Recap for Monday
August 20, 2001

Sam encourages Grace to forget about David. Meanwhile, Hank has convinced David to leave Harmony for the sake of Grace's happiness. Grace goes to confront her supposed husband when she learns he's leaving town.

Kay secretly pours water on the pile of wood so the kids won't be able to start a fire and signal for help. She explains to Simone she doesn't want to be rescued until Reese's story about the two girls comes true, i.e. until Charity dies. Charity senses that Theresa, Luis and Sheridan are in danger.

Trapped in a net, Tabitha tries to negotiate with Norma, but Norma still plans to kill her and Timmy. When Norma leaves to dig Tabitha's grave, Timmy unties the knot holding the net and frees his Princess. Tabitha and Timmy go in search of the teenagers.

Whitney notes Theresa's strange behavior and realizes her friend is hiding something.

On the boat, Luis tries to comfort Sheridan, who is worried that something bad is going to happen.

Bruce nearly gets Julian in a lot of trouble.

Tuesday, August 13, 2002

Interview.

Hmm. This place looks kinda cobwebby. I haven't updated here since my father-in-law died back in March. Lots has happened since then.

I quit my job and ran away from home, for one. I went to Pittsburgh and moved in with my wife for the summer. I couldn't stand the commute and we were both going crazy only seeing each other on weekends, so at the end of April I stuffed most of my possessions under the stairs at a friends' house, recruited another friend to drive me to Pittsburgh, loaded up her car with two cats, complete sets of goalie's and player's hockey equipment, a bicycle and who knows what else and went south.

Since then it's been all pins and needles. The idea was that being here for four or five months would be no big deal - once we heard about out interview we'd go and then I'd have the green card and we could move all of my stuff down. But the paperwork moves slowly at the best of times, and when you make a mistake, or two, or four (uh, that would be us), INS sends the offending docs back and you have to re-do them. So we did, and the paperwork went back into limbo.

Until Friday - that's when the big envelope came that said, "Be in Montreal on September 30th and we'll chat."

A good thing, too. I wasn't too excited about going back north at the end of the summer - but overstaying your welcome while you're applying for a visa is a very bad idea. So, we're preparing for Montreal now. I am looking for a job. I've even told the landlord we'll soon be able to keep ahead of our bills, a novel concept for us at the moment...

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Friday, March 29, 2002

Obit.

My wife's father died a week ago Wednesday of complications after surgery. He was 72.

This was the eulogy my wife gave.

"Milkweed" - by James Wright

While I stood here, in the open, lost in myself,
I must have looked a long time
Down the corn rows, beyond grass,
The small house,
White walls, animals lumbering toward the barn.
I look down now. It is all changed.
Whatever it was I lost, whatever I wept for
Was a wild, gentle thing, the small dark eyes
Loving me in secret.
It is here. At a touch of my hand,
The air fills with delicate creatures
From the other world.

**

Last summer my daughter Amelia and I tried to plant a garden in the backyard of our apartment building in Toronto, Ontario. A long way from the gardens I’d grown up planting in Banks, Oregon, but a funny thing was when the rows were all planted they looked just like my dad’s.

He had a way of planting – a raised row where the seeds were surrounded by a trough where you would water. The beans and peppers and radishes were all set on separate castle grounds protected by their own moats. Well, that’s how it looked to me, but my father explained that the roots would be able to grab the water easier, and when you took the hose to the garden there wasn’t a chance you’d wash away the seeds or seedlings or do any sort of damage to the vegetables.

So there in my backyard while I was planting with Amelia, my dad was with us, even though he was close to three thousand miles away.

There were so many things my father taught me -- so many stories and jokes and bits of advice that got inside me and stayed there. No matter how far away from him I was, he was right there with me in some way.

Last fall, when I went to interview for a job, before I even had a conscious thought, his voice popped in to my head, “They need you more than you need them – you’ve just gotta convince them of that.” I’ve taken that piece of advice with me into every interview I’ve had since he first said it to me.

And all the while, my whole life, while he was giving me so much good stuff to take with me, I saw other people try to get to it too. My father was very charismatic and people always wanted to be near him wherever he went. It might’ve looked like they wanted some thing from him, but I think what they wanted was his secret…

Yeah, that secret he had that kept him whistling all the time, that kept the smile on his face, that didn’t question whether the glass was half empty or half full but just took a drink and enjoyed it. We wanted to get close to that part of him in hopes that it was somehow contagious. That we could figure out how to start each day “bright eyed and bushy tailed.”

Yes, his playfulness would rub off on anyone who was near him. At his silliest is when he was at his most irresistible. His mischievousness was always an expression of his love, and the memories of him being sweet and spontaneous, when he was truly playing “Mr. Wonderful” are the memories I will always keep within easy reach.

We’ve each got some of him inside us, and we can see more of him in each other. He’ll never stop being in our lives.

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Friday, September 21, 2001

Snubbed.

President Bush addressed the Houses last night(Thursday, Sep 20) to talk about the events of September 11th and America's response to them. He thanked America's allies and friends for their support and sympathy, spoke of some of the conversations he'd had with leaders from around the globe, and outlined some of the plans to safeguard the United States against further attacks and to find those responsible for the terror of last week.

Here in Canada, it took all of thirteen minutes for Peter Mansbridge to note that the President did not name Canada in his 38-minute speech. (I had predicted three minutes, and Louise had predicted five, so I guess the CBC is to be lauded for their restraint in bringing this snub to the forefront. I don't know how long it took our friends at Global or CTV to comment on the issue.)

Later, the CBC news at 11pm had a panel discussion about the speech and the question of Canada's failure to be mentioned by name came up; Friday's online editions of some major Canadian newspapers (the Globe and Mail, the National Post, the Toronto Star, and the CANOE website all had stories about it.

This Canadian, for one, is glad to see we're keeping a proper sense of perspective. Seven thousand people were murdered Tuesday morning, and our media and some federal politicians are worried that G.W. wasn't able to work our name into a speech about it.

That's just depressing.

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Wednesday, September 19, 2001

New Job

It's good to have a little good news this week.

So I got a new job yesterday (September 19th), at the Canadian Memorial Chiropractic College in Toronto. I'm the new Purchasing Coordinator, which I guess means I'm responsible for purchasing and inventory and the like for the bookstore.

It looks like a good place to work - a small and friendly staff, close to home (about eight kilometres/five miles) and a school-hours kind of work week. it's those last two things, I think, that grabbed me - my old job was an hour and ten minutes from home and the job was a stressful 40 hours and I usually ended up skipping lunch. With the new job I will end up with another ten or fifteen hours a week for myself and my life. And no Gardiner-427-401 road rage to contend with. I might even ride my bike to work!

Friday, September 7, 2001

Suckers and Statistics.

P.T. Barnum once said that there was a sucker born every minute. Judging by what's been in my email inbox and my snailmail inbox this week, I'm becoming more inclined to agree with him.

First there was Patrick Darare, the alleged Nigerian project director who wants me to share in his 17 million dollar payday.

In today's mail there was the envelope stuffed with coupons for things like deals on roofing, back-to-school bargains, etc., etc., etc.

One insert spoke directly to my current employment (none) and financial (broke) situations: "Wealthy Man Wants to Give You His Wealth Secret Before It's Too Late!" was the bold proclamation. I have no doubt whatsoever that his secret must be amazing and succesful. After all, he used the word "secret" FORTY-FIVE TIMES in a two-page document. He used segment headlines like "FAST MONEY" and "LEGAL AND HONEST" and "$50 FREE!" throughout.

He's got "PROOF" - although I must admit if you claim that people from Rhode Island to California are making money from your "secret," it's not actually such a secret anymore.

If that's not all, at the very end of the thing is the following:

SWORN STATEMENT
"As Mr. John Wright's accountant, I certify that his assets exceed one million dollars[sic]"
    Mark Davis

I'm suspicious of a statement from an accountant that doesn't have a period at the end of the sentence - if he can miss that little dot, maybe he can misplace a decimal point too...

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Thursday, August 30, 2001

You may already be a sucker.

As a Canadian, I have a innate sense of civic duty, of wanting to do the right thing for my country, of wanting to help my fellow citizens.

But I have to draw the line at helping the Nigerian.

This isn't a case of highly-specific xenophobia or of racism. This guy wants to give me five million dollars.

The Nigerian in question calls himself Anthony Darare, and he sent me an email today. He says he's "Director of project and the newly appointed chairman, contract reviewing committee(CRC) of the Federal ministry of Works and Housing (FMW&H) in Lagos, Nigeria" and he's got a deal for me.

All I need to do, apparently, is to help him relieve his countrymen of seventeen million dollars and I get a 30% cut for my efforts. The way I understand it, Anthony's department negotiated an eighty million dollar deal with a Bulgarian contractor which ended up costing only sixty-three million. I'm unclear on some of the details, but apparently, in Nigerian politics, the project director gets to keep the difference. (Presumably he's also personally responsible for cost overruns, but Anthony's email didn't address that issue.)

Anthony will no doubt be disappointed with me; he requested that I keep his offer confidential, "considering the source and reputation of [his] name." The thing is, I had some doubts about the legality of the whole thing: I'm getting Employment Insurance payments from the government, and I have to report any other earnings over $100 per week. Five million would blow my EI out of the water.

And another thing - he says in his email that "this deal is entirely based on trust and the fear of God." I'm an atheist.

Frankly, I am amazed I passed his screening process.

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Tuesday, August 21, 2001

Passions.

I coined a word on our trip out west last month:

    Infuritainment: (n) anything which has entertainment value based solely on its most utterly infuriating qualities.

The steaming pile of excrement that NBC calls "Passions" is the living and breathing epitome of the word. Horrible writing, execrable acting, plodding pace and gaping plot holes combine to make this thing possibly the worst thing to hit TV since... well, since just about anything else on TV.

Two of the characters accidentally married each other in Bermuda in a drunken haze one day last week. (Nevermind that in Bermuda it takes two weeks to get a wedding license.) Now her fiance is there and she's agreed to marry HIM. (Where's that gif of my eyes rolling back in exasperation when I need it?)

Another character is a witch with a doll that is alive (and of course, only she can communicate with it), being pursued by a maniacal killer named Norma Bates (I know, I know) who talks to a skull (!) she carries around with her (and the skull talks back, through her, natch). Norma and her skull burn down the only boat on the island in one attempt.

So these clowns are trapped on an island with a bunch of teenagers. In that group, one girl (who has already sold her soul to the Devil) is trying to steal another's boyfriend by getting herself pregnant. One of her friends tries to talk her out of this loony idea, but does not stop her from dousing the signal fire the rest are trying to build. Another girl has visions and sees that they're all going to die. And nobody seems to remember that their parents all know where they are and when they're due back.

The guy who got accidentally married (remember him?) has hired a hit man to kill his sister. This is on orders from his father, who doesn't want her to marry her fiance. Dad's face is never shown on camera - rather, we get lots of shots of his hands, gesturing, holding cigars, picking up drinks, and shots of his legs as he walks in to and out of rooms. The guy doesn't really want to kill his sister, but after the plot involving the fellow who looked just like her fiance was uncovered he wasn't left with much choice.

My wife and ten-year-old stepdaughter love the show. I think they enjoy the unending mediocrity. I know they can't possibly buy the plot lines or the acting. I know they can't possibly think it's good.

I hope they watch only because it's better than watching the women in the trailer park on the Jerry Springer show painting "whore" and "slut" on each other's trailer and and car.

It is better, isn't it?

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http://nbc.com/Passions/