We interrupt this blog ...

I'm in a mood. You've been warned.

(I've no idea who this clown on the right is and I don't much care. But his appearance seems to generally capture my current state of being.

So I stuck him there! And all this text in the brackets is filler as I try to fix the layout to an appearance that is pleasing to me. This post was over before the brackets started.)

A meaningless meme?

Just because yesterday was such an awful day, today I take this meme from Brooke and toss it out there:

1.You are in the Witness Protection Program and must invent a new first, last, and middle name. What is it?

Big Balls Billy

2.You are in a threesome with two famous people, alive or dead.

Sophia Loren. Ashely Judd (she’s feisty).

3.You are in charge of naming your new band. What's the name of the band?

Sedition.

4. You are going to get a free tattoo. What would it be?

Invisible.

5. You are being forced to listen to one song over and over, ad infinitum, as a form of torture. What song is it?

Numa Numa. (Or whatever the hell it’s called.)

6. You are leaving your state/province. What state do you move to?

Hawaii.

7. You are leaving your country, where would you move?

Tuscany. Cook Islands.

8. You get to choose one book as the best ever written. What book do you choose?

The Sot-Weed factor by John Barth.

9. You get to choose one movie as the best ever made. What movie do you choose?

The Philadelphia Story. (Why didn’t I pick My Man Godfrey?)

10. You get to spend one day each as a bird, an insect, and a mammal. What bird would you be? What insect? What mammal?

A wren because it’s important to get in touch with your true self. Mosquito just to piss off people who annoy me. A dolphin so I can be happy.

11. You must relive one year of your life. Which would you like to relive?

Something in the late 1980s. My memory isn’t good on specific dates.

12. Which year(s) would you least like to relive?

Something in the early 1980s. Or anything to do with high school.

13. You have a time machine that will take you backwards anywhere from 1800 to the present. What decade do you most want to visit?

1920s or early 1930s … although the heating sucked. But they definitely dressed better.

14. You must choose to go skydiving or very-deep-sea diving.

Deep sea diving.

15. You get to return to the past (using that handy dandy time machine we were talking about before) and have a sexual encounter with a rock star who is no longer alive. Who do you pick?

Mama Cass Elliot. She’d be a hoot!

16. You get to be a contestant on any game show, airing today or in the past. What show do you want to be on?

Jeopardy. My useless knowledge must be good for something!

17. You are given $1 million dollars but you must give it all to one charity. What charity do you choose?

World Vision.

18. You must ban one word from the dictionary and all usage, to be no longer uttered or written. What word do you ban?

Impact as a verb.

19. You can have 100 million dollars tax-free but if you take it, you'll die at the age of fifty. Do you take it?

Ha ha ha. Anyone who has read my blogs closely will know how old I am and realize this is not a good deal. No thanks!

20. There is no number 20.

But if there was, the answer would be “wooly.”

Today's cryptic post

It is taking me forever to return to where I'm going.

(This probably requires some explanation. Who knows? Maybe one day it will be made available online.)

Another fiction flash

My contribution to JJ's Flash Fiction Friday #42 is done and posted. It's called:

A system for socks

Bill and Bernie

Why do I like this picture?

Well ... all pictures have memories attached to them and this is no different. But some have memories that are more poignant, and some recall memories of a different ... I dunno, kind? Not sure what the right word is.

Anyway ... To name one, I like it because my father took it. He was into photography. Way back around the time the dinosaurs were dying out, he took photos and developed them himself. This is one of the pics he took.

I like it for that damn cowlick I've got. Where the hell did that come from? Where'd it go? I don't have it anymore. One of life's mysteries.

I like this picture because Bernie's there. Bernie was a purebred Springer Spaniel. Unfortunately (as occasionally happens with purebreds) he went off his rocker. We were never sure why - though we had suspicions. Anyway, he began snapping at people. And then one day he bit a kid. And that was the kiss of death for Bernie. Literally. Sorry Bern. You are missed. Still. Even after all this time.

I like my pants. Notice the patches on the knees? My mom use to put these iron-on patches on my pants, the knees, because they were always wearing out. I guess I did a lot of crawling in the dirt and corruption of the world back then. I was big on bugs and stones back then.

So. Those are some of the reasons I like this picture. And that's all I have to say about that.

Hockey Hollywood's hot new trend?

I honestly didn't think I'd be writing anything more about hockey but, I may be wrong. It may be the hot new celebrity thing, right up there with diets, fitness and signature perfumes.

And this because that trendsetting celebrity Paris Hilton appears to like a partner who wears pads too. Dating Colorado Avalanche goalie Jose Theodore? Can such things be?

And what might it lead to?

Tomorrow's headlines here today:

Britney leaves Kevin for Edmonton's Chris Pronger!
"I wanted a man with a big stick"

Aniston dumps Vaughn - snags Lightning's Lecavalier!
"He's got good hands"

Oh dear. This is what illness does to the human brain. Why am I posting this?

A lengthy, energy absent day

This has not been the day I had hoped for. In fact, it’s been pretty much the exact opposite. (Just as that front page on the right is the opposite of what we were hoping to see this morning.)

Well, that happens sometimes.

It probably would have been a much better day had I had any sleep last night but I was wakend at 2:30 in the morning by some drunken woman screaming her idiot head off (and no, not the “Help me!” kind of scream but the “I’m drunk and have the brain of a pea” kind of scream).

On the other hand, I was reminded of the lovely Alberta sunrises and how early they arrive this time of year as I watched it from my balcony at 3:45 a.m. today. (According to Environment Canada, sunrise was 5:05 a.m. ... but the sky lightens much sooner than that.)

Anyway … I never expected to be making posts about hockey games – not normally my kind of thing. But damn … they were fun this year. Much better drama than anything I’ve seen out of Hollywood in recent years. It was all good … well, except maybe the end. That could have used a rewrite. But so it goes.

I guess I need to get a life now. Hmm.

(Yes, I still have a cold or flu or whatever it is I have. But I think it's making a slow exit now.)

Grumble, grumble - blah, blah, blah ...

The Oilers lost (no more smiles for the folks in the post below). I'm sick - literally (a cold/flu thing - headaches, glue-filled nose, sore throat etc.), and the assholes outside, drunk as usual, don't seem to understand the difference between winning and losing a championship.

None of that really matters to me right now. I just want to stop feeling irritable and stop being grumpy. It has the appeal of meat gone bad. Take it away!

Tomorrow will be better. I have willed it. (And I checked the weather forecast.)

Why are these people happy?

I think it’s one of two things. It could be because in a little less than an hour (as I type this) the Edmonton Oilers and Carolina Hurricanes will play the last hockey game of the season. No more after this. And there’s every reason to hope the Oil will win and bring the Stanley Cup back to Edmonton.

On the other hand, these people could be happy because this is the last hockey game of the season, the end of the NHL playoffs … and they live in the Old Strathcona neighbourhood, near Whyte Avenue, and after tonight the crowds will finally be gone.

It’s hard to say.

Merriment on Whyte Ave.

It was merry and boisterous and loud on Whyte Avenue last night. I ended up going to bed around 2:20 a.m. and I could still hear them.

The game ended somewhere around 9:00 p.m., I think.

The thing is, I’m somewhere a few blocks away from where most of the congregating takes place but last night – they were everywhere. In the earlier part of the night, it was like a bizarre mosh pit cum family day picnic what with the mix of 20-somethings and families with the kids.

And what could prompt such a spontaneous gathering of merry-making locals? The Oil, of course. The Oil!

And everybody is an Oiler fan these days.

Now it all comes down to one game. We’re not supposed to be anywhere near the final, much less the last game of a seven game, winner-take-all series.

But we are. And on Monday night, when the Cup is finally presented, what will the guys receiving it be wearing?

Copper and blue, of course.

Btw … This (on the right) is one of the ads they’ve produced to urge the boneheads to contain themselves and not destroy things. Much as I like the ad I’m not sure how effective it is. Drunken idiots don’t make the best listeners. (I think they said there had been something like 200 arrests made by 12:30 a.m. last night. I can attest to the fact that numerous people were whisked away as the smaller city buses they used as paddy wagons were wheeling down my street with sirens and so on. There were rather a lot of them.)

Oh … Once Monday is over and done with, I can’t help wonder what kind of police service we’ll have left as I’m sure they’ll all be ready for a least a month’s rest. Those poor buggers have been stuck dealing with the Whyte Ave. crowds through the entire playoffs – that’s like two months or something. The bill for that is already over $1 million.

The washing machine update

Because I know everyone on the Internet is anxious to know, I can happily report the washing machine is now working. Soon, I shall smell like a flower.

Why is it working? As they say in the film Shakespeare in Love: "It's a mystery."

I have no idea why today it is working. A close examination reveals nothing. Well, actually a close examination might reveal something but I suspect you would have to know what you're looking at in order to recognize it. I don't know.

In other news:

Well, there is no other news. Certainly nothing of interest. I got a haircut yesterday. It also rained again yesterday. I woke this morning with a cold that is trying to take root. At this stage, I appear to have been successful in showing the little bugger the door. But you never know.

Ah, this life. It's a thriller.

(Speaking of thrillers ... Oilers play tonight. GOILERS!!!) (And soon this Oilers thing will be over. A win tonight and there will be just one more game left. Currently, Crazy Ass Planet does not recognise any other scenario.)

The stench of modern life

Through no fault of your own, through some whim of the anonymous gods, the air becomes heavy with humidity and the skies darken with cloud and the heavens urinate upon us.

Yes, it rains. And it stinks.

What is it about rain that lifts every evil odor from every nook and cranny and every aging sofa and makes everything smell like cat pee?

I cast my gaze across the room at the sleeping cat and say aloud, “What have you done? And where?”

She does not answer.

I plug in the modern convenience of one of those “sweet-stink” creating products available at the Safeway and the domicile soon acquires a sweet scent … accompanied by the smell of cat pee.

“What has occasioned this?” I rage. And then I wonder, “Maybe it’s not the cat. Maybe it’s me!!!”

But a quick examination of the crotch area (a process I prefer not to go into) quickly affirms no shameful accidents on my part have caused this perfidy. No, I am convinced it is cat pee.

But where? Where? And why?

And what is it about a rainy night that makes every smell on the planet rise up like a mob asserting its inalienable rights?

Why does my home stink of cat pee!!!?????

Nude or smelly - some choice

No one likes a whiner, but really ...

1) The Oilers lost
2) The washing machine broke
3) Yes, the washing machine is broken

So it appears I can either go around naked or stinkin' out the joint wherever I go.

I suppose I could find a laudromat ... do they still have those? I guess they do - I keep seeing them in movies and on TV shows. I think there may have been one in Shopgirl.

Grumble, grumble.

This modern life. It ain't easy, I tell ya!

Ready for an Oilers win

In about two hours we begin Game 3 of the Stanley Cup finals, the one where the world sits back in amazement as the Edmonton Oilers, having dug themselves a hole, begin clawing their way back out. It will begin this evening with a bum slapping administered to the Carolina Hurricanes.

It should be quite the show. As you can see, I’ve donned my newly acquired Oilers cap in order to view the proceedings properly.

I realize many of you out there who visit this blog just don’t care. Hockey is to you as the manufacturing of shoelaces is to me. But you must bear with me. This is the Stanley Cup.

Now some may wonder why I am one of the three people left in Edmonton without an Oilers jersey. There is a reason for this. Yes, I could have picked one up with ease. But I chose not to. Why? Because, as Victor Navorski says in the film The Terminal, “I wait.”

Wait? Wait for what?

It should be obvious.

I wait to pick up the jersey that reads, “Edmonton Oilers – Stanley Cup Champions 2005 – 2006.”

I don’t think they’ll be on sale for at least a week.

In the meantime, I have my cap and my beer (Blue for Oilers).

And I wait.

And as they say on the Covered In Oil blog – GOILERS!!!

Why write? Why blog?

One of the pleasing things in life is coming upon something that confirms something you’ve always held to. I’ve often said to people that for me, reading and writing were much like meditation.

I’ve also had people ask why I blog, or why I have several of them. For one, where do I find the time? (I don’t know.) More importantly, why? Well, here’s something of an answer:

Interestingly, a large body of work over the last two decades has shown that writing regularly about one’s experiences clearly has beneficial effects on well-being and health. It even makes a measurable difference to immune function. Writing seems to have its healing effects whether the experiences written about are negative or positive ones. Thus the explanation is not as simple as a venting of otherwise pent up negative thoughts. I suspect that writing itself allows us to become more mindful of our thoughts, and at the same time take distance from them, replicating in a way the effects of mindfulness therapy or meditation.

This is from the book I’m currently reading, Happiness: The Science Behind your Smile by Daniel Nettle. For me, it’s quite fascinating. Much of what it argues seems to be intuited from what various studies have revealed (some from quite small samplings, to be honest).

What I like, maybe because it seems contradictory (like us), is that it seems to indicate that to some degree how we feel is determined by personality (you are who you are) yet at the same time we have the knowledge and ability to choose how we feel.

And I love the passage quoted. This is definitely one of the main reasons why I write, why I blog. Maybe the only reason.

I am a goat (too much information)

I tried posting this earlier today but Blogger was down. But I can post now and here it is, from Birthday Calculator, all about me, the Goatboy. The date in question, January 17:

Your date of conception was on or about 26 April 1955 which was a Tuesday.

You were born on a Tuesday
under the astrological sign Capricorn.
Your Life path number is 3.

Life Path Compatibility:
You are most compatible with those with the Life Path numbers 3, 6 & 9.
You should get along well with those with the Life Path numbers 1, 2, 5 & 11.
You are least compatible with those with the Life Path numbers 4, 7, 8 & 22.

The Julian calendar date of your birth is 2435489.5. (What the hell does that mean?)
The golden number for 1956 is 19.
The epact number for 1956 is 17.
The year 1956 was a leap year.

(I really don't get the numbers business but it appears to be very meaningful.)

Your birthday falls into the Chinese year beginning 1/24/1955 and ending 2/11/1956.
You were born in the Chinese year of the Goat.

(And yes, Capricorn also is the goat sign ... hence, Goatboy.)

The date of Easter on your birth year was Sunday, 1 April 1956.
The date of Orthodox Easter on your birth year was Sunday, 6 May 1956.
The date of Ash Wednesday (the first day of Lent) on your birth year was Wednesday 15 February 1956.
The date of Whitsun (Pentecost Sunday) in the year of your birth was Sunday 20 May 1956.
The date of Whisuntide in the year of your birth was Sunday 27 May 1956.
The date of Rosh Hashanah in the year of your birth was Thursday, 6 September 1956.
The date of Passover in the year of your birth was Tuesday, 27 March 1956.
The date of Mardi Gras on your birth year was Tuesday 14 February 1956.

As of 6/8/2006 2:11:09 AM EDT
You are 26,503,331 minutes old.

Your age is the equivalent of a dog that is 7.20352250489237 years old. (You old hound dog, you!)

(What the hell is that supposed to mean?)

Your birthstone is Garnet

The Mystical properties of Garnet:

Garnet is used as a power stone

Some lists consider these stones to be your birthstone. (Birthstone lists come from Jewelers, Tibet, Ayurvedic Indian medicine, and other sources)

Emerald, Rose Quartz

Your birth tree is:

Elm Tree, the noble-mindedness (ooh ... I like that!)

Pleasant shape, tasteful clothes, modest demands, tends not forgive mistakes, cheerful, likes to lead but not to obey, honest and faithful partner, tends to a know-all-attitude and making decisions for others, noble-minded, generous, good sense of humour, practical.

The moon's phase on the day you were born was waxing crescent.

(The Goatboy business ain't no joke. See where you go when you try goatboy.net).

This can’t be good - Oilers implode

Doh! Amid all the high expectations and cheers and beers … the Oilers started the Stanley Cup final by not only losing the game but losing it in a less than stellar way (blowing a 3 to 0 lead).

And to cap the debacle, they lost their goaltender, Dwayne Roloson.

Now, of course, everyone who said they were bound to win (many of whom didn’t give them a single thought at the beginning of the season) now say they haven’t a snowball’s chance in hell of winning.

So … for those who have not actually watched the Oilers this season, from someone who actually has, the Oil are not dead. The show isn’t closing. All is not lost.

Much as I like Roloson (he’s a great positional goaltender and has good reactions), he’s not spectacular. He’s just a pretty good goalie who has benefited from the way the Oilers play in front of him (well, except last night when they sucked).

The impact of losing Roloson will be more psychological than actual. The Oilers’ problem right now is at the other end of the rink. They out-skated, out-worked and out-shot Carolina last night. But Cam Ward was in the way.

The Hurricanes will get better. But then, so will Edmonton. One thing the Oilers will need to do is become more disciplined in their own end. (They’re kind of bipolar that way – sometimes fabulous, sometimes appalling.)

And Oiler fans can also take some comfort in the fact that all season long the Oil have shot themselves in the foot whenever they became comfortable with a lead – in a game, in a series, in the season. They seem to thrive on adversity and love putting themselves in a hole. I don’t know whether this means they have no killer instinct or just that they are not terribly bright. But either way, they play best when they are down.

Their biggest problem right now, I think, is the belief out there that losing Roloson means losing the series. It doesn’t. Not by a long shot. Oh … and another thing they’ll need to do is get over this business of driving opposing players into their goaltender. (It wasn’t just Bergeron who did it – Jason Smith did the same thing earlier in the game.)

Can they win the Stanley Cup? Yes. Will they? I believe that answer lies in the Carolina end of the rink.

Tags: Oilers, Edmonton Oilers, Stanley Cup, NHL, Hockey

Down the rabbit hole

Well, today has kind of vanished for me ... I slept way too late then got online and started wandering around Newsvine, my new favourite site. It's a combination of quite a few things - kind of news, blogs, links, comments etc.

Anyway ... that's where I've been. And I've create my own page there. The site uses news feeds but you can also seed it with stories etc. from elsewhere.

Blah blah blah ... Well, if you're like me, you'll love this stuff and get lost in it too. On the other hand ... maybe it'll just bore the pants off you.

Let's get happy

I've started a number of posts today and didn't complete any of them. I think I'm dealing with the residual effects of last week.

But I may have embarked on a new project. If I'm ambitious, I'll weave it in to another little project I'm planning. If I'm not ambitious (and this is the more likely eventuality), I won't.

It began with picking up a new book today, Happiness: The Science behind Your Smile by Daniel Nettle. Here's an intriguing quote from the Introduction:

“The systems controlling pleasure are not identical to those controlling desire. This is an important lesson; the psychology of aspiration is not that of satisfaction. We do not always want what we like or like what we want.”

(Ha ha ... does that describe relationships, or what?)

It promises to be an interesting read. Also interesting ... This book was in the science section as it's about the psychology, the brain etc. ... but as I turned around I realised the books on the other side were Self-Help and the first book I saw there was called ... Happiness. (It even had a quote by Richard Gere.) Unfortunately, I'm not interested in the touchy-feely aspects. I like the ones that discuss how the brain works.

For what it's worth (not having read the book yet) I think happiness, the vague and elusive whatever-the-hell-it-is, is related to a sense of purpose.

By the way, as usual I'm reading several books at once. So I'm also in process of reading The Weather Makers by Tim Flannery. (The book is subtitled How we are changing the climate and what it means for life on Earth.) As you can image, it's all about climate change and global warming. And I won't say anymore about that. (For now.)

There is something about this week …

Some weeks just aren’t supposed to go well. This is one of them.

I know this because whatever posts I manage are 1) very late at night when I know I should go to bed but I’m too buggered up to sleep so I fiddle and fart at my keyboard and, 2) the posts are never about the things I intend to post about – they’re just whiney tappings that, I hope, at least have a therapeutic benefit.

Today, for example, right from the starting pistol, began as a total shit festival. I woke from a dream where my cat, the beloved but annoying Gonzo, was old and decrepit and crossing a road against furious traffic, which she was no match for, and she lost. I dreamed she was hit by a car.

Odd, since she’s a house cat and never goes outside … but it was a dream, where all bets are off.

So I woke depressed and feeling like shit.

Then the glory of the day began and like a turd in a toilet bowl it went under. Is it me or is work generally just one big goddamn pain in the fucking ass?

Yes, I’m bitchy and cranky and now I will go to bed … but not before reading a bit of The Weather Makers, a book about how we’re going to hell in a handbasket because in this world, no one believes we’re killing ourselves until we’re dead.

(Heavens … I am in a black mood tonight! Thus the image of Gonzo baring her teeth. You would too if people were dreaming of you being hit by cars! Upside – tomorrow will be better. I shall make it so.)