Marijuana, Speed and Acid

This Saturday night I will be at the MSA Arena watching the Steepleton Roller Girls giving the old flying lip lock to the cement floor. For the first time I will not have to drive into Dope City to see what women really want to do to one another - slam their candy floss asses into the cold, hard cement on a sweaty Saturday night.

MSA Arena, for those of you unacquainted with my backwoods buttfuck of a town, was built in the '70s. The letters stand for Marijuana, Speed and Acid. Those three products still make up 70% of the local economy 40 years later.

If you are looking for me I will be sitting in the same chair I watch the Cross Checkers Junior 'B' hockey games from - the same chair Goldie Hawn sat in when she came to town to see her son Wyatt tend goal in an all-star game several years ago.

Some Days

Some days nothing much happens.

That is Canada for you.

You have your coffee.

You have your breakfast.

You cut some lawn.

You drink some beer.

You wait for the 8th race at your home track.

You have your money on the 7.

The 7 is a son of Newfoundland.

The 7 has shipped up from Emerald.

You think he is here to win all the money.

Some days nothing much happens,

Unless you have something on the line.

Two Eulogies

Celebrities dying affects us differently than when other folk die. That is a fact. Michael Jackson's death is still pissing me off. When I was a young punk rocker with a snot green attitude every time I heard a Michael Jackson song I wanted to blow up the world. Disco was shit and Michael Jackson was the Disco Shit King of Disco Shit Mountain. You would think I would be happy the disco fucker was dead. I'm not. As long as his heart kept beating he was slowly rusting away. Now that he has burned out the motherfucker is everywhere. Michael Jackson, the steaming hunk of shit, is going to be in my life until I die and join him in Never Never Land. It stinks.

David Carradine's death got to me too. David, unlike the steaming hunk of disco shit, was a lasting influence on my life. I would be a different man without the old Kung Fu tv series. He, not Bruce Lee, inspired me to take up Kung Fu and other martial arts. Without the martial arts my face would probably look a lot different now. I would probably look like Tiger Williams without the knowledge of Kung Fu.

When news of David Carradine's death and what he was obviously up to when he died reached me it got me thinking. Am I the only man on this planet who does not get dressed up in women's clothing, tie a belt around his neck so tight you run short on oxygen and make banana boat gravy? I already knew just about every man in town does this but I almost never thought about it. Now every time I see one of my neighbours on the street I imagine them in their wife's frock, choking themselves until they turn blue and having a good, sweaty masturbation. Despite this I still think David Carradine was one fuck of a guy. Rest in peace Grasshopper.

Computers Are Shit

Sonja bought me my first and only lap top computer a year and a half ago. Just in time too. The house computer was croaking at the very same time I unwrapped the portable number and I had not used it since I got the lap top sorted out.

Couple days ago the lap top croaked for no good reason. I put it in the fix it shop where some shifty motherfucker will bleed me dry before I ever see it again. Only trouble was that I have this writing habit that needs regular feeding so I went back to the house computer to see what would happen if I turned it back on.

It was still fucked. Fucked as the Dope City Canucks. But I persevered with it, managed to get in a bit of writing before it would croak again and performed what little computer first aid I am capable of on the fucked beast of a thing. Now the house computer is working problem free. Do not ask me why.

Now that I have been sitting here for a few days I am reminded how much more comfortable it is to write at a desk in my big ripped up office chair. There is lots of room for beer and empty beers around the monitor and I cannot hear Sonja when she asks me to do the things I really should be doing instead of writing and drinking beer.

The Hammer comes and checks on me once every hour or so. I pet her and sometimes she lies under the desk by my smelly feet.

I think the lap top is going to be getting a lot less use until the house computer inevitably shudders to a halt once again.

You Can Wag Your Tail Too!

Michael Jackson Special Breakfast

Ma was adjusting the rabbit ears on top of a small colour television when I showed up for breakfast this morning. Never saw a television in Ma's coffee shop before so I asked her, "What's up with the tv?"

"What you think Beer?" she asked back. "You think I bring it in watch Bugs Bunny - Roadrunner? Today Michael Jackson memorial. I watch it if I can." Instead of pouring me a cup of coffee she returned to her rabbit ear adjusting. I poured my own coffee.

"You want to tell your old man I'll have the Michael Jackson special breakfast this morning instead of my usual," I asked Ma.

"What Michael Jackson special breakfast you talk about?" she asked back.

"Same as my usual except with little weiners in a white sauce instead of bacon."

"You funny Beer," Ma sneered. "You no know what Michael Jackson mean to me and Wang." Wang is her husband's name. He was already looking for some little weiners in the back of the big cooler. "When we first go on date together and Wang try kiss me Michael Jackson singing Beat It on radio. I slap Wang on face. Nobody kiss me first date. Two date later I let him try again. No slap that time - just tickle!"

Wang looked up from the grill when Ma said tickle and smiled so big he just about straightened out his crooked teeth. Then he said something to Ma in their fatherland's tongue. Ma did not say anything back. She just smiled and went back to work on her rabbit ears.

"What did he say Ma?" I asked.

"He say Beer say one more thing bad about Michael Jackson he eat ball for breakfast."

Chinese Mother and Daughter Meet Paul St. Pierre

Sonja and I spent Sunday in a park. We laid out our blue blanket on the brown grass and read and watched the boats going out to sea and coming back to get more beer. Sonja read her sex book. When your old man gets to be as old as me a good sex book is as good as it gets. I started a book by David Sedaris. Guy in the book shop told me Sedaris is funny as fuck. He forgot to tell me Sedaris is also gay as fuck too unless his wife is named Hugh.

It got to be a little hot in the sun for me so when a shaded bench overlooking the water opened up I went over and sat down. It was a splendid spot. Too splendid a spot, I thought, to be left alone for long. Sure enough a Chinese lady and her daughter sat down beside me and began taking pictures of themselves and chatting in their language.

In the past I would not have talked to them but since I have to fill up this space with bullshit I small-talked them. "We have only been in Canada one year," the daughter told me, her English perfect. "We love it here in Canada." Everybody loves it here in Canada.

They had not yet left the invisible urban walls of Dope City. "We don't have a car," the daughter told me. I told them they must get into the wilderness as soon as possible. "Lots of people come to this country and never leave the city once they get here. Or if they do get out of the city they never get past Whistler. You will never fully understand the great mystery of Canada until you have paddled across one of our great lakes in a canoe."

My bench sharing new friends listened to me politely. I looked into their sweet brown eyes and wondered how much dog they had eaten back in China.

The daughter asked me, "Are there other places near Dope City we could visit without a car as nice as this?" I told them, "Probably not," but told them of a few places nearly as nice. Then I told them to check out Paul St. Pierre's books from the library this winter when they wanted to experience Canada from the warmth of their Bumblebee apartment.

"Who is this Paul St. Pierre you speak so highly of?" the daughter asked.

"He could have been the Prime Minister of Canada" I answered, "if only he was not from the West and drank more."

I have met many more strangers than I did in the past since I began the Dope City Free Press. The mother and the daughter were the best strangers yet. They are going to do alright in my country. They are going to do alright.