planning a canadian roadtrip.....

despite doing 3000 miles in 3.5 days last october (much thru the wilds of canada) i'm more than ready for another roadtrip.........now we all know the perfect roadtrips start spontaneously with little more than a vehicle, credit card and possibly being under the influence (no i don't advocate driving drunk/stoned or stupid - that's when you let yer friends drive so you can even get more wasted......). but admittedly a roadtrip to a hostile foreign country does require a bit of planning...........(passports, matching stories and attitude). oh, do you think canada is a peaceful nation? try spending an hour or so at canadian customs - but that's another story - avoid the sumas/abbotsford crossing......

however, there has been discussion as of late of the vital need for a large and personal stash of two (and possibly the only two) of canada's positive attributes - bueno candy bars and beaver buzz energy drinks. can't get either one in the states. they are forbidden fruit, made ever so much sweeter by the exotic (and dangerous) location. over the border. yes, THAT border......into the land of poutine, red green, damnable customs officials and "eh"..... although i really do want to see their faces when - in that little room with that lone naked light bulb hanging down over me - i tell them in all honesty i'm headin' into canada for the beaver buzz and bueno bars.......

we can make it from northern california to the border in less than 12 hours. that includes stops for gas and whatever. don't think we can??? if we didn't get (a) lost in portland (b) distracted by a great cosmetics sale in mt. vernon washington and (c) stuck in road construction hell just south of the sumas crossing we would've made it easy in 12 hours last time. that dark red streak blazing up I-5 that dark october night was US! only time i slowed down to something close to the legal speed limit was in southern oregon because - as a former resident of medford, oregon - i know how much oregon state police LOVE to pull over vehicles with california plates. no, i don't respect authority that much but i dislike a ticket and a hassle even more.....

anyway that's the plan. 48 hours in canada (as to be able to bring back $800 worth of candy and beaver buzz back duty free). then haul ass back across the border. of course it'll be on this blog........... and this time we'll be ready for canada. there will be mandatory stops at http://voodoodoughnut.com/ and http://www.bigfootjava.com/ in mt. vernon WA. canada? hopefully we can just blend in somewhere around vancouver as we fill up the back of the yukon with forbidden fruit...........natch we will find the places that canadian tourism does NOT want you to know about......

hopefully in a few months i'll have completed this mission (obviously after moving back down to california where all my craziest friends are) and can share the whole sordid tale (names will be changed to protect the innocent and the guilty)..........later

personality disorder??

welcome to the sunday afternoon of my discontent.......sunday afternoons are depressing. no more weekend to look forward to - just monday and another week of "nothing much too special if i'm lucky" or another week of "what the fuck is going to go wrong NOW???" option two is usually what happens by wednesday pm.....as i am awaiting calls and visits from both lowes and spenard builder's supply by mid-week, i'm sure this week - like most others - will be one of those "what the fuck......" weeks.

i'm also waiting for the results of a whole battery of tests done on me friday to be in my fabulous but somewhat distracted md's hands by monday. i'm not looking forward to learning the results. either way i'm screwed. if they are bad, then at least there's a reason for feeling lousy. if they are good, then it's even worse.......then there's no reason for feeling like a truck hit me.....

it was interesting to sneak a look at my records on my doc's computer though (he should be thankful i wasn't feeling too creative or i would've done something fun to his screensaver). let's go down the list ......"stage 3 chronic renal failure" - check. "vascular hypertension (see stage 3 chronic renal failure) - check. "depression" - check. but PERSONALITY DISORDER!?!? since when has this been a diagnosis and/or problem? true - i have the attention span of a gnat, a generally pessimistic outlook towards life, i question most authority and always drive over the speed limit..... but since when is this a personality disorder? i thought it was part of my charm....

now the nice folks at the american psychiatric association define a personality discorder as "an enduring pattern of inner experience and behavior that deviates markedly from the expectations of the culture of the individual who exhibits it". uh - and this is supposed to be a bad thing???

i just took a peak at the news from my "culture" today and did a few searches on twitter, yahoo, etc. etc. it seems that my culture is obsessed about jon and kate, susan boyle, the hills, octo-mom's new reality series and dozens of ways to increase penis size....... and some half-baked pro-life moron murdered an abortion doctor. in church nonetheless for that special touch of irony.

not that i don't indulge in reading cheap tabloids or trying to keep somewhat aware of the news (how else will i know what to complain about?) but why are all these people taking all of this sooooooooooo seriously??? if i had to live with a shrew like kate, i'd be spending a lot of time in bars myself. i'm still trying to figure out the public's obsession with women that produce litters......is there really that much of a market for clever uterus tricks?

as far as the pro-life moron - angry? yes. surprised? oh hell no! my only surprise is how quickly the right-to-life folks are disassociating themselves from the deed. if the tide of public opinion was actually in favor of such a cowardly act, they'd be beating their chests and proclaiming it was them all along........yes indeed - i gave him the gun AND a ride to church! but as it's not, they doing the non-violence spin faster than i would run to a 75% off clearance rack at macys.....

groucho marx had it right - "I don't care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members"....... we are the malcontents that relish in pointing out the emperor has no clothes (or that "caribou barbi" is a great nickname for sarah palin - but that's another rant). do you really want to go over the cliff with the rest of the lemmings? if questioning the status quo is a personality disorder, then my doc got it right - and the man knows me well enough to i would consider a "personality disorder" a compliment of the highest regard!

shit - i should've changed his screensaver while he was out of the room......damn!

i can't find the damn first post i wrote.............tell me again why i wanted to do this? i must've been under the influence of something..........

blogging and losing your virginity.......

my first blog....... and it has pretty much turned out like losing my virginity. lots of great expectations and romantic notions reduced to lots of awkward fumbling around.......

i had all sorts of clever, humorous, sardonic, insightful, etc. observations just welling up inside me. like the perfect comebacks you think of 10 hours after the fact......

but instead i am staring at something with absolutely no idea where to start, how to do it or even how to fake it (pretty much like losing your virginity except there's no wet spot to avoid).

but at least the first time is over and done with............whew!