Tales from the Homeland

Due to the ridiculously high price of flying home for Christmas, I elected to alternatively spend Christmas away and then head home after flight prices calmed back down. This particular trip had a few extra twists and turns to make it more of an adventure than I expected. Let's get down to it, shall we?

Just my luck it decided to be rainy and drizzly all day the day I flew out, perfect weather for walking to the bus stop. I simply refuse to pay $50 or whatever ridiculous amount of money cabs charge to drive you to the airport. I can ride the bus - subway - bus combo to get myself there for $3. Everytime I ride the TTC I seem to see something entertaining so everyone wins. I ventured out in the rain on the 5 minute walk to the bus stop dragging my suitcase behind me, next stop - NEW BRUNSWICK! That might be slightly exaggerated excitement, but I digress. It was a relatively lame ride up until the end of the subway line. While waiting for the express bus from the subway to the airport I saw this little dipshit of a man running through the subway station and sliding on the floor, back and forth, over and over. There was a group of guys (likely 18 yrs old or so) watching him as he slid back and forth in front of them. I assumed that the guy was just simply retarded until he stopped and the guys all gave him high 5s. I immediately disliked the lot of them immensely. I silently wished bad things upon them and hoped they were taking a different bus. NOPE! Same bus. I was already on the bus when they funneled in behind me and the little guy was now very loudly singing some ridiculous foreign song. I felt my blood pressure rising. It literally took all of my self control not to kick this little singing gnome in the face as he continued to sing for the next 20 minutes all the way to the airport. Luckily I had headphones, otherwise it might have been a much more eventful bus trip. Moral: Do not use a bus as your unofficial tryout for Canadian Idol. Little man syndrome at its finest. Let's continue on...

I arrived at the airport and checked my bags, then proceeded to security. I took off every piece of metal I had on and put it into the bin then proceeded to walk through the metal detector and of course it went off. Who was waiting for me on the other side of the metal detector? Yes, a little customs agent. He asked me if I wanted to be spoken to in English or French. I said English and he immediately started talking in French. I understand a minimal amount of French so I didn't stop him. He waved the baton over me and the only place it beeped was directly over my crotch. I thought to myself that this was likely a great time to inform him I don't understand French all that well. After having unbuttoned my pants and being waved down a few more times we found out it was the button on my jeans. I found it more amusing than he did and eventually he dismissively waved me on through.

Once I made it through security I found my gate and sat down, ready to kill the 2 hours before my flight. To my surprise and visual amusement, two guys sat down in front of me. I wish I had taken a picture of them, but I fear that a picture would not give this pair enough of a description that seeing them in person delivered. I will do my absolute best to describe them, but I doubt I can recapture the essence. The first guy was a wee bitty man with a shaved head, probably 40-45 years old. He was wearing a black bandana with big, friendly looking skulls all over it. Perhaps they were drunken, happy skulls. That was paired with possibly the oldest faded jean jacket still in existence. How can you dress up the oldest faded jean jacket still in existence you ask? That's easy, you clip a maraca and bongo keychain to the pocket! I can't blame him really though, I would never have guessed he was in Mexico without the keychain in plain view. Next up we have faded jeans with bedazzled pockets. I wish I was exaggerating this. Completing the outfit was a pair of white and very light blue sneakers. Like I said, my description can't even do it justice. The other guy was also sporting a jean jacket, a sweet leather cowboy hat and one of the best moustaches I have ever seen in person. All evidence pointed to them not being straight and the roles seemed clearly defined. No way a guy with a sweet cowboy hat and a moustache is the catcher. Moving on...

The plane ride was fairly uneventful, other than my ears feeling like they might explode during the landing. Also I'd like to take this time to tell anyone that feels the need to clap after a successful landing that I hate your face. Seriously, just smack yourself in the face with your seat/floatation device and save me the trouble. I'm not sure why this irritates me so much, but it does. My brother picked me up at the airport and we loaded into his van for the hour and a half drive to my hometown. The roads were terrible from the snow that had fallen earlier. You'd assume it was a slow and scary drive home, but it was not at all. It was a very FAST and ridiculously scary drive home. The few spots in the road that you could see anything other than snow, it was just gleaming ice. My brother is used to driving in that shit and it didn't phase him a bit, he drove about 120km/h the entire way home. I'm still not sure how we made some of those turns. To his credit, we hardly even slid on the turns and he didn't kill me. It did, however, take a few years off my life...

It never ceases to amaze me some of the stories I hear while in my hometown. One of the big stories this time around was how out of control the illegal cigarette trade has become. It's always been an issue with people buying cigarettes from people on the reservation for a fraction of the cost. My brother used to buy a huge bag of them at a time. Quite classy. It's gotten to the point where cops will pull people over and check their cigarette packages for illegal cigs, there is a $2 fine for every one of these cigs you are in possession of. Hmmm and people there ask me how I can possibly enjoy living in Toronto?? Well for one thing, most people here don't smoke at all. Those people I do know that smoke, they smoke legit cigs. You know the small town cops have a lot on their plates when checking for cigs is a priority.  

It snowed practically every day I was there, along with a 30cm drop on the Friday. That didn't stop me from venturing out to get beer in the storm. I didn't bother shoveling the mouth of the driveway, electing instead to try to drive out as fast as I could. There was so much snow that when I hit the end of the driveway about half of the snow went flying up and over the top of the car. Hey if you were in a small town in NB you would have done the same thing for alcohol. Don't judge me. The days after the snow, it was just bitterly cold. This brings me to my second story. The next door neighbour has a rather large gazebo in his backyard. My brother told me about how the neighbour goes out and stays in the gazebo most nights. On the bright side the guy does have plastic surrounding the gazebo and a wood pellet stove inside. Classical music can be heard blaring from the gazebo as well. How crazy must you be, or how much do you want to avoid your wife, that you would elect to stay in a freaking gazebo in -20 weather than inside of a warm house??

On a side note I had a very similar experience going through the security at the airport coming back, but at least this time the guy understood me when I elected for English correspondence.

All in all not a terrible trip home to NB, good times were had, good beer consumed with good people. Will I be moving back anytime soon? Hell no, but it is not a bad place to visit in metered doses.

Until next time, keep your trays in the upright position until the vehicle has come to a full stop.

The Roomie Chronicles

I would assume that most of us have had the pleasure/frustration of living with someone else. It can be the best of times, it can be the worst of times. Things can happen that bond you forever and, conversely, make you sworn enemies until the end of time. I have had a decent number of flatmates through the years with both positive and negative outcomes, as well as just plain bizarre experiences. Here for your reading pleasure I will recount them for you...

Roomie 1 (then 2 and 3 as well) - Straight out of high school I moved in with a good female friend. We lived in the basement apartment with two very OLD people living upstairs. They tried to impart more rules on us than what we had when we lived at home. We lasted there 2 months before we moved in with two other female friends. Funny how at the time I didn't see how this situation could possibly go wrong... It didn't just go wrong, it went epically wrong and friendships were severed. What happened? One of the roommates decided it was a good idea to make up a totally untrue story about me and I did not take kindly to it once I heard about it. To this day I don't know where the story came from or the motive behind it. All in all, a very unpleasant experience. Duration: 2 months and then 6 months.

Roomie 4 and 5 - I lived with a girl I was dating as well as a mutual female friend. Good times were had, bad times were had but overall not a traumatizing experience. After the previous roommate situation, anything was a step up. Tons of parties. Duration: 8 months.

Roomie 6 - This was a girl I was head over heels in love with. We moved in together with the idea of really going the distance. We even got a puppy. We lived together for 2.5 years and unfortunately for me I didn't know ahead of time she was a certifiable lunatic. I described one of her antics (kicking me out of bed after having a bad dream about me) in detail in a previous blog. Things basically fell apart in the last year together when she told all her friends about how I was going to propose at Christmas, only she neglected to tell me this was going to happen. When Christmas came around and she did not receive her ring, things quickly unravelled. We actually split up a few months later. Duration: 2.5 years.

Roomie 7+ - In a hurry to get away from the ex I answered an ad in the university newspaper to sublet a room for the summer. I was desperate and I basically took the first place I went to look at. It was only for 4 months so I figured I could tolerate anything for that amount of time. I lived in the bottom part of a house with at least 4, but as many as 7, Chinese guys. I was like a prisoner of war living there. Imagine living in a place where you heard conversations all day and most of the night, but you had no idea what the hell they were saying. Try it some day by leaving the french channel on (and french is a much "less angry" sounding language) and you will have some iota what I went through for those 4 months. There was a HUGE bag of rice in the kitchen and I got to write my rent cheque out to "Kok Wai Wong" (say that to yourself) every month, so it did have its amusing moments.  Duration: 4 months.

Roomie 8 - I continued my tradition of making questionable living arrangements by answering an ad in the local newspaper looking for a roommate. We set up a time to meet at the apartment and I met my future roommate and her best friend. We got along really well (I got along exceptionally well with the best friend) and we agreed that I should move in. After I moved in things got a little bit weird. She gave me 1/4 of a cupboard and less than 1/5 of the fridge for my stuff (not a big deal but just weird). She was less than cordial, always seemed to be in a weird mood. The strangest part was that she went out of her way to be exceptionally friendly and nice to me when her best friend was over. It was like living with Jekyll and Hyde. I remember one particular night when I was watching TV on the couch, she brought home a guy at like 8pm. We didn't have any rules about having people over, I couldn't have cared less. The thing I had an issue with was when they sat on the couch beside me, then proceeded to make out for about 30 minutes. The guy actually hit me with his foot at one point. The best part was that her bedroom was about 10 feet away from the couch, but in her mind it was a better idea to stay there and dry hump the f*ck out of some random guy on the couch inches away from me. One day she came home and started to tell me a story of how her friend was looking for a place to live, I stopped her and offered "She can move in here!" and with that I put an end to a bizarre living arrangement. I ran into her months later at a pub and she came up to me all smiles, hugged me heartily and proclaimed me "the best roommate ever". I'm pretty sure she had multiple personality disorder. Duration: 3 months.

Roomie 9 - I jumped quickly into a place just up the road from Jekyll and Hyde. It was basically just renting a room, it was a very limited time solution. This brought "Shallow Hal" (appropriately named by my buddy Awall) into my life. Shallow Hal rented a room down the hall from me. To say he was a Sketchbag was insulting the word "Sketchbag" . He was in his 40's, usually wore tank tops and a sleeveless jean jacket and his face was the texture of worn leather. He just had this look in his eyes that screamed "I plan to sell all your stuff while you are at work". He kept trying to chat me up when we'd run into each other and I would always end up talking to him for a few minutes. One night I came home with a 6 pack of beer after a stupid day at work and I left the beer in the fridge to chill. I was literally counting down the minutes until I cracked open that first cold beer. I managed to hold off for an hour and then I went to the fridge to retrieve my cold beer only to discover it was gone. There are a few no-no's for people in my life, stealing my beer tops the list. The funny thing is that I am usually generous and I would have given him one if he had asked. It took me about 10 minutes to stop seething enough to knock on his door without fear of grabbing him by the throat. He took a solid two minutes to open his door and I asked him if he had any idea what happened to my beer. I could tell by the look on his face that he knew exactly what had happened to my beer, but he denied it all the while refusing to look me in the eye. I stormed away muttering another word for someone that performs coitus with a female parental unit. About 30 minutes of plotting his demise in my room, I heard his door open and then I heard the fridge door open and close. I walked out to the kitchen and looked in the fridge to discover my beer box with a lone beer left in it. Knowing that I had shamed Shallow Hal into not drinking ALL 6 of my beer was as comforting as you may think. Needless to say I did not stay living there very long. Years later I saw Shallow Hal pushing a shopping cart down the street and I had a great sense of karmic balance. Duration: One month. 

There are many more roomie stories, but I will end this blog here before it turns into a novel. I will continue the Roomie Chronicles in another entry. Stay tuned and remember that if you mess with my beer, you will end up homeless. I'm tight with the Universe like that.

"Your last blog kind of sucked a little. Step it up a notch"

Over the weekend I was talking to a friend of mine that reads the blog and she casually informed me that my "last blog sucked a little and to step it up a notch". I won't lie, my initial reaction was to tell her I hoped her crotch was infected with termites and her arms too short to scratch. Then I realized she had just expected more from me and I had let her down. Then I felt bad. I went back and read it and yeah it did suck. There's nothing like a good old fashioned call out to make me go all Die Hard with a Vengeance up in here...I was just thinking how I haven't had any good inspiration for a blog lately, well colour me inspired. I'm seeing red. I'll have you know that my blog has been shown to cure cancer in lab rats, granted the clinical trials are still in the early stages and it is unknown if the rats actually had cancer to begin with. It is the preferred blog for 4 out of 5 dentists (those Sensodyne dentists are sooooo damn sensitive...).

So here it is for your reading amusement, another tale of dating from the long, sordid story of dating known as "The Dickie Memoirs". I'm still waiting for the book deal to come through, you might want to hold off on checking Amazon.com or Chapters anytime soon. I'm holding out for a million dollars and they're currently offering $5. Negotiations have stalled but I am confident they are just playing hardball. Actually they have never returned my emails or calls, but it is just a matter of time...

I was out at a pub with my roomate Teeder and we were having a few drinks just enjoying the Irish atmosphere and happy to be out of the apartment. The band was good and the night just had a great feel to it. We were telling each other jokes and laughing in our typical fashion when I registered some eyes on me. I don't usually trust my spider senses but this was unmistakable. I did a quick survey around the room and spotted the culprit. It was an attractive girl of slightly below average height with golden blonde hair. Her hair seemed to glow and had these really cute curls. I was intrigued. So I employed my unique and unfailing rules of engagement. In other words, I just looked in her direction once in a while and did my best to not look creepy. And by unfailing, I mean it works about 10% of the time. We generally looked at each other and smiled for about an hour. I'm quite shy around strangers and approaching girls in a bar is not my style, but for whatever reason I was inspired to go up to talk to her and her friend. You miss 100% of the shots you don't take right? You gotta be in it to win it? Pick a cliche and it likely passed through my mind.

I walked up, surprisingly cool, and I introduced myself. We chatted and kind of hit it off. It was close to closing time and I asked for her number, she gave it. I called her and was going to ask her out but she had to work. She invited me to come by the pool hall she worked at. I called my friend Awall and asked if he was up for some pool. He accepted the offer. We went to the pool hall and she set us up with a table. I noticed this woman at the bar that looked as if she is just killing time between bingo games. I tend to make a note of all the patrons in a public place just in case I need to get out in a hurry and I like to have mental notes about anyone that may cause trouble. She was noted. Not because she would cause trouble mind you, but in the case of a fire she may slow people down because she forgot her lucky bingo dabbers. These are the things I notice.

We played pool and the girl came back once in a while to check on us, we flirted a little. I suck at interpreting flirting, so maybe she just had something in her eye. On a side note, Awall is one of my best friends and we always have a some good laughs. He once picked me up and when I got in the car he was really excited so I asked him why. He explained that he just went to the bank machine and that it gave him some brand new $5 bills. He then told me that he thought he would put them away and keep them cause they might be worth something some day. I looked at him in total disbelief and said "Yeah they will, $5". He gave me a look like a kid that just found out there was no such thing as Santa Claus. Another time my mom was taking us both out for dinner and the waiter took our orders and he told Awall the choices of potato available with his meal: baked potato, mashed potatoes, and fries. Awall just replies in a quiet voice "potatoes". I nearly spit out my water. These events are so infamous now that when he does something stupid I just say "$5" or "potatoes" and we both laugh hysterically. Maybe this is a geography joke and you just needed to be there. I find it imperative to point out at this time that Awall did not drink or do drugs like you may assume. Interestingly enough he was along for a lot of my failed dating "adventures". But I digress, that is another blog entry...

So we finished playing pool and we were walking up towards the bar to pay for the game and to say goodbye. Awall was watching intently to see how I was going to mess up the goodbye like I have a tendency to do. Out of the blue the Bingo woman speaks up and calls me over. At this point it becomes obvious to me that the Bingo woman knows the girl and they have talked about me a little. Something was amiss and I could sense it. As I walked over to the woman I got the feeling it was a bad idea. As soon as she opened her mouth to speak my suspicions were confirmed. She knew I was trying to impress the girl and had it in her mind to use me for her enjoyment. Normally I would have declined what she said, but I was feeling a bit surly that evening. There was a group of 8 people (half guys, half girls) that were sitting on couches around the fireplace discussing sex and she was listening to what they were saying. She had a few objections to what the guys were saying and she wanted to voice her opinion. She would never do this but since I was approximately the same age as the group, she thought it would be great to have me voice it for her. She laid out the plan by saying "If you go over to that group and tell them you've heard what they were saying and just have to give your opinion that it's all about the girl, nothing else matters, it's just about the girl" I'll buy you and your friend a beer". She said it that way but what I actually heard was "Do this if you want to not seem like a total dork in front of this girl you're trying to impress". This request doesn't seem like a terribly big deal, but for someone decently shy like I can be, it was a big undertaking.

At this point I will say that women make men do stupid things all the time. I assume that is how the Olympics began way back when, it was originally just two guys trying to outdo each other over a woman.

In a moment of extreme bravery or total stupidity, I walked over to this group and they noticed me approaching. They were obviously wondering what the hell I was doing. Awall sat there at the bar laughing his ass off because he knew I was totally out of my element. With all eyes on me I opened my mouth and surprisingly the words came out fairly clear and confidently "Excuse me, but I couldn't help but overhear the conversation you're having and I just have to say, it's all about the woman for me, if she's not happy I'm not happy either". The guys looked at me like they wanted to kill me and the girls looked like they were quite interested in whatever else I had to say at this point. One of the girls said "All guys say that, but few of them know what the hell they are doing" and I replied "I was a boy scout, I never go into the woods unless I am familiar with the territory or have a good map. I've never gotten lost in the woods, and one time I tamed a wild cougar...". The guys stared at me with dirtier looks and the girls' smiles got a little bigger. I took that as my cue to exit stage left and I thanked them for their time and walked back to the bar. Bingo woman was smiling ear to ear like she just got an O-69 to complete the dreaded 4 corners game, the girl was smiling sheepishly at me and Awall was laughing and called me an idiot. The Bingo woman tried to order me a beer but I told her it was not necessary because I didn't do it for the beer while I smiled at the girl behind the bar.

I didn't end up dating the girl from the pool hall, but this helped me in overcoming my fears of looking foolish in front of people and likely spurred on a few blog worthy events down the road. It seems like a small blip on the radar, but it was the beginning of a new improved Dickie. Stay tuned...

My Apologies

First off my apologies...

I am back and I apologize for the long absence. Surprisingly more people than I would have thought have commented on the lack of entries lately. Funny, since nobody leaves COMMENTS ON MY ENTRIES...lol.

I just got back from a small vacation in the "Picture Province" for a good old country wedding and let's just say it was an experience. I didn't know it was possible to dance to "Spirit in the Sky" or "Footloose" or "Devil Went Down to Georgia", but I was proven wrong (by my drunken self mostly). My cousin actually requested some "fiddle music" from the band and she got her wish. My sister in law called me a "ghetto dancer" and I choose to take that as a compliment.

The time came when the garter was to be thrown and I was forced up amongst the single men. The competitiveness in me unexpectantly creeped up and I wanted to catch it, just for the sake of winning. As the garter was flying through the air I jumped for it and as it was about to land on my outstretched finger I came to my senses. I suddenly had the thought "What the hell are you doing??" and I pulled my finger back and and shifted my body (while still in the air) and avoided that thing like I was in the Matrix. The garter fell to the ground and I walked away like nothing had happened, nothing to see here! The crowd thought it was great and I felt like I just got shot in the chest while wearing a Kevlar vest and was trying to walk it off. "Haha I look pale? No I'm not feeling well, it certainly isn't because I almost caught the garter...that's RIDICULOUS. Where's my beer? Can I drink your beer? Oh I wasn't sitting on this side of the room before? Who are you? Oh sorry Uncle James, I didn't recognize you, you look so different from the last time I saw you 5 minutes ago...I'll be all right".

On a side note, I am an amazing dancer (opinions vary slightly) and you may find this hard to believe but I have had no FORMAL training. I found out at this dance that it is genetic which is both enlightening and a little upsetting. I thought I had carved out my legacy of snazzy dancing despite my family, but seeing my 83 yr old grandfather dancing to almost every dance and another 76 yr old relative doing what would be best described as naughty dancing, I see that it was inavoidable and the rhythm was eventually going to get me. I do take it to another level, but the foundation was already in place.

All in all good times had by all at the wedding/dance. Alcohol helps but it is good to go back to your roots sometimes and just let loose. So accept my sincerest apologies for leaving you all hanging for so long. I have another blog idea cooking so check back soon...

This for your viewing and listening pleasure if you're so inclined: