PPS

My plans to leave the Halloween candy on top of the cupboards where I can't reach it, has failed.
I've eaten 10 pieces of it already. And I still have four days to go.

Note to self: there is no such thing as just one mini-hershey bar.

The big box of Hershey's chocolate is especially dear to me (except for the Mr. Big's, ugh), because at the end of 2007 the last Canadian Hershey plant will have closed. They are relocating to Mexico to keep their labour costs down. And I will have to give up:

Reese's peanut butter cups

Hershey's bars

Glosette Raisins

Nibs

And most other chocolate bars worth eating.

With Nestle buying out most other companies, all that remains is Cadbury's. But if you know something evil about Cadbury's, let me know.

The funny thing about Fair Trade chocolate, and this isn't really a criticism, I guess, is that it's so very high brow all the time.

Want a chocolate bar? Sure, this one is 70% cocoa! Want a flavoured bar? Well, this one contains chillies and spices, and this one contains dried cherries and rose petals!

Why can't there just be a couple that are like, fair trade chocolate with caramel goo inside? Or a peppermint patty. Or peanut butter swirl?

There is fair trade sugar, so maybe these guys should team up and help me pollute my body with a more equitable kind of garbage.

My disclaimer is that this rant will absolutely not stop me from eating the blueberries and lavendar bar. That shit is absolutely delicious.

C'est L'Halloween

I remember having to learn that song as part of elementary school french classes. It's the song that I believe taught me the words for frog (grenouille), pumpkin (citrouille), and witch (sorciere).

Now that I am relearning French, I find that most of my vocabulary is from themed lessons and readings like this, and from food packaging.

Today I am going to try to make it to the firefighters annual haunted house. This is not so much because I love haunted houses, but because the burn house, the house where they set fires to practice putting them out, is one block away from my house, and that's where they hold the event.

I imagine it's like a concrete bunker, but I'm pretty eager to see inside.

Parce que c'est l'halloween, and I love it.

PS- pictures of my 13 jack o'lanterns to follow

In the news

So last week, my baby brother was on page one of their local newspaper, while my youngest sister was on page two, in two unrelated stories.

Apparently we're just meant to be in the spotlight.

Said by me

"I almost love it when things go wrong in my life, because then my blog is better."

Mr. D, this one's for you

Ha.... this is so your big sister. How do you like them apples?

Saved!

I am renown for leaving things behind.

I lose my wallet once a year. My keys every few weeks. My purse at irregular intervals. At the national union convention I attended, I lost my delegate identification within seconds of registering.

And yesterday, after a trip to the pumpkin patch (and the acquisition of a lucky 13 pumpkins), some browsing of very expensive shoes, and an amazing dinner with M.

I leave my laptop, the aforementioned coffee maker, my sweater and some other stuff in the back of M's car.

Which she, bless her, drives back to me from a nearby town when she realizes I have it. Only I'm asleep when she gets here, so I don't get to thank her properly.

Thanks!

And the call was coming from downtown Guelph

So I'm walking the dog, right, and I pass by the large and lovely park at the end of the street.

When out of the woods marches 40 army reservists, in full uniforms and gear. And they march down the street towards downtown.

And I think to myself, 'What the hell? Is Trudeau back in office?'

And it begins

My annual Halloween preparations have begun.

I am so very lucky that M. is visiting from Montreal, and wants to visit the pumpkin patch with me. Tomorrow we go in search of the ugliest, bumpiest, funniest-coloured pumpkins available.

I have 235 pieces of candy. 110 chocolate, 125 non-chocolate.

I am still in need of lights, fake spider webs, and other gaudy wonders to impress the neighbourhood.

Fortunately this is a pretty family place, so there should be no shortage of little ghouls and goblins to visit.

I love the holidays.

ha

Brought home the coffee pot, forgot the actual machine part on my desk.

No coffee no beep beep

I've had to lend my coffee maker to my under-funded little radio station for the weekend.

This sounded like a great idea to me- make the volunteers happy, and then I go out for coffee or get a jar of instant.

Except that it's a f#$%& holiday, and jeepers christmas, there's nowhere to get a cup of coffee anywhere. The convenience store only has decaf, and I am seriously considering chewing some of the grounds in order to get through to tomorrow.

Well, it's a good motivator to walk to work at 6:00am on a holiday Monday, anyway. Because when I get there I'm going to brew a full pot, and then drink it out of said pot.

For the record

I'd just like to say that Ghostbusters is a terrific movie.

we're a union, just by saying so....

Newsies, one of my all-time favourite movies, is a great example of collective organizing. Listen to the whole soundtrack, seriously. And watch the movie: children strikers, music and dancing, and a very young Christian Bale.

You can't lose.

Working Class Dictionary - update and thanks

Entries for the Working Class Dictionary are rolling in.

This project is more difficult than I first thought. People who use these words have, of course, internalized this vocabulary and we assume others speak our language.

They don't.

If you can, take a step back and add a word to the lexicon.

I'll post new entries to the blog next week.

Now seems like a good time

to tell you that this is a neoist project, undertaken in the name of neoism. Neoism encourages a world of collectivity, of plunder, of magic.

I plagiarize to show art/work as a collective, shared act. Anyone can call themselves Monty Cantsin and undertake an act of Neoism, just by saying so.

NEOISM: a purpose to get away from the p r i s o n of a r t ;

build o p e n - s i t u a t i o ns which permit anybody to

CONTRIBUTE, ACT, REACT, DESTROY: CREATE

We test & train our/your psychic & physical condition and give therapy for both

As the armed forces of worldpowers, Ministries of Finance & Culture, traders, parties & terrorists we are also standing on the alert to change the world

we are for a perpetual change

Learn more here

Coming soon: Plagiarists International Union cards - sign a card, join our union.

PS

My life is like St. Elmo's Fire, a terrific 80's movie, about a group of friends where everyone falls in love with everyone else, at the wrong time and in the wrong way.

The soundtrack is not as good as I'd hoped, but you should watch it anyway.

you're playing the world's saddest song on the world's smallest violin

That's what the union's lawyer says, whenever we have a great sob story that we can't back up with provable facts, or legal precedents.

But I've got the idea that I will create the world's happiest song, on the world's smallest farm.

It starts with this:

I will adopt some pot-bellied pigs


And then some pygmy goats (some jurisdictions in the states are fighting to have them considered housepets, apparently they're an ecologically sound way to maintain your lawn).

And recruit some Shelties to herd them
And some Cornish Game Hens to fulfill my bird love
And there we are, a miniature farm.

My friend D. says, "Erinn, you don't have to build the world's smallest farm just to make yourself feel tall."

That's true. I would feel tall just because I was living in the service of animals. But I promise that I will not ride such a small beast as this
Because I am a full-sized human, and that would be cruel.

In particular, I hope that this is amusing to M., who has always found miniatures to be interesting.

I am going to sleep, to dream of running a worker co-op bakery, and running a tiny farm out in the middle of nowhere.

dog-a-roll

Doggerel: /ˈdɔgərəl, ˈdɒgər-/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[daw-ger-uhl]

1.	(of verse) a. comic or burlesque, and usually loose or irregular in measure. b. rude; crude; poor.

I discovered a little while ago, quite by accident, that my little dog loves sushi. In fact, if you give her a sheet of the seaweed that you use to wrap it, she will eat the whole thing and then make that funny, mouth-smacking gesture that dogs do when you feed them peanut butter.

So when I make sushi for myself, as I did tonight, I always make her a little avocado roll.

Now if that's not the opposite of rude and crude, I don't know what is.

The thing about technology

The thing about technology is that there will be days when everything you touch breaks, when you can't get anything done, when you tear out your hair, when you arrive at work at 6:00am, and when the file transfer service you are depending on won't work, so you have to go in at 5:00 the next morning.

If anyone is aware of any openings on any chain gangs, I would consider that at this point.