Money or Dreams

This week has been tumultuous. I’ve been all up and down like a birthday clown coming off meth, and GEE WHIZ has it been fun for the people around me. Props to my boyfriend for not breaking up with me (thanks guy, you’re great), and props to my family for not changing their last names and going into hiding to get the F away from me.
The reason for the moody mood-ring emotional rollercoaster? Why, dreams of course. Splendid Rose-glasses-tinted dreams. The kind that mean you are like a bloodhound on a scent when it comes to jobs and opportunities and real life. The kind of dreams that wait impatiently in the back of your mind whispering:

“why haven’t I been realized yet? What are you doing? Every day you don’t do something valuable is another day closer to death.”

I like to imagine the voice whispering in the voice of Darth Vader, “psssh Paris, caaaaaw, what are you doing pssssh, cawwww with your fucking life pssssh.”
I digress.

So I’ve been temping here and there…whatever it’s boring… I mean it’s not that boring, I’ve worked in some cool companies, made some new contacts, you know the usual…and this week the Temp Agency (which has been excellent and kept me busy) contacted me and asked me if I’d be interested in being put forward for a job outside of the Creative Field. The role sounded like boring admin, but here’s the kicker… the money was excellent.

I had to have a good grapple with myself. I gave up a cushy admin position back in August to pursue my dreams of Film and Television. I’m young, I don’t really have any commitments, but HELLO it’s been exhausting scraping by each month. A part of me was really really REALLy attracted to the offer.

And then Darth Vader exploded in my head.

Literally, the Dark Side was calling me, but in this case the Dark side was the corporate world, the world of 9-5 and boring KILLMYSELF office politics. Stability. Health care. Benefits. All those words which must mean a lot at some point.
But not today, and possibly not tomorrow, and possibly not for the next few years.
It is stressful trying to keep a positive attitude about going after what you love (especially when a lot of other people seem to want it too), but there is also knowing in your gut when something is the right or wrong path to take. Do I want to wake up in ten years and realize that I’m unhappy? NO.

Would I rather keep slogging it out, working for free, getting involved with lots of projects and running myself ragged in the hope that I will get to where I want to be?
I think so.

But it is a tough balance, and on the days where I have to pay my rent, and phone bill, and internet and buy my Transport for the month and still try to budget for food and entertainment… well on those days I think about just taking a day job.
And then I remember that this my life and I only get one shot at it, so I better make the most of it…yada yada cliché, read them in Morgan Freemans voice. So I hoick up my falling down ratty old jeans, eat my stir fry for the fourth day in a row and keep going.

Because one day Money and Dreams might just go hand in hand.

The Next Five Years

“Life is what happens to you when you are busy making other plans” is something my father has been known to say on occasion, but which google reveals to be a John Lennon quote/song lyric. Never is that saying truer than it is for the month of February, which at 28 days most years, goes by in a flash. Here we are March 1st and I’m thinking, we should probably take down the Christmas tree.

My Mum wrote a very funny blog earlier this week, about how she feels she is just hanging around in the waiting room of life. She’s 43 years old and all her children have fled the nest, and she’s not sure what the next twenty years will look like. Well funny that, none of us do.

A day after reading her blog, a package I sent myself six weeks ago arrived. During the Christmas break back in Hong Kong, I spent some time going through some of my old stuff that has accumulated in my mothers tiny apartment. I found my old school blazer (which was gigantic on me in year 12 and now sits the way my work blazers sit…ever an indication of aging and thickening) old programs from Musicals I was in, and I found precious newspaper pages on which I featured.

When I was 15 and living in Hong Kong there was a section of the South China Morning post called “The Young Post” and for a period of time they had different groups of kids (I think they started with 9) come in, photograph them in a couple of different poses, and then send then get them to respond to certain questions. The idea was that you would vote one kid out of the young post every week.

I only lasted 3 weeks or so. My downfall week, the question was “tell us a joke”. My parents had a thick book of politically incorrect jokes that used to sit in our bathroom (wildly inappropriate for children, but hey, I learned a lot about sex and sexual interaction from that novel!) Now, I know what you are thinking, I went ahead and did the one about the Nun and the Irishman. WRONG. Because somewhere in the back of my rude-joke-packed-mind I realized that these jokes were hilarious but also WILDLY inappropriate for the young post, I looked up online, “politically correct, lame jokes,” and came up with the following, which I used as my answer:
“What’s brown and sticky? A Stick!”

I was eliminated. Well Fuck.

But that isn’t where our story ends today. The question before the one that ended my career as Supreme Young Person of Hong Kong 2004, was “Where do you see yourself in 15 years?” And I answered the following:

“Wow! I’ll be 30! Well I hope to be working in a creative Job, maybe Acting because that is something I have always loved, living in some far away exotic place, with some really hot guy.”

Well.

This year I will be 25 and that means it has been ten years since I wrote that.

Let’s check in.

I am certainly living in some faraway place; Toronto is NOT exactly close to Hong Kong, and I’m not sure what I would have defined as exotic back then, having lived the majority of my life in Asia at that point. Compared to the busy, loud, crazy city that I consider my home…snow covered everything is pretty exotic. Eh?

As for the job…at this point I’d take any job as the endless weeks of Temping blur into one another and my sent inbox fills with more and more desperate and unanswered emails, (I’m totally kidding, I’m still working towards the creative thing and have actually had a couple of non-creative job offers suggested to me, which I have politely turned down. I didn’t bust my ass being poor and interning for the last 6 months to give up and take yet another Admin job which pays the bills, but kills my soul.)

And as for the really hot guy thing, let’s not even go there. You don’t want to hear me gush about Canuck boyfriend and he’d probably de-friend me if I did. But I think I’m on-track with that one.

But the next five years is going to be pretty huge I’m guessing. There is obviously no way of knowing (because 2 years ago I would have never thought I’d be where I am today), but the one thing I do know is that life is an ever changing thing. You can never get too comfortable with the way things are, for better or worse, and it’s always for the better in my opinion.
I find it interesting that my Mother feels rutted in her life when she is still in the prime of it. I get it that the hands on child-rearing faze of her life has fizzled, but she never gets to stop being our mother (sucks to be you) and she never gets to stop being a part of her already fairly eccentric family. Maybe that’s her problem (and I suffer from it to) there are days when things just seem too calm and normal.

And that is freaky.
The good news is that she has the next generation to look forward to. Maybe not in the next five years, but, thanks to stupid biology, certainly in the next 15. And she’s already threatened to be the grandmother that feeds the grandkids sugar and lets them stay up late and gives them money to sneak out to concerts and will generally be considered “cool” and therefore loved more than me. Stupid ungrateful unborn, un-conceived children.

I guess we’ll just have to see where we’re at, twenty years from now.

Things that I hate that are actually really good for me

Celery

Celery is one of those ingredients that is in everything. Oh you wanted to make a stock? Celery. Oh you’re making a delicious soup? Celery. Cooking something that doesn’t seem like it would contain Celery? Celery. When it’s hidden in things like soups and stock, fine, but don’t go putting Celery in my Chicken Cashew nut. I can see it! It’s sitting right there! And I am not a fan. My dad used to cut up celery and put peanut butter on it. I feel like he called them Peanut butter floats or something like that. And even with a cute nickname I still wasn’t buying it (but then, I’m pretty sure my favourite word was just NO as a child, straight off the bat.) It’s a shame I haven’t made friends with this vegetable that tastes and feels like eating crunchy green snails because Celery is rich in Vitamin C and contains Potassium and Folic acid. It’s also rumoured to burn more calories eating celery than the beast vegetable actually contains itself.

Chamomile Tea

I associate the taste of Chamomile Tea with throwing up, thanks to a nasty experience in High School when I had a 24 hour puking virus and I slept at my friend Annies place and her mum offered me Chamomile tea in the morning to settle my stomach and I threw it up five minutes after I ingested it. It is a shame that I hate this because Chamomile tea seems to have antibacterial properties (probably why people think to drink it when they are sick) and also seems to help with menstrual cramps. One study found that drinking chamomile tea raised urine levels of glycine, a compound that calms muscle spasms. Researchers believe this is why chamomile tea helps menstrual cramps.

Milk

I’ll drink Chocolate milk by the gallon but I am SO not drinking plain milk. Plain milk on some kind of sugary cereal, fine. Milk in Earl Gray Tea, duh, what am I? A barbarian? Milk in recipes, yes yes of course. But not by itself. Yuck yuck yuckity yick. NOthankyouverymuch. Saying Milk is good for you is a bit like saying that cigarettes are bad for you. Everybody knows that Milk and dairy products are providers of calcium, phosphorous, magnesium and protein which are all essential for healthy bone growth and development. But what you maybe didn’t know is that studies have linked milk and dairy consumption with a reduced risk for cardiovascular disease, and other studies (who are these people studying Milk, don’t they have lives to get on with? Perfect Milk free lives?!?) suggest that regular consumption of low fat dairy products can help to reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes.

Onion

I hate this vegetable. When I was in year 12 and it was the night before my first HSC exam, my Mum took me to a steak restaurant and I ordered a steak which sounded delicious. It came topped with a huge pile of onions. I merely put my head down on the table and started to sob. I thought it was a sign my life was over and I would fail my exams. Thats how much I hate these. Which is a shame because Onions have many healthy properties. Raw onion encourages the production of good cholestoral which helps your heart and A powerful compound called quercetin in onions is known to play a significant role in preventing cancer.

Lamb

This is pretty blasphemous to admit as an Australian, but I don’t like lamb (to be fair, growing up in Asia, I didn’t have so much access to this meat, we mostly had pork and chicken). Some people slobber over the idea of Lamb Shank or cutlets, but I’d rather not. I wouldn’t order it for myself and it’s very rare that I eat it now in my grown up life. That is not to say that I’ve had all bad experiences, but for the most part Meh. Apparently Lamb is good for health conscious people, as it is a source of ‘good fat’ in the body and has less saturated fat than other meat products. Nah. I’ll just take my fatty fat thanks.

I’m going to jot this one down in “experiences”

Being unemployed has its suckyness and its awesomeness.

It sucks because, money is pouring out of your pocket faster than it is pouring in (worst). It also sucks because you spend your days tweaking a document that maybe, just maybe, you can fix JUST SO, so that employers will realize you are the fantastic, charismatic, charming girl you are in real life. You spend the day gazing at job posting websites, or kijiji, or hiking around the mall in your cute pretend corporate get-up with a sweaty grey file full of those pieces of paper clutched in your hands. You spend the day trying to convince people that seem to hate their life why YOU TOO should join their organization and maybe YOU could have the opportunity to hate your life too!

Then there is the sparkling hope, (this is the awesome part by the way) the idea that every resume and cover letter sent off or dropped by, could be the next fun thing, the next big adventure, the part that leads to the next part. Does everyone live with this same idealistic hope or just me? Who’d a thunk-it that a retail job where minimum wage is $10.25 in Canada could be so alive with potential.
Mama says: If you always do what you’ve always done, then you’ll always get what you’ve always gotten.

Wise words. I feel their invisible power tattooed across my brain. That saying is probably what drives my very existence. Well…that and that song from Pochahontas “Just around the river bend”… because seriously, whats back there? Gold? A kingdom of sloths? A tiny toy car factory staffed by midgets?

I digress.

I have been handing out a lot of resumes and cover letters that basically say “BLAH BLAH BLAH hire me for the love of god BLAH BLAH Kind regards, Paris.” And the truth of the matter is, if you hustle with some muscle (do we like that one?… I’m not sold on it frankly) then you are going to get some emails back, some calls and some interviews.

And thus, I have had all of the above. It is so exciting when you get an email back in the first 24 hours, you think, THEY REALLY LIKE ME! But sometimes those can lead to nothing and that second email doesn’t come back to you.

Then you get a call to come in for an interview. And so off you go, giggling with excitement, into the dark hole of the unknown with that little folder of resume’s your only flotation device.

So, a week and a half ago, I go to an interview, for what I think is a restaurant job. I go down to a very trendy part of downtown Toronto. I brushed my hair, I even applied some makeup (teehee, what fun!) and I wait in the very swanky plush restaurant area. There are three of us waiting to be interviewed. The guy interviewing us shows up late in a flap (by the way this mans name is Norwayne, a name I have never come across, personally) and it soon becomes apparent that the job is in fact a hosting position at a totally different club. The Norwayne man, tries as tactfully as he can, to tell me, that this job involves…scanty dress. I’m nodding along like, yep yep, tits out for the boys, gotcha. My interview is done in 2 minutes, I walk out of the building and Norwayne and I part ways forever.

Yesterday, I went to an open job interview for a new restaurant that is opening up. First of all, I walk into the place and it has a big blow up picture of a girl dressed in, what I can only describe as an Irish get-up that hooters would be proud of. Think mini tartan skirt, tartan bra, and tie up white shirt over miniscule tartan bra. Second, the picture has been dissected, as if this were a scientific drawing, with helpful hints like, “Tartan girls are always proud of their personal hygiene” and for some reason… a line pointing straight at this girls crotch. Or, a line drawn from this girls boobs with the hot tip “Tartan girls must wear the Tartan bra uniform. No other bra may be worn underneath”. I should have walked straight out. No miniscule tartan bra is going to be able to fight gravity and what I’m lugging. And third, instead of a sign saying “Job interviews” there was a sign that said “Casting”.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I still have secret aspirations of becoming an actress and having paparazzi trying to break onto my lawn, but…this is a waitress job, is it not? Lets call a tray wielding waitress, a tray wielding waitress.
I had the interview, surprise surprise I don’t have enough serving experience.

Time to start lying on that Resume….
End Rant

 

5 Reasons I am failing at life as an adult, but winning at being 3

 

Sometimes I love living away from home. Don’t get me wrong, I adore my family and I miss them, but they are the kind of people who I can take in small doses too. We have always been a gypsy family that lives spread out, and although we miss each other greatly, we are the type of family respect each others need to travel, quest for adventure. I have friends here who, at almost 30, are still living at home, and good for them if it works, because sometimes I still severely wish I lived at home, in fact, need to live at home.

Here are the reasons why I am failing at life as an adult, but winning at being 3 years old.

 

1. Meals

Whenever I have been home for a few days, I get this weird feeling in my stomach. My skin is better, and I sleep really well. And then I realize it is because I am eating 3 meals a day, (I know! THREE WHOLE MEALS!) and they mostly contain food that has been cooked at home and not in an industrial restaurant style kitchen. There are usually these vegetable things involved, and the meals happen at pretty standard times.

What I am trying to tell you is that two days ago I was really hungry after working a promo job, and it was late, and I couldn’t think what I wanted, so I bought half a roast chicken from the Portuguese place on the corner, AND an Ice Cream sandwich (lemon cake flavour) at Bakerbots bakery, and because I was walking, ate the ice cream first and the chicken when I got home. Failing at being an adult, WINNING at fulfilling my childhood fantasy.

 

2. Being outdoors

When I was a child, my parents were always telling me to turn off the TV and get outside because it was a beautiful day. WELL HAHA! Parents, because now I’m 23 and I don’t have a TV but I have my very own laptop where I can spend HOURS watching Cat videos, not leaving my house or Pajama’s until its nearly dark outside! So suckit adulthood!

3. Bedtime

My lights out time age ten and under was 7.30pm, maybe 8 if I had a sports game after school. WELL! My young fantasy’s are now coming true! I stay up waaaay too late just like all the big kids and do important things like check my Facebook wall repeatedly, and stalk people i’ll probably never see again or would recognize if I did. In the meantime, as mentioned before due to irregular sleepy times, my reoccurring face pimples are worse than the height of my adolescence. But I do what I want. So BOOYAH life. Take that high five in the face.

4. Dressing how I want every day with no one to say NUTHIN!

Yeah, I am wearing mismatching socks. What of it? Yeah this shirt has a toothpaste stain! So!? No I don’t think my sparkly blue eye shadow is too much for a daytime pool party. I can do what I want, and its only weeks later when I have come down off the crazy train of whatever-the-hell hormones were kicking around inside my brain that I look back and think, if ONLY my mother had been there to nag me to change. I always look so well dressed and put together when I am home. But nu-uh, I do what I want!

5. Laundry

As a three-year old, I didn’t care so much about laundry, because DUH someone else did it for me! It was like a magic trick, I would get dirty and boom, the clothes would be back by the end of the week, neatly folded and all good. As an adult, it is one of the most tedious things I have to do, and so I go out and buy more and more underwear, so the frequency of laundry is decreased. True story.

 

 

 

 

 

The hunt for New Roommates

I live in a really cool part of Toronto. Sandwiched between little Italy and little Portugal, close to Korea town (I eat pretty interesting take-away week to week). I love my apartment, in which I have the tiniest little room at the back of the house off the kitchen. I don’t mind my little room, I don’t really have much stuff in this city. I find that the less space I have, the less clutter and THINGS I acquire. So when both of my roommies told me they were moving out, I weighed up moving into one of the nicer rooms in our apartment.

My rent is the cheapest I have ever paid since I began paying rent. It costs me for one month, what it would cost me for 2 weeks in Sydney, and is a third of what I would pay for even a miniscule place in Hong Kong.

I decided with no guaranteed employment after camp in August, and with a bit of a road trip plan in the works for early September with Canadian Boyfriend, to stay where I was.

So now, lets discuss the hunt for new roommates.

Aside from the extremely stressful timing of this whole shenanigan-astic fiasco (what with me leaving for camp in a couple of weeks, and having a sublet) and just the general pain-in-the-assery associated with change, I was eager to tackle the task of finding two people to move into what is now my home.

I put out a ping online to friends and friends of friends. No bites. Bad timing. Lots of people looking for new digs for the start of September but alas July 1st, you were not the prettiest pig in the pageant. Its okay. Have a cookie.

And so I turned to that big aquarium of rare and bizarre creatures in the sky:

Craigslist (pronounced cray.g.z.list and not creg.s.list you North American foooooools)

And boy did I get a response!

I guess our rent is pretty reasonable for the area and the two rooms going are decent sized. I received 20+ emails in the first 3 hours. I was just happy that people were interested and I wasn’t going to have to scrape the barrel for people or die alone… wait…what?

I was pretty upfront about the place, what I’m like and the type of person I was after. I asked for people to tell me a little bit about themselves when they emailed me. The people who wrote “is the apartment still available?” or “I have interest. When I see the place?” and didn’t introduce themselves didn’t get an email with any further details.

But the ones who sounded normal, guys or girls, I was willing to give them the shot and show them around.

It just goes to show that anyone can represent themselves well on paper.

Where to begin, where to begin?

Perhaps with the guy that came first to look around. Tatoo sleeves, and insane scars all over his face from when he used to have 30+ piercings ABOVE the belt. Okay. Had a strange energy about him. Ex Cabinet maker, turned Paramedics student. I decided I better keep notes on all these people as I’d never remember them all. Beside his name I wrote “Nice. But kind of seems like that normal guy who would become a seriel killer.”

NEXT

Sweet, shy, Scottish guy who moved to Toronto around the same time I did. Cross eyed (me – extremely awkward and not sure where to focus when speaking to him – but no problem as he didn’t keep my eye for more than a second). Told waffling stories about things his grandfather said, or a random, completely out of context funny moments recalled, with no pretext or set up…

NEXT

Really nice, kind of dweeby guy who kind of reminded me of Howard from ‘The Big Bang Theory’. Works at Medieval times (a restaurant EXPERIENCE with live horses and jousting competitions, serving wenches tankards of ale…) as a trumpet player, studies music at University. Told me about his very shy, sweet girlfriend who might come and stay now and then. Yep fine no problem. This guy was looking like a winner… but just as we got up to go, his craigslist started to show.

“Oh there is one more thing” he begins, “I’m not sure if I should mention it…” he trails off.

Me: so friendly and encouraging, really think this guy is nice: “Go ahead. Be open, what is it?”

Him: “well… it’s not that my girlfriend and I have an open relationship really but…occassionally there would be a random person coming home with me.”

Me: (Is this guy telling me he kind of cheats on his girlfriend?) “Ok….

Him: “Oh! It’s not cheating… My girlfriend would be there too…”

Me: ……………………. uhm……………….

Him: “Not very often. But on Occasion. I thought I should mention it…”

Me: (TOTALLY Flustered) Right… okay so…. uhm just out of curiosity boys or…girls or… (WHY DID I ASK THAT?!)

Him: “Oh! Both! Sometimes at the same time rarely.”

He blushes. I blush.

Me: …………………………………… Thanks for coming to see the place. I’ll let you know.

There were others.

But nothing stood out like that exchange.

And I’m not against whatever it is he needs to do in the privacy of his bedroom. But… in our first meeting? In the first 30 minutes of getting to know the guy. Don’t get me wrong, I’m thankful he said it, because he was top three.

Thankfully, since then, I found two cool girls who are happy to move in.

brrrrrrr*SHUDDER*rrrrrrr

I dipped my toe in the craigslist pond, and lived to tell the tale.

We’ll see how this all works out.

A bag and a half of Crazy

Hi. I’m Paris. I’m 5″4, I have skin that breaks out in hives on occasion for no reason, and curled toes that  kind of look like claws. Also, I’m female, and as such I have lady productive parts, fun items like a womb, and these bad ass things called ‘Fallopian tubes.’ Pretty sure there’s other fun stuff down there, but that’s not what I’m really here to talk about today. I’m mostly talking about the goody-bag that turns me into a hormonal rampaging she-mammoth every 28 days or so.

Lots of boy readers (haha oh paris, lots, you flatter yourself…I digress) may be turning away at this point.

EW GROSS is she going to start talking about the P word?!

No. Relax brothers and father (the main component of my male readership) I am not here to recall hilarious anecdotes involving the painters and decorators (have I just turned my two gay brothers gayer?… oh well), instead I want to talk about that exciting game of wearing-no-seat-belt-while-quaffing-hard-liqour-and-oh-shit-the-break-lines-appear-to-be-cut…

PMS

Yup.

I am really lucky to have been born into a body I’m comfortable in, and I’m not whingeing about being of the female variety. There are super awesome advantages, and I have a baby making OVEN on my person, that’s a pretty cool aspect of the human body.

But honestly, hormonal roller coasters of swashbuckling highs and lows… I can do with out.

I try to be a rational person. I do. And 90% of the time, I wander through my brilliant life with very little to worry about, enjoying all the wonderful opportunities around me. I have an amazing family, great friends on all different continents, and a downright hilarious, Canadian-certified nice guy for a boyfriend.

And yet…

There are days where everything seems to go wrong. I’ve suddenly gained 20kilos over night. The re-occurring pimple is back and nastier than ever. My hair looks greasy, even though I washed it yesterday. People on the train were pushy. My friends don’t write back to my text messages. No body loves me. My boyfriend doesn’t love me, and he doesn’t understand me. My parents are being mean. My brothers suck and are ungrateful. And I don’t know what I’m doing with my life. And I hate EVERYTHING. And I need to eat all this chocolate but I’m SUCH a WHALE and I’ll never be happy or have the perfect life or have nice things and my career will be shit andijustwanttobelikecarriebradshawevenifSJPkindoflookslikeahorseandeverythingsucksandAHHHHHHH

This. Is. Hell.

You are a rational prisoner trapped inside your own body. A small voice in your head says:

“Actually, you look fine, you aren’t fat, and if you’re worried about it, just go to the gym and put down the chocolate”
“Your friends are just busy – they aren’t ignoring you.”
“Your boyfriends great – leave him alone and stop causing make-believe drama in your relationship”
“Your parents aren’t mean, they’re honest and open with you – be nice to your brothers, they might have to lend you a kidney or piece of liver one day.”

I like to imagine that the voice of rational me is like a tranquil calm old man sitting at a wooden table trying to hash this out, while the crazy me is like a swarthy, hairy, staggering pirate, sculling ale and slamming his fists down on the table.

“NO! WE SAIL AT DAWN!”

So, I am a crazy, teary, mess of anger and sullen silence for a week. And the people that love me start to think, wtf is wrong with the chick, why can’t she just be cool and the rational old man in me just sits in the corner (maybe he’s like Obe Wan Kanobe?) and he just shakes his head and thinks:
“This one will have to learn the hard way”

But honestly, HONESTLY, I hate being a bag and a half of crazy as much as the people around me hate me transforming into a bag and a half of crazy. It makes me apologize when a wave of ridiculousness has passed, and then spend stupid amounts of time fretting over why I am such a bag and a half of crazy, spending time talking and re-hashing scenarios with girlfriends, going home and thinking about the conversation I had with my girlfriends about being crazy, thinking: shit, maybe they think I’m 2 full bags of crazy and noonewilleverwanttohangoutwithmeandOHMYGODHERECOMESANOTHERWAVE!

To the ladies out there who feel my pain and know what I’m talking about – you are not alone. We all have our moments of crazy and semi-depression, and our self doubts.

To the guys (Hi dad) don’t hate us. I don’t know how you put up with us sometimes, but I’m super glad you do. And hey, at my age, I’ve probably only got twenty or so more years to go until I hit the ultimate jackpot in Hormonal Ecstasy known as Menopause. And from there I think we’re pretty much done… Until I produce a female heir and she turns 13…

xxxx

P

*picture found on Reddit.com
Artist http://www.murraythenut.com

23 things I don’t know how to do at the age of 23

I feel that there are certain adult skills that one might have acquired by the time one is 23.
I am sure they vary widely due to people’s individual circumstances, personality, socioeconomic position, culture and of course personal beliefs.
But there are some things that I cannot do, or have not tried, that seem out-of-place in my well-traveled, well-educated life.
And so here they are:

Twenty Three things I don’t know how to do at the age of 23, (and that I probably should considering…)

23. Set the oven
Oh, I’ve turned on the oven before, pre set to 350 degrees, I GET IT, I just don’t know how to execute it properly without destroying everything inside. And also how does the timer work? GAH!

22. Spell ‘Definitely’
So obviously spell check is on here in the post, but I honestly cannot wrap my head around this word. I think I may have a slight form of dyslexia, because I always spell the word “Definitly” or “Definatley”. I was always awful at spelling, I used to get my “b”s and “d”s around the wrong way. It’s kindof weird because I love writing, and I never let spelling get in the way, I kind of just bulldozed over it and made it work however I could.

21. Set a mouse trap
I’ve never really experienced a problem with Vermin (living in high up apartment buildings for most of my life.) Cockroaches I hate and have had to deal with, but mice? Those are pets aren’t they? I know they are. I had two growing up, Bindi and Gemma. Bindi lost an arm to a magpie which swooped past and ate it, and Gemma had a thyroid problem so became huge and fat, and then got a tumor. Both had to be put down, although they lived with their disabilities unhindered for at least a year or two. Oh the sparkling childhood memories. I digress, in our Toronto apartment, we’ve had little mousey friends, and after they ignored my humane trap which catches them in a box (to be released at your convenience) new, masculine roomie put his foot down and set a real trap. The killing kind. Sadly I was alone when I found the result, and turned into an UTTER wimp when I had to touch the limp soft body.

20. Open a bottle of bubbles
Any kind of alcoholic beverage in a glass bottle with a cork that pops off, is immediately handed off to someone else in the room, because I have destroyed too many light fixtures with my inexperience.

19. Sew a hem
I can sew on a button if it drops off (not neatly of course) but anything that requires more skill or patience then that is impossible. My mum is not a great seamstress, but she used to be able to hem my school dress if needs be.

18. Build a website
Even this most basic WordPress blog still confuses me. I have visited other blogs where the layouts are amazing and they have other tabs. Nope. Not me. My brother is the computery/internety one of the family, and I’ll just have to be content with being the Smart, Outgoing, Hilarious, Pretty, Girl one. Sigh.

17. Paint my nails
During the ridiculous Pantomime I did, I had a lot of free time during rehearsals. I mostly read, but once, I brought some nail polish and decided to tidy up my scratched and cracked polish. Much to the horror of some one who actually knows how to do this neatly, I got a lot of red polish on the skin of my fingers. “It’s fine” I told her, “You just wash your hands once it dries and it all comes off.” Apparently striking randomly in the direction of your nails is not the way to paint them, you can actually achieve this neatly, by gently placing the brush with polish on the edge of the nail, and brushing out delicately.

16. Negotiate a Contract
I find it toooooo awkward talking about money, well, that which applies to me. Other people, fine, FIGHT FOR YOUR RIGHTS. Me? No. I’ll just take the same small paycheck until I get annoyed and leave.

15. Cook a full Turkey or Chicken
Thankfully for my first Christmas away from home, it was a hodge-podge of religions and traditions, so we just had chicken breasts for lunch. I went to a Thanksgiving dinner hosted by my friend, and her Turkey was so amazing and moist, and the stuffing…ah! Simply awesome. But I just don’t get it. This probably has something to do with my problems with the oven.

14. Use eBay
I set up an account. I browse. I think I even set up a paypal account. But when it comes to stuff I actually want to buy…?! There seem to be too many buttons to click, too many things too fill out. UGH. Too much. I’d rather buy something face to face (oh god now I sound like an old foggie who is afraid of the internet.)

13. File a Tax Return
I have always given my tax returns to somebody else to do (boyfriends, father, accountant I worked for as a personal assistant) but now the date of lodging a Tax Return in Toronto looms, and I’m going to have to bite the bullet and figure it out. In a foreign country. Great.

12. Fill a car up with petrol
This seems just silly, but it is true. I grew up for a number of years with no car and no need for one (in Hong Kong and all) so my parents never asked me to help out with doing this. Also, I miss the days of service (here comes the old foggie Paris) remember when people served? Like at petrol stations they would fill up your car for you.

11. Use an Iron
I have tried, and I have failed. I’m getting better, but I would still not count ironing amongst my skill set.

10. Walk away from the samples people in grocery stores
If I take a free tester, I know that I will be standing there for a good five minutes listening to the sales pitch. I may even pick up the item they are hawking and then sneakily put it down somewhere else. I am a WUSS. That’s why I’ve just had to start declining.

9. Tie a nice pony tail
I remember first learning to tie up my own hair for school very late, like year 6 or even year 7. Why would I need to learn? I always had bob cuts, and when I did have longish hair as a kid, I had a maid and a mother that did french braids and treated me like a real live doll. Even now when I attempt it, it has lumps and bumps and I just think “fuckit” and leave it. It’s the artsy disheveled look ya’know?

8. Use the Automatic Cheque deposit at the ATM
I’ve never really tried – and I prefer to speak to a person direct (that way the cheque clears instantly) but yeah – I should learn how to use that technology though, not just to fight off foggie status, but also, like, come on man. The future.

7. Make a Tiramasu
It is my delightful roommie’s birthday Tomorrow, and after sneakily asking around for her favorite cake flavour to surprise her, have learned that her heart yearns for Tiramasu… If a cake doesn’t come in a box and require, 1 cup water, 1 cup vegetable oil and 2 eggs, then I can’t make it. Sorry. My desert cooking abilities are limited. I am an expert desert eater, just a poor desert maker. (Surely I should pick one meal and try to become a champion in that field, I have always thought I’d like to be good at deserts – everyone loves Nigella after all!)

6. Fix/Replace a Smoke Detector
Luckily I have always lived with those much more capable than myself – so our smoke detectors have remained active, and I, as a result, have not died a death related to smoke inhalation. The only reason I know our current smoke detector works is that I frequently set it off when cooking.

5. Hang a picture
I’m sure I COULD hang a picture, I mean – I logically know the steps involved: find a strongish wall, nail, hammer, TAH-DAH hang your picture. But I haven’t, and as a result, the beautiful frames I got for Christmas remain propped against the base of my wall, waiting to be hung.

4. Fix a flat tire
Are you really so surprised? If I can’t fill a damn car with petrol, how can I be expected to remove bits and fix them? I’ve seen them do it in movies. Looks like it involves a jack to lift up the car and then what? Screw driver? Meh.

3. Make a cup of Coffee
I drink tea, which is as hard as putting a tea bag in some hot water, adding milk, sugar, and stirring. Coffee drinkers seem to have a whole other process going on – that I just don’t get. They grind it, pour water through the ground up beans and a tiny paper sheet? UGH I don’t get it, and I live in fear of someone asking me to make them a cup.

2. Tell the difference between a ‘Good’ Bottle of wine and a Crap one
Yes, I’m afraid wines are wasted on me. If it’s sweet or bubbly, I’ll drink it. I know I like Zinfandel’s and that’s about it. My parents (who love wine) despair of me. My attitude until a year or two ago was: If it gets me drunk and goes down okay, then it’s probably alright. Classy.

1. Drive a Car
Yep, that is probably the number one thing I should be able to do at the age of 23. I have a long list of excuses for why I HAVE NOT got it, including that I went to University in a far away city, and that the legal driving age in Hong Kong is 18…blah blah blah, the truth of the matter is, I should have found a time to do it before now, but I haven’t and so I take to the road as a 23-year-old learner, attempting it on the wrong side of the road. I hope my friends who have offered to help will be patient with me.

And there you have it.

23 things people should probably have learned to do by the age of 23. Am I bothered? Perhaps a little bit.
But I have other experiences and areas of expertise. If you really break it down, I’m not great at Cars, fixing things, cooking, or cleaning, (and some online stuff) so long as I can find people who CAN do these things, then I’ll be alright.

And in return, I’ll write all the witty blogs.

Most definetly definatley definitly

Damnit.

The Old Woman Across the Street (a short story) Part 2

The old woman from across the street was much lighter than I thought. Her bulk was added to by layers of clothing. She was actually quite frail, and as I helped her to her feet I realized just how old she was. Lines carved rivets through her cheeks and under her eyes. The powder she had applied to her face was caught in the cracks, and her eyebrows were drawn on.

 

“Let me help you with your groceries” I said, gathering her meager items together and putting them back in her pull-along trolley. The vegetables were limp I noticed, and the apples which had rolled away were puckered, even from before their tumble across the salt packed concrete.

 

The hairs on my exposed arms and shoulders stood on end in the tart coldness, refreshing to my feverish skin, but also shocking. After everything was gathered and put back, I easily lifted the basket to the top of the stairs and left it there, hopping back down to assist the old woman in getting up. She was still shaky on her feet.

 

“Let me help you into your apartment” I said, and before she could argue I scooped up her basket and pushed open the unlocked communal front door. Inside a long dark corridor stretched ahead, a couple of doors to the left and right, and in the far corner, where the shadows were, a tight staircase rose up into the building. I stood back, letting the darkness fade into light, the old woman led the way slowly to the back of the hall and up the flight of stairs. On the first landing she turned right and entered the second door.

 

It was a house of tiny bedsit apartments, as I’d guessed, and the room had all the comforts a little room in an old house could accommodate. A single, simple metal framed bed pushed into the corner, a basin behind the door, a bar fridge, a hot plate and a window that looked onto the brick wall of the building beside. It was a pretty standard dingy little affair. I put the basket down just inside the door. The old woman sat down gently on the bed, sinking into the thin mattress. She seemed weary and bruised, and so, so old.

 

“Can I…would you like something?” I asked. The old woman shook her head and waved her papery thin-skinned hand.

 

“You should go. You are sick” she said accusingly, and I was surprised by her New Zealand accent, so similar to my own brash Australian burr, slightly burnt at the edges.

 

“You’re a Kiwi!” I exclaimed before I could stop myself.

 

She looked at me, shrugged her shoulders.

 

“I was. It’s been a long time since I was down in that part of the world.”

 

She pushed herself off the mattress and knelt down to put away her groceries, but the distance from her upright position was too far and she groaned, clutching her back.

 

“Please let me help you,” I said, calmly steering her back to the bed, and pulling the items from her basket. She sat heavily and watched me.

 

“You’re Australian” she said.

 

“I am.”

 

“You’re a long way from home.”

 

“So are you.”

 

She snorted.

 

“Bah. Home. This is home now.”

 

I looked around at the dark grubby little room and shuddered.

 

“Have you been in Canada long?” I asked, inspecting the semi-rotting fruit.

 

“About a year” she said. She pointed at one of the apples, “Pass me one of those would you.” She took a small bite of the fruit, closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the wall.

 

“Organic” she said, eyes still closed. She sighed.

 

I looked at the apples. If organic was code for rotten then she was right on. I put them in the bowl above her fridge.

 

There wasn’t much personality to the room and I was desperate to know more. It had been a while since I had met any other New Zealanders or Australians and I wanted to swap stories. I also didn’t want to go back to my stuffy apartment and watch more episodes.

 

“Where did you live before you came here?” I asked.

 

The old woman slowly opened her eyes and looked me up and down.

 

“Nosy.” She said.

 

I shrugged. I’d been called worse.

 

Wearily she pushed herself up from her bed and got to her knees beside it. Under the bed an old leather travel case, scuffed with age was wedged between floor and springs. She drew it out and unclicked the clasps.

 

 

I stared at the contents.

 

Utterly impressed…

The Old Lady Across the Street (A short story) Part 1

The old lady that lived across the street was always standing on her porch smoking stinky cigarettes. I suspected they were laced with weed. But they could have just been Turkish. She seemed out of place in our yuppyish neighborhood, until I realized that the house across the road was actually divided into tiny bedsit’s, and that she must be one of the renters.

 

I guess she had a room at the back of the house because there was never any Rear Window shit where I watched her life through our living room. I never saw her lights go on, never saw her playing piano or watched her watching TV. I really didn’t know anything about her except that she was always smoking her stinky cigarettes at 5.30pm everyday that I came straight home from work.

 

I didn’t really think too much about her, she was like any other neighbor I’d come to recognize in the street I’d moved to. The young father with bright red hair and a bright red wagon which always had two bright red-haired children stuffed into it and another hanging off his free hand. The middle-aged man in faded Canada Post Jacket fussing with his lawn every morning, leafs/snow/grass.  The pretty girl who was always bundled up on top, and wore thin stockings below.

 

They were all a part of the landscape and I took them for granted. Maybe sometimes I fantasized that I was like Truman from ‘The Truman Show” and they were all extras that added to the scenery. Other times I was less egotistical and just found it amusing that the number of familiar faces were growing with every passing day.

 

Then one morning, I took the day off.

 

Sinuses clogged with snot, chest heavy with mucus, eyes itchy, bloated, stomach churning. Yep, I had the whole list of fun I-can’t-go-to-work excuses. I sat on the couch miserably in my pajama’s, a freshly opened box of crackers in front of me, and the day stretched out like one feverishly exciting house party-of-one.

 

And then I saw the old lady. Hair covered with a scarf, bundled up in a mustard yellow sweater and heavy navy coat, she eased herself carefully down from the steps of the porch with her drag-along shopping trolley, and set off down the road towards the shops. I’d never seen her walk anywhere, and I’d never seen her off the porch, so I was surprised by how slow she was. I guess “old lady” denotes that she’s old, but there are varying stages of oldness. This was definitely less of the Helen Mirren old, and more of the papery thin-skinned grandmother old. I started watching episodes, filling up tissues with the poisons from my nose, throat and lungs. Occasionally I would look out the window and watch the goings on of my street. Mostly I was half conscious.

 

When I was at the end of my sixth straight episode of a sitcom, the old lady coming back down the street. Her pull-along basket didn’t have much in it. Leafy greens poked over the edge and I could see lumpy bags down in the bottom. I watched her try to navigate the stairs, the basket and the awkward distance between each step. And then she fell, not heavily, but backwards over her basket, and like a turtle, she lay on her back, arms and legs wiggling in the air. I pushed myself up on the coach and strained my head left and right looking out the window. No one was around, it was early afternoon, the street was quiet.

 

I grabbed my keys and ran down the stairs, a resplendent vision in faded saggy singlet top and hole riddled green and pink pajama bottoms. The old lady had used the railing to pull herself up, but she still looked shaken and her food was scattered over the pavement.

 

“Are you okay?!” I asked, out of breath and red-faced from my flu.

 

The old lady seemed to be checking herself all over for breaks, she was massaging her knee. After a moment she nodded, and tried to pull herself up further. I put my hands under her elbow and gently lifted her to her feet…

 

 

Photo Credit http://www.monalia.com/partners-in-rhyme-headquarters/