Iceberglandia

It’s supposed to be summer. It sure hasn’t felt like it, except for a couple of days.

Well, today at 8 O’clock PM, I decided to go out for a smoke. Having felt the weather in previous smoke outings, I did what I never thought I would do in motherfucking August: I put a sweater on.
As I was smoking, I joked within myself that it must be colder here than in fucking Finland. I quickly corrected myself. “Don’t be stupid, Iceberg. They must be freezing way up in those latitudes”.

Came back inside, logged on to the Weather Network’s website, and saw the local temperature:

“Those Finnish fuckers must be, at the very highest, at around 5°”, I thought. Not only are they closer to the Arctic Circle, but it’s midnight over there.
I almost considered not checking the temperature in Helsinki. I thought it pointless. But then I did, because I’m a stubborn fuck like that.

Really? REALLY?

Shit, man!

The Iceberg

I hardly ever get topical on this here blog. I hardly ever discuss news items, unless the baffle me in some way. Well, on Sunday, I was baffled.

See, I’m not an activist or anything, but one of the things that pisses me off the most is the way women are treated in some parts of the world. Condemned to a lifetime of never being seen, never being heard, and having only one right – the right to live (unless, of course, they are the victims of rape, in which case they bring shame and dishonour, and are deserving of being stoned to death).

Well, on Sunday I was reading my news items, as always, when this particular item caught my attention:

BBC: Mali Protest Against Women’s Law

Let’s wrap our heads around that one, shall we?

1. The Government of Mali, an african nation, proposes a law that gives women equal rights in marriage.
2. Women, yes, women, become pissed at this new law.
3. So pissed, in fact, that they organize a protest against said law.
4. All in the name of – you guessed it – religion.

Nice!

I look forward to watching video clips of these women being stoned to death for daring to organize themselves in protest. Stupid bitches.
The government has your back, you idiots! You can now speak, co-own shit, and inherit more shit when your husband dies. But you don’t want rights? Are you fucking kidding me? Why, dumbasses? Why don’t you want those rights?

“We have to stick to the Koran,” Ms Dembele told the BBC’s Focus on Africa programme. “A man must protect his wife, a wife must obey her husband.”

Oh.

The Iceberg.

Here’s another batch of creative ways of advertising products and ideas. You gotta hand it to some people, when they get inspired, they come out with some really good stuff.

What do you think? My personal favorites this time around are the BMW and the Jesus ones, because of their play on another sign (as opposed as I am to the catholic church, I’ll admit their sign placement made me laugh), the office products one with the Liquid Paper™, the yoga straw, and well, it doesn’t get any more genius than the McDonald’s one. The “depletion of the rainforest so you can dry your hands” one, by the WWF, was cool, as well.
The one with the guy washing his hands in the bathroom is for some psychiatric institution, hence the other guy in the mirror. And the Spiderman one was pretty clever, I guess. And according to what I read, the one with the paint isn’t an ad for a paint company, but for Nationwide Insurance. Still, it’s a classic.
I’ll be on the lookout for another 20 clever/funny ads. In the meantime, I hope you liked these, and the previous gallery which can be found here.

The Iceberg.

I usually buy my groceries at No Frills. I’ve done so for at least the two years I’ve lived at this place. First, because along with Zehr’s, it’s close by. And second, Zehr’s might have more variety, but No Frills has more specialty products. As in, a “mexican products” section, where I obtain such treats as my Kutbil’Ik Habanero Sauce, my flour tortillas, and the occasional pickled jalapeño slices.

Today, though, I decided it would be my last grocery shopping there. I mean, Just because of their items I might pop in every now and then, whenever I’m in need of things I can’t find elsewhere, but I am taking the 100 dollars (at least) I spend on groceries every month, elsewhere.

I can find lettuce and ham and bags of rice and beans and milk and coffee and fucking avocados just about anywhere. Why would I give my business to a store that allows what happened today?

I’ve been in line at the register before, and suddenly somebody pops up behind me, and the cashier tells them “you’re the last person” while she props up her The Next Available Register Will Be Glad To Help You! sign. They announce it, beforehand, and I understand. maybe her shift is over, maybe she’s got the squirts… I dunno. But if they have to leave, they let you know.

Today, though, I’m holding a basket with a loaf of bread, a few jalapeños, a pack of meat, a sack of stupid potatoes, and a fucking Gillette Fusion because it’s somehow cheaper to buy another razor with two cartridges than a pack of new cartridges. And I need to shave, like fucking immediately. I don’t know how other guys do it. One week later, and I’m itching like a fucking zombie.

In front of me, is a couple, with their son. They’re clearly Iranian. Iranians are cool, and I’ll defend them with my life if need be, because an Iranian looked out for me in that January 2007 night in Toronto.
They seem to love Pepsi. And lettuce. I don’t care, really.

I’ve been in line for a while now. The Iranians are putting their stuff on the conveyor thingie. The asshole with the “WHITE” tattoo on his left arm and “POWER” on his right is paying with debit. Fucking skinhead motherfucker, buying yogurt for his fucking aryan offspring. He walks away, unknowing of the fact that I’m not 100% white. Fucking racist fuck.
As the Iranians finish placing their Pepsis and their (admittedly ho-ho-ho) Iceberg lettuce on the conveyor, unknowing perhaps that I’ve been standing there watching a racist scumbag shop for yogurt, the bitch cashier with the “SMILE! I’M A TRAINEE” shirt asks me to please move to another line.

YOU FUCKING BITCH!

So, as she walks away, to talk to some people (it’s not like it was something else… she just shut her fucking register so she could go talk to her friends outside the registers), I line up, again, behind two shoppers. A lady, doing her fucking groceries for what seems to be some paramilitary bunker (I could have sworn, she rang up 1,000 dollars in groceries), and some stupid redneck who decided saturday afternoon at No Frills was the perfect time to stack up on Coca Cola cans. I swear, this dude stepped out with at least 25 cases of Coke. (25 X 24 = 600. Go figure).

Finally, the Tyrannosaurus Rex of a woman behind the register gets to scanning my stuff. I notice she, too, has a “SMILE! I’M A TRAINEE!” shirt. She’s fucking huge, man! About my size (6′2), but 45 times my girth. She could devour me with a single bite.
Not one to judge peoples’ appearances, I ignore the fact that she could flatten a Bradley tank just by frowning at it. She scans all my shit, and informs me with a hippo smile that it’s $24.50.
I slowly distance myself from her, but ask her for the name of the other chick. “Jessica”, she bellows. “Why?”.
It is at this moment that I cower so deeply, that I can only muster up a line from Monty Python’s Parrot sketch. “Because I wish to register a complaint”, I say. I swear, that’s what I said.
“Do you want to speak to a manager?” She asks.
“No, maybe the next time I stop by”, I say. Pissed off as I am, I can’t just go ahead and ruin somebody’s budding career as a cashier. Especially in these economic times. I walk away.

I see “Jessica” happily chatting away with her friends. I walk out of the store, fuming.

I’m carrying three grocery bags on my way home. One of them holds my 10 pound bag of potatoes. I arrive at the Hanlon Parkway, by far the busiest street on my way to, and back. The light turns green, which means I better hurry. I make it through the right lanes. The light turns yellow. I better kick my pace up a notch. Light turns red, bag with potato sack breaks halfway through the other lanes. I paid 5 cents for a bag, and of all places, this is where it decides to give in? I divert traffic. Some douche bitch in a Geo honks unmercilessly at me. I pretend not to care, as I toss the remains of the bag aside and pick up my 3.99 sack of potatoes.

I consider blaming that “Jessica” person for all my troubles. I decide it’s not all her fault. I don’t know who the people she ran to talk to were. I conclude I’d do the same if it were people from back home. I forgive her.

Still, she’s a trainee. She should know more than that. She should know I could have gotten her fired, but didn’t. She should reward me with sex. She should offer, at least. But she won’t. So I’ll take my business elsewhere, from now on.

The Iceberg

Do you daydream?

I do it a lot. It keeps me (somewhat) sane. On the other hand, it drives me crazy. Unlike the dreams I dream at night which range from “I can’t remember what, or if, I dreamt last night” to “DUDE! THAT WAS FUCKING BIZARRE!”, I have total control of my daydreams. Well, some of them. There do happen to be several day-nightmares that keep popping into my head, that I can’t control or blow away with a wish. My mind evoking my darkest fears, I guess. Incidents in which myself, or the people I love, have bad things happen to us. But it’s not what I want to discuss right now.

I want to discuss daydreams, because they’re nice. Confusing, yes, and certainly distracting at times, but nice. And necessary.

I won’t say that all, or most of my daydreams are of an escapist nature, but the theme does seem to come up several times a day. I envision myself being things I’m not, and dreaming up the possible outcomes of those things. I’m not talking about birds or dragons or “oh, if I were a ______, I’d totally do ______ scenarios.

Confused, yet?

The point I’m trying to make is that sometimes I think deeply about who, and what I am. What makes me tick, what makes me jiggle, and what makes me squirm.
I am what I am, and that’s it. There’s no significant changes I can make in real life to become another person, and for the most part, I wouldn’t want to. Sure, I could adopt certain habits or conduct patterns, but in the end, I’d still be whatever my DNA is. Whatever I inherited, was brought up with, and adopted as an influence would still reign over me.
But In my daydreams, I envision myself as a wholly different person, sometimes as hugely popular amongst my peers, and how cool that would be. To be the guy everybody is happy to see, to have e-mails and Facebook wall posts galore, and to have the world greet me with open arms.
Then, sometimes I envision myself as someone highly respected. Someone whose name is synonymous with wisdom, intelligent conversation, and good advice for anything I can help with.
Sometimes I even daydream about how different my life would be with just a subtle change. Like, if I had a more pleasant voice, or if I were good at sports, or knowledgeable about computers, or if I were some short dude with a bad haircut but a pleasing demeanor… Or if I could play any musical instrument, enjoy poetry and wine, or even if I were a ladies’ man.
Sometimes I daydream about alternate realities. Such as, what would be happening in my life right now, if I had stayed in Mexico? Or if I had moved to Canada earlier? Or, if instead of Canada, I had moved to the UK; Phoenix, AZ; or fucking South Korea? Or if I quit my job, had followed through with my plans of purchasing a car, or had experienced a different upbringing?

Daydreaming, of course, has a negative side. It sometimes interferes with real life, like when you end up making decisions based on our stupid little fantasy world. I’ve done it, we’ve all done it. Sometimes, the results are productive, most of the time they’re counter-productive.

Opposing schools of psychology would argue that it’s a good thing that I fantasize about being different because that keeps me grounded; or that I daydream all this because deep down I hate myself. To both I say “Bollocks!”, but I know for sure I don’t hate (most of) myself. And yes, daydreaming at times does keeps me grounded, in a way, so I don’t know.
All I know is that sometimes it would be nice to make those fantasies true – just to experience them in real life, you know?

The Iceberg

When will I learn? When, dammit?

I’ve said oftentimes that every single time I tempt fate by exclaiming something to be true, soon enough the opposite will happen.

As it happens, on Friday I was talking to a friend about the perils of falling ill. I once again postulated my theory that I drink enough booze that my body is a sterile environment, and not one where bacteria or other microscopic life forms could thrive. Then I uttered the phrase I know was an invitation to trouble:

I never get sick. I haven’t been sick in over a year.

Sure enough, when Saturday afternoon came around, I went to the kitchen. I pulled out a pack of ground beef, I chopped the holy trinity of veggies (tomato, onion and chili peppers), and pondered what else I could throw in, in order to make it more plentiful.

“Oh!”, I remembered. “I still have those potatoes I bought over 3 months ago!”. They weren’t rotten, but they were starting to go soft. Also, I didn’t trust the appearance of my habaneros, but who am I to waste food?
I even made tortillas. The flour I used was also purchased sometime in the spring. So, it could have been anything.

I ate away, and proceeded to enjoy my evening, full-bellied and happily pasting music videos onto my Facebook page.

Late into the evening, I had to, um, visit the lavatory. And I noticed the first signs that something was wrong. I’ll spare you the details, but suffice to say the smell was unbearable. I thought nothing of it. After all, I wasn’t expecting a lavender scent to emanate from those parts of my body.

Sunday morning, I got up feeling weird. I thought I might just be slightly hung over, so to “cure” my symptoms, I grabbed a beer. 3 seconds later I was hunched over the toilet bowl, making inhuman noises while my digestive system contorted itself involuntarily. Meanwhile, I had a hard time clenching other muscles in order to avoid a very messy cleanup.

“OK”, I thought. “So I’m not hung over. What was that all about?”. I made some coffee. By six o’clock in the afternoon, I had repeated the cycle of emptying my body a few times already, including the one time when timing couldn’t have been worse.
The upstairs neighbor/landlord’s laundry room is down here, adjacent to my apartment. Only two sheets of drywall separated him from the live performance. Only god knows what went through his mind as he heard bear-like roars (heightened by the acoustics of the toilet bowl, at that) and trumpet sounds… and the occasional splashing of liquid.

I felt like shit, shivering, and feverish and  weak and in pain. I went to lie down.

I woke up around midnight, feeling even worse. By now I had nothing else to let out. My body was just acting by reflex. I splashed some water on my face – the only pleasant sensation of the day – and managed to stay up for a while.
The smell coming from the bathroom, though. The penetrating, acidic smell of sickness. I didn’t want to spray aerosol, though. Gagging all day hadn’t been a problem for me, I didn’t need to enhance my reflexes. I just turned on the extractor and closed the door. And I’m still thinking of burning my towel.

I crawled back into bed around 2 AM, fearful that since I had already slept for six hours, I wouldn’t be able to get much sleep. Luckily, I slept another 8 hours.

Monday. The sudden realization that I had to go to work, no matter what. In these times, calling in sick is not an option – can’t afford to.
I tried my best to do my normal routine, ignoring how bad I still felt. Made coffee, and basically just transported it to the bathroom. If there’s anything worse than body-temperature vomit, it’s hot vomit, believe you me.

I took a shower, hoping it would make me feel better, and despite still being overly sensitive to the smell of food, managed to make myself some fish stock. I drank a bowl, and ate two small pieces of fish. And then I went to work.

The fish managed to stay inside, but I was still weak and feverish. To the point of being delirious, mind you. I shouldn’t be operating heavy machinery in that state. I chilled in the office for a while, while everybody assumed that I was just hung over. No sympathy from anyone, there.
By the time our first break started, I felt a little better. Not a whole lot, but at least I wasn’t delirious anymore. I wasn’t thinking about Djibouti at least.
When second break rolled around, I even felt hungry. After all, the only contents in my stomach were liquid – fish stock and water. I risked it and bought a hamburger and a bottle of V8 juice from the coffee truck. Somehow, I managed to keep them in, as well.

Today, I’m a lot better. My esophagus is still irritated, and my abdominal muscles still feel tired from all the efforts. Even my heart feels strained. But the fever’s gone, the pain is gone, and the coffee I made today is still inside.

Was it E.Coli? Salmonella? Food poisoning? Whatever it was, it sucked. Big time. I wish nothing of the sort upon anyone.
Oh, and in case you (or someone you know) ever get sick like this and end up losing vast amounts of liquid, try your best to replenish them, and eat lots of salt. Salt helps retain liquid. Limes with salt especially are good, because the taste of the lime helps eliminate the taste of puke.

The Iceberg

For the past year, or so, I’ve been hearing a lot about this Lady GaGa person.
Who/what is it? Is it a female? A She-Male? Does it act? Does it sing? Is it some annoying character from a reality show? All these questions have popped up in my mind. Just recently, I’ve heard she is in fact a singer, her real name is Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, she’s from New York, I’ve read rumours that she appears to have a penis, and I’ve heard many a mention of some song called “Pokerface”. That’s about it.

What exactly is her style? Is it Bubblegum pop? is it alternative (hey, suck it. Once you’ve made it onto a major label, you’re no longer “indie”. Hence my use of “alternative”)? Is it punk?

To this day, I’m proud to say I’ve not been a part of what seems to be a phenomenon, Lady GaGa. Just for you, though, I’m about to break said accomplishment.

I’m watching/listening to “Pokerface” for the firt time, ever. Here are my comments.

Oh. A Britney Spears clone with bad wigs. Color me surprised. And an ugly Britney, at that.
Up until the 18 second mark, it showed promise, what with the electronica intro, and her emerging from the water in a goofy “bedazzled” mask. But by the time the synth beats kick in, I roll my eyes.
By the time she opens her mouth, I notice the same vocal effects Britney Spears uses. Fuck, if Lady Gag-Gag (hee hee) had a little more nasal voice, I’d have a hard time telling them apart. She even has the same dance moves.
And what the fuck is that triangle on her cheek? And who decided that blue outfit looked good? And the visual effects. Oh god the visual effects. They remind me of Max Headroom.

Good! It’s finally over. What’s my veredict?

What a p-p-p-pile of crap, p-p-p-pile of crap.

So there you go. Now I know who Lady GaGa is, and I will continue to avoid her at all costs.

The Iceberg

I just about go on a murdering spree every time some person asks me one of these three questions, because they’re annoying.

I hate the first one on a personal level for two reasons. On one hand, it still pisses me off to read my blog stats, because they clearly show almost nobody is interested in whatever I write. And on the other, I hate having to answer people, individually, when they come up with this:

Hey, do you still write on your blogs?

Shit, people, can’t you just type the URL and find out on your own? It’s not like I’m keeping my blogs a secret. In fact, I might have given you the URL a couple of times already. Plus, you can find the links on my Facebook, among other places. But some people’s thought patterns, man, I just don’t get them.

The second one, also internet related, is when some tool asks me a question that, if 2% of their brain cells were working properly, they wouldn’t have to ask. In fact, sometimes it isn’t even posed as a question, but as an instruction, or a request. In keeping with the “question” topic, though, I’ll pose it in its interrogative form.

Hey, can you help me find some information on the internet?

Dude, if you’re too stupid to figure out the minimalistic structure of fucking Google or Wikipedia, at the very least, it’s not my fault. I didn’t drop you on your head as a baby, and I have no obligation to help you out.
Ha! Sometimes I’ll pretend to help them out, and at random intervals say something like “nope! can’t find it!”, and then they’ll suddenly say “oh, I found it!”, and I’ll let them believe for a few seconds that they outsmarted me. Then they act like all superior to me, and do their Messenger version of the “Ickey Shuffle” because they accomplished something on their own.
I just pat myself on the back, knowing I did something to make the other person feel good about themselves.

The last question is not annoying because of its personal nature, but it’s one I get a little too often. When a buddy asks me, I have no problem with it (hey, shit happens, we’ve all run out at times). But when a random stranger comes up to me with that line (and it almost always is the same line), I just want to kill them.

Hey buddy, do you have an extra smoke?

Fuck off, you bum! First of all, just because you see me smoking doesn’t mean you’re entitled to partake of my stash. Second, I don’t even know you, and I do not care at all for your particular icebreaker. Third, I don’t carry around “extra” smokes. I carry my pack, and I intend on consuming it all by myself.
See, I think that if I was able to work in order to earn my money, take said money to the store and exchange it for a pack of cigarettes, and carry around said pack all by myself, I’m entitled to smoke 100% of the contents by my fucking self. Are we clear?
Wanna start a habit? Pay for it yourself, you hippie douchenozzle. Alternatively, if you’re female, attractive and of legal age, and you still want one of my precious little cigarettes, I’ll let you flash me for 5 seconds in order to earn it. You fucking fuckos.

The Iceberg.

See if you can guess how I feel today. It’s not hard, but if you’re somehow stumped, I guess the image title would be a huge clue.

I haven’t much else to say. I’d go on another of my depression-fueled rants, but what’s the point? It’s not like anyone gives a shit anyway.
If something pops up, I’ll let you know.

The Iceberg

People deal with depression in many ways. Some people pop pills, some people take up illegal drug use, others drink their sorrows away, the more affluent spend thousands upon thousands on shrinks…

Me? I don’t deal with it. I let it envelop me when it kicks in. I’m not one to take medication, I can’t afford therapy (and even if I could, the whole idea of lying on a couch while some douchebag who couldn’t study a real career takes notes of what you say sounds stupid to me), and of course I’ve vowed never to do illegal drugs. As for the drinking, I love it, but it’s not exactly therapeutical.

I analyze it. I try to rationalize the whys and the hows of being depressed. And as of lately, I’ve been thinking about bad decisions.

Everybody makes them, even on a daily basis. From the unimportant ones (“did I over/underdress?”, “I shouldn’t have eaten that third hamburger”) to more serious ones (“I should have used a condom”, “I should have worn my seatbelt”), it could be argued that much like in the Van Halen video for “Right Now”, right now somebody is making a very bad decision.

There’s always a moment or two we wish we could erase. A situation that we would have handled differently. An event that, unknowingly at the time, became the pinpoint for the rest of our lives. And we fucked it up, and thanks to that, we are where we are today.

But where is that pinpoint? How far back in your life would you have to go? What if you had the opportunity to do so?
Let’ say you are granted the opportunity to change your life from one point on. You can somehow manipulate your younger self, the one who’s making that past decision, into acting differently. Just for that decision. That simple decision would change the rest of your life.

And let’s make something clear. Correcting one bad move doesn’t mean other poor thought patterns won’t happen – they will, they always will. But changing your life from one particular moment would make many things different.

In my case, I don’t know. I’m stumped. When did the trainwreck begin? What are my priorities?

Do I think about my career, and go back to the day I decided to quit my university studies? Do I think about my social life and go back to when I was a kid and force myself to play with others? Do I think about my health and go back and slap that first cigarette out of my own hand? Do I go back and take that very good job opportunity I didn’t take because I didn’t want to move to another city and not see the girlfriend who ended up cheating on me two months later? Do I just go back to my days as a fetus and just manipulate the umbilical cord around my throat?
And what if I happened to go back, change a few things, and not have the good things I do have right now, like my daughter, my friends, my positive experiences?

Of course, the space-time continuum hasn’t been cracked yet, which renders this whole post moot, but in the meantime I’m analyzing things instead of popping Xanax or Valium or Zoloft or whatever it is that shrinks give you.

The Iceberg.