To break way from the endless winter blues we decided to go to a cottage in Mt. Tremblant with another couple. Oddly enough with the same couple that came to visit us the last time we rented a cotttaagggeee. We left later than anticipated the Friday evening, as I had to work (ok, I had to write an exam at work that I basically mentally threw up on and then turned it into a dumpster fire). We ended up driving through hills and crazy curves in the dark, in my car, that was about 30 seconds away from committing suicide. On top of this fact, after crying twice over things that seemed extremely minor, I realized I was in defcon PMS mode. Yay! 

The next day we got up to prepare for a day at the spa. Our couple friends were far more organized and headed off earlier than us.

This part was redacted by my significant other.

After crying about how the day was ruined and couldn’t get any worse, Aunt Flow arrived. Gawd. When we arrived at the spa, there was a decent wait to get in. As we lined up and tried to blend in with the fancy, spa crowd, I reached into my bag to get the gift cards we were paying with and as I pulled them out I threw, what seemed like, a week’s supply of tampons onto the floor, in front of everybody. Yes everyone! This gal is bleeeedinggggg.

When we actually entered the spa we were told there is no talking allowed. That is literally like asking me to stop breathing. If I can’t make witty, potentially hilarious comments under my breath, I will develop a comedy tumour. There were even silent police roaming the grounds to shush you should you break the rules! My significant other and I attempted some weird sign language to help make decisions of what spa activity to do. We went into a hot tub, then walked to another hot pool, sat in some gravity chair thing and went to a sauna. While we were in a secret hall I took the moment to allow my words to spill free. “Oh my god, this is so boring. Like, we are in a hot pool with strangers, who cares. And those chairs? Like I can sit in a robe at home and lie in a chair, why would someone pay to do that? Also what the fuck is with the red blankets people are wearing over their white robes. Everyone’s looks like a Handmaid and it’s creepy as fuck! Praise be.” After making sure we got in two hours of pruning and making weird faces at each other we decided to call it a day. 

The rest of the trip was great. Lot’s of food, wine and games. We rocked Head’s Up and Cards Against Humanity for hours. The only thing I recall screaming repeatedly was “Abandoned with a volleyball! Abandoned with a volleyball!” Because in my head, that was the name of the movie everyone was describing to me. Like Castaway was never an option. Just ABANDONED WITH A VOLLEYBALL!

I had an extreme cold last week. One that feels like every facial orifice is seeping ooze. If I were a man, I would have taken the week off. Anyways, I was at work, in a meeting, during the worst day. I had a hundred Kleenex in my hands and was desperately trying not to sneeze all over my colleagues in our small meeting room. Our manager went over some new processes and explained some other admin procedures while I casually hoped my eye watering hadn’t connected with my snot to just be a cess pool of disgust. After the meeting my manager came over and said, “I just wanted to connect with you regarding what we went over in the meeting. You really didn’t look like you were taking the information well.” I was very surprised and wondered what she was talking about. She went on to explain, “You are just so expressive and I could see I needed to connect with you regarding your feelings on the new processes.” I was so confused. What was she talking about? The only think I remember about that meeting was me feeling like an hour long sneeze was coming on. Omg. Was she looking at my face thinking I was judging the information? Was she seeing my angry and frustrated almost sneeze face?! I HAVE A TERRIBLE COLD, I told her. And I was extremely angry at my potential sneezes that did not come into fruition. I was in a long term frustrated pre-sneeze state!! She started laughing hysterically. Omg no. I was not critiquing ANY information I was literally trying not to snot on everyone. Also – side note – I probably don’t care enough about new processes to make facial reactions to them. That part I did not say to my boss.

To follow up my annoying cold, I got an aggressive cough. I managed through it alright until one night it kept me up. I was annoyed so I went to the bathroom cupboard and grabbed an ancient cough syrup that I have no recollection of ever purchasing. Every time I sat up choking, I took a casual swig. By 5am my toes were tapping in the bed. I literally felt like I’d been doing lines of caffeine for hours. When I decided to finally get up for work I felt shockingly amazing for someone who had slept terribly. My body, in general, despises the morning. But not today ladies and gentlemen, not today. I was so pumped for my day I was scared to have coffee. But I had one anyways. I knew something was terribly wrong when I ran the entire 4 blocks to my bus and didn’t pass out and die. I don’t know what the fuck is in cough syrup, but that shit is fucking awesome. The one other time I recall taking cough syrup, in my whole life, was for a job interview. I swigged from the bottle because I was horrified of coughing out my interview answers. By the time the meeting began I had obviously taken too much because during the interview the walls started melting. I can’t believe you can just buy this shit at any pharmacy. I got to work before everybody and was hammering out files when others started coming in. When my cubicle mate came in I was shaking a bit but extremely focused. I ws also yelling about how there is meth or something in cough syrup. This was all roughly around the time my boss came in, just to hear me yell about being on meth. Weee. Keeping it professional! I assured him I had not knowingly taken meth but that I was extremely confident it was in over the counter cough syrup and I was, in fact fucked up on that. 

I did a food safety handling course last weekend. Oddly enough, the weekend after I somehow managed to get some type of food poisoning. Anyways, the course made me make some serious decisions about places I would never eat at again and possibly just never eating out again ever. During the course, they talked about a Marketplace episode where they discussed best before dates or something mildly interesting. But as the video was talking about this Marketplace episode, they showed a group of women, hanging out together with popcorn and wine…watching CBC’s Marketplace. I don’t know how other people’s ladies nights usually go, but mine does DEFINITELY not involve investigative journalism regarding the food industry. Like who were they kidding. Ladiessss bring over some wine and let’s watch MARKETPLACE! Woooo!

The night of karaoke was the first time that my Mom attempted to keep up with my day drinking. I have a pretty decent ability to continuously drink and ride that buzz (I feel like you have all probably seen me not maintain this buzz and move to defcon drunk, but that is not normal…insert opinion here). She started to get a bit louder and I was excited because that’s really why you go on on vacation with your Mom, to get a bit drunk, say truths you never have before and eventually make asses of yourselves. During the time of our cocktail drinking, a whole band had setup right behind us. I am sure they were waiting for us to get up so they could move our seats, as we were right in the way, but we remained. I was getting nervous because my Mother was pretty gung-ho about doing karaoke and that doesn’t jive with me, ever. I even ran into the wifi room (also known as the lobby) and messaged Alex that there were drunk rumours of karaoke and to please send help…to the Dominican! The best part was when my Mom leaned over and told me to look at these band guys in the pink shirts behind us and sort of winked implying they were hot. I told her that unfortunately she hadn’t whispered that at all and they were definitely aware of her feelings. She thought that was hilarious. We went to dinner to try and sober up and realize karaoke was a terrible idea. After dinner and possibly a nap, Mom was still convinced we were doing it. I tried to explain to my Mother that although I am loud and am ok being the centre of attention in a small group, karaoke is something I have never managed to do because it freaks me the fuck out. My Mom signed us up, chose a song and then we just sat there knowing they would call upon us at any point. I knew she would pick Carole King. When they called us up first I realized we were opening up karaoke night with a super downer song. It’s like LET’S GET THIS PARTY STARTED pan to us singing “You’ve got a friend.” We got some applause at the end probably due to the part that we can both comfortably hold a tune. One lady gave us a very enthusiastic thumbs up, probably a big Carole fan. We spent the rest of the night realizing we had to redeem ourselves with a party song. We probably came up with a thousand ideas, none of them perfect and then the evening ended. We would just have to remain the downer Carole King ladies who can’t read an audience. God why could we have not at least done “I Feel the Earth Move”?! Lesson learned.   

What highlighted how fancy this resort was, was the bathroom. I am a bather and I assume, going to most hotels and definitely resorts, that I will be showering because the bath is not up to scruff. This bathroom was totally marble from floor to ceiling and had a jet tub – ahhhh!! Half way through the trip I decided to have a pre-dinner/post beach bath. I was filling up the tub and decided to get the jets going. A sound that resembled a jet engine began and then, to my surprise, the jets started spraying water…onto the other side of the bathroom. So after one solid spray that made me realize this was not good, I ran for the button which I think just made it go again. Water was spraying on the walls, over the toilet, onto the mirror and was pooling at warp speed on the bathroom floor. At this point am I am panicking as the bathroom is beginning to flood. I hit the button again and it stopped. My Mom calls out – is everything ok? I said YES, I JUST NEED EVERY TOWEL IN THIS ROOM IMMEDIATELY and as she gets up she sees the water coming out of the bathroom into the room. And when I explained to my Mom how come I didn’t yell – it is because I don’t yell. I just need to fix the problem asap, what does yelling help? I realize something bad is happening and need to deal with it. We couldn’t stop laughing for hours. We replayed the story a hundred times and my Mom could not get around how I would not scream and yell over a bathroom flooding extremely quickly. I showed her parts of the bathroom that the water had hit just to show the strength of the jets. I’m almost glad I didn’t feel those in a tub as they might have ripped through my body. I never did end up using the tub for fear jetpacolypse may happen again or by body would be ripped to shreds. 

The highlight of our hilarity was our day trip out. We decided to do the day excursion that had us going to a waterfall, a school, an outdoor place to learn about local resources and a cigar factory. The closer the trip got, the more we had concerns about the 200 stairs down (and UP!) to the waterfall and the horse ride to get there. My Mom thought she just might die doing the stairs and my back was so fucked up from the mattress in our hotel, I had already spent one full night trying to sleep in weird positions on a blanket on the floor. Riding a horse seemed like the thing that would commit the spine pinches into full blown herniated discs. We went down to talk to our travel rep dude. He said that if we didn’t have knee problems everything would be fine. Ok we may not have knee problems but we have enough extra weight on both of us to probably create knee problems, ya know what I am saying buddy? He basically made us feel bad about being out of shape and having crooked spines and okayed us, medically, to participate. I told my Mother we should write to the company to let them know this kid with a 20 year old laptop just offered us serious medical advice. Because if we die on that trip, we should probably sue. 

The bus came to get us at the resort. It was like a giant safari jeep. A few women jumped off the only seat that had room and ran over to take pics of our gorgeous resort. Us, not wanting to wait, jumped onto that same seat only to have them scowl at us about it. The guy behind us told us we were right to sit and that they should not have got off the bus. Little did I know this would be the first of many ridiculous things these ladies would do. The bus drove out of the town and into the hills and stopped at the zip lining place. My Mom and I had discussed doing this. Well to be clear she thought it would be fun and I thought it sounded awful and wanted nothing to do with it. Everyone got off the bus except the same 3 women who had caused issue at our stop. We were the group doing the waterfall instead of the zipline. We would be stuck with these 3 ladies for the rest of the day. For those of you that have read my travel scribbles before, I do not do well in tour groups. It’s like mob mentality takes over and everyone becomes an idiot. This would be no exception. The tour guide figured out that my Mom and I were English and the ladies were French. The beginning of the tour she explained the whole day in French and then when she went to explain it in English the woman in front of me talked to her friend loudly the whole time. I didn’t hear a thing. Lucky enough I had understood most of the French but I still found it rude and annoying that she spoke through the whole thing. At this point I was pissed. Lucky for everyone there, I had emptied out half a bottle of 7up at the hotel and filled the rest with rum. It was 10am and I casually started sipping on it. 

Our first stop was at a little outside shelter where they would go over all their local resources. When we introduced ourselves at the beginning and they asked us where we were all from, I said I believed we were all Canadian. The other woman says that they were actually from Quebec. I rolled my eyes and thought, GREAT! We are on a trip in the middle of the Dominican with some overly chatty, rude, separatists. What the fuck. The tour guide talked about coffee, coconuts, rum, Mamajuana, Moringa, honey and we sampled everything. At the end, the Quebecois women asked our tour guide to take a photo of them. We asked the elderly woman in front of us to take ours. We handed her my iPhone and realized, like the amazing tourists we were, that she was standing there enthralled by seeing us on a screen but most definitely did not know how to use an iPhone. Mom and I stood their posing until we realized no photo would be had. The older woman started laughing and then we started laughing but we didn’t really have the heart to tell her she was not taking pictures. So we thanked her and took the phone back. The tour guide realized what was happening and took our photos but we were laughing too hard for them to be decent. Just after we got back onto our jeep, it started pouring. It also turned out that the jeep had broken down. There were huge holes in the canopy and water was splashing all over us. I lovingly cuddled my little 7up bottle and wondered how, being trapped in a leaky, broken down jeep with Quebec separatists, could get any worse? And then I watched the eldest French woman reach into her bag and pull out the pieces of a recorder and put it together. Like the horrible recorder flute things we learned to play in elementary school. Sweet mother Mary and Joseph, no. Then the little recorder diddy started. This was also the time that I wished I’d emptied out the whole bottle of 7up so that is was all rum.

We went to a school afterward but I felt weird about interrupting a class so white people could parade around but my Mom had brought pencils and being a teacher, thoroughly enjoyed it. I waited outside. I heard the woman start to play her recorder for the class and I almost ran in to apologize to the kids but I left it. Then we went to the cigar factory. They asked if I wanted a sample. I was surprised but they handed me one and lit it. I inhaled it like a cigarette which was not my best decision but I casually did not hack up a lung but felt like dying for about 45 minutes.

The highlight of our day was by far the waterfall. This was the part of the trip we thought we would never make it through. Me with the spine of an elderly woman with osteoporosis and my Mom without the fitness level to walk 400 steps without seeing death in site. We were each given a horse to ride and a human to babysit us. The one other time I have ever been on a horse was when I was a young child. I was at my “interesting” neighbours (who had a so called petting zoo), where I was wildly bucked off because I was holding a balloon and apparently that threatens tiny horses. I had never been on one since. So I was in no way looking forward to this experience. And thank god my caregiver did not speak English, as the whole time we traversed through the Dominican outback, I was swearing like a sailor in heat. My Mom couldn’t stop laughing from in front of me. I could see what the horse was stepping on and thought, I would trip and fall walking through this, he is definitely going to do the same. Side note here – I felt so bad for the conditions the horses worked in that when I returned I found an international Horse Welfare charity and contact them to let them know the situation. They did get back to me but hint – no random international horse charity in the world has the resources to do anything about this. But that was how I dealt with my horse guilt.

It was while on this horse, being walked by a local man, that I really felt like an asshole for not learning a lick of Spanish before coming. I was trying my best to communicate to the man who was looking after my life, in between me swearing, but all I could say was Cerveza and Gracias. When the fuck did I become such a tourist? Then we all stopped in a group, tied up the horses and our handlers now walked us down the 200 stairs. I was ok. Stairs are not on my list of things I can’t handle. But as we went lower and lower, I became concerned. I yelled ahead to Mom to ask if I should alert the helicopters to come get us at the bottom. She was basically so out of breathe she couldn’t answer. I assumed the answer was yes. When we got to the bottom there was a place to swim underneath the waterfall. It seemed like far too much hassle to me, to get into my bathing suit and go into the water, that I could not see an easy way in or out of. My Mother on the other hand, who at this point was glued to her helping man, didn’t give a shit and was going to swim. Her handler looked the other way for a couple seconds and when he looked back, my Mom was barreling across the path to the huts to change. He panicked and bolted to her side. It was so funny to watch. He knew and I knew, he was her only chance at surviving this trip. But he took it seriously. He caught up with her quickly and then proceeded to, on multiple occasions, save my Mom’s life.

I have never tried to write this part down, I prefer to act it out, so bear with me. My Mom was overly confident here. She walked out of the hut with the mission of getting into the water, like there would be zero issue there was no stairs and railing. Her lifeguard/handler was more aware of the perils here. While my Mom had changed into her bathing suit, I had been watching a model get glamour shots done at the base of the waterfall. So it was a stark contrast and extremely funny to have my Mom gingerly lowered/slide into the same pool of water. As I saw her get in, I wondered how she was going to get out. This is where we differ. I analyzed all angles and aspects of this pool before deciding if I should go in and I saw no way of making it out safely or gracefully so I said Fuck it. I saw my Mom wade around and waited for her face to look like, how the fuck do I get out of here? Our handlers were all in a circle having a health and safety conference or betting which one of us would die on the way up. Then I saw my Mom look around and I started laughing. She saw where everyone else was getting out and it was not good. But god dammit if my Mom didn’t just go for it. It was a slimy ledge that she had to hoist herself up onto then somehow get her feet under her without wiping out. I know I should have been concerned but it’s hard when you are laughing so hard. As I saw her go for ledge, she sort of threw her body at it in an attempt to beach herself onto the slippy ledge. Then I saw her handler realize what was happening, I have never seen anyone move so fucking fast in my life. He could see she was never going to make it so he threw what he was holding and ran across the shallow ledge to try and rescue my Mom. He seemed like a small guy but god bless him for having the strength to drag/pull my Mom out of the water. As he dragged her onto the ledge the top of the bathing suit went up over her belly. I am the worst daughter in the world but at this point, but I was cry laughing so hard that even the train wreck photos I was taking were not great. But she didn’t stop there. Once she was dragged to her feet, my Mom confidently walked through a wading pool to a soaking wet, warped board that people were gingerly walking on to cross the water to get back onto dry land. It was like watching an ACME cartoon where someone is about to die over and over again but someone else in the scene is preventing this from happening, while they have no idea. When her handler realized how confidently she was walking towards the board he dove towards her, as well as two other guys! They all knew she was absolutely about to wipe the fuck out. I was cry/laughing level 1000, I know I know. So as one man dives towards her from the direction she is coming, 2 other men run through the water to her from the direction she is going. As my Mom touches her foot to the board and starts sliding, she all-of-a-sudden has 3 strapping men holding her up. She slides a bit but keeps trooping at warp speed. I am in a crumpled ball at the end of this board waiting to tell my carefree Mother how many times she nearly died and how hilarious it was to watch. 

Our next mission was to escalate the 200 steps we had gone down. After about 1/4 of the trip up I had huge concerns about my Mom. I was quite far ahead of her and I could hear here laboured breathing. I thought, this is fucking stupid, my Mom is going to die on these fairly safe steps and not the 20 other ways she nearly died 5 minutes ago. I looked back and I could see my Mother’s handler becoming less like a helping hand and more like a human cane, to eventually a paramedic carrying a cadaver. We actually did it. We did make it. No one died. At the end of the trip you were asked to tip your manservant. I told my Mom that she owed her life to him, so figure that out in renumeration. She gave him a ton of well deserved money, like probably what he makes in a week or maybe a month. I feel like it’s not a vacation until you high five over the fact that no one hurt themselves or died.

Needless to say we had a great time. We drank too much, we got too much sun, we took a death defying day trip and made it home in one piece. Huzzah!

At around midnight, after working the evening shift, I was debating staying up all night instead of sleeping at all. My parents were coming to pick me up for the airport at 3:45 am and my alarm was set for 3am. I made the decision to sleep. At 3:45 my phone is ringing and my parents are on my front door step. I have casually, in my sleep apparently, turned off my alarm. An excellent start to the trip. I tie my hair up, throw on clothes and toss any last minute things to pack that I can think of and then rush out the door. Before leaving I do the Buttrum/forgetful friends mantra (Rob!) before leaving anywhere for any reason, “wallet, cell phone, bag (I always add on helmet at this point).” I am clutching my passport and I think, whatever I have packed, I will just have to make do. I was so flustered at the airport. There was no one in line and I told my Mother that of course we were way too early. When we approached the teller she let us know we were the last to go through. We raced down to the security queue where I lined up behind an extremely attractive, thin, tall, very put together woman. I felt like someone should take our picture together. I was un-showered, my hair was a mess, my clothes were wrinkled and covered in cat hair and I had tried to put eye liner on with shaky, rushed hands, half asleep. We went through security and I was trying to calm down and focus on getting a very overpriced, mediocre coffee when a security guard came up behind me and hands me my wallet and asks if it is mine. Of course it is. While waiting for the flight, I noticed there was a solid trend of passengers wearing matching lounge travel ware and I vowed that on our next flight, we would follow the ways of the French Canadian woman and don a wonderfully, unicolour track suit for our travels. After a solid 3 hour sleep and a bit of a rude awakening, my Mom and I were on the flight heading down to the Dominican. 

I don’t know why this is, but I tend to pack a ton of food with me while travelling because I am high maintenance in the feeding department. I also have an irrational fear of being somewhere where the only thing available for me to eat will eventually cause me to shit myself. For the trip I had 4 protein/granola bars, 1 bag of snap pea crips, 1 bag of caramel popcorn and 2 scones (maybe 7) from the bakery that fuels my ever present scone addiction, Strawberry Blonde. By the time we landed the only thing that remained was the caramel popcorn and 2 protein bars. Let it be known I cannot be trusted around snacks, at any point. Ever.

When we landed my Mom told me the airport was tiny (she had the window seat), I looked out the window and saw a portable and was like wow, the airport is the size of my grade 7 classroom! My Mom then pointed to the airport which was much larger and an actual building. We disembarked like celebrities down the stairs onto the tarmac and immediately started sweating like the stupid tourists we were wearing jeans, a shirt and a jacket in 30 degrees with  90% humidity. The pilot had given us all this weather information, including the fact that we would be landing in broken clouds. I have no idea where he was from but we both quickly adopted that term into our vocab.

The line ups to go through security/border immigration were endless. 3 planes landed at the same time and there were 4 kiosks working out of a possible 10. I told my Mom that I should find the manager of this establishment in order to offer some critical feedback that they may find useful in the future. On the other side of security there were a group of kids dancing and singing to welcome the hordes of tourists. After the first hour and half I was concerned for them as this felt potentially like child slave labour and when was relieved when they actually took a break and eventually gave up.

We were stuck behind 2 Barrhaven Moms and their kids. I think my Mom and I accidentally photobombed each of the (million) selfies they took. The conversation was hilarious, the kids were annoying and I prayed to the Gods of beach vacations they were not on our resort. The highlight of the line came when as we got to the first check point at the airport and a gentleman took our tourist card, one of the Mom’s asked if the DR was communist and then proceeded to ask the security officer, what sites they should see. We were mortified. Did they to even google the Dominican before booking a trip? Yikes. There was someone from Almonte about 10 people ahead of us – of course there was! Six degrees of Almonte always! I was also horrified that it was almost noon on the first day of my vacation and I didn’t have a strong cocktail in my hand. Serious problems. Just saying.

They played REM and Fifty Cent in the bus on the way to the resort and I was pleased. I will not delve into too much description because this isn’t a TripAdvisor review (and who are those people anyways, those reviews are all over the place). But, except for possibly a trip to the Turkish Riviera I took a hundred years ago, this peninsula that our resort was on in the Dominican, is what I imagine Paradise looks like. The last review we had read before coming on this vacation was that this resort was a dumpster because it had no tennis courts and the treadmills at the gym were rusty. God bless these people who were concerned about doing physical activity on this all inclusive vacation. Let it be known we never even saw the inside of the gym because it had too many stairs (truth!) and we would have not know what to do with tennis courts even if they were present. When we got off the bus and into the hotel we thought we maybe at the wrong place. As we went up the elevator we were sure that the room would probably be a dumpster, but it was beautiful and then we saw the view from the room and we both started yelling start the car! My mother was disappointed that they didn’t make swans or anything out of the sheets on the bed but she was throughly impressed with the butterflies they made out of the kleenexes. I told her confidently that those were just kleenexes shoved back into the box and not any type of origami. She agreed she may be wrong and that they might have just been crumpled up kleenexes. 

Before I get into the hilarious highlights of this trip, it is good to know that my Mother and I have this ability to start laughing and then immediately escalate it into a messy cry/laugh where onlookers may wonder if someone has died or cracked an amazing joke. This doesn’t happen with other people, I have no idea why this is, but when we get going, it doesn’t stop and it’s not attractive. This happened often and most likely made people feel uncomfortable. 

We decided to take a bus into town to check out the local, authentic vibe, off resort. How brutally naive we were. They took us right into this strip mall where a lovely sweet man greeted us and brought us to his shop. He put bracelets on our wrists, talked about how much he loves Canadians, brought over hand carved necklaces for us both and blessed us with this. I am thinking, how wonderful is this this man! I picked out 2 wooden carved items, of course unpriced. I assumed I would only purchase one but I wanted to know how much they were. I met my Mom at the counter. She was holding a baseball and he had a calculator with 7000 on it. Now let me back up here, we weren’t so naive that we didn’t spend 10 minutes back at the hotel figuring out exactly how to convert pesos to CDN dollars. We aren’t exactly math scientists, but we figured it out. So when I walk up to see this lovely man quoting the price of a baseball at $210 to my Mom, I wonder what the fuck is going on. I bring my own calculator out and show my mother the conversion. We are confused. My mom left shortly after. Just walking away from the transaction completely. Then he turns to me. He started with some outrageous number. My brain was yelling walkout like your Mother but the other half was like, get this fucking vase you will never use for a decent price! We went back and forth. Bartering makes me very uncomfortable and I always think I’m being Peter from Family guy yelling random numbers that don’t take sense.

Eventually I bought the vase I wanted, totally overpriced but not in the ridiculous realm. We left the store feeling totally stressed out and upset. The next store was less ridiculous but still stressful. I wanted to know the price of a good bottle of rum. I needed 4 people in the store to conference about it before I got the answer. I assumed they were all just trying to figure out how dumb I looked. The young man in the store told my Mom and I that he was part of the entertainment for the hotel that night. He was whispering and he told us not to tell anyone. He didn’t want his family who owned the shop to know we worked there. After the great rum price conference of 2018 they came back with a price I found reasonable. On older woman rang us through and my Mom looked at the young guy helping us and says, rather loudly, see you tonight! But we won’t tell anyone! As we left I told Mom that I think she had totally blown his cover and she had literally done the opposite of what he asked. After we returned to the hotel I noticed the same rum in the gift shop for $16 cheaper and I thought – he better hope we don’t recognize him tonight or I am taking out an ad in the paper announcing to his family that he doubles as a Michael Jackson impersonator (which he did).

We were so stressed out by the experience in town and constant bartering and price negotiating that we raced home and decided not to talk about the experience ever again and to wash the experience away with alcohol. I also decided I hate the vase I bought there and have no idea what to do with it. PS – my mother kept referring to bartering as dickering and I couldn’t stop laughing because I was sure it was not a word, at least not a word for that, perhaps something sluttier but in fact – word of the day -dickering, *a form of bartering*. The more you know!

Sometimes on resort trips, around day 3 – 4 you have these gaps that you are not sure what to do. You have had too much sun, you are tired, it isn’t a meal time and you are not one to participate in the terrible pool activities. My Mom and I decided to turn to technology. We played a few games of Scrabble before I told her it wasn’t fun to play against her because she knew all the stupid bullshit Scrabble dictionary words that were bullshit and I always lost hard. I remember I had head’s up on my phone so we gave that a go. It was a little awkward as we were on a patio with other people and my Mother and I have the ability to get loud (what?) so we may or may not have been slightly disruptive to the chill beachside vibe. It came to my turn and after a few great acting moments that my Mother guessed correctly I started acting out the motion of throwing a boomerang and then pointed at myself to show it coming back to me. My Mom immediately yelled “MURDER SUICIDE” at the top of her lungs and out of sheer shock, we had to stop the game to discuss how much Law & Order she was watching to go to such a dark place to quickly. I chose to put the game away after this. I sensed we may have been upsetting the other guests. 

To be continued…

I was on a major cleaning streak and I was listening to a best female voices playlist on my magical headphones that use blue teeth. Mary J Blige’s song Family Affair came on. I was scrubbing my stove like a stay at home Mom with no kids on cocaine, and started singing along to the song. I thought how cool is it that she is singing about Francophones being the life of the party. A bit random but probably true. If you are in a club and one side is English and the other is French, I think probably more fun and crazy things are happening on the party en Francaise. Many adult women in Quebec have blue or purple hair (maybe this is just Gatineau) but it explains everything. Let’s get it Francophonie all night long up in this dancery. I mean listen to the song. I have no idea how it is anything but these words, until of course I googled it. No Francophones were sung about by Mary J unfortunately, not one.

Things I have yelled to my significant other while flipping through Facebook…
I need to go to Thailand, it’s a MUST.
It’s imperative I have a baby goat.
OMG its a clumsy pug!
I have to go to Iceland. Feminism in action!
Yikes do I ever need a scone right now. Those look delightful.
I need to stop eating scones altogether
My face looks thin! Oh no, now it doesn’t.

I was at work when a rather cute young man asked me a question. I felt he was definitely flirting. As I walked away, chuffed by the interaction, my coworker walks over and says that I have cheese in my hair as she pulls a little chunk of it out. Hot.

My brother and I were out for dinner. I remember he went to see a movie recently with my sister. Hey Ben – how was that movie about the Black Panthers? I totally want to see it. Ben explains it’s not about the Black Panthers and I am very confused because that is actually the name of it. He explains it a bit more and I think, wow, that’s very different, imagine if I had gone to see it and the whole time been like, I am so very confused right now.

It was at this same dinner where, after choking on a piece of rice for 20 minutes I vowed never to eat anything so light and small and obviously inhalable ever again. It’s just asking for trouble.

Went to see OLP (Our Lady Peace) and MGB (Matt Good Band), acronyms only 90s kids can understand. I did something a little crazy here. When they first announced the concert, the only floor seats available were between $250-$300. Now, I am confident that all of the members of these bands have day jobs to keep themselves afloat, but for some reason, they were charging legendary rock bands prices for little Canadian 90s pips. I wasn’t going to pay that but I also wasn’t going unless I was on the floor, front and centre. I have decided this is what being in your mid thirties is all about. Drawing lines between things you will do and won’t do, things you like and don’t like and how to shape your day to day experience to enjoy it as much as possible. Sitting at concerts is a real buzz kill for me and I won’t do it. So, everyday, for close to 2 months, I checked back on the website to wait for the day they realized they could not sell the tickets and would open them up at a cheaper price. Then, 4 days before the concert, I was panicking as I couldn’t believe I was not going, it happened. The Platinum seating option faded away and then $100 floor seats were introduced and within a couple of high intenseity minutes, they were mine. That was an extremely proud moment for me. I called my brother to tell him we were going and he said he had been waiting for this call because he knew I’d figure out how to get the good seats.

So we went. What a mixed bag of people at the concert. I loved the dudes that had never left the nineties, with the cargo jeans and Vans sweaters. I thought – keep on living it man. There were many people much older than me which I was surprised to see, as I pictured my Dad there being totally out of his element.

And then it happened, my high school rock hero came onto the stage. The same band I had listened to everyday on the school bus to my miserable, goth, emo high school experience. Matt Good came out with a football polo shirt on so wrinkled, I assumed he had spent the last hour having a Dad nap on the tour bus to prepare for staying up past 9. His face was rounded and his crowd conversation was nothing but a Forrest Gump reference but it was still magical. They struck the first chord of a song I listened to while wondering what my life would like as an adult, if I ever made it out of high school alive and I started to tear up. Emo baby returns. Ben pointed out that the drummer had 2 snare drums and that, as a drummer himself, it was blowing his mind. I told to Ben to look at the drummer, he was quite possibly in his eighties and might need a second one in case he forgets where the first one is. The bassist for the next band, OLP, was also definitely someone’s grandfather. We named him James Taylor and we thought he was the most fun to watch in the show. There were a lot of thumbs up that we appreciated from that guy. At one point both bands came on stage to sing a Matt Good classic and I had a Canadian Music nerd meltdown. I was crazy dancing, I was screaming the words, I even threw up some vintage devil horns and after it was done I had to put my hands on my knees to catch my breathe for the next 5 minutes because I had totally forgotten to breathe. We had tons of fun. Ben and I together are a pretty fun, non stop action comedy troupe with elaborate commentary and endless laughs. At one point I made a joke on his behalf and the girl next to him told him I was a keeper and he yelled at her angrily saying I was his sister. She looked horrified and Ben was almost crying. Good times.

The last few times I have been to the gym, there has been a Maserati SUV there. I am not a car expert but I imagine that car costs more money than I will ever have at my disposal in this lifetime. So I was extremely curious to see who drove it. Each time I was there, I would set up on the elliptical in front of the window, watching Drag Race on my phone while quietly stalking the car. Then one day I wondered if people were doing the same thing to me. The whole gym is windows that looks at the parking lot. Maybe people were quietly waiting to see who drove the extremely dirty, key scratched, clown car with receipts papering most of the floor area. Maybe people were just as curious about my little hobo vehicle. Anyways, I finally saw the guy who owned the SUV. He looked rich aka his hair was unnaturally not grey and had been plugged back in but it was not as exciting as I hoped. To all those people wondering who drove the dirty, orange nub on wheels, I imagine I was a giant let down too.

A few days until vacation…with my MOM! We sat down to Easter dinner and got a bottle of wine out, knowing full well no one else was drinking it. Mom looked at my and said, well we might as well start practising for the vacation. Damn Ma, we are going to rock this trip.

Well my cat officially developed a liking for our vet’s two fingers. Or perhaps he has developed a taste for bright orange industrial laxatives. Whatever it is, this cat is constipated again and losing his mind. His new hobby is to hide in a cupboard and glare at you as you walk by. He starts meowing uncontrollably starting at 4am and nothing stops this, not even food. He spent this morning running up and down the hall attacking imaginary things in the carpets and when I was taking a bath he punched open the door with his paw just to turn around and sit with his back to me. I have noticed that my extreme lack of patience for interrupted sleep makes me a prime candidate for never having children. Unless children react just as well to a spray bottle? No, no that doesn’t sound right. What I don’t particularly understand is how, after purchasing a cat relaxant diffuser, I somehow stayed up all night working and the cat is getting aggressive with the floor and carpets. Obviously this is opposite day or they accidentally gave us the speed diffuser for getting shit done and getting crazy. That we are succeeding at.

The cat was prescribed over the counter daily laxatives, so I decided to check out a new pharmacy where I believe my friends knew the owner. I walked around, got to talking to him, name dropped my friends, told him if I ever need prescriptions I would happily change to this independent establishment and then casually put the largest bottle of Restora-lax on the counter. I was trying to make it more awkward by asking what the main ingredient was in it because I don’t like to give my cat chemicals (except for the disgusting meat by-product food and bright orange laxatives). He definitely thought it was a cover up so he told me about how it would not permeate into my body just clean out the organ, or something like that. So I responded by saying I will have to get a precise dosage for the cat so that I don’t need to go buy cat diapers. We sort of ended it at that and I realized that name dropping mutual friends is best done while not purchasing a $30 Costco-size tub of shit powder.

I don’t know what it is about my brain but I have no patience and or understanding of technology. I have no aptitude for computers. If I have to troubleshoot something I either call someone or cry because I’m frustrated. When I first got this laptop my friend Rob had to come over to show me how to fucking scroll down. So when I ambitiously asked for wireless headphones for Christmas I started to panic. I put a hold on it because I realized that a) I didn’t know how things worked without wires and b) I would probably not know how to use them. When I hear the word Bluetooth I picture a yellow minion character with an actual tooth that is blue. I have no idea what it is and what it entails. I am so without understanding that I tried to answer a call with my headphones (that I did end up getting) and I accidentally put it on speaker (in a public place) and then chose the one other device on the phone which was a speaker or something my Dad got for Christmas. Then I started panicking that my Dad was having a conversation through his speakers with the person that was trying to call me… right? Is that even possible? It’s all too much.

Someone at work asked if I was going to get an Instant Pot. I told them it sounded like Devil’s work being able to cook something so fast and I would stick to my old fashioned pots and pans, thank you very much. No one puts Satan in my kitchen.

Dry January…was pretty solid for 2 weeks until I worked a day at the store where both elevators broke down, one escalator, a dishwasher and a multitude of other smaller things that could go wrong did, and I knew this would be the day that Dry January died.

I cancelled my gym membership and tried out another one that I soon decided to switch too. I just realized it’s been over 2 months since I said I would join and I have still not made that one important step of actually joining…it’s going to happen. I feel it. I think about it often and sense I am almost ready to commit. I have wireless headphones for fuck’s sakes, I practically have to go the gym!

I went to take back my DVDs late at night after work this week. There was a younger couple smoking right where the DVD return slot was. Instead of just quietly sneaking around them, I decided to announce that I needed to return my DVDs right behind them, and yes, I am hilariously old school and I rent DVDs. They both laughed and said they didn’t even realize DVD rentals still existed. Amazing. I am happy I can show you the ways of the past. Follow me! Watch how I place this shiny plastic disc into a machine and it plays the pictures! Huzzah!

I was sick all week. It started with nausea, moved into full body, throat, nose and head. It was a roller coaster week. There were glimpses of feeling better throughout the days and then it would spiral into feeling like death. I only took one day off work, because, as I have said before, I have a sense of guilt attached to sick days. My parents were both elementary school teachers. Never could we fake sick. We were not like the other kids who would get the freebie day. Even if we were sick it was highly scrutinized. Usually they would even make us go to school for snow days! Anyways, when I did stay home I felt guilty that I was missing school. It didn’t feel right. But no day is lost while spending a day watching Oprah reruns. And I am sure I just felt better that day solely because I was watching Oprah. God I love her. When do I get a talk show like her? I would fucking nail that shit.

You know when your parents both got iPads and you realized they were never going to talk to each other again? My particular favourite is when they both send e-mails to me, from the same e-mail account, with similar sentiments, probably while they are sitting next to each other not talking. For example, I was having a particularly rough week at work and my Mom sent an e- mail with an inspirational message about feeling appreciated at work and within the same hour my Dad sent an e-mail with his own inspirational quote: “Don’t let the pricks get you down”. Anyways, my current perma-vision of my parents is both sitting in the living room on their iPads, not talking. My significant other and I got home today and he retreated to his computer and put on his new noise cancelling gamer nerd headphones I got him for Christmas, and I put on my new “headless headphones” as we call them in my family, which he got me for Christmas. While he killed demons or maybe went to war with worlds or something something dragons, I was making my dinner and jamming to Motown classics. I started performing my own concert. My audience was my fried tempeh about to be placed on a bed of massaged kale (bought pre-massaged of course). (Don’t worry team – I will feel super good about myself for a while, and then shame-eat a block of cheese in two hours.) I was nailing out Tina but couldn’t hear myself and had to pull an earbud out, and that’s when I realized I was a professional. A la Mariah Carey. Just taking my bud out so I could harmonize with the air. Someone get me some fucking hot tea. JK. Where was I? Oh ya, but the point was, here we were, in practically the same room, both in our own little worlds not talking. Reminds me of Best in Show – we can both talk or not talk for hours. We both like soup.  This is a sure sign we are becoming my parents.

When I was sick I was having a bath and saw something floating in the water. I started to absolutely freak out as it looked like a piece of flesh. I was not just sick, I was dying. Chunks of my flesh were coming off freely in a lightly salted bath. This was it. Goodbye cruel world. I will just sit here and melt away into my tub. I started panicking as I picked up the piece and realized it was a rose petal. Fuck you floral bath bombs. Never again.

As everyone who knows me is very aware, I work a lot. It permeates a lot of my life. Most nights I dream of work. Last night, for most of the night I dreamt I was walking a health and safety audit, for the other half, I was part of those terrible Just for Laugh pranks that I feel only Quebeckers enjoy. I catch myself using hilarious management speech in regular conversation, as I have mentioned before – but how exactly did you plan on explaining your expectations and finding something measurable to see if those expectations have been met?…Tiger? You meow all the time but I don’t feel you are adequately communicating your needs to me in a way I can act on confidently. I apologized for not having gloves on while preparing a cheese plate for a friend the other night. She was like , ‘what’? I thought I might apologize for lack of hair net too, but I left it. It came to a scary point the other night when I dropped a freshly poured ice cube tray on the floor and just stood there looking around for a wet floor sign but not leaving the scene of the crime in case someone might fall on it. It was after I awkwardly reached for a cloth that I realized I had the ability to move because there was only one other person in the house and I imagined that I could just tell him about it and if he did slide, he would probably not sue. Punchline: learn how to disconnect from work more so that one does not became a health and food safety manager in her own kitchen, while working on her staff’s (cat’s) communication skills.

I was reminded by someone yesterday that there was in fact a Simon’s in Ottawa now. I had completely forgotten and decided to check it out. It is extremely rare that I venture down to the Rideau Centre, because it is too far to walk, and if driving, you have to pay for parking and it’s downtown. Ew. I tried on some sweaters, but not nothing looked good. I went upstairs to the adult women clothing and wondered if this is really where I was supposed to be trying on clothes. I didn’t love any of the adult clothes, they didn’t have hideous cat prints or giant comfy chevron laced sweaters. I figured while I was there I would do a wander but I quickly realized that it was a hamster maze I may never figure out. It had changed so much that I didn’t recognize much. I thought I would check out the food court and it wasn’t there anymore. I realized the one thing I wanted to purchase were large containers for my obsession with baking muffins. But no, this was the Rideau Centre. There seemed to be a lot of shops with things that were nice, but nothing I needed, nothing practical like that. As I wandered around all I could hear was my my Dad’s voice bemoaning capitalism, and I thought, this is it, this says it all. 1000 expensive shops and not a damned thing I need (or could probably afford). I wandered into a store that I thought I might be able to connect with because of my years in the health food industry. After perusing a few items, my only reaction was – simmer the fuck down Saje, it’s just fucking essential oils. I don’t need to purchase a $60 “kit” to cure a headache while dance music is pumping into my brain. I can just use some $9 peppermint oil…and avoid your shop altogether.
When I realized I was doing the classic old person curmudgeon I decided to leave. Unfortunately, I took the next step into feeling like a senior and couldn’t find my car first try. I remembered I was on the Green level. Yay me! Although it turned out it was called the green garage, so all the levels were green. It only took me 2 different tours to figure it out, but I can always find my car. No big deal. Growing old is going to kick ass.

I bought tickets to Alt – J in Montreal. The week before the show I was panicking about what to wear. I have no fashionable clothes anymore; I have practical, comfy and hides-everything-clothes. I figured this would be a younger crowd considering this band was considered “indie” (I found out by researching them before the show, like a cool kid). My significant other said I should just go for the ironic Grandma look, as it may be the only hipster thing I could pull off. I looked down and I was wearing a Winner’s shirt/moomoo with my Grandma’s old sweater with ugly stitched flowers on it. I looked up and said, “Am I doing ironic Grandma right now unknowingly?” Yes, he said, you are, that outfit will be fine. On the night of the show I Instead did the opposite and wore a pleather coat like the cool 90’s kid I am.

I went to a housewarming party a couple weeks ago. I had spent half of the day before the party at the Chiro working on one helluva neck crick. I based my outfit on what would adequately cover the hot pack on my neck and cover my belly, as my choice of food for the day had been French fries. Only French fries. I was already feeling hilarious mingling expertly without moving my neck and hiding my hot pack, when I bit into a rice cracker and heard a crunch and realized half of my tooth had fallen out. This was the moment I realized it was all down hill from here.

I am going to the Grey Cup! I asked Ben yesterday who was even playing in it. He said Calgary and Toronto. I replied, so the Calgary Rough Riders will be playing the Toronto Rough Riders? Isn’t that how the CFL works, all the teams are rough riders?

I signed up for a 30 day workout challenge. Today was day 1. I skipped it in the morning because red river was flowing through my body angrily and causing pain. When I got home late this afternoon I put the video on, did the warm up, decided my floor was too creaky, stopped the video and went and made a drink. My commitment level is OFF THE CHARTS! Update – today was day 25, I have yet to do a workout…

I checked out a new gym the other day. I have given up on Goodlife and I wanted to see if it was me that hated working out or if it truly was the place I was at. This gym was tiny. The windows were filthy and it was empty – so I kind of loved it. I did a bit of cardio and then lifted some weights and, like most workouts, ended it early because there were so many other things I needed to do with my day. I imagine I am just too ADD to bum around a gym for more than 1/2 an hour because I don’t see immediate results. Like it’s totally not as satisfying as vacuuming the apartment, baking muffins, making soup, or writing. These things show me results, mostly in the fact that I can shove half of these things in my face after I have created them. Ha! I feel like this is in the same vein as the issue that I have where I also can’t ever relax. What kind of junkie limbo is that if I can’t work out or relax?! It doesn’t show me results! How did I become such a results-orientated crazy lady?! Considering there are some parts of my life in utter shambles, such as my finances, how come I don’t care for results on those things??Ahhhh. Am I alone in this ridiculous life dichotomy?

I had the special opportunity to witness my Dad with his improv group this weekend. They had the most unfortunate luck that they had booked this Glebe gig at the same time as the Panda Games – a football game between Ottawa’s Universities attracting only the brightest students, just kidding – the drunkest and most fucked up, unable to walk in a straight-line group of degenerates you have ever seen. The same group of people that last year, one of them shit in the refrigerated area of the LCBO. I had prayed (pleaded) to every God I could think of that I wouldn’t be working that day. But instead, I walked through the crowds with my fragile, aged Father. He wanted soup for lunch (as adorable older men do) so I thought I would take him to this amazing soup place in the Glebe, perfectly on the way to his gig. When we got settled and got our soup we sat down and I noticed the music just blaring at us. I looked at Dad and said, well this is perfect soup eating music, Rihanna…singing about S&M…very loudly…good stuff. The guy sitting at another table looked up and started laughing. It was such an odd choice of music. Anyways, on the way to the venue, we tried crossing the street against the traffic in a sea of children who couldn’t handle their alcohol. I was starting to get a little nervous about my Dad being so exposed in a gaggle of these fucktards and then I saw one girl, with a red solo cup in her hand start to lose her footing and dive right into my Dad. I put my body in front of him and felt a thousand units of adrenaline pump into my body to the point where I was actually about to make sure this girl found the cement ground with full force. I became a very scary over-protective Mama bear to my Dad. If she had gone into his legs we would have been fucked. I was so shaken up that there was nothing that could chill me out. Except maybe some old people improv. The show was great, the audience was fairly into it and they lucked out with an older version of me in a wheel chair in the front row who freaked out anytime they mentioned the valley or Almonte (I do that at work on the reg). I recognized my Dad’s acting immediately as the amazing story teller he has always been. And he was always the funniest person in our house growing up, so this group was an amazing marriage of his two natural talents. I am glad I didn’t kill that girl crossing the street, because I totally would have missed a great show.

I know I’ve said this before but I feel like I spend a large chunk of my time planning my healthy eating and fitness goals…while sitting on a couch, eating chips and drinking wine. So I thought I should maybe stop planning it and maybe just go ahead and write my own guide to a healthy life and let people know how to do it properly… first you start your day with the best intentions in the world. You have a shake and black coffee with a splash of MCT oil in it. Then you take all your vitamins! Which for me probably takes 10x longer than the rest of the world because I have a hilarious amount. Because I’m healthy? No. Because it’s in the morning and I haven’t lost my willpower yet. Sometimes if I am starving I have 2 poached eggs instead of a shake. Still ok! I pack myself a good lunch, either a salad or veg and tempeh. Good intentions prevail! Somewhere in the middle of the day, I want a snack that I have not pre-planned and thank goodness, there are chocolates in the break room! Or I can just walk 5 feet and purchase my own bad decision. Dark chocolate? A health food! (not if you eat the whole $8 bar) or perhaps avocado oil chips, that’s practically a fucking salad. Dinner is usually a write off considering how tired I am. I don’t feel like cooking, it’s probably 7:30 by the time I get home and ideally I would like to shove a full pizza in my face. A pizza and a salad. A fruit salad. I mean wine. I’ll spend some time each day feeling guilty about not going to the gym, planning future gym classes I may or may not ever get to. And then somehow I manage to find chips in my house even though I very rarely buy them. At least I biked to and from work today guys! I am so fit! And they day’s I get to the gym, I like to rewards myself with a gluten free loaf slice from Bridgehead. You too can lead this healthy life and get all kind of killer tips and tricks from my new book – being super healthy starts tomorrow!

I went to yoga for the first time in a million years. I had been avoiding the class at Lansdowne because I was sure it would be fashionable, fit Glebies in nice outfits. It was. As I got into the room, I thought oh god, what if I get gassy which I am known to be at the best of times even without twisting my body. And yikes, I am wearing a free t-shirt that is advertising a protein company, how tacky. As soon as I lied down on the mat I felt my stomach start to create a gas bubble. For fucks sakes, I hadn’t even moved and already I needed to let it out. Gawd. After we got going I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror in juxtaposition to the woman in front of me. She was thin, great hair, expensive outfit and would flow through the moves. I was bulging out of my cheap yoga pants, the Vega top hugging every roll, my hair in a weird top bun that looked more shitty then classic messy. My moves were the best. I did not gracefully flow through anything. I clunked. Yes my middle name is grace but I do not embody that in any way. From move to move I threw my weight around – the opposite of delicate. There were amazing older ladies in there kicking my yoga ass! I know yoga is all about accepting my limitations, being present and letting go but that’s hard to do when you are surrounded by mirrors, continually pulling your shirt over your downward dog exposed belly and doing the opposite side stretch of the rest of the class because the teacher is doing it backwards for the class and they all know that but I am following her to a backwards t! But I was enduring all this to get to my favourite part – Shivasana. Or at Goodlife, it’s called relax time or something spiritualess. But of course my mind did not stay on course, I didn’t stick with the teacher as we were scanning the body and finally when I did come back it seemed forced and then done. But the point is – I got out of bed on my day off and did something I talk about and never do. That is the big win here people!

We went to see the Phantom of the Opera! We are so fancy. Leading up to our departure, the main focal point was giving our bladders a pep talk about not causing issue at the NAC. I had a very uncomfortable and dark walk past a thousand people during a concert once and have perpetually feared the NAC for it’s lack of accessibility to people with bladder issues since. Our seats ended up being 2 away from the end and we had a very friendly conversation with the couple next to us as to how they totally understood the perils of mid performance peeing and we were allowed to pass by whenever we needed. Bladder anxiety lessened! I had really been into the music from Phantom of the Opera as a kid but didn’t have a lot of context for what to expect. After the chandelier made some weird firework and the organ music started blaring I was practically in tears with excitement which quickly turned to giggling over the eighties cheesiness factor. I thought they may have updated the music a bit but it definitely remained the original vintage magic. During the intermission our whole aisle was reprimanded for taking too long at the bar and holding the show up. I congratulated us all for being the most committed boozers there! They were a fun lot. One lady made the same joke about sitting in the forbidden Phantom’s seat twice, a sure sign they probably should have been cut off. At the very end of the performance I realized we were sitting so far away that during the last scene I thought I noticed that the Phantom was black. It didn’t matter, it’s just possible we were so far back that I could not make out the colour of the performer’s skin. #amazingseats! The punchline was it was good ol’ cheesy musical fun. If I took anything away from it, it was that arguments should be sang at all times and musicals are inherently hilarious despite the content. We are anxiously awaiting Les Mis so we can laugh/cry/eye roll/sing along to that one next! To the theatre!

We’ve been re-watching the Sopranos. After binge watching it for a couple hours I’ve realized that most of the show is just James Gandolfini eating sandwiches…

My brother and I made a last minute decision to go see Jack Johnson at Cityfolk last Thursday. I didn’t care what anyone said at work, I had been listening to his music since before they were born (impossible…maybe). It was the soundtrack to a time that was the most fun anyone could ever have had – being a nomadic, adventurous teen on the other side of the ocean, learning everything life had to offer while on the fly and mainly drunk. So yes, it hadn’t occurred to me that Jack Johnson was old people music, because I of course, associated it with my late teens. It wasn’t until the show that I realized just how “old People” music it was. Firstly, the crowd was terrible. They were not dancing, most people were talking through it and no one seemed to be excited. The couple in front of us were. They had left the kids at home and were out having a date night. They were talking to us about how their small children were jealous they were going to see Jack sing, the man who sang kid’s songs as well. I thought – fuck, Jack Johnson is old people/family music. When the fuck did this happen? We used to listen to it gathered around campfires, smoking wild grasses, hunting for wild growing psychedelic fungus and showing off our drinking skills. We lived in a trailer park that summer. I remember the exact campfire someone had a bottle of Stroh rum (80%, 160 proof) that we passed around until someone challenged me to multiple shots which I of course accepted. Let it be known I ended up in the hospital early the next day. Stay classy me. The hospital thought I was having a miscarriage which seemed bizarre to me as I was not with child and then they changed the diagnosis to being alcohol related. That made more sense. I was certainly with alcohol. But back to Jack.
It was clear that I was, in fact, an old person enjoying the music by the way I was trying to dance but also stretch my extremely sore back at the same time. The ol’ side to side sway became longer and deeper until I was basically camouflaging pain stretching for dancing. Then my brother pulled his camera out and I imagined we were taking a nice sibling selfie. I posed for too long before I realized he was taking a “snapchat video” and I looked like a fucking tool in it. #oldpersonforreal

We went to Toronto this weekend for the annual health food association show. Prices were extortionate downtown so we stayed in a hotel outside of town that I had stayed in before and had remembered it as being nice. After Siri took us in circles about 3 times around the hotel, as there was a street named the same as a crescent that intersected it and multiple U-turns later, we found our place. As we got into our room it occurred to me that the last time I had stayed there I had arrived 3 sheets to the wind, past midnight and had left first thing in the morning for a meeting. This room was okay. The bathroom counter was vintage, the air conditioner had a motor and some of the lamps were missing bulbs. It was nothing to write home about. It was when we went to venture out for dinner that we realized we were staying in a part of town I have now called “dumpster fire.” We finally decided on a gross chain to eat at because I knew they had GF stuff. I should have just eaten the bloody gluten because instead of me losing it all out the other end I ended up throwing it all up (I am a pretty lady). Knowing how delicate my stomach truly was, I spent the next 2 days at the show, carefully…shoving every piece of food I could humanely consume into my body. It’s the only time in the world 98% of everything is gluten free and veggie, so I took full advantage. I ate my 3 meals, each day, out of a thousand sample cups. Enviro disaster, but worth it.

You know when you get into a show so craptacular and embarrassing that you turn it down when the neighbours walk by your window? I’m into one right now. It’s so terrible that I imagine the director after every shot saying, fuck it, this garbage is not getting any better, it’s a wrap. It feels like soap opera with Southern accents smothered in lame sauce. But I’m committed. It feels like reading all the Fifty Shades books or the Sylvia Day trilogy – garbage but addictive. My name is Angie and I am a Netflix garbage addict. I actually needed some mourning time when I realized it ended after 2 seasons. Ugh I sicken myself.

I was biking home the other night from work. What crossed my path was a parade of homeless cyclists. The one in the front had a kid buggy attached to the back. There was a homeless guy in the kid buggy surrounded by empty beer cans. There was another homeless biker behind him laughing his ass off. I thought, I know where the party is. I bet, in all the Glebe, these guys are having the most fun, right now. They are also my totem animals. I wondered if I had joined onto the end of the parade they would have thrown me a beer. I guess I will never know, mistakes were made.

Ben and I drove to Kanata to see a movie with my parents. We were walking past the 3 Brewer’s towards the theatre when my Mother yelled across the patio “Yo yo! It’s your Ma!” I told Ben we should just put our head down and keep walking. Mom thought she was a cool rapper of some sort and it was best we just let her be alone in that moment to analyze it, so she realized she is in fact not a rapper and that it should never happens again.

During the same staycation where my car broke down we needed to take Tiger Pip (the cat) to the vets. When we got there they said he was constipated. They said the only thing they could do to help was remove it manually. The scene – an older, bald, Lebanese man with latex gloves with two fingers in my cats butt and the front half of the cat being held down by a young Asian woman. The cat started screeching at the beginning but then we got to wondering if he may be getting into this. On the ride home we talked to the cat saying, although it might have felt good, I could not afford to fund this potential new fetish, so I would be adding additional fibre to his diet from now on.