Baby It's Cold Outside

I had a coupon good for a 33% discount of seasonal misery, so I handed it over to Vishnu. Presto: winter doesn't arrive until the tail end of January. I'm generally pleased, but spare some ration of regret for the fact that the whole affair has only enabled my already highly honed procrastinating skills with regard to all things automotive -- I still don't have snow tires, and since my car weighs only 2.3 kilograms this means I've done a fair amount of highway skiing this week. I blame Iran.


Baby It's Cold Inside

This old schoolhouse need a good caulking. Littlestar has put a Fix-it Newfie to the task of finding us a new front door. The old front door is more like a curtain of beads than a door. It's permeable. It permies. I stay away from it whenever possible because it reminds me of ghost breath. Of course, the side door is worse: that hall we call the meat-locker. You can see your breath at noon. It keeps you from dawdling on the stairs, and mitigates the temptation to put your tongue on anything made of metal. Upstairs, where we sleep, things are cozier. Heat, like price, rises. I blame immigrants.


Creative Typography

For those of you who don't care to read my stories in episodes, recently completed tales include The Bikes of New York (sci-fi near-future novella) and Leslie and the Powder (slightly stirred contemporary novelette). I blame my mother.


Peripheral Museology

Everybody's favourite Toronto museum, The Textile Museum of Canada, has a current exhibition called Colour & Light: Embroidery from India and Pakistan which isn't nearly as boring as it sounds. Littlestar and Popsicle and I went to the opening the other night, in part to see the video installation on permanent loop that I produced for the exhibit through the auspices of my new paycheque overlords. The installation is also called Colour & Light, and features a bunch of Indians and Pakistanis talking about their personal connections to traditional fabrics -- seventy-eight interview segments composited over seventy-eight animated fabric backgrounds. I worked through a few weekends and long evenings in order to pull it all together, and I was reasonably satisfied with the results. Popsicle enjoyed the free cheese, while we enjoyed the free wine. We were very impressed by the hairstyles of some of the artistic dignitaries in attendance, and their foppish mannerisms were totally expert. Snaps, snaps! I blame Liberace.


Shout Out: johnny

Spec me up, yo.

Also: you'll notice all the poster purchasing hyperlinks I gave you are now 404s. Um, sorry about that. An unintended consequence of some Web housecleaning.


Shout Out: nstenz & LilFlightTest

Appy-polly-loggies we couldn't be attending your welding ceremony in the flesh, but our best wishes go out to you none the less. Congratulations! Among other issues I seem to having some trouble with my passport, which is: a) a special issue terror passport given to those the government doesn't trust on account of losing their non-terror passport too often in the past; and b) expired. Since this month is "Oh-crap-I-forgot-I-need-a-passport-to-visit-America!" month in Canada, getting out of my little expired terror hole is proving unfast -- the volume of applicants being swollen by some 700%.


Shout Out: clock & StackyMcRacky

Kudos on your reproductive achievements to date, which hitch on the coat-tails of your love achievements. Good job! Keep it up, champs.


Also: Littlestar

As per usual it should be noted whenever possible that Littlestar rocks, lest someone forget. She's a child-raisin', trail-blazin', choir-teachin', meal-cookin', giggle-crackin', jiggle-stackin', hot tamale of a cool drink of water. So say we all!