5:34 p.m. - 2004-09-08
a small message for a big guy!
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday, dear Phil-thy,
Happy birthday to you!!!!
(Your dirty postcard/birthday greeting is on its way!)
Love you and miss you, Phil!
8:10 p.m. - 2004-08-31
Wasn't Heathers, like, the Coolest movie. Ever.
I saw Christian Slater today.
Not in a movie or on TV or even from afar as he walked by quickly on some naff red carpet, but up close and personal. Ok, not exactly personal, but he was about 4 feet away when I walked by.
I was out in Little Venice walking the baby, when I saw a guy standing by a shop reading something. His head was down and I thought to myself "Gee, that guy kind of looks like Christian Slater from that angle." Then he lifted his head and I thought "He really looks like the guy." Then he yelled something to his kid and I concluded "Holy crap, that is Christian Slater." Standing on the street outside a convenience shop yelling at his kid like any other schmo that I happen to cross on any given day.
If I were 14 years old, I might have peed my pants with delight. Instead I merely did a double take and went on my merry way.
7:22 p.m. - 2004-08-30
Mancunian madness
I'm tired.
I really shouldn't be, I had quite the relaxing weekend. Over here in England, they had a bank holiday weekend. Bank holidays are fun...unlike Canadians who try to make up excuses for having a day free of work and banking worries (Victoria day, Labour day, Canada day), the English just pick randoms days of out of the month and tell people to stay home. They call them bank holidays, and today was one of them so I had a long weekend. Yay me.
The bro and sis-in-law invited me to spend the weekend with her parents in a town just outside of Manchester called Marple. Fortunately, I didn't have any other plans, so I took them up on their offer.
The parents are Ken and Liz, and I can tell you they're pretty good peeps. Ken kind of looks like a skinny santa clause and liz likes to drink red wine in the evening. You can take that however you'd like.
Anyhow, we ate, we drank and we went on a long walk. Ken and Liz are retired, so they spend a lot of time going on walks, planning walks and talking about walks that they've previously been on. Don't worry, it's not as boring as it sounds. They took me on a lovely walk around Marple, through some woods, along some small lakes, up some hills and beside a canal way with locks. It was, well, as quaint as a small Northern English town could be. It wasn't hectic and loud like London and, all in all, it was pleasantly peaceful.
And yet now, I'm home and, even though I dozed for most of the 4 hour drive home, I'm exausted. Perhaps it's because I didn't get my sleep in this weekend...no one in that household, including my 10 month old neice, sleep very late.
8:44 p.m. - 2004-08-21
What's the Picadilly-yo?
Some of the highlights that have been the last few weeks for me:
1- Three visitors from Canada in two weeks. It was certainly a pleasure having my friends around for a little while, but goddamn, was it a hectic couple of weeks. As much as I enjoyed having a social life again, it felt really good to deflate the air mattress that had been taking up 40% of my floor space. Nevertheless, big shout outs are going to my homeys Samarra, Shaggy and Sarah Fish for making the journey out to see their beloved wakko.
2- Where there was once a pretty folding door with mirrors in my flat, there is now a big piece of cedar with a handle. I have a small flat. Think of your bedroom or your garage or the most recent port-o-potty that you�ve used and then imagine fitting an entire apartment in there. That�s my flat. The place is divided into two parts, if you can imagine that, the living/sleeping/eating/storage area and the bathroom/kitchen (although I use the latter term loosely). It used to be that there was a non-obstructing, nice, little folding door that separated the two which I generally kept open and hung my coats and sweaters on. Then, one Wednesday evening, I came home to find that it had been replaced with an ugly plank of wood that opened up directly into the middle of my living/eating/sleeping/storage area. Fire regulations be damned, the thing has got to go!
3- I saw a celebrity. Some of the neighbourhood nannies I made a trip out to Hampstead Heath last week with the youngins`. I don�t exactly know what a "heath" is, but for the non-Brits out there, the place is a big, posh park. As we were sitting down to eat our lunch, we noticed George Michael was sitting in the car directly in front of us. I was about to break out in a ringing rendition of "Faith", but he drove away in his Range Rover. I was ok with that.
4- I made plans to go to Oktoberfest. It�s something that I�ve always wanted to do, so I thought now might be the time to do it. I�m flying into and out of Salzburg, because it was 150 pounds cheaper, and I�ll be camping just outside the city, but it should still be good. Provided my tent doesn�t get stolen or I�m not accosted by a cheery, singing nun turned nanny.
5- I saw the movie "28 Days Later". It was good, well directed. I definitely recommend it. But not to Samarra�it�s kind of creepy.
And with that, I�m done. It�s an exciting life I lead, folks. Really.
