the week in review

saturday - on the way to my bro's new pad in the luxurious yaletown, riding in the caddy, my mom stops at the no.2 rd & blundell liquor store for some canadian vitamins (hops, barley). while in line waiting to make our purchases, my mom drops this beaut: there was a rally at this liquor store today

me: what? why?

mom: they're closing it, people are upset.

*double take*, *cheeks burning red*, *rumble, rumble*, *steam coming out of ears*, *pop*

me: let me get this straight, there are people dying and starving, not only all over the world, but right here in our little city, there are people suffering the world over, there are people legally being murdered in that fucked up country to the south, and the people of my city can only muster the energy to organize a rally because one liquor store is closing in an area where 10 others exist?

*vomit*

human beings are fucking revolting sometimes. r-e-v-o-l-t-i-n-g. no doubt the rally crowd was made up of only white trash from the neighboring bc housing co-op that so desperately wants to be a trailer park.

monday - carrie and i hop into a cab to the mall to get her passport pics taken and have lunch. we decided on white spot, a great bc tradition, the bc burger *will* kill you but is comparable to the best orgasm you've ever had, etc. we order and wait for our food and chit and chat and fidget. carrie starts filling out her passport forms and leans her head down and i catch a glimpse of something so horrible, but at the same time, cute like gorilla babies. a baby of about 6 months is behind us being fed by someone who looks like laura bush and the baby turns his head, and i remember this in slow-mo, he turns in a scene that makes you expect his neck to creek. i see what looks like george w. bush in baby form. no, not a baby that looks like what dubya might have when he was a baby, but a baby that looks like dubya does currently with ears the size of dumbo. i shudder. suddenly the bc burger doesn't seem so appetizing.

so carrie goes her own way and i head over to the bus stop, cause rodrigo continues to suffer from battery unchargedness, and lack of insurance because the beastly engine isn't passing aircare (in british columbia, it's pretty much legalized theft - we all line up in our cars and then they ask us to get out of them, they lock our cars into these car-shackles and refuse to give it back until we give them $20). ps. if anyone wants to buy a 73 purple monte carlo... anyway, so i'm at this bus stop on the coldest day yet of the year, so cold it feels like it may snow, and of course the bus is late because that is the nature of public transit anywhere on this planet, and there is this group of teenagers committing truancy down the way a little and they're all gothed the fuck up, one giant fat girl in a yellow hoodie the size of forrest's first shrimping boat, the jenny, (sup swollen banana?) has black tears painted down her face and bum gloves with the exposed fingers and she wafts by me to check the bus times and i feel like grabbing her yellow submarine and pushing her up against the bus shelter and yelling "THERE IS NOTHING UNCOOL ABOUT SHOWERS.". but. instead. i am distracted by her whory smaller half in the jeans that expose so much crack, it's street value is off the fucking charts, and little missus' fucking belly is hanging out over her white belt cause her fur coat doesn't go down further than her nipples, which are, understandably, more erect than billybubbaclinton when he's playing with cigars, because most of her skin is exposed to the almost-snowy-autumn-chill. it is at this precise moment that white-belted-nipples decides to show off her cart-wheeling skills which just barely give us a glimpse of the undersides of her nanners and all the boys she's with are poppin woodies, their nuts are dropping, their voices changing and we-all-live-in-a-yellow-submarine pouts because her ensemble is not getting the attention that whore-girl's skin is.

i turn away. i've had enough of this. but it just gets better. down the street saunters fat-hairy-fuck with an ipod, sportin his cargo jeans, request from zellers (canadian wal-mart) no doubt, and has hair down to his knees, bone straight like axel-smack-you-up-bitch-rose. he winks. i vomit. and finally my bus comes.

later on that very same day, i find myself in the presence of one miss squish at the wonderful pioneer pub, just down the way. we pull up, say hi to dino @ the door, wave to the timmer and michelle and chris and park ourselves in the smoking room, atop a stool and proceed with the following conversation:

me: man, today at work i was driving the forklift to get the skids from the new delivery and the sup's all like "courtney, where's your hi-vis vest?" and i'm all like, dude, i'm trying to operate a fork lift here, can we talk about fashion some other time?

squish: yeah, the sup gets all out of sorts when you don't wear the proper head gear either. fucker. have you seen the sup's sup lately? i've been sleeping with him, i'll tell him to give him shit.

and so on. and so forth. it went on for a good half an hour. funny thing is, ash and i both own our own businesses and really, the hardest work we do is walking to the pioneeeeer pub.

our fun fake conversation stops abruptly when shouts ring out from the other side of the smoking room and a fight is threatening to disturb the blue collar pioneer peace. you can really see the psychosis required to want to fight people if you study it's beginning stages. one man says something out of line, and the other reacts and, influenced by the power of alcohol, refuses to hear what the other man is saying, even if it's an apology and just continues to repeat stupid macho bullshit, "stop it unless you wanna see blood pal" etc. the fight never comes to fruition and one of the guys is thrown out. he leaves the woman there who he'd been with, and it soon becomes apparent that her 14 or 15 yr old son is outside the bar waiting for her. he knocks on the door and begs her to come out and go home with him and she insists she is just having a coffee (do they even serve coffee at the pi?) and crying, sobbing begging continues and breaks everyone's heart. the eyes of the bar are turning on her and she feels it, so she leaves after her son has taken off, hopefully to go home and be a fucking mother. as all the commotion subsides, and patrons become more audible, we notice one man in the corner trying to tell everyone it is his birthday. an absurd scene. an absurd day.

thursday - after a day of diving heavily into blog-culture and flattening my ass on this chair, and a sad canucks game, ash and i head back to the pi. it's last call already so we just get one jug and sit outside and talk with gary about kids and babies and life and family. chris comes out to clean up the smoking room and turns off the keno tv - as she turns back to go inside, gary gives her a smile and she says "ohhh gary, i'm sorry, you're still playing keno?" and he says yes, but it's ok, he'll turn the screen back on and flip it off on his way out. chris smiles her warm smile, nods ok and heads inside. it's a pretty moment. thinking about the fact that all we really know about this woman is that she works at the pioneer pub, i grin because we can get along so well. i don't know if she supports the liberals or the death penalty or if she smacks up her kids and it doesn't matter because in that moment she's a friendly face. which is what i really love about the pioneer. the people there are not pretentious. the people there do not wear white belts. the people there don't pout when their yellow tarpaulin and black painted on tear drops are not enough to get the boys attention. the people there have no idea what a blog is and thus, they haven't the shadiest i'm writing about them when i come home. although last night, as gary talked about why he loves the pi, and ashleigh nodded in agreement, i did let it slip when i said "wait til the book comes out".

Currently listening: At Folsom Prison By Johnny Cash

posted by Courtney at 11:50 a.m.

Sick of paying so much for calls from prison? Click here, DO Something