Twister part II

Oh yeah, and last night at Mary & Mary's Twister cocktail party, an astounding number of men I've never met before told me they surely knew me from somewhere. Bizarre. But the strangest of all was one that went away muttering, "maybe from rugby." ?????

Anyway, I'm actually off to watch Nick's rugby game over at Laurier park. Maybe I'll run into the guy.

boycott Korova

Did I ever think I would say that? Korova, which I loved from the first moment I wandered in and landed in a crowd of kids jumping to Franz Ferdinand. Where I've pretty much spent the last two years, since back when Amy was trying bartending there, and we weren't ejected at 3am.

Oh, countless foosball tournaments, the time I won at pool, using the window to spy on the street below... just a ton of personal memories.

But, honestly, who is that bald loser? Last night there was, get this, a *line up* to get in. And next to the line-up was a constant stream of exodus, with each person telling us that the place was nowhere near crowded and they didn't understand the line. What made me furious though was this guy at the door yelling at people: "can't you even follow basic instructions?" But the very same "smart" guy would yell down "line up over here"... and not say "to the right, to the left, in the center". Where the hell is "over here", dude, we can't even see you from down here, but we still get to enjoy your insults. Oh, yes, I'm dying to go into your bar.

Worse, worse, worse: after choosing the foosball and drinks next door for a while, we got a call from inside Korova to go back. No more line. Well, at the end of the night, Mr. I Own This Place So I Am Entitled To Be A Skank is being equally rude to the Djs, who as usual are the principal point of going to Korova in the first place. I hope they quit.

And I hope he sits on a hot plate.

Twister

Something I realized this week (and you'll see how ironic this is in a sec) is how quickly I forget things. Say I'll have this brilliant, supposedly life-changing realization. Well, reading my 2004 diary entries the other day, I discovered that two years ago I was experiencing practically the very same "life-changing" "realizations", I've just forgotten all about them in the meantime! In fact, if I remember correctly, I forgot them about two seconds after thinking of them; at the very instant some goodlooking, nice boy walked into the scene. Damn!

Dr. Phil says (I will start sentences like this unapologetically) that the past is the best predictor of future behaviour. Does that mean that at age 31 I'm locked in whatever pattern I've been playing out since god knows when? And even this train of thought I'm having right now has been played out in my mind before, who knows how many times? And when I say "who knows" don't ask me: my mind is swiss cheese.

So what should I do? Dr. Phil says (uh-huh) that the only thing that can change the pattern of past behaviour is some seriously dramatic event. He doesn't usually give examples when he says this, so I'm not sure if going "oh my god! look what i'm doing, i'm repeating things!" constitutes a dramatic event. Feels dramatic, but is probably low on the global scale of drama. I wonder, does this mean I should be *more* dramatic? Relax, that was a joke.

For now I've taken the analytical observer pose. That means, I'm sort of stalking myself. Watching and waiting. I take mental notes and then I tell myself all about them, in lengthy conversations over hot cocoa and biscuits. We chatter all night, me and myself. Sometimes we don't see eye to eye, but in the end, we're good pals. I wonder what will happen, though, as soon as some goodlooking, nice boy walks in the room mid-chatter.

Kickball is like Life

Well, another game of kickball with the girls & boys. In case you haven't noticed, kickball (soccer-baseball where I come from - oh wait, that's Montreal) is a big thing these days. Like this year's Ultimate, only cooler because we care less. Everyone knows coolness is inversely related to your level of ernestness. Which makes me terribly un-cool, but anyway...

There are leagues of kickball players, and it was the sport du jour this summer for 20 & 30 somethings, and since I'm a 30something who hangs out with 20somethings, it works out nicely.

I kind of wasn't feeling it today though. Possibly related to being 30something among 20somethings, what do I know. But, *as in life*, I sucked it up and played. Not my best game, I admit. I'm an usually enthusiastic kickball player (unsual since I was kicked out of softball when I was 10 for "not hustling enough" and I'm an astoundly unathletic person) but not tonight. Still, *as in life*, it was worth it to stick it out. Good for the health, you know?

I saw a man getting arrested on my way to the game. The cops were telling him to put his arms out on the chainlink fence and he was, like, "whoa, calm down", as though they were at a picnic, and the cops had just given him another beer. Geez.

I also saw a man's penis today, which should not be such a special occasion but it was. I was walking along Napoleon and arrived at Laval. In front of me was an apartment's window and something on the other side caught my attention. I was absent-mindedly staring as I crossed the street toward it when I suddenly realized... is that a...? I think it is! First I thought it was a plastic penis, a toy. But as I came closer, I saw that it was a real penis, attached to a real man. The guy was obviously an exhibitionist: he was standing by the window, facing out, with the blinds drawn to his waist level, wearing a t-shirt and nothing else (maybe socks, I couldn't see that far down). And there was his manhood, lettin' it all hang out in the fall afternoon sun, just standing there. It was quite a nice one too, but I had to laugh. The whole situation was so bizarre.

My first exhibitionist and I'm 31 and three-quarters.

The Double

I'm addicted to quickening my breath, to the verge of fainting or wanting to throw up, which I don't. I don't know why, and I won't admit how I do it, but I do.

I'll put it like this: when I was young, and we lived in tranquil Montreal West, I would leave our house in the middle of the night just to walk around the block and be outside in the dark, when there was no one else there. As a grown-up, in the city, this sounds normal. But in MoWest, there really is no one on the street at night that should be there. Another thing I liked to do was lie in the middle of my street, because I knew no cars were coming but they *could* be. I know it all sounds lame now, but it was thrilling, and that's what I'm talking about. Making a contemporary, white, comfortably well-off, sometimes traumatic, but socially well adapted life exhilarating, if only in my imagination.

And then I spend the other half of my time trying not to be like this at all, because I actually despise it. It's like those kids who feel compelled to eat crap on a dare. Of course it's disgusting, but the worst part isn't the crap, it's your stupid addiction to doing it. The part you can't control.

Do you ask people questions you don't want to hear the answer to? Have you read someone else's email? Do you eavesdrop on people talking about your loved ones? Do you read the gruesome news that haunts you? Did you ever ask a kid to beat you up? Do you sabotage? And if so, can you tell me why?