shindiggery

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holy baloney batman i threw a shindig!

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no, there are no pictures.

i always seem to ‘forget’ to take pictures at the good parties…

it’s not on purpose or anything it’s just i forget i have a camera and then the party is nearly over and someone goes ‘oh there’s no pictures’ and i think to myself ‘fucking right, and that’s why you cut loose and had fun isn’t it?’

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dudes.

i threw a shin.dig. a capital S full on people having a great time and staying way later then they meant to shindiggery do.

and it was great.

shane insisted on catering and trust me kids, when shane offers to make her crazy olive dip and her crazy apple cake and date squares and several dips and crudites and casava pie (don’t ask but SOOO good.  it’s pie with MEAT in it!!!)

we got a cheese tray and made meatballs and then hubris and mightydoll made chili and tommer and rachel brought cookies (seperately) and da-mute made filo and nutella yumminess and the paper guy and his wife brought four layer mexi-style dip they made and there was wine and brownies and pie and fun and and and

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dudes, we did it UP

and it was good.

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at one point i came into my room and sat with my sist… you know i don’t know who i sat with… and all i could hear was happy conversation going on in the other room.

many of my loved ones came and you know what?

they loved each other!

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i have little signs of my loved ones everywhere in new plants and candle holders and coasters and awesome leftover food and more wine and beer than i started with!

my place is filled with memories of people i love or am just learning to know and little ghosts of their smiling selves everywhere.

some of the funniest people ended up getting together (shush not like that) and well, it was awesome.

hell rachel threatened to get me to throw her housewarming when she finally has it.

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you know what’s interesting about a party though?

who does and doesn’t come.

who does and doesn’t try.

you learn a lot about the people in your life when you throw a party and you definetely find out something about them.

a mutual acquaintance didn’t show up and yet she’d had several weeks notice and claimed to be coming until the day of and then made up an excuse.

and it was so obviously an excuse, heck she even called herself ‘the worst friend in the world’ in the message.  i’m choosing to assume she’s a little agoraphobic or something but it’s weird.

weird like the people who are so excited to come and then don’t show up or call or ever mention it again.

weird like people you love but who said ‘there’s no way we can make it’ who show up anyway even though they really, really don’t have time or like people you hardly know and invite at the last minute who show up with a really thoughtful gift.

you know, weird.

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i cut all my nails off to go climbing.

yes, i miss them already.

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did you catch that?  i get to go climbing!!

only on the baby walls but still!!!!!

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i found friends i didn’t know i had this weekend and it’s wonderful.

i learned that people i treasure really do treasure me back.

i was surprised to find that some people really can be counted on.

i forgot to get drunk, which i did at my last housewarming as well  (at that one i kept losing margaritas.  at this one i kept losing beers.)

i got a few really awesome gifts.

i ate and fed my friends fantastic food.

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i actually saw a man show up with two friends, cruise the party and then leave to go hang out at a university bar…

and he’s forty.

dude, you’re forty.  find a real woman.

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most of all?

i threw a SHINDIG and it ROCKED!

;>

fire boar

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so i’m a boar… it turns out that when my animal got to swim across a river and determine it’s supremacy it got there last.  funny that it’s element is water… perhaps, like me, it was so busy playing in the water that it forgot to race?

regardless, this is apparently my year.

i’m having a rare bout of cautious optomism and interesting things are happening.

chinese new year is february 18th right?

okay since that day, when it turned into my year, i’ve:

. moved into an awesome new apartment

. gotten a reformer off ebay and actually had it show up

. taught my first clients at my new place and had them like it

. gotten an ‘importers license’

. been invited to my SECOND EVER NHL GAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

. gotten a call from the sports clubs of canada that may involve a lot more work starting in may… i don’t completely trust them, i’ve come close with them before but i’m gently hopeful

. learned how to not pay brokerage fees at customs and that i only have to pay gst on business equipment

. realised that even in a ginormous place i still have more art than i have walls

. accidentally thrown the impromptu first gathering/true housewarming and had it be a smashing success

. [did i mention the hockey game?]

. been cleared by my physiotherapist to approach a climbing gym again.  i’m not allowed to do anything hard or fall or jump down from ANYTHING but i can go play with baby and beginner walls and start to get my muscles back

. slept well repeatedly

. tested negative for all scary stds [not that i was worried]

. learned that a teacher i know is leaving town and attempted to vulture a couple of her classes

. invited everyone i know to the first housewarming party that i’m ever throwing by myself.

. jumped up and down repeatedly about the hockey game i got invited to tomorrow (and it only happened yesterday)

. subbed for a teacher i revere and had her students claim to have a good time!

. had several friends to my new pad and entertained successfully

. met several awesome neighbours and invited them to that same party i’m throwing by myself.

. had a really great jam with the band

. realised i’m a liar and that half my friends are helping me with this party

.  gotten enough sleep that i’m consistently waking up before my alarm and feeling well rested

. plugged in the internet and had it ‘just work’

. had a suspicion that not everything i think i know is as it seems.  and no i’m not explaining that

. reconnected with several people in a business sense, people i needed to reconnect with

. already started to get more organized now that i have some room

.  enjoyed the sounds of silence outside my open window

. decided that it’s bedtime

new space

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the housewarming is march 17th, if you haven’t received your invite i’ve fucked up and you should email me.

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i’ve never had a place that was mine so fast. i think it may have something to do with the circumstances but regardless, this is my home now. i don’t miss my old one at all.

you know, as i type this i think to myself that i could have typed these exact same words three and a half years ago when i moved out of the house i shared with tr.

i can actually look back and realise that it’s always true. that the only places that didn’t feel mine from the beginning NEVER felt mine the whole time i was there.

still this place feels different.

maybe the same way that every time you’re in love it’s ‘different this time.’

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i taught my first client here today.

she approved of the space and loved my new reformer. she was entranced with the view which delighted me to no end because i am too.

i can’t stop staring out the windows!

there are trees and snow and beautiful old houses and people’s windows that are just far enough away. just far enough away that you can’t see in their windows exactly but just close enough that their lights are comforting.

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i stopped by my old apartment today to get the art hangers off the walls. i was going to pick up my plants too but the super agreed that they would die and i’m getting them wednesday.

it’s so small.

it’s so tiny and dirty and covered in dust.

god what a mess i left. i’m not allowed to clean it up because they’re renovating the whole place and there’s no point but i feel weird about it.

i don’t mean i wanted to paint it but i did want to get the major grime off the place before i passed it on. i’m under strict instructions to leave it alone.

i snuck some toilet paper in there today because i ran out at 3am the night before i moved.

yes of course i packed until 5am.

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i love my new house.

love love love love love it.

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only one small problem, i can’t unpack my books because the quarter round isn’t down in my bedroom. my books are piled in my bedroom to get them out of the way and my bookshelves languish empty and unwashed in my living room.

the carpenter has disappeared off the face of the planet because he had to go to court for something or other and i’m stuck not unpacking my books or half my clothing into my dresser until they hire a new carpenter.

yeah, you heard me, hire a new carpenter.

*sigh*

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the cats are beginning to settle in, harriet only cried three times last night instead of thirty seven times the night before.

mouse has investigated the hall and declared it ‘adequate’

and harriet is perturbed at all the changes

and mouse is taking it all in stride.

who knew harriet trouble houdini would be the one not taking the changes well? not i.

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i’m so happy they’re fixing up my old apartment instead of wrecking it, it frees me to be madly in love with this one.

which i am

twitchy ears

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it’s strange to sit here, cross legged on my bed and silhouetted in my mirrored closet doors by the reflected glow of my monitor. i can see my monitor as a black shape and lit up things on the bed and light on my skin.

i tried to take a picture.

yeah, good luck with that.

anyway all i can hear is the hum of a computer fan and the clicking of my fingers on the keyboard.

i can’t hear the people above me.

i’ve heard one conversation in the hall all day and it was quiet and i only heard it because i was passing by and of course i peeked out to see.

ONE!

that’s practically miraculous let me tell you. not to mention the total lack of cars honking, backing up, starting. blowing fumes into my window or otherwise interfering with the peaceful enjoyment of my domicile.

in fact it’s so quiet here that shane thought the wind slamming through the ravine was thunder!

but it’s not, it’s WIND! i have actual wind. thundery wind! and windows with beautiful snow storms outside them and warm lights across the way.

but did i mention the quiet?

every time i hear a noise i jump because it’s so unexpected. what’s funny is that earlier i could hear sirens all the time and now i don’t hear any. guess that’s the difference between snow and not snow in toronto. we got hit with this huge snowstorm today and it snowed right through the evening commute.

i dropped shane off a three minute walk from here and round trip was twenty minutes. it’s five on a normal day.

that was, in fact, the highlight of my day. she was in car in her very first real winter storm in my car!

we’re driving around and the snow is blowing and it’s sticking to the car as fast as i can brush it off although i did give it a full brushing before we left. i couldn’t see out the windows for anything.

but i’ve been driving in snowstorms since before i knew how to drive. i’m from sudbury after all. we have snow.

my mom used to scope out ice covered school parking lots on sunday afternoons while skiing and take us after to do doughnuts.

she swore she was ‘practicing’

uh huh sure mom.

but shane is from an island in the middle of an ocean. she does not have snow,,, this driving whiteness obscuring buildings that were two hundred feet away really freaked her out.

so did the fact that two inches of solid packed white stuff was all over the roads.

me? having fun of course.

i told her to make sure she took a walk in it or she would regret it :)

man you should have heard her, it was hilarious.  she just kept going ‘oh my god’ and cursing out drivers for not being more cautious.  god it was such a treat, i’m glad i was there.

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oh i just lost my train of thought, i heard a glass breaking noise from outside and had to go make sure the cats hadn’t broken the reformer.

yes, the reformer.

the reformer i put together forty three seconds after it came in the door.

the reformer i haven’t taken a picture of yet but i will honest i will.

it’s kind of dirty but otherwise awesome. clearly used but also clearly well cared for and liking to last forever.

i’m in love already… and it looks all pretty in my living room.

it’s the only thing set up other than this computer and it’s sitting on an end table beside the bed!

i somehow have a bucket full of cleaning supplies and no rags or sponges or scrubbers or paper towels. oh and no shower curtain, how did i do that?

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my ears are all twitchy, they expect all this city noise but all they hear is wind and clicking keys.

i think i’m in heaven man.