You Just Want to Shake'm!!

So somehow Eric manages to do this kind of post every other day, while it usually takes me a month or two to save up comments I want to make to the outside world. But apparently I was particularly blessed this morning, noticing not one, not two, but three things that left we really wanting to shake the person and say, "why!?"

#1 Classy Hot Girl Smoking & Drinking Tim Hortons Coffee

Now I should start off by clarifying that I don't think smoking is unattractive or attractive. I'm really neither here nor there about it. I prefer if Grimes doesn't smoke because (a) it means I'm stuck all on my own for 8-10 minutes every three hours and (b) because if he dies I'm really screwed. But for almost everyone else in the population - go nuts. And Timmy Ho's!? Man alive do I ever love that stuff. Tim Hortons is probably the only place in the world that makes me so happy that I don't mind that not a single cashier speaks even remotely passable english anymore  or that the store is always full of crazies.

*side note: last night I was accosted by a crazy man in line for coffee who explained how he only ate tuna fish, and would wait till the day before it expired, and then buy all the tins at a severely marked down price along with soon to be expired mayonnaise, mix up the tuna fish salad and spread it into an ice tray. Then, every night, he would just pop out two cubes of tuna fish salad, defrost it for a few minutes and spread it on. Actually not a bad idea at all now that I've written it down, but you have to understand that he was this scraggly old man with no teeth and dirt all over his face. THEN, when I finally got to the front of the line, I ordered the sandwich meal - I was there before class, so I was picking up my dinner - and the guy asked me what side I wanted. I asked for a cookie so he went over to the display, got me the white macadamia nut that I so craved and then turned around and looked at me, like "what else?" So I asked for another. And he looked back again, "what else?" Uh... Another one? Done. And again, "what else?" I guess 4 should be enough. Hell of a deal I thought, I only got one last time I ordered the meal. Of course the $4.70 meal came out to $9.20. "That seems a bit steep, doesn't it?" I asked. "You order FOUR cookies!!" Eugh.... It was the classic, "AND THEN..." But I digress...*

But when you put danking and Timmy's coffee together, it's not a pretty sight. Even paint and plaster covered dudes in work boots and jumpsuits look pretty damn rough sitting out in the cold having a Tim Hortons coffee and an Export Gold. So you can imagine my surprise as I turned the corner onto Queen St. from Bathurst and there was this glamorous woman - looked like a ruskie - with beautiful expensive boots, skinny jeans, an expensive jacket and a big expensive fur hat (think Costanza's) sensually smoking this long cigarette, and then taking a big haul from an extra large double double. There isn't a Tim Hortons in almost 3 miles of that intersection!! So you know she was really after that T.H.! It was stunning what a difference that coffee cup made. It was like when you see a slim bittie from behind who looks all hipstered-out and awesome, and then she turns around and she's a 60 year-old heroine addict with make-up smeared across her face like she never washed off her Joker costume after halloween. GAH! GAH! It feels like you should cough up a fur ball. That's what I wanted do to do when I saw the woman this morning. She was in front of a Starbucks!! Get a fancy drink!! I don't even like Starbucks, but I know this: if you're willing to spend $500 on a russian fur hat, buy a fucking latté!!

#2 iPod on Shuffle

Of course I listen to my iPod on shuffle all the time. Because it's your iPod! But while I was walking to work it really struck me just how dangerous this can be. I know people who just toss their iPod on willy nilly in public places. PUBLIC PLACES!! You don't know what could pop on! Hanson. "MmmBop." Good song? GREAT SONG! But you don't want that playing by accident. I recall one occasion, it was summer in Montreal. A time for lovers. I was living at 68 Duluth, just east of St. Laurent in this great apartment that had a deck out front that was mostly for my roommate and awesome friend Adam Conter, and a deck in back that looked over a tiny courtyard shared by the six apartments in this tiny building. If you sat on the back deck, the window to my room was only a few short feet away, and on warm nights you could sit out there, look up at the sky, listen to some tunes and enjoy life. 

One night I was up there with a totally bodacious babe - although obviously not as bodacious or babely as my current girlfriend, who may or may not be reading this... - and, as young bucks and buckettes are wont to do, we were smooching a bit, sharing some drinks, taking in the stars and listening to some tunes. All of a sudden, the opening riff to, "If I Had A Million Dollars." Game over.

"Is this Barenaked Ladies?"

"BNL? Uh... I don't know... I - I don't think..."

"It is! Isn't this that Million Dollar song?"

"Uh, maybe..."

"Huh...."

And that was the end of that. We stopped smooching, she suddenly remembered that she had an early morning the next day and had to leave, and I ended up being stuck with half a case of PBR and a few more hours of moonlight. Luckily I took advantage of the moonlight and gave those PBRs a good home.

I recall another occasion, a Wednesday, and I was studying with a girl who I had hooked up with the night before at Café Campus' 80s Night. I'd known her in Rez where we'd lived the year before and we got along really well. I thought she was very attractive (she was) and so the next day, I really wanted to make a proper push to see if something was there.

We were sitting around, diligently working, talking every once in a while, and listening to my iPod (on shuffle) and suddenly The Police came on. "Message in a Bottle". And I said, thinking out loud, "Eugh, sorry about this - I'm so sick of The Police, I feel like I'm saturated with these songs..." And she asked,

"Who?"

"The Police."

"Who?"

"The Police.... Sting?"

A puzzled look.

"The Police... we were at 80s night LAST NIGHT! Certainly you know one of the most influential bands of that decade."

"Nope."

"NOPE!? WHAT DO YOU MEAN 'NOPE!'"

"I don't know them."

"You don't know The Police? Syncronicity? It sold 8 MILLION records in the US alone!!"

"Sorry..."

"No... No, it's.... It's okay..."

And that was the end of that. Shuffle can mend you life / But shuffle can break your heart.

#3 The Unicycler

I'm probably the only person who is confronted by this - unless the whole world is going to complete shit faster than I'd originally thought... Every day on my walk to work there's this skinny little hipster kid - maybe 16 or so - who wears super slick clothes, keeps fashionably tussled hair, and rides a unicycle to school. Or sorry, did I not emphasize that enough? HE RIDES A FUCKING UNICYCLE!!! Now if it were a calm sunny Sunday in the middle of June and I saw a kid unicycle past me I'd either not care at all (very likely) or at least acknowledge that it was nice that a kid was having a good constructive time on a sunny summer day (possible, but much less likely). But it's a Canadian winter! If it's snowing, no problem. You'd better believe that there's one lonely track, writhing it's way up the Bathurst sidewalk. -25? there he is, just rubbing his hands together and looping up the street. And it's not like he's burning either. It's not like a guy on a bike who you feel sorry for, but  know that at least he'll be out of the cold sooner than you. This kid is struggling!! I want to grab him. I want to grab him and shake him and yell, "YOU DON'T HAVE TO DO THIS!!" I want to shake him till that emo glaze recedes from his eyes. Shake him till he makes that awesome involuntary noise that people make when they're being shaken; yoi-yoi-yoi-yoi. "SNAP OUT OF IT YOU GOOFY BASTARD!!" Just walk. Just for a month! That's all. Wait till the snow melts. Till it's above zero degrees. Wait till you can hear birds again. Wait till this looks like a fun constructive pastime, not like the escape plan for a lunatic clown child.

But sometimes you have to acknowledge that no matter how hard you shake a person - sometimes they just don't get it.