NI-eh-gRA (10 out of 10)

Captains log stardate 51715.2

The americans, more or less, have cleared out of Niagara Falls. In fact, much of the city is deserted in the blowing snow. We park under the tallest phallic tower downtown.

Frozen in the opposite season, I am drawn to the experience the second round. The falls smack me in the face. The same way the stained glass light at the Oratory slapped me on Monday. Thursday is a lucky day for Sagittarians.

Closer I can't stop taking pictures like the few crazy Japanese tourists out braving the wind snow here comes March lookouts and oh my there was even a lone mallard swimming watch for that drop off little buddy! but winter stabs and on we go back up the hill in its wind face turn left wind turn left again wind face turn left again casino time to. Gamble. Drink. Eat.

Travel companions came out on top. I lost 5 ((loser))
BUT A SERIOUS GOOD TIME!

JE M'APPELLE TORONTO:; and montreal closure

SET A COURSE EAST BERING 110 MARK 104 SPEED 120 KILOMETERS PER SECOND ENGAGE! MONTREAL STARTED FINE AND DANDY SUGAR CANDY GOOD KIDS IN THE BACK ME AND BEAUTY MA IN THE FRONT (SHE WAS HUNGOVER, AGAIN) BUT WE GOT THERE IN GOOD TIME YA YA YA.
DAY TWO: I MOVE THE CAR FROM MCGILL TO VERDUN. TURN LEFT FROM SHERBROOK ONTO PEEL !!!!BAAAM!!!! WEEWOOWEEWOOO RED N BLUE LIGHTS. IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE SO EEEAASSSY. "YOU TURNED LEFT AT A STRAIGHT OR RIGHT TURN ONLY INTERSECTION." "OH SORRY. I'M NOT FROM HERE." "I'LL NEED YOUR DIVER LICENSE." $154 TICKET, NO WARNING, NO POINTS LOST. HE DRIVES OFF. THEY ARE THE SAME EVERYWHERE EXCEPT IN QUEBEC WE CALL THEM "COCHONS" BLEW MY QUEBEC CITY BUDGET. TAKE MY FUCKING MONEY MONTREAL, JUST TAKE IT. HIGHLIGHT 1: THE ARTHURS. DAY TWO POST TICKET TRAUMA. GABRIELLE HAS ME IN, I MEET HER MAN ERIC HATCH, ANOTHER MARITIME-QUEBECOIS HYBRED. THEIR NEW SON/BASSAD HOUND LOMEZ, HE HAD SUCH LOVE. Also amazing dinner night three at Gabrielles parents; Marie-anne and Kevin Arthurs. Chouder, salad, salmon on lentils, red wine, banana splits, maple tea and the hockey game.
MONTREAL STILL HAS A BETTER SUBWAY SYSTEM.SARA AND I THE BEFORE THE ONE NIGHT WE WENT OUT TO A CHILDRENS BIRTHDAY PARTY WHERE I DISCOVERED THAT I AM OLDER THAN WATER AND UNABLE AND UNINTERESTED IN DRINKING ANYMORE.



DAY 4 HIGHLIGHT? I attempted something new in addition to something old. I knew I had to cut my losses and get out of there. Things weren't working. Montreal turned out not to deserve the pedestal on which I had placed it.

To escape I climbed the steep snowy face of Mount Royal. A serious hill in the centre of the island. After pulling myself through the snow packed stair cases which rose above the downtown highrises, I reached the climax and the sun came out.

I pushed north west towards the cemetaries, from there I discovered a great dome on the horizon. A dome I recognized and remembered as Saint Josephs Oratory, a place I had visited on my first trip to Montreal.


I climbed the staircase on the outside, got to the top and found the main entrance out of order. "Prochaine porte" a sign said. Through the next door way, after climbing the real mountain and the great staircase outside, an escalator was revealed. Then another. All the way up to the Basillica, automated escalators, after all that.

Weirded out, I pressed on. I had come this far. I made it to the main entrance to the sanctuary, I pushed inside to give it to God.

It was silent and enromous and smelled like aged concrete. It commanded your immediate attention. I slowly walked up the main aisle, trying to be quite in my big rubber boots. About three quarters up the way to the alter, !!!!!BAAAAAAMMMM!!!!! RED N BLUE LIGHTS The sun smacked me in the face with considerable force, through the huge stained glass windows above. I definitly felt it. It was time to leave Montreal. It was official.
I left the Oratory and headed for the Metro. On the way I passed Montreals version of Jameson Avenue. Degenerate buildings with for lease signs quaintly named, in this case for flowers. DINNER WITH SARA Then the next morning I got into the car and drove 5 hours home, all on my own. The drive was peaceful and at the end; roaring down the Gardiner Expressway through the core of my town gave me a new sense of belonging and reaffirmed my lessons learned. MONTREAL 2010

Montreal Tomorrow

I am going to Montreal tomorrow;
A city, tucked between the place of my birth, South-Central (Ontario) and the place of my home, New Bumbswick.

1998 was my first trip ever to Montreal, flying solo I mean. It was to see Gabrielle and I was 15. She was my best friend in Elementary school. Then she moved to her mothers mother land. Montreal.

Supplemental visits became easier when I moved to Toronto in 2001 and since 2006 it has become annual.

2006
2006
2007
2008
2008
2009

HOLY FUCK I am soooo relieved that tomorrow is the day this happens again. God speed, french cheddar red wine chain smoking snow gutter frozen metro sin city mount royal plateau drinking cross dressing cabaret dancing quebec city JOURDAIN!

Flying OCAD on Front street ends in Terror

I was in a square, a downtown square. It was night, I had my camera and I was on my bike. It was a celebration, downtown on Front and Wellington streets, along Simcoe and the waterfront. OCAD was there above us too. There were many people, I was with Martina and others. I had lost Matt. I started looking around for him in the crowd, there were a few fireworks and cheers in the background. Then I noticed him across the crowded street, through the traffic and the hustle. He was with Ola, they were on speed bikes, stopped at the Front of the street looking accross to the celebration. OCAD was floating.

I called but they couldn't hear me.

The traffic slowly moves to reveal an 18-wheeler transport truck carrying automobiles, it pulled up beside my friends on their bikes. As it came into view I notice tucked in amongst the cars it carries are dead and rotting bodies.

I felt fear. I started screaming to Matt and Ola, but they couldn't hear me.

The truck hit the gas and took a sharp turn onto Front street. It cut off my friends and ran them over. The truck sped quickly, the crowd panicked and the carnival atmosphere turned into terror. As it round the square down to the water, it was running people down along the way, I remembered that I had my camera. I jumped the fence and started photographing the dream from there on. Everything in stop motion.

The truck running down the crowd. The truck against the night sky. The truck turning back up towards the city towers. People screaming. The truck crashing into a tower. The tower exploding. I stopped taking pictures when I realized I had to help the injured.

Barfing at OCAD

The day issue two launches I am infiltrated by a 24hr gastric virus that enables me to vomit for the first time ever at my school, OCAD. As soon as I bike in actually, B LINE TO THE HANDI-WASH! Put the papers out, go to union in pain. Union says see doctor, doctor says you sick, take a cab home. Take cab, ask him to pull over several times to puke out the side like a hooded junkie in retrosupersunglasses. Watchout at King and Tecumseth. That was a big one.




The end to a showstopper of a week. Confrontations with friends, collegues, teachers, even the mentally ill including a woman who was eating package after package of equal sugar supplements, like 20, and a old hippie crackhead wearing dark shades and a headset stealing peoples bike lights. When questioned, all he could scream at me was "GET THE MONEY" I of course immediately reference Beyonce.
Thank fuck the virus has passed through and this week is over.

Where is my mommy?

DREAM:

I am back home, out in the garage, late night, shoveling the driveway. Stevie Brown, who plays Adam Harris, is up at the end of the driveway, shoveling. The snow is still coming down but I want to get rid of some before I come out to shovel again.

A man passes in the night, he is polite and says hello. I start to wipe the snow off a jeep in the driveway when I hear the terrible screams of a woman in horror coming from up the hill. I can also see the sky is starting to get lighter. Dawn is coming.

In a deep, but loud voice I tell Steve/Adam to get down here NOW. He knows I am serious. He throws his shovel in the pile by me, and I follow him up the stairs and into the house, the shrieks of the woman now are at the top of the road. She is in terror and is getting closer. I tell him to get in the house, and to be quiet.

I get in the house, the fireplace is roaring. I lock the door behind me and proceed to start to turn off all the lights in the house. Adam takes off his coat and sits in front of the fire, I am immediately concerned for my mother as I see my father sitting on the couch, catatonic. Where is she? Dad is on the phone, repeating over and over, where are you? Where are you? He's got tears in his eyes. He is now my sister playing my father. She is saying where are you mom, where are you, sitting in her preferred reading corner under the fern, head turning to follow me as I move about, the tears still in her eyes.

I continue to turn off the lights, there are candles lit everywhere for light, and the dawn is slowly breaking in the cold landscape. I race up the stairs, make sure the front door is locked. I start searching for my sister, and her friend Laura. I check her bedroom, nothing, the spare, nothing. Then I find her sleeping in my room. I lift her and carry her downstairs. She is very weak and whimpers nothing but the one question; where is mom?.

I lay her on the couch, my father on the other, my partner on the floor tending the fire, all together for a last stand and all I can think of is that maybe the screaming woman I heard earlier was my missing mother.

Just as I begin to contemplate going back into the snow to find the terror, I wake up.

STƩẮM STUDY yesterday

I love a hot shower, hot and dark in the depth of winter, protozoa in the beginning, no no I want to be flagellum, eternal and kind of fucked up because its not the prehistoric human but the primordial organism. Wait a second, isn't that just a window?

ẄƢste STUDY today

Surprised with the lack of junkiness of the lakeshore this morning on the wayz to Think Tank Tink Tank Sink Tank, I was ready to fake it and then we ran out of time so oooooo so I will post a few of the niceness I found to my contempt, remember think junky. Wastelandscape. There are others from yesterday and the day before but fuuuuuck I don't know what to do with this one. End Waste? End consumption. Kill the politicians. Oh, and kill the rich too. Instead, Exploring: EWaste (dugh) Wastelandscape, Travel Gluttons, Water Waste and Outer Space. Why?

Weekends like these...

Meeting parents of others in picturesque natural settings makes me homesick and replenishes my soul. This was a weekend I will remember for quite a while.