TACO NIGHTMARE.

Oh my gosh, WOW.

Apparently, when my brother and sister and I all graduate in June (I hope??), we will be spending a week with our very kind and generous parents in possibly the most cutest little yellow house ever.














I can't even believe how sweet and cheerful this little yellow house is.

This will be the first time we have gone on a voyage together as a family in years, and probably the last time such a thing will happen for years to come.

How about I won't even say where it is and you can just pretend it's wherever you would dream such a yellow house would suit you best for a week of reading and writing and Scrabble and rippled potato chips...and quite possibly, enough bickering to shut up the crickets.

I would never want to do that though, for the sound of summer crickets is something magical you can't often hear living in an apartment in the city.

And here we have the parallel universe version of the little yellow house on my beloved Drolet...

The purple one!






















Next up, tomorrow night the karaoke contest begins at Cock & Bull.



















What should I start with? What are you kids feeling??

The contest involves 3 bars with 12 contestants each, and every week one person is eliminated until there are 4 left at each bar and then we showdown for the big money...$1000! There are like 8 cash prizes though, and the weakest one is 75 bones so maybe I could win that maybe and pay my phone bill or buy you guys some chicken wings or whatever. St. Hubert anyone? Anyone??

So yeah, Wednesdays at Cock & Bull are karaoke night, and anyone can sing but only I can compete because I payed 20 dollars to be part of this special moment in history. Well me and eleven others and not you. Unless you are one of the other 11 people in it to win it.

So! Let's hope I make it past round one, and after that I might try and put pressure on the general public to get their vote on or vote or die or just stay home and eat Doritos, who cares.
















Envayz. It's virtually impossible to find evidence of P. Didd's VOTE OR DIE campaign from oh four right now...I guess since he started it, he can't really escape it, but everyone else can just pretend it never happened and that peace signs will save America.

So here are some gay Doritos.





















Who knew?!

So I think that I will probs go with "You Oughta Know" tomorrow night because I tried and trued it, plus Beyonce is apparently all over that shit on tour so angst is very now right now I guess.

Look out for the very best part which is when she doesn't say "FUCK", she does something ELSE. [Thank you for the hot tip Caroliner.]


If I get beyond the first round I might have to get into some Melissa Etheridge and quite possibly take up Ariel on last night's suggestion.


And by the way? Yup, I caught a unicorn on my way home from yoga, which is pretty incredible if you know a thing or two about unicorns.
















I also saw a panther and got three fantastic shots of it but I don't feel like scaring anyone on a Tuesday by letting them know there really are panthers in the Plateau that will maybe eat you, especially since there were no good snacks in the recycling today...
















Ha! Nice try, 4000 Drolet!

Aiight I'm audi 5000, POYCE!

P.S. They switched recycling, it's today not tomorrow.

LADIES LOVE THE ARTISTS, NO??

Hey you, let's banish manic Mondays...


And play a fun game called "Do you walk around the Plateau with your eyes closed?"

Let's begin, shall we??

Do you recognize this man...






















What about now...






















What about now eh? This is where he most closely resembles his Plateau reincarnation...























In fact, he may be walking his dog down St. Dominique right this very second!

First prize goes to Ayan probably!

SO WHAT...

And here we have some ideal rainy Sunday fare for your ears, my dears.






















I haven't been out strolling yet, but from in here it seems like happy rain more than the sad chilling rain that loves to bring great pain and cold to your forehead and then your fingertips.

It's more like the kind of rain you don't mind walking in for an hour, and then you get home and catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror and think "Well, I don't think I've ever looked lovelier than at this very moment...how can this even be..." and the reason is, you were walking through the spring rain that brings pleasure in its midst, just you wait, carefree is on its way.

I watched this rain from my bed, droplets crawling across the underside of the wooden deck that comes off my upstairs landlord Nancy's kitchen, and it was like a machine line in the best way, even drops cruising at equal distance apart, from one crack of wood to beyond where my view could take me. What reliable droplets of rain they were!

It's certainly rained since I moved to this apartment almost two years ago, but I suppose my bed as never been at the particular place that allowed me to see this magical moment, or maybe it was just the never the right type of spring rain or even the right Sunday afternoon...

And there you have it, the most dreamy post ever...

KITTENS.

I came across this on my ipeezie yesterday among these Nova Tunes compilations I downloaded and I was like "Oh shit, I love this song! What does it remind me of? Scotland? Austria??" and I decided upon investigation that it must have been something Ashley Bickerton and I watched on TV when we were in small town in Austria called BADEN in the year 2000.

Moloko - Sing It Back
Uploaded by hushhush112

In the year 2004, when I moved to Montreal, I was really into Derrick Carter and Mark Farina as I bring up from time to time when I remember how awesome they are to get shit done to...and I remember my first Saturday here I went to see Dimitri from Paris at what is now known as HOUSE but it used to be called LIVING...

I bought his Playboy Mansion CDs at HMV in the Rideau Centre after school when I was 16 and then I probably went and got a bean burrito at Taco Bell because they were only a dollar and twenty-eight cents.

Also amidst the Nova jams, I found this song by Markus Nikolai that I have never heard before but shit, is it ever cute!

And here is a Derrick Carter remix that I can't really hear as different but whatever, go Derrick Carter, you've helped me make my way to some apartment cleanliness on many occasions...

Also, the internet is cool because it made me remember buying the August 2003 issue of Muzik magazine when I was in Scotland that summer and I got this free CD that I really had fun with.













Anyway, it's long gone so if anyone wants to buy me that CD, it doesn't cost that much.

Or maybe I could download it?? Maybe! I'm really just learning how.

Also, I magically downloaded and have been listening to Bebel Gilberto when Gilles Peterson inadvertently reminded me of how pretty I thought this song was when I was 15...


You think it's terrible?? Well, I think it's lovely to sit under a tree to when there's a summer breeze...

And you can't deny the girl has got some good genes going for her...


Did you know my mom's name is Astrid? Isn't it pretty?? I think it is. So does Mansa, when she was 11 she wanted to name her daughter Astrid. Maybe she doesn't anymore, but hey Mansa, that's cool.

Oh yeah, sexy old men. Maybe next time, bye!

Okay, well here's the ultimate. He's no old fogie, but he IS older than Astrid Killike Paidra. What a cool name though, right?!

Anyways.

Hi Jeff Goldblum. How are you??





















Yeah, sure, see you at the beach, no problem.

















I'll wear my blond wig, it goes great with saltwater. Don't worry, Jeff Goldblum, I'm on top of it.

Jeff Goldblum, did anyone ever tell you...you're so...TALL... What's it like up there? Can I come??

















Alright, you think about that, Jeff Goldblum, I'll be waiting on line 2.

Also, Jeff Goldblum loves girls in their 20s.

You heard it here first.

GODSPEED. Or whatever suits your fancy.

UNICORN HIGH.

Yesterday's fortune was...

'Simplicity and clarity should be your theme in dress.'





















So that's always fun. Okay, okay, this picture is like two years old but I still like me colours.

Yesterday I saw a girl in purple tights and red coat and she reminded me of me but young and little...

Anyway, gotta go, surf's up!















This is probably older news than David after the Dentist but I still think it's funny. My sister sent it to me to try and convince me that I love cats even though I'm pretty sure I do not. But these days I'm thinking I might...


Stay tuned to find out the oldest dudes I have crushes. One is REALLY old...

AU-REVOIR!

OVERDUE ESSAY, SUP SUP SUP.

WHASSUP MA PEOPLE.

It is currently SEVEN outside and it will shortly be NINE. WHASSUP MA PEOPLE, I SAY, WHASSUP.

Today's fortune has yet to be determined as I haven't made it past my teller's stand but I have a feeling it will be "You are going to have some new clothes."

Sounds good, sign me up.

This morning I woke up to The Cars' Shake It Up, which was definitely fun.

What's with artists whose videos are 'disabled by request' on youtube? Like, who said?? What's the point?? Hey The Cars, are you pulling a Lars Ulrich?? I mean you're fun to wake up to on AM940 and all, but I think your real time to shine has maybe come and gone.

By the time Carly Simon came on around 7:10 talking about clouds in her coffee, I had my own coffee ready and had just taken out my recycling because I REMEMBERED IN TIME! And it was crisp and fresh outside and I thought "Wouldn't it do you a whole lot of good to take a stroll in the park?" The answer was yes, so I grabbed a letter I wrote to my dear friend Ayan, you know, Ayan that I saw yesterday, she who lives like 12 minutes away from me...and I walked to the Carré St. Louis to mail my letter (eventhough the mailbox on Roy is way closer...) and then I strolled through the park with my mug of fresh coffee and walked all the way around the fountain on the ledge, as though I were a tight rope walker and it was AWESOME. I think that I looked that much cooler because I was wearing baggy sweatpants and bright purple sneakers and my LOUD green parka and this funny blue hat that used to be my Grandma's...

Then I ran into this guy I know who I think is funny because when I met him in oh-six and kept saying how familiar he was, he said "My mom says I look like the guy in The Notebook!" and I thought that was really funny so now he's okay I guess but he was sort of mean to my good friend sometimes so like whatever, right? Anyway, I told him that if he had walked around the corner of Laval about a minute and a half earlier, he would have seen me walking around the fountain and his day would have been that much better, especially when he realized that he knew me and looked the other way...

WAKING UP EARLY IS THE SHIT, YO.

Soanyway, I'm kind of into teen goth eye make-up maybe kind of I think.

In Skim, which I mentioned yesterday, some older woman says to an angst-ridden teen, "You have the eyes of a fortune teller" and then her snarky friend says "That means you wear too much eyeliner."

This was funny, I thought, and so for the second day this week I am looking...actually more like a drag queen than a goth teen.

Maybe I look like a drag teen.

PEEP THIS, YO.














It's something funny related to the penis that I came across yesterday.

YO, THE INTERNET IS SO FUN. YO.

And Spiderman fans will appreciate this sweet nugget of angel dust.

I know how to do links! It's so flippin' easy! MY GASH!

This is last week's news maybe, but this is sort of really funny shit if you can stand it. It makes you cringe and want to look away. If you make it through to the end, you deserve a fresh bushel of pussy willows.


This is what my finger looked like today when I took off the band-aid I put on it yesterday when I cut it with my biggest knife when I was trying to shorten the stems of my fresh bushel of pussy willows because they were FAR TOO LONG.
















And this is an onion I can't bear to part with...


















Because he is no longer just a flavourful fetus, he is an actual being!!!

I can't put an end to that therefore I will plant him when it's warmer out...eventhough he is obviously a magic onion because he doesn't even need nourishment to grow, he just grows and grows and grows. Maybe that's just all onions. Who cares?!

No matter what, his name is definitely Richard, after my number one city gurl bestie Katie Hermon's dad, and also after the best guy from the original Guess Who?, before they got all politically correct and confused all of Wisconsin with ethnically diverse characters...

Speaking of KATIE HERMON...

Hey! Katie Hermon! School is almost over. Do you know what that means? I mean, do you even REALIZE what this could POSSIBLY mean???





















This is a beautiful work of art Katie made for me last spring, when I started to get excited, as usual, about how much fun summer is going to be, and so I tend to bring it up a lot and I don't know why this year would be any different because SUMMER IS HAPPENING AGAIN!!!

I had something to say about Carly Simon, and in relation James Taylor, and in relation this funny thing that happened in relation this past weekend??

Maybe next time.

Seeya!

Oh! Gilles Peterson's BBC Radio 1 show from last Thursday is "well good" as they say in Britain, so I think that you should go and listen to it before it disappears with a new one tomorrow.

YO! BYE!

WHAT UP CONFUCIUS, WHAT UP.

The first cool thing that happened on the way home from a sweet yoga class yesterday was when I ran into my personal fortune teller.





















You know, the dépanneur at the corner of Roy and Laval?? At 15 cents, this fortune teller/whoever's working the counter is a real bargain...
















Hey, yeah! You can't read it! That's because it's my journal. But it's okay because I invited you to look at it so it's no big deal. So I'm sorry you can't read it. I just took my first picture after taking off all the 'before shots' I really don't feel like looking at right now...Soanyway! My fortune says "Nature, time and patience are the three great physicians." It made me feel a bit like my mom really knows what's up, you know?

So then I surfed the web yo, and this girl totally shot me into a state of sunshine and love from The Sartorialist.





















Is she cute, or is she cute?? Man, she is CUTE.

Let's call her Clementine, shall we?

Not like that.

Say it in a FRENCHFROMFRANCE ACCENT!













En tout cas, if Clementine bicycled with me to and from wherever, I would never see harm ever because she would be my guardian fairy (and look completely non-silly biking in heels) and she would be really good at making cupcakes magically appear from beneath her blue feathery skirt. Clementine is le magique, case closed.





















On that tip, I heard that NBC's Matt Lauer was biking in Spain when a DEER JUMPED IN FRONT OF HIM. So now his shoulder is dislocated. A DEER! How much more exciting is that than me being hit by a car?! I luckily/scarily don't remember when that car did an illegal left turn into me last summer..but a DEER and no head trauma?? That's something you'll remember. It was probably a lovely afternoon and the Gipsy Kings were playing in the bushes. The Gipsy Kings who are by the way originally from France. Who knew?!






















Hmmm....so the other day? I was taking the bus back to Ottawa for a hot minute, and who should I run into at the bus station but a boy that I once knew. Really, he was a boy, and now he is FIFTEEN. I could tell because he was wearing an all-over print ski jacket covered in comics. Totally cute, don't get me wrong, just so "I'm fifteen right now", that's all.

So I was all "Oh my GOD, look at YOU! You're just...it's just...so....WOW. So what did you do while you were in Montreal?!"

And he was like, "Smoke weed."

And I was all..."Oh! Wow! Cool...so! Don't worry, I won't talk to you the whole time...so you had fun, that's cool....did you like, go out for any fun meals??"

And homeboy was like, "Uh...yeah, yeah we did. But...I don't really remember??" The giggles.

Whatever, he shared his candy with me and made me a paper crane out of his bus ticket receipt.

But the big scary news was that he asked me about my jaw and I mean it made sense he would have heard about it because his sisters, my homegirls from '95 yo, we all moved to Montreal together to make an exciting new life for ourselves. So I just thought, cute, so nice of him to ask when his brain is clearly a bit slow-mo right now...

It was only the next day, when I found a letter I had written to someone two days after my accident in July (a letter they had for some reason left in my room after they read it??) and I mentioned that this particular fifteen year-old had come to visit me and it was such a pleasant surprise.

THOSE DAYS ARE SUCH A BLUR. If I hadn't read that, I never would have remembered. Like now, I vaguely remember his presence in the room, but do I really, or do I just think I do?? Ugh, I don't know but it's weird to think about...And the funny thing is I was telling him how I had been thinking before the accident that I should get a helmet because my memory is my prized possession, and I should make a point of putting more of it on paper just in case...

He must have just thought I was so weird for talking about last time he was here for March break like four years ago, and going on and on about how grown-up he is now...

But I didn't know that I saw him in the summer!

So that's a bit unsettling as well as embarassing. Oh well...

Oh! In other news, I got rid of my long locks and don't even say it because it ain't even like that.

I actually cut my hair like 3 weeks before Devin and I broke up, which was also around the time I bought myself 24 roses as a mid-February love gift...which goes to show that I may have premonitions sometimes...as well as a faint urge to master the art of home-made potpourri.
















Which reminds me! My brother Alex got me TAROT CARDS for Christmas which I thought was kind of a weird gift but I took it in stride, like the time my dear friend Emma Jane's mother Jane gave me THE 2005 WITCHES ALMANAC because it reminded her of me when she saw it...???

Emma is coming to Canada this summer! I haven't seen her since the year 2006! THIS IS MAJOR GOOD NEWS.

Yesterday I read a whole graphic novel! It was a fun and easy read because I loved it, but still, we're not discussing it in class for 2 weeks so big up me for being a bit ahead of the game for a change....

This is the cover.





















This is an excerpt.













And this is a review.

Classic teen angst. With confused Wiccan lesbian undertones! So into it. I highly recommend it. And I know everyone is pushing you in a Watchmen direction but this is how you should really spend this Sunday afternoon, along with an almond croissant from Stella Estrella and a walk to the end of the pier in the Old Port to welcome SPRING!!!

I'm taking an English course on Quebec/Montreal writers and I like my teacher and he's on the internet so here he is.









Doesn't he look like his name should be "The Dude". Well, he does. I'm currently finishing my belated assignment on a poem called Blind Man in the Metro by Montreal poet, Carolyn Zaino. I like this poem because it makes me think of how Montreal was once this new place I lived that was scary, and now it's my home and I love it here, especially with all signs pointing towards summer happening again this year.

ALSO! In a month, I'm DUNZO WITH THIS UNDERGRAD.

Pray for me, children.

P.S. How many boys are going to see "I love you, man" tonight?!

SAINT PATRICK'S DAY IS OVER, GET OVER IT GUYS.

You know what's worse than a broken heart??















Losing your shit when you meet the Jonas Brothers??

Also, broken wine glasses on your carpeted kitchen floor when you're just trying to do a good thing by doing your dishes! In your bare feet!








Okay it was only one glass. But thank goodness I have a vacuum!

I'm okay guys, don't worry.


Besides, a bummer time is only as bummer time-ish as you make it.














God bless Dina Rosenberg for getting rid of her shit/giving me the rest of her Care Bear band-aids when she bounced back to Boston in August...

It has been an absolutely gorgeous week in Montreal and today it's cold but tomorrow it's going to be warmer again!

If you were my glue gun where would you be?? I swear, I threw it out after my snowglobe mishap in January by accident, along with all this other cool stuff like beads and feathers and earring hooks...

Keep your eyes peeled, seeya!

BRAND NEW TRUCK, BUTTERSOFT SEAT...

Hey, did you guys hear it's going to rain today??

Me too!/So what!?



The "when I look at you" here refers to me checking myself out in the mirror, last night's eye-makeup and all, and saying "2 point 2 more weeks of class, don't blow it, you can do it! You're pretty..."

SIDENOTE: Considering that I loathe "ST. PATTY'S DAYYY!!!", the "last night's eye-makeup" is more likely to refer to Sunday when I accidentally went to Korova in my gym clothes out of peer pressure and my friend Sara decided it was a good idea to give me Amy Winehouse eyes first.




















And Evan bought us a bit too much whiskey, but it was cool because Mike Chui was there and I love running into Mike Chui and telling him all my secrets and dreams and sometimes dancing with him because he is SUCH A FUN DANCER.
















It has been said for some years now, that Mike Chui will photograph my breasts before they lose their chutzpah. Let's hope it's not too late, but if so, there's always that plaster bust my friend Jake made of my rack when I was on the verge of 19...a bust that would later disappear, supposedly into the hands of his younger brother...

Anyway, I've been heavy into Bill Withers lately, Stevie Wonder, Erykah Badu, and Jill Scott. Even when they talk about downer times, I'm uplifted.

[SEE ABOVE: for Winehouse totally biting Badu's trademark. "Amy! You got the rat's nest! And the silly eyes! Don't go biting other peep's shit!"]

Talking Book, for example, has been my best friend when I'm sad and lonely, but also dear to me in times of summer sun and happiness.
















It's pretty much the best ever, and if I gave it to you on vinyl when I was 19, consider yourself crushed-on.

Once in 2005, my number one honey love city gurl Katie Hermon and I went to see Jill Scott at Metropolis and it was THE BEST. We were just radiating sunshine when we left...so obviously we strolled 3 doors down and caught THA ALKAHOLIKS. What fun that was!














Yeah, we're coooooooooool, yo......

I miss you babygurl...come back to Montreal and we'll a find a cute place that I'll let you help me not destroy with an over-abundance of Lionel Richie and things I think are art, like 10 000 pieces of gum rolled into a ball (that smells DELICIOUS!) or two lonely clementines that have shrunken to the size of (small) robins eggs, or a chinese food box full of strangers' phone numbers.















Now I'm going to do some sun salutations with some Life Brand exfoliating face mask on my face. My mom got it for me for Christmas, I mean it was Santa he put it in my stocking. Cool!























Coolest thing to happen in the future is dinner partying with Danielle Taylor tonight, she who works at least 3 jobs always, and volunteers at Moksha and does an hour and a half of yoga everyday and has the sweetest legs and fantastic bum and the greatest personality and she's way pretty too. And she like, NEVER gets to hang. So that's cool...and then we're going to karaoke and Melle Mel and I are going to sing DREAMS!

Then maybe some Skee-lo??

I can't embed the actual video, so go watch it because it's so totally incredible.

I ACTUALLY BOUGHT THE CD WHEN I WAS 10.


I should probably learn to do links or something, right??

Whatever, seeya!

Hello, Mister Richie...

Just woke up to Dancing on The Ceiling on my alarm clock/radio.


This is a good thing because I danced around my room with my hands in the air feeling like this week will be better than last.





















Lionel Richie is looking our for me, and he's a pretty big guy....He could take anyone! He could take anything... And make music of it, and so I hereby crown Lionel Richie my kindred spirit and unlikely saviour...of the week?? We'll see.

















If you know my home, you know that Lionel Richie features prominently, he's there, Lionel Richie, wherever you look...just READY to take on anything.

















So Lionel Richie is looking out for me you guys, okay??

















He's also making it warmer outside, which is very necessary right now.

















Lionel Richie bless Lionel Richie. Do you feel me on this one??





















I worked last night and it blew chunks.
















But I made enough money in tips to take a cab home from the party I thought I wasn't in the right spirits for....but it turned out I was that funny person that was "just leaving" for 2 hours and ended up staying for 3 more.





















Had a fun conversation with a guy who drills in the ARCTIC at MINUS 60, something to do with mineral excavation and hanging with geologists...When I told him I was half-Estonian he told me that reminds him of his number one movie Encino Man.





















Now not very many people know this, but when I rented Encino Man from Videoflicks with my babysitter Anne-Marie when I was 7, I watched it twice in a row! Anne-Marie thought I would like it so Anne-Marie turned even cooler than I already thought she was! She let us play with her hair, she'd piggyback us running down the stairs really fast and it felt SO FUN AND DANGEROUS, and she made pretty jewelery for her friend that was pretty like she was.





















So the peace out to Dani Jackson house party last night was a blast...I took the 24 and when I hopped on who should be there but my girl Melle Mel, and then 6 stops later, Lady Ayan jumps on, and we're all going in the same direction, to the same party to see off our dear friend the Deej, and it's like that song!


Now I'm going to go stroll down to the Old Port while taking in some baduizms...hopefully I'll see some moss growing on a rock because that always makes me feel good.



































































These are some pictures that I took in late November when I was strolling down there feeling good about life...