Potassium warning!

Caution: When you see a man coming down the aisle with a shopping cart laden with bunches and bunches of bananas DO NOT: give him a cheerful smile and say, "Say hi to your monkeys for me!"

The response, I learned today, is "Go fuck yourself."

Public Service Announcement: beware of fibre

Buyer beware! 

There's a new yogurt variety on the shelves. It's yogurt with fibre and if you're not watching carefully it could end up in your shopping cart, and worse: in your tummy.

Is this a conscious marketing strategy where the label of the new product is designed to blend in with the original label so that people will try the new shit by mistake? For all these occasions when they need to pay their innovation staff but they don't actually have a very good new idea? 

Anyway if you like the idea of yogurt that feels like gritty lawn debris and floor sweepings have been lovingly stirred in then you got nothing to worry about. Otherwise watch out for this sort of thing:

If it were up to me they'd be mandated to label in this manner:

I get it, Metro. I'm irrelevant.

December 20, 2021: Nothing in my kitchen but Kraft Dinner and soup. I place a $226 order with Metro Ontario Inc supermarket for delivery December 21, 6-8PM. This leaves $2 in my bank account.

December 21, 2021: I sit at the front door in my walker waiting from 6PM until 10:30PM. No delivery ever arrives. I go to bed with very little food and no money

December 22, 2021, 6AM: I submit a problem ticket through the Metro Inc. web site help centre.

December 22, 2021, 9:06AM: Metro acknowledges receipt of problem ticket "Delivery Late Order" and promises "our Customer Care team will review your request and happily assist you within 24 hours."

Not 24 hours later but 49 hours later:

December 24, 2021: email from Metro reads "Unfortunately the store has asked for a rescheduling on this order so, we would ask you to contact us toll free at 1-866-595-5554 to confirm a timeslot. 

We will send you a promotional code for 25$ by email to be use on a next online grocery order. You should receive your promotional code within a week. Don't forget to check in your junk mail folder."

I reply as follows:

I am having difficulties with my phone.

I am home ALL the time. I can receive an order any time. Can you please send my order, or else refund it, ASAP? I have no money and almost no food except what you possess. Please. I am disabled, on social assistance and desperate. 

Rich Landriault

December 25, 2021: Metro delivery service is now closed for the holidays. Merry Christmas

December 26, 2021, 10:50AM: Metro informs that my order has been cancelled and my account "will be refunded." Furthermore: "We’d love to hear from you! Share your thoughts about your online grocery shopping experience and you could be eligible to win $1,000 in free groceries! "

Well, that's fucking super. While you are totally victimizing a marginalized person, you're planning something real super nice for some random dude. Well, that just warms my heart y'all mutherfuckers!

December 27, 2021, 5:35AM: I post to the Metro Ontario Food & Beverage Company facebook page:

I am disabled and trying to live on $700/month. I spent my last $226 on groceries, with my shelves bare, on Dec 20 for delivery Dec 21. No groceries have been delivered nor any explanation why not. I begged for either my food or my money and got no reply. Yesterday you cancelled my order and still I have no refund. I have spent my holidays going hungry. How can you do this to someone? I AM HUNGRY !!!!!!!!!!! "

(I'm not actually hungry because I have friends and family who have taken care of me but that is not to Metro's credit. They do not deserve to know that.)

I added this comment: "ORDER 94516646. I am not available by phone at this time, due, essentially, to financial challenges."

December 27, 2021, 7:21AM: email received from Metro: "We are sorry that you were not completely satisfied with your online shopping experience. This email is to confirm your refund on order 94516646RO. The total amount of the returned items and/or service fees will be credited to your account."

I keep hearing about this "refund" concept but I don't know what they mean by that word since to date it has not manifested in me getting my money back. To their credit they have surrendered a reply to my facebook post:

Metro Ontario

Hello Rich! We are sorry to hear about this situation. For any request for a refund of a product, you can fill this document, one of our agents will evaluate your request and will carry out the refunding for you in the next days. This can be done within 14 days of the purchase date: https://www.metro.ca/.../help-center/reimbursement-form-qc. Please be advised that your concerns will be forwarded to Metro management. In order to restore the situation as soon as possible, we also invite you to contact the dedicated online grocery service at 1-866-595-5554 #3 for any other questions. Thank you very much and once again, we are sorry for this situation!

Well, the product refund request is completely inappropriate, as is the offering of a phone number after what I just said. But at least I know they are pursuing "the restoration of the situation" which means absolutely nothing but thanks for hurling a couple words at the wall to see if they stick. They didn't.

December 28, 2021: One full week later and still no food and no money. But I am seeing the beautiful subtext of their facebook reply. Here is their reply in other words:

Dear human: We are a corporation and so we make all the rules which govern our interaction. You are just a measly human product. In order to make this perfectly clear we give you a response to your adorable mewling; a response so utterly inappropriate in every line as to make you certain that no actual human employee wasted any of our time actually comprehending anything you have to say. Your resistance is futile. Maybe you'll actually get that "refund" some day. Maybe you will even get that $25 voucher that we conveniently packaged in a junk-mail trigger format so that it will hopefully go missing.

Well fuck you, Empire! As the great Princess Leia said: "Take your broken heart, turn it into art." I give you:

Every Corporate Apology Ever

Day three

The housemate and I hit the grocery store first thing after they opened. I managed to score a 12-roll pack of poop tickets. So hooray. What little was there will not have lasted long. Or maybe they cleverly held more in the back? Sadly there were only a couple boxes of instant noodles remaining, which I grabbed. And I noticed the egg section was barren. Everything else looked fine that I noticed.

The cashiers were already stressed though their shifts had just begun. They were not pretending they wanted to be there. I thanked mine and wished her luck. She appreciated that and softened and connected.

Trust me when I say that this is the time to be grateful and not to bitch to cashiers about your dissatisfactory shopping experience. But if you are a special kind of out-of-it and do choose to bitch about your dissatisfaction to the cashier, have a look around at the human beings in line and notice the complete revulsion in their eyes. This is because you are the new terrorist/pedophile/drunk driver of the pandemic era.

We lugged our treasures back to the car, attacked the hand sanitizer and retreated back to the sanctuary, prepared for the siege.

With regards to the egg section, here's a short message from Lachlan Patterson:

U is for Unappetizing

The last two times I purchased the pre-made panini sandwiches at Metro grocery store the bread was stale, hard, unenjoyable. Useless. The last three times I purchased the prepared roasted pork loin with rosemary they were overcooked, tough as hell, dry as a bone, practically inedible.

Yeah I know; maybe I should cook for myself. Well things are tough at our house right now and using the wreckage that was once a kitchen is not an option. I'm working on a kitchenette deal down in my lair but meanwhile...

I'm not one to complain to vendors but I'm starting to resolve to change all that. I feel like there is a disease in our society where we use our absurd privileges and wealth, not to produce greater quality but to assemble systems to fuck each other over for profit. And the result is less quality. And I feel sometimes like we allow this because we're so fucking artificial we're satisfied with the appearance of quality. Like the transactions alone are enough for us. It seems like as long as we can stick our experience on facebook (the eye of the other) it doesn't matter if the experience was solid.

I've been watching too much Kitchen Nightmares with the dual hero/anti-hero Gordon Ramsay. Every time I eat now I want to say "This is disgusting! You're not even trying! You don't even care!! You've lost your passion!!"

Oh well.

I need a plastic bag or else comped for a pair of socks, please.

The socks were new after all..

Sick Boy and I were having a little write-in at one of sixty-something Scooterville Tim Horton’s locations; one recently renovated and, at this time, barely attended. I vanished from the table - briefly I expected - in order to drop off a couple wee kids at the pool.

I did so, and then discovered that the T.P. dispenser was ill equipped to dispense anything. It was as vacant as a North American politician’s heart or brain.

So I sat there, waiting for someone else to come in so that I could ask them to fetch help from the staff.

And I sat there.

I flushed… and sat there some more.

And some more.

Apparently males do not use bathrooms in this neck of the woods.

And I sat there… wondering how long before Sick Boy became concerned enough to maybe check on me or something.

And finally the lights turned off, presumably due to motion sensor inactivity.

And I sat there in the pitch dark…

And sat there.

Finally, in the dark, I kicked off a shoe…

Later I would have to find it in the dark.

Later still, I approached the young cashier at the counter and said: “You’re out of toilet paper AND soap in the men’s room.”

“Okay. Thank you.”

“And therefore I need a plastic bag or else comped for a pair of socks, please.”

Deer in headlights.

“I beg your pardon?”

“I therefore need a plastic bag in which to transport home a wet pair of socks OR ELSE I need compensation for throwing them away.”

“Um. Oh.”

“They were brand new socks,” I said, nodding, wide-eyed, as if to say, yes, you understand correctly.

“Let me talk to my manager.”

“By all means. And can I get a large hot chocolate please?”

Maybe I’ll get the drink free, I thought. I didn’t.

It’s actually a nice bag but I don’t think I’ll re-use it.

Beware of Malware

Now that my newish Dell laptop is maturing into a slightly slower, slightly more problematic machine, the free-trial McAfee software is starting to play hard to get. Thus I receive this type of welcome little pop-up every day or so:

Wow. Two hundred and sixty in the last minute? Congrats McAfee. You've  been hard at work!

Yes, I realize that when you want to know who is responsible for something (such as anti-virus creation), two of the prime criteria are: Who is the authority on the matter? (virus creators). And 2: Who profits from something (such as virus creation)? (Answer: anti-virus companies and their employees).

I know that if I was being paid to fight viruses, I'd be tempted to launch a few out there to ensure my ongoing employment.

Oh dear! Are these the mad ramblings of a conspiracy theorist!

I prefer to call  it cautionary logic. And as a matter of principal I don't do business with suspected extortionists.

Also I've become too old for porn. So really, what do I have to be worried about! I've tried to stick to mainstream web sites for years and not come down with any viruses of any consequence.

Well, except possibly for once, years ago, when I used to receive a bounty of lost-and-unreturnable  jump drives which I thought I was using carefully. But one day I received one which contained among many other things, some pictures of young people which were probably not illegal but fairly certainly betrayed a previous owner's unfortunate sexual proclivity. I deleted them but later, strangely, some of them turned up on my computer along with other bland documents not of my creation. All of this I deleted only to later find some of them, along with my own files, sitting around on a different jump drive. I don't know if this was an actual virus  or just some kind of file reconciliation process gone rogue, but after more file deleting and garbage-tossing of suspected jump drives, I've gone years without this meddlesome (and potentially reputation-damaging) phenomena turning up.

Cutting to the chase: DO NOT TRUST UNKNOWN JUMP DRIVES! I actually buy my own now. Like a big boy.

Swoopy FWG terrorizes an agoraphobic sociopath

I walked into this cafe; the Brown Dog Coffee Saloon and Frittery or some such name, where I’m to meet Chess Champ shortly. I found every table in the place occupied but approached the service counter with optimism, endured a short wait in line and procured a coffee and scone, warmed with butter. There were enough solo-held tables-for-four that I figured some enlightened soul would be happy to share one with me for the time being.

Immediately others filtered into the place and so I had competition for tables.

A young woman alone at a two-seater table began to pack up. I edged her way and went on alert for potential competing interlopers. As it became fairly clear she was intending to go and returned from the trash bin to grab her coat and purse, I drifted by with a friendly smile and asked “Are you finished with this table?”

“Oh you couldn’t wait thirty more seconds before swooping in eh?” she said while grabbing her gear and rushing away.

In fact, thirty seconds would almost certainly have resulted in my losing the table to someone else but I didn’t take the question literally, especially since she showed zero interest in receiving an answer.

I interpreted her question to mean: “CAN’T YOU SEE THAT I HATE PEOPLE AND NEED TO OPERATE IN A BUBBLE AND NOT BE TALKED TO BY TERRIFYING STRANGERS!”

And my answer is: No.

Generally I still approach my Scooterville neighbours with the assumption that they have not just been reluctantly dragged away from The Sims 4 or other such human-connection substitute to a place full of real people where their only coping mechanism is to imagine delusional reasons to be offended by us so to justify an irrational fear of us.

I do not yet run on the assumption that we live in a bubble-soccer world where we must pretend to be isolated in clear sound-proof barriers until such a time as the Mystical Magical Benign Industry Machine starts pumping these wonderful products out to every store.

I can see the day coming though, so don’t worry. I’m sure you’ll get your way before long.

I wasn’t expecting to be poisoned or sexually harassed…

Who knew?

Before Grandpa Munster could even enter the passenger seat his waft rolled over me.

“Whoa,  Gramps!”  I yelped. ”You smell terrible!”  He froze.  I’d never commented on any of his smells before.  But suddenly I’ve finally hit the breaking point. ”When did you shower last!”

“Well I normally shower every night but last night…”

As usual he touches on the subject of my question without giving me a straight answer.  Me.  And I’m the least threatening of his inquirers.

Secretive… the constant complaint.  The one which keeps him on continued supervisory orders years after anyone else would have shed them.  Or at least the shedible ones I mean…

He smells like it’s been a week.

 ”Just a minute,”  he says. ”I forgot something.”  Yeah I know. to bathe.

Which he does not elect to do here and now.  He returns with a fresh shirt steeped in Fabreeze.  He now smells like two of my four least-favorite smells gloriously combined:  unwashed old-man and fucking-fabreeze.  The other two,  if you’re keeping score, are skunk and old man who no longer knows how to wipe his ass properly.

At the Koodo store the young pup of a bewildered service rep hums and haws over their latest sale and why it’s not right for Gramps.  It’s a different pup and a different conflicting story every time.  Gramps’ flip phone is getting too old.  He needs a new one.

At the Factory Direct Store we finally find the gold mine:  an unlocked flip phone for 29 bucks.  Hooray.  But there are complications and Gramps can possibly save another 10 bucks if we go to more trouble and return another day.  It’s well worth it to me (given my time and transportation expense) to just hand him the ten bucks, but I don’t.  He’s trying to live his life with a shred of autonomy at this moment so I indulge him.

Later he and his stink are gone and I am at the McDonalds drive thru with a coupon, taking great strides toward ruining my own life.  I get two diet cokes;  no ice.  One for my ersatz dinner and another to bring to board game night with the off-seasoned Strat-o gang.  Parked under the golden arches eating discounted shit-what-sort-of-looks-like-food,  the first coke goes down satisfactorily (and naturally on the watery side).

I take a sneak preview of the second coke;  the to-go option.  And It’s all wrong.  It tastes familiar though.  Like a rum and coke or a rye and coke.  I drank a good number of those in my late teens and I remember their grodie little stench and flavor.  I drink two or three ounces trying to get a handle on it.  Rye, rum or something else?  Jack Daniels?  Is the young drive-thru kid boozing on the job?  Did he give me his own drinkie-poo by mistake?

I suddenly wonder if it could be an alcohol-based cleaning product and I vow to sip no more.

I’ve kept the drink and hope to get it tested.  I know a couple or few lab technologists after all.

Pondering this lunacy I head for game night and as I enter the neighborhood with a parallel-parked SUV up ahead,  a little girl maybe eight years old hops out of the driver’s side rear door and stands defiantly in the middle of my lane.  I slow down while she begins to dance.  And by dance I mean gyrate and shake stuff at me. Stuff I wish not have shaken at me by any child (or any adult either for that matter). This is no bird dance but rather something she must have learned from the internet when Net Nanny failed.  Then she leaps back into the car as I pass while a woman,  busy at the rear of the truck seems to have witnessed none of her daughter’s rare talents.

Skeeter Willis, the Brothers Grimm (who are both awesome and in no way grim),  the Thoughtful Educator and… another fine gentleman I haven’t benicknamed yet are present and hear the story of the decrepitude that has so recently befallen their city this day;  the City of Saints. The Thoughtful Educator takes a sniff and believes the drink smells like glass cleaner.

We play awesome games including the pirate-themed Tortuga 1667 which Brother Two has just acquired through Kickstarter and it rocks!  Very efficient, balanced arrangement of interesting components well-pinned to the theme including a hidden loyalty factor we may have not fully appreciated this first time through. You don’t know at first who your teammates are.  Oddly I’d recently been planning a very similar game dynamic in a creation based on the cylons/human intrigue of the latter Battlestar Galactica show.  I’ve been creating a lot of board games lately.  More on that some other time.

Toward the end of the night Skeeter gives me shit for not blogging.

Believe me I have wanted to.  I find it hard to explain why I don’t.  It sort of almost has to do with momentum. The longer I don’t do it the harder it gets to start again.  It’s actually five times as complex as that but the punch line is probably not worth the lengthy explanation. Also it’s all very stupid and worthy of embarrassment - which I might still be capable of experiencing?  Perhaps?

Regardless:  it seems I am back, and I would very much like to stay.

Day 7: Six things you wish you’d never done.

In reality I would not change a thing as I can not possibly track the countless twists of causality that would alter who I am today as a result. But if I must examine events worthy of regret it would be so:

1. Killing all the gym lights during the high school band performance. How long can an orchestra continue playing in the dark, you ask? About 3 seconds and for the last 2 of those, it fails to resemble the intended song. Now you know.

2. Sending JN (an ex) the letter.

3. blindly assuming I wanted all the normal things that normal people want.

4. Jumping the 12' fence.

5. Assembling a very impressive unpaid parking ticket collection. Postage stamps might have been less problematic ultimately.

6. Ordering steak at Montana's last night. They're now 0 for 3 on steaks. This time though, I allowed them to take it off the bill. Resolved: I will order ought but their ribs henceforth.

So there.

.

Obi Wan, You're my only hope!

I'm straddling residences for a couple weeks while Pan vacations leaving two psychotic Dobermanns in my care. Juggling core possessions gets tricky. Got separated from my coffee pot (oh and my toothpaste too. Don't get too close). Thus I stopped at the Evil Tim Horton's Empire on the way to my Sunday night security gig at the Big Empty Warehouse for to buy me some drive thru coffees.

I dodge an array of extraneous curbs and roll up to the Squawk Box.

Storm Trouperette: Welcome to Tim Hortons... [evil empire]... How may I help you?

Moi: Hi, I'd like a large coffee with double cream please, and another large coffee with double cream and two sweeteners please.

Storm Trouperette: Sorry, double cream in the second one as well?

Moi: Yes please and two sweetener.

Storm Trouperette: Anything else?

Moi: No thanks.

Storm Trouperette: That'll be three fifty-nine. Please have your money ready at the window!

Puzzled, I mosey forward to the window of doom, lowering my own drivers door window as I go. The window of doom slides open as I dig out my wallet.

Storm Trouperette: Three fifty-nine.

Moi, cheerfully and polite: You know, it's kind of hard to fiddle with money while driving a car at the same time.

I pull out a fiver and surrender it.

Storm Trouperette: Well, most people have their money ready before they get to the window!

Unsaid but implied was this: LOOK HERE, YOU LITTLE INSIGNIFICANT BITCH PEON CANADIAN! I WORK FOR TIM FUCKING HORTONS! I AM THE AUTHORITY HERE! YOU WILL HAVE YOUR FUCKING MONEY READY WHEN I TELL YOU TO OR I WILL PERSONALLY CALL LORD VADER AT OUR NEW YORK OFFICE AND HE WILL ASPHYXIATE YOUR SORRY ASS WITHOUT EVEN LEAVING HIS DESK! AND THEN HE'LL BLOW THE PLANET OF YOUR CHOICE TO SMITHER-FUCKING-REENS!

[Editor's Note: She didn't say any of that.]

I know! But it was implied! It was in her eyes! Her dull
soulless Imperial eyes!

[Editor's Note: Whatever.]

So what am I supposed to do? I don't order the same thing at Tim Hortons regularly. I don't have their prices memorized and I'm not a human calculator. I usually pay with coins which must be wrestled from my front pocket.

I don't want to get Tatoonie all blowed up. Am I supposed to order and then remain at the squawk box getting my coins together while the driver behind me pulls his hair out or do I fish my money out while coasting forward and probably driving into the car in front of me or veering into a wall?

Or should I make the window lady wait for five to ten seconds while I put my coins together with the auto safely in park and risk having her dine on my cranium as punishment for making her wait?

I'm at a loss. What is the appropriate pop culture/matrix thing to do? Please help.

.

"Hurry up! Where's your money!"

The Olympia

Oh Captain Vino. Where were you when I needed you? You would have had a hay-day with this one:

So young Neo and I cut school for an hour today and hit The Olympia for fries and cokes. I wish I could tell you that the Olympia lived up to its name; that its spires transcended the clouds. Alas it is a wilting crapstand of a joint that has perhaps been cleaned since it was built - oh perhaps the same day they invented cigarrettes - which is perhaps why the aging regulars still feel entitled to smoke them.

We were the only patrons in the dining area. Our hostess emerged from some back area, moved behind the bar and shouted to me, "What do you want?"

"Um... lunch?"

"Yeah."

I nod my head to reinforce the idea that we would like lunch.

"So what do you want?"

"Um... a menu?"

She turns and grabs a menu. One menu. I go to the bar and get it from her. I return to the table and Neo and I share it. In a fit of profound generosity, the Grim Hostess comes around to the table. We order. The food comes quickly and is good and it is cheap. Afterward I approach the bar, settle the tab and hand over a 50% tip for which she remains silently thankful (I presume).

She' sprobably a really nice person. She probably just mistook me for the local cat murderer.

The experience was so sociopathically entertaining that I actually can't wait to go back.

Documentary: Food Inc.

I may already be a winner

I try to stay away from coffee-shop coffee but when I do partake, and when they`re doing the roll-up-the-rim-to-win shenanigans I almost always win. Meanwhile my friends who spend a thousand bucks a year at Tim Hortons complain that they never win.

Of course I never claim the prizes - the free donuts or muffins or what-not. I either lose the little paper cup shards or else tip prostitutes with them.

Not this one though! This is terribly exciting. I`ve won a Brookside almond sample! How cool is that? Okay, so it`s not like an entire almond. It`s just a sample, but still - even if I just get to lick the salty almond dust off of it or something...

I can`t wait.

[Editor`s note: We`re pretty sure he`s kidding about the prostitutes.]

Length matters

I prefer them long. Don’t you? Weekends, that is?

Saturday night – had a great chat with Doctor Lock concerning life after full-time corporate enslavement. Not that he’s retired, mind you. He just never went out for that whole full-time career thing to begin with. He had some great advice. On that note I must also credit Porn King and Matman for their kind ears and recent council on these matters and helping to keep me grounded.

The evening began at Doc Lock’s mom’s place where birthday celebrations took place amidst rather unique surroundings. The exterior of her home bears an ornate, almost spooky aura while inside it’s just plain eccentric. We have poems written on doors and running up the stairwell. We have a commercial size map of the entire New York City subway system in the hallway. The walls all bear the artwork of their owner, her late husband, and of the three sons who grew up within them. We have loaded bookshelves in every room (nothing wrong with that, I hope). A collection of handmade crowns – each fit for a king – though built of non-precious metals and stones. We have Christmas lights, a chandelier made entirely of artificial flowers (non-luminous) and a television set that has never been watched since the screen was painted over with a crude yet perfectly recognizable image of the Cleaver family – Wally, Beaver, June and Ward.

A stained-glass artwork bears one diamond-shaped tile that is perfectly the size of a soda cracker. This is obvious as this one sector contains no glass but rather – a soda cracker. This particular biscuit has occupied the spot about ten years and still looks good as new!

Oh – almost forgot. The sculpture titled Baby Jesus Bomb Factory. What does it look like? Exactly like a Baby Jesus Bomb Factory, of course. Next visit I must snap a picture of this and send it to Flumadiddle.

The birthdays in question belonged to Doc Lock and his brother, the sculptor. I made two ridiculous errors. One. I didn’t wrap Doc Lock’s gift in a railway or subway transit map, as everyone else did. Apparently I’m the last of his associates to underestimate the depth of his love of the tracks. Two – I got confused and thought it was Mamma Lock’s birthday instead of the sculptor’s. I gave her a cute little book clip. Her birth date is in November so this gift comes six months early. Or late. Take your pick. I told the sculptor he could choose any item belonging to Mom and take it home. Then we’d all be square.

Now – if you think these folks sound a bit like freaks, let me say, yes, they sort of make their own rules in life. But trust me - they’re qualified to do so.

Consider this batch of freaks I encountered later that night – like – 2:00 AM or so. I was attacked by a terminal case of the yumblies on the way home and got caught in the tractor-beam of the Death Star – I mean – the Golden Arches. MacDonald’s. Not the Death Star. Two spots away from the pick-up window all hell broke loose. Hooligans tried to extort extra product out of the management by refusing to move their car. I was imprisoned within a long line of cars for twenty-five minutes until Ronald’s boys finally called the police. Luckily I always keep a book in the truck so I was kept entertained by Zaphod Beeblebrox and Marvin the robot on their journey to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe.
Sunday. I hosted Skeeter Willis and his Port Credit Cardinals for the Strat-o-matic 2008 Benko Cup finals. I lost in the seventh game. This is the third time in four years I’ve gone to the finals the favored team and lost. I’ve decided to stop trying to win. I’m changing my name from the Ybor City Tabaqueros to the Ybor City Bridesmaids and going for the world record for championship losses. Wish me luck.

Monday. My folks invited Peter Pan up to the farm for dinner and I felt obliged to participate. Zee the Lanky Doberman also came along and had a marvelous time running all over hell’s forty-nine acres and playing tag with Pan’s gas-powered remote control truck.

During dinner, Zee, not allowed in the house, would alternate which dining room window she would stand upright and glare at us through. Finally she gave that up. Then the doorbell rang. And rang and rang and rang. We found Zee standing upright at the front door with one paw firmly on the doorbell. I kid you not.

Other than that barrel of laughs we spent all day either watching TV or talking about the dog. I survived the boredom and lived to tell about it.

So there.

Freaks and misadventure - part 2: The freaks

So where do you go when you need a good dose of freakdom to balance off the misadventure?

That’s right. The No Frills at Creditview and Bristol. I’d promised myself that my last visit here would be my last ever but you know how things are. This is the end of the line. I’d passed all the kinder gentler supermarkets when I realized I was in need of some yumblies and feeling optimistic, I dared take my chances at the little grocery shop of horrors.

While I was left personally unscathed I did have to witness a thicker display of boobdom than usual at the checkout – the 1-8 items only lane, of course. The actual names of this latest collection of spazoids to enrich my existence shall be respectfully masked by random aliases.

Up to bat at the register is Mr. Oblivious who pulls about fifty items from his shopping cart. The rest of us have baskets. Roughly forty of his items are cans of dog food. Mrs. Natterchops, maybe fifth in line and one ahead of me, watches with a keen eye and cleverly deciphers that fifty far eclipses eight on the counting scale.

“Hm!” she grunts. “That sure looks like more than eight items to me!”

Mr. Oblivious appears not to take notice.

She turns to me. “Maybe he doesn’t know how to count.” Then turning back around, says more loudly, “That must be it. He must not know how to count.”

I glance at the basket of produce in her hand. Like mine it contains six or seven items. But wait. Another basket lies on the floor at her feet, containing at least eight more items it seems, bringing her count to fourteen or more. Surely fourteen also eclipses eight according to any Judeo-Christian new-world counting scheme.

But now a new character arrives. It’s Mary McReservation and she drops a pack of butter tarts into the basket at Mrs. Natterchops’ feet and walks away again. My head tips forward. I gaze without expression at the abandoned tarts.

“Or maybe he just doesn’t know how to read!” Mrs. Natterchops barks. A couple pairs of eyeballs look her way but not those of Mr. Oblivious. He’s just daydreaming about his puppies I guess, and the International Gala Puppy Festival he’s to cater.

Mary McReservation returns with a giant breadstick in a white paper sleeve. A wise selection. She can use it to defend herself if Mrs. Natterchops audits her item count and goes for the jugular.

Finally, Mr. Oblivious, King of Canine Nutrition, moves along, followed by a couple others. Mary McReservation comes to bat with Mrs. Natterchops hanging back, ignoring the pretty red separator bars and placing her veggies at the mouth of the conveyor belt, wasting six square feet of space in front of her while my right arm stretches another inch.

Mary moves on, Natterchops is promoted and I approach. First I tackle the sea of randomly discarded baskets. I stack them all in a single tower, resisting the urge to squawk, “Maybe she doesn’t know how to stack!” I wouldn’t be heard anyway. Mrs. Natterchops is raking the young cashier over the coals.

“Why did you let that man use this lane! He had too many items! You shouldn’t have let him use this lane!”

‘Oh lady,’ I thought, ‘Just shut up and let her check out your tomatoes, will ya.’

[Editor’s note: We believe FWG is referring to actual tomatoes. Just be thankful she wasn’t purchasing melons.]

She really laid into the poor girl. “It’s your job to turn people away who have too many items!” Of all the dunderheadedness this was the one thing that offended me. Why you’d expect a cashier (never mind that she was half the age of the perpetrator), who makes a cashier’s wage, not a policeman’s wage, to take on the responsibility of policing the public is dumb enough. But thinking that as a customer, you can just walk into a commercial establishment and assume the role of owner/manager and start telling the staff what their job responsibilities are goes beyond stupid.

The cashier said nothing but looked uncomfortable. I really regret not speaking out in her defense. Instead I waited for Mrs. Natterchops to leave and said, “Just ignore my friend there. She’s on drugs.”

She didn’t seem comforted. Oh well.

FWG Versus the Dirty Thief

I stayed up late last night watching Clint Eastwood classic Pale Rider. My bid to sleep-in this morning was ruined by a phone call. It went like this:

“Hello?”

“Hello. May I speak to Stephen [McBeano-Windchime]?”

“No. He’s away on vacation.”

“Are you the homeowner?”

“No.”

“Do you know when I might be able to reach Mr. [McBeano-Windchime]?”

“Concerning what matter, please?”

“This is Sears Carpet Cleaning. We have a special offer for-”

“Excuse me but neither of us support merchants who stoop to telephone solicitation. We don’t believe it’s ethically moral.”

“Well, it’s ethically moral to work, you know!”

“Oh, I know, honey. That’s why I’m hiring Mr. [McBeano-Windchime] to find you and kill you. Since I’m paying him – since he’s working – it’s ethically moral to murder you. Sorry about your luck. Hope your will is in order.”

Okay – that was a complete lie. That’s what I wish I’d said. But I was a little groggy being woken up so really, it actually went like this:

“Well, it’s ethically moral to work, you know!”

“Well, Scooby Scooby Doo. Where are you? You got some work to do now!”

Okay. I’m lying again. It really went like this:

“Well, it’s ethically moral to work, you know!”

“Oh. Oh. Well, why didn’t you say so? In that case, come on over and clean the shit off my rugs. There’s weiner poopies all over them. By all means. Come on down.”

What?

Alright. Alright. I’ll tell the truth this time:

“Well, it’s ethically moral to work, you know!”

“Oh it is, eh? Well you’re a DIRTY FILTHY THIEF!”

[Editor’s note: What FWG really said was: “Not when you’re stealing my time, it’s not.” And then she hung up on him. End of story.]

Shut up, editor.

FWG and the Case of the Color-Blind Carpenter

Saturday morning. Busy day ahead. Lunch plans with Aequitas and a few other Nano writers. Dinner and movie plans with Professor Plonk and Captain Vino immediately afterward. And if all goes well, Sunday breakfast with the I.S.

I’ve got just enough time for a desperately-needed haircut before heading off to Hamilton. I’m starting to look like Jesus. Luckily Streetsville is the unlikely hair-n-nails capital of the world with no less than 32 merchants of the hairstylist/barber/manicure trade and it’s a cinch to find one this morning with an empty chair and an idle barber standing by.

“Nice and short on top, buzzed on the sides. The rest is at your discretion.”

“Square back or tapered?”

“I couldn’t care less. I never see the back.”

He does a fine job. I surrender a twenty including tip and then stare dumbly at the coat in my hands. It looks like my coat. Same color; black. Same style. Same label even – except – the fine print reads XL. I could have sworn my coat was an XXL.

I look back at the coat rack where five others hang. None of them look like mine. I pull the keys from the pocket of the coat in my hand and they are not my keys.

“Is something wrong sir?” asks the merchant.

“Yeah. Whoever owns this coat took mine by mistake.”

“That’s not your coat?”

“This isn’t my coat.”

“Hey, that’s my coat,” says the man in the chair who’s hair is being cut by the new barber lady. The lady with foul breath whom I shall never again allow near me.

“This is your coat?”

“Yeah.”

“Your coat’s not there?” says the merchant.

“No.”

“Maybe you wore a different coat than usual.”

“None of these coats are mine.”

“There’s six coats there. There’s six of us in here. One of them must be yours.”

“No. There are six coats here because whoever took mine left his own behind.”

“Aye aye aye!” exclaims the chief barber in perfect Lou Costello manner.

We finally decipher that the puffy blue coat is that of the perpetrator. How he mistook it for my black one is a wonder. I’m briefly assured that he’ll soon return as I detect keys in the pocket. He’ll surely not get far without them. But when I reach into the pocket I pull out a handful of large carpentry nails instead.

The barber wants my phone number. He wants to send me home and call me when my coat is returned. I explain that I am now without any keys. I have access neither to my apartment or to my car and all my weekend plans are now in jeopardy.

He sends me to the nearby Starbucks coffee shop and promises to come and get me the moment the mystery dunce returns with my coat. He even tries to lend me his own coat and five bucks for coffee.

At the shop I order a “Chai Latte – venti” and am immediately approached by a skinny messy-haired older man with hands shoved into jacket pockets and an overall imbalanced look. My first guess is that he’s looking for monetary hand-outs on the way to the liquor store.

He mumbles something to me that vaguely resembles, “How are you today?”

In no mood to contribute to the presumed alcohol fund, I reply, “Not good. Someone took off with my coat.” I volunteer this info because it’s a preamble to the Sorry, bud, my money’s in my missing coat excuse.

He counters with something that vaguely resembles, “Mm bduh-brm nnuh mrnuhm nuhm brsszssrtle brnuhm.”

“I see,” says I, nodding politely, then moving off toward the beverage pick-up zone. I arrive and discover he has followed me.

“I want to say something to you,” he says. At least I think that’s what he said. This guy’s the mumble champion of all time. “And I hope you won’t get mad at me.”

Great. This ought to be good.

“Mm bduh-brm nnuh mrnuhm nuhm brsszssrtle brnuhm.”

“I’m sorry. I beg your pardon?”

“Duhrm bduh-brm nuhm brsszssrdle nnuh mrnuhm blrmnuhm your coat brnuhm.”

I bite my cheek and turn to the coffee boy. “Is that my chai latte?” I already know it’s not but I just need to make contact with the living world again. He shakes his head and casts a worried glance at the mumble champ.

“Lemme purt it thiz way,” he croaks, “When a window of oppruhtoonity clozes, anozzer window ‘foppruhtoonity openz.”

Great. I’ve apparently lost the opportunity to drive my truck, enter my own residence, or visit some of my most important friends but I’ve gained the opportunity to receive priceless wisdom from the High King of Mumbletown. I guess I should count my blessings. Where-oh-where is my giant pet pterodactyl when I need one. If something doesn’t swoop down and snatch this man up and fly away with him – or devour him – either way – I shall have to scream. I mean – I’m normally very patient and kind to those less fortunate or to those playing the role of the less fortunate for the purpose of financial gain. But today I’m so very not in the mood.

Nothing else he says can be interpreted. I nod occasionally, accept my drink when it comes, nod some more and then, at a convenient break in his nattering, announce, “Well, it’s been nice chatting with you. So long, then!” I reach out to shake his hand. He looks down at it, wide-eyed. Then, over his shoulder, I see the face of an angel. It is the man who sat next to me in the barber shop twenty minutes earlier. He’s wearing a puffy blue coat and holding a black one in his hands. I walk away from Mumble King and accept my coat. The gentleman falls all over himself apologizing. I assure him repeatedly that all is well and “Thanks for returning it so quickly… No, no. I already have a coffee but thanks anyway… No really. It’s quite alright. It’ll give me something to blog about… Nothing. Nothing. It’s an internet thing. Never mind. Have a good day.”

I know. I know. I should consider getting a spare set of keys copied. I know.

World Junior Semi-Finals

Time for another world junior hockey medal-game simulcast! And while I’m at the office of course. Luckily my boss is a sports fan.

It’s the semi finals. U.S. earned a bye to get here. Canada fell to Sweden earlier and defeated Finland in a quarter-final contest to qualify. Today’s winner plays Sweden for gold; the loser for the bronze against Russia. Let’s face it – neither Canada or U.S. are interested in Bronze medals.


First period:

EE-Gads! First shift – all U.S. How didn’t they score? They were all over us. Swarming like bees.

Let me say – I despise tribalism of all kinds. It’s the inevitable preoccupation of humans, granted. I understand that but I wish we’d hurry up and evolve beyond it. But though nations don’t exist in my view of the world I can’t help but get excited and cheer for hockey teams that wear the red maple leaf. It’s a habit formed at an early age. I’m not fully evolved, you see. I’m not a saint just yet.

Canada with some pressure in the second shift. That’s good.


Pierre McGuire’s on board, doing the colour commentary. Thank goodness I skipped lunch. He rattles the digestion process, that bitch.

15:00 to play. U.S. gets the first power-play. They’re dangerous. Possibly the sharpest offense in the tournament. But Canada may have the best defense. And the best goalie.

They kill the penalty.

Canada’s Matthias hits the post!

I wonder if Kats is watching the game?

Oops. Replay from another angle. Hit the side of the net. Not the post. Perspective is everything. That’s why refs are so beat upon. The average sports fan doesn’t grasp the severe variability of perspective. Life is three dimensional yet we see in two dimensions. And every person or camera's view is unique.

Oops. Boss caught me with the game on. He showed me how to enlarge the video image to full-screen! Nice workplace eh?

0:05 to play. Been an exciting period. Fast. Plenty of scoring chances at both ends but no score.


Period Two:

Again, U.S. with the first major opportunity. Mason makes the save.

Ouch! Canada’s Kyle Touris fans on the shot with a wide open net!

What an exciting game. If only the NHL were half this entertaining – like it was in the eighties.

Oh! Scores! Shawn Matthias! His third of the tournament. He worked hard for that one. Good boy, Shawn!

13:00 to play. Another U.S. power play. Can’t allow too many or we’ll get burned for sure.

10:00. Canada’s turn on the power play. Scores! Karl Alzner! Blast from the point! 2-0.

Speaking of 2-0, the score in other affairs is Sidewalk 2, FWG 0. I took another spill yesterday. Slipped on the ice and went down in a bad way. The right knee is particularly sore.

“Oh,” said Pops (the step-dad), “You came down with a case of knee-monia!” He cracks himself up, the lovable little lunatic that he is.

More great chances for the Americans. Mason keeps making saves but we won’t keep them off the scoreboard forever. Don’t get complacent, boys!

Yikes. So much offense in this game at both ends. A two-goal lead isn’t so big in a wide-open game like this.

6:00. Canada on the power play again. Big chances. A three-goal lead would be significant. Oh my. Geoffrion takes another penalty for U.S. Forty-one seconds with a two-man advantage.

Chances galore! U.S. holding on. They kill the first penalty. Still down a man.

If I may return to the unpleasant subject of tribalism once again – There’s a variety store in the retail level below the ‘grotto’. We’ll call it… Luke’s Milk. I don’t shop there because ‘Luke’ is a dickhead and tries to bully people into leaving the parking spot right behind his backdoor open for him at all times. He acts as if he owns the spot which he doesn’t. We all pay for shared parking and when it’s the only spot available I damn well take it. It’s my right. He gets snotty about it.

So I was in the variety store in the complex next door to ours which is run by a very nice lady – who, I must mention, is of Asian descent. Her grasp of the English language is far from complete but certainly eclipses my grasp of Chinese or Korean or whatever is applicable. And English is a bitch to learn so kudos to her.

The other day she moved to bag my coffee cream and cheese slices and I said, “No bag, thanks. I just live next door.”

“Oh. Next door?” she said.

“Yes. Above Luke’s Milk. But I don’t like him so I shop here instead.”

“Ah, yes,” she said, nodding knowingly. “He is Paki.”

???

I just looked at her for a moment, trying to figure out what the heck she was trying to say. And then I figured she must have said just what she meant to say.

“Okay, well, good-bye then. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” she said.

1:00 to play. Yanks on the power-play again. A late goal would be huge. Canada with a short-handed break. Smith stops it.


Period Three:

16:00 to go. Oh dear. Another too-many-men penalty for the U.S. You can’t be doing that, fellas. Great passing on the power-play. Smith is keeping his team in the game. They survive the penalty.

13:00. Let’s not forget. U.S. has come from behind to close a two–goal third-period deficit before in World Junior play against Canada. And they went on to win. Oh! Scores! Gillies on the rush. His first goal of the tournament. 3-0. Huge lead.

Scores! Brad Marchand! Two goals only 30 seconds or so apart. 4-0. Wow. That should pretty much do it.

Also in the Cute-things-that-store-cashiers-say department: I was in the 24-hour Dominion grocery store the other night just after midnight. It’s always the same cashier at the single open till every time I’m there at night. She always has eye-opening things to say. I really should ask her to do a regular piece on this blog. It would be interesting. She was in her usual form the other night. A fellow in front of me asked if they carried hair colour for men.

“How would I know!” she barked. “That’s not my department!” She looks about sixty and has a very deep 90-cigarette-per-day-habit type voice. Very Gravelly. “There’s no one here in that department at this time of night!” She really snapped at him. No kidding.

7:00. Give the U.S. credit. They’re not giving up. They’re playing strong.

Oh dear. Replay shows that the Gillies rush was very slightly off-side. The third Canada goal should have been disallowed. We’ll see if it matters.

Oh god, McGuire, please shut up and go away.

Americans crashing the net. Where’s the puck? In the net! They score. 4-1.

5:00. Americans desperate for another goal. They’re pressing. Taking risks.

Breakaway Canada! That’s what happens. Smith stops him.

So anyway, it’s my turn before the Dominion cashier and I ask, because I’m in the mood for a movie, if she knows of any 24-hour video store around. I pretty much know I’m asking for trouble but what the heck.

“No!” she says, pausing to glare at me. “You people need to learn to do your business during the day!”

I smiled and nodded. I’m always appreciative when good Samaritans try to help out us people with their friendly advice. But I decide to be a tad cheeky. “I guess you’d like to get off the night shift, eh?”

“Hey, I have seniority here! I can work whatever shift I choose! I like the night shift!”

So if I understand her position correctly, she prefers to work the night shift but would prefer that no customers come… and that Dominion continue to stay open 24-hours and employ her anyway… to come to work… and not do anything. I guess that’s not too much to ask.

I’ll have to continue to visit Dominion Lady on the night shift and maybe bait her a little. She’s always got something fun to say. I should have been writing stuff down all along.

2:00. U.S. on the power play. They’re the only undefeated team in the tournament but they’ll need a miracle now.

I wonder if Claudia Supermom has some perspective on the Dominion Lady situation. She’s in the grocery industry. But she has far more useful things to say than Dominion Lady.

40 seconds to go. Another Canada penalty. Two-man advantage. Yanks need two lightening-fast goals. Won’t get them. Canada icing the puck. They win. Off to the gold-medal game! Hurrah!

No Frills. Or class.

Welcome to No Frills, galactic centre of ignorance.


Cruising home, anticipating dinner, I suddenly realize I haven't the proper salad dressing in the fridge. I've passed by all the civilized grocery stores and the only applicable merchant remaining between I and the Grotto is No Frills, home of filth, spoiled food and general imbecility.

What the heck. It's just salad dressing. In a sealed bottle. How wrong can I go?

Well, let's find out, shall we?

I pull in, avoid the more menacing potholes; those possibly bottomless, and park.

Inside, I squeeze down the narrow aisles past other zombified clientele, seeking the world's saddest little dressing collection in a remote corner and grabbing a hankerin' hunk o' cheddar on the way and a steak for kicks.

Three products in hand I hit the checkout land where three cashiers are working and forty-or-so customers (no exaggeration - swear) are crammed into three massive confused lines. Were we packed any tighter we'd probably trigger a Big Bang and birth a new universe. The entire front-of-store boulevard is grid-locked. Those touring the aisles are forced to reverse and use the back-of-store avenue to access other aisles.

Gazing well ahead I verify that I'm in the express aisle, clearly marked '1-8 ITEMS ONLY'.

The grid-lock does not deter one courageous patron from insisting she use the check-out boulevard for traversing the entire width of the store, expecting forty of us to climb atop each other to allow her passage. As she eventually inches up behind me I'm forced to acknowledge her presence as the lady standing behind me in line hails my attention - not by saying 'Excuse me, sir' or by tapping me on the shoulder or by any other respectable means commonly practiced by post-Neolithic hominids, but by poking me in the side. She jabs me right in the kidney. I just about shit myself.

I turn around very slowly and give her the deadest, emotionless stare I can muster while the courageous traverser squeaks, "Excuse me."

Silent, I turn to the mighty traveller and give her a slow expressionless sideways nod and press my body against the shopping cart of another shopper in another line. She inches by me eventually and I look back at the Poking Lady for a moment.

'Lady, if you ever touch me like that again I'll punch you so hard you'll sail clear through the air just like they do in those cartoons that you watch in your roach-infested apartment while you eat your Kraft Dinner and wait for Geraldo to come on.'

Outwardly I say nothing of course. I just peel myself off my neighbor's cart and turn and watch the patrons ahead of me shuffle forward, arrange their treasures on the conveyor belt and pay their dues.

One.

At.

A.

Time.

I grow increasingly dumbfounded as freak after freak stands under the very decorative '1-8 ITEMS ONLY' sign and deposits ten, twenty or thirty items on the belt. I can't help but wonder how many stages of genetic evolution separate these lower-order bipeds from my own species and just how the hell they sleep at night.

Upon gaining a six-foot proximity to the 8-item-only checkout line I watch a man unload about twenty-eight purchases.

I calmly raised my three items, one at a time and tossed them through the air and into his pile, announcing, "Here buddy, add these to your collection." And then I marched out the door. And then I halted a speeding Honda with booming bass-boomer blasting by flashing my palm at it, hauled the teenage driver from it through the window by his nose rings and snapped his neck in two. And then I wrestled a secret decoder device from a SPECTRE agent, sucked back a martini; shaken-not-stirred, and banged a soviet spy. And then I taught President Bush how to love his fellow humans and how to speak English. And then I delivered toys to all the good boys and girls of the world.

And then I awoke from the reverie, my three items still in hand. I paid for them and exited the store - thirty minutes closer to death then I'd been upon entry.

And that's the tale of FWG's last ever visit to No Frills. So there.

FWG