Fun in Three Parts

For those of you who read Jennifer's blog, I'll try to write this so it's not just a rehash. See, we've been spending a lot of time together, which she has documented, both amusingly and well.

Our time as neighbours is drawing to a close. Not any time soon, but it's out there. Eventually I'll get around to posting about one of the reasons. For now, you just have to trust me that it's no bad reason. But I'm sad about it.

++One

Last night we hopped all around the town. First dinner, Adam and J. and me. After, on our walk over to the Aloha, Jennifer said she'd been trying to come up with a team name for us. "I love that you were trying to do that," Adam said. "Yeah," J. said, "but all I came up with was Team Air Freshener Orphanage." And Adam made the sound of the air freshener that has become the metonymic touchpoint for our whole Osheaga trip. It was hilarious to us, but why it was wouldn't make much sense to anyone else. It was that kind of dinner.

After the Aloha was the RocknRoll Pizza Party, with a great band that gave Jennifer hope for a pop/punk scene in Ottawa. Today I ran into Luke Nuclear, RRPP mastermind, and he said the band had so much fun that their other band, music in the same vein, Statues, might just make us a visit. You will likely find us at that show.

This gave me enough time and bars to consume the appropriate amount of beer for seeing one's fairly recent ex-boyfriend; that is to say, enough to take the edge off the nervous, but not enough to hit weepy. I ran into James while the imbibing was taking place. He looked surprised when I mentioned going to a party at Eric's. "Yeah," I said. "I'm not sure if that's crazy or stupid." "A bit of both, maybe," he responded. True dat, but it felt like the right thing to do.

When people split up, it's easy to lose the other person, and all the friends you made through them, permanently. Sometimes, that's the right thing. I have exes I will never talk to again, sometimes because they treated me so badly they don't deserve it, sometimes because the connection was tenuous to begin with. Eric falls into neither of those categories, and I hope that someday we can be actual friends. Maybe not close friends, but real friends.

There was never any way around the fact that our first actual conversation was going to be hard. I figured a party, with lots of distractions, with lots of people I hadn't seen in a while, with the ability to make that beer a quick one, well, it was probably a pretty good start. I figured right. Almost everyone seemed happy to see me, Mark was pleased as punch with his birthday cookies, and Eric liked the map I gave him as much as I thought he would.

When J. and I got home, I did some late-night wind-down tidying in the kitchen. I could hear her doing the same: the cupboard doors opening and closing, some rattling around. The way I can hear the radio on for Shy Dog, the ghost of the CBC playing on my radio too. Or the way the laughter signals that Lesley or Adam or Michael is over for dinner. From anyone else those noises would be wallpaper at best, an annoyance at worst. Coming from Jennifer, they're insanely comforting.

++Two

Wednesday night's reading at Octopus, the inaugural evening of the Female First Fiction reading series, was fucking great.

For one, Jennifer read from her new novel-in-progress, about a 10 year old girl. If the excerpt is anything to go by, I'm gonna like it even more than Grrrl, which is saying something.

For two, Jessica Westhead read from Pulpy & Midge, a novel about a cowed office worker and his bully boss. It was a good reading and sounds like a good book. Even last night Adam and I were pretending to be Dan the Bully, punching our thighs and saying "Boys night!", trying to get the same combination of triumph and ferocity with which Westhead managed to infuse those words.

Afterwards, there was an impromptu panel during which our JWs talked about the process of getting published. It was adorable. So much nerdy girl excitement! Though I must admit, I was a little jealous. Not in a bad way, an eats-away-at-you way, but in an "I want to be up there talking about that, and I am going to have to reorganize my life and get off my ass and make that happen." kind of way. An inspired by wicked awesome ladies sort of way.

++Three

Tonight we're off to Zaphod's to see Immaculate Machine and Ladyhawk. I love the keyboardy pop of IM, and Ladyhawk is the right kind of dark fuzzy rock and roll. I expect it to be loud, I expect it to be fun.

The Smoking Hot Girl may be joining us in our indie rock adventure. Who knows what will happen after the show, but I will keep a neighbourly thought in mind about the ease with which sound travels from one kitchen to another.

Fun Times

This past weekend, venus envy turned 7, and we celebrated with a big ol' house party. The denizens of Queer Nation,* those brave souls, opened their house up to us, and there was much mirth. And drinking. And dancing. With very cute people in the room, and with one very cute girl in particular.

Lately, it seems like the parties I've been to have been full of dancing. I heartily approve of this. Who needs to go to a bar? You add a good mix of people with extensive playlists to a hardwood dining room floor and the answer is nobody. More rocking, less talking.

In keeping with my current Foxification goals, I got myself tarted up. I like to think I had an influence on Jennifer, who was, from initial reports, going to wear jeans and a tshirt, but instead showed up wearing a hot shirred dress and fancy legs. You can see the hotness and tartiness if you follow the link above.

It's crazy to me that venus envy ottawa is 7 years old. How did that happen? I moved here to run that store when it was just a baby. And now it's moved on and growed up to three times its baby size. It's a going concern, not a struggling one.

Though retail didn't end up being the right environment for this introvert, I loved working there. I met so many great people and felt like I was doing really good, really important work. And I got to meet Shelley, which to me is the best thing of all.

*Not to forget Christine and Adam, who don't, I think, have websites.

How I Roll

Jennifer: Did you knit this afghan?

Me: Yep.

J: How old were you?

Me: Oh, I dunno, in my teens.

J: How did you get it so long? That's crazy!

Me: Circular needle. The stitches all bunch up in the middle. I had no idea how many stitches there were - that was supposed to be the short end. Took forever.

J: How long?

Me: Jesus. Huh. Five years? I started when I was like, 13.

J: So not really in your teens, but when you were a teenager.

Me: Yes. Precisely.

We're Both Home

And both about to bike off again soon. To Andrea's CD release party, in this instance.

It was a fabulously well-organized event, which I always appreciate very much. And man oh man, does Andrea have a beautiful voice. And well-written lyrics. Those are two other things that I appreciate very much.

I agree entirely with Jennifer's prediction that we will be able to say I knew her when. Besides the good musicianship, Andrea knows how to work a crowd, and I mean that in a very nice way. I've been in front of a crowd often enough to know how hard won that apparent ease is.

The funniest part of the evening for me was a conversation I had with J. The singer of the first band* was introducing the other members of his band, one of whom had just come up on stage.

"And if you're wondering who just came up on stage, his name is David Ger[????]."

I did a double take and leaned over to whisper in Jennifer's ear. "Did you hear what that guy's last name was?"

She shrugged.

"'Cause it sounded like 'Gerbilly.'"

She threw her head back and laughed, and then rocked forward again when the mouthful of beer she'd just taken threatened to choke her.

"And on the drums, David's brother..."

We leaned forward expectantly.

"...Paul Ross."

"What?!" Jennifer said, "They don't even have the same last name!"

If my last name were Gerbilly, I might change it too.




*Okay, singer of first band, some hard love. Back off the mic. Just an inch. When you make love to the mic with your lips, your quite nice voice distorts and isn't quite so nice as when you are teasing the microphone by being two fingers away from it.

Success!

Funny what strikes a chord with people. So far, the post with the most comments is about organizing Eric's records. The one about sheets was surprisingly popular too. I guess it makes sense, since those of us lucky enough to have a bed spend a considerable amount of time in contact with it. The records, I have no explanation.

Jennifer was a peach on Sunday.

First, we had a lovely gossip and catch up in the car. You would think that since becoming neighbours we would see each other all the time, but that has sadly not turned out to be the case.*

Second, Ikea. Sometimes I love Ikea, sometimes it freaks me right the fuck out. Too many choices, too much humanity, a squirm of people slugging along the mandated path through objects tiny and large screaming "buy me! buy me!". And that chair - the Poang - that has the pneumatic arms pressing it? I hate that thing. When I told Jennifer that I hoped it wasn't working, she said "I'm going to start keeping a list of the weird things that creep you and Adam out. He hates lamps." How can you hate lamps? I thought. And almost said. But then again, why would you bother hating a chair being pressed pneumatically?

To my great pleasure the pneumatic chair pressers were out of commission when we got there.

It was actually a fairly calm trip as Ikea jaunts go. As we were walking in, J. said "I love playing Ikea bingo."
"Ikea wha?"
"Crying baby, check. Couple melt down, check. Yknow."
But we didn't see either of those things. Nothing really untoward happened. Not very dramatic, but also not very aggravating.

The only small drama of the trip came from me. You know what I think is obnoxious? Companies asking for your postal code. Fuck that. When the cashier asked me for mine, I said "Unnnnh, for...?" and pretended to look very confused.

I know exactly what they need it for, and while "So we know what neighbourhoods want catalogues," is probably on that list, it's probably not as high as say: what neighbourhoods buy big ticket items? what else do those people buy? where's the real money? who should we care about? And may I say again: fuck that.

But because I am at least moderately polite, what came out of my mouth was "No thank you, I don't need a catalogue." Which is an answer to a totally different question, of course, but she didn't ask again.

I got all the stuff on my list, plus one or two more small things, and walked out having spent $22 - half of which was a purchase for Eric. J. spent less than $10. Success indeed.

Then the real reason for the trip: Linen Chest. Or Linen Closet. Or Bed Bath and Beyond. Or Beds and Other Things That Make Your Life Comfortable. I don't need to remember it because I don't have to go back there for a decade.

That's right:

TAH DAH!

They are 350 count, white, egyptian cotton sheets. They are, in fact, crisp but soft.

Jennifer's presence worked in a totally different way than I expected In the end, she did not just pick one and make me buy it. For the best really, because no one wants her friend sleeping on sheets she hates and thinking of you every time she hates them. Instead, I was acutely aware of how much time I was taking and how much circling we were doing and I did not want to take too long or drag her all over the hell's half acre of the warehouse-like store looking for the exact right thing at the same time I knew there would never be an exact right thing, but still wanting to make sure I had covered all my options.**

So before I went, I decided WHITE. And left the rest up to my quixotic brain and the pressure of another person to seal the deal.

I'm happy with them. At least with how they look. They feel nice on when I touch them, but they were just put on this morning. And I'm leaving town.

Oddly, the first person who will sleep on them is neither me nor my paramour, but my paramour's friend, Housesitter Ian, while I'm in Halifax. That did give me pause, though I don't know why. I considered putting the sheets on after their first wash, getting it on with Eric, and then re-washing them. But that's a lot of work for something that doesn't really matter. In a decade, will I remember that Ian was the first person to sleep on them?

Now, probably yes.


*Although, I was having some people over for drinks on my porch on Tuesday night when she and her paramour and their three dogs pulled up in his boxy orange car. All we could see of the inside of the car from the porch was two dogs staring at us - the humans being too high up to be visible. "Hey," I said, very pleasantly surprised, since J. had left just a couple hours earlier. "It's Jennifer and the Man of Science!" Carolyn looked puzzled. "You know those dogs' names?"

**You know what would make my life easier? If linen stores were organized differently. Instead of by brand, say, which I'm sure the companies pay for (so the richer companies can get better spaces and it's way harder to comparison shop) it would make much more sense to organize sheets by size (king, queen, etc.), then type of sheet (set, flat, fitted, pillowcase, skirt, etc.), by material (including thread count), by solid or pattern and then by colour (or dominant colour, in the case of patterns). Okay, that sounds like a lot of work to put stuff away, sure, but think of how much time it saves in the end! And I'm gonna have to do it, yes, I am going to say something in the exact words of my father: I'm neat because I'm lazy. Why would I waste minutes searching around for something right at the moment I need it when I could just spend 5 seconds putting it in its right spot to begin with?