WATCHING THE ELECTION

Whew! The Conservative blue wave dissipated into a ripple almost as soon as the election results started coming in from the Maritimes.
All morning long, questions about the election rebounded back and forth across the counter at The Shop. “Voted yet?” “Who are you voting for?” When Fang came in five minutes late the first thing out of his mouth was, “Don’t let me forget to vote.” An hour later I told him he should cast his ballot while it was still slow.
I had been bracing myself for a Conservative minority government. I welcomed it in some ways: a minority means we’ll be back in the voting booths between six months to a year. It might be best for Stephen Harper to win the election and let the country see what he was really up to, and then let them decide.
For me, the turning point in the election came when Stephen Harper accused the Prime Minister of advocating Child Porn. Up until then it had been his candidates for Parliament making wild assertions about abortion and same-sex marriage. Harper’s accusation was bold, ruthless and just plain inflammatory. Luckily, it backfired.
I didn’t get to the voting booth until after three in the afternoon. I worked until one in the afternoon, needed to shower, walk the dog and stopped at the Pizzeria Uno for some quick sustenance to hold my pencil. The woman who owns the shop let me have a slice of the spicy chicken with my lunch special, (two slices and a soft drink for $3.25). “You have to be willing to make a deal if you want people to come in,” she said. I tipped her a dollar – I didn’t need the chicken slice, I like all their slices.
As I chowed down on my slab-lunch I read a commentary in The Georgia Straight about the importance of same-sex marriage to Canadians and why the writer was going to vote for the New Democrats. I had been waffling on which way to vote. I was prepared to vote strategically until last weekend when Paul Martin said a vote for the NDP was a vote for the Conservatives. It’s one thing to vote strategically, it’s something else altogether to be threatened into voting strategically. Besides, the polls were beginning to show the Liberals edging out the Conservatives, so I felt it was safe to vote with my conscience.
The results started coming in from the east at around five in the evening. The Liberals pulled ahead early and just stayed there. The newscasters warned that this wasn’t a forecast for the rest of country, but not long after the results in Quebec and Ontario – the “deciding” provinces, proved it was. I breathed a sigh of relief. Upchuck came over and got me high. The staid broadcast became more riveting after a joint. I had to pull myself away from the television to go to a writing workshop I’ve been participating in. Afterwards I went to The Pumpjack where they were showing the results on the big screen that is usually reserved for hockey. Harper was making his concession speech by the time I got there. I celebrated with a cheap Corona.
The election occurred on the same day the “International” coalition returned sovereignty to Iraq. In the meantime a U.S. Marine was captured and another executed. Despite the chaos in the world I have a lot of optimism for my country. We were on a path, had set our priorities and established limits to what we were prepared to do or not do. We have a voice distinctive voice. But best of all we came to our senses, even if it happened at the last minute. Let’s hope the same can be said for the States.

GarpinBC

LETTING GO

My nephew and niece get here a week tomorrow and I’m panicking trying to get my apartment into some sort of shape. I’ve lived here for seven months and there are still a couple of boxes I haven’t unpacked. The tile floors need to be mopped, the windows need be cleaned and Green Couch needs to be Febreezed.
The hardest part of cleaning up is letting go. It’s like an exorcism of all the bad purchases you’ve ever made, the projects you never started but never got around to finishing. I’m saying goodbye to the floor lamp from Ikea that has worked sporadically since I bought it and finally gave up on when I moved here. The lamp cost fifteen bucks or so, I paid more the lampshades I bought for it, but I’ve convinced myself that I was going to take it back and exchange it for one that works. It’s done nothing but collect dust and get in the way. It’s going to the Wildlife Thrift store in the morning.
I’ve also given up on about eight months worth of “The New Yorker.” My subscription ends in November; I’ve been keeping the back issues with the intention of going back and reading all the short stories I never got around to reading. I also think it’s kind of cool to have the around, giving my apartment that cosmopolitan feel. There’s a second-hand bookstore down the street on Granville, ABC books, that actually takes old magazines. It’s around the corner from the thrift store.
The hardest decision was the one to give up my collection of professional wrestling action figures. I bought almost all of them in eBay, paying way too much for them. I call them my boyfriends. There’s about twenty of them. I love looking at them, they bring back a piece of my childhood when I see them. But there’s too many of them. I picked the one I like the most – Hacksaw Duggan – and put the rest in a box with the vintage wrestling ring I had them displayed in. They’re going back on eBay where they came from, but not until I pay the outstanding six dollars on my account. That could be a while.
Then there are the odds and bobs. “Star Wars,” spaceships, Happy Meal toys, and the Palm Pilot I bought for twenty bucks. I bought the Palm second hand from someone I used to work with just to see if I would use it. The thing never worked quite the way I hoped it would. It would take forever to synch with my computer; the memory would be erased every time the batteries died, and I lost the driver for the keyboard I bought to go with it. This evening, while I was looking for the software for the palm to throw in with the other thrift store donations, I found the keyboard driver. I wrestled with myself for fifteen minutes trying to decide if I should finally just give up on the thing. I could re-install the software, if I tinkered with it enough I could get it working again, take it to a café and write instead of lugging my laptop with me. Then I remembered the problems synching it with my computer. Besides, there aren’t enough hours in the day to do the things I want to do as it is without wasting time on something I’ll never use. Into the box it went.
Once the game of “Sophie’s Choice” was over, I turned my attention back to Green Couch. “This couch smells like Ollie’s place,” Upchuck says whenever he comes over. The couch had been sitting in Ollie’s living room for the last year. He and Blaze chain smoke and rarely open their windows. I didn’t notice the smell at first; I just assumed it was my own cigarette smoke Upchuck was talking about. “It’s me you’re smelling,” I told Upchuck. “You’re just trying to be nice and pin on Ollie.”
“No, that is definitely Ollie’s smell. His place has a very distinctive smell. Your musky; he’s smoky.”
Indeed. With the sliding door open and a fresh breeze, all you can smell is a couch. It smells like the smoking room of some airport. It takes a week for Febreeze to work and I haven’t even started the treatment yet. I hope I can get rid of it before my niece and nephew get here. Blaze says the couch is from the fifties. It’s in great shape aside from the smell and worn springs. I wonder how long someone had it in their apartment before they were finally ready to let it go.


GarpinBC

BUSH-LITE

BUSH-LITE

Willard comes into the shop every morning for his double-Americano sitting in the parking lot, one leg wrapped around the other, reading the paper and smoking, his dog Earnest at his side. I’ve learned not to engage Willard in the topic of politics. It doesn’t matter what’s happening in Parliament, he some how interprets it as a slap in the face to him personally. Willard is in a perpetual state of outrage.
The other day he came into The Shop looking even more haggard than usual. “Are you okay?” I asked him.
He shrugged his shoulders like there were no tomorrow. “I was called a pedophile last night and I really resent it.”
I had the feeling he was exaggerating a little. Against better judgment I asked, “You personally were accused of being Pedophile?”
“No. That Conservative MP in Ontario did. She said protecting homosexuals under Hate Crimes laws would protect pedophiles.”
I knew it. I had seen and heard the comments on the news myself. It pissed me off, but I just figured the woman was nuts and that she wouldn’t get elected after a comment like that. Another Conservative MP compared abortion to the decapitation of Nicholas Berg. But that was before the debates. Since then, the Conservatives have gained momentum.
Neil, the owner of The Shop had been trying to get me to vote Liberal, but I was steadfast about Jack Layton and the NDP. “I’m sick of the bullshit. It’s time we went in a different direction. I’m don’t want to be a factory outlet for the United States anymore.”
“But he’ll turn us into a Socialist country,” Neil said, counting the days receipts. “He’ll have us standing in line for toilet paper!”
“He’ll restore our reputation in the global community.”
“Go ahead, waste your vote,” he mocked. “Just don’t vote for Stephen Harper and the Conservatives.”
“Not a chance.”
I couldn’t believe it when I had to eat crow a couple of days later. Neil and I had assumed our natural positions; I was at the grill cooking and he was behind me, counting cash on the counter.
“I watched the French language debates last night,” I told him.
“And…”
“I think I’m going to vote Liberal.”
“You love Paul Martin!”
“I still love Jack Layton – he’s the closest thing this country has to a Kennedy. But in light of what’s going on in the world, I think Martin is the safest bet. I like Layton’s ideology, but I think it’s too much all at once. And Stephen Harper scares the fuck out of me. He wants foreign investment in the CBC! Our crown fucking jewel! I’m convinced he’s going to attack gays by using the pedophile angle. The only reason I’m going to vote Liberal is so the Conservatives don’t win a majority government.”
The next day at work I complained to Neil that I was exhausted. “What were you doing?” Neil is convinced I spend all my free time at The Pilsner.
“I was up late watching the English debates. Did you watch them?” I did have a couple of beer at The Pilsner but I didn’t see the need in telling him that.
“No. I was at my kid’s birthday party.”
“They re-played them again at nine. What kind of a Canadian are you?”
“You’re going to vote Conservative?”
“Hell no! But it’s the beginning of the end for the Liberals.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
And it was. Paul Martin just couldn’t withstand the attacks he took from the other candidates over the Sponsorship Scandal and broken promises.
I took Ollie to register to vote on Wednesday. I had been bugging him about it for a couple of weeks. “Who cares?” he said, dismissing me with a wave of a spatula.
“Dude, there is too much going on in the world to be ambivalent.”
“I guess you’re right. Who do I vote for?”
“NDP,” I want to say, but I didn’t feel it was my place to.” Anyone but the Conservatives.”
We made plans to go down to the election office on his day off. He actually called me to come get him. We smoked a joint before we went. “What do I need again?”
“Photo ID and a signature. “
“Does my bathhouse membership count?”
“I think your Care Card will do.”
We walked on the sunny side of Pendrill St towards the election office. “So who should I be voting for again?”
“Normally I would say the NDP, but I think it’s important to vote Liberal. It looks like the Conservatives are going to win the election but we don’t want them in the majority. We’re basically voting to steal votes from the Conservatives.”
“I hate politics. I don’t follow it, I don’t get it, and I don’t care.”
“This is the first time I can vote in almost ten years – I wasn’t allowed to vote when I lived in the States. This election means a lot to me. It’s too bad I have to vote strategically instead of with my heart.”
Waiting for Ollie to register at the election office, who should walk out of the elevator but none other than Witch Hazel herself buttoned up in her reindeer sweater and toque. I watched her go up to the reception desk. I could just imagine her mouthing, “I’m colnd!”
Yesterday I went outback for a smoke. I had to step over Earnest who was blocking the door. Willard looked up from the paper spread over his crossed legs. His eyes rolled back into his head like he had just died on an operating table. I knew he was dying to talk politics. It was hot out, but the parking was still in the shade and I could smell the ocean in the breeze. The smallest opening would give Willard license to start in on one of his political diatribes. For once I was in the mood for it. As mad as I was about the potential outcome of the election, I could never be as stark raving mad as Willard.
“I guess it’s over for Martin,” I said.
“It just pisses me off that Stephen Harper is going to become Prime Minister!”
“He could get voted out in six months.”
“If he wins a minority government.”
“We can only hope.”
“Harper is recruiting people from Brian Mulroney’s old cabinet! He’s going to pull out of Kyoto and he wants more off-shore drilling!”
“It’s Bush-Lite.”
“It IS Bush-Lite. Can you imagine what it’s going to be like with Stephen Harper as Prime Minister if Bush gets re-elected?”
“Those Iraq War deserters won’t be getting refugee status here, that’s for sure.”
“And the only reason he’s going to win is Ontario wants to punish the Liberals. The West gets shafted every time!”
“It isn’t right. But who knows? I think, at heart, Canada is not a right-wing country and once Harper reveals his true colours, he won’t last very long. It’s happened before – remember Jim Turner? Joe Clark? Kim Campbell? “
“Remember Brian Mulroney?”
“All we can do is hope for the best right?”
This evening I saw a clip of Brian Mulroney’s son, Ben, interviewing Michael Moore who was in Toronto promoting “Fahrenheit 9/11” Michael Moore was telling Ben, “If you think your father set us back a few years, the combination of Stephen Harper and George W. Bush will set us back a hundred!”
One of the appeals of Canada is that there is a clear separation of Church and State. It really made me uncomfortable that the Religious Right has so much influence in American Policy. Then along came the Conservative Party. It just goes to show you can’t outrun the Right. Out of the frying pan, into the fire.

GarpinBC





 

Green Couch

I got a fourth-hand green couch this afternoon. Ollie and Blaze bought a mile long sectional for the townhouse and needed to unload the divan. I’ve had my eye on it for some time. The springs are all but worn out, and there’s a nice little butt spot on one end, but it folds open into a bed which will come in handy come July. As soon as they said they were getting rid of it I put dibs on it. “Svend said he might want it back,” Ollie said. Svend was the original owner of the couch – Lord only knows whom he inherited it from. But when Svend looked at his tiny bachelor apartment, he came to his senses and passed on it. The hard part was getting it from Ollie’s to my place. We live six blocks away at most, but neither of us drive or have a truck at our disposal. I reluctantly called Bud to see if he would help me. It seems like the only time I ever call Bud is to help me move something. I called and tried to sound nonchalant, as if I were calling to catch up. Since nothing is going on in either of our lives, it didn’t take long to get to the point. “I really hate to ask this…”
“You want me to help you move again,” he groaned into the phone.
“Just a couch. It’s just a couple of blocks and I promise you won’t have to lift a thing. I really need this couch, it folds out into a bed and I have all these people coming in July and I don’t have any place to put them. If I don’t get it within the week, they’re going to put it out on the street.”
“All right. My truck is full of garbage and I need to go to the dump. Can it wait till Friday?”
“Not a problem.”
Friday rolled around. I had to cover part of Ollie’s shift at the shop so he could go to the dermatologist. By the time I got home and walked the dog, I was too tired to move a couch. Bud called late Friday night. “Is there anyway this could wait till Monday or Tuesday? I didn’t make it to the dump and I’m going to Victoria on the weekend.”
“No problem.”
“You’re not mad.”
“Not in the least.”
In the meantime Ollie had found someone else with a truck, a girl named Dot who comes into the shop regularly. Dot is this short blonde thing who works Set Deck. I didn’t know who Ollie was talking bout when he described her. I don’t know the name s of a lot of people I serve; I know them more by what they drink. Dot is a double Americano run through twice. “Dot said she would help us with the couch,” I just assumed he was referring to some big bull dyke.
Ollie warned me the couch was really heavy. I had to open the shop, which meant I had to get up at four-thirty in the morning. Ollie and I went to his place and got stoned after work, and then I took the dog for an hour-long walk when I got home. I had a half hour to sit before I had to go back to Ollie’s and get the couch.
The couch wasn’t nearly as heavy as Ollie made it out to be. The whole thing was done in less than twenty minutes. It doesn’t take up the whole place considering how big it is,but I am going to have to do some creative re-arranging. I took the couch for a test-drive, kicking up my feet and watching, “Spiderman.”

GarpinBC






 

BLENZ

Blenz coffee shop, on the corner of Davie and Bute, closed today. It came as a complete surprise to everyone. Blenz is where people on welfare go for coffee. They had two roasts: Burnt and Acidic.
“They’re taking everything out of Blenz,” Ollie said, coming back from the liquor store.
“What?” I was cooking at the time and distracted.
“They’re carting everything out of Blenz into trucks.”
“You mean they’re closing shop?”
“Yeah!”
“Why?”
“The owner went to re-new her lease but Blenz head office said they dropped her francishe.”
“Wow.” Then I went back to cooking.
I had almost taken a job at Blenz. I was desperate for work and the Help Wanted sign was always up in the window. They couldn’t keep anyone in the graveyard position. I had gone in for an interview and met with the owner, a bottle-blonde with an Eastern European accent that reminded me of Dracula.
“I’m looking for someone to work 11 to 6,” she said.
It was the perfect schedule. I was living in North Vancouver at the time, and the hours fit in with the ferry commute. Then it dawned on me.
“Eleven to six in the evening or eleven to six in the morning?”
“Morning,” she said.
I was desperate for work but not that desperate. I imagined what it would be like: Junkies wanting to use the bathroom; guys coming back from the bars, people stealing from the tip jar; fist fights and calls to 911. I’m too old for the graveyard shift on the corner of Davie and Bute.
A couple of months later I was desperate enough to work the graveyard shift. As if sensing my desperation, Dracula called me back in for another interview out of the blue. On my way to meet her I stopped at Muddy Waters for a coffee. Ollie was working, and he sat down asked what I was doing.
“I’m going for a second interview at Blenz for the graveyard shift.”
“Don’t do that. I’ll get you a job here.”
Ollie and I had discussed said job before. They were looking for someone to open the shop, a shift that started at four-thirty in the morning. Since I was situated in North Vancouver and didn’t drive, I would have to ride my bike across the Lion’s Gate Bridge at Three-thirty in the morning. At the time we had decided it was too ludicrous to even consider, but with Blenz as my only other option, it made perfect sense.
In the middle of the afternoon Stuart comes into the shop and practically walks behind the counter. Stuart was a regular at Blenz in the afternoon. I’d see him there everyday reading one of the local rags in the window.
“So…has your business increased since Blenz closed?”
“No. Not really.”
“They’re closed, you know?”
“Yeah, Michael was telling me earlier. Why?”
“Well…She was abusing her employees and customers. And they’re blaming her for all the crap in the neighborhood. AND…she got into that shit with they guy who owns the deli.”
“The European Deli?”
“Yeah. She tricked him into signing a petition to have the rainbow flags removed from the lampposts.”
“Fuck.”
“You can read all about it in last weeks issue of the The West Ender.”
I made a point of looking for the article in the paper over a late afternoon cigarette out back in the parking lot. Meg was just coming out of the shop with her coffee and lit up a cigarette.
“You guys busier because of Blenz?” she asked.
“Naw. I think they had a certain kind of clientele. Did you hear why it closed?”
“Yeah. The owner said she was making too much money and Blenz wanted more from her. She’s planning to sue.”
“Well according to my sources,” I said, then told re-iterated what Stuart had told me.
“I heard about that petition,” Meg said. “There was something about it in the Editor’s column of XtraWest!”
I just read the column. Xtra had obtained the names on the petition and they had been blown up to poster side and posted in a few store windows. Not long after, the deli owner was having people come into his shop and threatening to boycott. When Dracula had brought the petition in for him to sign, she said it was about the Neighbour hood Business Association. The Deli Owner had no problems with the flags, and had contributed money to the Pride Day festival.
I walked past the store on my way to the liquor store after work. It’s completely empty. The corner is a much brighter place because of it.

GarpinBC

TOAST

This morning this French Canadian chick came into the shop. “Do you have bagels?” she asked Ollie.
“No,” he said.
“Why?” she asked him.
“Because we’re not Kosher.”
“Do you have toast?”
“Yeah.”
“Fine. I’ll have an order of whole wheat toast. Do you have marmalade?”
“No. We have raspberry preserves.”
The chick sighed in frustration. “Do you have peanut butter?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll have an order of whole wheat toast with jam and peanut butter.”
“Do you want anything to drink?”
“No.”
Ollie punched in the order of toast into the cash register.
“I’ve changed my mind. I’m going to have coffee with my toast.”
He didn’t bother asking her if she wanted dark or medium roast, he just poured her a cup from the nearest urn.
I had just taken over cooking from Matilda who was going off shift. There were a handfull of orders up already and it was getting busier. I pulled the toast off the grill, but had to dig around for a fresh jar of peanut butter. I was scooping some out when the French Canadian chick comes up, and takes the plate of toast.
“I’m going to take my toast before it gets cold.”
“Don’t you want your peanut butter?” I yelled behind her.
She comes back for the peanut butter. Then I waited a second.
“Do you have a knife?” she asks. So I hand her one.
I wanted to chase her down and hit her in the back of the head. I went to serve Sylvain who was waiting by the cash register. “How are you he asks?” with his own French Canadian accent.
“I’ll be better after a cigarette.”
“Going crazy?”
“No, but people are pushing me there.”
I poured him a cup of half dark, half medium roast coffee.
When I came back from my cigarette, the French chick was talking to Sylvain. After she left the shop, Sylvain came up for a re-fill of coffee. “Do you know her?” Ollie asked.
“She’s not a friend, but she used to come by the restaurant. She was telling me she’s a real bitch in the morning and she can’t control it.”
“You can say that again,” Ollie told him.
“I thought so,” Sylvain said. “I could feel it when I came in.”

GarpinBC

PRISONER OF AZKABAN

June 5, 2004

PRISONER OF AZKABAN

Yesterday I went to see “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.” I had been looking forward to its release, it sounded really dark compared to the other two films. I went with Blaze. It was an attempt to make up for the play I got too drunk to see a couple of months ago. I had originally given him a pair of movie passes as an apology. The other day I was over at the house and I reminded him the passes expire in July. He said he was aware of that and he was trying to decide which movie to use them for. I suggested Harry Potter since he’s such a fan of the books. “I’ve thought about that, but I’m going to wait until the crowds die down.”
“We should go see it opening day. Friday is my day off, I can get us some tickets for an afternoon show.”
Blaze hummed and hawed, but I assured him the movie would probably be playing in all six theatres and the crowds wouldn’t be as bad as he pictured.
“Okay. This will repay me for the play I didn’t get to go see.”
I’m never going to live that one down. From Prisoner of Azkaban to Prisoner of Blaze.
Blaze called just after three to say he was out of work.
“Do you want to meet at the hotel or in front of the theatre?”
“I’m going to see if I can get a quick beer in before the movie, so why don’t you meet me in front of the theatre.”
I was smoking a cigarette in front of Golden Age Comics ogling all the cool stuff in the window. I was trying to figure out how many comic books I would have to trade in to buy the Enid, (from Ghost World) doll when I heard someone call my name.
It was Upchuck.
I had deliberately been avoiding Upchuck since I started smoking again. Upchuck gave me three patches to get me on my way. After the patches wore out after day two, I was right back to a pack a day.
David was with his brother-in-law. They were checking out the movie times at Capitol 6 where Harry was playing, but they must not have liked the movie times because they bolted across the street to the Cineplex Odeon. Blaze came out of the little café next to the Odeon just as Upchuck disappeared behind a bus.
Blaze got me stoned in the alley behind the theatre before we went in. He was too stoned to carry on a conversation. He did moan about his feet and that he wanted to see the new Catwoman movie because the cast and crew had stayed at the hotel here he worked. Then he started kvetching about the kids in the audience.
“Have you ever seen a Harry Potter movie in the theatre?” I asked him.
“No.”
“Neither have I, but I’ve been assured by people who have that the kids are so enthralled in the story that don’t make a peep.”
The lights dimmed and we were subjected to almost a half hour of trailers for movies I wouldn’t pay to see on DVD. The new Hillary Duff movie looked particularly sucky even by teenybopper standards. That actress from Best in Show looks really funny in it as the wicked stepmother. Of course they have to use Hillary Duff’s fucking single in the movie. Between the clothing line, the album and her movies, the chick just makes me want to puke.
The Thunderbirds looks like it’s going to suck the bag as well. Since when are The Thunderbirds about a family? Who cares about freaking families saving the world? Give me puppets!
I remember chanting for Jennifer Love Hewitt’s career to tank, and now that it finally has, I almost feel sorry for her. I used to hate her as much as I hate Hillary Duff now. She’s been reduced to playing a veterinarian in the new Garfield movie. Those years on Dawson’s Creek meant nothing in terms of her career; she might as well have done a season on Survivor.
I completely lost my patience with the trailers when snow started falling down the screen and the names Steven Spielberg, Robert Zemekis, and Tom Hanks faded in and out in gold letters. The trailer was for The Polar Express. I wouldn’t see that movie just because they’re advertising it in June! Aside from that, I’m sorry – Steven Spielberg doesn’t scream Christmas to me. And the sound bites they were using were so sugary you just wanted to pull the hair of the person and front of you and start pounding on them.
The pot caught up with me when the movie finally started. I had a good belly laugh the first fifteen minutes. I was so high I was beginning to convince myself that this could be the first Harry Potter to get an Oscar nomination. The movie never quite lived up to the opening, but it was enjoyable all the same. There was one line I couldn’t believe made it into the movie. One of Harry's textbooks was called, “The Monster Book of Monsters.” The book had teeth and eyes and attacked the reader when unlocked. When told to turn to a page in the book that blonde Malfoy kid asks, “How are you supposed to open it?”
“You stroke it,” Weasley tells him. There were several snickers in the audience.
I’m convinced that Emma Watson is going to be the next Kate Winslet. They have her wearing low-rider jeans this movie. She’s looking pretty hot. I can say that about a fourteen-year-old girl as a gay man. Blaze thought Daniel Radcliffe is looking kind of sexy, but I don’t see it. In fact, I can’t think of anyone I would like to fuck in the Harry Potter Movies.
The movie lived up to its dark expectations. Pats of it were reminiscent of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang where the world isn’t so perfect and adults aren’t necessarily nice to children. There were moments when I thought, “Is this really suitable for children?” But I dismissed the notion; kids need this kind of crap. I remember watching Jacob Two-Two and the Hooded Fang and being scared and awe struck at the same time. I’ve seen that movie once, twenty years ago, and I still remember it. Granted, there were homosexual undercurrents in that movie that struck a chord with me. I left the theatre knowing a couple of hundred kids are going to wake up screaming in the middle of the night, and it warmed my heart.
After the movie we stopped at The Dufferin for a beer, which was as dark and creepy as the movie. “Hang on to you wallet,” Blaze said, as we entered.
I’m sure the bar makes a good chunk of cash of the unsuspecting post-movie homo crowd – at least for one beer, which was how long Blaze and lasted. Everyone in the bar eyed the door as if there ship was about to come in. The attire was strictly bargain basement, people coming back from their jobs in the mailroom or the reception desk of some seedy motel. Blaze wanted a cigarette with his beer so we went into the smoking room, which was freezing and smokey. The people in the smoking room were even more tragic than the people in the bar. Some of them appeared to be melting despite the air conditioning.
After The Dufferin, Blaze and I headed up towards the Gay Village and The Pumpjack. I had absolutely no money on me but Blaze had just got paid and offered to buy me a couple of beer. Whereas The Dufferin was fucking freezing, we were sweating buckets at The Pumpjack. The crowd was considerably better looking.
“I just came back from Harry Potter,” Blaze said to everyone he knew. He was so proud of the fact he saw it on opening day, something he would never considered in the past.
I didn’t spend a dime but managed to get fucking loaded. Upchuck showed up not long after we arrived. “I just saw the worst fucking movie,” he said.
“Let me guess,” I said. “The Day after Tomorrow?”
“You betcha! No fucking plot, no character development and completely implausible even for a disaster movie. My brother-in-law was snoring through it and said he liked it.”
I haven’t been to The Pumpjack when it’s busy in ages. I’ve been kind of avoiding the place actually. I’m bored of it, the same old faces, and the same old stories – my own included. I’m also trying to be more prudent with my cash and alcohol just doesn’t figure wisely into my budget at this point in time. There were a lot of good-looking guys but I’m too self-conscious to cruise them. I was also way too drunk to carry on a conversation with someone I just met.
I knew it was time to go when I turned into this sardonic bitch around this really cute guy my friend Baker was chatting up. The guy was in his early twenties, with the sideburns and the Abercrombie & Fitch shirt and the whole nine yards. It was probably the A&F shirt that got me going. The guy’s sister works at Muddy Waters in Yaletown. “I’m so embarrassed for her,” he said. That was when Greg introduced me as his co-worker at the Davie St shop.
For his part Baker kept forcing The Tokyo Lounge down everyone’s throat. It sounded really cool and everything but after the fiftieth person he described it to, it just sounded like one more name to drop if you’re anybody that matters in this town. I hate that crap, being defined by where you go. Granted, I’m a complete nobody, so I guess you could say I’m jealous.
I ended the night at Upchuck’s condo smoking a joint and drinking wine – not like we needed either. We sat on his white leather couch, our arms touching. I was tempted to rest my head on his shoulder and kiss him on the forehead. It’s almost better not having sex. I almost think it would spoil it. I basked in the warmth of our arms and legs touching, blabbering on incoherently. I staggered home close to midnight, passing out on top of my sheets and in my clothes.

GarpinBC