OLD SONG IN NEW FORMAT

GUY STEVOS - Morning in the City

Those of you who attended the last two FUN! shows would have heard this tune live. I based the parts on an acid jam I'd had with Trevor in January, which I basically transcribed from memory. The lyrics came a couple of weeks later, after a particularly moody and confusing day. Teaching it to the band took 15 minutes and it was all of a sudden a real tune. After our final gig, I recorded it at home in two hours and passed it on to Jason at Synaptic Plastic to master it, hence all the nice reverb.

But I have to admit, this song was inspired lyrically by a hip-hop group called Heavyweight. I'd sat in on a couple of studio sessions with them, and they'd had this one sorta gloomy, jazzy tune about taking the train to work everyday that put in me in a certain mood everyday. I suppose the chord progression must have had that same atmosphere to it, so as soon as I started to put the aforementioned jam into a song, I was back in that same mood. You know what I mean, that lethargic, dredging feeling you get sometimes on a dolorous day. It snows in the morning and rains at night, life is riding on a slow current day in day out, and you can feel the wave of desire moutning within you, assuring you that there must be something more to life than cycling through your day.

I needed some kind of hook, and I remembered the MC jokingly rhyming "up up down down" to the beat. Everyone laughed and didn't take him seriously at the time, but I must have stored it away in some special place, because as I wrote the hook, the "up - down - together" bit came naturally.

So yeah, props to that session with Trevor, the inspiration from Heavyweight, and the two live performances with FUN!

REBEL ENTERTAINMENT UNIT : THE SECOND COMING

it's amateur night at the drake hotel
i wake up from my crash pad, and here i live in hell
there's a scarf wearin girl lyin naked to my right
and there's a scar on my face from a second row fight
i ate breakfast in the lounge, free food receptions
for the afterwork crowd making serious connections
i go down to the basement and there's the whole band
they're gonna play without me and take home a grand
but i plug in my laptop and proceed to drop
the hottest shit from brooklyn and the kids start to hop
and the band starts whinin and gets booed out of town
this is how i do it when them bitches aint around

(sample)
girl: ooh, is that my favourite dj?
guy: aw yeah.
girl: aww yea!
(busta rhymes sample)
busta: wooha!
(macarena sample)
aiiight!
CLAP!

they dragged me to some bougie party after last round
it was so exclusive that it couldn't be found
just some random cheap apartment and my ex was in the sink
pukin all her guts out from too much to drink
it was her first time drinkin since she got out of the clink
and her voice is so loud, it's gettin hard to hear me think
she gives me a kiss and i taste her nasty vomit
she says "honey let's go hit it it, c'mon, you know you want it!"
i said "baby, i love you but i gotta turn the page,
and besides, i left my fuckin gear alone on the stage!"
i busted back to beaconsfield and headed down the stairs
but like i expected some fucker stole my wares
but i could buy another deck, the cash i made was tight
i'll set it up like fiya and boom: another night!

MY NIGHT BITCHES!

(guest dancehall vocalist)

dema sey dema sey dat mi nuh pley no geetah
and mi papy tell me "bwoy, gwan git yaself a job!"
so me wire up him table and me make a rinky sound
but dem girla and dem rudie come to dance me all around
dey pey money affa money, me pley dub a rub a dub
me pley soca me pley fela me pley all of africah
me pley all de rootie skankie nuttie rocksteady fi jah
and me take home all dem money and me show it up to pa
he sey "bwoy, me tinkin crazy, but is you now self-employed?
gi ya daddy one touch, me little rudie jungle bwoy!"
and now me play up drake hotel and all dem wanna hear
is original bob, but jah know, it pay de bill
and dem girlie still wanna make pass me bombaras
but in dis drake hotel, and dem be all bombaclat


(sample from the film "max")
hitler: i am the new artist practising the newww aaaaart!

NOT EVEN A MOUSE IN THE HOUSE RIGHT NOW

"good lord, what 'aaaaave ye done?" said the middle aged british woman as she walked by the housepainters. "you've got bluddy paint all over the bricks! well, oi'd say, if that were moi ploice, i'd 'ave you clean it right off!" as i watched from the front balcony her argument with the painter about whether or not the offending marks were made while they painted, she smiled at me as if she were helping me out. but i gave her a look of disrespect, the kind of "you're crazy, lady!" look, but she sauntered on proud of herself for helping out the little guy, when the truth of the matter is that no one cares if a bit more fresh paint got splattered on the already splattered brick wall. get a life!

they've turned the water back on in the building, only two hours later than promised. not bad, i must say. they're also paiting the front doors and putting new varnish on the wood interiors in the halls. and to top it off, we're getting new vinyl windows in every apartment free of charge. let's just hope they're not priming up the place to throw us out and start renting it off to the expanding crowds of forest hill and yorkville that are soon to invade the annex and quite possibly my beloved home.

THE INTERNET IS OUTTA CONTROL

i made a tune today that's being played on CKUW in winnipeg tonight. i'm not sure when exactly but i'll leave the song for you to download:



GUY STEVOS - June June (Jean Rouche mix)

FUN WITH THE PHOTOSHOP ARCHIVES

great, just what i need. a bleedin' TTC strike!

why are cities such poor managers of public utilities? our transit system is far too important for this kind of fuckery. it's being ruined and we'll have a real tough time working this out.

the TTC and everyone who has a hand in it can go to hell. my hope is that this strike is so devastating and punishing to the city that they have to overhaul the system altogether. they should fire moscoe and all the goddamn people in the head office, and start fresh. they ought to hire young, innovative thinkers who can change the face of the organization (a face that has grown progressively uglier since i started riding in my childhood.) maybe then we'll get some consumer-friendly fares and packaged token deals, better staff than those dicks who wear the maroon jacket these days, a serious above-ground lightrail system covering the city to replace these dinosaur streetcars and slow buses, and a stronger relationship between city council and the workers of the TTC.

in the meantime, we can all forget about economic recovery for a while. we can all forget about our taxes going to use as well, and while we're at it, we can all start wearing comfortable shoes.

i know i'll be walking all summer. if there was no winter in this town, i'd never use that stinking transit system.

A CALL FOR YOU TO PUT YOUR PANTS BACK ON AND THINK ABOUT IT FOR A SECOND

it's so easy to feel the void that's supposed to be filled by a significant other, but why does it have to be a void? and if it cannot be any other way, why does it have to be filled by only that one thing? do you really need it? in the long run, for most of us, yes, but right now?

there are certain things that we need because we're constantly told that we need them. one of these things is the love-sex-romance continuum.

i feel that films, television shows, contemporary songs, literature, photography and advertising dictate to us that without a sexual/romantic partner, we are nothing, useless human beings who have nothing to share with anyone and no future to look forward to. every character in every story about young people is either in love, dating or having sex with someone or many many people or looking to have sex, date or fall in love with someone or many people.

every character is in some form of a relationship with another human that involves sexual or romantic tension and fulfillment. even the single characters.

the single character is a complex one, however, portrayed primarily through paradox. they are alotted a certain amount of freedom, but always in the context of having the choice between partners at the snap of a finger. but in the end, they are never allowed to NOT have any sexual interests. they always pursue and either succeed or fail. i move that these characters are not single at all, for they are reliant on these relationships or potential relationships, however meaningless or fleeting they may be.

but what if we were to invent a character that was driven by other motivations than procreation and sexual pleasure? what if success and failure with regards to relationships was irrelevent to this person? no major character that i've come across has been free of their sexual impulses or perceived romantic responsibilities. for once i'd like to see a film in a conventional setting (ie person goes about daily life trying to find meaning) that has NOTHING to do with sex. a film i saw tonight, called The Rage in Placid Lake, came close, but of course ended in the same old female-male hookup at the end. a novel by michel houllebecq called the elementary particles works in reverse, starting it out with a relationship that ends up inspiring a character to reject sexuality from his world view. i propose that sex not be a part of the equation from point a to point z, just for once. an experiment in trying to concentrate on something else.

i believe that some of the greatest minds in history have prevented themselves from improving humanity because they were unable to channel their unrequited sexual feelings into a different kind of energy that still propagates the good things about the human condition.

you might say that making an asexual character would be problematic because it wouldn't be realistic. true indeed. we are all sexual creatures and we act upon those urges and desires daily. but for chrissakes! it's fiction we're dealing with here! we can make up anybody we want!

let's put this sacrifical lamb into the fray and see what happens.

now, if you'll excuse me, i have to go and fantasize about the lovely gemma from the aforementioned film.

MORNING IN THE CITYYYYY

up...down...together
up...down...together
it's morning in the city and the paper's at the door, your coffee's on the table and your shoes are on the floor
up...down...together
up...down...together
the weather today across the gta calls for periods of snow and then some rain
up...down...together
up...down...together
let it out, c'mon let it out, it's a long day ahead and it's only just morning
up...down...together
up...down...together
the train is now boarding, this is your final warning

sometimes in this city it is not easy to meet people. no one really wants to talk to you because they already have enough friends, acquaintances and people they just met in the last hour. no one wants to start a band with you because, well, they're already in five, and attempting to create a new "scene" in this town is about as useful to anyone as an extra button on their nicely pressed vintage shirt. so i say "fuggeddaboutit!" be anonymous and have fun with it. take a good walk and discover that buildings, windows and trees can be your friends too.

such was the mood on my way to class this morning. i could have sat in a dim studio for four hours with a bunch of people who don't give a fuck while our instructor spent the session just correcting all the cabling errors the last group left behind for us to fix. and all for what? so we can mix some whack cacophanic tune with so many tracks stacked on top of one another that it's like the tower of babylon in a pro tools folder. no thanks.

so instead of going straight, i turned right as i got off the streetcar on bathurst and headed westward to the far reaches of the queen west expansion. i finally found a place that is trying to kill me. a small diner near the hotel stretch fed me, for the price of 3.95, a pile of potatoes that looked like they'd been glazed with paint, three shimmering sausages, a coffee and FOUR EGGS!!! i got so much energy from all the protein and caffeine that i could have thrown a table over the bar. it was a great meal but now i can't have breakfast for a week.

from there, i proceeded through the grey area between portugal city and little italy. a little shop on dundads west near ossington housed a display in their window of portraits taken by their photographers over the years. grey pictures of children on their communion days rested for eternity behind cheap glass under fake gold frames. men, who by all accounts must be either old and withered or dead by now, shine in their prime as slick-haired gentlement on the store's walls.

on mansfield ave. between grace st. and bellwoods ave., a franciscan church has yet to take down its nativity scene display from its front lawn. larger than life dummies dressed in biblical shepherd clothing advertise a long since passed passion play, and stand watch over the manger. draped across its side walls hangs a sign in italian and english that says:

ILLUMINI UNA CANDELA PER IL VOSTRO CARO
LIGHT A CANDLE FOR YOUR LOVED ONES

inside the hut are several large, transparent candle holders that house white candles. around these glass monstrances are tape strips with names like "vecchio" and "andolini", but no first names. beside the church sits a palatial home with a statue of the virgin mary holding her baby boy on her lap. it looks at you so personally that you can't help but think it's a friendly presence.

gradually i stepped lightly towards my annex paradise after two or three hours on my feet. on ulster st., a mobile window washer on his bicycle recites a joke about president bush to a female friend. "jokes are ok," he informs her, "so long as no one's getting made fun of. i don't like mean jokes or racist jokes. but newfoundlanders tell the best newfie jokes ever!" they part ways and he waits at the traffic light, radiating a kind of modern-day gallantry perched atop his bike with his long red beard flowing from his cheeks and his scottish tam resting on his head. with buckets and squeegees slung over his shoulder, he rides off to go wash windows. chim chimeney cheeroo, i almost sang.

rastafarian city workers, their big bright hats clashing with their orange jumpsuits, take posters down from the streetlamps on harbord. the fish and chips store owner shovels the slush from his sidewalk. central tech high school students skip class and fuck around outside the pizza place. beautiful university girls in their long skirts and black tights walk home from lectures with books in arm. today is a cloudy, average day, and nobody is really up to anything special that i can see, but such a day is what keeps me living here in this, my beautiful city, the place of my birth.

but what's a walk in the west end without a trudge up the baldwin steps? from there i look down at dupont, spadina and bloor and further beyond, breaking through the haze with sheer force, the CN tower and the skydome. this is one of my favourite spots in the city, as it's one of its the most elevated points. one day i will go to the top of casa loma and get an even better view. i was always too afraid of climbing those tourets when i was a kid and therefore missed out on a lot.

a man walks up the steps carrying his bike, upside down, on his shoulders. the tires extend sideways as far as his arms would, and he rests the seat on the groove bewtween shoulder and neck in some ritual exercise that makes a proud pedestrian like myself gasp in horror.

it's time to go home.

NEW PHRASES FOR THE BORED : PART THREE

reject all forms of formal language and start combining various dialects and patois.

ex/

"tabarnak! ya done fuck up all mi rasclat shit! ben crisse, bredrin!"
= holy fuck! you messed up all my goddamn stuff! sweet christ, brother! (quebecois and jamaican patois)

"ye bampot! n'eo ket ur banne kafe, met stot marc'h eo!"
= you fool! that's not coffee, that's horse urine!" (scot slang and breton)

"that patrinfikulo better bec mon chu or i'll onanigi his alligator c^iesulino!"
= that motherfucker better kiss my ass or i'll jerk off his alligator whore! (esperanto and cajun)

courtesy of the alternative dictionaries (and no, they're not some new band from new york).

NEW PHRASES FOR THE BORED : PART TWO

you ruined my day (or anything to that effect) = "you sunk my bizzle shizzle!"

NEW PHRASES FOR THE BORED : PART ONE

beside the point = "beside the pint"

you lived beside a graveyard
but were buried miles away
with such ground to traverse
i'll visit on a rainy day
they wouldn't make you ashes
it was never meant that way
so they put you in a box
i carried you into to the grave
i took all your possessions
and i livened up my place
so my monument to you is now
inside my living space
the instrument's in storage
never sees the light of day
but when i listen through the f-holes
i can hear the songs you play
i'll never sell it off
not even for the highest bid
and when they see me play it
they'll say "my, just like she did!"
when it gets restored
i'll learn your flighty bow technique
so that when they see me playing
they'll be talking for a week

AYY MAMA!

don't you just love your mother? i love my mine. she came to town this weekend on business, the one time a year they throw money at her for an afternoon of easy work, and she spent it all on me! steaks from fine shops were cut and grilled into pies of blood, ice cream and strawberries consumed by the gallon and vodka shared in the after dinner twilight. and she even cleaned my bathroom and fed the cat!

i think my mom should sublet here over the summer. considering all the rapacious bullshit she traverses through every day in the confines of a university dental school in the middle of the prairies, she could use a few months of rock n' roll life with her little baby boy.

i'd offer her weed but she's probably have a heart attack.

REBEL ENTERTAINMENT UNIT: VERSES FROM THE DARKROOM

CULTURE WAR

they'll never let you join the military
so you might as well become a revolutionary
start your own party
political party
militant wing revolutionary army

culture war! knees to the floor!
en garde, monsieur, it's a culture war!

put on a mask
grab a gasoline hip flask
put your hands together and
BLAST! BLAST!
rebel entertainment unit radio broadcast
lightning fast, looks aghast
this is how the spirit of '22 lasts



HARDCORE MAN

he's a hardcore, hardcore man
he's a hardcore, hardcore man
he's a hardcore, hardcore man
hardcore, hardcore man

lives his life by a hardcore plan
(he's a hardcore, hardcore man)
has a brother named hardcore dan
(he's a hardcore, hardcore man)
drives around in a hardcore van
(he's a hardcore, hardcore man)
cools his room with a hardcore fan
(he's a hardcore, hardcore man)

he's a hardcore, hardcore man
he's a hardcore, hardcore man
he's a hardcore, hardcore man
hardcore, hardcore man



SOUL

i'm sittin in a bar where nobody laughs, nobody talks, nobody sings
i'm sittin in a bar where nobody laughs, nobody talks, nobody sings
i'm sittin in a bar where nobody laughs, nobody talks, nobody sings
i'm sittin in a bar where nobody laughs, nobody talks, nobody sings

i'm sitttin in a bar with artists, actors, rockstars, lawyers
mothers and their children, mailmen, escorts
quarterbacks, gardners, nurses, doctors
out comes the waitress, dour faces
clocks on the wall from different places
someone here's got words for the masses
but who has spoken? no one yet.

i'm sittin in a bar where nobody laughs, nobody talks, nobody sings
i'm sittin in a bar where nobody laughs, nobody talks, nobody sings
i'm sittin in a bar where nobody laughs, nobody talks, nobody sings
i'm sittin in a bar where nobody laughs, nobody talks, nobody sings

hey, you, lookin out the window
show me a sign that you're living, breathing
blow me a kiss, tell me a story
shake my hand, feel my pain
you...who me? yes you!
grab me by the shirtcollar, kick my face in
drag my little broken body off the stage and throw me in the gutter
put your feet into my shoes and wear them down with the soles of another
SOUL!

yeah! uh huh! this is the way we break the silence!
yeah! uh huh! this is the way we channel rage!
yeah! uh huh! this is the way we break the silence!
yeah! uh huh! this is the way we channel rage!



AFTERLIFE AFTERBIRTH

i'm an aborted foetus in the afterlife
colda had a job, coulda had a wife
coulda had myself a kid one day
but no! the doctors killed me

abraham lincoln suffered from afflictions
spiritual inhibitions and eerie premonitions
they say he loved the theatre, it took away his breathe
but his balcony tendency set the stage for death
the reunited nation, wrapt in celebration, were shocked at the murder
they felt for america and how much it hurt her
but we look at things now in the twenty first century
they've released john wilkes booth from the penitentiary
lee harvey oswald is on the attack
he wears a flack jacket in the streets of iraq
our potential for compassion has falle through a crack
in a global black hole and there's no turning back

i'm an aborted foetus in the afterlife
coulda had a job, coulda had a wife
coulda had myself a kid one day
but no! the doctors killed me

LA POSTE NOUVELLE

ok, ok, "new post!" says kerri, so i'm obliged to update. my ears are "squished", as they say in the field, from some listening tests i took a few hours ago. they had us sit in a room and listen to pink noise (all audible frequncies in human hearing played at once) at high volumes (~100dB SPL). an octave band would be increased by 12 dB for 3 or 4 seconds and we had to identify which octave on the frequency scale it came from. i found it quite easy, despite its taxing nature. all you had to do was listen during the training rounds (i'm not kidding, that's what they were called) and associate a sound with a certain octave. for example:

octave 0 - prehistoric earth
octave 1 - distant prehistoric earthquake
octave 2 - close jet engine
octave 3 - subway moming towards you down near the edge of the station entrance
octave 4 - subway moving right in front of you
octave 5 - roaring crowd
octave 6 - clapping audience
octave 7 - releasing steam
octave 8 - car driving through rain
octave 10 - deflating ballon

i aced it, thankfully, but since it was our first test, it's the easiest. next week and, for the rest of this semester, we will have a one and a half hour listening test based on music and dialogue, much more complicated ad subtle than pink noise.

so, reflections on the past month:

.1 it turned out to be much less impoverished than i thought it would be. i managed to go out three or four times a week to enjoy live music and didn't necessarily have to get loaded to do so, thus sparing me much cash and some room in the brain(click on that link for a new grand theft bus song that captures everything nicely.)

.2 mind you, there were some times when the catacombs of the old cranial organ were flooded with shite. i managed to get a lot out of a little. here's the explanation:

(f)x = more than x

where x is cost

i spent a good deal of time in that warm blanket that only a good toxic haze can bring you in the coldest of times. no damage has been done and i'm sittin pretty waiting for the next bomb to drop.

.3 i learned a tonne in school, but not everyday. sometimes it was a frustrating waste of time. but there were enough key moments and full days where my attention was sharp and my thirst for the knowledge at its highest.

it's friday and all i wanna do is DANCE DANCE DANCE...

HEY, LOOK, IT'S THE EVER INCREASING COST OF LIFE

ttc fares are going up to $2.50 a ride next month, which upsets me thoroughly. if you use the ttc twice a day, five times a week, then how much more do you pay per year starting march 6th? roughly an extra $120.

oh, that doesn't sound like much to you, does it, mr. briefcase man? is that what you spend on paper and office supplies a day? an hour? a minute? does it ever occur to you that you're subjecting riders to an even faster rise in the cost of living?

oh, but you don't ride, of course! after all, if i were a ciy councillor responsible for a fare hike, i'd steer clear of the ttc to avoid some of the wrath that would certainly meet me every time i hear the click of the turnstyles or the dropping of tokens into the slot or the hiss of the automated doors opening and closing. (mind you, if i were a councillor who rode the ttc - perhaps there are some - i might be more inclined to oppose the hike.)

now, i'm all for things like user responsible services, and no problem with adding costs to them. i take no issue with putting a small price on grocery and garbage bags. but we can be responsible for the upkeep of those things. if we don't want t pay the price for a shopping bag, we get a bin and bring it to the store. if our garbage is too full, we work on minimizing waste in the future. but there are major problems with this fare hike from a populist perspective.

one of the biggest problems is not the cost, but who pays for it. we cannot possibly be made to think that we are wholly responsible for the upkeep of our transit system. aside from basic measures of considerate behaviour, like paying our fare or keeping the stations and vehicles clean and non-violent, we cannot be expected to do much else. we as citizens cannot fix a damaged track or operate a tcc vehicle. the ttc is a specialized service which requires specialized service people to keep it working. and that costs a lot of money, fine. many millions if not a billion to run that system every year, and that's ok with me. but it's rather painful to think that we, as riders have done little to degrade the quality of the system, yet we must bear the brunt of the cost to repair it. which brings me to...

2) the extra $120 a year this will cost us. save some office workers who ditch their expensive cars for "the rocket" (who do make up a good percentage of riders, admittedly), the ttc is for most riders a budgeted cost that must be met each day or week or month. another $120 a year means that parents, married and single alike, may not be able to afford some vital material with which to raise their children. some people may have to start waking places more often, like myself. i as a young healthy able-bodied person can handle that, but what about the middle aged? it's not fair that they might have to walk longer distances, in some cases up to an extra hour or two a day, no joke.

what can we do? boycott the ttc? protest? well, i guess by default many of us will be staging our own little mass walkout when we can't afford to ride everyday.

as far as advertant opposition, it's too late to stop this increase, but you can bet in another couple years, city council will raise the spectre of the dreaded fare. and when that time comes, we should tell tour loyal and dedicated public servants to take a salary cut instead.

i wonder why the paper guy never fails to creep me out late at night/early in the morning. i was out front of the building during the wee hours enjoying what looks to me like the tail end of the nice weather we've been having, when i mistook the paper guy for a thief in reconnaissance. i figured he might have been a collector, driving around in his van to pick up discarded chairs and bottles and cans to sell out of the recycling boxes out on the street, but then i saw his newspaper in hand. i suppose the paranoia over newspaper guys dates back to my high school years in winnipeg, where i once woke up to a car pulling into my driveway. i went to the front door to see who was there, only to come across what i interpreted as a shadowy figure on my front walk throwing a brick at my front door.

spent yesterday evening and night at the el mo, where as part of a class assignment, i got to help record The Dream Band's reggae set. we used a really raw and basic method (we omly worked levels so that another class can do a proper mix) but it served as a fine opportunity to test out some of the stuff we learn in class. it's also rather nice to have your instructors' bosses listening to your mix in the phones while they close their eyes and bob their heads as a smile spreads across their cheeks.

i must go out and buy a couple of things today: a) the replacement for my one and only patch cable that i deemed too unimportant to pack after a few too man at a gig in kingston. b) some soap...i ran out yesterday and i feel so greasy under my clothes. i hate that shit!

ARTIFACTS FROM ANOTHER TIME

i had a dream last night in which i was back at my grandmother's apartment shortly after she died. as members of our family gathered all her things to be redistributed amongst kin, i went into the room that was once my grandfather's study. sitting there on the couch was her violin, her beautful 200 year old gem that she had played since she was a child, that she somehow managed to retrieve after she returned from the camps in '45. before i could touch it, it started playing on its own, although not visibly. the strings weren't vibrating and the bow was still in the case, but through the f-holes a bright, sunny piece played, no doubt by the ghost of my grandmother who gave me one last song.

i was so displeased that i had to wake up from such a beautiful dream. but my dad has kept the violin for me to learn one day, so in the end, i have the satisfaction of knowing this.

also in that room was my grandfather's med school diploma. when he returned home after the war, he went to his home only to find it in ruins. he went through the rubble and one of the few things he could retrieve was this diploma, which had only a small rip in it and was slightly browned over in one spot. he was so happy to find his diploma because it was one of his first victories as a young hungarian jew in a class of rumanians who resented his not only his superior intelligence and humble grace, but who he was. it was also the first step in a decade's worth of oppression that he had to endure.

the things they left behind in their apartment were plenty, and as a result i was able to put most of my room together when i moved from my temporary home on the upper floor to my new place on the lower floor of the madison house, just one week after my grandmother died. my father saw that i had taken a candlestick vase, an earthy green on that took the shape of an old lady's bust portrait. one of the few times in my life i saw my father cry when he said to me "please take good care of this because i remember this from my old house back home. i used to play with it when i was a kid."

here we are in the 21st century and our long and complex family history is contained within these few artifacts.

BOYCOTT UPS, SHIT ON THE GOV'T

apparently, this isn't exactly today's papers - it's been going on since 2002 - but UPS is suing the canadian gov't under NAFTA's chapter 11 provisions. they feel that because canada post uses the same facilities for both its letter and parcel courier services, this creates an unfair subsidy for canada post and thus hurts the business of UPS.

linda mcquaig echoes my sentiments on this matter beautifully.it's a goddamn cash grab and it's going to cost you and me some tax money. now, i don't think the gov't should get off so easy. it was mulroney who approved this provision, but the neither the chretien nor martin gov'ts have repealed this ridiculous act of compliance with free trade lobbyists.

vote green and none of this shit would happen.

A NEWSPAPER STORY PART 3

PART 1
PART 2

In mid December, Adam and Warren circulated an e-mail around the office that nobody would be getting any Christmas bonuses this year due to disappointing sales. That meant that I wouldn’t be receiving a $20 note that apparently I was entitled too. For other people who had been there far longer they felt hurt because when Adam takes his vacation during Feb. to warmer climes they know it will be courtesy of their bonus money. However, the Christmas party went on as scheduled and let me tell you that it was one that could only happen at the Save an Ad.

The Christmas party was to start at noon on a Friday. We would come in to work as scheduled and the office would still be open because some people would be conducting business, such as the car magazines. It was also payday for us so that was another added bonus as well. When the clock struck noon, all of us stopped working and went to unload cases of beer from Seamus’ car. There was also a buffet that included veal, eggplant, and salad. I’m sure Jenna enjoyed the fact that the veal was gone in no time.

Buckley asked Adam if it was ok for us to smoke weed in the promotions room during the party and he told him that we could go outside since it wasn’t that cold. A little bit later, Brian, who worked in displays and was Buckley’s smoking buddy, came in to the promotion room and started rolling a spliff. He was going to take it outside but Buckley insisted we smoke it in the promotions office. Brian said that he did not think that Adam and Warren would appreciate it. Buckley replied that he asked Adam earlier if we could smoke inside the promotions room and since he’d said we should go outside, that meant it was ok to smoke inside. Buckley, who had successfully conned Adam and Warren into controlling the promotions room, was too lazy at this point to even lie. Maybe that’s a sign that you should be smoking less weed. Buckley also made an announcement that “Brian has 15 half quarters for sale”, as if the art of subtlety did not exist.

Brian relented and pretty soon the room smelled like someone had burned a pound of reefer. There was an eight year old girl at the party, one of the employees daughter’s, and we were all worried that she was going to come in. Sure enough, she opened the door while we were smoking one of about 85 joints and I was just like, get away! The door kept on opening and eventually no one even cared. Seamus did walk in and this one guy name Dan from classifieds, who apparently was the original Dan at the Save an Ad, passed it to someone else and was like “I don’t even know what is going on.” I asked Buckley if Seamus cared and he told me that a bit of weed that someone had bought from him earlier was really from Seamus. This reminds me of a little vignette that Alicia had told us before. Apparently, a memo was sent around the office asking people to check if they smoked weed or sold it. A few people actually checked off that they smoked weed. Alicia thinks that the memo was sent out not to punish anyone but for Adam to get more hookups. Apparently, I know why this memo was not sent around when I was working at the Save an Ad because Adam could do worse than to ask his trusty manager Seamus.

At around two, some Russian lady came in and appeared to be distressed. Brian saw her and he was like, do you want to place an ad? Apparently, Buckley forgot to give the cheques for Adam to sign and the Russian lady, who worked at a nearby cheque cashing place called Money Hut, did not notice that the cheque wasn’t signed when Kavitha cashed hers in. She was promptly ordered to go to the Save an Ad to see what the problem was. When the Russian lady smelled the weed and saw everyone drinking she must have had visions that she had been had by Kavitha and that her immediate future would involve an unemployment cheque. Eventually, everything was sorted out and things resumed back to normal.

There was a little bluegrass hoedown going on in the promotions room involving a banjo played by Winnie, as well as various utensils. People commented that it felt like we were involved in a sequel of Where Brother Art Thou. Someone suggested that we should do a documentary on the Save an Ad and I told them that it was a bad idea because people would accuse us of staging it. Everyone promptly nodded their heads in agreement and that was the end of that.

Believe it or not, the Christmas party was the first time that I had been high at the Save an Ad. I refused to get high at work because I was not going to play their game. There’s a consequence for everything, and one reason I think so many people stay on at the Save an Ad is because their constant smoking renders them unmotivated to move up in life. A week prior to the party, I had a conversation with a few people who said that people either quit the Save an Ad right away or stay forever. As I was sitting on the couch a thought cracked through my haze that I had crossed the invisible line from a potential quitter to a lifer and that I was at the point of no return. Was I going to be stuck in the Save an Ad reality forever or would someone merciful send me to the next phase in order to save me from such an existence? Eventually, the crowd dwindled until just myself, Buckley, and Brian were present, or more accurately, Brian passed out on the couch. Somehow I managed to find my way to the subway and go home.
Like the Indianapolis Colts making it to the Super Bowl, some just things weren’t meant to be. In my case, I had missed the deadline to extend my work permit in Canada so I just decided to move back to the US. I made one last visit to the Buy & Sell to say my last goodbye to everyone and see what its like to be Buckley for a day. Instead of bumming cigarettes, I was giving them away since I bought some from the US for everyone to have. As they say, the more things change the more they remain the same and the Save an Ad was no exception.

If I ever forgot how ridiculous the Save an Ad is I sure remembered during my last day there. Apparently, Buckley thought he had been checking his e-mail address Buckley@promotethis.com even though Seamus had it on record that he hadn’t checked it since Dec. 24 (it was Jan. 6). Apparently, Buckley was unaware that his e-mail account had been set to Buckleyandpromotions@xxxxxxxx.com. Now I know why Buckley never received my e-mail saying that I was going to quit. When Seamus asked Buckley if he had remembered the password for Buckleyandpromotions.com he was like, “Um, I can’t remember.” Dan gave Buckley the advice that “maybe you should smoke more weed.”

I was talking to Dan of classifieds for a while and only then did I really begin to feel the pathos of the Save an Ad experience. People had been continuously calling him for free ads but no one would was willing to purchase a bold one. Eventually, Dan pleaded for someone to take him out of this “free ad reality” but he knew that was not going to happen. Before I left we smoked a joint and he told me that if you ever come back to Toronto you know where to find me.

So how do I sum up my experience at the Save an Ad? A cynic would say it was nothing more than a temporary job that I took up to pay the bills while I was wrapping up school. However, it obviously meant something because I did not write these words because I got bored watching the grass grow in winter. No other experience in Toronto, or in my life for that matter, gave me the inspiration to write a multi-page diatribe such as this one. Quite sadly, or not, it’s a high possibility that when I’m an old man, unless I leave a beautiful corpse behind, the Save an Ad will be my most prominent memory of Toronto even though I completed a Master ‘s degree in Geography at the University of Toronto.

As I reflect on my experience at the Save an Ad it brings up more questions than answers. What is the purpose of the Save an Ad? Is it a tax shelter, a secret government program to employ the unemployable, just another badly run business, or had I been tripping for two months? Thank god I’ll never know because I’m never going to work there again.

To end this story I’m going to bring up an interesting vignette. As I said in the beginning, I asked Dan if he was sure that the Save an Ad would overlook my legal status and he said he was certain it turns out he wasn’t allowed to be working either. He told me that he is on disability. Whether it was for his schizophrenia or drug addiction I will never know because I don’t ask questions that I don’t want answered. Ignorance is bliss.

THE END

- d.f.