Things that have happened to me today that may or may not be ironic:

• Walking to the bus in the pouring rain with no umbrella, hat or hood and having the first song to play on my Zune open with the lines “It’s raining again in Vancouver – I haven’t seen the sun in seven days”
• Writing a document for The Lab that claims an internal website is “just like Wikipedia, but with less information about Pokémon” – then an hour later finding myself doing an unrelated lookup on Wikipedia, only to have the first response to my search be an actual Pokémon

If I find a severed foot or someone having sex with a Big Mac on my way home, I quit.

This is the creepiest thing I’ve ever read.

And I’ve read about people having sex with Big Macs.

O_O

I was dismissed on the Sea Turtle this morning.

I was staring off into space and listening to music while waiting for the boat to arrive. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw someone standing beside me who was quite literally rocking out – a large lady in a gray muumuu/coat was staring at me and rocking back and forth as though her very life depended on it. I tried not to make eye contact, but it was obvious she was trying to get my attention – as soon as I glanced her way, her mouth started moving. I reluctantly pulled an ear bud out and listened to her mouth words:

Old Gray Rocker: Dooooooo yoooooou speeeeeak CAN-TON-ESE?
Me: No, I-
OGR: Are you Japanese?
Me: I-
OGR: Korean? Something else I didn’t understand but sounded like “orka”?
Me, finally getting a word in edgewise: I’m actually half Malaysian *smile*
OGR: OH. *turns and pointedly looks away*

WELL. How rude! And she made me stop listening to my angry punk rock for THAT? You suck, old gray coat lady!

Of course, she may have a very valid reason for being so dismissive of my entire half-race. As near as I can puzzle out, when she was young and beautiful and not nearly so gray, she had a dizzying romance with a handsome man who swept her off her humble feet. He showed her a lifestyle the likes of which she had never dreamed, introducing her to high society and all the finer things in life like opera and wine and meals that required special forks and finger bowls. She was head over heels in love, and she knew – just knew – that he was planning to propose to her that evening during their romantic Valentine’s Day dinner. Little did she know, however, that the handsome man’s mother was the iron-fisted ruler of her family and she had cruelly decreed that he would NOT marry filth below his station but rather into another family with the right connections to further her quest for power. That evening’s dinner, unfortunately falling on Valentine’s day was not going to be a proposal – it was going to be the handsome man’s goodbye; one last evening of romance with his true love before he was whisked away to marry General Wong’s dumpy but high-bred daughter.

Heartbroken, the young and beautiful girl grew bitter and resolved. She swore she would get revenge on the woman who ruined her one chance at love, and spent the next 30 years training to be the world’s best and most sneaky assassin. She had long since lost track of her target, but using her secret assassin skills she tracked the family down to Vancouver. Naturally, a highly skilled assassin roaming the streets would call attention to her plan, so a disguise was in order. She let herself go to the point where she would be absolutely invisible to the world around her – unremarkable in every way – and started the hunt that would finally release her from her hellish prison of broken hearts and shattered dreams.

Unfortunately for the now old, gray, bitter assassin, tracking down one single Chinese woman in Vancouver is very, very difficult. She moved aimlessly from neighbourhood to neighbourhood, approaching every woman she saw who could possibly be the target of her hatred and sharp pointy swords. She used every assassin trick in the book to start up conversations, gathering as much information as possible to discern if she had the right person in her sights. As the years went on, she became older and grayer and bitterer and rounder. Her conversations skills, while flourishing, did her little good in the end as her target continued to evade her. As she grew increasingly frustrated, she started using a direct process of elimination method to sort out the women around her: are you Chinese? No? Then go away.

This morning, it was my turn. Upon finding out that I could not possibly be the woman she had sworn to kill, she promptly dismissed me and by doing so, allowed me to live. She will have to continue her hunt, slowly closing in on the woman who stole her love by narrowing down her choices, one random Asian woman at a time.

Good luck, sneaky assassin! May your sword finally taste the juicy tang of victory!

Once, when I was very small, my dad took me with him to the bank. Many years ago, banks made you fill out deposit or withdrawal slips at a counter before you got up to the teller to complete your transaction. My dad filled out his paperwork, and went up to the teller to do grownup bank things. I was small and bored and somewhat cranky, so I did something I had read about in a book once:

I took a deposit slip from the pile, turned it over, and wrote:

.. then I buried the slip in the middle of the pile, and went to join my dad at the teller window.

I was a bad, bad child. I wonder if anything ever happened because of my little prank – if someone’s sitting in jail right now for an attempted bank robbery, I’m really sorry. I was young! Like, 7 or something! Plus, I read about it in a book so you can’t really blame me – blame books. Reading is clearly evil and bad for you.

The fun part is figuring out what terrible part of my life is a direct karma payback for that little stunt. Oops!

Seriously though, I feel bad.

Even if it IS a little bit funny.

I am so going to hell.

Regrettable statements I have made in the last week: “Never have I been less aroused by the smell of an old person!”

Also, last night I dreamed about Peppermint Bacon ice cream.

Both of these things are gross.

My blueberry muffin came with a heaping side order of Jesus. Seriously, the last thing I need in the morning is a scolding from above – I can’t really get much more humble or meek, so stop force feeding me Repent Sinner Pie and let me inherit the damn earth already.

Of course, I’m not really in a good position to bitch about this. Last night I forgot all about my morals and let Ed order pizza from Domino’s, a chain I had been actively avoiding for years due to their founder supporting pro-life religious and political organizations. This is highly distasteful to me, so I avoided Domino’s for years and years while feeling morally superior and smug about it all. Then came last night, when I was so tired and hungry I forgot all about my socially aware reasonings and ate pizza of the damned. It wasn’t until after I had finished dinner and wondered aloud why it had been so long since we’ve ordered from them that I remembered my womanly outrage and promptly felt many shames. I am a bad person.

To make up for it, I am going to choose whether or not I would like an abortion. My decision: no thank you, I am fine as it but thank you very much for the choice and perhaps someday I will take you up on your kind offer.

Take that, religious right.

I feel a little less guilty this morning after doing some research and finding that the loony founder doesn’t have much to do with the company anymore so it’s not like Domino’s is taking the $25 I paid them last night and using it to force some poor woman to have a child she can’t afford. This is good, because it was a damn fine pizza and I plan on eating the leftovers for dinner tonight. I realize I should still have some outrage left over allegations of employee abuse, but there’s only so many things I can be angry about and still be able to purchase goods and services so I will instead focus my incredulous nature towards things happening in my own backyard and not, say, way over there in the UK.

Tasty, tasty pizza.