******************************************
Rachelle: I’m sorry, honey, that’s just not the way that it works.
Rachelle: Although you identify as a two-lunged person, it does not change the fact that you only have one lung.
Rachelle: Yes.
Rachelle: Yes, I think it would likely disqualify you from being hired as a bodyguard.
Rachelle: Hate speech?
Rachelle: Really? You think that’s hate speech?
Rachelle: Well, yes! You should Tweet about it then!
Rachelle: That will really help get things done!
Rachelle: I like the way you fight for justice, you really are the sharp end of the spear!
Rachelle: Oh Pickle, if it’s of any consolation, there are all sorts of reasons beyond you needing supplemental oxygen that would likely stop a person from hiring you as a bodyguard.
Rachelle: Well, you’re pretty weak.
Rachelle: I know.
Rachelle: That rope hang test back in primary school was hard!
Rachelle: I don’t know what they were thinking.
Rachelle: I agree.
Rachelle: It was biased against those with upper body strength issues.
Rachelle: I’m sure you would have gotten a gold star if not for that test.
Rachelle: Well, bronze for sure.
Rachelle: Regardless, my love, I think it’s time to let that go now.
Rachelle: It was a long time ago.
Rachelle: Okay. If Tweeting about it will make you feel better, you Tweet away!
Rachelle: I’ll wait.
Rachelle: What did you Tweet?
Rachelle: FUCK THE ROPE!
Rachelle: Well, that will show them!
Rachelle: Do you think people will know what that means?
Rachelle: Yes. I am very naive.
Rachelle: I believe you. It probably will go viral.
Rachelle: But look, there are other reasons you might not flourish as bodyguard.
Rachelle: You’re kind of clumsy. You move like a pigeon, all jerky and unpredictable.
Rachelle: Also, you don’t enunciate very clearly. I think people would have a hard time understanding the things you reported into your lapel microphone.
Rachelle: Yes. There could be confusion.
Rachelle: Communication is key for a bodyguard.
Rachelle: You’d have to repeat yourself all the time. Lots of wasted time. A terrorist only needs a second to blow himself up.
Rachelle: Oh Michael, I am not “shitting on your dreams.”
Rachelle: His name is Richard Madden. He’s the star of the tv show Bodyguard.
Rachelle: THAT IS NOT TRUE!
Rachelle: He is not an asshole.
Rachelle: He’s just very organized and knows what he wants.
Rachelle: It’s called confidence and strength, and it can be very, very sexy.
Rachelle: A commanding, strong man.
Rachelle: No.
Rachelle: That’s not hate speech either.
Rachelle: If I was an “Alt-Right Nazi” who wanted to “exterminate” those who lacked confidence and strength, do you really think I would have married you, Pickle?
Rachelle: Yes, it is true.
Rachelle: Your potential was, and still remains great. Very great.
Rachelle: You’re my favourite bodyguard.
Rachelle: No.
Rachelle: Sorry.
Rachelle: I was mistaken when I wrote that.
Rachelle: Richard Madden is still my favourite bodyguard.
Rachelle: He could guard my body any time.
Rachelle: Yes.
Rachelle: Sexually.
Rachelle: Well, as much as it would pain me, if a beautiful actress asked you to be her bodyguard, I wouldn’t stand in the way.
Rachelle: I expect Jennifer Lawrence already has a security team in place, though.
Rachelle: But maybe she’d still hire you on. I hear she has a big heart.
Rachelle: You could be The Littlest Bodyguard.
Rachelle: Maybe get on Ellen.
Rachelle: Yes, it would be the Christmas story the world needs right now.
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Dear Santa:
I hope you enjoy your protein shake for your long journey.
I would like to know what it’s like to be Santa Claus.
- Is it fun to fly?
- Do you like being in charge of your elves?
- Do you like delivering presents to children?
- What’s your favourite hobby?
- What do you do over the weekend?
- Do you ever think of moving to a sunny place?
- Do you go on vacation?
- What’s your birthday?
- Do you deliver presents to pets?
- Do you have a pet?
Love,
Talullah from LA
Dear Talullah:
You should know that Santa is very grateful to you for leaving him a protein shake. You are a very sweet girl. Unfortunately, Santa is very lactose intolerant and suffers acute gastric distress whenever he has a protein shake, so he had to give it to Dasher, his lead reindeer, who is a bit of a hippy and really very experimental in his tastes. Last year Dasher tried Ayahuasca– saw serpents and had diarrhea for two days.
Santa isn’t sure how that “blessed” him with “spiritual advancement,” but whatever.
Santa will now try to answer all your questions!
- It is NOT fun to fly. It is VERY dangerous, especially with all the drones terrorizing the skies! Santa is only able to do it if he gets gassed up and takes his medication: 3mg of Ativan and a magic gummy.
- Santa is not in charge of the elves! Santa and the elves work as a team, functioning as a single unit without any hierarchy! Also, the elves are very well compensated for the work they do and the netting that surround Santa’s toy factory are NOT suicide nets like those at all the Apple factories in China! Also, any rumours you heard about elf slavery or elf sex slavery are not true! That’s fake news!
- Santa has had worse jobs. Working at a poultry farm, for instance.
- For hobbies Santa really enjoys Cosplay, voyeurism and experimenting with surveillance equipment.
- On the weekends Santa usually just chills and watches Netflix with the wife. Highly recommends Mindhunter.
- It is amazing to Santa how ill-informed people are! Little girls like you, Talullah, just live in little electronic silos, never learning anything you don’t already believe! Let Santa assure you, there is plenty of sun in the North Pole!
- We have been to Mar-a-Lago a number of times. Just the best. Saw Melania changing into her bikini once. Not bad at all.
- Santa will only tell you that he is a Leo with Pisces ascendent.
- No. Santa would throw-up if he ever even saw a chicken again.
- Several elves and a turtle.
It was a cheap, addictive entertainment.
Like Netflix.
Like porn.
Like the buildup to the Super Bowl.
The big event, as far as most media was concerned, was the landfall in Florida. This, it seemed, was the point to which all of our lives were leading, the apocalypse that was sure to prove whatever it was we needed proved. Days, perhaps even weeks before this happened, there was wall to wall coverage promising cataclysm. I learned to fear the “Cone of Uncertainty” and “Life Threatening Winds,” I listened to talking heads as if they were debating some sport, and I watched relentless loops of footage of nature destroying any puny mortal concerns that stood in its path.
And as the hurricane carved out it’s terrible path, each demolished, little island a grim foreshadowing of what was about to happen to over-populated and under-prepared Florida, the hurricane was simultaneously a prophecy of doom and a trailer for a Hollywood disaster film. Almost giddy, each day the broadcasters revealed– in all its punitive majesty– another verse in this Book of Revelations.
The media, of course, profited from our obsessive fear, and turned the volume up as loud as they could. The more clicks the better, and if it was terror and anxiety that ushered in these clicks, so be it. At one point a rain-soaked reporter, bent and staggering against the elements, conducted an urgent interview with a man who had not evacuated. Clearly the reporter was hoping for some Florida Man archetype to emerge from the scrub, a guy who looked like Kid Rock and was armed with a crossbow and some alligator mace, and wasn’t going to let some “lady storm” tell him what to do.
Instead, the reporter got a genius cardiologist, who with astonishing knowledge, detail and reasoning, explained precisely why it was safe to be exactly where he was. He was calm, too, not a trace of panic to him, and he made the reporter look like the very bad actor he was.
That the media manipulates and distorts news events, or even creates disaster porn, is nothing new. When 9/11 took place I literally could not take my eyes off the tv.
It was the most riveting thing I had ever seen, and it was a rating’s sensation. Now, with all our various technologies even further entrenched, this sense of chaos and anxiety has become a permanent, immobilizing fixture of our lives. The media, desperate to make a buck, feed us all the worst case scenarios, whipping us into a frenzy of panicky, dependent consumption.
My level of excitement had reached such heights that when Hurricane Irma finally struck Florida, I was actually disappointed–like I would be if I saw a movie where the trailers were better than the actual product they were selling.
This is completely perverse and backwards, but there you have it.
It is instructive when you’re caught in the swift currents of one of these types of stories to look up beyond your computer screen and out the window.
Remind yourself that we are actually living in the safest time in history.
( https://www.pri.org/stories/2014-10-23/world-actually-safer-ever-and-heres-data-prove )
Go outside, for surely something beautiful will fall to you.
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Me: That’s not true.
Me: I hate Donald Trump.
Me: Yes, I do.
Me: I really do.
Me: What on earth makes you think I don’t?
Me: The way I’ve been shaking hands?
Me: Look, I’ve always had a strong, Presidential handshake. It’s one of the things that attracted you to me, you know that!
Me: Oh C’mon, Justin Trudeau didn’t beat him! The media, so many lies! So unfair!!
Me: Trudeau was just trying so hard to be macho. Sad.
Me: Fake. Not true
Me: I am not talking like Trump now.
Me: Trudeau’s a bad hombre.
Me: Bigly.
Me: You see the way he was ogling Ivanka?
Me: Disgusting.
Me: An embarrassment to Canada.
Me: No, you’re an embarrassment to Canada.
Me: You are, too.
Me: Hell, I don’t even think you root for Canada during the Olympics.
Me: You’re not a patriot.
Me: You’re not helping to Make Mike Great Again.
Me: You’re a disruptive technology.
Me: Sorry????
Me: My Google Autofill?
Me: That’s a sacred precinct!
Me: You shouldn’t be poking around in there!!
Me: Well, I really don’t know why “Trump Anime Sex Fantasies” showed up there.
Me: Probably some keys Jones hit by accident.
Me: That little nugget gets into everything!
Me: What?
Me: He did what?
Me: Fuck!
Me: That was a gift from my sister.
Me. Sentimental value. Huge sentimental value.
Me: Don’t have a clue where I’m going to find another The Apprentice: The Board Game.
Me: Jesus. I feel sad.
Me: That was a fun game.
Me: Better than fucking Catan.
Me: Who wants to buy goddamn wheat?
Me: Really, you think you can make an night of it with friends “buying wheat?”
Me: Please.
Me: My attitude is fine.
Me: Anyway, we’ll see how he feels when I destroy his dog toy.
Me: I swear to God, that dog is evil.
Me: It is, too. The tail wags for no reason.
Me: No!! There was no battery in it!
Me: Really!
Me: It was creeping me out so much I removed all the batteries, but it still barked and tilted its head!
Me: Oh.
Me: I just thought there was the one spot for batteries.
Me: Who ever heard of two spots for batteries?!
Me: That’s insane!
Me: Whatever.
Me: Still think it’s possessed.
Me: Gonna murder us all in our sleep.
Me: I am going to build a wall around that dog and make Jones pay for it.
Me: No, watching Poltergeist hasn’t poisoned me against a toy dog!
Me: Well, maybe.
Me: Yeah, I guess you’re right.
Me: I had forgotten how scary that movie is.
Me: Netflix should be more careful with the types of movies they broadcast.
Me: Yes, I was.
Me: Have you ever watched Poltergeist stoned?
Me: Fucking terrifying.
- It’s late at night and I’m at my laptop playing WordCrack on Facebook.
I’m killing it. Words are just coming to me as if by magic. I’m easily the best WordCrack player who has ever existed. I am happy and at peace, surging through my life with the confidence and brilliance of an elite athlete. And then, amidst all the letters in the scramble, I see the name Jones popping up. I know it means something important and that it’s my duty to highlight and score the letters in order to keep my son safe, but when I try to do this, his name vanishes and appears somewhere else. I’m desperate, frantic in my attempts, but his name keeps eluding me, and then suddenly my time is up and I’ve failed. My score is zero. With a sense of dread I walk toward the nursery to check on Jones, but I know he won’t be there, that he’s gone, and that it’s my fault because I wasn’t a good enough WordCrack player.
2. Laetitia Casta and I are on a beach.
“Do you want me to climb up that tree and get you a coconut, mon cherie?” I ask her.
She says that she does and I shimmy up the tree with the greatest of ease. As I start to shake the tree, Laetitia does a cute, little dance for me down on the beach, “You are such a nimble, little monkey!” she says.
I can feel the sun on my face and the salt water breeze wafting through my hair. I am young and invincible. I shake the tree trunk a little bit harder, hollering like Tarzan, and this makes Laetitia laugh, and a coconut breaks free and begins to fall toward the beach, but instantly, it turns into Jones. I scream and throw myself after him, and I am falling for an eternity through a kind of darkness, never catching up to him, and then I wake up in a cold, poisonous sweat.
3. Rachelle, Jones and I are playing Risk.
I have amassed all my troops in Quebec and have assured myself victory, but Rachelle and Jones make a pact and gang-up on me. I try to be good natured about this, but inside I am burning with anger and jealousy. In short order they eliminate all my troops and knock me out of the game, laughing together as they do so. I start to scream at Jones, “You’ve always loved your mother more than me, always!!” And then I wake up feeling like an asshole, trailing this weight of shame behind me all day long.
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Rachelle: Is everything okay?
Rachelle: Oh.
Rachelle: Well, I don’t know why Netflix would be down.
Rachelle: But you’ve already seen Making a Murderer three times.
Rachelle: Yes, your thirst for justice is unusually obsessive.
Rachelle: No, strong. I wrote strong.
Rachelle: Must have been autocorrect.
Rachelle: Well, you’ll just have to be be brave, my love, I’m sure Netflix will be up and running soon and you can return to your Making a Murderer studies.
Rachelle: But tell me, how is Jones doing?!
Rachelle: Oh, he’s such a strong, little boy!
Rachelle: Well, you can’t take your eyes off him, you really can’t.
Rachelle: You should always be looking for his left.
Rachelle: Look, he always hits you with his left first. It’s his plan.
Rachelle: It’s not a dirty plan. He’s just a sweet, playful little boy!
Rachelle: So, just so you remember: The left comes first. And then when you’re dazed and trying to put your glasses back on, he will hit you with the right and then start kicking. Both feet. Every time, Pickle. You have to prepare for it.
Rachelle: I know he thinks it’s funny.
Rachelle: Well, I disagree, sometimes a bleeding nose can be very funny.
Rachelle: I know you get nose bleeds from the blood-thinning medication you’re on.
Rachelle: Sure. It’s not because Jones is stronger than you.
Rachelle: Yes, it is entirely possible you could still take Jones in a fight, but I wouldn’t bet on it.
Rachelle: He has muscle definition in his back. Do you?
Rachelle: So, he’s sleeping now then?
Rachelle: And you fed and changed him?
Rachelle: What does he look like sleeping? Does he look like an angel?
Rachelle: I don’t believe you’re in his room.
Rachelle: I think you just made that up.
Rachelle: He’s not talking in his sleep.
Rachelle: Send me a photograph of him sleeping.
Rachelle: Oh, you’re very clever.
Rachelle: I know you got over 130 on an online IQ test.
Rachelle: Pickle, you tell people you meet at parties that. You tell everybody that.
Rachelle: Yes, you are a genius, yet you still can’t drive or hold down a job. It’s fascinating, that.
Rachelle: Yes, the wildly misunderstood genius community is subject to a lot of bullying.
Rachelle: You’d think all those geniuses would be able to band together and cast a spell, but I guess I just don’t understand how genius works.
Rachelle: What?
Rachelle: Jesus.
Rachelle: Look, there is no way that Jones’ Exersaucer is haunted.
Rachelle: Yes.
Rachelle: It is creepy that it plays music of it’s own accord, and only when you’re in the room, but I don’t think it means it’s the Exersaucer of a dead child.
Rachelle: Well, no.
Rachelle: I don’t know the history of the Exersaucer.
Rachelle: Yes, I did buy it used.
Rachelle: Yes, so in theory it could have been sold by a grieving family that lost their child to a possessed and murderous Exersaucer.
Rachelle: I must say, watching Making a Murderer so obsessively really has really made you a better lawyer.
Rachelle: Netflix is back up, isn’t it?
Rachelle: I thought so.
Rachelle: Just don’t watch the horror stuff, okay?
Rachelle: It’s not good for you. Your doctors said so.
Rachelle: No, your doctors do understand genius.
Rachelle: Look, just throw a blanket over the Exersaucer if its scaring you!
Rachelle: Okay.
Rachelle: I will be back in about half an hour. You wanted the low sodium Triscuits, right?
Rachelle: Yes, I got it, LOW SODIUM.
Rachelle: Love you, see you and Jones soon, you’re doing great! xoxo
]]>I am now boycotting all of Trump’s luxury properties and hotels,
and have donated my, “You’re Fired!” t-shirt to charity. I don’t just believe in talking about change, I believe in being the change, and so instead of complaining about fascism on my Facebook page, I’ve started to picket the Trump International Hotel and Tower.
This is my journal:
Day 1:
Too cold. Stayed home and watched A Very Murray Christmas on Netflix. An instant classic.
Day 2:
Still chilly, but realized that the world isn’t going to change itself, so dressed in layers and headed down to Bay Street with my picket sign.
Teenager on subway asked me what my sign said.
“You’re a Chump if you support Trump.” I said, adding, “You’ve got to fight the power, you know? You have to BE the change!”
The teenager said, “Your sign says, “You’re a Trump if you support Chump.”
I looked at the sign and saw that he was right, and then asked him, “Well, if you knew what it said in the first place, why’d you ask me?”
The teenager shrugged.
Stayed on subway until it arrived back at the stop I had started at and went home.
Day 3:
Pleasant day. Maybe 10 degrees.
Took an Uber cab to the hotel and began my protest.
The first person who walked out of the hotel was a woman wearing a beautiful sundress, a winter scarf that must have fallen from heaven and a cowboy hat. She smelled like the most impossible music and was so blindingly gorgeous that I dropped my sign.
As she stepped into a waiting limo, I cried out, “I would build a wall around all of Mexico for you, I would make America strong again!” but I think maybe she was mute, as she did not respond.
I don’t remember much else from that day
Day 4:
Woke up and meditated hoping to receive wisdom and light to become better protestor.
I then went down to hotel committed to be the best protestor I could be.
I began to pace in front of the building chanting, “Dump-Trump, Dump-Trump, Dump-Trump!” Although I got the words mixed-up quite a bit, several cars honked, which I took to be signs of support.
Had lunch.
Feeling in the zone, I began to protest again but then got a text from my wife reminding me to pick up my blood pressure medication, and so I went off to the store to make sure I got there before it closed. Took my blood pressure while waiting. 120/70.
Not bad! Got my pills and a lotto ticket and headed home.
Day 5:
Took Uber down to hotel again. Talked to the driver about fascism. He agreed about its dangers. (I feel I am changing the world one little bit at a time!)Gave him a five star rating.
Today I proved an inspiration. As I believe we have to unite as one against Trump, I was delighted when a street person joined in my protest. She might have had her difficulties, but she was a very spirited, loud and creative chanter! Said her name was Parking Lot, because that’s where she did most of her work, and that Trump was a “Fuck Roach.”
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The first thing we came to understand is that you have to cede a lot of control and adapt to your baby rather than have your baby adapt to you. It’s also been important for us to discover that there are a billion different ways to raise a child, and any attempt at raising the child in a glittering, TV commercial kind of way is doomed. For instance, our Doula was an ex-cop who took smoke breaks throughout Rachelle’s labour, and shouted things like, “Push like there’s no goddamn tomorrow, push till you feel like you’re going to shit, then push ’til you feel like you’re going to shit and puke!” It wasn’t what we expected, but it worked.
When we found ourselves overwhelmed, disoriented and exhausted after the first week of being parents, we reached out for the help of a night nurse who would come in once a week and look after the baby while we slept. We found a man named Jim through an ad on Craig’s List. He had a super reasonable rate ($75 and a bottle of wine) and seemed very nice on the phone, so we thought we’d give him a try.
These are the notes he wrote for us (feeding time, amount fed, etcetera) when he was caring for Jones:
August, 23
11: 15 pm— James is a cute, little bugger. Sometimes when he’s sleeping it looks like he’s punching at somebody. Think he’s going to grow up to be fighter. We gotta give him a fighter nickname. I like “Little Fister,” but it’s your baby, so it’s your call!
11:45 pm—Had quick shower.
11: 50 pm—Crying like it’s the goddamned end of the world. Solution? Bottle. Four ounces of the good stuff. He loved it, just like a little wino. Got him to burp, then changed his diaper (Hoo, daddy!) and told him stories about the greatest hockey fights of all time until he fell asleep at about 12:30 am.
12:35 am—Didn’t see any cheese in the fridge. Not a big deal, but just thought I should let you know. Always good to have a lot of cheese in the house.
1:00 am—Now watching Netflix and completely into the totally awesome Deep Impact, which is a way better end-of-the-world flick than Armageddon. Can’t believe how young Leelee Sobieski is in it! She looks like a little child! Hard to believe she grew up to be a sex bomb. Not that long ago, somebody hacked into her cell phone and spread her “personal photos” all over the internet. Did you see them? Me neither. I’d never look at stolen material. (LOL!!)
2:00-2:30 am—Smoke Break: Left some Loggins and Messina on in the nursery to help calm little Jimbo. (Note: You have raccoons in your backyard)
2:45am—James crying. Fed him four ounces of milk, changed his diaper (just pee!) and then soothed him while watching the rest of Deep Impact. By the end, James had stopped crying and I’d started!
3:15 am—Put James to sleep. As a point of interest, this is the time in the Amityville Horror movie when the father killed his entire family while they slept. Always gives me the creeps this time. Weird thoughts.
3:20 am—Washed hands.
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adding that he, too, just like a Regular Joe, enjoyed watching the life-simulations depicted on television programs. It was as if some rudimentary form of Artificial Intelligence, one that existed in a strange human-like form that for all it’s advanced technology just couldn’t get the hair right, was trying to prove its humanity to a skeptical public. It was so clumsy it was almost sweet– like a grandparent saying YOLO in the wrong context.
However, the truly funny thing about this pronouncement was that nobody, not a single politician from any party, had ever suggested that they had a plan to tax Netflix. With this, it seemed that the Conservative strategy was laid bare—they were going to announce a really horrible, really unpopular idea every week, and then assure the public that they would fight tooth and nail against such an appalling idea. This tactic would confuse the public, who would mistakenly think that the combative stance assumed by the Conservatives meant that one of the other political parties had actually proposed the idea and that taxing Netflix would be essential to their governance.
Out of nothing, something– it was the conjuring of a perfectly evil plan.
In keeping with this theme, the next thing that Harper announced was also incredibly weird, only on this occasion instead of lining himself up in opposition to the weirdness, he was trying to initiate it. Stephen Harper suggested banning Canadians from traveling to terrorist-controlled countries. The idea behind this would be preemptive, serving to stop young, naive, would-be-jihadists from traveling to Syria, being trained by their dark forces, and then sent back, with ISIS flags now sown on their backpacks, to destroy the homeland.
This notion, crazy, paranoiac, wholly against the Charter and impossible to implement, seemed positively Trumpian in its blunt vulgarity. However, the point was never to impose such absurdity on the population, but to get the other parties to argue against it, thus making them look soft on terror.
It’s PSYOP’s, really, with the ruling government attempting to spread disinformation and confusion in an attempt to manipulate the mood of the electorate so that they’re not actually voting based on information, but on a “gut-feeling.” People will “feel” like the NDP want to tax Netflix simply because Harper said he was against doing such a thing, and after all, the NDP tax everything anyway, right? Likewise, people’s fears that the Liberals are soft on terror (Trudeau’s always getting his picture taken with Muslims!)
will only be reinforced, because now the Liberals have to argue that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with traveling to a country that most people associate only with blood-thirsty terrorists.
Harper’s strategy is to set off smoke bombs.
He’s not interested in persuading people with his inventive policy, but in sowing uncertainty and even fear, so that the undecided and those who don’t follow politics all that closely, the people who don’t really know what’s going on (because Harper has set about creating this bewildering cloud of Orwellian uncertainty and double-talk) will take the path of least resistance and opt for “stability” and maintaining the status quo.
In a nutshell, it’s everything that’s wrong with politics.
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