Falling in love is hard on the knees.

Well, it is.
Hard on the knees, I mean.
At my high school graduation, for example, I smiled for photos wearing that ridiculously unflattering mortar board with the tassel on the side that said "Holy fuck! I finally slept through enough classes to merit a diploma!" and beneath my red mini skirt, my knees were noticeably scabby.
Scabby due to love.
(Or, due to the reverse cowgirl position executed on cheap carpeting, which I often confuse with love. You say potato, I say french fries drenched in vinegar. That's just how I roll).

Anyhow.
This post isn't actually about that kind of love, or even about sex, for that matter.
Shocking, I know.
This post isn't about a boy.
It's not even about a girl, although there's nothing like an impending divorce to bring out your inner lesbian.

This post is about a goat.

Now, I know what you're thinking, and yes, Canada is quite progressive, but we're not there yet.

If you kissed a goat you and you liked it, you'd still better keep it in the closet.

For quite a long time, I had an intense love affair with the goat (and I hope by now you realize I am referring to this very blog, Kill the Goat).
Starting a blog made me look at my world differently.
I noticed things. I reacted to things. I thought about things.
And then I went home and wrote about those things. I found out which of my friends were "quotable", which events in my life were "blog-worthy", and which of my incendiary opinions garnered the most outraged comments. I loved seeing bits of myself reflected through the Goat. Every once in a while, I'd get it right: I'd write something that not only lit a spark of my own, but earned insightful comments from you as well, and soon that post was inspiring stories and articles that went on to become published, or gave birth to new chapters, or put the itch in my fingers to write for 17 hours straight.

Lately, however, I spank the Goat a little less often.
It isn't because I have nothing to say. In fact, now more than ever my life is bursting at the seems with juiciness that I've been keeping to myself (and by "keeping to myself", I obviously mean "drunk-dialling Robbie at 2am and yelling disjointed details to him despite the fact I've left the bar and the loud music I'm hearing is only in my head".) The point is, I haven't been telling my secrets to the Goat.

This makes Jamie sad.
(Oh god, she's referring to herself in the third person.)

But the separation has felt necessary because when I ventured a post about the wealth of adventure and excitement I've been privy to, I felt a bit inundated with mostly well-meaning people who chastised me for my forwardness, or worried about my safety, or turned me into a cautionary tale. I started to feel less like a newly liberated grown woman and more like a teenaged Goat with 53 overbearing parents. Somebody felt it important to (anonymously) tell me that my "naughty nymph blather" was boring him.


Sorrrrrrry.

So instead of asking everyone's permission to go about my life and enjoy myself, I just stopped writing. And that is a shame. Because once upon a time, this was one of my favourite hang-outs. This was the place where everybody knew my name, where the gossip was good and the martinis well-shook (and fucking dirty, just the way I like em, with 3 olives, not 2, 3).

Fair warning, Goat readers: I am reclaiming my space.
If you don't like it, you can get the hell out.
If you don't like it, you can blame Petite Anglaise.
You probably don't know her. I don't know her, either. But I read her book, after having read her blog (thoughts on this will be coming shortly to a book review site near you!). The net result is that she's made me fall in love with blogging again. Actually, she reminded me of why I loved it in the first place.
I like sharing. I like entertaining. I like documenting little snippets of life, and then re-reading them 2 years later with fresh, delighted eyes. I like meeting someone for the first time like we're old friends because they remember better than I do the day Janie was born. I like visiting other blogs to see what everyone else is up to. I like getting emails out of the blue that say "I get you." I like having hunky french men fall in love with me via my blog and then feeling the air around us sizzle when we finally meet face to face.

(Okay, that last one happened to Petite Anglaise, and not to me, but a girl can dream, right? Right? Several eligible bachelors have secretly been lurking for months just waiting to breathe some romance into my life, right?)

In summary: The goat is being rejuvenated. If I had the html skills, I'd send my site to the goat spa and get a total goat makeover, but since the only thing I can do is write, then writing is what will have to do.

I just hope these old goat knees can handle it.

Goat Hits Milestone, Celebrates with Tin Can.

Today I drank 500ml of water about 12 different times.

I sat in the sun and brought out at least 500 new freckles.

I sent about 500 thank-you texts to a boy who drove 500km to bring me presents last night.

I cranked the music up and purred with contentment a good 500 times.

I checked my crazy, impractical bathing suit at least 500 times to see if I was "boobing out", and thanks to the halter gods, I almost always was.

And right now, right this very minute, I am writing my 500th post here at Kill the Goat.

Amazing, isn't it, how the time flies?

500. Kill the Goat is an old geezer now. It should be collecting a pension and complaining to its kids that they never call anymore and watching Wheel of Fortune with the volume turned up absurdly loud.

It's amazing to me that I've stuck with it this long. It's outlasted 6 apartments, 1 husband, a dozen boyfriends and dozens more who never got that designation, thousands of bottles of whiskey, at least 9 hair colours (and that bald phase), an imaginary dog named Toby, several new year's resolutions, and what I thought was the limit of my blogging endurance.

And if I've managed to surpass my own expectations, it's only because of you guys - the people who come, who click, who read, and especially those who leave comments. I've met some incredible people, been offered some wonderful opportunities, and Kill the Goat has even played matchmaker a couple of times (with success, I might add).

I've been a bad blogger lately. I've been too busy, too sunburnt, too tired, too sore, too sticky, too full of convenient and\or unlikely excuses, but the truth is, I still get a little thrill everytime I hit PUBLISH, and an even bigger thrill each and every time someone hits the goat with a hickory stick.

This is the one place that's always home to me, no matter where I'm living, or how I'm earning money, or who I'm kissing. It's the one place that's always mine, just mine. I've told it some secrets, I've been vulnerable, I've shared elation and history and victories and heartbreak.

It's been a pleasure.

Ford Tough

Rory was my new bff about 7 seconds after I met her: we locked eyes, I smiled, she noticed my shoes. It doesn't take much.

A few months later and there's not much left to explore on the friend frontier; we've exchanged gifts and exchanged spit, we have a theme song, we have a "place" where everybody knows our name and the bartender mixes our martinis before our bums hit the stools - Mango Magic for her, Clear Skies for me (doesn't blue curacao make everything better?).

Rory and I are probably more than enough trouble just the two of us, but it's almost never just the two of us. We're a threesome.

Lucille is everything that I am not - big and black and fast, fast, fast. Lucille is Rory's truck.

Lucille is not just a vehicle, though. She gets us where we want to go - has taken us to the corner store for energy drinks, and to Jack's house for post-work debriefing, and last weekend on a 5-hour road trip. But she's also where we sit and have our chats, and where we hide our purses while we're dancing at the bar (clever, no?), and where we make our costume changes and store brownies and discover new parts of town and lose lots and lots of small change.

Lucille is where we eat chicken fingers when we suddenly realize we've just had too many martinis on empty bellies.

Lucille is where we throw our groceries when we suddenly get a craving for nachos, which we then forget about when we decide to follow a fire truck instead.

Lucille is where I sit quite comfortably in the back of the cab when Jack is riding with us, and where Luke sits rather uncomfortably (knees to chin) because whereas I am built for backseats, he is not.

Lucille is where we tell our secrets when it is raining outside.

Lucille where we've taken naughty pictures and practically overdosed on cough drops and compared ex-husbands. We've dug her out of snowbanks and gasped at how much it costs to fill her and taken her down "secret passageways" while being followed by less worthy cars.

When Lucille accidentally parked in front of a No Parking sign, I had her back. I karate-chopped that thing to the ground and stashed the evidence in my basement.

And now Lucille is putting some junk in her trunk. Her bed is piling up with boxes labelled 'kitchen' and 'linens' and 'pictures of Jamie'. Lucille is about to drive away to new and exciting horizons, and I find myself amazed at just how attached I've become and how sad I'll be to say goodbye. We've had some good times, the three of us. Lucille is some truck.

xo

Have my cake and eat it too?

This story is about a boy.

All stories are eventually about boys, aren't they? No matter how many hand-over-heart pledges I make to stay boy-free, the flesh is weak and I never seem to last more than a few days, except for a brief girl-fling phase that I had a couple of months ago, which was nice, but not nice enough. You know what I missed? Hint: it wasn't the football.

But like I said, this is about a boy, one boy in particular, and funnily, not one of the dozens with whom I've amused\satisfied myself with these last few months. I feel like I've been doing hardcore scientific research in the name of humanity -

Hypothesis: E.S.P. would greatly improve our success in dating.

Data collected: Hours of mattress-time with consensual lab partners.

Conclusion: Thank god in heaven we cannot read each others' minds!

(I think any good scientific research should give god his props).

As if I don't already get myself into enough trouble as it is, comments like:
"Jesus, that's a lot of hair!", and
"Lord that feels good, I just hope it lasts for a l- -....oh, never mind.", and
"I'm glad he's enjoying himself but if he doesn't quiet down a bit, China is going to lodge a noise complaint.", and
"Maybe if I roll over and spread em, he'll take the hint."

wouldn't really help. Oddly (or fittingly), it's comments of a very different nature that cause me trouble - comments like "I'm just here for the sex" and "Please try your hardest not to fall in love with me." Okay, I've never really said either of those things to dates, but you get the gist.

There's a myth out there that boys like sex. Not that I've ever heard any complaints, but you'd think that they'd be not only grateful but maybe a little enthused to have sex with no strings offered to them on a plate (I've tried offering myself on a bed, which is more traditional and far more practical, but there's something about a parsley garnish that really gets motors running).

Anyway.

It's not really working out that way.

I don't want a boyfriend. I don't want a relationship. I think it's fair of me to be upfront about that, and the boys invariably nod eagerly with that "Woohoo! Free sex!" glint in their eyes, but before you know it they're leaving "Baby I miss you\Why don't you return my calls?\Why won't you meet my mom?" messages on my cell. And if these half-relationships (their half, obviously) were the worst of it, I'd consider myself a lucky girl. Unfortunately, I've been treated to begging (ew!), bar fights (if you spill my appletini, a blowjob is automatically out of the question), and a bizarre situation in which Grant, who is on the small side, took on the naked man in my bed and lost (which was kind of hot, and kind of not). My weekends are bipolar: Fridays are fun and fancy-free, Saturdays are hot & heavy, Sundays are for messy breakups over waffles. Now why do I have to keep ruining my holy brunch time breaking up with people I never went out with in the first place? It's a mystery. A mystery that usually leads to Monday-morning vows of sexual retirement.

Boys these days. They'll put out, but they've all got commitment on the brain. Whatever happened to good old fashioned fucking?

Which brings me to Mike. Mike is THE BOY. Mike, so far, lives up to The Standards. He's tall, and broad, and insanely handsome. He waits until I've swallowed my wine before making me laugh. He appears to spend a good portion of disposable income on footwear. He's read Proust, and Dilbert. He buys me drinks two at a time. Clearly, he is the perfect man.

So, shockingly, I'm thinking I might like him to stick around. That being said, stick around in a non-committed, non-relationship, non-boyfriend, totally casual and unserious kind of way.

How do I tell him I'd like to ravage him on a semi-regular basis, with possibly a couple of movies or dinners thrown in when he has to rehydrate, but without the cuddling, hand-holding, playing pool with his buddies, borrowing his oversized sweatshirt, renting a cottage for the summer, getting a dog together, signing up for a joint checking account or looking at rings in the shiny glass case?

Notorious SDC

You take your tongue and you start from the bottom and run it slowly to the top in one long motion. Take the tip between your lips, give a soft suck, tease it gently until you get a taste.

Grasp the base firmly with one hand and swirl your tongue around the rest with short but assertive strokes. Make it yours. When there are drips (there are always drips), lap them up with the very tip of your tongue, and try not to moan too loudly in delight as you swallow it down.

If your fingers get sticky, know you're doing something right. Messy is sexy. Do yourself a favour and make it last. Use your hot mouth to make it melt. Run your lips softly up the side, leaving a trail with your tongue, and if your lips come away a little creamy you've hit the spot, so lick them clean and keep it up.

A little nibble never hurt, just don't get greedy. Let your tongue do most of the work. If you get breathless, take smaller bites, and take the time to really enjoy the feel of it hitting your throat. At some point, you just let your instinct take over and you get lost in the pleasure: your jaw opens wider to accomodate more, your hand starts to slide up and down in eagerness, you know the end is near and you'd like to slow it down to enjoy it longer but instead your tongue just goes faster and faster and you can't help but work that oral fixation for all it's worth.


That's right bitches: ice cream season is back, and Little Miss Small Dipped Cone just got majorly creamed. Eat up.

Where My Mouth Is.

He kissed me on his front porch, stooping to fit his frame to mine, folding himself around me, taking my face in his hands, his huge and deliciously calloused hands, and he kissed me so gently even my socks were surprised. He softly kissed the corner of my mouth until I felt the berry juice start to run, and it may not have been my house but I asked him in anyway.

He introduced me to his sexy shower, and the glories of making out fully clothed underneath a rain head, letting the warm droplets slither down into the sticky curves of my body, the heat of his hands sliding over every inch of me, fingers in the wet curls of my hair, my back against the blue tiled wall, his mouth crushing mine and his tongue proving that he wasn't always such a gentleman.

He stripped me of my sopping clothing, peeling each piece with aching precision, and when I was naked, he was suddenly shy until I grabbed him by his big belt buckle and freed him of his pants.

We never made it to the bed.

We did, however, make it to (make it on?) the rug in front of his bed (twice) (hello, carpet burns in funny places!), and on his kitchen counter with the blinds (and my legs) wide open, up against the hood of his truck in the garage (hood -ornament-shaped-bruise on my belly), and the hot tub.

Oh, the hot tub.

Ooooohhhh, the hot tub. Oooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Oh, the naughty, slippery things we did underwater while the heat made me drunk, and weak in the knees, and properly aimed bubbles made me blush, and convulse, and strongly mixed margaritas made me brave, and his stubble made the places where grazed my skin with his lips tickle, and a big strong cowboy made me cumcumcum.

And just when I thought I barely had the energy to find where my panties were tossed hours ago, I somehow managed to find just a little bit more so we screwed up against the back of the house, with my legs wrapped tightly around his waist and the privacy hedges doing very little to block the sound of my moans from the poor guy barbecuing next door.

When I woke up, it was dark out, and I was already having a slow fuck in the soft grass, underneath stars that winked back at me, with a man who is at this moment walking around with my teeth marks in his shoulder.

And that's what life is all about.

Pour Me Another

Christine, no matter what else she is, is a total sweetheart. She's had labels slapped on her since birth - autistic, bipolar, developmentally disabled, obsessive-compulsive - labels that are so dominant they cause others to forget that she's also a chocolate-loving diabetic with a passion for baton-twirling, achy shoulders that like to be massaged, and an engaging if unending style of conversation.


You may remember that I first met Christine many years ago when we were matched in a program that aimed for more equality for the disabled persons in our community. I was very young and just beginning my work in psychology and social services, and I had no idea what i was getting myself into. As she barreled into the room, lauded me with gifts (stained cartoony sweatshirts still smelling of moth balls and old sweat) and implored me to call her Christine instead of her actual given name (Barbara, which according to her, is old-fashioned), I began to have an inkling that life would never be quite the same again.


Supposedly, my mandate was to teach her "life lessons" to make her more independent, but I sometimes wonder if she wasn't secretly hired to teach me. Perhaps if I can list some of our adventures, you can judge for yourselves.


Lesson #1: Filling ketchup bottles is boring.


Finding a job is tough. Finding a job for the mentally challenged is way, way tough. Especially when the employee is as picky as Christine. Folding t-shirts wasn't stimulating enough; after 45 minutes of her first shift, she made a bed out of them and took a nap. Shredding documents was worse - eventually she found other, funner things to shred, like mouse pads, coffee cups, pens, and petty cash. But filling ketchup bottles was the absolute worst. I guess the monotony got to her, because the Heinz bottles sitting all innocent-looking on unsuspecting customers' tables were actually filled with more "interesting" contents - horseradish, coffee grounds, leftover green peas scraped off someone's dirty plate. The customers complained pretty heartily apparently. The gravy-cayenne-crushed-up-Ritalin was NOT a hit.


Lesson #2: My willingness to apply topical creams depends on the location.


So, 350-pound hyperactive women sweat a lot, or at least this one did. A LOT. Especially underneath her enormous, pendulous, surprisingly brown-nippled breasts. And big boobies chafe when they spend a humid day rubbing against, well, practically her knees! This leads to massive boobie-rash, the sight of which still haunts my dreams. And when she shed her shirt and handed me the tube of ointment, I could not suppress a shudder. I was wishing for a rag on a very big stick, but all I had besides my bare hands was a vague and silly notion of "making a difference." Ha.


Lesson #3: Riding the bus is fun!


You already knew that public transportation could be "fun" - the drunken leching, the frotteurs "accidentally" rubbing their inflamed crotches on you, the plink plink of someone paying the fare with 25 dimes - but I bet you didn't know that it was fun. Fun. Christine knows. Christine feels that the fare is negligible but that high-fives to the driver are of absolute necessity. The driver doesn't realize it's not so much a greeting as a warning. Oh yes, there will be singing. There will be dancing. There will be reenactments of The Lion King, aka, Best Movie Ever. And god help me, there will also be the passing of gas, because as much fun as riding the bus is, so is eating 7 bean burritos for lunch.



Lesson #4: Anti-psychotic meds make you hairy.



When I suggested a day at the beach, i must have been out of my head. It somehow slipped my mind that swimming = taking off our pants. Imagine my embarrassment at having to explain to her that the pube garden growing across the better part of her thighs really needed to be hoed, so to speak. Now picture the horrific shower scene that took place later: obese naked lady perched precariously on the side of the tub, legs spread wiiiiiiide open, big tufts of coarse, curly hair swirling around the drain like drowned rodents, and a razor so clogged with fur it looked like a tiny person with a huge afro.



The razor never recovered, and as for me, well...I drink.

Men I Intend to Marry:

Yes, I do realize that it is a legal requirement that I be divorced from the first husband before "embarking" on the second, but the truth is, I'm not sure if remarriage will ever be in the cards for me (despite what a psychic reading recently revealed). I didn't really expect it the first time around (marriage, I mean); it was a happy accident that couldn't be helped - love is referred to as whirlwindy for a reason, I suppose. And for that reason, I really don't expect to be so lucky a second time. I've had my Big Love, even if it wasn't the happily-ever-after that I probably (hopefully) deserved. So now if I have to "settle" for acrobatic sexual feats, dear friends who would do anything for me, new friends who make me laugh over plates of pasta, and a series of belly-clenching, foot-raising, heart-stopping, breath-quickening first kisses, then damn, I guess that will just have to do.



Now here's a list of boys who I wouldn't mind doing it with (and for comparison's sake, the old list). Is it just time that changes, or is it me?




1. Rick Mercer: Oh he's a cool guy, that Rick Mercer. In just 22 minutes a week, he manages to make me giggle. Some guys get a car ride, a martini, fettuccine alfredo, another martini, the wait in line to buy the tickets, the dark moments in the theatre before and after the movie, the car ride home, and the agonizing walk to my front door to make me laugh, even just a little, even just once, just a slight hah, even an eyebrow raised in appreciation or the corner of my mouth lifted in faint amusement would suffice, but still they fail. But not Rick. Rick is good. He is clever and witty and I even believe him to be a good person. Imagine that.










2. Timbaland: Who can resist such a super talented guy? I mean first of all, just think of all the cool ring tones I would have! And he knows all the right people - would I say no to a threesome with Justin Timberlake? Well, maybe. Would I say no to a threesome with Nelly Furtado? Try and stop me! Good thing he loves me just the way I are.





3. James McAvoy: How cute is he? How panty-wetting is that accent? Something tells me I could be rough with him, and that he would like it. Is that terrible? Yes, that's probably terrible. I should stop thinking such naughty thoughts. Like now. Or, in 30 minutes. Because he's probably a nice guy. He's probably got a Mum. He probably keeps his elbows off the table and everything, and I just keep thinking about flipping up my skirt and...oh wait. Down girl.


4. Madonna: While this is technically a list of men I intend to marry, Her Madgesty probably has the biggest balls on this list, or anywhere, and therefore qualifies in spades. Besides which, she's just boss. I adore her. She's fierce and she knows what she likes. I don't often say this, but for Madonna, I would totally obey. I would be her slave, for like, 30 whole minutes (yeah, I'm thinking those 30 minutes that I'm not thinking about James). I don't want to settle down and adopt African children with her. I just want to suck her toes. Haha. Totally kidding about the toes.

5. Jim Halpert: I hope he finds eternal happiness with Pam, I really do, but if for some reason it doesn't work out, he can have my number and I will happily rip off his button-down shirt, use his tie imaginatively, and put the photocopier in the office to alternative use. RRrrowwwrrrr.



6. Hawksley Workman: Yes, I know I've hummed about him before, but honestly, there are very few men in the world who sing directly to your crotch, and he is one of them. He's just a big bowl of ice cream and I want to lick him all up. You don't need any more proof than the evidence in his latest song, Piano Blink, which sounds like it was written just for me. I can get totally blissed out just listening to him sing in my bedroom, and if he makes me that happy through the wonders of internet piracy, then just imagine how powerful he'd be in person!





7. Jason Segel: It was hard to pick just one of Judd Apatow's gang for inclusion on this list. In reality, I'm picturing something much more polyandrous, because who wouldn't want to live in a house full of cute boys who can make you laugh? I have had love for Jason since Freaks and Geeks, which is to say, for quite some time. And amazingly, I kept that love even through Undeclared, and if you remember the pathetic blubbering mess of his character, then you know that's quite a feat. Having just seen Forgetting Sarah Marshall, I have to say that this boy brings something new to the table - unlike most Hollywood types, I can actually imagine having a conversation with him that doesn't make me want to jump off a bridge suspended over some very pointy rocks, and if that ain't romance, I don't know what is!




8. Clive Owen: Excuse me, but is this man not sex on legs? Movie theatres actually have to set their climate control ten degrees cooler when this man is on screen because ooooooeeeeee, he's on fire. See me breaking out into a sweat just typing about him? Now just think about the heat I'd be generating if there was actual skin-on-skin going on. We'd be talking epic, fire-ball proportions! Whew. Better get some flame-retardant sheets.

9. Jasper Fforde: Every time I review a Fforde book over at The Quickie Book Review, 2 things always happen: 1. I propose marriage 2. I make terrible double-f jokes, such as Fforde is Ffucking awesome! The truth is, #2 is probably a major reason for his continuing lack of response to #1. But I gotta give the guy some props, because even without a proper author photo on his book jacket, I still want to have his babies. His last book prompted me to offer "good lasagna and bad wine" , and you know what that means. Just be my boyfriend already!

10. Simon Pegg: Simon Pegg is something else entirely, an unlikely movie star with a knack for satire and wit that makes me melty. Yes, the dry humour does get me off, but the fact that he's a bit mysterious doesn't hurt either. If he's a cookie, I'd like to crack him. Doesn't that sound deliciously dirty?

Jay's Guide to Office Etiquette: How to give your man a boner on the company dime

When sitting at your desk, shoulders hunched toward the glow of your computer screen, papers piled in haphazard "organization" all around you, books propped open for easy reference (or at least to make it look good), it is surprisingly easy to appear to be working, even working quite hard, when in reality exchanging naughty text messages with a certain boy.

Not that I know this from experience.
I'm just throwing theories out there.

Of course, you then run the risk of blushing over these hypothetical dirty texts, and then your nosy (wonderfully nosy) coworker asks rather loudly what on earth could make "a girl like Jay" blush.

To which you could potentially respond: "I'm not blushing, I'm just flushed from the excitement of a job well done!" which is such a load of bullshit that you just blush all the redder.

And somehow your cell phone knows this is a bad time, and because your cell phone hates you (of course it hates you! didn't you just crush it in the crack of a recliner during a bout of random drunkenness? oh yes. yes you did)....because your cell phone hates you, it beeps loudly, louder than usual I'm sure, to alert the whole office that Jay's latest fling is inquiring as to the current state of her panties, should she actually be wearing any.

So all heads turn towards the sound of the incoming text, and in a fit of cleverness you can only attribute to all the aspartame you've consumed, you turn your head as well....toward the guy who sits beside you. That's right. When deflecting blame from yourself, never be afraid to pass it on to the innocent sucker sitting nearby. To really "sell it", you could do the "slight nod of disapproval", or even go so far as to cluck your tongue in disappointment at his utter disregard for those actually trying to work, goddammit.

So now you slide your cell under your desk, where surely no one will notice you replying feverishly. Getting caught sending sexy texts is almost as bad as getting caught in your friend's bed mid-blowjob. Or something.

Not that I would know about that first-hand, either. I'm just guessing.

And when that seems like poor camouflage (because texting furtively under your desk looks a lot like wanking it from your coworkers' perspective), just go directly to the ladies' room, where the stalls are all occupied with women sending penis-themed messages to their hunnies. It kind of makes you wonder how the heck any work ever gets done, but then you remember that it's company policy to always employ at least 10% anti-social virgins (who eat their lunches at their desks, bring potted plants to work, knit in their free moments, and only wash their hair on special occasions), and you feel the relief of not being counted upon to be even remotely productive.

The day goes by amazingly quickly once you make the decision to stop actually working at work and just piss away the time by taunting boys and rendering them useless at their own places of employment (if you're texting well, the poor things won't even be able to stand up). All this lack of an honest day's hard work would normally have you feeling unsatisfied come 5 o'clock, but I have discovered an ingenious way of filling your chest with a real sense of accomplishment: expensing those naughty text messages!

Pity the fool that ever gave me a company credit card.

Anti-Karaoke

I think possibly karaoke was sent to us by the terrorists in order to distract and anesthetize the hoi polloi into a false sense of "having fun" so that while every dive bar features some version of the anatomically-indistinguishable he-she with gravy stains on his-her shirt and a predilection for John Mellencamp songs, the rest of us slosh around the beer in our steins while we slur random words that we kinda\sorta think sound close enough to the lyrics, and then all together belt out those really great 5 or 6 words of the chorus that we're all sure about (come on baby, make it hurt so good).


Reasons why Jay will never be caught dead karaokeing:


1. I can't dance to someone stuttering out the lyrics to Crimson & Clover.


2. I can't keep a straight face when someone with a thick Punjabi accent is covering the Village People.


3. I'd have to put down at least one drink to grab the mic, and anything that cuts into my drinking time is not cool by me.

4. I feel squeamish around duets - especially the syrupy, pukey, romantic ones - and especially ESPECIALLY when sung by 2 people who are not a couple. Like, for example, my sister and my mom's boyfriend singing Meatloaf to each other.

5. Which is still not as bad as when 2 people who are not a couple sing raunchy songs with dirty lyrics to each other. Can anyone say INAPPROPRIATE???? Can anyone say CANCEL THE NACHOS?

6. Which is still not as bad as when 2 people who ARE a couple sing raunchy songs to each other, because in my experience:
a) this couple is FUGLY
b) this couple cannot help but launch into a quasi-choreographed dance sequence that involves some bumping and grinding that no one, and I mean NO ONE should ever have to see.
MY FREAKIN EYES!


7. It leaves you wide open to people posting silly pictures of you on facebook.

8. The guy in the cowboy hat and handlebar mustache rubs his crotch just a little too eagerly while singing I Touch Myself.

9. According to my unauthorized autobiography, i don't have flaws.

10. Why would I pay good money to sit at a bar and listen to amateurs destroy some perfectly righteous tunes when I could go to the bar next door and listen to the music the way it was meant to be heard - at ear-blistering decibels, mixed, remixed, and spliced together with some BeeGees because evidently the DJ is having a seizure.

11. Despite the world being filled with good music, karaoke mostly features: cheese by Celine Dion, stinky cheese by Mariah Carey, and inevitably, some baby boomers reliving their misspent youth with Grease tributes out the wahzoo. Yeah, I said wahzoo. And just for the record: Gloria Gaynor should only be sung by drag queens with big curly hair, sinfully short skirts, and gold go-go boots. Seriously.

12. And to the cougar wearing too much lipstick and not enough shirt: Mustang Sally isn't doing you any favours. First of all, it dates you. If you want the 19 year old to go home with you tonight, here are some pointers:

a) Try some Fallout Boy instead. That will at least put you in the right century, if not in the right age bracket.

b) Leave the leopard print at home.

c) The next time you bleach your roots that awful colour, try to leave a little leftover for your mustache.

d) If you MUST wear spandex pants, lose the gotchies. Your panty line can be seen from space.

Work is the curse of the drinking classes.

Have you ever been on one of those marathon conference calls at work, you know, the ones where some guy all the way in Montreal is blabbering on about something, god knows what (the only thing worse than the speakers on your phone are the speakers on his), and the only productive thing you've done is learning how to crunch those inter-office memos into the tightest, most aerodynamic projectiles ever, and using them to sink three-pointers in the office-ho's cleavage?

Well, it's not just me is it? I think companies would actually waste less money if they paid job coaches to come in and help us fine-tune our resumes.

Ah, work. Nothing raises your blood pressure and lowers your self esteem quite like it.

The cubicle thing is pretty amusing though. I mean, any situation that has you praying that your nearest compatriot doesn't buy cheapo dollar-store deodorant is okay by me. And way to capitalize on the spill-proof mug industry! I mean, when your elbows can cause someone else's coffee to spill all over a third person's computer, you'd better make damn sure that lid's screwed down tight. Of course, I've just happened to notice that "spill proof" really means "spill possible", but since you mistakenly think you're safe, the spill is surprising, and all the more spectacular because of it. Not to worry, though. Third degree burns totally get you the afternoon off, paid! Score! But be prepared to kiss those TPS reports goodbye.

I'm not sure if there's any such thing as cubicle-feng-shui, but I do believe that your pen cup should not be anywhere near your mouse wire. Because then it tips over every time you play minesweeper....erm, I mean, every time you good, solid work. Hard work. Quality work. Work that causes your pens to fall over. A lot. And the sound of 20 Bics hitting the desk, rolling toward the edge, then you swearing but reacting too slowly, and then all 20 Bics tumbling to the floor below and scattering to all 4 corners of the earth...well, that's a godawful sound. Especially when you're hungover. Or so I've heard. And especially when it's already happened 4 times. In the last half hour. And you never get all 20 Bics back. No, you're lucky if the return ratio is 80%, and at that rate, it gets quite costly to be dumping your writing instruments all over the place. But let's face it - if you move the pen cup to the other side, where your elbow routinely knocks over the coffee, then you'll have twice the mess, and your pens will be sticky for the whole goddamn rest of the day. What I prefer to do is tie a single pen to one end of a piece of string, and the other end around my wrist. True, I still can never find my pen, but I have started a revolutionary new office trend, and having these kinds of priorities is what surviving the work day is all about. Now I only need 3 martinis when I'm done work, and hardly any anti-depressants at all!

I love people who decorate their little spaces. I have a rubber duckie dressed as a cheerleader on mine. I think it's supposed to remind me that life doesn't suck or something. Sometimes it's hard to tell. Sometimes I think the duck is mocking me. My friend suggested that I decorate my wall with a large mirror so that I can watch myself throughout the day. It's already largely known that I enjoy the sound of my voice. In fact, my boss has taken to calling me Diva, and I'm sure I haven't the foggiest idea why (fake british accents aside), but honestly, I have a hard enough time getting my work done as it is without a hot blonde winking at me all day long!

Today a woman was going around handing out snacks, and she stopped at my desk to point out that there were rice krispie treats hidden underneath the cheesies. Nice. But then she said my name. Twice. And I was a bit taken aback - yes, I know I've recently been the subject of some office gossip, but how did she know my name? Elliott, who sits nearby, felt the need to point out that my name is plastered across my computer in large red lettering. It's even punctuated - Jamie!, it says. Jamie! Even my computer knows my name. When I sign on, it says HELLO JAMIE. I imagine it having a creepy computer voice, like Hal. I imagine it knowing too much. I imagine it somehow watching me undress at night. Almost every application I open at work says Not Jamie? Click here. And goddamn if I'm not tempted to click there, Jamie or not Jamie. And frankly, since we're on the topic, I'm also a little offended by my computer. You'd think after the quality time we've spent together it would start calling me Jay already. But my stupid computer is formal. It is so insistent on keeping things stiff and polite between us that I've taken to curtsying to it every time I leave my desk....and considering I was born without a bladder, that's kind of a lot. So now my computer and I are locked in a vicious battle of etiquette, and the question remains.....who will win???

Yeah, I know. I don't really stand a chance. Even my stapler is betting against me.

By and large, though, I am vastly entertained at work. I love how cough drops in the vending machine have gone up 50 cents in price in the time it took me to catch a cold and then get rid of it. I love how the company puts hand sanitizer in the bathrooms because it's faster than soap and water, and since they've already let you pee on company time, don't be thinking you'll be washing yourself too! I love Juanita, who gives me the giggles. Juanita sounds like a stripper name, and though I don't know for sure if she does any part-time pole dancing, I do know that she has terrific knockers that would certainly give a nice home to crumpled dollar bills. Just sayin'.

Of course, my "just sayin" policy likes to get me into trouble. People like to yell the phrase "HR issue!" as I walk by, and I'm pretty sure they're not just referring to the length of my skirts, though that probably doesn't help. However, was it me who made the thumb-tack penis? No, it was not. Okay, technically it IS on my cork board. And technically they are my thumb-tacks. And I suppose while I'm confessing I may as well admit that I may have goaded on the artist. But it wasn't me. And it's not to scale, I don't care what you've heard.

Have Uterus, Will Panic

Have you ever prayed to a little white stick?



Have you ever slumped over the toilet at work, depressed that your panties were as pristine as when you first put them on that morning?



Have you ever been late, significantly late, and prayed to God that it was cancer and not that? Pleased baby Jesus, not that.



Most of us girls have.



Most of us girls have at one point paced the sweatiest aisle in the pharmacy: on one end you've got darty-eyed boys trying to inconspicuously palm a box of magnum condoms, on the other end you've got peaky-looking girls trying to bury their box of feminine-itch cream deep in their basket of nail polishes and loofahs they don't need, and smack dab in the middle you've got us twitchy girls, usually with some friend offering moral support with a side of I-told-you-so, trying to decide between "requires 25% less urine!", "the pink giraffe means you're pregnant, the purple pulled pork means you're not, the pinkish-purpley asteroid belt means drink two Redbulls and try again later", and "free celebration condom inside!".



Generally speaking, today's pregnancy tests are pretty much fool-proof.



And generally speaking, the wild surge of emotions that comes with buying a home pregnancy test makes fools, or worse, of us all. So whether you're frantically unbuttoning your jeans praying nonono or yesyesyes, the chances are that you're shaky, you're nervous, and you're going to fuck it up.



Let's, for the sake of argument, assume that I have recently made such a trip to such a store with a girlfriend recently, and that she was in the nonono category.



Now, I have been fairly lucky so far in my life, but I do know some of what she's going through, so I've promised to hold her hand through this ordeal, and hell, I'm such a good friend, I'll even hold the stick she's just peed on if it makes her feel better. She asks me to take a sympathy pregnancy test instead. We buy matching tests (and peanut butter cups, and some laundry detergent, because whether her life is "ruined" or not, she still needs clean khakis for Monday)and start holding our breath together.



The experts recommend that you using your first morning's urine for the purposes of a pregnancy test - they even have a fancy acronym for it: FMU. But fuck that. At this point, it's fair to say that she's already spent 2 weeks or more freaking out, eating salty foods, doing extra jumping jacks, and trying to will her uterus to evacuate. She's felt the push-and-pull of wanting to know and not wanting to know, hoping for good news and avoiding the bad news, being worried, being very worried, being very, very worried, and above all, being in denial. So the fact that she's finally gathered enough courage to buy the stupid test and is now power-walking home with a glint of mad determination in her eye probably means that she's not going to calmly set the test down on her bathroom vanity, make dinner as if there's no possibility whatsoever of another tiny human being living inside her belly, and then head to bed for a night full of easy rest without any tossing and\or turning wondering if there will be protesters at the abortion clinic or if she should start saving the astronomical cost of what tuition in 2026 will most likely be, and then wake up the next day with a full bladder just brimming with potential. No, she's going to race home, think about vomiting, put some Madonna on the stereo, brace herself with a peanut butter cup and goddammit, she's going to use her late-evening-4-cups-of-coffee-and-a-shot-of-whiskey urine. It'll just have to do.



So, you pull down your pants with a last-minute wish that you'll find that Aunt Flo, against all odds, has finally decided to visit, and finding that she hasn't (that bitch), you pee on the stick. Or, you attempt to pee on the stick. But come on, we're girls. There is no aiming the pee. The best you can do shove the thing between your legs and hope not to get splashed. Fun times.


Now, once you've peed on the stick, you realize you should have read the instructions first. Because now you're holding a drippy stick, shaking with the injustice of it all, wondering what the bastard who did this to you is doing right now, probably playing Guitar Hero obliviously or something, trying to read the squinty print on the side of a soggy box. Why is the writing so small? Don't they know that impending doom renders the best of us illiterate?



And then there's the wait.

Now, I've had some long waits in my life.

The time between IV goes in and tumor comes out? Long wait.

The day and a half between Katie's water breaking and Janie's head crowning? Long wait.

Those few seconds between seeing the oncoming car and it smashing into us? Long wait.

Watching for either a pink plus or a blue negative to appear on a magic wand? Longest. Wait. Ever.

Close Encounters with Addiction

So.

I just finished reading that book up there, the one that I stole my title from. The problem is, it paints a flat picture.

It doesn't show the things that I have seen, up close and personal, working with the homeless population of this fair city.

It tries to. It introduces you to addicts living in downtown Vancouver, in a shelter not unlike the one I've worked in. But the truth as I've come to understand it is that none of us can really understand it until we've been elbows-deep in it as I have. Because I thought I knew. I thought I had the gist. I went to school, read the books, took the tests. I knew how it worked, how it didn't work, how to fix it, how not to fix it, how unfixable it sometimes was.

But really, I knew shit.

I didn't know that a person could be so desperate for a fix - a fix of anything - that she chugs hand sanitizer until a stink so bad it could strip wallpaper comes out her pores and she literally pickles herself. And then one day, on the gritty floor of the shelter cafeteria, I found her. And later found several empty gallon jugs of the stuff hidden under her cot.

I didn't know that a 20 year old girl could cry to me about being in agony, stripped raw, really, from so much whoring that she can barely walk right, and thus has to earn her drug money one 5$ handjob at a time.

I didn't know the pain of watching a crack addict give birth to her 11th baby, place it in the arms of children's aid for the 11th time without shedding a tear, and then sob because the nurse wouldn't give her any pain medication.

I didn't know how I would feel the first time I walked in on a dead body floating in a bathtub and think to myself Thank God. Yeah. Brutal. I am the lowest of the low for thinking such a thing, but maybe it gives you some indication of the kind of life this person led. It wasn't much. It was mostly heartache, misery, and drugs, with the occasional fish stick thrown in.

I didn't know what it would be like to sit face to face with someone, ask them about their cutting habit with their scars in plain sight, and hear them explain it so rationally - cutting and bleeding is the only way to feel something, feel anything, through the haze of drugs and pain - so rationally that I find myself nodding in agreement.

I didn't know how sick I would feel when a client was jonesing so badly during our short time together, scratching at invisible bugs, twitching violently, glazed and seeking, that they would eventually think up some excuse to leave the room, and we both knew damn well it was to go shoot up. And upon their return, with fresh track marks on display, the farce starts all over again. It never ends. It makes me sick.

I didn't know that there was a whole new level of sadness of frustration reached when a client celebrates their 3rd day of sobriety by going out and getting high.

I didn't know what a job that has you asking people Do you have Hep C? Do you have HIV? Do you think you might be pregnant? and hearing yeses to all three does to you over time. It breaks you down. It makes you cry at night.

I didn't know what it was like not to save them. Not to save very many at all. To lose them to coke, to meth, to the street, to pimps and johns, to knifings and prison and psych wards and the icy claws of death that stalk homeless shelters like you wouldn't believe.

I didn't know what it would be like to call someone's parents with regret, to inform them that their child who hasn't returned home in 5 years never will again. That the unclaimed body of their baby girl can be found in the city morgue. That they will never see her again. That she wanted to come home but couldn't. That she spent her last days craving the stuff that killed her, lying on a dirty mattress that didn't belong to her. That she spilled tears of remorse on her lumpy pillow. That it wasn't AIDS, although she had it, and it wasn't malnutrition though she'd rarely eaten in a month, and it wasn't hypothermia though God knows she'd spent nights half-frozen in snow banks, that it was a simple bacteria from a dirty needle that got into her bloodstream and went straight to her brain. That it was a sorry way to die, not nearly quick enough, and that she suffered, and that she missed her mother, that she suddenly realized she'd been living her life all wrong. And that in the end, it was too late. And all I could do was watch.

All I could do was watch.

How I Am.

Every morning I wake up with butterflies; I've become unpredictable even to myself.

It's exhilarating, really, to feel like you've been reinvented, like you've changed in some fundamental way. It also makes me nervous to not know what each day will bring, not know what exactly I am capable of, but pushing myself to test those boundaries, feeling excited because anything can happen. Anything.

I've had moments. I had one at the club the other night - standing half naked outside at 2am, waiting for a cab when some guy peels the shirt right off my breast (it was soaked with beer and came away slowly, reluctantly) just to see if I was cold - and you know what I did? I laughed at him. I laughed right in his face, because really, who is this girl, what life am I living? Is this even real? Shouldn't it be illegal to have this much fun?

Have you ever woken up with a hickey and not really known who gave it to you, or if it was even a girl or a guy?

Yeah, me too.

The Race Against Toronto

At the same time that Jason and I were split up but trying not to be, we also took up running. Perhaps I should have read more into the symbolic meaning of it than I did at the time, but I was probably too busy trying to outrun my own shadow to notice. When I would visit his crappy place out in the suburbs, we'd run past people's perfectly clipped lawns and their yappy little dogs, and the tricycles left outside, and the newspapers unretrieved at the end of driveways and cars parked crookedly alongside curbs. When he would visit my crappy place in the city, suddenly running wasn't just a way to be done working out faster than if I'd walked, it was fun. It was interesting. It was addictive.

It has led me to confirm a longstanding suspicion: the best part about Toronto is the sidewalks.

I'm not a fast runner. I'm not a graceful runner. There is nothing easy or effortless about it. I am awkward, and panty, and my feet look funny in running shoes as opposed to high heels, but damn if I don't get some crazy satisfaction out of it anyway.

I love weaving through the morning rush, the expensive people swinging their expensive briefcases, juggling their expensive lattés while trying not to scuff their expensive tassled loafers.

I love the gritty feel of the pockmarked concrete slabs; I love evading the wads of still-sticky gum; I love the stupid, gutsy pigeons who don't have the good sense to fly away when something comes careening towards them; I love the splatter of a ketchup packet that has already exploded under someone else's heel.

I love the blank stares of the people who are sitting on stools on the other side of the Starbucks' window, clutching at their morning caffeine with equal amounts of hope and disgust.

I love Albert, the homeless guy who sits on a milk crate cajoling coins out of pockets by offering a belated play-by-play of last night's game.

I love darting around the obstacles: the graffiti-ed mailbox, expired parking metres, signs begging me to come in for a perm and half off foil highlights, window shoppers transfixed by the nudes hanging in the gallery, street vendors and their questionable wares, strange-smelling hot dog carts, jittery wild-eyed junkies looking for their next fix, bored looking people on cell phones waiting for their dogs to find the ideal spot to take a leak.

I love the sound of impatient horns and cabbies rolling down their windows to shout invectives, the familiar strumming of the guy who earns his paycheque one dollar at a time deposited directly into his guitar case instead of his bank account, the blaring honk of the bully buses, the kind beeping of pedestrian crosswalk, the weird hum of a thousand ipods singing into two thousand ears, the scrape of reluctant feet dragging sleepy bodies closer toward office buildings.

I love winking at people as I pass them by. I love the people who smile at me. I love the people who raise their eyebrows in greeting. I love when people half-wave from the other side of the street, because the blur of my purple stretch capris looks a little too much like their friends', and then their sheepish smile when they realize that I am just another stranger out for a jaunt.

I love waiting at the corner for the red hand to turn into the white walking man who tells me it's safe to cross, even though in Toronto it's never safe to cross. I love the dedicated runners who don't wait idly, but hop from one foot to another or jog sillily in place, doing anything to keep that heart rate up. I love that you can always tell a serious runner by their backwards fanny pack, as if running makes fanny packs acceptable (it doesn't).

I love choosing a marker that's a few meters away, and closing my eyes, and running towards it blindly. I love it when I make it there unscathed, and I run extra hard to celebrate. I love it when I overestimate or underestimate my mark and I run extra hard to make up for it. I love it when I smack right into someone, and I giggle but don't stop as I yell my insincere apology while running extra hard to get away from my embarrassment.

I love seeing the same people as I saw yesterday. I love seeing new people that I have never seen before and never will again. I love the achy feeling in my thighs and the sexy bulge of my calves. I love the bobbing of my ponytail and the way my breath sounds inside my head. I love stretching in the elevator on my way down and gasping for breath as I run the last 6 flights up.

I love having an excuse to buy those cute little ankle socks. I love ordering poutine without a side of guilt because I had a damn good run this morning. I love breaking a sweat before 9am. I love taking up a new hobby that is so unJaylike that even I am completely baffled. I love the feel of Toronto as it unfolds in front of me, and behind me. I love how people part when they hear me coming, how they shuffle to the side and nod slightly as I glide past. I love you best, Toronto, when we're both going full tilt at an impressive pace.

What, you don't like veal?

This is what he asked me, straight-faced.

What, you don't like veal?

He seemed almost incredulous that I might be turning down such a fine delicacy. The veal he was referring to was of course himself, he being a young pup who didn't mind pointing it out to this old bitch.

Veal.

Yes, I have reached that stage in my life. I'm not a sexy heifer anymore. I'm an old cow. An udderlicious cow, but still.

Moooo.

Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy

If weekends had themes, that would be mine.



I love how on Friday afternoon, I'm sitting at my desk at work smugly thinking about what a good girl I'm going to be this weekend, how I'm going to be productive for once, not sleep half the day and then party all night, but actually catch up on the laundry and stock the fridge with leafy green things and finally crack open that scrapbook that I got for Christmas 2003.



And that fantasy lasts until the clock strikes 5, and I'm out the door and hopping into the back of someone's pick up, headed for trouble instead of for home. I get half baked, then fully baked, and then everything goes to hell, straight to hell, not even a stopover in slightly-naughty-but-still redeemable land. Damn.

You have to take an awful lot of cubicle-naps to atone for all the sleep-debt accrued during wild & crazy weekends, but the thing about the work week is, it's so fucking short! No matter how many times you manage to curl up under your desk, you're never fully recovered from the last weekend before the next one hits you square in kisser! I know that people don't often argue on this side of the fence, but from where I'm sitting, it seems to be true.

I love Mondays, but the truth is, when you're sitting there with your forehead resting on a pile of paperwork, one eye mercifully closed while the other one watches the clock (and it's not quite 10am), and your head pounds from the remnants of the juiced-up-techno version of a song that was never quite good to begin with but still got an awful lot of play at the bar on Saturday night and you're picking at the rub-on not-so-temporary tattoo from the grog-fuelled pirate party you attended on Sunday but you're already planning Thursday night's drunk run while not quite ruling out the possibility of Monday night festivities because honest to blog, if you survive this day, you'll deserve a drink or 8 - well, that's when you know that something along the way got effed up.

The 5 day work week is just not natural, and the idea of a mere 2-day weekend is just absurd. Weekends are so laughably abbreviated that you absolutely must do your best to squeeze every last drop of potential fun out of them (sometimes to your own detriment, and certainly to your liver's), which leaves you with no time at all for the resting, which is the key to not dying, so I'm told. By the time Monday rolls around, I'm thankful to go to work for 8 solid hours of not-partying, even if I have to chug several "breakfasts of champions" (Special K and Redbull) to get me there.

Oh, I bitch, but the truth is, once I get over the initial shock that fluorescent lighting and water coolers inevitably give, I start to get in the zone pretty quickly, and by 2pm on Monday, my knee starts jiggling under my desk, bopping around, looking for a beat that it's just not getting from my coworker's top-40 radio habit. And this week, god bless it, is even worse (or better, depending how dehydrated you are) than usual: Monday is St Pat's, so of course there will be going-outage, and since we're off on Friday for some vague Jesusy reason, Thursday night becomes the default "fuck yeah we're done work!" night, leaving only 3 hangover-hazy days in the middle for gossip, scheming, and of course - dialysis.

Oh, I like to complain, but obviously I'm enjoying myself. Like, really enjoying myself. 2008, after all, is to be Year of Me. And after the suckage that was 2007, at least for the most part (otherwise known as Year of Complete Horseshit), I think I deserve it.

Rum and coke tastes an awful lot like freedom.
Ahhhhhhhhhh.

Things I learned in the storm.

1. It's surprisingly possible to declare a pajama day at your local seedy bar.

2. When drinking rye and coke by the pitcherful, the glass is totally negligible if you have 2 straws.

3. Inappropriate and wildly imaginative conversation should only be interrupted to belt out classic rock lyrics that may or may not be playing in the background at the time.

4. It is not compulsory to kiss members of the same sex while flirting with members of both sexes, but it's pretty damn fun.

5. While sitting on the public pot, it is totally acceptable to open the door while your pants are still around your ankles if (and only if) there is a nipple ring on display. Points off for breaking the seal.

6. Boys do not forget an offer of three-way sex no matter how drunk they (or you) were.

7. After being accused of being "a retarded amount of fun", you will of course feel compelled to repeat the performance again the next night, regardless of the severe weather warning issued by Environment Canada.

8. There is no excuse for wearing sling back heels (no socks, obviously) on a night when over 50 cm of snow is expected.

9. No matter how much hash you smoke, your toes will still be cold. However, the fact that your friend appears to be wearing an umbrella-hat is happily distracting.

10. No matter how many times you hear "only an idiot would go out in this weather", the enticement of a crowded dancefloor and a bad Britney Spears remix will prove impossible to resist.

11. Cabbies, on the other hand, will heed the warning, and taxis will be completely unavailable.

12. Indeed, when you decide to hoof it for lack of better options, the city streets will be deserted (from what you can tell, anyway, it being "white out conditions" out there). No cabs, no public transportation, no cars whatsoever, aside from the ones sitting crookedly in ditches, or buried under several feet of hard-packed snow.

13. No matter how close to the yellow line in the middle of the road you walk, the snow drifts will still be up to your crotch.

14. Luckily, sex on the beach cures all.

15. I mentioned about the menage a trois, right? Turns out, it still buys you drinks the next day.

16. As implausible as it sounds, a one-man acoustic version of Billy Jean is pretty damn rockin.

17. There comes a point, a line gets crossed, when you just know that on Monday morning you won't be able to look at these people in quite the same way, but what the hell, life is fun, and this is what it's all about.

Doncha wish your blog was hot like mine?

It was the post that almost was.

The post that definitely was, but then disappeared.

The post that I wrote, and that was amazing, truly brilliant, would have had you nodding sagely at times, misty-eyed at others, and enlightened in the end.

You know that post? That post that you would have posted if only the blog monster hadn't eaten it? The kind of post that keeps you posting, that inspires postage in others, that ranks among the posts hall of fame, the post that other posts hold up as god of all posts for worship, admiration, and envy. Lots and lots of envy.

Oh the post, what a post it was. It never dithered. It was witty. It used peppery language that had us all cracking those half-smiles that we feel foolish for flashing at our computer screens. It was sweet, not sentimental, but with an edge. An edge like Hunter S. Thompson but with a dollop of Saul Bellow on top. And Maya Angelou sprinkles. And a side of David Sedaris, with 2 spoons for sharing.

And now it's gone, and you'll have to take my word for its luminescence. It was a post fit for a goat, but now it's floating around in the internet, unclaimed and unloved, like a lost mitten that will live a hauntingly useless life in a lost and found box, never to warm fingers again.

Now you'll never know the stellar week I've had, or the shady characters I met on a slippery sidewalk while waiting for the light to turn green, or why my driveway has suddenly turned into a meat market. You'll never know the stunning conclusion I've come to in the great "should I\could I fuck a younger (!) man" debate, or how I got those funny bruises on the backs of my knees, or how I really feel about white belts. And how will you sleep at night never knowing where that mysterious itch came from, or how I came to celebrate "Sausage Fest 2008" on an ordinary Wednesday just like any other, or whether I am likely to find a dozen pirate hats in time (in time for what?!).

Yup. It's rough. I wouldn't want to be in your shoes right now. There's been an awful lot of exceedingly interesting things happening around here, and now you'll never know....but you can always guess. :)

Stream-of-Mostly-Consciousness

Baby, you're drunk, and acting tough.

I'm not drunk. I'm happy.

Oh?

Happy. You know, that feeling you get when you've been dancing beside the speaker all night, and the only sense you have left is the sight of your own blonde tresses as they swish on by, even the pain from your slut shoes defleshing your heels is dim, the music is good, no the music is better than good because at least five times you've clapped with glee and squealed Ooooh, my favourite, and you're high on the sugar from your rum and cokes like this whole night is just for you, like maybe everyone in the bar came out just so that you could smile your smile and do your thing, and maybe it's not true but maybe it doesn't even matter because you're out there enjoying it all, lost in the twinkling coloured lights, taking the phone numbers to avoid the argument but dismissing them all with a saucy wink because you already know who you want to go home with tonight and your secret smile is because you're wearing the perfect panties underneath and he'll be pleased, but for now you're on the floor feeling the beat, touching yourself, basking in the heat, letting other bodies brush your own and sparking from all the electricity that surrounds you like the energy is communal tonight and everyone is sharing more than a dance, and you can feel their desires almost as palpably as you can feel the pendant around your neck, swaying like you do, catching in your cleavage, and the universe narrows to just this sweaty space, nothing else matters, tonight is the night.

And the fact that you've been bleeding in your shoes for the past 4 hours?

Details. Just details.
Now slam my back against the wall and kiss me like you mean it.