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Letter to Zack Galifankis

It has always been the dream of my friend Shelagh Corbett to marry a celebrity. “I just see myself with one,” she used to say by means of explanation. Sadly, over the years, after many rejections (Alec Baldwin, Will Smith, Tom Cruise, Nick Nolte, Wanda Sykes, Jose Canseco, Forrest Whitaker, Sylvester Stallone and Brett Favre, to name a few), and a few legal impositions, Shelagh has stopped chasing her dream. It hurts me to see her so sad, with little to do but crochet the likenesses of her loves onto throw cushions which now litter her cat-ruled home, and so I have started to write letters of introduction for her, to a more romantically realistic assembly of celebrities.

Dear Zach Galifiankis:

As you have the sort of looks that might grow on a person, and have a “style of comedy” that some might find distracting, you probably have a date for Halloween. However, I suppose it’s possible that the poorly healed emotional scars you acquired growing up as an outsider have precluded any sort of intimate relationship.

If this is the case, I think I know of somebody who might be willing to take a chance on you. She’s very patient, has worked with the homeless, and is quite frankly, out of your league looks wise. She also had a pony when she was growing up and can play Hey Joe on the ukulele. Intrigued?

Zach, if you’re courageous enough to just give love a chance, I can introduce you to this amazing woman and change your life.

For the better.

Yours,

Michael Murray

PS: This is a drawing that Shelagh did of you, one that I now believe is tattooed to her body at the juncture where her back meets her tailbone.

Michael:

I have asked my Personal Assistant to write to tell you that you spelled my name wrong.

It is Zack, not Zach.

All you need to do is check Wikipedia to get this sort of thing straight.

Stop being lazy.

I have to say, your friend Shelagh looks like she might be a cult member.

Why does she have a flower behind her ear and what is she staring at? Her Dear Leader?

Do you think I might be interested in a cult member?

Is that what you’re trying to say?

Zack Galifiankis

PS: If I was forced to come up with a nickname for you Michael Murray, it would be “Insufficient Postage.”

Rob Ford, Toronto mayor

On Monday, Rob Ford was elected Mayor of Toronto.

There are probably a few things you should know about him.

He’s your garden variety Conservative, the kind of guy that gets all red in the face, pumping his meaty fist in the air shouting,” the gravy train must stop!” The other striking thing about him is his appearance, which is of a defeated salesman. A big, heaving white guy, Ford has tiny, receded eyes that makes him look like he’s spent most of his life underground. His hair, so absent of colour as to appear transparent, is thin, sparse and likely styled by a straight guy from Oshawa. And of course, his past is buckshot with the sort of Frat Boy controversy you’d expect from a guy that grew up idolizing Rush Limbaugh and the CFL.

As such, all the downtown types in the city hate him, a loathing that is only amplified by Ford having dropped out of Carleton University in Ottawa before he got his degree in Political Science.

Well, I was living in Ottawa at the same time as Ford, and as we both drank at The New Edinburgh Pub each night, we became drinking buddies, and I want all of you to know that real Rob Ford, and not just the caricature that’s been presented in the media.

“The Robber” as he liked to be called, was an ass man. He always over-tipped the pretty waitresses and usually ordered the Suicide Wings. He certainly considered himself the life of the party, and if there were any lampshades in the place, well, he would have been the first to wear one. He had a Fantasy Hockey Team called “Fords Friggin’ Freight Trains,” (FFFT for short) that he was very proud of. He could also drink like a champion, putting back about 6 pints of Canadian a night, and whenever he got drunk he would talk in an Australian accent and inevitably start singing the theme to Ghost Busters.

However, there is more, much more to the man, and I want to share a few of the things that he said to me over the course of our year of drinking together.

“Mike, I know that everybody just thinks I’m a big, jolly ball of light, but I have my pain. I think about things, like why are some babies sick and others cute? Why?”

Later, Rob told me that he had been taking a creative writing course at the University.

“You know what I like writing about, Murray? Trucks. Fucking love writing about trucks.”

“Bigfoot is real. No shit.”

“I’m like the Captain, and you’re like Gilligan! You ever think of that?”

“I don’t think we should have any Russians in the NHL. Their names are too hard to pronounce and they’re pussies. You with me, little buddy?”

“Let’s get a few beers to go, head back to my place and smoke a joint. I’ve been working on that Honeymoon Suite song on the keyboards and I want to know if you think I’m ready for the Open Mike night on Sunday.”

“Mur, I swear, if a flying saucer came down right now, I would look up at ‘em and just yell, “Calgon, take me away!”

“Which character from “Friends” are you most like? I’m like Joey. And which chick would you most want to do? For me it’s Rachel. Big time. You see the can on her?”

“I don’t know, Little Buddy, sometimes I just think municipal government is too big.”

* ( most of this is not true)

Saturday afternoon, Down By the Riverside

On Saturday afternoon, in the parking lot at Saulter and Queen Street East, a dance school was putting on a recital. Under just the faintest suggestion of rain, beaming parents watched as children, evolving into various forms of perfection, executed the maneuvers they’d been practicing all week.

Dangerous Dan’s had set-up at barbeque area in the parking lot, advertizing themselves with signs that read, “Meat is murder, tasty, tasty murder.” The guys flipping the ribs, sporting the sort of facial hair you’d see on pro wrestlers, wore mechanic jackets with their names embroidered on them instead of the more traditional chef version. Around them, sitting on curbs and overturned boxes, dark-skinned older men, all built like fire hydrants, ate the ribs without conversation or expression.

A man on stilts walked down the street gathering publicity. He was 12 feet tell and dressed all in red, his hat stretching up to the clouds. He had a ukulele and was singing up a storm,

“I’m going to lay down my sword and shield,

Down by the riverside, down by the riverside.”

A young mother pointed to him, trying to encourage her boy toward the festivities, but he was terrified. Bawling his eyes out, he buried his face in his mother’s coat as the giant stomped down the street.

An elegant and elderly Asian woman who looked as if she was clad in nothing but clothes bought at Holt Renfrew paused in Jimmy Simpson Park, and in her three quarter length Burberry jacket, began to slowly execute T’ai Chi moves, while a five year-old girl in a full and excellent batman costume, swung loops around a parking meter in front of a gated tattoo shop.

A squadron of pigeons pecked at the bread scattered about a paved corner of the park. A mother’s eyes sparked, and she charged forth into them, stroller first, her daughter squealing and applauding as the birds took flight, encompassing her in the beating of their wings.

My personal trainer

Yesterday was my first session with my Personal Trainer. I’ve never had a trainer before, but after my surgery in August I figured it would be a good idea to get a professional to help me get in shape. Initially the trainer was supposed to be a 22 year-old Russian girl named Svetlana, but Rachelle told me that she’d found somebody else, a guy who was “inexpensive, not cheap.”

Whatever.

Anyway, the trainer’s name is Chunta, a Blackfoot name meaning “ Born During an Earthquake.” From what I can tell, the relationship between the Personal Trainer and the trainee proceeds along these lines:

1. You sign a cheque.

2. You sign a waiver absolving your trainer of any responsibility for the inevitable induction of a stroke, heart attack or intestinal rupture.

3. You then allow the Personal Trainer to ruin your life.

The first thing that Chunta did was inquire into my diet, quietly taking notes as I spoke (rather lovingly, I guess) of the alcohol, red meat and chocolate milk that served as my dietary staples.

“ We have much work to do,” he told me. “Your diet is out of harmony with your body. You are a Meat Dreamer, and you must learn to change your dreams if you want to change yourself.”

I nodded my head as he told me about the fruit, leaves and certain twigs (for protein) that were to comprise my new diet.

“So I’ll eat like a Chipmunk?” I asked.

“Do not underestimate the Chipmunk,” Chunta said, “ for the Chipmunk is a warrior.”

Again I nodded.

“We will start your session with a Yoga posture called The Cobra.”

“Wouldn’t it make more sense to start with a posture called The Chipmunk?” I asked.

“No.”

Chunta then demonstrated The Cobra, and I have to say, the posture looked pretty fucking easy. I snickered.

“You know, Chunta, I used to play hockey. I was on the second line back in high school. I think this is going to be a little too easy for me.”

He nodded.

I lay down on the floor and then began to push myself up into the instructed position, at which point I felt a terrible, hellish ripping in my left side.

I came to a few seconds later, with the trainer and Heidi– our Miniature Dachshund– looking down at me. Chunta uttered a few mysterious words in his native tongue, and then said, “Welcome back, my brave Chipmunk. You have been on quite a journey for our first session, and now you must rest.”

And then, just like the wind, he was gone, while I remained there, on the floor, the dog dozing on my chest, until Rachelle got home from work six hours later.

Parliament Street in Toronto

Walking down Parliament Street on Tuesday afternoon, I passed through some city housing located between Gerard and Dundas. Squat, red brick structures with no evident personality, they stared out over construction at the Lord Dufferin Public School across the way.

It was an unlovely, windy moment in the city and nobody looked happy. People hurried joylessly down the sidewalk, some private misery written into each one of their faces.

A cough that wouldn’t go away.

A ball-bustin’ ex.

A Visa bill past due.

A hated co-worker who always left dirty dishes in the sink.

Insomnia.

I stopped and looked at the buildings, trying to imagine the tightly packed lives contained within. My eye fell to one tiny window. Open, it was entirely filled by the face of a woman, who with her chin resting on her open palms gave the appearance of a heart-shaped cameo carved into the brick. One thin beam of sunlight was cast on this building, and it fell, as if focused, upon her. Smiling– her arm braceleted and her fingernails ornately painted– she reached out into the day, out into the light, and grabbed a fistful of sun, as if hoping to bring it back inside and into her life.

Heidi Blog

Michael has given the blog over to Heidi, his Miniature Dachshund for the day

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Heidi really like poker and think she pretty good at it.

Always have a good mind for math. Able to crunch numbers and figure out odds just as fast as rip head off mouse! Heidi know exact chances of getting inside straight, always play smart, never impulsive like stupid cat!

Heidi also expert in reading opponents. Spend lot of time watching four-eyed-two-legged treat giver, and always know what he thinking! Know when time for walk, know when time for food, know when he get scared– like when he watch ghost movie– because his scent change!

Heidi have all the tools to be poker champion, but a few problems still stand in her way.

When four-eyed-two-legged treat giver put out bowl of chicken wings or pretzels for card players, Heidi lose all composure. Jump on table, knock cards all over place and growl at other players while devouring food–very messy. Then get called BAD DOG and have to sit out next couple of hands. Sometimes think four-eyed-two-legged treat giver do this when Heidi on hot streak, but he probably too dumb for such strategy.

Other reason Heidi not having great success at poker is she have trouble hiding her tells. When somebody think about calling Heidi’s bluff, hackles begin to rise and Heidi snarl and show teeth to intimidate. This give it all away! Everybody see Heidi have weak position and just bet more! Two-leggers know Heidi bluffing and call her!

When Heidi have good cards, even if she slow playing hand, tail just wag, wag, wag. Sometimes she even start to whimper get so excited, and then everybody know that Heidi drew the flush and all fold! Can’t help myself, instincts take over like when see squirrel on fire escape and Heidi just stop thinking and charge at stupid squirrel, even though squirrel outside and Heidi inside!

Sometimes giving over to instincts good, like when see Jupiter catching Frisbee in park, but other times instincts bad and make Heidi do stupid things.

Heidi work very hard with therapist to get tail wagging under control. Very hard, very hard work, but Heidi make progress.

Therapist always asking Heidi about bone.

Why you like bone so much?

Why bury bone?

Don’t know what up with that.

Nuit Blanche in Toronto

Nuit Blanche is a pretty big deal here in Toronto.

The idea is that for 24 hours the downtown streets become arteries for all manner of performance, installation and exhibition and for one night, the city becomes a radiant pulse of art.

It’s a great idea that offers all sorts of promise, and every year I get terribly excited. Like thousands of others, I charged out into the streets a few weeks ago looking to have a mind-blowing experience of the first order. But the truth is that Nuit Blanche always devolves into a commercial rather than artistic enterprise. Relentlessly sponsored by Scotiabank, you can’t help but notice that everybody is first and foremost, looking to make some money. Stores, bars and restaurants stay open later, hair salons pretend to be galleries and all manner of junk is being sold off as art.

It’s not exactly depressing, just disappointingly monotonous, and it had the unpleasant effect of making me feel like a tourist rather than a participant. Overwhelmingly white in complexion, it’s an event for middle class people with pretensions. Participants in a consumer culture rather than a counter-culture arts scene, we plodded hopefully about the streets with the rest of our tribe. This, of course, was the best part of the experience, as the streets were just teeming, and the energy and potential of the pedestrian traffic far outstripped that of any of the installations or exhibitions I happened upon.

At one point I found myself standing in front of a patisserie on Queen West. It was a damp and cool night, and the glowing interior of the shop was vivid and arresting. Inside, pretty as Paris chefs, served stunning looking desserts to their customers, as if exchanging gifts. It was an immensely comforting sight. It was so safe and beautiful– almost magical in appearance– and it unfolded like one of those perfect, nearly accidental moments, a welcome contrast to the intentionality of the theme park city unfolding all around us.

And then later, heading home on the packed streetcar at three in the morning, an unwittingly pretty young woman smiled as she read a text message. On her lap was a perfect and prized dessert, something she was likely going to share with somebody she loved.

Driving to Ottawa

Rachelle has horrible taste in music.

It’s the sort of stuff you’d imagine that a relatively unpopular 13 year-old girl living in 1994 might like.

Blue Rodeo are so dreamy!!

The Dixie Chicks are so smart and courageous!!

Pearl Jam is so edgy!!

The soundtrack to Dirty Dancing RAWKS!

No matter, as I am generous and full of love, I always let Rachelle control the music when we’re in the car. And so, when we were driving back to Toronto after spending Thanksgiving in Ottawa, I suffered. Through a fog of grating static, Rachelle constantly fiddled with the tuner, happily landing on every craphole radio station in Southern Ontario. It was painful, especially when Rachelle, having found some Christian Country song she liked, began, out of key and unlike an angel, to sing/lecture at me:

“You’ve got to be your own man and not a puppet on a string
You’ve got to stand for something or you’ll fall for anything.”

Occasionally she’d poke me in the chest, underscoring how disappointed she was (still) in me after I backed down from a fight at our last floor hockey game. (Long story, suffice it to say that I didn’t want to hurt the chick, who thought she was some sort of floor hockey deity simply because she was a lesbian.)

Instead of allowing Rachelle to provoke me, I decided to give her the gift of education and told her at some length why her musical taste sucked and why my musical taste was awesome. After digesting my wisdom for an hour or so, Rachelle stopped at Starbucks, (making me stay in the car to make sure that our luggage wasn’t stolen) slammed the door and went inside to get a cookie.

It was at this point, having found a station that played nothing but The Blues, that I seized control of the music.

(Rachelle enters the car.)

Me: “Now this is some music!”

Rachelle: “ Why does it smell funny in here? You farted, didn’t you? You waited until I left and then you stunk-up the car!”

Me: “ Doggie smells her own doo.”

Rachelle: (Sigh)

Me: (Bopping my head and playing air guitar) “Yeah, The Blues are the perfect soundtrack for road trips! Make me feel like I’m in a movie, a gritty movie!

Rachelle: (opening all the windows and fanning her hand) “Oh, you must tell me about this movie.”

Me: “What do you mean?”

Rachelle: “Is your gritty road movie about a grown-man who doesn’t know how to drive? A man who forces his girlfriend to do all the driving because he never got his driver’s license on account of his phobia about hitting a squirrel?”

Me: “You eat too much chocolate.”

Rachelle: “And the star of this movie, he’s returning from his parent’s house, yes? With a Miniature Dachshund wearing a pink collar on his lap? Hmm, I wonder who should play this rough character?”

Me: “Your dad told me that you smelled funny as a baby and that they thought something was wrong with you.”

Rachelle: “ Remember that cute little piglet that played Babe. I think he’d be perfect in this role.”

Me: “You know what you are? You’re the coldest night of the year. That’s you—Rachelle-The Coldest Night of the Year—Maynard.

I then secured my traveler’s pillow around my neck and pretended to go to sleep, while Rachelle changed the radio station and resumed tailgating the car in front of us.

Dream Journal

As many of you know, I’ve been suffering some pretty serious self-esteem issues lately. The trigger for this, of course, was my failed collaboration with Ikea, who rejected my idea for marketing an easily transported and assembled line of Sniper Towers. (A very bad decision on their part that they will one day regret!!) This was compounded by a disappointing season for my fantasy baseball team—A Fury of Pigeons—and some elbow tendonitis, which has prevented me from participating in Ping-Pong, my great love.

However, with the help of Dr. von Hammerstein, I’ve been discovering that there are many, deep-rooted reasons for my self-esteem issues, and as part of the process, my doctor has asked that I keep a dream journal.

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Michael Murray’s Dream Journal—September 20—September 30, 2010

I have a recurring dream that Rachelle keeps stealing the covers. In this dream series, I sometimes see her taking money from my wallet on the desk.

In this dream I am working as a waiter back at Fettucini’s restaurant in Ottawa and my section just keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger. The people are coming in waves and there’s nothing I can do to keep up!

I am a flying saucer and inside of me are man-aliens performing anal probes on one another. I fly them to a distant planet called Mikonia.

(this is the sketch of the flying saucer that I provided for Dr. von Hammerstein)

I am playing Ping-Pong against a rooster. It’s a very competitive match, but I win, and when I do, a person that I hadn’t noticed before—some sort of judge—appears, grabs the rooster and chops off it’s head. It runs about the Ping-Pong table, headless and flapping it’s wings. I wake up screaming and crying, which Rachelle says happens about twice a week now.

I am in a Sniper Tower in the parking lot of Ikea and I am shooting people and I have a feeling of great peace and tranquility. Everything smells of freshly baked bread.

I am playing Scrabble and then I suddenly notice that the tiles are bloody and are actually my teeth, which keep falling out of my mouth. The only words spelled out on the Scrabble board are expletitives. I wake up screaming and crying.

Instead of walking, I decide to fly about the city. It’s a power I always have in my dream world, but rarely use. After a bit, though, I lose control of the ability to control my flight and get tangled in hydro wires. A murder of crows come to attack me, and I’m defenseless and scared, but then a bunch of pigeons come to fight off the crows, and then the pigeons, like angels, lift me up and fly me to safety.

I am a mighty steed galloping along a beach. I come across a centaur. The man half of the centaur looks exactly like Hugh Jackman. He asks me if I want to go swimming with him. I whinny a yes and we run off together into the waves.

The Avro on Queen East

On Thursday night I stopped into The Avro, a new bar on Queen East. The place has a hipster dive feeling to it, giving off the salvaged vibe of a place where the owners might have spent a lot of money in order to make it look like they hadn’t spent any at all. It was a good place to drink, and I was delighted to discover that they sold birthday cake– with a candle burning on top and served on a paper plate– for three dollars a slice.

After a few minutes a couple came in and sat by me at the bar. The man was near fifty and very proud of his hair–which clearly coiffed at an expensive salon– flowed easy and full to his shoulders. He wore those dramatic black frames that suggested he wanted to be noticed and immediately set about proving this to be true. He needed his presence to fill the bar.

Boisterous, he began to try to flirt with the much younger, tolerant bartender. Confidence, like cheap cologne he’d just applied, rolled off of him in clouds as he bragged about the dinner he just had at the Ruby WatchCo.

He was sharing himself with all of us, setting the room aflame, he must have thought.

His eyes lighting up, he turned to the pretty 23 year old in the white undershirt, who was sitting beside him at the bar. She had been having a conversation about dogs with a friend, and the man with the hair imposed himself on the conversation. Assuming some authority on the subject, he pronounced on various breeds, dropping in little bits of sexual innuendo whenever he thought he could get away with it. Encouraged by her neutral receptivity, he reached out and touched her bare arm, and immediately her face pinched into a startled, Vulcan severity. Sensing that the boundaries that he had been pushing were about to snap, he turned back to the woman that had accompanied him into the bar.

A blonde woman somewhere in her late 40’s, she had the fit, worn, sun-saturated face of somebody that might have been a tennis ace 25 years ago. As her date drummed the bar, singing along to the 70’s kitsch that was playing– his fingers sparking cocaine– she pursed her lips and let her eyes fall out of focus. Looking through the Pabst Blue Ribbon sign and the 45’s that decorated the wall by the beer fridge, it was as if she was staring into the past, remembering that tennis match when she was beaten by the Soviet, the point at which her life pivoted, moving ever downward to this moment on a Friday night when she found herself ignored, once again, by a man who wanted everybody’s attention but hers.