It’s hard to concentrate at work when your brain checked out a week ago.

I’m really looking forward to Christmas, but not so much for the good times – it’s more the four days off that tickle my fancy just so. I’m exhausted and cranky almost all the time now, and it feels like I’m treading pudding. Chunky pudding that’s past it’s prime. It’s cold, it’s slimy, and I think something is nibbling at my toes. Oh, this is just not good at all.

Last night Josh and I played a hearty round of Good Samaritan. We went to Lonsdale Quay after work for some last minute gifts (well, last minute for me and first minute for Josh because he is a dumb boy), and we saw CRIME in the parking lot. As we were paying for parking, a giant blue pick-up truck backed out of his spot and into a beige sedan. He stopped for a moment, drove forward, then turned his wheel and left the lot. What the fuck, dude. You just HIT A CAR and you didn’t even stop? What an asshole. He left a pretty significant dent in the rear passenger door; one that would definitely cost some coin to be repaired. Josh tried to get his plate number, but it was dark and rainy and the jackass had one of those tinted reflective covers on his plate to stop photo radar from getting his plate number (they don’t work, by the way). Josh memorized what he thought he saw, and I wrote a note to the car owner telling him/her what happened and left the plate number we had. Then because it was raining, we put the note in a plastic bag and left it under their windshield wiper. I hope he goes to the police and tracks the asshole down, because that was a shitty thing to do. I know what it’s like to have someone damage your stuff then just drive off, so hopefully Josh and I were able to help them out and get several large heavy books thrown at the idiot in the pick-up truck. Grrr at nasty people.

So hey, I’m apparently going to Las Vegas. Wacky!

I am phoning this post in.

Never forget the dinosaurs, man.

Also, look at my new hat.

The end.

This was probably one of the least relaxing weekends I’ve had in a while, but it was fun. Friday night saw us wandering around downtown, where we did some Christmas shopping and were coughed on by small grubby children. On Saturday Ed and I went out to survey the damage from Thursday night’s storm – the power was still out along Marine Drive, and the trees in Stanley Park were blown around like matchsticks. We spent most of the afternoon looking for something that apparently did not exist, a story I still do not buy – I saw it, damnit. There’s a conspiracy to make me think I’m going insane, but I’m too wily for that. It’s out there. I will find it.

Today Josh had to work near Granville Island again, so I made Ed accompany me for some more wandering. We had lunch, bought some more presents, and generally had a very pleasant afternoon which was good because we were there for almost 6 hours. After Granville, I convinced Ed it would be a good idea to drive down West 4th, where – hey, would you look at that – PUPPIES!

I got to spend almost an hour playing with the most adorable, wiggly, lovable 14-week-old pug. They put me in a pen with him, and we played and I giggled and he chewed on my toes. I didn’t want to leave, but the store was closing and I didn’t have the money to take him home with me. This just solidified my lust for a pug – I’m fairly certain I’m going through what women go through when they feel it’s time to start popping out babies, except I want a dog. I really, really, really want a dog. I’ve just barely been able to keep myself from buying dog supplies for the dog I know I’m going to get – eerily reminiscent of shopping with Ali when she was lusting after babies – but it’s a battle I’m losing rapidly.

There’s some irony, too – while I was busy staring at the pug, Ed noticed that the girl behind the counter looked familiar. Sure enough, we knew her – she was the VOKRA kitten foster mom we adopted Hobble from. Josh just happened to have pictures of our horsecat on his camera, and we were able to show her just how huge he’s gotten. It made me feel better about the whole place, because I know just how dedicated she is to animals – she’d never work where animals were mistreated or milled.

I want a pug. Someone please give me a pug, or money to get the pug I spent the afternoon with.

WHO WANTS TO HEAR A SECRET!

It’s only somewhat juicy, but a secret nonetheless!

So, who wants to hear it?

For all the chirping I do about our horrible neighbours, I’m sure the people who live below us think the same about us. In fact, they probably think we’re the worst people in the universe. I’m sure if I scoured the internet, I’d find a site called Rumbling Cough or Look at my Scabies that has a running commentary of all the awful things we do. We like to THINK we’re so awesome and considerate of others; the sun glinting off our halos as birds serenade us with a chorus praising our glory, but no. Truth of the matter is we’re just as bad as we think everyone else is.

For starters, we tend to clean the apartment at strange times. Before we were chastised most severely, Ed enjoyed vacuuming at night; usually around 8pm. The downstairs people let us know that a) our vacuum was loud, b) they have a baby who sleeps at this time, and c) please shut the hell up and do your housecleaning during the day like normal people. We didn’t know it bothered them, so we apologized and cut back on our late night vacuuming.

Unfortunately, I also like to clean late at night. Last Saturday I got it in my head to reorganize my girl sauces in the bedroom. This is all fine and good, except it was midnight. While I was dragging baskets of girl sauces out to sort and fondle, I was apparently making some unholy noise. There was a knock on our door, and lo – it was the itchy coughing man standing in his underwear, asking us to stop dragging the damn corpses across the bedroom floor because we were right above their bedroom and it was quite possibly almost as annoying as his rumbling, non-stop coughing. I stopped, of course, but I wasn’t really making THAT much noise. The “dragging” was my pulling a box out from under the dresser, then putting it back. Still, it probably shouldn’t have been done at midnight so I stopped.

That’s two strikes against us that we know about, but how many more do we not know about? I can think of at least one right away: our horse.

Much like the idiots upstairs have an elephant, we have a horse in our apartment. The horse sleeps all day and only really makes noise at 11pm and again at 8am. Horses need exercise, and ours like to gallop around. It’s incredibly loud in our suite; I can only imagine what it sounds like downstairs. We’ve tried to stop the horse from pounding around the floors, but anything we do only makes him more excited and more prone to galloping and also poo arias. It’d be fine if he wasn’t so large, but how do you tell a 20lb horsecat to stop being a cat? He’s barely 1.5 years old; he’s just getting into the playful stage. I feel bad every time he starts to stomp all around the apartment, but it’s also really funny. They haven’t complained yet, and I find it hard to believe that my pushing a box 1 foot across the floor is more annoying than a horse galloping around like an idiot.

I’m also incredibly clumsy and drop things all the time. I’d want to hurt me if I lived below myself. Hopefully they’re a little less sensitive to noise than I am, or I’m in trouble in addition to being not as awesome as I claim.