Waiting for Clean Surf

Not today, but surely tomorrow... and so it has been like this day after day... and this, compounded with my switching back to my short board (9'1"), has taken the fun out of surfing. It just so happens that I have two weeks off work (and closed the B&B for the holidays)... so I've been waiting, and have stopped "going out anyway because there's no such thing as a bad surf"... yeah, actually, there is... in fact, they're all I've had lately.

I also haven't been writing... or, rather, I've been writing only as much as I've been deleting. In a phone conversation this evening, I mistakenly claimed to have deleted more than I have written... I realized immediately that this is not possible, that I could only delete, at most, exactly as much as I've written. I've written and deleted so much lately... there has been a lot of self-censoring... depressing is too often confused with depressed... and even if Schopenhauer was right, no one really cares to hear it... especially not over Christmas... so tap tap tap tap tap and then baaaaaackspace; repeat.

For some good news, I'm going bungee jumping sometime soon... while not having fun in the surf, I decided that bungee jumping would be an excellent idea, especially as it promises excitement while requiring no skills at all, and only a little effort. The bungee jumping place is in Nanaimo... and I've just got to make sure they're re-opening tomorrow. And then I thought that if I make it all the way to Nanaimo, I might as well go to Vancouver for a visit... so... I'm thinking about it... but not all that stoked... I've got all sorts of visitors lined up for Tofino (even better than seeing them in the city... we're all less distracted)... and there's really nothing that I really want to do in the city... nothing I really want to buy, either. My dad then commented that since I've stopped reading, I don't even need to go to bookstores anymore. I hadn't thought of it, but it's absolutely accurate. I used to really want to go to MacLeods (really really really) and Sophia's and the UBC Bookstore... maybe even Oscar's... and even Chapters if I feel like paying too much for a coffee... but not anymore. I don't buy books online now, either. Ever since I was informed that Schopenhauer is "market controlled" and can't be shipped to Canada... I gave up.

Quitting reading is saving me so much money! Not only do I no longer need to pay for books, I don't even need to spend money to travel to bookstores. It's like quitting smoking! "Reading books never caused any cancer," said the person with whom I was speaking on the phone... indeed not... it causes much worse... and most of it probably listed in the DSM-IV. If I ever do decide to pick up reading again, I've got a small stash ready to go, there was a period (now over) during which I kept buying books because I hadn't noticed that I had stopped reading. So there's a stash if I want to read again. Otherwise, I'll spend the next little while clearing out my brain... it might recover as beautifully as an ex-smoker's lungs. Here's hoping.

And... in other news (I'm not sure how I feel about this)... Têtes à claques is now available in English. It's true... I went there just now to see what's new... I hadn't been there for a few months... and there it was... every video I could think of-- redone in English. The fact that they were for the longest time only available in French (and super colloquial Quebec French, at that) was sort of a consolation to me... it validated my learning French... not wholly, I'm not saying that... but it became one of the reasons that I was glad I speak French... it made it all worthwhile. For all my years of work, I was rewarded with the privilege of understanding and appreciating Têtes à claques. What is left to me now but capturing a few extra nuances in French movies, and overpronouncing some names of wines and cheeses? (which, btw, is totally uncool in Tofino, it's like no one even hears the bit that doesn't sound like English) Even Meilleur du chef (source of excellent illustrated recipes) is available in English. Why, in this new world (I heard a rumour than your Ipod will now translate for you??), would anyone bother to learn another language?

Give me something beautiful to make it worthwhile. Send roots rain.

Crappy surf today... does anyone want to go bungee jumping?

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Relax, it's almost over...

I could have titled this post "Merry Christmas"... or... "White Christmas"... but I decided against the former because "Merry" is such a strange word and so rarely used... it brings to mind "The Merry Widow"... which in turn brings to mind the word "Lustige"... and then of course, it looks and sounds so much like the English word "Lusty" that I just had to look it up... and... well wouldn't you know it, dictionary.com provides us with this for etymology:
bef. 900; ME luste, OE lust; c. D, G lust pleasure, desire; akin to ON lyst desire; see list ⁴
Didn't even need to take the OED out of the case for that one. Can you imagine people going around saying "Lusty Christmas"?

And as for "White Christmas"... I decided not to use that phrase because I just can't shake the double entendre in my head. White Christmas? Why yes it is... quite white indeed... and not because of the snow, either... but that's enough about that.

My Christmas plans are very conservative... all I need to do is get out of bed by noon, check the surf report, and go out for a surf if it promises to be good. I have been observing other people's Christmas plans unfolding, and am quite happy to not have to participate in anything of the sort.


Relax, it's almost over.

Gingerbread House

I started making a gingerbread house last Thursday... made a batch of gingerbread dough before going to the Koer's party... then I worked on it all week... and by the time I finished, it looked like this:
And the back looked like this:

Here's a close-up of the front:

And here is a close-up of the fence and trees:

The house (and landscaping) was completed this afternoon. The house was immediately delivered as a Christmas gift. I am in the process of uploading some "work in progress" photos... that will be out on another blog entry...

O Tannenbaume

Here are the beginnings of a royal icing arboretum.
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I wasn't going to mention the silver cars, but...

There's a song by Robert Charlebois called Je reviendrai à Montréal... which I had always found incomprehensible... Montreal winters didn't seem to me to be something one could miss... but the song is all about needing to feel the cold, to really be at one with it, to marry it, even (and that was always the part I found disturbing... the line "me marier avec l'hiver")... this past weekend though, for the first time, I sort of understood it a little.

It started snowing on Saturday while I was out in the surf and continued to snow into the night. On Sunday, everything was covered in snow. The wind was blowing the snow off trees and roofs. Snowflakes shimmered in the air. I remember looking out the window at the Quebec winter and its prohibitive -30 coldness and being told that it isn't too cold to go out for a walk as long as one dresses for it. Cold winters can be fun... for a few days anyway. I looked at Tofino covered in forgetful snow.. and wanted to be outside... to feel the cold... so I dressed for the cold and walked into town... (as it turns out, it only looked cold... it wasn't really)... I got to the park on Third Street (it has a name, and I knew it once) and stood there, looking at Lone Cone Mountain. I then had this urge to climb Lone Cone, in the cold, with the snow. Climbing a mountain covered in snow for some reason seemed like a good idea... maybe because I haven't yet christened these new hiking boots with a winter hike yet... or maybe I'm just thinking of a good day some years ago when I walked up a South Shore land pimple on an insanely cold Quebec winter day.

I didn't climb Lone Cone (logistic issues... it's on the other side of the water)... but I walked a little more. During my short Sunday morning walk, I ran into five people I knew... most of them were in their cars... one was standing beside his. Two rolled down their windows to talk to me. The odd thing was... all the cars were silver. There was a silver Honda Element, a silver Dodge Ram 2500, a silver Volkswagon Eurovan, a silver Dodge Ram 1500, and a silver X-Terra. I wasn't going to mention the silver cars in this note... but Anthony called me and we had a chat... when I told him about the five silver cars... he remarked that Val doesn't like silver cars. That's almost as odd as my running into only silver car drivers during my walk... so I'm now telling you all about it (fascinating, eh?).

When I sold my Pathfinder, I think I sold my courage with it. I use to drive anywhere in any weather condition... now with my RWD Aerostar (which, because it locks up an 11' board, is still the best car ever) I'm afraid to go anywhere in bad weather. And it's snowing right this moment... and I'm already worrying about my commute to work in the morning... it might take me 4 minutes instead of 2... or 12 minutes, even, if I choose to walk because I'm too scared to drive.

Cold

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