November 3rd, 2008

Big Monday

Well, I missed out on the chance to warn you that I was on Here & Now on CBC1 today (no podcast, sorry). Those who heard my short reading (from “ContEd”) say it didn’t suck. Of course, it was once again extremely entertaining to hang out at CBC studios.

I’m more on the ball in mentioning that I’ll be reading at the Cool Jew Cabaret at the Leah Polsuns Theatre tonight. The show starts at 8, but I’d *strongly* advise you to come around 7 for the reception, which will include
a) food
b) a bar mitzvah machine.

And it’s only Monday!

Poor helpless dreams!
RR

November 2nd, 2008

Nigel, Flannery, and Me

Nigel Beale and I sat down in a room filled with books to talk about what Flannery O’Connor says about good and bad short stories for The Bibliofile. Listen in here.

How sweet the sound / to save a wretch like me
RR

Quoting Hallowe’en

“At the Vietnamese butcher…where else would you get lungs?”

“Is this food? Oh, no, this is not food.”

“Who are you? No, not your name, your costume?”

“This sex doll is not very sexy.”

“This is what happens when you take apart a frog.”

“There’s goody bags!!”

“Well, that’s very creative.”

“These eyeballs stick to the wall.”

“Why are you squeaking?”

Wife: “They don’t get it. Nobody gets it.”
Husband: “Well, it’s what I’m wearing. I’m wearing it now.”

“Oh my god, strobe light! Seizure! Run away!”

“The standard first-year university costume for girls is skank.”

“Is it potato salad? Is it fish? What?”

“Can you move?”

Me: “Who are you dressed as?”
Man: “Mike Holmes… *Holmes on Homes*, it’s a home renovation show.”
Me: “I’m a girl.”
Man: “Right. Nevermind”

“And he just started screaming, ‘7 of 9, 7 of 9!!'”

“I get it! Oh, *now* I get it! I do, I really do. Wait a second…”

“Wait for the really naked girl.”

K (to me): “Ok, short people in the front for the photo.”
Me: “Am I short?”
K: “Well, if you have to hop up and down to be seen, you are short.”
Me: “I’m not hopping because I want to be seen, I’m hopping because I am cold. People can see me.”
K: “Fine. Stay where you are then.”

“What does dry ice feel like? Oh, it’s wet.”

RR

October 31st, 2008

It’s Hallowe’en

…but I’m only sort of half-assedly celebrating. I mean, I’m in all black…except for the rose-patterned tights. I ‘ve got green eyeshadow and black lipstick on, but I passed up a severed ear made out of chocolate (and scabs made out of dried cranberries, and an eyeball made out of who-knows-what) because it sort of squicked me out. Lame, I know, very lame, but the actual Hallowe’en party I’m attending is tomorrow (All Saints party?) so I’m getting another crack at the whole thing.

In the meantime, I leave you with the completely unspooky but totally astounding Against Me. I especially recommended “Borne on the FM Waves” (track 4)…oh, Tegan Quinn, you are adorable-punk.

Anxiety anxiety / you give me no mercy
RR

October 30th, 2008

Good news all around

I was interviewed by the intrepid Nathaniel G. Moore on Danforth Review and you can read the result. This morning I came quite close to walking into a skunk, but we both emerged unscathed. I have realized that I can avoid burning the tops of my ears while blowdrying by setting the dryer to a lower temp and drying for longer. This is a boring way to spend 10 minutes, hanging upside in one’s bra holding up the hairdryer, but it’s worth it, I guess.

Also, although I still waste way too much time obsessing about minutiae of etiquette, dress, diet, and dialogue, I realized whilst hanging upside-down today that I no longer care about enlarged pores, furniture, celebrity gossip or whether the person whose hand I’m shaking has a cold. So that *is* progress.

All the girls say
RR

October 29th, 2008

January 30, 2008

Because I am having a yucky day, I am reposting my favourite Rose-coloured post of all time. I hope it cheers you up as it does me:

Walking Down the Street, Warm and Misty Out
Me (coughing): I’m a little sick.
B: You are.
Me (coughing)
B: You are a little ho(a)rse.
Me: Heh.
B: You remember that, that joke? Horse-hoarse?
Me: Yeah, heh. Baaaah.
B: …
Me: Neeeigh.
B: You’re a little strange.
Me: Heh.
B: Heh.
Me: Was that part of it?
B: Part of…?
Me: Was that a joke? Part of the joke?
B: Well, yeah. Because I said you were a little horse and you said “baaah” and then you said “neigh,” so I said you were a little strange for doing that.
Me: Oh, ok, that’s funny.
B: Yeah, you just needed some context.
Me: Yeah.
B: Only, you actually had context to start with, since you were there.
Me: Yeah.
B: Huh.
Me: It wasn’t like I was just working my way around the barnyard, though.
B: ???
Me: Like, I made a mistake, making the sheep noise, but then I corrected myself and made the horse noise. I wasn’t just doing all the animals, I wasn’t going to say moo next.
B: Ah.
Me: It wasn’t “baah comma neigh,” it was “baah cut off with dash neigh.”
B: I retract my earlier comment.
Me: The stenographer that we pull along behind us in a little red wagon will strike it from the record.
B: You aren’t strange at all.
Me: Duly noted.

October 28th, 2008

Rose-coloured Reviews Via 1 Train Service

There are those who are to the manner born, and there are those who are still excited when the waitress gives us two after-dinner mints instead of one. I am firmly in the second category (I love each of my insurance company give-away pens with all my heart, and despair when I snag a pair of stockings after less than 10 wears). Those in the second category are stunned even the modest level of luxury on Via Rail‘s Via 1 class.

I have been devoted to Via since undergrad at McGill necessitated student six-packs, which are such a very good deal. And “comfort class”, as the regular part of the train is known, is just fine–at least if you are of average height and don’t mind bringing a bag lunch. The only people I can think of who would *need* Via 1 are the above-average in size…the business traveller could, I believe, make use of the Via wireless internet just fine from comfort class.

But despite being un*needed*, the comforts above Comfort Class are perfectly delightful and desirable when thrust upon a person (by, say, the travel arrangers at the Ottawa Writers’ Festival). I had been in the Panorama Lounge before, keeping a business-travelling friend company, so I knew what delights lay ahead–a comfortable place to sit (otherwise, you wait standing in a line-up for non-reserved seats on the train) and free drinks, as well as a private bathroom.

But to get all this you have to pick-up your ticket at the general ticket desk, and when I arrived (early, natch) said ticket desk was experiencing a mel-down. Apparently, Wednesday last, Via computers all over the country ceased to function for an hour or so. My departure hour. When a security guard took my ticket voucher, though, I didn’t know it boded ominous and just thought she was being helpful. “This is my first Via 1 trip,” I confided. “I’m very excited to go in the lounge.”

I guess I have seen people less willing to share in my excitement (those insurance pen/breath-mint incidents come to mind) but she was close. But, after we’d stood together a while staring at the ticket agent staring at her unusable computer, a bright spark flickered in the security guard’s grim eyes. “Would you like to go in the lounge *now*? We’ll take care of the ticket for you.” And just like that she got what she wanted (rid of me) and I got what I wanted (free diet Coke at 9:17 am).

I actually thought that all the Toronto porters, guards, agents, etc., were unusually thoughtful that morning, particularly considering what inconveniences they were putting up with. But in truth, they actually didn’t process my ticket voucher at all, just looked my name up on the manifest and assumed all was well, which made for a painless trip out and, on the way back, a horrible half-hour of staring at a teeth-sucking silent ticket agent who couldn’t figure out how to go back in time with his (perfectly functioning) computer and make up a ticket billing for a trip I’d already taken. It could be that the Toronto agents are better-trained than the Ottawa ones, or simply that the Toronto folk shirked responsibility for setting something up for me, but I definitely think the Ottawa guy could’ve been nicer to me and my accompanying lovely festival volunteer in the endless period we spent together.

But ok, after all that, both trips were actually lovely, and pretty much identical. The seats in Via 1 are slightly wider and higher than comfort class, and there’s enough leg room for the limbs of those well above six-feet (or for your laptop case, purse, and discarded boots). Then there are these weird sculpted tusks of pillows on the headrest. I think they are meant to keep your head from tipping onto your neighbour or into the window, but since I *like* to sleep pressed against the window (who knows why?) I wasn’t crazy about it. Actually, though, there’s plenty of room to get around the pillow.

Ok, everything else about this train-ride review is actually a restaurant review. The first train I took left at 9:30 am, and we were offered coffee, tea or juice; followed by pastries; then veggie chips; soda/cocktails; a three-course meal; coffee/tea; truffles, and maybe more cocktails if so desired, before we waddled off at 2:15. Sheesh. I didn’t sample the pastries or the cocktails, but the coffee, soda and veggie chips (called “Yum-yums” but still good) were all delightful. On the return trip, it was 6:15pm to 10:10pm, so we had an additional round of cocktails/soda instead of the pastries.

I crashed out (slouched against the window) just before the lunch service, and my seatmate (as he told me later) and the server debated and then decided against waking me–they held my first course in reserve until I regained consciousness. My seatmate, by the way, was as nice and friendly as could be, while quite obviously making the best of the bad situation that was sitting with me. It wasn’t personal; he just wanted to sit alone, and made no secret of this to the porters and servers that happened by. I felt that he should have been more discreet and pretended that it was his heart’s desire to have to stand up every 1.5 hours so I could pee. However, when he finally did leave (he took someone’s spot after they got off in Fallowfield) I put my feet on his seat.

Both meals were very good, though the lunch was mainly better than the dinner. There was a wide range of main courses, a fish, a chicken and a meat-meat each time, though if you are a veggie you have to order when you buy the ticket (which seems strange, given that it’s 2008 and many random meals just happen to be meatless). Also, the first courses both ways had an animal-origin protein, and there were no choices about that. A seafood salad on cucumbers going out, and sliced beef on rice-edaname salad coming home. I enjoyed the seafood and picked off the beef from the otherwise lovely salad (when I first heard the term “edaname salad” about a year ago, I was puzzled, but now I like them), but it would seem easier just to go the greens and croutons salad route, which I think pleases most of the people most of the time.

I had tilapia with vegetables and tiny little potatoes cut into quarters for the lunch, and slided breaded chicken over linguine and vegetables and a very small amount of red sauce for the supper. Both meals were nice, but just by virtue of the content I liked the fish better (breaded chicken=pointless, in my opinion). I also spent some time trying to decide if the meals, which are served in little ceramic bins about the size of two decks of cards, with everything heaped inside, are the same amount of food one gets in a restaurant all sprawled out on a plate. I think it was, about.

There were services on the Via 1 that I didn’t take advantage of–free newspapers, extra pillows, checked baggage service, possibly things that I didn’t even know about. But the most famous of all, the truffles, I was ready for. How wonderful–I had a chocolate one and a white chocolate one on my respective journeys, and both were full of delight (er, if you definte delight as sugar, cocoa butter and cream).

Also, whatever class you travel, the rhythm of wheels on rails is a delightful lullabye.

I’ve seen them all and man they’re all the same
RR

Rebecca on the Radio

My CBC Sunday Edition interview with Michael Enright is listenable here. You’ll have to download the podcast and cut to just past the end of the first hour, or else listen to the whole of it, which I don’t think is a bad idea, honestly!! I loved the whole show, but I guess I was in an awfully good mood.

A citizen outta you
RR

October 27th, 2008

Joy!

I’ve actually never in my life seen anything on the Discovery Channel, yet somehow their advert tapped exactly into my consciousness (and so did Scott, who passed it on). This is how I feel!!

Boom de ah dah
RR

October 26th, 2008

Back at it

Well, here we are in Toronto again, and by we I of course mean me, for depending on who is reading this, you might have been here all along, or never were at all. Wow, that sentence is really reflective of my mental state–confused and groggy.

The Ottawa Writers’ Fest was amazing, natch, but as you do when you are briefly in an exciting new place surrounded by exciting new people, I ran around like crazy (so many monuments!), stayed out too late (so many friends!), walked in the rain, swam with a headcold, talked too much and ate mainly granola bars and fajitas. I may never say anything that makes sense ever again.

If you want to read something about the fest that does make sense, try rob’s clever blog, which has notes on various events throughout the week, and likely more to come. If you want to hearken back to a time when I did write coherently, you can read the Uniter’s review of *Once*. And if you want to look hopefully ahead to a time when I may once more have it together, maybe consider hearing me read at the Cool Jew Cabaret on November 3. There will be a bar mitzvah machine!!

Now I need to go back to sniffling and folding my laundry and staring out the window at the grey grey sky. Toronto is not trying very hard to welcome me back!

How long before the story’s over?
RR