Saskatchewan Scrotums

The scotum is probably one of the funnier looking parts of the human body. Which is why seeing a pair dangling from a trailer hitch on the car in front of us made my mom and I crack up. Why was it there? Apparently Tiger Automotive has them, balls for men's cars who want to be manly. There were no labia though.

Scrotums for your car. What is the world coming to? Do you remember Neuticals, the silicone testicular implants that would make your boy dog have balls even after being neutered?

Well, aside from that, it's nice here in Saskatchewan. Not too terribly cold. Getting busy for some family parties. I don't even know when to expect the guests, but I've been tidying while Mom went to the doctors. I should really get back to that.

I'm buying someone balls for Christmas, I think she wants some.

Profanity Report

So I'm in Saskatchewan, where I may be moving. There may be a pretty juicy job here for me, and my family, and some wacky great friends. It's also my homeland. I think it's time for me to see if I'll feel different living in the place I really come from. As in, countless generations before me have survived here on the prairies.

But anyway, since I've been gone for a while from this blog, I thought I would update you on the feature. It's still really rough, and two crucial scenes haven't been written in yet. But I thought I'd give you all a taste of the script. Since I'm queer, all kinds of censoring things might happen during the making of Bunnyhug and it's release. So I decided to post the current profanity report. It's generated by Final Draft softwear, so I don't know who decided what counts as profanity.

BUNNYHUG -- STATISTICS REPORT


GENERAL STATISTICS

Number of words: 1833
Number of paragraphs: 251

PROFANITY
This profanity report should be used as a general guide to the profanity content of your script. Some of the items in this report may not be actual profanity and other real instances in your script may have been missed.

"Ass" (2 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
12, 76
It is spoken by the following characters:
ELLIE, NARRATOR

"Asshole" (4 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
24, 42, 60, 96
It is spoken by the following characters:
CASSANDRA, ELLIE, OLD QUAVERY LADY, RACHEL

"Bitch" (2 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
30, 108
It is spoken by the following characters:
JANET, MIRANDA

"Bullshit" (1 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
45
It is spoken by the following characters:
CASSANDRA

"Cock" (2 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
41, 95
It is spoken by the following characters:
ELLIE, SEXY FETISH LADY #1

"Crap" (1 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
24
It is spoken by the following characters:
CASSANDRA

"Damn" (2 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
76, 108
It is spoken by the following characters:
ELLIE, MIRANDA

"Dildo" (2 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
29, 78
"Fuck" (11 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
12, 13, 30, 31, 44, 73, 76, 92
It is spoken by the following characters:
ELLIE, JANET, MARY

"Fucked" (4 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
30, 52, 89, 98
It is spoken by the following characters:
ELLIE, JANET

"Fucker" (1 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
25
It is spoken by the following characters:
CASSANDRA

"Fucking" (10 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
17, 29, 31, 49, 71, 76, 84, 88, 98
It is spoken by the following characters:
CASSANDRA, ELLIE, JOHN, MIRANDA

"Piss" (1 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
77
It is spoken by the following characters:
ELLIE

"Shit" (5 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
11, 27, 42, 65, 86
It is spoken by the following characters:
DAMIEN, ELLIE, NARRATOR

"Tits" (1 occurrences)
It appears on the following pages:
11
It is spoken by the following characters:
JOHNNY

testing, testing . . . eins, zwei, drei

Traditions die hard

It is a common Vancouver tradition to light firecrackers and fireworks off every halloween. Bang, pops, and dreadful whirring noises have decended on the neighborhood. I must say, when I first moved here that drove me crazy. Vancouver loves it's halloweens. Now I have come to regard the rather violent celebrations with fondness. I'm just glad this halloween I will not have to go to the hospital.

This coffee cake's fumes are making me woozy.

Teabagged!

I teabagged myself last night, purely by accident. I was drinking the last dregs of chai and had the teabag wrapped around the handle. I was drinking when I saw the bag fly to my face, to hit me between the eyes with a warm wet slap. As the realization dawned on me that I had truly teabagged myself, I quickly began laughing and very nearly spewed my hot chai all over the place.

Happy Halloween!!!! I have the day off, which is saving me from seeing my coworkers dressed as zombies. It's a grey day in Vancouver, hopefully it will stay dry so the kids can go get candy.

I've been having some fun, writing writing my script. Going to Halloween parties. Thinking about stuff. I think I've been a bit low, the change of seasons affects me, like most bipolars. Going to daylight savings time doesn't help much either.

Shhh, don't scare baby

The most disgusting thing I read recently is that Katie Holmes had to agree to have a "silent birth." That means she can't scream her head off or make any noise that implies pain. IT"S Å scientologist thing. Freaking shift key is sticky.

That's just cruel to do to someone. Make them promise not to cry out during child birth.

I have one Werthers left.

Okay: the only reason I want breast implants. Within the next fifteen years you can get implants that are actually MP3 Players.

Madness is my friend

I have never gone surfing. Not once in my life. I was a prairie girl, where the hell would I surf? And the first time I swam naked in the ocean with a bunch of lesbians, I was so terrified of sinking into the deep depths that I didn't even realize how sexy that whole escapade was until I wrote it here.

So I'm not really cut out for surfing. But I watch it and I imagine that surfing would feel a lot like riding madness. It's scary, yet exciting, it's sometimes dangerous, and there's always the undertow.

I have been on a nearly lifelong journey to try and accept my madness. It's difficult. It's such a pervasive disability, and yet there can be long stretches of stability. And the creativity is addictive. Hypomania is just a hard thing to stop, because it feels so good. And let's not forget the wanting to snuff it moments. I hate those.

I like that I can think in a different way than other people. It gives one an advantage sometimes. Sometimes it's really a barrier.

Being manic feels like having every electrical appliance on in the house. Watching every channel at once. Fast urgent thoughts coming out like bumper cars, all crashing into each other. I think people are usually more scared of mania than depression, even very serious depression. People notice when I'm manic. People don't notice when I'm depressed. Sometimes they even say I'm cheerful.

In some ways it feels bad ass, because you're the pariahs of society. In some ways it sucks, because you're the pariahs of society.

By the way, whenever comments are turned off from now on, it's just because some jerk left a blogspam that I can't erase.

"This is the sort of nonsense up with which I shall not put!"

I think sometimes my manic mind frusterates others. I sometimes talk slooow, sometimes fast, sometimes so ridiculously fast it all comes out as gibberish (although I know all the words), but that's only on . . . extreme occasions. And I leap topics like nobody's business. I operate on several channels all at once, and I love to toy with ideas and link them to other things.

The opening of this blog complete, I feel very sleepy. And overworked. I found a few things in my manic depressive websurfing that were somewhat interesting, although completely unrelated to each other.

For instance: A water balloon exploding in zero gravity.(with Videos!)

My mother hates it when I end a sentence with a preposition. She has a fit, a cow, kittens. It's really the best way to get her mad without doing something you'll feel guilty about later. But according to Wikipedia, sentences ending with prepositions may not be that bad.

This is my current favorite flash, Ptikobj. I like his other work as well, but I warn you, the rest of it is quite morbid and grotesque. "There is a dog trapped in my guitar!" Ha ha, classic.

Oooh, speaking of morbid, and considering Halloween is fast approaching, here is my all time favorite site for ghost stories, The Shadowlands, followed by Obiwan's UFO Free Paranormal Page. Be sure to read the Black Eyed Kids and the one about the jello globs.

Someone was killed in my neighborhood, which troubles me, and they're gay, which troubles me. I really don't want to end my life in some alley getting my brains bashed in by some homophobic jock getting his jollies. And I imagine he didn't either. It really makes you wonder about human nature, that one small difference in your identity makes you prey. Bleh.

And really, those were all the things I was thinking about today.

They're back!

The mice ate my popcorn, nibbling away the nights. I am appalled. Popcorn is so important to my life. And now I am betrayed by rodents.

The Aboriginal Glass Ceiling

Or: The Myth of Aboriginal CandyLand

White people love to tell me how much money I have access to being one of those Aboriginals. They also seem to assume that I have a better chance of being hired than an equally qualified white person, because of equal opportunity employment. According to a surprising majority of people, I should be making 40 grand a year, when the reality is this year I MAY clear 8000. MAYBE.

It's true, my education was largely paid for by my reservation, I am not crippled by a huge student loan, and there were two funding sources I've recieved money from solely for Natives.

But now that schools over, I've applied at a wide variety of jobs in my field, all of which I'm qualified for, I am still struggling and working in a phone room. And when I look at other close friends of mine who are brilliant Native women, many of us are not employed in our field of expertise. Or where we are employed, it's really underpaid. Now I don't have access to production equipment, except for grants, and since it's still quite new for me to be dependent on grants, I understandably have the fear that being a minority in multiple ways, I won't get the funding to keep making work.

But back to the job thing. I'm qualified to do so many jobs, and yet I never get called back, even from people advertising as equal opportunity employers. I am beginning to suspect that there is a glass ceiling at work, one no one talks about, one which wants to keep the Aboriginal population as minimum wage slaves. Doing the menial work. It really makes me wonder.

I don't think Canada is ready for middle class Aboriginals.

I promise this will be as painless as possible

I'm doing my favorite kind of calling right now. I cannot tell you the specifics, but it's a very fast call basically getting an opinion and giving information. It literally takes about a minute to do, there's no money involved, and for the most part people don't actually mind it as much.

HOWEVER, there's always the few people who get infuriated the second you start. It's getting tipped off by the not-quite right pronunciation of their names, no matter how well you studied phonetics. Or the way you introduce yourself. Then they don't even listen to a word you say. You could be telling them they won a million dollars for all they know, and they just rip into you.

And here's the really weird thing, usually it's the women yelling at me that bothers me the most. The men are usually gruff and grumpy, but they usually make you laugh while they're telling you off. But women, eeee! Sometimes I think they would hunt me down and kill me given the chance.

I day dream about all the witty retorts never said, for the most part I just politely get them off the line. I say sorry so many times a day.

I must have done something REALLY awful in a past life to end up at a job where saying sorry is so automatic. I am a machine, a sorry saying machine.

But here is what I have to say to the mean ladies who rip into callers:

This morning I was eating something (I think it was chips) and drinking coffee and smoking and having my alone time with my huge pile of email (I'm on a listserv, it's not fans or anything), and this horrendous whirring saw noise starts, in the hallway outside my apartment. Ugh, I was so mad, and it continued on and off for the last hour I had before going to work, and totally wrecked my concentration. I wanted to yell at him, but I couldn't, and didn't. He was doing his job. So it was annoying, whatever, poor guy has to go be annoying everywhere all day. I was nice to him. I just imagined throttling him so he'd shut up. I didn't do it. And in the end we have nice new tiles in the bathroom. And a pit where the toilet used to be.

I miss the toilet, but I digress.

So just be nice with callers, we are usually pretty amiable to a polite no, and it doesn't take that long to talk to someone.

AND here's another thing about callers, YOU might know the person calling you. But they could be using a fake name, like Cha Cha DiGregorio, or Jessica Drake, or Mrs. Goulet. So you could be making your best friend or your cousin cry. Have you ever seen a caller cry? It is a sad sight.

Nylabone Propaganda

When I got my first dog, I remember reading some book that in retrospect, was probably put out by Nylabone. They were filled with lots of other information, but then all of a sudden, the benefits of Nylabones would be scientifically explained for a full forty pages. With full color pictures of the range of Nylabone products on the market.

So I dutifully bought a Nylabone, only to realize two dogs later that Nylabones were pretty much ignored, while cow hooves and pig ears were much more acceptable.

Suzie's prize cow hoof gave off a rank smell that put off everyone. She was an austrailian cattle dog, so maybe that's why she loved them so.

Now I'm looking at dog books again, and I find the same Nylabone propaganda is out there. I've yet to hear of a dog who actually likes their Nylabone. Maybe Mrs. Goulet's dog likes Nylabones.

Die Blogspammers!

Hey dude, I think your blog is cool, keep up the good work. By the way, check out the great rates on Home Loans.com!

Grrrrrr, nothing makes me madder than deleting someone's garbagy spam from off my blog, much like hosing away dog turds and horcked spit from the sidewalk. I am on the hunt tonight to learn how to get rid of these horrible things.

And everytime I delete the spam comments, there is left a little imprint "This comment has been removed." It makes me look like a censor when really I'm just erasing advertising.

Fellow bloggers would like to read this manifesto I found.

Do you know Mrs. Goulet?

After Unemployed Summer 2005, I now find myself in the bizarre position of juggling jobs. Today I will be quitting my current job and going back to a full time contract job, while at the same time waiting to see if I will be called in to work a completely different job. It's all very strange. Good thing my artist fee came in, which means I pay the rent somewhat on time and pay off two other outstanding bills.

At the same time, I am still being hounded by some bill collectors in Quebec. Actually, since my last known address was my mothers, she hounds her. Mrs. Goulet, she is called. Mrs. Goulet is very persistent. She is also francophone, and insists on leaving messages completely in french on my mother's answering machine. I think she represents Quebec Hydro, but my deeper fear is that she is collecting on behalf of the Quebec Health Care system, bloody hell I don't even remember what they're called.

The only word my mom knows in french is Chocolat, and that's because it was the name of a movie she fancied.

My own knowledge of french is most basic, elementary type stuff "Je suis tres froid" kind of thing, and I don't even know if that's right.

Tonight my mother is going for dinner with someone who's last name is Goulet, I wonder if she is related to the infamous Mrs. Goulet.

I wonder who Mrs. Goulet really is? I bet she has swear words written all over my leads about how impossible I am to find.

Mrs. Goulet is now a legendary figure in my family. She never tires out.

Oppression is Rude

I'm not out at work, for the two MAJOR aspects of my identity that make people weird, namely being a homosexshual and being a crazy lady. This means I've heard some unpleasant things about "dykes" and manic depressives in the last couple of days. Yes, we are the outcasts. We are the people who make others uncomfortable and scared, either that we'll "dyke out" on them (ugh, straight girls totally turn me off), or that we'll flip out and run around with hunting rifles.

Honestly, homophobia and crazy-phobia pisses me off. For one thing, I'm the most pacifist person you could ever find, the one time I got assaulted I didn't even raise a fist to my attacker. I took my glasses off, mostly because they were getting damaged and in my hazy getting beat up mindset I figured I should save them. So as far as being a violent maniac, it's never happened.

My main concern is that oppression is rude. What gives anyone the right to harrass someone based solely on their identity? And I especially hate it when oppressed groups slam other oppressed groups, and do you know why? Because A) it adds to global oppression, and B) the privilleged ruling class wants us to be fragmented groups. I mean, can you imagine if all the oppressed minorities rose up together in unison? We wouldn't be MINORITIES anymore, we would be an overwhelming majority, with huge power.

I'm glad my new job starts soon, hopefully it will be a little easier to be a complex little Thirza there.

False Christians ruin it for the rest of us

"For now you have hijacked the Son,
Last time I checked He came to light the lamp for everyone" - Tori Amos

It took me a really long time to get around to even considering that Jesus had something to offer me. Not because I disliked His teachings, in fact, he was quite sensible and had the same values I share. No, I didn't consider Jesus because of his followers. Followers like Fred Phelps of God Hates Fags fame, the one who demonstrated at Matthew Shepards funeral. Followers like the rigid Christians I knew in school, eager to bandy about words like Sin and Hellfire and the one true Saviour. They irritated me. For that reason alone I stayed away from Christianity. I didn't want to become narrowminded, didn't want to be like them. Didn't want to invoke the same deity as some homophobic redneck from the Bible Belt.

I much preferred Buddha's teachings, finding truth within yourself by your own spiritual regimine. Having compassion. I still like Buddha. The first time I meditated, I mean, really was able to still my mind, I felt my consciousness expand to include every living creature as myself, from an ant crawling along the edge of a leaf to a killer whale leaping out of the waters of the Georgia Straight. "Can it really be that simple?" I wondered.

Later on, when I went crazy, I started reading the Bible. Not the Old Testament, the grumpy God who was always changing his mind and smiting people. I read the New Testament. The life and times of Jesus. Jesus never made faggot jokes, or encouraged bloodthirst. People didn't even call him the messiah while he was alive, they always called him Teacher. I liked that.

I hesitate to call myself a Christian, for reasons I will elaborate further. However, having had a psychotic episode, having been in an altered spiritual state, I will say that yes, I do believe Jesus was an actual historical figure. I do believe in a God (although I do not consider it gendered).

I DON'T believe that the only way to Heaven, the Afterlife, what have you, is by being Christian. You may be baptized and go to church regularily, but you can still lead a fairly impoverished spiritual life. Consider the example of a very famous "Christian" who leads a very corrupted spiritual life. George W. Bush has turned nearly everything he has touched into crap. He's a dictator who electronically stole the last election and stole the previous one by denying many blacks the right to vote. He gets very angry at any collegues who give him bad news, turning his office into a group of simpering yes-men and women. He has illegally started a new Viet Nam, trashed reproductive rights, and maintained queers as sub-citizens with limited rights, he ignored New Orleans. And yet he is OBSESSED with portraying himself as a good Christian.

That makes me sick. While I still tenuously toy with the label Christian, my loving grandparents are avowed Anglicans, and have been for decades. Gramma does Bible Study, Grampa translates the Bible and is an ordained minister. They love and support me, their lesbian granddaughter, and even do queer rights activism within their church. They are perfect Christians. And yet what they practice seems so far removed from what Bush practices.

In some ways, I think I should call myself a Christian. I think it's time to take Christianity back from those who use it as a tool of oppression. Learning unconditional love, even for figures like Bush, is difficult, but an important spiritual exercise.

Even Jesus knew what his followers could do.

"When the Judgement Day comes, many will say to me 'Lord, Lord! In your name we spoke God's message, by your name we drove out many demons and performed many miracles! Then I will say to them, 'I never knew you. Get away from me you wicked people!'" - Jesus

Obsessive Woof woof!

Yes, we all laughed when Anna Nicole was giving her little dog Prozac. Dogs with mental health issues, who would believe it?

Well, now the madness in my family has even spread to my mother's dog. At first my mom was concerned by him barking madly in the middle of the night at nothing. Strange indeed. Anxiety maybe? Well, then he started licking all the fur off his leg. Hmm. And everytime I called my mom, I could hear the dog panting in the background. Excessive panting, barking, licking, a little light went on while Mum started dosing him with Rescue Remedy. I looked it up, and it turns out the little fuzzball has many characteristics of a dog with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

He's got a great personality, he's just very weird. I mean, you can't fault him for that. I've been doing some more research on it. Selectively bred dogs have a higher incidence of OCD, about 2 percent. Most dogs with OCD are male, while most cats with OCD are female. Large breeds excessively lick themselves, while terriers run in circles. If allowed to go unchecked, the dog may stop drinking or eating, so figuring out a way to treat it is pretty important.

Some of the drugs used to treat OCD pups are the trileptic antidepressants, and they are looking into the SSRI's too. Right now I think Mum's going to treat him with natural supplements, but who knows? Too bad no one else in the family has OCD, or we might know more about what he's going through in his poor little doggy head. Apparently they're aware that they're being odd, so they sometimes try to do their repetitive behaviours in private. Other animals usually stay away from them, yes, mental health stigma exists in animals too. I thought the kitties stayed away from him because he rolls them across the floor with his snout.

Anyway, anyone with good tips on OCD in dogs, let me know. And I don't want tips about Home Loans, or any other spam related "comments" crap. In case you're wondering why I've been deleting comments, it's because they are worthless spam comments with links to capitalist sites. Go shove it up your ass spam commenters, before I sic my mom's crazy dog on you!