Feeling hot, hot, hot

I hate summer. Heat and humidity make me feel pukey, grumpy and tired. It's June and already we are in the middle of a heat wave. The other day the humidex reading was forty-one degrees. Usually we don't get heat waves until July when we've had several weeks of warm to help us prepare for it, but this heat wave came out of nowhere, like that police officer who gave me a ticket for failing to come to a complete stop in the middle of buttfuck nowhere with absolutely nobody in a five mile radius, (except for the officer obviously. Bastard. That, friends, is a story for another day). Last week, I still had the duvet on my bed and sleeping was quite comfortable. This week the only thing on the bed is me in my granny knickers, not a pretty picture, let me assure you. I've spent the past three nights sprawled on top of the bed with the fan blowing on high, trying to get a decent night's rest, but it's hard to settle in for a night of blissful slumber with rivulets of sweat trickling down your cracks and crevices. Again, I have procrastinated and I am paying the price. I have a perfectly good air-conditioner sitting in the closet waiting to be installed, but I thought I had at least a few more weeks to do it. And now, it's too bloody hot to do it. Rumour has it that the humidity is going to break for the weekend so guess what I'm doing. I'm sure there will be funny little stories to tell about that. I am useless with tools and the air conditioner is heavy, large and awkward. Should be interesting. Wish me luck.

Really must revise the mail filing system...

About eight weeks ago I received a little pile of mail. I don't actually remember it, but if my usual routine is any indication, I stepped inside my apartment, dropped the mail, my bag, my keys, a carton of milk and quite probably a small selection of other odds and ends on the dresser in the hallway (and by hallway I mean tiny, tiled area barely big enough for me, never mind a dresser) just inside my door. I kicked off my shoes, sprinted into the bog for a pee. I came out, probably made myself a drink, popped something frozen into the nuker and sat down to watch Will and Grace, now on every day at five-thirty, which makes me very happy indeed. I likely ate my dinner (and by dinner I mean scarcely edible pasta with fatty, white goo, one chewy white chunk and a very light sprinkling of nameless green - marketed, incidentally, as Grilled Chicken Parmesan Penne with Broccoli Florets. Is a speck the same as a floret? I think probably not, but I digress.) After dinner, there's a pretty good chance I poured another bev, stuffed in a Mars bar and changed the channel. I might have done a load of laundry. Maybe I checked my phone messages. I certainly didn't call anyone back since I am notoriously bad for returning calls. It's not that I don't want to talk to anyone. I just have bugger-all to say and small talk makes me itchy. In my defense, my outgoing message says, 'I can't take your call right now. If you'd like to leave me a message, please do so after the tone.' It doesn't even hint that I will call back. I probably took a shower at some point to save time in the morning, maybe made tea, popped in a movie and puttered until the news finished at midnight at which point I brushed my teeth, got into bed, read fifteen or twenty pages of whatever was on the nightstand at the time and fell asleep.

Fast forward eight weeks.

Last night, I received a little pile of mail. I stepped inside my apartment, dropped the mail, my keys, my bag, a carton of milk and a small selection of other odds and ends on the dresser in my hallway. I kicked off my shoes, sprinted into the bog for a pee. (The variety in my life is staggering, yes?) When I came out of the bog I reached for the mail but it was gone. I looked on the floor, the kitchen counter, the vanity in the bog. Nothing. Then I pulled the dresser away from the wall a few inches, and behind it was my little pile of mail. Sitting atop another very dusty little pile of mail. Now normally this wouldn't be of any concern to me whatsoever. The bills come in, I pay them - I don't necessarily open them - I just pay them because they don't change much. I'm not sure exactly why, but this time I opened all of it, and was not remotely surprised to find out that it was largely the same old shit. Phone bill - paid already. Visa bill - paid already ( and by 'paid' I mean, paid enough to keep them off my back for yet another month but nowhere near paid off. Life is debt. I've made my peace with that). Mastercard - paid already (Ditto). Cable/ internet bill - you get the drift. The last piece I opened threw me for a bit of a loop. It was a lateslip from the library telling me that I had two overdue books which I should return and pay the fines immediately. I had absolutely no recollection of any overdue books. That's when I looked at the titles of the books and the name on the letter and was mortified to discover that it was not me! The letter was addressed to my neighbour, who I have never seen. I didn't even know someone lived there.

So here's the moral dilemma I faced. The admirable course of action would have been to seal the letter, knock on the neighbour's door, explain what happened, apologise profusely, insist that I never completely read the letter or the titles of the books ( since they were books about a medical condition with a bit of a stigma - nothing dangerous or contagious, just horribly embarrassing), offer to return the books for her and pay any additional fines incurred since the day I received the letter. That is what social responsibility and common decency told me to do.

What I wound up doing, and I'm not at all proud of this, was popping the letter into a larger envelope with an anonymous note saying "I got your mail by mistake. Sorry for the inconvenience.", shoving it under her door and bolting from the scene before she had time to lift her arse off the couch.

Shredding the damned thing and playing dumb crossed my mind but that, I am reasonably certain, is punishable by jail time, so I nixed the idea. I also considered going to the library and quietly paying the fine, but with my luck I would have got a scathing lecture from the dour librarian with absolutely no sense of ha-ha, just like I did that one time I opened my M and Ms packet too loudly and interrupted the other patrons. Again, not an option. This is all probably irrelevant since the library folks ring you and leave an automated message about ten days after they send you a notice, so my neighbour likely returned the books, paid the fine and got on with her life a good six weeks ago. I really must get over the guilt. Am I overthinking this?

They put fitting rooms in shops for a very good reason...

This is how the exchange probably should have occurred:

Me: Hi there, I'd like to return these pants, please.

Twelve year old assistant manager, hereafter referred to as Assman12: Certainly, may I have your receipt, please?

Me: Of course."

(Assman12 pushes a few buttons on the cash register, makes some small talk about the weather and the new spring line, gives me a new receipt.)

Assman12: Here you are, madam. I'm sorry they weren't suitable, but please come and see us again. Thank you."

Me: No, thank you. (Exit shop).

Here's how the exchange actually occurred:

(I walk into the shop, a bustling little hive of industry, and see Assman 12 behind the counter folding merchandise, another sales assistant ringing up a sale and two others discussing the mammoth snowfall of the night before with each other and a few browsing customers. I take a look through the rack of pants closest to the door then approach the counter.)

Me: Hello, I'd like to return these jeans, please. I have a receipt and I just bought them last week.

Assman12: Certainly, madam. What seems to be the problem?

Me: They don't fit properly.

Assman12: Did you not try them on in the store?

Me: No, they are the same style and size as the ones I have on but they are a mile big. (Refreshing change, incidentally, as things are usually a mile small for me.) I'd like them in a size smaller.

Assman12: Do we have any more in stock? (I assume she is asking the other staff members or just thinking out loud, but I answer anyway.)

Me: I looked but you don't seem to have any in the smaller size.

Assman12: Really?

(Assman12 steps out from behind the counter, walks past me to the rack that I have just checked, in full view of her, and riffles through them one by one.)

Assman12: Hmmm, we don't have a size smaller.

(Assman12 returns to the counter, takes a blue tape measure from around her neck and measures the pants.)

Assman12: The label says they're a size 8 but they seem to be more like a 10. (Keep in mind that this is one of those fashionable big girl shops, so with the 8/10 thing I'm taking huge liberties, but there's no bloody way in hell I'm telling you my real size. Let's just call it fiction and move on, shall we?)

(Assman12 steps back over to the rack, pulls another size 8 and measures them.

Assman12: Here, try these on. Sometimes they get labelled wrong.

(I humour her and try them on, even though I am about to be late for the evening's festivities - stuffing my trap with leftover shepherd's pie and watching The Biggest Loser. I step into the dressing room, take off my boots breaking a lace in the process, take off the old jeans, put on the new jeans which happen to be miles too big as well. I am now slightly encouraged that my arse is not quite as big as I had thought, since surely two pairs of pants can't be wrong, and pissed off at having broken the lace for nothing. And I understand that it would have eventually broken anyway, but this is not the best time. It's difficult to authoritatively demand customer satisfaction when you're dragging your foot behind you like Quasimodo, trying to keep your shoe from falling off. I fold the pants and take them to the counter where Assman12 is engrossed in a conversation about adjustable bra strap extensions with a buxom older woman whose hooters hang so low that mere adjustable bra strap extensions would almost certainly not solve the problem. But it's none of my business. I scan the shop for another sales assistant but they have all disappeared, like triple fudge brownies at a Weight Watchers meeting. I spin the earring rack and have a look while Assman12 measures the missus for a bra.)

Assman12: Did you know that seventy percent of women wear the wrong size bra?

Me: Did you know that one hundred percent of me is wearing the wrong size pants? Can I have your attention again, please? (Okay, I didn't say it, but I wanted to, and could you really blame me if I had? The second the missus steps into the fitting room I'm all over Assman12 like stink on shit before someone else gets to her. She takes my receipt, punches numbers into the cash register and hands me a new receipt.)

Me: Don't you need my credit card?

Assman12: Not for an exchange.

Me: I'm sorry. I think you misunderstood. I'd like my credit card to be reimbursed. The other jeans are too big too.

Assman12: Really? They're big too? (Again, she takes out the tape measure.) Well, these ones are two inches smaller in the waist than the other ones.

Me: I'm sure they are but they still don't fit. Can I just have my money back, please? Time is a bit of an issue unfortunately.

(Assman12 forces a smile, picks up my receipt and furiously assaults the keys on the cash register. When she finishes, she hands me another receipt.)

Assman12: Thank you. You have a great night. (It is quite clear that she doesn't mean it.)

(I leave the shop happy that I have succeeded in getting my money back and determined never to shop there again, although when your can is the size of a chevy there are few other options.)

Tonight, we hunker!

It is effing snowing again! Okay, I know that back in December I talked about how lovely the falling snow was and how festive and Christmassy I was feeling and how the weather outside was frightful but the fire was so delightful, but I am, emphatically, over it. I still love a good snowstorm but this is getting ridiculous. The weatherman said that this will be the worst storm of the season. They're predicting up to fifty centimetres of snow which is hard to imagine if you don't get much snow, but 50 cms is a buttload of snow, especially when you consider that the city has yet to move the 27 cms we got on Wednesday and the who knows how much we got last Saturday. At the end of the lot where I park my car there is a townhouse with the kitchen window looking out on to the street. The little woman who lives there with her teenagers can often be seen sitting and sipping her morning coffee and watching the world go by. Little snippets of other people's lives, even people we never speak to and don't really know, can become part of our routine. They can comfort us when our own lives occasionally spin out of control. I have not seen this woman since the end of December because the snow is piled up five feet above her window! She could be trapped under something heavy for all I know. I have to admit, it's somewhat unsettling, although curiously, not quite unsettling enough for me to walk the twenty extra steps, knock on her door and say "Hi, I'm Helen. Just popping round to make sure you're alright and not pinned under your fridge." I tell myself that the teenagers would have called 911 by now if something were amiss, and if I'm wrong and she is trapped under her fridge, there's a pretty good chance she won't answer the door when I knock.

I'm ready for the birds to return, the sunshine, the stench of dead earthworms after the rain, the eighty-three cents in loose change I will find in the street after the snow melts. I'm ready for Easter eggs and tulips and a clean car and sandals and a pedicure and pink polish on my toes. But it is quite clear that none of that will be happening any time soon. So I suppose I should just stay in my jams, make more tea, hunker down and enjoy sitting in my favourite chair, reading, while fifty centimetres of shit, crap and corruption furiously batters my living room window.

Behind This Door Lies Untold Horrors

I have made an accidental scientific discovery, on the same scale as Dr. Whatsisname and the penicillin growing, unencumbered, on the back of a copper penny. Or not. Here it is: The molecules in tonic water are so powerful that they can penetrate the walls of an aluminium can with enough force to produce a full-scale geyser effect. This is all speculation of course, since I didn't actually observe it, but doesn't every scientific discovery begin as speculation? After careful examination of the evidence I arrived at this conclusion.

Last night, in a rare moment of industry, I decided it was time to rid my apartment of the many weeks' worth of putrefying filth I had allowed to accumulate since the purchase of the coma-inducing couch. I began with the fridge. Not too bad actually - some questionable leftovers, half a bottle of recently-expired Newman's Own, three liquefied Brussels sprouts (I think) and enough onion skins to stuff a queen size mattress, but miraculously, no stink. (Note to self: The reason you don't have a boyfriend might have something to do with the reek of your breath resulting from eating all those onions. I'm just saying.) I moved on to the bathroom - soap scum, lime, rust, a plug of hair in the shower drain - the usual suspects. Vile, to be sure, but understandable. Then, when I probably should have packed it in, put on my jams and curled up on the White Wondercouch to gorge myself on snack foods and watch The Biggest Loser (yes, I see the hypocrisy, no, I don't care), I decided, in a blinding flash of inspiration, insanity or both, to mop and polish the kitchen floor. I opened the pantry/ utility cupboard door and the broom fell, obediently, into my hands. As I swept, I was appalled, but hardly surprised, by the festering heap of dust and grit that had lain scattered all over the tile floor which connects the bathroom, hall and kitchen. The breeze created when I closed the bathroom door blew it across the expanse of tile so that it rolled like a tumbleweed in a John Wayne film. I brushed it into the dustpan, emptied it into a bag and tied it securely so none of it could escape. It was when I opened the pantry again to get out the bucket and Vileda Twist Mop (the best mop ever - you can machine wash the mop head, not that I ever have) that I noticed, when I bent over to retrieve the bucket from behind a sack of potatoes and a beer case, that the box of corn flakes on the bottom shelf was covered in thick, viscous, transparent goo. What the f*ck, I wondered. A quick think and I was sure that I hadn't dropped anything sticky. I thought about tasting it, but I remembered chemistry class 1985, when the delicious Mr. Capeling emphasized that some of the deadliest toxins known to man are clear, colourless and tasteless. Although I was reasonably certain that there were no such poisons in my pantry, I wasn't taking any chances. Until five minutes before I hadn't thought there were any mysterious sticky messes in my pantry either. I pitched the corn flakes, took a quick look around, chalked it up to a spilled diet 7 UP and reached for the bucket. You can imagine my horror when I found the bucket stuck to the floor. I was beginning to worry. How is it possible to have a mess of this magnitude in one's flat and have absolutely no recollection of it whatsoever?

I took everything from the floor out of the pantry so that I could better assess the situation. There was a large petrified puddle of liquid sticky on the floor next to where the bucket had been and hundreds of droplets surrounding it. Something, I thought, isn't right. Whatever they sweeten diet 7 UP with isn't this sticky. I decided that the entire pantry would have to be purged, scrubbed and, quite possibly, fumigated before I settled for the night. Virtually everything on the bottom shelf had sticky splatters. I took all of it out and piled it on the countertop. The middle and top shelves weren't quite as bad - only a few cans, some bags of pasta and a sack of basmati rice were affected. I took everything out, piece by piece, and became more and more perplexed with each item. The gooey drips I spotted all down the wall were quite distressing. Then I cleared away a few packets of instant gravy mix (bought before I figured out that single people can simply pop into the colonel's and order a small gravy to go with their mashed potatoes), a box of macaroni and cheese (a staple of the single person's diet), two cans of Chunky Steak and Potato (the soup that eats like a meal), a jar of Madras simmering sauce (which I haven't tried yet but I'm sure is delicious) and a box of Multi Grain Cheerios (the best cereal ever). Behind all of that I found a forgotten clutch of five cans of tonic water, which led me to realize (a) I must clean out my pantry more often and (b) I must increase my gin consumption if perfectly good tonic water is being abandoned and forgotten. I took all of it out and when I picked up the last can of tonic I was stunned to discover that it was empty. Not slightly depleted. Not half full. Empty. Not enough moisture to fuel a decent kiss. Here's the kicker though : the tin was perfectly sealed. I examined it thoroughly for dents, cracks and puncture marks. Nothing. The ring top was still firmly in place. The seal was definitely intact. I suppose there exists the slightest possibility that it went into the pantry empty in the first place, but I'm certain I would have noticed when I took it out of the case. It must be the culprit, I decided. There was, of course, still the question of the sticky . Tonic water couldn't possibly be sticky, could it? It's water after all. I read the label, and again I was stunned to discover that one shitty little tin of tonic water has thirty four grams of sugar. Thirty. Four. Grams! How does something with thirty four grams of sugar not taste sweet? For years now I've been sucking back G & Ts like water at dinner parties, weddings and social events and wondering why my thighs rub together when all along I've been bathing my fat cells in concentrated sugar, completely oblivious. Needless to mention, I'll be drinking my gin with soda from now on.

The only conclusion I could draw from the whole fiasco was that the molecules in tonic water are so powerful that they can penetrate the walls of an aluminium can with enough force to produce a full scale geyser effect. If anyone reading this or the good people at Schweppes can offer another explanation, I'm all ears.

There is a silver lining to this story : Now that I have purged, scrubbed and sanitized my pantry I don't have to do it next month as part of my spring cleaning routine, freeing up much more time for slouching on the White Wondercouch, listening to the chirping of the birds and sipping gin and sodas.

New Couch : The Death of Motivation

I'm not sure exactly why but I haven't been motivated to write since before Christmas. I suppose it might have something to do with the lovely new couch I bought and have not wanted to lift my backside off of since the day it was delivered. After years of slouching on the ages-old green monster until there was an arse-shaped dent the diameter and depth of a meteor crater, I decided that, money permitting or not, it was time to look for something half comfortable. I quickly found a beautiful, reasonably priced, cream-coloured (one of the perks of not having children is that it allows you the luxury of having cream-coloured things) three-seat sofa which I snapped up immediately. I arranged to have it delivered but, in my drunken excitement, I failed to make arrangements to have the green monster removed. The upshot is that for two long weeks I lived with both of them crammed into a living room the size of an egg carton until finally, after calling every charity in the known universe, none of which were remotely interested in an ages-old green couch with a sizeable dent and a large wadge of carpentry glue melded into the upholstery, I wrestled the sucker into the elevator and down four floors to the parking lot. I was sure that someone would be able to use it, after all, the pullout mattress still had plenty of wear left in it, but the lady at the Sally Ann assured me that they don't accept even the most pristine sofa beds due to health codes. You could never be sure what went on in sofa beds, she said. I assured her that none of that had gone on in it, or anywhere else in my apartment for quite some time, to which she replied "I hear ya, sister", chuckled and hung up. I rang the people at city hall and informed them that there would be a large item for pick up on garbage day and the lovely woman who answered the phone seemed quite impressed that I had taken the initiative and warned them. Sadly, she apparently did not relay the message to the bin men as it sat there gathering snow and who knows what else for nine days, a grim reminder of my years of discomfort. I can only assume that the bin men eventually grew tired of looking at it too and finally removed it.

Anyway, my point is that I have hardly written lately. I've scribbled down bits and pieces here and there but my usual drive to get 1000 words a day, even 1000 words of drivel, left me. I told myself that everyone takes some down time after the holidays. It's the de rigeur January slump. But it's now well into February and, if I'm being completely honest, I have just become lazy. I have never had an eight week dry spell. If I don't write for two days I begin to worry that I have dried up and have absolutely nothing to offer the literary fraternity and my time might be better spent writing warning labels on cigarette packets or assembly instructions for cheap bookcases at Ikea. Those of you who have read bits of the Effing Novel From Hell might agree. But the laziness must stop.

I am a firm believer that inspiration is not something that strikes like some divine bolt from the blue. Rather, it comes from hours, often days, of slogging through umpteen pages of shit until one little nugget of truth starts a chain reaction and you're off. No more sitting on my can, watching reruns and stuffing myself with things that are bad for me and lamenting about my utter lack of talent. Time to extract the digit, get out a pen and turn off the television. I have umpteen pages of shit to write.