Tag: birthdays

I’ve never been to NYC

Given that my recent job interviews have all fizzled, my relationship has horrifically dissolved, and my birthday is fast approaching, I have decided it’s finally perfect timing to use up my plane ticket to visit Van Sise in New York city*.

I fly out of SeaTac to NYC on May 20th and return June 2nd.

I am going to miss Rafael’s Folklife and a few other things, (my original birthday plan was to set up a Whole Beast Feast, hit up the 40th Annual Folklife for a day, then hitch-hike with some strangers to the 10th Annual Sasquatch Festival for the rest of the long weekend), but given my present circumstances as a connoisseur of sad situations, it just seems like a better idea to be gone. Every night my dreams ache, my body wrenches with unhappiness, yet in the morning, I can’t seem to find reasons to be awake. I lie there motionless, wrapped up in nothingness, unable to conjure any appetite for life, any thread of grace, any desire at all for my bland, banal hopes or disembodied future. If I had a job or were in school, I’m sure it would be different, I would feel that my life was moving forward instead of slipping away, but as it currently is, a lonely narrative of inevitable failure after inevitable failure, all I want is to be away from here, all I want is escape.

*Originally we were going to wander around the southern states, visiting Atlanta and New Orleans, rounding off the trip, if we were lucky and it was delayed, with the last Space Shuttle Launch. Instead his work got in the way and the already-purchased plane ticket was cashed in for credit and put aside for a visit with him later.

oh help me, I want some right now

Scouring the net for something celebratory, I stumbled upon a Seattle chocolate walking tour of downtown. Tony bought us tickets and away we went the next morning for my best birthday ever.

The tour began in a hotel lobby, where we received head-set radios, then continued into the hotel bar, where we started our day with harsh, Bacardi heavy drinks as we waited for the latecomers to straggle in. The members of the group, finding this a bit much for ten a.m., mostly left full glasses behind as we left, while the tour leader, a brash young man with close cropped hair and humour, ignored our concern and led us out into the street, brandishing flash cards with various pictures of cocoa plants. I knew, then and there, the tour was going to be a riot, and it was, and for all the wrong reasons.

The next stop was a bakery, too small to let us in, where Tony and I began to break the rules. We were meant to wait outside in the chilly wind while plates of treats were handed out, but given half a chance, we darted inside, snagging coffee and snuggling in the warm, secure that if the group left, we’d hear it on the radio. It was there, too, we began to gain a reputation. Not for trouble, even though we were constantly making out, wandering off, and already knew all the answers to his questions, but as The Official Hedonists. Whenever we had a chance to speak, everything that spilled from our mouths sounded naughty. “Does anyone have any questions about the chocolate?” “Oh yes,” replied Tony, as innocent as the world, “This enrobing you were talking about.. Is it possible to enrobe a person in chocolate?” Never in my life have I been so obviously pigeonholed as a passionate, odd-ball sensualist. We very quickly became the secondary entertainment. “Can anyone tell me the best use of cocoa butter?” “Oh yes!” I said, delighted, “Body massage!”

We made him blush. We were winked at by various chocolate shop staff. The other members of our tour gave each other smoldering dark and secret looks. It was perfect and ever so much fun. So much so that our game even made up for the fact that one stop on the gourmet chocolate tour was at a popcorn shop. (Fail).

In summary: Skip the tour. Use the money instead to spend your money directly at the Dahlia Bakery, The Chocolate Box, (ignoring, if you can, their questionable chocolate smeared child banner), Fran’s chocolate’s, but most importantly, the blissful drinking chocolate at The Confectional. Do not let them fool you with their tiny cheesecakes. They are nothing. NOTHING. THE DELICIOUS DRINK IS ALL.

oh, her old apartments, they’re like places of worship to colour and good living..

REQUIRED LISTENING: Thingy, a free EP from Daddy_Scrabble, released by Edinburgh-based netlabel Black Lantern Music.

Stayed up two nights in a row, not for any other reason except that I have, and maybe a little that I find it more and more difficult to sleep without Tony.

Earlier, across the street at the auto body shop, someone was using an overhead announcement system to have a speaker phone conversation in arabic. Without context, it sounded like a rehearsal run recording of a middle-east political rally speech, the sort blared from speakers mounted on the roof of a car, blues brothers style, solid, unexpected, surreal.

I liked it. Over here, at my apartment, I’ve been moving furniture while listening to electronic klezmer jazz, shifting everything out of my room, stripping the walls, preparing it for painting. Most of the furniture’s been moved, and all that’s left is my computer and the bed, the latter of which I am simply going to pull into the center of the room and abandon under a sheet. Initially my plan was to ready the bedroom, leave town, then paint it when I got back, after all the pesky cat hair had settled, but Nicole, bless her, stepped in today with some last minute corrections. Sure, ready the room, but don’t pick up a paint brush, she said. Instead, she’ll paint it for my birthday while I’m out of town! Leaving me only with the hard task duties of being glad, grateful, and moving everything back in.

I was pleasantly surprised when she suggested it though truthfully I felt immediately stupid that I didn’t see it coming. After all, it’s a sweet gesture. Sweet, thoughtful, and entirely within character, considering the trail of super improved apartments she’s littered behind her or the recent threats to professionally power-wash Wayne’s deck, the better to complement the flower gardens she’s been inflicting plant by tiny plant on his jungle-neglected yard. Nicole is many nice things, smart, attractive, witty, and fun, but when it comes to home improvement, she is also a dedicated angel with a fiery sword. Or, as in this case, a sopping wet paintbrush, out to murder some beige.

an apology, an explanation

As many probably know, my birthday is this Saturday. Traditionally, I have a big party every second year, generally in June, but I don’t know yet if I’m going to make it happen. When it comes to birthday planning, I feel like I’ve been asleep on the train this year. People have been asking, shaking me a little awake, as I ride the days closer to the date, but my eyes have barely focused on the question, other things have been too important. I’m still trying to find ways to pay my rent, still trying to find ways to earn my way, and too engrossed in that to place my attention elsewhere.

As a result, no, I do not have any plans for the giant even-numbered party yet, for which I am legitimately sorry. I do know, however, that I’ll be in Seattle for the actual date this year. Folklife is this weekend, the mad and glorious folk festival that Rafael helps run, and taking a few days off to dance barefoot in the grass sounds pretty darned spectacular right now. If Vancouver people would like to join me there, we have space for people to crash at our place. So far David and Nicole are considering coming, and Lung might be meeting us there on his way back up from California.

I’m sure when I get back, there will be cake, but until I get my finances sorted out, even if only just enough to take care of essentials, I can’t justify taking the time and effort required to make something happen, not even for my birthday. Rent is coming up. I have to concentrate.

for the record (yes there is video no you can’t see it)

HIVE3 was as entertaining as ever, yet in spite of the pushy blow up doll horror movie incident, the near death experience, the cupcake rape-baby incest kiss, and the skunk suicide therapy, the most epic thing I witnessed this weekend was in my apartment: late yesterday afternoon, Lung manfully inflicted a brilliant and surpassingly brave four minute lapdance upon Victoria, my very surprised mother.

Lung’s astonishing strip-tease started mildly, with slow hip swings and mild gyration, but gained momentum as clothes came off, until he was throwing pants at my head and using his belt to better capture my mother, finally finishing with a shocking yet shamefully victorous Full Monty flourish of his genitals.

No word yet on if he left on his socks.

happy KLAATU birthday BERADA sunday NIKTO tea

Ray & Tony’s Super Duper Sci-Fi Horror Movie Double Feature Outrageous Day and Night Of Birthday!

bettmann - moon bridal hat - boston - 1956

March 21st
560 Mclean
noon – 11:30


Sunday Tea is a roving Vancouver tradition, an open-invite social event held weekly at different venues, generally from 11am-ish to 2pm-ish, depending on the hosts. Basically, if you’re reading this, you’re invited and so are all your cupcakes, cookies, and most fun friends. This tea is in honour of Ray and Tony’s birthdays, (March 16th and 19th, respectively), and goes from noon until it blends into our Sci-Fi Double Feature, (Eden’s Log & Pandorum), which starts at seven. (They knows nothing about either film, by the way, make sure not to give anything away!) There will be tea and cake! BYO-anything else. Pyjamas welcome, nudity discouraged. We urge people to bring not only the usual trappings of Sunday Tea, which are tasty snacks and good people, but also party hats, just for fun.

General rules for Tea are: New people are excellent, children are welcome, tasty things and interesting kinds of tea are encouraged, but no TimBits are allowed.

Allergy note: our household contains two cats and some nuts.

rock that candy shop!

Jess Hill (crop)

A happy birthday, five days late, shout out to my sweet singing gal pal, the incredible, laudable, utterly fantastic Jess Hill!

May your next year cost you nothing you did not want to lose, may it offer you everything you set out hope to find.
May it bring you roses and ravens of song, kisses lit by moonbeams and travel more than rain.

And happy birthday to Michael, who woke another year new only yesterday.

an animated description of (mr) maps

Trimpin : What an odd, lovely minded, delightful man. What odd, lovely minded, delightful art! I spoke with him after the film, and I’m going to see what I can do about making him an on-line calendar, so people will know where and when to find his installations and shows.

–::–

People tend to synchronize blinking when watching film, at moments calculated to give the least information loss.

–::–


We wandered in and out of our weekend, sidling up to previously made plans and usually walking away again, tied only to our smiles, our warm hands bound together better than our hours. Saturday was a day of birthdays, getting up slowly, swimming from bed as if from water, heavy limbed and discarding the charted day we’d made, instead filling it with a late breakfast at Havana’s and a wander down the Drive, searching out the perfect present for my found brother Michael. Indonesia, Bali, black wood and red glass, three hollow faces in a candle-light row, placid, eyes sweetly closed, a puddle of calm light for a time lately troubled. Downtown, then, our treasure tucked in a bag, downtown to Davie and Denman, the purpose seawall and ice-cream, something like a date, something like something we should have done years ago, arm in arm, sharing sugar on a park bench as the sun set into the ocean, orange and sparkle and gold.

Chasing the day with dinner, the present fit as right as expected, a train pour of alcohol down the table, familiar faces, names, periphery friends, lost family, personal history, remembering suddenly I had met Sara on the dance-floor we counted out New Year’s Eve together the same night I saved a life, the first good holiday midnight I’d ever had, as if the memories were only visible under blacklight or her pretty eyes. When the crowd split off for sushi, we dawdled behind over dessert, then walked out on our own, peeling away the city into paths, transit, and routes.

Frank‘s place was crowded, the floor a plane of pillows, inflated mattresses and grinning people lit by the flourish and improbable end of Buckaroo Bonzai. (A great attack of hello from Sam, a surprised, pleased greeting from Daniel.) Shedding our clothes in the storage closet felt like shedding skin, as we borrowed pyjamas to snuggle the night, clothing I haven’t worn since I was a child, and my body, strangely, just as small inside the loaned plaid flannel as it was wearing adult clothing then. Tony preferred the Strawberry Shortcake pants, he was welcome to them. In the velvety dim light of the party, he could have been handsome in almost anything. Finding a vacant beanbag, we settled in for Hooped, then Zombie Strippers, a movie that maybe should never have been made, except that parts of it were so much fun. After that we shifted to a mattress with Claire for Amazon Women On The Moon, then tried to sleep through most of Hell Comes To Frogtown, instead waking horribly to all the shooting and shouty bitz, which involved such complex philosophy as “why does that mutated(?) frog king have three snake penises, anyway?”

Shakes The Clown was next, which I wish I’d seen more of, then apparently Night Of The Creeps, which I completely missed, followed by Airplane!, which was kind enough to wake me for the lovely opening red zone white zone argument, but not keep me that way. Dawn arrived like a ghost, sliding between the cracks of the party, prying the new day out of the cracks of our long, cheerful night. I don’t know when people left, but there were only a few of us by the time morning and breakfast arrived, a small heaven of perfect waffles, strawberries with maple syrup, and bacon.

That day, once we walked home, with matching clouds of impossible hair, we stayed in all day, in bed, until it was Monday.