Tagged: Thoughts
RIP The Lo Pub
- by admin
yesterday I went out with tyrone, @abstractartform and @cenquist for some beers and snacks at my favourite close-to-school haunt, the lo pub, which is closing this weekend and it's breaking my heart.
I don't 100% understand what's happened beyond the fact that the HI hostel that was in the same building is moving and the building was up for sale and, I guess, the new owners didn't want to keep the lo pub part of it.
what I do know and understand is that it sucks, 100%.
besides the fact that lo is right beside my campus and was the perfect place to head in-between (or before, or after) class to grab some half pints and something from their seriously delicious vegetarian menu (omg the chickpea fritters omg) and hang with friends, to the monthly meetups for secret handshake, it was a super-important venue for the local music scene.
I've seriously seen every kind of band there, shitty rock and low-key indie and weepy chicks singing and the 8-bit shows my pal mr ghosty (pictured) did there, too. I'm not a musician (ha) but my peeps tell me jack was the nicest and coolest guy to deal with, and he gave a legitimate shit about the music scene here.
he's one of those guys who might not know you (though he might know me from how often I sucked back beers there) but everyone knows who he is. I'm sure there are lots of people who owe their first shows to him, and lots more who owe their awesome evenings to him.
RIP lo pub. here's hoping the crew can make the magic happen somewhere else real soon.
watch this and be inspired by it
- by admin
because shit's fucked up in nyc today
people are dead, more people are hurt, the country scared and so is the rest of the world
for you, america. we're scared for you.
because we miss this side of you.
the brave one, that inspired us and made us proud. made us wish we were americans because you guys were the coolest of the cool doing the best of the best.
so please stop shooting each other. you can do so much better.
get well soon.
your friend from canada
xo
been so tired lately it feels like I have lead bones
- by admin
not cool adamantium ones like wolverine but heavy, old, useless bones that get mad at me for riding my bike every day and climbing stairs and walking to the corner store.
I can't get enough sleep and even when I do I feel worn-out hours later. maybe I've got a vitamin deficiency. someone from the internet cure me.
I'm supposed to hang with Kbabs tonight but I'm gonna bail because she wants me to bike to her house so she can make me a sammich and then we'll ride bikes to my house so I can get changed so we can go for a walk. all before 8pm. and I don't wanna.
I wanna go home and lie in the dark under a blanket with the cat and take a nap watching some junky movie on netflix by myself because tyrone has vj stuff to do and I never, ever get any alone time.
I wanna get gross subway for dinner because I'm lazy and maybe a cookie, too, because I've been eating salads all week and I want chocolate, damnit. I deserve the sub and the cookie and probably the diet coke I'll toss on there for good measure.
this is the part where you tell me eating that way won't help how tired I am.
and then comes the part where I say eff you and eat it anyway.
because that's the best part about being a grown-up lady: not always acting like a grown-up lady.
a year ago today we lost one of the good guys
- by admin
even if you didn't like the ndp you can't deny that jack was a great person, a caring politician, and a man who not only had a vision of a better canada, but made every effort in his daily life to live his vision. he rode his bike to work every day. he had solar panels on his house. he met with regular canadians every chance he got and genuinely listened to their opinions.
I met him at the ndp rally in winnipeg a few years ago when he was running for the prime minister's office in the federal election, the year the orange crush changed the political spectrum of the country. it showed how he moved so many people, and when I saw him speak he moved me. I'd never seen anyone speak so fiercely about the good canadians are capable of, who was so energized about working together and helping each other.
after he was done speaking he was walking around shaking hands and I found myself standing in front of him. he wasn't much taller than I am, which was surprising, and he took my hand in his and shook it and I said the first stupid thing I could think of. I said "good luck jack, I know you can do it" and he said
"with your help we can do anything. thank you"
and after I cried. like I'm crying now. because he was right.
what we need to take away from his death is that the fate of our country isn't in the hands of one man, but in our collaborative efforts to achieve greatness and make canada a better place.
I hope one day we can make him proud.
rip jack, I miss the shit out of you.
some days I don't feel like blogging
- by admin
nothing I have to say feels witty enough, smart enough, relevant enough to type out and hit 'publish' and be proud of the next day.
maybe my problem is that I care if I'm proud of what I say later. should I be?
tyrone messaged me this morning and said "I've been reading your blog, you've been sad lately" and though I was in a good mood at the time it made me sad because is that really what I sound like? fuck. I'm sorry, guys.
I think I need a vacation, which isn't happening anytime soon because school starts in omg like two weeks so there's no time or money available for such frivolousness. and yes I know I just came back from BC and Connect and festivals but I mean a vacation. far away. somewhere I can relax and bit and not stress and chill the fuck out for the first time in what feels like years.
don't get me wrong I'm happy with life and my friends and tyrone and blah blah but sometimes you don't realize how stressed out you are until someone else has to point it out and them boom it all lands on your shoulders like a huge weight and of course you're at work when it happens so you have to push through the whole afternoon feeling like junk.
of course.
so let's just pretend everything I said above was cute hilarious banter about the video of the hovercraft video.
today is Jabez's birthday
- by admin
Wikipedia says this about the name Jabez:
Jabez is a Biblical male given name from the Old Testament. It is of Hebrew Origin. In 1 Chronicles, Jabez is a well-respected man (ancestor in the lineage of the kings' tribe of Judah) whose prayer to God for blessing was answered (see 1 Chronicles 4:9-11).
which I didn't know when I met him on NYE three years ago and as a result proceeded to sit down next to him and ask him what his real name was, not his 'stupid raver nickname' and hassled him about it until he showed me his ID which, in fact, said Jabez on it.
whoops.
despite this though he decided I was okay to hang out with and one time came over to drink wine and hang out before Tyrone's show at some bar, and because Jabez is better at computers than I could ever be he linked his computer to mine and was sharing some cool tunes with me and we were singing obnoxiously and we had a good time. then the next day I deleted what I thought was the link to our computers without asking him and accidentally deleted a whole bunch of his really important IT work stuff.
whoops.
the poor guy must be a glutton for punishment because I can't even count the amount of times he's had us over for drinks and parties and I've passed out there, drank too much there, thrown up in his bathrooms, and otherwise been a bad guest. I've also been mad at him more times than I'd like because being friends with me is hard, sometimes.
whoops.
and despite all this he keeps on being my friend for reasons I don't understand. maybe it's because he's older than I am and hopes that I won't be a total douche forever (which is probably wrong), or because we both have good taste in movies and music and literature and it's fun to have what you think is a high-brow intellectual conversation with someone and then look back and realize that you were just talking out your ass to each other the whole time.
which is what friends are for, right?
so happy birthday Jabez. I hope when I'm as old as you I can be even half as cool, and thanks for being my friend.
a lot of people dump on Winnipeg
- by admin
because, okay, it's not a "cosmopolitan city" and our skyline needs work, I know
but we have a wicked phallus bridge that looks cool
and, okay, we don't get lots of cool, huge concerts all the time because we're kind of in the middle of nowhere
but our isolation means that we raise some wicked-talented people
and okay, the older generation are obsessed with moving into the suburbs and avoiding downtown at all costs
even though our downtown is actually awesome, and The Village is is the second highest-densely populated neighbourhood in the country
and, okay, building a megamall out in Tuxedo by the new IKEA that you have to have a car to access because it's designed so you have to drive from one part of the mall to another is really stupid
but at least we'll finally have access to snazzy Swedish furniture
and, okay, the Jets aren't doing so well, even though the whole city except me is obsessed with them and cheers nonstop and cares SO MUCH about hockey
it's still fun to watch over beers at The Yellow Dog, right?
and, okay, our mayor is a total jerk who does sketchy shit and kicks children in the face
but you know what?
we're tough, here in the 'Peg
because it's minus fucking forty-five today and we go about our business like it's nothing
none of you sissies in Toronto or Vancouver could handle this.
here is what being a Rhetoric student has taught me
- by admin
nothing I ever say will convince you and I'll talk to you till I'm blue in the face but even if you say
okay Alyson, I agree with you
you probably won't because though my job is to convince you almost nobody is ever truly convinced
which makes me sad.
everyone is always arguing with each other, which means we're having an argument right now and we don't even realize it
you're probably saying
stfu Alyson and get on with the post
and I'll say
okay just this once
because I don't want to fight anymore.
let's not fight, okay?
everything I say to you will fade & become irrelevant
which is the worst for a writer because we like to trick ourselves that our words are Dickens in waiting, but rhetoric is limited to the language of the day and what I say now may not even make sense in 10, 20, 30 years
I'll be an old lady and whippersnappers won't care what any of us had to say about anything
kids these days.
everyone can do rhetoric
so why am I studying it?
to do it better than you?
can I?
who knows, it's all subjective
so I'll never know.
damn.
mostly I've learned rhetoric can't solve all of our problems
which comes back to nobody being convinced by anyone else
so we only use rhetoric when we know we can persuade other people
so am I persuading you, now?
or are you still mad at me from before?
Tea Party audience cheered for letting the uninsured die
- by admin
this is probably one of the most disgusting things I have ever seen in a 'civilized society'
the amount of ego, ignorance and selfishness involved to
cheer about letting an uninsured person die
is something I can't grasp
whatever happened to being a good person
looking out for your fellow man
basic human decency
remember that Jesus guy in that book all the Tea Partiers love so much?
what would he have to say about this
don't you think he'd be disappointed in the way these people think?
Don't get a boob job
- by admin
by Alyson S.Back in April I got a breast reduction that took my massive 36DDD chest and made them a happy 'n healthy 34C cup and since then it seems like everywhere I go people are talking about getting implants and, ladies, I just don't get why. My huge boobs took over my life; they bothered my back constantly, made it hard to find clothes that fit my ribcage and my chest, and it's all people saw when they looked at me. Having a surgically enhanced chest seems to be the first thing women think of when they want to feel better about themselves, and here's why I disagree:
1. They won't suit you
I'm serious, I've never looked at a woman who has implants and thought "wow, those look so realistic and natural". Listen, if the top of your breast is as round as the bottom, you just don't look right. Why do you want to go from having to wear a push-up bra to looking like you've got one on 24/7? It's not natural, and it's not sexy.
Case in point, Donatella Versace:
Do you really want that to be you some day?
2. You "like how fake they look"
Do you also not like having a personality? Because that's what that attitude says about you. Because believe me, the guys who hit on you because of your impossibly unnatural tit-to-hip ratio don't give a damn what university you attended and whether you read Mother Jones on the regular. You know what implants tell other people? That you're insecure. In fact, you're so insecure with yourself that you paid someone to shove chunks of saline under your chest because for some reason not being able to see your feet past your cleav makes you feel better about yourself.
Which leads me to my next point:
3. It's a waste of money
My reductive surgery was 100% paid for by the government because believe it or not it's a huge (har har) hassle to have huge boobs and they were actually detrimental to my lifestyle. Here in Canada at least it's considered a necessary surgery, but implants (surprise surprise) are not. The approximate cost for breast implants in Canada is $6,000-$7,000 for saline and $7,000-$10,000 for cohesive gel. That's a year (or two) of university, or a down payment on a car, or a really great trip somewhere. Go have the time of your life on a topless beach somewhere with your bra-less, scar-free boobs and get over your tit envy. You'll thank me later.
4. You think it will make you more attractive to the opposite sex
If this is your reasoning, start hanging around with some men who are actually adults and don't care about shallow shit like how big your cup size is. Honestly.
5. You're "sick of being a AA"
Stop for a second and think about how much you weigh, then think about your cup size, and odds are your little boobs fit really well onto your frame, whether or not you think so. Sure your breasts might not be spilling out of that tube-dress but at least you don't look like you've been jamming yourself into it and let's face it the fashion industry is geared towards women who are waif-thin, so you're ahead of the pack already. Plus you don't have to deal with gross droopage down the line, and no amount of surgical maneuvering is going to be able to stop that.
6. You think having bigger boobs will make you more popular/successful/etc
Recently I read something on Raymi's blog that shocked me. She's been talking quite a bit recently about getting implants and in her most recent post responded to someone encouraging her not to by saying "but then i can skyrocket to infamy fast like heidi montag and make a lot more money then retire in portland. business investment. plus they’ll take the heat off my nose" and while you need to take most things Raymi says with a grain of salt this really bugs me because she's become so huge already without slicing herself up and it's one of the things I've always respected about her.
Besides, do you really think huge boobs will make people like/admire/appreciate/find you more attractive than they already do? They won't. Your friends love you for who you are (if they don't ditch them asap) and if you're dating/looking for a man with any sort of integrity he'll love you regardless of what cup size you are.
7. "I don't care what people think. My implants are for me"
No, they aren't, because if you didn't care what people thought you wouldn't be caving to social pressure and walking around with big fake boobs on your chest for all to see. Do you really think that unless there was that societal pressure to be rail-thin and have boobs the size of Mount Everest you'd be feeling the way you do? Of course not. Back before the industrial revolution girls were supposed to be plump because it was a sign of social status (aka they weren't working out in the fields all the time). But now heaven forbid if you can't squeeze into that size 00 dress around your waist while filling a D cup on top. See how times change? Which one seems more healthy (both physically and mentally) to you? I shouldn't have to tell you the answer.
Listen, everyone struggles with self-image issues but implants are the most overt way you can tell people "I don't like how I look" without flat-out screaming it at them. By letting someone slice you open and shove saline under your nipples (which might lose sensation, don't forget) you're not taking a stand for women or even for yourself. You're letting your own insecurities rob you not just of your own personal finances, but also of other people's respect.
