Internetless survival mode

I've been without internet access (at home) for over a week. This means that I’ve had to find other things to do to fill all the time I usually spend reading blogs, checking the weather and looking up miscellaneous things like the plot synopsis for Much Ado About Nothing. (I'm going to see my nephews in this play next week, and I don't want it to be a repeat of my experience with The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade, where I was lost from the first bathtub scene. Of course, this is Much Ado About Nothing set in the Chicago gangster era, so even knowing the plot may not help.) One of my first time-filling acts was to go see Leonard Cohen. His still phwoar voice assured me he's still my man, and I think it would have been fun if they had temporarily re-named wherever he stayed in Kingston the Chelsea Hotel, and furnished the room with a Janis Joplin look-alike. If I had had time I would gladly have grown my hair longer, frizzed it out more and taken on the role.

I watched The Wickerman. Not the original version, the 2006 one with Nicholas Cage. **SPOILER ALERT** Cage’s character is lured to an island inhabited by a group of earth mothers, who occasionally sacrifice a male non-virgin to ensure a good harvest. (Watching the movie brought back memories of a festival we went to in Nepal. The day was devoted to sacrificing young male goats to appease the goddess Kali, who obviously enjoys a good bloodbath. I'm so glad I have two X chromosomes.) I thought the movie was creepy, but the next day I looked on Rotten Tomatoes and most of the reviewers trashed it – they found it filled more with unintentional humour than horror. I hadn't thought that **SPOILER ALERT** Nicholas Cage donning a bear suit to blend in with the earth mothers wearing bird masks was funny when I was watching the movie, but as I was recounting that part of it to a coworker I went into an uncontrollable fit of chortling and snortling.

And I've been watching Seinfeld. When Maureen and I went for dinner before gettin' down with Lennie, she told me a story that sounded like it had Seinfeld potential. She lent the book of recipes that came with her bread maker to a friend, and then the friend died. She of course didn't want to ask for the book back, but couldn't use her bread maker without it. We tried to think of what Elaine would have done. She would probably have offered to go over and help the husband sort through his wife's effects, with the real intention of looking for the recipe book. She would instead find some explicit photos of her friend with Kramer. Jerry would be upset because, after looking at the photos, he would realize that Kramer and Putty had both stolen his move. George would refuse to go to the funeral because he had been told it would be inappropriate to wear velvet.

Watching Seinfeld has made me uncomfortably aware of how similar I am to George, even though I don't generally want to drape myself in velvet. I'm going to a cottage this weekend with four friends, and one of them is celebrating her birthday. Somehow the five of us got into the gift-giving thing last year. I really want to nip this nascent tradition in the bud. Isn't it enough that we get together to celebrate? Why do I have to bring a gift? That “have” makes me realize that it has become an obligation, and I'm rebelling. Unless I can think of something to re-gift. If only someone had given me a label-maker for Christmas.

Of course, there is always the garden to fill my time. A complicated love-hate relationship there. My love of living things does not extend to aphids, which I really, really hate. They are destroying my purple leaf sandcherry and burning bushes, which I planted because they are supposed to be hardy. Nowhere did I read that these plants are a favoured congregation spot for aphids. Did you know that a female aphid can lay 250 eggs a day, and that's without mating? Damn those two X chromosomes. On a more positive note, I made a wonderful discovery in mulch this week. The gardening centre offers three varieties: pine bark, cedar and cocoa. The latter was the only one that promised the aroma of chocolate. I bought three bags, loaded them in the car, and did some grocery shopping. When I got back to the car, which had been parked in the sun, the interior was infused with the scent of chocolate. Heaven! The three bags are now piled in my back yard. Yesterday I saw two squirrels sniffing them delightedly, then ripping their way into them. This made me uncomfortably aware of how similar I am to squirrels. Maybe I should just keep the bags in the car all summer. I’m sure the smell would overpower any feelings of road rage in me.

When I got home from work today there was a flyer stuck in my door, asking me how I plan to survive the end of the world. I hadn't really thought much about this, although maybe I should given North Korea's recent activities and the rising seas, and that fact that if I do have a plan in place I won’t have to bother making a will. I will devote the rest of my internetless existence to giving this question more thought. But come Sunday, when my new account is activated, I'm going to start reading blogs again (rumour has it that I've been missing some good posts, like the one of a long-haired Deloney)... as long as my friends don't sacrifice me this weekend to ensure a better harvest of gifts next year.

Pit bulls on the loose

I usually like to see dogs dashing around parks and living the good North American dog's life. But last night when I went out to try and fight the weeds (which is a little like revisiting the Vietnam and probably Afghanistan experience on an annual basis), I noticed two pit bulls running in the park behind my house. I know there are a lot of pit bull look-alikes and these dogs may not in fact have been pit bulls, but still, they had massive jaws that looked like they could have easily taken on any body part of mine, including my head. The toy they were playing with was a car tire hanging from a tree. The dogs would leap up, latch onto the tire and shake the hell out of it. I wasn't actually that nervous for myself, since I assumed that if the dogs were off-leash in a children's park whoever owned the dogs must feel confident that they could call them off someone. I was more worried for my cats, who were wandering around in the backyard oblivious to the bloody end I was imagining for them. I've been slightly paranoid about their fates ever since a friend told me a story about how once, when she was walking her dog, the dog saw a cat and took off after it. The cat ran back in the direction of where it lived and almost made it, but the dog caught it and killed it in front of my friend, the cat's owner, and the latter's young daughter. (This same dog also got a groundhog and massacred it in front of the boathouse where the Queen's rowing team was about to set out for an early morning practice, which was an inauspicious start to everyone's day except the dog's.) I can't even imagine how I'd react if something like this happened to one of my cats, except in my mind I was going hysterical and yelling obscenities at the two guys who were with the dogs and possibly kicking the dogs' heads in. (Civilization is only epidermis deep in me. And it's probably good I never had kids. I would have been one of those hockey moms, or, at the very least, pathologically overprotective.) Fortunately, and as generally happens, my worst-case scenario did not transpire. (As yet another no-doubt irritating aside, I wonder why I allow myself to think of the worst-case scenario. Is it because that deep down I think that whatever happens can't possibly be as traumatic as what I imagine might happen, so that if it does happen I'll be able to handle it? Gee, and when I saw that dog rip my cat apart, it wasn't nearly as bad as I had thought it might be.) The pit bulls or pit bull look-alikes continued to happily attack the tire, the cats continued to happily roam, and I continued to unhappily age a bit more.

It's hard to find much to laugh about in airports

When airport improvement projects are undertaken they should incorporate elements of humour, like an open mic comedy lounge. As it stands, it's hard to find much to laugh about in airports. I went to a conference in Chicago last week. When I checked in at the Air Canada desk, I was given a customs declaration form for pre-clearing US customs at the Toronto airport. I wasn't bringing in firearms, antlers, alcohol or fruits or vegetables, so I checked “no” to each of these items. When the customs officer asked if I had any food, I replied “just my lunch to eat before I get on the plane.” He then accused me of having lied on my form. When I said that I wasn't bringing the food to the US, I was informed that I was on US soil now and that I had in fact brought food in. I asked how was I to know this since I was still in Toronto and there were no signs warning me I was entering the US? (Besides which, most of the food I had was probably imported from the US.) The “conversation” went back and forth like this for a bit, with me getting more agitated and the overly officious officer asking questions that seemed purposeless and vaguely harassing, like whether I had a university education (I am going to write to American Customs and Border Protection to complain about that one). He was like a pit bull, taking hold of and violently shaking me until all signs of excitement and joy had been extinguished. In the end he spit at me “You have lied to a federal officer of the American government.” Wanker, my eyes spit back at him. He sent me to another area where I had to undergo secondary security screening. While waiting there I copied down a “comments” telephone number on a sign informing me that US Customs officers are professional and courteous. Maybe this was meant to be humourous?

On my return from the conference while waiting to claim my checked bags (which cost me $40 US on United Airlines), I heard this announcement: “We apologize to everyone coming from Montego Bay for the delay in getting your luggage. We are trying to locate it.” The fact that an airline had managed to lose a planeful of luggage made me smile. Maybe there is hope for airports yet.