probably not somewhere I went

I arrived back in the P-dot last night, much to the relief of the 3 people who know I live here. The bananas which had been unripe when I left are now spotted like a leopard. My jaunt down to the city of glass was fruitful, fairly blurry, and is conveniently recounted below:

Stepping off the bus in my hometown, it took me all of 30 seconds to accidentally run-into my dad. That's what's great about small towns, at least for the non-claustrophobic among us. We ate fajitas, talked about various things and watched his dog Gamgee chase ducks.

The day of the wedding, which was the main purpose of the trip, began with an ominous rainbow over the pond outside my window. Ominous in a good way, I should say, because that adjective is unfairly dominated by negative connotations. The wedding was inconveniently 450km South of my hometown, so the morning was spent driving. 6 deer, 2 bald eagles, 1 chipmunk and a few short 'detours' later, we arrived at a garden in front of a big, pristine heritage home. The bride was my mom's best childhood friend, which doesn't explain why I was there, but it does explain why I didn't know anyone there. Fortunately, the wedding party included a 150lb German shepherd with a pink bow, so I had him to talk to if it turned out everyone spoke only Portuguese.

Most of the people were a generation or two my senior, but they did speak English. I recall talking to a lot of them, but I'm not sure what about. Probably a lot of it was explaining why I had on a gorilla suit (that's apparently not what semi-formal means btw). One person did stand-out though, a Mr. McNaughton who had been a friend of my grandpa. They were both on ski patrol in Quebec in the late 1950s, and spent some time skiing in Switzerland as well. The details aren't the thing. He was unexpected, as I don't think I've met a friend of my grandfather before.

Champagne is nice, but I decided to go see Chris and Mikara, who are expecting their second child this fall (hooray!). We mostly wandered around, drove around, and hung-out in general. That's all we need to do though. Our meetings are kind of like an episode of Seinfeld: a succession of pointing out different things that we find funny. And we happen to find everyone and everything funny, so the episode never ends.

The next day Dash took me to her family's Sikh temple. That was unexpected and fascinating. Fortunately there were only about 4 people there, so my various misunderstandings of what one is supposed to do in such a temple went mostly unnoticed. The carpet was soft to the bare foot, and I ate some tasty, doughy substance. I also met 3/4 of her immediate family, who were very nice.

There you have it. That is most of what has waylaid me lately.

P.S. I got my atlas back from my mom's house, and I finally put a new battery in my watch. I don't know how I survived for several months without those things, but now all is right with the universe.

*the photo is copyright 2000 (C) Guninder S Bagga

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Leah

I was thinking about what I should post today, but when I searched the place where my thoughts should have been, there was only an empty, off-white, plastic bucket. It had recently been full of tiny frogs, I deduced, judging by the hundreds of tiny frogs hopping away in all directions. But they were gone now, and all that was left was a tiny inscription reading: "tom the tiny frog was heer."

Having no frogs in my idea bucket, I decided I should start a series of posts introducing some of my family members. After all, their well-adjustedness might reflect well on me. So, without further ado, let me introduce my twin sister: Leah Shiloh Henderson

Leah is not really my twin sister, having been born about 21 months earlier than me (in October 1978), but we are both bipedal. She is currently studying photography (which is a fancy word fer picture-takin') in Montreal. She is a vegetarian, and possibly a vegan (which is like being a Jedi Master of vegetarianism), but she is not a raw foodist (because why would anyone be a raw foodist?). In the mid-nineties Leah was a member of a fictional band called Batch. I think they were a britpop band, despite having no British members, but it doesn't matter, since the band was fictional.

Leah used to live in Sweden, which is where she got her jet black hair. She also lived in Perth, Australia for two years. According to my memory of the map of Australia, Perth is the city in Australia that is really far away from the other cities, and very lonely. Pretend you have a piece of toast shaped like the continent of Australia. Most of the cities are along the bottom right side of the piece of toast, but Perth is all the way over on the bottom left! Argh?! Whyyy?!! Now smush-up the piece of toast and eat it! That'll teach you Australia, plan your cities better!

Despite the fact that she once threw a rock at me, Leah is a really nice person who is impossible to hate. So unhateable is she that the U.S. Navy Seals are currently trying to recruit her to search the foothills of Afghanistan for Osama Bin Laden, knowing that if she finds him, he will immediately surrender, moaning: "Oh, how wrong I was, Western culture is not the great Satan, we all must get along, and play volleyball."

P.S.
Thanks for those pics you sent me.
I don't know who the photo credit for this picture is. My guess would be Sam, or an automatic timer.

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School done. Which means I can write sentences with with no verbs in them. The term went well, meaning that I didn't drop any classes or assignments into the academic woodchipper that is procrastination. Now I just have to find some kind of employment for the next 2 months so I can chip away at the tuition that is sitting on my mastercard. So, if anyone has . . . . like . . . some chipmunks that need walking, or something . . . call me. Also, you'll have to buy me a phone first.

Apparently I'm going to the wedding of someone I don't know in Vancouver this weekend (probably 2 people I don't know, if I remember how weddings work). I guess that means I'll have to start brushing my teeth again. On the plus side, there is a high probability of free food. Also, it's supposedly near the Shadbolt center, and Jack Shadbolt is possibly my favourite British Columbian artist.

Does anyone else like Ben Folds Five (not to be confused with the gramatically-challenged 5IVE)? I was just introduced to them a few weeks ago, well, to their music anyway. They remind me of Weezer, with their subtle, subversive sense of humour. Actually, that's not a good description, but it's a nice alliteration. I'm not a world-famous music critic like Chris, after all. The important thing is, Matt from Australia likes them, and normally he only listens to ABBA cover bands and the "Crocodile Hunter" themesong.

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Whoever invented the summer solstice hates me. My room has like 15 windows (2 actually) that face the sun, which apparently thinks it's ok to shine into my eyes 23 hours per day. I've averaged about 3 hrs of sleep the last 4 nights. This may also be due to my ill-advised swallowing of steel wool, which I thought might cure my cold. I know, I know, why don't I just get some opaque drapes? Easy for you to say, the international drapery cartel hasn't pronounced a fatwah on you. Who knew they were so protective of their goats?

On the plus side, my need for darkness gave me an excuse to build a wicked awesome pillow fort. Not that anyone ever really needs an excuse to do that. Seriously though, despite my burning retinas, I really like it up here.

Today I'm going to go on an all citrus diet, and I'm going to try to find a St. Bernard to come and give me moral support, since I've seen that work in commercials. Oh yeah, It's exam/final papers time now, so I will be MIA for a bit. I know, you're heartbroken.

In unrelated news, my completely scientific poll has revealed that 1 person wants me to die, no one wants to marry me, and 6 people like Tacos!

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G8 leaders agree agreeably on debt relief agreement

read the article from Reuters
The G8 countries agreed to write-off at least 40b$ owed to the World Bank, the IMF, and the African Development Bank by at least 18 countries, mostly in Sub-Saharan Africa. This is a good thing. Like many good things, it makes me happy. To be sure, all things are criticizable to the criticism-inclined. We can question the conditions under which those loans were granted in the first place, and we must admit this is only one step towards the solution of this problem, but it is a very positive and hopeful step.

By the way, when did the G7+Russia become the G8? I missed the memo.

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I was in a play yesterday and the day before. We did three scenes from Harold Pinter's The Birthday Party (1958) for my Modern Brit Lit class. Although acting is definitely not a strong suit of mine, it was a lot of fun because The Birthday Party is in the Theatre of the Absurd genre. I played McCann, an Irishman, who interrogates the protagonist (Stanley) until he goes insane. I also got to sing, and one of my lines was "The bastard sweatpig is sweating!"
That class is cool because the teacher is actually British, with the appropriate sense of humour. Yesterday, he called someone a "daft sod" (in a friendly way). I'll have to remember that one.

Manu Ginobli is my favourite Argentinian. He's also the only Argentinian I know, except for that jerk who caused David Beckham to get redcarded at France '98. Manu had a spectabulous second half last night in San Antonio's 84-69 win over Detroit (in game 1 of the NBA finals). I'm actually cheering for Detroit, or, more specifically, I am cheering for Ben Wallace's majestic afro. He had it braided last night, which is clearly the reason they lost. SA is pretty cool too though, despite the fact that they slaughtered poor Steve Nash's Suns. I like SA's international flavour, with starters from USA, Argentina, and France, as well as two Slovenians on their bench. How can you lose with a guy named Rasho on your team?

I've decided I like bananas again. Grapefruit is still my favourite fruit, but bananas have portability in their favour, and they only cost 0.59$ per pound. Also, they help you make friends with monkeys.

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BANNED IN CHINA!

That's right, some 10 days after its release, Infallible Plankton has officially been banned in China, probably due to IP's overwhelming stupidity. Actually, all blogs hosted by blogspot (aka blogger.com) are inaccessible in China, part of The Party's ongoing effort to squelch personal expression. Granted, 90% of all blogs provide no edification whatsoever, and mine has driven 2 people to commit themselves already. Still, weak dudes . . . seriously weak. It's like that episode of The Simpsons where Lisa questions the logic of an educational film, and her teacher presses the "independent thought alert" button under her desk. Except instead of a button, it's mass censorship. The Great Firewall of China, as they say.

read more:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4617657.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3548035.stm
Wikipedia: Censorship in China

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Happy 157th Birthday Paul Gauguin! Where have you been?

Judging by that festive potato, it is also my birthday. Thanks for sending me those wicked awesome candles Dasha! I'd just like to say I'm proud to have exceeded the average life expectancy for Europeans.*


*Europeans living during the time of the Bubonic Plague

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postsecret

I'm not sure how I stumbled across this site, but it really makes you wonder how someone would think it up. Basically, the entire purpose is for anyone who feels like it to write down their secret on a postcard, and mail it anonymously to this bloke in Maryland, who then posts them on his blog weekly. A few are funny, some are hard to believe, and a lot are just really sad. The sad ones are a strange kind of sad. It is both personal and impersonal. Personal because you are sometimes getting to see a part of a stranger which you would never have a chance to see otherwise, but it's still impersonal since they are anonymous. See for yourself . . .

http://postsecret.blogspot.com/

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