Stupid Confession of the Day

So, T.A. PAUL- my second favourite T.A. of all time, and thus deserving of the constant capitalization- invited me to his New Year's shindig. I decided not to go. In other words, I am forfeiting the right to see one of my favourite authority figures get drunk and weepily sing along to the Carpenters for Guelph.
I also made the brilliant decision to tell everyone I still knew in Guelph that I always get morose on this date, and am quarantining myself away from the general population to contain the suck. Which of course, makes it perfectly understandable that I am mildly miffed that no one in Guelph has invited me to their New Year's thing.
Which I, of course, would just refuse anyway.
Sometimes I don't make sense, even to myself. And yet, still:

Diving In The Resolution Dumpster

I've been visiting the scrapheap of my broken resolutions over the past few days. I'm trying to decide whether I should do New Year's resolutions this year or just forget it, and say they're a clever ruse to sell exercise machines and Suze Orman books. It's the cyclical nature: I am miserable and unhappy about myself, so I make resolutions aimed to fix them, but then I make them too ambitious, and when I inevitably spend most of the year eating granola bars in front of the computer, I get to feel bad again just in time for December.

So, I won't make the same kind of resolutions. Anything about my weight is right out, for obvious reasons. I always say I want to be more informed about the world, but the world is scarier the more you know about it. Maybe I should swap "watch the National every night" with "watch Entertainment Tonight every second week?" No, that's even more depressing than failure. And don't even get me started on my attempt to green my living. My life is supported by a thin tissue of take-out containers and impulsive shopping, and the thought of deodorant crystals makes me ill. Also, if the end times are right around the corner, I want to go out driving an SUV with one hand and mashing a Big Mac into my gob with the other.

No, I'm not so decadent. Furthermore, I still lack my G2, so driving any vehicle outside of a bicycle is out of the question. I guess it would be easier just to give up resolutions entirely, but I'm still optimistic. And I figure if I set some goals, even if I fail a little, there's a good chance I'll accomplish a bit more than I would otherwise. So, this year, I'm setting just five simple goals. Prepare for limited success, world!

Protagitron's Resolutions for 2009

1. Learn how to cook Indian food
2. Read all of Remembrance of Things Past
3. Graduate
4. Visit New York City
5. Be more frugal

Oh, and then there's Protagitron's One Big Resolution for 2009:

1. Be less of an obsessive, neurotic, depressed weirdo and enjoy life... you delightful dumbass.
   

Obscure File Categories, 1

From the files of "Sexier in Theory Than in Practice":
Shopping for bras. Particularly with a mother who insists on only buying the ones in boxes because the sale is better. I will say that the new bra keeps my girls up, but it also looks like a relic from the Soviet Union and could, quite possibly, stop one of their tanks.

The Tackiest Thing Ever

Please Note:

1. Lavender and teal colour scheme
2. Stills from the movie around the base
3. Arch
4. Quotes on the arch
5. The fact that one of those quotes is "I carried a watermelon!"
6. That there is a button you can press which then plays audio clips of those clips, as well as this monologue: "Look, spaghetti arms. This is my dance space. This is your dance space. I don't go into yours, you don't go into mine. You gotta hold the frame."

Reader, I purchased it. But only at 50% off, and only to plug the hole in my heart after my nascent tradition of "Buying a Batman ornament after Christmas" was quashed.

Guelph Digest

I thought my blog needed some sex appeal. This is my favourite mug from my Grandfather's "Naughty Mug" collection.

Well, how was everyone's Christmas? I spent mine Chez Grandma, in the town of Ingleside, which is kind of like a suburb of Cornwall, a town whose most notable feature was its paper plant. Which has since closed down. I feel bad about making fun of it, because the people there are quite nice. However, being in a small town when you're stuck with family, and old enough to resent the fact, is no fun. Although Guelph is not Montreal, you can still get out of your house and go somewhere. In Ingleside, there is no "there" there, at least outside of the house after regular business hours. Unless if it's somebody else's house. What I'm driving at is that I spent a lot of time upstairs, reading, this Christmas. I still recorded two bits of Grandmotherly wit and wisdom to carry you guys into the New Year, however:

1. "And they were selling popcorn for thirteen dollars! I just about shit myself!"
-Grandma Protagitron on her encounter with price gouging at a production of Mamma Mia.
2. "And she was using the toilet, so I had to pee in the sink! It was that or piss on the floor."
-Grandma P again, on proper bathroom etiquette when traveling in the state of New York.

What year is it at Grandma's house? Is it 1954, 2004, 1982, 1983, or a year represented on none of these calendars?

I am now back in Guelph, considerably more enlightened. Also, considerably better dressed. Montreal friends, there is a reason to get out of the city. I don't care if you're going to Ontario, or Moose Jaw, or even staying in Quebec and going to some po'dunk town where the locals give you the stink eye. The second hand clothing is going to kick Montreal's ass. I'm not saying that Montreal doesn't have good thrifting, just that you are competing with 1 620 692* other people for the choice items, and they are probably craftier and better at haggling than you are. So, you can either be lucky, fork over some serious coin, or content yourself with the best the early 90s has to offer in burgundy corduroy.

Guelph Haul

I am never lucky, so I am Guelphy. In today's haul: Vintage herringbone jacket, made in Edinburgh sometime in the sixties, judging from the label. Diane Von Furstenberg scarf, which I paid more for than I usually pay for secondhand goods, but 14$ for DVF is a sacrifice I'm willing to make. And, from Value Village, the Bluest Coat in the World. It is so blue it is post-post-blue. It deserves its own biohazard sticker. The legally blind might be able to make out light, dark, and this coat. I love it, and plan to be buried in it.

There is another good reason to go to Guelph: All Strung Out. Mote has her own (awesome) yarn store. I wasn't around when it opened, but I had to come down and drop a few dollars. Not as much as I would have liked, but I am under severe financial and space considerations. Also, my stash is in danger of smothering the cat, which would just push me over the edge from righteous to sad spinster. So, I limited myself to just some Diamond sock yarn, which is a gift for a friend anyway, and some Noro Kureyon Sock, which is for a secret project. But here's why you shouldn't do the same:

1. Supporting local businesses is awesome.
2. Mote is a lovely person.
3. Who doesn't love yarn?

I can't think of a better three reasons. And for those smartasses who are wondering if I even knit anymore, some day there will be pictures. Or maybe line drawings. Whatever.

Winter in balmy Guelph. Slushtastic!

In That Holiday Spirit (of Twitchiness)

I don't know whether it's the fact that I'm a bit sick, or if it's the holiday blues, or maybe it's the 'nog, but I've been acting damn strange lately. 

The good thing is that I'll be visiting Ingleside over Christmas, so it's not like I'll stand out much in my weirdness.

All slagging of miniscule Ontario towns aside, I know it's not the 'nog. But more on that later. 

Until then, I actually went to see a movie! A real one, in a theater with tickets and everything!

Frost/Nixon Dramatizes the story behind the famous interviews by David Frost of Richard Nixon, which prised some honesty about Watergate from Nixon years after he resigned. That I could only write that sentence because I read movie reviews says something about one of the problems Frost/Nixon faces. Nixon is a generational figure, either as a sinner or as a joke. To me, he was firmly the latter, and the first things I learned about him were, in order, Watergate; the V for Victory fingers; "I am not a crook!"; and that he was the owner of a pair of magnificent jowls. The bitterness shown by some of the movie's characters over Cambodia, or over betraying the American people, is confusing when you're wondering if he's the same lovable old guy from Dick. Frank Langella's excellent performance as Nixon, and the pull of the underdog narrative, also make Frost's eventual triumph less than satisfying for anyone who was not a victim of the seventies. It becomes almost unwanted.

There is one other issue, the conceit of editing it as a partial documentary. Although the scenes set during the interviews act like narrative film, they are awkwardly broken up by documentary-style commentary by the major players, played by the same actors in aging make up. When people are reminiscing, they are already acting out their version of history, and by the time you have actors acting like they are acting, things are starting to get a little overcooked. I do feel like I am being a little picky, however. In spite of these two issues, Frost/Nixon is quick-moving, and interesting. You can barely feel the two-hour long running time. And, at least watch it as a historical document on insanely wide ties.

Praise YHWH!

As of 11:45, I have finished completely with Jewish History: 400-1000 CE. I feel like there are now two paths of celebration open to me:

1. Watch a Christmas movie

2. Order a bacon cheeseburger, and ask for shrimp on the side. To garnish with, at my will. 

I am so happy, and yet so sleepy, and all I can think of is Maimonides. The wind calls out his name, and yet smells of rendered pork fat. I am confused. 

Random Moment: An Ode to the Familiprix

Familiprix Classic: Direct From the 80s EconoWrap Christmas Paper. For My Familiprix Gifts.

I'm very fond of the Familiprix near my house. In my area of P.S.Chuck (Point St. Charles- I am trying to make this happen,) life is sustained by three places. There is the depanneur. Rather, there are several, but they are interchangeable in their quality of stocking everything but the one thing you went there to find. Even when that one thing is butter. Which they usually have, but not when you're halfway through a recipe, although you can content yourself with sandwiches in packages, green sugar, balloons, panty hose, cat litter, lentils, and a giant liter of green hair gel in a tub. And porn. If you're hungry, there's Centre Pizza, serving Crispy Delight chicken and ice cream. 

And when you need pills or something a little classier than the dep, there is the Familiprix. It is not a drugstore in the mode of Pharmaprix or Jean Coutu. Rather, it's what I imagine the old-timey drugstores of black and white movies would look like if they were allowed to order things from the present day. They carry one line of everything, and only one line of everything, and you learn to like that one line, because really it's your fault for forgetting to stop off at the Pharmaprix. Apparently Cover Girl won the battle for make-up supremacy, while those bug-eyed Russ creatures have a lock on the stuffed animal gift rack. I am letting you all know this, so you can figure out where your Christmas presents came from. 

It all sounds like I don't love the Familiprix, but I do! I do, because the lack of choice is liberating. I go there, and I am only confronted with one kind of chips, and one kind of pencil, and am not paralyzed by the agony of abundance that affects the privileged and the neurotic. Because, in Mother Familiprix, TAMPON CHOOSES YOU. 

And I like it that way.