Sexo y la Ciudad

Y se acabó. Terminé de ver cada capítulo de Sex & The City (salvo por la cuarta temporada, que nunca estuvo disponible en mi video club). Gran e inesperado final.

Pasé por un montón de emociones viendo el programa en sus 6 temporadas. Y soy una persona bastante emocional, así que no es difícil imaginarse los mil y un caminos por donde me llevó la serie. No me esperé, eso sí, el final. Me hizo pensar en las amigas que tengo ... en Santiago. Y justo me meto al MSN y ahí está la Bubi tirándome mil trescientos piropos. ¡Qué rico que te quieran y que te lo griten! Qué rico oír hablar de pisco sours, y la Vero que me dice que preferiría hablar conmigo por teléfono de mi ex-barrio. Antonia Zegers, ¡te compro MI departamento!

Qué rico pensar en el viaje que hará la Mariana, a reecontrarse con la amistad.

No es algo en lo que quiera concentrarme en este momento de mi vida, pero tengo que admitir que hay un gran pedazo de mi corazón que no vive aquí conmigo, sino muy lejos, en una tierra relativamente nueva y a la vez antiquísima para mí. Como una persona que, quien sabe por qué, pero sabes que siempre te aceptaría devuelta. Y no sólo te aceptaría sino que te haría un gran hueco a su lado y te diría "esto es todo tuyo".

Pero no hoy.

Video & The Single Girl

I'm picking up speed. I went to yoga twice this week, after I finally got paid. Who knew participating in a worldwide genetic study could put such a dent in my finances. Anyway, I think I'll go more often this coming week too. I can still feel the wear in my muscles and I want to go until that eases. Until I'm really used to it and those muscles have redeveloped from slack-dom. Is this why other people go to the gym?

I just wish there was a multi-yoga-studio pass. You know how each studio has passes that make each class you attend cheaper than paying as you go? Well, what if -like me- you go once to Corps a Coeur (on St Denis), once to Lyne St-Roch (on St. Laurent) and once to L'Institut de Yoga & Meditation (on Mount Royal)? I think there should be a pass sort of like the Access Montreal card, that lets you get in for less in different places around town.

I'm a pretty lazy yoga-er. I went to a Yoga I class on Friday, even though that's below my level of yoga-skills. And worse than that, I faked the stretches for the half-arc. Tee hee. Karmic punishment? I forgot my mat at the studio.

***

After drinks with Cecilia at Réservoir, I stopped by the video store for some good old-fashioned Sex & The City. Season Four, I am disappointed to report, is STILL out. And why do they only have one copy of it, while they have multiple copies of the other seasons? What is about Season Four, my god??

Ok, but the really scary-sad thing was that the video store was PACKED with... single women. I wanted to distance myself from them ("I'm not really single; my boyfriend is just out of town") but mostly I was just amazed. I also thought how happy the guy behind the counter must have felt. He can pick up without even leaving the job.

And as a card-carrying single girl for the weekend, I dutifully picked up 6 DVDs worth of STC plus one movie Tom never wants to take out: Palindromes, by Todd Solonz. Remember that other movie he directed, Happiness? Oh, good times, with my friend Juan Luis, watching Lara Flynn Boyle throw herself on the bed and tug at her hair in the "I'm such a fraud, why wasn't I raped when I was 12" scene.

***
I think BOM needs to add Best Manicure, and I recommend Art Nails, on St. Denis & Marie Anne. Shu-wey!!

Love for Sale

I don't know why I haven't cleaned the tub yet. It's not like I've been busy doing much else. It's sort of like Talking Heads's "I was born in a house with the television always on" around here this week. Max Headroom, remember? You had to put a blanket on the tv to "turn it off".

I had some fantasies of going to the good old Westmount library today. They're open until 9pm weeekdays. But my membership from the merged-city days lapsed (lapsed is better than expired, I hear) last May and do you know how it much it costs to become a member if you don't live in the fine city of Westmount, Quebec? It costs $119 a year.

If I haven't been to the library since last May, do you think I'm going to pay $119 to maybe take a book out this year? Na-uh.

Anyway, back to the original topic, it's too cold and wet to go out anyway. My TV loves me, it told me so.

PS: a search for images of "love for sale" comes up with a lot of porn... for free.

I still haven't cleaned the tub

(up there: a view 20 minutes ago from my window)

But I thought of a few other things I wanted to talk about.

Jeff Ltd. Have you seen that show? I was THIS close to writing an email to CTV to tell them: how can you put on a show about a 'ladies man' when he is so obviously flaming?! But then I felt bad about saying that. So I'm writing it in my blog instead, heh heh.

***

Last Saturday Tom and I went to my friend Cecilia's Pump Up The Volume party. She and some of her friends got someone's work loft; rented lights, speakers and a disco ball; and put on an 80s party. Hearing the song Tainted Love brought me all the way back to the Santiago club, Blondie, where I did most of my 80s dancing in the 90s.

People seemed really nice at the party. A good crowd of Quebexicans, as Tom likes to call us. EVEN THOUGH WE'RE NOT MEXICAN...! :) Chilequebes is a good alternative, although more nation-specific.

***

On Sunday we went to see this local documentary at Ex-Centris, Les Barbiers. The paper said it had French subtitles so we mistakenly thought that meant it was in English. Wishful thinking. I think Tom said he understood 2% of it. It was mostly French, some of which was "joualment" indecipherable to me. Some Italian, some Greek. It was a cute look at some old barbers, that dying profession. There was also a second generation younger barber who seems to be doing well by expanding into more modern "trimming" techniques. Nothing x-rated, no worries. One poor guy in Trois-Rivieres didn't seem to ever have any business at all. How do people like that survive economically?

***
I just spent several minutes going over my answers to the Mirror's Best of Montreal before getting to the part that says the cut-off date was April 21. Oh.

I just wanted to say Andrew Chang of CTV is my favourite male reporter. Annie De Melt, of course, is my favourite female one. My favourite Montreal blog -cough, cough- is jgallagher.blogspot.com. And the best minority? QUEBEXICANS!

Classifieds

My friend Sebastian is showing his moving La Sagrada Familia* at the Tribeca Film Fest this weekend in New York. I *reeeeeeaaaally* wish I could go but I think my finances are against me. Somehow, the money's all gone and I don't remember the party.

I was checking out the McGill Classifieds and even craiglist (ie total crazy strangers who aren't even necessarily students at a reputable university) for rideshares but there's way more people who NEED a lift than people offering one.

***

Somehow I find myself watching Hockey Night in Canada. Ever since my little anthropologic experiment at the Tap Room on Rachel, I actually *care*. I'm pretty happy now, since we're beating the Hurricanes 3-0 and I know the last game we won 6-0. Of course, I don't even know if the 'Canes (saw that on tv) are from North or South Carolina. North, I think... heheh.

***

Le Petit Tomburger has flown away on Air Canada wings to visit his mother on Vancouver Island. Remember how nice the pictures I sent were? Well, he says it's even more beautiful this time of year. Damn! We had a great lunch at Prato today. I have an entire veggie lasagna in my stomach as I write. Yuuuummm!!

I think I'm supposed to be doing all the things Tom's not really interested in doing right now... ie renting Seasons Four and Six of Sex & The City (oh yeah, and WHO has season 4?? They never return it to the video store! it's never in!) and going to see Friends with Money -because it's a "chick flick" apparently- and... uh, doing laundry? I'll probably just clean the tub every day. Isabelita's favourite pastime. Maybe Tom's roommates will let me in to do their bathroom and kitchen sometime.

*you may recall he showed it here in Montreal last September and everyone who I sent to see it really liked it. He's since won all kinds of awards for it.

do you know where I can find a sublet for August?

I'm looking for a sublet to house my mother when she comes for her vacation this summer. Here are some preferences:

- available during August
- in the Plateau
- furnished
- Rent under $1000
- ideally near Park Lafontaine's west side, or anywhere between there and the Ghetto.
- ideally furnished in a manner befitting one's mother
- ideally a lot closer to $500

Got it? Now, even if you don't know a place like that, do you know a website that offers apartments like that for sublet or short term rental? Send it to me!! Thanks :)

the nightmare

I woke up at 5 this morning, from a pretty scary nightmare. I was driving with my dad along a beach, looking for a body. The beach was actually strewn with bodies, of women with their hands tied behind their backs, looking like you would if someone had beat you with a sack of oranges. Toward the end of the beach I saw one of them move. This woman had short blonde hair, now I can’t be sure if she had glasses or not. But she was definitely missing the bottom half of a leg. She looked like all the other women –naked, bruised, hands tied behind her back- but she was alive! Obviously, someone had left her there for dead, on this beach where apparently it was ok to leave dead bodies.

My dad turned the car around and I felt we should do something, even though it seemed scary to stop and talk to her. Kind of like how it would be scary to talk to a ghost. So I rolled down the window and asked her if we should call 911. I know it sounds weird now, *asking* if we should call emergency, but it made sense at the time.

In the next scene my dad and I were being interviewed by some cops. I thought they seemed slightly suspicious, like they thought my father was responsible for this woman’s attempted murder. THAT was scary too. What if he WAS? I remember one of the items in that scene was a notepad where there were words written in red pen, the kind of pen my dad had said he preferred. I don’t know, it was all bizarre. The REALLY scary part for me came when I offered to get the men some coffee or something.

I went to the other room, and I was just thinking how much I enjoyed doing that: getting coffee, serving them all and making them feel good, when I saw a strange man at the window! The window was open, he was obviously not friendly, and I felt paralyzed. I tried to scream but nothing would come out. It was awful. Finally, I managed to run out the room into where my dad and the cops were. And that’s when I made myself wake up and think about something else.

***

The other Axel has thoughtfully sent me something called The Four Truths of Buddha. He says it helped him and he hopes it will help me. I’m just happy to get it.

nos divertimos en primavera

en fin. el fin. terminé. quieren saber más? escríbanme o llámenme. todo será mejor.

***

It's finally a super sunny Sunday in Montreal. Time for a new season, I guess. Of trying again, all over again, like every time. I don't think I "choose the wrong men", thank goodness. I think I choose very nice guys, actually. There's a reason why I'm friends with most of them. But I do think I'm always pushing, always trying to get a little more... even when the material in my hands just won't take any more. The material being the relationship, not the man.

And I think I'm one of those women who puts all her eggs in another guy's basket. "Please take care of these for me, and get them safely to market". I wish I didn't do that, but I can't really imagine ME not doing that.

There's a hole in the basket/bucket, dear Liza, and I guess I should at least *try* to fill it myself before I ask someone else to. I wish myself luck with that.

Ps I've enabled text messaging on my cell again. Text away!

& the City

So I'm midway through Season Two of Sex & the City. I saw Season One on my laptop already. And it's a little freaky how much I identify with some of the subjects they bring up. It's weird, because I saw a lot of these episodes on actual HBO when they were aired the first time around (or second, or third) and I don't remember getting it so much. Maybe it's because I wasn't 31 then, and I think Carrie's character is about 32 in Season Two. But then again, I wasn't 31 when most of the stories I'm reminded of happened...

There's too many to go through, and, you know, I don't want them to be misunderstood. My connection to them, I mean. But sooo many!

The only thing missing from my life -now or in the past- are the Manolos, the Kate Spades, the Guccis, the Hamptons...

a letter to Amy

As you predicted, there was a little get-together last night, after Steve passed his comprehensive exam. He said it felt a bit anti-climatic because it isn't totally over and he still has to hand in a 12-page document. But at least he passed! Congratulations, Steve!

Brian, Brianna, Bruno, Greg, Grae, Rob, Graham, Tom and I went to Tap Room, on Rachel, and watched the Canadians beat the Bruins 5-3. I don't think I'd ever watched a hockey game at a sports bar before. It was pretty exciting actually. They even rang a bell when the Canadians scored to put themselves in the lead. We ate peanuts, everyone but me drank pints of beer (you know I don't drink beer; I had vodka tonic), and when we left after the game, Grae, Brianna, Greg and Tom had a snowball fight. I was no fun: I hid behind a stranger having a cell phone conversation at the door of the bar to avoid getting hit. And then I ran away, teehee.

Since I know you are a social butterfly, I'll tell you that the next anxiously awaited event is Brian's 24-hour birthday party this Saturday. Now THAT will be exciting. Tom's roommates are really looking forward to it too, and so is my friend Sarah. I think few people will actually make it across the 24 hours, but secretly I think if I wanted to, I could. Just tooting my own horn here, but I was always good at marathon parties when I felt like it. The secret? PACE. The more moderately you drink, the more likely you won't fall asleep before 9am.

On to other things. For lunch today I made Smashed Potatoes with Basil Pesto (that's kind of redundant, but that was the name of the recipe). I think it would have been even better with the basil from your garden. :) My own herb garden (crappy webcam photo attached) is doing really well. Tom gave me the set for Christmas. My friend Enza said she had one and they all died after transplantation (after the threat of frost, you plant them outside) but I'm hoping that's not a rule. We already killed OUR-chid Napoleon, I don't want to have some kind of gardening curse. I mean, if you can't take care of a plant, what can you take care of?

Today would have been a good day to play hooky with you and just watch the sun change position on the wall, Amy. I'm really crazy to get out of this job. I'm hugely disappointed, and... I should do like they did in that movie, what was it called ? "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to put up with it anymore!".

Anyway. Hope spring is looking better in the Greater Toronto area. Hope to see you soon.

Step Inside

Click on this and listen to the song in my head...

01 Step Inside.m4a
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Looking for...

A brighter, better future, like a European sailing the unknown Atlantic just in case she finds that on the other side.

The things I believe are basic and true, and that I must have: like sunshine, a plan, a winning scavenger team that’s always looking to recruit new members.

A better job.

A bigger kitchen, but the for the same rent.

The right balance of squalor and sophistication.

Movies and real-life adventure. Making everything from an imaginary road movie to a Dogma 95 film. In Danish.

A gang of midnight art saboteurs to hang out with once in a while.