pass the biscuit!

The weekend that was….



Saturday saw me plugging numbers at the salt mine while the higher ups decided whether or not to makes moves to move this thing along but in the end pulled the plug on the moves and stayed put so now, Monday, we’ll be moving ahead and trying to get done what we need to get done by Friday so there’ll be no work this Saturday…I haven’t made any grand plans for the weekend, and it’s only Monday, because shit changes every day and will change many times before Friday’s work is done.
Saturday night was the last Topanga meal of 2007 – Shauna and I headed there picking up Ang along the way and then ‘he who can not be named on the blog’ joined us a little later on - and I went out in style ordering the chili relleno burrito with a little chicken and beans thrown in there as well…not a two entrée dinner, the relleno was inside the burrito – that sucker isn’t on the menu…if I was a little braver I would have ordered it el presidente, but I couldn’t do it….nice too for the Topanga to pick-up the tab for Saturday night’s feast...thanks Andrew. The Topanga staff/xmas party was Sunday night which we attended at after our hockey game – a game we won 5-0 to bring our record to 13-0…I played well, not well…’nuff said about that. more on the Topanga party later….
Sunday morning Shauna and I grabbed Devon and headed-up to crave for some breakfast. I had never been there and was pleasantly surprised by the breakfast fare served there. Shauna had a panetone french toast with some sort of berry compote while Devon and I each had benny’s…good times…afterwards we roamed around main street…dropped-in on the voltage kids, I bought some new shoes at umiboshi, ran the racks at Eugene Choo, the Front and Twigg and Hottie….Devon was done by then so we dropped her off at home and headed to Granville island to see the kids at that pickle. Mishi showed us her new tooth cap and the Garbs danced to motown. So, the usual. Then it was off to a matinee at tinseltown, “before the devil knows you’re dead’ with heartthrob Phillip Seymour Hoffman….a good flick, but not the feel good hot of the christmas season…be warned, it ain’t gonna warm your heart…
Dinner was quick as I had to get to hockey with Mr. Tornack…then, after our convincing win, it was off to Topanga. We grabbed Shauna and went to see what was going on…it was fairly sedate affair but there had. Obviously, been some drinking going on as I saw dishwasher and all around good guy Leo, passed out on the floor in the back by the staff washroom…this morning ain’t his best morning I am sure. We had to make an early exit but when it was all said and done sleep wasn’t had until almost 2 am so I’m a little tired today but it’s all good..merry ho-ho…
Back at the salt mine…the end of the week will signify an end to the first portion of this job and in the new year it’ll be all downhill…resolutions will be made and broken. This week and next I will also be posting the best of the blog for 2007 so look for your favorite pics from the year that was 2007.

Have fun.

G. xoxo

garn face by shauna.



topanga's xmas tree.



tornack enjoys some meat at the topanga party.



leo has a nap after a few too many egg nogs.




mishi's new tooth...which one?...if ya can't tell, that's a good thing.



nice. french toast.



me and the love of my life. really.



um. ok.



devon snuggles up at breakfast.



erica at voltage had a cool look going on.



he who can not be named on the blog enjoys some topanga goodness.

a

ang and he who can not be named on the blog enjoy some mexican xmas cheer.

hey....who ya talkin' to....

one of my co-workers should have a cell phone strapped to his head to save his arm. the amount of time he's on the phone everyday is astounding, and no one has any idea who he's actually talking to...maybe he doesn't either. i have decided to put up a bounty to anyone who can get me a copy of his cell phone bill, actually i'd like to see the last three months but i would settle for one month. just one. like a piece to the puzzle that is he. i'm not holding my breath.
but it got me to thinking about my cell phone usage which i thought was minimal overall. on lots os jobs i have the phone strapped to my head and have huge bills. so i calculated the last four months numbers....not as scary as perhaps my co-worker's numbers but still....
3363 minutes which equals 56.05 hours or 2.33 days on the phone. shitty. and that's just my cell phone. i handle at least 1400 calls a month at my office. i don't even wanna think how many hours/days i spend on that phone...ok....good times.
i actually hung up on joel - my boss - today...he wasn't impressed. oh well. i'm still getting shit done. and that's all that matters.

g. xo

out with it...

many, many months ago i sold a macbook laptop to a friend of a friend. because he was short on cash i gave him a deal that allowed him to pay me half then and half within a few weeks maybe a month or so. it has now been over six months and i have not yet gotten the second half of the laptop cost. nice. if i do not get payment within the next, short, while i am going to 'out' him on here. why? because i can. and you may know him which will make it all that much better.

g. xo

still grumbly...but the goods get noticed...

i know, i know...i've been a bad web blogger but it's been busy....shocker.
the countdown to shauna's excellent mexican vacation has started - she'll be flying outta here tuesday morning for her date with the sun. she and her family are going on a mexican riviera cruise on a ship with eighteen restaurants alone...there should be some shuffleboard to be had as well. i will be meeting up with her in LA on the 26th and then we'll be heading out to the desert to hold hands and ignore our cell phones. it will be nice to go from having to get shit done each and every day to avoiding getting shit done for a couple of weeks. as much as i love you all - don't expect to get ahold of me between the 26th and 31st...i'll be driving and looking for burrito stands.
in other news...



my pal - or at least he used to be my pal, willy vlautin, his book 'the motel life' has been named by the washington post, as one of the year's top 25 novels. pretty good. i've read it and it's a good read...one day maybe i'll finish all those half written things i have on this computer box...good on ya willy.
the salt mine keeps us all busy here. as usual. nothing new to report here except that we're running out of money fast and will have to print more if we're to finish this thing up in style. after the xmas break it's all downhill with me looking forward to the new baseball season and thoughts of spring training in arizona...dare to dream.
my stomach is still grumbly but i'm hoping that goes the way of the dodo soon enough...less jingus more jangus i'm hoping.

have a great....

g. xo

grumbly...

..there's some sort of jingus going on in my stomach....

more later.

g. xo

sunday errands and the bomber perfection continues....

big sunday.
we slept-in in a big way not getting out of bed until almost 11 a.m...yikes...i wasn't and haven't been feeling great so maybe i needed a big sleep (we did go to bed kinda late to though after getting home late from the island...) after we did, finally, get our collective shit together we headed out to run some xmas errands shauna had to get done before she goes on her mexican riviera cruise - umbrella drinks, shuffleboard, lounging by the pool, that sort of thing....we also dropped some xmas lights we had hanging around the house to the pickle so they could make the pickle a happy holiday place to be....they've been playing all sorts of bad xmas music there lately...then it was off to robson street to go to the bank and get more shit done..we ran into andrew and sonia..andrew was looking especially dapper but i failed to get a picture of him...lookin' good though.
corie and i had a bomber hockey game yesterday afternoon and had some fans come and watch us play - to experience the bomber greatness...shauna and ang came along as well as raine and eric 'half-gay' lemay...raine has just started playing hockey so i think it was exciting for him to see guys he knew playing. he came down behind the bench and said hi during the game - he's a great kid, eric is very lucky. shauna and ang were found after the game relaxing in these massage chairs they have up in the bar area - it was hard for us to get them out of them.
then it was off to stella's on the drive - look at me back on the drive - to get some snacks and a few beverages...then, home to watch housewives...it's getting good..now some murder shit...you really should be watching this show....

ok..back at it here...funny, when i/we started this piece of work i set-up a six month calendar and started to cross off each day as it ended each night (did that make any sense..?) anyhow, you get it...but when i started doing it i had a tough time with hos far away december seemed at the time. the number of days until we got there, a lifetime away and now we're here and two weeks away from our xamas break...and then after that we're on the home stretch of it all...weird.

have fun.

g. xo

i've got your christmas lights right here...

yesterday shauna and i rocked the bc ferry and made our way over to nanoose bay where floyd and janene live. kind of an early xmas dinner/visit thing. because it wasn't some sort of holiday weekend the ferry line-ups on both end were very small and we had no trouble getting on either way...the trouble is the $65.00 each way....fuckers. when we got there floyd had made us a nice root vegetable soup and fancy pita sandwiches with brie and salmon...nice work floyd.
before dinner floyd enlisted my help to put up some xmas lights and janene enlisted shauna's help with some web page problems she was having....good times...i don't know if anything was solved on the web site front but the lights looked good in the end...
so all in all it was a good trip over to the island for all..and then home to bed where i had the sleep of the dead...i've had a bit of a cold/flu thing and needed a long sleep in...

i'm tired...hope you had a great sunday....

g. xo


on the island they have sushi, eh...



floyd works on the lights.



nice.



the ferry is so great...



floyd ponders the lights.



floyd gives 'er on the ladder.



nice.

ang gets down topanga style

last night after work shauna and i went over to gailan's pottery studio and picked out a couple of cups that shauna had had her eye on...i'm not much of a pottery guy or really not a pottery guy but gailan's stuff really is beautiful....

check her out... http://www.gailanngan.com/

there ya go...

afterwards we went and grabbed devon as she and shauna were gonna have a little girl time together and were gonna go to the bacchus lounge and have a drink and watch the goings on...i found out later that there were a few good things to look at...after i dropped them off i went and grabbed ang (who up until last night had never been to topanga....) and then mishi and peter and we headed to west fourth for a little dinner with our man 'he who can not be named on the blog'. don bull was there as well but not sitting with us. he was there well in advance of us with his buddy rob who was celebrating his 47th birthday....geezer...by the end of the evening we were talking to them across the room like we were just sitting in my livingroom...sometimes i wonder if casual topanga diners ever feel left out as everyone else there seems to know each other....don and rob then came over and joined us for the last little while and 'he who can not be named on the blog' and he traded insults back and forth showing their true love for each other. it was good....i love don bull - but don't tell him...at one point i phoned don's better (far better) half, donna, and told her that her man was ruining our dinner...she laughed and went back to sleep. and so it is.

ang liked her dinner. and put up with the rest of the goings-on.

off to vancouver island today. nice. more later.

g. xo

bull loves the topanga.



huh?...two burritos?



i've never had the two burrito dinner ever...they accidently made that last night...thank god i don't get all the other jingus as well - cheese and beans, or i'd be dead...



me and mishi...



no pics...



hey! it's ang!



ang gets ready to go...



ang's first topanga bite.



ang gets 'er done.

as a young man i....

had some bad hair and was in some bad musical acts...lovingly referred to as 'fuck bands'...one such band was lou cooper with alice reed and the commotions. we played lou reed and alice cooper songs. we played the savoy a couple of times, a few parties and john barley's which later became the cruel elephant. issy saw lou cooper. a gig poster for the john barley's gig has resurfaced after many years as was posted on facebook by my pal scott who is a local punk rock historian. great guy. i would later record as I Weedeater, perform as Pepe Deluxe and sing with the likes of No fun, hard rock miners, zumpano and new wave-oke. why am i telling you this...? i dunno, i just am.



also posted on facebook - of which i have a love/hate relationship with, is a picture of my grade seven basketball team. nice. and nice hair. good lord.



played hockey against the old dawgs last night..it was good. i have had new steel put on my skates and be it in my head or otherwise it feels better than the old steel so it was worth the money...i scored a couple last night and assisted on another one or two...good times..don't get me wrong, it's still about the economy of motion (read - doing exactly was required to get the job done not unlike work to rule....) but it feels good and i have some jump. nice. bombers game sunday. we have three more games until they move us up another division in the new year. from division seven to division three in one season...good lord, who do they think we are...?

heading over to vancouver island tomorrow morning to see floyd and have a our holiday dinner...i know it's a little early but schedules, busy ones, dictate such a thing so there. deal with it. shauna and i will be there for lunch and dinner so it's a pretty big day out for us...i just love the ferry...so great.

have a great night. have fun.

g. xo

payphones and mail boxes

last night i had to meet someone down on commercial drive, yup, there i was again in the land of the new hippies, guys named tony and lawn order clients who owe me well over $300.00...good times...anyhow, there i was and i had a letter to mail before i had to meet up and do you think i could find a mailbox...? what's the deal with this town - and it is a town, don't be fooled....you can walk for blocks and blocks and not see a mialbox....they're getting as rare as telephone booths. fucked. also if you notice, in certain parts of the city it's getting harder and harder to find sidewalk garbage cans....like near meinhardt or south granville in general...why? because the rich folks don't want binners going through them. not on my block mister. anyhow...seems it's hard to just find the regular day to day stuff anymore. why do i care?...well, i really don't as i rarely mail a letter or need a payphone but it's a definate sign of the times....more e.mail, less people writing mailable letters (and why canada post wants to or tried to impose a levy on every e.mail sent....i say fuck you...) and less garbage cans because of binners and the 'man' trying to get you to recycle...or something...

more here at the salt mine every day....having two drivers has made my life much better and taken thelion's share of the driving off of paul - such a great guy and driver...holy shit i can only think back to how bad it has been when i had the likes of bob black and certain others....you don't know them but suffice to say they were great wastes of skin. our second driver right now, hardip, gets the drill and works hard..i like him...i'm losing him at the end of the week i think....i'll lobby to keep him but they already want me to cut him lose...fuck that.

more as it develops.

g. xo

rainbows and lollipops

so beautiful....outside our shop today...like right fuckin' now!

have a look and take a little time out for yourself.

g. xo

finder's keepers

the other night as corie and i were leaving the rink, where we play the only game we can name - the good old hockey game, i saw off to the side, perched on the edge of the curb, a water bottle caddy that not only holds bottles but pucks as well...what was i to do?...it was 12:20 a.m., not a soul in sight, not a peep, so i took 'em....they'll be a good addition to the bomber family. you always lose pucks, you always need some water...we have, once again, been moved up a division in the league we play in over there. it should be fine, but it could be harder for us to maintain our perfect record (11-0 thus far...)....i've had a few suspect games in the last while but thought i played ok the other night...more dry land training is needed as well as some more games on the sheet. i'll lace e'm up thursday night which will be good...and at a decent hour, 7:45 pm, not the 10:30 ice time we had on sunday.

nice.

be good.

g. xo

wicked

overheard in my elevator a few minutes ago.

............

guy one: so what bands have you done?
young girl: i dunno
guy two with bad english accent probably not real: like who?
young girl: a few bands...i dunno.
guy one: like?
guy three: like blood?
all guys and other girl in elevator: ha ha ha ha ha
young girl: um...i did weezer's hair?
guy one: rivers?
bad english accent guy: wicked! weezer is wicked!
young girl: i don't know which one. i did a couple of them, their hair, i don't know which ones.
guy one: wicked.

..............

yup. wicked.

it's sunday and it's snowing. and we're off to ikea. it's kind of a rite of passage when two people move in together.

g. xo

a flurry of activity....and snow..

tonight after a little running around getting shit down earlier in the day, and after shauna had watched a few episodes of the housewives, we headed out for dinner to poontango, a place that hasn't seen my face a lot lately...we grabbed megan along the way and then went by hammered and pickled and got mishi and the garbs and away we went....it was good to see all the kids again as well as the kids at topanga. now, home, fat and satisfied with my off the menu food and some more housewives....and bed and another sleep-in tomorrow morning....

night night.

g. xo

more from tonight...

hangin' loose red burrito style...

after work last night i made my way home with a replacement piece of glass the good guys at on-set glass had given me for a couple cases of beer...i hadn't mentioned it before, because i was a little distraught but i screwed-up one of the first pieces they had sold me. anyhow, the wall that separates the loft from the downstairs is now has a very nice translucent laminated white glass...fancy. i still need a few pieces of wood or UHMW shitola to complete the task and it's all done. pics soon.
after we put the glass up we - shauna, ang and i - headed up to the Toque craft fair at the western front. every main street hipster was there including erin collins - who i haven't seen for a long time, jennifer mckay from the block, wendy from dream, the academy of text girls, rocker fisher rose, allison smith of allison wonderland ...nice crowd really. it was a little packed but there were some fine crafts to be had. emilie and devon were selling some of their wares - and if you're interested they're there today as well. devon with her doodlepuffy's and emilie with books of her art and some other art related books. good stuff....
after that we headed down to commercial drive, yes me on commercial drive, to go to hottie's birthday party. on the way we grabbed a snack at red burrito - which has been going down hill lately and they seem to be having a tough time keeping those burritos rolled nice and tight...mine falling apart like a cheap suit. still a good snack.
we were told to get hottie crappy birthday presents so she would open a bunch of crappy things before she actually was given her 'real' present which was an ipod a few people had contributed money towards. shauna got her a box of elastics and i got her a book by time-life that i had found in the recycling bin while i was taking the crap from BOC yesterday. others presents were kinda good or at least not bad....anyhow, she loved the ipod and also loved the 'crappy' presents so it's all good.
we slept the sleep of the dead last night and are planning on domestic duties today...shauna's going to catch-up on her desperate housewives and i'll gonna hang loose...

now, you hang loose.

g. xo


me and ang rock out.




devon's doodlepuffy's.



elilie sells her wares.



hottie opens her book of fishes.



more hottie presents.



wendy from dream.



wendy and shauna.