So the day before yesterday Sam f-books me about paintballing, and he asks me about the X-tra Cab. I take a day to respond, and yesterday morning I reply that it's doing well and there are no problems with it. Nice Will, real nice. So after my last class of the day I start it up and everything is tickety-boo. I notice that I've traveled a ridiculous amount on $20 worth of fuel, so I decide to tank up. When I'm at the pump, however, my resolve weakens at the thought of paying $1.47/litre and I decide to put only $20 in again. Good thing. I sit in the parking lot for a while, eating my disgusting white spot burger and fries, and when I pull out there is a strong scent of gas. However, I'm in a gas station and I just put gas in X, so it makes sense. A ways down the road, X just isn't driving quite right, the smell of gas is still present, and i have a bad feeling. However, I somehow made it all the way to the Kwantlen campus in Langley. I stop to buy a textbook at the bookstore there and when I get back to X I realize that there's a trail of gas running behind it and a little puddle sitting under the passenger side. Not good. I don't have any mechanical skills, or even any tools, so I do my best to try and find out where the leak is coming from. I can't really find it. This sucks. From there it's only 22 km to my house so I figure I can make it back and find out what's wrong once I'm there. Not true. I make it about as far as 216th and Fraser Highway before my plans really collapse. X is having serious trouble so I stop at the gas station to see what's wrong with it. I put some oil in, even though there's an 'acceptable' amount already in there. Still the same. Then I decide that there's really nothing for it but to try and make it home in any shape. I make it as far as the gas station across the street. X is having problems with throttle control, and those are problems I'm not qualified to treat. Fortunately I have the number of Clover Towing in my wallet from my last adventure in Langley. X gets towed. I am sad. I have to take the bus this morning and turn up half an hour late for class. It's like my life has been a constant downward spiral ever since Sam asked me how X was doing. People say I'm lucky, I say 'if it wasn't for bad luck, I wouldn't have no luck at all'.
Park Ranger
Wednesday, 17 September 2008
Friday, 5 September 2008
Irregularily Published News Edition Presented in Glorious Monotone
You know what the first thing I felt when I got my cast off was? Relieved... and then scared. Of course I felt relieved because I had put up with the stupid thing for a good month at least and I was finally free, but I felt scared because I felt powerless. The lower half of my leg and my foot were so weak that it was hard walking on them, my heel had lost most of its flesh so I was stepping directly on the bone which made it painful to walk. Running was out of the question and is still pretty hard. As I walked to the highway to hitchhike back to Summerland I realized that I had just lost the ability to do a whole catalogue of things associated with youthful athleticism, I felt destined to grow into a bitter old man well before my time. It was completely irrational, but it scared me.
It took me a while and I went through a series of misadventures, but I've finally made it to the coast. Driving down in the X-tra Cab proved more difficult than I thought. It was the first time I had really driven standard, I had only driven around the block a couple of times a few months back, so it felt like I was jumping into the deep end making the trip. I'm pretty sure that I've stalled it a few thousand times already, trying to get it into first. The other problem with coming down in the x-tra cab was that the alternator doesn't really work that well (I wouldn't say it's completely fried because so far it hasn't died while driving during the day). The battery died about 13 km outside of Princeton so I stood by the side of the road with my hazards on in the middle of the night and waited for about half an hour before someone stopped. It turns out they were a transmission mechanic and had a shop in town so they loaned me an extra battery and put my dead battery on charge. I spent the night in the ridiculously expensive Deers Head motel. I guess I may be spoiled having stayed in hostels, but $60 seemed pretty expensive for just one night. I should have just stayed in the truck. In the morning I bought an extra battery from the transmission mechanic and completed the trip with relatively few incidents.
I've already registered for all my courses, but I've missed the first week of classes. Not a good start, but it's not too serious of a blow and I should get back into the swing of things fairly quickly. The house is pretty cool, it's just a basement suite and my room is pretty small, but I've got enough room, it's pretty clean, fairly new, and so far I get along pretty well with my house mate.
That's pretty much the news edition of this blog, presented in glorious monotone (I never realized it was possible to type in monotone, but apparently it is). Tune in next time for more exciting adventures in the life of the
pipe smoking professor
It took me a while and I went through a series of misadventures, but I've finally made it to the coast. Driving down in the X-tra Cab proved more difficult than I thought. It was the first time I had really driven standard, I had only driven around the block a couple of times a few months back, so it felt like I was jumping into the deep end making the trip. I'm pretty sure that I've stalled it a few thousand times already, trying to get it into first. The other problem with coming down in the x-tra cab was that the alternator doesn't really work that well (I wouldn't say it's completely fried because so far it hasn't died while driving during the day). The battery died about 13 km outside of Princeton so I stood by the side of the road with my hazards on in the middle of the night and waited for about half an hour before someone stopped. It turns out they were a transmission mechanic and had a shop in town so they loaned me an extra battery and put my dead battery on charge. I spent the night in the ridiculously expensive Deers Head motel. I guess I may be spoiled having stayed in hostels, but $60 seemed pretty expensive for just one night. I should have just stayed in the truck. In the morning I bought an extra battery from the transmission mechanic and completed the trip with relatively few incidents.
I've already registered for all my courses, but I've missed the first week of classes. Not a good start, but it's not too serious of a blow and I should get back into the swing of things fairly quickly. The house is pretty cool, it's just a basement suite and my room is pretty small, but I've got enough room, it's pretty clean, fairly new, and so far I get along pretty well with my house mate.
That's pretty much the news edition of this blog, presented in glorious monotone (I never realized it was possible to type in monotone, but apparently it is). Tune in next time for more exciting adventures in the life of the
pipe smoking professor
Saturday, 23 August 2008
The Smell of Autumn
Went for a walk the other day and as soon as I got out of the door I smelled Autumn. It's just a subtle smell, but it's one of my favorites. It was overcast, but down the road there were still men out in their yards, mowing or trimming hedges. It's as though they knew what was coming and were trying to push it back, filling the air with the smell of freshly mown grass to cover the deadly scent of fall.
I do love the summer, but in the same way I like the winter, because it's a fun season. Autumn, however, is something special. In Autumn the leaves turn, you start smelling woodsmoke, there's a crispness in the air, everything is dying in the fall, but it's in passing that nature is its most beautiful. I don't subscribe to the season of spring. It's still pretty decent, especially at the end of a long cold winter, but there's not the same mystery as the Autumn.
The other part of the fall is that November is the saddest month of the entire year. September is back to school, new beginnings, a new year. October is color and fire and the joie de vivre is in everything. But November is like purgatory, everything dies in November, but we're still left waiting for the winter. It rains in November, not a warm spring rain, but a bitter rain. In the spring it's tears of joy, but in November it's tear of sadness.
So I welcome the smell of Autumn. I won't fight against it like the yardmen and lawnmowers. I'll embrace it.
smell it in the air
all the yardmen push it back
but fall is coming
I do love the summer, but in the same way I like the winter, because it's a fun season. Autumn, however, is something special. In Autumn the leaves turn, you start smelling woodsmoke, there's a crispness in the air, everything is dying in the fall, but it's in passing that nature is its most beautiful. I don't subscribe to the season of spring. It's still pretty decent, especially at the end of a long cold winter, but there's not the same mystery as the Autumn.
The other part of the fall is that November is the saddest month of the entire year. September is back to school, new beginnings, a new year. October is color and fire and the joie de vivre is in everything. But November is like purgatory, everything dies in November, but we're still left waiting for the winter. It rains in November, not a warm spring rain, but a bitter rain. In the spring it's tears of joy, but in November it's tear of sadness.
So I welcome the smell of Autumn. I won't fight against it like the yardmen and lawnmowers. I'll embrace it.
smell it in the air
all the yardmen push it back
but fall is coming
Wednesday, 6 August 2008
Dropping the Bomb
listening to K-os - Love Song
today is the anniversary of Hiroshima's destruction, nuclear style. How does one celebrate such an auspicious occasion? How indeed, one may set of fireworks or burn a mock-city, Guy Fawkes style. One might take some time, have a moment of silence. Reading Watchmen again a few days ago and realize how hard it is for me to take a position on it. We grew up taught that destroying Hiroshima was the only way to end a bloody war, that it was neccessary. It's true in a way, if Hiroshima hadn't been bombed, and Nagasaki a couple of days later, the resulting casualties from the invasion of japan would have been greater than the loss of life in both cities.
listening to Nirvana - The Man Who Sold the World
That's not all we have to consider. You might call into account the deaths from radiation poisoning after the fact, you might call into account that we introduced the single worst weapon of mass destruction in history. We introduced mustard gas in the first world war and changed the face of warfare. Splitting the atom changed it again, just as radically. There's no real defence from nukes, and we're making more and better/worse ones all the time. If a nuclear war started now, at this late stage, we'd be looking at the collapse of civilization as we know it, literally a man-made doomsday. We unleashed something we didn't fully understand.
listening to Leonard Cohen - Hallelujah
If we hadn't dropped the bomb we would still have nuclear weapons today, they still would have been developed, even if the Americans hadn't done it. If the war had have gone on, where would we be today, I don't know. It may have been another Vietnam. What would we have to become to win the war, what did we become? The people that would have died, would have been mostly soldiers, they knew what they were getting into. The people that did die were civilians, they were "innocent". But really, what's the difference? They're all people. We mourn them all the same. I've never really been able to fully come to terms with whether it was right or wrong, and there's always been something nagging me that says I should know. That we all should know. That if the time comes again to make that decision, that we would make the right decision. It's something we really have to understand, but it takes knowing ourselves for what we really are. It takes looking at who we are (our history defines us) and facing the fact that we may have been wrong. That we may have done something profoundly wrong. I don't know how I should celebrate, or if I should, maybe the only way to honor its history would be to search it out, to find out for ourselves if we were right or if we were wrong.
pipesmokingprofessor
today is the anniversary of Hiroshima's destruction, nuclear style. How does one celebrate such an auspicious occasion? How indeed, one may set of fireworks or burn a mock-city, Guy Fawkes style. One might take some time, have a moment of silence. Reading Watchmen again a few days ago and realize how hard it is for me to take a position on it. We grew up taught that destroying Hiroshima was the only way to end a bloody war, that it was neccessary. It's true in a way, if Hiroshima hadn't been bombed, and Nagasaki a couple of days later, the resulting casualties from the invasion of japan would have been greater than the loss of life in both cities.
listening to Nirvana - The Man Who Sold the World
That's not all we have to consider. You might call into account the deaths from radiation poisoning after the fact, you might call into account that we introduced the single worst weapon of mass destruction in history. We introduced mustard gas in the first world war and changed the face of warfare. Splitting the atom changed it again, just as radically. There's no real defence from nukes, and we're making more and better/worse ones all the time. If a nuclear war started now, at this late stage, we'd be looking at the collapse of civilization as we know it, literally a man-made doomsday. We unleashed something we didn't fully understand.
listening to Leonard Cohen - Hallelujah
If we hadn't dropped the bomb we would still have nuclear weapons today, they still would have been developed, even if the Americans hadn't done it. If the war had have gone on, where would we be today, I don't know. It may have been another Vietnam. What would we have to become to win the war, what did we become? The people that would have died, would have been mostly soldiers, they knew what they were getting into. The people that did die were civilians, they were "innocent". But really, what's the difference? They're all people. We mourn them all the same. I've never really been able to fully come to terms with whether it was right or wrong, and there's always been something nagging me that says I should know. That we all should know. That if the time comes again to make that decision, that we would make the right decision. It's something we really have to understand, but it takes knowing ourselves for what we really are. It takes looking at who we are (our history defines us) and facing the fact that we may have been wrong. That we may have done something profoundly wrong. I don't know how I should celebrate, or if I should, maybe the only way to honor its history would be to search it out, to find out for ourselves if we were right or if we were wrong.
pipesmokingprofessor
Thursday, 31 July 2008
Parallel Universes
listening to MGMT - Time to Pretend
Today I went to the Summerland Health Center to get my foot re-x-rayed. I crutched and hobbled all the way from Orchard Crescent to the Tim Hortons and got a ride up the hill because at that point I was too exhausted and my arms hurt too much to really consider scaling it on crutch. I was fifteen minutes late because I had thought the appointment was at Dr. B Harrold's office. I was also fifteen minutes early at Dr. Harrold's office to put the distance in perspective. Fortunately, even though they book every ten minutes, the x-ray specialist took pity and slotted me in. I didn't get any results back today, but I'm going for an appointment with Dr. Harrold next week, I've got my fingers crossed (really, it's getting pretty hard to type (with my fingers crossed, I wasn't referring to the foot (although it would be pretty crazy to learn how to type with one's feet))). As I was walking through the lobby I saw someone familiar and said hi (it took me a moment to realize I actually did know them) and she stared at me for a full, awkward, long second before realizing who I was and said hi. The usual "what did you do to your foot" followed by "I broke it" and "are you still working at timmies" followed by "yes" and then an awkward silence followed by me mumbling something about having to go and walking out the door, and I realized that we really had absolutely nothing in common now I'm no longer working at tim hortons and a few months have gone by. It's almost as though we'd been inhabiting parallel universes for the last few months. And it's funny how often that happens. We change. And if you haven't seen someone for a long time it can be like getting to know an entirely new person. I know for myself that I change constantly. Sure there will be things that will always stay the same about me, but I'm not the same person that I was seven months ago and I never will be that person again. I know that when I move back to the coast there will be a lot of people that I'm good friends with that I will appear to be an entirely different person to. For the last 7 months I've inhabited and been influenced by an entirely different environment, a parallel universe, to the lower mainland. It's not better and it's not worse, but it's radically different. So I'm nervous, apprehensive, looking forward to seeing you, looking forward to getting to know you again. I haven't kept in touch that well, and for that I'm sorry, but I do miss you. So here's to meeting again in a month or so.
fool sitting here typing
Today I went to the Summerland Health Center to get my foot re-x-rayed. I crutched and hobbled all the way from Orchard Crescent to the Tim Hortons and got a ride up the hill because at that point I was too exhausted and my arms hurt too much to really consider scaling it on crutch. I was fifteen minutes late because I had thought the appointment was at Dr. B Harrold's office. I was also fifteen minutes early at Dr. Harrold's office to put the distance in perspective. Fortunately, even though they book every ten minutes, the x-ray specialist took pity and slotted me in. I didn't get any results back today, but I'm going for an appointment with Dr. Harrold next week, I've got my fingers crossed (really, it's getting pretty hard to type (with my fingers crossed, I wasn't referring to the foot (although it would be pretty crazy to learn how to type with one's feet))). As I was walking through the lobby I saw someone familiar and said hi (it took me a moment to realize I actually did know them) and she stared at me for a full, awkward, long second before realizing who I was and said hi. The usual "what did you do to your foot" followed by "I broke it" and "are you still working at timmies" followed by "yes" and then an awkward silence followed by me mumbling something about having to go and walking out the door, and I realized that we really had absolutely nothing in common now I'm no longer working at tim hortons and a few months have gone by. It's almost as though we'd been inhabiting parallel universes for the last few months. And it's funny how often that happens. We change. And if you haven't seen someone for a long time it can be like getting to know an entirely new person. I know for myself that I change constantly. Sure there will be things that will always stay the same about me, but I'm not the same person that I was seven months ago and I never will be that person again. I know that when I move back to the coast there will be a lot of people that I'm good friends with that I will appear to be an entirely different person to. For the last 7 months I've inhabited and been influenced by an entirely different environment, a parallel universe, to the lower mainland. It's not better and it's not worse, but it's radically different. So I'm nervous, apprehensive, looking forward to seeing you, looking forward to getting to know you again. I haven't kept in touch that well, and for that I'm sorry, but I do miss you. So here's to meeting again in a month or so.
fool sitting here typing
Monday, 28 July 2008
In Metronome
I was born on a cold day in Metronome
with the factories beating in time
and in an old, old cradle of sorts
my heart made the city's beat mine
now I grew up a son in the steely streets
my father the son of a beggar
and though the woman who gave me my life was alive
the city was my mother
and I would have no other
please come back to me woman in Metronome
you left me the day I was born
but I'll be waiting for you, here in Metronome
waiting for you to come home
as a young man I rode on the trolley car
and searched through the city for renassiance
I wrote my first poem about the sun
and I gave it to a friend
he took the first train getting out of here
and I never bothered to follow
though I miss them both and will shed a tear
I wouldn't take the train
and I know I would do it again
please come back to me here in Metronome
you have my words and my song
I'll be waiting for you, here in Metronome
waiting for you to come home
when I was a man my father died
as he walked from the house on the corner
he died in the streets with a pocket in his hand
and was washed into the gutter
for the city was his lover
interlude
it was another cold day in Metronome
and I found you in a cafe
we talked for hours until you went home
and I waited for you the next day
now each day I could find I would meet you there
and we'd ride on the trolley for hours
we'd sit on the tops of the factories
and visit the birds in the square
we thrilled just breathing the air
now the winter had passed and the spring had come
and I brought you factory flowers
then springtime passed by and the summer came
we walked in the shade or the shadow of towers
soon autumn had come into Metronome
then we felt the chill in the air
each day we would meet and go wandering
we loved and were loved in return
but November, November I should have known
I stood in the leaves in the square
I waited for you in the steely streets
I waited, but you were not there
and I cannot abandon cold Metronome
though I'd search the world entire
my heart beats in time with the factories
the beat of my heart would expire
though for you I would die
please come back to me darling in Metronome
without you my heart will go cold
I'll be waiting for you, here in Metronome
waiting for you to come home
with the factories beating in time
and in an old, old cradle of sorts
my heart made the city's beat mine
now I grew up a son in the steely streets
my father the son of a beggar
and though the woman who gave me my life was alive
the city was my mother
and I would have no other
please come back to me woman in Metronome
you left me the day I was born
but I'll be waiting for you, here in Metronome
waiting for you to come home
as a young man I rode on the trolley car
and searched through the city for renassiance
I wrote my first poem about the sun
and I gave it to a friend
he took the first train getting out of here
and I never bothered to follow
though I miss them both and will shed a tear
I wouldn't take the train
and I know I would do it again
please come back to me here in Metronome
you have my words and my song
I'll be waiting for you, here in Metronome
waiting for you to come home
when I was a man my father died
as he walked from the house on the corner
he died in the streets with a pocket in his hand
and was washed into the gutter
for the city was his lover
interlude
it was another cold day in Metronome
and I found you in a cafe
we talked for hours until you went home
and I waited for you the next day
now each day I could find I would meet you there
and we'd ride on the trolley for hours
we'd sit on the tops of the factories
and visit the birds in the square
we thrilled just breathing the air
now the winter had passed and the spring had come
and I brought you factory flowers
then springtime passed by and the summer came
we walked in the shade or the shadow of towers
soon autumn had come into Metronome
then we felt the chill in the air
each day we would meet and go wandering
we loved and were loved in return
but November, November I should have known
I stood in the leaves in the square
I waited for you in the steely streets
I waited, but you were not there
and I cannot abandon cold Metronome
though I'd search the world entire
my heart beats in time with the factories
the beat of my heart would expire
though for you I would die
please come back to me darling in Metronome
without you my heart will go cold
I'll be waiting for you, here in Metronome
waiting for you to come home
Invasion of the Clumsy Lovers
listening to Clumsy Lovers
I had an epic dream last night, a really great one. It was an invasion of the bodysnatchers dream, pretty similar to the new The Invasion one, but it still had the awesome pods from the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Either way it was pretty scary. It started out as Dad acting pretty strangely and I was getting kindof suspicious of him, but then Dad asked Mom something really personal and judging by the way she answered somehow I found out that it was actually the rest of the family that had already been changed into alien clones and only Dad and Alpha were still themselves. Anyways, we all had to get out of there to try and find a safe house or warn the government of the invasion already underway. Eventually we got seperated and ended up at this old warehouse. I don't know what happened to Alpha and Dad, but Alpha's Jetta was on the second floor of the warehouse and Dad's flatbed was in the parking lot. Also we had met up with this little boy who's parents had already been changed and he had ended up with me. So anyways I ran into the truck with the boy and we were trying to find the key, but we were being mobbed by the crazy emotionless changed people so we had to boot it out of the truck and up to Alpha's car on the second floor. The only problem was that it had somehow gotten onto the second floor and the only way to get it down was to back up and drive as fast as we could off the second floor balcony, and that's where my dream ended.
I try not to tell people my dreams because they're usually pretty crazy and I'm not the greatest at telling them, but when I have a really vivid one I can't help it. Credits for the eastcoast music go Ashley travelling in Newfoundland. In other news I've got a crazy cast on my foot/leg because the x-ray technician thinks the break extends into the joint on the bone so I'm still off work, but hopefully I can get it off in a week or so because it's getting pretty boring. Also I'm working on a sweet song called "In Metronome" which I'll post as soon as I'm done.
Park Ranger
I had an epic dream last night, a really great one. It was an invasion of the bodysnatchers dream, pretty similar to the new The Invasion one, but it still had the awesome pods from the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Either way it was pretty scary. It started out as Dad acting pretty strangely and I was getting kindof suspicious of him, but then Dad asked Mom something really personal and judging by the way she answered somehow I found out that it was actually the rest of the family that had already been changed into alien clones and only Dad and Alpha were still themselves. Anyways, we all had to get out of there to try and find a safe house or warn the government of the invasion already underway. Eventually we got seperated and ended up at this old warehouse. I don't know what happened to Alpha and Dad, but Alpha's Jetta was on the second floor of the warehouse and Dad's flatbed was in the parking lot. Also we had met up with this little boy who's parents had already been changed and he had ended up with me. So anyways I ran into the truck with the boy and we were trying to find the key, but we were being mobbed by the crazy emotionless changed people so we had to boot it out of the truck and up to Alpha's car on the second floor. The only problem was that it had somehow gotten onto the second floor and the only way to get it down was to back up and drive as fast as we could off the second floor balcony, and that's where my dream ended.
I try not to tell people my dreams because they're usually pretty crazy and I'm not the greatest at telling them, but when I have a really vivid one I can't help it. Credits for the eastcoast music go Ashley travelling in Newfoundland. In other news I've got a crazy cast on my foot/leg because the x-ray technician thinks the break extends into the joint on the bone so I'm still off work, but hopefully I can get it off in a week or so because it's getting pretty boring. Also I'm working on a sweet song called "In Metronome" which I'll post as soon as I'm done.
Park Ranger
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