...curl a ma foe...

Oh! Right! I have a blog! --

So I've been busy, I guess that's obvious. I got a phone call from Dr. Anahita this week and remembered that there's a whole other blogging world out there and maybe I should drop in and say hi. So... hi.

I'm thrilling that I can finally sing that polka dot bikini song, except modified because the one I bought today is orange. But it's cute and skimpy and all the right kinds of curvy so hurrah! Who wants to go to Wonderland with me? Let's go!

How are you guys doing? Any exciting stories? Sheida, any new man eating plants? No? Why not?

...amazing!...

I'm consistently amused by the uneducated loafs who work at Paramount Wonderland - they never do seem to get things right.

My back is sore sore sore and red like lobsta. These the results of an entire day spent in the waterpark. Oh but the tan is nice. Toasty brown.

...so, from head to toe...

The daily ascent in a condominium elevator is a perpetual competitive ordeal. I take immeasurable pride in being on the 27th floor, knowing there are only four floors above me; knowing that in nearly all instances, I will be the most... elevated... in any given elevator.

It's sad, but true. The moment when, in an elevator filled with people, I press the highest button gives me a certain thrill.

How funny, this litter matter of esteem. How unbelievably silly, some of the ways I find it.

...vera mason said so...

I was bored stiff throughout Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Questioning all previous adoration of both Johnny Depp and Tim Burton, hoping they will be redeemed by the Corpse Bride which looks promising.

Am as of this moment a fan of Payless Shoe Source, never again to denounce its name. Hurrah for cheap cute shoes in spades!

Tomorrow is a barbecue at Poopnick's - Marth he doesn't have your number and my phone is on the mend so I couldn't pass it on, but you're invited. Drop him a line for address and time info.

Lessee what else - this weekend is Oakville so further absence of me. Also the boy has his first reading, so we wish well. Things are busy, busy is good, good times for all. Good luck to China, currently flooded with two of my friends in its borders.

...i brought my journalists to meet your journalists...

The sixth Harry Potter is unequivocally excellent - so touching and moving and surprising. There is an inconsistency which, to my memory at least, appears enormous between the character of Snape in this book and the last but I won't be certain until I reread the fifth book tonight. I am at once shocked, delighted, brokenhearted and absolutely on tinterhooks for the next book.

I spent exactly one hour and 10 minutes at my own birthday party last night before getting so sick I had to leave the revelers partying it up at 7 West while I ran home and into bed where I stayed until 11 this morning. Relatively, this has been rather a lowkey kinda birthday. Of course that was helped out by the sheer number of people who forgot, or got the wrong day (including, sadly enough, my parents who both rang in on the 15th, the next day). I had never felt so special.

Tomorrow is choosing courses, but is also possibly Wonderland. What to do, what to do... is an education really all the important anyway?

...sheryl crow and supermodel hair...

Birthdays are for girlie beauty/lunch days on the town with the best friend, dinner with your parents, and a boy at night. That, at least, was all perfect about the day.

Less appropriate a presence on a birthday is bronchitis, which has felled me for the third time in 14 months. Not letting it stop my fun, I did all my usual running about and am only paying for it now, when I can barely speak without coughing up a storm. Waiting for my saviour to arrive in the form of cough medicine and antibiotics.

At the intersection of Shepperd and Leslie this afternoon, a flock of geese were crossing the street in single file. As we approached and slowed, we saw a police officer pull up and stop, getting out of his squad car to direct traffic, holding people at a stop until the geese crossed in safety. Thank you to that lovely gentleman for showing me something beautiful and kind on my birthday.

...all you ever wanted [was love]...

I am in love with being taken care of when I'm sick. With kisses on the forehead, and the stroking of my hair. With orange juice in a mug first thing in the morning. With your head in my lap, getting comfy for a long subway ride. With bubble baths, and the Harper's Index, and magic markers. [With you].

--------------------------------------------

In two days I will be recognized as a grownup in every single country in the world. Which doesn't mean a whole lot in the larger scheme; the scheme in which I'm already there, if together-grocery shopping and handholding as we cross the street is any indication.

...inside...

Six words have been chasing themselves around my head for the past two days. I can't tell you what they are, but that they are powerful and large, high as the skies. The effect they had on me was extreme. They snuck in 5 days before my birthday, and changed everything.

This week has too much working, preparations for Harry Potter (!!!) and catching a few of the Fringe festival shows. I miss blogging but I can't find the time or motivation. Only a silly sense of duty brings me back every few days. Hope you are all as well as I am.

...reigning in...

I'm full up with wanting to learn, and wanting to share, and wanting to love. I make this effort because I want to, and for that reason, it stops being an effort. It's so easy to give completely.

...CAP catch [oooh]...

For the record, I didn't introduce the idea. It was a matter of proximity and of the fact that we might, by virtue of my parents and I living in the same building, eventually run into them here. Was that a problem, I wondered? I'm sure they would like him. He's sure too.

"Oh, I'm not worried that they won't like me. I'm just not sure I'm ready to meet your parents."

Which naturally has me questioning things. Is this a bad sign? Or my typical insecure paranoia? These are not rhetorical questions. My security is dependent on your comments, so please advise.

...from lightyears away...

Re: The "throw-up couple of the year" and a touch of domesticity.

The past three days it almost felt like living together. Get up in the morning, play, get dressed and go to work. When I come home, he's still there having spent the day writing, buying some groceries, making the bed. I never did get that key back. I don't think I will now. Noticing suddenly something different today - "Did you shave?!" Heh. "Oh that. Yeah. I used your razor".

Oh good, now we're married. Teehee.

We brought the brother to the show on Monday night to meet the boy, and all was well. Boy was good, brother was good, reports to parents will be good.

Four days away now until Sunday and Andy at Wonderland. Hurrah for Persian pride and exuberant fobness. The twins will hold down our fort (and get seats) while Farnam and I rush mad to get from a) PAX and b) work, respectively, to the show. Farnam, tickets? Are we good to go?

...plaits, godlights, down to the wire...

It was singularly outrageous and charmingly community-building - earlier this afternoon, a group of about 15 random strangers stood together chatting over the course of 20 minutes in the South-East vestibule of Sheppard subway station, while we waited out a downpour that had sheets of cold water rushing down the stairs soaking our flip-flop-clad feet.

Note to self: Do not wear gorgeous teal-tulle skirts to occasions featuring a handful of eligible Persian males or your aunt will spend hours hounding you to try and make you dance with them.

I love Persian men, for the record. Their utter certainty in their own accomplishment and attraction, their - ... hmm, how shall I phrase this... moral flexibility? - and their conversation habits which range from insipid to completely inappropriate. I obviously don't refer to all Persian men, but the ones in that particular circle certainly, as well as the ones with whom I myself have had experience. Joyous fun.

This week's reading:

Conrad's Fate - Diana Wynne Jones
A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving (I just read a pre-release of his latest, and was disappointed a little so I'm regressing to the masterpieces)
The Secret Life of Adrian Mole Aged 13 3/4 - Sue Townsend
Dona Flor and her Two Husbands - Jorge Amado
The House of the Spirits - Isabel Allende

...tag! you're it!...

Because no one thought to tag me about this book thing, I'm bloody doing it myself. I LIKE talking about books dammit.

Total Number of Books I Own: several hundred, between my place, my uncle's garage (until I move again), and my parents basement.

Last Book I Read: Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn, a very clever novel about language and the alphabet. Today I started his new one, Ibid which is just as cute, just as clever.

Last Book I Bought: Line of Beauty, by Alan Hollinghurst, No Time by Heather Menzies and Conrad's Fate by Diana Wynne Jones

Five Books That Mean A Lot To Me:

Spoiler warning:

1. An Underachiever's Diary by Benjamin Anastas - because it gave me insights into someone I love, and threw the concept of the hero on its head. Would I have cared for him without reading this book? Probably, but I understand him better.

2. I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith - I read this book when I was in high school and lost, and related so much to Cassandra's character. Aside from the fact that it's beautifully written with a slew of interesting and unique characters, it's very true to reallifeemotion, which I am always a sucker for.

3. Lord of the Flies by William Golding - for two reasons. The reason which pertains to the book is because when I read it at 13, it shocked the realities of human nature into me. An emotive reason is because it started the tradition of my mother and I trading books with each other.

4. Skinny Legs and All by Tom Robbins - while I agree that Tom Robbins generally doesn't need a justification, ever; I will mention that (despite what others say), this is clearly his best novel.

5. Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder - this book is a phenomenal achievement. At once a gripping mystery tale, and a complete introductory history to philosophy. A heavy read, it took me several attempts to get through it before I finally finished it last year.

6. (I know we were meant to say 5... but I broke the rules writing this, I will continue to do so, thank you) - Beyond This Dark House, Guy Gavriel Kay - the book of poetry by my favorite Canadian author of novels is gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous, and very much like the way he writes his works of fiction.


I won't tag 5 people but I would like to hear Farnam's list - so... she is hereby tagged.

...swank...

The elderly lady called into the store around 4 to say that she wasn't feeling well enough to come down into the store, but she lives upstairs and if she gave us her credit card info could we please purchase a couple of CD's, a book and today's Times for her, and have someone run it upstairs to her suite? Which we did of course, her business with us being both frequent and extravagant.

Must.

Be.

Nice.