, salt pork, truffles, pistachio nuts, garlic, eggs and parsley and made into a rich brawn.
When the treated skin is ready, this brawn is stuffed into it, packed tightly so as to fill every fold, pushing out every original feature, and the whole is then wrapped in damp cloth and tied up very tightly with string in the shape of the boar's head.
This bundle is then cooked for four hours in a jelly stock, allowed to cool, then unwrapped. The head, now looking like its old self, but without eyes, teeth or ears, is then dipped into a dark gelatine to regain some of its more natural colour, the shaved skin being pinkish and blotchy.
Once the dark gelatined head is dry, the decoration begins. First the original ears, nicely trimmed and cleaned and browned in dark jelly, are put back, then the eyes, made of whites of egg and truffles, a calf's tongue, a l'ecarlate is skewered intot he mouth, and the tusks, thoroughly cleaned and bleached, replaced in their own position, but at the angriest angle. The top of the head and the surround is descorated with aspics and atteletes (little utensils in the shape of skewers with ornamented tops on which truffles, fruit, cock's comb, crayfish or other decorative foods are threaded) and sometimes a lemon is stuck in the boar's mouth for good measure.
The head is usually laid on a silver platter, or better still a gold one, and either placed in the centre of the high table or brought in with much ado, a blare of trumpets and the waving of flags, by two exhausted chefs.

last monday i quit the wholesale club. this thursday was my last day. last night i went to a cashier's 29th birthday party, solely attended by her co-workers. for some unknown reason i've been putting off telling the quitting story. maybe i'm getting guitly about repeating myself. i've had to tell it at least a dozen times or more since last week and it's losing its special magic for me. so here it is to get it over with, and leave this for reference purposes so when people ask why i quit i can point (metaphorically) here.
monday was a long day. my boss hates me because i take tips from customers. this is completely verboten. there are probably more reasons why she hates me (she hates my dirty runners, but that is reasonable). so because she hates me she had been giving me mostly nine hour shifts. that's two fifteen minute breaks with an optional hour lunch. already that day charles had made me do routine dumpster work. charles is a cowboy and a prick. he wears cowboy boots, cowboy hats, tight jeans, aviators, and rolls up his cuffs. he walks with an exaggerated swagger but has the nasal falsetto of a cartoon animal. the job requires me to climb out of the garbage receiving bay door and scrape rotting trash (the trash that doesn't make it to the dumpster, the stuff that sits around for weeks at a time getting more and more disgusting) to the side so it can be put in the dumpster later. when i started, the other clerk had apparently refused to do this job unless supplied with a "biohazard mask" (this seems so old, i'm sure i've mentioned it before, oh well) and when he didn't have that, he bawled like a little baby girl. so the job had already broken one kid. it wasn't that bad, i only had to climb back up on a makeshift step ladder of milk crates because charles was too lazy to prop open a door with a box for me. then i got to (this was just for fun) pull the milk crates up using a long ice scraper. it was like the skill testing plush-toy crane-grab games.
anyway that is all beside the point, just to say that i'd been dealing with unpleasant stuff all day and was tired and angry.
then i get a call for a wet cleanup in the bathrooms. there's no way that a call like that can be a good thing. you're not allwed to have merchandise in that area so it's not like someone dropped a jar of pickles. something far worse had been dropped. to be blunt, there was a trail of shit going for some fifteen or twenty feet and rounding the corner to the ladies' washroom. it started out so small that i didn't even notice it until i looked down at my feet and there was a plop only inches away. hard to see on a brown concrete floor. but the spots got larger and larger as it went along. the largest being about the size of a toddler's fist, including the wrist area. it was my duty, apparently, to mop this mess up. mangers and employees were running around passing on the news of the horrible accident, but it was up to me to clean it. i got the mop and tied my apron around my face to block the smell, because it was a horrible stink. most people who only deal with shit when it's happily in its little aquarium habitat don't realise how goddamn awful it smells. maybe if you've shat outdoors, or in some kind of asian squatting ditch, or in a toilet with no water you know. it's bad. human shit is probably the worst smelling feces of any species (ha ha a rhyme) because of our disgusting chemical greasy artificial diets. i got about three or four globs mopped up, aside from the little vegetable (onion perhaps) chunks that wouldnt stick to the mop. then i realised that if i were ever going to leave this job, now would be the time. if i let myself finish mopping up, i would have crossed the rubicon of shit. and it was unlikely i'd get such a decent excuse to quit, so i'd better seize it. so i gave my two weeks notice. when i tell this to people, they usually say "i would have just walked out" and i think they're probably right. i'm not sure why i didn't. too sissy perhaps (probably). lazy-eyed chipper steve, co-chair of the health and safety committee took over for me. that guy will do anything, it's scary. he lives to work.
later, i found out the culprit. an older fat woman. it had squeezed and snaked down her pant leg as she waddled frantically (i imagine) to the can. she annihilated the bathroom stall and offered to clean it up herself. she blocked up the toilet and made it overflow. people said "oh how embarrassing for her" and so on. but someone who is truly embarrased doesn't go on shopping after that. especially not carrying a garbage bag with your shit-smeared clothes in it. her husband had to drive home and bring her new clothes to change in to. me, i would have legged it out the back door (which was open to air out the stink) and never ever ever shown my face in that store again. possibly even changing my name and moving to another continent (pretty tempted to make an "incontinent" joke there but you can fill in the blanks). some days after that i found out that it was charles who put me up for the job, and stood around smoking and laughing outside while i had to confront the shit.
many people will be missed but i pray to god that i'll never end up doing a job like this again.

Dear Chadwick Jacques,

Re: Cactus Cafe Douglas Ltd.

Thank you for your comment card regarding the Cactus Club Cafe in Victoria last month. We truly appreciate the feedback and the opportunity to address your concerns.

I am very sorry that you were made to feel uncomfortable and that you felt your server was possibly under the influence of alcohol. Please be assured that I have forwarded your comments to the Restaurant Leader for that location for her review. Of course, Cactus Club Cafe has a zero tolerance policy when it comes to drinking on shift. Sarah will reiterate this with her staff to ensure that this does not happen again.

Thanks again for taking the time to bring your concerns to our attention, Chadwick. I would very much like to invite you back to Cactus. I hope that you will accept the enclosed certificates for your next meal on us. Should you not want to return to the Victoria location, we also have a location in Nanaimo and eleven more in the Lower Mainland. Also, the certificates are valid for one year, so there is plenty of time for you to redeem them.

Sincerely
Margaret Vlug
Customer Relations
Cactus Club Cafe

Enclosures (2)

things are looking up. it's not quite clear how it happened, but i work at russell books now. this is something i can't fuck up. not only is it pleasant low pressure work around books, but, this is the best part, almost all the employees are young and pretty girls (i assume smart too but that hasn't been verified as thoroughly as the young and pretty part). it's a nice change from the real canadian wholesale club where the cashiers can't stop getting pregnant and i end the day soaked in garbage water and rotten milk and sticky pop. the one nice thing about the wholesale club is (i've mentioned this two or three times to everyone in earshot) thatit provides me with enough free time to complete the globe sudoku.