Tis the Season

Heading down for lunch, the elevator stopped on the 29th floor. Cal walked in. He had just come back from a Christmas fête.

We made awkward small chat about the weather, his kids, the busy-ness. It was a long ride down. I was holding my breath the entire time and trying to carry on a conversation, almost fainting. I wondered what he was thinking, was he holding his breath too?

     His bowels had aired a turkey-cranberry combo that followed him into the lift joining us. He didn’t look embarrassed, so in the holiday spirit I looked embarrassed for him.

Inspired by ASA. Image by Shutterstock.

ASA

Even after all this time, I can still spoil my Christmas a little remembering the years where I had to spend every moment leading up to the holidays studying for exams and worrying myself sick about how I would do. Throughout high school, I’d invariably be suffering through the latest flu, laughing along with my fellow consumptives as the tissues piled up under our desks, ending an essay question on acetylsalicylic acid with the line: “. . . and boy could I use a couple right now!”
     In university the fear eventually moved to my bowels, and the chemistry was far more complex.

Inspired by Olive, the Other Reindeer. Photo from the collection of the National Museum of American History.

Olive, the Other Reindeer

On our evening dog walk Richard looked at a window decorated for Christmas. A frosty stencil of a sleigh pulled by reindeer sailing through the night sky.
     “How many reindeer are there?” he asks.
     So, I break out in song and finger-count, “You know Dasher and Dancer and Comet and Cu—”
     “Not the Rudolph song,” he interrupts me, “Rudolph is made up!”
     Who knew? A myth of a myth separated by about 100 years.  Next thing he'll tell me is that Hermey the Elf didn’t become a dentist. Some people just have to suck the joy out of the holidays.

Inspired by Global Logistics for Carefree Consumption. Illustrations by Celesse.

Global Logistics for Carefree Consumption

It was produced in Yiwu, Zhejiang Province, and on April 26 it began its journey towards its end-user, travelling 215 kilometres to CNE Express’s East China Sorting Facility in Pinghu. There, it underwent various sorting processes and re-scans until April 28, when it was trucked to Shanghai's Pudong Airport, a distance of 123 km. Overnight it was loaded on a plane. In the morning it began its 11,407 km air voyage to me, arriving at YYZ, via an intermediate airport, three days later. It travelled with methodical precision, like a moonshot, and today I can’t even remember what “it” was.

Inspired by Tussöy and a shipment routing summary received from CNE. Distances cited are derived from Google Maps. Image from Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981).

Memory Tree

Eliza looks at our tree crowded with ornaments, many chipped and broken, and comments: “Some people curate their trees.”

     But how can I pitch the ornaments from my childhood? The ones Mom made with my kids? Nathan’s birds he drew on cardboard when he was four? The crumbling baked-dough fish? Every ornament my kids made at school and brought home to me so proudly? Or the hanging card inscribed by my mother-in-law: “Xmas 2001, love from Nanny & Grandpa”? She would die of a heart attack just after New Year’s.

     I tell Eliza: “It's not about art. It's about memories.”

Inspired by the season. Photo by Nancy.

Bona fide

The word boner came up over dinner with friends recently.
     It conjures up unique childhood, teenage and young adult memories. Grade 8 awkward slow dances to Stairway to Heaven. A variety of flasher encounters—men in cars with no pants, men streaking through parking lots and nude men in apartment windows. Countless TTC boners. Against arms, butts, close to the face while sitting on the old crowded streetcars.
    Maybe I’m depraved, repressed or suppressed, psychologically maladjusted, to find this hilariously entertaining. Or maybe it’s just the comfort laughter that women share of city life in the ’70s and ’80s.

Inspired by Keep it in Your Pants, Sailor. Photo of the Beury Building in North Philadelphia, PA by Dunning∿Kruger FX.

Tussöy

Mary just wanted it out of the house, but I thought it might fetch $80.00 online, except I’d first need to sew the seam that had popped, but after a year of putting that off, I was ready to give it away, because at least then I could make them come and get it as-is, except the first person was housebound, and the second had no car, so I offered to squeeze it down to a more luggable size, but then his kids got sick, and I ended up delivering it anyway.
     Just to get it out of the house.

Inspired by Keep it in Your Pants, Sailor. Photo by the author.

Keep it in your pants, sailor

I found a FedEx bag stolen by a porch pirate, ripped open then dumped under the viaduct by No Frills. UNIQLO. Leggings and a sweater.  As it wasn't an oversize cashmere sweater in a nice green, I'd locate the house and deliver it back. Enroute, I noticed a smell, not that plastic off-gassing, but an unearthly fermentation of dirty gotch and Stinking Bishop. Where on his person had Jack Rackham stashed this bag? Had this package met his and canoodled into a brief but unholy alliance, an olfactory abomination that sat somewhere between a rotting whale and post-November 5th democracy?

Inspired by Reality 24/7 and UNIQLO’s corporate policy regarding porch pirates. iPhone template by Ivan Effendi.

Reality 24/7

Unrestrained by the wise, abetted by toads 

The Day-One dictator will soon have the codes

He’ll knock allies, break treaties, he’ll trash global order

Impose big new tariffs and stiffen the border

At home, with his helpers (all in on the grift)

He’ll cut rich folks’ taxes and kill the green shift

He’ll cancel, dismantle, untether and wreck

Sometimes to score-settle, sometimes just for heck

He’ll name-call, dog-whistle, he’ll insult and brag

So the base will hold firm and believe him on MAG

And we’ll watch it non-stop, ’cause we be what we be:

Credulous suckers hooked on reality TV

Inspired by Tunnel Vision. Image by Ron Thompson, based on a photo by Oleksandr Delyk and the ubiquitous dumpster-fire meme, photographer unknown.

Tunnel Vision

When our old console TV broke, my mother, in the belief that you never throw anything away, and that she’d have the money to fix it someday, borrowed a smaller black-and-white set with a finicky bunny ear antenna, and placed it on top of the old set. I watched reruns of Star Trek, Gilligan’s Island, and I Dream of Jeanie in fuzzy grey tones. A year later, when the second TV broke, she got her hands on an even smaller set and placed that on top of the second. I carried on watching reruns—not noticing the tragicomedy around me.

Inspired by Autumn Moon. Illustration by Image Creator, character design by Filmation.

Autumn Moon

It was during the autumn moon, and she came calling

She took me to the tower top to catch a breath and see the city lights

How could I refuse those lights?

She took me into the streets to feel the city lights

And how could I refuse to feel those lights?

She walked me through the electric lights to a place where there were no electric lights to a place where there were only lights from within.

How could I refuse her then?

With my love I sleep, in her arms I keep.

How could I refuse her then?

Inspired by Getting Back to Her. Photo by Fred Ni.

Getting Back to Her

She forgot how to have fun

She forgot how to smile

Moaning, griping, bitching

Tired, dirty wasted place

No one seems to give a shit

Busy buried in internet space

7 am

She wakes alive

Her heart’s beating 

She’ll do something different today

Baby, she’s running

And you’re holding her hand

She’s all glittered up and laughing

Masses of friends

Enveloped in joy

Gentle touches, grateful eyes

Dancing and singing

Throats parched dry 

Feet aching, backs tweaking

Don’t let it end

Cool damp air

Rushes upon them

Wrists twinkling with traffic lights

Wanting to walk forever 

She found herself tonight

Inspired by My Secret Garden. Photograph by Lars Van de Goor.

My Secret Garden

Fear of identity theft got me worried enough to purchase my own paper shredder, figuring that if I was still expected to recycle my personal records, at least I could discourage the more casual fraudsters.

Next was to hide those shredded records at the bottom of the blue bin and pile it high with junk mail and fliers. Finally, the best advice I heard was to mix all the most critical stuff up with your compost—a stupid mistake, since now, every spring, when the wind blows through the garden, it whispers those secrets to every one of my neighbours.

Inspired by Food for Thought. Image by Image Creator.

Food for Thought

Phil and I were texting about hispi cabbage. Seconds later, the offending vegetable appeared on his Insta account.

     “Like, chill guys,” he said.

They won’t. Last year after a few Misko admonishments of ”None of your sass, Jordan.” I got a Ticketmaster ad. Currently, I’m flooded with knitting, Deadly Uncle memes, and uber atavistic period pants. Period Pants? Since I’m also targeted for incontinence products and thigh shapers, I guess it means I’m not completely profiled.

     So how about I throw them a bone? 

     Siri, where can I buy:

     — Caged glass

     — Vintage Tool

     — Merino Balaclavas

     — Mary Beard

     — World Peace? 

Inspired by Eat, Live, Whatever. Image of Nipper and His Master’s Voice by Francis Barraud.

Eat, Live, Whatever

I relish new culinary experiences, but I found cooking Kraft Dinner and pork ’n beans in one pot a disappointment. I ate it anyway. When I lived without refrigeration in Africa, I learned that piri-piri chilies can mask the taste of rotten meat; also, that overcooking is your friend. Those were good times. While backpacking in Scotland, I discovered canned haggis at Tesco. The ingredient list was off-putting, but the product was passable, if overly grey. Recently, watching me cook, my daughter asked, “Are you ‘live to eat,’ Dad, or ‘eat to live?’” Poor lass. She already knew the answer.

Inspired by Ode to Bread. Image scavenged from Reddit.

Ode to Bread (or Gluten-free Toast Tastes Like Slightly Warm Rice Loaf)

The evening before I took the blood test for Celiac, I pigged out on bread—a crusty warm-from-the-oven slathered in real butter sourdough. Toast had been my comfort—morning, noon, and night. Whole wheat with banana, eggs on rye, grilled cheese, Montreal bagel with cream cheese, pain au chocolat, baguette, pumpernickel—all turned against me, churned my stomach, made me choke on acid reflux, hurt my head and fogged my brain. I knew I had Celiac before I took the test, and long before my doctor confirmed it. But like a junkie, I had to have just one last fix.

Inspired by Superhero Diet. Photo by Nancy.

Superhero Diet

3:00 p.m. rise

3:05 Mountain Dew while on Insta, X

3:45 tiktok

3:50 another can of Mountain Dew, vape

4:05 cup coffee, vape

4:15 tiktok

4:16 Mountain Dew, vape

4:30 tiktok

4:54 tiktok

5:05 tiktok, X

5:11 Mountain Dew, vape

5:30 grape soda

5:45 tiktok

6:00 CBD to take the edge off the day

9:00 start commenting on tiktok seriously

10:00 THC

11:00 Mountain Dew, tiktok,THC

11:30 tiktok, etc.

12:00 commenting on TikTok, X

12:05-6:00 a.m. THC, coffee, vaping, Cheetos, vitamin C powder, continuous pornographic movies

6:00 bath tub - Mountain Dew, Lindt chocolate balls, Popeyes chicken leftovers

8:20 sleep

─────────
Inspired by Hunter S. Thompson's Daily Routine and Le P. Photo by Fred Ni.

Le P

Dinners out with my aunt and cousins in the early ’80s are memories that linger fondly. Eating at a restaurant was a rarity for us—my then 33 year-old single dad with three kids under the age of 12.
     It was woody, dark and cavernous with tacky saloon doors and an over-powering aroma of gravy.
     I barely remember the dinners, but I do remember the desserts. Holding my cafeteria tray, I would stare in awe through the finger-smeared plexiglass at the deluge of choice. Mostly jellos of various artificial colours with perfectly placed globs of chemical whip cream.
     Ponderosa. 

Inspired by Voss. Photo by 2womenwithapast on eBay.

Voss

Wrapping up the company, we needed some expenses to offset our sales, and so I’m sitting in the Harbour Sixty steakhouse asking for just water.
     “Sparkling or still, sir?”
     And although I’m about to indulge in The Most Expensive Meal Ever, part of me is hanging back at Swiss Chalet with my mother, who always considered beverages an unnecessary expense when the water was free and, figuring that “still” is just fancy talk for “tap,” makes what I think is the most frugal choice . . . and ends up with 800ml from an artesian Norwegian well and another $12.00 on the tab.

Inspired by A Causality Dilemma on Roncey. Image by Voss.

A Causality Dilemma on Roncey

A couple cans of beer
A tablespoon of fishy blancmange in a tepid yellow sauce
A potato pancake
A small bowl of beets
2 playing card-sized slices of pumpernickel
And a sliver of apple pie . . . $82
And the music. My God.

That’s 41 words and coincidently my share of the bill. 

I will now leave the remaining space, where fifty-nine words should be, for quiet self-reflection over my most recent money piss-away. What came first? The ridiculous concept of “Small Sharing Plates” or the entitled foodie-stooge willing to pay $16 for a pickerel quenelle the size of a Queen olive? 

Inspired by A Postmodernist Hundred. Photo by Noblige.