Billy Bob Thornton is Off His Meds (Again)

Who'd of thunk a little interview on CBC radio would become the talk of the internets?

Someone came of as a dick in this interview and it wasn't the Canadian. Manners triumph over rudeness yet again!

It'll make you squirm, but it's totally worth it. For the squeamish, here's a partial transcript.

Wow. Just...wow.

A Little Bit of This, a Little Bit of That

Mom Update:

She convinced her doctor to ditch the morphine pump and now she's on a patch which is a huge relief and has improved her mood immeasurably. Her latest test results show a very small (like millimeters small) increase in her tumour growth (which is better than we had expected) however there is bad news--a larger more aggressive tumour on her spine near her tailbone/small of her back is threatening to cause permanent nerve damage which will lead to paralysis, incontinence and other nasty and unbearable things.

So the doctors have suggested (and my Mom has agreed to) radiation therapy on the tumour to shrink it and avert these problems (hopefully.) She starts a week from Monday and will get treatments every week day for two weeks. I guess at that point they'll see how effective it was and will decide what to do from there. The best part? Mom's now got a tattoo! Four of them in fact--they had to tattoo little dots on her tummy to guide the radiation techs to get the aim right. I was hoping it'd be a 'tramp stamp' but you can't have everything.

My New Hairdo!

I love my hair again! I've spent the last year or so not really loving my hair which is hard for me to admit because I'm very hair vain. Historically I've loved my hair most when it was cut in a bob and (probably not coincidentally) it's also the style I get the most compliments on. My Honey and my hair stylist both prefer my hair longer so I have been giving it the old college try, but no matter how great the hair cut I just couldn't really embrace longer hair. I hate the feel of it on the back of my neck, I hate how hot is seems and how it's always getting in the way. And don't start with the "Why don't you just put it up?" If I wanted my hair up I'd have it short. Not to mention I feel like I look terrible with my hair back in a ponytail.

The final nail in the coffin of my long hair came last Sunday when Kiki said to me from across the room, "I miss your bob." That was all the validity I needed. So last night I instructed my loyal and long-suffering hair stylist to "take it all off" which he did and it looks and feels fantastic! I think it might be the best bob I've ever had. It's an angled bob (longer in the front, shorter in the back) with a subtle stacked back that I can add major volume to if I want a more Vamp-y look. The front comes just below the chin and the back is just above collar height. The reason I'm going into such great detail with the description is because you're not likely to see a picture of it posted to this blog any time soon. And did I mention I'm vain about my hair?

Miscellaneous

It was Randy's birthday on Thursday and tonight's the big celebration. Don't know exactly when it's all starting but I know the festivities will include dinner and drinks at a local pub, probably hangin' and prezzies at Katie's and then dancing our figurative asses off at our preferred dance club. Katie and I got the best gift ever for him--he better like it or we'll kick his ungrateful, skinny little 'O'Nasty' ass! Actually, Kiki's gift was better--she got him Rock Star for his XBox360. Their neighbours are gonna hate us...

"I am a Deeply Superficial Person"

Today I went to see a showing of Andy Warhol's work in what could be one of the least expected places you could imagine--the Children's Museum in Kitchener, Ontario. It's been there for weeks now and I finally got around to going--and boy, am I glad I did!

I'll be honest--my expectations weren't very high. I mean really--Kitchener? How much Andy Warhol stuff could they possibly get?

As it turns out, quite a lot.

Marilyn was there in all her glory, and Mick. And of course the ubiquitous Campbell's soup can. But so was Venus. And Santa Claus. And stuff he did for kids that I'd never even heard of.

In addition to a surprisingly large and comprehensive collection of his work, there were black and white photographs taken of the goings on at his famous Factory featuring all the regulars and their shinannigans. The museum had also re-created the Factory for kids to make their own screenprinted Warhol-inspired works of "art."

So the moral of this story is this; great things can happen in K-W and if you find yourself in this backwater I strongly urge you to check this out. You'll be glad (and pleasantly surprised) you did.

P.S. The Children's Museum also has a fabulous organic cafe called eXhibit. I recommend the grilled cheese.

All Right, Mr DeMille, I'm Ready for My Close-up

I have had unhappy skin for the last week and a half. I ran out of my favourite facial moisturizer and I've had to use my backup moisturizer and while it is adequate, it just isn't nearly as wonderful as my usual stuff.

When I discovered this particular moisturizer it was as though a whole new world opened up to me. I don't mean to hyperbolize here, but you don't understand how much money I've wasted trying to find something that my sensitive skin would not only tolerate, but embrace like a long-lost relative. This stuff makes my skin soft as a baby's bottom and it evens and smooths my skin like nothing else I've tried (and I've tried a lot of stuff!)

For the last week and a half I've looked on helplessly as my skin began to betray me. I started noticing it's texture losing it's smoothness, variations in colour becoming more apparent and even a little (gasp!) acne showing up and it's not even my period!

This morning all that changed. Last night after work I visited the drug store to finally pick up a new bottle and lo and behold the stuff was on sale! Ten bucks off! So I lavished my poor face with attention, applying both last night before bed and this morning after my shower and it was like the last 10 days had never happened!

Well, to my face anyway.

Any Excuse to Celebrate!

Today marked the day I had my 3000th visitor to my blog! This anonymous individual arrived at my blog via Mindy's and lives somewhere in Canada and accesses the interwebs via Roger's. How do I know all this? I'm psychic!

Actually, that's not true. It's because I subscribe to a stat counter. See that little green icon at the very bottom left of my blog? Waaaaaay down, all the way down at the bottom? It says, "sitemeter." Click on that and you'll see how many visitors have been on my blog and if you click on the "recent visitors, by location" link on the left hand side you'll see where these visitors come from. It's pretty fucking cool!

I love my site counter--it's cool to see the strange Google searches that bring people to my blog (and I also like to know if My Honey has been to check it out recently--hellooo cyber stalking!) It also serves as a great ego boost when I get to feeling like nobody cares about what I have to say and I start to question my value as a human being in general. I like when I see new people coming along and spending 5 minutes browsing my posts, but I like even more that all you regulars (you know who you are) keep coming back to read me time after time even though most of my posts are rambling crap. Yes, I am fishing for compliments.

Anywhoo, I just wanted to share this little success with you and thank you all for your continued support of my self-indulgent dream of become famous on the interwebs. 3000 visitors can't be wrong!

Someone's Trying to Justify My Rent Increase

They're painting the unit doors in my apartment building this week (they being the ubiquitous "they" who are responsible for making decisions about these types of things.) Well, doors and "frs" to be exact. I was a little confused by the sign, partly because I didn't know what "frs" were and also because I couldn't understand why (assuming "frs" is a shortened form of something) the entire word wasn't spelled out as there was ample room on the sign for more than 3 letters.

So then I started thinking maybe "frs" was actually an extremely abbreviated version of a much longer word that wouldn't fit on the sign, like "furnitures" or "fornicators" or "forefathers." But none of these really made any sense so I assumed, probably like everyone else, that "frs" was "frames." Doors and frames.

Three days into the exercise someone finally cleared the whole thing up once and for all by writing in pen "floors" below "frs" on the sign in the elevator. Well there you go then.

So far I haven't seen any paint on the floors, but maybe they're just covering their bases in case they spill some.

Thank goodness they're not painting the fornicators! How would I explain coming into work covered in gray paint?

You Kiss Your Mother With That Mouth!?

I'm finding the North American obsession with oral hygiene a bit unsettling. Obsessiveness in general is unsettling, but the part that really creeps me out is how my mouth is depicted as a cesspool of bacteria, germs and unsightly stains, not fit for exposure to other human beings. I'm often told I have a dirty mouth, but it's generally meant in a more figurative sense than a literal one.

I can't seem to sit though a commercial break in my favourite TV programs anymore without being beaten over the head with images of giant teeth dripping slimy purple-brown goo and magnified alien-like bacteria pulsating and wriggling like Jell-o. But thanks to the modern miracle of CGI, the "hero" in these epics is often just as creepy as the (alleged) bad guys.

Consider the mouthwash with the pink "liquid men" splashing around in your mouth--doesn't that just give you the willies? Or the other one that promises to "Stop gingivitis before it starts, " which makes gum disease sound more like an eventuality than a possibility. These scare tactics are meant to convince me I can't live a normal life without their products, but the thought of using them makes me want to scream with terror.

I guess what really offends me about these ads for fancy toothpaste, motorized toothbrushes, gingivitis-fighting mouthwash--and most importantly, teeth whiteners--is the insinuation that my mouth is naturally diseased and defective and without the intervention of these innovative and high-tech products I'm doomed to a life of pain and suffering, both physical and psychological. My $2.49 toothbrush and $3.79 toothpaste just aren't gonna cut it--in fact, it's irresponsible of me to even be using them!

I guess I'd better stock up before they're all recalled and taken off the store shelves. If they're that ineffective, one would assume a responsible company concerned with my oral health wouldn't want to taint their reputation by selling products that don't work. Right?