i defining i: funny

Showing posts with label funny. Show all posts

July 7, 2011

gag (v.)

I don"t have much of a gag reflex. Most things, though gross, will elicit a verbal response from me instead. A gag, only comes now and again, when words just can't be processed in time.

Words, like the following, are great titles for wretched, sickly things we encounter in life:
"gross" (a go-to term for things that simply repulse us; overused in my vocabulary)
"yucky" (to describe things that elicit a pasty fat-tongue feeling at the back of your throat)
"disgusting" (for a response to something physically seen)
"creepy" or "uncanny" (if it gives me some kind of out-of-this-world, ephemeral shudder)
"foul" (if it's immoral or indescribably stinky)
"abysmal" (if I'm feeling dramatic or using a British accent)
"god-awful" or "fugly" (in response to bad fashion choices)

All of these words are great for making a negative remark and expressing a repulsed opinion about both the physical and abstract world. However, none of these words encompass what a gag does.

Gag encompasses a moment. It makes your eyes roll back, the skin go all goosebumpy, and the brain momentarily stop functioning. It's an experience where for an instant, the exact millisecond that the sparks in your mind fly to connect what's happening, your body follows with a simple gag.

Today, I gagged for the first time in a long time. I was sitting in my office keeping up my daily quota of 2L of water a day by sipping from my Nalgene. Before I knew it, I had something in my mouth - the texture of a leaf. I spat it out, instantly, and to my horror, realized it was a daddy long legs. Well, a deceased daddy long legs. My throat did some funny retraction thing, and there it was: a gag.

I eventually got over it, ate my peanut butter and banana sandwich and got on with my day, researching ebook series and fact checking an article on a universal influenza vaccine.

But it wasn't over.

A few hours later, I was on St Catherine walking home from work with a bounce in my step, in a giddy mood. I walked into the Jean Coutu there to buy some Bandaids and goat milk soap (my latest obsession). In the aisle, to my horror, another gag recurred.

What I'm about to show you probably does not warrant the gag reflex kicking in, but I guess the muscle memory kicked in with the long-legged bug still lingering in whatever part of my brain it is that files away trauma.

Here it is my friend. Something gag-worthy:

For other cilantro-haters like me, please join the anti-cilantro movement.

Thank you and good night, y'all.

*gag*

May 23, 2011

count off (n.)

It's been a while since I wrote anything - seeing I moved my butt across the country for an exciting opportunity to work at Reader's Digest Canada for the summer, you think it would've been sooner that I'd feel I needed to let it allll outttt!!

I haven't had a moment to even reflect on all that's happened in the last 2 weeks - however, now that I have a long weekend, I can get started (and hopefully finished).

To avoid this turning into a long Vish Ramble, I will also (in Vish-like manner) proceed with a list.
Alliteratively and alphabetically (feels so good).

I imagine this will give you all an idea of what my life in Montreal (mon-ray-all) has been like since I got here a couple of weeks ago :) Of course, there's parts missing, but I've tried to piece it together....

My Apartment is on Rue Aylmer - with ample room for all my stuff.

I've been drinking ample amounts of St. Ambroise amber ale on any given "patio day".

I have a balcony that overlooks a bad-ass beer can burial ground.

Bixi bikes are the best - and especially beneficial for booking it to Outremont for fresh babkas and bagels in the a.m. (My monthly Bixi pass was the first thing to arrive in the mail addressed to me!)

$2 chow mein on St. Laurent is not closed. Clearly, it's still conducive to late-night chomping - two doors down from the original location.

Crescent St.'s Sir Winston Churchill pub is cheaper than I remember it being. $2.50 for a mixed cocktail on Mondays?!

Champs has officially been classified as the centre of Canucks fandom.

D

Dinner has become really delightful because I get to dream it up and make myself - simple or crazy, it's always delicious.

Evening runs and walks :)
Eden grocery has all the lovely specialties I encountered in Vancouver all in one spot: vegetable gyozas, Bengal spice tea, fortune cookies, Leslie Stowe's crisps, mint body wash & Manna bread!

Looking forward to festival season to start up in June... it's gonna be effin' crazy! And fireworks!
Miss Farmer, my new weekend roomie :) sleepovers, manicures, movies & ice cream!
I have yet to learn francais... Je vais continuer essayer...

Google has been a gigantic help in giving me tips on how to find things, clean things, cook things, and just generally, how to play house!

H

My home was not hot enough (i.e. cold) so I used my hair dryer to keep my toes warm in the mornings.

H&M shopping and city "hike" with Dani for 6 hours in the heat.
Tim Horton's iced capps in the old city.

Visited Little Italy, Dani's neighbourhood - the industrious Jean Talon market and its invigorating fruit samples are the bomb.

Place Jacques Cartier and the old city - just great for jolly weekend afternoons :)

Cooking "instruction sheet" pull-out in my oven! And my red kitchen!

I really like my kitchen - it's kind of a room of its own, with access to the balcony and filled with useful knick-knacks; it has a Vish-sized oven, too!

Mini kickoff pizza party at work on my first day at RD.
Went to The Keg with Ben before he left for the month; probably the last steak I'll be able to afford on my summer (party, concert) budget!

Pont Victoria connects Montreal with St. Lambert.

Ben and I went on a little adventure to St. Lambert where he'll be working at an e.s.L. camp!
Biking the Lachine canal and the St. Lawrence river.

The first day arriving at my apartment, it looked more than a little dark - but then Ben screwed in some more light bulbs... phew!
Oh-- AND! check out: Librissime bookstore.

Marche Lobo: money well spent (on mounds of food - organics too!); with prices like that, it's gotta be a shady operation, right?
Mango had a 30% off sale! Speaking of mangoes... the city can't get enough of them!
Missing all my Vancouverites, of course.... :) Vous me manquez!

N

Noshing: one of Dani & Vish's favourite activities when they get together. (Melt that Fudge-O, Dani!)

Trying on onesies at Forever 21 on the long weekend...uber obnoxious-looking.

Poutine, please!

Quinoa, the quintessential nutritious dinner :)

Reader's Digest is going really well - I've been given a range of responsibilities that I like doing and am good at: research, reviewing/editing, writing copy, pitching articles, doing marketing tasks (ad layouts for example) and updating online content. So far, so good - and everyone is so nice!

S

except no goal by Salo yet....

and no win for Ben...(yet!)

Free shots at the sports bar for every time Burrows or Salo scored a goal!
Skyping with my Vancouverites makes me feel special :)
Summer hours at work means early Fridays!
Scrabble with Ben is not dead!

Tam tam on Sunday: picnicked and really got into it...so sweaty!

U

Early May: UVA rays, what!
& St. Urbain's wonderful Jewish bakeries - and downhill bike lane! :)

Vishie likes this ville she's living in. A smart personal venture.
Restaurant signs, "apportez votre vin", means cheaper wine for just an uncorking fee!

The park kiddy corner to my building.

Walking to work is great! Sipping coffee, getting a bit of Vit D, right before the day starts :)
Also - On Saturday I realized that my apartment had no hot water; and I also realized that, you know you're in Montreal when your neighbours don't seem to care or mind all that much - apparently hot water is more of a luxury than a necessity? Well, I'm relieved to find that today (Monday), the faucet gave me what I needed and it sure is hot!

xox's to all my lovelies who aren't here with me!

Couldn't say anything but, "Yes!" to onion rings at Champs!

Z
Looking for Dani's place - on rue zygote was over zealous as it was really "rue Zotique".... woops.

Now I know my Ah - Bay - Says... Next time won't you chante avec maaayyy!!

<3 miss you all!

May 6, 2011

patience (n.)

patience - a noun. Though it really should be a verb.

Over the last three months, I've been putting my design skills to work by offering my volunteer services to Mothership Stories Society, a non-profit organized by Marilyn Norry, which dedicates itself in collecting stories about mothers as written by their children in order to archive a valuable history of ordinary women, which otherwise may be forgotten. Without such efforts, legacies of interesting, perseverant women whose lives tell us about women's roles and experiences and the times in which they've lived, may never be recorded.

Today, after weeks of editing, typesetting, caption-collecting, resolution-fixing, exporting, merging, and flattening, we finally printed a final version of: My Mother's Story: the originals.

[Stay tuned for news on where to buy the book!]

The seven hour ordeal (made all the less chaotic and stressful by Oscar's Books' Adam and Barry), entailed changing margins last-minute for 120 minutes, fixing files to fit new printer specifications, and reformatting photos till we got them just right. We chose paper stock, grew impatient with the printer at times (oh cream paper why must you curl?!), but eventually came out with a breathtaking book that just made us all fuzzy inside.

During the process, I also just learned the importance of patience and how it helps to find the humour and joy in stressful situations so that you can stay functional. Find contentment through patience instead of making things worse by giving in to impatience, its evil sibling.

I also realized why, when saying patience, we're kind of saying "pay" "ssh" "sense".

Pay
Without patience, you pay the price. If you lose it, get hasty and decide "oh whoooo caaaares", it bites you in the ass. I thankfully didn't experience this today, but was nonetheless tempted to give in to this illogical bargain.
You also have to pay a certain amount of attention and find focus, energy, diligence, and good stamina in order to get patience to really work its magic.

Ssh
You have to keep that little voice in your head that's screaming "WTF %^&#@!!" and other such unhelpful and wasteful filth from clouding your mind. You must shush that angry, impatient voice so that you can keep your focus on what's really at hand - what really matters in the end. You don't want years of dedication and months of hard work to go to waste just because you lost your nerve right at the end.

Sense

paper, ink, glue to bind!

This has a dual aspect. In one way, while impatient, your senses become a little crazy and over-irritated, for lack of a better word. You're waiting for the printer to print 234 pages at a time, the glue is heating up more slowly than you'd like, your stomach's grumbling, and you feel your blood sugar is plummeting because you just had to get those margins right before you deserved a break. (Yup, I'm referring to hangriness here again- I'm quite susceptible to it as you can see).
Your senses become a little crazy when you're impatient - the lights are too bright, and you lose sense of time. You start seeing page numbers where they shouldn't be (and really aren't).
(Thankfully, however, I also became hyper-aware and could still tell which "final version" was really the final version; I also somehow still retained a deft hand clicking through InDesign with super-alien precision.)

"Pop! goes the weasel!"

In another way, it also makes sense to be patient. It's always more efficient than impatience - and a whole lot more fun. Though we spent close to five hours at Oscar's today, waiting and printing, and proofing, and changing and printing again, we had a lot of laughs. I got to meet some new people, learn new things about distribution, eat a cookie and a mandarin, watch the Expresso machine in action, pose for pictures, and to our amazement and joy, finally see a pretty copy come out, with a smile on my face.

Here's to a job well done! And please let me know if you'd like a copy :)

And because it's so fitting:
Here's to all the mothers of the world for being the most patient people on the planet.

Happy early Mother's Day!

My mom and I.

March 25, 2011

hangry (adj.)

Today I was a busy bee. Off I went to school this morning, then caught a dentist appointment around lunch, and whilst waiting for my fluoride to set into my teeth, starved my poor self putting together scholarship applications. Then, I had a very productive meeting with my lovely MPub tech group (Rabbit Hole Marketing!) and our professor, while chowing down on some lentils. After a couple of hours of that, I sat in my swivel chair working on my first digital portfolio, then ran off to a yoga class as part of my #YYoga30DayChallenge. Busy busy bee!

I must share with you that whenever I use that phrase, I am reminded of "Busy Bee Cleaners" - an establishment I drove by twice, every single day for an entire decade. Every morning, as I drove up Granville Street from 70th Avenue on my way to grade 4 (or grade what have you), I'd see Busy Bee Cleaners - a little white boxy building, in the far corner of the little strip of stores next to the Korean noodle place, looking grungy and dusty and packed.
For some reason, the name stuck; and today, I thought of myself as this crazy lil bee flying around doing way too much, not eating enough, with piles and piles of laundry to do!

Apart from feeling like a busy bee, however, I also felt HUNGRY. After yoga, I had what I call, "yoga-head". I temporarily felt fine - until, of course, my boyfriend came over and I decided to become irritable and annoyed at almost everything he said.
So, today: my entry is dedicated to Ben. I'm sorry for getting so hangry. I hope that, next time, you force feed me before we truly interact. Then you'll get some more honey, and less stinger.

(p.s. He's accepted my apology. We're having a splash of scotch with our friend Aaron right now - he cooks up a meaaannnnn stir-fry! Thanks, Aaron!)

[I would really, really appreciate some feedback on my portfolio, too. Any comments are welcome, and will be taken to heart! Thanks!]

March 13, 2011

prejudice (n.)

I drink, I fall down, no problem.” ~James Joyce

In light of some recent conversations, (either mildly inebriated or dead sober in History of Publishing class), I got to talking about Jane Austen.

"An alcoholic is someone you don't like
who drinks as much as you do."
~Dylan Thomas

It first began with a discussion of what a true literary "canon" is, who gets to decide, and whether we should care. To spare you the bore (that only MPub students could enjoy), it was concluded that there were a number of us with English Lit degrees or the like who never read Pride and Prejudice.

Over the weekend, I had a chat with some friends of mine and we somehow started talking about literature (we were probably drinking scotch). Our conversation also culminated with Jane Austen by way of Joyce and Conrad.

"What's so unpleasant about being drunk?
You ask a glass of water" ~Douglas Adams

I've personally concluded that, while it is important to not be complete ignorant of classic lit, there's nothing wrong with choosing to avoid it. Some would call you "low brow" for never picking up Bronte; others would say you're "uneducated" for SparkNote-ing Middlemarch.

I say, there's so many books out there to sift though that it is a skill in itself to discover unconventional, "non-English curriculum" authors like Graham Swift, Haruki Murakami, Richardson Davies, Ivo Andric, and Will Self - at the expense of Jane Austen - and all of whom I would have never discovered had I stuck to "Top 100 Novels of All Time" lists.

"Beer, of course, is actually a depressant. But
poor people will never stop hoping otherwise."
~Kurt Vonnegut

I call it being proud in my prejudice.
There's too much to experience to not pass judgment.

Drink and dance and laugh and lie,
Love, the reeling midnight through,
For tomorrow we shall die!
(But, alas, we never do.)"
~Dorothy Parker

"Good books, like good friends, are few and chosen; the more select, the more enjoyable."
~ Louisa May Alcott

February 2, 2011

quoth (n.)

Yup.
Sounds like: a wet cough somehow escaping through your nostrils.

It also is an archaic simple past tense version of "quethe" which sounds like: a wet sneeze that somehow escaped through your eye sockets.

The reason this is my word today - apart from wanting to be kind of Murakami-ish - is that my mind's been very occupied with a paper and seminar presentation I've been preparing for my tech class on copyright.

Some keywords spinning through my head recently:

digital locks, creative commons, social restrictions, unregulated use, Lawrence Lessig, Bill Gates, "quoting", fair dealing, DRM, Bill C-32, copying, sharing, expression, creativity, free culture, remixing, Google, attribution, derivative works, creator, user, YouTube, Share-Alike, commercial use, blogging, published, registry, provisions, technology, distribution, interpretation...

These come up in no particular order (though I hope they show up in some meaningful nature in the paper) and are concepts that really cannot be given the proper attention in 1500 words and a batch of slides on WordPress.

However, to give myself some perspective and help myself embrace the fact that it's not up to me to figure out the solution to current issues surrounding copyright law in Canada.....I've employed some Photoshop skillz and devised a few cartoons I consider to be funny - and I hope you'll giggle a bit, too.

Enjoy.

A short summary of copyright law:

Law of Anne, 1710.

No such thing as unregulated uses?

Length of copyright terms: creator's life + 50 years!

"Google, google, toil and trouble..."
The new Disney?

Have a good weekend,

- Vish

January 31, 2011

reason (n.) Kafka on the Shore review

I had a lovely Saturday this past weekend - finished off some work for school around 6pm and then decided to finish off the Murakami novel I've been reading... I lay into my super comfy couch and read for about half an hour and then was lulled to sleep with The Deep Dark Woods playing in the background. I can't remember the last time I napped so deeply - and man, did I enjoy it. Didn't even wake up groggy...

Forty minutes later, I got up, fixed myself a huggggee coffee and excavated through the last twenty pages of Kafka on the Shore. It was fantastic(al). I had about an hour and a half before I was heading out for a friend's birthday so I did my best to make sense of a novel that according to its author,

"...contains several riddles, but there aren't any solutions provided. Instead several of these riddles combine, and through their interaction the possibility of a solution takes shape. And the form this solution takes will be different for each reader. To put it another way, the riddles function as part of the solution. It's hard to explain, but that's the kind of novel I set out to write."

(I won't keep quoting the genius man though - there's way too many blogs out there that keep referring to a certain interview with Haruki Murakami.)

So, great. I was left with questions that somehow amalgamate into a set of riddles - riddles that aren't even really clear, let alone their solutions. So, after turning the last page, Murakami planned to still require me to continue suspending my beliefs so that I could draw up a "reasoned" (or rather, "reasonable") solution.

You'd think that after 460 pages of suspending belief and growing accustomed to incestual relationships, fish raining from the sky, speaking cats, spirits roaming through forests and lots and lots of blood (sucked dry from wrists and gushing from feline intestines, you know, so you get the general idea) - you'd think after all that, coming up with a reasonable (i.e. insane) solution would be easy.

My first inclination was to be lazy and find someone else's answers and appropriate them to my own understanding of the book; however, what I found was an array of forums full of questions (like my own), reviews of a "dreamlike", "mindbending","tour de force", and a really snazzy author site - (which a lot of Flashdoesn't detract from, but rather, enhances the experience...)

So, in short, I found no answers out there so I had to figure it out for myself.

Stop reading now if you haven't read Kafka on the Shore - because you may think I've lost my mind. Instead, scroll down for some LOLcats.

Otherwise... Here's my take:

There's undoubtedly questions set up by the plot - the biggest one being, what constitutes a character, which extends to, who is who really? Understanding the duality of the characters helps justify their actions.
Simply, drawing from Shintoism I presume, is that a character is made up of the body and the spirit - read through the lenses of literal "bodily" conventions versus the metaphorical "spiritual" conceptualizations.

I gather that the entrance stone, when opened, allows spirits to move between bodies - and when closed, "logically", does not permit this movement... this is why a couple of characters (Nakata and Miss Seiki) die when the entrance stone is closed. I presume this is because they are not "complete" - Nakata's spirit moves into Hoshino because he is too weak/sleeping to close the stone, and Miss Seiki's spirit is in the spirit world, and so her body must die. You must have both aspects of "your"self in the literal/bodily world when the stone is closed because the spirits can no longer enter the living/bodily world (outside the forest) to fill the empty bodies...(?)

In general, it's confusing as to who is who when certain actions take place. In the literal world (of the reader and the logic set up external to the novel), the body trumps the spirit. This is why we initially feel uncomfortable dealing with events that take place that break down our expectations (like for example, Kafka sleeping with his mother and sister).

When Kafka sleeps with Miss Saeki, it is Kafka sleeping with his mother - but only as interpreted by "literal" or "bodily"- otherwise his body is just reuniting with the spirit of his mother. So, since the novel is working on several levels - the literal and the dreamlike spirit level - our literal, reading-selves feel very uncomfortable while our imaginative selves can interpret this differently: Kafka Tamura wants bodily attachment to his real mother, and the spirit inside him (the boy on the shore) is morally justified in partaking in the sexual act (with 15 year old Miss Seiki) and Kafka Tamura is jutified in reuniting with his mother on a spiritual level.

I digress. I can't handle explaining this in full sentences. So...
A confusing chronology (by me):

1. Hillside scene - kids fall unconscious. Nakata (body and mind) loses all his memory - Miss Saeki (body and mind) has opened the entrance stone to reunite with her lover - Kafka (the boy she saw on the shore).

2. Miss Seiki loses her spirit and becomes a hollow person in this world, working at the library with Oshima.

3. The body of Kafka Tamura leaves his home in search of his own spirit - which he finds at the library in Takmatsura (in the room with 15year old Miss Saeki; in effect, the spirit of Kafka Tamura is really the living spirit of Miss Seiki's lover, whose body was killed in university).

3.a. At this point, the real spirit of Kafka Tamura leaves his body and goes into Nakata. This is why Nakata and Kafka Tamura are both drawn toward each other, on parallel paths that eventually converge - on a spirital level - when the entrance stone is closed and things are "set straight".

4. Miss Saeki's spirit remains as a 15 year old girl (and appears in the room, where the body of Kafka Tamura sleeps with her - in his "dream" world).

4a. As such, Kafka Tamua's spirit has left his body (and gone into Nakata's body) and has been replaced by the Kafka on the shore's spirit - so he sleeps with what his body thinks is his mother.

5. Kafka Tamura's father's spirit takes shape as a concept - Johnnie Walker (his father is empty, mean, a hollow body, which is why they don't get along).

5a. Nakata (Kafka T's spirit) murders the Johnnie Walker (the spirit of Kafka T's father).

5b. Kafka Tamura reclaims his living spirit in the world, retains memories and escapes spirit forest before closing of the entrance stone.

6. Nakata is seeking to close the entrance stone in order to free the spirit of Kafka Tamura inside him - at the expense of Miss Saeki's bodily life, as her spirit will have to remain forever in the spirit world, making her body die. (When the entrance stone is closed, no longer can your body live without a spirit)

6a. As such, Nakata's body dies since his spirit is Kafka Tamura's spirit - which returns to Kafka Tamura when his bodily self overcomes the spirit inside him -Kafka on the shore- so his body returns to the bodily world, leaving the 15yr old Miss Saeki in the forest and acting as a transporter of Kafka on the shore's spirit (back to the spirit world). His body leaves to reclaim his own spirit (from Nakata).

7. Nakata's spirit goes into Hoshino (speaks to cats) and uses Hoshino's body to close the entrance stone. (Note: Nakata's spirit leaves him when he is "weak" and sleeps for long periods of time to become the concept, Colonel Sanders who guides Hoshino to complete the closing of the entrance stone mission).

I hope that made sense. Let's try and simplify it again:
When the entrance stone is opened:
spirit body
Kafka Tamura ----> Nakata and back to Kafka
Nakata ---> Coloner Sanders/Hoshino
Kafka on shore (lover)---> Kafka Tamura/ left in spirit world
Miss Saeki ---> 15 year old self in spirit world
(returns for a while, sleeps w.Kafka and then returns to the spirit world to tell Kafka to go back, reclaim his spirit and remember her forever.)

When the entrance stone is closed:
Miss Seiki and her lover are together in the spirit world (both bodies dead)
Nakata is dead and remembered forever by Hoshino (his spirit survives in him?)
Kafka has reunited his spirit with his body.

Lastly, Oshima and Sakura.... I gather neither is Kafka's truly sister - it would be too obvious. I actually believe that Kafka doesn't sleep with his real sister - which is a way to show that he was not necessarily led down an 'Oedipal' path, but that his projections about what 'fate' is are misguided; in fact, fate comes from the willpower of the spirits (the thing that Hoshino "kills" - the willpower of the spirits is effectively forbidden entry into the bodily world so that things can be restored (set 'straight').

Oshima is probably just a character presenting to us the possibility of duality even within the bodily aspect of ourselves to furhter break down the boundaries of our expectations and expected understandings...

Haha.. and stop. (TOtal geek out.)

[05.19.2011: I noticed this page is getting a lot of hits via searches about the book. I welcome comments and would love a discussion if it's compelling. Don't be scared, people-I-don't-know!]