It just slipped out...

I am stupid.


I promised myself I wouldn't write about my love life here, because I know my amour occasionally reads this. You know, to avoid my big stupid mouth running off at length and perhaps saying (writing) something I don't mean. We all do that, right...but it's so much more crummy in writing. At any rate that is precisely what I want to chit chat about. My big stupid mouth.

To call me impulsive would be a major understatement and because of this I am prone to make a lot of stupid decisions and stupid mistakes. And let me tell you 'it's not my fault' only has so much weight. Very little actually, if you aren't a ten year old. And even with the clarity the Ritalin has given me, my misfiring, pre-drug brain has created habits that have become very hard to break. It's as if I have to re-learn how to be in the world.
So as I clumsily manoever this life of mine, tripping and stubbing my toes the whole way, the crazy fools who choose to be with me ( thinking that cause I look like an adult I must be one) get burned. And sometimes badly.
The impulsiveness also translates into impatience and frustration and rage at not being understood. But also heaps of guilt...I experienced this tenfold after having started the Ritalin. It's as if a window opened on all the tumultuous situations in my life and shone a light on the culprit...ME.
So with my impatience glaring and obvious in these little flashbacks, I experienced those heaps of guilt I talked about. I think guilt is one of the most unhealthy feelings, because it's so amorphous, it teaches you little or nothing and is always directed at yourself. Guilt is the emotional equivalent to shooting yourself in the foot.
Good rarely comes of guilt..(and I'm not talking liberal guilt that makes rich people donate to charities...I'm talking about making yourself feel lower than worms). This is where I tended to abuse the hell out of myself. Drinking till you puke and pass out, anyone? Ganja till my eyes turn green, chums? Self-destruction can actually feel productive when you think you're an asshole and don't deserve to be loved.

But that, too, is an immature response. And I'm trying really hard to upgrade instead of taking steps backwards off this cliff. Thing is, for the man I love, it may be too late. Because I have made SO many mistakes...I've tried to hurt myself, tried to hurt him. I've tried to cover it up, because of guilt and stupidity and a brain that needs a little help with its homework. And I'm not sure he knows how much he has helped and how patient he has been and how much I appreciate and love him. I tell him, but it always seems to me that it comes out sounding needy, and I don't want it to. I want him to realise that with all of my faults and handicaps, I am a strong and nurturing woman capable of great things. I don't offer a needy love. I want my love to support him, hold him like a hammock, to make him realise he has someone always looking out for him, someone to break his fall.

This is another reason I need this place to write. I need to admit...to myself, to the world...(okay to the, like, TWO people who read this) that I have fucked up royally but am trying to mend.

In Sudbury, they have these things called slag dumps where the molten nickel from the mines is poured on top these large dumping hills and the locals will grab beer and watch it dribble down the hills on Saturday nights because it's all lit up like a bright, glowing lava sundae. Basically, it's nickel run-off....it's the junk that's no longer useful. It's the stuff they separate from what is valuable. So that's what this is....my slag dump. And occasionally, even though I don't want my junk anymore, it looks pretty brilliant being dumped on a dark website in Montréal.

ROGERS BLOWS GOAT...I HAVE PROOF.

Right now, ladies and gentlemen...RIGHT NOW I am on hold with RogersCanada who recently bought out Sprint Canada. To explain, I switched to Sprint from Bell because Bell couldn't find customer service with a flashlight and a map...And Sprint was SO much better....I mean they are still a phone company so screw them, right?...but they had nice, pleasant, English speaking agents on the phone who were helpful and didn't keep me on hold for an eternity.
Now Rogers, ah Rogers you sonofabitch, my service has changed. First off, I haven't gotten a bloody bill from them but being the good hearted, honest soul that I am, I tried to find if I owed the bastards anything. So I check my online banking and realise I paid them less than two weeks ago and so the money is gone and in their grubby little hands. But just to check it out I try and manoeuver around a (Oh I'm still on hold) very poorly designed website to find some info on we-of-no-choice-in-the-matter new clients of Rogers. So former Sprintites are directed to call a customer 'service' line...I am shocked to find that after I punch in my phone number I have the choice to get my account balance from the automated bitch on the line...with no more proof that it's me than I can use a telephone. Sprint used to ask name, birthdate, blood type before...and now I can get it by putting in a phone number...can you say ILLEGAL? (Still on hold...) (but they apologize for the unsual delay...)

Anyway the surly bitch I finally got a hold of has put me BACK on hold after telling me what her little automated system told me (I owed them a hundred bucks to be paid today. HA! WTF?!?) was wrong and that I didn't owe them shit till the 20th of September. She chastised me for 'believing' the automated system...(um...isn't that what it's for?). So fine. I'm still pissed at the oversight which allows any(freakin)one have acces to my account balance and how I pay and when...Hark! Is that Bell, sounding much more appealing by the second? Yep I think it is....

Morning from Montréal. Where the Mutual Funds companies rip you off and you have no evening news!
This CBC lockout is really boiling my potatoes. Thank godess I still have Dave Bronstetter in the morning; I can't fully wake up without his dulcet tones. But what the hell is the deal here? Do we not realise what an asset the CBC and their underpaid employees are? I am having serious pangs with the way my country seems to be headed.
Mr. Martin, are you listening? No, of course you're not. That's why we are rapidly moving towards privatised health care, that's why we're hangin' up Hydro Lines around pristine Québec waterfalls, that's why you all don't feel the necessity to explain EXACTLY what's happening with Canadian troops in Haiti.
Running under the same contradictions that I'm pretty used to as a Canadian, our government seems to selflagellate over inconsequential shit like the Sponsorship scandal... Are we really SO idealistic to believe this kind of crap hasn't happened in our government before? Really think that Mulroney wasn't greasing his fair share of fat-cat palms? Do we really think a Conservative government would be more transparent? Or are 'we' just pissed because it's got something to do with Quebec and National Unity and all that same tired sky-is-falling hysteria that only succeeds in making the Separatists (I will NOT call them the other S word) reaffirm the idea that the rest of Canada doesn't understand Québec and makes the rest of Canada reaffirm that Québec is whiney kid at the front of the class always asking for special treatment. Just makes us all hate each other just a little more doesn't it?
But what really gets my panties in a wad is what I saw on my local news (what's left of it). Justice Gomery's expressionless mug requesting the VIEW from Canadians on how our Liberal government can rebuild our trust. In an embarrassingly Canadian-cliché move, The Gom is actually probing regular Joe Canadians, to tell him and the other stupid white men how to DO THEIR JOBS...
One of the serious questions involves Canadians' views on how to "ensure clearer accountability between the executive and administrative arms of government". Well, let's see for starters, let's have all government staff outfitted with those electronic tracking bracelets like they gave to Martha Stewart. Or maybe just put them all in a pen and zap them with cattle prods.

My point is, perhaps the government could ask our opinion on RELEVANT issues? Ask us our thoughts on things like child poverty in Canada or the homeless epidemic in a country that prides itself on its quality of life or the fact that few people can get proper mental health attention from qualified doctors. Governments mismanaging government funds has occurred since the dawn of governments and I'm not sure even cattle prodding them will change that. But if The Gom is proposing that the views of regular Canadians ACTUALLY MATTER...THINK of what we regular Tom, Dick and Harriets could accomplish if we were asked on a regular basis? Wasn't that the point of voting for whoever you voted for? To have your voice heard? Or do you just get a kick out of making little check marks in little boxes?


"We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw.
Alas!Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar"...T.S Eliot(1925)

WHY SPINNING CLASSES SUCK

Hello all!

....And a special hello to those of you who are right now, thinking about their fat asses and considering joining a gym. I joined one. AND I rarely have a day that goes by that I'm not thinking of MY fat ass.
Okay fine. So I only started going this week after having had the membership for six months. And..I actually may have to sell a kidney to continue paying the exorbitant monthly fee, butt (pun INtended) I am convinced this is good for me.

I have never been a sporty gal. I prefer my 'sports' to be accompanied by drinking and smoking. For instance, I am quite an accomplished bowler, and damn if I can't scare a few blokes with my dart skills. Alright, so it's not my skills they're scared of.

I figured what the hay, though. Maybe it was time for me to stop complaining about my ass and get it movin'..Very Oprah motivational type crapola then started oozing out my ears. (Oprah, I love you.) I then found myself adding odd music like Michael Jackson's Keep the Faith to my iPod Shuffle. (Which is wrong on many levels, I realise).

So when a co-worker asked if I'd join her on Tuesday for a spinning class at the same gym, I said yes. With little more enthusiasm than if I'd been asked to file my taxes. I knew it would be painful, but I had an obligation and a duty.

Lunch time was when we were planning to sit and spin. I was a nervous spin virgin. I recalled stories I had heard of cult-like gatherings with sinewy Lances and Lancettes pedaling furiously in the dark with blaring music and a light show. I was not sure this was for me.

Ten minutes into the class I KNEW for certain that it wasn't. Besides the fact that the pain on my crotch bone approximated having rough sex with a brick, I could barely understand the instructor's thick Latino accent over the blaring Shakira. The point was that he was to be 'virtually' guiding us bikers through streets and up and down hills with us controlling the resistance on the bike, depending. Didn't help that the little prick decided to tell a room full of Montrealers that they were biking through the streets of Toronto. So when he 'guided' us to a portion of Queen Street to try and pass a motorcycle, I snorted so loudly I almost fell off my bike.

Being the only ones with two X chromosones in the class, I'm pretty sure the instructor, unfeasibly named Larry, was trying to ignore our presence as much as possible. Christ, I was trying to ignore my OWN presence. I was desperately trying to ignore the chest pain and the pools of sweat on the floor around the bike. Tried to ignore Larry, tried to ignore that my co-worker didn't look nearly as traumatised as I, tried to ignore the time and how it wasn't passing nearly fast enough.

When we hit the 45 minute mark, I gave the "get me the fuck out of here" look to my fellow Chick Spinner and dismounted gracelessly. Still pumping the pedals like the Tazmanian Devil, Larry called out "Have a nice day girls!" as we stumbled out of the room ( I more than she). With Jello-Legs I hit the shower and knew that I would never, ever, EVER take another spin class. Good riddance Larry-I-know-your-name-is-NOT-Larry!!

Gossip Girls

Last night I met a friend for coffee. She's this very pretty practically thirty girly who's just failed the Bar exam for Québec Law and therefore enjoys repeating how crappy this province is and how she can't wait to high-tail it to T.O.

I owed her some moula so I agreed to meet her for a bit. Well, a bit turned into five hours around a table with two of her equally obnoxious friends waxing bitchy over some girl at a party who took a shower at the host's house without asking. "Omigod, I was like, how fucking rude is that?" Heather-Number-One recounted.

As far as I could tell it wasn't such a huge deal considering the background story about this party inlcuded lovely tidbits about doing lines of coke off some Chad's six-pack. An unauthorised shower seemed like party peanuts compared to the other shenanigans (mother is that you?) going on at this boondocks brew ha-ha. Hoity-Toity Hudson teens really get off on that sort of drug induced mayhem, but apparently bathing requires special permission from the Queen. I mean, let's be serious...I've had a couple of parties where I would have PREFERRED my guests take showers!

At any rate, this conversation along with every one before and after revolved around the slagging of some heinous bitch who stole someone's boyfriend, or had herpes, or suffered from depression (to which Heather Number Two piped in saying "Aw, COME ON. I can deal with someone having a FEW PROBLEMS...but fuck!")(seems she went to the same School of Empathy as Tom Cruise).

Not being one to keep my mouth shut in POLITE (ha!) company I distractedly said,"Well this, you guys, is pretty much the reason I don't have women friends."

What I expected was akin to hair pulling and boob twisting but what actually happened was somber nodding all around and agreement at how horrible women can be to each other. Why IS that? I don't buy that it's related to our competition for the males of the species....frankly are they really worth all this hullabaloo (mom, that you again?) anyway? Are women just naturally nasty? Does it really make people feel superior to verbally thrash their fellow chiquitas around them for the sake of a personal pick me up?
Makes me puke. Makes me want to tear my high school year book to shreds.