Please Take One

the commonwealth heads of government (CHOGM - i love the way that acronym goes down the throat) summit was held in uganda recently and the nation spent weeks getting ready for it. prostitutes, not ones to miss out on good business opportunities, took the time to take english classes - to make sure they could communicate well with customers. we all know know that communication is key when involved in the service industry. the last thing you want is to have disputes because one party didn't quite understand the terms they agreed to. thank goodness this was not a meeting of the multi-lingual united nations - the good thing about being part of a group of nations formerly colonised by the british is the unifying language.

during this heavy influx of the freed from colonisation the women of the night community also decided to raise their nightly business rates from $60 to $100. in a country where the average annual salary is less than $200 a year, that is some windfall. mtv may have to consider a ugandan woman of the night cribs. holla!

here's hoping one of the improved english lessons included a class in - no, sir, no condom, no sex. not even for $200 a night. i want to live to spend this money you are going to give me.

To Be Continued...

so i was thinking that maybe with my birthday and all coming about, i would get all deep and meaningful. you know, take some time to test the wisdom of my advancing age and ponder the deeper mysteries of life. perhaps take stock of where i am and reassess where i want to be. i mean, at some point don't we need to get beyond i want to be able to effortlessly touch my toes and do the splits? but no, i find myself resolving to never give up. but there is another issue - what to wish for when i blow out the candles on the cake. now that is really difficult. it has to be something extra special. something that maybe only a wish could make come true. something like:

1. backstage tickets to every show on the abba reunion tour. maybe they'll let me sing backup or at least play the tambourine and be a true dancing queen.
   
2. world peace. or at the very least, change the rules of war. disputes are to be settled through dance. viennese valtz to victory!
3. i refuse to write effortlessly touch my toes and do the splits here. i don't need a miracle for that, i have yoga. can't waste my birthday wish.
4. to be so casual and cavalier when i meet bill clinton (and i will meet bill clinton) that he'll have absolutely no idea i have an awesome crush on him. taunt me if you like, the heart (or loins) will do as it will.
5. hey! are the children covered by the whole world peace thing? because i totally want them to be healthy and happy and not allegedly kidnapped by air workers in chad.
6. shiny glitzy outfits for my world tour with abba deal. and for that to come with no shame. and an afro wig.
7. more leisure time. like waaay more leisure time. and then an extra week.
   

I Said Get On!

so the other day grandpa jones (names have been changed because i'm just not good with them) gets on his bicycle to go and pick up his four year old grandson james. this is a journey he's taken before and the trip to the school passes uneventfully. it's great exercise for grandpa jones. he's 77 and this keeps him young and chipper. he makes good time and gets to school as the kids are coming out of school. he spots his grandson coming towards him and waves to make sure that the little boy has seen him. the boy approaches and grandpa says "hey son, let's go."
"go where?" the boy looks a little confused.
"what do you mean, go where? did you just wake up? we're going home. get on the bike." the boy still looks a little lost.
"but who are you?"
"what do you mean, who am i? boy, i'm your grandpa now stop playing with me and get on." grandpa picks up the boy and puts him on the bar and they set off. the ride home is quiet - grandpa has to save his energy for the ride and it seems the boy still hasn't woken up because he looks dazed. it takes a while but they get home and grandma jones comes out onto the porch. as grandpa jones is helping the boy of the bike she shouts out,
"so who the heck is that and where's my grandson sam?"
"now that's funny. you know it's sam."
"sam? grandpa, you've got the wrong kid."
did i mention that grandpa jones has been sam's grandpa for four years? and that grandpa jones has picked sam up from school before. that james is no relation of sam's and apparently doesn't even look like him?

good confused man that grandpa jones is, he put james back on the bicycle and took him back to his waiting aunt and picked up the correct grandson but, people, i couldn't make this up if i tried.

Two Girls Walk Into A Bar...

sometimes people just need to let stuff out. you know, so they don't go explode and go a little or a lot crazy. some write poetry, some talk to strangers in public places.

a short while ago, a friend and i wandered into an irish pub. we had a thirst and time to kill. as we worked our way through our first drinks, two men came and sat next to us. old friends who had not seen each other in a while, they had finished catching up and were looking for something new to talk about. and they happened to sit next to us and strike up a conversation. so we discussed what people in irish pubs discuss - life, politics and wham. things were lively, we were on drink two, when at my right ear i heard a voice. i looked over my shoulder to see a man standing there. i was about to shrug him off but he begged me to listen to his story. so i thought, what harm is there in listening?

he begins. he came to this irish pub with a woman he met earlier in the day - a very lovely woman he added. but things got interesting when his ex-girlfriend walked into the pub (a risk you run when you go to the spots that you and your ex used to frequent). it seems this man had not yet forgiven his ex for leaving him and their two dogs. "i've got pictures, let me show you," and next thing i knew i was looking at wallet photos of two dogs in various poses. "cute," i responded more out of politeness than anything else.
"what are you doing?" my friend was getting impatient.
"he's showing me photos of his dogs," i shrugged, still a little confused. why me?
but he was tapping on my shoulder - he still had a story to tell.
so i looked back at him and he continued.

anyway, as i mentioned, he had not yet moved on from his ex-girlfriend. she was probably too young; she was nineteen and he was 32 when they met. his friend was dating her mother. but that hadn't seemed to matter (neither the age gap nor the two friends and mother and daughter double dates) and they had moved in together and adopted two lovely puppies together. things had been going great, he was ready to "breed." things started going wrong when he bought her a volvo.
"don't take this the wrong way," as he moved in really close and gazed earnestly into my eyes, "i want to have the perfect white family." not knowing which was the right way to take it, while wondering what memo i had missed that stated that a volvo is central to having the perfect white family, i said, "ok." my bewilderment must have looked like hurt feelings because he rushed to add - "well i'm sure you and i could have the perfect family but our kids would all have afros." i could think of many reasons why he and i wouldn't have the perfect family but he had a story to tell so he continued.
"she got mad because i asked her to make a payment and so we broke up." i was pretty sure that he was oversimplifying but i said, "ok."
then he started telling me just how perfect they were for each other. he claimed he used to be a pro baseball player and her father used to be a basketball player and started talking about short stops and he must have seen my eyes start to glaze over and my body start to turn towards my friend because he cut himself short and finished with, "anyway, i haven't seen her in two years and so i am off to try to make her jealous." again while my pub-mode brain was trying to make sense of this, i asked - "with your new girlfriend?"
"oh no," he looked at me as though i had just said the dumbest thing, "i'm just going to talk to her. i'm not really sure what i'm going to say but wish me luck."
"ok." again, confused expression must have made him feel that he needed to say more.
"you know i probably will never see you again, " to which i nodded. "i would have loved to chat you up but tonight there are just so many beautiful white women here."
"ok, now you can get lost."
because i didn't want to have stuff i needed to let out.

I'll Crush You Like A Bug! A Bug, I Say!

so our governor, elliot spitzer isn't having such a good week. and i feel kinda bad for him because i remember that i thought he was pretty cool for standing up for the little guy against the big corporations. seems though he got on lou dobbs's bad side and apparently that mr dobbs is a force stronger than nature. i don't know much about this lou dobbs character. i gather that he has a nightly show on cnn and i have tried to watch it but it seems to always been in reruns because every time i catch a clip of him he is talking about "broken borders", whatever those are. i just wonder when they have new episodes - damn writers' strike.

anyway back to what is going on with elliot. so new york, mostly city, being a melting pot and all is full of people from all over the world and not everyone is here legally. that's all well and good but despite our fantastic public transportation system, some of these not so legal residents of new york drive motor vehicles, sometimes for a living and sometimes even with passengers in the vehicles with them. so the governor thought it might be a good idea to get all these guys take the tests and hopefully that would make the roads a safer place to be. i am sure he had some other reasons for this - i am thinking driver's licences help our glorious big brother keep a protective eye on us.

but that lou dobbs he felt very strongly about this. it seems that if you give people driver's licences today, they'll be fakely driving tomorrow. i had no idea. i could have been committing voter fraud all these years if i had known that all one needs to register as a voter is a driver's licence. i had always been told that the proof of citizenship process was far more stringent but lou dobbs has opened my eyes. there are a whole lot of non-citizens driving around america completely clueless regarding the power of that piece of plastic in their wallets. but we can't let too many people know. or before we know it only citizens will be allowed to drive.

Come On Day, I'll Take You On

oh my goodness! am i tired! wow! i was kinda tired by eleven a.m. but i had no idea what tired was. i thought maybe another coffee but then i thought, no, pace yourself. first day at work, the last thing you need is the caffeine shakes. and the sky was all grey and it looked as though it was going to rain all day long. but i got to work and there was a package waiting for me. and in it was each day a small victory, a book i am totally looking forward to reading that was illustrated by oscar grillo whose awesome blogs help get me going each day... i was so excited! it was like christmas come early. i was sitting there thinking - should be hating this day but i was smiling.

and then my phone rang and it was my mother, calling to tell me that my super brought me a new fridge. now perhaps i have never told you about the fridge in my apartment, or rather that was in my apartment, but it was older than everyone i know - put together. seriously. and i have been trying to get my landlord to replace it. i was at my wits' end, especially when my fridge also started to weep in frustration - all over my kitchen floor. i called the super in to witness my fridge falling apart. i mean what else was it to do, seeing as it knew it could barely do what it was born to do. the super said, the landlord will never do anything but let me look around and see what i can do. this morning as i walked to the subway i wondered idly if he had forgotten me and if it would seem pushy to call him again. and then i got the fridge! it is not brand new but it's brand new to me and i think it was built in this century. and, i can barely believe it, i think it's frost free. i thought that getting excited over a refrigerator required a spouse and children but, look at me... i am breaking all the stereotypes.

now that i have conquered grey monday, i am going to relish my small victory for about 10 minutes before i pass out because - gosh darn it, today i discovered exhausted. eureka.

Back On The Block!

i am going back to work tomorrow. ummm... yay?

You Know Those Three Monkeys...

enough already cnn! what are you trying to do? get me all down with your "news"? i mean i settle down with my popcorn and seltzer water ready to be entertained with dog the bounty hunter's declarations that he wants to be buried with washington's slaves as reparations for using the n-word and instead you serve me with footage of an ambush that left several soldiers in iraq. i could have gotten past the footage of the ambush which looked like some collection of shooting stars, but then cnn had to go and make it all real by having us meet survivors and families and hear their stories. cnn had me crying on my couch, shouting at my mother - but he was only twenty years old!
what's up with that cnn? have you forgotten the 'tainment' in edutainment? how am i supposed to get my holiday buzz on when you're showing me action in emergency centers in iraq? how am i supposed to not waste time trying to make sense of the politics of war when you are showing me toddlers with gunshot wounds to the head? how am i supposed to focus on which celebrity is pregnant and not telling when you are filling my screen with pain and suffering?

oh yes, veterans day weekend. so come tuesday we'll go back to the way things should be. there is an old adage, something like, if a man falls in the desert and no one is there to see him, does it really matter?

or something like that.

What I See Is What You Get...

by the time i finished primary school, several things were apparent. one was that i had an aversion to writing on the line. despite having to stay after school to fill pages with handwriting that was supposed to be on the line, i couldn't see why it was so necessary to do so (except to have free afternoons.) it is not as though words are no longer words if they are not on lines. another was that at times of high excitement my brain would get way ahead of my hands and my writing would become illegible in attempt to catch up.

when i started high school, we had some compulsory classes - cookery, sewing and art. cookery produced some rather tasty butterfuly cupcakes. sewing class ended with a nightie that was designed before my mother was born and wasn't cool even then. art resulted in failure. abject. the final exam on which, apparently, the entire grade was based (because i cannot remember us doing anything the entire year) had us doing still life paintings. i swear this to you, the apple was yellow, or golden as in golden delicious, but the art teacher threw the painting back at me. "paint it green! it's an apple, apples are not yellow!"
"my apple is yellow, i can't paint it green if it doesn't look green to me!" she gave me the evil eye and i refused to back down. to pull out the green paint would be to compromise my principles and i only do that for chocolate or ice cream.

i came last and the comment was that i "failed to see an apple." it was the family joke for months and the art teacher made her point by failing me and putting me at the bottom of the class.

the following term i made a new friend. the girl who came second last in the class. it seems she had spent the previous term fascinated by me. apparently i would sit with the girls that produced the most amazing works of art and had the gall to produce my non-art without the slightest trace of shame. as though i had no idea that i sucked - and i have a sneaking suspicion that i was a tad clueless. her beating me in class at least assured her that she was not crazy and even though the art teacher said she drew a pretty flower - first of all she came second last and second and most important she drew a GRAPEFRUIT. she is so lucky that i liked her otherwise i would have demanded my rightful second last position because at least it was really an apple that i failed to see.

yet, through failure, i made a friend, a fellow november baby and someone to play madly with in art class while the art teacher ignored us. fun times. fun times. and so this weekend as part of my november celebration of a truly awesome month, i celebrate the old friend and a new friend. so i am off to have some ice cream and chocolate and i hope you do too, maine and prettylyf. and don't forget to boogie!

Six Degrees, Schmix Degrees...

tell me, does it happen to you? you come home and you say to your mother you met someone called joe. or you get off the phone and she is looking at you expectantly and so you say or that's my friend joe. and then she always asks, oh joe who? and you always think, really mom? you think you REALLY know everyone that i know? but you want to test her and you are all oh joe bloggs. and she is all oh, is he peter's son? you know, peter from the u.n. and you are thinking? seriously mom? we chatted about our favourite drink and maybe pretended we were a bit deep by discussing global warming and recycling. do you really think i asked who his dad was? so then she gives you that look and then you have to pick up the phone to call or text message to ask "ummm, so joe is peter your dad?" and joe is all "how did you know?" and you have to tell him how your mother claims she knows him. and then she shouts from the kitchen "it's not a claim. i know him very well." and maybe they went to school together. or were in college in the same area at the same time. or they met at a meeting last week.

and you realise that there is no mystery in your life. you wonder if you'll ever meet a stranger. and yet you breathe a slight sigh of relief because at least your mother will be able to tell you if the word about town is that he's an axe murderer.

oh but i digress. so last night we got to bed in my cozy apartment (where one really can have no secrets) and then she says - do you know? and goes into this discussion of some kind of family and friends tree and i am barely listening but i say yeah, why? and she says well i spoke to this young woman and she says she reads your blog. and i am lying in my bed wondering if my mother is talking in her sleep. but then she says, yes, her name is tjidzani. if i could jump, i would have jumped out of bed. she really does know everyone.

no way! how small is this world? i have to blog about this, i told her. and she responded - ok. and what exactly is blog?